BlogDigital Marketing / Inbound Marketing

INBOUND 2020: 4 Eye-Opening Marketing Insights

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The 4-day INBOUND 2020 came to a close on September 7th, with a whole host of informative and productive sessions that provided attendees with excellent insights into the world of marketing and how it’s evolving with the changing times. With around 21,000 people attending this landmark marketing event, these professionals…

The 4-day INBOUND 2020 came to a close on September 7th, with a whole host of informative and productive sessions that provided attendees with excellent insights into the world of marketing and how it’s evolving with the changing times. With around 21,000 people attending this landmark marketing event, these professionals were witness to some of the monumental marketing developments that would shape this landscape for the years to come. The advent of the “marketing flywheel” The “marketing funnel” is an age-old concept that pretty much any sales and marketing expert would be familiar with, a process meant to tailor business prospects and provide them with a personalised journey to become a customer. However, one of the major drawbacks of this method was that it didn’t place due importance on retaining customers. In a bid to change this, Brian Halligan – the co-founder of HubSpot – proclaimed that the age of the “marketing funnel” was over. In a bid to provide customers with the treatment they want, Halligan introduced the concept of the “marketing flywheel.” It placed customers at the centre of the marketing process to provide them with the importance they deserve, ultimately turning these people into advocates for their brand. The prominence of personalised video content As the attention span of people decreases over time, more and more brands are moving towards video content to capture the attention of their audience and improve engagement. Thus, the focus on professional video content has increased by a considerable margin. However, as marketing continues to evolve, customers prefer a more “personal” touch when it comes to their content. After all, a major aspect of HubSpot’s marketing approach is to adopt a more humanised approach to make customers feel like they’re interacting with actual people, not faceless conglomerates – after all, there’s a reason why livestreams have become so prominent. This raw video content is exactly what brands should focus on. With the announcement of HubSpot Video, brands can create videos on-the-fly from a laptop or phone with ease. From follow-ups to prospect engagement – everything can be carried out with engaging video content that will help build a personal relationship with your customers. New developments in the HubSpot Growth Suite One of the most significant talking points of INBOUND 2018 was the announcement of several improvements in the HubSpot Growth Suite, providing its customers with a vast suite of features to augment their overall experience. The new product offerings by HubSpot meant that its customers could stay on the platform from start to end, without having to go through the additional headache of having to switch over to different marketing platforms. It allows its customers to create an extensive database by incorporating and uploading all their optimum marketing offerings with little to no problems. An increasing focus on conversational marketing By this point, almost everyone must’ve already had some experience with chatbots. More and more brands are increasingly utilising chatbots and various other forms of conversational marketing to drive engagement with prospects and develop meaningful relations with customers. Now, INBOUND 2018 revealed another product by the HubSpot in the form of an innovative chatbot that provides users with endless functionality. Brands can map out their leads, customise responses, and offer a tailor-made experience that encompasses everything involved in conversational marketing to a T, and then some. INBOUND 2020 was an enlightening event for marketing professionals that provided many valuable insights regarding the marketing landscape of the near future. After this event ended, most marketing professionals only had one thing on their mind – what innovative measures will INBOUND 2021 bring to the table?

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    BlogGeneric

    Why Re-Skilling is the Most Important Ingredient to Create the Workforce of the Future

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      Companies constantly need to update skilling programs for their employess to remain relevant and cutting edge.The Indian start-ups space is evolving exponentially. The growth has been largely contributed by newly arrived technology cycle which has brought new requirements and hence rapidly changes the existing skills in the labor market.…

     

    Companies constantly need to update skilling programs for their employess to remain relevant and cutting edge.The Indian start-ups space is evolving exponentially. The growth has been largely contributed by newly arrived technology cycle which has brought new requirements and hence rapidly changes the existing skills in the labor market. A specialized or diverse skill set is expected out of employees to be relevant in this rapidly changing digital environment. The advancement of technology and automation has brought us to the brink of an unanticipated catastrophe when it comes to manpower employability. The fast-paced technological progress is giving way to new developments; however, reskilling has become the most essential ingredient to create the workforce of the future.

     

    Re-skilling, by definition, means "teach” (a person, especially an unemployed person) new skills. In the current scenario, there is a strange skepticism on the ability to cater to the change in technology by the present skill sets of employees. It arises from the fact that the workforce is not equipped enough to adapt to the rapidly changing technological advances. The world has moved almost overnight to new forms of technologies involving blockchain, AI, Machine learning technology which is forecasted to make lot of workforce redundant. Banking has seen a dash of technological change through use of blockchain and automation of analytics by AI and Machine learning augmentation. Industrial automation has seen a surge on manufacturing sector organizations moving to low human resource intensive processes. Automobile companies saves almost 90% cost of manual testing efforts by implementing industrial design, robust governance, and strong process flow through automation of processes.

     

    In the light of almost a renaissance happening in the technology world, it has become vital to "re-skill" to stay on pace with the automation of processes. In the ever-changing landscape currently, by the time companies manage to set up a full-fledged team, the technology becomes obsolete. Therefore, it is very important to equip the native employees with resources and provide a congenial agile work framework for quick adoption.

     

    Re-skilling is critical in a startup or a digital marketing space because it gives a competitive advantage in the long run and is much better than hiring skilled workers. Invest in people you already have and build on their strengths. Average age of the employees is another factor which gives reskilling an encouragement in mid-size businesses. A major chunk of today’s workforce starts from 20 and ranges till 35 which makes it easier for companies to reskill them. They are flexible and carry an open mind to change and adopt new roles and opportunities coming their way. There is an efficient way to build and gear a team to campaign their way to the top of the chain, and that’s by empowering employees with reskilling.

