Internet marketing1. The role of branding in marketing the promises a company makes for its consumers through its branding image A logo or brand stands for your business and connects your product with the consumer. Your brand is an asset and should be treated as such. The creation of a brand is far more demanding than a simple naming game. Using a brand is known to Represent your business professionallyStay in the memory of the target audienceInspire customer confidenceEvery brand, like every person and business, has a unique personality. No two brands can have the same personality. A brand mustInvent its own style of communicationProve its difference (why is this product better than competitor) Regularly invest in communicationsA brand requires a promise to the consumer that holds true to the experience it can reliably deliver consistent quality excellence, great customer experience etc. A brand promise is the commitment to deliver made between that brand and its audience. Its made, of course, in order to encourage that audience to buy. Ultimately of course a promise lives or dies on whether it is believed and delivered on no surprises there but the promise itself is shaped by a range of factors: the nature of the offering; the capabilities and capacity of the brand; the rival promises of competitors. Whats often overlooked is that the character of the promise itself changes depending on the sector. Let me give an extreme example: a retail-style promise made by a professional services firm would fail. Imagine if a patent attorney promised her customers that they would love how our intellectual property advice makes you feel. Sure, its hardly a distinctive promise anyway, but clients would be laughing all the way to the door. (Equally, a professional services firms approach applied to selling domestic vacuum cleaners would be awkward to say the least.) Thats because the style and nature of the promise and the commitment itself needs to align directly with the priorities of, and influences on, the decision maker. And that to my mind is where too many brand promises go wrong. They overlook how different the decision making processes are. Each process, and the factors that drive it, should decide the premise of the promise. Business to consumer promises are most effective when they focus on excitement. Though the excitement factor itself may differ, retail brands and luxury marques generally make promises intended to make the pulses of buyers quicken be that because buyers believe theyre getting a bargain, or they love the way something sounds or looks. The promises of retail brands, for the most part, need a high level of feel-good to be effective. Brands from Coke to Rolex understand this only too well. Very, very different promises but the goal sentiment is to raise interest. A brand making a business-to-business promise must focus on the key priority for that audience which is maximized value. Often the promise that best addresses that need is one focused on minimizing risk. Again, the promise aligns with the decision process. While for consumers, the decision driver is often one of spontaneity and thrill, for a business audience, the key drivers in evaluating a promise are around fulfilling business needs and representing an acceptable risk to the business model. Reputations, personal and corporate, are at stake along with dollars. For that reason, the B2B promise needs to revolve around reassurance the work will be delivered and the results will have both a positive bottom line impact and also help boost reputation.5 steps of brand buildingCustomers experience your brand in numerous ways: products, packaging, price, marketing, sales personnel, etc. Each of these contacts or touchpoints molds the customer's impression of the brand. Some of these touchpoints are obvious, like product performance, and one-on-one customer interactions. Other touchpoints, such as the product manual, monthly statements or post-sales support, may be subtler in their brand effects. Your brand image creates expectations. It defines who you are, how you operate, and how you're different from your competitors. In essence, your brand image is a promise - a promise that must be kept. If the brand is a promise you make, then the customer experience is the fulfillment of that promise. The customer experience can't be left to chance. It should be actively designed and controlled in a manner that enhances your brand image. It must consistently reinforce the brand promise across every customer touchpoint or the value of the brand itself is at risk. Here are five easy steps to building a strong brand and an optimized customer experience: 1. Identify your reasons-to-believe.Your brand promise is irrelevant if your customers do not believe it. Therefore, your promise must be supported by reasons-to-believe. This will automatically add substance to the promise and define specific expectations for the customer. For example, an automobile manufacturer promises potential customers that Car XYZ is an "intelligent choice for serious drivers." What makes it an intelligent choice? Why should the customer believe this promise? To address this question effectively, the manufacturer could frame its promise with two reasons-to-believe... sporty performance and safety. These two reasons in essence define "intelligent choice" and clearly set customer expectations. They also give the company specific direction for designing the customer experience through tangible customer touchpoints like vehicle design features, advertising campaigns, dealer sales approaches, and customer service activities. 2. Identify customer touchpoints.Each individual step in your business process contains a number of touchpoints when the customer comes in contact with your brand. Your ultimate goal is to have each touchpoint reinforce and fulfill your marketplace promise. Walk through your commercial processes. How do you generate customer demand? How are products sold? How do your customers use your products? How do you provide after-sales support? This comprehensive trace of your marketing, selling, and servicing processes allows you to create a simple touchpoint map that defines your customers' experiences with your brand. 