Creating a More Sophisticated Retargeting Campaign
Retargeting should now be familiar to most of us as web surfers and consumers. It’s the practice of marketing to people who have already visited your site once. The perceived benefit of this being that you’re marketing to a more targeted audience – people who’ve visited your site before. Well yes, but a very simple campaign like this might not cut it in today’s modern digital world.
It is easy for the wrong people to receive your marketing messages as multiple people may use one device or those who visit a website once may have no interest in ever doing so again, and may never have converted anyway. So this puts into question actually how targeted you can be. These messages can also be annoying for consumers, particularly if they’re not relevant.
So, how can small business owners and marketers make the most of retargeting so as not to pester consumers but also be more relevant and targeted?
Be Cleaver with Data
Consider a more joined-up approach to collecting data and insight about your consumers and their behaviour. Having a central pool of data that comes from multiple sources and all of your channels will allow you to be more specific about who you retarget and why. You’ll no longer be retargeting based on one simple action (such as visiting your site once) but on information and insight that has more depth.
Consider a DMP to help with Retargeting
A Data Managment Platform will allow you combine your customer data and third party data to learn more about your target audience and therefore retarget more effectively and efficiently. A DMP will help minimise the waste retargeting can often cause. For example if an 80 year old lady looks at football boots online it’s likely it’s a mistake or...
Digital Skills Gap – The Facts
Following Google’s recent announcement promising free digital skills training to everyone in the UK, and much discussion over the past year about the ‘digital skills gap,’ I thought we’d recap on some of the facts.
Google boss Sundar Pichai announced: “No matter where you live, no matter where you’re from, no matter what your job is – you deserve access to all the information, education, and opportunity the web has to offer.” An extension of Google’s Digital Garage that has been running for the past couple of years to help SMEs and entrepreneurs make the most of digital, the initiate aims to help everyone tackle digital.
Digital Skills for SMEs
Although online tools and resources are more accessible than ever, for small and growing businesses the House of Commons Digital Skills Crisis report found that 49% of SMEs are suffering tech skill gaps in the UK. It also reported that the digital skills gap costs the UK economy around £63bn a year in lost income.
The issue is built on the fact that digital is changing so quickly, constantly. Entrepreneurs are good at what they do, which is why they go into business but keeping up with the ever evolving world of digital, and managing to successfully complete proves difficult for some. Awareness of the tools and support that are out there is one thing, finding the time to learn and develop is another. The rise in popularity of freelance and flexible workers may be a solution to some of the issues, as SMEs are able to draft in experts to work part-time or on a project basis....
Consumers Are Willing To Pay More For Purposeful Brands
Michelle Keaney, partnership director at The Marketing Academy and founder of Three Point Zero recently wrote an article for Marketing Week about responsible consumption and how consumers are willing to put their money into ‘purposeful brands.’
As we head into the busiest time of year for most e-commerce brands. Research last year from IRI and Boston Consulting Group showed that the growth of brands classed as Responsible Consumption brands has overtaken ‘conventional’ brands. One of the important points is that RC brands are able to charge a higher price – on average 58% more than regular brands.
For years studies and polls have shown that consumers are keen to shop more responsibly, and it seems now the time has come for them to actively do so. This could be down the fact that there’s more choice when it comes to purposeful brands brands, or that they’re now more accessible than ever.
The opportunity for these brands if big. Globescan’s 2016 public radar shows 40% of ‘aspirational consumers’ – the world’s emerging middle class – want to choose brands that “have a clear purpose and act in the best interests of society.” Although apparently consumers struggle to name brands that represent this purpose they look for, some examples are; Toms shoes, Ella’s Kitchen, Tesla, Cook and Method.
The Risk of Becoming Irrelevant
If responsible consumption is important to 40% of the world’s consumers – could brands that ignore RC become irrelevant? Creating wealth for shareholders is one thing, but there are a progressive amount of social capitalists who believe in addressing challenges and change when it comes to business. However, these two...
