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Marketing Strategy

Content Marketing Resolutions for 2013

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As 2012 continues to wind down and we look forward to what 2013 will bring, a great opportunity presents itself to evaluate our content efforts throughout this year, make improvements, and get a jump on January 1. In the spirit of the holiday season and the New Year, we’ve gathered up a list of some Content Marketing “New Year’s resolutions” to make sure your business is ready to hit the ground running when the ball drops.

Revamp an Existing Content Strategy

Even if you’ve got a content marketing strategy in play, it’s always a good idea to take a step back and seek out areas that performed well vs. those that could use improvement. And this doesn’t just mean your digital content assets. If you’ve spent a big chunk of time optimizing digital content, social media profiles, etc., what does that mean for your tried and tested physical marketing materials, like flyers and brochures? Have these been updated as well, carrying over the same cohesive brand message, look, and feel?

This is just one example to consider when evaluating content as a whole. If you’d like more tips in this area, our team recently wrote an exhaustive white paper on the subject (and did we mention it’s free to download?).

Subscribe to a New Marketing Source / Blog

We all know the value of the Internet when it comes to gathering the latest trends, tactics, and updates from a marketing perspective. With that being said, branching out and finding a new resource can offer up better insights and give your marketing teams more fodder to drive their future actions toward innovation. There are a bunch of resources, blogs, and discussion groups out there that report on what’s “hot” among different audiences.

If your company would rather keep up with industry-specific trends, taking that route also has great advantages. Keeping up and interacting via LinkedIn groups is a great way to find and participate in industry-wide discussions as well as hear different opinions and viewpoints.

Evaluate your Brand and Content as a Tag Team

Nothing in digital marketing operates in isolation. Everything is interconnected, and different campaigns always influence and affect each other. From a content-based standpoint, one of the most direct relationships is between your content and your brand.

For 2013, it may be time to re-evaluate this relationship; does your content reinforce your brand promise and “mission statement“? Is there a solid “brand language” established for all company communications? Do these elements work together across all media and materials? Taking all of these concerns into consideration is a big step toward highlighting what makes your business stand out and carrying those differentiating factors over to the way you market and advertise.

What’s your marketing resolution for 2013? Leave us a comment below!

Sizing Up Tag Management For Your Organization

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What is Tag Management?

Tag management is a way to add, edit, and remove tags from your website. The most common forms of tags (small piece of code) are for web analytics, search engine marketing, ad serving, and testing; however, there are many other types. These tags are usually in the form of JavaScript. Tag management systems provide you with flexibility to combine these tags into a single tag and control the deployment of the tag from a console, not directly on the website.

Do I need Tag Management?

In my opinion, it depends on the type of website (content management systems or “hard coded” websites), your marketing tactics, website performance, security policy, and business strategies. If you are not proactively looking to measure all marketing initiatives, then you’re not ready for tag management and you need to start measuring. If you have more than 1 million pageviews to your website and 3 different types of JavaScript or tags on the website, then you might want to consider tag management. In addition, if you have specific needs such as poor load-times, industry security issues, or to make a strategic decision to empower your marketing team, I would recommend looking into a tag management system.

Types of Tags supported by Tag Management Solutions

How it works: Common Approaches of Tag Management

There is a variety of implementation methodologies, but most vendors use client-side tag implementation. A few use server-side tag management and a combination of client-side & server-side tag management. Both options use JavaScript tags; however, the main difference refers to where most tags are fired, either at the browser or server level.

Why Tag Management?

Most tag management solutions have partners with prebuilt common tags to implement quickly and save you time. There are often workflow and user administration features to manage users and processes to manage quality assurance as well as approvals to launch tags. The uses of simplified user interfaces make it easy for everyone to use the tool. There are also reports to see if the tags are working effectively. Many vendors give you additional features for auditing, conversion analysis, and attribution modeling.

Recommendations for Tag Management by Business type

  1. For small businesses that need tag management, I would recommend Google Tag Manager. It’s free and it should provide you with the basic necessities of tag management with align with your marketing tactics.

  2. For mid-sized businesses with multiple tags, 1-10 million pageviews, and a need for tag templates, I would recommend QuBit. It has native reporting with API features and about 50 tag templates for ease of use. It’s fairly priced and has options for self-service or hosted management.

  3.  For enterprise businesses with multiple tags, mobile devices, security issues and more, I would recommend Ensighten. It has hybrid deployment options with additional modules such as mobile or privacy. It’s more expensive but worth the security features. There’s a one-time flat implementation fee plus the cost of pageviews.

Action Items to move forward with Tag Management

  • Take inventory of your tags and future tagging opportunities.

  • Review tag management solutions that meet your business’s needs.

  • Do your research on possible vendors & demo the solutions.

  • Select a solution for your business.

  • Find two tag management champions: Business side & IT.

