A Deal in your Pocket: How Consumers Get Local Shopping cues from Social Media

Harman Bajwa
Written by Harman Bajwa
on December 20, 2011

Retail Ecommerce Sales is a huge success by all standards, but still a majority of shopping still takes place offline in local stores. While $155 billion worth of consumer goods were bought online last year, a far larger portion of offline sales were influenced by online research.

Forrester estimates that $917 billion worth of retail sales last year were “Web-influenced.” It also estimates that online and Web-influenced offline sales combined accounted for 42 percent of total retail sales and that percentage will grow to 53 percent by 2014, when the Web will be influencing $1.4 billion worth of in-store sales.

Increasingly, consumers are taking advantage of the sophisticated capabilities of smart phones to do more of this online research while in a store or on the go. Location-based technologies in mobile devices help on-the-go consumers to get directions to local stores, look up product availability and check in for special offers.

Further, some of the most innovative location-based services send shoppers automatic alerts and deals if they are near a retailer’s store. Imagine if you are able to get a special sale feature of the hottest items in fashion that only last for 24 hours in the store. Shoppers can enjoy tremendous savings by shopping for designer brands on the go.

However, a flipside remains as retailers will need to address consumers’ privacy concerns for these services to become main-stream.

What Is Driving Local Commerce?

We all know the influence of internet and mobile devices to find information online. This is now also being used to find information about nearby stores, restaurants and other businesses. Shopping at a “local” retail store from the consumer’s perspective is more likely lead them to a purchase.

Consumer awareness, use of location-based digital services and targeted local advertising and marketing initiatives are all driving local commerce. The retailer further has embarked on an exciting journey where he can send the consumer relevant offers based on their location and product needs that influence their in-store purchases.

How do Such Devices Augment In-Store Shopping

Retailers are doing a better job to woo online consumers in their physical stores. In fact, these retailers see this as an opportunity to enhance the in-store shopping experience.

  • Mobile in-store research enables consumers to compare competitors’ prices, read customer reviews and access special offers while at the point of purchase.
  • Retailers now offer mobile apps that help customers feel more confident about making purchases, and some have even equipped their sales associates with iPads to help customers make purchase decisions.
  • Mobile and social are becoming important sources of local retail and product information. Mobile shoppers in particular are turning to social media to check prices, read product and business reviews, and get coupons and deals from local stores.
  • Local shopping cues and opinions about local retailers and in-store deals influence the shopping decisions of today’s consumers.

Smartphone Users are ready to Buy

A user who looks up local information from their desktop PC is removed from the act of shopping. She/he might be in an early stage of online research which may precede an actual store purchase by hours, days or even weeks. In contrast, on-the-go mobile shoppers are ready to shop i.e. have an urgent need, in the act of shopping, ready to fulfil that need. Thus the connection between research and a purchase is much closer.

With mobile in-store shoppers, who research while standing before a product under consideration, these two actions are occurring simultaneously. For marketers, a mobile user with local intent presents an opportunity to influence a person who is ready to buy.

Mobile in-store shopping is in the early stages of consumer adoption. They not only help on-the-go shoppers find local retailers and products but also augment their in-store shopping experience. Retailers on the other hand, will earn customer loyalty if they enhance the shopping experience with digital tools, as well as offer targeted coupons and deals.

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Twitter Overhauls a New Look

Christina Svetia
Written by Christina Svetia
on December 15, 2011

Twitter’s recent overhaul last week has bought “substantial improvements” to the user experience of both its web and mobile interfaces. It’s a matter left to debate as to where the inspiration came from, but this new haunt of creativity seems to be heavily influenced by rival sites Google+ and Facebook.

One of the features included is a new banner just below the profile information that stretches across the page and the ability to pin a tweet at the top of each brand’s stream. The result is a valuable opportunity for brands to showcase their dernier cri and to have a more distinctive presence on Twitter. These changes are definitely a spin in the right direction, but we need to still ‘watch the birdie’ to see as to how much flight it actually gains.

Twitter Brand Pages Launch

As part of the comprehensive redesign and growth strategy, what Twitter realized is that its users simply do not spend as much time (as Facebook!?) on it. So in order to encourage more interaction and keeping them glued in for a longer time, Twitter takes one step forward by launching its Brand Pages.

