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An online brand's knowledge of individual consumer preference is now the standard for nurturing long-term relationships. This ensures customer intimacy, which is becoming a key strategic imperative for companies to differentiate themselves and optimize their acquisition and retention results.
Large companies in India are increasingly focusing on digital transformations due to greater awareness of new operating models, essential to survive disruption. The adoption of the Internet of Things (IoT), automation, robotics and artificial intelligence (AI), combined with design thinking, extends beyond digitally-intense industries such as retail, media and telecom.
For digital technology to yield the maximum business benefit, it needs to transcend the boundaries of marketing and channels, joining up the customer experience with elements of the business – such as sales, customer service, distribution, product development, human resources, research and development, manufacturing, and logistics. Each of these has a role to play in the customer experience and each one of them can be enhanced through data and the insights it surfaces.
Rajan Anandan, the Google's vice president for Southeast Asia and India, talks about the current key drivers for internet penetration in the country. He noted that data and smartphone prices as well as the rise of Indic (Indian languages), will continue impact growth.
OPINION: The biggest mistake the media industry tends to make is to separate print and digital operations as though they were mortal enemies. Or worse, paying lip service to the online environment just to be seen to be actually doing something about the internet of things that so rudely disrupted the cosy comfort of the print industry of yore.
With almost two-thirds of all consumer purchases made within half an hour of being exposed to Out-of-Home (OOH) advertising, it's time to revisit the critical role the medium plays in the broader marketing mix. Roadside Outdoor Audience Data (ROAD) now provides rich data on the consumption and impact of billboards, and integrated with other media stats allows brands to further craft effective, integrated campaigns. OOH should play a key role in this space, argues Howard Lonstein, Marketing Manager for Outdoor Network.
In the last few decades, telecom services and information technology in India have seen a steady progress. Today we are inching towards a New India. With PM Narendra Modi’s Digital India vision, India is seeing a paradigm shift moving gradually towards a cashless economy, with Digital at the forefront and a more conducive business environment.
Meet Sunil Bharti Mittal, the man who transformed the way Indians kept in touch, from the year-long wait for a landline connection to mobile phones that could be used anywhere and were available to everyone.
Easypr.ng, an online marketing and media content distribution platform has been launched in Lagos. Through the platform, individual and corporate organizations in need of public relations and other marketing services can customize required service to suit their budget plans.
The paper explores Small and Medium Size Enterprises (SMEs) in Saudi Arabia within the context of environmental sustainability. The objective of the study is to examine whether SME’s sustainable marketing competitive advantage through environmental initiatives can positively associate to a firm’s environmental (green) best practices and stakeholder influences; similarly, it also identifies if best practices mediate environmental costs and competitive advantage. A sample of 181 responses are obtained and are analysed using factor analysis, multiple regression and their interaction effects. The findings show that the association between firms that have competitive advantage due to environmental initiatives were found to be significant for best practices and indirect stakeholder influences. Furthermore, the results identified that by using environmental best practices, SMEs can lower their environmental costs to gain marketing competitive advantage. These findings highlight the function of environmentalism and how it can influence practitioners.
A fantastic roundup of stats from the APAC region this month, with data on luxury ecommerce, marketing automation, app usage and mobile payments.
This chapter investigates the characteristics, challenges and dynamics of female entrepreneurship in developing contexts. In so doing, the authors first review the literature on female entrepreneurship in developing contexts, clustering results by region, they then provide a focused case study on female entrepreneurship in Jordan. The chapter identifies research gaps and future research directions, as well as recommendations for policy makers and entrepreneurs.
Companies should allocate budget to researching their customers' needs and wants and digital behaviour before developing a digital marketing strategy, advises digital communications consultant, Sue Disler, in this Q&A with Bizcommunity.com.
From artificial intelligence to rising data intelligence and brand safety, the IAB South Africa council heads have alerted the industry to the latest digital marketing trends for this year. With 2017 well into its second half here is a list of trends that have been preoccupying the minds of the IAB councils. The trends were curated by the IAB South Africa from its council heads.
According to a recent survey by E-consultancy, customer experience will overtake price and product specifications as the key brand differentiator by 2020. Add to this the fact that customers are more digital than ever, demanding an omni-channel interaction model with products and services tailored specifically for them, and it’s safe to say that we are living in the era of the digitally evolved customer, where technology allows the customer to sit at the centre of everything.
Paris-based NetBooster Group has launched digital performance marketing agency, NetBooster South Africa, in partnership with Limbik Responding Creative. This makes available its digital services and expertise to South African firms through a strategic partnership for sub-Saharan Africa with Limbik, a SA agency based in Stellenbosch.
Analytics and big data ventures in business are slated to continue to grow at rapid rates around the globe in the next few years. Studies by management-consulting firms like A T Kearney have projected a growth rate of 10 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of the analytics software industry between 2015 and 2020 (Forbes 2015). With pressures on business to show growth and profitability, and with increasing competition, the role of analytics and knowledge management services, in general, is bound to grow further (Bhandari, Singer & Scheer, 2014).
Social media has empowered customers' to play an active role through liking, commenting, interacting and building communities, giving feedback and co-creating products and services. So it has become imperative for organizations to adopt social media and engage their customers positively. Studies on the drivers for the organization to adopt social media, a socio-technical innovation, are very few. This paper studies the factors for an organization that lead to adoption of social media. Technology Acceptance Model, Users and Gratification Theory (U&G) and Technology -- Organization -- Environment (TOE) framework will be studied to identify key factors leading to adoption of social media by the organizations. The research also explores the impact of social media adoption on marketing strategies of the organization.
Digital marketing can be clearly called as one of the best marketing mediums owing to its effectiveness and simplicity. As compared to several conventional marketing tools, it is more accountable and enables companies to keep a track of their investment. Companies and brands are now investing in campaigns regardless of their budget and are able to measure the responses in real time. Digital marketing is bigger than ever in diverse economies of Europe and the United States. Further, it is leaving a lasting impact on the Middle East and Asia Pacific region. The Middle East is an amalgamation of several markets with assorted cultures and preferences. It can be a tough task to target Middle East as a single market.
