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Does Social Media Effect e Mail Response

2011-07-06T14:37:23Z

Many marketers wonder if email will remain relevant in a social media driven world. A recent comScore, study, called "U.S. Digital Year in Review," looked at trends and rankings in U.S. Internet activity. The bottom line is that email usage among teenagers age 12-17 declined 59 percent in 2010, and declined by 18 percent among the age group 18-25. The only increase was among users age 55 and older where email usage increase during 2010.

This has lead to three conclusions:

While social media usage has been increasing, email remains an important tool for ecommerce marketers..

Social media uses email. For every Facebook wall post or new Twitter follower, an email is sent to notify the user of updates. The world of social media would not have the stickiness it does without these constant reminders flooding our inboxes, driving us back to those sites. Asking a consumer to log into several different sites on a daily basis to check updates is a large commitment. Many rely on their inbox as their one-stop notification center to help manage the clutter.
Business communications depend on email. Most online transactions require users to enter their email address, and users expect to receive timely notifications afterwards. Businesses and consumers use email to communicate, not only promotional offers and newsletters, but also electronic versions of bank statements and order confirmations.
Consumers react differently to social media. Social media is social. It's a vehicle to stay in contact with friends, family and professional colleagues. For consumers, it can be a vehicle to voice opinions and make requests. Many businesses that use social media have found that consumers request coupons or deals that will directly benefit them.

In conclusion, a large percentage of consumers depend on email. Most of them also use social media regularly. Marketers will continue to use email as a communication channel. By using both, social and e mail, marketers enhance their brand, effectively communicate across a message spectrum and grow their sales.

Customer Attribution

2011-03-27T15:50:00Z

Attribution is the process of linking the desired marketing outcome or activity to a promotional effort or efforts. For example, directly linking a customer’s purchase to a banner ad. Or even more complexly, seeing the ad off line via a catalog or print ad, searching for the site on Google…seeing the paid advertising… then going to the site.

In the world of multi-channel marketing, correctly understanding and attributing the real source driving the purchase is no easy task at best. At worst, it can contribute to channel over or under performance and spend and may mask your true ROI.

There are many reasons this problem exists, they include:

Data tracked in different tools and stored in different places

Integration of click and customer identified data (PII)

Tracking across channels

Budget restrictions

Analytical tool and people limitations

The heart of solving the allocation issue is to create an integrated customer data resource. This links together all of the data sources in both your on and off line customer engagement. This creates a single way to track and understand customer behavior. It allows you to develop multi-channel allocation models, instead of a more limited one channel to action model.

Next week I will discuss how to transform a integrated data resource into a customer intelligence capability.

Multi-Channel Customer Marketing

2011-03-18T18:32:00Z

There are several skills and capabilities that any marketer needs to create successful multi-channel marketing programs. The three most important are:

Touch-point customer attribution –in off line channels, it’s easy since you most always have PII (personally identifying information) available from DM, 800, etc. On line is another story. For example, how does off line advertising drive search, banner and CSE’s. The best definition of Attribution I have seen, a process of using business rules and models to allocate credit to any marketing communication, across all channels and touch-points, which leads to a desired action such as a sale or lead or engagement.

Customer intelligence workbench –This is a resource that integrates all relevant data from all sources and channels that enables analysis that drives marketing decisions for multi-channel and cross-channel engagement. The workbench is a complex resource that combines off and on-line data, off and on line performance and generates analysis that drives execution such as loyalty, acquisition, retention, engagement, etc.

Customer Engagement Execution – is the process of executing marketing strategies that engage customers across all channels that you and the customer choose to engage. There is a slippery slope here. Most execution systems such as campaign management, e mail, social media, etc, do not interact and integrate. The Holy Grail is to create one system which will do it all.

Over the next several weeks I am going to discuss each of the three areas in much greater detail. I look forward to your comments and suggestions.

The Post-Recession Consumer

2011-03-05T19:01:00Z

As we start to think about a time in the near future called “post-recession”, a good customer detective must also think about how the post-recession consumer will behave differently. How will consumers prioritize spending and will different groups such as boomers behave differently.

Some new patterns seem clear:

Consumers will do a better job of searching for information before they make decisions about products and services….the more a marketer can do to make it easily found the better.
Marketers will need to get closer to consumers through multi and cross-channel engagement
Marketers need to stress value and quality in addition to price
In order to get a customer’s loyalty, marketers will have to engage better than the competition
Consumers want positive content and communications

There is a lot of information available every day on how the US economy and consumers have been hurt by the recession and much speculation about the consumer mindset. What are your thoughts?

