How much is it essential for businesses to understand the value of a well implemented Analytic figure in their structure? I am thinking especially of the small and medium enterprises, which usually tend to underestimate its strategic importance.

A well implemented analytics data collection mechanism is an important price of entry. Without it you are coming to play the football game naked. You look embarrassing, and you are going to lose.

My hope though is that small and medium sized businesses will come to appreciate the value that actually using the data will have on their business. In as much I’ve pushed companies, of all sizes, to adopt the Digital Marketing & Measurement Model. That provides them with a very structured five step process to follow, ask the most important questions before they touch the data.

The end result is a better understanding of why it is that you need data, and once you get it how do you focus your efforts to ensure you are answering the right questions. With that comes an appreciation of why an investment in data is critical.

What do you like of this discipline from your personal perspective? Do you agree with me saying that no SEO can call himself so if he does not own a profound knowledge of Analytics?

I love SEO. It is such a fascinating science and the rewards are awesome. The thing that appeals to me personally is that there are a, mostly, clear set of logical things we have to do in order to rank high for relevant keywords. It is fun to do those things at a system or marketing level.

It would not surprise you to learn that what is a lot of fun about SEO is the enormous amount of data available to understand your current situation, understand what it will take to get to the next step, and, my favorite, quantify the business impact of our SEO efforts. Without analytics it is impossible to even be 10% effective at doing SEO. And that is great.

Finally, what is the newest challenge of the Analytics science? Are maybe the Social metrics the new western frontier of Analytics?

Social is just one more thing to think about, I am not sure that it is a challenge all by itself. In terms of challenges I think there are a couple of very sophisticated ones.

First one is that consumer experience is evolving at such a fragmented rate that most places where we need data from are places where we don’t have, to put it crudely, our analytics tools’ analytics tags. That means that more and more of the data we need to be smart sits outside our immediate purview. Our ability to use APIs, scrapers, multiple tools is going to be super critical.

The second problem, perhaps even harder, is how to deal with this multiplicity from a data analysis perspective. Much of this data is missing primary keys, it is often incomplete, and sometimes even incorrect. And it is rich with information we can turn into actionable insight. Yet from a human capital perspective we don’t have enough people with the right skills. Time will solve both these problem. But I hope that current and future analysts and marketers appreciate this problem and start to invest the seeds of what it will take to solve them in the long term.

The interview sums up the definitive role that analytics plays in any digital marketing strategy. It also provides great insight into the future challenges SEO will face and the kind of landscape we are moving into. As the constantly evolving nature of the web continues to present challenges in this area, a solid understanding of SEO and web analytics remains crucial to successfully carrying campaigns into the future.

Read the full interview published by SEOmoz, here.

After relaunching their Chaos website with great success last year, Riaan and the team decided to do something extraordinary to rewards its passionate community of fans.

The answer my learned lecturer gave me was not very satisfying. She mumbled for 15 minutes about communicating to markets and contained stuff about the ‘P’s’ of marketing. The response was long and rambling, and left me a little bewildered.

If you Google the phrase “What is marketing” now you will find the answer just as bewildering. There are many differing definitions.

As the CEO and Creative Director of a company concerned primarily with offering marketing services, I’ve grappled with the challenge of defining the term correctly for some time. It is a sprawling, convoluted subject and tough to get to the heart of what we marketers do.

At the same time, marketing has experienced seismic change in our generation.

Social media, in particular, is the most exciting innovation in communication since Alexander Graham Bell unveiled the telephone in 1876.

After a lot of thought and discussion, head butts and tequilas, Mike and I finally settled on this:

“Initiating and maintaining profitable relationships.”

This definition cuts to the core of the marketing process. Our jobs as marketers, digital or otherwise, is to first find customers or clients (initiate); then maintain interaction with those customers (maintain); while ensuring that the interaction has value for both parties (profitable) in order to build a sustainable community (relationships).

