blog.endai.com

Optimizing Your Landing Pages

2012-03-14T23:48:49Z

Landing pages are a visitor's 'first impression', much like a handshake, so, make it a good one. Offer value and be engaging. However, consumer expectations change. Consequently, it's important your landing pages meet their expectations and evolve according to what they expect. For example, you may consider landing pages to offer a different experience for visitors that are coming to your site for the second or third time, and offer 'mobile-ready' functionality. With the advent of mobile, QR codes may be a good option to bridge the gap between on and offline. These create a great opportunity for 'on-the-go' visitors allowing them to take action at a later time; plus, you can track and optimize them, and they're easy to use. This is also a good way to catch some mobile traffic when you don't already have a lot of mobile traffic coming to your page.

Here are just a few top considerations to include in your landing page optimization plan:

Relevance
Simply put, the more relevance the higher the probability of visitors converting. This can be optimized by location--make a localized version based on geo-location or even browser language. Localized content is a great way to connect with visitors. The more your landing pages speak to users' keywords, the more targeted and relevant the information. This increases specificity and potentially conversions.

Provide a Customized Experience
Landing pages must be relevant. One way this can be achieved is by creating a simple multi-step form in which the screen your visitor sees next varies on their answer to the multi-step form they just completed. With this, the copy and applicable pictures on your site are tailored to each specific visitor's information they input, tailored to their data. At this point, the visitor sees their relevant information, increasing the odds of conversion as relevancy has just increased.

Create a Path to Conversion
Forms are a great way to collect data, but don't make it a hassle for visitors to the point where your bounce rate is through the roof. Break up the form into multiple pages so the hurdle is low, enabling visitors to quickly take action by completing 1 to 2 fields. If visitors proceed and are lead to a second page of the form, you can include more fields as the visitor has shown interest and each progressive step is more relevant. This prevents users from feeling overwhelmed, and multi-page forms are very effective. If you are a business with various locations, have the second form page be customized to each specific branch location.

Social Media Integration
There is a lot of power in social--use it. The first step is to add social elements to your page including share, 'like' and '+1' buttons, among others. Fans and videos provide social proof--provide visitors several outlets to interact with you in many ways. Create landing pages for your social pages. Take this a step further and ask someone to share after they convert. The one pitfall is if everything is not talking to each other. It's important to integrate across everything you're doing, including your keyword landing pages, email landing pages, LinkedIn landing pages, etc.--not just your PPC landing pages.

Results Driven Data
Data leads to actionable insights. You want to know the total number of visitors to your landing pages, bounce rates, flow of traffic and who/how many visitors converted. Dig deeper to find out the who, the what and the how. What are your visitors doing? Does a certain page have a high bounce rate? Were conversions higher last month? Tagging must be done in order to find out this information and track visitors' engagement on your site. For example, if you see a certain page on your site has a high bounce rate, then the conversion rate must be low--dig deeper to see how this can be improved.

Google Analytics: Updates to Interface

2012-02-28T22:59:26Z

Over the past few days, you may have noticed that the Google Analytics interface looks slightly different. This past week, the team at Google made two rounds of updates. Below is a quick summary of those updates.

Speeding Up Reporting

Since the switch to the new version of GA, some of you may have noticed that reports were taking longer to load than in the old interface. They've made some updates to correct this:

1) Report Loading Progress

2) Sampling Adjustments

Improved Navigation

1) Icons in left navigation

2) Report Refresh Link

As a Google Analytics Certified Partner, Endai specializes in configuring, managing and analyzing the data you need to get the most out of your website. If you have any Google Analytics issues that need solving, please contact us using the form on the right.

Search Meets Social

2012-02-25T05:28:07Z

Next time you're logged into Facebook or Google+, do a search and see if you notice anything different. Your friends may be recommending great restaurants to eat at, commenting on an interesting article, or even sharing YouTube videos of your favorite song. If you really want to know what your friends are sharing on Google+, log into your Google+ account, do a search, and if any of your friends have shared or +1'ed a related search result, you can search within just your friends' recommendations by clicking on "personal results..." at the top of the SERP (Search Engine Results Page). Social recommendations are having a huge impact on SEO (Search Engine Optimization).

Social visibility is having an even greater impact. Engagement, sharing, likes and comments are showing on the SERP. The greater the visibility, the more potential followers, which leads to more potential engagement and SEO value. Now, your ranking on the SERP is partially dependent on your social media impact and influence, and currently makes up one of more than 200 factors of Google's algorithm (including Google+, Facebook and Twitter). In an increasingly technologically dependent world, this is one way personalization is making a comeback--through personalized search results. So the question is, what are some tactics to improve your social media influence to improve your SEO?

