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Text messaging has replaced the phone call as the preferred method of communication. In fact, in 2012, wireless carriers are likely to handle more text messages than mobile phone call minutes.
It is important to understand and respect that by marketing via SMS text, brands are communicating with consumers in an intimate manner.
The ready-to-eat cereal category is extremely competitive and not without its challenges. Commodity pricing pressures have forced many companies to offset costs by raising their own prices. And as if the competition from other branded products wasn’t enough, private-label cereals have become an attractive alternative to price-conscious consumers. Meanwhile, cereal brands have long been criticized for being high in sugar and salt and boasting little nutritional value.
Google expanded the digital world of cloud computing on Tuesday, announcing the rollout of "Google Drive."
The service, which will give users 5GB of free remote storage and additional space for a monthly fee, puts the Web giant in competition with Apple and Microsoft, as well as specialized services like Box and Dropbox, in a space that increasingly looks like the future of computing.
In a bid to show just how flexible and soft their new shoes are, Nike have come up with a brilliant web app that uses your face to control the shoes.
Trendspotting is the mother's milk of digital marketing punditry. If I had a dime for every "top 10 tech trends of [insert year]" article I've ever read, well, I'd just have a large pile of dimes, and if I had a dime for every one I've written, I'd have at least 30 cents.
SMS, or text messaging, is the most widely used mobile technology today and it can be a very effective way of gathering email subscribers away from the web. This tactic is especially useful for companies and non-profits who hold events, run traditional media, or have a significant number of visitors passing through their physical location.
Despite social media marketing’s maturing from a noisy infant to an arrogant adolescent in the marketing department, over the last 12 months the resistance to taking it seriously and apply and implement appropriate resources is still ever present.
Julius Genachowski, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, said Wednesday that failing to meet the “challenges” of cybersecurity will mean the U.S. will “pay the price in the form of diminished safety, lost privacy, lost jobs and financial vulnerability — billions of dollars potentially lost to digital criminals.”
The FCC chair called on Internet users, providers and policymakers to address multiple “cyber threats,” including botnet attacks, domain name fraud and IP hijacking.
It's that time of year, again. Time to sharpen our pencils and get ready plead our case for 2012 conference events & meetings spend. No doubt, your CFO is locked and loaded. How about you? Are you ready?
Whether they pushed the pop-culture envelope, captured consumer attitudes for a moment or forced changes in how the big game's ads are run, the following represent the commercials we think spurred the most movement.
Written by Jeff Bullas - View Comments Categories: Blog, Blogging, Content, Social Media, Social Media Marketing Why do you turn on the television? Why do you open a magazine? Why do you read the newspaper, whether it is online or folded and crumpled on your coffee table? We want to be entertained, amused and educated and the reason you open the laptop, turn on the tablet or browse on the mobile, is that we are seeking information and it is called content. Google earns $30 billion a year indexing and helping you find information and content. In an information age, creating content should become the focus of your marketing, whether it is for the consumer or for business.
Kellogg Co. is revamping its marketing strategy for its Special K cereal brand with an updated application that lets users manage their weight loss goals via mobile and desktop.
What does 2012 hold in store for online marketing? The acceleration of innovation in online technologies and the ways we can discover, consume and engage with information can be a challenge to keep up with. But as digital marketers that are more than shiny object opportunists, seeing future trends is exactly what we need to do in order to anticipate our place in the digital universe.
It’s not just about where you can sell stuff to people right now, but next month, next year, 5, 10 or more out. That’s why I think the concept of discovery, consume and engage is so important, because it transcends ideas like “social network” or “search engine” and focuses more on consumers and technologies. Will we be using a search engine like Google in 5 years? Will we be using desktop computers in 5 years? What will future social networks look like? Answers to those questions are answers to the future of marketing and customer engagement.
Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon and plenty of other large companies are innovating at amazing speed to gain control of our attention. Some are doing it through devices, some through content, others through infrastructure. A handful of companies have had a huge impact on what we do online and at the same time, new companies, start-ups and individuals are creating amazing solutions. What are you doing to see the bigger picture and what it means for your business?
You may remember a brilliant chocolate marketing campaign we featured here about a year ago from a Greek brand called Lacta. At the time I thought it was one of the smartest pieces of marketing I had seen online but they have only gone and bettered it themselves with a new augmented reality app.
Landing page creation, optimization and analytics best practices
Businesses are now hungrier than ever and are willing to do whatever it takes to earn the trust of customers. As a result, your competitors are moving faster than ever in an effort to make a play for your would-be patrons.
