UNIT 1 Introduction to Digital Marketing

Digital marketing encompasses all marketing efforts that use an electronic device or the
internet. Businesses leverage digital channels such as search engines, social media, email, and
their websites to connect with current and prospective customers.

Marketing has always been about connecting with your audience in the right place and at the
right time. Today, that means you need to meet them where they are already spending time: on
the internet.

Enter digital marketing — in other words, any form of marketing that exists online.

Digital marketing is defined by the use of numerous digital tactics and channels to connect
with customers where they spend much of their time: online. From the website itself to a
business’s online branding assets — digital advertising, email marketing, online brochures, and
beyond — there’s a spectrum of tactics that fall under the umbrella of “digital marketing.”

The best digital marketers have a clear picture of how each digital marketing campaign
supports their overarching goals. And depending on the goals of their marketing strategy,
marketers can support a larger campaign through the free and paid channels at their disposal.

A content marketer, for example, can create a series of blog posts that serve to generate leads
from a new ebook the business recently created. The company’s social media marketer might
then help promote these blog posts through paid and organic posts on the business’s social
media accounts. Perhaps the email marketer creates an email campaign to send those who
download the ebook more information on the company.

Scope and Importance

Digital Marketing industry is booming not just in India but all parts of the world. The year
2016 took the industry by surprise with over 1.5 lakh job opportunities in the Digital Marketing
domain. Well, the following was a bigger surprise when only the first quarter of 2017 marked
for 8 lakh job opportunities.

The surveys conducted by several forums have predicted this number to grow with
Digitalisation in the nation. Our Prime Minister has been actively promoting the idea of Digital
India. PM Modi’s digital India campaign gained massive popularity. The initiative of
Government of India is aimed at providing easy services to its natives.

Now imagine when a nation’s government is promoting the digital interaction, what do you
think will be the Digital Marketing scope in that nation.

The Digital Marketing industry is at its peak at the moment due to many reasons, take a
look at some of them:

It is the newest thing in town

Hasn’t the internet driven all of us crazy? well, it sure has. There was a time when a new serial
on the TV used to be the hot topic whereas today, the online posts or a new music video on
YouTube grabs our attention. What is this? this is a shift in the choice and preferences. Digital
media is gaining mass attention because of the fresh air it has got with itself. It’s like living in
a new era. We are experiencing a revolution, while we are shifting from the traditional to the
Digital media.

It is flexible

Since the entire work is to be done on the internet, there is no restriction of the place. It doesn’t
matter if you are at the office or at home. All you need is a device that is connected to the
internet and you are sorted. Yes, it is actually that easy. Do you want to check your bank
balance? do it on your smart phone. Want to book movie tickets? pick up your smartphone and
book! This is the digital age, everything is available at your fingertips.

It is easy

Accessing the digital media is no rocket science. It is a piece of cake. The newest of users also
take a maximum of few days to learn how to operate the digital media. This is purely because
it is designed in such a user-friendly manner that its primary objective is to ease the operations
for human beings, the reason why our mobile phones are now called smartphones.

Eco- friendly

Being responsible citizens of the world it is important that we operate through mediums that
do not harm our atmosphere cause being ignorant to the atmosphere will only have an adverse
effect on us. The digital media additionally cuts down on paper usage. We operate the digital
media over the internet and thus can save ourselves a lot of hustle in terms of hard work, long
process of work and all the other drawbacks of using the traditional medias.

Fastest Reach

Previously radio was considered to have the fastest reach because of the live communication
feature. Radio is still the medium with the widest reach but the new media is gradually
overshadowing the most popular medias like a newspaper, television, etc.
Today, you post anything online and it gets trending within a few hours. This is because the
number of users of the digital media are touching heights with each passing day.

Influential

The man kind is used to being influenced by whatever is trending the most. The virtual media
has not fallen short of influencing the masses of its own new style. The social media occupying
the most space has infused itself so well in the lives of the users that it is like the early morning
newspaper that is a must. Only this newspaper is carried forward all day long (pun intended).

Job Opportunities

The massive user engagement calls for more and more job opportunities. The employment
sector has seen a major share of jobs generated by the Digital Marketing Industry. The statistics
show that the total number of job opportunities in the Digital Marketing industry to cross 8
lakh job in 2017. The career scope in Digital Marketing seems attractive to masses and that is
the reason why many professionals are learning this course to enter the industry.

High engagement

It is true that the traditional media are being completely overshadowed by the internet- led
Digital Marketing due to high engagement factors. The brands and companies have begun to
give extra emphasis to the ad campaigns run on the internet over television ads. The revolution
is here!

Small investments and big Returns

Digital Marketing ad campaigns ask for a very little amount of investments as compared to
television and print ads. The high ROI is attractive enough to draw the attention of the
marketers and advertisers.

Measure immediate results

An advertiser running a social media campaign can easily measure the performance of the
campaign in real time without waiting for long intervals. The leads generated and online
purchases are a direct measure of the performance of the campaign.

The campaign is run over the internet and the performance is measured in real time what can
be better than this for a business?

There must be many more reason to the list of why Digital Marketing industry is at its peak
but we will move further from here to briefly discuss the scope of Digital Marketing jobs in
India.

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Internet Vs. Traditional Marketing Communications

To clarify the terms, the use of print ads on newspapers and magazines is a simple example
of traditional marketing. Other examples include flyers that are put in mailboxes, commercials
both on TV and radio and billboards. On the other hand, when a business invests on building a
website, advertising the brand name through different social media such as Facebook, Twitter and
YouTube, this kind strategy is called digital marketing.

Benefits of Traditional Marketing

You can easily reach your target local audience. For example, a radio ad might play in one
location: your city or region. Or mailbox flyers will go to households in a select number of suburbs.

The materials can be kept. The audience can have a hard copy of materials of which they can
read or browse through over and over again.

It’s easy to understand. It can be easily understood by most people because they are already
exposed to this kind of strategy.

Neuroscience seems to support the benefits of hard copy marketing. A study sponsored
by Canada Post and performed by Canadian neuro-marketing firm TrueImpact compared the
effects of paper marketing (direct mail pieces, in this case) with digital media (email and display
ads).

The technologies used in this study were eye-tracking and high resolution EEG brain wave
measurement. The three key metrics evaluated in the study were cognitive load (ease of
understanding), motivation (persuasiveness), and attention (how long subjects looked at the
content).

Direct mail was easier to process mentally and tested better for brand recall. According to the
report,

Direct mail requires 21% less cognitive effort to process than digital media (5.15 vs. 6.37),
suggesting that it is both easier to understand and more memorable. Post-exposure memory tests
validated what the cognitive load test revealed about direct mail’s memory encoding capabilities.
When asked to cite the brand (company name) of an advertisement they had just seen, recall was
70% higher among participants who were exposed to a direct mail piece (75%) than a digital ad
(44%).

The Downside to Traditional Marketing

There is very little interaction between the medium used and the customers. It is more of
providing information to the public that the brand exists with the hope of these people patronizing
the brand.

Print or radio advertisements can be very costly. Printing materials can be expensive and you
need to hire people to distribute these.

Results on this marketing strategy cannot easily be measured. Was the campaign
successful?

Benefits of Digital Marketing

You can target a local audience, but also an international one. Further, you can tailor a
campaign to specific audience demographics, such as gender, location, age and interests. This
means your campaign will be more effective.
Your audience can choose how they want to receive your content. While one person likes to
read a blog post, another person likes to watch a YouTube video. Traditional marketing doesn’t
give the audience a choice. Most people hate receiving sales flyers in their mailbox or phone calls
at inconvenient times on stuff that they have little interest in. Online people get the choice to opt
in or out of communications and often it is relevant because they were the ones searching for it in
the first place. Don’t underestimate the power of market segmentation and tailored marketing.

Interaction with your audience is possible with the use of social media networks. In fact,
interaction is encouraged. Traditional marketing methods don’t allow for audience interaction. You
can encourage your prospects, clients and followers to take action, visit your website, read about
your products and services, rate them, buy them and provide feedback which is visible to your
market.

Digital marketing is cost-efficient. Though some invest on paid ads online; however, the cost is
still cheaper compared to traditional marketing.

Data and results are easily recorded. With Google Analytics and the insights tools offered by
most social media channels, you can check on your campaigns at any time. Unlike traditional
marketing methods, you can see in real time what is or is not working for your business online and
you can adapt very quickly to improve your results.

Level playing field: Any business can compete with any competitor regardless of size with a solid
digital marketing strategy. Traditionally a smaller retailer would struggle to match the finesse of
the fixtures and fittings of its larger competitors. Online, a crisp well thought out site with a smooth
customer journey and fantastic service is king – not size.

Real time results: you don’t have to wait weeks for a boost to your business like you would have
to waiting for a fax or form to be returned. You can see the numbers of visitors to your site and its
subscribers increase, peak trading times, conversion rates and much more at the touch of a button.

Brand Development: A well maintained website with quality content targeting the needs and
adding value to your target audience can provide significant value and lead generation
opportunities. The same can be said for utilising social media channels and personalised email
marketing.

Viral: how often do your sales flyers get passed around instantly by your customers and
prospects? Online, using social media share buttons on your website, email and social media
channels enables your message to be shared incredibly quickly. If you consider the average
Facebook user has 190 friends of which an average of 12% see their liked posts – your one
message has actually been seen by 15 new prospects. Now imagine a number of them also like
and share your message and their friends do the same? That’s why high-quality content is so
important.

So which kind of marketing is better?

Well, we would recommend both. Obviously, we are passionate about digital marketing, because
we know that it works. But we do use traditional marketing materials, too.

A 2009 study conducted by Bangor University and branding agency Millward Brown also used
fMRI to study the different effects of paper and digital media.

Some of their key conclusions were:

• Physical material is more “real” to the brain. It has a meaning, and a place. It is better connected
to memory because it engages with its spatial memory networks.
• Physical material involves more emotional processing, which is important for memory and brand
associations.
• Physical materials produced more brain responses connected with internal feelings, suggesting
greater “internalization” of the ads.

How We Use Both Digital & Traditional Marketing

Our traditional marketing methods support our digital marketing efforts. The two do not operate in
exclusion from each other. But we only use hard copy marketing materials to further strengthen a
relationship with a contact, referral partner or client. We don’t invest in television or radio ads, for
example, but we will give brochures to someone who is interested in our services. Rather than
taking an all or nothing approach, it appears that a multi-channel approach that leverages the
unique benefits of paper with the convenience and accessibility of digital will perform best.

Internet Microenvironment
The environment under which organization functions determines how it will conduct its
business. Organizations have to constantly monitor and appraise the external business
environment. Organizations have to make changes in its operations in accordance to the
environment as to be profitable and effective. Therefore, understanding the business
environment is important before developing any marketing strategy.

Specific forces such as a market place, customers, organization, etc. which directly affects
organization are referred to as micro-environment.

The internet has made a direct impact on the micro-environment of the organization.

Market Place
The market place for an organization includes interaction between all the elements of the
micro-environment. There are five forces which impact organization in the marketplace.
The impact of internet on the five forces is as follows:

Bargaining Power of Customers: with the advent of the internet, customers have wider
choices of products than before. The increase in competition has reduced the price level
as customer demand more transparency in operations. Thus the bargaining power of
customers has increased.

Bargaining Power of Suppliers: again with wider choice due to the internet. The
bargaining power of the supplier has gone down

Threats of substitute: the internet has enabled quicker introduction of products and
services. The organization must carefully observe the introduction of substitute in the
market as to avoid losing market share.

Barriers to entry: the internet has substantially reduced establishment costs, especially
in the services industry. Therefore, organization has to carefully observe the movement
of the new entrants in the market.
Competition: the internet has started the trend of faster commoditization of products.
Thus companies need to find new ways through which it can differentiate itself from
competition.

Customers
An organization’s success is dependent on strong customer base. Therefore, customer
needs and requirements require a better understanding from the organization. A
qualitative and quantitative analysis needs to be developed by the company to track
consumer behavior and create more consumer insights. These consumer insights can be
used by marketing groups to develop specific strategies.

Companies are using demand analysis to understand and determine the potential of the
new business proposition among customers. Companies also deploy qualitative analysis
to understand perception of a consumer towards new products and services.

After assessing demand and perception among consumer for the products and services,
companies develop marketing communication to target specific potential customers and
convert them to actual customers. This conversion marketing technique helps companies
improve their customer base.

Online sites track the way consumer navigates to reach particular destination or buying
decision. This helps companies to design better websites. The internet search engines
are the first stop for many consumers to begin searching for a particular product or service.
Hence it is important to understand the phrases or sentence consumers are using to reach
a particular product or service.

Companies divide consumer into a particular group or segment based upon their
demographics and psychographics.

Online Buying Behavior

It is very important for an organization to understand how the internet works in a multiple
channel scenario. Thus, companies develop different models to understand online buying
behavior.

Companies have started creating personas which summarize the customer needs,
requirements and environment based on their internet usage. Based on this persona,
companies develop a customer scenario. This customer scenario is series of task or path
taken to come at a desired buying decision.

This customer scenario is part of the overall buying experience and it involves multiple
channel partners. Therefore multi-channel strategies have to be built in assessing overall
customer online buying behavior.

Competitors
Online business is dynamic in nature. Therefore, it is important for organizations to monitor
usage of the internet by the competition. The internet is the new medium through which
companies undertake the task for customer retention and acquisition.
This dynamism has introduced new services and innovative marketing mix more
frequently compared to traditional marketing techniques. Benchmarking also has become
dynamic and cannot be considered one of, activity, but has to be continuous.

The strategies of traditional competitor are well known. However, with the internet and
globalization, new entrants are always posing a constant competition to the organization.

Companies for benchmarking should analyze competitor’s web site, identify the current
trends and keep an eye on future trends.

Suppliers
Total customer satisfaction is the key in developing long and fruitful relationship with
consumers. Therefore, it becomes important for the organization to monitor supplier, as
they do affect quality or experience for customers.

