UNIT 1

Digital Marketing: Meaning, Scope and Importance

Meaning
Digital marketing encompasses all marketing efforts that use an electronic device or the
internet. Businesses leverage digital channels such as search engines, social media, email, and
their websites to connect with current and prospective customers.

Marketing has always been about connecting with your audience in the right place and at the
right time. Today, that means you need to meet them where they are already spending time:
on the internet.

Enter digital marketing — in other words, any form of marketing that exists online.

Digital marketing is defined by the use of numerous digital tactics and channels to connect
with customers where they spend much of their time: online. From the website itself to a
business’s online branding assets — digital advertising, email marketing, online brochures,
and beyond — there’s a spectrum of tactics that fall under the umbrella of “digital
marketing.”

The best digital marketers have a clear picture of how each digital marketing campaign
supports their overarching goals. And depending on the goals of their marketing strategy,
marketers can support a larger campaign through the free and paid channels at their disposal.

A content marketer, for example, can create a series of blog posts that serve to generate leads
from a new ebook the business recently created. The company’s social media marketer might
then help promote these blog posts through paid and organic posts on the business’s social
media accounts. Perhaps the email marketer creates an email campaign to send those who
download the ebook more information on the company.

Scope and Importance

Digital Marketing industry is booming not just in India but all parts of the world. The year
2016 took the industry by surprise with over 1.5 lakh job opportunities in the Digital
Marketing domain. Well, the following was a bigger surprise when only the first quarter of
2017 marked for 8 lakh job opportunities.

The surveys conducted by several forums have predicted this number to grow with
Digitalisation in the nation. Our Prime Minister has been actively promoting the idea of
Digital India. PM Modi’s digital India campaign gained massive popularity. The initiative of
Government of India is aimed at providing easy services to its natives.

Now imagine when a nation’s government is promoting the digital interaction, what do you
think will be the Digital Marketing scope in that nation.
The Digital Marketing industry is at its peak at the moment due to many reasons, take a
look at some of them:

It is the newest thing in town

Hasn’t the internet driven all of us crazy? well, it sure has. There was a time when a new
serial on the TV used to be the hot topic whereas today, the online posts or a new music video
on YouTube grabs our attention. What is this? this is a shift in the choice and preferences.
Digital media is gaining mass attention because of the fresh air it has got with itself. It’s like
living in a new era. We are experiencing a revolution, while we are shifting from the
traditional to the Digital media.

It is flexible

Since the entire work is to be done on the internet, there is no restriction of the place. It
doesn’t matter if you are at the office or at home. All you need is a device that is connected to
the internet and you are sorted.  Yes, it is actually that easy. Do you want to check your bank
balance? do it on your smart phone. Want to book movie tickets? pick up your smartphone
and book! This is the digital age, everything is available at your fingertips.

It is easy

Accessing the digital media is no rocket science. It is a piece of cake. The newest of users
also take a maximum of few days to learn how to operate the digital media. This is purely
because it is designed in such a user-friendly manner that its primary objective is to ease the
operations for human beings, the reason why our mobile phones are now called smartphones.

Eco- friendly

Being responsible citizens of the world it is important that we operate through mediums that
do not harm our atmosphere cause being ignorant to the atmosphere will only have an
adverse effect on us. The digital media additionally cuts down on paper usage. We operate
the digital media over the internet and thus can save ourselves a lot of hustle in terms of hard
work, long process of work and all the other drawbacks of using the traditional medias.

Fastest Reach

Previously radio was considered to have the fastest reach because of the live communication
feature. Radio is still the medium with the widest reach but the new media is gradually
overshadowing the most popular medias like a newspaper, television, etc.

Today, you post anything online and it gets trending within a few hours. This is because the
number of users of the digital media are touching heights with each passing day.

Influential

The man kind is used to being influenced by whatever is trending the most. The virtual media
has not fallen short of influencing the masses of its own new style. The social media
occupying the most space has infused itself so well in the lives of the users that it is like the
early morning newspaper that is a must. Only this newspaper is carried forward all day long
(pun intended).

Job Opportunities

The massive user engagement calls for more and more job opportunities. The employment
sector has seen a major share of jobs generated by the Digital Marketing Industry. The
statistics show that the total number of job opportunities in the Digital Marketing industry to
cross 8 lakh job in 2017. The career scope in Digital Marketing seems attractive to masses
and that is the reason why many professionals are learning this course to enter the industry.

High engagement

It is true that the traditional media are being completely overshadowed by the internet- led
Digital Marketing due to high engagement factors. The brands and companies have begun to
give extra emphasis to the ad campaigns run on the internet over television ads. The
revolution is here!

Small investments and big Returns

Digital Marketing ad campaigns ask for a very little amount of investments as compared to
television and print ads. The high ROI is attractive enough to draw the attention of the
marketers and advertisers.

Measure immediate results

An advertiser running a social media campaign can easily measure the performance of the
campaign in real time without waiting for long intervals. The leads generated and online
purchases are a direct measure of the performance of the campaign.

The campaign is run over the internet and the performance is measured in real time what can
be better than this for a business?

There must be many more reason to the list of why  Digital Marketing industry is at its peak
but we will move further from here to briefly discuss the scope of Digital Marketing jobs in
India.

Internet Vs. Traditional Marketing Communications

 

To clarify the terms, the use of print ads on newspapers and magazines is a simple example of traditional
marketing. Other examples include flyers that are put in mailboxes, commercials both on TV and radio
and billboards. On the other hand, when a business invests on building a website, advertising the brand
name through different social media such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, this kind strategy is
called digital marketing.

Benefits of Traditional Marketing

You can easily reach your target local audience. For example, a radio ad might play in one location:
your city or region. Or mailbox flyers will go to households in a select number of suburbs.

The materials can be kept. The audience can have a hard copy of materials of which they can read or
browse through over and over again.

It’s easy to understand. It can be easily understood by most people because they are already exposed to
this kind of strategy.

Neuroscience seems to support the benefits of hard copy marketing. A study sponsored by Canada
Post and performed by Canadian neuro-marketing firm TrueImpact compared the effects of paper
marketing (direct mail pieces, in this case) with digital media (email and display ads).

The technologies used in this study were eye-tracking and high resolution EEG brain wave measurement.
The three key metrics evaluated in the study were cognitive load (ease of understanding), motivation
(persuasiveness), and attention (how long subjects looked at the content).

Direct mail was easier to process mentally and tested better for brand recall.  According to the report,

Direct mail requires 21% less cognitive effort to process than digital media (5.15 vs. 6.37), suggesting that
it is both easier to understand and more memorable. Post-exposure memory tests validated what the
cognitive load test revealed about direct mail’s memory encoding capabilities. When asked to cite the
brand (company name) of an advertisement they had just seen, recall was 70% higher among participants
who were exposed to a direct mail piece (75%) than a digital ad (44%).

The Downside to Traditional Marketing

There is very little interaction between the medium used and the customers. It is more of providing
information to the public that the brand exists with the hope of these people patronizing the brand.

Print or radio advertisements can be very costly. Printing materials can be expensive and you need to
hire people to distribute these.

Results on this marketing strategy cannot easily be measured. Was the campaign successful?

Benefits of Digital Marketing

You can target a local audience, but also an international one. Further, you can tailor a campaign to
specific audience demographics, such as gender, location, age and interests. This means your campaign
will be more effective.

Your audience can choose how they want to receive your content. While one person likes to read a blog
post, another person likes to watch a YouTube video. Traditional marketing doesn’t give the audience a
choice. Most people hate receiving sales flyers in their mailbox or phone calls at inconvenient times on
stuff that they have little interest in.  Online people get the choice to opt in or out of communications and
often it is relevant because they were the ones searching for it in the first place.  Don’t underestimate the
power of market segmentation and tailored marketing.

Interaction with your audience is possible with the use of social media networks. In fact, interaction is
encouraged. Traditional marketing methods don’t allow for audience interaction. You can encourage your
prospects, clients and followers to take action, visit your website, read about your products and services,
rate them, buy them and provide feedback which is visible to your market.
 Digital marketing is cost-efficient. Though some invest on paid ads online; however, the cost is still
cheaper compared to traditional marketing.

Data and results are easily recorded. With Google Analytics and the insights tools offered by most
social media channels, you can check on your campaigns at any time. Unlike traditional marketing
methods, you can see in real time what is or is not working for your business online and you can adapt
very quickly to improve your results.

Level playing field:  Any business can compete with any competitor regardless of size with a solid digital
marketing strategy.  Traditionally a smaller retailer would struggle to match the finesse of the fixtures and
fittings of its larger competitors.  Online, a crisp well thought out site with a smooth customer journey and
fantastic service is king – not size.

Real time results: you don’t have to wait weeks for a boost to your business like you would have to
waiting for a fax or form to be returned.  You can see the numbers of visitors to your site and its
subscribers increase, peak trading times, conversion rates and much more at the touch of a button.

Brand Development: A well maintained website with quality content targeting the needs and adding
value to your target audience can provide significant value and lead generation opportunities.  The same
can be said for utilising social media channels and personalised email marketing.

Viral: how often do your sales flyers get passed around instantly by your customers and prospects?  
Online, using social media share buttons on your website, email and social media channels enables your
message to be shared incredibly quickly.  If you consider the average Facebook user has 190 friends of
which an average of 12% see their liked posts – your one message has actually been seen by 15 new
prospects. Now imagine a number of them also like and share your message and their friends do the same?
That’s why high-quality content is so important.

So which kind of marketing is better?

Well, we would recommend both. Obviously, we are passionate about digital marketing, because we know
that it works. But we do use traditional marketing materials, too.

A 2009 study conducted by Bangor University and branding agency Millward Brown also used fMRI to
study the different effects of paper and digital media.

Some of their key conclusions were:

 Physical material is more “real” to the brain.  It has a meaning, and a place. It is better connected
to memory because it engages with its spatial memory networks.
 Physical material involves more emotional processing, which is important for memory and brand
associations.
 Physical materials produced more brain responses connected with internal feelings, suggesting
greater “internalization” of the ads.

How We Use Both Digital & Traditional Marketing

Our traditional marketing methods support our digital marketing efforts. The two do not operate in
exclusion from each other. But we only use hard copy marketing materials to further strengthen a
relationship with a contact, referral partner or client. We don’t invest in television or radio ads, for
example, but we will give brochures to someone who is interested in our services.
Rather than taking an all or nothing approach, it appears that a multi-channel approach that leverages the
unique benefits of paper with the convenience and accessibility of digital will perform best.

Internet Microenvironment
 
The environment under which organization functions determines how it will conduct its
business. Organizations have to constantly monitor and appraise the external business
environment. Organizations have to make changes in its operations in accordance to the
environment as to be profitable and effective. Therefore, understanding the business
environment is important before developing any marketing strategy.

Specific forces such as a market place, customers, organization, etc. which directly affects
organization are referred to as micro-environment.

The internet has made a direct impact on the micro-environment of the organization.

Market Place
The market place for an organization includes interaction between all the elements of the
micro-environment. There are five forces which impact organization in the marketplace. The
impact of internet on the five forces is as follows:

Bargaining Power of Customers: with the advent of the internet, customers have wider
choices of products than before. The increase in competition has reduced the price level as
customer demand more transparency in operations. Thus the bargaining power of customers
has increased.

Bargaining Power of Suppliers: again with wider choice due to the internet. The bargaining
power of the supplier has gone down

Threats of substitute: the internet has enabled quicker introduction of products and services.
The organization must carefully observe the introduction of substitute in the market as to
avoid losing market share.

Barriers to entry: the internet has substantially reduced establishment costs, especially in

the services industry. Therefore, organization has to carefully observe the movement of the
new entrants in the market.

Competition: the internet has started the trend of faster commoditization of products. Thus
companies need to find new ways through which it can differentiate itself from competition.

Customers
An organization’s success is dependent on strong customer base. Therefore, customer needs
and requirements require a better understanding from the organization. A qualitative and
quantitative analysis needs to be developed by the company to track consumer behavior and
create more consumer insights. These consumer insights can be used by marketing groups to
develop specific strategies.
Companies are using demand analysis to understand and determine the potential of the new
business proposition among customers. Companies also deploy qualitative analysis to
understand perception of a consumer towards new products and services.

After assessing demand and perception among consumer for the products and services,
companies develop marketing communication to target specific potential customers and
convert them to actual customers. This conversion marketing technique helps companies
improve their customer base.

Online sites track the way consumer navigates to reach particular destination or buying
decision. This helps companies to design better websites. The internet search engines are the
first stop for many consumers to begin searching for a particular product or service. Hence it
is important to understand the phrases or sentence consumers are using to reach a particular
product or service.

Companies divide consumer into a particular group or segment based upon their
demographics and psychographics.

Online Buying Behavior

It is very important for an organization to understand how the internet works in a multiple
channel scenario. Thus, companies develop different models to understand online buying
behavior.

Companies have started creating personas which summarize the customer needs,
requirements and environment based on their internet usage. Based on this persona,
companies develop a customer scenario. This customer scenario is series of task or path taken
to come at a desired buying decision.

This customer scenario is part of the overall buying experience and it involves multiple
channel partners. Therefore multi-channel strategies have to be built in assessing overall
customer online buying behavior.

Competitors
Online business is dynamic in nature. Therefore, it is important for organizations to monitor
usage of the internet by the competition. The internet is the new medium through which
companies undertake the task for customer retention and acquisition.

This dynamism has introduced new services and innovative marketing mix more frequently
compared to traditional marketing techniques. Benchmarking also has become dynamic and
cannot be considered one of, activity, but has to be continuous.

