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Susan Gunelius

Susan Gunelius

Marketing Automation Challenges and Opportunities

growth marketing automationFor brand marketers, automating processes does more than save time. It also increases lead generation and conversions. That means an investment in marketing automation can increase sales revenues.

A new study by Ascend2, the Marketing Automation Benchmark Summary Report, found that of marketers who are already using marketing automation, only 7% believe that it has not be successful in helping them to achieve important objectives. More than one in three marketers (69%) who responded to the Ascend2 survey indicated that marketing automation has been somewhat successful for them, while nearly one in four (24%) believe it has been very successful for them.

Brand marketers are using marketing automation in a variety of ways and few have the skills needed to fully leverage the opportunities it presents. Nearly one in two marketers who responded to this survey have to outsource some (41%) or all (7%) of their automated marketing campaigns.

However, even with great marketing automation tools and external expertise assisting them, brand marketers are still faced with many challenges when it comes to actually making marketing automation work for them. Most marketers struggle with developing an effective strategy (45%), limited budgets (44%), and a lack of skilled staff (40%). Furthermore, more than one in three marketers (34%) identify insufficient data quality as the most challenging obstacle to marketing automation success. With that in mind, it’s not surprising that the top two factors that marketers consider when choosing a marketing automation tool are analytics and reporting (41%) and ease of use (40%).

As with all marketing tools and marketing campaigns, metrics matter. Marketers involved in this study believe that the most useful metrics for measuring marketing automation performance are:

  • Lead conversion rate = 57%
  • Revenue generated = 42%
  • Lead generation ROI = 40%
  • Cost per lead = 32%
  • Leads generated = 32%
  • Pipeline value generated = 29%
  • Open/click-through rate = 21%
  • Website traffic = 17%

There is no doubt that marketing automation tools can help you execute more efficient and more successful marketing programs, but without the right skills to use those tools and accurately analyze the data provided by the tools, your success with them will be limited. I believe that employee training on using marketing automation tools (among others) is an investment that would pay off for almost any company. Would you agree?

How have you effectively integrated marketing automation at your company. Leave a comment and share your success story.

Image: Carl Dwyer

Facebook Rules Social Referrals

mouse click web trafficWhere does traffic to your branded website come from? Check your analytics data and it’s highly likely that Facebook will be near the top of the referrer list. That’s because Facebook now accounts for nearly a quarter (23.9%) of all traffic to websites. In other words, social referrals, particularly social referrals from Facebook, are getting more important every day.

This data comes from the 2nd Quarter 2014 Shareaholic Social Media Traffic Report. The study was developed through an analysis of trends between the first and second quarters of 2014 as well as a year-over-year analysis to determine how social referrals have changed since mid-2013.

The final data was developed by analyzing the eight most popular social media platforms to determine the amount of traffic each platform referred to Shareaholic’s network of sites during each of the study periods (quarterly and yearly).

The Data

Between the first and second quarters of 2014, changes in social referral traffic were very small. Facebook increased its share of social media traffic referrals from 21.25% to 13.39%. During the same period, the other seven social media platforms lost some of their share of social media traffic referrals. Collectively, those seven platforms lost nearly the same amount of social media traffic referrals that Facebook gained. It’s quite possible that Facebook simply stole some share from the other platforms.

In June 2014, Facebook had the biggest social referral share (23.39%) followed by Pinterest (5.72%), Twitter (1.03%), and StumbleUpon (0.60%). LinkedIn had the smallest social referral share (0.02%) followed by Google+ (0.06%), YouTube (0,06%), and Reddit (0.19%).

Looking at the year-over-year results is far more interesting. Here are some key statistics identified in the study:

  • Social media referrals doubled between mid-2013 and mid-2014, increasing from 15.55% to 31.07%.
  • Three social networks gained share of social media referrals year-over-year—Facebook (+150.49%), Pinterest (+69.53%), and StumbleUpon (+13.33%). All other social media platforms tracked in this study lost some of their share of social media referrals—YouTube (-82.66%), LinkedIn (-77.41%), Reddit (-65.54%), Google+ (-19.81%), and Twitter (-18.12%).
  • Facebook’s share of social media referral traffic (23.39%) is five times greater than the next closest social media platform in terms of referral traffic, Pinterest (5.72%).
  • The amount of traffic that Facebook sends to all websites increased by 150.49% between mid-2013 and mid-2014.

