Online marketplace next evolution?
A central idea behind the online marketplace has been taken from the high street department store where many different brands and products are all available under 'one roof'. This is where I'd draw a line under the similarities, as an online marketplace takes the model to a new level. There is no need to commit working capital on inventory as the products displayed are held by the retailers and brand partners. The online marketplace combines eCommerce and well-crafted customer journey design and advanced use of actionable data to attract visitors onto a website with the intentional of selling branded products and services. Customer insight derived from CRM, analytics and big-data. Cutting edge algorithms can use AI with actionable insight being sourced from big data and blockchain taking care of the transactional elements. Real time integration between the suppliers and the online marketplace
Three popular cloud migration paths
Context. The last 10 years has seen a marked change in IT strategy and platform hosting strategy across business sectors as companies have moved to cloud based services. This article provides a simplified view of three different cloud migration paths. At the time of writing this update (Feb 2020) it appears that most businesses have now moved away from on-premises to the cloud and many of these business are now considering further migrations in search of optimisation or performance improvements. Other drivers for migration can be a change in strategy, a merger or an acquisition. Much has been written about selecting the best strategies as migration is often complex and can appear daunting. By breaking down the project into logical units of work and taking a step-by-step approach, even the most complex migration paths can be simplified and de-risked. Migration will
Online self-service drives EBIT
Online customer self service functionality delivers substantial upsides to EBIT. It's not difficult to identify and measure the business benefits of a new online self-service. It helps if agreement has been reached, in advance of launching the service, on the attribution model and benefits recognition (using standard metrics, benchmarks and KPIs). An obvious example would be the correlation between a particular new online self service completions and corresponding call reductions in customer service functions or through call-centres. Since most call-management systems track calls and outcomes it is possible to correlate specific transaction types back to the equivalent equivalent transaction type (subject to accurate call logging and reporting). This means we can now put realistic business-cases together to invest in 'customer journey optimisation' projects and determine the ROI. The selling of complex products such as insurance, holidays and international courier services
Responsive vs Adaptive vs Apps
The best mobile experience for your customers and best outcome for your business may be delivered by a mobile web-app (aka adaptive web). But you may be bucking the trend if you go with a web-app instead of building a downloadable mobile app or just going for the one-size fits all 'mobile first' website design. This post explores pros and cons of a mobile web app, compares to two other popular options and provides a case study of a successful web-app implementation for a global brand. Pros and Cons of a Mobile Web App AKA adaptive web Likely to be less complex (therefore less risky) and costly than designing and building a downloadable mobile app. The best mobile experience for the customer will undoubtedly be where the digital journey has been designed and optimised specifically for mobile visitors, with
Content commercialisation with social media and ad-tech
Business and Technical Integration of Social Media Commercialisation of Social Media with ad-tech and retail is a phenomena most people are aware and familiar with. Social Media is used to extend brand reach and content distribution, drawing us to other sites, platforms for monetised content and online retail. Visitors are surreptitiously compelled to engage in social commerce Social Media is also great for lead generation, customer support, PR. The proliferation of Social Media platforms with global reach and unimaginable audience levels is a gift to digital savvy businesses. These platforms are like ready made channels to market. By sparking the reader's interest in particular subject matter, readers are naturally drawn other digital publications sitting on other websites that are designed and built find out more about them and to make money online. Board-level commitment is required to increase the
2014 ‘social media marketing’ with Facebook?
Here are some reasons why, in 2014, I thought that channel integration of facebook was a good idea for online marketeers. Social networks lend themselves to the sharing of great ideas, products and brand advocacy. Successful social media posts and interactions can drive visitor traffic to product landing pages and booking engines on a website. Promotion of events and campaigns are available through a device in the pockets of an increasingly large global demographic who buy their mobile phone for social media: Over 1 billion active Facebook users each month use it on mobile, representing the vast majority of active Facebook users. Facebook remains the undisputed leader in social media referral traffic (23.39% of social media referrals reported at the time of this post in Oct 2014) Plenty of tools to provide insight on Facebook marketing and enrich our understand about customer
Augmenting Customer Insight with AI and Big Data
An example of actionable customer insight would be information about a customer's propensity to respond to 'call to action'. Ideally we'd like to access this information, in real time and across any given channel. Actionable customer insight can be automatically derived using algorithms that apply rules and logic. These algorithms based on simple business rules on limited data sets, but accuracy improves with increased complexity and bigger data sets. Machine learning can bee applied using AI methods to enable ongoing automatic optimisation. Next best actions are determined through algorithms that rely on data-models that are built from behaviours, patterns and trends. Data is sourced across multiple channels and retained in data lakes and/or big-data repositories, then processed and re-organised across data-marts that are tailored towards particular applications. Discuss... using decisioning and next best action solutions. Sources of big-data
How to get ahead of the curve online.
This article was first published on 26th June 2010 on my first professional website. What strikes me is the paradox that technology and method have massively evolved over the period, yet we still face the same challenges and business priorities. This short paper looks at ten ways to getg ahead of the curve online. In particular it looks at boosting the performance of your web assets so that your digital proposition is the preferred click through from natural search. 1. Well defined content strategy. This keeps your websites alive and fresh, with content ownership mapped-out across the business and a commitment to ensure editorial (stories and images) remain vibrant and relevant. Use content format that is appealing and sutable for target audience groups. for example, the right mix of text and images, use of video clips, user generated content, data