Brand Evaluation - Task Assignment #3

Today we discussed online customer acquisition techniques.  How does your brand use the Internet to acquire customers?  Does their competition use display advertising?  How do they compare?

Try to find out if your brand is using display advertising.  If so, what do you think the objective of the campaign is?  Do they have a clear call to action?  Are they using landing pages effectively?  Who do you think they are targeting?  How could they improve?

Look for other signs of acquisition campaigns.  Are they using event marketing?  Public relations?  Viral marketing campaigns?  If so, how do you think they are doing?  Can they improve?  If not, what should/could they be doing?

You will score 10 points for this one.  Happy ad hunting!

Quiz #1 - Wed. September 26

Quiz #1 has been saved to eLearn and is ready to go.

You must complete this quiz on Wednesday September 26 between 8:00 am and 8:00 pm.

You will have 30 minutes to complete the quiz and you get one attempt at each question.  Questions are multiple choice and T/F (there is one exception).

Includes questions on chapters 1 - 5.  It will give you a good taste of what to expect for the mid-term exam.  If you have been keeping up with your reading and assignments you should be in good shape.

Good luck!

Targeting Your Online Advertising

What is Online Advertising?

It refers to a form of promotion that helps in marketing goods and services through internet to deliver advertising messages to the consumers. 

Targeting Audience through Online Advertising

As we all know Online Advertising now a days has a fast pace of promoting and marketing products and service to the targeted user in a tremendous degree of accuracy and in a really fast way by placing ads on different websites and tracking them through different tracking methods. It helps advertisers reach niche audience with customized message. 

Targeting your online advertising includes targeted audience that an advertiser wants to reach, these can be reached through:

Demographic: - It helps the advertiser target the audience on the basis of their age, sex and nationality. For example, some advertisers want to target consumers on the basis of their age, so they come out with ads that attract and target that particular age group so that they can reach the market they want. Websites like Yahoo and Facebook use it.

Geographic: - Geo-Targeting helps in determining Geo location of the website visitor and delivers different content to the consumer based on the location as set by website. It reaches targeted audience of a particular place, state, city, country.  It helps website owners and advertiser to restrict content in places where they don't want it to be viewed and displays content customized for that particular area or location.

Behavioral Targeting: - Advertisers target users from their behavior online, such as from search, visiting different websites and behavior segments For example, targeting companies establish an agreement with the publisher, who puts a code on his website(that collects information from the consumer). Then when the user is using that website, the site will put up a cookie on the users browser which keeps on updating as the user surfs online, this helps the advertiser to reach the targeted market through their behavior online.

Language:-Language targeting serves ads only to users who have selected to access the website in a certain language of their choice. This type of language targeting ads can be seen on regional local websites, it helps reach only those users who use the website in a particular language that the advertisers are targeting. For examples: - User using English, French, Spanish, Hindi or Punjabi etc. to access a website.

Interest:-Interest based targeting refers to delivering ads to people on what they care about, either for a long term or at a given moment. Google Ads and other keyword related search ads fit into this category because they only delivered those ads to people that they desire at that time. Ads on blogs or focus issued websites are also a really good example of interest based targeting. Campaigns can use interest based targeting to reach a particular person or group who cares about that subject at that time.

Flash Mob Marketing - Check it out!

As promised, I will be sharing some examples of how flash mobs are used for marketing and how you can effectively market a product or service with these fun events.

Skule Nite is a local (GTA) group who has been using flash mobs quite effectively for a few years now.  Check out their videos and a recent article about their most recent performance and see if you can learn any tips!

 

They even made the news recently! 

http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2012/09/engineering-students-exam-interrupted-by-flash-mob.html

Please note:  I do NOT recommend you consider scheduling your flash mob during mid-term exams here at Mohawk:)





Cloud Computing – The Next Step of the Online Technological Revolution

What exactly is the “cloud”?

The cloud is a metaphor for the internet. Cloud computing is the process of using the internet as your personal online tool to store data, update software and run applications.  This new era in technology promises convenience and efficiency to all users. Cloud computing is the future of business.

The Advantages of Cloud Computing

Portability           

Imagine have the ability to access your online data from anywhere in the world? With cloud computing this is not only a possibility, its reality. Whether it’s running an online business or accessing your files for a school assignment, all you need is an internet connection.