Marketing Election 2012

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If you voted in the Presidential election yesterday and are still in the voting spirit, you’re in luck! We’ve created our own election where the fundamental marketing belief systems are going head-to-head. No debates and no political attack-ads, and at the end, you’ll get to cast your vote! But first, let’s take a look at the candidates.

Digital Marketing Party

As technology continues to thrive and building relationships with customers holds more marketing clout than ever before, it seems as though digital marketing is building a strong presence to lower costs, increase reach & visibility, and drive sales. Compared to its traditional competitor, the Digital Marketing party touts that it’s more forward-thinking and more in tune with modern audiences.

The Digital Marketing Party’s high-level platform items break down like this:

  • Cost-Effective & Cutting-Edge

  • Removes Geographic Barriers (potential for international markets)

  • Focused on Forming Relationships with Target Audiences

  • Affords Adaptability and Flexibility

Traditional Marketing Party

On the more conventional side of things, some businesses are perfectly satisfied with their current initiatives (phone calls, billboards, TV and radio ads, etc.), and adhere to the “ain’t broke, don’t fix it” mentality. The traditional party argues that digital marketing is still new and constantly changing. This party believes that it will take time to see what, if anything from the digital marketers will be able to truly stand the test of time.

The Traditional Marketing Party’s high-level platform items are as follows:

  • Time-Tested, Reliable, and Consistent

  • Some Audiences are Better Reached through Traditional Means

  • Traditional Campaigns can Form Relationships as well

  • Takes the Business to the People (more direct)

The Ideal Sales Process

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A balanced and consistent sales process is critical to the survival and growth of any business, agency, or corporation. The fact is a company can only go as far as their sales will take them. This means that, if a salesperson or team is unsuccessful you can bet that the company will be as well. There are many different approaches and views on what the ideal sales process is or looks like. However, if you are looking for the perfect approach, you better be the most patient person in the world because there is no such thing. There are only opinions, judgments, and past statistics to try and guide you in the right direction. So from my experiences, here is my opinion on what the ideal sales process looks like.

The Initial Call

The initial call is one of the most important parts of the sales process. This is where you want to plant that initial seed in their mind and let them know that you are here. It is important to be confident and speak clearly. Control the conversation and show them that you know what you are talking about. The best call is a smart call. So, be sure to know their company, industry, and speak their language. By doing so, this will increase the probability that the call will go well. Sales professionals will get a prospects voicemail the majority of the time, and it is important not to get discouraged when this happens. Even though you did not speak directly with the prospect, a good voicemail is still a step in the right direction and a chance to get your name and company name out there. Also, too many salespeople attempt to sell to the prospect on the initial call. This approach most likely will fail 9 times out of 10. In my experience, the initial call is all about trying to set-up a meeting.

The Follow-Up Email

The follow-up email is a big part of the sales process. However, some sales professionals still do not seem to understand exactly how to send a follow-up email correctly or just how beneficial it can be. What many salespeople do not realize is that even though they may have gotten a prospects voicemail on the initial call and have not heard a response since, this does not automatically mean that they are uninterested. Many prospects are more comfortable communicating with people they have never spoken to before via email instead of over the phone. Also, many prospects are extremely busy and email might be the quickest and most convenient form of communication. So, it is important to be thorough when sending a follow-up email to a prospect. Make sure to tailor each email to those prospects specific needs. The same generic email to every prospect is boring, ineffective, and quite frankly is plain lazy. In my experience, it is also best to send your follow-up emails first thing in the morning because that is when everyone checks all of their emails. By doing so, this will improve the chances of your email being read.

The Follow-Up Call

In my experience, the follow up call is the turning point in the sales process. If are lucky enough to get a hold of the prospect on the follow-up call, you can usually start to gauge how interested or disinterested the prospect is. At this point in the process, the prospect has most likely looked over the information that you have sent them and has a pretty good idea on if they are looking to acquire your company’s services or not.

The Meeting

The Meeting is the most important part of the sales process. This is where you separate the men from the boys. When a sales professional is lucky enough to get a meeting it is time to buckle down and prepare physically and mentally. Make sure to develop a presentation that briefly highlights your company’s services and how you can help the prospect address their major pain points. Also, too many sales people go into a meeting and continuously talk about their company and achievements.  This is a big mistake! It is important that when you go into a meeting that it is conversational. You need to find out everything you can about that prospect and what their needs or struggles are. Then you can speak to how your company can help to address that need. In my experience, if you go to a meeting and you are talking more than the prospect is that is not a good sign. So, be confident and engage the prospect! Finally, be sure to ask the prospect what the next step is and always leave something behind (e.g. business card, folder, etc.)

Do Not Give Up!

