Do offline channels drive online search?

Press Release authors love numbered lists - example "1o things you should know about marketing", or "8 marketing tools you must use".  By putting an exact figure to any subject there is an implication that if you follow that advice, then success is ensured. We advocate the use of an appropriate mix of marketing methods integrated into a coherent marketing plan, not a list to  simply be ticked off as done. This includes a mix of offline channels as well as online activity. Writing about market research is another fertile source for PR people too, so it was interesting that Marketing News Flash, an e-mail newsletter published by Industrial Technology, selected a statistic from some previous research to support the value of advertising in magazines. Print advertising  rather than being in terminal decline, according to the research is the stimulus that prompts 30% of all online searches. The magazine's own research found that "76% of readers prefer magazines to keep up to date with new products and information relevant to their job. 66% also find out more information from a supplier after seeing an advertisement in the magazine".

However looking at the market research conducted in America in June 2007 by iProspect and Jupiter Research, further interesting figures emerge demonstrating the importance of offline marketing channels in prompting further search online. Television advertising at 37% was in top spot, but hot on its heels at 36% was word of mouth recommendation by a friend or acquaintance, then indeed 30% due to print advertising in newspapers and magazines. Perhaps of equal interest was that the company name or brand at 68% was the most commonly used keyword.

Although clients typically report that most of their sales leads come from their web site, what is very important is that more than two thirds are searching for a company or brand rather than a generic product category and most of them will have discovered their awareness of the brand offline. So perhaps it is premature to move all marketing investment to the Internet. Customers are still strongly influenced by the offline world and turn to the Internet as a convenient tool to learn more. At Technical Marketing Ltd, we help businesses put together and implement marketing plans that develop the brand message, raise top of the mind awareness and develop compelling content that provides the information your prospects are searching for. Informed people then make enquiries. 

Image: iProspect.

Are ordinary user recommendations more powerful than opinion leader endorsement?

Although the company web site is today probably  the primary source of enquiries and sales leads, there still needs to be some stimulus for prospects to take this route in the first case. They need to have at least an interest in the product or service you offer. This could be prompted either by need or recommendation by a trusted source. The recommendation format provides a personal endorsement that has long been used in marketing. This could be in the form of testimonials and case studies  typically given by recognised and respected opinion leaders.  Of course the recommendation could be more formally expressed in terms of a written specification issued by a consultant. Most marketing programmes recognise the need for favorable reviews and work hard to ensure influential people are on message.  But now just as the Internet offers the promise of a level playing field for small companies, so there is an opportunity for users of products to comment on their experiences. In fact some intermediary sales sites like Amazon invite users to write a review and Trip Advisor has become an important resource for travellers to benefit from the perspective of ordinary people who tend to be less glowing in their reviews than professional travel writers.

Social marketing sites allow companies to conduct a 'conversation' with users who now have the opportunity to comment and indeed exchange views. This has the potential to be a powerful new marketing tool but demands both a level of engagement and commitment of resources that few b-2-b companies have yet recognised.

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Market leadership credibility

Information has never been more universally accessible than now, in the Internet era. Turning to the Internet as a rich source of all knowledge has become the preferred starting point in the purchase cycle to research product/service options and to become better informed before entering into actual price negotiations. With the old business model  an enquiry would be followed by a sales call where the salesman had the upper hand due to superior and jealously guarded product knowledge. However the reluctance to share important information that can influence that final purchase decision is still kept back, at least on many company web sites. Yet that information, that unique knowledge or insight,  is probably what differentiates one company from its rivals. It is what establishes the company's credibility. The authority it commands within its specialist sector. A typical web site will show the company products and offer detailed technical specifications that can be downloaded, but then so do all the competitors. There is nothing to differentiate one product from another other than price!

What too few companies make use of is the White Paper. A document which can provide the essential background information that sets the product in context to the situation where it will be used. Not only can a White Paper be a valuable briefing document for the prospect, but it also establishes the company as an expert in that market, lends credibility to them as preferred suppliers and potentially, as a valuable business partner. Prospective customers will see beyond the headline price to a company that can also provide useful guidance and advice based on knowledge and practical experience. White Papers can provide checklists of what to ask for in a product, which specification points are essential, which are not and lead the prospect towards a product requirement that they are best placed to meet.  This may mean disclosing information that traditionally been withheld, but may also be the critical differentiator that wins a new  customer.

