Online Marketing for Marketers

The need for ROI-based online marketing will be ever greater in 2009 as financials types will be scrutinizing every marketing dollar and looking for cuts.  As I’m sure you know, marketing is one of the first to get some budget shaving—but of course your sales people are still looking for fresh leads in the pipeline and they’re expecting you to help. 

If you have not fully embraced online lead generation and cost-per-lead (CPL) programs now is the time.  The era of email list rental and blasting as an online lead acquisition tool is nearing an end.  The vast majority of your outbound email winds up in spam boxes or get deleted.  Media (both print and online) companies have had it good by renting email names at high rates and guaranteeing no results.  It is time to ask them to do business in a new way.  Read more

If you are like most of my clients, you are confused about what your paid search advertising budget should be. I created a simple tool you can use to determine a profitable budget. A link to the free tool is provided at the end of this article. But first, let’s review some basic budget setting concepts.
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Ok, perhaps the headline is a bit overdramatic, but the point here is that companies tend to focus far too much on staying within a set budget line for their online initiatives to the detriment of driving an acceptable amount of qualified traffic. This common, albeit myopic, tactic will drive marketers right out of a job.

Any promotion campaign – but particularly online ones – must first and foremost deliver returns for a company’s investment. This is where the true value of such initiatives lies; if they bear sizeable fruit, it would stand to reason that an organization should look at putting more resources toward them, and consider going over budget to capitalize on their full potential. That isn’t to say that corporations need to write a blank check to advertising outlets, but it does mean that adherence to an arbitrary dollar figure should not come at the expense of customer growth and market share. Doing so leaves significant money on the table. Read more

With the volatility in the economy these days, marketers are being held more accountable for the dollars being spent online. Quality has replaced quantity, and getting your arms around the ROI from each campaign is a much more pressing issue. Fortunately, given a proper strategy, marketers can obtain the tools needed to help them spend wiser.

Developing a campaign tracking strategy is a common challenge for organizations. However, this strategy is fundamental to the success of your campaign analysis. A campaign that is tagged improperly will yield incomplete data which negates a marketer’s ability to track ROI and often leaves marketers with unanswered questions about their campaigns. Educated guesses need to be replaced with data-driven decisions as it pertains to what works and what doesn’t as you embark down the path of campaign optimization. Read more

ROI. They want to see it from us. CEOs, COOs, clients. They want and they expect us to show ROI. Not in click-throughs. Not in press releases picked up. Not in web site or blog hits. ROI means return on investment. Investment is measured in dollars and cents. So is ROI. So why do so many of us respond with things such as: Read more

So, I am sitting here looking through the latest B2B magazine, BtoB’s Best 2008 and a thought strikes me, How come “return on investment” or “campaign success metrics” don’t matter enough to report on?

At a time when the economy is tightening every day, our clients want quantifiable results. They are watching every dollar spent and demanding that we measure the return on each. Yet, almost 30% of the issue is all about the “Best Creative” - with no mention on the success of any of the campaign. More interestingly, the issue hi-lites the tops Brands, Marketers and Creative - nothing about the most successful campaigns based on their return. Read more

Yesterday’s  Association of National Advertisers’ CMO Rountable comprised of Gary Elliott, Vice President, Hewlett-Packard Company; John Harrobin, SVP, Marketing & Digital Media, Verizon Communications; Becky Saeger, Executive Vice President and CMO, Charles Schwab Company, Inc, Steve Sullivan Senior Vice President, Liberty Mutual revealed some real insight into where the minds atop the major brands of America are, if you could read between the lines.   Here are some of the ideas shared that I thought we’re most interesting as it relates to Fear, Faith and Ignorance at the top… Read more

Your brand benefits from a job well done. If you understand what your brand is, you will appreciate the fact that every effort you make in your business environment has an impact on your brand. If you are still a little puzzled over what “brand” is, simply consider it your reputation. Every element in your business culture has a role in building your brand. Challenges to your business are also challenges to your brand. Read more

Last June and July, the LA Times featured a few articles on internet marketing and spend.

Spending on online advertising surpasses TV, report says   …it’s growing so fast that in 2008 it is projected to surpass ad spending on TV, radio and movies combined for the first time ever.  Further, in another article: “In times of economic strain, marketers and agencies are under more pressure to prove their results,” he said. On the Web, advertisers know how many people clicked on their ads and how many people ignored them. That’s tougher to prove in, say, something like radio.  …Lest you think about abandoning your job and going to work in online advertising, here’s one note of caution: Spending on Internet advertising actually dropped slightly for the first time in 13 quarters. Read more

31 Days of the Dragon

In early 2008 HP launched a new laptop that they dubbed ‘The Dragon’. It is a beast, weighing 15lbs, with a 20.1” HD ready screen, dual TV tuners, blue ray DVD and (2) 250GB hard drives and oh yea, Vista Ultimate. The go-to-market price was in the neighborhood of $4,800. Sales were flat out of the gate. Really? What a surprise. I could hang a 60” plasma on the wall for that kind of cash. 

HP employed the traditional advertising media against the launch initially, web, television etc. Still sales were flat. Several months after the product launch HP turned to a social media marketing firm, Buzz Corps Inc. for help. Buzz Corps developed a social media campaign to promote the product through a competition administered through 31 techie blog sites. Each site was assigned a day of the month for their contest over the 31 days.

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