Website Magazine April 2016 by Website Magazine

3 Tactics for Sustainable Email Marketing

THE MAGAZINE FOR WEBSITE SUCCESS APRIL 2016

Getting Started with

â&#x20AC;&#x2122;NET TESTING INSIDE THIS ISSUE... Identify & Prevent Negative SEO Personality Traits of Top Optimizers How to Host a Twitter Chat

PLUS

0 5 P O T

t Conten & ement Manag ce xperien E b e W ns Solutio

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3 Pillars of Social Login, Page 38

The Link to Local SEO Success, Page 18

5 Tips to Leverage Reviews this Holiday Season, Pg. 18

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DECEMBER 2015

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NOVEMBER 2015

The Web

Everyday & Everywhere

Web Analytics The SMB Content Marketing Checklist Solving the Web’s Cruft Problem Build Business Models with a CRO Focus

IS ALIVE

BUSINESS OPERATIONS

INSIDE THIS ISSUE...

What Makes a Difference in SEO Today?

Hitting a Customer Service Homerun

Branding Basics for Marketers

Smarter, Faster, Stronger Website Redesigns

Last-Minute KPIs for Retailers

The Tricks & Treats of Transactional Email

TOOPT5oo0ls

TOP 50

IA L MED SOCIAGEMENT MANA TIONS SOLU

EMAIL CE IEN EXPERTIONS SOLU 14

Page 14

Page

4 Steps to Stronger IT Security, Page 34

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AUGUST 2015

Fundamentals of International SEO

How to Spot a A Greedy Marketer

PASS OR FAIL: Tips for Grading Your Customer List

The IoT’s Impact on Customer Lifetime Value

Why is Your Content Not Converting?

6 Ways to Maximize Customer Loyalty Programs, Page 34

Digital Ad Creative Checklist

PLUS TObPCo5nte0nt

We nt geme Mana ems Syst

AND

D s Service

SEO Troubleshooting for Google Newbs, Page 16

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10 CELEBRATING

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Super Pack for jQuery Junkies

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How to Compete Against Amazon

People Problems in Conversion Optimization

3-Steps to Get More Product Reviews, Page 18

INSIDE THIS ISSUE...

Summer Email Fitness Guide

M RCES RESOU

Page

SOFTWARE

Structured Data for the SERPs

TOPOB5ILE0

ECIFIC BIZ-SP WARE SOFT ONS SOLUTI14

The Stars of Digital

INSIDE THIS ISSUE...

PLUS

TOP 50

JUNE 2015

LOCAL WEB

EDGY

INSIDE THIS ISSUE...

Email Personalization through Segmentation

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JULY 2015

The Race for the

E-COMMERCE

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YEARS

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ESSENTIAL

MOBILE SURVIVAL GUIDE

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3 Strategies to Increase Organic Reach on Facebook, Page 30

How to Set Up an Email Highlight Reel, Page 36

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OCTOBER 2015

Disruptive

Predictions for the ‘Net’s Future

INSIDE THIS ISSUE...

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PERFORMANCE MARKETING And the Affiliate Flow INSIDE THIS ISSUE... Today’s Top 3 SEO Trends How to Compete for Leads Conversion Rate Optimization for Startups PLUS: Top 50 Software Solutions for Web Professionals

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DESIGN FOR OPTIMAL INTERACTION INSIDE THIS ISSUE... Create Value Propositions That Work Common Project Management Pitfalls Is CRM Failing the Digital Enterprise? PLUS: Top 50 Monetization Networks for Web Publishers

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Getting Started with

’NET TESTING

Aided by powerful technologies and numerous best practices established through trial and error, ’Net professionals can and should feel confident that it is absolutely possible to “improve” the performance of any digital presence through testing initiatives. Understanding a few of the fundamentals of the practice and the solutions being used can result in greater revenue and a better experience for users. Let’s get started.

THIS MONTH IN WEBSITE MAGAZINE

W NE

Mobile Analytics for the Competitive Edge

Reduce, Recycle & Reuse Emails

As more consumers reach for mobile to connect with brands, businesses must utilize the data these interactions offer to improve experiences.

Campaigns can drain resources (time and money), but there are some proven strategies for more sustainable email marketing.

INFOGRAPHIC Watch

How to Host a Twitter Chat

Take a look at what matters most in SEO today in the new Infographic Center, featuring WebMag.co content.

Use these real-time events to extend brand reach and increase user engagement while gathering insights and leads to use after the last tweet.

Slack and Collaborate

Retailers & Minimum Advertised Price

The communication platform has taken the Web by storm but how do you get started? And what other options are available?

Framing and enforcing a MAP policy can help those selling goods online protect their brands and improve channel relationships.

Are You Built for CRO?

Who Will Get the Small Business Vote?

Discover the best person to drive conversion growth in your company based on these personality traits apparent in current leaders.

A variety of recent polls have been conducted to see who this demographic plans to vote for, why and to what effect.

EXPLORE WEBSITE MAGAZINE’S DEPARTMENTS Stat Watch: The New Normal in Software Spending

Enterprise Ready: Buyer Loyalty Begins with Employees

Small Business Lab: Welcoming Gen Z to the Workforce

Quiz Time: Keeping Up with Mobile Consumers

Top 50: Content & Web Experience Solutions

E-Commerce Express: The Personalization of Everything

Mastering Search: Preventing Negative SEO

Design & Development: AMP Basics

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DIGITAL SCOOP Check out Website Magazine’s email newsletters covering search, e-commerce, social, design and more at wsm.co/webscoop.

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From the

EDITOR Essential Testing Guidance David Ogilvy, the advertising executive that Time Magazine once called “the most sought-after wizard in today’s advertising industry,” said “Never stop testing, and your advertising will never stop improving.” While the world has changed dramatically since Ogilvy dominated Madison Avenue, testing still provides the best opportunity to improve. A June 2015 report from Optimizely, a provider of testing solutions for websites, found that 53 percent of respondents planned to increase their budget for optimization in the next year. The report also revealed that 98 percent of respondents agreed that optimization was valuable to the success of their marketing and product strategy; 94 percent agreed that optimization improves their understanding of their customers; and 91 percent agreed that optimization increases conversion and engagement metrics. While the benefits are clear, it seems enterprises are somewhat hesitant to invest in the practice. The Optimizely study found that slightly over half of respondents, 52 percent, had just one or more workers dedicated to optimization. For most enterprises, however, it’s going to take a lot more than a small percentage of their staff spending a few hours a week to maximize Web traffic through testing initiatives. Testing needs to be an ongoing, iterative process, supported by every corner of the enterprise. The problem seems to be that most just don’t know how to get started. In this month’s feature article at Website Magazine, ’Net professionals, aided by powerful technologies and numerous best practices established over time through trial and error, will gain the required confidence to improve the performance of a digital presence through testing initiatives. By understanding the fundamentals of the practice and the solutions being used, greater revenue and a better experience for all can result. In addition to the feature of this month’s issue, readers will find insights and guidance on other important trends, techniques and tactics to help accelerate their ’Net success; including mobile analytics, collaboration software, email marketing, social media, digital advertising to name but a few. There’s much more in this issue as well that Website Magazine readers shouldn’t miss, including practical tips for preventing negative SEO tactics, and how to handle the inevitable influx of Gen Z into the workforce. As always, we hope you enjoy this issue and join us on the ’Net, where our editors and industry contributors provide daily, in-depth coverage of today’s most important tips, tech and trends. Best Web Wishes,

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EDITOR-IN-CHIEF:

Peter Prestipino peter@websitemagazine.com MANAGING EDITOR:

Amberly Dressler adressler@websitemagazine.com ASSOCIATE EDITOR:

Allison Howen ahowen@websitemagazine.com *CONTRIBUTORS:

Anna Convery Amber Hyatt Travis Bliffen Radhika Mohan Singh Roy Tim Ash EJ McGowan Mihir Kittur GRAPHIC DESIGNER:

Shannon Rickson shannon@websitemagazine.com ADVERTISING:

Kelly Springer kspringer@websitemagazine.com Brian Wallace brian@websitemagazine.com SUBSCRIPTIONS:

Sandra Woods sandra@websitemagazine.com

Peter@WebsiteMagazine.com

#TestedThat Dozens (if not hundreds or thousands) of website elements can be tested (and optimized) at any given moment. Join @WebsiteMagazine on Twitter during the month of April to share your #TestedThat moments.

Website Magazine, Volume 11, Issue 4, April 2016, (ISSN# 1942-0633) is published 12 times a year, January through December by Website Services, Inc., 999 E. Touhy Ave., Des Plaines, IL 60018. Periodicals Postage Paid at Des Plaines, IL and at additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Website Magazine, 999 E. Touhy Ave., Des Plaines, IL 60018. Canada Post: Please send undeliverable items to: 2835 Kew Drive, Windsor ON, N8T 3B7 Copyright 2016 by Website Magazine. All rights reserved. Materials may not be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission. For reprints of any article, contact the editor. *The opinions expressed by contributors are not necessarily those of Website Magazine.

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Net

BRIEFS

QUICK HITS The Power of New data from TrueShip is shedding light on just how successful the 20-year-old eBay marketplace is, revealing that at any given time there are more than 800 million items on sale, and more than 160 million potential bidders/buyers. Perhaps the most surprising stat of the study, however, is that 80 percent of the goods on eBay are new.

Just DEAL with Ad Blockers The IAB is taking on ad blockers with the release of its Publisher Ad Blocking Primer, a guide that outlines tactics for publishers to persuade people to stop using the technology. The primer uses the acronym “DEAL” as its recommended approach, encouraging publishers to: Detect ad blocking to initiate a conversation; Explain the value exchange advertising enables; Ask for changed behavior to maintain a reasonable exchange; Lift restrictions or Limit access in response to consumer choices. The guidance comes at a time when ad blocking adoption is growing fast among consumers, with recent data from Tune showing the number of ad blocking mobile users has more than tripled from Nov. 2015 to Jan. 2016.

More Than A Like Brands on Facebook now have new types of interactions to measure, as the social network has finally rolled out its anticipated “Reactions” feature, which provides Facebook users with a new way to express their sentiment. In addition to “like,” users can choose one of five different reactions, including love, haha, wow, sad or angry. It will be interesting to see how Reactions impact brands, as audiences may be more likely to engage with posts if they can express the way it makes them feel beyond the traditional “like” option.

$ WHO GOT PAID? $175 Million

In an extension of its Series F financing round, Snapchat reportedly raised $175 million in new funding from Fidelity Investments and other investors.

$42 Million

Social media management platform Sprout Social closed its Series C investment round, raising $42 million from Goldman Sachs, Merchant Banking Division and New Enterprise Associates.

$2.6 Billion

IBM Watson Health announced plans to acquire Truven Health Analytics for a whopping $2.6 billion, which when completed will make IBM’s health cloud one of the world’s largest and most diverse collections of health-related data.

