Posts tagged Strategy
Is E-Marketing Dead??
Feb 22nd
With all the spam that we get, does e-mail marketing still work?
As with any other type of marketing, there is one key — make it relevant. For companies that believe in just sending stuff to their data base of customers because those people were kind enough to provide them with a clear gateway to market to them, there is a special word for that type of marketing: SPAM. I have signed up with various companies for their emails thinking that I will get special offers or notified of things before the regular consumer, but have had some of those companies just send completely irrelevant garbage that has forced me to add them to my SPAM list. I’m sure this was counter-productive for what they had in mind. However, there ARE companies that have made use out of the information I provided to them when I signed up (age, interests, location, etc) and have sent very specific emails with content that interests me or is directly targeted to me. I check them, read them and often even pass them on to friends and encourage THEM to sign up for the emails as well. Now that’s some bang for your buck.
Check it out: Digital Marketing Guide: E-mail
Study: Half Of Top Web Retailers Have No Meaningful Facebook Presence
Feb 16th
Is Facebook for ALL retailers?
I still remember when Flash came out and all my clients “needed” a new site done in Flash for them. At that time, SEO was not really holding hands with Flash and, while it made sense for some clients, I was still confused why other clients wanted to jump on the bandwagon for something that clearly may not appeal to their consumer base. This is more or less how I feel about retailers having a presence on Facebook. While I think it is a give in for some, such as Winners, who barely put something new on their page and it gets thread upon thread of user-generated buzz and feedback, it clearly may serve no purpose at all for clients that don’t have consumers that are active on Facebook or offer no added value to their Facebook presence. I know a certain car sharing company that did not have someone monitoring their Facebook page and when a concern was posted by one user, instead of addressing it asap, it was left for weeks. This unfortunately opened the door for their other Facebook fans to jump on the thread and complain about the company and their lack of customer service. It was addressed later, but that lack of constant presence, defeats the purpose of being there. So, for any companies out there that want to be part of the Facebook party — please make sure you have the resources to do it right or it will bite you in the ass!
Check it out: Retailers and Meaningful Facebook Presence
Moms Place Trust in Other Consumers
Feb 10th
Mom’s are looking to real feedback through social media methods to help them make purchasing decisons
As a newer generation of internet-friendly moms are emerging (perhaps?), more and more of them are looking online for help in deciding what products to purchase. Looking to everything from forums to YouTube to Facebook (to name a few options), it compares only to in-store sales in deciding factors! It makes a huge difference seeing/reading a review by someone who has actually experienced the product rather than just reading a spec sheet and product description given by the manufacturer. My latest thing has been to look to Consumers Reports (with a subscription for full access) for unbiased testing reviews paired with user reviews to make major purchasing decisions. I guess its not just moms that are looking for real reviews.
Read the article: Mom’s Place Trust in Other Consumers
Using Social Media in Your Business
Feb 10th
Its the buzz in Business — Social Media — But how should they actually use it effectively?
Its like when Flash came out — everyone wanted a website in Flash — whether it was useful to them or not. This is on a greater scale now. Social Media is a whole realm. There are so many options and opportunities that lie within it that can either be useless to a business, damage a business but hopefully help a business. The question is, how to make it a positive experience for both the business and it’s consumers across various platforms?
Check it out: How Social Media Can Work Across Multiple Parts of Your Business
Virgin Mobile
Feb 8th
Virgin Mobile is a super fun and exciting brand — their look and feel changes with each of their campaigns and this was a big challenge in designing their site! They needed a site that would easily facilitate their ever-changing look through a CMS, but not look CMS driven. This was done on their home page and content pages by allowing images to bleed into an area that looked like it was part of the background, but was actually part of the images. A great solution that allowed for flexibility and ease of use. Other features that were designed for the site were tools that helped users decide which plans and phones were best suited for them based on their “Help Me Decide” user tool. Another great feature was a 360˚ interactive tool for each phone they offered that allowed users to explore the phone’s features in more detail and then follow with plans that went with that particular phone.
The resulting site was fun to view and interact with for users, but also easily updatable for the client.
This version of the site is no longer available online.
Click on the thumbnails below to see highlighted sections of the internal site.