3. Determine the most influential touchpoints.All touchpoints are not created equal. Some will naturally play a larger role in determining your company's overall customer experience. For example, if your product is ice cream, taste is typically more important than package design. Both are touchpoints, but each has a different effect on our customers experiences as a whole. To determine the touchpoints driving your customers' overall experience, your organization can use a wide array of techniques ranging from quantitative research to institutional knowledge. The methods you use will depend on the complexity of your products, commercial processes, and your existing knowledge base. 4. Design the optimal experience.Once you have completed the above three steps to building a brand, you should be able to design your optimal customer experience. Here's how:Determine how to express each reason-to-believe at each key touchpoint. For example, how can you reinforce sporty performance (a reason-to-believe) in product design, at the dealership, and in marketing campaigns (the influential touchpoints)? 5. Align the organization to consistently deliver the optimal experience. A holistic approach to aligning your organization to consistently deliver the optimal experience is essential. Identify the people, processes, and tools that drive each key touchpoint. Look beyond employees that have direct contact with your customers. The impacts of behind-the-scenes employees are less obvious but no less important. Similarly, the impact of workflow processes and tools (i.e. technology systems) on the customer experience may be less intuitive but crucial to consistent delivery. Identify which activities don't align with your envisioned customer experience. Determine how to address them so that these components can be brought into alignment. The Final WordEvery product or service you bring to market yields a customer experience. Is it the experience you intend? Does that experience fulfill the promise you've made to the marketplace? By identifying the people, processes, and tools that drive your customer experience, you can actively design and control your own, unique, optimized experience. The brand promise you make to the marketplace will be kept day in and day out across every key customer touchpoint, building a strong brand.2. The role of internet and digital media for promotional channels such as advertising and PR. The Internet and information technology have dramatically changed the environment for business. Marketers new ability to convert all types of communications into digital media has created efficient, inexpensive ways of connecting businesses and consumers and has improved the flow and the usefulness of information. Businesses have the information they need to make more informed decisions, and consumers have access to a greater variety of products and more information about choices and quality. The defining characteristic of information technology in the 21st century is accelerating change. New systems and applications advance so rapidly that it is almost impossible to keep up with the latest developments. Startup companies emerge that quickly overtake existing approaches to digital media. When Google first arrived on the scene, a number of search engines were fighting for dominance. With its fast, easy-to-use search engine, Google became number one and is now challenging many industries, including advertising, newspapers, mobile phones, and book publishing. Despite its victory, Google is constantly being challenged itself by competitors like Yahoo! and Baidu. Baidu is gaining ground with 75 percent of the Chinese search engine market. Baidu has also announced it will create its own mobile technology to challenge Googles more than 40 percent market share in mobile operating systems in China. 3 Social networking continues to advance as the channel most observers believe will dominate digital communication in the near future. Today, people spend more time on social networking sites, such as Facebook, than they spend on e-mail.Digital media are electronic media that function using digital codes Digital marketing uses digital media to develop communications and exchanges with customers Electronic marketing, or e-marketing, refers to the strategic process of distributing, promoting, pricing products, and discovering the desires of customers using digital media and digital marketing. Social networks are meeting places where users connect with one another by creating profiles and searching networks for people to add as friends or followers. The Internet allows marketers to communicate with consumers, reach new markets, and target markets more precisely. 1. It is important that marketers incorporate multiple digital media into their marketing strategies. 2. It is a growing area that is quickly changing. The most important benefit of e-marketing is the ability of marketers and consumers to share information. The Internet has changed how marketers communicate with consumers, suppliers, and employees. Digital marketing is essential, for many businesses, in attaining and retaining a competitive advantage.AdvertisingAdvertising is a means of communication to a target audience using mostly paid media such as television, radio, the Internet and print publications. Successful advertising programs include themes that communicate company mission, branding and services as well as specific product information. The media for advertising are chosen based on what market research has identified as the most successful way of reaching a target audience and the financial resources that can be applied to advertising based on the marketing budget. Public RelationsPublic relations is a communication method used by businesses to convey a positive image to a target audience and the general public. Public relations methods can include press releases, community involvement and speaking at public forums on issues important to a target audience. Small companies with small advertising budgets can use public relations as an inexpensive medium to establish the company name and communicate a brand image. Successful public relations programs highlight company accomplishments and positive