Every marketer knows there are certain selling seasons that cannot be ignored -- Halloween, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Christmas, Hanukah, Valentine's Day. However, they may not be aware that today's digital marketing should go beyond a one-size-fits-all approach, regardless of consumers' natural inclination to shop more at certain times of year. Marketers need to start going above and beyond offering deep discounts or clinging to catchy marketing messages.
With consumers spending more time and money online, marketers must prepare their digital marketing strategy to proactively target today's savvy shopper -- or risk losing prime revenue to the competition. This year, Channel Advisor's 2010 Consumer Shopping Habits survey found that more than 58 percent of consumers are very likely to purchase gifts online, as opposed to the 41 percent who choose to shop at brick-and-mortar stores.
According to comScore, consumers spent $29.1 billion online alone during the 2009 holiday shopping season, and eMarketer predicts that e-commerce spending will reach $51.4 billion by the fourth quarter of 2010. With numbers like these, the online opportunity -- both during holidays and off-season -- has nowhere to go but up. That said, driving online retail traffic is only the beginning: Marketers must step up their game and begin to truly engage customers by personalizing and tailoring the seasonal shopping experience.
What works
Improving web traffic via analytics and SEO methods has been digital marketers' focus for so long that most have pretty much mastered it. And while landing page optimization strategies are often given careful attention, content and design decisions are typically based on subjectivity. It's time to stop guessing and concentrate on what happens after visitors arrive. By neglecting the real tactics that convert browsers into buyers, marketers continue to miss out on tremendous revenue growth.
As consumers evolve, marketers attempt to improve website complexity and messaging -keeping it fresh and up-to-date. But sites that do not employ methods to truly remain dynamic are not equipped to optimally perform during seasonal holiday spending surges. Changing your content and adding new product offers isn't enough to drive double-digit revenue growth...
You'll need to go a few steps further:
1. Cater to your customers' mood. Create a seasonal site design to demonstrate your brand's holiday spirit. Display items most likely to sell during a particular season on your most popular website pages.
2.Target and recommend. Prominently display product offers, discounts and promotions targeted to match customers' needs. Make sure everything they may want to buy is easily located in a single virtual aisle.
3.Make it easy to buy. Thoroughly A/B test and improve important forms. If the registration, login, or checkout processes are too cumbersome, shoppers will simply give up at the point-of-purchase.
4.Use live multivariate testing and iterative tweaking to drive higher conversion rates. Subtle changes such as font size, color, and copy can have a huge impact on revenues. Test different variations to see what yields the best results based on your live visitors' interactions.
5.Monitor and learn from customer behavior. A one-size-fits-all website doesn't deliver the best brand experience. Improve behavioral targeting to deliver a better online experience by offering page layouts, product recommendations, sequences, content, and offers that have been dynamically selected based on users' demonstrated preferences.
6.Make navigation effortless. Shoppers won't fill their shopping carts or click anywhere near the checkout line if they are bounced around a poorly designed website. Go back to the basics: Make it easy for customers to find their way around by including a search facility; make the checkout page prominent; and avoid zeroing out filled-in forms every time they change pages.
7.Make it personal. Go beyond the standard "people who bought this, also bought this" suggestions by using website personalization. Product suggestions and wish list options that are relevant based on the individual shopper's site activity will vastly improve revenues.
Make every season a success
All the time and money spent on search, SEO, advertising, and landing page optimization will be wasted if true optimization strategies aren't put into place. Solutions such as multivariate testing, website personalization, and behavioral targeting make marketers' job easier every day -- they also automatically improve the digital experience with fluctuations and changes in seasonal spending and customers' shopping moods. Ensure every seasonal shopping experience with your website is a happy one, for each and every individual user, and never miss your revenue mark again.
Showing posts with label online branding. Show all posts
Showing posts with label online branding. Show all posts
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Tuesday, June 08, 2010
Creating Lifelong Subscribers Through Email Marketing
You Guys Met Online. It started with a visit to your site, and there was an immediate attraction. Maybe-Maybe not. Are you making it easy to be “introduced” to potential subscribers? It’s essential to make it “easy” to sign up. Whether it’s through your corporate website or promoted through your social media outlets, keep the following rules in mind when considering your introduction tactics:
Think Sex Appeal
Okay, not really, but do think about appealing to your subscriber. How does the term “Subscribe” compare to the term “Sign up”. It may be a small component of your registration process, but it’s an important one because it’s the first call to action. Consider all of the elements of your subscriber process and identify elements that may be less than appealing and may cause fallout. Don’t Be Afraid of a Little Self Promotion.
Reinforcing the benefits of your email marketing program is critical to increasing opt-ins. It also serves a great purpose of setting expectations. Regardless of whether it’s content or frequency that you are promoting, it helps give the subscriber a clear description of what to expect and helps them make an informed decision.
The reality is that your subscriber relationship is very similar to any relationship. It starts with a date, doubts can occur, breakups may happen, or lifelong partnerships are made. As a marketer, these steps are all part of the lifecycle so it’s important to be able to identify the phases and read the cues of your subscriber relationship. This paper will outline the elements of a strategic email marketing program that takes the subscriber from introduction to a lifelong relationship.
Be Careful of Coming Off Too Eager
Many subscribers are willing to subscribe in return for something that is valuable to them. You can consider different offers for signing up. The offer may include free shipping, dollars off, content offer, “exclusive” opportunity, or a percentage discount. Be careful, though. Often times a contact that has been incentivized through an offer is less likely to be retained. You will have to work that much harder at making it a lifelong relationship.
Think About How You Make Connections
It’s critical to be where your possible subscribers are. Just like when you are in your twenties trying out the various social scenes looking to make a long lasting connection , so should you try out the various channels that your “would be subscribers” are hanging out. If you haven’t leveraged social media to promote your opt-in you should consider it. Including a permanent spot on your Facebook page is a good start, or tweeting about it every so often will spread your reach. Don’t forget the more traditional paths such as SEO/SEM as well.
