Marketing in Digital Age

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What the heck is a campaign

We all have different opinions about that silly word because Marketing is so broad and convoluted that we can't agree on a single word. If you're responsible for in-house email marketing then a campaign could mean a single eshot. If you're working for an ad agency then campaign would mean a series of ads. While a campaign to SEO specialists could mean increasing ranking for a specific product line, category, page or even a website in a given time. Get the picture? It's not to say we, the marketing specialists, need to get our shit together and agree on terminology and meanings for specific activities. The simple explanation is "marketing" is no longer a job description (it hasn't been for a long time). It's a generalised definition under which all these categories and sub, sub sub specialties exist. "What is a campaign?", you may ask. It depends on your job title, responcibilities, industry, etc. You define it, not textbooks.

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Calculate Maximum Value Per Investment

Sometimes Google AdWords makes recommendations that look something like this:

This was taken from Google Places. Google's recommendations may not be this same amount but the logic behind calculating how to get maximum value is the same. There are few ways to go about this. You can 1) ignore that recommendation and go on using your current bids, 2) trust Google and chose recommended amount, or 3) manually test suggested amounts and then go with your findings. If you chose the third option, this blog is for you.

To test Google’s suggestions you need some basic Excel skills. This is how I transferred mine into Excel:

To work with more than 3 suggestions, I used Excel to predict values using FORECAST function. Red Amount, Clicks1 and Clicks2 are forecasted predictions. Then I calculated Average clicks using Excel’s Average function and Cost per Click. This is what it looked like after forecasting:

The next best thing to do is to graph this to have a visual representation of what you're looking at. I used a simple line graph in Excel with Average Clicks on X-axis and Cost per Clicks on y-axis.

When you look at the graph, it becomes apparent that at $1.04 cost/click the line offsets the most and the slope changes. Google’s recommendation is to invest $440 for best possible results to get an average of 427.5 click. However, this graph suggests that 135 clicks (or $140) is the tipping point. Anything over $140, with an average of 135 clicks, is a good investment and anything under it isn’t. Surely you'll get the most bang for your money by investing more, because your cost per clicks goes down. And Google is not completely wrong in suggesting $440.

This method can be used in most cases to determine suggested values based on historical data.

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Digital Marketing Strategy. What the...?

We know about corporate strategy and strategic management, but what the heck is an Online Marketing Strategy? It’s part of the bigger picture, the overall marketing strategy, but it branches off to its own steps. However Online or Digital Marketing Strategy compliments corporate strategic objectives steps and Marketing Strategies. Say for example if one of corporate strategic objective is to expand in various countries, then the Marketing Strategy would be to increase brand awareness. In turn, this will lead to digital branding campaigns trying to ‘get eyeballs’ on ads across various platforms in those countries.

Digital Marketing strategies include many technical steps, which most of the time are ignored or done incorrectly. Let’s strip it down to basics and see the general concept of Online Marketing. Building a website is like building a brick and mortar location. Brick-by-brick or page-by-page you’re putting together a place, where your location will be wowed and customers would love to do business with you. Your store name or website title matter a lot, but so does your description, keywords, content and tags of the goods and services you intend to present to visitors. Brick and mortars select specific locations as one means to driving traffic to storefront, while in digital world your traffic drivers are links that are found on other sites and search engines. Therefore to be foundable you have to be search engine friendly and work continuously on backlinks. You may advertise on billboards and television, but in digital marketing you run considerably different campaigns on various search engines and social networks. You may track brick and mortar store conversion, but you have to also track digital conversions to find out the quality of your ads, site and location on search sites. Various reports and marketing research can assist brick and mortar businesses in finding their target markets and fine tune company’s focus. Digital Marketing reports, like Analytics, can also help with recognizing target markets, interests, trends and direct focus to creating better value for Online customers. If brick and mortar companies want to increase return customers, one method is to maintain a continuous relationship with customers. It is also possible to form and maintain customer relationship digitally through proper customer relationship management.

As we can see there are clear similarities between brick and mortar and digital, but the steps we take to get there vary considerably. Digital marketing has more hands-on approach, where professionals are directly involved with the website, its contents, advertisements and reports. The information that Online visitors can get about the product, goods and services is much higher than when looking at store shelves. However, a window of information that appeals to only visual stimuli does not compare to in-store brick and mortar displays and talking to a sales associates. For example, when we walk into a supermarket we immediately smell foods; we can touch our fruits and pick which ones we want; we can smell the meat behind the meat counter or marvel it while butchers cut that one favourite peace that we love. Therefore, in digital marketing we strategize on visual and logical appeals- if it looks good, makes sense, is trustworthy and valuable, and cheap then buy it.

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Lets Get Philosophical, Part 1 – What Marketing Is Not About

To come up with a general definition on marketing, I first decided to cover what marketing is not. Therefore I started digging through various definitions from well-known authors and organizations. In my university Marketing textbook the authors gave short description of marketing as “meeting needs profitably” (Kotler & Keller, 2006). Others use more elaborate definitions. These are fractions of definitions out there that I picked for this topic:

Marketing is a management process that identifies, anticipates and satisfies customer requirements profitably (Charter Institute of Marketing).

