BlogTechnology

Top 5 UI/ UX Trends 2018

By Honey Singh
March 1, 2018

The technological advancements happening universally are changing the way the world is looking at everything. Needless to say, when we talk about technology, the first thing that comes to mind is the computers or machines that can write, calculate, talk, and do things that humans can. While the creation of computers has been a revolution, there is a need to upgrade them with the evolving technology. Much like computers, there were times when consumers used phones for merely communicating with one another. Nonetheless, they have now evolved to become devices that are the supporting hand of any human. Smartphones as we call them, help us to perform all kinds of functions and allow us to access the world with just a click of a button. The evolving technology calls to upgrade such devices with time and provide a user experience that is ever improving. For this, the essential requirement of any user is the interface. The front end as we call it, the User Interface is how a user and a computer interact through the use of various hardware and software. The times ahead will call for improved User Experiences through enhanced User Interface. Both these concepts work in tandem, but there is a slight difference between the two. While User Interface deals with what is visible to the user at the front end, User Experience is a broader term and aims to enhance the experience of the person using the device or application. Indeed, technology has been evolving daily and has been impacting every sphere. The UI and UX are not left behind. Therefore, we have listed down the top 5 trends that will dominate the UI/ UX technologies in 2018.

1. Focus will be on the User

When the customer is the centre of all your business efforts, including your product design and delivery, you are bound to soar profits higher than ever. In 2018, brands will primarily focus on creating UI and UX that can provide an enhanced user experience on all devices like computers, laptops, smartphones, etc. Additionally, brands will also work on creating personalised UI/ UX based on the user personas and their journey patterns to meet their tastes and interests.

2. Easy Usability will be Important

With everything happening at just the click of a button, consumers these days, are becoming lazy to make efforts in doing anything and everything. Therefore, it becomes imperative to create technologies that are user-friendly and deliver outstanding user experiences.

3. The Rise of Voice UI

With voice assistants like Google Talk, Apple Siri, Microsoft Cortana and Amazon Alexa, we can be assured that searches via voice will rise in 2018. The time where you needed to screen to perform any activity on any device will be gone, and voice-based searches will rule. Also, with automation easing out the process of using furniture and home accessories, consumers will go ‘screenless’, and Voice User Interface will dominate the electronics market enabling users to interact hands-free with technology and gadgets.

4. Borderless Display

In 2018, vibrant and colourful palettes will replace the old dull and boring ones giving the user interfaces a new and striking appearance. Also, the palettes will get a new borderless look to replace the old grid concept in mobile interfaces. Additionally, intuitive cards will replace the age-old icon display to present information like text, photos, links or anything regarding a particular subject. Borderless display combined with vibrant, informative cards will form the basis of new interfaces in 2018.

5. Video and Sound Design

Every click on your mobile screen, whether to like, write a comment or select an emoji, is accompanied by background sounds in the form of tones or jingles. Such sounds make the user experience all the more pleasant and exciting. With the rapid transformation in the graphic design world and consumers widely preferring to watch videos, video content will replace images. These trends are sure to give the users an improved and vibrant experience. Therefore, UXers should gear up for this year to provide a complete makeover to their User Interfaces to compel the users to use their applications. Adding vibrant colours to your UI and improving the UX altogether is the key to intrigue your users to use your application or software again and again.

