image courtesy of DC Comics

So the Caped Crusader walked into our offices a while ago with this dilemma…
“For the last while there’s been a buzz around Gotham City about them taking the
Bat-signal down. Apparently it’s no good that I just put it out there, and anyone and
everyone who looks up into the sky can see it. My deep voice, masculine appearance and
tight black undergarments over my just-as-tight-other-garments are creating impressions
and putting ideas in people’s heads. I don’t like it, I don’t like it at all. How am I going to
tell anyone about my awesome Bat-ness?”
And thus began our conversation around ‘Plan Dark Marketing 1.0′

It’s 2014 and the city is dark, the excitement has simmered and the silence is stark.
They’ve closed the Bat-signal and rushed it away, and now no one can hear what the Bat’s got to say.
You see some folks got carried away in the fuss, not abiding by rules in the frenzy & rush;
Some folks were so eager to spread the Bat’s name that they targeted adults and kids all the same.
But control is important when folks can get hurt – now the Bat must think smart to send out his alerts.
So he’s set up a network of those the right age, who’d given permission for him to engage,
and now Batman continues to talk to his crowd – his message direct, coming through clear & loud.
Alas, other big players weren’t forward in thought, and now they sit in silence, alone & distraught…

 
Ok, so Batman didn’t really walk into our office. We do have one or two colleagues who surely believe that they could be the Bat (we even have an enabler who could set you up with a really life-like Bat-suit), but we figured that this would be an interesting analogous approach to take in terms of the future of marketing for alcohol brands.

 
Mass marketing of alcohol brands is on the out
It’s not new news that there’s a draft bill sitting behind parliament doors that aims to address the very real problem of alcohol abuse in South Africa (more reading about this in the link at the bottom of this article). And it’s also not exactly “hot off the press” that the thinking expressed thus far by those involved in this initial draft aims to tackle the issue by completely banning the advertising of alcoholic products.

image courtesy of noalcoholads.org

Just as the leaking of the Control of Marketing of Alcoholic Beverages Bill was premature, so is any comment on what the eventual bill will look like – whether it be an entire or partial ban. What’s not premature however is the acknowledgement that marketers in the alcohol industry need a Plan B. If above-the-line marketing, such as TV and Print Ads, Billboards, Radio, Event and other Out-of-Home Advertising is going to be prohibited or even heavily regulated, brand marketers need to open their avenues of communication. And this is incredibly exciting to me and my social-crazy collegaues (not the Bat-crazy ones).

 
So what’s the plan Robin? (get it? Robin… Batman and Robin…)
Mass marketing doesn’t require permission: you don’t need my permission to show me a billboard or run a TV ad, or schmooze (or shout at) me on the radio – all you need is my attention. And this is where permission-based digital marketing comes out smiling.

Let’s be real here: Email marketing is no longer “mass marketing”. I get all hot-under-the-collar and little red stars flash before my eyes when I hear this old-school term still paired with email marketing. If marketers continue to send “spray and pray” emails out by the thousands to their customers, they’re doing it wrong. Email marketing requires a hand up in the air, asking to receive your communications – and this is one of the key factors that sets this channel apart from other marketing: it’s permission-based. Similarly, social fans and followers have raised their virtual hand asking to hear from a specific brand. In terms of providing permission to receive alcohol-related communications, the necessary steps required in order to confirm important criteria such as age can also be met and addressed. So, if and when any ban comes into effect, it won’t (in its current form) affect permission-granted communications across email and social channels.

 
Build now, or sit in silence, alone and distraught
We’ve seen regulation within the tobacco advertising industry and from recent press releases we know that its bound to happen in the alcohol advertising industry too. Therefore, Plan B is simple:

if you haven’t already done so, start driving your fans, followers and brand advocates to give you permission to market to them.

Get them to sign-up and engage with you through your email newsletters and social platforms. Be responsible and qualify their subscriptions by asking important questions such as date of birth. Get your marketing teams used to the idea of broadcasting across digital, permission-based channels. And then, when the Bat-signal is shut-down and all goes dark, not only will you still be communicating with your customers, but you’ll be doing it in a responsible, relevant and measurable manner!

