10 tips to developing your online community

The emergence of social media platforms, online forums, and company or product blogs has led to a number of consequences for brands, including an opportunity (and compulsion) to embrace new ways to connect with their target audience and a desire to build thriving online communities. The ‘secret sauce’ that gels a community around a brand can be hard to find, but there are certainly a number of principles which can help take the right approach.

How to lay down the foundations

Preparation tends to play a key part in success, and this is no exception.  Make sure you establish a few fundamental pieces as you embark on a mission to develop your brand’s online community through: 1. Internal buy-in Developing and nurturing online communities is an Art. It requires a specific skillset, time, dedication and perseverance. Don’t underestimate the resources required and make sure that you get buy-in from…

It’s the message not the medium, stupid!

Marshall McLuhan, the Canadian Philosopher of communication strategy,  famously coined the expression “the medium is the message” which, whilst being right in suggesting context is important, managed to brainwash generations into thinking that the medium mattered more than the message...

Being on telly makes all the difference. True or False?

Increasingly, I hear people talking about the media strategy or about integrated marketing rather than what the campaign needs to achieve. One big FMCG company I know placed greater emphasis on their trade marketing than on anything else. The trade had to be convinced that the campaign was big and long-lasting. This gave social media an unusually important role in putting “x’s” on a media schedule.

There are pages and pages of stuff looking like lots of hits….of what?

Barking? Not really. Trade support is a key but please don’t argue that this was a decision based on…

The John Lewis #snowmanjourney integrated campaign

So the nights are drawing in and for the past few weeks we’ve been bombarded with the usual festive TV ads and cheesy Christmas jingles blasting out of our screens. But this year, instead of targeting our wallets, some retailers have turned to emotional triggers when crafting their festive ad campaigns. Many of the ads we’ve seen are far less factual, price and/or product-led than previous years. The creative strategy and subsequent marketing messages they portray are less about saving customers money, and more keen to engage with the spirit of Christmas – to stir consumers’ emotions and bring back the tradition of the festive period. I read an article claiming that retailers are likely to be more successful if they market and appeal to people’s emotions at Christmas, as potential consumers are more likely to be…

Checkout abandonment statistics show where you should focus your site improvements

I'm often asked about average ecommerce rates by site owners looking to boost their sales. It's a year-round concern with this compilation showing that even for established brands during sale periods, the average add to basket conversion rate is around 12% during a visit with convert to order around half that at 5.6%. If this sounds poor compared to the conversion rate a physical retail outlet would achieve, that's a fair improvement on ten years ago when we used to speak of a "rule-of-thumb" for average Ecommerce conversion rates of around 2%. The improvement in averages since then suggests the value in conversion rate optimisation. That said, it's inevitable that online conversion rates will be lower than offline with price transparency available through comparison sites and many still researching online and purchasing offline (the ROPO effect).

Reasons for shopping cart abandonment?

To encourage…

7 tips to effectively promote your infographics

Last week I gave tips about creating effective marketing infographics. But creating an infographic isn't enough, to generate the return you'll obviously have to promote it. You'll want to do this since infographics are primarily useful for promoting your knowledge around a topic by being insanely shareable, and in turn attracting inbound links - the more exposure you can build, the better the return.

The power of show not tell

Infographics are visually appealing - if I were to tell you about the popularity of pork pies vs steak and kidney pies you'd be bored very quickly, however let me show you a crafted graphic to illustrate that and I'll be sure of at least a wry smile and probably a tweet or share into Facebook if you have an opinion on either over the other. Leveraging this obvious benefit holds the key to promoting an…

How to plan, create and market a 'how-to-video'

‘How to’ videos are one of the most popular video types on the net, so should always be considered as part of your content marketing efforts. They are an accessible format that can be applied to marketing many types of businesses. Essentially what you are doing is explaining how to do something that your people in a business are skilled in and knowledgeable about as it relates to your products and services. All ‘how to’ videos are different, but we have developed a formula that can be applied regardless of the subject. Work through these steps to get the best results with your ‘how to’ video.

1. Planning the video

What do your customers need help with?

There is approximately no point in making a how to video about something that everyone knows how to do. In the planning phase you need to research and define the…

Using Google+ Ripples and other free tools to connect with influencers

Influencer outreach should be a core approach in today's marketing. Google+ gives great new options for identifying and interacting with opinion leaders and industry experts who have the ability to influence others to take positive action. Those interactions may include sharing content, links or even signing up to newsletters or product demos. Google+ is a very powerful 'information network', a place where many people (100 million active according to the latest estimates) go to connect with others around their interests and passions. Whilst Google+ may not have the sheer size in numbers of Facebook (with over one billion users), those active on Google+ are enthusiastic and highly engaged. One of the benefits of seeking out influencers on Google+ is the impact Google+ content is having on natural search results. Unlike Facebook or Twitter, where search engines are…

5 tips for better marketing copy

Most articles about writing marketing emails look at calls to action, paragraph length and similar. All important of course. But the process of developing text that moves the reader to the right action or thought is not just about the actual writing. It's also about creating the ideal environment for people to write good copy. So how do you help those people do a better job? (At this point, email copywriters like me will simply suggest you pay them more - just kidding). Here a few personal tips that I've found help.

1. Provide the right framework

You wouldn't expect an architect to build you the right house with no more information than "I need a house". So it is with an email copywriter. They need a briefing that goes beyond simply stating what text elements you want written. The more contextual information you provide about the whos, whys and whats of…

Trends in marketing with the best potential for commercial growth

Update: My review of 22 Digital Marketing Trends 2014 Throughout the year I’m asked about What’s New, What’s Hot and What’s Next. This is one of the reasons why we’ve created the [What’s New in Marketing" updates, to give a monthly summary to help people working in marketing and using digital technologies see the latest developments which really matter. So much of what’s discussed daily in digital marketing is useful or interesting, but just noise. In this review I will focus on the major trends which we think will be significant in 2013. What’s "significant’? These are marketing activities where we expect to see the most increased investment and focus in 2013. The activities will gain the funding since they will have the biggest impact in creating additional leads and sales and strengthening brands. It doesn’t focus on the latest new Ecommerce…

How run-of-site template design features can make a large impact

Is this a question often asked by online marketers? When it comes to website optimisation is the footer something you usually consider? Well if it’s not, it probably should be; because how you use your website footer can have a major impact on conversion rates. As part of a full conversion rate optimisation and UX-Driven MVT strategy, we conducted an A/B test for one of our clients, Radley+Co (the luxury hand bag people). It was a simple test, measuring how conversion and revenue would be affected by introducing a mega-footer containing the product list broken down into categories. Once our UX Designers had created the new version we used the Optimizely testing tool to implement this A/B test across every page of the website. We tested a smaller footer only featuring a simple one line navigation menu against a larger mega-footer. Both…