Archive for September, 2010
Why Flash doesn’t always mean cash
Sep 30th
More than one in two consumers abandon sales from websites if they can not see a picture of the product as rich media becomes an essential element of brand marketing.
New research from Brandbank reveals that despite the many industry voices calling for a move towards rich media capabilities in eCommerce platforms, without careful planning these features can be detrimental to sales.
Rather than demanding more interactive experiences, consumer’s main priorities when shopping online are seeing multiple product images and correct, comprehensive product information, according to the agency’s Retail Media Report.
Over two thirds (67%) of consumers say that they are put off buying a product where no product image is given and 61% are put off buying a product with limited textual information. Other top consumer gripes include poor quality product images (58%) and out-of-date product information (58%).
Having a lifestyle image to accompany a pack-shot is also important with almost one in two (48%) consumers saying that they would not buy a product without seeing images of it being used in a real-life setting.
Compared to these basic priorities, rich media features such as zoom, 360-degree image rotation, video and audio come further down the priorities list with consumers and can actually give rise to negative experiences and loss of sales. More than a third 39 of consumers are deterred from buying by having to wait a long time for product videos or images to load, while over half (58%) are put off by having to download additional software or plug-ins to view product images or video.
Rob Tarrant, managing director at Brandbank, said, “I think everyone in the industry is excited about the move towards media-rich features like 360 degree spin and at Brandbank we’re gearing up for this in a big way. However, while rich media is, undoubtedly, highly effective in certain situations, at this point it’s not appropriate to every retail sector.
“Talking to people heavily involved in the retail side of things, it’s apparent that, in terms of sales, the most effective web features are still the more basic alternative views, conceptual imagery and additional product information.”
The only two sectors where rich media is notably high are fashion and technology, according to the study.
Around half of consumers state that they use image zoom when buying clothing (52%) and consumer technology (48%). This is more than double those who said zoom would be useful for buying pharmaceutical products (17%) and groceries (24%).
The biggest difference in consumer expectations between sectors is the demand for multiple images of a product. While only one in ten (11%) consumers claim that they would use multiple images when buying pharmaceutical products, a significant 56% would like to see multiple images of a product when purchasing clothing and accessories online and 55% for consumer technology.
Tarrant added, “The key issue for a retailer is striking the balance between design creativity and bottom-line sales. The time will come when widespread, sophisticated multimedia features will result in great conversion rates for retailers – and indeed this is already the case in the fashion and technology sectors.”
Online is the way to a student’s wallet
Sep 28th
Brands must look online to capture students, with online promotions most effective way of engagement.
New research from a student lifestyle report conducted by studentbeans.com and YouGov SixthSense reveals that online promotions are the most effective way to communicate with students.
When looking for sources of information on latest deals and products offered by companies, 86% of UK students turn to online vouchers. Campaigns centred around an offer are also likely to have a higher response rate – a studentbeans.com survey in March 2010 found that 94% of respondents expected companies to provide special offers for students.
Many students still engage with email marketing, with 57% getting information on deals from emails sent by voucher and offer websites and 38% sourcing deals from email newsletters sent directly from the companies themselves.
Students are also becoming more receptive to email marketing, with the knowledge that these are likely to include special offers and deals. 48% of UK students say that the number of emails they read from companies has gone up.
Commenting on the results, James Eder, Commercial Director of studentbeans.com said, “Students are more Internet-savvy that any other consumer group and it is no surprise that they are responding to email marketing campaigns and online vouchers. However, brands need to ensure that their messaging is targeting young people effectively – the research shows that over half of students think that most emails they receive from companies are irrelevant to them.”
Why online retail growth is set to continue
Sep 28th
Kara Trivunovic, senior director of strategic services at StrongMail explains why advanced sales techniques from retail websites are likely to prompt customers to choose the sofa over the high street more often, whatever the weather.
Recent reports of a three-year high in online retail sales are not merely a reflection on the UK’s lousy weather this summer.