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BlogTechnology

FinTech trends to watch out

By Team #ARM Worldwide
February 23, 2018

FinTech companies are nothing but financial services companies that are backed and supported by technology to deliver financial products and services. They provide financial services by making use of technology and software. FinTech companies are still in their developing stage due to the slow progress of these companies from the traditional methods to the technological ones. However, it’s time for financial marketers to realise that the shift should be done much faster than they expect. With technological advancements changing the digital landscape in a big way and online platforms like Paytm and other FinTech companies facilitating payments and money transfers in the simplest way possible, financial services providers will have to gear up to compete with them. While FinTech has been driving the finance industry in a big way, new trends are approaching this industry in the year 2020. Some of these are: Rise in Wallet usage With the advent of online payment apps like Paytm, Mobikwik, Freecharge, etc., cashless transactions have seen an upsurge. It will continue to rise in 2018. People will continue to use such services and add to the cashless transaction pool, and the use of digital platforms like online wallets for making payments and transactions will increase. Data Analytics and AI will rise Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been affecting every industry and finance industry is not left behind. AI is being used for customer interactions, trading, risk management, fraud detection, etc. AI is also being deployed to automate the back-end tasks. Apart from AI, the finance industry will also use data analytics to cater to consumers’ needs and preferences and provide them with more personalised experiences. Use of blockchain Blockchain is the technology behind the new digital currency we call as a cryptocurrency. Blockchain will not only be used for such digital currencies but, will play a role much more significant than that and will be used in other financial services products as well. Collaboration of banks and FinTech companies Today, banks have started collaborating with FinTech companies to integrate each other’s strengths for providing an enhanced and improved customer service experience. The aim is to provide technologically backed banking facilities to the customers. Privacy and security at priority With cybercrimes affecting the cyberspace and digital consumers facing issues with privacy and security, it becomes imperative for banks and financial institutions to ensure the safety of their data. For this, regulatory bodies are also working on making rules that are stricter and provide enhanced security while also ensuring privacy. Instant payment with UPI and AEPS Newer payment methods like UPI (Unified Payment Interface) and AEPS (Aadhar Enabled Payment System) are facilitating simpler and faster ways of making transactions. Banking will become more open, and the way the people transact and make payments will reform. Rise in use of chatbots The leading market players in the banking industry like HDFC and ICICI have installed chatbots for customer interactions and customer solutions to provide a smooth and hassle-free user experience. In 2020, the quality of chatbots will improve giving rise to enhanced and accurate responses. Further, with an increase in voice search, chatbots will also become voice-enabled and talk to our customers to solve their queries. FinTech companies are proliferating due to consumers adapting to the technology as it is advancing. With the internet available at cheaper rates and smartphones offering a one-stop platform for all the consumer needs, it becomes imperative for the financial services providers to go digital and put technology to its maximum use. Keep these trends in mind to provide your customers with a tech-driven enhanced experience and gain an edge over the competition.

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Benefits of Social Media Marketing for Financial Services

By Team #ARM Worldwide
February 21, 2018

Social media is playing a huge role in making the world a smaller place. Just one click and you get to connect with coworkers, associates and all other stakeholders with minimal effort and no cost. From industry players, marketers, to your customers, all are using the social platforms like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, etc., to connect with the world and know what is happening in the industry. As a result, it becomes imperative to harness the power of social media and leverage it to market your business to your target audience where they are. Though most industries have been using social media immensely to market their business to their target audience, the finance industry is still making its way to it, rather slowly. However, financial marketers must realise the need to use social media to market their products and services to their target audience. It is crucial as your audiences are the most active on these platforms, which makes it easier to attract engagement and convert it into customers. Why financial marketers should start using social media marketing is not just limited to the fact that it helps you connect with people but because it offers benefits much more than one could even imagine. Let us look at what these are: It’s for free The biggest and the best advantage that all social media platforms offer is that they are available free of cost and with practically no costs involved, these platforms provide much broader and easier access to our target audience. Also, with the advent of smartphones and the evolving internet technology, people lately, have been able to access these platforms any time and anywhere, which makes it imperative to deploy this marketing strategy to reach the target audience where they are. Increases visibility Given the extent to which people worldwide are consuming social media platforms, brand presence on these platforms is sure to increase brand visibility. It will not only help raise brand awareness but, will also increase the extent of expertise-based referrals you receive, drive more traffic and in turn, generate more leads. Promotes your content offers Technological advancements are bringing in newer marketing strategies that can be employed to market one’s business. One such approach is content marketing, which as the name suggests, means distributing your content. Social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, etc., serve as the best platforms for distributing content offers like blogs, ebooks, whitepapers, etc., that you’ve created for your target audience. It will benefit brands by creating awareness on the one hand, and increasing engagement, on the other. Leverage existing content Today, the meaning and scope of content is not just limited to words put in an article but, includes images, videos, podcasts, infographics, and others. Social media platforms serve as the best way to amplify the content you’ve created for your target audience. You can start by creating a blog for your audience, sharing it on Facebook for a more extensive reach, creating tweets and sharing on Twitter, creating a video around it and sharing on YouTube, and the list can go on and on. Builds credibility and trust While it creates and builds engagement, social media also helps strengthen brand authority by backing your website and content offers. Brands should look for increasing their followers that can help build connections and in turn, improve credibility. Here, platforms like Twitter not only serve as a place to interact with your target audience but also make your customers feel that they’re cared for and attended. Boost organic traffic and SEO rankings Posting quality content on social media regularly will not only boost your organic traffic but will also increase your search engine rankings. The more qualitative content you produce and share, the chances of your followers sharing your content increases. Undoubtedly, the more the links pointing back to your website, the higher will be your search engine rankings. Social sharing is a trend that is spreading far and wide, and it’s time you take leverage of it. Brands worldwide are benefitting from harnessing this marketing strategy in a big way. It’s time for financial marketers to move from traditional marketing to social media marketing because this is the trend of the morrow. Reach your audiences where they are, for free and earn returns higher than ever before.