 
As promised, further reading on the proposed South African ban is available here on Business Day. We also loved this interesting and socially-responsible take on self-regulation in the alcohol industry from Econsultancy.

There are many views on the pros and cons of the proposed advertising ban for both established and new brands. We’d love to hear your thoughts on this exciting topic!

Would you like to chat about how you as a marketer can be prepared with a Plan B? Contact us today – we’d love to chat.

Until next time, keep engaging!

Stacy Nortje
Head of Performance Email Marketing

So you’ve taken the big leap of delving into the exciting world of social media for business, but what’s next? Have you thought about a long-term strategy or even a short-term one yet? What about an increase in website traffic or sales? Sure, you might have a handful of Likers on Facebook and a decent Twitter following, but where does this all fit in the bigger scheme of your marketing plan?

See, all this time you’ve been told to join the conversation, but no one has actually told you what the conversation is. The truth is there is no big, mysterious conversation. There are millions of micro conversations happening on the social web, and in order to lead these conversations you have to create something worth talking about. And how is this achievable? A sure-fire way of sparking interest about your brand is by taking a cross-channel marketing approach; integrating traditional marketing methods to your social media campaign.

And what does this all mean?

It’s not rocket science; it’s simple really. Think about what you would do if social media didn’t exist, and then do it – like building a giant-sized model of your product (let’s call it a car) for your Facebook Likers to tag their names on in tribute to them Liking your page. Because, in essence, that is the actual social element of the campaign. The only difference is now you have the power of the social web to publish your offline efforts online, and watch how it becomes the next big thing.

If you look at a viral idea holistically, conversations only come about afterwards. It is what is being said after the initial event that makes the campaign successful. For this reason, it is imperative that you don’t throw out the old to make way for the new. Contrary to popular belief, I still think there is much value to traditional media in this Web 2.0 world. In fact, now more than ever, above-the-line media holds the potential to be an integral part of an all-round marketing strategy for your business.

Top three brands that are doing it right

Below we look at three brands that have integrated traditional advertising methods into their overall social media strategy.

•  TNT on Telenet – TNT is a Belgian television network whose “Push to Add Drama” button made waves across the globe earlier this month. As part of their launch campaign, TNT set up a big red button in the middle of a quiet square in Belgium, with a hanging sign that read Push to Add Drama just above it. The button triggers a series of choreographed dramatic events that brings drama to the square; such as an ambulance truck driving away without its patient to name one. The video became one of the most popular videos watched in the week of the TNT’s launch and has been viewed on YouTube over  4 000 000 times in just two days.

• The Diesel Facepark Event - used a lot of (if not all of) Facebook’s terminology that event-goers could relate to and have fun with. Notorious for being unconventional, Diesel invited their fans to a Facepark where thousands of Diesel fans received a cardboard cut-out of their Facebook profiles and were given the opportunity to interact with each other physically, using Facebook lingo – such as write on each other’s walls and poke each other.

• Green Giant – This frozen vegetable brand have taken social gaming to the next level with their on-pack Farmville promotion. Farmville by Zynga is one of the most-played social games on Facebook, where users start out with an empty farm on a quest to develop it into a thriving cultivated land. Green Giant took the initiative of printing Farmville coupons on the packaging of their frozen vegetables.  Upon purchasing frozen vegetables from Green Giant, the coupons could be used as farm coins, the game’s virtual currency, to buy crops and animals via the market in order to upgrade their farm.

via: forbes.com

The Bottom Line

Uses don’t want to be told to Like this page now (and win a free iPad!) or to follow you on Twitter if you have nothing valuable to offer. But they will Like and share your content if you publish interesting content to your social media profiles. And remember, the key to a successful social media campaign is the strategy.

“You can buy attention (advertising). You can beg for attention from the media (PR). You can bug people one at a time to get attention (sales). Or you can earn attention by creating something interesting and valuable and then publishing it online for free.” – David Meerman Scott, Best-Selling Author & Speaker

Until next time, keep it social!

