intro to mark chapter 13

fear of missing out (FOMO)

An always-on digital lifestyle can take a mental toll. One study looked at what happened when people shut off their attention to social networks. Many began to feel isolated and grew concerned that they were missing out on what was occurring in the world around them.

Branded content:

Any content developed and owned by the brand. This can include blog posts, white papers, research reports, infographics, or any other content that a brand produces for itself.

User-generated content:

Content created by a brand's fans and followers. It communicates a brand's value in users' words rather than the company's or those of a neutral party (like a journalist). User-generated content can include reviews from users (like product reviews on Amazon.com) and other customer-contributed content (like posts on social media). Ideally, this type of content would come from satisfied customers.

Expert content or earned media

Credible, third-party articles and reviews from unbiased journalists. This is the earned media that is often the result of PR efforts.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

Digitial marketing consultant Vanessa Fox, in her book Marketing in the Age of Google, states, "Those businesses that don't realize we've experienced a shift in consumer behavior and that customers and customer data are now centered on search will lose market share to those that do." Not sure if you believe that? Consider the following facts: 93 percent of online experiences begin with a search engine. Click-through rates also greatly depend on the link's position on the first page. Links listed on the first page of a Google results page obtain over 90 percent of clicks. Studies have consistently shown that the first organic search result (organic meaning not a paid ad) on the first page gets at least 30 percent of clicks, and the first three search results get between 50 and 60 percent of clicks. That is, the difference in performance between being the first listing and the second is much greater than that between the second listing and third, and so on

Location-Based Marketing: Bringing Relevance to Digital Content

Factoring location into marketing campaigns is an established practice. For example, marketers have for many years targeted people at the community level using media like a local newspaper. Mobile technologies are now making such information more precise and readily available in real time. Today, marketers can create targeted ads that are accurate to within a few feet in places such as the aisle of a grocery store or the shoe section of a department store.

Impact of the Digital Revolution on Marketing Practice

For over 50 years, in the mass-media era, marketing communication was largely one-way—from the seller to the buyer. In that time, marketing management focused on the portion of a marketing budget devoted to "paid" media—things like advertising, personal selling, and sales promotion. This no longer makes sense in a two-way communication world. Today, integrated marketing communications experts broadly categorize their media investments across three categories: Paid media—publicity gained through advertising, such as buying a 30-second Super Bowl commercial, taking out a billboard along a busy stretch of road, or sponsoring a local golf tournament. Owned media—publicity gained via a brand-controlled source, such as a website, blog, or Facebook page. Earned media—publicity gained through editorial influence or by grassroots actions, such as product reviews on Consumer Reports, online reviews via an online social source such as Yelp, unsolicited brand conversations on Twitter, or a viral YouTube video featuring a company's product or service.

Search Marketing increasing online brand visibility

In late 2005, news broke about Procter & Gamble's controversial strategy to increase the sophistication of its in-store marketing. These efforts included everything from more distinctive packaging to special in-store promotions and displays. P&G was seeking to enhance customer-brand encounters within the retail store. In the words of A.G. Lafley, the company's former chair, president, and CEO, "The best brands consistently win two moments of truth."15 These are: The first moment of truth (FMOT) is the incredibly short window of three to five seconds after a shopper first encounters a product on a store shelf. In these precious moments, marketers must appeal to shoppers' senses, values, and emotions to convert them into customers The second moment of truth (SMOT) is the actual experience a customer has with a product once he or she buys it and returns home.

Societal Implications of an Always-Connected Consumer

It is hard to imagine life without access to digital tools such as social media and smartphones. As a result, the historic significance of social media as an innovation often goes unrecognized by its most avid users. Author Erik Qualman collected statistics that reveal the number of years it took earlier technological innovations to reach 50 million users:3 Radio: 38 years. TV: 13 years. Internet: 4 years. Facebook: reached 100 million users in just 9 months.

What Happens Online, Stays Online—Forever

Marketers should remember that whatever content goes online tends to stay online—somewhere, forever. This is true for both images and text. It's worthwhile to stop and think before publishing social content or interacting online in a manner that may be perceived by some as either tasteless or rude. Brands that seek to remove or restrict such materials are often sanctioned in a very public and humiliating manner. Online marketing gurus refer to this phenomenon as the Streisand effect. The backstory behind the Streisand effect begins with a hobbyist couple, pilot Gabrielle Adelman and photographer Kenneth Adelman, who decided to photograph the entire California coastline and post their images online. (You can see their work at www.californiacoastline.org.) Singer Barbara Streisand insisted that photos of her house be removed. The resulting publicity stir caused people to copy the photo and post it to sites all over the Internet. Mike Masnick, a blogger for Techdirt, subsequently coined the term Streisand effect for attempts to remove content from the Internet that actually cause it to instead spread more broadly. Not only is Barbara Streisand's house still visible online (these images are easily found using Google Image Search on "Barbara Streisand house"), but also her name has become synonymous with futile attempts to remove content from the Internet.41 Be sure to protect your personal brand and don't fall victim to the Streisand effect!

