10 Digital Marketing Trends for 2013

This blog posting is one of my favorite series, I’ve been posting a list of 10 digital marketing trends in ’11 and ’12.

So what’s expected to happen in 2013?

Brazil has the FIFA Confederations Cup in preparation for the ’14 World Cup, the US has a fiscal cliff to climb and together with the EU an imbalance on revenues and expenses to address.  The NFL has some skulls to crack to fix their concussions problems, those employed in the US will hire the unemployed in foreign lands (read more outsourcing), more foreigners will purchase US land, buildings, businesses and IP, and of course, VP Biden is the newly assigned czar on gun control.

IMHO, 2013 will follow Amara’s Law: “We tend to overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run.”

So here they are: The top 10 digital marketing trends of 2013.

10. Gamification – “All Play and no Work makes Jack a rich boy!”

9.  Cloud computing enables scalability to allow for new experiences in video games

8.  Digital Content across devices enables personalization that follows users across platforms

7.  TV is old.  It’s still king of the screens, but it’s content that folks want anytime, anywhere on all four screens. 

6.  The Smartphone begins its attack on plastic in mobile payments.

5.  Tag Management becomes a competitive imperative

4.  Users prefer mobile devices when reading magazines and shopping

3.  Social Media Mainstream and Niches continue to grow, especially in Emerging Markets except China

2.  Big Data will lead to consumer insights and smarter experiences at the speed of light

1.   The glory goes to the man in the arena and not their bankers and consultants.  

10.  Gamification – “All Play and no Work makes Jack a rich boy!”

So have you seen websites that try to encourage your behavior by offering you a little badge for doing something?  Foursquare gives you a badge when you check into the same place three times for example.  Dashlane offers badges when you save passwords in their password and credit card maintenance software, and Fitocracy makes working out with your friends a competitive game.  Users can Level Up by improving their bench press and earning a badge, post it to facebook and let the world know about their development.

As Daniel Pink will tell you in his book, Drive, human nature is best motivated by a sense of purpose, autonomy and self-mastery.  These types of immediate rewards for accomplishing small tasks might seem like it’s meant for grade school kids, but the data doesn’t lie.  Gamification increases engagement, helps users spend more time on site, and

that drives ad revenue and subscriptions since folks tend to develop a sense of being invested based on the recognition and the bragging they’ve done on social networks.

We’ve come a long way from that LinkedIn profile bar that showed 90%complete.

read more

Exciting growth in e-commerce throughout Latin America

In our communications, there have been a  few times that we have delved into the potential of Latin America in the digital world and why companies like LCG have set their sights on a market that has over 500 Million in population and its richness in resources and people.  Let’s take a look at the data about the behavior in this area and what are the expectations concerning E-commerce.

Here are some figures: According to the Latin American Institute of Electronic Commerce, the region has exceeded 32 billion euros in electronic trading, showing a fast growth trend continued in 2012.  But there’s more, an article published by the Mexican multimedia “The Economist. Mx “and dated 21 November 2012, predicts that by 2013 Latin America will see a growth around 28.5%. read more

Web Analytics for Amateurs: Part 1

Those who are new to the mysteries of web analytics may ask: What is web traffic analysis?  What are its principal metrics?  How can measuring it help me grow my business?

Web analytics is the study of user behavior on a web page.  The Web Analytics Association defines it thus: “Web analytics is the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of internet data for purposes of understanding and optimizing web usage.”

Those who are unfamiliar with web analytics usually consider it a technical tool.  But make no mistake – web analytics is, first and foremost, a business tool, which can and should be used by any organization with a digital presence.  Good web analytics tools measure critical factors such as return on investment and site usability with speed and precision at a reasonable price.  They allow users – even those without a technical background – to measure their digital marketing strategies in minute detail.  Stakeholders can see results in real time, allowing them to make critical business decisions quickly, or look at “big picture” reports that clearly show whether or not their ebusiness communication strategy is going in the right direction.

What does web analytics give us?

Web analytics allows businesses to better identify user preferences, and understand how visitors interact with their website.  Stakeholders can easily determine which site features and content are the most popular, and which are leak points.  They can uncover visitor preferences according to geography, user actions, length of visit, or completion of certain tasks.  This type of segmentation is an organization’s best ally, allowing marketers to customize their offerings based on actual user behavior, rather than simply throwing around hypotheses based in conventional wisdom about what works and what doesn’t.

What tools do you need to get started?

People: It’s impossible to overstate the importance of investing in talented analysts, who possess the education and experience necessary to transform raw data into valuable information.  Avinash Kaushik isn’t exaggerating when he says that, for every $10 spent on analytics tools, $90 should be spent on the people who are going to use them.

Software: Business owners who don’t invest in web analytics tools are like store owners who close their eyes every time a customer walks through the door – they’re turning their backs on their best bet for growth and success.  Web analytics tools help organizations improve not just their websites, but also their entire digital media strategies.  Fortunately, there are a number of online traffic management tools for organizations to choose from –some free and others paid.  Not all have the same functionalities or measure traffic in exactly the same manner, but all will provide valuable insights to any organization that wants to grow its online presence.  The most prominent include: SiteCatalyst (formerly Omniture), Coremetrics, Google Analytics, Webtrends, and Yahoo Analytics.

Stay tuned for our next post on Web Analytics for Amateurs.  We’ll be discussing KPIs, key metrics, and objective setting.