     

    Employees need to combine excellent digital specialist skills with deep functional business knowledge. They should be comfortable with short delivery cycles and be able to operate across silos and within cross-functional teams.  Today, the ability to collect and analyze data to derive insights about a business or about the domain is the differentiating factor that separates companies at the top of the business from their competition. This is where the concept of ‘reskilling’ comes into place – where companies constantly need to update skilling programs for their employees to remain relevant and cutting-edge. We often see that those companies who are at the top of their game, highly prioritize learning and development goals for their employees.

     

    Processes are changing and getting upgraded continuously, hence concrete steps need to be taken in this context. There are some pointers that needs to be considered while upskilling employees –

     

    1. Regular training programme - Engaging employees in multiple training programs by inviting experts to the organization to share their learning and experiences can always help the workforce gain knowledge. Listening and learning from the masters of the field gives a sense of trust to the employees that upskilling is an option to a better future. This further encourages employees to learn and reskill themselves. This is possible only if they get access to Flexi-learning, allowing them to learn at their own pace alongside their busy work commitments.

    2. Easy access to training material – Employees should have access to learning. They need to be able to study anywhere anytime at their own convenience. Technology allows for easy access of study material across any device through flexible Learning Management Systems, even while on the go. The online courses are typical of shorter durations allowing the students to upskill quickly within a short period of time. 3. What company leaders can do - Assess the skills and capabilities of the current workforce against the capabilities one will want in the future, not what is needed currently. The goal is to identify gaps so that the leaders can help individuals focus on specific areas to reskill or upskill. Create a real-time system that helps monitor progress over time. 4. Taking ownership –  For any organization to be successful, it’s important that its employees succeed and adopt a continuous learning mindset. A proactive engagement to learn new skill set will help them succeed in future. As LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman says, “embrace a start-up of your mentality”—which means adopting a more entrepreneurial approach and carving your own path through the new world of work. Majority of workers appear to understand this already.  According to a survey, 74 percent say they believe it’s their own responsibility to update their skills rather than relying on any employer.  

    We can take the case of American multinational conglomerate AT&T Inc. which choose to rapidly re-skill more than a hundred thousand of its current employees. AT&T has been strong in its conviction to give its employees—those who have built the brand over the past decades—the opportunity to ensure the continued marketability of their skills through wholesale reskilling.

     

    Re-skilling builds an atmosphere where people can pay attention to jobs of the different kind that demands thinking and creativity which helps an individual grow. The procedure may sound intimidating, but this is the only way to survive in this technologically evolving space. Help can be taken from academic institutions to help revise curriculums and create opportunities for lifelong learning. At the same time, individuals within themselves have to develop that zeal for learning, take the charge of reskilling oneself rather than relying on some third party.

     

    Together companies and employees can prepare the manpower for tomorrow.

    Originally published at https://bit.ly/2pi61eA on September 16, 2018.

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      Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

      How to Become an SEO Expert

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      Search Engine Optimisation – three words that have become commonplace in the current landscape of marketing due to the sheer level of importance they hold right now. After all, search engines have become so prevalent in the internet space that it has become the need of the hour for businesses…

      Become an seo expert Search Engine Optimisation – three words that have become commonplace in the current landscape of marketing due to the sheer level of importance they hold right now. After all, search engines have become so prevalent in the internet space that it has become the need of the hour for businesses to understand the relevance of sites like Google and see to it that their ranking on these search engines is at a respectable level. This, in incredibly simplified terms, is what SEO is all about – adopting certain marketing practices that help improve the visibility of the website on search engines which, in turn, improves overall traffic. However, simply knowing about the concept of SEO doesn't ensure that your marketing strategies will witness breakthrough success. Here are some things that a business needs to keep in mind if they wish to optimise their SEO practices and make the most of their investment in this particular marketing strategy.
      • Get an understanding of how SEO works: It’s honestly surprising as to how many businesses skip this crucial step. After all, it’s imperative to attain some basic knowledge about SEO before one can choose to practice this strategy from the get-go. Learning the basic concepts and then educating oneself about more complicated terminologies is the preferred course of action to take. Google actually has a starter guide that will help immensely in this regard, along with a few courses to understand the more complicated aspects of this strategy.
      • Understand Search Engine Marketing (SEM): One might think that Search Engine Marketing and Search Engine Optimisation are two different things, which is right to an extent. However, at the same time, someone can also argue that they’re two sides of the same coin. Therefore, it’s imperative to ensure that a business understands the various strategies that fall under the umbrella of Search Engine Marketing. Knowing about these strategies and executing them to a T is a sure-fire way to ensure success for your entire digital marketing strategy, including SEO.
      • Track and analyse the metrics: SEO is all about the numbers, which makes it essential for businesses to understand exactly what makes this strategy tick. This is where SEO metrics come into play. Everything from keywords, hits, rankings, and whatnot play a critical role in measuring the effectiveness of your SEO services strategy. If a business wants a respectable ranking on a Search Engine Rankings Page (or SERP for short) for their website, then these metrics should be analysed at all times for greater effect. Google Analytics is probably the best and most popular tool in this regard.
      • Stay updated about the rules: There are no such things as hard-and-fast rules in SEO. The algorithms that govern the functioning of search engines keep on changing all the time. Becoming an SEO expert mandates the need to stay up-to-date with these ever-changing rules so that the SEO campaigns being carried out presently don’t become irrelevant. Something as simple as reading up on SEO news outlets and figuring out what Google is up to will go a long way in this regard.
      Becoming an SEO expert is by no means an easy goal to accomplish, but keeping the above things in mind will go a long way in attaining this achievement. With the sheer importance that SEO holds in the current day and age, it’s vital to ensure that the strategies revolving around this aspect of digital marketing are correctly and efficiently executed.