With Brand Pages companies (and not users) will have much greater creative control over how their profile looks and feels to its users. Brand Pages incorporate two key elements wherein a large header consisting images can be used to display their logo and tagline more prominently. And – where now brands can also choose to keep a particular tweet at the top of their time line. Further that top tweet also auto-expands to reveal an embedded photo or video from Flickr, YouTube or other sources, without requiring the user to take action.

Additionally, they separate out a brand’s @ replies and mentions, which is an important move for customer-service companies like Bing, which frequently responds to users but wants a way to keep its messaging from getting diluted.

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8 Ways to Unshackle your Blog Writing

Harman Bajwa
Written by Harman Bajwa
on December 11, 2011

We all know that the act of blogging can sometimes leave us in a thicket – be it being tethered in mind, the word choices, tied to desk or pen or computer. Yet the common objective is to monetize our site. If we want our reader to stay submerged in our stories, a blog can be truly effective only if the reader joins us on our dive. For that matter, blogging shouldn’t be taken lightly, nor left to last minute revisions.  Having a plan is crucial for success in everything in life including blogging.

However that doesn’t mean you spend all your waking hours redressing your blogging strategy. But in fact, you should take the time, and research and effort to be able to produce quality content as opposed to inconsequential word garbage or wishy-washy phrases.

So if you’re set to change the world with your blog or looking to improve the current one, here are some tips to deliver maximum impact (dynamo !:)) and influence for your readers.

1. Grammar! Grammar!

Curiosity is different than other ways of being fulfilled. What’s wrong? Shouldn’t it be “different from“?  This can be read as an awkward and, incorrect sentence structure.

Too many blog posts give little attention to many such English language blunders which promote the improper use of the written word. It is worth noting that many of such errors, if overlooked, endure the test of time to become a permanent part of our language. Thus taking a crash course in Grammar can enlighten you about some of the most common errors made by native English speakers and writers.  It’s unravelling—and embarrassing—how much you can forget about a language that you daily speak and write in.

2. Use a Dictionary

Dictionary.com has been my favourite and most visited site ever since I started writing. If you’re without one, chances are you’re using words incorrectly without knowing.  Mind twisters, word games and daily crosswords are destinations for reliable source for word meaning and its usage, and learning.

3. DO NOT Plagiarize

Anyone who has written a word knows that plagiarism is not always black and white. The boundary between the rewritten word and research is often unclear. The Internet has diluted people’s understanding of plagiarism and most think that it’s free for you to cut, copy or paste on your blog. Simply put, plagiarism amounts to using others ideas and original words as your own, without crediting the original source. It can amount to serious copyright issues and legal action if caught.

4. Follow a Specific  Direction

Your blog should have a clear purpose.

What do you wish to convey to your readers? (e.g. Business concepts, Self improvement etc.)
What Value are you adding? (e.g. helping people solve professional or personal issues)

What do you wish to convey to your readers? (e.g. Business concepts, Self improvement etc.) What Value are you adding? (e.g. helping people solve professional or personal issues)

Also your blog needs to slowly and steadily build a relationship with your readers. Otherwise, without an interested audience to care about your content, your blog would soon be another floppy piece of writing.

5. Defining your  Voice

Blogging is anything where the purpose is to express thoughts, and feelings or information. But, that information should draw traffic. And this can be done if you can draw people to your unique voice. The rule states that in order to become an expert in something, you need to put in 10,000 hours of practice. But fret not  – developing a unique voice is easier than that.

Your content should offer thoughtful evaluations that are written in an interesting way. You could include interesting anecdotes or examples to elaborate your point. Re-read some memorable blogs and scrutinize it to determine as to what made it appealing to you. Study the writing of successful bloggers.  If you’re writing for a particular industry or business, make sure your editorial voice matches that organization’s intended branding.

6. Use a Scan-able Layout and Concise Text

The reason for this is people rarely read Web Pages word by word. Research on how people read websites shows, that 79 percent of the test users always scanned any new page they came across; only 16 percent read word-by-word.

Since the attention span of a user is limited online, massive chunks of words should be avoided. Also the articles on blogs should be broken down into lots of small paragraphs, easy to grasp sub-headings and relevant images.

7. Remember to re-read and proof-read your Content

Proofreading is the task of correcting a piece of writing, the importance of which cannot be understated. A writer should check for grammar, spelling, punctuation and other typos before submitting a post.

