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

    Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
    Mar 20 2024
    5 Ways To Leverage Business Coaching To Grow Your Marketing Agency via @sejournal, @jasonhennessey

    As the owner of a marketing agency, it can be tempting to try and handle every aspect of your business single-handedly.

    After all, your vision and passion are often driving your agency forward.

    However, attempting to tackle every challenge alone can quickly lead to burnout and stagnation.

    This is where many agency owners bring in their secret weapon: a business coach.

    Many of today’s successful entrepreneurs — such as Steve Jobs, Sheryl Sandberg, and Eric Schmidt — were able to take their ventures to the next level with business coaching.

    From providing invaluable guidance and accountability to offering fresh perspectives and strategies, a business coach can revolutionize how you operate and scale your agency.

    Why Hire A Business Coach?

    Many agency owners don’t realize that business growth starts from the inside out.

    Rather than a toolbox of “strategies,” you need to re-examine how you perceive success, manage your team, and harness your unique strengths.

    The right business coach will help you foster personal growth – then professional growth – to achieve long-term, sustainable results.

    A business coach can provide:

    • An objective perspective on your business, providing insight into what is working well and what might be holding you back.
    • First-hand experience, advising you on the best strategies for scaling your team, reaching new revenue milestones, establishing your brand, etc.
    • Accountability, keeping you honest when it comes to your goals and commitments.
    • Skill development, spanning everything from financial planning and hiring to communication and public speaking.
    • A supportive environment for you to vent, navigate challenges, revel in successes, and discuss concerns in your business.

    After hiring my business coach, I quickly realized that I needed to shed old habits and open my mind to new ways of running my business.

    For example, I realized that losing myself in the day-to-day operations was not sustainable.

    My coach advised hiring a COO to manage operations, opening up more time for me, the Visionary, to create our Vivid Vision, and explore new business ventures and speaking opportunities.

    1. Lead Your Team With Confidence

    As an agency owner, it’s time to shatter the illusion of self-sufficiency and embrace the power of teamwork. Even if you’ve taken the steps to hire contractors or employees, I would bet there are some areas of your business where you’re resisting giving up control.

    A business coach will empower you to focus on the things you do best, whether that’s creative thinking, marketing your agency, speaking to clients, building a personal brand, etc.

    They will also be honest in identifying areas where you can delegate tasks to team members, allowing you to scale your agency more efficiently.

    Consider how much time and money are invested in you getting bogged down by tasks like social media posting, scheduling meetings, responding to emails, etc.

    A business coach may advise you on how to hire great talent, lead with confidence, develop a strong company culture, and ultimately achieve better results.

    2. Find Your “Trillion Dollar” Idea

    Many business owners consider themselves to be visionaries, as it takes creative thinking to come up with a business idea and follow it through to fruition.

    But these imaginative qualities can be hard to wrangle when you have too many ideas. A business coach can help you find clarity in the noise.

    That might not mean discovering a literal trillion-dollar idea, but at least focusing on the idea (or ideas) that will have the most impact on your business.

    That could mean launching a new offer, expanding to a new market, exploring speaking opportunities or brand partnerships, etc.

    Shiny object syndrome is often the death of many entrepreneurs; a business coach will help you stay on track with the right ideas.

    Beyond that, an experienced business coach will know how to quantify the success (or failure) of your latest venture.

    If your efforts aren’t paying off, they can help you shift focus. If your project is gaining traction, they can help you capitalize on that momentum.

    3. Avoid “Been There, Done That” Mistakes

    It’s important to learn from our mistakes – but many mistakes are avoidable.

    The value of working with a business coach is that they have made many mistakes before and can help you avoid preventable challenges.

    For example, there is a ton of bad advice out there about how to “scale.” You might assume that, say, launching a digital product is the best next step for your agency.

    But a business coach might have already launched a digital product many times over, and can tell you what to do and what not to do during the process – or whether you should scrap the idea completely.

    Also, in a personal development sense, they can warn you of the signs of burnout or notice when you are out of alignment with your goals. They’ll help you stay true to your priorities and avoid getting sidetracked on your journey to success.

    3. Get Your Finances In Check

    Financial management is a common area of avoidance for many business owners.

    The truth is that many of us have distorted beliefs about money, as well as general inexperience with how to manage it.

    An experienced business coach has likely overcome many of the mental blocks that make managing finances difficult. They’ll have learned the ins and outs of business bookkeeping, financial planning, tax preparation, and when to hire financial services.

    Your business coach can help you create a realistic budget and financial plan for your agency.

    They might advise on how to forecast future revenue and expenses, set financial goals, and set key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure progress.

    They’ll also likely have experience in cash flow management, helping to maintain a healthy influx of revenue to sustain your business.

    They might suggest strategies for improving cash flow, such as developing passive income streams, enforcing payment terms with clients, or optimizing your internal processes.

    Perhaps most importantly, business coaches can help with financial decision-making. This might mean advising on smart investments, expanding the business, up or downsizing personnel, integrating technology, or taking on debt.

    The right coach will empower you to take control of your agency finances.

    You’ll feel more prepared to dig into the numbers, incorporate best practices, and make informed decisions that benefit your business.

    4. Know When To Trim the Fat

    There’s a common trend in the marketing “agency” model of offering a wide, incohesive range of services. The result is a lack of point-of-view on what the agency does best, the audience it serves, and what it achieves for its clients.

    Business coaches help agency owners “trim the fat,” so to speak, when it comes to what’s superfluous in the agency.

    In other words, there may be several services that are generating little-to-no revenue and are instead causing a distraction in what is the core purpose of your agency.

    Even Sheryl Sternberg’s business coach highlights this concept, with the appeal to “[not] fall so deeply in love with your own content that you can’t see that some of it is excess.”

    Ultimately, your service offerings are most effective when they are clear, simple, and relevant to your target audience.

    For example, perhaps your agency does website design, branding, social media management, and email marketing, but 90% of your revenue comes from websites.

    Doubling down on your website design services may allow you to hone your offer, streamline your development process, increase your rates, and scale your new client acquisition system.

    5. Expand Your Network Of Winners

    One of the benefits of having a business coach that I wasn’t expecting was the networking opportunities.

    My executive coach was able to connect me with so many professionals and mentors who ended up helping me and my business. I’ve also formed friendships with other CEOs, and that support has been invaluable.

    Your business coach might introduce you to other winners in their network. You might not even realize you need their help.

    You’ll be able to tap into a wider pool of talent, mentors, thought leaders, and, yes, even friends.

    Again, the illusion of self-sufficiency can be a real killer in your business. Don’t assume that you can or should navigate this journey alone.

    Networking with other industry professionals can help you avoid common pitfalls, overcome growing pains in your agency, and step into new opportunities for growth.

    Finding The One

    While it may seem intimidating to invite an outsider into your inner circle, the benefits of hiring an experienced coach are undeniable.

    In hiring my business coach, I’ve gained invaluable insights and support that have allowed me to scale my agency to new heights.

    Finding “The One” (i.e., the right coach for you) will look different for everyone. For me, I happened to stumble across a TED talk by someone who challenged the way I saw business success.

    I read his books, followed his social media, and set a goal to work with him one day.

    That speaker was Cameron Herold, and I’m happy to say that I was able to hire him as my coach. And, man, am I glad that I did.

    In the early stages of our coaching journey, he illuminated a fundamental truth: While books provide valuable knowledge, a coach offers the swiftest route to implementation and tangible results.

    With his help, we were able to take our agency from $5M to $10M in revenue.

    Selecting a coach who is aligned with your specific needs is paramount.

    Whether that’s doubling your revenue, scaling a team, fine-tuning your offer, or striking a work-life balance, find someone who has been where you are now and has made it through to the next level.

    LinkedIn, Facebook Groups, Instagram, YouTube, and podcasts are great places to find people who are doing amazing things.

    As an agency owner, you’ll quickly discover how coaching is an investment that can have significant returns for your business.

    More resources:

    Featured Image: Ground Picture/Shutterstock

    Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
    Mar 14 2024
    10 Law Firm Marketing Tactics For Business Building In 2024 via @sejournal, @krisjonescom

    The legal industry is more competitive than ever, requiring law firms to leverage a blend of advanced technology and refined marketing tactics to stay ahead. A blend of SEO tactics to improve organic visibility and PPC advertising to target high-intent audiences can give you the edge.

