2009 - Will Digital Rule the Media???

As we know history repeats, its applicable to all sector like fashion, consumer behavior or advertising. We have seen recession in year 1993, 2000 and now 2008 is there facing the same.

In this scenario marketers are forced to cut the manpower cost and they have to be more accountable for whatever they are doing. They used to spend heavy money behind advertising for the brand awareness but the problem is that they could not calculate the returns of the same. TV advertising, Print advertising are not that much ROI based as internet is (If print ad has coupon which consumer need to tear and encash, then it's all together a different thing but again company has to make dealer or shopkeeper aware about the same in advance)

While the advertising and marketing industry has gradually started feeling the brunt of the economic downturn, Digital media is one industry which is quite upbeat about its future

The Internet has been accessible from SEC A, B, C, D from cities like Bombay, Chennai, Calcutta, Banglore, Delhi, Poona etc had helped marketer reach the critical mass of the english speaking audience in less cost.

Online is not immune from the economic downturn, but while other sectors see falls in expenditure, the internet is still experiencing an incredible increase and is propping up the entire advertising market because in past internet advertising proved to be powerful.

The main challenge for the agencies is to educate the client about the online and its advantage. Also how they have helped other clients to achieve the same.

Email Marketing – Have you checked your MAIL today?

The current economic crises puts pressure on marketing managers / advertisers to reduce cost while getting more revenue. So now marketing managers are considering digital advertising, as it is more ROI focused.

The Advertiser is now considering internet as a medium in their marketing budget but the sad thing is that very little budget is allocated to internet whereas internet can give maximum conversion at minimum cost if used properly. According to Zenith Optimedia in 2006 ad spends on internet was 210 crore and is expected to touch 2250 crore by 2009. The contribution of the internet in the overall ad revenue just 1% as on 2006 and was expected to grow to 6.8% by 2009.

Advertiser will have a choice of using any of the following ways to explore his business online

1) Display advertising - Banners and skyscrapers,

2) Interstitial advertisements and pop ups,

3) Opt in emails,

4) Contextual advertising and Search engine advertising.

5) Social Media Marketing

Let’s take a look on Email marketing, as it’s still the most used activity over the net. As per survey conducted by IAMAI Icube 2007, the use of internet mainly happen for mails and then for chat ( 51% for mails and 11% for chat). So this stats shows that mail is the mostly chosen activity over the net.

E- mail advertising is another online tool that is available to the marketer in order to advertise online. Due to the declining click- through rates of other types of online advertising vehicles, a shift has been made to e-mail advertising. The main advantage of e-mail marketing is that we can personalize it. Also we can decide the target audience with utmost ease. Its effective and engaging as user gets information in which he has interest

As I have explained about the Email marketing activity, lets see how one can use this to tool to explore his business. The EM can be used for spreading awareness about the brand to create strong impact in the minds of the consumer or to generate sales. When we send mails on a periodic basic, the user gets habit of that and he interestingly looks for new mail form our side. This creates a good impact and perception in the mind of the consumer. The company can carry newsletter activity for informing existing customers about latest happenings in the company that might result in “Brand Loyalty” and will help to get personal with the customer.

EM can duplicate the impact made by face-to-face communication and it can stop customers jumping from one brand to another by providing quality information at accurate time. We can’t say EM provides information at the right time but it encourages us to take an action. It creates a need and also shows us the way to satisfy it. The user is looking for information and there is no better way of this apart from a mail in an inbox? But one has to make sure that the customers to whom mails are sent must be “Opt in” customers which means that they have given us the permission to send them emails by signing on a website, otherwise there are chances of the emails getting rated as spam. Ex. An online mobile store has an iPhone launching in 2 months. You fancy an iPhone. The store allows you to sign up for a newsletter that will alert you when the launch is official and you can purchase it. Or, if it is $400 now, and you find it expensive, however you fancy it, so you sign up for the wish list, to inform you of any price drops.

In terms of cost and Target Group, it’s a more accurate approach as you can decide your Target Group and control costs. If handled properly EM can boost sales to a new level with low costs as compared to other forms of advertising where Advertiser pays crore of rupees for making awareness and is not sure about the expected sales. In this case the Internet is more accountable as it is easier to track return on investment. EM helps in informing customers who are not interested, convert them into prospects, get sales and maintain a long term relationship with them.

With the EM activity, you can easily calculate ROI and can define the effectiveness of an activity. We can get the following reports to measure the performance of the campaign

1) No of mails sent

2) Mails delivered

3) Link activity report (popularity of each link in your campaign)

4) Unsubscribe report

5) Open rate

6) Bounce rate

7) Time spent

Advertisers can mail coupons along with the information and can expect boost in sales of the product. Also he can ask prospective customers to provide refer friends so that they can also enjoy the offer. This will help the Advertiser to increase their database and generate more sales. But the company has to offer the customer an option to opt out if he is disinterested in the free coupon scheme.

A case in point for success of coupons is the Sure Type product that was a tool for Mac and Windows to help users automate common tasks. They released coupons to customers of various denominations like 20% off, 30% off etc. with this they were able to increase their sales revenue by 15%.

EM gives your brand a cutting edge in the market. Frequent mailer programs will help your brand top of the mind recall. Most of the population today use mails for many reasons so tapping the customer will be easy. Finding another method that offers such personalization as EM seems to be impossible as of now.