What’s in a domain name

Choosing the right domain name, the unique URL or address of particular website that defines itself from the World Wide Web, is harder than most people think.

Aside from becoming part of your branding and digital assets, a domain name is the by-word that people will use to find you or your business online.

“Your domain name should be relevant to your business, thus using your brand name is a great option,” recommends the Certified Digital Marketer (CDM) Program. “In situations where you can’t use your brand name, make sure your address helps to explain what your business offers with keywords related to your industry.”

As a general rule, keeping the domain name short and sensible is better than long ones because it’s easier to type and far less susceptible to mistakes.

“Try to find a domain name that only has one possible spelling and is easy to spell. Ideally you want your domain name to pass the verbal test—if you were to say it to somebody, they should be able to type it correctly without your help”, discussed in What Works in Websites class of the CDM Program.

Use relevant keywords and “brandable” names. Keywords will help improve your site’s ranking in search engines and give people an idea of what your site is all about.

Meanwhile, a “brandable” name establishes a distinct identity and communicates indirectly related ideas and feelings. But there are also a few issues that you have to tread carefully like the use of trademarked names, use of plurals, articles, and so forth.

Learn more about the process in website development in What Works in Websites of the CDM Program.

Log on to imadigitalmarketer.com or call 927-0096, 0928-506-5382 for more details.

source: technology.inquirer.net

Focus on social listening

If you have a thriving Facebook or Twitter site, congratulations! Your efforts in digital marketing to promote your social media assets are working. However, the crucial question is: are you using these assets properly?

One of the most productive activities you can do in your social media assets is social listening—which can go handy with your electronics customer relationship management (eCRM) or digital marketing programs.

“Social listening is listening to online conversations to monitor possible or actual trends in order to measure the potential impact of these chatter,” says Jason Cruz, Social Products Director at MRM/McCann, during recent lecture at the Certified Digital Marketer (CDM) Program.

It has three major applications which any business enterprise can use. First and foremost is to discover new content ideas for marketing campaigns. Second is to build relationships with brand fans and advocates. Third is to spot online conversations early on and manage crisis.

“It’s good to spot what are people are talking about, their problems, the potential trends, and what we can publish to satisfy consumers,” says Cruz. “Social listening can also be used to build credible and authentic relationship with brand ambassadors.”

Socialmedia Today identifies eight social listening tools that you can use in your business to align with your social media strategy. Few are free, all equally effective according to your goals. These are SocialMention, SocialRest, Tweetreach, ViralHeat, DataSift, SimplyMeasured, Sysomos, and Zoomph.

“Social listening is applicable at all stages of marketing campaign,” says Cruz. “From the start of a campaign to post-event evaluation, social listening has an important role in serving both positive and negative effects of online conversation.”

Learn how to develop your social listening skills to improve brand engagement and customer relationships with The Social Media Marketing Specialist Track of the CDM Program.

Enrollment ongoing, enlist now!

Visit imadigitalmarketer.com or call 927-0096, 0928-506-5382 for more details.

source: technology.inquirer.net

The next wave of marketing

MANILA, Philippines–Anson Dichaves became the first global customer marketing director for Ponds of Unilever.

He then became global head for shopper marketing of Philips’ consumer lifestyle division before joining Nielsen as managing director of shopper research for Asia, Africa and Middle East.

He won the Mansmith Young Market Masters Award (YMMA) in 2006 for his work in customer development. He now does consulting work on shopper marketing.

Question: What is the most often overlooked aspect of shopper marketing?

Answer: Great shopper marketing starts with great shopper insight. Shopper marketing is marketing. Insight drives actions and solutions. Neuroscience proved that 99 percent of what we do are driven by subconscious behavior or what we usually call habit. People more or less buy the same things most of the time.

Shopper marketing is all about influencing buying habits, and you can only do this by understanding what the habit is through shopper insight.

Q: What will consumer companies be missing without a good shopper marketing program?

A: Shaping buying behavior of shoppers in favor of your brand or store.

Without a good shopper marketing program, retailers will miss out on knowing shoppers’ evolving buying behavior and preference. For example, at Nielsen, we were able to pick up that shoppers these days prefer to shop smaller baskets more frequently. Winning retailers are the ones who are able to pick up on this trend, innovate the smaller format that serves everyday needs of shoppers.

For manufacturers, it’s all about locking your shoppers into autopilot mode of picking your brand whenever they visit your category aisle.

Q: Unilever was your first employer. You almost didn’t make the cut, but something made them accept you. Can you share with our readers this story?

A: I’ve been turned down twice and only managed to get an interview on my third attempt. There will be moments in your life that you know clearly what you want, if you felt this, be persistent and never give up.