Leilah van der Schyff

Social Media Analyst

Source: B-Mag

I use Facebook, Twitter and Google+ on a daily basis and they each serve a unique role in gathering my daily dose of information. However they are not the full sources of that information and more like links to the real story, a sort of notification system. The full story  is more often than not published on a blog.

You probably have some kind of blog or news feed on your organisations site or even your own personal site. You might also feel the content that gets published on those sites is not getting the attention it deserves. Well we’ve outlined 5 tips that will help you in getting your content out there and shared.

The 5 Blogging Tips:

1. Involve the person you want to share your content with in the creation process

Whenever I write an article for my own blog I reach out to at least   one person I know has some interest in the subject I’m writing about. I’ll just send them an email asking them to give their opinion on a rough draft. Then when the article gets published send them another email to say thanks.

2. Appeal to Groups to share your content

This applies to any industry no matter how boring or uninteresting it is. You just need to find people that are passionate about the subject you’re writing about. These are the people you want to share your content because it has some kind meaning to them. You could write about a cause like cancer research or make a donation and write an article appealing to your followers to do the same.

 Source: Amanda Wenk

3. Share boring data in an interesting way

There is no shortage of data that, in its current form seems uninteresting, but is still really relevant. One of my favourite ways of displaying boring information is through an infographic. You could take a bunch of statistical findings, turn them into colourful graphs, and arrange them into a big sexy infographic.

Source: iCrossing

4. Join in the conversation

There are conversations and discussions happening all over the internet and they’re happening all the time. No matter what industry you’re in there are people talking about something and you need to be involved. Have a look at sites like Topsy.com, Reddit or followerwonk that track trending conversations based on keywords. You simply search for your relevant keyword and jump right in.

5. Rank stuff

This is by far the easiest way to get people interested in what you’re writing about. Rank them. I often create a top ten list of gadgets to illustrate experiences I’ve had with them. By ranking stuff you create an attractive way of getting people’s attention because they’re made the number one spot on your list.

If you can implement at least two of these steps when you create content for your blog I guarantee you’ll receive a positive response and ultimately get your content shared. If you feel like there’ something worth adding to the “tip list” then you can  leave us comment below and let us know.

Brandon Caulfield
SEO Analyst

Let’s say you are considering purchasing a great-looking NORTHFACE soft shell jacket that you’ve seen a few times in one of your favourite outdoor magazines. If you could design your perfect personal shopping experience, what comes to mind?

Well, if you ask me, I would prefer a friendly consultant who will be welcoming, wishing me a wonderful day. It is after all a wonderful day for me – I’m finally on my way to owning this masterpiece that I’ve been eyeing for a while now.

With this positive energy to support me, I would stroll around the shop, ready to be enticed by the various articles on offer. I would be excited by the very comforting look and feel and endless product selection throughout the shop. In fact, I would think that I could spend hours browsing around in here.

Items would be displayed perfectly and sorted in a way which makes complete sense to me. I wouldn’t be crowded, leaving me take a very close look at everything in my own time. I would have all the time I need to decide what I want… which colour I prefer, how this jacket matches other items in my wardrobe. And what do you know – right next to my jacket of choice would be the awesome backpack I’ve been longing for!

I would feel relaxed and happy ambling about on my own, and at the same time I would know that there are friendly, honest and incredibly competent consultants available should I need them – I can ask if I want to, but I don’t have to. This is important to a shopper (and especially to a woman) you know!

Happy with my jacket, I would find my way to the tills. I would relish the fact that there are absolutely no queues and it’s still all about me. Payment would be easy and safe – I wouldn’t even have to carry around my credit cards because the store would already know me well. With the end of a super sale and with no surprises, I would be chuffed as cheese.

Wow, wasn’t that dreamy? My favourite part about this whole “would be” experience is that it was mine. I recently experienced this perfect encounter and it set the tone for a beautiful, long-term relationship with the store-brand. Throughout the whole process, the consultant knew me not only by name, but knew my approximate taste, size and payment details. I could take the item home into my very own environment and easily return it, should I regret my decision (which I of course have not!). And I even got a personal note from the consultant after my purchase – directly to my inbox. And guess what? I immediately told all of my friends about it!  Oh, you’ve got to love online shopping!

