Admen dream about Silvia Medina.

She’s part of a highly coveted demographic group, 18-34 year olds, that companies from Coca-Cola to Apple just can’t get enough of. Though her parents came from the Dominican Republic, she was born and grew up in the United States. She’s a fully bilingual, fully bicultural Latina, just about to finish her MBA. If you want to find her, you’ve got to go online.

Silvia has been on the internet since 1996, and uses it constantly for…

...continue to read "Net Gain: Latinos Are Going Online More Than Ever"

In case you missed the live webinar or had technical difficulties while watching it last week, you can watch it on YouTube now.

The presentation is 63 minutes, and the sound on the YouTube version isn’t the best. If you prefer, you can watch it full-screen and with better sound via WebEx.

The webinar starts with an introduction to Website Optimizer by Google’s Tom Leung. Then I share some of what we have learned at FutureNow over the the past decade of optimizing websites,…

...continue to read "Google Website Optimizer Webinar: What Should I Test?"

Everyone’s using the “r” word. Just a month or two ago, online marketers were whispering the word for fear of contagion. Now it’s spoken out in the open. We all seem to sense that we’re in a recession or that one’s stalking us and tapping on our shoulder.

Some sites are experiencing slight sales declines; others are prepping for the recession by trimming marketing budgets and tightening their belts in other areas. Online marketers are being asked to do more with…

...continue to read "3 Steps to Recession-Proof Your Online Marketing"

Here it is, the list of February’s top 10 converting retail sites*…

1. Snapfish – 17.4% 2. Vistaprint – 16.8% 3. Lands End – 15.2% 4. ProFlowers – 15.2% 5. Lane Bryant Catalog – 14.7% 6. LL Bean – 14.7% 7. HSN.com – 14.6% 8. 1800flowers.com – 14.2% 9. ebay – 14.0% 10. Blair.com – 13.8%

Last month, I wondered if we would see any Valentine’s day influence to this month’s list. What do you think?

This is the first time we are…

...continue to read "Top 10 Online Retailers by Conversion Rate: February 2008"

Makeup is like deodorant to me. I would rather not think about it — ever — and I only wear it because I have to.

I don’t know makeup brands or colors, and I don’t care enough to research what makeup would be right for me. Usually, my need for makeup only results in a purchase if a friend recommends something specific, or when I run out of an essential piece, like mascara. Then I’m found sprinting to the local pharmacy…

...continue to read "Why Free Web Tools Make Customers Want to BUY NOW"

On our “Ask the Experts” post, one reader asked how to go about optimizing a low-traffic website.

We get this question a lot.

Marketers — particularly small business owners and do-it-yourself-ers — want to know if optimization is worth it. They’re short on time and they’re dealing with limited resources. They can’t wait six months to fix something that’s broken now. They don’t have the luxury.

If you’ve realized optimization can’t wait, and you don’t have the budget to hire a firm, consider…

...continue to read "Top 7 Tips for Optimizing Low-Traffic Websites"

The news that Borders is considering putting itself up for sale should come as no surprise.

Although the company used last week’s announcement that they’re seeking a buyout as an opportunity to blame a tight credit market and competition from discount chains like Wal-Mart, Borders‚ disappointing performance stems from a failure to take e-commerce seriously.

For Borders not to have an exclusive online presence in this day and age boggles the mind. The homepage is a drab catchall for store locations, gift cards, and company…

...continue to read "The Demise of Borders Books: Death by Internet"

Yes, it’s that time again!

Recessions are the economy’s little reminder that your marketing needs to be more efficient. Lots of our friends and clients are being asked to produce more sales with less resources. (And if you’re reading this post, that might sound familiar to you.)

Traditionally, in the offline world during recessions, marketers had their advertising budgets cut, then pressure was placed on sales teams to close more sales. But in the online world, marketers are expected to deliver both…

...continue to read "Recession-Proof Your Online Marketing"

Have you ever read a blog post that had so many interesting and profound ideas, you actually re-read it several times? That’s what happened to me when I read this fascinating article by Joseph Carrabis at iMedia Connections.

I originally read the article because it talks about gender and website design. But there’s much more to it than the title (”Website Marketing Across Genders”) suggests. For instance, the phenomenon he calls “Towards” and “AwayFrom” advertising.

I’ll dig into that in another post, but…

...continue to read "How Website Images Affect Visitor Persuasion"

They say it’s better to be born lucky than rich. Guinness stout definitely has the rich part down (pun intended), but it seems they were a bit short on viral marketing luck this St. Patrick’s Day.

Guinness made a valiant attempt to make St. Patty’s a national U.S. holiday with their Petition 3-17 campaign. Their argument: Since there are nine times more Irish-Americans than there are people in all of Ireland, and since people of all ethnicities already miss work on…

...continue to read "How Guinness Might Have Converted One Million"