They say, Content is King of a Digital Marketing Strategy but Engagement is Queen. And clearly, the lady runs the house!
Saying that Search Engine Marketing in India , undermines the role of SEO in increasing visibility and engagement would be stretching the truth too far. As one of the leading providers of Search Engine Marketing Services in India, we at UrsDigitally understand the crucial role Search Engine Optimization plays in leveraging your content. You could have a robust Content strategy in place, but it can still fail to turn the right heads if your SEO efforts fall short.
Let’s look at these 15 almost-shocking SEO Statistics for 2021 to understand once and for all the decisive role SEO plays in running your Digital Strategy ship:
Over 58% of B2B marketeers agree that SEO generates more leads than any other marketing initiative.
When it comes to B2B SEO strategies, the focus is largely on keywords that decision makers most often search for while they are brainstorming. There are apps and tools that can analyse and rank these keywords based on how effective they can be for Search Engine Marketing lists.
72% of online marketeers describe content marketing as their most effective SEO tactic.
Content is extremely crucial to step up your SEO game. A well-updated content strategy for your website is crucial for acing the SEO checklist. When your content is customized as per target group, you create the image of a brand that is sensitive and caring towards consumer needs.
At UrsDigitally, we follow a content strategy for each month that is created based on extensive research about emerging trends. We are living in the information age. When your consumers have valuable takeaways from interacting with your content, meaningful exchanges are created that goes a long way in building brand faith.
70-80% of people ignore paid search results.
Clearly, people rely more on organic search results because they seem more authentic. There is no shortcut to increase your organic search ranks except following the foolproof SEO strategy.
Bounce rates increase by 50% if your website takes 2 extra seconds to load.
The new Google Search algorithm also specifies that website loading speed is one of the most crucial factors that determine your website SEO score. Higher the bounce rates, lower are your website rankings.
Conversion rates fall by 12% for every extra second that your website takes to load.
Once again, a slow website is the millstone around the neck of your SEO strategy. Even one unresponsive page could lower your website rankings by scores.
87% of smartphone users hit search engine results at least once a day.
The sheer vastness of this statistics should you spur you on to consolidate your SEO strategy.
Almost 40% of users who are viewing your website in mobile mode will leave if it takes more than 3 seconds to load.
We are in the mobile era and optimizing your website for mobile devices should be atop your priority list.
By the third quarter of 2020, almost 60% of website traffic came from mobile devices. Desktops and tablets would be contributing to the rest. You can easily imagine how much you would be losing out on by ignoring mobile optimisation.
Writing long-form content is mostly better than writing 500-word blog articles.
From keyword-density to detailed informative highlights, longer blog articles that provide readers value for their time will surely help you up the SEO ladder.
So why do we focus on long-form content? An informative, well-researched article is just the thing needed to hold the gaze of the information-hungry consumer. That’s how you get visitors to spend longer time on your website, contributing to higher rankings. You provide your visitors with valuable takeaways while your website gets the much-needed leverage.
61% of mobile searchers are most likely to contact a business that has a mobile-friendly website.
A quick, specific, and mobile-optimized website is often the first impression that lays the ground for your future interactions with the brand.
When we updated our UrsDigitally website with floating mobile icons for Whatsapp and Call, the number of potential client inquiries increased by over 60%! Most of these were high-potential leads which got converted thereafter. A mobile-friendly website can easily do wonders to your conversion rates.
75% of people never scroll past the first page of search engine results.
Ranking! Ranking! Ranking! As you can see, all your SEO guides can not help but fixate on your rankings quite as much as Indian parents of youngsters appearing for competitive examinations! It is common knowledge that users rarely make it to the second page of search engine results. Turns out only 0.78% of searchers actually click on results from the second page.
81% of people make some kind of online research before making a large purchase.
Therefore, fix your SEO checklist, use lots of user-generated content, showcase positive customer feedback to ensure that your products are attracting their gaze.
47% of customers view 5-6 content pieces created by a company before talking to a salesman from the company.
The style and tone of your content matters a lot when it comes to Search Engine Marketing. When visitors engage positively with your content, it invariably boosts your rankings. Not to mention, good content also raises the panache quotient of your organisation and creates a strong dynamic brand presence.
When it comes to conversions, leads from search engines have a 14.6% success rate while outbound leads record only 1.8%.
Leads from organic search always have higher chances of conversion. For your consumers, organic search results seem genuine, authentic, and unaffected. On the other hand, cold-calling, email marketing, and other such efforts have resulted in only 1.8% successful conversions. It is therefore little wonder that leading edge Search Engine Marketing Services in India are in so much demand.
69.7% of Search queries contain four words or more.
You might have been hearing the buzzword ‘keyword phrases’ being juggled around a lot. Well, this is the reason behind it. Identify the most trending keywords, use the various tools available, and target keywords that will fetch you real time results.
90.63% of pages get no organic search traffic from Google.
It only takes so much for brands to slip into ‘digital darkness.’ Without the right inbound efforts (SEO, Blog Content,) your brand could easily slip into a digital marketeer’s worst nightmare.
The more backlinks a page has, the more organic traffic it attracts from Google.
Inbound links often attract the traffic of other pages to your page as well. But backlinks should be added to the content judiciously. There should be a specific strategy to adding backlinks rather than a random scattered approach.
92.42% of keywords get ten monthly searches or even less.
Clearly, the volume of search is based on a small segment of keywords alone. This is the sole reason why keyword analysis is of vital importance.
Around 8% of search queries are phrased as questions.
While decision makers are brainstorming options and ideas, it makes sense that they submit their searches phrased as questions.
The #1 result in Google’s organic search results has an average CTR of 31.7%.
Be it ads or your website, understanding the CTR (Click Through Rate) is of primary importance while analysing any kind of strategy success.
51% of smartphone users have discovered a new product or a new company while conducting searches on their smartphones.
The mobile generation feels more comfortable browsing on their mobiles. Therefore, making your website mobile ready has to rank highest in your SEO priority list.
Hopefully, this comprehensive list has abated any doubts you might have had regarding the importance of SEO in fuelling strategy success.
Over 69% of digital experiences begin with a search engine! Most simply put, Search Engine Marketing is used to increase the visibility of websites in search engine results. Battle-proofing your technical SEO is the safest armour you can don on to optimize your rankings. Technical SEO covers all the technical requirements that a website needs to stay optimized for modern search engines.
Technical SEO includes components such as rendering, crawling, indexing, and website architecture. At UrsDigitally, one of the leadingSEO Service Providers in India, we know how much first impressions matter. That is why every aspect of your technical SEO, from ideal URLs to site structure needs to be perfectly arranged to ace search engine rankings.
This 9-step master guide is here to help you fortify your technical SEO checklist:
Cut down on Dynamic URL strings
Static URLs for the win! One of the key steps of strengthening your SEO is to use static URLs instead of dynamic ones. Static URLs contain the targeted keywords and are more user-friendly by default.
Creating XML sitemaps for Search Engines
An XML sitemap is a list of your site’s URLs that can help search engines find your site’s pages more easily. This sitemaps also help in helping search engines choose canonical URLs on your site.
Avoid superfluous words and characters in your URL
Using superfluous conjunctions and prepositions in your URL is a big no-no. Avoid any superfluity within your URL that can steal focus off the main point. Even repetition of keywords should be avoided.
Use Mobile-first Indexing
With the Mobile revolution on the rise, you need to ensure that your site is fully responsive and mobile optimized. Search consoles can be used to beta-test the desktop and mobile versions of your website.
Enable HTTPs for your website
Onboarding the HTTPs bandwagon is a crucial step in ensuring that viewers trust your website. The lock pad on your address bar reassures the viewer and provides the much-needed sense of security.
Regularly safe check links on your site
If you want your website to fare well in Search Engine Marketing, the key step is to remove broken or dead links from your site. Ensure that your internal links are functional and redirection links are taking you to the right pages.
Use Webmaster Tools such as Google Search Console
Search consoles help in chalking out the status of your websites. From mobile usability issues to website traffic, search consoles monitor everything to help you analyze and fix the issues.
Optimize your Robots.txt
Want to know how the robots.txt text file is important? It is the one that directs and gives instructions to websites as to which pages of your websites to crawl and add to the index. You need to minimize the chance of false blockings that might affect your Search Engine Marketing results.
