Promoting Email Consistency: A conversion boosting best practice

Posted August 23rd, 2010, by Tom Ellis

Tom EllisTo My Kind Followers: Alas, it’s the final week of my internship here at Monetate for soon I must return to Wharton to complete the last year of my MBA. So please, sit back, relax and enjoy the final installment of “Lunches with Brett.”

As I was chowing down on my chicken salad sandwich, Brett and I were discussing how promotional email campaigns have the potential to be one of the most effective marketing tools. After all, some people on your email list are probably customers already and others have shown enough interest in you to hand over their email address. It reminds me of that line from Alec Baldwin’s character Blake, the real estate sales shark in the film version of Glengarry Glen Ross: “a guy don’t walk on the lot lest he wants to buy.”

According to Brett, a person on your email list could be considered a warm lead, the hard part is done. But I’d done some research in preparation for our lunch… Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Blog, Personalization, Strategy, Tom

What Happened to Customer Service and the Personal Touch?

Posted July 22nd, 2010, by Tom Ellis

faceless customerHey everyone—Tom here again. I know it might not look like I’m here, but I am. (There is nothing wrong with your computer, do not adjust your set.) That faceless ”picture” of me is there to underline a point I am about to make, or rather, a point that Brett was making during one of our recent lunches.

If you caught the first two installments of my summer blog series, Lunches with Brett, you will know that Brett covered several important landing page tips. This week he was keen to talk about something different, something you might call “the lost art of online customer service.”

Brett also wanted to debunk some myths about website personalization, including the perception some companies have that the technical challenge is too big, and the return on investment is too unpredictable, to make it worth doing. So let’s looks at the facts, as Brett sees them from his position, that is, totally immersed in website optimization.

Fact #1: People love personalized attention. Whether we are physically in a store or shopping online it makes no difference, we humans love personal attention. And yet many e-commerce sites seem content to treat each online customer like just another blank face (see image above).

Do you know of any customers who appreciate this sort of generic, unfeeling treatment? I didn’t think so. At best, this type of impersonal service will do nothing; at worst it will spurn resentment, disloyalty and possibly even permanent defection. Here are some interesting recent statistics on this very topic.  Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Blog, Personalization, Strategy, Tom

Lunches with Brett: Landing page anchors, what they are and why you need them

Posted July 12th, 2010, by Tom Ellis

Tom EllisWelcome back to Monetate’s summer blog series: “Lunches with Brett.” If you missed the first installment, allow me to introduce myself, I’m the guy in the picture, Tom Ellis, a Wharton MBA summer intern here at Monetate, and I’m busy gathering nuggets of marketing knowledge from Brett Bair, the ecommerce mastermind here at Monetate.

In the first installment Brett revealed some great ideas about landing pages (if you haven’t read, it, you should, now, then come back and read on). Fortunately, when you’ve got someone like Brett on your team, there’s more where that came from, which brings me to this week’s theme: The Landing Page Anchor.

What is a “landing page anchor?” I asked Brett over a particularly tasty turkey club sandwich over here at our headquarters on the north side of Philadelphia.

Brett began his answer by explaining that the landing pages which a site visitor sees upon clicking the best search results tend to contain the most relevant information, by design. Typically, these are pages that… Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Blog, Personalization, Strategy, Tom, marketing

These Badges Don’t Stink: Highlighting product shots shows positive results

Posted June 17th, 2010, by Stephen Cobb

What irony! The best-known quote about badges refers to “stinking badges” despite the fact that badges are generally not stinky. In fact, they are almost always a good thing. From merit badges to badges of honor, most real world connotations have been positive. And now digital badges are proving both positive and helpful to e-commerce.

product shot badge

I’m talking about the badges you see on retail websites. These online store badges say things like: New Arrival; Staff Favorite; Special Value; and Top Pick. (The example on the left is from one of our clients, Freshpair, whose site sports one of the great e-commerce taglines: “buy underwear in your underwear”.)

Placing badges on product shots can make a big difference to the way shoppers interact with your site. In fact, whenever our clients have introduced badging the effects have been positive (defined as an increase in conversion rate, an increase in average order value, or both). In my opinion the most likely reason for this is that… Read the rest of this entry »

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Which 3 Product Features to Highlight? We picked a dynamic trio of marketing marvels

Posted June 8th, 2010, by Stephen Cobb

Sales Director Marc Hatton demos Monetate booth Several members of Team Monetate will be in Chicago this week at the world’s largest event for Internet retailers: IRCE (as is “Internet Retailer Conference and Exposition” opening today at the McCormick center).

Success at trade shows often hinges on what you do before you get there. When you’re prepping for an event like this it’s important to make sure everyone is “on message.” At high traffic trade shows it’s just not possible to show off every feature of every product to everyone who stop by your booth.

So we decided to focus on 3 features at IRCE that are unique to the Monetate Real-time Marketer product, things we can do for online retailers that nobody else can. Our feature picks went out in a news release but I will be going into more detail about the dynamic trio here on the blog:

Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Blog, Personalization, marketing, testing

Where Your Customers Are At: Location-based merchandising without GPS

Posted April 22nd, 2010, by Stephen Cobb

Ge-location targetingThe GPS capabilities of smartphones can be dazzling but I think they could be leading some retailers to overlook a different and potentially more profitable type of location-based marketing. I’m talking about geo-targeted marketing opportunities that have nothing to do with mobile devices, opportunities with more revenue potential than anything currently triggered by GPS.