The strategies of traditional competitor are well known. However, with the internet and
globalization, new entrants are always posing a constant competition to the organization.

Companies for benchmarking should analyze competitor’s web site, identify the current
trends and keep an eye on future trends.
Suppliers
Total customer satisfaction is the key in developing long and fruitful relationship with
consumers. Therefore, it becomes important for the organization to monitor supplier, as they
do affect quality or experience for customers.

Intermediaries
Marketing intermediaries are companies which help the organization sell, promote and
distribute products and services in the market. For internet marketing, there are online
intermediary websites. These intermediary websites work as a platform between consumers
and business suppliers. The online social networks also act as an intermediary. They provide
a platform which facilitates collaboration and exchange between various individuals.

The companies need to maintain constant watch on the internet environment. This will help
organization respond to ever changing and evolving internet micro environment.

Use of B2C and B2B internet Marketing

While business-to-business and business-to-consumer Internet marketing strategies are two
different animals, in that one model targets businesses and the other consumers, the benefits
that B2B and B2C provide to marketers are about the same. In short, both models help
businesses increase sales in an increasingly competitive marketplace. In 2012, in the United
States the number of potential Internet buyers in this increasingly competitive marketplace
reached a new peak: 245 million potential buyers online.

Increased Awareness
With over six billion Internet users across the world, it’s obvious why B2B and B2C Internet
marketing increases awareness of businesses and their products or services. More than that,
with more B2B and B2C companies marketing themselves on the Internet, marketers are in a
better position to pick up details about their competition. Additionally, with the advent of the
social networking explosion, more business and consumer patrons are voicing their opinions
about various products and services. This gives marketers even more empowering info about
what the market is thinking – knowledge they wouldn’t have if they themselves weren’t using
the Internet.

Better Interaction
The social network explosion, in addition to email and website marketing, also gives
marketers the ability to interact more directly with their customers, whether businesses or
consumers. An important part of this interaction is educating customers, either as a group or
as individuals. Marketing strategists at the firm Customer Paradigm cite business authors
Margaret Clark and Carol Pearson, who say that educated customers will buy more than
confused ones. So whether it’s marketing via email, podcasts, a website or social networks,
marketers who are interactive on the Web increase their authority in the marketplace –
another advantage from using the Internet.
Better Service
Better education relates to better service. In the days of mom-and-pop stores, customer
service usually meant the interaction you got once you walked in the store, when what you
ordered was delivered to your doorstep or when you called via telephone. Now that more
B2B and B2C companies are using the Internet, though, they’re providing marketing websites
on which customers can make contact when they have questions or concerns, and they’re
sending informative emails that don’t merely advertise but also inform their customers with
practical information. This means that customers, ideally, are getting much more robust
service.

Refined Messaging
The Internet has also provided marketers with more specific information about their
customers, such as when they’re more receptive to receiving an advertising message. Armed
with this knowledge, some B2B and B2C companies use a marketing method called “right-
time marketing.” According to business analyst firm Garner, Inc., the statistics are too
compelling to ignore: strategically timing email marketing messages will help marketers see
as much as a 600 percent rise in performance over more lax messaging methods, such as
email blasts and cold calling.

Internet Marketing Strategy

The internet is considered as a channel partner. Hence online marketing is to be considered as
a channel marketing strategy. An Organization needs to define specific objective from
internet marketing and building communications as well as scheme around it.

Internet marketing is one form customer touch point where companies directly interact with
existing as well as potential customers.

Integrated Strategy
The biggest challenge for the companies is to integrate internet marketing strategy with
overall marketing strategy. The prime reason for this challenge is the thought process that has
considered internet as an independent entity. Many organizations have not made an effort to
make internet as any function of the organization.

The internet is a new channel partner for many organizations. Therefore, it is essential that
companies create separate the internet marketing plan. As companies begin to understand the
full potential of internet marketing, a separate internet marketing plan may not be required.
The overall marketing plan now will be developed considering the strategic advantage of
internet marketing.

Strategy Building
Every company needs to develop a logical framework for its operations as to meet its
business objectives. The overall business objectives need to be broken to milestones, the
 company has to achieve within a certain time frame. To achieve these milestones, companies
need to develop strategies around the key activities.

One of the key activities is in strategy development is marketing. The strategy developed to
achieve business objectives through marketing is called as a marketing plan.

An internet marketing strategy building begins with understanding the current market
scenario. After analyzing market scenario, companies develop marketing plan and specific
internet related objectives. To achieve internet channel objectives, companies develop the
internet marketing plan. After developing and defining internet marketing plan, the next step
is to analyze the online presence of the company. The company can start working towards
implementation of marketing strategy, if it already has an online presence.

A strategy would be considered incomplete, if there is no continuous monitoring of the same.

A strategy modified and re-worked based on positive or negative feedback.

Strategy Review
An organization functions in a dynamic environment. It needs to ascertain whether the
current marketing strategies are effective or they require some modification. This internal
marketing audit looks to resolve following key activities:

 A complete review of the internal capabilities of the company, process and resources.
 A complete review of the present market and the competition, including the micro and the
macro environment.
 A complete review of current internet contribution in the marketing plan.

Another aspect of the strategic review is to assess the current contribution of internet
marketing plan with other marketing activities. This can be done by understanding the current
internet marketing capability. The first step is to check whether company has its own website.
The next step is to check whether the website is registered with any online business directory.
The next step is to create the website with a basic company and product information. The
next step is making the site interactive where a potential customer is able to place further
enquires. The next step is to develop the website which is capable of e-commerce activities as
well as customer service desk. The final step is to develop a full functional website which can
help the company in marketing as well as relationship building.

Goal Setting
Any marketing strategy or plan should be constructed to support the overall business
objective of the company. Companies have a general tendency of developing the internet
marketing plan away from the overall marketing plan. Companies have resorted to
experimentation in internet marketing plan rather than a focused approach.

This lack of clarity in the internet marketing plan has led to many failures with companies
suffering from financial loss.
 Integration of the internet can be done through scenario based analysis. In the scenario based
analysis various market simulations are created to explore different possibilities. The internet
marketing role in all scenarios needs to be explored to take the full advantage.

The financial benefits of internet marketing would be through increased sales and better
topline growth. The internet marketing would also help in customer service, by development
easy self-help guides, thus reducing overhead cost.

The intangible benefits of internet marketing would be a better corporate image, enhanced
visibility, customer relationships, better customer service etc.

Strategy Formulation
The internet is considered as a channel partner for the company and therefore it should be
part channel marketing strategy. It is important for the internet marketing strategy considers
the following:

 The strategy developed should outline objectives which generate leads and sales from this
channel.
 The strategy should target the customers which are users of the internet.
 The strategy supports the customer in making the buying decision as well as delivering the
product.
 The strategy should highlight differentiation from competition.
 The strategy should encourage consumers to use the internet along with channels.
 The strategy should help in customer acquisition as well as retention.

Implementation
The company needs to ascertain various pros and cons of internet marketing strategies before
implementation of one particular strategy. With finite resources companies look for solutions
which are implementable.

To implement an online marketing strategy, companies have various marketing applications.

Companies need to maintain portfolio of these applications and make a careful selection
depending upon risk and reward.

Post implementation it is important to maintain tracker of the strategy. These trackers are
frequently centered on, visitor tracking, lead generation, online sales and finally customer
retention.

Development of internet marketing strategy should follow the same path as that of any
marketing strategy, without forgetting uniqueness that the internet brings to the company.

Types

 Display Advertising: The use of banner ads and other graphical advertisements to market
products online.
 Search Engine Marketing: Using search engines to help connect users with the products and
services they are most interested in. Companies can pay to receive preferential ranking in a list of
search results.
 Search Engine Optimization: A free and organic way for companies to improve their
visibility on search engines.
 Social Media Marketing: Using sites like Facebook and Twitter to connect with customers.
 Email Marketing: Communicating with customers through the use of carefully designed
emails.
 Referral Marketing: Using internet channels to encourage consumers to recommend
products to their friends and families.
 Affiliate Marketing: Working with other businesses to make it easier for consumers to shop
for products online.
 Inbound Marketing: Boosting the value of a company’s web presence by adding unique
content like blogs, games, and tutorial videos.
 Video Marketing: Using web videos for promotional purposes.
 UNIT 2
The Marketing Mix. (7 P’s) in online context
 

The 4Ps were designed at a time where businesses were more likely to sell products, rather than
services and the role of customer service in helping brand development wasn’t so well know. Over
time, Booms and Pitner added three extended ‘service mix P’s’: Participants, Physical evidence
and Processes, and later Participants was renamed People. Today, it’s recommended that the full
7Ps of the marketing mix are considered when reviewing competitive strategies.
The 7Ps helps companies to review and define key issues that affect the marketing of its products and
services and is often now referred to as the 7Ps framework for the digital marketing mix.
Although it’s sometimes viewed as dated, we believe the 4Ps are an essential strategy tool to select
their scope and is particularly useful for small businesses. For startups reviewing price and revenue
models today, using the Business Model Canvas for marketing strategy is a great alternative since it
gives you a good structure to follow.
Companies can also use the 7Ps model to set objectives, conduct a SWOT analysis and undertake
competitive analysis. It’s a practical framework to evaluate an existing business and work through
appropriate approaches whilst evaluating the mix element as shown below and ask yourself the
following questions:
 Products/Services: How can you develop your products or services?
 Prices/Fees: How can we change our pricing model?
 Place/Access: What new distribution options are there for customers to experience our
product, e.g. online, in-store, mobile etc.
 Promotion: How can we add to or substitute the combination within paid, owned and earned
media channels?
 Physical Evidence: How we reassure our customers, e.g. impressive buildings, well-trained
staff, great website?
 People: Who are our people and are there skills gaps?
 Partners: Are we seeking new partners and managing existing partners well?.
An example of a company using the 7Ps strategy
Take a look at HubSpot as an example, which was founded in 2006; Hubspot has 8,000+ customers in
56 countries and sells software. What does their marketing mix look like?
This is a top level overview; you would take this into greater detail and ask the following questions:
8. Products/Services: Integrated toolset for SEO, blogging, social media, website, email and
lead intelligence tools.
9.  Prices/Fees: Subscription-based monthly, Software-As-Service model based on number of
contacts in database and number of users of the service.
10. Place/Access: Online! Network of Partners, Country User Groups.
11. Promotion: Directors speak at events, webinars, useful guides that are amplified by SEO and
effective with SEO. PPC Social media advertising, e.g. LinkedIn.
 12. Physical Evidence: Consistent branding across communications.
13. Processes: More sales staff are now involved in conversion.
14. People: Investment in online services.
15. Partners: Hubspot looks to form partnerships with major media companies such as Facebook
and Google plus local partners including Smart Insights who it is collaborating with on
research in Europe.

Managing the online customer experience

1. Create a clear customer experience vision
The first step in your customer experience strategy is to have a clear customer-focused vision
that you can communicate with your organization. The easiest way to define this vision is to
create a set of statements that act as guiding principles.

For example, Zappos use their Zappos core family values and these values are embedded into
their culture; which includes delivering wow through service, be humble and embracing
change.

Once these principles are in place, they will drive the behavior of your organization. Every
member of your team should know these principles by heart and they should be embedded
into all areas of training and development.

2. Understand who your customers are

The next step in building upon these customer experience principles is to bring to life the
different type of customers who deal with your customer support teams. If your organization
is going to really understand customer needs and wants, then they need to be able to connect
and empathize with the situations that your customers face.

One way to do this is to create customer personas and give each persona a name and
personality. For example, Anne is 35 years old; she likes new technology and is tech savvy
enough to follow a video tutorial on her own, whereas John (42 years old) needs to be able to
follow clear instructions on a web page.

By creating personas, your customer support team can recognize who they are and understand
them better. It’s also an important step in becoming truly customer centric.

3. Create an emotional connection with your customers

You’ve heard the phrase “it’s not what you say; it’s how you say it”?

Well, the best customer experiences are achieved when a member of your team creates an
emotional connection with a customer.

One of the best examples of creating an emotional connection comes from Zappos, when a
customer was late on returning a pair of shoes due to her mother passing away. When Zappos
 found out what happened, they took care of the return shipping and had a courier pick up the
shoes without cost. But, Zappos didn’t stop there. The next day, the customer arrived home to
a bouquet of flowers with a note from the Zappos customer service team who sent their
condolences.

Research by the Journal of Consumer Research has found that more than 50% of an
experience is based on an emotion as emotions shape the attitudes that drive decisions.

Customers become loyal because they are emotionally attached and they remember how they
feel when they use a product or service. A business that optimizes for an emotional
connection outperforms competitors by 85% in sales growth.

And, according to a recent Harvard Business Review study titled “The New Science of
Customer Emotions“, emotionally engaged customers are:

 At least three times more likely to recommend your product or service

 Three times more likely to re-purchase
 Less likely to shop around (44% said they rarely or never shop around)
 Much less price sensitive (33% said they would need a discount of over 20% before they
would defect).

4. Capture customer feedback in real time

How can you tell if you are delivering a wow customer experience?

You need to ask – And ideally you do this by capturing feedback in real time. Post-
interaction surveys and similar customer experience tools can be delivered using a variety of
automated tools through email and calls.

And of course, it’s even possible to make outbound calls to customers in order to gain more
insightful feedback.

It’s important to tie customer feedback to a specific customer support agent, which shows
every team member the difference they are making to the business.

5. Use a quality framework for development of your team

By following the steps above, you now know what customers think about the quality of your
service compared to the customer experience principles you have defined. The next step is to
identify the training needs for each individual member of your customer support team.