contributions to community. The formulation of the digital marketing plan is likely to be informed by four signi cant and interdependent elements.481 Strategic alignment of digital promotional activities with corporate, marketing and marketing communication strategies is important as it should ensure development of a potentially successful digital marketing plan. This process should also help de ne the purpose of the digital marketing activities.2 The value proposition should emphasize the unique advantages created by the use of digital technologies for example, choice (amazon.com offers the worlds widest and deepest range of books at very low prices), convenience (tesco.com offers round-the-clock shopping), community (Facebook brings people together around the world). The value proposition created through the relative advantage afforded by digital technologies should reinforce core brand values and be clearly articulated to target audiences. It will also determine the extent to which organizational change is required. 3 Organizational change is likely if the digital marketing plan is to be delivered successfully. A good example to consider is how retailers like Tesco and Sainsburys have developed unique logistical solutions to support online ordering. E-commerce initiatives can involve applying a wide range of digital technologies: Internet, EDI, email, electronic payment systems, advanced telephone systems, mobile and handheld digital appliances, interactive television, self-service kiosks and smart cards. Consequently, utilizing such technologies may require signi cant changes to operations and working practices in order to ensure that the right skill sets (capabilities) and resources are available when required.4 Implementation of the plan should be executed in a timely manner. Additionally, the success of the digital marketing plan is likely to be affected by senior management commitment, availability of appropriate resources and the appropriateness of the strategic vision that is guiding the implementation. The signi cance of the digital marketing plan for a companys overall strategy will also largely be dependent upon levels of technology adoption, investment and integration.In addition, analysis of the environment should take place in order to determine the likely relevance of digital marketing. When assessing a target audience the following information will be useful.491 Customer connectivity: the proportion of the target markets that has access to relevant technologies.2 Customer channel usage: how often target market participants use online channels and how they use the particular digital channel/platform (e.g. purchase or research?). For instance, for each customer segment and digital channel (e.g. Internet, interactive digital TV or mobile), a company should know the proportion of the target market that: makes use of and has access to a particular channel browses and, as a result, is in uenced by using the channel for pre-purchase research and evaluation buys through the particular channel.3 Online media consumption: how many hours each week are spent using the Internet in comparison with traditional media such as watching TV, reading newspapers or magazines, or listening to the radio? 3.How can your website support the inbound telemarketing efforts of your company?Inbound TelemarketingWhen we become an extension of your company!Call Center and Telemarketing Solutions by OceanConnects Customised Telemarketing SolutionsHow we use inbound telemarketing for your businessIVR (Interactive Voice Response) interactive set of menu options directing callers to the appropriate department so they can have their queries handled faster and more accurately Live Answering Service: we take the calls when you cannot, so that no calls are left unanswered, no client is greeted by a voicemail and so that you receive all messages accurately and completely Customer Service- taking care of your customers before, during and after the purchasing of a product or serviceOrder taking:whenever a customer visits your website, comes across your brochure, hears or sees your add, making a phone call is often the first choice for contacting you. This allows the customer to speak to a live person and receive the required information and clarification about the product.Answering calls generated by direct response television / radio / newspaper advertising campaigns Catalogue or Information Requests: tell us how you want your calls answered. We will just need you to provide us with information about your company and products and our agents will familiarize themselves with all you want your customers to know. Event and Conference Registration: if your organizing an event or a conference, not only can we assist you in promoting the event, but we can also provide Live Agent Registration. This way, in addition to registering, the registrants can also ask for more information. Managing complaints effective complaint management and problem resolution process allows organizations to obtain customer feedback and data, which is then used to: - improve the services/products- increase customer satisfaction and loyalty- increase profitsCustomer service and support solutions it is common knowledge that retaining a customer is much more profitable than finding a new customer, make sure they are well looked after. We can provide your company with both contact centre and helpdesk support solutions so that you can rest assured that all customer issues and queries are dealt with in real time and professionally. Competition line have you launched a competition or are you planning to and need assistance handling all calls and/or gathering entering details from participants? We have the knowledge and skills to take this task on and deliver accurate information back to you. Breakdown service if your employees need to be on call 24/7 to rapidly assist your customers when they call your number, we could save you the trouble of having one person in the office just waiting for a call to come in. How can we do that? Because we are in the office at all times passing on your customers message to your on call employees so that your company can do its job. Once the task is completed just let us know and we