Business and Marketing

Eighty-three percent of retailers sent general holiday or winter-themed campaigns last year, making it 2014's most popular theme.

If you think holiday music begins playing too early each year, you're in for a rude awakening.

According to a recent Yesmail study, retailers began sending holiday-themed campaigns earlier than in previous years with 32% more brands deploying such emails in 2014 than 2013. In addition, Q3 2014 overall email volume grew by 26% YoY, and open rates increased by 11% over the same period. Also, Q4 2014 volume grew by 8% YoY while open rates increased by 2%.

“Engagement and Deliverability for Holiday-themed Emails: 2014 Recap, 2015 Takeaways” analyzes the YoY email marketing campaigns of brands such as Apple, The Home Depot, and Walmart using its Market Intelligence tool. It finds that average open rates remain largely unchanged from the third to the fourth quarters of 2014, despite an average quarterly volume increase of 46% over that span. The consistent average open rate of about 14% in the second half of the year bucks the historical trend of open rates dipping as email volume increases.

“Consistent open rates while volume is spiking can be in part due to more strategic email marketing programs,” says Michael Fisher, president of Yes Lifecycle Marketing. “Brands are creating better mobile experiences, developing comprehensive segmentation strategies, and implementing advanced personalization. These practices translate into more informed campaigns that achieve better inboxing rates.”

The lion's share (83%) of retailers sent general holiday or winter-themed campaigns, making it 2014's most popular theme. When general holiday or winter-themed campaigns were deployed at the most opportune time, they generated an open rate of 15.5%—up from 14.2% for all other emails.

Additional findings include:

• Back-to-school, Black Friday, Thanksgiving, and general holiday emails benefitted from later deployment. Open rates for Black Friday-themed emails, for instance, increased from 14.1 to 14.8% when deployed closer to the holiday.
  
  
• On the other hand, Halloween, Cyber Monday, and Christmas-themed emails benefitted from earlier deployment. Halloween emails were 15.2% in the first half of October, yet decreased to 13.3% in the latter half.
  
  
• Christmas-themed emails sent in the days after Christmas saw a 15.7% open rate, as opposed to 14.9% for all other communications deployed over the same time period.

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Experian Marketing Services announces enhancements to its Marketing Suite designed to better harness customer data.

              

“For years the technology itself was driving [marketing technology] purchase decisions,” says Matt Seeley, president, Experian Marketing Services. “Now we're seeing more customers who understand the value of data. As a result, data capabilities are leading more and more purchase decisions now.” 

That focus on customer data is one of the drivers behind enhancements to the Experience Marketing Suite, announced during the company's 2015 Client Summit. Those upgrades include addressable advertising and predictive intelligence tools, both of which are powered by Experian's consumer database of more than 700 million individuals in 270 households. The tools are designed to help marketers identify and interact with their customers across channels and devices.

“Customers want to be treated as one person no matter how many social profiles they have or devices they use,” said David Evans, senior director of solutions engineering at Experian Marketing Services, during the summit's opening keynote.

To address cross-channel audience activation, Experian's new offering is designed to help marketers execute one-to-one campaigns across digital and traditional channels. The addressable advertising functionality is designed to enable marketers to select the best audience for a specific campaign based on first-party CRM data, Experian's data, or both. The tool also provides data on which customers saw an ad, whether they saw it more than once, and if it influenced their in-store or online activities.

In terms of real-time, predictive intelligence, the new functionality in the Experian Marketing Suite integrates real-time identity and intelligence data. This is designed to provide marketers with predictive insights that help them optimize campaign performance. For example, marketers can test email subject lines, send times, and channels across customer segments, and then use that data to predict the performance of future multichannel campaigns. These predictive insights, in combination with customer data, allow marketers to see how content performs with specific audience segments, and as a result identify what drives customers to take specific actions. 

Using Experian's new tools to get a holistic view into their first-party and Experian's third-party data, Seeley said, marketers have an opportunity to create a rich understanding of their customers—and then take decisive action based on that insight.

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Real Mail Notification sends subscribers emails at 8 a.m. with photos of that day's mailbox contents.

 

Thirty-seven percent. It was a number that would not stop rattling around in the head of U.S. Postal Service VP of New Products and Innovation Gary Reblin. It represents the increased lift the average marketing campaign sees when email and direct mail are used in tandem. “What we said was, ‘What if we could give consumers an email preview every morning of what they'll be seeing in their mailboxes that night?'” Reblin says. “We take pictures of just about every piece of letter mail that goes through our facilities. We have the capability to share a direct mail piece with end consumers through their digital devices.” What's more, USPS can entertain the possibility of making the U.S. Mail a digital conduit for website visits and transactions.

Thus was born Real Mail Notification (RMN), the Postal Service's Great Byte Hope, the breakthrough that senior Post Office executives anticipate will illustrate what digital-only marketers are missing by leaving mail out of the mix. The service, which sends subscribers emails at 8 a.m. with photos of that day's mailbox contents, will debut in a pilot in New York City this fall in a co-rollout with My USPS, the Postal Service's parcel-tracking service.

RMN isn't likely to win any design awards. The pictures of mail pieces passing through sorting machines at high-speed are black and white. But mailers will be able to partner with the Postal Service on adding interactive options such as click-throughs to phone calls or websites. “We're doing this to enhance the mail product; mail is not a digital product, but this product is interactive. All you have to do is give me a link,” Reblin says. “Our tests...saw a tenfold increase driving people online.”