?OF THE MONTH

QUESTION

Which software program is most important for the success of your business operations and why? To answer this question and possibly be included in an upcoming issue of Website Magazine, visit wsm.co/aprilqotm.

Product Videos Equal More Conversions E-commerce retailers are finally catching on to the power of product videos. Invodo’s 2015 Product Video Benchmarks Report reveals that the use of product videos by e-commerce retailers grew by 41 percent in 2015 compared to 2014, with total video views increasing by 42 percent yearover-year (YOY). What’s more, the data found mobile views increased by nearly 150 percent YOY. The highlight of the study, however, was product videos’ impact on conversions, with the data showing that video viewers are 1.7 times more likely to make a purchase than non-viewers.

The Mighty Mobile Experience Consumers take their mobile experiences really seriously. In fact, an overwhelming 93 percent of survey respondents from a recent Sitecore study say they take immediate action if their mobile expectations aren’t met, while 33 percent never purchase from the brand again. On the bright side, when a good mobile experience is achieved, 76 percent of respondents say that it has an influence on their loyalty to a brand.

Social Media Managers Rejoice! It only took five-plus years, but Instagram now supports users who manage more than one account on the platform, enabling them to switch between business and personal profiles without having to completely sign out of each account first. While it seems like a simple change, it’s removing an annoyance for many social media managers, which might encourage greater time spent on the platform for business purposes.

POPULAR WITH WM READERS Supercharge Your SEO with JSON-LD +

wsm.co/chargeseo

It’s difficult to miss the rich snippets appearing on Google’s search engine result pages (SERPs), including review stars, product pricing information and more. Web professionals would be wise to know how to implement this type of information coding.

The Great Debate: Developer vs. Designer +

wsm.co/devroads

It can be difficult to differentiate between Web design and Web development. While it’s a nonissue for most, designers and developers must figure out where their job starts and ends to set expectations and even boundaries with clients and teams.

Avoid These 7 #OnlineShoppingProblems +

wsm.co/buyprobs

Online shoppers have no problem voicing their concerns on Twitter with the hashtag #OnlineShoppingProblems. Merchants can take a look at these grievances to provide better shopping experiences and avoid being a future Twitter punchline.

Net

BRIEFS WEB TECH WATCH

APP FOCUS

See what has the ’Net community all abuzz with Website Magazine’s #WebTechWatch series, a monthly roundup profiling both emerging and established technologies and some of the most useful solutions for today’s Web workers. Submit your own recommendations by tweeting us @WebsiteMagazine.

Automate.io Create multi-app workflows in a drag-and-drop interface.

Peek In Watch users interact with a Web app in real-time.

Shopify merchants will now be able to serve their customers via SMS, thanks to the new iOS keyboard app dubbed Shopkey. The e-commerce keyboard gives Shopify merchants instant access to their product catalog across their messaging and social apps. This is beneficial because messaging apps are becoming a popular customer service channel, and having the Shopkey keyboard handy enables merchants to better serve – and sell to – their customers. Discover additional apps at ApplicationMagazine.com.

Survey Count Smoochbot

The Key to SMS Messaging for Merchants

Build your own chat bot that connects to anything.

Develop and distribute surveys with this lightweight solution.

Simbla

Since You’ve Been Gone

Drag-and-drop with this responsive website builder.

Deliver personalized on-site and email product updates.

Zefyr Access insights about the people and companies being emailed.

Shippo Track packages across multiple shipping carriers with a single API.

Automate Ads Track user events, attribute conversion and automate ad operations.

Attendize An open-source event management & ticket selling platform.

Have tips, stories, or funding or acquisition news to share?

Tweet us @WebsiteMagazine

Stat

The New Normal in Software Spending Worldwide IT spending is expected to undergo a slowdown this year with China set to post its first-ever decline (-0.3 percent) courtesy of price competition, economic uncertainty and other factors, according to research firm International Data Corporation (IDC) – with the U.S. being the major exception. IDC predicts the global IT market is expected to increase by just 2 percent this year after having posted annual growth of 5-6 percent since 2010. In contrast, IT spending in the U.S. is expected to remain stable, forecasted to increase by four percent for the fourth consecutive year (the “new normal” as IDC calls it), in spite of an expected decline in the PC market and weakening growth in servers and storage. The growth is in large part due to U.S. enterprises’ commitment to investments in big data, cloud, mobile and social. IDC expects the new normal of four percent annual growth in IT spending to continue in 2017. From IDC’s Worldwide Black Book, here are some highlights of IT spending in the U.S. last year: Smartphones accounted for half of the overall industry growth rate of six percent in 2015. Spending on cloud infrastructure was also strong throughout the year, resulting in growth of 16 percent for the server market and 10 percent for storage systems. Enterprise spending on software, including software as a service (SaaS), posted healthy growth of seven percent with strong investment in analytics, security and collaborative applications.

For more industry insights, visit our Software Everywhere channel at wsm.co/softwarewm or scan the QR code on the left.

WATCH More Stats to Know & Share:

20.9%

Social media spending is expected to climb to a 20.9 percent share of marketing budgets in the next five years.

124

(The CMO Survey, Feb. 2016)

With a combined net worth of $532.4 billion, California has the highest population of billionaires in the United States (124) with the technology industry leading the pack. (Forbes, March 2016)

$96,370

Average technology salaries in the U.S. saw the biggest year-over-year leap ever, up 7.7 percent to $96,370 annually with HANA (high performance analytic appliance) being the technical skill generating the biggest paycheck at $154,749. (Dice, Jan. 2016)

43%

Silicon Valley and San Francisco’s share of U.S. venture capital investments shot up between 2013 and Q3 2014 nearly seven percentage points to 43 percent. More than half (55 percent) of the VC investments were in software. (Joint Venture, 2015)

22% The probability of a tech company being an activist target – investors who purchase large numbers of a public company’s shares to put pressure on its management – is 22 percent, the highest of all industries. (The Boston Consulting Group, 2015) A P R I L 2016

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Enterprise

READY Start at Home!

Build Buyer Loyalty by Investing in Employees By Anna Convery, CMO of OpenSpan

Happy and knowledgeable employees keep customers happy. Customers ultimately want positive experiences and companies that recognize that customer experience is king can competitively differentiate their organization. Positive customer experiences are made or broken by employees at every level, but especially the customer service agents who are on the frontline. When companies equip their agents with the right technology and company training so employees can act as brand ambassadors, they set them up for success. The challenge is continuously training and engaging current and new employees. Let’s look at the three ways company leaders can invest in their employees in order to boost customer satisfaction and loyalty.

1. Simplify Processes and Technologies

Change Resistant Discover the most common reasons why employees resist change and why it’s so difficult to change mindsets and behaviors at wsm.co/changeresist. 10

In today’s omnichannel world, employees are required to interact with several systems to do their jobs. Customer data for example, is usually stored in multiple locations – customer relationship management (CRM), billing, inventory, etc., – and customer interactions can take place on the phone, email and online instant messaging. It can be difficult for service agents to have a seamless experience with customers when they are faced with managing multiple applications (sometimes dozens) just to locate the entirety of a customer’s information and interaction history, causing longer call handle times that can negatively impact customers and the employees. Having to interact with all of these various systems puts a burden on the employee that takes away from their ability to do their job well. More importantly it can hinder them from delivering the level of customer experience that customers expect. Companies should implement a 360-degree view of the customer that streamlines service processes by integrating legacy systems together and aggregating all critical buyer data into a simple consolidated view. .com

APRI L 2016

2. Focus on Training Today, customers really only want to interact with one person for all their needs. As such, employees need to be broader players instead of the niche specialists they have been, so that they can serve all their customers’ needs from beginning to end. To propel these new skills, company leaders need to make training and education a company focus. One of the best practices being deployed for employee training is what we like to call the “flip.” This is what happens when companies flip the traditional classroom experience and allow employees to bring their real-life experiences and best practices to the fore, be the teachers and be an integral part of the training program. By cross training colleagues and making employees subject matter experts, organizations are able to cover more ground and make the training process more fun, interactive and engaging.

3. Increase Employee Engagement There’s no doubt that engaged employees are better employees, proven to interact better with customers and drive sales. In fact, a study of 64 organizations from Kenexa revealed that companies with highly engaged employees achieve twice the annual net income of organizations whose employees lag behind on engagement. Improving employee engagement can be challenging for any enterprise, but the key is taking it one step at a time. The first step to improve employee engagement is understanding how team members work and what factors support or detract from their engagement levels. For example, using employee desktop data can help brands gain insight into whether employees are having a difficult time navigating desktop applications or performing prescribed processes. From there, companies can improve those obstacles accordingly to simplify them for employees, saving them time and enhancing the customer experience. Above all, employees only service customers in the best way they can, so it’s important for companies to raise the bar and ensure that its staff can in fact do its best. When companies remove barriers and streamline processes, employees can deliver exceptional service. Make sure employees are highly engaged and well trained to handle all requests so they can serve the customer from beginning to end, and aren’t forced to work with fragmented systems and applications. By addressing these key areas, companies can create world-class customer experiences that grow buyer profitability and strengthen loyalty. Anna Convery is the chief marketing officer and executive vice president of strategy for OpenSpan, where she oversees the company’s global market development and strategic growth.

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BUSINESS LAB

Generation Z Making an Organizational Shift In an Already Competitive Talent Market

By Amber Hyatt, Director of Product Marketing at SilkRoad

Sixty million strong, Generation Z (born after 1995) is a demographic that is growing rapidly (according to census data). Soon enough, they’ll be leaving their dorm rooms and entering the workforce in droves. As the labor market floods with Gen Z talent, human resources professionals must learn the best ways to attract and retain them. Not only is Gen Z the future of the workforce, but they’ll also be costly to replace similar to what we’re seeing from millennials now. In fact, data from Millennial Branding, a Gen Y research and consulting firm, estimates that it costs between $15,000 and $20,000 to replace millennial employees; increased turnover driven by Generation Z would only accelerate those costs.

Understanding Gen Z’s Marked Traits

HIRE SMARTER Discover the top recruitment and applicant tracking software solutions at wsm.co/betterhire. 12

Blissfully unaware of a world without Internet, Gen Z is the most digital native generation to date, raised with a smartphone in hand, a tablet propped up and limited (if any) exposure to dial-up. This, as one would expect, has fostered an ondemand culture that seeks immediate resolution to questions and problems and produces short attention spans, which demand variety in the workplace. Variety fosters drive, though, as Gen Z is eager to connect with their peers and push ideas in an open and collaborative environment.

