Ads to Go

We’re seeing a consistent trend in mobile ads… they’re increasing. According to Deliver Magazine over 31M people claimed to have viewed an ad on their mobile device between June and September 2008 – over half of them were men.

Similar studies, including the Media Advertising Forecast from MAGNA (courtesy of eMarketer), project a 36% increase in mobile advertising revenues – bringing the medium to $229M in 2009, and $409M in 2011. This is in sharp contrast to the traditional mediums of newspaper, radio, magazine and TV each of which have each seen a 14+ percentage drop this year.

Why is this sector growing when all others are sliding? My guess would be two-fold, the first part related to our usage… everyone’s on the phone, all the time! Pick any public place, odds are half of the people there are on their mobile – most viewing, texting etc. instead of talking.

The other component of the guess would be related to available targeting – mobile devices are among the most personal items we have today some guard their numbers, many screen calls and most are judicious with their usage either because of their contract or available battery life so if you’re viewing a mobile ad, it has to be important. Associated tracking, SMS op-ins etc. show the importance and help marketers realize the potential upside to their mobile investment strategy.

Make plans to dial into our Mobile Marketing Service In Action call today (@ 2:00 ET.)

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SIA: Mobile Marketing

You’ve probably sensed the theme of mobile marketing in this week’s series of posts… these have been leading up to tomorrow’s Service In Action call focused on the topic.

Our call tomorrow will cover marketing ideas on mobile email, SMS and the where the industry is heading. Join us to learn how to best connect with your recipients anytime, anywhere! We’ll share examples of how retailers, entertainment companies and financial institutions stay connected and competitive. We’ll also discuss ways to help position your organization for the next level of marketing and capitalize new revenue opportunities.

Make plans to dial into our call tomorrow (@ 2:00 ET.)

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SMS Coupons

Many marketers are entering into the SMS Marketing space, I’ve always admired the connection Bravo TV has with their viewers through their Mobile Fan Clubs, I’ve also read about the success Coke has had with their My Coke Rewards program and seen others – Papa John’s and Subway use SMS to deliver special offers.

I must admit that I was kinda surprised when I read about the success Ashley Furniture Homestores has had with SMS – mainly because SMS is an instant form of communication and furniture purchases typically have a long lead time. Their initiative was detailed in a Nielsen whitepaper, The Short Code Marketing Opportunity.

The Ashley Furniture Homestores in the Carolinas has eight stores and were looking to boost sales last summer so they sent 6,000 text message coupons to customers (their opted in list) informing them of a secret four day sale, they coupled the SMS with email (some 29K.) The SMS campaign was the more successful – generating $85K of the $135K revenue from that sale; or $122 in revenue for every $1 spent to execute the text campaign.

For Ashley, the mobile coupons were sent as text message codes, these codes were manually entered by a store cashier. Other companies have incorporated multi-media to send barcode coupons to be scanned like a traditional paper coupon. Learn more about SMS success…

Make plans to dial into our Mobile Marketing Service In Action call this Friday (@ 2:00 ET.)

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How do you Mobile?

Think about how you (and those you know) use a cell phone… eMarketer recently published a story on a study from Lightspeed Research on just that topic. Lightspeed did a multi-country study on cell users in the US, UK, France and Germany and learned that most make a call at least once a day – the highest reported frequency was in France (57%) with the US (52%) closely following. The UK relied heaviest on SMS – even over voice calls. After voice and SMS, internet browsing was the most poplar daily activity with some UK respondents indicating that they use their mobile daily for internet connectivity.

The European mobile infrastructure is much different from that in the US, but current evolutions are freeing up the US mobile space – can you say 4G network? These advancements coupled with the changes in contracts and device technology will radically change the game for marketers in the next few years. Are you offering a mobile rendering version? Is your site mobile friendly? Is SMS part of your interaction? The need for a mobile strategy may not be a necessity today, but it will be in the near future…

Make plans to dial into our Mobile Marketing Service In Action call this Friday (@ 2:00 ET.)

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Mobile Versioning

How smart is your smartphone? The answer may have to do with the way it handles email. Odds are your phone fits into one of three scenarios, according to Mark Brownlow’s article on Email Marketing Reports. The first (best case) is that the device handles the HTML without a problem, this instance could be improved a mobile (smaller) version optimized for the device’s screen.

A second scenario is that the device receives text-only versions and the final is that it receives the original HTML source code (full links) or simplified version of the HTML. Keep in mind that none of these are bad things… some are just closer to your original email than others.