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        BlogDigital Marketing / Inbound Marketing

        State Of Inbound Marketing – 2018

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        ‘Your customer journey is your content journey’ –  is rightly said and the closest we can come to defining Inbound Marketing. Providing a bespoke customer experience that underscores creating personalized content has never been more important than now. Given the competitive digital leading world and the mechanics of how customers/…

        ‘Your customer journey is your content journey’ –  is rightly said and the closest we can come to defining Inbound Marketing. Providing a bespoke customer experience that underscores creating personalized content has never been more important than now. Given the competitive digital leading world and the mechanics of how customers/ buyers respond to your content on the Web, it is becoming increasingly crucial to create and control your brand narrative. That said, to gauge the state of inbound marketing in 2018, various regions were surveyed to gauge how these companies made use of such a strategy. The regions surveyed are as follows:
        • North America (NORTHAM)
        • Latin America (LATAM)
        • Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA)
        • Australia and New Zealand (ANZ)
        • Southeast Asia (SEA)
        Let’s take a look at how inbound marketing practices have shaped the landscape of marketing in 2018.

        Marketing

        Companies were asked about various important questions related to the field of marketing. What are your company’s top marketing priorities over the next 12 months? Converting leads into customers is one of the biggest challenges faced by any company – a challenge that can be met through the application of inbound marketing. By invoking a genuine interest in the brand, customers will be more inclined towards the products and services that are offered. Thinking specifically about inbound marketing projects, what are your company’s top priorities? A major aspect of inbound marketing is the generation of organic reach, which can be done through the tried-and-tested practice of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and content creation based on the buyer’s journey, among other such initiatives. What are your company’s top marketing challenges? Given different marketing challenges based on your industry and business model, you, as a marketer, can address your organization’s business pain points via creating content that is aligned the overarching business objectives. By generating a certain level of trust and rapport with your target audience through effective inbound marketing practices, generating traffic and leads becomes significantly easier. What content distribution channels do you plan to add to your marketing efforts in the next 12 months? The consensus in the marketing world is that video content is the easiest to digest, and the prominence of free video platforms like YouTube, Facebook Video, and Instagram help promote this notion.

        Sales

        With a constant and unwavering focus on promoting sales, the following questions were asked to companies who were adopting the inbound marketing methodology. What are your company’s top sales priorities for the next year? Focusing on customer retention is the biggest acquisition lever you have in the long-term. Losing a prospect midway is incredibly frustrating for any company, however applying inbound marketing methodology – attract, convert, close, delight – can offset the negative impact of your customers leaving you too soon via effective nurturing and listening. What is more difficult to do in sales compared to 2 or 3 years ago? Outbound marketing technically forces the consumer base to interact with the brand – an action that has many negative connotations. By enticing your customers to have a vested interest in the brand through inbound marketing, the frequency of customer responses will unequivocally increase as a result of earning their attention over a period of time and creating value across the customer touchpoints. In your opinion, what part of the sales process do reps struggle with most? The entire process of identifying, prospecting, qualifying, and closing becomes easier when customers are genuinely interested in what the brand has to offer. However, sometimes, buyers, instead of following a linear journey arrive into a ‘spaghetti bowl’ – they’d still need directional content that can move help them move swiftly through the sales funnel. And that’s where using inbound marketing flourishes. What has been the most successful channel for your sales representatives to connect with a prospect? A direct call is always effective when it comes to connecting with a prospect, but if it seems too intrusive then other channels can be taken to contact a potential lead as well. Which is the top source of leads for your sales organisation? The major reason why inbound marketing is gaining so much traction is that – unlike outbound marketing – sales are generated by constructing a proper reputation for the brand, which will compel people to interact with the brand of their own volition. Thus, doing so will help improve the overall sales of the organisation by a considerable extent.

        Sales and Marketing Alignment

        The major focus of inbound marketing is to align the sales and marketing activities of a company to ensure that the strategies being adopted are reaping results. How would you characterise your company’s sales and marketing relationship? A disconnect between the sales and marketing divisions can prove to be quite costly – take the example of a 2015 case study, where it was noted that a disconnect between these processes led to a cumulative loss of around $1 trillion. Which source provides the highest-quality leads for your sales team? (By the company’s sales and marketing relationship) This graph speaks for itself – no matter how effectively your business might be functioning, it’s only through the application of quality inbound marketing strategies that your sales efforts will reap substantial results. Which is the top source of leads for your sales organisation? (By the company’s sales and marketing relationship) The business that want to ensure the success of their strategies must understand how imperative a Service-Level Agreement (SLA) is. It is a contract between the sales and marketing departments that defines the level of service expected from each division of the business. This helps facilitate a sense of transparency and allows for both departments to perform to their utmost potential.

        Consumer behaviour

        At the end of the day, inbound marketing is meant to attract customers through non-intrusive marketing practices. This makes the tracking of consumer behaviour and patterns even more important. What sources of information do you rely on when making purchase decisions for business software? At the end of the day, trust is the most significant factor that will compel a buyer into purchasing a product. Establishing this rapport is crucial to ensure the success of one’s business ventures. How do you prefer to communicate for business purposes? By keeping a track of consumer preferences and following the proper lines of communication, marketers will be able to deploy optimal marketing strategies and solutions to suitably target their audience and increase sales by a substantial margin. So, what are the takeaways from this report?
        • Inbound marketing has become a widely accepted - and most trusted - marketing strategy, which will help companies in communicating with their customers better
        • The marketing initiatives of companies have been completely revamped with the onset of this strategy. Cost-effectiveness and ease of implementation – yes, you can generate more leads and win new business without making huge marketing spends - are a few factors that have contributed to this growing notion.
        • The sales process has also been heavily impacted due to the non-intrusive nature of inbound marketing. Customers develop an interest in the brand and its offerings, which has proven to be invariably useful when it comes to the conversion of prospects into leads.
        • Through the application of inbound marketing, more and more companies can align their marketing and sales activities in a seamless manner through the utilisation of SLAs and be establishing common growth metrics. This helps prevent any miscommunication and sees to it that the company’s efforts are directed towards a holistic goal.