These are just a few ways that you can raise your game in facilitating matchups. The challenge as well as the opportunity lies in finding ways to be creative, get yourself out there, and get those opt-ins.
The First Date
Oh, the nervousness of the first date. You guys are introduced, you feel a connection, there’s a “how do we get to know one another better?” moment, and then there’s magic…or there’s a disconnect. This can also be true of your subscriber’s first experience with your email campaign. If expectations weren’t set or there wasn’t reinforcement of those expectations, it may end in your subscriber feeling as though you aren’t really in tune with their needs. Subscribers should receive a welcome message immediately following their opt-in to your email marketing program.
This welcome message is the first date. It tells whether or not you guys are going to last or if this relationship will fizzle fast. A well-crafted welcome message not only reinforces the benefits of subscribing, but it also puts content and frequency in the hands of the subscriber. If you aren’t allowing your subscribers the opportunity to choose what content is relevant to them, how often they would like to receive it, or what types of campaigns they would like to receive, then you are doing your email marketing program a disservice. If you want to create compelling campaigns that speak to your subscriber and drive relevancy, start with letting them do some of the talking. Let them tell you what piques their interest and use that data to create customized experiences unique to them. It will definitely get them intrigued to see what’s next.
The Blind Date
A blind date is awkward at best. You have friends that match you up because they think you would be PERFECT for each other, just to find out that you have nothing in common. You stumble through the evening and both hope that it will end sooner rather than later. Now let’s talk about buying a contact list. The reason we use “subscriber” throughout this whitepaper is because the fact remains that someone who subscribes or opts-in to your email marketing program is much more likely to:
Achieve Higher Subscriber Retention Rates
According to a report by Forrester Research titled “Email Marketing Needs Permission”, opt-in lists retained 49% of their subscribers while those that didn’t utilize opt-in lists only retained 28% of their subscribers.
Engage More Valuable Prospects and Customers
Those that are willing to opt-in to receive your messages are also going to be more willing to provide additional data, such as preferences, allowing you to create more relevant campaigns.
More Profitable (higher conversion rates)
It’s inevitable; someone who requested to receive content from you is much more likely to open, read, and convert. Remember to use the data that you have collected to ensure that the message is timely and meets the needs of the customer. In other words, deliver what you promised at registration.
Reinforce Reputation
The worst mistake we as marketers can make is to assume that what we have to offer is what the subscriber really wants. Making the assumption that a person wants to receive your message without their explicit opt-in can hurt your campaign performance as well as your brand reputation. Put the choice in the hands of the contact and you build a relationship that will last from opt-in to win-back.
“We’re Dating”
You’ve announced it to everyone, you guys are officially dating, which also means you’re “off the market” for others. Now if this were only true for our marketing programs. Once you get through the “get to know you” stage and start relating to your audience with relevant content that converts, you can create a real brand advocate. How do you do this? We’d love to say it’s easy, but as in any relationship, it takes work.
Don’t Treat Every Date the Same
A “one size fits all” message approach will not retain your subscriber. You need to segment and craft campaigns that are compelling. The possibilities are endless as to how you segment: purchase behavior, website history, demographic data, and preferences are just a few ways to target your audience. Ultimately the key is to begin to think of each subscriber as unique, instead of thinking of them as one whole sum. Your subscribers will thank you and the return will be well worth it.
Be Responsive
Nothing can be more relevant than an email campaign that responds to the lifecycle of your subscriber. Whether it’s a transactional message triggered from a purchase, or a win-back message triggered after 60 days of inactivity, creating campaigns that respond to activity or inactivity are highly targeted and keep the subscriber engaged. Allow Communication to Happen. It’s easy to get into a push mode. Push campaign after campaign without eliciting a response from your subscriber. In today’s social environment, you must be willing to give your subscriber a voice. Whether it’s through user reviews, polls, or video, giving your subscriber a voice builds trust and brand loyalty, not to mention it adds credibility to your product or services.
Stop Smothering Me
It happens to the best of us. We get over-eager. We stop thinking about the needs of our subscriber, and begin only thinking of our needs. There are warning signs, but we always seem surprised when we are faced with our subscriber saying “no more” or even less appealing, marking our campaigns as SPAM. Why does this happen? Easy. We aren’t relevant to our subscriber any longer. This action can happen from one event or a series of events. Regardless, it’s important to keep in mind not to over-do it. Just like your constant texts can annoy your significant other, so can over-sending annoy your subscriber. Set frequency caps. Also make certain that every message that you are sending out is truly relevant to your subscriber.
Don’t send for the sake of sending.
Marital Bliss
Creating a lifelong subscriber is hard, but the payoff is huge if you are willing to make the commitment. As in any long-term relationship, there will be bumps in the road. Win-back campaigns are a must, just as flowers are after a big fight. Here are just a few ways to keep the dialogue fresh and the relationship alive. The Power of Exclusive.
Exclusive can go a long way in your subscriber relationship. Exclusive offers, content, and previews are just a few ways that you can make your subscriber feel special and distinguish them from the rest of the crowd.Keep it Fresh.
The key to a lasting relationship is to not let the romance fizzle. This too can be said of your email marketing program. Prevent your campaigns from running on auto-pilot and always consider ways to optimize. Testing is a viable component of email marketing that other marketing channels don’t have the advantage of incorporating. Consider subject lines, offers, time of send, or call-to-actions as a start. It’s just good practice to not ever feel like your relationship is good as is. There’s always room for improvement.
Build Loyalty
A brand advocate can do more for your business than you realize. Create a subscriber loyalty program that allows them to reap the incentives of tweeting out your email promotion or making purchases. Showing appreciation for the subscriber relationship is an underutilized tactic in many email marketing programs.
Win-Back Their Love
Before they hit that unsubscribe button, be cognizant of how the subscriber is engaging with your email marketing program. Make every effort to win them back before they disengage completely. Create a trigger-based campaign with an “I must stay committed to this brand” offer that sends to your inactive contacts after 30-60 days. Try to win them back before they have already said goodbye. At the end of the day, creating a lifelong subscriber should be a priority for your email marketing program. Reducing churn and increasing loyalty positively impacts your bottom line. Not to mention, it can create real brand advocates. Deliver the right message to the right audience at the right time and reap the benefits of a lifelong subscriber.