Online retail sales reached £5 billion in the UK this July, a rise that was said to be a result of unseasonable rainfall. But these days, everyone is looking for a great bargain, and online shopping has made it easier than ever to comparison shop. Plus, it’s immediate and completely accessible. Even in shaky economic times, consumers are looking to spend – they just want to get more for their money. Factor in the rise of member-based, limited-time, designer sales sites, and shoppers are in virtual shopping heaven.
Retailers have seen success in offering exclusive designer sales for years. H&M experienced overnight successes when designers such as Jimmy Choo, Comme Des Garçons and Stella McCartney ran their exclusive sales in the store. Shoppers are desperate for the latest designers but at knock off prices. If they don’t have to face crowds of people sifting through racks and piles – even better. Imagine being able to pick through all those amazing offers from the comfort of your sofa.
Online shopping and e-commerce is a proven and successful channel for driving revenue for many retailers. But how can retailers offer the same kind of bargain deals on only a select number of garments? Well, when they’re gone, they’re gone and the customers know it. They have to act fast to get the latest deal. What’s even more evolutionary is that the sense of urgency isn’t just a one time and done instance, companies have turned it into an entire business model. Read the rest of this entry »
Going Places? You’ll need a map…
Sep 27th
The introduction of Facebook Places to the UK adds a new dimension to mobile marketing, with users of the world’s largest social network being able to post recommendations – and criticisms – of suppliers and destinations. Bruce Townsend, of ecommerce software specialist, Actinic, compares who’s who of mapping in the online world.
Mobile search has been growing for some time. With GPS now widely available on phones, more and more are location-related – currently around a third, according to Google. On our family holiday this year, when a mobile phone charger broke, we used mobile search to locate a supplier and find a replacement. Searches for restaurants and homes for sale are popular.
So, I thought it would be useful to cover the main sites where a business needs to be listed in order to appear in mobile and social search results.
This is the big one. Almost 90% of UK searches go through Google. Google Maps entries also feature in the main Google results for geographical searches, eg ‘pizza delivery birmingham’.
Nokia phones are the most popular in the world, and their Ovi Maps application now offers free satnav for life. Nokia lags behind in Europe and North America, but it’s new Symbian 3 operating system promises to breathe new life into the old dog.
Microsoft’s search engine lags behind Google in percentage terms, but its alliance with Yahoo! will more than double its market share. In desktop search and on Windows mobile devices, it’s still a force to consider.
Foursquare is the leader in geosocial networking, with numerous shops, restaurants and tourist destinations listed. It pioneered concepts such as the ‘Swarm’, where many users log in together at one place. It’s here that marketers are learning how to use this medium commercially.
Facebook added Places in response to Foursquare’s success. Although new and undeveloped, it promises a similar facility for Facebooks’s massive 400 million user base.
All of these sites are free and easy to sign up for. If footfall matters to you, you’d be crazy not to.
Colenso BBDO NZ named best agency in the world
Sep 24th
Colenso BBDO New Zealand has been named the best agency in the world for emerging and young creatives, topping the YoungGuns Top 10 rankings of the most Awarded Agencies of the past decade.
The agency for its works with clients including Mini, Nintendo and Snickers.
The Top 10 Agencies ranking identifies agencies that have produced the most awarded creative talent in the 10 years since the YoungGuns were founded.
Three UK agencies made the list – Mother London in 6th, DDB London in 8th and Saatchi & Saatchi London in 9th.
The Top 10 list also features agencies from the USA, Australia, Argentina and India.
TBWA\CHIAT\DAY New York features second, followed by Crispin Porter + Bogusky to make up the top three.
The complete top 10 Awarded Agencies list is:
1 ColensoBBDO, New Zealand
2 TBWA\CHIAT\DAY New York, USA
3 Crispin Porter + Bogusky, USA
4 Del Campo Nazca Saatchi & Saatchi Argentina
5 Mother London, UK
6 Leo Burnett, Chicago, USA
7 Ogilvy & Mather, Mumbai, India
8 DDB, London, UK
9 Saatchi & Saatchi, London, UK
10 Saatchi & Saatchi, Australia
Retargeted ads triumph
Sep 23rd
comScore just released a new study they conducted with ValueClick Media on the effectiveness of online display advertising according to its media placement strategy.
The research firm analyzed 103 campaigns from 39 different advertisers covering 7 industries, examining the lift in brand website visitation and trademark search queries across six different media placement strategies.
