Author: David Dinh

For over 10 years David has helped drive hundreds of thousands of customers to businesses and understands what it takes to manage the chaos and headache of customers across different departments, systems and platforms. From roles in product development, product management, working in enterprises and advising for businesses going to sale and exit, David’s DNA is understanding the customer. David currently serves as Chief Operating Officer and Growth at Woveon, ensuring teams can scale and respond back to all their customers.

6 Tips to Using Emojis in Your Digital Marketing Campaigns

Posted on May 11, 2017March 15, 2023 by David Dinh

“A picture is worth a thousand words.”

And similarly, an emoji is also worth more than a word. This has actually been proven in a University of Missouri-St. Louis study–seeing an emoji is much more enjoyable than seeing a word in the Oxford Dictionary. Surprisingly, research has shown that looking at a smiling emoji ? activates the same parts of our brains as looking at a real smiley face! Emojis change our mood and may even alter our facial expressions to match that of the emoji. Out of the people surveyed, 75% of men and 84% of women think emojis are more effective in expressing their feelings than words.?

What’s mind-boggling is that we’re not born with these kinds of reactions to emojis. Rather, emojis are so powerful that they have actually shaped our brains and created a new brain pattern.? They’re also modifying our vocabulary and speech patterns. According to Instagram, users are substituting Internet slang such as “bae,” “rofl,” etc. for emojis.

A whopping 92% of the online population uses emojis. Emojis are loved or liked ? by 64% of users but are hated or disliked ? by only 6%. The tremendous rise of emojis has significantly affected digital marketing campaigns. Emojis increase the like rate of Facebook posts by 57% and the comment rate and share rate by 33%.

Because of the effectiveness of using emojis, digital marketing campaigns have pounced on the opportunity. Every year, brands use emojis in digital marketing campaigns 609% more than they do in the previous year. In 2015 alone, brands’ emoji usage increased by an unbelievable 777%.?

By now, you should be thinking, “How should I best use emojis for my own digital marketing campaigns?”?

Well, you’ve come to the right place.

Use Emojis for your Digital Marketing Campaigns

1. Know your emojis

This may seem like common sense, but misuse of emojis could really backfire and show how out of date a brand is. For example, the peach emoji ? can have different connotations than what seems obvious. Be sure to check out Genius’s comprehensive descriptions of each emoji, Hubspot’s guide on obscure emojis, and Daily Mail’s 12 commonly misunderstood emojis.

Genius’s List of Emoji Names

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Not only should you know the basic meanings of each emoji you use, but you should also know which ones to use in the first place. Which ones have the highest engagement? Which ones appeal to your audience the most? See the chart below for the top 10 most popular emojis.

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2. Know your audience

Again, this may seem like common sense, but there are some powerful ways, such as audience segmentation, to cater to specific sectors of your audience. Keep in mind that although all of the statistics mentioned above seem to be very positive, there are still 11% of customers who find using emojis in digital marketing to be inappropriate and 12% who think it’s childish, which are significant portions of your audience.

Age

Unsurprisingly, emojis are used more by younger people, who also have a higher chance of thinking that it’s normal for brands to use emojis. The social media channels in which users see emojis vary for different age groups as well. Users aged 25-44 prefer emojis in texts ? whereas users aged 45+ prefer emojis in emails.✉ Thus, you should make sure to tailor your digital marketing campaigns to users of different ages.

Researchers discovered that English-speaking US emoji users ?? were more “direct” while Japanese emoji users ?? tended to be more indirect, using emojis to decorate their messages or imply something for other users to deduce.

See the chart below for a comparison of emoji usage on Instagram in different countries.

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Obviously, brands should maximize their emoji usage in digital marketing campaigns in countries like Finland ?? but reconsider using emojis in countries like Tanzania.??

Ultimately, being mindful of differences in culture, social norms, communication, language, etc. across different regions goes a long way for digital marketing and for any cross-cultural interactions in general.

Age and region are only two of many possible ways of using audience segmentation to customize your digital marketing campaigns for different users.

3. Combine emojis with videos

According to Twitter, chances of videos being retweeted are 6 times higher compared to photos and 3 times higher compared to GIFs. Video ads that include branded emojis kindle SIX times the level of emotional connection and interest.

