vendredi 28 février 2014

Zoiro’s #DontStopDenim Creates Live Interaction To Keep Zoiro Man VJ Manish In His Denin Underwear

Zoiro’s #DontStopDenim Creates Live Interaction To Keep Zoiro Man VJ Manish In His Denin Underwear image zoiro denin


Remember those hoardings all over the city featuring a guy in Denim briefs? Well, that’s the Zoiro man promoting Denin, denim intimates for men from Zoiro, the designer innerwear brand for men. And, today the innerwear brand is out with an exciting online campaign at ‘Dont Stop Denim’.


The campaign gives fans the power to keep the Zoiro man in his Denin underwear for the whole day by throwing challenges for him. Make him do the salsa, propose to the chair, dance like a robot, or sing a funny song and the Zoiro man would oblige.


One has to use the hashtag #DontStopDenim in their challenge tweets. And, remember..the Zoiro Denin guy will start wearing his clothes if there aren’t any challenges in #DontStopDenim. But, of course, that hasn’t happened because he looks so comfortable in his denim briefs!


The 24-hour campaign has an iPad Mini and many other prizes to give away every hour.


#DontStopDenim


Zoiro’s #DontStopDenim Creates Live Interaction To Keep Zoiro Man VJ Manish In His Denin Underwear image zoiro Dontstopdenim website


The very talented VJ Manish, as the Zoiro Denin guy has been accepting all kinds of crazy challenges since the morning. You can watch him live at the ‘Don’t Stop Denim’ website after logging in with your Facebook or Twitter id. On the left bottom is the time lapsed and the right bottom shows the remaining time. Right now, there are 9 hours remaining to this live campaign and he is gone for a break. The number of tweets or Facebook posts made is given at the top right corner, while the live tweets flash at the bottom.


I’ve been watching him do a yoga asana, sing the ‘Meri Jaan’ song, act like a British spy, do kung fu, talk in tapori Hindi and whatnot, all the while dressed in his Denin underwear. At one time in the morning, he did wear his jeans as there weren’t any challenges in the Twitter stream. In this screenshot, he’s been enacting an Indian ‘bahu’.


Here’s a look at some of the crazy challenges waiting for him:












The campaign was promoted a few days ago with a video shared on the Zoiro’s Facebook and Twitter pages. The Zoiro guy tells you not to tweet with #DontStopDenim if we do not want to see him in his Denin underwear. While the campaign is on right now, the hourly winners are being announced on the brand’s Facebook and Twitter page.



Creative use of digital & social media


When you tell someone not to do something, they are even more tempted to do it. Zoiro’s #DontStopDenim campaign is built on the same premise, where the brand gets users to actually tweet with the hashtag. It’s been 18 hours to the campaign and the hashtag has been trending in Mumbai.


Moreover, the idea of a website and live interaction through social media is an impressive one. Tangible incentives for the users and the fun interaction created by the talented VJ Manish, has made the campaign worthwhile. Quite an interesting concept to promote the Denin brand as something so comfortable, that a man could be wearing only a Zoiro Denin the entire day and not feel under-dressed!


What do you think about #DontStopDenim? Hope you’ve thrown a few challenges at the Denin guy.






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Why Your Sales Numbers Are Coming Up Short

Why Your Sales Numbers Are Coming Up Short image question mark newThe seller who best clarifies the problem, earns the customer. The primary benefit of value-based selling, as opposed to product-focused selling, is the ability to solve customer problems without resorting to product commoditization.


If your sales process isn’t grounded in customer problems, your opportunities aren’t likely to capture the true value of the solution provided.


Here are four reasons why:


1. Buyers Need Evidence Their Pain is Understood


In the sales process there should be a direct correlation between the buyer’s pain and a solution that it will address that pain. Without business pain, there is no business. Equally important, buyers who believe that their pain is clearly understood will be more willing to share critical information throughout the buying process and will work harder to understand the solution being presented.


2. There is Limited Access Within the Buyer’s Organization


Failure to fully understand how a buyer’s pain is directly related to needs higher in the organization can narrow a seller’s sphere of influence to a limited number of key stakeholders. If your salespeople can’t attach their solution to the largest business problem, it limits access to economic buyers who control discretionary funding, reducing support for the proposed solution.


3. The Solution is Perceived as Expensive


Focusing on a laundry list of irrelevant product features creates an impression that the solution is more than the buyer needs, and therefore, more expensive. Remember, the value of the solution is in the eyes of the buyer, not the seller.


4. The Customer Has Difficulty Differentiating Between Competitive Offerings


When customers can’t differentiate between multiple competitive offerings; they often assume that all of the solutions are similar in value. This perception reduces the decision to the lowest common denominator: price. Sellers who fail to introduce relevant differences early in the sales cycle miss a fleeting opportunity to influence the buying criteria.


5. The Value Proposition is Not Clearly Understood


This final challenge occurs when internal sales resources aren’t aligned around a common sales approach that clearly articulates and delivers the company’s value proposition. This lack of alignment leads to sales cycle inefficiencies, customer confusion, and brand dilution in the marketplace.