 

Cost Efficiency

Running an online business is costly. As your client base increases, investment in new software services is essential. You’ll need more space to hold all that new information and consumer data. This means spending money on data storage servers, software updates and management to run these new devices.

Do you see the flaw in this solution?  What happens if your client base suddenly decreases in size? What do you do if you’re a small business owner and you can’t afford this new investment?  Cloud computing is your answer. Amazingly with cloud computing you buy the exact amount of storage space you need, no more, no less, saving you money on storage facilities and unwanted employees.
  

Data Efficiency

Do you need to be a tech expert to use cloud computing? Absolutely not! Storing information in the cloud is quick and easy. With an unlimited storage capacity you don’t have to worry about running out of space. Since all your data is stored in the cloud, the entire process of backing up and recovering your files is much simpler than other traditional methods of data storage.

 

Cloud computing allows us to use our computer resources more efficiently.  It is rapidly changing the way people do business over the internet. Gone are the days of saving your work with a USB stick and working from the same computer. This tool is a sensational piece of innovative technology!

Brand Evaluation - Task Assignment #2

Today we discussed the 4 Elements of a Brand.  How would you characterise each of these for your brand? (4 points)

We also discussed video marketing in great detail.  Does your brand use video to market their products/service?  If yes, how?  Can you identify their objectives?  Are their videos being shared?  How would you evaluate their success?  Do you have any recommendations?  If no, how could they use video to market their products/services?  How does their competition use video for marketing? (6 points)

Looking forward to your reviews!

The Future of Video Marketing

THE FUTURE OF VIDEO MARKETING

As we know, consumers watch a lot of television and use the internet everyday.

- 32% of people used pre-recorded to watch video, compared 23% of using DVDs and 20% using Internet.

- there are only 13% of people use streamed for watching video

- However, there are just only 5-6% of people using Smartphone and tablet for watching video

The table below show us that all people over the year spent almost 20 hours per week for watching video on variety of devices.The table make it clear that there are so many ways to consume video content. The more people watch video, the more benefits that business can have by using video marketing as online advertising. 

The table show us the percentage of spending in ads in Canada from 2009-2014.
There are so many ways to use videos for business and marketing purposes. There is also a good information to produce videos to customers. Many experienced marketers believe that video marketing is successful for small business. Because video production may have low cost, and secondly, the process of creating and deploying can be fast. Marketer can create the video on any video sharing channel. And You Tube is the most popular channel with both business and customers.
Video marketing needs the successful strategy, just like another type of marketing campaign. One of the most important key to tell the story to customer is meeting the need's customers and delivering the benefits to customers. Video marketing is already the successful marketing tool and it continues to grow year over the year.

Business Models

Before we start talking about business models, it is important to know what a business model is. According to our text book, “a business model is how a company makes money or a non-profit organization achieves its revenue objectives, how an entity sustains itself”. The most common way for a website to generate revenue is to sell goods or services. Non-profit organizations can raise revenue through donations.

Making money on the internet seems easy, but it is not. Even successful companies have a hard time expanding to the internet, especially when trying to engage with social media. As a business owner who operates solely on the internet, I can assure that it is a competitive, aggressive and hard-to-understand market. But, once tamed, it can also be very profitable and fun – especially when you, just like me, play videogames for a living.

The basic web business models described on our text book have both B2C and B2B applications, a few have non-profit applications, and are the following:

1)Brokerage Model: brings buyers and sellers together.

2)Advertising Model: displays advertisements during navigation.

3)Infomediary Model: resells useful information.

4)Merchant Model: provides good and services.

5)Manufacturer Model: takes place when a manufacturer reaches buyers directly

6)Affiliate Model: offers incentives to partner sites.

7)Community Model: connects individuals and groups.

8)Subscription Model: delivers services and content for a fee.

9)Utility Model: delivers services and content on a paid base.

Machinima Logo

As I mentioned earlier, I play videogames for a living. How do I do that? Well, I work under a modified Brokerage Model. I own two Youtube channels – http://www.youtube.com/BRKsEDU and http://www.youtube.com/PequenoSapeca – and both are partnered with a Youtube Network called Machinima. What Machinima does is place advertisements of companies willing to promote through Youtube on my Youtube channel. Basically, I sell advertisement space, which is bought by the advertiser through Machinima (the broker).

