Web site Promotion

Web site Promotion
Online promotion uses communication via the Internet itself to raise awareness about a site and drive traffic to it. This promotion may take the form of links from other sites, banner advertising or targeted e-mail messages.



Online Advertising

Advertising on the World Wide Web is generally acknowledged to take place when an advertiser pays to place advertising content on another web site.



Some important concepts of online promotion

Banner Advertisement:

A rectangular graphic displayed on a web page for the purposes of advertising. It is normally possible to perform a clickthrough to access further information. Banner many static or animated.



Page and ad impressions and reach

One page impression occurs when a member of the audience views a web page. One ad impression occurs when a person views an advertisement placed on the web page. Reach define the number of unique individuals who view an advertisement.



Effective frequency

The number of exposures of ad impressions (frequency) required for an advertisement to become effective.



Clickthrough and clickthrough rate

A clickthrough (or an advertisement click) occurs each time a user clicks on a banner advertisement with the mouse to direct him or her to a web page that contains further information.

The clickthrough rate is expressed as a percentage of total ad impressions, and refers to the proportion of users viewing an advertisement who click on it. It is calculated as the number of clickthroughs divided by the number of ad impressions.



Banner Advertising

Objective

Cartellieri et al (1997) identify the following objectives of banner advertising:

§ Delivering content

§ Enabling transaction

§ Shaping attitudes

§ Soliciting response

§ Encourage retention



Location for banner advertising

1. Portals

2. Generalized news services

3. Specialzed interest site



Paying for banner advertising

§ CPM and run-of-site: Cost per 1000 ad impressions. CPM is usually her for run-of-site advertisement where advertisements occur on all pages of the site.

§ Web site auditor: Auditors accurately measure usage of different sites in terms of the number of ad impressions and clickthrough rates.

§ Per exposure: typically through ad impressions or possibly through the length of time the user views an advertisement

§ Per response: payment only occurs according to the number of clickthroughs that occur

§ Per action: payment according to a marketing outcome such as downloading a product factsheet, a new sales lead received when the user fills in an online form giving his or her name and address, or an actual purchase placed online.



Making Banner advertising work:

1. Appropriate incentives are needed to achieve clickthrough

2. Creative design needs to be tested extensively

3. Appropriate keywords are needed

4. Placement of advertisement and timing need to be considered carefully

5. Consider the clickthrough quality, not just the quantity

6. Build the infrastructure to deal with the response



Other online promotion methods

Promotion in search engines and directories

One important aspect of traffic building is maximizing the number of users who find a web site when searching using keywords, in a search engine, directory or a portal. This promotion technique is particularly important in view of the number of web users who use such facilities for finding information. Achieving good search rating listings is a skilled job, which is often dependent on a webmaster who is familiar with the techniques for achieving good listings in search engines.



Links from other sites: co-branding and sponsorship

The growth of Internet-based sponsorship has been compared to the transition between radio and television advertising. Sponsorship as well as taking the form of a promoter sponsoring a site can make use of opportunities for involving individual personalities in sponsorships.

Co-branding is an arrangement between two or more companies where they agree to jointly display content and to conduct joint promotions using brand logos or banner advertisements.



Using e-mail for advertising

Email is used to communicating and building long-term relationships with customers, and inform customers of new product or market information relevant to them. Email can also used for paid-for advertising. For example, it is possible to buy space for an advertisement within an email newsletter.



Recommended Book

Dave Chaffey, Internet Marketing

Online Marketing Effectiveness Measurement

Online Marketing Effectiveness Measurement
Three Levels of Measurement

Chaffey (2003) suggests three main levels of measuring internet marketing effectiveness.

Level 1: Business effectiveness measures

§ Direct online distribution to revenue (in percentage terms and absolute monetary amounts)

§ Indirect online contribution to revenue (in percentage terms and absolute monetary amounts

§ Profitability of website (the direct revenue of the web site minus the operational cost of the web site)

§ Return on investment (ROI). This is a measurement over a longer period that calculates the return (amount of revenue) compared with initial investment and operational costs.

§ Operational cost reductions.