Intermediaries
Marketing intermediaries are companies which help the organization sell, promote and
distribute products and services in the market. For internet marketing, there are online
intermediary websites. These intermediary websites work as a platform between
consumers and business suppliers. The online social networks also act as an
intermediary. They provide a platform which facilitates collaboration and exchange
between various individuals.

The companies need to maintain constant watch on the internet environment. This will
help organization respond to ever changing and evolving internet micro environment.

Use of B2C and B2B internet Marketing

While business-to-business and business-to-consumer Internet marketing strategies are two
different animals, in that one model targets businesses and the other consumers, the benefits
that B2B and B2C provide to marketers are about the same. In short, both models help
businesses increase sales in an increasingly competitive marketplace. In 2012, in the United
States the number of potential Internet buyers in this increasingly competitive marketplace
reached a new peak: 245 million potential buyers online.

Increased Awareness
With over six billion Internet users across the world, it’s obvious why B2B and B2C Internet
marketing increases awareness of businesses and their products or services. More than that,
with more B2B and B2C companies marketing themselves on the Internet, marketers are in a
better position to pick up details about their competition. Additionally, with the advent of the
social networking explosion, more business and consumer patrons are voicing their opinions
about various products and services. This gives marketers even more empowering info about
what the market is thinking – knowledge they wouldn’t have if they themselves weren’t using
the Internet.
Better Interaction
The social network explosion, in addition to email and website marketing, also gives marketers
the ability to interact more directly with their customers, whether businesses or consumers. An
important part of this interaction is educating customers, either as a group or as individuals.
Marketing strategists at the firm Customer Paradigm cite business authors Margaret Clark and
Carol Pearson, who say that educated customers will buy more than confused ones. So whether
it’s marketing via email, podcasts, a website or social networks, marketers who are interactive
on the Web increase their authority in the marketplace – another advantage from using the
Internet.

Better Service
Better education relates to better service. In the days of mom-and-pop stores, customer service
usually meant the interaction you got once you walked in the store, when what you ordered
was delivered to your doorstep or when you called via telephone. Now that more B2B and B2C
companies are using the Internet, though, they’re providing marketing websites on which
customers can make contact when they have questions or concerns, and they’re sending
informative emails that don’t merely advertise but also inform their customers with practical
information. This means that customers, ideally, are getting much more robust service.

Refined Messaging
The Internet has also provided marketers with more specific information about their customers,
such as when they’re more receptive to receiving an advertising message. Armed with this
knowledge, some B2B and B2C companies use a marketing method called “right-time
marketing.” According to business analyst firm Garner, Inc., the statistics are too compelling
to ignore: strategically timing email marketing messages will help marketers see as much as a
600 percent rise in performance over more lax messaging methods, such as email blasts and
cold calling.

Internet Marketing Strategy

The internet is considered as a channel partner. Hence online marketing is to be
considered as a channel marketing strategy. An Organization needs to define specific
objective from internet marketing and building communications as well as scheme around
it.

Internet marketing is one form customer touch point where companies directly interact
with existing as well as potential customers.

Integrated Strategy
The biggest challenge for the companies is to integrate internet marketing strategy with
overall marketing strategy. The prime reason for this challenge is the thought process that
has considered internet as an independent entity. Many organizations have not made an
effort to make internet as any function of the organization.

The internet is a new channel partner for many organizations. Therefore, it is essential
that companies create separate the internet marketing plan. As companies begin to
 understand the full potential of internet marketing, a separate internet marketing plan may
not be required. The overall marketing plan now will be developed considering the
strategic advantage of internet marketing.

Strategy Building
Every company needs to develop a logical framework for its operations as to meet its
business objectives. The overall business objectives need to be broken to milestones, the
company has to achieve within a certain time frame. To achieve these milestones,
companies need to develop strategies around the key activities.

One of the key activities is in strategy development is marketing. The strategy developed
to achieve business objectives through marketing is called as a marketing plan.

An internet marketing strategy building begins with understanding the current market
scenario. After analyzing market scenario, companies develop marketing plan and specific
internet related objectives. To achieve internet channel objectives, companies develop the
internet marketing plan. After developing and defining internet marketing plan, the next
step is to analyze the online presence of the company. The company can start working
towards implementation of marketing strategy, if it already has an online presence.

A strategy would be considered incomplete, if there is no continuous monitoring of the

same. A strategy modified and re-worked based on positive or negative feedback.

Strategy Review
An organization functions in a dynamic environment. It needs to ascertain whether the
current marketing strategies are effective or they require some modification. This internal
marketing audit looks to resolve following key activities:

• A complete review of the internal capabilities of the company, process and resources.
• A complete review of the present market and the competition, including the micro and the
macro environment.
• A complete review of current internet contribution in the marketing plan.

Another aspect of the strategic review is to assess the current contribution of internet
marketing plan with other marketing activities. This can be done by understanding the
current internet marketing capability. The first step is to check whether company has its
own website. The next step is to check whether the website is registered with any online
business directory. The next step is to create the website with a basic company and
product information. The next step is making the site interactive where a potential
customer is able to place further enquires. The next step is to develop the website which
is capable of e-commerce activities as well as customer service desk. The final step is to
develop a full functional website which can help the company in marketing as well as
relationship building.

Goal Setting
Any marketing strategy or plan should be constructed to support the overall business
objective of the company. Companies have a general tendency of developing the internet
 marketing plan away from the overall marketing plan. Companies have resorted to
experimentation in internet marketing plan rather than a focused approach.

This lack of clarity in the internet marketing plan has led to many failures with companies
suffering from financial loss.

Integration of the internet can be done through scenario based analysis. In the scenario
based analysis various market simulations are created to explore different possibilities.
The internet marketing role in all scenarios needs to be explored to take the full advantage.

The financial benefits of internet marketing would be through increased sales and better
topline growth. The internet marketing would also help in customer service, by
development easy self-help guides, thus reducing overhead cost.

The intangible benefits of internet marketing would be a better corporate image, enhanced
visibility, customer relationships, better customer service etc.

Strategy Formulation
The internet is considered as a channel partner for the company and therefore it should
be part channel marketing strategy. It is important for the internet marketing strategy
considers the following:

• The strategy developed should outline objectives which generate leads and sales from
this channel.
• The strategy should target the customers which are users of the internet.
• The strategy supports the customer in making the buying decision as well as delivering
the product.
• The strategy should highlight differentiation from competition.
• The strategy should encourage consumers to use the internet along with channels.
• The strategy should help in customer acquisition as well as retention.

Implementation
The company needs to ascertain various pros and cons of internet marketing strategies
before implementation of one particular strategy. With finite resources companies look for
solutions which are implementable.

To implement an online marketing strategy, companies have various marketing

applications. Companies need to maintain portfolio of these applications and make a
careful selection depending upon risk and reward.

Post implementation it is important to maintain tracker of the strategy. These trackers are
frequently centered on, visitor tracking, lead generation, online sales and finally customer
retention.

Development of internet marketing strategy should follow the same path as that of any
marketing strategy, without forgetting uniqueness that the internet brings to the company.

Types
• Display Advertising: The use of banner ads and other graphical advertisements to
market products online.
• Search Engine Marketing: Using search engines to help connect users with the products
and services they are most interested in. Companies can pay to receive preferential
ranking in a list of search results.
• Search Engine Optimization: A free and organic way for companies to improve their
visibility on search engines.
• Social Media Marketing: Using sites like Facebook and Twitter to connect with
customers.
• Email Marketing: Communicating with customers through the use of carefully designed
emails.
• Referral Marketing: Using internet channels to encourage consumers to recommend
products to their friends and families.
• Affiliate Marketing: Working with other businesses to make it easier for consumers to
shop for products online.
• Inbound Marketing: Boosting the value of a company’s web presence by adding unique
content like blogs, games, and tutorial videos.
• Video Marketing: Using web videos for promotional purposes.
 UNIT 2 Online Buyer Behaviour and Models

The Marketing Mix. (7 P’s) in online context

The 4Ps were designed at a time where businesses were more likely to sell products,
rather than services and the role of customer service in helping brand development wasn’t
so well know. Over time, Booms and Pitner added three extended ‘service mix P’s’:
Participants, Physical evidence and Processes, and later Participants was renamed
People. Today, it’s recommended that the full 7Ps of the marketing mix are considered
when reviewing competitive strategies.

The 7Ps helps companies to review and define key issues that affect the marketing of its
products and services and is often now referred to as the 7Ps framework for the digital
marketing mix.
 Although it’s sometimes viewed as dated, we believe the 4Ps are an essential strategy
tool to select their scope and is particularly useful for small businesses. For startups
reviewing price and revenue models today, using the Business Model Canvas for
marketing strategy is a great alternative since it gives you a good structure to follow.

Companies can also use the 7Ps model to set objectives, conduct a SWOT analysis and
undertake competitive analysis. It’s a practical framework to evaluate an existing
business and work through appropriate approaches whilst evaluating the mix element as
shown below and ask yourself the following questions:

• Products/Services: How can you develop your products or services?

• Prices/Fees: How can we change our pricing model?
• Place/Access: What new distribution options are there for customers to experience our
product, e.g. online, in-store, mobile etc.
• Promotion: How can we add to or substitute the combination within paid, owned and
earned media channels?
• Physical Evidence: How we reassure our customers, e.g. impressive buildings, well-
trained staff, great website?
• People: Who are our people and are there skills gaps?
• Partners: Are we seeking new partners and managing existing partners well?.

An example of a company using the 7Ps strategy

Take a look at HubSpot as an example, which was founded in 2006; Hubspot has 8,000+
customers in 56 countries and sells software. What does their marketing mix look like?

This is a top level overview; you would take this into greater detail and ask the following
questions:

8. Products/Services: Integrated toolset for SEO, blogging, social media, website, email
and lead intelligence tools.
9. Prices/Fees: Subscription-based monthly, Software-As-Service model based on number
of contacts in database and number of users of the service.
10. Place/Access: Online! Network of Partners, Country User Groups.
11. Promotion: Directors speak at events, webinars, useful guides that are amplified by SEO
and effective with SEO. PPC Social media advertising, e.g. LinkedIn.
12. Physical Evidence: Consistent branding across communications.
13. Processes: More sales staff are now involved in conversion.
14. People: Investment in online services.
15. Partners: Hubspot looks to form partnerships with major media companies such as
Facebook and Google plus local partners including Smart Insights who it is collaborating
with on research in Europe.

Managing the online customer experience

1. Create a clear customer experience vision
The first step in your customer experience strategy is to have a clear customer-focused vision
that you can communicate with your organization. The easiest way to define this vision is to
create a set of statements that act as guiding principles.
 For example, Zappos use their Zappos core family values and these values are embedded into
their culture; which includes delivering wow through service, be humble and embracing
change.

Once these principles are in place, they will drive the behavior of your organization. Every
member of your team should know these principles by heart and they should be embedded into
all areas of training and development.

2. Understand who your customers are

The next step in building upon these customer experience principles is to bring to life the
different type of customers who deal with your customer support teams. If your organization
is going to really understand customer needs and wants, then they need to be able to connect
and empathize with the situations that your customers face.

One way to do this is to create customer personas and give each persona a name and
personality. For example, Anne is 35 years old; she likes new technology and is tech savvy
enough to follow a video tutorial on her own, whereas John (42 years old) needs to be able to
follow clear instructions on a web page.

By creating personas, your customer support team can recognize who they are and understand
them better. It’s also an important step in becoming truly customer centric.

3. Create an emotional connection with your customers

You’ve heard the phrase “it’s not what you say; it’s how you say it”?

Well, the best customer experiences are achieved when a member of your team creates an
emotional connection with a customer.

One of the best examples of creating an emotional connection comes from Zappos, when a
customer was late on returning a pair of shoes due to her mother passing away. When Zappos
found out what happened, they took care of the return shipping and had a courier pick up the
shoes without cost. But, Zappos didn’t stop there. The next day, the customer arrived home to
a bouquet of flowers with a note from the Zappos customer service team who sent their
condolences.

Research by the Journal of Consumer Research has found that more than 50% of an experience
is based on an emotion as emotions shape the attitudes that drive decisions.

Customers become loyal because they are emotionally attached and they remember how they
feel when they use a product or service. A business that optimizes for an emotional
connection outperforms competitors by 85% in sales growth.

And, according to a recent Harvard Business Review study titled “The New Science of
Customer Emotions“, emotionally engaged customers are:

• At least three times more likely to recommend your product or service

• Three times more likely to re-purchase
• Less likely to shop around (44% said they rarely or never shop around)
• Much less price sensitive (33% said they would need a discount of over 20% before they would
defect).

4. Capture customer feedback in real time

How can you tell if you are delivering a wow customer experience?

You need to ask – And ideally you do this by capturing feedback in real time. Post-interaction
surveys and similar customer experience tools can be delivered using a variety of automated
tools through email and calls.

And of course, it’s even possible to make outbound calls to customers in order to gain more
insightful feedback.

It’s important to tie customer feedback to a specific customer support agent, which shows every
team member the difference they are making to the business.

5. Use a quality framework for development of your team

By following the steps above, you now know what customers think about the quality of your
service compared to the customer experience principles you have defined. The next step is to
identify the training needs for each individual member of your customer support team.

Many organizations assess the quality of phone and email communication, however, a quality
framework takes this assessment one step further by scheduling and tracking your teams
development through coaching, eLearning and group training.

6. Act upon regular employee feedback

Most organizations have an annual survey process where they capture the overall feedback of
your team; how engaged they are and the businesses ability to deliver an exceptional service.

But, what happens in the 11 months between these survey periods?

Usually, nothing happens. And this is where continuous employee feedback can play a role
using tools that allow staff to share ideas on how to improve the customer experience and for
managers to see how staff is feeling towards the business.

For example, using project management software or social media tools, you can create a closed
environment where your organization can leave continuous feedback.