If you’re new to blogging, a helping hand from a friend could help you weed out confusing constructions and add precision, and coherence to your writing. This is especially crucial if you are a guest author for a site.

8. Write an interesting Headline

Each headline conveys the gist of the story on its own. Would you have read this post if it were stated “10 tips to better your writing?.” I’m sure you wouldn’t have. With thousands of posts being published every minute, one needs to communicate in a precise manner with a handful of words.

A good way to start is to look up the BBC news site for some awesome headlines. The amount of meaning they squeeze into this brief space is incredible: for then every word counts.

The blogosphere is the universe of network-accessible information; attracting and retaining people’s attention is more difficult than ever before. Your written perspective can virtually be welcomed by a limitless audience if done well.

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Getting onto Top Google Ranks may not be your Best Internet Marketing Move

Christina Svetia
Written by Christina Svetia
on December 8, 2011

Now that you have got yourself to the top 10 slots on Google Ranking, are you getting more sales than those below you? This is what some marketing managers and internet marketing experts have failed to perceive at times. A typical myth from some marketing moguls is that you need to be on the first ranks in your PPC or organic search results in order to get more traffic and more sales. More traffic definitely, however this does not automatically convert into higher sales. Even if you spend tonnes of money on being the first in search engines Google or Yahoo, it does not ensure a higher conversion rate.

The Split-Attention Divide

When it comes to buying items in grocery, drug, electronics, department and clothing stores, shoppers are more likely to make a purchase if they find an instant connection with your website i.e. they find instantly what they have been searching for.

When they click on your PPC (pay-per-click) or organic search ad, make sure that your website presents the page they want. If they are looking say, for a particular electronic item, make sure they see that item displayed and nothing else. For once your prospect has a limited attention span and soon could abandon your website if s/he doesn’t find what they are seeking for.

Navigable Waters

A slow loading website is frustrating enough, but if your website is not easy to navigate your sales would instantly take a downhill plunge. Visitors have a hard time making a decision if you give them too many choices. Make your navigation prominent and easy to find on each page. They should be able to search for information or products they want easily in a matter of seconds.

For this, at the beginning when you engineered your website, you must determine your website purpose. A website purpose depends on the genre of your business, simply means what you wish to convert. B2B businesses website purpose is usually getting prospects to leave down their contact details to follow up. An E-commerce stop-shop will want prospects to take out their credit cards for a purchase and, a B2B portal will want getting prospects to leave down their contact details to follow up.

The Trust Factor

Last but not least, some web hosting companies, who offer free web site hosting, will put ads on your pages to cover the costs. To make people buy from you online or even giving you their contact details your business and brand needs to be authentic. If you are cheap about your web hosting, your visitors probably won’t trust you.

Hence be honest and authentic in your online or even offline internet marketing efforts.

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Tablets relegates the Mouse’s Tail

Pooja Mehra
Written by Pooja Mehra
on December 1, 2011

Tablets offer a different style of browsing, and web owners must improve its experiences, Forrester says.

Forrester Research Inc. predicts that tablet sales will grow from 10.3 million devices in 2010 to 44 million in 2015. And as the tablet market grows, product strategists must nurture both the app ecosystem and the browser environment —as both will be key channels for delivering content experiences on tablets.

In a recent survey of tablet owners by Forrester, tablet users were found to access websites on their tablets more often than they do apps. Consumers driven to find information on companies they want to do business with find websites still as their first preferred point of contact. Although an app can be considered as another touch point for the customers, a website can nevertheless be accessed anywhere, and on any device.

“While people spend a lot of time browsing sites on tablets, the simple truth is that sites weren’t built specifically for these devices. As a result, unintended usability breakdowns hamper most website experiences on tablets today” writes Forrester Research senior analyst Vidya Drego in her recent report. So as the number of consumers browsing sites on a tablet skyrockets, website owners must look to create the right experience strategy, and improve the web browsing experience from tablets.

Five Fixes for Merchants to Enhance their Browsing Experience

For the benefit of merchants Forrester has identified five quick fixes firms can make today to improve how users experience their websites on tablets.

I. Consider Alternatives to Plug-ins like Flash, Java etc: Sites that rely heavily on flash multimedia do not render well on the iPad. iPhone visitors to a site with Flash see only a blank square. Further, while few sites today are completely constructed in Flash, large numbers of sites use Flash for displaying multimedia elements, menus, and some imagery. As a result, merchants should use alternatives to Flash, such as HTML5 for audio and video streaming and JavaScript and Cascading Style Sheets 3 for animations.

