Archives for posts with tag: internet marketing
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Succeeding in Turbulent Times

April 16, 2009 //
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There has been more evidence of the dreaded R word hitting the digital world in the past few days as previously untouchable companies face the harsh reality of a less profitable future. The irony is that these companies are seeing the pinch in the way of less than huge profits, where as smaller businesses are seeing the impact come in the form of zero profit and the prospect of going out of business. It goes to show however, that the difficult economic times are hitting companies in every sector, including Internet marketing, and of every size.

Google Feeling the Pinch?

Today, Google is set to post its Q1 figures and experts are predicting a sequential drop in revenue for the first time in Google’s history as a public company. And with 3 rounds of redundancies already in the first quarter of 2009, some cracks are starting to show in Google’s bullet proof exterior. The reality of the situation is that Google will still post huge profits and huge revenue and its biggest concern is appeasing investors and maintaining share price, there isn’t much danger of them going out of business any time soon. It does show however the severity of the situation however that it is hitting even the biggest and most profitable of Internet companies.

Ebay Going Back to its Core

Another Internet giant, Ebay, has announced measures this week which suggest they too, are conscious more difficult times may be ahead and they need to focus on their core business. After selling social content discovery website Stumble Upon back to its founders they have also announced they are planning to take Skype public in 2010 due to a realisation of its “limited synergies with Ebay and Paypal”. Ebay bought Stumble Upon just 2 years ago and Skype in 2008, and despite both posting impressive growth Ebay has since decided neither is a close enough fit to their core business. Both these purchases are evidence of a more frivolous time when large Internet companies had deeper pockets and could make $75M purchases (the price paid for Stumble Upon) without worrying too much about how it would fit in with their business. Now the honeymoon period is over, companies are looking harder at their businesses and spotting the need to streamline and maintain a focus on core activities.

Time to Rip up the Script

With Internet giants such as these cutting back, what chance is there for the smaller business? How does the small website owner survive in difficult times? I think it has been proven in the past that those with a solid business model who react to the changing market quickly, will survive. Sure things will become more difficult and margins will be squeezed, but those who remain agile should be able to ride the storm. Companies need to rip up the playbook of 2007-2008 and make sure their strategy for 2009 is in fitting with what the market demands. Make sure you are meeting a market demand and providing something more, or significantly better than, your competition. Be prepared to change in line with the market, stay agile, and keep in touch with customer demands. Hopefully then, you should be able to survive the difficult times and possibly even come out the other side in a stronger position. There will be casualties, no doubt about it, but for the companies which can stay strong and adapt, there could also be huge opportunities.

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Categories Digital Marketing

Love hate relationships

May 22, 2008 //
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I was reading Marketing’s fourth annual survey into the top loved and hated brands and noticed the fickle nature of the public in their views on brands, and undoubtedly linked, their advertising campaigns.  What struck me from the survey, more than the strange appearance of AOL at number 2 in the top 50 hated brands even though their UK profile doesn’t warrant such a high profile spot, was the number of brands named highly in both the most hated, and most loved lists.  In the main list you actually only have two brands appearing in the top 20 of both, these are The Sun and Nokia (via ngage in the most hated), but if you get down into the different tables for the individual markets it is much more apparent.  I suppose you could just argue that the more you drill down by market, the less brands their are and so the more chance of a brand appearing in both lists but if you take such a broad market as “fashion” you would imagine there are enough brands out there to limit duplication.  But yet in this particular category 3 brands appear in the top 5 for both hated and loved!  Topshop is number one hated and number 5 loved, Levi’s is number two loved and number 4 hated, and Next is number one loved and number 3 hated.  How can brands be perceived in such a different way?  Is it simply that such well known and high profile brands are more likely to stir an extreme emotion in users where as slightly lesser brands stay under the radar a little more?  Your guess is as good as mine.  I have listed some of the other occurences of this below, focussing on the digital areas of the survey (as that is the topic of the blog after all!):

mobile networks love and hateinternet service providers love and hatesocial networks love and hate

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Categories Social Networking

Clicks arent a good measure of response? No sh*t sherlock!

