by Fronetics | Oct 26, 2016 | Big Data, Blog, Content Marketing, Data/Analytics, Marketing
Big-data insights can help you segment your email database to better target prospects based on where they are in the buyers’ journey.
Most companies these days are swimming in a sea of big data, the great swaths of information they’ve amassed from sales records, social media connections, website leads and contacts, and online analytics.
At first glance it’s a tangle of information that is hard to organize and even harder to learn anything from. That’s a stumbling block that forward-looking businesses need to overcome. Big data can help breathe new life into one of the most reliable yet shopworn tools of the trade: email campaigns.
Embrace Big Data
A study by the executive head-hunting firm Spencer Stuart surveyed 171 companies regarding big-data usage. Just a little over half of the companies used their big data to help guide email, SEO, and SMS marketing campaigns. That’s a fairly low rate, given the potential leg-up that big data can provide.
Consider what Walmart is doing. The company has big-data information on about 60% of all Americans, with which it micro-targets customers based on their individual interests and habits. It’s a powerful strategy that is spreading quickly to businesses of all sizes.
How can you use big data to freshen up your email campaigns?
Be a Collector, Not a Hoarder
Chances are, you are obtaining a lot of data, especially if you have an active content marketing plan in place. Not all of the data you get is equally important. Your focus should be on data that can lead to an actionable and quick response — for example, are you gathering information on your customers’ buying habits? Do you know who they are, where they are, what their interests are, what their email address is, and how your business connects with them?
Collect that relevant data and study it. Much of it will come from the buyer’s journey — the breadcrumbs that potential buyers leave for you in your big data. These pieces of information are keys to your personalized email responses.
Respond In Kind
Most experts agree that a quick and targeted email response is a good strategy for encouraging a new customer to make a purchase. The email needs to respond directly to the buyer’s interests — using information you’ve (hopefully) logged with your big data.
From this point on, it’s crucial to make sure that every email that is sent to that buyer is built around a backbone of big data. Nurture your customers with personalized emails that offer content and deals that line up with their specific interests.
Don’t Mess with the Masses
Mass emails — the generic sales pitch email — used to be the cost-effective and simple way of reaching and converting customers. Now, it’s more than likely they’ll get sent to the trash, or worse, the spam filter. The mass email is your one-way ticket to spam purgatory.
“Traditional methods of mass marketing doesn’t resonate anymore and they’re being ignored by the audience,” said Volker Hildebrand, Global Vice President of Strategy at SAP Hybris, in a recent interview with Forbes. “Data is the fuel for customer engagement, and being able to pull together all the relevant information about in real-time.”
You can do better than the mass email approach. If you’ve collected relevant data and you’ve studied your buyers’ journeys, you have the tools in place to build a smart email campaign. Tailor your campaign to personalize your approach to your customers, and more than likely they’ll open that email.
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by Fronetics | Sep 22, 2016 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Supply Chain
Companies in the supply chain and logistics industries should take note of these 19 content marketing trends.
Joe Pulizzi of the Content Marketing Institute recently revealed his predictions for the biggest trends in content marketing for 2017. As the leader of CMI, Pulizzi dedicates much of his time discussing where content marketing is heading with enterprise marketers around the world.
Since 88% of B2B marketers use content marketing as a part of their marketing programs, you’ll likely see some of these trends and issues arising among your competitors, your clients, and, ideally, your company in the near future. As you start to strategize for next year and beyond, be sure to consider these ideas in your supply chain marketing plans.
Creation of a real content marketing strategy
We can’t say it enough: Organizations that have a documented content marketing strategy are more likely to be successful than those that don’t. You would never operate a business without 1) creating a strategy, 2) documenting it, 3) following the strategy, and you should feel the same way about your marketing plan. Here are a few resources to get you started:
Native advertising
Native advertising is a paid, content-based promotion delivered in stream, within the same format as the channel the reader (or viewer) is using. Think of sponsored updates on LinkedIn, which look just like regular posts, or when a radio DJ promotes a product within the regular broadcast. I’ll be writing more about native advertising in the coming months and how the supply chain might use this opportunity as part of their content marketing efforts.
Influencer marketing
Forbes describes influencer marketing as, “A nonpromotional approach to marketing in which brands focus their efforts on opinion leaders, as opposed to direct target market touchpoints.” Basically, highly visible people become brand advocates by employing your products or services in their everyday lives. There are earned influencers, influential people who use your product regularly because they like it. And there are paid influencers, who receive compensation for using certain brands. More to come on this topic as well.
Purpose-driven marketing
Companies can appeal to a target audience by promoting their shared interest in a worthy cause through content. Examples from the supply chain include these six companies that are doing well by doing good.
Video and Visual
Video is not just for funny cats and cover artists anymore — it’s the most popular form of content being consumed online. Smart marketers are developing a visual storytelling strategy that offers consistent delivery of valuable content. Consider how your business might utilize features like Facebook Live or channels like YouTube.
