Digital

Multi-Channel Marketing

A bit of research fell into the email inbox this morning that’s worth airing. On the back of an earlier article about trying to maximise the impressions of a print ad it was interesting that this research looked at the channels used in the marketing mix and how those channels are tracked.  The research was conducted by SkyIQ , part of BSB Sky. Of the 12 channels used, the most predominantly used channel was online being employed by 76% of the marketers surveyed. In my own opinion that figure struck me as being on the low side. Given that the survey had canvassed One hundred senior marketing professionals working within large organisations in the UK  I thought that online/digital would have been used by the majority, if not certainly the vast majority of all the companies.   Some of the ‘traditional’ media were next in line with print being used by 71% of respondents, email by 66% and, greeted with a broad smile from An Post, direct mail came in at a healthy 61% usage. TV was last only employed as a marketing channel by 36% of the respondents along with mobile also on 36%.     You could get the impression that some channels were not employed for the sake of a “safer option”. Given that we have a 117% penetration of mobile phones in the Republic the figure of 36% usage in the marketing mix strikes me as particula...

Print Advertising Research

It’s a long time since I saw research like this (not that I’ve been actively searching). It’s all to do with how to improve the ROI on your print advertising by getting more eyeballs to your ads. In the world of digital that’s impressions and is very easily measured. The CTR is then used to calculate your RIO. All very simple if you have the technology to back this up – which web browsers are very adept at doing. However, the punter tanking a glance at a printed page – thats a minefield in terms of research. It’s almost impossible to link the cursory glance (or more) at an advert and a sale. So the best practice is to give your advert the best possible chance of being seen and read. The people over at market research agency Validators came up with some really interesting research on this. And, as all hope has not yet gone and there are people still advertising in print, I thought it would be interesting to summarise their findings.    Their research was based on eye tracking studies – literally following eye movements to see where it stops and focuses on more (and less). These types studies have been used for a good few years in the Directory business as the on page/in copy marketing is massively important. Anyway, they reported that the four biggest influencers to having your press ad gain more impact...

Daily Deals and Coupons, some interesting research

There have been some very interesting studies conducted recently into the world of the ‘Daily Deal’ and coupon redemption. Perhaps one of the more interesting of these was conducted by Rice University in September of last year and again in June of this year. But.... if you've been tempted, have a look at something we cooked up, a daily deal calcutator  Their research findings are a fantastic guide to any business tempted by the lure of a daily deal. Whilst many of the business running these deals are very satisfied with the outcome, many are not. There are some parts of this fairly intricate equation that businesses can influence and some are completely out of their control. There are so many elements involved in these Daily Deal promotions that it’s really very difficult to isolate and pinpoint one or two key factors. In their September research, Rice University maintained that the two key drivers to success or failure of a Daily Deal were Employee Satisfaction and the coupons effectiveness in attracting new customers. Employee Satisfaction is a massively important element. These promotions will (should) increase the workload of your staff or they may face extra hours. If there little in the way of recompense for the extra work, then it’s going to be an uphill struggle to succeed. Another element that makes these promotions work is the number of new customers that return to an establishment and spend at full rates and your staff have a vital role in...

Ireland Internet statistics

An amalgam of statistics here combining data from ComScore and Akamai, the internet network people. Looking at just some of the data that leaps out: Irelands very low average hours per visitor in comparison to its near neighbours. Irelands stands 5# from the bottom and is 63% less than to of the list The Netherlands in first place. The good folk in the Netherlands have, according to comScore, a high propensity to be on Linkedin and Twitter. The latter is most likely pulling up the time spent on line. Likewise we don’t exactly eat through the pages when online, as a consequence of our limited time online. Its best expressed on a levelling minute per page across the countries where we are an even more disappointing second from the bottom, Norway being last. But maybe it’s the lack of speed which leads to frustration, poor page turns and overall dissatisfaction.Ireland ranks very badly for the number of connections above 5Mbps and very strongly on the number still connecting at below 256k. I can’t think of life at 256k.

News 2.0?

I stumbled across broadsheet.ie earlier this morning as I was looking at what has been called, in particular grandiose terms it should be said, News 2.0. The term gives the impression that News has moved on, we have reached a new Golden Era. The News is Dead, Long Live the News (2.0) Perhaps a more apt term would be Parasitic 2.0. If copying and pasting stories you find in your selection of bookmarks passes for News 2.0, then we’re all in serious trouble. Wikileaks becomes Wik-CtrlC-CtrlV. Back to the story of broadsheet.ie: This morning in a fairly puerile attempt at what they obviously think passes as humour, they added their own ‘sub heads’ to story regarding the questioning of Louis Walsh about an alleged assault in a nightclub. All very, very childish. Long live News 1.0

Ireland Facebook Statistics

Some very interesting Facebook statistics are available at Social Bakers. So we put a few of these together here, just to give you an idea of what’s happening on Facebook as we write. Firstly we will look at Facebook penetration worldwide. There’s really two ways to look at this; absolute numbers or penetration as a % of the population. In numbers, the United States is, naturally, way ahead of the rest of the field with over 150 million Facebook users or the equivalent to half of its population. Ireland’s figure is always going to be low in comparison and we have 1.9m Facebook users, or just shy of half the population. When looking at the numbers, it’s worth remembering that Facebook was originally only in the English language. It wasn’t until early 2008 that it began to translate in to French, Spanish and German. So some countries may only be beginning to adopt the Facebook format as it becomes localised in their language.

