Email and Mobile Marketing Blog

“Business & Technology: How to Find and Keep Customers for Life.” was the topic of the 4th Small Business Summit concluded on February 3, 2008 at Digital Sandbox in NY. The show was great and attracted big names like Microsoft, Dell to one-person companies.

The summit touched upon and discussed issues that concerns almost every business like Keeping Customers: It’s the Relationship (First) Not the Products, Online Presence: More Important Than Ever, How to Get Free Publicity Through Media Coverage, Business Survival Techniques from a Navy Seal and The Power of Email Marketing: 10 Things You Need To Know

The speakers included Bob Pearson, VP Dell, Brent Leary, Co-founder CRM Essentials LLC, Michael Schultz, Microsoft Office Live, Jonathan Rochelle, Google and Harry Brooks, Network Solutions.

It was a win-win day for everyone, for Prime Strategies and SmallBiz Technology.com for putting up a fantastic event, for small businesses to learn from the experience of big and big companies for finding customers for their products.

The hot topic of discussion was social media marketing and seems like lots of entrepreneurs were very scared and overwhelmed. There is so much too do, twitter, creating page on facebook, writing blogs, press releases, presence of social communities. Truly it is tough for a small company with 3-4 people to manage so many marketing avenues but also these are very effective in building relationship with customers.

mobile and email marketing

Yes and the winner is none other than Email Marketing. You didn’t get this, my apologies I’m talking of the most preferred marketing tactics  by marketers for the year 2009.

Especially in this recession email marketing tops the list of the most preferred marketing tactics. The definition of the ‘most preferred’ is the tactic that gives the best ROI. Email Marketing and paid search marketing are the top performers for a B2C marketer.

According to a recent survey conducted by Marketing Sherpa, marketers have to be still careful in using email marketing. Marketers are focusing on less expensive high investment marketing tactics. The biggest challenge for advertising agencies and creative teams is to create a solution that is effective, relevant, innovative and still cost effective. The survey also highlights on a wide range of techniques and approaches to make email marketing all the more appealing to marketers.

One such approach is transactional emails. Transactional email is the one that provide information like receipt, order confirmation, shipment notices, customer service alerts, monthly statements etc. Transactional emails have higher open rates, thus it is great to leverage it to push brand messages and promotional offers. The study also provide details on how to design the content of transactional emails without compromising its sanctity.

The survey is a must read for email marketers and all marketers in general. Please read the complete survey report http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.php?ident=31009&pop=no

The survey provides various charts on how to maintain email marketing ROI without investing in testing, measurement and optimization. The study offers alternative tests that seem to work effectively like email design tests, email targeting tests etc.

And finally the study indicates the role of specific marketing tactics in lead generation and lead nurturing.

Also read the article - Top Email Marketing Strategies in Economic Downturn for further details. http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.php?ident=30863

mobile and email marketing, permission based marketing, self service marketing, targeted marketing email benchmark survey 2009, email marketing, marketing sherpa

I was going through my EkoBuzz emails, i subscribe to mobile marketer newsletter. I read this really interesting article A sector by sector look at the Mobile Marketing Opportunities for 2009. The article highlights innovative ways mobile marketing can be used in different industry, here are some of the excerpts from the article. 

Apparel and accessories business marketers can use their stores, shopping bags, email newsletters, loyalty cards, wired and mobile websites to encourage their customers to sign up for mobile loyalty program.   

Entertainment Industry can put short clips of movies and TV shows, songs, ringtones, trailers, theater locations, SMS alerts of premieres and concerts, discounted tickets, mobile coupons, mobile fan clubs, backstage passes, mobile games and links to mobile sites. 

Automakers surely not the desired advertisers but mobile can help them build customer loyalty.  Websites can be used to encourage visitors to sign up for mobile alerts from dealers – new models, test drives, markdowns, dealer events.

The article is a must read for all mobile marketers. In a nut shell whichever industry we are in, mobile marketing is a must have weapon in our marketing plan. The beauty of this channel is that its performance and results improve with integration. There are measures available to gauge the success of mobile campaign so don’t shy away. Accept it and ‘build better relationships’ with your customers 

Keep reading and post your comments

kriti Jaising

mobile and email marketing

According t o Newsweek magazine Barack Obama is the most powerful man in the world. Soon to be the president of the United States of America Barack Obama has created a history for being the first African American President. The charismatic president elect launched a fully integrated marketing campaign for his 2008 Presidential Election but the highlight of the election campaign was the innovative use of mobile channel.

The Barack Obama election campaign used all facets of mobile campaign. The primary target audience for the mobile campaign was young voters that are digitally savvy and politically inclined. The young voters were encouraged to visit Obama’s website and register for text message program to stay on top of the latest news. The campaign included downloadable ring tones, wall papers, text message alerts on Barack Obama’s local events, other big news, coupons to buy items at candidate’s online store etc. The mobile channel was optimized to reach voters in a continuous but non-intrusive way and the frequency was kept to 1-2 messages per week.

