Digital Marketing Strategy

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Marketing's core goal is to create value for consumers through co-creation processes, and digitalization is transforming how firms achieve this by changing the media ecosystem and communication logic.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Marketing's purpose: creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for stakeholders, especially consumers.
• Value is co-created: value emerges from the interaction between consumers (with their skills and resources) and firms (with their products and services), not just transferred through products.
• Multiple types of value: utilitarian (task-based), hedonic (fun/playfulness), and linking (interpersonal connections)—expanding beyond simple product utility.
• Common confusion: value doesn't reside in the product alone; it's created when consumers interact with offerings using their own expertise and context.
• Market orientation foundation: firms create value by generating and responding to intelligence about customers and competitors across the organization.

🎯 What marketing creates

🎯 The definition and focus

Marketing is "the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large."

• The excerpt concentrates on the value-creation elements: processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings.
• Why this matters: consumers don't buy products or services—they buy offerings that create value in their lives.
• The textbook focuses specifically on value creation for consumers in online contexts.

💎 Three types of value

Type	What it means	Example from excerpt
Utilitarian value	Task-related, rational consumption based on product utility	A car's ability to move from point A to point B
Hedonic value	Experience of fun and playfulness	Pleasure of driving, humorous YouTube videos
Linking value	Creation of interpersonal connections between consumers	Belonging to a consumption community like Harley-Davidson riders

• The understanding has broadened from the old economist view (utility only) to include experiential and social dimensions.
• For digital marketers: multiple avenues exist to contribute to consumers' lives beyond task completion.

🤝 How value is co-created

🤝 The co-creation principle

Value is always co-created through the meeting of consumers (with their own resources like skills, expertise, and possessions) with firms (and their resources like brand campaigns, service delivery, and products).

• Old view: value resided in the product and was transferred to consumers when they used it.
• New view: value emerges from the interaction between consumer and firm.
• This is conceptually very different from thinking value is simply "in" the product waiting to be extracted.

🚗 The car purchase example

The excerpt uses car buying to illustrate the shift:

Traditional utilitarian view:

• Consumer buys car to extract utility (transportation from A to B)
• Value = product feature

Modern co-creation view:

• Community reason: buying to belong to a consumption community (Harley-Davidson strategy)
• Hedonic reason: the car as recreational object where how they get there matters more than the destination
• Skill-dependent: a sports car's value depends on the driver's expertise to maximize it
• Participation-dependent: Harley-Davidson value is underdeveloped if the owner doesn't participate in the worldwide community

Don't confuse: The product has characteristics that enable value creation, but consumers must bring their own resources (skills, participation, context) to actually create that value.

📹 Digital content as value creation

• Firms create value by offering free content online.
• Hedonic content: humorous videos provide entertainment value.
• Educational content: online tutorials help consumers improve skills and knowledge.
• Strategic benefit: by increasing consumers' expertise, firms expand consumers' resources, enabling them to create more value when consuming products later.

🧭 Market orientation framework

🧭 What market orientation means

Market orientation: "the organization-wide generation of market intelligence, dissemination of the intelligence across departments and organization-wide responsiveness to it."

Three-step process:

1. Generate market intelligence
2. Disseminate that intelligence across departments
3. Respond to it organization-wide

👥 Two dimensions of market intelligence

Customer orientation:

• Generating and responding to information about customers
• Identifying and responding to customer needs

Competitor orientation:

• Generating and responding to information about competitors

• Examining and responding to competitors' efforts

• Market orientation has been found necessary for firms to compete effectively in markets.

• The textbook's strategic framework centers on answering customers' needs, goals, and desires more effectively than competitors do.

📡 The digital transformation

📡 McLuhan's insight

"The medium is the message"—the characteristics of a medium (TV vs. print vs. internet) play an important role in communications, in addition to the message itself.

• The internet as a medium has played a transformative role in shaping the message.
• The ways messages are diffused to consumers have been vastly transformed since the 1950s.

📊 Evolution of word-of-mouth models

The excerpt references three periods in the evolution of how messages diffuse from firms to consumers (Figure 1.1), showing the transformation of the media ecosystem.