The Lesson for Brand Marketers

The message for brand marketers is in the data. Social referrals should be an important part of your KPIs. You should focus your marketing efforts on the networks that not only drive conversions but also support your efforts to drive traffic back to your website through the sharing and conversations that they do online, particularly on Facebook.

Are you tracking social referrals? What referral trends are you seeing for your brand website? Leave a comment and share your thoughts.

Image: Christoph Kurtzmann

Navigating the Numbers in the Online Purchase Path

digital shopping cartAccording to a new infographic from Baynote, data plays an important role in the online purchase path (see the infographic at the end of this article), but few companies are effectively navigating through the opportunities and roadblocks that all of the data creates.

The infographic breaks the online path to purchase into five distinct steps: discovery, research/intent, interest/checkout, after the sale, and path to purchase future considerations.

Let’s take a look at some of the data to see what’s happening along the path.

The Data

  • 89% of consumers use search engines to find information about products before they make a purchase. That’s nine out of 10 shoppers!
  • 79% of consumers follow brands on social media to get more information about products, services, and so on.
  • 92% of consumers trust earned media (such as personal recommendations) more than any other type of advertising.
  • 70% of consumers trust online reviews.
  • 86% of consumers are influenced by negative reviews that they read online.
  • 21% of consumers abandon their online shopping carts because the checkout process is too inefficient. That’s one in five sales lost!
  • 66% of consumers would buy more online if shipping were free.

The data is compelling and points out some fatal flaws that brands are making in their ecommerce strategies. For example, only 30% of brands are sending personalized emails to existing customers to try to increase repeat purchases despite the fact that research shows personalized emails are opened 29% more frequently and clicked on 42% more frequently than non-personalized emails. Furthermore, transaction rates are six times higher for personalized email messages.

Brands are also failing when it comes to mobile. According to the infographic, 54% of ecommerce transactions will happen on mobile devices by 2018, but many brands are still trying to fit their traditional marketing strategies and campaigns into the mobile space. In essence, they’re creating self-inflicted roadblocks that keep them from achieving their growth goals because a growing number of consumers will be frustrated with the brand’s mobile shopping experience.

Key Takeaways

The important thing for brand marketers to understand is that they can take control and remove many of the obstacles that lead to reduced conversions. Listen to the data. Turn roadblocks into checkpoints where you check the data, review the user experience, and make the necessary changes to reduce cart abandonment rates and increase positive reviews and social sharing.

data online purchase path

Source: Baynote

Image: Svilen Milev

Enterprise Content Marketing in 2014

laptop content marketingIf you’re struggling to find employee buy-in to support your content marketing plan, fighting for every content marketing budget dollar, and disappointed with content marketing performance measurement options, you’re not alone. According to The State of Enterprise Content Marketing 2014 report from the Content Marketing Institute (CMI), many senior-level marketers feel the same way.

The data came from the CMI Executive Form held in San Francisco, California in May with 40 senior-level marketers discussing the present and future state of enterprise content marketing. The final report offers a number of key challenges and insights that are common among all or most of the executives in attendance, including:

Marketing Silos Impede Progress and Success

Marketing silos exist everywhere, not just in big companies and not just in content marketing. Having worked in marketing departments for some of the largest companies in the world during my career, I can attest to the rampant existence of silos. Today, marketing needs to be integrated across the enterprise, and that includes content marketing. However, the challenge to overcome marketing’s reputation as the department that only likes to spend money is one that has evolved over many decades and is unlikely to disappear anytime soon. It’s up to leadership to build and support a company culture that values marketing, including content marketing. And that brings us to the next item…

Company Cultures Don’t Support Content Marketing

Prioritizing content marketing has to come from the top down. Leaders and employees need to be trained on why content marketing is important to the company and the brand as a whole. The State of Enterprise Content Marketing 2014 report explains the challenges identified by executives related to company culture:

It can be difficult to get employee buy-in for content marketing. In addition, education is needed around social media governance, especially in companies where the C-suite is still “afraid” of what might get out. Training, as well as a flexible line of communication about content that can be shared across networks, can be invaluable.

