website-2015-11

NOVEMBER 2015

5 Tips to Leverage Reviews this Holiday Season

What Makes a Differencein SEO Today?

EMAIL

EXPERIENCE

SOLUTIONS

PLUS TOP 50

NOVEMBER 2015

THE MAGAZINE FOR WEBSITE SUCCESSWEBSITEMAGAZINE.COM

10YEARS

CELEBRATING

INSIDE THIS ISSUE...

Branding Basics for Marketers

Last-MinuteKPIs for Retailers

The Web IS ALIVEPredictions for the ‘Net’s Future

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Resource CenterFINELY FOCUSED INFORMATION FROM INDUSTRY SPONSORS

Why Uni� ed Commerce Platform is a Must for Business GrowthTo be successful in omnichannel commerce, companies can no longer rely on legacy siloed or homegrown business applications. No matter what a systems integrator tells you, these siloed bits of technology will never communicate as effectively as one unifi ed platform. Sponsored by GoECart

12 Campaigns to Run this HolidayAs all retailers know, the holiday season is the most wonderful time of the year, if you’re ready for it. In this eBook we will explore key tips and tricks to keep your customers before, during and after the holidays, as well as the top 12 campaigns to run this year. Sponsored by Windsor Circle

The ROI of Responsive DesignBy now, the concept of responsive Web design is well known, and increasingly perceived as a necessity. Mobile shopping is soaring. Download our eBook discussing the ROI of responsive design and how to build the case to your executives for why responsive technology will grow your sales. Sponsored by MarketLive

Back in the Hopper: The Marketplace Fairness ActThree versions of remote sales tax legislation are in circulation and each would create different consequences for those selling online. Read this two-page overview to learn why and how passage of a federal Internet sales tax law could impact your business.Sponsored by Avalara

10YEARS

Download free at www.WebsiteMagazine.com/resources

Website Magazine’s Resource Center presents whitepapers from our sponsors that provide information, specifi cs and metrics to help you make decisions for website success. Download free at www.WebsiteMagazine.com/resources.

Scan to visit our Resource Center at www.WebsiteMagazine.com/resources

How to Win at Black Friday & Cyber MondayThis holiday season it’s imperative that retailers serve up personalized offers to create a more integrated experience, making it easier for consumers to shop their way. Download this whitepaper to learn more about the top fi ve trends for the 2015 shopping season. Sponsored by Avalara

Automated Replenishment GuideDon’t let your customers run out of their favorite products. By leveraging predictive analytics, powered by Windsor Circle, you can ensure your customers never miss an order. Download this free guide to learn how to set up automated, data-driven replenishment emails and benefi t from recurring revenue. Sponsored by Windsor Circle

GET THEDIGITAL SCOOPCheck out Website Magazine’s email news-letters covering search, e-commerce, social, design and more at wsm.co/webscoop.

Stat Watch: Visibility via Social

Enterprise Ready: Right-Brain, Left-Brain UX

Small Business Lab: Brand Disciples 101

Quiz Time: The Science of Analytics

Top 50: Email Experience Solutions

Mastering Search: SEO Di� erence-Makers

E-Commerce Express: Holiday Reviews in Focus

Design & Development: Accessibility in Web Design

Web Commentary: 10 Years Later...

Explore Website Magazine’s

DEPARTMENTS

It’s a fast-paced and dynamic industry that ‘Net professionals fi nd them-selves working in today. Competing now and in the future will require enterprises to create experiences for customers in new, engaging and even unexpected ways. Taking a look back at how far the Web has come (and where it is headed) is a good place to start.

THIS MONTH IN WEBSITE MAGAZINE

Hot Web ConferencingSavvy professionals are turning to Web solu-tions to hold meetings and broadcast live events in e� ective and engaging ways.

Branding Basics“Branding” does not need to be a dirty word for digital marketers. Discover several ideas to help your company use branding to its advantage.

The Gift of FollowersImplement and integrate these email and social tips to get more chances to market to custom-ers this holiday season.

Make the Most out of EmailIf increasing open rates, lifetime value and rev-enue are the goals, marketers should review these important considerations for email today.

Last-Minute KPIsRetailers will want to pay special attention to the metrics of holidays past to ensure a successful present and future.


Explore Website Magazine’s

DEPARTMENTS


GENERAL MANAGER: David Ruiz [email protected]

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Peter Prestipino [email protected]

MANAGING EDITOR: Amberly Dressler [email protected]

ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Allison Howen [email protected]

*CONTRIBUTORS:Marina Kalika

David TriceMarcus ToberMatt Parsons

Tim AshEJ McGowanJeremy Hogan

GRAPHIC DESIGNER:

Shannon Rickson [email protected]

ADVERTISING: Kelly Springer [email protected]

Brian Wallace [email protected]

SUBSCRIPTIONS: Sandra Woods [email protected]

The Magazine for Website SuccessReaching the largest audience of Web professionals of any Internet

industry publication.

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International: 1.773.628.2779Fax: 1.773.272.0920

Website Magazine, Volume 10, Issue 11, November 2015, (ISSN# 1942-0633) is published 12 times a year, January through Decem-ber by Website Services, Inc., 999 E. Touhy Ave., Des Plaines, IL 60018. Periodicals Postage Paid at Des Plaines, IL and at ad-ditional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Website Magazine, 999 E. Touhy Ave., Des Plaines, IL 60018.

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Copyright 2015 by Website Magazine. All rights reserved. Materi-als may not be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission. For reprints of any article, contact the editor.

*The opinions expressed by contributors are not necessarily those of Website Magazine.

www.WebsiteMagazine.com

From the EDITOR

Thanks…

Thank you for the opportunity to publish Website Magazine. Thank you for recognizing the opportunity that the ‘Net provides personally and professionally to billions around the world; thank you for seeking Web success for your enterprise; and thank you for serving as the inspiration for the nearly 100 issues that have been published (so far). Thank you – this is your Website Magazine as much as it is ours and we’re honored to play a role in your digital life. A lot can happen in the course of 10 years (read the commentary for more on that). Web technology has evolved rapidly since the first issue arrived as one might imagine, as have the techniques and tactics used by digital professionals like you to ideate and create, publish, distribute and analyze the efforts made on the Web. It is, obviously, useful to look back over a decade of digital work to see what’s been accomplished, and to see first-hand how things have changed (or not) and just how much. A history (regardless of how detailed), by itself, however, is insufficient. It is also useful to have a plan for moving forward. This issue of Website Magazine does both – exploring the technologies and techniques used by Web professionals to acquire and retain customers, as well as providing some predictions on what the digital landscape will look like in another 10 years. If there’s one thing you can count on, it is this – dedicating yourself to creating useful and engaging experiences, ones rooted in a clear vision, is the only true path to Web success. This month’s feature article highlights some of the most useful approaches today’s digital brands can take to create more efficient and effec-tive websites and should serve readers well over the next 10 years. There is also a whole lot more included in this much-anticipated 10-year anniversary issue. Readers will discover some powerful tools for Web confer-encing, learn about a few branding basics and gain useful tips for acquiring more followers. And, as Website Magazine and its readers approach the holiday season, readers will find guidance on making the most of email, learn about some important SEO difference-makers and establish a foundation for gather-ing important key performance indicators. As always, we hope you enjoy this issue and invite you to join us on the Web where our editors and industry contributors explore the topics that matter most to digital success. And once again, thanks for 10 great years – we are excited for the next decade and we hope you are as well.

Best Web Wishes,

[email protected]

A Mission a Decade in the MakingWebsite Magazine is officially 10 years old, and we want to celebrate with you. Look for the phrase “returning customers” (hint: it’s in orange and bold in the second half of the magazine), open up the November 2015 digital edi-tion of Website Magazine at wsm.co/digitalwm15 and click on that phrase. Participants will then be directed to a special landing page where they will be entered to win a $500 prize. The winner will be announced next month!

Find Website Magazine at these

Internet industry tradeshows.

Big Data TechConNov. 3-4

Chicago, IL

Ad: TechNov. 4-5

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10YEARS

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YouTube is making videos shoppable with a new ad unit called Shopping ads, which present consumers watching videos on the site with an info icon in the upper right corner. Once clicked, related Cards will be revealed – including product ads. Clicking on one of these ads then directs the consumer to the mer-chant’s website. It is important to note that Shopping ads will use an auction model similar to Google’s search ads. Targeting based on context and audience will also be available.

YouTube Makes Videos Shoppable

QUICK HITS

Net BRIEFS

A whopping 44 percent of U.S. consumers go straight to Amazon when beginning their search for products online, bypassing both top search engines and retailers in their path to purchase according to a recent study from Survata and BloomReach. Comparatively, the data shows that 34 percent of consumers begin their online shop-ping journey on search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo, while just 21 percent start with a specific retailer.

Product Searches Start on Amazon (Usually)

Google unveiled a series of algorithmic changes that will reduce hacked spam in its search results. According to Google, the changes will end up impacting roughly 5 percent of queries (depending on the language). Users may temporarily notice that for certain queries, the number of results shown is reduced.

Google Attacks Hacked Sites

QUESTIONOF THE MONTH

$110 Million LogMeIN acquired single-sign-on and password management service LastPass for $110 million in cash, with up to an additional $15 million in cash in contingent payments.

15 @WalmartLabs, the technology pow-er behind Walmart Global eCommerce, has made its 15th acquisition in the last four years with its purchase of PunchTab. While terms of the deal were not disclosed, @WalmartLabs did note it will be using the PunchTab technology to enhance its exist-ing customer relationship management (CRM) tools.

$450 Million Pandora has en-tered into an agreement to acquire live events technology company Ticketfly. The transaction is valued at approximately $450 million, with a nearly equal balance of cash and stock.

?

$ WHO GOT PAID?

What is the biggest analytics challenge for your Web-based business, and why?

To answer this question and possibly be included in an upcoming issue of Website Magazine, visit wsm.co/novqotm.

