If your emails aren’t mobile-friendly, you could be missing out on a huge opportunity to engage your subscribers and drive conversions. A recent study shows that 67% of all emails are now opened on mobile devices. In order to grab the attention of the modern day consumer, it is imperative to tailor your emails for smaller screens and scrolling fingers. Check out these key tips to ensure your emails are optimized for mobile viewers.
1. Short Subject Lines
47% of email recipients decide whether to open an email based on the subject line alone. If the subject is too long, it can get cut off on a mobile screen and disrupt the opportunity to connect with your reader. A mobile device only shows 25-30 characters of an email subject line, so it is imperative to be concise with your wording.
2. Single Column Layout
On a mobile device, multiple columns in an email often look too busy and can be confusing for the reader. Using a single column template will simplify your design and highlight your important content. It also makes the email easily scrollable, keeping your call-to-action in direct line of sight.
3. One Clear Call to Action
Emails that contain a single call to action (CTA) can increase clicks 371% and conversions 1,617%. To receive the maximum amount of clicks on a mobile device, it is important to keep a CTA to 2-4 words, use a higher contrast button color, place CTA towards the top of the email, and size the button to at least 44 x 44 pixels.
4. Concise Copy
Too much copy in an email can be overwhelming and boring to look at, especially on a mobile device. Use bulleted lists and short paragraphs to create easily scannable content for the reader. It is also important to increase the size the text to avoid people needing to zoom in to read the information.
5. Space to Click
Mobile screens get crowded quickly. If you stack links and CTA’s too close together without leaving enough space around them, recipients can accidentally click the wrong link. To keep this from happening, make sure to leave plenty of room to click, keep links to a minimum, and avoid stacking them.
The holiday season from November to the end of December is the most lucrative time of year for retailers. Is your business ready for the shopping frenzy? With the holidays quickly approaching, now is the time to formulate your marketing strategies to attract customers and generate those sales! Check out these marketing tips below to see how your business can maximize its sales during the holiday season.
Make Your Cyber 5 Strategy Part of a Bigger Game Plan
Those extremely important shopping days from Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday are referred to as the “Cyber 5”. A common misconception is to get your ad campaigns up and running just in time for Black Friday. While it is crucial to recognize the Cyber 5 as huge shopping days, implementing a more comprehensive advertising approach will result in a more consistent and effective campaign. In 2018, marketers devoted 19% of their search budgets to Cyber 5 spending, but those days make up for just 9% of holiday shopping. This year, more businesses are looking to adopt a strategy that encompasses the Cyber 5 as well as the whole extended holiday season. This results in catching the attention of both the October early-bird shoppers and the last minute shoppers.
Optimize for Mobile Use
A growing number of consumers are visiting websites from mobile devices. Your business must be optimized for mobile use if you want customers to find your store and stay to shop. A responsive web design is crucial for grabbing the attention of consumers and will result in greater engagement and higher sales numbers. The National Retail Federation projects 105 billion in online sales this holiday season with an estimated 127 million shoppers predicted to shop on Cyber Monday. Of these Cyber Monday shoppers, 25 million said they would specifically use their mobile devices for purchases.
Take Advantage of In-Channel Buying
Consumers are more connected than ever before. A recent study found that 64% of customers are using multiple channels to complete a single transaction. This translates to many touchpoint across numerous different platforms. In 2018, holiday traffic to digital sites from social media channels grew by 22% year over year. This year, even more shoppers are expected to be buying in-channel. This means that retailers should be ready to push their brand where the consumers already are, such as social media platforms.
Royal Highnies’ Holiday Success
Royal Highnies is a growing luxury loungewear and undergarment retailer. From boxer shorts to lounge pants, to tee shirts and more, Royal Highnies provides ultimate comfort for the whole family.
During the 2017 holiday season, Royal Highnies wanted to boost its online advertising in order to attract more consumers to the brand. This is where Spectruss came in. Our team worked with Royal Highnies to implement digital marketing strategies that would result in a huge ROI.
First, we conducted detailed market research to identify a specific target market for Royal Hignies. Based off this audience, we did rigorous keyword research to ensure their brand would be seen by the right consumers.
Once we defined a specific customer base, we developed a digital marketing plan that included creative email campaigns, shopping ad campaigns, display ads, social media ad campaigns and fresh graphics.
This campaign utilized new approaches and creative materials designed specifically to reach Royal Highnies’ target market. The end result? Royal Highnies saw a 25% increase in online sales and a 10% increase in wholesale sales.
