Exploratory Research Design

In the context of marketing research, every research problem is unique in its own way, but almost all research problems and objectives can be matched to one of three types of research designs—exploratory, descriptive, or causal. The researcher’s choice of design depends on available information such as nature of the problem, scope of the problem, objectives, and known information. Exploratory research design is chosen to gain background information and to define the terms of the research problem. This is used to clarify research problems and hypotheses and to establish research priorities. A hypothesis is a statement based on limited evidence which can be proved or disproved and leads to further investigation. It helps organizations to formulate their problems clearly.

Exploratory research design is conducted for a research problem when the researcher has no past data or only a few studies for reference. Sometimes this research is informal and unstructured. It serves as a tool for initial research that provides a hypothetical or theoretical idea of the research problem. It will not offer concrete solutions for the research problem. This research is conducted in order to determine the nature of the problem and helps the researcher to develop a better understanding of the problem. Exploratory research is flexible and provides the initial groundwork for future research. Exploratory research requires the researcher to investigate different sources such as published secondary data, data from other surveys, observation of research items, and opinions about a company, product, or service.

Example of Exploratory Research Design:

Freshbite is a one and half year old e-commerce start-up company delivering fresh foods as per the order to customer’s doorstep through its delivery partners. The company operates in multiple cities. Since its inception, the company achieved a high sales growth rate. However, after completion of the first year, the sales started declining at brisk rate. Due to lack of historical data, the sales director was confused about the reasons for this decline in sales. He prefer to appoint a marketing research consultant to conduct an exploratory research study in order to discern the possible reasons rather than making assumptions. The prime objective of this research was not to figure out a solution to the declining sales problem, but rather to identify the possible reasons, such as poor quality of products and services, competition, or ineffective marketing, and to better understand the factors affecting sales. Once these potential causes are identified, the strength of each reason can be tested using causal research.

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Lower Your Bounce Rates with SMstudy

The bounce rate (BR) or the percentage of people who entered a website and immediately left, is a popular metric companies use to determine the quality of a webpage.

According to Digital Marketing, Book 2 in the SMstudy Guide®, bounce rate is defined as “the percentage of visitors who leave the first page of a website they encounter without clicking to other pages on the website. A lower bounce rate from a modified advertisement would indicate that customers were leaving the page less often, possibly because they were finding the page relevant to the advertisement. The target bounce rate should be the bounce rate of pages linked to similar advertisements that the company has used successfully.”

So, a BR is not exactly a percentage of people who visited a website and immediately left, but actually a percentage of people who visited a website but then performed no other trackable actions. Technically, according to these guidelines, a person could read a 10-thousand-word article on a company’s website and share it with five hundred of their closest friends without actually performing a trackable action. A common misconception in regards to BR is often the way it is calculated. If a company does not take into consideration the example above, then the bounce rate will appear to be too high.

Once a bounce rate is properly calculated, it’s time to get down to business. User experience should be the first factor a company looks at in the hopes of reducing their BR. People that browse websites are looking for a seamless passage through the site. If a company’s website is confusing, difficult to navigate or causes confusion, people will tend to look for another site they can get around more easily. As the old saying goes, “keep it simple, stupid.” Another easy way to enhance user experience is to ensure the content is relevant and engaging. This can be done by creating videos, images, blog articles, and more.

One additional action that can easily improve a person’s user experience is customizing language to region. As stated in Digital Marketing, “In order to ensure that the marketing message is relevant and reaches audiences around the world, businesses can also customize their ads based on the language preference for their audience. For example, a company providing services in Canada may wish to develop both French and English versions of their ads to target search queries in either official language.”

For more information about bounce rate and how to lower your company’s percentage visit www. SMstudy.com where you can be sure you will be able to take a seamless journey through our website. 

The importance of product positioning to the marketing strategic planning

Product positioning is a very important tool for an effective marketing strategic planning. Product positioning creates an image of the company’s products in the mind of consumers, highlighting the most important benefits that differentiate the product from similar products in the market. Product positioning involves identifying points of parity and points of differentiation that enable a company’s product to both meet market standards while offering consumers additional value on key dimensions such as quality, innovation, price, leadership, and functionality, among others.

