SigmaWay Blog

In market research, it is observed, quite frequently that when the research is undertaken by paid bodies, they have a tendency to skew the data, for the company's favor, which may not be healthy for the company in the long run. Hence more and more companies are turning to, undergraduate or graduate marketing students who are unpaid and usually furnish unbiased information, as their main interest lies in gaining knowledge about the industry, learning about research analysis and developing presentation skills. Companies are preferring the fresh outlook of students, guided by proper mentors. Read more at:

http://www.cmswire.com/customer-experience/is-college-the-key-to-better-market-research/

In this information era, marketing is all about information and content marketing is an important part of marketing strategy because it provides a foundation for leveraging other marketing channels. For example: social media marketing is one of the best ways to reach leads, but what will happen if you don't have a content to post in a social media account? According to Sarah Goliger (Inbound Marketer at HubSpot), content marketing is a long-term strategy. Tips to manage content marketing:

• Plan ahead
• Write evergreen content
• Promote evergreen content
• Leverage older content for new conversions

To know more about content marketing and its importance, please follow this link: http://www.business2community.com/content-marketing/how-campaign-based-content-will-kill-your-marketing-strategy-01238559

An idea can also be marketable just like any product or service and if executable properly, then can also be as valuable. Skilled people who sells idea often are called earn buy-in, which helps in increasing funds. A good salesperson specifies about the product they are selling to solve customer's pains. Likewise, by knowing an idea well enough, one should establish a stronger bond between what they are selling and what audience needs through conversation. To know more read the article at: http://www.cmswire.com/cms/social-business/the-art-of-selling-an-idea-029138.php 

A well-known tractor maker company in US, is also a front-line innovator. This company has incorporated integrated software, network connectivity and data gathering sensors into tractor hardware. It is a perfect example of digital transformation in a much needed field, but yet, least expected of such transformation, till now. Digital transformation should be the heart of every business, whose sole purpose is to improve the existing business philosophies of the firm. Read more at:

http://www.cmswire.com/customer-experience/digital-transformation-your-key-to-survival/

In an age, where a large proportion of email opens are done via mobile devices, marketers should consider responsive design, which allows them to control the email display, according to the size of the viewer's screen, adding flexibility to the content display of the mail. Email marketing solution providers are there to help. Pre-send testing is important, which makes sure that the messages look as good as desired across all devices ranging from tablets, mobile phones and desktops. To know more, please follow the article by Akin Arikan (Contributing Author) at:http://www.cmswire.com/cms/digital-marketing/the-age-of-mobile-moves-from-static-to-dynamic-029255.php

"Your strategies and budget on business technology agenda-technologies, systems, and processes to win, serve and retain customers"- Kyle McNabb (Vice President of Research Strategy at Forrester Research). In the age of customer era, all B2C organizations need to find ways to meet the needs of the customers.  They are also forming customer-obsessed operating model which focuses on customer loyalty, innovation and growth.

In his article “Building A Customer-Obsessed Operating Model,” suggested some ways to make a customer obsessed operating model:
• Investment in new skills like analytics and big data.
• Rethink your process and try to apply agile in your entire organization.
• Re-engineer your systems.
• Modify governance.
• Transformation of organizational culture into more customer-oriented culture.
Read more at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/forrester/2015/05/26/building-a-customer-obsessed-operating-model/

Thanks to enhanced campaigns, the role of paid search has been changing. Paid search helps to expand company's footprint on a search engine result pages and increases visibility as consumers often cast their eye towards the largest visual element when we go through a website. With new technology and devices like laptops, tablets and smartphones marketers must plan ads in a way that it reaches the consumers in the search context that the they prefer. Users set ads to appear according to three general events:  

• The time of day when the customer conducts a search       
• The device type on which the consumer is accessing the search     
• The location in which the ad is served 

The benefit is streamlining campaign so that ads that used to require separate campaigns, can now be handled in a single campaign. Marketers can increase campaign bids during the times of day when customers are more likely to search for a product. Enhanced campaigns has not only benefitted marketers but also the customer as their convenience is taken into account. Read more at: 

http://www.cmswire.com/cms/analytics/maximizing-your-enhanced-marketing-campaigns-029244.php 

Digitalization revolution is forcing organizations to change or review their organization processes and strategies. Jay Scanlan (Strategy leader of McKinsey Digital) in his Mckinsey article talks about some questions which an organization should ask at the time of introducing digitalization into their organizations:
• Whether your current business model is viable, or do you need to fundamentally change the nature of how you compete in the marketplace?
• Do you need to transform your core business-as-usual organization rapidly, or you can afford to build new businesses and the new capabilities required to compete and win over the next 10 to 15 years?
• How many new functional capabilities do you need to grow and develop, and how much do you need to change your existing supply chains, your existing operational capabilities, and your existing channel architecture to be more effective?
And to introduce digitalization, you need to rethink on your resource allocation and budgeting strategies. To know more about the benefits of digitalization and how digitalizing is changing strategy, please follow this link: http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/strategy/how_digital_is_changing_strategy