I  wrote about this recently in an article that appeared in All About Retail Online Integration. I pointed out that an overwhelming majority of online purchases are still made from notebooks and desktops. What follows is an updated and extended version of that article:

The fact that smartphones can display information which reflects their physical location is generating a lot of buzz. Marketers are getting positive results when using this capability—made possible by GPS technology—for adverts, offers, and coupons. However, marketers should not overlook the fact that any web site, any online store, can market and merchandise relative to location, without GPS. That’s because, whenever you visit a web site from your desktop or notebook or netbook, the site can determine the general location of your device based on its IP address.

This simple fact of Internet technology creates the potential to market and merchandise relative to location, but… Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Blog, Personalization, Strategy, marketing, real-time marketing

Email Marketing & Personalization Summit, Monday, February 22nd

Posted November 19th, 2009, by Stephen Cobb

Desert-SpringsSome blog posts have a specific task to perform and the role of this one is a formal announcement:

Monetate is sponsoring the “Email Marketing & Personalization Summit,” an intensive, one-day, attendance-limited event, to be held at the JW Marriott Desert Springs Resort in California, on February 22nd.

Now I can get back to being informal: I think this is going to be great! The summit is an information-packed event that features a series of round tables at which retailers can get seriously practical advice on a variety of hot marketing topics like the one that is being presented by Monetate CEO David Brussin:

“Up Close And Profitable: How Segmented, Targeted Marketing Drives Revenue Lift On Retail Sites”

David will be joined by a senior marketing executive from one of today’s most successful online retailers. (BTW, David is a master of this subject and if you’ve not had an opportunity to hear him talk before, this is a great chance to do so, in a controlled setting where there will be plenty of time to ask questions and engage in one-on-one discussion.) Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Events, Industry, Personalization, marketing

Can You Ever Have Too Much Traffic? Yes, but you can never have too much conversion

Posted November 12th, 2009, by Stephen Cobb

Lines to get in to ad:techTraffic. Sometimes it’s a bad thing, like when you’re stuck in it while driving to work. Sometimes it’s a good thing, like when you’re running a business. Then you want traffic. Traffic to your restaurant, movie, hotel, airline, or store. And you definitely want traffic to your web site. You want people coming to your online store, your booking system, or the digital place where you promote whatever it is that your business is about. So I’m going to have to defend my assertion that you can have “too much traffic” because it borders on heresy in the world of digital marketing.

But before I do that, a few words about this world of digital marketing. It was on display last week at the ad:tech event in New York, an event that had plenty of traffic of its own. Ad:tech is billed as “the #1 event for interactive marketing” and I don’t doubt the claim. The event outgrew the New York Hilton last year and has moved to the Jacob Javits Convention Center, a bold gamble given the state of the economy back when the decision to move was made, but it seems to have paid off.

At one point the registration line stretched almost the entire width of the Javits then doubled back on itself. And when you got into the exhibit hall the aisles were jammed. (I did a short radio interview from the show floor with Bryan Eisenberg and you can tell from my voice that I’m having to shout to be heard above the noise of the crowd: WebmasterRadio.fm Interviews Stephen Cobb). Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Industry, Personalization

Marketing Around Real Events Means Marketing in Real Time

Posted November 9th, 2009, by Stephen Cobb

The MarketA few posts back I suggested that the launch of Windows 7 presented several opportunities for creative online marketers who were nimble enough to roll out campaigns and promotions to take advantage of emerging trends. This past weekend I encountered two articles that speak to this.

The first is from The Guardian: Microsoft boosted as Windows 7 sales outpace Vista. The article says early sales figures for Windows 7 suggest “shoppers are switching to Microsoft’s new operating system in their droves, shrugging off the cloud cast by its predecessor, Windows Vista…figures by research firm NPD Group suggested that sales of Windows 7 in the United States were 234% higher than when Vista launched in January 2007.” This is good news for sites hoping to convert visitors with W7 hooks like the ones I outlined (7 Ways Microsoft Windows 7 Can Help Online Retailers: Even if you don’t sell PCs).

And the other article, from CNET a few weeks ago, backs up my thinking that W7 hooks can work beyond the inner circles of Windows devotees: Apple sees Windows 7 as an opportunity to sell Macs. The article talks about Apple looking forward to the release of Windows 7 because “frustrated Windows users will [in Apple's opinion] buy a Mac.”

My point? Savvy marketing means keeping your finger on the pulse of our world and spotting opportunities to connect with your target market wherever, and whenever, they arise. If you have competition–and who doesn’t?– this is not an optional strategy: Your competition will take advantage of those opportunities, potentially at your expense.

Smart marketing also means putting in place a marketing platform that can react quickly to emerging trends. Creating a new Google Adwords campaign takes a matter of minutes but a lot of that ad spend will be wasted if it takes the I.T. department a week to make the appropriate changes to your web site (appropriate coding and placement of messages, graphics, discount codes, and so on).