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          What marketers can learn from Simona Halep’s success story

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          Recently, the world of professional tennis witnessed the crowning of a new French Open champion, Simona Halep. By doing so, she also achieved her first Grand Slam title – a feat that had eluded her for what felt like ages. However, no matter how many obstacles Halep encountered in her…

          Recently, the world of professional tennis witnessed the crowning of a new French Open champion, Simona Halep. By doing so, she also achieved her first Grand Slam title – a feat that had eluded her for what felt like ages. However, no matter how many obstacles Halep encountered in her journey, she always managed to hold her head up high always in the face of adversity. The story of Simona Halep is something that everyone should read up on, especially since it talks about a struggle that everyone faces in their lives – the constant barrage of failure and an unwavering mentality to look past these failures and succeed, no matter what the cost. Even as a marketer, there are various things that one can learn from Halep, which will help foster a positive attitude and help achieve success as a result.

          #1. Experiencing failure is important

          It took Halep four attempts before she finally managed to win the French Open. Think about that for a second – the World No. 1 experienced failure a total of three times, before she finally achieved greatness. Normally, any person who failed three times while trying to achieve something would generally give up on what they would assume to be a fruitless endeavour. This behaviour is totally understandable – after all, it’s in the nature of human beings to win, and losing even once can affect one’s mentality. But three times? That’s totally out of the question. This is the case for marketers as well. A failed marketing strategy is more than enough to deter people from following the same tactic again, for reasons that might justify this behaviour in their minds. However, there’s one crucial thing that must be kept in mind – failure is integral to success. One needs to analyse their failures and gauge the reasons that caused such a collapse. By learning from their mistakes, people – marketers or otherwise – will understand how to deal with a similar situation if the need arises again. The greater clarity they attain in their thought process, as a result, will prove to be invariably useful in the long run.

          #2. Pressure is an integral aspect of life

          Failing three times on one of the grandest stages in tennis will surely take a toll on one’s mind. Halep had to visit a psychologist to deal with the pressure of constantly failing to perform in the finals of the French Open. However, by keeping a positive mindset and focusing on the end goal, Halep was able to conquer this obstacle and finally become the French Open champion. Anyone well-versed with the ins-and-outs of marketing can vouch for the fact that workplace pressure can come up at any time. How people deal with this pressure defines their success in the long-term. Pressure should never be seen as a deterrent – rather, one must learn how to flourish under such external pressure. This will allow marketers to make great decisions in the face of adversity and – ultimately – pave their path to success.

          #3. Hard work is essential to succeed

          However, a positive mentality can only take someone so far. Being hopelessly optimistic is not the way to achieve any goal. Keep in mind that hard work is imperative to enjoy success; if a person can talk the talk but not walk the walk, then what’s even the point? The drive to succeed and achieve redemption for past losses wasn’t the only motivating factor that spurred Halep onward to win the title. It was also the hours upon hours she spent honing her skills and body to become proficient in her field and win this esteemed accolade. She put in her blood, sweat, and tears to achieve the goal of becoming the very best. Similarly, marketing is not as simple as just forming an idea out of nowhere. An aspiring marketer needs to perform extensive competition research and analyse the target audience to figure out what kind of campaigns would connect with them. Without doing so, their marketing initiatives will be nothing more than a flash in the pan.

          #4. Accept one’s weaknesses

          Human beings like to think that they’re perfect. After all, the fact that we’re the smartest species in the entire world certainly adds to this hefty perception that we have about us. However, there’s a prevalent saying that should always be kept in mind – nobody’s perfect. No matter how high we might think of ourselves, there are times when we’re woefully inept in accomplishing a particular task. It’s completely normal for this to happen, and the last thing anyone should do is beat themselves up over it. No one is perfect, and everyone has flaws. If Halep went into the finals with the mentality that she could do no wrong, then she would’ve lost the match before it even started. Rather, she realised her faults, and made efforts towards amending them. Marketers also need to realise that no matter what, there will be certain aspects of their work where they might be lacking. Teaming up with other people and working towards correcting these faults is important if one wants to truly become a marketing guru. Being humble is an important trait that’s important for people in any field, whether it might be marketing or anything else.

          #5. Realise that things occur at their own pace

          Imagine the frustration that Halep would’ve experienced time and time again when she lost three times in the finals. A person who’s the best in the world in their field of expertise might obviously attain a sense of misplaced entitlement and assume that everything should be handed to them. However, in the face of all this adversity, Halep realised one thing – one can never force the onset of success. If they put in the efforts and wait, then success will come to them. This goes for marketing as well. One might have the best marketing idea with the perfect execution, but that doesn’t mean that results will happen instantly. Being patient is imperative to ensure the success of any marketing strategy – restlessness will only compel people to jump the gun and lead to less-than-favourable outcomes. The story of Simona Halep is an amazing tale that anybody can attain inspiration from. The core values that compelled Halep to make it big is one of the major reasons why this story is so relatable, regardless of which field a person might be specialising in. Marketers should find it in their best interests to look at such inspirational stories and connect it with their line of work to attain new insights.

