Jul 11 2024
START Planning Steps To Develop Your Digital Marketing Success Plan – S For Strategy via @sejournal, @coreydmorris

This excerpt is from The Digital Marketing Success Plan, the new book from SEJ VIP Contributor Corey Morris.

In what is the most distracted and disrupted era in digital marketing–especially SEO–history, we’re testing and trying things out faster than ever. While change is coming at us fast, it is critically important to still have a documented, actionable, and accountable plan for your digital marketing efforts.

In his new book, Corey Morris, details a five-step START Planning process to help brands arrive at their own digital marketing success plans to ensure ROI and business outcomes are at the heart of every effort while allowing plenty of room and agility for the rapid changes we’re experiencing in digital and search marketing.

Search Engine Journal has an exclusive feature of the first step in the START Planning process–”S for Strategy”–unpacking the four steps in this first and most critical phase.

Chapter 3: S For Strategy

The Strategy Phase is the most comprehensive part of the START planning process. The subsequent phases are all dependent on the work done and defined in this phase.

Strategy works through profiling, auditing, research, and goal setting. Knowing what marketing has been done in the past, where things stand currently, and—most importantly—where you want to go is critical at this juncture and overall for any digital marketing success plan.

The strategy phase has four steps, the first of which is profile. This could be considered a simple step, as we’re just gathering information and definitions.

However, it could also be misinterpreted, and it is challenging because it requires an expert to ask the right questions. That includes detailing the team involved in the effort and defining the product (services) we must sell, the brand, and the target audiences.

In short, we’re putting the details on the table about who we are, our resources, and our capabilities. We are identifying what we’re selling, what value it has, how we deliver it, and the pricing model. We also must know what our brand is in terms of positioning, differentiation, and equity that it holds.

And, as important as anything, we must know who our target audience personas are, their customer behaviors, and the funnels or journeys they take to buy.

Anyone can ramble off some demographics or targets. But, as companies grow, having a mutually agreed understanding of what the business sells, who it sells to, and the money it costs to do so is extremely hard.

I say all of this in hopes that you don’t get stuck here on some of the hard details, and also knowing that if it is easy, you might want to challenge some things and see if you can go deeper and ensure that you truly have the agreement and buy-in that you seem to.

The second step in the strategy phase is audit. We need to know what we’ve done in the past and are currently doing so we have a full picture of what has worked, what hasn’t, and why. Audits are important at this juncture, and this step might be one of the most time-consuming in the entire digital marketing success plan development journey.

As you obtain or create documentation of historical activities, you’ll need access to all the past and present networks and platforms. Then, you can deep dive into audits, including technical paid search, technical SEO, content SEO, web systems, email marketing systems, and more, based on what has been done in the past and what is available for you at this juncture.

The third step in the strategy phase is research. So far, the focus has been on who we are and what we’ve done leading up to where we currently stand with our efforts. This phase is where we get perspectives beyond our own data and understanding.

This is where we seek out internal perspectives from marketing, sales, ops, product, and other relevant teams and stakeholders—as well as from our customers or clients. Additionally, we’re doing external research to learn new insights or validate what we think when it comes to competitors, target audiences, and what the future opportunity forecasts or models out for us.

The final step in strategy is goals. With a thorough picture of who we are, where we stand, and what opportunities are out there for us, we can workshop to arrive at a realistic set of goals. Maybe we came into the process with our own goals, or maybe at this point, we’re starting from scratch.

Regardless, this step is critical to the rest of the process and arriving at a plan that can drive success. This is where we look at business goals and how marketing can affect them and ensure we set proper expectations before we move the strategy from ideas to action.

“WE HAVE A PROBLEM” Premium Roofing Manufacturer Story

A high-end roofing manufacturing company came to us with a unique problem. Marcy, their marketing manager, had a lot of past success with SEO, their website and email marketing, and extensive campaigns driving traffic to their websites for homeowners and contractors alike–fueling their sales operations.

Marcy had gone through several different agencies over the past few years. She had varying experiences with them, had a great one for a while, and then had a couple that didn’t value or know as much about SEO. She didn’t realize that, at the time, it was a line item to some of those agencies. It was getting done, and rankings and traffic were fine. Nothing was sticking out of the ordinary.

One day, Marcy noticed a problem in Google Analytics. Traffic is starting to drop overall. She dives in and, as she is very familiar with the reports and channels and diagnoses this as an SEO problem within a minute. SEO traffic is dropping, but she can’t tell why.

The agency says everything looks good on their end. Marcy can’t find any errors on the site. However, there’s this mysterious drop where she can see they’re not where they used to be in the Google rankings. Subsequent drops in traffic, conversions, and form submissions going through to their sales team validate it.

She remembered her work with me a few years prior at a different agency and reached out. She thought of me as someone she could trust to fix any SEO problem, which I take as high praise. I was at a conference in Silicon Valley, getting ready to take the stage to speak about SEO troubleshooting.

And so that was the ironic part of it to me. I gave my speech and immediately after had a longer conversation with Marcy over the phone. I could dive in and see the same things she saw, and I knew that we needed to do a full audit very quickly and understand what was going on.

I brought the rest of my team back home into the challenge. Within two days, we had diagnosed two very acute issues that were hidden and that most people wouldn’t see. We wouldn’t have found them unless we had gone through our analysis auditing process to get that deep.

We presented those findings to Marcy and her CEO, who both knew how big of a negative impact this would have on their business if they didn’t get this corrected.

We presented three options. One was to fix the issues technically within their current site. Still, being forward-thinking and ROI-driven, we didn’t want just to offer to patch the holes and wait for the next problem to come. So, we presented two other plans. They included a midrange plan and a long-range plan to build a new website and not only fix the issues but also strategically amplify some other things.

They opted to invest in the new website, and that turned into an ongoing relationship with us to monitor and amplify their SEO and take it to new heights, not just reclaiming what they had lost but making new ground. And I’m excited that we saw that all the way through. It played out exactly as we had projected and was validated by growth for them.

The company eventually sold for a record amount and won awards from our peers for that work. The moral of the story is not just to accept the status quo but to realize that not all professionals who have SEO in their title have an equal set of skills. Auditing is an important tool in getting to the root cause, not just for fixing an immediate problem but even more critically for long-term success.

“WE HAVE TO GET THIS RIGHT” Continuing Care Retirement Community Story

Jamaal found us through Google. He was the director of admissions and marketing for a high-end retirement facility that serves as a continuing care community. They had everything: independent living, dining in chef-inspired restaurants, activities, a pub, and anything that active senior living would want through the continuum of care, including assisted living and skilled nursing.

They have an excellent reputation in their city and are well known; however, that’s with the community at large. They needed help to reach their target audience, who could be potential residents or adult child influencers in their lives—the next generation down.

When something happens, and it’s time to look for this type of living situation, the people at that important step are less aware and less prepared for the conversations they must have with their loved ones in a critical phase of life. These people were supposed to be moving into research and action toward admission.

Also, while it was a wealthy, high-end property, it was nonprofit, very benevolent, and gave back so much. The margins were tight, and there wasn’t a large marketing budget, but they knew they needed to do something.

Jamaal’s challenge when he came to us was, “I know you can do everything. I know I probably need all the things under the digital marketing umbrella. I even need a new website, but I don’t have the budget.”

We said, “That’s not a problem. We start small with many of our clients and find the areas where we can have the greatest ROI and impact. Then, we build from there and create budgets, opening up dollars for investment in other opportunities.”

So, we came into the situation, and we analyzed their audience. They had a wealth of data. They knew their business inside and out, and it was fantastic for us to see that. Still, they needed help understanding digital marketing and couldn’t connect the dots.

They had talked to three or four other providers who gave them high-ticket products or service offerings and didn’t want to work with them to find the right solution or where they should get the most bang for their buck.

We returned to them and recommended, “You should start with SEO.”

Jamaal laughed because he said that was the opposite recommendation that several of the other agencies had made. They had said, “No, you should start with $100,000 a month in Google Ads.”

I said, “You should start on SEO at a fraction of that,” even though we knew the challenges were there with being unable to build a new website. We’d have to navigate their antiquated website and optimize what they had.

We knew that telling the story, getting the content right, and even optimizing a lousy website would get us further along in the long-term journey of driving new leads to the website. We knew we only needed a handful of people to find the site to understand what they did at the right moment, get the right story, and come through the doors and experience this wonderful place.

After building momentum, one lead at a time, we could start talking about a new website, activate additional marketing channels, and layer in aspects of the digital marketing success plan to see success in the long term.

Ultimately, they grew as a business and their marketing investment grew respectively. Eventually, they were acquired by a large hospital system, where everyone could flourish and get the mission and the word out.

The moral of the story is it’s always better to do something rather than nothing.

But if you’re on a limited budget, understand that the obvious answers or the expensive ones aren’t necessarily the best ones. Be willing to dig into the data, do the hard work, and see the opportunity to create new budgets.

By seeing small successes, one at a time, you can build toward bigger things.

To learn more about why digital marketing planning is so important, Corey’s START Planning process, and how to implement which he details in the full book (including more real stories and “how to” sections for each phase of the process), download the book now on Amazon.

For a limited time through July 17, the Kindle version is only 99 cents.

You can also find out more information and free resources at https://thedmsp.com

More resources:

Featured Image: nuruddean/Shutterstock

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Jul 10 2024
Part 1: How To Launch, Manage, & Grow An Affiliate Program Step-By-Step via @sejournal, @rollerblader

A value-adding affiliate program is among the highest-value, lowest-risk, and most reliable revenue channels. This three-part series will teach you how to launch, manage, and grow a value-adding affiliate program.

First, we should define “value-adding.” For this guide, value-adding is traffic that does not intercept your own efforts. If you lose SEO rankings, get banned on social media, or your email and SMS lists are destroyed, your affiliates will continue to be able to send you the same volume of customers and sales, helping you stay afloat.

But there are risks to the channel, and it is a heavy labor marketing strategy. Unless you are a major brand, there is no massive group of people who want to promote your product or service and drive sales to you. This is why having a proper plan to launch, manage, and grow your affiliate program is vital, and these three guides teache you how to do that.

Over the last 20+/- years, I’ve helped companies of all sizes and across the world launch, manage, and close down affiliate programs. I’m a two-time winner of the Affiliate Summit Pinnacle Award, which at the time required nominations from the international affiliate community and voting on by their board of directors.

I currently manage affiliate programs, coach companies, and in-house managers. I also managed an affiliate CPA network for a year in the past. I’ve been on all sides of the equation.

This guide is based on my experience and is intended to help you launch, grow, or remove stagnation from your affiliate program. It’s packed with pro tips to help you with attribution and answer your questions when something feels off, and you’re not getting explanations that sit right, like “It’s part of the customer journey or lifecycle.”

So, let’s start with a definition of an affiliate program because there is a lot of confusion between programs and networks. Then, we will go into the rest of part 1. Each part of the series gets more advanced, so if this is too easy, keep reading.

What Is An Affiliate Program?

An affiliate program is a marketing channel in which a company pays a third party on a revenue-sharing basis to promote its products, services, or offers.

The affiliate program is tracked via a software solution known as an affiliate or CPA network or through an analytics platform.

Now that we have a definition of what an affiliate program is, let’s get into the post.

This topic is split into three parts. Use the jump links below to navigate this post, and watch out for part 2!

Definitions

The jargon with affiliate programs can get confusing, the following is how we define each in this guide. Please note the wording can change based on the country and language.

For example, we say “affiliate program” in the USA, but in the UK, you may hear “affiliate scheme.” It’s the same thing.