The Golf Warehouse, operated by Redcats USA was one ecommerce retailer which acted early on this issue. Since the two main features on its home page were based on Flash slide presentations, it promptly created static images to render on devices that don’t support Flash to maintain a better experience on the iPad.

II. Simplifying complex Mouse tail movements : Touchscreen devices do not support mouse actions like hover or double-click. Thus to offer an optimal tablet browsing experience, merchants should also simplify complex mouse movements. Designers should stick to scrolling, panning, and selecting or clicking on elements to enable touchscreen users to get the most from the experience.

III. Increase spacing between interactive elements: Most interactive elements like drop-downs, links, radio buttons, and check boxes were designed for mouse input, not finger taps. As a result, many of these elements are spaced tightly and result in mis-selections or misfiring when controlled via a touchscreen. More space in and around these elements should reduce errors.

IV. Increasing the size of text and other elements of a page: Screen size and resolution
vary in Tablets, and while most allow users to zoom in to better view content and functionality, zooming in repeatedly to see and interact with a site can get tiresome quickly. Drego writes. “Increasing the size of key elements including headlines, category names, navigation elements and body copy can help users quickly scan content without zooming in. This has the added benefit of making a site easier to use from a PC as well.”

IV. Increasing the size of text and other elements of a page: Screen size and resolutionvary in Tablets, and while most allow users to zoom in to better view content and functionality, zooming in repeatedly to see and interact with a site can get tiresome quickly. Drego writes. “Increasing the size of key elements including headlines, category names, navigation elements and body copy can help users quickly scan content without zooming in. This has the added benefit of making a site easier to use from a PC as well.”

V. Avoid fixed page width and positioning: Because most tablet users toggle the orientation of the device among vertical and horizontal views, merchants should steer clear of using a fixed page width since it can effect in content that renders too narrowly or widely for the device.

Forrester Research says following these five tips can help customer experience professionals leave tablet users satisfied with their site. It adds sites seeing increasing traffic from tablet devices should look out for patterns in their analytics data and quickly improve to create the right experiences for its tablet customers.

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The Rapid Adoption of “Like” and How Marketers need to Treat their Facebook Pages

Harman Bajwa
Written by Harman Bajwa
on November 25, 2011

Ever since Facebook began encouraging businesses to deploy the ‘thumbs-up’ button across the web, brands have been galloping to stockpile their “likes”.

With thousands or even more of “likes”, what’s next?

Research has shown that users who voluntarily click the L- button are more likely to purchase the brand and have the disposition to recommend the same brand to friends as well. But, aforesaid this simplicity of the L-Button means that there may be no actual engagement beyond the fleeting moment of the click.

Hence to move beyond the post-“like” phase of Facebook marketing, companies will need to excite their fan base in a more compelling manner. Not only do they have to brainstorm evoking posts to fire up the fuel, but also facilitate interactions that spur a sense of community, and rewards for their supporters ongoing loyalty.  Brands that do not make their Facebook marketing a priority will risk seeing their hard-earned “likes” melt away. Simply put, consumers are willing to interact with brands and companies on Facebook—if they see value in it.

How Marketers Need to Treat Facebook

Many marketers are already on Facebook, even as they are still figuring out the best way to use the site to meet their specific needs.

In December 2010, Facebook reported it was serving more than 2 billion “like” button clicks every day to more than 2 million websites that had implemented it. “Like” has come to become the de facto currency of Facebook success, and marketers just can’t get enough.

Yet as Facebook is becoming the primary in the manner companies engage with their consumers online it only raises questions about its risks and rewards of marketing on it.

  • Because FB is an essential marketing took, it is critical for companies to get it right

According to Burson-Marsteller’s “Global Social Media Check-Up 2011,” 61% of Fortune Global 100 companies are using Facebook fan pages in 2011, up from 54% in 2010. In the US this percentage is even higher, with 72% of Fortune 100 companies on Facebook in 2011. However not every company has found success with its marketing efforts on FB.

  • Facebook must be fully integrated into a company’s overall marketing plans

Companies need to think and re-align their overall marketing strategy to include Facebook marketing. Standalone efforts in this area are not sufficient anymore; companies which link their online and offline efforts find greater success.

