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20th December 2016
12:18am GMT
As 2014 comes to a close the marketing mix has never been so complex and for many it can be highly confusing to know where to start. I wanted to put together a little list of seven of the areas I would focus on if I had a business and was setting out online. There are 100s more things you could be doing but in terms of there being a bit of "blue ocean" to play in I like the following areas and could see you get excellent ROI. Give them a go...
You probably noticed of late that more video is appearing in the Newsfeed than ever before. It used to be Youtube videos that got shared on Facebook but that trend is changing faster than ever thanks to Facebook's own push into video. It all started around the time of the "Ice Bucket Challenge" and you can now see all the movie studios, news organisations and large publishers uploading their content directly to Facebook instead of Youtube. Given that Facebook are clearly favouring their own product it is a great way to make your video go even further than normal. Watch out for better quality player, improved analytics and lots more customisation in 2015 as video eyeballs move to Facebook.
If you own any sort of website or app I suggest you have Google real time analytics open at all times. I only ever have three tabs open in the browser and it is always one of them. Set up correctly in can give you instant feedback into what content is working, the products you are selling and how social traffic is engaging with your property. You'll learn so much (like which device and when users are using to engage with your content) just by watching how people interact in real time.
Probably one of the most underused tools in the online marketers arsenal. The offer so much flexibility from capturing email signs ups through to driving sales and lead generation. You don't even have to be spending money to use some of the cards and they offer a rich media experience (especially on mobile) that you just can't get with a normal tweet. Would be a sin not to use them.
Connect & discover: The Twitter story in 1:40
http://t.co/TRRiDAbkUR
— Twitter Advertising (@TwitterAds)
November 8, 2013
Ever noticed the amount of ads that seem to "follow" you around the web? That is what is called re-targeting and it is one of the most effective tools for driving sales and building your brand by staying front of mind with your online audience. Google and Facebook the two big players in the room and getting it started is as simple as just adding a pixel to your website.
No matter how many new social networks emerge it is plain old email that has been around for a couple of decades that I see selling the most stuff online. The stats from Black Friday for example show that over 35% of sales came via email campaigns. So many people ignore it hoping to drive sales from the newer sexier social media but you simply have to have a quality database and smart campaigns over email. You'd be stupid not to.
With all the social networks there is a phase that I like to call the "Wild West Stage". It is that time before they lock down the entire platform with advertising. With the advertising comes a bunch of rules banning competitions, forcing you to spend money to grow your following and generally making everything harder for you. Instagram are still just about in the wild west phase and it is super easy to grow your numbers there with competitions and other hacked together campaigns. Get in there and get your community built for free before they force you to pay to grow an audience.
You might have noticed that we've quietly rolled them out across all our sites. There are 600 million users of Whatsapp now (about half what Facebook have and well over double the size of Twitter) and they love sharing content within the app. Just like when the Twitter and Facebook buttons came out you'll want to add these thus making it super simple for people to share your content with their friends.