  • Affiliate (also known as a publisher) – The person, company, or entity that promotes a brand, service, or product on a performance basis.
  • Affiliate network – A tracking platform that traditionally hosts ecommerce stores with multiple products, single or multiple lead forms for SAAS, service providers, aggregators, or services, and earns their money through override fees on transactions and annual software usage fees.
  • Affiliate program (also known as scheme) – A store, service provider, or company and aggregator that pays other people, companies, or groups to promote their offering on a revenue-sharing or mixed payment model.
  • CPA network – Similar to an affiliate network, but does single offers or multiple private offers for a long-form, lead form, or landing page type of deal. Instead of ecommerce stores and sites, you may find subscriptions, bundles, and other types of “deals” or “offers” vs. selling individual products or shopping experiences.
  • Offer – Normally found on CPA networks, not affiliate networks, an offer is a commissionable service, bundle, or lead gen that pays a fee for a specific action, including downloads, form fills, and completed purchases.
  • OPM (also known as affiliate management company, consultant, or affiliate marketing agency) – Stands for outsourced program management.
  • Intent to purchase or convert – Commonly used to define where the person is in their customer journey. It is often confused with value-adding, they are not equal or one-in-the same. “High-intent to purchase” or “relevant traffic” can often be used to disguise financially damaging behaviors to the company if allowed in the affiliate program.
  • FTC disclosures – These are advertising, endorsement, and relationship disclosures the FTC requires when promoting a product, service, brand, or app in order to receive some form of compensation. Click here and here to learn more.

Value add – The level of influence an affiliate click or interaction has on the decision to purchase:

  • High value – Partners that introduce new users to the brand and have their own traffic. Without this partner, the brand would not gain exposure to the audience or have sales.
  • Mid value – This touch point can be a review that helps convince a customer to convert or brings a customer back who either did not know the brand offered the product or service or forgot the brand existed.
  • Low value – An interaction that likely would have occurred without the partner, but there was at least some level of influence. This could be reviews, some end-of-sale touchpoints, or mid-shopping interceptions.
  • No value – When an affiliate has a touch point that does not influence the decision but takes a commission. This includes coupon codes that leak from influencers or partnerships, some end-of-sale and mid-sale touch points via browser extensions, and websites (including mass media) showing up for “your brand + coupons” in Google.

Now that you have the jargon, let’s jump into the guide.

Setting Goals And Expectations

The first step in launching or rebuilding an affiliate program is to set clear goals and expectations. Some companies do not care if their partners add value; they just need to show that there is a program and sales occur in it.

This is most common with large brands, inexperienced affiliate managers, and agencies that use a “set it and forget it” or “automated” strategy.

Other brands want customer acquisition, brand exposure, and new traffic sources so they can increase revenue and win back previous customers. It is up to you to define the goals for your company and program.

Side note: I’ve heard from C-level and marketing executives who say they do not care if the affiliates add value or not; they just want to keep the board or the C-suite happy. Other times, they need to spend their budget to keep their budget, so they turn their heads the other way, knowing their company is taking a loss. The network reps tell me similar things, and that is why low—and no-value partners will continue to thrive.

Based on the goals you set, you’ll be able to define what is needed in a platform and how to locate and recruit partners that meet your goals and see success with the channel. Proper affiliate platform selection is vital.

Not all platforms offer video creative or advanced HTML/JavaScript for advanced tools. Some have a great reputation in your niche but only do offers vs. ecommerce sales, so you won’t be able to grow or scale if you work with them and want traditional affiliates.

If compliance is important, not all networks give you direct access to the partners in your affiliate program, and some block referring URLs. This means you don’t know if your partners are making false claims, including medical claims, not following brand guidelines, or using advertising disclosures.

To pick a tracking platform for your affiliate program, ask yourself these questions:

  • Do I want new customers or not?

Will I be ok with revenue losses if AOV (average order value) increases, and can I do a controlled test before I launch?

  • This is a common talking point by voucher/coupon and loyalty browser extensions to get into programs. They will say allowing them to interact with customers already in the shopping process increases conversions or AOV.
  • You must have an unbiased third party, which means no affiliate networks, affiliate managers, or affiliate agencies running the test. None of these groups is unbiased, as all are incentivized to allow these touchpoints.
  • What types of creatives will I need to provide in order to achieve my goals?
  • Am I okay with not being able to forecast profitability, as the entire channel is out of my control?
  • Knowing this is a labor-intensive channel, can I dedicate the resources and take the financial loss during the first year or two to test its viability? Or will my time and money be better focused on PPC, social media, SEO, win-backs, co-marketing, offline advertising, etc…? If I don’t have the time, can I afford to take a loss on an agency for a year while they try it for me?
  • What is the potential market opportunity, and have I tested the conversions from it? This refers to how much traffic is out there that you cannot reach on your own if your goal is a value-adding affiliate program.

Pro tip: Launching multiple networks because access to all affiliates is a bad idea 99.99% of the time. You’ll need to add custom logic code to your shopping cart to prevent paying out to multiple networks and to track all affiliate network clicks with a custom internal attribution system.

If you don’t have custom click attribution, the wrong network will get credit for the sale when two are involved, and you’ll end up choosing the wrong one to stick with. Don’t make this mistake as so many do.

Forecasting If An Affiliate Program Makes Sense Or Can Be Profitable

If all your affiliates are doing is intercepting your own traffic through browser extensions or by showing up in Google or Bing for your brand + coupons, you can forecast affiliate sales based on total site conversions.

These partners grow and fall as your own efforts grow and fall as your traffic falls because they are intercepting your own customers on your own website.

The more customers you have, the more they can intercept and the more they make. The less you have, the less they have to intercept and the less they make.

With that said, you can make a forecast for high-value affiliates that bring sales you would not have had on your own. This involves using data points from other channels. I’ll use non-review and non-coupon SEO affiliates for the example.

  • Start by using Google’s Keyword Planner or a keyword estimator from your favorite SEO tool to find estimated search volumes.
  • Combine the volume with your own data points for conversions. (For example, if you have a 5% conversion rate from PPC for the phrase “best blue tshirts” and there are 10,000 people searching each month, having affiliates show up for this phrase in SEO lets you forecast potential revenue if they send you the traffic.)
  • Combine this with your other data points for a more complete opportunity, including social media influencers, YouTube, and co-marketing.

Here’s A Formula To Use For A Basic Affiliate Program Profitability Forecast

2,000 visitors at 5% conversions with an AOV of $50 = $5,000.

With a 10% commission, 20% network fee, and operating cost of $2 per order, your profit is $4,200 (there is a net cost of $800 in the example above).

Last, add in anything you pay your affiliate manager including bonuses and design costs for banners, etc…

If you pay your affiliate manager $2,000 per month, your revenue will be $2,200 per month or $26,400 per year. The customer acquisition cost (CAC) is amazing!

Bonus tip: Look at how many customers come back and purchase again. If you are not paying on the second or third sale but keep the touchpoint in your records, then each additional sale from this acquisition counts as revenue with a higher ROAS (return on ad spend).

In the situation above you may find that this affiliate traffic leads to a large LTV (lifetime value) customer, so maybe you take a loss on the first sale for the partners with a higher PLTV (predicted lifetime value).

You may lose on the first sale, but you don’t have to pay for that same customer multiple times, and the affiliate continues to send you more like them because your affiliates are being paid fairly.

Move On To Part Two: Types Of Affiliates & Onboarding

Now that you know what the terminology means, how to forecast profitability, and can set goals and expectations for your affiliate program, let’s look at the types of affiliates, the tools they’ll need, ways to activate them, and communications strategies in part two.

More resources: 

Featured Image: Roman Samborskyi/Shutterstock

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Jul 1 2024
Top 10 Digital Marketing Trends For 2024 via @sejournal, @gregjarboe

It’s been a year of considerable disruptions in digital marketing so far.

Right now, the industry is dealing with the integration of generative AI and the impact this is going to have on user behaviour and how people search. Alongside the relentless updates that Google keeps throwing at us.

SEO is changing and the industry is trying to adapt whilst accepting the uncertainty.

But, it’s not all catastrophic, there is a lot of opportunity ahead for those that can evolve to embrace the new.

To help marketers and brands thrive amidst uncertainty, I’ve outlined trends to focus on, guided by strategic insights and Yogi Berra’s timeless wisdom,

“Predictions are hard, especially about the future.” – Yogi Berra

Digital marketers can no doubt relate to Yogi’s sentiment, acknowledging the challenge of what lies ahead.

These, then, are the top 10 digital marketing trends for 2024:

1. Strategy: “If You Don’t Know Where You Are Going, You Might Wind Up Someplace Else.”

Why is “strategy” this year’s top trend instead of the latest technology?

Well, as Yogi once observed, “If you don’t know where you are going, you might wind up someplace else.”

According to Spencer Stuart’s 2024 CMO Tenure Study, the average tenure of chief marketing officers (CMOs) at Fortune 500 companies in 2023 was 4.2 years.

The study also found the average tenure of CMOs at B2B companies was 4.5 years. It was 4.0 years for CMOs at B2C companies. And it was just 3.1 years at the consumer-heavy top 100 advertisers.

So, developing a digital marketing strategy that will generate above-average results within a couple of years is the key to keeping your job as the CMO of a big brand.

And if you don’t master the art and science of creating a digital marketing strategy that generates business outcomes, then you won’t land one of the CMO jobs that turn over each year.

In other words, learning to use the latest technology is necessary, but it won’t get digital marketing leaders and executives where they want to go.

2. Generative AI: “Predictions Are Hard, Especially About The Future.”

Yogi also said, “Predictions are hard, especially about the future.” So, it’s tempting to ask generative AI tools to predict their own future.

OpenAI’s ChatGPT 3.5 says:

“AI and machine learning have been transforming digital marketing for years, but 2024 is poised to see these technologies become even more integral. From chatbots and predictive analytics to personalized content and ad targeting, AI will enhance customer experiences and drive efficiency. Brands leveraging AI can expect to see improved ROI and deeper customer insights.”

Google’s Gemini (formerly Bard) says:

“It ain’t science fiction anymore. Artificial intelligence (AI) is taking center stage, from crafting personalized chatbots that convert like crazy to optimizing campaigns with laser precision. Don’t fear the robot takeover, embrace it!”

And Anthropic’s Claude 3 says:

“Artificial intelligence writing assistants like Claude have been making waves, and in 2024 we’ll see these tools become ubiquitous in content marketing. They’ll help scale content creation while maintaining quality.”

But AI can’t see the big picture for your organization. It can’t empathize with people. And it can’t be creative like you. So, AI needs you in the driver’s seat to make it work effectively.

3. SEO: “It Ain’t Over Till It’s Over.”

Some pundits think SEO is dead. But as Yogi declared, “It ain’t over till it’s over.”

That’s because SEO pros have the remarkable ability to adapt to constant change or new information. Often, this means adjusting to the latest Google algorithm updates. But this also includes rethinking strategies based on the recent Google API “leak.”

Now, Rand Fishkin and Mike King were the first to report on the leaked documents. Although Google has officially acknowledged that these internal documents are authentic, it has also cautioned against jumping to conclusions based on the leaked files alone.

What should savvy SEO pros do?

Well, I’ve known Fishkin for more than 20 years. And he has the experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness (E-E-A-T) you’ve heard about.

So, I’m going to follow Fishkin’s recommendations, including:

  • Hire writers with established reputational authority that Google already associates with quality content.
  • Supplement link-building with public relations to increase branded search demand. (I’ll say more on this below.)
  • “Think about SEO as being more geographically specific than you think it is even for web search results.”
  • Move beyond parsing Google’s public statements and embrace experimentation and testing to uncover what produces results.