A special iPhone application was also launched to engage iPhone user. The application allowed users to read campaign news, press releases, photos and video highlights. Other impressive features of the application were “Get Involved” that was based on GPS location technology to get information on closest Obama campaign office, “Call Friends”, “Local Events” and “Donate” link at the bottom of the page.

Clearly the objective of the mobile channel in the campaign was to drive voters to vote besides getting donations. The campaign achieved its aforesaid target very effectively; thousands of people went for advance voting. The campaign also helped Obama team to build an extraordinary database of the young voters with pivotal information like mobile numbers, email addresses, zip codes etc.

Texting is truly has a phenomena and the success of Obama campaign has unveiled the true potential of mobile channel then
WHAT ARE MARKETERS AND CORPORATES WAITING FOR??

Please send in your comments and share your favorite mobile marketing success story.

Kriti Jaising

mobile and email marketing

Looking for a new channel or medium to promote your brand, want to break the advertising clutter, trying to position your brand contemporary and tech savvy and also have shoestring advertising budget then look no further. Your prayers have been answered. Mobile advertising , yes it is the future. Still not sure whether it will break the grounds like online advertising did just couple of years ago. A recent report by The Kelsey group indicated that the U.S. mobile advertising market would grow from $33.2 million in 2008 to $1.4 billion in 2012

There are different forms of mobile advertising derived mainly from its predecessors like online, print, TV etc. It is too early to predict the winner amongst the current mobile advertising options. Some of the forms of mobile advertising are

Mobile Banners – has great potential to be successful like online banners. The acceptance and usage of mobile banners is dependent on Mobile Web (WAP). The sooner customers use mobile web the greater are the chances that advertisers will push traffic to mobi sites via mobile banners.

Mobile Search – the Google on mobile. Anytime anywhere mantra is the key to the success of mobile search, the more people get attracted to use mobile search the more advertisers will use mobile search as an media to promote brands.

Mobile TV – Television still is the most dominant advertising medium attracting billions of dollars from advertisers and brands and is still considered the most effective medium for brand building and brand recall. The TV commercial spots are expensive and has lot of clutter. The idea for mobile is to pick the success ingredient from television and implement to mobile TV.

The mobile advertising for sure is the future; marketers, advertisers and small businesses are inventing newer ways to maximize the use of mobile phone. Mobile’s portability and accessibility makes it a unique platform and we are all waiting eagerly for its success.

Keep reading and post your comments.

Kriti Jaising

mobile and email marketing

Social Networking!! You got it the most happening and the most talked about marketing channel. It got to be because it is the least expensive too. Small business owners, marketers, product mangers, software developers to managing directors and CEO’s of big companies are using social networks to expand and revive their connections.

Young teens initiated Social Networking as a way to make friends online and business professionals have added the marketing twist to this concept. From casual teen talk medium to top executive PR platform, social networking has come a long way. It is so effective that it is used as an integral element in online marketing plan.

The benefits are immense and immediate from finding the jobs to vendors relationships are key. To facilitate the use of social networking I have complied a list of most popular social networking websites.

Twitter
Delicious
StumbleUpon
Facebook
linkedIn
Flickr
YouTube
Slideshare

Mobile Advertising, Mobile Marketing and SEO, Text/SMS marketing, mobile and email marketing, permission based marketing, self service marketing, targeted marketing Add new tag

Mobile Marketing is undeniably the epicenter of today’s marketing world. Marketers are talking about mobile marketing, trying to understand how to measure the success of campaigns, what metrics to be used. But still not all the issues pertaining to mobile marketing are clear thus lot of uncertainty. As much as marketers want to add mobile marketing in the marketing mix, they are unable to solve this puzzle as there are pieces missing. In this tough economy, mobile marketing can actually help marketers save some dollars. If well integrated with other marketing tools mobile marketing can give us desired results. But there some issues still unanswered.

1. How to tackle Customer Privacy
2. Educating and ease of accessing content.
3. Multiplicity of platforms
4. Slow adoption of multimedia
5. Lack of metric transparency
6. Lack of consumer acceptance
7. No uniform standards
8. Uncertainties in cross-media integration
9. Inventory of content

We all are working together to integrate and implement mobile marketing campaigns effectively and how to measure their efficacy.

If you have other issues that i have missed, plaese add in this list to help others.

Keep reading

Kriti Jaising
EkoBuzz

mobile and email marketing

September 4, 2008

Mobile Marketing is the new love child of marketing industry. Mobile phone ownership is growing much faster than computers. Every newspaper, e-newsletter, magazine covers how mobile marketing is gaining momentum, exponential growth in customers using mobile phones as a communication tool, how many more text messages they are sending, how many are subscribing to data plans to excess mobi sites and reach their friends via mobile social networks.

