Website Magazine January 2014

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Social Media Predictions for 2014,

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JANUARY 2014

NOW IS THE TIME TO...

STARTUP Inside This Issue...

>> E-Commerce SEO Challenges >> Flat Design in Focus

>> Web Wellness Formula Plus: 50 Top Testing & Optimization Tools

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Cover Story

Now is the Time to...

STARTUP

Aspiring entrepreneurs are recognizing how much value the Web provides, how expansive its opportunities are, and how much potential exists for our most aggressive, innovative and interesting ideas — if you are willing to work for it of course.

Explore theWebsite Magazine

Departments

30

31

Domain-Name Security

Content Marketing Tips

Discover valuable ways to use the new TLDs to secure a company's brand identity.

32

35

Web Wellness Formula

3 Email Resolutions

Stop buying into every digital “diet pill” promising fast results — instead, focus on your site’s “core”.

36

Responsive Design Hype Avoid the mistakes of early adopters by weighing the pros and cons of going responsive.

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Move beyond superficial wins and understand how to use content to grow your business.

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JANUARY 2014

10

Enterprise Ready: Personalization for Big Brands

12

Small Business Lab: Live Chat Strategies

14

50 Top: Testing & Optimization

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Mastering Search: E-Commerce SEO Challenges

18

E-Commerce Express: Next-Gen Payment Processing

& Development Digest: 20 Design Flat Design in Focus

40 Commentary: Snapchat for Non-Millennials

This New Year, resolve to revamp a key component of your brand’s marketing efforts — email.

38

Social Media Predictions See what executives think 2014 has in store for networks like Pinterest, Google+ and more.

Get the Digital Scoop Check out Website Magazine’s email newsletters covering e-commerce, search, SoLoMo, design and more at wsm.co/webscoop.

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F R O M T H E E D I TO R

With Peter Prestipino

Starting a Conversation on Startups There is a certain mystique about startups – and there always has been. Encompassing all that the business world values – courage, creativity, hard work and absolute unadulterated passion for something — the concept of the modern startup is as close as many of us will ever be to getting in on the ground floor of anything and it’s dominating the attention of the technology space today.

Visit Website Magazine at these upcoming Internet tradeshows:

SES Feb. 10-13 London eTail West March 3-6 San Antonio, TX SMX March 11-13 San Jose, CA Conversion Conference March 17-19 San Francisco, CA AdTech West March 26-27 San Francisco, CA

What many quickly find (or realize after spinning their virtual wheels for years) however, is that launching a startup is hard (really hard), requiring a commitment for which few Internet professionals are truly prepared for, and often results in nothing more than disappointment and empty bank accounts. Even with the best technology, a flush angel investor or aggressive venture capitalist, and the most creative presentation, it doesn’t always work out. That, of course, isn’t stopping Internet professionals like you from trying.

What startups need most is a solid foundation. Website Magazine’s feature article for January 2014, “Now is the Time to Startup” certainly isn’t the first startup guide to be published, nor will it be the last, but what it does provide is a general roadmap, along with resources, solutions and tactics, that can accelerate success and provide aspiring entrepreneurs some confidence that, without questions, now is the best time ever to “startup.”

This edition of Website Magazine will also help propel Internet professionals — at both startups and established enterprises — into 2014 with some useful, innovative and disruptive ideas. This issue offers readers practical advice on personalization, guidance on setting new and effective standards for live chat communication, and provides detailed information on e-commerce SEO, Web performance, flat and responsive design, payment processing, content and email marketing, and a whole lot more. Website Magazine subscribers will also find some rather interesting social media predictions from a few of the most interesting minds in the digital media space.

Enjoy this issue of Website Magazine and make sure to visit us at WebsiteMagazine.com for our daily coverage of the news that matters to your Web success.

Best Web Wishes,

Access the January 2014 issue at wsm.co/wmjan14 or by scanning the QR code below.

Peter Prestipino — Editor-in-Chief, Website Magazine Peter@WebsiteMagazine.com

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PUBLISHER: Susan Whitehurst susan@websitemagazine.com EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Peter Prestipino peter@websitemagazine.com GENERAL MANAGER: David Ruiz druiz@websitemagazine.com MANAGING EDITOR: Amberly Dressler adressler@websitemagazine.com ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Allison Howen ahowen@websitemagazine.com *CONTRIBUTORS: Robert Hoffmann Jerod Morris Erik Harbison Tim Ash ART DIRECTOR: Janet Crouch www.grafikadesign.net GRAPHIC DESIGNERS: Jesse Erbach jesse@websitemagazine.com Shannon Rickson shannon@websitemagazine.com ADVERTISING: Kelly Springer kspringer@websitemagazine.com Brian Wallace brian@websitemagazine.com SUBSCRIPTIONS: Sandra Woods sandra@websitemagazine.com

Website Magazine, Volume 9, Issue 4, January 2014, (ISSN# 1942-0633) is published 4 times per year in February, May, August and November with 8 special issues (January, March, April, June, July, September, October and 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.

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Discover the companies detailed in this issue of Website Magazine, and the

Copyright 2014 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.

executives who provided their insights, by visiting our online Success Corner

*The opinions expressed by contributors are not necessarily those of Website Magazine.

at wsm.co/NQJan14.

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JANUARY 2014

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Twitter Targets Tailored Audiences Shortly after filing its IPO, Twitter zeroed in on advertising revenue. Not only did the social network introduce new mobile targeting filters that allow advertisers to reach mobile users by device, OS version and Wi-Fi, but the company also launched

Amazon Delivers…by Drone?

a retargeting solution dubbed

The hottest topics of conversation over Thanksgiving weren’t Amazon’s awesome

define groups of existing and

deals or immense inventory. Rather, the retailer chose the holiday season to announce its

potential customers who have

very aggressive and futuristic logistic plans. For starters, the company announced a part-

shown interest in a certain brand

nership with the U.S. Postal Service to deliver packages to Amazon Prime members on Sun-

or category, even if it was off the

days. Amazon already offers this perk in Los Angeles and New York, but will start supporting

Twitter platform. For example,

additional cities in 2014. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos also announced, during an interview with

retailers could use Tailored

60 Minutes, that the company is testing package delivery via drone, noting that the service

Audiences to reach prospects

could be up and running in as little as four years with a goal of delivering packages to con-

who have recently visited their

sumers in 30 minutes or less. Now for the real question — is drone delivery realistic or just

websites by retargeting them

good publicity during the busiest shopping season of the year?

with ads on Twitter.

“Tailored Audiences.” The latter program enables advertisers to

PINTEREST GROWS UP, GETS “RICH”

More News of Note

Social media’s darling is growing up right before our digital

Thanks Adobe — Email Marketers No Longer Held Back by CPM-Based Pricing. Learn More at

eyes. The company made several interesting announcements in Nov.

wsm.co/AdobeCPM

2013, including the release of its first API and a new type of “rich” pin.

Groupon Giving Away Freebies (Sort Of). See More at

The company’s first set of API endpoints were initially released to a

wsm.co/GrouponFree

handful of partners including Zappos, Target and Nestle. The APIs can

Peek into Digital Agency iAcquire with an Editorial Q&A at wsm.co/InsideiAcquire

be used to showcase popular products or to curate top articles and other content from Pinterest on a website’s homepage. Conversely, the new rich pin, dubbed “Place Pins,” allows users to include extra details such as contact info directly within pinned content.

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JANUARY 2014

Facebook Drives the Most Social Traffic to Retail Sites, But the Second Place Platform May Come as a Surprise — wsm.co/RetailTraffic

m o b i l e a p p wa t c h

Smartphones and tablets are influencing consumer-shopping behaviors like never before. In fact, Adobe reports that during Thanksgiving weekend, more than 24 percent of online sales occurred on these devices, an increase of 118 percent from just one year ago. To understand just how shoppers are using these small screens, retailers should get familiar with the apps consumers leverage to make purchasing

Tumble into Ads

decisions and complete transactions.

Not surprisingly, Yahoo is taking the profitability of its microblogging site Tumblr seriously, with the launch of

Slice

a new ad unit that highlights advertisers' Tumblr blogs in

This handy online shopping companion app helps consumers track packages and save money. The app links to email inboxes in order to find shopping receipts and track shipments. What’s particularly useful for shoppers is that the app notifies them when there has been a price drop on items they’ve purchased or if a product has been recalled. Plus, Slice provides consumers with insights into their online shopping behaviors, including which categories they purchase from most often and how much they spend.

the “Explore” tab on iOS and Android apps. The "Sponsored Trending Blogs" ad unit doesn’t make its official debut until Jan. 2014, but some users have already encountered promoted blogs from the platform’s beta partners, such as Delta, 20th Century Fox, Calvin Klein and Sony Pictures.

This is Tumblr’s second 2013 advertising initiative created exclusively for the small screen (it launched in-stream

Wanelo

mobile ads in April 2013).

Wanelo is one of the most popular digital shopping communities around the ’Net. Community members post the products featured on this platform, which come from a variety of retailers ranging from big brands to independent merchants.

Through the app, members can discover and share new products, as well as create wishlists. Plus, by clicking the “Buy” button on an item, consumers are directed to the item’s product page, which allows them to go from the discovery stage to the purchase stage with little friction.

PriceGrabber

Watch out Angie’s List, because eBay Hire has made its official U.S. debut. The platform, which is currently in beta, allows local service professionals (like lawyers and plumbers) to create profile pages in order to market their

Consumers can use the PriceGrabber app to find the lowest prices for products. The app helps users find products from a variety of stores, including local merchants, as well as enables users to compare prices, check product reviews and view merchant ratings. Consumers can use their mobile devices to scan barcodes and set price alert notifications. Moreover, the app offers local deals for more than 160 U.S. metropolitan areas, as well as deals from group-buying sites like LivingSocial.

service offerings and rates. The platform will eventually also include ads that feature service professionals in relevant product search result pages. eBay Hire is temporarily free, but eBay plans to charge fees for every booking after the platform’s promotional period ends.