QUESTIONOF THE MONTH

The Authenticated Testimonials seal lets people

know we can be trusted. And trust has its advantages

such as increased website conversions & sales.

-Alan J. www.SupplyHero.com’’’’

Phone: 1.866.904.5414 InternAtIonAl: 1.773.272.0998AuthentIcAtedtestImonIAls.com

How AutHenticAted testimoniAls work:We contact your customers to verify each statement.

Authenticated testimonials provides a verification seal to display on your website.

Prospects are more inclined to trust and purchase your products or services!

Net BRIEFS

Have tips, stories, or funding or acquisition news to share? Tweet us @WebsiteMagazine

Web Design Mistakes that Kill RankingsGoogle rewards websites that provide a great user experience with higher search rankings. Al-though many Web professionals think their sites are optimized for usability, some are still making simple mistakes.

Keep reading at wsm.co/wdmistakes

7 Reasons Why Astute Internet Marketers are in Love with PinterestWith more than 70 million users, Pinterest has quickly become a social powerhouse. The Web’s most perceptive marketers not only realize this, but are also using it to their advantage.

Keep reading at wsm.co/luvpinterest

Employee’s Choice: Perks or Pay Raise?New data from Glassdoor is shed-ding light on employee prefer-ences when it comes to job com-pensation. Find out if traditional pay raises outweigh perks like in-surance, bonuses, vacation time and pensions.

Keep reading at wsm.co/compensate15

WEBTECHWATCH#

+ Ad Intelligence from Sensor Tower: A platform to benchmark advertising spend and shape future acquisi-tion strategies.

+ WooBoard: Cloud-based employee recognition platform to motivate, empower and engage workers.

+ Wootric: Gather Net Promoter Score (NPS) and ac-tionable “voice-of-cus-tomer” feedback within mobile applications (see image).

See what has the ‘Net community all abuzz with Website Magazine’s #WebTechWatch series, a monthly roundup pro� ling both emerging and established technologies and some of the most useful solutions for today’s Web workers. See more and submit your own recommen-dation at wsm.co/wtwnov15.

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to mobile users’ � ngertips with its Primer app for Android and iOS devices. The app helps users learn new digital marketing skills with quick, � ve-minute lessons. New lessons are added every week and cover the topics of advertising, content, measure-ment and strategy.

Discover more apps at ApplicationMagazine.com.

| 9 NOVEMBER 2015 |

Eight out of ten videos in the top U.S. search engine result pages are from YouTube. (Searchmetrics, 2015)

Instagram has the highest amount of users (53 percent) who follow brands of any of the top social networks. (GlobalWebIndex, 2015)

Since 2013, post promotion has risen 120 percent for brands on Facebook. Now 75 percent of brands on Facebook promote their posts.(Socialbakers, 2015)

While Twitter is primarily a mobile platform, 61 percent of the ad dollars spent on advertising campaigns on the network are not targeted exclusively to either mobile or desktop users. (Kinetic, 2015)

Nearly all (96 percent) of Pinterest users leverage the network to gather product information and 93 percent of users are planning purchases. (Shopify, 2015)

96%

120%

53%

61%

80%

Stat WATCH

Have tips, stories, or funding or acquisition news to share? Tweet us @WebsiteMagazine

Brands should know

how obsessed the

average user is with

social media. Recent

data from GlobalWebIndex, in fact, indicates social

networking accounts for nearly 30 percent of a

Web user’s daily Internet activities – but to what ef-

fect does consumers’ social use have on a brand’s

ability to be found online?

Ninety-one percent of marketers, who invest as

little as six hours a week on the various social networks,

indicated their e¡ orts increased exposure for their

businesses (Social Media Examiner, May 2015). While

exposure in this study was not used quantitatively, it is

considered the top benefi t of social media marketing

according to those surveyed, followed by increasing

tra¢ c and developing loyal fans.

One of the ways social media may be help-

ing marketers increase exposure for their brands is

through its prominence in today’s search engine re-

sult pages (SERPs) where Google+ posts still receive

prominent placement, tweets are once again being

indexed in real-time and Facebook is often a top or-

ganic result for a brand query. In fact, Searchmetrics

found this year that higher-ranking URLs have more

social signals (as reported in the company’s Search

Ranking Factors and Rank Correlations whitepaper).

Further, at least 61 percent of those investing

a minimum of six hours per week in social media

marketing saw improvements in search engine

rankings according to the previously mentioned

Social Media Examiner report.

What this means is that brands cannot focus solely

on social media nor can they focus solely on search

engine optimization or any other channels or initiatives

exclusively. The optimal approach should be to balance

e¡ orts and investments across channels. To see which

channels are playing a role in an industry’s path to pur-

chase, marketers should plug in their data to Google’s

Customer Journey tool (wsm.co/cjourney15).

Gain Greater Enterprise Visibility with Social Media

30%

| NOVEMBER 2015 10 | 10YEARS

At the time, however, enterprises were looking at the data in an isolated silo of technology and didn’t see the appropriate places where it could be utilized. Simultaneously, customer service teams and marketers were largely conducting initiatives without getting any insights from the vast amounts of customer data that was being accumulated. As a result, their campaigns were more generalized and out of touch with who their customers really were. Even less effective were the results of their personalization efforts. These were, in essence, two sides of the digital experience brain that were not working together. Eventually, though, with technology relentlessly progressing in the management of big data, the practice became less intimidating. As data was tamed, marketing teams began to discover new ways to leverage insights offered to create more targeted, and creative, campaigns. Since enterprises have come to a clearer understanding of data, they are better able to link the numbers with the inspiration, the insights with the vision. Companies have learned the powerful combination of left-brain analytics and right-brain creativity to develop a holistic approach to customer experience and marketing.

Left-Brain Data BasicsIn the beginning of the big data era, companies would look at the giant mounds of data and get overwhelmed. Fortunately, over time, they have learned how to orga-

nize their data in order to better understand customer behavior and create appropriate targeting algorithms. The two basic data sets to consider have always been, and continue to be, (1) website visit history and (2) purchase history of the consumers. From these two sets fl ow other customer behavior metrics including page or content area viewed, time on site, previous en-gagement, campaign lead source, opt-out activity, cart value and many others. As mobile has emerged over the last several years, so have data sets. Additional segmentation informa-tion such as source channel and cross-channel journey data are now in use. Possibilities are endless when busi-nesses can deconstruct the mountain of data and look at it in meaningful sets.

Joining with Right-Brain StrategyWhen companies concentrate too much on optimi-zation, however, they may overlook creative consid-erations and ideas that may result in greater returns. Conversely, customer experience should tap into peo-ple’s emotions and play into popular culture, but fo-cusing on creative doesn’t mean ignoring data. It’s akin to a sports team focusing on defense at the expense of an offensive strategy. Merging key performance indica-tors (KPIs), consumer insights and channel data with a right-brain creative strategy is a stellar combination. In fact, data plays an important role in directing creative. Incorporating both data and creativity means maintain-ing a balance between insight-driven ideas and com-pelling execution. Many of today’s top brands are using customer information to strengthen the service side of their operations, as well as to optimize the content mar-keting they publish to their owned media properties (e.g. blogs, microsites and social media).

The Left and Right Brain of Digital Experiences

By Marina Kalika, Sr. Director of Product Marketing at TouchCommerce

When the term “big data” became pop-ularized many years ago, companies scrambled to take advantage of the huge amounts of information coming in from their business activities and customers.

Enterprise READY

Produce Better Digital ExperiencesHow can today’s companies take advantage of both left- and right-brain strategies to improve the bottom line?

Better listening: Customer experience feeds off of the knowledge of customer behavior and their pref-erences. The more real-time information companies have about what customers are thinking and what they are talking about, the better they are able to meet their needs. Big data opens the windows to an in-depth view of the customer’s mind, as well as where trends may be leaning in the future.

Better engagement: Once brands have the right data and metrics, they can interact with and en-gage those prospects that are most relevant, most likely to buy and most likely to wield the greatest market influence.

Better strategies: By learning from the data re-ceived and analyzing it, brands can improve their strategies for engaging customers. Collecting in-sights from different data streams helps to identify

patterns in their customer engagement strategies, as well as those of competitors.

Better offerings: Digital is transforming the enterprise and forcing companies to continually come up with new and better offerings. Fortunately, data provides companies an opportunity to see trends that their cus-tomers may or may not be aware of and can give them an edge that will make a huge impact. The ability to see beyond the horizon sets great companies apart from everyone else.

Working TogetherJust as the brain’s right and left hemispheres work together to complete the human experience, so too must data and creativity if the aim is to enrich the cus-tomer experience. Alone, each of these components of digital experience is indispensable, but their greatest power lies within working together.

Marina Kalika is the senior director of product marketing at TouchCommerce, the innovative leader in omnichannel customer engagement solutions for market-leading brands.


Advocates regularly buy your product. They’re great, and your business loves them. They aren’t, however, the shout-your-brand-from-the-rooftop and buy-every-prod-uct customers that all companies aspire to have. Disciples are not only voracious consumers of a product, but also those that adore a particular product or set of products so much that they proactively recommend them to others. Think about the people who will sleep over-

night on city streets just to get Apple’s latest iPhone – or the motorcycling enthusiasts

who are hardcore disciples of Harley Davidson (buying its boots and bikes

and participating in shows and social groups). These are brand disciples. If marketers haven’t fi gured out the importance of these brand and prod-uct disciples, consider this: Accord-ing to Boston Consulting Group,

nine out of ten consumers and more than 50 percent of busi-ness-to-business (B2B) custom-

ers trust recommendations from friends, colleagues and peers when making purchas-

ing decisions. Disciples, however, can’t be bought.

