Many new businesses struggle to generate leads. How do you get people interested in your product or service when they’ve never heard of it or don’t realize that they need it? The truth is that it’s not easy. However,  you can accelerate your lead generation through a content marketing strategy. It’s the art of creating and sharing valuable content that educates your target audience and ultimately leads them through your sales funnel.

But to succeed at content marketing, you need a content marketing strategy. This gives you the roadmap to go from generating content ideas to distributing finished pieces to your audience.

12 Steps to a Successful Content Marketing Strategy

And yet, according to a survey conducted by the Content Marketing Institute (CMI), only 40% of B2B marketers have a documented content marketing strategy.

If you fall into the same camp, it might be time to get serious about your own content marketing strategy. Here are some steps it should include:

1. Set goals

Every content marketing strategy must start with setting goals. Otherwise, you won’t know when it’s failed or succeeded.

So, ask yourself what you aim to accomplish. Are you trying to boost traffic to your website, increase engagement on your social media accounts, or make more revenue?

Whatever it is, write it down. Create a mission statement that outlines exactly what you want your content marketing to do.

2. Attach KPIs to your goals

Once you’ve established your content marketing strategy goals, make them more specific and measurable with key performance indicators (KPIs). These are metrics you can use to evaluate the performance of your content marketing strategy, such as online views, clicks, and conversions.

Set KPI targets based on your goals so you know what to aim for. This is part of making your goals SMART (i.e., specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound).

Other KPI metrics you might consider is including the number of email subscribers, SEO rankings, and social media shares.

3. Determine your target audience

At this point, you should get clear on your target audience. That way, you know who you’re addressing in your content, which will resonate more deeply.

First, start collecting demographic data on your current contacts: their age, gender, location, income, education, etc. Some of this you can do with tools like Google Analytics that analyze your site visitors. Otherwise, you may need customers to volunteer this information via surveys, contact forms, or testimonials. Asking for specific feedback lets you understand them better.

From there, you can segment your audience into different groups. Then, create buyer personas or customer avatars for each group. These serve as ideal customer profiles that describe their interests, pain points, behaviors, etc. This will make it easier to write content with the right person in mind.

4. Run a content audit

Chances are that your business has already published content before, such as blog articles, social media posts, videos, podcast appearances, and so on. Go through these to assess where you stand. How are you performing against your KPI goals?

By analyzing your historical content and comparing it against your goals (and your competitors’ content), you can better understand what needs to be done.

Use a content audit tool to streamline this process. It can help you identify gaps in relevant keywords you’re not ranking for, questions you’re not answering, and other improvements you could be making.

5. Choose the best content channels

During your content audit, note what channels your content is being shared on most. Is it on social media, forums, or other websites? Again, a web analytics platform can help you do this.

Watch for trends and double down on whatever seems to be working best. If you notice that your content is getting a lot of traction on X (formerly Twitter), you may want to focus on this channel in your content marketing.

6. Decide on content types

Now that you’ve determined the best content channels to target, decide what type of content to focus on. This could be long-form content like blog articles and email newsletters or short-form content like social media posts or TikTok videos.

Other content types include YouTube videos, infographics, webinars, ebooks, and podcasts. Narrow down a few that will most effectively reach your target audience.

7. Generate content ideas

Next, start brainstorming content ideas. A good approach is to identify questions your target audience is asking. For example, you can use Google’s autocomplete feature to find commonly asked questions in your industry or niche.

From there, you can come up with topic clusters or pillars around which to organize new content ideas. The goal is to develop as many content ideas as you can in a structured way.

8. Solidify a content creation process

With your content ideas in hand, it’s time to establish your content creation process. At a minimum, you’ll need staff to manage and create the content. This could include full-time, part-time, or freelance writers, along with a head editor or manager.

You’ll also want to invest in a content management system (CMS) to keep your content organized at all stages of creation. Set up standard workflows for each piece of content, such as outlining, writing, image sourcing, editing, revising, publishing, and sharing.

9. Create a content calendar

A content calendar (aka content plan) lets you plan, track, and set deadlines for different content milestones. Without one, you’re bound only to have sub-par results.

Use project management software (PMS) to set up your content calendar and assign due dates to upcoming content pieces. Ensure each piece goes through the proper approval channels to streamline the publishing process.

10. Create content

Now that you’ve researched and planned, it’s time to create the content. Ensure your content writers address your target audience directly and write in your brand’s voice. Every piece should be original and deliver value. This will help it stand out from the vast amount of similar content already out there on the internet.

From there, ensure content is checked, edited, revised, and ultimately approved. Use a combination of employees and software tools to verify content for accuracy and quality.

11. Distribute and market your content

Once a piece of content is complete, share it! You can do this via email marketing (aka drip campaign) software or manually. Spread the new content everywhere, and don’t be afraid to repurpose content into different forms. For example, you could turn a blog article into a video script, a social media post into an Instagram photo, a white paper into an infographic, etc.

Also, don’t forget to take advantage of any user-generated content like testimonials. Share them on your accounts to create a positive brand image.

12. Measure results and adapt

The last step of the content marketing process is to measure results and adapt accordingly. This comes back to measuring KPIs and noting changes over time — whether positive or negative.

Regularly track website views, social media shares, email subscriptions, etc. From there, you can determine what’s working and what isn’t. You can even run A/B tests to compare two versions of a single piece of content.

The point is to continuously improve your content marketing. Double down on what works and abandon what isn’t. That’s the only sure way to success.

You’ll see your business gradually grow as you refine your content marketing strategy. Your content will attract more readers who turn into leads and, ultimately, customers. Trust the process and watch your company reach the next level!

The post How to Develop a Successful Content Marketing Strategy appeared first on ReadWrite.

Lead generation is a critical aspect for all types of businesses, regardless of their industry or size. It allows businesses to generate sales leads, nurture prospects, and convert them into real paying customers.

However, in the absence of a lead generation model, businesses struggle to find new customers and grow their business. 

The digital era brought many technology companies into the limelight, specifically after Covid-19. Fast-track digitization enabled the rise in demand for tech professionals globally. This has underpinned the technology sector’s health and put it at the top of the pile.

Numerous technology firms today have created and captured future growth opportunities and saw the biggest jump in median five-year annual TSR. Now that we know tech comes out on top, the question is, can it stay there? To ensure its consistent growth, it becomes requisite for technology companies to generate leads.

In this piece, we’ll go through the best strategies for lead generation for technology companies to help them reach their prospective customers.

Lead Generation for Technology Companies- Top 12 Strategies!

Any marketing plan must include lead generation as a key component. It can help you identify new customers, attract potential customers, and drive revenue for your business.

You can produce leads for high-value prospects through customized B2B lead generation efforts. But the question is: how do you go about it? How do you implement these strategies? To help you out, we have compiled a list of strategies facilitating lead generation for technology companies.

1) Build an Interactive Landing Page

Having a well-designed and optimized landing page is crucial for generating leads. A professionally designed website can build trust and credibility with prospects, increasing their likelihood to purchase.

In terms of design, ensuring the landing page is visually appealing and easy to navigate is essential. It includes using a compatible layout, clear and persuasive language, and highlighting the key features of the products or services.

The landing page should be optimized for conversions. It includes using A/B testing to experiment with different design elements and using analytics tools to track the page’s performance.

A landing page’s speedy opening and mobile device optimization are also crucial. It entails implementing a responsive design and enhancing pictures and other content to load devices quickly.

2) Use Chatbots

Chatbots can respond to frequently asked questions and qualify leads by gathering information from potential customers through a conversational interface. They can simultaneously handle a large volume of 24/7 leads without human interaction. It enables organizations to reduce labor expenses while expanding their reach and consumer base.

Additionally, chatbots can be programmed to ask specific qualifying questions, which can help identify and prioritize high-quality leads. It also ensures that the sales team spends time on the most promising opportunities.

The chatbot can ask questions to gather information such as contact details, budget, and project requirements. The collected data can then be used to determine if the lead is a good fit for the business or should be passed on to a sales representative for further follow-up.

3) Host Webinars

Hosting a series of webinars to educate potential leads on addressing a particular need is ideal for positioning your company as a thought leader. You prove your knowledge and win over potential consumers by offering insightful information on a specific subject. It can raise brand recognition and trust, eventually encouraging leads and sales.

Webinars can also be used to introduce new products or features and provide demonstrations or case studies to showcase the value of your products and services. Additionally, webinars can also be used to engage with potential leads, allowing them to ask questions and provide feedback. It can also help to qualify leads further and identify their areas of interest.

4) Offer Free Trials

Offering free trials can be a great way to generate leads for a business. They offer potential customers the opportunity to try out the product or service before committing to a purchase, which can increase the likelihood of them becoming paying customers.

By allowing potential customers to try a product or service without paying any penny, businesses can build trust and demonstrate the value of their offering. Free trials can also gather valuable information about potential customers, such as their needs and preferences, which can be used to tailor future marketing efforts.

5) Use Content Syndication

Content syndication is publishing similar content to other websites to increase visibility and reach a larger audience. By syndicating your content, you can get more visitors to your website, which can then be converted into leads through calls-to-action or other forms of engagement. It might assist you in growing the audience for your brand and producing quality leads.

However, it’s important to note that when you syndicate content, you should include a rel=” canonical” link pointing to the original source. This tells search engines that the original content is authoritative and should be indexed, while the syndicated copies should be ignored.

Moreover, it ensures you don’t run into issues with duplicate content, and your website’s SEO is not affected. However, you must choose the correct platform for content syndication to ensure the right visibility and audience.

6) Send Surveys

Sending out surveys can be another effective lead-generation strategy for a business. By making the survey available across multiple channels, you can increase the chances of reaching a wider audience and getting more responses to boost the conversion rate.

Surveys allow businesses to gather valuable information about potential customers, including their needs, preferences, and pain points. This information can be used to tailor marketing efforts and create targeted offers that are more likely to be successful.

Furthermore, making more educated assessments of your product and marketing strategy will enable you to understand your target market’s demands better.

7) Explain Complex Topics in Videos

Using videos to explain complex topics is another excellent way to engage and educate potential customers about your product or service. Videos aid in simplifying complicated ideas and making them easier to understand for your target audience.

Videos facilitate lead generation for technology companies by demonstrating the capabilities of the software or other technical products. They can show how the technology works in a real-world setting and give potential customers a better understanding of its features and benefits.

Remember that the video should be concise, brief, and professionally crafted. It should be tailored to the target audience’s preferences and highlight the key features of your products that add value to their lives.

8) Consult with Recent Clients for Referrals

Asking for referrals from existing customers can also drive leads for a business. This strategy can be particularly effective if the existing customers have a positive experience with your business, as their referral carries more weight than a traditional advertisement. It is a mere fact that happy and content customers are more eager to share their experiences with their friends, relatives, and coworkers.

There are many ways to ask for referrals. It may include offering incentives, such as discounts or rewards, for customers who refer new business or simply including a referral program as part of the customer’s experience.

It’s important to make it easy for customers to refer others to your business by providing them with a referral link or code.

9) Collaborate With Influencers

Influencer marketing has become a popular and effective lead-generation technique for technology businesses. By collaborating with industry influencers, you can reach a wider audience and generate a high ROI through authentic and personal sales techniques.

Influencer marketing can be effective for businesses that sell consumer products or services, as it allows them to showcase their offering in a relatable way. Influencers’ recommendations are more believable than traditional advertising since they’ve gained the audience’s trust.

Influencer marketing campaigns can be implemented on various social media platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook. The campaigns can include sponsored posts, giveaways, product reviews, influencer takeovers, and more.

It’s important to note that influencer marketing should be well-planned and executed, as it is not a one-size-fits-all solution. Finding the right influencers that align with the brand’s values and target audience is essential. Also, to measure the campaign’s success, it is important to establish clear goals and key performance indicators (KPIs) before starting the campaign.

10) Ask For Testimonials

Customer testimonials can be a powerful tool for B2B lead generation in the technology industry. Positive reviews can help to enhance a company’s reputation and be used to promote its products or services. Additionally, satisfied customers may be willing to refer their contacts to the company, which can also be a valuable source of leads.

Furthermore, customer reviews can also increase website traffic by making it more likely that a company’s website will rank higher in search engines. This can lead to more potential customers finding the company’s website and potentially bringing in more leads.

11) Use Social Media

Being active on social media can help you generate more leads. Are you thinking how? The idea is to increase brand awareness and make it easier for potential customers to find and contact your business through social media.

You can increase your visibility by regularly posting engaging content, responding to comments and messages, and actively reaching out to potential customers.

Additionally, social media platforms have built-in features to create targeted ads and campaigns to reach specific audiences. But, companies need to evaluate which channels their target audience is most active on. Instead of dividing their attention across too many platforms, they should prioritize those channels.

A company may attract a larger audience by being active on several social media platforms. However, it also requires resources to maintain and create content for those channels.

12) Leverage Intent Data

Intent data can be a valuable tool for B2B technology companies to generate leads. The term “intent data” describes user actions that reveal a definite interest in purchasing or conducting research. These acts can be as simple as looking at product or price pages, downloading whitepapers, or conducting keyword searches or other resources.

By analyzing the actions of potential customers, B2B technology companies can gain insight into the interests and needs of their prospects.

Using intent data, you can target these prospects with personalized messaging and offers, increasing the likelihood that they will engage with your company and ultimately become loyal customers.

Wrapping Up

Lead generation strategies are the most critical aspect of sales. An organization’s sales funnel is empowered by drawing in more leads. And in today’s digital world, there are an array of options to nurture leads and improve sales.

The primary purpose is understanding the needs and interests of your target audience and matching their expectations. Try adapting one or more of these strategies to improve your lead generation efforts and spur your company’s market growth.

To win in this competitive market, you need the best Lead Generation System made for SaaS companies.

Inner Image Credits: Provided by the Author; Pixabay; Thank you!

Featured Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Thank you!

The post Top Strategies of Lead Generation for Technology Companies appeared first on ReadWrite.

Digital assets are the foundation of modern marketing, presenting a variety of formats to tell a brand’s story and engage with clients. However, quantifying and organizing digital assets can be overwhelming, especially as brands try to keep up with new channels and trends. With each new piece of content generated, how much of the older assets become lost or forgotten, collecting digital dust in the process?

As marketers, we create large volumes of digital content. In fact, nearly 329 million terabytes of data are created each day.

Picture your brand’s digital landscape. What does it look like? Is it overwhelming consumers’ feeds with unwanted noise, or is it delivering useful resources they’re looking for?

To connect with consumers before they even enter their brand’s ecosystem, marketers need a way to paint a clear picture of their digital library, visualizing existing assets and forming connections between them. This also allows brands to organize their assets within a control hierarchy and see opportunities to grow or scale back to strengthen their brand footprint and more effectively promote their message.

So, what’s the most effective way to organize a brand’s asset stack? The MACH-6.

Meet the MACH-6

The MACH-6, or 6-Level Marketing Asset Control Hierarchy, is an organizational framework for brands, helping them gain clarity of their assets according to a hierarchical stack determined by the degree of control a brand has over them.

The MACH-6 is a tool for owned asset optimization (OAO), providing brands with a holistic view of their digital footprint. Discovering opportunities to expand reach through atomizing content or creating entirely new owned assets becomes easier.

In short, the MACH-6 allows brands to establish an asset-first approach to satisfy the needs of their audience, building meaningful relationships in the process.

Understanding the content hierarchy

As marketers, most of us are familiar with the varying degrees of control over our brand assets (wouldn’t it be great if we could guarantee news coverage of our brand would be entirely accurate and favorable?). The MACH-6 breaks these degrees of control into three categories: owned, managed, and leveraged. This organization helps brands recognize the level of control they have over their content.

Picture a table with six layers. The higher you go, the broader a brand’s reach, but the less control it has over the content. While losing control seems counterproductive to brand management, working up to this level is necessary to reach new audiences and draw more consumers in. However, this can only be successful when brands are ready to deploy a comprehensive library of owned assets to support and inform the content coming from the layers of leveraged and managed assets (and provide owned touchpoints for later transactions).

Owned Assets

The MACH-6 should be built from the bottom up so that brands can form a sturdy base with owned assets, which they have complete control over technically and creatively. This category is broken into three layers: foundation, ground level, and Tier 1.

This stack begins with brand basics like company values and purpose, brand language and visual identities, proprietary data and IPs, customer personas, marketing positioning, and executive and employee ambassadors. These assets build the strong foundation that the entire marketing strategy should be based upon. What consumer data can you use to inform content production? How should content be written? What purpose is an asset driving for your mission? All assets should be connected to this foundation to maintain consistent brand messaging and positioning.

Then, we move up to websites, including sub-brand websites, at the ground level and Tier 1 above, which includes pillar content, blog posts, tools, downloadable content, and corporate communications. These assets are fully controlled by the brand and create an external representation of the foundational base.

Managed Assets

Split into two layers — Tier 3 and Tier 4 — a brand’s managed assets are pieces of content that the team has some control over. The brand controls these messages, but channels that are not. Continuing from the three layers of owned assets, Tier 2 includes public relations, events and communications, social media, bylines, ads, and emails. While a brand technically owns and manages its emails and social media accounts, Instagram, Gmail, Microsoft, and other platforms and email marketing tools ultimately control how the content is delivered, creating some limitations.

Tier 3 encompasses company profiles and ally websites, organic search, sites like Wikipedia, and content syndication. Brands can strongly impact these assets with their lower MACH-6 layers but have less control over what content is, and how it’s shared.

Leveraged Assets

The top level of the MACH-6 structure focuses on influence and consists of user-generated and third-party content that brands can guide or direct in some ways but ultimately cannot control. Examples include affiliates and influencers, reviews, word-of-mouth communication, user-generated content, and news.

In reality, the stronger the owned assets a brand creates, the more controlled messaging the managed and leveraged channels have to pull from. That increases the chances that a brand’s preferred narrative is shared more often and to more consumers.

How to implement the MACH-6

With the MACH-6, brands can zoom out and assess their entire network of assets. This is a critical first step to organizing data and managing content, allowing brands to build a more effective strategy.

Regardless of a brand’s size, most will have a vast ecosystem of content that they have invested time, energy, money, and other resources to build. However, much of that content goes underused or becomes forgotten because it is improperly organized.

The MACH-6 allows brands to be better equipped to identify and understand their needs, sharing and creating the appropriate assets to help move them through the journey to conversion.

But how do you begin when approaching a mountain of assets?

Understand your audience

To organize your brand assets and prioritize your focus areas, you need to know what your target consumers are looking for and how you can provide it through your assets. Map out your consumer journey to understand what channels your audience uses, where they go for specific answers, what types of content they trust and use, etc. This will give you a blueprint to lay your current MACH-6 over to understand areas of opportunity for your brand better.

One note here — the consumer journey has changed. It’s no longer (and perhaps never was) a linear path. Ensure your journey map is current and honest, showing modern consumers’ complex and sometimes fragmented journeys.

Audit your assets

The ultimate goal of the MACH-6 is to help brands successfully implement an OAO strategy. Auditing your existing assets and understanding which level of the structure they belong in, will help you determine what you have too much or too little of in each of the layers and allow you to make adjustments where necessary.

