It’s Christmas time! – One of the busiest periods for e-commerce. Are you ready..?

Last year, shopping related queries went up 29% (Google NZ data) compared to Christmas 2009, with a higher query growth for NZ brands than for international ones. Each year, more Kiwis make their Christmas purchases online as it’s more convenient and also easier to compare products and prices online.

Your conversion rate is more likely to increase during this favourable e-commerce period, especially if you follow our 10 tips below:

1. Adapt your offer to Christmas and to your targeted audience

This may sound relatively obvious but you have to keep in mind that Christmas is a very particular event in the year, with its own communication “code” and purchasing behaviour. For instance, people are more likely to buy for others for Christmas than during any other period of the year, i.e. they are not the final user of the product. Keep this in mind.

Also, Christmas is one of the most competitive periods in the year for many industries. You can’t expect people to buy your product if your offer is not appealing enough or if your communication is not quite right. Your offer must stand out: Be original, don’t offer the same discount as you usually would. There are many other ways to incentivise a purchase: free delivery, buy one get one free, sponsorships, offer a free gift with the order, etc.

2. Don’t forget your loyal clients

The fact that they are already your clients doesn’t mean you should neglect them. Make an extra effort for them because this will cost you less than to acquire new clients (their average cart value and re-purchase rates are higher), but also because they are your best brand promoters: word of mouth is still the most influencing media, it’s just that these days this sort of thing happens via Facebook chat.

3. Be visible on the relevant networks

There is no point of having great offers if no one can see them! If you consider the ratio audience reach/advertising cost, online advertising is one of the most affordable advertising channels compared to TV, radio, newspapers or billboards. You can reach a broader audience with Google Display Network which shows a 90% reach in NZ and 1.1 million unique users for the Shopping related websites. Thanks to a large set of targeting options (contextual, placements, interest based categories), Google Display campaigns enable you to target your audience cost-efficiently. In addition, you can use the Display Ad Builder to create effective banners at a very low cost.

4. Be findable in a short term

As shown below, “Christmas” searching seasonality starts as early as September and peaks mid-December.

Therefore, you need to make sure you don’t miss this window by being present on Google search results pages. Create tactical campaigns targeting specific “Christmas” related keywords (Christmas gifts, Xmas ideas, etc.) and use seasonal creatives.
In addition, make sure to stay competitive by increasing your daily budgets and maximum CPCs. Finally, have read of our 2010 recommendations: AdWords Christmas advertising tactics.

5. Be findable in a mid-long term period too

Think SEO. Create a specific page (or set of page) which will be optimised for Christmas (content, links, URLs, etc.). Given that competition for the “Christmas” query is very fierce, you may prefer optimising your content on more specific terms to gain organic rankings for your relevant search phrases. And once Christmas has come and gone – don’t delete your page!

6. Take advantage of your existing social networks

Of course don’t create a Facebook page just for the sake of Christmas: You need to have a consistent and long term communication with your customers and “fans”. If you don’t have a Facebook page yet, you are still on track to make it work for Christmas but hurry up! Once again, be original in your content: make your social network a special place for your fans or followers, offer different custom deals on Twitter compared to Facebook and don’t necessarily try to sell your products at all costs.

7. Be visible all along the purchasing process

As we have seen above, people start researching their Christmas gifts long time before December 25th. Retargeting campaigns are an excellent way to bring back these “early” browsers and reconnect them to your products. Google Remarketing allows retargeting 84% of your audience by placements across the Google Display Network. Make sure you read my pro article on Google remarketing.
During November you want to be visible on Display networks. You will also need to ensure that you are findable on digital marketing channels that are usually closed to purchasing, such as SEM campaigns and shopbots. In others words, make sure that your brand shows up when people are ready to buy.

8. Optimise your email campaigns

Make sure you reach your audience (watch your deliverability and opening rates) and adapt your email strategy to your database, that is to say segment your customers for better results. In addition, leverage your eDM campaigns by increasing the virality (“tell a friend” function for instance).
Consider also co-registration to broaden your audience.