The challenge is that many eMarketers are unsure of how many of their recipients are viewing email on a mobile device or how to best meet their needs. For the short term, the inclusion of a mobile version is a great way to test popularity. As phones continue to smarten-up (more capabilities) and decrease in price, many more of your recipients will rely on them to serve as their primary email/ internet connection, the mobile version option will help you prepare while simultaneously setting your recipient’s expectations.

Best practices incorporating the mobile version are still forming, but consider these suggestions from Mark’s article:
1) Offer a link to a small screen version in your HTML email (first scenario, above)

2) Add mobile URLs to your plain text version OR set the line length in the plain text version to a mobile-friendly number of characters (second scenario)

3) Make it easy for those with poor HTML email rendering (older operating systems) to find/ follow the mobile version URL (third scenario)

Make plans to dial into our Mobile Marketing Service In Action call this Friday (@ 2:00 ET.)

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Share Everything

Years ago the writing All I really need to know I Learned in Kindergarten was really popular, this Robert Fulghum piece has even been revived to fit global leadership… anyway, the first point of this is applicable to today’s post, Share Everything.

As eMarketers, we’re familiar with the social networking share tabs, many are using and some of us (i.e. me) believe that these tabs will soon replace Forward-to-a-Friend. So…
Which are the most successful? Are they being used? How do I get a piece of the pie?

The responses to those first questions are part of a recent survey from Silicon Alley Insider (courtesy of Blending The Mix and AddToAny) – Facebook is leading the charge as being the most successful site for sharing email content, email (traditional F2F) is second, followed by Twitter. The best part is that you can easily take part of the success by simply including the tabs in your outbound messages. A little code can go a long way to help make your message shareable while simultaneously influencing your viral success and social media outreach.

Once you’ve included these tabs, examine which are the most popular for your recipients, use this as your litmus to develop additional content for that forum – just because Bebo has a small number on this list doesn’t mean it’s not top of mind for your email recipients… maybe other, like-minded consumers are there!

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The Good & Bad

We all know the positive aspects of social media, but our new electronic word of mouth can also do harm. One of my favorite Columbia restaurants has experienced both the positive and negative aspects of social media – Za’s Brick Oven Pizza was also a favorite of Women’s Gamecock Basketball Coach, Dawn Staley. Staley is a local celebrity fond of Za’s and Twitter, historically she posted Tweets about her plans to dine there (multiple times a week) and host meetings with her team at the restaurant.

Unfortunately she had a bad experience there in early July and Tweeted she would not return… as a result influenced 1500 followers. Details aren’t published in The State but Za’s has made some personnel changes and hopes to have her back in the near future.

For marketers, it’s important to remember that you aren’t the only one influencing your social destiny... a simple disagreement/ misunderstanding could have greater impact and a small Tweet could have greater meaning. To be effective, you must keep watch, reply, repost and/ or respond when it makes sense.

P.S. If you’re in Columbia, the Three Cheese Za is well worth a try.

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Free Stuff!

It’s not secret, people love free stuff… even if they don’t need it, want it or know what it is. Social media is an excellent way to capitalize on this innate human desire. Case in point is the recent Twitter-based contest run by Moonfruit.

To celebrate their 10-year anniversary, Moonfruit’s marketing director Wendy White lead a contest where Twitter followers could win one of 10 Apple MacBook Pros over seven days. To enter, you only had to send a creative tweet that included "#Moonfruit. All told, they acquired a number of new followers and saw an increase in paying customers – over 20% in sales.

Learn more about their strategy in Dana Mattiolo’s article in The Wall Street Journal and maybe you could Tweet-up a contest for yourself!

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Creating Attractive Conversations

I spent three days with members of the Mailorder Gardening Association sharing ideas around Social Media Marketing, we talked about Engagement and how to stay connected with those we serve. Summarizing those conversations, we found that the customer has a typical engagement lifecycle covering three stages:

Stage I: The Pre-Purchase/ Purchase – Initially, the consumer is trying to learn about your offering, if they get all the answers and are interested they will make the purchase.
Stage II: Product/ Service Delivery Stage – The consumer receives the product/ service from you and does their initial evaluation/ first time use.
Stage III: Product/ Service Satisfaction Stage – Make a post-sale call to inquire if all went well and see how the product/ service is meeting the customer’s needs.

On all three occasions, you have an opportunity to extend the engagement, continue your message and leverage social media and/ or user-generated content. Pre-plan for the first stage; ensure that your FAQs are listed on the site and where you can leverage pictures and video as part of this outreach.