Level 2: Marketing effectiveness measures

§ Customer acquisition or new leads generated by the web site

§ Sales generated directly and indirectly by the web site

§ Impact on market penetration and demand

§ Customer satisfaction and retention rates of clients who use the Internet, compared with those who do not

§ Incremental or cross-sales achieved through the Internet

§ Impact of Internet on customer satisfaction, loyalty and brand

Internet sales will be expressed as:

§ Internet sales as a proportion of all sales made by company compared with sales by all companies operating in market (the Internet contribution)

§ Internet sales as a proportion of all Internet sales for company (the Internet market penetration)

Marketing costs that could be measured include:

§ Reduction in cost of promotional material (lower printing costs)

§ Cost of acquiring a new customer

§ Cost of developing/supporting an existing customer relationship through time

Marketing effectiveness also includes less tangible benefits, beneficial elements, such as:

§ Corporate image and brand enhancement

§ Building long-term client relationships and reducing ‘churn’ of customers.

Level 3: Internet marketing effectiveness

§ Capture – how effective are we in attracting customers to a site using online and offline promotion methods? Does the site use banner advertisements, offline advertisements with specific URL? Does it use search engine meta-tags? How well do this work?

§ Content – how well are customers supported with information and ease of use through the content and design of the site? Is the online proposition clear? (What are the unique offers/value of the site?)

§ Customer orientation – does the content suit its target audience: that is, in job-specific, industry specific, or country-specific terms? Is it easy for a particular audience to find information? Is it relevant, accurate, up to date? How well are there for clients to the site at each stage?

§ Community and interactivity – how well are the customer’s needs as an individual met by providing community facilities and establishing an interactive dialogue?



Any other criteria for measurement? Berthon et al (1998) points out five criteria for measuring the effectiveness of a web site aiming at selling products in term of drawing the customer through different stages of the buying decision.

§ Awareness efficiency – target web-users/all web-users

§ Locatability/attractability efficiency – number of individual visits/number of seekers

§ Contact efficiency – number of active visitors/number of visits

§ Conversion efficiency – number of purchase/number of active visits

§ Retention efficiency – number of repurchases/number of purchases



Online measurement methods:

§ Online web metric and server log files: online measures are those that are collected automatically on the web server, often in a server log file.

§ Hits and page impressions (view): a hit is recorded for each graphic or block of text requested from a web server. It is not a reliable measure of the number of people viewing a page. A page impression is a reliable measure, denoting one person viewing one page.

§ Site visits (user sessions): one site visit records one customer visiting the site

§ Website auditors: auditors accurately measure the usage of a site as the number of page impressions and visitors.

§ Referring site and exit pages: a log file may indicate which site a user visited immediately before visiting a particular site. Exit pages give a summary of the main pages from which users left a site.



Recommended Book

Dave Chaffey, Internet Marketing

Internet Marketing Research

Internet Marketing Research
Alongside the constant monitoring of an organization’s marketing environment, there must also be research into customer’s needs and wants and the monitoring of the effectiveness of marketing activity. The Internet provides a vehicle by which the marketer can gain rapid and often extensive access to secondary market and data.



The internet can be used to understand an organization’s macro and micro marketing environment. By monitoring information available on the Internet, organization can attain more accuracy in their assessment of the competitive situation and the identification of potential market opportunities.



The Internet is well suited to secondary research since many of the traditional sources of information such as company reports, government reports, economic data and surveys from market research organizations have now migrated online. Some data are provided free of charge, but other data must be paid for and accessed via an extranet. Accuracy of searching information source via the Internet depends on the methods of collecting data and the sample size. The two most popular online research methods are online questionnaires and focus group.



Recommended Book

Dave Chaffey, Internet Marketing

The Internet Marketing Plan

The Internet Marketing Plan

Internet marketing plan is an operational plan to achieve an Internet marketing strategy through implementation of a new version of a web site and associated marketing communications. Chaffey et al. (2003) suggests that eight important decisions should be taken to formulate the Internet marketing plan:



· Decision point 1: Who are the potential audience?

