The internet has made life easier, at least for most of us. The field of marketing, however, has demanded a constant attention to social media, email and other virtual tools to analyze customer behavior and increase profitability. Marketing is no longer about the creation of an advertisement; it is about the intensive analysis of the market and the individuals within it. Online marketing may be less costly, but it has increased the toil of advertising. Without these five tools, the marketer would go crazy!
1- Amplitude and Analytics
Despite many contenders, Google Analytics has remained one of the most used online marketing tools for many years. Developed by one of the largest computing giants in the world, Analytics gathers detailed statistics about how customers interact with a business’s website. The data it gathers includes a number of important statistics regarding traffic. Knowing how to apply this information is where Amplitude comes in.
Amplitude was developed to help marketers discover the “Aha moment.” This is the moment in which the marketers suddenly comes to understand what key variables signify that a customer is likely going to stay or leave. By using Boolean search logic, Amplitude helps the marketer reach this moment by allowing him to determine many important things with the data his business website generates. Firstly, it enables him to sort users into groups based on what they have in common. Specifically, it allows the marketer to see where and when visitors to a site become inactive and what is common between them and other users. Further, it generates graphical images of the data that can be used for more thorough analysis. This can enable new market strategies to developed based on the specific nature and statistics of the individual business, not a series of objective laws that rarely function as promised.
Using the traffic data from Google Analytics, both traffic and individual customer can be analyzed together, creating a model of the market that has both sociologic and psychologic roots.
2- Outbound
Email marketing is the new direct mail. Sending an email is now much quicker, cheaper and eco-friendly than mailing a traditional letter. If a business is operating without a website, it is only inducing unnecessary costs that will prevent profit maximization.
But writing email after email to customers and potential customers or even knowing who to email and when can be time-consuming, tedious and boring. Outbound integrates itself into a website and tracks customer behavior like Amplitude. But instead of gathering statistics, it sends emails to customers and potential customer based on their individual actions. These emails are created and uploaded by the marketer before the software becomes active of course.
3- A Website Valuation Tool
When trying to determine the value of your online business, the best place to start is by looking into valuation reports, such as Site Price, which show the values of hundreds of online businesses that were sold recently. Find businesses that are similar to yours in size, age, profits and business model. The most important factor to pay attention to in these valuation reports is the sales multiple of each business, as this is what will make or break the value of your own online business.
4- Mention: A Look toward Social Media
In addition to email, social media is also necessary for marketing success. Choosing what platform to use, however, can be difficult. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+ are just the tip of a very large iceberg. And there might be a conversation going on about your business on one, two or a hundred of these sites at this very moment.
Mention allows the marketer to track mentions of the business across millions of online sources in 42 languages. Knowing where, when and what is being said about the business in one of these locations might mean countering negative press before it even becomes newsworthy. It also enables a conversation to begin that could increase customer retention, be used to gather information about consumer behaviors or simply analyze the market and how the business rests within it.
Conclusion
Five of the best tools for online marketing include Google Analytics, Amplitude, Outbound and Mention. Together they allow a business to analyze individual customer behavior and the market from a number of perspectives through a number of mediums. Ultimately, this analyzation is the key to implementing strategies that could increase the value of the business.
