Posted 16th February 2015 by APSIS

Personalise, predict, recommend… What’s the difference?

In my last blog, I offered a technical perspective on personalisation – what it is and how it works. In this blog I am going to elaborate a little on some common confusion that arises when we talk about customisation through personalisation, predictive analytics and recommendation systems.
 
Personalisation
In the context of Internet based companies, personalisation implicitly refers to a system that automatically delivers dynamic content such as textual elements, links, adverts, product recommendations, etc.
3 minutes
Posted 22nd October 2014 by APSIS

Why cross-channel marketing needs to be ‘the norm’

Do you focus on above or below the line marketing?
 
Above or below the line is a term that was common speak in the 80’s, used to identify whether an agency specialised in helping with mass marketing communications (e.g. TV advertising) or something with a 1:1 call to action (such as telemarketing).
3 minutes
Posted 08th October 2014 by APSIS

How to celebrate National Customer Service Week – and how not to…

So, it’s National Customer Service Week this week!
 
This will undoubtedly come as a shock to the pizza restaurant that treated myself and my colleagues with such unnecessary rudeness, that it prompted me to take to Twitter to lambast their – yep, you guessed it – customer service.
 
As a marketer myself, I understand why the customer has to come first, and I analyse each and every personal retail experience against what are probably fairly high benchmarks and standards.
2 minutes
Posted 17th September 2014 by APSIS

Why marketers need to bring ACTION and INSIGHT closer together

I’ve been working with online technology for 8 years now and one theme has been hanging around for a while – real-time.
 
It’s becoming more and more prevalent, yet there still seems to be a debate as to how important real-time is for marketing and sales. When I worked in analytics, primarily selling or consulting on a platform that wasn’t real-time, the usual response I had was that ‘real-time isn’t needed because you can’t gain insight in real time.’
 
This is true.
3 minutes
Posted 26th August 2014 by APSIS

How an each-way bet is more profitable than trying to predict the winner

I’ll happily admit it to anyone (and even via the medium of this blog) that I’m a tech junkie.  If it’s new and innovative I’m on it, using it, testing it.  Thing is, I’m not alone; a quick poll of my friends tells me that I’m just one of the gang when it comes to how much new technology I adopt.  Let me extrapolate this further and ask how many old generation iPods or smartphones (particularly Blackberry!) you have nestling in the draw of your kitchen where you throw your junk?
3 minutes
Posted 12th August 2013 by APSIS

Content marketing Part 1

Visit any online marketing event and you’ll likely hear people discuss how content marketing is replacing more traditional promotional approaches. But what is it exactly? And is it really anything new?

Content marketing typically involves the creation and distribution of content that attracts attention, positions the organization positively in the minds of customers and/or prospects, and thereby strengthens awareness, loyalty...and sales.

4 minutes
Posted 12th June 2013 by APSIS

How to create the perfect newsletter

Split testing is a powerful tool that increases the efficiency of your newsletters. It is easy to use and it may give you up to 20% better results.
But still, three quarters of all email marketers never test anything. It is time for a change – let’s get started!

4 minutes
Posted 13th March 2013 by APSIS

Real Time Marketing and email

Timing is essential in all marketing efforts, but it is decisive for Real Time Marketing. Email gives you a unique set of tools to reach the right person, with the right message at the exact right time. We will show you how!

What is Real Time Marketing?

Wouldn’t it be great if you could reach just the right recipients at the time when they are the most susceptible to your message? That is the reasoning behind Real Time Marketing, a set of metods and techniques that marketers use to communicate with their recipients at at a time that suits them.

4 minutes
Posted 03rd December 2012 by APSIS

Optimize your welcome letter

Congratulations! You have a new subscriber. Someone who wants to know more about your business, your products and your services. Someone who has shopped from you or even taken the time to find their way to your website and who has given you his or her email address.

You have made contact with someone who is interested and sympathetic.

Now, it is time to manage this opportunity. What can you do to get your new subscriber to feel welcome? How can you build a long term relationship?

4 minutes
Posted 07th September 2012 by APSIS

Email trends 2012: Delivarability

The biggest challenge for you as an email marketer in 2012 is deliverability. There is a strong trend amongst the largest web-based email clients like Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo, to protect their users against unwanted email.

4 minutes