Optimizing the Navigation and Website structure
Last but not the least, while optimizing your URL structure and link audits, you can not ignore the importance of a congruous website structure. Google ranks your website based on its structure and ease of navigation. You need to take that into account while evaluating website functionality.
Minimize site-loading time as much as possible
It is hardly news that site-loading speed is one of the top lookouts for your Google rankings. But did you know that over 40% of users abandoned a site after it took too long to load? When users click on the ‘back’ button, your site’s bounce rate increases dramatically. From optimizing rich files to using CDN, no stone should be left unturned in order to maximize your site loading speed.
Be creative with Microformats
Different websites have different functionalities. Whether events, products, or review snippets are being showcased – you need to use appropriate mark-ups consistently throughout your website. Using microformats such as hCard, hReview, hProduct, hCalender, etc. have immense SEO benefits.
Even apart from these major points in the checklist, SEO Service Providers also need to be mindful of practices like adding breadcrumb menus, structuring data, pagination, etc to stay on top of the technical SEO game.
Even the best content may go unnoticed until you take care of the SEO concerns of your website first. When increased visibility is the prize cake, be ready to take it away with this SEO master guide!
We are all familiar with the age-old adage – too many cooks spoil the broth! While analyzing the recent trends in Social Media Marketing, we at UrsDigitally, one of the leading Social Media Marketing Agencies in India, have decided that the adage needs to be modified a bit to be applied to our context. Not just too many cooks, even the right ingredients in the wrong amounts, or too many ingredients can spoil the broth just the same! Same goes for your social media marketing strategy. Of course, none of us are ignorant of the immense potential of social media in digital marketing. But have you ever wondered why it works wonders for some and not for others?
For the perfect broth, you need to adhere strictly to the recipe. In Social Media Marketing too, there are some ‘do’s and ‘don’ts that you just can not ignore.
Automated Back-link Posting
This is one of the biggest blunders you can make while posting on social media. Imagine you were a consumer interacting with a new brand’s social media page and suddenly there’s a huge number of back-links appearing on your newsfeed. Random, thoughtless back-link posting will make you seem like just another spamming website. That’s the last thing you want!
Not using tracking analytics
How can you possibly manage something that you can not measure? Well, you need to use proper analytics tools to figure out which tactics are working and which are not. For instance, many Social Media Agencies use Google Analytics to figure out the engagement rate, click-through rate (CTR,), and various other parameters that need to be checked.
Don’t be the jack of all ‘platforms’ and master of none
Another oft-repeated adage that supports the point we are trying to make. You can set up social media pages on all platforms, but without the bandwidth to manage them, your efforts will always fall short. Social Media Marketing Agenciesneed dedicated teams to manage all channels and provide quality service to your visitors.
Avoid creating multiple profiles on Social media platforms
This is another serious concern that can put the authenticity of your social media pages to question. When a consumer sees multiple profiles of the same brand on social media, they get confused. More than 75% of the time, they will not be engaging with the brand thereafter.
Not highlighting enough user generated content
No matter how adept Social Media Marketing Companies are at promoting content, nothing convinces consumers better than reviews from other customers. Showcasing user reviews and recommendations can work wonders for your social media strategy. You can not ignore the importance of user-generated content.
Passive stance and Low Visibility
In an attempt to appear less aggressive on social media channels, some brands lose out on a lot. The world of Social Media Marketing is dynamic and ever-changing. You need to maintain a similar energy in your post frequency too!
Deleting or being unresponsive to negative comments
When you have a social media channel, you can not avoid negative comments. But one of the biggest blunders that Social Media Agencies need to be wary of is deleting or any kind of unresponsiveness or passivity while managing negative feedback. Instead, when you respond responsibly, you create the image of a brand that accepts accountability and is ready to provide better services.
Excessive self-promotion and no content diversification
It is no news to us that promotional content runs a huge risk of being ignored for good. Instead of imparting value to your consumers, if your social media activity is largely just self-promotion, you will not garner much engagement. Also, the content needs to be diverse and appeal to the taste of your customer base. If you came across a brand that only spoke about its products and services but not about the value that it provided to your life or the purpose of the brand itself, would you engage?
The world of social media marketing is an evolving vortex, you miss one step and you slip into the ‘low visibility’ zone. That is why UrsDigitally, one of the leading Social Media Marketing Companies in Kolkata, India follows a fixed social media strategy – a plan of action that is updated every month. This strategy is the lifeboat you perfect with time to sail through the changing currents. Policies are updated, trends analysed, and mistakes spotted to foolproof all social media marketing policies. So, what are you waiting for? Grab the reins now and get an infallible social media strategy for 2021!
Imagine you have just moved into a new neighbourhood! The first thing you do once you have settled in is to get to know your neighbours. What you say, how you choose to introduce yourself goes a long way towards creating the right impression! Even this simple analogy throws light upon how crucial Content Marketing Services are for startups. In the world of digital Marketing, your content is the voice of your company that your customers connect to.
Content Marketing Agencies in India play a very significant role in the branding process for startups. Apart from the usual content services that businesses require to boost revenue and increase conversions, startups need even more specialised content tools to create an entirely new brand identity in digital platforms. Google has a radar on how your content is being received and your content engagement online. Therefore, a sound content marketing strategy is not only indispensable to engage and retain users, it also optimizes a site’s Google search rankings. As it is, things are definitely going to be a lot different in 2021. While we are standing at the brink of an almost apocalyptic year, 2021 seems to hold the promise of renewals and rejuvenation. Your brand needs a sound content strategy to surf the waves of digital change that 2021 will bring!
Your brand, your voice
Content strategy has an undeniably important role to play when it comes to creating a brand image for startups. When you are forming a strategy for a brand that has no digital presence, you have to decide the brand voice and create a brand image that will be followed for the rest of the journey. This is in itself a Herculean task that needs market analysis, research, and launching the campaigns at the right platforms.
For instance, UrsDigitally, one of the leading Content Marketing Agencies in Kolkata, India has a detailed procedure that we follow to create or revamp a brand’s digital presence. We run survey campaigns to determine how the brand is perceived by its existing clientele.
When Excel Interior Wallpapers approached us for their digital marketing needs, they did not have any digital presence at all. We ran campaigns, surveys, and employed numerous tools to vitalize their digital presence. We used Content Marketing Services in India such as digital storytelling through campaigns such as Walls Come Alive to create a strong brand voice. Long story short, within a few months the website footfalls reached 1.14 Lakhs while its social media reach skyrocketed to 2,26,601. There has been no looking back since then. You can hear what the CEO of Excel Wallpapers has said regarding UrsDigitally’s impact on their services here.
Your Page Experience determines your SEO ranking: Google’s new Algorithm
Consumer experience has always been the central factor while devising a strategy. As brands grow, so do their SEO traffic. But did you know even new brands can rank on top with a stellar Page Experience? Google’s new algorithm uses Page Experience as a marker of how much users are liking your site. The most liked sites are ranked on top. After delving into the intricacies of how this algorithm works, we have narrowed it down to one key factor for you – your overall Page Experience is dependent on the loading speed of each page! You need to ensure there are no broken pages, irritating pop-ups, and pages that just won’t load on your website. These factors bring down your entire site experience. You also need to assess your website design and sort out any usability issues. There are many analytics tools like Crazy Egg test to check for these issues. The digital world is increasingly running on the ‘what Google thinks’ metrics. Use these tips to stay ahead of the game!
Create a Brand Story that your customers will find engaging and relatable
One point to remember is that everyday your customers are interacting with over 20 brands, only 40% of which manages to leave an impression on them. What is it about these brands that is different? The answer is that they manage to strike a chord of familiarity with the customers, which increases the brand’s relevance in their lives. An engaging brand story ensures client retention as well as expansion. Digital marketing gives you the opportunity to reach your customers on various platforms, but whether you can grab and retain their attention is entirely based on your content strategy. So, one of the biggest steps for a startup is to develop a brand story that will appeal to its target audience.
Content-driven Personalization
The new-age consumer is smart, and they expect your attention and support. By personalizing their customer experience with your brand, you make them realize they are important to you, and give them a reason to come back. How do you do it? The answer again is through content. Create a personalized reading experience for them. For instance, if a consumer who interacted with your content last browsed a story about a new restaurant that has opened up, give them a list of the ten best new cafes that have opened up in town! A brand ought to know how to pique their customers’ interest. With content-driven personalization you create a bond of familiarity with the customer, which could just be the content strategy you need to set your brand apart in 2021.