Trust is paramount to the value of disciples’ recommendations, so it must be earned. When

properly earned and cultivated, disciples can be turned into an unoffi cial sales force. They want to connect with a

business in a real and authentic way, and companies must overcome any and all obstacles to that authentic experi-ence. Failing to meet a disciple on his or her terms will have direct fi nancial impact. Disciples require that brands treat them with the utmost respect, that they know them and understand their needs as well as a brand under-stands its own.

Understanding Disciples: It’s Getting ComplicatedSocial, mobile, analytics and cloud technology are among the top trends driving the expectations of today’s custom-ers. As a result, customers are testing the boundaries of brand authenticity at every touchpoint. Efforts to meet the needs of disciples are made more diffi cult by today’s functional and technical infrastructures, which can make relevant information about disciples unavailable to com-pany associates when it is truly needed. Knowing where disciples are in their specifi c journeys can appear to be vir-tually impossible and has become a “Holy Grail” of sorts for many businesses.

Speaking their LanguageThe solution to overcoming these hurdles is for com-panies to focus on interacting with disciples the way friends and neighbors interact with each other – with true familiarity and understanding. When friends and neighbors interact, they do so with an understanding of the context of the interaction. This means recogniz-ing disciples when they engage with a business, no matter whether it’s on the phone, via text or from a tweet. When disciples walk into a store, sellers should know who they are and greet them by name. The goal is to deliver personal relationships at scale, enabling the entire business to recognize these customers at every touchpoint and engage them with deep under-standing. The time is now for businesses to understand every customer touchpoint in order to identify and un-derstand their true disciples. To meet the needs of disciples, engagement must be-come the responsibility of the whole business, and prom-ises made by the brand need to be met at every interaction with customers. By empowering an entire business to engage in truly personal interactions at every customer touch-point, businesses can recognize and relate to disciples when it matters most – at the moment of engagement. This is the secret to building lasting, meaningful rela-tionships with brand disciples in today’s current com-petitive landscape.

David Trice is co-founder and CEO of ENGAGE.cx, the lead-ing experience-driven CRM for enterprise. Prior to launching ENGAGE.cx, Trice was VP of CRM at Oracle, where he led the launch of Oracle’s Fusion CRM.

Brand Disciples and the Secret to LoyaltyBy David Trice, CEO of ENGAGE.cx

There are brand advocates, and then there are brand disciples.

Small BUSINESS LAB

| 13 NOVEMBER 2015 | 10YEARS

There is science behind virtually every business decision now-adays, and it’s all thanks to the power of analytics. When leveraged properly, Web analytics solutions provide

business professionals with the data needed to optimize web-

sites, make better marketing decisions and increase conver-

sions. Enterprises certainly seem to be aware of these benefi ts,

as a study commissioned by Dell Services reveals that more

than 70 percent of businesses are actively using or have near-

term plans to use analytics in their everyday decision-making.

Further, only fi ve percent of those leveraging analytics believe

that they have achieved the highest level of analytical maturity.

Translation: enterprises can do more.

While the data available within analytics solutions can be

quite intimidating, even the most basic metrics (tra� c, views,

opens, etc.) can be used to benefi t a company’s bottom line.

Gain confi dence in your data and keep up with the industry’s

latest trends in Website Magazine’s Insights on Analytics chan-

nel at wsm.co/netanalytics. In the meantime, test your analytics knowledge with No-

vember’s Quiz Time.

For the answers to this month’s Quiz Time, visit wsm.co/qtnov15 or scan the QR code on the left.

The Science of Analytics

1. By 2026, revenue from the “big data” market, including the sale of related hardware, software and professional services, is expected to reach…

a. $5.6 billion

b. $113 million

c. $23.7 million

d. $84 billion

2. Which one of the following is NOT a video metric that YouTube’s analytics o� ering provides?

a. Average View Duration

b. Estimated Minutes Watched

c. Accumulated Viral Potential

d. Playback Locations

3. True or False: More than half of business leaders will experience di¡ culties evaluating data quality and reliability.

a. True

b. False

4. What Google Analytics feature launched in 2015 helps users recover deleted data?

a. Recovery Master

b. Trash Can

c. Data Rescue

d. RDD (Recently Deleted Data)

5. Almost half of companies are leveraging advanced analytics to do what?

a. Predict their company’s fi nancial performance

b. Recruit customers

c. Improve retention initiatives

d. Conducting competitive research

Quiz TIME

As a channel, email just does not seem to generate the discussion, investment or attention it deserves among today’s digital enterprises and that is unfortunate as it has – for the entire Web’s history – been one of its most productive. Organic search, digital advertising and social media are important to the suc-cess of every enterprise, of course, but the high performance that results from taking full advantage of the email channel (for both transactional and non-trans-actional messages) is unmatched in the digital realm today. According to Adestra’s recently released Email Marketing Industry Census, for example, email was ranked as the best channel in terms of return on investment (ROI). What’s more, the study revealed that revenue from email increased by 28 percent year-over-year for respondents and 68 percent of companies rated the channel as “good” or “excellent” – and the positive data points don’t stop there:

Email is not without its challenges – poor deliverability, failures in executing rel-evancy and personalization initiatives, and data decay being some of the most common. This month’s Top 50 in Website Magazine, however, profi les the many companies in operation today that are helping brands both big and small elimi-nate or reduce these issues and maximize their use of email to drive revenue and deepen audience engagement. The email experience is vastly different than it was many years ago, but so too are the technologies and tactics employed by today’s enterprises. The practice of email is incredibly dynamic, with signifi cant digital advancements being made and new techniques and tactics emerging daily. Use this month’s Top 50 as a start-ing point as you actively pursue solutions to enhance the email experience for your brand and its customers.

Mastering the Email Experience

Top 50

Find out how your email campaigns’ open and click-through rates measure against your peers at wsm.co/ecompare15.

How Do Your Emails Compare?

Salesforce.com

MailChimp.com

ConstantContact.com

Zoho.com

Experian.com

InfusionSoft.com

Aweber.com

VerticalResponse.com

Benchmarkemail.com

iContact.com

GetResponse.com

MadMimi.com

MyEmma.com

Act-On.com

Silverpop.com

Bronto.com

Campaigner.com

CakeMail.com

ActiveCampaign.com

Comm100.com

Streamsend.com

Listrak.com

Freshmail.com

BombBomb.com

WhatCounts.com

Lyris.com

SimplyCast.com

IgnitionOne.com

BlueHornet.com

MailerLite.com

GetDrip.com

MailerMailer.com

Contactology.com

JangoMail.com

ReachMail.net

Strongview.com

Subscribermail.com

EmailBrain.com

LeadFormix.com

ElasticEmail.com

Eyejot.com

SalesFusion.com

Boomerang.com

HallData.com

Yesmail.com

SmartFocus.com

EmailDirect.com

Pinpointe.com

Mailup.com

GraphicMail.com

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+ Email marketing yields an average 4,300 percent ROI for U.S.-based businesses. (DMA)

+ Companies using email to nurture leads generate more “sales-ready” leads and at a 33 percent lower cost. (Forrester Research)

+ For every $1 spent on email marketing, the average ROI is $44.25. (ExactTarget)

+ Email conversion rates are three times higher than social media. (McKinsey & Company)

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Resource CenterFINELY FOCUSED INFORMATION FROM INDUSTRY SPONSORS

Website Magazine’s Resource Center presents white papers and webinars from our sponsors that provide information, specifi cs and metrics to help you make decisions for website success. www.WebsiteMagazine.com/resources.

Scan to visit our Resource Center at www.WebsiteMagazine.com/resources.

WEBINARSERIES

SERIES

| NOVEMBER 2015 16 |

With Google’s algorithm continuously evolving as well as the dramatic rise of mobile search, it is essential that companies keep a close eye on strategies that push up their pages in the rankings and keep them there. Three important discoveries emerged from an an-nual analysis (conducted by Searchmetrics) of the top 30 search results on Google.com for 10,000 keywords. The study analyzed common characteristics of pages with a high Google ranking and the factors that corre-late with (or are more likely to appear on) these pages.

1) Quality content, not keywords Content strategies based purely on inserting or includ-ing individual keywords within copy are dead. The study shows that the emphasis today must be on creat-ing relevant, high-quality content that is easily under-stood and comprehensively covers the topic. The average word count of the top 30 pages in search results, for example, increased by 25 per-

cent since 2014, while Flesch readability (which measures how easy or diffi cult it is to read a piece of text) is becoming more important. This not only indicates that high-ranking content tends to be longer (providing it’s relevant and adds value) but should also be easily understood (while accepting that specialist content for expert audiences may, of course, be more complex). In addition, semantic analysis provides evidence that high-ranking pages cover topics in greater depth, touching on a variety of related subjects, which also means they rank for more search terms and topics overall to assist in potentially attracting more traffi c. For example, the proportion of important “proof terms” connected to the main topic identifi ed in the content of the website page in the analyzed search re-sults is around 78 percent, while the average propor-tion of “relevant terms” (slightly distant but related words) is around 51 percent. So if the main topic or search query is “Mexico holidays,” proof terms such as “Mexico hotels” or “Mexico fl ights” are likely to be common, as well as relevant terms such as “Riviera Maya” or “Cancun sights.”

By Marcus Tober, CTO and Founder of Searchmetrics

Search is one of the primary ways mar-keters drive tra c to their online con-tent today.

What Really Makes a Difference in Search Today?

Mastering SEARCH

2) User experience mattersWebsites that rank higher also tend to offer a more user-friendly experience. They are more likely to use features such as bullet points to present content in a more structured way, as well as more menus, buttons and other interactive elements that help to make sites easier to use. With more people searching on the move, upward of 30 percent of sites appear-ing in the top 30 now use responsive design to auto-matically optimize pages for a mobile, tablet or computer experience (the real percent-age is very likely much higher as the study only analyzed the most common types of responsive design). High-ranking pages also tend to include more internal links that visitors can click and follow to fi nd additional related information on the site. Links, however, must point to relevant information that adds value – it is not just about increasing the number of citations alone.