I thank Pong Ejercito and Perry Villa for giving me the chance as UST was not the usual school for Unilever to hire fresh graduates.

The only opening then was in sales and modern trade. Back then, most sales people wanted to be in general trade. The key is to make the most of what is given to you, give your best, work hard, stay humble.

Luckily, I managed to find excellent mentors like Joy Isla and Carl Cruz. We were able to build modern trade as the place to be, at the same time, were able to hire and mentor some of the most talented people. I am proud to say they are now senior managers and directors in Unilever and other companies.

Q: You were then managing some key accounts for Unilever when you made them proud by being part of the first batch of the Mansmith Young Market Masters Award (YMMA) in 2006. You won because, while most other entries were merely selling products, you created a unique store layout program for your major retailers, improving overall business for your key accounts. How did you conceive this idea?

A: Listening to your retailers and their shoppers is the key. I am actually from an industrial engineering background without any FMCG experience. My first assignment was Robinsons. They are a very progressive retailer and, back then, they wanted to promote and lead the category management practice in the Philippines. We partnered on a few categories and, along the way, we realized that we can fix the current space which may be over/under allocated to total store space. That’s where the store layout management concept was conceived—it was combining industrial engineering facility design and layout with sales data and how shoppers shop.

The concept further evolved with Carl Cruz (who now heads customer development in Unilever) to develop solution centers, which combines several categories to sell solutions rather than just products.

Creativity is a very interesting phenomenon. I always advise people to squeeze all your ideas in a project. Don’t hold back because, when you give your all, your creativity becomes stronger and next level thinking naturally comes.

Q: Can you share the most memorable shopper marketing project you have initiated for Unilever, Philips and Nielsen?

A: In Nielsen, it’s Shopper Lab, the first in the region. Right shopper research is about decoding behavior rather than basing it on interview. The shopper lab is the epitome of this philosophy. It combines leading edge technology like eye tracker to see what shopper sees, touch screen virtual store to observe what they do, and EEG neuroscience technology for what they ‘feel’. This was co-funded by the Singapore government, and the concept is exported out to developed markets like Australia.

For Philips, it was setting up the global shopper marketing organization. To be able to put shopper marketing on the global CEO’s agenda, I had to learn new skills like collaboration and building supporters across the entire organization globally.

For Unilever, it was the global repositioning of Ponds from mass to “masstige.” To support the dramatic change of the entire product range, we had to change 4,000+ beauty counters, upgrade the look and skills of 5,000 beauty advisers across all priority markets globally within 3 months. We discovered the shopper insight of how to give shoppers a premium experience without intimidating them. We applied this insight across everything we do—hired a French design house to drastically change our counters, worked with a New York-based Thai couture house that designed our beauty advisers’ uniforms, and partnered with Singapore airline trainers to ensure our beauty advisers were giving the best service in the industry.

Although Ponds already evolved after I left in 2008, I can still see the DNA in-store today.

Q: Can you briefly share some best and next practices for shopper marketing?

A: In terms of retailer and manufacturer collaboration, joint shopper project from insight to execution is the big thing. This enabled new kind of activities to the shop floor, retailers are becoming more open to co-branded activities because there is a supporting insight on why we should do things a certain way.

For manufacturers, reverse brand innovation is becoming common. Some new innovations today start from the shop floor—understanding what the issues are with shoppers, how do we change or reinforce certain behavior, and what innovation we can do to make this happen.

What’s next is category shopper marketing. A lot of shopper projects today are brand-based, saturation will happen soon on the retailers’ end. Retailers have to nominate the best category shopper champion to assist them help grow the total category based on their shoppers’ buying behavior.

Q: The store used to be the first moment-of-truth (FMOT) for shoppers while product use is known as the second (SMOT). Nowadays, the Internet has taken over as the early influencer (known as the ZMOT or the Zero moment-of-truth) of consumer’s perception and attitude about a brand. How is shopper marketing expected to change in the light of social media?

A: ZMOT is dependent on category. For some categories like electronics, plane tickets, hotel reservations, online is very big. For some companies, digital shopping is part of the shopper marketing portfolio. It’s just influencing buying behavior on a different channel. The key is all about understanding the search and buy behavior of shoppers in both click and brick channels and how best to influence them.

Q: In the Philippines, we don’t hear shopper marketing much. How do you see the potential of shopper marketing in the future?

A: Shopper marketing works best on developed markets as growth becomes harder. In the Philippines, grocery retailers are still getting a lot of growth by expansion and acquisition. Once they saturate this, shopper marketing is the key to generate the next level of growth phase. In other categories like luxury goods, where store expansions are limited and retailers are more concentrated, shopper marketing is already an inevitability.