Automated on-request Content Channels to help you stay on top of things in 2021
You are missing out on a lot if you are not making use of the tremendous advancements of technology. Chatbots are slowly becoming the new face of customer support. You can now add innovation to your content as well by creating on-request content chatbots who can aid self-learning. Using content automation has been a very recent trend that is helping businesses expand their presence through various content channels. Here are the few ways in which AI can help with your content:
Identifying trending content topics: What you write about is just as important as how you write for a successful piece of content. This is a relatively easy automatable task that AI tools can help you with – identifying the topics with most potential.
Basic content creation: Although bots can’t create comprehensive blog posts or creative and moving content yet, they can generate basic content. This can be used to fasten the content creation process.
Proofreading: AI can totally take a chunk out of your proofreading time and resource.
With the help of NLP and NLG (National Language Generation) services, AI can really revolutionize your content creation process.
Create campaigns that will capture the prevalent mood and drive it home with an effective strategy
One of the most crucial content-related services is creating campaigns that capture the essence of your product and manage to infuse the prevalent mood of your customers into it. To cite one perfect example of this, we could look at the campaign UrsDigitally suggested for Dalmia Gold Tea. The campaign slogan was ‘chalo chaye ho jaaye’ that manages to capture the Indian sentiment behind making tea an accompaniment with every mood. Be it a get-together with old friends, festival gatherings, or even a simple de-stressing at home after a long day of work, tea captures every mood just as our slogan does.
Such effective eye-catching campaigns is one of the primary content marketing strategies startups should be focusing on. Startups need campaigns that can create an impression and stay with their customers long after their interaction with the brand. The aim is to transform one-time buyers into regular patrons, while also enticing dormant viewers to make a purchase.
Figure out what forms your core Messaging Matrix
Once your brand voice is decided and your objectives are laid out, next-in-line is the process of analyzing what underlying message each of your content strategies are meant to convey. Haphazard strategies do more harm than good, therefore streamlining your campaign messages is one of the most important Content Marketing Services. It lends a definite purpose and pattern to your marketing strategies. This process is especially long and extended for startups because in the nascent stages, your organization really needs to find itself and map out the messages that will appeal the most to the brand’s ideal customer base.
Fix a consistent publishing plan for your content
In relationships and brand activity alike, consistent efforts are your biggest friends. Create a publishing plan for your content – fix the dates, manage regular intervals, and target specific key dates in a month. Constantly updated content retains customer engagement, while a consistent publishing plan builds faith in your brand. The faith-building process is especially crucial in the case of a startup. That is why your ideal Content Marketing Services not only encompasses creating the best content but also maintaining a consistent flow.
Pay close attention to the ‘where’ and ‘when’ while publishing your content in 2021
Did you know many recent surveys that indicate that sharing your content at a specific time in social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram have garnered more engagement than other times? There’s one tidbit you could use while publishing your content in 2021. Your agency of choice should be the one that is well informed and alert to these trends and patterns so you know that your content is shared at the right place at the right time. A startup should also focus on which social media platform your ideal customer base is most active. This is based on the brand details and product specifications. For instance, LinkedIn is the best place to appeal to a B2B customer base, but Instagram and Facebook have a much wider scope of reaching the young populations (if they are the key demographic of your customer base.) Ads and campaigns are accordingly customized based on the platforms where they are launched.
Multi-Channel Marketing for your content in 2021
Consumers are rapidly adapting to new platforms, brands can not be far behind. Do not miss out on the advantages of multi-channel marketing in 2021! With multi-channel marketing you not only engage a larger demographic, it also helps you chalk out more buyer personas and analyze a greater number of buyer journeys. If the same consumer comes across your content on different platforms, it creates the image of a brand that is alert, engaging, and accessible anywhere. That must work wonders while creating a brand image from scratch!
With Digital Transformation on the rise, Content Marketing strategies are becoming increasingly popular. Content is king, or so they say! But what is it that distinguishes content writing from Content Marketing? A content strategy is what can help your content be more relatable and relevant for your target clientele. A well-informed consumer is a happy customer. As it is, with Digital Transformation on the rise, the primary focus is on enhancing customer service. In a futuristic digital transformation model, even social media channels are meant to serve as Customer Data Platforms. The new-age customer is always connected and alert. To meet the rising and evolving customer expectations, companies are slowly increasing the number of CDPs. A data-driven marketing plan is the need of the hour.
Digital marketing is slowly but steadily leaning towards humanizing brands! New-age consumers no longer buy products or services, they buy ideas and experiences. Surveys have shown that 60% of consumers have agreed that they will not have any further association with a brand after the first negative experience. You can understand the importance of successful customer interactions for successful conversions, and turning one-time customers into patrons.
2021 is going to be different in so many aspects. Amidst the present conditions, everybody is looking forward to this new year more than ever. You need to constantly update your content to match up to the rising expectations from this year. Even apart from these key strategies there are countless more strategies you could employ to give your content an edge over the others.
The key point is ‘Edit! Edit! And More Edits’!
You have to be ruthless with your content sometimes because a well-updated content is one of the key factors that go into building a brand image. A brand that is sensitive to details dedicated towards perfection is the image you need to establish to build faith in your brand. Being interactive on social platforms, attentive towards customer feedback, and informative while solving customer queries goes a long way in building a solid brand image for a startup. Your content is your voice in the digital marketing world! A deep baritone (your brand story) and well-articulated speech (your content strategy) is what you need to make people stop in their tracks and listen.
‘Transformation’ is a very positive and futuristic term in itself. A transformation, metamorphosis, holds a lot of promise for the future and hope of renewal. While we are standing at the brink of an almost apocalyptic year, you should be chalking out a sound Digital Transformation Strategy for the upcoming year. It is normal to set a lot of expectations from a new year. But in the case of 2021, the expectations are mounting sky high, as are the changes. Businesses have been aware of the potential of Digital Transformation since long, but 2020 really put things into perspective. Digital Transformation in businesses evolved from a work-in-progress status to a booming phenomenon. That is why 2021 could be the best year to bring your Digital Transformation vision to fruition.
Digital Transformation Strategy and Digital Marketing Strategy are often complementary. In fact, it is said Marketing techniques and IT solutions should work together to jointly drive digital transformation. Thanks to Digital Transformation, 2021 will see many such exciting transitions from traditional planning to models of active agility. Did you know there are over 8000 apps on Marketing Technology alone? IT has been innovating apps to facilitate marketing since ages. We already have all the resources we need to expedite Digital Transformation. When IT and marketing come together, they open up a vista of endless opportunities where autonomous organisations come up and flourish with their own individual brand of novelty technology solutions and transformation strategies.
For instance, UrsDigitally, one of the leading experts of Digital Transformation Strategy in India, has already joined hands with a leading edge Mobile App Development Company, MaxMobility to bring this futuristic model to work in executing a unique Digital Transformation vision.
With all the alluring possibilities and promises 2021 holds, we bring to you this guide that takes you through the areas of digital transformation that has robust opportunities for innovation & novelty:
Transforming the roles of Chief Marketing Officers and their teams
While Digital Transformation is gaining ground, the roles of CMOs are changing rapidly. Formerly, CMOs were mostly just concerned about marketing techniques and strategies. Now their chief priorities include brand image, brand health & hygiene, and facilitating customer service to name a few. What is it about digital transformation that has caused such a sea change within the internal workings of the company? It is possibly the fact that the chief aim of Digital Transformation is to keep up with the changing needs of the consumer. As you know, the new-age consumer is slowly imbibing the changes in market models and becoming more alert and demanding. With social media channels, customer service outlets, content marketing services and everything else going digital, accessibility has increased and so have consumer expectations. The CMOs are responding to this change by updating their activities too.
Automation all the way
Embracing automation is one of the key things for you to do in 2021 for driving digital transformation. By implementing the correct APIs (Application Programming Interfaces,) you can simplify app development considerably. APIs facilitate communication between your product/service and others of its kind. APIs play a very critical role in expediting the app development procedure, while saving money and resources. But the majority of business leaders across industries agree that often the inability to connect systems, data, devices, etc. or in other words the lack of seamless enterprise mobility options inhibit automation initiatives. Consequently, for your digital transformation model to succeed, you need to put your APIs to better use to reduce automation complexity.
