As it’s the first week in January, it’s crystal ball gazing time and not one to be left out we’ve taken a look at the many predictions around what will be the next big thing in Marketing in 2012. We’ve selected a few of what we think are the hottest trends. So read on to discover why the only place to be seen this year is on screen. And if you’re feeling downcast by tales of economic woe, how brands will be ready to divert your attention through gamification and interactive apps. Find out why your purse could soon become a collector’s item and community focused initiatives are set to capture the hearts of consumers.

Digital wallets
Contactless payment devices such as near-field communication (NFC) and QR codes will enter the mainstream in 2012. When used in smartphones, they encourage customers to merge their wallet with their mobile phones. Surveys suggest consumers are ready to embrace this trend. Two-thirds of UK shoppers say cash is inconvenient , according to 2011 surveys by Barclays and PayPal. According to Juniper Research, 300 million devices will be on offer to allow consumers to “tap and pay” through NFC by 2014. It is estimated the value of contactless payments and ticketing using NFC will reach $113bn (£72.4bn) per year by 2016 around the world. (Source: Stylus.com)

Welcome to the cloud
Businesses will invest large amounts of money in cloud computing and mobile technology next year. According to the report: IDC Predictions 2012: Competing for 2020, 2012 will see more money spent on mobiles and tablets than PCs and 80 per cent of commercial applications are set to be on cloud platforms. “The UK is underinvested in IT –  and with advertising and consumer spending rapidly moving online and kit becoming out of date, some rise there is likely,” points out chief executive of the Centre for Economic and Social Research, Douglas McWilliams. (Source: IDC.com, Insight.com)

Local marketing and partnerships
As the clean-up efforts following the London riots show, community love is on the rise. This year will see a resurgence of local marketing to tap into people’s collective devotion to their local community. While the internet by nature is international, there is a growing market for local websites and scope for businesses to tailor websites to specific localities. Brands are also set to tap into this trend for collective working as partnership marketing becomes more common. This will not just be about tactical value-based promotions but about strategic alliance with other brands. (Source:23red)

Screening
In 2012, if it is not on screen, it’s not worth seeing. Touchscreens and tablets have made it much more convenient for consumers to view online while they are on the move. UK supermarket chain Sainsbury’s has tapped into this trend by partnering with television provider Sky, allowing shoppers to watch sports events while they shop using in-cart iPad docks and speakers. In 2012, video consumption will soar as brands increasingly use this channel to engage with customers. Video brochures, video newsletters, and regular video communications will become standard features on websites. According to Cisco, 80 per cent of all internet traffic will be driven by video by 2015. (Source: Trendwatching.com, Milwardbrown). Running in tandem with this is the prediction that mobile is set to overtake the desktop PC and laptop – which is why it’s more important than ever to ensure that you have responsive web design to allow for the multitude of devices that your potential customers can access your site via.

Playfulness
In a bid to escape from the grim news about the economy, consumers will become more responsive to entertainment and escapism. Big brands will become more playful, using gamification and other “funware” that use points, puzzles and level progression to attract and engage customers. Social tools and technologies that enable people to interact with TV programmes will explode in 2012. Viewers will be able to interact with TV and producers will draw on this data for creative inspiration. Services such as Bluefin Labs and GetGlue indicate traditional TV ratings may be bolstered by “social ratings” as advertisers start to take into account how a show is travelling beyond the TV audience. (Source: Milward Brown)

LexisClick is a full service digital marketing agency, we specialises in helping businesses grow by using the power of digital marketing, with services such as web design and build, SEO, PPC, email marketing, and social media.

To find out how we can ensure your marketing is on trend in 2012 take a look around our website www.lexisclick.com or give us a call on 01202 788333.

From the LexisClick Marketing Team

(Adapted from Trends for 2012 from The Marketer January 2012)

B2B Online Marketing, Blogging for business, Email marketing, Marketing General, Online Advertising, Online Marketing, Social Media Marketing, Web Design

Blogging for business, Marketing General, Online Marketing, Social Media Marketing

The following infographic shows some key stats from the Econsultancy report which was published earlier in November. (State of Social Report 2011).

We’d love to hear about what you measure in your social media metrics… drop us a line.  From the Social Media Team at LexisClick.

