Digital Marketing And Media

Social Media

In August, 2008 Facebook reached 150 million users. Every day since another 374,000 have signed up.

In itself, that is remarkable, but what truly makes Facebook unique is that unlike other large membership sites, its users are active, each day spending more than 3 billion minutes on the site.

This is the basis of social media -the facilitation of conversation and community. If you consider that your website is just one tiny planet in a constantly expanding universe, the ability to plug into the rest of the conversation is crucial.

That said, as a recent phenomena, utilising social media can be hit and miss. But, with a team devoted to understanding the area, we have developed an effective social media methodology.

Based around audience profiling and monitoring, community identification and competitor analysis, our approach will not only explore your target audience, but give you the tools to engage them in a meaningful dialogue.

From a company blog to forums, video, bookmarking and RSS feeds, we can help you build and absorb your own online community.

eSurveys

Ultimately businesses live and die by how satisfied their customers are. Regardless of whether you're online or offline, the simplest way remains to just ask.

Of course, asking is itself problematic. You are not just asking for a customer's feedback, you are asking for their time and their effort. Even surveys that include incentives are not offering them in real time.

Asking for a full, meaningful response can be a hard sell. But, by changing the mode through which you ask, you also change the odds.

Moving your survey online has many benefits. Gone is the high cost, low return rate of a traditional mail or phone questionnaire. In its place are the low production, real time response and high return rate of a digital solution.

Our eSurveys are intuitive and user friendly, they have been designed to encourage consumers to respond, and do not require a technical user to interpret the results, which makes them perfect for your business to quickly, and easily implement.

Search Engine Optimisation

In June, 2006 the verb 'Google' was officially included in the Oxford English Dictionary. It signalled a new maxim, that one of the best ways to find customers was to let them find you.

Today, they are savvier, more engaged and uniquely proactive. They navigate the Internet through the filter of the search engines -and if you're not at the top of that list, you're not on the list at all.

Google claims over 200 independent factors in determining page ranking, all of which can change at any time.

Remaining at the top of the page is a challenge.

As the largest full service digital services company in Australia, we're experts in the complex language of the search algorithms. We will not only optimise your site's content but also increase it's prominence through participation in the Web 2.0 arena.

Ultimately though, we're an ideas team, with the creativity, the imagination and the experience to understand the nuances of SEO and maintain your position at the top of the page.

Online Promotions

If advertising tells you to buy, a promotion tells you to buy now.

A good promotion creates immediacy, awareness, and all powerful hype. But more importantly a good promotion doesn't just tell people to buy; it gives them a reason to. The dialogue between consumer and company is opened.

When you consider the scope of possibilities in a digital space, the potential for a return on investment is enormous. From loyalty promotions to games of chance and skill, or the more modern viral promotions, your brand can only grow for engaging consumers.

Even when your main point of sale is offline, online can be the best place to drive your sales. Lower costs, more interaction, broader audience, greater accountability -they are all the hallmarks of promoting on the Internet.

Of course, it is also a complicated place and developing a successful promotion is a nuanced effort. That's why we offer a full BTL marketing service, from concept all the way through to end of promotion reporting.

And that's why we can make your promotion better, your brand bigger and your customers happier.

Conversion Design & Optimisation

Creating anything for the web is an odd practice. All the hours spent writing copy; all the hours spent choosing graphics, all the hours agonising over placement.

End game, most people will spend less than fifteen seconds on your site. They will spend about 3 of those reading. Only it won't be reading -it's more like scanning, first paragraph, second paragraph, straight down the left hand side.

Most ads and emails don't fare any better. And when you consider the sheer amount of information the Internet offers, it's not surprise. People are looking for something fast, and if they don't find it they'll be gone just as quickly.

Enter Conversion Design -it demands that every element of your online presence be accountable. Because every bit of space is worth something, even online. In this sense conversion design is rocket science, forensic accounting, brain surgery for consumers.

Because the most expensive thing you can do with your online presence, is fail to convert it to a sale. The Internet is fluid, and with our suite of tools, your digital marketing can be constantly better and always converting.

Mobile Marketing

For almost two years, there have been more mobile phones in Australia, than people.

It's understandable; your phone is crucial. It's your veritable link to the world not currently present, and every month there is a newer model with more features and better design.

Welcome to mobile marketing, you have just discovered an enormous, receptive audience, plugged in 24/7.

The only problem is, they're not always receptive. Your customer views their phone as personal, social, private. If you're going to enter their metaphorical living room, you better be invited, no matter what you're offering.So how do you reach the mobile audience?

With ingenuity, respect and the intent purpose of adding value to their day. That is a language we speak, and it's how we keep our client's mobile marketing ahead of the mobile pack.

Competitive Analysis, Consumer Research & Insight

It has been said that the greatest moments in science are signalled not by "Aha", but the more sedate, "That's interesting".

In real life epiphanies are rare, ideas are incremental.

Consider Newton.

For over 2000 years people had been hit by falling apples. The apple, then, was not responsible for the idea of gravity, but rather Newton's insight into why it fell. A lesser educated man may have gained only a bruise.

We believe every idea is born of an insight.

That is why we dedicate ourselves to understanding the space we work in, thoroughly and entirely. That is why we have developed a unique suite of research products and armed ourselves with the brightest people in the research and digital industries.

In return, we can apply our insights to your brand -the ways that consumers interact with it, how this can be improved and the multitude of ways to go about it. And that's why our clients repeatedly see a return on their investment.