Human Capital Resources are Hard to Come By

Where should the content marketing team sit on the organizational chart? Who should be on the team? Should team members be dedicated to content marketing or should content marketing be just one part of their job responsibilities? Should content marketing be outsourced? These are the questions that enterprise executives are still struggling with. In the meantime, progress slows and success is limited. “Hurry up and wait” is the norm when it comes to content marketing because decision-making isn’t happening efficiently or confidently.

Content is Created but Not Promoted

Companies invest in content creation, but not as many invest in content promotion. The days of “if you publish it, they will come” are over. For the enterprise, content promotion is an important part of a comprehensive plan. Without it, content has very little chance to survive and thrive.

View the SlideShare presentation below for the complete The State of Enterprise Marketing 2014 report from the Content Marketing Institute.

What challenges are you experiencing with your brand’s content marketing? Leave a comment and share your insights.

Image: Ahmed Al-Shukaili

Most and Least Respected Brands of 2014

corporate brand office buildingThe most respected brand of 2014 is Coca-Cola while the least respected is Delta Airlines.

The ranking of the most and least respected brands of 2014 comes from the Brand Respect 2014 report from CoreBrand. Using its Corporate Branding Index, which is a 23-year quantitative study, CoreBrand’s team analyzed 1,000 corporate brands (not product or divisional brands) that have been publicly traded for more than five years, and have been tracked by its Index for more than five years.

Over 500 companies met the study’s criteria and were included in the final analysis. Each brand was ranked based on familiarity (i.e., how familiar U.S. survey respondents were with the brand) and favorability (i.e., how survey respondents who were familiar with the brand ranked it in terms of overall reputation, perception of management, and investment potential). The top 100 brands with the highest familiarity rankings were sorted by their favorability scores to create the list of the most and least respected brands of 2014. The top 10 and bottom 10 brands follow:

10 Most Respected Brands of 2014

  1. Coca-Cola
  2. PepsiCo
  3. Hershey
  4. Bayer
  5. Johnson & Johnson
  6. Harley-Davidson
  7. IBM
  8. Apple
  9. Kellogg
  10. General Electric

10 Least Respected Brands of 2014

  1. Delta Airlines
  2. H&R Block
  3. Big Lots
  4. Denny’s
  5. Best Buy
  6. Rite Aid
  7. J.C. Penney
  8. Capital One Financial
  9. Family Dollar Stores
  10. Sprint Nextel

CoreBrand warns that the least respected brands are not the same as the least favorable brands that it tracks. Rather, the least respected brands are those that have the biggest gap between familiarity and favorability among survey respondents. In other words, “These are among the most well known brands, but lag dramatically in perceptions and audience sentiment. These 10 brands represent the bottom of the most familiar in regards to brand respect.”

It’s also important to note that the data is relative. For example, Delta Airlines ranked as the least respected brand of 2014. However, in comparison to competitor airline brands, Delta ranked second highest for familiarity but it ranked lowest for favorability. The other airline brands analyzed in this study (US Airways, United Airlines, Southwest Airlines, and American Airlines) all suffered from similar problems and low favorability scores were common across the industry. In other words, all airline brands suffer from low brand respect.

The brands included in this study are all household names. U.S. consumers (and in many cases, consumers around the world) are extremely familiar with these brands, but for some of these brands, that familiarity can’t make up for the lack of favorability.

How does your brand stack up in terms of familiarity versus consumers’ perceptions of the brand as favorable or unfavorable? When was the last time you invested in the necessary research to determine if there is a gap between familiarity and favorability for your brand? If that gap is growing, your brand respect is decreasing. Bottom-line, this is information you need to know as a brand marketer, so invest in the research before the gap gets too big.

Image: Stella Levi