    Modern marketing strategies require personalized approaches that resonate with clients and potential audiences. A mix of strategies can put your law firm in front of the right people at the right time.

    Below are timely recommendations for law firm marketing tactics, each designed to address distinct aspects of a comprehensive and effective marketing strategy.

    1. Develop A Comprehensive Marketing Calendar

    A well-planned marketing calendar is essential for law firms to strategically organize and schedule their marketing activities throughout the year.

    By mapping out campaigns, budgets, and key dates in advance, law firms can avoid ad-hoc marketing efforts and ensure a consistent and sustained approach.

    This proactive strategy enables firms to align marketing efforts with business objectives and key dates in the legal calendar, providing a framework for systematic progress and evaluation.

    Adapt to today’s dynamic omnichannel environment. Consider blending traditional channels like billboards and TV ads with a mix of organic and paid strategies on popular online platforms like Google and Facebook for optimal results.

    Read more: How To Create An Editorial Calendar For Content Marketing In 5 Easy Steps

    2. Embrace Digital Marketing

    A robust online presence is indispensable for law firms.

    This involves leveraging SEO to enhance search engine visibility, engaging in content marketing to provide value and establish authority, and utilizing social media platforms to connect with and expand the client base.

    While paid acquisition on Facebook and Google is competitive and expensive, it is necessary if your firm wants to stay top of mind when someone may need your services.

    Although competitive, digital marketing can be more cost-effective than traditional forms of advertising like print ads or billboards.

    With proper planning and execution, your law firm can reach a large audience without incurring the high costs associated with traditional marketing channels.

    A dynamic digital marketing strategy can significantly increase a law firm’s reach and reputation, attracting potential clients and reinforcing relationships with existing ones.

    Digital marketing offers robust analytics tools that allow your law firm to track the performance of your campaigns in real time.

    This means you can measure the effectiveness of your efforts and make data-driven decisions for optimization.

    Today’s digital marketing can be complex for non-trained and experienced professionals.

    Consider hiring an experienced digital marketing agency to gain access to experienced marketers.

    Be careful not to put your marketing dollars in the hands of inexperienced marketers who have recently graduated from college and are unlikely to have the skills necessary to compete effectively in the fiercely competitive legal vertical.

    Read more: 15 Top Digital Marketing Tools & Why We Love Them

    3. Personalize Marketing Efforts

    Personalization in marketing is about understanding and addressing the specific needs and interests of potential clients.

    Tailored messaging that resonates with a client’s unique legal situation enhances engagement and conversion rates.

    This involves creating content and marketing materials that speak directly to the concerns and questions of your target audience, making them feel seen and understood, thereby fostering trust and loyalty.

    Use audience targeting on paid digital ad platforms like Facebook to boost performance by showing ads to the most relevant audience.

    Audience targeting on Facebook refers to the process of selecting and defining specific groups of Facebook users who are most likely to be interested in your content, products, or services.

    You can also set up Custom Audiences, which allow you to target people who have already interacted with your business in some way, such as website visitors, app users, or people on your email list.

    You can upload your own customer data to create Custom Audiences.

    Once you’ve created a Custom Audience, you can use it as a source to create Lookalike Audiences.

    Facebook will find users who share similarities with your existing audience, expanding your reach to potential customers who are likely to be interested in your offerings.

    Read more: How To Use SEO To Target Your Audience Throughout The Funnel

    4. Implement Google Local Service Ads (LSAs)

    Google Local Service Ads (LSAs) are a cost-effective way for your law firm to connect with local clients.

    The pay-per-lead model ensures that your firm only spends on ads that directly result in client contact.

    LSAs appear at the top of Google’s search results, above even traditional paid search ads.

    This prime placement can significantly increase your law firm’s visibility and attract potential clients.

    Google verifies businesses that use LSAs, which can enhance your law firm’s credibility and trustworthiness.

    Potential clients are more likely to choose a verified and trusted legal service provider.

    LSAs operate on a pay-per-lead basis rather than pay-per-click.

    This means that your law firm only pays when a potential client contacts you directly through the ad, making it a cost-effective advertising option.

    LSAs allow your law firm to target ads to specific geographic areas, ensuring that they reach your potential clients who are actively searching for legal services in your local service area.

    By targeting individuals searching for legal services in specific areas, LSAs can generate high-quality leads.

    LSAs are designed with mobile users in mind, making it easy for potential clients to contact your law firm directly from their mobile devices. This is especially important considering the increasing use of smartphones for local searches.

    LSAs facilitate direct communication between potential clients and your law firm through phone calls and messages, streamlining the process of connecting with potential clients.

    Even if your law firm does not have a website or a limited online presence, you can still benefit from LSAs, as they provide a direct way for potential clients to contact your firm without visiting a website.

    Finally, maintaining an optimized Google Business Profile and gathering positive reviews are key to maximizing the effectiveness of LSAs as an acquisition channel for your law firm.

    Read more: Is Getting Your Google Business Profile “Google Guaranteed” Worth It?

    5. Implement And Use Google Analytics 4

    To gauge the effectiveness of marketing strategies, your law firm must employ analytics tools.

    Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is a free software that provides detailed insights into how your law firm’s website performs.

    GA4 makes it easy for your law firm to understand how users navigate their website, including which pages are most visited, where users drop off, and the paths users take.

    This information can help optimize website content and user experience.

    Your law firm can also assess whether your website is effectively engaging and retaining visitors.

    By properly tracking the performance of your online campaigns, your firm will be able to understand client behavior and make more effective data-driven decisions.

    Regular analysis of these metrics enables your firm to refine its marketing strategies, optimize resource allocation, and enhance the return on investment (ROI) of your digital marketing efforts.

    Importantly, Google Analytics tracks specific actions that are valuable to your law firm’s marketing efforts, such as contact form submissions, phone calls, or appointment bookings.

    Also, by knowing where your website traffic is coming from – whether from organic search, paid advertising, social media, or referrals – you’ll be empowered to allocate marketing resources effectively and identify successful marketing channels.

    Finally, with the increasing use of mobile devices, Google Analytics 4 offers insights into how well your website performs on different devices and screen sizes.

    Your law firm can ensure that your website is mobile-friendly and responsive, resulting in more traffic, leads, and marketing success.

    Read more: 7 Top Tips To Become A GA4 Pro (Even If You’re A Beginner)

    6. Utilize Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Ads

    PPC advertising provides your law firm with immediate visibility on search engines like Google, Bing, and other digital platforms.

    One of the clearest benefits of PPC advertising is that as soon as a campaign is launched, ads can start appearing in search results, generating traffic to your firm’s website quickly.

    PPC allows precise targeting based on keywords, demographics, location, and other factors.

    This precision ensures that ads are displayed to a highly relevant audience actively searching for legal services.

    With PPC, your law firm has full control over your advertising budget.

    You can set daily or monthly spending limits, and only pay when someone clicks on your ads.

    This “Pay for Performance” makes PPC campaigns unique to other forms of marketing, increasing the likelihood that it is cost-effective and manageable.

    That said, keep in mind the advice given for all forms of digital marketing: It’s almost always best to hire a professional to properly create and effectively manage your PPC campaigns.

    If you are a smaller law firm, PPC can level the playing field by allowing your smaller firm to compete with larger, more established competitors.

    By bidding strategically on relevant keywords, your smaller firms can gain visibility alongside more established law firms.

    PPC campaigns enable your law firm to conduct A/B testing of ad variations, landing pages, and call-to-action buttons.

    This testing helps you identify the most effective messaging and design elements to maximize conversions.

    Read more: 12 Hidden PPC Features You Should Know About

    7. Get Into Legal Directories

    Legal directories are a primary digital marketing tactic for law firms.

    Getting listings in online legal directories can provide a few benefits for your law firm, and it’s relatively easy for you to do.

    Being listed in directories is important because they’re a reputable source of information for potential clients.

    However, directories also provide some SEO benefits that will give an added boost to the rest of your digital marketing efforts.

    You want your law firm to be one of the top results for those looking for lawyers in your area.

    For this to happen, search engines need to know where you’re located, and local listings in directories are one more way of doing this.

    A listing in one of these directories will also help with link building, an important part of SEO.

    These listings ensure that you’ll get backlinks from websites that you know have good authority.

    Read more: How To Attract Backlinks To Your Law Firm Website

    8. Incorporate Video Marketing

    Video content has become a powerful tool in digital marketing.