Here’s a simplified look at what they found:
Retargeting – Served to users that have previously visited an advertiser’s site.
ReTargeted ads had the highest lift in trademark search behavior with a whopping 1,046%. The downside is that retargeting by the very nature of the beast, doesn’t reach as many potential customers so it’s perfect for those who have a high volume of abandoned shopping carts.
Premium Pricing – High visibility placements on premium publishers.
The downside here is the cost, but research showed a higher than average lift for this type of ad.
Contextual Targeting – Ads served to related page-level content
Also an expensive option, but the upside is that contextual advertising had a much larger reach than other types, surpassed only by. . .
Run-of-Network (RON) – Ads which appear anywhere in the network, often optimized by conversion
Efficiency Pricing – Cost-per-click engagement with creative
Both of these were looked at as low cost alternatives that have the best reach but don’t have the lift of targeted ads.
So retargeting it is! Except for one thing…
Anne Hunter, vice president of advertising effectiveness at comScore, says, “One of the key findings of this research is just how effective Retargeting is at generating lift. However, if marketers want to continue to enjoy the benefits of this highly effective strategy, they must also deploy it responsibly and in a manner with which consumers are comfortable.”
This is a topic we’ve discussed before and I don’t know if I’m just noticing them more often or if more advertisers are using them, but I still find it a little freaky, particularly when the ad doesn’t jive with the page I’m reading. For example, yesterday I was reading a serious interview with a breast cancer survivor and the ad that popped up was for a toy store I’d recently visited. Cute, animated mascot and breast cancer just don’t mix. I noticed the ad, but not in a good way.
comScore also found good results among advertisers that used a mix of three or more placement strategies at the same time. In one campaign that used five different methods, the average number of minutes on the brand’s site rose to seven times the norm.
Google decides its time to show us what its got – display ads
Sep 22nd
Google rarely advertises. It hasn’t needed to in order to become one of the hottest online companies of the millennium. But now it has decided it does need ads. Question is, who’ll be watching?
Through a new 35-foot-wide, 13-foot-tall billboard in Times Square, Google makes the case that it will improve a stagnant sector of the advertising business. The search giant has also recently launched a campaign in Australia too.
Bold, in-your-face ads have never been Google’s style; instead, the search giant professes to prefer ads that attract users’ attention by being relevant.
For all of Google’s success, its business has been built on search ads, it doesn’t get as much attention for its display ads, which include images, video and audio, even though those ads appear on YouTube and the million websites using Google’s display ad network.
That is the source of growing frustration at Google, which does not want to be seen as dependent on search ads, according to reports.
The message it wants to get across in its ads is Google has a business beyond search ads. More than 90% of Google’s revenue comes from text ads, but advertisers are now wanting more from the internet guru.
The billboard is part of Google’s broader ad campaign called Watch This Space, which includes ads in trade magazines and other print and online media, to inform advertisers and marketers that Google is invested in online display ads, too.
Search ads seek an immediate response in the form of a click, while display ads seek something mushier: brand awareness and loyalty.
The Times Square billboard, which will be 35 feet wide and 13 feet tall and stand 3 feet off the ground, will show a web page with the words “Display ads are big. They’re gonna be huge.” Below the tag line, “Watch this space,” an arrow points to an empty space where a display ad could be.
In the last few quarters, display advertising has become one of Google’s fastest-growing businesses, as advertisers including Ford, Kodak and Armani have embraced it.
Even though it is late to the display game, Google is trying to improve a stagnant business.
and as the internet giant says, ‘Watch this space’.
Checking in? Think about it first
Sep 21st
Onlinefire’s Melanie Seasons questions our blatant disregard for own own privacy with the launch of Facebook Places in the UK.
I’m going to come right out and say it: I have always thought Foursquare as kind of creepy, and with the introduction of Facebook Places in the States recently, I’m a tad worried LBS (or, Location-based Shouting, as I’m going to start to call it) is going to get out of hand.
It’s not that I don’t care if you’re at Kew Gardens or Polpo or All Star Lanes, it’s just that I’m sure everyone in the world doesn’t have to be privy to that information as well. I consider myself to be trustworthy – others… I’m not so sure.