• The chapter concludes by examining how digitalization is changing the ecosystem in which marketing activities are conducted.
• The transformation moves away from representing the company to representing the customer.
• This sets up discussion of the consumer journey in subsequent chapters.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

The internet has fundamentally transformed how firms create value by shifting power to consumers who now co-create messages, discover brands through their own searches, and require companies to represent customer needs rather than just promote themselves.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Market orientation foundation: Value creation requires generating and disseminating market intelligence about both customers (customer orientation) and competitors (competitor orientation) throughout the organization.
• Three-stage evolution of message diffusion: From organic interconsumer influence (1950s) to linear marketer influence via celebrities (1970s) to network co-production where consumers co-create and transform messages (internet era).
• Attention economy and fragmentation: Media and audience fragmentation means information is now plentiful but consumer attention is scarce, making it harder to reach mass audiences through traditional advertising.
• Common confusion—finding vs. being found: The shift is not just about better targeting; it's a fundamental reversal where companies must create content so consumers can discover them during searches, rather than companies hunting for consumers.
• Representing customer vs. company: Effective digital marketing focuses on solving consumer problems and addressing their needs through helpful content (tutorials, resources) rather than simply promoting company products.

📡 Market Orientation as the Foundation

🧩 What market orientation means

Market orientation: "the organization-wide generation of market intelligence, dissemination of the intelligence across departments and organization-wide responsiveness to it."

• Organizations create value by generating information and spreading it throughout the firm to respond properly.
• It is not just collecting data; it requires dissemination across departments and organization-wide action.
• Example: An organization gathers customer feedback, shares it with product development, sales, and support teams, then all departments adjust their approach based on these insights.

👥 Two dimensions of market intelligence

Market orientation operates through two complementary orientations:

Orientation type	What it focuses on	Purpose
Customer orientation	Generating and responding to information about customers	Identify and respond to customer needs
Competitor orientation	Generating and responding to information about competitors	Examine and respond to competitors' efforts

• Marketing academics and practitioners typically aim to address both dimensions.
• Being market-oriented has been found necessary for a firm to compete effectively in markets.
• The strategic framework in this context centers around answering customers' needs, goals, and desires more effectively than the competition does.

🔄 Evolution of Message Diffusion Models

📻 1950s: Organic interconsumer influence model

• Advertising firms created messages they believed could sell products.
• Mass media (TV, newspapers, magazines, radio) diffused these messages.
• Word of mouth was organic—it happened between consumers without firm interventions.
• Example: A company creates an ad campaign for TV; consumers watch it and may discuss it with friends naturally, but the company has no role in those conversations.

🎤 1970s: Linear marketer influence model

• Theories recognized that some individuals held more power to influence other consumers than others.
• Firms increasingly leveraged influential consumers and celebrities to diffuse their messages.
• Called "linear" because influencers were believed to faithfully diffuse the message created by firms and their advertising agencies.
• The message flow was still controlled and predictable: firm → influencer → consumers.

🌐 Internet era: Network co-production model

• Consumers, online communities, and networked forms of communication (such as publics created through hashtags) have an increasing role.
• Consumers now play a role not only in diffusing messages but also in transforming them.
• Don't confuse with earlier models: This is not just amplification or faithful transmission; consumers actively reshape and reinterpret brand meanings.

💼 Marketing implications of co-production

Marketers have adapted in two key ways:

1. Targeting influencers within networks: Directly targeting influencers who are part of consumer networks and communities, resulting in the explosion of influencer marketing and the rising influence of micro-influencers.

2. Social media monitoring: Developed capacities to identify emergent discourses on and around their brands, which sometimes completely reinterpret brand meanings.

⚠️ Doppelgänger brand images

Doppelgänger brand images: "a family of disparaging images and meanings about a brand that circulate throughout popular culture."

• Consumers now create alternative campaigns that tarnish the intended image initially created by brands.
• Example: Consumers using Twitter to diffuse alternative brand meanings or groups of consumers such as 4chan co-opting advertising campaigns.
• Implication for firms: Companies now have to consider not only how their messages can be amplified by consumers but also how they could be co-opted, reshaped, and resisted.

