MarketingExperiments Blog: Research-driven optimization, testing, and marketing ideas

It’s the latest trend in print ads and TV commercials – drive customers to a landing page on Facebook instead of the brand’s own website or microsite. So, for example, a Toyota print ad with a contest might include Facebook.com/Toyota as the call-to-action this year when last year it was likely Toyota.com/contest.

So I can see the benefit to Mark Zuckerberg for you paying good money to drive all of your traffic to his site, but is a Facebook landing page the right call-to-action for your campaigns?

As with many marketing questions, there is no one correct answer, no one-size-fits-all solution. However, if you are thinking of using a Facebook landing page in your marketing, here are some factors to consider. Read more…

Hey buddy, why should I buy anything from you? OK, that’s a harsh way to start a blog post, but, essentially, what value do your products or offerings have to your buyers? Unless you nail that down, any marketing you do is just puffery (and ineffective puffery at that), not really communications.

As we continue to dive deeper into value proposition for an upcoming book we’re working on, we see an increased need to help marketers discover what value they truly offer customers. That word – discover – is key. You simply cannot dictate your value to your customers. You have to determine what truly works for them.

One of the biggest untapped resources for making that discovery is social media.

So in today’s blog post, let’s take a quick look at a few ways you can use social media to help discover your value proposition. And by help, I mean social media will not give you THE answer. But it will help you come up with a few ideas that you can then test which will ultimately lead to your most effective value proposition.
Read more…

This week marks the fielding of MarketingSherpa’s third annual Social Marketing Benchmark Survey. Looking back, I am fascinated at how far our practices have advanced in this channel in the past three years.

One of the most significant advances has been the materialization of the social marketing architecture.  This systematic redesign of how social media sites individually contribute to overall marketing performance, has also brought attention to the significant need to incorporate landing page optimization as an important element of a social marketing strategy. Read more…

For MarketingSherpa Email Summit 2011, we brought a few of our analysts along, set them up in the MECLABS booth, and let them loose live optimizing attendee emails and landing pages. Here is one example that we thought might be helpful for you as you optimize your own pages …

St. Stephen’s University (full disclosure: our Managing Director, Flint McGlaughlin, sits on the Board of Directors for St. Stephen’s University) has been driving traffic to landing page from a Facebook ad to collect leads on potential students. The problem is that a majority of leads aren’t converting to actual applications to the school.

Here is the landing page, and here is the lead capture form from the page:

After the user fills out the form they are redirected to a “thank you” page where they have the option to apply to the university at no cost. The school wants applicants, and not leads, and found through this campaign potential students who didn’t initially apply from the thank you page did not convert to applicants once the lead was transferred to an email follow-up campaign. Read more…

I’ve listened to the gurus and read their blogs. I studied the MarketingSherpa ROAD Map for social media marketing. Heck, I’ve taught that ROAD Map to a hall of very gracious marketers. From experience, I have to say that pretending to be a social media marketing guru is a pretty sweet gig.

So, when I had to roll up my sleeves and walk the walk, I had no idea how much work would go into just getting started. Read more…

So, you have a Facebook Page for your business. Check! You even have a couple of people “liking” it already (mostly friends and family). Check! It might also have your blog posts or website updates automatically appear on its wall. Great! But what now? Why aren’t your revenue charts spiking to the ceiling?! There is an update after an update, but is there actually anyone there? No response, no interaction – what’s the point then?

Managing a Facebook Fan Page takes more than that. The good news is that you can truly build a community of loyal fans converting to loyal customers over time. The best part is that it does not have to take most of your day (or budget, if you are considering hiring a social media manager to deal with it for you).

In fact, after making yourself familiar with few basic rules and getting the feel for your Facebook audience (since every industry and offer or product you want to promote is totally different), half an hour of daily Facebook management is all you need to maintain the flow and eventually stimulate conversion. Read more…