But as you probably know, unfortunately a lot can go wrong. So why can’t every online shopping experience be our favourite? Why do the majority of them actually look like this:

Not everyone seems to have the perfect digital experience. And the real-life roadblocks represented by the comedic video above seem to plague all of us, no matter our preferences or behaviour. But in today’s online world, with (almost) endless possibilities, no one should be treated the same. Technology allows marketers to build a true relationship with their audience. New users require a bit of handholding, while loyal customers appreciate the fact that they are SOMEone not EVERYone.

So at what point do users decide that they’re not having the prefect experience anymore, and step out of the user journey? How would you create the perfect customer journey? If you’d like to know how to go about answering these questions, contact me and my team  – our passion is creating the perfect customer journey for you and your clients.

Until next time, conversion matters!

Anne Scharlow
Conversion Director

A client recently raised doubts as to the cost-effectiveness of ongoing, long-term SEO investment. Understanding the importance of implementing a solid SEO strategy that contributes to the long-term success of a business, we internalised the following question to establish how we would showcase the value of this channel to our client:
 

Can we compare the difference in the Cost per Visit between SEO and PPC if looking at the same amount of visits for a sample of non-branded keywords?

The short answer: Yes! And the results are not only a fantastic business case, but they also re-iterate our preferred strategies in terms of SEO and PPC investment (as shown by the diagram below).
 

After calculating all costs; including for both traffic mediums, SEO and PPC we found the following CPC’s:

Natural Search: R4.77 Cost per Visit.
PPC: R16.00 Cost per Visit.

PPC was nearly 3½ times more expensive than Natural Search for the same amount of non-branded traffic.
 

Now, it is important to note the following:

SEO is a long term solution that improves your website’s authority over time. A website that ranks well organically has a higher trust value for visitors. SEO over time will compliment and support your paid search campaigns but more than twice as many people will click on an organic listing than a paid listing.

We have dedicated SEO teams that work closely with the PPC teams to ensure that the high volume and high cost terms are optimised for natural search. This then brings the cost of paid search down by us reducing the position on page as the SEO position increases.

If you are interested in learning more about SEO and how we can change the online landscape of your business contact us today!
.
Etienne Beneke
Head of SEO

It’s a relatively lesser known web browser, but according to HTML5Test.com – a page which will test how well the browser you’re using supports HTML5 – Maxthon beats all major browsers in support of the latest and greatest web-sperience.

Haven’t ever heard of this browser before? Don’t be alarmed, its popularity hasn’t yet taken off as one of the top browsers in the Western market. Based on Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, Maxthon was originally created by a Chinese programmer who wanted to customize the Internet Explorer web browser. It has actually won numerous awards and was one of the twelve browser choices Microsoft presented to their European users in 2010. Maxthon has been touted as fast, small, flexible, and easy to use, with extra features that make it a browser recommended for those looking for a change of pace.

Back to the HTML5 test results…
Jess Chen, CEO of Maxthon states that, “Maxthon 3 is the best browser for HTML5-rich experiences… These independent findings from HTML5Test.com, which people can verify for themselves by accessing the site with the latest version of Maxthon 3, confirm we have the best browser for now and the future of HTML5. We are leading the way in HTML5 performance, backed by our proprietary GPU hardware acceleration technology and other standards that make the whole web run faster.”

Strong words. So what’s the scoring behind this?
Well, Maxthon 3.3 scores a total of 440 points out of a possible 500 points in terms of support for HTML5 and related specifications and standards. In comparison, Google’s Chrome browser (v18) scores a total of 413 points. http://html5test.com/results/desktop.html
 
You can find out more about how the scoring works here.

Want to find out more about some of the features included in Maxthon 3.3?
Dual display engines
Some older web pages (not written for newer standards) are distorted, have features that don’t work, don’t display at all, or even crash other browsers. Usually Maxthon 3 will recognize these pages and automatically switche to Retro Mode, designed for those older pages.

Mouse gesture?
Maxthon’s Mouse Gesture feature lets you navigate through the web by moving the mouse in patterns that tell the browser to go back, forward, refresh, and even hide. That’s just the beginning! You can create your own gestures by selecting a mouse move and tying it to many different commands.