For the second stage, make sure the consumer knows how to reach you – include all forms of contact on the packing invoice (including social media links.) Invite the customer to provide their feedback either through a product review or social media comment. You should also include contact information for one of your experts (power user, specialized CSR.) The third stage is vital, invite the consumer to provide feedback or expand on the feedback provided – do more than send a normal survey.

The importance of staying in touch cannot be underestimated, so make sure that your interaction is real and effective. Remember, there are tons of social media options – research, learn where your consumers congregate and make those connections; spending as little as 20 minutes a day can go a long way towards creating engagement.

If you need additional ideas or would like a copy of the presentation shared at the Mailorder Gardening Association, send a request.

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More than 140!

We’ve been posting a great deal on Twitter recently, due to its popularity and abounding coverage in the media. One such example of recent coverage is from Forbes on their late-breaking accomplishment… The Longest Tweet In History.

Recently Forbes’ own Taylor Buley posted a 247 character Tweet, a quote from Steve Forbes, through Twitter's programmable API. Buley’s Tweet was truncated at 136 characters with Twitter using the remaining four characters to display a space and hyperlinked ellipsis – hyperlinked to the full 247 character Tweet.

Twitter seems to have made these accommodations for the verbose, returning information that indicates a truncated Tweet and accommodating with hyperlinked ellipsis. While this is good news, you shouldn’t abuse their generosity – try to get it in 140 characters, if you need more consider blogging (Ah! Ah! Ah!)

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Mobile, Mobile, Mobile!

Mobile messaging is here to stay; many of us are rarely out of arm’s reach of our cell so it’s no surprise that the technology, use and design keep evolving. According to a recent eMarketer article, many are using a particular type of Smartphone… the iPhone, it garnered 13% in the Smartphone Usage and Brand Study from Crowd Science. Blackberry was close behind with 9%

For marketers the more interesting intelligence is the way these devices are used – Internet browsing was the most common function (80% of responders) followed closely by camera functions (74%) and email (73%.) This is great news as we consider additional ways to connect with consumers – imagine the opportunities with mobile banner ads, photo contests and email outreach (i.e. a timed response.) More importantly, this shows that you’re never too far from your recipient… timing changes, needs change (mobile rendering.)

If you’re not completely ready for the mobile revolution, make plans to join our Service In Action call on Friday, July 31. We’re going to discuss successes in the field, technology advancements, challenges and opportunities for marketers – hope to hear you on the call!

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Anytime, Anywhere

Go on, admit it… you’ve checked your mobile phone while driving, in meetings, during meals, while in bed, while brushing your teeth? Everyone’s on their phone, all the time – my ten-year-old cousin even has her own cell.

Considering the constant need and interaction marketers have to consider how this medium will play into your consumer interaction for 2009 and beyond. Here are a few facts on Mobile Marketing:

• 203 million of the 263 million US wireless subscriber plans included text messaging as part of their package as of 3Q08, according to a Nielsen Report1
• US Mobile subscribers send an average of 357 text messages each month, but only place 204 calls a month1
• 7.5% of all US households were wireless-only as of June 2008 (compared to 15% all of 2007)2
• Mobile phones to be main Web tool by 20203

What is your mobile strategy? If you’re still developing the framework or looking to engage recipients via SMS, Picture or email to Smart Phones you must take part in this month’s Service In Action call! In the meantime read past posts like, Where’s my Phone? from March.

1) The Short Code Marketing Opportunity, Nielsen; December 2008
2) National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS)
3) Agence France Presse

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Tweet Tweet

I’m familiar with Twitter, its marketing impact and value to a brand… but I’m far from being a Twunkie (Twitter Junkie.) In fact it seems like this social media darling adds a new app with almost every Tweet. So to help out here are a few better known Twitter Apps/ Terms, you can also visit The Top 21 Twitter Applications (According to Compete) for more:

- TwitPic is an app that lets you share photos on Twitter; they’ve had over 1.2M unique visitors in February.
- Tweetdeck streamlines notifications and tweets.
- Digsby centralizes your email, IM and social networking accounts into one desktop program.
-Twitterfeed allows users to automatically tweet posts published on a user’s blog using RSS.
-Twitterholic is the top Twitter user ranking site and had over 147K people visiting monthly.

In addition to these cool apps there are also ways to make your Twitter page do more for your brand, in a recent post on Social Media Today, Ian Orekondy detailed great information on how to search in Twitter (hastags,) some of the available analytic tools and ideas to help make the most out of our Twitter profile (i.e. backtweets.) Read his post, 3+ Ways to Measure the Impact of Social Media on Search, and couple these apps, to get the most out of your 140 characters!