An action or business of promoting and selling products or services, including market research and advertising (Google Dictionary).

Marketing is a social and managerial process by which individuals and groups obtain what they need and want through creating and exchanging products and value with others (Kotler, Armstrong, Wong, and Saunders, 2008).

Although all definitions of marketing are valid in their own ways, they are incomplete and partial when trying to come up with a general description of marketing.

Kotler and Keller, and Koter, et al describe marketing as a process trying to meet human and social needs and simultaneously generating profit for the organization. They are absolutely right in distinguishing managerial from social marketing, but their definitions overlook various marketing fields- branding, advertising, etc.- when defining marketing. In branding, your immediate goal is not to meet customers’ goals, nor is it to generate profit. Kotler and Keller, focusing mainly on managerial concepts of marketing, surely overlooks other areas in marketing. For example, display advertisers’ flash ads for digital marketing are not designed to meet web surfers’ needs profitably. Companies’ team leaders, managers, or analytics teams determine the profitability of those display ads. What I’m trying to state is, marketing is not merely used by management, and generating profit is not its sole purpose as defined by Charter Institute of Marketing, and Koter and Keller. I agree with Kotler, et al description of value and product creation, however, it still overlooks other concepts (e.g. designing and A/B testing a website has more to do with having a presence and researching which design is optimal for desired response- conversion, time on site, etc.).

Charter Institute of Marketing identifies marketing as a process that is done by managers, and is for profit generation. Although I like the fact that Charter Institute recognizes identification and anticipation to satisfy certain needs, it overlooks certain marketing areas that are involved in managing relationships, designing, and raising awareness. Also, non-managers can also be involved in marketing, and not all marketing is done to generate profit.

It may help to look at another profession to understand where Google Dictionary definition went wrong, … Lets take practicing medicine as an example. If we asked various medical practitioners about what it means to practice medicine, we might get different answers. An Anesthesiologist might say that medicine is about taking away pain, while Psychiatrist might talk about the wellness of the mind. It doesn’t surprise me that Google is mainly focused on promoting and selling products (by using Google AdWords), research (by using Google Analytics), and advertising (by using AdSense). I’m sure customer relationship management, rebranding and bettering value hasn’t even cross their mind.

Mentioned definitions of marketing are correct, however they are specific, highly focused and specialized. There are many areas in marketing and one cannot ignore an area when defining marketing as whole. Various marketing professionals do specialized work to achieve marketing goals. Managers are not the only ones involved in marketing, but are part of a whole. There are various marketing professionals working together as whole for decision-making and reaching marketing goals. Generating profit could be a marketing goal, but not all marketing goals are focused on profit. Not all professionals use ads to reach customers, and not all customers are consumers. For example, memos can be used for internal marketing. Therefore, marketing doesn’t necessarily leads to advertising; it could be a research to find target markets, maintaining database, geomarketing to find just where to open a new brick and mortar store, or tagging a web page.

Now that we know what marketing is not, the next question to ask is, “what is marketing?” Read Lets Get Philosophical, Part 2, to find out.

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GDN Placement Reports for Decision-Making

As part of our practice we regularly generate reports at campaign, keywords, etc. levels. When using Google Display Network (GDN), we also have to run placement reports, which generate measured site-level performance reports. These reports should be the most important data to help with our decision-making as to where to continue advertising and which sites to exclude. Therefore data from placement reports, not how we feel about a specific site, should help guide our decisions. By always adjusting display bids separate from search we can use GDN placement reports help us with decisions regarding underperforming sites.

If sites meet your desired objectives and yields high conversion we should:

Use them in managed networks

Add additional budget

If sites do not meet your objectives:

Lower the bid or exclude the sites

If ads appear on irrelevant pages:

Optimize keywords

Add negative keywords

To see your ads performance on GDN in your AdWords account click the Campaigns tab, click the Networks tab, click show details link to expand the Managed and Automatic placements tables and apply columns and filters. You can download Managed or Automatic placements table, or click Create to generate report.

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Segmenting Keywords

Often times we look at clients’ products and services and think, “now how should I describe this?” when we’re trying to come up with keywords. Each one of us has his or her method: some just wing it, some use keyword generators, others have more specific methods. What works for me is segmenting keywords and target customers in various stages of buying funnel. If someone is searching for a TV repairman she can use various types of keywords:

Generalize - These types of keywords have the highest search terms, most impressions. For example, TV repairman, television repair

Problems - Consumers using these types of keywords describe problems and are looking for a cure, e.g. how do I get rid of insomnia

Indications - These keywords describe actual problems in greater details. For example, static on television screen, television channels won’t change

Product Descriptions - Consumers use part or model numbers, or detailed product descriptions, e.g. 42’ Samsung TV

Information  -Consumers are researching on a topic, but not necessarily need to make a purchase. Content and keywords on information does not lead to high returns, but does drive high number of traffic and is excellent for brand awareness and large number of impressions. An example is if someone looking to find information on “carbon monoxide poisoning” instead of “CO alarms”.