Many organizations assess the quality of phone and email communication, however, a quality
framework takes this assessment one step further by scheduling and tracking your teams
development through coaching, eLearning and group training.

6. Act upon regular employee feedback

Most organizations have an annual survey process where they capture the overall feedback of
your team; how engaged they are and the businesses ability to deliver an exceptional service.
 But, what happens in the 11 months between these survey periods?

Usually, nothing happens. And this is where continuous employee feedback can play a role
using tools that allow staff to share ideas on how to improve the customer experience and for
managers to see how staff is feeling towards the business.

For example, using project management software or social media tools, you can create a
closed environment where your organization can leave continuous feedback.

7. Measure the ROI from delivering great customer experience

And finally, how do you know if all this investment in your teams, process and technology
are working and paying off?

The answer is in the business results.

Measuring customer experience is one of the biggest challenges faced by organizations,

which is why many companies use the “Net Promoter Score” or NPS, which collects valuable
information by asking a single straightforward question:

Planning website design

  1. Point of sale
Is this your only point of sale or is it to compliment a brick and mortar shop?

This question is mostly to do with stock and POS systems. If you have a physical shop with
inventory shared between the website and the shop, the systems need to ‘talk’ to each other
so inventory on your site is always accurate.

This will affect the platform and systems integrated.

2. Photos
Product photos are an essential part of an online shop. If you only have a few items to sell, a
one off professional photo shoot will be enough but if you update stock regularly, invest in a
good camera and a photo box, so all photos are consistent and look professional.

Remember – white background photos will work best with most websites.

3. Delivery / Postage:
How will you package and post your goods? can they be posted or must be delivered door to
door?

Are you restricted by delivery locations (state, country)?

How much will it cost you to package / post deliver? will you charge a fee?

These are important questions to ask as this will need to be set up as part of your online shop.
If you are not set up for delivery, you cannot start selling online!

4. Terms
Terms, exchange, refunds – these are issues that you will need to consider before launching
your online shop.

In most cases you will be able to use a template document provided by the platform (for
example Shopify has some excellent examples) but if your terms are a bit more complex you
might want a lawyer to review and draft a document for you.

5. Payment
Are you set up to receive online payments? There are many options available they vary in
cost. The platform you use will also affect the decision.

For example, Squarespace only works with STRIPE and PayPal & Shopify works with a
wider selection. Do your research and compare benefits and fees.

6. Processing
How do you want to communicate to customers once they purchased?

Most system offer an automated email confirmation and you can change the text / look of
these emails. You can also send a confirmation once package left or send a customer survey
after. There are many options and it will be a good idea to take note once you come across a
shopping experience you like. Everything matters and effects the overall customer
experience.

7. Time
Maintaining an active online shop takes time!

If you are expecting a few orders a day, take into account handling and processing orders,
posting orders, and handling customer enquiries.

Also consider the time it takes to add new stock to your site, taking photos, writing
description and uploading.

Understanding site user Requirement

The first step in developing any eCommerce application is to interview the user base to
generate a list of features to be included in the application. This comprises the important
input for defining the capabilities of the application.
 There are two sets of users of shopping cart applications: site administrators and end users
who purchase items using their Web browsers. After interviewing end users and
administrators, application requirements such as the following may be generated.

End User Requirements

End user features that facilitate the enjoyment of Internet shopping might include the
following:

 Users should be able to use the eCommerce application from any Web browser supporting
HTML 3.2 (or later) and cookies.
 Visitors new to the site should be able to register by themselves. Users will be differentiated
by unique user identifiers.
 Transactions should be secure. That is, a basic authentication mechanism must be built into
the application to prevent unauthorized persons from making transactions on a user’s behalf. Secure
socket layers (SSL) or other encryption mechanisms are typically used to thwart the access of
sensitive information (such as credit card numbers) sent to the server by Web browsers.
 Site visitors should be able to purchase goods or services via the electronic store.
 Users should be able to view a complete list of specified items available through the site.
 Users should be able to search for items by related attributes. For example, visitors might
search for CDs by artist, album title and/or genre or search for books by author, title and/or ISBN
number.
 Site visitors should be able to search the database using relevant keywords to identify items of
interest.
 Users should be able to select items of interest and add them to their shopping carts for future
purchase.
 Visitors should be able to modify the quantities of items in and/or delete items from their
shopping carts before checkout.
 All selected items should be shipped to the user following purchase.
 Users should be able to view the status of items they have ordered.
 Large numbers of users should be able to use the application simultaneously.
 The performance of the application should not degrade with an increase in the number of
goods or services offered.

Developing and Testing Content

 Usability research helps organizations understand user needs, identify potential issues, and generate
ideas for improvement. While usability testing is often used to evaluate a website’s user interface
(UI), this method is also invaluable for discovering the best way to present information on your
website. By paying attention to how people read, interpret, and access content, you gain a greater
understanding of how to communicate, structure, and format information.

It’s great when sites have good navigation. But too often we see the user experience fail at the
content level: People can navigate to the content but don’t understand it. Analysis shows that
people often use websites to collect, compare, and choose products or services. Have users
evaluate your digital copy so that articles and information match their needs and
expectations. People read online content differently than printed material.

The usability study methodologies for evaluating UI versus content are fairly similar.
However, there are nuances to the methodologies that are worth considering when the
primary goal of the usability study is evaluating digital copy.
 Below are suggestions for how to get the most out of your research.

Tips for Testing Content on Websites

1. Avoid recruiting proxy users: In every usability study, you should always aim to test your
designs with representative users. However, when testing content, your recruiting criteria should be
even more stringent. Take extra care to recruit the right participants.

Those people evaluating the information on your site should truly be representative of your
user population: they should have the same mindset, situation, AND user goals. The
flexibility you have with recruitment depends on the use case and type of information on your
site. You may have some leeway with general e-commerce sites, but for content-rich,
research-intensive activities or for B2B websites, you must find people who fit the exact
circumstance.

In other words, the scenario that you give people should match the current problem they need
to solve. Unlike regular UI-focused studies, content-focused studies should not ask test
participants to “pretend” or “imagine” to be in a situation. The risk of invalidating the study
is much higher for content because the participants’ motivation is much more important for
obtaining accurate insights.

It is impossible for proxy users to instantly acquire knowledge or know the situation well
enough to assess the value of the content. For example, people who have just been diagnosed
with a serious medical condition are more likely to relate to the content accurately than
someone who is asked to pretend to be interested about a disease.

It’s not good enough to recruit participants who generally fit the demographic profile, such as
by age, gender, income level, and location. Such criteria are too broad to give you deep
insight. General recruitment criteria won’t cut it. You must find people who are actually in
the process of researching the information you are evaluating.

2. Be aware of the limitations of unmoderated studies: Unmoderated studies are done without

the facilitator present: Participants work on their own. This method can be useful for getting user
feedback on narrow parts of the site such as workflow or snippets of information. However, when
trying to discover how people conduct research, compare offerings, and make decisions, the best
approach is to conduct a moderated study, where the facilitator is present.

Content studies tend to have long stretches of time when the user is simply scanning page
after page—in silence. When left alone (such as in an online unmoderated situation) users
may feel awkward and wonder whether they’re being helpful. Without proper feedback and
reassurance, participants often alter their behavior by approaching the task in a more
superficial manner. Task times are often shorter for online studies than in traditional test
settings. When on their own, participants assume that the goal is to work quickly, not
realistically.

Also, the facilitator can ask the user for clarifications. With unmoderated studies, you miss
opportunities to ask personalized, user-tailored follow-up questions. Even though participants
are instructed to think out loud, they often forget to explain their actions and thoughts.
3. Give tasks that are tailored for each individual: In most traditional usability studies,
researchers follow a prepared script and give study participants prescripted tasks to perform. For
content testing minimize your reliance on a script. Spend time at the beginning of each session to
discuss the participant’s situation and make sure the task scenario matches their exact circumstance.
It’s OK to prepare some more generic tasks prior to the study, but be willing to modify or craft new
ones on the spot as you learn more about the participant’s situation, and as the session unfolds. You
want to give participants the freedom to research a topic as they please, so you uncover what’s
important and what’s not. Don’t rigidly control the activities or force an unrealistic task. The more
pertinent the tasks, the more vested people are at completing them.

The best results occur when study participants forget about the testing environment and
immerse themselves in the activity rather than merely going through the motions. Participants
can sometimes “fake” their way through simple pass or fail activities (e.g. Find the contact
name for Press Relations), but such is not the case for exploratory tasks where having a
scenario that precisely matches the person’s current situation and emotional state is critical.

4. Remember, there is no right answer: Unlike well-specified tasks (e.g., “Find the opening
hours for the Fremont public library”), open-ended tasks don’t have a definitive answer. Open-ended
tasks are meant to assess content quality and relevance. Use this time to learn how people explore and
research, what questions they have, how they expect information to be communicated, and whether
your site meets their needs.

Consider competitive testing: Sometimes you can get insights into your users’ needs by
allowing them to search freely on the web or by letting them visit competitors’ sites rather
than restricting them to your own site. Don’t worry that you’re wasting precious testing time:
if users are truly representative, the insights will often be revelatory. And you can always
limit the free exploration to a small part of your session.

5. Set expectations for time allocations: Open-ended tasks have vague end points, often
leaving participants wondering how to best spend their time. At the beginning of reach session, tell
people to work at their own pace and not to worry about the time.
6. Get comfortable with silence: Expect long stretches of quiet time while the participant
focuses on processing the information. Don’t appear impatient. Avoid being interruptive or fidgety.
Injecting too many questions while users work breaks their concentration and alters their behavior. If
you need to ask a question mid-task, keep it neutral, such as “What are you thinking?” or “What are
you looking for?” Once users answer, let them continue. Resist the temptation to blast questions. Save
questions for the end. When user testing is conducted well, users behave authentically and the
study generates realistic findings.

Integrated internet Marketing

Communications (IIMC)
 As search engines continue to change, so, too, must our strategies for maintaining powerful online
presences. Gone are the days where little one-off marketing techniques made an impact. Now, the
game is all about providing the user with an all-encompassing experience online. In order to create
this experience for your website’s visitors, you need to combine a lot of digital strategies into an
“integrated digital marketing” campaign.
 Integrated digital marketing is, as it sounds, the integration of multiple marketing strategies to
form a cohesive online approach for your business. Here’s what it typically entails:

 Web development and design

 Search engine optimization (SEO) and search engine marketing (SEM)
 Content marketing
 Social media marketing
 Local listings management
 Paid advertising (or pay-per-click advertising) campaigns

The idea behind integrated digital marketing is that, while each individual strategy doesn’t
have a huge impact on its own, when used in conjunction, you can create a more influential
online presence.

And it’s not just some passing fad. It’s pretty much the status quo when it comes to tackling
the digital realm. Of course, there are still one-off campaigns out there, but most agencies are
moving toward integrated solutions, as a well-rounded marketing strategy provides better
visibility and ROI for businesses online.

BUZZWORD OR LEGITIMATE SERVICE?

Make no mistake—integrated digital marketing is a legitimate service provided by digital

marketing agencies. But some agencies tout it as if it’s a unique service that you can only get
from them.

The fact is that most digital marketing agencies have their own form of integrated marketing
because it’s the most effective way to build an online presence. So don’t let the
buzzworthiness of an “integrated digital marketing plan” sway you to choose one agency
over another. Because, chances are, both of them probably offer that service. Instead, when
you’re choosing an agency, focus on what they bring to the table in terms of resources and
proven success. For more help with choosing the best firm, here’s a quick guideline on how
to avoid the wrong SEO firm.

Integrated digital marketing is most certainly the best way to build an online presence, but
don’t get caught up in how cool the term sounds—and don’t fall under the impression that it’s
a special offer at specific firms. Almost all marketing these days, digital especially, has a
great deal of integration involved.

Objectives and Measurement of

interactive
marketing communication
 A company’s task is partially achieved after the creation and hosting of the website. But with
effective promotion techniques and creation of visibility, a company is able to attract visitors to the
website. However, attracting visitor is not enough; the company needs to bring quality customers to
 the website. For this internet marketing specialist develop online and offline promotion strategies, to
create differentiation and awareness.

Interactive Marketing Communications

There are several differences between traditional marketing techniques and online marketing
techniques. It is necessary for the company to evaluate these differences . Some of them are
as follows:

 Space: In traditional marketing, outdoor space for promotion is limited and thus expensive.
On the other hand digital media space is unlimited and thus inexpensive.
 Image: In traditional advertising, company’s perception is very important compared to the
information content. On the other hand, in digital space, information content of the campaign is of
foremost importance.
 Communication: In traditional marketing communication is one way. However, in digital
space, communication is interactive.

Integrated Internet Marketing Communications

The internet becomes more effective if it is integrated with other marketing communications
of the company. The company has many channels through which it can communicate a clear
and distinct message to its target customers. The key characteristics of integrated
communications are as follows:

 Uniformity: All communications channels should be connected with each other.

 Consistency: All communications should be conveying the same message.
 Continuity: All communications over a period of time should be connected and same.
 Complementary: All communications channels should bring synergy to the whole marketing
campaign

Objective for interactive marketing communications

The interactive marketing communication should be supporting overall marketing objectives

of the company. However, the objectives of interactive marketing communications should be
as below:

 Online and offline promotion techniques should be used to attract visitors to the website. This
process is referred to as traffic building. However, this technique should be specific, measurable,
actionable, relevant, and time-bound.
 The on-site communications should be able to deliver the message that builds a certain
perception of the company. These messages should be relevant to the company’s product and
services.
 All marketing communications should be able to generate pre-determined online and offline
sales.