Where do you have a gap in owned assets? How can you shift resources to expand certain tiers and perhaps reach new audiences throughout their journeys? This also allows you to ensure your brand’s messaging is communicated at every level of the MACH-6 —  consistency that will help with your brand’s credibility and awareness.

Audits also include looking over financials and prioritization. How can you better pair your budget with your consumer journey and preferences? What pieces of content aren’t performing well and can be optimized to make a larger impact?

Understanding your digital landscape will give you a stronger strategy to connect with consumers and drive business results.

Build your foundation

First, ensure you have a strong base of branding. Educate your entire organization on your brand basics—your vision, mission, purpose, and values—and make any updates necessary before expanding your work to the full MACH-6. Then, don’t shy away from your brand’s foundation. This messaging should echo throughout all of your brand content, so don’t hesitate to proudly publicly share your brand basics, and always ensure your assets are connected to them.

Next, look to your Ground Level and Tier 1 owned assets — the key to a brand’s success online. Identify gaps in your owned assets and fill them with content that matches your brand’s foundation.

For example, if you don’t have any unique tools or downloadable information, consider ways you can better provide value to your consumers with guides or templates that support their journeys. Or, brainstorm ways to expand your digital footprint, like creating a new website for your brand to publish blogs, media, downloadables, and other assets that connect you to your core consumers, directly answering their questions and addressing their needs.

Regardless of reach, optimized owned assets are a brand’s most powerful tools, enabling brands to take action when necessary but maintain the creative and technical freedom to communicate and share their story.

Optimize your content

The MACH-6 is part of a larger marketing asset ecosystem that provides brands various opportunities to expand and reach more consumers. While essential for business growth, a more extensive reach requires relinquishing some control.

To balance your assets and maintain some control, ensure your brand’s owned assets are optimized to be discoverable. Use data-backed strategies to appeal to Google — focus on high-volume search keywords and questions, build author authority, and then create a consistent schedule for publishing new content. Or boost engagement and visibility by including unique visuals, questions, and how-to guides.

With a greater depth of owned resources optimized for visibility and user experience, more consumers, journalists, and publishers will find your brand and identify it as an authoritative voice in your area of focus.

This helps to solidify your brand’s messaging further and establish its tone, making it recognizable and influencing the narrative created by your leveraged assets in Tier 4. In fact, building a solid foundation of owned assets increases the effectiveness of managed and leveraged assets.

If you build it, they will come. So be prepared.

Many of us will recall a big news story or memorable Super Bowl ad when we think of successful marketing tactics. These draw a lot of attention and bring brands in front of more people than they would normally reach. But, brands have a limited window of opportunity to capitalize on the extra attention.

Without a framework of optimized owned assets that use data and branding to answer questions and proactively meet the rising demand, brands can miss out on the increased visibility, which will fizzle out as quickly as it appeared. Capturing attention is half the battle and people are more likely to continue researching a brand after a significant event.

When brands have a library of diverse assets built before this significant draw, the new audiences will have plenty of touchpoints to learn about the brand and make connections. This will help create brand awareness, establish trust, build brand loyalty, and convert customers. In fact, Kia recently demonstrated just that.

By auditing, organizing, and balancing the content in a brand’s vast collection of digital assets, a brand is better equipped to create and share a steady stream of touchpoints to reach a broad base of consumers. As the brand grows, so will its library and the opportunities to build awareness, connect with audiences, and ultimately convert sales.

The MACH-6 is a tool that helps brands organize and visualize their asset stack to assess every potential consumer connection point and deploy the right content to the right people at the right time. This gives brands control over their owned assets at a foundational level that can transfer across all marketing assets and channels.

With the MACH-6, brands understand how their assets meet consumer needs and become empowered to make meaningful connections for the long term.

Featured Image Credit: Photo by Ketut Subiyanto; Pexels; Thank you!

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In the competitive world of business, your company’s pricing strategy can be a pivotal factor in determining its chances of success.

One effective approach is tiered pricing, which offers commensurate price points for different levels of a product or service. This strategy not only caters to a broader audience but also maximizes profit by encouraging customers to opt for higher-value tiers. It’s effective for many types of businesses, from SaaS to e-commerce.

This article will explore four clever ways to use tiered pricing to boost your business’s profitability.

What Is Tiered Pricing?

The tiered pricing strategy uses multiple price points, or tiers, for different levels of a product or service. Prices are set based on the features, duration, and quality level of each tier. This type of pricing helps businesses offer their customers multiple options without sacrificing profitability.

For example, if you offer subscription services for your business, you could create three price tiers. Tier 1 could be the basic subscription that offers a limited range of features, while Tier 2 and 3 offer additional features at higher prices.

In this way, tiered pricing helps businesses create an effective value proposition with multiple price points for different needs, helping to maximize market penetration. It also allows customers to decide which tier best fits their needs and budget without compromising on the quality of the product or service.

Four Types of Tiered Pricing Strategies

Now that you understand the basics of tiered pricing, let’s look at four different strategies that can help you implement and leverage this pricing model.

Feature-Based Pricing

Feature-based pricing is one of the most common tiered pricing methods. In this strategy, each tier offers different features at a range of price points. This type of pricing allows customers to choose from multiple options and pay only for what they need or want.

It involves creating three or more tiers based on the features included in each tier. For example, if you’re selling a product or service, you could create tiers based on the amount of features offered with each option. This allows customers to choose from multiple options and pay only for their needs or wants.

The low-price tier offers the basics of the product or service at a lower cost, while the mid and high tiers offer additional features at higher prices. This strategy allows businesses to reach a wider audience by offering specific price points for different customers.

Ahrefs is an example of a business that uses feature-based pricing. They offer four subscription tiers, each with different features and prices.

Usage-Based Pricing

Usage-based pricing sets different prices depending on how the product or service is used. The price increases with usage, and customers can choose the tier that best meets their needs.

For example, if you offer software as a service (SaaS), you could create tiers based on the number of users or the required data storage. This allows customers to choose a tier that best fits their usage.

Dropbox is an example of a business that uses usage-based tiered pricing. They offer multiple tiers based on the amount of storage needed.

Duration-Based Pricing

Duration-based pricing sets different prices for subscription plans. This is similar to usage-based pricing, but it’s based on the duration of the subscription commitment rather than the amount used.

For example, if you offer a subscription service, you could create tiers based on monthly or annual commitments. This allows customers to choose a tier that fits their budget and needs best.

Netflix is an example of a business that uses duration-based tiered pricing. They offer multiple tiers based on the number of streams and HD/4K video quality.

Volume-Based Pricing

Volume-based pricing offers discounts when customers purchase multiple units of the same product or service. This is similar to usage-based pricing, but it’s based on the number of units purchased rather than the amount used.

For example, if you sell a product in bulk, you could create tiers based on the number of units purchased. This allows customers to choose a tier that fits their budget and needs best.

Amazon is an example of a business that uses volume-based tiered pricing. They offer discounts when customers purchase multiple units of the same product or service.

Benefits of Tiered Pricing

There are many benefits of tiered pricing, including:

• It allows businesses to offer different options at different price points and cater to a wider audience.
• It helps maximize profits by encouraging customers to opt for higher-value tiers.
• It increases customer loyalty by allowing them to choose the tier that best fits their needs.
• It simplifies the pricing structure and allows customers to easily find the tier that works best for them.
• It helps businesses stay competitive by offering more value for their customers.

Best Practice for Tiered Pricing

When implementing tiered pricing, it’s important to keep the following best practices in mind:

• Understand your customer needs and choose appropriate tiers.
• Keep the tiers simple and easy to understand.
• Provide clear information about each tier so customers can easily compare them.
• Offer incentives for customers who choose higher tiers.
• Make sure the customer experience is consistent across all tiers.
• Test different pricing strategies to determine which one works best for your business.

Final Words

Tiered pricing can be a great way to increase customer loyalty and maximize profits. By understanding how to use them, companies can create tiers that meet their customers’ needs and budgets without compromising on quality. To ensure success, it’s important to keep the best practices in mind and test different marketing strategies to determine which one works best for your business.

Featured Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Thank you!

The post Four Clever Ways to Use Tiered Pricing for Maximum Profit appeared first on ReadWrite.

Well, it’s been a long time since we’ve been exposed to the influence of technology on our daily routines. Does the idea of conquering the unimaginable with this potent and resounding force of transformation strike you as an intriguing possibility?

Should that be the case, then, in what manner do the shifts occurring within the technological framework directly connect us? How has it embraced a new wave of behavioral changes in us?

The changing facet of technology has made the world a smaller place to live in. Imagine you are a digital traveler who leverages technology to take your followers to every site you navigate. This makes your followers connect with the outside world easily without leaving the comfort of their homes. This is what trending technology is all about.

Let’s talk about e-commerce here.

Buying and selling things of value is an activity familiar to us since time immemorial. But with the advent of technology, the innovative side of businesses has renovated its world by incorporating e-commerce.

Electronic commerce (e-commerce) is one fascinating side of the internet that helps companies connect with customers worldwide and earn more profits. So when businesses look around, they get a whole 360-degree cover of the entire population.

Picture the scene: after setting up your profile eagerly, you made the first digital footprint. Like personal profiles, businesses also furnish their e-commerce landscape to enhance online visibility.

What does this online presence mean to direct selling businesses? This is what we are talking about. MLM companies yield productive results with their online presence through efficient management of the commission, advanced customer support and a secure payment system, among many others.

Click, Shop, Smile

Most of us have evolved from carrying heavy bags after shopping and panting until we reach home. And this could be a moment where you think how easy it would be if e-commerce had existed then. Since time has no end, so is the beginning of the e-commerce business.

This online store has revealed its usefulness, ranging from MLM start-ups to enterprises. With unlimited offerings, the e-commerce ecosystem consistently matures and advances so that your direct sales can access all the latest technologies for streamlining your business.

These features include,

• robust reporting and analytics feature
• marketing automation and lead generation
• cross-selling/upselling feature to increase Average Order Value (AOV)
• product reviews and ratings
• replicated website
• repurchase and auto-ship

Embrace this opportunity to leverage technology and revolutionize your customer’s shopping experience, but remember everything is at your fingertips!

Will MLM companies stop with e-commerce alone? Hey there, you belong to a tech-savvy generation, stopping technology with one or two outcomes doesn’t deliver justice.

Let’s take an instance. Imagine starting a small restaurant with a hospitable ambiance, modern infrastructure, the best chefs, quality foods, and excellent customer service. Within no time, you can expect an exponential rise in customers. After witnessing this shift, won’t you rebuild the interiors for more accommodation?

Likewise, e-commerce has extended its zone to welcome social selling for building a rapport with potential customers. When e-commerce emerged as a business model, social selling became the strategy MLM companies adopted to leverage the power of social media.

Some social selling!

What’s not it?

Social selling is not advertising, which people tend to avoid. It is also not about blasting people with special offers and links that navigate to your website, nor is it about bombarding people’s inboxes with a plethora of commercial messages. This obviously annoys them to a limit to put your brand into the spam list.

Customers are not advertising tools to drive sales and earn profit.

Then what is it?

Direct selling companies understand how prospective customers conduct market research on potential vendors before choosing the right one. In order to provide customizable services, these companies have adopted tools to streamline customer needs and concerns and solve them efficiently with proven strategies even before they realize them.

“Social selling expands on the age-old basics of getting to know your customers and meeting their needs.” – Jon Ferrara, CEO, Nimble @Jon_Ferrara

This is social selling where you will engage your customers with real-time conversations, share important information, and treat them as people, not as sales targets.

Wherever a customer is, there is business. So when customers are online, and you pride yourself on being there where your customers are, then why aren’t you there?

Social selling is more like sitting in a coffee shop and having a healthy conversation with the opposite person. As network marketing has embraced social selling, distributors connect with prospects through social media instead of coffee shops. Sounds good, right?

As coffee beans exist in a variety of flavors, social networks also range from LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, or wherever you can find your prospects, form relationships, and build trust. Though the flavors differ, you will have the best sips!

So, what’s the result?

Now we know what’s the primary goal of social selling. It is not about making direct sales pitches and making potential customers overwhelmed or anxious. It is all about nurturing leads by providing valuable insights, addressing their concerns, and answering their questions. To develop this, network marketing uses various strategies to

• Maintain a strong social presence
• increase brand awareness
• deliver a seamless experience through omnichannel publishing
• enhance customer acquisition and retention
• engage audiences with prompt responses to their queries
• ensure customer satisfaction with personalized services

Social selling is synonymous with establishing trust and credibility. Direct networks create an online space for potential customers to consider their offerings, products or services when they are ready with a purchase decision.

In a nutshell, it’s all about getting a customer to know you without involving in any sales goal. With social selling, you can lead your potential customers to make informed decisions by generating more product awareness. This gradually builds up their trust in you.

“You can’t wait for customers to come to you. You have to figure out where they are, go there and bring them back to your store.” – Paul Graham, co-founder of startup accelerator Y Combinator @paulg.

Pause for a moment now. Remember migrating to a new place and having zero idea about the language and stores around? But with just an e-business platform your needs will be met. This is because both e-commerce and social selling crosses seven seas and seven mountains to reach and take you to the required online stores.

To Put it Together

Until now, we have touched on the concepts of e-commerce and social selling. But how shall we incorporate it into direct selling? Buckle up to witness the words following the evolution or should I call it, the revolution.

One way the direct selling model has updated itself with the changing times is to integrate itself with e-commerce and social selling. Let’s see what are the outcomes of doing so.

Is it time to stop reading? For now, no. Because the direct selling community hasn’t stopped with e-commerce and social selling.

Fasten your seat belts and carry your electronic cart; we are navigating toward social commerce.

Belonging to Team Gen Z

During a celebration, I happened to meet a distant cousin who has an aversion to social gatherings. But when I noticed her appearance, I felt I was amidst a fashion parade. Her attire was unique and breathtaking, with a crazy range of shades in a tropical-printed blazer. That day, she was the town’s center of attraction and talk. Even after years have passed since our encounter, I still remember her attire more than her face.

That very day, I heard someone whispering about how she purchases everything behind the screens to avoid talking to strangers in the stores.

My exhausted eyes could not invite sleep but started scrolling through every online store. And bang, I officially became a member of Gen Z.

Did you like my tale on the beginning of social commerce in my life? Weren’t you able to find the concept? If not, give it another story as the whole tale is social commerce, from how I rushed to various stores in different locations brimming with crowds to avail discounts on my purchases from the comfort of my home.

Visit TikTok, YouTube, and Facebook to enjoy your free time. While scrolling Instagram, I see how influencers endorse a brand with their products and services.

But when social commerce met direct sales, success strategies began to take a new turn, just like the point where an airplane takes off from land.

At this point, social commerce begins with multi-channel e-commerce, flexible commission calculations, online and onhand real-time inventory management, consistent logistics, and exceptional customer services. The end is a door to endless possibilities.

To wrap up, whether it is social commerce, social selling, or influencer marketing, the whole idea is to

• Improve customer engagement with user-generated content as a sales tool after customers respond to surveys or share their opinions on the purchased products.
• Make their shopping experience one of the best moments of their lives
• Embrace omnichannel business strategies to reach customers worldwide and drive sales

Featured Image Credit: Karolina Grabowska; Pexels; Thank you! 

The post Evolution of Direct Selling from E-commerce to Social Commerce appeared first on ReadWrite.

Top startups today have no time for routine tasks related to data entry and administration. This is where sales automation comes into play for the best startups, which helps optimize your manual tiresome and time-consuming assignments. 

Marketing automation allows your sales assistants, managers, and CMOs to focus less on the organization of the whole marketing process and more on their direct function – selling.

Luckily, there is a wide choice of special tools that can help you automate lead lists building, send sales emails and follow-ups, schedule meetings and calls, and perform other tasks.

Why Is Sales Automation Important for Your Startup?

It Helps Save Effort and Time 

Marketing automation can help increase sales efficiency by 14.5% and decrease marketing expenditures by 12.2%. Besides, business owners, CEOs, and CMOs claim that the biggest advantage of sales automation for their company is saving time at 30%. 

With business administration getting tough these days, 68% of companies use marketing automation somehow. 

It Provides Insight Into the Effectiveness of the Sales Process

An increase in earnings (85%) and marketing productivity (69%) are the main reasons businesses want to implement automated lead nurturing. Moreover, 63% of companies are beating their rivals, thanks to sales automation.

It Helps Identify Sales-Ready Leads and Maintains Relationship with Leads

When used to nurture leads, marketing automation tools show an increase in qualified leads. The reason is simple – automated instruments give you detailed data about your prospects. This helps push every deal down the sales funnel and propose a personalized, data-driven offer so that your lead is more willing to make a buying decision.

It Helps Grow Revenue

As reported by 60% of users, implementing sales automation tools in their business has improved the number of leads that convert to deals. And this increase can be as high as 225%! Even just after one month of use, 3x more prospects can be converted to sales. 

Types of Sales Automation

Modern technologies and artificial intelligence can help you save way more time than you could imagine. If you automate routine tasks throughout each sales funnel stage, you will have enough freedom to focus on interesting and creative tasks. As a result, you will sell more.

You will be surprised at how much can be automated by software:

1. Automate Sales Prospecting

If you implement a dynamic CRM, you can use countless criteria to filter out the most suitable leads based on the required conditions. You can also get a personalized email, Slack notification, or in-app alert once a new lead matches your demands. Put differently; you will keep getting a prequalified list of contacts regularly without lifting a finger.

2. Streamline Processing and Enrich Your Lead Database

The more knowledge about the target audience and existing clients you have, the more powerful you are. Data about your lead’s job position, presence on social media, solutions their business provides, existing suppliers, etc., will help you successfully get in touch with them.

3. Stop Entering Data Into CRM Manually

Set up workflows in your marketing automation software to track records of your qualified leads automatically. For instance, you can determine all the contacts that have submitted the form or downloaded the price list as “qualified.”

4. Automate Your Email Campaigns

Do you still send each email manually to all your leads or copy and paste the same messages? Alternatively, try using email templates, personalize, and schedule letters for every client’s best conversion. You can try using tools like Snov.io for that purpose.

5. Manage Marketing Collateral

Sales reps spend tons of time searching for useful content or writing texts to send to their leads. Ensure your business has a сorporate shared Google Drive folder where you store valuable files. This way, it will be easier for you to access the most important marketing documents, saving time during every contact with prospects.

6. Schedule Calls, Meetings, Mailouts, etc.

Planning a meeting with a sales lead over email can take time and reminds us of a tennis game. You suggest one meeting time to your prospect; they propose another option, then you offer a third solution, etc. This is tiresome and can also destroy the impulse in your sales negotiations.

Instead, you can use one of many meeting-scheduling tools (like Calendar, for example). They give your contacts direct access to your calendar and enable them to plan the meeting in any free time span if you dd customized scheduling links 2020 to your email messages and signatures. Most such tools grant free trials, so it is easy to study and test them.

7. Use AI-Powered Analytics of Sales Conversations 

If you want to analyze your calls, check your campaigns’ efficiency, and improve your sales approaches, try using sales communication AI-software. It allows you to quickly check what topics you discussed in a call, what rivals you mentioned, and study the talk-to-listen portion. Tools like Gong and Chorus pull out key pieces of your talks and give you AI-powered insights.

