World Events
Online Marketing in an Ailing Economy
Wednesday, November 19th, 2008 | 49above Updates, World Events | No Comments
Daily news reports about falling stock prices, companies close to bankruptcy and recession talk are normal these days. In fact over the last months more and more economies steered towards a recession and so far there are no signs of an end to this trend. The International Monetary Fund revised its international economic growth projections twice in only 3 months and the year 2008 has every potential to turn out even worse than any predictions made.
The Challenge with Traditional Advertising
Large budget cuts are usually the first reaction of decision makers. However, no marketing certainly results in no sales and no sales drive any company into even deeper financial problems. The challenge with traditional advertising is that it is does not produce quantifiable results because it is impossible to establish any kind of accurate tracking data about the success of any given offline campaign or advertising medium used. For example, no one can know how many people have seen a billboard advertisement and subsequently turned into buyers for the advertised product or if the billboard had any affect since buyers might have come from another marketing channel.
Every Crisis Bears Opportunity
Online marketing is different. In the online world, marketing spend can be traced and evaluated for results since there is quantifiable data that shows, for example, how many people have been exposed to an ad, how many people clicked an ad, or how many people purchased after clicking an ad. This kind of data is available in the pay-per-click world of Google, MSN, Yahoo and other providers. However, even with the best tracking and campaign performance improvements in place, there is still the element of redundancy for clicks not resulting in sales. No PPC campaign can deliver a 100% conversion rate!
The market demands more efficient solutions as companies cannot and want not afford redundant ad spend. The solution is affiliate marketing. What is affiliate marketing? Affiliate marketing leverages the highly targeted traffic from 3rd party website owners who wish to sell a product or service for any given company. Traffic sent to a merchant is tracked through a third party network and the affiliate usually is compensated on a cost-per-action basis, as opposed by a Pay-per-click compensation. This means, the merchant only has an expense in the form of commission if the traffic that came from an affiliate turned into a sale. No sale-no cost, however free branding for the merchant on the affiliates web site!
Often this relatively new online marketing channel is underestimated in its effectiveness. However, the truth is that companies across almost all industries experience monthly sales revenues from this channel in millions of dollars.
Vancouver based 49Above Marketing Inc. (http://www.49above.com) is one of North Americas leading online marketing companies, which offer this kind of marketing besides PPC and media buying services. 49Above Marketing’s Director and Co-founder Lasse Kubiack noticed an even higher number of clients who turned to online marketing over the last months as in the months preceding the financial crisis. “We see an even higher ad spend in the affiliate marketing industries as companies receive 100% of the desired return on ad spend with CPA models” explains Kubiack. Online Marketing is cost effective, quantifiable, flexible and highly targeted.
According to Mr. Kubiack, in these difficult economic times more and more consumers are looking to shop online in hopes to find a bargain, use a coupon code and to save a car ride with gas expenses to the overpriced local shopping mall. While brick and mortar stores have seen a dramatic decline in retail sales, their online competitors experience normal to elevated sales at the same time.
US Economy Crash Good for Online Businesses?
Monday, October 20th, 2008 | World Events | No Comments
Businesses are struggling all over the world right now with the economy being so poor, but is it really a bad thing for online retailers?
With people looking to spend less money on everything, people are turning to the internet to find the things they need at lower costs. Coupon sites, rebate and discount sites, and any etailer who is offering general discounts seem to be noticing an increase in sales, unlike traditional bricks and mortar retailers who are feeling the effects.
Gas prices are keeping people from driving as much. Visits to the mall are becoming minimal. But does that mean consumers are completely cut off their spending habits? Absolutely not. Instead they are looking to purchase for the convenience and comfort of their homes while saving money by finding good deals online.
Our piece of advise: if you’re a retailer who has an ecommerce site, offer some discounts to incentivize people to buy from you online. People aren’t going to quit their buying habits cold turkey, they are just going to be more thrifty. Offer things like free shipping, 10% off minimum orders or $5 off rebates and you will get people on your website spending money they would otherwise at the mall.
The economy isn’t going to stay bad forever, so in the meantime, realize their is opportunity to help online shoppers save a dollar or two while still driving sales and conversions to your websites.