Offline Promotion Techniques

The use of traditional marketing media like TV, Radio, Posters, and Print for promotion
purpose is referred to as offline promotion techniques.

The distinct advantages of offline promotion techniques are as follows:

 Offline tools like TV, Radio, and Newspaper have far more reach, as they are used by all
consumers.
 Offline tools are able to create more visual appeal, hence impact is higher.
 Offline tools are able to create a more emotional connection using sound, visuals etc.

The disadvantages of offline promotion techniques are as follows:

 The cost of running an offline promotion is higher due to high competition and limited
resources.
 The percentage of wastage, which is the inability to reach correct customers, is higher in
offline promotion.
 The measurability and tracking of offline promotion technique are expensive as the company
needs to have dedicated resource for the same.
 As space and time availability is limited for offline promotion, information has to be very
concise.
 Personalization is difficult to achieve in offline promotion.
 Offline promotion is one way in nature and lacks the interactive element.

Online Promotion Techniques

The use of the internet channel in promotion techniques is referred to as online promotion.
The online promotion is referred to as traffic building exercise. The objective is to attract the
maximum amount of visitors and customers. Some of the tools used in online promotion
techniques are as follows:

Search Engine Marketing: the search engines are the key in directing traffic to the website.
This alone cannot be achieved through registration with the website. A Search engine
optimization technique where by using certain selected phrases and words, the company’s
website is placed higher in the search result, needs to be utilized. Pay per click is another
technique where the company’s website is listed on typing of certain phrases.

Online PR: the management of company image in the internet world is achieved through
online PR activities. The online PR objective is to increase favorable perception of the
company on the third party website, frequented by the customers. The online audience is
more connected to organizations as well as with each other. Hence online reputation
management becomes critical

Online Partnership: Partnership is very important in the current internet world. Companies

need to develop strategies to manage these online partnerships. Affiliate marketing, in which
e-retailers pay commission to third parties for sales creation, is a form of online partnership.

Interactive Advertising: The online advertisement takes place when an advertiser pays to

place its content on another’s website. However, each website can be considered as
advertisement in itself, as highlights to the customer about the company’s product and
services. Interactive advertisement should be able to deliver content for enabling e-commerce
activities.

Email Marketing: Email plays an important role in online marketing communication

campaigns. Email marketing is used to reach directly to customers encouraging them to trial
and purchase of new products and services. Email marketing is also used to receive inquiries
from customers for any kind of support.

Viral Marketing: The usages of email to transmit promotional communication to potential

large number customers at one go by leveraging the internet is known as viral marketing.

On-Site Promotional Techniques: through traffic building exercise, visitors are attracted to
the website; however, it becomes important to convert them into consumers. This can be done
through on-site promotion via incentives, coupon, schemes etc.

Selecting the optimal communications mix

Companies have limited resources in terms of capital. It needs to develop communications

plan taking into consideration cost benefit analysis. Every communication techniques have its
own pro and cons. Companies needs to evaluate and chose communications which support its
overall marketing objectives.

UNIT 3
Email Marketing
Email has become one of the most popular forms of communication. In 2010, there were an
estimated 90 trillion emails sent out worldwide. That breaks down to 2.8 million emails sent
every second. These numbers are gigantic, but not surprising when you consider how
important the mail in all forms has been throughout history.

But as the cost of postage and printing has risen, the effectiveness of marketing through the
mail has declined. Businesses now have to pay more while seeing smaller returns. This is
exacerbated by the fact that new communication tools provide many of the same services that
standard mail does. Although direct mail marketing has not disappeared by any means, it has
been on the decline for years.

As advertisers have shifted more and more of their efforts online, they have tried to find ways
to use the strategies developed in print advertising in new online environments. Most of the
traffic once handled by the postal service now happens over email, creating a new method of
direct marketing. Today, the average marketer sends 64 emails to their customers every year.

Email marketing is, quite simply, using the tools of email to deliver advertising messages.
The vast majority of Internet users have email accounts which allow them to receive an
almost unlimited number of messages instantly. According to a survey conducted by Pew
Internet, 82% of U.S. adults use the Internet, and email is one of the fastest, cheapest and
easiest ways for marketers to connect with customers.
 Email is a remarkably flexible tool that can accommodate a wide range of messages. Ads can
be quite simple, or they can be flashy, multimedia packages. The aesthetic of the ad will
depend on the company and the product for sale. Some ads are only text while others include
images, video, and long lists of links.

Email can accommodate almost any message a marketer wants to send. For instance,
UrbanDaddy.com, a nightlife website, ran a highly successful email marketing campaign by
including large, eye catching images in the header of the email. The images were geared
toward a young male demographic and gave the email context. They encouraged the reader to
scroll down and engage with the sales messages contained in the body of the email.

The email marketing industry has exploded over the last 15 years. In 2011, companies spent
$1.51 billion on email marketing efforts. In order to tap into this growth, a number of
companies have started to provide email marketing services to businesses large and small.
Below are some of the most popular providers.

 iContact
 Benchmark Email
 Constant Contact
 Pinpointe
 GetResponse
 Mailgen

Email Newsletters: These are regular emails that are sent to a list of subscribers who have
chosen to receive updates from a company. Newsletters usually don’t have explicit sales
messages, but try instead to build a relationship between a customer and a brand. They often
have a conversational tone and contain news and information that will be of interest to the
customer. The goal is to keep a customer connected to a company even when they are not
buying anything.

Transactional Emails: These are emails that are sent out after certain actions trigger them.
When a customer buys a product or makes a reservation, emails are sent out confirming that
transaction. They legitimize online commerce by giving customers a way to prove they have
bought something. Transactional emails often also contain new sales messages. Studies have
shown that transactional emails are opened 51.3% of the time, while newsletters are only
opened 36.6% of the time. Knowing that they have a captive audience, marketers will often
try to insert new sales pitches into emails that are not explicitly for selling. For example,
airline reservation emails often ask if you would like to upgrade your seat for a fee.

Direct Emails: These are used to inform customers about new products, sales and special
offers. They provide customers with direct information about products and usually provide a
link or another easy way for customers to access the product. They are similar to the coupons,
catalogs, and sales fliers that used to be sent through the post office.

Email marketing is used most often by organizations with strong online presences.
Competition amongst e-commerce sites is fierce, and email marketing is a proven way to
engage with customers and differentiate your company. Online businesses prefer to use email
marketing because it makes it easy for customers to link directly from an email to a product
page.
However, email marketing isn’t used only for selling products online. Nonprofit
organizations and political campaigns make use of email to connect with supporters and
donors. They have as much to benefit from email marketing as anyone else. It is now
standard to ask for an email address when collecting information from interested parties.

The low cost and relative ease of carrying out an email marketing campaign means that it is a
tool that is accessible to almost any business. A small mechanic’s shop can put together an
email list and then send out coupons for oil changes or brake jobs. The scope and
sophistication of these campaigns may not be as great as larger businesses, but that doesn’t
mean they won’t be effective.

Email marketing is an inexpensive and easy way to connect with customers, but campaigns
must be carried out systematically. A poorly planned email campaign can quickly lead to
annoyed customers and disappointing sales.

The first step is to collect a comprehensive list of email addresses. The only significant
disadvantage of email marketing is that many countries have laws against sending spam.
Companies that send out unsolicited emails can face significant fines. It is crucial to only
send emails to customers who want to receive them. It is important to make the process easy
for customers to sign up for email updates. They can also offer incentives like one time
coupons to encourage higher subscription rates.

Analyzing the emails of competing businesses can be a great way for companies to plan their
own. This can be done easily by just signing up for their email lists. Competitor’s emails
reveal what kinds of images, messages and specials they are using to appeal to their
customers. Businesses can then tailor their email campaigns to match or beat the offers of
their competitors.

Designing the look and feel of the email is an important but tricky process. The choice of
images and text must reflect the demographic that is being marketed to. The email needs to
grab the reader’s attention and draw them into the details of the sales pitch as quickly and
succinctly as possible. If the email is confusing or boring, readers are likely to delete it before
reading too far into it. All of that effort is then wasted.

Deciding which customers receive which emails is a way to give marketing messages
relevance. Larger companies will use email to push multiple different products, updates and
offers. Matching the message to the customer leads to higher sales and greater levels of
customer satisfaction. Email marketing software makes it easy for companies to segment
their email delivery based on criteria that they establish.

After an email campaign is sent out, it will be important to track and evaluate the success of
that campaign. Pre-established metrics should be used to determine success or failure. If a
campaign is not performing well, marketers can change the design of the ads, the products
being emphasized, or the deals being offered. The flexibility of email makes it easy to
implement changes quickly and inexpensively.

Opt-in-email Marketing
 
Opt-in email is a term used when someone is given the option to receive email. Typically,
this is some sort of mailing list, newsletter, or advertising. Without obtaining permission
before sending email, the email is unsolicited bulk email, better known as spam.

There are several common forms of opt-in email:

Unconfirmed opt-in / Single opt-in

Someone first gives an email address to the list software (for instance, on a Web page), but
no steps are taken to make sure that this address belongs to the person submitting it. This can
cause email from the mailing list to be considered spam because simple typos of the email
address can cause the email to be sent to someone else. Malicious subscriptions are also
possible, as are subscriptions that are due to spammers forging email addresses that are sent
to the email address used to subscribe to the mailing list.

Confirmed opt-in (COI) / Double opt-in (DOI)

A new subscriber asks to be subscribed to the mailing list, but unlike unconfirmed or single
opt-in, a confirmation email is sent to verify it was really them. Generally, unless the explicit
step is taken to verify the end-subscriber’s e-mail address, such as clicking a special web link
or sending back a reply email, it is difficult to establish that the e-mail address in question
indeed belongs to the person who submitted the request to receive the e-mail. Using a
confirmed opt-in (COI) (also known as a Double opt-in) procedure helps to ensure that a third
party is not able to subscribe someone else accidentally, or out of malice, since if no action is
taken on the part of the e-mail recipient, they will simply no longer receive any messages
from the list operator. Mail system administrators and non-spam mailing list operators refer
to this as confirmed subscription or closed-loop opt-in. Some marketers call closed-loop opt-
in “double opt-in”. This term was coined by marketers in the late 90s to differentiate it from
what they call “single opt-in”, where a new subscriber to an email list gets a confirmation
email telling them they will begin to receive emails if they take no action. Some marketers
contend that “double opt-in” is like asking for permission twice and that it constitutes
unnecessary interference with someone who has already said they want to hear from the
marketer. However, it does drastically reduce the likelihood of someone being signed up to
an email list by another person.

The US CANSPAM Act of 2003 does not require an opt-in approach, only an easy opt-out
system. But opt-in is required by law in many European countries and elsewhere. It turns out
that confirmed opt-in is the only way that you can prove that a person actually opted in, if
challenged legally.

Opt-out

Instead of giving people the option to be put in the list, they are automatically put in and then
have the option to request to be taken out. This approach is illegal in the European Union and
many other jurisdictions.

Address Authentication
Email address authentication is a technique for validating that a person claiming to possess a
particular email address actually does so. This is normally done by sending an email
containing a token to the address, and requiring that the party being authenticated supply that
token before the authentication proceeds. The email containing the token is usually worded so
as to explain the situation to the recipient and discourage them from supplying the token
(often via visiting a URL) unless they in fact were attempting to authenticate.

For example, suppose that one party, Alice, operates a website on which visitors can make
accounts to participate or gain access to content. Another party, Bob, comes to that website
and creates an account. Bob supplies an email address at which he can be contacted, but Alice
does not yet know that Bob is being truthful (consciously or not) about the address. Alice
sends a token to Bob’s email address for an authentication request, asking Bob to click on a
particular URL if and only if the recipient of the mail was making an account on Alice’s
website. Bob receives the mail and clicks the URL, demonstrating to Alice that he controls
the email address he claimed to have. If instead a hostile party, Chuck, were to visit Alice’s
website attempting to masquerade as Bob, he would be unable to complete the account
registration process because the confirmation would be sent to Bob’s email address, to which
Chuck does not have access. Wikipedia uses this mechanism too.

Best practice

The step of email address verification (confirmation) is considered by many anti-spam

advocates to be the minimum degree necessary for any opt-in email advertising or other
ongoing email communication.

Online PR
 Public relation in an online world means the way the things are promoted through internet
throughout the world. Public relation is a kind of a bridge between the organization and customer and
when it is connected to online world it means that the public relation person is telling the policies of
company or organization online using internet on some particular website and promoting the products
throughout the worldwide. Thus PR is an integral part of company’s marketing strategy.

Public relation practitioner is the person or department which promotes the positive image of
their respective company or organization. Public relation department deals with the people in
such a way that they have to build the positive image of their product that it’s the best one
and they will not be able to find the better product in society.

Social media has revolutionized everything and has evolved new thinking patterns and
awareness among the general public and because of this new trends to market products and to
sale them have emerged. In terms of public relations social media has heralded a new and
golden age of communication management. Also the act of public communication has also
become easier and now they can communicate about a brand more easily also the concept of
ratings of a brand and public views on their sites can be posted enabling direct feedback and
if the feedback is positive then only more people will buy products of that certain company.

The two way nature of online communication has spawned a reality in which brands
negotiate their public image with daily consumers.
Nowadays public relation departments have come to the online world as people are getting
more concerned about the things that are on internet. Online world requires the interactive
communication so that the customer are satisfied and persuaded by the image set by of Public
relation department.

