They are different types of digital marketing. Some of them are mentioned below:

• B2C: This includes e-commerce websites, through which companies sell products/services directly to customers.
• B2B: Such online websites involve transactions from one business to another.
• C2C: These websites allow customers to sell to customers. One good example is eBay.
• Lead based websites: Such a digital marketing strategy enables a company to generate value from the online world, by collecting leads for their business. Such leads are referred to organic leads, and they are similar to the role played by walk-in customers in retail stores.
• Affiliate marketing: In this model of digital marketing, an active seller markets the products/services of a manufacturer/service provider, and receives a share of the profits for every sale generated.
• Local marketing: This form of marketing is usually adopted by small and medium sized businesses, to seek out new customers who will improve profits. Some of the common digital marketing strategies used in this model are social media marketing, local directory listings and social-deal websites.

Digital marketing experts use different approaches to achieve their goals, some of which are geo-targeting, niche tactics and one-to-one approaches. One of the biggest benefits of online marketing is that marketers have a wide variety of channels at their disposal. This means that they can easily formulate a strategy based in individual circumstances, and company requirements. Some online marketing channels usually used in marketing mixes are blogs, articles, press releases, pay-per-click, white papers, SEO, SMO, link building, social deals and directory submissions.

Online marketing also helps companies reach billions of Internet users all over the globe. If we take the laws of probability into account, this global reach is expected to strongly increase a company’s chances of a higher return on investment. Moreover, digital marketing is much cheaper than traditional marketing.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing agency, and can be contacted on 0845 388 5583 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.

• Brief the new leadership: Get ready to give the new digital marketing leadership a short brief about the current digital marketing strategy being pursued by the company. Here, there is no need to hide or ‘sugar coat’ any campaigns that have underperformed or failed. A brief will help get them up-to-speed with the work being done by your company. Ensure that you mention the performance metrics and reasoning used for evaluating the functioning of each element.

• Analyse the main reason for the change: Take an introspective look at the performance of your campaign and digital marketing team, to learn why the company management decided to change the leadership. Maybe, they lacked confidence in the current team leader? Maybe they wanted someone with the skills to handle a new type of digital marketing technology?

• Don’t allow the new person to bully you: One of the worst things for team morale is letting the new digital marketing leadership unnecessarily criticise your team, even before that person checks the situation. Instead, unemotionally state your case, backing it up with strong facts and statistics.

• Don’t get emotional about recommended changes: The new digital marketing manager was hired to improve the current campaign, so he will obviously look for ways to make it better. He is not your friend, and has already been instructed to make a positive impact, quickly. If you are lucky to get a good leader, he will first try to understand the current situation, before getting the current team to help with analysis.

• Check their background: If the new manager has vast experience in search, they are more likely to delve into keyword use and research. If they have achieved massive success on social networking sites, they will attempt to replicate this success at your company too. Only the most strategic players will assign less importance to their past experience, and check the unique circumstances presented by the particular case.

• Ensure your voice is heard: If you think that the new leadership is making reckless digital marketing moves, which may hurt the interests of your company, then speak up. However, remember to back up your points with strong facts.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing consultancy, and can be contacted on 0845 388 5583 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.

In the digital marketing industry, it has become common practice to start emails with a ‘Hi’ and sign off with an informal ‘cheers’. However, many digital marketing professionals have even stopped using these informal greetings, and just send their message as it is. What does this reflect about the business we are currently doing? If a digital marketing specialist cannot take the time to show a bit of compassion in their emails, how do they expect to effectively grow as an industry?

What if digital marketing professionals actually took a step forward, and displayed kindness to show that they care about the digital marketing campaigns they are conducting?

The Webster’s dictionary defines ‘manners’ as:
• A characteristic or customary mode of acting.
• Social conduct or rules of conduct as shown in the prevalent customs.
• Habitual conduct or deportment.
• A distinguished or stylish air.

Likewise, it defines ‘professionalism’ as:
• The conduct, aims, or qualities that characterise or mark a profession or a professional person.
• The following of a profession (as athletics) for gain or livelihood.