Product positioning starts with identifying the specific, niche market segments to target e.g. not just working professionals but single working professionals of age group 25-30 years, having an annual income of $50,000-$60,000, and enjoy adventure activities. After segmenting the target market by demographic and psychographic attributes, marketers must understand customer needs. With well-defined target segments, product positioning enables a company to meet very specific needs of a particular market segment, offering value that may not be provided by competitors.

Marketers must keep an eye on the competitiion while considering positioning elements of their marketing strategy. An effective positioning must convey a message to customers why this company’s product should be preferred over the other competitor’s products of similar nature. In other words, the company should not go by the flow of the market i.e. copying what the competitors are doing rather they need to stand out from the crowd by offering distinguishing or differentiated product attributes and other value added services.

The next stage is how to communicate the differentiated offerings to the identified niche market segments. This is possible by selecting the appropriate communication channels that are tailored to connect with their identified target audience when they will be most receptive to these messages. Say for example, a sports car manufacturer position their products through communication via television advertisements during sports events like formula one. They also use print media by running full page high resolution color ads in sports magazines.

It is important that the business incorporate the product positioning across all facets of the business, including manufacturing and customer service in order to ensure consistency of the positioning from the consumer’s standpoint. Further, the positioning must not only align with other divisions and with the current corporate objectives, but also provide long-term sustainability and remain relevant for product variants and for future market scenarios. Using strong product positioning is a key component to the success of the Marketing Strategy and to meeting overall corporate objectives.

To learn more about the product positioning, visit SMstudy.com.

Great Teachers Deserve the VMEdu Authorized Content Partner Program

Great teachers are rare. Great teachers should be prized for what they give to the world. A great teacher should not have to slog it out alone, wasting precious time taking care of the tedious work that must be completed in order get thier courses recognized and propeled to success. This is where the VMEdu Authorized Content Partner (V.A.C.P.) program can come in handy. The V.A.C.P. program offers to take on the heavy lifting of course preparation, presentation and management, leaving great teachers with time to do what they do best...teach!   

The VMEdu Authorized Content Partner program provides real advantages for teachers who are ready to get the word out about their courses!

The V.A.C.P. program lets teachers create and upload courses through an easy-to-use cloud interface called the VMEdu Course Builder. Everything related to your course, including videos, test questions, case studies, flashcards study guides and more can be included. And have no fear, the VMEdu technical team is always available to assist with course creation or any other technical assistance. There is no cost for creating or uploading your courses, and zero licensing fees.

The creation of a mobile app is another perk of the V.A.C.P. program. VMEdu can create a mobile app to support your courses with both your company name and logo. This app can be used by students to experience all available  courses as well as provide students with flexibility they need in their learning experience. Apps can be downloaded from the Google Play Store (for Android App) or Apple App Store (for IOS App).

In addition, VMEdu has a global partner network of more than 750 Authorized Training Partners (V.A.T.P.s), and if so inclined, teachers can sell courses to the VMEdu A.T.P. partner network. Prices are set by the teacher and VMEdu assists in reaching out to its large network of corporates, colleges/universities, training companies and individual trainers. This helps increase reach and at the same time garners additional customers and revenues. More specifically, if a course relates to sales and marketing, teachers may consider selling their courses through SMstudy.com, the global accreditation body for sales and marketing certifications.

VMEdu understands that managing classes can take up a ton of valuable time, so they’ve created an easy-to-use portal where teachers can manage course-related activities such as student access, course financials and course reporting.

With all the benefits of partnering with VMEdu, teachers now have an option that makes sense. The V.A.C.P. program is the accommodating, helpful, time-saving platform that teachers need, so they can focus on the important work of teaching.

For more detailed information of the VMEdu Authorized Content Partner program, visit http://vmedu.com/Benefits-of-VACP.asp

There is Always Room for Improvement

When faced with a difficult task, do you instinctively fight or flight? If you lean toward fighting, you are considered to be a member of the population with a “Growth Mind-set,” a term coined by Carol Dwerk in her 2014 TED Talk, The Power of Believing You Can Improve.

Dwerk defines the “Growth Mind-set” as people who see an error and attempt to fix it. People that believe “abilities can be developed, they engage deeply and process the error, learn from it and correct it.”

Sales professionals are constantly facing new challenges  In order to address them, they must tackle them head on, and at the same time, learn from the process, whether the outcome is a success or failure.