Attracting Talent

To compete for the best new talent, businesses must incorporate new strategies that appeal to a completely different generation. Here’s where to start: .com

APRI L 2016

Beef up the employer’s brand: According to internal data, nearly three in four HR professionals don’t have a formal branding program, and 51 percent aren’t considering one. Gen Z’s are shopping for jobs like they’re browsing Amazon, so the employer’s brand and how it’s communicated online will be vitally important to attract top talent. Offer robust benefits related to career goals: When asked by Adecco what they’d look for in their first job, Gen Z’s prioritized career growth (36 percent), fulfilling work (19 percent) and stability (19 percent) over more traditional benefits. A workplace culture that enables mentoring, on-the-job learning and personal development is essential. Introduce a service element: Gen Z’s desire to capitalize on entrepreneurial visions and make a positive impact in their communities is strong. In fact, the Bureau of Labor Statistics found that 26 percent of 16 to 19 year olds already spend time volunteering. Offer flexible work environments: Gen Z’s expectation of connecting wherever, whenever, eliminates the traditional 9-5 office environment. Gen Z’s don’t feel bound to a specific time and place every day, and are far more concerned with the work they produce versus where they produce it.

Employee Retention

Thought Millennials were quick to jump at new opportunities? They’re a cakewalk compared to the 83 percent of Gen Z’s that believe three years or less is the appropriate amount of time to spend at their first job, with more than a quarter looking to jump ship in a year or less according to Adecco. Variety will be crucial to Gen Z retention. Organizations must introduce “microlearning,” and provide opportunities for Gen Z’s to contribute at a meaningful level. Additionally, organizations must nurture and provide development opportunities at every turn. Connect Gen Z’s with their peers for guidance through mentorship and prioritize consistent training and feedback. These approaches enable organizations to groom Gen Z’s for leadership roles while maintaining a high level of engagement.

Gen Z Is on the Way

While there’s still a lot to learn about millennials, Gen Z’s are bringing an entirely different set of challenges. Although a tall task, companies must embrace an organizational shift in order to fully prepare for the next generation in the workplace.

Quiz

TIME

Keeping Up with Mobile Consumers With more than 2 billion people predicted to connect to the ’Net via mobile devices this year (Inter-

1. What percentage of consumers would prefer using messaging apps to engage with customer service versus phone calls?

tomer segment and go far beyond just a mobile-

a. 11 percent b. 38 percent c. 57 percent d. 72 percent

optimized website.

Cheat sheet: wsm.co/cserviceapp

national Data Corporation), it is vital that businesses meet the expectations of this ever-growing cus-

Today’s on-the-go customer wants the ability to leverage in-store mobile solutions, connect with brands via messaging apps and receive mobile-specific marketing promotions via email and text. In fact,

2. True or False: 92 percent of consumers want to shop in stores equipped with mobile solutions. Cheat sheet: wsm.co/mobilepact

2016 data from Vibes reveals that 59 percent of consumers say their opinion of a retailer would become more positive if they started to receive coupons and

3. What percentage of mobile wallet users is likely to save personalized mobile wallet offers and coupons to their devices?

mobile landscape and the technologies that support

a. 8 percent b. 35 percent c. 67 percent d. 94 percent

it are changing every day – as are consumers’ mobile

Cheat sheet: wsm.co/phonesave

offers that could be saved to their smartphones. The challenge for businesses, however, is that the

habits. Are you prepared? Keep up to date on the most important changes by regularly visiting Website Magazine’s Mobile World channel at wsm.co/mmatters16. But first, discover how much you know about consumers’ mobile expectations by taking April’s Quiz Time.

4. True or False: 75 percent of consumers would spend more money with a brand if they could switch channels or devices and continue a conversation without starting over and repeating their information. Cheat sheet: wsm.co/engageprefer

5. Overall app usage grew by how much in 2015?

Get the answers to this month’s quiz by scanning the QR code on the left or by visiting us online at wsm.co/qtapril16.

a. 6 percent b. 31 percent c. 58 percent d. 83 percent Cheat sheet: wsm.co/appgrowing A P R I L 2016

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Top

RANK WEBSITE

Content Management & Web Experience Solutions The software solutions used to power the digital presence of modern Web enterprises – primarily those self-identified as service providers or information publishers – are impressive in nearly every way. The platforms today’s businesses use to manage their content are given a variety of names, from Web experience management systems (WEM) to enterprise content management systems (ECMs) to a whole host of variations. This can cause quite a bit of confusion for even the most experienced technology buyers. For those looking to replatform in the coming months, be aware of how critical this software decision is to the entire enterprise, from the sales floor to the service department. In order to operate a successful Web presence, a content management system (CMS) is now an absolute necessity. It is both the back-end capabilities (workflow, data asset management, analytics), consumer-facing features and resulting benefits (from gamification to personalization) these software offerings provide that in many ways can determine an organization’s success (for a more detailed look at some must-have features for any deployment of a CMS, visit wsm.co/choosecms). Yet CMS offerings rarely receive the attention they deserve. That could prove to be a mistake of epic virtual proportions. There are many attempts at revealing the best solutions on the market and there is also certainly no shortage of affiliate-curated lists of top vendors in this essential software vertical, but there is always a need for unbiased information on the actual popularity of the true leaders, as well as those that are emerging and now warrant, if not demand, the attention of Web-focused enterprises. The offerings and solutions featured in this month’s Website Magazine Top50 are some of the best. While each enterprise’s needs and expectations will be different, those listed here provide ’Net business with an exceptional starting point as they explore the many powerful available offerings.

Inside April’s Top 50

Web content management systems are used for everything today – from designing to administering digital content – and as such demand closer examination. Get a closer look at some of the solutions mentioned here, as well as the reason for their popularity and proven functionality, at wsm.co/april50.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48. 49. 50.

Adobe.com Weebly.com Oracle.com Wix.com IBM.com WordPress.com Squarespace.com Webs.com Drupal.org Jimdo.com Yola.com Acquia.com OpenText.com EllisLab.com SDL.com Concrete5.org DNNSoftware.com Sitecore.net Modx.com Sitefinity.com Kentico.com CMSMadeSimple.org Typo3.org Episerver.com Plone.org Umbraco.com Orchardproject.net Django-cms.org OneHippo.com LightCMS.com SilverStripe.org Joomla.com CushyCMS.com HPengage.com BridgeLineDigital.com Ez.no Textpattern.com Subdreamer.com Bolt.cm dotCMS.com OpenCms.org Contentful.com MadeByFrog.com BigTreeCMS.org Vivvo.net N2cms.com WebGUI.org Crownpeak.com Wolfcms.org Subrion.com

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Collect with Caution

IoT and the Personalization of Everything By Amberly Dressler, Managing Editor

Internet retailers have just scratched the surface of what’s possible when it comes to collecting data and acting directly on shoppers’ behaviors, motivations, attributes and connections to provide 1:1 experiences. For some perspective, in 2015, around 1.43 billion smartphones were shipped to consumers (source: Statista), which give anywhere, anytime Internet access to billions of people and, for retailers, the ability to collect more information to move more consumers toward more purchases than ever before. If that weren’t enough, everyday items are becoming connected too (e.g., thermostats, baby monitors, water bottles, etc.) giving way to more data collection and more opportunities to personalize interactions. The popularity of Internet of Things (IoT) devices, for example, is exploding. Reports indicate that the smart-home industry generated $79.4 billion in 2014 (Harbor Research and Postscapes) and that global spending on IoT devices and services will hit $1.7 trillion in 2020. What’s more, Telefonica predicts 90 percent of cars will be “online” in just four years. 16

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Retailers will need access to the information IoT is providing; they’ll need to secure that additional data; and then they’ll need to figure out how to make the best use of it for both themselves and their consumers.

Data for All Similar to traditional retailers, IoT providers are able to gather data from outbound messages (e.g., email, push notifications) as well as in-app events (e.g., clicks and sessions). All of this customer information is on top of what is collected from more traditional touchpoints such as websites, search and social. The data ramifications of an always-connected consumer are immense and leveraging the right solutions will allow retailers to act on it. Treasure Trove, for instance, offers a suite of SDKs (software development kits) making it easy to integrate event data from different platforms while also providing the ability to load historical data in bulk from any source. What Treasure Trove provides companies is the ability to collect data from different data sources (mobile, IoT devices, Web and Saas), and store, analyze and act on it, such as by personalized experiences based on the information. Treasure Trove currently integrates with solutions like Google

Up for the Taking There’s an infinite amount of data to collect, interpret, leverage and, more importantly, protect across touchpoints and across devices. Just as retailers seek customer information for their advantage, so do those with malicious intent. Of what value is personal data to hackers? Wearable Technologies recently cited that consumers’ personal data will be valued at more than $1 trillion by 2020. When credit card information and customer profiles are stolen, brands take a hit to both revenue and reputation, but there’s more to be lost in this hyper-connected age.

IoT hacks are quite common. In a controlled environment, Wired recently reported on a hacker taking over a Jeep’s driving controls, while BlueBox Security discovered children’s communication could be intercepted over a Wi-Fi enabled Barbie doll (since pulled). Medical devices, security systems and other connected devices are also vulnerable to outsiders who will not only be able to operate them maliciously but also steal the emitted information.

Responsibilities of Connectivity The more data that is made available the more personally responsible retailers will have to be for it. While consumers are willing to provide their information for a more personalized experience, brands need to be transparent about the ways in which they will use the data. This might include a revamp of the terms and conditions (especially for IoT products used in homes While consumers or other privacy critical areas); a quick guided tour of what data is are willing to procollected, as well as how it will be used to personalize a user’s expe- vide their informarience, can also go a long way in reducing fears (similar to the ap- tion for a more proach Facebook takes to ensure users understand privacy settings). personalized experiRetailers may also want to ence, brands need look to social networks and email service providers to begin offer- to be transparent ing two-step verification. While everyone in retail is trying to about the ways in reduce steps to conversion, frequent security breaches may war- which they will use rant two-step verification as a way the data. to ease consumer concern. Social login can also help, as can payment options like PayPal or Apple Pay and giving consumers greater control over how their data is collected, used and shared by retailers.

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Analytics, App Annie, Tableau, Hubspot, Salesforce, Zendesk and Optimizely – tearing down data silos and building “a single source of truth.” What does that look like in the real world? Let’s take Amazon’s Dash Button as an example. By putting the Dash Button on household items like laundry detergent, favorite beverages, grocery items, pet food, etc., consumers can re-order these items through Amazon with a click of a button. Amazon Web Services even offers its technology to developers to build white-labeled IoT buttons for Dash, which can be used to start a car, call a cab, order pizza, leave feedback at a hotel; the possibility is limited only by the developer’s imagination, coding abilities and brand focus. Just think about the data that can be collected: usage, satisfaction, loyalty and churn to name a few. Absolutdata CEO Anil Kaul suggested that since Amazon Dash is very brand specific (at least when used in its original form), manufacturers and e-tailers will receive very valuable data about what “types” (gender, location, etc.) of people tend to be loyal to their brand. This info can then be used to perform accurate sales forecasting and lookalike targeting, where a brand knows the ideal buyer type and can target advertising toward similar audiences. It’s only a matter of time before Web content management and e-commerce systems stake a bigger claim in IoT to help their enterprise users more easily leverage this data to customize messaging and experiences. Many today, however, are already doing their part to bring data – regardless of the platform in which it resides – to retailers in order to help them understand and act on browsing history, social connections, referrals, customer service experiences, location information, cross-channel interactions, sales readiness, intent and other attributes (even facial recognition) to customize messaging and experiences to them; for instance like through retargeting that ends after a person buys that item on a competitor’s site (wsm.co/ecomtarget).