  • “Like” is only the Beginning

That’s the reality…After the ‘like’, what else? It is actually just the beginning. Some companies think getting clicked means is end of the game, but it is only the opening kickoff. It is much harder, strategic to sustain the relationship post-click than it is to get consumers to make that first click.

  • Consumer Interaction on FB is still at its nascent stage

There is still a lot of scope for growth in consumer interactions with brands. According to Arbitron and Edison Research, only 25% of social network users say they follow companies or brands on social networks. That means there are still many opportunities for marketers to engage consumers.

  • Social Keeps Changing

While the new age social users are comfortable interacting with brands directly, it also means they are becoming more discerning about companies and brands they support. The social interactions can change rapidly and companies need to keep pace with its changes.

The number of companies and marketers on Facebook is growing, and will continue to grow as they see success using the site.

social media

By monitoring how many comments and “likes” certain posts get, for example, companies can figure out what days and times work best to reach fans and what types of content fans enjoy. Further marketers can do a better job of updating their pages and improving brands by –

  • providing advance information and previews of future products or future offers
  • involve participants to take part in games and competitions
  • give them access to exclusive information
  • send invitations for events related to the brand beyond Facebook
  • provide timely information – more often
  • the convenience of ordering products online from the page itself
  • and lastly, discussions with brand representatives

Whereas the launch of a “Like”, in Facebook is just a moment, brands need to continuously engage to prove their worth to their loyal supporters.

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Social CMO’s to Lead the New Brand Experience

Pooja Mehra
Written by Pooja Mehra
on November 21, 2011

One of the most exciting aspects of the emerging market shifts is that we find ourselves living through an underlying power called the social technology – where collaboration and influence through social networking is said to pilot the biggest impact on organizations in the next three to five years.

CMO’s indicate that many of these strategies involve deepening social relationships between the company and its audiences, engaging with them (without annoying them) and in fact personally participating in such efforts.  However, only 16% of CMOs think that it’s necessary to become proficient at social media themselves to be successful leaders. Further research but also signifies that CMO’s who personally participate in social media will be much better cut at – a) leading the new brand experience, and b) leading a new generation of cross-functional marketing organizations.

So who’s really right? One viewpoint suggests that CMO’s who take on the proactive front lead in employing and ‘engaging personally’ the “whole dimension” of customer engagement strategies can become natural leaders in helping their companies take advantage of social tools and evolve their business processes throughout the entire prospect/customer lifecycle. Yet an overwhelming majority of CMO’s hesitate to personally participate in Social Media.  In a study by Business Insider of 143 top marketing executives from the Fortune 100 companies, only 15 CMOs were identified as having an active Twitter account. While many CMOs use LinkedIn, most do not use social media to interact with everyday consumers. In addition, many CMOs only use social media because of peer pressure instead of believing in the need to personally master social media.

CMO acts as a Chief Steward of the Brand Experience

As the chief decision maker and steward of the brand experience, CMOs must understand how to align social media initiatives with brand-building strategies that result in a competitive advantage. By personally participating, they can use their experience to identify opportunities quicker and provide better guidance to the organization and its partners. CMOs don’t develop media plans without an understanding of their audience and the guidance of strategic objectives, so they should do the same with social tools.

The Three C’s: The Customer, the Competition, and the Company

CMOs must use social media to understand the online social impact of the three C’s: the customer, the competition, and the company.

  • Listening to the customer with thy own eyes and ears – Through social networking tools CMO’s can develop a direct line to online customer sentiment, similar to the fashion they do with focus groups and key customers. For instance, Michael (Dell of Dell) and Brian (Dunn of Best Buy) are closer to their customers and thus know what customers like and dislike about their company firsthand. Added to this, Dell also has set up a command center (for market insights) which has a glass wall facing out onto the rest of the office, providing an easy view of large monitors with colorful graphs detailing the online conversations happening at that moment. The functional value of the command center comes from Dell receiving the significance of consumer sentiment using social media listening tools that provide scalable, timely, and actionable insights – Real-time.

  • Keeping Pulse on Competition: Rather than wait for traditional competitive intelligence reports, the social CMO should personally follow her competitors on Twitter or “like” his competitors’ Facebook pages to keep up with new social media experiments. For instance, Julia Goldin, CMO of Revlon, follows her competition on Twitter and Facebook because she wants to understand how they engage with consumers through new channels.