USPS tested Real Mail Notification in a 6,600-user program in Northern Virginia early this year. Results showed that 93% of users opened their email alerts within two hours of receiving them each day. Nine out of 10 testers said they would continue using the free service were it made permanent, and 86% said they would recommend it to friends. But it's the response rates seen during the test—albeit to USPS's own appeals—that will make direct marketers stand up and take notice if they're replicated on a large scale in The Big Apple. The average response rate of RMN subscribers was 5.9%, compared to 0.5% for a control mailing. Much of that (4.8%) came via click-through options, but email alert recipients were also twice as likely as the control group to type in a URL.

Because Postal Service consumer panel research shows that, in most households, one member regularly retrieves and opens the mail, Reblin is convinced that RMN will expand direct mail to a wider audience. “I was part of the RMN test and I personally found this to be true, because my wife usually opens all the mail,” he says.

New York will provide more accurate numbers of how RMN might perform on a nationwide basis, since it will be offered to residents of all five boroughs through emails and a wide-ranging ad campaign. Reblin and other senior Postal executives will be keeping close watch on how widely the program will scale. “If a mail piece gets a 20% response rate [through RMN], but only 1% of the population has it, it's not helping anybody,” he says.

The Postal Service has partners lined up for the New York pilot, but mailers wanting to join in will be interested to know that the service is free, and will stay that way if it flies. Should RMN significantly increase advertising mail volumes, it will have served its purpose for USPS and be open to all big mailers. Reblin is optimistic that it will not only take wing, but give direct mail a needed boost.

“We think this is an idea that is going to change and revolutionize direct mail,” Reblin predicts. “Why? Because, for marketers, it's all about response.”

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Some quick info to keep you up-to-date, including the number of marketing emails sent in Q1 2015 that were responsive.

 

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Ebay Now becomes eBay Then, as the online marketplace decides immediate delivery does not work in its business plan.

Ebay Now, the marketplace's three-year experiment in same-day delivery, has been ended, according to a company statement that also announced the discontinuation of its Valet, Fashion, and Motors apps. The program offered quick delivery from national retailers such as AutoZone and GNC in Chicago, Dallas, New York, and San Francisco. A Brooklyn pilot program with 80-plus local retailers has also been shuttered.

“While we saw encouraging results with the eBay Now service, we always intended it as a pilot, and we are now exploring delivery and pick-up/drop-off programs that are relevant to many more of our 25 million sellers,” wrote eBay Chief Product Officer R.J. Pittman in the notice.

Tom Caporaso, CEO of ClarusCommerce, operator of FreeShipping.com, was not surprised by the development. “For shoppers interested in collectibles, custom goods and apparel, vintage clothes, and the like—eBay's main product lines—quick delivery isn't nearly as important as free shipping,” he said. “The service also gave larger stores a strong advantage, so eBay's smaller sellers, who didn't have the size or infrastructure to offer same-day delivery, will benefit and are therefore more likely to keep using eBay's marketplace.”

Web marketplace expert David Spitz, CEO of ChannelAdvisor, agreed that same-day shipping is not for everyone. “It's expensive and challenging, especially without a substantial and mature distribution infrastructure like Amazon enjoys. Ebay Now required a valet to shop for the consumer, and we doubt that was a scalable or profitable approach,” he said. “It will be interesting to see how same-day delivery plays out across other players.”

Pittman noted that providing a simplified experience for customers was another factor in the decision to close eBay Now.

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It aims to simplify the complexity of scaling programs enterprise-wide and allow a larger number of employees to share company-approved content.

 

In an attempt to allow enterprise companies to deliver tailored content that resonates with specific divisions and meets all compliance and regulation issues, Dynamic Signal today unveiled what it claims is the first platform that enables content personalization and management geared toward specific audiences within an organization.

The platform aims to simplify the complexity of scaling programs enterprise-wide and allow a larger number of employees to share company-approved content. The technology lets each division manager control his own group but still works as one global program.

"I believe in the next 12 months, the majority of Fortune 1000 companies will use employee advocacy," says Russ Fradin, CEO of Dynamic Signal. "It's only a matter of time. Advocacy leaders at enterprises need to think ahead for scale, even if they're just in the planning/piloting stage right now. Your employees will not thank you for switching out their social sharing app later. Advocacy leaders need to plan for the future now."

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A Postal Services showing signs of life and a Congress showing no signs of activity is a formula for exigency's demise, insiders say.

Insiders who have long fought the postal rate wars feel that the Postal Regulatory Commission's eight-month extension of the exigent surcharge will inevitably lead to its demise. There's no discernible inclination on the part of the PRC to do otherwise, they say, and the Postal Service is exhibiting new signs of life. Only an act of Congress can grant the USPS's wish of exigency forever, and the odds of action on such legislation in the next two years are slim to none.

“[Senator Tom] Carper had indicated a willingness to do that, but Congress isn't really doing anything right now. They're kicking all cans down the road,” says Hamilton Davison, president and executive director of the American Catalog Mailers Association. “Once the 2016 elections get into full swing after the summer recess, they're going to have to start making decisions, and there are a lot higher priorities outside of postal reform.”

Gene Del Polito, a seasoned observer of the Washington scene after three decades heading the Association for Postal Commerce, is betting on apathy for exigency. “Unless the Postal Service is at death's door—and actually they've been doing better save for the prefunding issue—their situation is not desperate enough for Congress to do something in an election year,” he says. “I can't see a Republican Congress doing anything to mollify the unions, and the Democrats haven't got the muscle to get [a reform bill] done.”

As for mailers, exigency has become business as usual. Their budgets have been recalculated for the surcharge and they are prepared to muddle through another eight months. “Our members were expecting it,” Davison says. “We had forecast that we'd be looking at another six to eight months of exigency.”