B2B Online Marketing, Blogging for business, Online Marketing, Social Media Marketing

A recent report from Econsultancy states that companies are still grappling with the isue of measuring social media (SM), though fewer are reporting that they are unable to measure ROI (37%) compared with 47% last year.
The three most important SM metrics reported are direct traffic from SM sites, brand awareness, and customer engagement, which have little to do with ROI! See the table below fo breakdown of responses…

From The Social Media Team at LexisClick

Blogging for business, Marketing General, Social Media Marketing

More information about the producer can be found via the following link

http://blog.piajanebijkerk.com/WordPress/2011/03/18/giving-credit/

B2B Online Marketing, Blogging for business, Email marketing, Marketing General, Online Marketing, Uncategorized, Web Design

Fast on the heels of our LinkedIn Cheat Sheet comes one for Twitter. This  includes useful tips and explanations of the most popular terms and icons. Statistics for Twitter are more difficult to track down but Twitter themselves state that they have 175 million users worldwide – though how many of these are active accounts is debateable.

Love it or hate it you shouldn’t be ignoring it!

Twitter Cheat Sheet 2

B2B Online Marketing, Blogging for business, Marketing General, Online Advertising, Online Marketing, Social Media Marketing

LinkedIn has 152 million users worldwide, with approximately one million new members joining every week. Get up to speed and join in the fun with this jargon buster!

LexisClick LinkedIn Cheat Sheet 2

B2B Online Marketing, Blogging for business, Marketing General, Online Advertising, Online Marketing, Uncategorized

We stumbled across a Google+ cheat sheet on Mashable.com The cheat sheet includes most of the common syntax, hotkeys and tips you need to know to use Google+ Cheat Sheet. Let us know if you find this useful, or if you’ve found any other cheat sheets that you’d like to share…!

Blogging for business, Marketing General, Online Advertising, Online Marketing cheat sheets, Google

We use it for fun, we use it to arrange our social life and we use if for business.

Your Facebook business page wall is the home where your business’ fans, friends, customers and critics can all interact directly with your company. They can post questions, comments, feedback or fan mail. Fellow fans of your business may even interact with each other.  Many individuals will interact with content your business has posted itself.

There are three ways people can interact on your Facebook Business Page that you should be monitoring.

Wall posts: Anyone who ‘likes’ your page can post content to your page’s wall. And that means ‘anyone’! They can say good things, complain, talk about a recent experience they’ve had – whether it was good or bad. These remarks are user generated content about your brand and as such are very powerful.

Comments: These are an opportunity to react to a wall post. Both you and your fans can comment.  Think of it as a mini conversation that started from the original post.

Likes: The classic thumbs up! If someone ‘likes’ a wall post, this means they like the content of that post or they are agreeing with it.

Another important thing to understand about the content that gets posted to your page’s wall is, that the more people interact with a wall post, the more ‘viral’ that post becomes. For example, when a individual posts something to a page’s all, that action is also referenced on the wall of that individual’s personal profile. Same goes with ‘liking’ and ‘commenting’. Also wall posts that receive an exceptional amount of ‘likes’ and ‘comments’ often show up in other Facebook users’ ‘news feeds’.

Your ‘news feed’ consists of the most relevant and important items occurring in your network. Your goal should be to react to the most important items in your business’ news feed and get your wall posts featured in others’ news feeds.

(Taken from – A guide to streamlining your social media process – Hubspot)

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www.twitter.com

What you should be monitoring in Twitter

There’s lots of valuable information available to marketers in Twitter if only you can find it…

Here’s some hints and tips on the type of information and tweets you should be looking out for!

Relevant questions about your company: If someone tweets ‘should I buy X product or a competitor’s product?’ you want to be ready to respond. If not directly by offering helpful content about your business, perhaps you could point that person to a customer of yours if you can’t help directly.

Relevant questions about your sector: Being helpful by answering someone’s question is a great way to develop credibility with that person. In the event they need a product or service related to one your business provides they might end up coming to you!

Requests for support: If a customer tweets a request for help (either directly to you or perhaps via their network) it is very important that you notice that tweet and respond accordingly. Happy customers are key to a successful business.

Complaints and feedback: Critics are always out there, and it’s important to acknowledge and resolve issues when you can. Leaving them unanswered is the worst option.

Competitor mentions: Monitor those conversations for information and data, other people are praising them, complaining and asking questions – it’s free competitor intel.

Praise: It’s a wonderful thing to receive – why not say thank you? Retweet it.  Save it to your favourites. It’s wise to appreciate those who appreciate you!

(Taken from – A guide to streamlining your social media process – Hubspot)

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