Training is a key element of Corporate Sales. It is essential for the corporate sales team to be thoroughly trained in their job function and be very knowledgeable about the products or services they are selling. This is required in order to capitalize on sales opportunities, capture the maximum value for sales, and maintain positive relationships with customers. Corporate selling relies heavily on person-to-person relationships, and well-trained sales personnel are better equipped to initiate opportunities, communicate the value of a product or service and close sales.

In order to be considered a sales professional, there are two styles of training that must be mastered: Sales and Negotiation Training and Product Training.

The focus of sales training is to generate gains in individual sales. Sales training covers the entire range of processes, tools, and skills required—from prospecting to closure. Negotiation training helps the sales teams understand the dynamics of the negotiation process, minimize conflicts, and arrive at mutually beneficial outcomes. Effective negotiation can promote lasting relationships between a company and its customers.

Product training is equally important for the corporate sales team. Product training equips the team with the skills to effectively address customers’ technical concerns, communicate the value proposition, assess needs and answer questions. Product training transforms the corporate sales team from simply sales representatives to solution providers or consultants for the customer.

The two styles of training are defined as:

Sales and Negotiation Training- In this form of training process, the sales team is trained in the sales process, from prospecting to closure of the sale. The team is also equipped with the necessary skills to negotiate the sale to arrive at mutually beneficial outcomes.

Product Training- In this form of training process, the sales team is trained on the various products and services of the company in order to effectively communicate the value proposition, answer customer inquiries, and provide ongoing support to customers.

Training is important for existing corporate sales team members as well as new recruits. However, it is particularly important for every new member of the corporate sales team to undergo thorough training before being fully inducted into the sales team. 

Just because you have yet to learn the skills needed to excel in the professional world of corporate sales does not mean it’s time to engage your flight response. Keep your focus on the word “Yet.” You are not there yet. But with the help of SMstudy, you can learn how to process an issue, learn from it, and correct it. It’s all about the fight.

To read more articles about sales and marketing, visit http://www.smstudy.com/articles

Sources:

Carol Dwerk, “The Power of Believing you can Improve,” 2014. https://www.ted.com/talks/carol_dweck_the_power_of_believing_that_you_can_improve?language=en#t-338450

Pixel Stuffing, Ad Stacking and Billion Dollar Losses

In an article earlier in the week by SMstudy, we began with this quote from Fortune, “A massive chunk of the advertising market is based on smoke and mirrors, or even outright fraud.”[1]

The article written by Matthew Ingram focused on bots, software creepy crawlers that mimic human activities making online ads appear to be creating more impressions that they actually are, and thereby stealing fees based on CPI (Cost-Per-Impression). In this article, we take a quick look at two other online advertising fraud techniques: pixel stuffing and ad stacking.

A Bit of Background

While some watching the advertising world continue to point to declining ad revenues—“not just for print, but for digital and video and pretty much everything,” others see growth in online ad revenues. The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) reports online ad revenues achieving a 17 percent overall Compounded Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) from 2005 through 2015.[2]

But all can agree that what is definitely growing are revenue losses due to criminal activities, “The IAB said that a myriad of issues—from fraud to ad blocking to content piracy—is now costing online marketers around $8 billion annually.”[3]

As early as 2013, industry insiders had been saying that “Half or more of the paid online display advertisements that ad networks, media buyers, and ad agencies have knowingly been selling to clients over the years have never appeared in front of live human beings,” says Samuel Scott, writing in MOZ [4], citing a source from The Wall Street Journal.[5]

Ad Fraud Techniques

Bots account for almost half of fraudulent impressions. The rest come from a variety of techniques that include pixel stuffing and ad stacking.

Pixel stuffing is “where an ad designed to appear at 1,024 by 480 pixels is crammed into a one-by-one pixel square,” according to Ingram. Naomi Schwartz, writing for TechCrunch, describes this as “iFrame stuffing,” saying, “iFrame stuffing compresses an ad into a tiny one-by-one pixel size. The ad is served up on a site as a real ad and reported as a view, even though a real user would never be able to view such a tiny ad.” This might be similar to the use of “small print” to hide legalese in contracts: legally it’s there, but it’s not meant to be seen.