Although PowerPoint has been around for years, it is still the king of presentation software tools. It is an absolutely critical arrow in my business marketing quiver … and for some reasons that might surprise you! Here are seven ideas to use PowerPoint slides to create new value for your social media marketing efforts.
A blog about meeting planning by Donna Kastner.
As more B2B companies devote more of their budgets to social media marketing, many social media thought leaders are debating the value of outsourcing time spent on tools such as Facebook, Twitter, blog content development and community management. Social media’s inherently personal take on customer service, media relations and brand development has caused some B2B marketers to wonder if marketing agencies can tap into companies’ cultures and present them online as authentically as internal communicators.
Like public relations and advertising services, however, the time and attention outside agencies can devote to planning and executing a B2B company’s social media strategy can often increase its reach. Perhaps the best way to approach B2B social media is a marriage of internal and external minds that maximizes a social media campaign’s success. When each side’s strengths are combined, the worth of social media exceeds individual status updates, Twitter mentions and blog posts.
Here are six things both sides should bring to the table to make sure social media supports overall B2B communication and sales goals:
Agency strengths
1. Experience
Any agency worth its salt will be able to provide case studies of successful social media campaigns it has accomplished for other clients. The social media space is a relatively new one, so having a team of experienced, hands-on professionals can be much more valuable than in-house employees who may have just heard about the business uses of Facebook and Twitter at an industry conference.
Agencies that offer social media services are constantly staying on top of new tools, practices, monitoring services and research, and that expertise can make a B2B company’s journey into social media marketing more successful in less time. By drawing off of other social media campaigns’ failures and successes, agencies can better navigate and streamline social media strategies and standards.
2. 24/7 Monitoring
The time requirements of B2B social media can seem daunting for internal communicators with to-do lists that seemingly grow by the hour. An agency has an arsenal of tools in place that allow its employees to monitor the 24/7 online world more effectively in less time. This takes the “I’ll never catch it all” anxiety out of social media, and allows internal communicators to focus on the most valuable online interactions that could lead to sales and long-term relationships.
3. Reporting
To justify their services, agencies must prove their value with regular, detailed reports and measurements. This type of reporting – often overlooked or put on the back burner by internal marketers – is key, and gives much-needed metrics for internal management teams. Beyond graphs and numbers, these reports’ analytical approaches can provide recommendations and foundations for future goals, strategies and budgets.
Internal strengths
1. Passion
Working internally for a B2B company requires a deeper connection with a company, its goals and its employees, something that is hard to develop externally in a short amount of time. An internal communicator can bring an authentic passion and tone that speaks to target audiences, boosts online sincerity and develops lasting digital relationships, while an agency can help channel and direct that know-how in the best, most-efficient ways.
2. Multi-departmental integration
Social media shouldn’t exist in a silo. An agency will help B2B companies develop their digital strategies, but internal teams will have the knowledge necessary to also integrate those plans with their sales, marketing and customer service teams’ initiatives. By bringing these relationships to the table, internal teams can maximize their agency’s knowledge and experience to pull together a social media strategy that accounts for and supports their overall B2B business goals.
3. Access to company thought leaders
No matter the industry, valuable content designed for specific target audiences is the most important part of a social media strategy. And as much as an agency can dive into a company’s product roster, brand position and communication practices, the experts with the most industry pull, respect and expertise reside inside a company. Internal communicators work with them every day, and have the relationships that can make specific social media tactics such as expert blog posts, video interviews with B2B CEOs and blogger interviews valuable to key stakeholders.
Do you think a balanced approach utilizing the strengths of both an agency and a B2B company’s internal team can lead to social media success?
Related posts:Find a B2B Social Media Internal Champion As social media finds its way into more B2B marketing... 4 Ways to Bridge the Social Media Gap With B2B Sales Team The common disconnect between B2B sales and marketing teams has... How to Fail at B2B Social Media Many B2B companies are heading into 2010 with a slight...
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Okay, last week, I launched the CRM Watchlist for 2011. The first two posts (of six) were published. If you haven't read them, please do. There is something of a method to the madness so it would be kind of important to read at least the first one to understand how I choose a company for Watchlist goodness.
What I'm going to give you here are the names of companies that aren't the full service suite providers or even long time veterans of the CRM market but those that tend to specialize in a particular one of the pillars one way or the other. That means, since this is a CRM Watchlist, you will NOT see pure play social media companies here (though in a later post you'll see the social media and community platforms that have taken CRM integration seriously. They count in this.) What you will see is companies that provide technologies for enabling marketing, customer service and sales.
I'd particularly take a look at the customer service category, primarily because customer service is what drives Social CRM, unlike its traditional cousin, CRM, which was driven by sales.