7. Measure the ROI from delivering great customer experience

And finally, how do you know if all this investment in your teams, process and technology are
working and paying off? The answer is in the business results. Measuring customer experience
 is one of the biggest challenges faced by organizations, which is why many companies use the
“Net Promoter Score” or NPS

1. Set your purpose and goals.

What is the purpose of your website? Is it to gain publicity for your business? To sell
your inventory? To rally support behind a cause? It’s important to identify your
website’s purpose, as well as your target audience. You should also define your
goals. How many visitors do you expect per month? How many do you expect will
sign up for your newsletter? How much in sales do you expect to make? Set
measurable, specific goals for your website that are in line with your marketing goals.
An analytics tool like Google Analytics will allow you to monitor your website’s
performance over time.

2. Create a budget.
Whether you’re an established, mid-sized organization or a fledgling start-up, you
should always set a budget for your website expenses. This will probably include
funds for web design, programming, and web hosting (though other expenses may
apply). Research the market by shopping around and consulting with professionals.
Don’t sell yourself short by comparing prices alone. What you save in money you
may later pay for with a lackluster site and lots of headaches. It’s better to choose
team members based on experience, insightfulness, references, and examples of
work.

3. Assign roles.

• Company stakeholders (owner, marketing manager, or whoever else represents a primary

function of the business)
• Web developer
• Content writer and/or editor
• HTML/CSS professional
• Web and graphic designer

Make sure everyone on your team knows their role and what is expected of them,
and that they stay abreast of deadlines and new developments.

4. Create a content strategy.

What kind of content will you be displaying on your website? Content is basically
anything that gives your visitors information. It can include, but is not limited to:

• Blog posts
• Documents
• Video
• Pictures (such as in a gallery)
• Slideshows
• Embedded social media feeds (such as your Twitter stream or Facebook page updates)

Your content strategy is the way that you plan to present your content over time. For
instance, when developing a blog strategy, you may want to publish two blog posts a
month, and put out a free quarterly report for your subscribers to download four
times a year. Since content is such a vital aspect of a website, bring in help if you
need it. Hire a writer who is experienced with writing for the web, and invest in some
professional looking pictures of your storefront and employees.

5. Structure your website.

Decide what pages you’ll be using and what features will be on each one. Most
websites have an About and Contact page, but the pages you use should meet your
business’ needs.

6. Create a mock-up.
A page mock-up, also know as a wireframe, is essentially the outline of your website
(with the initial design being the first draft). Usually created in Photoshop or
Fireworks, you don’t have to put too much detail into your mock-up. Use placeholder
text to fill pages, and don’t worry about details. This is just to give everyone an idea
of what the website will look like.

If you don’t have a design program, you can also map it out with pen and paper!
When you have a general feel of what you’d like, you can send it to a designer to
create or do so yourself.

7. Start designing.
The importance of good web design can’t be stressed enough. Good website design
includes both usability and aesthetics. An ugly website will drive away visitors, as will
a website that’s difficult to navigate. Keep in mind some basic concepts of usability
as you go:

• Make your navigation easy to understand and easy to find. Research shows that most users
expect website navigation to be vertical and centered at the top of the page.
• Use an easy-to-read font for blocks of text. Choose a background color and text color that
contrast well (Hint: No red text on a hot pink background).
• Make sure your site fits the screen. Use responsive design (or an equally effective approach) to
make your website one that adapts to all screen sizes.
• Keep your website light so that it loads quickly.
• Make the company logo and tag line prominent on the page.
• Keep styles and colors consistent across the website.
• Make copy clear and concise, and put important information and features (e.g., your newsletter
sign-up form) above the fold.
• Make notes about what to include in the style sheet as you design, as you want to keep style and
function separate. This is important, not only to comply with web standards, but to make it easier
to change something in the future if you need to.
• You should also design with the future in mind. For instance, your website may only have a few
blog posts now, but what about when you have two hundred?

8. Test it out.
Testing is important for getting out bugs out and catching details that you might have
missed initially. Make sure your website shows up the way you want it to in all
browsers, including Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, and mobile web browsers
like Safari and Opera Mini. Test it on your cell phone, your tablet, and your
colleague’s cell phones and tablets too. You want your site to have a consistent
appearance no matter what screen it shows up on. Make sure all of the links work,
that the images are properly sized, and that you’ve replaced all of the placeholders
with actual content. See to it that all of the forms and other input fields are working.

9. Maintain your site.

Once your site is launched, the work isn’t over. A website is an ongoing entity that
continuously represents your company, so maintenance is very important. Monitor
your analytics software to see how your website is performing with the public. Keep
an eye on metrics like your number of unique visitors, bounce rate, and which pages
are most popular on your website. You might find that certain metrics are more
useful to you than others, but that is information you’ll find out over time.

For me, steps to design a website requires 7 steps:

 1. Goal identification: Where I work with the client to determine what goals the
new website needs to fulfill. I.e., what its purpose is.
2. Scope definition: Once we know the site's goals, we can define the scope of
the project. I.e., what web pages and features the site requires to fulfill the
goal, and the timeline for building those out.
3. Sitemap and wireframe creation: With the scope well-defined, we can start
digging into the sitemap, defining how the content and features we defined in
scope definition will interrelate.
4. Content creation: Now that we have a bigger picture of the site in mind, we
can start creating content for the individual pages, always keeping search
engine optimization (SEO) in mind to help keep pages focused on a single
topic. It's vital that you have real content to work with for our next stage:
5. Visual elements: With the site architecture and some content in place, we can
start working on the visual brand. Depending on the client, this may already
be well-defined, but you might also be defining the visual style from the
ground up. Tools like style tiles, moodboards, and element collages can help
with this process.
6. Testing: By now, you've got all your pages and defined how they display to
the site visitor, so it's time to make sure it all works. Combine manual
browsing of the site on a variety of devices with automated site crawlers to
identify everything from user experience issues to simple broken links.
7. Launch: Once everything's working beautifully, it's time to plan and execute
your site launch! This should include planning both launch timing and
communication strategies — i.e., when will you launch and how will you let the
world know? After that, it's time to break out the bubbly.

Understanding site user Requirement

The first step in developing any eCommerce application is to interview the user base to
generate a list of featuresto be included in the application. This comprises the important input
for defining the capabilities of the application.

There are two sets of users of shopping cart applications: site administrators and end users who
purchase items using their Web browsers. After interviewing end users and administrators,
application requirements such as the following may be generated.

End User Requirements

End user features that facilitate the enjoyment of Internet shopping might include the
following:

• Users should be able to use the eCommerce application from any Web browser supporting
HTML 3.2 (or later) and cookies.
• Visitors new to the site should be able to register by themselves. Users will be differentiated
by unique user identifiers.
• Transactions should be secure. That is, a basic authentication mechanism must be built into the
application to prevent unauthorized persons from making transactions on a user’s behalf.
Secure socket layers (SSL) or other encryption mechanisms are typically used to thwart the
access of sensitive information (such as credit card numbers) sent to the server by Web
browsers.
• Site visitors should be able to purchase goods or services via the electronic store.
• Users should be able to view a complete list of specified items available through the site.
• Users should be able to search for items by related attributes. For example, visitors might search
for CDs by artist, album title and/or genre or search for books by author, title and/or ISBN
number.
• Site visitors should be able to search the database using relevant keywords to identify items of
interest.
• Users should be able to select items of interest and add them to their shopping carts for future
purchase.
• Visitors should be able to modify the quantities of items in and/or delete items from their
shopping carts before checkout.
• All selected items should be shipped to the user following purchase.
• Users should be able to view the status of items they have ordered.
• Large numbers of users should be able to use the application simultaneously.
• The performance of the application should not degrade with an increase in the number of goods
or services offered.

Site Design and Structure

A Web page’s structural elements are the basic parts that Internet users often expect to see
when they visit a website. Understanding the location and purpose of the main structures can
help you relay information about your small business and products or services in ways that
attract visitors and retain their interest.

Page Header
The header is the area that runs horizontally across the top of a page and is commonly the same
on most every page in the site. It helps make a website visually identifiable to visitors. Similar
to a letter heading or letterhead at the top of stationery, the page header displays information
about the person or company controlling the website via title text, logo, background images,
tagline or a combination of these elements. Other elements often placed in the header include
a site-search box, shopping cart link, site-access link and navigation tools.

Navigation Tools
Web-page navigation tools are located in several areas outside of the header including the right
or left sides, center or bottom of the page. They offer page-to-page navigation or instant jump
to the top of the current page. Designs feature text- or image-based one-click links organized
standalone or in tab, drop-down or pop-up menu and list layouts. Some sites also feature
breadcrumb trails — links to every page you would visit to reach the current page organized
left-to-right on a horizontal line in the header or top center of the page in the order of your
movement through the site, if you were to follow the site’s organizational hierarchy.

Sidebar Columns
Sidebar columns, also known as sidebars, run vertically along the left or right side of Web
pages. They usually provide primary or secondary site-navigation links and information you
want to emphasize such as contact details or important updates about the site operator or the
topic of the site. Other elements often placed in sidebars include personal or partner advertising,
a site search box and search filter tools. Sidebars usually display information as an unbroken
column or a column divided into sections or boxes.

Primary Content
The primary content area on a page is traditionally located to the left or right of a sidebar or
between two sidebars. It provides main page information you want a visitor to focus on. The
primary content area features a main title and content formatted into concise text paragraphs,
images, videos or combination elements divided by spaces or subheadings. It also often
features elements previously mentioned such as a breadcrumb trail and jump navigation links,
as well as update information such as content publication or update dates and links to websites
relevant to the content or that you think would interest visitors.

Page Footer
The footer runs horizontally across the bottom of pages. It provides navigation links visitors
might find useful, as well as details about a page or website such as a logo, copyright date,
website operator’s name, page author name, legal statements and links to the site terms of use
and privacy policies. Other elements often placed in the footer include links to the site
operator’s contact page or email address, job postings page, feedback-form page, support page
and frequently asked questions page.

Developing and Testing Content

Usability research helps organizations understand user needs, identify potential issues,
and generate ideas for improvement. While usability testing is often used to evaluate a
website’s user interface (UI), this method is also invaluable for discovering the best way
to present information on your website. By paying attention to how people read, interpret,
and access content, you gain a greater understanding of how to communicate, structure,
and format information.

It’s great when sites have good navigation. But too often we see the user experience fail
at the content level: People can navigate to the content but don’t understand it. Analysis
shows that people often use websites to collect, compare, and choose products or
services. Have users evaluate your digital copy so that articles and information match their
needs and expectations. People read online content differently than printed material.

The usability study methodologies for evaluating UI versus content are fairly similar.
However, there are nuances to the methodologies that are worth considering when the
primary goal of the usability study is evaluating digital copy.

Below are suggestions for how to get the most out of your research.

Tips for Testing Content on Websites

1. Avoid recruiting proxy users: In every usability study, you should always aim to test
your designs with representative users. However, when testing content, your recruiting
criteria should be even more stringent. Take extra care to recruit the right participants.

Those people evaluating the information on your site should truly be representative of your
user population: they should have the same mindset, situation, AND user goals. The
flexibility you have with recruitment depends on the use case and type of information on
your site. You may have some leeway with general e-commerce sites, but for content-
rich, research-intensive activities or for B2B websites, you must find people who fit the
exact circumstance.

In other words, the scenario that you give people should match the current problem they
need to solve. Unlike regular UI-focused studies, content-focused studies should not ask
test participants to “pretend” or “imagine” to be in a situation. The risk of invalidating the
study is much higher for content because the participants’ motivation is much more
important for obtaining accurate insights.

It is impossible for proxy users to instantly acquire knowledge or know the situation well
enough to assess the value of the content. For example, people who have just been
diagnosed with a serious medical condition are more likely to relate to the content
accurately than someone who is asked to pretend to be interested about a disease.

It’s not good enough to recruit participants who generally fit the demographic profile, such
as by age, gender, income level, and location. Such criteria are too broad to give you deep
insight. General recruitment criteria won’t cut it. You must find people who are actually in
the process of researching the information you are evaluating.

2. Be aware of the limitations of unmoderated studies: Unmoderated studies are done

without the facilitator present: Participants work on their own. This method can be useful
for getting user feedback on narrow parts of the site such as workflow or snippets of
information. However, when trying to discover how people conduct research, compare
offerings, and make decisions, the best approach is to conduct a moderated study, where
the facilitator is present.

Content studies tend to have long stretches of time when the user is simply scanning page
after page—in silence. When left alone (such as in an online unmoderated situation) users
may feel awkward and wonder whether they’re being helpful. Without proper feedback
and reassurance, participants often alter their behavior by approaching the task in a more
superficial manner. Task times are often shorter for online studies than in traditional test
settings. When on their own, participants assume that the goal is to work quickly, not
realistically.

Also, the facilitator can ask the user for clarifications. With unmoderated studies, you miss
opportunities to ask personalized, user-tailored follow-up questions. Even though
participants are instructed to think out loud, they often forget to explain their actions and
thoughts.

3. Give tasks that are tailored for each individual: In most traditional usability studies,
researchers follow a prepared script and give study participants prescripted tasks to
perform. For content testing minimize your reliance on a script. Spend time at the
beginning of each session to discuss the participant’s situation and make sure the task
 scenario matches their exact circumstance. It’s OK to prepare some more generic tasks
prior to the study, but be willing to modify or craft new ones on the spot as you learn more
about the participant’s situation, and as the session unfolds. You want to give participants
the freedom to research a topic as they please, so you uncover what’s important and
what’s not. Don’t rigidly control the activities or force an unrealistic task. The more
pertinent the tasks, the more vested people are at completing them.

The best results occur when study participants forget about the testing environment and
immerse themselves in the activity rather than merely going through the motions.
Participants can sometimes “fake” their way through simple pass or fail activities (e.g. Find
the contact name for Press Relations), but such is not the case for exploratory tasks where
having a scenario that precisely matches the person’s current situation and emotional
state is critical.

4. Remember, there is no right answer: Unlike well-specified tasks (e.g., “Find the opening
hours for the Fremont public library”), open-ended tasks don’t have a definitive answer.
Open-ended tasks are meant to assess content quality and relevance. Use this time to
learn how people explore and research, what questions they have, how they expect
information to be communicated, and whether your site meets their needs.