Facebook

Be sure to complete all your profile information and use keywords anywhere it makes sense, which will layer in SEO value. It's also important to include links back to the site on your Facebook profile.
Claim your brand name as part of your Facebook URL. This will uniquely tie together your Facebook brand with your profile leading to greater visibility, brand consistency and will also raise your search engine ranking.
Always include 'Like' and share buttons on your site to encourage responses, engagement and to seek participation. You want to encourage engagement across your entire site, not just the homepage.

Twitter

Remember, it's not about the number of Followers or number you're Following--it's about engaging in conversation with your followers
It's important to follow leaders and influencers of your brand, as these are the mavens, those that talk about your brand and spread the good word
Again, social media is a two-way street--re-Tweet valuable content. You need to give to get. Your followers will appreciate this as well. Show them you're listening.

Google+

Protect your brand name by making sure you've claimed it so you can own what's happening as a result
Images and videos are getting more real estate in search--emphasize sharing these in addition to keyword-rich posts
Bring value to the conversation--most Google+ users are seeking information and use this social media tool differently than Facebook. Give users what they want
Include the Google+ button on every page throughout your site to connect to customers, increase awareness and get viral growth--tap into the 90 million users that are currently using Google+. The Google+ buttons should be as ubiquitous as the 'Like' and 'Follow' buttons.

When it comes to social media and SEO, it's about meaningful and relevant content, and sharing this content across your audiences. Leverage social visibility to boost SEO through social insights and viral techniques. Regardless of which social media platform you choose to use, always shoot for quality first. The more they're engaged with you the more you are on top of mind. Link your content between Google+, Facebook and Twitter--promote interaction across channels and engagement will soar and so will your search ranking. However, be mindful of linking things appropriately and customizing messages across the various social media platforms for your audience because each platform has different audiences.

Here's a quick summary:

Drive follower growth
Segment with Google+ circles & Facebook Lists
Understand your audience
Differentiate content
Drive engagement

10 Tips to a Better Email List

2012-02-21T08:24:08Z

Commercial email beats out the next closest online marketing competitor by 100%. According to a report from the Direct Marketing Association, email boasts a return of $40.65 for every dollar spent, leaving it as the highest ROI form of marketing communication available to business.

In order to reap returns that high, companies need to have a strong and engaged subscriber list, with a proven record of being receptive to your message. After over a decade in email marketing, Endai has narrowed down the secrets of list-building to 10 points.

1. Always Opt-In: Never subscribe people without prior permission. Even giving a clear opt-out mechanism will not save you from spam reports, unsubscribes.

2. Allow Customers to Connect: Tie email subscriptions in with other conversion points to allow customers who already like your products to connect via email. For example, offer email subscription as part of the checkout process.

3. Don't Make Subscribing an Afterthought on Your Website: We notice a lot of companies ignoring their mailing list sign-up on their websites. Don't throw it in as an afterthought. Plan your subscription funnel with the same rigor that you plan your sales funnel.

4. Cross-reference Email Content with Other Channels: If you have a popular blog, Facebook page, or Twitter stream, mention content found in your newsletter and link to it with an invitation to subscribe. A simple link and invitation can introduce a large and untapped audience to your mailing list.

5. Give Something to Get Something: An email address is inherently valuable, and your customers recognize this fact. Bartering something of value to your customers is a great incentive for them to volunteer their contact information.

6. Don't Give Too Much: You want every person signed up to your list to be engaged with your company, not simply with a promotion you're running. If the only reason they signed up was to receive a gift, they probably won't stick around. Your gift should be just valuable enough to counteract the cost of subscription; not act as a primary motive.

7. Actively Monitor Your Mailing List: A subscription should not be the last step in your email marketing plan. Monitor the way your list behaves, and use that data to modify your content strategy.

8. Analyze, Test, Modify: Your email strategy should be a constant cycle of analysis based on past behaviors, testing multiple options, and modifying future emails based on results.

9. Segment on Behavior, not Self-Reported Demographics: Segmenting your list is critical. Make sure that you are segmenting customers based on their interaction with your content, not on preconceived notions of how demographics should behave.

10. Be Clear and Consistent: Make sure that every single subscriber on your list is aware of when and how often you send emails, and make the purpose of each email clear. A lack of consistency in timing or messaging can serve to scare away subscribers and drastically increase your spam report rate.

A good email list can be an incredible asset to a company, while a poor one can be useless at best and a liability at worst. By following our ten simple points, you can watch the effectiveness and ROI of your email list grow dramatically, along with your bottom line.

B2B Conversion Optimization: Small Steps to Big Growth

2012-02-21T07:58:03Z

Hundreds of millions of dollars in sales are lost every year due to poor website usability. According to eConsultancy, companies estimate that they lose 24% of their annual online revenue due to a bad website experience. Further, they state that companies have very little understanding of what is happening at the bottom of the sales funnel, near the point of conversion.

Given that 70% of B2B purchases start with search, these companies have even more reason to make sure that website visitor flow is simple and creates no barriers to conversion.

What is B2B Website Conversion Optimization?

