Tag Archives: marketing

July 16, 2015 · 10:08 am

Evaluating big data and predictive analytics

bigdata

The use of business intelligence and marketing information systems has expanded in recent years. Through advancements in technologies, marketers can extract value from very large data sets. Very often, companies can benefit if they use and reuse the same data to extract added value from it. Sometimes, it would also make sense for these companies to acquire data that they do not own (or data that was not collected).

All individuals leave a “digital trail” of data as they move about in the virtual and physical worlds. This phenomenon is called, “data exhaust”. Initially, this term was used to describe how Amazon.com used predictive analytics in order to suggest items for its customers. Predictive analytics could quantify the likelihood that a particular person will do something — whether it is defaulting on a loan, upgrading to a higher level of cable service or seeking another job. Such data anticipates human behaviours that have not happened as yet. For instance, Fedex has predicted which customers were most likely to defect to competitors. Even, Hewlett-Packard made a good use of suitable data to identify employees that were on the brink to leave the company. The latter corporation took remedial decisions in anticipation of staff turnover.

Predictive data is usually based on large amounts of cur¬rent and past indicative information that may have been collected from multiple sources. Such data could also provide additional details of customer personas, segments and prospects. Quantitative techniques can be deployed to find valuable patterns in data, enabling companies to predict the likely behaviour of customers, employees and others. First Tennessee Bank had used predictive analytics to increase its marketing response rate by better targeting its offers to high-value customers (IBM, 2015). Through predictive analytics businesses’ could quantify how many consumers will buy their products after receiving electronic mail. They may also measure how effective their personal mailing was.

Nowadays there are fewer inaccuracies in the measurement of big data. In addition, many applications of data can arise far from the purposes for which the data was originally intended. However, big data and predictive analytics could raise a number of concerns. Minor increases in the data accuracy of predictions can often lead substantial savings in the long term. There many companies that have saved significant financial resources by using predictive analytics. For instance, “Chickasaw Nation has used predictive and patron analytics to reduce its month-end close processes by 50%. This way it has also improved customer experience. In a similar vein, predictive tools and smart cards enabled Singapore Land Transit Authority to provide a more convenient transportation system.

Although, individuals tend to regularly repeat their habitual behaviours, pre¬dictive analytics cannot determine when and why they may decide to change their future preferences. The possibility of “one off” events must never be discounted. Many customers may be wary of giving their data due to privacy issues. The underlying question is; when does personalisation become an issue of consumer protection? In 2012, consumers learned that Target was using quantitative methods to predict which customers were pregnant. Very often, advances in technology are faster than legislation and its deployment. These issues could advance economic and privacy concerns that regulators will find themselves hard-pressed to ignore. It may appear that digital market manipulation is pushing the limits of consumer protection law.

Evidently, society has built up a body of rules that are aimed to protect personal information. Another contentious issue is figuring out the value of data and its worth in monetary terms. In the past, companies could have struggled to determine the value of their business; including patents, trade secrets and other intellectual property.

Despite its numerous pitfalls, the market is responding to the emerging demands for corporate IT solutions. Extant relational databases are capable of handling a wide variety of big data sources. Statistical analytical packages are similarly evolving and are working in conjunction with these new data platforms, data types and algorithms. Furthermore, big data is also being modified for those clients that may require cloud-based services. Cloud-based service providers offer on-demand pricing with a fast reconfiguration facility.

This short contribution suggests that in the foreseeable future many corporations would require bespoken software that is relevant for their particular line of business. Customised business intelligence software and big data systems allow organisations to load, store and query massive data sets in short time periods. Business could make good use of structured data (such as demographics) and unstructured information (including text and images) to improve their operational performance and customer service levels.

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July 6, 2015 · 8:53 am

Untangling Big Data for Digital Marketing

customers
The web and its online communities are expanding the use of big data. Ecommerce conglomerates including Amazon and eBay have already transformed the market through their innovative, highly scalable digital platforms and product recommender systems. Moreover, internet giants like Google and Facebook are leading the development of web analytics, cloud computing and social media networks. The emergence of user-generated content in fora, newsgroups, social media and crowd-sourcing platforms are offering endless opportunities for researchers and practitioners to “listen” to marketplace stakeholders; including customers, employees, suppliers, investors and the media.

Unlike the traditional transactional records that were conspicuous in past legacy systems, e-commerce systems continuously gather insightful data from the web. Much of the value of data is derived from secondary uses that were not intended in the first place. Every dataset can possess some intrinsic, hidden, not-yet-unearthed value. Having said that, many potential applications could skim along the edges of what might be ethical, moral or even legal.

In addition, online review sites and personal blogs often contain opinion-rich information that may be explored through textual and sentiment analysis. Arguably, consumer sentiment analysis may not be designed for automation but could be better adapted for the real-time monitoring of the marketing environment. Successful businesses strive to understand their customers’ personas so that they target them the right content with the relevant tone, imagery and value propositions.

Therefore, advertisers continuously gather consumer data and use it well to personalise every aspect of their users’ experience. They strive to take advantage of their consumers’ cognitive behaviour as they try to uncover and trigger consumer frailty at their individual level. It may appear that companies gather data on their customers in order to manipulate the market. They need to establish processes which determine when specific decisions are required. Firms use big data to delve into enormous volumes of information that they collect, generate or buy. Marketers need to realise that it’s important to analyse, decide and act expeditiously on data and analytics. It’s simply not enough to be able to monitor a continuing stream of information. Businesses should be quick in their decision making and take action.