Consider competitive testing: Sometimes you can get insights into your users’ needs by
allowing them to search freely on the web or by letting them visit competitors’ sites rather
than restricting them to your own site. Don’t worry that you’re wasting precious testing
time: if users are truly representative, the insights will often be revelatory. And you can
always limit the free exploration to a small part of your session.

5. Set expectations for time allocations: Open-ended tasks have vague end points, often
leaving participants wondering how to best spend their time. At the beginning of reach
session, tell people to work at their own pace and not to worry about the time.
6. Get comfortable with silence: Expect long stretches of quiet time while the participant
focuses on processing the information. Don’t appear impatient. Avoid being interruptive
or fidgety. Injecting too many questions while users work breaks their concentration and
alters their behavior. If you need to ask a question mid-task, keep it neutral, such as “What
are you thinking?” or “What are you looking for?” Once users answer, let them continue.
Resist the temptation to blast questions. Save questions for the end. When user testing is
conducted well, users behave authentically and the study generates realistic findings.

Integrated internet Marketing

Communications (IIMC)
As search engines continue to change, so, too, must our strategies for maintaining
powerful online presences. Gone are the days where little one-off marketing techniques
made an impact. Now, the game is all about providing the user with an all-encompassing
experience online. In order to create this experience for your website’s visitors, you need
to combine a lot of digital strategies into an “integrated digital marketing” campaign.
 Integrated digital marketing is, as it sounds, the integration of multiple marketing strategies
to form a cohesive online approach for your business. Here’s what it typically entails:

• Web development and design

• Search engine optimization (SEO) and search engine marketing (SEM)
• Content marketing
• Social media marketing
• Local listings management
• Paid advertising (or pay-per-click advertising) campaigns

The idea behind integrated digital marketing is that, while each individual strategy doesn’t
have a huge impact on its own, when used in conjunction, you can create a more influential
online presence.

And it’s not just some passing fad. It’s pretty much the status quo when it comes to tackling
the digital realm. Of course, there are still one-off campaigns out there, but most agencies
are moving toward integrated solutions, as a well-rounded marketing strategy provides
better visibility and ROI for businesses online.

BUZZWORD OR LEGITIMATE SERVICE?

Make no mistake—integrated digital marketing is a legitimate service provided by digital

marketing agencies. But some agencies tout it as if it’s a unique service that you can only
get from them.

The fact is that most digital marketing agencies have their own form of integrated
marketing because it’s the most effective way to build an online presence. So don’t let the
buzzworthiness of an “integrated digital marketing plan” sway you to choose one agency
over another. Because, chances are, both of them probably offer that service. Instead,
when you’re choosing an agency, focus on what they bring to the table in terms of
resources and proven success. For more help with choosing the best firm, here’s a quick
guideline on how to avoid the wrong SEO firm.

Integrated digital marketing is most certainly the best way to build an online presence, but
don’t get caught up in how cool the term sounds—and don’t fall under the impression that
it’s a special offer at specific firms. Almost all marketing these days, digital especially, has
a great deal of integration involved.

Integrated Internet Marketing Communications

The internet becomes more effective if it is integrated with other marketing communications
of the company. The company has many channels through which it can communicate a clear
and distinct message to its target customers. The key characteristics of integrated
communications are as follows:

• Uniformity: All communications channels should be connected with each other.

• Consistency: All communications should be conveying the same message.
• Continuity: All communications over a period of time should be connected and same.
• Complementary: All communications channels should bring synergy to the whole marketing
campaign

Objective for interactive marketing communications

The interactive marketing communication should be supporting overall marketing objectives

of the company. However, the objectives of interactive marketing communications should be
as below:

• Online and offline promotion techniques should be used to attract visitors to the website. This
process is referred to as traffic building. However, this technique should be specific,
measurable, actionable, relevant, and time-bound.
• The on-site communications should be able to deliver the message that builds a certain
perception of the company. These messages should be relevant to the company’s product and
services.
• All marketing communications should be able to generate pre-determined online and offline
sales.

Offline Promotion Techniques

The use of traditional marketing media like TV, Radio, Posters, and Print for promotion
purpose is referred to as offline promotion techniques.

The distinct advantages of offline promotion techniques are as follows:

• Offline tools like TV, Radio, and Newspaper have far more reach, as they are used by all
consumers.
• Offline tools are able to create more visual appeal, hence impact is higher.
• Offline tools are able to create a more emotional connection using sound, visuals etc.

The disadvantages of offline promotion techniques are as follows:

• The cost of running an offline promotion is higher due to high competition and limited
resources.
• The percentage of wastage, which is the inability to reach correct customers, is higher in offline
promotion.
• The measurability and tracking of offline promotion technique are expensive as the company
needs to have dedicated resource for the same.
• As space and time availability is limited for offline promotion, information has to be very
concise.
• Personalization is difficult to achieve in offline promotion.
• Offline promotion is one way in nature and lacks the interactive element.

Online Promotion Techniques

The use of the internet channel in promotion techniques is referred to as online promotion. The
online promotion is referred to as traffic building exercise. The objective is to attract the
maximum amount of visitors and customers. Some of the tools used in online promotion
techniques are as follows:
Search Engine Marketing: the search engines are the key in directing traffic to the website.
This alone cannot be achieved through registration with the website. A Search engine
optimization technique where by using certain selected phrases and words, the company’s
website is placed higher in the search result, needs to be utilized. Pay per click is another
technique where the company’s website is listed on typing of certain phrases.

Online PR: the management of company image in the internet world is achieved through
online PR activities. The online PR objective is to increase favorable perception of the
company on the third party website, frequented by the customers. The online audience is more
connected to organizations as well as with each other. Hence online reputation management
becomes critical

Online Partnership: Partnership is very important in the current internet world. Companies
need to develop strategies to manage these online partnerships. Affiliate marketing, in which
e-retailers pay commission to third parties for sales creation, is a form of online partnership.

Interactive Advertising: The online advertisement takes place when an advertiser pays to
place its content on another’s website. However, each website can be considered as
advertisement in itself, as highlights to the customer about the company’s product and services.
Interactive advertisement should be able to deliver content for enabling e-commerce activities.

Email Marketing: Email plays an important role in online marketing communication

campaigns. Email marketing is used to reach directly to customers encouraging them to trial
and purchase of new products and services. Email marketing is also used to receive inquiries
from customers for any kind of support.

Viral Marketing: The usages of email to transmit promotional communication to potential

large number customers at one go by leveraging the internet is known as viral marketing.

On-Site Promotional Techniques: through traffic building exercise, visitors are attracted to the
website; however, it becomes important to convert them into consumers. This can be done
through on-site promotion via incentives, coupon, schemes etc.

Selecting the optimal communications mix

Companies have limited resources in terms of capital. It needs to develop communications plan
taking into consideration cost benefit analysis. Every communication techniques have its own
pro and cons. Companies needs to evaluate and chose communications which support its
overall marketing objectives.

Interactive marketing communications

Interactive marketing, sometimes called trigger-based or event-driven marketing, is a
marketing strategy that uses two-way communication channels to allow consumers to connect with
a company directly. Although this exchange can take place in person, in the last decade it has
increasingly taken place almost exclusively online through email, social media, and blogs.
As interactive marketing relies on having a means of open communication with customers, social
media channels have been a large part of this strategy, usually headed up by a company's
marketing or customer success departments. The most common application for interactive
marketing is using it as a lead generator in a sales funnel. Interactive marketing is nearly
inextricably linked to content marketing, so companies can produce audience-relevant content that
is shared many times, or "goes viral", and eventually establish themselves as an authority in their
particular industry. Consumers tend to trust those that are designated thought leaders in their
industry, so this strategy can bring in many inbound leads, coming through gated download pages,
for example, that they are nurtured via more content created specifically for them off of the
information they've previously shared.
Forms of interactive marketing
• Search Engine Marketing – This involves everything from optimizing a site so that
it shows up higher in search results, to placing targeted ads on the sides of results
pages.
• Email Marketing – Delivering ads, deals, and notifications through email is an
effective and economical way to communicate with customers.
• Sponsorships – Partnerships with companies that have a more established online
presence can be a great way to connect with new customers.
• Blogging – Fun, short form blog posts keep customers informed about new products,
special deals, and the culture behind a brand
• Widgets – Simple downloadable tools that are branded are a great way to create
additional value for that brand.
• Social Networking – Sites like Facebook and Twitter have millions of users and are
critical spaces for connecting with customers
• Targeting – Certain ads can be targeted at certain customers. When customers are
exposed to advertising that is relevant to their needs, they purchase more.
• Offline Activation – Companies must actively advertise their URL and Twitter handle
in offline environments so that customers can easily find them online.
Unit-3
Email Marketing
Email has become one of the most popular forms of communication. In 2010, there were
an estimated 90 trillion emails sent out worldwide. That breaks down to 2.8 million emails
sent every second. These numbers are gigantic, but not surprising when you consider
how important the mail in all forms has been throughout history.

But as the cost of postage and printing has risen, the effectiveness of marketing through
the mail has declined. Businesses now have to pay more while seeing smaller returns.
This is exacerbated by the fact that new communication tools provide many of the same
services that standard mail does. Although direct mail marketing has not disappeared by
any means, it has been on the decline for years.

As advertisers have shifted more and more of their efforts online, they have tried to find
ways to use the strategies developed in print advertising in new online environments. Most
of the traffic once handled by the postal service now happens over email, creating a new
method of direct marketing. Today, the average marketer sends 64 emails to their
customers every year.

Email marketing is, quite simply, using the tools of email to deliver advertising messages.
The vast majority of Internet users have email accounts which allow them to receive an
almost unlimited number of messages instantly. According to a survey conducted by Pew
Internet, 82% of U.S. adults use the Internet, and email is one of the fastest, cheapest and
easiest ways for marketers to connect with customers.

Email is a remarkably flexible tool that can accommodate a wide range of messages. Ads
can be quite simple, or they can be flashy, multimedia packages. The aesthetic of the ad
will depend on the company and the product for sale. Some ads are only text while others
include images, video, and long lists of links.

Email can accommodate almost any message a marketer wants to send. For instance,
UrbanDaddy.com, a nightlife website, ran a highly successful email marketing campaign
by including large, eye catching images in the header of the email. The images were
geared toward a young male demographic and gave the email context. They encouraged
 the reader to scroll down and engage with the sales messages contained in the body of
the email.

The email marketing industry has exploded over the last 15 years. In 2011, companies
spent $1.51 billion on email marketing efforts. In order to tap into this growth, a number of
companies have started to provide email marketing services to businesses large and
small. Below are some of the most popular providers.

• iContact
• Benchmark Email
• Constant Contact
• Pinpointe
• GetResponse
• Mailgen

Email Newsletters: These are regular emails that are sent to a list of subscribers who
have chosen to receive updates from a company. Newsletters usually don’t have explicit
sales messages, but try instead to build a relationship between a customer and a brand.
They often have a conversational tone and contain news and information that will be of
interest to the customer. The goal is to keep a customer connected to a company even
when they are not buying anything.

Transactional Emails: These are emails that are sent out after certain actions trigger
them. When a customer buys a product or makes a reservation, emails are sent out
confirming that transaction. They legitimize online commerce by giving customers a way
to prove they have bought something. Transactional emails often also contain new sales
messages. Studies have shown that transactional emails are opened 51.3% of the time,
while newsletters are only opened 36.6% of the time. Knowing that they have a captive
audience, marketers will often try to insert new sales pitches into emails that are not
explicitly for selling. For example, airline reservation emails often ask if you would like to
upgrade your seat for a fee.

Direct Emails: These are used to inform customers about new products, sales and
special offers. They provide customers with direct information about products and usually
provide a link or another easy way for customers to access the product. They are similar
to the coupons, catalogs, and sales fliers that used to be sent through the post office.

Email marketing is used most often by organizations with strong online presences.
Competition amongst e-commerce sites is fierce, and email marketing is a proven way to
engage with customers and differentiate your company. Online businesses prefer to use
email marketing because it makes it easy for customers to link directly from an email to a
product page.

However, email marketing isn’t used only for selling products online. Nonprofit
organizations and political campaigns make use of email to connect with supporters and
donors. They have as much to benefit from email marketing as anyone else. It is now
standard to ask for an email address when collecting information from interested parties.

The low cost and relative ease of carrying out an email marketing campaign means that it
is a tool that is accessible to almost any business. A small mechanic’s shop can put
together an email list and then send out coupons for oil changes or brake jobs. The scope
and sophistication of these campaigns may not be as great as larger businesses, but that
doesn’t mean they won’t be effective.

Email marketing is an inexpensive and easy way to connect with customers, but
campaigns must be carried out systematically. A poorly planned email campaign can
quickly lead to annoyed customers and disappointing sales.

The first step is to collect a comprehensive list of email addresses. The only significant
disadvantage of email marketing is that many countries have laws against sending spam.
Companies that send out unsolicited emails can face significant fines. It is crucial to only
send emails to customers who want to receive them. It is important to make the process
easy for customers to sign up for email updates. They can also offer incentives like one
time coupons to encourage higher subscription rates.

Analyzing the emails of competing businesses can be a great way for companies to plan
their own. This can be done easily by just signing up for their email lists. Competitor’s
emails reveal what kinds of images, messages and specials they are using to appeal to
their customers. Businesses can then tailor their email campaigns to match or beat the
offers of their competitors.

Designing the look and feel of the email is an important but tricky process. The choice of
images and text must reflect the demographic that is being marketed to. The email needs
to grab the reader’s attention and draw them into the details of the sales pitch as quickly
and succinctly as possible. If the email is confusing or boring, readers are likely to delete
it before reading too far into it. All of that effort is then wasted.

Deciding which customers receive which emails is a way to give marketing messages
relevance. Larger companies will use email to push multiple different products, updates
and offers. Matching the message to the customer leads to higher sales and greater levels
of customer satisfaction. Email marketing software makes it easy for companies to
segment their email delivery based on criteria that they establish.

After an email campaign is sent out, it will be important to track and evaluate the success
of that campaign. Pre-established metrics should be used to determine success or failure.
If a campaign is not performing well, marketers can change the design of the ads, the
products being emphasized, or the deals being offered. The flexibility of email makes it
easy to implement changes quickly and inexpensively.