Mobile marketing can be classified as mobile advertising, mobile search, and mobile social networking. Mobile advertising can be in a form of banner as a simple text based SMS or MMS, games, videos, music etc. ‘Relevance’ is the key to mobile advertising that makes it different and much more effective than traditional form of advertising. Currently SMS text messages are the most popular and used form of mobile advertising as not very many mobile subscribers have opted for premium services that allow downloading of games, music, video etc.

Mobile being an extremely personal medium, advertisers and marketers are cautious of walking on the fine line. Invading the consumer privacy is another reason that marketers and going slow with mobile advertising. The future holds tremendous potential with the latest location based mobile services. The newer mobile phones are equipped with satellite–positioning technology that will open new door to the success of mobile marketing. Geographic targeting, sending mobile coupons based on consumer location is gaining acceptance and more and more advertisers are spending marketing budget on these newer ways to reach target audience at the time when they are ready to spend.
Mobile search, thanks to Google mobile the search results pages will be on small mobile screen. Typing salon will bring up the ad of the closest salon along with the organic search results.

Consumers are surely in for a surprise with marketers, mobile operators and mobile applications providers working hard every day to make every day a special day.

Please send your feedback and comments

Kriti Jaising
EkoBuzz

mobile and email marketing

EkoBuzz the leading self service email and mobile marketing campaign service, announced today that they have joined the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA). The Mobile Search Committee was established to develop common business models, operating procedures and technology interfaces that help operators offer an integrated, carrier branded mobile experience to their subscribers. The committee also helps content providers monetize their opportunities in the mobile ecosystem.

“We are delighted to be a part of the MMA to be a part of the mobile community and to help foster collaboration among the key players in the mobile community,” said Kriti Jaising, Chief Marketing Officer at EkoBuzz. “Having built our mobile marketing campaign technology from the ground up for mobile, EkoBuzz offers a simple yet stylish mobile campaign solution and enables our customers to have a unique insight into reporting and tracking of mobile campaigns.”

The Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) is the premier global association that strives to stimulate the growth of mobile marketing and its associated technologies.

Buzz on EkoBuzz Mobile Advertising, mobile marketing association, mobile marketing campaigns

I have been working on optimizing my company’s website EkoBuzz and in the process came up with the thought of sharing my experience and resources with other people who are interested in learning optimization and doing it themselves. I started reading Bruce Clay blogs, attended Jill Whalen Organic SEO Training Class and enrolled for SEMPO Institute’s Insider’s Guide to SEM program.
SEO is an elaborate step-by-step process of improving a website’s search page results ranking. It is critical to know where to find the correct and legitimate information. Understanding and following the guidelines of search engines is pivotal to the success of SEO.
Most SEO’s have their own mix of tools and techniques to optimize pages, create & build links, and track search engine results page ranking. To make it easy and convenient for people like me I am putting together a list of the most relevant websites and resources essential to understand and do Search Engine Optimization.
Lets look at it from the beginning, SEM Search Engine Marketing include Search Engine Optimization SEO and Search Advertising also known as pay-per-click PPC. Search Engine Optimization process involves understanding of Links, html tags like title meta tags & anchor text, directories, keywords & phrases, SEO web design, copywriting for SEO & PPC, SEO Roadblocks, how to find ways to avoid these roadblocks, how to submit a website and how to track and design reports.
The following are some of the very helpful, effective and popular free and paid search engine optimization tools
Free Tools
Analytics Tools
www.google.com/analytics
Server Tools
www.seotoolsset.com/tools/free_tools.html
www.dnsstuff.com
Keyword Analysis
www.keyworddiscovery.com
www.livekeywordanalysis.com
www.seomoz.org/tools/kwtool.php
Ranking Monitors
www.alexa.com
www.mcdar.net/dance/
www.digitalpoint.com/tools/webrank
Links
www.linkpopularity.com
www.marketleap.com/services/freetools/
www.elixirsystems.com/tools/linkpopularity.php
Copywriting
www.copyscape.com
http://tool.motoricerca.info/similarity-analyzer.phtml
SEM Glossary
www.seobook.com/glossary
SEM ROI
www.pageviews.com/resources/roicalculator
Report Spammer
www.google.com/contact/spamreport.html

Advanced Paid SEO Tools
www.advancedlinkmanager.com
www.clicktracks.com
www.omniture.com
www.tamos.com/products/smartwhois/
www.seotoolset.com
www.trellian.com/seotoolkit/
www.webposition.com
www.wordtracker.com
www.webtrends.com

Hope these tools are helps to you in a successful SEO process. Keeping reading as I’ll share the most effective SEO Resources in the next blog.
Thanks for your time. Please share your comments.
Kriti Jaising
EkoBuzz

mobile and email marketing Add new tag, Bruce Clay, EkoBuzz, Mobile Marketing and SEO, sem