fill in the report and have it sent to you. After-hours call handling when people call your company after hours looking for information about your services and there is no one there to answer to phone your company could be missing out on potential business opportunities. Why take that chance when you could make the most of every opportunity? We would be delighted to learn everything about your company and products so that we can pass that information on to your prospective clients! will support your customer acquisition effort by verifying all information captured and communicated relevant to your service offerings...while your customer is on the phone! We custom tailor programs to meet and exceed client objectives. Our order taking system allows AMERITEL to custom script your program with logical call progression and work from your database to look up customer information and update accordingly. Our system effectively facilitates even the most complex up sell, cross sell, and special offer initiatives. Accurate totals with applicable shipping and handling and taxes can be communicated. AMERITEL records all calls taken for quality assurance purposes. 4. How can your database support your one to one marketing efforts on the internet? One-to-one marketing. One-to-few or one-to-one communications with individualized message and medium for each highly targeted market or individual customer.There are four key steps for putting a one-to-one marketing program to work: Identifying your customers. To launch a one-to-one initiative, your company must be able to locate and contact a fair number of its customers directly, or at least a substantial portion of its most valuable customers. It's critical to know customers in as much detail as possible: not just their names and addressable characteristics(such as addresses, phone numbers, or account codes), but their habits, preferences, and so forth. And not just a snapshot - a one time questionnaire. You need to recognize the customer at every contact point, I n every medium used, at every location, and within every division of your company, no matter which product line is involved. Remember, however, that the "customers" who benefit from your one-to-one program may not he limited to the end users of your product or service. If, for example, you are a manufacturer selling to retailers, then you will also want to apply the principles of one-to-one marketing to create better relationships with your channel members and other intermediaries in your demand chain. Differentiating your customers. Broadly speaking, customers are different in two principal ways: they represent different levels of value and they have different needs. Once you identify your customers, differentiating them will help you to focus your efforts so as to gain the most advantage with the most valuable customers. You will then be able to tailor your company's behavior to each customer in order to reflect that customer's value and needs. The degree and type of differentiation in a company's customer base will also help you decide on the appropriate strategy for a given business situation. Interacting with your customers. Improving both the cost-efficiency and the effectiveness of your interactions with customers is a critical component of a one-to-one marketing program. Cost-efficiency improves by directing customer interactions toward more automated and therefore less costly channels. For example, a company that provides helpful, up-to-date information at its Web site won't need to spend as much as it once did supporting a more expensive call center. Effectiveness improves by generating timely, relevant information, providing either better insight into a customer's needs or a more accurate picture of a customer's value. Every interaction with a customer should take place in the context of all previous interactions with that customer. A conversation should pick up where the last one left off, whether the previous interaction occurred last night or last month, at the call center or on the company Web site. Customizing your enterprise's behavior. Ultimately, to lock a customer into a learning relationship, a company must adapt some aspect of its behavior to meet that customer's individually expressed needs. This might mean mass-customizing a manufactured product, or it could involve tailoring some aspect of the services surrounding a product-perhaps the way the invoice is rendered or how the product is packaged. In any case, the production or servicedelivery end of your business has to be able to treat a particular customer differently based on what was learned about that customer by the sales, marketing, or any other department. In rushing to reap the rewards of relationship marketing, it's easy for a business to overlook this critical fourth step, leading many to misunderstand the entire discipline as simply an excuse for direct mail and telemarketing.5. How can a company personalize the interactive web sessions with specific customersTHE PERSONALIZATION VALUE SPACEWhen we talk about personalization we assume we are addressing a whole range of information types and possible values to customers and businesses. For example, various projects within IBM Research are aimed at "knowing the user" on an individual level and as a member of some category of users (e.g., expert web user). These efforts include everything from identifying product preferences (through explicit questions), to inferring current goal intention (through gaze or click stream), to attempting to identify emotional state (though facial expression Technologies vary in computational complexity, including various rule engines or user model based calculations. Our research was not aimed specifically at identifying a single "best technique". We do not believe this is a reasonable goal because our work suggests that (1) the value of techniques to any customer will vary with the role of the customer at any given time, (2) the value of a technique to a business will depend on the kind of business objectives they have, and (3) there are likely to be interactions between techniques resulting in a package of techniques that would be optimally effective. Our research will explore this Personalization