So, congratulations to the winners here!! This had a lot of competition. It was not easy to make particularly this segment. So even when I'm covering their weaknesses as well as their strengths, to be on this means that at least to me, these companies are the important ones or will be in their areas in 2011.
To read the full ZDNet article, click here
I have to imagine that Kevin Spacey is getting sick and tired of the use of his movie's title for pretty much everything related to a regular event. So this "Sigh" is for him. Sigh. In the first CRM Watchlist 2011 (long) post I covered the Big 4. In round 2, we're going to look at the tried and true companies from the CRM side who you would almost expect to make it. There are a couple of twists this time around as you'll see. Or, as the case may be, won't see. But then, they could be mentioned in a subsequent post too. Heh. Heh. I love suspense.
The Tried and True - & Welcome Back
Stable. Solid. Occasionally innovative. Very smart. Customers like them. This tends to be how they are described and why they made the CRM 2011 Watchlist (or the 2011 CRM Watchlist. Or….). But there are some blemishes on their often tanned skins. But when you look at them, generally, you're gonna say "niiiice tan." Here goes.
To read the full ZDNet article, click here
Okay, I know its been tough (for me. I'm sure you've had a lot better things to do, but I happen to have no life), but its now that time. The oft mentioned, always maligned, CRM Watchlist 2011 is ready.
No drum roll yet, though.
First - Since this post concerns the Big 4 of the enterprise software world, each company gets what will be by far the most comprehensive treatment. Each company mentioned in subsequent posts will get a considerably shorter entry.
To read the full ZDNet article, click here
For this part of the Watchlist, what I'm throwing out there are my winners for the social mainstream. Another development in 2010 was that community platforms, social media monitoring tools, social channels etc. got mainstream credibility. You made it, baby!!
For any one of them to make this list though, while there are dozens of worthy companies out there who are part of the social mainstream, they have to show either native CRM functionality or that they understand that they have to integrate with traditional CRM applications to get where they want to be. They have to have at least clear and unimpeachable intent to do that in order for me to think "wow, this is a company I want others to know about."
To read the full ZDNet article, click here
Last month, a panel of experts including Paul Greenberg, author of the seminal CRM at the Speed of Light, customer experience guru Shaun Smith and SugarCRM CEO Larry Augustin, delivered their verdict on the most significant developments of the past year in the world of CRM.
In this follow-up article, the same panel provides its predictions on what will prove to be the talking points of 2011.
To read the full MyCustomer.com article, click here
Well, we're in the homestretch. This is Part #5 of the Watchlist which is where I take the companies that for one reason or another defy categorization and let you see them as victors on their own. They are Spartacus.
To read the full ZDNet article, click here
A beast of a different type, yes? I'm not trying to compare technology vendors to consulting companies or systems integrators. My standards for them were quite different. For example, their actual technology offering wasn't all that meaningful since the vast majority of them offer frameworks and methodologies enhanced by technologies made by other companies. Thus, what becomes important, at least in my assessment of these firms, is their alliances and how smart the mix of partners is and what the partners think of them. Additionally, to these firms, putting practical spin on thought leadership is hugely important. Not only do they need to turn out the strategic thinking and do the research, but they need to be quite tactical and show their plan to execute when it comes to the thinking. That's why 3 of the 4 winners have a specific Social CRM practice or sub-practice. That weighed heavily in my decisions.
There are other SI/Consultant firms out there with SCRM practices and/or who provide thought leadership but these are the ones that stood out for either one of them or both.
To read the full ZDNet article, click here
Epsilon, KBM Group and Targetbase topped the 2011 Forrester Research Wave assessment of US database marketing service providers. Forrester listed all three in the "leaders" category.
The report measured the top database marketing vendors against 90 criteria. Companies were gauged based on their current offering, their corporate strategy and the depth of their market presence.
To read the full DM News article, click here
How do companies maximize the value of their investments in mobile marketing? As with any storytelling exercise, figuring out what to say and when to say it is the hardest thing. Seasoned mobile marketers have found that there is no substitute for a well-crafted and well-executed campaign, one focused on satisfying customer need without getting in the way.
To read the full E-Commerce Times article, click here
Time and time again, we in this industry are asked the same question, "what is the most effective way of generating leads???"
The answer to this question lies in one truth, and that is the attention span of the user. When a user signs up for a product they are at the peak of their personal interest level, but that level quickly diminishes. With each different type of advertising technique, the user is one-on-one with a product, and they longer they spend with it, the better the lead will ultimately be. The goal is to keep the user as interested as possible, for as long as possible, before making them do anything on their end (click a button, fill out a form, etc.).
To read the full MediaPost article, click here
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