Two-Way Personalization As more retailers look to combine and leverage the vast amount of data created from traditional marketing touchpoints (e.g., email, social, search) and emerging sources like IoT devices, 1:1 marketing will need to move beyond its current one-sidedness to give end-users more control and more transparency to decide to what degree they’re willing to opt-in to the personalization of everything, which will go a long way for brand loyalty now and in the future.

Mastering

Revenue, Rankings & Reputation

PREVENTING NEGATIVE SEO By Travis Bliffen, Founder of Stellar SEO

Search engine optimization is one of the trickiest aspects of digital marketing – and there are some within the industry who aren’t willing to put in the work and, instead, break the rules in hopes of ousting a competitor.

NEGATIVE SEO TACTICS

An enormous rise in negative SEO techniques are threatening safe, organic and natural search traffic growth, making it imperative for Web professionals to understand what it is, the malicious strategies being used and how to combat them before losing their rank and their reputation.

Hacking One of the most common and obvious ways to destroy someone’s natural SEO authority is by hacking them. By getting inside the content management system (CMS), hackers can remove all the relevant keywords and, quite simply, destroy the SEO foundations from the inside out all while pointing links to gambling, X-rated material and other less-than-desirable sites.

WHAT IS NEGATIVE SEO?

Learn to Disavow The best weapon in the fight against negative SEO may just be Google’s disavow tool. Learn how to make use of this solution at wsm.co/nowdis. 18

A series of vicious tactics and tricks used to sabotage a competitor’s Google ranking, negative SEO is a backhanded way of leap-frogging a rival’s website on Google results. By destroying a competitor’s natural and organic growth, their own site appears more relevant and more authoritative by comparison. The reason this malicious practice has become so common in the past few years lies in Google’s own brilliance. Many years ago, it was relatively easy to trick Google into boosting search ranking. It involved a series of techniques that experts referred to as “black hat SEO.” It took advantage of the loopholes in Google’s ranking algorithm, and allowed sites to manipulate their way to the first page. Everything from stuffing keywords into content to purchasing unnatural backlinks was considered black hat. Naturally, Google got wise to these practices and quickly put penalties and blocks in place. It became much more difficult to game Google. .com

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The decline of black hat SEO means that desperate website owners are turning to malicious attacks on their competitors instead. It’s a very real problem, and those who run websites that are building natural growth might be at risk. Below are just some of the negative SEO tricks that might be used against an enterprise today:

Sending Spammy Links Linking is one of the key ways in which Google measures a site’s authority. If many websites link to content, Google can assume that site is a strong voice on the subject. Google has, however, cracked down on black hat linking. For those who use spammy or unnatural links, Google will spot it and penalize the site. What rivals will do is purchase links and direct them all to the site they are trying to take down. It makes that site look like it’s practicing black hat SEO, and Google will penalize the site for it. Employing Malicious Anchor Text Some competitors will go one step further than purchasing spammy links. In many cases, they’ll link to a site using malicious and spammy keywords (e.g., online poker). These keywords harm a site’s credibility, its online reputation and its keyword relevancy.

Flooding a Site with Bots Sending bots into a website is an even more sophisticated and malicious form of negative SEO. They are used to penetrate and take over website infrastructure, degrading the digital experience and eroding a site’s good SEO standing. Removing the Best Backlinks When assessing a site’s authority, Google isn’t just looking for quantity of links. They’re looking for quality. They’re looking to see that high-authority sites are linking to a site (e.g., news sites). If a website gets a link from one of these websites, Google takes notice and ranks it higher. As part of negative SEO, a company’s rivals will target its best backlinks and remove them. They’ll deceive the company with the outbound link by emailing them as the site owner, asking them to remove the link. In one swift move, a site’s best links can disappear.

HOW TO COMBAT NEGATIVE SEO Those are some of the ways negative SEO has become a problem. Outside of using Google’s disavow tool (see sidebar), how can it be combatted? Use Software for Website Security A company’s biggest threat of negative SEO is hacking and bot infiltration. It can cause irreversible damage to a website and reputation. Companies like Distil Networks have designed and built software that will protect a website from 99.9 percent of all bots and hacks. It’s more secure and powerful than any browser firewall, and is designed with negative SEO in mind. By creating a database of bad bots, it can quickly identify malicious intruders. It also monitors typical and natural user behavior on a site. If it senses strange behavior, it will instantly protect the site using techniques like bot throttling. Monitor Backlinks As mentioned, negative SEO techniques include sending spammy backlinks to a site. If a company can keep track of all its current backlinks, it will be easier to

spot malicious offenders. There are plenty of tools and software that will help a site owner visualize his or her website’s linking structure, with Majestic Site Explorer being a popular choice. Protect the Best Links An enterprise should always keep track of its strongest natural links, and take notice if one is removed. The best way to protect those links is to use an email address associated with the domain name. When speaking with editors and website owners, always use that individual email address. Ask them to ignore any communication that doesn’t come from that domain. Check for Duplicate Content Google is very tough on duplicate content and plagiarism. If it spots content on another website without permission, it will penalize the original poster anyway. With that in mind, Web professionals should keep an eye out for content appearing on other websites. One simple method is using a tool called Copyscape. This tool will scan the Internet for traces of duplicate content. Users can input a website address or paste the body content into the box.

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NEGATIVE SEO: A series of vicious tactics and tricks used to sabotage a competitor’s organic ranking.

Search on Social Social media is great for discovering negative SEO. Professionals can quite quickly find accounts and spammers that are purposely trying to harm their site. Rivals will use these accounts to spread spammy links to the site, and encourage sharing. It will slowly lead to a wider and natural looking negative linking strategy. They’ll also use these accounts to spread duplicated content, and simply to damage a company’s online reputation. Site owners should use the search functions of Twitter and Facebook, and report negative-SEO links as spam immediately. Don’t Make Enemies Negative SEO is a vicious circle, and if a site owner gets caught inside, it will end badly. They should focus on building a natural, organic search ranking and avoid engaging in negative techniques. What’s more, they shouldn’t argue with clients, competitors or make unnecessary enemies. While site owners should focus on their own natural techniques, they’ll want to keep an eye open for negative tactics that could cause damage to their reputation and rankings.

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Copying and Republishing Content As one would expect, Google takes a negative view of plagiarism and duplicate content (even on the same site). One negative SEO technique involves copying content before it is indexed by Google. The malicious party will then publish that same content on hundreds of different sites. It results in a Google penalty for duplicate content and makes it impossible for search engines to distinguish a site’s content from others.

Design and

DEVELOPMENT

QUICK HIT:

AMP Basics By Peter Prestipino, Editor-In-Chief

Google officially launched its Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) Project within the search results in late February/early March 2016 and many involved in digital media are now actively exploring how to take advantage of this incredible opportunity. And that should include you. What is AMP exactly and how can you make it work for your enterprise? The development of AMP is in response to the ever-growing/increasing usage of mobile devices (and in many ways, experts argue, pressure from Facebook and its Instant Articles offering, which hosts publisher content directly within the social network). With AMP, Google is essentially presenting a way for designers and developers (the whole Web really) to improve the mobile content ecosystem so it is faster, less cluttered and more reliable for consumers. Sounds like something you can get on board with, right? Let’s hope so. Research from Soasta indicates that mobile pages that are one second faster can experience a conversion rate increase of up to 27 percent. What’s more, the bounce rate can be as high as 58 percent for Web pages that take nearly 10 seconds to load. Speed and performance improvements, of course, aren’t the only benefit of using AMP. Google has also indicated that AMP pages will have “enhanced distribution,” which can lead to more revenue via ads and 20

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subscriptions for publishers. When users search for content on Google from a mobile device today, Web pages created using AMP appear (when relevant) in the “Top Stories” section of the results page. As one might imagine, that’s driving its fair share of interest from publishers both large and small. The benefits appear to be many, so how does AMP actually work and how can you get started? Website Magazine has put together a Quick Start Guide to AMP at wsm.co/quickamp but let’s take a look at a few basics. Accelerated Mobile Pages are just like any other HTML page, but only a limited set of technical functionality (defined and governed by the open source AMP spec) is allowed. AMP files take advantage of various technical and architectural approaches that prioritize speed to provide a faster experience for users (for example, by allowing only asynchronous scripts, sizing all resources statically, forcing CSS to be inline and size-bound and keeping third-party JavaScript out of the critical path). The goal is not to homogenize how content looks and feels, but instead to build a more common technical core between pages that speeds up load times. In addition, AMP files can be cached in the cloud in order to minimize the amount of time content takes to get a user’s mobile device. By using the AMP format, content producers are making the content in AMP files available to be cached by third parties. Publishers continue to control their content, but other platforms can easily cache or mirror the content for optimal delivery speed to users. Google has stated that it will provide a cache that can be used by anyone at no cost, and all AMPs will be cached by Google’s cache. The introduction of AMP is a big shift for Google, from indexing and directing users to content to establishing the framework and actually hosting a portion of that content it serves to users. The objective is that the combination of limited technical functionality with a distribution system built around caching will lead to better performing pages, and increased audience development for publishers. Google’s Accelerated Mobile Pages project will encourage today’s digital enterprises to ensure the mobile Web works better – and there’s plenty of room for improvement as it stands today.

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Insights on

ANALYTICS

The More You Know

Mobile Analytics for a Competitive Edge Radhika Mohan Singh Roy, Sr. Product Evangelist at Agile CRM

The use of mobile devices has continued to explode in recent years and it is taking up a significant amount of peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s time, more than desktops and other types of media combined. People are simply spending more time with their mobile devices; relying on their smartphones and tablets to get the latest news, connect with peers and even to carry out business research. With an audience of always-on consumers, marketers can connect with customers and prospects at the right place and at the right time with the right offers. In order to do so, however, businesses must understand and use mobile analytics to determine their consumersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; purchase path and where they can intervene to close the sale. 22

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In order for brands to personalize their promotions and give customers exactly what they need, they must be able to analyze various customer data, which consists of online click stream data, point-of-sale transaction data, unstructured data from call logs, social media sentiment and, more importantly, mobile-based location data. It may seem like a big challenge for businesses, but to remain competitive enterprises need to find ways to keep up with this emerging trend.

