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A Facebook Coin is Probably the Next Big One, Says Blockchain Capital Co-founder

“For multinationals to issue their own currencies and request that their consumers purchase in that particular currency is not that outlandish,” says Blockchain Capital co-founder Gavin Brown.  “So perhaps with multinationals being what they are the fact that they are able now digitally and technologically to issue their own currencies and request their consumers to use it is perhaps not a sort of an unreasonable thing to think. It may not be the whole mission short term but certainly in the medium term for sure. I mean a Facebook coin is probably the next big one I think.”

Gavin Brown, co-founder & director at Blockchain Capital, discusses blockchain and cryptocurrencies in an interview on CNBC:

Wherever There is Potential for Mistrust Blockchain Can Be a Solution

We’re still very early in the technology, so a lot of people obviously associate bitcoin with blockchain, which is the underlying technology, which is understandable. However, the thing that most people fail to realize is that blockchain technology can obviously be applied to many different sectors and many different industries. I’m really keen, especially in the UK where I do a lot of work in my Future Economies Research Center which is a run out of Manchester Metropolitan University.

What we do there is we look at various industries where blockchain is a really good solution to manage lots of things around provenance and trust, scalability, traceability and things like goods supply chains. Really, wherever you’ve got the potential for mistrust blockchain can be a potential solution.

There Are Now Over 2,000 Cryptocurrencies

Regarding cryptocurrencies, If you look overall there are over 2,000 coins in total now. If you look at fiat currencies, the money we use day-to-day, there are 180 fiat currencies recognized by the United Nations globally. Yet there are over 2,000 cryptocurrencies most of which are trying to be some kind of money replacement. So the general play and the way I perceive it is that we will have a shakeout phase as we do with any kind of technology and we’re likely to see it coalesce around either one or a handful of winners.

Those winners will obviously win big. Identifying who they’re going to be is obviously the challenge. That’s why for most people they’ll probably want to run a portfolio inside the crypto asset space to try and maximize their chances. This is almost similar to a sort of leverage private equity-type model the way you’re running lots of different plays, where most will lose, but if you get the winner then you win big.

A Facebook Coin is Probably the Next Big One

What we’re seeing really is the democratization of money. If you and I wanted to we could create a CNBC coin and within three hours we could have it up and running and when we transact with people we could request that we do it using that particular coin. It raises the question of will people trust that coin? They will trust it if they trust your brand and f they trust your products. For instance, Starbucks has over a billion dollars worth of assets on its balance sheet of people who prepaid for coffee on their charge cards in advance. That’s because they trust the brand, they like the product, and they’re confident it will be there.

For multinationals to, therefore, issue their own currencies and request that their consumers purchase in that particular currency is therefore not that outlandish. We live in an era where McDonald’s has got a higher credit rating than the country of Ireland. So perhaps with multinationals being what they are the fact that they are able now digitally and technologically to issue their own currencies and request their consumers to use it is perhaps not a sort of an unreasonable thing to think. It may not be the whole mission short term but certainly in the medium term for sure. I mean a Facebook coin is probably the next big one I think.

A Facebook Coin is Probably the Next Big One, Says Blockchain Capital Co-founder

The post A Facebook Coin is Probably the Next Big One, Says Blockchain Capital Co-founder appeared first on WebProNews.

from https://www.webpronews.com/facebook-coin/

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Counterfeits Wreck The Economy – Here’s How

Online bargain hunting is great, but sometimes those bargains turn out to be counterfeit. One study found that as many as two in five name brand items purchased online is counterfeit. Counterfeiting can be costly to businesses that have intellectual property stolen and sold out from under them, but counterfeiting can also be dangerous to consumers and can diminish the public image of counterfeited brands.

Counterfeits Are More Pervasive Than Ever

Thanks to online marketplaces where anyone can be a seller, highly convincing counterfeits make their way into homes and businesses across the world on a daily basis. An astounding 39% of the merchandise on online marketplaces is counterfeit, while 34% of search engine results yield counterfeit products as well. Makeup and skincare products are the most frequently counterfeited items outside of electronics, but supplements and medications are also counterfeited more frequently than you might suspect. While 16% of medications sold online are counterfeit, 10% of all medical products sold in developing countries are counterfeit, and most people don’t know they’ve used counterfeit medicines or medical products until they have had a bad reaction.

Counterfeit electronics are also a lot more common than most people realize, and they can be very dangerous. 99% of fake iPhone chargers failed critical safety tests, causing electrical shocks and even sometimes electrical fires. Even secure cryptocurrency wallets are subject to counterfeiting, leaving valuable cryptocurrency in danger and most consumers wouldn’t even know it unless they were trained on what to look for. Many of the bargain electronics on online marketplaces are counterfeits; everything from replacement batteries to SD cards are commonly counterfeited.

The Problems With Counterfeiting

Not only is counterfeiting extremely costly – it’s estimated the global economy lost $323 billion from it in 2018 alone – it can leave consumers at risk and give companies an undeserved bad reputation. Most counterfeits are so convincing an unsuspecting consumer might not know it’s not a genuine article, and once something goes wrong the defrauded company is going to get the misplaced blame for the malfunction.

Counterfeiters are also often associated with organized crime, and the profits from counterfeit merchandise can fund the drug trade, human trafficking, and more. Websites that sell counterfeit merchandise can often be used to steal the identities and bank card information of the unsuspecting people who use them, leading to still more crimes.

Counterfeiting has also led to a trade war with China. One of the major complaints of companies that have manufacturing done in China is that some of those manufacturers are stealing intellectual property and using it to create an entire market of counterfeit products. This led to tariffs, which has led to a trade war standoff. Ironically, this trade war is pushing up the cost of genuine products, which in turn fuels the demand for counterfeits. Counterfeiting is a serious problem for everyone, and it doesn’t just take money out of the hands of wealthy purse designers. It causes genuine harm to consumers, businesses, and the economy as a whole. Learn more about the global cost of counterfeiting from the infographic below.

The post Counterfeits Wreck The Economy – Here’s How appeared first on WebProNews.

from https://www.webpronews.com/counterfeits-wreck-the-economy-heres-how/

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At Honeywell Innovation is Always the Key, Says CEO

“Innovation is the key,” says Honeywell CEO Darius Adamczyk. “Anything we do in Honeywell, innovation is always the key. Whether it’s expanding into Europe, driving more robotics, a connected  warehouse offering which we are bringing to customers and having a broader play, are the key technology levers for that business.”

Darius Adamczyk, CEO and Chairman at Honeywell, discusses how the company is using innovation and technology to drive growth in an interview on Bloomberg:

Honeywell Digital Makes Us a More Contemporary Digital Company

As we always said my number one priority as CEO was to drive organic growth, but we never say we’re going to give up on our margin expansion. We do it through a combination, both commercial levers, which is managing our mix, and always introducing new products, which bring more value to customers. But also not forgetting our roots, which is driving productivity. With the number of ERPs we have and the kind of complexity we have in our supply chain, Honeywell Digital, which is going to make us a much more contemporary digital company, we have plenty of levers for productivity as well.