The use of Internet is getting common and the social networking sites are getting more
popular. So the organizations or companies and even brands have created their websites and
made pages on social networking sites like Facebook and twitter so that they remain in the
race of getting popular in online world or social media.

Public relation person or department makes the company’s websites interactive and promote
their products in such a way that the audience finds all the benefits and advantages of the
product or organization and think that this is the best organization or brand to grab the
product or do work.
The examples of public relation in online world can be clearly of the facebook pages that how
the brands and organizations are promoting their name and once the people like their page
they get the updates of the respective company or product on their newsfeed on daily basis
that helps the brand or organization in increasing their business. The role of Public relation
department in such type of online world can be judged when any person comment or ask
something about their product or organization the public relation person has to answer that in
such a convincing way that the other person gets satisfied.

All the advantages of the organization, company or the product are on their websites and
nowadays people have started rating companies and if a company does not have an active
website or the Facebook page of that company has less ‘likes’ then people are less likely to
buy products of that company. Further advantages of online PR are:

Immediacy: The response in social media is measured in minutes so a PR person has to be

actively engaged to the online profile of his company before other companies grab the
narrative.

Direct engagement: Social media demands an online engagement where the PR person has
to be answerable to the public in an honest and open manner.

Transparency: This means that everything is open on social media so the PR person has to
be very careful in building a positive image of the company in the online world as there is no
room for falsification.

Reach: This is the greatest benefit of the online world as it allows promoting and managing
the brand on a global scale with minimum expenditure. Secondly through this the company
can easily target the most discrete audience.

Another example can be of online shopping. The concept of online shopping is increasing
nowadays and in the promotion of that the public relation department is putting up the great
role as it is difficult to satisfy the customer especially when he is exposed to the pictures of
the products offered by that company and details about it. Online shopping websites require
the strong public relation department so that they are able to persuade the customer to buy the
product online and make them believe that the product they will be buying will be up to the
mark and will stand on their expectations. This is also done by giving a yearly warranty or
exchange offer of that product so that it satisfies the customer.

The public relation person gives the general and controlled opinion to build the positive
image of that specific firm in front of the public and among the people in that organization.
Public relation department only tells the advantages and benefits of the products but they
should also keep in mind that the things should not be exaggerated that much because it will
portray a negative image of that organization.

Online PR has created a number of opportunities by grouping like-minded people. But it has
also given the option to its large audience to criticize a specific media company on its own
media platform. Now the content on the site of a company lasts longer so creative and
compelling content should be written on the site. The content quality should be high that it
buys a credible audience. Online presence in terms of social media is challenging so the
online PR manager should keep an eye to negative feedback. As online PR activities are
mostly geared to influencing media and audiences these include forums, search engines,
blogs and other communication tools.

SEO/PR is an innovative approach used in online PR as it combines public relations with

search engine optimization generating more publicity through crafting online press releases.
Through this there will be an increase in the online rating of a company’s site and this will
eventually lead to increased sales.

Principles of PR in an online world

The following are some principles of public relations in an online world

Face up to crisis

The companies who indulge in crisis should accept their faults , write a sorry note for
customers in their online profile and should also promise their customers that that mistake
would never be repeated by the company in future.

Think creatively:

Thinking creatively is very crucial for online PR. The online site of a company should consist
of videos, pictures , games , discount offers to make it more engaging and intriguing so that
more people are likely to buy products of that company.

A tactful PR strategy:

In order to create a positive online image of a company a very planned and systematic PR
strategy should be used which includes pacing up with the internet , sensitively answering the
questions of clients and creative interactions with the customers.

Identify customers
 In an online world the PR person has to identify real clients of the company and influence
them.

Monitoring

While managing PR of a company in a virtual world the PR department has to monitor online
conversations, glean insights etc.

Build a web strategy

Tools should be utilized to make an effective online strategy.

Track results

Some of essential online PR tools are

1. Social media platforms

2. Search marketing
3. Social media release
4. Online surveys
5. Email

As online PR is associated with improving results from digital marketing communication

techniques in particular social media so it is a very cost ineffective technique for making
people aware but it requires a lot of hard work.

Tactics for online PR are:

Influencer marketing
Online PR analytics
Online PR outreach
Online PR strategy
Real time marketing
Reputation management

Some ways of reviewing online PR options is through 4 types of strategy.

1. Attracting visitors through search

2. Engagement and dialogue
3. Building campaign buzz
4. Defensive crisis

Importance of online PR:

Internet has a great influence on the public opinion, especially when they are not certain. For
instance a boy gets acne on his face and he doesn’t know which cream to use . He will take
into consideration a lot of factors e.g price, other people’s opinion and most of all his
decision will be greatly influenced by the information of the product available on the internet.
Challenges of online PR:

Internet has dramatically changed the process of communication. Internet has opened up a
number of opportunities and challenged, specifically for the PR sector which masters
communication through traditional means. While PR specialists virtually had no competition
in the era of the traditional media, the democracy of the Internet has forced them to compete
with the entire world

Interactive Advertising
 Interactive advertising refers to promotional techniques that include an element of feedback
from those to whom the advertisements are directed. This feedback gives the advertiser
analytical data that can be used to improve the advertising methods being employed.
Interactive advertising is usually used to refer to online advertising, but can also be applied to
offline advertising methods such as consumer surveys.
Although interactive advertising in now generally considered common sence, it was a
groundbreaking idea when Internet analytics first started being used with any rigor. By
tweaking ad approaches, colors and content, and soliciting feedback from the target
segments, advertisers have given potential customers the opportunity to interact with
companies and their advertising, rather than simply being pitched to. Of course, this overt
feedback is usually given less weight than the analytical data that tracks how changes in an ad
affect its performance. 

Interactive advertising goes beyond simple banners and clickthroughs, using social media,
branded polls and games, and many other approaches to engage the target audience.

Online Partnerships
 
If you build a Web site and no one visits, does it still exist?

Much like trees falling in the forest, unvisited Web sites may or may not be making noise —
but it doesn’t much matter, because no one’s there to hear them.

Once you recognize this, you’ll see that online marketing is just as important to the success of
a Web site as the site’s design, technical features, and server speed.

It’s not enough to bring your store online and then just wait for the customers to come rolling
in. You’ve got to take an active — and ongoing — role in acquiring those potential
customers, by making sure they know about your site and by encouraging them to visit. One
of the best ways to do that is to build partnerships with other, related sites on the Web.

Content Partnerships
Content-sharing partnerships can increase your visibility and get your content in front of
more people. And, you may be able to augment the content on your own site, providing a
richer experience for your own visitors and customers.

For example, if you’re selling bicycles online, why not form a partnership with an online
retailer of bike clothing? You could sell their bike shorts along with your mountain bikes, or
vice versa. An online travel agent specializing in bike tours would be another good choice for
a content/product partnership, as would a site offering books and magazines on biking. If you
want to add interesting, current content on biking to your own site, find an online biking
magazine and partner with them: Their content can augment your site, and you can sell bikes
through their site, sharing a percentage of the revenue with them.

One advantage of a content partnership, in addition to increased exposure, is that your site
will look bigger to visitors. Providing a rich online experience is an important part of Internet
retailing, and if you can’t immediately fill up your store with thousands of items and
thousands of pages of content, one way to provide that experience is by “borrowing” products
and content from your partners.

Done properly, partnerships like this will increase traffic on both sites. It’s sort of like buying
banner ads, except that costs are minimal, and content partnerships are generally bi-
directional: each site points to the other. Also, you get to share space in the desirable
“content” portion of your partner’s site, rather than the oft-ignored banner ad spaces at the
tops and bottoms of their pages.

Link exchanges and search engines

Of course, you don’t have to go as far as sharing content and catalog listings with your
partner sites. Simple link exchanges and “webrings” have long been used among related sites
to mutually boost their Web traffic. Link exchanges between related sites help attract
customers who are simply browsing, following one interesting link after another. They also
help snag those who are searching for something in particular. A potential customer may find
one of your partner sites through a search engine, then follow a link to your own site.

A webring is simply a more organized form of link exchange, where a group of related sites
band together and organize the links among themselves so that visitors can click from one to
the next, eventually (if they’re patient enough) following an unbroken chain of links that
encompasses the whole set of sites.

Of course, registering your site with the big search engines is an essential component of an
online marketing strategy. Most savvy Internet users first turn to search engines when they’re
looking for something. It’s important that your site show up near the top of the list when
someone enters a relevant query.

A more sophisticated kind of partnership is possible with search engines, as well. For
instance, if you enter a search for a book or author on Yahoo, you’ll see — in addition to the
usual list of search results — a small box promising a list of related books at Amazon.com.
Similarly, if you enter a search for a musical group, a box appears offering to sell you albums
at CDNow.
Excite has partnerships with various retailers, who get top billing in Excite’s Shopping
channel. If you’re a big enough site, similar partnerships are possible with Yahoo, Excite, and
other search engines — and it may be well worth your while to pursue these kinds of
relationships, given how critical search engines are to Web surfers.

Online marketing opportunities abound, and it’s essential that you take advantage of them
with a strategic marketing plan. Otherwise, no matter how beautiful or technically advanced
it is, your site will be playing to an empty house.

Viral Marketing
Viral Marketing is any marketing technique that induces websites or users to pass on a
 
marketing message to other sites or users, creating a potentially exponential growth in the
message’s visibility and effect. A popular example of successful viral marketing is Hotmail, a
company now owned by Microsoft, that promoted its services and its own advertisers’
messages in every user’s email notes.
Types of viral marketing techniques

There are three criteria for basic viral marketing; the messenger, the message and the
environment. All three must be effectively executed in order for a viral message to be
successful.

Some techniques for effective marketing include targeting the appropriate audience and
channels, creating videos, offering a valuable service or product for free, creating an
emotional appeal, social outreach and enabling easy sharing and downloading.

Who uses it

Viral marketing can be effective as a stand-alone tool or as part of a larger marketing

campaign. It can be used by both large and small companies, but can be especially attractive
to smaller business, as it can be more cost-effective than traditional marketing efforts.

Viral marketing has been used by energy drink companies, movies and even political
campaigns to generate marketing buzz.

Viral marketing is the goal of many companies looking to leverage the social media space to
promote their products. Defined as piece of content generated by a person or business that
inspires consumers to eagerly share it with their expanded social circle, viral marketing can
help build brand recognition instantly — but is easier said than done.

Instant Awareness

Viral marketing can be important in launching a new product by getting your brand in front
of a large potential market quickly. A YouTube video costs a fraction as much as a TV
commercial, but if it inspires people to share your message it can have a major impact on
brand recognition. Kraft, for example, used viral marketing to successfully launch its MiO
brand of liquid water enhancer. Twitter and Facebook are among the other social media tools
that allow users to share content, and are useful in attracting attention.

Make It Easy

A viral campaign isn’t the place to tell your audience every single detail of your product or
service, even if it’s their first exposure to what you’re selling. Instead, it should generate a
reaction quickly and easily, such as laughter, surprise or shock. If you already have a strong
online presence, seed it with your biggest fans first to get them to spread the word for you.
It’s not an ideal marketing strategy to just post your product’s viral marketing video on
YouTube and hope for the best. Consider placing ads linking to the video on search engines,
with the ads appearing when users search terms relating to your product, such as “stain
removal” for a dry-cleaning service.

Get Their Attention

Companies can be tempted to make the new product’s attributes the centerpiece of a viral
marketing effort, but if that’s the star of the show it usually falls flat. Before you design your
campaign, assess what causes you to click on a video or forward a link, and ask those in your
company or social circle with experience in social media for their thoughts. Would you click
on a video because it promised to be the best tongue cleaner on the market? Probably not. But
Orabrush found success with viral marketing by making the star of the show a giant human
tongue that did things like compete against little league football players on YouTube.

Measuring Effectiveness

It’s important to build in metrics to let you know if your campaign is going viral, and if it’s
having the desired effect on brand awareness. Views, likes, re-tweets and other basic
measures are a start, but find ways to expand that to something more meaningful to your
campaign goals. Perhaps offer a free sample of your product as part of the campaign, and
measure how many fill out the form to request the free sample. Or have the clicks take users
to a landing page on your own site and measure how many engage there as well.

Control Factor

The biggest risk isn’t the possibility that a campaign will fall flat, but the loss of control that a
viral marketing campaign necessitates. When customers pass along your viral marketing
efforts, they do so on their terms, not yours. You might turn off customers as well as win
them — but you also may find your users see selling points that you never thought o

Blogs Promotion Tool

 Blog marketing is the process of reaching your home business’ target market through the use of a
blog. Initially, business owners had a blog separate from their websites, but today, you can easily
integrate the two to make it easier for you to manage, as well as easier for visitors to access. Many
business owners use a blogging platform, such as WordPress, for both their site and blog. Further, as
 blogging has grown in ease and popularity, many people have created businesses from blogging all on
its own (as opposed to having a business first and then blogging).