📺 Media Fragmentation and the Attention Economy

📉 The fragmentation phenomenon

Historical context showing the decline of mass audiences:

• 1970s: All in the Family was watched by a fifth of the US population at its peak.
• 1980: Dallas finale was watched by 90 million viewers (more than 75% of the US television audience).
• 1983: MASH* finale was watched by 105 million people.
• 2004: Friends finale was the last to make the top 10 list, coinciding with accelerated broadband internet adoption.

Why fragmentation matters:

• Consumers have an increasing number of options for media-based entertainment.
• Traditional media companies now compete against user-generated content found on social media websites such as Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok.
• Younger consumers have moved en masse to these new media, complicating the creation of advertising campaigns.

💰 The attention economy concept

The concept is not new but has become critical in the digital age:

• 1971: Simon discussed how "information consumes … the attention of its recipients."
• 1996: Bill Gates stated that "content is king."
• Mid-1990s: Mandel and Van der Leun mentioned in Rules of the Net how "attention is the hard currency of the cyberspace."
• 1997: Goldhaber added that "as the Net becomes an increasingly strong presence in the overall economy, the flow of attention will not only anticipate the flow of money but eventually replace it altogether."

The fundamental shift:

Past	Present
Information was rather scarce	Information is plentiful
People consumed information from only a few sources	Consumers are diffused over a largely fragmented media ecosystem
Companies could rather easily target consumers to diffuse advertising messages	It has become more difficult for companies to diffuse their advertising messages to a mass of consumers

This difficulty, combined with the development of targeting technologies, has led to the rise of inbound marketing and content marketing.

🔍 Finding Consumers vs. Being Found

🎯 The traditional approach: Finding consumers

How marketers used to operate:

• Used market research reports to understand where consumers hung out, so as to place advertising there.
• Identified what consumers watched so they could run ads during their favorite shows.
• Understood consumer movements in a city to put ads and billboards in the right places.
• Although this still functions online through online targeting by placing ads on relevant websites, there has been an important switch.

🔎 The new approach: Being found by consumers

How consumers find companies:

• Consumers find companies through their normal everyday searches.
• Finding companies expands the sets of brands that consumers consider before making a purchase.

The mechanism:

1. A consumer has a need or problem.
2. They might ask a friend, go to a store and trust a salesperson, or (as millions do every day) turn to the internet to search.
3. Through searches about their need or problem, thousands of consumers discover new brands and products every day.

Implication for digital marketers:

• In order to be found by consumers, you need to create content that addresses their problems.
• Content creation becomes central to the marketing strategy.

The fundamental shift:

• Past: Companies would find consumers and try to attract them to their stores or choose their brands through traditional media and advertising.
• Present: The job has moved to creating content that informs, educates, and entertains consumers so that they can find us when they are searching for solutions to the needs they have or issues they are facing.

🎭 Representing the Company vs. Representing the Customer

🏢 Traditional approach: Representing the company

When finding consumers, companies would talk about themselves.

Example from the excerpt:

• A Home Depot ad emphasizes how "Home Depot is more than a store … it is everything under the sun … all at a guaranteed low price" where you can save on flooring and where they have everything for your needs.
• The ad is presenting the company and explaining why the company and its product are the best choice for the consumer.
• The ad represents the company.

👤 New approach: Representing the customer

Representing the customer means switching the focus to consumers' needs and goals and the problems they are experiencing—and helping consumers address those problems.

How companies do this:

• Create resources such as tutorials and infographics to help consumers solve their problems or achieve their goals.

Example—Nike:

• Developed an extensive set of videos to help consumers work out at home, train for running, or eat better (all available on their YouTube channel).
• The main goal is not to talk about how great Nike and its products are; it is to help consumers achieve their goals of training, running, and eating.
• This still serves the company well: When a consumer is searching for at-home exercises, they might come across Nike, consume their tutorials, and then be more likely to buy from Nike when purchasing sneakers or exercise clothing.

🛠️ Taking it further: Tutorials tied to products

Some brands offer tutorials tied with products they sell, with readily available shopping lists for do-it-yourself projects.