9. Optimise your conversion process

It is not too late to start a conversion rate optimisation project. Within 2 weeks (depending on your traffic) you will be able to test and see which version of a particular page or, better, of a conversion funnel has a better conversion rate. Google Website Optimizer allow you to do so with very few changes on your source code. So start testing today for extra conversion points tomorrow! Here’s our take on conversion optimisation.

10. Track your traffic accurately and be ready to react

Are you sure about your Google Analytics data? Do you track all strategic actions on your website? Do you look at the relevant KPIs? These are some questions that you should consider before it’s too late. Watch your trends closely (% new visits, bounce rates, conversion rates) and make sure you and others have easy access to relevant data (via custom dashboards and reports for instance). In addition, involve the IT people so they can quickly react if needed (server availability issues, addition of new content, etc). We have a Google Analytics case study coming out very soon, make sure you check that out.

Pro Tip #1: Don’t forget to buy YOUR presents

This one is a bit more personal, but indeed if you don’t want any problems at home, don’t think about your Christmas pressies at the last moment…!

Pro Tip #2: Finding cheap pressies just got easier

www.greatdailydeals.co.nz pulls together the best deals from all popular New Zealand daily deal sites. You can sort by “Greatest Discount”, “Cheapest”, “Most Popular”, “Finishing Soon” and even “Staff Picks”. Well worthwhile checking out.

First Rate is here to help you get ready for Christmas so don’t hesitate to contact us for a no-obligation chat.

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• Christmas Gifts PPC – Online Advertising for the Christmas Period

It’s a sad fact that there are a lot of businesses whose websites are under-performing, leaving thousands of dollars on the table without even knowing it. When it comes to websites most businesses are frustrated with poor conversions, sales and the lack of qualified traffic the website receives.

If you are going to be investing in online marketing and using your website as means of building and growing your business, it is essential that you extract maximum value from your investment by ensuring your website is performing to its full potential.

Having the best looking site has NOTHING to do with whether it will bring you more clients, make more sales or grow your business. A fact lost on many organisations. Don’t get me wrong, it’s important to have a good looking site, but the design element of your site should never be your first consideration.

The simple truth is this: the internet is one of the greatest business building inventions EVER, but you have to use it the right way or it becomes a huge black hole that you pour money into.

So how do you ensure your website gets the most from your online marketing efforts?

Here are 10 tips to help you get the most out of your website

1. Focus & Purpose. Your site should be built with a specific purpose in mind. If this is unclear you are going to be shooting blanks in the dark. Ensure your website is set up to achieve a specific outcome from the onset.
Some common purposes include:

• An extension of our current advertising (radio, newspapers, etc.)
• To educate customers and prospects
• To develop a list of qualified prospects
• To make/ increase sales
• To compete in the global marketplace

2. Show them the Value. If you don’t immediately show your visitor just how valuable your site is, then they will leave… QUICKLY. On the Internet you only have a few seconds to capture your visitor’s attention, otherwise they are gone… and they AIN’T COMING BACK! It’s a known fact that people will do business with companies or people they like and trust. Your website should answer these 4 questions in the mind of your key prospects:

• Is this what I was looking for?
• Who is this company?
• Can they help me?
• Can I trust them?

3. Beware of the glorified brochure syndrome. Your prospects are tuned into channel WIIFM, (What’s In It For Me). Your site needs to speak directly to your ideal customers and you need to show and tell them that you have what they are looking for and how they can get it. Visitors come to a site expecting to find answers to their questions, solutions to their problems or for entertainment value.

4. Function over form: Flash based sites look good but you will really struggle to get them to rank well in the search engines. So many sites focus on the design element and miss the point all together. Your website must be easy to navigate and designed in a way that makes it easy to find information. One of the goals of your website design should be to keep usability easy, and simple.

5. Let your business occupy their head space. Remember this: your visitors will only be on your site for a short time, and once they leave they are NOT coming back. Unless, unless, unless you do one very important thing…YOU NEED TO CAPTURE THEIR CONTACT INFORMATION!!!

6. Follow up: Once you have your prospects contact information you can then follow up and build a relationship with your prospect.