Opt-in-email Marketing
Opt-in email is a term used when someone is given the option to receive email. Typically,
this is some sort of mailing list, newsletter, or advertising. Without obtaining permission
before sending email, the email is unsolicited bulk email, better known as spam.

There are several common forms of opt-in email:

Unconfirmed opt-in / Single opt-in

Someone first gives an email address to the list software (for instance, on a Web page),
but no steps are taken to make sure that this address belongs to the person submitting it.
This can cause email from the mailing list to be considered spam because simple typos
of the email address can cause the email to be sent to someone else. Malicious
subscriptions are also possible, as are subscriptions that are due to spammers forging
email addresses that are sent to the email address used to subscribe to the mailing list.

Confirmed opt-in (COI) / Double opt-in (DOI)

A new subscriber asks to be subscribed to the mailing list, but unlike unconfirmed or single
opt-in, a confirmation email is sent to verify it was really them. Generally, unless the explicit
step is taken to verify the end-subscriber’s e-mail address, such as clicking a special web
link or sending back a reply email, it is difficult to establish that the e-mail address in
question indeed belongs to the person who submitted the request to receive the e-mail.
Using a confirmed opt-in (COI) (also known as a Double opt-in) procedure helps to ensure
that a third party is not able to subscribe someone else accidentally, or out of malice, since
if no action is taken on the part of the e-mail recipient, they will simply no longer receive
any messages from the list operator. Mail system administrators and non-spam mailing
list operators refer to this as confirmed subscription or closed-loop opt-in. Some marketers
call closed-loop opt-in “double opt-in”. This term was coined by marketers in the late 90s
to differentiate it from what they call “single opt-in”, where a new subscriber to an email
list gets a confirmation email telling them they will begin to receive emails if they take no
action. Some marketers contend that “double opt-in” is like asking for permission twice
and that it constitutes unnecessary interference with someone who has already said they
want to hear from the marketer. However, it does drastically reduce the likelihood of
someone being signed up to an email list by another person.

The US CANSPAM Act of 2003 does not require an opt-in approach, only an easy opt-out
system. But opt-in is required by law in many European countries and elsewhere. It turns
out that confirmed opt-in is the only way that you can prove that a person actually opted
in, if challenged legally.

Opt-out

Instead of giving people the option to be put in the list, they are automatically put in and
then have the option to request to be taken out. This approach is illegal in the European
Union and many other jurisdictions.

Address Authentication

Email address authentication is a technique for validating that a person claiming to

possess a particular email address actually does so. This is normally done by sending an
email containing a token to the address, and requiring that the party being authenticated
supply that token before the authentication proceeds. The email containing the token is
usually worded so as to explain the situation to the recipient and discourage them from
supplying the token (often via visiting a URL) unless they in fact were attempting to
authenticate.
For example, suppose that one party, Alice, operates a website on which visitors can
make accounts to participate or gain access to content. Another party, Bob, comes to that
website and creates an account. Bob supplies an email address at which he can be
contacted, but Alice does not yet know that Bob is being truthful (consciously or not) about
the address. Alice sends a token to Bob’s email address for an authentication request,
asking Bob to click on a particular URL if and only if the recipient of the mail was making
an account on Alice’s website. Bob receives the mail and clicks the URL, demonstrating
to Alice that he controls the email address he claimed to have. If instead a hostile party,
Chuck, were to visit Alice’s website attempting to masquerade as Bob, he would be unable
to complete the account registration process because the confirmation would be sent to
Bob’s email address, to which Chuck does not have access. Wikipedia uses this
mechanism too.

Best practice

The step of email address verification (confirmation) is considered by many anti-spam

advocates to be the minimum degree necessary for any opt-in email advertising or other
ongoing email communication.

Online PR
Public relation in an online world means the way the things are promoted through internet
throughout the world. Public relation is a kind of a bridge between the organization and
customer and when it is connected to online world it means that the public relation person is
telling the policies of company or organization online using internet on some particular website
and promoting the products throughout the worldwide. Thus PR is an integral part of
company’s marketing strategy.

Public relation practitioner is the person or department which promotes the positive image of
their respective company or organization. Public relation department deals with the people in
such a way that they have to build the positive image of their product that it’s the best one and
they will not be able to find the better product in society.

Social media has revolutionized everything and has evolved new thinking patterns and
awareness among the general public and because of this new trends to market products and to
sale them have emerged. In terms of public relations social media has heralded a new and
golden age of communication management. Also the act of public communication has also
become easier and now they can communicate about a brand more easily also the concept of
ratings of a brand and public views on their sites can be posted enabling direct feedback and if
the feedback is positive then only more people will buy products of that certain company.

The two way nature of online communication has spawned a reality in which brands negotiate
their public image with daily consumers.
Nowadays public relation departments have come to the online world as people are getting
more concerned about the things that are on internet. Online world requires the interactive
communication so that the customer are satisfied and persuaded by the image set by of Public
relation department.
The use of Internet is getting common and the social networking sites are getting more popular.
So the organizations or companies and even brands have created their websites and made pages
on social networking sites like Facebook and twitter so that they remain in the race of getting
popular in online world or social media.

Public relation person or department makes the company’s websites interactive and promote
their products in such a way that the audience finds all the benefits and advantages of the
product or organization and think that this is the best organization or brand to grab the product
or do work.
The examples of public relation in online world can be clearly of the facebook pages that how
the brands and organizations are promoting their name and once the people like their page they
get the updates of the respective company or product on their newsfeed on daily basis that helps
the brand or organization in increasing their business. The role of Public relation department
in such type of online world can be judged when any person comment or ask something about
their product or organization the public relation person has to answer that in such a convincing
way that the other person gets satisfied.

All the advantages of the organization, company or the product are on their websites and
nowadays people have started rating companies and if a company does not have an active
website or the Facebook page of that company has less ‘likes’ then people are less likely to buy
products of that company. Further advantages of online PR are:

Immediacy: The response in social media is measured in minutes so a PR person has to be

actively engaged to the online profile of his company before other companies grab the
narrative.

Direct engagement: Social media demands an online engagement where the PR person has to
be answerable to the public in an honest and open manner.

Transparency: This means that everything is open on social media so the PR person has to be
very careful in building a positive image of the company in the online world as there is no room
for falsification.

Reach: This is the greatest benefit of the online world as it allows promoting and managing
the brand on a global scale with minimum expenditure. Secondly through this the company can
easily target the most discrete audience.

Another example can be of online shopping. The concept of online shopping is increasing
nowadays and in the promotion of that the public relation department is putting up the great
role as it is difficult to satisfy the customer especially when he is exposed to the pictures of the
products offered by that company and details about it. Online shopping websites require the
strong public relation department so that they are able to persuade the customer to buy the
product online and make them believe that the product they will be buying will be up to the
mark and will stand on their expectations. This is also done by giving a yearly warranty or
exchange offer of that product so that it satisfies the customer.

The public relation person gives the general and controlled opinion to build the positive image
of that specific firm in front of the public and among the people in that organization. Public
relation department only tells the advantages and benefits of the products but they should also
keep in mind that the things should not be exaggerated that much because it will portray a
negative image of that organization.

Online PR has created a number of opportunities by grouping like-minded people. But it has
also given the option to its large audience to criticize a specific media company on its own
media platform. Now the content on the site of a company lasts longer so creative and
compelling content should be written on the site. The content quality should be high that it
buys a credible audience. Online presence in terms of social media is challenging so the online
PR manager should keep an eye to negative feedback. As online PR activities are mostly geared
to influencing media and audiences these include forums, search engines, blogs and other
communication tools.

SEO/PR is an innovative approach used in online PR as it combines public relations with search
engine optimization generating more publicity through crafting online press releases. Through
this there will be an increase in the online rating of a company’s site and this will eventually
lead to increased sales.

Principles of PR in an online world

The following are some principles of public relations in an online world

Face up to crisis

The companies who indulge in crisis should accept their faults , write a sorry note for customers
in their online profile and should also promise their customers that that mistake would never
be repeated by the company in future.

Think creatively:

Thinking creatively is very crucial for online PR. The online site of a company should consist
of videos, pictures , games , discount offers to make it more engaging and intriguing so that
more people are likely to buy products of that company.

A tactful PR strategy:

In order to create a positive online image of a company a very planned and systematic PR
strategy should be used which includes pacing up with the internet , sensitively answering the
questions of clients and creative interactions with the customers.

Identify customers

In an online world the PR person has to identify real clients of the company and influence them.

Monitoring

While managing PR of a company in a virtual world the PR department has to monitor online
conversations, glean insights etc.
 Build a web strategy

Tools should be utilized to make an effective online strategy.

Track results

Some of essential online PR tools are

1. Social media platforms

2. Search marketing
3. Social media release
4. Online surveys
5. Email

As online PR is associated with improving results from digital marketing communication

techniques in particular social media so it is a very cost ineffective technique for making people
aware but it requires a lot of hard work.

Tactics for online PR are:

Influencer marketing
Online PR analytics
Online PR outreach
Online PR strategy
Real time marketing
Reputation management

Some ways of reviewing online PR options is through 4 types of strategy.

1. Attracting visitors through search

2. Engagement and dialogue
3. Building campaign buzz
4. Defensive crisis

Importance of online PR:

Internet has a great influence on the public opinion, especially when they are not certain. For
instance a boy gets acne on his face and he doesn’t know which cream to use . He will take
into consideration a lot of factors e.g price, other people’s opinion and most of all his decision
will be greatly influenced by the information of the product available on the internet.

Challenges of online PR:

Internet has dramatically changed the process of communication. Internet has opened up a
number of opportunities and challenged, specifically for the PR sector which masters
communication through traditional means. While PR specialists virtually had no competition
in the era of the traditional media, the democracy of the Internet has forced them to compete
with the entire world.
Interactive Advertising
Interactive advertising refers to promotional techniques that include an element of
feedback from those to whom the advertisements are directed. This feedback gives the
advertiser analytical data that can be used to improve the advertising methods being
employed. Interactive advertising is usually used to refer to online advertising, but can
also be applied to offline advertising methods such as consumer surveys.

Although interactive advertising in now generally considered common sence, it was a

groundbreaking idea when Internet analytics first started being used with any rigor. By
tweaking ad approaches, colors and content, and soliciting feedback from the target
segments, advertisers have given potential customers the opportunity to interact with
companies and their advertising, rather than simply being pitched to. Of course, this overt
feedback is usually given less weight than the analytical data that tracks how changes in
an ad affect its performance.

Interactive advertising goes beyond simple banners and clickthroughs, using social
media, branded polls and games, and many other approaches to engage the target
audience.

Viral Marketing
Viral Marketing is any marketing technique that induces websites or users to pass on a
marketing message to other sites or users, creating a potentially exponential growth in the
message’s visibility and effect. A popular example of successful viral marketing is Hotmail, a
company now owned by Microsoft, that promoted its services and its own advertisers’
messages in every user’s email notes.

Types of viral marketing techniques

There are three criteria for basic viral marketing; the messenger, the message and the
environment. All three must be effectively executed in order for a viral message to be
successful.

Some techniques for effective marketing include targeting the appropriate audience and
channels, creating videos, offering a valuable service or product for free, creating an emotional
appeal, social outreach and enabling easy sharing and downloading.

Who uses it

Viral marketing can be effective as a stand-alone tool or as part of a larger marketing campaign.
It can be used by both large and small companies, but can be especially attractive to smaller
business, as it can be more cost-effective than traditional marketing efforts.
Viral marketing has been used by energy drink companies, movies and even political
campaigns to generate marketing buzz.

Viral marketing is the goal of many companies looking to leverage the social media space to
promote their products. Defined as piece of content generated by a person or business that
inspires consumers to eagerly share it with their expanded social circle, viral marketing can
help build brand recognition instantly — but is easier said than done.

Instant Awareness

Viral marketing can be important in launching a new product by getting your brand in front of
a large potential market quickly. A YouTube video costs a fraction as much as a TV
commercial, but if it inspires people to share your message it can have a major impact on brand
recognition. Kraft, for example, used viral marketing to successfully launch its MiO brand of
liquid water enhancer. Twitter and Facebook are among the other social media tools that allow
users to share content, and are useful in attracting attention.

Make It Easy

A viral campaign isn’t the place to tell your audience every single detail of your product or
service, even if it’s their first exposure to what you’re selling. Instead, it should generate a
reaction quickly and easily, such as laughter, surprise or shock. If you already have a strong
online presence, seed it with your biggest fans first to get them to spread the word for you. It’s
not an ideal marketing strategy to just post your product’s viral marketing video on YouTube
and hope for the best. Consider placing ads linking to the video on search engines, with the ads
appearing when users search terms relating to your product, such as “stain removal” for a dry-
cleaning service.

Get Their Attention

Companies can be tempted to make the new product’s attributes the centerpiece of a viral
marketing effort, but if that’s the star of the show it usually falls flat. Before you design your
campaign, assess what causes you to click on a video or forward a link, and ask those in your
company or social circle with experience in social media for their thoughts. Would you click
on a video because it promised to be the best tongue cleaner on the market? Probably not. But
Orabrush found success with viral marketing by making the star of the show a giant human
tongue that did things like compete against little league football players on YouTube.

Measuring Effectiveness

It’s important to build in metrics to let you know if your campaign is going viral, and if it’s
having the desired effect on brand awareness. Views, likes, re-tweets and other basic measures
are a start, but find ways to expand that to something more meaningful to your campaign goals.
Perhaps offer a free sample of your product as part of the campaign, and measure how many
fill out the form to request the free sample. Or have the clicks take users to a landing page on
your own site and measure how many engage there as well.

Control Factor
 The biggest risk isn’t the possibility that a campaign will fall flat, but the loss of control that a
viral marketing campaign necessitates. When customers pass along your viral marketing
efforts, they do so on their terms, not yours. You might turn off customers as well as win them
— but you also may find your users see selling points that you never thought of.