WHAT IS MOBILE ANALYTICS? Mobile analytics is similar to Web analytics in that it monitors the activities of users who are accessing a particular service from mobile devices. Data that is gathered by mobile analytics consists of info about the behavior pattern of the user such as their location,

is the future of mobile and it starts with understanding the current and past behavior of mobile users.

number of visits, device type, preferences, usage, purchases, returns, technical details, past customer service interactions, error reporting and other insights that can help marketers make informed business decisions, automate marketing efforts and ultimately, develop better customer relationships.

WHY DO BUSINESSES NEED IT TO COMPETE? 1. Assemble Rich Customer Information Information is power. Every business needs as much information as they can get about their customers (as well as their competitors and their customers too). Mobile analytics provides a business with enormous amounts of information required to provide a better service experience both on desktop and mobile devices. With mobile usage at an all-time high in recent years, the information that can be acquired by analyzing the stream of data coming through is priceless for businesses across all industries. 2. Provide Personalized Service Mobile devices are the best platform to provide personalized services to customers because of the sheer amount of information coming from them and their role as a consumer’s closest friend. The information gathered by analyzing the data stream from mobile devices can be utilized by businesses to provide much more effective and personalized services to its customers like by where they are located, what they have previously purchased, and whether or not they’re actively using the product or service. What’s more, personalized messaging and services served on mobile devices help improve conversion rates compared to those that are not tailored toward the individual. 3. Find Customer Opportunity Data gathered from mobile analytics can help businesses discover additional opportunities to reach out to more potential customers and increase their sales and profits. Marketers with the right mobile analytics solutions (see sidebar) are able to adjust business models and messages accordingly, as new information becomes available through analyzing mobile data and then using self-learning models to take advantage of consumer trends and needs. For instance, if

a large percentage of app users are contacting mobile live chat operators at night, perhaps more customer service staff needs to be assigned to those later hours when users are measured to be seeking assistance.

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Combined with location data, real-time marketing

4. Implement Real-Time Marketing There is tremendous value in real-time marketing. In fact, social intelligence company Wayin, recently found that 98 percent of marketers report a positive return on their real-time marketing investments. Mobile presents the perfect channel in which to send real-time updates (e.g., breaking news or pop-up sales) and real-time promotions (e.g., discounts on products a retailer is trying to move out). Combined with location data, real-time marketing is the future of mobile and it starts with understanding the current and past behavior of mobile users. 5. Provide Seamless Service Mobile analytics can help businesses enhance their customer relationships in a variety of ways. One way to do so is to understand where mobile customers are failing to convert to better inform the conversion process. For instance, if an app user has decided to make an in-app purchase but then doesn’t complete the final step, the business will need to evaluate how to improve that conversion flow whether it’s an updated form, a live chat intervention at that moment or another way to help the user accomplish his or her goal

FOR THE WIN: BETTER RELATIONSHIPS, UX & ROI In the present business environment, mobile analytics is indispensable; it offers a wealth of information and can help organizations transform the way they reach out to their customers, increase engagement and do business as a whole. As more and more consumers reach for mobile to connect with both peers and brands, businesses across all industries must utilize data from these interactions to maximize user experience and gain a definite edge over their competitors.

Radhika Mohan Singh Roy is a senior product evangelist with Agile CRM. He has previously worked with Google, Apple Computers, Bank of America and Simplilearn.

Who’s Analyzing Mobile? Check out the current leaders in mobile analytics at wsm.co/mobilebehave.

Get Started with

’NET TESTING By Peter Prestipino, Editor-In-Chief

The testing and eventual optimization of Web-related assets is the most sophisticated of the digital disciplines. Depending on the approach taken by an enterprise, the execution, creative effort and investment can be simple or complex, minute or massive. Getting started can seem overwhelming, but it doesn’t need to be that way. Aided by powerful technologies and numerous best practices established over time through trial and error, ’Net professionals can and should feel confident that it is absolutely possible to “improve” the performance of any digital presence through 24

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testing initiatives. While new functionality is brought forward into the market regularly (explore Website Magazine’s Software Everywhere column at wsm.co/softwarewm), understanding a few of the fundamentals of the practice and the solutions being used for testing and optimization can definitely result in greater revenue and a better experience for users. The goal of testing is simple: deliver a website experience that is functional, useful, engaging and, perhaps more importantly, an improved one for both the business and its audience. That is easier said than done considering the rapid pace of digital development, of course, but anyone responsible for such an initiative – be they marketer, designer, analyst or a member of the C-Suite – can rest assured that their commitment to this practice will yield positive results when done well.

In this month’s feature article at Website Magazine, let’s explore some of the fundamentals of testing, address a few important considerations for this essential digital practice within any enterprise and provide a framework for selecting solutions that will surely accelerate ’Net success.

FAILING TO PLAN, PLANNING TO FAIL It should probably go without saying, but testing initiatives demand that enterprises have a plan in place. For any enterprise seeking to enhance conversion rates, increase engagement and improve the user experience, testing (and optimization) is the single best way to do so as it allows them to maximize the Web traffic they receive and make smarter decisions relating to marketing strategy, design choices and user engagement efforts. Where most Web workers stumble, however, is in failing to plan out their initiative, determining the goals of their tests and how those objectives will be met. Whether it is to increase conversions or the lifetime value of a user, there should be a clear target because without a plan, professionals should plan to fail. Discover how to formulate a testing plan for your website at wsm.co/plantests.

Optimization Tools Access Website Magazine’s new “Big List of Testing & Optimization Tools” to identify offerings appropriate for the testing initiative of your enterprise (and its size and budget) at wsm.co/testomize. DATA COLLECTION Dramatic improvements in conversion can be seen in every vertical; those in the media, e-commerce and service industries can expect increased engagement in whatever form including pageviews, revenue, registrations or even an increase in user generated content. There’s no limit to the benefits of optimizing experience but if positive improvements are the aim, it’s necessary to take the guesswork out of testing. Running a test based on a gut feeling or “professional instinct” (or even what has worked for other companies) is, simply put, a bad practice. Fortunately, there is another, and far better, source of inspiration for this phase of the testing process: analytics. There are several important insights Web professionals should look to acquire from their Web analytics data in order to identify optimization opportunities and “testable” moments (e.g. the highest or lowest converting traffic sources, or the pages with the highest or lowest value, etc.); for example, data about what the key abandonment points

The Need for Speed Consumers expect a Web page to load in a matter of seconds and a significant number will abandon sessions altogether if their expectations aren’t met – wreaking havoc on conversion rates. Discover the Web’s top resources for monitoring load time, render time, down time, requests and page size, and leverage them to start testing the variables suspected of slowing down the digital experience at wsm.co/webspeedy. are within the buying journey (which might be the checkout form for example). Combing through all this information, studying conversion rate, the top converting pages (along with exit and bounce rates) depending on source and other variables including device type, is an essential part of the optimization process. If it’s not being measured, Web professionals won’t be able to manage (or optimize) it. After an enterprise has an idea of what visitors are doing and where they’re going, the next step is to understand why. Analytics solutions, however, can only reveal there is a problem; usability testing can provide the answer as to why the problem may be happening. Usability tests essentially reveal points of friction in the funnel, where visitors become stuck, confused and frustrated. Some possible tests to consider include a browse flow (which reveals how visitors chose to start, like site search or navigation, if product pages and their elements are appealing, and if calls-to-action are clear and compelling enough to convert users from browsers to buyers) and a buy flow (which indicates how users move from product page through the checkout to the final order confirmation). As computer scientist and U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Grace Hopper once said, “One accurate measurement is worth more than a thousand expert opinions.” With guesswork on the enterprise sidelines, it is time to concentrate on testing ideas for the digital experience.

Friction Reduction The list of reasons website or application visitors aren’t converting is long. Find out what elements – copy, calls-to-action, images – are causing friction and preventing users from following through at wsm.co/preventbuy.

VARIABLE SELECTION After identifying the issues preventing a greater number of conversions from occurring or a deeper level of engagement from being achieved within analytics (the issues that warrant testing and demand optimization) it’s time for the next phase of the process – selecting the variables that should be tested in order to optimize the digital experience. The selection of variables for testing is an important phase of the testing process. While anything on a website can be tested, let the following serve as initial inspiration. Calls-to-Action Calls-to-action (CTAs) indicate to users what they can expect so brands should be the ones actively aiming to drive the conversation. A variety of CTA elements can be tested including their color, size, contrast, as well as placement. For example, an e-commerce merchant might modify the wording of a “Buy Now” button to “Add to Cart,” change its color from orange to yellow and move it higher into the field of a user’s vision.

Color Psychology Colors mean something different to everyone depending on past experiences and context, making them one of the greatest testing variables. For example, orange will attract impulse shoppers, while navy blue will appeal to the budget conscious. Read more at wsm.co/colortesting. Forms If users have made the decision to purchase, sellers must eliminate distractions and one of the best ways to do that is to reduce the amount of information gathered from users or to simplify its collection. The number of required fields is an ideal testing variable (e.g., shorter forms, experts argue, yield more conversions). For example, what impact does removing the phone number or zip code field from a form have on conversion rate? What about separating the personal data and postal data collection into a multi-step checkout? Keep in mind, not all tests show positive results, and there may be a negative impact to modifying forms, or any test that prevents or limits the collection of data that can be used in the future. Social Proof Testing the inclusion (or exclusion) of social buttons/icons is another popular test. While the presence of social proof can encourage users to recommend and provide some validation of brand integrity for a user, they can also have a negative impact as they can distract users. Testimonials are an additional form

of social proof that can be tested through inclusion/exclusion (as well as the depth and breadth of those elements). Test the placement of these testimonials, the quantity featured and the elements they contain (including the positive/negative nature of quotes or the presence of star ratings within testimonials). Site Search Providing Web visitors an opportunity to search through content or products has been proven time and again as a way to increase engagement and draw visitors deeper into the conversion funnel. The execution of site search, however, is often woefully inadequate and lacking in quality. Testing the placement and size of search boxes, the search prompts that are used, as well as the type of actual results returned and the information shown could provide a very positive improvement to a number of key performance indicators. Exit Offers Should bounce rate or abandonment rate be exceedingly high, it is essential to intercept users if they reveal the intention to leave the experience (which can be achieved in a variety of ways). Test the presentation of exit offers in this scenario with personalized and specialized incentives (e.g., discounts, free gifts, vouchers) to determine the impact on conversion. Internet retailers, for example, could present shoppers with items that were recently viewed or recommended by others. It’s rare that any end-user will purchase on their initial visit, and testing the presence of exit offers and how those incentives are executed is another test that’s worthy of enterprise-wide attention. Many testing options abound obviously; it really comes down to making a decision about what needs to be tested and putting those tests into place. It’s impossible to make improvements without doing so.