Value Space (PVS) through an examination of personalization policies (e.g., permission marketing, levels of identity), feature categories (e.g., collaborative filtering, click stream analysis), user characteristics (e.g., predisposition to trust, interaction goal), and business context (e.g., product offering, business goals). We believe that the effectiveness of personalization efforts are a function of these four components (i.e., Effectiveness = f (policy, feature, user context, business context)).This conception of personalization does not stand alone; we view personalization as closely tied to Privacy and Security research. While Privacy deals essentially with users controls over information about themselves, personalization is concerned with the value that might be realized by a customer and provider from sharing information with one another. In general, Security research has to do with the confidence that data cannot be compromised or taken by unauthorized sources. We believe that both Customers and Providers view security as essential to proceeding with any interaction between them. Extending this, we view Trust as an important element of the value propositions for both customers and providers in any interaction. Customer trust of an e-business develops through their perception that the data they provide is secure, will be used only as they allow, and provides them value.Chat Enables Interactive Conversations for Online Customers Many customers initial explorations of a brands product or services occur on the brands web site. This is the time for brands to ensure that online visitors receive the support they need and to provide a positive web experience. Chat conversations provide the following benefits: Improve customer confidence. Accurate responses to questions enhance customers experience and result in a favorable view of the brand by the customer. Engage customers more fully. Customers often surf the web looking for product information and services. Interactive sessions keep potential buyers involved, leading to higher sales and customer satisfaction. Provide faster response times. Automated web chat provides information directly to customers and deflects traffic from assisted support. This reduces traffic flow and decreases handling times for those customers who seek assisted support. Simplify customer experience. The transfer of an automated chat session to a live chat agent or phone conversation minimizes customer effort and contributes to the Customers Lifetime Value. It makes it easy for customers to receive quality support and results in a positive customerThe three distinctive steps for building online consumer relationships are: Get Consumers to Come (Pre-Purchase) Once There, Add Value (Purchase), and Get Them to Come Back (Post-Purchase)In any of these three phases, consumers have different objectives, scopes, intentions and shopping habits. In order to achieve and build a more efficient online consumer relationship, a different personalization technique is suggested for each of the three phases described above. The figure below presents a framework of understanding for personalization methods complementarities through the various phases of building online consumer relationships as well as the optimum use of personalization techniques per phase. Figure 1: Building online consumer relationships using personalization Techniques6. How can a company use cloud services to personalize the service experience of customers? Explain in terms of 3 levels of services of cloud computing?Cloud computing is Internet-based computing, whereby shared servers provide resources, software, and data to computers and other devices on demand, as with the electricity grid. Cloud computing is a natural evolution of the widespread adoption of virtualization, service-oriented architecture and utility computing. Details are abstracted from consumers, who no longer have need for expertise in, or control over, the technology infrastructure in the cloud that supports them. Cloud computing describes a new supplement, consumption, and delivery model for IT services based on the Internet, and it typically involves over-the-Internet provision of dynamically scalable and often virtualized resources. It is a byproduct and consequence of the ease-of-access to remote computing sites provided by the Internet. This frequently takes the form of web-based tools or applications that users can access and use through a web browser as if it were a program installed locally on their own computer. Cloud Software as a Service (SaaS)--The capability provided to the consumer is to use the providers applications running on a cloud infrastructure. The applications are accessible from various client devices through a thin client interface such as a web browser (e.g., web-based email). The consumer does not manage or control the underlying cloud infrastructure including network, servers, operating systems, storage, or even individual application capabilities, with the possible exception of provider-defined user-specific application configuration settings Cloud Platform as a Service (PaaS)--The capability provided to the consumer is to deploy onto the cloud infrastructure consumer-created or acquired applications created using programming languages and tools supported by the provider. The consumer does not manage or control the underlying cloud infrastructure including network, servers, operating systems, or storage, but has control over the deployed applications and possibly application hosting environment configurations Cloud Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)--The capability provided to the consumer is to provision processing, storage, networks, and other fundamental computing resources where the consumer is able to deploy and run arbitrary software, which can include operating systems and applications. The consumer does not manage or control the underlying cloud physical infrastructure but has control over operating systems, storage, deployed applications, and possibly limited control of select networking componentsThe idea behind any cloud computing proposal is for you to pay only for what you use, scaling up or down according tobusiness needs. Vendors