Ad stacking is “where multiple ads are programmed for a single slot,” according to Ingram. Schwartz explains it this way, “In this type of scam, multiple ads are placed on top of each other in a single ad placement. Only the top ad is in view, but all of the ads are reported as viewed.” The affect is much like the old cemetery swindle of selling a single burial plot to numerous customers.

Among six strategies to combat the effects of bots, pixel stuffing, ad stuffing and other fraudulent activities recommended by Samuel Scott, former journalist turned digital marcom professional, global marketing speaker and contributor to TechCrunch and Moz,  is that online marketers should “stop doing cost-per-impression (CPI or CPM) campaigns” and “revise advertising KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) and metrics in human terms.”

What you, as an online advertiser, decide to do is the billion-dollar question.

For additional interesting and informative articles on sales and marketing, visit http://www.SMstudy.com/articles

[1] Matthew Ingram. (July 1, 2015) “There’s a Ticking Time Bomb Inside the Online Advertising Market.” Fortune. Retrieved 5/25/16 from http://fortune.com/2015/07/01/online-advertising-fraud/

[2] From the IAB annual report “IAB internet advertising revenue report 2015 full year results April 2016” at http://www.iab.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/IAB-Internet-Advertising-Revenue-Report-FY-2015.pdf

[3] Christopher Heine. (January 19, 2016) “Bots Will Cost Digital Advertisers $7.2 Billion in @016, Says ANA Study.” AdWeek. Retrieved on 5/25/16 from http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/bots-will-cost-digital-advertisers-72-billion-2016-says-ana-study-169072

[4] Samuel Scott. (6/22/15) “The Alleged $7.5 Billion Fraud in Online Advertising.” MOZ. Retrieved on 5/26/16 from https://moz.com/blog/online-advertising-fraud

[5] Suzanne Vranica. (6/11/2013) “Web Display Ads Often Not Visible” The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved on 5/27/16 from http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887324904004578537131312357490

Five Exceptional Examples of Product Placement in Hollywood Movies

The European Union defines product placement as "any form of audiovisual commercial communication consisting of the inclusion of or reference to a product, a service or the trademark thereof so that it is featured within a program." Product placement is one of the most effective methods of advertising because it has a viewing audience of nearly 100 percent. While TV advertisers lose many viewers who take breaks during commercials, movie viewers pay attention to product advertisements because they are engrossed in the film. The growth of product placement in movies has been phenomenal over the past decade. The U.S. is the largest and fastest growing paid product placement market. It generated revenues of $1.5 billion in 2005, $2.9 billion in 2007, and $3.7 billion in 2008.

Lets look at five exceptional examples of product placement in Hollywood movies that stood out in terms of seamless integration with the storyline and benefit to the brands.

1. Wilson (Movie: Castaway) - "Castaway" took the concept of product placement to another level by using a brand name for a character. When Chuck (Tom Hanks) gets stranded on an island, he finds a Wilson volleyball from one of the boxes that was in the plane. He paints the ball and turns it into a friend and companion named "Wilson." One of the original volleyballs used in the movie was auctioned for $18,500 to the ex-CEO of FedEx Office, Ken May. Wilson launched a joint promotion at the time of the films release boasting the fact that one of its products was co-starring Tom Hanks.

2. Sears (Movie: Man of Steel) - The 2013 blockbuster "Man of Steel" holds the record for the most occurrences of product placement in a movie. Apparently, the producers signed around 100 deals with promotional partners. One prominent example of product placement in the movie is a Sears store. Supermans father uses Craftsman tools and works at Sears. One scene includes a Sears store being blown up. Sears used this opportunity to create a Guinness World Record for the largest number of people assembled in one place dressed as Superman by gathering 566 employees in Superman costumes at the companys headquarters.

3. McDonalds (Movie: Pulp Fiction) - The 1994, Quentin Tarantino movie "Pulp Fiction" is arguably one of the best movies ever made. One bit of iconic dialogue centers on McDonalds. While discussing cultural differences among nations, Vincent Vega (John Travolta) and Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson) reference the Quarter Pounder and Big Mac.