4. Simplify user engagement

How do you want your customers to use emojis? Do you want them to share/retweet the post? Answer a question? Tag someone else?

General Electric ran an effective digital marketing campaign by asking users to send a snap of an emoji to view their “Emoji Table of Experiments.”

Source

(Source: http://emojiscience.com)

Domino’s launched a digital marketing campaign that allowed users to order pizza by tweeting pizza emojis. ? This campaign not only dramatically simplified the process of ordering pizza, but it also increased brand awareness for Domino’s, which benefited from free advertising thanks to Twitter users.

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The bottom line is that so many people today are too busy to devote time and attention to digital marketing campaigns, but if you can find a way to make their lives easier and make it simple for them to engage, you’re golden.?

5. Don’t overuse them

With all of that being said, emojis are a double-edged sword.⚔ Similar to the law of diminishing returns in economics, where past a certain optimal point, something becomes inefficient, the same goes for emoji usage. Let us all learn from Aristotle, where he stated that we should find a mean between two extremes–excess and deficiency.

59% of users aged 18-34 believe brands are trying too hard to incorporate emojis into marketing campaigns.

Like everything in life, there’s a balance. Aim to strike that balance for the use of emojis in your digital marketing campaigns as well.

6. Use emojis to track customer reactions

As we said in the beginning, emojis are powerful ? ways for consumers to express their feelings and are more effective than words for most users. This creates a vast field of opportunity for companies like yours to gather fast, up-to-date data on customer reactions to their products, which can be used to target customers in the future. Surely, we can all agree that customers these days are much more willing to share their opinions on social media rather than in surveys.

At first glance, emojis can seem like very simple, fun things that you use in your messages to your friends to make sure that they know you’re joking. But emojis actually have tremendous potential and have already transformed the ways we think ? and communicate. Start making use of them today, and comment an emoji below to let us know what you think!

Are you looking to further capitalize on digital marketing but not sure where to start? We’ve got you covered with 8 marketing plan templates.

5 Ways Companies Have Used VR for Marketing

Posted on April 27, 2017March 15, 2023 by David Dinh

In today’s ever-changing tech world, companies from around the world and from all different industries have started to incorporate VR into their marketing campaigns. VR gives them the opportunity to give their users experiences like never before.

But wait a minute. What is VR?

VR stands for Virtual Reality, and a brief introduction for Virtual Reality can be found in our Innovated Uses of VR for Businesses.

If you are already aware of the basics of VR and are more interested in incorporating this new impressive technology into your marketing strategy, stick around to see what 5 innovative companies have already done!

How VR has been used for Marketing

1. Volvo

Volvo, a worldwide car manufacturer, began the virtual vehicle tour. As shown above, their new car, the XC90, has the ability to be accessed by anyone in the world with a computer. They designed a virtual tour of the car where one can interact and see all the features without ever having to leave his/her home. The idea itself may be simple yet nobody had done it before. Shortly after Volvo premiered this new feature, other companies followed. Mercedes-Benz now does the same as Volvo, allowing customers from anywhere in the world to tour its cars virtually. This marketing strategy has also spread to other transportation companies such as KLM and other airlines. As the VR industry becomes bigger, companies such as Volvo will continue to provide excellent and detailed displays of their products to improve consumer experience.

2. Coca-Cola Sleigh Ride in Winter

Coca-Cola, a massive and well-known international company, has always been at the forefront of innovation, from their products to their marketing teams. Within the last few years, Coca-Cola has started to implement VR into their marketing strategy. This past winter, Coke put together a sleigh ride VR experience that gave customers, and more importantly children, an opportunity they will never forget, Santa’s sleigh ride. They have also started a creative project to turn recycled Coke boxes into DIY VR glasses. Coke’s marketing team truly moves with innovation, coming up with impressive ways to maintain such high customer satisfaction through the services they provide outside their products.

3. How Patron is Made

Patron, unlike the rest of the other companies we looked at, has more of a challenge when it comes to marketing. Really, what can you say? Drink this for a good time? It took a very creative turn to make its VR experience one that their customers were sure to enjoy. It looked past its product and looked at more of the process behind the company. It was able to capture the process from start to finish, highlighting things that made its company look good, such as recycling its used products, and showing that its finished product ends up in places where most people are having a great time. Patron really thought outside the box, taking the drinking experience to another level.

