What is a Demand Side Platform? 

An ad tech used by advertisers in real-time bidding options, demand-side platforms allow people to purchase ad inventory from multiple suppliers simultaneously, including ad networks, ad exchanges, and individual publishers. The DSP network keeps all available suppliers in one place, so ad buying and management are easier for advertisers. A DSP is one of the most basic tools in programmatic advertising, almost eliminating the need for human participation in the auction. Demand-side platforms and supply-side platforms automatically pit publisher inventory against suitable ad units, in accordance with the parameters set by advertisers and publishers. This happens in a short period of time and this is what makes it a very cost-effective method of ad inventory purchase and selling. 

DSPs are used for programmatic ad buying, particularly bidding in RTB auctions. DSP’s task is to purchase the impressions on a suitable inventory, showing it to users that have met certain criteria of the optimal (minimum) price. Commonly used by agency trading desks (ATDs), advertisers, agencies, or in-house marketing teams, DSPs allow media buyers to get access to many SSPs, Ad Networks, and Ad Exchanges through a singular interface. So they may buy rich media, mobile, video, and native ads simultaneously. This process of inventory purchase happens within seconds, making trading profitable and less cumbersome. 

DSPs are the opposite of SSPs or Supply Side Platforms, which refer to a technological platform representing the publisher’s interests, selling ad inventory. SSPs receive the bids from advertisers and inventory requirements from DSPs. When someone wins the RTB auction, both parties i.e the advertiser and publisher have their interests served. 

Why Did Demand Side Platforms Arise? 

Earlier, digital ads were purchased and sold by ad buyers and salespersons. DSPs came into being to remove the need for media buyer and publisher negotiations. The process became cheaper, more transparent, and fully automated. Manual negotiation has no place in the world of DSPs. Purchasing ad space in real-time through DSPs allows advertisers the chance to target audiences very specifically, with certain campaigns, at the right time in the right ad formats. 

DSPs have basically automated decision-making and decide which impression is worthy of a bid while calculating the maximum value of each impression. An RTB auction sees the system sorting impressions automatically to announce the highest bidder, who pays the price which is preset by the second-price auction, i.e a $0.01 increase over the 2nd highest bid offered. This is called a fair price mechanism, put in place from preventing overspending by advertisers. 

How Do Demand Side Platforms Work? 

Using a DSP campaign building tool, an advertiser can provide certain criteria to set a target audience, like age, gender, annual income, etc. Then, if they want to spread their ad budget throughout the day, the ‘Daily Cap’ option allows them to do so. The ‘lifelong pacing’ option allows you to distribute the budget over the ad campaign’s lifetime. If you want to make sure that your ads show only on good-quality websites, you can block web pages that show sensitive content and blacklist publishers you don’t want to deal with. 

Manipulations, tuning, configurations, and optimizations are up to the advertisers, which is why DSPs are called self-served demand-side platforms. There are managed service and full-service DSPs, designed for advertisers who need support in managing their campaigns. 

RTB Bidding

DSPs analyze inventory to decide its value on behalf of the advertiser. If it fits the targeting settings, DSP calculates the maximum cost of that ad inventory. The bid response is then relayed back to the ad exchange. Bid prices are based on the advertiser’s preset budgeting data, and information like browsing behavior, place, and age groups. Machine learning algorithms have ensured that analyzing impressions happen almost immediately. 

Ad Networks

What Are They? 

Acting as a bridge between advertisers and publishers, or DSPs and SSPs in case of programmatic advertising, Ad Networks also known as Digital Advertising Networks pick up inventory from publishers put it into categories, and offer this as inventory to advertisers based on demographics. There are many kinds of ad networks, each of them with a different purpose. 

Horizontal Ad Networks

Working with multiple publishers, such networks give publishers the golden treatment, i.e there are no barriers on the way. They work on a CPC model, which means that you only pay if the visitor clicks on your ad. Such a network is amazing for low-budget ad campaigns, as the ability to target could be curtailed. 

Vertical Ad Networks

These allow you to target site visitors. They will work with publishers who specialize in a particular niche, like sports, fashion, hobbies, lifestyle, and so on. Some networks may work with publishers just based on niche, so if the site isn’t a fit, the publisher may not be presented. 

Premium Ad Networks

Only accepting the best inventory with the highest levels of traffic, like The Guardian or HuffPost, premium ad networks are tough to join. It is deemed to be the safest place for online media trading. 

Basic Difference Between a DSP and an Ad network

While demand-side platforms may sometimes offer features as ad networks do, the ability to dip into a pool of resources and specific targeting is their USP. Most DSPs offer one tool for the ad campaign launch, optimization, and analysis, which gives them a point over ad networks that aren’t always all-in-one. DSPs charge only when a transaction takes place, without adding margins to inventory. Both DSP platforms and ad networks work in conjunction without losing quality. The latter adjusts RTB bidding opportunities, while the former purchases the premium ad inventory, only to resell it with higher margins.

The Following Table Presents a Comparison of DSP and Ad Networks

Which Should You Choose? 