Social Media Marketing Metrics

Marketers track social media activity to help improve their marketing efforts. There are literally hundreds of different metrics that can be derived from social media-related sources. Some are more widely used than others. provides a list of metrics commonly found on the dashboards of digital marketing analysts and managers. We'll discuss several of the most important social media metrics in greater detail below.

How Does Online Search Work?

Successful search marketing requires, at minimum, a rudimentary understanding of how search engines work. Search engines have two major functions: To build an index of all web content. To provide search users with a ranked list of the websites they've determined are the most relevant.23 In order to create an index, search engines need to know first what content is available on the Internet. Search engine companies actively read and analyze content on web page links from all across the Internet and store it for retrieval in subsequent queries. They accomplish this task by using automated software programs, called web crawlers or spiders, to visit each page—just as you or I would do, only very quickly. Any site that is linked to from another site already indexed, or any site that manually asked to be indexed, will eventually be crawled. Sites and links that contain a larger amount of updated content are crawled more frequently than others and to a greater depth.24 All of the data are stored in vast data centers with thousands of petabytes' worth of drives.

Engaging Consumers through Social Media Marketing

The ability to share, tweet, and interact on any kind of online site is now almost a given. Thanks to social media, personalized interactions between brands and consumers are fast becoming the new normal in the online world. Social interaction begins with establishing and maintaining a strong social presence. Inbound marketing firm HubSpot asked nearly 600 consumers what kind social media presence they expect of any brand. Consumers reported that they expect brands to be active on at least three to four social channels. details results from the study with respect to preferred social channels. There was some generational variation in social media usage and preferences. While use of Facebook by younger users is declining, the research almost universally suggests that a Facebook presence remains a must. Consumer expectations for Twitter presence were about 10 points lower. They were lower still for Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube, and Google +

More Competitors + More Channels = More Noise

The power of digital communications has lowered barriers to market entry in many market sectors. This shift has enabled many smaller, more nimble competitors to compete head-to-head with established brands. For instance, according to the Brewer's Association, craft beer sales grew by 5 percent in 2017, compared with a drop of 1 percent in overall beer sales.13 New York's artisanal-food scene is so hot that even pickle and jam makers now get the tech start-up treatment.14 Thanks to digital distribution and promotion mechanics, a company can start in someone's bedroom and soon begin to eat into the market share of rivals listed on the New York Stock Exchange or NASDAQ. At the same time, the media landscape is changing. Traditional mass-media channels are on the wane. More and more households are "cutting the cord" and dropping pay cable and satellite TV in favor of Internet-based options like Hulu and Netflix. Popular new social media platforms seem to emerge every year. In this fragmented media landscape, customer attention is an increasingly scarce commodity. How do marketers break through the clutter and noise to reach their audience?

Brand Democratization

Today, many experts see this type of company-controlled brand management as rapidly fading. Dan Lewis, chief public affairs officer at Molson Coors, suggests, "Brands don't belong to companies any more—they belong to the people who choose to buy them."11 Thanks to the growth of the social web, consumers today are experiencing a validating and influential form of empowerment. The process of defining, building, and maintaining a brand is now a collaborative one. Whether through Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, blogs, product forums, or Pinterest, customers are sharing their experiences on platforms where audiences can readily find what others are saying about the brand—both positive and negative. As customer brand engagement grows, however, so do customers' expectations with respect to greater brand transparency. Customers today want to know more than simply features and benefits—they want brands they can believe in. They want to investigate the inner working of a company themselves, to know that their favored brands are actually walking the walk not simply talking the talk. If marketers attempt to convey a message that is not supported by the actual experience of the product, then the feedback will overwhelm the message; the audience will know the truth. On the flip side, if the brand experience supports or exceeds the message, then the audience will heap praises on the brand in the public eye

white paper

a concise yet authoritative report or guide that seeks to inform readers about a complex issue and presents the issuing body's philosophy on the matter. It is meant to help readers understand an issue, solve a problem, or make a decision

search engine marketing (SEM

is the process of generating website traffic by purchasing advertisements on search engines

Search engine optimization (SEO)

is the process of getting more traffic based on higher rankings of free or "organic" search results on search engines.

Social media monitoring, also known as social listening,

is the process of identifying and assessing what is being said about a company, individual, product, or brand on the Internet.

Video marketing

involves posting digital video content on brand websites or social media sites such as YouTube, Facebook, and others. Shoppers find visual content helpful for informing decisions. Research found videos 50 times more likely to receive an organic first-page ranking than traditional text pages. Recent neuromarketing research shows that animated videos are particularly effective in "hijacking" consumers' attention systems and help make content more memorable

informed consent

is a key principle within marketing ethics, referring to permission granted in the full knowledge of the likely consequences. However, obtaining informed consent for data use can represent a challenge to some organizations harvesting data; all potential uses of the data may not even be known at the time data are collected.