We’ve all seen the headlines, and some of us have already felt it. A recession is looming. The R word can send chills down a business owner’s, and even employees’, spine. Luckily, there’s good news. We know how to beat a recession. On top of that, we know how to make your company beat your competitors in a recession. Here’s how:
First, a company should see a recession as an opportunity to beat your competition, not to run and hide. For instance, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut took advantage of McDonald’s choosing to drop their advertising budget during the 1990-91 recession. The result was Pizza Hut growing 61%, Taco Bell 40% and McDonald’s declined 28%. Pretty astonishing numbers, right!?
Second, a recession is a great time to trim the extra fat and lower your recurring overhead. Payroll is the largest recurring line item cost for each business, and if things slow down during a recession, you could be stuck with an uncomfortable amount of payroll. At the same time, those large agencies that you have been using for your campaigns and technical aspects of marketing, charge huge numbers based on their large overhead. This is where smaller, more nimble agencies, such as Spectruss, have an upper hand. Not only do we thrive in the digital realm, but we also have all of the capabilities in-house to act as your entire marketing department. This lowers your costs, and allows you to easily scale up or down with us, even on a month-to-month basis.
Third, have a team that is constantly watching the data. There will be a lot of opportunity that will open up during a recession, including areas of advertising with less saturation, lower costs per click, and adjusted sales pitches that really resonate. Having the ability to track all of this data, monitor it daily and adjust in real time will produce the largest return on your investment.
Attacking advertising and marketing with a digital first approach has helped Spectruss grow over the last 8+ years. We have grown to bring all technical aspects of marketing and advertising in-house, thus strengthening the client’s brand identity and lowering their overall cost. We can either act as your out-of-house marketing department taking lead from your in-house CMO, or even help you build strategy as your Virtual CMO. In short, Spectruss makes your business recession proof.
Give us a shout today to setup a free consultation with Founder Sam Silvey.
In a fast paced, digitally-run world, it is becoming increasingly harder to grab the attention of consumers. If brands want to stand out in this highly competitive market, they must get creative with their messaging and their marketing strategies. Customers are looking for authenticity in a brand and one of the best ways to establish this is with user-generated content (UGC).
UGC is content related to a certain brand that is voluntarily produced by individuals with the potential to drive conversation and build engagement. If a customer has a great experience with your brand, they are inclined to share that experience with their peers. Word-of-mouth referrals are extremely profitable for businesses because it provides authentic information from previous customers, boosting brand credibility and recognition.
The power of user-generated content has proved to be so beneficial that brands are integrating this into their marketing campaigns.
Share a Coke With…
When Coca Cola launched its “Share a Coke” campaign, people went crazy over the personalized bottles. Coca Cola changed its traditional label to “Share a Coke with” followed by a name. This multi-national campaign, which used 250 of the country’s most popular names, aimed to have people find a coke bottle with their name on it and then share it with friends.
To keep the hype going, Coca Cola asked customers to share pictures of themselves enjoying a coke with their personalized bottles on social media. This lead to massive amounts of user generated content, raising awareness and increasing user engagement with the brand. This massively successful campaign resulted in Coca Cola’s customers stepping into the role of advertiser.
The Royal Wedding
We all remember the highly anticipated royal wedding of American TV star Meghan Markle and Prince Harry of England in 2018. The lavish royal weddings of the past have always been real affairs, but this time, things were a little different.
Along with sending traditional reporters, the BBC news channel also sent 50 people from the general public to watch the wedding and share their experiences on social media. This built a connection with the public by providing them with a way to view the wedding through the eyes of every day people.
The individual stories shared from these 50 viewers were a form of user-generated content. The BBC news used this strategy as a way to attract more viewers and engagement from the public.
People trust the opinions of peers which is why it is so important for brands to incorporate UGC. The more trust and transparency a brand can establish with its customers, the stronger the brand will become.
What can a full-service all in-house advertising agency do for your business? The opportunities are endless, but you may have some questions. What services do we offer and which ones are best for your brand? And how much does it cost? Well, our services aren’t a one size fits all. We customize pricing for each client based on their specific business needs. At Spectruss, we love to learn everything we can about your company so we can develop the best plan of action for you!
Over the past 10+ years, our team at Spectruss has studied everything from video creation to web programming to become experts on how each aspect can benefit and grow a company. Our agency offers a vCMO service which encompasses all aspects of web programing, graphic design, videography, photography, content writing, advertising, digital marketing, and social media management. The vCMO package comes in four different levels including: entry level, silver, gold, and platinum. Each level provides more hours of service with a lower cost per hour.