Blogs Promotion Tool

Blog marketing is the process of reaching your home business’ target market through
the use of a blog. Initially, business owners had a blog separate from their websites, but
today, you can easily integrate the two to make it easier for you to manage, as well as
easier for visitors to access. Many business owners use a blogging platform, such as
WordPress, for both their site and blog. Further, as blogging has grown in ease and
popularity, many people have created businesses from blogging all on its own (as
opposed to having a business first and then blogging).

The Pros of Blog Marketing

The very nature of blogging makes them ideal for marketing since they provide new
content to draw people back, and offer a way for consumers and businesses to interact.
Here are a few other benefits:

1. Inexpensive to Start and Run. While there are free blogging platforms, such as Blogger
and WordPress.com, to maintain a professional appearance that allows for your unique
brand to shine through, use a self-hosted option, such as WordPress.org. For the cost of
a domain and web hosting, you can have a customized blog marketing for you.
2. Easy to Use. Most blogging platforms are simple to use. If you can copy, paste, type,
drag & drop and upload, you can have a professional looking blog.
3. An Effective Way to have Bi-directional Traffic Come to Your Site. Offering tips,
updates, and other new contents give people a reason to come and/or return to
your business website, which gives them the opportunity to buy.
4. Improves Search Engine Ranking. Google, in particular, likes to find and rank new
content, and many entrepreneurs use blogging specifically for search engine optimization
(SEO)
5. Allows You to Show Your Expertise to Gain Trust and Credibility with Your
Market. People like to know who they’re doing business with. With a blog, you can prove
you’re an expert, provide helpful tips and other valuable information, all of which help
consumers feel good about spending money on your product or service.
6. Connect with Your Market. While most businesses now use Twitter and other social
platforms more than blogs for engagement, blogs can allow you to have a conversation
with your market. This gives you the opportunity to build trust and rapport, as well as get
feedback and provide customer service.
7. It Can Make Money Beyond Your Product or Service. You can accept
advertising, promote affiliate products and get sponsors, adding additional sources of
revenue to your business.

The Cons of Blog Marketing

Like just everything else in life, there is a downside to blogging, including:
1. Time-Consuming. Creating new content and updating your blog can take a significant
amount of time. Hiring freelance writers and a virtual assistant, or using private label right
content can help.
2. Needs a Constant Stream of Ideas. Along with time, having something new blog about
is one of the biggest challenges bloggers face.
3. It Can Take Time to See Results. The Internet is overloaded with information, so getting
people to your blog takes time.
4. It Needs to Be Marketed Too. You’re using the blog to market your business, but for it to
work, people need to know about it, which means you have to find your target market and
entice them to your blog.

How to Do Blog Marketing

Starting a blog and using it to promote your business can be set up within minutes. It’s the
ongoing management and marketing that will take time.

1. Make a Blog Marketing Plan. What are you going to share on your blog? News, tips,
resources, etc? Further, how often will you update your blog? Daily, weekly, etc?
2. Create Your Blog. Decide on your blogging platform, and set it up, including
customization that fits your business. Be sure to use the same logo on your blog as on
your website (if you have a separate website) to retain consistency. If you use a free blog
platform (not recommended for business blogging), have a domain name pointing to the
blog to make it easier for consumers to get to your site.
3. Fill Your Blog with Several Posts ASAP. Readers don’t like to visit a blog with only one
or two posts. Add ten or more posts quickly, and then go to your regular post schedule.
4. Market Your Blog. It’s very easy to integrate social media into your blogs so that your
blog posts go out to your followers. Include your blog on your marketing materials as well.
5. Reply to Comments. Remember, blogs are social, so people will ask questions, provide
feedback, or share their opinion. Delete spam posts.
6. Use Your Blog to Encourage Email Signups. Signups is another great way to keep
people who are interested in your business coming back to your blog, which again, gives
them more opportunity to spend money with you.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is the process of gaining market online by purchasing
Ads on search engines, say Google, Yahoo, or Bing. SEM involves the promotion of
websites by increasing their visibility in Search Engine Result Page (SERP).

Search Engines
The search engines use algorithms to provide the most relevant results to every user. For
producing best suggestions to the users’ queries, they consider not only the search
keywords entered by users but also users’ location, type of device and operating system
they are working on, users’ preferences, and their identities.

The better the search algorithm is, the happier the user is with its results.
 Search Marketing Approaches
Search marketing works with two approaches −

• Earning traffic through unpaid or free search listings (SEO Methods)

• Buying traffic through paid search listings (PPC Ads)

In the first type of search marketing where advertisers earn traffic through unpaid listings,
there are two popular methods − organic and non-organicsearch.

Organic SEO Non-organic SEO

It takes more time to create as more concentrated

towards content creation, building hyperlinks, meta-tag It is speedy.
optimization, keyword enhancement, etc.

It yields late effect. It brings immediate effect.

It focuses on short term

It focuses on long term results.
results.

It is inexpensive. It is very expensive.

They cannot be affected financially. They can get affected

financially.
Once the design of the website and its content is good, It required high degree of
it requires less management. management.

Inorganic search is Black

Organic SEO is called White Hat search tactic.
Hat search tactic.
How to Get Organic Results
Organic results can be achieved by Search Engine Optimization. You need to invest time
and expertise in creating an appealing yet efficient website that can work to build long
lasting trust in your business.

You need to build your business website according to SEO techniques which use White
Hat Tactics for rank improvement. The SEO techniques are described in chapter SEO
Friendly Website.

How to Get Inorganic Results

 They can be improved in two ways:

• Improving your quality score

• your bids for keywords and Ads

Inorganic results are instantly reflected. Here is a checklist for inorganic search
optimization:

• Mine keywords properly. Group them into relevant themes.

• Use correct match types. Estimate bid on all match types. Choose the benefiting one.
• Keep testing your Ad copies and landing pages.
• Strive constantly to improve CTR.
• Aim for higher quality score.
• Target relevant locations. Only look for the places that seem to give you business.
• Run search query report. Filter prominent keywords. Bid higher on most searched
keyword.
• Bid your keywords accordingly. Calculate and strategize methods to achieve ROI.

Organic versus Inorganic Search – Which is Better?

It is better and safer to start with Organic SEO in case of small business because it
requires low-cost investment. In addition, it builds your internet presence gradually and
creates a solid foundation for your business. It is found that the organic search results are
very much likely to get attention of the viewers.

Inorganic SEO is good for customer targeting. For example, PPC advertising. While opting
for this, you need to make sure you are investing in the appropriate advertise. You need
huge funds to hire a management or your own dedicated expertise, which can take care
of your paid searches.

Though organic and inorganic results are independent of each other’s performance, yet
you need to perform well in both to boost up your business. Paid Ads boost your business
and website ranking. Organic results marks trust on your business.

Steps Involved in Search Engine Marketing

These are the general steps involved in search engine marketing −

Step 1 − Define Effective Strategy

• Define your target audience.

• Identify their needs and motivations.
• Highlight how your product is best to serve their needs.
• Review your business position in the marketplace.
• Identify your competitors.
• Identify your specific goals and benchmarks, such as search ranking, sales, website
traffic, and other ROI metrics.

Step 2 − Choose Right Keywords

• Select most important phrases relevant to your business.
• Also select the phrases that are frequently searched by your target customers.
• Conduct brainstorm sessions for potential terms your customers use when thinking about
your products and capabilities.
• Interact with your sales and customer service teams, and best customers to know the
frequently used phrases.
• Employ a keyword research tools to compile a list of highly searched terms.

Step 3 − Optimize Your Website Content

• Focus on your website structure. Keep it simple.

• The search engines looks for the underlying code of your website when they visit your
website.
• Create crisp, clear, and correct content that can retain users’ attention.
• Use your keyword phrases relevantly in pages title tags, heading tags, directory names,
file names, alt tags and meta tags.
• Pay attention to meta description. It is shown in the search results below your link,
providing a great opportunity for you to bring visitors to your Website.

Step 4 − Submit Your Website for Indexing

To be visible online to the customers, ensure that all the pages of your website are
completely indexed by the search engines such as Google, Yahoo, and Bing.

For speedy process of getting indexed by the other engines, submit your website to the
DMOZ.org, an Open Directory Project. Once DMOZ accepts your website, Yahoo and
other search engines have no problem indexing your website.

Step 5 − Add Quality Links to Your Website

• Build links to your website from valued links of other websites that are frequented by your
targeted visitors.
• The more quality inbound links you have, the more popular your website is with Google
and other engines.
• Make your website content is link-worthy. Create interesting and informative content on
your website such as a library of best practices articles, blog trends in your industry, etc.
• You can also garner links from vendors, customers, business partners, and trade
associations.
• Distribute press releases and articles online.

Step 6 − Manage Paid Search Advertise

• Bid on the most relevant keywords. Do not pick them based on only popularity.
• Make sure your product offer is interesting to the potential customer.
• Tie the bidding strategy to business results. In many cases a lower Ad position will produce
a higher ROI.
• Finally, include a compelling ‘call to action’ in the Ad and send traffic to a relevant landing
page tied to the Ad.

Step 7 − Measure Success of Advertise

• Check how well you performed in the past.
• Measure CPC, CPR, Clicks, Bounce rate, Impressions, ROI, etc.
• Employ Web Analytics to monitor progress and problems.
• Monitor your position regularly in the search results.
• Identify problems and plan strategies to improve your results in the future.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO is short for search engine optimization. Search engine optimization is a methodology of
strategies, techniques and tactics used to increase the amount of visitors to a website by
obtaining a high-ranking placement in the search results page of a search engine (SERP) —
including Google, Bing, Yahoo and other search engines.

Optimizing Visibility in Search Engines

It is common practice for Internet search users to not click through pages and pages of search
results, so where a site ranks in a search results page is essential for directing
more traffic toward the site. The higher a website naturally ranks in organic results of a search,
the greater the chance that that site will be visited by a user.

SEO helps to ensure that a site is accessible to a search engine and improves the chances that
the site will be found by the search engine. SEO is typically a set of “white hat” best practices
that webmasters and Web content producers follow to help them achieve a better ranking in
search engine results.

Optimizing Organic Search CTR

SEO is also about making your search engine result relevant to the user’s search query so more
people click the result when it is shown in search. In this process, snippets of text and meta
data are optimized to ensure your snippet of information is appealing in the context of the
search query to obtain a high CTR (click through rate) from search results.

SEO may also be called search engine optimizer when using automated tools to assist with the
optimization process.

Website Optimization
Also called search engine optimization (SEO), website optimization is a phrase that describes
the procedures used to optimize – or to design from scratch – a website to rank well in search
engines. Website optimization includes processes such as adding relevant keyword and
phrases on the website, editing meta tags, image tags, and optimizing other components of your
website to ensure that it is accessible to a search engine and improve the overall chances that
the website will be indexed by search engines.
A phrase used to describe the procedures to optimize the speed at which your website loads in
a Web browser. This type of optimization generally involves editing your website to optimize
scripts, HTML or CSS code for faster loading. It’s also reduces the number of components
such as images, scripts, or video components that are needed to render the webpage.

Content Marketing
a type of marketing that involves the creation and sharing of online material (such as
videos, blogs, and social media posts) that does not explicitly promote a brand but is
intended to stimulate interest in its products or services.
 Advertising uses the content to describe the business, brand, and business reputation. The
content can be in various forms such as news, webpages, videos, white papers, infographics,
podcasts, blogs, case studies, and photographs.

Content is what is sold or accessed on the Internet. Content developers create the content to
provide the information to the viewers. It can be in the form of text, graphics, and animation.

Content marketing refers to the approach of creating and sharing of informative, relevant,
valuable, and consistent content to convert a group of audience into customers and retain them.
Content marketing is non-interruptive way of marketing.

Good content helps customers become more knowledgeable about the product or service and
make better buying judgment.

Goals of Content Marketing

The goals of content marketing are as follows:

• Brand Awareness: It marks the presence of your brand.

• Sale: It boosts lead generation at quicker pace.
• Customer-Vendor Relationship Building: It helps in creating engagement between buyer
and the company.
• Customer Retention: Pleasing content attracts customers and helps one in retaining him.

Types Of Content
Let us see what each type of content gives −

News
They contain news about new product release, updates on products, etc. For example, news of
releasing new mobile handset on website of NDTV gadgets.

Webpages
SEO webpages can hold the content in the best possible way and sell the content.

Videos
They say, video is the second best thing to pursue a viewer in person. Creating crisp and
compact videos can bring good market at doorstep. Promote your business videos across
multiple channels, and ensure that your videos are optimized for mobile viewing, as an
increasing number of users view them from their mobile devices.

Infographics
These are long, vertical graphics or columns that include graphs, charts, statistics, and other
information. Infographics makes use of the fact that 90% information transmitted to human
brain is visual, which makes people perceive it faster than text.
Podcasts
They are digital files available in the form of episodes, which can be downloaded on the PC.
They can come in various formats such as audio, video, e-Pub, and pdf. It allows people to
subscribe and it can prove as a powerful medium to communicate a range of ideas, products,
and information to audience. The businesses engaged in podcasting are − IBM, Oracle, Yarn
Craft, etc.

Blogs
Business blogs deliver excellent content marketing. Blogs are required for a business to survive
in the race of content marketing.

Case Studies
Case studies are detailed studies pertaining to a particular problem, action, individual,
organization, event, or action, existing at a specific place at a given time. They encourage
content marketing to build trust in the product and in turn business.

Photographs
A picture speaks a thousand words. Pleasant and relevant pictures can stand as a good content
for content marketing and boosts the business.
 Unit 4
Social Media Marketing
Social media is the term commonly given to Internet and mobile-based channels and tools that
allow users to interact with each other and share opinions and content. As the name implies,
social media involves the building of communities or networks and encouraging participation
and engagement.

Social media itself is a catch-all term for sites that may provide radically different social
actions. For instance, Twitter is a social site designed to let people share short messages or
“updates” with others. Facebook, in contrast is a full-blown social networking site that allows
for sharing updates, photos, joining events and a variety of other activities.

How Are Search & Social Media Marketing Related?

Why would a search marketer — or a site about search engines — care about social media?
The two are very closely related.