March 12, 2008 //
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I read an article in last weeks revolution which made me laugh out loud.  I have known for a while that some of the more traditional media types are way behind in the digital channel and many of the larger media buyers get by on their buying power and ability to schmooze a client about the brand exposure of their digital activity.  This article however took the biscuit with its naivety about measures of performance in the digital channel.  The basis of what the author was saying was that clicks aren’t an accurate measure of online activities performance.  YOU DONT SAY!

Isn’t the biggest benefit of digital communications is measurability and accountability?  The ability to track PAST the point of impression, and all the way through to conversion (whatever the desired outcome may be).  With this is mind it shocks me that people would still be using the click as a measure of performance.  Obviously in certain instances the objective is to promote awareness and so the fact that the add got clicked on is an indication people are paying it some attention and are showing an interest in what you have to say, but these instances are few and far between.  The measure of performance should be based on the desired outcome of the campaign, whether that be sale, quote, enquiry, application, this is dependant on the industry in question.  It is archaic to still be using clicks as a measure for performance as the article rightly points out these can be out for all sorts of reasons.  Please guys, wise up and become accountable for your work.  Stop playing the vanity game with branding and clicks and begin playing the real game of driving acquisition and accountability for your clients!

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Categories PPC

Is digital killing direct mail?

March 7, 2008 //
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An article in this weeks edition in Marketing Week questioned the future of direct mail in the face or increased pressure from digital direct response channels.  With direct mail volume dropping 7.4% from 2006-2007 and showing a continual decline in since 2004 has the measurability and accountability of digital mediums put pay to the direct mail industry?

For a two page, center piece article  I have to say that this seemed to me like a massive over reaction to the success of digital in the past few years.  The article eventually comes to some sensible conclusions about the evolution rather than death of direct mail and EHS Brann CEO Matt Atkinson makes the most valid point “consumers are not saying they don’t want direct mail, they are saying they don’t want junk mail!”.  it is not about cutting direct mail from you marketing mix but rather becoming more intelligent and targeted in your activity.  This is likely to mean volumes will drop but not necessarily that return will follow, more likely you will just become more efficient.

Every piece of the marketing mix has a benefit, either direct return or impact on other media.  Do you think there would be so many searches for finance companies brand terms on the search engines if the companies didn’t do so much offline activity? Of course there wouldn’t, it is all about striking the balance and appreciating the impact one media has on another.  I have experienced it first hand when a company has cut offline activity as they are getting better returns online only to see a drop in overall performance as their offline exposure stops pushing people to the search engines.

With the growing emergence of digital channels it was always going to impact other channels in one way or another, after all, economic circumstances aside, there are only every going to be a finite number of people in the market for your product at any given time.  It makes sense then, that if a percentage of these people start to use the Internet to find a supplier then the number of people using the other channels should see a dip.  What marketers really need to consider though is how to make the most of the whole marketing mix in order to maximise the opportunities the market holds, and rather than wield the sword at the under-performing media, stop to think about the impact they each have on one another.

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Categories Digital Marketing

Yahoo! rejects Microsoft bid

February 12, 2008 //
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Yahoo!’s board have unanimously voted to reject Microsoft’s astronomical bid of $44.6bn (£22.4bn) claiming the offer significantly underalued the company! Rich considering the offer was 61% up on their closing share price from the previous day.  Yahoo!’s explanation is that the bid undervalued the strength of the Yahoo! brand, user base and recenty investment in advertising technology.  My take is that they arent too keen on becoming a Microsoft company and having a consolidated position in the market as they already have a larger share of the lucrative search marketplace and a comparitive stance in other areas of online as well.  I wonder whether this will open the door for a bid from Google as had been rumoured last week or whether Yahoo! would rather continue the fight on their own against the big G.  This probably wont be the last we hear about alliances and a consolidating market but Im not sure any future deals will be on the same scale.

NMA article here

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Categories Search Engine Marketing, Search Engine Optimisation
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