Up until fairly recently eCommerce recommendations and remarketing were only possible for large eCommerce sites. However, the emergence of recommendation and remarketing tools and service providers over the last two years have made these sales boosting benefits accessible to even small businesses and marketers.

In this article we will look at what recommendations and remarketing are within the field of eCommerce, before looking at how they can benefit your business and boost your sales.

What Recommendations & Remarketing Mean

Recommendations have long been a core component of Amazon’s website, with up to 70% of Amazon’s home page dedicated to recommendations.  There are three primary types of recommendations:

• Generic: These recommendations are seldom influenced by your past browsing and shopping history, and often show what other customers are currently looking at, or what the top-sellers are in general, or by category.
• Complementary: These recommendations are directly influenced by your current and past behavior on an eCommerce site, and will be made up of items that complement or enhance the items you are currently looking at.
• Alternatives: These recommendations are alternatives to what you are currently looking at, or what is already in your cart. Alternative recommendations can be used to either upsell or to retain a customer where the product they were originally interested in is out-of-stock.

Remarketing is primarily about having your online ads displayed to users who have previously visited your site, as they browse other websites. However, remarketing can also be used in tandem to recommendations by showing visitors to your site products they have viewed on other sites, and even items that are relevant to their current geographical location.

Both recommendations and remarketing rely on you having a substantial amount of data regarding your customer’s behavior and history, and the arrival of recommendation and remarketing tools and service providers gives small businesses access to this, along with access to 3rd-party data that enhances what they have already collected.

Photo Credit Think with Google

Using Recommendations to Increase Average Basket Size

Careful implementation of complementary, and even generic recommendations, can lead to an increase in your average basket size, with a McKinsey case study showing that cross-selling techniques can increase sales by 20%. The focus should be on items that enhance what the customer is looking at; for example, if the customer is looking at a shirt, complementary recommendations would be pants, shoes and even socks that create a complete outfit.  However, there shouldn’t be too many recommendations or you risk losing the customer. Generic recommendations in this context can encourage customers to explore your site more, possibly finding items they want, but weren’t actively looking for.

Photo Credit Think with Google

Using Recommendations to Increase Conversions

Countless sales are lost each day when the item the customer is looking for is out-of-stock; but alternative recommendations can help you. Whenever an item is out-of-stock, ensure that you display at least three alternatives, using a good, better, best approach. Caution must be taken when setting up your alternatives since they should closely match the original; if the customer was looking for a light switch, don’t offer them a new lampshade as an alternative.

Photo Credit InfoSys

Using Recommendations to Improve Customer Loyalty

Personalization plays a critical role in fostering customer loyalty for online stores, and personalizing some of your generic recommendations is one way to start. Generic recommendations are shown when you don’t know what the customer is actually looking for, but once you have some history on a customer’s past behavior you can, in addition to the standard generic recommendations, show a list of items they bought recently, or buy frequently. This is particularly appropriate for FMCG and other items customers need to buy regularly.

Amazon’s recommendations are said to generate up to 30% in additional revenue for the company, and while they have been doing this for quite a few years, any online business, big or small, can realize a boost in sales through the proper implementation of their own recommendation and remarketing strategy. The only requirement is that you start now.

Przemyslaw Mankowski as a CEO of QuarticON concentrates on company’s further expansion on the market, lead International business strategy and develops business partnerships in CEE and worldwide. He has been working in New Tech industry for several years. Prior to joining QuarticON.com, he was Sales Director in Agora and Member of the Board in Trader.com (Poland). He was also CEO at Passus and NextWeb Media.

Marketing Podcast with Matthew Dixon

The way people buy has changed just about everything about sales and marketing today.

The way people buy in B2B has grown so complex that just understanding the buying landscape is half of the battle.

My guest today for the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast is Matthew Dixon, co-author of The Challenger Customer: Selling to the Hidden Influencer That Can Multiply Your Results. We talk about influencers, why they matter to your marketing goals, and how to reach them for the best results.

In his previous work, the Challenger Sale, Dixon and his co-authors presented research that overwhelmingly suggested a new way to prospect and sell and even a new way to view sales hiring.

In this addition to the Challenger series, they talk about the need to identify and work with the “hidden influencer” in every B2B selling environment.

Questions I ask Matthew:

• What is a hidden influencer?
• How do you identify and engage a hidden influencer?
• How does a salesperson insert themselves in the customer journey earlier?