Super drag and drop
Drag and Drop to open new pages and images or perform a web search.

Smart address bar
Search by typing your keywords right into the address bar. Press “Enter”,”F6″ or “Go” buttons to execute the search. Sometimes after you input keywords, you’ll see a recommendation prompt containing related keywords. The prompt includes top sites, your history and your favourites related to those keywords. You can limit this recommendation to only top sites by hiding history and favorites in the options menu.

Ad hunter
Son’t want to see ads? Easy – click the ad icon and select “block content manually.” You can then select which ad spaces you want to block, one by one. Click the “finish” button on the top prompt bar after you’re finished with the page. Maxthon 3 will remember and block those ad spaces next time you visit.

Passport
Registering as a Maxthon Passport Member gives you free, instant access to cloud services like online favorites, browser history and settings that travel with you from computer to computer!

Multi-search
After you input your search keywords in the address or search bar and press “enter” or click the “go,” or “search” buttons, Maxthon Multi-Search will show you what each search engine returns for your query.

Night mode
Darken the background colour of your web pages a little to make things easier on your eyes. And if you don’t know which colours lead to eye strain, e.g. green in low light, Maxthon 3 knows and will help you out. Just press the Night-mode button in the Quick Tool bar and you’ll get the optimum background colour.

Maxthon seems to be a lot faster that other popular browsers with a very powerful and customizable set of built-in features, so you can do more on the web. Its definitely a browser that we are going to be hearing a lot more of. The only downfall is that its not yet available for Mac users, but keep your eyes peeled!

Are you using Maxthon? Let us know about your experiences with it!

Until next time, keep browsing!

Frank van der Elst
Senior Designer

The social networking world has a been abuzz ever since the formal announcement of Facebook acquiring Instagram, a growing photo-sharing application, for $1 billion in cash and shares. Facebook CEO and Co-founder Mark Zuckerberg publicly announced the acquisition on his timeline on Monday, where he noted the deal to be an important milestone for the social giant.

What does this mean for Facebook?

As you know, photo sharing is a critical part of the Facebook experience but has never really been a core development focus for the company. By acquiring Instagram and all of its 30 million users, we believe that Facebook is taking a step in the right direction towards bridging the gap between photos and sharing. Moreover, Instagram’s viral nature fits right in with Facebook’s aim of helping you connect and share with the people in your networks.

However, Zuckerberg has stressed that he has no intention of integrating Instagram into Facebook. Instead, it will remain an independent portal with all of its original features that users have grown fond of.

What does this mean for Instagram?

There has been much talk amongst Instagrammers about how Facebook will ruin the beautiful photo-sharing application and shut it down. And we can’t really blame these users for not thinking otherwise; Facebook recently bought Gowalla (a location-based mobile social network) only to shut it down. So what does Zuckerberg have planned this time around? We can’t say for certain, but think about this….

Would he really spend $1 billion (Facebook’s largest acquisition yet) in purchasing a company that he was just planning on shutting down?

Also, now the small Instagram team has the access to and support of thousands of Facebook engineers who, in our opinion, could definitely improve the speed issues that thousands of Android users have been complaining about. We may even see a completed app for iPad and BlackBerry sooner than we think.

Introducing Instagram, powered by Facebook

We’ve witnessed quite a few web mergers over the last few years and Facebook’s decision to keep Instagram as an independent arm reminds us of the Google/YouTube merge; a smart decision, as it is this very detail that have kept users loyal. Zuckerberg states: “We’re looking forward to working with  the Instagram team and to all of the great new experiences we’re going to be able to build together.”

Read the official press release here 

Until next time, keep it social!

Leilah van der Schyff

Social Media Manager

According to Google South Africa, at the end of 2011 around 5.4 million people in South Africa had a tablet or internet enabled smartphone. As of March 2012 this figure is already topping 10 million people and growing rapidly.

A potential target market of this size is tempting to any marketer, and Google Adwords is equipped with tools to assist online marketers to target these users very effectively. However, marketers are continuing to find it difficult to target Blackberry users with adverts specifically relevant to their current location.