Affiliate Links

I looked at this before when I thought some publications were being a little disingenuous about their affiliate policies. But, I am glad to see, that our friends at News International are being completely up front about selling their traffic. In an article on High street fashion the say Want to know where your favourite stars' frock is from? Fear not, every week we bring you the hottest celebrity looks from Britain's High Street - and you can click through to buy them online straightaway. You can click on any of the images which will, via what looks like affiliate links, whisk you off to the different retailers. I’m actually all for print recycling their information on line and garnering as much loose change as they can for their work – even it the links are done retrospectively. We’re about to have a change in television programming there sensitive and venerable viewers will have to be informed if a product(s) have been commercially placed. Should the same apply here? Probably not, as...

Search Engine Simulators

In order to see exactly how your pages are seen by search engines you can use an online ‘search engine simulator’. There are plenty of them about but there may be some variations in the results. Using this facility will show you what words and phrases are going to be indexed in that page. It’s an excellent way to look at your pages. Its takes away the distraction of graphics or flash and strips the site down to its most basic. And that’s the way the site will be seen by and indexed by search spiders. A word of caution, some sites look absolutely fantastic to the human eye, readable and navigable. Take for example the retail site of Brown Thomas. A lot of care and attention has been taken with this site and it’s very easy to negotiate. However the home page is all flash and therefore cannot be read easily by a search engine. You can see the results of what a spider sees in that page below – very little. More importantly the rest of the site is a blend of Flash and HTML and would be of some use to a spider. But the home page has no spider navigable links to the rest of the site and therefore it’s like a bullet in the head of a spider entering that page. Its not exactly a big meal for a spider!   

Panda Problems?

Here's a interesting take on the recent Google Panda update – specifically on Google.com. Below is the before and after of an Irish website whichwas competing for a fairly competitive key phrase. Before the update we had tracked it in and around 10th# and it had been relatively stable over that months up to that give or take a position or two. The landing page for that keyphrase on that particular site was, well, a bit light and really didn't live up to the promise. After the "update" they currently reside in 75th#. That has to hurt.

Irish Times Digital and other yarns

There was a initial raised eyebrow on seeing the ABC cert for the Irish Times website. Raised in a positive way it has to be said. In November 2010 they had 3.9m unique browsers that month and over 36m page impressions. So mental congratulations went their direction. However, the brakes were soon applied on that sentiment when I read, what can only be described as a ‘gushing’ and, if were were splitting hairs (as they were in the story), a disingenuous article in their Business Section the same day. In an effort to be ‘comparative’ the article made reference to the ABC figures of rival Independent Digital. They pointed out that they had (a paltry) 1.9m unique browsers and 26.6 page impression. What seems to have fallen off the page on the way to the printers was the fact that those Independent Digital figures are a year old – they apply to January 2010. If the IT can scream in a headline a 82% increase year on year, then surely (and dont…) they could have mentioned that ID figures were 12 stale. Its a little trivial and its apples/oranges. Further down the page was an article on the unfortunate demise of the Sunday Daily Star. It was fairly matter of fact and the relatively small piece was given two by-lines. Two heads are better than one? Perhaps not. The story made reference to the the Sunday Daily Star circulation: The Sunday Star achieved average weekly sales of about 54,000 in the first half of last year – just more than half the level achieved by its sister daily title “about 54,000 in...

Mobile Retail and m-commerce.

Some interesting stats and facts have come to light this month – in this instance concerning the rise and rise of m-commerce. In a report conducted by Tamar (UK Based Research) suggest that 19% of consumers will do their festive shopping via a mobile handset in 2010. I’d hazard a guess that there are also a huge number of individuals that will conduct their primary research on a mobile but might leave the “last mile” to be concluded elsewhere for a variety of reasons (some set out below). Tesco in the UK expect 10% of their sales will come through a mobile. Understandable as Tesco customers would already have their details registered and it’s simply a matter of signing in and doing the weekly shopping when you’re getting the evening tube to Tooting Broadway. And that seems to be key – the convenience and safety of having your details already gathered and stored on a retailers site. The survey suggested that many more would go the m-commerce route if their fears over security were allayed. There is also the logistical issue, and again, the security aspect of using a credit card in a public place. Then there’s the physical and mental anguish of attempting to key in a 12 digit credit card number (and all the other relevant paraphernalia that goes with it) on, say, public transport. If you don’t have the digits and dexterity of a seamstress, then the last mile is best conducted elsewhere. In the UK 54% of the top 20 retail sites had either a mobile app or a dedicated mobile web portal. But it still leaves nearly half that have neither. In...