What you’ll learn if you give a listen:

• How buyers have changed, and how salespeople must change with them.
• How to approach businesses that use network-based decision-making.
• The different groups of stakeholders to identify.

Patagonia is a revered brand not only for its products, but also for its purpose-driven environmental ways. The brand has cultivated a deeply loyal following. Craig Wilson spent eight years at Patagonia in various upper-level marketing roles and shares his perspective on the Patagonia loyalty model in the just-published book, The Compass and the Nail.

While the author outlines a fancy (but utterly confusing) diagram on how to forge customer loyalty the Patagonia way, the best advice he shares is this:

“Share your beliefs. Demonstrate how they integrate into your product, design, and presentation. Communicate what inspires your particular esthetic. Those that believe what you believe will become part of your tribe.“

Patagonia’s beliefs are rooted in the love for the outdoors. For over 30 years, Patagonia has run its business with a strong point of view about protecting and preserving the environment. The company knows that pollution is a by-product of how the business does business even when it makes conscious choices to reduce its impact on the environment.

The company has gone so far in its environmental mission by encouraging its customers NOT to buy new clothing but instead, to reconsider their purchase and/or repair their current Patagonia products.

By voicing its strong point of view, Patagonia is able to attract like-minded customers that aren’t tied to functional marketing triggers of price, promotion, or distribution. Instead, Patagonia endears itself to customers through emotional triggers. Michael Crooke, former Patagonia CEO explains…

“Customers become advocates of brands because they develop an emotional connection with their core purpose. Brands that elicit advocacy provide a value beyond just product quality and experience. This connection is something that deserves analysis, as it is the foundation of true loyalty.”

Creating loyal customers should be the goal of any business.

Unfortunately, according to Craig Wilson:

“The term ‘loyalty’ and its associated meaning has been dumbed down to effectively mean giving your customers something, or paying them in some way, to stick around and keep buying from you. It’s disconcerting. Rarely is the word loyalty used to refer to a relationship, and more rarely is the word loyalty used to describe advocates.”

The Patagonia way to foster customer loyalty that leads to brand advocacy is based upon doing business “from a place of trust and inspiration.” When customers trust your business stands for something far greater than making money, then a loyal tribe of believers will be emotionally inspired to support your business.

This is what Patagonia has been doing for the past 30 years. It’s what your business should be doing for the next 30 years.

The post The Patagonia Way to Customer Loyalty appeared first on Brand Autopsy.

Even a casual reader of this blog will notice that we’ve made a few changes around here.

Change in business is inevitable and a major overhaul of one of your primary business assets – such as a website and blog – is something that must be entered into strategically as much as aesthetically.

These days a site design can become obsolete in as little as 18 months.

It’s not just that design trends and fashions evolve, it’s that people start to expect your site to operate a certain way based on what they experience around the web.

If you’re site doesn’t scroll the way they are used to, has a linking structure that doesn’t make sense or is a mess when viewed on a mobile device or tablet you run the risk of losing the interest of folks you’ve worked hard to attract.

Here are the things we did that are behind our “why a new design.”

Community vs. lead capture

Perhaps the biggest change was to move away from the traditional lead capture practice of offering a single piece of content, such as an eBook in exchange for an email address.

Today we are asking people to join our content community. In return, they will gain access to our entire library of ebooks and premium content, such as webinar archives, as well as all future content.

My feeling is that is the way forward for content publishers like us and I believe creates a greater sense of long-term community rather than one-off trade of information.

I wrote about this idea in a bit more detail here – The rise of the content community

New URL structure

We finally moved a little closer to the modern blog structure with our URLs.

Today, many publishers have shifted the idea of a blog to true content management. The concept of a daily updated blog with dates attached has been supplanted by the practice of creating and publishing content around themes or categories without regard to date.

We didn’t go all the way with this as moving 4,000 blog posts created over the last 13 years was scary enough for me, but we moved towards this by taking all dates away from URLs and blog posts. (We had some nice help from Yoast and my host Synthesis on this.)

We will move a step closer in the future as we arrange evergreen content around core themes. I’ve written about this practice in depth here – How to create a total content system

Updated theme

We completely updated the WordPress theme on the site to incorporate more visual elements and simplified navigation structure.

Site Journey

We have several very distinct groups that look for information on Duct Tape Marketing and we wanted to make easier for these segments to find what they were looking for.

