Social media is the hot new genre of marketing.  The statistics available concerning social media usage are staggering… and the face value test is simple.  How many people do you know who do not use at least one form of social media?

With the tremendous usage of social media in its’ many forms, there are limitless possibilities for the marketing professional.  Marketing departments are becoming savvier in understanding how social media sites can fit into their repertoire of tools, and are diving feet first into the social media pool.  The trick to social media marketing is understanding what sites should you focus on to receive the best ROI.

Astir Analytics can help you navigate the social media landscape and make the best choices for where to concentrate your resources.  Depending on the type of products your provide, the audience you want to reach, and a number of other factors, you may want to limit the scope of your social media marketing efforts.  Many companies make the mistake of trying to have a presence on too many social media sites, and end up spreading themselves too thin.  Astir Analytics has the expertise to guide you to the right choices.

If you wish to learn more about how Astir Analytics can improve your social media marketing presence, contact me at (908) 279-8670 ext. 704.

Best Regards,

Bob Markowitz

Executive Vice President

bmarkowitz@astiranalytics.com

Social Media

There is a lot of buzz coming out of Austin this week from the SXSW conference.  Many of the articles have to do with technology and marketing.  I enjoy reading Rich Meyer’s New Media and Marekting blog and he discusses SXSW in a recent post.  I love this quote from the post “10 Steps to make marketing more relevant again”.  Here Rich says it best, “I don’t care if 100,000 people Like you on Facebook and if your website has 10 million visitors a year.  If you’re still losing market share than something is wrong.  Start looking at metrics like engagement and bounce rates. Evaluate your search marketing to determine the cost per conversion or targeted action and find out the most common paths through your website.”

He is right on the money.  How is this relevant to you?  This is where we come in.  Our firm Astir Analytics focuses on helping you measure the right metrics to determine how effective your marketing campaigns are in converting suspects to prospects to customers.  I would welcome the opportunity to share a few case studies that are relevant to your business to help you make some changes to the status quo.

Please contact me at: nlynn@astiranalytics.com or (908) 279-8670 x717

Thank you,

Nathan

Nathan  Lynn | Director of Business Development

Astir Analytics

In a recent short article in MarketingProfs, regarding boosting the  impact of business to business content marketing (http://www.marketingprofs.com/short-articles/2500/three-ways-to-augment-the-effectiveness-of-your-b2b-content-marketing?adref=nlt022412&utm_source=mpt&utm_medium=quicktake&utm_campaign=basic&utm_term=content&utm_content=article) the author points to the following three areas as critical; spending more money, aligning content with the buying cycle and C-suite support.

All of the above are obviously important, but they all take for granted that the content itself is perfect (which is not always the case).  Therefore, working and measuring the content effectiveness is a critical factor that needs to occur throughout the process.  It is extremely critical to measure continuously and then change based upon the key measures.

Astir Analytics helps our clients tackle their measures and reporting challenges by designing solutions that meet the most demanding needs. We can help you through the process of understanding the Information to give you better Insight and in the end achieve greater Results.

Give me a call, I’d love to discuss the Astir difference.

Bob Markowitz

Vice President

(908) 279-8670 ext. 704

bmarkowitz@astiranalytics.com

I continue to read and enjoy Richard Meyer’s articles on his New Media and Marketing Blog.  One recent article was entitled, “Do we really need to consistently measure ROI of everything ?”, spoke to the need or lack thereof of constantly trying to measure ROI especially with Social Media.  Richard makes the case that countless hours and thousands of dollars is wasted when trying to understand and quantify the effectiveness of social media.  It puts it plainly, “ROI starts and ends with sales” and I agree that the easiest thing to measure is revenue.  To that end why not create a dashboard that measure sales as related to marketing campaigns?  Our clients here at Astir Analytics have created dashboards that bring in all of their marketing campaigns both online and offline into one place to have one version of the truth.  From this dashboard that can tell in a few simple mouse clicks how they are doing and if in fact they are moving the company towards reaching its sales goals.

Please contact me to learn more on how we can help you gather the right Information to provide the most accurate Insight and yield the best Results.

