Corporate Eye

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Archives for September 2013

Responsive Web Design for Brand Advertisers and Brand Publishers

responsive web designToday, consumers can look at websites on a wide variety of devices from traditional desktop computers to smartphones and tablets. In fact, comScore estimates that by 2017, tablet shipments to consumers will surpass desktop shipments. Already, mobile advertising makes up 41% of Facebook’s revenue and 25% of YouTube’s revenue. You can follow the link to learn more statistics that support a mobile-first strategy.

The world has gone mobile and brand advertisers and brand publishers need to prioritize mobile in all aspects of their business strategy. Responsive design is gaining in popularity, not just among small businesses and web publishers who need an affordable and easy-to-manage way to go mobile, but to large brands and publishers, too.

David Taintor of Adweek reports that brands like CNN, Mashable, The Boston Globe, and several Hearst brands (Harper’s Bazaar, Town and Country, and Road and Track) have already moved to (or are about to move to) responsive web design. Taintor cites a research study by Undertone, a digital ad network, which found that 53% of publishers who responded to the survey plan to move to responsive design within the upcoming year.

It’s not surprising that responsive design is gaining traction among businesses, publishers, and brands of all sizes around the world. Rather than managing multiple versions of a website, creating and maintaining mobile apps, and so on, a single responsive website can do it all at a fraction of the cost and with significantly fewer resource hours.

For brand advertisers, Taintor notes that responsive design has shown better mobile advertising opportunities. He explains, “Inherently, responsive sites place mobile ads front and center, rather than relegating them to the sidelines.”

I asked responsive design expert Jody Resnick, CEO of Trighton Interactive, to provide his opinions about responsive design for large brand advertisers and publishers. Here is what he had to say:

With the proliferation of so many types of devices of varying screen sizes, responsive design solves a multitude of problems for large brands and publishers alike. First, it enables them to manage only one website that looks the same no matter what device someone is using and to work with only one set of analytics.

Secondly, and probably more important for big brands and publishers, is that responsive websites allow companies to have cross-screen analytics directly integrated into ads so they can determine the ideal size of ads as well as visitors’ geographic location, device, and type of use. More and more big brands and publishers like Time, USA Today, and Smashing Magazine are going responsive and using analytics to improve advertising on their websites and increase their advertising revenues.

Responsive also means responding to different user states based on the available data. Publishers must determine what state of mind the user is in to provide effective advertising. Are users accessing your site while standing in line somewhere? Are they home relaxing? Are they traveling? Location and activity play a big part in the relevancy of ads and how engaged a user will become. With data from responsive websites, understanding the user experience and responding to it is easier than with multiple, device-specific websites.

Responsive design represents a significant opportunity for both brand advertisers and brand publishers. Have you considered it for your brand yet? Leave a comment below and share your thoughts.

Image: Trighton.com

Lands’ End Responds to Gmail Tabs

mouse arrow clickWhen Google launched Gmail Tabs in June, brand marketers had reason to be concerned. Suddenly, email marketing messages were automatically removed from the inbox that Gmail users see when they open their email accounts. Instead, email marketing messages were moved from the Primary Tab to a separate Promotions Tab. Gmail users need to click on that Promotions Tab in order to see and read brand email messages.

At first, reports showed that the introduction of Gmail Tabs didn’t have a significant effect on email marketing message open rates. However, once the “shiny new toy” effect passed, reports showed the opposite is true. Open rates have gone down for email marketing messages since Gmail Tabs came on the scene.

What’s a brand to do? Lands’ End hopes that making customers feel like they’re missing something is the answer.

In a promotional email message sent to Lands’ End marketing email subscribers last week, Land’s End used a message subject line that cleverly taps into consumers’ emotions. The subject line warned customers to, “Move us to Primary and never miss another deal!” It’s safe to assume that most consumers who have opted in to receive Lands’ End promotional email messages won’t want to miss a great deal from the brand they love. This is a great subject line that is highly relevant to the target audience and includes a clear call to action.

When recipients clicked through to view the full Lands’ End email message, the copy clarifies the problem for customers and shows them how easy it is to make sure they don’t miss any great deals from the brand. The copy read:

Gee… missing something? With Gmail’s new inbox settings, your landsend.com emails will end up in the “Promotions” Tab. Which means you may miss our announcements on new arrivals and savings events. It’s an easy fix!