    Your law firm can use videos to provide a more personal and engaging way to communicate your values, services, and expertise.

    Video content tends to be more engaging and memorable than text-based content.

    Video can capture your target audience’s attention and convey information in a visually appealing and concise manner.

    Videos can be utilized across various platforms, including your law firm’s website, social media, and email marketing campaigns.

    Incorporating professional-quality videos, with attention to accessibility through subtitles, can significantly enhance user engagement and SEO performance.

    Videos also empower your law firm to communicate complex legal concepts and information in a more accessible and understandable way.

    This can help potential clients grasp the nuances of their legal issues and your firm’s services.

    To extend your thought leadership beyond the service area of your law firm, you can post your videos on YouTube.

    Building out a channel for your law firm on YouTube may increase its reputation, leading to hiring profile cases and opportunities.

    Read more: How Digital Video Advertising Will Dominate The Next Decade

    9. Market To Existing And Past Clients

    Retaining existing clients and re-engaging past clients is often more cost-effective than acquiring new ones.

    Happy clients are more inclined to refer friends, family, and colleagues to your law firm.

    Word-of-mouth referrals from your existing clients can be a powerful source of new business.

    Implementing a Google Review tool, such as BirdEye or Zappy Cards, can significantly enhance word of mouth, as well as serve as social proof of the quality of your legal services.

    Marketing to existing and past clients keeps the firm at the forefront of your client’s mind. It can be through regular newsletters, updates on legal developments, and direct mail campaigns, which can encourage repeat business and referrals.

    A focus on maintaining strong relationships with current and former clients can yield significant returns in terms of client loyalty and new business opportunities.

    Read more: 10 Key Client Questions To Inform Exceptional Quality Content

    10. Engage Locally

    Local involvement can set your law firm apart in your community.

    This can include sponsoring local events, participating in community service, or offering pro bono services.

    Such engagement not only builds brand awareness, but also establishes your firm as a committed and integral part of the local community.

    This approach can also increase trust and respect within the community, potentially resulting in more client referrals and higher client retention rates.

    In such a highly competitive industry, many clients prefer working with local attorneys who deeply understand the local legal landscape and community.

    Engaging your law firm locally helps differentiate it from non-local competitors.

    Building relationships with local businesses, organizations, and professionals can also lead to a strong referral network.

    Other local businesses may refer clients needing legal services to your law firm if given the opportunity to meet and get to know you or one of your law colleagues.

    Read more: Using Local Business Partnerships And Collaborations To Build Authority And Visibility

    Conclusion

    For law firms in 2024, success in marketing requires a balanced blend of technology-driven strategies and personal engagement.

    Firms must innovate and adapt to stay competitive in a rapidly changing market.

    From embracing digital tools and analytics to fostering deep community connections, these tactics are not just about attracting clients but building enduring relationships and a strong, reputable brand.

    By implementing these strategies, law firms can navigate the complexities of the modern legal landscape and achieve sustained growth and success.

    More Resources:

    Featured Image: FotoSajewicz/Shutterstock

    Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
    Mar 12 2024
    How An Enterprise Digital PR Firm Earns 100’s Of Links In 30 Days via @sejournal, @hethr_campbell

    Struggling to earn links from journalists and the press?

    Digital PR for SEO has quickly become an alternative to traditional link building. However, earning links from the press can be a challenge creatively.

    That’s where we come in.

    Watch our on-demand webinar, as we explore how to scale the very time-consuming and complicated process of earning links from digital PR, with proven case studies showing how you can earn hundreds of links in 30 days.

    You’ll learn:

    • The process and tools to earn press links in just 30 days.
    • A scalable process to gather data to enhance journalist storylines.
    • How to combine data and expert commentary for the press.

    Kevin Rowe, Founder and Head of Strategy at PureLinq, will give away the process his firm has used to secure hundreds of meaningful links and mentions on top-tier domains using data-driven digital PR, with proven examples.

    Kevin’s firm has systematized a scalable process for data-driven digital PR for SEO, and now he wants to share it with you.

    Discover how to earn quality links through a strong digital PR presence.

    View the slides below or check out the full webinar for all the details.

    Join Us For Our Next Webinar!

    9 Major Google Updates From 2023 & 2024 SEO Predictions

    Join us for an in-depth, actionable recap of the need-to-know Google updates from 2023, along with key predictions for 2024.

    Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
    Mar 12 2024
    21 AI Use Cases For Turning Inbound Calls Into Marketing Data [+Prompts] via @sejournal, @calltrac

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

    If you’ve been enjoying having random conversations with ChatGPT, or trying your hand at tricking a car dealership chatbot into giving you a new car for $1, just wait until you start using safe AI professionally.

    Marketers are finding lots of ways to use generative AI for things like SEO research, copywriting, and summarizing survey results.

    But one of the most natural and safe fits for AI is marketing data discovery during conversational call tracking.

    Don’t believe us?

    Here are a ton of AI marketing use cases that make perfect sense for your teams to start using.

    A Quick Call Tracking Definition

    Call tracking is the act of using unique phone numbers to tie a conversation to its marketing source, and collect other caller data, such as:

    • Location of caller.
    • New or returning caller.
    • Website activity associated with the caller.

    It can help attribute sales to:

    • Best performing marketing materials.
    • Best performing local website landing pages.
    • Best performing PPC campaigns.

    Manually tracking and analyzing each conversation can take hours, and often, important nuances are missed.

    This is where AI can help speed up marketing insight discovery and automatically update contact and sales pipelines.

    All you need is a prompt.

    What Prompt Or Quick Recipe Can I Use To Get AI Insights From Call Tracking?

    Your automatically logged call transcriptions + an AI prompt = automated conversation intelligence.

    Once you have this setup configured, you can drastically speed up your first-party data collection.

    To get more specific, prompts have two main parts. The question you want answered, and how you want AI to answer it. As an example:

    The question: What prompted the Caller to reach out?

    The prompt [how should AI answer]: You are a helpful Sales agent responsible for identifying what marketing channel prompted the contact to call. If the contact did not identify what prompted their call please only respond with “None”.

    Below are some example responses on what a contact might say:

    • Podcast ad.
    • Social post.
    • Friend or family recommendation.
    • Stopped by event booth.
    • Read reviews online.

    1 – 18. How To Use AI To Update Customer Contact Fields

    Starting off boring, but powerful: Generative AI can take your customer conversations and automate data entry tasks, such as updating caller profiles to keep them relevant and qualified.

    21 AI Use Cases For Turning Inbound Calls Into Marketing Data [+Prompts]Image created by CallTrackingMetrics, March 2024

    Impressive? No.

    But the time savings add up quickly, and let your team work on the things they like (that make the company money) instead of manually filling out wrap-up panels after a call.

    What Contact Information Can AI Automatically Update?

    1. Name – You’re going to get a name from caller ID which is a great start, but is it the name your caller prefers? Is it up to date or is it still the name of a former customer who left their company to chase their dreams? With a quick AI prompt, you can make sure you’re greeting the right person when they call back.
    2. Email Address – It might be a default value for form submissions, but getting an email address from a caller can take a lot of back and forth. AI isn’t going to ask for that last part again, or require you to read it back to them to verify. It’s just going to do it.
    3. Company Name – You might be using a sales intelligence tool like ZoomInfo to pull this kind of thing from a database. Still, you might also enjoy the accuracy of extracting directly from the words of your prospect.
    4. Buyer Role – Maybe not a basic field, but one AI can fill out nonetheless (much like other custom fields below!). Give your AI a list to choose from like a researcher, influencer, or decision maker. Sure would be nice to know how much influence they actually have without having to ask directly.

    Can AI Automatically Tag Conversations In My CRM?

    Of course!

    In CRMs and sales enablement tools, tags are used to categorize and segment your conversations for further analysis or follow-up.

    Some popular tags for call tracking are marking someone a new or returning caller.

    You can set a tag manually. You can set a tag using an if/then trigger. And because of what this whole thing is about, you can update tags using AI.

    21 AI Use Cases For Turning Inbound Calls Into Marketing Data [+Prompts]Image created by CallTrackingMetrics, March 2024

    Use AI to automatically add tags to your prospect’s profile, based on their actual calls.