B2B website conversion optimization is the process of using data to understand how visitors interact with a website, and then creating marketing experiments to drive more visitors to take actions of economic value.

Using Data to Find Actionable Insights for Improvement

Endai uses a process of analysis, experimentation, and measurement to optimize websites for better conversions. The first part of this process can be summed up in one word: data. Without strong analytics to parse for a broad picture of where visitors are falling off your website, it's impossible to create changes for improvement.

Step one in understanding where problems lie is pinpointing bottlenecks in your current conversion process. This is done by analyzing data from Google Analytics and drawing conclusions from past visitor data. Endai processes thousands of visits to get an understanding for where the roadblocks to goal completion occur.

The second step in website conversion optimization is to take the conclusions drawn and design experiments based on the conversion barriers uncovered in step one.

For instance, healthcare manufacturing giant Midmark grew online form submissions by 600% after Endai identified a roadblock in their visitor flow. The small change of moving the location of the online submission form, and subsequently removing two steps in the conversion funnel, drastically increased the effectiveness of their process without having to undertake a large website redesign.

Similarly, after identifying that a submission form was too lengthy for our client STERIS Isomedix, Endai modified the form and increased submissions by 17%. This small change is expected to bring an additional $77,000 in revenue within the first year.

The final step in optimizing for conversions is to measure the effectiveness of the changes made. Endai continues to monitor user behavior and quantifies any improvements seen as a result of our experimentation.

The conversion optimization process isn't a one-time step - it's a constant process that seeks to incrementally increase the usability and effectiveness of your online presence. As soon as we're done with step three, we go right back up to step one in order to identify any new issues that have arisen, or to find other areas for improvement. By taking incremental steps based on actual data, we eliminate much of the uncertainty and economic risk of investing in unproven strategies, and provide a clear return at every step of the process.

Put simply, Endai's B2B website conversion optimization process is a more cost-effective, bottom-line friendly way to make sure that your website is working as hard as your sales team at growing revenue.

Measuring Customer and Prospect Intent Before You Invest in Time and Resources

2012-02-19T18:33:18Z

80% of your business comes from 20% of your customers - a rule that should be familiar to any B2B executive. While its importance isn't in dispute by anyone, finding the 20% and optimizing your sales funnel to focus on them can be difficult. Especially when trying to identify which of your prospects might join that 20% in the future.

Identifying Big Purchasers Before the Purchase
Oftentimes it is critical to identify prospects who may turn into large buyers before they have purchased a single item or service. So the question becomes: how do you find and target the 20%?

Endai's solution is the Email Engement Score. The Email Engagement Score is a method to quantitatively track and prioritize sales efforts to target the most engaged and receptive prospects, allowing you to segment your list by behavior instead of less predictive methods like demographics and self-reported data.

How Does The Email Engagement Score Work?
The Email Engagement Score is generated by aggregating user actions and assigning a value to certain behaviors. For example, opening an email is an action that represents interest in your company or product. Clicking on a link within the email is an even stronger signal of interest, or engagement.

By assigning meaningful values to actions and analyzing individual behaviors and responses to your email marketing campaigns, your sales team can get a significantly better understanding of where to focus further outreach. You can also segment your mailing list by behavior instead of metrics with traditionally poor predictive rates such as company size, job title, or annual revenues.

Why Segment Lists By Behavior?
The Relevancy Group, in a report published October 2010, points out that untargeted or poorly targeted email campaigns cost as much as 3.6 times more than similar well-targeted and highly focused campaigns. Since few predictive mechanisms are nearly as accurate at gauging subscriber interest or commercial intent as well as behavioral analytics, incorporating the Email Engagement Score into your sales process and segmentation strategy is an invaluable way to bring down costs and boost the ROI of your outbound marketing efforts.

Besides direct ROI gains, a less often mentioned benefit of proper segmentation by user behavior is the strong competitive advantage this can confer to your marketing team. According to that same report, less than 40% of marketing teams currently employ behavior segmentation, giving those B2B companies that do a clear opportunity to reach leads with much more relevant and engaging information and content, and outmaneuvering competitors' efforts.

The Key Takeaways
As more companies jump completely on the outbound email marketing bandwagon, ROIs are naturally going to decrease. An influx of mail has consistently been shown to decrease open and click rates, as prospects become inundated with messages.

The solution to this loss of customer attention is to continue to build more and more focused email campaigns that place the right sales message in front of the right customer at the right time.

One of the strongest advantages of email marketing is it's ability to record and track recipient behavior, in order to identify what that right message is, who it should go to, and when. By paying attention to the Email Engagement Score, your marketing and sales team can 1) identify which customers represent the biggest potential revenue streams for your organization, the 20%, and 2) identify what kind of messaging those customers are most receptive to.

This allows you to cut through the daily email clutter and reduce your marketing overhead, boost your ROI from email, and ultimately grow revenue in an intelligent way based on quantitative, hard data instead of hunches.

The First Step to Social Media--Start Measuring!