Honeywell Digital really has three primary elements. First is data governance, which is standard across all our various businesses. We’ve done over 80 acquisitions in the last 15 years so we have a lot of disparity. Then there are common processes, which is we want to run our businesses the same way in a very consistent manner. We have some pockets of excellence, but those have some inconsistency. Finally, all integrated into a common IT platform. Just to give an example, we had well over 1,500 different software applications before we started. We had over 150 ERP systems. It’s just very difficult to run a company efficiently and enable us to really make good data-based decisions. Honeywell digital is really all about enabling that.

Anything We Do In Honeywell, Innovation is Always the Key

Warehouse automation, which we started in 2016 with our Intelligrated acquisition. It’s been just a terrific business growing strong double-digit. We also made another acquisition called Transnorm which added to that technology in Europe in Q4 last year. We were planning on growing it organically, but also we’re looking to enhance our offerings, so we’re looking for inorganic opportunities as well. Innovation is the key. Anything we do in Honeywell, innovation is always the key. Whether it’s expanding into Europe, driving more robotics, a connected warehouse offering which we are bringing to customers and having a broader play, are the key technology levers for that business.

Amazon is a big customer but we have a lot of big customers. I wouldn’t say it’s a predominant customer in that business. Just about everybody is looking into ecommerce because with a lot today’s retail you really have basically two options. One option is to enhance the in-store experience which a lot of retailers are doing. The other one is to drive ecommerce. We think that this trend is going to continue. Although I would say it’s in the middle innings in the US, it’s just beginning in Europe. We think we have a huge opportunity in Europe, India, and some of the other overseas markets.

We have a very active venture capital fund and we’ve made about six investments in the last six months which is augmenting our technology plays. So although we haven’t made any big acquisitions, other than Transnorm in Q4, we are continuing to invest through our venture fund and we’re deploying capital that way. It’s been a terrific story for us in 3D printing for instance, particularly for our aerospace business. For a lot of the slow-moving parts we’re trying to basically get a new part certified and three printing per day. That’s our objective. Our aerospace businesses have made tremendous progress in achieving that and it’s really helping both for our inventory and on-time delivery for a lot of our aftermarket customers.

It’s Important For Teachers To Be More Effective in STEM Education

Regarding the workforce, education is the key and particularly STEM education. Honeywell is a big believer in that. Not only do we develop a lot of our young people that we bring into the company but we also spend a lot of money and time on developing teachers. It’s important for teachers to be more effective in STEM education. It’s something that we’re going to be supporting going forward even on a broader scale because that’s the way to differentiate our company.

We’re always going to be differentiated by technology and we want to bring the brightest and the best. We want to make sure that it’s a competitive issue, not just here in the US, but everywhere we hire people, and we hire people just about everywhere. We have engineers in the US, China, India, everywhere around the globe. I would say lately we’ve actually been very much on the hiring string. When you grow 8% that creates a lot of opportunities to hire a lot of people particularly in the area of technology and engineering and software.

At Honeywell Innovation is Always the Key, Says CEO

The post At Honeywell Innovation is Always the Key, Says CEO appeared first on WebProNews.

from https://www.webpronews.com/honeywell-innovation/

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Stop Making These 7 Online Marketing Mistakes and You Will Crush It, Says Neil Patel

If you avoid these seven online marketing mistakes and you follow these tips you’re going to generate more sales, says popular digital marketing expert Neil Patel. A common theme of Neil’s tips is creating a brand. “Google doesn’t want to rank sites that aren’t brands,” he says. “There’s an issue out there called fake news and that’s why they’re pushing brands over anything else.” Patel says that if you follow these tips you’re going to crush it!”

Neil Patel, digital marketing expert and founder of Neil Patel Digital, discusses the seven online marketing mistakes in his latest video release:

Stop Making These 7 Online Marketing Mistakes

I’m going to break down seven online marketing mistakes that you need to stop. You’re probably wondering you’re doing all these things but why aren’t you seeing results? Even if you’re doing the right things, if you’re also doing the wrong things at the same time it’s going to hurt you and it’s going avoid you from getting the results that you deserve.

Mistake 1: Not Collecting Emails

The first mistake you are making is not collecting emails. It doesn’t matter how good you are with SEO or marketing only a very small percentage of your visitors are ever going to convert into customers. By collecting emails not only can you get people to come back to your site but you can convince them to convert over emails.

The moment someone gives you their email address think of that as a micro-commitment. They’re much more likely to convert into a customer because they committed, they already gave you something. That’s why you want to collect emails. You can do this through sliders or exit pop-ups. You can do this for free using tools like Hello Bar.

Mistake 2: Not Collecting Subscribers Through Push Notifications

The second mistake you’re making is you’re not collecting subscribers through push notifications. There are free tools like Subscribers.com that’ll make it easy. Just add in a JavaScript or a WordPress plug-in and then when people come to your website they will automatically subscribe through the browser. Then anytime you have new content or products or services that you want to sell then you can notify them through Subscribers.

Mistake 3: Not Building a Brand

The reason tip number one on collecting emails and tip number two on getting more push notifications subscribers are really important is because you need to build a brand. This gets you into the third mistake. Google doesn’t want to rank sites that aren’t brands. Why is this? There’s an issue out there called fake news and that’s why they’re pushing brands over anything else. It’s not just going to be Facebook and in Google. Eventually, it’s going to be Twitter and LinkedIn and all the sites out there.

When you get people back to your site seven times you’re much more likely to build a brand. It’s called the Rule of Seven in marketing. So with your site, you want to provide an amazing user experience. When you provide an amazing user experience, create a great product, create a great service, it’ll help you build a great brand over time.

Mistake 4: Not Interlinking

The fourth mistake you’re making is not interlinking. You may notice on Google I’m ranking for terms like online marketing on page one. You’re probably wondering how do I do this? A lot of it comes out to interlinking. In my sidebar, I link to my most popular pages of content. When I write blog posts related to online marketing I link back to the online marketing guide that talks about what online marketing is. By having all these links it helps me rank higher.

Mistake 5: Just Focusing On Text-Based Content

The fifth mistake I have for you is just focusing on text-based content. The future of digital marketing is moving to video. It doesn’t mean you should stop doing text but it means you should also be doing video. When you do video you’re going to get more traffic because everyone’s lacking it. LinkedIn wants it right now. YouTube wants more of it. Facebook wants it. Instagram even wants it.

Why is this? They want to crush the television networks. You look at things like the Oscars or traditional movie theaters and they’re not doing as well. You look at traditional TV and they’re going to get crushed. Why? It’s because of Facebook. It’s because of Google. It’s because of Netflix. If you’re there creating that video content you can be part of it and you’re going to get extra traffic. They want as much help as possible to crush these big old-school companies.

Mistake 6: Sticking To Just a Few Marketing Channels

The sixth mistake that you’re making is you’re really sticking to just a few marketing channels. Marketing is competitive. People raise venture capital hundreds of millions of dollars just so they can compete in marketing and sales. You need to do more than one or two or three marketing channels. The more you do the better off you’re going to be.

Mistake 7: Not Asking For the Sale

The seventh mistake I have for you is not asking for the sale. Whether it’s a lead or whether it’s getting people to buy your product, there’s nothing wrong with asking people to buy from you. If you don’t you’re not going to generate any sales. Everyone’s like I get all this traffic through my online marketing but no one’s converting. Why? Because you’re not asking for a sale.