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BlogDigital Marketing / Inbound Marketing

Essential Digital Marketing Strategies for Financial Services

By Team #ARM Worldwide
February 19, 2018

The digital space is evolving rapidly with the technological advancements that are taking place. Every industry is shifting its focus from product improvisation to customer satisfaction. The finance industry should also gear up if they want to survive in the market and retain their customers. Amongst all the other sectors, it is essential for the finance industry to adapt to this digital transformation as quickly as possible because the ones that do will thrive, while others will have to fight to survive. The digital landscape is progressing daily, which makes it imperative for financial companies to go digital and employ strategies that can help them grow and retain customers. For this, financial service providers should make use of specific digital marketing strategies that can help them maintain their market position and gain an edge over their competition. Financial marketers must realise the need to move from traditional forms of marketing to the newer ones to reach their target market where they are readily available. Customer Retention is the Key With everything happening at the click of a button, customers today expect smooth and hassle-free services from every brand they deal with. Moreover, for the finance industry, where customers are at the pivot of the business, it becomes necessary to retain customers before they move to the competitors. For this, they should provide unmatched customer services and should be available at their beck and call to support and guide them throughout their buying journey. Create Valuable Content It is essential that financial service providers also focus on creating awareness among the consumers. It is necessary because, even though consumers are using financial products, there is still not much awareness and clarity about these products and services. Indeed, brands that will create content that is informative and valuable for their target market will build trust among them and in turn will gain an edge over their competitors. Video is the New Content Evidently, video content has been taking over textual content in a big way, as consumers today find videos more engaging. Therefore, financial companies should emphasise on creating informative video content as it is visually more appealing, attracts higher levels of engagement and creates positive SOV (Share of Voice). Mobile Responsive Design Today, consumers are using smartphones for performing all their tasks, no matter how big or small. Therefore, it is crucial for financial companies to build websites that are mobile responsive. They should work on delivering enhanced and smooth user experience with minimum page load time so that the user does not switch. Finance companies can also consider creating mobile applications to facilitate smooth banking and other financial transactions for the consumers. Inbound Marketing Marketers of tomorrow know that to retain customers, they should produce marketing that customers love. For this, they need to start marketing the inbound way. Inbound marketing is nothing but marketing your products and services to your target audience, using content that is personalised and specially created to address the needs of the buyers during their buying journey. Marketing Automation Marketing automation is one of the best and the most significant marketing strategy that marketers should utilise. It means automating your marketing processes using software like HubSpot, which can help in saving your time and resources that can be better employed for other operations that require human intervention. Social Media Social media provides every industry with the most accessible and most cost-effective platforms to interact with their customers. Financial marketers should exploit social media to its full potential to market their products and services to the target audience. Customer-Centric Retail Banking Finance companies have always been focusing on product innovation to satisfy their customers. However, with the technological advancements and the evolving digital world, finance companies should shift their focus from product innovation to customer-centric products. They should emphasise on creating products and services that can best suit the needs and preferences of the consumers. Incorporating these financial digital marketing strategies into your marketing plans is essential for every financial marketer to attract more customers and retain the existing ones. Customers are at the pivot of every finance industry and focusing on them to create products and services that meet their requirements will surely entice them to prefer you over your competitors. Read Blog-Hike up your Financial Business with Inbound Marketing.