Companies may use what they know about human psychology and consumer behaviour to set prices. Behavioural targeting is nothing new in digital marketing. When firms hold detailed information about their consumers, they may customise every aspect of their interaction with them. On the other hand, there could be instances when certain marketing practices could lead to unnecessary nuisances. Nowadays, customers are frequently bombarded with marketing endeavours including email promotions that are often picked up as spam. Therefore, one-size-fits-all messages could also have negative implications on prospective customers.

Eventually, firms could use this database to deliver promotional content to remind customers on their offerings. Consumer lists whether they are automated or in the cloud should always be used to deliver enhanced customer experiences. Customer-centric marketing is all about satisfying buyers. Customers may in turn become advocates for the business. Hence, technology has become instrumental for marketers in their ongoing interactions with people.

Evidently, without data, businesses could not keep a track record of their marketing effectiveness and performance stats. Engagement metrics; including, email-open rates, click through rates, pay per click and the like enable marketers to continually fine tune their individual customer targeting. Today, many individuals are becoming quite active on review sites, such as Yelp.com or Tripadvisor; and on social media channels; including Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin or Google Plus.These modern digital marketing tools are helping business to engage in social conversations with consumers. Social media networks are often rich in customer opinion and contain relevant behavioural information. Moreover, the social media analytics could capture fast-breaking trends on customer sentiments toward products, brands and companies.

Businesses may be interested in knowing whether there are changes in online sentiment and how these correlate with sales changes over time. Digital media is supporting many businesses to map out how customers receive promotions, messages, newsletters and even advertisements. Relevant data is also helping these businesses to keep a focus on their customer needs and wants.

This contribution suggests that there is scope for businesses to consider realigning (and personalising) their incentives toward individual consumers by using data-driven marketing. Many businesses have become proficient on the use of maintaining databases of prospects and customer lists. They gather this valuable information to communicate and build relationships. This data collection may possibly drive new revenue streams and build long-term loyalty.

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June 19, 2015 · 9:46 am

Crunching Big Data for Operations Management

Big data

For decades businesses have been using data in some way or another to improve their operations. For instance, an IT software could support small enterprises in their customer-facing processes. Alternatively, large corporations may possess complex systems that monitor and detect any changes in consumer sentiment towards brands.

Recently, many industry leaders, including McKinsey, IBM and SAS among others have released relevant studies on big data. It transpires that they are using similar terminology to describe big data as a “situation where the volume, velocity and variety of data exceed an organisation’s ability to use that data for accurate and timely decision-making” (SAS). These providers of business intelligence solutions have developed technical approaches to storing and managing enormous volumes of new data.

The handling and untangling of such data requires advanced and unique storage, management, analysis and visualisation technologies. The terms of “big data” and “analytics” are increasingly being used to describe data sets and analytical techniques in applications ranging from sensor to social media. Usually, big data analytics are dependent on extensive storage capacity and quick processing power requiring a flexible grid that can be reconfigured for different needs. For instance, streaming analytics process big data in real time during events to improve their outcome.

Insightful data could easily be retrieved from the Web, social media content and video data among other content. Notwithstanding, such data could be presented in different forms; ranging from recorded vocal content (e.g. call centre voice data) or it can even be genomic and proteomic data that is derived from biological research and medicine.
Big data is often used to describe the latest advances in technologies and architectures. Nowadays, big data and marketing information systems predict customer purchase decisions. This data could indicate which products or services customers buy, where and what they eat, where and when they go on vacation, how much they buy, and the like.

Giant retailers such as Tesco or Sainsbury every single day receive long-range weather forecasts to work 8-10 days ahead. Evidently, the weather affects the shopping behaviour of customers. For example, hot and cold weather can lead to the sales of certain products. It may appear that weather forecasting dictates store placement, ordering and supply (and demand) logistics for supermarket chains. Other retailers like Walmart and Kohl’s also use big data to tailor product selections and determine the timing of price markdowns.

Shipping companies, like U.P.S. are mining data on truck delivery times and traffic patterns in order to fine-tune their routing. This way the business will become more efficient and incur less operational costs. Therefore, big data extracts value by capturing, discovering and analysing very large volumes of data in an economic and expeditious way. This has inevitably led to a significant reduction in the cost of keeping data.

Big data can also be linked with production applications and timely operational processes that enable continuous improvements. Credit card companies are a good illustration of this dynamic as direct marketing groups at credit card companies create models to select the most likely customer prospects from a large data warehouse. Previously, the process of data extraction, preparation and analysis took weeks to prepare and organise. Eventually, these companies realised that there was a quicker way to carry out the same task. In fact, they created a “ready-to-market” database and system that allowed their marketers to analyse, select and issue offers in a single day. Therefore, this case indicates that businesses became much more effective (and efficient) in their processes through iterations and monitoring of websites and call-centre activities. They could also make personalised offers to customers in milliseconds as they kept tracking responses over time.

Organisations are increasingly realising the utility of data that could bring value through continuous improvements in their operations. This contribution indicated that relevant data needs to be captured, filtered and analysed. Big data is already swamping traditional networks, storage arrays and relational database platforms. The increased pervasiveness of digital and mobile activity, particularly from e-commerce and social media is leading to the dissemination of meaningful data – that is being created each and every second. Successful, online businesses can gain a competitive advantage if they are capable of gathering and crunching data.