You may remember the Please Rob Me campaign started earlier this year by Netherlands-based creatives Frank Groeneveld, Barry Borsboom and Boy van Amstel. It brought to the attention the fact that if you are checking in and announcing publically all the places in the world you are, it leaves wide open, the one place you aren’t…home, which could potentially leave you vulnerable to burglaries. The campaign gained moderate success, but I think it didn’t touch enough on one point – even telling people where you are currently can be dangerous.
I would hope those with stalkers and evil exes wouldn’t use the location-based services, but you never know. If you’re posting your current whereabouts, is that not an invitation itself to be mugged?
While brands are using LBS to an advantage, I worry about consumers’ eagerness to share, and for what purpose? Someone tweeting that they’re working late from the Starbucks on Tottenham Court Road may get a free coffee every once in a while, but they could also be leaving themselves open to having their laptop, Blackberry and iPad pinched on the way out.
Or perhaps, I’m over reacting? What are your thoughts on ‘checking in’?
Metro’s social media strategy is going places with Foursquare
Sep 20th
Move over Facebook — Foursquare is the hottest social networking property on the market at the moment and Metro newspaper has wasted no time in getting down with those geo-location kids.
Metro has become the first UK newspaper to cover what is quickly becoming the most popular new network.
Metro’s support will allow users of Foursquare to be able to view restaurant and film reviews when they ‘check- in’ to relevant places.
Working with social media agency Diffusion, Metro’s expansion on to Foursquare is just one of a number of social media outlets the urban newspaper now has a presence, enabling it to communicate to its users and readers.
Along with Facebook pages for Metro.co.uk and its Fantasy football game, Metro also has a number of individual twitter feeds, including sport, showbiz, weird, entertainment and fantasy football.
It also runs a twitter feed for spoof anchormen Donnie Fox and Bill Craze from Metro.co.uk’s METime campaign that launched earlier this year and which encouraged users to ‘Grab some METime’ throughout their working day.
Jamie Walters, digital director, Metro said, “We are really excited to be the first UK newspaper to take advantage of this platform and I am sure users will find our reviews helpful when they are on the move and exploring the UK’s cities.”
Ivan Ristic, director of Diffusion added, “Metro’s readers, particularly those living in London, have become enthusiastic early adopters of Foursquare in the UK and they are crying out for tips they can trust. By creating a dedicated Metro layer on Foursquare we now have the ability to deliver targeted, timely and trusted editorial reviews to Metro readers and to create new opportunities for brands keen to work with an established media partner to deliver location based marketing.”
Why Yahoo! CEO is confident of iAds failure
Sep 17th
In the past few months, Yahoo! has signed up David Beckham, extended a partnership with Facebook and launched itself into the world of internet TV. But the internet giant isn’t planning on getting into mobile advertising any time soon judging by CEO’s Carol Bartz’s latest criticism of Apple.
Known for her stern words, Bartz told Reuters this week that Apple’s iAds system will “fall apart for them”.
Bartz believes most advertisers will eventually reject Apple’s ad system because the company demands too much control over what advertisers do.
She told the news wire, “Advertisers are not going to have that type of control over them. Apple wants total control over those ads.”
However, the tough CEO said Apple’s effort is “okay for experimentation.”
Meanwhile, it was just last month that UTalkMarketing.com reported that Apple was already facing a number of challenges with its iAds platform, with many campaigns experiencing delays.
Advertisers and marketers are both still learning how to master the new platform as they also come up against Apple’s tight controls.
Since launching its iAd mobile advertising service on July 1, Apple has been slow to roll it out.
Apple named 17 launch partners for iAd — but of these just Unilever and Nissan have had iAd campaigns in July. Other campaigns, including campaigns from Disney and JC Penney, began last month.
The problem right now is that Apple is handling ad unit production as it develops tools for external agencies with which ads can be designed in future. This means ad agencies “don’t necessarily know what it is capable of or how to use the technology,” one ad executive has said.
Clearly mobile advertising, although still a nascent market, has become the next battleground pitting Yahoo! against Google and Apple.
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