Now, minus some extraordinary development, mailers will be waiting out the final days of the 4.3% surcharge. “They've been living with it for more than a year. Whatever happened with their businesses has happened. It's not going to have any significantly greater impact than it already has,” says Del Polito.

Still, neither association executive is willing to breathe a sigh of relief. Nor is D. Eadward Tree, the nom de plume of a publishing executive, who wrote today in his Dead Tree Edition blog that “the surcharge is slated to expire somewhere around April 2016 instead of August 2015. But remember that, in Washington, ‘temporary' taxes tend to become permanent.”

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Its broad definition of what constitutes an autodialer has companies fearing lawsuits for conducting business as usual.

Marketers who use text messages and automated phone calls are fretting that the Federal Communications Commission's recent order interpreting the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (TCPA) will hurt consumers more than it will help them. Two trade associations have filed petitions in appeals court challenging the ruling, and corporate defense attorneys fear an increase in class action lawsuits.

In releasing the order, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler (above) wrote, “Today we help Americans hang up on nuisance calls,” adding that unwanted “robocalls” and texts were the agency's largest complaint category last year with more than 215,000 filings. But Commissioner Michael O'Rielly, who voted against the order, called it a “farce” and an “unfathomable action” that expands the scope of TCPA.

O'Rielly expressed concern that the order will put an end to important communications that consumers have expressly consented to receive from companies, especially those that provide an undeniable public service. Among these he numbers alerts that a child failed to arrive at school, product recalls, health care warnings, and financial alerts for such things as bank overdrafts. He strongly protested the orders applying to text messages. “The TCPA was enacted in 1999, before the first text message was ever sent,” he wrote.

Immediately following the ruling's release on July 10, petitions challenging the FCC's authority were filed in appeals court by the Professional Association for Customer Engagement and the Association of Credit and Collection Professionals. Both take issue with the FCC's broad definition of what constitutes an “autodialer.”

“If you have a software system with an autodialer option, that's now deemed an autodialer in the FCC's ruling. That contrasts with other courts that have said you can't make a case about something that may be done in the future. You have to look at how the calls are currently being made,” said Christine Reilly, a partner in Manatt, Phelps & Phillips who defends companies in TCPA suits.

TCPA defines an autodialer as a machine dialing a number without human intervention. Reilly says the FCC ruling takes a strict constructionist position on the definition, placing texting apps smartphones with autodial functions under it. “I had a client ask me if he should go out and buy some rotary phones,” quipped Reilly.

The other sensitive issue in the FCC order concerns reassigned numbers. In his opinion, Wheeler mentioned a consumer who'd gotten a new cell phone number and received 27,809 unwanted text messages over 17 months. Marketers agree that such incidences are egregious and should be corrected. What they take issue with is the amount of leeway the FCC has given them to make things right. It grants them a one-call exception on an unwanted message before they become liable for penalties. The problem is that the language of the order states one call, not one engagement with a consumer or one reaction to a complaint.

“Give us a chance to get it right. How do we comply with a rule when we have no way of knowing a number's been reassigned. That database does not exist,” Reilly said. “This one-pass rule—it's terrifying to think of what kind of class actions will come as a result of it.”

Not to worry, according to attorney Jay Edelson. The Chicago-based class action attorney who has taken the likes of Apple and Google to the wall predicates his game plan largely on a TCPA stipulation that allows cell phone owners to sue for up to $1,500 per unwanted contact. Presented with Reilly's concerns by Direct Marketing News, he said marketers need not fear an incremental rise in lawsuits.

“I don't see the FCC order as a change in the law. It helps verify a number of issues, meaning that we're not going to have to waste time litigating the gray areas of the law. It even exempted a number of text messages, such as those sent by health care and financial institutions,” Edelson said.

Edelson had little sympathy for businesses griping about the one-pass rule for reassigned numbers. “What responsible marketers do is scrub the lists. It's an automated procedure. It takes no time and it avoids all the hassles,” he said. “The thing is, the industry continues not to get consent. That's on them and it's easy to do.”

Marketers are not likely to agree that gaining consent is easy, however, and FCC Commissioner O'Rielly doesn't agree that the agency's action won't provoke more court actions. “It will lead to more litigation and burdens on legitimate businesses without actually protecting consumers from abusive robocalls made by bad actors,” he commented.

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Interactivity and added options for brand engagement highlight the new options.

AOL today introduced five new premium video formats aimed at increasing consumer engagement with brands. Havas has signed on as the first agency to offer the formats to its clients.

A “branded skip” video format will offer viewers the option to interact with a brand—by filling out a survey, for instance—instead of watching the entire video. The “branded slate” option presents a 7-second, animated branding segment before transitioning to video content.

“As digital continues to evolve and grow, advertisers are demanding new ways to naturally engage with audiences,” said David Miller, VP of advertising product management for AOL. “This allows for more creative branding and unlocks new audience targeting opportunities through data and automation.”

The other new formats are:

Linear expandable: Viewers who interact with a banner inside the video are presented with an overlay offering them the ability to explore a content-rich microsite.

Linear modules: Interactive icons appear while the advertiser's video is playing.

Linear sequence:  Displays an interactive end-frame after the advertiser's video has completed.

All the new formats are available across the AOL platform, which includes properties such as Huffington Post, Autoblog, and TechCrunch.

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Marketing VP Chris Brown is considering reassigning how much he allots to catalogs, email, and search—all of which drive online sales—but a new allocation strategy isn't clear based on past customer behaviors. More testing would help him decide but his budget is due in a week. What should he do?