Thank you,

Nathan

Nathan  Lynn | Director of Business Development

Astir Analytics

I really enjoy reading Richard Meyer’s New Media and Marketing Blog.  Richard has been involved in Marketing and specifically Digital Pharmaceutical Marketing for many years.  His last post on Social Media ROI got me thinking.  Social Media continues to be a hot topic, if it wasn’t, then you wouldn’t be reading our Astir Analytics Blog at this very moment!  Just the mention of Social Media and ROI in the same sentence can create a debate that might take on epic proportions.  Some will argue that it is very hard to measure the effectiveness of Social Media, others have found tools (as mentioned in Richard’s post) that help you manage your Twitter account.  I think that regardless of the platform or the medium there has to be some sort of stake in the ground as to why you will engage in yet another form of Marketing, in this case Social Media.  Once you have established your rationale you need to set up some benchmarks to measure and manage the time you will invest.  You may acknowledge that from the very beginning the ROI will be low because you are still pushing out content as you would through a PR firm or maybe it will be high as you engage in customer conversations as Gary Vaynerchuk explains so eloquently on his new book “The Thank You Economy”.

Either way, you can’t manage what you can’t measure.  The unique advantage our clients have when working with us is that we help them build the tools they need to measure their Marketing effectiveness albeit: Social Media campaigns, Email campaigns or Offline campaigns.  We bring it all together so that you have one view of “How Am I Doing?”.

Let’s begin a conversation that starts here, as I know that our Social Media ROI dollars are well spent and you should know that as well.

Thank you,

Nathan

Nathan  Lynn | Director of Business Development

Astir Analytics

50 Cragwood Rd., Suite 219 | South Plainfield, NJ 07080

Office  (908) 279-8670 x717  | Mobile  (973) 699-7122

www.astiranalytics.com

I just came across a great blog post from John Jantsch at Duct Tape Marketing (http://www.ducttapemarketing.com/blog/2012/01/11/5-exercises-in-perceptive-listening/) that discusses the different type of listening that can occur as well as some tasks on how to strengthen your Perceptive Listening skills.  This article really got me thinking about how in Marketing we really need to slow down and really start pay attention and listen better.  What are your customers or prospects really telling you?  Are you really listening to them?

As I continued to ponder this question, I wanted to see how this would relate to our business to see if there was a connection.  I came to the conclusion that in order to listen you need to understand and in order to understand you need some basic facts. It can be boiled down to asking questions and listening for the answers.

This is where we come in!

Here at Astir Analytics we have worked with our clients to develop some innovative surveys that have auto-generate recommendations documents that are driven by the survey responses.  In one instance, we worked with a client to build a Performance Benchmark Survey that was used by their sales team to drive more sales because they knew what their client’s need were BECAUSE they had listened.

There is a saying that the numbers tell a story, the question is are you really listening.

Please contact me to continue this discussion and see if there is a way for us to understand your challenges to find a solution that exactly fits your needs.

I promise we are really good listeners!

Thank you,

Nathan

Nathan  Lynn | Director of Business Development

Astir Analytics

50 Cragwood Rd., Suite 219 | South Plainfield, NJ 07080

Office  (908) 279-8670 x717  | Mobile  (973) 699-7122

www.astiranalytics.com

With every company having the power of content creation, literally at their  fingertips, Ann Handley and CC Chapman recently wrote in their book book Content Rules: How to Create Killer Blogs, Podcasts, Videos, Ebooks, Webinars (and More) that Engage Customers and Ignite Your Business, that it is important for companies to welcome this role as a publisher.  However it is not just important to embrace the role with volumes of content, targeted content and content that makes sense to the company audience is key.  Eleven content rules are in turn offered.  To see a synopsis, go to the following article http://www.marketingprofs.com/short-articles/2476/why-content-marketing-rules-and-whats-in-it-for-you?adref=nlt010712&utm_source=mptw&utm_medium=quicktake&utm_campaign=basic&utm_term=content&utm_content=article.

Once all of the targeted content is created and published and as content is updated (in order to keep the message and information fresh and new) measurement is required.  It important area that needs to be understood is what works and what does not.

The experts at Astir Analytics, Astir IT Solutions and Sysnet Technology Solutions can help you get your arms around this area.  We can work with you in understanding the response rates, understanding what measures are important and most importantly understanding what works, and what does not.

We can walk you through the process of helping you understand the Information to give you better Insight and in the end gain greater Results.