2012-02-11T16:05:13Z

Social media refers to environments where people are interacting, communicating, sharing information and creating profiles. These may include, and are not limited to, social networks, blogs, social games and consumer commenting sites (reviewing and rating products).

Social Media measurement is increasingly important. First, marketers have high hopes for social media. Another reason is because measurement and budgeting for social media go hand in hand. ROI matters because proof of higher returns means continuing social media efforts. This way, marketers can have proof that what they are doing actually works--they want reassurance. The social aspect of social media is what makes it very rewarding, but with it comes risk. By tapping into information through customers, it can be difficult to keep tabs on a brand's health and reputation when it's constantly being talked about. You can only control and regulate social media to a certain point. According to a study by Forbes Insights and Weber Shandwick, 54% of a brand's reputation is attributed to online sociability today, and is expected to grow to 65% in the next 3 years.

Today, social media measurement is not widely utilized. We as marketers are still too reliant on metrics such as the number of Facebook 'Likes' or Twitter 'Followers'. Meanwhile, ROI questions still go unanswered. Sixty percent of marketers today use fan count as a success measurement in social media, and only 13% of US marketers found themselves to be 'very effective' at measuring social media campaigns, according to Chief Marketer. The key point is that we must move beyond the basics and look at metrics that focus on business value in order to move away from the stage of infancy.

The first steps involve the actual process of starting to measure. You can't assume it's impossible. Surprisingly, many marketers don't measure because they think it's far too complicated and they don't know where to start, including 39% of worldwide retailers that don't measure social media currently (Economist intelligence Unit). However, there is no silver bullet--there is no one, single metric that will provide you with a benchmark of success. The metrics that will matter the most are the ones that pertain to your specific company. These will vary among different industries and companies. Set clear goals and KPIs (key performance indicators) and begin measuring accordingly.

Here are a few steps you can take that will provide you with a solid starting point to being your journey of measuring social media:

Our brand has 38,072 Facebook 'Likes' and 42,689 Twitter Followers.

It's not the number of fans, it's what you do with them and what they do for you. Social media is reciprocal--it's a two-way street, a conversation. Therefore, it's important to know and understand who your brand followers are, including their demographics, what they say and how they help your brand. More importantly, it's crucial to find the influencers, the mavens--those who post often and write about your brand or company and have social impact. The more you understand your fans and brand followers, the more ways you can tap into them. From here, the next step involves increasing the number of contributors--those who write on your wall and talk about you. This is key in getting your name out there in a positive way.

A great example of how this was done well in the past is the case of the Ford Fiesta movement. In 2009, Ford wanted to roll-out the Fiesta. By giving out 100 of these cars to the most influential people they found, they were able to create online buzz and a strong online presence. What Ford wanted to answer was, 1) can buzz generate leads and 2) can online buzz help save them money. They took the time to do their research and found the influencers. Through these influencers, they built a community months before the vehicle even went on sale. Normally, they would have gone to a car show, spent a lot of money on media and would have sat back to watch sales rather than use social media as heavily as they did. This was a completely different approach--they went after the people rather than sitting back and waiting for results.

Go beyond brand metrics.

The more marketers can work towards understanding how social media impacts your business, the better. Don't just count the number of Facebook fans or the number of contributors--track them to the point of sale. Integrate and measure factors that are specifically important to your brand such as the number of leads, sales and revenue. Awareness and engagement are easy to measure, but social media can measure so much more. More online buzz correlated to incremental sales for Lay's brand according to a study; an ad campaign triggered online buzz which in turn caused a sales surge for Skinny Cow ice cream brand, according to a study conducted by Symphony IRI Group and Visible.

Integrate social analytics with marketing analytics.

Once you understand how online buzz relates to your overall marketing performance through social media analytics, you can effectively bridge the gap between measurement and budget. From here, determining your ROI is the next step and can lead to building future business.

Stay tuned for a forthcoming blog post on Search Meets Social.

Online Gift Card Sales: Operational and Marketing Considerations

2012-01-31T17:07:59Z

Online Gift card sales is expected grow at a rate of 29% annually to reach $5.8 billion* by 2014. While many business to consumer Brands offer Gift Cards, there are specific, and potentially profitable considerations to think about regarding online marketing.

It is important for retailers to have a gift card system that leverages the best practices for tracking, promotion and marketing functionality.

When developing a gift card site, we suggest the following:

Saving a Source ID with the order will enable you to analyze data at the order level.

For Example: Assigning a different Source ID to your Paid Search and Email campaigns will allow you to quantify the results of both programs separately. This will enable you to calculate Orders, Life Time Value, Average Order size, etc. by marketing channel.

Tracking search terms from Paid and Organic Search with each order enables you to optimize search based on sales (especially valuable for SEO generated sales).

For Example: Before you start an SEO program, you can see which search terms are generating orders and the size of those orders. Now, when you start your SEO program, you have a set of search terms that you know drive some level of results.