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CMO’s Guide to Digital Media Planning

By Team #ARM Worldwide
February 15, 2018

The digital boom and advancement have changed forever the way marketing is being done. Today, more and more marketers are shifting towards online marketing from traditional marketing methods. This has led to the setting of new trends such as digital media planning and buying. Many marketers are preferred allocating a chunk of their marketing spend towards online inventory rather than physical inventory. Digital media planning entails the development and execution of online ad campaigns through different channels such as social media platforms, search, display and mobile advertising. To implement a successful digital media buying plan, a marketer must possess the expertise and a lot of patience. As a CMO, you might have considered allocating a significant portion of your marketing spend towards digital media planning. Here are a few important tips you should keep in mind while implementing your digital media planning strategy in order to increase your ROI from it :

1. Focus on overall development

Digital marketing is a function which cannot be executed depending on a marketer’s whims and fancies. It needs to be executed with dedication and a proper direction. Most online campaigns fail to generate expected results since they lack a solid plan and direction. While traditional marketing campaigns do not require much of planning and direction, online campaigns require a strategic media plan to be crafted before the creative plan is ever conceived. In order to develop a successful digital media plan, as a CMO, you should be able to answer some key questions such as what are your campaigns goals and objectives, who are your buyer personas and are you able to cater to their needs, do you have a clear marketing perspective and does it align with your brand’s personality, what are the channels which work the best for your brand, is your call-to-action buttons successful in bringing in prospective leads, etc. Answering these key questions pertinent to your overall marketing goals will help you to get a clear picture about whether your marketing efforts are heading towards the right direction and will enable you to make any improvements in your marketing strategy.

2. Identify your Target Audience

Identifying and researching about your buyer persona is, no doubt, a crucial task. A marketer should always perform the buyer persona research thoroughly and should not skip any procedure or step while doing so. It is very crucial for you as a CMO to know who you are targeting, what are their job profiles, and all other crucial information about them. You should be as specific as you can while asking your question. You should ask your marketing team to give you the report about the current web analytics of your brand to understand how your target audience is interacting with your website. You should take note of which elements of the website engage them and which pages do they visit more often. This will help you to identify what resonates with them, and will enable you to optimize it accordingly. You can also study some consumer behavior data from the industry thought leaders as well as research about your target market’s social media trends to obtain deeper information about your prospects. The more focused your target is, the more successful your digital marketing campaign will be.

3. Do Continuous Research About the Marketing Trends Around

A successful marketing campaign cannot be executed without constantly updating yourself about what are the current marketing trends by using all the data available on the internet such as e-books, case studies, white papers, etc. You should also keep track of the ad campaigns of your competitors, and analyze what worked for them, and try to incorporate those elements in your online campaign. Browsing your LinkedIn account and tracking the discussions of your industry peers would help you to gain an insight about what planning and monitoring tools they use and which ad networks would be best fit for your marketing goals and which aren’t.

4. Keep a Track of your Campaign’s Performance

If you don’t keep a track of your advertisement campaign’s performance, it would really be a waste of your marketing efforts, since you won’t be able to know the areas where your ads performed well or where it didn’t. One of the greatest advantages of advertising online over traditional channels is that you can track your campaign’s performance in real time. The data you will collect will help you to get a clear picture about in which direction is your campaign going, and also make necessary adjustments to your campaign to ensure it is successful.

5. Cross-channel marketing

For making an online campaign successful, a marketer should consider adopting a cross-channel approach of marketing, which includes integrating various channels such as email marketing, online paid advertising, social media platforms, and various other online mediums. For instance, if a user, who may be a prospective customer, fills a form in your website, you can follow him up by you can follow him up by providing more information on the topic he wanted to search, through his email, and this may result into prospects leading to sales. Thus, by using cross-channel marketing platforms, you would be able to keep a connection with the customers, and be able to shape up the mind of the customer to buy the product.

Conclusion

Buying online ads inventory through a digital media planning can turn out to be the great asset to you, provided that it is done strategically and with planning. Most of the consumers are now found online, searching for your product and company before purchasing your product. Hence, you can target customers where they are, and grow your customer base too, which would increase your sales and lead to a higher ROI.

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Best Email marketing Practices For Financial Marketers