Give me a call, I’d love to discuss the Astir difference.

Bob Markowitz

Vice President

(908) 279-8670 ext. 704

bmarkowitz@astiranalytics.com

As the year comes to a close and you reflect back on 2011 and prepare for 2012 one of the areas that you might be focusing on is how your Sales team did this year in converting their Marketing leads.  Are your leads converting to Sales?  Here are a few that should not be overlooked.

In a recent article on Marketo entitled “Are You Lost In A B2B Sales Lead Pardox” the concept of Lead Scoring is discussed as playing a huge role is driving the success of your sales team.  They need to be focused on the right leads at the right time.  Not only does does the Marketing Team and The Sales Team need to come to a consensus on the proper scoring, the leads need to flow to the correct reps through an appropriate technology solution.  Our firm Astir Analytics has the experience and capabilities to not only help you define the proper Lead Scoring for your unique needs but we can also help you deploy a system to help you manage and move the leads through the organization effectively.

The other topic I want to mention from the article is the concept of You can’t Manage What You Can’t Measure.  Analytics plays another key and critical role in managing those valuable leads at any given point of time. Having the right Information to provide the best Insight can only lead to the better Results in your Lead Management Program.

If you would like to learn about our Client’s Success Stories please feel free to contact me for more details, our hope is that we can create the same results for you and your organization.

Happy Holidays from Astir Analytics!

Nathan Lynn

Dir, Business Development

Astir Analytics

nlynn@astiranalytics.com

(973) 699-7122

Nathan Hanks, co-founder and co-chief operating officer of ReachLocal recently wrote an article entitled “10 Ways to Own Page One of the Google Search Results”  (http://www.marketingprofs.com/articles/2011/6381/10-ways-to-own-page-one-of-the-google-search-results).  In his article he lists the top 10 ways to get your listing on page 1 of the Google search results as follows (by the way, his description is focused on the local business perspective) :

-          Search Advertising

-          Website

-          Web page optimization

-          Blog

-          Google Place Page

-          Google Profiles

-          On-line Directories / Listings

-          Social Profiles

-          Review Sites

-          Syndicated Press Releases

While combinations of the above items certainly will drive up your listings, what needs to be understood is that continual refinement of the above is absolutely necessary, no matter which ones of the above you undertake.  It’s not as easy as set it and forget it, since your competition is also vying for the key page 1 listings.

What isn’t discussed in his article is the constant monitoring, measurement and refinement necessary  in order to continue to succeed.  While it takes a considerable amount of work to get to page 1, it takes as much or more work to stay on the page 1 listings.  Astir Analytics helps our clients tackle their measurement, analysis, and reporting needs, by designing  solutions built to meet the most demanding needs.

We can help you through the process of helping you understand the Information to give you better Insight and in the end gain greater Results.

Give me a call, I’d love to discuss the Astir difference,

Bob Markowitz

Vice President

(908) 279-8670 ext. 704

bmarkowitz@astiranalytics.com

There was an interesting article by Christopher Krywulak that discusses the phenomena of customers knowing more than salespeople     (http://www.marketingprofs.com/articles/2011/6200/when-your-customers-know-more-than-your-salespeople?adref=nlt102111).  A major contributing factor to this is on-line availability of information.  While much of the article focuses on the in-store experience, it is obvious that this is true also for the business to business environment as well.

Each of us  receive an immense amount of information everyday, whether delivered to a smartphone, reader, tablet or PC.  The trick becomes how to process all of this information and how to make quick smart decision.  In the same way, as we make our decisions, the companies that we affect by these decisions receive data on what we did.  In turn causing them to make new decisions, causing new information. Sort of a vicious cycle.

So while Mr. Krywulak’s focus was on the product information used in making buying decisions, we need to also look at the data implications surrounding the decisions from both the buyer and seller perspective.  This all leads to measurement along the way in order to gain a better understanding of what is happening, why it is happening and what to do about it.  Which is where we come in.

Astir Analytics helps our clients tackle their metrics and reporting issues and design solutions that meet the most demanding needs. We can help you through the process of understanding the Information to give you better Insightand in the end greater Results.

Give me a call, I’d love to discuss  the Astir difference,

Bob Markowitz

Vice President

(908) 279-8670 ext. 704

bmarkowitz@astiranalytics.com