Think Sex Appeal
Okay, not really, but do think about appealing to your subscriber. How does the term “Subscribe” compare to the term “Sign up”. It may be a small component of your registration process, but it’s an important one because it’s the first call to action. Consider all of the elements of your subscriber process and identify elements that may be less than appealing and may cause fallout. Don’t Be Afraid of a Little Self Promotion.
Reinforcing the benefits of your email marketing program is critical to increasing opt-ins. It also serves a great purpose of setting expectations. Regardless of whether it’s content or frequency that you are promoting, it helps give the subscriber a clear description of what to expect and helps them make an informed decision.
The reality is that your subscriber relationship is very similar to any relationship. It starts with a date, doubts can occur, breakups may happen, or lifelong partnerships are made. As a marketer, these steps are all part of the lifecycle so it’s important to be able to identify the phases and read the cues of your subscriber relationship. This paper will outline the elements of a strategic email marketing program that takes the subscriber from introduction to a lifelong relationship.
Be Careful of Coming Off Too Eager
Many subscribers are willing to subscribe in return for something that is valuable to them. You can consider different offers for signing up. The offer may include free shipping, dollars off, content offer, “exclusive” opportunity, or a percentage discount. Be careful, though. Often times a contact that has been incentivized through an offer is less likely to be retained. You will have to work that much harder at making it a lifelong relationship.
Think About How You Make Connections
It’s critical to be where your possible subscribers are. Just like when you are in your twenties trying out the various social scenes looking to make a long lasting connection , so should you try out the various channels that your “would be subscribers” are hanging out. If you haven’t leveraged social media to promote your opt-in you should consider it. Including a permanent spot on your Facebook page is a good start, or tweeting about it every so often will spread your reach. Don’t forget the more traditional paths such as SEO/SEM as well.
These are just a few ways that you can raise your game in facilitating matchups. The challenge as well as the opportunity lies in finding ways to be creative, get yourself out there, and get those opt-ins.
The First Date
Oh, the nervousness of the first date. You guys are introduced, you feel a connection, there’s a “how do we get to know one another better?” moment, and then there’s magic…or there’s a disconnect. This can also be true of your subscriber’s first experience with your email campaign. If expectations weren’t set or there wasn’t reinforcement of those expectations, it may end in your subscriber feeling as though you aren’t really in tune with their needs. Subscribers should receive a welcome message immediately following their opt-in to your email marketing program.
This welcome message is the first date. It tells whether or not you guys are going to last or if this relationship will fizzle fast. A well-crafted welcome message not only reinforces the benefits of subscribing, but it also puts content and frequency in the hands of the subscriber. If you aren’t allowing your subscribers the opportunity to choose what content is relevant to them, how often they would like to receive it, or what types of campaigns they would like to receive, then you are doing your email marketing program a disservice. If you want to create compelling campaigns that speak to your subscriber and drive relevancy, start with letting them do some of the talking. Let them tell you what piques their interest and use that data to create customized experiences unique to them. It will definitely get them intrigued to see what’s next.
The Blind Date
A blind date is awkward at best. You have friends that match you up because they think you would be PERFECT for each other, just to find out that you have nothing in common. You stumble through the evening and both hope that it will end sooner rather than later. Now let’s talk about buying a contact list. The reason we use “subscriber” throughout this whitepaper is because the fact remains that someone who subscribes or opts-in to your email marketing program is much more likely to:
Achieve Higher Subscriber Retention Rates
According to a report by Forrester Research titled “Email Marketing Needs Permission”, opt-in lists retained 49% of their subscribers while those that didn’t utilize opt-in lists only retained 28% of their subscribers.
Engage More Valuable Prospects and Customers
Those that are willing to opt-in to receive your messages are also going to be more willing to provide additional data, such as preferences, allowing you to create more relevant campaigns.
More Profitable (higher conversion rates)
It’s inevitable; someone who requested to receive content from you is much more likely to open, read, and convert. Remember to use the data that you have collected to ensure that the message is timely and meets the needs of the customer. In other words, deliver what you promised at registration.
Reinforce Reputation
The worst mistake we as marketers can make is to assume that what we have to offer is what the subscriber really wants. Making the assumption that a person wants to receive your message without their explicit opt-in can hurt your campaign performance as well as your brand reputation. Put the choice in the hands of the contact and you build a relationship that will last from opt-in to win-back.
“We’re Dating”
You’ve announced it to everyone, you guys are officially dating, which also means you’re “off the market” for others. Now if this were only true for our marketing programs. Once you get through the “get to know you” stage and start relating to your audience with relevant content that converts, you can create a real brand advocate. How do you do this? We’d love to say it’s easy, but as in any relationship, it takes work.
Don’t Treat Every Date the Same
A “one size fits all” message approach will not retain your subscriber. You need to segment and craft campaigns that are compelling. The possibilities are endless as to how you segment: purchase behavior, website history, demographic data, and preferences are just a few ways to target your audience. Ultimately the key is to begin to think of each subscriber as unique, instead of thinking of them as one whole sum. Your subscribers will thank you and the return will be well worth it.
Be Responsive
Nothing can be more relevant than an email campaign that responds to the lifecycle of your subscriber. Whether it’s a transactional message triggered from a purchase, or a win-back message triggered after 60 days of inactivity, creating campaigns that respond to activity or inactivity are highly targeted and keep the subscriber engaged. Allow Communication to Happen. It’s easy to get into a push mode. Push campaign after campaign without eliciting a response from your subscriber. In today’s social environment, you must be willing to give your subscriber a voice. Whether it’s through user reviews, polls, or video, giving your subscriber a voice builds trust and brand loyalty, not to mention it adds credibility to your product or services.