  • Understanding the company’s social strengths and weaknesses: Collecting data on how positively or negatively customers talk about their brand online, CMO’s can aggregate to get firsthand knowledge of their company’s brand experience. Only then can a social CMO inspire a vision and outline a compelling online roadmap and leverage their current social capabilities. For such, the CMO’s can participate in company sponsored social initiatives on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn, or influencer blogs.

Thus the CMO is the perfect champion for using social media strategies beyond marketing because he has the capabilities and opportunity to effect most deeply in his company’s brand-building and marketing efforts.

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Prepare for a Mobile-Driven Internet Strategy

Harman Bajwa
Written by Harman Bajwa
on November 18, 2011

Mobile Purchases will grow quickly among Frequent Online Buyers

Millions of Canadians and Americans use the Internet every week to purchase products and services. They are not only affluent consumers but are also technology savvy who turn to their mobile phones for support in their purchase journey – making them an ideal target group for mobile-driven, cross-channel shopping. eMarketers and professionals then need to be prepared to support these frequent online buyers and start investing in cohesive mobile marketing strategies to woo and influence their buying decisions (internet marketing strategy).

Mobile Web search and Display driving a large Revenue

According to a Forrester report, by 2011, more than 75 million mobile users will access the mobile Internet, and that number will grow to nearly 117 million by 2015.

Smartphones, owned by one-quarter of these users have fundamentally changed consumers’ mobile behavior, exposing them to a broad range of media channels — like email, Internet browsing, and shopping — to engage with right from their pockets. To second that, Google actually accounts for 59% of all mobile advertising revenue in the US with a majority of that revenue coming from mobile Web search and display – creating a greater focus on how to optimize existing search and display resources for mobile.

Profile of a Frequent Online Buyer

FOB – or a ‘frequent online buyer ‘oozes of affluence, and a tendency to shop impulsively, yes even online. They have a unique profile (catch them marketers’) that presents a promising opportunity for online retailers to engage and woo them on a regular basis. So what are the common points that define such consumers –

For one, they spend more than others and shop spontaneously. Their behaviour is not driven only by affluence, but also because they are impulse shoppers, they  enjoy the whole experience of browsing the mall called the ‘internet’ and  like to discover the latest products conveniently, without even leaving their homes.

Secondly, FOB’s are big mouths when it comes to shopping. As much as they like to shop, they love to tell their friends about the products that interest them, give ratings and reviews of products or services, and voice their opinions on shopping. They also hear to similar sentiments voiced by their peer group and get guidance on their purchasing decisions.

Lastly, they are tech savvy (yo!) and experienced internet users. They embrace the web as their own, adopt new devices early on, and use the internet more than others. In fact 43% of FOB’s browse the web on their mobile phones on a weekly basis.

FOB’s Are More Likely to Use Their Mobiles for Commerce

Internet Marketing Vancouver

Frequent online buyers are already more likely to purchase products using a mobile phone. While adding to the convenience of shopping and purchasing spontaneously,   these buyers also access product information, review and store locators whenever they want.

Leading retailers have already begun to encourage mobile commerce through different approaches. The likes of Tesco, Albert Heijn and Zara provide fully established mobile website options. Others offer mobile applications to browse their catalogs, find stores, or make purchases. And still others are pushing relevant content with its iPhone app that shows weekly offers.

Mobile shoppers are also more likely to cut through multiple shopping categories online. With their access they not only research and purchase things like travel, gadgets, music or tickets – but also products like cosmetics, baby care, groceries, which are less penetrated eCommerce categories in most countries.

Using the Mobile Channel to Influence Decisions

Retailers looking to leverage the growing medium of mobile channel need to connect online behaviour to mobile behaviour, and subsequently build a strategy that facilitates mobile-driven, cross-channel shopping (all part of your internet marketing plan). For that they can start by –