If your numbers are behind this quarter, your sales team could be struggling with optimizing value and differentiation throughout the sales process. Ensure your sales team has the ability to uncover customer needs, articulate value, and differentiate solutions in their sales conversations and throughout the buyer process.


Why Your Sales Numbers Are Coming Up Short image fc873d77 a2e0 48a4 b1ef b3b537f04f02






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A Simple 5 Step Lead Generation Approach to B2B Email Marketing

Lead generation is the heart and soul of many business models, especially services firms and SaaS providers that rely on a steady flow of new customers for cash flow and growth. The tactics available for lead generation range from using appointment setting firms to hiring outside sales teams to improving your SEO and inbound marketing tactics. But a number of anecdotal experiences suggest that strategic outbound email marketing (and applying similar techniques to networking through platforms like LinkedIn) can help get you in front of the CEO (or your target prospect) quickly and effectively. The advantage of targeted emailing campaigns is that they let you control which companies and contacts you make and attract to your company. Here’s a closer look at one technique I’ve seen in play very successfully, specifically in B2B markets.


A Simple 5 Step Lead Generation Approach to B2B Email Marketing image 11008394895 5e22c3af3c b


Source: Flickr


Step 1: Define your specific business goal


For companies that are hungry for leads, launching a lead generation campaign is a double edged sword. It’s easy to get excited about the potential of new leads, but suddenly everyone is trying to join in the action. “While you’re out trying to attract new leads for X product, could we try to generate interest in Y division?” However, it’s absolutely critical that the foundation of your campaign be built upon one very specific goal or agenda. The more narrow and specific your focus, the more success you will be. If you dilute your goals, there is a better than average chance that your program will fail to achieve any of the objectives you set out to accomplish.


So what makes an appropriate lead generation goal? Here are a few specific examples:



  • An SaaS company with a portfolio of products focuses on developing leads for one specific software program.

  • A services company launches a campaign to offer its services to a new vertical, such as SEO for accounting firms.

  • A company developing content campaigns sets a target to connect with the Chief Marketing Officer of companies larger than $2 million per year in eight possible industries.


Don’t move forward until you’re able to articulate your goal in one sentence or less. Remember, as you get the hang of this, it’s possible to use the same process to push growth in other areas of your business.


Step 2: Develop a quality list


Lead gen professionals will often tell you that your best efforts will only yield results on par with the quality of your list. If your list contains any of the following, you’re likely to come up short:



  • Out of date contact information

  • Out of date names or titles

  • Companies that are out of business

  • Companies that are inactive in the space that you’re targeting

  • Companies with a focus that’s shifted

  • Bad geographic data

  • Companies that don’t fit your target profile


There’s a range of ways you can get your lists, from creating your own to industry groups to list retailers. If you’re buying a list, it’s important to understand how active a list is, how frequently it’s updated, and what quality assurance techniques they use to vet their information. Where possible, I’d advocate targeting a smaller sample of dream companies that you’re interested in doing business with. Leverage the advantage of being in control of what companies you’re putting your message in front of. But for some verticals, lead gen is a numbers game. As long as you’re working off quality information, both in terms of recency and accuracy, that’s the most important aspect of a list.


Finally, consider the make-up of your companies and come up with four or five titles that you could target. For example, if you’re in the IT space, you might be writing to the Chief Technology Officer, the Director of IT, an IT consultant, or even the office manager. This varies widely depending on the size and type of company that you’re targeting, but create a cluster of job titles with this position in mind.


Step 3: Draft a short, tight sales pitch


I’ll caveat this by saying that there isn’t a single right approach here. For some people, long sales letters work well. For others, highly personalized prospecting messages that show a deep understanding of the company are what’s required. For purposes of this experience, however, I’m going to advocate that you write a very specific message.


Here are the basic guidelines to keep in mind when crafting your pitch:



  • No more than 300 words; ideally, 250 words or less.

  • Features a tightly crafted value proposition that’s written with your specific target in mind. The piece should be drafted to a company’s CMO or sourcing manager, for example. The more specific to the problems and challenges that person faces, the better.

  • Spend significant time on your headlines and your opening. It’s critical that you capture the reader’s attention and keep them moving along.

  • Take a copywriting approach that’s as benefits driven as possible.

  • Leverage real customer data and examples, including client names, statistics and pull quotes.

  • Avoid clichés.

  • Write in a natural, friendly, conversational tone. Avoid jargon and formal business language.

  • End on a strong call to action.


In a sense, this is copywriting 101. At the same time, delivering this in less than 300 words is a writing challenge of the highest order. If you achieve it, you’ll have a piece of copy that not only helps generates leads but can be used in multiple places.


Step 4: Choose entry points other than your target recipient


It’s possible, during the list building process, to identify a number of individuals that you could send your email to – other than the person you really want to target at the company you’re reaching out to. If you’re hoping to talk to IT, start with admin or sales. It’s counterintuitive, but what you’re asking for here is a referral. You’re going to take advantage of the power of great writing, professional presentation, and our overwhelming desire to get something off our plates to ask your ideal prospect’s colleague to make a simple email introduction.