Web 2.0 Without a Paddle

A recent SHRM survey shows that businesses are making use of new social media technologies – although not necessarily to their best advantage. For instance, while 40% of companies surveyed enforce specific policies for their social media actions (and 39% monitor their employees’ social media use on company networks), only 28% of organizations actually have social media strategies in place. A meager 21% bother to calculate their social media ROI. And only 12% of companies surveyed have at least one full-time employee whose primary job function is to manage Web 2.0 efforts.

It’s great to see businesses engaging with social media, and in some cases devoting human resources to their efforts. However, the SHRM survey results show that most organizations have a long way to go before they reach a high level of social media sophistication. No organization should be testing the Web 2.0 waters without a coherent digital marketing plan in place. And it’s simply a waste of time and resources to implement social media strategies without also analyzing the return on investment.

Creative, well-strategized use of social media can improve brand awareness, customer engagement, and product perception. However, a mismanaged campaign can alienate customers, muddle a brand’s message, and create bad press. That’s why it’s so important for businesses to not only establish a presence on social media networks, but also to do so within the context of a cohesive, integrated digital strategy.

Cross-Channel Digital Communications Are More Effective Than TV and Radio Spots

Responsys announced a lot of innovations last week at their annual conference.

The platform Responsys allows marketers to reduce their reliance on paid media by focusing on new school relationship marketing channels. It’s amazing to me how much companies spend to acquire traffic. About 95% of the budgets in the digital marketing space are spent on paid advertising. Yet every business consultant knows that you can gain a bigger lift in revenue by increasing folks already in your pipeline than by going out and acquiring new prospects at the mouth of the funnel.

And Responsys has case study after case study of folks that have done just that.

Southwest Airlines for example established a corporate wide focus on cross channel communications. They launched campaigns via email, text and retargeted advertising. Retargeted advertising

Retargeting is an online advertising technique that focuses only on people who have already visited your site.  Anyone who has visited your website will receive a small identifier on their computer (called a cookie).  When the user visits any website that has advertising on it, and where your ad has been placed on the major networks, then your ad will appear to those users.  It generally costs less than most advertising models and generally outperforms other advertising tactics.  Here are a few examples of the creative that went out via their platform.

And the results speak for themselves.

Southwest Airlines has over 10 million email subscribers, 1.7 million Facebook fans, and 1.2 million followers on Twitter, and tens of thousands mobile subscribers.

“Our number one transaction days used to be when we dropped a TV and radio spot. Now our number one transaction days are when we execute an email campaign coupled with a mobile and social campaign through Responsys.”

–Director of Marketing, Southwest Airlines

Companies are learning how to use cross-channel communications to increase engagement and have more meaningful dialogue with their customers. We think this is a good thing, both for companies that are prepared to stomach the good and the bad that comes along with the raw conversations that will happen once they open these channels, and for the customers that they serve.

Organizations prepared to stomach this type of change need to be sincere in their approach, be willing to have conversations in public view, and provide value beyond “brochure-ware.”

What Can Digital Marketers Learn from Moneyball?

Did you see the movie Moneyball yet?  Billy Beane changes the game of baseball by using data.  And the same trends have been happening in the digital marketing arena for just as long.  

According to leading web analytics guru Avinash Kaushik, many large organizations still practice online marketing as a faith-based initiative – that is, they place their trust in intuition, bad data, and inefficient indicators when making strategic decisions.  Unfortunately, the use of weak metrics like clicks and page views often makes web analytics results look more impressive or meaningful than they actually are.  This allows managers to feel comfortable and content with their marketing decisions, without digging deeper to determine if their efforts are actually yielding useful results.  We think those types of metrics are generally ineffective.  We call them “caveman analytics”.  read more

“Your Ad Choices” and Self-Regulation in the Advertising Industry

On January 20 of this year, the Digital Advertising Alliance launched a campaign to inform the public about new forms of internet-based advertising, as well as ways consumers can protect their privacy online.  Called “Your A Choices,” it is one of the largest US-based campaigns about consumer privacy to-date.  Interestingly enough, “Your Ad Choices” was initiated around the same time the public debate surrounding SOPA and PIPA began to escalate.  Both these events have led consumers to think more about their rights online.

The “Your Ad Choices” logo first appeared in online advertisements last year.  It was introduced with one specific function: to serve as an advertising option button, which allows consumers to decide whether they want to watch online advertising based on their specific internet navigation activity.  This practice makes it possible for brands to offer their users ads that correspond as closely as possible with their interests – while also providing consumers the opportunity to opt-out.  This strategy is closely associated with the practice known as “Permission Marketing,” which is typically characterized by an emphasis on security, transparency, and user control, thereby promoting self-regulated best practices.

Self-Regulation in the Advertising Industry

The DAA is a strong advocate of self-regulation in digital advertising.  It develops and implements industry practices and rules of conduct, to which advertising professionals voluntarily submit.  But is there truly a need for such standards alongside economic regulation in the market, as well as legal regulation from the state?

Indeed, legislation is adequate to establish general principles (for example, that advertising should not be misleading); however, the protection offered in theory may not actually be available in practice – after all, the law is typically slow to respond to consumer protection complaints.  In contrast, self-regulation is specifically designed to proactively address the details and nuances of advertising content, and offers consumers a simple form of protection.  Self-regulation helps prevent actions that might cause harm or injury, as opposed to after-the-fact legal sanction, which seeks only to repair damage that has already taken place.  Thus, the form of self-regulation promoted by the DAA is not designed solely to benefit the online advertising industry, but also to protect the general public by incorporating the option of internet-based advertising.