Stop Smothering Me
It happens to the best of us. We get over-eager. We stop thinking about the needs of our subscriber, and begin only thinking of our needs. There are warning signs, but we always seem surprised when we are faced with our subscriber saying “no more” or even less appealing, marking our campaigns as SPAM. Why does this happen? Easy. We aren’t relevant to our subscriber any longer. This action can happen from one event or a series of events. Regardless, it’s important to keep in mind not to over-do it. Just like your constant texts can annoy your significant other, so can over-sending annoy your subscriber. Set frequency caps. Also make certain that every message that you are sending out is truly relevant to your subscriber.
Don’t send for the sake of sending.
Marital Bliss
Creating a lifelong subscriber is hard, but the payoff is huge if you are willing to make the commitment. As in any long-term relationship, there will be bumps in the road. Win-back campaigns are a must, just as flowers are after a big fight. Here are just a few ways to keep the dialogue fresh and the relationship alive. The Power of Exclusive.
Exclusive can go a long way in your subscriber relationship. Exclusive offers, content, and previews are just a few ways that you can make your subscriber feel special and distinguish them from the rest of the crowd.Keep it Fresh.
The key to a lasting relationship is to not let the romance fizzle. This too can be said of your email marketing program. Prevent your campaigns from running on auto-pilot and always consider ways to optimize. Testing is a viable component of email marketing that other marketing channels don’t have the advantage of incorporating. Consider subject lines, offers, time of send, or call-to-actions as a start. It’s just good practice to not ever feel like your relationship is good as is. There’s always room for improvement.
Build Loyalty
A brand advocate can do more for your business than you realize. Create a subscriber loyalty program that allows them to reap the incentives of tweeting out your email promotion or making purchases. Showing appreciation for the subscriber relationship is an underutilized tactic in many email marketing programs.
Win-Back Their Love
Before they hit that unsubscribe button, be cognizant of how the subscriber is engaging with your email marketing program. Make every effort to win them back before they disengage completely. Create a trigger-based campaign with an “I must stay committed to this brand” offer that sends to your inactive contacts after 30-60 days. Try to win them back before they have already said goodbye. At the end of the day, creating a lifelong subscriber should be a priority for your email marketing program. Reducing churn and increasing loyalty positively impacts your bottom line. Not to mention, it can create real brand advocates. Deliver the right message to the right audience at the right time and reap the benefits of a lifelong subscriber.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Online Newspaper Advertising - Latin America
Online newspapers are the essential link for people to stay connected to information, news and their home countries.
When they read the news directly from online newspapers such as La Prensa from Panama or La Republica from Costa Rica, they are receiving un-biased news and information directly from their country. Readers review their local news covering subjects from politics to the latest gossip from their countries' entertainment. Now the technological enhancements of the internet makes reading online newspapers easier than ever!
I stumbled upon an article by Mort Goldstrom about the reasons why to advertise in online newspapers. I think this very much applies to Latin America and reinforces why it is so important for advertisers to include this in their online marketing mix. I hope sharing this with you increases your knowledge and helps you understand more in depth how the online newspaper opportunities can really work for your clients.
10 Reasons to Advertise on a Newspaper Website
Frequency- The online newspaper Web site user spends more than twice as many hours online than the general user. Online newspaper users are three times as likely as general 'Net users to be online during the workday when out of reach of other media - 8-11 a.m. is a new "primetime" for media consumption (Source: "Power Users," 2006, MORI Research)
Credibility- Branded content brings a higher quality audience. A study from the Online Publishers Association (OPA) showed that OPA audiences were more likely to buy products and services in a number of key categories, including automotive, entertainment, financial, home, travel and business to business.
Targeted- If you want to focus on a particular backyard, advertising in an online newspaper is more personal and more relevant because it is local. Newspapers also publish a plethora of niche sites (youth, women, movie fans, Hispanics, are illustrative) for virtually any demographic advertisers could possibly hope to reach. - "Newspapers know more than ever about their web audience because of online registration programs and audience segmentation software"]
Purchasing Power- Eighty-nine percent of newspaper Web site users purchase online compared with 56 percent of general users. Forty percent of online newspaper users have incomes higher than $75,000; 69 percent own their homes. Eighteen percent of online newspaper users have spent more than $2,000 online in the last six months.
Content- Excluding e-mail the most popular online activities and content categories include national and local news, sports, financial information and entertainment news and things to do. [Shopping, cited in the original, is lower on the list.] Fifty-four percent of general Internet users visit online newspapers for local news, compared with 40 percent for the local TV station Web site and 20 percent for the local radio station site. ["Power Users," 2006, MORI Research]
Advertisers Believe in Newspaper Sites- Online newspapers have enjoyed eleven consecutive quarters of double digit increases for advertising since NAA started reporting online ad spending in 2004.
High Profile- Online newspapers generate very large gains in Online Ad Awareness among C-level and other higher management job holders: C-level managers showed a 23 percent increase in Aided Brand Awareness, VP/director-level managers showed a 38 percent increase and other management showed a 37 percent increase following their exposure to an ad campaign in online newspapers (across all industries.) When the brand metric shifts to Message Association, C-level execs showed the largest increase in lift after exposure to campaigns on online newspapers, at 88 percent. No management category showed less than a 51 percent increase. (Dynamic Logic's MarketNorms database, 2006)
Reinforcement- Fifty-six percent of online newspaper users also read the newspaper in the past five days, and repetition increases awareness.
Cutting Edge- Newspaper Web site users are more likely (by almost twenty percent to own some kind of portable electronic device. They are also more interested in receiving advertising and product offers through those devices. Forty percent of online newspaper users are aged 18 to 34. [Source: "Power Users," 2006, MORI Research]
Mix- A variety of recent studies have demonstrated the power of online, when included in a mix with traditional media, to elaborate the brand message. Newspaper, print, and online products combined have the highest penetration and most desirable audience of any other local medium.
When they read the news directly from online newspapers such as La Prensa from Panama or La Republica from Costa Rica, they are receiving un-biased news and information directly from their country. Readers review their local news covering subjects from politics to the latest gossip from their countries' entertainment. Now the technological enhancements of the internet makes reading online newspapers easier than ever!