8. Automate Lead Management 

If you spend hours managing your CRM instead of making calls and bringing contracts, try automating all the activities related to prospects and deals. The market offers plenty of instruments to record your conversations, schedule meetings, and plan emails for you. Check if your current CRM offers workflow automation and start implementing it.

9. Manage Deals and Papers

Today, most of the contracts and offers are mailed and signed over the internet. Tools like Hellosign or Adobe Sign offer solutions for e-signing, lots of impressive analytics features, and functions that can help boost your conversion rates. 

This is just a small part of the many marketing activities that can be automated. In the age of AI and robots, all types of routine organizational tasks can be automated, while a real live contact with the prospective or existing client should remain to be carried out in person.

How to Choose the Best Sales Automation Tool?

Selecting the best tool or several tools that suit your needs might take some time, as many options on the market claim to be the best. We hope these pieces of advice will help you choose the best instruments for your business.

Decide What Processes You Would Like to Automate

Check all marketing processes you have at the moment. Does lead qualification take much of your daily routine? How much time do you spend on lead nurturing, prospect engagement, and content marketing daily? Do you schedule follow-up calls or send reminders manually? How long does it take to organize bulk seasonal offerings? 

There can be dozens of similar questions. Analyze your answers and think about what processes should not take so much time or where you can avoid manual work from you or your team.

Make a List of Essential Functions

After you’ve chosen the main processes, try to create a list of specific features you’ll require, such as email marketing automation or mobile availability. If you do not select features and must-have’s your business needs, you might end up with a complex product you cannot use. Choose the required functions and, after that, compare several platforms according to the list of criteria.

Finally, Test the Product in Practice

Once you have specified the must-have functions, prioritize them and shorten the list to several most important items. After that, compare the software once again to see which tool you can start using right now. It would be great to test-drive each platform by getting a free trial or an interactive demo to get a more comprehensive vision and make a more prepared decision. 

This might look like a lot of work, particularly if you are working hard to help your company survive. Still, experience proves – a couple of hours invested now will pay off a dozen times in the future. 

Top Sales Automation Tools

Snov.i0

Snov.io is an integrated cold outreach automation platform used by sales departments, marketers, startups, and simply anyone who needs high-quality outbound research and outreach tools.

This all-in-one toolkit allows you to speed up creating and managing lists of prospects and bring your brilliant ideas directly to their inbox. It works for every stage of your marketing process:

• Non-stop lead gen and verification. You can automate your lead generation, pump up your funnel with targeted leads, and accelerate conversions with this solution. It boasts 98% email deliverability thanks to the high quality of new and existing leads guaranteed by the 7-tier verification.
• Nurture, engage, convert. Boost engagement with effective nurturing based on automated outreach. Personalized triggered email drip campaigns can help you easily convert leads and smoothly move them down the sales funnel. Schedule campaigns for existing clients, automate follow-ups and track email responses from your Gmail.
• Study market rivals. Snov.io research tools allow you to monitor what sets you apart from your competition and discover new ways to convert. You can check full company profiles and tech stack behind your rivals and leads. 
• Grow and scale your business. Keep your efficiency always in control – sync across platforms with over 2,000+ powerful integrations. 

Pricing: Snov.io offers unlimited freemium with credits that are renewed every month. Paid plans that start at $33 per month billed annually.

Moosend

This marketing automation platform comes with some features that promise to help users generate more clicks and sales. Surprisingly easy-to-use and with a short learning curve, Moosend allows you to create and send email campaigns designed to respond to the prospect’s needs.

From user onboarding to abandoned cart sequences, this platform allows you to design workflows that make sense for your audience and lead prospects further down the sales funnel. 

Users can select any event to trigger the automation, such as visitors browsing a specific page or viewing a product, and set it in motion in a simple manner. What is more, you can test one of the ready-made automation workflow recipes.

Pricing: Moosend offers a free forever program for up to 1,000 subscribers that includes most features. Paid plans start at $8 per month billed annually.

Juro

There is nothing worse than a sales team getting a prospect to commit before month-end, only for the deal to get stuck in the contracting phase. Word documents fly back and forth, versions go missing, data is lost, and visibility is non-existent. 

Sales teams at high-growth startups are turning to new, in-browser tools to end this manual process. Juro is a contract collaboration platform that enables your team to self-serve, agree, and manage routine contracts at scale from one unified workspace.

Salespeople use a natural language Q&A flow to spin up a contract in seconds, from a template over which legal has oversight. They can even generate contracts directly from Salesforce, with two-way data sync making sure versions are the same in both platforms. 

Parties negotiate in-browser in the sidebar and can then eSign securely on any device to help salespeople close deals on the move. Post-signature analytics help stakeholders spot bottlenecks and friction to keep deals moving fast and make contract management data-driven.

Juro is used predominantly by high-growth tech startups with lots of contract volume, like Deliveroo, Wolt, and Babylon Health. 

Pricing starts at free, with bespoke plans depending on the integrations required.

Paperform

Capturing leads is the first and most foundational step in the inbound-driven sales process. Paperform is a versatile form and page builder that might help you do just that: collect leads and kick off the conversation seamlessly and elegantly.

Paperform stands out among the alternatives thanks to its modern interface and customization features. It is easy to make forms and landing pages look unique and fit your company’s broader brand.

There are more than a hundred form templates available, so you will never have to start from scratch no matter what kind of form you are looking to build.

The built-in email automation feature makes Paperform even more useful. Your startup sales department is likely to have limited bandwidth, especially when responding to leads across different time zones.

You might leverage Paperform to send out automated yet highly-personalized emails to leads that submit your forms. Later, once the conversation is already ongoing, your sales reps can catch up quickly and take it further.

Pricing: Paid plans start at $15 per month.

Outfunnel

Outfunnel is an email marketing tool with deep CRM integration. Whether you are using Pipedrive, Mailchimp, or Copper, it has you covered. You’ll be able to create drip or one-off campaigns with defined segments for your sales team using lead-scoring while automating and reducing tasks that were previously done manually. 

With dynamic sender information and smart workflows, Outfunnel will help you stay on top of your leads while continuously allowing you to build up relationships with your current and future customers.

Pricing: Outfunnel offers a free two-week trial. Paid plans start at $19 per month.

HelpCrunch

As an all-in-one customer communication tool, HelpCrunch allows businesses to automate numerous aspects of the sales process. Once you sign up for the tool and install its live chat widget, you can put inbound lead generation on autopilot.

First, HelpCrunch helps businesses engage their visitors proactively with the help of automated chat messages. You can offer help in your website’s strategic places, such as product, pricing, or checkout pages, and initiate conversations on your terms.

People will see a quick and convenient way to contact you and will not hesitate. Simultaneously, you can use live chat to collect leads’ contact information and pre-qualify them on the go with pre-chat and offline forms. Visitors will specify their names and email addresses and choose a department that will better cater to their needs.

While the shared inbox will contain all incoming requests in chronological order, sales reps can create their custom inboxes to filter conversations by their tags, assignees, departments, etc. This way, they will be able to assist warm leads on a first-priority basis.

To keep the conversation going, your team can follow up on their leads with the help of automated email sequences and accelerate deal closure.

Pricing: The ‘Live chat’ subscription by HelpCrunch is available for $12 per month per team member billed annually. If you want to enjoy the ‘Live chat + Emails’ plan, its pricing starts from $23 per month per team member.

Zapier

Zapier is a tool that brings together all your favorite apps, such as Gmail, Slack, Mailchimp, and more. You can automate repetitive tasks, and you do not need to know coding, or rely on developers to build the integration.

Create thousands of different workflows (Zaps), e.g., schedule events in your Google Calendar directly from new Trello cards, save your Gmail attachments to Dropbox, or post tweets across multiple Twitter accounts. 

Zaps consist of a trigger and one or more subsequent actions. A trigger is an event that initiates your workflow. Zaps automate your processes in the background, allowing you to concentrate on more important tasks. 

Zapier counts every task you run through your Zap. To decide which Zapier plan suits you best, you should keep in mind the number of tasks your Zaps run. 

Pricing: The service offers a free trial so that you can study some popular Zap templates. Paid plans start at $19,99 per month billed annually.

Hootsuite

Hootsuite is an SMM platform that supports social network integrations for Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube. The tool helps you boost your organic and paid ads’ effectiveness with the Hootsuite automated ad solution. 

Hootsuite allows you to advertise on social media easily. Manually or automatically, you can target key audience segments or market niches by age, location, and user interests. The tool can help you reach more of your social media audience, monitor feedback about your brand and rivals, and use social analytics to make data-driven business decisions.

Besides, its mobile apps allow you to manage your presence on social networks from any location. You can also connect your existing instruments with over 250+ apps and integrations in a single toolbox. 

Pricing: A 30-days free trial is available. Paid plans start at $19 per month.

Wrapping it up

Nowadays, more and more businesses realize the power of sales and marketing automation tools and implement them in their workflows. Accordingly, new instruments in this market niche are emerging a dime a dozen. 

Analyze your needs and select the best toolkit that will help you seamlessly automate your whole sales funnel: lead generation, nurturing, engagement, follow-ups, conversion, and growing a loyal audience.

Image Credit: Ola Dapo; Pexels

The post Top‌ ‌8‌ ‌Sales‌ ‌Automation‌ ‌Tools‌ ‌for‌ ‌Startups‌ ‌in‌ ‌2023 appeared first on ReadWrite.

The rapid adoption of Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices globally and across every sector is changing how we search and share information. IoT devices go beyond just personal technology like smartphones and computers. They include smart speakers, inventory trackers, and even refrigerators equipped with modern software, sensors, and processing capabilities that connect and exchange data.

In essence, these IoT devices form an intricate network of connected objects. They constantly share, collect, and analyze data while simultaneously performing the task at hand.

With the rise of new search queries and results, SEO is pivotal for IoT businesses. They seek an edge in an industry where users don’t just search on phones but also on IoT devices

The Intersection of IoT and SEO

The ultimate goal of IoT devices is to aid in making the best business decisions. They offer insights into users’ behaviors. In fact, By 2025, it is estimated the adoption of IoT devices will reach about 30.9 million devices. The trend towards utilizing IoT devices means these devices are becoming more advanced and dynamic.

Users will keep searching for products and services online, and businesses will persist in finding cost-effective ways to assist them. But how do these IoT devices attract new users?

SEO is a cost-effective strategy to promote top IoT devices to end users. Like IoT devices, we use search engines to share, gather information, and guide our choices.

The only difference today, with the help of IoT devices, is the entry point to access information.

While the idea of a massive network encapsulating billions of devices might be daunting, these devices provide SEO specialists with valuable information that informs successful SEO strategies. However, the rise of IoT devices has changed how and where we find informative content.

What is SEO for IoT Devices?

Not only do IoT and SEO intersect, but they are synergetic because they both work to understand and meet customers at the most critical moments using valuable data. In a nutshell, SEO for IoT devices includes utilizing search engines like Google to increase your device’s visibility via your website, user reviews, and collaborating with other IoT experts.

Simply put, IoT and SEO intersect regarding the data they depend on to tap their target audience. While IoT advancements significantly change how SEO specialists embrace data, the IoT and SEO industries are perfect for building digital twins.

It is no surprise that in today’s data-driven world, IoT is the primary source of collecting big data. At the same time, SEO is responsible for generating analytics-based solutions that are used in making more informed decisions.

SEO best practices have evolved to adapt to IoT devices like smartwatches, voice assistants, intelligent cars, and connected homes. For example, We have to consider semantic queries and keep our fingers on the pulse of the IoT landscape.

As users adopt more IoT devices in their lives, they will clearly expect their devices to have internet connection capabilities and the ability to connect with other devices. The magic in these connections happens when we reveal the value of IoT products through SEO.

With IoT devices providing new ways for people to access the internet, these change how people search for information and products. For instance, SEO strategies have had to move away from typical exact keyword searches in Google to consider conversational voice-based searches queried via smart speakers and virtual assistants like Apple’s Siri.

Let’s look at one of the world’s most sold IoT devices, the Google Home smart speaker, with 52 million units sold so far since launching in 2016. With its simple design and emphasis on voice commands, SEO specialists have had to optimize their content to be the first (and only) information Google Home’s system deems credible enough to share with its end user.

The Google Home has an array of smart features, but for the sake of the role of SEO, we will focus on seeking answers via Google’s search engine.

As you can see, compared to its Apple competitor, the Google Home device is rated higher due to user ratings and underlying SEO techniques, which we will discuss further in this blog.

Google Home uses voice commands, so optimizing your content for long-tail keywords is vital. This makes it easier for smart devices to process and analyze. As IoT devices conduct searches and communicate with others, Google uses this data to gauge your website’s expertise and credibility.

IoT devices aim to deliver benefits efficiently. By integrating SEO in promoting your product, more visitors will trust your innovative IoT solutions. These solutions offer advanced analytics and data-driven decision-making tools.

The Benefits Of SEO For IoT Device Providers

This year, the need for businesses using SEO rose to an all-time high as consumers consistently turn to search engines. With this being said, SEO remains one of the most viable and cost-effective ways to reach customers while understanding their behaviors in real-time. Organic search remains the primary source of website traffic, with Google leading with 92.02% of all searches online.

Utilizing SEO helps promote your IoT product and ensures users are eventually converting.

Here are some of the benefits of using SEO for IoT:

1. Generates Leads Cost-Effectively: Lead generation is one of the most beneficial elements of SEO. It cultivates interest in your business and products,  transforming attracted prospects into loyal customers. SEO helps you understand how your site can rank higher in Google’s SERPs. Therefore, please both search engines and prospective customers visiting your website.
2. Increases Brand Awareness: SEO helps Increase awareness by generating organic traffic to your website, especially If your website can earn and maintain a spot on the coveted first page of Google. Increasing online visibility sounds good, but it’s only effective if random website visitors become actual customers.
3. Gets You Ahead of the Competition: SEO also helps your site stand out from online competitors who want to attract the same high-quality prospective customers. The best way to rank well and get discovered by your target audience is to use SEO. It helps you outperform competitors, get discovered by customers, and boost lead generation.
4. Builds Trust and Increases Your Credibility: A high-ranking site in Google’s SERP is considered the highest quality with the most trustworthy product because it is built on a foundation of credibility. With SEO, you rank higher in SERP than competitors. This makes you the most trusted source of information in your niche.
5. Optimizes Your Website for Users on New IoT Devices: SEO reveals your customer’s search behavior, making it easier to hear and anticipate customer needs via their IoT devices. SEO reveals the devices your customers are using. This means you can adapt your website to fit these new points of entry.

Why is SEO important in the IoT industry?

The massive adoption of IoT devices means people are changing how they search. SEO enables businesses to keep up with how people use these devices and how their search habits shift.

Currently, the market size of the IoT industry is estimated to be over $600 billion, with many experts believing it will grow exponentially due to the increase in the adoption of more IoT devices. According to Statista, the worldwide Internet of Things (IoT) sector will be valued at over $1 trillion by 2030.

In this trillion-dollar market, SEO’s role is to monitor search behaviors and adapt content focus. It’s all about understanding how searches are conducted and engaging more people through varying methods.

SEO Strategies to Promote IoT Devices

• Prioritize Voice Search Optimization

One-third of US consumers own a smart speaker. This isn’t a surprise as voice-powered tech saves time and helps productivity, therefore saving money. As of 2023, there are at least 4.2 billion voice assistants in use.

Popular smart devices, like Amazon’s Alexa and Google Home, answer voice queries. This means their search engines prioritize voice, and SEO should follow suit.

Voice-powered IoT devices can enhance customer service, ensure consistent experiences, and boost efficiency. Voice searches often reflect natural language with longer sentences. This emphasizes the importance of long-tail keywords.

Optimizing your site for voice search helps devices like Alexa read your content to users. At the same time, IoT devices analyze this content. It’s key to identify long-tail keywords from user data for ranking. This maintains a balance between natural voice search and text search.

The challenge is balancing content for traditional typed searches with the longer, conversational phrases often used in voice search.

• Semantic SEO For Complex Searches

Many of these IoT devices are smart enough to understand the nuance of language, like conversational words users would speak rather than type out. In SEO, this is termed semantic search, focusing on intent and context. Therefore, it’s essential to optimize your content for Google to identify the context.

Consider the search term “Polo”. This could point to the equestrian sport, a German car, or a clothing brand.

• Integrate Interactive Search Content For AR/VR Devices

The adoption of Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) devices is continuously growing, with Statista predicting a $297 billion value by 2024.

In 2023 alone, Meta unveiled the Meta Quest 3, their next virtual reality headset. Similarly, Apple introduced the Vision Pro AR headset.

As SEO adapts to trends, it’s vital to integrate interactive search content for such devices to rank higher in SERPs. Search engines will probably consider AR devices during crawling and indexing. They’ll seek content bridging organic search with AR/VR search.

• Utilizing Structured Data For IoT Specifications

In SEO, utilizing structured data like metadata is vital for Google to understand the content on your pages and products. When you tell Google what is on your webpage in a structured way, it is easy for the search engine to interpret the content. Structured data also give visual cues for specifications of IoT products like star ratings and product categories.

If you search for smartwatches based on ratings and reviews, structured data will show the product’s specifications and the site’s rating system.

• Leverage Online Content To Build Industry Authority And Visibility

Encourage Customers To Share Experiences With User-Generated Content

Data shows that 66% of people watch videos to learn about a brand or a product. But when customers themselves explain, review, and test the product in the video, it adds another layer. This is User-Generated Content (UGC), where videos can better explain what written details cannot.

Encouraging users to share their IoT product experiences through UGC can boost trust and revenue. Customers value seeing others discuss a device’s use, price, and other good and bad aspects of the product.

Many Gen Z customers today use video-sharing platforms like YouTube and TikTok as alternative search engines to Google. Take the Philips Smart Lamp, for example, where over 36.9 million views have been generated by UGC content in TikTok.

On TikTok, not only does a large amount of UGC content for Philips Smart Lamp show us reviews, but Phillips’ TikTok pages and other products rank based on customer keywords.

Collaborate With IoT Experts To Promote Product Credibility

Collaborating with IoT experts to promote your products ensures they provide honest, credible reviews to their trusted audience. Due to their credibility, these experts already have an audience seeking information through their content.

Let’s look at tech YouTube creator and reviewer, Alex Teo, who is known for reviewing the latest automated tech products and helping consumers make informed device buying decisions.

His review of the best collection of smart home products is an intelligent collaboration strategy to promote your product. Since Teo is a more minor creator, consumers are likelier to see his reviews as more authentic.

Over 32,000 people watched this review, potentially as a step towards making a purchasing decision. Keeping an eye on IoT-based search media will help you keep track of how and where your target customers are finding new IoT devices.

• Participate In IoT Events To Build Industry Authority Offline And Online

For a long time, SEO has focused on data from online tools (like Ahrefs keyword planner and SEMRush). However, turning to real-world events and offline information will help build visibility among other IoT businesses and customers.