supporting cloud computing can interpret this statement differently, providing varying levels of services to achieve this result. The three approaches to cloud computing are Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Software as a Service (SaaS), and Platform as a Service (PaaS). This excerpt from the recent publication Windows Azure Step by Stepwill elaborate.Infrastructure as a ServiceSome vendors provide the infrastructure to build solutions, and you rent the hardware such as servers, load balancers, a firewall, and cables. You then configure these remotely and install your solutions on them. You can scale up by requesting more servers and reconfiguring the load balancer without purchasing more hardware. You can scale down at any time by reconfiguring the infrastructure you rented from the cloud service provider. This vendor approach is called Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) because a customer can rent the infrastructure without having to forecast and provision for the highest possible demand in advance. In this approach, you are responsible for correctly configuring the rented infrastructure.These are the most important points to remember about IaaS:The lower levels of the stack are managed by the vendor.Very few vendors actually provide an operating system. You are still responsible for managing everything, from the operating system to the applications. The obvious benefit of IaaS is that it frees you from the concerns of provisioning many physical or virtual machines.Software as a ServiceIn another approach, you can rent a service offered by the vendor and then configure the service by using the interface provided by the vendor, without having to know what infrastructure the vendor uses to provide that service. This approach is called Software as a Service (SaaS) because you pay to use defined services. For example, Microsoft Exchange Online carries a per-mailbox charge. To configure it, you use a web application supplied by the vendor to request mailboxes, and name and dimension them. You receive a password for that user and nothing else is necessaryusers can access their mailboxes immediately.This proposed interface has little in common with the on-premises version of Microsoft Exchange. In an SaaS model, you do not have control over nor are you responsible for the hardware on which the service is installed. Similarly, you have no control over the operating system that runs the service, nor any control over the software apart from what the web user interface exposes to you. In other words, a vendor provides everything required to run the application, shielding you from all the underlying components.Platform as a ServiceThe third approach is Platform as a Service, or PaaS. In this approach, you rent a platform on which you deploy your applications without configuring the infrastructure and without the limitations of the SaaS approach.The Wikipedia definition for PaaS is as follows (Wikipedia, Platform as a Service, 2011,http://en.wikipedia....rm_as_a_service):...the delivery of a computing platform and solution stack as a service. PaaS offerings facilitate deployment of applications without the cost and complexity of buying and managing the underlying hardware and software and provisioning hosting capabilities, providing all of the facilities required to support the complete life cycle of building and delivering web applications and services entirely available from the Internet.PaaS offerings may include facilities for application design, application development, testing, deployment and hosting as well as application services such as team collaboration, web service integration and marshaling, database integration, security, scalability, storage, persistence, state management, application versioning, application instrumentation and developer community facilitation. These services may be provisioned as an integrated solution over the web.The Windows Azure platform fits best in the PaaS category, because it doesnt provide access to the underlying virtualization environment or operating system details such as the network interface, IP configuration, and disk management.The key concepts to remember when dealing with PaaS are:The platform vendor provides and manages everything, from the network connectivity to the runtime. PaaS offerings reduce the developer burden by supporting the platform runtime and related application services. Developers can begin creating the business logic for applications almost immediately. PaaS, compared to traditional hosting solutions, offers the potential for significant productivity increases, because the cloud provider manages all the hardware and operational aspects of the cloud platform.Software as a ServiceSoftware as a Service (SaaS) delivers business processes and applications, such as CRM, collaboration, and e-mail, as standardized capabilities for a usage-based cost at an agreed, business-relevant service level. SaaS provides significant efficiencies in cost and delivery in exchange for minimal customization and represents a shift of operational risks from the consumer to the provider. All infrastructure and IT operational functions are abstracted away from the consumer. Platform as a ServicePlatform as a Service (PaaS) delivers application execution services, such as application runtime, storage, and integration, for applications written for a pre-specified development framework. PaaS provides an efficient and agile approach to operate scale-out applications in a predictable and cost-effective manner. Service levels and operational risks are shared because the consumer must take responsibility for the stability, architectural compliance, and overall operations of the application while the provider delivers the platform capability (including the infrastructure and operational functions) at a predictable service level and cost. Infrasrtucture as a ServiceInfrastructure as a Service (IaaS) abstracts hardware (server, storage, and network infrastructure) into a pool of computing, storage, and connectivity capabilities that are delivered as services for a usage-based (metered) cost. Its goal is to provide a flexible, standard, and virtualized operating environment that can become