How well do businesses really know their customers?

As consumer expectations for relevant content and offers grow as they experience top retailers such as Amazon, companies need to focus even more on customer experience through relevant communications. When completing our Managing Digital Marketing in 2015 research we were interested to see how well companies do understand their customers since many respondents said that improving use of CRM and applying Big Data concepts was a priority for this year. We asked businesses which of the classic segmentation and targeting techniques they used to target their customers using online marketing, for example targeted emails or web-based personalisation. The results show that, overall businesses are long way from the 360 degree customer view and personalised customer lifecycle marketing that many have discussed for a long time. As marketers we see a lot of examples about how we should improve…

Retail examples showing how to bring the on and offline worlds together through social and mobile channels.

I have been following the retail industry as businesses plunge or dip their toes into the omnichannel waters. Some are certainly doing some revolutionary, original campaigns using technology which I'll look at here - do share others you like! This blog posts sums up my favourite case studies from retailers with some thoughts on how this will impact the modern marketing department’s strategies, as technology drives change.

How are retailers tackling the on and offline world?

Consumers are using multiple devices, screens, and channels to make purchases, but you know this already. Retailers still get a huge chunk of sales in their bricks and mortar outlets, for example clothing and footwear brands in the UK 44% of purchases are done in store*. In store doesn’t provide the same level of data as their website or digital marketing activities. They will only…

6 issues to consider when reviewing your investment in online display advertising

Online media measurement company comScore and WARC have summarised the state of Display advertising in an interesting deck giving 6 key lessons to help maximise the impact of your display advertising, from planning, to managing and evaluating your campaigns to improve your brand loyalty and engagement. Their whitepaper provides good examples from leading brands such as Kelloggs and opportunities for brands to leverage, so we thought it was worth sharing and summarising.

6 Lessons to improve your Display Advertising

Lesson 1: Don't rely on CTR as the key measurement

Ad Clickthrough rates (CTRs) have always been relatively low compared to Google AdWords, but  it's not a complete metric, since people may view your brand or offer on a ad and it will resonate with consumers who later search on the brand or go direct to the site. This research shows Advertisers experiencing low CTRs did see an increase in sales,…

Benchmarking digital marketing capabilities for your business or your clients against these success factors

The contribution of digital marketing to your bottom line is dependent on whether you have the right capabilities in place, to manage all of the digital touchpoints. But which capabilities are important, which do you need to review? Last year, James Carson and Dave Chaffey identified these in our  Managing Digital Transformation Guide for Expert members illustrated in the top-level capability review visual below. By Digital Marketing Capabilities we are referring to reviewing 7 core capabilities which are strategic approach, performance improvement process, management buy-in, resourcing and structure, data and infrastructure, integrated customer communications and customer experience. You can see that the first four, A-D are around process and management for digital marketing with E-G focused on the tactics to reach and engage audiences. How do businesses compare - how advanced…

Seconds out, Round 1 in a series of 4 bouts!

Boomf gets a clear value message.

Welcome to Round 1 of Smart Insights' Marketing Fight Club, where you get 2 different expert opinions on the simplest way to boost sales for a real startup. Watch the video below to get simple tweaks that you can apply to your business today to improve your value message and increase conversions. After you watch the video don't forget to vote for the winner of this round in the comments below, and share your thoughts on the strategies discussed. We'd love to hear your feedback!

Stepping into the ring today we have...

Ian Lurie - Expert marketer, speaker & CEO of Portent. vs Pete Z - Email sales specialist at magnett.co Ian is well-known for his search marketing and analytics advice which you'll find on the Portent Blog. Ian and I go…

 Ideas on getting more creative in our marketing

What makes the difference between a good company, and a great one? Creativity. Fostering a culture of creativity in your business and your life will allow greater innovation, more effective problem solving, and a genuine competitive edge. When technology has made certain skills a commodity, it’s the creative, individual human elements that distinguish a successful business.

How to drive your creative marketing?

If you’re looking to inject some creativity into your life and your business environment, then take note. 1. Make your time work for you William Blake, visionary poet and inspiration for many a creative type, put it simply: 'Think in the morning. Act in the noon. Eat in the evening. Sleep in the night.' Figure out how your brain and body’s natural rhythms work, and as best you can, listen to them and work with them rather than fight against them. Plan your day around your own…

Holiday marketing planning for retailers

Marketers, we know the struggle. We know that taking into account the holiday seasons are vital to your retail strategy and it's not just having an idea of what you will do, it's having a plan, a system and a course of action. Without these things, you’ll be left in the marketing dust. Timing is everything. At Fathomdelivers.com, we have created this infographic and content, to give you a framework that you could work to for the year. If you are looking for management buy-in, it can help to have a visual calendar to show your plans - whether it's for a quarter, a six month period of the year ahead and also a great way to show your results if you don't have an analytics dashboard. Here are some ideas of how we have used it to plan from October - January, for a retailerr.

October - SEO…

Are you tapping into the potential of niche social media communities?

Social media marketing still represents a key opportunity for most of us, despite the hype that's only been intensifying since 2012. You might feel you've missed the boat, that you should be doing more. Depending on your progress, your market and your competitors, this will hold true to varying degrees. Like the Digital Marketing Radar, which we featured yesterday in our update reviewing all the Smart Insights 'mindtool' infographics to review the opportunity of digital marketing, the Social Media Marketing Radar infographic helps show you the types of social sites you can consider. You can also download our full set of 10 infographics. The radar helps focuses attention and resources on the sites appearing towards its centre, as these sites are generally agreed on as the most important within a business. In this post I'll also explain why it's important to look beyond…

How will Webrooming and Showrooming evolve this year?

The Holiday season has just past, while for some the numbers are still being tallied on whether or not end of year festivities were successful, let’s take a look at how shoppers got into the holiday spirit. The holiday 2014 shopping season has shown an increase in shoppers’ spending for holiday gifts. Shoppers were eager to get on with the gift buying and avoid uncomfortable overcrowded situations. Online sales up by 8.3 percent in comparison to online sales in 2013. - IBM, 2014. Holiday spending for 2014 will rise by 4.1%, predicts the National Retail Federation predicted.

What is Webrooming and Showrooming?

Shoppers were engaging in two types of shopping behaviour: webrooming and showrooming. Webrooming is identified by 'the behaviour a consumer takes by researching online, before going into the store to elevate and examine the physical product before purchasing.' [Donnelly,…

A tool for reviewing the options for online customer acquision and monitoring for social media and other sites

You will have noticed that there's a fair amount of choice online for reaching and interacting with your audience, in fact it's overwhelming! You can't be everywhere, so it's important to prioritise which types of sites and partnerships you invest time and money in to try to gain visibility through outreach, partnering and advertising.

2015 update - introducing the Marketing Bullseye

Since we introduced the Radar in 2010 we have evolved it into the infographic shown below. In this update, we introduce the Marketing Bullseye Framework - a great new tool to review customer acquisition from Traction which has a similar purpose - see the end of the post for a description.

To help you review and prioritise, we developed the "Digital Marketing Radar" which gives a prompt on the different types of…