Twitter went down this morning. Bryan got more productive

Imagine all the social networks failing at once. What would you do differently with your time if you weren’t spending time on social networking? Would it be more or less productive?

...continue to read "The End of Social Networks"

Obsessions can be useful or harmful.

Thanks to GigaOm I learned about Jeff Bezos’ obsession in a footnote he wrote to Amazon’s 2008 letter to shareholders:

” At a fulfillment center recently, one of our Kaizen (continual improvement) experts asked me, “I’m in favor of a clean fulfillment center, but why are you cleaning? Why don’t you eliminate the source of dirt?” I felt like the Karate Kid.“

Amazon’s obsession with continual improvement has permeated their culture and made them a great company.

Here are…

...continue to read "What Are Your Obsessions?"

We’re working on completely rewriting the content on our website but several people noticed this and have asked about the new OnTarget(TM) for Google Analytics. OnTarget is now using Google Analytics’ Data Export API.

Here are other apps besides OnTarget that are using Google Analytics’ Data Export API.

Here is OnTarget for Google Analytics:

OnTarget provides full optimization, testing, and improvement cycle recommendations on how to improve goals online and increase conversions from marketing campaigns. Clients determine how many resources can be devoted…

...continue to read "Google Analytics & OnTarget"

Kudos to Omniture for posting “Survey: Search Marketers Underutilizing Sophisticated Metrics.” It takes guts to stop applauding customers and share some tough love.

According to the Omniture survey:

Marketers picked cost per click and click through rate as among their top metrics to optimize search campaigns instead of deeper metrics such as return on ad spend, cost per customer (or sale) or profit per order 43 percent of e-commerce respondents do not know how to accurately measure profit per customer (or order)…

...continue to read "Dirty Diapers, Shame and Web Analytics"

My grandma used to tell us that she was too poor to buy cheap.

Tom Crandall in his iMediaConnection SEO column explains “why the traditional thinking on ‘cheap’ no longer applies”. I think he’s right for several business categories but not all.

Our new service OnTarget is by far the least expensive and most effective proven system for companies to continually improve their conversion rates.

So why don’t we just call OnTarget cheap?

Hmmm… The answer is simple.

We never want the type of client who is…

...continue to read "The Value of Cheap"

John Gaffney’s “Ruining the fantasy of customer ownership” is worthy of a high-five. Read the entire post, it’s short, but don’t miss the conclusion:

“…at no time does a brand own a customer. That chain is cut loose too easily. Brands that approach the online marketing space for customer ownership will be disappointed. Come looking for that precious bit of attention, and marketers get paid in full.”

...continue to read "You Don’t Own That Customer"

I have a new dashboard. I love my dashboard. It shows me our OnTarget clients’ conversion rate improvements month after month.

Yesterday Ice.com, an OnTarget client and #144 on the Internet Retailer 500, surprised us. Shmuel Gniwisch, CEO of Ice.com told a reporter at Internet Retailer about OnTarget:

…attributes to it a 20% increase in conversions after one week, including sales it can track to its call center after the online jeweler followed OnTarget’s recommendation to make more prominently feature a toll-free…

...continue to read "Document Conversion Rate Wins Every Month"

As a young teen I heard Mark Knopfler sing about “money for nothing and chicks for free” and I remember fantasizing about how good that sounded but even then I knew that it was too good to be true.

I’ve noticed from many of my marketing colleagues that money for nothing is the order of the day; maybe it’s the hard times. Seth Godin blogged yesterday about getting rich quickly, Brian Clark blogged about making money from blogs, and just this…

...continue to read "Money For Nothing & Clicks For Free"

My Amazon habit goes way back. I joined Amazon Prime as soon as they started the program. If some villain wanted to take away my Amazon he would have to pry my mouse from cold dead hands Maybe I’m being overly dramatic but you get the point.

I no longer think about the selection, convenience, service, price, “free” shipping or much else when I shop at Amazon. Even New York State’s insistence that Amazon collect sales tax did not break my…

...continue to read "No More Amazon For You?"

Anthony Garcia, our Lead Persuasion Architect, sent everyone at FutureNow a video about OnTarget™. We all commented and then he produced the version you can watch below. We knew what the OnTarget software-as-a-service is; why it’s so different from everything else; how OnTarget works on your website; and even what kind of client results it produces. However, you may not be aware of those things and that is what makes your feedback much more valuable to us than our internal critique.

In the spirit…

...continue to read "Please Keep Our Message On Target"