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JANUARY 2014

Saviry The Saviry shopping app helps users discover deals, freebies and sales. The platform highlights recent deals in numerous categories, including electronics, clothing, games, groceries and home essentials. Shoppers have the ability to vote for deals and view trending deals based on other users’ votes.

S TAT

W AT C H

‘Net Advertising Investments Mobile climbing, digital video rising, ad revenues surging — Those are three takeaways from an Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) report released in Oct. 2013.

Businesses invested so much into digital advertising like mobile and video that revenues actually hit a historic high of $20.1 billion for half-year 2013, representing an 18 percent increase over last year’s first-half digital ad revenues of $17 billion.

“Consumers are embracing new screens, new content and transforming how they shop, communicate and consume content at an accelerated clip,” said Sherrill Mane, senior vice president, research, analytics and measurement at IAB. “And, in response, marketers are turning to those same interactive arenas just as quickly.”

The IAB report highlighted massive revenue increases in nearly all interactive advertising formats, including: ■ Mobile revenues soared to $3 billion in the first half of 2013, representing triple-digit growth at 145 percent, from $1.2 billion in the same period in 2012.

■ Digital video, a component of displayrelated advertising, took in $1.3 billion in revenue during the first six months of 2013, an uptick of 24 percent over the first half of 2012.

■ Search revenues in the first half of 2013 totaled $8.7 billion, up 7 percent from $8.1 billion in the first half of 2012.

Find more useful data and valuable insights at WebsiteMagazine.com.

70%

Despite e-commerce’s growth, phone calls are still an important channel for researching and purchasing, according to a Google AdWord’s report. So much so that 70 percent of mobile searchers report they “click to call” directly from search results to connect with a business.

$1 in $5

Data from digital marketing company Kenshoo indicates that $1 in every $5 spent on Facebook ads are delivered on mobile devices.

35%

Apple devices made up 35 percent of total impressions in Q3 2013 on the Millennial Media mobile advertising platform. This is down from the 39 percent of total impressions made on Apple devices in the previous quarter.

86%

Video ad spend is forecasted to increase 86 percent in 2014 according to the “State of Video Industry” report by Adap.tv and Digiday.

70%

In its IPO filing, Twitter reported that more than 70 percent of its ad revenue is coming

from mobile devices.

26.6%

Television advertising retained its spot as the most favored medium to reach consumers according to Nielsen, but Internet display ad spending skyrocketed 26.6 percent during the same period, fueled by large increases from Latin America and Asia.

J A N U A RY 2014

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ENTERPRISE

The Building Blocks of

Personalization for Big Brands

By Amberly Dressler, Managing Editor

Think for a moment about Legos — the toy building bricks that for generations have been practically synonymous with childhood. As kids, many of us built Legos with our siblings, parents and friends. Those children became adults and now purchase Lego products for new generations. They buy so many Legos that the brand is number two in the global toy market (behind Mattel, followed by Hasbro). Sure, Lego has nostalgia on its side, but it is not a stretch to credit the brand’s popularity in the 21st century to its investment in the digital experience. Lego is separating itself from the pack with a similar commitment to personalization — and you can too.

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Personalization’s Holy Grail Unless someone knows a person really well, it’s nearly impossible to determine tone online. It is possible, however, to infer certain things about the person behind a digital interaction, because in personal relationships, there are back stories. Say a man posts an image of his son playing with Legos on Facebook with the caption, “Great, rainy day.”

Someone who doesn’t know him may think he’s upset that he has to stay inside on a Saturday night. This man’s sister, however, knows he loved playing Legos on rainy days as a child, was excited to purchase his son a set of Star Wars-themed Legos and is using his Blackberry that desperately needs an upgrade. Today’s consumers want brands to know that too. They need to be his sister. Well, maybe not exactly, but pretty close.

Now, how does a brand deliver an experience to “their brother” that speaks to him directly?

Fortunately, if an enterprise can imagine it, there’s a technology that supports it.

Please Remember Me Nate Barad is the director of product strategy for Sitecore. After speaking with him, we know that aside from his role at Sitecore, Barad is a dad to two young boys. Without speaking directly to him, Lego can assume that too. His online order history with Lego, and other companies, is full of duplicate purchases. To avoid meltdowns, anytime he buys a toy, a tablet — you name it — he buys an extra one so that each of his sons has his own.

Using Sitecore, Lego uses Barad’s order history and what he calls “digital body language” to personalize his Web experience. For example, Lego pushes down items that don’t have two in stock — minimizing any frustration Barad may have after investing time in products he ultimately won’t buy. Lego also promotes “buy one, get one free” (BOGO) offers or “buy two get free shipping” promotions to Barad, which they wouldn’t necessarily serve to someone without his buying history. Lego and other brands can build a robust profile of Barad and his fellow shoppers (including how and when he shops, what he buys, what promotions he interacts with, what age group he buys for and more) to customize content and his user experience.

Barad expects brands to have this kind of intimate knowledge of him and to earn his business by leveraging the information to build an experience designed for him. In fact, Accenture Interactive reports that 75 percent of U.S. consumers like when brands personalize messaging and offers so they are more relevant, while e-tailing group states that 51 percent of consumers are willing to share data if it results in receiving a better shopping experience. Overall, 44 percent of consumers appreciate retailers more when they remember their buying and browsing behavior across all channels (source: e-tailing group).

So, what are you waiting for? If you’re like many brands, you are stuck behind a wall of misconceptions, cost concerns and IT barriers.

Party of One Before a brand can even begin to personalize a shopper’s experience, they have to understand what personalization is and what it isn’t. According

to Baynote VP of Marketing and Development Dan Darnell one of the biggest misconceptions that brands have about personalization is that they are going to use a visitor’s profile information to personalize the experience and that this is the only option. In fact, for 80-90 percent of commerce sites visitors are anonymous.

“To believe I am going to know your gender, household income, etc. and then deliver relevant content, sounds like the right thing to do if you have that info, but for the majority of people coming to commerce sites, you need other strategies to personalize,” said Darnell.

Baynote educates brands that personalization is delivering relevant content based on what a marketer does know about a visitor, such as when a person came to a site using a particular search term (if they’re not receiving Google organic traffic of course) and then went to the sweaters section, but the marketer knows nothing else. Or, like our earlier example, this shopper buys two of everything in “x” age group. To speak on a 1:1 basis with customers, profiles need to be built and then leveraged with automation. Getting started with these technologies can take as little development time as putting a tag in the footer of a website, much like an analytic solution. Conversely, to deploy more broadly, it can require server-to-server integration, which is, of course, the recommendation of many experts.

“The breadth of what you can do with this technology is eye opening for a lot of our prospects and clients,” said Darnell. “The fact of the matter is it’s early days for a lot of them, some of them are playing catch-up and those moving to the next step understand deploying personalization throughout a website will continue to generate improved revenue and engagement.”

Costs for solutions like Baynote can range from a few thousand dollars a month to tens of thousands depending on brand and use cases, but Darnell says the return on investment is well worth it. He continues that personalization is a critical, necessary tactic within the arsenal of the modern Web experience.

Brands need to break down personalization barriers and build their businesses like a child playing with Legos, because if they can imagine it, the technology is absolutely available to build it.

J A N U A RY 2014

Can You Pass the Enterprise Mobile Test?

Discover three things to know before going mobile at wsm.co/mobilepassfail.

zon a m A The fect t Ef roduc

g ows p on kn s are nothin z a m A n e io e at tion. S mend recom personaliza xist at ut ies e witho ortunit p zon p o t atama wha e b / o wsm.c

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WEBSITE MAGAZINE’S

SMALL BUSINESS LAB

By Peter Prestipino, Editor-In-Chief

Setting a New Standard for Customer Care Initiatives With

LIVE CHAT SOLUTIONS

Companies operating on the ‘Net today typically struggle with two major problems: getting consumers to their websites, and converting those visitors into loyal, paying customers upon arrival.

There is no shortage of methods to get new users in the digital door, but there seems to be little in the way of actionable advice on the tactics or technology solutions that help ‘Net professionals engage users to a degree where they are comfortable, and more than willing to pull out their real-world wallets.

If your enterprise is looking to enhance its users’ website experience and shorten the road to digital profitability, live chat software may be the answer you’re looking for. Fortunately, for technology buyers, making the case for implementing these solutions won’t be too difficult.

Consumers are quite familiar with live chat software (just under two-thirds of U.S. shoppers have used live chat — a 15 percent rise from 2009). What’s more, those that use the Webbased functionality — be it on a retail or service site — are more likely to buy and less likely to abandon their sessions. It’s also a whole heckuva lot cheaper than running a call center.

! t s i L Big at solution2s01a4t

e ch chat of liv .co/live wsm

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JANUARY 2014

The Value Proposition of Live Chat Live chat is one of those strategic capabilities that can differentiate a business from the competition in customers’ virtual eyes. When the solutions are implemented thoughtfully, of course, they will allow brands to connect with customers in a positive, meaningful and effective way. Digital enterprises must understand a few things before implementation however, including how a live chat solution could improve the customer experience (e.g. shorter phone call wait times) and if that solution can provide an experience better than what consumers have come to expect, as well as the level of resources required to own and operate the software.

The “total cost of ownership” question is undoubtedly important to understand for small enterprises as it’s not just the technology that needs to be purchased, but also the time required for training as well as staffing employees to manage the solution and actually do the chatting

with visitors/customers. Even after implementation, any number of problems can cause the total cost of ownership to skyrocket and make the investment a loss. Poor responses from support agents and platform failures will not just cause a lost upsell, but perhaps a lost client as well. Ensuring that your enterprise selects/acquires a best-of-breed solution should satisfy any concerns that the technology is sound. But will the training be thorough?