Because ultimately, the most important step in any online venture is to first understand.

Digital Creative & Rich Media Production

The latest trend to hit online marketing is hard to define. It's video, audio and animation. It lies somewhere between a website and a banner ad. It's engaging, interactive and participatory.

Its name is Rich Media, and though you may not be able to define it -you certainly know it when you see it.

New data suggests that rich media ads produce a click through rate (CTR) five times higher than traditional formats. It should come as no surprise, then, that upon finding your voice online, it can cut through the loudest room in the building.

Its sudden rise in popularity also means that it is not enough for your branding to be static anymore. Your customer doesn't want a sales pitch, they want an experience. And, with almost 40% of online ads incorporating rich media, you can't afford not to provide them with one.

This is where we come in. We're experts in show stopping, a difficult feat in a medium infinitely engaging. But with our help your brand won't just be up in lights, it will be a stepping stone to a new audience.

Channel Planning

In 1964 Marshall McLuhan declared "The medium is the message.

"Nearly fifty years later the ramifications of that are huge. Just consider the extensive variety of channels available and the import of picking the correct one.

Welcome to the art of Channel Planning.

It is a talent that requires an understanding of how communication and culture, technology and psychology intersect in the mind of the consumer. Because for all the engaging design in the world, choose the wrong medium and you are also sending the wrong message.

At best consumers will ignore you; at worst you have irritated them. Either way it can be an expensive foray into the online market.

To untangle the competing pros and cons, you need someone articulate across all digital points of contact. You also need a decisive strategy, one that guides your campaign from the beginning, not the end.

With 12 years experience in the digital sphere, we are uniquely placed to fill this role, so that when your next campaign reaches its audience the medium really is the message.

Search Engine Marketing (Paid Search)

When someone uses a search engine, what they're really doing is asking a question. Successful businesses not only have the answers, they make sure users can find them.

Of course, providing the answer requires knowing the question. From the big, such as what a customer wants all the way down to understanding what words they will use to search for it.

Once you know what a customer is looking for, you can gain value from providing it. Therein lies the challenge.

What do your customers want? What are they searching for?

Even offline it is not always easy to tell. Enter the digital sphere with the wrong answers and your efforts will not be rewarded.

Today, your shop or office can extend online. You can be ready with a solution to any query, at any time. Opportunities are no longer finite.

This is where we can help.

With 12 years in the business, we are experts in consumer behaviour online. We are also our client's partners. We pride ourselves on knowing your products as well as we know our own, and in understanding the whole story, we can help you maximise your online potential.

Email Marketing

One in five legitimate commercial emails never reaches its target. Most of this can be blamed on a simple miscalculation.

Despite its potential for mass communication, email is personal.

For your customers it is as personal as a phone call, or an SMS. This makes it a unique way to open the dialogue between a brand and its clientele, and a unique way to drive them away. Abuse the trust, and your unique opportunity will quickly find its way into the trash bin.

The trick to making your email marketing successful is to make it meaningful. We can do this through a number of ways, ranging from accurate personalisation to segmented databases, ISP-friendly design and, most importantly, a reputation for ethical conduct.

It is this breadth that will transform your email marketing from just another deleted message, into a meaningful conversation with your customer.

Analytics

When John Wanamaker said, 'Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted, the trouble is, I don't know which half' he was operating in a different time.

Today we do know.

The Internet is the most measurable medium in the history of marketing. Every click is recorded. With the right tools we can tell where your customers are, how they got to your site and what they did there.

Today, the only wasted advertising is advertising not measured.

And yet, with approximately 90 percent of companies using the online space, only 10 percent are also using effective quantitative analysis to check their progress.

It is a unique environment not properly applied.

With our analytical tools we can directly link the effect of your online advertising to your on and offline sales. We can isolate what is successful, what isn't and what needs to change to make your brand more profitable.

Crucially, our tools can make your online advertising cheaper, better targeted and, most importantly, entirely accountable.

Digital Media Planning & Buying

Online Advertising -it is a burgeoning industry, and a misunderstood one. Even today, as hundreds of millions are invested, 99 percent of online ads are never clicked on.

Why?

Because the Internet is a conversation, not a megaphone. Evolved digital advertising needs to focus on users. It needs to ensure they can receive information where they want, when they want and through the channels they want.

To an extent, advertising has always been about this, but the future lies in creating a bigger two-way street. The digital arena demands ads that don't shout at customers, but talk to them -ads that engage.

That is why we offer a full Digital Media Planning & Buying service, so that you can benefit from our ideas and our experience, as well as our technology.

Not only do we know where to place your campaign and how to get the best price, we can also make it a more appealing experience for your customers. We can make it smarter, better looking, more targeted. We can help you engage directly with your audience.

Ultimately, it's that knowledge and experience that will make your online campaign one of the 1%.

Digital Relationship Marketing

The conventional wisdom, when it comes to websites is that traffic is king. But is an audience really an audience if they're not listening?

The difference between clicking on a site and reading the information is enormous. Even bigger is the gap between reading the information and purchasing the product.

That difference is engagement. Without it, a website is just a shell.

Enter the business that understands its customer as an individual. In tailoring their communication, they have a better chance of engaging the reader.

Of course, mapping customer needs is no exact science. But, with a constantly evolving profile of individual preferences, demographics and behaviour, we can divide your database and radically increase the success of your digital communications.

If every communication is an opportunity, we can make sure each one counts, whether it's online or offline, email or face to face.