Consider, for a moment, if you receive an email that begins with something like:


Hi Kate, Could you refer me to the person that’s responsible for your hiring process?


If I am Kate and I’m not the Hiring Director, I may ignore your email. But more often, I’ll respond to your message with a cc to the appropriate person or giving you their email address. You want to strategically try, over the course of a few weeks if needed, to follow up with a range of individuals at a company. You should also not be afraid to send a follow up message after a week or so, reiterating your request. One point that I’ve noticed is that this works particularly well with medium and larger companies.


Step 5: How to close


Where the process can fall apart is how you respond to the message with a cc to the appropriate person. When you have a window of opportunity, resist the urge to send a presentation or brochure, or a long email explaining why you’re getting in touch. Instead, you want to use this opening to make a personal contact with your ideal prospect. Ask to get them on the phone, even if it’s for 15 or 20 minutes. You’ve then moved them along in the funnel from cold contact to lukewarm lead, and can use your sales process to close the deal.


It’s not a fool-proof process. It doesn’t work all the time, and it depends on how effective your copy is, how targeted your message is to your prospect, and whether you’ve been persistent and focused in your outreach. But especially in the B2B markets, this email marketing approach can help you make new contacts and launch the conversation with potential clients.


What approaches are you using today in prospecting emails or lead generation outreach that are effective? Let me know in the comments below.






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3 Reasons You Should Use Website Visitor Tracking

More than likely, your website plays a sizable role in your overall business success. 3 Reasons You Should Use Website Visitor Tracking image footprint


It’s the primary point of brand engagement for prospects, leads, and customers, all of whom are uniquely interacting with your pages and content, assessing your products and services, and ultimately counting on your website to deliver what they need … no matter where they are in the buying process.


It’s a high bar with the potential for higher rewards; thus, worthy of the time, budget, and resources you spend on it.


So if you haven’t already (and only 51% of B2B companies have, according to a recent study), one of the key systems you should implement and take full advantage of is website visitor tracking.


By doing so, you will:



  • Improve the efficiency of lead-gen and sales processes

  • Improve lead quality

  • Close more sales


Let’s look at how.


Visitor tracking vs web analytics


First things first: semantics.


Are “web analytics” and “website visitor tracking” the same thing?


Yes and no.


Website visitor tracking is a specialized subset of the generic category called Web Analytics.


They’re interrelated and complementary, but not all web analytics tools offer website visitor tracking. For those that do, it might be included in the overall solution or available as an additional for-fee service. (The Act-On platform includes website visitor tracking.)


For simplicity (and to move this blog post along), here’s a way to parse the terms:



  • Web analytics has a broad focus on website optimization and performance. It measures traffic patterns to help companies optimize site functionality, the online experience, and marketing initiatives. Common metrics include unique visits, page views, pages per visit, new visitor rates, bounce rates, average time on site, and conversions (note that “conversion” covers many actions, depending on the business and/or campaign).

  • Website visitor tracking has a narrow focus on individuals’ behavior while they’re on your website, including who they are, where they came from, what precisely they’re clicking on, downloading , and engaging with, how recently, and how frequently.


The combined use of both capabilities forges a powerful tool for sales and marketing efforts. Web analytics provides the solid understanding of how your site is working … or not. And website visitor tracking provides in-depth information about the specific individuals and companies engaging with your site.


The net:net is a veritable motherload of knowledge that directly benefits your lead-gen and sales efforts, including their efficiency and their revenue numbers.


Bringing this full circle, here’s how website visitor tracking delivers the benefits mentioned at the beginning of this post:


Benefit #1: Improve the efficiency of lead-gen and sales processes


Website visitor tracking allows you to see – often in real time – who is visiting your website and, based on their trackable behaviors:



  • why they’re on your site,

  • what their issues, interests, and/or pain points are, and

  • where they are in the buying process.


The ability to “see” what individuals – both known and anonymous visitors – are doing on your website gives you the ability to target them, meaning you can deliver valuable content that’s tailored to their needs and encourages them to take the next step.


(Yes, this is possible with anonymous visitors. It just takes a little bit of investigative work using visitor-tracking filters and integration with a tool such as Data.com.)


As a result, processes are streamlined for everyone; marketers can gauge the effectiveness of their content and nurture campaigns, sales teams can optimize their time by focusing on the highest-priority leads, and prospective customers can move at their own pace to a purchase decision.


Benefit #2: Improve lead quality


Here are two stats that underscore this benefit quite nicely:



  • According to a recent Aberdeen Group study, sales and marketing professionals both agree that lead quality is far more important to revenue than lead quantity (by a factor of 2-to-1).

  • Ad Age’s 2013 Lead Gen Study reports sales professionals as saying only 23% of leads are qualified to the point of being sales-ready. (MarketingSherpa reported this figure at 27% in a 2012 study.)


Qualified leads are the bread and butter of sales quotas (and increasingly, marketing quotas). At the end of the day, making the numbers hinges on a having a consistent, steady flow of leads progressing stage-to-stage – i.e., being qualified – through the sales pipeline.


