Customization

Roberts refers to the NikeiD website as an example of customizing a product (105). Nike is an international brand and caters to a variety of markets. Upon entering the site, I was asked about my language preference and then my country of residence. Nike is already targeting what products I see based on two simple profiling questions asked as I enter the site (Roberts 208).

I (and presumably many other visitors) had a lot of fun experimenting with the shoe customization. The interactive nature of the activity kept me on the site and playing around with colors, laces and accents. This interactivity definitely increases the stickiness of the NikeiD site (Roberts 103).

Other sites could capitalize on the customization, although the back end product creation must be concrete before starting any kind of program. For example, Spam could customize labels to include a persons face on the can of spam. M&M's did just that by allowing people to purchase candy customized with a short message. These unique uses of customization may cost the consumer (and the producer) a few extra dollars, but the interactivity has the power to draw in customers and keep them on the site longer.

Animal Allies Humane Society (AAHS) is interested in revamping and relaunching the website within the next 6-8 months. Roberts offers several suggestions on website effectiveness that AAHS should take into consideration through the redesign process.

One of the items to be addressed is the navigation. What are logical headers? Logical paths for the drop down menu? One simple way for AAHS to identify possible combinations is to use card sorting (Roberts 279). A group of volunteers/users of the website may be able to identify better a better organizational framework for the site.

Another important part of testing that AAHS should incorporate is the use of a focus group. The group would be asked to complete a task or find specific information. Through a simple testing process of the former online donation form, AAHS found that the online giving process was cumbersome and confusing. After switching to another provider, online donations increased! The same principal is true for the rest of the site. A focus group would be able to identify problems in the site before the public was given full access.  (Roberts 280)

Although a site redesign is an exciting time, no organization can afford to miss the important step of evaluating web site effectiveness before going live.

Spam. View Source.

Spam clearly has someone in the background who knows how to do on-page optimization. A tour of the "view source" to check out the html code reveals a carefully crafted site. Their attention to on-page optimization must certainly help their search engine result placements on Google. (Fleischner 20) A few things I noticed in their source code:

1. Use of cascading style sheets. This keeps the code on the site clean which means Google will be able to browse the site easier, giving the site a better chance for a higher ranking. (Fleischner 31)
2. The title tag is listed as "SPAM > Home." This meets the general guidelines of keeping the title tag short so that Google will put more weight on the words listed in the title tag. (Fleischner 23)
3. Repeated keywords in the text. Words such as "recipe" and "cooking" are repeated in the site description. Fleischner recommends using keywords twice to have a bigger impact on SERPs. (23) Spam.com has avoided keyword stuffing by overusing the words. (Fleishner 25)

Developing an Email Campaign

When I revisited Chapter 7 in Roberts, I started wondering how other websites are developing their email campaigns. Specifically, I wondered about collecting customer data.

To sign up for the fan club, Spam.com asks for name, address, phone and some demographic data. The additional demographic data includes birth year, gender, age of head of household,  number of children and household size. This data is an important way to have insight into customers. (Roberts 188)

Based on my profile, Spam.com can learn about my needs and what I might value. (Roberts 188) For example, they wouldn't want to send me information about how to make spam fun for kids since there are no children living in my household. They might conclude that since I'm a female, I would be interested in receiving recipes. Or, since I'm a young adult, I may be more interested in connecting via social media.

Profiles also give Spam.com a great opportunity to segment the list based on what they've learned about their customer's needs and interests. Segmenting is a marketers best friend because it allows targeted marketing; much more effective than sending a blanket email to all constituents. (Roberts 189)

One recommendation for Spam.com is that they add some preferences to the account page. This is a great place to find out if visitors have specific interests in cooking with spam or if they are checking out the site for fun. I recommend that Spam.com do an overview of what they have to offer, assess how that matches up with customer needs, and then offer additional information through preference check boxes on the account page.

Twitter for Twins

Twitter continues to mystify me. I've got the hang of facebook, but for some reason Twitter terrifies me in the ways only social media can.

I came across an article headline in the SmartBrief enews talking about how many players on the Knicks are Twitter users. The Knicks boast 11 players on Twitter, putting them at the top of the league. Oklahoma City Thunder and Milwaukee Bucks are the other top teams. (Article from NYT, by Howard Beck)

Amazingly enough, just two years ago players couldn't even talk to the media without a PR rep next to their side. Now players tweet on everything from hobbies to religious quotes. They share their lives via social media, just like any other person. (This is significant because anyone can be on Twitter - not just folks who are followed by cameras and make millions annually.)