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May 30, 2015 · 4:11 pm

The future of marketing is mobile…

mobile

An IBM (2012) technology trends survey indicated that mobile devices could increase the productivities and efficiencies of organisations. This study showed that mobile software was the second most “in demand” area for research and development. In addition, Gartner BI Hype Cycle (2012) also anticipated that mobile analytics was one of the latest technologies that may potentially disrupt the business intelligence market. At the same time, the market for mobile advertising is escalating at a very fast pace. Interestingly, eMarketer (2012) had predicted that mobile advertising shall experience a surge from an estimated $2.6 billion in 2012 to more than $10.8 billion in 2016. Evidently, there are niche areas for professional growth, particularly in this specialised field; as more and more individuals are increasingly creating new applications for mobile operating systems.

Recent advances in mobile communication and geo-positioning technologies have presented marketers with a new way how to target consumers based on their location. Location-targeted mobile advertising involves the provision of ad messages to cellular subscribers based on their geographic locations. This digital technology allows marketers to deliver ads and coupons that are customised to individual consumers’ tastes, geographic location and time of day. Given the ubiquity of mobile devices, location-targeted mobile advertising seems to offer tremendous marketing benefits.

In addition, many businesses are commonly utilising applications, including browser cookies that track consumers through their mobile devices as they move out and about. Once these users leave these sites, the products or services that they had viewed online will be shown to them again in advertisements, across different websites. Hence, businesses are using browsing session data combined with the consumers’ purchase history to deliver “suitable” items that consumers like. Therefore, savvy brands are becoming increasingly proficient in personalising their offerings as they collect, classify and use large data volumes on their consumers’ behaviours. As more consumers carry smartphones with them, they are (or may be) receiving compelling offers that instantaneously pop up on their mobile devices.

For instance, consumers are continuously using social networks and indicating their geo location as they use mobile apps. This same data can be used to identify where people tend to gather — information that could be useful in predicting real estate prices et cetera. This information is valuable to brands as they seek to improve their consumer engagement and marketing efforts. Businesses are using mobile devices and networks to capture important consumer data. Smart phones and tablets that are wifi-enabled interact with networks and convey information to network providers and ISPs. This year, more brands shall be using mobile devices and networks as a sort of sensor data – to acquire relevant information on their consumers’ digital behaviours and physical movements. These businesses have become increasingly interactive through the proliferation of near-field communication (NFC). Basically, embedded chips in the customers’ mobile phones are exchanging data with retailers’ items possessing the NFC tags. It is envisaged that mobile wallet transactions using NFC technologies are expected to reach $110 billion, by the year 2017. The latest Android and Microsoft smartphones have already include these NFC capabilities. Moreover, a recent patent application by Apple has revealed its plans to include NFC capabilities in their next products. This will inevitably lead to an increase in the use of mobile wallets (GSMA, 2015). Undoubtedly, the growth of such data-driven, digital technologies is adding value to customer-centric marketing. Therefore, analytics can enable businesses to provide a deeper personalisation of content and offers to specific customers.

Apparently, there are promising revenue streams in the mobile app market. Both Apple and Android are offering paid or free ad-supported apps in many categories. There are also companies that have developed apps for business intelligence. For example, enterprise / industry-specific apps, e-commerce apps and social apps. Evidently, the lightweight programming models of the current web services (e.g., HTML, XML, CSS, Ajax, Flash, J2E) as well as the maturing mobile development platforms such as Android and iOS have also contributed to the rapid proliferation of mobile applications (Chen et al., 2012). Moreover, researchers are increasingly exploring mobile sensing apps that are location-aware and activity-sensitive.

Possible future research avenues include mobile social innovation for m-learning; (Sharples, Taylor and Vavoula, 2010; Motiwalla, 2007), mobile social networking and crowd-sourcing (Lane et al., 2010), mobile visualisation (Corchado and Herrero, 2011), personalisation and behavioural modelling for mobile apps in gamification (Ha et al., 2007), mobile advertising and social media marketing (Bart et al., 2014; Yang et al., 2013). Google’s (2015) current projects include gesture and touch interaction; activity-based and context-aware computing; recommendation of social and activity streams; analytics of social media engagements, and end-user programming (Dai, Rzeszotarski, Paritosh and Chi, 2015;  Fowler, Partridge, Chelba, Bi, Ouyang and Zhai, 2015; Zhong, Weber, Burkhardt, Weaver and Bigham, 2015; Brzozowski, Adams and Chi, 2015).

 

References:

Bart, Y., Stephen, A. T., & Sarvary, M. (2014). Which products are best suited to mobile advertising? A field study of mobile display advertising effects on consumer attitudes and intentions. Journal of Marketing Research, 51(3), 270-285.

Brzozowski, M. J., Adams, P., & Chi, E. H. (2015, April). Google+ Communities as Plazas and Topic Boards. In Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 3779-3788). ACM. Retrieved May 22nd, 2015, from http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/research.google.com/en//pubs/archive/43453.pdf

Chen, H., Chiang, R. H., & Storey, V. C. (2012). Business Intelligence and Analytics: From Big Data to Big Impact. MIS quarterly, 36(4), 1165-1188.

Corchado, E., & Herrero, Á. (2011). Neural visualization of network traffic data for intrusion detection. Applied Soft Computing, 11(2), 2042-2056.