Discover several recommendation engines that can increase the number of internal links presented and the relevancy of those links at wsm.co/boost-links.

3) Backlinks still highly correlate with rankings – but their value is decliningSearch experts have long understood that search engines use the number and variety of backlinks to a page – from other sites – as a quality signal (e.g. if a lot of other pages point to a page, then it must be valuable and useful). For many years, Google has attempted to clamp down on those who try to game the system by build-ing false (or unnatural) links just for the sake of im-proving rankings – and it seems to be working.

While backlink features still show a fairly high correlation with rankings, their value is gradually de-clining. This trend is likely to continue as Google can now better analyze and give more weight to factors such as user behavior and content semantics. There remains a correlation between high rankings and the number of backlinks, but it is lower than last year.

For tips on creating content that naturally gets links, go to wsm.co/natural-links.

Interestingly, backlinks from news sites occur more frequently on high-ranking pages – maybe because Google views these links as a reliable indicator of quality (it is more diffi cult to manu-facture false links from online publications) and freshness. While link building is on the wane, link “earning” by creating quality content is the way to go.

As the research shows, to rank highly, the emphasis is now on good, relevant content on sites that provide a top-notch experience and are technically sound.

Marcus Tober is CTO and founder of Searchmetrics, a leader in search and content performance.

A Match Made in Digital Heaven?Top-ranking sites increasingly have one thing in common: respon-sive design. Arm yourself with additional reasons to go responsive at wsm.co/seoheaven.

““While link building is on the wane, link ‘earning’ by creat-ing quality content is the way to go.


E-Commerce EXPRESS

By Matt Parsons, Chief Customer O¢ cer at PowerReviews

5 Tips to Leverage Reviews this Holiday Season

By now it’s clear that ratings and reviews are an essential part of the digital shopping experience, and further, how consumers make purchase decisions (see sidebar). Not all review content is created equally, however. So how can a brand ensure it makes the most of the review ex-perience? Let the following serve as a useful guide dur-ing this holiday season and those beyond. 1. Stock Up on ReviewsThe best way to ensure that products have reviews is for retailers to ask for them by sending a post-purchase email to every customer each time they buy from them (internal data revealed that nearly 67 percent of reviews originate from post-purchase emails). In the event that a company is introducing a new product for the holiday season, those respon-sible for marketing should consider conducting a “sampling” campaign, sending samples of that pre-released product to generate reviews ahead of time. This could help move potential customers toward conversion since others have already tested it and provided their recommendation.

2. Make it MobileMore mobile shoppers than ever before are expected by the end of this year. And while shoppers are using mobile to make purchases online, they’re also using it at brick-and-mortar locations. In fact, a 2015 study re-leased by the Local Search Association revealed that 90 percent of consumers are using mobile devices to help them make purchases while in-store.

Marketers can take advantage of this growing trend by ensuring shoppers have everything they need in the palms of their hands and that means mobile-friendly re-views. Brands, for example, will want to use responsive design to ensure that reviews display properly regardless of screen size. Further, they should ensure their reviews section doesn’t slow down page load time, which is es-pecially important on mobile, as there are already envi-ronmental fl uctuations to contend with.

3. Use Reviews in Holiday Ads & SignageAs mentioned above, customers don’t just read reviews, they trust them. Only price impacts purchase decisions more. When featuring products in holiday advertise-ments and signage, retailers should consider including reviews and star ratings to enhance their ads with the voice of the consumer. Marketers can even use the data they’ve collected to create holiday shopping guides that feature top-rated items, making it easy for consumers to fi nd the perfect gift for everyone on their list. Creative marketing campaigns like these can increase sales this holiday season, and increased sales provide more opportunities for retailers to collect reviews – even offl ine.

4. Solicit Reviews from In-Store ShoppersWith foot traffi c at an all-time high during the holidays, retailers should consider leveraging in-store shoppers to generate a higher volume of reviews. This is best done by tying existing loyalty programs, which track in-store purchases, to post-purchase emails campaigns. For ex-ample, when a person provides his or her phone num-ber to access loyalty perks in-store, the retailer can email them a receipt, ask for a review and even provide a small promotional offer.

5. Test Incentives & Rewards for ReviewsThe majority of consumers who aren’t writing reviews cite needing an incentive to do so. As the holiday season ap-proaches, it is a good idea to use rewards to motivate cus-tomers to leave reviews. By experimenting with different types of rewards – 10 percent off the next purchase, bonus points to an existing loyalty program or a sweepstakes entry – retailers can see which offers generate the most reviews. Sweepstakes programs, in particular, are a digital goldmine if acquiring more reviews is a retailer’s goal. Reviews will prove critical to the performance of In-ternet retailers this holiday season. Those that actively pursue them, make them accessible and reward those that invest their time in providing them, will be those positioned for Web success in the future.

Matt Parsons is chief customer offi cer at PowerReviews, a pro-vider of ratings, reviews, and question-and-answer technology.

The holiday shopping season is truly a wonderful time of the year for retail brands, but those unprepared for the end-of-the-year shopping blitz could end up missing out on thousands (in some cases, millions) of dollars in sales. The reason? Reviews.

88% of consumers say they trust online

reviews as much as personal recom-

mendations.(BrightLocal, 2014)

70% of consumers are interested in

accessing product ratings and reviews

while in store.(PowerReviews, 2015)

Did You Know?

NOVEMBER 2015 | | 19 10YEARS


While regulation is not uniform across industries (read, “Web Accessibility Rules for 2015” atwsm.co/warules15 ) experts like Carin van Vuuren, CMO of Usablenet, notes an increase of cases where online businesses are sued on the grounds of discrimination. While some corporations are mandated by the federal government or other agen-

cies to make their website accessible, others, notes van Vuuren, want to be good corporate citizens and sup-port all their customers. There are, of course, revenue implications as well. “Being unable to navigate non-descriptive links such as ‘click here’ or ‘more info’ greatly impacts the experi-ence for the user living with disability, and is likely to end in abandonment in the journey,” said van Vuuren. “For those users who have low vision or are blind, or-dering products online or even booking a holiday using a device can become impossible if the business in ques-tion hasn’t considered their needs when designing the experience. An assistive site that offers a good user expe-rience for users will not just increase loyalty and trust for the business, but will impact the bottom line positively as well.” With 15 percent of the world’s population living with some form of disability (according to 2014 data from the World Health Organization), brands may not only feel compelled to improve their online experience, but also soon be required to. When it comes to implementing ac-cessibility, however, many designers have to rely on their peers to set an effective plan in motion, as their resources may be limited. Website Magazine enlisted the help of accessibility ex-perts to provide advice on meeting or maintaining stan-dards (for more tips go to wsm.co/webaccess15). After all, while there are many considerations to be made when designing a website for accessibility, there are plenty of reasons for brands to make the effort – loyalty, compli-ancy, conversions and decency to name just a few.

By Amberly Dressler, Managing Editor

More people are accessing the Web than ever before and with the infl ux of new Internet users comes a greater demand to make it usable for everyone regardless of abilities.

Designing for Web Accessibility

Design and DEVELOPMENT

Advice from the Pros:

“When I was in university for computer science I met someone who was blind and surfi ng the Internet using a text-to-voice accessibility application. It was fascinating to watch: He’d rapidly switch from element to ele-ment on the screen and determine what the content was about. The dicta-tion app would just pronounce the fi rst few syllables of the content and he’d know what the content was about. Images and links were the tough-est. People spam these elements with keywords rendering the ‘alternate text’ attribute useless to its original purpose. Ever since then, when I code, I make sure all my alt text is descriptive and succinct by imagining it from the perspective of someone who’s visu-ally impaired.”

~Orun Bhuiyan, Marketing Technologist, Senior Developer at SEOcial

Real World: Coding for Accessibility

Adopt an Accessibility-First Approach“You’ve heard of mobile-first, which is a useful approach for getting designers and develop-ers to think about the context of

use and break-points in the mobile form factors, but ‘accessibility-first’ endeavors to make Web accessibil-ity standards compliance, as well as empathy, founda-tional to any website or application project.”

~Thelton McMillian, Founder, President and CEO of Comrade

Use New Web Design Standards“Website accessibility has got-ten trickier over the last few years. Websites have been (and still are) going through an awk-ward growth spurt; they’re be-

coming less like mildly interactive brochures and more like highly interactive app-like experiences. And as websites have become more complex, the bare minimum for accessibility standards has also grown more complex. We’re hopeful that accessibility implementation will catch up to design and functionality trends. The recently debuted U.S. Web Design Standards (ac-cess at wsm.co/wdstandards) is a great example of making implementation easier – it provides easy-to-implement solutions for government websites and in-directly helps raise the bar for all websites. If Google begins to emphasize the importance of accessibility more than they already have, we’ll really start to see standards pickup.”

~ Justin Kalaskey, Lead Designer at WebMechanix

Be Basic“The recent trend for flat design and a simpler look and feel to sites has been very beneficial to accessibility. The more straight-forward a website is, the easier

it is for screen readers to present the content. With small wearables like watches, designers have to pres-ent only the core functions of their applications with a very basic interface, and this is a good mindset to have when designing for accessibility too.”

~ Fiona Taylor-Gorringe, Developer and Blogger for MyAccessible.website

Check for Color Contrast“People with a variety of vision is-sues (color blindness, low vision, cataracts, etc.) find it difficult to read without sufficient contrast between the foreground text and

background color. Because of this, check your pages with a color contrast checker and never rely on color alone to relay important information. Testing for WCAG’s recommended 4.5:1 color contrast ratio is a good start. This can easily be done with Webaim’s color contrast checker or Web Acces-sibility Evaluation (WAVE) tool. In addition, a great tool that allows you to simulate how your site might look with a number of different vision deficiencies is the WAVE plugin for Chrome.”

