Most Sales In 2015 Will Be Web Influenced...Get Ready

Forrester Research has a new forecast out that covers all retail sales - delivering the news that 2015 will be a watershed year in retail. In 2015 more sales will be either Web Influenced or Web Only...versus Non-Web Influenced.

The report is titled "US Cross-Channel Retail Forecast, 2011 - 2016". For manufacturers and their local retailers who sell those goods, this should have a profound impact on your actions.                   

Doing the math: $1.856 Trillion in 2015 retail is the combination of ecommerce and web-influenced sales -- beating out the $1,780 Trillion in "old fashioned retail". The other way to phrase this is : "All Newspaper/TV/Radio/Direct Mail/POS/Sky-writing only" influenced retail will be in the minority in a short years.

As most things are in life, this is a double-edged sword.

The downside for manufacturers and their retail channel partners caught flat-footed will be fewer sales and higher costs sunk in traditional "paid" media. Retailers will be "showroomed" by consumers who browse in your retail aisles but buy elsewhere -- either online or down the street. I recently bought a laptop and accessed specs and reviews on my smartphone while in 3 different stores -- ultimately buying in the last store. How many of you have spent a few hours researching a product online, and knew more than the salesperson when you visited the store?

The upside of this trend will be more sales at lower costs for those who embrace this new technology-enabled consumer at every phase of the process. Depending upon your product category: Dreaming/Inspiration;Casual Research; Retail and Online Investigation; Purchase; First Use; Ownership. Consider: What content and assistance do you offer online to help consumers at each of these phases? Are you reaching these consumers with your paid media as well as your owned (i.e. free) media? Is your online product selection and experience consistent to your retail environment? Manufacturers, are you syndicating your content and making it easy for your retailers to use it in their websites and social media?

There is still time to get ready for 2015 if you start soon.

Increase banner ad effectiveness by 285%

We've recommended pairing landing pages with banner ads in our MarCom systems for our clients, but now we have solid evidence to support that hunch. A recent Marketing Experiments webinar explored this topic and reported a 285% increase in effectiveness when testing this.

Why? Consumers don't experience as much "mental friction" when things flow smoothly from the banner to the landing page. The expectation of the click is fulfilled.  There is less confusion. Even a split second of hesitation costs you.

Now imagine leaving this decision up to a local dealer that is spending your co-op dollars. Will your system offer a fool-proof method for executing this best practice? The solution is simple: Your Ad Builder or Marketing Resource Management software needs to offer banner ads paired with matching landing pages for your dealers.

Clearly leaving the choice up to a dealer isn't as effective as controlling this vital element in your system. Make your co-op funds stretch farther, be more effective and help your dealer execute an great campaign that sells more units for you. It's a win-win.

More restructuring in the Yellow Pages industry this month

This month the earth shook in the Yellow pages industry.  This seems like old news as we've been talking about the dramatic decline in printed yellow page usage and the surge in online local search, but the fact that these two events occured in April 2011 is striking.

April came in with a bang with the news that TMP Directional Marketing was closing up shop.  This was a big deal and sudden by their own admission.  See the news to clients letter posted on their website. 

"We know this is all happening very quickly and wish we could have provided you with more notice. Unfortunately, an unforeseeable perfect storm of events has hit our company. Industrywide declines in the rate of print usage have significantly reduced our revenues. At the same time, we are contending with substantial debt obligations. Unfortunately, this combination has severely limited our ability to refinance– leaving us no other responsible choice but to wind down operations."
 
What ensued was an interesting and active discussion in social media as to the cause.  Was it due to a dying media platform?  Other YP competitors?  Failure to adapt?  Others stood up for TMP and the yellow page industry as having solid ROI and many active markets.  With everything said, it was hard to refute that the arrogance of continually raising rates 2-3% annually in the face of declining usage is not a great business practice.  Some of the former exec's are already coming together as 2nd Act Local Marketing.
 
The second tremor that was less of a shock was that the Yellow Pages Association is no more.
The Yellow Pages Association is now the Local Search Association. This industry group  unveiled the widely anticipated name change at its annual conference in Las Vegas this month. The logic behind this dramatic move is the association’s members are repositioning themselves more broadly, and less directly as "directory publishers", therefore their trade group should naturally reflect that fact.
 
After years of putting on a brave face, it was time to "reposition".  Only time will tell whether the name change was cosmetic or real.  As we all know by now, local search with Google, mobile and social platforms is hot and getting stronger as more of us convert to smartphones with better browsers.
 
The question "Is Yellow Pages dead?" misses the point.  No smart advertiser wants to be among the last ones clinging to a declining media platform.  There is a tipping point past which printed yellow pages or any other media will go...and then it ceases to be truly relevant -- whether it merely exists or not.
 

Google is 69.67% of Search and Search Impacts Everything

Hitwise reported that Google is still the overwhelming leader in online search with 69%+ share (Dec 2010) with a sample of 10 million US households. That's no surprise.  But more interesting -- beyond the small changes in month-over-month market share -- is the overall impact of search on our lives.