I stumbled upon an article by Mort Goldstrom about the reasons why to advertise in online newspapers. I think this very much applies to Latin America and reinforces why it is so important for advertisers to include this in their online marketing mix. I hope sharing this with you increases your knowledge and helps you understand more in depth how the online newspaper opportunities can really work for your clients.
10 Reasons to Advertise on a Newspaper Website
Frequency- The online newspaper Web site user spends more than twice as many hours online than the general user. Online newspaper users are three times as likely as general 'Net users to be online during the workday when out of reach of other media - 8-11 a.m. is a new "primetime" for media consumption (Source: "Power Users," 2006, MORI Research)
Credibility- Branded content brings a higher quality audience. A study from the Online Publishers Association (OPA) showed that OPA audiences were more likely to buy products and services in a number of key categories, including automotive, entertainment, financial, home, travel and business to business.
Targeted- If you want to focus on a particular backyard, advertising in an online newspaper is more personal and more relevant because it is local. Newspapers also publish a plethora of niche sites (youth, women, movie fans, Hispanics, are illustrative) for virtually any demographic advertisers could possibly hope to reach. - "Newspapers know more than ever about their web audience because of online registration programs and audience segmentation software"]
Purchasing Power- Eighty-nine percent of newspaper Web site users purchase online compared with 56 percent of general users. Forty percent of online newspaper users have incomes higher than $75,000; 69 percent own their homes. Eighteen percent of online newspaper users have spent more than $2,000 online in the last six months.
Content- Excluding e-mail the most popular online activities and content categories include national and local news, sports, financial information and entertainment news and things to do. [Shopping, cited in the original, is lower on the list.] Fifty-four percent of general Internet users visit online newspapers for local news, compared with 40 percent for the local TV station Web site and 20 percent for the local radio station site. ["Power Users," 2006, MORI Research]
Advertisers Believe in Newspaper Sites- Online newspapers have enjoyed eleven consecutive quarters of double digit increases for advertising since NAA started reporting online ad spending in 2004.
High Profile- Online newspapers generate very large gains in Online Ad Awareness among C-level and other higher management job holders: C-level managers showed a 23 percent increase in Aided Brand Awareness, VP/director-level managers showed a 38 percent increase and other management showed a 37 percent increase following their exposure to an ad campaign in online newspapers (across all industries.) When the brand metric shifts to Message Association, C-level execs showed the largest increase in lift after exposure to campaigns on online newspapers, at 88 percent. No management category showed less than a 51 percent increase. (Dynamic Logic's MarketNorms database, 2006)
Reinforcement- Fifty-six percent of online newspaper users also read the newspaper in the past five days, and repetition increases awareness.
Cutting Edge- Newspaper Web site users are more likely (by almost twenty percent to own some kind of portable electronic device. They are also more interested in receiving advertising and product offers through those devices. Forty percent of online newspaper users are aged 18 to 34. [Source: "Power Users," 2006, MORI Research]
Mix- A variety of recent studies have demonstrated the power of online, when included in a mix with traditional media, to elaborate the brand message. Newspaper, print, and online products combined have the highest penetration and most desirable audience of any other local medium.
Friday, September 11, 2009
Optimizing Your Facebook Initiatives
Traditional search marketing holds that there are two ways to get search engine traffic. The first is to pay for it via pay-per-click advertising, and the second is to earn the traffic with optimal search engine placement. In the earned search marketing business of search engine optimization (SEO), a Facebook fan page is merely a web page, just like any other, except that it has the built-in benefit of residing on a very powerful domain. The same goes for YouTube, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Smart optimization, combined with the strong domains that house them, can propel your social media pages to the top of search engine results for relevant searches.
With that in mind, here are tips for optimizing your Facebook initiatives, as well as some brands that are getting it right.
Facebook
Quick tips for optimization:
Provide regular updates. Like most social media, a Facebook page is only as good as the content available for fans to interact with. Generally speaking, the more digital assets (videos, photos, etc.) the better. Provide regular updates (at least daily and preferably more, though this will depend on your niche) that encourage user participation. Respond to user feedback. To keep from falling behind, consider creating a calendar of updates at the beginning of each week or month.
Choose a good name for the page. The name of your Facebook page is arguably the most important early decision you will make because this is the very first thing the search engines will see when they visit your page. At the very least, you should include the name of the business. You might also include targeted keywords if appropriate.
Choose a good username. A username allows you to have a "clean" URL. For example, if you choose "dwaynejohnsonrocks" as your username, your page URL will be "www.facebook.com/dwaynejohnsonrocks." These URLs look nicer on business cards and letterhead, and they are easier to remember.
Vanity URLs, as they are called, also provide an opportunity for further optimization with your business name or a selected keyword. Given the choice between the two, the business name will be more appropriate in most cases.
Take advantage of the "about" box. The "about" box is a great place to include relevant content and keyword-rich descriptions. This is one of the only places on a page's "wall" that allows for fully customized copy to be written. Many pages use this space to simply provide a link back to the corporate website or place their tagline, but it is an ideal place to help the search engines understand more about your page.
Customize your page. Facebook allows for a moderate amount of customization. You can't change backgrounds or otherwise skin the page, but you can completely customize other things. For example, you have a large degree of control over how your tabs appear. In addition to adding unique content inside "boxes," you can frame a page hosted elsewhere, which allows for full control over the look and feel of that particular tab (within the confines of the Facebook page that surrounds it, of course).
A customized page immediately communicates credibility to the user and also shows a commitment to your brand's involvement with not only Facebook but also social media as a whole.
Who did it great
Threadless
The online T-shirt company Threadless has been active in social media since its inception. Its business model of printing user-submitted and user-voted designs requires an environment that encourages feedback and user interaction.
With that in mind, here are tips for optimizing your Facebook initiatives, as well as some brands that are getting it right.