Training Support Teams for Success Live chat agents will need to be trained to use the system and its features, trained to provide accurate, personalized answers in a conversational flow, and finally, trained on how to upsell and cross-sell (uncovering the needs of the customers). These support agents represent the brand online, so they must be able to facilitate sales and resolve issues for the customers they encounter. There’s no better way to facilitate this than through the quality of writing. Strength in this area is vital to conveying an accurate message and upholding the quality of the brand.

Don’t make customers guess what it is that you’re saying — be brief, stay on point, ensure grammar and spelling are perfect, watch the tone and always use the customer’s name when possible.

Software Quality is Paramount

Successful live chat initiatives are in great part dependent on the quality of the interactions, but also with the experience consumers have with the software itself. Take advantage of features that set customer expectations, such as showing queue position and wait times before a chat session starts. Ensure there is a typing notification when the agent is preparing a response. In a sales queue, the chat platform can make customers feel secure if it automatically encrypts sensitive information. Another feature that can enhance the online interaction is co-browsing; in other words, where an agent and customer can look at Web pages together.

Many additional tactics can help any enterprise that is considering implementing a live chat solution do so with positive results, including:

• Never keep customers waiting more than 60 seconds; if queue times are too long, adjust system settings (if available) to hide the live chat features from website visitors.

• Empower live chat agents to invite other members of your organization, from sales representatives to technical staff, in order to help get customers’ questions answered quickly and correctly.

• Always ask customers for their opinion of the live chat experience after their sessions. The results will be useful in analyzing areas that might need improvement.

• Leverage any available feature in the software solution that could potentially improve the live chat experience, from real-time monitoring of users to file transfer of content (presentations, catalogs, etc.) to co-browsing.

Tracking ROI Measuring the impact of live chat implementation is also important to this initiative — or any digital initiative really — and there are many metrics that can be tracked. For high-volume enterprises, tracking the number of chats per hour might be useful or the average handle time (AHT). Those metrics can seem out of place in smaller enterprises, however, as they don’t really reveal the performance of the agents and the live chat experience that is being presented to consumers. More meaningful metrics might include lift in sales or revenue per agent, the increase in conversion rate or the margin per chat. Even the difference in average order value (AOV) for those that engaged with a live chat representative versus those that did not is useful.

Life as a Live Chat Operator When customer service takes the digital form, it adds an additional layer of complexity. Not only do you have to deal with the demands and wildly different temperaments of prospects (many of whom are already customers), but it’s often necessary to do so with a virtual smile on your face. Website Magazine interviewed several live chat operators to understand what it is like to be a live chat operator on the ‘Net today — see what they have to say at wsm.co/livechatstories.

Who’s Ready to Chat?

The Internet has changed the way consumers discover and experience people, products and services, and no enterprise can afford to ignore the tools that influence the experience and drive engagement. Live chat, when implemented thoughtfully, and when employees are trained the same way, presents a powerful way to improve the customer experience — and the bottom line of your digital enterprise.

J A N U A RY 2014

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50

TOP

Testing & Optimization Solutions for Internet Professionals Testing and optimizing a digital property — be it a website or application — may not seem nearly as cool or edgy as designing or promoting it, but it’s quickly becoming the most important aspect of digital initiatives for the modern enterprise. It’s the last opportunity Internet professionals have to make a positive difference to their companies, products and brands’ bottom lines.

As an industry, we’re not basing decisions on gut instinct anymore, but, instead on empirical data — and that’s a good thing. Those responsible for testing and optimization play an integral role in the performance and longterm success of their enterprises. It’s not easy to make a case for testing and optimization, however. As a result, in small- and mid-size enterprises in particular, those initiatives rarely get the budget. The reason? Essentially, there’s no single definition, and it can be hard to wrap your virtual head around.

It’s a broad field that encompasses many different areas, from the purely technical to the more ephemeral notion of “user experience” and how it plays into something as tangible as conversion. That is beginning to change of course. A study of 1,500 global IT decision-makers by Capgemini and Hewlett-Packard found that by 2014, quality assurance testing is expected to consume as much as 28 percent of the IT budget — up five percentage points from 2013.

In this edition of Website Magazine’s Top 50, readers will find solutions that are capable of satisfying a wide variety of testing and optimization scenarios — from the informal and qualitative to the formal and quantitative. There are solutions for understanding how websites appear in different browser and operating system combinations such as BrowserStack.com, A/B testing platforms like Unbounce.com and VisualWebsiteOptimizer.com, as well as solutions that measure the technical performance of digital properties including Compuware.com and Yottaa.com.

Wait…

There’s More!

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The 50 solutions included here are only the beginning, there are many, many more worth exploring. You’ll find a good selection of them at wsm.co/TestOptimize.

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JANUARY 2014

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mastering

search

By Amberly Dressler, Managing Editor

Sink or Swim SEO Challenges for Retailers There are three types of people

Many retailers fall into one of those categories when it comes to how they approach their in this world — those who dive in company’s search engine optimization.

Increasingly, however, many Internet rehead first, those who test the tailers are dry as a bone — sitting on the steps waters and those who sit on the — deciding to ramp up their digital advertising spend because they think their sites will steps too scared to jump in. never rank organically. Sure, there are constantly shifting technologies, interplay between different channels and consumers’ changing behavior to muddy the waters, but all retailers really need is a little push.

Uncle Dave & Keyword Not Provided Some people have — or have least heard of — an uncle who taught his niece or nephew how to swim by simply pushing him or her in the pool. The idea is that the kid will sink or swim. If Uncle Dave, we’ll call him, wasn’t positive that the child would pop up to the surface, then he never would have pushed him or her in.

Like Uncle Dave, Google pushed retailers into the pool, even if they weren’t ready.

In 2013, Google shifted to encrypted search, which strips away 100 percent of the keyword insights that search marketers had become so reliant on (like swim floaties). This is because Google was confident “good” retailers would pop up and learn to swim. The folks at BrightEdge see this transition as a positive one. Keyword not provided allows brands to remove their dependency on keyword-level data and improve their SEO initiatives by focusing on page quality and conversion-based data. This doesn’t mean, however, that the process is easy. BrightEdge CEO and Founder Jim Yu advises that keyword not provided requires marketers to press the reset button on their search strategies and focus on contentcentric approaches.

What does a “content-centric approach” really mean? For starters, it means more companies are forced to become information publishers as content plays an increasingly central role in marketing strategy. Now, chances are, most retailers have been

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engaging in content marketing in some fashion for years — by publishing content like gift-giving guides, blogs, catalogs, etc.

Today’s Internet retailers looking to top the search engines, however, must move beyond creating content on a whim to actually understanding what customers want to consume. Merchants should analyze any available website data to understand what customers are querying based on metrics like page popularity, bounce rates and other indicators that show users are or are not finding what they are looking for. Retailers should create content around those successes and failures.

“To understand and measure the performance of your content, it’s important to analyze search engine rank, social interactions, site traffic and conversions,” Yu said. “Google analytics is a great way to gain a light understanding of your content’s performance, but more advanced analytics platforms are necessary to truly see content’s impact and optimize accordingly.”

Community Pool For merchants jumping into the SEO pool, it can feel like they’re competing at an Olympic level. According to Yu, generic keywords are highly competitive and expensive, which means smaller merchants must take a different approach to win the gold. Customers’ reliance on mobile devices presents the perfect opportunity for local merchants.

Bing and Google are increasingly looking to deliver locally relevant results to users. Fortunately, searches made via mobile devices often have local intent. Merchants should focus on touchpoints where their brands may be interacted with, according to Rio SEO VP of Local Search Solutions Bill Connard. This can include optimization for local landing pages, iOS applications, local directories and in-car navigation devices.

When discussing directories, in particular, it’s extremely important for retailers to manage their information to include correct operating hours, physical addresses, phone numbers, etc. Ultimately, however, brands should be more concerned with their own branded local search terms, according to Connard, so

they can acquire the traffic that may be directed to those other directories. In other words, rank higher than Yelp for key phrases such as a “business name + location.”

“Managing review sites and directories are important but not as important as having local branded search in place because you are losing traffic to directory sites,” said Connard.

This brings us to Google Carousel, which has changed the search game for marketers in a big way, according to BrightEdge’s Yu. Rio SEO’s Connard agrees that retailers will see that Google Carousel is triggering local branded searches that were not triggered in the past. Essentially, Google Carousel eliminates the local listings “pack” and replaces it with a horizontal bar of image-based local results at the very top of the search results. For example, if a searcher queries, “pizza places in San Diego,” the top results likely belong to Yelp, but a “carousel” of pizza places near San Diego, CA appears above the organic results.

Once a searcher clicks on one of those results (like this editor’s all-time favorite Bronx Pizza), a search engine results page (SERP) will appear around that business and only that business as pictured here. The question becomes, how do retailers ensure they are not losing traffic to the likes of Yelp or Foursquare?

These are Yu’s recommendations to leverage Carousel to improve site traffic:

1. Don’t leave it to Google to determine information about your business; set up a Google Place for Business and a Google+ page to provide the best information about your business.

2. Ensure images are high resolution, unique and ordered in terms of your preference.

3. Encourage customers to review your business on Google+, because research shows that reviews play a crucial role in Carousel placement. (Note: Don’t end up in Google’s bad graces, check out 10 terrific — and totally white hat — ways to generate user reviews at wsm.co/10getreviews).

Paid Lessons Internet retailers are ramping up their digital advertising spend because many think it’s increasingly difficult to rank their sites in the search results. And despite the fact that constantly shifting technologies, interplay between different channels and consumers’ changing behavior can seem like a challenge, retailers can dive right in, with better SEO results to show for their nerve.