As the internet exposes us to larger audiences, the functions of forging relationships, building communities, mass dialogue and customer interaction are now particularly important – concepts vital for marketers to grasp if they are to remain relevant in an increasingly noisy environment.

Louis covered the digital consumer, and what we can expect, and Justin tore into the macro-environmental landscape, sharing loads of love for Telkom along the way.

We gave away some of our new T-shirts at the end, followed by a Q&A session with the audience particularly interested in some of the controversial and contentious future predictions by our favourite (not so skinny) Australian living in SA.

Here is Louis’ presentation:

Here is the presentation by Justin:

Thanks again to Deloitte for such a stunning venue, and for Corona for the refreshment.

(do a search on 2010 digital marketing trends and you’ll get the picture)

A lot of noise indeed and often lacking context I believe…

A bit more focused and centred around the South African user, here are The Heavy Chef’s trends for the next year:

5 WAYS SOUTH AFRICAN CONSUMERS WILL USE THE INTERNET IN 2O10

1. MORE VIDEO, MORE OFTEN: Visual mediums online and offline will always have appeal, whether consumed for entertainment, for information or for learning. Thus, with bandwidth on the increase, this means we are busy consuming more content online, more often and much, much faster. It’s a no-brainer that video consumption would thus play a bigger part in the South African consumers web experience. Thus, for marketers I’d suggest you investigate ways of using video online to engage with your customers. At The Heavy Chef Project, we’ve been using this with great success.
2. 2-SCREEN SURFING: In the states (that is the United States of America, not Vrystaat), they often refer to a 3-screen (three) culture being a mobile device, a laptop/PC and your Television. All forming part of a richer, integrated Internet experience. Within the South African context and looking to 2010, the usage of the Internet would primarily be around your mobile and laptop/PC. With both device Internet usage on the up. However, not being an Either-Or-type-scenario, both ‘screens’ will be used by consumers for different needs.
3. SOCIAL INFLUENCE AND TRUST: A few days ago, I was keen for a bit of sushi, so I asked my 185 Facebook friends and 768 Twitter followers for some recommendations on where to eat. Needless to say, I had many options to choose from. Options that I valued. So much for the Yellow Pages… and Google. One of many examples I can use, but expect the South African consumer in 2010 to utilize Facebook and Twitter, as well as refer to blog opinions more often when recommending and/or making purchase decisions.
4. USAGE MATURITY: It’s a known fact that with higher Internet speeds, richer Internet experiences will result and certainly more mature (read: confident) browsing. No doubt Facebook has a had a major impact on the South African consumers’ lives. One of the biggest spin-offs though is that Facebook (and I do think Facebook primarily) has played a big part in creating a more mature Internet usage culture in South Africa, from being more security/privacy conscious to consumption and sharing of media to usage across 2-Screens (see point 2) and even navigating trough a JAVA-rich environment. Thus, for marketing in 2010, don’t be too afraid of pushing the browsing boundaries somewhat.
5. CLEAR MOTIVATIONS: One thing that is standing out for 2010, is that the Internet is being used more and more for specific reasons. Not just for random surfing. In fact, the popularity of online tools to do accounting, sales management, document sharing, connecting with friends, organizing events etc is very much proof of this. In fact one of the more popular buzz-words these days amongst geeks is “Cloud Computing” – essentially, taking software (like MS Word) and offering it online (like Google Docs). The result, centralized storing, collaboration opportunity and broader accessibility. Towards 2010, I’m expecting South African consumers to be very objective-driven in going online, with clear motivations. Thus, for marketers I’d suggest spending a great deal of time in defining your message/promise, keeping it consistent and supporting that with a proper web marketing drive.