The copy goes on to provide two simple steps to move Lands’ End email messages to the Gmail Primary Tab and those steps even include a screenshot, so consumers clearly understand exactly what they need to do. Those steps tell recipients to:

  1. Open the Promotions Tab, click on the Lands’ End email, and drag it into the Primary Tab.
  2. When asked if you want future LandsEnd.com emails to go directly to your Primary Tab, click “Yes.”

Of course, recipients could always move Lands’ End email messages back to the Promotions Tab in the future, but they could also unsubscribe. The important point is that brand marketers need to remind consumers of how the brand’s email messages can benefit them so they’re motivated to move those messages to their Gmail Primary Tab. Remember, all Gmail users are not tech savvy, so as Lands’ End did, be sure to explain how to move your brand email messages to the Primary Tab. Don’t assume they can do it without some help.

Have you asked your subscribers to move your brand email messages to the Primary Tab yet?

Image: Leonardo Barbosa

Filling the House: Guaranteeing Good Event Attendance

crowd students at recruitment event
It’s tough to walk through any university campus without spotting at least some flyer, poster or even a live event demonstrating how competitive the graduate job market is at the moment. Though this isn’t ideal for the student population, it’s great news for companies; selecting top talent is obviously much easier if you’ve got a large pool to choose from and there’s definitely a self-perpetuating atmosphere of stiff competition surrounding the big recruiters.

However, until the recruitment process actually starts, the stories are little more than hearsay for students. Gauging how tough getting that job really is only starts to happen when students start to attend recruitment events and to really get a feel for the market. So, if you want to generate a competitive buzz around your business, your events need to be filled to the brim with top students…

Use Every Channel to Advertise

Even in our electronic world, the effect of a cleverly designed poster is still massive, but it’s easily forgotten. You need to back up what’s already been seem with emails, bulletins and your own social media. The Facebook event is quite possibly the most powerful reminder out there and will trigger wavering attendees into action.

Do be careful not to over-advertise, however; it’s a fine line between making your event publicised and becoming a nuisance. Constantly driving for attendees via University bulletins or through societies could also seem like you’re struggling to make the numbers.

Go Exclusive

Though most events do have some limitations on numbers, presentations, dinners and lectures are usually a case of the more; the merrier. However, a free-for-all approach won’t necessarily guarantee you good numbers; an exclusive system can work much better.

Limiting your event to ticket holders only is a good way of ensuring numbers are high. You don’t even need to operate a formal, paper ticket system. A guest list which requires an online-sign in needs little more than an iPad on the night, but remember it’s worth keeping some guest spaces available.

Exploiting Word-of-Mouth

It’s an old marketeers cliche that the ‘word-of-mouth’ is still the best tool out there, but it’s wrong to assume people will talk by themselves; give them something to shout about! Encouraging guests to bring along talented friends or incentivising Facebook attendees to invite others is a good start if it’s backed up with a good reward!

Finally, it’s worth remembering your best bet for guaranteeing good attendance is to hold a top-quality, innovative event. No amount of marketing can beat organising something that people really want to attend!

Do You Trust Your Social Media?

students-mobile
Students are burdened with a lot of stereotypes and though some of them are most definitely true, many of them are just myths. Aside from the obvious, students are well known for being one of the brightest, most tech-savvy groups in society. Any lecture theatre in the UK will be full of tablets, ultra-thin laptops and, yes, plenty of smartphones all online, almost all connected simultaneously to Twitter, Facebook and multiple e-mail accounts, collectively downloading more information than was being downloaded from the lecturer.

It was surprising, then, to see the results of a survey conducted by a top student forum, The Student Room, that claimed that students don’t find university social media particularly trustworthy or especially useful when compared to emails, meetings or university newsletters. Given that the average university is planning to increase spending on social media by 60%, it’s a worrying thought and it’s a problem for all those looking to attract attention to recruitment by social media.

A part of the difficulty is that undergraduates, as do all of us, consume social media at a remarkable rate. The smartphone allows us to flick through maybe two hundred Twitter updates in less than thirty seconds and there’s almost no possibility of saving or flagging a particular tweet for later: it demands our attention and it wants it now! This ever-changing environment makes it extremely hard to relate what we see and consume online to an actual real-world process.

We also know how easy it is to update a social media account; it takes about ten seconds and one individual. As opposed to a thoughtful, composed email that has most likely been checked by other members of your recruitment department, it’s too easy to assume that information posted on social networking sites is due to be updated and amended at a laster date or, worse, just inaccurate.