Price Scheme While sales/journey funnels will need to be set up appropriately to leverage price schemes for improved conversions, testing the presence of freemium versus free trials might be useful, or adjusting the length of the trial (perhaps even the actual pricing of different plans) can be as well. Learn more about decoy pricing on a website at wsm.co/decoycost. SOFTWARE SELECTION There was a time when if ’Net professionals wanted to test how one element performed, doing so in a manual fashion was the only way to get it done (and with the help of developers). Thanks to some very powerful software solutions, however, it’s easier than ever to test and optimize a website.

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When determining the ideal website testing solution for an enterprise, know there are several things to consider, including the pricing model (is it fixed-rate or usage based?), the characteristics of enterprises using the offering (size, budget), what’s required for setup, the number of campaigns that can be run simultaneously (or over the course of a specific time period), and what’s required for ongoing campaign creation and management. Since we want testing to become a continuous, iterative process within our enterprise, this might be one of the most important decisions a Web professional makes. Not all solutions available on the market today are right for every enterprise, however, as each will have their own unique features and, of course, limitations. Let’s look at a few of the features most in demand by today’s Web enterprises. Multivariate testing: Multivariate testing uses several different values for multiple elements on one page to create countless combinations or versions of that page, each of which are exposed to a random segment of live traffic. An analyst can measure the impact each of those variables has on the Web page’s conversion rate. Since they present many different versions of a page, multivariate tests require more time and traffic to achieve statistical significance. However, they allow marketers to test many elements of a Web page simultaneously. Most of the solutions on the market today offer some combination of A/B (split) testing and multivariate testing capabilities. Selecting the right solution at the outset will make scaling testing initiatives simpler in the long run. Multi-page testing: Multi-page testing allows users to test an element that spans multiple pages of the website, while providing a consistent user experience for the site visitor. For example, if a company wants to test a design element of a multi-step checkout process, visitors who got the original variation on step one will continue to see the same variation through the rest of the checkout flow. This is a much more sophisticated feature (along with cross-domain testing features) and is not available through most of the more basic offerings.

Test Duration, Volume & Validity A/B tests (as well as other forms of testing including those of the multivariate variety) can run for any length of time but ideally will do so for at least a full sevenday week (and typically no longer than a few months). When tests are run for too long, additional variables can influence the results (like seasonal changes or promotions). Access some guidance on the right length of time depending on the variable chosen and the traffic received at wsm.co/runtesting.

Native heatmapping: Many A/B testers use in-page Web analytics, or the analysis of user interaction on one Web page, to identify areas of confusion or barriers to conversion on a Web page. This data helps testers come up with ideas for website changes that might improve conversion. Heatmapping is one type of in-page Web analysis, which shows mouse or click activity. Note that some tools don’t offer this feature natively, but instead offer it through third-party integrations. User roles and permissions: The availability of different roles and permissions for different users allows companies to limit the ability to perform certain tasks. For example, user A might be able to simply view reports, whereas user B can design experiments and user C can actually launch experiments. This is useful if companies don’t want all testing software users to be able to make direct changes to the website with no oversight. Role-based workflow and approval: Related to user roles and permissions, this type of functionality allows users to follow a particular workflow to build and launch experiments within the tool. For example, user A might design and set up an experiment, and then pass it off through a chain of superiors for approval before launching the test. Adaptive Algorithms: In some testing software tools, the user defines the percent of Web traffic that should be allocated to each variation being tested. For example, a user might decide to send 75 percent of traffic to the original version, which has a known conversion rate, and 25 percent to the new treatment. Once the test has reached statistical significance and seen enough Web traffic, the winning version is released to all visitors. However, some tools can use an adaptive algorithm to adjust the division of Web traffic as test results come in. This allows a company to take advantage of the winning variation by sending more traffic to it, while still exploring the possibility that the lower performing variation might still win. This helps discourage users from ending tests too early and getting false positives, while still allowing them to take advantage of what could be the winning variation. Automated, machine-learning or predictive capabilities: Predictive capabilities allow testing and targeting software to predict visitor behavior, based on previous actions and the behavior of other, similar website visitors, and tailor content accordingly. Predictive targeting requires some self- or machine-learning capabilities on the part of the tool, where a computer model ingests data from various sources and makes a best guess regarding the most effective content to present to each visitor.

THE TEST IS NEVER OVER Testing comes down to understanding the drivers of conversion, the inhibitors and doing something about it. While there’s no guarantee that increasing the drivers and reducing the inhibitors will make any difference, in most cases that’s exactly what happens. Dig into your conversion funnels, find out where users/visitors aren’t converting, get creative with tests and make it an iterative process. Testing is never over.

Infographic

CENTER

CENTER A spotlight on the SEO-focused infographics running at webmag.co. Each and every day at Website Magazine’s WebMag.co resource center, several infographics are published to help ’Net professionals like you learn about a variety of important topics essential to digital success – including e-commerce, design and, as seen in this month’s INFOGRPAHIC CENTER in the print issue of Website Magazine, search marketing.

SEO Advantages of HTTPS Sites There is a growing trend for websites to use HTTPS encryption, even if they collect no personal data. What are the SEO benefits to encrypting data to and from a website? Discover the advantages and how to create the best HTTPS configuration for SEO with this infographic from digital marketing agency PrimeVisibility. wsm.co/httpspros

Structuring a Perfectly SEO-Optimized Page Discover which on-site elements are most important to the success of search engine optimization initiatives with this useful infographic from QuickSprout, covering topics such as linking to authority websites, using optimized URL extensions and more. wsm.co/perfectseo

10 Online Review Stats Product, service and business reviews not only add useful content for an audience (existing customers and prospects), but the benefits to search marketing (both paid and non-paid) are also immense. Check out 10 interesting statistics that will encourage enterprises to do more in the realm of online reviews with this infographic from ReachLocal. wsm.co/reviewstats

Launch an Effective Digital Marketing Campaign A step-by-step guide that details how to launch a digital marketing campaign in 2016. This infographic from Bull Dog Digital Media offers up 29 steps to get Web enterprises in a position to dominate the ’Net and profiles numerous tools for every step of the process such as HubSpot for updating a lead scoring system. wsm.co/2016dig

Fix Any Google Penalty Although penalties issued by Google aren’t a new phenomenon, they are a great cause of concern for SEOs. For those who have ever been hit with a penalty, check out this infographic from Submit Edge SEO, which provides a step-by-step guide to fixing any Google penalty. wsm.co/whatpenalty

Visual Guide to Structured Data Structured data is a way to annotate content so machines (and search engines) can understand it. Discover the structured data elements that help search engines understand larger concepts, index website content better and present it more prominently in search results (and specifically, the Google Knowledge Graph) with this infographic from Volume Nine. wsm.co/picstructure

Inbound Marketing & The Sales Funnel Take a look at the various stages of the sales funnel and gain a better understanding of how to guide leads through the buying journey and turn prospects into clients with this useful infographic from SyneCore. wsm.co/inboundfunnel A P R I L 2016

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Software

EVERYWHERE

Getting Started with By Allison Howen, Associate Editor

Every so often, a startup comes around that takes the world by storm. Most recently, that booming business is a communication platform that goes by the name of Slack. In just two years Slack gained a whopping 2.3 million daily active users and reached $64 million in annual recurring revenue. What’s more impressive is that these gains are warranted, as 32 percent of Slack users report the tool increases productivity, 48 percent say it reduces emails and 79 percent say that it improves team culture (according to a Slack-conducted survey). If better communication and collaboration is something your team is looking to take advantage of, consider adding Slack to your digital toolbox and check out Website Magazine’s five-step guide for getting started below:

Step 1: Invite Your Dream Team Team leaders must take the initiative of inviting their team members to the platform. Once signed up with their company email address, employees can complete their profiles and download the Slack desktop and browser apps. Although Slack is also available through desktop browsers, the company says that its apps actually offer the best experience.

Step 2: Create Some Channels

The Biggest Workplace Trends of 2016 Discover the technology in use at today’s workplace and who’s using it and where at wsm.co/todaywork.

One of the great things about Slack is that conversations are organized into channels, which not only keeps chats focused (e.g., design discussions stay in the design channels, marketing messages stay in the marketing channel, etc.), but also creates an archive of resources like past conversations and files. When getting started, it is important that team leaders set up a few basic channels and to keep in mind that more can be added later. The general channel, which is required but can be renamed, is important because it’s accessible by all team members. This makes it a great place for sharing announcements and other important company information. Aside from this key channel, team leaders should consider creating channels based on departmental teams, specific projects and topics, locations and more. Slack’s various features, like app integration and separate departmental channels, allow enterprises to improve productivity and reduce time spent on emails.

Step 3: Pick Your Preferences Most of Slack’s preferences are pretty basic, but there are a few options that team leaders should pay special attention to. The default channel option, for instance, can be set to automatically add new users to specified channels. Additionally, large teams may want to require @ for mentions so that team members aren’t notified for conversations that don’t pertain to them. One of the most important preference options, however, is team roles. There are five user types available on Slack, including owner, admin, member, restricted account and single-channel guest. Slack suggests enabling at least two owners and admins for every team, as these roles have access to team-wide preferences and permissions. What’s more, large teams may also want to restrict who can post in the general channel, as it can quickly become oversaturated with off-topic conversations if everyone has the ability to post.

Step 4: Get Familiar Although Slack is a user-friendly platform, there is always a learning curve when getting familiar with new technology. New users should take some time to explore the solution, including experimenting with Slack’s robust search functionality. For example, team members can use search modifiers, such as “in:” to search a specific channel, “from:” to search for content from a particular person and “during” to search a certain time period. What’s more, results can be filtered by recency, relevancy and file type. Team members should also get to know “Slackbot,” which is the platform’s built-in robot that helps new members fill out their account profile and provides them with a private place to store notes and links.

Step 5: Integrations Galore! Arguably the most impressive feature Slack offers is its vast integration library. In fact, the company has an App Directory with 280 apps in categories that range from analytics and design to human resources and project management. These integrations make the platform even more powerful, and Slack suggests letting all team members leverage integrations rather than just admins. By doing so, every team member can access the tools he or she needs to be more productive. Integration examples include Google Drive, Dropbox, GitHub, GetResponse and Wunderlist.

Software

SPOTLIGHT

Not Ready to #Slack?

Other Collaboration Software to Know By Amberly Dressler, Managing Editor

Ten IQ points are lost when fielding constant email, the same as missing an entire night’s sleep according to the Institute of Psychiatry. If that weren’t enough, it takes people 16 minutes to refocus after handling incoming email, reports Microsoft (the parent company of enterprise social network Yammer). It’s figures like these – and the countless others pointing to email as an office timewaster – that have some companies vowing to ban internal emails altogether while others are turning to collaboration software to complement email messaging, and with great success. What would your team do with that extra time? For those ready to improve team collaboration, check out these alternatives to Slack below:

Tack.tech Created primarily for non-technical teams, Tack is a new offering that claims to be the only collaboration tool a professional will ever need. What is most compelling about Tack is its mobile-first design to keep team members connected and engaged from any device so they can check in on the progress of projects, feedback, announcements, direct messages and discussion boards whether at work or on the go. For distributed teams (either across the country or even across the office), Tack could be the answer to keeping everyone connected as channels can be created for specific objectives.