We cater to many business owners and marketers looking for tips, tricks and advice around building marketing systems and we also cater to marketing coaches, consultants and agency owners looking to grow their practices.

We put a path front and center on the home page that allows members of these groups to choose content that more closely meets what they are probably looking for without the need to search for it.

As with all projects of this nature, it’s still a work in progress but we welcome your thoughts and feedback!

There’s no doubt that infographics are an influential element of today’s marketing landscape. They take advantage of your audience’s ability to process visual information quickly and to retain the key facts long after the words have faded.

You can use infographics to:

• Tell a story
• Weave in insightful data
• Build your brand
• Increase SEO through easy sharing
• Increase your credibility

But before do all of those things, you have to actually create the infographic. Here are 6 steps to creating an effective infographic — so you can begin to reap the benefits.

1) Create an outline: Even though you’re going to be telling the story through visuals, graphs, and data – it is still all about telling a story. Like all good stories, it needs to flow in a way that helps your audience understand it.

Identify the key messages you want to communicate and give some thought to the sequence of how you’d like to present the data.   You’ll want to build up to your conclusion appropriately.

2) Do your research: Accurate facts, statistics and credible sources are all key to building a valuable infographic that can create buzz for you and your business. This isn’t the place to approximate or guess. Remember that the data is the core of your story. It creates the interest and is your main tool for providing insight. So don’t skimp here. Take the time to really dig deep.

Be sure you provide reference links (typically at the bottom of the infographic) to document your data sources.

3) Take time with the title: An infographic’s title is in essence a headline and deserves the same time and attention as if you were creating a print ad. If the title doesn’t grab your audience then it’s pretty tough to lure them into the content.

Advertising legend David Ogilvy knew the power of headlines, and proved time and time again that the headline determined whether an ad would get read. He rewrote his famous headline for a car ad over 100 times before being content with “At 60 miles an hour, the only thing you hear in the new Rolls Royce is the ticking of the dashboard clock …”

Be as diligent as David Ogilvy and create a headline that does the heavy lifting.

4) Paint the picture: I hate to state the obvious but what makes your infographic work is how it looks. Too many visuals, clichéd images or a lack of organization in the storytelling means that all you’re going to get is a glance.

The images you use should frame the story and the data fills in the details. At each stage of your story, use an image to anchor and explain that particular section. Be mindful of your color scheme as well. Choose a palate that will make the data pop, and make your infographic stand out in the sea of competitors.

5) Draw conclusions: A good infographic doesn’t just present facts. It combines those facts, trends and other information to help people see the connections. In a world where we are overrun with information, we’re still starving for meaning. Your infographic should illuminate and connect the dots for the audience.

Think of your infographic as a snapshot that helps someone get the big picture and then, if they want to, they can drill down into your specific data and even check out your sources for the nitty-gritty if they want to.

6) Finish right: Just a few things to make sure you keep in mind. Always include your own URL on the infographic so you get credit for creating it. Be sure to make it easy to share on all the social networks and if you can, offer embed codes so people can post it on their own websites and blogs.

The post 6 steps to creating an effective infographic appeared first on Drew's Marketing Minute.

I hear another train is coming. As business keeps changing, so should our presence.

SmallBiz LIFT continues to grow, as do conversations with business owners and operators. Topics of conversation are more in-depth than just what tools to use and what’s the next trend. Talk has moved beyond the surface and into the Learning, Improving, Finding Flow or Fit, and Thinking ahead.

As you may know, the ConverStations name came about by mashing up the words Conversation and Stations, thinking that blogging and other social networks had the potential of being conversation stations for business and consumer to engage.

While ConverStations was once a platform to share how blogging and social media could help augment business, a change in season and reason for ConverStations is coming soon. Literally, a Conversation Station.

Using various mediums including streaming video, the plan is to engage with small business owners, rural business owners, freelancers, solopreneurs, and other specialists in discussions around business growth and continual improvement. Of course, LIFT will be a framework we continue to use.

We’re still putting pieces together. Watch this space for how to become part of the conversation and for a launch (reboot?) after the holiday season.

Photo from DollarPhotoClub

      

Related Stories

• End of the Line for ConverStations?
• METHOD: Scanning and Saving Before Sharing
• GUEST: The New Landscape of Small Business Financing
• Unleashing the Power of Agile and Scrum: Collaboration and Teamwork Tools

 

We’ve all been there: stuck with writer’s block on a tight deadline. It can completely derail your writing progress, and frustrate you to the point where you can’t get anything done. As a business owner, you don’t have time to sit around with writer’s block, and if your blog is well-read, the fear of disappointing your readers may add extra pressure.