Why will ad spend be wasted? If your web site does not carry on the conversation you start in those ads, and carry it from the landing page through the entire site experience, then your conversion rate will probably be dismal, and it will certainly be lower than if you have created continuity from the ad through to entire site experience (and all the way to the checkout if you’re an online retailer).

We live in a real-time world, from “as-it-happens” cable news to instant consumer intelligence on Twitter. Simply put, to compete online with a reasonable hope of success you need an online marketing platform that works in real time.

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Posted in Industry, Personalization, Strategy, marketing

Don't Spook The Customers: Halloween's a good time for a user interface review

Posted October 29th, 2009, by Stephen Cobb

Halloween means different things to different people; but if you’re a retailer, why not think of this annual indulgence in masks and costumes as a reminder to review the user experience faced by shoppers at your online store? After all, nobody wants to enter the holiday shopping season with a spooky user interface that scares away potential customers.
Boo!Not that you would scare off your online shoppers on purpose, but the fact is, despite advances in Internet technology and web design, some online shopping experiences still feel more like a trick than a treat.

(BTW, Halloween night in America will be an hour longer than normal this year because Daylight Saving Time comes to an end at 2:00AM on the morning of Sunday, November 1–one hour is hardly enough time to do a full user interface review, but may be enough to ask friends and family to shop your store and give you unvarnished feedback on their experiences.)

What would be an example of a shopping treat that turned into a trick: I recently abandoned a shopping cart containing over $100 worth of purchases. Why? Because the store rejected my home address as “invalid.” After trying four different variations, I clicked out of that site feeling cheated and grumpy.

This particular interface failure is indicative of a wider phenomenon that I call “the input hack.” This is a web form that offers no help to the user yet responds to input errors with a series of unhelpful messages, leading to multiple attempts to complete the form in a tediously iterative and increasingly annoying process which, upon successful completion, feels like you’ve managed to hack your way into a classified computer system (when what you’ve actually accomplished is a much more modest goal: convincing an online store to accept your order).

So let’s be clear: Customer input should not be an exercise in trick or treat. Whenever a customer inputs data your response should be positive and helpful, whether or not the customer provided “correct” data. Do not, for example, respond with messages like this:

Email address improperly formatted or contains invalid or illegal characters.

I can almost hear Monty Python’s John Cleese delivering that error message in a voice dripping with disdain: “You bumbling idiot, what’s the matter with you? Can’t you even type an email address without screwing it up?” Furthermore, that type of error message provides no clue as to what a correct email address looks like. Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Industry, Personalization, Strategy

Daylight Savings at Your Online Store? Time-based tips for web-based retailing

Posted October 25th, 2009, by Stephen Cobb

clocksThere are 4 tips in this post and right off the bat here’s the first one:

Tip #1: The clocks in Europe went off daylight saving time last night. That means the usual time difference between the US and the EU has been cut by one hour, so Paris is only 5 hours ahead of New York instead of the normal 6 hours (where last night = Saturday, October 24, 2009).

This anomaly will persist until next weekend when the US goes off DST. Then the Paris-New York difference will go back to the normal 6 hours until March 14, 2010. At that time the US will Spring forward to DST and cut that time difference to 5 hours, until the EU switches to DST on March 28. (For readers in the UK, that’s 4 hours for this week, then back to 5 until that special fortnight in March when it will be 4.)

Confusing? Hopefully not, because today’s global business climate requires that we maintain, at all times, a clear sense of what time it is, for us and for our customers, suppliers, and partners. And in the 24/7 world wide business of online retailing this opens up some interesting possibilities for personalization of store content. Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Industry, Personalization, Strategy, marketing

7 Ways Microsoft Windows 7 Can Help Online Retailers: Even if you don't sell PCs

Posted October 22nd, 2009, by Stephen Cobb

Windows 7 LaunchesIf you’re an online retailer, how excited should you be about today’s launch of Microsoft Windows 7? May I suggest you think of this latest version of Microsoft’s operating system as an exciting marketing opportunity, one that could extend beyond hardware and software sales.

As you probably know, your online store can detect the type of operating system that shoppers are using. With a major new operating system in the mix, why not leverage that data point in your merchandising? I think there are ways to leverage Microsoft Windows 7 even if you are not selling computers.

How might that work? Because it’s a more obvious application, let’s start with those retailers that do sell computer hardware and software. Such companies comprise a significant slice of the Internet Retailer Top 50, from the obvious manufacturer sites like Dell (#3) and Apple (#5) to office stores like Staples (#2), Office Depot (#4), and OfficeMax (#6). Then you have mass merchants and multi-channel retailers like Sears (#7) and QVC (#11) as well as digital specialists CDW (#8), NewEgg (#9), and BestBuy (#10).

Here are some of the ways retailers like this could leverage Windows 7:

1. If a visitor is using an earlier version of Windows: Pitch new computers that come with Windows 7 or offer a deal on upgrades to Windows 7, or hardware to run Windows 7 better.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Industry, Personalization, Strategy, marketing
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