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            BlogTechnology

            Top Reasons Why People are not Able to Get the Best out of their Marketing Automation

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            How long has it been since you logged into your Facebook or Twitter using a laptop? We are assuming that you cannot even recall the last time you did it. Well, owing to the digital transformation affecting the businesses as well as consumers at a rate faster than ever, everything…

            How long has it been since you logged into your Facebook or Twitter using a laptop? We are assuming that you cannot even recall the last time you did it. Well, owing to the digital transformation affecting the businesses as well as consumers at a rate faster than ever, everything is in your hand; just a click away! Not only this, with growing digitalisation, searches are happening through the voice medium more than the traditionally written word searches, which makes it imperative for marketers to get the best out of their marketing automation efforts. For instance, companies are increasingly using ‘Chatbots’ to deliver unmatched personalised customer care services to their target audience. Though the use of chatbots has increased and their scope has widened with brands using them to cater to all their customers’ needs and queries, the question that still remains is - are we personalising them and making them more humanistic? Automating marketing processes is essential, what is more important is personalising them. It is vital to understand which marketing processes to automate to maximise the efficacy of marketing automation.

            What is Automation?

            It is nothing but using software and technologies for marketing efficiently on multiple online channels and automating repetitive marketing tasks. Automation is changing the digital landscape in a big way with technologies like mobile computing, embedded systems, among others, which is why marketers should be abreast with the evolving digital world to be able to use it to their advantage. Certainly, with technology advancing daily and becoming readily available to the consumers worldwide, it is essential for marketers to use the latest tools and techniques to reach out to their target audience where they are accessible. While there are marketers who have been using automation to their advantage, there are others who might not have even heard about it! However, the fact is that every marketer and every business out there has been using automation without realising it. The question though is, are you using your automation capabilities to its maximum potential? Automation does not come alone. Several technologies like big data, machine learning, and artificial intelligence are evolving the digital landscape in such a way that we are seeing more and more digitalisation each day. Further, marketers have been using these technologies to a great extent in various marketing processes like sending out bulk emails, posting on social media, data segmentation, creating buyer personas and many other marketing tasks that are routine and repetitive. The marketers of tomorrow know that to stay in the competition by retaining existing customers and attracting new ones, they need to not only automate their marketing processes and remain prompt and regular in interacting with their target audience, but also stay personalised. So, let’s ask you, are you using personalisation with automation? If you are, are you using it to its maximum potential? If you are finding it difficult to answer this question, then it is time to work on your processes at the earliest because technology is evolving daily, and consumers are using it more than ever. This makes it imperative for marketers to exploit the digital world to its fullest and reach their target audience where they are. For example, in countries like Singapore, more than 50% of their population regularly spends time on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and Snapchat actively. According to a yearly survey, 7 out of 10 Singaporeans access social media through mobile devices, which is double the global average. Also, the speed of the internet connection is around 18.2 Mbps, three times as compared to the global average that is 6.3 Mbps. The crème state of internet connectivity, its usage, and the number of social media users in the country are a testament to the rising need of using marketing automation to its full potential. It can be done by putting the best tools in practice to achieve marketing automation goals like sending out emails, publishing social media posts and other such recurring or routine tasks to attract and nurture prospects and customers. However, given some inherent challenges basis the nature of businesses, marketing complex, the multiplicity of customer touchpoints, and the way marketers approach their marketing and broader organisation goals – is wide and vast. As a result, marketers across the country have not been able to extract much out of them and use them to their advantage. Marketing automators face various challenges, like budget, quality of customer data, knowledge of different types of automation, producing engaging content, integrating with other systems, measuring effectiveness, and analysing results. However, for every problem, there is a solution. To start with, you can create ROI-focused goals, understand your customers and buyer personas, align and integrate your business functions and systems, practise reporting and measure and analyse results, among others. Studies show that nearly 85% of the marketers feel that they could benefit more from their marketing automation efforts. Therefore, we have listed the top reasons why marketers are not able to get the best out of their marketing automation tools.

            1. Lack of Personalisation

            While you must have started automating your email flows and other marketing content, personalising them is equally important. Certainly, you can reach out to a mass audience with a different message for each one out there, which is why practising effective segmentation of buyer persona is essential. It not only helps you follow the divide and rule philosophy, but also enables you to win their hearts by creating messages that cater to their specific needs, interests, preferences, and of course, demographics. Moreover, not only is personalisation important, but you also need to maintain a personal tonality in your message to let the reader feel that you are interacting with them one-on-one and that they are cared for. Automation and personalisation work in tandem and increasing automation is just a better way of personalisation.

            2. Attract New Prospects - Right and Fast

            Your email contact list is not here to stay forever; it needs to be refreshed and refilled from time to time. Estimates say that 25% of your email list wanes every year. It is not just the bottom-of-the-funnel leads that need to be attended; conversion is also essential at the top-of-the-funnel. Therefore, marketers must spend time in filling their top-of-the-funnel leads because it is crucial to continuously grow your email list by attracting new prospects to make your marketing automation productive and increase your potential leads.

             3. Incorrect Message Timing

            When automating your marketing processes, it becomes significant that you judge the needs and the stage of the buyer’s journey to help them with information about your products. As an inbound marketer, you must be aware of the different stages in the buyer journey – attract, convert, close, delight. Therefore, the content that you send across to your prospective leads, potential customers, and existing customers, should be able to cater to the stage in their buying journey.

