Posts for "Social Business Software"

It’s hard to find anyone these days who hasn’t sought guidance from at least one forum in the course of their surfing career, but the title has come to represent a deeply diverse and often confusing array ranging from amateurish HTML-based pages that hark back to the early days of the internet to sophisticated community platforms that enable client-customer interaction and generate insightful analytic data. In the early years of the 21st century businesses began hosting their own community and support forums, but lacked a cohesive strategy or goal for what to do with all of the valuable information and ... READ MORE

With the explosion of social sharing through sites like Facebook, Twitter and even Instagram countless new opportunities have sprung up that allow IT departments from a variety of industries to supplement, in some cases even eliminate, many of the customer support techniques of the past. The consumers of today are some of the most tech savvy individuals to date.  When these same consumers come to a business or company seeking tech support or needing to voice an inquiry they expect the same turn-around times and speeds that they enjoy when they are engaged in similar activities with peers or other branches ... READ MORE

I recently had a talk with a guy who claimed that he knew exactly what social media can do for companies. The funny thing is that he knew this without even using social media himself as he did not believe in this as a way to get his work done. His claim was based on lots of observations related to investment opportunities. I was a bit surprised by his position and claims. Even though, I spend several hours a day using social media tools such as LinkedIn and Twitter, I do not have a clear-cut answer on how to extract value ... READ MORE

The Challenge: Brands are struggling to stay relevant online. Per a study by Forrester, only 3 percent of websites earn a passing score in terms of user experience. Consumers cited three reasons why websites are generally failing to live up to customer expectations: Content and website functionality aren't based on deep customer research. Menu names are vague and typically do not provide visitors with a clear next action Text is illegible and privacy statements are not clear enough Poor website usability is not the only shortcoming. Per findings from Marketing Sherpa: among 1,100 online retailers evaluated, the study found a near 60 percent average shopping ... READ MORE

The Challenge: Businesses know mobile apps offer tremendous customer engagement opportunities--if done correctly. Unfortunately, businesses can also eat up marketing budgets--without the customer engagement payoff--if mobile apps are not planned out with customer needs in mind. According to Forbes, the world has gone from 0 to 60 billion mobile app downloads in just the last four years. However, in a Nielsen Research Study, of the 82% of U.S. adults who are now active cellphone users, 43% now have apps on their phones. But, 56% said they delete the apps they don't use, most within two weeks of downloading them. Don't be "another" app. ... READ MORE

The Challenge: If you are not creating a personalized preference-driven experience for your customers, they'll go looking for that type of experience--with your competitors. According to a study by MyBuys, an e-tailing group, 40% of respondents stated that they buy more from retailers that personalize their shopping experience across channels. Additionally: • 41% buy more from retailers that send them personalized emails • 39% buy more from retailers that personalize Web recommendations. The study noted that the practice of tailoring offers and promotions to consumers based on their past shopping or browsing experiences appears to increase buyer readiness, engagement, and sales activity. These findings are ... READ MORE

The Challenge: What can we learn from a 157-year-old fashion company that’s being called “the world’s most digitally competent luxury brand”? That a multichannel and personalized customer experience is becoming the expected standard among consumers. Just as high fashion brands have been trendsetters in clothing, they are now trendsetters in multichannel marketing. Global fashion icon, Burberry, launched a program recently that upped the ante on multichannel marketing. Burberry’s Millennial-targeted “Runway Made to Order” campaign allowed viewers from around the world to live stream their Fall fashion show, and purchase and personalize items directly from the runway via a state-of-the-art interactive e-commerce ... READ MORE

The Challenge: In a study by the Business Marketing Association, most BtoB marketers say customer engagement is a high priority within their marketing organization (72%), but 43% grade their company's level of customer engagement, a C, with even more giving their companies a D or an F. The opportunity for BtoB marketers: successfully engage their customers by establishing new avenues of relevant communication. Despite such poor self-ratings, 72% of surveyed BtoB marketers cite customer retention and loyalty as their primary reasons for establishing customer engagement efforts. Other motivating factors are recommendations for products and services that match customer needs (54%) and a ... READ MORE

Bloomfire knows the value of content. The company allows you to build an online community and engage with your colleagues and customers through knowledge sharing. We sat down with Craig Malloy, CEO and co-founder of Bloomfire, to discuss the ins and outs of how companies can get the most out of their content both in-house and externally.   What is Bloomfire's mission? The problem we're solving is the following: workers spend an inordinate amount of time searching for the information they need. Studies have shown this to be at least 30% of their workday. The internet has made it a lot easier to ... READ MORE

The Challenge: Per recent guidelines, you will be penalized if your emails do not have adequate levels of deliverability and "engagement". Consider the following options to optimize your lists to increase open rates and engagement. New Rules Regarding Deliverability and Engagement Per our previous blog, recently most email service providers converted to a new algorithm that calculates deliverability using a combination of the original email delivery rules plus new "engagement" factors: open rates, clicks, unsubscribes, and complaints. With these new human behaviors factored into the equation of deliverability, future emails that you send may be considered SPAM or not delivered at all, ... READ MORE