Interactive Online Marketing

That is a familiar image, isn't it? The well-traveled, world-weary suitcase, littered with stickers from places visited from Alaska to Zimbabwe. The trusty suitcase that is lugged from state to state and country to country: it may be battered and bruised, but it serves its owner well as they globe-trot across the world.

I used to be envious of the owners of those suitcases. That image motivated me to have my own beat-up, decorated travel companion to visit far off places with.

I have been living outside of America for almost nine years now. I lived in Sydney, Australia for just under five years...

At ExactTarget, we’re passionate about our clients—they’re some of the best brands we know, and we’re often inspired by their dedication to the work they do. And Von Maur is an excellent example! From the company’s start in the late 1800s until now, Von Maur has always put their customers first.

If you’ve visited one of the retail chain’s stores, you know what I mean—impeccable service, inviting décor, musical ambiance, and top-notch products. And while the company’s perfected their signature “above and beyond” service in stores, Von Maur wants customers to experience the same great service...

Every industry is unique, with its own challenges and opportunities. But for marketers in the travel and hospitality industry, the pressure of delivering the right message, at the right time, via the right channel is truly next level.

To succeed in this heavily-saturated market, travel brands must create a seamless information-gathering and booking experience for their customers. If they don’t, they risk missing that very narrow window of time when travelers are ready to make their tentative travel plans become a reality (i.e., book the trip!).

In short, missing that elusive window of...

The first thing most aspiring marketers learn is the importance of identifying and subsequently engaging those beautiful people called “the audience” no matter where they live online. This lesson gains wholehearted acceptance from everyone in the marketing world. However, the execution becomes complicated, and soon we all learn that feeding something like a blog everyday just simply isn’t enough.

We must put ourselves on the customer's online path.

Think goals first, campaigns second and tactics third.

What’s the goal? Always start there. That’s what the university lecturer taught you a long time...

There’s no doubt that today’s consumers are mobile. They’re constantly on-the-go, sending and receiving communications of all types, and they’ve come to expect that information be (literally) in-hand at all times. Consumers in the UK and around the globe are no longer sitting at their computers searching for information—instead, they expect information to be available all around them. At the same time, they expect that information to be relevant to their lives.

The hyper-connected consumer expects brands of all sizes and industries to start meeting them where they are. It also provides new...

In my last post, "Are you Leaving Money on the Table by Sending Non-Targeted or Blast Emails?", I explained that sending the same offer to your entire database could actually be hurting your sales efforts and causing you to leave money on the table.

In this post, we will shift gears to focus on your merchandising strategy. By utilizing a "crawl, walk, run" strategy that leverages automation, you can actually increase AOV, boost your conversion rate, and provide your shoppers with an overall better shopping experience.

#4 Way Retail Marketers are Leaving Money On the Table: Manually Merchandising...

March 13, 2013, was a historic day for Kickstarter, the website dedicated to social funding for anything from software development to stage shows and everything inbetween. Ex-hit television series "Veronica Mars" launched a campaign to raise $2 million in financing to produce a motion picture of the cult favorite, hitting its goal in under 10 hours and setting a record for the quickest $1 million to be raised in the site's history.

Fans rejoice at the impending return of their favorite moonlighting private eye, but what does this mean for the film industry? And what does this say about...

There’s no doubt that today’s consumers are mobile. They’re constantly on-the-go, sending and receiving communications of all types, and they’ve come to expect that information be (literally) in-hand at all times. Consumers are no longer sitting at their computers searching for information—instead, they expect information to be available all around them. At the same time, they expect that information to be relevant to their lives.

It was no suprise to us that Australians are leading the world in their adoption of technology and in partiular how they connect with brands on mobile devices. The...

Let’s face it: gaining and retaining customers can often feel like a delicate negotiation process. What is the right mix between what you’ll give in the way of offers and discounts to what your customers gain through their interactions with you?

However, retailers will have more than just price in their bargaining arsenals. In this post, we explore the benefits of using an abandoned cart program to recapture lost revenue.

#1 Way Retail Marketers are Leaving Money On the Table: Not Having an Abandoned Cart Strategy

Our Retail Touchpoints Exposed data found that only 22 percent of retailers on the...