a foundation for PaaS and SaaS.IaaS is usually seen to provide a standardized virtual server. The consumer takes responsibility for configuration and operations of the guest Operating System (OS), software, and Database (DB). Compute capabilities (such as performance, bandwidth, and storage access) are also standardized.Service levels cover the performance and availability of the virtualized infrastructure. The consumer takes on the operational risk that exists above the infrastructure.7. Describe the components of SOSTAC Model and show how they can support the marketing strategy of the firm? SOSTAC Model was invented by Paul Smith, who is a bestselling marketing author, international speaker and consultant. He is the originator of the planning system used by the entire world. SOSTAC focuses on 6 most important elements of any businessSituation analysis, asking what is the current state of the business Objective, helps list an overview of goals for the business Strategy helps provide a big picture plan to achieve the goals. Tactics breaks down the big picture strategy into smaller details. Action helps assign responsibility and deadlines for certain tasks. Control, offers an easy way to track the progress of the plan.Each of these 6 elements contributes an essential piece of the overall marketing plan. They are now used by blue chips Corporation around the world and also by many small business and organizations. Traditionally the task of putting together a decent business or marketing plan has been enough to strike fear into many an aspiring junior manager or budding entrepreneur: "You want a marketing plan? Including financials? By the end of next week? Of course, no problem... (Oooer.. how on earth am I supposed to do this?..)" The young planner then cocoons himself or herself away for a week after asking friends and relatives for examples of good planning documents, none of which is any use whatsoever, and trying to guess what exactly the boss (orbank manager) actually needs. Of course most of the time the boss hasn't got the first clue about how to write a decent plan either - it's all a big game - moreover most of the bosses who do know what they want don't have the sense to coach the terrified underling as to what the plan should look like. So the inevitable reams and reams of pointless calculations and hypotheses ensue, much midnight oil is burned, and a needlessly complex business planning document is produced. Happily not so with PR Smith's SOSTAC tool. Common sense prevails, and we can safely get on with producing a proper useful working planning tool, instead of something that will attract a jolly good bollocking for the unwitting planner, and then be tucked away into a deep drawer never to see the light of day again. Incidentally when accrediting the SOSTAC model the official attribution is PR Smith (there are thousands of Paul Smiths..), and it is certainly appropriate to use the symbol, which I do here on this page rather more freely than normally because so many people have come to think that SOSTAC just sort of grew on a wall or something, or was devised by someone else who thought they'd fancy taking the credit for it. here are some tips on how to use SOSTAC based on my experience of applying it in companies and seeing how students apply it in assignments. 1. Use SOSTAC to review your processBefore looking at how you apply SOSTAC at each step to create a marketing plan, my first tip is to use it to review your planning process and how you manage your marketing. Ask yourself critically about the activities you personally and your organisation are good at. Maybe you spend too much or too little time reviewing the situation. Perhaps youre not so good at setting SMART objectives, or developing strategies to support them or the control stage of assessing how effective your strategies and tactics are and adjusting them? 2. Get the balance right across SOSTACOftentimes, there is too much time spent on analysis within a plan and not enough on setting the strategies. Id also say that for a student assignment, its best to make reference to AC relatively brief, incorporating them into other sections. So as a rule of thumb, this is how your balance of content could look: S (20%) O (5%) S (45%) T (30%) = 100%3. Summarise your Situation in a TOWs matrix form of SWOTTo give focus to your situation analysis I recommend this form of SWOT analysis. This helps integrate SWOT with strategy. 4. Make your goals SMART and link them to your analytics/control process Since digital marketing is so measurable, it makes sense to be specific as possible about your goals by developing a funnel conversion model. You should also setup specific goals in Google Analytics. But its worth thinking about the full range of goals indicated by the 5Ss. 5. Integrate the different elements of your SWOTOftentimes in a plan or report there isnt good flow relating sections. To help this I recommend summarising your entire SOSTAC plan within a table.8. In relation to SEO, describe 5 concepts, processes, and best practices Search engine optimization is a complex subject, especially when you consider all the information and misinformation readily available online. The basic principles are fairly constant and building a solid foundation in SEO understanding will carry you much further that trying to exploit the tactic du jour. That said, SEO can be generally categorized into 5 different aspects: Keyword researchSearch engine friendly site developmentOn-page SEOLink BuildingAnalyticsEach of the above is important and they all work together. The whole s greater than the sum of the parts. Lets talk about each of the above in more detail. 