Website visitor tracking makes this a reality because it provides the most important information you can use for your lead scoring programs: who your visitors are and what they want.


This knowledge allows marketers to more effectively nurture leads and deliver more qualified leads to sales.


Additionally, by merging the knowledge gleaned from real-time website visitor tracking with historic engagement behavior, actionable insights and a-ha’s can be uncovered, and these can be used to optimize content plans, campaigns, and sales messages.


Benefit #3: Close more sales


The capabilities inherent in website visitor tracking all work together to get you the payoff. Here’s an example to illustrate what’s possible:



A returning visitor comes to the website for the 3rd time in as many days. The system recognizes the visitor, who is already set up in the company CRM system, and sends an alert to the sales rep, letting her know that this visitor is very interested in Product A.


The system also applies the lead scoring algorithm to the visitor’s record based on current and past engagement behavior with website content and interest. The current visit puts the visitor’s score above the sales-ready threshold for Product A. This automatically triggers a sales alert email and auto-enrolls the visitor into a nurture campaign.


When the visitor opens and clicks on the sales alert email, another alert is sent to the sales rep who, after reviewing the visitor’s activities in the CRM record, picks up the phone and is successful at setting up a product demo the following week.


After attending the demonstration – which is one of the most successful sales-closing tactics – the visitor purchases Product A.



At the end of the day, management wants to know what you’ve done for them lately. Pulling a healthy list of closed sales out of your pocket will surely impress and contribute to your company’s – and your – continued success.


Interested in Act-On’s Website Visitor Tracking dashboard? Register today for our weekly marketing automation demo or contact us for a one-on-one conversation.


Image of “Digital Footprint Word Cloud” from penbentley, used under a Creative Commons 2.0 license.






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How Belvita Turned Mornings Into Engagement Wins

Everyone knows that mornings aren’t easy. After hitting that snooze button a couple of times, you decide to finally get up, rub the sleep off your eyes and start the day.


Tasks such as getting ready for work, cooking breakfast or sending your kids off to school, does require a bit of an extra push never mind going for a run or worse…the gym.


belVita recognized this hectic (and worst?) part of someone’s day and saw an opportunity to engage. Let’s jump in and find out how.


#Morningwin


#Morningwin is the hashtag of the hour and we all need one, a morning win not a hashtag. belVita introduced the hashtag and started the campaign around the beginning of December 2013.




The campaign was centered around celebrating the followers’ “Morning Wins”. These could be big wins like going for run, sending your kids to school or small ones like doing laundry without losing a sock. Followers received a customized digital certificate or trophy addressed to the user with their accomplishment added in. A microsite was used to show people their customized trophies and certificates which were sent as a picture on Twitter. A few lucky followers even got real life trophies and certificates before they ran out also the people at the Kiddnation office got their share as well. There is also a video up on how the campaign was executed, and it really is worth a watch.




How Belvita Turned Mornings Into Engagement Wins image pic 1


The hashtag was only used 10 times by belVita’s followers in December, but the usage of the hashtag grew rapidly in the New Year. By the end of January, the hashtag was used 2,516 times by followers, perhaps an indication that Christmas meant that people didn’t have enough time for mornings!


The hashtag continues to be used in February and has been used 838 times by fans as of 26th February.


#Morningwin was the most used hashtag by the brand and followers as it was the only campaign hashtag used by the brand – they did use other hashtags but not around a central theme.


In January, belVita received 5,172 favorites and were re-tweeted 2,432 times which shows the campaign was successful in generating a large amount of engagement and gave an opportunity for the brand to have a conversation with their following.


Growth, Growth, Growth


How Belvita Turned Mornings Into Engagement Wins image


In January, the brand saw a growth rate of 45.6%, well over the sector average of 2.3%. In December the brand saw a growth rate of only 4.7% which seems marginal, but it is interesting to observe that there is a correlation between hashtag usage and fan growth. The maximum growth occurred in January, which is when the hashtag usage was highest.


A brand that conducted a similar campaign is Nature Valley from the United States. In celebration of National Granola Bar Day, which is on 21st of January, Nature Valley sent a free granola bar and a certificate, if followers DMed them.


The hashtag used for this campaign was #granolabarday and the giveaway campaign only lasted a day. The hashtag was used a total 121 times by followers and the brand saw a growth rate of just 0.9% in January on a follower base of 19,000 followers. While belVita saw huge growth from its campaign, it’s possibility that Nature Valley could have seen similar growth if their campaign had lasted longer.


Similar styled digital certificates were also given to Nature Valley followers.




Response Rate


How Belvita Turned Mornings Into Engagement Wins image


The chart above shows the number of times the brand replies on the different days of the week. The brand responds to a higher number of tweets later on in the week, while keeping the average reply time low, but on Mondays the brand takes longer to reply to much fewer tweets. It’s likely that since the brand doesn’t reply on the weekend, that they are catching up on Mondays and hence take a longer time to reply, not since the volume of quires are higher, but since they need to get up to speed.


