TM Events case study summary
Written by Martin Wong on August 31, 2011
A Fully Immersed Social Event Experience™ Helps TM Events Trend in Canada
Event management company TM Events used social media during their 10th Anniversary Party to drive up awareness of their brand. This one campaign doubled Facebook page views and increased their fans and followers by more than 25%.
When TM Events decided to include social media as part of their 10th Anniversary Party, they turned to MarketingSmartt to create their social media campaign. They liked the philosophy behind MarketingSmartt’s Fully Immersed Social Event Experience™, which integrates social media activities with the physical venue to deliver measurable results.
TM Events CEO Traci Myles had two main goals behind adding social media to the party:
- To prove that social media built around an event can help companies gain Twitter followers and Facebook fans,
- To do it in a way that merged social media with an event in a fun, seamless, unique, and memorable way.
Tip of the Month – August
Written by Martin Wong on August 31, 2011
Track Your Lead Sources
Lead management tools, analytics, CRM systems. When you are juggling between traditional and Internet marketing, it seems as though you need sophisticated tools to track your results. But even If you’re not ready to implement contact management tools, there are some simple tracking mechanisms you can adopt.
Use different phone numbers
Use different phone numbers on your website, print ads, collaterals, and directory listings. When print ads ruled, it was good practice to use different phone numbers or email addresses on different ads and marketing collateral. Now that you’re online, it’s no different. This is particularly important if you are running SEO or other online campaigns. If you use the same phone number for both online and print ads for example, how do you differentiate?
Include social media
Update your online contact form to include social media. Social media is the new word-of-mouth. Your sales reps used to ask, “How did you hear about us?” Make sure the form on your “Contact Us” page asks this question and includes options such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, blog, and popular product review sites.
Evaluate, evaluate, evaluate
Consumer buying habits have changed drastically over the past five years. Even if you’re just using a spreadsheet, you need to document where your leads are coming from to avoid making decisions based on habit or subjective opinions. Consider these statistics:
- 74% of consumers rely on social networks to guide purchase decisions. (Gartner, July 2010)
- 62% of shoppers search for deals online before at least half of their shopping trips (Wall Street Journal, 2011)
For example, your marketing budget may be split evenly between print ads and Internet marketing. You find out, however, that 80% of your leads come from online sources. Tracking lead sources tell you which mediums are most effective, and allow you to re-evaluate where to put your efforts.
Conversion Optimization
Written by Martin Wong on August 31, 2011
Testimonials are Dead: Long Live User Reviews
You’ve worked really hard to collect customer testimonials for your website. Testimonials have been one of the most effective ways of demonstrating the quality of your product or service to potential buyers. But recent studies show that with shoppers going online to do research, testimonials might not be as powerful as before.
- The average shopper uses 10.4 sources of information to make a decision, an increase from 5.3 sources in 2010. (Google, 2011)
- Shoppers trust consumer reviews nearly 12 times more than descriptions that come from manufacturers. (eMarketer, February 2010)
- 67% of shoppers spend more money online after reading recommendations online. (Internet Retailer, September 2009)