4. Link Building: “Always Go To Other People’s Funerals; Otherwise, They Won’t Go To Yours.”

I spotted this trend a long time ago, and I spoke about it at SES London 2009 in a session titled, “Beyond Linkbait: Getting Authoritative Mentions Online.”

Back then, I said link bait tactics can be effective “if you focus on the underlying quality as well as ingenuity needed to get other websites to link to you.”

I also provided a couple of case studies that showed British SEO professionals how to “approach journalists, bloggers, and other authoritative sources to enhance your company’s online reputation, whether or not you get links.”

But getting authoritative mentions without links didn’t translate. People on the other side of the pond thought I was saying something unintentionally funny like, “Always go to other people’s funerals; otherwise, they won’t go to yours.”

Hopefully, Fishkin’s recommendation will enable a lot more SEO pros to finally understand the underlying wisdom of supplementing link building with public relations.

As he clearly explained at MozCon, “If you get a whole bunch of links in one day and nothing else, guess what? You manipulated the link graph. If you’re really a big brand, people should be talking about you.”

5. Paid Media: “It’s Déjà Vu All Over Again.”

Everyone knows that Google, Meta, and other paid media are adding AI to their advertising platforms faster than the speed of sound. So, this might be mistaken as background noise.

But I’ve spotted the signal in the noise. Today’s frenzy to provide AI solutions is remarkably like the frenzy to provide programmatic solutions a decade ago. As Yogi said, “It’s déjà vu all over again.”

This means that digital marketers – and their agencies – can quickly refresh their “programmatic” workflow and turn it into “AI” best practices.

For example, Google touted a five-step programmatic workflow five years ago.

It consisted of:

  • Organize audience insights.
  • Design compelling creative.
  • Execute with integrated technology.
  • Reach audiences across screens.
  • Measure the impact.

Why is today’s process of buying and selling digital media in an automated fashion so similar? Because AI is just fulfilling the early promise of programmatic to engage with consumers in the moments that matter most.

But there’s one significant difference between then and now.

As you’ll read below, it’s the improved ability to integrate your advertising platforms with your analytics platform to measure the impact of campaigns on brand awareness and lead generation.

6. Analytics: “You Can Observe A Lot By Watching.”

Performance marketers integrated their advertising platforms with their analytics platform more than a decade ago to measure the impact of their campaigns on “conversions.”

But brand marketers rarely focused on their analytics data because “brand awareness” was something they measured when consumers initially saw their display ads or watched their video ads.

A funny thing happened after Google Analytics 4 rolled out last summer. A “Business objectives” collection replaced the “Life cycle” collection of reports and one business objective you can now track is “Raise brand awareness.”

For example, brand marketers can now use traffic acquisition, demographic details, user acquisition, as well as which pages and screens users visit to measure brand awareness in places that are less vulnerable to ad fraud.

Another business objective you can now track is “Generate leads.”

So, digital marketers can measure any user action that’s valuable to their organization, including:

  • Scrolling to 90% or more of their blog post.
  • Downloading a whitepaper.
  • Subscribing to their newsletter.
  • Playing at least 50% of a product video.
  • Completing a tutorial.
  • Submitting a registration form.

And as Yogi noted, “You can observe a lot by watching.”

7. Content Marketing: “When You Come To A Fork In The Road, Take It.”

In the summer of 2020, the Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs fielded their annual survey and found that “Content marketers are resilient. Most have met the challenges of the pandemic head-on.”

In response to the pandemic, B2B and B2C marketers:

  • Increased time spent talking with customers.
  • Revisited their customer/buyer personas.
  • Re-examined the customer journey.
  • Changed their targeting/messaging strategy.
  • Changed their distribution strategy.
  • Adjusted their editorial calendar.
  • Put more resources toward social media/online communities.
  • Changed their website.
  • Changed their products/services.
  • Adjusted their key performance indicators (KPIs).
  • Changed their content marketing metrics (e.g., set up new analytics/dashboards).

In other words, many content marketers totally overhauled their process for creating a content marketing plan from stem to stern.

For some, 2020 was the year of quickly adapting their content marketing strategy. For others, it was the year to finally develop one.

According to BrightEdge, content marketers are now “preparing for a Searchquake,” a tectonic shift in the content marketing landscape triggered by Google’s Search Generative Experiences (SGE).

But content marketers now know exactly what to do. As Yogi directed, “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”

8. Video Creation: “If You Can’t Imitate Him, Don’t Copy Him.”

I teach an online class at the New Media Academy in Dubai on “Influencer Marketing and AI.” This may seem like an odd combination of topics, but they’re related to another class I teach on “Engaging Audiences through Content.”

I tell my students that creating great content is hard. That’s why marketers start using influencers or AI to create video content that their audience will find valuable and engaging. Then, they learn that there’s more to learn.

For example, AI can create realistic and imaginative scenes from text instructions. But AI can’t be creative like humans. So, the heart of every great video is still innovative, surprising, human-led creativity.

I show them “OpenAI Sora’s first short film – ‘Air Head,’ created by shy kids,” a Toronto-based production company.

Then, I ask them to apply what they have learned by using Synthesia, Runway, or invideo AI to generate a short video for their capstone project.

Invariably, they report that AI video generators can create realistic and imaginative scenes from text instructions but aren’t creative like shy kids.

Or, as Yogi put it, “If you can’t imitate him, don’t copy him.”

9. Influencer Marketing: “Nobody Goes There Anymore. It’s Too Crowded.”

The Influencer Marketing Hub says, “Most marketers believe that finding and selecting the best, most relevant influencers to be the most difficult part of influencer marketing.”

That’s ironic because HypeAuditor offers an influencer discovery platform that enables marketers to search through a database of 137.5 million influencers on Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, X (formerly Twitter), and Twitch.

It also enables marketers to apply filters to discover the perfect partners for their brand.

This apparent contradiction reminds me of Yogi’s comment, “Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.”

But it also indicates that most marketers are looking at influencer identification through the wrong end of the telescope. What should they do instead?

Well, I show the students in my “Influencer Marketing and AI” class how to use SparkToro to get a free report on the audience that searches for “Dubai.”

Infographic showcasing digital marketing trends for 2024 with monthly searches and demographics for Dubai. Image from SparkToro, June 2024

SparkToro estimates that 446,000 to 654,000 people search for “Dubai” monthly. And it uncovers the websites they visit, the keywords they search for, and their gender demographics.

Screenshot of a list showing accounts related to Dubai, their affinity scoresImage from SparkToro, June 2024

SparkToro also identifies the sources of influence for this audience, including high-affinity accounts and hidden gems, so marketers can invest in the right ones.

10. Social Media: “The Future Ain’t What It Used To Be.”

I’m a big believer in “the rule of three.”

So, I wasn’t startled when I received an email from Jennifer Radke inviting me to attend “an exciting webinar focused on a high-level look into using ChatGPT for social media!”

But I was shocked when Katie Delahaye Paine shared a link to new research by Asana’s Work Innovation Lab and Meltwater, which found that “only 28% of marketing professionals have received training on how to use AI tools effectively.”

I was also horrified when I read a column by Mark Ritson in MarketingWeek that argued, “AI’s strength is automating high-volume, short-term marketing activity, which means social media could become a cesspool of synthetic content.”

Hey, I was having lunch with Chris Shipley in 2004 when she coined the term “social media.” So, I remember when social media still had a promising future.

But, as Yogi once declared, “The future ain’t what it used to be.”

So, social media marketing has three options:

  • They can get upskilled to use AI tools more effectively.
  • They can get reskilled to identify the right influencers.
  • They can update their resumes and look for new jobs.

Picking Digital Marketing Trends Is Like Playing Moneyball

Some skeptics may question this counter-intuitive lineup of the top 10 digital marketing trends for 2024. Some of my selections seem to throw out conventional wisdom.

I recently watched the movie Moneyball (2011) for a second time. I was reminded that the Oakland Athletics baseball team’s general manager, Billy Beane (Brad Pitt), and assistant general manager, Peter Brand (Jonah Hill), used sabermetrics to analyze players.

This produced an epiphany: Picking digital marketing trends is like playing Moneyball. If you want to win against competitors with bigger budgets, then you need to find strategic insights, critical data, tactical advice, and digital marketing trends that conventional wisdom has overlooked.

And where did I come up with the whimsical idea of matching each trend with one of Yogi’s memorable quotes? Was it inspiration or hallucination?

I recently watched the documentary It Ain’t Over (2022) for the first time. It’s about New York Yankee Hall of Fame catcher Yogi Berra. And it supported Yogi’s claim, “I really didn’t say everything I said.”

But sportswriters kept attributing these Yogi-isms to the catcher because these “distilled bits of wisdom … like good country songs … get to the truth in a hurry,” as Allan Barra, the author of a book on Yogi, has explained.

And that strategic insight produced this year’s update – by a human – as opposed to last year’s top 10 digital marketing trends by ChatGPT.

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Featured Image: SuPatMaN/Shutterstock

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Jun 6 2024
Understanding Information Security & Risk Management via @sejournal, @DrSScheuing

This edited extract is from How to Use Customer Data by Sachiko Scheuing ©2024 and reproduced with permission from Kogan Page Ltd.

I have an extremely confidential piece of information on a particular sheet of paper. This A4-sized paper contains a list of Christmas presents I plan to give to my family members.

To make sure that no one gets access to this information, I have hidden it in my home office, in the cupboard next to my desk. There you find a chunky English dictionary.

When you open the page where “Christmas” is listed, you will find my precious list, carefully folded into two.

But what if my children or my other half comes to look something up in an analogue dictionary? Arguably, the risk is small, but I am not taking any chances. I have a secret language called Japanese.

My family might find that piece of paper, but all they will see will be タータンチェックの野球帽 and 腕時計, which are basically hieroglyphs to them.

Thanks to this, my family enjoys wonderful moments exchanging gifts every Christmas. Just writing about this makes me grin, imagining the surprised faces and a burst of laughter, surrounded by the green scent of the Christmas tree and the obligatory mulled wine.

This motivates me to conceal this highly sensitive information even more!

We will discuss how companies and their marketing department can protect their secrets, and their data, so that they, too, can bring a smile to their customers’ faces.

Understanding Information Security

In some games, you have this “get out of jail card.” With these cards, you can avoid missing out on a round of games. What if I said GDPR has something similar?

It is called data security.

The GDPR provisions for data security are in line with the risk-based approach embedded in law, where risk is mini­mized, and more flexibility is given to controllers.

For instance, when regulators decide on fines, they must take security measures companies have put in place to protect the data into consideration (see Article 83(2)c of GDPR) (legislation.gov.uk, 2016).

Say your laptop is stolen.

If it was encrypted, you do not need to inform your customers that there was a data breach. Not having to inform your customers saves the brand image your marketing department has been building for years.

That is one reason why data security is such an important discipline. Many organizations have a separate security department and a chief information security officer who heads the functional areas.

Those marketers who had security incidents published by news outlets must know how life-saving security colleagues can be in times of need.

Definition Of Information Strategy

The word data security is not found in Article 4 of GDPR, the article where definitions are listed. Instead, the word “security” appears in Article 5, where the basic premises of the data protection law are described.

In other words, data security is one of the main principles of the GDPR, “integrity and confi­dentiality.”

GDPR expects organizations to ensure the prevention of unauthorized or unlawful processing, accidental loss, destruction, or damage of data as one of the starting points for protecting personal data.

TOMs must be implemented to this end so that the integrity and confidentiality of the data are protected (Article 5(f) GDPR) (legislation.gov.uk, 2016).