The future belongs to those who can shape both consumption and buying habits in favor of their brand.

(The author is chair of marketing training firm Mansmith and Fielders Inc. and co-founder of Young Market Masters Awards [www.youngmarketmasters.com], now on its 10th annual search. For the complete interview, visit www.josiahgo.com.)

source: business.inquirer.net

Building your online community

MANILA, Philippines–Around 15 years ago, online customer engagement means making the customer sign a feedback form or join a topical conversation in online forums.

Then in 2004 Facebook was born and ushered in the era of Web 2.0 where “customers build your business for you”–a web as platform for users generating content in the form of ideas, text, videos, or pictures that could all be harnessed to create value.

Thus social platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest and YouTube dominate the sites of online community we know of today where users are king.

If you want to create an online community for your brand or company, Jason Cruz, Social Products Director for MRM/McCann, stresses the importance of having a clear idea of its objectives.

“The online community should create a center of communication expressing the brand’s messages, values and ideas; converse with consumers and brand fans in social media; and curate a community-sourced content,” Cruz reminds the students of Social Media Marketing 102 during a recent lecture in International Institute of Digital Marketing (IIDM).

In the Philippines, the most dominant platform is still Facebook with 34 million users, 22 millions of which access the site through mobile devices. Micro-site Twitter, one of the fastest social platforms globally and used extensively as community- and consumer-support, is slowly gaining ground with around 28 million users.

To run an online community successfully, you need a very good online community manager. It could be you, or a designated digital marketing pro. In any case, Cruz cites the following traits that he should have:

    Personality fits the brand’s desired social media persona;
    Tonality and language match the community members’;
    Deep understanding of the community and offline members;
    Deep understanding of anecdotal stories and community sentiments

Develop your skills in online community management with the Social Media Marketing Specialist Track of the Certified Digital Marketer Program.

Call 927-0096 or 0928-506-5382 or register at imadigitalmarketer.com.

source: technology.inquirer.net

Branding should ‘pull,’ not ‘push’

Within marketing circles—in the real rough and tumble world and the laboratory called MBA classes—strategies usually fall under “push” and “pull.”

In the same way that marketers have to choose between getting more market share by pricing low and increasing profit margin by pricing high, what marketing strategy to adopt is left to the judgment call of the chief marketing officer or no less than the CEO.

However, this book, “What Great Brands Do,” challenges many assumptions among marketing people.

Author Denise Lee Yohn dishes out earth-shaking ideas—like these: “ignore trends,” “don’t chase customers,” “sweat the small stuff” and “never give back.”

These are actually culled from the titles of the eight chapters that are full of success stories—many of which are inside track accounts of very successful brands. Yes, because they continue to perform well in the marketplace.

“Just Do It,” the long-running tagline of Nike is a highly successful branding statement. What’s behind its phenomenal success?

Yohn explains in the book: “Nike’s Wieden+Kennedy agency had a series of simple ads that showed athletes of all kinds doing what athletes do – sweating, straining, running and jumping… All of them spoke about what they do, and why they do it, followed by the on-screen invitation: “Just Do It.”

As the author narrates it, Scott Bedbury, Nike’s marketing chief in 1987, declared: “It is not about products; it is about a brand ethos.”

The point is to establish an “emotional connection” with all types of customers.

“We make our purchase decisions based on how products promise to make us feel,” says the author.

Another case involves Pampers, Europe’s top-selling disposable diaper that was rapidly losing its market share to a close competitor in 1997.

Pampers marketers convened focus groups—and one insight emerged.

Pampers was focusing on “dryness” and yet the mothers were more concerned about their babies’ “health and development.”

Yohn says it aptly: “The organization morphed from a narrow focus on product benefits to a broad focus on delighting moms and enhancing their babies’ ‘development.’”

Even Pampers’ office was transformed into having “baby-friendly color schemes.”

What business is our brand in?

Yohn advances this question – a question we at the Asian Institute of Management asked over 30 years ago, inspired by the ground-breaking article of Theodore Levitt published by Harvard.

Yohn says Levitt’s observation “made more than a half century ago, is more relevant today than ever.”

It is called “positioning.”

She asks: Are fast-food brands in the drive-through business or are they in the good-food-fast business?

Are airline companies in the transportation business or are they in the business-productivity business?

Before building our brand, she advises, the question “what business are you in” must first be settled. And don’t forget to “develop deeper, richer, stronger connections with customers and sustain their claims to strong and differentiated value propositions.”

Great brands challenge trends. Yohn has many market histories and examples to prove the point that getting out of the pack will spell success.