· Decision point 2: Integrating ‘the nets’

· Decision point 3: Defining the scope of Internet marketing communications

· Decision point 4: How do we ‘migrate’ our brands on to the Internet

· Decision point 5: Strategy partnerships

· Decision point 6: Organizational structure

· Decision point 7: Setting the budget

· Decision point 8: The schedule



A suggested Internet marketing investment plan



1. Objectives statement

§ Corporate objectives of online marketing (mission statement)

§ Detailed objectives: tangible and intangible benefits, specific critical success factors

§ Contribution of Internet to promotional and sales activities

§ Value proposition of website to customer

2. Strategic positioning

§ Impact of Internet on existing sales and promotion channels

§ Impact of Internet on market structure and representation needed

§ Strategic positioning in response to perceived impact

3. Assessment of current position

(a) Internal audits

§ Internet marketing audit (business, marketing and Internet marketing effectiveness)

§ Audience composition and characteristics

§ Web site contribution to sales and profitability

(b) External audits

§ Business and economic environment

§ The market and customer activity

§ Competition – threats from new services and new companies?

4. Assess opportunities and threats

§ Market and product positioning

§ Methods of creating digital value and detailed statement of customer value proposition

§ Marketplace positioning (buyer, seller and neutral marketplaces)

§ Scope of marketing functions.

5. Partnering arrangement

§ Promotion

§ Distribution

§ Development

6. Integrating the ‘nets’

Assessing the role and plans for integrating:

§ Internet

§ Extranet

§ Intranet

7. Channel choices

(a) Use of:

§ Seller-controlled sites

§ Buyer-controlled sites

§ Neutral site

(b) Channel choices: split of sales between manufactures and resellers.

8. Promotional and communication activities

Specifying online and offline promotion methods and costs such as advertising and PR. How will existing promotional activities be represented on the web site? Role of one-to-one marketing.

9. New media branding

Options and risks assessments for brand:

§ Migrate traditional brand online.

§ Extend traditional brand: variant.

§ Partner with existing digital brand

§ Create a new digital brand.

10. Measuring site effectiveness

Identify a measurement process and metrics covering:

§ Business contribution

§ Marketing effectiveness (offline measures, e.g. leads, sales, brand enhancement)

§ Internet marketing effectiveness (online measures, e.g. page impressions, visitors, repeat visits, registrations).

11. Resource requirements:

§ Budget including costs for development, promotion and maintenance

§ Time-scale

§ Staff

§ Outsourcing

12. Implementation

§ Project management.

§ Team organization and responsibilities

§ Risk assessment (identifying risks, measures to counter risks).

§ Legal issues.

§ Development and maintenance process.

(Source: Chaffey et al. (2003), Internet Marketing




Recommended Book

Dave Chaffey, Internet Marketing

Internet Marketing Strategy

Internet Marketing Strategy
For many companies developing a first version of their web site is not the result of a well-defined Internet marketing strategy; rather, it is a necessary response to a rapid market development. The decision to create the web site is reactive: a response to the development of sites buy new companies in their sector, or by existing competitors or a response to customer demands. According to Chaffey (2003), a possible starting-point for a company needing to develop an Internet strategy will be

1. Existing company, no web site

2. Existing company with existing web site

3. New web-based start-up



Generic strategy approach:

McDonald (1999) suggests four main phases in developing a generic strategy:

1. Goal setting (develop Internet marketing strategy)

2. Situation review (develop Internet marketing strategy)

3. Strategy formulation (develop Internet marketing strategy)

4. Resource allocation and monitoring (define Internet marketing plan and monitor)



Strategic goal setting:

When an Internet marketing strategy is being defined, the objectives should be clearly stated in the Internet marketing plan

§ Cost reduction of 10% in marketing communications within two years

§ Increase retention of customers by 10%

§ Increase by 20 percent within one year the number of sales arising from a certain target market

§ Create value-added customer services not available currently

§ Improve customer service by providing a response to a query within two hours, 24 hours per day, seven days a week.



Situation review

Internal Audits

Internal Audits review following elements:

1. Business effectiveness

2. Marketing effectiveness (leads, sales, retention, market share, brand enhacement and loyalty, customer service)

3. Internet effectiveness

External Audits

Three most important elements of external audits is:

§ Legal constraints

§ Social constraints

§ Technological constraints



Assessing opportunities and threats

SWOT analysis will help highlight the opportunities and threats. Then, appropriate planning to counter the threats and take advantage of the opportunities can be built into the Internet marketing plan.



