Digitally Focused

Personalization is a catch all phrase in the digital world. In reality, personalization can be executed in many ways. For example, a desktop display ad targeted to thousands based on a generic search term, all the way to an individualized dynamic product offer email. Yes both of these are personalized, just at a different levels. Personalization can be defined by the size of the audience, the specificity of the content that is being presented, the channel being used and even the timing of the message. The mix of these determines the "personalization" level. The findings are that the more personalized, i.e. catered to an individual level the better performing the KPIs. Though a great personalization mix at a group or segment level can provide higher performing ROIs too. The challenge to marketers is to optimize the personalization level and the cost to do this, and depending on the industry, the product or CTA, performance will vary. The direct to consumer retail ...

In the simplest terms, mobile experience is controlled by how well our eyes and fingers perform with the display we are using. In the future, this will also include how well our voice projects and how well our ears hear. The fact is that our fingers get longer, fatter and slower, and eyes get weaker over time. Our fingers are what they are, unless we diet and make them thinner. Our eyes can be corrected mechanically and physically. An interesting but obvious point is that these physical changes impact everyone from toddler to aged. In a 2010 study, a total of 160 children's fingers were examined. The average length of each finger increased by 37% from 3 to 10 years of age, and diameter increased by 20%. [2010 Elsevier GmbH.] Thomas M. Greiner, a researcher for the U.S. Army did a study in 1991 finding that an average thumb length of 2.74 inches for men and 2.49 for women. Shorter in length than the average mobile display diagonal today. Based on data from d...

Why trust is so important now. The digital age has brought a lot of good, but it has also brought cyber crimes, the dark web, identity theft, privacy invasion, reputation damage and other growing harmful activities. What this means to marketers is that trust should be embraced as a key brand tenet, and guarded and nurtured as a brand equity component. Before the digital age, trust was a focus of the product promise. Did I receive what I purchased? Did it perform the way I expected? This has been a focus of the Better Business Bureau (BBB), who says they are "instilling consumer confidence and advancing a trustworthy marketplace for all." But now trust expectations have expanded and customers are asking: You will honor my privacy? You won't take my digital footprint/click-stream data and use negatively? You will protect my personal data including contact, health and government? You will protect my financial data from cyber criminals? Thes...

Direct messaging (DM) has huge business value impacting employees, prospects and customers, and marketing, sales and operations. I have not seen an aggregated summary of DM, including what it is, its limitations and opportunities, so here it is. I prefer to refer to DM as Direct Private Messaging (DPM), which is the ability to send a private message directly to a customer(s) or any other person(s) associated with your channel or platform. A direct personalized and or segment level message creates engagement, response and ultimately customer satisfaction, lower costs and or higher revenues. The key channels with DPM include mail, email and cellphone. Digital platforms today include Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, and Pinterest. These channels and platforms differ on protocol, level of personalization, message and recipient sizes, allowable recipients and other features. Below is a summary of the nine service "Names." You will also see that there are five different pr...

Multi-channel marketing is a tactical approach which has evolved from offline channels like direct mail and telemarketing to include a vast number of online channels including owned, paid and earned tactics. Marketers have been tying together branding across channels for a long time by integrating brand elements, messaging and call-to-actions. The prevalence and adoption of mobile, and the "technology always" millennial generation are game changers to branding. Multi-channel marketing efforts have moved from picking a segment, a message and channel(s), to continuous marketing pushed across omni-channel platforms. See my article How to Match Digital Experience Tactics to User Scenarios . Brand equity provides the foundation for economic transactions….. “who are you doing busy with?” Vision, goals, strategies and tactics for attracting and retaining customers are tied to the brand equity framework.   Traditionally, the ability to attract new customers is largel...

When I meet with clients or colleagues I like to ask them for their definition of digital transformation. It varies widely from department to department and leadership to rank and file. The definition I share with them is "comprehensively changing business processes and or experience journeys by integrating digital technologies, processes changes and people skills, with the intent to create competitive advantages and accelerate profitable growth." Comprehensively is the key work. The online definition of comprehensive, "in a way that includes or deals with all or nearly all elements or aspects of something." So digital transformation is about big change across a process, line of business, division or company. Digitization is about automating processes. Applying technology to do things faster, smarter and with a higher quality than humans can do. This is more limited execution versus a transformational effort. Another angle of digital is application mo...

Experience is not a one size fits all solution. Though today most conversations are around a generic bucket of experience tactics being delivered to a universe of prospects, customers, partners and employees. The reality though is that this universe is made up of many different sets of experience expectations. If we want more satisfied customers, increased loyalty, a lower cost to serve, more engaged employees and ultimately an increase in net promoter score, then we need to think differently. What is needed are different iterations of experience based on user scenarios. I use the term scenario instead of segment because experiences are dynamic, ever changing like scenes of life. Segments are static slivers in time. Here are some vastly different user scenarios. A 38 year old "technology social" woman who likes to shop high-end brands is traveling alone to work by train, using her tablet to discuss the latest style of dress shoes with her community. A 23 year o...

The digital marketing technology stack is like a stack of pancakes. Too little and you might not be satisfied. Too much and you have buyer's remorse. How do you get it just right? What is the digital marketing technology stack? The answer will differ depending on who you ask. Some will define it as marketing automation, a digital marketing hub, sales automation, content management, ecommerce or some combination of each. The digital marketing stack is a subset of the marketing technology stack. The digital marketing hub (DMH) is defined by Gartner's as, provides marketers and applications with standardized access to audience data, content, workflow triggers and operational analytics to automate execution and optimization of multi-channel campaigns, conversations, experiences and data collection across online and offline channels. DMHs are focused on the top of the funnel. "Advanced" digital businesses though are looking to manage and optimize the ent...