The site should be able to fire individual conversion pixels which will enable you to run an affiliate sales program with accurate performance metrics.

For Example: With individual conversion pixels you can run on multiple affiliate networks while ensuring that you are accurately tracking each.

Shipping confirmation emails should also include the Shippers Tracking URL. This reduces the call volume/expense associated with Customer Service.

Customers should be able to ship multiple Gift Cards to multiple addresses within one order.

Ensure that you have proper Fraud Protection from the Payment Gateway Provider.

The website should be able to accommodate multiple offers at the same time so that you can quickly test/optimize multiple offers. Don't plan on testing offers? Please read this first, or this.

To accommodate split tests, the site should automatically direct incoming traffic to the appropriate landing pages. This will allow you to ensure testing integrity on your marketing experiments.

When a visitor sees an expired offer, they should be redirected to a current offer. This improves the customer experience and provides an opportunity sell to this customer.

Abandoned orders should automatically be put into a "win back" email communication stream to increase sales. Read more about SitePreserver, a Shopping Cart Abandonment solution.

Having a gift card platform with these features and functionality will ensure that you are optimizing the experience for your customers and maximizing the yield on your investment.

*Javelin Strategy & Research

Increase Your ROI: Tap into Tablet Shoppers

2012-01-18T09:11:42Z

Twenty one percent of mobile sales come from tablets.¹As people are spending more time online due to devices such as iPads and tablets, especially online shoppers, it's time to consider optimizing your business's website to capture these consumers.

The graph below shows the huge growth potential that lies within the tablet economy, including a projected 35.6% of internet users to be tablet users by 2014.

Tablets are preferred over smartphones for web shopping.²The reason for this includes the fact that web shoppers opt for larger screens offered by tablets as opposed to smartphones, making it easier to use and view items in a web browser.

We're in an app world now. Tablets are used for much more than just web browsing devices. Apps also aren't just web-browsing tools, but an in store experience. Tablets allow you to bring the store and the experience to your home, inside your living room as you're sitting on the couch relaxing after work. According to Geek.com, a record 1.2 billion apps were downloaded during the last week of 2011, and 509 million in the US alone.

Of those surveyed, the number one online shopping app downloaded was a retailer specific app.³What this means is it's important that retailers configure their websites so they display properly on tablets for ease of viewing.

Here are a few ways to optimize retailer sites for tablet shoppers:

Identify activity and volume of your site

During this step you want to use and understand in-house metrics to identify the main platforms through which consumers visit your website, such as tablet, PC and mobile. Also, it is important to do an initial 'site check' of your website to see how it appears on different devices. Forget auditing your site on just tablet v. mobile platforms. There are various differences between different tablets as well. For example, your site may display differently on an iPad as opposed to a Kindle Fire simply because the iPad is about 9.5 x 7 inches and the Kindle Fire is about 4 x 6 inches.

Highlight and optimize key activities

In order to best determine how exactly to optimize your site based on your consumers' needs, it's important to see why your consumers are visiting your site and what they are using it for. Are they buying items and using a checkout system, are they browsing various items or information, or are they just accessing account information? You want to optimize your site based on your consumers' needs to make your site easier to navigate and increase convenience. If your consumers are searching, insert and optimize a quick navigation bar throughout the site and highlight a search bar for ease. Lastly, create ease throughout the checkout process by offering alternative payments. The easier the checkout process, the higher the conversion.

The 'fat finger' effect

Tablets and smartphones are predominantly touch screen these days, so adjustments need to be made to the tap areas on the screens so consumers can easily navigate throughout the site. And here we introduce the 'fat finger' effect--you're trying to 'click' or tap on the 'Checkout' button but instead you're actually tapping on the button that says 'edit cart' or 'continue shopping'. If only the size of the buttons were bigger and further away from other links to avoid this issue. Another option is to include predictive search capability throughout on-site search navigation which minimizes key strokes, like a short-cut.

Streamline product detail pages

You can further optimize your retail site by removing any elements that just simply don't convert as well as others. This will create a cleaner pathway to get consumers to checkout and make it much easier and convenient. This will also maintain focus on what consumers are trying to do and minimize distractions.

Ultimately, you want to give consumers more ways to get on to your website. Therefore, you want to enable purchasing to occur very quickly and ensure ease of experience--this is key. The ease of experience makes tablet shopping apps more useful. It's time to stay ahead of the game and optimize consumers' tablet-browsing experience while shopping online. Don't fall behind, and watch your ROI grow.

Here's a great infographic by Monetate: Are Tablet Buyers Taking over Ecommerce?

Footnotes:

¹Forrester Research: "The State of Retailing Online 2011".

²Bizrate Insights Tablet Commerce Flash Survey 2011, in partnership with Forrester Research.

³Bizrate Insights Tablet Commerce Flash Survey 2011, in partnership with Forrester Research.