When generating keywords, it is usful to consider mentioned various types of segmentations depending on your target markets and your clients' needs. You'd want more impressions when you're raising brand awareness, and better clickthrough rate and conversions when you're advertising to sell a specific product or generate leads.

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Introduction to Buying Funnel

Before consumers dive right into purchasing goods from an e.commerce store, they go through stages of buying. Stages that consumers go through are referred to as buying funnel, where they start with being aware of your product and end up making a purchase. It is vital to understand these stages to be able to properly market your goods and services to online shoppers. After all, “if you build it, they will come” does not refer to e.commerce.

Buying funnel has five stages:

1. awareness

2. interest

3. learning

4. shopping

5. buying

In digital marketing proper steps have to be taken to make sure the buying funnel works towards your or your clients’ advantage. That means deciding appropriate keywords, content and ads for each stage. Being the first, awareness means you have to make your products or services known to online shoppers. Consumers won’t know about your cool new product, store, or services unless you make it known. At this stage in funnel keywords and content are generalized to capture more impressions (e.g. keywords should be low converting but with high volume of impressions). As you progress working down the funnel your keywords, ads and content should become more-and-more specific. Next, you want to create interest in your product, brand, and services. Ask yourself how your products make consumers’ lives easier or better, and create the need for your product. This means introducing the specific features or tech specs in your ads, keywords and content. Afterwards, you can introduce industry-specific terms and jargons for consumers to learn and appreciate your brand, store, or services. At this point you want consumers to need your products or services more than the competitor’s. When consumers learn about your products and services, they also learn about your competitors. Now consumers are shopping around for the best possible deal by comparing and contrasting features, prices, quality and quantity. Therefore, at any given point a potential consumer might decide to go with another because they meet their needs. To help consumer make informed decisions, you should use highly specific keywords, content, and ads because consumers, who have reached this stage have certain level of knowledge about the product. Finally, when consumer has made up their mind to purchase a specific product, the only thing they have to decide is where to buy it from by comparing prices, reviews, shipping and handling costs, warranties and return policies. To help with their buying process, it is better to use product names and part numbers along with company names when deciding on keywords and ads.

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Backlinks Painlessly

We’re all aware of google and moz page ranks, and make it our regular SEO practice to keep checking on sites’ ranks. One of the most important factors that affect page rank is backlinks. Some SEO specialists think that backlinks are so important that they use automated social bookmarking programs to saturate the Internet with their clients’ blog links, home pages links, product page links and just about any links possible. They end up posting links on irrelevant sites and sites with no authority just to get their clients’ names out there. They become so desperate to get links out there that some pay for apps, and even purchase decapchers to automatically submit to bunch of sites with captchas.

It is wrong, a waste of time and money to think that merely saturing the Internet, especially social sites, with bunch of backlinks will help boost your clients’ page ranks. It is not the quantity of backlinks but the quality that matters. And what I mean by this is the authority of the site and relevance of your link. Example: If you’re working for a client who manufactures and sells shoes on her site, and you post her site links everywhere possible, then you just wasted your time and your clients’ money in accomplishing almost nothing. Think of it from visitors' perspectives, "why should I give a damn about 'click here for great quality shoes' offer if I'm searching for travel deals?" Or do you really care to see e-commerce offers on Digg or StumbleUpon? Or do most people use deep web searchbanks to find what they're looking for? I’m not implying that social bookmarking tools are a waste of money, but merely stating the fact that what really matters to google or mozrank is not the quantity of your links out there but the quantity of those links related to the page content and those pages' authorities. Thus, you should aim to get your client’s link out on highly ranked sites that have relevant content.

Think of it this way, one relevant link can play a much bigger role than hundreds of irrelevant ones. It's not productive to spend time and money on getting links up in  every place possible and annoy visitors and site owners with your social bookmarking decapchers and irrelevant “visit here” comments. Instead, in lesser time, you can find relevant sites, socialize, develop a relationship with the site owners and volunteer to help each other grow with link or blog exchange. It’s that simple and doesn’t cost anything.

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Yahoo Site Explorer Replaced by Bing Webmaster Center

Yahoo announced that Yahoo & Microsoft Search Alliance decided that there should not be two different webmaster portals for a single source. Therefore they started to integrate Yahoo Site Explorer with Bing Webmaster Center. Currently some of South and North American countries (including US and Candada) are transitioned with Bing Webmaster Center and Yahoo's organic search results are handled by Bing. Once transition is complete, which is expected in late 2011, Yahoo Site Explorer will shut down. Until then, digital marketers should not stop using Site Explorer. Yahoo also announced that even though Site Explorer will be gone, Yahoo will continue to crawl sites.