Outside Of GDPR, Information Security Is Defined As Follows

Information security is the safeguarding of information and information systems against deliberate and unintentional unauthorized access, disruption, modification, and destruction by external or internal actors. (Gartner, Inc., 2023)

Information security is the technologies, policies, and practices you choose to help you keep data secure. (gov.uk, 2018)

Information security: The protection of information and information systems from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, disruption, modification, or destruction in order to provide confidentiality, integrity, and availability. (NIST, 2023)

Approach To Information Security

Just as marketing professionals created strategic frameworks – 4Ps, 7Ps, 4Cs, and so on – so the school of information security strategy has come up with frameworks: the CIA triad and the Parkerian Hexad.

CIA stands for Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability.

Donn Parker, a security consult­ant, later expanded this framework with three more elements, namely Utility, Authenticity, and Possession.

Below is a brief description of the six aspects of the Parkerian Hexad (Bosworth et al, 2009).

Availability

Availability refers to the ability of the organization to access data. When, for instance, there is a loss of power and your marketers cannot access customer data, it is considered an availability problem.

The file is there, so it is not stolen. However, the marketer is temporarily unable to access the particular data.

Utility

Utility of the Parkerian Hexad relates to the problem of losing the usefulness of the data. For instance, if a campaign manager loses the encryption key to the data, the data is still there, and it can be accessed.

However, the data cannot be used because the emails needed for carrying out an email campaign are encrypted so they are useless.

Integrity

Maintaining integrity refers to preventing unauthorized changes to the data.

For instance, if an intern of the marketing department accidentally deletes the field “purchased more than two items” within the dataset, this is an integ­rity-related security incident.

If the manager of the intern can undo the deletion of the field, then the integrity of the data is intact.

Typically, integ­rity is maintained by assigning different access rights, such as read-only access for interns and read-and-write access for the marketing manager.

Authenticity

Authenticity relates to the attribution of data or information to the rightful owner or the creator of that data or information.

Imagine a situation where your advertising agency, acting as your data service provider, receives a fake email which instructs them to delete all your customer data.

The agency might think that it is a genuine instruction from your company, and executes the command. This is then an authenticity problem.

Confidentiality

When someone unauthorized gets access to a particular marketing analytic file, confidentiality is being breached.

Possession

The Parkerian Hexad uses the term possession to describe situations where data or information is stolen.

For instance, a malevolent employee of the marketing department downloads all the sales contact information to a mobile device and then deletes them from the network. This is a possession problem.

Risk Management

In addition to understanding the problems you are facing, using the Parkerian Hexad, your organization must know the potential security risks for the business.

Andress suggests a useful and generic five-step risk management process, for a variety of situations (Andress, 2019).

Step 1: Identify Assets

Before your organization can start managing your marketing department’s risks, you need to map out all data assets belonging to your marketing department.

In doing so, all data, some distributed in different systems or entrusted to service providers, must be accounted for.

Once this exercise is completed, your marketing department can determine which data files are the most critical. RoPA, with all processes of personal data mapped out, can be leveraged for this exercise.

Step 2: Identify Threats

For all data files and processes identified in the previous step, potential threats are determined. This may mean holding a brainstorming session with marketers and security and data protection departments to go through the data and processes one by one.

The Parkerian Hexad from the previous section can be a great help in guiding through such sessions. It will also be helpful to identify the most critical data and processes during this exercise.

Step 3: Assess Vulnerabilities

In this step, for each data-use surfaced in Step 2, relevant threats are identified.

In doing so, the context of your organization’s operation, products and services sold, vendor relations as well as the physical location of the company premises are considered.

Step 4: Assess Vulnerabilities

In this step, the threats and vulnerabilities for each data and process are compared and assigned risk levels.

Vulnerabilities with no corresponding threats or threats with no associated vulnerabilities will be seen as not having any risk.

Step 5: Mitigate Risks

For the risks that surfaced in Step 4, measures necessary to prevent them from occurring will be determined during this stage.

Andress identifies three types of controls that can be used for this purpose. The first type of control, logical control, protects the IT environment for processing your customer data, such as password protection and the placing of firewalls.

The second type of control is administrative control, which is usually deployed in the form of corporate security policy, which the organization can enforce. The last type of control is physical control.

As the name suggests, this type of control protects the business premises and makes use of tools such as CCTV, keycard-operated doors, fire alarms, and backup power generators.

With the time, risks may change.

For instance, your marketing department may be physically relocated to a new building, changing the physical security needs, or your company might decide to migrate from a physical server to a cloud-based hosting service, which means your customer data will have to move, too.

Both such situations necessitate a new round of the risk management process to kick off.

In general, it is advisable to revisit the risk management process on a regular interval, say annually, to keep your company on top of all risks your marketing department, and beyond, carry.

Approaching Risk Management With Three Lines Of Defence

Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) established a risk management model called Three Lines of Defence.

The model requires three internal roles: (1) the governing body, with oversight of the organization, (2) senior management, which takes risk management actions and reports to the governing body, and (3) internal audit, which provides independent assurance, to work together and act as robust protections to the organization (IIA, 2020).

The elements of the Three Lines of Defence are (IIA, 2020):

First Line Of Defence

Manage risks associated with day-to-day operational activities. Senior management has the primary responsibility, and emphasis is put on people and culture.

Marketing managers’ task here is to make sure that their department is aware of data protection risks, including security risks, and are following relevant corporate policies.

Second Line Of Defence

Identify risks in the daily business operation of the business. Security, data protection, and risk management teams carry out monitoring activities.

Senior management, including the CMO, is ultimately accountable for this line of defence. A well-functioning second line of defence requires good cooperation between marketing and security, data protection, and risk management teams.

Practically, it would mean understanding the importance of operational-level auditing and providing input to the security team, even when there are other pressing deadlines and business issues.

Third Line Of Defence

Provide independent assurance on risk management by assessing the first and second lines of defence. Independent corporate internal audit teams usually have this role.

Here, too, the marketing department will be asked to cooperate during audits. Assurance results reported to the governance body inform the strategic business actions for the senior management team.

References

  • Andress, J (2019) Foundations of information security, No Starch Press, October 2019.
  • Bosworth, S, Whyne, E and Kabay, M E (2009) Computer Security Handbook, 5th edn, Wiley, chapter 3: Toward a new framework for information security, Donn B Parker
  • Gartner, Inc. (2023) Information technology: Gartner glossary, www.gartner.com/ en/information-technology/glossary/information-security (archived at https:// perma.cc/JP27-6CAN)
  • IIA (2020) The Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA), The IIA”s Three Lines model, an update of the Three Lines of Defense, July 2020, www.theiia.org/globalassets/documents/resources/the-iias-three-lines-model-an-update-of-the-three-lines-ofdefense-july-2020/three-lines-model-updated-english.pdf (archived at https://perma.cc/9HX7-AU4H)
  • legislation.gov.uk (2016) Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council, 27 April 2016, www.legislation.gov.uk/eur/2016/679/ contents (archived at https://perma.cc/NVG6-PXBQ)
  • NIST (2023) National Institute of Standards and Technology, US Department of Commerce, Computer Security Resource Centre, Information Technology Laboratory, Glossary, updated 28 May 2023, https://csrc.nist.gov/glossary/term/ information_security (archived at https://perma.cc/TE3Z-LN94); https://csrc. nist.gov/glossary/term/non_repudiation (archived at https://perma.cc/DJ4A- 44N2)

To read the full book, SEJ readers have an exclusive 25% discount code and free shipping to the US and UK. Use promo code SEJ25 at koganpage.com here.

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Featured Image: Paulo Bobita/Search Engine Journal

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May 28 2024
How Agencies Can Have Successful Client Partnerships [Part 2] via @sejournal, @coreydmorris

Let me start by saying that I know you’re successful and probably wonder what you can learn from me as an agency owner, leader, or staffer.

I will humbly admit that I can and do continue to learn from you; I have some great relationships with other agency owners and always learn something when I’m in the room with them – even if it sometimes feels more like a therapy session than one where we solve all of our problems.

The agency business is hard.

Whether we’re talking about advertising, digital, PR, or other niches and specializations, we’re in a hard industry. We care deeply about people – our own and those who are our clients – as well as the missions and causes that factor into the reasons we’re in our current gigs.

This article is my companion and “part 2” in this series. The first was about how brands can have successful relationships with agencies. In this one, I’m taking the other side.

I’m here today to share the 8 things I’ve learned over my nearly 20 years in agencies – mostly from the mistakes I have made – so if there’s anything you haven’t experienced, you don’t have to go through it yourself.

1. Know What You Want Or Need

This seems blunt, and I apologize if so. But it probably should be.

If you don’t fully push clients to share their goals or help define what success looks like for your partnership and their investment in an agency (or any resources), you’ll risk wasted dollars and time (for both sides) in getting to their ROI goals and risk churn or attrition of the client relationship.

For some clients, it is a process to figure out what they want and many agencies (including mine) have a robust planning and strategy process to help get to the definition and strategy mapping stage.

However, if you don’t work to elicit objectives and truths for their ROI math and measures that show if something is profitable or not, they might not be ready to go down the path of evaluating an agency partnership and, unfortunately, may sign on with you, but not last long.

2. Be Clear On Communication

I often emphasize to prospects and clients that I want them to be bold and honest and to share with us the details of when and how they want to be communicated with.

That is definitely not a one-way street.

Whether you have highly defined communication processes and cadences or typically adapt them to the client, I want to encourage you to be clear early in the relationship about what works best for your agency.

Be open to sharing how you like to communicate. That could be through email, Slack, text, phone calls, scheduled meetings, tickets, or messages in a project management system. Whatever it is, when it is, and what the response times they can expect, you are definitely best served in sharing about your communication parameters.

We never want clients guessing or our staff being caught up in out-of-cycle, off-hour messages or misaligned response windows.

Despite the constant change in subject matter (that we have to contend with), algorithms, and attribution, one of the biggest reasons prospects and clients still reach out to me is that they weren’t getting the communication they expected from their previous agency.

I know this is a two-way problem, and in many cases, the agency would probably acknowledge communication was an issue, too – or wish that they knew, as it is something that is, in many cases, easy to correct compared to the other challenges we face in meeting performance goals in an ever-changing marketplace.

3. Remember The Scope

My companion article mentions scope, and I want to make sure it isn’t lost or forgotten on the agency side as well. I’m as guilty as anyone of wanting to add value (aka over-service) to clients to show them love in the relationship.

Despite the goodwill built and the potential for growing lifetime value with a client, we have to make sure that our teams understand the scope.

If you have tailored scope documents to different clients, then maybe your team is really dedicated to scope management. However, regardless of what your scope management looks like, if you aren’t tracking utilization, efficiency, and profitability in your agency – down to the client level – then you’re likely operating without all of the information you need.

It is really easy for an owner, salesperson, or anyone to get a scope approved in a contract, SOW, MSA, or other document and then for the team to take over and not look back at it.

Be diligent about what is in scope and what is out of scope, and have dedicated processes to monitor and implement the proper change orders and management techniques to stay on budget in a professional manner.

4. Be Invested

This is a weird one. We all say that we are invested and excited about any client who comes through our doors and chooses to work with us—and that we choose to work with. However, I have seen a lot of strange things in my career.

Again, no judgment here, and I can’t say that my team has been fully engaged or invested in every single relationship. Naturally, there are clients and brands in some less-than-sexy industries.

There are clients who are not the easiest to connect with on a personal level. There are clients who are not themselves invested in the work. Or, there are clients who are not pleasant to interact with, and for any number of reasons, you can’t fire them at this moment.