Process automation is another phenomenon that most companies are embracing in every department, be it Sales Force Automation or in HR. The end effect is not just reflected in efficiency but also in a robust revenue boost. In this Covid-struck situation, almost 58% of businesses around the globe are estimated to start Process automation and Robotic Process Automation by 2021. Those who have already started implementing the changes have reported a whopping 83% increase in agility and resilience is their supply chain framework.
Branding as an all-inclusive process
As Digital Transformation gains momentum, we will witness the rise of one-stop consulting firms that provide end-to-end services. When different Lines of Business work together with IT to jointly drive Digital Transformation, we see the rise of autonomous more self-reliant organisations with holistic bands of services. Therein, the entire branding process becomes more uniform. Can you imagine one organisation doing everything for you?
Boom in Customer Data Platforms
Of course Customer Satisfaction Index is one of your most important KPIs, and Digital Transformation brings about a welcome change in the way brands are interacting with their customers. Customer Data Platforms are rising rapidly, and brands are focussing on making customer interactions more informative and value-driven. The new-age customer is alert and expects to remain connected with the brand at all times. Enhanced customer support and easily accessible support platforms is the answer key to the ‘always connected’ customer test.
CDPs have an added relevance amidst this Covid crisis because with the remote working models gaining ground, data is becoming more fragmented. Within such an ever-expanding vista of touchpoints, CDPs will become even more relevant. Organisations are already coming up with newer CDP services with the hopes of gaining the coveted 360-degree view.
Since the Covid crisis hit us, we have witnessed how marketeers have thrown away all the rulebooks. The need for innovation and thinking out-of-the-box is of prime importance now more than ever. Perhaps this need and urgency is aligning perfectly with the rise of Digital Transformation. Companies are increasingly investing on cloud platforms. CIOs are demanding better digital strategies to survive and thrive in the pandemic-hit market. That is why the changes in Digital Marketing Strategy is becoming so important in 2021.
While 2020 only laid the groundwork for the change, 2021 will see the changes taking effect and coming to fruition. From the rise of autonomous branding units to a boost in cloud strategy, 2021 is all set to be a historic year. That is why you need to ensure your Digital Transformation model is fully equipped to set sail on this sea of change we are about to witness!
If you missed our Digital Strategy Made Easy
Webinar which took place on 17th December, you can catch up on everything you
missed right here!
Panelists:
●Amit Lakhmani – Founder and CEO, MaxMobility
●Mitul Das – Co-Founder and CEO, UrsDigitally
●Abhishek Chamaria – Co-Founder and Director, UrsDigitally
●Mouli Basu – Sales Head, UrsDigitally
●Priti Pandit – Growth Leader, UrsDigitally
●Priyanka Mandhyan – Marketing Head, UrsDigitally
●Nirupama Paul – Senior Digital Marketing Executive, UrsDigitally
The Insights:
Our webinar started off with an interesting
structure. All panelists had a role to play in a hypothetical situation. The
client (Mouli Basu) has approached the CEO of UrsDigitally (Mitul Das) for a
pitch on Digital Strategy. Mitul calls upon his trusted team for insights from
his martech expert (Amit Lakhmani), SEO Expert (Nirupama Paul), Content Expert
(Priyanka Mandhyan), Media Expert (Abhishek Chamaria), and E-Commerce Expert (Priti
Pandit).
Let’s see what they all have to say!
The Client Brief
The company Tools India Pvt Ltd is an expert
in manufacturing. Until February, the brand thought that sales via online
mediums was not possible. Unfortunately due to the pandemic the on ground sales
team got affected. So how could they still garner sales?
Following were the asks:
●ROI
●Can a product like tools be sold online?
●What should be the ratio of spends between organic and inorganic
mediums?
●How can we build a tech stack and accumulate leads on one platform?
●Figuring out the pain points or Domain Analysis:
To complete a thorough domain analysis, you require an answer to the following
3 questions:
○What was the journey in financial year 19-20?
○What does the brand want to achieve in 2021?
○What kind of actionables does that achievement require?
Tools India Pvt Ltd.
already has a website and Facebook channel but is not getting the results that
it truly desires. So the UrsDigitally team needed to know what happened last
year, what were the hits and misses, and what they were trying to achieve in
2021.
●Understand the business KPIs through background research
Tools India Pvt Ltd had the following KPIs in FY19-20 as presented as a vision
map:
When working in digital marketing, there are many verticals. Whether it is SEO,
Content Strategy, Social Media Management, etc. Many times all these verticals
are treated in a compartmentalized way. But it is important to draw a vision
map, i.e., a visual representation of what is the common goal and what are the
aspects to be achieved for the goal, such as the one you can see above to bring
synergy to everything being done in digital marketing.
Going further into the KPIs, it is important to understand what was happening in the last two years in a comparative format.
Following was the analysis for Tools India Pvt Ltd:
Some things that can be analysed include profitability, increase in number of
SKUs, number of channels or introduction of new channels, organic marketing,
etc.
After a careful analysis of the above data from Tools India Pvt Ltd, we found
the following:
We found these to be the most important takeaways:
○Lack of integration between strategy and analytics
○Inability to inculcate the voice of consumer
Since the consumers were mainly from rural areas, the brand was unable to
create contextual communication targeted to them.
The essence of strategy lies in understanding what the data is trying to tell
you, what your business objective is, what your consumer wants from you, and
ultimately how far you are from that goal.
Keeping that in mind, we found that the following KPIs were most important for
Tools India Pvt Ltd during FY 20-21:
●Create vertical-wise strategies
○The Martech Strategy
To create any martech strategy, it is important to first be clear with the
goals and map them with the kind of tools that would be required.
In the specific instance of Tools India Pvt Ltd, it is important to keep 3
components in mind as per the KPIs and domain analysis:
■The tools and technologies that help keep them connected with
customers
■Tech tools to streamline sales and marketing operations
■Tools that can provide key measurement metrics and provide a
performance report
Step 1: Go through a basic checklist. This will map the current tech
maturity.
Find the full tech stack audit template along with an example of the audit
for Tools India Pvt Ltd here.
Step 2: Find the tools and apps that are fulfil the gaps
Step 3: Measure data and analyze
There are a few metrics that every business owner should be monitoring:
Metrics
What
Formula
Why its imp?
Customer
Acquisition Cost (CAC)
The Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) is a metric
used to determine the total average cost your company spends to acquire a new
customer.
Sales & Marketing Cost = Ad Spends +
salaries + commission/bonuses + overhead in a month/qtr/year
New Customers = Number of new customers in a
month/qtr/year
CAC = Sales & Marketing Cost / New
Customers
CAC illustrates how much
your company is spending per new customer acquired. You want a low average
CAC. An increase in CAC means that you are spending comparatively more for
each new customer, which can imply there’s a problem with your sales or
marketing efficiency
Marketing % of
CAC
The Marketing % of Customer Acquisition Cost is
the marketing portion of your total CAC, calculated as a percentage of the
overall CAC
Marketing Costs = Ad Spends + salaries +
commission/bonuses + overhead of the marketing department only
The Marketing % of Customer
Acquisition Cost is the marketing portion of your total CAC, calculated as a
percentage of the overall CAC.
Customer
Lifetime Value (LTV)
Customer lifetime value is a metric to
determine the total revenue that one customer gives during its lifetime
Lifetime Value = Revenue the customer pays in a
specific period * average customer lifespan
Ratio of LTV to
CAC
The Ratio of Customer Lifetime Value to CAC is
a way for companies to estimate the total value that your company derives
from each customer compared with what you spend to acquire that new customer
LTV / CAC
The higher the LTV:CAC, the more ROI your sales
and marketing team is delivering to your bottom line. However, you don’t want
this ratio to be too high, as you should always be investing in reaching new
customers. Spendng more on sales and marketing will reduce your LTV:CAC
ratio, but could help speed up your total company growth
Time to Payback
CAC
The Time to Payback CAC shows you the number of
months it takes for your company to earn back the CAC it spent acquiring new
customers.
