Pinterest, anyone? Cue the sound of site owners everywhere groaning with disbelief as the newest content sharing site becomes the big ‘must do’ online marketing activity of the moment! Launched in March 2010, by December 2011, Pinterest was in the social networks Top 10 with 11 million visits per week, according to internet data analysts, Experian Hitwise.
So will site owners ‘pin it’ to be in it …?
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The festive season is here once more and the annual round up of facts, stats and analytics from around the web are flying thick and fast, covering the online landscape in a wondrous blanket of gleaming awesomeness! All those trillions of daily tweets and billions of Facebook users bigger than entire populations of European countries combined, etc.
Suffice to say, and despite dire predictions of imminent economic collapse from the offline realworld, the future outlook for sassy mobile and tablet superspace, replete with social buzz and shopping on the fly, never looked more promising for eCommerce …
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Mobile and tablet! Is your website optimised for the Technology Twins? Just like the other Dynamic Duo of today’s online X-men, search and social, the superheroes of the multichannel will be sites who are at one with the motivations and behaviours of the user in 2012 – “to boldly go …”. Yep, that’s right, it’s all about sorting your website out!
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Website owners who fail to keep up and pay attention to the changing web are about to have a rude awakening! From January 2012, Microsoft will update Internet Explorer (IE) browsers to the latest version automatically – without the user’s knowledge! The message is clear – the multichannel and platform search and social age is here now and either eCommerce adapts or dies!
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It seems that UK consumers come out on top for purchasing online and using their mobiles for internet access, according to a new Ofcom market report. More end of year figures from a Gartner study show that use of tablets has spiralled to around 63 million units in the last twelve months.
Add to this the 46 per cent of mobile owners who use their devices to access the web and the near 90 per cent who visit retail sites – the question has to be asked … why are so many websites still not optimised for access by ‘on the move’ technology …?
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“Optimise your website for mobile – now!” is the big message constantly aimed at you, the hapless site owner trying to get a handle on what needs to be done to keep your presence ranking on a fast changing web. Dipping your toes into social media, blogging and tweeting was a bit of a leap of faith and now being told you have to lay out more money to enable user access to content via mobile and tablet … calm down dear, it’s only multichannel marketing!
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If eCommerce website owners were wary of social media because they couldn’t see how to measure tangible return, the new age of multichannel might appear to them to be an even more daunting prospect when trying to nail the original source response metric. Who’s using what channels, when, why and where?
Downloading a mobile app, an ad link clicked and then a tweet, followed by a like, checking Facebook, or newsletter opt-in, maybe just placing one item in a basket or perhaps asking a question online, sending an email, dialling the freephone number, QR code scanned. User options and behaviours are cascading across multiple channels and platform, online, offline – everywhere!
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Integrated marketing is a big buzz term – and it can cover an exhaustive number of possibilities. Not only is it vital for site owners to be aware of their customers’ online / offline behaviours via preferred channels and platforms it’s also the key to better directing and influencing progress along the sales funnel to conversion.
Consumer use of mobile smartphone technology is driving the shift to online / offline. According to Google, in 2010, nearly 90 per cent of in-store transactions were first researched online. Clearly, today’s eCommerce needs to optimise its’ marketing strategies to keep in close touch with buying intentions and subsequent decisions of their target niche audience.
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Latest news that Twitter looks set to launch its promoted tweets and trends service in the UK in October seems to be a further sign of the increasing convergence between social and business on a networking site where marketing has been trying to gain a meaningful foothold. But will the micro blogging site start to look more like a Google SERPS page even as Google+ seeks to take the search engine further into social territory? Is social marketing coming of age?
Or is it the same old, same old? Site owners have been constantly befuddled by social media and the ROI question since networking sites first made their appearance around five years ago. Today, there is still a significant percentage of both eCommerce and service based site owners who are yet to be convinced that ‘social’ currency can sufficiently influence hard cash sales to be worth the effort of devoting increased time and resources to social content provision.
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The convergence of online and offline. It’s not so new. In fact, over 90 per cent of retail sales occurs offline in real stores after search has been conducted online to collect the relevant information. The development of multichannel only reinforces consumer capability to jump across technology platforms to reach their purchasing destination. That includes still making the traditional telephone call or trip to the high street.
eCommerce has always optimised the close relationship between online marketing and the call to action in real-world purchasing. It is never more apparent than in local search online to conversion in-store, offline. Downloading online offers and coupons, opting in with subscriptions, sign ups and texts are simply being added to with tweets, mobile apps and QR codes. More consumer choice of connection – more routes to market!
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Recent observations of Google testing a new design concept for its’ search results page could replace the ‘Google No.1’ mentality, which has constantly obsessed eCommerce site owners, mostly to the exclusion of all else in the last twenty years. In the age of the smartphone and tablet, it’s the scroll and the flick-thru’ rather than the clunky click that gets the speedy search result. Seems Google, mindful of search and social remodelling the landscape around itself, is going scrolling…
In other words … Google is testing the idea of an infinite scroll of web search results. It appears that the top search box, navigation bar and the left-hand side panel will be retained while the user scrolls through results, producing a page sequence matching the current Google experience. While a click is still needed to go to the next page to see more results, the possibility for infinite scrolling in web search results, as deployed in Google Image Search, could be a real boost to future online marketing campaigns and improved traffic performance from selected SEO keywords.
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Slowcoach businesses may be missing out on Quick Response customers! According to digital business analysts, comScore, over 50 per cent of those who scanned QR codes were high income segments between the ages of 18-34 interacting with physical print, such as magazines, newspapers, or product packaging.
Offline jumping to online and back again is where much multichannel and platform action is taking place, so are site owners queuing up for QR?
A few are but the majority not, is a fair answer! Adoption of QR codes by eCommerce in physical locations, such as shop windows or high street advertising has been scarce. Whereas, according to comScore, it seems that savvy brands are finding more effective integration in traditional print applications, thus providing interactivity and data capture to formerly static advertising mediums.
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