photo credit: Sirsnapsalot

With out Christmas List to Santa safely in the post, let’s take a look ahead to 2012, with a couple of New Year’s resolutions aimed at ensuring online marketing success over the next 12 months:

Improving your online marketing profile via social media has to be a big component of the New Year – if not the biggest. Get those fan pages up and running on Facebook and your account ready to roll on Twitter, along with messages urging customers to “Like” or “Follow” your brand.

Try to look up customers who were once frequent sights on your email listings but who have gone quiet in 2011. Many may be pleased to hear from you and as long as you are not seen to be pestering them, re-engagement efforts can improve your internet marketing successes.

As with all New Year’s resolutions, too many will cause you to lose your focus and willpower – so just bear these in mind for now, and OMD will keep suggesting other routes to online marketing success during the Christmas period – and beyond!

photo credit: Sean MacEntee

A recent study revealed that the primary online marketing portal for businesses remains their corporate or company website, despite the rise of internet marketing campaigns on social media.

The survey, by tech firm Demandbase and the Focus business network found that only personal referrals and recommendations from satisfied customers trump online marketing initiatives based on company websites when it comes to producing sales. Researchers found that such sites were seven times as effective at generating leads as social networks such as Twitter and Facebook.

Furthermore, almost 25 per cent of respondents admitted the most sales leads came from their website, followed by 14 per cent who selected email marketing campaigns. Online advertising came next, and social media scooped only 3 per cent of respondents’ recommendations.

Demandbase chief executive Chris Golec commented: “Despite its increasing influence, it’s important to keep in mind that no business sale is made without the buyer going to the corporate website first.”

photo credit: Asthma Helper

In the last 18 months there has been a huge surge in both the popularity and reach of social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter and now Google+. So how do businesses go about marketing a commercial website when everyone is spending all their time on social sites? Some businesses have taken themselves lock, stock and barrel over to Facebook in order to ride this social media wave.

But while social media channels are a perfect source of web traffic because they allow a high level of targeted marketing, a good business website is still an essential part of online marketing. A customer that finds you on Twitter, Facebook and suchlike will invariably expect to find a smart-looking website showcasing your products and services in all their pixelated glory.

SEO is NOT dead, inbound links are still crucial, and on-page SEO can’t be overlooked just because you signed up to every social channel available! Abandoning your website for a social platform may seem savvy in the present social media surge, but remember that ‘your’ Facebook real estate is still owned by someone else.

The key to a successful online marketing campaign is to treat your website as your core online presence, and use social media to promote, sell and communicate with customers. It’s your website and you own it – don’t be afraid to shout it from the heady heights of Twitter Towers and Castle Facebook.

Virgin Media Business urged retailers and other commercial companies to up their game and focus more online marketing efforts on Twitter.

Research carried out by Virgin found that too many businesses are failing to capitalise on the unique internet advertising potential of micro-blogging sites such as Twitter, and their close relatives – social networks such as Facebook. According to researchers, just 9 per cent of firms used Twitter for online marketing and only a third used social media.
“Since its founding, Twitter has changed the way we shop and engage with brands and, as such, has become a fantastic tool for customer engagement,” Virgin Media Business customer service director Phil Stewart commented.

The Centre for Retail Research director Joshua Bamfield admitted that “it is probably true that the smaller stores have not got on this bandwagon yet,” but added that this “may simply reflect the fact that they’re very busy, they don’t have the skills and they don’t see why they should bother.”

Sales figures seem to show, however, that those who do “bother” will ultimately reap the online marketing rewards.

photo credit: whatleydude

The UK Parliament is turning its scrutiny on internet advertising, following concerns about personal privacy sparked by the News of the World phone hacking scandal.

MPs want to investigate the data security and privacy issues surrounding online marketing efforts which identify appropriate individuals for advertising via their web surfing habits, such as their searches on Google or their activities on social networking sites like Facebook.

Some 13 MPs are calling for a so-called “internet bill of rights,” giving users more safeguards over their online privacy.

The difficulty for the politicians is that while users would like to see less personal information held by third parties, they also enjoy the benefits that personally tailored online marketing can bring, according to online advertising industry journal Campaignlive.

Online marketing professionals are now likely to lobby MPs, pointing out that internet advertising already gives users the choice of opting out of various kinds of adverts and pay per click initiatives.

photo credit: n-re-k

Until now, there have been two very distinct strands to online marketing, informed by the two giants of their fields – Google and Facebook.

The search engine giant has always been the undisputed ruler of the SEO marketing world, with Yahoo and Bing coming a clear second, while Facebook – along with Twitter – have been instrumental in pushing social media to the forefront of all successful online marketing strategies.

Now everything is likely to change again as the two strands come together, thanks to the launch of Google’s very own social network, Google+.

Google+ has already been the victim of its own success, going over capacity within two days of its launch and necessitating a temporary halt until it could recalibrate its systems.

Experts are saying that Google+ could herald a new dawn for online marketing, bridging the gap between such business-orientated networks, such as LinkedIn, and the more casual friends networks like Facebook.

photo credit: Sean MacEntee

The end of last month saw online concerns mark Social Media Day, with a great many companies taking a fresh look at how the juggernaut that is social media impacts on their internet advertising and online marketing strategies.

It has been a truism of the past two years that social media such as Facebook and Twitter is the place to be when it comes to the future of online marketing, and there is no sign that the engine is slowing down, with Facebook Fan Pages and Twitter advertising more important than ever. It is no longer a happy luxury, it is an essential part of any internet marketing drive.

The inclusion of social media in such a strategy should never be an addition, or an afterthought. It should be integrated into the overall plan and complement other aspects of online marketing, such as mail outs, SEO marketing and Google Analytics.

With almost half of all businesses using social media as an integral part of their marketing strategy, the lessons for the future are clear.