Because of this, we struggle to treat important information exclusively posted on social media sites with the seriousness it deserves. Whether that’s a call for applications or the announcement of an office open day, we consume it and we forget about it almost immediately. It’s no surprise that even students, the great experts of social media in our generation, are struggling to trust what goes up on social media sites.

Of course, there’s no need for this to be a limitation to your social media use. So long as your feeds link to permanent, official and accurate corporate web capital with, preferably, an RSS subscription for updates, you can ensure that social media is just another way of getting to the final message, without being a goal in itself. This takes away the content from your transient Twitter feed and confidently sets it in web-based stone, there to be checked, used and revised for as long as it’s needed.

Social Identities and Social Logins – What Brand Marketers Need to Know

social loginLast week, I published an article on the Corporate Eye blog about using big data to generate revenue.  I cited the growing need to implement social logins whenever possible as explained in a white paper from Gigya:

“Users who log in to a website using an existing social identity are essentially granting that website permission to access their first-party social data such as full name, interests, education, social connections, email address, location, and more.”

However, simply saying that brand marketers need to implement social logins in order to collect data about consumer behaviors that can be turned into targeted campaigns isn’t enough. Let’s take a closer look at how trends in online behavior are driving the need for more brand marketers to implement social logins.

In an infographic published by Gigya recently, which is shown below, you can find key data about social logins and social sharing that reveal how behavior trends are changing. According to the data, more than one out of two social logins are performed through Facebook, but Google+ is catching up quickly with nearly one out of four social logins coming through Google’s social network. Google+ is closing the gap even more quickly in specific categories. For example, fewer than one in two social logins are performed through Facebook on media and publishing sites while greater than one in four social logins on those sites are done through Google+.

Gigya points out that Google+ social logins are driven at least in part by mobile consumers who log into sites on their Android devices using branded apps from the Google Play store. However, it’s also interesting that Gigya notes the players in the social login space aren’t limited to social networks. Amazon is expected to become a brand to watch in this space in the near future.

It’s interesting to note that despite the growth of Google+ social logins, social sharing is still very limited on Google+ when compared to Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.

You can see all of the data in the infographic below. The lesson to learn is simple. At the very least, marketers should already be investigating how to implement social logins on their branded sites.

Source: Gigya

Image: Vangelis Thomaidis

One Step Closer to Pinterest Advertising

pins for pinterestThere are over 70 million people around the world using Pinterest, a site that debuted just a few years ago. Given the site’s rapid growth and massive size, it’s not surprising Pinterest announced this week that it would start testing promoted pins as a way to generate ad revenue.

As CEO Ben Silbermann explained in a blog post on the Pinterest blog, “It’s important that Pinterest is a service that will be here to stay. To help make sure it does, we’re going to start experimenting with promoting certain pins from a select group of businesses.”

At launch, Pinterest will test promoting pins in search results and category feeds, but Silbermann points out that his team hasn’t figured out how the entire process will work. In fact, no one is paying Pinterest for promoted pins yet. Furthermore, Silbermann explains that his team doesn’t want promoted pins to damage the user experience on Pinterest. To that end, Silberman explains in his blog post that his team is working to ensure that promoted pins will be:

  • Tasteful. No flashy banners or pop-up ads.
  • Transparent. We’ll always let you know if someone paid for what you see, or where you see it.
  • Relevant. These pins should be about stuff you’re actually interested in, like a delicious recipe, or a jacket that’s your style.
  • Improved based on your feedback. Keep letting us know what you think, and we’ll keep working to make things better.

Given the fact that the vast majority of Pinterest users are women, a coveted audience for brand marketers, promoted pins could be a significant opportunity to brands in a long list of categories. Silbermann explained that users will start seeing promoted pins which are relevant to their searches very soon. For example, a user who searches for children’s birthday party theme ideas could see a promoted pin for invitations or decorations from a greeting card brand or party supply company.

Until now, Pinterest didn’t have an advertising platform, and whether users are happy about the introduction of promoted pins or not, two things are certain. First, Pinterest needs to generate revenue if it wants to stay around for the long term, and advertising is the most logical place to start. Second, brands should pay close attention because Pinterest advertising could be an excellent opportunity to get in front of targeted audiences, particularly female audiences whom research shows make or influence the vast majority of purchase decisions.

Image: Jeffrey Collingwood