I write a lot in my free time in addition to my usual blogging, so I’ve dealt with writer’s block a lot. Here are some of the best ways I have been able to break the bind and get back to creating great content.

Take a Break 

Sometimes when you’re having a hard time writing, the best thing to do is step away from the task at hand. Get your mind off your topic for a little bit and think about something else. If you are extremely busy, move on to the next task and complete it. If you can, though, I’d suggest clearing your mind entirely. Try taking a walk around your office or home, or if the weather is pleasant, head outside and take a deep breath.

When you get a real bad case of writer’s block, you may be over-thinking your project and how to get over it. Just step away and take a break, over-thinking and worrying about it will only prolong the block.

Once you get back to whatever you were writing, reread your work from the beginning. You’ll be amazed the direction in which your train of thought will take you.

Skip Around

If you find yourself hung up on writing a particular point in your post, try skipping ahead to a different point. Sometimes it can help you feel better to get words on paper instead of sitting idle and staring at the blank page. Think about the next point of your blog post, and skip ahead a bit. Once you complete that thought, maybe you can go back to the section that hung you up.

Write Something Else 

Like the athlete that tries to recover from a turned ankle by walking it off, sometimes the only way to get through writer’s block is to write. Close your main project and write something completely different. Writing a blog post? Try your hand at poetry. Working your way through a technical eBook? Write a children’s story or fiction piece.

Your new work doesn’t have to be good (No one will ever have to see it) but it just has to be different. Once when I was having a really tough time progressing, I decided to write a rap lyric. The lyric was horrendous, but when I went back to my main project, the words seemed to flow. Sometimes you have to just change the way you think before progressing.

Get Active

There are countless studies proving that exercise increases productivity. Exercise gets your blood pumping and gets more of your brain active. If you’ve been sitting over your computer reworking your sales copy for hours, studies show that your brain starts working at a lower efficiency. Working out will recharge your batteries, and help you work more effectively.

Can’t get sweaty or don’t have the time to work out? Go for a walk outside or, even better, up and down the stairs. Take 15 minutes and move around as much as possible in that time. If Yoga is your thing, you can even do a few poses. All you have to do is get out of your chair and your heart racing.

Have a Beer (no, seriously)

If all else fails, have a beer to help get creative. Alcohol in small amounts can help you relax and boost creativity. Be responsible, though. It may be pretty tough to get things done after a long happy hour.

It’s just a block, not the end of the world

Even the best writers get writer’s block occasionally. Relax, you’ll get through it. There are plenty of ways to recharge your creativity and finish your project, all you have to do is find what works best for you.

Alex Boyer is a Community Manager and Content Ninja for Duct Tape Marketing. You can connect with him on Twitter @AlexBoyerKC

My weekend blog post routine includes posting links to a handful of tools or great content I ran across during the week.

I don’t go into depth about the finds, but encourage you check them out if they sound interesting. The photo in the post is a favorite for the week from Flickr or one that I took out there on the road.

Good stuff I found this week:

fone.do – virtual phone system with lots of smart features

Seed Keywords Engine – nice, little tool that lets you find the best keywords with input from customers

Clara – virtual employee for scheduling meetings using simple requests

UPDATE 2: Thanks for the great feedback via Twitter and email. I am pleased you are finding the course useful. As we have already hit the limit on the previous discount coupon, I have released another code. Use THIS LINK before midnight on Sunday to enrol.

UPDATE: The special 100% discount sold out. But I have released 50 more discounts @ 100%. Use THIS LINK to access the Mastering Twitter for Business course. It is only available for this weekend.

Have you ever wondered why CEOs like Richard Branson and Elon Musk spend their precious time on Twitter?

If so, I’m inviting you to join my new Mastering Twitter for Business course which has just launched on Udemy!

This weekend I am offering FREE access to the course. Be sure to take advantage of this discount while it lasts.  Here is where you can get your 100% discount.

In this course I get you up and running the right way:

• Setting up your profile and lists
• Styles of tweets, hashtags and Twitter etiquette
• Measurement, technology and more

There are video lectures, hands-on exercises and plenty of practical tips and tricks to help you get value out of Twitter from Day 1.

I hope to see you in the course – and on Twitter.