In any situation, it shows when we aren’t invested in the client. Maybe they were the first to show it, or maybe we were. They could be quiet quitting on us.

Whatever it is, we need to show our commitment to not just the day-to-day but to being the idea-bringing, problem-solving, solution-seeking, and proactive communicating member of their team that we can be. We must show our commitment and do all that we can to be fully invested in the relationship.

5. Share Your Expectations

Understanding and managing client expectations is important in the agency/client relationship. It has been talked about forever and will continue to be.

Expectations, however, are a two-way street. We want to know what our clients expect and to help shape those expectations to be realistic based on the scope, our expertise, or the scale of the services we’re offering.

However, what if we also stated what we expect of our clients? I’m not saying it is a perfect process, as the party who is paying the bill typically wants to feel catered to and have their expectations met.

At the same time, as I think back on some of my team’s biggest challenges, they often stem from some type of asset, approval, deliverable, or step that a client hasn’t followed through on or done in a timely manner.

Did we do our best to clearly state our expectations on what we expected from the client? Did they know the consequences of not delivering?

Whether it is a balanced, mutual client agreement, a manifesto, bill of rights, or some other expectation-setting tool or document, I believe that agencies (including mine) should do a better job of stating our expectations while also trying to understand, manage, and set those of the client.

6. Be Patient, Yet Expect Accountability

This one is hard – sometimes really hard.

Accountability can be intimidating and something that is hard for agencies to accept as we typically, by default, don’t have control of client branding decisions, sales teams, ultimate marketing approvals, product roadmaps, or financial performance.

Yes, we often can get transparent ROI math, access to CRM, and possibly a seat at the marketing table.

The difficulty of accountability is that when we don’t have full control, we often can’t be fully accountable for results and actions. In relationships with little digital agency accountability, it is easy to stay on the search or marketing side of the table. That means doing what we can from the outside or a couple of levels deep.

We can report marketing metrics and KPIs and collaborate, but ultimately, it is up to the client to judge the effort’s ROI and connect all the dots.

On the other hand, to get to the depth we need in order to fully prove our ROI, we might not agree with or like the decisions being made and still have to settle for a certain level of accountability that isn’t totally fair to us.

In any situation, we must find a balance between being patient as we navigate getting as deep as possible with our clients versus pushing too hard or being walled off from information.

7. Provide A Clear Escalation Path

Most people in the business world are respectful and professional and want to maintain a positive reputation.

This leads to cordial relationships and often great camaraderie between people on the client and agency sides of the relationship.

However, if the day-to-day person on the agency side is close to the work or close to the client contact, chances are that the client contact may not feel super comfortable providing negative feedback.

Feedback is a great tool in general, as getting it early and often in a relationship allows for minor adjustments to strategy, communication, or other factors in the relationship. However, if someone doesn’t know where to give objective feedback or doesn’t feel they can do it without hurting feelings or being confrontational, then that is a problem.

I mentioned quiet quitting earlier.

I have observed a lot of quiet quitting of clients in agency relationships over the past couple of years. While I don’t know that having an escalation path is the biggest factor, I can definitely recommend making it clear and comfortable for the client to know how to give direct feedback, anonymous feedback, and feedback to others in the chain of command in a way that will be handled professionally so they aren’t shy about giving it.

8. Celebrate

This is possibly the most overlooked aspect of any agency relationship. It might be easy to keep the client at arms distance or even to assume they are celebrating their own wins separate from yours.

Assuming they have real wins in their company that have any attribution to or opportunity to bring in your agency for, then encourage it!

Good agencies care about their clients and their success. Companies who see that success and feel like their agency is a partner, not a vendor, should naturally want to celebrate together.

If you have a partnership that isn’t at arms length, please share your successes with the client and push them to share data and reasons to celebrate with you as well.

With how many years I’ve been doing this, I know our type. I know that we’re agency people who know how to properly party and celebrate things and love to hear about wins and share them.

Chances are, if we are good at sharing wins and cultivating a culture for our clients to share wins with us, we’ll be able to properly party with our clients and be one team instead of two in the relationship.

It might not seem like a big deal, but believe me – in the post-COVID era and in a decade with a lot of burnout, we need to celebrate wins more than ever.

Have Honest, Clear, and Difficult Conversations Earlier

While some of what I talked about might feel like tough love, please know that I will be the first to say that I’m not perfect, nor is my team.

Everything I have shared is what I believe in and is also something I want to be accountable for.

Whether it is setting expectations, making sure the fit with the client is right for both sides, being open to honest feedback, managing scope, or any number of other things that you can do to enhance the client experience and have smooth client relationships, I want to challenge you to test these things out and see how they improve retention, performance, and efficiency in your agency.

More resources: 

Featured Image: LightField Studios/Shutterstock

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
May 22 2024
Optimizing Interaction To Next Paint (INP): A Step-By-Step Guide via @sejournal, @DebugBear

This post was sponsored by DebugBear. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

Keeping your website fast is important for user experience and SEO.

The Core Web Vitals initiative by Google provides a set of metrics to help you understand the performance of your website.

The three Core Web Vitals metrics are:

This post focuses on the recently introduced INP metric and what you can do to improve it.

How Is Interaction To Next Paint Measured?

INP measures how quickly your website responds to user interactions – for example, a click on a button. More specifically, INP measures the time in milliseconds between the user input and when the browser has finished processing the interaction and is ready to display any visual updates on the page.

Your website needs to complete this process in under 200 milliseconds to get a “Good” score. Values over half a second are considered “Poor”. A poor score in a Core Web Vitals metric can negatively impact your search engine rankings.

Google collects INP data from real visitors on your website as part of the Chrome User Experience Report (CrUX). This CrUX data is what ultimately impacts rankings.

Image created by DebugBear, May 2024

How To Identify & Fix Slow INP Times

The factors causing poor Interaction to Next Paint can often be complex and hard to figure out. Follow this step-by-step guide to understand slow interactions on your website and find potential optimizations.

1. How To Identify A Page With Slow INP Times

Different pages on your website will have different Core Web Vitals scores. So you need to identify a slow page and then investigate what’s causing it to be slow.

Using Google Search Console

One easy way to check your INP scores is using the Core Web Vitals section in Google Search Console, which reports data based on the Google CrUX data we’ve discussed before.

By default, page URLs are grouped into URL groups that cover many different pages. Be careful here – not all pages might have the problem that Google is reporting. Instead, click on each URL group to see if URL-specific data is available for some pages and then focus on those.

Screenshot of Google Search Console, May 2024

Using A Real-User Monitoring (RUM) Service

Google won’t report Core Web Vitals data for every page on your website, and it only provides the raw measurements without any details to help you understand and fix the issues. To get that you can use a real-user monitoring tool like DebugBear.

Real-user monitoring works by installing an analytics snippet on your website that measures how fast your website is for your visitors. Once that’s set up you’ll have access to an Interaction to Next Paint dashboard like this:

Screenshot of the DebugBear Interaction to Next Paint dashboard, May 2024

You can identify pages you want to optimize in the list, hover over the URL, and click the funnel icon to look at data for that specific page only.

Image created by DebugBear, May 2024

2. Figure Out What Element Interactions Are Slow

Different visitors on the same page will have different experiences. A lot of that depends on how they interact with the page: if they click on a background image there’s no risk of the page suddenly freezing, but if they click on a button that starts some heavy processing then that’s more likely. And users in that second scenario will experience much higher INP.

To help with that, RUM data provides a breakdown of what page elements users interacted with and how big the interaction delays were.

Screenshot of the DebugBear INP Elements view, May 2024

The screenshot above shows different INP interactions sorted by how frequent these user interactions are. To make optimizations as easy as possible you’ll want to focus on a slow interaction that affects many users.

In DebugBear, you can click on the page element to add it to your filters and continue your investigation.

3. Identify What INP Component Contributes The Most To Slow Interactions

INP delays can be broken down into three different components:

  • Input Delay: Background code that blocks the interaction from being processed.
  • Processing Time: The time spent directly handling the interaction.
  • Presentation Delay: Displaying the visual updates to the screen.

You should focus on which INP component is the biggest contributor to the slow INP time, and ensure you keep that in mind during your investigation.

Screenshot of the DebugBear INP Components, May 2024

In this scenario, Processing Time is the biggest contributor to the slow INP time for the set of pages you’re looking at, but you need to dig deeper to understand why.

High processing time indicates that there is code intercepting the user interaction and running slow performing code. If instead you saw a high input delay, that suggests that there are background tasks blocking the interaction from being processed, for example due to third-party scripts.

4. Check Which Scripts Are Contributing To Slow INP

Sometimes browsers report specific scripts that are contributing to a slow interaction. Your website likely contains both first-party and third-party scripts, both of which can contribute to slow INP times.

A RUM tool like DebugBear can collect and surface this data. The main thing you want to look at is whether you mostly see your own website code or code from third parties.

Screenshot of the INP Primary Script Domain Grouping in DebugBear, May 2024

Tip: When you see a script, or source code function marked as “N/A”, this can indicate that the script comes from a different origin and has additional security restrictions that prevent RUM tools from capturing more detailed information.

This now begins to tell a story: it appears that analytics/third-party scripts are the biggest contributors to the slow INP times.

5. Identify Why Those Scripts Are Running

At this point, you now have a strong suspicion that most of the INP delay, at least on the pages and elements you’re looking at, is due to third-party scripts. But how can you tell whether those are general tracking scripts or if they actually have a role in handling the interaction?

DebugBear offers a breakdown that helps see why the code is running, called the INP Primary Script Invoker breakdown. That’s a bit of a mouthful – multiple different scripts can be involved in slowing down an interaction, and here you just see the biggest contributor. The “Invoker” is just a value that the browser reports about what caused this code to run.

Screenshot of the INP Primary Script Invoker Grouping in DebugBear, May 2024

The following invoker names are examples of page-wide event handlers:

  • onclick
  • onmousedown
  • onpointerup

You can see those a lot in the screenshot above, which tells you that the analytics script is tracking clicks anywhere on the page.

In contrast, if you saw invoker names like these that would indicate event handlers for a specific element on the page:

  • .load_more.onclick
  • #logo.onclick

6. Review Specific Page Views

A lot of the data you’ve seen so far is aggregated. It’s now time to look at the individual INP events, to form a definitive conclusion about what’s causing slow INP in this example.

Real user monitoring tools like DebugBear generally offer a way to review specific user experiences. For example, you can see what browser they used, how big their screen is, and what element led to the slowest interaction.

Screenshot of a Page View in DebugBear Real User Monitoring, May 2024

As mentioned before, multiple scripts can contribute to overall slow INP. The INP Scripts section shows you the scripts that were run during the INP interaction:

Screenshot of the DebugBear INP script breakdown, May 2024

You can review each of these scripts in more detail to understand why they run and what’s causing them to take longer to finish.

7. Use The DevTools Profiler For More Information

Real user monitoring tools have access to a lot of data, but for performance and security reasons they can access nowhere near all the available data. That’s why it’s a good idea to also use Chrome DevTools to measure your page performance.

To debug INP in DevTools you can measure how the browser processes one of the slow interactions you’ve identified before. DevTools then shows you exactly how the browser is spending its time handling the interaction.

Screenshot of a performance profile in Chrome DevTools, May 2024

How You Might Resolve This Issue

In this example, you or your development team could resolve this issue by:

  • Working with the third-party script provider to optimize their script.
  • Removing the script if it is not essential to the website, or finding an alternative provider.
  • Adjusting how your own code interacts with the script

How To Investigate High Input Delay

In the previous example most of the INP time was spent running code in response to the interaction. But often the browser is already busy running other code when a user interaction happens. When investigating the INP components you’ll then see a high input delay value.