What Is A Customer Detective?

2011-02-23T01:39:00Z

A Customer Detective literally works for a marketer to track down and understand who their customers are. A customer detective starts with DATA, lots and lots of data. Not just any data, mind you….actionable data! But we are not quite to actionable data yet.

I start by observing who buys their stuff…how frequently and for how much. I observe by literally watching customers and by analyzing the data….who, why, how and when and how much. I then enhance that data with third party data to create complex segmentations or clusters by customer value. Then I can start to build a process of understanding how to engage and communicate with best customers and look alike prospects. Now we are talking actionable data!

In today’s marketing world, it is all about multi and cross-channel implementation of the right message and content with the goal of engaging the customer at the right time and getting her to l buy my clients products. This is a customer detective in action.

For example, today I finished a project adding third party on and off-line media data to customer purchase behavior and created a segmentation by cluster and customer value. The result is a fine tuned media plan implementing web and cable buys by real customer purchase data. Gotta Love it!

Media Multi-tasking….A Perfect Storm!

2011-01-20T14:52:00Z

The perfect storm in my case is the convergence of three studies. First, I looked through an extensive study by Ofcom on UK media consumption patterns. The most interesting part was about simultaneous media usage by age groups. They found significant difference in device usage (TV, Radio, Mobile, Music Center, Land Line and Handheld) and usage of multiple devices or convergence of media types at the same time. The second study was by Nielson. It looked at simultaneous use of TV & Internet, and its frequency. 50 percent of the panel engaged in simultaneous use of PC and TV daily and time spent multi-tasking has grown nearly 20 percent year-to-year. This media convergence behavior has changed significantly in even the last year and doesn’t show any signs of slowing down.

The third study was a panel of one. I have observed my 16 year old, sitting in front of the TV, using Facebook on his laptop to engage with friends and listen/watch to Youtube videos in a separate browser window…..all at the same time. If that is not multi-tasking and convergence, I don’t know what is!

Neilson had the following takeaways:

Marketers should coordinate on-line and TV buys

The focus of the user seems to be on the internet content, not the TV

The content watched on the internet is not connected to the TV content

This trend is to be expected in younger age groups, but it is spreading into older groups as well.

Recently, I conducted a study for a retailer looking at how to plan media by cluster segment integrating on-line and off-line viewing patterns. Now it seems the next step is to look at the convergence of content and viewing behavior to drive media consumption.

Monetizing Web 3.0

2011-01-17T17:19:00Z

In the on-line and off-line world, marketers create content (products and services) and then provide distribution to users or buyers. For on-line content providers, the cost of distribution is very low compared with off-line. It also goes without saying that marketing costs are lower in the on-line world. McKinsey UK recently looked at the idea of surplus or balance of content creation versus payment for the content and compared on-line to off-line. It was their conclusion that there is a lot of potential revenue left on the table.

This got me thinking about new or improved models of revenue generation in the on-line ecosystem. Currently, on-line revenue generation models include fee for service and third party advertising on their site and of course payment for products and services.

Third party advertising creates a dilemma for marketers. How much is too much…this includes pop-ups, banners and third party content. When will content users say it is too much noise, and is there an opportunity to create a “premium” level of content with limited or no intrusive marketing efforts? In the premium area of delivery, the balance of revenue changes between advertising and content usage fees. This is the heart of the McKinsey articles thrust.

Thus, in the future, we will all be looking at ways to jigger the balance of revenue to content. Examples include:

Raise the fees for current content delivery. A lot of thought needs to be given to price elasticity.

More and more advertising on site. Just how much will content users put up with?

New “premium and super-premium” fee based content areas.

New ways of content delivery. Ideas include social media, mobile and third parties.

The answer is innovation in how we deliver content in a multi-channel world and how we charge for it. I don’t think the current balance to change dramatically in 2011, but I do expect to see very creative new ways to deliver and charge for content.

10 websites that they think will be big players in 2011

2011-01-12T16:32:00Z

Thought I would repost this….Mashable recently listed 10 websites that they think will be big players in 2011. They include:

Kickstarter -a crowdfunding platform for creative content.

OpenLeaks- an alternative to OpenLeaks, unlike WikiLeaks

Klout- a source to gage social influence

Hipmunk- for travel search

Gilt Groupe- location-specific group buying deals, and full-priced retail

Diaspora- an open source social network platform

Quora- a social engagement platform

Grooveshark- a music streaming

Drupal- blogging capabilities

Foursquare- the leader in location based offers

Check these sites out and let me know what you think!