Offline IoT events are essential for leveraging real-life data points to build credibility among customers and keep an eye on competitors.

There are many IoT events, like the Global IoT Tech Expo and Intelligence Cities US, where industry leaders collaborate and learn more from leaders in IoT-adjacent industries like cars, cloud technology, and smart city planners.

• Hyper-Personalized Content Boosts User Engagement

Experiencing more focus on personalization from an online business has become standard for today’s consumer. Furthermore, this is expected to improve through IoT as the devices collect more user data.

Let’s look at one of the more personal businesses utilizing IoT functions: Healthcare. HERO, a smart medication dispenser is used by many elderly patients who rely on home treatments and pill intake. The HERO connects with your phone and smartwatch via WiFi to alert family/caregivers to monitor the pill intake.

Of course, with personalization comes privacy concerns. The HERO dispenser allows users to remove certain information they once shared, like names and passwords, email, contact info, or health conditions.

The pinnacle of personalization in the IoT journey is when we gain valuable insights through the devices. This allows you to manage the outcomes for future personalization, making it easier to hear and understand your customers.

This trend of hyper-personalized content will increase with more IoT devices becoming interconnected with more data about customers’ search histories and behaviors.

• Build Trust Through Blockchain Technology And Transparency

Privacy and cybersecurity are among the main concerns with connecting all of our devices to collect data. Many businesses leverage the information derived from smart devices to promote products strategically. Conversely, others may use this access too much, overwhelm the customer, or raise privacy concerns.

However, integrating blockchain in IoT devices improves security because of its decentralized data storage and sharing. The global blockchain IoT market size was estimated at $351.9 million in 2022. Similarly, showing transparency in the type of data you are storing and using and why you are using it empowers customers to share their information more wisely.

But how do security and trust influence your SEO content?

Google’s algorithm rewards site content consumers trust, usually through proven results and transparency. So, blockchain is worthy of consideration. Every data entry in blockchain technology is visible and verifiable.

This transparency influences SEO by building credibility and enhancing a business’s online reputation. It positively impacts rankings in Google’s SERP (Search Engine Results Page).

This transparency is particularly important for IoT devices because users need to trust the device with which they share information. Relaxed security or not using blockchain can result in your website losing priority in IoT device searches.

The Future Of SEO In The IoT Industry

For now, Google remains the most extensive website traffic tool, as Google Analytics is used by 85.3% of all websites. The future of SEO in the IoT industry points to a shifting focus on voice search and keeping abreast of IoT developments and trends.

Another rapidly growing trend is the adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI). SEO experts may turn to AI to collect and analyze information from IoT devices faster than before and use AI to improve their content to ensure it ranks higher in search engines. But, Google does penalize content that it perceives as AI-generated spam.

Additionally, with more users turning to their phones over desktop searches, Google has had to move to mobile-first indexing, which favors content optimized for mobile search. For this, Google recommends aligning all content and metadata is the same for desktop and mobile sites.

The rise of IoT devices means SEO specialists are constantly ‘future-proofing’ their strategies to optimize for more in-depth voice queries automated sensors, and have strong data analysis tools. SEO specialists are working to address future search queries and optimize content to meet the changing needs of target users.

Conclusion

With the trajectory of the IoT industry, businesses keen on implementing SEO will see a significant boost in organic traffic. With a little patience and consistency, the return on investment in an SEO strategy will be clear in time.

The IoT and SEO industries constantly keep up with algorithms, software updates, and technological advancements. These aspects can shift the number of visitors to their sites and engage with the sales process. But one thing is for sure: IoT opens the door to new SEO strategies, while SEO paves the way for greater success.

Inner Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Thank you!

Featured Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Thank you!

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Email marketing is one of the most effective tools to reach customers and engage with them. It eliminates the need for expensive campaigns, efficiently building relationships with customers and engaging them with your product or service.

This post will discuss some essential email marketing statistics that marketers and business owners should know.

These statistics will help you understand how successful your email campaigns are and how to make changes to improve results. These insights allow you to optimize your emails for maximum effectiveness and better ROI. Additionally, you’ll get a clearer picture of what kind of content resonates with your audience so that you can create more targeted campaigns that drive more conversions.

Insights for Email Marketing Success

What creates success in email marketing? That’s what these email marketing statistics will cover. Use these as inspiration and ideas to make your own email marketing score big wins.

Personalization Boosts Click Rates

1. Emails with personalized titles experience 26 percent more clicks.
2. Incorporating customer names or mentioning recent purchases can significantly increase email open rates.
3. Personalization nurtures customer engagement and fosters stronger connections with the audience.

Mobile Optimization

1. Approximately 49 percent of all users open their emails on mobile devices.
2. One in five emails is not optimized for mobile phones, resulting in lower conversion rates.

The lesson is that marketers should prioritize mobile optimization to engage a wider audience and conduct thorough testing for visual appeal and functionality.

Return on Investment (ROI)

1. Email marketing ROI can reach as high as 4400 percent, surpassing other marketing channels.
2. Email marketing remains remarkably cost-effective even with large-scale campaigns reaching thousands of subscribers.

A/B Testing for Optimized ROI

1. A/B testing can improve ROI by 28 percent.

Utilizing A/B functionality in modern email marketing services is highly recommended. Testing will help determine the most effective campaigns for the target audience, enabling the optimization of future messages.

Average Open Rates

1. Average open rates across industries sit at around 17.6 percent.
2. Marketers should not panic if one in five subscribers opens their emails; a 20 percent open rate is considered above average.

Email marketing’s success lies in mobile optimization, personalized content, A/B testing, and understanding industry benchmarks.

Given the significant mobile user percentage, optimizing emails for mobile devices is crucial. Personalization boosts engagement, increasing click-through rates.

A/B testing informs effective strategies, leading to better ROI.

Understanding average open rates provides context for campaign performance; aiming to surpass these benchmarks indicates successful audience engagement. Mastering these elements unlocks the full potential of email marketing for marketers.

Global Email Marketing Insights and Statistics

These are useful statistics you should know about worldwide email marketing numbers. These details will help you see the potential of your business.

1. Globally, a staggering 347.3 billion emails are sent and received daily, showcasing email communication’s wide-reaching impact.
2. 99% of email users check their inbox daily, with some individuals checking up to 20 times daily, highlighting the consistent engagement potential of email marketing.
3. 61% of consumers prefer email contact from brands, indicating that email remains a preferred and effective means of communication.
4. 49% of consumers want to receive promotional emails from their favorite brands on a weekly basis, showcasing the demand for regular updates and offers.
5. 41% of email views occur on mobile devices, while desktops account for 39%, emphasizing the importance of optimizing email content for both platforms.
6. The average email click-through rate (CTR) stands at 2.13%, providing a metric to gauge the level of engagement with email content.
7. 77% of the ROI comes from segmented, targeted, and triggered email campaigns, emphasizing the significance of personalized and relevant content.
8. 47% of emails are opened or discarded based on the subject line alone, making it a critical factor in email open rates.
9. Subject lines with urgency and exclusivity result in a 22% higher open rate, presenting effective strategies to entice recipients.
10. Popups on a website can increase the email list by 1.375%, offering an actionable tactic for growing subscriber lists.
11. 15.8% of emails are missing or caught by spam filters, highlighting the importance of maintaining email deliverability and sender reputation.

The statistics underscore the significance of email marketing for marketers. It remains a major communication channel for consumers, demanding consistent and personalized engagement.

To succeed, you must optimize content for mobile and desktop and employ compelling subject line strategies.

The remarkable ROI, driven by personalization and automation, showcases email marketing’s cost-effectiveness.

Test subject lines and use popups on websites can enhance campaign efficiency and grow subscriber lists. Be vigilant against spam filters; it is essential for ensuring successful email deliverability and minimizing lost opportunities.

Email Marketing Statistics in eCommerce

Online shopping and eCommerce businesses rely on email marketing to drive sales and success. Here are statistics on email marketing related to eCommerce and ways that it can help you grow your online store.

1. $230 Million in Purchases: Demonstrating Email Marketing’s Revenue Influence
2. Email marketing contributed $230 million in purchases during a single quarter, highlighting its significant role in driving revenue for businesses.
3. Companies with over $10 million had an average of 133.97 list segments, ten times more than those with revenue under $100,000. This emphasizes the correlation between income and the number of list segments maintained by businesses.
4. Abandoned cart emails and other automation collectively generated over $50 million in one quarter, showcasing the effectiveness of automated email campaigns in boosting sales and conversion rates.
5. Abandoned cart emails enjoy an average open rate of 45%, indicating their effectiveness in re-engaging potential customers who left items in their carts.
6. 68% of millennials reported that promotional emails influenced purchasing decisions, reinforcing email marketing’s relevance and appeal to this key consumer demographic.
7. 38% of marketers actively use email to reduce shopping cart abandonment, acknowledging its potential as a valuable strategy to recapture lost sales opportunities.

The statistics show email marketing’s significant impact on revenue generation for your eCommerce site.

The $230 million in purchases attributed to email shows its effectiveness as a revenue-driving tool. Automated campaigns, like abandoned cart emails, bring in substantial revenue, too.

Email marketing also significantly triggers millennials’ purchasing decisions, underscoring its relevance to this key group. 

By addressing shopping cart abandonment through email strategies, you can reclaim lost sales opportunities and improve conversion rates. In this way, strategic and targeted email marketing is essential to unlock its full potential for driving revenue in the eCommerce industry.

Conclusion

These compelling statistics tell a story: that of the transformative power of email marketing.

It’s not just a tool for communication but a significant driver of customer engagement and revenue generation for your business.

Whether it’s a matter of enticing click-through rates, achieving an impressive return on investment, or triggering beneficial customer behaviors like recapturing abandoned shopping carts, email marketing stands at the forefront.

The information we looked at here also underscores the need for personalization, automation, and strategic content to boost your email campaign results.

If you’re not already leveraging the power of email marketing, now is the time to start. Harness what it can do to engage your audience, grow your brand, and drive your business to new heights.

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The adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been rapidly spreading across numerous industries, and can now be found in anything from supply chain management to healthcare, and construction.

However, with the adoption of any new technology comes a sense of hesitation, often leaving business leaders to question whether their decision will positively impact their forward-looking strategy.

In the last several months, we’ve seen widespread use of AI being implemented in the realm of digital marketing, allowing marketers and small businesses to more effectively grow their ad campaigns and target audience engagement.

Despite the potential drawbacks of AI in digital marketing and content strategy, the technology has proven to be a game-changer in other industries. For example, AI has been used to discover new cancer drugs in record time, with one small-cap company at the forefront of this innovation. While the long-term implications of AI in marketing remain uncertain, its success in other fields suggests that it could have a positive impact on the industry. Visit Behind the Markets. This paragraph is AI-generated advertising.

With several big-tech companies heavily investing in the development of newer and more advanced tools, digital marketers and business owners alike are now beginning to question the long-term implications these tools can have on their marketing and content strategy efforts.

How AI Is Used In Digital Marketing And Content Generation

There is already a plethora of digital platforms, publically available, which enables marketers and novice professionals to utilize AI tools to help improve and build more effective marketing strategies

For instance, some marketers have started relying on tools such as Albert, an AI application that can help them further optimize paid campaigns on social media platforms and websites.

Other tools, including Skyword, help to personalize content, enabling marketers to narrow down their efforts more effectively to reach their desired target audience.

Solutions such as CopyAI and AI Writer, among several others, can help marketers efficiently generate new content. Other applications can help teams generate vast amounts of data more efficiently, helping them to establish new forward-looking metrics and key data points that can be used within their content marketing strategies.

The adoption of AI software tools now touches on several key points within the digital marketing landscape, enabling teams to work more efficiently and helping them to develop more comprehensive strategies for their business and clients.

The Drawbacks Of AI In Digital Marketing

With any new technology, there comes a series of drawbacks and risks that need to be carefully evaluated before implementing these tools within the broader scope of a company or business’s digital marketing strategy.

Transparency

One of the most common, and often widely questioned concerns regarding the effectiveness of AI applications is transparency. The majority of these tools function through the basis of consuming vast amounts of available data. Through this process, AI tools can develop automated algorithms that can help to deliver more accurate insights.

However, more recently experts have begun to question whether these practices are transparent, and can directly improve their digital marketing strategies.

Although these systems can now filter through copious amounts of data and information, there’s still little transparency in terms of how these tools are being trained, and whether effective measures are taken to minimize issues relating to bias, misinformation, and other factors that can damage a business’s digital marketing strategy.

Ethical Concerns

Another potential drawback is the ethical implications of using AI models to build digital marketing strategies. Inaccurate use of these applications can cause bigger near-term problems for marketers and novice entrepreneurs.

Marketing teams will often generate new content through strategic development, however, with artificial intelligence, questions regarding the collection of data, inaccurate information, and copyright issues have resulted in several ethical dilemmas that require marketers to resolve through human interpretation.

This would mean that although these systems can ensure more accurate measurement of key data metrics and target engagement, marketers will need to establish clear guidelines on how these systems can effectively be used to enhance their digital marketing strategies, instead of overtaking the entire process.

AI Bias

There is already substantial evidence available that has shown the biased leaning tendencies of some AI models. Research has shown that large AI databases were found to be over 38% biased in the information they provided users with.

Using ineffective AI models that deliver biased results can directly impact a company’s marketing strategy, and further influence their content strategy. This would require digital marketers to accurately align their metrics with the tools they are using, but also ensure their data is not only skewed towards a specific social demographic.

These efforts require additional resources, only increasing the initial cost of marketing budgets for content creation or ad campaigns. Additionally, AI bias can lead marketing teams to overlook important pockets of their demographic or audience, which in the long term can derail their efforts or decrease engagement.

Lack Of Personalization

The use of personalization in marketing, and perhaps more importantly in content is one of the most valuable assets for any digital marketing team. Industry data suggests that personalization through targeted ads and messaging are key elements in the buying process.

Nearly 23% of surveyed consumers said that their purchase decision was largely driven by a personalized ad. On top of this, 39% of those who were surveyed questioned the transparency of personalization in targeted ads, raising concern over how companies retrieve their information and how it’s being used.

AI models tend to rely on existing content, and not human intelligence, or human emotion. This can create a detachment between marketing teams and consumers, further displacing their content within the consumer perspective, and only widening the gap between them and achieving engagement with their target audience.

Unnatural Content

Although some platforms allow marketers to create new content almost instantaneously, too much dependence on AI models can lead to unnatural content and often out of touch with the target audience.

The resulting factor often leads to content that seems less human, and almost too robotic. While these instances are often avoided by professional marketers, teams that have less knowledge or experience, and have an over-dependence on automated content generation can find their strategies being lost in translation and slowly moving away from their key objectives.

Additionally, other pitfalls include content that is similar to other competitors, as AI models make use of available data and information to generate ideas, and don’t necessarily come up with new ideas that can help brands set themselves aside from their competitors.

Dependence On Data

One of the key drawbacks of newer AI models is their dependence on new information or data to generate algorithms. This requires agencies and marketers to already have access to the necessary information they want to have analyzed.

For smaller agencies, with less access to reputable and trustworthy data, this can create additional problems, seeing as they tend to have less available resources to effectively train new AI models.

The high dependence on new data or information can create setbacks in how marketers can apply their marketing strategies. To ensure effective, and more reliable outcomes, agencies would need to constantly retrieve new data to train their models, but also ensure transparent use of this information.

Less Optimized Content

For content to rank above those of their competitors, marketing teams need to constantly update the information, and ensure it aligns with search engines’ optimization and ranking criteria.

The prevalence of artificial content has meant that many search engines have to update their crawler criteria, meaning that some search engines can now flag a website or content that was solely generated with the use of artificial models.

Newer tools can now evaluate the optimization of certain pages, focussing on key points that are not directly adding value to the user. With these efforts, search engines can punish content that is not dually optimized.

Ultimately what this means, is that new crawler technology can now detect content that has been generated by humans compared to those generated by algorithms.

Unrealistic Expectations

In general, marketers have unrealistic expectations when it comes to the application of artificial intelligence. While these models have greatly impacted how marketing teams can now develop new marketing and content strategies, there is still the reliance on human intervention that will be required throughout the process.

The overall infrastructure of artificial intelligence is still in the development process, which means that many of these systems are still relatively straightforward, and can’t be considered an end solution for digital marketing.

AI capabilities can help digital marketers make more insightful and informed decisions, however, human intervention is still necessary for editorial curation and ensuring accurate application of marketing and content strategies.

Inaccurate Information

Currently, not all AI models are trained with accurate or up-to-date information, leaving a lot of room for marketers and content teams to oversee these gaps. The cost of using wrong information, or misinforming customers can create further costlier efforts for a team, that can tarnish any company’s reputation and authority.

What’s more, the rise in false or misleading information being published on social media is creating further setbacks for the AI models that make use of these platforms to train and collect data.

The reliance on these AI models, in the long-term, can lead marketers to create strategies that are not only out of touch with their target audience but could mislead them with false information, leaving concerns relating to a company’s authority within the consumer marketplace.

Final Thoughts

While artificial intelligence has enabled marketers to be more informed through the use of analytical data, there remain several pitfalls that separate marketers from staying in touch with their target audience and their overall marketing and content strategies.

Digital marketers will need to consider their direct needs, but also the long-term effectiveness of these tools and how they can positively impact that forward-looking strategy.

Using these tools in combination with more traditional efforts, including human ingenuity would ensure that marketers can effectively adopt accurate models, but override these insights with human intelligence when needed.

A heavy dependence on artificial intelligence is still not recommended for teams that are less informed or skilled in how to use these tools to their best advantage. Instead, marketing teams can focus on how these tools can enrich their analytical insights, and use metrics that align with their overarching marketing goal.

Published First on ValueWalk. Read Here.

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Brands are under immense pressure to advance and evolve as customer buying trends change, budgets shrink, and broad economic factors become increasingly complicated.

In response, many companies are turning to emerging applications of well-known technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to make their companies more agile, competitive, and responsive.

These technologies provide powerful buyer insights that allow companies to understand better when customers will make a purchase, what they will buy, and when they will engage.

According to a Deloitte survey, 79 percent of respondents have fully deployed three or more AI technologies, a 15 percent year-over-year increase. As AI and ML technologies become more ubiquitous as mainstream services soar in popularity and serve as proof of concept for many business leaders, everyone seems to want more. To accelerate AI and ML adoption, three-fifths of businesses intend to increase spending on digital transformation by the end of 2023. Of course, simply throwing money at the latest tech trends doesn’t guarantee business success.

The key lies in leveraging data, a company’s most abundant and valuable resource, to directly enhance AI and ML solutions that impact core KPIs at the enterprise level. These systems can help companies achieve two foundational objectives: increase top-line revenue and reduce overall costs by enabling new efficiencies.

Here’s how leaders can leverage strategic applications of this technology to remain agile and create compelling customer interactions with impact in 2024 and beyond.

#1 Collect the Right Data & Collect it with Consent

Many companies are overwhelmed by the volume, velocity, and complexity of customer data they collect. They are unable to convert this raw data into actionable customer-facing interactions.