Boosting Online Sales Over the Festive Period
If you’re an e-commerce business the festive period is likely to be an important time of year for sales as 53% of people plan to shop online. Early preparation and planning will help you make a success of the selling online opportunity, during Black Friday, Christmas, and the post-Christmas sales.
Optimising the Festive Opportunity
Less is More – At this time of year people won’t usually be buying for themselves and are often looking for inspiration. Categorising gifts into sections (for him, for her, for bakers, for gardeners, etc) makes it easy for shoppers to navigate to the right area, where you can then provide them with a concise selection of ideal gifts. This should keep things less complicated for you during a busy period too.
Market to the Millennials – Setting the pace these days for online shopping, this group expect their online shopping experience to be quick, efficient and mobile. Get it right and they could become a key customer group. Even if your products don’t normally appeal to this generation remember this is gift buying time.
Give Last Minute Shoppers an Option – Gift cards are one of the most popular last minute options so make it easy for procrastinators and those who leave things right to the last hour! Delivery will be key to this too – but of course be realistic about what you can offer.
Jump on the Trends – Can you incorporate this year’s hottest trends into your products or promotions? Can you highlight and showcase a selection of product that lend themselves to what’s popular right now? Use social media to generate a buzz!
Branching Out with Your Online Selling
Google Shopping – Google shopping saw huge growth in the first quarter...
YouTube Best Practice and Top Tips
For marketers and business owners video is an engaging way to create and share fresh content, and there are more options than ever for doing so. YouTube is currently the third most popular website in the world and has over a billion users. It’s easy to embed YouTube videos across social media platforms, however native video uploaded directly to the likes of Facebook and Twitter seems to be performing better than YouTube video in terms of reach. Choosing to include YouTube into your marketing plan is also about embracing the community and making the most of this channel’s ability to help you get discovered and increase awareness. YouTube should become part of your video strategy, alongside an onsite gallery or the use of video on other social networks.
Why Choose to Use YouTube
Google search – videos are appearing more in search, so including video on your page could help to improve authority
The second largest search engine – YouTube is bigger than Bing, Yahoo, Aol and Ask combined with over 3 billion searches a month
Advertise – there’s lots of effective options for YouTube advertising
Tell your story – a fantastic way to tell your story online
A Global Audience
YouTube has global audience of 88 different countries and 76 languages. Because so much of the content on YouTube is instructional, it may be that people from all over the world can watch and learn without subtitles. But there is now a wide range of languages available for subtitling too. Video content in the native language to those you’re targeting is always best – if you need to caption, always have a native speaker review for accuracy.
Appeal to How and Where YouTubers Watch Video
Unsurprisingly most YouTubers watch video on mobile, but surprisingly...
Why Online Reviews and Testimonials are So Important and How to Make Them Work For...
According to BrightLocal 92% of us read online reviews and 68% consider them a significant trust factor. So as well as building local reputation and trust, reviews can impact your rankings and testimonials can win you in-SERP stars. Many local businesses may also use third-party review sites. But what does all this mean, and what’s the difference?
Third-party reviews are reviews from customers on external sites such as Tripadvisor. Traditional testimonials are snippets taken from a customer and placed direct on your website. The thing is here, you may only choose to display the most positive testimonials on your site. Onsite reviews via website applications now allow business owners to have customer reviews posted directly on their site, often including ratings or stars, or allowing for owners to reply and comment. So there’s lots of options, and Miriam Ellis, local SEO expert at Moz suggests to yield maximum benefits, you’ve got to:
Know the guidelines and technology
Have a clear goal and a clear plan for achieving it
Commit to making a sustained effort
Each site, e.g. Google, Yelp, Facebook, etc. has a different set of guidelines in relation to customer reviews and using schema technology. For more detail about this check out the advice from David Deering on this Moz blog.
In terms of defining your goals for your own on-site consumer feedback pages, you will need to do this per city or area if you have more than one location. Here are Mike Blumenthal’s (GetFiveStars’ co-founder and renowned local SEO) top tips for creating your goals.
Be customer focused – make sure your testimonial page is easily accessible and portrays your brand well.
Be Google focused – get your testimonial page ranking well, ideally showing a star rating. You can also have...