Advertisers prefer DSPs over ad networks because of a lack of control and low efficiency. Ad networks have certain disadvantages, like fixed CPM and masked site reporting. Earlier with the absence of automation software, they were used, but today advertisers use programmatic advertising, without relying on ad networks anymore. Thanks to DSPs, you have an unlimited supply of inventory from many sources, and can create custom audience segments with specific targeting. The advertisers get access to a range of publishers all over the world and only have to manage ad campaigns, while real-time bidding is implemented by the media buying process. 

Final Thoughts

To start purchasing inventory automatically, you need to sign up with a DSP provider or build your own. Look for one with a sophisticated DSP and customizable technology so you can always expand your brand’s services. Read our blog on ad viewability and its impact on publishers’ revenue to find out how low ad viewability can negatively impact publishers. 

The post A Guide to Understanding Demand Side Platform first appeared on Publir.

Bid shading algorithms examine prior clearing prices of a placement, compare them to what a buyer is ready to pay and make their best prediction of the lowest price a buyer may submit to win the auction. However, there is a lot that may go into bid shading algorithms—for example, ad size, site, placement on-page, and so on—and each firm handles it a bit differently. Bid shading was created to keep consumers who are dissatisfied with having to pay much higher costs under the first-price model, which has recently gained favor.

How does bid shading work?

Although ad tech companies differ in how to bid shading works, the main goal is to discover and agree on a bid cost that is somewhere between the first and second-price bids. Taking the arithmetic median of the first-price and second-price bids is one approach to achieve this. While this is a simple technique, it is not the most efficient in terms of calculating the best value for the offer. 

The alternative way is to examine previously-stored data such as bid history, site statistics, ad size, and win rates, and then compute the bid based on the expected value of the impression.

However, because the main objective of bid shading is to “bid lower to save money,” users of bid shading will end up winning fewer auctions than they would if it wasn’t in use.

According to data from The Trade Desk, Rubicon Project, and Pubmatic, bid shading can save buyers up to 20% on costs. Some companies provide bid shading as a free service, while others charge a fee based on the money saved.

Who offers bid shading?

A small number of DSPs and exchanges, including all of the majors, provide bid shading. Since the introduction of programmatic advertising, publishers and advertisers have found it increasingly challenging to effectively manage ad inventory. 

Publishers are debating whether first-price style auctions are the way to go moving ahead because programmatic advertising networks predominantly rely on second-price style auctions to generate money. 

Google Ad Manager adopted first-price style auctions throughout its network in late 2019, providing for improved pricing transparency for both display and video advertisements. Bid shading has offered advertisers more control over ad space spending while also stabilizing demand for publishers’ ad inventory.

What does bid shading mean for buyers?

Bid shading is a service that is provided to buyers. If you’re a buyer, there’s nothing wrong with bid shading. Demand-side platforms (DSPs) introduced bid shading to shield their clients from price inflation when the market transitioned from second-price to first-price auctions.

Today, it’s simply one part of their larger bidding strategy. The DSP analyses historical trade data to anticipate the minimum successful bid price for future purchasing opportunities, which is used to inform bid-shading. The bid values of the DSP are then gradually reduced to achieve an appropriate price while retaining the win rate. This makes a lot of sense as a way for DSPs to add value to their consumers.

How does bid shading affect publishers?

In principle, first-price auctions mean that publishers will receive greater rates from purchasers. Many purchasers didn’t know how to alter their bids for a first-price auction before bid shading, so they momentarily overpaid, benefiting publishers. However, the recent evolution of bid shading has resulted in a 20% fall in publisher CPMs on average. With the correct tools, publishers can maintain price control and manage yield.

Setting price floors is a profitable method that publishers can adopt. Adjusting price floors in Ad Exchange may have a big beneficial influence on publisher revenues if done correctly. The price floor sets a lower price ceiling for bid shading algorithms, and the impact is similar to the second price auction, except that the adjustment occurs on the bidder’s side rather than in the auction itself.

What does the future of bid shading hold?

As per numerous advertising sources, bid shading is not a totally new concept. Historical bid data and auction dynamics have long been used by DSPs and SSPs to enhance and improve their products. In general, they aren’t merely providing ‘bid shading.’ 

Those that cannot afford to create their own technology must rely on DSPs to generate the appropriate bids and avoid spending too much. Publishers on the sell-side are not required to take any action since they have no influence over bid shading. Bid shading will very certainly be used when the industry transitions to first-price auctions.

Final Thoughts

Understanding the dynamics of both first-price and second-price auctions is critical for publishers. First-price auctions may increase income prospects for publishers while also providing advertisers with a clearer insight of auction dynamics. The switch to first-price auctions is simply one piece of the transparency jigsaw as the industry strives to create a fair playing field that allows for more transparent bidding.

In addition to the ability to win premium inventory bids, header bidding and bid shading give marketers a wider reach to reach their target audience at a lower cost. For all intents and purposes, both publishers and marketers are in a win-win position.

Read More

10 Questions Every Publisher should ask when selecting an Advertiser

Top 13 Ways to Improve Your Organic Click-Through Rate (CTR)

The post Bid Shading and its impact on Publishers/Marketers first appeared on Publir.

Different Areas Of Seo

On-Page SEO

This is about building content to push your rankings. You need to incorporate keywords into your content and web pages. Your content metatags and titles should be on point, as should your keywords. You shouldn’t stuff your content, and it should be concise and well-written.