CAC / Margin-adjusted revenue from the customer
In industries where your customers pay a
monthly or annual fee, you normally want your Payback Time to be under 12
months. The less time it takes to payback your CAC, the sooner you can start
making money off of your new customers. Generally, most businesses aim to
make each new customer profitable in less than a year
Marketing
originated customer %
The Marketing Originated Customer % is a ratio
that shows what new business is driven by marketing, by determining which
portion of your total customer acquisitions directly originated from
marketing efforts
Marketing originated customer %
=
New customers originated from marketing lead /
New customers in a month
This metric illustrates the impact that your
marketing team’s lead generation efforts have on acquiring new customers.
This percentage is based on your sales and marketing relationship and
structure, so your ideal ratio will vary depending on your business model. A
company with an outside sales team and inside sales support may be looking at
20-40% Margin Originated Customer %, whereas a company with an inside sales
team and lead focused marketing team might be at 40-80%
Marketing
Influenced customer %
The Marketing Influenced Customer % takes into
account all of the new customers that marketing interacted with while they
were leads, anytime during the sales process
Marketing Influenced customer %
=
Total New customers that interacted with
marketing / New customers In a month
This metric takes into account the impact
marketing has on a lead during their entire buying lifecycle. It can indicate
how effective marketing is at generating new leads, nurturing existing ones,
and helping sales close the deal. It gives your CEO or CFO a big-picture look
into the overall impact that marketing has on the entire sales process.
●The Search and Organic Strategy
Step 1: Website Audit and Competitor Analysis
This helps us know the issues that need to be fixed. The competitor analysis
adds on by providing an insight into the backlink strategy and keyword strategy
of the competitors and where your brand can grab at an opportunity.
Step 2: Keyword Research
Selecting keywords in which search volume is high and competition level is low.
A mixture of high to low competition level is usually good to have. Tools like
Google Trends, Keyword Planner, SEMRush and Ubersuggest can be used to search
for these keywords.
Following are the keywords shortlisted for Tools India Pvt Ltd:
SEO and Paid Keywords
Keyword
Avg. monthly searches
Competition
Suggested Bid
hoe
agriculture
1600
Low
5.16
agriculture
hand tools
880
High
14.3
farm hand
tools
260
High
5.72
hand
ploughing machine
140
High
3.8
agri hand
tools
90
High
3.92
agriculture
weeder machine
90
High
13.98
agriculture
hand machine
70
High
6.62
Step 3: Find the Specific Target Audience for Google Ads
Targeting based on geography, types of websites and apps, and mapped against
your various target audiences is one of the best ways to get good results from
Google Ads.
Following is the targeting for Tools India Pvt Ltd:
Whether it is Facebook groups, LinkedIn groups, guest blogging sites,
infographic sites, forums, or presentations sites, it is important to be
present everywhere after carefully choosing the platforms on which your
customers are present and mapping out these platforms Target-Audience wise. Once
platforms are chosen, you just need to chart out your content and provide links
to your website to improve your rankings!
Here’s a look at the organic distribution plan for Tools India Pvt Ltd:
This process allows
you to humanize your target audience and understand what they really care
about. It also gives you an insight into what kind of content you can create
and through which channels that would convince them the most.
Here’s a buyer
persona for Tools India Pvt Ltd:
Step 2: Topic Research
Using tools like SEMRush,
Ubersuggest, Buzzsumo or the rest, it is now quite easy to see what is trending
on search engines for your specific keywords as determined by the SEO
specialist. Just insert the keyword, choose your region, and you’re good to go!
Choosing a topic that
has a high search volume is definitely a good move. But SEMRush also gives an
idea of the kind of questions people are asking about the topic. Answering
these questions through blog or social media posts gives immense value and
increases search rankings.
Here’s what SEMRush
has to show about Tools India Pvt Ltd’s keyword hoe agriculture:
Following the
results, we can definitely create a pricing guide for garden tools and write a
blog post about the most common farm tools and equipment.
Step 3: Make a Content Plan
It is important to
make a detailed content plan that lays out all your goals, KPIs and desired
results, and mapping your content to those goals.
The content plan also
includes:
●Funnel – wise Mapping
We map the content according to the sales funnel we follow in UrsDigitally:
○Lead Magnet – a piece of content that attracts your target audience
so that they provide their information.
○Nurture- Keep communicating with the audience to keep them
interested in your brand
○Tripwire- Offer the most engaged people a free offering so they at
least try your product
○Core Product- Market your main product to people who have already
tried it by providing benefits or discounts
○Profit Maximizer- Upselling or cross-selling products to an audience
that has already bought from you
○Return Path- Keeping the audience loyal to your product through
loyalty programs and offers
So what pieces of
content will you use as a lead magnet, how will you nurture your leads, what
will you offer so the audience tries your product, what features will you
promote of your core product, how will you upsell or cross-sell, and how will
you keep your audience loyal. Furthermore, what platforms will you use to
conduct these activities?
●Target Audience – wise Mapping
The same content can
be divided as per the different target audiences you are targeting.
In case of Tools
India Pvt Ltd, since our target audiences are plumbers, farmers, gardeners and
the like, dealers and distributors, and people who like to try DIY projects, we
need to plan content for each one of these target audiences and define it in
our content plan.
●Platform – wise Mapping
Charting out your social media calendars, email marketing calendars, blog
calendars is something you need to do in your monthly content plan itself.
Do remember that it
is good to post at least 3 posts on social media per week, 4 blogs on your
website, 3 blogs on platforms such as wordpress, blogger, and medium, one
infographic on infographic sites and one presentation on presentation sites.
This forms a good backlink and SEO strategy as well.
For Online
Reputation Management, it is recommended to answer 1 Quora/Reddit/Answer per
day and answer negative reviews taking it as constructive criticism.
You can find a
monthly content plan template here.
View the content
plan of Tools India Pvt Ltd here.
●The Media Strategy
The first and
foremost thing to understand before starting off the Media Strategy is to
understand how the sales are doing currently. What is the amount of sales you
are getting versus the amount you are spending on marketing?
Step 1: Understand the number of new customers needed per month
Step 2: Calculate the Customer Acquisition Cost
Step 3: Measure your Cost Per Lead for the campaign once executed
Step 4: Measure the ROI for the campaign once executed
While running the
campaign, it is important to retarget the people who have interacted with your
company. Facebook allows for multiple types of custom audiences who are people
who have either interacted with your posts, page, videos, or lead ads. You can
retarget people who filled your lead form but didn’t submit it, creating
targeted communication and so much more.
Find the media
template complete with formulae required to complete all of the above steps here.
Since ROI is
important for every brand and the commerce marketplaces such as amazon,
flipkart, big basket, grofers and more have started gaining value, digital
sales depends heavily on such platforms.
Step 1: Analyze the sales platform-wise versus marketing budget
This will cover in
detail what is the minimum and maximum marketing budget required, what has been
the performance over the past year, what has been the assistive spend (that is
marketing budget on other channels leading to the ecommerce portal), what are
the new portals that can be considered and the associated paid and organic
activities, as well as the assistive marketing plan.
It is important to
decide which products need paid optimizations and which ones require organic
optimizations. Organic optimizations would include reviews and product
description SEO.
You can find a
template for defining these parameters here.
The commerce plan
for Tools India Pvt Ltd can be found here.
Step 2: Measure the impact
Measuring and
garnering insights from each of the above activities is extremely important to
improve upon the strategy the next time. The reporting needs to involve the
revenue report, target of new portals to be added, product optimization and
addition report, ad campaign report, assistive ads report, and organic listing optimization
report.
The UrsDigitally team is delighted to announce our most recent collaboration with Brandie! Brandie is the world’s first crowd-marketing platform, operating with the ingenious motto of democratizing marketing. Calling Brandie an Influencer Marketing Company or a Social Media Marketing Company alone restricts its scope somehow. It is the world’s first platform designed with the idea of envisioning crowd-marketing with a holistic approach. As one of the leading Digital Marketing Agencies in India, UrsDigitally has also taken great leaps in providing end-to-end digital solutions to our clients. As innovative and out-of-the-box thinkers ourselves, UrsDigitally applauds the inspiration behind Brandie. Our collaboration is essentially pivoted around innovative minds coming together to fulfill a unique vision. 2020 brought a sea of changes, and marketeers are already throwing out the rulebooks and leaning towards newer ideas. With Digital Transformation on the rise, 2020 has already seen a rising trend of different lines of businesses coming together and collaborating with each other to widen their horizons and provide holistic services. For instance, IT comes together with Marketing in the UrsDigitally-MaxMobility collaboration, a futuristic step in the direction towards providing end-to-end digital marketing solutions.