    1. Spam – Sure, you can mark something spam yourself, but why not let AI do it for you so you can move on to real work?
    2. Product Tags – What was the caller asking about? Add product tags to calls for further analysis, or to jump right into the sales pitch when they call back.
    3. Lifecycle Tags – Have AI examine what kinds of questions your prospect is asking and qualify them along a scale of just learning to ready to buy. Or even, mark them as an existing customer.
    4. Target Account – Did the caller mention their company size? Maybe you asked them about revenue or tech stack. If you let AI know what your ideal customer looks like, it’ll help you quickly identify them when you’re talking to one.

    Can Generative AI Score Leads In My CRM?

    Yes! However, if 100% of your calls end in sales, skip this part.

    For the rest of us, phone, text, and chat leads range from “never going to buy anything” to “ready to give you my credit card info.”

    You need a way to gauge which leads are closer to “ready.” This is where lead scoring comes in.

    21 AI Use Cases For Turning Inbound Calls Into Marketing Data [+Prompts]Image created by CallTrackingMetrics, March 2024

    While there are lots of ways to score your conversations, you can use AI to sift through the transcription and qualify a lead for you.

    For call scoring, this often looks like a score of 1 to 5.

    So, here are a few examples of how AI can automatically score your leads from transcripts and chat logs.

    1. Readiness to Buy – The most classic approach to scoring is asking, “How likely is this lead to buy?” A score of 1 is unqualified, and a score of 5 is they’re already paying us.
    2. Ideal Customer Fit – Just like adding a target account tag above, train your AI on what a good customer looks like, and it can also give you a score. How closely does this caller fit your ideal profile?
    3. Coaching – Not everything has to be about the lead. Sometimes we want to grade our own team. How well did your sales team stick to the script? Were they friendly? Let AI roll it up into a score for you.
    4. Follow-up Priority – Aggregate readiness to buy, customer fit, and other inputs to decide on how aggressively to follow up with your leads.

    Can Generative AI Capture & Update Custom Fields From Phone Calls & Chat Logs?

    Your company is likely not the same as every other company using call tracking to get customer insights.

    You’ll want some flexibility to determine what’s important to you, not what your call-tracking provider has determined to be important.

    With custom fields, you get to put your creativity and strategy together with AI’s scalability to automate pretty much anything.

    21 AI Use Cases For Turning Inbound Calls Into Marketing Data [+Prompts]Image created by CallTrackingMetrics, March 2024

    AI can accurately assess and notate:

    1. Product Familiarity – You’ve tagged a call with a product name, but how much time do you need to spend educating the prospect vs. selling them?
    2. Related Products – What else could you be selling this person?
    3. Appointments – If your team runs on appointments or demos, having an AI add a calendar date to a custom field opens up a world of automated possibilities.
    4. Next Steps – Follow up with an email, a call, or an appointment confirmation text. Have AI pull the best next step from your conversation.

    19 – 21. How To Use Generative AI To Take Action On Automatically Updated Sales Contacts

    Ok, so there are some time-savings when you use call tracking and AI to update fields.

    If that’s not quite exciting enough, let’s see what you can actually do with those automated fields.

    21 AI Use Cases For Turning Inbound Calls Into Marketing Data [+Prompts]Image created by CallTrackingMetrics, March 2024

    19. Automate Advertising Optimization

    Use conversion data to inform your decisions.

    Throw AI into the mix, and you go from A to optimized without lifting a finger.

    How?

    The tags and fields your AI just updated become qualifiers to send only the signals that matter to your business over to platforms like Google Ads where their machine learning will go wild to find more of the same. Where you might have been stuck sending a simple conversion (like any call with talk time over 90 seconds) now you can send those conversions with a three or better score for readiness to buy, and a product tag.

    20. Better Personalization In Your CRM

    To kick things off, your AI automatically scraped the conversation for an email address, so now you can add a new contact to an email-centric tool like HubSpot immediately at the end of the conversation. H

    ave you updated product tags? Use that as a great trigger to enroll them in a highly relevant email drip.

    Feed your call scores and product tags into your CRM’s lead scoring system and add complexity to a usually surface-level approach. Or do something as easy as sync their company name to their record so you can personalize outreach.

    21. Following Up & Closing Deals

    You’re not having AI fill out custom fields for fun, you’re doing it to make your job easier.

    And one of your primary jobs is following up after a conversation to get someone closer to purchasing.

    Agreed on a time for your next meeting? Send that date field to your favorite scheduling tool and get a calendar invite in their inbox. Or maybe you had a softer “call me next week” agreement? Use that to send the caller to an outbound dialer that’s set to call as soon as you log in the next week.

    How To Use AI For Analyzing Calls

    Moving beyond data entry, when you give AI a call transcription to work with, it can pull out insights to help your team get better.

    In the time it would take you to read through one eight-minute phone conversation, AI has analyzed your whole day’s worth of calls and is off taking whatever the robot equivalent of a coffee break is.

    What can AI do to upgrade your conversation intelligence? Unfortunately, after 16 use cases, we’re bumping up against our word count and we’ll have to save that for part two: Another Ton of AI Use Cases for Call Tracking.

    Image Credits

    Featured Image: Image by CallTrackingMetrics Used with permission.

    Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
    Jan 17 2024
    Why RevOps Is Essential For Your B2B Marketing Strategy via @sejournal, @alexanderkesler

    Revenue operations (RevOps) is an organizational approach that aligns teams, workflows, and strategies through a unified revenue lens with goals and metrics focused on revenue growth.

    In past years of economic uncertainty, the need to prove return on investment (ROI) has led many businesses to adopt RevOps as a cross-organizational strategy.

    However, its definition and execution vary across companies, influenced by factors such as infrastructure and the strategies that are in place to drive long-term demand.

    In this guide, I present the RevOps strategy we implemented at INFUSE and recommend for 2024, which is aligned with go-to-market (GTM) motions and demand generation best practices to fuel predictable and lasting organizational growth.

    GTM And Demand: Frameworks To Enable RevOps

    The robust and granular nature of go-to-market (GTM) and demand generation frameworks makes both particularly well-suited for steering RevOps initiatives.

    Combining both allows revenue teams to craft iterative strategies that prioritize brand awareness and buyer engagement.

    Adopting a blended approach with both frameworks for your RevOps strategy is an effective way to guide product/service activation initiatives, as well as sustain demand for these offerings to meet performance goals.

    GTM Frameworks For RevOps

    Numerous GTM frameworks exist, with the majority emphasizing specific approaches to facilitate growth.

    For example, product-led growth (PLG) is a GTM model centered on driving revenue with a specific (often freemium) product motion.

    Meanwhile, an inbound growth model is led by driving traffic and lead generation through an inbound channel mix.

    Today, full-funnel approaches to GTM are especially effective, given their focus on supporting buyers at every stage of their journey.

    Therefore, rather than focusing on a product or channel mix, the priority is to build seamless experiences for buyers that offer a level of precision that is necessary to establish trust.

    Demand Frameworks For RevOps

    Demand generation serves as a supportive approach to achieving the objectives of a GTM strategy.

    Essentially, it acts as a conduit to sustain brand awareness and cultivate a pipeline of sales opportunities for the organization.

    In periods of sluggish economic growth, demand generation is crucial for preventing pipeline deceleration and retaining lead interest.

    Lead nurturing is a key element of demand strategies as it develops and maintains brand interest among prospects until they are ready to buy.

    Therefore, it helps develop growth and conversion forecasts, as well as drive brand referrals through content marketing and thought leadership.

    How To Launch A RevOps Strategy In 5 Easy Steps

    Below is a five-step process for driving a RevOps strategy that is fit for the market challenges of 2024:

    1. Establish RevOps At Your Organization Across Teams

    A core element of RevOps is establishing structures to align your team members and anchor the focus of your organization on the activities necessary for revenue growth.

    To achieve this, you will first require a well-defined north star (or unified goal), which can be set by following these steps:

    • Clarify your Unique Value Proposition (UVP): Revisit the unique value you offer to clients as a brand in terms of what drives revenue. This will allow you to focus your offerings on what drives organizational growth while also addressing the unique challenges of your target market.
    • Identify organizational obstacles: Evaluate what issues in your organizational culture, tech stack, and staff are currently hindering the full alignment of processes required for RevOps. The goal here is to identify the most common bottlenecks that impede your teams’ agility.
    • Define your purpose and goal: Define your key revenue goal to help plan the steps required to achieve it. This shared vision will sustain all teams’ activities and future strategies. If, for example, the goal is to increase market share by 30%, all business activities should be guided by that end goal.