If it were a simple case of not being able to geographically target Blackberry users this would be a relatively easy-to-explain annoyance which had to be dealt with. The problem though, is that location based advertising does work for Blackberry users, but does not work consistently all the time.

Why do you have trouble Geo-Targeting Blackberry Users with your location-based Paid Search Ads?
The reason for this anomaly is actually fairly simple: the latest Blackberry handsets allow for virtually unrestricted internet browsing and are no longer reliant on Mobi sites. Searching on Google can be done in the same way as on any other internet enabled device, and is tracked in much the same way. The problem comes about when the user searches using the Blackberry search tool. Due to the centralised data services offered by Blackberry, all these handset-enabled searches are dealt with at the nearest Blackberry data server. This makes country specific targeting possible, but specific location targeting impossible.

So, what now? Is it even worth trying to Geo-Target Paid Search Ads?
Due to the growth in smartphone user base and the effectiveness of location based marketing to these users, it would be foolhardy to stop implementing geo-targeted Paid Search Ads so based on a group of users you may or may not be able to target. Pressure is no doubt being placed on Blackberry to resolve this issue, but in the mean time you will need to target at a country level if you absolutely have to include all smartphone users, or simply continue to use specific location targeting knowing that some Blackberry users will not see your ads.

 
Have a question or comment around Paid Search Geo-Targeting, or want help implementing Paid Search that will perform? Let us know below or contact us directly today!
 

Until next time, keep searching!

Nick Wonfor
Paid Search Specialist

The world’s (arguably) most popular social platform had their first marketing conference this week announcing new functionality that will change the ‘face’ of the platform forever.

At the top of Facebook’s agenda was Premium, a new suite of products for marketers designed to leverage the social network’s access to their communities, you and your friends.

From the perspective of the average user not much has changed beyond the new timeline, which let’s face it, we all love. It may take a small while to get used to how it operates, we all like what we know. I do urge you to bear with it though, it is very user friendly, the content is bright, it’s beautiful, encourages engagement and, well, it’s sexy! Whilst this is all true there are of course still kinks that need to be ironed out, but isn’t that the nature of social, possibly digital as a whole to a large respect?

From the perspective of the digital social marketer, these new developments change the way the platform can be leveraged to get the best for your clients. The new products they have released are as follows, Ad’s that are integrated into newsfeeds, Ad’s on the right hand side of users homepages, Mobile integration with ads appearing in newsfeeds on your mobile device (cell, iPad, tablet etc), Ad’s that appear when you log out of your account  and Deals.

If you would like to see some of these ads and changes in progress, you can take a look at the image below to see what to look for and next time you cruise the wave of Facebook profiles, visit friends on their pages and post images for all to see, keep your eyes peeled for one of these little changes popping up and see how you feel about them.

via: mashable.com

Now, whilst this all sounds very exciting, Facebook has been slowly introducing these elements over the past months so you will have been engaging with these elements possibly without even realising. This could mean that they integrate well with the platform, or were hidden cleverly with the introduction of timelines. There is a cross-over of both these guess-timations , overall, it is my opinion that Facebook needed to step up to the mark, especially from a marketer’s perspective and this is not a bad attempt.

The only brand spanking new products are the Deals and Log-out Ads.  The functionality of offers is firstly free to advertisers, and allows brands to share discounts and promotions within their Facebook community/ies . The log out ad’s are said to cost around $700 per day, is it worth it? The ad’s themselves were first introduced at Facebook’s marketing conference in late February. The social network demoed the placements to marketers as a new, optional fourth placement and touted them as a way for advertisers to put giant, interactive ads in front of the 37 million U.S. users who log out of Facebook each day.

Facebook’s intention with these new changes is to bring themselves and brands to the ground level. What I mean here, is when a brand mentions something you want to hear, it will appear in your feed. However, if it is something boring, as with your friends profiles, you can filter them out. This means that brands have no extra power than an individual using the platform.