7. Basic SEO elements are missing. Good luck trying to rank your site if it is missing basic SEO fundamentals.  Before you ever lay down a byte of HTML code for a site you have to know and understand at least the basics of SEO and how it fits into the design. The number one aspect of SEO for web design is selecting keywords relevant to your site.

9. Keep your site up to date. Have you ever seen those sites that haven’t been updated in four years? Full of outdated material, outdated pictures, maybe even a copyright date that says “2001”?

Nothing will drive people away faster than a site that looks like a ghost town… remember, your visitors don’t trust you… and they are looking for any validation of that mistrust that they can find.

10. Measure to see what’s working. You need to measure and see what’s working and what isn’t. So many web site owners have no idea how to track, manage and gather statistics so that they can make better strategic decisions. This is crucial to the success of your online endeavors. A tracking solution like Google Analytics provides invaluable intelligence that no website should be without.

Subscribe to our newsletter (on the right-hand side of this page) for great tips, advice and case studies on getting the most out of your online marketing investment. Or contact us for a no obligation chat.

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Download our award winning case study

The Power of Longtail: Focus Property

First Rate increases leading brand’s search engine rankings, powering their online business so that they rank above their competitors.

We have 30 consultants across Sydney, Perth and Auckland managing over 100 Google Adword Campaigns and generating over 1 million clicks a month and are proudly Google Analytics and Google Adwords certified.

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First Rate has taken the top prize for the IAB Australia Awards 2011, in the Organic Search (SEO) category for our client Focus Property.

The awards were held last night in Sydney and we’re all stoked to have claimed the top prize amongst a high calibre of entrants. Judges commented that our entry was

“a very well laid out entry with a nice focus on the right aspects of SEO. The point of differentiation is that they ticked criteria for SEO but went above and beyond focusing on Longtail strategy.”

Award Winning Case Study: The Power of Longtail, Focus Property

The state of play

Focus Property is Sydney’s leading property management firm. Currently managing over a 1/4 billion dollars worth of residential real estate with in Sydney’s CBD. Focus Property enlists services such as sales, letting and property management.

Our client operates in a highly competitive market with many large and established players, such as Ray White, LJ Hooker, Run Property and the Carrington Group. The competitors had strong presence in not only the property management segment but also the sales and letting segments.  Focus Property realised that an increasing amount of new business was being generated through the web as buyer behavior evolved, especially through the search engines.

The Strategy

First Rate was engaged to help improve search engine visibility and drive qualified organic leads and increase footprint. While there was a significant traffic available for head terms such as “property management”, these would not be best for converting into high quality leads. This is because they were generic and at the research phase of the buying cycle rather than being brand focused in their search queries.

First Rate discovered Focus Property had service offerings in 118 suburbs that had sufficient volume to blanket the long tail search market.  Long tail local keywords were focused on because collectively the volume of these keywords was large and anticipated that conversion rate and lead quality would be greater. This was consistent with focus on generating high quality traffic. Personalized landing pages were created for the target suburbs, giving more personalized pages and relevant content. Suburb pages were created and optimized for terms such as “<suburb> property management” and variants of that. This would then result in high quality localized leads.

Tactics

Content would be needed to target the identified keywords for example, “Bondi Property Management” and no 1 for virtually all terms relating to suburb name, property management as above. Working with Focus Property, we created pages for each of the 118 target suburbs, containing information and photos specific to each suburb Information was sourced from a number of locations such as the Australian Bureau of Statistics. This created rich content for the search engines, as well as creating a relevant, personalized landing page experience for prospects as originally forecast.

Results

We saw not only a significant increase in unique visits and visits from organic search but also an increase in ranking for head and secondary terms securing the head term as ranking number 1.

• In 12 months traffic jumped from 481 visits per month in Dec 09 to over 3300 unique visits per month in Dec 10.
• Monthly visits from non-paid, non-brand organic search increased 15 fold (from roughly 110 visits in Dec ’09 to over 1,700 visits in Dec ’10).
• #1 ranking in Google for head term “property management” achieved in early 2011.
• Top 5 rankings for a variety of secondary terms.



Get in touch with our team for more information about the power of longtail or SEO.

experts@firstrate.com.au

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