Huddle.com For companies with 100-plus users, Huddle keeps projects, communication, approvals and even content in one place. While there is a real-time activity stream and full-version history that allows enterprises to see who’s accessing and editing content, Huddle’s machinelearning dashboard surfaces the content and tasks that are important to individuals and their project milestones – keeping staff focused and on-task. Enterpriselevel users (Huddle counts Kia and Panasonic as customers) will appreciate the many security controls it offers. For instance, administrators can manage access

rights across individuals or teams, both within and outside an organization, as well as instantly revoke access across all user devices.

Glip.com Easy to use, Glip is a fully searchable group chat, task management and file sharing application with desktop and mobile offerings. One of the key features of Glip is the ability to create teams and groups to streamline communication and file sharing without disturbing other processes, while still allowing for direct messages with individual team members. Glip is also well liked for its task functionality in that users can create tasks, add progress notes and complete those tasks within the application.

Asana.com Leveraged by a variety of teams – everyone from Uber to Major League Baseball to Salesforce – Asana provides a place to keep track of tasks, projects and conversations to move work from start to finish. For instance, managers can log in to Asana and get project progress reports in a glance like how many tasks remain, how many have been finished and when the due date is. And, with such a focus on content marketing in most organizations these days, Asana can house an interactive editorial calendar to prioritize and schedule content. What’s more, editors can create a task for each article, attach drafts directly to the task, and use the Sections or Subtasks feature for review stages. At any point, users can access their project in Calendars View to get a visual look at when the work is happening.

Get Working! While email messaging is a valuable channel for brands looking to acquire and retain customers, it’s becoming very clear that its role in communicating internally is diminishing. With so many “freemium” options, enterprises would be wise to explore a collaboration solution sooner rather than later to improve productivity, engagement and transparency. For more compelling software options to increase productivity and teamwork, visit wsm.co/noiteam.

Conversion

CORNER

Are YOU Built for CRO? Personality Traits of Top Optimizers By Tim Ash, CEO of SiteTuners

Are you the right person to drive conversion growth at your company? Internet marketers often look to tools and technology in order to do their jobs more effectively. We are always chasing the next “new thing” and hoping that it will be the breakthrough in performance that we are looking for. However, as they say in horse racing: “You bet the jockey, not the horse.” This is also sound advice for Web professionals: forget about the skills and see if you have the right character traits to be effective at conversion rate optimization. On some level, the qualities below can’t be taught – either they are part of one’s personality or they are not. Conversion rate optimization leaders share the following traits:

Dissatisfaction Many online marketers play it too safe. They are basically happy with the way that things are, and are just looking to fine-tune their campaigns. A good CRO 32

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will actually be restless – unhappy with current performance enough to want to change it in significant ways. They will be the ones digging through analytics and finding the inefficiencies and remaining problems. They will not accept too many pats on the back for acceptable performance; rather they’ll drive for excellence. This relentless skepticism is part of the nature of the best optimizers.

Investigation Being a detective is also critical. Once they have uncovered apparent problems, optimizers need to dig deeper. Like a dog with a bone, they should chew on the problems – going beyond the surface to understand their causes. Often the information needed to gather insights or make key decisions will not be readily available. The best optimizers are collaborators that will seek the help of colleagues, people outside of their company, business prospects and website visitors. They will get the answers – often creating value just by asking the right questions and following through. Sometimes this can be uncomfort-

able, as they’ll find that others resent the extra effort required from them to assist. Tenacity, however, goes a long way in cross-department initiatives.

Empathy People are very different, and as marketers we are solving a very difficult problem: how to influence the brains of total strangers. If leaders proceed with the assumption that everyone feels and thinks like them, they will go far off the mark. Good CROs have to constantly self-monitor and silence that part of them that says “I would personally never do that.” It does not matter what they believe, it only matters what their website visitors actually do. There is oftenrepeated moaning in the CRO community about the outsized influence of the “Hippo” (highest paid person’s opinion) when making website changes. While this is indeed a real problem, it’s important to remember we are all Hippos, and that hidden in our own assumptions are often the biggest barriers to improved performance. Like a curious 3-year-old child, CROs have to ask an endless number of questions (often open-ended). They have to look for things that are curious in the behavior of website visitors and always seek out the things that don’t make sense. This will often point the way to unspoken assumptions that one carries. CROs should cultivate a deep knowledge of psychology and neuromarketing and seek to understand basic human nature, and look for irrational motivations based on the different circumstances or past experiences of visitors. Further, online marketers should always remember they have expert-level knowledge of their website and business and they are trying to influence people with short attention spans who are not at all invested in what marketers are trying to convince them to do. Being a CRO master requires one to constantly return to the perspective of visitors, and advocate for them.

Flexibility Most online marketers may not bend beyond their comfort zone, but as a CRO they must adapt to extreme changes. Things that have worked in the past, or in another situation, will no longer serve them. Strongly held beliefs can blind marketers to seeing the things it takes to succeed or get important insights, so they have to constantly re-evaluate the tools, assumptions and mindsets behind their work. Through a single workday, CROs may switch hats becoming a Web analyst, direct-response copywriter, user testing coordinator, market researcher, Web developer and project manager. CRO is equal parts art and science and those responsible for it within their organizations

have to smoothly and appropriately transition among very diverse tasks to get the job done.

Conviction On the other side of flexibility is also the need for conviction, and there is a tension between the two. It will be very easy for others to hijack CRO projects, or to water them down. Typically the needs of website visitors will get lost in the shuffle, and submerged under the chorus of internal company needs and politics. A CRO’s clear and incisive ideas will get diluted, changed beyond recognition by a thousand wellmeaning nudges from others, so they have to be clear about what they are trying to accomplish and to find the correct balance between advocating for their point of view and incorporating important considerations from others inside of the company. A good CRO will know what battles are essential to fight, and which compromises are acceptable.

Perspective Most of us are married to our job function. With the exception of high-level managers, most are expected to work within their narrow specialty. CRO, however, requires its advocates to cross functional and departmental lines. Ultimately CRO is growth-hacking – figuring out the quickest and most efficient ways to align the goals of a company with the needs of its website visitors. Those who continue to play in their limited sandbox of digital marketing will not have the results they want or the respect of their co-workers. It is important to be a business analyst who really looks at the whole operation and figures out the major points of leverage. Maybe the value-add that CROs create has nothing to do with split testing another headline. Perhaps instead they should be advocating for a more flexible content management system, or improved email communication via marketing automation or reviewing the call-scripts and training given to the customer support team. In this regard, CROs should always communicate with their management team in the language of financial analysis and the bottom line impact of their work. For those who noticed the lack of specific training or tools required to do a CRO’s job, this is because without the mindset above, those are largely useless. Without these traits, a career in CRO might be a frustrating journey so take an inventory of your own character. Are you the right person for the job? Tim Ash is the CEO of SiteTuners, Chair of Conversion Conference and bestselling author of “Landing Page Optimization.”

Optimizers to Follow on Twitter Access a list of top CROs to keep up with daily at wsm.co/crotweets.

EXPERIENCE Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

3 Tactics for a Sustainable Email Marketing Strategy By EJ McGowan, General Manager of Campaigner

Every April brings Earth Day, a day for us to think (and act) on how we are impacting our planet for future generations. A popular mantra used around this time of year is, “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle,” and while these are great tips to keep in mind to help better the environment, they can also apply to email marketing. Marketers know that most campaigns drain resources (time and money), so, whenever possible, it’s beneficial to be creative on where and how to curb costs and maximize effectiveness. There are proven tactics available, fortunately, that can help marketing professionals across industries create and maintain a sustainable email marketing strategy.

Reduce contact numbers to strengthen deliverability rates.

Better Email Etiquette Get 15 tips at wsm.co/emailpolite.

Marketers put in a lot of prep work developing targeted campaigns, so they should make sure they don’t let that work go to waste. By trying to avoid notoriously unresponsive users when building a campaign’s contact list, marketers have a better shot at increasing key performance indicators as these users can stall campaign metrics and even be dangerous for deliverability rates in the long-term. For example, Internet service providers (ISPs) can eventually block emails from senders who don’t receive many opens after a period of time. Enterprises should leverage features like engagement scoring to identify and pluck out low-performing recipients, and focus on sending

campaigns to engaged users who are likely to open, click or forward their emails. For some tips on how to segment unengaged users and get them to come back, visit wsm.co/openpls.

Reuse offers and calls-to-action (CTAs) that garner high return. Contacts know what they want, and consequently so do marketers. Brands should conserve the energy spent on coming up with new promotions by looking at which ones worked best in the past and re-offering them at strategic times throughout the year. For instance, if a retailer offered a discount on jewelry or perfume around the holidays and found that it was a big hit, they should consider sending out the same promotion ahead of Valentine’s Day. Similarly, if their contacts responded well to a user survey last May, the retailer will want to send out a similar one this May. By reusing successful offers and CTAs every now and then, marketers will be sure to reach their goals while saving time and effort. An editorial calendar for email marketing may help this initiative as goals can be tracked and campaigns can be scheduled. Learn how to develop an editorial calendar at wsm.co/planemail.

Recycle content from email campaigns for social channels. Social media marketing is a cost-effective strategy that goes hand-in-hand with email marketing, and repurposing content between the two channels is a great way to have a brand’s message reach double the audience with half the effort. Marketers will want to make sure that links to social pages are highlighted in emails, so that contacts can easily interact with the brand on another platform. This cross-channel interaction will amplify messages on social media, give marketing content new life and help it reach new targets that are not yet on a brand’s contact list. Discover tips to integrate social and email at wsm.co/somail. As Earth Day approaches and you see reminders to “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle,” use this time to consider how you might be able to cut down on email marketing waste and create effective, self-sustaining, email marketing campaigns. EJ McGowan, general manager of Campaigner, has more than 25 years’ experience in the software industry with expertise in building highly available, scalable SaaS-based solutions.