The ads are the main change up and brands will of course leverage them. The moves from Facebook are bold, however fair, and we watch with excited eyes and bated breath to see how both our clients, your clients and individuals react to these interesting changes.

via: pauldunay.com

It seems that Facebook is focusing more on the commercial aspect of their offering, certainly in favour of the brands that use the service, however, the truth of the matter is that Facebook was designed as a social interaction space for individuals. It’s initial purpose was not orientated around being a space where commercial entities could connect with their target audience, that was just a very nice off-set reaction to the platform that has lined many pockets very nicely thank you very much! The fact is Facebook is just catching up – catching up to what you ask? Well, as they are pretty much on the front line of social evolution, they are taking a little of what they learnt from yesterday (quite a lot actually), a pinch of what is going on today and ‘thumb-sucking’  what we all desire for tomorrow. It is my opinion that they have been pretty forward thinking with these new changes. I look forward to seeing where they lead Facebook, the main concern being that users feel it is becoming too commercial, although I think they have done a very clever job of avoiding this fate, what do you think?

Come back and tell us what you think, we love to hear your thoughts and love it when you share them. Are the new Ads a good or bad thing? Is Facebook getting too commercially orientated? What’s next for social platforms? Over to you……

Until next time, keep it social!

Stuart Fairbairns
Head of Social Media

For websites to effectively serve businesses and brands there is a seemingly simple formula:

Let’s look at some of the essential terminology:

Website Site visitors are driven to a website from multiple sources such as search marketing through the likes of Google and Yahoo, e-mail campaigns, social media potentially through Facebook and YouTube, online display and offline activations.

Website Conversion refers to the ability of the website to convert its visitors to perform a desired action, for example a successful order or purchase. For non-transactional websites, this could be measured by the number of user sign ups or registrations and website enquiries about a particular product.

Sales Conversion refers to the process of converting a web prospect into an actual sale. For lead generation websites, this would be measured by how well the agents are converting the web leads into a closed sale. For e-commerce websites, we would analyse the actual process of completing the transaction in the online environment. Looking at seamless check-out processes but as well post website initiatives is important here. Are delivery timelines in line with the online promise and does the product fulfill my expectations created online?

Each of these elements of the formula needs to perform effectively and if there is one element that is dysfunctional, the overall results will be poor. More customers means more revenue and more market share.

BEING VISIBLE

In terms of website visibility, most people would acknowledge the importance of the placement on search engines. The growth of the search engine giant Google is well known and everyone wants to have top placement for their brands. A study conducted by iProspect showed that 67% of online search users are driven to search for information about a particular company, product, service, or slogan by an offline channel.

Did you know that being online is the second most common thing you do while watching TV after eating? Given this, it is surprising that there is still reluctance by brands to allocate sufficient portions of advertising budgets to actual placement within the search engine results pages.
By way of example, in the first quarter of last year, we had a leading automotive brand allocate 80% of its digital marketing budget to banner display. Search received less than 10% of this budget. At the end of the quarter, when it came to analysing the results of this lead generation campaign, both search and display banners generated a similar number of website visitors. The real kicker is that when it came to conversions –in this case, actual test-drive requests – search generated 96% while online display accounted for less than 4% of conversions.

To this automotive brand’s credit, search has subsequently been give much larger portions of the budgets for lead generation and continues to outperform other media! That is the great thing about digital marketing – it is measurable. So, as search marketers, we wait for these opportunities to prove the business case and do so time and again.

DRIVING TRAFFIC IS NOT ENOUGH – let’s look at the Conversion side of things.

Impressions and clicks do not change businesses. Looking at the conversion and analytical side of things, we “Conversion Optimisers” are obviously not impressed with the fact that very often, digital marketing initiatives are reduced to purely driving traffic. A website which receives a high amount of volume but does not perform within its potential is lost revenue. A website can be optimized and be top of the search engine rankings, but if the experience and content is not up to scratch, no products will be sold. If this is the case, the campaign is essentially ineffective.

The client pays for each click on the creative, or per thousand impressions, depending on the model. These metrics do not indicate any tangible success. A million hits to your website without a single sale or newsletter sign-up are not effective. However the beauty of online marketing is the fact that campaigns are measurable and should be able to justify their spend. Companies should therefore develop a Return on Investment model as their quantitative basis for making a decision. So why not use the measurement potential of online marketing initiatives and evaluate campaign efforts?