Quick tips for optimization:
Provide regular updates. Like most social media, a Facebook page is only as good as the content available for fans to interact with. Generally speaking, the more digital assets (videos, photos, etc.) the better. Provide regular updates (at least daily and preferably more, though this will depend on your niche) that encourage user participation. Respond to user feedback. To keep from falling behind, consider creating a calendar of updates at the beginning of each week or month.
Choose a good name for the page. The name of your Facebook page is arguably the most important early decision you will make because this is the very first thing the search engines will see when they visit your page. At the very least, you should include the name of the business. You might also include targeted keywords if appropriate.
Choose a good username. A username allows you to have a "clean" URL. For example, if you choose "dwaynejohnsonrocks" as your username, your page URL will be "www.facebook.com/dwaynejohnsonrocks." These URLs look nicer on business cards and letterhead, and they are easier to remember.
Vanity URLs, as they are called, also provide an opportunity for further optimization with your business name or a selected keyword. Given the choice between the two, the business name will be more appropriate in most cases.
Take advantage of the "about" box. The "about" box is a great place to include relevant content and keyword-rich descriptions. This is one of the only places on a page's "wall" that allows for fully customized copy to be written. Many pages use this space to simply provide a link back to the corporate website or place their tagline, but it is an ideal place to help the search engines understand more about your page.
Customize your page. Facebook allows for a moderate amount of customization. You can't change backgrounds or otherwise skin the page, but you can completely customize other things. For example, you have a large degree of control over how your tabs appear. In addition to adding unique content inside "boxes," you can frame a page hosted elsewhere, which allows for full control over the look and feel of that particular tab (within the confines of the Facebook page that surrounds it, of course).
A customized page immediately communicates credibility to the user and also shows a commitment to your brand's involvement with not only Facebook but also social media as a whole.
Who did it great
Threadless
The online T-shirt company Threadless has been active in social media since its inception. Its business model of printing user-submitted and user-voted designs requires an environment that encourages feedback and user interaction.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Making A Brand Relevant In Social Media
There are two components to advertising in the broader sense. One is the content that you manufacture, and the second is the channel and method you use to distribute that content. My sense is that the issue here is one of distribution and manufacture. So from a manufacturing point of view, the messaging that sums up the message of brands and even creates them is in a state of very, very rapid evolution. It's in a state of evolution in a number of dimensions -- in terms of the duration of messages, the formats of messages, and everything that goes with that. The world is not doing badly in terms of involving that manufacture. So that's a good thing. And the good thing for the agency business and the creative community, if you like, is that there has never been a bigger demand for more granular messaging to go in different formats.
The purpose of brand communication -- pretty much above everything else -- is to create social relevance for brands. What social relevance means is having a substantial cohort of the population, or certainly a big enough cohort of the population that justifies the cost of whatever it is you were planning to do in the first place -- that knows what the brand is, like it, feel it's relevant, and that is suitably exposed to it. That's what social relevance is. You still need to do that. So the question is: Has the bar for social relevance gone up? Yes, it has, and so the way you do that is to create a platform of some description, and you build social relevance around that platform.
Where can digital fill in the holes that traditional often leaves behind or completely ignores?
Digital fills holes in a couple of ways. The first thing it does is it helps by replacing the reach that's lost by the somewhat diminished use of other channels. But what digital really does is break the relationship between cost and duration. One of the reasons why the structure of the market was positioned the way it was in the old world is because it was limited either by the number of pages the magazine publisher could use to print and distribute and carry around on trucks, or the amount of spectrum that was owned by a broadcaster, and so forth. So the industry was capped before. When you think about advertising, think about it in two ways. Part of it simply pushes visibility into the market, and another part is much more directional. And what that direction is doing is taking people from a fairly superficial form of contact into the opportunity to engage much more deeply with that content.
The purpose of brand communication -- pretty much above everything else -- is to create social relevance for brands. What social relevance means is having a substantial cohort of the population, or certainly a big enough cohort of the population that justifies the cost of whatever it is you were planning to do in the first place -- that knows what the brand is, like it, feel it's relevant, and that is suitably exposed to it. That's what social relevance is. You still need to do that. So the question is: Has the bar for social relevance gone up? Yes, it has, and so the way you do that is to create a platform of some description, and you build social relevance around that platform.
Where can digital fill in the holes that traditional often leaves behind or completely ignores?
Digital fills holes in a couple of ways. The first thing it does is it helps by replacing the reach that's lost by the somewhat diminished use of other channels. But what digital really does is break the relationship between cost and duration. One of the reasons why the structure of the market was positioned the way it was in the old world is because it was limited either by the number of pages the magazine publisher could use to print and distribute and carry around on trucks, or the amount of spectrum that was owned by a broadcaster, and so forth. So the industry was capped before. When you think about advertising, think about it in two ways. Part of it simply pushes visibility into the market, and another part is much more directional. And what that direction is doing is taking people from a fairly superficial form of contact into the opportunity to engage much more deeply with that content.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
U.S. Hispanics Repesent 10% of the Online Market
True to its reputation as a "melting pot," the U.S. boasts an increasingly large Hispanic population -- the implications of which, when it comes to advertising, go far beyond a language barrier. A recent report from Pew Hispanic Center stated that U.S. Hispanics have represented more than half of U.S. population growth since 2000.
Marketers may have been tempted in the past to ignore this group -- or, at the least, did little to tailor messaging to it -- but it is no longer financially wise to do so. According to a 2008 comScore survey on U.S Hispanics online, 5 percent of U.S. born and 17 percent of foreign-born Hispanics said they pay more attention to online video ads than TV spots, and 17 percent and 26 percent, respectively, find them more engaging than TV ads. The same survey also states that 13 percent of U.S. born and 22 percent of foreign-born Hispanics said they are more likely to respond to ads targeted to Hispanics.
The comparison of TV and online advertising as it relates to response rates should be viewed in context of the language barrier. In the U.S., there are television networks such as Univision, which are broadcast in Spanish and include direct cultural relevance to Hispanic audiences. These types of channels are certainly not the only ones that Spanish-speaking audiences may view, but they are a specific destination on television where they know they can see programming in their language. Similarly, the internet is a much vaster marketplace, but those same types of destinations exist, even though Spanish-language sites are not the only ones viewed by Hispanic audiences.