Example—Home Depot:

• Offers tens of tutorials on their YouTube channel, which makes sense since the home improvement store sells products for such projects.
• Within tutorials (e.g., how to build a fire pit), Home Depot presents a list of "Materials You Will Need."
• This list directly brings consumers to sections of their website where they sell such products.
• The tutorial has thus become a great resource to create sales.

Don't confuse: This is not abandoning product promotion; it's reframing promotion around customer needs. The company still benefits commercially, but the entry point is solving customer problems rather than pushing products.

🗺️ The Transformed Consumer Journey

🛤️ What is a consumer journey

Consumer journey: the experience of a consumer across the different stages of their buying process, which then extends to phases of relationships with a company.

Example scenario—buying sneakers:

1. You might have an existing pair. How satisfied were you with that pair?
2. If highly satisfied and you still love the brand, you might go buy the same pair (this is why companies try to build loyal customers: to foster repeat sales).
3. If unsatisfied, the model is not available anymore, or you want variety, you might look for another pair.
4. You go through different stages:
   • Recognize a need you want to answer
   • Discover options to answer that need
   • Evaluate these options
   • Make a choice and buy a new pair of sneakers
   • Evaluate how much you like or dislike this pair

🔄 How digitalization has transformed the journey

The new digital ecosystem has led to a drastically different way to enter relationships with brands:

Traditional journey	Digital journey
Brands discover consumers	Consumers discover brands
Companies initiate contact through advertising	Consumers initiate contact through online searches aligned with their needs, goals, and problems
Passive consumer reception	Active consumer search and evaluation

The objective for companies doing marketing online: Be there when consumers need them.

🎯 Understanding consumers through personas

Two broad approaches to conducting marketing:

1. Mass marketing: An undifferentiated approach where products are simply sold to the masses.
2. Targeted marketing: Firms practice segmentation and tailor marketing communications and products to segments.

Why targeted marketing works better digitally:

• The digital ecosystem makes it quite easy to address segments, even segments of one.
• Although mass marketing is possible online, many processes unique to digital marketing (web analytics, A/B testing, online targeting platforms) work best when firms have defined segments.

🧩 Segmentation and personas

Segmentation: Creating groups of consumers that are homogeneous (they have similar characteristics to each other) but are heterogeneous from the rest of the population (they are differentiated by their shared characteristics).

Personas: Semi-fictional, generalized representations of a customer segment.

Purpose of personas:

• Help you better understand your customers and prospective customers.
• Make it easier for you to tailor content to specific audience needs.
• Provide a concrete reference point for marketing decisions.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Digitalization has transformed how consumers discover and engage with brands, requiring marketers to use personas and consumer journey mapping to create targeted campaigns that meet specific needs and challenges.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Discovery shift: Consumers now discover brands through online searches aligned with their needs, rather than brands discovering consumers.
• Targeted vs mass marketing: Digital tools work best with defined segments rather than undifferentiated mass marketing approaches.
• Personas as tools: Semi-fictional representations of customer segments help understand who customers are, what they need, and how to communicate with them.
• Common confusion: Needs vs wants—needs are basic deficiencies (food, water), while wants are personal criteria for fulfilling those needs (specific brands or products).
• Goals and challenges drive content: Understanding consumer goals, motivations, and obstacles is essential because people turn to the internet to resolve everyday challenges.

🎯 The Digital Discovery Shift

🔄 How consumer-brand relationships have changed

• Traditional model: brands discovered consumers through outbound marketing
• Digital model: consumers discover brands through their own searches
• Consumers initiate relationships based on their specific needs, goals, and problems
• Marketing objective: be present when consumers need you, not push messages when you want to reach them

Example: A consumer searches "how to change a tire" and discovers a brand through helpful content, rather than seeing a TV ad.

👥 Building Personas for Targeted Marketing

🎯 Why targeted marketing matters online

Targeted marketing: firms practice segmentation and tailor marketing communications and products to specific segments, as opposed to mass marketing (undifferentiated approach selling to the masses).

• Digital ecosystem makes it easy to address segments, even "segments of one"
• Digital processes (web analytics, A/B testing, online targeting platforms) work best with defined segments
• This course emphasizes targeted approaches over mass marketing

🧩 What personas are

Personas: semi-fictional, generalized representations of a customer segment that help you better understand customers and tailor content to specific needs, behaviors, and concerns.

