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An inevitable consequence of the push to achieve sales through multiple channels is that businesses must also be prepared to deliver multichannel customer service. But is social there yet?
An inevitable consequence of the push to achieve sales through multiple channels is that businesses must also be prepared to deliver multichannel customer service.
Poor levels of service can ruin the overall shopping experience and mean that the customer is lost forever, so online, in-store, mobile and all other channels must work together to deliver an excellent overall customer experience.New research from eDigitalResearch examined how consumers prefer to contact companies and then compared the various response times and satisfaction levels.
The survey asked more than 2,000 UK respondents how they expect to be able to contact a business - 92% selected email, followed by telephone (71%) and by post (45%). Fewer than one in four (22%) said live online chat and just 11% said social media....
Knowing which social media channels to use to build your brand and engage your audience is crucial. Study your market and your social media platforms to create social media solutions unique to your company.... In an increasingly “social” world, having the right communication channel for your company is more important than ever, and the list of social media platforms grows longer. The choices seem endless: Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook, Blogger, YouTube. These are just some of the channels dominating social media marketing services. But which ones should you choose? While any social media channel will be an extremely useful tool in your company’s inbound marketing strategy, there are a few broad trends you should be aware of. The type of social media solutions your company will want to use depends on the depth of your brand messaging and the demographics of the group being targeted. The latter can be a bit tricky, so analyzing the age, interests, and other characteristics of a company’s target market is an important first step in determining which social media channel to use. A young, hip student is likely to spend more time checking out new content on Tumblr or Pinterest, and exploring predetermined pages on YouTube or Facebook. A more mature audience, however, is likely to be found on LinkedIn Groups and Google+ Communities....
Investing time and money on social media is necessary for all types of businesses nowadays. Here are nine examples of small businesses using social media for branding. Social media is the new way for the word to spread: from product recommendations to advice on what to do, where to go, and what to do. From little conversations that mean nothing to meaningful revelations that could change lives, from stupid pictures to inspiring profiles – social media has it all. Customers have the final word now. News gets out faster. Other users and buyers are now the trusted sources. Social conversations are now the holy grail of business reputation management. Social media is social proof that materializes quickly. Small businesses are indeed tapping into the power of social media....
In a crowded conference hall filled with digital ad marketers, Citibank North American head of consumer marketing Vanessa Colella explained why it made perfect sense that one of her first orders of business was, in fact, "eliminating the digital marketing department." While having a group of digital specialists who "all come with incredible backgrounds, they speak in jargon, and wear blue jeans" could be comforting, Colella explained at Ad Age's Digital Conference, that it is often a crutch. Why? Because everyone in a company's marketing department needs to be fluent in digital strategy. "There's no path for you if you don't," she said. So Citibank trained everyone, from those who specialized in bus shelters to TV marketing, to be digitally savvy....
Social media marketing is the fastest growing area of influence in the digital world. It encompasses social media campaigns, strategy and optimization, and increases brand visibility, engagement and conversions. 83% of marketers say that social media is important to their business. That number continues to elevate as Internet capabilities advance, necessitating a brand social presence. At ZOG Digital, we have quite a lot of experience in digital marketing (In fact, our CEO, Jeff Herzog, started iCrossing before Google was around!). So we decided to share our compiled social media marketing “wisdom” in the list below...
The Kardashians are social media marketing and branding superstars. Here's how you can Keep Up with the Kardashians on your own social media networks.... Love them or hate them, the Kardashian family knows how to market themselves. Okay, so they have a reality TV show, or four, that helped propel them to the highest levels of fame. But they are still social media marketing and branding superstars. So here's how you can Keep Up With The Kardashians....
For the latest in our series of posts looking at how the world’s biggest brands use social I’ve turned the spotlight on Microsoft. Bill Gates’ empire still looms large over the global software market, though its fortunes are often overshadowed by Apple’s astonishing level of success. And much like Google, Microsoft also runs a few of its own social platforms – enterprise network Yammer and Pinterest clone Socl. So it’s interesting to see how Microsoft makes use of other social networks to promote its products and maintain its fortunes....
... Today, Facebook offers businesses several ways to market themselves. The first option is to create a Facebook page about their business and use it to blast out brand messaging via posts to users who like their page. This is an option that many businesses have chosen and has become the talking point across all professionals. The second option is to run paid advertising via Facebook ads. These ads can drive on-site (to generate likes for the business’ Facebook page or engagement with prior page posts) or off-site (to drive traffic to a webpage off of Facebook). Looking at it this way, the opportunities on Facebook are rather black and white, though each one offers a complex set of opportunities and strategic implications. It is one site online (with a tremendous amount of traffic) brands can use in their marketing plans. Sounds simple enough, right? Wrong. This is where the Facebook Problem comes into play. The main part of the Facebook Problem is that brands have forgotten about integrated marketing communications. Marketers are guilty here....