“No one can whistle a symphony. It takes a whole orchestra to play it.” – H.E. Luccock
That musical note resonates well with the idea we nurture at UrsDigitally. We believe in the power of collaborating with leaders and trailblazers like Brandie to add sparks to new inspiration and ensure we are seen, heard, and talked about in the right places. Our Digital Transformation vision is holistic and vast, and 2020 has already been a major milestone in the long journey we have mapped out for ourselves. We have partnered with MaxMobility, one of the leading experts in Digital Transformation and Mobile App Development in India. Together we provide you the strategy and the infrastructure. Our loyalty solutions partner, GrabLoyalty, is another pillar holding up the digital transformation vision.
Change is no longer optional
We have always known that change is inevitable, but 2020 has had us looking change in the face. One silver lining of standing at the brink of an almost apocalyptic year is that we get to steer the wheels of change and accelerate into the new era of Marketing! The covid crisis has already caused a huge shift from physical to digital marketing. Innovation in digital marketing has the stage now, and we aspire to make the best of this limelight:
Social Media usage has seen a sharp 57% hike since Covid struck us. As a Social Media Marketing Company, the scope of this is endless. With our collaborations and creative campaigns, we need to target the customers on their own turf.
Influencer Marketing statistics have been on the rise since the lockdown. ‘Impulse buys’ rates are high too, and Influencer Marketing Agencies need to level up their game to make the most of it!
Social media platforms are slowly emerging as touchpoints of Customer Service. This is one of the trends of Digital Transformation that demands us to change our roles as social media marketing agencies as well.
Brandie employs the power of customer generated content to drive successful campaigns. With Brandie’s wide network of social media influencers and nano-influencers, we are aspiring to add more momentum and value to our campaigns. As Simon Mainwaring rightly said,
“Effectively, change is almost impossible without industry-wide collaboration, cooperation, and consensus.”
Why Crowd Marketing?
Crowd marketing goes well beyond the scope of social media marketing or influencer marketing. These are only subsets of crowd marketing, a holistic campaign that employs content creation, search engine optimization, reaching out to one-time buyers, harnessing the power and reach of nano-influencers, etc. for effective lead generation. Crowd marketing offers something akin to shooting-fish-in-a-barrel opportunities to entrepreneurs by helping them connect with highly targeted audience groups. With Crowd Marketing, you can:
Raise Brand awareness and establish your unique brand story
Generating promo messages with a call to action that drives customer engagement.
Harness the powers of quality content to establish themselves as thought leaders.
Drive more website traffic because you are being talked about and noticed by your ideal clientele.
Lastly, and most importantly, lead generation through meaningful engagement driven by the above factors.
Crowd marketing holds promise for new businesses and established brands alike. That is why we say it is holistic in every aspect, from clientele to its scope in aiding digital marketing. Brandie has already garnered trust of notable brands like Puma, Nature’s Basket, The Belgian Waffle, Fastrack, Swiggy, and a lot more. Like UrsDigitally, Brandie’s partners and clients are also ranging across industries, encompassing Retail, FMCF, Telecommunications, and many more. This only widens our scope of driving Digital Transformation together.
What we can do together
Together, Brandie and UrsDigitally can revolutionize marketing trends with:
Over 99% increase in Total Available Market
25-35% increase in engagement rate comprising customers and nano-influencers
UrsDigitally with Brandie can bring about greater cost-effectiveness, accessibility, authenticity, and reach.
Building greater customer trust by promoting user generated content
Create personalized user journeys so consumers can develop a personal relationship with your brand and be a part of your brand journey.
Digital word-of-mouth to create the buzz and hype and boost your brand image as well as sales.
One of the driving consumer psychologies is the need for validation. When a consumer is doubtful or uncertain regarding a product or service, they always seek external validation. As consumer-centric brands, both Brandie and UrsDigitally are trusted by leading names across industries. Being one of the leading Social Media Marketing and Influencer Marketing agencies in Kolkata, India, UrsDigitally has already harbored a wide range of clientele and partners. Each partnership has added more plumage to our range of services and ideas. A dynamic pool of ideas is one of biggest assets in marketing. Each partnership enriches our journey and helps us delve a little deeper into the idea pool. Our most recent collaboration with Brandie holds the promise of innovating newer trends in Social Media Marketing and Influencer Marketing!
Simply put, eCommerce software is an online platform that allows businesses to set up functional digital stores.
While the business world is slowly making the shift towards an eCommerce model, optimizing E-commerce Marketing Strategies become one of the most important tools for a digital marketeer. The convenience of eCommerce lies in its easy accessibility. But the downside to this is the fact that your competition is just as easily accessible to the customer. Herein lies the importance of coming up with E-Commerce Marketing Strategies that keep you ahead of the competition.
The success of any strategy is based on the conversion rates. Once that primary goal is achieved, patron retention is the subsequent concern for the digital marketeer. Therefore, this is a long drawn-out process that requires proper planning and the utmost attention to metrics, customer expectations, and market research.
At UrsDigitally, we do not have any one-size-fits-all strategy for e-commerce augmentation. The marketing strategy for each brand is as unique as the brand itself. While the strategy provides an overarching plan comprising a set of goals, the tactical decisions — which can be defined as a set of actions — are made to accomplish the strategy. Unlike brand strategies, tactics can be similar irrespective of the brands.
However, there are some things that need to be kept in mind while making an overarching strategy.
The right information leads to the right action
The foundation for creating successful E-Commerce Marketing Strategies is accurate and extensive market research. The right information is the most important step towards taking the right action, especially when it comes to creating any digital strategy. One must take into account your customer expectations, understand and analyze target customer details like age, gender, geographical location, as well as the amount of money they are likely to spend towards the purpose. These are the parameters that determine the subsequent stages of strategy building.
Knowing what the competition offers is also another aspect of increasing the relevance of your brand to the target customers. Market research often reveals data that can not only add to the marketing strategies but also become significant while setting product details.
A well-researched strategy grabs the attention of your target customers, helping them relate to a brand that is aware of their expectations.
Selecting the right tools increases the chances of conversions multifold
Google Shopping Ads
This is one of the tactics we have used for multiple brands with great effect. For brands with a large inventory of products, we use showcase shopping ads that bring several related products in the display. Some marketers claim that this tactic can yield a 200 percent increase in the conversion rate. That may sound too ambitious. However, we did experience quite a jump in sales for some of the brands we manage.
Personalized e-mails
This tactic is so common that it is often taken for granted. We do not, however, stop at just using the customers’ names. We invest time in researching a customer’s purchasing habits and then plan our interaction with them personalizing the tone of the content, subject line, and the CTA. The initial communication is followed by several rounds of personalized follow-up emails for the best result.
Blog posts
This is another proven tactic to boost e-commerce sales. In fact, well-written, informative blog posts have helped us achieve a 2-3 times increase in organic SEO traffic over the course of a year. And did we tell you? To this date, this remains the most cost-effective means to increase footfall in your online store.
Amazon first
Although we follow a unique strategy for every brand, there are a few rules that we keep in mind while devising an overarching plan. And that starts with making a presence in a high-traffic marketplace. When it comes to selling merchandise, that means Amazon. The next step involves going to a product/ service-specific marketplace (such as Nykaa for personal care brands).
Online sales through the website
With the nature of business becoming more online post-Covid, more and more companies are integrating e-commerce features into their websites. However, at UD, we never commit to making conversion through the website an overnight affair. In this context, our strategy is to amplify the brand’s presence on several channels, first. With the growing familiarity of the brand and its offering, the traffic will increase automatically.
There is no substitute for creativity
All the research and strategy in the world may just fall flat if you fail to add that unique edge to your marketing program. That creativity of your campaign is what sets you apart, grabs the attention of your ideal buyer, and turns one time buyers into loyal customers. You as a digital marketeer need to have that unique vision that your ideal clientele will be able to relate to immediately. Most successful marketing campaigns in the world employ that creative aspect which creates a lasting experience in the minds of its immediate customers as well as all those who come across it.
Successful E-Commerce Marketing Strategies not only cater to immediate demand but create buyers out of those who are actively viewing the campaign by piquing their interest and addressing their expectations. A creative marketing strategy has the advantage of expansion as well as retention.