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e- c o m m erce

express

Peter Prestipino, Editor-In-Chief

INNOVATIVE & DISRUPTIVE PAYMENT PROCESSING FOR E-COMMERCE-MINDED DEVELOPERS Most e-commerce merchants Chase and PayPal have a virtual stronghold on the industry, but there are sowith the leaders in e-commerce lutions and platforms emerging that are both innovative and disruptive to the payment processing. digital status quo, and that are quickly becoming top-of-mind with e-commerce developers.

are going to be quite familiar

Stripe: One of the reasons these vendors are so dis-

Recurring Payments Subscription commerce solution OrderGroove partnered with eBay Enterprise in Aug. 2013 to offer retailers a platform to manage repeat orders, and many other merchants are looking to do the same.

See a comparison of some of the top recurring payment platforms including Chargify, ChargeBee, Memberful, MoonClerk and Space Box. Visit wsm.co/getpaid8.

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ruptive is because they empower not just merchants, but also technology providers an opportunity to wrestle back control from the credit card companies. E-commerce platform Shopify, for example, announced in Aug. 2013 the release of Shopify Payments, a credit card processing system that leverages the Stripe payments technology. The integration enables merchants to accept and manage VISA, MasterCard and American Express payments directly through their Shopify system — instead of forcing them to go through a third-party payment gateway. In addition to the direct integration with Shopify, merchants receive instant setup and approval, as new stores are automatically deployed with the Shopify Payments system, providing an opportunity to start selling immediately without needing a separate payment gateway or merchant account. The system also provides real-time payment information so storeowners can see their payment balances, upcoming payout schedules and receive email notifications when funds hit their bank accounts.

Dwolla: In Sept. 2013, e-commerce solution 3DCart announced an integration with the Dwolla payment network (wsm.co/3dwolla), which enables its customers to send, request and accept money through email, phone, and social networks including Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, eliminating the need for paper checks and charge cards. Unlike other payment companies that rely on credit and debit cards and can charge sometimes excessive processing fees to make payments, Dwolla features a custom-built network that securely connects to a chosen bank account while allowing users

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to move money easily and affordably. With Dwolla and 3dCart, transactions more than $10 will cost just $0.25, while anything less than $10 will remain free.

BlueSnap: Another reason e-commerce developers are turning away from more traditional payment options is because of the sheer sophistication of the alternatives.

BlueSnap, for example, is one of the most comprehensive payment platforms on the market today, powering the checkout process for e-commerce merchants of all sizes worldwide, and fueling growth for online businesses serving digital, physical and mobile markets. As both a global payment service provider and an international payment gateway, BlueSnap has reinvented the checkout experience by combining the power of four key components: integration into the storefront, global payment processing, a subscription technology and marketing tools for upsell at checkout. Companies like BlueSnap are also far more willing to take a chance on those merchants and marketers that haven’t yet made a name for themselves. The company now serves upward of 5,000 merchants, and supports shoppers in 180 countries by localizing the experience, with 28 languages, 60plus currencies and 110 payment types.

WePay: Many of these solutions have broken through thanks to their willingness to go where other networks simply won't. The popularity of crowdfunding is accelerating rapidly and technology solutions have emerged that are capitalizing on the trend. The WePay platform, for instance, recently announced that it is now processing up to $1.5 million per day in crowdfunding payments, and powering six of the top 15 crowdfunding marketplaces, boasting more than 30 partners using its API, including GoFundMe, Fundly, Fundable, YouCaring and Honeyfund. WePay has averaged 35 percent monthly growth in crowdfunding-specific processing since it launched its first crowdfunding API partner in Oct. 2011. On average, WePay has processed 648 percent more crowdfunding volume in each calendar month of 2013 than the same calendar month in 2012.

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de s i g n & de v e l o pment

digest

By Allison Howen, Associate Editor

DISSECTING THE FLAT DESIGN TREND The digital design world has

The trend took off in 2013 for a variety of reasons, and to the chagrin of many Apple fan boys and girls, none have to do with the release of iOS7. Rather, consumers and mobile have been the biggest drivers, as flat designs not only load faster on mobile devices and desktops, but also remove distractions from the user experience. Before an enterprise fully embraces “flat,” however, it is essential to know what it will gain or lose.

done a virtual 360, replacing the days of bevels and drop shadows in favor of simpler, sleeker appearances.

That’s right, we are talking about flat design.

What makes design “flat”?

This question might seem simplistic, but it's imperative to have a working definition. While there are a few basic elements of flat design, the main differentiator is an absence of depth according to Les Kollegian, the CEO of branding and marketing agency Jacob Tyler.

“When the Web first started and Photoshop came out, people were trying to use effects to make designs very intricate and create as much depth as possible,” said Kollegian. “As time went on, the flat design components started to emerge and have been adopted, because I think consumers appreciate simplicity and ease of use.”

A

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Designers are forgoing elements like drop shadows, bevels and gradients in favor of simpler, two-dimensional icons and imagery. This approach results in the absence of visual depth, but typography and vibrant colors serve as elements of interest. Take the HubSpot website as an example (see image A). The white text on the site’s landing page stands out against the primarily orange background. All of the design elements have a purpose, and there is little distraction on the page. Plus, the site’s “View the new features” call-to-action is not only cohesive with the rest of the site, but also lacks elements like shadows or gradients that could give it distracting depth, making it completely two dimensional and straight-forward.

Why is flat design popular?

Flat design has increased in popularity because it puts the focus on content, which leads to a better ROI. As previously mentioned, these often more simplistic appearing designs can improve the user experience, making it easier and faster for visitors to navigate a website to find what they are looking for.

“Unless you’re on an entertainment site, it’s really about going to a website to solve a task and flat design creates an easier approach to getting things done,” said Kollegian. “I tend to believe that any time you are creating simplicity, its’ creating an ease of navigation to go from step A to step B.” Kollegian also notes that the bright colors often seen in flat designs can improve usability, as they can help minimize distractions for site visitors by putting the focus on links and other navigation elements.

Flickr’s website, for instance, uses a dark background to highlight the white typography that is featured on its landing page. Plus, the site’s most important callsto-action are highlighted in bright pink, while the rest of the clickable links turn bright pink when visitors mouse over them (see image B). This helps draw visitors’ eyes to the most important areas of the page.

Flat design, however, isn’t only trending on websites. In fact, it can be seen in nearly every type of creative nowadays, including within apps, advertisements

“

Flat design has increased in popularity because it puts the focus on content, which leads to a better ROI. B

”

C

and infographics. Recently, popular social sharing service AddThis unveiled a new, flat look for its product icons, calling them “modern” and “vibrant” (see image C). The update provides a few advantages for developers and marketers. For instance, not only do the new icons load faster on websites, but early testing found that they also foster 48 percent more clicks.

Flat designs usually have less weight than designheavy sites, which means they tend to load faster both on the traditional and mobile Web. Because of the value placed on speed and fast-loading sites nowadays, this is another reason that flat design has been trending.

Kollegian says that anytime his team is implementing flat design, they are usually also developing in responsive. This is not to say that responsive sites must feature a flat design, just that the minimalistic approach makes flat design adaptable, which helps developers offer a consistent experience across users’ devices.

Is it right for my business?

There is really no correct answer to this question, as it is up to an enterprise to identify the preferences of its customer base. That said, Kollegian offers some

advice to companies that are considering making a design change.

“Ensure that any design you create for your website is appropriate for your target market. Don’t just design for the sake of following a trend,” said Kollegian. “That’s not to say this is a fad, but that you should always make sure your consumers are taken care of. If flat design is the way to go, then I highly recommend it.”

If your team decides to commit to flat design, it is important to keep a few things in mind. First, teams should conduct competitive analysis to see how other companies have approached flat design. This not only provides the creative team with inspiration, but also ensures that everyone is on the same page from the beginning. In addition, creative teams should work to include only the necessary elements on a site, as too much content or needless imagery can distract visitors from completing the task they intended to complete. Lastly, as always, it is important to conduct testing (A/B, user experience) in order to discover which elements yield positive results (clicks and conversions) and which elements, well, don’t. After all, flat design should enhance the user experience, not hinder it.

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NOW IS THE TIME TO…

STARTUP

By Peter Prestipino, Editor-In-Chief

It’s hard to pinpoint just how many Web businesses exist at any given time – much less offline enterprises that now demand stronger and more vibrant digital components to compete – but it is probably safe to say that it is growing…. and certainly far faster than in years past.

As the commercial Web continues to evolve, it is serving an increasingly important role in the omnichannel success of the modern enterprise — from pure-play e-commerce merchants to app developers, as well as offline service providers and Webbased publishers. As a result, Internet professionals and Web workers like you must constantly engage in a process of discovery (or, in some cases, rediscovery) surrounding the fundamentals of Web success, mastering the most important lessons for those days when they are no longer “just” a startup but a profitable, established enterprise.

Receiving guidance as a startup can at times seem as useful as a Ted Talk (inspirational of course, but often short on “how to”). In most cases, however, a more practical use of time and talents is required for startup founders and startup workers. You already have the inspiration, now is the time for the perspiration.

After a difficult and seemingly never-ending recession, business is starting to boom and the Web is once again a key driver of commercial activity. While some startups will certainly find their brands quickly headed in the direction of the digital deadpool, a select few will stand the test of time and earn the respect and dollars of consumers. A handful perhaps will even reach super-company status — like Amazon, Google, Facebook and others that have gone public and very much changed Economic growth is expected to the real and virtual world. Even if you’re brighten in early 2014, according to not a super-company, there’s quite a bit of a Kiplinger finance report, thanks to money to be made and now is the time to business and consumer confidence get started. gaining strength and Europe emerging What is so very appealing about “startfrom its own 18-month recession. ing up” a digital business today, far more Still, the 2014 economy, like that of so than in years past, is that the cost of 2013, will likely be well below the entry is so incredibly, so phenomenally economy’s long-run potential, 4-5 low. More and more people are finally recyears into a recovery. What does your ognizing — even those without any forbusiness forecast for the coming year mal background in technology — just — positives or negatives? Take how much value the Web provides, how Website Magazine’s 2014 Outlook expansive its opportunities are, and how survey and see how your forecast much potential exists for our most agcompares to other Internet profesgressive, innovative and interesting ideas sionals’ at wsm.co/2014forecast.