I can also, on my own, sell ad placements on my Youtube channel (on my channel’s background or on videos), which is shown below, and promote products, brands and services on Twitter and Facebook, which I use to better engage with my audience but which also work as a form of promotion for me and / or for other companies businesswise.

BRKsEDU Youtube Channel - 288,240 subscribers - 32,338,072 total views

If you have any question related about Business Models, Youtube, Twitter or Facebook, feel free to ask them in the comments section or to contact me via Twitter or Facebook.

Clickable Ads

Online Ads include all of the methods by which businesses try to get Web surfers attention and sell their products and services. No matter popping up ads, banners, sidebar links, social networks, emails or affiliate networks, they are all strategies used by marketing people to attract new consumers and gain leads for company. However, advertisement on the Internet has been around for near fifteen years and many users are looking at the ads they skim on the Web in a different way. Online web promotion strategy is becoming more and more of a science as everyday surfer of the Internet are turning increasingly irritated by the many ways that web advertisement can often surreptitiously take over a "www" that one is trying to use. The challenge today is considering and finding other ways of getting people's attention.

The methods for Internet promotion hasn't really changed quite in the past ten years. Popping up ads are still a big weapon among tons of advertisers, which already drive net surfers crazy. Related researchers are fast to point out that "pop-ups" are the highest rated form of despised advertisement. Ads that attempt and bait potential consumers into clicking on it rated just as low and ads that suddenly pop up and hide what you are really wanting to find are also widely disdained. When Internet advertisement doesn't have close buttons, and when it floats across your screen, or plays surprisingly without your permission, those ads are really nothing but annoying to people according to research. Therefore before a potential consumer ever relies on those pass kinds of online web advertisement ploys, more energy and money should be spent on highly proven methods of promotion. 

In my eyes, nowadays online web ad is moving forward of being a partner with the idea of helping people find answers, not just making a sale. This is maybe a tough concept for hardcore salesman to accept, but in the process of helping consumers find answers to their questions, more business goals can ultimately be achieved. For example, the blog is a great chance of writing personally, without a bunch of hype and it allows the writer to become a sort of expert or "turn to" person when potential clients or customers have questions ( just like us ). It also can have sidebar invitations to visit company website and an invitation at the end of the blog, and it should be used for informational functions, not related to product presentation. The idea is to get potential consumer to come back again and pass blog on to others for their enlightenment as well.

Branding on the Web

We as marketers know, (if you don’t, you should) that branding is a critical component in achieving success. We’re using the traditional approach of listening and providing the customer with a solution for his needs, but are constantly evolving and focusing a lot more on branding.

Branding is much more than just adding a recognizable logo, having a catchy slogan or standing out from the competition. Nowadays, this phenomenon is about creating a long-lasting relationship with someone who knows little or nothing about you, and transforming them into a loyal customer who trusts and loves your company.
 

The strength of a brand -also known as brand equity - will affect this. And because the internet is such an important part of our everyday lives, branding on the web is much more important. Our mission has become a lot easier due to the fact that the internet allows customers to have an increased level of brand awareness and makes them quicker to act than traditional mass-media. This doesn’t mean that the same marketing principles don’t apply anymore. On the contrary; a customer passes through the same stages – awareness, familiarity, trust, commitment- but a lot faster because of the internets advantage of being highly interactive, engaging and able to personalize communication. 

Creating an online brand

The resources and efforts required for a good branding campaign are quite high. That’s why there are guidelines that should be followed for a better end-result. The most important ones are:

• Emphasize the quality and mission of the company.  You will want to implement an image or reputation that stands out and is respected.

• Research your customer and engage him through the use of signage, advertising and online personality.

• Find the right balance between advertising-marketing and customer relationships.

•  Continuously manage and control available information about your products or company.

It is becoming clear that people are making choices and develop attitudes towards certain brands based on the material they find online. This issue can be handled in several ways. The first would be to create and spread your own relevant content, or by letting the users come up with the information - reviews, discussions or blog posts - and handle that content accordingly with the use of marketing tools such as search engine optimization.

As a conclusion, it is fair to say that branding is a highly complex process if it’s done right, but it is vital for any type of business because the targeted consumers are always changing and develop new needs that need to be addressed.