4. Marriott Teleporter

Marriott Hotels, much like the others we have talked about, provided a new and innovative way for customers to view its brand. It created sites where individuals have the opportunity to travel the world from essentially inside a phone booth. These experiences brought them from NY to Hong Kong, and along the way they were always reminded that there was a Marriott location in each city. This showed the customers Marriott’s vast reach and that they could always find a place to call home no matter what corner of the world they wished to travel.

5. Discovery VR for Environmental Education

Discovery, my personal favorite, has further advanced the way we educate our world citizens through virtual reality. It has created a learning environment like no other. Discovery found the value in virtual reality in that it is so versatile. It took 360-degree cameras from the depths of the ocean to the vastness of space. It put these incredible experiences online where customers could interact by actually moving the camera in the direction they pleased, giving the user the best experience possible. A brand that is willing to spend so much time and innovation on its customers, like Discovery, creates valuable customer retention through these marketing strategies. It also provides a service to the public that is so innovative and captivating.

Marketing With VR

While these companies are the early adopters, other big companies are soon to follow. The future of VR is here, in the now. Companies from around the globe are transforming the way virtual reality is used to provide the best customer services and experiences through marketing strategies.

From startups to international corporations, VR is changing customer experience and service. It is taking a new form, allowing individuals to travel the world from the convenience of their home or simply letting their imagination run wild. VR is the paving the way for businesses to once again focus on the customer bringing to life experiences that were once thought of a thing of the future.

5 Customer Analytics You Should Be Measuring

Posted on March 13, 2017March 15, 2023 by David Dinh

Living in a time where we are so surrounded by technology, we would think that it makes sense that companies would start to take online information and use it to their advantage. Businesses around the world are using customer analytics to drive up profits and keep customers happy.

But what is customer analytics?

Customer analytics is the process by which data from customer behavior are used to make business decisions. In more simple terms, it’s businesses tracking your every move online, compiling profiles on each customer so they can improve the shopping experience. The information they take ranges from four main categories. These include personal, quantitative, qualitative and descriptive data. Now that we have the basics, read on to find out more about the top 5 Customer Analytics You Should Be Measuring to increase your businesses profits and better adapt to customers.

For a better customer conversation management data analytics, use conversational technology. Request a demo now!

Best Customer Analytics to Boost Business

1. Demographics

Demographics are the basics of customer analytics. It is essentially a personal profile on each one of your customers. These consist of categories such as age, gender, race, geography and income. This information is important to marketers especially. For example, if a company is trying to target teens and young adults through their marketing campaign, they would be able to see if their advertisements are getting to the correct people. If they see that for some reason only people 40+ are visiting their site, it is easy to conclude that they need to find a new way to reach their intended customers. Demographics, although seemingly basic, are one of the most important customer analytics to track.

2. Sources of Incoming Traffic

Being able to track where your customers came from is also an extremely important factor when it comes to customer analytics. If your company has been trying to market on different platforms such as email, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or Snapchat, you can see what campaigns are working. This is essentially the same as the demographics analytic except the difference is in the application they are coming from and not personal qualities.

3. Returning Customer Conversion

Gaining new customers is 6.5 times more expensive for a company than keeping an existing customer, so why not prioritize your existing customers? This is why using the metric of returning customers can save companies vast amounts of money. If a customer has already been on your site, you can once again track the way they got to the page. Noticing that most of your returning customers are coming from social media, you could possible scale back outside marketing or TV ads. This would most likely cut costs and allow you to focus more on keeping your old customers as well as increasing advertising in places that tend to have returning customers.

4. Page Views

Page views, one of the more simple topics in analytics, are simply the number of visitors your website or individual page gets. It is important to get the most page views you can to bring in as many customers as you can. This function can also monitor specific blogs or PDFs that your company posts. This will allow your company to post more blogs or PDF that are on similar topics. It is important to know what part of your website interests your users the most so you can develop more of that material.

5. Average Session Duration

When it comes to making big business decisions, such as spending large sums of money on advertising, a company will want to know who to target and why. All of this information can be found using Google analytics. It is important to know who spends more time on your website so you can gear your advertising toward them. For example, the average Facebook link stays open for only 10 seconds where average direct URL is open for closer to 53 seconds. The people who spend more time are obviously more interested in your product, but you also have to look at where the traffic is coming from to understand the true data. You can even see what pages on your website are visited the most. For example, say that a company has a blog page that attracts more views than any other page. You can have your employees focus on outputting more blogs on topics that have been getting the most clicks and highest average session duration.