— if you are willing to work for it.

ECONOMIC TRUTHS:

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OBLIGATORY DOWNER: IT’S NOT GOING TO BE EASY Every 60 seconds, 571 websites are created, 11,000 professional searches are conducted on LinkedIn, 72 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube and more than 200 million emails are sent. Only a handful of wellfunded or bootstrapped startups will (without much effort seemingly) stand out and excel amid this level of activity, make a name among the millions of other digital properties trying to do the same and somehow manage to make a profit. The rest will need to operate efficiently, diligently and creatively in order to move from startup to established, profitable enterprise. With the right guidance, of course, anything is possible. That’s the focus of this edition of

INSPIRATION for STARTUPS & ENTREPRENEURS The Ted Talk conference series is undoubtedly an idea worth spreading in itself — as its tag line indicates — particularly for startups and entrepreneurs. Website Magazine has assembled some of the most important Ted Talks from the past few years, covering motivation, productivity, marketing and advertising, innovation and more. Review this curated speaker series on the Web at wsm.co/toptedtalks.

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BRAND MATTERS: The Dot Com domain name extension was once the hallmark of all things Internet. That, of course, is changing quickly with the introduction of the hundreds of new generic top level domains hitting the market in 2014. Stay up to date on important domain name related news at Website Magazine’s Domain Masters channel at wsm.co/WMdomains.

Website Magazine. Throughout this feature article, you’ll encounter both personal stories of startup founders, as well as links to several supplementary lists of practical resources at WebsiteMagazine.com. It’s not going to be easy to get through it all, but we’re sure you’ll manage just fine.

Ultimately, what startups need most is a formal plan, which provides a roadmap for success, projecting 3-5 years ahead and outlining the route a company will take to grow their revenues. Website Magazine has put together a quick guide on creating a “digital” business plan at wsm.co/newbizplan. If you are serious about starting up, let this be the first moments you spend as a startup.

EXPERIENCE NECESSARY & PASSION REQUIRED

with the cockiest millennial founder. For example, the executive team for TaxJar, a software-as-a-service that automates sales tax for small- and medium-sized online sellers (tax compliance), has deep experience in building tax companies, accounting products and collectively have spent years working with online sellers — so they know the challenges of their prospective customers firsthand. While “experience” does not ensure success, it can certainly be a determining factor.

For every startup with a young, passionate, driven but unexperienced founder, there are others (like ex-Microsoft VP Parthasarathy) that highlight the value experience-driven insights can have on an enterprise. Given the choice, it’s likely that you too would choose experience over the alternative any day. The reason, while not necessarily true in every case, is that with experience comes an ability to differentiate product and brand — and as consumers and investors come around, that proves to be of immense importance. Of course, passion alone can take you quite a long way too.

“We are the misfits of tech,” said Braydon Moreno, CEO of RoBo 3D, makers of an open-source 3-D printer. Without substantial tech backgrounds like many other companies, Moreno and his team take a different approach. “We understand what the consumer is expecting in an electronics product and then work toward exceeding those expectations. Our goal is to work on developing and sustaining a superior customer experience while simultaneously expanding the possibilities of what one can do with tools such as our personal 3D printer.”

The image of startup founders pulling all-nighters in their basements or garages isn’t actually farfetched. Many do work in their homes or in shared offices, but it’s not where they are starting from that really matters, but who is doing the starting, or who with, which ultimately makes the difference between success and failure for today’s startups.

“I previously spent 19 years at Microsoft where I led and grew a number of business units,” said Sanjay Parthasarathy, CEO of Seattle-based company Indix, a cloud-based product intelligence platform for retail brands.

Parthasarathy also started the .NET Group, which eventually became the Developer & Platform Evangelism Division (D&PE) at Microsoft. It was responsible for upward of $1 billion in revenue. Parthasarathy’s last role at Microsoft was as the corporate VP of the Startup Business Accelerator, a new division created to Even with the passion of a startup, build startups for Microsoft. What his genthere is always a time when eral career experience affords him is a greater you’ll need to start hiring others understanding of the challenges startups to take on some of the work — be face, and the insight to know when an idea it design, development, marketing is worth pursuing. Parthasarathy is also an or any of the other essential active investor in early stage startups, conpositions within a digital enterprise. sequently, with investments in Buuteeq, Find out where startups (and GaMa, DocSuggest and Skift. established) companies are hiring The startup enterprises with the most from at wsm.co/hiringin2014. stable futures are likely those with the most experienced teams, not necessarily those

HIRING FOR STARTUPS:

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IDENTIFY DEMAND, DEFINE THE DIFFERENCE Experience and passion are important and are two great equalizers in the startup game, but nothing is more vital to the success of an emerging enterprise than what it is, product or service, they are actually providing.

Thanks to his experience, Parthasarathy in particular understands the value of having a product that is in demand. His Indix solution provides a comprehensive view into the

Website Magazine Webinars Website Magazine’s webinars are professionally produced and put you in touch with a great, techminded audience that is interested in improving and growing their Web-based businesses.

Webinars are the best way to get together groups of potential customers and educate them about your product. The webinars also result in the most 1 to 1 conversations and produce the warmest of leads because you have the opportunity to perform a live demonstration and answer questions.

A Website Magazine webinar includes: • Support with the presentation, a 1-hour webcast, and the registration lead list • Your webinar will be promoted through Website Magazine advertising channels • Expect an audience of about 1,000+ professionals • Your webinar will be archived and freely available on Website Magazine for 6 months

Reach out to one of our representatives today at sales@websitemagazine.com to talk ideas and find out more!

THE MAGAZINE FOR WEBSITE SUCCESS WEBSITEMAGAZINE.COM

FAIL FAST: The current ideology behind startups is to fail fast, so you succeed faster.

It may seem counter-intuitive, but the idea is that in building a startup, failure is inevitable. There will be problems and the faster you encounter them, the faster you can learn, adjust and grow. Check out three high-profile failed startups from 2013 and discover what you can learn from their mistakes at wsm.co/startupmishaps.

or want it? It is, in fact, what many condigital landscape for retailers — something sumers find most frustrating. that is sorely missing in the market today.

If what your startup is offering is com“We discovered that while salespeople plicated to explain or grasp — to any degree leverage CRM tools, marketers have marwhatsoever, it is likely going to be a barrier keting automation, and financial analysts to adoption by consumers, and a great big leverage financial modeling applications, wall to potential investors (as well as the product managers, pricing analysts, catemedia and market influencers that can help gory/merchandising managers at brands and spread the word about your startup to these retailers don’t have a comprehensive tool at their disposal to research product landscapes in an efficient and two groups). In short, a clear purpose provides a clear path to profitability. meaningful way,” said Parthasarathy.

In this month’s Top 50 on page 14, Website Magazine profiles “Instead, they spend an endless amount of time searching for and synthesizing product information from the In- some of the leading testing and optimization solutions for Interternet while leaving little time to actually analyze and act net professionals. Several of these solutions, including UserTesting.com and ConceptFeedback.com, can remove any doubt in a upon that information.”

The Indix platform enables merchants to explore, analyze founder’s mind that what they are presenting to users will be unand visualize product-related information (assortments, cata- derstood, as well as any potential barriers to use or adoption.

With any luck, enterprises like local-mobile startup Comlogs, channels, competition, prices and promotions) and to do so in real-time. The difference is what Indix and other muteStream will understand and put testing and optimization successful startups must focus on. After all, a difference is the at the top of their startup to-do list.

The solution aims to deliver foot traffic to brick-and-mortar status quo, a difference improves the performance and prolocations located near or around public transit — straightforfessional lives of their users. So what’s next for this startup?

Indix’s long-term goal is to achieve a bigger scale for prod- ward enough. A look under the virtual hood however shows the uct data in its platform. There are more than 1 billion products vision and the potential. Using its predictive geo-targeting techand services on the Internet. Today, the Indix platform has be- nology, the startup plans to change the way local businesses intween 100-150 million products and more than 4 billion price teract with mass transit commuters. Its content delivery platform points. The next few months are crucial for Parthasarathy and very much fills a void in mobile advertising on mass transit, learning the routines of riders, and matching his team as they move toward achieving a individuals with relevant ads. bigger scale on product data and realizing Just having a purpose for the technoltheir vision of organizing, analyzing and viogy you’ve innovated isn’t enough — the sualizing the world’s product information. benefit it provides also needs to be in deThe difference that Indix wants to be mand, and capable of making differences known for is the largest source of productin the personal or professional lives of its related information, something that will There certainly needs to be some users. But success as a startup goes even likely be in great demand for merchants degree of user demand for further — without a powerful and reliable across the globe. solutions and services, but how technology to serve customers, you’re do you know if what you’re offering A CLEAR & PURPOSE-DRIVEN likely just one more solution headed for is of interest to consumers?

TECHNOLOGY the digital deadpool.

Check out three platforms to Keeping your website, technology, product gather feedback at and/or service simple may just be the best STRENGTH & RELIABILITY WIN wsm.co/measuredemand. piece of advice startups can receive to spur THE DIGITAL DAY initial and ongoing use. Without a clear Without a strong and reliable back-end, purpose, how will users know if they need platforms like CommuteStream would not

MEASURING DEMAND:

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STARTUP FUNDING: Few, if any, startups are flush with cash at the outset. So how do they get funded? Angel investors, crowdfunding platforms, venture capitalists or by their own bootstraps? Website Magazine interviews startups about the source of their funding and the lessons they’ve learned at wsm.co/getfundednow.

be able to reach the tens of thousands of daily commuters in the next three months as it plans, much less the hundreds of thousands it expects a year from now.