Content marketing

is a marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined and profitable audience.

Search marketing

is a marketing practice whose goal is to generate traffic from search engines through both paid and unpaid efforts.

location-based service

is a social, entertainment, or information service that allows a company to reach and engage with its audience using tools and platforms that capture the geographic location of the audience. The delivery mechanisms used for location-based services include mobile applications, short message service (SMS) text messaging, and even in-store digital signage. There are several really interesting examples of marketers using this technology to enhance their customers' experiences.

search engine

is a software system designed to search for information on the World Wide Web. The search results are generally presented in a list of results, often referred to as search engine results pages (SERPs). The information may be a mix of web pages, images, and other types of files. In general, the higher and more frequently a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine's users. Search marketing is an in-demand field and an attractive area for students interested in pursuing digital marketing careers. Search marketing encompasses two closely related practices: search engine optimization and search engine marketing:

blog

is an online journal in which people or companies post their thoughts and other content. Blogs are usually related to narrowly defined topics. According one source, there are more than 31 million blogs in the United States today. Many bloggers use social networks such as Twitter and Facebook to promote their blog content

Digital marketing

is an umbrella term that refers to the marketing of goods or services using digital media, such as e-mail, websites, search engines, and social media platforms. We've used the term social media throughout the text, but here let's define it formally.

Mobile computing

is technology that allows transmission of data, voice, and video via any wireless-enabled computing device, without a fixed physical connection. The combination of social media networks and mobile computing has had a profound impact on consumer behavior, and in turn, on marketing practice.

Sentiment analysis, also known as opinion mining

is the analysis of the feelings (attitudes, emotions, and opinions) behind the words, using natural language processing tools.52 It is a way to measure the tone of the conversation—is the person happy, annoyed, or angry? Share of voice helps marketers evaluate how conversations about one brand compare with conversations about its competitors. This might include determining what percentage of the overall conversation about brands within an industry is focused on one brand compared with its main competitors. Since so many social media conversations (and data) are public, you can measure your competitors' impact just as easily as you can measure your own.

zero moment of truth (ZMOT)

is the moment when a customer uses a digital device to begin learning about a potential purchase. In Lecinksi's words, it is "that moment when you grab your laptop, mobile phone, or some other wired device and start learning about a product or service (or potential boyfriend) you're thinking about trying or buying."16 He argues that while there is no denying the importance of the first and second moments of truth, consumers' newfound abilities to search for virtually anything at any time has created new moments of decision before the consumer even gets to the store display case. graphically illustrates the ZMOT concept.

E-mail marketing

lets marketers send highly targeted, personalized, relationship-building e-mail messages. However, spam—unsolicited, unwanted commercial e-mail messages that clog e-mail inboxes—is a source of continuous irritation for many customers. To address concerns relating to spam, most legitimate marketers now practice permission-based e-mail marketing. They send product information only to customers who "opt-in," and they make it easy to "unsubscribe" if the recipient tires of the e-mail relationship.

paid listings

purchased links that typically appear either at the very top or upper right of a search-results page. Google AdWords is, by many measures, the most popular paid search platform used by search marketers. It is followed by Bing Ads, which also serves a significant portion of ads that appear on Yahoo! After preparing a small ad to appear on either of these platforms, marketers choose search terms that will make an ad show up in the search results. With Google AdWords, the price-per-click for these search terms will vary based on demand. The marketer specifies a daily budget for the paid ad and the ad is then ready to go live.

Social media

refers to Internet-based applications that enable users to create their own content and share it with others who access these sites. Social media are playing an increasingly important role in how consumers discover, research, and share information about brands and products.

location-based marketing (LBM)

to adapt content, messaging, or service delivery to a target's location, using GPS data transmitted from an individual's mobile device. Advances in technology have made this method accessible to organizations and marketers with budgets of all sizes. For instance, the owner of your favorite Indian buffet down the street may register for free with Google Maps, a GPS application used on smartphones. The restaurant then comes up on the Google Maps application when you look for directions or search for a restaurant in the area

Social media marketing

uses combinations of digital tools such as websites, online videos, e-mail, blogs, social media, mobile ads, mobile apps, and other digital platforms. It seeks to engage consumers anywhere, anytime via their computers, smartphones, tablets, Internet-enabled TVs, and other digital devices. Marketing organizations are committing increasing percentages of their resources to social media marketing for one simple reason: More and more people are spending more and more of their time on these platforms. Whether we are looking at Facebook to see what a friend is up to, checking a celebrity's Twitter to keep up with pop culture news, or contemplating which Instagram filter makes us look better, social and mobile technology have become natural parts of our everyday lives.