Conclusion


Gone are the days, where the fastest way to make a nutritious breakfast is taking some cereal and adding some milk. Yogurts, Instant waffles, cereal bars and now, breakfast bars are focusing on not only providing a balanced meal but are also trying to place themselves as the brand that can provide you with the energy to power your day. A country report by Euromonitor International stated that, the cereal market in the UK is mature and consumers are looking for alternative breakfast products, which seems to be resonating on social media with the likes of belVita.


It’s great that brands these days are humanizing their following instead of just looking at them like a number which just needs to grow. belVita really took the effort to make their campaign more personal, with customized certificates and trophies and saw the opportunity in the everyday ritual of their followers and tried to integrate with it. Brands should take note that, a little personalization goes a long way and will generate engagement, conversation and an increased following.


Methodology


Unmetric compiled this report by sourcing data from its own platform. Data and Insights on belVita’s activities on Twitter were analyzed for the month of January, 2014. Sign up for a free trial here.






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Your Checklist for a More Effective Email Marketing Campaign

Your Checklist for a More Effective Email Marketing Campaign image email marketing sheetWhile some say that email isn’t an effective marketing tool anymore, research shows that it still has the highest ROI of any online marketing tactic.


One reason is that email is still a dominant avenue of communication in business. In fact, 91 percent check their email daily. Email subscriptions to websites for updates and information is growing at the fastest rate ever, with 74 percent of consumers actually preferring to receive commercial communications by email.


We talk with several companies that are doing email marketing, only to find out they’re missing out on some significant opportunities. If you’re wondering how your company stacks up, read the checklist below and evaluate your email marketing.


Review your email lists for segmentation opportunities


A common opportunity we uncover is email list segmentation. Companies usually default to using a single email marketing list and offering a monthly newsletter signup.


The problem here is that a one-to-many email message — especially a newsletter — isn’t relevant for every customer. Every customer does not need every email.


It’s vital that you craft your email marketing lists into the appropriate segments. Rather than just focusing on a monthly newsletter, for example, you may segment a list by actions customers perform on your website. You’d do this so you can hone the message in and make it more relevant.


Segment your audiences based on how the person signed up for the campaign. Did they sign up in the process of downloading a free resource guide? They might be doing their early-stage buying research and need messages crafted towards that purpose.


Send email from a real person’s email address


It may seem like common sense to send email marketing campaigns from an administrative or vague email address like “info@,” but you may want to reconsider.


If there’s a recognizable name and email address in your email campaign, your open rates will be higher. Use a recognizable name that customers would look forward to getting an email from.


Also, you might want to make sure the email looks like it’s coming from a real person instead of over-designing your email. The more personal you can make the email look and sound, the more effective it will be.


Reconsider your subject line


Your subject line is a major factor that determines whether or not subscribers open the email. It needs to be relevant, which is easier to do once you segment your list.


If you don’t have an in-house email marketing copywriter, that’s not a problem (but it might take you more time to find the right words). Spend time researching what makes a great subject line, and then spend time crafting the right subject line for each campaign. Give each email its own time and attention to reap higher open rates overall.


Identify a relevant call to action


Another common email marketing opportunity? Providing a clear, relevant call to action (CTA).


Too often, marketers distract readers with too many options. Ask yourself this question, “What is the one thing you want the reader to do?”


Identify the one action you want a subscriber to take and craft your messaging, graphics, and copy to that single purpose. You can include your social media links and references to recent blog posts, but at the end of the email it should be 100 percent clear what your subscriber should do with that email.


Don’t forget mobile


If you aren’t checking how your email marketing looks on mobile devices before you send them, you should. While 48 percent of emails are opened on mobile devices, only 11 percent of email marketing campaigns are optimized for mobile devices!


Take time to know your target audience to find out if mobile-optimized email newsletters are right for your business, then plan and design accordingly.


Can you improve your email marketing campaigns? From the email subject to the sender name, every piece of your email marketing campaign matters, so be sure to devote time and resources to each one.


What other tips would you share with others that want to improve their email marketing performance? Leave those in the comments below.


Your Checklist for a More Effective Email Marketing Campaign image da60262b 068c 491c b520 35fdebf48cf71


photo credit






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Top 5 Ways To Support Your Partner Community

Top 5 Ways To Support Your Partner Community image Support Your Partner CommunityI often think…”How the world has changed”. In times gone by, suppliers could visit their business channel partners drop product marketing material off, have a cup of tea and a bun and say go and sell. Unfortunately, for an old head like me, we’re not there today. In this generation where everything is fast moving and new products being created, the channel partners have so much information, that they find it hard to separate the signals from the noise. We are in a highly competitive market and as software vendors we need to work hard to make sure our products are front of mind over the others. A central part of this is delivering reseller support throughout the sales process.


Here are 5 ways in which I believe we need to support our partner community.


1. Be agile & efficient to you partners requests


Do this by responding quickly and effectively to requests. Being agile means working collaboratively with a team or business partner. For instance, you need to learn how to respond quickly to partners, respect the rules of engagement and respect the autonomy of the channel. Being agile internally means delegating to members of the team, empowering them and aligning internal processes to your new way of working. Agile can give you more flexibility as long as you’re prepared to be flexible.