One survey of CIOs and senior IT leaders found that nearly three-quarters of respondents said they were struggling with data management, and most companies are discarding the vast majority—up to 90 percent—of the data they receive.

Effective AI and ML implementation is predicated on accurate, actionable, and timely customer data, so companies must turn off the firehose of information instead of collecting the correct information at the right time to inform the right decisions.

Brands can leverage several data sources to obtain this information, including:

• Transactional data from credit card and other financial services
• Customer-collected data from surveys, research, and other buyer-centric sources
• Loyalty data from product offerings and other promotional opportunities

Specifically, focus on incentivizing customers to provide 20 percent of the data that provides 80 percent of the value.

The brands best positioned to receive the highest value data will acquire customers’ consent before collecting data, capitalizing on transparent data collection practices to solicit support and build trust.

The results of building customer trust with this approach can reach all the way to the bottom line. Eighty-four percent of consumers say they are more likely to share information with brands with transparent data practices and policies, 77 percent say it impacts their purchases, and 50 percent say they will purchase more from transparent brands.

The message for innovative brands is simple: obtain explicit consent from individuals before collecting data. Users should be able to opt in or out easily. Some consumers will undoubtedly opt-out, but those that remain, when properly nurtured, become the backbone of solid brands.

#2 Compile a “Single View of the Customer”

Compiling a “single view of the customer” means having a complete and accurate understanding of a customer’s needs, preferences, and behaviors based on all the data and interactions a company has collected about them.

This can be achieved through multi-platform infrastructures that allow businesses to store, track, and analyze customer data from various sources, such as sales, marketing, and customer service.

Such efforts focusing on the value exchange must gather the information to complete the 80/20 guiding principle, which relies on progressive profiling to provide a single customer view across all touchpoints.

#3 Create Real-time Interactions

Real-time interactions can propel people through buying by delivering the information, insights, and promotion needed to convert leads into sales.

While customers expect real-time, hyper-personalized interactions, many anticipate that brands won’t be able to deliver. One industry report found that 44 percent of Gen Z shoppers and 43 percent of millennials “expended more effort than expected to complete an interaction.”

In 2023 and beyond, time is a valuable currency. Companies can increase conversions by deploying AI and ML solutions to power real-time interaction management systems that foster emotional connections, identify potential pain points, and optimize the buying journey.

Many brands continue to rely on static content to entice buyers. AI and ML solutions let brands move beyond this, delivering real-time, personalized interactions at scale.

#4: Create Hyper-Personalized Experiences for customers

A McKinsey & Company report found that 71 percent of consumers expect brands to provide personalized experiences, and most are disappointed when they don’t deliver.

Customer data is key to personalizing customer experiences, but many brands are overwhelmed by the firehose of information, making the sheer data volume and information sprawl an impediment to progress.

AI is making sense of this information and using it to generate targeted advertising content that empowers personalized experiences at scale.

Marketing, commerce, analytics and data, and merchandising can use AI in different ways to present targeted content to prospects and customers through lightboxes, promotional links, special offers and discounts, and platform onboarding efforts.

AI is moving brand marketing away from content repositories that present plausibly engaging content to consumers to an environment where analytics, profile information, and segmentation data can be used in real-time to create customer-centric, generative content that converts buyers.

In retail advertising as one example, AI allows advertisers to present advertising content with surgical precision in ways that we could only dream of five years ago.

Truly Data Driven

Leveraging AI and ML is becoming increasingly crucial for brands to maintain relevance in a digital-first world, to remain competitive, and to create compelling customer interactions. Businesses can increase top-line revenue and reduce costs by collecting the correct data, compiling a “single view of the customer,” and creating real-time interactions.

However, it’s important to note that simply investing in these technologies is not enough. The key is using data, a company’s most valuable resource, to impact core KPIs at the enterprise level directly. As AI and ML adoption continues to rise, companies implementing these strategies will be well-positioned to remain agile and stay ahead of the competition.

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Wikipedia, the world’s largest online encyclopedia, has become an indispensable resource for information-seekers across the globe. With millions of articles covering extensive topics, Wikipedia has revolutionized how knowledge is accessed and shared.

In today’s digital age, having a presence on Wikipedia holds immense importance for individuals, organizations, and public figures. This is where the demand for professional Wikipedia page creation services grows exponentially.

These services assist individuals and businesses in navigating the complex guidelines and procedures of Wikipedia to create well-crafted, informative, and compliant pages. The expertise of these services ensures that the pages meet Wikipedia’s standards and are backed by credible sources.

This blog covers a range of companies that are significantly known for creating Wikipedia pages. Let’s get started!

Boost Your Social Presence Drastically With These Well-Known Wikipedia Page Creators

The best action here is to get support from professionals. Here are the top Wikipedia page creation services 2023 listed below for your convenience.

1.      Wiki Professionals Inc

Wiki Professionals Inc. is a reputable and leading company that provides expert Wikipedia page creation services. With a team of experienced Wikipedia editors, writers, and creators, they have established themselves as reliable for creating and managing Wikipedia pages for individuals, businesses, and organizations.

Thus. Wiki Professional Inc.’s commitment to quality, attention to detail, and adherence to deadlines make them a preferred choice for anyone seeking to establish a solid online presence through Wikipedia.

What Are They Best For?

• Comprehensive Services – Page creation, editing, monitoring, updating, and maintenance.
• Customized Approach – Tailored solutions to align with client objectives and branding.
• Credibility & Relevance – Ensuring well-sourced and verifiable information.
• Timely Delivery – Efficient project management for on-time completion.

2.      Wiki Page Consultant

Wiki Page Consultant is a web-based platform designed to assist individuals and organizations in creating well-versed Wikipedia pages. They work closely with the clients to gather relevant information, identify reliable sources, and draft a Wikipedia page that meets the person’s notability and verifiability standards.

At Wiki Page Consultant, the professionals understand Wikipedia’s guidelines and policies, ensuring a high chance of page acceptance. So, hiring experts from Wiki Page Consultants is a wise investment for all who want to enhance social visibility.

What Are They Best For?

• Expert Guidance – Professional expertise in navigating Wikipedia’s guidelines and policies.
• Page Creation and Editing – Assist in creating or improving new Wikipedia pages.

3.      Wiki Proficiency

Wiki Proficiency is an innovative platform that has created exceptional Wikipedia pages since its establishment.  It combines cutting-edge technology, expert guidance, and a community-driven approach to simplify the page creation process while adhering to Wikipedia’s standards and guidelines.

Their expertise in crafting impeccable Wikipedia pages has garnered them a prominent position in this list. They have grouped with the experts who adhere to Wikipedia’s policies and set themselves apart from the competition.

However, if you need an expert direction for Wikipedia page development, Wiki Proficiency stands out as one of the greatest platforms.

What Are They Best For?

• Citation and Sourcing – Ensuring accurate information with proper citations from reliable sources.
• Vandalism Prevention – Utilizing advanced algorithms to detect and prevent vandalism on created Wikipedia pages.
• Continuous Monitoring – Regularly monitoring and maintaining Wikipedia pages to keep them up-to-date and relevant.

4.      Wiki Page Writing Services

Wiki Page Writing Services is a well-known corporation for Wikipedia page creation. They have completed over thousands of successful wiki pages for valued customers. Their professional services specialize in crafting comprehensive and well-researched Wiki pages tailored to your needs.

With all their expertise in sourcing references and creating engaging content, these services provide a seamless experience from start to finish, making your Wiki page creation process hassle-free and effective.

What Are They Best For?

• In-depth research – Conducts thorough research to gather relevant information and credible sources.
• Notability assessment – Evaluate the subject’s significance to determine if it meets Wikipedia’s notability standards.
• Transparent communication – Maintains open communication with clients throughout the page creation process.

5.      Wiki Counsellor

Wiki Counsellor is a groundbreaking platform that aims to revolutionize the process of Wikipedia page creation. With its exceptional expertise and commitment to quality, Broom Wiki has gained popularity for crafting comprehensive and reliable Wikipedia pages.

Whether creating new Wikipedia pages or updating existing ones, Wiki Counsellor’s proficiency in research and content creation makes them a trusted choice for individuals and businesses seeking professional Wikipedia services to boost their global.

What Are They Best For?

• Intuitive Interface – Offering a user-friendly website.
• Automated Citation Management – Simplifies process by integrating automated tools.
• Quality Assurance Mechanism – Maintain the accuracy of the content while implementing quality assurance tools.

6.      Wiki Management Inc

Wiki Management Inc. is a leading provider of Wikipedia page creation services. The professionals at Wiki Management Inc understand the nuances of writing neutral and notable content that follows Wikipedia’s strict standards.

The platform features a step-by-step wizard that guides users through each stage of page creation. From selecting the topic and conducting research to formatting the content correctly, the expert ensures that users follow Wikipedia’s guidelines accurately.

Trustworthy and reliable, they empower clients to establish a credible online presence through the world’s largest encyclopedia.

What Are They Best For?

• Automated Formatting – Takes care of section headings, citations, references, and categorizations.
• Language Support – Supports multiple languages for diverse contributions.
• Quality Control & Review – Automated checks and expert editors ensure content accuracy.

7.      Wiki Page Creator

Wiki Page Creator is a valuable platform offering unparalleled services to create informative and reliable Wikipedia pages. They have employed the world’s experienced editors who understand Wikipedia’s intricate guidelines and policies. By leveraging their expertise, businesses can surely establish a credible online presence globally.

Additionally, Wiki Page Creator provides users with a range of customizable templates to maintain a professional appearance. Users can select the most suitable design for their page, allowing for an aesthetically pleasing presentation that reflects the subject’s personality or brand.

Thus, you can effectively showcase your accomplishments and enhance your reputation with their assistance.

What Are They Best For?

• Content Research Tools – Integrated tools to find reliable sources and article references.
• Customizable Templates – Diverse layouts to personalize Wikipedia pages to user preferences.

8.      Wiki Contributors

Wiki Contributors emerged as essential entities in creating and expanding Wikipedia pages. Their work colleagues are highly professional in researching, writing, and adhering to Wikipedia’s guidelines.

Also, their ability to compile relevant information, properly cite sources, and maintain neutrality allows individuals and organizations to enhance their online presence and credibility. In the dynamic landscape of digital knowledge, Wiki Contributors continue to play a key role in curating information-rich Wikipedia pages.

Whether it’s for personal branding, business promotion, or sharing significant accomplishments, Wiki Contributors ensures that your Wikipedia page stands out as an authoritative source of information.

What Are They Best For?

• Enhanced Content Quality – Maintains high standards of accuracy and verifiability.
• Fast & Secure Submissions – Efficient handling of the submission process on behalf of the user.

9.      Wiki Editors

Wiki Editors is another award-winning platform among the top Wikipedia page creation services. As one of the most trusted and reliable Wikipedia page creation tools, Wiki Editors empowers all notable personalities to establish a prominent online presence and contribute to Wikipedia’s vast knowledge source.

To maintain the highest quality standards of the page, they offer expert review and editing services. This review process helps prevent potential issues, such as deletion or rejection, thereby increasing the likelihood of successful page creation.

What Are They Best For?

• Built-in Citation Manager – Simplified management of accurate and credible references.
• Collaboration and Review – Teamwork and review system for collective contributions and quality assurance.

10.  Wiki Page Creation Agency

Last but not least, Wiki Page Creation Agency is another leading company that has experts on board to create perfectly crafted Wikipedia pages. From editing, revisions, and proofreading, everything is done from an eagle’s eye so that no project is delivered with errors.

Moreover, the professionals at this agency know how to create Wikipedia pages that adhere to Wikipedia policies. Thus, their dedication to accuracy, neutrality, and compliance with Wikipedia’s policies makes them a trusted choice for individuals and organizations seeking a professional and reliable Wikipedia page creation service.

What Are They Best For?

• Page Editing and Updating – Comprehensive editing and updating services to maintain the accuracy and relevance of existing Wikipedia pages.
• Content Verification – Fact-checking and ensuring all information is supported by reliable sources.
• Multilingual Knowledge Sharing – Facilitates global knowledge exchange.

Summing Up

The above list is organized based on current trends and user reviews. Their services have demonstrated a proven track record of creating and maintaining Wikipedia pages for various clients.

So, whether you are an aspiring artist, a startup entrepreneur, or a notable public figure, taking their services offers reliable solutions to establish and maintain your presence on the prestigious platform of Wikipedia.

Featured Image Credit: Cottonbro Studio; Pexels; Thank you!

All Inner Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Thank you!

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In the rapidly evolving B2B landscape, effective lead generation is crucial for business growth. B2B leaders must navigate complex payment preferences and O2C systems– to stay ahead of the competition. The digital transformation of recent years has accelerated the automation digitalization of O2C (order-to-cash)processes, offering merchants new opportunities to expand their presence and reach. However, with a well-managed payment strategy, the entire process can continue. This article will explore how optimizing O2C processes can drive successful B2B lead generation, foster customer loyalty, streamline operations, and unlock business growth.

Embracing Customer-Centric Payment Experiences

One of the critical considerations in B2B lead generation is providing B2C-like purchasing experiences. Buyers today expect seamless payment options and immediate gratification. However, by offering multiple convenient payment methods and streamlining the purchasing process, merchants can improve customer satisfaction and transaction speeds and ultimately increase business success.

In a Forrester study, “Optimize Your Payment System to Seal the Deal,” more than 90% of respondents stated that improving payment options for B2B customers would enhance customer satisfaction, transaction speeds, and overall business success. To meet these expectations, merchants must provide painless purchasing experiences that mirror the ease and convenience of B2C transactions. This includes offering multiple payment methods, such as credit cards, electronic funds transfers, and digital wallets, with the ease of one-click purchasing.

Streamlining O2C Processes for Improved Cash Flow

Automation is pivotal in transforming O2C processes. Automated systems eliminate manual tasks, reduce errors, and expedite invoicing, credit decisions, and reconciliation processes. Merchants can remove complexity and improve cash flow by integrating comprehensive B2B payment solutions with existing platforms, such as P2P and ERP systems.

Manual processes can be time-consuming, error-prone, and hinder cash flow. Businesses can achieve significant cost savings and operational efficiencies by automating order creation, invoice generation, and payment reconciliation. According to the Boston Consulting Group, companies implementing automation in order creation processes can achieve cost savings ranging from 15% to 30%. However, industrialization also improves the customer service experience, leading to more loyal clients and reduced non-payment risk.

In addition, implementing automation technology facilitates instantaneous cash flow monitoring, allowing enterprises to make informed judgments and enhance their working capital management. By streamlining O2C processes, companies can free up resources, reduce administrative burdens, and allocate more time and effort to strategic activities that drive lead generation and revenue growth.

Leveraging Instant Decisioning and Credit to Drive Sales

Offering trade credit and establishing dedicated financial relationships can significantly impact B2B lead generation. Buyers tend to spend more when provided with favorable payment terms and credit lines. By enabling fast decision and credit evaluation, merchants can attract new customers, increase sales, and cultivate a loyal buyer base.

By providing flexible payment options and efficient credit evaluation, merchants can cater to diverse buyer preferences and increase their sales potential. Research shows that 15% of B2B buyers spend more when offered trade credit. Moreover, 82% of buyers would choose a vendor that provides invoicing at checkout with extended payment terms over competitors.

Instant decision-making systems leverage data analytics and technology to assess buyers’ creditworthiness in real-time.

This enables businesses to offer appropriate payment terms and credit lines based on individual customer profiles, mitigating non-payment risk. However, by simplifying the purchasing process and providing attractive credit options to buyers, merchants can differentiate themselves from competitors and secure a larger market share. Fast decisions help attract new customers, nurture repeat business, and build long-term customer loyalty.

By leveraging instant decisions and credit capabilities, merchants can offer personalized payment options tailored to each buyer’s needs. This flexibility enhances the purchasing experience, encourages larger order sizes, and promotes customer satisfaction. Additionally, with dedicated financial relationships and credit lines, buyers are more likely to choose a particular vendor over others, leading to increased sales and market share.

Unlocking Sales Growth and Efficiency through O2C Transformation

Transforming O2C processes can yield significant benefits for B2B businesses. Dynamic pricing, streamlined orders, faster payments, and automation drive sales growth, cost savings, and process transparency. However, these enhancements increase customer satisfaction, operational efficiency, and a stronger b2b lead generation foundation. Here’s how to choose the right B2B lead generation company for your business.

A well-optimized O2C process enables merchants to offer dynamic pricing and promotions to attract buyers. Moreover, by automating pricing calculations and integrating them with customer data, businesses can provide personalized pricing strategies that optimize revenue while meeting customer expectations.

Streamlined order experiences are essential for driving lead generation. Moreover, by automating order processing, merchants can reduce manual errors, ensure order accuracy, and expedite fulfillment. These results in improved customer satisfaction, faster order delivery, and increased chances of repeat business.

Real-time complaint resolution and fewer disputed invoices are critical for maintaining strong customer relationships. However, by implementing automated systems that enable quick and efficient issue resolution, merchants can address customer concerns promptly, build trust, and foster loyalty.

Merchants can proactively communicate order status, provide real-time updates, and maintain open lines of communication, resulting in a positive customer experience and increased customer loyalty. Moreover, increased process transparency allows merchants and buyers to see the entire O2C journey. This transparency builds trust, reduces disputes, and fosters smoother collaborations.

Optimizing B2B Lead Generation: O2C Process Transformation Guidelines

To optimize B2B lead generation through O2C process transformation, follow these essential guidelines:

1. Understand Customer Expectations: Gain insights into your B2B customers’ payment preferences and expectations through research and feedback. This understanding will guide your O2C transformation strategy.
2. Embrace Automation: Leverage technology and automation tools to streamline O2C processes. Integrate payment systems with existing platforms to eliminate manual tasks, reduce errors, and expedite cash-related processes.
3. Offer Multiple Payment Options: Cater to diverse buyer preferences by providing a range of payment methods, including credit cards, electronic fund transfers, and digital wallets. Simplify the purchasing process with one-click options.
4. Implement Real-Time Decisioning: Utilize data analytics and technology for instant decision-making on creditworthiness. Tailor payment terms and credit lines based on customer profiles to increase sales potential and mitigate non-payment risk.
5. Communicate Transparently: Maintain open communication channels with buyers, providing real-time updates on order status, shipping details, and payment confirmations. Also, address customer concerns promptly to foster trust and satisfaction.
6. Continuously Optimize: Regularly evaluate O2C processes and monitor performance. Also, make necessary adjustments to improve efficiency, customer experience, and lead generation.

By following these guidelines, businesses can enhance lead generation capabilities, strengthen customer relationships, and drive growth in the B2B landscape.

Conclusion

In today’s rapidly changing B2B landscape, optimizing O2C processes is essential for successful lead generation, business growth, and customer satisfaction. Customer-centric payments, automation, and efficiency help enterprises thrive in the digital era.

Optimizing O2C (Order-to-Cash) procedures enhances operational efficiency and establishes a strong foundation for building lasting customer relationships. Businesses can unlock their full potential in b2b lead generation and achieve sustainable growth by prioritizing a seamless end-to-end payment strategy and leveraging digital tools.

Featured Image Credit: Monstera; Pexels; Thank you!