As part of our reserach for the recent SUBSCRIBERS, FANS, & FOLLOWERS report, Marketers from Mars, we asked consumers to share their thoughts on how marketers could improve their cross-channel communcations.

We're happy to share a few of their repsponses here:

How do you improve email marketing performance?

“Make your site stand out from others on the net. Offer a site that is simple to navigate. Offer a 24-hour customer helpline service and also reply to all emails received within the hour. Don’t inundate your users with emails—one per week will do. Make your subject line eye-catching so the...

When it comes to daily usage of various online channels, our Marketers from Mars research reveals some interesting trends and differences between marketers and consumers. In many ways, usage rates follow similar trends of prior reports, with email, text, Facebook, and Twitter rounding out the top four.

What’s interesting to note is the higher rates of consumer usage in emerging channels such as Pinterest, Instagram, and Foursquare. While marketers use nearly every digital platform more frequently than consumers, these platforms show different usage patterns.

If consumers are there, should...

The 20^th annual SXSW interactive festival in downtown Austin, TX, brought in tens of thousands of people competing to maximize their brand’s visibility. From swag to branded pedi cabs to exclusive parties, people are doing whatever they can to create brand awareness and build lead generation. Who will break out of the mainstream and leave an impression on this year’s SXSW?

Here are a few noteworthy announcements:

1. Bre Pettis, CEO of MakerBot Industries (known for their 3-D printers) revealed the MakerBot Digitizer. This device uses lasers to scan the contours of physical objects. These...

Last week, ExactTarget had the opportunity to participate in one of our first tradeshow events in Stockholm, Sweden, home to our newest office location. Webbdagarna was a two-day event attracting more than 1,500 of the Nordic region’s interactive and web marketers--all keen to understand more about the future of cross-channel, how to implementeffective programs, and where to start in bridging the gap between offline and online channels.

ExactTarget Nordics recently opened its doors in Stockholm, Sweden, in the Östermalm business district. We’re excited to have a local team led by Henrik...

It’s March, and we know what that means. It’s time for some Madness. Teams around the country have started punching their tickets to the tournament and several more will do so throughout this week/weekend before the final field is announced Sunday evening. It’s a time of year when college basketball captures the imagination of the country, brackets are filled out, brackets are busted, and fans everywhere are tuning in to witness shining moments.

For many fans, that means watching more than one game at a time. Whether that happens at a sports bar, your home, at work (I would never), or just...

Summer is just around the corner, and for the music industry that means one thing: summer concert tours. And more than that, music festivals throughout the United States are gearing up for their 2013 edition.

Two weeks ago, the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival, hosted in Manchester, TN, announced its lineup for the June 13-16 festival. But unlike typical concert lineups announced online, Bonnaroo chose to turn this announcement into more of a virtual event.

On February 19, as a part of a 3-hour event hosted on the YouTube channel Bonnaroo365, the 2013 festival lineup was announced. In addition,...

Multiple touch points and disparate systems can often prove challenging for organisations trying to make sense of their data, leaving them with no way to leverage the information they have to gain insight into their customers.

At TFM&A (Technology for Marketing & Advertising) in London recently, I was struck by the number of similar conversations I had with various marketers. Consistently, they expressed frustrations around having to depend heavily on IT to obtain data in order to send out customer communications and how this generally leads to delays and unnecessary additional costs.

Whenever a...

I recently read an article on TFB (The Future Buzz) which argued against the principle of using simple communications to reach out to the mass of your customers. I must admit, I wholly agree with assuming that you have a smart base of customers! It is definitely apparent that "dumbing down" messages does not guarantee that they will be engaged with by everyone, especially in today's digital age of smart and service-focused consumers.

The same blog post argues that using generic and simple messaging can portray your brand as "cheap" and "untrustworthy." I am not a businessman, but I am sure...

Mobile World Congress convenes just one week from today in Barcelona, Spain (February 25-28). We are excited to make the trip to the world’s premier mobile industry event and round out what seems like a mobile world tour, after already hitting CES, Mobile Insider Summit, and MMA this year.

The theme of Mobile World Congress 2013 is “Explore the New Mobile Horizon” and will center on trends like contactless payments, augmented reality, embedded devices, and connected cities. There will be over 1,500 product and technology exhibitors and an App Planet dedicated to the mobile app...