Recap: It's budgeting time at Zoom Running, and Marketing VP Chris Brown wants to recalibrate where he's spending his designated marketing dollars. His challenge is attribution. He's considering reassigning how much he allots to catalogs, email, and search—all of which drive online sales—but the purchase drivers aren't clear enough to properly allocate the new budget based on past customer behaviors. Additionally, the overlapping way Brown and his team coordinate multichannel campaigns makes it difficult to know with certainty which touch or combination of touches actually prompts purchases.

Another positive making his task more difficult is the effectiveness of Zoom's social sharing strategy. Brown wonders if he should simply allot more to social, even though, in some cases, email and mobile are the channels actually spurring activity there. More testing would help him decide, but his budget for the next fiscal year is due in a week. 

May winner
Jim Pisula, Principal, Jim Pisula and Associates
Brown is a little late to this decision with only a week left before the budget is due, but the deadline is on him and he has to choose.

Presumably, he has received input from his team as to how the funds ought to be allocated and he hasn't heard any new information to guide any reallocation.

He does have one piece of new information, that to some extent email and mobile are spurring activity in his social media sphere—yet, he's thinking of allocating more funds to social without considering an increase in channels that partially drive social's activity.

Besides polishing his résumé, Brown ought to consider the following:

• Allocate 90% of the budget in the same fashion as the previous year; after all, some results have been positive or he would have questioned them in the past.
• Take the other 10% so he and his team can devise some tests to be completed in 45 to 60 days.
• Use the test results to reallocate the remaining budget for the rest of the fiscal year.
• Resist the temptation to allocate more resource to social media until the tests are completed and analyzed.

In the future Brown will likely not wait until the end of the budgeting period to do any fundamental reassessments. If results pan out, Zoom Running continues to prosper. If they don't due to misallocated funds, Brown is smarter in his next position.

Other responses
Peter Mendelson, CMO, Raiseworks
Zoom Running is operating under the last-touch attribution model. With last touch, all credit is given to the last touch from the prospect that ultimately made the conversion, sale, etc. Although not ideal, many companies still do attribution this way since other models are much more complex. Last touch will artificially make some channels look more efficient than others, as they are reaping the benefit of all previous “touches” by the prospect. For example, DRTV is a key driver for Internet sales, yet with last touch it would not get credit for viewers who saw the URL in the commercial and went to a landing page to complete the order.

Still, it's wise for Marketing VP Chris Brown to budget based on the most efficient channels first (based on last touch) and then work backwards knowing full well that other channels in fact aided in this process. Therefore, social media, although important, should not arbitrarily get an increase in budget versus a year ago unless Brown can demonstrate its contribution in the numbers.

Kevin McPherson, Industry Sector General Manager, Xerox
Budgets are not rigid; they need to have some flexibility. Markets are constantly changing and evolving, marketing spend needs to have some flexibility to be able to adjust to the market. Therefore, Brown should set up his marketing budget with the best information he has now and build in the flexibility to reallocate funds between channels, campaigns, and social. He should also build in some funds to do some pilots to test new concepts. Marketing is a continuous process and he needs to build this learning process into his budgeting so that it's not a one-time activity.

Lawrence A. Tillinger, Proprietor, SFLI
Brown should segment his budget request for the next fiscal year as it was for this fiscal year—among all drivers of online sales—and then submit it to the budget approval process.

Afterward, Brown should begin using the free version of Google Analytics, or a similar program, to get multichannel attribution data, institute A/B testing, followed up by multivariate testing.

Brown's budget request for the next fiscal year, with the same divisions as the current year's budget, should explain that the amount to be allocated to each segment is multichannel attribution analytics data-dependent, may change with approval by those responsible for the budget approval process, with the total budget amount remaining the same.

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Here, a look at a typical day—if there is such a thing—in the life of a marketing-centric editor.

One thing I've learned covering marketing for nearly three decades is that every day is a new adventure. That's one reason I love it—and a big reason that we're giving you an inside look at how a number of your peers spend a typical day, if there is such a thing, in the cover story, "A Day in the Life of Marketing." How do stories like this come together? Here's a look at my day today to find out.

9:45 p.m. yesterday Check my schedule for tomorrow. As much as I love surprises, remembering an 8 a.m. meeting across town at 7:45 a.m. is not a pleasant one.

5:15 a.m. Exercise and a round of fetch in the park with my dog charge me up. There's nothing like watching a dog's unbound enthusiasm and perseverance to put life into perspective.

7:15 a.m. Read as many of The New York Times' news briefs on my iPhone as I can cram in before my subway line heads underground.

8 a.m. Breakfast at my desk, with a side of email.

8:20 a.m. Catch up with news editor Al Urbanski. He needs to review a volumunous report from the Postal Regulatory Commission for an analysis article, but still churn out the day's daily news; so, we discuss which news briefs he plans to prioritize.

8:25 a.m. Dive into editing Elyse Dupré's section of the “Day in the Life” article. My rule: Edit everything at least twice; you'll always catch something new on the additional read(s).

9:30 a.m. Time to dash upstairs for our weekly events meeting. With our Social Media Virtual Event and 40 Under 40 awards coming up, most of the conversation revolves around our plans for promoting them.

We end early, so I complete several to-do's from the meeting, which include scheduling time with Marketing Director Jackie Amato and Perry Simpson, our digital content coordinator, to plan how we'll integrate the content and social strategies for 40 Under 40. While I'm online I check email and refer several PR people to the appropriate writers for articles they're interested in.

This sparks me to make sure all the articles for the September and October issues are assigned and the print and website deadlines are up-to-date. Then I check my calendar for the vendor briefing I have later, and visit LinkedIn and the company's website to prep for the call. That reminds me to review my notes from two recent vendor briefings and add story ideas to our ideas list. And that prompts me to email Tracey Harilall, our circulation director, to request a list of readers I can invite to breakfast for a focus group. I'm planning several so I want to get them scheduled.