Oprah Winfrey did not follow trends, unlike Martha Stewart, Yohn reveals.

“Unlike many other talk shows, she took herself off the air when her show was still successful and one of the most effective branding platforms ever created,” she says.

She adds: The concept of not following the trend “is very similar to the ideas advanced in the seminal best-selling book “Blue Ocean Strategy.” “Companies grow best when they leave existing market spaces that are bloody with cut-throat competition (red oceans) and create instead uncontested market spaces (blue oceans).

Branding is also about not being afraid of polarizing your would-be customers.”

“Red Bull,” the strong drink that artists, journalists and truck drivers drink to keep them awake—had an equal number of customers who love it and customers who avoid it like a plague.

“If you stand for something, some people will love you and some will hate you,” said Thomas Grabner, then CEO of Kastner & Partners, Red Bull’s advertising agency.

The book values “customer experience” beyond a so-called great brand. What is the use of  a great brand when delivery is bad? “Sweat the small stuff,” says Yohn. Every detail is important.

“Your brand is a magnet,” she concludes.

It pulls, not pushes—and does much more besides making your customers love you. What’s true in real life, not pushing yourself, is true in the business world. The principles are actually LIFE principles.

dmv.communications@gmail.com

source: business.inquirer.net

Tips for effective e-mail marketing

MANILA, Philippines – In 1972, Ray Tomlinson invented the email while working for Bolt Beranek and Newman as one of ARPANET’s contractors. In 1975, John Vital created a software to organize emails and by 1976, the email had been equipped with features we use today. Throughout the years, its use for personal correspondence changed. Businesses tapped into it as a marketing tool and it continues to be an effective one at that, and so email marketing was born.

According to litmus.com, webmail opens increased to 25% with Gmail’s new feature of automatically enabling images. Exacttarget.com found in their study that the most preferred channel for delivering marketing messages is email. Bryan Wade, ExactTarget’s Senior Vice President of Content Marketing credits this preference to marketers giving consumers control in email marketing. Consumers trust brands that they’ll respect their preferences and receive information that’s relevant to them.

Now we know it’s the most preferred channel, the question is: are you doing it right? Here are a few tips for effective email marketing.

1. Double opt-in keeps the blacklist away

Internet Service Providers (ISPs) filter emails before it even reaches a consumer’s inbox. Triggering a 2nd opt-in email to confirm their subscription keeps you out of the blacklist.

 2. Keep a consistent “from address” and subject line

Keeping a consistent “from” name builds recognition and subscribers are comfortable to receiving emails from you. Recognizing you through your “from” name and subject lines make it less likely for them to add you in their spam list.

3. Email appearance is vital

In email marketing, aesthetics is just as important as content. Email Marketing is both an art and a science, a beautifully designed email affect different variables that contribute in consumer engagement and maximizes the potential of triggering a response.

4. Optimize your call-to-action (CTA)

Use captivating colors and graphics and enticing clicks for an effective call-to-action. You want subscribers to participate and engage with you so don’t be afraid to ask. Have a primary CTA on the upper left quadrant.

5. Remember the “F” Pattern

Be sure to put your logo and headline at the top of your email. Use the “F” pattern to your advantage by carefully positioning email content that’s easily understandable and accessible for your subscribers.

Whether it’s building brand awareness, offering discount & promos or sharing new information, email marketing is the way to go! Learn how to craft the perfect email with the CDM Program.

Register online at imadigitalmarketer.com or call 927-0096 / 09178967952 today!

 

source: technology.inquirer.net

Publicis, Omnicom merge to form world’s No.1 advertising group

PARIS — French advertising group Publicis and its US rival Omnicom will merge, bringing together the third and second largest firms in the sector to form the world’s advertising leader, the two companies announced Sunday.

The new company, dubbed the Publicis Omnicom Group, whose capital will be split 50-50 between the shareholders of the two firms, will be co-directed by the current bosses, Maurice Levy of Publicis and John Wren of Omnicom, a joint statement said.

source: business.inquirer.net

How to Make Money with an Online Store

One of the first things that comes to mind when many think of a home business is selling something. Setting up an online store can be a good way to earn money, especially since it is possible to do it by either selling your own goods, or becoming involved in drop shipping, so that it isn’t necessary to keep goods in stock.







No matter how you decide to run your online store, though, you need to give careful thought to how you set up your store, and how you market your goods.

3 Tips for Successfully Establishing Your Online Store

Establishing a successful online business requires planning and effort. Steve Chou runs Bumblebee Linens, a successful ecommerce store selling cloth napkins and mens handkerchiefs. Steve runs the store with his wife, and they made a profit of six figures in their first year, by carefully considering their target market — and how to market to that target.