The Pros of Blog Marketing

The very nature of blogging makes them ideal for marketing since they provide new content
to draw people back, and offer a way for consumers and businesses to interact. Here are a few
other benefits:

1. Inexpensive to Start and Run. While there are free blogging platforms, such as Blogger and
WordPress.com, to maintain a professional appearance that allows for your unique brand to shine
through, use a self-hosted option, such as WordPress.org. For the cost of a domain and web hosting,
you can have a customized blog marketing for you.
2. Easy to Use. Most blogging platforms are simple to use. If you can copy, paste, type, drag
& drop and upload, you can have a professional looking blog. 
3. An Effective Way to have Bi-directional Traffic Come to Your Site. Offering tips,
updates, and other new contents give people a reason to come and/or return to your business website,
which gives them the opportunity to buy.
4. Improves Search Engine Ranking. Google, in particular, likes to find and rank new content,
and many entrepreneurs use blogging specifically for search engine optimization (SEO) 
5. Allows You to Show Your Expertise to Gain Trust and Credibility with Your
Market. People like to know who they’re doing business with. With a blog, you can prove you’re
an expert, provide helpful tips and other valuable information, all of which help consumers feel good
about spending money on your product or service.
6. Connect with Your Market. While most businesses now use Twitter and other social
platforms more than blogs for engagement, blogs can allow you to have a conversation with your
market. This gives you the opportunity to build trust and rapport, as well as get feedback and provide
customer service.
7. It Can Make Money Beyond Your Product or Service. You can accept
advertising, promote affiliate products and get sponsors, adding additional sources of revenue to your
business.

The Cons of Blog Marketing

Like just everything else in life, there is a downside to blogging, including:

1. Time-Consuming. Creating new content and updating your blog can take a significant
amount of time. Hiring freelance writers and a virtual assistant, or using private label right content can
help.
2. Needs a Constant Stream of Ideas. Along with time, having something new blog about is
one of the biggest challenges bloggers face. 
3. It Can Take Time to See Results. The Internet is overloaded with information, so getting
people to your blog takes time.
4. It Needs to Be Marketed Too. You’re using the blog to market your business, but for it to
work, people need to know about it, which means you have to find your target market and entice them
to your blog.

How to Do Blog Marketing

Starting a blog and using it to promote your business can be set up within minutes. It’s the
ongoing management and marketing that will take time.
1. Make a Blog Marketing Plan. What are you going to share on your blog? News, tips,
resources, etc? Further, how often will you update your blog? Daily, weekly, etc?
2. Create Your Blog. Decide on your blogging platform, and set it up, including customization
that fits your business. Be sure to use the same logo on your blog as on your website (if you have a
separate website) to retain consistency. If you use a free blog platform (not recommended for business
blogging), have a domain name pointing to the blog to make it easier for consumers to get to your site.
3. Fill Your Blog with Several Posts ASAP. Readers don’t like to visit a blog with only one or
two posts. Add ten or more posts quickly, and then go to your regular post schedule.
4. Market Your Blog. It’s very easy to integrate social media into your blogs so that your blog
posts go out to your followers. Include your blog on your marketing materials as well.
5. Reply to Comments. Remember, blogs are social, so people will ask questions, provide
feedback, or share their opinion. Delete spam posts. 
6. Use Your Blog to Encourage Email Signups. Signups is another great way to keep people
who are interested in your business coming back to your blog, which again, gives them more
opportunity to spend money with you.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is the process of gaining market online by purchasing Ads
on search engines, say Google, Yahoo, or Bing. SEM involves the promotion of websites by
increasing their visibility in Search Engine Result Page (SERP).

Search Engines
The search engines use algorithms to provide the most relevant results to every user. For
producing best suggestions to the users’ queries, they consider not only the search keywords
entered by users but also users’ location, type of device and operating system they are
working on, users’ preferences, and their identities.

The better the search algorithm is, the happier the user is with its results.

Search Marketing Approaches

Search marketing works with two approaches −

 Earning traffic through unpaid or free search listings (SEO Methods)

 Buying traffic through paid search listings (PPC Ads)

In the first type of search marketing where advertisers earn traffic through unpaid listings,
there are two popular methods − organic and non-organicsearch.

Organic SEO Non-organic SEO

It takes more time to create as more concentrated towards

content creation, building hyperlinks, meta-tag optimization, It is speedy.
keyword enhancement, etc.
 It yields late effect. It brings immediate effect.

It focuses on short term

It focuses on long term results.
results.

It is inexpensive. It is very expensive.

They cannot be affected financially. They can get affected

financially.

Once the design of the website and its content is good, it It required high degree of
requires less management. management.

Inorganic search is Black Hat

Organic SEO is called White Hat search tactic.
search tactic.

How to Get Organic Results

Organic results can be achieved by Search Engine Optimization. You need to invest time and
expertise in creating an appealing yet efficient website that can work to build long lasting
trust in your business.

You need to build your business website according to SEO techniques which use White Hat
Tactics for rank improvement. The SEO techniques are described in chapter SEO Friendly
Website.

How to Get Inorganic Results

They can be improved in two ways:

 Improving your quality score

 your bids for keywords and Ads

Inorganic results are instantly reflected. Here is a checklist for inorganic search optimization:

 Mine keywords properly. Group them into relevant themes.

 Use correct match types. Estimate bid on all match types. Choose the benefiting one.
 Keep testing your Ad copies and landing pages.
 Strive constantly to improve CTR.
 Aim for higher quality score.
 Target relevant locations. Only look for the places that seem to give you business.
 Run search query report. Filter prominent keywords. Bid higher on most searched keyword.
 Bid your keywords accordingly. Calculate and strategize methods to achieve ROI.

Organic versus Inorganic Search – Which is Better?

 It is better and safer to start with Organic SEO in case of small business because it requires
low-cost investment. In addition, it builds your internet presence gradually and creates a solid
foundation for your business. It is found that the organic search results are very much likely
to get attention of the viewers.

Inorganic SEO is good for customer targeting. For example, PPC advertising. While opting
for this, you need to make sure you are investing in the appropriate advertise. You need huge
funds to hire a management or your own dedicated expertise, which can take care of your
paid searches.

Though organic and inorganic results are independent of each other’s performance, yet you
need to perform well in both to boost up your business. Paid Ads boost your business and
website ranking. Organic results marks trust on your business.

Steps Involved in Search Engine Marketing

These are the general steps involved in search engine marketing −

Step 1 − Define Effective Strategy

 Define your target audience.

 Identify their needs and motivations.
 Highlight how your product is best to serve their needs.
 Review your business position in the marketplace.
 Identify your competitors.
 Identify your specific goals and benchmarks, such as search ranking, sales, website traffic,
and other ROI metrics.

Step 2 − Choose Right Keywords

 Select most important phrases relevant to your business.

 Also select the phrases that are frequently searched by your target customers.
 Conduct brainstorm sessions for potential terms your customers use when thinking about your
products and capabilities.
 Interact with your sales and customer service teams, and best customers to know the
frequently used phrases.
 Employ a keyword research tools to compile a list of highly searched terms.

Step 3 − Optimize Your Website Content

 Focus on your website structure. Keep it simple.

 The search engines looks for the underlying code of your website when they visit your
website.
 Create crisp, clear, and correct content that can retain users’ attention.
 Use your keyword phrases relevantly in pages title tags, heading tags, directory names, file
names, alt tags and meta tags.
 Pay attention to meta description. It is shown in the search results below your link, providing
a great opportunity for you to bring visitors to your Website.

Step 4 − Submit Your Website for Indexing

 To be visible online to the customers, ensure that all the pages of your website are completely
indexed by the search engines such as Google, Yahoo, and Bing.

For speedy process of getting indexed by the other engines, submit your website to the
DMOZ.org, an Open Directory Project. Once DMOZ accepts your website, Yahoo and other
search engines have no problem indexing your website.

Step 5 − Add Quality Links to Your Website

 Build links to your website from valued links of other websites that are frequented by your
targeted visitors.
 The more quality inbound links you have, the more popular your website is with Google and
other engines.
 Make your website content is link-worthy. Create interesting and informative content on your
website such as a library of best practices articles, blog trends in your industry, etc.
 You can also garner links from vendors, customers, business partners, and trade associations.
 Distribute press releases and articles online.

Step 6 − Manage Paid Search Advertise

 Bid on the most relevant keywords. Do not pick them based on only popularity.
 Make sure your product offer is interesting to the potential customer.
 Tie the bidding strategy to business results. In many cases a lower Ad position will produce a
higher ROI.
 Finally, include a compelling ‘call to action’ in the Ad and send traffic to a relevant landing
page tied to the Ad.

Step 7 − Measure Success of Advertise

 Check how well you performed in the past.

 Measure CPC, CPR, Clicks, Bounce rate, Impressions, ROI, etc.
 Employ Web Analytics to monitor progress and problems.
 Monitor your position regularly in the search results.
 Identify problems and plan strategies to improve your results in the future.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

 
SEO is short for search engine optimization. Search engine optimization is a methodology of
strategies, techniques and tactics used to increase the amount of visitors to a website by
obtaining a high-ranking placement in the search results page of a search engine (SERP) —
including Google, Bing, Yahoo and other search engines.

Optimizing Visibility in Search Engines

It is common practice for Internet search users to not click through pages and pages of search
results, so where a site ranks in a search results page is essential for directing
more traffic toward the site. The higher a website naturally ranks in organic results of a
search, the greater the chance that that site will be visited by a user.
SEO helps to ensure that a site is accessible to a search engine and improves the chances that
the site will be found by the search engine. SEO is typically a set of “white hat” best
practices that webmasters and Web content producers follow to help them achieve a better
ranking in search engine results.

Optimizing Organic Search CTR

SEO is also about making your search engine result relevant to the user’s search query so
more people click the result when it is shown in search. In this process, snippets of text and
meta data are optimized to ensure your snippet of information is appealing in the context of
the search query to obtain a high CTR (click through rate) from search results.

SEO may also be called search engine optimizer when using automated tools to assist with

the optimization process.

Website Optimization
Also called search engine optimization (SEO), website optimization is a phrase that
describes the procedures used to optimize – or to design from scratch – a website to rank well
in search engines.  Website optimization includes processes such as adding relevant keyword
and phrases on the website, editing meta tags, image tags, and optimizing other components
of your website to ensure that it is accessible to a search engine and improve the overall
chances that the website will be indexed by search engines.

A phrase used to describe the procedures to optimize the speed at which your website loads in
a Web browser.  This type of optimization generally involves editing your website to
optimize scripts, HTML or CSS code for faster loading.  It’s also reduces the number of
components such as images, scripts, or video components that are needed to render the
webpage.

Content Marketing
Advertising uses the content to describe the business, brand, and business reputation. The
content can be in various forms such as news, webpages, videos, white papers, infographics,
podcasts, blogs, case studies, and photographs.

Content is what is sold or accessed on the Internet. Content developers create the content to
provide the information to the viewers. It can be in the form of text, graphics, and animation.

Content marketing refers to the approach of creating and sharing of informative, relevant,

valuable, and consistent content to convert a group of audience into customers and retain
them. Content marketing is non-interruptive way of marketing.

Good content helps customers become more knowledgeable about the product or service and
make better buying judgment.
 Goals of Content Marketing
The goals of content marketing are as follows:

 Brand Awareness: It marks the presence of your brand.

 Sale: It boosts lead generation at quicker pace.
 Customer-Vendor Relationship Building: It helps in creating engagement between buyer
and the company.
 Customer Retention: Pleasing content attracts customers and helps one in retaining him.

Types Of Content
Let us see what each type of content gives −

News
They contain news about new product release, updates on products, etc. For example, news of
releasing new mobile handset on website of NDTV gadgets.

Webpages
SEO webpages can hold the content in the best possible way and sell the content.

Videos
They say, video is the second best thing to pursue a viewer in person. Creating crisp and
compact videos can bring good market at doorstep. Promote your business videos across
multiple channels, and ensure that your videos are optimized for mobile viewing, as an
increasing number of users view them from their mobile devices.

Infographics
These are long, vertical graphics or columns that include graphs, charts, statistics, and other
information. Infographics makes use of the fact that 90% information transmitted to human
brain is visual, which makes people perceive it faster than text.

Podcasts
They are digital files available in the form of episodes, which can be downloaded on the PC.
They can come in various formats such as audio, video, e-Pub, and pdf. It allows people to
subscribe and it can prove as a powerful medium to communicate a range of ideas, products,
and information to audience. The businesses engaged in podcasting are − IBM, Oracle, Yarn
Craft, etc.

Blogs
Business blogs deliver excellent content marketing. Blogs are required for a business to
survive in the race of content marketing.
Case Studies
Case studies are detailed studies pertaining to a particular problem, action, individual,
organization, event, or action, existing at a specific place at a given time. They encourage
content marketing to build trust in the product and in turn business.

Photographs
A picture speaks a thousand words. Pleasant and relevant pictures can stand as a good content
for content marketing and boosts the business

UNIT 4
Social Media Marketing
 Social media is the term commonly given to Internet and mobile-based channels and tools that allow
users to interact with each other and share opinions and content. As the name implies, social media
involves the building of communities or networks and encouraging participation and engagement.

Social media itself is a catch-all term for sites that may provide radically different social
actions. For instance, Twitter is a social site designed to let people share short messages or
“updates” with others. Facebook, in contrast is a full-blown social networking site that allows
for sharing updates, photos, joining events and a variety of other activities.

How Are Search & Social Media Marketing Related?

Why would a search marketer — or a site about search engines — care about social media?
The two are very closely related.

Social media often feeds into the discovery of new content such as news stories, and
“discovery” is a search activity. Social media can also help build links that in turn support
into SEO efforts. Many people also perform searches at social media sites to find social
media content. Social connections may also impact the relevancy of some search results,
either within a social media network or at a ‘mainstream’ search engine.
 Social Media Marketing At Marketing Land
Marketing Land is the sister site to Search Engine Land that covers all facets of internet
marketing, including these popular topics within social media marketing:

 Facebook
 Instagram
 Twitter
 Pinterest
 Linkedin
 YouTube

Social media marketing can help with a number of goals, such as:

 Increasing website traffic

 Building conversions
 Raising brand awareness
 Creating a brand identity and positive brand association
 Improving communication and interaction with key audiences

Designing Content for Social

Media Marketing
 Social media networks support multiple content formats and there has been rapid growth in the use
of interactive formats, for example, carousel ads on Facebook. This flexibility of format (text, image,
multi-image, video, carousel etc.) gives marketers the ability to experiment with different types of
content to gauge how best to attract and engage social users.