Why personas matter:

• Help understand who ideal consumers are
• Clarify consumer characteristics
• Guide how to communicate with different segments
• Needs, desires, and problems of personas should be the starting point of any marketing strategy

Where personas help:

• Creating campaigns and ads
• Guiding product and service development
• Assisting with customer support

🔍 How to develop personas

Research foundation:

• Market research
• Internal company data
• Behavioral tracking (now possible online)

Segmentation variables (Figure 2.2):

Variable Type	What it includes	Use
Demographics	Age, income, location, etc.	Targeting (e.g., Facebook Ads: 18-25 year olds within 1km of Mile End who like cycling)
Behaviors	Purchase patterns, usage	Tracking and prediction
Lifestyles	Activities, interests	Understanding context
Psychographics	Values, attitudes	Deeper motivation

Don't confuse: These variables are useful for targeting but less informative for how to talk to consumers—that requires understanding goals, wants, needs, and challenges.

🎯 Understanding Consumer Motivations

🎯 Goals and motivation

Goal: the cognitive representation of a desired state, or our mental idea of how we'd like things to turn out.

• Goals can be clearly defined (e.g., stepping on Mars surface) or abstract and never fully completed (e.g., eating healthy)

Motivation: the psychological driving force that enables action in the pursuit of a goal.

Two types of motivation:

Type	Definition	Example
Intrinsic	Benefits from the process of pursuing a goal	Student works hard because learning is pleasing
Extrinsic	Benefits from achieving a goal	Student works hard to get good grades for a job

🧩 Needs vs wants

Need: a basic deficiency given a particular essential item (food, water, air, security).

Want: placing certain personal criteria as to how that need must be fulfilled.

Example: A teenager says "there's nothing to eat" while standing in front of a full refrigerator—they have a need (food) but specific wants (particular food items).

Marketing reality:

• Most marketing is in the want-fulfilling business, not need-fulfilling
• Apple wants you to want an Apple Watch specifically, not just any watch
• Ralph Lauren wants you to want Polo, not just any clothes
• Exception: Non-profits (e.g., American Cancer Association) focus on needs (get a check-up) without caring about specific providers

🔀 Utilitarian vs hedonic needs

Type	Nature	Purpose
Utilitarian	Practical and useful	Functional problem-solving
Hedonic	Luxurious or desirable	Pleasure and enjoyment

🚧 Challenges

Challenges: obstacles faced by a consumer in resolving a need or fulfilling a want.

Why challenges matter:

• Consumers turn to the internet daily to resolve challenges
• Examples: how to change a tire, how to apply makeup, how to paint a room
• Resolving challenges drives consumption of online content
• Understanding challenges helps create relevant marketing content

📋 Creating Complete Personas

🛠️ Essential persona components

1. Targeting information:

• Behavioral, demographic, geographic, and psychographic data
• Facilitates ad platform targeting

2. Campaign creation information:

• Needs and/or wants and/or goals and/or challenges
• Facilitates content and messaging development

3. Humanizing elements:

• Picture (makes persona feel real)
• Quote from real consumer interview
• Name
• Examples of "real" problems

📝 Persona example: RV Betty

The excerpt references RV Betty (Figure 2.3) as an example demonstrating how all the above components come together in a short persona format.

🗺️ Consumer Journey Concept

🛤️ What is a consumer journey

Consumer journey: the trajectory of experiences through which a consumer goes—from not knowing they want something, to buying it, to performing post-purchase activities (most obviously, consuming the product).

Journey stages mentioned:

• Awareness (not knowing they want something)
• Purchase (buying)
• Post-purchase (consumption and other activities)

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Personas—semi-fictional representations of customer segments—help marketers understand who their ideal consumers are, what they need, and how to communicate with them, which is essential for creating value in targeted digital marketing.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Why personas matter in digital marketing: digital tools like web analytics, A/B testing, and targeting platforms work best when firms have defined segments, making targeted marketing more effective than mass marketing online.
• What a persona is: a semi-fictional, generalized representation of a customer segment that combines demographic/behavioral data with goals, needs, wants, and challenges.
• How personas are built: through market research and internal data, using segmentation variables (demographics, behaviors, lifestyles, psychographics) intersected with consumer goals, motivators, and challenges.
• Common confusion—needs vs wants: a need is a basic deficiency for an essential item; a want is the specific way that need must be fulfilled (most marketing focuses on want-fulfillment, not need-fulfillment).
• Why goals and challenges are crucial: understanding what consumers want to achieve and what obstacles they face helps create relevant content, since consumers turn to the internet daily to resolve challenges in their lives.