Stop Making These 7 Online Marketing Mistakes and You Will Crush It, Says Neil Patel

The post Stop Making These 7 Online Marketing Mistakes and You Will Crush It, Says Neil Patel appeared first on WebProNews.

from https://www.webpronews.com/7-online-marketing-mistakes/

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Your Choice Isn’t College or Oblivion, Says Mike Rowe

“Your choice isn’t college or oblivion. It’s not higher education or alternative education,” says Mike Rowe of the TV show Dirty Jobs. In 2008, Mike created the mikeroweWORKS Foundation to launch a national PR campaign for skilled labor. “There are so many ways to go, from apprenticeships to scholarships to fellowships to community college. All of it is equal. When you promote one form of education at the expense of the others you create the problem that we are having right now.”

Mike Rowe, of Dirty Jobs and the mikeroweWORKS Foundation, discusses on Good Morning America the need for people to look at all job options, not just college:

Your Choice Isn’t College or Oblivion

We have seven million jobs now that are open and the vast majority don’t require a four-year degree. There’s a ton of opportunity that people don’t talk about. What we are talking about instead, unfortunately, is the best path for most people. It’s a cookie cutter approach to how to figure things out. For the last 40 years, that path has been really simple. Get a four-year degree, borrow whatever it takes to get it, and then get out into the world and pursue your dream. What’s happened as a result is the skills gap has gotten wider and the college debt is now approaching $1.6 trillion. And we are still lending money we don’t have to kids who can’t pay it back who are training for jobs that don’t exist anymore. It’s madness when there is so much opportunity around us.

My foundation looks for people who are willing to hit the reset button, retool, learn skills that are in demand, and get to work. We are in a binary time right now. Everything is this or that. Blue collar or white collar. Left or right. Everything is framed with a false choice. Your choice isn’t college or oblivion. It’s not higher education or alternative education. There are so many ways to go, from apprenticeships to scholarships to fellowships to community college. All of it is equal. When you promote one form of education at the expense of the others you create the problem that we are having right now. It’s fine to push college but you can’t push college by saying if you don’t go over here you are going to wind up with some vocational consolation prize.

A Job is Not the Proximate Cause of Your Happiness

The mikeroweWORKS Foundation evolved out of Dirty Jobs. Part of the reason was the cognitive dissonance that occurs when you see somebody doing something that is supposed to make you miserable but instead is making you joyful. Dirty Jobbers as a group were having a ball. People couldn’t understand, why is everybody laughing in the sewer? Why is everybody having such a good time doing these jobs that I’ve been taught will make me sad and unhappy? The reason is that you’ve been lied to most of your life. A job is not the proximate cause of your happiness. You are.

We all want to be passionate about what we do. But why would we wait until we’re doing the magical thing that allows us to be passionate? You don’t follow your passion you bring it with you. That was one of the big lessons from Dirty Jobbers. These people were passionate about what they were doing but they didn’t sit down and say what do I have to do to be happy? I need this job. I need this kind of mate. I need to live in this sort of zip code. I need this kind of education. You spend all your life checking boxes that basically give you permission to feel good about the thing you ought to feel good about right now.

Your Choice Isn’t College or Oblivion, Says Mike Rowe

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from https://www.webpronews.com/college-oblivion-mike-rowe/

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We Want To Be the World’s First Global Sleep Brand, Says Casper CEO

“We really consider ourselves the sleep company,” says Casper co-founder and CEO Philip Krim. “Everything we do is about helping our customers sleep better. It’s about getting a great mattress but it’s about everything that could help you sleep. We’re trying to take products to market that are end to end about sleep solutions. We want to be the world’s first global sleep brand and we think we’re well on our way to doing that.”

Philip Krim, Casper co-founder and CEO, discusses how Casper, a highly successful direct to consumer brand (DTC), is still in the early days of growth in an interview on CNBC:

We Want To Be the World’s First Global Sleep Brand

We actually think Casper stands alone. We really consider ourselves the sleep company. Everything we do is about helping our customers sleep better. We think end to end about sleep. It’s about getting a great mattress but it’s about everything that could help you sleep. In January we launched a technology product, a lighting product, that actually helps you wake up better and fall asleep better. We’re trying to take products to market that are end to end about sleep solutions. We want to be the world’s first global sleep brand and we think we’re well on our way to doing that.

We think we’re really one of the first of our kind. We were a digitally native business, having launched online with Casper.com, but we’re actually now scaling our business offline as well. We’ve opened up 23 retail stores and we have great partners with folks like Target. We believe that we will have a business where no matter how consumers want to shop for our products we have great products and great experiences. We actually think there’s really not a public company comp that’s done that journey.

Repeat Revenue Increases Dramatically As We Launch New Products.

Yesterday we launched our hybrid line which is actually the combination of innerspring technology and foam technology. We launched two different models around that. For us, we’re actually still able to compress those mattresses, ship them anywhere in the country, and they’re really phenomenal products that we’re in development for over a year in our Casper Labs program based in San Francisco. From a cost structure, it works just the same way as our foam mattresses. You can compress it, you can ship it anywhere, it’s super fun to open and they sleep really great.

We make great pillows, we make great sheets, and we make great lighting products. We are seeing higher and higher attachment rates as we launch new products and we’re seeing repeat revenue increase dramatically as we launch new products. We’re only a five-year-old company, actually as of this month. We launched April of 2014. As we get our customers to be a little bit more mature we’re seeing them come back time and time again not just to buy mattresses but to buy our full suite of products. That’s really exciting for us.

We’re In the Early Days of Scaling

We actually changed the way that you would return a mattress. In the industry traditionally it’s a huge pain, but with us, you call us up and we’ll pick up the mattress. You don’t even have to pack it back up, nothing. We will come to pick it and up and then we donate it locally. We appreciate that you gave us a shot. We also are changing the way that people shop for the products. We have our Casper.com website where you can learn all about these great products but we have 23 stores that we’ve opened. We’re opening up over a dozen this quarter, two this week in fact, and those stores are a great complement to the online experience.

We don’t break out profitability overall. Casper has a great product, we have a great business model, and we’re seeing that by taking it to market both online and offline that it’s actually growing our online business in a very efficient way. We think this go to market strategy is working well. We’re in the early days of scaling it and we believe we can keep building this out for years to come.

We Want To Be the World’s First Global Sleep Brand, Says Casper CEO

The post We Want To Be the World’s First Global Sleep Brand, Says Casper CEO appeared first on WebProNews.

from https://www.webpronews.com/sleep-brand/

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We Want To Make It Easier For People To Go From Inspiration To Purchase, Says Pinterest CEO

“I don’t know about social commerce overall but I definitely know that our users often want to buy the things they find on Pinterest,” said Pinterest CEO Ben Silbermann while discussing going public on the NYSE. “A lot of people say they discovered a product or service while browsing Pinterest,” says Silbermann. “We just want to make it easier for them to go from that inspiration all the way to reality, which in this case would be a purchase.”

Pinterest was initially priced at $19 per share, which gave it a value of $10 billion on Wednesday morning. The company closed Friday up 28% at $24.40, which vaulted Pinterest to a value of just under $13 billion.