“In terms of implementation, we use JavaScript for both client and server, using Node.js/Express for back-end and HTML5/ Backbone.js for the front,” said Samuel Pro, co-founder and CEO of Commute Stream, showcasing the familiarity with technology that every founder should have at the ready. “By using a unified language, and the latest tools, we have been able to rapidly develop and continue to evolve a lot of technology with minimal staff. Everything is built for scale, and we are looking forward to some new markets very soon.”

While there isn’t necessarily anything groundbreaking about the service on the whole (geo-targeting ads are nothing new), its approach is certainly disruptive and by all accounts unique, which seems to be what consumers and investors are looking for these days.

The good news for startups is that they won’t have to deal with any bulk legacy systems, instead, they can build with a vision for the future, ensuring there is synergy among features.

INNOVATIVE BY NATURE, DISRUPTIVE BY DESIGN

always require such dramatic shifts in production or presentation. Often, even the smallest change, the subtlest innovation, can result in wildly positive outcomes.

There are a number of retargeting platforms in existence, for example, but recently launched Dispop is the only one to combine a full display platform (including both direct targeting and retargeting campaigns) with built-in creative solutions. By taking this unique and rather novel approach to creative optimization, new and fresh banner ads are continuously injected into advertisers’ campaigns by a team of professional designers.

“We cater mostly to SMBs who don’t have the knowledge and expertise with running a full blown display campaign,” said Ayal Ebert, CEO and founder of Dispop. “Most SMBs will run a display campaign alongside their search campaign on Google. However, 90 percent of Google’s revenue comes from search, so on a product level their display and retargeting solution is more of an after-thought.”

By making it easy for SMBs to set up and monitor their display campaigns, with the human-creative angle, Dispop is poised to be quite disruptive to the advertising industry as a whole.

Startups are typically perceived as disruptive by design — one powerful idea, supported by a passionate group, and in demand from an equally passionate community — that’s a startup through and through.

“When I saw this technology and the Thanks to the availability of data, opportunities in the space, we all came toit’s not uncommon for startups gether and jumped right in,” said RoBo to become over-measured.

3D’s Moreno. “When we launched our Startups, however, need to remain product on Kickstarter.com, we had hopes focused on growth; choosing just of selling 50-100 machines and when we a handful of metrics that showcase pre-sold over 1,000 machines, we knew the success your enterprise had this was something we were going to dive will go a long way. From “shares” into long term and really change the space to “sales,” find out the best for better.” progress metrics to measure at It’s certainly easy to see how a startup in wsm.co/measurethis. the 3-D printing space can be classified as “disruptive,” but being disruptive does not

PROGRESS METRICS:

IT’S TIME TO “STARTUP” Companies today must provide a useful, convenient, smart and fun product or service. That’s a lot for a startup to consider. No two readers will find themselves at the same stage in the startup process — you may be on your couch or sitting at a desk at your full-time job. You could have just bought a domain name or are in the final stages of your first round of funding. Whatever stage your startup is in, it’s always the right time if you have a differentiated product or service in demand and the passion to see it through.

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DOMAIN MASTERS

By Robert Hoffmann, CEO Hosting at 1&1 Internet, Inc.

New TLDs:

How to Protect Yourself Against Online Vulnerabilities More than 250 million domains were registered worldwide, as of last year, (according to Verisign’s latest Domain Name Industry Brief) and this number continues to grow each day. The increased congestion in the namespace, however, has influenced the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to recognize the need for new domain extensions thus creating more opportunities for businesses and individuals to claim their own piece of the Web.

Fight Back Against Brand Abuse You’re brand name is being used maliciously, now what? Discover your rights and a plan of action at wsm.co/icanndefend.

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The new top-level domains (TLDs) represent a paradigm shift in the way businesses are identified online.

Websites will be able to communicate their website missions better via different themes such as geographical location (.nyc, .miami, etc.), website type (.shop, .blog, etc.), business sector (.restaurant, .doctor, etc.) or hobby (.football, .dance, etc.). While these new TLDs should improve the likelihood that businesses will acquire their desired domains on the crowded Internet, implementing them into a brand strategy will also contribute to a safer and more secure Internet.

Cybercriminal abuse cases increase every year. In fact, Google discovered that an average of 9,500 new malicious websites were registered daily in 2012 alone. These sites were either innocent websites that were compromised by malicious authors or built with the specific intention of distributing malware or phishing. This affects trademark holders whose reputations are at stake.

Furthermore, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) recorded 2,884 cybersquatting cases covering 5,084 domain names last year. The organization defines cybersquatting as “the pre-emptive registration of trademarks by third parties as domain names.

Cybersquatters often exploit the first-come, first-served method of the domain name registration system by registering names incorporating trademarks, famous people or businesses with which they have no connection.”

Those that initiate such cybersquatting then plan to resell the domain name to the company or person involved at a price much higher than that of the initial registration cost. The clear vulnerabilities that lay within

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the virtual environment demonstrate the need for businesses and individuals to stay informed and take necessary precautions against such potential harm to their online representations.

In addition to maintaining positive business reputations driven by security purposes, it is important to consider the impact that new TLDs may have on the public perception of a business. For example, some companies that have applied to become a registry of .bank are doing so on behalf of the global banking community. They plan to place restrictions on those that try to register the domain extension and only allow those that are a recognized bank and financial services company to use it. A local bank would want to consider this option. Potential visitors may feel a greater sense of trust or comfort visiting a .bank website, as they can rest assured that they are working with a secure online bank before they disclose confidential, personal details.

Although the new TLDs may seem intimidating to those unfamiliar with the concept, they do offer many opportunities for trademark holders and companies to defend their businesses and online presence from cybersquatters. Developing an extensive and elaborate domain portfolio is perhaps one of the most valuable methods to help secure a business identity on the Web. Consider proactively registering multiple variations of a professional domain name and domains that communicate different products specific to a company, and including variations of spellings or alternative domain extensions like .us or .com in your portfolio. These tactics will prevent others from registering your trademark or product as a domain and reduce the chance your brand will lose traffic and confuse customers, which could be detrimental to a business's online reputation and its bottom line.

The first new TLDs available for registration are planned to be launched by the end of 2013, as of writing, and a number of new domain extensions will be introduced per month. With more than 700 new TLDs scheduled, releases will occur gradually over the next 2-3 years for businesses and individuals to acquire.

Reserving, and then registering, your domain within multiple TLDs is a good way to reduce the likelihood of becoming a victim of cybersquatting and increase brand protection, improve your business visibility on the Web and help to capture more traffic.

PERFORMANCE

INSIDER

Content Marketing Tips for 2014

By Allison Howen, Associate Editor

At the dinner table, on the beach and in the airport — these are just a few of the places people consume content today.

The world is more connected to the Web than ever before, which has left enterprises searching for new ways to satisfy the growing demand of content consumers. As a result, most business owners (58 percent) are planning to increase their content marketing budgets in 2014 according to the Content Marketing Institute. Before marketers put more resources into this evolving strategy, it is important to move beyond superficial and short-term successes, such as likes or views, to truly understand how to use content to grow a business.

1. Identify marketplace opportunities.

The fastest way to generate impactful content is to know what your audience is interested in. Use your analytics as a starting point. For example, if a beauty retailer’s best-selling product is a red lipstick, creating a blog or infographic that helps readers pick their “best shade of red” is likely to be a homerun. For additional insights, marketers can leverage social listening tools like Brandwatch or Visible Technologies to discover hot topics among their audiences.

Aside from covering popular topics, marketers also need to capitalize on other marketplace opportunities.

CEO of InboundWriter Skip Besthoff recommends researching competitors’ strategies and identifying writing topics where a site’s content can compete. He advises that simply writing about a topic one is knowledgeable about is leaving success to chance.

2. Create a path to purchase.

In order to influence an enterprise’s bottom line for the better, a marketer must tactfully incorporate a path-to-purchase into content.

“Creative content that’s purely interesting definitely has a place in raising brand awareness and traffic, but it doesn’t necessarily attract people who will then go on to make a sale, which is ultimately what clients want,” said Estelle Puleston, creative project manager at Strategy Internet Marketing. “However, if you can create something that’s both useful/interesting and subtly encourages a sale, you’re on to a winner.”

Let’s go back to the beauty retailer example. By linking to inventory within the lipstick article, mar-

keters can funnel consumers to product pages with just one click.

3. Make content consumable.

Consumers won’t hesitate to move on from content that is difficult to consume, whether it be a long video, unorganized infographic or poorly formatted article. CEO of ePromos Promotional Products Jason Robbins suggests using a consistent writing style that is both engaging and professional, as well as creating a visually appealing structure (e.g. with subtitles or bullet points).

“Put the meaty stuff — stats, figures, factual information — as early as possible in your content,” continues Robbins. “People are busy. If they don’t find what they need on your site, they’ll go elsewhere.”

4. Test marketing copy.

When it comes to marketing, enterprises must learn what type of copy performs best. After all, competing in the social sea and email everglades is not an easy feat.

For email, Seamas Egan, manager of revenue operations at Campaigner, advises marketers to focus on subject lines. Campaigner, like many other email service providers, offers an A/B testing feature that makes it easy to test different subject lines. Marketers tell Campaigner what to test, how they want it to pick the winner and the system will do the rest.

Testing copy that will motivate subscribers to open is the key, and the same concept holds true for social. Luckily, social allows marketers to leverage visuals to attract attention. See other tips for creating social posts that get clicks at wsm.co/getsocialclicks.

5. Know where to promote.

To give your content the best chance for success, it is important to know where to distribute it.

“Go where your customers and prospects are,” said Rob Yoegel, content marketing director at Monetate. “People consume content in different ways, at different times and in different places. Create different versions of content to address the different ways people consume content.”