A modest increase in conversion rates has an enormous effect on a company’s profit. In other words, in order to be double as profitable as your competitors, you don’t necessarily need to be twice as good as them.  A 10% increase in conversion rate can mean the difference between making a profit and gaining a loss.

While most marketers are obsessed with impressions and click metrics, we conversion analysts motivate to look behind the shiny large figures. In other words, what did that traffic actually do for your website? Did it convert to a sale or lead generation action on your website? And more importantly, was it worth the spend?

The problem we are facing in South Africa is that most marketers are not e-commerce-focused. They often have the perception that they do not have any true measurable on their website. Therefore purely driving traffic and brand awareness is enough.

We disagree. Let’s go back to our automotive brand (which obviously doesn’t sell cars online). Looking at the website, the brand should have a clear purpose.  This purpose is to ensure that a potential customer, independent of their decision making profile, should be able to take his or her decision towards a particular product one step further. In this case, booking a test drive would be a potential next step.

If your prospect is in his very early research phase, your website should cater for various options to display information, as well as give him the opportunity to compare options. A conversion for this segment would be what the industry calls a shallow conversion, such as a high time on site with reasonable page depths, download of a spec PDF or usage of a comparison tool.

A more sophisticated researcher, meaning someone who has done his or her research potentially on- and offline should ideally convert in deep conversion goals, such as the engagement with a car configurator, indicating specific request or a store locator for further engagement. We should also not disregard the signups for newsletters, as those are true indicators of brand loyalty and if well done, opens up the communication in a long term way.

Average Conversion rates

We’d like to stress that we have to be careful when speaking about averages; performance varies from industry to industry, campaign incentive, brand, etc.  However marketers love the fact to compare themselves across some sort of benchmark. Let’s follow the industry perception that for a Display on ad level, the industry average click-through rate is approx. 0.25%, for Search marketing it is approx. 1%.

In other words, if you are running a Display campaign online, out of 100, 000 impressions, with a click-through rate of 0.25%, 250 users click on an ad and with a conversion rate (which is arrival on website and acting on it) of 3% (industry average), 7,5 leads are generated.

If your internal lead to sales rate is 15%, you will roughly convert 1 user from seeing your ad to actually converting to a closed sale.

The point is what if your internal target is set to 300 closed sales per month?  The options are either increasing traffic and investing in more display spent, or (and this is the honest way), optimize all 3 components of your digital funnel: visibility, website usage and sales conversion.

If you are visible, you are facing the challenge that your landing page has to follow up with the expectations created prior to landing. Therefore clear calls to action for conversion are needed – persuasive messaging, re-assurance that one is on the right page, and an answer to the “what can I do next?” question.

Our suggestion is obviously to first optimise your target page, prior to investing more marketing spend. Secondly one needs to measure all campaign effectiveness with honest metrics, in order for marketing budget to be attributed sufficiently.

So what are we saying?

First of all, independent of Display, Search or other digital initiatives, each of them should have clear goals and objectives set, prior to running a campaign. Once established, we should agree on clear conversion drivers, which have to be measured, monitored and acted upon. A campaign report at the end of a 3 months cycle is not what drives success, it is in place more to monitor on an ongoing basis, reveal learning and user your data in a smart way. Clever customer segmentation, retargeting- and testing strategies should be at the top of a user-centric marketer.

Secondly. It is a multichannel world – measure it. Marketers today are increasingly encouraged to look beyond the last click to find areas of opportunity. Advanced web analytics technology does allow us analysts to measure the influence of various channels within the marketing mix.  Don’t silo campaigns, set clear campaign targets and measure the effectiveness of them influencing each other.  Given the fact that around 90% of online engagement starts in search engines, it stands out, that your marketing initiatives have to be connected. A powerful targeted display message, supported by search, driving to a relevant and customized landing page will ensure that your marketing efforts are driving success and marketing budget is allocated correctly.

Keen to find out more about honest measurement?
Please contact us at conversion@iprospect.co.za

Chat soon, Conversion matters!

Anne Scharlow, Conversion Director
Rob Stanbridge, Search Director