The MoreVisibility team has sponsored and presented at several conferences over the past few months, in different vertical and geographic markets. Without fail, the hot topics at all of these events were Data Integration (CRM/Analytics) and Video. The interest and number of conversations seemed to be equally split between both of these “hot topics”. Here are my current thoughts on each:
- CRM & Analytics Integration – As Google Analytics Certified Partner, our team fully understands the importance of accurate and comprehensive data. At this time, most advertisers do also – which has eliminated the need to convince marketers how important it is to have an analytics platform. However, having the analytics platform set-up properly and pulling through web traffic and user behavior data is only part of the solution. Being able to complete the picture or tell the entire story is mission critical for advertisers. This means leveraging Universal Analytics to pull in external data sources, as well as integrating your CRM with your Analytics thereby allowing you to understand all that happens online, while also following the user’s activity and lifetime value offline. It creates an incredible picture of ROI for your marketing efforts to have this type of transparency and visibility into the data. Tell me, how far does your data go?
- Video Strategy & Content – Although it isn’t the first time this year I have mentioned the popularity surrounding video content, the intensity and sophistication of the conversations in this area has increased. The dialogue typically includes considerations around:
- Importance of Video Content
- Length of Video
- Professional Video Only
- Video Distribution and Video Sharing Platforms
- Video Advertising Options
All of these inquiries are valid and stress the importance of a well-crafted, video strategy prior to engaging in production or distribution. This is the area I have seen many marketers stumble … they are running before crawling or walking. The order in which they are rolling out video content isn’t setting them up for success. Develop your plan, to include all the considerations outlined above (plus some others) and then define what success will be (KPIs just for video content). Once that is established, begin in stages to allow for performance evaluation, followed by optimization and testing. I’m interested to know, what’s been successful for your brand in video?