If people are the heartbeat of social media, content is the blood. It’s your content that people
see and respond to, and that communicates your values and messages.

But what content works? How do you plan what to talk about, on which platforms and in
what formats?

Producing and sharing content is no guarantee of success. Smart content marketers

understand the need to align social with other channels to ensure there is a consistent style of
communication with customers and the stories they are telling, and that is driven by a clear
plan rather than scrabbling each week to find something to share.

Why is it important to get your content right for social media?

Social media is most often used for personal reasons to connect with friends and family, or to
be part of conversations that align with your personal interests and passions.

If you serve content to people with this mindset that isn’t appropriate, relevant or useful, it
can have the effect of turning people off and driving them away. Similarly, if you blast
people with a constant stream of content, it can be overwhelming and come across like a
shouting match.
 You need to take the time to learn what people want to read/watch and make it digestible via
the formats and channels they find most useful.

Why you need an over arching comms & content plan

Start with a clear comms and content plan that is aligned with business goals. This isn’t social
specific; it should govern how you communicate with customers across all channels. Social
can then inherit this plan and adapt it to suit social networks.

For example, you may have a campaign launching a new detailed guide and social is used to
seed snippets from the guide over X weeks with a hook to download the full content. So the
overarching plan guides what is being talked about and when, then the social media plan
decides how to tell the story to a social audience based on content format, style and
execution.

Before you start posting content, you need to answer the following questions:

1. What are we trying to achieve on social media and how does this align

with core business goals/objectives/targets?

2. What stories do we want to tell and how can we make them relevant to

our social audience?

3. What is our social customer profile and what types of content to they

respond best?

4. What’s the current state of the market – how do competitors and

comparators perform socially and what content works for them?

5. Who needs to be involved in content production and marketing?

6. How will we measure the success of social content?

7. How will we optimise and improve what we’re doing?

Competitor analysis for social content

Imitation is flattery.
By this, I don’t mean copy what your competitors are doing, but if you are fighting for
mindshare amongst a similar audience, it pays to know what content that audience currently
 consumes and responds to. You can then factor in popular topics and content formats into
your social content plan.

By knowing what competitors are doing, you can also quickly identify content gaps:

1. What topics aren’t they covering?

2. Which topics are they covering poorly, with low-quality content?
3. Which topics are they covering but not comprehensively, so there’s an opportunity to
establish a niche foothold?

Originality is inspiring.
We decided to create inspiring content through other people. We ran a series of inspirational
events featuring speakers who had a success story to tell, to demonstrate that success is
unique to each of us and what makes each person successful varies but people who achieve
have some things in common e.g. drive and ambition.

This helped generate unique content that drove social engagement:

 Announcements of new free events at our London base (with Eventbrite registration)
 Announcements for new speakers and a profile (amplified by them sharing with their personal
networks)
 Live tweeting to share quotes and insights from the speakers, via the hashtag #shedevents
 Post-event write-ups and photos for visual content
 Quotes from the speakers for short social posts
 Post event interviews with some of the speakers around topics related to inspiration.

Creating a social media content marketing calendar

Keep this simple. Work on a quarterly basis and build out the content plan month-by-month
aligned with your overall content calendar.

You should have a set of stories that need to be told, then break down for each month which
story components are the focus and the content formats and social channels that will be used
to distribute the messages.

Optimising content for a social audience

Businesses produce a lot of content; don’t restrict your social channels to content the social
team produces. Think laterally.

For example, customer service teams create a lot of helpful content for users, answering
FAQs and enquiries. They often add to the business knowledge base, and this information can
be really helpful to social customers e.g. care instructions for a product. However, the content
may not always be in a format and style that’s suitable for a social audience, so you can take
the raw content and repurpose for your social channels.

Let’s use the example of care instructions. You could turn this into ‘Tip of the day’ for
Twitter, using short-form, take-away advice that can link to more detailed content on your
website.
 Creating regular hooks
Find a content format that can be used to create regular posts that encourage people to come
back for more.

Increasing content reach

You want the biggest reach possible (amongst relevant audiences) so that you optimise your
investment. This means finding ways to encourage other social users to share your content
with their wider network. Below I look at 3 techniques to enable this:

Scarcity

You’ve got something but there isn’t much left and people have to hurry to get it. Scarcity is
often a marketing veil but if used well can drive social activity. A good example is popular
events where tickets sell out quickly – publicising the ticket launch date well in advance
drums up interest.

Uniqueness

If you offer something that people can’t get anywhere else, and it’s relevant to them, you
stand a good chance of getting their attention and increasing engagement with your social
content.

Amplification

Find influencers who have their own engaged audience (don’t just think ‘people with millions
of followers’, the followers need to actually listen to what they’re saying). Come up with a
value proposition for them that encourages them to listen to what you’re posting and then
share your content.

Test, measure and learn

How do you know what content works in social media?

Even without web analytics or social media analytics, you can very quickly look at
engagement metrics for individual posts e.g. likes on Facebook, RT on Twitter.

However, to know how content contributes to your digital KPIs and ROI, then you need to
ensure you’re measuring a much wider set of metrics. A few tips:

 Add campaign tracking to all posted links (using a consistent tracking taxonomy)
 Use social reports in web analytics to monitor social sessions and conversions
 Use referral reports to compare social domains to other domains for referral traffic
 Use landing page reports and then apply social segments to gauge social impact for key
content pages
You should also use social network specific analytics to explore the impact of your content.
For example, on Twitter you can compare month-on-month for total engagement and drill
down into tweets with the most impressions and engagement.

Make sure you define the KPIs you will measure success against and then ensure reports are
set-up to provide the data for analysis. Don’t go into the analytics tools with no idea what you
want to measure – you’ll waste a lot of time!

Useful tools
It helps to use a toolkit to coordinate and automate social content marketing. That doesn’t
mean remove the human element and personalisation, it simply means use tools to help you
get your messages out there efficiently, for example queuing Tweets to be sent at times that
are most likely to get engagement from your followers.

There are lots of free and paid tools out there. Below is a small list of ones I find really
useful:

Hootsuite/Tweetdeck
Social media aggregation platforms to help you coordinate your streams, schedule updates to
multiple platforms and monitor keywords/hashtags to see what content other people are
posting/responding to.

Buffer
A great queuing system that helps you plan bulk updates and set a publishing schedule for
each social network, as well as providing URL shortening and tracking (though you can of
course use your own).

Followerwonk/Audiense/Buzzsumo
For identifying key influencers based on topic, location etc., really useful for connecting with
people who can amplify your content.

Campaign Marketing
 Marketing Campaigns promote a product through different media, including television, radio,
print and online platforms. Campaigns don’t have to rely solely on advertising and can also
include demonstrations, word of mouth and other interactive techniques. Businesses operating in
highly competitive markets may initiate frequent marketing campaigns and devote significant
resources to generating brand awareness and sales.
Marketing campaigns can be designed with different goals in mind, including building a brand
image, introducing a new product, increasing sales of a product already on the market, or even
reducing the impact of negative news. Defining a campaign’s goal usually dictates how much
marketing is needed and what media are most effective.

Marketing Campaign Activities and Negating Negative Publicity

Marketing is all about reaching customers, and there are many ways to do that, from a simple
postcard to a coordinated social-media blitz. Small companies can email invitations to a special
 sale and offer a free product to every customer who brings in the invitation. Larger companies
can use paid advertising and professional agencies to reach a wider audience.

Whatever the size of the company, it’s important that someone is dedicated to handling the influx
of traffic a marketing campaign generates. If you are prompting customers to sign up for your
email list, you must make sure that the list is managed well and that new customers receive
welcoming messages. If visits to your website increase, you must continually update your content
to convert this traffic to profitable sales.

Companies that lose sales due to major negative press often use marketing campaigns to
rehabilitate their images. One example is Chipotle Mexican Grill, which was investigated by the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention after dozens of customers became sick in 2015 from
food safety issues related to E. coli and norovirus. Chipotle’s sales dropped 30%, and to get
customers back in the door, Chipotle offered coupons for free food via direct mail and texts.
Chipotle also used online video to announce a $10 million grant to support local farmers.

Examples of Successful Marketing Campaigns

The long-running Aflac duck campaign is one example of a campaign that significantly
raised brand recognition. The company’s brand-recognition rate was just 12% when it launched
the campaign in 2000, and more than a decade of advertising boosted recognition to 90%.

Lay’s launched its first “Do Us a Flavor” campaign in 2012, asking customers to suggest new
potato-chip flavors through texts, Facebook and Twitter. The company’s sales increased 12%,
and its volume of Facebook followers tripled.

Tracking Social Media

Marketing Performance
 While it’s true that every large company probably needs some social media marketing strategy, it
isn’t necessarily true for every business.

No matter your company, you should have at least a Facebook page that provides some
information about your business and links to your website. The question you have to answer
is—do I want to consistently commit resources to a social media marketing strategy?

Just about every business can benefit from social media marketing, but if you’re a small
growing business, you need to worry about resource allocation. That means conducting a
cost/benefit analysis of social media marketing.

There’s no one right way to go about this, but broadly speaking, here are the benefits of that
social media marketing can provide:

 Create a stronger bond with your existing customer base

 Increase your brand awareness
 Boost the performance of other marketing strategies, such as content marketing
 Gain an understanding of what your audience thinks about you
 Create another medium for which you can convert prospects into customers

Think of your social media goals as high level. There will likely be several different metrics
that contribute to one goal. The following are some common goals:

 Increase conversions
 Build your email list/leads
 Increase your brand awareness
 Boost audience engagement

Tracking Tactics
Since goals are so high level, looking at how you perform relative to a goal isn’t very helpful.
Let’s say you want to increase your conversion rate and at the end of the quarter you’ve
fallen short.

Well, if all you’re doing is tracking your conversion rate, you won’t really gain any insights
into what was working and what wasn’t.

If you want to find out what works and what doesn’t and, ultimately, reach and surpass goals
in the future, you need to track the performance of your individual tactics.

The first step here is to make a list of all of your tactics. There are countless social media
marketing tactics, but as an example, here are five:

 Content distribution
 Replying to all (appropriate) mentions
 Capitalize on trending topics
 Run contests
 Use Gifs in tweets

You need to understand why you are committing time and resources to each of your tactics,
and then figure out how those tactics contribute to a specific goal. If a tactic isn’t contributing
to a goal, it’s probably time to scrap it. If a tactic isn’t sufficiently contributing to a specific
goal, it might be time to scrap that one too.

So, let’s continue with the example goal of trying to increase your conversion rate. We’ll
assume one of the tactics you’re implementing is distributing more content. After a month of
sharing more content on social media, you are seeing that the pieces you share on social are
not only getting more views, but they’re also converting at a higher rate.

With this information, you can confidently say that social content distribution is linked to
higher conversion rates. Now that you’re armed with this information, you can use it to
inform your social strategy going forward.

Measure and Refine

So you’ve determined your goals, you know which tactics roll up into which goals, now all
you have to do is measure and refine.
You’re almost certainly going to need a tool to measure the metrics you want to. If you
already have a social media management tool, it will have some measurement capabilities,
but it’s crucial that your tool has the right capabilities.

If your current social media management software doesn’t have what you need from a
performance management standpoint, go find the one that does and make the swap. Your tool
shouldn’t be defining what you measure, you should.

Once that’s squared away create reports that provide all the info you need for all of your
metrics. Remember that this is an ongoing process, not a set it and forget it situation.

You should be continuously evaluating your performance. If you are far-exceeding some of
your goals, maybe aim higher and vice versa.

You’ll find that when you get into a groove and are effectively measuring your social
performance, you’ll be able to be more calculated in your strategy, and ultimately get more
return on your investment

Advertising on Mobile Devices,

Mobile Apps
 Mobile advertising is type of advertising that appears on mobile devices such as smart
phones and tablets that have wireless connections. As a subset of mobile marketing, mobile
advertising can take place as text ads via SMS, or banner advertisements that appear
embedded in mobile web site, in downloaded apps or in mobile games. Mobile technology
used by companies such as Google and Facebook tailor mobile advertisements based on
individual’s web browsing history, geographic location, and with data collected by shopping
habits. Because mobile devices typically have smaller screens than computers or laptops, this
form of digital advertising is usually optimized for small displays by being concise.
Mobile Advertising
As mobile devices outnumber television sets now by almost 3 to 1, the chances of a potential
customer seeing a mobile ad are greater than that of most other forms of advertising today.
One of the popular models in mobile advertising is known as cost per install (CPI), where
payment is based on the user installing an app on their mobile device. CPI mobile advertising
networks work either as incent or non-incent. In the incent model the user is given virtual
points or rewards to install the game or app.

Mobile Advertising History

The earliest form of mobile advertising took place via SMS test messages, but has quickly
evolved to mobile web and in-app advertisements. Many apps offer a free version that can be
downloaded at no cost, but which is paid for by placement of advertisements within the app.
Such advertisements can be removed by purchasing a full or premium version of the app.
Mobile versions of websites also have advertisements which have been optimized for the
smaller mobile displays than would appear on the full version of the same website.
Mobile Adverting Platforms
Mobile advertising also works hand in hand with mobile marketing, which uses personal data
collected and technology such as location services to personalize ads based on user
preference, habits, or location. Some mobile advertisements may appear only when a mobile
user is in close proximity to a certain store or service provider. Mobile ad placement works
by way of a programmatic bidding process for ad placement, in which advertisers bid in real
time for the right to place an ad on a mobile device. The infrastructure that allows for this
process is known as a demand-side platform (DSP). Use of such platforms allows advertisers
to optimize their performance as based on a number of key performance indicators (KPI),
such as effective cost per click (eCPC) and effective cost per action (eCPA).