According to successful CEOs and marketing experts, the survival of any business in the near future will rely on maintaining close relationships with customers. In this competitive and dynamic world, the ability to predict, adapt and change are the basic necessity for organization’s survival. According to Shawn Casemore (President and Founder of Casemore and Co Inc.), there are three fundamental areas of business that affect the profitability of any organization are:
• Customers
• Market
• Employees

 But for the growth and long-term survival of an organization, they need a close relationship with their customers. Three steps to create a close relationship with your customers are:

• Shift away from a functional mentality.
• Build offerings that deliver value.
• Tune into customer feedback.
To know more about these steps and professional view regarding marketing, please follow this link: http://www.industryweek.com/customer-relationships/increase-profits-creating-closer-customer-connections

According to a recent study, 50% of the consumers believe that their brands are clueless about how to reach them and only one in three customers believe that their brand understands them. According to Bill Carmody (CEO of Trepoint), the best way to understand the customer is by emotional intelligence. Emotional Intelligence refers to the ability to perceive, control and evaluate emotions. It is about being real, authentic and intuitive and also helps to develop digital marketing campaigns. Here are some tactics to implement emotional intelligence in digital marketing campaign:
• Understand your audience by using social listening tools such as Topsy, Hootsuite and Social Mention.
• Add value to customers rather than simply pushing your agenda. Adding value includes finding ways to enhance and improve the customer’s experience.
• Try to attract customers by thinking beyond benefits and features.
• Think ways to surprise or delight your audience rather than creeping them. This can be done by using predictive analysis.
• Respect when retargeting.
Read more at: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/246390

The increasing importance of digital marketing is forcing every organization to use digital marketing. Here are some tips for organizations which are planning to use digital marketing:

·         Hire someone who has knowledge about digital marketing or learn how to use digital marketing.

·         There are various ways to analyze digital marketing, but some of them may suit you or some not. It is important to keep on trying new ways.

·         The best type of digital advertising reaches its audience by consent. Maintain a link between consistent efforts and spamming.

·         Try to make your advertising, mobile-friendly because mobile revolution is the next revolution.

·         There are various tools that allow for a do-it-yourself approach and leverage content across platforms.

Read more at: http://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/051215/dos-donts-digital-marketing.asp

Millennials are the young adult between the age group of 18-34 years and according to reports total buying power will fetch $1.3trillion annually.  Millennials are diverse in terms of attitude, behavior and language, due to which marketers are facing problem in targeting them. According to Sujan Patel (Entrepreneur and Marketer, VP of Marketing at When I Work), there are some common characteristics shared by all of them. He discussed some tips on targeting millennials, they are:
• You should have an attractive mobile marketing
• Target social groups, instead of life stages
• Be relevant and engaging
To know more about these tips, please follow this link: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/246199

In this competitive world, most of the organizations are struggling to attract customers. They are advertising on TV, newspaper, billboards. But, they are not getting success.  Here are some successful marketing strategies used to target the right customer at the right place and at the right time are:

·         Content marketing is one of the most powerful marketing strategies. This includes articles on website, e-newsletters, videos and articles on other website.

·         Make advertisement look visually good by adding pictures. According to a recent survey by Hubspot A/B, images used in tweets increase clicks by 36%, increase retweets by 41%, increase in leads by 55%, and increase visit by 31%.

·         Use responsive design, website technology for detecting the customer’s device and providing reformatted website according to the screen size.

·         For transparency, use social media marketing.

·         And at last, try to relate with target customers.

To know please follow this link:  http://www.business2community.com/online-marketing/competitors-arent-01222954

According to Enza Lannopollo (Researcher at Forrester), "organizations ability to protect the customer's privacy is the building block of trust and long-term relationship." According to the Mobile Ecosystem Forum (MEF) annual research report surveyed 15000 respondents, about 49% of respondents say that lack of trust limits them from downloading the app, 72% of the respondents are not happy with sharing personal data and 34% of the respondents say that lack of trust stops them from buying online apparels.
This shows that trust is one of the most important factors while buying, downloading or sharing personal data on mobile apps. Craig Piezle (executive director of the Online Trust Alliance), offered 9tips for making an effective transparency process:
1. Communicate the value to the consumer.
2. Have a clear and concise privacy policy written for the customers, not for your legal team.
3. Provide the ability for consumers to opt out.
4. Restrict any sharing with third parties.
5. Have a lawyer’s privacy policy with icons.
6. Consider having privacy policies written in multiple languages.
7. Define your retention practices.
8. Move from a compliance mindset to stewardship.
9. Embrace doesn’t track.
To know more about the benefits of using transparency and why transparency is important in today’s customer driven society. Read an article “Big Data: Protecting Privacy Is Good For Business” by Pam Baker (Author of Data Divination: Big Data Strategies) at: http://www.informationweek.com/software/enterprise-applications/big-data-protecting-privacy-is-good-for-business/a/d-id/1320367