    Functional Vs. Departmental RevOps:

    Molding RevOps teams and processes can either be guided by a functional (staff roles) or departmental perspective. Each approach comes with its own set of advantages and disadvantages, underscoring the importance of a careful evaluation to determine which one aligns best with the unique needs of your business:

    • Functional: This approach establishes tasks for team members to fulfill based on their skill set. For example, a person well-versed in project management would be responsible for developing RevOps systems.
    • Departmental: This approach assigns RevOps duties for each department of the organization based on their expertise and availability. It is simpler to implement compared to the functional approach, yet presents more risk of creating data silos (therefore, establishing data flows across departments is a must).

    2. Adopt The Recurring Revenue Bowtie Model

    Developed by Winning By Design, the Recurring Revenue Bowtie Model envisions the buyer’s journey as a closed loop to focus efforts in equal measure on interactions before and after a sale.

    This full-funnel approach helps emphasize the importance of onboarding and expanding business with existing clients through upsells, cross-sells, and renewals.

    ull-funnel approachScreenshot from Winning By Design, December 2023

    The Bowtie Model is well suited for RevOps since it focuses on both sides of the buyer’s journey: the path toward conversions, as well as the nurturing that is necessary to expand client relationships and encourage post-sale growth.

    Given the forecast of slow growth for 2024 (Reuters, 2023), this model is particularly well suited to the challenges ahead—namely, the emphasis on increasing client lifetime value (CLTV) and reducing churn to boost ROI.

    3. Align Data And AI For RevOps

    At the essence of RevOps lies the concept of actionability, underscoring the critical need to prioritize buyer data that can be leveraged to shape strategies that boost conversions.

    Enhancing your buyer data with actionable, real-time data points empowers you to adapt campaigns as needed and acquire insights about your audience, guiding future iterations.

    Buyer intent data is perhaps the most useful data for RevOps, as it demonstrates when and how buyers interact with your brand.

    It can also shape future touchpoints (via lead nurturing or sales teams) to encourage further engagement.

    By aggregating buyer intent data and utilizing AI-enriched platforms such as a client relationship management (CRM) system, it becomes feasible to glean insights from RevOps strategies as a whole.

    This empowers your revenue teams to make informed decisions for optimizing ROI, which prioritizes prospects demonstrating buyer intent at the right time.

    Since this data is timely, it also allows teams to craft content that garners the highest audience interest due to its relevance.

    4. Enable And Engage Defensive Buyers

    2024 is anticipated as a year of slow growth, a trend stemming from the past few years of economic uncertainty.

    This unusual climate is prompting decision-makers to adopt a defensive stance, as well as exercise heightened scrutiny over the risks associated with their purchasing decisions.

    Marketers embracing a RevOps strategy in 2024 must formulate comprehensive buyer journeys that address common objections and build trust right from the outset.

    Below are three tactics to enable and engage defensive buyers in 2024:

    Create Self-Paced Buyer Journeys

    According to Forrester 2024 Predictions, the demand for self-service will be greater than ever, especially as Millennials and Gen Z buyers now make up two-thirds of B2B buyers.

    Companies should consider developing buyer journeys that allow prospects to discover pricing, watch a demo, or even download a free trial at their own pace – without the need for a salesperson.

    Already commonplace in SaaS, this trend is likely to expand to other B2B industries, placing a significant emphasis on the importance of providing digital buying experiences that enable buyers to investigate and finalize purchases.

    After all, 75% of B2B buyers prefer a sales experience without sales representatives.

    Leverage ABX And Engage All Buying Group Members

    Account based experience (ABX) is an approach that adopts client and user experience (CX and UX) best practices to inform account targeting strategies.

    At INFUSE, it is the approach we adopt for account based marketing (ABM) due to its ability to enrich buyer experiences with personalized touchpoints.

    ABX also helps inform a holistic view of target accounts, developing an outreach strategy that considers all buying group members and the needs of different departments and professionals for approving a purchase.

    Thus, ABX proves to be an ideal approach for crafting a buyer’s journey that seamlessly aligns with the preferences of cautious buyers.

    This stems from its emphasis on meticulously tailored lead nurturing touchpoints, ensuring a precise level of personalization that directly addresses individual buyer challenges.

    Revisit Your Lead Data And Tech Stack

    As noted earlier, building efficient data flows is a critical first step in RevOps. Therefore, it becomes imperative to carry out a thorough audit of your tech stack and lead database to ensure a solid foundation for success.

    This audit should focus on detecting inconsistencies and incorrect information on buyers, as well as eliminating any redundant tools and bottlenecks.

    Since alignment is key for RevOps to truly function, ensure all data and tools are seamlessly integrated and available for all team members to glean insights and inform their strategies.

    5. Nurture With A RevOps And GTM Focus

    Enable your lead nurturing for revenue growth by benchmarking it against RevOps key performance indicators (KPIs), such as client lifetime value (CLTV) and client acquisition cost (CAC).

    These metrics help inform lead nurturing efforts toward revenue generation, which helps teams plan campaigns that will result in continued buyer engagement and a predictable pipeline of sales opportunities.

    Five tips for nurturing with a revenue focus:

    • Design touchpoints with revenue KPIs in mind: Guiding lead nurturing efforts through a revenue lens facilitates the development of content and outreach that has been created to maximize returns.
    • Develop nurturing tracks for different pain points and buyer personas: By establishing a lead nurturing cadence for each buyer persona (which addresses a unique set of pain points with solutions best suited for that buying group), you will be more successful in encouraging conversions.
    • Benchmark quarterly growth against nurturing efforts: Measuring organizational growth (such as net new growth) enables the routine tracking of your lead nurturing performance. Keep in mind, however, that lead nurturing is highly dependent on the average length of your sales cycle. So, for organizations with long sales cycles, performance will be difficult to glean quickly. Even so, consistent and early measurement indicators help glean insights to update future lead nurturing campaigns and ensure continued buyer interest.
    • Survey clients of key target audiences: Collect direct feedback from clients within different audiences that you are targeting for a timely overview of their brand perception, as well as market challenges and expectations for 2024. This will help personalize your messaging to better address the concerns of your target buying groups.
    • Analyze conversations with prospects: Record and assess conversations with prospects to determine the success of different approaches, as well as the objections and reactions of buyers toward certain topics. This will help determine which topics and messaging points are most successful in driving conversions.

    Key Takeaways

    Keep these takeaways in mind when planning your RevOps strategy to ensure the best outcomes:

    Develop A Rich Buyer Experience

    By leveraging the best practices of ABX, the post-sales enablement of the Bowtie Model, and a personalized touch to your lead nurturing, you can build a rich buyer experience that supports revenue growth.

    In other words, to drive revenue, you must align team efforts in a manner that capitalizes on developing a relevant buyer’s journey, which will maintain your brand top of mind throughout the buying group’s potentially lengthy and scrutinous decision-making process.

    Align Your Datasets, AI, And Tech Stack For RevOps

    Make sure to audit your existing data and technology through a revenue-first lens by eliminating redundancies and unnecessary data that will impede the insights required for driving growth.

    Consider your revenue metrics when analyzing this wealth of data and how your tools should function to make sure you are tracking revenue attribution from marketing and sales efforts.

    Nurture Leads For Long-Term Revenue Growth

    Develop comprehensive and relevant lead nurturing cadences that are custom-tailored to each buyer persona to engage buying groups as a whole.

    This will enable future sales opportunities for when buyers are in-market for your solutions.

    More resources: 

    Featured Image: Viktoria Kurpas/Shutterstock

    Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
    Dec 15 2023
    What Is First-Party Data And How Do You Use It? via @sejournal, @brookeosmundson

    First-party data has been the talk of the marketing industry for years now.

    With ever-tightening user data privacy laws and regulations, it’s imperative that marketers embrace a world with little-to-no data cookies.

    We have to get more creative on how to legally, and ethically, capture customer information.

    Not sure what first-party data is? Or not quite sure where to start with a first-party data marketing strategy?

    Follow along to understand what first-party data is, how it differs from other data types, and how to apply it to your own business.

    What Is First-Party Data?

    First-party data is information or data points a company collects from its customers.

    This type of data is collected through the business’ owned digital channels, with the consent given by the users to have their data collected.

    Compared to second-party and third-party data, first-party data is usually considered the most reliable because it comes directly from the customer.