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Social Media

MAVENS From Start to Finish

HOW TO HOST A TWITTER CHAT By Amberly Dressler, Managing Editor

Twitter has its share of issues from a business standpoint (e.g., lack of focus and low engagement), but the network has always provided compelling ways to unite like-minded people. The most popular way to join in on a conversation is with hashtags, of course, but some brands are elevating their Twitter marketing by hosting Twitter chats. These organized events bring together people who want to get info and share their knowledge about a certain topic. When done right, Twitter chats can extend an enterprise’s reach while also increasing current and prospective customer engagement. What’s more, the insights and leads gleaned from the event can last long after the chat ends. With that in mind, here are the basics of hosting a Twitter chat:

Pick a Topic Very similar to how a writer would choose a subject for a blog post, a brand needs to decide what topic is most relevant to its enterprise’s goals. For instance, in preparation for its company event Share15, BrightEdge, a provider of an SEO and marketing platform, conducted a Twitter chat entitled “Content Battleground,” discussing nearly every aspect of content marketing (creation, challenges, changes) as this topic was very relevant to its conference and its offerings.

Moderators and participants should label their questions and answers, respectively, to keep the chat organized and readable. 36

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For help picking a topic, marketers can conduct keyword research to understand what people are searching for, consult their customer service reps or ticket system to find out what people are frequently asking of their company, and/or look to Facebook Insights, their social media management platform or content management solution to analyze which topics have been most popular with their audience in the past.

Prepare Questions Once a topic has been chosen, brands should write (and likely re-write) their questions in advance, which offers moderators and influencers (more on each of these later) a chance to prepare their answers, as Twitter chats move quickly. It’s important that core participants are prepped so the material is useful to all. What’s more, questions should be labeled and tweeted (by the moderator) as Q1, Q2 and so on, allowing participants to correspond their answers (see image).

Invite Guests Emails, social posts, landing pages and other marketing collateral should be prepared and published to inform a wider audience of the Twitter chat. As the event gets closer, brands will want to reach out to individuals (like with direct tweets) to increase audience size. Prior to general announcements, however, hosts should find industry influencers who will commit to being there at the scheduled time. Enterprises should ensure this is a diverse group that will bring different perspectives to the discussion. It should be noted that these influencers will likely make up the bulk of responses, as many people will simply want to observe. Core participants don’t have to be paid, but these in-

dividuals and their companies should be promoted to make it worth their while (social shout-outs work).

Pick a Moderator As the person responsible for asking the pre-set questions, responding to side conversations, and keeping the chat moving and on schedule, brands should choose a moderator who will adhere to their guidelines while also providing unbiased insights. Many technology companies, for example, select industry editors who understand the content but won’t show preference toward the host’s offerings. Having an independent third party moderate the event ensures the chat doesn’t take a promotional turn, and subsequently turn off participants. Finally, moderators should be thanked via tweets and blog mentions.

SEMrush’s audience of Web professionals have come to expect these chats as they’re part of the company’s overall content landscape. In addition to a hashtag (that should be used in every message about the event: before, during and after), brands will need to choose which platform to advise participants to use. TweetDeck, for instance, allows users to still follow their Twitter feeds, but also add a column for just the event (by hashtag). While TweetDeck is a popular platform, another one to consider is TweetChat, which provides users a lot of control over the flow of messages coming in (chats happen so quickly that the ability to hit “pause” can be very valuable). TweetDeck also essentially mutes the rest of Twitter, so the participant can focus on the Twitter chat’s questions and answers.

Recap/Report Twitter chats are the perfect example of “it’s not worth doing if it can’t be measured.” Knowing this, hosts often use tools like Tweet Binder to gather insights on how well the event did in terms of reach and engagement. A brand can choose to share these insights with a wider audience (see image) or with key participants as they’ll want to be encouraged to participate again.

Choosing an independent third-party moderator ensures an educational, not promotional tone.

Set a Schedule Every minute of a Twitter chat should be planned. Not everything goes according to plan, of course, but the moderator, key influencers and the host’s staff (everyone from entry-level marketers to the CEO) should understand the schedule. The moderator, especially, will need to know when to move on to the next question, which is often after the host’s main representative (like the CEO, CMO, etc.) has answered.

Provide Instructions Not everyone (even active Twitter users) is familiar with how Twitter chats work. It’s important that key participants are provided a document containing the prepared questions, the set schedule and the format. For instance, brands need to select a hashtag for the event so interested parties can join, responses can be tracked and so everyone is on the same page. SEMrush, for example, frequently conducts Twitter chats and uses the same hashtag (#semrushchat) each time and advises their participants of it often.

SEMrush shares its Twitter chats’ stats to encourage continued participation.

Repurpose One of the most compelling aspects of Twitter is its realtime nature, but for brands this means their content will quickly be pushed down by newer tweets. An enterprise would be very (very) wise to repurpose the content from the Twitter chat into blogs, infographics, emails, graphics and other material that can be published on the site or shared again on social media for those who didn’t join the original conversation on Twitter.

Repeat Whether it’s once a year in preparation for an annual event or once a week, brands should commit to hosting Twitter chats on a regular basis so participants know when to expect them. Plus, the more Twitter chats an enterprise hosts, the more streamlined and effective they will become.

Net

ADVERTISING

Protect Your Retail Brand

Complement MAP policy with an UPP policy for high-value products Checkout prices are not subject to MAP, as they are displayed only when a customer shows interest in buying a product. Steep checkout-level discounts, however, can also dilute the perceived brand value. If managers notice an increase in checkout-level discounting, they should consider complementing their MAP policy with a Unilateral Price Policy (UPP) to discipline over-discounting at the checkout page.

By Mihir Kittur, Co-Founder of Ugam

Modify MAP for peak shopping seasons Internal data shows a spurt in MAP violations by 15-20 percent during and a few days after festive seasons. Some brands choose to bolster their price monitoring for these times. Alternatively, to avoid too many retailers from undercutting each other, a lot of brands vary their MAP prices for specific seasons to give retailers additional room for lowering prices.

Framing & Enforcing a MAP Policy Disruptive technologies are enabling new ways to circumvent minimum advertised price (MAP) policies. These evasion tactics and technologies include encrypting online prices to dodge price monitoring tools, making personalized offers on social media and email, implementing coupons and instant rebates, among other practices. Enterprises that don’t evolve to meet these new challenges risk brand dilution, ineffective channel relationships, consumer confusion and, worse, revenue loss. An increasing number of channel managers and legal counselors realize that what worked in 2015 will only be partially effective in 2016. Here are some factors to keep in mind while framing and enforcing an effective MAP policy:

FRAMING THE POLICY Update policy to include price obfuscation It’s not uncommon for channel partners to exploit the blind spots in a MAP policy. An increasing number of retailers today ask shoppers to call, register on their website or add products to the cart to find out the “real” prices of products. These prices can often be well below the agreed MAP, but there’s little merchants can do to curb them if they are not defined as violations in their MAP policy. Other methods to be included in a MAP policy are personalized offers on social media and email, which can in turn obfuscate prices; encrypted online prices also need to be included in the MAP policy to avoid conflict. 38

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ENFORCING THE POLICY Tune the monitoring based on retailer segments The Internet is wide and complex, and it can be too far-fetched to expect 100 percent MAP compliance at all times. Depending on parameters like volume of sales that fall below MAP, retailers can tune their monitoring to specific retailer segments (large online retailers, marketplaces, local retailers). Include mobile apps and mobile ad networks when tracking for MAP compliance It’s no longer enough to only monitor website prices. In 2015, the usage of shopping apps grew faster than any other category of apps, according to mobile analytics firm Flurry. The surge in smartphone apps has also given way for mobile ads that retailers can’t afford to ignore anymore. Use data scorecards to encourage compliance Agreeing to a MAP policy often means that retailers will be undercut by others who don’t. There’s an opportunity to use data scorecards to influence desired compliance. While technology disrupts, it’s also an enabler. Making effective changes to the MAP policy and effectively deploying technology can help on-going brand protection. Mihir Kittur is a co-founder and chief innovation officer at Ugam. He oversees sales, marketing and innovation and works with leading retailers and brands, delivering insights and analytics solutions to support their category decisions and improve business performance.

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Web

COMMENTARY

Small Business Speaks:

Candidates & Concerns in the 2016 Presidential Election By Amberly Dressler, Managing Editor

Small businesses play a big role in the U.S. economy – accounting for 54 percent of all U.S. sales and providing 55 percent of all jobs according to the Small Business Association.

Presidential Website Face-Off Cast your vote for the best candidate website at wsm.co/prezpages.

When it comes to the 2016 Presidential election, their opinions (and influence) matter too and a variety of recent polls have been conducted to get a better sense of who this demographic plans to vote for and why. For instance, Alignable, a social network for local merchants, found that small business owners (SBOs) are struggling to find a candidate to rally behind, with Donald Trump being both the most feared Republican candidate (38 percent) and the most loved (29 percent) while Hillary Clinton is the most feared Democrat by 29 percent of respondents and most loved by 19 percent. With similar results for Bernie Sanders and Ted Cruz in both categories as well, it makes sense that a full 81 percent of small business owners believe no candidate understands their needs. Despite this, Manta (a small business directory) polled SBOs a number of times over the last several months and got an entirely different set of results. Manta’s results were more decisive with Trump’s support among small business owners consistently

growing throughout the primary campaign. In an Aug. 2015 Manta poll, 41 percent stated that Trump was the best Republican candidate for small business; in a January poll, Trump’s support had grown to 62 percent. In Manta’s newest poll (post-Super Tuesday), 69 percent of small business owners said Trump is the best Republican candidate for small business and found that respondents favor Trump overall as well, followed by those still “undecided” and then Clinton. On the Democratic side, 56 percent of small business owners think Clinton is the best candidate for small business, and 40 percent favor Bernie Sanders (January’s results). While primaries will continue through June, small business owners are rightfully already concerned about issues impacting their bottom lines based on the outcome of the next several months. For instance, Alignable found that increased taxes are of the greatest concern for SBOs as well as immigration and rising healthcare costs. Manta posed a similar question to its group of SBOs and very close to 50 percent said the economy is the most important issue this election year. Following far behind, 18.6 percent cited taxes and 11.2 percent said health care is the most important issue to their small business. Of course when small businesses fear an economic shift, it impacts job creation, spending and other critical areas. Even with the election year, however, Manta’s newest Wellness Index indicated that only 12 percent of the survey’s participants expect that the uncertain political landscape will taint their business outlook for this year. Twelve percent doesn’t seem like much for an election that is playing out pretty aggressively online (specifically social media) and is expected to continue to do so. This is, however, good news for the economy (e.g., jobs, local spending, etc.) because 83 percent of small business owners are optimistic about business prospects in 2016 likely due to a strong ending last year. In fact, 69 percent of the SBOs surveyed by Manta indicated a successful second half in 2015. While Web professionals will be impacted by this year’s election in a variety of ways, small business confidence is likely the biggest area of concern. Of course, prior to November there will be more SBO polls, more sentiment analysis and more changes on the horizon too…it’ll definitely be interesting to watch (to say the least). Those enterprises that focus on optimizing their businesses processes, regardless of who’s residing in the White House, will be those best positioned for ’Net success in the next four years, and the many years to follow.

THE WAIT

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