As more ad dollars shift to this growing segment of the U.S. population, those destinations will become in-demand (i.e., expensive) online inventory for marketers. So how do you reach out to other cultures in an effective and cost-efficient way?
Behavioral targeting can help marketers reach across the cultural divide, helping to identify Hispanic online audiences, or any other ethnic group for that matter, and deliver messaging that is relevant to not only their language, but also their overall culture. It can also expand the inventory marketers use to reach Hispanic audiences.
Behavioral targeting is used to create Hispanic audience segments first based on users who have visited Spanish-language sites or any sites with Hispanic-relevant content. You can then create sub-segments based on not only ethnicity, culture, or language, but also interests and purchase intent behaviors observed on those or other sites. You can even identify "purchase influencers" among U.S. Hispanic populations, based on browsing and buying behaviors plus geographic location. You may then serve culturally relevant marketing messages to these segments when they travel to any other site online.
You will also find re-targeting useful, once you have begun to build these behavioral segments. As you serve ads to your Hispanic audiences and sub-segments, you can then re-target them across whichever network or sites you choose, with upsell, cross-sell, or discount offers. As a marketer, make sure you're making the most out of these types of programs by using bilingual creative, or messages in Spanish, with themes and designs that will resonate with a Hispanic audience.
Finally, ensure that you are integrating your marketing into these segments with your other media programs. With your search program, you can strengthen your segments by layering your behavioral data with your search data. Behavioral profiles that have been tagged as part of a Hispanic audience or sub-segment can be given a boost by search data including Spanish-language or Hispanic content keywords or search engines that have been set to Spanish.
Consumer education is a challenge no matter what language you're speaking or audience you're trying to reach. If you decide to embark on a Hispanic-focused BT campaign, ensure that your privacy policies are clearly communicated in both languages on your site, as well as any type of opt-out or opt-in functions you provide.
According to SMG Multicultural CEO Monica Gadsby, 19.5 million U.S. Hispanics are online, 70 percent of Hispanic women are online, and Hispanics make up 10 percent of all online users. This might be a significant portion of your potential customer pool, and reaching out to them can be just as easy as reaching out to any audience segments, with a few process and creative changes. Based on its ability to accurately segment audiences, behavioral targeting is by far the most efficient way to market to the Hispanic population. And remember, these same principles can be applied to any cultural group that you want to reach out to in the country.
Marketers may have been tempted in the past to ignore this group -- or, at the least, did little to tailor messaging to it -- but it is no longer financially wise to do so. According to a 2008 comScore survey on U.S Hispanics online, 5 percent of U.S. born and 17 percent of foreign-born Hispanics said they pay more attention to online video ads than TV spots, and 17 percent and 26 percent, respectively, find them more engaging than TV ads. The same survey also states that 13 percent of U.S. born and 22 percent of foreign-born Hispanics said they are more likely to respond to ads targeted to Hispanics.
The comparison of TV and online advertising as it relates to response rates should be viewed in context of the language barrier. In the U.S., there are television networks such as Univision, which are broadcast in Spanish and include direct cultural relevance to Hispanic audiences. These types of channels are certainly not the only ones that Spanish-speaking audiences may view, but they are a specific destination on television where they know they can see programming in their language. Similarly, the internet is a much vaster marketplace, but those same types of destinations exist, even though Spanish-language sites are not the only ones viewed by Hispanic audiences.
As more ad dollars shift to this growing segment of the U.S. population, those destinations will become in-demand (i.e., expensive) online inventory for marketers. So how do you reach out to other cultures in an effective and cost-efficient way?
Behavioral targeting can help marketers reach across the cultural divide, helping to identify Hispanic online audiences, or any other ethnic group for that matter, and deliver messaging that is relevant to not only their language, but also their overall culture. It can also expand the inventory marketers use to reach Hispanic audiences.
Behavioral targeting is used to create Hispanic audience segments first based on users who have visited Spanish-language sites or any sites with Hispanic-relevant content. You can then create sub-segments based on not only ethnicity, culture, or language, but also interests and purchase intent behaviors observed on those or other sites. You can even identify "purchase influencers" among U.S. Hispanic populations, based on browsing and buying behaviors plus geographic location. You may then serve culturally relevant marketing messages to these segments when they travel to any other site online.
You will also find re-targeting useful, once you have begun to build these behavioral segments. As you serve ads to your Hispanic audiences and sub-segments, you can then re-target them across whichever network or sites you choose, with upsell, cross-sell, or discount offers. As a marketer, make sure you're making the most out of these types of programs by using bilingual creative, or messages in Spanish, with themes and designs that will resonate with a Hispanic audience.
Finally, ensure that you are integrating your marketing into these segments with your other media programs. With your search program, you can strengthen your segments by layering your behavioral data with your search data. Behavioral profiles that have been tagged as part of a Hispanic audience or sub-segment can be given a boost by search data including Spanish-language or Hispanic content keywords or search engines that have been set to Spanish.
Consumer education is a challenge no matter what language you're speaking or audience you're trying to reach. If you decide to embark on a Hispanic-focused BT campaign, ensure that your privacy policies are clearly communicated in both languages on your site, as well as any type of opt-out or opt-in functions you provide.
According to SMG Multicultural CEO Monica Gadsby, 19.5 million U.S. Hispanics are online, 70 percent of Hispanic women are online, and Hispanics make up 10 percent of all online users. This might be a significant portion of your potential customer pool, and reaching out to them can be just as easy as reaching out to any audience segments, with a few process and creative changes. Based on its ability to accurately segment audiences, behavioral targeting is by far the most efficient way to market to the Hispanic population. And remember, these same principles can be applied to any cultural group that you want to reach out to in the country.
Monday, June 23, 2008
How Brands Become Part of People's Lives'
All brands can gain consumer respect. But how do you identify which elements you need to put in place to become a part of the brandthread of people’s lives’? A brand doesn't just get respect, it depends on three criteria:
Performance
Does the brand offer better quality in comparison with its competitors?