Steve offered these three quick tips for setting up a successful online store:

1. Pick a product that is not readily available in stores.
2. Pick a product with an ambiguous dollar value. Stay away from brand name goods that are easy to comparison shop.
3. Pick a product that is timeless, and that will never become obsolete or go out of fashion.

When looking at Bumblebee Linens as a case study, you can see that Steve has followed his own advice. You can’t find handkerchiefs, especially those that are custom embroidered, easily in stores. Additionally, these types of handkerchiefs are hard to find, since they have an element of customization and personalization. The dollar value isn’t set. And, finally, a nice handkerchief is always acceptable as a momento, or a token, and a very fashionable addition to almost any occasion or special event.

But you don’t have to choose handkerchiefs. There are plenty of items that fit this description — especially if you are particularly good at making something hand-made, or if you can find a good wholesale price on something that isn’t available in the big box stores.

Making money with your online store starts with carefully considering what you will sell, and how you will get it to customers. You can use drop shipping to avoid keeping the items in stock yourself, or you can actually sell items that you keep with you, and arrange to ship them yourself. Steve is running an excellent course on running a profitable online business, if you are interested in starting your own online store I highly recommend this course.

Market Your Online Store

Of course, next you have to figure out how you are going to market your online store. People won’t buy what you’re selling if they don’t know about it. Some of the common ways to get the word out on your online store include:

1. Use an AdWords campaign to increase your visibility online.
2. Sign up with other ad networks and programs to help you place banners and ads on a variety of web sites.
3. Make use of social media by creating profiles on Facebook and Twitter.
4. Start a blog to draw traffic to your online store.
5. Encourage bloggers to help spread the word by offering an affiliate program that pays commissions.
6. Buy more traditional advertising in print, radio, and magazines (although this can become very expensive, very quickly).

Part of your marketing strategy has to include search engine optimization, though. An increasing amount of business online comes as a result of web searches. Your online store needs to show up in results when people are looking for the items you sell. This means that your product descriptions, tags, and other web page elements need to be optimized so that search engines can see that you are a good fit for a potential customer’s search.

source: financialhighway.com

Tips for Using an Email Marketing Platform

Besides phone calls, email is the most pragmatic method for computerized communication for businesses. Regardless of the size of the business, the use of email is practical and boosts productivity and time-efficiency. For online businesses, emailing is needed all the more. There are dozens, possibly hundreds, of email marketing platforms offering free emailing solutions for small business owners. This provides everyone the required leverage in order to succeed in the digital arena. Therefore it's vitally important that you, as a business owner, put your whole mental effort to choosing the right platforms. In the course of action, you have to be certain that the platform of your choosing shares the view of your farsighted goals for the business.

There are many considerations for ensuring you have the right platform, such as ease of use, amount of technology involved, comfort, stability, reach, troubleshooting and so on. Are you a DIY kind of guy who works hands-on and wants that everything he touches passes his personal level of scrutiny? Or perhaps you are the kind of businessman who'd rather spend his time in other more productive ventures and let his staff manage things for him? With email marketing platforms, you'd find that the position you're in is much the same. You'd end up deciding which is better: manually processing each email or using the comforts of automation.

In that regard, there are many email marketing platforms that compete to offer you the best service imaginable. There are a few who exaggerate and sell themselves more than necessary, but there are many that are true to their promises. GetResponse serves as a good example. Here are three major reasons by people choose this email marketing platform over others:

1. It is simple. Wise business owners know that there is value in simplicity. Ease of use is a direct benefit of a simple platform. With GetResponse, that simplicity is even supplemented by dozens of video instructions, saving its customers hours of reading.

2. GetResponse has fully automated features. Of course, there are other email marketing companies with similar features. But there are valid reasons why many people prefer GetResponse over the competition. Perhaps GetResponse offers better automated functionalities, better autoresponders and better everything. Additionally, they provide a thoroughly organized list of customers and prospects and mailing lists.

3. What's more is that GetResponse provides comprehensible marketing analytics, showing customers how efficiently their marketing strategy is performing. You can track events such as clicks, forward messages and more, all in one control panel. To make that easier, you can even download or access the data analytics on your mobile phone.

When you come to realize email marketing widens the reach of your business, you will be able to use it more wisely and take advantage of it to boost profitability. If you're still unconvinced about either GetResponse or email marketing itself, the only way to prove it is to test it.

Jeffrey Cheah is an online list building specialist. Discover how you can make money online as quickly as by visiting http://www.InboxCashToday.com where you can download your FREE copy of "Inbox Cash Techniques" now. It's only for a limited time!

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