~Michelle Williamson, Accessibility Lead for Mediacurrent

Take a Human Approach“Consider input from people with disabilities. Assume that someone can’t fully interact with one part of your site, whether vi-sually, with hearing or physically.

It’s a very human approach, and one that can benefit the population of people of all abilities.”

~Sharon Rosenblatt, Web Accessibility Specialist at Accessibility Partners, LLC

Avoid “Future Proofing” “Meeting and maintaining acces-sibility standards needs constant attention and a defined process. Designers/developers should have a strategy for this, make

sure they have support from accessibility experts, and consider tools/solutions (such as Usablenet Assistive) that can help provide a blanket of accessibility across a website as it changes. When advising our clients on improving upon the user experience (UX) of their site or app, we explain that a small investment into user-centered research or insight will help to inform accessibility, which in turn is likely to offer a return on investment. We are also able to conduct an audit of the accessibility and com-pliance requirements of any website, to assist compa-nies with developing a fully accessible website.”

~ Carin van Vuuren, CMO of Usablenet

Check out what re-sources your fellow designers and develop-ers are using to ensure their websites are ac-cessible by all users at wsm.co/watools15.

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Although it is not necessary to outline the many data points that could illustrate the tremendous growth and develop-ment of the Internet since that time, it should be noted that while many things have changed (and others stayed the same), digital has become an essential part of business today. And believe it or not, despite some setbacks (privacy and security to name but two), it has all been for the better. This issue of Website Magazine is a special one for many reasons, but none more so than that it will provide an op-portunity to look back and explore what works (and what did not – or does not). This is an opportunity to remind our collective self of what it really takes to achieve ‘Net success today, and prepare for the inevitable next steps. What read-ers will fi nd in this 10-year anniversary issue is evidence that the Web is not just alive, but it is also thriving. What is more, all signs indicate it will remain that way for the fore-seeable future – but there are quite a few things that must be addressed to continue this upward momentum.

Positioned at the intersection of business and tech-nology, Website Magazine has been fortunate to occupy a unique vantage point in our decade-long history in that our editors have access to, and early awareness of (thanks to our active community of ‘Net profession-als), the technology, solutions, techniques and tactics that help enterprises accelerate their success and de-velop effi cient and meaningful – and most importantly, profi table – relationships with their existing customers and potential audiences. This issue of Website Magazine looks at the primary areas of interest and numerous fundamentals of Web success because that is what Web-site Magazine is – the magazine for website success. That in and of itself is not enough, however, readers also need to know how it will change, and so predictions are included in the following pages to ensure those actively involved in the digital success of their enterprise can thrive for another decade. There are, of course, many things that can infl uence the success of a business that are both in and out of its con-trol – but when one knows what those things are, they can manage them and modify them to their ultimate benefi t, bending them to their digital will so to speak.

THE BIG IDEAInnovative ideas are the foundation of what it takes to achieve success on the Web and enterprises must remain committed to this principle. The enterprises that build their products, services and solutions with this in mind from the outset are still those that rise above, easily differentiating themselves from the

When Website Magazine fi rst launched in November of 2005, it was a very di� erent time for digital.

By Peter Prestipino, Editor-In-Chief


Hosting & the CloudThere are few things more important to the short- and long-term suc-cess of an enterprise than the reliability of its infrastructure. Over the past 10 years, nothing has changed more (and for the better) than how enterprises host their websites and applications. Discover fi ve ways to make good use of your cloud deployment at wsm.co/5deploy.


Website Magazine Readers SpeakWhat is the most signifi cant development in the past 10 years and how has it changed how your business operates? Share your thoughts at wsm.co/wmreaders10.

competition and are those most likely to achieve genuine suc-cess in the future. There is simply no sense in being a virtual ‘also-ran’ or digital ‘johnny-come-lately’ as the Web has no tolerance for slightly better or somewhat different offerings. Consumers want things that are wholly and completely better in some way (be it features, price or service). There are simply too many instances of the former today, but that has, in fact, always been the case. Website Magazine’s fi rst issue provides, perhaps, the clearest example of this (and it is something I’m still most proud of for recognizing).

The feature article was “Yahoo vs. Google.” At the time, Yahoo was the powerhouse, Google the disruptive up-start, and Yahoo it seemed to many was more concerned with the bottom line and satisfying investors, whereas Google was simply organizing the world’s informa-tion. In the 10 years since, their respec-tive successes have been clear – Google has grown to be one of the most powerful companies in the word, while Yahoo has struggled, replacing CEOs as fast as the rest of the digital world changes its web-site designs (every few years on average). What was the difference? It was likely a

matter of priorities – one company’s focus was revenue, the other developing the absolute best technology that it could. The “big ideas” were different for these companies and it’s my personal hope that the readers of Website Magazine over the past 10 years have recognized what its talented team of contributors and dedicated staff writ-ers and editors have always focused on – helping them create the very best digital products and experiences for their audiences and ultimately generating sustainable streams of revenue in the process. The 10-year anniversary issue of Website Magazine will be no different – what you will fi nd on the following pages will highlight how today’s Web professionals can maxi-mize their investment of time and resources and how to create memorable, effi cient and effective experiences for their users today and tomorrow.

‘NET PREDICTION: Enterprises that focus on creating unique and compelling products and experiences will be those that thrive over the next digital decade. Further, those that create rich and engaging experiences for users will fi nd they become more like Google than Yahoo.

DOMAIN NAMES & BrandingThe growth of the Web is refl ected in the growth of the do-main name industry – and it’s poised for another signifi cant round of growth in the very near future. The .COM extension still dominates the digital conversation, counting upward of 120 million active domains in Verisign’s

most recent report. The popular and seemingly default choice for a digital presence is being somewhat threatened, however, by the introduction of the new top-level domain extensions. And the one thing .COM alternatives really needed, they fi nally received. Fears of low resale values and how search engines may treat websites that use the new top-level domains (nTLDs) may have prohibited greater adoption up to this point, but with Alphabet (formerly Google) announcing that it would use abc.xyz as its primary domain, things may change in the fu-ture. Companies always look for ways to differentiate their brands and the experiences they develop, and domain names are becom-ing an increasingly accessible way to do just that. A greater familiarity with the new extensions among end-users should also drive greater adoption. In fact, Go-Daddy recently released results of a study that shows in the last 18 months, customers pointing a domain name to a so-cial media site increased by 37 percent – a rise the company attributes to customers wanting to control their online iden-tity. GoDaddy isn’t the only company to notice the shift. Verisign also indicated they have seen an increase of more than 10 percent for domains pointing to sites like Facebook and LinkedIn in Q2 versus Q1.

‘NET PREDICTION: Expect a significant drop over the next de-cade in the number of .COM registrations and a slow-and-steady increase in the use of non-.COMs such as .CLUB and .WORK, as well as region-specific nTLDs such as .NYC or .LONDON.

WEB DESIGN EvolutionIt’s probably safe to say that the design of most digital pro-fessionals’ fi rst website was, shall we say, an absolute and total embarrassment – at least when they look at it today. Thanks to the sophistication of today’s software solu-tions, design is faster, cheaper and better in nearly every way. Designers have learned over time what excites users and compels them to take action, they understand the im-portance of even the subtlest interaction, and have access to detailed feedback on every moment of a user’s visit, infor-mation that can be used to iterate quickly and ship products more meaningful to the bottom line of an enterprise.

Software Everywhere There is not a moment in the day that Web professionals do not in some way inter-act with software – it’s essential to the digital experience today, and the topic has been covered extensively in past issues as well as in our “Software Everywhere” channel at WebsiteMagazine.com. Explore many of the top solutions identifi ed in our annual Digital Power Players of 2015 issue at wsm.co/powerplayers15.

There is not a moment in the day that Web professionals do not in some way inter-

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It is not uncommon, however, for designers to lose sight of the fundamentals. For example, applying a grid to designs gives layouts visual balance and harmony, using colors/tones that both complement and contrast well drives in-terest and interaction, and selecting the right fonts/typography expresses context and conveys a timeless appeal. Design of course, is fl uid, but even if there is a need to transform a digi-tal presence, it’s important to never forget the basics.

‘NET PREDICTION: While software solutions for design, like those found in Adobe’s Creative Cloud, are empowering de-signers to create faster and better, those that maintain focus on the fundamentals of design will be those that continue cre-ating experiences for users that drive genuine engagement.

SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION & Content DevelopmentIf there’s one topic of interest that has maintained its status as incredibly important in the minds of Internet profession-als, it is that of search engine optimization (SEO). While the search engines have become very sophisti-cated in the way that they crawl, index and return websites, it would be diffi cult to argue that the practice of search en-gine optimization has really changed all that dramatically since the fi rst issue of Website Magazine. Consider links, for example – they remain the most important factor in how and where a website ranks. Also consider “content.” It too is important, yet many Web profes-sionals are still confused by the phrase “quality” content – no one serious about their ‘Net success would set out to create anything less right? The lack of standards, coupled with the black box that is search engine algorithms, result in confu-sion and frustration today just as it did many years ago. For this reason, those most successful with the practice of search engine optimization know this: Create content that users want, create a great deal of it to satisfy every possible need and interest related to their product and service and share that content with those that are able to provide a link/citation to it on the Web. That’s the secret of SEO – always has been, and it always will be. The nuances are obviously very important and Website Magazine remains dedicated to highlighting the techniques and tactics in each issue as well as online in its Mastering Search channel at wsm.co/mastersearch.

The rest of SEO, however, from meta tags to structured data, means little in comparison to providing an experi-ence to users that is of value, and that can be discovered by users. If Web professionals want to excel on the search results pages, the focus must be on content development and content marketing.

‘NET PREDICTION: More than any other means of digital cus-tomer acquisition, search engine optimization will likely change the most over the next decade. Learn how to future-proof SEO initiatives on the Web at wsm.co/thinklikeseo.