🎯 Why targeted marketing and personas

🎯 Mass vs targeted approaches

The excerpt contrasts two broad marketing approaches:

Approach	Definition	Digital fit
Mass marketing	Undifferentiated; products sold to the masses	Possible online but less optimal
Targeted marketing	Segmentation-based; communications and products tailored to segments	Works best with digital tools

• Digital ecosystems make it easy to address segments, even "segments of one."
• Many digital marketing processes (web analytics, A/B testing, online targeting platforms) work best when firms have defined segments.
• For this reason, the excerpt emphasizes a targeted approach.

🧩 What segmentation means

Segmentation: creating groups of consumers that are homogeneous (similar characteristics to each other) but heterogeneous from the rest of the population (differentiated by their shared characteristics).

• Firms practice segmentation to tailor marketing to specific groups.
• Personas are a tool to help create and represent these segments.

🎭 What personas are and why they help

Personas: semi-fictional, generalized representations of a customer segment.

• They help you better understand your customers and prospective customers.
• They make it easier to tailor content to the specific needs, behaviors, and concerns of different segments.
• Key benefit: personas help you understand who your ideal consumers are, what their characteristics are, and how to talk to them.

Why this matters for value creation:

• The excerpt reminds us that the goal as marketers is to create value.
• In digital marketing, we create value by "representing the customer."
• The only possible way to do so is to understand who this customer is and what they need.

📋 Where personas are used

Personas assist in a wide variety of marketing activities:

• Creating campaigns and ads
• Guiding product and service development
• Helping with customer support

🔍 How to build personas

🔍 Segmentation variables

Firms develop personas the same way they develop segments: through market research and the use of internal data.

Four main types of segmentation variables:

Variable type	What it includes	Digital targeting example
Demographics	Age, income, education, etc.	Facebook Ads: target people aged 18-25
Geographic	Location, region	Facebook Ads: living within a kilometer of Mile End
Behavioral	Purchase patterns, usage, trackable online actions	(now trackable online)
Psychographic	Lifestyle, values, interests	Facebook Ads: who like cycling

• Example from the excerpt: on Facebook Ads, you can select to deliver an ad to people aged 18-25 living within a kilometer of Mile End who like cycling.
• However, these variables are less informative concerning how to talk to these consumers.

🎯 Goals, needs, wants, and challenges

The excerpt emphasizes intersecting segments with:

• Goals
• Wants
• Needs
• Motivators
• Challenges they face

Why this intersection is important: segmentation variables tell you who to target, but goals/needs/wants/challenges tell you how to talk to them.

🧠 Understanding consumer motivation

🧠 Goals and motivation

Goal: the cognitive representation of a desired state, or our mental idea of how we'd like things to turn out.

• A desired end state can be clearly defined (e.g., stepping on the surface of Mars).
• Or it can be more abstract and never fully completed (e.g., eating healthy).

Motivation: the psychological driving force that enables action in the pursuit of that goal.

Two sources of motivation:

Type	Definition	Example
Intrinsic motivation	Benefits from the process of pursuing a goal	Desire for a fulfilling experience while working on a Mars mission; a student learning because the act of learning is pleasing
Extrinsic motivation	Benefits from achieving a goal	Fame and fortune from being first on Mars; a student working hard to get good grades for a good job

🆚 Needs vs wants

Need: a basic deficiency given a particular essential item (food, water, air, security, etc.).

Want: placing certain personal criteria as to how that need must be fulfilled.

Example from the excerpt: when we are hungry, we often have a specific food item in mind. A teenager will say there is nothing to eat while standing in front of a full refrigerator.