This can happen for various reasons, for example:

  • The user interacted with the website while it was still loading.
  • A scheduled task is running on the page, for example an ongoing animation.
  • The page is loading and rendering new content.

To understand what’s happening, you can review the invoker name and the INP scripts section of individual user experiences.

Screenshot of the INP Component breakdown within DebugBear, May 2024

In this screenshot, you can see that a timer is running code that coincides with the start of a user interaction.

The script can be opened to reveal the exact code that is run:

Screenshot of INP script details in DebugBear, May 2024

The source code shown in the previous screenshot comes from a third-party user tracking script that is running on the page.

At this stage, you and your development team can continue with the INP workflow presented earlier in this article. For example, debugging with browser DevTools or contacting the third-party provider for support.

How To Investigate High Presentation Delay

Presentation delay tends to be more difficult to debug than input delay or processing time. Often it’s caused by browser behavior rather than a specific script. But as before, you still start by identifying a specific page and a specific interaction.

You can see an example interaction with high presentation delay here:

Screenshot of the an interaction with high presentation delay, May 2024

You see that this happens when the user enters text into a form field. In this example, many visitors pasted large amounts of text that the browser had to process.

Here the fix was to delay the processing, show a “Waiting…” message to the user, and then complete the processing later on. You can see how the INP score improves from May 3:

Screenshot of an Interaction to Next Paint timeline in DebugBear, May 2024

Get The Data You Need To Improve Interaction To Next Paint

Setting up real user monitoring helps you understand how users experience your website and what you can do to improve it. Try DebugBear now by signing up for a free 14-day trial.

Screenshot of the DebugBear Core Web Vitals dashboard, May 2024

Google’s CrUX data is aggregated over a 28-day period, which means that it’ll take a while before you notice a regression. With real-user monitoring you can see the impact of website changes right away and get alerted automatically when there’s a big change.

DebugBear monitors lab data, CrUX data, and real user data. That way you have all the data you need to optimize your Core Web Vitals in one place.

This article has been sponsored by DebugBear, and the views presented herein represent the sponsor’s perspective.

Ready to start optimizing your website? Sign up for DebugBear and get the data you need to deliver great user experiences.

Try DebugBear For Free

Image Credits

Featured Image: Image by Redesign.co. Used with permission.

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
May 21 2024
7 Ways AI Took My Job [To The Next Level] via @sejournal, @CallRail

With AI-powered call attribution, you can gain valuable insights into which channels are driving the most conversions.

How Call Attribution Works

  • Step 1: Assign – Select unique call tracking numbers to assign to each campaign or listing.
  • Step 2: Track – Potential customers see your ad or listing and call the associated phone number.
  • Step 3: Forward –The calls ring directly into your main business phone, regardless of which number they use.
  • Step 4: Analyze – Because they used one of your tracking numbers, you instantly know which ad or campaign inspired them to call.

With AI-powered call tracking, gone are the days of wondering how your digital marketing efforts are tied to high-value inbound calls.

For agencies, this helps prove the real value of your services and extend the life of your client relationships.

2. AI Can Help You Save Time On Manually Reviewing Calls

Listening to and analyzing phone calls manually can be time-consuming and inefficient for agencies.

However, it’s an important part of understanding the customer experience and sales team performance.

With AI-powered call analysis tools, you get quality, keyword-tagged transcriptions with near-human-level accuracy.

Not only can this technology help you save over 50% of the time spent listening to phone calls, but it can also help you deliver actionable recommendations to clients and drive better results.

Conversation Intelligence, for instance, is trained on over 1.1M hours of voice data and enables real-time analysis for instantaneous results.

This advanced tool provides opportunities for you to improve your strategy through the following granular insights:

  • Spotting disparities in the industry-specific lingo your sales team uses, compared to the lingo your prospects are using to describe their business challenges and goals.
  • Identifying trends or gaps in your service offerings based on what your prospects are asking for.
  • Identifying frequently asked questions and other important topics to address through content marketing.
  • Setting goals for lead qualification — not just the quantity of leads generated for your business.

Conversational AI is perfectly suited to summarize the content of long conversations – however, the call summaries still require a human to read them and determine the main takeaways.

But if you work in a bustling small business, it’s unlikely you’d have the bandwidth for tasks such as call transcription, summaries, keyword spotting, or trend analysis.

Rather than displacing human labor, conversational AI is assisting businesses in taking on tasks that may have been overlooked and leveraging data that would otherwise remain untapped.

3. AI Can Help You Lower Cost Per Lead / Save Money On Tools & Ad Spend

Ever wonder why certain campaigns take off while others fall flat? It’s all in the data!

Even failed campaigns can offer invaluable insights into your client’s audience and messaging.

But if you can’t spot the underperformers quickly enough, you risk wasting your ad budget on ineffective tactics.

The quicker you can identify what’s working and what’s not, the quicker you can pivot and adjust your marketing strategy.

With AI-powered tools, agencies can access instant insights that enable them to reduce wasteful spending and improve overall campaign efficiency.

How To Deliver More Value With AI

  • Make a bigger impact in less time: AI-powered technology creates a force multiplier within your agency, allowing you to make more of an impact with the same level of inputs you’re already using.
  • Unlock actionable insights from call data: AI is revolutionizing the way companies leverage call data by enabling them to gain insights at scale. As a result, businesses can increase their ROI and deliver greater value to their clients by analyzing hundreds of calls efficiently.
  • Foster alignment with data-driven strategies: By analyzing customer conversations with AI, businesses can align their marketing strategy with data-driven recommendations, enhancing overall coherence. Additionally, the ability to create triggers based on specific phrases enables automated analysis and reporting, further streamlining the alignment process.
  • Drive effectiveness with rapid insights: Leveraging Conversation Intelligence enables agencies to deliver better insights faster, increase conversion rates, refine keyword strategies, and develop robust reporting capabilities.

With the right AI-powered tools, you can access the insights you need to ensure maximum ROI for your clients.

4. AI Can Help You Improve Overall Agency Efficiency

Are you spending too much valuable time on tasks that produce minimal results?

Many agencies find themselves bogged down by routine, administrative tasks that don’t contribute much to their bottom line.

But with AI automation, agencies can streamline their operations and redirect their energy towards more strategic endeavors.

From email scheduling and social media posting to data entry and report generation, AI can handle a wide array of tasks with precision and efficiency – giving you time to focus on high-impact activities that drive growth and deliver tangible results.

Ways Your Business Can Benefit From Automation

  1. Automatically transcribe your calls to boost close rates: See how your team is handling difficult objections and ensure that they’re delivering your businessʼ value proposition in an effective manner.
  2. Score calls based on quality and opportunity: Take the time-consuming work out of scoring your calls and determine which campaigns drive the best calls to your business.
  3. Classify calls by your set criteria: Qualify, score, tag, or assign a value to the leads that meet your criteria, automatically.
  4. Automatically redact sensitive information: Protect your customers by removing billing or personal information. Keep your data safe and secure through complete HIPAA compliance.
  5. Monitor your teamsʼ performance: Use Conversation Intelligence as a valuable sales training tool to ensure your team doesn’t miss any key messaging marks.
  6. Know your customersʼ needs: Identify conversation trends in your phone calls and stay privy to evolving customer needs.
  7. Improve your digital marketing strategy: Use AI-powered insights to inform your digital marketing strategy and boost your online presence.

By automating mundane tasks, agencies can optimize workflows, increase productivity, and improve efficiency across the board.

Looking for 5 – 7? Download The Full Guide

Rather than fearing AI, the future belongs to those who embrace it.

By strategically combining human creativity with artificial intelligence, you can unlock capabilities that transcend what either could achieve alone.

Want to discover even more ways to level up your agency with AI?

Get the full guide here.

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
May 8 2024
Top 15 Ways To Secure A WordPress Site via @sejournal, @inmotionhosting

Thankfully, there are plenty of steps you can take to protect your WordPress website.

Easy WordPress Security Basics

When setting up your WordPress site security, there are some basic things you can do to beef up your protection.

Below, we will take a look at some of the first things you should do to help protect your website.

1. Implement SSL Certificates

Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificates are a standard technology that establishes an encrypted connection between a web server (host) and a web browser (client). This connection ensures all data passed between the two remains private and intrinsic.

SSL certificates are an industry-standard used by millions of websites to protect their online transactions with their customers, and obtaining one should be one of the first steps you take to secure your website.

2. Require & Use Strong Passwords

Along with obtaining an SSL certificate, one of the very first things you can do to protect your site is use strong passwords for all your logins.

It might be tempting to create or reuse a familiar or easy-to-remember password, but doing so puts both you and your website at risk. Improving your password strength and security decreases your chances of being hacked. The stronger your password, the less likely you are to be a victim of a cyberattack.

When creating a password, there are some general password best practices you should follow.

If you aren’t sure if you are using a strong enough password, you check the strength of one by using a free tool like this helpful Password Strength Checker.

3. Install A Security Plugin

WordPress plugins are a great way to quickly add useful features to your website, and there are several great security plugins available.

Installing a security plugin can add some extra layers of protection to your website without requiring much effort.

To get you started, check out this list of recommended WordPress security plugins.

4. Keep WordPress Core Files Updated

As of 2024, there are an estimated 1.09 billion total websites on the web with more than 810 million of those sites using WordPress.

Because of its popularity, WordPress websites are oftentimes a target for hackers, malware attacks, and data thieves.

Keeping your WordPress installation up to date at all times is critical to maintain the security and stability of your site.

Every time a WordPress security vulnerability is reported, the core team starts working to release an update that fixes the issue.

If you aren’t updating your WordPress website, then you are likely using a version of WordPress that has known vulnerabilities.

There is especially no excuse for using an outdated version of WordPress since the introduction of automatic updates.

Don’t leave yourself open to attack by using an old version of WordPress. Turn on auto updates and forget about it.

If you would like an even easier way to handle updates, consider a Managed WordPress solution that has auto updates built in.

5. Pay Attention To Themes & Plugins

Keeping WordPress updated ensures your core files are in check, but there are other areas where WordPress is vulnerable that core updates might not protect such as your themes and plugins.

For starters, only ever install plugins and themes from trusted developers. If a plugin or theme wasn’t developed by a credible source, you are probably safer not using it.

On top of that, make sure to update WordPress plugins and themes. Just like an outdated version of WordPress, using outdated plugins and themes makes your website more vulnerable to attack.

6. Run Frequent Website Backups

One way to protect your WordPress website is to always have a current backup of your site and important files.

The last thing you want is for something to happen to your site and you do not have a backup.

Backup your site, and do so often. That way if something does happen to your website, you can quickly restore a previous version of it and quickly get back up and running.

Intermediate WordPress Security Measures That Add More Protection

If you’ve completed all the basics but you still want to do more to protect your website, there are some more advanced steps you can take to bolster your security.

Let’s take a look at what you should do next.

7. Never Use The “Admin” Username

Never use the “admin” username. Doing so makes you susceptible to brute force attacks and social engineering scams.

Because “admin” is such a common username, it is easily-guessed and makes things much easier for scammers to trick people into giving away their login credentials.

Much like having a strong password, using a unique username for your logins is a good idea because it makes it much harder for hackers to crack your login info.

If you are currently using the “admin” username, change your WordPress admin username.

8. Hide Your WP Admin Login Page

On top of using a unique username another thing you can do to protect your login credentials is hide your WordPress admin login page with a plugin like WPS Hide Login.