Pinterest Goes Public on the NYSE!

Ben Silbermann, co-founder and CEO of Pinterest, discusses on Bloomberg how Pinterest is unique both in how consumers use the product and how advertisements have simply become part of the experience:

The Ads On Pinterest Can Actually Be Really Additive

We really talked with investors about how regular people use the product every day. People use it to get inspiration for a whole range of things, everything from the food they cook to the clothes they wear to their homes. It’s really more about your personal inspiration and it’s less about your friends. It’s not really about following celebrities in the news. We wanted to make sure that everyone understood that because that’s how our users see the product every day.

The thing that makes it really special is that the reason people are on Pinterest is to get inspiration and do things with their life. It’s really lined up with what advertisers want which is to inspire new customers and get them to buy products and services they really love. What that means is that the ads on Pinterest can actually be really additive as long as we do a good job of making sure they’re highly relevant. I think that’s just really different from a lot of media companies where ads are candidly a little bit of a tax. That difference in alignment I think is the biggest difference between us and some other media properties.

My Eye Is On What’s Going to Make Pinterest Great 10 Years From Now

I still think there’s a real opportunity to grow over time and increase engagement. A lot of people might use Pinterest for one thing or two things but they don’t know the wide range of different ways people all over the world use the product. I also got to say that we’re super proud that we’re growing globally. If it (IPO) was just a few years ago the story would have been primarily a US-based service. It’s just really fulfilling for the company to know that the product works all over the world.

We’re in the very first chapter of that story (selling internationally) so we’re just hiring our first local sales teams in places like Canada, Western Europe, Germany, and France. We’re just at the beginning of the journey but I think there’s going to be a real opportunity to show the same great results we’ve seen in the United States to advertisers all over the world. We’re going to continue to invest for the long term. We’ve shown really good margin improvement over the last few years but my eye is always on what’s going to make Pinterest great three years, five years, and even ten years from now. That’s going to be how we continue to run the business and we’re really excited to see it keep growing.

We Want To Make It Easier For People To Go From Inspiration To Purchase

We’re always working to make sure people can bridge that gap between seeing something inspiring and doing it. One area that we’re investing in is making sure that we match inspirational images with more and more products that are at a price point that matters for people and for retailers they really trust. We just enabled people who are retailers to upload all of their catalogs into Pinterest. We’re investing a lot into computer vision technology to match those products with images and we’re not just doing it with shopping, we’re also doing it with all the different use cases. If you have a recipe on Pinterest now you’ll see the ingredients and people can write reviews. If you have a DIY project you can see other people’s experiences, whether it was easy or whether it was a little harder than they expected.

I don’t know about social commerce overall but I definitely know that our users often want to buy the things they find on Pinterest. A lot of people say they discovered a product or service while browsing Pinterest. We just want to make it easier for them to go from that inspiration all the way to reality, which in this case would be a purchase.

Making It Easier For People To Go From Inspiration To Purchase – Pinterest CEO

The post We Want To Make It Easier For People To Go From Inspiration To Purchase, Says Pinterest CEO appeared first on WebProNews.

from https://www.webpronews.com/pinterest-inspiration/

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Automation Will Not Kill the Need for Human Skills In Manufacturing, Says Allegion CEO

“Where you have a high variation you’re always going to have the need for human input,”  says Dave Petratis, CEO of Allegion. “If your manufacturing designs or products have very little labor input, let’s say like a cell phone, you can automate that. But where you add variation to the product that’s being developed or manufactured it requires labor. I can think of a variety of industries where automation will not kill the need for human skills in manufacturing globally.”

Dave Petratis, CEO of Allegion, discusses the impact of technology and automation on manufacturing jobs in an interview on Bloomberg Markets and Finance:

The Real Breakthrough That’s Coming is Digitization

We see the growth in manufacturing in technical jobs where people are able to manage those automation schemes at higher levels of pay. I’ve been a part of that manufacturing story over my 38 years and have lived that. I think there’s a great underlying story. American manufacturing is doing a great job of driving productivity inside the factory. That’s why the goods and services produced have never been higher, but the skills of those jobs are at a higher level.

That puts challenges on manufacturing like Allegion. At Allegion we have advanced the capabilities of automation in our style of product and it never ends. The real breakthrough that’s coming in the next decade is digitization. This is how we use information technology, artificial intelligence, and information to be smarter manufacturers.

Automation Will Not Kill the Need for Human Skills In Manufacturing

I challenge that (the assertion that technology will replace humans). Where you have a high variation you’re always going to have the need for human input. If your manufacturing designs or products have very little labor input, let’s say like a cell phone, you can automate that. But where you add variation to the product that’s being developed or manufactured it requires labor.

An example of that would be right here in the Indianapolis where we have manufactured here for over a hundred years and shipped globally. We produce 2,200 variations of an exit device which is in the building that you occupied today. It requires human input because of the variation. I can think of a variety of industries where automation will not kill the need for human skills in manufacturing globally.

The post Automation Will Not Kill the Need for Human Skills In Manufacturing, Says Allegion CEO appeared first on WebProNews.

from https://www.webpronews.com/automation-allegion/

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The Secret to Subscription Business Models is to Think About Your Customers, Says Zuora CEO

“The secret of these business models or products is not just going beyond on products. Think about your customers,” says Zuora CEO Tien Tzuo. Zuora helps companies implement subscription business models into their existing products and services using their cloud-based software. They help their customers which include OTT (Over the Top) content providers, tech companies, and even traditional consumer brands like Fender Guitars enter the subscription economy.

Tien Tzuo, Founder and CEO of Zuora, discusses how even the most traditional of companies can successfully implement a subscription business model in an interview on Fox Business:

This is the Early Days of OTT

It seems to easy as an end user. You just pick up your phone, fire up your browser, and you start using these (subscription) services. A lot of things have to happen behind the scenes. You have to check your credit card, remember to send out the monthly bill, figure out how much revenue you should recognize, or allow your customers to upgrade to a family plan or a better bundle. We take on all that so that companies can focus on what they do best which is providing a great service and a great experience for their customers.

I think people are missing the big picture which that OTT really today only represents 5% of the $500 billion spent on TV. This is really the very early days and there is probably room for many vendors to thrive. If you think about the cell phone market there’s AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint. It’s true that they use pricing packaging to compete with each other but they also have differentiated products in the marketplace.

Think About Your Customers

The secret of these business models or products is not just going beyond (and reinventing) products. Think about your customers. The great story about Fender (Guitars) is that Fender realized their customers obviously wanted to be musicians, but it was hard. Over 90% of their customers actually stopped playing the guitar after 90 days. So they asked, “How do we help our customers over the hump?”

How to Play Guitar, by Fender

If they are playing them well they are going to play for life and they’re going to buy a lot more guitars, a lot more amps, a lot more picks. They launched Fender Play to really teach their customers for a simple $20 a month how to play the guitar. They are seeing enormous success in the customers that actually sign up for Fender Play in sticking with it. So stick with the guitar and you can become really good. It’s never too late.