Does the brand strive constantly for innovation, improvement and flawless service?
Do you have the feeling you're getting value for money?
Trust
How trustworthy is the brand?
Can you always count on the brand?
Does the brand always meet your expectations?
Reputation
What is the brand's reputation like? Is it a leader in its category?
Is the brand honest and does it own up to any mistakes?
Does the brand operate as a “good citizen” and does it work for a better world?
For brands to become part of peoples’ lives' they need to use these life pillars (Language, Music, Fashion, Sports, Food, Family, Activities) to diffuse their message. Brands must associate with these pillars, each of which can influence one another:
Creating Interest
Are there any brand myths?
Does it have a rich tradition and history?
Does the brand make you dream?
Does the brand have a recognizable logo, symbol or icon?
How much does the brand play on the senses?
Thread of People’s Lives'
How close to its consumers can the brand get?
Is there two-way communication between the brand and the consumer?
Does the brand exhibit interest in its consumers and their individual needs?
Performance
Does the brand offer better quality in comparison with its competitors?
Does the brand strive constantly for innovation, improvement and flawless service?
Do you have the feeling you're getting value for money?
Trust
How trustworthy is the brand?
Can you always count on the brand?
Does the brand always meet your expectations?
Reputation
What is the brand's reputation like? Is it a leader in its category?
Is the brand honest and does it own up to any mistakes?
Does the brand operate as a “good citizen” and does it work for a better world?
For brands to become part of peoples’ lives' they need to use these life pillars (Language, Music, Fashion, Sports, Food, Family, Activities) to diffuse their message. Brands must associate with these pillars, each of which can influence one another:
Creating Interest
Are there any brand myths?
Does it have a rich tradition and history?
Does the brand make you dream?
Does the brand have a recognizable logo, symbol or icon?
How much does the brand play on the senses?
Thread of People’s Lives'
How close to its consumers can the brand get?
Is there two-way communication between the brand and the consumer?
Does the brand exhibit interest in its consumers and their individual needs?
Wednesday, December 05, 2007
Breaking Through Online Clutter - Roadblocking
Expanding the online advertising market is the goal for advertisers and agencies...
What does this all mean?
Budgets – $60b-$80b by the end of the decade indicates a paradigm shift from traditional media to digital.
DR Vs. Branding – At least ½ will be spent on DR… but now a sizeable amount is dedicated to branding.
Clutter, Lots of Clutter – Bigger budgets means more competition. It’s going to be difficult to stand out and differentiate one brand from another.
So how do we break through the clutter?
Creative Creative – Good creative will always prevail
Creative Media – Put your creative in front of the correct audience
Premium media – Get greater reach with premium media spots
Roadblocking – Eliminate all distractions; own the page!
Breaking Through the Clutter - The ingredients of a Good Roadblock:
- Product Release Proximity - High Impact
- Short and Precise Time Window – Surgical strikes
- Cross Media Buy – Own a page, section or site
- Synchronized Creative Execution – 1 + 1 = 3; the sum is greater than its parts
- Smooth Production Process – Seek a solution where both units can be proofed together
- Real Time Monitoring – Time is the essence, Roadblocks often run only a day, making real time reporting critical
No Competition = No Clutter
Examples of good Roadblocks:
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
Online Marketing in Your Hispanic Communications Mix
Online activity among emerging majorities consumers continues to grow at a rapid pace. The percentage of Latino Americans, with access to the Internet, (whether from home, school, job, or other access point), increased from 43% in January 2002 to 69% in January 2006. More than 20 million U.S. Latinos are online. Forrester Research, in Cambridge, Mass., found Latinos are active in online banking, and a Roslow Research Group study reported that 70% of U.S. Latinos said that they would use the web to research a car purchase.
Research can be used to find those influential Web users and what they want to see. The web can also be effective on younger ethnic consumers by simply entertaining and engaging them with authentic and organic aspects of their culture, primarily the latest trends in music, fashion, and technology.
A study by AOL/Roper ASW shows that almost 20 million Hispanics in the US are online. While this is already an impressive number, the growth rate is even more impressive. About 20% of online Hispanics had connected their households to the Internet less than six months earlier. More than half who were not yet online expected to connect within the next two years.
In addition, the detailed survey found that Hispanic online consumers have quickly made the Internet part of their everyday lives. They go online at home an average of 9.2 hours a week, for example, compared with 8.5 hours for the general online population and they now heavily rely on the Internet to learn more about products, to share opinions, and to improve their lives. In fact, 70% now view the Internet as the best source for comparing prices, making it the most powerful information medium for influencing online Hispanics throughout the purchase decision process.
The Hispanic community is online in large numbers, and it's happening right now. So far, Hispanics feel there is a lack of online content and advertising available in Spanish. Although it is true that many Hispanics speak English fluently, at least half prefer to read content in their native language, according to comScore Media Metrix.
Research can be used to find those influential Web users and what they want to see. The web can also be effective on younger ethnic consumers by simply entertaining and engaging them with authentic and organic aspects of their culture, primarily the latest trends in music, fashion, and technology.
A study by AOL/Roper ASW shows that almost 20 million Hispanics in the US are online. While this is already an impressive number, the growth rate is even more impressive. About 20% of online Hispanics had connected their households to the Internet less than six months earlier. More than half who were not yet online expected to connect within the next two years.
In addition, the detailed survey found that Hispanic online consumers have quickly made the Internet part of their everyday lives. They go online at home an average of 9.2 hours a week, for example, compared with 8.5 hours for the general online population and they now heavily rely on the Internet to learn more about products, to share opinions, and to improve their lives. In fact, 70% now view the Internet as the best source for comparing prices, making it the most powerful information medium for influencing online Hispanics throughout the purchase decision process.
The Hispanic community is online in large numbers, and it's happening right now. So far, Hispanics feel there is a lack of online content and advertising available in Spanish. Although it is true that many Hispanics speak English fluently, at least half prefer to read content in their native language, according to comScore Media Metrix.
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