1. Keyword ResearchEveryone would like their pages to rank #1, which begs the question rank for what? Not all keywords and keyword phrases are equal. Some are typed into a search engine more often and some are more likely to lead to a sale. You dont need or want to optimize for every possible keyword or phrase. For example say you sell real estate in Des Moines, Iowa. You might think it important to rank well for the phrase real estate, but is it? Someone looking to buy property in New York or Los Angelesisnt going to be interested in the homes you sell in Des Moines. Why spend time and money trying to get those people to your site. Youd do much better to target phrases that include Iowa and even better Des Moines. As a web designer you might think it important to rank well for the phrase web design, but again is it important? Are people searching for the phrases web design looking to hire a web designer or are they looking for information about web design, perhaps a definition? There are 3 types of queries someone might type into a search engine Informational queries searching for information from general to specific Navigational queries searching for a specific site or page Transactional queries searching with an intent to purchase You probably dont want to spend time ranking a blog post of information for a transactional query and you probably dont want people typing informational queries to land inside your shopping cart. All three types of queries are important and each could ultimately lead to a sale. Someone finding helpful information on your site may very well come back later and buy something. The important thing to understand is that what a person types into a search engine reveals something about their intent and that based on the searchers intent youd want different pages of your site ranking for different queries. Developing A List Of Keywords To TargetThe first step in developing a keyword list is brainstorming. Take some time and write down as many words and phrases as you can think of that relate to your site with the understanding that this is simply the start of your research. You should be able to build a list of 50 100 phrases without much trouble. As you continue to brainstorm phrases some themes should being to emerge. Do you only offer web design or do you also offer web development? Maybe you also offer WordPress development and Drupal development. You might specialize in ecommerce design or small business web design. Perhaps you also offer web hosting. Each of these will likely become a keyword theme around which youll build a more detailed list. Brainstorming will only yield so many words so your next step should be to expand your list through some keyword tools. Here are a few freebies to get you started. Google AdWords Keyword ToolSEO Book Keyword ToolWordTrackerKeyword DiscoveryThe last two also have paid options that will return a lot more phrases and have additional features for research. There are also a variety of more advanced keyword research tools should you desire them. Dont worry about the absolute numbers with keyword tools. The numbers are estimates. For example when I typed web design into the free WordTracker tool, 8 of the top 20 phrases were specific to North Dakota web design. Its unlikely that so many people are searching for web design in North Dakota and more likely that one or more web design firms in North Dakota are searching for those phrases a lot to see how well they rank. Consider the numbers more in relative terms in comparison to each other. If all of the above tools show that more people search for web design than website design, its probably true. Just dont count on the absolute numbers to hold true, especially as a prediction of future searches for the phrase. A few tips about building keyword lists:Find the words and phrases your customers use instead of industry jargon. Its great that you develop with progressive enhancement. How many of your clients do you think search for progressive enhancement or even know what it means Look for synonyms Similar to the above seek the words potential clients will use. You call ite-commerce. They might type ecommerce. Is it web design or website design? Add qualifiers Our Des Moines Iowa real estate agent might add Des Moines, Iowa, or both to most every phrase. As a web designer your services might be affordable or professional. Optimizing for professional web design services also optimizes for web design services Services would also be a qualifier. Qualify your qualifiers You might be tempted to add a qualifier like free since so many people use the word. However someone searching for free anything isnt looking to buy. Unless youre offering something for free its probably best to stay away from free as a qualifier. Look to your analytics package to see what phrases are currently brining people to your site. These can tell you what youre already ranking well for and give you ideas about similar phrases you can also likely rank well for. Keyword ResourcesThe above barely scratches keyword research. Here are some free resources to add to your knowledge of researching and selecting keywords Keyword Research and Selection (PDF) One of the best PDFs for understanding the process of keyword research and keyword selection Keyword Research Guide (PDF) Real experts offer thoughts on keywords for a fictional company SummaryIts important to remember that SEO, while capable of providing a valuable source of traffic, is still only one way to attract potential clients and customers to your site. Think of SEO as part of your marketing strategy instead of your whole marketing strategy. Dont lose sight of the forest staring at a handful of trees. SEO is an iterative process that can begin anywhere. Most of the time it will begin with keyword research, especially if youve yet to build your site or create the initial content. Keywords help you define who your market is and what that market is looking for. Theyll also lead the way when it comes to how you develop your site, what content you choose to create, and how that content is written.9. Describe the 4 marketing activity of CRM and how each maybe applied to IM?CRM is an approach in building and sustaining long term business with customers. CRM comprises of four marketing activities :Customer selectionCustomer acquisitionCustomer retentionCustomer extensionManaging the sales process, this can be achieved through e-commerce sites or in a B2B context by supporting sales rep by recording the sales process SFA (sales force automation) Campaign management- ad, direct emails, and other campaigns. Acquire and retain customers through a multichannel buying process and customers life cycle. Improving customers knowledge, targeting, service delivering and satisfaction.