Why is social media important? The Knicks are not only making themselves more accessible to the public, but they're also driving buzz about themselves and their team. According to the Beck, the N.B.A. is among the more of the professional sports leagues with the most Facebook fans, most viewed You Tube videos, and over 40% of the league players have Twitter accounts.

I did check out the Timberwolves site to check out their Twitter connection. Impressively, they run a constant feed on the homepage with tweets from fans and the team. Kudos to the Timberwolves for working to connect!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/24/sports/basketball/24knicks.html?_r=3&src=twrhp

http://www.nba.com/timberwolves/

Hubspot's Website Grader of Animal Allies Website

Hubspot gave www.animalallies.net a rating of 88 whereas a “competitors” site ranked 55. (Not a true competitor, but another local animal shelter.)

The grade was given based on: Content (blogs, readability, indexed pages on Google), Site Optimization (meta tags, number of images, heading tags, sites linking to the website), Social networking connections(twitter, delicious) and Interactive (forms on website, RSS feeds).

Based on Hubspot's comments, I would recommend that www.animalallies.net make the following improvements:

• Start a blog. This could be a weekly blog post from the veterinarian or the medical staff about some of the different medical issues coming through the shelter. Or the blog could be written by an adoption counselor, highlighting a specific animal up for adoption. There is also the potential for the volunteer coordinator to write about what volunteers have been working on. To add to blog readership, an RSS feed should be included so readers are alerted when new content is available.
• Promote the site better through social networking sites. Starting a twitter account with simple updates, then linking the account to the AAHS website. Another somewhat simple fix would be to add social networking buttons to make it easy for people to share content (especially adoptable pets!) on their personal sites. For example, a series of buttons could be added to the stray pets so someone could repost a stray listing on their facebook site.
• Assess readability of website. The current grade is College Undergraduate. The content of the site could use a good read through to make sure the pages are easy to read. Some of the copy is rooted in industry jargon or copied from a press release. The press release copy does not necessarily translate into web copy and should be evaluated more closely before posting online.

ModernMedicine.com

I worked for six years in the B2B industry. One of the projects I worked on was developing and implementing the marketing to build the customer base on modernmedicine.com. This is a website that validates physicians against the American Medical Association database and provides a unique community of content for physicians only.

In reading about ad serving in Robert (163) I started thinking about how we served ads to those physicians. When I left the company, we were starting to work with a third party company to develop a more complex logic to serve ads to users based on what their behavior on the site. (Roberts 166)

Modernmedicine.com Already had the basics down - if a urologists logs in and views articles on urology, ads related to that field would display. If no industry specific ads were waiting in the wings, a general ad geared towards the physician would be served. What we were working towards was being able to serve ads based on that physician's behavior. For example, a urologist may login and read an article about HIV, then watch a video about brain surgery. The more in depth they got into the site, the better we could serve ads.

At the time, I didn't know the technical terms for ad serving. Now I can tie in the strategic goals with the technical terms. I hope they've been successful in implementation!

Grants and Social Media

Last week I attended a UWS seminar on grantwriting with Boris Frank.He brought up the interesting point that social media will begin to play a bigger role in winning grants. I am somewhat a newcomer to grantwriting and assumed that grants would continue on the path of traditional format of the printed word.

One group that is already taking advantage of social media in grantmaking is Pespsi. On their website, you can vote for which organization you believe deserves a grant the most. However, to login to the site, a person much pass through a login where you can provide an email OR login through facebook.

As eMarketer discovered in a study conducted earlier this year, heavy facebook users spend more money online compared to the average internet user. So, for an organization that sells products and has a foundation associated with them, linking grants with social media is a great way to engage consumers and hopefully inspire a purchase down the line.

http://www.refresheverything.com/
http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007739

Qwest

Interesting turn of events. After starting this online course, I realized that my internet connection is too slow. Or maybe I'm too impatient. Either way, I started talking to people about better internet service. Lucky for me, my neighbors had the same problems with my current internet company, but had since switched to Qwest. Their very positive experience (on the back end) encouraged me to try it out... as well as the introductory value proposition of a lower price point. (Roberts 56,89)