    First-Party Data, Second-Party Data, And Third-Party Data Explained

    Let’s dive in further between the three data types, how data is collected, and when and where to use them.

    First-Party Data Explained

    First-party data is any data point collected by a business directly from users or customers.

    There are many ways first-party data can be collected from an audience. Some examples include:

    • Website or app analytics. Typically, this information is gathered from user interactions on a website or in an app. Data points can include demographics, location, page views, clicks, purchases, or time on site.
    • Email marketing lists. Subscriber data from email campaigns, newsletters, or additional email interactions.
    • Customer relationship management (CRM) systems. Data housed within a company’s CRM system, usually after a customer purchases. It usually stores customer profile information, purchase history, customer service interactions, and more.
    • Social media accounts. Data collected from social media profiles and interactions with a company through their social media accounts.
    • Surveys. Responses from customers, which can include data points like demographics, email, contact information, and more.
    • Customer feedback. This type of feedback can be collected through multiple channels, such as website online chat or product reviews, just to name a few.

    In order to collect first-party data, a user has to consent to their data being collected.

    Typically, companies put a tracking pixel on their website or app. Upon a customer’s first visit to one of those, they are usually served some sort of banner or pop-up asking them to consent to track behavior.

    If a user consents and accepts, numerous data points (like the above described) are gathered and stored in a CRM system.

    Companies primarily use first-party data for personalized marketing efforts and improving customer experiences.

    Additionally, it helps businesses make more informed decisions from the data by analyzing the behavior of their actual customers.

    Second-Party Data Explained

    Second-party data is sometimes confused with third-party data.

    Simply put, think of second-party data as “secondhand” data. It is data that a company didn’t collect itself but shared directly from one company to another.

    What makes this different than third-party data is that it’s not sold or purchased from another company.

    Usually, the data is shared as part of a partnership or mutually beneficial agreement between two companies.

    Below are a few examples of how second-party data can be used in practice.

    • A travel agent partners with certain airlines, hotels, or car rental companies to gain access to their booking and reservation data. This then can allow a travel agency to provide personalized packages, discounts, and recommendations to customers.
    • A health and wellness app collaborates with a wearables device company (i.e., smartwatch). The app can collect wearable data points from a user, such as heart rate, step counts, and sleep patterns. The wellness app uses that data to provide personalized insights and recommendations to a customer.
    • An educational technology company wants to partner with schools or universities to gather data on student academic performance and learning. The technology company then uses this data to inform future educational content to improve student learning.

    Second-party data is primarily used to expand datasets on a company’s first-party data set.

    This type of data sharing allows companies to gain data from trusted partners to get a better, more comprehensive view of their target audience without having to go through the heavy lifting of collecting the data themselves.

    Third-Party Data Explained

    Third-party data is data collected by an external source, which is then sold to businesses for various reasons.

    The biggest difference between third-party and first/second-party data is that there is no true connection to the customer.

    Additionally, because third-party data is purchased in large quantities, the data is aggregated and anonymized to meet privacy regulations.

    Third-party data can come from a variety of sources, including information from:

    • Public records.
    • Government agencies.
    • Online activities or website cookies.
    • Social media accounts or profiles.

    There are both benefits and drawbacks to third-party data.

    One of the main benefits of third-party data is that it’s relatively easy to buy large data sets of demographic or behavioral information on your target audience.

    Perhaps the biggest downfall of third-party data is the reliability or accuracy of the data purchased.

    A few examples of third-party data used in practice include:

    • A real estate company gets third-party data from public records, including information on property values, property characteristics, and more. This helps the real estate company with property appraisals, market analysis, and how to better market real estate listings.
    • An online retailer wants to cross-sell or upsell additional products to its customers, so it purchases third-party data to analyze customer purchase behavior to help predict relevant cross-selling opportunities on its website.
    • Pharmaceutical companies may purchase third-party data on prescription medication usage in order to align their marketing efforts with existing healthcare trends.

    Compared to first-party data, it’s considered less reliable as it’s not information coming directly from your customers.

    Third-party data is primarily used by companies to complement first-party data. It’s not practical to rely solely on third-party data for marketing efforts.

    Using third-party data to analyze trends and behavior in your greater target audience is a better way to leverage large data sets.

    What Are The Limitations Of First-Party Data?

    While first-party data is considered the most reliable and accurate for businesses, it does come with some pitfalls and limitations.

    Below are a few drawbacks to first-party data collection.

    • Limited scale. Since first-party data is limited to the information a customer provides, or the interactions a company has with its users, data sets can be limited by size. Especially for newer businesses or niche companies, it may be difficult to gain statistical significance or be able to reach a wider audience at scale.
    • Sampling diversity concerns. Similar to the above, with limited scale, a company could run into a low sampling diversity when analyzing data. It could lead to skewed customer demographic insights and may not accurately reflect a wider target market.
    • Data privacy concerns. All companies, regardless of how they’re collecting first-party data, need to stay up-to-date on user data privacy regulations at all times. This takes time and employee resources to ensure compliance is reached.
    • Data decay. This is referred to when customer profile information becomes outdated. Examples of this can include if a customer moves, changes their phone number or email address, and can lead to inaccurate customer profiles.
    • Resource intensive. Gathering and collecting first-party data takes time. It’s not a “one-and-done” task. First-party data requires a level of maintaining after its collected, whether that comes from investing in technology, data analysis, and/or maintaining accurate customer information over time.

    Don’t let these limitations scare you away from using first-party data to its full potential.

    Next, we’ll dive into different ways to make your data work harder, and smarter, for your business.

    How To Use First-Party Data

    You’ve spent all this time collecting and organizing first-party data for your business.

    So, what’s the best way to use it?

    Believe it or not, there’s a lot more you can use first-party data for than marketing campaigns.

    Below are five examples of ways to use first-party data more holistically for your business.

    1. Expand And Optimize Marketing Campaign Targeting

    If you’re looking to expand your marketing efforts to a wider audience but are unsure where to start, start with your first-party data.

    If large enough, first-party customer lists can be turned into lookalike audiences in advertising platforms to help reach a broader audience with similar characteristics as your current customers.

    For existing campaign optimization, try segmenting customer groups by certain characteristics.

    Smaller, custom segments allow for more accurate and personalized messaging to those users, which can help increase conversion rates, customer loyalty, and more.

    2. Encourage Customer Loyalty

    Most customers like to feel rewarded by repeated loyalty to a brand. This could come in the form of a specific loyalty program, special discounts or sales, or birthday recognition gifts.

    Using first-party data that captures purchase history and personal information like date of birth and turning it into special incentives can help retain valuable customers longer.

    3. Prioritize Product Improvements

    This is an often overlooked way to utilize first-party data because it comes back down to the company and product itself.

    Taking the time to review customer feedback and survey responses helps identify customer pain points, opinions, and what they love.

    Capturing these data points on a regular basis can help companies pivot to take action quicker on customer pain points and prioritize product development efforts to improve customer satisfaction.

    4. Optimize Content Strategy

    First-party data is also helpful for content optimization strategies.

    Gathering information such as customer engagement metrics can inform what topics or categories users resonate with most.

    Shifting ad, social, or website content to what resonates with customers can help better attract users quicker, which can then help lead to more customers.

    As with all content development, keep in mind to ensure brand voice and tone are consistent and authentic across all channels.

    5. Predictive Analytics For Data-driven Decisions

    If you have a large set of first-party data, it can be used to build predictive models to forecast customer behavior, future sales and revenue, churn rates, and more.

    Using this information strategically guides better decisions made directly from your data.

    Predictive modeling also lends a hand at outlining a typical customer’s journey, which helps identify steps and interactions a user takes before purchasing.

    Do We Need To Consider Zero-Party Data For The Future?

    Third-party cookie deprecation has been on the docket for a while now.

    As of October 2023, Google announced it will disable third-party cookies for 1% of Chrome users starting in Q1 2024.

    While that may not sound like a lot, the start of disabling cookies means marketers need to be proactive in 2024 about a zero-party data strategy in the future.

    Zero-party data is considered data given to a company directly from the users themselves.

    The data is willingly shared with a company through outlets such as:

    • Surveys.
    • Forms.
    • Direct interactions with a business.

    Examples of zero-party data are similar to first-party data and can include:

    • Personalization data.
    • Purchase intent.
    • User account data.
    • Feedback and reviews.
    • Survey responses.