Getting Started With Email: Channel Observations to Support Chronic Disease Patient Care

2012-01-09T14:09:54Z

Today, email is used to support the communications needs of many different types of organizations, ranging from big businesses to small local schools, and just about every personal communication need imaginable. In this post, we'll provide a general overview of the email environment and the factors that make it successful. In addition, we'll talk briefly about how email may contribute to the successful treatment of patients with chronic diseases.

The Email Environment

Email has been called the "killer app" in the business community for many different reasons, yet all point to the same realization: email has changed the way consumers and organizations communicate with one another. Just ask the United States Postal Service and they'll quickly tell you how the times have changed. In a recent statement, the USPS reports, "A significant portion of USPS losses in the past few years has been due to an unprecedented decline in mail volume -- down more than 20% since 2007. The replacement of letter mail and business-transaction mail by electronic alternatives continues to cause downward pressure on mail volume."¹ Email is quick, efficient, targetable, measurable, and provides synergies with other media.

A quick look at industry statistics highlights the prevalence of email communications:

Email is the preferred method of commercial communication by 74% of all online adults."² Email has been used by nearly 90% of consumers since 2005.³

Email is a tool used by most Americans today, as demonstrated by the number of email users supported by the major providers:

Ø Microsoft webmail properties: 256.2 million users

Ø Yahoo: 254.6 million users

Ø Google: 91.6 million users

Ø AOL webmail properties: 48.9 million users.⁴

There is little doubt of the importance and capability of email to reach U.S households. So, what do you need to know to get started in leveraging this communication channel? Similar to most disciplines, email behaviors have been studied and are becoming well understood by practitioners. Our research and experience has led Endai to identify 3 fundamental laws to successful email communications, which we will describe below.

Email Must Be Relevant

Many people categorize business to consumer communications as spam. By definition, "spam is unsolicited bulk email". Unsolicited means that the recipient has not granted verifiable permission for the message to be sent. Bulk means that the message is sent as part of a larger collection of messages, all having substantively identical content."⁵ Email is not spam, if it is permission-based and of interest to the consumer (patient). When a consumer "opts-in" to email from your organization and becomes a "subscriber," they are telling you that they want to hear from you and that your communications are relevant to them.

In marketing circles, it has long been known that relevance is the key to successful advertising initiatives. Studies by leading email research firms consistently validate this axiom, by finding that relevance is a primary reason indicated for opening emails. Experienced communications specialists apply the information volunteered by their customers to help raise the relevance of e-communications, increasing open rates and click rates, and ultimately impacting customer behaviors.

At Endai, we work to identify relevance by testing a wide range of subject lines, creative copy, and longitudinal programs, targeted by segments and personalized based on the individual needs of the organization's customers.

Email Must Be Anticipated

If a consumer expects to receive communications from you, then the likelihood that they will open your email goes up significantly. The following compiled market research survey data is noteworthy:

"64% of small businesses execs said they decide whether or not to open the (email) newsletter based on who it's from."⁶

"79.1% of online merchants feature the company name prominently in the "from" line of the message"⁷ to increase open rates.

"55.9% of respondents cited knowing and trusting the sender as the primary reason for opening an email."⁸

In the realm of patient care specific to chronic diseases, it is likely that patients will be eager to subscribe to email communications and anxiously anticipate the arrival of communications from their healthcare provider, if they believe that the information will be of value to them.

Email Content Must Be Valuable

In any transaction, there is a "value exchange." Consumers will conduct business with you if the cost of doing business is less than or equal to the value they receive in return. Similarly, if subscribers receive critical information or a special offer from you via email, they will learn that there is value to opening your emails.

The value proposition to patients with chronic diseases has the opportunity to be viewed as having significantly high value. Patients are likely to value care reminders and communications if they believe these emails will benefit their health in the long term.

Patient Care: Building Your Email Capability

When a patient or loved one is diagnosed with a chronic disease, they typically conduct extensive research, seek trusted advisors, and over time learn how best to manage their health care needs. Typically, patients or loved ones "learn" best when they absorb small chapters of information over time. Different patients have different information needs, based on their level of education and personal backgrounds. The nature of email is well suited to meet the diverse needs of patients and loved ones with chronic diseases. By observing how patients interact with email content, and how they choose specific content to examine by clicking on carefully engineered links, health care providers can target an appropriate learning curriculum to each patient to maximize the success of treatment regimens.

There are many aspects of an email capability that need to be considered before launching a campaign, including:

Your messaging strategy, and how emails will compliment your existing communication

Delivery of emails and the technology platform

Building and maintaining the email address database

Creating a Communications Framework (architecting relevance)

Email design and content

Campaign Management

Can-Spam Compliance

Privacy Laws (including HIPPA)

Metrics to guide your campaigns

Endai is well positioned to support these design elements and more as you seek to meet the needs of chronic disease patients.

