Digital Marketing Best Practices

Thomas Robbins, Chief Evangelist, Kentico CMS

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Agenda

• What is digital marketing?• Best practice areas

– Media– Content– Technology– Automation– Mobile

• Wrap up

Let’s ask the analysts..

“Overlapping or related terms and concepts include "Web experience management (WEM)" and "customer experience management/platform (CEM and CXM)."

Source: Hype Cycle for Web Computing, 2013

Source: Hype Cycle for Content Management, 2013 Source: Hype Cycle for Web Computing, 2013

Does this sound familiar?

• Consumers want..– Products, service or local

information– Answers to questions– More information

about…

• CMO needs…– Data driven marketing – Marketing relevance– Channel integration– Consistent personalized

customer centric marketing

With the constant growth of the web, and more and more people getting connected every day, Content Management System (CMS), Web Engagement Management (WEM), Customer Experience Management (CXM) digital marketing has become a necessity for many organizations. This also includes small businesses that want to foster customer loyalty and increase their customer base.

What is digital marketing?

• Common Benefits– Puts the consumer in more control– Provides convenience– Increases satisfaction– Drives brand loyalty– Reduces the selling cycle– Reduce the cost of sales– Builds your brand– Provides targeted results– It’s measurable/repeatable– Cost effective

• Common Components– Website design (user experience)– Content marketing features– Marketing automation– Search engine optimization (SEO)– Pay per click (PPC) campaigns– Social marketing– Email marketing– Display advertising (banner ads)– And more…

Digital marketing is the process of building and maintaining customer relationships through online activities to facilitate the exchange of ideas products, and services that satisfy the goals of both parties.

Best practice: understand your customer journey

• The first step for any successful digital marketing strategy– How well do you understand your customer?– What channels are customers using for research?– What channels are customers using for purchase?– How does the

experience in one channel affect the behavior of another?

Source: Heart of the customer

Focus Areas for today…

Media Content Technology

Automation Mobile

Understanding media types

Media type Definition Examples Usage Benefits Challenges

Owned media Channel a brand controls

• Web site• Mobile site• Blog• Twitter• Account

Built for long term relationships with potential customers and earned media

• Company control

• Cost efficiency• Longevity• Versatility• Niche audience

• No guarantees• Company

communications not always trusted

• Takes time to scale

Paid media Brand pays to leverage a channel

• Display ads• Paid search• Sponsorships

Shift from foundation to a catalyst that feeds owned and created earned media

• In demand• Immediacy• Scale• Company

control

• Lots of clutter• Declining response

rates • Poor credibility

Earned Media When customers become the channel

• Buzz• Viral

Listen and respond – earned media is the result of well executed and coordinated owned and paid media

• Most credible• Key role in

most sales• Transparent

and lives on

• No control• Can be negative• Hard to scale• Hard to measure

Best Practice: Owned media

• What are the biggest problems they are trying to solve?• What information are they typically searching for?• What trends are influencing their business and personal

success?

Build a buyer persona

• Type of content• Topic covered• Date created• Buyer persona• Download/Views/Leads

Conduct a content audit

• Awareness -> Company/Website/Blog post/Social• Research ->Whitepapers/Webinars/Industry reports• Action -> Analyst reports/Product sheets• Personalize the experience• Test….test…test… and test even more…

Map content to the buying cycle

Goal: Create Compelling Corporate Content

Paid media: Understanding the channel mix

Role Tactics

Paid search Capture immediate demand in market and capture leads

Targeted keyword, contextual text ads, mobile search

Display banners Deliver contextual relevance and drive engagements

Target relevant publishers, re-targeting of micro-site, audience buying

Email Research specific audiences in a one to one environment

Direct publishers, list buyers, newsletters, rich media email

Content syndication Connect target with relevant content and capture lead information

Whitepaper downloads, online webinars, cost per lead buys

Best Practice: Paid media

• Lots of places to buy ads and each has their strength and weakness

• Use the banners module and sell your own adsKnow your area

• Drive traffic to the landing page/website/microsite where content is available for download

• Segment content and target based on priority, business needs, etc. (conversions/lead scoring)

• Have clear calls to action• Test (A/B or MVT)

Create a content led approach

• Set attainable goals• Review results regularly and adjust• Be merciless with non-performance

Continually analyze results

Goal: Get best ROI

Best Practice: Earned media

Consumer generated content

Conversation

Collaboration

Community

Collective intelligence

Easy DifficultEase of ImplementationVisible

Invisible

Ease of Understanding

Goal: Bring brand fan advocate stages to scale

Best Practice: Earned media

• Present or past customers• End customers• Analysts• Influencers• Partners• Employees• Enthusiasts

Identify your evangelists

• Identify the passion • Deliver content and technologies to help them tell the story

Create a social object

Goal: Enable others to tell your story

Best Practice: 4 Ps of content marketing

• Content positioning no different than marketing your product

• Pay attention to personality and tonePositioning

• Drive your content with passion• Share that passion with your audiencePassion

• Paid media is essential for created content• Paid media should integrate with your own media assetsPaid media

• It takes time to build a strong community• Continually optimize and refine content• Research

Perseverance

Best Practice: Content marketing lifecycle

Planning

Creation

Approval

Publishing

Measurement

Optimization

For more information: Content marketing quick start guide

Best Practice: Multilingual content marketing strategy

• Be able to articulate the core brand essence

Develop a compelling core message

• Consider everything – start with tone of voice

• Translation is only the beginning of localization

Translate and localize the message • Why not automate?