Snapchat
Yes — Snapchat. Before you roll your eyes, check out this convincing article, Why Snapchat Will Be Great for B2B Companies, by Gary Vaynerchuk of Vayner Media. Keep your eyes on this social media platform in the coming year.
Facebook
One thing about Facebook you can count on is that it will always be evolving and adding features to keep up with user preferences. Also, Pulizzi is convinced businesses can do better when it comes to promoting content on this platform. Companies should keep a close eye on what’s to come with Facebook in the near future and how organizations are using it to distribute content and generate leads.
Teams and workflow
Take a good look at content production in your organization. Do blog posts go unedited? Are projects frequently late? Is your team clear about who needs to approve what? A strategic, consistent way to track and complete content-based projects can help streamline production and improve efficiency — not to mention quality.
Content strategy (pipes and process)
Developing a strategy that helps your organization scale its content-production efforts, re-purpose existing content across multiple channels, and properly leverage user experience and technology is key to content marketing success.
Mobile
Google announced in May 2015 that the number of searches on mobile devices has now surpassed those conducted on desktops in the U.S. And we know that reality isn’t limited to personal internet use. Evidence suggests B2B buyers are increasingly using mobile devices to do research, make inquiries, and purchase products. If your website and marketing emails aren’t mobile-friendly, your company is missing out the significant share of customers who demand mobile-optimized content. Try these tips:
Content technology
The marketing software market is expected to grow to more than $32.3 billion by 2018. The number of options companies have is almost blinding. Count on content technology to continue to demand a lot of attention — and, potentially, financial resources — in the next few years.
Writing
Josh Bernoff’s recent article in the Harvard Business Review hits the nail on the head: Bad Writing is Destroying Your Company’s Productivity. In a vast sea of crappy content, superior writing and storytelling can make your business stand out, win customer’s trust, and earn new business. Here are some resources:
Integration with sales
Integrating your sales and marketing teams is one of the most impactful ways to leverage content to gain new customers. For example, merging one of our clients’ sales and marketing databases to improve team communications played an important role in helping the company increase new business by 30%.
ROI and measurement
Making a business case for content marketing is one of the top priorities for the majority of B2B marketers year after year. Check out these resources:
Email and marketing automation
Marketing automation can expand your content’s impact, improve conversion rates, generate leads, and drive repeat purchases. Additionally, it can remove cumbersome manual tasks from your content workflow, freeing up your resources to add value to other, more meaningful tasks. Pulizzi says an expert recently revealed to him that companies are utilizing approximately only 10% of the functionality behind marketing automation — meaning, there’s much room for improvement in this area.
Content distribution and promotion
Even the best, most valuable content is worthless if it fails to reach your target audience. Companies are now focusing on the strategic distribution of their content assets to ensure their success.
Executive buy-in
Earning C-suite support for content marketing is a challenge for many marketers in the supply chain and logistics industries. See “ROI and measurement” above for some resources to support your efforts to win executive buy-in.
Global integration
Organizations and their supply chains continue to become more complex and global in scale. This can put a strain on communication, processes, meeting customer needs and expectations, etc. Content marketing strategies should account for the challenges of global operations.
Construction of a media organization
Pay attention to the recent flux of organizations purchasing media companies or properties to become media enterprises. Microsoft’s purchase of LinkedIn comes to mind, as well as Arrow Electronics’ acquisition of a number of technical and media properties from UBM.
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by Fronetics | Aug 29, 2016 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Manufacturing & Distribution, Marketing, Strategy, Supply Chain, Warehousing & Materials Handling
Fronetics designed a content marketing strategy that helped the logistics software company realize increases in new business and sales revenue.
Your company is doing pretty well. You have a nice website and a social media account or two. And you’ve experienced year-over-year growth. Why would you do anything differently?
Just ask TotalTrax, a provider of real-time vehicle, driver, and inventory tracking technologies for manufacturing and warehouse operations. Despite a decade of positive growth, the company realized there were many untapped opportunities for new business. So the TotalTrax team hired Fronetics Strategic Advisors to create and implement a new, data-driven marketing strategy that could increase web traffic, lead generation, and brand awareness.
After a comprehensive audit of TotalTrax’s digital assets, Fronetics was able to recommend a course of action and implement a multi-channel content marketing program. The program included such steps as:
- Creating a blog and posting regular targeted content
- Consistently posting on TotalTrax’s social media accounts
- Implementing paid search, email marketing, and other strategies
After just 24 months, TotalTrax realized significant gains in web traffic, lead generation and nurturing, and — most importantly — new business and sales revenue.
To learn more about how content marketing helped TotalTrax grow business, download our case study below.
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by Fronetics | Aug 18, 2016 | Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing, Strategy
Transactional emails offer prime real estate for driving further customer engagement or action.
Your business probably invests a lot of time and effort creating marketing emails to send to your prospects and consumers. But have you thought much about the content of your confirmation and thank you emails?