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W E B H O S T I N G PA N E L

By Jerod Morris

Get a Faster Website and Chiseled Abs With This One…Simple…Formula What determines how well your website performs? Don’t worry if you are unsure how to answer this question. There has been so much hype in recent years about the cloud and content delivery networks, not to mention the grading tools galore that assess different data points to arrive at a single site performance “score,” that it’s understandable if you feel overwhelmed or confused as to what really matters.

Fortunately, so much of it is just noise. In this way, the world of website performance has become like the world of diet and exercise.

In that world, there always seem to be new fads and “next big things” marketed as the secret for losing weight and getting fit. Except, there is only one time-tested formula that actually does work 100 percent of the time: eat healthier and strengthen your core. That’s it.

That’s the formula.

You can take as many diet pills and do as many crunches as you want for quick results, but your overall wellness is not being impacted.

The formula for improved Web wellness is even simpler. If you want your website to be a lean, mean, quick-page-serving machine, then you need to develop a razor-sharp focus on one area: strengthening your site’s core. So, what exactly does that mean? Let's break it down.

You know that your physical core is basically your body minus your arms, legs, head and upper back. It’s the muscles in your belly and lower- to

Secure s, Customer Boost Biz Discover how to turn Web security into a competitive advantage at wsm.co/trustycloud

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middle-back, plus your hips, pelvis, gluteus maximus and some other minor muscle groups. Almost every single movement your body makes originates from your core, which is why a strong core is imperative for overall physical strength and stability, as well as injury prevention.

Your website’s core is your site minus any and all appendages — like content delivery networks for example — that you have affixed to it. Specifically, your website’s core is its domain name system (DNS) and hosting, plus your content management system (CMS), design and any origin caching that’s in place.

Every single call into your website depends on its core, which is why an optimized core is essential for consistently fast load times and security against hackers, malware and downtime.

Your site’s core begins with DNS and hosting.

If you go cheap for either, or choose a premium provider that fails to deliver on its premium promises, nothing else you do really matters. It would be like eating a nutrient-packed, low-calorie,

veggie-filled diet…but then relying on high-caloric beer for your liquids. You’d undo any good.

Bad DNS or hosting means your performance will always lag behind your smarter competitors, and no amount of image optimization or CSS simplification will change that.

Want a quick way to know if you have obvious DNS or hosting issues? Run a quick test on websites like Pingdom, WebSiteOptimization.com or others, and analyze the first object to load, your domain name. If its load time isn’t measured in milliseconds — and not a lot of them are either — then you’ve got problems.

With a strong DNS and hosting foundation in place, your CMS can go to work managing and serving your content. It will do so most efficiently on a hosting stack specifically optimized for it.

Core optimization does not stop there. A host designed for a particular CMS is optimal, but it’s not magic. A bloated site on an optimized host will load faster there than on a generic shared one...but it’s still a bloated site that is slower than it needs to be.

Bloat occurs because there are always plugins, add-ons, or any number of other features or functions that can be added.

Just remember that they all come with a price, and that price is their impact on load time. A site with an optimized core has trimmed the fat. It doesn’t have 500 objects loading on every page just because it can…it has 85 objects that all serve an essential purpose for the visitor experience.

It’s like eating better and exercising more; a simple, no frills formula that works. The rest will have only minimal impact, if any.

Speaking of “the rest,” consider content delivery networks (CDNs), which have been one of the hottest (and most misunderstood) buzz strategies in Web performance over the past few years.

Employing CDNs can have a positive impact on performance in the right situation. A media-intensive site with an optimized core that offloads its high-resolution images and large video files to a CDN saves bandwidth and gets users its media content more efficiently.

On the other hand, tacking a CDN onto a site with a nonoptimized core in hopes of getting consistently faster page load speeds is nonsensical. Here, a CDN is just being used as a Band-Aid for a poor core setup. Unfortunately, it’s an all-toocommon “strategy.” It’s also somewhat understandable.

Content delivery networks and many cloud solutions have had misleading marketing campaigns behind them, which has led to the mounting confusion about what really matters when it comes to website performance.

This is where cutting through the noise is key. Get to the heart of the matter, because you may not need what you’re being sold. Online and off, optimizing your core gives you speed, strength and stability. And that’s what determines performance.

W Web eb 360: F Fundamentals undamentals of W Web eb Suc Success cess iis s the one-and-onl one-and-only y guide tto o mastering ma stering all the elemen elements ts critical critic al to to W Web eb success. success.

WebsiteMagazine.com/Web360

Jerod Morris is the Director of Content for Copyblogger Media and a founding member of its Synthesis WordPress Hosting division.

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EMAIL

EXPERIENCE

3 EMAIL MARKETING RESOLUTIONS for the New Year

By Erik Harbison

In the world of email marketing, the competition is fierce. A recent study from Return Path found that the average person receives 416 commercial email messages per month. That's about 15 per day.

With all of those messages competing for subscribers’ attention, the New Year is an ideal time for an email marketer to review current practices and resolve to put his or her best foot forward in 2014.

1. Catch up with old friends — It’s inevitable.

Over time, everyone’s email subscribers will become disengaged. Maybe their interests have changed, or maybe they weren’t really that interested to begin with. Other subscribers may be unsatisfied with the quality of the content they are receiving.

Whatever the reason, the New Year is an ideal time for marketers to get disengaged subscribers back on board, actively engaging with their messages. Brands can isolate subscribers that have not opened their emails or clicked on links in the last 3-6 months and send them a series of re-engagement emails.

There are a number of win-back tactics to test. For one, companies can email a survey asking for feedback on their products or even their emails. Marketers can also send emails that allow subscribers to change their email preferences or that force them to click a link to continue to receive updates. It’s always important to include calls-to-action in emails, but for re-engagement messages it’s especially critical. Marketers want to ensure they can separate those who are still interested from those who have “checked out” entirely.

2. Trim the fat — No matter how hard brands try, some subscribers are simply going to stop opening or reading their emails. These disengaged subscribers are an increasing concern because Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are beginning to factor engagement into email deliverability. This means that if a company’s email list is full of people who are ignoring them, it may have trouble getting future emails to the people who actually do want to hear from them.

Marketers who have tried re-engagement strategies and have subscribers who still aren’t interested, should remove them from their lists. In addition to the deliverability issues, these subscribers clearly aren’t interested in their content or products. There’s

no sense in trying to sell to people who aren’t buyers.

Now, companies shouldn’t purge anyone from their lists without a warning. A reminder email should be sent, letting them know they’ll be unsubscribed unless they indicate otherwise. After about a week or two with no response, it’s safe to remove them from a list.

3. Read more — We’ve talked a lot about subscribers, but email marketers also need to look at themselves in the mirror when they make resolutions.

Companies that have lost a lot of followers or aren’t growing as fast as those involved would like, should see if its content needs some sprucing up.

Revamping such a core component of a brand’s marketing efforts, can seem like an overwhelming challenge, but marketers can start small by looking to others for inspiration. Internet professionals should subscribe to their competitors’ email newsletters to see what works and what doesn’t, and then co-opt some of those strategies to meet their individual needs. We should all get in the habit of reading a few relevant marketing blogs on a daily or weekly basis. They can be a great resource for tips and strategies.

The key to maintaining New Year’s resolutions — whether they relate to a business or a waist line — is to set attainable goals and map out a specific action plan for achieving them.

Vowing to clean up your list or start exercising is great, but neither effort will be successful if there is no plan. It’s imperative to Yesma set deadlines and make these activities a il’s shares Jason Warno regular part of a routine. That way, we ck va won’t be staring back at these same resemail d luable tips on ata hyg olutions in 2015. ie

Keep it Cl ean!

wsm.c n o/spot e at clean

Erik Harbison is currently CMO at leading email provider, AWeber Communications, where he guides strategic direction and daily operations for the company’s PR, sales and content/performance/brand marketing initiatives.

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CONVERSION CORNER

By Tim Ash

Responding to the

Hype of Responsive Design The hype surrounding responsive Web design (RWD) was substantial for digital marketers in 2013. For those without a responsive site, chances are good you’ve at least thought about making this a priority, especially if you are in the e-commerce space. As is true for most fads, however, being caught up in the excitement of responsive design doesn’t mean it is a perfect solution for every enterprise, or that those who are implementing RWD on their sites are doing it well.

If you’re thinking about responsive design — and you certainly should be — you can avoid making some of the mistakes made by early adopters. Long page load times have been atop the list of RWD concerns for some time, but that issue is only the tip of the virtual iceberg. There are far greater considerations to keep in mind when responding to the hype of responsive design.

Focus on the user, not the screen With so many devices and screen resolutions to juggle, it’s easy to get bogged down in technical details and forget about users. Rather than thinking about how a website will render on different size screens, think about the experience those users will have when browsing a website on different devices. Web visitors expect a similar experience regardless of the device they are using, and when that experience changes dramatically they are more likely to leave.

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Just as important, think about how easily people will be able to interact with your site on all of their devices.

Users won’t care if a website is responsive or not, but they will care whether they can accomplish what they want to do. If links are too hard to click, pages take too long to load, or navigation is not “fat-finger” friendly, the site has failed. And that can happen to a responsive site just as easily as to one that isn’t.

Maintain clear interaction cues When site visitors are using laptop or desktop computers, they have the advantage of relying on their cursors to indicate what is “clickable.” Without being consciously aware of it, many users actually “read” with their mouse — moving the cursor along with their eyes. However, on mobile devices there is no hover behavior and no cursor that turns into a finger whenever it passes over a link. What’s more, because viewing websites on mobile devices is generally

adds an item to a cart on a smartphone is four times less likely to purchase than a visitor from a desktop (source: SeeWhy). In addition, 90 percent of people move between devices to accomplish a goal, whether that’s on smartphones, PCs, tablets or TV (source: An example of a menu icon that expands Google). to present the user a full category-based That last statistic is navigational structure. particularly powerful.