4. Omega (Movie: Casino Royale) - Product placement in James Bond movies isnt new. Omega is one brand with a long history of association with the Bond films. It started in 1995 with "GoldenEye," in which Pierce Brosnan wore an Omega Seamster Quartz Professional watch. The trend followed as Brosnan flaunted different models of Seamster in later films. Daniel Craig, the current 007, has also worn the Omega Seamster in all of his Bond movies and even mentions the brand name Omega in "Casino Royale."

5. Starbucks (Movie: Youve Got Mail) - The 1998 romantic comedy "Youve Got Mail" famously placed two brands in the storyline--AOL and Starbucks. In the movie, Tom Hanks is shown drinking coffee at Starbucks and even makes a reference to the coffee giant in the dialogue: "The whole purpose of places like Starbucks is for people with no decision-making ability whatsoever to make six decisions just to buy one cup of coffee. Short, tall, light, dark, caf, decaf, low-fat, non-fat, etc. So people who dont know what the hell they are doing or who on earth they are can, for only $2.95, get not just a cup of coffee but an absolutely defining sense of self: Tall. Decaf. Cappuccino."

Back Talk Can Be Good for You; Customer-Centric Differentiation and SMstudy

“I wandered in and out of the brilliant stacks of cans following you…”

– Allen Ginsberg, “A Supermarket in California”

When potential customers “wander in and out of the brilliant stacks of cans,” what sets your product apart from all of the others on the shelf? What makes buyers begin following you?

Is it the need that you meet? Or the value proposition you offer? Is it your product’s packaging? Or placement on the shelf? Is it the reputation of your company that shines a special spotlight on your offering?  If your answer is, “Yes,” then you’re ready for a trip into the sometimes puzzling world of creating a product’s differentiated positioning. Grab your cape, Alice; you never know what you’ll run into down the rabbit hole.

A well-planned and executed differentiated positioning of a product sets it apart and attracts buyers. The process of creating a differentiated positioning “involves creating a positioning statement that clearly articulates, in a succinct sentence, how the company wants the customers in its selected target markets to perceive its products,” says Marketing Strategy, book one in theSMstudy™ Guide series.[1]

In our previous article, “What Turns a Ford into a Lincoln,” we looked at the use of features to set one product apart from another, to make it attractive to targeted market segments. This same list of features is used when writing the positioning statement. In this blog we consider the influence of the target segment itself and customer feedback on preparing that “succinct sentence.”   

Once your company has completed the process of selecting a target segment, it will have “detailed information…, such as specific wants and needs, customer personas, segment size, and so forth,” according to Marketing Strategy. The company then can “analyze the target segment information to determine areas where it has, or can, create a competitive advantage when positioning its products.” 

Where does a company get a clear statement of the “specific wants and needs” of their potential customers? From customer feedback, of course. “But, they’re potential customers!” someone is saying, “How can we get feedback from customers that aren’t customers, yet?” There are ways down this rabbit hole.

One way is to use industry benchmarks and Key Performance Indicators (KPI). “Comparing the company’s performance against industry benchmarks and KPIs helps prevent a company from focusing its positioning efforts on creating differentiators that are of little importance to customers in the industry,” the SMstudy™ Guide says. Your potential customers will have significant similarities with others in the targeted segment for similar products.

Closely related to benchmarks and KPIs, are existing marketing research reports. Your company or an industry group may have already conducted research that is relevant. “This research can help identify the best possible product features and associated product positioning based on how purchase intentions vary with changes to particular product characteristics. Furthermore, analyzing customers’ attitudes toward competitors’ products provides additional insights into how well the positioning strategies of competitors are working, and whether there are some gaps in their positioning that the company can exploit,” says the SMstudy™ Guide.

Another way is to talk to your company’s present customers. “No one can articulate your strengths better than your clients,” writes Cidnee Stephen in her article “How to Differentiate Your Business from the Competition.”[2]

As the SMstudy™ Guide puts it, “Understanding the customer experience and obtaining customer feedback about a company’s existing products (a concept referred to as the “Voice of the Customer”) helps a company to determine the positioning of its products. Such customer feedback includes improvement suggestions, compliments, and complaints.” Your company has probably been collecting feedback of this nature through post-purchase surveys, product registration processes, and the “Contact Us” tab on its website. This data is usually reviewed through a product or service improvement filter. Now is the time to look at that data with a filter emphasizing positioning.