Dai, P., Rzeszotarski, J. M., Paritosh, P., & Chi, E. H. (2015). And Now for Something Completely Different: Improving Crowdsourcing Workflows with Micro-Diversions. In Proceedings of the 18th ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work & Social Computing (pp. 628-638). ACM. Retrieved May 17th, 2015, from http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2675260

eMarketer (2012). eMarketer in the News: June 1, 2012 Retrieved January 28th, 2015, from http://www.emarketer.com/newsroom/index.php/emarketer-news-june-1-2012/

Fowler, A., Partridge, K., Chelba, C., Bi, X., Ouyang, T., & Zhai, S. (2015, April). Effects of Language Modeling and its Personalization on Touchscreen Typing Performance. In Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 649-658). ACM. Retrieved May15th, 2015, from http://cslu.ohsu.edu/~fowlera/Fowler_CHI2015.pdf

Gartner (2012). Big Data Drives Rapid Changes in Infrastructure and $232 Billion in IT Spending Through 2016. Retrieved January 20th, 2015, from https://www.gartner.com/doc/2195915/big-data-drives-rapid-changes

Google (2015). Human-Computer Interaction and Visualization Research at Google. Retrieved May 20th, 2015, from http://research.google.com/pubs/Human-ComputerInteractionandVisualization.html

Ha, I., Yoon, Y., & Choi, M. (2007). Determinants of adoption of mobile games under mobile broadband wireless access environment. Information & Management, 44(3), 276-286.

IBM (2012) Tech Trends Report. Fast track to the future. Retrieved May15th, 2015, from http://www-01.ibm.com/common/ssi/cgi-bin/ssialias?subtype=XB&infotype=PM&appname=CHQE_XI_XI_USEN&htmlfid=XIE12346USEN&attachment=XIE12346USEN.PDF#loaded

Lane, N. D., Miluzzo, E., Lu, H., Peebles, D., Choudhury, T., & Campbell, A. T. (2010). A survey of mobile phone sensing. Communications Magazine, IEEE, 48(9), 140-150.

Motiwalla, L. F. (2007). Mobile learning: A framework and evaluation. Computers & Education, 49(3), 581-596.

Sharples, M., Taylor, J., & Vavoula, G. (2010). A theory of learning for the mobile age. In Medienbildung in neuen Kulturräumen (pp. 87-99). VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften.

Yang, B., Kim, Y., & Yoo, C. (2013). The integrated mobile advertising model: The effects of technology-and emotion-based evaluations. Journal of Business Research, 66(9), 1345-1352.

Zhong, Y., Weber, A., Burkhardt, C., Weaver, P., & Bigham, J. P. (2015). Enhancing Android accessibility for users with hand tremor by reducing fine pointing and steady tapping. In Proceedings of the 12th Web for All Conference (p. 29). ACM. Retrieved Ma7 20th, 2015, from http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2747277

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February 7, 2015 · 7:36 pm

Better Access to Finance for European Enterprises

Although there has been substantial research on enterprises; information on their financing needs is quite limited. Small business entities are often viewed by financial institutions as relatively risky. In this light, the European Union (EU) continues to reaffirm its support for the small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). As a matter of fact, the EU has drafted the ‘Small Business Act’ in 2008 and has refined it again in 2011. Another example of the EU’s commitment in this regard is conspicuous as it frequently calls for research and training schemes in the subject area of ‘SMEs’, where grants are issued under ‘Marie Curie’ and ‘Cordis FP7’ programmes.

Very often, small firms tend to find themselves in an equity gap, where it may prove quite hard to acquire capital. Although commercial banks are key providers of finance for many enterprises through the provision of loans; unsecured debt finance without collateral is very limited. Therefore, SMEs’ growth into viable investment opportunities may be severely restricted. Throughout the years, the EU has dedicated several funds to help these small (and micro) enterprises. Recently, the EU’s Enterprise and Industry Division has reiterated the importance of improving access to finance for SMEs. This interesting development has led to numerous funding schemes and to a new generation of financial instruments that support SMEs’ financing needs. Evidently, the EU has committed itself to boost its support for SMEs through various financing programmes, as illustrated in Table 1.

Table 1: EU measures that support SMEs

EU SMESource: EU (2015).

Europe is responding to the contentious issues facing SMEs by providing a mix of flexible, financial instruments under programmes, such as; the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP), Progress Microfinance, the Risk Sharing Instrument (FP7), EIB loans and Structural Funds. For instance, the EU (in 2013) allocated a budget of €2.3bn specifically to bolster the “Competitiveness of Enterprises and Small and Medium-sized Enterprises” (COSME) during the period between 2014 to 2020. This initiative has been designed to support European SMEs in four key areas:

  • Developing entrepreneurship;
  • Helping SMEs access finance;
  • Supporting SMEs who wish to internationalise their business, and
  • Reducing the legislative and regulatory burden on SMEs.

Almost 220,000 SMEs profited from the Commission’s Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP) programme (EU, 2013). CIP has proved to be a very successful programme over the past few years. Since 2007, there were many SMEs that had benefited from CIP Funding . In fact, CIP was able to stimulate more than €15 billion of financing for SMEs, so far (EU, 2013). With a budget of €1.1 billion (CIP) has helped to mobilise over €13 billion of loans and €2.3 billion of venture capital for SMEs across Europe. Under its SME guarantee facility, CIP has helped nearly 220,000 SMEs to access loans.

These loan guarantees are required by individual entrepreneurs or  small enterprises that do not possess sufficient collateral.  Every euro that is dedicated to guarantees will in turn stimulate 30 euros in bank loans (EU, 2013).

