I’ve wanted to find one of these for ages now. An online tool to create a poll on your website allowing people to vote and for the results to be displayed.
I’d do one on my blog here but due to newness, and few subscribers so far, it may be pointless. I guess that is the rule for doing this kind of thing… you need the audience first or you may end up looking like Bill No Mates.
Polldaddy
Less than 1% of press releases issued online contained a link (via Drew McLellan).
Traditionally, getting the word out for PR people was enough but with the concept of linking, there’s more value to be gained.
It’s not just about the potential that someone may actually “click through” to your site, but in the eyes of the search engines, the very fact that the link is there in the first place could be of benefit. I say “could” because it all depends on the site that’s linking to you.
One way of seeing who Google sees linking to you (works with Yahoo too) is by typing in the following into the search field:
This basically says, find all the sites that link to my website but don;t include the links that come from my website.
Note: My blog is a week old so there isn’t much to shout about.
With competitive pricing already a strain for online shops, maximising profit means looking to leverage your existing customer base as much as possible. And, with the increasing costs of pay-per-click with competition, wouldn’t it be good to become less reliant on Google?
It’s cheaper to keep customers than market to new ones so why not make the most of the ones you have? With databases and online profiling it’s easier to segment your customers into groups and direct your sales message using cost-effective online e-mail marketing tools, sending more targeted messages.
It means that when you send a sales offer, it can be more specific. The connection is that much stronger with your customer. They subscribed to that list so are more inclined to follow through any call-to-action. I did a project earlier this year which worked a beauty.
As well as creating targeted groups, you should also personalise your messages. Why not go one step further and send vouchers on birthdays or anniversaries?
Moonpig got me onto this a few years ago with a birthday calendar. I don’t ever forget a birthday now because I get an e-mail a week before the date and 9 times out of 10, I go to them to buy the card.
The key to personalised customer information is not to ask for too much up-front.
All the successful retailers online simply require an e-mail address and name to start with and move on from there. Don’t scare people off with lots of questions you simply don’t need.
As people begin to trust you (it’s all about trust), you can then leverage that trust by asking for recommendations; but only when they feel comfortable with you. At the end of the day it’s their reputation at stake, so they need to know that you will make them look good to their friends if they do refer you.
You can incentivise with referral schemes, vouchers and discounts, but people are much more canny than that, especially with their friendships.
A mixture works best. If they are prepared to refer you, offer them a voucher, and the person they refer. It lightens the load of expectation on all sides, because the financial benefit is shared. This makes it an easier buy-in for both parties.
The more you know about customers and their buying patterns, the more you can direct your sales message. It hails back to the one-on-one relationship shopkeepers used to have – “The Usual Mrs Perkins?”
With the sophistication of online databases, you should have this intelligence. An example for me was recently seeing that one particular customer ordered the same set of three skincare products, every three months on the beauty product website I run for a client.
If I direct a voucher to that person for those products at the right time, I am solidifying that customer as an asset. Yes, it costs me profit in the short-term, but I end up with a more engaged and loyal customer moving forward.
Sometimes, we concentrate so much on new business, we forget the assets we already have.
With a little concentrated marketing, we could be creating more business and more profit. We can also maximise word-of-mouth marketing, which is not only very powerful, it’s free.
Before I start, I know it’s not the be all and end all: Being the cheapest guarantees nothing and user experience and trust are still high on the agenda, but…
So, when you are creating a shop online, you need to offer real value to your customers. E-bay taught us that there are bargains to be had and the web has moved on even further, so it’s almost an expectation of any online shop by consumers.
Some online shops are fighting back with short-term cloaking tactics - increasing delivery charges (some e-bay sellers being a case in point) and offering prices without VAT to make them appear cheaper at the front-end. It can only lead to a disappointed customer though surely?
Competitive pricing online doesn’t just mean offering similar prices to the shop round the corner anymore. It means offering prices equivalent (if not better) to every shop out there for competing consumable products.
Yes, price isn’t everything, people are still looking for appropriate trust signals and value, but your prices count for a lot when a consumer’s best friend is a search engine.
Of course, your distributor may well want to control your pricing of their products, but ultimately manufacturers and their supply chain are losing that control as online retailers risk their wrath and find different channels (grey imports) to purchase from.
For smaller online retailers, the key is find find the right balance. You don’t have to be the cheapest and you do need to make a profit, but how high can keep your prices and still compete?
Clients often tell me that SEO (search engine optimisation) isn’t required on their website because they aren’t interested in search traffic.
And, because so many small businesses ignore SEO, they can’t be found through search engines at all, even if your type their company name into a search engine.
Not only does this not make sense (for the sake of some simple tagging), an unethical competitor could be optimising a web page specifically to take search traffic away from you by utilising your company name against you. I’ve seen it with keywords in the old days and I am seeing it now with pay per click advertising - keywords are easy to use and invisible to the general web user.
