Steps to run a successful Online Marketing (including Social Media) Campaigns

Understand -> Measure -> Develop Strategy -> Implement -> Iterate -> Improved Implementation -> Results

Understand:- Facebook :- 350 Million, Twitter : 75 million, LinkedIn : 58 million. These numbers matter no more than a 1 minute discussion factor for a Business (Small or Big). Important is, where exactly are the potential Target customers/clients. First, understand that.

Measure :- "What gets measured, gets done" Measure the amount of people who actively seek your product and people who gets activated to know more about your product due to Viral effect. Work around the platforms where they are in abundance and concentrate on increasing this number. Take control of ROI and a good Analyst will always strive to increase the ROI.

Develop Strategy: What are the keywords people use to find your product, what campaigns have been proven successful for your competitors etc. Use all the useful data in your strategy development. Example: A local Law firm need to target only a city, so it needs everything that makes it a bigger Internet brand, but primarily in the city. This Strategy will be completely different from the Strategy of Online Retailer who sells Worldwide.

Implement: Go ahead and implement. Use variable campaigns and keep checking the results of each of them. Remove the worst ones, add more resources to the best ones and improve the mediocre ones. This will help increase the ROI. I recently did a Presentation on Small Business & Use of Internet, which highlights the Strategy for Small Business Campaigns.

Iterate: Iteration is very important for enhancing the value of offering.

Tip: If you are running Facebook Ads (Assuming CPC: 25cents and CPM 30 cents), if you are on CPC and you are getting CTR of more than 0.1%, shift the campaign to CPM, this will save your Campaign cost by 40% (40% is assuming the Campaign Manager Cost is negligible ).

Improved Implementation: By now you will have your results. Add in the data you are collecting from your Campaigns to improve the campaigns.

Results:- Keep enjoying. Important is to be effective - in knowing, what you are doing. Try to beat the benchmarks in your industry. Keep costs low (compared to benchmarks) but not at the expense of a customer acquisition.

We follow the above steps for our Vancouver Internet Marketing or any other Clients. Do visit the website http://www.ismoip.com/ for more information on Internet Marketing

Cheers

In response to Linkedin Question :- Weather Economy is decided by Crude Oil or Money?

Oil is just a commodity, yes a large one but after all a commodity. It is a resource required to drive the demand of various activities in the economic growth and set up of Economies. In 2008 almost $2.7 trillion of Crude Oil was traded, big enough right. But when you compare it to World GDP it is less than 5% of almost $60 trillion (World GDP). Yes there is lot of value added at various stages and that increases the influence on Crude Oil in deciding the final GDP numbers. But certainly it is not the Economy decider.

2nd factor which can explain you about why it is not the only driver is CPI. Energy including oil are 17% of Inflation basket (in US). There are 83% other things that is part of inflation basket, so does it explains the World GDP or economies certainly not.

Gulf Countries, they are always profitable even if Oil trades at 30$, if they have excess cash, they create Soverign Wealth Funds and invest in other countries, so higher prices doesnt mean more local investments.

Now coming to money.

Money supply drives prices, no matter whatever the reason be. Price of any thing, stock, commodity, food will increase if more money is chasing it, but does that mean money drives economy certainly not, it is just the means to buy something once economy has given you enough power to buy something.

So what drives economies:-

1. People:- Countries need to be young to grow, where you have more earning population and less dependent population. In other words the earning population earns enough to take care of dependent population.

2. Economic development, which is dependent on government policies, open and investor friendly the country more wealth (in any form) will enter the economy thus making it grow.

3. Literacy. Can you name a developed world economy that is not literate, certainly not. More literate the people are, more connected they will be, more intellectual they will be and more options they will have to drive the economic activity.

4. Innovation:- Innovation does not mean only about winning Nobel Prize, it can also be doing something already being done, but in more efficient manner. Like, producing cheap, micro products etc.

To conclude: Crude is a commodity required to full fill certain tasks of economy. Money is one way of deciding the wealth the economy have and a mode of exchange, it in itself is not a wealth. Economy, is dependent on the activity that takes place within it or associated with it. Thus decided by all (All means all) the action that happens within it.

Follow the Original Discussion on on my linkedin Profile.

Indian Insurance Sector - Comparison and Analysis

Insurance premium in US stands at $1.4 trillion. 52% life health and 42% casualty. That is approx 9% of GDP. Figures are at 12.5% for UK, 10.5% for Japan. Indian insurance market approx. at $30billion and 3% of GDP is smaller than even Taiwan. So still there is lot of room for growth. The FDI in insurance sector is just 10% as of now, still enough scope for more investments to come before they reach the proposed cap of 49%. So in figures, things look good.

Now if we look subjectively, from where the growth will come from?

Along with FDI, you will also see the influx of insurance products from developed world. SME sector, is still vastly untapped for employee group insurance. With hospital boom coming up and happening, do you think they are banking upon only patients who can pay. Not really these fore sighted med companies know that, with the growth of medical insurance, they are bound to get more customers (patients), These med companies will push hard along with medical insurance companies to bring in some innovative and cheaper insurance products for huge Indian middle class.

So insurance sector still remains in nascent stage and lot need to be done. This is one game, which still have lot of juice in it.

However I personally is worried about ULIPs, insurance agents in India, keep pushing ULIPs harder and harder, because they get more commission by selling these plans rather than ordinary insurance plans.