The Secret to Subscription Business Models is to Think About Your Customers – Zuora CEO

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from https://www.webpronews.com/subscription-business-modelszuora/

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5G is Designed So That Industries Can Use Cellular at Massive Scale, Says Qualcomm CEO

“The transitions, 3G to 4G, 4G to 5G, are very important in order to maintain your leadership position and also it enables you to really open up and expand your business in the new areas,” says Qualcomm CEO Steve Mollenkopf. “5G is really designed so that other industries such as automotive, self-driving cars, connected healthcare, connected education, connected infrastructure, are really set up to use cellular for the first time at massive scale.”

Steve Mollenkopf, CEO of Qualcomm, discusses how 5G is for the first time enabling industry to use cellular technology on a massive scale in an interview on CNBC:

5G is Designed So That Industries Can Use Cellar at Massive Scale

In this industry, you do not want to miss the transitions. The transitions, 3G to 4G, 4G to 5G, are very important in order to maintain your leadership position and also it enables you to really open up and expand your business in the new areas. This is more so true on 5G than any other G transition. We wanted to make sure that we were able to position the company do that. We did that while at the same time we brought a lot of other costs discipline within the envelope. We’re very pleased to be able to do that. It was a good call to make. I’m very proud of the team to be able to execute on that in the midst of what probably looked like a lot of distractions from the outside.

5G is really designed so that other industries such as automotive, self-driving cars, connected healthcare, connected education, connected infrastructure, are really set up to use cellular for the first time at massive scale. Our problem today is not, do we have a great technology lead? It is how do we scale that across new industries? This is a good problem to have and I’m looking forward to tackling it with all my energy.

The Energy of the Companies is on How to Ramp up Quickly

Really talking about the past and some of the he said she said is not that helpful. I can tell you where the energy of the two companies is right now. The energy of the companies right now is let’s figure out how to ramp up as quickly as possible. The relationship is focused on that issue. I’ve had a lot of discussions not only within my team but also with the Apple team. That’s the focus. We talk all the time. The companies to get to an agreement as complex as this you’ve got to talk. But I can tell you, companies like this they move on and they move on to the things that are natural to work together which is products. We’re all excited about doing that.

We are two product-focused organizations. We’re working on products, we’ve done it in the past and we love doing it. We’re good at doing it. That’s where the focus is that’s what we’re excited about. The reality is when you’re working on technologies that are meaningful and are relevant to many industries worldwide you’re going to grab attention. As long as you have a technology lead you can work your way through that. We were able to do that in the past and certainly were able to do that over the last five-plus years. I’m sure it’s going to be a little bit more calm but I can tell you I’m very happy to have that technology position.

5G is Designed So That Industries Can Use Cellar at Massive Scale, Says Qualcomm CEO

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from https://www.webpronews.com/qualcomm-5g/

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Stop Making These 5 Deadly SEO Mistakes, Says Neil Patel

After you stop making these 5 deadly SEO mistakes your google traffic is going to increase, says digital marketing expert Neil Patel. Sometimes just making a simple change can dramatically increase your traffic. For instance, Patel says that the moment he took out the dates from his URL his search traffic shot up 58 percent in just 30 days.

Neil Patel, digital marketing expert and founder of Neil Patel Digital, discusses the five beginner SEO mistakes in his latest video release:

Mistake 1: Putting Dates in URLs

The first mistake is putting dates in your URL. I used to do this with NeilPatel.com. What a huge mistake. My URL structure used to be NeilPatel.com/year/month/TitleofmyBlogPost. The moment I took out the dates from my URL guess what happened to my search traffic? Within 30 days it went up by 58 percent. I’m not talking about taking my search traffic from a 1,000 visitors to you 1,580 visitors. I had hundreds and thousands of visitors from Google already each month with dates in my URL. The moment I removed them I saw an additional 58 percent increase in my search traffic.

So whatever URL structure you have just make sure it does not have dates. Reason being is when you have a date in your URL, Google thinks of your site as being relevant to that date. You write a blog post and they’re like oh, this blog post must be related to January 12, 2025, or whatever the date is today. If you want your content to continually rank as evergreen content you can’t put dates in your URL.

Mistake 2: Thinking of Your Site as a Silo

The second mistake that you’re making is you’re thinking of your site as a silo. It doesn’t matter how many different sections you have or categories, it’s still one site. It’s on one domain name. For example, my blog is about marketing, so when I create content I link to all the other marketing posts (on my site) that are relevant to the posts that I just released.

You should consider thinking of your website as one big site versus different silos so when you write content you should link to other pieces of content that are relevant. That way all of your pages are going to be interconnected and they’re going to rank higher.

Mistake 3: Thinking of SEO as Just SEO

The third mistake that you’re making is you’re thinking of SEO as just SEO. It’s not just about on page code. It’s not just about building links. It’s not even just about getting social shares. It’s about building a brand. Eric Schmidt, the ex-CEO of Google, once said that brands are the solution. What he’s talking about is that when Google was trying to figure out what sites to rank higher than others he decided as well as ton of other people in Google that if you have a brand you should rank higher.

Why is that? You’ve heard of this thing called fake news. It’s a great way to combat that. It’s not just Facebook who’s concerned about fake news. It’s also Google, LinkedIn, Twitter, and all of the major platforms out there. Building a brand does wonders for you especially when it comes to SEO. You can do things like collecting emails to get people to keep coming back to your site. You can use tools like HelloBar to do that for free. You can use tools like Subscribers to do push notifications so that when people come to your website within one click they can subscribe. Getting all of those people to keep coming back will help reinforce your brand to them. That’ll help you climb in the rankings in the long run.

Mistake 4: Just Writing Content

The fourth mistake is just writing content. I know you’re that content is king, how is that a mistake? Writing content isn’t a mistake. It’s writing content and then not updating it, and that’s what most people do. They just write content and they write more new content then after that they write more content and guess what they do after that they write more new content. If you update your content Google’s going to see it as fresh, hip, new, and still relevant, and rank it higher.

With over a billion blogs out there Google likes picking brand new updated content versus old outdated content. This doesn’t mean you have to rewrite the whole article. It could just be paragraph or two or a few lines. It could just be reviewing an article and making sure it’s still up to date where you make no modifications because it’s still good to go.

Mistake 5: Not Thinking About the User

The last mistake you’re making is not thinking about the user. Google looks at something called user metrics. Whether it’s the browser or the toolbar Google wants to make sure people have an amazing experience. They’re using all those platforms to track how and when people come to your website and how they perceive it.

They can’t talk to them by serving them or anything like that. What they can see is when someone performs a Google search, clicks on the listing landing on your site and within a second they are they clicking the back button. If they are it tells Google your website or that web page isn’t relevant. By putting the user first instead of putting SEO first it’ll help you climb to the top.

The post Stop Making These 5 Deadly SEO Mistakes, Says Neil Patel appeared first on WebProNews.

from https://www.webpronews.com/seo-mistakes-neil-patel/

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Preparing Your Business To Go Up In A Down Economy

Consumer Confidence Index, or CCI, is one of the most interesting and reliable surveys for reflecting on and predicting the future of the economy. Reviewing the current economic status of consumers and their own expectations for the future is very telling and as the largest contributor to economic growth, consumer spending is responsible for up to 75% of GDP. So what happens when that consumer spending drops? The bubble bursts.