After reading these definitions, most people would want to conduct business in a more careful manner. Of all the faux pas in the digital marketing world, the worst is a lack of manners and professionalism. Digital marketing professionals may commit various indiscretions such as failing to introduce a new team member, cancelling a scheduled meeting without any explanation, or sending emails without a signature. However, nothing has a bigger impact on people than a lack of manners and professionalism.

When dealing with people, whether clients or team members, it is better to show them some sort of professionalism than not. In addition, you are more likely to get ahead if you include manners and courtesy, within your communications. The better you communicate and work together, the more likely you are to succeed and bring in higher profits.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing consultancy, and can be contacted on 0845 388 5583 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.

Are marketers doomed when they stop offering promotions? Can online retailers survive the last quarter of the year, without offering digital marketing discounts or free shipping, when their competitors are strongly competing for business? Certainly not!

Below are some digital marketing tips to help retailers get good profits in Q4, without having massive decay rates in Q1:

• Personalise your digital marketing promotions, to show customers that you know them well. Instead of sending a simple discount coupon, send them an email listing some products they may be interested in, depending on their previous purchases. While such a digital marketing email offers coupons, it also emphasises that you want to continue having a relationship with the customer.

• After the initial promotional period is over, wean customers off the promotion slowly, rather than stopping the digital marketing offer abruptly. For example, modify a ‘free shipping’ offer to something that can be availed only on purchases of above £100, rather than on every single purchase.

• Apply a reward schedule that is not continuous, such as a ratio-based reward system. This means offering customers a discount only if they make a certain number of purchases. This will not only make sure that people continue to buy your products in Q1, but will also attract customer-interest all through the year.

• Use the high traffic in Q4, to offer a reward structure that will make the behaviour of customers more profitable. For example, if you notice that some customers are only shopping from a single category, offer them a discount to encourage them to purchase from a category they have previously not brought from.

If you plan your promotional offers carefully, with the aim of gaining long-term customer loyalty, you will not only have a profitable holiday season, but a profitable year. Avoid training people to buy only when a discount is offered. Instead, combine competitiveness with personalisation and good service, to get customers to make digital marketing purchases all through the year.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing consultancy, and can be contacted on 0845 388 5583 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.

We recently spoke with a group of leading digital marketing experts, and discussed the problems faced while working with brand characters over various digital marketing channels, including social media. Below are some key points which digital marketing professionals should keep in mind, while expanding real and animated brand characters for the digital medium:

• Asset management: A brand character is a valuable business asset that takes time to build. They can be misused, just like other assets, and hence need to be protected. In some cases, a brand character may even be more valuable than the brand they symbolise. For example, Flo (Progressive Insurance’s clerk character) has more fans on Facebook, than Progressive Insurance itself.

• Emotional advantages: The benefits of a brand character are usually different from the benefits of their corresponding brand. Sometimes, characters are given a strong emotional value while the brands are kept logical. This creates a powerful combination, which enables companies to strongly connect with prospective customers. While brand characters focus on the fun aspects, the actual brand has to focus on rational stuff, like answering customer queries.

• Recall value: Brand characters can help your company get noticed amongst the crowd of digital marketing advertisers, because of their inherent recall value. If a brand is promoting a new product, a brand personality can give them a huge advantage while persuading customers.

Brand characters have been on television, magazines and product wrappers, and until now have never spoken back to a customer. However, when a company moves from one-way advertising (radio, TV and print) to the interactive space, digital marketing professionals will have to consider what audiences will expect of the brand personality.

You have been entrusted with bringing a popular brand character to the audience in a more personal way. While the digital medium offers interesting opportunities for greater interaction, there are also chances of making big mistakes. The most important thing is to ensure your brand character is believable, and draw up a list of things it shouldn’t do or shouldn’t say.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing agency, and can be contacted on 0845 388 5583 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.