Not sure if you are ready for a vCMO package? We also offer a la carte services which means you can take advantage of individual tasks such as branding, website design, etc. The best way to know what you can get for your budget and what services are ideal for your company is to give us a call! In fact, we are extending an offer to you to schedule a FREE 30 minute strategy consultation with the founder and CEO of Spectruss, Sam Silvey!
Month-to-month means no long term commitment. We all know the painstaking process of signing to a year long commitment. If things don’t go right, you still have to finish out the contract. We give the freedom and ability to go month-to-month with our vCMO service and give you the peace of mind to cancel at any time. But, we are sure that’s not going to happen, because you’re going to love our services!
We offer four different vCMO levels: entry level, silver, gold, and platinum. Each level provides more hours of service with a lower cost per hour. That’s the beauty of having no long term commitment. You can change the level of work you may need each month!
So what exactly is vCMO? Well, vCMO or virtual Chief Marketing Officer, is a service we provide that covers all strategic marketing for your business. Our team of professionals strategize the best ways to maximize your company’s growth and then implement those methods to provide the largest ROI for your business. Within our vCMO service, we provide all aspects of web programing, graphic design, videography, photography, content writing, advertising, digital marketing, and social media management. And if your company already has a Chief Marketing Officer? Great! We will work along side them to assist with any and all outsourcing needs. Since we do everything in-house, we provide strong brand consistency and high quality results.
We realize not everyone is ready to sign a contract, which is why we are excited to offer our month-to-month vCMO services to demonstrate the work we can do to grow your company. Ultimately, our goal is to establish a long lasting relationship with our clients. When you grow, we grow too! We are confident in what we do and we know that when you experience our work for your company, you’ll want to stay with us!
What is the preferred method to work with a full service agency?
What is the best way to hire an agency?
How do you pay for advertising and marketing agencies?
We get asked these sort of questions a lot, and we know, it can get very confusing. Over the last 10+ years, we have narrowed down the ways we work with clients to three main options.
Before we dive into these options and why we chose them, let me explain an important piece of the puzzle. Most agencies out there are specialist, meaning they focus on one area of advertising or marketing. While this seems like a good idea to those companies looking to outsource a few areas, we have seen it cause major problems in brand identity, leading to a decrease in ROI.
That said, Spectruss has set out to change the marketing and advertising industry by providing everything in house. This comes as no easy task, but our founder Sam Silvey is stubborn and believes in his mission of building the strongest brands in the world. Having everything in house not only strengthens brand consistency and identity, it also lowers the overall cost of labor for the client, thus providing a stronger ROI.
Now, on to those three ways that we work with our clients:
Our preferred method of working with clients is referred to as the Virtual CMO. Basically, it’s a retainer package that rewards our clients with lower cost per hour as they commit to more hours per month. Our goal with the Virtual CMO package is to build a mutually beneficial relationship with our clients, acting as an extension of their marketing department. We not only provide all of the technical aspects of programming, videography, photography, design, content writing and digital advertising, we also act as consultants to help brain storm and build cutting edge campaigns and high-level marketing strategy. And don’t let the name confuse you, we have no dreams of eliminating the valuable position of Chief Marketing Officer, our goal is cultivate relationships, including not biting the hand that feeds you 🙂
Many new clients come to us with individual tasks that they’d like us to do. We call these a la carte services. Typically we see clients coming to us to build their new e-commerce site, help manage their digital advertising, send out monthly email campaigns, or manage social media accounts. We are always more than happy to bid on these a la carte services, but please know, at Spectruss we get really psyched on building complex strategies that provide the largest ROI for our clients. The feeling we get when we see our strategy pay off for our clients is like a drug to us. Again, we are more than happy to start small with any client, but we love the opportunity to grow as you grow.
Finally… we arrive at campaign based projects! This is the Mad Man approach to advertising, working on a percentage of your total advertising budget for the year. You’ve heard some people refer to this as the Agency of Record, but we avoid that work like the plague due to it’s recently obtained negative connotation. In short, we will work with companies who have already identified their total advertising budget for the year, or for an individual campaign, and take a percentage of the total budget to build and execute said campaign. The one monumental thing that we do different at Spectruss as opposed to the typical Agency of Record model, is we have everything in house. If you have questions about what I mean, check out this video where I cover the flaws in the Agency of Record.