By Team #ARM Worldwide
February 12, 2018

The evolution of digital marketing has brought forth many new marketing methodologies for marketers. Email marketing, however, continues to remain the best and the most personalised way of interacting with your customers. It also remains the most potent digital channel for financial marketing services providers to practice effective multichannel marketing. Apart from the obvious benefit of providing a free platform for marketers to interact with their prospects and customers, email marketing helps in saving costs, increasing ROI and retaining customers. It is one of the most influential and proven ways of attracting new customers. However, with new technology coming in daily, the scope and trend of email marketing has also changed over the course of time. Today, emails don’t just contain text messages wrapped in a box and mailed to prospects and customers but, have become much more interactive and call for actions from the customers’ end. It’s not just the changing digital space but, also the shift from desktops or personal computers to other devices like smartphones, iPads, tablets, etc., that have created the need for newer ways of designing emails. Needless to say, emails will continue to occupy the most critical position in the list of marketing as well as remarketing strategies used by financial marketers and with a balanced combination of approach and techniques, marketers can make the most out of this age-old yet crucial marketing strategy. Having said that, let us see what the best email marketing practices that should be followed by financial marketers are. Mobile responsive emails With the incoming of mobile phones, especially, smartphones that allow ease of access anytime and anywhere, desktops have taken a backseat. More than 50% of the customers today access emails on their mobile phones, which makes it essential for financial marketers to create emails that are mobile ready and responsive. Therefore, marketers need to optimise their emails for mobile as well as desktop. Create data-driven personalised campaigns Marketing today, much like the products and services, have become customer-centric. Businesses, today, start by creating their product or service around the consumers’ needs and preferences. Why not marketing, too? Using technology to gather customer data is what marketers have been doing for long now. Financial marketers should use this data to create personalised campaigns based on their customers’ personas. Also, marketers can use segmentation, which means splitting your buyer persona into more targeted groups basis their demographics, tastes and preferences, their searches and interests and other such criteria. Following this step, you can create personalised campaigns for the different buyer persona. Create gated and ungated content Ungated content means the one that does not require users to any carry out any Calls-to-Actions (CTAs) before viewing the content that you’ve shared. Whereas, in gated content the user has to first fill the form and then the content will be downloaded. Practice email marketing with ungated content or use marketing automation to auto populate the form with prospect’s information and lure your prospects to become your leads. Leverage video content The fact that YouTube is becoming the biggest search engine makes it imperative for financial marketers to move from creating blogs to creating videos for their customers. Informative videos can be attached to emails to lure the viewers to open and watch the videos. Obviously, anything that involves video and sound attracts people more than just words formed to create information. Therefore, marketers must leverage video content to its maximum potential to create visually attractive emails. Real-time marketing This is a trend that follows the personalisation of emails according to the buyer persona. It involves addressing the needs of the customers by sending the right message to the right place at the right time. More efforts will be required in creating such personalised emails but, they will be more efficient and generate more responses and hence, leads. There is nothing better than showing your prospects that they’re cared for, and this is just the technique that does it all! Automation and integration Automation is the latest technology that marketers are using in every task of their marketing process. When you start sending across email drips to your prospects and customers, it can be very tedious to keep track and timely send follow-up emails, which is where you need automation. By automating your email process, you can not only save the time and resources involved in sending them but, also be prompt and timely with their delivery. Attach compelling CTAs and landing pages The last but not the least email marketing practice that financial marketers should follow is adding CTAs to the emails. Every email that you send to your buyer persona should contain persuasive CTAs to entice the reader to act upon your email. Further, not only should the CTAs be compelling enough, they should be accompanied by convincing landing pages that can force the buyer to close the deal with you. Though email marketing is considered as an age-old marketing technique, it is multiplying with the growing technology. Brands are creating emails that were never seen before with attractive and captivating content, be it information, images, infographics, videos or alike. If you’re a financial marketer looking to attract your prospects and converting them into customers, follow these tactics to fill in your target audiences’ inboxes with the best emails ever! Read Blog-Hike up your Financial Business with Inbound Marketing.

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Are You Taking Advantage of QR Code Marketing?

By Team #ARM Worldwide
February 8, 2018

We are sure you’ve come across those weird looking squarish barcodes. Yes, we are talking about QR or Quick Response codes. They are omnipresent these days and can be seen in advertisements, direct mail communication, and even sale announcements. More and more businesses are realizing what QR codes can do to increase their growth and are using the codes as part of their marketing strategy. How can QR codes help with marketing and communication? Though mostly used in websites as well as email marketing, QR codes play out in a better manner when physically present before the user. So, a direct mailer with a code will work better than the one in the email marketing. Sales carry bag, a street sign or an eatery’s takeaway box lets the user or the viewer use the QR code physically and connect faster to loads of information by scanning it. Whatever the trade pundits say, QR codes are here to stay. They will continue to grow and become popular by way of their frequent usage. Easy to create, hassle-free, they are becoming convenient for the customers to use them. Engaging audiences with QR codes is a task that’s not very difficult which would ultimately lead to traffic to your site and eventually sales. We are listing some examples of how organizations big or small can incorporate QR codes to better their standing in the market:

Wine labels with QR codes could help connoisseurs or even those trying to acquire a fine taste know more about the vintage, the vineyard or even be able to locate a store for their further consumption.
Online property agents could use a QR code to enhance sales or simply inform people about the availability of real estate. This could be added to videos of walkthroughs of the property.
Employees’ business cards could carry QR codes thus facilitating the process of networking for all.
QR codes placed next to the products in retail shops could help with detailed information about the same.