1:17 p.m. I come up for air, and lunch.

2:05 p.m. Back to editing Elyse's article; round two. When I'm done, I'm inspired to write my section of “Day in the Life,” but before I get past the intro Keith O'Brien, our group's VP, digital, asks for a quick final review of our
refreshed tag list for our CMS. We're in the process of a site redesign aimed at improving our user experience, and this will enhance search and navigation.

3:30 p.m. Get an update on the latest from vendor Dynamic Signal. Briefings keep me up-to-date on new technologies and strategies. Sure, one meeting is one vendor's perspective, but have several per week and trends surface.

4 p.m. One more round of email, which includes scheduling calls for three panel discussions I'm moderating at upcoming events. I wrap the day editing a case study scheduled to post the next day on our site—pausing only to review and approve our daily newsletter.

5:45 p.m. While my computer shuts down I download my personal email to my iPhone so I can catch up on industry newsletters on the subway ride home. Then I move a stack of folders with print pages to proof onto my keyboard—top priority for tomorrow.

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Prophet, a global marketing consultancy that put Olive Garden in food trucks and Electrolux into new brand clothes, announced today it had purchased Altimeter Group to expand its position in digital intelligence. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Altimeter is perhaps best known as the home of acclaimed digital age futurist Brian Solis, author of The End of Business as Usual and expert in the quickly changing relationships between businesses and customers. The research company tracks trends for clients that include AT&T, Google, IBM, and Salesforce.com.

“Prophet understands the value of research, and we believe they will grow the impact of what we do. They'll give us global reach,” said Altimeter CEO Charlene Li.

Prophet CEO Michael Dunn said that the increasingly global nature of competition creates a constant need for new intelligence that Altimeter will help his company fill. “Business has become borderless. Whether you're a big home goods manufacturer in Europe or a Chinese tech manufacturer trying to go global, digital innovators and disruptors have changed the way you have to play to win,” Dunn said. “Big companies think they can take their foot off the gas, but then all of a sudden…”

Li (left), whose company will retain its name and branding, said the alliance will help Altimeter spread its wings and try new things. Dunn said that Altimeter provides his clients with a valuable new competitive tool.

“We told clients about the deal yesterday and the level of enthusiasm and excitement from companies such as Cigna and Hershey was clear,” Dunn said. “They recognize we are investing in innovative thinkers to help them with their next set of challenges."

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CMOs complain their thought leadership is neither engaging nor authoritative, and fails to reach decision-makers.

Another whitepaper, another survey, another yawn. A survey of more than 600 chief marketers released this week by the CMO Council and NetLine reveals that they are extremely dissatisfied with the direction and quality of the thought leadership content they distribute, leaving them with fewer quality leads than they'd like.

Only 12% of marketers believe that their internal content generation machines are strategically programmed to target the right prospects with relevant and persuasive content. The problems? Content processes are stakeholder-driven and ad hoc, sales and marketing teams are on different pages, and metrics lack strategic direction.

While three quarters of CMOs surveyed identified “number of views and downloads” as the key metric used to rate the quality of their content, they admitted they needed to find better yardsticks to help address the following issues:

• Not developing customized content for target audiences, named by 48%;
• lack of budget allocation to creating engaging, authoritative content (48%);
• not producing content relevant to different segments (44%);
• failure to reach decision-makers (43%); and
• not maximizing content distribution channels for maximum reach (39%).

“Syndication and distribution that targets audience groups and has measurable results is indispensable for a successful content strategy. The quantity and quality of audience-appropriate content directly correlates to the number of leads that will end up in the pipeline,” says NetLine CEO Robert Alvin.

On the positive side, 46% of those surveyed said they had made significant strides in realigning their marketing organizations to better support sales and improve selling cycles. A similar percentage said they will devote the biggest portion of their budgets in the coming year to lead generation and qualification.

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It will then account for an estimated 28% of Facebook global ad revenues, says an eMarketer study.

Instagram, which recently introduced “shoppable grams” with buy buttons, is on track to quintuple its ad revenues in only the next two years. Forecast to do $595 million in sales this year, its tally will skyrocket to $2.81 billion by the end of 2017, according to an eMarketer report.

That number will then account for 10% of Facebook's global ad sales in 2017, but 14% of its mobile revenues, eMarketer estimates. In the U.S., Instagram will make up 28% of the social network's mobile total. The U.S. will account for 92% of Instagram's revenues next year, dropping to 85% in 2017 when eMarketer forecasts higher international activity. Instagram does not currently offer a desktop ad product, therefore all sales numbers are for mobile.

eMarketer's wildly optimistic assessment of Instagram's future is predicated on what the research company sees as extremely high demand for new ad products rolled out in the past year. In addition to transactional activation, they include the ability to buy ads via APIs and enhanced measurement and targeting features.

“Now that Instagram is opening up, there is a lot of pent-up demand. Instagram advertisers will be able to use a full slate of Facebook targeting tools, including the popular Custom Audiences feature. That will be a key drawing card,” said principal analyst Debra Aho Williamson of eMarketer.

Growth in Instagram's U.S. user base will serve as a  catalyst, too. Up some 60% to 64 million people this year, eMarketer estimates that more than 110 million people—a third of the population—will hold Instagram accounts by the end of the decade.

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The fuel brand enhances its rewards program to boost engagement and drive people to fill up at its stations.

Loyalty means different things to different marketers. Sometimes it's defined by repeat sales; other times it's determined by engagement.

For BP, loyalty is all about generating top-of-mind awareness: So, when it's time for consumers to fill up at the pump, the fuel brand wants them to drive to a BP station.