Understanding Web Analytics Part 2

2011-01-07T16:12:00Z

Here is the post of the last four high level thoughts on web analytics for your business:

Focus on the Money Trail

Most effort on any given website is spent on content creation. Ecommerce sites can benefit from an index value report that computes "how much revenue" has been attributed to a given page and content. Through some simple drill down analysis you can focus on specific content types such as products, videos, blogs, interaction, etc.

Search Strategy

Search analysis focuses on acquisition of high value site visitors. For a quick look, copy your terms into a cloud based mapping tool (Tag Clouds) and see a visualization of what terms rise to the top. Your brand should dominate, but there should be other words are also prominent. I guarantee that the view will be insightful.

Optimizing Campaigns

Outcomes that are important include revenue, reduced cost and increased customer satisfaction. To optimize campaigns, you want to focus on the campaign detail for paid search, display, email, affiliates, etc. The focus is on inefficient spending vs. opportunities for improvement weighted against the value of the customer acquired.

Creating an Intelligence Factory

The web data analysis journey will find concrete and actionable insights. Through the use of third party tools such as Webtrends, Coremetrics and Omiture, integrated with Google and social media tools, you can create a strong intelligence capability that will analyze both pre and post data streams to drive optimized marketing. Another great new tool is Alternan’s Alchemy. Alchemy links social, on-line channels with your marketing database and campaign development and management.

Understanding Web Analytics

2011-01-03T15:55:00Z

This week I will post several high level thoughts on web analytics for your business. In no particular order, we will look at:

Evaluating the acquisition strategy
Site visitor management
Finding low hanging fruit
Focus on the money trail
Search strategy
Campaign optimization
Creating an intelligence factory

With this post, we will look at the first three and the final four later in the week.

Evaluating the acquisition strategy

The key acquisition is to have a balanced selection of acquisition channels. This includes search, referring sites and direct response campaigns. Best practices (rule of thumb) suggests that search could represent around 40% of traffic, another 25% from referring sites and 25% from direct traffic and another 10% from campaigns. If your search balance is too high, you may be overexposed and if it is low, you are likely under spending. You need to dig into the campaign analysis detail to understand strengths and weaknesses of each channel and how to recommend new or modified strategies. I should note that some channels such as CSE’s and Affiliates are a grouping of many sites and need to be evaluated individually or in logical segments.

Site Visitors Management

This is all about understanding how strongly visitors are attached to your site. Most marketers have access to the Google Analytics visitor log which allows you to understand visitor behavior, including how often they visit, time on site and time per page, etc. This includes recency of visit as well as frequency of visit. Is this analysis consistent with the business goals? This data can be segmented by content, campaign, source, etc.

Finding the Low Hanging Fruit

Marketers spend lots of money and time acquiring traffic. So, spend time analyzing the top places where that money is being wasted and/or spend wisely. Most web analytics tool provide this analysis as a standard report. It will show analysis such as bounce rates, indexed against site average, for the top entry points to the website. For example, high bounce rates could mean that you are attracting the wrong audience or you are not connecting with consumers when they come to your page.

Key Insight on Search Engines and Social Network Markers

2010-12-08T15:20:00Z

There is a clear evidence of the value of social marketing and search rankings. Through a series of interviews recently, Google and Bing have “peeled back the onion” to reveal some of the social related markers (i.e. content, blogs, links, tweets, facebook, etc.) that they consider in their formulas that drive search result ranking.

The impact for marketers is that link sharing on Twitter and Facebook is evaluated based upon the entity sharing them through a score that Google calls "Author Authority," and Bing calls "Social Authority." To steal from a Dan Fogelberg song, “twin sons of a different mother”.

While the blogs I follow don’t agree completely or yet appreciate all the markers, the markers that most likely are tracked by the search engines include:

Quantity and diversity of sources of social sharing
Timing ( sharing over time)
Supporting content accompanying links
Quantity and engagement Level
Quantity of friends and followers of an individual or brand
Authority level and importance of followers
Level of engagement with followers
Relevance or patterns of the topic
Associations (domains) of authors

Over time, I’m sure we will figure out how to focus on the key markers and how they directly impact web rankings. The goal of which is to drive SEO through social network linking and media.

The Big Bang Theory of the Digital Ecosystem

2010-12-02T21:53:00Z

Like the universe, our digital world seems to be also ever expanding….more blogs, more web sites, more forums and more communities. This leads to more content and chaos in the digital ecosystem as we attempt to navigate through the ever expanding universe.

Seth Godin observes that “once you overload the user, you train them not to pay attention”. He suggests that the price for the overload of content is that consumers become “desensitized” to all the content out there. There is a point here, it certainly happened with broadcast and print in the offline world.