            4. Marketing and Sales Alignment

            One the best benefits that marketing automation offers is the alignment of the sales and marketing functions in an organisation. If these core business functions are not aligned properly and are still operating in silos and individual work orbits rather than a cohesive business unit; it means your marketing automation has not been appropriately implemented. Therefore, to cover the lack of sales enablement, marketing, and customer services alignment with respect to business and respective function goals, strategic and tactical implementation of automation tools is essential.

            5. Limited Use of Automation

            Marketing automation is not just about automating your email flows and sending out timely email drips to your target audience. It also allows you to practise multi-channel marketing, send text messages, and automatically add people to your Facebook ad campaigns. What is essential here is that you do all this, but in accordance with the consumer data that you have received based on site visits, previous purchases, email responses or other such factors. It is critical that it should be used methodically and strategically to deliver the best results, to put marketing automation to its maximum potential.

            6. Content Marketing

            Content is the fuel that drives every communication, be it text, images, videos, or voice messages. If your content is not captivating enough, sending personalised emails, social media posts, text messages, etc. will not deliver the desired results. Therefore, to power your marketing automation efforts, you need to fuel them with appropriate content marketing techniques to drive sales, business and growth. Many businesses within Singapore, and across the globe, have been losing on to a lot of investment on marketing automation software only to watch their efforts go in vain. However, if you are able to avoid the glitches mentioned above and convert them into opportunities for your business marketing processes, you will be able to notice measurable and quantifiable ROI generating results. Therefore, by making the best use of marketing automation software, brands can experience results and revenue like never before. Automation is a technology that is empowering machines to do tasks that were once done by humans. If nothing else, it is making us lazier by enabling computers and devices to do the routine and standardised functions for us, sparing us on time, energy and resources. The idea, on the contrary, is to leave us time for strategising and planning our automation processes keeping the bigger picture in mind and making the most of automation. So, are you shaking the grounds to increase the efficiency of automation to practise effective personalisation to drive business as well as economic growth?

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              BlogDigital Marketing / Inbound Marketing

              How Financial Marketers can use Digital Marketing to Create Brand Awareness

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              Technology is changing the digital scape in a big way. Marketing has taken a shift from the traditional methods involving print and electronic media to the digital modes which cater to the desktop and mobile users. However, with the technological developments, the digital marketing practices have also transformed with time,…

              Technology is changing the digital scape in a big way. Marketing has taken a shift from the traditional methods involving print and electronic media to the digital modes which cater to the desktop and mobile users. However, with the technological developments, the digital marketing practices have also transformed with time, and it is not just limited to selling products anymore. Digital marketing today extends its scope beyond improving web page SEO, attaining higher SEO rankings, increasing page clicks to creating and enhancing brand awareness and reaching out to your target audience. Therefore, it becomes imperative for marketers to use digital marketing to its maximum potential to reach out to their target audience and create brand awareness among them. Many financial marketers must feel that they are not generating revenue instantly. However, they should understand that more the brand awareness, higher will be the consumer base that knows about them and sooner or later, they may convert into customers. So, are your digital campaigns efficiently raising awareness about your brand products and services? If your answer is a NO, then you certainly need to look out for these strategies to create brand awareness amongst your target audience with the use of digital marketing.

              1. Use Social Platforms

              While using social media is essential, what is necessary is that it is used in the right manner. Various social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest etc. all cater to a different set of consumer category. Therefore, financial marketers should categorise their social media content based on the target audience and the social media platform. It is vital for brands to post the right content, at the right platform and the right time to stimulate quality lead generation from the social networks.

              2. Leverage Influencer Marketing

              Influencers are active participants on various social media platforms. The fact that they are known personalities and have the power to influence people with their thoughts and opinions makes them influencers. Additionally, they have a comparatively higher number of followers and a more extensive reach. Therefore, it is imperative to use these influencers at your disposal to promote your brand. Finance is an industry which requires a lot of trust on the part of the prospects and existing customers. When these influencers tell your brand story, your target audience is sure to believe in you.

              3. Paid Advertising

              Paid advertising is another way to boost your posts and create awareness about your brand on social media platforms. Facebook’s paid platform lets you boost your posts to reach a broader target audience and facilitate your efforts to generate more leads and in turn, drive sales. The more significant advantage it offers is that you can target only the consumers whom you think might be interested in your product or service. For instance, you can choose the gender, age group, interests, demographic location and a lot of other filters to limit your post reach only to your target audience.

              4. Interact through Emails

              Emails, since the advent of the digital age, have been the best and the most personalised way of communicating with your target audience. Therefore, financial marketers must use this marketing tactic wisely to communicate with their target audience on a one-to-one basis. Sending personalised emails that include information relevant to the various buyer personas will surely make your prospects, and customers feel that they are cared for. Further, emails are the best way to nurture your visitors into prospects and prospects into customers.

              5. Appreciate your Loyal Followers

              Call them your brand lovers, loyal followers or ambassadors, this category of consumers who love your brand and your offerings should be brought into the picture because there is nothing better than customer testimonials telling your story through their experiences. Make these brand lovers feel that they are cared for by communicating with them and including them in your stories. When your followers feel that they are being noticed, they will inevitably revert with more fondness towards your brand and will turn out to be brand promoters.

              6. Optimisation is Important

              SEO has the power to take you ahead of the competition or keep you lagging. Therefore, utilise this marketing technique to the full and support all your web page content, URLs, titles, meta descriptions and every other content piece you post online. It will increase your visibility and create awareness as more and more people will be able to view your content. The digital landscape is changing the way financial marketers market their products and services to their target audience. Harness the power of every digital marketing tool and technique to not only promote sales but create brand awareness to help you paint the bigger picture and reap its benefits in the future.