I was recently asked a provocative question: “What experiences or insights have shaped your views on brand and reputation management in today’s business environment?” This is a great question and the more I thought about it, the clearer the answer(s) became. 1. The first insight reflects the The Changing Role of Influence. There is a great quote by Gary Hamel, who says “Influence is like water. Always flowing somewhere.” This is very true in today's business environment as new sources of influence are forming around our companies and industries at an extremely rapid pace....
...However, one type of content that still is underutilized in the world of SEO is online video. Although a lot of brands are incorporating video content into their overall online marketing strategies, most SEOs don’t place a high priority on it. Usually, they opt for creating various other types of content (e.g., infographics, images, written content, etc.). If used correctly, video can be an extremely powerful form of content and make a significant contribution to your overall SEO strategy, in more ways than one....
Picture the scene – you’re an innovative marketer working for a company that is stuck in the past. They have a website but they’ve never really paid much attention to SEO and they’re certainly not going to give you any money to engage in this newfangled “content marketing” the kids are talking about. What do you do? Well, believe it or not, it’s actually perfectly feasible to run a (basic) content marketing campaign on zero budget. Don’t expect the results to be earth-shattering and remember you will need access to a strong writer to get the great guest posting spots that will form the backbone of your efforts. However, with these five free tools you will be able to run a shoestring campaign that will demonstrate proof of concept to those holding the purse strings, allowing you to make a strong pitch for the kind of budget you deserve....
The goal: optimized content that attracts, engages, and converts. To get there? Lee Odden shares his formula for making a great content marketing strategy, including five creative content sourcing ideas and four types of content you need to know.
Businesses may soon be able to lure customers passing by their stores with precisely-timed, tailor-made discounts sent to their cell phones. AT&T Senior Vice President Jeff Bradley said his company is working with a well-known restaurant chain on an app that would send a customer a dollar-off coupon for her favorite latte or slice of pizza. His statement created an audible buzz among the nearly 1,000 people in the big ballroom of the Westin Seattle on Wednesday, and it was just one of the whiz-bang examples he cited to show how technology is dramatically reshaping how goods and services are traded....
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Looking to get your startup or small business on the path to success? There are lots of resources that can help you know how to approach your marketing, partners, suppliers, design, and legal matters, which are all crucial to the success of your business. Here are 10 killer resources that will help you take your business from idea to successful execution....
Every company these days knows they have to get social. Yet often, even when organizations think they're embracing social media in a big way, they aren't.... ... For most companies, social means marketing. It equals Facebook likes and Twitter followers. But that's just the price of entry into the social world we -- the 1.5 billion people using social networks -- are crafting around us. Because as powerful as social media is for exchanging ideas, it has the potential to do so much more for organizations. It can, in fact, become a new production line. Think about why that makes so much sense. In a society defined by information, we all deal in knowledge. Unleashed, always connected, able to look up unprecedented amounts of data with a swipe of a fingertip, we constantly swap reviews, advice, insights, and connections. All of these everyday actions are the raw materials in the 21st Century's form of production. And the social network? That's the production line, combining raw materials with many of the interactions generated among the people who share it. This gives life to new ideas, innovation and, as many are discovering in the workplace, a higher form of engagement....
Jay Rosen asks, reasonably, that people start drawing useful distinctions between buzzy terms like content marketing, sponsored content, native advertising, and even brand journalism. Here’s my stab at it:
The Native Matrix - Who is it written by? Editorial staff, Sales staff, ad agency, Brand execs - Who is it published by? Publisher: Public relations, Sponsored content/ Native advertising, Brand journalism/Thought leadership or Brand: Content marketing, Marketing, Blogging *Sponsored content is designed to be read; native advertising is designed to be shared. None of these distinctions is hard and fast, of course, but at least it’s a start; basically, it all comes down to who writes the content in question....
It’s a wired world, so let's allow our products to help them market themselves! Here are five ideas you can use to do that.... If you sell a web app or a software product that has web elements, it’s time to consider how your product can help market itself. More and more we’re seeing marketing built into products, allowing the code to do some of the advertising work for you. Here are five methods to consider.
Many marketers today are looking to increase their Facebook fans, LinkedIn memberships and/or Twitter followers. Social media marketing is a new buzz-word in both b2b and b2c domains. But, when it comes to engagement, how easy is it to measure the engagement-level of your Facebook fans or LinkedIn Group Members? How easy is it to interact with them and nurture them? How easy is it to get usage and engagement metrics out of Facebook, LinkedIn et al? Is it even possible? Can you act on the metrics? External social sites are good for brand-building (or reach) but not for interaction or engagement. A recent Gartner report cited that a mere six percent of marketers claim that marketing on social networking sites is their top priority. What is even more powerful is that 45 percent of those surveyed said corporate websites were key contributors to marketing success. And from the customer perspective, four out of five customers claim to visit a website for product information and only a mere 19 percent would visit a Facebook page, according to Incyte Group....