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Fans & Tweets Up, Search Down

Is your favorite search engine losing ground? A recent Website Magazine article highlights how some (even new) search engines are being overshadowed by social media; we’ve all seen the overwhelming success of Facebook and Twitter but these sites are also becoming a first source for information.

Social media isn’t just for fun, many serious business have joined ranks yielding more meaningful connections. Reciprocally, the value of the information continues to rise, because these businesses view the importance of the channel. Users are also capitalizing on their contacts, using them as a first pass to find the answers they seek or as companion searches since alternate/ additional (more entertaining) information can be found on Facebook than through a Google search. Similarly, Twitter is being used by many for breaking news and important updates so users can search the site (via hashtags) to quickly access uber-targeted info.

So what are you waiting for? Social Media is here and is important and a successful way to strengthen your connections with your consumers or find new ones… get online, make some friends and start offering the latest/ greatest about your brand!

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Empty Cart Syndrome

Cart abandonment seems to be on the rise; according to an e-tailing group survey 60% of retailers are seeing rates over 20% this year. Unfortunately it’s just too easy to leave that filled cart… so easy that some shoppers are repeat abandoners.

The Sad Tale of Abandoned Shopping Carts in eMarketer cites the e-tailing survey along with a study by PayPal and comScore which offers details from the shopper’s POV… as you can probably guess the major reason for cart abandonment was attributed to high shipping charges (46% of respondents.) Other reasons were their interest in comparison shopping (37%,) searching for a coupon (27%) and customer service concerns – i.e. need to reach a CSR or were concerned about security of checkout.

Unfortunately the economic downturn isn’t helping retailers, so to combat the current strife you have to ask if it would be best to give recipients what they expect… at least in the short term. Maybe offering a shipping discount or a coupon would help generate some additional revenue and reduce the number of abandoned carts – especially when you consider that the average abandoned cart value is $109!

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Post too Much!

Ever worry about posting too much on your Twitter account or Facebook status? While these social networking tools are great ways to keep in touch there is a downside to them as well, a recent MSN Travel article details how one man’s out of town/ vacation status may had led to a burglary.

Israel Hyman of Arizona owns an online video business, he uses Twitter to connect and generate buzz and has earned over 2K followers… he now believes that his Twitter updates tipped the burglars off when he updated his account with his vacation status. According to the article, only very specific video editing equipment was taken from his home.

Don’t fit the same fate, keep the social networking sites dedicated to your business business-focused; keep close tabs on contacts that you allow in your personal social networking sites and when in doubt, post after the fact!

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Outlook 2010

Various industry blogs have been commenting on the upcoming release of MS Outlook; although still in beta testing, the word on the street is that Outlook 2010 will continue to use MS Word as the rendering engine (same as the current 2007 version.) This decision will continue to impact your email rendering; specifically your emails delivered to Outlook, users will NOT have support for:
- Background images (HTML or CSS)
- Animated GIFs
- Forms
- CSS floats or positioning
- Flash or other plug-ins

One of the best detailed write ups is posted on the Email Standards Project by Dave Greiner (Email Client News.) This post details more about the issues at hand and shows how these decisions will render emails going forward. The part that I find most interesting is the social media response (via Twitter.) Tons of interested parties have gone out to voice their opinion on http://fixoutlook.org/, you too can weigh in and possibly influence the release of Outlook 2010 (approximately a year away.)

This is yet another use of social media to group and influence change in our industry.

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Fiskateers

A few weeks ago we posted about the success Liz Claiborne New York saw through the creation of an online community. Their story is a great example of how to boost brand awareness and loyalty while simultaneously getting insight from their target market.

Cut to a related story on Fiskars Brands, 350+ year old Finland-based Company, they were seeing low brand loyalty following the introduction of a knock-off version of their products… in response they launched a huge R&D push which showed that despite recognition, they weren’t making an emotional connection. With the goal of increasing brand name mentions and sales in specific geographic regions, Fiskars sent out a national call for part-time (paid) Fiskars Ambassadors, after selections and an intense few days of training the five selected Ambassadors began spreading the word about the true Fiskars products.

These Ambassadors regularly post to a blog about their work – attending tradeshows, lead classes, chat online and interact with stores/ owners to build brand but never sell. In 24 hours they had 200 Ambassadors. There was an increase of conversations online – some 600%. They saw a near 60% increase in hits online, increased sales in stores that hosted a Fiskateer and most importantly saw the creation of marketing tools, events (online and offline) as well as valuable feedback to marketing and product development while strengthening the company's connection to customers.

