Archive for the 'Branding' Category

Interactive Marketing Gets Some Good News From Retail

Published
by
Tom Dressler
on August 4, 2008
in Branding, Customer Acquisition, Customer Retention, Media Buying, Online Marketing, Social Media and Website Analytics
. 0 Comments

According to the latest information provided by Forrester…

Retail marketers are responsible for more than one-third of all interactive marketing spend: an expected $8.2 billion by year end 2008. As veterans in the interactive space, retailers will grow IM investments at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 25% as they continue to refine existing programs to drive more online sales and also experiment with new media and richer display ads to boost brand awareness and customer engagement.

What great news…something that looks positive when reporting about the economy.

Some interesting facts:

  1. More than 1/3 of all Internet Marketing spend comes from Retail Marketers
  2. Retail Marketing is a veteran when it comes to Interactive Marketing
  3. Smart Interactive Marketers focus first to refine current programs to increase sales
  4. Experiment with new media to boost brand awareness and customer engagement

The lessons mentioned here make sense to me. Increase marketing when times are tough. Focus on channels that can be measured. Optimize existing ROI programs while testing other awareness opportunities.

Your comments are welcome and appreciated.

Facebook Marketing Strategies, Food for Thought

Published
by
Tom Dressler
on July 30, 2008
in Branding, Customer Acquisition, Customer Retention, Lead Generation, Online Marketing and Social Media
. 0 Comments

Facebook Marketing Strategies, Food for ThoughtWe as Interactive Marketing professionals, consumer market research professionals, and eBusiness & channel strategy professionals look for solutions that meet the needs of today’s online environment. When posed with this question, Facebook comes up over and over again. So what should we do about it?

As described by Forrester,

Facebook is a media, community, and application platform that offers an existing thriving ecosystem, scalable growth, and quick word-of-mouth marketing. The ability to understand users, their preferences, networks, and helps web applications to quickly segment and rapidly grow.

WebsiteBiz FacebookWow, what does that mean? First off, as a community the opportunity to study your prospects are huge. Are they engaged on Facebook and/or Social Media as creators, critics, collectors, joiners, spectators, or inactives? I find this information to be surprising at times. If your market is using Facebook it provides a targeted advertising platform unlike any we have ever seen before, the ability to provide messages segmented by location, gender, and/or preference gives us the ability to accurately market effectively.

Ideas to be considered when evaluating Facebook Marketing

  • Demographics and trend data
  • Word of mouth and viral growth using Newsfeeds and widgets
  • Groups, sponsored groups, and other community features
  • Harness personal and network information
  • Contextual and targeted advertising opportunities
  • Monetizing your efforts
  • Case studies of success and failure
  • Understanding costs, and strategies to measure ROI

While this can seem intimidating at first, proven strategies do in fact deliver positive results. But a more coherent approach is to start with your target audience and determine what kind of relationship you want to build with them, based on what they are ready for.

Please provide your thoughts and impressions of Facebook Marketing.

Video Ads on YouTube Coming?

Published
by
Eric Dudley
on July 16, 2008
in Branding, Customer Acquisition, Media Buying, Online Marketing and Social Media
. 1 Comment

YouTubeYouTube is proving to be a challenging advertising platform for Google. Google acquired YouTube in 2006, signaling big ambitions for online video advertising. However, they are running into a series of problems with copyright infringement issues and the fact that many online agencies and advertisers are still weary of this relatively new medium.

Some of the snags Google is running into include:

  • Advertisers are reluctant to put their ads on YouTube due to fear of questionable content of amateur videos. For example, can you imagine a Folgers video ad prior to watching “Coffee causes heart attacks”? Or a Disney family friendly ads displayed before some provocative video of a celebrity?
  • Copyright litigation. Viacom Inc. sued Google last year because unauthorized television and movie clips were posted by YouTube users.
  • Inefficient sales process. The rapid growth of Google has hindered the sales systems.

Google has launched “Operation Spaghetti” to unclutter the mess that YouTube has been for them. Even if these problems are solved, will advertisers see a benefit to attaching ads to online videos on YouTube? This would be an extremely cumbersome process if we had to evaluate each ad prior to placing a video ad for our clients.

  • Will YouTube filter videos for suitable advertisers? Maybe
  • Will it rely on the YouTube community? Doubtful!
  • Perhaps a combination. We’ll see…

In the meantime, agencies and advertisers running video ads have other options. And knowing Google, they have a plan already in the works to further monetize YouTube. Stay tuned.

Measuring Results Online - What should you track?

Published
by
Kyle Bumgardner
on February 28, 2008
in Branding, Customer Acquisition and Website Analytics
. 0 Comments

Unfortunately, I still see marketers struggling to communicate the value of online marketing and how it drives bottom-line results. Much of this is caused by a lack of standard metrics by which to measure results online and report impact…especially when a direct response conversion is not clearly evident.

Most CEO’s and CFO’s are focused on driving efficiency and scale to achieve revenue growth. But when it comes to marketing, they need to be able to make a connection between the work ($) that is being done and the revenue that will be produce as a result.

Bottom line.

With studies suggesting that merely 2/3 of all marketers include metrics in their marketing plans…a need for more standard measurement is necessary for measuring results online. So, what do you track? The ultimate answer is Everything…but realistically, try focusing on things that will move the needle and provide leading indicators of revenue. (Stuff that C-Levels discuss).

Here are 10 tactical examples that you might not be considering when establishing metrics for measuring results online:

  1. Brand impact (i.e., increased brand awareness, intent or favorability)
  2. Number of impressions
  3. Position of paid listing
  4. Number of clicks
  5. Ratio of new to returning visitors
  6. Amount of increased website traffic
  7. Duration of website visits
  8. Amount of increased traffic to physical store
  9. Amount of increased volume to call center
  10. Number of leads generated for products sold online
  11. Number of leads generated for products sold offline
  12. Number of immediate sales generated for products sold online

Collecting this data will create trends and insight that will translate across most organizations.

Behavioral Targeting Ad Spend Growth

Published
by
Eric Dudley
on April 21, 2006
in Branding, Customer Acquisition and Media Buying
. 1 Comment

Marketers know that behavioral targeting gets better results. Publishers like that behavioral targeting delivers more revenue. Consumers find the ads relevant to them and their searches. It’s no surprise that behavioral targeting is expected to grow.

According to eMarketer, $1.2 billion is expected to be spent this year alone on behavioral targeting.

Behavioral Targeting Ad Spend Growth

According to senior marketing executives, types of data used to target include:

-> Demographics
-> Geography
-> Past purchase history
-> Past contact history
-> Web data usage
-> Primary research attitudes
-> Channel preference

Our company, WebsiteBiz, utilizes behavioral target for the Biltmore Estate.