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                BlogGeneric

                Five Movies to Inspire Millennial Marketers

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                The Millennial generation, born between the year 1980 and 2000, includes people who are considered to be open-minded, self-expressive, liberal and confident. Often called the Generation Y, millennials are passionate about their work and are forming the most substantial portion of the workforce. They are great multi-taskers and are easily…

                The Millennial generation, born between the year 1980 and 2000, includes people who are considered to be open-minded, self-expressive, liberal and confident. Often called the Generation Y, millennials are passionate about their work and are forming the most substantial portion of the workforce. They are great multi-taskers and are easily inspired too. But, what keeps them going? Millennials are excelling in every field and sector and are not just motivated by money, but work environment, transparent operations, innovation & ideation, challenges, and growth. Like every other field, millennials in the marketing field should also be motivated and continuously inspired. Entertainment is just the best way to vent out stress and work pressure, which is why we have listed down five movies to inspire our millennial marketers while also entertain them and give them the much-needed break time.

                1. The Social Network

                The Social Network is the story of the social media giant, Facebook; its creation, evolution, and journey to becoming the platform it is today. The movie tells you about the success story of Facebook, the thought process of its founders, their steps to building and developing it and the thick and thin it went through, while on its road to success. It teaches the lesson that one cannot achieve success without overcoming the obstacles that come along your way.

                2. Steve Jobs

                The movie, as the name says, is the biography of Steve Jobs, the visionary, the biggest product designer and marketer of our generation. We all know that he is the man behind the technology giant, Apple, but do we know about him as a person? Well, this movie tells you about his hardhearted treatment of his employees, his indifference towards his loved ones and his employee micromanagement. Despite all this, the film leaves you with sympathy for him.

                3. The Founder

                The Founder is the story of the maker of the largest food chain in the world, McDonald’s. Ray Kroc, a 52-year old milkshake machine salesman, builds the world’s most efficient food empire. The story also tells you about his broken morals and conspiracy methods, leaving you with the thought of learning to differentiate between doing whatever you can to achieve your goals and doing what is morally correct.

                4. The Pursuit of Happyness

                The movie revolves around the story of Chris Gardner, an unpaid intern struggling to raise his 5-year old son on his own. Throughout the film, you will experience emotional highs and lows, owing to the ups and downs of his homeless life, despite which his ambition, determination and his undying love for his son, drives him to success. This movie teaches all the millennials not to forget their loved ones in their pursuit of achieving their dreams, because their love and support is essential, no matter what.

                5. The Joneses

                The story of The Joneses revolves around a family – a perfect family of charming and good-looking people, who have just the perfect life. The best part is that all of this is fake. They are a bunch of salespersons by profession who influence the community and promote their products to them. This movie is just the best inspiration for millennial marketers willing to pursue influencer marketing. These movies are a must watch for every millennial marketer as they serve as the best guides and are a collection of inspirational stories to motivate the millennials through every aspect of life.

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                  BlogTechnology

                  Improve Customer Experience with Growth-Driven Design for Finance Marketing

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                  The digital landscape is changing daily and to meet the standards of the current times and provide an enhanced experience to their users, financial marketers need to keep abreast with the latest technological trends. Are you still marketing your products through those age-old marketing techniques? Is your website still the…

                  The digital landscape is changing daily and to meet the standards of the current times and provide an enhanced experience to their users, financial marketers need to keep abreast with the latest technological trends. Are you still marketing your products through those age-old marketing techniques? Is your website still the same dull, boring collection of textual information showcased on screens with a white background? Well, if your answer is Yes, then what you need is a website re-design. While you might be wondering that website redesign means staying offline for months and not being able to cater to your digital customers owing to an inactive website. The solution to your problem is in the form this a new website redesign process known as the Growth-Driven Design (GDD).

                  1. What is Growth-Driven Design (GDD)?

                  Growth-Driven Design is nothing but a website redesign process that helps you revamp your website in stages. This is different compared to the traditional website redesign process, which involves renovating the entire website altogether. Amongst the many demerits of following the conventional method of a website redesign, the biggest and the foremost is that you tend to lose a lot of customers during the redesign period. However, with the growth-driven design, this turns out to be an advantage as you tend to improve customer experience if your follow the growth-driven design approach.

                  2. How does it work?

                  The Growth-Driven Design methodology states that you should revamp the most-responsive and high traffic pages of your website first and the rest in the later stages. Therefore, it starts with identifying your traffic generating web pages and reinventing those so that you do not lose on to the valuable customers from those pages. In the later stages of the redesign process, you can move on to pages with lower traffic reach and steadily build your new website. It is a very strategic and organised approach to redesigning your site and has worked well for all the businesses worldwide.

                  3. How can it improve customer experience?

                  The ideology behind following the GDD approach is to enhance the end users experience. With the GDD approach, your website is updated at least once a week to continuously improve website performance for making it appealing for the visitors. Additionally, it focuses on creating better experiences for the target audience by analysing their usage, page views, etc., to ensure enhanced experiences for the users. The Growth-Driven Design methodology is a structured process and works on revamping the website by keeping in mind the user data. It is true that every brand or business is working to keep their customers happy and the GDD method is just helping you accomplish your customer satisfaction goals. The GDD process starts with reviewing and analysing customer data to evaluate their tastes, preferences, website usage journey, their problems and many other factors, which are considered and kept in mind before formulating the redesign strategy. This means that the GDD process is entirely customer-oriented and aims to improve user experience by analysing consumer behaviour.