2. Provide training support


Software companies should be able to provide training and support. Effective training is essential to empower your staff get the most from your business systems. At Eureka, we offer training that is tailored to your organisation’s needs.


3. Deliver marketing and sales support


If you specialise in developing and selling software solutions you should have access to exclusive sales and marketing resources to help you increase commercial opportunities and stand out from the crowd. Also to support your partner community, you need to feed the partners with relevant product marketing material including, online webinars, events, seminars etc.


4. Incentivise the Business Partner sales teams i.e. good margins


A channel incentive campaign offers partners something that motivates, rouses or encourages specific behaviour. A well executed channel incentive program creates a virtuous circle in which both channel partner and vendor are motivated to collaborate to attain improved performance and achieve per-defined goals.


5. Deliver good after sales service


For many customers, after-sales service is what makes one supplier stand out from another, often more than product or price. Good customer service can attract new business and can create a loyal customer base. At Eureka one of our values is customer service, so we make it our mission to provide, all customers not just resellers, excellent support, knowledge and reactiveness.


What other ways do you think we could support our partner community? Tell me in the comments box below.


Top 5 Ways To Support Your Partner Community image 3f7d0a98 9f63 4195 b210 1c6991d142bb






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Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands

Retail brands are loved on social media, owing to their famous clothing and accessories collections. However they have a reputation of being highly product-centric on Facebook and Twitter.


Nothing can be as wrong as purely promoting products on social media sites. As if hoardings and print advertisements were not enough, brands have stuffed their social media accounts with ‘product only’ content. In this article, I will chalk out the difference between product only and product oriented content; the latter being a better strategy.


I have based my study on the following 10 retail brands for the period beginning 1st November 2013 to 5th February 2014.



  • Van Huesen

  • Louis Philippe

  • Flying Machine

  • Woodland

  • Jack & Jones

  • Basics Life

  • Vero Moda

  • Peter England

  • Allen Solly

  • Fasttrack


Community Building


Retail brands have a good fan following on Facebook as compared to other sectors. 50% of the brands are above the 1 million mark. Fastrack, however, is a long chase at 8 million+ fans, which is an excellent number for Indian brands and still maintaining a healthy growth rate of 6%.


Vero Moda, on the other hand, has the lowest number of fans, with a little over 2 lakhs, but with the highest growth at 34%.


It is interesting to note that most brands above the 1 million mark have a growth rate of less than 10% while most of the brands which are below the 1 million mark have a growth rate of above 15%.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Fan engagement 1


Since Vero Moda has the highest growth rate, I dug a little deeper to uncover some insights. During the last week of November 2013, the brand’s growth was at its peak and fell after the 1st week of December. It rose again during the 1st week of January 2014, taking a major dip in the week after that. There has been a fall and a rise in the last 2 months. This could be due to a campaign or activity which we will track in the content section.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Fans Engagements for retail brands 2


On Twitter too, Fastrack has the highest number of followers, which is 56K+. It is far ahead of all the other brands which are like tortoises in comparison with less than 10K followers.


Allen Solly, which has an staggering growth rate of 367% for the time period analysed, might soon catch up with Fastrack, considering Allen Solly’s growth rate is only 8%.


Flying Machine has the lowest number of followers (778) but is growing at a rate of 9.5%.


Note: Basics Life has a Twitter handle with 0 tweets and thus we have not included them in our study.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Increase in Followers 3


As a % of followers, @VanHeusenInd follows people the most among all the 9 brands in Retail Brand.


Content Strategy


Louis Philippe posts the most posts among the 10 retail brands. LP has posted 286 updates which, on an average, is 3 posts a day. This is followed by Vero Moda, Jack & Jones and Allen Solly, which post at least 2 updates a day on an average.


Basics Life posted the least number of times (75) which means the brand skipped posting on certain days like the weekend.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Retail Brands Rate 4


According to the Unmetric Insight module, 5,335 new posts were written across these 10 ‘brand walls’. That’s an average of 5.4 posts per day, per wall.


Campaigns and Performances


Some of the top performing campaigns came from Louis Philippe, Van Heusen, Allen Solly and Fastrack. #Naughtees by Fastrack and #CrossOverStyling by Allen Solly were the top performing campaigns.


While #CrossStyling got the most number of likes, #Naughtees had a wider audience reach. #Naughtees scored the highest engagement score (249 out of 1,000) with only 2 posts while the rest scored below 150 with an average of 10 posts.


#Naughtees received an average of over 7K+ likes, 189 shares and 81 comments per post. The graphs below breaks down the number of interactions that each campaign achieved and the average number of interactions per post.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Brands Like Share Comment Rate 5


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Brands Like Share Comment Rate 6


Cover Images


Some brands know how to use their cover image space perfectly. Flying Machine has not only created some cool images but also effectively used their brand ambassador, Virat Kohli.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Brands Cover images 7


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Flying machine Images 8


Basics Life uses this space to make festive greetings too, with specially designed images that sport brand colors.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Republic Day Wishes 9


Using hash-tags the right way


Some of the most popular ways of using hash-tags are innovative. Each brand has its own style. Fastrack tops the list when it comes to the usage of quirky hash-tags. Be it a product launch or a contest, Fastrack makes sure it has catchy hash-tags in its status.