Recessions don’t come on suddenly – though the effects may feel as though they hit all at once, there are subtle signs for the trained eye well beforehand. Interest rate trends are a key indicator. Impending recession is likely if short-term interest rates are higher than long-term interest rates. Another indication is initial unemployment claims for unemployment insurance, revealing that businesses may need to reel in current spending. Perhaps one of the worst instances of unemployment complications was during the Great Depression which brought unemployment up to 25% and remained above 10% even until 1941, almost a decade later.

Housing and construction indices can result in action from the Federal Reserve, which can have a snowball effect. In 1980, a recession was caused directly by the Federal Reserve when it raised interest rates to combat inflation. The housing crisis and subsequent Great Recession of 2007 was triggered by the subprime mortgage bubble bursting and spreading through the rest of the economy.

But while economic downturns aren’t necessarily surprising, that doesn’t make them any easier to deal with. In 2018, one out of seven Americans were three or more months behind on their auto loan payments, a key indicator of financial trouble. And what we understand from the economy ebb and flow is that what goes up must come down. But not all businesses suffer this fate. In fact, there are entire industries that seem to thrive in a down economy.

Small luxuries like cosmetics and skincare, vices like tattoos, cigarettes and tobacco, even candy, are all likely to continue to do well during a downturn. During the Great Recession, consumption of alcohol said steady and sales of alcoholic beverages in the US actually rose by nearly $2 billion. Non-cyclical businesses, like tax services and funerary businesses, will likely always be in need; yet while they survive, services offered and consumer demands shift in the face of an economic downturn. Cremations are often much less expensive than a traditional burial and have, unsurprisingly, been on the rise over the last decade. As they say, the only two certainties in life are death and taxes; US accounting firms themselves have declined at a rate of .3% every year since 2008, but the job sector as a whole experienced growth. Retail shopping, both discount and luxury, has shown growth on both ends, giving us a glimpse into the personal, family-level effects of recessions of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer. Though there are some industries that seem almost immune to the effects of economic dips, that doesn’t mean we all need to pivot our business into a funeral home or a candy manufacturer. Instead, the takeaways we learn detail a larger picture revealing sustainability, responsible spending and budgets, inventory management, and, perhaps most importantly, mastering core competencies. In other words, survivable businesses zero in on what they do already do best and then do it better than competitors to survive a downturn. See this infographic for more on the secrets of surviving an economic downturn, what hangs in the balance of success, and how your own business can stay afloat no matter how far the economic bar dips.

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from https://www.webpronews.com/preparing-your-business-to-go-up-in-a-down-economy/

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Salesforce CEO: Every B2B and B2C Company Is Becoming a B2B2C Company

Salesforce co-CEO Marc Benioff says that every company is becoming a B2B2C company. “Every B2B company and B2C company is becoming a B2B2C company,” says Benioff. “What company does not have to directly connect with the consumer? You could be a traditional industrial company who’s selling to B2B resellers and you have to be ready in this connected digital revolution to be able to connect directly to your consumer as well.”

Marc Benioff, co-CEO of Salesforce, discusses their recent high flying quarterly results and talks about how every company is becoming a B2B2C company in an interview with Jim Cramer on CNBC:

We Just Had a Fantastic Fourth Quarter

We just had a fantastic fourth quarter. We’re taking a look at those numbers right now and it was an amazing quarter. In fact, we beat our revenue estimates quite handily. As part of that, our co-CEO Keith Block closed the largest transaction in our history and the largest transaction ever in Barclays history. It was a deep nine digit transaction to help automate their 50 million customers. It really goes to show how the three major trends that are playing out in computing today, the cloud, broad digital transformation, and a focus on the customer, can really impact our company by creating a huge deal and also being able to support a huge transformation at Barclays.

I feel great about our business. I’ve always felt great about it. We’re coming up on our 20 year anniversary this Friday. It’s been 20 years that have been unbelievable to us here. We are coming up on a year that we’re going to do $16 billion in revenue that far exceeds my expectation. I still have never been more excited about Salesforce than I am right now. When I look at the short term I see $20 billion right around the quarter and I see $30 billion right around the corner. In fact, we initiated a four-year guidance today of $26 to $28 billion.

Every B2B and B2C Company Is Becoming a B2B2C Company

You can look at a great deal that we did this quarter with Amgen, a tremendous biotechnology company. This is a company that’s really expanding with our health cloud. This is our vertical strategy to build products specifically for certain industries. In this case, our health cloud is going to help Amgen connect with their customers in a whole new way.  Every B2B company and B2C company is becoming a B2B2C company. What company does not have to directly connect with the consumer?

Not just Amgen, everybody. You could be a traditional industrial company who’s selling to B2B resellers and you have to be ready in this connected digital revolution to be able to connect directly to your consumer as well. That’s a major trend that we’ve benefited from for so many years now and you’re going to see that continue to play out. That’s certainly something driving this relationship with Amgen as well.

Brunello Cucinelli and Lamborghini Using Salesforce to Connect

Brunello Cucinelli is one of the great fashion brands in the world and we’ve completely transformed Brunello Cucinelli. He actually touches the customer in many different forms. He has a direct B2C relationship. He’s online with them. We run his website. You go into his stores. That’s a direct consumer connection. But did you know he’s a B2B company also? That’s because he’s selling to resellers who are reselling his products in some of the big retail stores around the world. He’s a B2B and a B2C company. We have to bring it all together with him and give him a single view of his customer. That’s the transformation he has to go through and has gone through and that’s why he’s had such great growth and we’re so excited for him.

Another great example is Lamborghini. Of course, Lamborghini is actually traditionally a B2B type company. They’re selling to their dealers and they’re making sure their dealers are successful. some of those dealers are not even owned by Lamborghini but now they need to be able to connect with their customer in real time, all the time. They’re also a B2C direct customer. That’s why the new Urus, their new SUV, is built entirely on Salesforce. It’s the connected Lamborghini. That’s a vision for all car companies in the future that they can directly connect with you, not just connect with their dealer. That’s the B2C and B2B transformation that we’re talking about.

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from https://www.webpronews.com/salesforce-b2b2c/

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5 Strategies to Address New Challenges in Asset Management Marketing

The asset management industry isn’t what it used to be. In the face of continued growth, the market has become increasingly crowded and fiercely competitive. But while competition has increased, differentiation among investment offerings has diminished.

What’s more, there’s been a fundamental shift in the relationship between clients and brands. In today’s customer-centric business climate, investors expect firms to provide them with modern, highly personalized experiences—wherever they are, and on any device they choose.

Consider these statistics:

64% of customers say customer experience is more important than price in buying decisions (Forrester).

70% of buying experiences are based on how customers feel they are being understood (McKinsey).

79% of customers only consider brands that show they understand and care about them (Wunderman).

80% of high-net-worth investors under 40 say they would leave their firm if it fails to provide an integrated channel experience (Frost & Sullivan).

Today’s evolving industry landscape has introduced unexpected challenges for asset management firms—and marketing leaders are under pressure to keep up.

Two Essential Elements of a Modern Marketing Strategy

An asset management marketing team has two central functions: to help recruit and retain advisors and to help acquire and retain clients.