                  4. Other Benefits

                  The Growth-Driven Design methodology not only improves customer experience but, it offers many other benefits which are: It helps you launch your website within 4-8 weeks as compared to the traditional method that can take months. Additionally, you can keep updating your website as and when required and keep improving your users’ experiences. The GDD method also helps to increase conversion rates owing to the scope that it offers to continuously change and update your website to attract higher quality leads and convert them into customers by creating improved user experiences. The GDD method builds for your business, a highly responsive and dynamic website, which gives you opportunities to modify your landing pages and CTAs according to your marketing campaigns. It helps you experiment with different ways to create a faster, smarter and efficient website to boost user engagement and in turn, increase website traffic. The GDD approach also helps increase ROI. When your website is customer-centric, provides for improved user experiences, diverts your efforts towards a targeted audience, you can generate quality leads. It thereby leads to more sales conversion rates leading to overall business growth and increased ROI. A Growth-Driven Design website can benefit your business tremendously owing to the quick and easy launch in comparison to the traditional design method. It also helps in better website optimisation by focusing on continuous website improvement according to user feedback to provide higher value and enriched website experiences. Key Features of HubSpot COS Design & Development

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                    BlogDigital Marketing / Inbound Marketing

                    Email Marketing Trends This Year

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                    Because of technological advancements and the influence of Covid-19, the future of email marketing has brought both opportunities and challenges. It's impossible to discuss upcoming developments without considering the impact of Covid-19. Throughout the global pandemic, brands have changed how they interact and communicate with their customers on the internet.…

                    Because of technological advancements and the influence of Covid-19, the future of email marketing has brought both opportunities and challenges. It's impossible to discuss upcoming developments without considering the impact of Covid-19. Throughout the global pandemic, brands have changed how they interact and communicate with their customers on the internet. As a result, email marketing saw a surge in popularity, and new email trends emerged. You must stay on top of current trends to keep up with the competition and execute your email marketing strategy. Email marketing has been the age-old strategy of marketers to reach their target audience on a one-to-one basis. As part of their digital marketing efforts, marketers use multiple strategies like SEO, social media, inbound marketing, and content marketing. While emails have been the go-to strategy for every marketer to reach customers more personally, the way they’re created and designed is experiencing a change. We all know that technology is advancing at a breakneck pace, and the digital space is evolving with it, so the way marketers send emails to consumers is also changing. These days, emails are getting more personalised to meet the consumers’ needs and preferences, and marketers are creating more interactive and visually attractive emails.

                    What are some of the latest trends in email marketing?

                    To remain on top of your email marketing game and see a boost in engagement and conversions, consider these email marketing trends:
                    • Include user-generated content
                    • Make use of artificial intelligence to improve results.
                    • Optimisation for all platforms
                    • Hyper-personalization for email campaigns
                    • Making sure of privacy
                    Everything in the digital landscape is changing, and marketers are using it to attract more customers and stay ahead of the competition. Email marketing will continue to evolve in the coming years, and the following trends will dominate.

                    1. Mobile Responsive Design

                    The fact that consumers have been shifting from desktops to mobile phones for the smallest of their browsing needs. Consumers today are using mobile phones to check and work on their emails, which calls for marketers’ attention to create mobile-responsive emails and provide the users with a smooth and uninterrupted experience. Therefore, marketers should create mobile-friendly emails and ensure that the load time is zero and the users undergo an enhanced experience.

                    2. Segmentation and Personalization

                    Consumers are the foundation of B2C businesses. In today's technologically advanced world, where consumers are of importance, it is essential for businesses to develop marketing suited to their target audience's specifications. Marketers must segment their customer data based on various criteria's -
                    • Demographics, age, interests, needs, and more
                    • Paying close attention to the clients' buying patterns
                    • Functioning of market 
                    • Working on designing personalised emails 

                    3. Omnichannel Marketing

                    Omnichannel marketing allows brands to amalgamate all consumer experiences into one. From physical stores to brand websites, in-app experiences to social media interactions, email is the key ingredient, if companies wish to combine all these experiences to enhance and personalise the buying journey of the customer.

                    4. Interactive Emails

                    Many marketers believe that email marketing is impacting marketing in a big way. Therefore, it is of the essence for marketers to divert their energies into creating emails that are interactive and engage the viewer. It will help in increasing the engagement rate while also reducing the bounce rate. For instance, emails that can help viewers purchase within the email itself are sure to attract users.

                    5. Attractive Visuals

                    Emails are no more just plain text messages sent to consumers. Marketers are working more than ever before to create emails that are visually appealing and contain content that catches the eye of the viewer. Emails, nowadays, contain images, infographics, GIFs, videos, video shots, etc., thus, are more vibrant and attractive.

                    6. Artificial Intelligence

                    In 2022, big brands will invest heavily in using Artificial Intelligence for their email marketing practices. AI will be used for all processes like data segmentation, data analysis, integrate product recommendations, and many others. AI can also be used to send personalised emails to their target audience. There are now technologies that can automatically produce or rewrite marketing content automatically, guided by performance data. Marketers will start using AI tools to write email content, subject lines, and calls-to-action on a more regular basis, and might discover that these technologies can now improve performance in many circumstances.

                    7. Gamification

                    Gamification of emails includes including puzzles, games, and riddles in emails to make them more interactive and keep the viewer engaged for long. Therefore, marketers should consider including recreations like think quick puzzles, rapid fires, spinning a wheel for winning prizes, answer to win, and the like. With emerging technologies having a greater impact on the digital realm than ever before, marketers must prepare to update their email marketing services and strategies. Emails that are interactive, visually appealing, and keep the user engaged for a long time will be critical in converting prospects to customers and customers to brand promoters, and without these two, marketers would struggle to compete.

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