Below are some tips for writing content for digital marketing purposes:

• Include meaningful headlines that would attract readers.
• Use bullet points and lists to organise your information, and make it easy for readers to scan.
• Upload photographs, graphics, illustrations and videos to keep your audience coming back for more.
• Separate the digital marketing content on the page into manageable sections, to make it more readable and navigable.
• Ensure your article is of a manageable size, as most Internet users prefer not to read lengthy pieces of content.

Before the content is created, one should perform keyword research to learn what the targeted audience is looking for. Some users may be searching for broad terms like ‘running shoes’, while others may be looking for product specific terms like ‘black Nike Lunarglide men’s running shoes’. If a large number of users are searching for product-specific terms, it would help to have a separate page with digital marketing content related to that term. Whatever you do, you should always map your content to the chosen keywords. This way, whenever a person searching for a particular digital marketing keyword lands on your page, they will always find relevant content.

Next, place your digital marketing keywords in appropriate places, such as the title, sub-headings, image tags and video tags. Do not stuff keywords in the text; instead include them in natural-sounding sentences.

While conducting keyword research, check how competitive your selected keywords are, in addition to looking at popularity and search volume. If a keyword is highly competitive, it may be difficult to gain high-rankings and visibility. Instead look for less competitive alternatives, with lower search volumes. Sometimes, it is better to get a good rank for a less popular term, than be invisible for a high ranking one. Some useful digital marketing tools for keyword research are Google AdWords Keyword Tool, Wordtracker, SpyFu and iSpionage.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing consultancy, and can be contacted on 0845 388 5583 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.

• The thoughts of customers regarding their brand.
• The digital marketing channels customers use to converse about the brand.
• The people whom consumers influence by their brand-related conversations.
• What would motivate customers to make a second/third purchase within a cycle?
• Are the company’s marketing messages resonating?
• Why did a certain group of customers leave the company for a competitor?

The time has now come to give more importance to such learning objectives, bringing them to the same level of the main business goals. This is because the feedback a company can get through their interactions with customers, and the tracking of customer behaviour and responses, is powerful enough to improve almost every other aspect of business. However, this is only if digital marketing professionals take the required steps to succeed. Some of the things you can do are:

• Frame the questions you want answered before you launch a digital marketing programme. Also keep the right tracking and listening tools in place, to measure customer responses.
• Distinguish between learning and testing. While testing is more about how well your campaign is performing, learning is about collecting useful insights that will enable you to make better business choices.
• Invest money, time and resources for collecting these digital marketing insights. Marketing research is not free, and you may need to buy new tools or train staff to get the information you need.
• Distinguish between noise and true insights. Sometimes, a single customer may give you a more valuable insight, than the loud noises made by a group of highly vocal customers.
• Confer with employees from other departments, especially those who have no contact with customers, to find out if they have a question or suggestion that could prove to be valuable for your business.
• Check for inputs from partners, distributors and other external sources. They generally have vast industry and category experience, and can provide you with rich sources of data.
• Build a feedback and review cycle to ensure that all collected data is available for use within a specified time frame, and provides timely benefits.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing agency, and can be contacted on 0845 388 5583 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.

Below are some do’s for you:

• Do use separate voices for the character and the brand, with the character’s voice expressing emotional benefits, and the brand’s voice stating rational benefits.
• Do ensure that you research the brand character from a deep emotional level. Learn about its personality, and what things it can/cannot say or do. This will make the brand character credible, especially on digital marketing channels like Facebook, where strong levels of fan engagement is expected. Create a brief describing the character’s personality in detail, and make sure that your digital marketing team stays true to the character while replying to online messages etc.
• Do research. Collect and analyse different digital marketing metrics, to learn about the type of value the brand character is bringing to the business.
• Do consider other digital marketing elements that could represent the character, like audio and video. Think of what, where and how to share.
• Do take care while translating a character, for the first time, into an animated one that speaks. Ensure that you capture the essence of the character, by writing suitable dialogues and selecting the right voice-over artist. Once you launch it, this style will have to be consistently followed over all digital marketing platforms. Avoid generating a creepy quality in these animations.
• Do check if the brand character has a history and if so, try and feature it in the digital marketing medium.
• Do watch out for trends in growth and usage.
• Do plan for improper use of your brand character. Once your assets are online, strangers may misuse them for cruel or perverse purposes. Think ahead and formulate a plan on how to respond if your asset is being corrupted.
• Do make an attempt to connect the brand character with the product/service you are selling. Ensure that such a connection brings back value to the company, through calls-to-action that can be measured, such as clicks, likes etc.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing agency, and can be contacted on 0845 388 5583 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.