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The rapid emergence of the Internet of Things (IoT) plays a vital role in shaping the future of e-commerce. It unites physical objects through internet connectivity and advanced data collection capabilities. As observations reveal, IoT transforms how businesses track, analyze, and anticipate customer needs and augment the overall shopping experience.

“E-commerce & IoT are the modern-day amigos that can provide seamless experiences to its users and can help businesses thrive, no matter how dull the market gets.”

The article shares insights about the growing impact of IoT on e-commerce. It delves into strategies that e-commerce marketplaces can adopt to harness the full potential of this technological revolution.

What is one of the most talked about concepts — IoT?

Physical devices like gadgets, appliances, and vehicles possess embedded software, sensors, and connectivity. This integration enables the objects to establish connections and exchange data, defining the concept of interconnectedness.

Internet technologies have made it possible to connect physical elements to the network, which is the basis for developing the IoT (Internet of Things).

This technology allows for the collection and sharing of data from a vast network of devices, creating opportunities for more efficient and automated systems.

Is IoT the game changer?

Internet of Things (IoT) is the networking of physical objects that contain electronics embedded within their architecture to communicate and sense interactions amongst each other or concerning the external environment. In the upcoming years, IoT-based technology will offer advanced services and practically change how people lead their daily lives.

Advancements in agriculture, power, gene therapies, smart cities and smart parking management, edge computing, big data, medicine and healthcare, and smart homes are just a very few of the categorical examples where IoT is strongly established.

Today, with around 15 billion connected IoT devices worldwide, the figure, Oracle mentions, is expected to rise to a whopping 22 billion by the year 2025.

The latest IoT analytics report shows that global IoT connections grew by 18% in 2022 to 14.3 billion active IoT endpoints. This number is predicted to grow another 16%, leading to 16.7 billion active endpoints.

This growth for the year 2023 is slightly lower than it was predicted for 2022. Essentially, IoT device connections are expected to rise for several years to follow. These figures leave every stakeholder thinking about whether IoT is really the game-changer.

Image credit: Here.

IoT in E-commerce: Dictating new rules and pushing industry limits

Image credit: Here.

IoT refers to a network of interconnected devices embedded with sensors, software, and network connectivity, enabling the collection and exchange of data with minimal human intervention. With billions of devices connected worldwide, IoT presents immense opportunities for e-commerce markets. This fac reshapes how businesses operate, manage operations, and engage with customers.

Research firm Gartner stated that IoT would result in a transformation of the world of delivery services. The magnanimous impact of IoT on e-commerce can be well gauged by the fact that the study stated that a thirty-fold increase in Internet-connected physical machines by 2020 will significantly alter how the sector works.

An example of IoT’s applicability in e-commerce can be comprehended by the fact that there are warehouse robots within e-commerce companies that work with machine learning algorithms. Machines can identify certain items within a cluttered environment and determine the best ways to pick them up safely and effectively.

Better Demand Analysis, Personalization, and Customer Engagement

IoT devices can collect vast amounts of data on customer behavior, preferences, and purchase patterns. By analyzing this data, e-commerce platforms can do a better demand analysis, create highly-personalized shopping experiences for varying consumer needs, and offer relevant product recommendations and targeted promotions. This level of personalization enhances customer engagement, eventually nurturing brand loyalty and driving sales.

The use of IoT has been pretty revelatory for businesses. Its use in information sharing helps firms better understand their customers’ needs and collaborate with them for better demand planning and ameliorated customer service. IoT helps to close the information gap in modern supply chains by capturing fine-grained information among organizational entities, processes, and people in real-time

Inventory Management and Supply Chain Efficiency

IoT enables businesses to implement data-driven inventory management systems using sensors, RFID tags, and real-time tracking technologies. These systems monitor stock levels, anticipate replenishment needs, and avoid out-of-stock situations. This ensures that the right products are available when customers demand them. IoT’s potential to streamline supply chain processes includes optimizing logistics, warehouse management, and order fulfillment, leading to improved operational efficiency, cost savings, and faster deliveries.

The cyber-physical systems (CPS), which are nicely integrated with communication, computation, and control systems,, can manage the inventory and make the supply chain free from bottlenecks.

By analyzing demand data and enabling self-decision-making algorithms for the machines in CPS, the production line can work efficiently with a minimum of direct human role and fewer errors in real-time interactions.

A paper published in Elsevier mentions that several scholars have investigated the potential of RFID for supply chain traceability, stating that RFID provides increased visibility, tracking, and enhanced communication throughout the supply chain.

The paper also asserts that businesses have myriad reasons to consider applying IoT in their supply chain models. The extant literature that the paper has produced establishes that IoT can be extremely useful. It can hep in tracking to locate products, materials, and assets, and to know their current status and environmental conditions. This is highly suggestive of the fact that herein, lie heaps of opportunities for e-commerce businesses.

Smart Warehouses and Automation

IoT-powered smart warehouses play a crucial role in transforming e-commerce operations. The integration of IoT devices like sensors, drones, and autonomous robots facilitates automation, enabling smoother processes and reducing human errors. These capabilities allow businesses to manage inventory more effectively, expedite order processing and shipping, and ultimately deliver better customer experiences.

With the challenges of storing and warehousing growing in abundance, one of the finest ways of combating such a situation is the automation and robotization of the warehouse system. On the one hand, automation expedites business operations and smoothens the storage and movement of inventory. On the other hand, robotization does not mean completely replacing human work with machines. Instead, it is about supplementing and increasing human work efficiency with robotic systems.

Consider the example of Amazon, a known tech giant in the e-commerce space. It effectively uses IoT installed robots that take care of picking, packing, and many other jobs, ensuring the product’s effectiveness. Amazon, in their warehouses, uses drones as well to pick up and deliver products. The engineers at Amazon are also working on a pinch-grasping robot. Tests showed a prototype achieved a tenfold reduction in product damage due to its gentle but secure grip.

Seamless Omnichannel Experience

The Internet of Things if utilized well by businesses, does lead to ameliorated omnichannel experiences.

Explicitly said, one of the primary benefits of IoT is its ability to create a seamless omnichannel experience for customers. As per a report published in Walker, a customer experience consulting firm, the customer experience will overtake price and product as the key differentiator by 2020 (and we’ve seen this). Standing in 2023, we know the importance of customer experiences (CX) and the joys they can bring. This speaks volumes about the relevance of customer experience (CX) in today’s customer-centric business world.

By synchronizing data across multiple channels, IoT allows e-commerce marketplaces of all natures — and sizes and brick-and-mortar stores to offer a unified shopping experience. Moreover, real-time updates and access to shopping carts, wish lists, and customer profiles ensure a consistent and personalized approach.

Conducting your businesses by leveraging the IoT devices should gather direct, up-to-date customer feedback to understand what matters most to them. They can then deliver as per the varying needs. IoT can be a game changer for businesses if integrated effectively, as it offers seamless omnichannel experiences.

IoT-enabled Delivery Solutions

IoT can potentially revolutionize the delivery process in e-commerce, from smart lockers to drone deliveries. Connected devices provide real-time location tracking, enabling businesses to monitor shipments and provide customers with up-to-date information on their orders. Autonomous vehicles and drones guided by IoT technologies promise faster, more efficient deliveries that minimize costs and enhance customer satisfaction.

Technavio market research report suggests that the autonomous delivery market is poised to grow by USD 16.86 billion during 2020-2024. Given this projected trend, Chinese e-commerce companies deployed robots, more so to deliver orders to combat the pandemic.

A Chinese delivery app ‘Meituan Dianping’ launched the concept of “contactless delivery”, in which the brand has started using fully automated vehicles to send grocery orders to customers’ homes in Beijing.

Strategies for Ecommerce Marketplaces

Having learned that IoT influences logistics, inventory, warehouse management, deliveries, and the overall e-commerce scenario, businesses should act wisely. And business wisdom lies in embracing technology, integrating IoT, and becoming the leaders of change.

To capitalize on the IoT revolution in e-commerce, businesses must adopt innovative strategies. Besides that, they must be capable of addressing current market dynamics and anticipating future developments.

1. Embrace IoT-driven Personalization: Leverage IoT devices and data analytics to offer personalized experiences and tailored product recommendations. The perfect blend of IoT and data can help businesses develop targeted marketing campaigns that resonate with individual customer preferences.
2. Optimize Supply Chain and Inventory Management: Implement connected devices and real-time tracking technologies for efficient supply chain and inventory management. This will help in reducing costs, avoiding stockouts, and ensuring products are available when customers need them.
3. Design Omnichannel Experiences: Focus on building seamless, synchronized experiences across all touchpoints and channels. This will give customers the convenience and flexibility they always desire.
4. Invest in IoT-enabled Delivery Solutions: Explore innovative delivery solutions such as autonomous vehicles, drones, or smart lockers. This can be done by enhancing customer satisfaction with faster, more convenient deliveries.
5. Prioritise Security and Privacy: As IoT devices collect vast amounts of data, it is critical to prioritize security and privacy concerns. Implementing robust encryption and stringent data protection measures can help businesses take care.

Be Future Ready: Stay informed about IoT developments that impact e-commerce. Also, businesses must act proactively to adapt and evolve with market developments.

Wrapping up

The development of the Internet has affected almost all businesses operating in today’s tech-dominated market. To remain competitively upfront — today’s supply chain and logistics industry should prioritize developing and implementing IoT technologies. This will help them drive significant advancements and enhance warehouse systems.

Undoubtedly, the Internet of Things is transforming the e-commerce playing field. It impacts every aspect of the customer journey, from personalization to delivery. Businesses can gain quickly by embracing IoT technologies, blending them in, and adopting forward-looking strategies. By integrating IoT, futuristic e-commerce businesses can doubtlessly enhance customer satisfaction and secure a competitive edge in an ever-evolving landscape.

The emergence of IoT has paved a smooth way where there wasn’t initially — ones where businesses were stagnating. But, the fact remains at the heart of every contemporary business and wakeful stakeholder that if IoT is understood and absorbed well, it will help around 70% of retailers from all over the world to improve their customer relations

Concludingly, there is no doubt that the time to seize the opportunities presented by IoT is now. Businesses and entrepreneurs that leverage the potential of IoT will undoubtedly thrive in the e-commerce marketplace of the future.

Featured Image Credit: Photo by RDNE Stock project; Pexels; Thank you!

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SEO is the process of optimizing websites for search engines to obtain organic traffic, high-quality leads, and elevate the revenue generation rate. It is considered one of the significant parts of digital marketing. Besides this, other aspects of digital marketing, such as PPC (Pay Per Click), SMM (Social Media Marketing), Content Marketing, Email Marketing, Influencer Marketing, Affiliate Marketing, and Display Advertising, are also effective.

But they can’t match the long-term success of SEO. However, SEO is like a lock; you can’t unlock it without the right pattern. But what is the right pattern? No need to worry because this blog will reveal all the essentials of a perfect SEO strategy.

Here are Some SEO Strategies That You Need To Consider:

Keyword Research 

Keywords are the popular search terms your target audience uses to reach you. Finding those key terms is not as easy as ABC. However, some SEO executives conduct keyword research solely with the help of tools like SEMrush, Ahrefs, Moz or Keyword Magic Tool. But you can’t expect to experience the best results unless you put manual effort into it. 

‘NEVER-FORGET” Tips

1. Filter Keywords based on search intent, keyword difficulty, and global volume. 
2. Don’t only rely on seed keywords. Make sure to use a combination of long-tail keywords and interrogative questions (What, Why & How).
3. Don’t solely rely on keyword research tools – SEMrush, Moz, Keyword Magic Tool, etc. 
4. Never forcefully embed keywords. Always embed keywords according to proper keyword density. 
5. Never use keywords in exact match form. By doing so, you will be killing the user experience. 

On-page SEO 

On-page SEO is crucial for the success of an SEO campaign. It refers to all the elements of the website. Everything needs to be on-point: speed, content, page URLs, internal linking, and structured markup. In addition, On-Page SEO requires only 30% effort, but it accounts for 70% success of an SEO campaign. Here is the on-page SEO checklist: 

Off-Page SEO 

By Off-Page SEO, we mean the off-page SEO activities conducted outside the website. These activities are crucial for building credibility and authority for the website. Unlike on-page SEO, off-page SEO requires 70% of the effort, but it accounts for only 30% of the success in the SEO campaign. It has been observed that Google prioritizes websites with strong off-page SEO in search engines. 

What is the best approach to conduct off-page SEO? 

Off-page SEO works better if it is conducted through guest posting. Guest posting of blogs and infographics can help you get valuable backlinks from reputed websites. 

How do you get backlinks through guest posting of blogs and infographics? 

To obtain backlinks from reputable websites through blogs and infographics, you must prepare a strong pitch and convince clients to accept it. Once accepted, you must provide them with content that meets their word count, formatting, outline, and content structure guidelines. Embed the link within the content.

Tip:

Make sure the anchor you choose is informative. Promotional anchors often create a negative impression in the user’s mind, as they may assume that the information presented in the blog or article is solely for promotional purposes. Consequently, the content may appear to be of low quality.

Local SEO

Local SEO refers to optimizing a website or online presence to increase visibility and attract relevant traffic from a specific local area. It targets potential customers within a specific geographic location, such as a city or region. Local SEO aims to improve a business’s online visibility in local search results, especially when people search for products or services in their immediate vicinity.

For example, if you own a bakery in New York City, you would want your website to appear prominently when someone searches for “bakery in NYC” or “best bakeries near me.” Or if someone is looking for an SEO company in Toronto, their search query can be “SEO Toronto” or “Toronto SEO company.”

How important is content in SEO? 

Content is incredibly important in SEO because it’s the backbone of what search engines and users look for. High-quality, relevant, and engaging content not only helps search engines understand the purpose and relevance of your website but also provides value to your audience. Creating content that aligns with user intent and incorporates targeted keywords naturally increases your chances of ranking higher in search results.

Additionally, valuable content attracts more organic traffic, encourages user engagement, and can earn backlinks from other reputable websites. All of this can contribute to improving your overall SEO performance. In short, content is the fuel that drives successful SEO campaigns by satisfying both search engines and users alike.

Conclusion

To make an SEO campaign successful, you need to ensure that all three SEO components are properly aligned with the goals and objectives. For example, if off-page SEO aims to build credibility and authority, don’t settle for low-quality websites. And, if you’re doing on-page SEO to enhance the user experience, then follow any black hat SEO techniques to get it as needed. 

Featured Image Credit: Provided by the Author; Thank you!

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Staying on top of the latest business trends is vital for today’s CEOs and business leaders. While it seems like there aren’t enough hours in the day to consume all the great content available, podcasts provide an excellent way for you to learn on the go.

The top business podcasts not only feature brilliant minds dishing out great advice but also provide inspiration for new ideas and ways of thinking. Whether you’re commuting to work, working out, or traveling for business, podcasts are a valuable tool for productive learning.

From candid interviews with founders to shows analyzing the technologies shaping the future, the right podcasts can give you strategic insights into the world of business. Here are the top 10 podcasts that every CEO should be listening to:

1. How I Built This

“How I Built This” is a podcast hosted by Guy Raz that delves into the stories behind some of the world’s best-known companies. He discusses the trials and tribulations faced by innovators, idealists, and entrepreneurs as they built their iconic companies. Notable guest stars have included the founders and CEOs of companies like:

• Airbnb
• Spanx
• Ben & Jerry’s

Each episode provides a deep dive into the journey of these individuals, from the initial idea to the many challenges faced and the eventual success.

2. The Tim Ferriss Show

“The Tim Ferriss Show” is a renowned podcast hosted by Tim Ferriss, who is best known for his book “The 4-Hour Workweek.”

The podcast stands out in the business category and is frequently ranked the #1 business podcast on Apple Podcasts. It has surpassed 900 million downloads, making it one of the most listened-to podcasts globally.

Notable guest stars on the show span a wide range of fields and include celebrities, entrepreneurs, authors, and experts, such as:

• Mark Zuckerberg
• Brene Brown
• Matthew McConaughey
• LeBron James
• Dr. Jane Goodall

Each episode delves into the lives and routines of these world-class individuals, extracting tactics, tools, and habits that listeners can adopt. Topics range from favorite books and morning routines to time-management tricks and exercise habits.

3. Masters of Scale

An award-winning podcast that delves into the many intricacies of scaling businesses, “Masters of Scale” is hosted by Bob Safian and features in-depth interviews with some of the business world’s most influential figures.

The podcast discusses their journeys, challenges, and strategies in building and scaling successful companies. “Masters of Scale” has a reputation for hosting industry leaders who have played pivotal roles in shaping the culture of major companies, including:

• Apple
• Uber
• Google

These guests share invaluable insights into the dynamics of creating and maintaining a thriving company culture.

4. The Prof G Show

Hosted by NYU Stern marketing professor Scott Galloway, “The Prof G Show” offers a sharp, in-depth analysis of the major tech companies impacting today’s world.

Galloway dissects many aspects of firms like Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google, covering their:

• Business models
• Competition strategies
• Valuations

Some of the most popular episodes of “The Prof G Show” include deep dives into Prime, Alexa, and Amazon Web Services. Galloway takes complex business concepts and explains them in an entertaining way that not only educates but also intrigues.

5. Beyond 7 Figures

“Beyond 7 Figures” provides tactical advice and strategies for growing a business past the seven-figure revenue mark.

Host Charles Guadet, the CEO of Predictable Profits, draws on his experience scaling companies as well as being the go-to coach for seven and eight-figure founders as he interviews executives from other fast-growing companies and discusses a wide range of challenges and strategies that emerging companies face. Some of his popular episodes dive deep into topics like:

• Building predictable revenue streams
• Market positioning
• Achieving scale through processes
• Team building
• The pitfalls and traps that keep many seven-figure companies from growing

Gaudet emphasizes high-impact changes leaders can make to their hiring practices, operational workflows, and mindsets. These changes are accessible and can help CEOs drive scalable growth.

6. The Pitch

“The Pitch” is a unique podcast that allows you to listen to real entrepreneurs pitch their companies to real investors. This podcast is hosted by Josh Muccio, and each episode features a new business idea. Founders present their:

• Company vision
• Business model
• Traction so far
• Funding needs

After their presentations, they’re grilled by investors with tough questions. This podcast provides a strategic look into how investors think, evaluate, and poke holes into businesses to identify their true investment potential.

And for CEOs, the show highlights techniques you can use to craft a compelling pitch, respond well under pressure, and exude confidence when fundraising for your business.

7. B2B Engagement Podcast

The B2B Engagement Podcast, hosted by enterprise B2B sales and marketing platform Kaon Interactive, takes listeners into discussions with leaders of the world’s largest companies, including IBM, HPE, TE Connectivity, and more.

B2B Engagement Podcast’s conversations focus on real-life challenges faced by the sales and marketing teams of global B2B companies and practical solutions. The audience gets a glimpse into high-level discussions of strategies that power some of the highest-performing companies, such as:

• Adapting to change
• Sustaining innovation
• Serving customers in complex B2B environments
• Improving sales effectiveness and customer engagement

The B2B Engagement Podcast brings highly substantive conversations that impact the complex environment of B2B enterprise growth.