Footnotes

1. http://money.cnn.com/2010/08/05/news/companies/US_postal_service_earnings/index.htm)

2. http://emailstatcenter.com/: Merkle"View From the Digital Inbox 2011" (2011)

3. http://emailstatcenter.com/ MarketingProfs, "2010 Digital Marketing Fact Book" (Spring Edition, 2010)

4. April, 2008, USA Today article cited ComScore Media Metrix figures for February, 2008

5. http://www.mass-emailer.com/what-is-spam.shtml

6. http://emailstatcenter.com/ Bredin Business Information (2007)

7. http://emailstatcenter.com/Internet Retailer (2007)

8. http://emailstatcenter.com/Return Path (2007)

How Google Places Affects Your Business

2012-01-05T02:22:55Z

Search engine optimization (SEO) continues to be an integral part of a business's marketing campaign, and now, Google Places is making it even easier. Plus it's free. Google Places now includes additional features on the search engine results page (SERP) when your local listing appears making you more visible and attractive to web surfers.

Visually Enhancing your Business Listing on Google Places

As shown above, the Google Places listing displays not only a map of the business location, but also photos of your products and business, details including descriptor snippets, price, nearest subway, a link to make reservations (if applicable), links to available menus and reviews. According to Brian Pasch of PCG Digital Marketing, photos and videos are the biggest missed opportunity, with 85% of business listings missing out on a complete set of photos and videos. These should be utilized to differentiate your business as they add great value to your listing and attract attention.

The Importance of Reviews and the Amazon Effect

The number of reviews and total gold stars shown on your business listing reflects positively on your business and web surfers are more inclined to click on those specific listings first. This phenomenon is referred to as the Amazon effect, and has clearly trained consumers to click on the products (or companies, in this case) first that have the highest ratings. Reviews heavily influence buying behavior. As a best practice, it is crucial to respond to any negative reviews to make a good impression, to acknowledge the feedback and see how to make it better. It is also important to take the time to thank positive reviews. Show that you're listening and appreciate all feedback. An easy way to encourage and acquire more reviews is through 'Internet Reputation Management' cards, such as the one shown above. Make it easy for your customers to provide feedback by providing them with a link or QR (quick response) code to your Google Places listing on a card so they can easily and quickly write a review at their own convenience.

The Power of Google+ and SEO Integration

Roughly 20% of the surfing population is logged into Google+ while conducting a search, according to Brian Pasch of PCG Digital Marketing. What does this mean exactly? When you're signed into your Google+ account, the SERP includes your friends' photo thumbnails when they share or +1 something. Your friends' photos make these listings pop and influence click behavior. There is significant CTR on searches including Google +1s as related to the Amazon Effect. Most importantly, Google +1 takes precedent over standard SEO ranking on the SERP. This means that a specific business listing could potentially move up to the first page of the SERP when your friends +1 it, even if previously that business had no prior SEO and was on the second page.

Bing Webmaster Tools: New Features

2011-11-16T12:06:58Z

In past blog posts about search engine optimization, we've referenced using tools such as Bing Webmaster Tools to deal with issues such as 404 errors and the importance of XML sitemaps. Recently, Bing added some new features to its Webmaster Tools to enhance its utility.

DNS-based Vertification

In addition to verification of ownership of your website via a code on the home page or an XML file, DNS based verification has also been added.

Crawl Details

This report has been enhanced to show ALL inbound links, not just ones that return a 400 header response code.

adCenter Data Integration (US only)

Reports showing traffic and keyword data will now include average cost-per-click and average bid data.

URL Normalization

Suggestions for URL normalization will now appear in the account, allowing websites to deal with some canonicalization issues within Bing Webmaster Tools. This is important for dealing with duplicate content issues, which was covered in a previous blog post.

For assistance on search engine optimization techniques, as well as other internet marketing strategies such as search engine marketing and email marketing, use the form on the right to contact Endai for a free consultation.

Google Analytics: Update to Sessions

2011-08-22T12:59:40Z

Recently, the Google Analytics team made a change to how sessions are defined in GA:

Before

- More than 30 minutes have elapsed between pageviews for a single visitor.

- At the end of a day.

- When a visitor closes their browser.

After

- More than 30 minutes have elapsed between pageviews for a single visitor.

- At the end of a day.

- When any traffic source value for the user changes. Traffic source information includes:utm_source, utm_medium, utm_term, utm_content, utm_id, utm_campaign, and gclid.

This change does NOT apply to historical data, only new data collected after August 11th. While this may slightly increase the number of visits you see for your site (the Google Analytics teams expects less than a 1% increase for most users), this is beneficial in the long run as it brings GA's definition of a session more in line with the common definition of a visit, and will lead to more accurate traffic attribution.