In a crowded market where customer expectations have changed, that’s easier said than done. Indeed, as firms struggle to differentiate themselves, marketers are quickly learning that traditional acquisition and retention strategies are no longer effective.

Today, firms that can build deep, long-term relationships with their target audiences—and deliver truly meaningful experiences—will rise above the competition. The keys to building those relationships are aggregating your customer data and then acting on that information in a timely fashion.

Five Tactics for Creating Clear Differentiation

Here are five ways marketers can deliver superior value to clients—to improve acquisition and retention:

1) Get Personal

Today’s investors expect their communications with asset managers to be personalized and highly relevant to their needs. The challenge, of course, is achieving this level of service at scale; traditional batch and blast emails simply won’t work.

Through the use of demographic and behavioral data, segmentation, and lead scoring, firms can gain the rich, 360-degree customer view they need to deliver the personalized messaging clients expect.

2) Facilitate Communication

Modern clients—regardless of age—have become digitally savvy. They’ve grown accustomed to getting answers and access to information on the go, across multiple devices. The problem is, many asset management firms developed their various touch points in silos, thereby creating a disjointed and sometimes disorienting customer experience.

Delivering connected communications requires an omnichannel approach. The right automation solution should allow teams to deliver seamless conversations—as clients (and advisors) move from their phones to their laptops to their tablets, and beyond—all from a single platform. 

3) Build Trust

Asset management is a high-stakes service and building client trust is crucial. While providing a personal touch is central to creating meaningful relationships, steps must be taken to safeguard client privacy.

Asset management firms must adhere to strict regulations surrounding marketing investment management and the handling of client funds. Indeed, compliance is a fundamental concern. Marketing leaders must ensure that their systems—and their marketing teams—are always up to date on new rules and regulations.

A trusted engagement platform, with high-security standards, will enable marketers to deliver personalized experiences, across multiple touch points—with a keen eye on privacy and regulatory compliance.

4) Find Truth

Historically, the asset management industry has been cautious about new MarTech trends. As a result, many marketing teams are still operating on outdated, disparate systems, including their CRM solutions.

Building and nurturing meaningful client relationships requires a single source of data truth. By creating a centralized repository of data and insights, marketers can move from a reactive acquisition and retention strategy—to a proactive one. A single source of truth will also help brands deliver consistent messaging across sales and marketing.

An automated marketing solution that easily integrates with CRM platforms—as well as multiple solution partners and open APIs—is essential. By gathering multiple data points in one location, it will provide the single source of truth marketers need to create the personalized experiences clients demand.

5) Prove ROI

For many marketing leaders, creating a strong marketing strategy is only half the battle. The next step is to prove their efforts are yielding real results for their institutions.

Marketing teams must be able to effectively measure—and continuously improve—the impact of their programs.

A fully optimized marketing engagement platform—one that puts all marketing data into a single view—will enable more robust reporting. Indeed, it will empower teams to move way beyond click-through rates—to measure multi-touch attribution, pipeline, and true ROI.

The post 5 Strategies to Address New Challenges in Asset Management Marketing appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

from https://blog.marketo.com/2019/04/5-strategies-to-address-new-challenges-in-asset-management-marketing.html

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How SEO Can Drive Your Marketing Initiatives

Today’s modern marketing department encompasses a variety of roles that blend expertise in both traditional and digital mediums. Hiring for SEO related roles, in particular, has increased by over 40% in the last year.

Companies are injecting more dollars than ever into organic search and content marketing. This strategic shift calls on SEO and marketing teams to move in concert in order to achieve mutual campaign KPIs. Crossing the collaborative divide requires an equally mindful transition towards consistent communication, project management processes, and teambuilding.

Issues with integration

Making two cross-discipline teams work cohesively can be a challenge. About 75% of cross-functional teams fail. In order to mitigate the risk of a poorly-executed campaign, it’s vital to integrate the day-to-day functions of both marketing and SEO teams. To do that, it helps to take a look at some of the common barriers to success.

Lack of communication, specifically pertaining to goals

No clear method for measuring ROI

Siloed mentality or lack of flexibility

Gaps in technology adoption

It’s incredibly difficult to strive towards a goal that isn’t clearly defined. Expecting teams with different skill sets to work within ill-defined project parameters is even harder. Scope creep becomes a real issue, alongside a general lack of confidence in project deliverables and team cooperation.

Measuring the impact of a product can also be adversely affected by a lack of clarity. If a project doesn’t have a clear, standardized system for measuring ROI, it becomes difficult for each team to understand the impact of their work and fairly attribute responsibility. This is difficult in any cross-functional scenario, but in the marketing world, where ROI has been historically difficult to measure, it can prove disastrous.

Too often, separate teams become siloed, isolated from the larger department by their specialized skill set. Breaking down creative silos means that valuable information is shared more freely across teams, and the resulting output is more dynamic, which is an extraordinarily valuable thing in the world of marketing. Adapting to current trends in SEO and marketing, as well as being able to execute on them within a joint strategy means being receptive to change.

One barrier to entry for cross-discipline collaboration is a technology adoption gap. Although MarTech software applications accounted for nearly 30% of a CMO’s budget in 2018, certain aspects of technical SEO might be harder to conceptualize and fit under a unified marketing umbrella. Implementing standardized technology tools aimed at promoting collaboration and data analysis is a cornerstone of modern marketing strategy.

Impact on revenue

Successful inter-departmental collaboration can be tied to revenue and positive brand impact. Over 90% of Google traffic is observed on the first page, meaning if you are ranking on the second, third, or tenth page, your marketing efforts are unlikely to be seen.

Social media marketing and content strategy have long been the territory of traditional marketers. Hybridized digital marketers and SEO strategists can help drive marketing objectives centered around the most compelling and technical aspects, bringing to the table a unique understanding of how organic search helps drive brand visibility.

Cross-functional communication provides more visibility into emerging trends, ROI modeling, and organizational needs that can inform marketing spends and strategic focus. Nurturing a basic understanding of the relationship between a brand and its customers also helps marketers and SEO experts alike create smarter strategies and drive more profitable results.

Best practices for fostering collaboration

Fortunately, creating a culture of collaboration doesn’t have to be such a heavy lift. SEO strategists and marketers have similar core competencies. Given the right tools and processes, SEO efforts can help drive marketing objectives and vice versa:

Collaboration tools

Workflow processes

Education and employee engagement

Collaborative tools and software platforms are hitting the market with increasing regularity. Implementing these tools can positively impact the way SEO and marketing teams work together as well as conduct day-to-day job functions. From project management platforms like Asana or Basecamp, to collaborative meeting tools like Slack and Google Hangouts, using a standardized set of tools helps empower organizations with distinct departments and enables remote workers to create compelling campaigns in real-time. This also helps teams establish workflow processes that break large-scale projects down into smaller tasks, allowing them to keep a close eye on potential bottlenecks at all stages of the project management life cycle.

Breaking down organizational silos can do a lot towards creating a shared sense of expertise and a shared vocabulary. Defining project objectives and metrics to track against helps improve the collaboration between SEO and marketing teams since all stakeholders will understand how their efforts and area of expertise play into a shared outcome. Not every marketing objective will be SEO focused, but it’s still important to get stakeholders in the room to talk about keyword targets and opportunities, as well as conduct training sessions.