8. Masters in Business

“Masters in Business” is a podcast that features weekly interviews with leading investors, economists, and financial experts to help you gain valuable knowledge in markets, economics, and personal finance.

The host, Barry Ritholtz, digs into his guests’ backgrounds, failures, and philosophies to learn what drives their success. Popular episodes include discussions on:

• China’s economic outlook
• The psychology of money
• Career advice
• Causes of the Great Recession

This podcast aims to demystify complex topics like risk management, behavioral economics, and valuation models.

9. The $100 MBA Show

A no-nonsense podcast, “The $100 MBA Show” provides practical business lessons and advice in bite-sized episodes.

The host, Omar Zenhom, provides real-world advice on topics like:

• Marketing
• Business finance
• Leadership
• Productivity

Podcast topics range from effective email management and best hiring practices to business travel hacks and budgeting tricks. Zenhom draws from his own experience founding and exiting multiple successful companies to coach listeners on the essential skills needed to launch and grow a business.

10. HBR IdeaCast

“HBR IdeaCast” comes from the Harvard Business Review and features inspiring ideas and interviews with some of today’s top business thinkers.

The episodes explore numerous themes and topics, including:

• Understanding psychology
• Improving productivity
• Building resilience
• Navigating hybrid work
• Driving innovation
• Learning the impact of technology on leadership

Podcast guests have included researchers and acclaimed authors who discuss insights from their work. There’s also a recurring segment of the podcast called “Now What,” where experts address listener questions on overcoming specific leadership challenges.

For CEOs, “HBR IdeaCast” provides intellectual fuel and evidence-based advice to sharpen your strategies and leadership capabilities.

Utilizing podcasts to grow

The business realm is one of constant change, making ongoing learning critical for CEOs and business executives. Podcasts offer a convenient way to stay sharp by absorbing insights from industry leaders while on the go.

So, beyond the tactical lessons, these shows can help fuel your innovation and vision. Podcasts are a great tool for self-improvement because they provide actionable wisdom, allowing you to invest in personal development that ultimately transfers to better strategic decision-making and more evolved business leadership.

The post The Top 10 Podcasts for CEOs in 2023 appeared first on ReadWrite.

The world of podcasting has seen explosive growth over the past decade. We are a little more than halfway in 2023; the number of podcast listeners has reached 464.7 million, a number that continues to rise. With this rapid expansion, creators find it more challenging to stand out in a crowded market. A robust podcast content strategy is essential, and in today’s data-driven world, the power of artificial intelligence (AI) and predictive analytics can offer a competitive edge. Let’s dive deep into how AI and predictive analytics can be leveraged to enhance your podcast content strategy.

1. Understanding the Basics

Before we delve into the strategies, it’s vital to understand what we mean by AI and predictive analytics:

• Artificial Intelligence (AI): At its core, AI mimics human intelligence processes through machines, especially computer systems. It can involve anything from voice recognition (like Alexa or Siri) to problem-solving.
• Predictive Analytics: This uses data, statistical algorithms, and machine learning techniques to identify the likelihood of future outcomes based on historical data. In the podcasting world, it can help predict what topics will resonate most with listeners, among other things.

2. Tailoring Content to Your Audience

To optimize your podcast content strategy, it’s paramount to fathom your audience’s preferences. AI can analyze vast amounts of data from listener feedback, reviews, and listening habits. By doing so, it can provide insights into:

• Topics that resonate with your audience.
• Preferred episode length.
• Optimal publishing times.

Predictive analytics can then forecast the likely success of future episodes based on this data. This allows creators to tailor content more precisely to their audience’s tastes, improving engagement and retention rates.

3. Predictive Topic Analysis

Using predictive analytics, podcast creators can analyze trends across various platforms (like social media, news outlets, and search engines) to gauge which topics are gaining traction. For instance, if a specific subject begins trending on Twitter, a podcast episode around that theme might be timely and relevant. By staying ahead of the curve, you ensure your content remains relevant and compelling to listeners.

4. Automated Content Curation and Creation

AI tools, like natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning, can assist in content curation and even content creation. For example, AI can:

• Summarize lengthy articles or research reports, giving podcast hosts a concise overview.
• Suggest relevant content or guests for interviews based on trending topics.
• Automatically generate show notes or episode summaries.

While AI should not replace the human touch entirely, it can significantly aid in streamlining the content creation process. Paid editing and marketing services like PodAllies can vastly reduce the time any creator spends on the production side of their podcast.

5. Enhanced Listener Interaction

Voice recognition and NLP can be used to enhance listener interaction. Imagine a podcast episode that can interact with listeners in real-time, answer questions, or adjust content based on vocal feedback. While this might sound futuristic, advancements in AI are making this a possibility. By making podcasts more interactive, creators can engage their audience innovatively, setting their content apart from the competition. There isn’t an AI tool that can do this yet.

6. Personalized Advertising and Monetization

For podcasts that rely on advertising, AI and predictive analytics can revolutionize monetization strategies. By analyzing listener preferences and habits, AI can suggest personalized ad content, ensuring that listeners hear promotions most relevant to them. This can lead to better conversion rates and increased ad revenue. Two significant services that facilitate cutting-edge podcast monetization are AdvertiseCast and AudioGo.

7. Performance Analysis and Feedback Loop

A crucial aspect of a robust podcast content strategy is reviewing performance and making necessary adjustments. AI can offer real-time analytics on episode performance, from listener counts to engagement rates. Predictive analytics can also forecast future performance trends. This data can then be fed back into the content creation process, creating a continuous improvement loop.

8. The Human Element: Balancing AI with Authenticity

While AI and predictive analytics offer powerful tools for enhancing podcast content strategy, it’s essential not to lose the human element. Podcasts are inherently personal mediums, and listeners often connect profoundly with hosts. While AI can provide insights and streamline processes, the content itself should remain authentic and human-centric.

Conclusion

The fusion of AI and predictive analytics with podcasting is paving the way for a new era of content creation. By harnessing these tools, podcast creators can craft more targeted, relevant, and engaging content, setting their podcasts apart in a crowded market. However, it’s essential to strike a balance between leveraging technology and maintaining the personal, authentic touch that listeners love. With the right approach, AI and predictive analytics can significantly enhance your podcast content strategy, ensuring your podcast not only survives but thrives in today’s competitive landscape.

Featured Image Credit: Photo by George Milton; Pexels; Thank you!

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In the dynamic world of search marketing, the strategic fusion of organic and paid strategies has emerged as a game-changer for brands seeking unrivaled success in the digital realm. Let’s delve into the realm of integrated search marketing strategies, shedding light on how this powerful alliance is reshaping the landscape and propelling businesses to dominate search engine rankings and drive substantial returns on investment.

Understanding the Force Behind Integrated Search Marketing

Integrated search marketing strategically blends the forces of organic search engine optimization (SEO) and paid search advertising (PPC) to create a potent and synergistic approach. Both organic SEO and PPC individually offer significant value, but when harmoniously integrated, they give rise to a digital powerhouse with multifaceted benefits.

Organic SEO ensures high search engine rankings through targeted keywords, authoritative content, and user-centric optimization, driving valuable organic traffic. In contrast, paid search advertising utilizes sponsored listings to secure prominent placements above organic results, delivering instant visibility and attracting targeted traffic.

In the article “Integrated Search Marketing Strategies: How Organic and Paid Brings Big Success,” Clarity Digital presents an enlightening perspective, revealing the critical secrets behind this transformational strategy. Let’s dive deeper into the insights to understand how this fusion unlocks unparalleled achievements.

1. Dominating Search Visibility: A Competitive Edge

The foremost advantage of integrated search marketing lies in conquering search engine results pages (SERPs). By combining the forces of organic and paid search, businesses can occupy prime real estate on SERPs, ensuring comprehensive visibility that bolsters brand credibility.

Appearing multiple times across the results page instills trust in users and intercepts potential customers at various stages of the purchasing journey, significantly increasing conversion possibilities.

2. Amplifying Keyword Insights for Precision Targeting

Effective keyword research forms the bedrock of any successful search marketing campaign. The amalgamation of organic SEO and PPC offers unique perspectives on valuable keywords, enabling businesses to identify high-performing terms with unparalleled precision.

Organic SEO provides insights into user search behaviors, long-tail keywords, and content-driven queries, while PPC campaigns deliver real-time data on keywords that generate the most clicks and conversions. The combined insights empower businesses to optimize their keyword strategy with extraordinary efficiency.

3. Strengthening Content Strategy through Data-Driven Decisions

Content excellence is a cornerstone of SEO success. Integrated search marketing allows businesses to leverage paid search data to validate the effectiveness of their organic content strategy. By analyzing the performance of PPC ads, companies can gain valuable insights into which ad copy and CTAs resonate most effectively with their target audience.

This data-driven approach strengthens content creation, ensuring alignment with user interests and intent. The result is a fortified content strategy that fosters meaningful engagement at every touchpoint, cultivating brand loyalty and authority.

4. Remarketing: A Second Chance for Enhanced Conversions

The strategic integration of organic and paid search brings remarkable benefits to remarketing campaigns. Remarketing, a powerful tool for re-engaging previous website visitors, becomes even more impactful when combined with organic SEO efforts.

Businesses can deliver personalized ads that align precisely with their interests by targeting users who have interacted with the website through organic search. This integrated approach significantly enhances conversion chances by capitalizing on previous engagements and reinforcing brand recall.

5. Balancing Short-Term Goals with Long-Term Growth

Integrated search marketing optimizes cost efficiency and ROI by balancing short-term objectives and long-term growth. Organic SEO delivers sustainable, enduring benefits but may require time to yield significant results. In contrast, paid search offers immediate visibility at a cost.

When integrated, businesses can capitalize on the advantages of both strategies. They can leverage paid search for initial traction while complementing it with organic SEO for sustainable growth, optimizing overall ROI and mitigating risks associated with over-dependence on any single channel.

Real-World Success Stories: TechWiz and E-CommMart

The transformative potential of integrated search marketing is well exemplified in real-world success stories:

TechWiz: A Tech Startup’s Triumph

TechWiz, an innovative tech startup, faced stiff competition in the tech market. They achieved unprecedented visibility by implementing a comprehensive search marketing strategy that combined organic SEO and paid search advertising.

Their organic search presence surged 300%, while PPC ads garnered an outstanding 40% click-through rate. This synergistic approach catapulted TechWiz to top positions in SERPs, boosting website traffic and lead generation and resulting in a remarkable 120% increase in sales.

E-CommMart: Revamping Online Retail

E-CommMart, an e-commerce giant, sought to enhance its conversion rates. By integrating organic SEO with remarketing campaigns, they targeted users who had abandoned their shopping carts through paid ads.

This strategy yielded a remarkable 70% increase in cart recovery and a subsequent 25% growth in sales. The integrated search marketing approach reconnected E-CommMart with potential customers and amplified ROI on their ad spend.

Conclusion

The Unbeatable Fusion: How Integrated Search Marketing Strategies Catapult Brands to Success

Combining organic and paid search marketing can greatly benefit brands in the digital world. TechWiz and E-CommMart are prime examples of the success that can be achieved through this strategic partnership. This approach increases visibility in search results, enhances content strategy, and generates impressive ROI. By harnessing the power of integrated search marketing, your brand can stand out in the highly competitive digital landscape.

Featured Image Credit: Photo by Caio; Pexels; Thank you!

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The right natural link structure can make all the difference in SEO success. No longer is it just a matter of quantity; quality organic link building is what really counts. In order to get ahead, businesses need to gain an understanding of natural link graphs on the web and how to properly maintain one.

From creating shareable content and obtaining links from diverse sources to closely monitoring performance with SEO tools – there are definitely strategies you’ll want to keep in mind if cultivating top-notch organic linking is your goal.

This guide will discuss key factors that should be respected when attempting to develop a healthy and successful setup for search engines and audiences alike.

Tips for Maintaining a Natural Linkgraph

Source: SEO.co

Quality Content Creation

Creating content of high quality is crucial for building a robust natural link graph. When done properly, it can result in organic backlinks pointing to your website or brand. Quality content encompasses valuable, informative, and shareable pieces and caters to the target audience’s needs or interests.

Writing articles that people genuinely find interesting increases the chances that they might share them with others online, which can lead to potential submission links from directories or blog networks.

Good content can also build a reputation as an industry thought leader or trendsetter by providing unique insights into topics that readers may have otherwise gone underappreciated without contextually relevant perspectives.

In other words – good content leads to more eyeballs, social signals, and referral traffic, all of which must support a sustainable link building strategy.

Outreach and Relationship Building

Outreach and relationship building are essential elements to maintaining an organic link structure. When considering which potential sources to target with outreach, influencers, and prominent sites should always be at the top of the list, as these types of relationships translate into more measurable links than, say, lower-level authors or website owners.

Additionally, it’s important to avoid simply treating these interactions like transactions if you want to invest in sustaining an organic network.

Focus on creating useful and relevant content that will serve both tools organically; aim for longevity over short-term profit opportunities. As you build genuine connections with industry experts, bloggers, ect., open opportunities will present themselves for hosted content and dofollow backlinks – often without having asked.

Guest Blogging with Integrity

Guest blogging is a great way to establish domain authority and garner natural links, but it must be undertaken with integrity for successful SEO.

That means writing high-quality content that adds value without excessive self-promotion or keyword stuffing and only submitting articles on relevant and authoritative websites. It also means connecting in an authentic fashion with influencers, bloggers, and industry experts before asking for potential link exchanges or backlinks.

Building mutually beneficial relationships helps ensure the best chance of getting your content accepted on popular sites in exchange for links or shared posts. By taking the time to ensure you’re presenting yourself well while guest posting, you can maximize its potential SEO benefits by avoiding penalties linked to low-quality link schemes.

Avoiding Black Hat Practices

Black hat techniques involve taking shortcuts with a link building strategy to get quick, unethical SEO results. Avoiding all types of black hat practices is the key to successfully sustaining an organic link structure.

Firstly, stay clear from buying links glaring signals for search engines that a website might be using underhanded tactics for ranking purposes. Also, steer away from automated software and spun content.

Every attempt to game the system only leads to long-term damage in your overall link portfolio as well as greater chances of facing stiff penalties by search engines like Google. Lastly, make each backlink count – only approve high-quality links with higher relevancy values when seeking new and fresh opportunities for acquiring additional healthier anchors into your live portfolio.

Diversification of Link Sources

Diversification of link sources is an important component of maintaining a healthy, natural link graph. This involves obtaining links from different types of websites, such as blogs, forums, directories, news sites, and more.

To truly diversify your link profile, necessary effort must be put into developing relationships with authentic sources all around the web who can provide relevant content or even something as simple as brand mentions which can bring in valuable backlinks.

Furthermore, it’s also crucial to diversify the anchor text for other facets, but this (brand names+ keyword variations.) Doing so will help protect against search engine penalties while still receiving benefits to build up domain authority over time.

Monitoring and Adjusting Your Linkgraph

Utilizing SEO tools to track backlinks

With such a tool, webmasters can easily assess the quality and quantity of links connected to their websites or domains. Furthermore, it allows them to evaluate the effects their link graph progresses are having on authoritative signals and root out potential issues down the road.

By reviewing key metrics such as quantity vs. quality ratio or domain/page authority scorers, marketers can identify opportunities for improvement and detect potentially dangerous links before they cause trouble in search rankings.

Regularly auditing and removing harmful or irrelevant links

Maintaining an organic link structure is essential for successful SEO. As part of the process, regularly auditing existing backlinks and removing any irrelevant or potentially harmful links can have a significant impact on your ranking and website credibility.

Doing so helps to ensure that only relevant and quality websites are linking to yours – within Google’s webmaster guidelines.

Doing regular audits helps you identify toxic links from sources such as black-hat scrapers, comment spam, and low-quality directories, which don’t contribute anything positive to your rankings.

You must proactively manage those shady link schemes coming in by contacting anyone who has linked unethically before they become a problem for your business or website visibility. Removing negative backlinks creates a more naturally shaped backlink profile and ultimately increases SEO potential.

Adapting strategies based on performance and industry trends

Regularly monitoring your link profile allows you to stay informed on which links are helping or hindering SEO progress, as well as keep up with the latest algorithms and updates from search engines.

Having this holistic view enables you to continually adjust your approach in order to obtain only high-quality links that truly benefit the overall SEO score and reach short-term goals. It also encourages diversification of sources since relying solely on manual outreach can open up websites to disavowal regulations by search engines if deemed unchecked.

In employing website evaluation tools for tracking, analysis, and comparison purposes – companies are given valuable insights as to what should be used tactically next for the best results.

Conclusion

Maintaining a healthy and organic link structure is essential for improving search engine rankings and website visibility.

Quality content creation, outreach and relationship building through reputable sources, engaging in ethical guest blogging practices, diversifying the types of websites linked to your page, monitoring and adjusting as needed; each of these factors plays an important part in creating long-term SEO success by enabling your website to foster a natural link graph.

Effectively optimizing what links you choose to engage with can prove beneficial for increasing ROI by exhibiting credibility amongst both search engines and readers alike while garnering great attention from potential customers.

Those passionate about embracing their knowledge into finding solutions that are not only sustainable but also superior should prioritize safeguarding matchless methods enforced by enduring trustworthiness which will all reflect naturally in their link graphs.

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If you use any social media platforms – Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, etc. – you likely know that people are using them to sell items they no longer want or need, from clothing to cars to landscaping materials to furniture to more. Given that there are nearly 5 billion people using social media, it is no surprise there was this progression.

Describing Social Commerce

Social commerce is simply using social media platforms to sell goods and services. Sellers can be individuals or companies.

Although originally conceived to share pics, memes, and photos, a variety of platforms have commerce features built in. That includes TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and Pinterest.

According to Statista, global sales using social media are estimated to be $1.3 trillion in 2023. This is expected to rise to nearly $3 trillion by 2026. Not only are users selling goods and services already but some generations, millennials and Gen Z especially, are using social media platforms as search engines for items they are looking to buy.

Social media selling is incredibly popular in Asian countries. Estimates show that nearly 90% of people in Thailand have purchased from a social media platform. In the UK, 54% of buyers have made a purchase from TikTok and in the United States, 36% of social media users are expected to buy from social media, with these stats also coming from Statista.

The Social Media Shopping Experience

If you’ve spent any amount of time on platforms like TikTok or Instagram, you’ve very likely seen a celebrity of some type, whether an actor or an athlete, promoting a certain product and encouraging you to buy it. In addition, you’ve probably seen digital stores and products on marketplaces and many social media platforms.

Commerce in a Changing World

The pandemic of 2020 changed the way people around the world interact with their environment and how they achieve tasks, and shopping is no exception. It was during this time that influencers discovered live streams, which resulted in their followers shopping for the products they endorse or recommend. This is called entertainment selling and continues to trend throughout the world.

The idea behind entertainment selling is that social media users are exposed to short-form videos that pop up in their feeds or “suggested for you” sections on their social media platforms. The theory is that this targeted marketing promotes faster buying decisions. And, these in-feed videos are targeted to their audience, using machine learning algorithms, so much of the time the products and/or services are relevant to you, increasing the chances that you’ll buy.

