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Small Businesses Moving Aggressively to Online Marketing

Posted on January 5, 2012 by Andrew

Digital marketing is continuing to grow compared to traditional forms of advertising among small and medium-sized companies (SMBs).

According to BIA/Kelsey, digital spending for US SMBs is expected to reach $16.6 billion annually by 2016.

That means 70 percent of SMB marketing budgets will be spent on digital. In 2010, SMBs spent 52 percent of their budgets on traditional marketing and advertising, but that number will shrink to 30 percent in 2015.

Digital marketing includes mobile, social, online directories, online display, retargeting, search, and more.

Neal Polachek, president of BIA/Kelsey, said SMBs are using digital practices to engage their customers for longer periods of time.

“With the advent of daily deals to drive customer acquisition, SMBs are now increasingly focused on leveraging technological solutions to engage, grow and retain a higher percentage of their customers,” said Polachek. “As this trend accelerates, these SMBs will turn to outside providers to harness simple tools, which will enable them to maximize the long-term value of each new customer they acquire.”

Some of the other Key takeaways from the report are as follows:

Overall, U.S. SMB spending on media, marketing and business solutions will grow from $22.4 billion in 2010 to $40.2 billion in 2015, representing a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12 percent.
SMB spending on traditional advertising will be essentially flat during the forecast period, experiencing a 0.6 percent CAGR, from $11.8 billion in 2010 to $12.1 billion in 2015.
SMB spending on digital/online media will grow from $5.4 billion in 2010 to $16.6 billion in 2015 (24.9 percent CAGR).
SMBs will also increase spending on performance-based commerce and transaction platforms, from $1.7 billion in 2010 to $4.6 billion in 2015 (21.5 percent CAGR).
Spending by SMBs on customer retention business solutions will grow from $3.5 billion in 2010 to $6.9 billion in 2015 (14.6 percent CAGR).

As you can see, digital marketing and advertising are becoming increasingly important. There’s no excuse for why you shouldn’t have your own digital marketing campaign. Contact us today to learn more.

Mobile Will Make Up 15% of Total Ad Spend In 2016

Posted on December 21, 2011 by Andrew

Think mobile isn’t important? Well, most of your competitors do. A new research report by Swedish analyst firm Berg Insight predicts that mobile ad spending will grow 37 percent annually over the next four years.

In 2010, mobile ad spend was just $3.4 billion worldwide, but Berg is estimating it to increase to $22.4 billion by 2016.

Berg Telecom Analyst Rickard Andersson said that our rapid smartphone adoption is a “game-changer,” and accredited the increase of mobile ad spend to major brands’ willingness to incorporate mobile into their campaigns.

“Brands are now progressively embracing the mobile channel, including the entire range of apps from games and entertainment to utility applications. Also, mobile web advertising and opt-in SMS campaigns are popular,” he said.

Andersson also predicted that location-based advertising will gain ground over the next few years, offering up marketing messages that are “hyper-relevant” to the user in both time and place.

It’s not all sunshine and rainbows, however. Berg says the market hasn’t matured yet, and many big companies such as Microsoft, Apple, Google, and Amazon are vying for mobile users’ attention.

With more people using smartphones – and with mobile ad spend increasing – don’t you think it’s time you evaluated your mobile strategy? The battle for market share among the tech giants shows how important mobile is becoming.

It’s not too late, as mobile is still young, but you need to think about all the customers you’re missing out on. Google reported that more than half of all local searches have local intent, meaning that your customers are using mobile to search for you.

Check out our what we do page to learn more about how we can help your business with local Internet advertising and marketing.

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Search, Display and Retargeting: The Trifecta of Online Advertising

Posted on September 1, 2011 by Andrew

That title is misleading. To have a great online presence you need more than just search, display ads and retargeting, but these points are a good starting place for any local business who wants to convert more online shoppers and increase its revenue.

Each of these parts can be used on their own, but function stronger when used together. Just look at the title, we called it a trifecta, and everyone knows that a triangle is the strongest shape. If you didn’t, well you just got a geometry lesson as well as a digital advertising lesson. You’re welcome.

Lift in Online Sales Per Online Strategy

If you want to visualize how these three aspects work better together, take a look at the chart below. As you can see, using search and display ads together gives much higher returns than using them separately.
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Search
The first part of the equation is search. As we covered in a previous post, search is huge, and should not be taken for granted. Search has become the gateway to the Internet, so you need to start using search advertising to appear at the top of search rankings. It’s called SEM, and it looks like this:

Those big red circles are where your ads show up. That means that when someone searches for products or services that your business delivers, your ads appears, increasing hits to your website.

The only problem with search is that only 4% of time on the Internet is spent in search engines, and 96% is spent doing everything else. You might think search isn’t worth it, but everything on the Internet stems from search, so it should remain an important piece of your online strategy. Search gets your foot in the door, but the next two parts help you walk through it and sell your products.
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Display Ads
The second aspect is display advertising. Display ads show up on websites around the world, and their main goal is to boost traffic to the owner’s website. The first display ad was in 1994, and looked like this:

Since 1994, display advertising has grown tremendously. In Q2 2011, more than 1.1 trillion display ads were served across the world, and this number is only going to increase as more and more people come online. The only problem with display advertising is that, a lot of the time, it gets ignored. Internet users train themselves to overlook the ads, thinking they’re irrelevant. That’s where the third part comes in.

Retargeting
Retargeting is the last piece of the puzzle, and the part that ties it all together. If you weren’t aware, 97% of your website visitors leave and never come back. Retargeting is display advertising that essentially follows up with the customer after they visit your website. It works like this: the consumer visits your website; they pick up a special line of code that places a cookie in their browser; your ads get delivered to the consumer as they are surfing the web, reminding them of your website. ComScore created a handy cartoon to show how it works from the consumer’s end:

Retargeting is unique because it displays ads to consumers who have already shown interest in your products, making them easier to convert. It’s a win-win situation because the user gets ads that are relevant to their desires, and you get more sales in return.

Let us Help you!

As you can see, our trifecta of online advertising will help you see a greater return on your online ad spend. Check out our website and our past products and see how we can help you. Fill out a form on our site or call us to learn more.

The State of Search

Posted on August 17, 2011 by Andrew

Search has never been bigger: 26.6 billion searches were conducted in June 2011 alone, which marked a 6% increase from June 2010. This mirrors overall search growth from 2010-2011, which is also at 6%. Search has been growing like crazy the last few years, and shows no sign of slowing down.

You may already be aware that people use search. You probably use search the same way your customers do. I mean, when was the last time you picked up the Yellowpages? Yeah, we don’t remember, either.

We know that search is growing, but online search spending is growing more than search is. In 2011, search marketing is expected to grow 20%, and is expected to almost double from 2010 to 2015.

What does this mean for you and your business? It means you need to start an online campaign, fast. There are huge dollars being spent on online advertising, but you don’t have to spend big, you just have to do something. If you have a campaign already, you need to evaluate your strategy to get the most from all your advertising dollars.

Now that you see how important search is, stay tuned for next week’s post about using search and display ads to drive more traffic to your website.

UPDATE: Here is our post about search, display ads and retargeting: the trifecta of online advertising.

Images sourced from comScore