By default, a majority of WordPress login pages can be accessed by adding “/wp-admin” or “/wp-login.php” to the end of a URL. Once a hacker or scammer has identified your login page, they can then attempt to guess your username and password in order to access your Admin Dashboard.

Hiding your WordPress login page is a good way to make you a less easy target.

9. Disable XML-RPC

WordPress uses an implementation of the XML-RPC protocol to extend functionality to software clients.

Most users don’t need WordPress XML-RPC functionality, and it’s one of the most common vulnerabilities that opens users up for exploits.

That’s why it’s a good idea to disable it. Thanks to the Wordfence Security plugin, it is really easy to do just that.

10. Harden wp-config.php File

The process of adding extra security features to your WordPress site is sometimes known as “hardening” because you are essentially giving your site some extra armor against hackers.

You can “harden” your website by protecting your wp-config.php file via your .htaccess file. Your WordPress wp-config.php file contains very sensitive information about your WordPress installation including your WordPress security keys and the WordPress database connection details, which is exactly why you don’t want it to be easy to access.

11. Run A Security Scanning Tool

Sometimes your WordPress website might have a vulnerability that you had no idea existed. That’s why it’s wise to use some tools that can find vulnerabilities and even fix them for you.

The WPScan plugin scans for known vulnerabilities in WordPress core files, plugins and themes. The plugin also notifies you by email when new security vulnerabilities are found.

Strengthen Your Server-Side Security

So you have taken all the above measures to protect your website but you still want to know if there is more you can do to make it as secure as possible.

The remaining actions you can take to beef up your security will need to be done on the server side of your website.

12. Look For A Hosting Company That Does This

One of the best things you can do to protect your site from the very get-go is to choose the right hosting company to host your WordPress website.

When looking for a hosting company, you want to find one that is fast, reliable, and secure, and will support you with great customer service.

That means they should have good, powerful resources, maintain an uptime of at least 99.5%, and use server-level security tactics.

If a host can’t check those basic boxes, they are not worth your time or money.

13. Use The Latest PHP Version

Like old versions of WordPress, outdated versions of PHP are no longer safe to use.

If you aren’t on the latest version of PHP, upgrade your PHP version to protect yourself from attack.

14. Host On A Fully-Isolated Server

Fully-isolated virtual private servers have a lot of advantages and one of those advantages is increased security.

The physical isolation offered from a cloud-based VPS is inherently secure, protecting your website against cross-infection from other customers. Combined with robust firewalls and DDoS protection, your data remains secure against potential threats and vulnerabilities.

Looking for the perfect cloud environment for your WordPress website? Look no further.

With InMotion Hosting’s Platform i, you receive unparalleled security features including managed server updates, real-time security patching, web application firewalls, and DDoS prevention, along with purpose-built high-availability servers optimized for fast and reliable WordPress sites.

15. Use A Web Application Firewall

One of the final things you can do to add extra security measures to your WordPress website is use a web application firewall (WAF).

A WAF is usually a cloud-based security system that offers another layer of protection around your site. Think of it as a gateway for your site. It blocks all hacking attempts and filters out other malicious types of traffic like distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks or spammers.

WAFs usually require monthly subscription fees, but adding one is worth the cost if you place a premium on your WordPress website security.

Make Sure Your Website & Business Is Safe & Secure

If your website is not secure, you could be leaving yourself open to a cyber attack.

Thankfully, securing a WordPress site doesn’t require too much technical knowledge as long as you have the right tools and hosting plan to fit your needs.

Instead of waiting to respond to threats once they happen, you should proactively secure your website to prevent security issues.

That way if someone does target your website, you are prepared to mitigate the risk and go about your business as usual instead of scrambling to locate a recent backup.

Get Managed WordPress Hosting featuring robust security measures on high-performance servers, complete with free SSL, dedicated IP address, automatic server updates, DDoS protection, and included WAF.

Learn more about how Managed WordPress Hosting can help protect your website and valuable data from exposure to hackers and scammers.

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Apr 25 2024
Google Universal Analytics 360 Sunsetting Soon: Migration Tips & Top Alternative Inside via @sejournal, @PiwikPro

This post was sponsored by Piwik PRO. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

This year, Google will finally phase out Universal Analytics 360, requiring paid users to switch to Google Analytics 360.

This is not something you can skip or postpone, and the clock is ticking.

The new analytics differ significantly from the previous version, and you can’t migrate data between them, so the transition can be challenging for organizations.

Since you’ll be starting from scratch, now is a good time to explore other options and determine if there are better solutions for your needs.

The three main areas to consider when deciding if you want to stay with Google or move to another platform are: the migration process, privacy and compliance, and ease of use.

When Is Google Universal Analytics 360 Sunsetting?

July 1, 2024 is when Google will phase out Universal Analytics 360.

What Should I Do Next?

Google encourages you to migrate to Google Analytics 360 as quickly as possible.

If you don’t, you could:

  • Lose critical advertising capabilities.
  • Lose the ability to export historical data.
  • Face delays in setting up Google Analytics 360.

    How To Migrate To Your Next Analytics Platform

    Moving to a new platform is much more than just implementation; it is vital to plan your migration properly. Below are five steps to help you through the entire process.

    Step 1. Evaluate Your Stack & Resources

    Before you switch analytics tools, take the time to evaluate your entire stack, not just the tool you’re changing. Ensure that your stack is up-to-date and meets your current business needs. Migrating to a new analytics vendor almost always requires more people and more time than originally estimated. It’s a good occasion to remove redundant tools from your stack; it might also allow you to integrate with new ones that can help you run your analytics and collect data more comprehensively.

    Step 2. Tidy Your Data

    Over time, data collection may get messy, and you find yourself tracking data that isn’t relevant to your business. A migration gives you a chance to clean up your data taxonomy. Ensure that your new tool allows you to use the same categories of data as the previous one. Pay close attention to any data that needs to be collected automatically, like location data (country, region, city), and device details (device type, browser). Finally, make sure the SDKs you need are supported by your new tool.

    Step 3. Implement A New Platform

    This step involves setting up the tracking code that collects data about visitors to your website or app and making any necessary modifications. Remember to set up tags to gather more detailed data through events or connect third-party tools.

    Speed Up The Transition: If you switch to Piwik PRO, you can use a migration tool to easily transfer your settings from Universal Analytics (GA3) and Google Tag Manager.

    Step 4. Evaluate Tour New Data

    Once you’re done implementing your new platform, you should run it parallel to your existing tool for a few months before finalizing the migration. During this time, you can audit your new data and correct any errors. In this manner, you can retain your historical data while simultaneously generating new data segments on the new platform.

    Step 5. Provide Training For Your Team

    All end users need training to comprehend the platform’s operations, retrieve necessary data, and generate reports. This step is frequently missed as it falls at the end of the project.

    Upon finishing this step, you will be set to switch to your new platform fully. If you find the migration process challenging, consider getting help from outside sources. Some analytics vendors offer hands-on onboarding and user training, which accelerates product adoption.

    Is Switching To Google Analytics 360 Worth The Hassle?

    You might be thinking, “Migrating to the successor of UA 360 won’t be a walk in the park,” especially if you work for a large organization.

    In addition to subscription and data migration costs, you may also need to train your staff or increase fees for external marketing agencies that will face new challenges.

    While Analytics 360 has incredible use cases, there may be other tools that better suit your needs.

    Switching to alternative solutions may be a good option for you.

    How To Pick A Replacement For Universal Analytics 360

    To decide whether to choose a new platform or stick with Google, consider a few important factors:

    1. Because GA 360 is a different software, your marketing and analytics departments will need to allocate extra resources to learn the new platform. You will also need the support of analysts, developers, and data architects to help you reconstruct reports based on the data architecture of the chosen platform. Choosing a solution with similar features and user experience to UA 360 can be a good option, because it saves resources, making onboarding faster and easier.
    2. You will also need to redesign your entire customer journey, because the data model in GA360 has changed from sessions to events. This process can be more challenging and costly than choosing a session-based platform or one that offers you freedom of choice.
    3. Another important consideration is the level of support offered by the vendor. This can greatly affect the quality of the migration and onboarding to a new platform. Although Google Analytics is currently the most popular tool for analyzing web traffic, the level of support it provides is limited. Other companies like Piwik PRO can offer more in this area, including personalized onboarding, product implementation, training, and dedicated customer support at every step.

    Consideration 1: Think About Privacy & Compliance

    Organizations around the world are increasingly concerned with data privacy and compliance. A 2023 Thomson survey found that 80% of business professionals acknowledge the importance of compliance as a crucial advisory function for their organizations. Gartner, on the other hand, predicts that, by 2025, 60% of large enterprises will use at least one privacy-enhancing computing (PEC) technique in analytics, business intelligence, and/or cloud computing.

    This is due to a growing number of new regulations that place greater control over personal data at the forefront. The EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) are two of the most prominent examples. The landscape has been further complicated by events such as the Schrems II case, Brexit, and China’s Personal Data Protection Law. Data protection is also increasingly important in some sectors, such as healthcare, where regulations like HIPAA are mandatory.

    If your company operates globally or has ambitions to do so, the first thing to consider is who has full ownership of the data, where the servers hosting the data are located, and who owns them. Google Analytics 360 only offers cloud deployment in an unknown location, which means that data might be transferred between data centers in the Americas, Europe, and Asia. This makes it difficult to know exactly where the data is stored and ownership is unclear. For now, the issue of data transfers between the US and the EU has been resolved by the EU-US Privacy Shield framework agreement, but the future stays unclear. Last year, NOYB, led by Max Schrems, announced that it would soon appeal this decision to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU).

    To meet privacy and compliance requirements in different countries and industries, choose a platform that allows you to customize your hosting plan and set specific parameters for data collection and analysis. Platforms like Piwik PRO Analytics Suite enable you to store your data on servers in Europe, the US, and Asia, based on your preferences. This translates into flexibility and security of your data.

    Consideration 2: Ease Of Use & Integration

    This may sound counterintuitive, but the new GA 360 might be too complex for many. While it offers numerous advanced functions for data analysts, it lacks features specifically designed for marketers. As a result, marketers may need help in configuring the system to efficiently use the data.

    On the other hand, in GA 360, the data model shifts from session-based to event-based. This is especially important if your teams depend on UA 360 behavioral reporting, benchmarking, and e-commerce flow reports, as these features are unavailable in the new release. You also need to revise all the reports for all the stakeholders.

    Conversely, Piwik PRO strongly emphasizes simplicity and enables marketers to quickly access the necessary data. Additionally, the data model combines both session-based and event-based structures. This approach ensures that you can start working with the data faster and deliver the reports that stakeholders are used to. Another big advantage of Piwik PRO is its model for working with raw data, which is a valuable source of knowledge about users and provides richer reporting in more contexts. Google Analytics does not provide raw data exports, so you have to use various services and tools to accomplish this. To be fair, however, exporting large raw data packets with Piwik PRO software may take longer than with Google solutions.

    The new GA 360 is most effective when used mainly with products from the Google ecosystem. When considering data activation, Google Ads is the most suitable option. When it comes to Piwik PRO, you still have this option, but integrating with other solutions is much easier. The platform offers four modules: Analytics, Tag Manager, Consent Manager and Customer Data Platform (CDP). The CDP module, available in the paid plan, lets you create detailed customer profiles and categorize your data into various audience segments. You can activate them to provide a personalized experience and run effective campaigns across multiple channels.

    The landscape of modern analytics is constantly changing. On the one hand, there are ongoing discussions about privacy and compliance regulations, while on the other, companies are trying out various methods to collect and analyze data. In the end, your choice of analytics platform will impact the performance of your marketing and sales efforts. So take the time to explore, and you may find other solutions that better suit your organization’s needs.

