Chart of the Week: Pandemic hits high-ticket air travel and cruises, alongside small pleasures such as eating out, as marketers reassess what constitutes value for customers right now and how digital marketing can help

Charts from Market Insider paint a grim picture of life for marketers in the travel industry as airline and cruise numbers plummet

The biggest cruise names in the pandemic are, of course, Princess Cruises' The Diamond Princess Yokohama (with 700 passengers infected and eight deaths) and the Grand Princess (now in day 14 of quarantine in San Francisco). Analysts at Goldman Sachs are comparing the pandemic to similar scale events such as the 2001 recession, the 2008 financial crisis, and, the Costa Concordia disaster of 2012 (another cruise ship disaster, where 33 passengers died off the coast of Italy).

"Averaging the moves made after such events, cruise prices dipped by 6.3% and took roughly…

Chart of the week: 25% of UK shoppers polled by RetailX have reduced or completely stopped shopping 'in person at physical stores' while 5% report a temporary increase

Data gathered by RetailX, on Wednesday 11 March, indicated some small but significant changes in customer behaviour due to growing Covid-19 concerns. As well as a reduction in shopping in person, the report found the UK public already cutting down on leisure activities, eating out and attending large work-related events. Moreover, following the Prime Minister's new Coronavirus approach outlined on Monday 16 March, we are currently witnessing increased changes to online and offline consumer behaviour. Consumer analytics are only as useful as the context we afford them. This same group of 1,000 UK participants was also asked about current online shopping habits. Over 95% report shopping…

Chart of the Week: 87% of marketing, CX and analytics professionals say good CX is important but only 24% are performing highly at delivering it

Offering a good customer experience (CX) can increase conversion, create return customers and turn consumers into brand advocates, all of which benefit your brand. It’s no surprise then that 87% of CX, marketing and analytics professionals say that customer experience is very or extremely important to their organization. According to Pointillist’s new research, only 2% of respondents said that it is not important (with 11% saying it is somewhat important), highlighting the need to make CX a focus of your business and marketing plans over the next 12 months. [si_guide_block id="86160" title="Read our Free Resource – 10 common website customer experience mistakes" description="This guide reveals examples of poor website design from different…

Benchmarks of B2B webinar promotion and presentation

Webinars are a key inbound marketing technique, particularly for business-to-business companies. Webinars can be used to support different audience engagement goals across the B2B marketing and sales funnel from attracting new prospects to interact with your brand through to nurturing prospects, product demonstrations and keeping customers up-to-date. Experienced B2B marketers will know from their tests which are the best times to promote and what attendance levels can be expected, but if you're planning a series of webinars, then we hope you find this summary of B2B webinar statistics useful. They're from BrightTALK which we use for our webinars, but the insights shouldn't be platform specific since the mechanics of promoting and encouraging attendance are similar. We'll present the benchmarks as the answers to a series of FAQ we hear from webinar marketers.

Q. Best day of week to promote a webinar?

This data is actually showing the most…

Increasing competition across all industries means that customer experience is more important than ever if you want to stand out for the right reasons

Customer experience (CX) is more important than ever. With competition increasing, the digital world making it easier to make purchases and consumers less likely to be swayed by brand loyalty, CX can make all the difference between a conversion and a lost customer. This is why businesses need to look at and improve the customer experience they offer in line with current consumer expectations. Failing to do so could leave you well behind your competitors, even if your product is more advanced. To better help you understand what CX in 2020 looks like, we’ve gathered some recent statistics from customer experience research. These stats should help you benchmark your performance, better understand current consumer expectations, bear in mind where CX is going in the future and stay one step…

Video is continuing to grow in popularity and importance, which means it's vital to stay on top of the latest advances and statistics in order to create a strong digital video marketing strategy

Video is a highly effective form of content and its popularity has gone hand-in-hand with the rise of social media. Despite the fact that so many of us consume online videos on a daily basis, many marketers still aren’t using video as part of their digital marketing strategy or aren’t seeing the best results. In order to inform your marketing strategy and help you get the best possible ROI from campaigns, we’ve compiled some video marketing statistics that could help you get to grips with video.

92% of marketers say it’s an important part of their marketing strategy

In 2020, 92%…

Chart of the Week: 97% of consumers have abandoned a purchase because the service wasn’t convenient enough, showing that e-commerce needs to compete on more than price.

Convenience is the backbone of e-commerce and a huge reason that online shopping has boomed over the last few years. Shopping online offers the convenience of purchasing items when and where it suits you, via a payment method of your choice while also having your item delivered via a method that suits you. It’s no wonder then that convenience is changing the way people shop and how they view certain shopping options, as the National Retail Federation’s latest research shows. This is why e-commerce brands need to consider more than the quality and price of the products they are offering when it comes to showcasing their proposition.

Inconvenience causes cart abandonment

When it comes to the most important things to consumers when online…

Chart of the Week: 45% of marketers say increasing engagement is the biggest challenge for email strategies and yet this isn’t a primary goal to work toward.

Email marketing has long been a tactic that delivers high ROI, which means there are a lot more marketers and brands utilizing email to engage, convert and retain customers. However, the increase in use means that inboxes have never been so crowded and, as a result, it is getting harder to stand out. Despite the struggle to get opens and clicks becoming very real, marketers still need to deliver tangible results – especially as email has historically performed so well. Email effectiveness may be dwindling but optimizing your strategy ca still ensure you see improvements. [si_blog_banner_cta] However, the question then becomes how you can improve the effectiveness of your email marketing. After all, sticking with the same strategy isn’t going to see things go well during 2020…

51% of marketers believe that influencer marketing helps with quality customer acquisition but how else could it benefit your digital marketing strategy?

While many social media users and consumers are growing tired of influencers, they are still an incredibly effective marketing tactic for brands. In an increasingly digital world that has seen people become immune to more traditional forms of advertising, influencers do exactly what they say on the tin – they influence purchase behaviour. Influencers are trusted to give honest reviews, recommendations and tips to their followers, which means they can make a difference to which product or brands consumers ultimately buy from. The ultimate form of social proof, influencers have a degree of credibility in their niches, which makes them a go-to source for information. Beyond this, influencers do something that many brands still struggle to do – they build relationships with their customers. A large part…

Chart of the week: 77% of online minutes in the UK are spent on mobile, showing that mobile-optimized marketing really is a must

The amount of time people are spending online is on the rise, with most opting to access the web via mobile. The vast majority of individuals across the world are now spending most of their online time on a mobile device, with the ability to be always connected changing people’s browsing habits. According to Comscore’s Global State of Mobile report, the total minutes spent online in from June 2017 to June 2019 increased by 43%, with Canada seeing a 34% rise during the same period. A large proportion of these extra minutes are spent on mobile, with it now being common to check your phone while out and about. [si_blog_banner_cta] So, what does this mean for digital businesses and what do marketers need to bear in mind?…