Don't confuse:

• Needs are universal and basic.
• Wants are specific and personal.
• Most of marketing is in the want-fulfilling business, not the need-fulfilling business.

Marketing examples:

• Apple does not want you to buy just any watch; they want you to want to buy an Apple Watch.
• Ralph Lauren wants you to want Polo when you shop for clothes.
• A non-profit such as the American Cancer Association would like you to feel a need for a check-up and does not care about which doctor you go to.

🎁 Utilitarian vs hedonic needs

The excerpt mentions that needs are often separated into:

Type	Nature
Utilitarian	Practical and useful
Hedonic	Luxurious or desirable

🚧 Challenges

Challenges: an obstacle faced by a consumer in resolving a need or fulfilling a want.

Why challenges are important:

• Consumers turn to the internet every day to help them answer challenges they face in their everyday lives.
• Examples: how to change a tire, how to have the perfect Friday night makeup, how to paint a room.
• Resolving challenges drives the consumption of online content.

🛠️ Assembling a persona

🛠️ What to include

When creating a persona, bring together the following information:

1. Targeting information:

• Basic behavioral, demographic, geographic, and psychographic information to facilitate targeting.

2. Campaign creation information:

• Needs and/or wants and/or goals and/or challenges to facilitate the creation of your campaign.

3. Information that makes your persona feel real:

• A picture
• A quote from an interview with a real consumer
• A name
• Examples of "real" problems

📸 Example: RV Betty

The excerpt references "RV Betty" as an example persona and asks: "Can you find the information mentioned above in this short persona?"

This illustrates that a well-constructed persona should contain all three categories of information (targeting data, goals/needs/challenges, and humanizing details) in a compact, usable format.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

The consumer journey—the trajectory from recognizing a want or need through purchase to post-purchase activities—varies greatly by market and persona, and understanding it strongly contributes to firm performance.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What the journey is: an iterative process from considering alternatives to satisfy a want/need, through evaluation and choice, to consumption and post-purchase activities.
• Three phases: pre-purchase (activities before buying), purchase (acquiring the product), and post-purchase (activities after buying).
• Journey vs customer journey: consumer journey is broader (pursuit of life goals across all touchpoints), while customer journey focuses on interactions with one specific firm.
• Common confusion: journeys are not one-size-fits-all—they vary greatly by market (e.g., banking vs groceries), persona, and specific goals (e.g., quick lunch vs marriage proposal restaurant).
• Why it matters: top-performing firms understand journeys better than peers and use journey insights in marketing efforts; journey length and timing shape campaign strategy.

🎯 Needs, wants, and challenges in marketing

🎯 Wants vs needs in marketing

• The excerpt states that most marketing is in the want-fulfilling business, not the need-fulfilling business.
• Example: Apple wants you to want an Apple Watch (not just any watch); Ralph Lauren wants you to want Polo (not just any clothes).
• Contrast: a non-profit like the American Cancer Association wants you to feel a need for a check-up but doesn't care which doctor you choose.

🛠️ Utilitarian vs hedonic needs

Utilitarian: practical and useful in nature.

Hedonic: luxurious or desirable in nature.

• These categories help classify what drives consumer behavior.

🚧 Challenges as a third driver

Challenges: an obstacle faced by a consumer in resolving a need or fulfilling a want.

• Consumers turn to the internet daily to resolve challenges: how to change a tire, how to apply Friday night makeup, how to paint a room.
• Resolving challenges drives online content consumption.
• Important for marketers: addressing challenges helps create relevant campaigns.

👤 Building personas

👤 What a persona is

• A semi-fictional representation of a segment that brings together information to guide targeting and campaign creation.

📋 Components of a persona

A persona should include:

Category	What to include	Purpose
Targeting data	Behavioral, demographic, geographic, psychographic information	Facilitate targeting
Motivations	Needs, wants, goals, challenges	Facilitate campaign creation
Humanizing details	Picture, quote from real consumer interview, name, examples of "real" problems	Make the persona feel real

• Example mentioned: "RV Betty" persona (figure reference in excerpt).

