Marketers are being paid thousands to millions of dollars, yet many are failing miserably to give consumers a memorable experience while building awareness for the brands they represent. They are paid to create and sustain a connection that should exist between the moment of encounter and a successful “post-experience” of any marketing campaign. This experience should then lead to a sale or referral.
Some websites, mobile apps and printed marketing campaigns around us are confusing consumers yet should play a great role in marketing and then make the sale. They are simply misunderstood by consumers in many instances. When marketers introduce new technologies (i.e. symbols, icons, calls-to-action), they should “better-educate” consumers through the process for best marketing results. They should better construct the copy and design to fit the flow leading to the eventual sale or referral.
When consumers are successfully engaged by campaigns on the web, mobile devices or print, they’re curious and want to begin an experience leading to a reward. When deprived of such an experience or left in limbo with marketing messages, the results can lead to bad reviews for the brand, high exit rates by visitors, and low ROI for the companies paying for such campaigns.
Let us remind ourselves that the need of every business is get customers to eventually “make a sale” or “refer someone to make a sale”.
For the web, some design elements include the navigation bar, generic rss feed icon, social network fanboxes, social network icons, photo galleries, subscription forms for email or mobile alerts.
Marketers need to team up closely with designers, editors, developers for website design and content curation or management. Content and design need to engage, educate, then encourage website visitors, to make a sale or refer a sale – after a great experience is a plus.
Mobile Marketing campaigns – QR codes, Microsoft Tags and Text Message marketing and Mobile ads
Marketers need to make sure companies label “scanning” marketing with directions to scan the images of the QR codes or Microsoft Tags properly. Add the download source of the scanner for the images to be easily downloaded, then used to scan.
Consumers that are naive about QR codes will not scan them properly. This will lead to a negative mobile experience. Who pays the price of losing the potential customer? The company will. Not the marketer that advised them to use these QR codes. QR codes are not going anywhere (with a monthly growing rate of scans in the millions in the US alone). They are becoming much more useful and habitual in consumer engagement, so why not use it to create a positive experience instead of the other way around. New technology, methods and tactics should be patiently introduced to consumers and not rushed. Enjoy this photo article about good and bad examples of campaigns using QR codes.
Mobile SMS Text
Marketing text messages should have a personal touch and mention first names of your subscribers. This warms up the message and makes it matter more to the recipient. Use URLs that start with a domain name familiar or from a brand compared to different unknown link shorteners. Consumers are shying away from launching links without a domain name except very popular link shorteners like Bit.ly. ALWAYS make sure the url/link in the sms campaign leads to a mobile-friendly landing page or website. It is imperative you make the recipient never “pinch and zoom” to struggle and view the message you deploy.
Mobile advertising
An affordable approach to Mobile advertising is to piggy-back on mobile apps of local and regional companies with a similar demographic. Create partnerships by providing social rewards and offers to their mobile customers. This adds to the customer’s mobile experience and indirectly advertises medium sized to smaller brands and companies. Don’t just advertise….provide a service with every ad. Partner with companies that their demographic fits your offering at the moment of encounter. A realtor should not try advertising houses in a restaurant app. People do not want to think about buying homes when hungry. A realtor could advertise a great home in an interior designer’s app or vice versa.
Print Marketing – LESS is still MORE, Very Simple is the new Engage
Simplify your advertising copy and messages. Keep it simple with not more than 2 font styles, images should be adjusted for faster loading speeds on web and mobile. Creatively, images should speak for themselves i.e. translate the campaign message effectively. Spend more time having the perfect image designed so you type less for a call-to-action. TIP - Use short and simple facts with numbers to engage consumers where necessary.
Our recent incoming clients at Keadworks complain about social networks and mobile marketing strategies being very unsuccessful for their past campaigns. Some express doubts with social networks, blogging and mobile marketing via QR codes or SMS marketing results. We’ve had to enlighten them that the problem is neither the social networks nor the QR codes, but the inability to design a campaign that educates consumers of their offering and brand through a simple experience.
When we designed and developed our events marketing application Kojami, we had innovative goals but had to implement these in phases, while educating users in parallel. We want individuals, event companies, corporations and businesses to easily create, manage and track events’ and attendees data and analytics before, during and after the events occur – to build better strategies towards their company bottom line.
Every step of the way, the application not only provides a great set of solutions but also educates every user. This happens through the website, mobile features, copy and blog content. We strive to enhance the copy and design to better guide users to enjoy their experience while driving results for companies using the product as well.
In conclusion, marketers are shoving new technology down the throats of companies and consumers without guidance and better education. This is HURTING MARKETING instead of getting positive results for companies/brands while providing great experiences via web, mobile and print for consumers. Let's educate consumers about the new technologies and how to interact with their favorite brands much easier. This way they get rewards and stay loyal. And let us educate companies that are clients, to implement these new technologies so they produce better results. In the end, everyone wins!