As absurd as it may sound, chatting with ads could become commonplace as speech-communication with computers continues to evolve. Just looking at ads is bad enough, so who would want to talk to them? While many people would likely answer "no one," voice-recognition software maker Nuance says the opposite is true. What Is A Voice Ad? Wanting in on the booming mobile ad market, Nuance developed a way for people to chat with ads much as they do with Siri on the iPhone. Called Voice Ads, the technology works off the Internet connection of any iOS or Android mobile device.... Hey. You. Get offa my phone!
Articles in a series on Mashable.com called “What’s Inside” looked for all the world like the hundreds of other articles on the digital media site. But journalistically, they were something very different.
The articles, about technology topics in a wide variety of products, including modems and theHubble Space Telescope, were paid for by Snapdragon, a brand of processor chip made by Qualcomm, and the sponsor of the series. Most were even written by Mashable editorial employees.
An article on Google Glass technology was shared almost 2,000 times on social media, indicating that readers may not have cared, or known, if it was journalism or sponsored content, although the series was identified as such. Advertisers and publishers have many names for this new form of marketing — including branded content, sponsored content and native advertising. Regardless of the name, the strategy of having advertisers sponsor or create content that looks like traditional editorial content has become increasingly common as publishers try to create more sources of revenue....
Sports are an inherently social activity, so brands like Nike are a natural fit when it comes to social media marketing. To find out how the sports giant makes the most of this opportunity, I thought it would be interesting to see how it uses Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+. This post is the latest in a series of blogs that have taken a similar look at major brands including ASOS, Tesco, Red Bull, Cadbury and McDonalds...
Using Twitter as a medium, the World's Fastest Agency will respond from briefing to idea within 24 hours. A networked team of creatives in New York launched a new service that meets the demand for rapid turnaround advertising. Using Twitter as a medium, the World's Fastest Agency will respond from briefing to idea within 24 hours. Outputs will include tag lines, product and service naming, communications platforms and (of course) stunts. According to its press release: WFA helps time-pressured clients keep pace with the lightening fast 24/7 global media and social culture. Clients can say goodbye to 100-page PowerPoint decks, meetings, weeks of fee negotiation, countless emails, more meetings, lunch, meetings, scope of work to-ing and fro-ing, meetings, more emails, Q&A sessions, tissue meetings, inaudible conference call, pitch, feedback, feedback on the feedback, re-briefing, re-pitching, another meeting, more feedback, focus groups, another meeting, more emails…. A three-step process involves the deposit of a one-time fee of $999 via PayPal, the sending of a brief to @fastestagency, and then the turnaround of an idea via Twitter direct message within 24 hours....
New research study identifies Twitter Tribes by unique words As a Twitter power user, I couldn’t resist looking into this Twitter research study on word usage in my favorite micropublishing channel. It’s fascinating to say the least. It’s titled "Word usage mirrors community structure in the online social network Twitter." Researchers looked at more than 250,000 users to define some very interesting Tribes. Who knew Twitter users were forming such unique Tribes and speaking their own language? Academics really do provide a useful service for the rest of us. Pointing out the sociological implications of social media and everything else we do....
The big question that is often asked about social media when it comes to investing money, resources and time is “what is the return on investment?” Some pundits will say that is not the right question because it is like asking “what is the ROI on your phone?”. Others will say social media should stand up and be measured in its own right. The challenge though is that we live in a multi-channel marketing world and the path to your sales door for your product is not a straight path and easy to measure... Should the first click or the last click get the credit?... So what has been the results achieved from social media marketing? Here are a few examples....
The rise of spontaneous social ads means the end of the ad campaign as we know it. fascinating thing happened at the Super Bowl this year. Typically, Super Bowl advertisers meticulously plan every aspect of their presence months in advance of the big game. But this time, Coca-Cola, Audi, and Oreo didn't just limit themselves to pre-packaged creative — they also had in place rapid response teams that adapted to events as they happened. So when the rest of America was reacting to the power outage in the stadium, the brands were, too — appropriately and in their own brand voice. Recently, the Wharton Future of Advertising Program asked more than 175 industry leaders to describe their vision of what advertising would be like in the year 2020. Based on our analysis of the responses to the 2020 Project, the Super Bowl case isn't just a once-a-year stunt — it's a preview of a model that will scale and become a foundational characteristic of major brand advertising. The industry experts had a varied take, but a remarkably consistent theme emerged: the rigid campaign-based model of advertising, perfected over decades of one-way mass media, is headed for extinction....
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From the research, it looks like consumers have low expectations of "social service" and companies are doing their best to keep those expectations low by not delivering very well.