Adding Influencers to the mix adds a dash of credibility
You can not deny the relevance of social media while talking about digital marketing strategies. But among other E-Commerce Marketing Strategies, the one that takes the social media experience richer is Influencer Marketing.
A social media influencer has authentic followers who have faith in him/her. This strategy uses that follower list to promote products, thus turning the influencer as well as the followers into patrons. The influencer’s recommendation is usually seen as relatable and reliable.
The active conversion rate of Influencer Marketing has gone off the charts in recent times, turning influencer marketing into an invaluable tool.
E-commerce Marketing Strategies form a big part of the marketing campaign of any business because it enhances the digital buying experience, which is after all what the future era of business looks like. Digital commerce platforms are still evolving, changing every day, which is why leading digital marketing companies in India such as ours are offering their services in creating the strategy best suited for the business concerned.
Need some assistance with sales augmentation? Contact us for a free consultation by emailing reachus@ursdigitally.com!
‘REALIZATION’ CHECK: CONTENT MARKETING IS DIFFERENT FROM CONTENT WRITING
“Every brand needs to tell a story”
That’s exactly what aspiring business tycoon Mr. X heard from his consultant and advisor of a content marketing agency.
How would that story be told?
Yes, blogging (The consultant implanted the opinion that blogging was the way to build content authority and boost rankings) should be part of the content marketing services.
Harpooning on the bright idea, this is what Mr. X did.
He hired a content writer to keep telling stories of himself (hardships, struggles, ambitions, vision, etc) in the form of ‘beautiful’ blogs!
Three months later, Mr. X had gained three fantastic subscribers—the writer, consultant, and his fake ID which was advised by the same consultant to better handle the subscriber flood.
The THREE MAJOR BLUNDERS
Curtain drop!
Of course, blogging is not a bad idea in itself, but Mr. X committed three blunders that cost him his money and most importantly, time!
First—Communication! No one (unless you have a big fan following) is interested in your personal story. This is a value-based communication and not episodes of your CV (Tell what you have to offer and how the audience can benefit for the same)
Second— People! Blogging works best when sufficient background work is done concerning the TG(Pin-pointing on the exact TG with buyer personas, research on the most searched KWs and insertion of the same to boost rankings, identify audience needs and hence leverage tools to see trending topics on the field based on the requirements, etc )
Third— Platform! Most people make the fallacy that content writing and content marketing are just two sides of the same coin. NO! Content production is just one segment of the entire tale. (Even if you do everything right, how would your audience know you are writing blogs in the first place? Hence, analysis needs to be done on which platforms the TG engages more and how to promote or market your blogs on those platforms to enhance visibility and subscriptions)
This is the entire quote that no one tells you. But as a content marketing agency, we think it is imperative to understand!
Every brand needs to tell a story THAT THE AUDIENCE WANTS TO LISTEN
With that now established, how as a business owner could you recognize the red flags before it’s too late?
More importantly, what’s the methodology to craft a crackling content marketing strategy?
Just as we have always loved, let’s spill the secrets through 4 different ‘W’ Stories!
WHO SHOULD YOU SPEAK TO?
Once upon a time, in the magical land of India, one of the most esteemed hand tool manufacturers knocked our humble agency doors for some content marketing services. The challenge was whatever communications they made, no matter how much they spent, engagement rates never shot up!
Worse still, there were obscene comments in many posts that severely harmed the brand’s reputation.
Enter us.
Upon a first-level analysis, we noticed a glaring mistake! The communications all catered to the young generation while their target audience was composed of trade persons, farmers, dealers, and more!
This is what we did!
For every segment of the TG, we created a complete buyer persona with their preferences, lifestyle, hobbies, age details, and more.
Upon completion of the exercise, few things became as clear as a Mauritian deep blue sea!
First and foremost, vernacular communications were extremely important. Second, Shakespearean and poetic English, as much as our copywriters would love to write, should be abandoned for straight-forward conversations. Third, provide value-based inputs, tips, etc!
We narrowed down the communication strategy to convertible specifics as soon as we did the audience profiling right! We knew to whom we were speaking to and their mindsets!
Within a few weeks, engagements increased to double!
WHERE SHOULD YOU SPEAK?
Nah, marketing doesn’t mean Facebook, Google, Instagram only!
In many other cases, based on audience profiling, the platform could change drastically.
This is what happened.
A major jute product manufacturer approached our content marketing agency to get bulk purchase inquiries from industry leaders. The pain-point was the usual—a lot of money being dumped into Facebook lead ads, but none yielded results!
We spotted the gap rather quickly! No one logs into Facebook thinking they would make a deal worth tens of lakhs! Yes, Facebook promotes a friendly mindset and not business-like.
Our team came up with a streamlined marketing strategy that had two aspects: Organic LinkedIn reach-out and Google ads specifically targeted to big export-import exhibitions, trade shows occurring in India and abroad.
The reason was simple—Business owners who could afford the deal size as specified by our client usually maintain a strong ‘prospect’ network, in most cases offline. They have LinkedIn profiles to connect with bigger leaders online and command strong visibility on trade shows, expos, conferences relevant to the industry.
Marketing is about understanding the right channels for the right audience!
Within a few months, we delivered some quality leads with one even from Future Group itself!
WHAT SHOULD YOU SPEAK?
YES!
In most cases, we hurry to think of the content topic first but unfortunately, that’s not right. Content marketing services shouldn’t revolve on what I WANT to speak but rather on WHAT MY AUDIENCE WANTS TO LISTEN TO and WHERE can I get their most attention!
Here’s an inside story.
Usually, monthly communications for a brand are made way in advance so that there is no disruption during implementation.
However, things drastically transformed with a sudden lockdown!
People’s mindsets shifted and the initial communications made no sense.
For some brands, we even did teleinterviews, sessions, webinars, and whatnot. The entire tonality shifted from promotional to value based!
Unsurprisingly, paired with the fact that people were at home and surfing on platforms more, we witnessed as much as a 1000% increase in reach, engagements, and many more such metrics.
Well, this is an unprecedented scenario. But, the gist remains the same. Any content marketing agency needs to produce content that satisfies customer needs.
An easy way to crack what the TG needs for the industry our client specializes in is to find the most searched keywords. Once that is done, we can either utilize the same to find the most engaging blog topics or content and even set up ‘trend reminders’ to get notified of any trendy topic in the sector.
For instance, in the above jute manufacturer example, we immediately spotted that ‘green consumerism’ was a big trend and jute being a 100% environment-friendly packaging solution, we built up case stories on how the client was contributing to this trend, paired with engaging facts.
These were used as ads and connectivity content for Google and LinkedIn. The content tonality, as obvious, was conversational to uphold the ‘connection’ aspect!
Hence, producing engaging and need-based content fine-tuned basis the platform it would go to.
WHEN SHOULD YOU SPEAK
Let’s make this very clear!
A lot of business owners and even marketers don’t pay heed to the timing factor while communicating on platforms.
Consider a scenario.
You see a health and fitness ad in the morning when usually people go out to jog versus you witness the same at night when you are laid back after a good day’s work!
When would you respond more? Sure enough, the first case.
While it would be time until such level of personalized distribution becomes a reality but you just can’t ignore the time factor!
This is exactly what happened with one of our clients, a reputed surgeon.
We had decided to hold special Facebook Live Sessions in the evening when the Doctor was free. The sessions were based on increasing immunity strength and fitness with the right diet!
The engagement rates were initially low and that’s when we decided to apply a hunch! We had initially thought that evening was the best time since people would be free after daily work. However, since the content was based on diet and breakfast to lunch being two of our heaviest meals, people were more than nonchalant to follow the rules at dinner time!
We changed the content a bit—How to drive a healthy diet plan from morning till night and published the same at 10 every morning.
Within a few iterations, views and engagements almost tripled!
The timing of your communications is always important. However, it’s difficult to gauge the right posting times at the start.
For the same, you could always follow the following chart at the initiation phase before there is enough audience data to personalize the timings (an analysis based time framework for the best posting times on the world’s biggest social networks)
Source: entrepreneur.com
CONCLUSION BONUS: THE FIFTH – WHAT’S NEXT?
The above ‘4 W’ Framework is a great strategy to initiate content production that bridges your offerings with the audience’s needs, is personalized according to platforms, and is posted at the right time.
However, things are not always so smooth. There is no FIXED FORMULA when it comes to content marketing services.