EMAIL DOMINATION & the Behavior of InteractionThere have been constants of course in the history of the Web; and for Internet marketers, there has been no more productive and cost-effi cient channel than that of email. Everything has changed about the practice of email, however – from the strategies used for acquisition, to the complexities of deliverability, as well as the methods used to drive engagement. What the most successful enterprises have discovered is that the activity of their audience should inform their approach. Emails triggered based on the activity or “behavior” of recipients, for example, which involves building profi les for each individual subscriber, should be the aim of every sender today. Depending on the actions taken with a busi-ness, recipients should be served with messages customized to their personal experience. The information used to deter-mine these triggers should be demographic (e.g. age, location, profession), and include site visit history, as well as specifi c interactions (like a previous purchase) with a product or ser-vice. On average, behaviorally triggered emails receive a 152 percent higher open rate than traditional emails (source: Kiss-metrics), making it an effective approach for enterprises. Whether it’s to confi rm that an action has taken place, or to simply educate or delight recipients, behavioral trigger emails deliver relevant information exactly when the buyer needs it. Since behavioral trigger emails are contextual, they are more valuable to the buyer than a generic email blast, and are the means by which brands are creating memorable and meaningful experiences for their audiences today.

‘NET PREDICTION: It has been suggested that the demise of email is imminent, but all signs point to its continued use by marketers and consumers alike. The manner in which mes-sages are delivered, however, will most certainly change as consumer expectations evolve, and as mobile (and other smart devices) become even more pervasive.

ADVERTISING, MARKETING & Demand GenerationOne of the most signifi cant differences from the Web of many years ago is the degree to which the experience can be customized. Today it is being personalized in ways never before conceived of and each buyer’s jour-

Social Media Matters? Most brands have, to date, struggled with social media. While some use it as their primary means of acquisition, others use it as an opportunity to engage their existing audience, and still others as a means to provide timely support. See how some of today’s top brands are using social media to their advantage at wsm.co/socialmavens.

Most brands have, to date, struggled with social media. While some use it as their primary means of acquisition,

ney can be unique and dynamic, changing to meet their wants, needs and interests, evolving alongside their mo-tivations and goals. Where the community of Web professionals once was concerned purely with lead generation, today’s focus is on demand generation, creating touchpoints with each buyer (existing or potential) and catering to those users over time, instead of just focusing on generating as many leads as pos-sible, in as short a time frame as possible with as little invest-ment as needed. Demand generation is about treating interactions with the care and consideration they demand and personal-ization provides such an opportunity. With consumers encountering numerous touchpoints on their path to pur-chase, marketers have an equal number of opportunities to help reinvent this journey. The programmatic trend, for example, is helping connect marketers and advertisers to the world’s media supply, and uses software and technology to automate and optimize the buying and placement of ads in real-time. In other words, programmatic takes all the information it can collect about a buyer and converts that information into action – the pur-chase and display of the right ad at the right time in the right place. Marketers can set specifi c parameters to guide the pro-cess, and even integrate customer relationship management (CRM) data to deliver an even greater level of personalization. What is important about programmatic (and the various ways it is manifested including retargeting – learn more at wsm.co/bestretarget) is that it illustrates how savvy enter-prises are shifting their focus toward greater effi ciency; those that fail to recognize the opportunity likely won’t survive another decade.

‘NET PREDICTION: Advertising is under attack; personaliza-tion tactics can appear creepy to some users and ad blockers are preventing brands from getting their message in front of users altogether, which will require the industry to be more thoughtful and helpful in their approach.

ANALYTICS, PERFORMANCE & Measurable ImprovementsOf all the areas of expertise for ‘Net professionals, it is analyt-ics that often gets the least attention – and that is unfortu-nate. There is no other way to gather the necessary insights required to change things – everything – for the better. Consider back when website activity was measured with “hits” as the indicator of ‘Net success. What became clear to digital teams was that this measure of success was misleading as it counted/included everything – every image load, every page, everything – and wasn’t a reliable indicator of performance. Fortunately, the Web as a whole has fi nally recognized that the accuracy of analytics data is as important as anything in the digital enterprise. Plus, the better that data is, the better decision-making will be and the faster an enterprise will achieve ‘Net success.

Today’s analytics offerings for Web enterprises are in-credibly powerful and detailed. Not only do they provide a more accurate refl ection of performance, they are also increasingly used to help measure the user experience. As an industry, professionals moved from counting visits and page views, to tracking a variety of detailed indicators of performance – goals, events and interac-tions are measured with ease and that is not something that was easily done many years ago. How many ‘Net pros, however, actually use that information to their ben-efi t? Consider an individual’s choice of analytics system. Chances are high that not only are they able to identify the sources of traffi c, but also what landing pages they arrived on, their bounce rate, and the journey they took down the path to conversion or engagement. This wasn’t available many years ago, but it is today and it is the responsibility of every digital professional to make good use of the data afforded to them.

‘NET PREDICTION: It might be diffi cult to believe, but more and better data will require greater attention from Web pro-fessionals. Over time, enterprises (and the technology that supports them) will become better at profi ling the activity of individual users, providing even more opportunities to engage users in the moments that matter.

The Web Is AliveThere are hundreds of other possible topics that could have been included in this writeup, emerging and established tech-nologies, and proven and edgy tactics that have helped Web professionals accelerate their success. What you should take away, however, is that the Web is alive, and it is changing and evolving right before your digital eyes. The more it changes though, the more it ultimately stays the same. We as a com-munity of ‘Net professionals still want to create experiences for consumers that resonate but the means by which we now use have changed. As a result, it is essential that today’s Web enter-prises remain committed to delivering useful experiences and being thoughtful about the manner in which that is done.

Mobile & Local Perhaps the main reason that “local” never became what many hoped was because it didn’t have a conduit to the offl ine experience, or at least one that was as seamless as consumers needed. As smartphones emerged and became more sophisticated, mobile and local quickly became hot topics in the digital discussion. While mobile/local really plays more to the interest of enterprises with an offl ine presence, there are steps that every company should take in this new consumer reality. Learn more about combining mobile and local at wsm.co/molotips.

Mobile & Local Perhaps the main reason that “local” never became what many hoped was because it didn’t have a conduit


For example, a new amusement park may be a “hot” hang-out spot while also being a really “cool” place to have fun and meet new people. The same concept holds true in the professional world too, as a popular technology may be a “hot commodity” due to the fact that it offers unique fea-tures that are really “cool” to use. Such is the case with the three Web conferencing solutions featured below:

Hot Company: Blue JeansWhy It’s Cool: VersatilityBlue Jeans offers cloud-based video collaboration services that work with any video-enabled device and Internet access. The coolest aspect of Blue Jeans’ Web conferencing solution, however, is that users can launch large meetings with up to 100 interactive participants. For even larger Web conferencing needs, users can leverage Blue Jeans’ Primetime events ser-vice, which enables them to have up to 3,000 remote participants. This service is ideal for businesses look-ing to hold large training sessions, marketing events or interactive lectures, and was even leveraged by the Sundance Film Festival in 2015. With the Primetime service, Sundance was able to broaden the audience for a documentary premier at its Festival, as well as hold an interactive video panel discussion after the premier with audience members across the country. By using the service, Sundance brought new audiences into the Festival’s experience and fostered interactive discussions by inviting remote audiences into the conversation.

Hot Company: join.meWhy It’s Cool: SimplicityJoin.me started out as a screen-sharing tool, but evolved into a complete Web conferencing solution that focuses on ease-of-use, enabling anyone to par-ticipate in meetings without the need to download software fi rst. With the solution, meeting hosts can leverage features like customizable links and one-click scheduling. While customizable links enable hosts to add a branded element to the meeting, one-click scheduling makes it simple to set up meetings in ad-vance with either the join.me Scheduler or directly within Outlook or Google Calendar. It is also important to note that join.me offers mobile apps to make it easy for participants to join meetings no matter where they are located. In fact, the solution offers Android and iOS apps (including an Apple Watch app) that participants can leverage to join conversations and view pre-sentations. These apps are available for all three plans that join.me offers, including its free offering that allows for up to 10 meeting participants and features screen sharing, fi le transfer, video confer-encing and whiteboarding capabilities.

Hot Company: AnyMeetingWhy It’s Cool: Vast Tool SetAnyMeeting offers a vast tool set that is sure to cover any needs a host may have for his or her Web conference. In fact, the solution offers functionality to support every step of a Web conference, from custom email invitations to after-meeting reports. AnyMeeting provides three plans, all of which come with their own unique tools. The Meeting Lite plan, for example, provides unlimited meetings for up to four people, as well as chat, screen sharing and meeting notes functionality. On the other hand, Meeting Pro can host up to 30 people, enables users to record meetings and leverage in-meeting fi le shar-ing. Lastly, Webinar Pro can host up to 200 people in a meeting, offers PayPal webinar ticketing func-tionality, as well as custom surveys, audience polls, an attendee waiting room and integrations with both Facebook and Twitter to make it easier for hosts to promote their conference.

Hot or Not?While these Web conferencing tools are both hot and cool in their own ways, it is important for pro-fessionals to consider their own company’s unique needs before selecting a solution. When available, users should take advantage of free trials before making a fi nal decision.

Although the words “hot” and “cool” are opposites by defi nition, there are times when they can be used to describe the same thing or circumstance.

By Allison Howen, Associate Editor

Software EVERYWHERE

Hot & Cool Web

Conferencing

Meetings almost never go as planned, but

there are some proven ways to increase

ef� ciency, boost pro-ductivity and take your

meetings to the next level. Read more at

wsm.co/meetwell.

5 Tips to Get More out

of Modern Meetings

To order your copy, go to: www.domains360book.com

THE WAIT IS OVER

What’s Inside Domains 360?Readers will discover...

+ A Brief History of Domains

+ Details on the Technical Landscape

+ Guidance on Mastering Domain Management

+ Tips for Establishing Domain Portfolios

+ Insights on Buying & Selling Direct

+ And Much More!