Assessing threats

Michael Porter’s classic 1980 model of the five main business forces that impact a company can be applied to assessing threats. These forces includes:

· Threat of new entrants (for a company to set up a rival service on the Internet is common)

· Threat of substitute products and services (the Internet is a particularly good as a means of providing information-based services at a lower cost. The greatest threats are likely to occur where product fulfillment can occur over the Internet, as is the case with delivering share prices, industry-specific news or software)

· Bargaining power of customers (the bargaining power of customers is increased when they are using the Internet to evaluate products and compare prices.

· Power of suppliers (the Internet tends to reduce the power of suppliers since barriers to migrating to a different supplier are reduced)

· Extent of rival between competitors (the threat from existing competitors will continue, with the Internet perhaps increasing rivalry since price comparison is more readily possible, and new products, services and ways of selling or business models will occur using the Internet.



Strategy Formulation

Amount of investment and commitment to the Internet

The amount invested in the Internet should be based on the anticipated contribution the Internet will make to a business. To decide on an appropriate investment in the Internet is, in part, an act of faith by senior managers since it will be based on forecast levels of use of the Internet.

Market and product positioning

The Internet offers new opportunities for selling new products into new markets. These present strategic options that need to be evaluated. As a starting point, many companies will use the Internet to help sell existing products into existing markets. The Internet channel can help consolidate or increase market share for this sector by providing additional promotion and support facilities.

Internet marketplace positioning

The advent of the Internet forces companies to reappraise the way in which they sell products, since new and existing competitors will take advantage of this new distribution channel, even if one company does not. For the company, this raises questions such as which new market structures will arise, which marketplaces it can operate in, and what the implications of the new marketplaces are for existing distribution strategy arrangement.



Setting the Internet marketing value proposition

Internet marketing consultants suggest that in the same way that any company or product will only be successful if it has a unique selling proposition, it is also necessary for their web site or Internet presence. Having a clear Internet value proposition has several benefits:

· It helps distinguish the site from its competitors (this should be a web site design objective).

· It helps provide a focus to marketing efforts, and company staffs are clear about the purpose of the site.

· If the proposition is clear it can be used for PR, and word of mouth recommendations may be made about the company.

It can be linked to the normal product propositions of a company or its product.



Recommended Book

Dave Chaffey, Internet Marketing

Internet Marketing Fundamentals

Internet Marketing Fundamentals

What benefits can the Internet provides?

According to Bocij et al. (1999 in Chaffey et al. 2003), the benefits of an Internet presence can be summarized using the ‘6C’:

1. Cost reduction. Achieve through reducing the need for sales and marketing enquires to be handled by telephone operators and the reduced need for printing and distributing marketing communications material, which is instead published on the website.

2. Capability. The Internet provides new opportunities for new products and services and for exploiting new markets.

3. Competitive advantage. If a company introduces new capabilities before its competitors, then it will achieve and advantage until its competitors have the same capability.

4. Communication improvement. This include improved communications with customers, staff, suppliers, and distributors.

5. Control. The Internet and intranets may provide better marketing research through tracking of customer behaviour and the way in which staff deliver services.

6. Customer service improvement. Provided by interactive queries of databases containing, for example, stock availability or customer service question.



Internet Marketing concepts:

Many companies, when starting to use the Internet for marketing, took the approach of simply re-publishing existing marketing materials in a new form. This approach, termed ‘brochureware’ or electronick brochures, was a practical first step, but is now discredited since it fails to acknowledge the differences in this medium (Chaffey, 2003):

§ The medium itself is different in that it is digital, interactive, and a greater depth of information can be published on a web site.

§ The demographics may be different

§ The culture of purchaser may be different;

§ The market may be different.



As a digital medium the Internet is quite different from traditional mass media in a number of aspects (Chaffey, 2003):

1. It is predominately a pull medium rather than a push medium

2. It is a digital medium that enables interaction

3. It offers potential for one-to-one or many-to-many communication

4. The medium changes the nature of standard marketing communications such as advertising

5. Changes to the distribution channel and marketplace enabled by the digital medial.



There are number of ways that the Internet support marketing communications?