Sources:

EU (2015) Improving the financing environment in Europe. http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/policies/finance/financing-environment/index_en.htm accessed on the 20th January 2015.

EU (2013) Improving access to finance for SMEs: key to economic recovery. http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-13-387_en.htm?locale=FR accessed on the 20th January 2015.

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February 2, 2015 · 5:38 pm

Using Big Data for Customer-Centric Marketing

Big data

The latest advances in information and communications technologies have brought significant improvements for the processing and storage of digital information. Nowadays, users can easily access multiple sources of data that is readily available through websites, social media networks as well as from mobile devices, including smart phones and tablets. These developments have inevitably led to endless opportunities for marketers to leverage themselves by using big data analytics.

Big data has expanded in recent years. As a matter of fact, digital data has dwarfed analogue content and continues to grow at an exponential rate. This data is being collected and stored in massive amounts by search engines and eCommerce conglomerates. In addition, more information is being gathered through social media networks. In fact, all individuals leave a digital trail of data as they move about in the virtual and physical worlds. This phenomenon is called, “data exhaust”. Initially, this term was used to describe how Amazon.com used predictive analytics in order to suggest items for customers. Hence, predictive analytics anticipates human behaviours that have not happened yet. Evidently, it is based on large amounts of current and past indicative data that has been collected from multiple sources. Yet, at the moment, such analytics cannot determine when and why individuals may change their preferences for certain brands. Another new addition to big data is called preventative analytics. This latter one is aimed at reducing the likelihood of contingent situations, risk and uncertainty. It may be particularly relevant in the fields of healthcare, public services and law enforcement.

Data is the new currency for connecting people, ideas and products. Today, digital information is being gathered in innovative, new ways that have dramatically changed and improved consumers’ experience. For instance, online businesses are commonly utilising browser cookies to track websites that are visited by internet users. Once individual users leave these sites, some of the products or services they had viewed; will be shown to them again and again in native advertisements, across different websites. Therefore, businesses are using browsing session data, combined with the consumers’ purchase history to deliver “suitable” items for consumers. Many brands are becoming quite proficient in personalising their offerings – as they collect, classify and use large data volumes on consumers’ behaviours.

This year, more brands shall be using mobile devices and networks to acquire sensory data. As more customers are increasingly carrying smartphones with them, they are (or may be) getting used to receiving compelling offers that instantaneously pop up on their mobile devices. This type of geo-based marketing message is delivered at the right time and the right place. Of course, firms will need more than transaction history and loyalty schemes to be effective at this. They will inevitably require socio-demographic and geo-data that other businesses are not capturing. Moreover, anonymous cookieless data-capture methods are connecting consumer data with matching geo-location-based data. It may appear that these methods are empowering marketers to hyper-target consumers with real-time mobile ad campaigns before, during and after in-store activity. Geo-location capabilities are not only enabling advertisers to capitalise on leads, in real time; but they can also offer valuable insights on shopping habits and consumer behaviours. This information is valuable to brands as they seek to acquire relevant information on their consumers’ digital behaviours and physical movements.

Notwithstanding, businesses have become even more interactive through the proliferation of near-field communication (NFC). Basically, NFCs are embedded chips situated inside smart devices. These chips exchange data with retailers’ items possessing NFC tags. It is envisaged that mobile wallet transactions using this NFC technology are expected to reach $110 billion by 2017 (CNBC, 2013). The latest Android and Microsoft smartphones already include these NFC capabilities. Indeed, these technological developments can enable businesses to provide a deeper personalisation of content as well as bespoken offers to individuals. Consumers use apps that may involuntarily indicate their geo-location to third parties. As a result, data collection has greatly benefited from geo-data services like satellites, near-field communication and global positioning systems. These systems track users’ movements that measure traffic and other real-time phenomena. Arguably, the emergence of such data-driven, digital technologies are adding value to customer-centric marketing endeavours. Unsurprisingly, sensor analytics, geo-location and social data-capture were some of the big trends that were recently announced during the 2015 Consumer Electronics Show.

Big data is fundamentally shifting how marketers collect, analyse and utilise data to reach out to customers. It is helping companies to get new insights into how consumers behave. The challenge for marketers is not to become dependent on big data and analytics to drive business strategies, but rather to recognise its value as a tool for customer satisfaction. Therefore, big data should inform, not consume marketing efforts. Perhaps, new marketing decision-making ought to harness big data for increased targeting and re-targeting of individuals and online communities. Lately, on-demand, real-time marketing has become more personalised. Every customer contact with a brand is a moment of truth, in real-time. Businesses who are not responding with seamless externally-facing solutions will risk losing their loyal customers to rivals.

This contribution suggests that a strategic approach to data management can generate leads and conversions. It also maintains that an evolving digital ecosystem will lead to superior levels of customer service, engagement and repeat business.