For instance, the brand was launching helmets and ran a campaign #GetHard. Now this is bold, fun and exactly what the youth connects with on social media. It also integrated an Instagram activity, with Facebook promoting it with #MetalHead.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Fastrack Facebook Post 10


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Fastrack Facebook Post


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Fastrack Facebook Post 111


Jack & Jones conducted a preview of its collection where it invited top bloggers to the store and promoted the event using the hash-tag #SSPreview14. This is a nice way to conduct an influencer activity.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Only India Twitter Tweets 12


Relevant v/s Irrelavant Content


Some brands run out of topics to talk about and hence try to spice up their content with topics which are fun to read but otherwise irrelevant for the brand.


Allen Solly has some posts which comes across as being out of sync from the overall content. It has posted some travel content in an attempt to get some interaction.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Allen solly Facebook Post 13


However, on Twitter, the brand has some very nice tweets which are also very relevant.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Allen solly twitter tweet 14


Showcasing accolades is also a good thing since fans look forward to news about their favourite brand. Also, it is a great branding activity. Peter England got huge interaction figures on such a post update.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Peter England Facebook Post


Jack & Jones announces its store openings on Facebook and Twitter.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Jack Jones Facebook Post


Beyond Products


While most brands present their products in an unattractive fashion, some posts simply deserve all the attention. Louis Philippe posted an update about belts which received good interaction as compared to its other updates which suggests that it could have been a promoted post.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Louis Philippe Facebook Post 17


On Republic Day, Van Heusen came up with a simple, straight forward update.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Van Heusen India facebook post 18


Flying Machine did a series of fun posts with a campaign called #NewCool. One of these images was that of its brand ambassador Virat Kohli and the classy crisp content, with the image, has done very well in terms of engagement.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Flying Machine Facebook Post 19


Woodland creates interactive content. However even its Twitter account is linked to Facebook, leaving no scope for exclusive content on Twitter.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Woodland Facebook Post 20


Basics Life has some well-designed post updates too and each one of them receives good interaction.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Basics Life Facebook Post 20


Conversations on Twitter


Interacting with fans on Twitter should be the focal point for brands. Some brands are doing this beautifully. Louis Philippe makes it a point to track conversations even when not tagged. Such interaction takes the brand reputation places.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image conversation on Twitter LP


Allen Solly encourages conversation by posting open ended questions. Usually when a user praises a brand, the brand makes an effort to thank him/her. However, Allen Solly has also taken this forward by asking the user what they like about the product, trying to extend the conversation.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image conversation on Twitter Allen Solly


On the other hand, Jack & Jones moves the conversation off social media.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image conversation on Twitter Jack Jones India


Events and Brand Associations


Some brands have bought a social angle to their offline events. Social Media is a great place to promote your events in, with a contest or an activity. Van Heusen was the Style Partner for Supersonics but did not do much beyond a single post and a tweet about the event. The brand could have been creative instead, by showcasing some activities on Twitter.


Social media is a great place to talk about events since nothing is as social as events.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Van Heusen India facebook post 21


Louis Philippe did this by posting a picture of Anirban Lahiri, who is a well-known personality when it comes to golf. This was a golfing event supported by the brand.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Louis Philippe Twitter Tweet 22


Vero Moda, who participated at The Sula Fest, updated a nice string of posts and tweets. They shared videos and photos and even created a #VEROMODAatSulaFest14.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Vero Moda Facebook Post 23


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Vero Moda India Twitter Tweet 24


They also ran an Instagram contest. Other retail brands must follow suit.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Vero Moda India twitter Tweet 25


Lastly, the campaign even roped in a blogger for the event.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Vero Moda Sula Fest 26


Another event by Woodland became popular on Twitter. It was called #DriveTheDunes, which was an adventure trip to Rajasthan. The winners were selected on Twitter and their journey was documented and live tweeted too. Influencers like City Ninjas were roped in.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Woodland Twitter Tweet 27


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Woodland Twitter retweet 28


Applications


Some brands have made good use of applications. However, many applications do not guarantee a lot of monthly users. Flying Machine has the least number of applications (3), yet it has the highest number of monthly users (over 6K+). Vero Moda, on the other hand, has the highest number of applications (14) but has a negligible number of users.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image average likes


Flying Machine launched a contest which was simple yet effective. Users were asked to upload selfies on Instagram through its Facebook application.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Flying Machine Facebook Post


Flying Machine promoted it on its Twitter account too.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Flying machine Images tweets 31


Consumer Engagement


Retail Brands are product oriented and this is clearly not helping increase engagement among fans. Vero Moda has the highest PTAT score of only 3.4% but most brands fall in the range of 1-2%, which is average but still on the lower side.