Mobile marketing utilizes multiple distribution channels to promote products and services via
mobile devices, such as tablets and smartphones. It makes use of features of modern mobile
technology, such as location services, to tailor marketing campaigns based on an individual’s
location. Mobile marketing is a way in which technology can be used to create personalized
promotion of goods or services to a user who is constantly connected to a network. Mobile
advertising is a subset of mobile marketing.

Mobile marketing may include promotions sent through SMS text messaging, MMS
multimedia messaging, through downloaded apps using push notifications, through in-app or
in-game marketing, through mobile web sites, or by using a mobile device to scan QR codes.
Proximity systems and location based services can alert users based on geographic location or
proximity to a service provider.

Mobile marketing an indispensable tool for companies large and small as mobile devices
become ubiquitous. The key players in the space are the brands (and companies that they
represent through advertising), and service providers that enable mobile advertising. Mobile
advertising targets audiences not so much by demographics but by behaviors (though
demography plays a part, such as the fact that iPad users tend to be older and wealthier). One
notable behavior in the mobile marketing space known as “snacking,” which is when mobile
device users check in to media or messaging for brief periods. Such seeking of instant
gratification equates to more points of contact for marketers.

In mobile marketing, the device (especially screen size) does make a difference — users of
smartphones and iPad tablets react differently to mobile marketing. For example, smartphone
users tend to find informative content to be the most relevant, yet iPad users tend to be
captivated by interactive advertising that features rich media presentations with eye-catching
imagery (the message of the content is a secondary concern).

Mobile Marketing vs. Traditional Marketing

Unlike traditional marketing efforts, mobile marketing takes advantage of the fact that many
users of mobile devices carry them around with them wherever they go. As a result, location-
based services can collect customer data and then offer coupons, deals or promotions based
on their proximity to a store or a place frequently visited by the consumer. These marketing
campaigns can be more targeted and specific to the individual user, and should therefore be
more effective for the company doing the marketing. One example may be a marketing
 campaign that sends food-related coupons to a customer any time they come within half a
mile of a specific supermarket.

Mobile Marketing Concerns

There are privacy issues concerning how the data collected by mobile devices is used and
whether or not companies have the right to collect such data without explicit consent. Such
data can be used for identity theft or to send spam if it falls into the wrong hands due to data
theft or poor security of the information. Also, the tracking of individual’s locations and
movements may be considered crossing the line by some

Tracking Mobile
Marketing Performance
 When it comes to mobile advertising performance, there are various metrics available to determine if
your efforts are on the right track.

Here are the key metrics that can help you understand how effective your mobile ad
campaign is.

First, the 4 easily accessible KPIs:

 Click-through Rates: CTR is the ratio of the number of clicks on an ad to the number of ad

impressions (number of times an ad has been viewed). CTR is not considered an ideal measure of ad
performance. Nielsen research has shown a high CTR to have a negative correlation with ad
interaction. CTR doesn’t take into account user’s intent while clicking (clicks can be accidental) or
calculating engagement, brand awareness, etc.
 Leads generated: The number of prospective customers identified during the ad campaign.
 Cost Per Acquisition: CPA shows the expenditure a business has to incur to convert a user.
 Sales Revenue Determines how much revenue was generated per ad (ad campaign). 

These indicators give a narrow view of how a campaign is performing.

To gather a more holistic view of your marketing efforts, you should consider
these 6 metrics:

1. Conversion Rate (CR): This metric gathers data on the number of users who performed the
desired action e.g. installs, registrations, purchases etc.
If a user saw an ad and performed the desired action, he is a potential customer. This can be used to
build a sales funnel and determine how many users abandon a sale and at which step. It can be
computed according to an advertiser’s goals, eg. Installs/Clicks; Registrations/Installs; Sales/Installs
etc.
2. Retention Rate: or Percent Retention is a very strong KPI. Advertisers instead should see
that the user not only installs the app but also uses it in the long run. It’s typical for a user to abandon
an app in the quest for more features, freebies, and offers.
Retention Rate captures how many users use the app more than once within a specified time frame, by
monitoring the user’s interactions with the app. It is more logical and profitable for advertisers to
retain existing users rather than spend large budgets on acquiring new ones.
3. Social Metrics/ Social Engagement: Social Media Platforms have become imperative to any
ad campaign. Using social networks also open better targeting opportunities based on location, age,
gender, interests etc.
Measuring the number of likes, shares, re-tweets or brand mentions can help analyze how well
consumers react to an ad. This metric determines customer engagement and can indicate whether a
customer will recommend your brand or buy from you again.
4. Brand Lift: If your mobile ads don’t generate the targeted number of clicks, but help
increase brand awareness; they have done a part of their job. If a mobile ad was successful, brands
would see a spike in search queries on search engines and higher web traffic on their site and social
media pages. 
5. Return on Ad Spend (RoAS): This is the revenue generated after accounting for all ad
expenditures. It is important to consistently track profits or loss combined with other metrics, you can
then decide whether to invest more in the ad or reduce the ad spend.
6. Secondary Actions: Measuring actions that users take after they view the ad reveal if the ad
generated an interest. These actions are easily measurable and comprise click-to-call, search queries
about the business, sharing statistics on social media or accessing map or driving directions. This
information can help marketers channelize their resources accordingly to plan more personalized
campaigns that lead to conversions.

A few other metrics worth measuring:

 View-ability: measures if an ad was seen by a human, and how many times it was viewed.
Sometimes the adsare not viewable because they take too long to load or aren’t visible for at least one
second and the user quickly scrolls away.
View-ability is related to ad effectiveness and brand recall. You can use it to measure how well
different mobile ad formats are working.
 Purchase Intent: Monitoring a user’s wish-list or shopping cart indicates how close the
person is to purchasing a product. Marketers can adjust campaigns accordingly to motivate them.
Marketers must use a combination of metrics to gauge the true measure of their mobile ad
effectivenes

Web Analytics-Meaning, Key

Metrics and Tools
 Web analytics is reporting and analysis of data on website visitor activity. It is not only a
tool to measure web traffic but also can be used as a tool for business and market research.
Techniques used to access and improve the contribution of e-marketing to a business, such as
referrals, clickstreams, online research data, customer satisfaction surveys, leads and sales.
Thus, marketers use web analytics exploring data and reports to build their knowledge on
customers’ preference and behavior according to types of sites, which areas customers click
more often when they online. It also helps marketer understand their customers better and
improve their business performance. (Dykes, 2012)
These are three stages that they need to concern when setting up a web analytic tool. The
analysis is the ticket for them move from Steupland to Actionland. It is the isolating of
meaningful and actionable insights in data and reports that when acted upon by your
organization can drive business value.

Alignment Stage:
At this early planning stage, it is necessary for marketer to gather their business objectives
and capture stakeholders’ online behavior by their online measurement strategy. Clearly
understand measurement strategy and well analyze visitors is critical to success. Thus,
marketers have to carefully handling relevant and meaningful data which will directly affect
the business in the long-term.

Collection Stage:
At this point of stage, large companies may spend amount of time on technical
implementation such as multiple web domains and online marketing initiatives. (Dykes,
2012)

Reporting Stage:
This is the last stage for companies move from Setupland to Actionland. This stage is
important where you create report and distribute them to organization using a manual or
preferably automated approach.

TOOLS AND METHODS USED TO HELP MARKETER

There are two types of web analytics, on-site and off-site web analytics.

ON-SITE ANALYTICS
On-site web analytics is used for marketers to measure a visitor’s activity when he browses
on your website. This includes its drivers and conversations, for example which ads on
landing page encourage more people to purchase and which title of information visitors click
most. This data is used to analysis visitors’ online behavior and can be used to improve
website or marketing campaign’s audience response.

Simply, on-site web analytics tools are used to analysis and measure behaviors of visitors’
journey and actual visitor traffic arriving on your website. For example, which landing page
encourage visitors to make a purchase, what links visitors clicked on (from search engine to
get to the site or came there directly) to the site, and time they spent and stayed on given
page. Therefore, On-site web analytics measures of website in a commercial context.

For the business, website became more important than ever before, it handles more
information. Companies also need to know if their marketing campaigns are working on
internet-based, just like John Shumway, the global vice president of product management at
Akamai says “marketing people are increasingly driving the need for we analytics”. (Dave
Chaffey, 2003)

Firms can conduct on-site web-analytics through the following ways:

Analytics Software Produced by Companies

Some companies such as WebTrends and Google Analytics produce web analytics software
that converts data by using combination of tables and graphs. It automatically monitors your
website’s traffic and highlights any significant changes, thus, managers can easily understand
and analysis the effectiveness of their campaigns. And, where visitors come from and which
pages retain visitors the longest, and also, track visitors progress s they click though the site.
It can be simply shows daily visit on your website, type on traffic and time on site by country.

Other technologies for data collection

Other technologies companies used for data collection are eye tracking system and mouse
tracking analytics. It is a key method for testing visitors’ behavior and areas they focus more
often when they on a web page, and both eye tracking and e mouse tracking analytics studies
offer businesses accurate and actionable results. Therefore, the result can be used to improve
a web site or marketing campaign’s audience response.

Eye tracking system is utilized by many top enterprises such as Google. This tracking system
uses specialist software to track internet visitors where the eyes land on a webpage.

Similar to eye tracking system, Mouse tracking analytics follows the mouse movements of
internet users to simulate eye movement on a webpage. From the research, it has shown when
both methods of testing are conducted simultaneously, in the result, they find out exactly
what the visitors look at on the page which contains 84%-88% accuracy. In addition, both
method of tracking analytics deliver valuable information to managers about visitors’
involvement and engagement with your website. This is vital to work out what changes you
need to make in order to benefit your visitors’ experience as well as improve the website.
(ClickTale, 2010)

OFF-SITE ANALYTICS
Off-site analytics data can be obtained for any website-including your competitors and
partners. Which means is analysis the internet as a whole for the websites. Thus, the key
differences of off-site web analytics measures from your potential audience (opportunity),
share of voice (visibility), and buzz (comments).

Unlikely to on-site web analytics only captures what happens when visitors visit and engage
with your website, by using various technologies to help monitor and analysis website to
create meaningful actions and results. However, as social website becomes more popular and
ascendant channel for internet users, and everything becomes more transparent on social web,
organization information are shared, spread on it, thus, through this platform, marketers are
able to measure the latest buzz about website or organization.it is important for marketers to
monitor not only what happens on the website but also outside of your website. Improving
from what other people are saying about the company and provide products and services
match customers requires. Off-site Web Analytics solutions can help businesses stay on the
leading edge of overall trends. (Monitoring Buzz With Off-Site Web Analytics, 2010)

Firms can conduct off-site web-analytics through the following available software:

Alexa and Compete

There are numbers of web analytics software provided service to measure your competitors
how much and what type of traffic are garnering to their site. Alexa and Compete are two free
services help marketers to find top-level information, including the top searches people used
to find the site, as well as traffic comparisons versus other Websites. For more comparison
capabilities and a deeper level of demographic information, marketer can just simply
upgrades their account.

Similar to Alexa and Compete system offerings monitor and aggregate a wide swath of Web
traffic, paid services from Quantcast and Nielsen NetRatings also provide analytics tools and
research related to online audiences, as well as online ad buying and selling.

As by shown example of how Alexa provide services for marketers by monitoring and
aggregating a wide swath of Web traffic from multiple sources to develop estimates for
overall ranking and other factors.

On the table 1 below, shows top 5 sites on the web. According to off-site web analytics is
measuring about your competitors and monitoring the internet as whole website, it is obvious
for marketers to analysis the market, so that company can generate more sales, reduce
marketing costs, enhance campaign performance, provide better user experience, and reach
specific target segments. As well as on table, more specific shows competitor daily/monthly
search traffic and top queries from search traffic and more other details. Thus, research on
your competitors and understand their strategy, is the advantages for the company to take step
forward than others in the market.

Co Tweet and HootSuite

There are other tools like CoTweet and HootSuite are relative newcomers to the market when
they looking further out into the social web. Especially for small and medium-size business
that use tools to monitoring and engaging with social web. It started as management tools
Twitter, but they are now expanding their support for other social channels such as Facebook
and LinkedIn. It simply for an organization tracks the effectiveness of multiple marketing
efforts in multiple social channels, and also from platforms.

Because social web such as Twitter and Facebook, it creates more effective buzz to a
company. Therefore, this platform is critical important for for small and medium-size
business to enhance awareness. CoTweet is a web-based social media
management and analytics tool. With CoTweet you can not only manage clicks on content
you publish within the application, but also integrate any web analytics platforms with
campaign codes and shortened URLs. Just like Bobowski believes “it provides closed-loop
reporting and allows marketers to associate revenue and other success metrics to social media
activity”. (Peters, 2011)

As shown table below, CoTweet also provides updates and follow-up messages to be
assigned to specific social media managers. Different knowledge of social media managers
can responses immediately to appropriate questions and comments from followers, which
shows to followers that there are person behind responding the questions. Also, from the
questions and buzz marketers will know who he is talking with if question arise for as
specific tweet. It helps marketers collected more accurate data and responded visitor’s needs.