  • Optimizing Website for Mobile Use: Mobile surfers expect to browse the web just as regular online users – they want information to function as neat and efficiently on their mobiles. Thus much of your online system should be optimized to include this offering.
  • Examine mobile apps that accentuate the unique features of the phone:  Give a mobile customer added value. Simply repurposing the website does not necessarily make a good app. If a customer is interested in conning via iPhone, give him a direct link to your websites iPhone app – that allows him to easily browse its catalog, wish-lists etc.  Look for features that specifically take advantage of phone capabilities such as GPS store locators, and cross-promote.
  • Push Relevant Content: Mobile Smartphone owners are usually always on the run – that’s one reason they actually possess a Smartphone isn’t it? This provides an opportunity to push content through the mobile channel. The busy consumers appreciate being notified of offers, in-store promotions, events and discounts, particularly when they are timely and relevant.
  • Encourage & Let Share: While optimizing your mobile website or building applications, incorporate functionalities that allow easy browsing for product ratings and reviews, rating buttons for products, Facebook “Like” buttons, or links to forward product pages to friends. FOBS’s like to express opinions and are influenced by ratings and reviews when shopping.
  • A  Functional Channel Connector: Cross-channel activities such as locating nearby stores, checking its timings, or comparing prices are most popular mobile commerce activities indulged by FOBs. You could consider building mobile applications that allows them for instance, build grocery shopping lists based on the items they frequently purchase or track their online orders from a mobile phone. Some great innovations can be done here!  Further, you can try to optimize the experience for mobile phone screens, especially the payment procedure. Mobile-friendly & secure  payment options helps ease the process of payments while promoting functional user experience.

Hence, new-age interactive marketers are surely to reign the first set of true mobile marketers, creating specific mobile search and display media buying plans, while scrutinizing one-offs like campaign-based apps to provide additive business value.

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Optimizing to Improve your Quality Score

Pooja Mehra
Written by Pooja Mehra
on November 15, 2011

For search marketers to compete in a competitive pay-per-click landscape and curtail keyword price inflation, campaigns must evolve with search algorithms that increasingly take into account site-side factors such as landing page relevance.

We all know that Google’s got this “quality score” (QS) thing – that matters. And it has evolved beyond simple auction-based price and CTRs. Adwords uses this on a scale of 1 to 10 to rate how good your ad is while matching to a search query or relevant it is as compared to others ads, and the more it assumes significance, the less you’ll get charged for each click.

Most of the time Google’s quality score bot does a reasonably good job while sweeping its index, but sometimes to make better of your campaign, it needs to be pointed in the right direction. To do that, optimizing your web page semantically and structuring documents logically are useful tactics at your disposal.

Let’s first quickly review the factors involved into quality score calculation. There are two different quality scores Google associates with each keyword in a campaign. The first determines –

  • The minimum bid amount using a keyword’s CTR
  • The relevance of the keyword to its ad group
  • Landing page quality
  • Account’s historical performance
  • + other factors that are not publicly disclosed

A second score is assigned for an ad’s position in the results and is determined by a keyword’s CTR, the relevance of the keyword and ad to its respective search query, as well as the account’s historical performance. Google applies these metrics to weed out poorly performing keywords, which helps deliver targeted and relevant ads to the search engine’s users while eliminating the noise caused by spam ads and unrelated offers.

Assuming that your landing page loads normally – CTR can be attributed as the single biggest determinant of QS. In other words,

Fantastic CTR = Great QS

How to Improve Your Quality Score

Quality score improves when an account has its campaigns, ad groups, and keywords thematically aligned with each other.

Weed out the Good from the BAD

If an existing account has a history of poorly performing keywords, and even if marketers isolated those keywords, deleted them or simply added them elsewhere in the account, Google while performing a sweep of the account’s history with reassign the same quality score to these previously deleted keywords. Therefore, marketers must adopt various best practices when establishing new accounts, and consider starting from scratch (in a new account)

Carefully Craft your Strategy

Marketers should carefully craft their ads, ensuring that keywords associated with these ads are embedded within ad copy and that ads correlate to their respective ad groups in a tightly bound and cohesive fashion. For this you need to split Keywords into smaller more targeted Ad Groups.

For example, a jewelery retailer with an AdWords account might have one campaign for Fashion Jewellery, with ad groups broken down into various looks as well as keywords with colors or other descriptive keyword phrases. A second campaign might be dedicated to High-end jewellery, with ad groups broken down into colored stones and gold categories as well as keywords with brand or cut types. This strategy not only is favorably looked at by search engines and guarantees improved rankings, but also facilitates management of accounts that are coherently structured and well organized.