Product piloting and conducting focus groups are two additional ways to collect feedback on a product or service that is not yet in wide distribution.

Our trip seems to use product and company differentiation interchangeably. Does that make sense? Down this rabbit hole, it does. The two are membrane on membrane close. The differentiated positioning of the company as a whole should guide all positioning of the company’s products and services. 

Does this article say it all about creating differentiated positioning? Absolutely not! In fact, the part of our treatment of this topic will discuss using SWOT Analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats).

As good as back talk can be, so can a good SWOT across the backside … or at least, across the corporate office!

For more interesting and informative articles on sales and marketing, visit SMstudy.

[1] The SMstudy™ Guide is available at http://www.smstudy.com/SMBOKGuide. 

[2] Cidnee Stephen. “How to differentiate Your Business from the Competition.” Bplans; Starting a Business Made Easy. Retrieved on 4/5/16 from http://articles.bplans.com/how-to-differentiate-your-business-from-the-competition/#.VwLfWKs56mM.linkedin

Selecting Points of Parity and Differentiation

Points of parity for a product are those characteristics of a company’s product that are not unique but are rather on par with competing products. Points of differentiation are those areas on which a company’s product outperforms competing products. The company needs to decide which product features and benefits it wants to match with competing products, and those it wants to differentiate from competing products. It is simply not feasible or advisable for a company to differentiate its product on all aspects.

Though points of differentiation provide a company with its competitive edge over the competition, choosing points of parity carefully is also important. Customers should be able to relate the company’s product with a certain product category, so they can understand at a broad level the type of need that the product satisfies. Therefore, some basic characteristics of the product must be similar to other products in its category. If the product fails to meet the basic characteristics that customers expect from all products in the product category, then customers may not consider it for purchase, irrespective of how well the product is differentiated on other characteristics.

In product categories where there are many differentiation options (such as in the software industry), it makes sense to focus on creating sustainable differentiators rather than on blunting the competition’s points of differentiation. Thus, efforts could be better utilized in creating profound points of differentiation. Additionally, differentiation is not always accomplished through product characteristics. It can be created by offering better services or unique packaging, or by implementing more efficient processes that provide a cost advantage.

Let’s try to understand this better with a few examples..

In the past, the ability of major retailers to provide options for customers to purchase products online would have been a point of differentiation. However, as online shopping grows in popularity and more companies develop their e-commerce capabilities to match consumer demand, the ability to facilitate online shopping has become a point of parity among major retailers.

Similarly, Until recent years, free internet connectivity through Wi-Fi was a point of differentiation for some coffee shops; however, as increasingly more consumers have come to expect this service, the ability to be freely connected is quickly becoming a point of parity in the industry.

A company may choose to match a competing product on a point of differentiation, effectively softening that product’s edge. Thus, if the company achieves parity on all the basic characteristics and blunts the competition’s competitive advantage by targeting its point of differentiation, then even a relatively minor point of differentiation can provide the company with a competitive advantage.

To read more articles about sales and marketing, visit SMstudy.com/articles

The New Battleground for Brands

Consumers rely on their mobile devices to keep them in-the-know in order to make decisions regarding their personal and professional lives. Think about it, on average you check your smartphone 85 times per day. That’s 85 chances for companies to get their brand seen. And most companies have attempted to optimize this opportunity by expanding their reach through mobile apps, but have fallen flat.

Here’s why: micro-moments, or “intent-driven moments of decision-making and preference-shaping that occur throughout the entire consumer journey.”  

Let me break it down for you a little further. People use their smartphones to purchase products, look up information, and watch videos. Sometimes they just reflexively turn to their device. According to Google, “In these moments, consumers' expectations are higher than ever. The powerful computers we carry in our pockets have trained us to expect brands to immediately deliver exactly what we are looking for when we are looking. We want things right, and we want things right away.”

So what can we do? According to Digital Marketing, book 3 in the SMstudy® Guide, “Rich media ads are image ads incorporating animations or other elements that provide users with ways to interact with the ad. Such elements are often customized to match user behavior. The targeted and personalized nature of the ads is intended to generate greater engagement, resulting in more views and clicks.” These types of ads woo users into making the clicks that get them to the right thing right away.