So there you have it, the three ways that Spectruss works with their clients. To recap, we offer the Virtual CMO Package, A La Carte Services, and Campaign Based Projects. I imagine the last question you have is “how much does it cost?” So, I’ll give you a hint, it’s not free… But seriously, all of our quotes are custom for our clients, but a typical range is from $5,000 / month to $100k+ / month. And yes, we take Amex 😉
I’m sure you are ready to sign on the dotted line, but not so quick! Before we get started, let’s setup a free 30 minute strategy consultation and discovery session so we can learn more about you and your business! All you got to do is fill out the form below and we will give you a shout immediately to set up a chat.
Awesome! We look forward to chatting with you, and ultimately, helping you build a faster, stronger, better business!
What does that mean exactly? Glad you asked. We are an advertising agency that has everything you need right here in the same office. In the office, we have a web programmer for all your website needs. Behind our programmer is our project manager who handles all lines of communication from the client to team in the office. Our creative director is on the other side of the room creating any and all design work. The social media and advertising manager work closely in creating the best strategic plan for each client. Our photo and video director handles on-location shoots, campaigns, commercials and more. Our full-service, in-house team works together to create a seamless work environment on every project.
WHY THIS IS YOUR BEST OPTION
When companies start to outsource their web design, videographer, etc. the brand starts getting confusing. Each outsourced service doesn’t understand the concept of your brand and many times the brand image gets lost. We pride ourselves in working together as a team to create a brand consistency that will leave a lasting impression on your audience.
A WORD FROM THE OFFICE
We asked our social media manager what was her favorite part about having an all in-house agency. Her response was, “Whenever I need content to post, I simply ask one of our graphic designers to create a unique design. If I need video or photo content, I just ask our photographer/videographer for some new content. Being able to collaborate with everyone in the office makes each project go smoothly!”
Every company starts off with just an idea. Imagine an idea that can be brought to life surpassing your wildest dreams. That’s how Spectruss treats every design project. We are passionate about creating beautiful designs that proudly reveal your brand to the world!
Our in-house creative director, Justin Aragon, has a Bachelors degree in Architecture from the University of Tennessee. His background in architecture has helped shape his career as a designer. Our creative director says, “My architectural training and knowledge of the classics have helped me identify and incorporate the qualities of timeless design to every project.”
Our design team keeps your brand cutting edge, memorable, and consistent across all mediums. From classic, to modern, graphic heavy, to a more minimalistic approach, the Spectruss design team works in every style to ensure a brand aligns with your company. Whether you’re needing a logo, graphic work, branding voice, web design, or all the above, the creative minds at Spectruss can’t wait to take your idea and turn it into a beautiful, timeless brand.
Here’s just a few of the designs we’ve created. Love what you see? Let’s talk!
Chattanooga advertising agency uses strategic digital marketing to help Sturm Cosmetic Surgery experience growth by five times in a single month
Chattanooga, TN- August 9th, 2019- Spectruss, a full-service advertising agency based in the Chattanooga, TN area, initiated strategic planning and progressive advertising management to increase growth for Sturm Cosmetic Surgery by 380% from June to July. Incorporating research-based digital marketing strategies has been the foundation for building a strong and growing customer base for Sturm Cosmetic Surgery, located in Ames, Iowa.
“Reaching a specific target audience is a key component to Sturm Cosmetic Surgery’s incredible growth,” says Preslie Gifford, Advertising Manager at Spectruss. “In order to market to a focused demographic, it is essential to make sure display ads are seen by the right people. I focus on utilizing Google Ads due to the fact that research indicates potential cosmetic patients search ‘the best of the best’ near their location. This means people in the Ames, IA surrounding area who are searching anything related to cosmetic procedures will see Sturm Cosmetic Surgery at the top of the google search list. Social media advertising isn’t far behind in ranking. The key to social is combining fun, informative and promotional content.”
With consumer research, competitive analysis, and audience segmentation, Spectruss has built a strong brand identity for Sturm Cosmetic Surgery that has produced significant results. Spectruss used digital strategies to drive more traffic to Sturm’s website which in return, drove traffic to the office. Sturm Cosmetic Surgery experienced double the amount of website traffic in the month of July compared to the month of June.
ABOUT SPECTRUSS Spectruss is a full-service advertising agency based out of Chattanooga, TN that specializes in marketing solutions utilizing custom website development, brand identity, videography and photography, digital marketing, e-commerce, paid media, public relations, review management, and data analysis. Their mission is to build long-lasting relations, living on the cutting edge of technology, advertising, and marketing to provide an unrivaled return on investment for clients. For more information about Spectruss, its clients, and services, visit https:// spectruss.com.