1. What can be done to benefit from QR codes?

QR codes have to be printed on something to get noticed, this in itself is a wonderful opportunity to keep your message highly targeted. While your business can easily cast an extensive net, it can still only target a meaningful audience. With the availability of newspapers, magazines, business cards, direct mailers, fliers, signages, packaging and much more, your QR codes on them can redirect the consumers to a distinctive feature on your mobile website. It could be any of the following:

Buying off directly from the smartphone
Videos that could showcase branding, how-tos, product demos, entertainment and other engaging content
Store locator
Options to subscribe (this could lead to data gathering for making sales or at least contact at a later stage)
Coupons
Recipes and tips
Help with restaurant reservations/view menu
Downloads

2. Even your customer benefits from QR Codes

The customer is already impressed by you that she/he doesn’t have to bother with dialing numbers or clicking endlessly to get to where they want to be. Just by scanning the action code on magazines, ads, coupons or signages, the user can reach you. You’ve saved them time and effort and made it easy for them to get the information they need. These are positive impacts that are quite capable of bringing people to your store. Studies say it all with the numbers - 94% of mobile users search for information on their smartphone and more than half of that percentage – a whopping 66% of those searchers do go ahead and visit a business in person or online at a later stage.

3. Small businesses can benefit fantastically by using QR codes

Recent studies have shown that the usage of QR codes has gone up by more than 50% over the last year. Consumers are tapping into mobile business websites like never before. Smaller businesses with a mobile website have recorded 84% jump in sales. With an appealing mobile website design, along with the usage of QR codes, smaller businesses can easily get the word out about themselves. Customer experience can be enhanced and sales can be moved up with just the usage of a smartphone and some quirky looking squares. It can’t be an easy decision for smaller businesses to let go of this opportunity. We are putting forth some fabulous benefits to market your small business whilst using QR codes Gets print and online media together Time to shorten the gap! QR Codes can be really useful to bridge the gap between print and online media. Use them in offline print and they redirect you to online pages. Poring through a publication, you come across an advertisement for a retail product. Along with it stands a QR code that can help you with a detailed description of the product. Scan the code and you could reach a video that could put your doubts about the product at rest.

4. Helps you build a community

Your codes could get linked to your business’s Facebook page. Scanning the code would automatically lead to people liking your page. Your followers could increase almost immediately. And you could retain them or attract some more with discount codes that are unique to each and every QR code. “Scan and get 15% off” could be a start to an all new relationship with a potential customer.

5. You can track them all down

You possibly couldn’t know who checked your ads in magazines and newspapers, but QR codes lets you track results because they are based on scans. Now you can figure out if someone from the next town is giving your business or someone next door has noticed your ad in the local paper.

6. Build some excitement with something extra

Everyone likes something more than is dished out. Customers too are interested in knowing if there is an iota of mystery in that scan and they will get something they aren’t expecting. So, if you’re talking about food, you could write, “Scan the QR code for a superfast, super delicious recipe.” People always like something that comes to free and this is an added benefit that the customer is sure to like. It’s not hard on the pocket You can get your QR codes created for almost nothing. Some free online programs will readily do that for you. Some free online programs are available that can create basic QR codes for you! Websites namely qrstuff or qrcode kaywa come for no cost or are extremely cheap. They also provide great information for your QR needs. QR code creation has increased to an amazing 1,253% in the past few years. Two million action codes out of these were created in less than 3 months. That speaks volumes about the importance of QR codes in marketing and communication. It has a very limited downside and a very large upside potential to grow sales. It can aid in getting you new customers, more business and definitely much more exposure. From customizing messages to personalized wrapping papers, from making dull spaces into places of interest, from adding a touch of creativity to almost anything, QR codes are worth giving a shot. Also, Know more about Digital Marketing to hike up your Business.