New findings from IBM Marketing Cloud’s 2016 Email Marketing Metrics Benchmark Study suggest you should. The survey “examines messages sent by nearly 750 companies and 3,000 brands in 2015, using a wide variety of measurements to establish benchmarks on customer engagement (via multiple open, click, and device/email client metrics) and list churn (hard bounces, unsubscribes, and complaints).”
One important finding relates to how recipients engage with transactional emails, messages confirming a purchase or an action (such as signing up for a newsletter). In almost every respect, transactional emails outperform non-transactional emails. For example:
- Transactional emails generate roughly 2x the open rates of non-transactional emails.
- Transactional emails generate roughly 3x the click-through rates of non-transactional emails.
This should not be a surprise, since these emails are based directly on a person’s purchase or action. But what many companies don’t realize is that these messages represent an opportunity to drive further customer engagement or action. Adding a prominent call to action can encourage the recipient to join your email list, make an additional purchase, or otherwise move further down the purchase path.
Instead of a simple “Thanks for your purchase!” email, put a little thought into how you might keep that person interacting with your business. Here are a few ideas:
1) Ask them to review their purchases.
Include a link to the recipient’s account or orders page. This gets them back on your website, where you can add additional calls to action, advertise related products, or encourage them to join a loyalty program.
2) Offer an incentive for future purchases.
Encourage recipients to buy again soon by providing a discount code for their next transaction. This also helps build brand loyalty by showing customers you value their business and want them to come back.
3) Request they follow you on social media.
Provide links to your various social media accounts to build additional touch points with your customers and prospects. Suggest they post photos of themselves using the products they purchased, share their purchase (or link to the newsletter sign-up, etc.) with their followers, or enter your contest or giveaway happening on these platforms.
4) Show them how to use their purchase.
Link to content that can improve their experience with the product or service they just bought. Step-by-steps guides, how-to videos, images of other buyers using the product: give them valuable support to improve their user experience and to keep them engaged with your content.
5) Display similar or related products.
What else do customers buy when they make the same purchase? Do you have other products or services that go along with it? For example, someone buying a hammer might also be interested in nails, toolboxes, or screwdrivers.
6) Ask them to join your loyalty or rewards program.
This is another way to offer incentives for future purchases and exclusive access to deals while your business gains additional information about the person.
7) Request they sign up for your newsletter, join your email list, or subscribe to your blog.
Encourage them to stay in the loop by opting into your content. You’ll stay in the sights of potential buyers that aren’t ready to make a purchase, and be on their mind when the time comes to buy.
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by Fronetics | Aug 8, 2016 | Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing, Strategy
B2B marketers who meet more often to discuss and evaluate their content marketing strategy report success at much higher rates than those that meet less frequently.
Do you feel your content marketing is producing results? Only 30% of B2B marketers say they feel effective, and a shocking 55% admit they do not actually know what content marketing success looks like.
If this sounds familiar, take a note from the most effective B2B marketers: Meeting more often can improve content marketing performance.
Another meeting? Say yes for success
We all have been guilty of thinking, “Great. Another meeting to squeeze into my schedule.” But the B2B Content Marketing 2016: Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends – North America found some interesting correlations between content marketing effectiveness and frequency of meeting. For instance:
Meeting daily or even weekly improves content marketing results.
61% of the most effective B2B marketers meet daily or weekly with their content marketing team, either virtually or in person.
Meeting more often is time well spent.
Teams that meet daily or weekly find the meetings to be more valuable (70% of respondents) than those who meet less often — like biweekly or monthly (49%). But, only 36% of the content marketing professionals surveyed met once per week, and only 8% met daily. And you guessed it: Those were the teams that reported having the most success with their content marketing.
Meeting strategies
There is more to success than simply holding a meeting, of course. Time spent around the conference table is not going to bring results unless you are asking the right questions with keeping eyes on your content strategy.
What are the new challenges the team is facing? What is happening in the news or industry that might affect or interest your audience? How is your audience responding to recent content? There must be more to regular meetings than coffee and bagels.
Equally important is ensuring the team has a clear vision of your goals and benchmarks. The greater the team’s understanding of what success looks like — clearly defined objectives, expectations, and your content marketing goals — the more effective they can be at their job.
Things to discuss about your content strategy:
- Purpose: What is the goal or objective the team is striving for from content marketing efforts? More leads and increased brand recognition are common examples.
- Audience: Who is your target audience, and what are their needs, interests, and concerns? Where do they consume content (e.g., LinkedIn, blogs)? When do they visit those channels?
- Tactics: What platforms are you using for distribution, and how do they work together? Is there an email campaign as well as daily Facebook, Twitter and Instagram posts, for example? Are images important for results?
General discussions to include:
- Open-topic communication: Tap into knowledge from all members of the team to generate ideas, information, and data for content creation. Open discussion can bring insight and fresh angles of approach.
- Ways to improve and reach objectives: Fresh ideas are as important to the team as fresh content. What could you be doing better? Should you be measuring something that you’re not? Are there new technologies or tools that you should try? Every team member should have a voice in how to best execute or improve your content strategy.
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