Hence, the next step would be to carefully do what most falter in doing.
A monthly storyboard with engaging content on the right platforms and communicated at the right time is, ACTUALLY, THE START!
What follows is a more rigorous technical aspect wherein feedbacks has complied, analysis is done from social media insights, website analytics followed to comprehend the audience behavior, campaign performances, website performances, and suggestion of recommendations to make the 4W framework implementation better in the next month!
Any ROI-driven content marketing agency such as ours worth its salt will tell you that constant generation and feedback to enhance the former is the core of true content marketing.
Back when we were in high school, our physics teacher explained how neutrons were formed. Those weird ‘particles’ basically doing nothing (neutral charge) yet having a significant impact (balancing nuclear mass) were the mid-way between two opposite element poles – Proton (positively charged) and Electron (Negatively Charged)!
It was fascinating how two different worlds could be merged into a new entity!!
Almost a decade hence, the above philosophy stunningly holds even for industries that have a sparse correlation with core physics concepts – Digital Marketing Services!
Online and Offline marketing is the Protons and Electrons of the advertising industry. Critics, experts are always at loggerheads on the comparative effectiveness of the two worlds. Ideally, fundamentally offline businesses with local physical presence such as in retail, hospitality, F&B industries have been inclined towards offline advertising. Whereas, businesses with online offerings such as in education, counseling, IT, e-commerce, have always been inclined towards the online end of the demarcation.
THEN, PANDEMIC HAPPENED!
Within a few months, the entire global business scenario could not fathom that a digital transformation strategy was ‘the’ way forward to build a sustainable organization. Adding to the fact that billions have graduated towards digital-heavy decision making only exacerbated by the present scenario, digital advertising has become a necessity rather than ‘an option’!
Enter PHYGITAL – The ‘unthinkable entity’ or world where online marketing impacts offline businesses. And, that’s exactly where our story begins today.
Source: clearvoice.com
‘Tryst’ With India’s Retail Goliath
Godrej Interio – Naam toh suna hi hoga!
Yes, UrsDigitally’s digital marketing services were awarded a special marketing contract for Godrej Interio – India’s most popular and largest furniture and furnishings brand.
To be specific, Godrej Interio had realized that digital promotions were indeed the way forward and hence wanted to shift the entire marketing exercise of their hundreds of physical stores to online.
As a digital promotions partner, UrsDigitally would be responsible for managing activities of 75 stores under Godrej Interio East – the brand’s most esteemed cash cow region!
Source: hmhub.me
The Goliath-level Challenge
Behind every silver lining, there is a cloud! (Yes, we flipped it intentionally!)
Digital marketing services are only served best when all stakeholders are digitally active.
Even though digital advertising was surely the way forward for the sustainable business growth of all stores, there was a stark lack in the digital knowledge among store owners and Godrej TSIs who were acting as a bridge with the stores.
There were other challenges too:
Since many stores were nearby, there was a chance of regional overlapping while campaign targeting
Google My Business listings of many stores had multiple issues that needed to be solved
A proper digital presence for each Godrej store on Facebook was required
Compliance issues – Being Godrej, any promotions taking the name of the brand is bound to raise suspicions until and unless they were officially ratified
The primary step hence was to digitally educate all TSIs and Store owners on what we intended to do, what offers we would be running, what would be the digital experience for consumers seeing the ads, how the processes would flow, and lastly how communications would take place across all levels (agency -Godrej stakeholders – dealers – prospect consumers). Most importantly, how to manage the incomprehensible amount of information flow across all stakeholders!
Long story short, we needed to set a process! And that too in a way so that DATA OR ACTIVITY UPDATES are not only all captured seamlessly but also visible and accessible across all levels in a congruent manner.
Being a rising digital marketing agency with high vision but a lean operating model, unless this was set, the entire activity was doomed to be a failure. And, yes, the hiccups in this digital transformation strategy were much more than one could have comprehended.
Source: yourtrainingedge.com
A Mammoth Overcome
Tens of sheets and multiple online meets later, the entire communication and data management process was streamlined.
All sheets and campaign data were compiled into a comprehensive information bank that was accessible across different factions of the team. The sheets were formulized to deliver unique insights that would designate a campaign’s performance strength, weakness, etc.
In addition to streamlining the overall team structure, a data analysis structure was also developed wherein the team would monitor every campaign detail minutely from a sheet, reports to generate decision making insights as to what could be done for weaker performing locations—create videos with vernacular language maybe? Or, fine-tune interests to more locally beneficial ones?
Easier Planned than Done: The To-Dos!
These weren’t common times and nor was this a common project case wherein the client would be patient enough to wait for months for relevant business results.
Herein, the 75 Godrej store owners were extremely bullish about results and we had to prepare for an ROI-extreme campaign. This was Phygital campaigning at its best!
During the initial research phase to carefully map the activities that need to be done for impactful business results, we came across some notable factors:
An intent search was pretty high and hence user traffic campaigns for Google, Facebook would result in huge enquiries
There were suburban areas wherein target locations and audience size would be very low! Streamlined campaigns with customized content could be needed to attract the audience in those areas
For the non-intent audience that needs a bit of push selling, Facebook lead promotions would act as the perfect tool
A set of interests, behavioral metrics were identified that would be utilized for better campaign targeting
Geo-fencing techniques to be used to fine-tune the targeted location for each store to prevent overlapping
Review and consumer concerns were not properly addressed and that had reduced local store/page ratings which required proper planning
Each store needed to have a proper Facebook presence to run advertisements – Facebook store pages need to be created for each shop
After careful analysis of requirements, targets, and audience analysis, the following activities were planned:
Facebook Channel Management
Enquiry Generation and Sales Funnel Development – Lead generation and traffic
Google My Business Management for Each store
Online Review/Reputation Management
Online Response Management
The Vehicle Starts Running!
Finally, after a lot of blueprinting, ratifications, approvals, process set-ups, the campaigns went live by the 1st week of July.
Fingers crossed! We needed to show the best results to sustain the reputation of our digital marketing services, the brand, and warm-up organizational dreams!
Reach, engagement, impressions start blowing from the first day. HOWEVER, there were subsequently low enquiries.
All our painstaking efforts of setting up processes, educating stakeholders, developing team structures, plans seem to go out of the window!
It was a disaster weekend. We were clear that other metrics and stats would amount to nothing if there were not many inquiries. An emergency, hours-long meeting was followed by frantic activities, exchanges, and the entire campaigns were completely re-done and re-targeted within a matter of two days!
And, then something magical happened!
We generated over 300 enquiries within 2 days. Suddenly, the entire environment shifted. As the campaign progressed, the numbers kept on rising.
Tons of leads started flowing both from social channels and via user traffic from the landing page. As the numbers started climbing, a separate team member had to be identified who would just be responsible for sorting the data basis the store locations and updating on the client-facing sheet.
The tandem of tools, media experience, data analysis, and result-oriented decision making worked!
Source: 2fps.com
All Comes Down to This: Result Stats
At the end of the month, this was the entire picture:
7362 total leads/enquiries from social channels
Over 3.1 million reach
Over 6.2 million impressions
5 lakh+ total clicks, 66 thousand link clicks
5 lakh post engagements
1 lakh+ video views
For landing page analytics:
12,000 unique visitors
1644 total leads/enquiries from landing page traffic
13,000+ sessions
Average session duration – 1 minute!
The best part – the leads generated had an unprecedented 24% relevancy rate (High conversion probability). This not only made the entire campaign significantly business positive for Godrej Interio East but also we were notified that the pan India relevancy rate was only 6-7% and that too on a much lower lead count!
In short, we had generated the most number of enquiries than any other activity in all of India for Godrej and performed more than three times better on the business relevancy front!
Considering all the hiccups we had, this was just fascinating!
We had beaten the pandemic blues and proved that Phygital (Digital marketing for businesses with physical presence) works in such a magnitude!
Source: dealersupport.co.uk
Conclusion
Well, every coin has two sides!
While our enquiry and business numbers were impressive, this also set huge expectations from our digital marketing services!
As they always say, maintaining the top spot is more difficult than attaining the same.
Hence, this is just the start.
We are planning bigger and better in the subsequent month, focusing on more automated tools, increased data analysis competency, and smarter decision making.
Results would talk for us and we dream to one day manage digital promotions of the entire pan India Godrej stores.