1. The Internet most readily lends itself to impersonal communications such as advertising, PR and sales promotions since this sort of communication can be achieved simply by publishing existing documents such as brochures.

2. The Internet is of great value in advertising, as web sites provide the opportunities to give greater information on product features and benefits than do other media such as television and newspapers.

3. The Internet also offers great scope for PR and sale promotions. The Internet has significantly change the nature of PR, since a company web site itself can act a vehicle for PR.

4. Personal communications such as sales calls from the company to the purchaser are not really facilitated by the Internet, although it may be possible in the future if video conferencing becomes a routine business activity.

5. Of all personal communication techniques, direct marketing offers the most potential for use by the Internet.

6. Internet marketing can help enhance brand activities techniques which include: sponsorship, exhibitions, customer feedback, and co-branded content.



Recommended Book

Dave Chaffey, Internet Marketing

Basic Marketing Concepts

Basic Marketing Concepts

According to John Stubbs, Chief Executive of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, “Marketing consists of the anticipation, identification and fulfilment of customers’ needs. It is, or should be, at the heart of every commercial enterprise (and a good few non-profit organizations as well). The source of every organization’s future cash flows is the customer, and it is the task of marketing to win customer preference. This requires highly professional marketers, but also a company-wide appreciation of the role and critical importance of marketing.”

It is therefore the communication and explanation of marketing to a wider audience is vital.

Marketing Definition

There are three main way to define marketing. As Forsyth (2003) points out:

· Marketing as a philosophy of business. That of seeing the customers and ensuring profitability by providing them with value satisfaction. The reverse of saying ‘This is what we make, buy some’, it ensures the business focuses on customer needs.

· Marketing as a function of business. It is the total management function that co-ordinates all that the philosophy implies, anticipating the demands of customers, identifying and satisfying their needs by providing the right product or service at the right price, time and place.

· Marketing as a series of techniques used to carry out the whole process. These include advertising and selling, plus a plethora of other promotional techniques and everything from research to pricing.

Marketing: art or science?

The techniques of promotion, advertising and selling are not precise in their effect. They, and marketing itself, are as much art as science. So the good marketers are as creative as they are technically able; whether they succeed or not may have as much to do with experience, and with ‘gut-feel’ as it does with following the rules. They are the modern-day commercial alchemists; except that instead of eye of toad and wing of bat their ingredients are USPs, copy platforms, self-liquidating offers and brand strategies. Perhaps more than any other management function marketing thrives on jargon; and whilst jargon is only professional slang, it is invaluable in an activity where the great thing is to appear more scientific than artistic (Forsyth, 2003).

Marketing Mix Concepts

Marketing Mix Concepts

Marketing mix The set of controllable tactical marketing tools - product, price,place and promotion - that the firm blends to produce the response it wants in the target market (Kotler, 1999).

Product means the totality of 'goods and services' that the company offers the target market. The Honda Civic 'product' is nuts, bolts, spark plugs, pistons, headlights and many other parts. Honda offers several Civic styles and dozens of optional features. The car comes fully serviced, with a comprehensive warranty and financing that is as much a part of the product as the exhaust pipe. Increasingly, the most profitable part of the business for car companies is the loan that they offer to car buyers (Kotler, 1999)



Price is what customers pay to get the product. Honda suggests retail prices that its dealers might charge for each car, but dealers rarely charge the full asking price. Instead, they negotiate the price with each customer. They offer discounts, trade-in allowances and credit terms to adjust for the current competitive situation and to bring the price into line with the buyer's perception of the car's value. Place includes company activities that make the product available to target consumers. Honda maintains a body of independently owned dealerships that sell the company's cars. They select dealers carefully and support them strongly. The main dealers keep a stock of Hondas, demonstrate them to potential buyers, negotiate prices, close sales, arrange finance, and service the cars after the sales (Kotler, 1999).



Promotion means activities that communicate the merits of the product and persuade target customers to buy it. Honda spends millions on advertising each year to tell consumers about the company and its products. Dealership salespeople assist potential buyers and persuade them that a Honda is the car for them. Honda and its dealers offer special promotions - sales, cash rebates, low financing rates - as added purchase incentives (Kotler, 1999).