Order your copy of Domains 360

Website Magazine’s latest book by Editor-In-Chief Peter Prestipino is available for purchase at www.domains360book.com.

10YEARS

CELEBRATING

By Tim Ash, CEO of SiteTuners

Branding Basics for Digital Marketers

It is the province of the Mad Men set – wowing clients with slick creative campaign pitches. Similarly, it is a detailed brand-guidelines document laying out allow-able fonts, colors and even messaging for maintaining consistency across all marketing materials – a restric-tive set of handcuffs. Huge amounts of media money are spent on branding exposure, seemingly without a requirement for any tangible results. On the other side, are the accountable digital mar-keters like you – measuring every aspect of marketing, testing and optimizing everything and keeping an eye on campaign ROI. You chafe at the seemingly random restrictions placed on you when something is arbi-trarily declared to be “off brand.” It seems like this gap

can never be bridged and the two groups are destined to speak past each other forever. Luckily, there is a better way. The following ideas should help you better understand how to use brand-ing to your advantage.

A brand is expensive to build and diffi cult to changeFace it – most marketers don’t work for Coke, or Nike or Disney. And despite their claims that their product is “the world’s leading solution for...” some-where, deep down marketers probably know that is not true. Maybe the brand is well-known in a tiny market niche, or in the minds of direct competitors, but unless marketing teams have already spent a lot of focus, time and money – they don’t have a real brand at all with the general public. Don’t confuse name recognition with brand.

“Branding” is a dirty word for many digi-tal marketers.

Conversion CORNER

For those who do have a strong brand, they may have the opposite problem because it has a life of its own. Don’t think that a cosmetic logo change or a new creative campaign will change people’s percep-tions overnight.

Don’t pretend you have a brand when you don’t.

A brand is not its representationMany people mistakenly believe that the brand is its visible symbols, or color theme or design aesthetic – but this is not true. It is the mental concepts that are triggered in audiences’ minds that are the actual brand. Marlboro’s cigarette brand may be defined by iconic blocks of red color, but also by photographs of cowboys on the open range. The real brand, how-ever, is the vision of rugged male independence that it evokes in people’s minds. The trigger is not the brand, and digital marketers should have the freedom to ex-periment with the best stimuli to best activate the un-derlying brand concept.

Our job is to identify the best triggers to activate the un-derlying brand concept in prospects’ minds.

A brand is situational, not absoluteA brand is not monolithic and equally strong in all circumstances. If someone mentions bookstores, most Americans would probably think of Barnes & Noble. If asked about this in the context of online, however, they would probably activate the Amazon brand. If asked about audio books, they might think of Audible.com. This shows how much the concept of brand is context-dependent. All are bookstores, but one can provoke an audience to bring other brands quickly to mind by manipulating the context.

Your job is to identify contexts in which your brand is the dominant leader.

People’s brand needs are also situational, not absolutePeople’s days are filled with competing priorities and goals that often change on a moment-by-moment basis. Most do not have durable needs or desires. When someone is hungry, for example, they want to eat and this dominates their experience. When that

same person is cold, shelter becomes a priority. When sad, they seek excitement or distraction. Yet this could all be the same person. Knowing about their demo-graphics would tell a marketer little about their affin-ity for a restaurant, ski lodge or live music event brand in the moment.

Stop thinking about market segments, and think about situational brand advantages instead.

A brand frame must be consistent with messagingAll brands satisfy some combination of basic implicit human goals. Everyone craves excitement, adventure, autonomy, discipline, security and enjoyment at vari-ous times. A marketer should be very clear about the degree to which his brand activates each of these. For example, the Volvo brand works primarily on autonomy (individualistic idiosyncratic self-ex-pression), discipline (austere and functional looks) and security (strong safety record). By contrast, BMW is more likely to map to goals of adventure (the potential for extreme performance), excitement (high-speed prowess) and enjoyment (of the driving experience itself). Let’s say both companies created high-performance sports cars that are very capable. Which one is likely to activate its brand in the minds of the consumer, and sell more cars? The answer is obvious. BMW would have a tremendous advantage because its brand frame fits the product. By contrast, the notion of a high-performance Volvo is in almost direct opposition with its brand frame, and will fall on deaf ears with consumers (as evidenced by several failed attempts to launch sports cars over the decades).

Understand the implicit goals satisfied by your brand and make sure your messaging amplifies these.

Hopefully, the above ideas will help you unify mod-ern direct-response digital marketing with the seem-ingly esoteric realms of branding. They should not be separate, but should be used in tandem to create the strongest possible impact.

Tim Ash is the CEO of SiteTuners, Chair of Conversion Confer-ence and bestselling author of “Landing Page Optimization.”

Website Magazine Bookshelf: DecodedFor detailed examination of these concepts, Phil Barden’s “Decoded” is a must-read. It’s available for purchase at wsm.co/decodethis.

““ ...digital marketers should have the freedom to experiment with the best stimuli to best activate

the underlying brand concept.

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Research found that 49 percent of Internet retailers already plan to prioritize social sharing to increase marketing effectiveness, and 71 percent say social integrations are key for successful email marketing campaigns (read more: wsm.co/holidayqs).

What kind of holiday cheer will these brands likely see from social media integrations?

There’s a unique value to social campaigns. For instance, social media consumption varies from platform to platform, providing a second, third and fourth opportunity for the savvy marketer. Social also allows for diversification of out-reach platforms like the addition of mobile for a company that has traditionally only done desktop. And, generally, it is an incremental, cost-effective strategy that can be added to any email marketing campaign.

QUICK HIT: Discover the optimal time of day to post to different social media networks at wsm.co/timesbest.

There are two main operations of social: social shar-ing and social connecting. The former is very powerful because it allows for wider reach through the initial contact’s network and general shares. The latter creates a more personal connection between a customer and brand. Both are important to leverage in any successful social integration campaign.

In short, social is the gift that keeps on giving. How can you take advantage and turn it into the Rudolph that will lead you through the blizzard of the upcom-ing holiday season?

Re-gifting: It’s OK (sometimes). Using social atop an email marketing campaign means marketers already have the content. Besides monitoring and manage-ment tools, there’s nothing else they need other than ready-to-mail marketing content. Brands can repack-age the same content that’s in their emails into eas-ily digestible bits that consumers can take in while browsing Twitter or Instagram.

Secret Santa shouldn’t always be a secret. Consumers should always be able to know where their messages are coming from, but, more importantly, they should always be able to connect with the sender. Companies can make it easier on themselves by adding “Follow” and “Like” social buttons into their emails that can quickly connect their contacts to their social pages. Be it subscription pages, or even unsubscribed notices, allow consumers to have the option to connect with a brand their way. Just because they don’t want a particular company’s emails, doesn’t mean they don’t want to know what’s going on.

Give hints on your gift and see if it’s a hit. Just like email marketing, where subject lines can make or break a mes-sage, social media ad headlines can mean the difference between a new or lost follower. Use A/B split testing to determine the best ad headline for social. The more likes, share and followers it generates, the more certain a com-pany can be that it’s a winner. This works for posts in general as well. Marketers should be tracking which of their customers respond on which platforms — there is no single best option — but having that additional infor-mation is another piece on which to base segmentation.

Leave out milk and cookies. As part of embracing social media platforms, launch campaigns that are specifi -cally driven to generate followers and subscribers, not sales. In these cases, marketing emails should be concentrated on social promotion. For instance, grant special offers only when subscribed through a specifi c social channel. Depending on how many platforms and angles are available to do this, try it once a month or as little as once a quarter. This form of outreach also creates a social presence that will not put off contacts when seen on other emails. Ultimately, social engagement could make or break your holiday season efforts. Though email mar-keting campaigns will remain the crux of consumer engagement, social integration could be the differen-tiator you’ve been looking for. Use the tips above and give your brand the gift of more followers.

Social will, without a doubt, be top-of-mind for Internet retailers this upcom-ing holiday season.

Social Santa:

Give Your Brand the Gift of Followers this Holiday SeasonBy EJ McGowan, GM of Campaigner

Social Media MAVENS

WEBSITE MAGAZINEIN YOUR INBOX

Subscribe for our channel-focused weekly newsletters at wsm.co/email15

Sign up for one (or all) of our weekly newsletters, choose from e-commerce, search, social, design and dev,

and our industry trends news. It’s as easy as entering your email address!

YEARS


While nobody wants to be a Scrooge, analytics data can help retailers decide where to be generous or stingy — as there are indicators buried within ghosts of holidays past and present that can predict the successes or fail-ures of the future.

PastEven with national holidays like Fourth of July and com-pany-specifi c events like anniversary sales, chances are that an e-commerce site’s largest promotional efforts come at year-end. With Black Friday fast approaching (and ex-pected to once again be the busiest shopping day of the year), it’s imperative retailers look at what happened Nov. 28, 2014 to inform what will happen Nov. 27, 2015. They can turn to their current Web analytics system (see a list of the most popular at wsm.co/coolanalytics) to refl ect on that single day (by setting a custom date range) and even compare it to past Black Fridays. Retailers should pay special attention to campaigns (e.g. Facebook ads, email newsletters, paid search, etc.) that boosted key performance indicators (KPIs) like conversions, revenue and length of sessions, while fl agging any that had nega-

tive implications, like above-average bounce rates. These campaigns’ successes and failures should set the precedence for this year’s efforts – even if some last-minute modifi cation is required. For example, if an email campaign on Black Fri-

day 2014 performed poorly (few sessions derived, no conversions, etc.), a retailer will want to review that par-

ticular message within their email service provider (ESP) to discover the reason. Perhaps it was sent too early or too late in the day? Was it missing a call-to-action? There are important questions to ask if campaigns underperformed on such a critical day (see sidebar). Some of these KPIs, however, may be irrelevant a year later. For instance, a retailer could have suf-fered a high bounce rate (access industry benchmarks

at wsm.co/mozbench) from a campaign directing mobile users to a landing page that was not opti-mized for their device. This year, however, that same campaign (or a similar one) could be lucrative if that retailer is now mobile-ready and capable of serving users regardless of the device being used. While there are many questions that arise from even the most basic analysis, these are the type of queries that need immediate answers (and should inform campaign changes) in the coming weeks.