70% of B2B Buyers Start With Search

2011-06-06T19:28:29Z

Why is Search Engine Marketing important for B2B companies? Let's start with the raw numbers. In 2010, there were 100 million searches for healthcare related equipment. Of those searches, the vast majority was seeking specific answers to specific questions. Search has become a combination reference guide, phone book, and stream-of-consciousness learning tool. How does this relate to B2B Internet marketing? A recent study by research firm Mediative found that over 70% of B2B buyers begin their purchasing decisions with searches through search engines. Similarly, a study by DemandGen found that 75% of all B2B buyers enter the purchasing mindset through searches.

With over half of all your prospects starting their buying process through search, the process of capturing potential leads can become largely automated. Search drives a tremendous pool of potential prospects to build up within the sales funnel, but just as importantly, the nature of search creates a potentially valuable segment of self-identifying prospects directed to your website. In other words, because these B2B buyers enter your website through search, they have already declared their intention to seek information on products and services similar to the ones you offer. In many cases, web analytics data suggests that these visitors convert to leads and sales at a greater rate than average website traffic. Put even more simply, leads that enter your funnel through search marketing are at least a warm, if not an outright hot, lead that actively wants to know more about your product.

Search has allowed B2B buyers to reach out directly to companies without the traditional process and costs of outbound marketing. This shift to inbound search marketing is helping B2B companies switch their focus from targeting leads to nurturing prospects. This is where the advantages of search marketing begin to shine through. By automating marketing processes and adding Search Marketing to fill the top of your sales funnel, your marketing team is ensuring that every prospect that they encounter is already primed to receive their marketing message. Every one of those 70% of buyers who initiate their internal buying cycle with a search of potential vendors comes to your page with the mindset that they are at least considering a purchase, if not outright ready to make a commitment.

What Role Does Search Play in my Sales Cycle?

While the majority of B2B sales are still closed offline, it's important to note that according to the DemandGen survey, 80% of B2B buyers stated that they initiated their last major purchase. Less than 10% of those surveyed reported that the buying cycle was initiated by a cold call or similar outbound technique. B2B buyers are quickly realizing that they now have the tools and resources available at their fingertips to quickly and efficiently make large purchasing decisions, or at least research their options, without having to go through the process of consulting with various competing sales teams.

Playing the large numbers game:

100+ million annual searches for healthcare equipment is no small sum. Numbers that large demand attention. A significant amount of data shows that these searches are being performed by prospects ready to make a purchase decision, and the DemandGen study found that as many as 50% of B2B buyers made a decision and budgeted resources towards a purchase AFTER a need was discovered. In many cases, they reported that they found a solution or product first, often in a situation where they did not know a need existed, and THEN made a case for the immediate adoption or purchase. This may seem like putting the cart before the horse when viewed through the lens of traditional outbound marketing, but it makes perfect sense when considering the huge number of searches performed daily and the vast amounts of information available for those searchers.

Making sure B2B buyers are aware of all possible needs and all possible solutions is a difficult, if not impossible, task. However, the process of searching for tangentially or coincidentally related information can very easily pull a previously uninterested buyer's attention towards a novel solution to either an old problem, or could alert them to a need that they previously had not considered. In fact, it was reported that 25% of large purchases were made after the buyer's attention was drawn to a competitor who had adopted a product or solution that noticeably increased their ROI. Automating your business marketing to take advantage of these coincidental and long-tail leads allows you to significantly increase the number of prospects that you are feeding into the top of your sales funnel, while freeing up your marketing and sales teams to focus on building a connection and closing offline sales.

Search marketing can dramatically increase the number of leads your online marketing generates. More importantly it can significantly reduce your cost per lead, and thus increase the ROI of your marketing efforts, by providing only interested and primed leads for your sales and marketing teams to pursue. Gaining efficiency in your sales cycle and simultaneously increasing the number of prospects coming in can be a potent combination. Contact us to find out how Endai's online and email marketing Playbook can harness the power of search volume to make a sharp and noticeable difference to your bottom line.

Yahoo Web Analytics: New Version Launched

2011-05-27T11:12:21Z

Recently, Yahoo announced that they have released Version 10.1 of Yahoo Web Analytics. A major component of this new version are enhancements to segmentation and report filtering functionalities, which are important when using web analytics data to determine the behaviors of those customers and website visitors that are most valuable to your organization. Below is a summary of the updated features:

Feature	Description
Audience Definition	Enhanced segmentation capabilities including expanded variety of group and metric parameters and ability to export segments to partner exchanges.
Segment Types	The application of segments to varying scopes of activity has been enhanced to include manipulation at both the global and line item levels via the Visitors, Visits and Tracked Events segment types.
Enhanced Report Filtering	Improved user interface design, organizing filtering controls directly over tabular report data.
Legacy Yahoo! Categories & Properties	Due to a change in IDs (and how we capture them) for Y! Interest Groups and Y! Properties of Interest, we will have a transition period where both "old" and "new" interest categories will be available. You will need to follow a few guidelines when using these interest categories.

(Source: http://help.yahoo.com/l/us/yahoo/ywa/prod_updates/4225282.html)