Imagine if a new private company gets flow of redemptions now when these ULIPs have bleed ed and recent rally was not enough to break even the prices. Ordinary Indian does not know about the risks associated with these equity linked plans. So here government need to do something, I would say government should reform the commission paid to insurance agents and be more strict , so that commission should not decide what agent sells. It should be the need of customer, what should decide it.

Overall it is still a story will long journey and lots of action.

Does it really take complicated formulas and strategies to create wealth?

In response to linkedin question:-

The question was :-

Does it really take complicated formulas and strategies to create wealth? Read on -

Warren Buffet's advice for 2009
Extract -
Every new year, I adopt a couple of old maxims as my beacons to guide my future. This self-prescribed therapy has ensured that with each passing year, I grow wiser and not older. This year, I invite you to tap into the financial wisdom of our elders along with me, and become financially wiser.

* Hard work: All hard work bring a profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty.

* Laziness: A sleeping lobster is carried away by the water current.

* Earnings: Never depend on a single source of income. [At least make your Investments get you second earning]

* Spending: If you buy things you don't need, you'll soon sell things you need.

* Savings: Don't save what is left after spending; Spend what is left after saving.

* Borrowings: The borrower becomes the lender's slave.

* Accounting: It's no use carrying an umbrella, if your shoes are leaking.

* Auditing: Beware of little expenses; A small leak can sink a large ship.

* Risk-taking: Never test the depth of the river with both feet. [ Have an alternate plan ready ]

* Investment: Don't put all your eggs in one basket.

I'm certain that those who have already been practicing these principles remain financially healthy. I'm equally confident that those who resolve to start practicing these principles will quickly regain their financial health.

Let us become wiser and lead a happy, healthy, prosperous and peaceful life.

Article Source - http://www.financialexpress.com/news/warren-buffetts-advice-for-2009/423658/
Having read this one would wonder does it really take all that we try and do to create wealth or does it abiding by some simple and straight maxims to achieve it -
your thoughts folks.

My answer to it is:-

Let me answer this point by point.

Hardwork:- . So the question is, what is ideally a hardwork and what is not. For me:- Everynight when I go to bed if I feel that in a day I did atleast one thing that was more than my daily routine and was a value addition, it means I worked hard. Over longer period of time, to quantify (financially) you should strive to keep your monthly income (from all sources) to grow every year atleast a percent more then inflation rate.
Laziness: Early in the morning if I make a plan for the day and at the end of the day if I feel that I missed the plan and wasted time on something not useful, that means I was lazying around.
Savings: The best habit on planet, but for a family where bills await you much before the pay check arrives, question arises of how to save?
I suggest as soon as a pay check comes 1st thing you should spent it on is towards your investments, make sure you set a minimum limit (ex: 10% +/- of paycheck) and stick to it. Be disciplined and each year, amount should increase minimum by the rate of inflation. Know what you will need later like:- retirement, downpayment, child's school fees etc.
Borrowing:- This point is bit tricky. Borrowing is not that bad as thought. Simply put, if you are borrowing to buy something that is liability (ex: consumer durables, holidays, for regularly eating out) then it is bad, unless its a necessity. However if you are borrowing to create an asset (house, small business, for me even good books) then it is a good thing. Be sure that when you go out to borrow, you shop hard, you bargain hard (ex:- Mortgage payment of $100000 for 25 years at 5% is $584/month and at 4.5% is $556/month. So a 0.5% will make you pay 5% more every month for 25 years and this 5% will cost you $15635 over 25years, that is whopping 15% of the principal borrowed ) and time your borrowing (ex: if you are going to buy something after 2 months, dont borrow today and keep paying interest for extra 2 months. So be a borrower but smart borrower.
Accounting:- Well said quote, however how to practice it. I suggest, plan your monthly budget, be accountable to yourself at personal level. Keep the same principle for work too.
Auditing: Very important in wealth creation. One example is mentioned above. Another could be: imagine you are have a credit card liability (at 17% thats what cards charge at an average) of $5000 and you are paying $100 every month, it will take you 7.75 years and $9311 to clear your debt. However if you convert it to personal loan of $5000, at 8% you need to pay $102/month (almost same), you will clear your debt in 5 years (2.75 years before) and with only $6083...Huge saving of leakage of over 50% and time.
Risk taking: Its difficult to genralize the risk. Some thing is risky for you may not be for me and so on. However the closest answer I can provide is:- Diversify your risk and investments. Over longer period of time equities have delivered highest returns(11% historically) then other asset classes, even though they are risky. Check your risk profile (may be here you need a financial advisor, but remember that they are more concerned in selling the product where they are paid higher commision, so be careful and consult more than1 before hiring them) and decide accordingly your diversification ratios and investments.
Investments: This is my favorite point and I can write a book on it, however already being so long, I would try to keep it short.
Savings are meant nothing if kept idle in checking or normal 2% savings account, because inflation will eat it up over the years. Once you have created your risk profile, you should start investing immediately. Blend of equities+bonds+others if yield 8% returns, investing $2000/monthly will give you $ 9,47,000+ by 25th year, imagine if you keep this investment raising year after year.......
So wealth creation is easy if basics are clear and one follow a disciplined approach.
Hope it was useful.

Wealth Creation discussion