“Loyalty isn't just about rewards for consumers,” says Doug Dryan, BP's payment and loyalty manager. “That's a rewards program. Loyalty is about [creating] a level of engagement with a consumer that allows him or her to always have your brand top-of-mind.”

But maintaining this constant awareness is easier said than done. Price and proximity dictate where people fill their tanks, Dryan says, and most consumers aren't sitting on the edge of their seats waiting to hear from their local gas stations. "We're not Starbucks," he says. "We're not that cool. So, it's not constantly peppering that consumer with information about BP."

Still, BP tries to engage with its customers through its Driver Rewards program.

The loyalty program, which debuted in April 2013, comprises three product offerings: BP Card, a credit card that rewards consumers for BP purchases; BP's Visa, a credit card that allows consumers to earn discounts for purchases outside of BP (such as for travel or groceries); and BP's Driver Rewards Loyalty Card, a non-payment rewards card that enables consumers to earn perks for BP purchases.

In the past all three rewards products offered cents-off-per-gallon incentives, but the way consumers earned these rewards differed. Some products offered discounts based on dollars spent, Dryan explains, while others offered rewards based on gallons pumped. 

“Nobody thinks about how many gallons [you pumped] when you buy gasoline,” he says. “You think about how many dollars just came out of your wallet.”

As a result, BP wanted to create a simpler, more cohesive program—one that offers consumers better rewards and still allows the brand to engage with members on a regular basis. So, BP rolled out an enhanced version of its Driver Rewards program this summer.

Driving change

The new Driver Rewards program follows a more unified structure and allows consumers to earn discounts based on dollars spent. Here's how it works: For its first promotion, which runs until September 1, BP is giving all rewards members 25 cents off per gallon for every $100 spent on fuel for 90 days; BP Visa rewards members can earn the same for every $100 spent on all qualifying purchases (including dining and groceries). Once the promotion is over, BP Driver Rewards Loyalty Card holders and BP Card holders will earn 10 cents off per gallon for every $100 spent on fuel; BP Visa card holders will earn 25 cents off per gallon for every $100 spent on gas, as well as other discounts for eligible purchases outside of BP.

To enroll in the program, consumers can visit a participating BP gas station, pick up a loyalty card, and fill out an online profile. The profile asks consumers to provide their name, email address, ZIP Code, and phone number. When it comes time to fill up their tank, consumers can simply swipe their card at the pump. Or, they can ditch the card altogether and simply enter their phone number.

A bumpy road

Unfortunately for BP, the road to launching a new loyalty program wasn't exactly a joyride. The company conducted customer research to better identify how it should reward its members. It also upgraded its CRM technology from an in-house solution to Epsilon's CRM database this past December. Plus, it shifted to a new bank, Synchrony Financial, to issue its credit cards. 

Dryan says that the entire journey from research to final product took about a year. “Don't underestimate the amount of work that it takes when you bring together multiple vendors to deliver a consumer product,” he warns.

But BP's hard work paid off. The company notified its existing loyalty members and card holders of the changes on May 18 and announced the enhancements to the rest of its consumers on June 3.

Going the distance

In terms of promoting the program, BP relied on digital ads embedded within third-party content and elevator advertising to win over non-members. And because BP has consumers' attention for three to four minutes at the pump, it also decided to include information about the program at points of purchase, such at the fuel dispensers and inside its stations' convenience stores. Additionally, BP provided site operators with local marketing materials. It even conducted 120 training sessions in less than one month across its footprint to help educate operators about the program.

“[The marketing] spans the spectrum from corporate, digital-led campaigns down to local-level activity that our site operators are executing on,” Dryan says.

As for its existing members, BP sent informational emails and segmented direct mail pieces to them in the days leading up to the May 18 announcement (as well as on the day of the launch) to get people excited about the new program.

In addition to segmenting consumers during the acquisition phase, the company relies on segmentation to drive relevant messaging once people become members of the program. Dryan says the brand pairs members' demographic data gleaned from the enrollment process with their purchase behavior (e.g. how often they purchase, how much they spend per visit) to divide them into seven transactional segments and send them relevant communications. In addition, the company is able to cross-sell members different products. For instance, it sent emails and direct mail pieces to Driver Rewards Loyalty Card members asking them if they'd like to sign up for a BP Visa card.

Pumping out progress

As of June 10, BP had four million people enrolled across all of its loyalty products. In addition, Dryan says, BP doubled its number of BP Visa card members within the first few days of the program's June launch. He also says that the average spend on Driver Rewards cards has increased.

As for future improvements, Dryan says he'd like to simplify the program even more and introduce new mobile elements. However, tying in mobile components presents safety challenges, he says, such as mobile users being unaware of moving cars around them.

Whatever future enhancements BP makes, it's likely that consumer insight will drive them forward.

"The biggest misconception out in the marketplace today is that offering a loyalty program will drive consumers to your site," he says. "You need to offer consumers a loyalty program that makes sense for them. You also need to have the ability engage with consumers all along their purchase journey, not just at the time of transaction. If you can get those two things right, [then] you're more likely to have that loyal set of consumers versus just having a piece of plastic sitting at your point of sale and giving someone a free item every fifth purchase."

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It's a slow ascension. Just over a third of large enterprises support one. Names like Ford, Sephora, and Walmart, however, are leading the way.

If the word “innovator” appears in your company description, please review the following list: Silicon Valley, Tel Aviv, Los Angeles, Seattle, New York City, Boston, London, Toronto, Vancouver, Chicago, Paris, Sydney, Sao Paulo, Moscow, Berlin, Waterloo (Canada), Singapore, Melbourne, Bangalore, and Santiago.