Social media often feeds into the discovery of new content such as news stories, and
“discovery” is a search activity. Social media can also help build links that in turn support into
SEO efforts. Many people also perform searches at social media sites to find social media
content. Social connections may also impact the relevancy of some search results, either within
a social media network or at a ‘mainstream’ search engine.

Social Media Marketing At Marketing Land

Marketing Land is the sister site to Search Engine Land that covers all facets of internet
marketing, including these popular topics within social media marketing:

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• Pinterest
• Linkedin
• YouTube

Social media marketing can help with a number of goals, such as:

• Increasing website traffic

• Building conversions
• Raising brand awareness
• Creating a brand identity and positive brand association
• Improving communication and interaction with key audiences
Designing Content for Social
Media Marketing
Social media networks support multiple content formats and there has been rapid growth
in the use of interactive formats, for example, carousel ads on Facebook. This flexibility of
format (text, image, multi-image, video, carousel etc.) gives marketers the ability to
experiment with different types of content to gauge how best to attract and engage social
users.

If people are the heartbeat of social media, content is the blood. It’s your content that
people see and respond to, and that communicates your values and messages.

But what content works? How do you plan what to talk about, on which platforms and in
what formats?

Producing and sharing content is no guarantee of success. Smart content marketers

understand the need to align social with other channels to ensure there is a consistent
style of communication with customers and the stories they are telling, and that is driven
by a clear plan rather than scrabbling each week to find something to share.

Why is it important to get your content right for social media?

Social media is most often used for personal reasons to connect with friends and family,
or to be part of conversations that align with your personal interests and passions.

If you serve content to people with this mindset that isn’t appropriate, relevant or useful, it
can have the effect of turning people off and driving them away. Similarly, if you blast
people with a constant stream of content, it can be overwhelming and come across like a
shouting match.

You need to take the time to learn what people want to read/watch and make it digestible
via the formats and channels they find most useful.

Why you need an over arching comms & content plan

Start with a clear comms and content plan that is aligned with business goals. This isn’t
social specific; it should govern how you communicate with customers across all channels.
Social can then inherit this plan and adapt it to suit social networks.

For example, you may have a campaign launching a new detailed guide and social is used
to seed snippets from the guide over X weeks with a hook to download the full content.
So the overarching plan guides what is being talked about and when, then the social media
plan decides how to tell the story to a social audience based on content format, style and
execution.

Before you start posting content, you need to answer the following questions:
1. What are we trying to achieve on social media and how does this align with core business
goals/objectives/targets?
2. What stories do we want to tell and how can we make them relevant to our social
audience?
3. What is our social customer profile and what types of content to they respond best to
4. What’s the current state of the market – how do competitors and comparators perform
socially and what content works for them?
5. Who needs to be involved in content production and marketing?
6. How will we measure the success of social content?
7. How will we optimise and improve what we’re doing?

Competitor analysis for social content

Imitation is flattery.
By this, I don’t mean copy what your competitors are doing, but if you are fighting for
mindshare amongst a similar audience, it pays to know what content that audience
currently consumes and responds to. You can then factor in popular topics and content
formats into your social content plan.

By knowing what competitors are doing, you can also quickly identify content gaps:

1. What topics aren’t they covering?

2. Which topics are they covering poorly, with low-quality content?
3. Which topics are they covering but not comprehensively, so there’s an opportunity to
establish a niche foothold?

Originality is inspiring.
We decided to create inspiring content through other people. We ran a series of
inspirational events featuring speakers who had a success story to tell, to demonstrate
that success is unique to each of us and what makes each person successful varies but
people who achieve have some things in common e.g. drive and ambition.

This helped generate unique content that drove social engagement:

• Announcements of new free events at our London base (with Eventbrite registration)
• Announcements for new speakers and a profile (amplified by them sharing with their
personal networks)
• Live tweeting to share quotes and insights from the speakers, via the hashtag
#shedevents
• Post-event write-ups and photos for visual content
• Quotes from the speakers for short social posts
• Post event interviews with some of the speakers around topics related to inspiration.

Creating a social media content marketing calendar

Keep this simple. Work on a quarterly basis and build out the content plan month-by-
month aligned with your overall content calendar.
You should have a set of stories that need to be told, then break down for each month
which story components are the focus and the content formats and social channels that
will be used to distribute the messages.

Optimising content for a social audience

Businesses produce a lot of content; don’t restrict your social channels to content the
social team produces. Think laterally.

For example, customer service teams create a lot of helpful content for users, answering
FAQs and enquiries. They often add to the business knowledge base, and this information
can be really helpful to social customers e.g. care instructions for a product. However, the
content may not always be in a format and style that’s suitable for a social audience, so
you can take the raw content and repurpose for your social channels.

Let’s use the example of care instructions. You could turn this into ‘Tip of the day’ for
Twitter, using short-form, take-away advice that can link to more detailed content on your
website.

Creating regular hooks

Find a content format that can be used to create regular posts that encourage people to
come back for more.

ncreasing content reach

You want the biggest reach possible (amongst relevant audiences) so that you optimise
your investment. This means finding ways to encourage other social users to share your
content with their wider network. Below I look at 3 techniques to enable this:

Scarcity

You’ve got something but there isn’t much left and people have to hurry to get it. Scarcity
is often a marketing veil but if used well can drive social activity. A good example is popular
events where tickets sell out quickly – publicising the ticket launch date well in advance
drums up interest.

Uniqueness

If you offer something that people can’t get anywhere else, and it’s relevant to them, you
stand a good chance of getting their attention and increasing engagement with your social
content.

Amplification

Find influencers who have their own engaged audience (don’t just think ‘people with
millions of followers’, the followers need to actually listen to what they’re saying). Come
up with a value proposition for them that encourages them to listen to what you’re posting
and then share your content.
 Test, measure and learn
How do you know what content works in social media?

Even without web analytics or social media analytics, you can very quickly look at
engagement metrics for individual posts e.g. likes on Facebook, RT on Twitter.

However, to know how content contributes to your digital KPIs and ROI, then you need to
ensure you’re measuring a much wider set of metrics. A few tips:

• Add campaign tracking to all posted links (using a consistent tracking taxonomy)
• Use social reports in web analytics to monitor social sessions and conversions
• Use referral reports to compare social domains to other domains for referral traffic
• Use landing page reports and then apply social segments to gauge social impact for key
content pages

You should also use social network specific analytics to explore the impact of your content.
For example, on Twitter you can compare month-on-month for total engagement and drill
down into tweets with the most impressions and engagement.

Make sure you define the KPIs you will measure success against and then ensure reports
are set-up to provide the data for analysis. Don’t go into the analytics tools with no idea
what you want to measure – you’ll waste a lot of time!

Useful tools
It helps to use a toolkit to coordinate and automate social content marketing. That doesn’t
mean remove the human element and personalisation, it simply means use tools to help
you get your messages out there efficiently, for example queuing Tweets to be sent at
times that are most likely to get engagement from your followers.

There are lots of free and paid tools out there. Below is a small list of ones I find really
useful:

Hootsuite/Tweetdeck
Social media aggregation platforms to help you coordinate your streams, schedule
updates to multiple platforms and monitor keywords/hashtags to see what content other
people are posting/responding to.

Buffer
A great queuing system that helps you plan bulk updates and set a publishing schedule
for each social network, as well as providing URL shortening and tracking (though you
can of course use your own).

Followerwonk/Audiense/Buzzsumo
For identifying key influencers based on topic, location etc., really useful for connecting
with people who can amplify your content.
Campaign Marketing
Marketing Campaigns promote a product through different media, including television,
radio, print and online platforms. Campaigns don’t have to rely solely on advertising and
can also include demonstrations, word of mouth and other interactive techniques.
Businesses operating in highly competitive markets may initiate frequent marketing
campaigns and devote significant resources to generating brand awareness and sales.

Marketing campaigns can be designed with different goals in mind, including building a
brand image, introducing a new product, increasing sales of a product already on the
market, or even reducing the impact of negative news. Defining a campaign’s goal usually
dictates how much marketing is needed and what media are most effective.

Marketing Campaign Activities and Negating Negative Publicity

Marketing is all about reaching customers, and there are many ways to do that, from a
simple postcard to a coordinated social-media blitz. Small companies can email invitations
to a special sale and offer a free product to every customer who brings in the invitation.
Larger companies can use paid advertising and professional agencies to reach a wider
audience.

Whatever the size of the company, it’s important that someone is dedicated to handling
the influx of traffic a marketing campaign generates. If you are prompting customers to
sign up for your email list, you must make sure that the list is managed well and that new
customers receive welcoming messages. If visits to your website increase, you must
continually update your content to convert this traffic to profitable sales.

Companies that lose sales due to major negative press often use marketing campaigns
to rehabilitate their images. One example is Chipotle Mexican Grill, which was investigated
by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention after dozens of customers became
sick in 2015 from food safety issues related to E. coli and norovirus. Chipotle’s sales
dropped 30%, and to get customers back in the door, Chipotle offered coupons for free
food via direct mail and texts. Chipotle also used online video to announce a $10 million
grant to support local farmers.

Examples of Successful Marketing Campaigns

The long-running Aflac duck campaign is one example of a campaign that significantly
raised brand recognition. The company’s brand-recognition rate was just 12% when it
launched the campaign in 2000, and more than a decade of advertising boosted
recognition to 90%.

Lay’s launched its first “Do Us a Flavor” campaign in 2012, asking customers to suggest
new potato-chip flavors through texts, Facebook and Twitter. The company’s sales
increased 12%, and its volume of Facebook followers tripled.
 Tracking Social Media
Marketing Performance
While it’s true that every large company probably needs some social media
marketing strategy, it isn’t necessarily true for every business.

No matter your company, you should have at least a Facebook page that provides some
information about your business and links to your website. The question you have to answer
is—do I want to consistently commit resources to a social media marketing strategy?

Just about every business can benefit from social media marketing, but if you’re a small
growing business, you need to worry about resource allocation. That means conducting a
cost/benefit analysis of social media marketing.

There’s no one right way to go about this, but broadly speaking, here are the benefits of that
social media marketing can provide:

• Create a stronger bond with your existing customer base

• Increase your brand awareness
• Boost the performance of other marketing strategies, such as content marketing
• Gain an understanding of what your audience thinks about you
• Create another medium for which you can convert prospects into customers

Think of your social media goals as high level. There will likely be several different metrics
that contribute to one goal. The following are some common goals:

• Increase conversions
• Build your email list/leads
• Increase your brand awareness
• Boost audience engagement

Tracking Tactics
Since goals are so high level, looking at how you perform relative to a goal isn’t very helpful.
Let’s say you want to increase your conversion rate and at the end of the quarter you’ve fallen
short.

Well, if all you’re doing is tracking your conversion rate, you won’t really gain any insights
into what was working and what wasn’t.

If you want to find out what works and what doesn’t and, ultimately, reach and surpass goals
in the future, you need to track the performance of your individual tactics.

The first step here is to make a list of all of your tactics. There are countless social media
marketing tactics, but as an example, here are five:
• Content distribution
• Replying to all (appropriate) mentions
• Capitalize on trending topics
• Run contests
• Use Gifs in tweets

You need to understand why you are committing time and resources to each of your tactics,
and then figure out how those tactics contribute to a specific goal. If a tactic isn’t contributing
to a goal, it’s probably time to scrap it. If a tactic isn’t sufficiently contributing to a specific
goal, it might be time to scrap that one too.

So, let’s continue with the example goal of trying to increase your conversion rate. We’ll
assume one of the tactics you’re implementing is distributing more content. After a month of
sharing more content on social media, you are seeing that the pieces you share on social are
not only getting more views, but they’re also converting at a higher rate.

With this information, you can confidently say that social content distribution is linked to
higher conversion rates. Now that you’re armed with this information, you can use it to inform
your social strategy going forward.

Measure and Refine

So you’ve determined your goals, you know which tactics roll up into which goals, now all
you have to do is measure and refine.

You’re almost certainly going to need a tool to measure the metrics you want to. If you already
have a social media management tool, it will have some measurement capabilities, but it’s
crucial that your tool has the right capabilities.

If your current social media management software doesn’t have what you need from a
performance management standpoint, go find the one that does and make the swap. Your tool
shouldn’t be defining what you measure, you should.

Once that’s squared away create reports that provide all the info you need for all of your
metrics. Remember that this is an ongoing process, not a set it and forget it situation.

You should be continuously evaluating your performance. If you are far-exceeding some of
your goals, maybe aim higher and vice versa.

You’ll find that when you get into a groove and are effectively measuring your social
performance, you’ll be able to be more calculated in your strategy, and ultimately get more
return on your investment.
Advertising on Mobile Devices,
Mobile Apps
Mobile advertising is type of advertising that appears on mobile devices such as smart phones
and tablets that have wireless connections. As a subset of mobile marketing, mobile advertising
can take place as text ads via SMS, or banner advertisements that appear embedded in mobile
web site, in downloaded apps or in mobile games. Mobile technology used by companies such
as Google and Facebook tailor mobile advertisements based on individual’s web browsing
history, geographic location, and with data collected by shopping habits. Because mobile
devices typically have smaller screens than computers or laptops, this form of digital
advertising is usually optimized for small displays by being concise.

Mobile Advertising
As mobile devices outnumber television sets now by almost 3 to 1, the chances of a potential
customer seeing a mobile ad are greater than that of most other forms of advertising today. One
of the popular models in mobile advertising is known as cost per install (CPI), where payment
is based on the user installing an app on their mobile device. CPI mobile advertising networks
work either as incent or non-incent. In the incent model the user is given virtual points or
rewards to install the game or app.

Mobile Advertising History

The earliest form of mobile advertising took place via SMS test messages, but has quickly
evolved to mobile web and in-app advertisements. Many apps offer a free version that can be
downloaded at no cost, but which is paid for by placement of advertisements within the app.
Such advertisements can be removed by purchasing a full or premium version of the app.
Mobile versions of websites also have advertisements which have been optimized for the
smaller mobile displays than would appear on the full version of the same website.