But, as search engines move away from the keywords meta tag in natural listings, how optimised is your website, even for your own company name, location or what you do?
When someone actually wants to find you in a search engine - will they even get close? I had it last week trying to find a company in a certain town. It took me about 20 minutes to find them finally through an obscure directory, which listed an contact e-mail that I had to copy and paste the domain name from.
Many people go overboard, trying to get as many words in as possible. Keep it simple and relevant. Remember, when someone does a search (1) and (2) are what show up in the Google search results. So many results look messy because they are stuffed with so many words.
Search engine optimisation is one thing but it’s still a human being doing the search. Make your links informative and relevant, but also make them attractive (advertorial style) so if they do come up in the search results, someone will want to click on your link.
Consumer brands spend millions trying to make us buy their products. The old adverts simply aren’t enough any more, we need more to persuade us to part with our cash.
Perhaps it’s because we are so over-run with messages that we get confused. Straight-forward adverts have been replaced with lifestyle ads, or viral campaigns that are disconnected.
Check out this recent micro-site for Cadbury Dairy Milk: I am still trying to make the connection. Compare it to the advert I saw at the cinema for Ben and Jerry’s Climate Change College last night.
The key differentiator for me is engagement. The Ben & Jerry Campaign leaves me with a reference point. I can make the connection of eco-conscious ethics, which, in turn, enhance their brand. A drumming gorilla leaves nothing except a regard for the CGI.
And, it’s not just for the big consumer brands. We all have an obligation to create real engagement in our customer relationships.
I get calls from printing companies all week long trying to offer me something the others guys all already offer and price is not the only reason for me to defect.
My relationships with printing partners have been developed over time and the links are strong – I have been engaged and a relationship is in place.
I think I’ve also switched off (to some degree) from anyone trying to infiltrate my general buying patterns. I still like to think I have choice - and Google tells me I do.
This makes it difficult for marketers on two levels:
Many companies still don’t think they should be working that hard on either counts. But the rewards are there for those that do and it’s never been easier and cheaper with Blogs, e-mail marketing and social networking.
No one wants to lose a client, but how many of us want to work hard just to keep them? That’s the real differentiator.
Google Adwords is a great tool for driving traffic to a website, especially an e-commerce site. It creates a quick and easy way to reach a search audience by creating an ad and bidding on a set of “keywords”. But, because it’s easy and delivers results, more people are using it, which is driving up the click-through charges.
It’s worthwhile adding that a lot of these people are lazy and unskilled, bidding on the most generic terms and throwing money at it - Google must be drooling. I had a meeting with a charity a couple of months ago who assigned themselves a £500 budget and got through it in less than a month. When I checked out their account, they had one advert with 5 very generic terms and had paid a hell of a lot per click-through. The sad thing was the words were so generic that they didn’t actually apply to what their charity does.
When dealing with clients, what I have found interesting is that many of the corporates still view pay-per-click as advertising in the traditional sense of the word, ie. stick up an advert and send it over - let’s go for numbers. And, because of that they don’t mind spending thousands of pounds a month to drive traffic to their site.
Yep, than can be done, but when the visitor gets to their site, the process is broken, the information is not clear - basically the experience is lacking. So, the traffic shoots up, but the sales or leads don’t come in.
But, suggest they take their marketing budget and spend it developing the website and it doesn’t seem to register as worthwhile!
A lot of marketing people still seem to see a website as another piece of collateral, like a brochure. “It’s done, I can see it so let’s move on to the next piece.”
So, ask yourself, do you even know what you are getting? Do you know the parts of your website that work, or don’t work? You could start by loading on a good stats package - Google Analytics (free) or my favourite is Hitslink. You could also start to actually talk to people. Ask them to be frank and become objective about their responses. The old analogy of the “weakest link” on a website is so, so true. If you can start to fix the broken stuff, then the marketing may look after itself…
Blogging is seen (and talked about) as being a great way to engage with your ‘audience’. That’s alright for the authors and early adopters who have an audience of 100’s of thousands of people, but a couple of months in and you are getting maybe 2 visitors a day, should you give up?
Lot’s of people do give up quickly, maybe because there isn’t an instant reaction to the things they are saying. Maybe we all deep down think we are going to be the next Seth Godin or Aaron Wall and we soon realise we’re not.
There is also lots of advice out there for the best way to blog about the best way to blog but some of the best tips I have are:
Don’t let me put you off though - let’s face it, this is my first post on a new blog.
Remember though, it’s bloody hard work. If, however, you get a small audience of five of your existing clients, and they really buy into what you say, then surely, I would count that as a success - it’s all relative after all.