Optimizing Landing Pages to Improve Quality Scores

When optimizing (SEO) your landing pages, think of the inverted pyramid.  That means the most important information should be at the top of the page: your title tag, meta description, and the first paragraph of content that are highly prioritized by Google. Besides, the following points will act as a checklist to help optimize your landing page -

  • Cautiously isolate variables when adding (or removing) from landing pages.
  • Equal landing page creative with scope and quality of offers.
  • Match landing page content with ad copy to enable seamless flow.
  • Enable quickly loading landing pages because slow loading pages are penalized.
  • Remember that only exact matches count, meaning there is no need to optimize for every phrase.
  • Seed title tags, and optimize metadata to match keyword phrases in the landing page’s respective ad groups.
  • Employ day-parting to focus on seasonally higher-demand conversion periods.
  • Entirely avoid pop-ups.
  • Use paid content links (e.g., AdSense), but never preceding initial content.

Modify Your CTR

Make sure your ad copy laser-targeted.  Match it to the specific keywords the user searches for, and repeat those words throughout the ad. The ads should make sense and capitalize the first word of each word, excluding prepositions, conjunctions etc.

Following a top-down linear progression throughout their accounts, marketers can succeed, regardless of budget. No one solution-fits-all QS. So determine if campaigns and their respective keywords are consistent in theme with each ad groups within them, if ad copy is consistent with keywords associated with ads, and if landing pages are relevant to ad copy and keywords. You’re typically rewarded with good Quality Score when you strive to build a strong account history with relevant ads that point to good landing pages.

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‘Over-the-Top’ Video Consumption on the Rise

Christina Svetia
Written by Christina Svetia
on October 24, 2011

Gone seem the days when TV set was the main source of attraction in home entertainment. Media usage- as rapidly as it is changing today has more internet-enabled devices and screens to keep one’s mind and body glued. Consumers’ digital media habits are shifting significantly – and perhaps beyond recall – away from the TV set – now beholds the advent of Video delivered “over-the-top” via the internet. (Content that is delivered via broadband streaming or download)

Think of this, in a typical week, 10% of all U.S. adults watch streaming content online such as videos, TV programs and movies. In fact consumers can’t seem to get enough video; this percentage has doubled in just the last two years. In addition, when it comes to watching online streaming video – similar is the case. This medium is becoming ever more popular amongst adults of all ages.  And to keep up the rising demand, in turn, specialized video content websites are seen multiplying and traditional media websites such as NBC.com. ABC.com etc continue to move towards streaming video content, including full episodes of popular TV shows online.

Shifting Grounds

The potential loss of cable TV subscriptions is felt most acutely by the TV networks and content providers, but the challenges and barriers to duplicating the cable experience via the internet are still numerous and it would take some time before it makes a significant impact on TV viewership.

With an average home consuming space with quite a few screens that are used simultaneously and multifariously, the Nielsen Company in a report traced that digital video recorded (DVR) and other time shifted television is watched at double the pace as video online at 7 hours, 11 minutes per month.  Further, data showed that mobile video has grown stupendously, up to 11 million Americans consuming it each quarter, an increase of 9% versus the previous quarter.

Well, much of this growth can be attributed to increased mobile content and the rise of the mobile web as a viewing option. Everyone owns a Smartphone these days and, tablet ownership is not far behind. Each of these devices affords a different video viewing experience and has made viewers to consume content on the go.

Soaring Over-the-Top…Sort Of

Netflix now has more than 23 million subscribers, adding 3.6 million in Q1 2011 alone. When you account for Hulu Plus, Bamboom, Amazon and others, you realize the impetus is pointing to this direction – when consumers can get the same or similar content for little or no cost online any time they choose, why not stop paying for traditional media.

In fact some 15% of all US TV households rely solely on over-the-air digital broadcast signals, according to Knowledge Networks, representing more than 17 million households and 45.6 million people.

Further, Informa Telecoms & Media estimated that 4.5 million consumers worldwide will drop their pay-TV service for over-the-top video in 2011—a number that will reach 16.1 million in 2015.

But all is not rosy and glowing if you see the limitations of it. There are some serious consumer frustrations from around the world including – high cost of downloading video, the extra time spent buffering, downloading and then playing the video , the somewhat unpleasing ads that accompanied some video and, poor quality of non-HD video.

Consumers are certainly becoming aware of alternative video services, but most are adding them to their video-viewing repertoire, not replacing entire delivery systems. If the content turns to be more professional, the more amenable consumers are to paying for it.

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