Invest time designing the right navigation What makes people jump between devices to accomNavigation is one of the most important elements of any plish a goal? It might be that they aren’t able to easily acwebsite, regardless of the viewing device. But poor navi- complish their goal on the device they started with. Or, gation design for visitors on mobile devices is not just a more likely, it is that they have a different intent in mind altogether. For example, if you are visiting a hospital nuisance; it could make a site practically unusable.

Effective site navigation helps users find what they’re website from a desktop you might be looking up servlooking for, as well as understand where they are within ices, trying to find a doctor, checking to see if your ina site. But with as few as 400 pixels of width to work surance is accepted and so on. But if you are on a with on mobile devices, it can be challenging to deter- smartphone, you’re primary goal is likely to get a map, mine how to present navigation without it becoming the a phone number or visiting hours.

Whatever the key customer journeys are for your center of attention. The best solution is often one in which the navigation is there when users need it, and site, they are likely to vary by device type. Designers hidden when they don’t. Some sites do this with a menu need to know enough about visitors and their goals to icon (see image), a symbol that is growing in popularity ensure responsive design considers these different goals. but hasn’t yet reached “convention” status… yet. This The goal should be to understand what role a smartcould be an option for those who know their visitors are phone or tablet visit may play in the overall visitor joursavvy Web users. A safer approach for many sites will be ney, and to make sure the responsive site meets the to use a drop-down or “select” menu. The user simply needs of visitors by presenting the right information on clicks the menu and scrolls to the selection (or category) the right device at the right time. of interest.

The worst thing you can do is try to shrink the menu Go responsive responsibly to fit the device. Many organizations with large, com- Today, many assume that RWD is necessary. Accepting plicated menu structures have attempted this solution the reality of a multi-device world however doesn’t make and the result is generally a long list of tiny links that a responsive design framework a forgone conclusion. In are nearly impossible to click without first pinching to fact, the responsive approach has some drawbacks that enlarge. Avoid any solution that doesn’t feel natural and can be avoided with a dedicated mobile site. Enterprises effortless to users. And if there is an information archi- need to weigh the pros and cons of both approaches to tecture problem, it should be dealt with at the root level decide what’s best for their users.

And remember that a responsive site is not necessarbefore even thinking about going responsive. ily a high-converting site. Most who create responsive sites are trained in Web development, not usability or Recognize that customer journeys conversion-rate optimization. The measure of success for are device-centric Before an enterprise starts a RWD project, it should re- a website, whether responsive or not, will always be conview its site’s analytics reports and segment visitor paths version rate. Think less about the screen and more about and conversions by device, screen resolution, window getting your users to their conversion goal. resolution, browser and operating system. Even if the data isn’t entirely accurate it will provide a glimpse of Tim Ash is the CEO of SiteTuners, Chair of Conversion how visitors behave differently according to device.

Plenty of statistics exist that illustrate how behavior Conference and bestselling author of Landing Page and intent change by device. For example, a visitor who Optimization. quite slow, most people are reluctant to start tapping all over a page. This means that design must make it visually clear what elements on the site allow for user interactions. Buttons, links, form fields and other points of user interaction must be large enough to be clicked easily, and spaced far enough away from other page elements that users don’t risk clicking the wrong elements.

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Show Emails Responsive Love Many marketers are considering how to implement a responsive design on their website, but few have extended the same focus to their email marketing campaigns. According to GetResponse, 41 percent of emails are opened on mobile devices, but only 25 percent of marketers are optimizing their emails for mobile (source: Econsultancy), however.

With more than 200 different screen sizes and resolutions (and counting) already in existence, it goes without saying that many people receiving your emails are probably not seeing the message as you intended. Recreate your email templates in a responsive format with these five templates for merchants at wsm.co/respemail.

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S O C I A L M E D I A M AV E N S

By Allison Howen, Associate Editor

Social Predictions for 2014 In 2013, for example, brands experimented with new content formats and social selling strategies. Conversely, emerging social networks like Pinterest started honing in on ways to monetize their efforts. In order for brands to succeed in 2014, we’ve asked a few social executives to shed light on what trends they believe the New Year may have in store.

Social media has

“2014 will be the year when social media truly becomes integrated into the full marketing mix.”

— Bill Piwonka, VP of Marketing at Janrain

been on a roll, and the majority of marketers will increase their social media budgets this year (source: Webmarketing123).

The challenge in planning for a year

“While social media has been considered a part of the media mix for some time, most brands have had distinct strategies for their Facebook, Google+, Twitter, etc. presence, while rarely considering how to leverage the behavioral, demographic and psychographic data available from their customer’s activity on these networks into their overarching marketing strategy. In 2014, we'll see brands using this information to both improve interactions on the individual networks, and personalize the experiences across sites and devices for their customers.”

ahead in social, however, is that the channel is rarely, if

“A picture will be worth 10,000 words.”

— Mike Volpe CMO at Hubspot

take over the responsibilities of managing more interactive and dynamic customer communication over social channels — including sales, support and service initiatives. In addition, international growth of social intelligence and engagement will greatly accelerate and become the norm in developing markets, where consumers are often mobile savvy and use crowdsourcing for recommendations.”

“Shareable and visual content will play an increasingly important role in a small business’s marketing strategy.”

— Mark Schmulen, General Manager of Social Media at Constant Contact

“Small business will increase their adoption of visual-based social networks like Pinterest, YouTube, Instagram, Tumblr and Slideshare. A powerful image or video will carry much more weight across social networks with small businesses creating more visually inspired marketing campaigns with fewer words.”

“We expect to see social commerce grow by leaps and bounds in 2014, due in large part to deeper integration between retailers.”

— Jesse Ness, Senior Marketing Manager at Ecwid

ever, predictable.

“People used to think of Pinterest, YouTube and Instagram as outlets for visual content, but with updates to Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook, every social channel now prioritizes photos and images, and organizations who ignore this trend do so at their peril. Being successful on social media with imagery doesn't require a massive creative spend; it mandates a clear understanding of the types of content your audience wants and an understanding that bite-sized content will win the day for attention spans and engagement, especially on Twitter.”

“2014 will be the year social data will truly enter mainstream marketing and business operations.”

— Richard Pasewark, CEO of Visible Technologies

“Social media will come full circle as marketing will

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JANUARY 2014

“For example, Pinterest just announced that several major e-commerce websites will now greet visitors by showing their most pinned items from the social networking site. As retailers and social networks become more interconnected, the result will be more purchases made based on peer influence — whether directly on an e-commerce site or on the social network site itself. We also expect to see new approaches to social selling. Social networks are still trying to figure out how to monetize their user base.

Some form of social commerce could be the answer; however, no network has fully succeeded in cracking the social commerce code yet. So there will be lots of experimentation in this space in 2014. The merchants that benefit most will be those whose technology can adapt to this deeper integration and interconnection, and manage multiple online venues as a single entity.”

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W E B C O M M E N TA R Y

By Allison Howen, Associate Editor

WHAT NON-MILLENNIALS SHOULD KNOW ABOUT

SNAPCHAT It can be challenging for me, a 25 year old, to keep up with the newest social platforms and mobile apps, so I cannot imagine what it is like for non-millennial professionals.

Take Snapchat as an example. Although I was a little late to join the “ephemeral” messaging app’s bandwagon, I have since fully embraced the company that reportedly turned down a $3 billion offer from Facebook. In recent weeks I have started using the app more frequently, and data shows that I’m not the only one. In fact, the company’s 23-year-old CEO Evan Spiegel revealed that the messaging app processes more than 350 million snaps a day, and you wouldn’t be far off to assume the majority of these snaps are being sent by the millennial age group.

After a few weeks of sending silly “selfies” and pics of my “adorbz” puppy (see images) to my old college pals and high school-aged sister, I was surprised to find out that some brands are also active on Snapchat. At first I was unsure of how this somewhat trivial app could be used as a marketing platform, but then the images started rolling in. While some brands hit the virtual nail on the head, others would be wise to participate in a “Marketing to Millennials” workshop. For those companies and others still unsure of the Snapchat craze, here is a crash course from an ’88 baby:

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remember your brand, but also tell their friends about it.

• Make Snaps Last — Not all snaps are deleted after they are viewed, because in Oct. 2013 Snapchat unveiled a feature called “Stories,” which enables users to combine snaps to create a narrative that can be viewed anytime within a 24-hour period. This feature is ideal for retailers launching flash sales or for brands showcasing unique events, as the New Orleans Saints do on game days.

• Personalization Wins Cool Points — Sex might sell, but personalization rules. The most memorable brand snap I received was from GrubHub, who directly replied to a message I sent to them that had nothing to do with ordering food whatsoever. But will I order through the company in the future? You can count on it.

• Don’t Be Boring — Unless your Beyonce, most millennials don’t care about behind-the-scenes pics of your office. Just like any other type of content, snaps that are not engaging will be easily forgotten if not totally ignored.

• Spread the Word — After discovering a few brands on Snapchat, I reached out to friends to see if they were following any companies on the platform, yet none knew what I was talking about — not even my younger sister who uses Snapchat like it’s her job. Bottom line, if your enterprise is putting resources into a platform or channel, it is vital that your audience knows about your presence.

• Sex Sells (this is Snapchat after all) — A few of the brand snaps I received were pretty racy (I’m looking at you Karmaloop), but they were also among the most memorable. This doesn’t mean that your enterprise should compromise its image in the name of millennials, but adding an edge to your snaps — like the video I received of someone “twerking” with a coupon code — will make recipients not only

All that said, Snapchat is a very young platform that will continue to change almost as fast as its snaps are deleted. Only time will tell if it has real legs to stand on or if it will be thrown to the wayside by its fickle, primarily millennial user base.

At the end of the virtual day, professionals who quickly adapt to new technologies are put in a better position to withstand the test of time, regardless of the generation they identify with.

JANUARY 2014

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