News bearing web sites

Several years ago it became apparent to the team at Technical Marketing Ltd that much of the content for a company web site was pretty much static. The products, services and stuff about the company itself, didn't really change that much, or that often. What did change was news. 

News can be about company results, investments, acquisitions, appointments, contract wins and  projects.  Or new product announcements, exhibitions, events, market research findings and comment on industry issues. The problem we recognised is that the PR people who were schooled in copy deadlines, embargo dates and other timing issues didn't run the web site. The IT guys did web sites and often it was pretty low on their priority list as well. If they had to fix payroll software then it could be a couple of weeks before they got round to posting news items if they bothered at all. 

All that changed, for our clients at least, when we rolled out the Virtual News Office. With a VNO, stories could be published online as soon as they were ready to go. In fact every story can be published rather than end up in some editor's waste bin. Although our goal at the time was to provide a service that got company news accessible through the company web site we soon realised it was also getting indexed by search engines and because the news story actually resides on the VNO server it was creating relevant links to the company web site, in turn improving ranking of that site.

I have written before on the inevitable shift of emphasis from print to Internet as the place where news is published and consumed. The print business model based on advertising revenue and free distribution is under threat and many publications now charge for news publication and in doing so forfeit editorial control over the news pages. Not only does this degrade quality, but some magazines now resemble a notice-board patchwork of press releases. Whatever journals do they cannot match the immediacy of the Internet. However the sustainable business model for online aggregated news sites is taking time to emerge, as generally these sites offer free news and have no subscription revenue. Interestingly, in the industrial and engineering sectors, industry web sites that are mainly news oriented, or as someone called it today - 'news bearing' - are emerging as important resources for enquiries for engineers or architects. 

Because such industry sites contain so much relevant content about a product category an engineer searching for a component will most likely find the that site higher up the search results than any one manufacturer of that component. So what he reads initially is a press release that in turn provides links to the supplier. And online aggregated new sites are becoming more selective, only publishing interesting news and carefully monitoring how many hits each attracts. The most popular news suppliers find their news items featured and fed to Google News and other participating sites. So this trend once again emphasises the importance of news creation and news delivery and increasingly as a direct source of sales leads.   

Marketing to a budget or on a budget?

In these times of economic gloom sound marketing advice, based on research, is to maintain the marketing activity while the financial management tendency, based on prudence, is to cut marketing expenditure. 

Research by Harvard Business School has shown that it is essential to maintain marketing spending, even more so in a recession and to emphasise core values. “It is well documented that brands that increase advertising during a recession, when competitors are cutting back, can improve market share and return on investment at lower cost than during good economic times. Uncertain customers need the reassurance of known brands.”

In the last blog I talked about the importance of a Marketing Plan and closely linked to the plan is the Marketing Budget. As with the marketing plan - a statement of intent, a manifesto and plan of action - time should be spent on carefully building the accompanying marketing budget. Companies without a budget seem to be more easily tempted to buy special advertising offers and buy into all kinds of special deals than companies who have planned ahead and purchased at more advantageous series rates for marketing services that are core to the plan. Not only are the bargains not always appropriate but it is amazing how quickly the costs mount up and without apparent benefit. 

I have frequently referred to the engineering philosophy behind technical marketing. Take the case of purchasing a new machine or piece of equipment. It is regarded as an investment that will be justified on the benefits it will bring - lower costs, improved productivity, better quality. We look at marketing as an investment, an investment that should deliver valid returns. Just because there is often a significant creative element does not devalue the investment benefit. Equally there should be benchmarks and goals set that are measurable.

Another more subtle way of cutting the marketing budget is to cut quality. Where marketing is not valued by a company, then purchasing marketing services cheaply can be tempting. The problem with this interpretation of budget is that the downgrade in quality that usually accompanies becomes apparent to customers. They start to perceive the company as a 'budget' brand and lower their expectation of both the quality and value of that company's product accordingly. Interestingly people buying marketing services at a budget price might think otherwise in their day to day lives. They would probably opt for experience rather than trainees or amateurs and recognise that experience may appear more expensive but is actually the safe option. The same people that wouldn't let a student do their hair or fix their teeth will happily let a relative or man they met in a pub have a bash at their web site, design a brochure or photograph products. Although professional marketing advice might come at a higher hourly rate it can prove a wise investment in doing things right and helping the company build credibility.