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BlogTechnology

Website Must-Haves For Financial Services

By Team #ARM Worldwide
February 2, 2018

With newer technology coming in daily and consumers worldwide adapting to it at the fastest rate ever, marketers too need to adapt to it and create tech-driven websites to offer their users an experience that stands out from the competitors. The digital landscape has been evolving rapidly, and brands globally are capturing the digital space to compete and gain an edge over the competition to attract the target audience and close them into sales. Apparently, one should start with self-analysis. What this means is that one should start by analysing and improving their website. Many financial institutions like banks, loans and mortgage providers, etc., have already begun redesigning their website and are achieving success with their new website designs. What you need here is a website redesign. On the one hand, there is the traditional method of revamping your website in one go, and on the other, is the Growth-Driven Design (GDD) process that helps you revamp your website in stages. Marketers must prefer the latter given the benefits it offers like reduced time lag during the transition, continuous lead generation, etc. While you start your website redesign process, let us give you some must-haves for your financial services website to ensure your users with an enhanced and improved experience. Desktop and Mobile responsive Your website must already be performing well on the desktop. However, with the various mobile devices around, consumers are viewing information on their mobiles and tablets, which makes it imperative for financial marketers to work on creating a hassle-free and smooth mobile experience to their users. Intuitive navigation and Search Box It is critical that your site visitors go through an effortless browsing experience. To ensure this, you should provide for intuitive site navigation so that users can easily find the required information without having to search much. Additionally, your website should also contain a ‘Search Box’ to facilitate easy search through your website. Contact information Another essential element that should be present on your website is your contact information. This information should be visible in either the header or the footer of your website. Users might want to contact you for products information or queries, for which your email, telephone and address details must be available for their use. Engaging multimedia content The content displayed on your website supports and enhances your brand’s image and personality. Therefore, it is essential to publish good quality content on your website to build brand credibility. Apart from being informative, your content should also create awareness amongst customers about industry trends and give solutions to their problems. Consumers, these days, enjoy watching a mix of different types of content, which is why your website should also contain images, infographics, and videos, apart from the product information, articles, and blogs. Add Customer Testimonials There is nothing better than your customers telling your success story. Create a separate web page for customer testimonials and add their reviews and experiences to show your success story through them. It will boost the prospective customers’ confidence in you, and they might want to do business with you. Clear CTAs & easy-to-fill forms Now that you have visitors on your website, the next step would be to increase their stay-time on your website. For this, every internal page of your website must include CTAs or Calls-To-Action to help your site visitors travel through your website without having to wander around unknowingly. Also, every CTA should be accompanied by informative landing pages wherein you can include downloadable content offers. Moreover, to convert these visitors into leads, you can add easy-to-fill application forms to obtain the details that can eventually help turn them into customers. Strong SEO SEO is the backbone of any web content. Therefore, financial marketers should give equal importance to SEO because this is the technique that will help you gain higher rankings on the SERPs and the higher the ranking, the more will be the traffic generated. For increasing your website authority, you should also work on interlinking your web pages, which will help transfer the juice of high authority pages to others. Live chat option With chatbots and voice search changing the way consumers search on the WWW, another crucial element that your website should contain is the Live Chat option. From the time a visitor lands on your website, they should be able to see the live chat option, which can help them with their queries. Integrated security With cybercrime increasing day by day and consumers becoming more conscious about providing personal information on the WWW, it becomes mandatory for marketers to protect user data. Financial marketers can smartly include privacy policies to let their users know that their data is safe and protected. Analytics With tools like Google Analytics telling you about your website performance regarding traffic count, viewers count, sessions, bounce rate, etc., it has become easier than ever to monitor your web performance. You can easily track which web pages are performing better than others and use these pages to build authority by linking them to other web pages. For non-performing web pages, you can improvise them to create more useful content for your users. Financial marketers must start redesigning their website now because the user experience is of prime importance and without a tech-driven smart website, you’re sure to lose on to your customers. Read Blog-Hike up your Financial Business with Inbound Marketing.

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BlogSocial Media Marketing | Content Marketing

Must-Follow Checklist for Video Creations

By Team #ARM Worldwide
February 1, 2018

While a lot has been talked at length about the importance of videos in everyone’s social feeds and how video content consumption is the future, not many know what making great shareable video entails. The advent of native video into everyone’s lives has changed the way netizens consume content. From short videos to mute videos, and from live videos to 360-degree videos – video evolution has addressed various consumer needs and simultaneously helped marketers reach highly targeted audiences. Various reports suggest that more than 500 million hours of Youtube content is consumed each day. Some reports also assert that 90 percent consumers find product videos highly useful in making the purchase decision. Furthermore, some reports that have delved into the video consumption habits – just by having a brand logo in the video increases the probability of purchase by 9% – implying that consumers feel more convinced at looking at brand videos. The same report also suggests that people spend are likely to spend 3X times more time on a live video than a video that’s no longer live. This only goes on to prove that creating video content is no child’s play and should be taken up seriously as it is expected that by 2020 80% of consumer internet traffic will be driven through video.