Adwords and Trademark infringement

An interesting digging match is ongoing in London over the use of trademarks and Google adwords. The case was taken by Interflora against M&S over their used of the trademark name “Interflora” as a keyword in their adwords campaign (CPC of the keyword is €0.63 here). The case even dragged Google in with Interflora looking to hit them in the suit as well. However the ruling stated that Google simply facilitated third parties and did not mean that Google itself was using the mark. The court ruled that a third party could be liable 'in the case where the ad does not enable the average internet user, or enables that user only with difficulty, to ascertain whether the goods and services referred to therein originate from the proprietor of the trademark or an undertaking economically connected with it or, on the contrary, originate from a third party'...

QR Codes again!

The Sunday Business Post ran adverts for Sherry FitzGerald last Sunday where the adverts carried QR codes. The codes, once read in an appropriate reader on a Smartphone, will link the advert to the sherry FitzGerald website. And fair enough, it’s a bit of innovation in an arena that slow to innovate. A follow-up article this week gave the impression that this was somewhat ‘cutting edge’. Whilst Sherry may have been the first to use the QR code in an advert, its far from cutting edge. Similarly, there was a story in the Irish Times in April extolling the virtues of the technology and somewhat beaming at the fact that their joint venture paper, The Metro Herald, will begin to experiment with the technology. Considering that The Sun were using the technology in November 2007, it really cant be considered as innovative.

Times OnLine Paywall

The Times stuck a paywall around their content yesterday 15th June. There will be huge interest in this paywall concept from a variety of sources: The News International Counting Dept (aka Finance). The bean counters and shareholders will be holding their breath the see what the up take will be and how the ‘markets’ react. They will have to make some sort of shareholders statement as to the uptake one would suggest as they opted out of the eABC last month and, therefore have no visible visitor numbers. The media, or the rest of the media to be accurate, is a collective ‘bitch’. Because of that, some lofty quarters probably have a feature at the ready so that if the ‘collective wisdom’ of this harlot does come to pass and the wall has to be decommissioned, they can print and be dammed. ‘ How Murdock Failed’ would be the choice of headlines. There is nothing like straight in -  no kissing. However none of them, the hurlers on the ditch that is, will quote Llyod Jones: the men who try to do something and fail are infinitely better than those who try to do nothing and succeed And spare a byte for the parasitic ‘scrapers’. The sites that rob and rehash well constructed and expensive articles to wallpaper their own sites for nothing. If they use (scrape) copy from behind the wall for their own sites, where will they stand legally. An aptly timed bit of research hit the screens from Harris/PCUK today. The latter acronym is “Paid Content UK”, a website owned and run by Guardian Media. The results show that only 4% of inline...

Mobile and Radio Promotion make a good fit.

Here's a really good example of merging mediums, there are plenty, but I liked this one for its simplicity and a small bit of 'wonder would that happen here?' A Taco chain in Florida Taco Maker reported a 21% increase in Q1 sales, crediting a promotion it ran between radio advertising and mobile handsets for the increase. I don't think there are many companies that can boast a 21% increase in sales, let alone double digit in Q1. They developed a new character called Juan Maker, and Mexican-American character that made radio appearances to chat about his freebies. These were recorded live and during the interview Juan offered listeners the chance to get a 1lb burrito, free, if they sent a text as requested by that particular interview** Participating hungry Florida residents on receipt of same would then present that text (coupon?) at participating outlets to redeem the freebie. They are quoted as getting 5,000 texts and redeeming 2,500 burritos over the 6 weeks of the promotion. If you break that down it's (working on a 5 day week) its 166 text a day - hats not a huge ask. Interestingly, each text requested by their character Juan was different and allowed the company to track the response of each 'interview'. They are then able to track the response rates by station, DJ, day part, day etc. Marketing agency says that the campaign cost less than $50,000. That works about at $20 per redeemed coupon. You would really want the punters to be buying a...

Mobile Sites for Newspapers

In the last ground of electronic ABC figures there were some extra interesting stats furnished by the Guardian. They launched a mobile site earlier this year and they gave a first look at some of the data.  Overall they had 27,324,309 unique users to its site in April - making it the most visited site out of all the UK morning papers. But the mobile site attracted 101,000 and 2.1m page impressions during the month. More interestingly, two thirds of that traffic came from either an iPhone or iPod Touch. "The Web" seems to feature very high on the agenda of Apple disciples. Figures released by AdMob showed that, from their tracking, that although Symbian have a 52% market share of handsets worldwide the operating system only accounts for 7% of HTML mobile usage.   The iPhone users as a...

2D Barcodes

I've been a fan of QR Codes (2D Bar codes) for some time, looking at them first to see if I could utilise the technology to issue unique WAP links for various products. I could (and may still) and the technology is excellent in that respect, but the real problem was with their adoption, which was, well, lacklustre and fragmented. The technology allows you to capture a 2D code image with a mobile phone camera which is subsequently converted to one of a few (pre) chosen options. The QR code could be pre coded to be a URL for the phone's browser; it could be text, an SMS or personal details. Taking a snap of a QR code on a business card automatically transfers the all the 'contact' details to the phones phonebook, saving the recipient having to key it in. This particular application is big news in the Orient where at one point every...