It is very important that a sales professional never lets a potential prospect fall through the cracks. If someone asks you to follow up in 6 months, then follow up in 6 months. If you cannot get a hold of a prospect or keep getting their voicemail, then continue to leave voicemails. Continue to let that seed from the initial call grow! One of two things is going to happen, either they are going to ask you to stop calling or they are going to finally give you that 30 minutes you need to show them what they have been missing. So, unless a prospect asks you to take them off of your list, keep trying to get that meeting and never give up! As is mentioned earlier, everyone has a different approach or view on how the sales process should be done. There is no perfect way to sell! In my experience, the most important thing is to be confident, be unique, know your product, and commit to the process. Selling is not always the easiest thing to do, but as long as you stick with it and commit to what works for you the future will be bright for you and the company.
Want to share your ideas and views on the sales process? Let us know in comment section below, or contact us at 610-743-5602.

3 Ways Gamification Can Help Your Marketing

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What Is Gamification?

Gamification, whether you realize it or not, has already had an impact on your everyday life. If you’ve ever checked-out in an online store that marked your progress, earned badges using Foursquare, or been a part of a customer loyalty or “frequent-flyer” program, then you’ve experienced Gamification first-hand.

So what’s it all about? Gamification is the practice of taking game-design elements and applying them to non-game contexts. The achievements, leaderboards, rewards, and progress bars in our examples represent elements we might find in a game, but are used when we shop or interact on social networks. While the technique has been around for a while, Gamification’s marketing uses have only begun to take hold.

Incentivizing Online Activities

The goal of every game is enjoyment from the user, and one way this has been accomplished online is by offering incentive for completing certain actions. “Sign up and get the first month free,” “Receive 10,000 Bonus Miles after your first year,” and other similar offers have compelled consumers to take action because it results in something of value, i.e., a prize, reward, or bonus. The marketing implication of this lies in the power of achievement and feeling a part of something exclusive. Your customers will be far more likely to sign up for a newsletter, answer a survey, or fill out a form if they feel as though their actions are worth something.

Game Mechanics

The web user experience is often one of the most important marketing materials, as it constitutes one of the first touch points a prospective customer will have with your business. To that point, there are many opportunities to “gamify” this experience, starting with your content. According to a theory known as “Cascading Information,” consumers respond better to information in small pieces, ensuring they fully comprehend everything before delving deeper. How can this apply? Take YouTube, for example. The average viewer will typically drop off after only a minute or so (and you can check the analytics to prove it). By creating shorter sections of this content, you build your audience up to greater levels of complexity. Throw in a call to action (or a reward) along the way, and they’ll come back in droves to see what comes next.

Interactivity & Engagement

As I’ve said, these techniques and mechanics have the central purpose of appealing to the user—making something that is boring or taxing enjoyable and worthwhile. From a marketing perspective, all these translate to better engagement with your target audience. The other great part about utilizing Gamification is that it can apply to all aspects of your Digital Marketing plan, including developing contests via social media, advertising limited-time promotional offers, motivating staff & employees, or combining incentives to create a “meta-game,” the possibilities really are boundless.

If you don’t think Gamification fits in with your industry, think again. Even if it’s not at the forefront of your marketing strategy, game elements can still work behind the scenes to help you define customer behaviors and lead them to your company to fulfill their needs. Let us know what your thoughts on Gamification are in the comments below (1,000 Bonus Points go to the first 5 who post!).

3 Content Questions for your Next Web Design Project

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For any business owner, the company website is one of the most valuable marketing materials. It is often one of the first points of contact for prospects, and as they say, first impressions are everything. A website’s content, when managed effectively, ultimately contributes to higher conversion rates, increased revenue, and better customer service across the entire business. But before the content creation process begins, there’s a few questions to ask yourself that will save you time and aggravation.

Do I Have All The Materials I Need?

I don’t mean cutting down the amount of work you do by reusing the content of your brochures and data sheets. Instead, gathering and utilizing the context, message, or tone from these established materials can give your brand a kind of “time-honored” consistency. In addition, users and potential customers will often respond and more easily relate to content they feel is familiar. That’s the trick—making sure your content is updated and “fresh,” but reinforcing the same message / values that you’ve established your business around.

Do I Know Who I'm Writing For?

The point above, as you might expect, leads to the issue of your audience. To attract, engage, and ultimately convert customers with a website, it’s important to have a firm grasp on who makes up that audience and what they want to see. Choosing your desired segmentation, identifying their interests, needs, and expectations, and finally aligning your content with those attributes makes for a smoother process and a better, more impactful end result.

What About The Future?

When all is said and done, what happens next? Where do you take your content after your project is complete? The good part about pondering this is that there is a wealth of options for your new web content. For example, you can create an optimization plan to ensure it stays fresh and relevant. You can also use your renewed branding efforts to update your marketing materials, brochures, pamphlets, social media pages, etc. The goal here is to form a solid information architecture with a steady stream of relevant content. No matter how you end up using it, understanding the applications of new content is a big step on the path to better marketing.

Now more than ever, great content is at the heart of all marketing, and taking your efforts online doesn’t change that. Investing the time and work into new web content is something that will have a host of benefits in the long run. Overall, thinking about your company’s history, your target audience, and what lies ahead will greatly contribute to that success.