The Undeniable Power of Video Marketing
Someone once said “a picture is worth a thousand words.” Somewhere along the line, a videographer or director responded, “Then what’s a video worth?” Turns out, quite a lot. Video marketing has seen a significant increase in interest in recent years, and, looking at the statistics, it’s no wonder why some are calling video marketing the most important trend in marketing and advertising today. Just how powerful and pervasive is video marketing? According to recent studies, more than 70 percent of all consumers surveyed said they have shared a brand’s video, and nearly three out of four businesses say adding a video component to their content increased their conversion rate. More than half of the consumers surveyed say that being…
Read MoreDigital Marketing with a Brick and Mortar Experience
Marketing, like all endeavors, evolves over time. The mom and pop stores and the Sears catalog gave way to downtown shopping districts and, later, shopping malls. Many brands adapted, transitioning from small footprints and mail order, to large showcase stores. Then came big box outlets, a discount version of mall department stores where you could buy just about anything. In the early 2000s, as more consumers logged onto the internet and stayed, retailers and marketers saw something new coming over the horizon, but it would have to be built largely from scratch. Consumers would need to be taught how to search for what they wanted and how to use the software that allowed them to buy those products and services.…
Read MoreVital Elements of Marketing Orientation
“Who is the customer,” and “what do they want?” Boil all the jargon and these are the two most vital questions every marketer needs to answer. The process of finding the answers to these questions is called marketing orientation. The point of this process is to develop a strategy that places the brand in a better position to find the right customers, connect with those customers, and meet their needs. Four vital elements of this process are identification, explanation, assimilation, and direction. Identification This is the step during which stakeholders within the business or brand identify and clearly define the challenge the brand is facing. Examples might include, shifting consumer tastes, changing trends, new competition, market confusion, growth problems, disconnection,…
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Social Media Marketing Keeps Climbing
The popularity of social media for marketing continues to soar. It’s still important, nonetheless, to monitor it because some of the favorites keeps changing. Video Is Big As mentioned in earlier articles, video is a key choice these days. Not only does it help tell a story but it’s also useful in teaching and explaining things. YouTube was one of the first to recognize the power of video in 2008. Facebook jumped in in 2016 and Instagram was one of the most recent platforms to do so. According to the Pew Research Center, 73% of Americans currently use YouTube and 68% Facebook. A study by Brandlive, a video platform training company, reported that 95% of marketers surveyed will be…
Read MoreHow Influencers Build Community and Drive Sales
Social media influencers are an important part of a digital marketing plan. Given the metrics and statistics, that statement should no longer be considered controversial. The plain fact is, influencers have become a valuable part of most successful digital marketing campaigns. The reason for this is simple: Influencers build community, drive engagement, and create sales. That much is self-evident. What’s not so self-evident is why this happens and what digital marketers should do to encourage more of it happening to the brands they represent. One of the first – and biggest – reasons for the success of social media influencers is the trust they’ve established with their audiences. Fans and followers value their opinions while also seeing influencers, in many…
Read MoreGetting The Most out of Influencer Marketing Campaigns
Influencer marketing continues to grow in popularity as its effectiveness is proven, time and time again. The number of personalities working as influencers continues to increase, offering smart marketers real-life and real-time examples of what to do and what not to do when attempting to employ influencers in marketing campaigns. Here are some of the best practices marketers and brand managers should use to get the most out of their influencer marketing campaigns. Consider Clout, Not Just Numbers The key to success with most influencers is finding the right niche. Going off the number of followers or scope of influence alone does not necessarily guarantee results. The most important metric for influencers is, indeed, influence. How well and how often…
Read MoreHow Digital Marketing Strategy Creates Consumer Engagement
As social media and Amazon searches continue to consume more market share, consumer shopping and buying habits are shifting right along with this trend. This is leading to a more fragmented marketplace, with people breaking into – and increasingly looking for – specific niches, rather than mass marketing products. Because of this, brand managers need to reconsider what they’re doing about digital marketing in order to better engage with today’s consumer. Developing a new and dedicated digital marketing campaign is a must for any marketer interested in maintaining or building their customer base as consumer habits continue to shift. Here are a few reasons why this is important: Digital Marketing Reveals Customers Getting to know a customer really is and…
Read MoreA Dummies Guide to Influencer Marketing
Influencer marketing has quickly become a major buzzword in the digital sphere, but the concept has been around for much longer than many pundits may assume. So what exactly is influencer marketing, and how does it work? When individuals meet an “expert” in their field, the person in question is often immediately viewed as a knowledgeable and trustworthy source of information. An expert, then, can have significant sway over an audience’s views – and wallet. This is, in essence, influencer marketing: the development of advertising via influential people and thought leaders, rather than directly through the brand itself. Marketing strategies that utilize the reach of a social media influencer have grown in recent years, especially as marketing teams realise that…
Read MoreFedEx CFO Responds to “Horrific” Income Drop
As more companies enter the shipping business, and more consumers demand faster shipping times, longstanding brands face greater logistical and financial challenges. For the past year, stalwart industry leader FedEx has been struggling. Recently, the company posted a net income that’s 40% lower than the same period the prior year. Revenue is down as well, leading to a significant drop in operating income. FedEx CFO Alan Graf didn’t mince words, though he did promise the downturn was temporary, saying in an analyst call reported by business media, “We are at the bottom… Our adjusted operating profit decline is horrific… it’s going to improve. We’re going to come off the mat and improve into next year…” Analysts point to several different…
Read MoreRussia Pushing Back Hard Against Olympic Ban
The Olympic Games are coming in 2020, and the soccer World Cup follows two years later. If a World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) sanction holds up, Russian athletes will not be allowed to compete under their country’s flag or wear their nation’s colors, a penalty Russian President Vladimir Putin has called “unfair.” Russia has announced plans to file an appeal challenging the four-year ban that came as a result of sanctions, stemming from a WADA decision finding that representatives “manipulated doping laboratory data” in an effort to hide previous infractions. Putin said the sanctions defied common sense and law, calling out the agency for the wholesale ban and suggesting WADA should impose individual sanctions, rather than blanket bans. Russian advisors called…
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