With all the buzz around Web 2.0 and search engine optimization campaigns, it’s easy to lose sight of the ABCs of online marketing. Here are six often-overlooked fundamentals to keep in mind:
• Track your traffic and promotions…then use the data you collect. If you know how customers are finding you, you can better focus your promotional efforts and dollars as well as measure return on investment. Many companies go through the motions of collecting data, but few apply it systematically to all the places they could or should. Start by ensuring that your Website captures visitor paths, landing pages, and exit pages. And don’t forget to include a checkbox in your online “contact us” form with options to identify how visitors found your site.
• Experiment with and customize your messaging. The Web and associated marketing tools allow for infinite A/B splits. The ability to send an unlimited number of e-mail messages on the cheap opens up new vistas for test marketing. However you choose to segment your market, you can test offers, calls to action, and products. And don’t forget to respond when someone answers your messages. We’ve found that half of the companies we e-mailed with questions don’t bother answering. If you want to create a community, you have to be ready for two-way communication.
• The need for speed can kill—your online business, that is. We recently surveyed 2,400 consumers in eight countries. The number-one reason they gave for leaving a Website was that it was slow—and our data sample included countries where broadband is faster than in the U.S. Therefore, resolve to keep your design simple. Make sure that somebody’s first exposure to your Website—the click over from finding you on Google—doesn’t land them in a syrupy mix of slow-loading, pointless animations.
• Take advantage of strength in numbers. This year focus on cross-promotional and cobranded marketing activities with noncompetitive, synergistic e-tailers. For example, if you design and sell wedding dresses, reach out to a wedding photographer you know and offer to exchange referral e-mail and mailing lists, to exchange banners and links back to your site or special customer or discount promotions for each other’s clients.
• Promote yourself. Always point visitors from one of your assets to another. If they reach you via a partner’s site, tell them what you do before you send them back. Keep them engaged around your message, and entice them to come back for more.
• Remember that there is a great big world out there. Once you’re paying attention to your Web statistics, you might find that you’re getting a lot of traffic from abroad. Figure out if there is enough of any one group to justify translating your Website or those A/B e-mail splits to get across your value proposition. Then do the math on adding incremental sales for each country that looks good in your Web stats. Test your market segmentation in other countries to see if it holds true. You might have to tweak your products, your offer, and your commerce site, but these are all well-understood operations. International marketing and sales will build on the best practices that you should be using at home.
Don DePalma is the founder/chief research officer of the research and consulting firm Common Sense Advisory, based in Lowell, MA, and author of “Business Without Borders: A Strategic Guide to Global Marketing.”
Other articles by Donald A. DePalma:
Global Naming “Gotchas” Trip Up Microsoft and General Motors
Can’t Read, Won’t Buy: Why Language Matters to Global Marketing
What Happens When Going Global Goes Bust?
Knowing When It’s Time to Take Your Brand Abroad
Global Marketing: Money + Web + Local Experience = Success
Global Marketing: Triage and Nuance
Global Marketing: Toe Dippers, Stubbed Toes, and Second Bouncers
Global Marketing: Where Does Your Company Fit In?
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