So, how do we capture our audience’s attention in an ever expanding ecosystem that is acting against us by overloading us with content? The answer is that we have to get better capturing their attention with more focused content…not just more of it.

If your content is recognized by your target audience as valuable, they will spend the time to engage with you. This is the heart of social influence and is the solution to content overload.

A New Way of Looking At Brand Positioning and Social Media

2010-11-19T14:49:00Z

I have read several articles, challenging the methodology of brand positioning in the age of social media and online marketing. Traditional brand positioning deliverables are messages developed and placed based upon a specific target audience description and a defined competitive understanding. The argument is that while positioning works in traditional media, it does not best drive a brand in online and social media where there is an interaction and conversation.

An author recently described social media as follows, “Social media has been likened to a cocktail party where brands had better come prepared to talk about more than themselves.” Playing out this theme, you probably don’t want to talk to everyone at a cocktail party, only people who interest you or have something interesting to say. You seek out and engage with those individuals. This is what brands must do in social media to succeed.

So, where do brands turn if “positioning methodology” does not deliver the goods in social media channels? The answer, in my opinion lies in traditional database marketing and direct marketing analytics.

I just saw a study on active social media participants which showed that the most valuable brand spenders were not the best referrers of the brand. This analysis was accomplished by creating a 10 decile segmentation structure for social media participants. Segmentation based upon actual consumer data can help shed light on how a brand can engage with a customer across both on and offline channels.

Back at that cocktail party, do I want to talk to 10 million Facebook users or the 100 that will drive the referrals…..the answer is somewhere in between. As always, I welcome your thoughts on this topic.

SEO Optimization and Google

2010-11-13T17:40:00Z

Google analytics and keyword tool stand are free tools that can serve as the basis for SEO strategy.

Google Analytics offers a free analytics solution with access to a SEO data that often requires custom implementation in the paid analytics tool world. You can look at entry page URL, visits, orders, sales, bounce rates and other valuable metrics. You can associate natural search visits and sales to keyword and entry pages.

Google Analytics is fast and easy to navigate. Google Keyword Tool offers insight into the value of keyword phrases. By basing optimization decisions on keyword data allows you to capture more traffic and sales for keyword phrases .

A key concept of SEO is sight structure optimization. Google has a product called Googlebot which can crawl your site. Site architectures need to support crawling and indexing.

Google provides a suite of Webmaster tools. They offer:

Crawl Management
Content Management
Domain Management
Search Management

Google offers many more tools and best of all, they are free.

Social Media ROI

2010-11-03T14:55:00Z

Determining whether social media is working for you is a complicated task. Traditional ROI methodologies do not effectively deliver metrics on customer engagement. Businesses need to focus on why customers use various social channels and how customers engage with you.

For example, why would customers visit your blog or visit your Facebook page? The answer is linked to customer experience, content, interaction, word of mouth and the customers’ interest in having a relationship with you. Marketers have unique opportunities to develop programs that meet the previously mentioned question of “why engage”.

The following chart looks at some key metrics for social media channels.

Exploring Site Analytics

2010-09-22T16:35:00Z

It is important to have web site analytics capabilities as part of your eCRM efforts to monitor your site and guide functionality and usability and drive conversion. The analytics output also drives site optimization. Implementation of web site analytics requires the integration of multiple and sometimes disparate data sources so you can get a single view that drives to actionable analytics. One of the most important goals of this analysis is to make it easier for your customers to find the right information and convert.

The first step in the process is to choose the right tool set and make sure the data feeding the tool is accurate and represents all data sources. Next is the data reporting and analysis step. Most applications packages have both standard and custom reports. However, you will want to drill down to very detailed levels of analysis that may require a data analyst position. This person must understand the nature of the data, the application and your web site. The last and most important step is moving from data analysis to actionable decisions. This is a joint effort between web analysts and business managers.

Site analytic tools are just that…they focus on site. Some of the limitations of site analytics include capture of referring and impression data as an example. In addition to basic site reporting, you may have web some web 2.0 site functionality such as ratings, video, site ratings and customer interaction. Many of these applications come with their own analytical capability. At the end of the day, you want to create a continuous learning capability so you can refine all your site related processes and drive KPI’s.

Exploring Media Analytics

2010-09-16T13:35:00Z

The great news about media metrics is that with the right analytical tools, you can measure every aspect of your programs. The key is to understand the KPI’s (key performance indicators) you want to link to each on-line program or campaign and make sure you have a line of sight to the data required to do the analysis. This can be a challenge if you do not have a good eCRM solution that collects a wide array of data or works across multiple data repositories. For example, you want to be able to link click stream data with transaction and behavior data. For many marketers, this includes linking off-line data with on-line data.