Just more proof that social media is a great way to connect with existing and emerging consumers… will you have the next big idea?

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Capturing IDs Correctly

A friend of mine runs marketing for a major sports team, during each game he has interns walking through the aisles handing out paper to get fans to enter a contest – a single entry collects the fan’s email and other contact information and gives them the chance to win a season ticket package and other prizes. They have tons of entries but it’s a logistical nightmare… his team is really behind with entering the information into their database he even has to throw out some of the cards because the info is illegible

Another friend runs a major charity; she tries her best to have volunteers collect money at public places. People are kind to her but she struggles to get enough volunteers to stand out in the weather during the holidays and solicit donations. Her bigger challenge is how to collect personal contact information from the donors – after all, these are people who have donated something and are likely to give in the future. Obviously adding this to the volunteer’s responsibilities will be a pain, and will likely reduce their success rate… plus she’ll have the challenge of inputting all the information in a timely manner.

A third friend works for a major financial institution, he has great signage to collect email IDs but only has about a 30% capture rate in his bank branches… what’s worse is that people don't pay as much attention to the campaigns after they’ve signed up.

All three of them seek your input; give us your ideas and suggestions to better capture information and improve readership! Your comments will help all blog readers!

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Email & Sleep Deprivation

We took an informal poll of eMarketers to find out what elements of their email program keep them up at night. We wanted to know their challenges and hope to incorporate these in future Service In Action call topics and Panel of Peers sessions. Here are 15 from some of the best in the industry:

1) How do I get higher conversions/ clicks from the people who’ve opened? How to boost sales?
2) How do I make sure the data is segmented correctly?
3) How do I improve my deliverability?
4) How do I truly integrate different channels; where should I start? How should I combine the cross-channel data collected?
5) How do I deal with unsubscribes – reduce the number and deal with those who want to drop off?
6) How do I best explain our eMarketing program to management?
7) How do I really get started with social media?
8) How do I integrate social media marketing in my overall marketing efforts (print)?
9) How do I reduce the time spent on executing email marketing campaigns?
10) While analyzing results, what should I look at first? Who else should analyze results?
11) How do I reduce marketing spend without leaving out impressions?
12) How do I deal with email being perceived as SPAM?
13) How do I make sure the recipient is not receiving too much email? How often should he/ she be targeted?
14) How do I survey the recipient? How do I ask questions? What should I ask?
15) How to grow the list (effectively)?

Be sure to share yours with us, a quick email or comment can get your idea on the radar for a future Learning Network event.

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Ask Them (Part III)

So you have their information (tips from yesterday and Tuesday) in your database, including their email ID… now the challenge is making sure you get them to pay attention to your campaigns. We all know that an email capture is not just about getting their ID; it’s about ensuring that your recipient is interested in what you’re sending.

Start by getting your team to be proficient users of your email program, your goal should be 100% opens and clicks by your own people. If your team is paying attention to your program – they’ll be in a better position to describe the emails to your customers/ prospects. Don't forget to have signs in your store/ branch and posted on your other channels listing the benefits of your email program – really crisp messages to 1) entice the user to sign up; and 2) stress to the recipient that you have a program worth their attention.

Try to keep your solicitation messaging consistent across channels, run internal contests to reward your own people – on email collection and email capture effectiveness. Define email capture effectiveness as a scoring system for a customer to both open and click your campaigns. It is not just about collecting names, it’s about getting people to pay attention.

Share your ideas with us and look for future posts on effective ideas to get your customers engaged.

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Ask Them (Part II)

My friend (yesterday's post) has learned a lot about her program over the past year and offers a fresh perspective based on lessons learned, here are some tips I’ve offered to enhance her outreach:

1) Spend a little more time engaging the customer in relevant dialogue; talk to them about the product they’ve purchased, solicit their input and point out your digital assets – sell them on visiting these portions of your site and sharing information.

2) As you sell them on these digital assets and associated benefits, be crisp and precise – make sure you have this scripted so there is no confusion by the reps. A consistent branded message across channels goes a long way in keeping things clear.

3) Take a little extra time to get their email ID, get them to notice your Facebook page, let them follow you on Twitter. Don't just ask for their email first, describe the benefits of your program and only then ask… this increases your chances of collecting the information.

This intelligent conversation gives your brand credibility, makes your reps look real and helps to engage your customers.

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