This article is a great reminder of the importance of strategic thinking when putting together a marketing campaign. So often people try to translate one message into multiple media without thinking about the strengths and weaknesses of that channel, who the audience is and what they expect from that channel.

“…in an era where we are conducting online surveys of customer databases more than ever, why would anyone on that list ever not qualify? You don’t have to look at the data for people that don’t meet some tactical criterion–this time–but if a customer is willing to complete a survey instrument, why ever dump them out of it if they are the wrong age/zip code/smell/blood type/whatever? You might find a use for that data elsewhere. And it’s also another opportunity to thank people for being customers. Just a thought.”

Click here for the full article.

And that’s really the point. Be thoughtful about your marketing.

It’s really important to have fresh content on your website and social media platforms on a regular basis, but it’s also important to think about what you want that content to do.

This Social Media Examiner article looks at 3 purposes for content from the perspective of the sales funnel.

#1: Raise Awareness at the Top of the Funnel

#2: Encourage Consideration in the Middle of the Funnel

#3: Drive Action at the Bottom of the Funnel

Today’s “introspection question”:

What percentage of your online content is oriented to which one of these three?

Want to dig deeper? Click here to see the details.

Perhaps the most important part of Marketing is getting people to respond positively to a call to action. Behavioral Research shows that we tend to respond more positively to others we have something in common with. This article says that effect is enhanced if the attribute is “uncommon”.

“…managers and leaders looking to encourage an atmosphere of cooperation and support among their teams would be advised to take extra time to focus attention on the things that their teams share. On what binds, rather than divides them.”

Click here for the full article.

What “uncommon” attribute can you use in your next marketing piece that will cause your target market to be more likely to respond?

One of the impacts of the internet is the “democratization of marketing.” By that we mean that anyone can become a marketer (or critic) on social media. There are even stories in traditional media that give direction on how to be an online “critic” using a tool like Yelp.

Click here for the full article.

Do you ever leave reviews?

Are you more likely to leave a review for good service or bad service?

Do you rely on social media reviews when shopping online?

Businesses want to know what ROI their Digital Marketing will achieve. To them it’s all about moving an audience to make a purchase decision because that is what pays the bills. It takes planning based on the budget and requires measuring and adapting the message and medium to the feedback of the audience. It takes repetition and time.

In the digital age the steps are essentiality the same but the distance between the steps is shorter.

Look at the findings of this recent study at Acxiom:

“…online ads, when optimized for frequency and volume as detailed below, do indeed drive incremental in-store revenue – and lots of it. Findings indicated that the frequency of exposure should fall somewhere between the range of 10 and 100 impressions and the optimal length of a campaign should be between four to eight weeks in order for behavior to be influenced.

Ultimately, this need for multiple exposures over an extended period of time suggests that ads work incrementally to increase brand awareness. Rather than motivating an immediate response, they improve the odds that the person who saw them will, when the need or opportunity arises, choose the advertiser’s product.”

Click here to see the full article.

How does your online marketing budget take this reality into account?

Lots of practical application in this article, but this observation is profound:

“Look at the services that showed marked year-over-year growth: Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat, and Vine’s debut at 9%. The social networking space is showing signs of being an actual, you know, market, with a wider variety of players all developing significant user bases.”

Click here to read the full article.

How are you using this market to grow your business?

Everyone wants results from their advertising, but what does it cost to get results?

“Budget appropriately, because the very worst thing you can do with an ad is spend too little–it will get you the same results as spending nothing.”

Click here for the rest of Godin’s article.

Janine Gibson, the former U.S. editor of the Guardian, whom the Times unsuccessfully sought to hire, about the transformational nature of the internet on news:

The hardest part for me has been the realization that you don’t automatically get an audience. For someone with a print background, you’re accustomed to the fact that if it makes the editor’s cut—gets into the paper—you’re going to find an audience. It’s entirely the other way around as a digital journalist. The realization that you have to go to find your audience—they’re not going to just come and read it—has been transformative.

Read the whole story about the NYTimes “Innovation Report”.

How is your marketing being transformed by the power of audience choice? How are you giving your audience what they want?