Here are a couple easy tips for creating the perfect micro-moments for your company to fully get use of those dollars it spends on marketing:

Create a blueprint: we all need to start somewhere, and the best place is the drawing board. Figure out what your target consumers are looking for and when. It is helpful to use Google Analytics to assist this process. With this data you can efficiently decipher what draws consumers to your brand and at what time. Time is an important factor that many companies overlook. Consumers are more likely to search for information on their phone while they are performing a task, so releasing a micro-moment during regular business hours can promote viewers to keep on viewing. Provide your audience with what they want, when they want it.

Understand your consumers: People process visuals 60,000 times faster than text, so give the people what they want, videos! Quick thirty-second to one-minute videos that engage consumers will increase click-rates from the micro-moment to your website. It is important to create the right moments that make consumers want to learn more about your brand.

Create a moment that seamlessly leads to your product. This may seem like a no-brainer, but the content you create, whether it be visuals or text, better give the consumer relevant information about something they are interested in as well as information about your product. There needs to be a connection between the two. A good example of this is Dunkin’ Donuts. The company released an app that not only navigates you to the closest Dunkin’ Donuts coffee shop, but also depicts the wait time at each location, so customers can plan their route to the coffee shop with the least amount of wait time. The app and the micro-moment that was launched with the start of the app seamlessly takes the consumer to the product.

Become one of the successful brands that use micro-moments to market products, and for any questions refer to SMstudy.com to help you with all of your sales and marketing needs.

To read more articles about sales and marketing, visit www.SMstudy.com/articles

When is enough too much? Interpreting Marketing Research and SMstudy

Ever look out at the ocean on a cloudy day? The huge gray mass above stretches out to meet the darker gray mass below at a black line on the horizon?

Standing on that beach, some people feel the ocean’s irresistible allure and comforting power. Others feel like they’re being sucked between two insatiable plates that will crush them at that line in the darkness.

An ocean on a cloudy day is an apt comparison for Big Data and metadata. Big Data stretches its expanding, roiling clouds of content over an equally roiling sea of metadata. Both are massive and powerful. They can both be threatening.

The desire to mine Big Data is making billionaires out of “mining equipment companies,” and references to their algorithms, claims of superior computing speed and boasts of expansive storage capacity are everywhere. Big Data is big content, and that content is getting bigger exponentially. How do we find what we need and want? The answer to that question is to be found in marketing research. A company’s marketing research team will develop expertise in web analytics in addition to what they already know about market analytics. They will need to incorporate more and more disciplines to turn data into information, information into knowledge and knowledge into wisdom.

Once one begins to get a handle on Big Data—or at least has a plan on how to handle it—he or she faces that almost surreal world of metadata. From the murky world of spying, the world learned there is useful information that is with the content but is not the content. “Metadata is the ‘data about data’, or the data that can be taken from an individual piece of content,” says Emma Battle in a blog for Success 360.[1]

In 2010, Raffi Kirkovian, a Twitter employee, published a “Map of a Twitter Status Object” that identifies 37 discrete pieces of information contained in a Tweet other than the actual content of the tweet.[2]

Four years later that seems to have grown, “At 140 characters a tweet seems tiny, but it can yield a wealth of information. According to Elasticsearch, a startup that builds software to help companies mine data from social media, there are 150 separate points of so-called metadata in an individual tweet,” says Elizabeth Dwoskin in a Wall Street Journal blog.

For marketing researchers this can be a bonanza, “A marketer can look at tweets sent by their target audience and see that the majority of the tweets have times stamped after 5:00 p.m. The marketer can then conclude that the best time to reach their target audience on Twitter may be after 5:00 p.m.,” says Battle.

How do marketing professionals go from data to decisions? Through interpretation. The data that is collected and analyzed “is used to enable the team to identify patterns, draw conclusions, solve the research problem, and achieve the research objectives,” according to SMstudy® Guide – Marketing Research, a book in the SMstudy® Guide series on sales and marketing.[3]

The Guide recommends that data interpretation start with three important inputs: the analyzed data, the research problem and objectives. During the interpretation process, “findings from the research analysis are compiled and reported to the marketing team and senior management and are ultimately used to inform marketing and business decisions.” In deciding what to compile and what to report, the researcher will rely on the research problem and objectives because they “provide a focused and definite direction to the data interpretation process,” according to the SMstudy® Guide.