• Focus on content

Simplify content management

• Begin with multiple channels and paid advertising

• Don’t neglect mobile

Develop and integrate into strategy

Best Practice – Increasing CTA

• Adapt to different devices– Test to make sure they render correctly on different mobile devices and consider

different options for different devices.• Make it colorful

– Use a color that ensures it doesn’t blend or match with other buttons.

• Make it massive– CTA’s should be the biggest link

on the page to reduce frustration and abandonment rate.

• Create a sense of urgency– Test different tactics to see what

works. • Test..test.. and test

– Testing will ensure that you have the best CTA (A/B and MVT testing is your friend)

Best practice: Embrace integration

• Build the technical infrastructure to support dynamic, cross channel conversations with customers – Why it’s important

• Data integration, technology integration is part of the new world

– What does Kentico CMS 7 offer• HTML 5• Salesforce integration• Data.com integration (aka Jigsaw)• MAXMind GEOIP database• Cookie levels and Cookie consent web parts• Translation services (XLIFF)• REST • Integration Bus

Business models & goals, corporate culture, resources

Business models & goals, corporate culture, resources

Information needs, audience

types, expertise, tasks

Information needs, audience

types, expertise, tasks

Document types, objects,structure,

attributes,meta-information

Document types, objects,structure,

attributes,meta-information

Can you say Information Architecture?

• The art and science of structuring and organizing information systems to help people achieve their goals.

• Information architects organize content and design navigation systems to help people find and manage information.

A visual definition…

questions

answers

Users• audience types• information needs

Content• scope and volume• structure• metadata

Info. Architecture• org, label, nav, & searching systems

Business Context• strategy• resources• culture / politics• workflow

IA

Why is IA Difficult?

Users

Documents and Applications

Communication Chasm

ExamplePersonal Digital Assistant

SynonymsHandheld Computer

"Alternate" SpellingsPersenal Digitel Asistent

Abbreviations / AcronymsPDA

Broader TermsWireless, Computers

Narrower TermsPalmPilot, PocketPC

Related TermsWindowsCE, Cell Phones

Best Practice: Use IA metrics…

• Cost of finding (time, clicks, frustration, precision)

• Cost of not finding (success, recall, frustration, alternatives)

• Cost of development (time, budget, staff, frustration)

• Value of learning (related products, services, projects, people)

Best Practices: Marketing automation

You can’t automate a process that doesn’t

exist Map your lead flow Leverage buyers

personasUnderstand your email

reputation

Eliminate extra work later – define a master

labeling system

Design lead capture forms as short as

possible

Data should drive lead scoring, lead

conversions and decisions – keep it

simple and objective

Align sales and marketing – hands leads

on a silver platter

Provide a human touch when validating digital

behavior

Keep lead nurturing as dynamic as possible

Goal: Deliver the right message at the right time in the right location

A new world…

What’s your mobile content strategy?

Getting started with a mobile content strategy

1. What’s your current mobile statistics?

2. What’s your timeline and budget?3. Who is your target audience?4. Is there a target platform? 5. What are the application features

and functionality?6. What are the developer skills?

The rest of the story…

Solution Time to build solution

Ease of delivery Cost

Mobile Sub Site Typically less than a day

Simple to test using existing processes and environment

Responsive Design Upfront planning/ Variable depending on complexity of site

Modification to testing processes and environment essential

Application stores Typically more than 2 weeks

New testing infrastructure and processes required

Summary

So many devices…

3 Layouts

4 Layouts

6 Layouts

Source:http://www.metaltoad.com/blog/simple-device-diagram-responsive-design-planning

Application platforms

• Stored and run locally on the device and have full access to the platform and hardware

• Obtained from application stored that includes a lead time and approval process before deployment

• Developed on the default language of their respective platform

Native Application

• Largely based on web technologies running within a native application mimicking the look and feel of a native app.

• Leverage the device feature to run a web application locally

Hybrid Application

Short list recommendations…

• Performance intensive applications• Marquee applications that can’t compromise on user experience or performance• Applications for offline or disconnected requirements• Games or applications with rich visuals• Applications that require background processing• Applications requiring heavy interaction with local data or device hardware• Where cost savings and cross platform code sharing is not a goal• Where a single device or platform is targeted

Native applications

• Work well for business and content applications with a basic user interface and functionality requirements

• Targeting multiple platforms• Adding native functionality to existing web applications or creating a native wrapper

around a mobile web site• Work well for creating a simple mobile optimized version of an existing site

Hybrid applications

Wrap up…

• Think customer first• Think strategy first• Personas required

Questions

Thanks!Thomas Robbins, Chief Evangelist

thomasr@kentico.com@trobbins