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What is Contest Marketing and How Can It Work For Your Brand?

Contest marketing – one of the best ways to “win” over new users and brand advocates. In the rise of social media, the use of contests, sweepstakes and giveaways have evolved and become redesigned to suit our new online culture. 

Both big and small brands are able to leverage contest marketing to amplify their brand message, gain new online engagement and bring their products to the forefront of potential consumer’s social media feeds such as Facebook contests or Instagram contests.. 

While online remains king for contest marketing, there are a number of brands still effectively integrating traditional marketing and in-store contesting to help meet their needs. These types of contests are often integrated with some form of digital marketing or data collection.

These kinds of campaigns involve more than just contesting on Facebook. With so many options to explore in the world of contest marketing, where do we even begin? What strategies are best employed to create an efficient contest marketing strategy? 

In this article, we examine the undeniable impact of contest marketing and examples of effective strategies to impact your brand’s bottom line through a customer-first contest experience.

Here’s what we’ll cover

What is Contest Marketing?

Contest marketing is a marketing strategy that utilizes contests, giveaways, sweepstakes or lotteries to boost brand awareness and reach new potential customers. 

Contest marketing capitalizes on the consumer desire for free stuff. The thrill and rush of winning the contest is a prize in itself and motivates many individuals to enter contests despite the low odds of ever actually winning. Contest marketing is an undeniable force in the world of experiential marketing and has significantly evolved over the years, particularly in relation to social media and online contesting.

There is no limit to the creativity that you can integrate into your contest marketing. Contest marketing can take various forms both on and offline. These several forms span both traditional and digital marketing, including:

  • Social media contests on Facebook, Instagram or other social media platforms
  • Website-based contests that gather consumer information through a collection form
  • Email and SMS based contests that gather consumer information through email marketing or texts
  • In-store contests

While these examples are the most common forms of contest marketing, there are endless opportunities to integrate contests into your current marketing strategies. Contests are a way of “game-ifying” your promotions to create unique brand engagement opportunities and call to actions through the use of the contest. 

The benefits of an effective marketing strategy can include increased online engagement both on your website and social media, increased consumer sales and increased access to your customers through email lists, SMS contact lists or other ways of direct to consumer marketing.

Contest Marketing is just one form of Social Media campaign. It’s important to keep up with 
all the social media trends. Here are“Social Media Trends to Prepare for in 2023” to help you stay up-to-date. 

How Do You Create An Effective Contest Marketing Campaign?

When executed effectively, a contest marketing campaign can achieve any number of business goals. For many brands, contest marketing is a significant tool in their marketing arsenal to help break up the monotony of their content or marketing. In order to maximize your contest marketing impact, we recommend integrating content marketing into your overall marketing strategy, both in traditional marketing and online. 

Brands who cross-market their contests see their brand exposure increase overall compared to brands that run contests in isolation from their other marketing work.

In order for a contest marketing campaign to be successful, it is important to create a strategy that compliments your campaign and overall goals and objectives.  When developing a contest marketing strategy, there are several key considerations to keep in mind, including:

  • A set of goals and outcomes you hope to achieve
  • A strategy for helping to align your contests with your other digital marketing strategies such as social media, website content, SEO, email marketing and advertising initiatives.
  • A process for determining a winner and delivering prizes. Although it may seem simple, it is important for this process to be well thought out and efficient in order to keep the trust of your consumers.
  • A way to track the performance of the contest in order to track efficiency and outcomes. This will help to guide your contest marketing strategy in the future.

5 Examples of Successful Contest Marketing Campaigns

1. Lego Themed Contests

Lego themed contest marketing example
Contest Marketing is just one of many marketing campaigns that a Social Media Manager will facilitate.

Lego’s social media content strategy relies heavily on user-generated content. Their social media feeds feature fan-created Lego art and their contest marketing strategy honours this experience. 

Through themed creator contests, Lego encouraged their followers to create themed Lego art and share a photo to win the prize. This type of contest not only helps to amplify the Lego brand message on social media, but also gives Lego additional social media content to use on their channels later.

2. Lays “Do Us a Flavour” Contest

Lay's contest marketing example
Lay's Do Us A Flavour campaign

In 2017, the Lays potato chip company asked fans to help create their newest chip flavour. Users could share their idea for a  unique chip flavour in exchange for a chance to win a million dollars. This contest generated significant social media traction and helped to reinvigorate the brand’s in-store marketing efforts. 

This type of integrated contest experience not only encourages online engagement but also increased sales once the chip flavour was released. This type of contest creates a consumer investment in your product and can help to shake up both digital and traditional marketing efforts.

3. The Great Eggo Waffle Off!

Another great way to encourage brand awareness is through a voting-style contest where fans can choose their favourite product or variation of a product in order to win the prize. Recently, Eggo Waffles created a fan contest called  The Great Eggo Waffle Off! where fans could make their own creations using Eggo waffles and share online to garner votes. 

This type of contest tackles two types of consumers – those who like to create and share content (called user-generated content) and those who like to view and simply vote. By creating a call-to-action for both consumer bases – the creators and the voters – Eggo effectively engaged consumers on a scale of involvement, therefore, increasing the percentage of their fans who would participate.

4. Influencer Giveaways

Influencer Giveaway Contest Marketing Example
An Influencer Giveaway example

Giveaways are very common strategies used by social media influencers to help increase their followers, engagement and partnerships with brands. These types of giveaways are often seen on Instagram and involve an individual to take some sort of action such as following, commenting or liking a post in order to enter the contest.

 These giveaways are usually hosted in partnership with a brand and their products, helping to organically amplify this brand online in audiences they might not usually reach.

Influencer marketing is a lucrative industry and brands of all sizes are taking advantage of the extensive reach of both celebrities and social media influencers.  This type of contest marketing is relatively easy to execute (for a price!) and can be adjusted to accommodate timely events and pop culture moments.

A recent example of this type of influencer relations and contest marketing is the recent influx of Peloton giveaways during the COVID-19 pandemic. Peloton, an at-home spin bike with integrated digital features and classes, took advantage of this opportunity to help leverage their brand message through influencer contest marketing as an at-home fitness option.

5. In-store contests – Tim Horton’s Roll Up The Rim and McDonald’s Monopoly

Tim Hortons contest marketing example
CNW Group/Tim Hortons

Another great example of contest marketing is a contest that directly encourages sales.  In contrast to social media contests and contests entirely run online, many brands are encouraging sales by creating a “game-ified” consumer experience. 

Monopoly x Mcdonald's Collaboration Contest marketing example
Monopoly x McDonald's Collaboration

Two effective examples of this type of contest marketing are the Tim Horton’s Roll Up the Rim contest and the McDonald’s Monopoly contest. By creating a game experience out of regular purchases, these brands encourage additional sales and an intentional purpose for buying their products. These types of contests can be incredibly costly to run but can dramatically increase sales and customer purchases in a very direct way.

Key Takeaways for Contest Marketing

Contest marketing can be a one-off marketing strategy or a long term component of your brand’s overall digital and traditional advertising presence. There is a strong case to be made for the benefits of contest marketing including increased brand awareness and recall on social media, online and in-person. 

However, it is important not to underestimate the strategy and planning involved in executing an effective contest marketing campaign, especially if you plan to run multiple contests throughout a period of time. 

Want to learn how to maximize the potentials of social media? Advesa offers tailored social marketing strategy for your business. Start your journey today. 

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10 Brand Philosophy Examples To Align Your Company Culture

Do you and your employees have a clear vision of your core values in the form of a refined business philosophy and mission statement?

Better yet, are you and your employees aligned with them? Motivated and geared towards the same goals?

If not, then your team may be falling short of being effective with your time. Also, you might even be working in a toxic work culture, or, even, failing to create a brand that truly connects with others.

A business’s brand philosophy is focused around the ideas that govern your company’s ethics, objectives and vision. And a great one aligns all these with your branding, product design and marketing.

But the question is — where do you start?

For some inspiration, take a look below at some award-winning business philosophy examples from world-famous companies.

Here’s what we’ll cover:


10 Brand Philosophies To Refine Your Business Strategy

The brand philosophy of a company provides the blueprint for all employees to unite under and follow.

Here are some of the top examples of companies that clearly envision and communicate their business philosophy internally and to their customers.

Inspiring Business Philosophy Examples


 
  1. Google
  2. Chanel
  3. Nike
  4. Alexander McQueen
  5. Apple
  6. Starbucks
  7. Sennheiser
  8. Dove
  9. Warby Parker
  10. Title Boxing

1. Google

Search engine giant Google keeps its brand philosophy clear, concise and ambitious.

When it comes to FAQ design, the clearer and simpler the questions, the better. Customers use the FAQ page to quickly find the answers to their burning questions. The less time spent browsing and searching, the less likely they’ll be frustrated. The more likely they’ll stay and make a purchase, increasing your customer conversion rate and brand value.

If your questions are long-winded and unclear, it defeats the purpose of having a FAQ in the first place.

Questions worded plainly provide the customer with the fastest avenue to finding an answer and might even help them find questions that they didn’t even know they had.

A good example of this is Twitter. They include clear and simple questions, with different topics split up into smaller questions.

2. Chanel

Coco Chanel brand philosophy
Coco Chanel's passion for unique and atypical designs lives on in her brand's philosophy and the team's passion.

It can be difficult to make a lasting impression in an industry as fickle (and as saturated) as in fashion. Chanel, however, has stood the test of time. Founded in 1909, Chanel is synonymous with sophistication and liberation. Fashion designer, Coco Chanel, began her business in the post-World War I era with the philosophy of liberating women from the restrictions of corsets and bustles. Her clothes emphasized comfort and fashion simultaneously. 

Even though Coco Chanel, the brand’s founder, is long gone, her niches continue to spearhead the business’s purpose in providing stylish clothing for the respectable woman. Coco Chanel’s passion for striking visual motifs and unique aesthetics is still being carried out by their equally passionate team.

3. Nike

Nike's inclusive, all-encompassing brand philosophy champions fitness for everybody - no matter your skin, culture or creed.

Nike’s co-founder, Bill Bowerman, started out as a track and field coach. Dissatisfied with the available leather and metal running spikes, Bowerman did all he could to design running shoes that would help athletes reduce their times.

But, more than this, it is Bowerman who helped defined Nike’s ultimate mission statement. By adding an asterisk to the original idea of bringing “inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world,” Bowerman forwarded the idea that, “If you have a body, you are an athlete.”

It is this sentiment that has opened Nike up to just about everyone. Its inclusive values add warmth and help humanise a brand that would otherwise exclude an entire chunk of the population.

Today, their products, reiterates their core notion by implementing inclusive promotional designs such as plus-sized mannequins and accommodating practical designs such as soles that support prosthetic legs whilst running.

4. Alexander McQueen

Alexander McQueen brand philosophy
Luxury fashion line Alexander McQueen stays true to their brand philosophy roots while executing on new fashion trends and fads.

Alexander McQueen’s fashion house is known for his dark and dramatic designs consisting of violent and grotesque elements. 

The late McQueen was renowened for artistic genius, brimming with unique designs thats often were controversial (the 1995 show titled, “Highland Rape” springs to mind). McQueen worked closely with Sarah Burton and together they shaped his philosophy of producing high-quality and luxurious garments that pushed the envelope. 

These 2 figures, both iconic figures in the fashion world, generate trust and reliability through their respective legacies. 

In a similar vein, the brand’s philosophy which advocates shock and glamour has been consistently reiterated over the years using celebrities and public figures to endorse the garments. Burton famously designed the Duchess of Cambridge’s wedding dress, whilst McQueen himself was often photographed styling the likes of Sarah Jessica Parker and Lady Gaga.

5. Apple

Apple brand philosophy example
Since the advent of the original iPhone, Apple has been pushing its brand philosophy and its product design to new heights.

From 1997 to 2002, Apple fronted their ‘Think Different’ campaign. What are the implications behind this? Thinking differently represents out-of-the-box, intelligent, and creative modes of operation. Even though the actual advertising campaign is no longer running, ‘Think Different’ is a business philosophy example that has permeated throughout the brand over the years.

From the sleek retail stores fronted by smart-casual tee-shirt-wearing staff, to their cool and trendy co-founder (the late Steve Jobs).

Apple has always sought to represent an ethos which is ground-breaking in its genius, yet relaxed and accessible for the everyday person. It’s a philosophy which translates well into their product design.

Revolutionizing the mobile phone industry through the original iPhone and continuing to innovate, everything about the company oozes “Think Different.”

6. Starbucks

Starbucks brand philosophy example
Coffee giant Starbucks takes a top-down approach to franchising to make sure its brand philosophy is not lost in translation.

These days, it seems like there’s a Starbucks on almost every street corner around the world. Taking Starbuck’s brand philosophy into account, it’s no wonder there are so many coffee shops conveniently situated at every community intersection.

Starbucks brand philosophy is community driven. Their goal of inspiring and nurturing the human spirit one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time is made apparent through their actual stores.

Each Starbucks as a hub for the communities that they serve, establishing close ties with the customers in each unique locale.

Starbucks does not allow its stores to be franchised. Instead, store locations and design are decided at corporate.

Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz had this to say about the decision: “We believed very early on that people’s interaction with the Starbucks experience was going to determine the success of the brand.” This brand philosophy example is executed not just on the local or regional level, but at the executive level as well.

7. Sennheiser

Sennheiser brand philosophy examples
Sennheiser looks at innovation through a consumer-oriented lens and campaigns this sentiment through their product design and brand philosophy.

“We have a vision,” states the Sennheiser website. “We are shaping today the audio world of tomorrow – that is the ambition that we and our company live by from day to day.” 

No matter the industry or purpose, the speaker and headphones giant’s philosophy describes a culture of innovation and  adaptation. Sennheiser is all about technological upheaval and this is communicated in its brand philosophy and in its actions. 

According to Sennheiser, the name represents the establishment and development of trends. Their company culture is designed to be adaptive and responsive to quick changes in consumer preferences. 

There have been many ground-breaking innovations – developing the first directional microphone in the 50s, the first open headphone design in the 60s and infrared transmission technology in the 80s. 

Evidently, this lines up with the business philosophy and customers have learnt to associate these qualities with the brand. 

8. Dove

Dove brand philosophy example
Gentle on skin and beauty standards, Dove's brand philosophy is embodied by their respect for a multitude of beauty standards.

Soap and toiletries company, Dove, centers their brand philosophy around “real beauty.” As a brand philosophy example, Dove shines as an all inclusive one, and this philosophy is extended throughout their business practices.

Instead of using models, Dove insists on asking every-day women to display and model their products. Their goal is to shatter rigid, harmful beauty stereotypes while helping young women and girls overcome anxiety and insecurity about their self-image.

Dove’s brand philosophy states that beauty should be a source of confidence, not anxiety. It endorses a plurality of different beauty standards to achieve this end.

Not only does Dove encourage others to love themselves. It also drives consumers to feel like their unique beauty standards are being recognized and addressed.

9. Warby Parker

Warby Parker brand philosophy example
Trendy and affordable, Warby Parker successfully translates its business philosophy into reality.

Warby Parker began with a group of students resolving the lack of access to affordable and good glasses. Their goal is to offer fashion forward, designer eyewear at affordable prices while helping others gain accessibility to vision. 

This brand philosophy example translates mission statement into practice. To lower costs, they use plant-based cellulose acetate while assembling and polishing their frames by hand to give it that premium finish. To deliver on their vision of increasing vision accessibility, Warby Parker pays it forward by distributing a free pair of glasses to someone in need –  talk about an eye for an eye! 

10. Title Boxing

Title Boxing brand philosophy example
Title makes boxing and other fight sports less intimidating and more inviting for sport novices.

This is another sports and fitness brand that follows the trend of increasing inclusivity and accessibility for its consumers. They don’t only focus on professional athletes and fighters, they also cater to amateur boxers as well. One of the main beliefs is that the brand will help everyone in reaching their goals, whatever they may be. 

Whether that’s through apparel, boxing gloves, fitness equipment or punching bags, Title Boxing has created a connection between creating champions and their products. 

Beyond their fighting equipment and apparel, they also have an abundance of clubs, facilities and organizations that consumers can participate in and obtain coaching from. 

In doing so, the brand positions themselves as mentors and helpers and not the boxing stars of the show. 

Key Takeaways

To compose your own brand philosophy, you’ll need to consider your core principles: 

  • Consider the nature of your business, your unique selling point, who your audience is, and what your goals are. 
  • When you’ve figured this out, you’ll need to maintain and elevate it; this philosophy needs to be constant and consistent, and something that everyone on your team can advocate and believe in. This can be easier said than done but, as the brand philosophy examples have shown, it’s certainly doable and is a sure-fire recipe for success. 
  • Create a story between your product and service and your philosophy. What drove you to create your business in the first place? What ideas represent the essence of your brand? These questions will help you define your brand philosophy and create a narration. 

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Social Media Trends to Prepare for in 2023

As of 2022, there are approximately 3.96B social media users around the world. That’s more than half of the world population! In the coming years, this number is projected to increase even more. 

Simply put, marketing on social media is the best way to reach as many people as possible. With increasingly innovative features, tapping into the social media powerhouse will help businesses create meaningful touchpoints with new and existing customers.  

Here are 5 upcoming social media trends in 2023 to help you capitalize on this ever-growing platform: 

Influencer marketing is likely to play a larger role in the upcoming years

 

Gone are the days where influencers promoted products by simply snapping a picture of them to endorse it. Influencer marketing, which has been at the forefront of social media marketing has become interestingly intricate and engaging. With the surge of Gen Z social media users, authenticity and personal identity become the new way to sell on social media.  

Influencers seamlessly incorporate products that they endorse into their paid and unpaid content and let it do the talking. There’s no need for explicit advertising content when followers are genuinely interested in their lifestyle and products that they use. That’s why they followed them in the first place right? That’s the magic of social media. 100,000 followers mean 100,000 potential customers.  

social media influencer @imjennim An Instagram post by @imjennim

In fact, 61% of consumers trust influencers’ recommendations–more than the 38% who trust branded (and often biased) social media content. Each influencer already has built a niche community of their own. In fact, smaller influencers have higher engagement and are in large supply. So, it is no surprise that brands and markets prefer to work with micro influencers than traditional celebrities for their promotional campaigns. Collaborating with the ones that align with your brand value and mission will bring you closer to your target audience.    

Brands have a 93% higher engagement rate when they partner with creators. Influencers are ranked from mega (1 million-plus follower), macro (500,000-plus followers), mid-tier (50,000-plus followers), and micro (10,000-plus followers), each with a different marketing strategy so brands can choose the tier of influencer that best fits their objectives. 

Short-form videos and bite-size content will continue to reign

 

One of the most noticeable trends of social media marketing content is the proliferation of short-form content, most particularly short videos and reels. Sorry Instagram and Facebook, we have to give the credit to Tik Tok for bringing this trend back. To compete with TikTok, Instagram and YouTube launched the short video functions shortly after in 2020. 

Short videos are everywhere for good reason. This type of content is short and sweet, capturing enough detail and message that their creator wants to get across. Plus, they are stimulating and addicting. One minute you’re on your phone scrolling through your video feed and watching one. The next thing you know an hour or two have passed, cause those 30-second videos do add up. 

Instagram reel  

An example of Instagram reel 

It is safe to say that reels hold the potential to transform the way we do marketing and ads. Tik Tok videos and short reels on Instagram are actively pushed by their algorithm, leading to more reach and engagement. According to HubSpot Blog’s 2022 video marketing report, short-form ranks #1 for lead generation and engagement. 

content performance statistics  

Instagram content performance 2022

Reels are indeed more than just a fad. They are here to stay, as evident in the features and tools that these platforms continue to update, leading to more content creation. Yet amid the rising hype around short-form content, a lot of brands have yet capitalized on this promising feature. This could present a significant opportunity for brands to get more attention by creating a diversity of content, including reels to reach and engage with more audience. 

Growing utilization of user-generated content

Businesses are increasingly incorporating user-generated content (UGC) into their social media marketing strategy to increase their brand exposure and value proposition. UGC is any form of content, such as images, videos, test, and audio, that is posted by users on online and social media platforms. In a gigantic sea of information and new content rolling out every day, authentic content is the floater for content creators to stay afloat.  

Authenticity is increasingly important to consumers. Approximately 90 percent of consumers reported that authenticity played a factor in their shopping decision, up from 86 percent in 2017. This comes as no surprise as consumer awareness increases in a saturated market. People are more likely to trust and buy products recommended by people who have no affiliation to the brand.  

Many brands have taken advantage of UGC in order to engage with their consumers, foster community, and create valuable conversation. Beauty brand, Glossier drives engagement with its social content by encouraging customers to get vulnerable and share their selfies. It does so by posting customer stories that are personal and heartwarming, which they use Glossier products. Glossier is one of the brands that relies more on customer-submitted imagery than it does on professional models and product shots.  

When the brand launched its Mega Greens Galaxy Mask, thousands of users shared selfies of themselves in the mask with the hashtag #maskforce, which Glossier reposted on its own social accounts.

 

An user-generated post for Glossier

Who doesn’t want to buy a product that is valued and said to work by other fellows? Plus, getting recognition is one of the key reasons people post on social media, and user-generated content gives every user a chance to be an influencer. 

Augmented reality continue to thrive on social media platforms

With every step into digital transformation, the lines are blurring between the virtual and real-world than imagined, making AR the future and integral part of social media marketing.  

If you don’t know what Augmented reality is, remember the Instagram or Facebook filters that alter the way you look with makeup, lighting or a pair of cat ears in real time? That’s AR.  

The Facebook messenger app has some of the AR games like Asteroids Attack  and Don’t Smile. The former is a staring contest where the first person to grin loses and in the latter, users can navigate a spaceship with their face.  AR also facilitates the shopping experience on social networks. Facebook has the facility, where most of the online sellers can provide the experience of the product, with the help of AR. In some of the campaigns on Facebook, customers could actually see how a pair of sunglasses or a lipstick shade look on them, helping them make the right decision. Other AR functions also include projecting certain 3D furniture onto the user’s surroundings, so they can gauge if that piece of furniture fits their living space. 

Try-on virtual glasses on Facebook  

Usage statistics suggest that filters can quadruple the engagement time of videos. It is estimated that the average time a user spends engaging with filters is 75 seconds. 

As giant tech companies such as Google and Facebook continue to develop AR technology, along with consistent software development, it is likely that AR will continue to be more widely used to enhance customer experience online and offline. In fact, giant retailers JCPenny is reinventing itself by employing diagnostic technology to analyze selfies and provide recommendations for a personalized skincare routine, with a vision of creating an inclusive shopping experience. 

By keeping up-to-date with digital transformation news, you can keep from falling behind in the digital marketplace. 

Social media emerges as e-commerce outlets

As shopping became more virtual during the pandemic, social media platforms are transformed into an increasingly popular shopping outlet.  

The number of social media commerce buyers in the US alone will predictably exceed over 100 million by 2023.  

Facebook leads the way as a top choice for social commerce. In 2020, Facebook added Facebook Shops to its range of shopping tools, which include Facebook Marketplace and shoppable ads.  

Other major social platforms continue to follow suit. In-stream commerce is a key element of TikTok’s future growth strategy, with the platform already seeing big success with its on-platform buying options in mainland China. It’s faster and more convenient to make a one-click purchase on a product you see on social media instead of clicking through a bunch of links.  

According to TikTok’s insights into their user’s purchasing behavior below, product awareness, research and purchase all take place on the app. 

TikTok's users insights  

TikTok’s users insights

Besides TikTok, Instagram is another leading social ecommerce outlet. Introduced during the pandemic, the ‘shop’ function can be added to any product-contained posts, allowing users to purchase products with one click. Instagram also previously introduced checkout on the platform. 

Instagram checkout Instagram checkout

 

The shopping tab on Instagram’s homescreen is a destination for people to discover new brands products and editor’s picks, personalized to them. In fact, as many as 70% of consumers look to Instagram to discover a product. In addition 90% of Instagram users follow at least one business page.  

As social media allows brands to create a more omnichannel approach to their customers, there will soon be more innovative e-commerce and conversation functions in the upcoming years.

Conclusion

Social media usage is expected to remain on an upward trajectory over the next 2-3 years. Growing engagement will continue to fuel social commerce and generate venues for businesses. Social media giants like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok will only accelerate their technical advancement.  

Keeping up with trends and news regarding digital transformation is crucial to the success of brands and businesses. Not sure where to start? Advesa has a team of digital marketing specialists that are dedicated to coming up with and executing creative social media strategies that work for you in the long run.   

Connect with us today so we can transform your business vision into reality.

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Digital Transformation is Not All About Technology

As digital transformation spending is predicted to top $2 trillion dollars by 2023, various businesses and corporations are pouring their investment into digital. Like any other investments, those who don’t set the proper initiatives and strategy may risk wasting their capital and resources.

A digitally transformed company understands its users, designs solutions they will want to use, and creates those solutions with available technology. Digital transformation is about more than solely technology or the adoption of new digital tools and services. It is about understanding the needs of customers and acting on that insight to create a more compelling user experience.

Digital transformation must start with people. 

Here are 5 main principles of digital transformation to take into consideration for your organization:

Leadership is the starting point for digital transformation

If you want your company to transform into a digitally-savvy operation, you have to create a culture of digital transformation and user-centricity. If people in your organization feel uncomfortable embracing the need to change and to add digital transformation to their core mission, they will not succeed at either. They may even drive the transformation effort back and slow progress.

If you want your transformation to succeed, you need to transform your leadership, too. This means that every leader within your organization needs to be thinking, acting, and making decisions with the customer experience in mind. A digitally transformed company knows their value proposition and why customers choose to buy from them.

People operation is one of the key factors in digital transformation

Digital transformation is not just about technology or the IT department. It’s about the entire organization and how it operates. In order to make all aspects of your organization function properly, you need people who are equipped to succeed in the new landscape. This means people who have the expertise to use the tools and tech available to them, people who understand the importance of data analysis in decision-making, people who know how to build relationships with customers. 

People operations is about ensuring that you are hiring and working with the right and well-equipped people. Most importantly, it is about making sure that they are happy in their roles. It involves everything from recruiting to retention, outsourcing if needed, and everything in between.

Recognise where you are and where you want to be

Before you can create a roadmap to digital transformation, you need to understand where you are now in your company’s evolution. You need to understand what your current technology solutions are, how your products and services are delivered, and what kind of user experience your customers have with your business. Where do your customers interact with your business—online or on the telephone? What products and services do you offer? How do you interact with your customers? 

After you have an idea of where your company is today, you can decide where you want to be. You can identify what things need to change in your business and what you need to do to get there.

Creating a well-crafted digital transformation strategy is crucial to the success of your business. Support is available closer to you than you think. There are aid programs that help you get started and accelerate your business through digital technology. One of the most recent and prominent ones is the Canadian Digital Adaption Program (CDAP), which provide funding to small and medium businesses. On top of this, working with the right partner and specialist can help bring your digital vision to life.

Consider a customer-centric approach

Technology facilitates our connection and relationships, when utilized properly and strategically. If the goal of digital transformation is to improve customer experience and intimacy, an organization must orchestrate their business strategy around their customer. And this starts with an in-depth understanding of their customer. 

Across the customer journey, from awareness to purchase to advocacy, each interaction and stage benefits from a customer-centric approach. In a world with an inundated amount of information and content, the need for personalization and personal identity representation is more emphasized than ever. 

Spotify is one of those companies that take personalized experience to a new level. Their annual Wrapped campaign gives Spotify users an in-depth look at their yearly music by collecting data on their frequently listened to artists, songs and podcasts.

It didn’t take long for their feature to go viral and become a year end ritual for all music lovers all over the world (of course except those who use Apple Music)

Spotify Wrapped personalized playlist
Spotify Wrapped

Measuring and tracking are key

The outcome is as important as the process since it reflects what organizations do effectively and what you need to refine in order to achieve the desired results. Otherwise, businesses will spend money and resources aimlessly. In order to meet the demand of today’s digitally connected world, measurement must be consistent across all the departments.

For example, customer experience today does not only involve solely customer service and sales representatives. Ensuring customer satisfaction now intersects with other aspects of the business such as website design, product development, and supply chain management. 

That’s why creating an organizational commitment to digital transformation is so important. For digital transformation to work, everyone in your organization must commit to making the changes necessary and achieving the ultimate outcome of providing customers with the experience they love. 

Transformation is a process

Transformation is more than a one-time event; it’s a process.

Digital transformation works for organizations who place customers at the heart of what they do and ensure a unified mindset and attitude of all their employees.

Deciding the digital tools and the strategy needed to achieve their goals come after setting the right intention. 

While changes can be difficult and challenging, with the right mindset and support from within and without, you will be better equipped to succeed in the digital world. 

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SEO Matters – How to Get Started

‍Search engine optimization is an essential part of online marketing because it helps your business appear prominently in search results and drives more traffic to your website. If you’re new to SEO or need a refresher, this article will cover everything from fundamental principles to technical implementation details. Let’s get started!

What is SEO?

SEO stands for “search engine optimization.” It’s a broad term used to describe the process of improving the visibility of a website on search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo. In plain English, search engine optimization is about getting more traffic from search engines.
How much traffic is another question. It’s not an exact science and traffic can range from a few hundred visits per month to millions.  In fact, about 50% of online shoppers start their product searches on search engines like Google, Bing, or Yahoo.

How to Implement SEO Strategies

SEO Strategies
(Cr: running robots.com) Components of SEO

The first step of implementing SEO strategies is to assess the current state of your site. This means auditing what is currently on your site, how it is structured, and how consistent it is across the board. Once you’ve established a baseline, the next step is to identify opportunities for improvement. To do this, you’ll want to look at how your website is currently performing.
Here are a few ways to do this:

  • Use Google Search Console to track your website’s performance.
  • Run a few keyword searches and see what your competitors are up to.
  • Run an audit of your website’s internal links.

Once you have a better idea of what you’re up against, you can start implementing the following strategies to improve your site’s performance.

Begin with Content Marketing

With so many different elements to SEO, it can be overwhelming to know where to begin. So, why not start with the most important aspect of SEO? Content marketing. Your website is a product. It needs to solve a problem or provide a value proposition that resonates with your target audience. However, you can’t just sell your product outright. Instead, you need to provide value through helpful information, insights, and original content. If you manage to do this well, you can establish yourself as an authority in your industry and generate consistent traffic to your website.

Create a Roadmap for Your SEO Strategy

Once you’ve laid out your content strategy and are ready to start implementing SEO strategies, it’s important to create a roadmap for your SEO strategy. A roadmap helps you organize your efforts and better manage your time. The good thing about SEO is that it’s never too late to start improving your website. With that in mind, you want to prioritize high-impact SEO strategies that can move the needle quickly and make an immediate impact on your site’s visibility.

Choose the Right Keywords

One of the first things you need to do is identify the right keywords to target. Search engines like Google use the information on your website’s content to create a searchable index of your site. The more keywords you can fit on your page, the higher you’ll rank in Google’s search results. However, it’s important to choose the right keywords and position them on your website strategically. You don’t want to overstuff your page with keywords or use a variation of the same keyword over and over again.

Be Authentic and Be a Good Steward of User Experience

When deciding which keywords to target, it’s important to be authentic and a good steward of user experience (UX). Putting yourself in your customer’s shoes will help you identify your customer’s exploration path on your website. Therefore, creating an engaging user experience is a critical component of SEO. It can determine whether someone stays on your site or quickly bounces off and navigates to a different website. It’s important to optimize your website for quick loading times, simple navigation, and streamlined conversions. Overall, your website should be easy to use and navigate.

On-site optimization

Once you’ve completed the above steps, you can start optimizing your website for SEO. This includes optimizing your website’s content, structure, URL, and more.  You can improve the overall quality of your website content by following these best practices:

  •  Keep things short and sweet: Long-form content is great for in-depth information, but it’s not ideal for SEO.
  • Write with your target audience in mind: Write with your readers in mind at all times, because what you want to say is less important than how you want to say it.
  • Create high-quality, unique content: Don’t overdo the keywords. You don’t want to keyword-stuff your content or place unnecessary emphasis on certain words.
  • Optimize your website structure: You can improve the click-through rates (and therefore the traffic) of your pages by optimizing the structure of your website.

A team working on web design

Off-site optimization

After you have done the on-site optimization, the next step is to implement off-site strategies to increase your brand awareness and improve your page standing.
This includes optimizing your website’s backlinks. Backlinks are the links that lead back to your website. They can come from other websites, blog posts, guest posts, and more. The more high-quality backlinks you have, the better your website’s standing will be. Some of the best ways to build backlinks to your website include:

  • Building engaging blog content
  • Guest posting on high-authority websites
  • Creating an influencer marketing campaign
  • Concluding your SEO efforts with content marketing, social media marketing, and email marketing

Try Paid Ads to Track ROI

Once you’ve implemented all the high-impact SEO strategies outlined above, you can start to measure the ROI of your SEO efforts. To do this, you’ll want to invest in pay-per-click (PPC) ads. This is an easy way to track how your SEO efforts translate to actual revenue. PPC ads are advertisements that show up at the top of search engine results pages (SERPs). You can target specific keywords and bid on ad space directly. To get the most out of your PPC efforts, it’s important to track your results closely. This will help you identify which keywords are most profitable and how much you’re willing to pay to rank in those spots.

Summing up

With so many different elements to SEO, it can be overwhelming to know where to begin. Worry not because we are here to assist you. Get in touch with us to learn how our team of highly-skilled professionals can help you optimize your website SEO and user experience.
Be sure to stay up to date on the latest digital marketing news, too. The search engine landscape changes constantly, so you’ll want to make sure you stay informed.

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What is Tech Stack? Choosing the Right One for Your Business

What is tech stack?

Tech Stack is like a backpack filled with the right technologies to sift through before building a software (usually a mobile application or web). Each technology in that backpack plays a unique role in the application development process. It may involve UX/UI design technologies, programming languages, CI/CD, software and tools used by the development team. Tech Stack can also be understood as a solution to technology problems and is sometimes called Solution Stack.


Investing various elements of your tech stack is crucial to the success of any businesses, as they provides your team to develop and manage products that fulfill the needs of your customers.


The growth and development of new technologies that are introduced to the market every year increases rapidly in the 4.0 era. So in every period, there will be tech stacks that reign and occupy a large market share in the software development community.


There is, however, never the most superb or hegemonic tech stack. Each resonance from different technologies will bring a different result depending on the nature of the problem. Modern problems call for modern solutions.


The rising modern tech stack

Before Software as a Service (Saas) softwares and services took the tech market by storm, there weren’t a lot of software development tools available. Tech stacks were also relatively simple then: there were LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP), an older standard for building PHP-based web applications, and non-open source alternatives like WAMP (for those that preferred Windows to Linux).


In general, there are 3 main types of tech stack: a frontend stack, backend stack, or a full stack. Below are options you can consider for each type:


Frontend tech stack 

Modern web applications are based on coding languages such as HTML, CSS, JavaScript, or frameworks based on JS, like React, Vue, and Express. Developers choose the programming languages and frameworks depending on the user experience they want to build, including the user interface and the functionality of the web pages or mobile application.


Backend tech stack

The backend or server-side tech stack consists of many components, like database, data structure, server, framework, and operating system. Lightweight technologies are ideal for basic purposes, whereas some are loaded with features that only a complex application might need. For example, some companies who utilize website development platforms like WordPress or Wix usually opt for built-in Google Analytics in order to generate and view data.


Full stack tech stack

This is the most common type of stack used in desktop web applications. It consists of both frontend and backend technologies–for example, angular for the UI, a framework like Django for the application logic, and a database like MongoDB for managing data.


A modern tech stack has many more components due to the increase in the number of devices from which users can access applications and the huge volumes of events and data processing. For that reason, it often contains advanced technologies like business intelligence, event processing, data lakes, analytics, and cloud services.


Businesses often select what goes into their tech stack based on the needs of their projects and other factors. An early stage company still finding traction might lean toward low-cost, flexible options they can switch out later, while another might choose technology that maximizes scalability, so they can meet the demands of enterprise customers.


The components of a modern tech stack

Tech Stack should be built from compatible technologies to achieve its ultimate goal–creating value for customer and businesses. Today, there is a pool of tools product teams and engineers can combine and use to develop and maintain products that serve their market segment. Below is an example of a general tech stack model for web development:

The components of a tech stack
The components of a tech stack


Here are some components in a tech stack along with some popular examples:

  • Programming languages:

    developers usually choose the languages they’re most comfortable working with as well as the type of application they want to build. A project may require several programming languages and operating systems.

Popular operating systems and languages:

Linux


iOS


Android


Swift


Java


Ruby


Python


Javascript

  • Servers:

    A web server takes in request (http) from the client (i.e. their browser), passes it on to the database for the requested information, and handles the response.

Popular services:


AWS


Google Cloud


Azure


Apache


Nginx


CloudFlare


Fastly

  • Databases:

    Data is an integral part of a tech stack. No matter how simple or complex your application, you need a place to store all your information. Some modern data platforms further enhance the functionality of databases by providing intelligent querying, aggregation, transformation features, and analytics tools in addition to data storage and retrieval.

Popular data infrastructure: 


MySQL


Azure SQL Synapse


MongoDB


Redshift


PostgresSQL


Snowflake


Splunk


Talend


Fivetran

  • Frameworks:

    a framework is a collection of languages, libraries, and utilities designed to help developers build applications. Frameworks provide the structure and basic functionality to build an application, including communicating with your database, handling requests from users, and automating some customer interaction functions. Frameworks can be backend or front end.

Popular backend frameworks:


Django


Laravel


Spring


.NET


Popular frontend frameworks:


AngularJS


React


Bootstrap


jQuery


Emberjs


Backbonejs

  • API Services:

    API (Application Programming Interface) services are interfaces that provide a program with a description of how to interact with a system in order to retrieve and/or change the data within it.

Popular API platforms: 


Segment


Google Apigee


Mulesoft


Tealium


Zapier

  • Monitoring and performance tools:

    these tools help you understand how each layer of your tech stack is performing. Monitoring and performance tools collect and analyze data about the technical performance of your software, and are designed to track the health of servers, databases, services, and other internal systems.

Popular options: 


New Relic


AppDynamics


Dynatrace


Datadog


How to choose the right tech stack for your business

Below are a list of factors to consider:


The speed and functionality of the application

What goes in your tech stack greatly depends on the business purpose you are trying to solve. A more advanced system and stack will be able to handle a large amount of data. In their start-up days, Twitter used to pick their tech stack based on Ruby on rails for rapid development. Then they switched to another stack using Java/Scala to increase the system’s load capacity.

Custom tech-stack


(Cre: mongodb.com) Custom tech-stack

Time to production

Picking an appropriate tech stack will help your team build a fully functional application in the least amount of time. If your developer team is used to PHP, a programming language, the LAMP stack is usually preferred over other stacks. Slack, a popular employee communication platform, is built with the LAMP stack. On the other hand, Microsoft’s stack is ideal for those who prefer Microsoft systems and frameworks.

LAMP stack vs WISA stack

LAMP stack vs WISA stack


The budget of your project

It is important to set a budget range for your project so you know how much you can allocate to your tech stack. It is critical to get stakeholders on board when it comes to investing in technology applications, particularly when there are now so many requests across all areas of the business. You will also want to consider future purchases you might need to make during the financial year and whether this cost will penalize something else you might need in the future.


Design and user experience

One of the most important questions to ask to build the right technology stack for your business is whether your tech stack caters to design requirements of the UX/UI team. A good user experience is the key to attracting more traffic. If your website is content-driven, choose a technology that supports server-side rendering. Choosing the right tools that will serve the purpose of your user interface will help you create a more seamless customer experience.

At a time where E-Commerce is growing 14.1% per year, you need modern and intuitive systems to effectively capture the market. Choosing the right tech stack can help you drive your products to success, making your product easier to build and ensuring it evolves alongside customer needs. Our team of full stack developers and UX/UI designers will work closely with you to deliver a digital solution for your business needs. Get in touch with us to see how we can build the right tech stack for you and put your idea to live.

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Customer Value: What it is and How Your Business Can Build it

We all know that a successful brand is one that delivers value to its users. The higher your value proposition, the greater the level of customer satisfaction and this is the key to success of any business. Customer satisfaction can be represented by a metric called customer value. How to optimize this index and build a business image in the eyes of consumers? First of all, let’s get to know the customer value definition. 

What is customer value?

Customer value is the totality of benefits that customers receive during the process of learning, purchasing and using products/services. Those values include the benefits of the product/service itself such as utility, features, etc., complemented by the brand’s value proposition and the customer experience throughout the process of learning, buying, using, and maintaining. 

Customers come to a purchase decision after determining whether they receive enough value for the price of the product or service. 

The importance of customer value

Customer value is one of the important indicators of marketing. After determining what it is, we consider the roles of this indicator in marketing as follows:

  • An enhanced form of products and services.
  • Plays a vital role in the marketing strategies of businesses, especially large enterprises with a high level of brand awareness. The more established a business, the more value they bring to their customers. 
  • Creates a great advantage in the competition with competitors, profoundly influencing customers’ decision to act.

Knowing how to price your product or service fairly and in accordance with their value proposition will help your business reduce friction, win customers, and increase customer loyalty. 

How do you measure customer value?

In a simple equation, customer value is as the difference of benefits and costs.

Customer Value = Benefit – Cost

It is important to note that ‘cost’ does not only refer to tangible cost (cash, checks, interest, etc) of the product or service, but it could also include intangible cost, such as time, effort and mental effort that customers spend during their customer journey.

Similarly, there are different types of benefits that influence a customer’s purchase decision.  

These benefits lie not only in the features and uses of the product, but also in the brand value proposition. Branding plays an important part in enhancing customer value. As perceived benefits increase and cost decreases, customer value proposition increases accordingly.

Identify perceived benefits

 

Total Customer Benefit is determined by evaluating the following items:

  1. Product benefit – the basic attributes of the product such as quality, design, functionality, packaging and cost savings.
  2. Services benefit – the support services offered alongside the product. These may include pre-sales and post-sales customer services such as delivery, installation, warranties, servicing and guarantees.
  3. Personnel benefit – the value added by company representatives during the sales process to overcome customer objections and facilitate a sale.
  4. Image benefit – the value proposition to a customer of increased image and reputation achieved by being seen to own and use the product. Image benefit is often gained directly as a result of enhanced brand equity. Hence it is an important foundation of building consistent customer loyalty. 

 Estimate the total cost

Total customer cost is comprised of the following elements:

  1. Monetary cost – the price paid for the product or service by the customer.
  2. Time cost – the cost to the customer in time spent in the decision making and buying process such as searching, evaluating, purchasing and delivery lead times.
  3. Energy cost – the degree of physical effort expended by the customer while searching for, evaluating, buying, installing, using and receiving delivery of the product.
  4. Psychological cost – the cost related to any dissatisfaction and frustration experienced by the customer during the evaluation and purchasing journey.

Since you’re working with tangible and intangible variables, the formula above won’t look like a typical math equation. You can only measure the total customer benefits and compare them to the total cost to make sure the former outweighs the latter. 

Additionally, customer value proposition might vary depending on your customer segment. Different buyer persona perceives the same sets of value differently depending on their current needs, problems, and goals. Therefore, you should start segmenting your customers into different buyer personas and calculate the value proposition for each group of customers. 

How to generate customer value

 

  • Develop valuable ideology and culture for your business

Ideology and culture are much harder to change, and it’s also harder to compete. Products and systems can be easier to copy than it is to change the mindset and culture of the company. For long-term success, ideology and culture are important long-term factors that will set you apart from your competitors. Ideology and culture, together with systems, help create great customer experience and values.

  • Understand your customer’s journey

Creating customer value enhances customer satisfaction and experience and vice versa. To create true value, you must be aware of what your customers consider valuable. Customer lifetime value can change throughout the customer journey. They will become aware of the value you provide when they are first introduced to your product or brand, and this will change as they begin to interact with your product, service, staff, and even other customers.

Mapping a detailed customer journey will help you identify gaps and opportunities to provide timely solutions and add value 

  • Collect customer data

Getting to know your customers is a continuous process. Customers’ needs and behaviors do change and so should your process and system. Collecting real-time data overtime will help you gain valuable customer insights and make decisions accordingly to constantly refine and improve their experience and journey. 

To conduct this activity, you will need access to both quantitative and qualitative customer data. Management teams will have facts and statistics to back up their proposed changes, so leaders can make decisions with confidence knowing their perceived value matches their customer base.

  • Focus on more than just price

While it is true that price is one of the main factors customers take into consideration when making purchasing decisions, there is more to a product or service than its monetary value. To create true value, you must be aware of what your customers consider valuable. You must understand how customers view your competitors’ products. What factors are important to help customers make purchasing decisions? Price versus benefit, which is more important? Are you good at delivering what your customers consider important? Can you deliver more than your competitors based on these factors? This is why marketing strategies and communications are vital to gathering customer feedback and understand them.

  • Leverage customer retention

You might think once someone has become your customer, they’re able to perceive and receive the customer value that you offer. While this might be true, you shouldn’t forget to refine and level up the value of your product or service.

A lot of businesses utilize customer loyalty programs to offer even more value, benefits, and convenience to their existing customers. Coupled with data collection and analysis, businesses will be able stay attentive to the ever-changing needs of their customers and provide timely solutions that satisfy them. 

Loyal customers also, in turn, bring value back to your business. Since 93% of customers read reviews before making a purchase, having loyal customers write reviews and testimonials for your product or service will enhance your value proposition. 

Customer value is influenced, not forced

Remember your customers will never buy something because you think it is outstanding. They buy because they like or need them. Value is not something you can force. 

Establishing and communicating value is important because the results of your efforts are measured by the customer’s perception of the value you bring to them.

Remember the last time you decided to go out to eat without thinking about your destination. You compared the value of similar restaurants while trying to make a decision. It is completely based on subjective perception.

Because it is so subjective, customer value can only be influenced – never controlled. Therefore, it is important to always note that the stronger your relationship with your customers, the greater their perceived value.

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