Yesterday, Ian McNamara, Creative Company’s Media Developer and I made the trek to Monona Terrace for the University of Wisconsin’s E-Business Consortium’s Business Best Practices & Emerging Technologies conference. Yes, we know it’s a mouthful.
The event was sold out and rightfully so. We were going to give you are 12 best of but you get 4 bonus ones just because we like you so much.
1. We are learning to communicate again and the implications are profound. The changes in social media are affecting ALL of your customers. Everyone is adapting and the rules and expectations for how you serve customers are now being set – BY THE CUSTOMERS.
2. We are all social snackers. We move in and out of various social mediums in an effort to get our fix for the day. These aren’t Oreo cookies though – they are real people influencing other people and you want to be part of the conversation. Your brand had better have some personality or you won’t be invited in.
3. The ultimate competitive edge is innovation. 6 out of 10 things you try will fail but 4 out of 10 will succeed. All companies say they are innovative but few really are. Encourage your coworkers to trust each other, comment on each other’s work and take criticism in stride. Information must be shared openly about successes and failures.
4. Anticipate the future. “Hoping” that it won’t happen isn’t a strategy. Mobile. Digital. The cloud. Social. They are here to stay. Make sure you’re there.
5. Give your customers the gift of time. What is the thing we all thirst for? More time. If you can give them that, they will buy and buy and buy.
6. Make sure your ecommerce, email marketing and web functionality works well on all platforms. Tablet shoppers spend up to 20% more than PC shoppers and buy faster, for example.
7. Eliminate the roadblocks. Stop asking questions you don’t need to ask in your website check out lanes or to subscribe to your e-newsletter or blog. These are barriers to doing business.
8. On your website, science has shown that people pay attention to the middle the most. Make sure your visuals are captivating. They are looking to exit when their eyes move to the left or the right so ask them to stay in those spaces.
9. Your customers “buy buttons” are in their reptilian brains and this is primarily visual. Make sure you have images in your check out lane. You may be doing business but if they aren’t emotionally engaged, they’ll check out without buying.
10. Your goal in any digital format is to get your customer to raise his hand. That’s it and you get one ask. Don’t mucky it up.
11. Temperature bars are key on websites when you’re asking people to sign up, complete a survey or check out. Always let them know where they are at or you’ll lose them.
12. Give them choices to order. If they get frustrated during the ordering process, 92% of them will NEVER come back.
13. People use the internet to collect evidence. Give them a reason to choose you and your brand.
14. When it comes to email marketing – and we knew this already at Creative Company because we do so much of it – your shelf life is 8 to 48 hours. 90% of your response will happen in the first 8 hours.
15. Trigger emails are the most effective. As in, “You left the shopping cart, is there something we can help you with?” The Abandon Cart emails as they are called are very effective. Or, emails based on past purchases – Amazon does a great job of this. Companies with sophisticated data will succeed and that email address is your golden ticket to the Chocolate Factory.
16. And lastly, we are learning to communicate – again. At any given moment, you have a variety of channels open to you. 1 to 1, 1 to Many and Many to Many. How you use them matters.