Many social media platforms have a “store” tab somewhere that takes you directly to the shopping portion of the application. For example, it’s called “Marketplace” on Facebook and allows you to search for specific items or simply browse the goods and services placed for sale by other users. Another example is the product showcase tab on TikTok that lets users see videos and live streams that promote specific items.

What to Know About Selling on Social Media?

Social media sales are a way for legacy and new businesses to get a brand out there and increase their customer base.

If you are considering expanding your operations to include selling on social media, there are some things to consider.

• Make it easy for buyers. This is your chance to make a good first impression and interact with potential buyers, so make it count. Once they’ve found you, take this chance to send them to your website or storefront so they can purchase your products or services. With a few extra steps, you can make it easy for them to become a customer.
• Build a customer base and a community – you’re putting your brand on social media to reach more potential customers. You want enough interactions to be front of mind, but not too many to cause irritation. Selling on social media is a two-for-one because you engage with your customers and sell to them in the same place.

Statistically, social media is currently one of the best ways to increase brand awareness. Consider that 79 percent of TikTok users discovered new brands on the app, according to a TikTok user survey.

It takes time to build a social media presence and get your goods/services noticed. But, thanks to Fameswap, you can buy established accounts that may contain your target audience.

• Use customer data to improve performance. Most brands make use of social media as a part of their sales and marketing strategy. It turns out that brands that operate on multiple social media platforms are much more successful. This is by as much as 494% higher, according to some estimates.

By analyzing social media data, you can identify which products to showcase and also how to encourage buyers to choose your products over the competition. by using direct messages, targeted ads, or live streams.

Consider This

While there’s definite value to social commerce, it’s best to fully understand how it works to determine if it’s the right choice for your brand. Success depends on finding the right platform with the target audience for your products/services. Success won’t occur for every brand in this way. You’ve got to find the platform where your potential buyers are spending their time.

Whatever platform you choose, remember that you will still face some of the same challenges as opening any other storefront or marketplace. This includes:

• aggregating orders that might happen in a number of different channels,
• where to base fulfillment operations
• how to integrate legacy and digital operations.

A tech expert can help bridge the gap between your traditional methods of selling and your social media selling platforms.

In Conclusion

Selling on social media is an ideal complement to your website. Plus, it opens new channels for buyers to find you and your brand.

Marketing and selling goods on social media makes sense for many brands and businesses. It creates awareness of what you have to offer, can drive your sales, and increase your customer base.  By watching trends, you can improve your marketing to drive further sales and find new customers.

Setting up a shop takes a bit of time and effort at the front end. But, it pays off in dividends once your shop opens. Now is the time to get on board the trend.

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Personalization platforms are a new must-have for all businesses, but sometimes they look like a Christmas tree covered with decorations. To help everyone who has experienced this pain, here is a how-to guide for choosing a retail personalization platform.

In this article, I will share my opinion about why marketing personalization has become so popular, what principles should be followed when choosing a personalization platform, and what a typical decision tree might look like.

Why marketing personalization is so popular

Nobody likes spam and unnecessary offers. However, spam, robotexts, and robocalls will increase dramatically in 2023. If a store makes marketing at least a bit more human by remembering previous purchases and personalized messages, the customers’ attitude towards it changes. This approach is often called “human2human marketing” or “marketing with a human face.” This means: do not spam; do not pressure a buyer; help them make an informed choice based on personalization.

Below is the data I’ve collected on the added revenue from personalized campaigns among Mindbox clients. The dark green bar is the lowest added revenue among the companies in a particular industry. The light green bar is the highest one.

For example, newsletter personalization can add 3-16% in revenue among retailers selling home goods and furniture.

When brands realized the potential of personalization, the marketing tech sector exploded.

The number of martech companies increased from 150 in 2011 to 9.9 thousand in 2022.

There are now so many viable technologies to pick from, each with its own functions and merits.

So, how do you choose the right personalization technologies without losing your mind

Marketing personalization (automation) technology is a complex tool. Be ready for the fact that the preparation and selection of a platform will take longer than implementation.

Here are my top five tips for successful implementation:

1. Formulate the implementation goal: a metric of success and expectations for it. Decide who will use the tool and if such people are in your company.
2. Describe examples of scenarios for using the technology.
3. Decide if you need customer data integration.
4. Estimate the speed of implementation and changes.
5. Estimate the ROI.

Principle 1. Formulate a metric of success and outline your expectations for it

The goal of platform implementation is the most important. If your team cannot agree on a clearly defined goal, you’ll never reach success. So it’s better to postpone the purchase of automation technology until everyone is aligned. Strong goals include success metrics, timelines, and a chain of responsibility that everyone agrees on.

Essential points about the metric

• Agree on the method of calculation. Make sure that it is challenging to simulate its achievement without seeing real benefits.
• Formulate expectations for the metric. A metric without expectations doesn’t work.

For example, the team implements a website personalization technology and makes a statement about success: Conversion has increased by 0.5%. What is this measured against? Is this a large or small amount?

Examples of bad or ineffective metrics

• Revenue growth from an email channel measured by Google Analytics’ last-click attribution model

This metric is easy to inflate: improve the campaign design and the number of emails sent. Sometimes this is precisely what is hidden behind flashy terms like “growth hacking.” You will receive more orders attributed to the email channel using this metric.

The reason for the apparent growth in this case is traffic redistribution. Customers will often visit the website using a link from an email with a new design rather than typing a URL or using a search engine.

The changes may not affect the turnover and marginality of the business.

• Share of customers who are members of the loyalty program or a higher average order value from members of the loyalty program

Real-life example: A chain of canteens inside business centers has implemented a loyalty program. Both metrics show excellent growth, but the company’s turnover and revenue are not increasing. Why is this happening?

The problem is that no new customers have appeared in the canteens since people from the outside simply cannot get there. The same employees from the same business centers continue to go to the canteens that they used to go to before. Only now, the audience has been divided into layers—people who spent more money registered in the loyalty program first. As a result, both metrics look rather good.

The number of program participants is growing, and the average check per participant is higher than for ordinary customers. However, there are no real benefits for the business. Moreover, there are drawbacks. The marginality of sales fell because regular customers began to buy at a discount.

Look at examples of good metrics

The examples below qualify as good measurements because it’s easy to quantify the results and challenging to inflate or misrepresent them.

• Revenue or margin growth

United Colors of Benetton used this metric and looked at segment creation, increase in conversions and average order value to measure progress. INCANTO looked at automated recommendations based on consumer behavior to track this.

• Decreasing costs

Reducing the company’s workload is the primary thing that affects this metric, as shown in the cases of Burger King and Olant. Another factor that impacts these results is reducing total marketing costs, see United Colors of Benetton.

• Increasing transparency and rate of change

Here, the use of control groups and the number of new monthly campaigns are the two main factors that can influence this goal. Flower delivery service Blossom Flower Delivery leveraged both of these to get real, quantifiable data to improve their processes.

Examples of well-defined goals

Examples of ineffective goals

Such goals in practice can mean that the team or a particular marketer does not really understand what to do.

Principle 2. Describe use cases

Are you familiar with the situation in the table below?

This is a classic situation when a large company tries to compare several technologies. Sometimes completely different ones. A giant table is created, sometimes containing several hundred lines, where different departments enter their functionality “wish list.”

Unfortunately, the final decision about which platform to use is often left to the people who are either too busy or unqualified. As a result, they fill out comparative tables based on shallow information like basic presentations or site descriptions. Sometimes they even ask contractors to fill out the tables for them.

However, even in a best-case scenario where everyone is qualified, does great research and creates a high-quality table, there’s still a high probability that it won’t lead to a good choice.

Business Examples of Well Define Goals and Metrics

Imagine you are an advanced marketer: You want to build RFM segments and launch targeted campaigns and promotions based on them. This requires technology, so you decide to do a side-by-side comparison of platforms that each perform very different overall functions:

• One is a gateway for email campaigns;
• Another is a niche technology, such as a big data trigger service;
• The third is a marketing automation system.

When you look at the line “Ability to send campaigns by RFM segments,” all three are marked “yes.” Thus, at first glance, it seems the question of choice comes down to price.

However, there’s a problem: What did they really mean by “Yes?”

1. The specialists presenting the gateway for email campaigns assumed that you would collect data on your side, clean it up, segment it, then send a list of email addresses, newsletter templates, and related data to the gateway for each segment.
2. Colleagues from the big data trigger platform meant they would utilize their programmers according to your wishes, e.g., writing a code that segments data and sends campaigns.
3. The employees of the marketing automation platform meant that their task was to provide a user-friendly design interface in which your marketer would build segments and launch campaigns with a manager who would help integrate and use the platform.

Therefore, you need to decide whether a particular technology suits you based on an assessment of use cases and not on functionality comparisons.

What if you formulate the “wish list” in the form of a workflow

Workflow 1: Our programmers developed a system that counts RFM. I just want to email address lists corresponding to the desired segments.

Solution: An inexpensive email gateway is better suited for the workflow.

Workflow 2: I want to try making targeted campaigns for RFM segments, but I don’t really understand what effect it will give or how it should be done, and I definitely won’t do it by myself.

Solution: You need an agency or a niche service that will quickly and cheaply do everything for you ‒ with a certain degree of transparency.

Workflow 3: I regularly recalculate and edit RFMs. The segment is used for email, SMS, mobile push notifications, and promotions. Each time a new marketing mechanic is launched takes a lot of time from analysts and programmers; it just doesn’t make sense!

Solution: An automation platform is needed here.

A list of workflows (future marketing campaigns) is critically important for making a conscious choice.

Ask potential candidate platforms to do the following:

• Evaluate workflows that are important to you and show implementation in each platform (for example, in a trial version). This way you will understand which product is suitable for your tasks. After, you can filter out companies that cannot help you conveniently or effectively reach your goals.
• Provide contacts of three to five companies (ideally from your industry) that have already implemented similar workflows on the chosen platform. Make sure that your needs are likely to be achieved based on their experience.

I have also prepared a list of essential things to consider when choosing an automation platform.

Principle 3. Think about data integration

Companies that sell their products across online and offline outlets or use several different channels of communication with their customers face a problem called “data integration.”

Customer information is spread piecemeal across several systems and databases, often with considerable overlap.

Buyers’ personal data, behavioral data, purchase history, and promotional points are stored in any or all of the following locations:

• The accounting system of retail points of sale;
• The website database;
• The platform for managing commodity promotions and bonus points;
• The CRM.
• Email services: campaigns, open rate, click rate, emails;
• Gateways: SMS, push notifications with similar data;
• The website: views of products and categories, cart, tags;
• Google Analytics: traffic sources, sessions, tags;
• Call center systems;
• Niche personalization services: your own specific pieces of data.

Synchronization of all of this is not a trivial exercise

First, you have to cleanse and unify customer data. This process should consider possible errors and typos in the full name, cities, and addresses, and the confirmation of contact information (email and phone number). It must also be secure so that when combining the two records, access to the account with the loyalty program bonus points does not get into another person’s hands.

Next, relevant information from different systems should be collected, classified, and merged around this “cleansed” record, e.g., what product a person clicked on in the email, what they looked at on the website, what they bought in the end, how much it cost, how they used bonus points, and so on.

Changing data for a specific person

Ideally, when changing data for a specific person, it is necessary to recalculate the segments they were previously placed in and use common sense when changing communications tactics. For example, after combining duplicates in the database, two supposedly different customers who made a single purchase may now be a single loyal customer with a much higher average order value. This is good news for you, but you do not want to immediately send them an email with promotions and discounts on expensive goods if they received completely different offers to one of their accounts before that.

All of this should work in real-time on large amounts of data (hundreds of millions of events for an average retailer), and it should be possible to manage external systems such as gateways or website personalization technologies.

Data cleansing

Data cleansing and unification (and its sequences for business) is a complex thing from a technical, marketing, and business point of view. Because of this, data integration and systems often don’t receive the attention needed. Instead, businesses simultaneously buy and launch separate niche personalization services, which leads to chaos.

All of the above systems should coexist in harmony with one another

Do you regularly face the following situations?

• You get an offer to buy something at a promotional price, but when you click on the link, you find out, “Oh, this promotion is not available for online customers.”
• You cannot use bonus points from the loyalty program on the website.
• You receive campaigns promoting products that are out of stock, or the prices in the email don’t correspond to the actual ones.
• The store is chasing you with retargeting and social media ads, even though you’ve already bought the product from the store.
• You receive conflicting offers in different channels: for example, a discount in an email, and at the same time a “buy one, get one free” (BOGO) campaign via SMS.

All these are different manifestations of “integration chaos.”

Algorithms

The second, less obvious consequence of ignoring the importance of data is how it affects the usefulness of the algorithms, big data, and neural networks that so many rely on. Algorithms and big data are susceptible to data quality. If you feed them with fragmented and unclean data, the results will be fragmented, messy, and unusable.

The highest efficiency of automated product recommendations, for example, from Amazon, is associated with a large array of uniform, clean, and reliable data that the retailer has collected for many years.

Data integration is the cornerstone of meaningful and effective personal marketing. Without it, there is no point in investing in personalization tools – the result will likely be random.

The problem of effective data integration is so essential that a separate class of platforms to solve this problem was created: the CDP, or customer data platform. In the United States, the market for such systems is one of the fastest-growing, with the CDP Institute forecasting CDP industry revenue will reach $2.3 billion in 2023.

Therefore, if you are:

• A company with online and offline points of sale;
• Using several channels of communication with customers;
• Building a complex, personalized communication, and discount scheme;
• Planning to actively use big data algorithms;

Data integration is essential

Be sure to take time to evaluate the CDP functionality on the platforms you are going to choose. Information on how to consider your options can be taken from this file.

As for interesting resources that talk about CDP (and where there is a directory of platforms, for example), I recommend cdpinstitute.org.

One of the relatively new trends in this industry is the emergence of integrated Customer Engagement Platforms (such as Mindbox). Platforms solve not only the problem of centralizing data, but also include marketing engagement tools. Such a products can significantly reduce the cost of marketing technology and accelerate the marketing team’s productivity by streamlining time-to-market hypotheses and new workflows.

Principle 4: Evaluate the speed of implementation and change – TTM

Time-to-market (ТТМ) is a metric of the speed o f implementation and the “ease” of managing changes in the solution.

One of the largest companies in Eastern Europe uses a German enterprise marketing management system. The transactional email the brand’s online store sends after placing an order is simple text, very primitive, and without any kind of personalization. As we now know, the reason for this is not poor marketing.

To personalize this email, the platform needs to be improved. However, modifications can only be purchased from a system integrator company. The approximate work estimate is $44,000 with a six-month lead time.

Time-to-market changes in the example above are not acceptable.

Unfortunately, this is a classic situation with implementing enterprise solutions according to a technical assignment. One person made the decision, the technical assignment was written by someone else, and a third person implemented these decisions.

Ultimately, specialists who have to use the implementation results find themselves alone with a clumsy monster that has lagged behind the real state of affairs for a couple of years and an integrator company that builds its business on change requests.

The ability to adapt

One of the most critical aspects of personalized marketing is the ability to adapt quickly.  Fashion retailer 12 STOREEZ provides an excellent example of this approach by frequently conducting A/B tests to improve engagement and key metrics. For instance, one test revealed that addressing customers by name in push notifications did not enhance their response rates, contrary to the team’s prior assumptions.

Marketers should be free to take independent action without relying too much on IT, analysts, approval processes, or work plans. This enables them to pivot quickly and seize opportunities as they arise.

RFM segment example

Let’s go back to the RFM segment example and try to understand how it can influence the choice in terms of TTM changes.

The first situation: RFM is calculated by internal development; an email gateway sends newsletters

• To change the logic, you must involve developers: ticket, technical assignment, deadlines, money, project management.
• Pain and suffering

The second situation: RFM is programmed somewhere within a niche solution like a big data trigger service or implemented by an agency

• Changes cost time and money;
• Fast but not flexible;
• The cycle of change is relatively slow;
• Not always transparent;
• Acceptable with restrictions.

The third situation: Marketing Automation Platform

• The logic is rebuilt in the platform interface in just a few minutes;
• A smart marketer is needed (surprise!);
• The fastest, most transparent, and flexible way to manage changes;
• More expensive if we compare only the price of the technology without taking into account the costs of development, project management, etc.

Principle 5. Estimate ROI

So, we have completed all of the previous steps: We formulated a goal and expectations for it,  developed a preliminary scenario and chosen a suitable platform (including CDP) with an acceptable TTM for implementation and changes. We now have to assess ROI.

To estimate ROI

• Summarize expectations by implementation metrics (revenue, savings, speed);
• Estimate costs for platform and integration resources;
• Estimate the costs of people who will use the platform and help achieve the result;

I believe it is risky to implement technologies with integration time frames of six months or longer before any chance of seeing benefits or with a return horizon of more than a year.

This is because:

• By the time the implementation is ready, the current use cases are likely to change significantly.
• There is a high risk of changing the marketing team, potentially bringing a radical new approach. During the trial period, a new team is unlikely to want to deal with a large and complex legacy project from the previous team.
• If the integration assessment period for launching the first scenario is several months, then expect surprises. Most likely, the implementation period delays at least twice (this is not a joke).

Bad example of estimated ROI

One of our clients, a mid-sized retail company, has been trying to implement a marketing automation platform for the second year in a row.

• After the start of implementation, it turned out that they underestimated the amount of data integration work that the retailer had to do on its own. As a result, the customer’s development team has been working for almost a year.
• During the integration period, the retailer’s costs increased. This is because there is a need to pay for both the integrated platform and the current services.

The direct and indirect switching costs start from $500,000 to a million or more.

From an outside perspective, this is a symptom of an insufficiently developed implementation solution.

On the other hand, it may well turn out that there is a plan. For example, to use the platform to increase site conversion by 2%. Then, the economy of implementation will most likely look very good.

A good example of the estimate of ROI

A company that completed all the steps listed above is Blossom Flower:

• The team set out clear goals: launch direct marketing communications, set up automated reminders for existing customers, and acquire new leads using pop-ups.
• The marketing department proposed workflows and ideas. After they implemented it during a demo, they also assessed integration risks.
• The team assessed the chosen platform to ensure sufficient data integration functionality for their goals.
• Calculated ROI.

Results

• 426% ROI within the first five weeks
• Nine workflows with 38 automated campaigns launched, along with behavior-based lead capture pop-ups
• +200,000 “lost” customers

Decision tree:

Step-by-step scheme for decision-making and technology choice

Final thought

Choosing the right personalization platform for retail marketing can be a daunting task. With so many technologies available and each one offering different features and benefits, it can be challenging to determine which one is the best for your business.

However, by following the right principles and taking the necessary steps to prepare for implementation, you can ensure a successful outcome. This includes setting clear implementation goals and metrics, defining use cases for the technology, integrating and cleansing data, evaluating the speed of implementation and changes, and estimating the ROI.

Ultimately, personalization can greatly benefit your business. Provide proper marketing that doesn’t spam or pressure buyers, increasing revenue, customer loyalty, engagement, and satisfaction.

Featured Image Credit: Photo by Canva Studio; Pexels; Thank you!

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