Analysis of The Analytics

As you can see, all of these chosen analytics work together, but a company has to find the patterns and solutions to the problems they are seeing. While it may seem that monitoring just demographics or page views will not boost a business too much, the long tail effect comes into play by monitoring more and more analytics. As the world keeps embracing the technological changes in our society, more businesses will move to using customer analytics to improve business strategy and efficiency. Google analytics makes tracking your customers habits and desires that much easier too. These analytics are the best option for a company to get a well-rounded look at who, what, and where website traffic is coming from. They lay the platform for more analytics to be built on.

5 Creative Ways You Can Use Customer Service to Amp Up Your Online Marketing Strategy

Posted on February 28, 2017March 15, 2023 by David Dinh

Looking for some quick and easy tips to improve your online marketing strategy? Look no further. Customer service, a once again focused upon aspect in the business world, can improve your marketing with a few simple tricks. Stick around or read 7 Online Marketing Strategies to Maximize Website Visits, The Art of Killing Digital Advertising or 5 Ways Companies Have Used VR for Marketing.

Customer Service Hacks to Kill Your Online Marketing Campaign

1. Mix Your Marketing and Customer Service Team

Marketing is the part of the business that brings customers in, while customer service is what keeps them there. For this reason, it only makes sense that the two work together. Companies also have a 60-70% chance of keeping old customers but only a 5-20% chance of gaining new ones. When the marketing and customer service group work together, you can target existing customers and save lots of money too!

2. Use Social Media as a Customer Service Tool

Companies should see social media as a huge opportunity when it comes to advertising and customer service. People contact companies over Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram all the time. Just the other week, I was on a United Airlinesflight, and I had tweeted at them. They responded asking me how my flight was going within minutes. This is a great example of how customer service over marketing channels is so important. It shows to their followers how much they are invested in their customers and that they truly care. This also shows that the companies are up to date when it comes to interacting with customers. They are open to change and customers want to see companies that embrace change like they do.

3. Feature Customers on Social Media

Another idea to boost your marketing campaign using customer service is through customer spotlights. Your company could pick a customer of the week. This could be through the amount they spent, the positive interactions they have with your company, or many other things. You could then post this through social media. This once again shows that the companies are invested in their customers and that they like to give back to the community.

4. Use Customer Reviews as Promotional Material on Social Media

When it comes to showcasing your customer service team, what better way to do it than through customer reviews? Your company can prove to its customers that its product and customer service teams are actually rated highly. Best Buy is a company that does this very well. They post their reviews to social media, at stores, and in other online ads. It is proof that they have satisfied customers.

5. Give Special Opportunities to Special Customers

Across different industries, companies reward their valued customers differently. One company, BMW, gives customers who recently have purchased a car the opportunity of a lifetime. They invite them to BMW Days around the world and let them race their top-of-the-line cars. They will have all different types of cars, ranging from their M5’s to their I3’s. They let their customers go all out racing on the track for hours. They record these days, sending out these clips to social media. The services they provide their customers is something they will never forget. GM and Ford have similar days too that draw new customers in and keep existing customers happy. Other industries do this through their products. Tech companies invite customers to test out new products first and give feedback. This once again shows they take customer feedback seriously and then they can boast about it online. Lastly, smaller companies such as micro-breweries around the world invite customers to their locations and give tours and tastings. Half Acre Brewery, based in Chicago, USA, gives tours of their facilities and posts their reviews to social media. Time and time again, these companies get fantastic reviews and prove to their customers through online marketing that their customer service is world class.

Customer Service and Online Marketing

A company’s marketing team gets customers in the door, while customer service keeps them there. Using these customer service hacks for online marketing is a fantastic way for your company’s teams to work together. So if you’re looking to amp up your online marketing, merge your teams together, take to social media, highlight your customers, and boast about your customer reviews (only if you can back it up with facts). Most of these include social media in some way, shape or form, and that is why it is so easy to incorporate both your marketing team and customer service teams. This increases both employee and customer happiness. If you are looking to read more into tracking your customers preferences and habits to better target them, head to 5 Customer Analytics You Should Be Measuring.