If you don't have an innovation center in any of those towns, you may not be as forward-thinking as you imagine. The problem with establishing an innovation center is finding innovative people to staff it. True innovators are few and far between, but they tend to congregate in these areas.

“One of the reasons that companies open innovation centers is to get the expertise of the talent they don't have. Ford and Sephora have centers in Silicon Valley because that's where a lot of the start-ups are,” said Brian Solis, author of What's the Future of Business and analyst at Altimeter Group. The towns named above were the focus of a new study Altimeter undertook with Capgemini consulting called “The Innovation Game,” something many companies are losing by looking to their R&D organizations to carry the ball.

“So many R&D centers fail to innovate because they are built to focus on next-generation products, when what innovation centers focus on are start-ups and consumer behavior,” Solis said.

Altimeter and Capgemini's research looked at the largest companies in the automotive, financial services, manufacturing, telecom, and consumer products & retail verticals, and included interviews with key executives at those companies. Two thirds of those managers said they are facing increased pressure to innovate, but that increased investment in traditional R&D centers are producing diminished returns. Tellingly, only 5% of R&D staff say they feel highly motivated to innovate, according to the report.

The answer, according to the report, is innovation centers that must act as fast as the plugged-in population if they hope to get their new releases to market before the market moves on to something new. Innovation today is already brewing among consumers before R&D centers can even begin the practice of catching up with them.

“The future of marketing has nothing to do with marketing. It has everything to do with experiencing what's going on where the innovation begins,” says Solis (left). “You gain perspective by looking at the world through the eyes of your digital customers.”

To date, only 38% of the 200 companies studied have established innovation centers, but several have succeeded in adjusting to the faster pace of commerce. Zappos Lab launched the Ask Zappos personal assistance service in the space of 12 weeks, says the report. In nine months, Walmart Labs developed a new search engine that led to a 20% increase in online sales conversions. Staples' innovation operation got its digital wallet into the marketplace in just nine weeks.

Manufacturing companies led the pack in numbers of innovation centers, with a penetration of 58%, followed by telecoms at 43%. Financial services companies, only 28% of which fund centers, brought up the rear. Locating the funds for the centers, not surprisingly, is the biggest thing holding companies back.

“There is no budget for innovation centers. If it's not a top-down mandate, then some internal champion has to create a sense of urgency and make a case for it,” Solis says. “Everybody faces this challenge, and it's often a case of starting small and working fast.”

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For the first time, users of the email analytics provider can pull down data from other providers, consumers, and developers.

Return Path this week rolls out its data cloud, and with it access to real-time data from email service providers, consumers, and developers. “All this data comes into one standardized platform, allowing users to leverage insights across the breadth of the email ecosystem,” says Return Path CMO Scott Roth. “If I'm a brand, I can now go to one place to learn how mailbox providers view me and how consumers are engaging with me.”

The Return Path Data Cloud gives users API access to email optimization data and access to online and offline consumer purchase data through standardized, formatted feeds. It also offers access to real-time global deliverability and threat intelligence data. “If a brand user or one of our strategic partners prefers to bring the data into their own environment, they now have access to it,” Roth says.

Return Path says its Data Cloud receives inputs from more than 70 mailbox and security providers representing 2.5 billion email accounts and in-depth behavioral insights directly from the inboxes of more than 2 million consumers.

In a statement, CEO Matt Blumberg called the introduction of the cloud as “an important step forward for a pioneer in the development of data solutions."

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Consumers are already starting their back-to-school shopping. Has your brand done its homework?

The school bell won't be ringing for another month, but back-to-school shopping is definitely in session. According to a July 2015 Google Consumer Survey, nearly one third of back-to-school shoppers have already started loading up on essentials. In fact, data from Shop.org shows that about 30% of online consumers start their back-to-school shopping at least two months in advance.

“We are currently in the midst of the second biggest shopping season in the U.S.,” Julie Krueger, Google's industry director of retail, said to a room of journalists at a Google-hosted press breakfast. “Do you hear all of the back-to-school carols?”

And while many consumers try to get a jump-start on their back-to-school shopping assignments, most still cram to complete them. According to a March 2015 Google Consumer Survey, 80% of back-to-school shoppers say that they make their purchases in two weeks or less. Seventy percent make these buys at three stores or less.

What does this mean for marketers and retailers? If they're not present as customers browse and consider products while outside of the store, Krueger says, then the odds of them winning shoppers over for their in-store purchases are not high.

“You have to be in the consideration to start,” she later told Direct Marketing News.

Marketers and retailers, however, don't have to show up just early; they have to be everywhere.

Consider this: There was a year-over-year 4% decrease for in-store foot traffic Krueger said; however, there was also a 3% year-over-year increase in same-store sales, suggesting that consumers are doing their browsing and research elsewhere—like through blogs, online reviews, social, and mobile. As a matter of fact, Krueger reported that 50% of back-to-school searches are happening on smartphones—up from 40% last year.

Sharing even more insight was Lisa Green—Google's head of industry, fashion, and luxury—who said that 22% of 18 to 24 year olds visit YouTube to figure out what's cool to purchase. In addition she's already seeing a 120% increase in watch time for back-to-school videos, and back-to-school YouTube searches are up 43%.

So instead of thinking of the dot-com world and the brick-and-mortar world as two siloed entities, marketers and retailers have to think of the shopper experience as one cross-device, omnichannel journey. As Jason Spero, Google's VP of performance solutions, said during the event, “You now can't plan the mobile without the store, and you can't plan the store without the mobile.”

How can marketers and retailers do that? Jonathan Alferness, VP of product management for Google Shopping, focuses on three key moments in the shopper's journey:

1. I-want-to-know moments: These are moments when the customer is deciding what to buy and is looking for facts (e.g., price, product details) to help him make a decision.