Below is a bit more reading from other sources on trends for 2010:

South Africa

http://www.huddlemind.net/profiles/blogs/10-crucial-consumer-trends-for

http://www.fluxtrends.com/web/content/view/116/57/

http://www.collings.co.za/2009/11/consumer-trends-for-2010.html

http://www.matthewbuckland.com/?p=1183

Global

http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/cs/2009/11/six_social_media_trends.html

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/12/03/cashmore.web.trends.2010/ (I like!)

http://darmano.typepad.com/logic_emotion/2009/11/social.html

There were three reasons for the design:

1. Clean and simple – there was too much content on the previous site, so we’ve tried to focus the new design on work examples and credibility

2. The Heavy Chef Philosophy - obviously, this is an underlining credo to everything that WWC is involved with, so the ingredients are coming through strongly.

3. Brand - the brand message of WWC is “we create digital strategies that make our clients money” so we’ve tried to get that across with the focus on case studies, results and testimonials.

Check out the new site here: www.worldwidecreative.co.za

Initial feedback is strong, and we welcome constructive criticism. Please let us know your thoughts and suggestions for the way forward.

So, when I stumbled across Comcast Town, I was reminded of Justin’s words of wisdom.

Comcast Town is an online contest where creative minds can design a digital apartment via Comcast Town’s amazing, interactive portal.

Creating a totally new, cartoonish world, the portal provides users with a Sims-like navigation – allowing you to explore Comcast Town, interact with elements (including listening to guitar-playing squirrels!) and, ultimately, create your own little apartment.

Competition mechanics aside, this is a truely grand design of a marketing campaign. A creative masterpiece. The case study of all digital marketing case studies.

Pay Comcast Town a visit at ComcastTown.com.

I’ve embedded a brief intro video on Comcast Town below (0:59) – check it out:

Craig Reid

Mike has been running a tight ship so far. We’re halfway through the day, and already it’s been a very engaged and interactive Session.

Some highlights include introducing the example company that we’re using for the three days “South African Golf Guide” and getting the team to work with the various delegates’ own brand objectives.

Mike has created a dummy company that the delegates are going to be working on, in between working on their own brands. By the end of the three days, the idea is that the course attendants will come up with a strategy and execution plan for a real website (that the World Wide Creative team will create).

In amongst the delegates we’re stoked to have Jon Cherry, Craid Reid (MD of Fuel Online) and Ettienne, otherwise known as ‘the new guy’ at World Wide Creative.

More pics here.

heavy chef

The World Wide Creative studio is buzzing with a trifecta of announcements. The first, and most significant, being the inaugural Heavy Chef “Creating Profitable Websites” Course running from the 12 – 14 August in Cape Town. We are also finalising a Johannesburg Course, which will be announced in an upcoming Heavy Chef newsletter.

(The second and third announcements are the redesigns for the Heavy Chef Project site and the new World Wide Creative site. The live dates have been set for next week and we will be unveiling our new look on BizCommunity.)

The course in particular has already gathered a lot of attention for its focus on practical learning (as apposed to information gathering). Delegates will get their hands dirty, learning first-hand how to create and run a profitable web campaign. The course will cover three aspects of running a campaign:

1. Strategy
2. Development
3. Marketing

Course attendants will be involved in a process of creating a real campaign, with the course instructors made up of professionals currently working in the industry.

There is an early bird discount for the course for delegates booking in the month of July.

Click here to find out more about Heavy Chef’s new digital marketing course.

Debbie sent a tray of the cakes back with me to feed the masses in the studio, and this was the result on the balcony upstairs…

cake

Thanks Debbie. The entire team are smiling from ear to ear (and rubbing their bellies happily). Of course, they now expect this on a weekly basis, so we may need to discuss a trade exchange…

cake

While on the note of new clients, we’re excited to bring aboard a host of new projects over the past few weeks: AL Indigo, Design Faktorii, Mondi and Distell. Welcome all – !

With all the new work, our digital marketing team is growing. With that we welcome Ettienne Mostert to our team – here’s Ettienne tucking in…

ettienne

Welcome Ettienne! We trust your association with the World Wide Creative digital marketing team will be a long and fruitful one.