Top 5 Secrets to Excellent Customer Service

Posted on February 23, 2017March 15, 2023 by David Dinh

A company’s most important feature, without a doubt, is its product. If there is no desire for the product, a business will not succeed. But what else makes companies stand out from others?

The secret lies in customer service.

Read on to find out about some secrets of customer service and one business, Woveon, that is truly a forerunner in this not-so-new industry.

Ways to Excellent Customer Service

1. Customer Loyalty

To start off on our adventure to world-class customer service, it seems fitting to talk about customer loyalty. When a customer is loyal, they will keep buying products, turning into more and more revenue. But how does a company identify and keep these customers happy? At Woveon, identifying important customers and helping with their every need is easy! Woveon has created AI (Artificial Intelligence) programs that identify businesses-valued customers in multiple ways. Say someone has shopped at an e-commerce website multiple times and has a great buying history but has now run into some trouble. If they contact the store via multiple channels such as social media or email, a representative from the business can pull up their information and understand they are a valued customer. They can focus on their problems more quickly, and this keeps up customer satisfaction.

2. Consistency

Much like loyalty, consistency is another key factor when it comes to customer service. Woveon makes it easy for a customer service representative to be consistent throughout their interactions with customers. The software records past interactions that allows the business to recall past services it offered to the particular customer and the means by which the problem was resolved. With all of this data, the company can provide consistent help to valued customers. This, in turn, can create word-of-mouth interactions, generating new customers.

3. Knowledgeable Staff

Nothing is more frustrating than calling customer service and feeling more apt than the “resourceful” representative. This is why it is so important to have knowledgeable staff who don’t just stick to a script and set of instructions. Your employees should be able to problem solve on their own. In order to do this, one should hire people who show interest in their business and understand its products. However, having knowledge on more than just the product is important. For smaller businesses, getting to know your customers and being able to talk with them more on a personal level can be very important. With Woveon’s technology, this is a walk in the park. Woveon’s recorded conversations not only help with consistency, but it can also help a customer service rep get to know the client more by reviewing past conversations. Although this may not apply to all businesses, small to mid-sized companies can really benefit from having personable customer service reps who are extremely knowledgeable about their product and clients. So before hiring any applicant, make sure he/she is enthusiastic about the product or service the company provides.

4. Response Time

“Thank you for calling. Your call is very important to us today. Please hold while we transfer you to our next available representative.”

We’ve all heard this dreadful message. Five minutes later, you are still listening to the same terrible background music and just waiting for your questions to be answered. This is why it is so important to have urgency when conducting customer service. If you make a customer wait for five or more minutes, their frustration is almost sure to be rising as well. To help this problem, Woveon’s interface has a simple search bar that any customer service rep can pull up and see what the customer’s history is. It includes common problems the customer has had along with small subcategories, illustrated in a 3D model that is quick and easy to use. Woveon’s incredibly accessible database and easy-to-use software cut down time that the customer is forced to listen to background music and become frustrated. Having dealt with many customer service departments, I can say that the best way to keep a customer happy is to be fast and knowledgeable about all potential problems. But even if you can’t identify the problem right away, act with urgency and get the process started as soon as possible in order to retain strong customer loyalty.

5. Apologize and Move On

Everyone makes mistakes–some you can control, others just happen. It is always better to apologize first and then move forward. When it comes to customer service, the representative is almost never to blame; however, the customer may think differently. A customer service rep should apologize not only for the inconvenience the customer is going through, but also so the customer can sense that the rep personally cares about the problem. If you are nice to your customers, they, in turn, would be more likely to reciprocate. Of course, there will be good and bad customers, but as long as you are willing to be upfront, apologize for any mistakes you could have made, and are ready to solve the problem, most customer interactions will go smoothly. Remember, solving the problem is only half of the interaction; being fast, knowledgeable, and polite completes the customer service process.

To help you out, here are 5 templates to get you out of sticky customer situations.

If you want to retain and build a bigger customer base, a company has to have great customer service. Word of mouth “advertisement” is 5x more powerful than any media ad. Because of this, a company’s customer service has to be efficient, knowledgeable, and polite. Luckily, with Woveon, customer service comes easy. Using Woveon’s software is a hack in itself when running a business, and if you are ready to bring your business to the next level, start with your customer service using Woveon.