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December 10, 2014 · 8:53 pm

Anticipating a surge in social media usage during 2015

smm2
Firms are increasingly facing internal and external pressures to enhance their digital presence in social media platforms. This year, many businesses ought to focus on relationship-based interactions and employ inbound marketing techniques for the following reasons:
1. Consumers are Digitally-Empowered
The rapid proliferation of social media has significantly modified the nature of human activities, habitats, and interactions. Real-world social relationships have also migrated to the virtual world, resulting in online communities that bring people together from many contexts. This movement into the digital dimension allows individuals to share knowledge, entertain one another, and promote dialogues among different cultures. The question is no longer if people are signing in; the question is what they are signing in to and why they use certain applications to do so. From a consumer’s perspective, the use of information communication technologies may offer a number of benefits, including efficiency, convenience, richer and participative information, a broader selection of products, competitive pricing, cost reduction, and product diversity. Social media tend to enhance those benefits as consumers are able to communicate more proactively. For example, through social networking and online reviews, consumers can seek out others’ opinions about specific products. In doing so, they are valuing peer judgments in addition to the firms’ promotions; this trend may indicate a shift in the locus on the persuasive power of word-of-mouth marketing.
2. Social Media and Consumer Engagement
If many customers are on social media, then firms should also engage with customers on social media. Firms should seek to develop digital relationships by using promotional strategies that emphasise the co-creation of content and meaning. To this end, consumer reviews can be particularly helpful. Of course, firms have always communicated with their customers, whether online or through personal selling. However, today’s customers are able to respond to firms through digital communication tools. This recent development may create pressures on firms to adopt a more digital presence.
Therefore, the evolution of Web 2.0 represents a social revolution whereby firms are increasingly engaging with their customers online. It may appear that this is a ubiquitous phenomenon that is related to significant global advances in information communication technologies as well as to lower costs for internet access and usage. These developments have set the stage for major shifts in digital marketing strategies and tactics, particularly with respect to the integrated marketing communications dimensions.
3) Building Brand Equity through Content Marketing
The web is an extremely powerful tool for marketers who are interested in creating stronger brands. Many businesses are already using social media as a channel of communication with their customers. Lately, savvy marketers are focusing their attention on content and inbound marketing as they strive to enhance their visibility online. The right content on corporate websites, blogs and social media can build the brands’ image and reputation. Carefully designed landing pages often use persuasive content which can ultimately bring good prospects through the buying funnel. Therefore, marketers are encouraged to try different formats of content as they engage with their potential customers.
Digital marketers should feature content which should be a good fit for their target customers as well as for their corporate objectives. Their marketing content may be displayed on: web pages; online articles and guest posts; blog posts social media posts, eBooks, presentations; customer review content, product FAQs; videos and micro-videos; pictures, infographics, and animated GIFs among other media. Businesses are increasingly creating a broad range of online content for many reasons. Quality content has the ability to educate, inform, generate leads and entice customers. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that the notion of content marketing is gaining ground, particularly in the C-Suite.
4) Viral Marketing and Word-of-Mouth Campaigns
It is widely believed that the word-of-mouth “buzz” about products may lead to conversions, product adoptions and sales. Therefore, firms are increasingly relying on social networks and “viral” marketing strategies. The term viral marketing describes the phenomenon by which consumers mutually share and spread marketing-relevant information online. Of course, it is in the businesses’ interest to leverage themselves through word-of-mouth (WOM) publicity on social networks. Such digital marketing stimuli may result in social contagion by means of e-mails, posts, likes, tweets et cetera. Therefore the dispersion of all marketing messages will then rely on the consumers themselves.
It goes without saying, publicity is more cost efficient than traditional mass-media advertising. Very often, successful marketing campaigns may trigger a strong emotional response in recipients. The effects of viral messages may possibly contain primary emotions (including surprise, joy, sadness, anger, fear, and disgust among others) on the recipients’ emotional responses to the creative ads and may even result in subsequent forwarding behaviours.
In conclusion, this article suggests that social media and digital marketing have already transformed the way how businesses engage with customers. Perhaps there’s an opportunity out there for businesses to differentiate themselves through interactive marketing. For instance, social media may provide simpler, faster and effective platforms that can reach different consumer segments. Notwithstanding, viral marketing tactics seem to offer a means of marketing communications at relatively low-cost, with a significantly reduced-response time and an increased potential for market impact.


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November 20, 2014 · 7:18 pm

Digital Marketing trends to look out for during 2015

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(This contribution also appeared on Business2Community.com)

As 2014 is winding down, it’s time for businesses to start planning their marketing strategy in a business scenario that is continuously changing at the speed of technology. Firms should adapt themselves to the online marketing environment. Many marketers are already chasing their daily meanderings in terms of “likes”, “shares”, “tweets”, click-through rates and ever more immediate metrics. All these interesting developments on internet allow businesses to differentiate themselves to get ahead of their rivals. Smart marketers regularly collect social data to offer more personalised, relevant and wanted content toward customers. Interestingly, 78% of marketers believe that data-driven marketing via digital channels is the path to new growth (American Marketing Association, 2014). In a sense, web 2.0 has helped businesses to share relevant information about their branded products, service features and propositions that may have generated leads and conversions. Nowadays, some of the best businesses are focusing their attention on inbound marketing techniques as they diligently segment their audiences and target them with online advertising through different social platforms:

  1. Social Media Marketing: It is in the businesses’ interest to get to know about the demographic profile of customers. In addition they should be aware of the latest contemporary trends and conversations that are happening on social networks. Businesses ought to present themselves in a way that feels native and endemic to customers. One of the main ways that companies are establishing authority and trust among their consumers is by consistently creating high quality content that may provide useful and interesting insights to audiences. Through integrated marketing communications involving social media channels, companies are steadily building a strong rapport with customers, which will inevitably help them to develop brand equity.
  2. Ad Re-Targeting: Today, businesses use content marketing tactics by producing valuable, engaging content that is designed for specific customers. Content on social media is becoming more conversational in nature. Consumers value those brands that show their human face. They consider them as trustworthy and authentic. Therefore, businesses communicate with their targeted audiences to build fruitful relationships with loyal followers. Several marketers are increasingly becoming quite proficient in re-targeting customers. Retargeting works by utilising browser cookies that track websites that are visited by internet users. Once the users leave these sites, the products or services they viewed will be shown to them again in advertisements, across different websites. Therefore, ad retargeting works to increase the overall conversion rate by reminding consumers of the product or service they had viewed. This keeps the brand and the product at the top of the consumers’ minds. Many studies have indicated that simple exposure to brand names and logos may ultimately lead to purchase decisions. Even if there’s no instantaneous purchase, an increased brand awareness can really pay off in the long run.
  3. Search Engine Optimisation: The goal of Google, Bing and other search engines is to provide their users with the most relevant and highest quality content. It goes without saying that, these days social signals may play a key role in organic search rankings. As more people share content through social media channels, it is very likely that the most popular content will be featured in search engine results. It’s no coincidence that the top-ranking search results tend to have lots of social shares, while those ranked lower have fewer. Moreover, social shares may often serve as a stamp of approval or can be considered as a trust signal for visitors. That’s why so many businesses are installing social share plugins and encouraging consumers to share their content, as much as possible.
  4. Mobile Marketing: We are living in an era that is characterised by mobile readiness, responsive designs as well as the revival of ‘going local,’ Businesses are encouraged to produce content that “scales down” on mobiles. Such content may include marketing emails, eNewsletters, websites, social posts and the like. According to (Forbes, 2013), “87% of connected devices sales by 2017 will be tablets and smartphones”. Whether businesses opt to create an alternative mobile version of a website or decide to utilise responsive web design, it’s important for them to provide a positive experience for those internet users that are browsing via mobile devices.
  5. Video Marketing: When it comes to potential reach, video is peerless. YouTube is currently receiving more than one billion unique visitors every month – that’s more than any other channel, apart from Facebook. For the record, “one out of three Britons view at least one online video a week – that’s a weekly audience of more than 20 million people in the UK alone” (Guardian, 2014). Of course, it’s vital for businesses to offer content that is easy to digest; if not, consumers will simply move on. Apps such as Twitter’s Vine (with its six-second maximum clip length) have dramatically increased the opportunity for businesses to upload social videos having authentic content.

In a nutshell, this contribution suggests that next year many businesses will increasingly resort to digital marketing tactics to reach their individual consumers. eMarketer (2014) anticipates that in the next 12 months,  the marketing budget that is allocated to social media will rise to 13.2% (from 9.4%). It is imperative that marketers learn how to  engage with online visitors through effective, relevant content. Notwithstanding, it may appear that electronic marketing has changed consumers’ mindsets and behavioural attitudes toward businesses. Perhaps, there’s an opportunity for businesses to leverage themselves through faster adaptations, shorter lead times and always-on, real-time marketing.

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November 6, 2014 · 6:20 pm

Re-conceiving Corporate Sustainability and Responsibility for Education

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(This contribution also appeared on CSRwire)

During their learning journey, individuals acquire knowledge and skills that ought to be relevant for their prospective employment. The provision of their education is the responsibility of national governments. Yet, business and industry seldom offer continuous professional development and training to their human resources that supplement formal education (although they are rarely involved in setting outcomes of curriculum programmes). Very often, companies have to respond to challenging issues such as skill mismatches where candidates lack certain competencies that may be too deep to bridge through corporate training courses. Perhaps, global businesses may compensate to a certain extent as they can shift their operations elsewhere to tap more qualified employees. However, the constraints on their growth can be halted by the broad impact of inadequate education and training in some industries or regions. Therefore, corporations may possibly become a key player in addressing unmet needs in education. Several companies have the resources and the political influence to help improve educational outcomes which will in turn help them to nurture local talent. Leading businesses are already devising Corporate Sustainability and Responsibility (CSR) programmes that are actively supporting education across many contexts:

For instance; Cisco (a provider of networking equipment), has created more than 10,000 networking academies in 165 countries. 4.75 million individuals have improved their employment prospects as they attended training to become network administrators. At the same time, these individuals have increased the demand for Cisco’s equipment. Similarly, SAP and Verizon have often partnered with local universities and education institutions in order to deliver courses, career coaching and customised degrees on site for employees. The companies have discovered that employees that pursue such programmes are more likely to remain loyal to their company. Naturally, it is in the interest of employees to attend educational programmes that may ultimately lead to their career progression and better prospects. Moreover, continuous professional development and training may considerably reduce high employee turnover. Interestingly, SAP employs people with autism in technology-focused roles. In doing so, SAP concentrates on these individuals’ unique strengths. This way, the company can gain access to a wider pool of untapped talent that will help to foster a climate of creativity and innovation. In a similar vein, Intel has also invested in training programmes and partnerships that strengthen education. The company has recognised that its business growth is constrained by a chronic shortage of talent in science, technology, engineering, and maths (STEM) disciplines. Through programmes like Intel Math and Intel Teach, the global multinational has delivered instructional materials, online resources, and professional development tools for hundreds of thousands of educators across the United States. The students’ have acquired STEM and other 21st century skills, including critical thinking with data as well as scientific inquiry. This is a relevant example of a corporate business that has successfully addressed its workforce needs. Intel has recognised specific skill gaps in its central areas like technology and engineering. Accordingly, the company has committed itself for further investment in education. The company has created higher education curricula in demand areas like microelectronics, nanotechnology, security systems and entrepreneurship. Undoubtedly, Intel’s efforts affected millions of US students. At the same time, the company has increased its productivity and competitiveness. In addition, there are many big businesses that contribute in stewardship, charitable and philanthropic causes. In the past, the GE Foundation has supported systemic improvements in urban school districts that were close to GE’s business. These investments have surely helped to close the interplay between corporate sustainability and responsibility (CSR) and corporate philanthropy, while strengthening GE’s long-term talent pipeline.