Here is a brief video recapping some interesting findings on what we all did with search in 2010:

QR Codes Need to be Easier or they'll be Extinct

I was struggling to read a QR Code on a colleagues' business card recently (after three tries I lost interest) then saw Heidi Tolliver-Nigro's blog "Ever Tried to Download a QR Code Reader?" today. She struck a chord, judging by the number of comments to the blog.

While QR codes are novel, they won’t receive widespread acceptance until three things happen:

1) QR Code readers need to be loaded onto all mobile devices. This will remove the obstacle that Heidi mentions and increase user adoption. Think back to life before Adobe Acrobat Readers weren't on all new PC's. Get the picture?

2) Users will need a bit of training. Once the software is loaded onto all devices this will be fairly straight-forward...something like "Point and shoot to see this website". Once users know the software is on their device and recognize a QR code when they see it, we're halfway there.

3) Marketers will need to incentivize users with lots of value in order to get them over the hump. Just going to the homepage of your site isn't going to motivate anyone. They could just as easily go there directly or use Google. There needs to be something special there: a prize, coupon, sweepstakes, inside information...something to justify the extra effort in the consumers mind.

I’ve blogged on QR code readers a year ago and they remain a novelty today while other devices like ebook readers take off. If QR codes don't become easier to use soon new technologies that are easier will replace them. Look at Google Goggles. Point and shoot. No cryptic codes.

Remember: The Web grew (and continues to grow) based upon being better, faster and easier than alternative methods. Who buys a set of encyclopedia's anymore? Who spends all day shopping for a car, refrigerator or lawn tractor by going from place to place without first spending time online doing some local research? Time starved consumers can't wait.

On the Web its either Easy or Extinct. Pick one.

Do you have Uber Control over your Advertising?

Nobody likes to think of something going wrong in the marketing department. The wrong ad ran. Product data or legal terms are out of date. Mistakes are broadcast and our in-bound callcenters, dealers and online customer service feels the heat. Upset dealers and injury to the brand are the result.

Our AdBuilder systems offer an incredible amount of control over marketing and advertising activities. We all know it, but don't want to think about the "what if" worse case scenarios.

We had one of those last week with a client. Frantic calls and red exclamation point emails fly. It's a big legal issue if we don't stop these ads. "What can we do NOW???". The AdBuilder team swung into action!

In a matter of 4.5 hours:
* the original artwork was pulled down
* all ads created were identified by number, author, date/timestamp and publication
* ads were located at print publications and recalled
* new ads were posted
* new ads were sent to print publications to meet original materials deadlines

Amazing teamwork facilitated by a well designed system. Thankfully everything worked out okay and was back to normal by lunchtime.

Do you have uber control over your dealer advertising like this? The ability to control your marketing message and brand is what separates merely good from great. We often don't want to think about "when disaster strikes", but we have a group of very happy marketing clients, agency partners, (and lawyers) who are glad someone did.

The Check is NOT in the Mail

I attended a Direct Marketing Association conference last year that felt more like the "Online Marketing Association" versus the typical direct mail cheer leading sessions of yesteryear. it used to be that the USPS Postmaster General addressed the DMA with everyone hanging on his every word. There was an air of stability to the whole scene.

John Potter, Postmaster General, struck a different tone on Tuesday. It was direct and unvarnished. He talked about the staggering shortfalls in postal volume and revenue -- and the need for immediate and drastic change.

"It's reflective of a macro change in how society communicates." Potter stated, referring to the dramatic change brought on by online and digital technology.

This wasn't some little internal study either. Three big consulting firms played major roles: Boston Consulting Group (BCG), Accenture, McKinsey. This was big and serious.

The main story line in the press had the USPS predicting mail volume would fall 15% from 177 billion pieces in 2009 to 150 billion pieces in 2020; closing branches and limiting delivery to five days a week.

What wasn't widely reported were some darker statistics:

* BCG surveyed different groups to make their forecasts. Commercial mailers predicted a 15% drop in their volume, likely anticipating their own plans to move to online bill payment and outbound email. Consumers predicted a drop of 22% based upon their personal use of the mail system. BCG then used something called the "Broadband EU Leader" trend to project a 34% drop in volume by 2020. The last trend being more than double what the press reported.

* Real Revenue per Delivery Point is predicted to plummet by almost 50% by 2020 -- from $1.80 today to a $1.00 in 2020.

What are the implications for marketing?

1. Get used to a constant drumbeat of higher postal rates and lower service levels as we march toward 2020

2. Expect ROI for mailed campaigns to be increasingly harder to hit as rates increase

3. Make sure your lists are up-to-date and squeaky clean. Smaller micro-targets will become the norm vs. the exception as mailers seek to mine pockets of gold in their lists

4. Prepare now to transition your corporate and channel support programs online. The Ad builder system for your channel partners needs online options now to anticipate the trend and get them comfortable with those options (local online search, email, online video, text messaging, local Facebook campaigns).

The sooner your channel starts thinking this way the better. Your leadership from marketing is critical. The check is no longer "in the mail".