    Piwik PRO is a solid choice to explore for your next primary analytics solution. Book a personalized demo of the Enterprise version and see the benefits of introducing Piwik PRO Analytics Suite in your organization.

    REQUEST A DEMO

    Image Credits

    Featured Image: Image by Piwik PRO Used with permission.

    Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
    Apr 23 2024
    How To Address Middle And Bottom Of Funnel Pain Points via @sejournal, @alexanderkesler

    The B2B marketplace has evolved rapidly in recent years due to various global factors, with the pandemic and economic turbulence being the top drivers.

    As a result, there has been a notable change in both marketer and buyer priorities in recent years.

    Speaking with our clients and partners, I have observed that in 2024, marketers’ top priorities have shifted from personalized outreach to generating sales-ready leads and driving pipeline opportunities.

    This likely results from a more evident objective of proving return on investment (ROI), and pressuring marketers to effectively guide prospective clients through the discovery and purchase journey more efficiently.

    However, this focus is understandable given the benefits of a stable pipeline with middle (MOFU) and bottom (BOFU) of the funnel leads.

    Not only does it offer a consistent avenue for sustained growth, but it also allows sales teams to capitalize on the best opportunities for conversion.

    In this guide, I present playbooks we implemented at INFUSE and recommend for B2B organizations in 2024 to effectively address the most common MOFU and BOFU pain points to increase conversions.

    The Evolution Of The B2B Buyer

    The increasing complexity of the buyer’s journey – a result of buyers taking a largely defensive position in an effort to de-risk their portfolios – has resulted in expanded B2B buying committees, extended sales cycles, and more discerning buyers across buying committees of organizations of all sizes and complexities.

    This shift is unsurprising, considering that 83% of buyers initiate first contact with vendors. It suggests that sellers learn about buying processes on the buyer’s terms.

    Buying committees are also increasingly younger, with many now comprising Millennials and Gen Z. These generations demonstrate unique buying behaviors compared to their predecessors; they are more independent, tech-native, and display a greater need for autonomy in their client journeys.

    In fact, research shows that approximately 70% of the buyer’s journey is now done completely independently, without ever engaging with sales.

    These young buyers have also prioritized cloud purchases, particularly due to the effortless integration of low/no-code solutions that allow organizations to build on their purchases in their own time as resources allow.

    Addressing Middle-Of-The-Funnel (MOFU) Pain Points

    Below is a list of the four most common middle-of-the-funnel pain points and strategies to address these challenges:

    1. Lack Of Personalization

    Conversions often stall due to a lack of understanding of the key needs buyers face in MOFU, as well as identifying the right timing and messaging to increase velocity to the bottom of the funnel.

    Below are four tactics to address this pain point effectively:

    Utilize Accurate Targeting With Segmentation

    Ensure that prospective buyers are correctly segmented throughout their buyer’s journey.

    Adjust targeting as their pain points and goals change to ensure aligned messaging. This can be streamlined with the use of data analytics tools to identify and categorize audiences based on their unique behaviors.

    Make Use Of Data Throughout The Buyer’s Journey

    It is normal for prospective clients to move freely in their buyer’s journey, often skipping phases or going back to research as needed.

    Be sure to continually assess their position using behavioral data and other feedback mechanisms to ensure they receive the correct nurturing for their funnel stage.

    Implement Feedback Mechanisms To Understand Prospect Challenges

    Set up regular feedback loops via surveys, focus groups, and social listening tools to gather insights.

    These can be used to make adjustments and optimize nurturing to target buyers at the right time with relevant messaging on the platforms or channels they frequent.

    Find The Right Go-To-Market (GTM) Motion To Lead Your Nurturing And Funnel Efforts

    GTM models act as a blueprint for molding an organization’s frameworks.

    This involves determining target buyer personas, establishing interdepartmental data processes, and coordinating efforts to ensure a seamless revenue cycle.

    Often, organizations have several GTM motions running simultaneously, which can be beneficial to accelerate velocity with certain buyer segments, hone in on the right product-market fit, or test a new market or solution.

    2. Limited Budgets

    Budgets will consistently remain a focal point, particularly in a time of high expectations – not only for vendors, but internally within organizations and buying committees.

    Committee members are tasked with making carefully considered purchases that yield tangible returns, underscoring the importance of budget consciousness.

    Below are three tactics to address this pain point effectively:

    • Create a tiered pricing structure per persona designed to evolve alongside their budget and requirements. This allows for strategic upsells and cross-sells, maximizing revenue and catering to diverse needs.
    • Provide referral programs to accommodate their budgetary requirements (with incentives) while encouraging clients to stimulate top-of-funnel demand.

    3. Incorrect Content Or Messaging

    When buyers receive content or messaging that is not relevant to their pain points, role, or stage in the buyer’s journey, it diminishes their interest and trust in the brand.

    In fact, 47% of buyers reported that the key driver behind opening emails was relevant messaging.

    Below are three tactics to address this pain point effectively:

    • Deliver the right content to the right audience by tailoring messaging to suit the specific pain points and buyer’s journey stage of each prospect. Utilize customer relationship management systems (CRMs), data analytics, surveys, and other sources of buyer data to build highly personalized nurturing programs.
    • Ensure your content is demand-ready by understanding the role of core decision-makers in the buying process and tailoring your content accordingly. In addition, ensure that your messaging is adjusted to the channels they frequent.
    • Keep your brand top of mind by engaging buyers early with relevant content that addresses their evolving pain points. Providing answers to frequently asked questions and highlighting distinctive value propositions are essential for driving high engagement rates at the top of the funnel. This, in turn, facilitates the transition toward conversions in the subsequent phases, fostering sustained interest.

    4. Single Channel Engagement

    Buyers utilize more channels than ever, with the majority engaging with brands on 10 or more channels.

    This trend is evident in current B2B buyer behavior, as prospective clients consult a variety of sources before making buying decisions. As a result, organizations that rely solely on single-channel engagement risk overlooking crucial audience segments.

    Below are two tactics to address this pain point effectively:

    • Omnichannel engagement is a necessity. B2B buyers increasingly seek a seamless omnichannel journey, with 87% preferring a personalized and consistent experience across all channels. To meet this demand, it is important to integrate your sales and marketing efforts across multiple touchpoints, ensuring consistency and continuity throughout the buyer’s journey.
    • Email-only does not work anymore. While email remains a fundamental tool in B2B communication, its effectiveness as a standalone channel is fading. With crowded inboxes and evolving buyer preferences, organizations must diversify their communications and invest in strategies across multiple channels to create demand in their market – not just capture it.

    Addressing Bottom-Of-Funnel Pain Points

    Below is a list of the three most common bottom-of-funnel (BOFU) pain points and strategies on how to address them:

    1. Performance Against Competitors

    Considering the increased scrutiny of buyers in the current landscape, it comes as no surprise that most buying committees will seek to compare your solution with multiple competitors.

    This highlights the importance of establishing key differentiators and demonstrating how your solution best supports your buyers’ business growth and objectives.

    In fact, brand equity – as a precursor and counterbalance to full-funnel demand generation – is a critical element of a solid business strategy. Research shows that 84% of deals are won by the first vendor a buyer contacts.

    This first contact requires companies to have comprehensive brand-to-demand strategies in place, to ensure they are first on their buyers’ minds.

    Below are three tactics to address this pain point effectively:

    • Offer competitor analysis that clearly defines your unique value proposition (UVP) to engage BOFU leads. Develop personalized comparisons of products against your competitors based on the features that are of the most interest to each segment. Make this information engaging and accessible in brief reports and datasets that highlight your strengths at a glance.
    • Provide assurance through nurture streams that engage and educate prospective clients. Offer problem-solving content such as case studies, whitepapers, webinars, executive briefs, and industry reports demonstrating how your solution addresses challenges and delivers ROI.
    • Offer free tools and demos illustrating personalized problem-solving. Enable buyers to experience the benefits of your solution firsthand by offering free tools, demos, or trials that allow them to explore its capabilities. Tailor demos to address the specific pain points and objectives of each buyer or segment, and adjust your demo tactics to meet the needs of the increasingly younger, tech-savvy, and independent buyer.

    2. Integration And AI Concerns

    Amidst the challenge of managing bloated tech stacks, integration has become a key concern. 35% of executives reported their legacy software was rigid, expensive, and difficult to use.

    Buyers actively seek tools to solve new business challenges while navigating integration requirements.

    In addition, the B2B landscape has embraced the advantages of incorporating generative AI into day-to-day operations, as demonstrated by the fact that 73% of marketers were already leveraging generative AI, just six months after the release of OpenAI’s GPT4.

    Below are three tactics to address these pain points effectively:

    • Ensure solutions seamlessly integrate with existing systems. Proactively evaluate compatibility features of popular software and prioritize features that facilitate seamless integration. Establish a robust testing protocol to verify compatibility before deployment, ensuring minimal disruption and maximum value to clients.
    • Integrate AI into existing solutions where possible. Identify areas within your solution where AI integration can truly enhance functionality and value for clients. Collaborate with developers to seamlessly embed AI capabilities into these solutions and ensure thorough testing to guarantee integration and optimal performance.
    • Provide training to meet the demand for innovation and automation. Develop customized training and coaching programs tailored to your buyers’ specific needs and skill levels. Offer ongoing support and resources to facilitate continuous learning and adaptation to new technologies.

    Due to the democratization of technology, the rise of low-code/no-code solutions, and the increasing tech-savvy Millennial and Gen Z buyers, sellers now require a more solution-oriented approach, equipped with technical knowledge.

    By the time buyers are ready to meet with sellers (typically 70% or more into their purchasing journey), they often have detailed technical inquiries and may no longer require the high-level discussions that vendors are traditionally accustomed to.

    Meeting buyers where they are has become a fundamental requirement.

    3. ROI Concerns

    Buyers are increasingly pressured to achieve ROI goals, making this a recurring concern among those seeking information on how solutions can assist them in reaching their performance objectives.

    Below are two tactics to address this pain point effectively:

    • Support claims with case studies and/or customer testimonials. Utilize tangible ROI data from existing clients, preferably from the same or similar industries to the buyers. Combine this with case studies to inform bottom-of-funnel nurturing activities such as content and webinars.
    • Foster brand evangelism to build confidence. Provide exemplary post-sales service to support clients and regularly check in with them to ensure their satisfaction. Brand evangelism can be utilized to address common objections after a sale while establishing brand credibility within your industry.

    Key Takeaways

    Engage Buyers Where They Are In Their Buyer’s Journey

    Lead nurturing and engagement tactics should always be tailored to address the pain points, challenges, platforms, and context of your buyers at their current stage in the sales funnel, ensuring relevance and effectiveness.

    Innovate In Both Service And Technology To Maintain A Competitive Edge

    In the B2B landscape, where technology is becoming increasingly democratized, it is crucial to consistently evaluate and refine your strategies, such as prioritizing low/no-code approaches, to stay updated with industry trends.

    Explore Go-To-Market (GTM) Strategies

    To fuel your GTM strategies with iterative approaches and data-driven insights, establish protocols for testing and optimization.

    Continuously analyze performance metrics, refine tactics based on feedback, and foster collaboration across teams to ensure relevance and effectiveness.

    Continuously Assess And Optimize Strategies To Streamline Nurturing

    Given that each buyer’s challenges, needs, and readiness to purchase will frequently shift, ensure that you are closely monitoring their behavior triggers to optimize nurturing activities.

    More resources: 

    Featured Image: NicoElNino/Shutterstock

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