This morning I’ve been reading about how some of the news sites which require readers to pay for a subscription are faring. Funnily enough the article is published on paidContent.org – website that doesn’t charge for subscriptions.
The first newspaper has 670 subscribers paying $2.95 per week and lost 40% of their traffic in the first 3 weeks of requiring a subscription. At current rates the model is bringing in just $102,778 per year which isn’t going to be enough to cover the cost of 2 people to run the site. Read more →
Compare the Meerkat is probably one of the best campaigns of the year and has managed to differentiate a boring product in an industry where every competitor is boasting of the same key features and benefits.
The interesting part of the campaign for me is that it was based partially on the fact that “meerkat” had a cost per click of 5 pence compared to £5 for the keyword “market”.
We weren’t sure that we had cracked it with Comparethemeerkat.com. At first they were based in Yorkshire and next door to the offices of Comparethemarket.com.
It ticked many of the boxes but research found that the play on words didn’t drive the required affection and in many cases was met with groans. We weren’t sure that it was so bad that it was good.
On the other hand, the comparemeerkat.com website (where you can compare thousands of meerkats) seemed to capture the imagination in research. In exploring this idea we also found that cost per click on meerkats was in the region of 5p (market was £5)
So we rebriefed the idea to the creatives asking them to create layers of character, warmth and affection. Aleksandr Orlov was born. A loveable but complex character who is desperately frustrated by the confusion between Comparethemarket.com and Comparethemeerkat.com.
In a world with hundreds of major sites all competing for the same keywords it’s often hard to make a profit based on SEO & PPC alone – what you need to do is figure out how to get people searching for you and in order for that to happen you need to build a brand.
Forgetting even about the recent Google brand update the main advantage of being a brand is that thousands of people will search for your website every month. Take into account the fact that these visitors might convert at for example 5% rather than your usual 1% and your brand status can literally make the difference between success and failure.
For example a site which gets 500 brand visitors a day will make 750 sales per month from brand search netting £15,000 profit on a modest £20 profit per sale. This same site could do the same with traffic from SEO but that would need 5 times the traffic to generate the same sales figures.
There are a load of different ways to build a brand from TV/press advertising, social media and offline PR but the easiest way is using the clients website and online marketing strategy to help visitors believe that the site is a big brand, even if they’re not quite there yet.
Put simply, everything you do and every message you convey on your site has to say that you are the experts, the number one company in your industry and can be trusted and relied on 100% to offer great service and great products.
One of the great ways to do this is with SEO – most people think the most reputable sites are at the top of Google so the more traffic you can send the more trusted you become. Of course first impressions count which is where the onsite branding comes in. There are two types of site, ones which are happy just to shift products and ones which have a quality feel to them. The difference might not be obvious initially but once you spend some time on the site and have a good look round a brand site you can see the attention to detail, design and usability.
Of course not every brand has a decent website but if you want to compete on a higher level within your industry then building an amazing website which has more content, more features, more tools and a better design than every other site in your industry is essential for you to become a brand and take over.
Anybody can knock up an ecommerce site for next to nothing but without the attention to detail required to actually build a brand that site will never become an industry leader.
If you have yet to register then check out my Top 16 Things To See guide and then head over the the registration form (it’s free) to book your place amongst 13,000 attendees and hundreds of exhibitors. Read more →
Kieron from ShareMyPlaylists.com is giving away a Sony PS3 and all you have to do to be in with a chance of winning is to upload a Spotify playlist to his excellent Spotify community site. If you haven’t visited ShareMyPlaylists.com yet, it’s fast becoming the biggest and best Spotify playlist site around.
In the 7 or so weeks since going live it has gathered over 1000 playlists submitted by it’s users. The site was quoted as “Genius” by NME.com and also won the Site Inspection site of the week award in New Media Age. Praise indeed. Read more →
Internet World is happening at Earls Court, London on the 28th, 29th & 30th of April 2009 and to help those attending we’ve published this handy guide to make sure that you don’t miss any of the good bits.
Internet World is Europe’s longest running, best attended and biggest event for digital marketing and online business, attracting over 13,000 visitors and more than 300 exhibitors. It’s free to attend but you will need to pre-register.
Click here to print a PDF version of the guide with a detailed floorplan.
Twitter Panel Debate
Twitter is getting huge amounts of attention but most brands (apart from Dell) seem to be unsure how to use it.
On Wednesday 29th April at 11am in the Keynote Theatre a panel of leading industry figures and global brands who have led the way in the social media revolution will share their experiences with the 13,000 expected Internet World visitors.
How to start using Twitter and how to understand the benefits for your organisation
How to write relevant and powerful tweets, the do’s and don’ts, and how to monitor and react to the activity around your brand
Tips and case-study-examples of successful campaigns, how to build followers, who to follow, applications to manage your campaigns, and how to resource effectively
The keynote theatre is packed full of great speakers and you probably wouldn’t go far wrong listening to them all. However there are 6 that really stand out for me and I’ve summarised them below:
Tuesday 10.15 – 10.45 David Walmsley, Head of Web Selling at John Lewis will be talking about Selling more online – six rules for smarter e-retail.
Tuesday 12.30 0 13.00 Geoff Turral, Marketing Director at Porsche will be discussing how the rapid changes in the make-up of the premium automotive sector are forcing new approaches and how web trends are changing core customer activity at Porsche.
Tuesday 13.15 – 13.45 Alex Hunter, Head of Online Marketing at Virgin Media will be talking about “Brand 2.0″ which should be pretty interesting.