    Integrating a zero-party data strategy benefits businesses because it can take personalized marketing and customer experiences to the next level.

    To start gathering zero-party data, it may be worthwhile to incentivize users to provide their valuable information – also known as a value exchange.

    A user provides a company with their personal information in return for something of value to the customer, such as a product discount.

    Ultimately, zero-party data helps build customer trust, increases user engagement, and drives higher conversion rates and repeat customers.

    When integrating any type of data strategy, always be sure to keep user privacy and consent at the forefront of your mind.

    Not only is it ethical, but it’s becoming a legal requirement in almost all regions.

    More resources: 

    Featured Image: Piscine26/Shutterstock

    Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
    Dec 4 2023
    Unlock Ecommerce Success: How You Can Get Up To 87% More Traffic [+ Report] via @sejournal, @getdotstore

    Wondering how to boost your ecommerce SEO to help you rank higher on SERPs?

    Do you feel like you’re getting a new competitor every day?

    In the era when everyone has an ecommerce storefront, how do you make sure your store has as many advantages as possible?

    Gaining traffic and visibility is listed as one of the top issues that online sellers face, especially if you’re just starting your business and the next step is to choose your URL.

    So, what are some of the major issues you might face as a new ecommerce company? How can you solve them?

    Let’s dive in.

    How To Boost Ecommerce Performance & Decrease Customer Acquisition Costs

    The game has changed and .com domains aren’t the only way to get customers to take your business seriously.

    If the primary goal of your website is to sell, nothing says that better than a .Store domain extension.

    It’s the perfect call to action that instantly connects with potential customers and attracts them to your site.

    Some of the key advantages of using a .Store domain include:

    • 87% more traffic.
    • 2X visibility.
    • 12% lower cost of conversion.

    Increase Your Web Traffic by 87%

    An ecommerce website on a .Store domain gets 87% more visitors than its .com counterparts.

    Your domain name is basically like the virtual storefront of your business, and choosing the right one can have a significant impact on your success.

    Why It Works

    When users see a .Store domain, it instantly communicates that they are on an ecommerce platform where they can make purchases.

    This clear and direct messaging not only attracts more visitors but also translates into increased sales, which ultimately results in more revenue for your business.

    Double Your Site’s Visibility On Search Engines

    An ecommerce site sporting a .Store top-level domain (TLD) gets an impressive double the amount of search visibility.

    How?

    Well, search engines love contextually relevant keywords, and having the word “store” in your domain name can be a powerful keyword tactic for your site’s rankings.

    This added relevance doubles your visibility on search engines, ensuring that potential customers looking to make an online purchase can find your store more easily.

    Check out the study.

    Reduce Your Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) By 12%

    Marketing costs can be a major concern, especially for new and growing businesses – and this is yet another way the .Store domain can transform your SEO strategy.

    When users come across ads for a product category, they are 12% more likely to make a purchase if the ad directs them to a “store” domain.

    Thus, the cost to acquire your user is much lower.

    Analyzing .Store Domain Performance: The Full Report

    [Get the full report]

    The true impact of .Store TLDs on both paid and organic traffic were examined in a groundbreaking study conducted by Contrast Digital.

    This extensive report uncovers a wealth of insights that can reshape your understanding of domain performance.

    According to the data, there’s a potential long-term benefit of using .Store domains from a SEO standpoint.

    We’ll dive into some key facts from the study below, but you can download the full report to dig into the detailed results.

    Organic Study

    This extensive 12-month experiment examined the performance of two distinct websites.

    The key difference between the two websites was the domain extension.

    One website was on .com while the other was on a .Store; with the second-level domain being identical (think example.com vs example.store).

    Both sites comprised 82 pages categorized into products, categories, blog posts, and information pages, maintaining identical layouts and product descriptions in order to control variables and conduct a fair assessment.

    Googlebot’s crawl time, along with impressions, clicks, and click-through rate measured through Google Search Console, provided a detailed comparative analysis.

    Significance testing using MATLAB code offered insights into potential differences between the sites’ metrics, forming a comprehensive overview of their organic performance.

    Key Performance Trends:

    • Example.store achieved the first 100 clicks, 20,000 impressions, and 250 clicks in a 30-day window faster than example.com.
    • Google seemed to prefer the example.store domain over example.com, indicated by faster indexing and crawling.
    • Example.store had a 49.01% larger keyword footprint than example.com, correlating with larger impressions over 12 months.
    • In non-blog content, example.store had a 30.27% increase in visibility compared to example.com.
    • In blog content, example.store had a 67.02% increase compared to example.com.

    Overall, the significance tests consistently show that .Store TLDs outperformed equivalent .com TLDs in clicks, impressions, and click-through rate (CTR) over the 12-month experiment.

    Want to learn more? Check out the full report for additional insights.

    PPC Report

    This report delves into the Google paid ads segment of the experiment, evaluating the performance of example.com and example.store over 5 months.

    After allowing both websites to naturally perform for three months, paid media was introduced to assess their response to targeted paid traffic, with a primary focus on understanding consumer trust around TLDs.

    To ensure fairness in the paid ads environment, settings were adjusted to rotate ads indefinitely, preventing bias toward any particular ad.

    Additionally, landing page destinations, ad content, keyword targeting, and max bids were standardized across both accounts, eliminating variables and placing emphasis on individual performance.

    Key Performance Trends:

    • Example.store had a 12.12% higher conversion rate than example.com, 1.48% vs 1.32%.
    • Example.store managed PPC spend more consistently through daily budgets, possibly contributing to better performance.
    • Example.store had a statistically significant 15.37% higher CTR compared to example.com, potentially due to the recognizable association of .Store with eCommerce.
    • Example.store outperformed example.com in conversions (33 vs 24) and had a cheaper customer acquisition cost (£39.59 vs £44.45).
    • After 5 months, example.store performed the best overall in clicks, CTR, average cost per click, and cost.

    Overall, the .Store domain consistently outperformed .com and emerged as the superior performer in the paid experiment.

    Navigating The Customer Acquisition Challenge

    We know how difficult it can be to capture the attention of your ideal audience, particularly as a new online business without an established track record.

    Another key issue you might be facing is profitability.

    As essential as marketing may be for your brand, it can certainly be costly to execute effectively.

    So what are some ways you can get the most bang for your buck and maximize your return on investment (ROI)?

    How can you add value while keeping your customer acquisition costs low?

    Though there are various marketing tricks and tactics you can try, sometimes, the answer can be just as simple as picking the right domain name.

    Oftentimes, the domain you choose for your business can tell consumers a lot about what you offer and what they can expect.

    So if you’re looking to enhance your online retail presence and lower your cost per acquisition (CPA), it might be time to switch things up.

    With a .Store domain extension, you can gain a significant performance advantage and get a leg up on your competitors.

    Diversify Your Digital Identity: Embracing The Evolution Beyond .Com

    Now, I know what you’re thinking: Will customers trust an address that doesn’t end in .com?

    How does Google classify a website with a .Store domain and how will it impact your search rankings?

    Domain names are not actually a part of your overall search engine rankings – however, that doesn’t mean you can just forget about them.

    Your choice of domain name can be an important aspect of your UX and public image, and should usually be the most recognizable aspect of your business.

    Till now, the domain extension decision for anyone building an ecommerce site was largely determined by conditioning, perception, and an overall lack of data.

    The idea that .com domains are the only viable choice for websites is incredibly common.

    However, there’s now an objective, data-backed study available which, for the first time, shows that .Store as a top-level domain (TLD) can actually benefit ecommerce sellers in a major way.

    Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
    Nov 27 2023
    39 Emotions Digital Marketers Can Use In Advertising via @sejournal, @gregjarboe

    In a previous article, How To Make A Video Go Viral, I mentioned research that shows videos that evoked the emotion of hilarity, inspiration, astonishment, and exhilaration tended to be shared the most. People shared videos that elicited “high-arousal” or intense emotions twice as much as ones that elicited “low-arousal” or moderate emotions.”

    For the past few months, I’ve been searching for a new way to categorize emotions and I stumbled across a post on LinkedIn that said, “Here it is! The DAIVID Field Guide to Emotions in Advertising with each of the DAIVID 39 emotions.”

    The LinkedIn post said,

    “As every good creative knows, make people feel something and it will have an effect on brand and sales.”

    So, I downloaded their field guide and read all 56 pages in one sitting – like a whodunit. It even opens with a killer quotation by Jonathan Haidt,

    “The rational mind thinks it’s the Oval Office when actually it’s the press office.”