After you have analyzed program and campaign level media metrics including clicks, actions, impressions, creative, response and channel, you will want to focus on linked data analytics. Examples include cost to acquire, margin, product related and lifetime value (LTV).

Another important analysis step is optimization. How can we maximize the use of the spend we have available. This process looks at image/brand and direct response campaigns to shed insight on how each drives customer behavior and response. Multi-channel marketers also integrate their off-line media in this process. One outcome is an analysis of how multiple channels actually influence the desired response. For example, how does broadcast influence search and on-line display ads.

The last topic to cover is attribution of sales to the appropriate direct response media or combination of channels. For example, you may be using, display, paid search, affiliates, blogs, comparative shopping engines, off-site video, social media and off-line media such as catalogs, print and broadcast. Which one drove the customer to your site and how many impressions across multiple channels are enough.

Next week we will look at site analytics in more detail.

Three Key Categories of Digital Analytics

2010-09-02T15:29:00Z

There are three major categories of analytics we need to look at when we focus on digital analysis. They are media, site and eCRM analytics.

Media analytics allow us to create the desired response to our digital media advertising and campaigns. As marketers continue to shift expenditures from traditional media to on-line, it becomes increasingly important to both track and attribute ROI to expenditures. The major key to success is to attribute media data and transaction data. This allows for optimization of on-line behavior with the desired result.

Web site analysis helps marketers design, guide and manage optimized experiences for customers and prospects. Most marketers purchase a software package to help drive site optimization. A successful system allows for complex data analysis and drives actionable site enhancements and customer interaction.

eCRM analytics drive successful customer acquisition, relationship and experience management. It allows you to create the appropriate engagement strategy across site, media and direct response communications.

Underlying all three categories of analytics is data. In fact, “it’s all about the data”. In future postings, I am going to explore various aspects of the three categories of analytics and the underlying data needed to be successful.

The Buzz About Behavoral Targeting

2010-08-20T20:30:00Z

The Wall Street Journal recently conducted and reported on research that surfing the Internet starts a process that “passes information about you and your interests to tracking companies and advertisers.” The Journal conducted a comprehensive study that assessed and analyzed a broad array of cookies and other on-line surveillance technology ( such as beacons)that companies are deploying on Internet users. The article suggest “that the tracking of consumers has grown both far more pervasive and far more intrusive than is realized by all but a handful of people in the vanguard of the industry.”

They suggest that some of the tracking files were so detailed that they verged on being anonymous in name only. They enabled data-gathering companies to build personal profiles that could include age, gender, race, zip code, income, marital status and health concerns, along with recent purchases and favorite TV shows and movies.

Third party companies or resellers such as Blue Kai, EXelate and Lotame and others resell this data to marketers that want to target internet users by behavior and demographic characteristics.

Much of the buzz around this article and related blog posts has been negative as you might expect. However, in future posts, I would like to explore the value side of using behavioral targeting to match together consumer and marketer.

Please join me in this conversation!

The Rise Of Mobile Marketing

2010-08-04T00:07:00Z

The rise of mobile (mobile marketing) as a marketing channel and key customer touch-point, drives yet another opportunity for the shift of marketing budgets from traditional marketing media spend to more direct channels such as direct mail, e-mail, digital and of course mobile.

Mobile marketing will likely provide the next advancement in multi-channel and integrated marketing, offering higher levels of targeting effectiveness and impact.

Analysts now project that location based mobile marketing spend will top $4 billion by 2014. Recently, Google stated that one third of Google mobile searches via the mobile web "pertain to some aspect of the searcher's local environment." Both are stats to think carefully about!

This year (like the past couple of years) started off with lots of promise and enthusiasm about 2010 being "the year of mobile marketing." While I am not sure it will come to pass in 2010, several aspects of mobile marketing seem to have come of age.

The most important are location marketing, smart phone applications and mobile payments and transactions. The only down side I see currently, is that most (if not all) location based marketing programs seem to use discount and product promotion to drive participation....all the time! I would like to see a balance of relationship applications and discounts.

I believe that the real opportunity is to integrate mobile into triangulated multi-channel programs. This is the development of integrated multi-channel marketing efforts that triangulate a minimum of three channels such as website, in-store and smart phone mobile application and location marketing....this is real integrated marketing!!

There is no doubt in my mind that mobile marketing is here to stay and will become an increasingly powerful force in our customer marketing efforts.

What do you think?