With focus and direction, the marketing researcher uses three categories of tools to identify patterns and draw conclusions that will meet their company’s or client’s needs: tables, charts and expert judgment. Tables such as spreadsheets by Microsoft and Google help researchers organize large amounts of data. Some, like Microsoft’s Excel, provide a variety of filters and grouping tools for this purpose.

There are thousands of charts available to the market researcher. When one uses the term “chart” to be a category name that includes diagrams and graphs, the number of methods for visually displaying often complex relationships explodes. TheSMstudy® Guide highlights bar charts, stratum charts, pictograms and cartograms for their usefulness and broad-based familiarity.

Once one has an excellent collection of tables and charts, something is still needed to make complete sense of them all: expert judgment. “The ability to appropriately interpret the data develops with experience. Inexperienced researchers can sometimes interpret data in a preferred way because of their comfort level with a given method. A researcher should try to seek the opinions of industry experts and research experts, who can provide valuable inputs in choosing the best way to interpret data within the given constraints,” says SMstudy® Guide’s Marketing Research book.

When relevant inputs are processed with appropriate tools, the researcher draws conclusions that are used to solve the research problem and inform marketing decisions. In short, accurately interpreted research means you know the problem AND the best solution options. And knowing is a great feeling between the clouds and the ocean.

 [1] Battle, Emma. (7/23/14) “Metadata, Mega Data or Big Data What’s in It for Marketers” Success 360. Retrieved on 4/21/16 from www.success360i.com/metadata-mega-data-or-big-data-whats-in-it-for-marketers/   

[2] April 18, 2010 Raffi Kirkorian published a “Map of a Twitter Status Object” http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/TweetMetadata.pdf

[3] For more information about the SMstudy® Guide please, visit http://www.smstudy.com/SMBOKGuide/overview-of-SMstudy-guide

What Turns a Ford into a Lincoln?

When I was a kid the men in my neighborhood used to say, “The only difference between a Ford and a Lincoln is the packaging... and ten thousand dollars!” The pause between “packaging” and the “and ten thousand dollars” got the intended laughs. Men who couldn’t afford most of the regular Ford line—though still dreaming about the Lincolns—needed those laughs... and the consolation.

Marketers know that those neighborhood men were partially right: the right packaging can enhance a product’s differentiated positioning. More often though, a product’s position in its market is earned by its quality and the quality of the services that accompany it. The process of creating a well-defined differentiated positioning statement “helps a company maintain focus on each product and its value proposition while developing the key elements of its marketing mix, pricing, and distribution strategy,” says Marketing Strategy, book one of the SMstudy® Guide series.[1]

The common four elements of a marketing mix are “product, price, place, and promotion.”[2] These elements become refined and powerful when developed in connection with clearly defined pricing and distribution strategies. The creation of differentiated positioning for a product uses these elements and strategies to define “a list of the product features that are most important in helping customers make their purchasing decision,” according to Marketing Strategy. 

The features that set one’s product apart from others is often the decisive information for consumers. Though made by the same manufacturer, a Lincoln has distinct features that cannot be found on models from Ford’s standard line. There are features such as seat warmers and electronic monitoring systems that make Lincolns luxury cars that are positioned, priced and promoted to the luxury market. The same can be said about Cadillacs and other model lines built by General Motors—Lexus and Toyota, Affinity and Nissan, and so on.

In the process of creating a differentiated position, a company’s marketing team will use inputs such as the selected target segment, the company’s strengths and weaknesses, opportunities and threats, a list of competitors, details of competitive products, industry benchmarks, existing industry research reports and customer feedback about similar products or from research projects such as market tests and focus groups. And these inputs are raw resources for future blogs (previews of coming attractions).

Though much of this seems common knowledge, it takes a well-thought-out differentiated positioning statement to get products to the right street.

1. This series of six books covers six aspects of sales and marketing aligned to the most common career groups in this domain. The SMstudy® Guide offers a comprehensive framework that can be used to effectively manage sales and marketing efforts in any organization. For more details, visit: http://www.smstudy.com/SMBOKGuide.   

2. BusinessDictionary.com Retrieved on 3/31/16 from http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/marketing-mix.html