Off-Page SEO 

This refers to the optimization processes that happen off the website. For this you need to build and foster online relationships with people, creating content that they love. It lays the groundwork for eventual SEO success. 

What’s The Deal With SEO

SEO is actually quite simple. It needs small changes, based on the bigger ones that the search engines announce. Such changes make a difference to overall site rankings and SEO strategies. Such changes may not come frequently, but when they do it makes sense to be prepared for them. In a broader perspective, SEO insights or best practices, or whatever you’d like to call them, are there to serve as a guideline to tackle problems that occur on the fly. 

SEO Strategies to Follow

Page Title, Meta Description, URL, and Tags – Should Be Thoroughly Formatted

Under 70 characters, and with a maximum of 3 long-tail keywords, the most important keyword should be the first. You should use pipes (|) to separate the keywords. The page’s meta description shouldn’t exceed 150 characters and must include 2 of the keywords that the page title uses. A good meta description gives the reader a reason to visit your website. Stuffing keywords is not good, rather, add them so the content seems conversational. The first keyword should also appear in the webpage’s URL. If you’re using more keywords, separate them by dashes (-). Don’t forget to include at least one or two H1 heading tags, using the first two keywords of the web page title. 

Again, stuffing isn’t recommended. Rather, weave them into the content carefully. H2 heading tags should also be there, to be placed under each H1 tag. 

Know Where Your Traffic Comes From – Social Media, Search, or Direct Visits

Which sources are you getting the most traffic from? Via this metric, you can get website visitors based on metrics like social media, search, and direct visits, individual, tagged marketing campaigns, etc. Search traffic can also be broken down further. A lot of analytics solutions track what part of your SEO-related visits come from Google, Bing, or Yahoo. The data you get can help you make adjustments catering to different requirements and variables, according to the search engine. You have to monitor traffic sources to analyze where your audience is coming from, what they’re interested in, and what kind of content they are clicking on. 

Which Keywords Attract The Most Audience? Find Them And Put Them To Use

The keywords that your audience uses to visit your site are important. You need to track what part of search traffic originates from which of the keywords that you are aiming for. These results can help you formulate your keyword strategy. If a keyword is being repeatedly used to direct traffic to your website, pay attention to it, and build your strategy around it. You can tag and track campaigns using other software tools like SpyFu, so you can get a better idea of where your traffic is originating from if you are looking for organic search traffic sources. 

Are You Using Images Properly

If you are incorporating images into your website, match their file name with one of the page title’s keywords. The alt text in the image should tally with the image’s file name and the page title keyword. Dashes (-) are to be used when separating words in the picture filename, but not between words in the alt text. If you find changing an image file name tough, use a keyword from the page title to change the image’s alt text. 

Mobile Or Desktop? What Are Your Traffic Sources

Today, more people use mobile devices to browse content. There are more mobile searches than desktop searches. If you can track the devices that your visitors use, you can adjust and optimize their experience and make sure they enjoy it. As we look toward the future, mobile devices are going to play a big role in SEO. Tracking traffic by devices can help you create more relevant, user-friendly content.

Always Keep Up With Metrics That Measure Engagement 

If visitors come to your site, that’s just half the battle won. If you want to convert visitors into leads and customers, you need to calculate a few metrics. It is important to measure the engagement of visitors if they land on your page. The first metric, bounce rate, will tell you what percentage of visitors have left your site without navigating to any other page. Another metric, time on page, will tell you the approximate time an average site visitor spends on your page. A third metric, pages per visit, calculates how many individual pages your average visitors end up viewing. 

Internal and Cross Links 

When it comes to internal links, one or two on the page, linking to relevant pages should be used. The keywords to use in the anchor text for each link should be from the list of target keywords. For cross-linking pages, at least 3 internal links should be used, with the anchor text again containing keywords from the page that you are linking to. 

Track Micro and Macro Conversions 

You need conversions, otherwise, engagement makes no difference. You need to know whether search engine traffic is taking the action you want when they visit your website. Web analytics systems can distinguish between micro and macro conversions. The former measures steps on the way to your end goal, like visits to your pricing page, lead conversion, or staying on your site for a fixed period of time. Macro conversions oversee actual wins, like client conversions or sales. Both have to be closely monitored, as they can help you realize what efforts work and what don’t.

Finally, Fix Broken Links and Errors 

A website contains broken links, both internal and external. There may be errors experienced by users if they enter the redirect loop. There might be some 404 errors for users who encounter missing pages, and even Google may run into ‘crawl errors’ while trawling through your site. These small things can directly impact SEO, negatively. Track them constantly, so you can fix them on the fly. 

Final Thoughts

In conclusion, the above SEO strategies and insights can help you, but they aren’t all there is to SEO. There are several tools that can help you monitor your website, and analyze data to craft a successful SEO strategy. Read our blog about it here. SEO needs dedication, and it isn’t a ‘set it and forget it, kind of topic. Keep reading up regularly on new updates to stay abreast of trends, and implement them immediately to ensure your website viewers have a seamless experience.

The post SEO Insights That Are Invaluable If You Want A Good Online Presence first appeared on Publir.

Simple as it may be to answer, it requires very specific data. Without this, a business plan won’t happen, and as a result, your potential investors won’t take you seriously. Nothing can be of help if you don’t know your market size. Putting aside your core product, a lot of market research is required before you launch. The market size should be financially viable. Why would investors get involved if the size is in the millions? 

Why Should You Understand Market Size? 

You need to address two categories. One is the addressable market, i.e the total revenue opportunity of your brand’s goods. The 2nd is the available market, a portion of the first for which you can actually complete. You need to clearly understand the difference between the two to fine-tune your product. 

By calculating market size, you get an idea of market trends. Find out demand drivers, and keep an eye out for early competition that could affect the market size. Market size is imperative if you dream of securing some funding for your business. One of the most basic numbers every potential investor is going to ask you for is one factor that can be easily overlooked while crafting early business plans. 

How Do You Calculate Market Size? 

Data on the number of potential customers or the total number of transactions each year will give you your market size. For example, if you are a start-up selling innerwear, everyone is in your market figure. If people are purchasing several sets of innerwear a year across both online or offline mediums, then there is a good chance that the market size for innerwear is conducive enough for you to enter the market with your product. 

Zero Down On Your Market Sub Segment

No company has a complete monopoly, owning 100% of the market share. Even Facebook, a start-up in a Harvard dorm room, had to compete with an albeit dying Orkut, and MSN messenger, to be a preferred communication medium among university students. A smart Zuckerberg then decided to come up with a strategy that targeted exclusive colleges, so other university students would feel ‘left out of the bandwagon and join his social network. If you are an online education company, you would want to target both parents and children with ads about courses offered on your website. 

Top-Down Market Sizing

It is very important to take into account your local market before estimating the value of the market on a larger scale. Top-down market sizing starts by looking at the current market from a macro perspective and then narrowing it down to a segment you can target realistically.

Let us take an example of a hypothetical start-up selling bananas online in the US. How big would the market be for your fruit-selling start-up? Well, the first step would be to find out how much parents spend on their children. According to the Consumer Expenditure Survey of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average household spends around 751 USD on fruits and vegetables annually, for a total of around 94 billion dollars spent yearly in the US. 

However, not everyone is a fan of home deliveries. Hence, it may be prudent to start services in big cities. Around 30% of America’s population lives in urban areas, so only 30% of those sales can be captured by your start-up, which brings your market size estimate down to 28 billion USD. Also, not all of the fruits and vegetables bought online are bananas. Again, a certain percentage of the audience will go to supermarkets. That further brings down a market size. 

Bottom-Up Analysis

You need to figure out where you want to sell your products, which locations will be willing to stock them, and how many similar products typically sell during a fixed time period. Being objective can help you chart out realistic growth for at least 3 or 4 years. Compare these calculations with the overall addressable market. Any number ranging from 1 to 5 percent of the total market share means your plan may be viable. 

Study Your Competition

The competition density and the nature of companies on top are vital so you can come up with a strategy to fight them. The industry you are in is very important in this regard. For example, the aviation industry is a tough place to crack, and getting even 10% of the market share is considered an achievement. On the other hand, certain manufacturers of very specific B2B engineering products enjoy bigger market shares because there aren’t many similar companies making the same thing. 

Calculate Static Market Size

Carrying out commerce in a static market is tough. Fighting for a bigger slice of the same customer pie, year after year requires clever thinking. A good example here is hospitality, where new hotel companies need to figure whether budget accommodation industry models are doing better than those in the luxury segment. 

Before Calculating Market Size, Remember

Calculating market size requires objectivity. Market size data that reveal issues like a lack of customers may be a red flag. A timely notice so you won’t launch your product in a dead market. Markets are not inherently static, they constantly evolve, and considering market trends such as the latest technology or studying new patterns in consumer spending habits is indispensable for an accurate market size estimate. 

Wrapping Up

In conclusion, when it comes to determining the total addressable market or (TAM), no new company should dream of getting a total of 100% market share. It is impossible to capture an entire market without first going after specific niches, certain price points, demographics, or areas. For those who have a tough time calculating a reasonable amount of market share in their industry, they could call their competitors anonymously to find out their volumes, to get a faint idea. You can also read our blog about carrying out market research in the digital age, so you can access the information you need for your strategy, quickly and easily.

The post What Is Market Size And Why Is It Important first appeared on Publir.

Techniques to understand stages of Brainstorming

Brainstorming can be divided into 3 stages

• Idea capture 
• Idea discussion and critique
• Selection of final concept

To understand these stages in-depth, let us look at the various techniques that one can make use of to effectively brainstorm.

Round Table Idea Writing

This is a nonverbal method that requires everyone to write down around 3 or 4 ideas that are related to the topic they’re discussing. Around 5 to 10 mins should be enough for this procedure. After this, a kind of shuffling may be done wherein one person passes their ideas to either the person on their right or their left. That person, in turn, can add some more unique points and this can go on and on, till the piece of paper makes it back around the table. This way everyone gets a voice and all ideas get captured rather effectively, albeit briefly.

Quick Ideation

This method requires everyone to jot down as many ideas as possible within a stipulated time period. Do this before any idea is discussed so that no concept is shot down before it can even grow and develop. Rapid ideation gives people the chance to capture their ideas prior to the critique stage. Because many ideas are inevitably shot down, noting them down can be quite useful.

This method also prevents people from prematurely killing their own ideas due to a lack of self-confidence.

Figure storming

This method sees the group pick a person, not in the room. It could be a boss, a public figure, or a fictional character. The point is to see the problem from this 3rd person’s perspective. Like for instance. How would Joe Biden approach a particular problem?

This can also be useful because a person who is a little hesitant about putting forth their ideas in public might be comfortable using an alias.

Online Brainstorming

Also called ‘brain netting’ this method sees each and every team member involved using a digital medium. The advantage of this method is that even people who work remotely can contribute solidly. A central location for your team members to jot down ideas will help. Even if your employees aren’t in the same time zone, you can fix a common slot and use an app like Slack to pursue ideas. Even a simple Google Doc which everyone can access can serve as a common company-wide notepad of sorts for certain ideas, whenever staff feels inspired. This is a great way to capture ideas. You should have separate meetings for discussing and executing the chosen ideas. Remote employees feel included and Digital mediums also allow users to create anonymous usernames if they want to protect their identity.

Round Robin Technique 

With this technique, each team member gets a chance to throw an idea into the pool. Even before any idea is examined or critiqued, others may be listed from the rest of the participants. In taking points from each team member in a rapid-fire fashion, this method acts as a sort of figurative hat passed around, with everyone contributing something before the collections are examined. 

The Step Ladder Method

The problem with a lot of brainstorming techniques is that the quieter people in the room don’t get a chance to put forth their points. Sometimes, the first few ideas heavily influence the discussion unfairly. The step ladder method sees a facilitator first introduce the topic and dispatch everyone except 2 people from the room. The 2 selected people will brainstorm for a few minutes before being joined by a third person. This person will give their own points and join in the discussion as well. Slowly, individuals will be reintroduced into the room one by one, each sharing their ideas before finding out what else has been discussed. 

Teammates outside the room can ponder and write down their points but shouldn’t discuss these with anyone else before being invited into the brainstorming room. This method is highly effective if you have a smaller team.  For larger enterprises, different methods will be better suited.

Mind Mapping

It isn’t always the first idea that comes out that is the best. However, using it as a source, one can come up with 2 or three more ideas. Mind mapping is a technique in which a group begins with a single idea, then uses it as a base to come up with similar ideas or sub-ideas. Think of the central idea as being in the middle of a large spider web, and other ideas emerging forth from it. Mind mapping is great for those who prefer to think visually when it comes to brainstorming. 

The Starburst method

A technique that is useful during the later stages, when a group has already decided upon an idea, sees the team begin with the original idea at the center, then create a 6-point star surrounding it. Each point is a question, for example, who is the target audience? What is the best time for a product launch? What was the reason for creating the product? The Starburst idea for brainstorming depends on questions, so as to probe the idea from each angle. The point is to defend the idea, to see whether it stands the test, and then moving forward with all the questions answered. It’s a good way for teams to work on solutions together. 

Changing the Playground

Sometimes changing things up works wonders. Take your team out to a casual lunch, or even switch to a different floor in your office building to get new ideas flowing. Being in a different physical space can change how employees think because constantly thinking in the same zone can become quite repetitive and boring. Moving your team to a new space may give them a burst of inspiration, albeit for a short period of time. It could inspire people to think differently. 

Gap Filling 

Also popularly known as gap analysis, this method takes into account your current state, and your end objectives, trying to find gaps between the two states. By asking a very simple question, i.e ‘how do we get from point A to point B’, gap analysis finds problems in your enterprise and helps plug them, using workable solutions. A flowchart can be useful for drawing out a gap analysis. The current state marked on one end, and the ideal state on the other, will be ideal so team members can understand what they are working towards. They can then pitch in ideas that can bridge the gap. 

Final Thoughts

The above brainstorming techniques are pretty capable when it comes to either coming up with a new strategy or solving issues that your company is facing. The most important point to remember is to keep facilitating communication between your team members, and breaking down barriers so that no one hesitates when it comes to putting forth ideas. Read our blog on setting marketing objectives, so the next time you conduct a brainstorming session or are part of one, you know how to round it off by setting the right objectives.

The post Top Brainstorming Techniques To Learn In 2021 first appeared on Publir.

What Is Social Media Competitive Analysis?

A study of your competitors, to find out their strengths and weaknesses and compare those against your own, social media competitive analysis is a great way of measuring your own results pitted against that of others. Find out where you lack, how your company can grow, and whether you need to replace some strategies. Identify your competition, and see the social media platforms they use. Find out how they use those platforms, and dive into their social media strategy. Stack up your own social media metrics against that of the competition. Find gaps in your social media strategy and work on them. 

Why Is A Social Media Competitor Analysis Needed?

Why go through all the trouble of doing this in the first place? Well, everyone’s audience today overlaps, so you can gain some valuable insights from your competitor’s strategy. Here’s why the data it throws up can be useful.

• Performance Benchmarks – Learn about average followers, a company’s engagement rate, and other data. 

• Get ideas as to the best time slots to post on social media for your industry. 

• Try to find out what customer problems your competitors are solving. 

• Try and come up with new and better content ideas that your audience can identify with. 

• Learn how to communicate with your audience across different platforms. 

• Find ways to make your brand stand out. 

Your social media competitive analysis can be done either as a one-off or periodically to keep a track of your rivals. A quarterly or monthly report in this regard may help. 

How Do You Carry Out Social Media Competitive Analysis?

A social media competition analysis can be done in 4 easy steps. 

Step 1 – Find Out Who Your Rivals Are

Try to find the most competitive keywords –  You already should be having a repository of relevant keywords. For example, if you are a New York-based marketing manager for a car showroom company, you’re more likely to focus on keywords like “car showrooms in NYC”, or “best places to buy a car in New York”. But then, look carefully and dive deeper. Are you selling family sedans or luxury vehicles that cost upwards of $100,000 each? Have a good understanding of your keyword stock so you can understand who you’re really competing against online. Use the Google Adwords Keyword Planner to seek keywords most relevant to your company. Use the tool to analyze your website, get a list of relevant keywords and the related average monthly searches and competition levels. 

Check which firm is ranking for those keywords on Google – After choosing around 5 or 10 keywords closest to your business, put them into Google, and get a fair idea of your main competitors. Brands that are shelling out cash for Google ads to get their name ranked above organic search results when they have poor organic rankings, should catch your attention. Check out the websites of your competitors, and explore their social profiles, saving their links in your spreadsheet.

Find out who is popular on social media searches – The world of search on social media is quite different from Google. The brands that do well on the search engine, may not rank that well on Facebook or Instagram. For Facebook, enter the keyword in the search box, and click on ‘Pages’ to see any official handles and access their content. 

Find out what competitors have your audience’s attention – Tools like Facebook’s Audience Insights, and Twitter’s Analytics can help you with data about which brands your audience is interested in, on social media. Use Facebook’s Audience Insights to find your target audience’s demographics. Facebook’s insights are invaluable for customer reach. With Twitter Analytics, find each of your Top Followers, visit their profiles and check their follower list for accounts they interact with, or their feed for re-tweets, etc. 

Narrow down to 5 of the best – You don’t have to fight everyone in the market. From the large list of potential competitors, narrow down your list to the most important 3 or 4 brands most closely competing with your brand on social media. 

Step 2 – Get Intelligence and Data

After narrowing down to your most important competitors, find out what they are up to, on social media. A quick glance through the social networks of every brand that you identify as a top competitor can give you important points that might help, like – 

• Their preferred social networks
• Their follower count and rate of follower growth
• Rate of posting content
• Engagement rate
• What their preferred hashtags are, and how many hashtags they use.

This information is easily available on your competition’s social profile. 

Step 3 – Carry Out A SWOT Analysis

A SWOT Analysis can help you figure out how you are stacked up against the competition. Find out ways to improve your strategy, and learn to fight threats along the way. Take a look at your business, and identify the below – 

S – Strengths

List metrics where you score more than the competition.

W – Weaknesses

List metrics where your numbers are below the competition. This is where you should improve and always remember, to work both on strengths and weaknesses for each social network. 

O – Opportunities

After comparing yourself to your rivals, you can get an idea of where you stand and can find potential opportunities to make use of. These are areas where you may improve vis-a-vis your competition, based on previously-gathered information.

T – Threats

Finally, do account for threats that come from outside the company. Study the growth numbers and catch any anomalies, like a previously smaller rival suddenly experiencing a spike in followers.

Out of these, strengths and weaknesses are to do with factors under your control. Opportunities and threats are based on external factors that you need to be cognizant of.

Step 4 – Incorporate The Data With Social Media Monitoring 

Carrying out one competition analysis is not going to help. Try to carry out your social media competitive analysis regularly, with the latest information. You can get the latter using a social media monitoring strategy, which will give you the newest data to incorporate in your next analysis, great for identifying potential threats and opportunities. 

There are several tools for social media monitoring, allowing you to listen in on conversations about your brand, competition, and the industry.

Conclusion

In conclusion, carrying out a competitive analysis can help you gain valuable insights and even uncover a flaw in your marketing strategy, if one is present. It can help you improve and change quickly enough to stay ahead of others and at the forefront of your target audience’s minds. Read our blog on social media influencers and how they can play a pivotal role in attracting the right audience to your brand. 

The post How to do a Competitive Analysis on Social Media first appeared on Publir.

Companies would do well to focus on data maintenance. Inaccurate data in their customer database can affect their day-to-day working and bad news for marketing teams. How would you address your customer’s concerns, if you did not know who they are, and what their priorities are? Accurate, reliable data is the need of the hour. Gone are the days when companies relied on manual work to iron out data issues. This is time-consuming and frankly boring for manpower. Why use your employees to export data, or use Microsoft Excel with all its complicated formulas, to only revert to your CRM! Learn how CRM Data Maintenance affects B2B marketing, so you can keep your system updated and error-free. 

Why is CRM Data Maintenance So Important? 

Poorly-managed data impacts the entire organization, having an especially harmful effect on sales and marketing. In such a scenario. The data that the marketing team gets is instrumental in ensuring the success of its marketing campaigns. Below are the reasons why CRM Data Management is so important. 

Segmentation

Basic marketing activity is the starting point of all marketing campaigns. The most important part of any marketer’s job is segmentation. The process of analyzing long customer lists and breaking them down so as to communicate with each segment is important. Each audience has its own needs. List down the people you are speaking to, and break them up into smaller and manageable groups that resonate with particular opinions. Poorly segmented audiences lead to data inconsistencies that could hamper the effectiveness of a marketing campaign. Any effective campaign speaks to multiple levels of management, so communicate accordingly. 

Personalization 

This cannot be stressed enough. Personalized messages are important for successful campaigns, and if your CRM data is consistent and high-quality, your messaging can be highly personalized and therefore, effective. Simple data oversights, such as an extra letter in a name directory or a capitalization out of order can cause a disruption, and impact the whole data mining system. Avoid inconsistent associations, and consequential deal derailments by ensuring your CRM is always up to date. 

Customer Experience 

Customer journey is very important because the less specific your marketing message is, the more your brand might suffer. Customer data needs to be segmented effectively so relevant messaging is delivered. Data quality makes a big difference to customer satisfaction. Without reliable data, companies would have no way of keeping their customers happy. 

How Do You Practice Effective CRM Data Maintenance?

Constantly auditing your CRM knowledge, finding problem areas, and fixing them should be the priority of your CRM Data Maintenance policy. Below are the focus areas which must be paid attention to. 

Data Quality in CRM Data Maintenance

Maintaining consistent data quality ensures that knowledge is accessible, related, and constant. Your knowledge standard impacts your complete group. Apart from the information being correct, the right people in your group should be able to access it whenever required. The knowledge that is kept in individual silos slows the group down. Data consistency demands that knowledge be standardized and formatted in your database. For example, cell phone numbers should be segmented accordingly, job titles must be standardized and names of contacts should be capitalized appropriately. If you maintain consistency, you can club knowledge in easy-to-remember methods. Finally, your knowledge and data must be related to the field you are in. If you have thousands of GB of information, it would be useless if it isn’t about your target market. Regular knowledge upkeep processes like knowledge cleaning ensure high quality of data. 

Cleansing Data 

It is imperative to omit inaccurate, poorly formatted, duplicate, or unfinished data in your CRM. A very common example is first name and last name capitalization issues, for instance, Alex vs Alex. Addresses as well, need to be in a standard format, like the telephone numbers (65578498 vs 655-784-98). Remove incorrect or fake data, fix the special character, and outlying issues. Data cleansing isn’t easy. It takes time and involves breaking up your database to assign tasks to various team members, who load the data into Excel, further using VLOOKUP and similar formulas to identify and skip anomalies, before reimporting that data back into the CRM. It takes good Excel skills to get this done. 

Removing Data Duplications 

If you check your own smartphone, you might find multiple entries for one contact. Imagine how much duplicate data companies have to deal with. Duplicate contact records might occur due to manual entry or backend CRM, data imports, or software integrations. Posing a big inconvenience to the marketing team, duplicate data leads to spikes in campaign costs and productivity losses. The time that could be spent productively on other aspects of the project is instead wasted in ironing out data issues. Combing through records to find the right or most accurate record is a waste, and data duplication requires marketing teams to remove the copies before new campaign launches. Finally, the customer experience also gets jeopardized because the customers get mixed and redundant messages, while you, on the other hand, are unable to understand their needs clearly. 

Data Purging in CRM Data Maintenance

As the name suggests, this involves removing useless outdated, redundant, and low-quality data that fills up important database space and hampers company reputation among other things. You know your data needs a thorough cleanup when you have undelivered mails, fake or outdated prospects, poor customer interaction records, half-baked contact data, passive contacts, duplicate contacts, and more. The usability of your CRM data depends on how well you purge it. Keeping away clutter helps to cap data storage costs and CRM fees, and saves your team precious time. Expect better email delivery, open rates, and sender reputation with a successful database purge.

Data Monitoring and KPIs

Identifying key issues is instrumental in fixing them, w.r.t to your CRM database. There are various database issues you’re likely to run into and you’d do well to understand what they are so you can prioritize fixing the most important ones. You can generate reports manually by monitoring your KPIs, but only if you’re prepared to run reports or use Excel for analysis. Having a clear KPI is important to track your progress, and to keep a check on your customer data as a whole. 

Final Thoughts 

In conclusion, your CRM is constantly being updated with new data, and that brings in a whole new range of errors and inaccuracies. Audit it frequently so you can be armed with the correct customer information when crafting your B2B marketing campaigns. Understanding your customer is key to cracking a successful campaign, and in that regard, your CRM Database can tell you everything about your customer you need to know. Read our blog on the best digital marketing tools of 2021 to get an idea of what you can use to ensure maximum market visibility online and high customer engagement. 

The post What is CRM Data Maintenance and How It Affects B2B Marketing first appeared on Publir.

Qualitative forecasting can help executives make predictions about company finances, based on expert judgments. It is performed by analyzing past and future operations. This allows executives to predict how the company may perform in the future. The information they look at is collected from sources like staff polls or market research. Accounting for both sides of the forecasting process can help you set accurate targets and put plans in motion. Through qualitative forecasting, you can understand customer and market behavior in a deeper way, which is particularly helpful if your company is exploring new sales methods. As your company grows, qualitative forecasting will help you make sound decisions and reliably predict what your sales might be. 

Why Do You Need Qualitative Forecasting?

Need to decide how many new hires to make, or how much inventory to keep? Or how to adjust sales operations to be more efficient? Or maybe you’re curious about which feature of your company’s product or service works best in advertisements. Qualitative forecasting can help you find out that, and more. You can rely on sources apart from numerical data, and predict trends accurately. Here’s why you need it. 

It’s the Other Side of the ‘Forecasting Coin’

In conjunction with quantitative forecasting, qualitative forecasting can give you a holistic perspective of both subjective and objective factors, before you make a business decision. This is very useful for bigger companies with reams of numerical data that can supplement it with market research and expertise. This helps the business put out comprehensive, accurate sales predictions. 

Uses History to Help With the Future

There’s a saying that those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Qualitative forecasting prevents just that by forcing business owners to take into account their firm’s past performance, and not dismissing any anomalies as a one-time thing. Qualitative forecasting allows you to use objective, quantifiable historical data to create sales projections, expense predictions, and revenue forecasts based on your firm’s history. This is a great way to prepare for worst-case scenarios if one ever occurs. 

Good for Small Businesses and Startups

As mentioned earlier, bigger companies with huge bundles of data could benefit from qualitative forecasting; even smaller businesses that don’t have many numerical data could make use of qualitative forecasting to help them achieve their business goals and objectives. In the face of a lack of volume of data, other factors might help these firms make decisions. 

Great for Attracting Stakeholders

Let’s face it. Hard numbers based on data will always make your pitches more attractive, whether you’re trying to find a loan, attract investors, secure a new line of credit, expand with a partner, or even sell your firm. Investors usually feel more secure when they see solid numbers that point toward a logical forecast. They may not be lured by vague ambiguous statements like “our past experience sells us.” They want you to back that statement up with data. 

Recognize Patterns and Make Better Decisions

Computer programs have made it possible for us to whittle down to the most useful data to make accurate projections. For example, even a seemingly simple Excel sheet can help you find useful patterns like changes in sales over a year or more. You can segregate data by date, customer, vendor, or whatever parameters you want. You could predict production costs based on a pattern found over the last 5 years, or more. This can help you make sound business decisions.

 How to perform Qualitative Forecasting

There are several methods of doing this. They include – 

The Delphi Method

In this method, a panel of experts is individually questioned, soliciting their opinion one at a time. This is done to avoid any bias so business predictions aren’t affected by personal opinions. Other employees then study these responses, replying back with their own analyses and queries. The teams then settle on a prediction that is practical for the firm and move forward from there. This method is great because it involves questioning multiple people about sales forecasts separately, cleverly avoiding group thinking or off-hand and collaborative opinions. However, this method leads to a lack of consensus because many experts can offer widely different perspectives, making it tough to put together a sensible qualitative forecast. 

Survey

The survey is the old tried and tested, and the highly accessible option of performing effective qualitative forecasting. You get your data from your consumers, and that firsthand insight can help you penetrate new markets or study your target audience’s behavior. There are so many ways of creating and distributing surveys, and most of these collect data about ‘experience.’ Emails, cold calls, or inviting clients to the office for personal interviews can help firms collect information, which they can use to make useful predictions about a company’s future, based on data from their existing customers.

Market Research

Using market research, you can evaluate the success of your company’s products or services by introducing them to consumers and recording the reactions. Companies can either use their own employees or outside agencies and conduct market research in focus groups or blind product testing. Companies can study consumer reactions to decide what products or services to push forward and which ones to revise to better meet consumers’ needs. Market research is a great insight into what potential new consumers want from your organization. 

Outsource it to a Consultancy

Sometimes, the best thing to do is to leave qualitative forecasting to the experts, especially if you’re a start-up or a small business, with limited experience and without the means to put together reliable qualitative forecasts. Many companies outsource their qualitative forecasting responsibilities to consultancies that have a better insight into the industry, or markets. 

Like all forecasting techniques, qualitative forecasting too has a few drawbacks. 

Some of them are – 

• Bias clouds subjective information, and qualitative data is inherently subjective. 
• Humans are error-prone, and without concrete numbers, qualitative forecasting could produce inaccurate results. 
• A consultancy might not really know the company well enough to perform a detailed or accurate enough analysis. 

In conclusion, qualitative forecasting is indispensable for an organization. If you want your firm to move toward its goals, you need a proper forecast to set those goals, and break them down into milestones, etc. While analyzing numbers can help your firm to a certain extent, qualitative forecasting provides that three-dimensional insight that brings to the table varied experiences, and a tinge of the real world into strategy and decision-making so companies can prepare for any scenario. 

Final Thoughts

Qualitative forecasting is used to help companies make sales and marketing decisions. Health care employees use it to find trends in public health, colleges rely on it to predict student trends. It finds use in construction, agriculture, and virtually every other industry with managers relying on it to reach business goals. Read our blog on how you can leverage social media to amplify your business, use the internet to your advantage, to make more sales.  

The post A Comprehensive Guide to Qualitative Forecasting first appeared on Publir.