Mobile Adverting Platforms

Mobile advertising also works hand in hand with mobile marketing, which uses personal data
collected and technology such as location services to personalize ads based on user preference,
habits, or location. Some mobile advertisements may appear only when a mobile user is in
close proximity to a certain store or service provider. Mobile ad placement works by way of a
programmatic bidding process for ad placement, in which advertisers bid in real time for the
right to place an ad on a mobile device. The infrastructure that allows for this process is known
as a demand-side platform (DSP). Use of such platforms allows advertisers to optimize their
performance as based on a number of key performance indicators (KPI), such as effective cost
per click (eCPC) and effective cost per action (eCPA).

Mobile marketing utilizes multiple distribution channels to promote products and services via
mobile devices, such as tablets and smartphones. It makes use of features of modern mobile
technology, such as location services, to tailor marketing campaigns based on an individual’s
location. Mobile marketing is a way in which technology can be used to create personalized
promotion of goods or services to a user who is constantly connected to a network. Mobile
advertising is a subset of mobile marketing.

Mobile marketing may include promotions sent through SMS text messaging, MMS
multimedia messaging, through downloaded apps using push notifications, through in-app or
in-game marketing, through mobile web sites, or by using a mobile device to scan QR codes.
Proximity systems and location based services can alert users based on geographic location or
proximity to a service provider.

Mobile marketing an indispensable tool for companies large and small as mobile devices
become ubiquitous. The key players in the space are the brands (and companies that they
represent through advertising), and service providers that enable mobile advertising. Mobile
advertising targets audiences not so much by demographics but by behaviors (though
demography plays a part, such as the fact that iPad users tend to be older and wealthier). One
notable behavior in the mobile marketing space known as “snacking,” which is when mobile
device users check in to media or messaging for brief periods. Such seeking of instant
gratification equates to more points of contact for marketers.

In mobile marketing, the device (especially screen size) does make a difference — users of
smartphones and iPad tablets react differently to mobile marketing. For example, smartphone
users tend to find informative content to be the most relevant, yet iPad users tend to be
captivated by interactive advertising that features rich media presentations with eye-catching
imagery (the message of the content is a secondary concern).

Mobile Marketing vs. Traditional Marketing

Unlike traditional marketing efforts, mobile marketing takes advantage of the fact that many
users of mobile devices carry them around with them wherever they go. As a result, location-
based services can collect customer data and then offer coupons, deals or promotions based on
their proximity to a store or a place frequently visited by the consumer. These marketing
campaigns can be more targeted and specific to the individual user, and should therefore be
more effective for the company doing the marketing. One example may be a marketing
campaign that sends food-related coupons to a customer any time they come within half a mile
of a specific supermarket.

Mobile Marketing Concerns

There are privacy issues concerning how the data collected by mobile devices is used and
whether or not companies have the right to collect such data without explicit consent. Such
data can be used for identity theft or to send spam if it falls into the wrong hands due to data
theft or poor security of the information. Also, the tracking of individual’s locations and
movements may be considered crossing the line by some.
 Tracking Mobile
Marketing Performance
When it comes to mobile advertising performance, there are various metrics available to
determine if your efforts are on the right track.

Here are the key metrics that can help you understand how effective your mobile ad
campaign is.

First, the 4 easily accessible KPIs:

• Click-through Rates: CTR is the ratio of the number of clicks on an ad to the number of
ad impressions (number of times an ad has been viewed). CTR is not considered an ideal
measure of ad performance. Nielsen research has shown a high CTR to have a negative
correlation with ad interaction. CTR doesn’t take into account user’s intent while clicking
(clicks can be accidental) or calculating engagement, brand awareness, etc.
• Leads generated: The number of prospective customers identified during the ad
campaign.
• Cost Per Acquisition: CPA shows the expenditure a business has to incur to convert a
user.
• Sales Revenue Determines how much revenue was generated per ad (ad campaign).

These indicators give a narrow view of how a campaign is performing.

To gather a more holistic view of your marketing efforts, you should consider
these 6 metrics:

1. Conversion Rate (CR): This metric gathers data on the number of users who performed
the desired action e.g. installs, registrations, purchases etc.
If a user saw an ad and performed the desired action, he is a potential customer. This can
be used to build a sales funnel and determine how many users abandon a sale and at
which step. It can be computed according to an advertiser’s goals, eg. Installs/Clicks;
Registrations/Installs; Sales/Installs etc.
2. Retention Rate: or Percent Retention is a very strong KPI. Advertisers instead should
see that the user not only installs the app but also uses it in the long run. It’s typical for a
user to abandon an app in the quest for more features, freebies, and offers.
Retention Rate captures how many users use the app more than once within a specified
time frame, by monitoring the user’s interactions with the app. It is more logical and
profitable for advertisers to retain existing users rather than spend large budgets on
acquiring new ones.
3. Social Metrics/ Social Engagement: Social Media Platforms have become imperative to
any ad campaign. Using social networks also open better targeting opportunities based
on location, age, gender, interests etc.
Measuring the number of likes, shares, re-tweets or brand mentions can help analyze how
well consumers react to an ad. This metric determines customer engagement and can
indicate whether a customer will recommend your brand or buy from you again.
4. Brand Lift: If your mobile ads don’t generate the targeted number of clicks, but help
increase brand awareness; they have done a part of their job. If a mobile ad was
successful, brands would see a spike in search queries on search engines and higher
web traffic on their site and social media pages.
5. Return on Ad Spend (RoAS): This is the revenue generated after accounting for all ad
expenditures. It is important to consistently track profits or loss combined with other
metrics, you can then decide whether to invest more in the ad or reduce the ad spend.
6. Secondary Actions: Measuring actions that users take after they view the ad reveal if the
ad generated an interest. These actions are easily measurable and comprise click-to-call,
search queries about the business, sharing statistics on social media or accessing map
or driving directions. This information can help marketers channelize their resources
accordingly to plan more personalized campaigns that lead to conversions.

A few other metrics worth measuring:

• View-ability: measures if an ad was seen by a human, and how many times it was viewed.
Sometimes the adsare not viewable because they take too long to load or aren’t visible
for at least one second and the user quickly scrolls away.
View-ability is related to ad effectiveness and brand recall. You can use it to measure how
well different mobile ad formats are working.
• Purchase Intent: Monitoring a user’s wish-list or shopping cart indicates how close the
person is to purchasing a product. Marketers can adjust campaigns accordingly to
motivate them.
Marketers must use a combination of metrics to gauge the true measure of their mobile
ad effectiveness

Web Analytics-Meaning, Key Metrics

and Tools
Web analytics is reporting and analysis of data on website visitor activity. It is not only a tool
to measure web traffic but also can be used as a tool for business and market research.
Techniques used to access and improve the contribution of e-marketing to a business, such as
referrals, clickstreams, online research data, customer satisfaction surveys, leads and sales.
Thus, marketers use web analytics exploring data and reports to build their knowledge on
customers’ preference and behavior according to types of sites, which areas customers click
more often when they online. It also helps marketer understand their customers better and
improve their business performance. (Dykes, 2012)

These are three stages that they need to concern when setting up a web analytic tool. The
analysis is the ticket for them move from Steupland to Actionland. It is the isolating of
meaningful and actionable insights in data and reports that when acted upon by your
organization can drive business value.

Alignment Stage:
At this early planning stage, it is necessary for marketer to gather their business objectives and
capture stakeholders’ online behavior by their online measurement strategy. Clearly understand
measurement strategy and well analyze visitors is critical to success. Thus, marketers have to
carefully handling relevant and meaningful data which will directly affect the business in the
long-term.

Collection Stage:
At this point of stage, large companies may spend amount of time on technical implementation
such as multiple web domains and online marketing initiatives. (Dykes, 2012)

Reporting Stage:
This is the last stage for companies move from Setupland to Actionland. This stage is important
where you create report and distribute them to organization using a manual or preferably
automated approach.

TOOLS AND METHODS USED TO HELP MARKETER

There are two types of web analytics, on-site and off-site web analytics.

ON-SITE ANALYTICS
On-site web analytics is used for marketers to measure a visitor’s activity when he browses on
your website. This includes its drivers and conversations, for example which ads on landing
page encourage more people to purchase and which title of information visitors click most.
This data is used to analysis visitors’ online behavior and can be used to improve website or
marketing campaign’s audience response.

Simply, on-site web analytics tools are used to analysis and measure behaviors of visitors’
journey and actual visitor traffic arriving on your website. For example, which landing page
encourage visitors to make a purchase, what links visitors clicked on (from search engine to
get to the site or came there directly) to the site, and time they spent and stayed on given page.
Therefore, On-site web analytics measures of website in a commercial context.

For the business, website became more important than ever before, it handles more
information. Companies also need to know if their marketing campaigns are working on
internet-based, just like John Shumway, the global vice president of product management at
Akamai says “marketing people are increasingly driving the need for we analytics”. (Dave
Chaffey, 2003)

Firms can conduct on-site web-analytics through the following ways:

Analytics Software Produced by Companies

Some companies such as WebTrends and Google Analytics produce web analytics software
that converts data by using combination of tables and graphs. It automatically monitors your
website’s traffic and highlights any significant changes, thus, managers can easily understand
and analysis the effectiveness of their campaigns. And, where visitors come from and which
pages retain visitors the longest, and also, track visitors progress s they click though the site. It
can be simply shows daily visit on your website, type on traffic and time on site by country.

Other technologies for data collection

Other technologies companies used for data collection are eye tracking system and mouse
tracking analytics. It is a key method for testing visitors’ behavior and areas they focus more
often when they on a web page, and both eye tracking and e mouse tracking analytics studies
offer businesses accurate and actionable results. Therefore, the result can be used to improve a
web site or marketing campaign’s audience response.

Eye tracking system is utilized by many top enterprises such as Google. This tracking system
uses specialist software to track internet visitors where the eyes land on a webpage.

Similar to eye tracking system, Mouse tracking analytics follows the mouse movements of
internet users to simulate eye movement on a webpage. From the research, it has shown when
both methods of testing are conducted simultaneously, in the result, they find out exactly what
the visitors look at on the page which contains 84%-88% accuracy. In addition, both method
of tracking analytics deliver valuable information to managers about visitors’ involvement and
engagement with your website. This is vital to work out what changes you need to make in
order to benefit your visitors’ experience as well as improve the website. (ClickTale, 2010)

OFF-SITE ANALYTICS
Off-site analytics data can be obtained for any website-including your competitors and
partners. Which means is analysis the internet as a whole for the websites. Thus, the key
differences of off-site web analytics measures from your potential audience (opportunity),
share of voice (visibility), and buzz (comments).

Unlikely to on-site web analytics only captures what happens when visitors visit and engage
with your website, by using various technologies to help monitor and analysis website to create
meaningful actions and results. However, as social website becomes more popular and
ascendant channel for internet users, and everything becomes more transparent on social web,
organization information are shared, spread on it, thus, through this platform, marketers are
able to measure the latest buzz about website or organization.it is important for marketers to
monitor not only what happens on the website but also outside of your website. Improving
from what other people are saying about the company and provide products and services match
customers requires. Off-site Web Analytics solutions can help businesses stay on the leading
edge of overall trends. (Monitoring Buzz With Off-Site Web Analytics, 2010)

Firms can conduct off-site web-analytics through the following available software:

Alexa and Compete

There are numbers of web analytics software provided service to measure your competitors
how much and what type of traffic are garnering to their site. Alexa and Compete are two free
services help marketers to find top-level information, including the top searches people used
to find the site, as well as traffic comparisons versus other Websites. For more comparison
capabilities and a deeper level of demographic information, marketer can just simply upgrades
their account.

Similar to Alexa and Compete system offerings monitor and aggregate a wide swath of Web
traffic, paid services from Quantcast and Nielsen NetRatings also provide analytics tools and
research related to online audiences, as well as online ad buying and selling.

As by shown example of how Alexa provide services for marketers by monitoring and
aggregating a wide swath of Web traffic from multiple sources to develop estimates for overall
ranking and other factors.

On the table 1 below, shows top 5 sites on the web. According to off-site web analytics is
measuring about your competitors and monitoring the internet as whole website, it is obvious
for marketers to analysis the market, so that company can generate more sales, reduce
marketing costs, enhance campaign performance, provide better user experience, and reach
specific target segments. As well as on table, more specific shows competitor daily/monthly
search traffic and top queries from search traffic and more other details. Thus, research on your
competitors and understand their strategy, is the advantages for the company to take step
forward than others in the market.

Co Tweet and HootSuite

There are other tools like CoTweet and HootSuite are relative newcomers to the market when
they looking further out into the social web. Especially for small and medium-size business
that use tools to monitoring and engaging with social web. It started as management tools
Twitter, but they are now expanding their support for other social channels such as Facebook
and LinkedIn. It simply for an organization tracks the effectiveness of multiple marketing
efforts in multiple social channels, and also from platforms.

Because social web such as Twitter and Facebook, it creates more effective buzz to a company.
Therefore, this platform is critical important for for small and medium-size business to enhance
awareness. CoTweet is a web-based social media management and analytics tool. With
CoTweet you can not only manage clicks on content you publish within the application, but
also integrate any web analytics platforms with campaign codes and shortened URLs. Just like
Bobowski believes “it provides closed-loop reporting and allows marketers to associate
revenue and other success metrics to social media activity”. (Peters, 2011)

As shown table below, CoTweet also provides updates and follow-up messages to be assigned
to specific social media managers. Different knowledge of social media managers can
responses immediately to appropriate questions and comments from followers, which shows
to followers that there are person behind responding the questions. Also, from the questions
and buzz marketers will know who he is talking with if question arise for as specific tweet. It
helps marketers collected more accurate data and responded visitor’s needs.

CONCLUSION
This report has shown that Web continues to have growing importance in marketing efforts,
therefore on-site and off-site Web Analytics solutions will likely become more crucial tools
that lead to greater business success. This is supported by the number of toolset made available
to businesses of all sizes to monitor and analyze web traffic on their sites in order to determine
what is happening not only throughout the rest of the Web ecosystem but also in social media.

Refer to PPT
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