Keeping employees engaged is one of the best ways to keep collaboration productive and consistent. Scheduling regular standing meetings to go over progress towards objectives, and providing avenues for professional development, certification, and mentoring help cement team building efforts that drive success.

SEO strategy for results

Marketing teams need to be thinking about SEO, and SEO teams need to be thinking about marketing. With more companies throwing their weight behind organic search and adjacent forms of marketing, both teams will be working towards common KPIs. The marketing strategies of the future incorporate a more holistic approach to brand strategy, and companies that are able to foster cross-functional collaboration are setting themselves up to be more able to respond to the changing market.

The post How SEO Can Drive Your Marketing Initiatives appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

from http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/modernb2bmarketing/~3/32eJkvtX2kg/how-seo-can-drive-your-marketing-initiatives.html

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Event Marketers Are Ignoring the Power of Video—Here’s How to Catch Up

Video ads are one of the most potent tools in a marketing arsenal. So why do so many event marketers ignore it?

According to a 2018 Animoto report on social video trends, 93% of business score new customers from video marketing on social media. Eventbrite research shows that 94% of event creators who use video say it’s effective. While both reports highlight the power of video marketing, they also note that less than half of event marketers actually use this effective tool.

That’s a lot of business to leave sitting on the table.

Video clearly is engaging ticket buyers, but many event marketers are too intimidated to use the medium. After all, video is one of the most daunting types of content to produce. Your skills as an event organizer may not include filming and editing a promotional video—but it’s worthwhile to learn these few basics.

Create event videos that drive buzz

In an increasingly video-driven advertising space, focus your efforts on three essential videos—two before the event and one after:

A ticket launch video that builds buzz, encourages registrations, and establishes your event as the place to be this year.

A reminder video that answers attendees’ most frequently asked questions leading up to the event.

A memorable recap video that offers nostalgia for attendees and serves as a strong marketing asset for your next event.

If you only have the bandwidth to create one video, prioritize based on your brand’s goals. If you want to drive ticket sales, create a launch video. If you want to improve your attendance rate and engage attendees, create an FAQ video. If your goal is creating clips you can use to promote your next event, create a recap video.

When you release these videos certainly matters, but you must also create something that effectively engages your audience. The following three strategies will help you make videos that are informative and compelling:

1. Make the CTA your MVP

Your CTA (call to action) is key because it shows viewers how to take the next step (buying tickets, for example). But how can a CTA call viewers to action if they don’t actually see it?

Although placing your CTA at the end of a video feels natural, many viewers won’t stick around for the entire video. To ensure audiences see your CTA, place it in the middle of your video.

Beyond perfecting the timing of your CTA, you also need to give viewers clear instructions in terms of what they should do. Instead of saying “Buy tickets,” use clear and specific language: “Swipe up to RSVP” or “Click the link in our Facebook event.” People aren’t going to take the next step if they don’t know how, so make your CTA as clear as possible.

2. Use size to strategize your Facebook spend

It’s counterintuitive, but smaller events mean you should put more funding toward Facebook video ads. At 2.27 billion users, according to NBC News, Facebook holds plenty of reach and is ripe for event marketing. Facebook also has more robust ad targeting, support for video, and searchability for events than any other social platform.

Prioritize Facebook in your budget, keeping your event’s size as the key decision maker when allocating funds. Gather any location, demographic, or other important information about your audience, and then tailor your Facebook campaign to that base. Once you’ve homed in on your target, deduce your exact spend and plan the rollout and execution of each piece. By figuring everything out beforehand, your campaign’s resources will stretch further and your ROI will be more concrete.

3. Promote across online channels

Facebook is incredibly powerful, but a powerful video strategy requires more layers. Not everyone in your audience will be active on Facebook—and even if they are, a multichannel approach keeps them thinking about your event as they’re browsing online.

Use video across these digital platforms:

Your website: It’s easy to embed promotional videos on your homepage. The Animoto report I mentioned earlier suggests that 86% of businesses engage their audiences through this platform.

YouTube: As the second-largest search engine, upload your videos here to build your audience without much additional effort.

Email marketing: Animoto reports including the word “video” in an email subject line increases its open rate by 19%. This method offers low-hanging fruit for increased viewership, helps with viewer engagement, and simplifies connecting with attendees post-purchase and post-event.

There’s no better way for your audience to feel the buzz surrounding your event than video. Event organizers might lag behind other industries when it comes to video marketing, but that doesn’t mean it needs to remain the case. Use these marketing tips to take the mystery out of video—and drive sales.

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Don’t Call It a Comeback: Drip Campaigns Have Been Here for Years

I know what you’re thinking: Drip campaigns? They’re about as relevant as Michael Bolton.

But here’s the thing about Michael Bolton: He’s always relevant!

Truth is, the concepts behind drip campaigns—sending communications to customers and prospects on a regular basis—remain as relevant today as ever. The difference is that marketing automation has made this process much more sophisticated.

Now, instead of scheduling the same series of emails to go to the same people on the same day each week, you can send your audience valuable personalized communications based on actions they took, content they engaged with, or segments they fit.

So, while the idea of traditional drip marketing may sound out of date, there are still plenty of key areas where it can come in handy.

Who should be using them? And when?

Great questions!

Email drip campaigns are perfect for new companies with few prospects or businesses with small marketing departments. They’re also ideal for marketers just starting out their careers.

That’s because they’re generally cost-effective and easy to set up and run. They focus on what’s happening in the moment, so there’s limited long-term planning involved. And not many people are required to execute them.

Essentially, all you need to do is create communications, determine a cadence, and send out your messages. This gives you an opportunity to regularly connect with prospects and educate them enough to make a purchase.

Drip marketing can be particularly effective when you’re:

Reengaging a cold sales lead: Did a once-promising prospect suddenly abandon you at the one-yard line? Using a series of drip emails, you can educate them on how your product can help solve their problems, reinforce their desire to buy, and nudge them toward the end zone.

Providing thought leadership: Not quite sure what your prospects are interested in or where they are in the buying cycle? Staying in touch by providing always-on thought leadership content through an email drip campaign can help you get answers. Plus, it can make sure your brand stays top of mind for your prospects.

Delivering customer newsletters: Looking for more cross-sell and upsell opportunities? Drip emails—in the form of customer newsletters—can do the trick. By delivering fresh insights on an ongoing basis, you can highlight customer pain points and introduce readers to new products that can help them overcome their issues.

If nothing else, drip marketing offers your business a great way to regularly remind people why they connected with your brand in the first place.

What drip campaigns are all about

Regardless of how you use them, the most important thing to remember is that drip campaigns are all about building relationships and nurturing leads. To do that, your communications must provide constant value.

Your audience should trust that you’re going to deliver what you promised. Your messages should be relevant to your readers’ needs. The experiences you deliver should be consistent across multiple channels. And your campaigns should be continually tested and optimized so they pack the most punch.

Fail to do all of that and you’ll have to deal with “Unsubscribe” getting the most clicks in your emails.

Download What Is Lead Nurturing? to learn more.

The post Don’t Call It a Comeback: Drip Campaigns Have Been Here for Years appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

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