2. I-want-to-go moments: These are moments when the customer is looking for stores that carry the items that they need.

3. I-want-to-buy moments: These are moments when customers are ready to purchase fast and easily.

The bottom line for retailers? Show up on time; play nice with other channels; and practice your one-two-threes.

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E-commerce players with intimate knowledge of Amazon think Marc Lore may have the time, money, and business model to keep the new marketplace aloft.

 

According to Brad Stone's book The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon,”  the all-powerful marketplace set its Competitive Intelligence unit on Marc Lore's Diapers.com business, dropped diaper prices on Amazon.com by up to 30% to bleed the successful startup, and ultimately pressured it to sell out to Bezos and company for close to $600 million dollars.

Today, Lore will set out to lower prices—and, one guesses, the boom—on Bezos and Amazon with the launch of a new all-encompassing online marketplace called Jet.com. Jet is a $49.99-a-year subscription service that offers free shipping on all orders of $35 or more. Most important, however, it promises to give members the lowest prices possible, even if it loses money on the deal, which it intends to do until at least 2020. One of the most highly capitalized e-commerce startups in history, Jet has raised $225 million and intends to burn its way through hundreds of millions more to build out its product selection. It goes so far as to operate a “Concierge Service” that buys merchandise it doesn't have from other retailers and taking a loss by selling it at a lower price.

A crazy idea? It might seem so if it wasn't the battle-tested and highly capitalized New Yorker Lore behind it.

“No doubt about it. This is a really audacious bet he's making, but Marc is not somebody I would bet against. Price, selection, and speed is what Amazon is all about, and price is the jugular that Jet is going after,” says David Spitz, CEO of ChannelAdvisor, whose platform connects suppliers with online retailers the likes of eBay, Alibaba, and, of course, Amazon.

“Amazon does a good job with best price, but the difference here is in the business model,” Spitz explains. “Jet doesn't charge a commission on a sale. It makes its money with the annual subscription fee. Amazon takes an average eight to 15 percent on sales. So, Jet not taking that cut leaves sellers a lot of room to play with on price.”

Sellers are happy to jump on board with Jet for that reason, Spitz says. “We've signed a significant number of retailers and suppliers to sell on Jet. We're seeing some pretty intense interest from the supply side of the equation.”

Shmuli Goldberg, director of marketing for Feedvisor, a provider of pricing optimization services to online sellers, thinks there's room for Jet.com in an Amazon world. He says that what Lore is attempting is more of a social than a retail experiment. “It's almost the antithesis of Amazon and Amazon Prime. Amazon asks people to sacrifice a better price to get excellent customer service. Jet asks them to sacrifice customer service for the best price.”

One thing different about Lore compared to dot.com startups of the past is the realistic, long-term plan he took to investors. He has admitted that it will take him years and a huge investment to buy share. Like a general walking into battle, he's confident of victory, but equally aware that Jet.com might run out of ammunition. Still, he has a war chest that will let him direct his campaign through the end of the decade and he has his eyes set on a defined retail territory: bargain shoppers.

“I have no doubt that Jet will find a place in the market, because there's a strong contingent of people—we've judged it to be about 14% of consumers—who are always looking for the best price,” Goldberg says. “And he may not be looking to become profitable. He may be trying to build a sustainable business model, like Amazon.”

Both Goldberg and Spitz agree that the retailer in Jet.com's sights may not be Amazon at all. “I think the people at Costco have more to fear. Jet.com is looking for people to sacrifice customer experience for lower prices. Right now, that's Costco,” Goldberg says.

“This is a model that, if it endures, can really take off. We've seen this proven by Costco,” says Spitz. “Jet can do it if they prove they're able to turn seller commissions into sustainably lower prices. If it were some unknown quantity behind this, I might be wary, but Marc Lore knows the business and knows where he's heading.”

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The social and mobile expert will direct strategy for the company's agency clients.

Epsilon today announced the hiring of Tom Edwards as chief digital officer of its agency business, where he will direct client efforts in areas including consumer engagement, omnichannel activation, mobile strategy, social media, and content marketing.

Edwards has spent more than 15 years in digital marketing, most recently as EVP of strategy and innovation in digital for The Marketing Arm. He previously served in a similar role for Red Urban, a DDB unit, and was CMO of INgage Networks, a cloud-based social solution. He also teaches marketing as a member of the adjunct faculty of Wayland Baptist University.

“Tom has been among the most notable executives within the digital, mobile, and social media industry and we're excited to bring him on board to support our data-driven creative agency,” said Richard McDonald, SVP, strategy and new business, Epsilon.

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Online sales were 97% of what they did on the first big Christmas shopping day, and 60% of Cyber Monday's.

For third-party sellers doing business on Amazon, the marketplace delivered on its promise of Christmas in July. ChannelAdvisor, an e-commerce optimization platform, reported today that its customers achieved 97% of the sales on Prime Day through Amazon that they did on Black Friday 2014. Yesterday's take also equaled 60% of the business they did last Cyber Monday.

“What this means is, effectively, Amazon delivered on the pitch and they came within 3 percent of delivering a holiday sale in July that was the size of Black Friday,” said ChannelAdvisor Executive Chairman Scot Wingo. “This is pretty amazing.”

Other findings from ChannelAdvisor's customer study:

• Sellers with a heavy proportion of FBA (fulfilled by Amazon) inventory saw much higher sales than self-fulfillers.
• Best performers participated in all levels of offers, including free shipping and lightning deals.
• Deal velocity—unit volume over a specific time period—exceeded Black Friday levels.

“Amazon exceeded our expectations for Prime Day,” Wingo said.

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