Author archive for Andrew Stockwell
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What can we do about customers abandoning their shopping baskets?
As promised here is the follow up to my December blog about why customers abandon their shopping baskets.
Below I’ve given some tactical ideas on how to target and engage with these distinct segments.
Wish List’ers
They spend hours online. They look at every option and test the varieties. They may never buy from a company but they sure will fill their shopping basket up with things they wish they could buy. Offline they are called window shoppers. They are often the young, energetic and underfunded.
For these guys you need to create a sense of real urgency. Make them realise NOW is the time to buy. Limited stock…end of sale…4 hour offers…All help speed these orders through the checkout. Use emails leading with the most appropriate offer to catch the attention of these wish list shoppers who have not yet decided to buy, but want to. They just need the right excuse. Read more »
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Is there one magic button to rule them all?
In ‘The Lord of the Rings’ the evil Lord Sauron was always hunting for “the one magic ring that rules them all”. Luckily he’s not an online marketer as that sort of attitude just wouldn’t do…
Life would be very easy if one call to action could rule them all. Sites would all be identical and the one ‘super design agency’ would be shared by all companies. Unfortunately this is not the case. As online marketers we are uniquely placed to use the wealth of data and expertise at our disposals to understand exactly what works well on our websites and then select the right elements through testing and optimisation. Read more »
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Why do customers abandon their shopping baskets?
Why are we here? Who started the big bang? Why is the sky blue? Why on earth do customers abandon their shopping baskets??! There are some eternal questions people regularly ask; I’ll just focus on the last one in this blog….
Have you ever watched someone browsing around a high street shop? They bumble in after seeing the well groomed mannequin in the window, they thumb through the racks, may even try something on that is just a bit ‘too trendy for them’…well exactly the same thing happens online. Read more »
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7 habits of highly effective email marketers
We all know about the huge revenue generating potential of email marketing; the potential to communicate to customers at hyper speed for a fraction of the cost of a piece of snail mail…BUT we also know that not done effectively it can eat into the time and resources of a marketing team. Email marketing requires specialist knowledge and in today’s fast moving environment it also requires flexible minds to constantly tweak and evolve the plan to react to what the competition and the ISPs do to change the landscape. In my time working with some of the greatest minds in email marketing I’ve identified 7 habits which really set the most effective email marketers apart from the rest. Read more »
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Why analytics should be one of the first things considered when launching a new site…
When a new site launch is fully underway your stress levels are at an absolute maximum. Several things we know for sure are going to happen which will amplify this even further; business requirements will probably change, the content management systems won’t do exactly what you thought it would, your technical lead will invariably go off with a long term illness and in all probability your budget will run out far quicker than you thought. People may ask; why would you make this period even more painful by trying to focus additional time, effort and resources on the implementation of web analytics? The simple answer is web analytics will be your best friend, your success barometer, your truth teller and your provider of the gauge of success through the days/weeks/months after the launch.
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Objectives setting: Building success metrics into your planning. Don’t fly blind.
If I had a pound for every time I saw an online marketer building their campaign reports after the campaign has finished I would be a rich man.
We’ve all been there; lets get this email out, lets get this banner campaign live, oh no we’re in a recession let’s change our PPC campaigns to reflect this… but reporting should be part of every online marketing plan; it should be thought about by every stakeholder. Ask yourselves: what are the success metrics? What do I want to know? What do I want to show my boss? What can my boss pass up to his/her boss?
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Test, test, test. Testing should be the first line on any email marketing plan.
Test test test and test some more, then when you’ve learnt what makes a positive impact on your email results start testing all over again!
We’ve all heard about the benefits of email testing many times before; so why are so many big brands not testing? Is it a lack of resources? A lack of ideas? Or is it just that optimisation is not viewed as a key strategic goal? It might be worth adding one reason is because email is so cheap people don’t bother as the ROI is normally good whilst on expensive media (e.g. print or paid search) you have to test to optimise, to justify spend.
When writing an email, strategy testing should be central to every initiative. We should celebrate successful tests as they allow us to make change for the better, but we should also celebrate unsuccessful tests as they show us where to re-focus our testing efforts next time. The beauty of testing is it’s a win win situation.