Tuesday 14.00 to 14.45 Stuart Glendinning, Managing Director Mortgages & Local at Money Supermarket is speaking about Strength through diversity: How the world’s most popular price comparison site is riding the storm. Don’t miss this one.
Wednesday 13.15 to 13.45 James Davey, Head of Online Marketing at B&Q will be asking Is your search strategy fit for multi-channel retailing? It should be interesting to hear how B&Q are embracing search in 2009.
Thursday 11.45 to 12.15 Sara Linfoot, Group Head Content Solutions at The Guardian will be talking about Casting the net wider – building engagement
across the web.
The Branded3 Beach Stand
In tribute to our Malaysian studio Branded3 will be bringing some of the exotic Far East to Earls Court – free cocktails, a whack-a-shark arcade game & even fine white sand will be decorating stand E2062.
More importantly we are offering free SEO clinics as well as open discussions about the latest happenings with Google & the SEO industry. So if you want some free advice on SEO, Twitter or just a free cocktail come and find Patrick, Vin, Antony & Tom on stand E2062.
Tuesday Seminars
13.00 to 13.50 in the mobile, online advertising, affiliate & search marketing theatre. Hands on SEO: Experiences and best practices for large sites. Dan Cohen, Global SEO Engineering Lead, MSN
15.20 to 15.50 email, mobile marketing and analytics theatre. Marketing in a downturn: What to consider when marketing to consumers in a difficult economy. Robin Goad, Director of Research, Hitwise
Wednesday Seminars
12.00 – 12.50 Internet Retailing panel debate
10.40 – 11.10 enterprise 2.0 & content management theatre. Sky’s journey towards website accessibility: Review of Sky’s insight into the diverse needs of people who wish to access information and what has been done, so far. Carmel Giblin, Head of Corporate Responsibility & Accessibility, BskyB
12.00 – 12.50 The Future of Social Media panel debate: Buzz Monitoring – How to Ensure you know what people are saying about your brand in social media, and what you can do to influence the conversation.
Thursday Seminars
10.00 – 10.30 mobile, online advertising, affiliate & search marketing theatre. Innovate or Die – Lessons from the last 10 years of online. Chris Cuddy, CEO, Cheapflights.co.uk
10.40 – 11.10 mobile, online advertising, affiliate & search marketing theatre. SEO and PPC synergies – Gulf Air case study. Susana Inarejos, Head of Technical SEO Department, Bigmouthmedia
14.00 – 14.30 internet world theatre. Obama 2.0: Lessons in Social Media from the Obama Presidential Campaign. Kate Cooper, Managing Director, Digital Training Company & Leo Ryan, Director, Ryan MacMillan
The idea of social media being part of the buying process is quite new to most brands even though a lot of forward thinking people started thinking about it a few years ago.
The downturn will also accelerate the use of social media, such as blogs and social-networking sites, by consumers looking for intelligence on firms and their products. As trust in brands is eroded, people will place more value on recommendations from friends.
Social media make it harder for brands to pull the wool over consumers’ eyes, but they also offer canny companies a powerful new channel through which to promote their wares and test new products and pricing strategies.
After a lengthy period of testing we are pleased to launch a new product which allows companies to track telephone sales with the same accuracy and detail as e-commerce transactions.
Personally I think this is one of the best tools I’ve ever seen and am genuinely excited about it.
The Call Metrics software integrates telephone call monitoring with popular web tools such as Google Analytics & AdWords conversion tracking as well as client CRM systems to provide the ultimate marketers dream – the ability to track ROI for marketing spend. Read more →
This is a guest post by Jamie Murray Wells from glassesdirect.co.uk. We like to feature guest posts from people who are running successful & innovative online businesses as a break from the normal SEO talk.
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“In order to be irreplaceable one must always be different.” Coco Chanel
 I’m more likely to quote Seth Godin than Coco Chanel, but when Carole on my team quoted Chanel at me this week it gave me the idea for this post. In a week where we’ve added Vera Wang and Nicole Farhi glasses to our growing designer collection it seems appropriate to start with a style legend.
What was Chanel talking about? Innovation and the ability to differentiate yourself in a crowded market. In the current climate, where investment is scarce and competition for funding is fierce, innovation and differentiation are more important than ever.
There are lots of examples where this advice is appropriate today – the job market and the online PPC market are just two - so my advice is look at your current business and decide whether you’re innovating enough to survive and thrive in the next 3-5 years. Stelios Haji-Ioannou started out with only 2 planes in 1995 , but through innovation in air-travel Easyjet is now flying all around Europe and helped create a new business model.
Glasses Direct was founded on innovation in 2004. We set out to answer a problem that no-one else realised they had. Running with an idea and making your own space requires a strong belief in what you’re doing. 5 years later, we continue down this path and continue to grow.
For example, we recently added a Home Trial service, the first of its kind in the UK. People often tell us that they need to try the glasses on in the store to “be sureâ€. But wouldn’t you prefer to try your glasses on at home? With a variety of different outfits? And have it cost less than the parking and petrol for a trip to town? Traditional opticians have never needed to do this because they are relying on the status quo. We think people deserve better and that’s been our mission from the beginning.
This summer we’ll be doing the same for prescription sunglasses and designer sunglasses. It’s a very competitive market and we’ll be competing with Chanel herself. With that in mind, I wanted to finish with one last piece of advice – once you become successful, keep an eye on your competition. If you aren’t constantly innovating and improving then you’re going to be overtaken soon.
Good businesses, especially online ones, come from challenges to the status quo. Think about how your business could challenge “the way things are” and make a difference in 2009 and beyond.
