2015 - The Best & Worst of Simply Friday

So - how did the newsletter perform?

• 45 newsletters sent this year which was a little behind last year’s 47 but ahead of 2012 and 2013’s 44.
• Grew the opening rate from last year’s 58% to 62%
• Changed the opening title to shorten it by removing the “It’s Friday” Text
• A lot of churn - the list size stayed the same but many more new subscribes and unsubscribes than previous years.

On the whole I think I’m happy with that - driving the opening rate above 60% is encouraging and considering how the first half of the year was - I think I have a soft target for 2016!

The Best of 2015

What’s Going On In Your Business
Opening rate of 72.34%
July 2nd.

What's Going On In Your Business?

An impassioned plea to not only start measuring your performance but to actually do something with the data.  Just compiling the figures isn’t enough - you need to be changing behaviors as a result of data trends.

The Worst of 2015

Marketing Advice From Helmuth Von Moltke The Elder
Opening rate of 50.94%
October 29th

Marketing Advice from Helmuth von Moltke the Elder

You’d think after last year’s worst performer I’d have learned that random headlines that make sense to me but give you no indication as to what’s inside don’t work.  I wish I’d got this one across better as it is a critical point:

Digital marketing is the wild west and it’s different for everybody and every business.  Yes you need a plan and a general objective but you won’t find out what works for your business until you dive in.  The message that “No plan survives contact with the enemy” is so true when it comes to digital marketing - particularly in the social world.

Finally...

I don’t know about you but I’m exhausted - it has been a draining year.

I’m going to take the rest of month and get my energy back - do some reading and catch up on a million things I’ve been putting aside.

Have a happy holiday season and a fabulous new year.

See you on January 7th.

Written while listening to:  C major Theme - Lisbon Development

Image Credit: Metric Spaces by stuartpilbrow on Flickr
Image Credit: Bismarck, Roon, Moltke - Wikipedia

2015 Internet Trends - More Mobile - More Video

2015 Internet Trends Report from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers

I always look forward to Mary Meeker’s annual Internet Trends report, it’s 196 slides of the sexiest business intelligence you’ll read all year, and as you probably won’t, here are some of the main takeaways:

• Mobile ads are getting good
• The power of messaging and real time communication
• The growth of Men’s imagery
• How to manage Millenials
• The importance of customer reviews
• How to capture the teen market
• and much, much more…

What’s most relevant for you?

While 2013 was about mobile and 2014 was the development of the tablet audience, this year it’s about video.  But just to underline how important mobile has become consider this, back in 2011 people spent less than 1 hour a day on mobile devices (phones, tablets etc) - now they spend almost 3 hours and that accounts for over half the time they spend online!

That’s nuts!

But while mobile traffic grew 69% last year, the real insight is that over 55% of that traffic was video!  Just check out these figures from Facebook:

• 50% of all Facebook users watch at least one video a day
• 53% of those views come from shares
• 75% of those views happen on mobile.

Takeaway for 2015

Now before you all leap off and start your own YouTube channels let’s be real.  Those videos getting shared on Facebook probably have more to do with puppies than they do small businesses. 

The takeaway for me is that video is now a mature channel and is just one of the options you have to communicate your story.  Have a think about where and how you could use video as part of your overall communications strategy, with all the different options and platforms, you should be able to find something that works for you and your customers.

---

Written while listening to: Tubular Bells Part 1 Mike Oldfield

2015 Internet Trends: http://www.kpcb.com/internet-trends