In a nutshell, this contribution redefines the private sector’s role in the realms of education. It posits that there are win-win opportunities for companies and national governments as they cultivate human capital. Indeed, companies can create synergistic value for both business and society. In the main, such a strategic approach can result in new business models and cross-sector collaborations that will inevitably lead to operational efficiencies, cost savings and significant improvements to the firms’ bottom lines. Notwithstanding, the businesses’ involvement in setting curricula may also help to improve the effectiveness of education systems in many contexts. Businesses can become key stakeholders in this regard. Their CSR programmes can reconnect their economic success with societal progress.

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August 30, 2014 · 11:44 pm

Environmental Responsibility in the Hospitality Sector

In a recent media release Hyatt has reiterated its commitment to environmental stewardship with a focus on energy, waste and water reduction, sustainable building, supply chain management as well as stakeholder engagement. In Hyatt’s Corporate Responsibility Report, the listed hotel corporation has unveiled an aggressive set of environmental goals for the year 2020, all designed to strengthen Hyatt’s collective ability to collaborate, inspire and further its commitment to environmental stewardship. Hyatt has also defined a suite of measurable and actionable targets. Hyatt hotels aim to create a more sustainable future for themselves and for their neighbours. The hotel group posits that the conservation efforts have reaped fruit, resulting in major reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and water and energy usage by property across their portfolio. Hyatt maintains that its commitment to environmental stewardship touches every aspect of its business, from the way how the hotels are built and operated, to the way they collaborate with their global supply chain, to the way the hotel chain influences change through the passion and commitment of its employees around the world.
Setting Focus Areas
Hyatt 2020 Vision focuses on significantly expanding the global chain’s strategic scope, especially in areas where past efforts have not had as much of an impact due to occupancy fluctuations and rapid business growth in developing markets. With this in mind, the hotel chain’s three strategic priorities include the following;
• “Use Resources Thoughtfully: Hyatt is committed to examining how its hotels source, consume and manage natural resources to serve their guests. Hyatt will identify ways for Hyatt hotels to reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, use less water, produce less waste and make more environmentally responsible purchasing decisions. As a highlight, Hyatt has set the goal to reduce water use per guest night by 25 percent, and within water-stressed areas, Hyatt has set a 30 percent reduction goal. Additionally, Hyatt is elevating its recycling efforts by challenging every hotel to reach a 40 percent diversion rate, as well as by setting a recycling goal for renovation waste.
• Build Smart: Hyatt will work closely with stakeholders to increase the focus on building more efficient, environmentally conscious hotels across the enterprise. Beginning in 2015, all new construction and major renovation projects contracted for Hyatt managed hotels will be expected to follow enhanced sustainable design guidelines. Hyatt will lead this initiative by mandating that all new construction and major renovation projects for wholly owned full service hotels and resorts achieve LEED certification, or an equivalent certification.
• Innovate and Inspire: This goal reflects Hyatt’s commitment to be a catalyst for bringing more hearts, hands and minds to the table to help advance environmental sustainability around the world. This includes Hyatt’s commitment to create a funding mechanism to support the innovation, ideation and acceleration of sustainable solutions within its hotels that can be replicated across the Hyatt portfolio, as well as the broader hospitality industry” (Hyatt Corporate Responsibility Report, 2013/2014).

Reporting Progress
Hyatt’s reported some of its major milestones, including:

• “The launch of Ready to Thrive, Hyatt’s global corporate philanthropy program focused on literacy and career readiness, which included a $750,000 investment in career readiness programs in Brazil.
• Building 11 libraries and supporting reading and writing programs in 30 schools through a new partnership with Room to Read, impacting 30,000 students in India.
• Donating 35,000 books to kids in need across the globe through We Give Books and Room to Read.
• Donating more than 100,000 volunteer hours in 2013 – a 69 percent increase from 2012.
• More than 80 percent of Hyatt hotels recycling at least one or more waste streams.
• A reduction in resource use intensity in each of Hyatt’s three regions compared to 2006 – up to a 20 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, up to a 13 percent reduction in energy and up to a 15 percent reduction in water.
• Development of responsible seafood sourcing goals based on a global purchasing audit in partnership with World Wildlife Fund.
• Required more than 40,000 of its global associates — including housekeepers, front office, concierge, guest services, key service and security personnel, and all management-level colleagues — to complete Human Trafficking Prevention Training. Hyatt also implemented a standard for all of its hotels to have training measures in place” (Hyatt Corporate Responsibility Report, 2013/2014).

Sources:
Hyatt Thrive: http://thrive.hyatt.com/en/thrive.html
Hyatt Corporate Responsibility Report (2013-2014): http://thrive.hyatt.com/content/dam/Minisites/hyattthrive/Hyatt%20Corporate%20Responsibility%20Report-2013-2014.pdf

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