    The field guide draws from research conducted at the University of California, Berkeley; Stanford University; and the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science at the University of South Australia.

    The field guide categorizes 39 emotions into 6 “emotional cohorts”  and acknowledges,

    “Emotions in advertising are nothing new. Intuitively, gifted storytellers have taken us through lows and highs to make us feel good and well disposed towards brands through the years.”

    It explains, “What we have lacked up to this point though, is a clear codification. Whether something is ’emotional’ or not has often been decided subjectively and with the poor emotional lexicon that we humans have.”

    And it concludes, “That’s why we have the DAIVID 39, which gives us a common language to communicate this through the advertising process and brief with feeling.”

    So, here is the all-important language that digital marketers can use to define and, therefore, replicate advertising success through emotion.

    39 Emotions Digital Marketer’s Can Use In Advertising

    Empathy

    According to the DAIVID Field Guide to Emotions in Advertising, there are 11 emotions in the Empathy cohort that digital marketers can put on their palette when creating a campaign:

    • Admiration: A feeling of profound respect or approval.
    • Calmness: To be free from agitation, excitement, or disturbance.
    • Empathetic pain: A specific variant of empathy that involves recognizing and understanding another person’s pain.
    • Gratitude: an expression of grateful thanks and appreciation for benefits received.
    • Hope: An audacious desire accompanied by the expectation of, or belief in, fulfilling it.
    • Pride: Complex with definitions such as self-esteem and satisfaction in oneself, pleasure that comes from an association, relationship, or achievement, or a feeling of solidarity.
    • Relief: The removal or alleviation of something oppressive, painful, or distressing.
    • Sadness: An expression of grief or unhappiness.
    • Satisfaction: The fulfillment of a strongly desired need or want.
    • Trust: The extent to which a person or thing is accurate, honest, safe, and dependable.
    • Warmth: The quality or state of being warm in feeling.

    The field guide includes a link to a video, “seen in the wild,” for each emotion. And that will certainly help if digital marketers are unclear about the definition of an emotion.

    But I looked for videos that I’d seen, which I could use to illustrate the creative effectiveness of “Empathy.” And I didn’t need binoculars.

    In Google Analytics 4 Should Trigger Reorganizations & Agency Reviews, near the end of the article, I said digital marketers could use YouTube’s Director Mix to create customized videos at scale, swapping out different elements to tailor content to specific audiences.

    As an example, I mentioned that Mondelēz India had designed its Not Just a Cadbury Ad Campaign Video employing YouTube Pin Code Targeting, YouTube Director’s Mix, and Google Maps API.

    This enabled the brand to produce thousands of customized AI-generated ads for 270 pin codes across 8 cities. This hyper-localized campaign helped 1,800 local retailers grab business during Diwali in a global pandemic.

    The campaign delivered incredible business results, including doubling the sales for the retailers featured in the ads and over 32% more business growth than they’d forecast.

    What I didn’t mention back then was the name of Mondelēz International’s strategy: “Empathy at scale.”

    So, “Empathy” made people feel something, which influenced branding and sales.

    Approach

    According to the field guide, there are 11 emotions in the Approach cohort:

    • Adoration: A state of deep love and respect.
    • Aesthetic appreciation: The enjoyment of something because of its beauty or some other factor associated with aesthetic preference.
    • Amusement: Something pleasantly entertaining or diverting.
    • Entrancement: The feeling of being carried away with delight, wonder, or rapture.
    • Craving: An intense, urgent, or abnormal desire or longing.
    • Inspiration: The state or power of moving the intellect or emotions.
    • Interest: A feeling that accompanies special attention to a person or thing. It engages attention and stimulates further observation.
    • Joy: To experience intense pleasure or delight evoked by well-being, good fortune, or by the prospect of owning what one desires.
    • Knowledge: The condition of knowing something gained through experience.
    • Nostalgia: A sentimental longing or wistful affection for some past period or irrecoverable condition.
    • Romance: A feeling of excitement and mystery associated with love.

    Yes, there’s a link to a video, “seen in the wild,” for each of these emotions.

    However, I didn’t need a spotting scope to find examples of different approaches that have generated measurable outcomes. Let me highlight a recent one.

    In 10 YouTube Marketing Strategies & Tips (With Examples), I included an example of inspiring video content of the UAE’s tourist experiences, cultural events, and enjoyable adventures.

    It was created for the second season of the World’s Coolest Winter campaign and entitled A Winter Through My Eyes.

    The short documentary film asks, “Can a country be truly enjoyed by someone who cannot see?” It tells the story of Clara, an 11-year-old Lebanese girl who has been visually impaired since birth.

    Now, this award-winning video got 8.9 million views, which is remarkable – because the World’s Coolest Winter is primarily a domestic tourism campaign, and the UAE has a population of about 10 million, which is equivalent to the population of Michigan.

    But it’s worth noting that the campaign helped to:

    • Increase hotel revenues in the UAE to AED1.5 billion, a 50% upsurge over the previous year.
    • Boost the number of domestic tourists to 1.3 million, a 36% jump over the campaign’s first season.
    • Raise hotel occupancy rates to 73% in 2022, a 7% gain over 66% in 2021.

    So, this “Approach” not only made people feel something, but it also influenced branding and sales.

    Positive Adrenaline

    According to the field guide, there are four emotions in the Positive Adrenaline cohort:

    • Awe: Variously combines dread, veneration, and wonder that authority, the sacred, or sublime inspires.
    • Excitement: A feeling of great enthusiasm, eagerness, or thrill.
    • Sexual Desire: A physical attraction and desire for physical intimacy.
    • Surprise: The response to an unexpected or astonishing event.

    I haven’t written about the following case study before, but I’ve used it in the class I teach on “Engaging Audiences Through Content” at the New Media Academy in Dubai. It consists of two videos.

    The first is entitled, See you at Dubai Expo | Emirates and now has 5.3 million views and 87,800 engagements.

    The second video is entitled We did it again | Emirates. This video takes a behind-the-scenes look at how Emirates took its A380 for a spin around the Burj Khalifa for the making of its new advertisement.

    This video now has 13.9 million views and 211,000 engagements.

    So, these videos made people feel something. But did they also influence branding and sales?

    Well, Expo Dubai, the first event of its size and scale held since the start of the global pandemic, recorded over 24 million visits and was hailed as a tremendous success.

    A couple of months after its videos went viral, Emirates Group announced that revenue increased by 86% over the previous year, with strong customer demand as worldwide travel restrictions eased.

    Correlation or causation? You be the judge.

    Negative Adrenaline, Primal Urges, And Rejection

    Now, you may not want to put the last 13 emotions on your palette when creating a campaign, but you should be able to identify them if you see them in the wild:

    • Fear: An unpleasant, often strong emotion caused by anticipation or awareness of danger.
    • Horror: A painful and intense dread, fear, or repugnance.
    • Anger: A strong feeling of displeasure and usually of antagonism.
    • Awkwardness: A feeling of discomfort or being out of place in response to a situation.
    • Disgust: A strong feeling of dislike aroused by something highly distasteful.
    • Embarrassment: A feeling of shame, self-consciousness, or awkwardness.
    • Guilt: A feeling of deserving blame for offenses committed by yourself or others.
    • Shame: An uncomfortable feeling of guilt because of your own or someone else’s immoral behavior.
    • Anxiety: An apprehensive uneasiness over an impending or anticipated harm.
    • Boredom: Being weary and restless through lack of interest.
    • Confusion: Uncertainty about what is happening, intended, or required.
    • Contempt: Despising someone or something.
    • Distrust: To doubt the honesty or reliability of a person or thing.

    Yes, I know that Halloween has just been held again, and some people enjoy watching horror movies.

    But you should think twice before using any of the negative emotions in these last three emotional cohorts.

    Why? There are three key reasons:

    • The field guide says, “Generally, it’s advisable for … brands to leave us with a positive emotion.”
    • According to a recent article in Think with Google, 7 in 10 people say they try to be optimistic despite the latest political, ecological, and economic news.
    • As Yoda says, “Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”

    So, there you have it: A digital marketer’s palette of 39 emotions to use – or avoid using – in advertising.

    Disclaimer: All statistics not linked are from a gated Tubular Labs report.

    More resources: 

    Featured Image: Roman Samborskyi/Shutterstock

    Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments