Marketing, or rather, the technique of 'selling' a product, brand, idea or even person, has been around in one form or another since the beginning of mankind. It has always been shaped by the technology of the day. First, word of mouth, then print, television, billboards all the way along to the current space - social media. However, things are different this time. The 'marketer' is no longer solely in control of the flow of information.
The 'marketees' now have a whole digital world at their fingertips, and dictatorship has given way to a conversation between equals. E-marketing, in essence, is the process of marketing a brand using the Internet. This includes direct and indirect marketing and employs myriad technologies to help businesses form a connection with their customers.
As such, e-marketing should include all the activities a business conducts via the World Wide Web, the aim of which should be to attract new business, retain current business and develop brand identity.
When done properly, the return on investment (ROI) from e-marketing can far outstrip that of old-school, traditional marketing strategies. Regardless of the type of business, the Internet has truly become a force that cannot be ignored, and it can be a means to reach literally millions of people every year. In a very short space of time, it has become the forefront of a redefinition of the way companies interact with their customers.
Opinion mining stage right
Sentiment analysis is the method of automatically locating and analysing digital content in real-time from across multiple channels such as Web sites, e-mails, forms and surveys in an attempt to hone in on customer sentiment buried within textual data.
The Internet has truly become a force that cannot be ignored.
The goal of sentiment analysis or opinion mining is to determine the attitude, opinion, emotional state, or intended emotional communication of the message.
The ability for any marketing department to accurately and quickly detect flame rants (bad press) as well as the ability to manage product perception and brand reputation is vital. In this day and age of 'always-on' marketing, no company can afford to take its eye off the ball for even one minute. 'Always-on' marketing is defined as 'a system made up of many moving parts that affect one another', including but not limited to real-time marketing in response to social media, listening and responding to conversations.
Centre stage
In the last few years, Nike has completely redesigned the way it markets to its customers. Gone are the big budget brand campaigns celebrating a single hit. Gone is the reliance on big-name superstars to move product. In the past, Nike's biggest audience was the 200 million plus people who tuned in to watch the Super Bowl. Nowadays - Nike relies on technology, a massive investment in social media and e-marketing.
Realising it was possible to hit 200 million-plus hits aday across all its sites and social media communities - Nike has completely redefined the definition of harnessing the power of social media. With a total marketing budget of $2.4 billion in 2011, it has embraced the concept of Facebook first, television second; outdoor advertising on a 30-storey billboard which posts fan headlines from Twitter; and a 40% reduction in television and print advertising.
Nike is the world's largest sports company - 30% bigger than its nearest rival, Adidas. With a seemingly unlimited budget and a revolutionary new approach to marketing, it is easy to understand how Nike turned the way it approaches things on its head, and in the process, heralded in a revolution.
An orchestrated approach
As such, it is not hard to see how the need for any marketing department to easily and accurately determine the current sentiment being expressed on any given social media site is priceless. Negative sentiment that is allowed to run rampant would be disastrous to a marketing campaign like the one Nike has embraced. It is all too easy for unfounded negativity or off-hand remarks to gain a momentum and life of their own. And when a marketing strategy is massively reliant on social media, the damage to brand reputation could be devastating.
Too many companies are still stuck in the age-old methodologies. Their approach to marketing is outdated, and frankly, damaging to their brand. This is a brave new world, one in which marketing departments have to orchestrate a harmonious relationship between e-marketing and the analysis of current social media sentiment if they want to have any hope of preserving brand and product reputation.
Sadly, the successful implementation of an effective e-marketing and sentiment analysis strategy may seem daunting to many smaller businesses with a limited budget and access to only the most fundamental of technologies.
However, it isn't. The key is to start small. Actively market a brand or company on the most popular social media sites. Proactively respond to comments or questions. Do not let negative sentiment fester and boil. If possible, reward unsolicited positive sentiment - the loyalty and goodwill generated is invaluable.
Once these fundamentals have been mastered, and ROI can be measured and proven, it should be a much easier task to convince businesses to invest in more robust and automated systems.
He who dares, inevitably, succeeds.
Share