This score might also vary from time to time, considering the high engagement during a campaign as opposed to negligible scores at other times.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Average no. Of fans 321


The PTAT score is something that is not well understood by many Facebook users and often they use it to measure engagement. However, since the score takes in to account a whole host of different interactions, it’s not a good indication of engagement.


From the chart below Basic Life has the highest engagement score (311), followed by Fastrack (134). While high engagement on a page does not guarantee growth, it is definitely one of the major factors for attracting a high organic growth. Flying Machine (21) scored the lowest.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Engagement Score 33


Note: Engagement is based on weighted averages of the responses to posts expressed as a percentage of the estimated number of impressions delivered. Responses are calculated by a weighted summation of the number of likes, the number of comments and the number of shares of the particular post.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Basics Life Facebook Post 34


The above post was the second highest engaging post among all brands in the retail sector. It received a total of 8K+ likes, 231 comments and 108 shares. Not only was the post celebrity-oriented (I wonder if they got Beckham’s image rights?!) but it also had a contest associated with it. It had an engagement score of 790.


Allen Solly posted a contest related post which received an engagement score of 834, highest within 10 brands, and among a total of 1,785 posts. This also was different in terms of Facebook Only Offer for fans.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Allen Solly 35


This brings us to another very important factor to measure engagement, which is the average number of likes, comments and shares per post. This is particularly important because it’s a basic measurement of what kind of updates your audience enjoys and is willing to interact with.


Fastrack, which was leading in terms of fan following, also has the highest number of likes, comments and shares per post. On an average, the brand receives 3K+ likes, 42 comments and 91 shares per post.


Basics Life also receives, on an average, over 2K+ likes, 25 comments and 34 shares per post. Apart from these 2 brands, per post engagement of retail brands is miniscule and must awaken the respective brand managers to take corrective actions.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Like share comment Rate 36


On Twitter, Louis Philippe engaged best with fans during the study period. The brand had 1,445 tweets, out of which 483 were proactive tweets (tweets that are not replies or retweets). It also had the highest engagement score of 777.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Tweets Engagement Score 37


Fastrack might not have been the best engaged brand on Twitter but it received the maximum number of re-tweets (2), favourites (3) and replies (1) on an average, per tweet thanks to its much larger follower base. Louis Philippe and Peter England saw just 1 re-tweet and reply each, per tweet.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Retweet Rate 38


In terms of mentions, Louis Philippe was mentioned the most on Twitter, with a total of 4,895 mentions, followed by Fastrack, with a mention of 4,094.


Most other brands were mentioned less than 2,000 times, the least mentioned being Flying Machine, with only 21 mentions.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Mention Count 29


Customer Service


Customer service within Retail brands might not be as important as that within Telecom or Insurance brands. However, customer service is always an important part of social media and is present within these 10 brands to varying degrees. Mere promotion of products does not help if the brand is not interested in interacting with the users.


Fastrack and Jack & Jones hardly respond to user postings.


Woodland and Peter England have responded to a little over 2% posts on Facebook and have taken an average time of 10-15 hours to reply. Though Flying Machine has the best average response time, which is 9 hours it counts for little since the brand has only responded to just over 5% of posts.


Louis Philippe has responded to 50% of the posts at an average response time of 16 hours which suggests that they are having to get approvals for each response or are not replying over the weekend.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Average Response Time of Retai Brands 40


Twitter has lately earned the reputation of being a leading social media platform when it comes to customer service. Many users have started looking up to Twitter as a problem-solving medium.


Woodland takes the longest time to respond, with an ART of 220 minutes and Peter England has the fastest ART of 8 minutes. 10 out of 15 replies by Peter England were reported to have been given under 15 minutes. Followed by Louis Philippe, 139 replies out of 239 were given under 15 minutes, which is commendable.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Average Reply Time of Retail Brands 41


However, replying to tweets is not the only measurement metric. While some brands have only 20 tweets to reply to, others might have over 200. Therefore, it is important to look at the response rate as well.


Allen Solly has the best response rate of 41.13% while Peter England, as mentioned above, has the best average reply time of 3 minutes. Apart from Van Heusen, which has a response rate of 20%, all the other brands are below 10%.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Average Reply Time of Retail Brands 42


Sentiment


Retail Brands talk about offers, products and sales. Thus, there is hardly any scope of negative sentiments on their pages. Both on Facebook and Twitter, the sentiment is positive. Basics Life however, has the most negative sentiment on Facebook while Flying Machine has the most positive net sentiment.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Customer Sentiments For Brand 43


On Twitter, Woodland had the most positive net sentiment while Fastrack had the most negative sentiment. This is calculated based on the type of tweets the brand replies to rather than all the mentions of the brand.


Social Media Strategy Review: Retail Brands image Customer Sentiments For Brand 44


Conclusion


Overall, most brands have found their place on social media and most of them are doing a good job. The campaigns have innovative twists and various live tweeting activities on Twitter which deserve appreciation. However, some brands could do with exclusive content on Twitter and improve their customer service support.


Analytics support courtesy: Unmetric






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