So, rounded below is a checklist for successful video content creation:

1. Length

While we are good at consuming videos that are informational or newsy, brand marketers should keep in mind that ideal video length should be not more than 15 seconds. With an ocean of videos been fed to consumers daily through their social streams, it becomes imperative for marketers to stick to a video length that is crisp, clear and concrete

2. Audience

Since we are looking at a digital landscape with shorter videos, variation in videos is something that should also be considered. Since shorter videos are easier to create, they can be altered with content pertaining to different target audiences. This solves two purposes – creating content that is relevant and reaching out to different target audiences. These digital times call for the brands to use the power of targeting more proactively.

3. Be authentic

Heard of fake news? And how there are serious allegations against Russia behind the last American Presidential elections? Yes, we are living in times of ubiquitous content and unverified content. Be very sure of the content that is reflecting in the video. Cross check every bit not just for the typos, but also for what is being conveyed. Also, keep in mind that consumers are quite aware, and don’t hesitate in pointing flaws or misinterpreted facts on social media.

4. Transmittable without sound

A key ingredient of creating videos for today’s age – use clearly readable subtitles. Why may you ask? Because an attention span of close to 8 second and a social feed flooded with content shouldn’t be detrimental in limiting the social engagements on your video! Look at this way – the social feeds are clustered places that are packed with ‘n’ number of videos, where most users just scroll to the next video without even listening to the context. Sounds familiar, right?

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What is Account-Based Marketing and Why You Need it?

By Team #ARM Worldwide
January 30, 2018

Amidst all the advancements that are happening in the marketing world, Account-Based Marketing is also something that marketers of today have started to practice. It may seem like a new concept at first, but once people understand what it is, they realise that this is something like what they have been practising for a long time now. Let us understand what Account-Based Marketing is. Account-Based Marketing, or ABM, follows B2B enterprise marketing with a targeted approach by contacting key accounts and communicating through hyper-targeted content and campaigns created for them and delivering a personalised experience to companies that matter most. Account-Based Marketing is quite efficient when compared with traditional marketing because it focuses on highly targeted audiences, while traditional marketing focuses on reaching out to masses. It is more about one-to-one marketing than the traditional one-to-many marketing. The question is, why should you do it? Why should you put in so much effort? For this, let us understand what the benefits of practising Account-Based Marketing are.

1. Alignment of Sales and Marketing Functions

To successfully implement ABM, enterprises need to align the sales and marketing teams to work in tandem. It is important that these teams work together to implement the ABM strategy that’ll include identifying target accounts, developing a communication strategy and monitoring the campaign’s progress.

2. Drive revenue and increase ROI

Any marketing effort requires that it generates results in the form of revenue, this is no different in the case of ABM strategy. Following the ABM methodology means that you are targeting only those people who are your potential customers which means that the conversion rate is much higher as compared with traditional marketing and the revenue generated will be more as compared to the costs involved. Therefore, marketers of tomorrow know that they need to start utilising this strategy to drive high ROI and minimise costs.

3. Personalised customer communications

Account-Based Marketing, as the name suggests focuses on creating hyper-targeted content and campaigns. This means that marketers need to personalise their content according to the interests, needs and preferences of the key accounts of the company they are targeting. Account-Based Marketing is all about building relationships by delivering content that is specific and relevant.

4. Optimum use of marketing resources

Following the ABM strategy for achieving your marketing goals can help to structure marketing efforts and increase revenue. Focusing on a limited target audience, i.e., your key accounts help save on to the costs that might otherwise be incurred in marketing to the market at large. Also, by integrating the marketing team with the sales team, marketers can work in tandem with them to create personalised content for the key accounts and in turn, maximise the efficiency of the B2B resources. Account-based marketing focuses on aligning the marketing team with the sales team and making the two units work together to convert leads to sales and in turn drive revenue. Marketers should implement this strategy sooner and help organisations achieve higher ROIs based on marketing campaigns that are specific, relevant and personalised to meet the needs, preferences and interests of the target audience.

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