It was found that, 59% of CMO's who use technology strategy, depends on marketing ops for tools, analytics, process and metrics. According to Scott Vaughan (CMO of Integrate), marketing operation (marketing Ops) focuses on customer acquisition. The marketing operations function has emerged due to the need for a more transparent, efficient, and accountable view of marketing. Its growth was driven by the proliferation of marketing technology and increased pressure from the C-suite to prove the value of marketing and contribute to the bottom-line. The Marketing Ops role is increasing in today’s world, so, some tips for Marketing Ops leaders. They are as under:
Tip 1# Lead process change by organizing around the customers: Look at your current marketing plan, technology, process and resources.
Tip 2# Drive decisions based on governed data: Apply data governance to improve quality.
Tip 3# Shape the marketing technology infrastructure: Identifying and applying right technology.
Read more at: http://marketingland.com/marketings-new-customer-nerve-center-marketing-operations-127292

In this digital world, continuous innovation in marketing is very important to have a competitive advantage. The traditional ways of marketing are no longer effective, but marketers need to build engaging ads to attract customers, which leads to the development of touchpoint marketing. Touchpoint marketing aims to build a contextual customer experience across every online and offline touchpoint. This approach can help in building loyalty and engagement of customers.

Here are some tips to make touchpoint marketing effective:

• Create an emotional customer experience.
• Move from linear marketing to the customer life cycle.
• Shift from personalized campaigns to contextual interactions.

To know more about touch point marketing, read the article link “touchpoint marketing helps you stay connected with customers” by Patrick Tripp (Senior Product Marketing Manager for Adobe Campaign) at: http://www.cmswire.com/cms/digital-marketing/touchpoint-marketing-helps-you-stay-connected-to-customers-029110.php

iGen or  Generation Z is the generation who has been born in digitalization age with smart phones in the hands. iGen is independent, stubborn, pragmatic and always in a rush. Marketers are facing problem in understanding their interest, hobbies and attitude. Gen Z wants to know everything about a product before buying. They trust friends, strangers over advertisements, blogs or information on the net. In an article by Joan Schneider (CEO of Schneider Associates), shares some tips on how to market iGeneration:

·         Personalize Everything.

·         Connect with them through social media.

·         Be strategic with advertisement.

·         Excite I Generation with content.

·         Use mobile to reach I Generation.

Marketers also need to be social, transparent and personal with this generation. To know more about this generation read an article “How to market to the Generation I” by Joan Schneider at: https://hbr.org/2015/05/how-to-market-to-the-igeneration

Every businessman wants to enter into new market for growth or better opportunities, but most of the time they won't able to succeed because of competition. An article by Samit Varma (CEO of Pizza Studio), discusses about three components which can help organization to enter into the new market:

·         Focus on consumer impact: Provide high quality, consistent product. People buy products based on their initial experience, so try to make a positive impression. Customer satisfaction is the only key for success.

·         Allow for customization: Today’s customers believe in customization, so to succeed in new market an entrepreneur need to provide customized product with quick delivery.

·         Streamline for predictability: Consistency in operations is very important for timely delivery of products. Implementing forecasting and planning can help entrepreneurs.

Read more at:   http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245813

In today's world, brands need to stand out and do something different. So, a new concept has come up. It is the concept of placing your brand in a subscription box.  Subscription box is a box that is received by subscribers periodically and contains products and samples. They can be used for customized market research and provides information about products and packaging. According to Euromonitor International, using subscription boxes will help to retain customers. Using this subscription box can reduce your marketing expenditure and help a company to reach a national audience, increase social traffic and sales. To know more about subscription box and its benefits, read the article linked by Aihui Ong (Founder and CEO of lovewithfood.com) at:  http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/245753

According to Chris Golec (founder and CEO of Demandbase), innovations in marketing technology are solving many critical issues of B2B marketers. These innovations are taking place in advertising, personalization, conversion and measurement which are helping marketers in driving and engaging present and potential customers. Future of B2B is maintaining continuous and long term relationships with customers. Three areas where innovation in B2B taking place:

• Accounting Based Marketing (ABM): It provides a vital strategy for companies that want to create sustainable growth and profitability within their most important client accounts. ABM focuses explicitly on individual client accounts and their needs. More importantly, it is a collaborative approach that engages sales, marketing, delivery, and key executives toward achieving the client’s business goals.

• “Always-on” advertising & subscription model: B2B organizations need to advertise on a regular basis and for attracting right companies, you need to have the right content on your website.

• Best of breed vs. Single vendor: Best of breed is better because it provides best solutions for each problem.

Read more at: http://venturebeat.com/2015/04/30/the-future-of-b2b-marketing/