How Do You Know Your Online Advertising is Working?
This recent video report interview of Jeremy Stanley, Sr. Vp., Product & Data Services, Collective, posted by iMedia, and the article written by Gretchen Hyman on February 15, 2012, is an excellent and lucid discussion of the current state of online advertising analytics. Please click through to read the article and view the video below.
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Just the Facts - Getting Down to Business
Helping our clients communicate and sell their services and products is our business. So, let's get down to it. How can you use the current social media to your advantage? Well, have you heard of Quick Response Codes?
While QR codes have been the rage in Japan and Europe, the technology is just emerging in the U.S. with some retailers and manufacturers linking customers to their brands' Facebook pages. Basically, one downloads a free app for an Apple or Android smartphone and then uses the phone camera to scan QR codes which can be found on price tags, product literature, direct mailers, in-store point-of-purchase displays, magazine ads, vending machines and even billboards.
Google recently announced that it is shifting away from QR codes in favor of another technlogy, Near-Field Communication (NFC). Instead of pointing their phones at QR codes and waiting, users will be able to wave their phones over NFC chips embedded in signs and devices. Some project that NFC will become a widely used system for making payments by smartphone. Many smartphones already contain embedded NFC chips which can send encrypted data a short distance, "near field", to a reader located, for example, next to a retail cash register. Consumers who have their credit card information stored in their NFC smartphones can pay for purchases by waving their smartphones near or tapping them on the reader, rather than bothering with the actual credit card.
Still, QR code use is further down the implementation path at this time.
How a QR code helps you sell
The best apps can help one find an item in the local store. Some offer prices on those goods. QR codes often link back to mobile websites, (sites designed to be read on a smartphone) where customers can find additional information, coupons, videos, etc. Expanding a bit, the QR code connection can also be made to:
- Help patients obtain information and track their requests
- Present a customer satisfaction survey
- Aid vacationers in choosing a hotel or price a rental car
- Product, service or community promotion
- Provide product or services information 24/7 in a storefront window or other display, e.g. airport
Like any communications or marketing tool, how successful it is depends on maintaining several links. Among them: accurate inventory and pricing data and linking to a "mobile" website designed for smartphone users so that app-sized versions of sales literature can be accessed for current "sale" details. See: Stalking the Retail Aisles With a More Focused Purpose, New York Times, Bob Tedeschi, 24 Aug 2011 (PDF) and A Diamond Maker Joins Hearst to Show Power of Print and Dazzle, New York Times, Tanzina Vega, 8 Sept 2011 (PDF) .
Trends - Mobile Visual Search (MVS)
Since humans are visual animals, we tend to follow a pattern: see, like, buy. QR codes are nifty. But, standing alone, they do not offer much toward satisfying the "see" portion of the pattern.
There is now something recently updated in that area provided by Google – of course – termed "Google Goggles." Originally introduced in December 2009, Google Goggles is a mobile app for your smart phone which operates as a doorway to the universe of Mobile Visual Search (MVS). According to Popular Mechanics writer John Brandon, Google has recently enhanced Google Goggles. "Google Goggles can identify foreign currency, such as a euro or a peso, and look up the exchange rate between that currency and the dollar. The app also has a continuous scanning mode so you don't need to snap a photo of the object."
MVS is safe, secure and versatile to use. It's also very practical in that it provides a way to interactively connect with our actual surroundings. Marketers may note: If Google continues to improve Google Goggles, it may catch fire because it is so intuitively practical. Eventually Google Goggles, and similar apps, could provide a virtual doorway to nearly everything we see in our surroundings, creating a marketplace that is familiar and instantly accessible for both male and female humans. Now that is my kind of marketing. More about this topic >>> http://mashable.com/2012/02/15/qr-codes-rip/ Popular Mechanics offers more about VMS in this article, "A Sneak Peek Inside Four Silicon Valley Tech Labs" by John Brandon >>> http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/gadgets/news/a-sneak-peek-inside-four-silicon-valley-tech-labs#slide-1 In the meantime, please take a look at this video:
Is Your Message Getting Through?
No matter how experienced or educated we are we are constantly reminded that our world changes, often with blinding speed and leaving us wondering how our business disappeared, our community deteriorated or our organization fell apart.
In the past things worked so slowly that standing still and doing nothing was actually a reasonable "plan of action". In fact, it might have been the best choice. But, that's not true today.
Whether you believe it or not, you face extinction by standing still and doing nothing. The news business is a clear example. Coast-to-coast, newspapers are ceasing print production and scrambling for new business models. Seemingly overnight Facebook, Twitter and other social media, have become the news medium of choice for millions, instantly delivering what's happening right now to people of all ages via iPads and smartphones.
Do the People Who Matter Hear You Now?
Like newspaper publishers, you can no longer stand still and hope people read your papers. And, like the publishers are learning, you, too, have to deliver your message through the media that people you need to reach are using — no matter their age, ethnicity or gender.
If you are in business today, or a community leader, you know you must transition away from what you have been doing to something better, stronger, more competitive, more tuned to today's world. You have no choice. You must transform and market yourself, your company, your organization, your community in new ways. Otherwise the world will pass you by.
It's really simple, isn't it? By making sure your message gets through you'll have a chance for it to be heard, understood and cause the results you intended. Doesn't that make more sense than rolling the dice and hoping you'll connect?
We will help you make that transition. Contact me, Ron Baker, today. 734-238-2789 rbaker@mktcom.net