• Presently, Google is one of the top three websites that prospective customers visit as part of their shopping process. Another site is Amazon.com. This has led to Google developing a strong relationship with buyers.
• Google is the single largest source of digital marketing traffic for most e-commerce websites. These websites strongly rely on Google for targeted traffic that will convert into sales.
• Google works to constantly enhance the user experience, providing customers with more relevant results, and ease of use. One example is the Panda/Farmer update that started in mid-February and continued till November. This update was one of the most far-reaching algorithmic changes made in the last decade. It helped Google develop a deeper relationship with consumers, based on the positive experiences they had while running searches.
• Since the last year, Google has been working to improve its shopping and wallet capability, and is trying to integrate a shopping functionality with its search results pages. Through this functionality, Google aims to be more relevant to users who are interested in online shopping.

Reviews and ratings are one of the most important things referred to by consumers before making a purchase. They also help drive useful traffic to e-commerce websites. Hence, digital marketing analysts expect customer reviews to hold a prominent place in Google’s shopping functionality.

There is no doubt about it; Google has become a quasi retailer. Here, two interesting questions being asked by digital marketing specialists are:

• When will Google’s experience be persuasive enough that large numbers of customers begin considering it, whenever they have to shop?
• What should digital marketing brands and retailers do to ensure that their products/services are the number one thing in customers’ minds?
• How to get consumers to directly visit one’s shopping outlets (whether these are at a retail store, on their website, or on Facebook)?

In the digital marketing arena, some brands will win while some will lose. If companies want to stay ahead of their competitors, one of the foremost things they need to do is to create a Google+ Brand Page. Getting an early digital marketing presence on Google is expected to reap golden harvests in the future.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing consultancy, and can be contacted on 0845 388 5583 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.

Clearly, there has always been a big chasm between the marketing and IT departments. Most digital marketing professionals who are in the business of selling software products know that sales talk ending with the sentence ‘no IT involvement needed’, will usually result in an easy sale. In most companies, the marketing and IT departments have different mindsets, as well as a set of different business goals. People who have worked in both these departments know just how poles apart they are.

The inherent differences between the IT and digital marketing departments make it difficult for them to work together as a cohesive unit, basically because both are strongly competing for the year-end bonus offered by the company. In the end, it comes down to a battle of speed vs control. Digital marketing is about speed, while IT is about control.

Professionals who are involved in digital marketing have to be quick to respond to market shifts and quick to make sales. They have to think in terms of cycles for their digital marketing campaigns, and experiment with different channels. On the other hand, IT is more about decreasing the number of systems, formalising various processes, cutting down operational costs over the long term, and reigning in rogue initiatives. So, what needs to be done to align them?

Many digital marketing articles have been written, and many people have spoken on how to align the digital marketing and IT departments. There are hundreds of large consultancies with their balanced scorecards and other features, and entire ‘best practices’ for improving alignment with IT departments. The IT industry, as it usually does, has also created industry frameworks for governance, with codes on how to align themselves with the needs of the company. And still digital marketing professionals complain!

No matter what alignment approach you choose, the first thing to do is to recognise your differences. It is important to understand that the other side also wishes to innovate, and a continuous conversation has to take place if you both wish to achieve your goals.

Qudos Digital is a leading digital marketing agency, and can be contacted on 0845 388 5583 or info@qudosdigital.co.uk.