My visit to www.qwest.com landed me on a page with a few great offers - a nice way to engage me (acquisition) as a first time customer. (Roberts 84) Once I clicked through on the too-good-to-pass-up offer, I was greeted by a pop up with a live customer agent asking if I needed help. Normally I would be displeased with such an intrusion, but since my knowledge of the different packages was low, I engaged in conversation. Of course, this high level of service and support led to my purchase of a new internet plan. (Roberts 85)

I'm only partially through my purchasing process. No idea yet if I'll be loyal to this new company. But if I continue to have easy access to service, a quality product and the costs don't increase dramatically, Qwest may just retain me. (Roberts 85)

Let's hope they've thoroughly reviewed their value chain and continue to meet my needs as a consumer.

Branded social games... where spam could use improvement

Today as I browsed the marketing section of the IAB enews, an article about branded social games caught my eye. Yesterday I commented on spam's online games. In this particular article, Oliver Chiang talks about the marketing value of online games. Although Chiang focuses on facebook games (and spam just has games on their website) it gave me pause.

So I checked out the spam website again. I had a blast catapulting cows at soldiers while everyone made funny noises. Will I come back again? Will I email the link to a friend? Possibly. In that case, spam has succeeded in driving more web traffic - both repeat and new visitors.

Where spam is lacking is a great facebook game. Perhaps I didn't look hard enough, but I couldn't find an easy link to any games on facebook. For that matter, a brief search of facebook turned up no obvious official spam page with games. There's a big opportunity here to engage consumers in a deeper way - and increase your reach as you do so. (Chiang)

In addition to viral marketing, Chiang discusses the increased revenue opportunity for branded social games. Not only do visitors play the game, but the company has a new opportunity to sell branded merchandise. (Which is tempting when you imagine just how cool you'd look in spam branded socks.)

Spam - you're doing great with your game, but it's time to expand. Get yourself a developer with a sense of humor and test the facebook waters.

Article referenced: http://www.forbes.com/2010/09/13/social-games-sanrio-technology-brands.html

Spam lovers share through social media

I'll begin by disclosing my bias for spam. I do enjoy a nicely fried slice of spam every now and then. In fact, I've been the museum in Austin, MN and purchased my very own spam cookbook. (Worth a visit if you're ever in the area!)

Now that my bias for spam is out of the way... I noticed that spam does a decent job at linking their main website to social media. Part of the standard toolbar is a link to follow spam on Twitter. On a handful of other sections, such as the recipe exchange and portions of the fun & games, website visitors have the option to share content through Facebook, Reddit and other social media sites. Visitors can also easily email the page or print the information.

In a September 10 article, eMarketer notes that over 500 million consumers are accessible through Facebook, and more are reachable through other networking sites. Spam may be letting go of some brand image control, but they've now opened themselves up to a whole network of new potential customers.

Spam is doing a good job at providing more customer value - they appear to have identified customer needs and now host recipe sharing and fun games to play. (Roberts) However, are they actually developing long-term customer relationships? According to the eMarketer article, marketers are split on whether or not social media actually develops brand loyalty.

Either way, Spam has jumped on the social media bandwagon and integrated their fun and charismatic marketing with popular social media sites.

Gift registries for anyone?

Even though Target has an overwhelming number of retail items, they have a few features that allow them to meet the needs of individual shoppers, especially in the realm of gift registries. Target.com offers gift registries for babies, weddings and anyone who's dreaming of a longer shopping list. I can appreciate that I don't have to have a baby or get married just to make a dream shopping list. In that way, Target is meeting my needs. (Roberts 22)

What I particularly liked (if I were to create a registry), was the customer feedback section. I prefer reading other buyers' opinions before I buy online - a few positive reviews can sell me on an item. Any website can turn a happy customer into free advertising by making it easy to give feedback. But as Christopher Haddad pointed out on the Hubspot Blog, be prepared for all sorts of feedback - including negative comments. He makes a good point to follow up with peeved off customers. Target definitely makes the reviews easy to find and quick to browse.

Another advantage of the Target.com gift registry is that anyone from my mother in NH or my friend in Duluth can access the same registry and then choose to purchase online OR in the store. Internet has revolutionized gift registries in that geography no longer matters. (Roberts 18)

Target - nice work on making your gift registry accessible and easy to use.

Madeleine's First Blog Post

Looking forward to posting more about brand marketing.