PresentRetailers often focus too much on the amount of traffi c their site has (or the “magic” number of visitors that will solve all their problems) instead of the quality of traffi c it is currently receiving. By comparing referrals based on the revenue they are bringing in, retailers will have a current understanding of where their last-minute efforts should be directed. For example, if a specifi c publisher (e.g. a blogger) is just outside of an e-commerce site’s top referral sources (e.g. top 10 or 20) but generates revenue, a retailer may want to send that site owner an email or a tweet thanking them for their support and perhaps offering their readers an exclusive end-of-year promotion. Since the publisher has already shown inter-est in that retailer’s site, he or she may need just a little push to promote it more often this holiday season.

Yet to Come Without tending to past and present data, retailers won’t like what is yet to come – especially if they aren’t looking at new versus old business at year’s end. This holiday season, retailers are going to put on their best show – free or discounted shipping, beautiful creative and more – which can bring in a lot of new shoppers. If sellers don’t cater to returning customers, however, they are doomed to fail. Not only are returning custom-ers more likely to react positively to a retailer’s market-ing efforts, but Zeke Hamdani, director of Web services for Celerant Technology, says returning customers can also provide the most profi table transactions. In fact, an Adobe Digital Index Report indicated those who have purchased from a company twice before are nine times more likely to convert than a fi rst-time shopper, while a RJMetrics E-Commerce Benchmark report indicates the more times shoppers buy the more likely they are to increase their average order value (AOV).

Make it a Happy Holiday It’s critical that retailers think more about the past, cur-rent and future experiences they are offering by review-ing their analytics and making last-minute changes so it’s not just a happy holiday season, but also a lucrative one – setting even higher benchmarks for 2016.

Every retailer has choices to make when it comes to how they approach the holi-day season — from where they choose to spend their money to what they choose to spend their time on.

By Amberly Dressler, Managing Editor

A Metric’s CarolLast-Minute KPI Tips for Retailers

Insights on ANALYTICS

Discover items to check off before you

launch important end-of-year campaigns at

wsm.co/xlist15.

Holiday Campaign Checklist

© copyright 2015 Website Magazine

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10YEARS


Email EXPERIENCE

The assumption was that social media and messaging platforms would overtake email as the primary means of communication, particularly given the preferences of millennials, and the rise of mobile devices. While the list of communication channels is longer, and smartphone usage higher than ever before (and grow-ing by the day), a new study suggests email isn’t going anywhere just yet. In a study released in Aug. 2015, Adobe re-ported that Americans spend up to six hours per day checking email. This included time both at and away from the workplace, and it was shown to occur during a range of activities including watching television, lying in bed and even using the restroom.

With American workers and consumers still de-voting such a high percentage of time to email, here are some important considerations for marketers:

Keep email in the marketing mix – Regardless of what assumptions Internet professionals may have about email’s use now or in the future, the numbers clearly show it remains a primary source of information. Email can still serve as a valuable mechanism for de-livering a brand’s message to a targeted audience, so companies small and large need to keep it in mind when planning their next marketing initiative.

Keep email interesting and relevant – Just because audience members are actively reading email, doesn’t necessarily mean they want to be reading a company’s email. More than one-third of respondents in Adobe’s survey indicated they wanted fewer repetitive emails from brands they engage. Marketers will want to avoid fl ooding contacts with too many messages, and be selec-

By Jeremy Hogan, Senior Manager of PR and Digital Content at Celtic Chicago

For years, marketing experts have tried to predict when email will “die” as a vi-able medium, and what channel(s) will ultimately replace it.

Making the Most out of Email Today

tive in those they do send their way. How can they tell if their audience is interested in what they are sending?

Keep track of your results – Marketers are always chasing metrics to quantify the success of their ef-forts, and email campaigns offer plenty of data to help gauge and improve their performance. Brands can see what messages their readers are actually opening, discover the optimal send times and evaluate click-through rates to judge if their message has value be-yond an enticing subject line. Most email platforms even provide the list of devices individual recipients are using to read a message. Companies are likely to fi nd that smartphones are the leading device used to check email, reinforcing the importance of catering to a mobile audience.

Keep a “mobile-fi rst” mindset – Mobile devices are quickly becoming the preferred method of checking email. This fact was confi rmed in the previously men-tioned Adobe report, which states 88 percent of millen-nials use their smartphones for email. The study also confi rms what many marketers know from personal ex-perience – people don’t want to deal with the excessive scrolling required of viewing an email on a smartphone built for desktop. The standard rule of email design in 2015 – and truly any Web design – is to design for mo-bile fi rst. Companies will want to assume their audience will be viewing their message on a smartphone, and plan the layout accordingly – avoiding excessive load times required by large images, and keeping all content in a single-column format that fi ts within a standard mobile phone screen (discov er the basics of mobile-optimized email at wsm.co/mobilebasics). Once a message’s content and layout have been optimized for today’s audience, one key step remains.

Keep your website current – The primary goal of an email blast is to drive traffi c and spur a specifi c action once a recipient is on the brand’s website (the same as any digital marketing effort one might employ) – not only requiring marketers to convey the value of click-ing through to a site, but also participate in some web-site upkeep. With heightened awareness and prompts to visit a site, marketers should ensure that there is relevant and engaging content of interest to their au-dience once they are there. Further, if an e-blast pro-motes a specifi c offer or product, it should be the fi rst information a reader sees after clicking through. The digital landscape is continually shifting, and it can be diffi cult to manage the countless ways people are receiving their content. The devices and platforms

used today might be signifi cantly different fi ve years from now, creating challenges for marketers look-ing to stay ahead of the curve. What we do know is that today’s audience is still very much dependent on email for staying connected, in spite of any assump-tions we might have had to the contrary. It is impor-tant that marketers embrace this fact, and strive to deliver meaningful content their audiences want in a format they can easily access and read.

Jeremy Hogan is a senior manager of PR and digital content with Celtic Chicago, a full-service marketing fi rm.

10 Need-to-Know EMAIL MARKETING STATS

The top three uses of email are newsletters (66 percent), pro-motional content (54 percent) and welcome series emails (42 percent). –Salesforce

Ninety-one percent of consumers check their inbox at least once per day. –Salesforce

One-third of marketers say their subscribers read emails on mobile devices at least 50 percent of the time. –Salesforce

Forty-seven percent of emails are now opened on a smartphone. –Movable Ink

Twenty percent of marketers say their company’s primary revenue source is directly linked to email operations. –Salesforce

For 69.7 percent of U.S. Internet users, email is the preferred method of communicating with businesses. –eMarketer

Sixty-one percent of consumers say they like to receive promotional emails weekly and 28 percent want them even more frequently. –MarketingSherpa

The top three metrics used to track email marketing success are click-through rates (47 percent), conversion rates (43 percent) and click-to-open rates (38 percent). –Salesforce

Two-thirds of companies would like to improve their personalization (64 percent), marketing automation (64 percent) and segmentation (62 percent). –Econsultancy

For more insights into email marketing, visit wsm.co/emailexperience.

In the 10 years since the fi rst pages of this publication were initially made available back in Nov. 2005, I’ve consumed no fewer than 10,000 cups of coffee while within the confi nes of Website Magazine offi ces, acquired many thousands of followers on social networks, used fi ve mobile phones and three different laptops, written well over 5,000 posts and articles for the weblog and print edition of this publication (not to mention three books) and edited thousands more from staff and con-tributors. I have even hit “send” on what I can only as-sume is many millions of emails at this point. I’ve attended more tradeshows and networking events than I can possibly remember, and even been for-tunate enough to speak at a few. I have been interviewed countless times and interviewed thousands of Web pro-fessionals myself, from established CEOs whose compa-nies were eventually acquired by the biggest brands in business and technology, to startup founders in emerg-ing industries whose vision, motivation and dedication was nothing short of pure inspiration. It has been an amazing 10 years fi lled with successes and failures, highs and lows – and I would not want it any other way. What I didn’t realize when the fi rst issue of Website Magazine was published was just how much I would ultimately learn; not about the technologies or tactics mind you (although I’ve acquired many important and valuable lessons in that time frame that shape everything I do now and will do in the future), but rather about

people and their fears, needs and motivations. A lot can happen in 10 years, but I feel confi dent in saying this: If you are able to understand what people (friends, fam-ily as well as your digital audience) ultimately want and need, you and your enterprise will be better off for it – much better in fact. That’s not easy, of course, as we all are motivated by both the seen and unseen, the immediate and the fl eet-ing. Some are concerned with profi t (money), others compliments, and still others some publicity or at least recognition. Some have a need to be understood, others for a sense of security. These are not easy demands to meet, of course, requiring a sensitivity that can only be developed by making the effort, remaining committed to a cause and purpose greater than oneself, and being vulnerable and willing to fail. Making a genuine connec-tion with those around you isn’t easy, but it is worth it. I encourage all readers of Website Magazine to make that effort as the reward is immense. This issue, and all those before it, would not have been possible without the help of many people – the list too long for the confi nes of this one page. These people helped me understand my own vision for this publication, worked feverishly to help manifest it and have all been a valuable part of Website Magazine’s, and my own, success and for that I am eternally grateful. To our readers, and all those that have supported us, 10 years later, I say thanks. With a continued dedication to understanding the people and technologies that rep-resent this industry, we will all be positioned for greater success in the future.

I did a few rough calculations when the Website Magazine team was putting this issue together.

By Peter Prestipino, Editor-In-Chief

Web COMMENTARY

10 Years Later…

website-2015-11

Documents