🗺️ Defining the consumer journey

🗺️ Core definition

Consumer journey: the trajectory of experiences through which a consumer goes—from not knowing they want something, to buying it, to performing post-purchase activities.

• More theoretically: "an iterative process through which the consumer begins to consider alternatives to satisfy a want or a need, evaluates and chooses among them, and then engages in consumption."
• The journey is iterative, not strictly linear in real life.

🔄 Three phases of the journey

Phase	Definition	Examples of activities
Pre-purchase	Activities before buying	Awareness, research, evaluation
Purchase	Activities to acquire the product	Buying, transaction
Post-purchase	Activities after buying	Consuming, reviewing, repurchasing

🏢 Consumer journey vs customer journey

• Don't confuse these two concepts:
  • Customer journey: focuses on a customer's journey with a specific firm; includes only touchpoints associated with that firm.
  • Consumer journey: broader perspective; consumers "undertake [a journey] in pursuit of large and small life goals and in response to various opportunities, obstacles, and challenges."

Touchpoint: any way a consumer can interact with a business—person-to-person, website, app, or any form of communication.

📊 Why understanding journeys matters

📊 Impact on firm performance

• A 2015 survey by the Association of National Advertisers found that top performers understood the journey better than their peers.
• Top performers had better processes to:
  • Capture journey-related insights
  • Use those insights in marketing efforts

⏱️ Journey variation by market

• Journey length varies greatly by market:
  • Longer journeys: banking, voting, finding a credit card
  • Shorter journeys: groceries, personal care products
• Source: a survey by Google mentioned in the excerpt.

🍽️ Journey variation within a market

• Example: Google found three types of restaurant journeys:
  1. Pick within the hour
  2. Pick a day before going
  3. Pick two to three months before going

🍽️ Restaurant journey scenarios

The excerpt hypothesizes what drives these three journey types:

Journey type	Likely scenario	Marketing implication
Within the hour	At work, looking for lunch; low involvement	Push Instagram ads with menu of the day around 11 a.m. or just before lunch
One to two days before	Going out with friends or a date; moderate involvement	Start campaigns on Wednesdays to capture Friday/Saturday restaurant-goers
Two to three months before	Travel planning (for foodies) or marriage proposal; high involvement	Need longer, "always-on" continuous marketing activities

• Key insight: journey timing shapes when and how to run campaigns.

🧩 Conceptualizing journeys

🧩 Journeys as thinking tools

• The excerpt emphasizes: "these are not perfect representations of reality."
• Rather, they are thinking tools that help us create marketing campaigns.
• In real life, people tend not to be so linear in their decisions.

🧩 Common stage-based model

• A common textbook conceptualization: consumers move between stages, starting with awareness of many brands and slowly refining options to make a purchase.
• McKinsey represents such a typical model (figure reference in excerpt).

🧩 Five stages in the McKinsey model

The excerpt begins to describe five stages:

1. Awareness: the consumer is aware of a large number of products or brands in the market that might address their need.
2. Familiarity: From this large number, the consumer performs initial research and becomes familiar with a subset.

(The excerpt cuts off after stage 2; stages 3–5 are not provided.)

• Note: This is a typical funnel-like progression from broad awareness to narrower consideration.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Consumer journey models have evolved from a linear funnel—where awareness narrows to purchase—to a circular model in which consumers expand their consideration set during research and then enter loyalty loops that generate consumer-driven marketing.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Funnel model assumptions: consumers start aware of many brands and progressively narrow options through familiarity, consideration, and purchase stages.
• McKinsey's competing findings: consumers do not reduce options over time; instead, they add brands to their consideration set during active research.
• Circular model stages: trigger → initial consideration → active evaluation (where set expands) → purchase → post-purchase experience (where consumers create content).
• Common confusion: the funnel assumes mass advertising creates awareness that leads to purchase, but the circular model shows consumers can enter consideration sets through search and reviews without prior awareness campaigns.
• Digital marketing implication: brands can support consumers throughout their journey with helpful content rather than relying solely on push advertising.

🛒 The traditional funnel model

🛒 Five stages of the funnel

The funnel model describes a linear progression:

Stage	What happens
1. Awareness	Consumer knows many products/brands that might address their need
2. Familiarity	Initial research narrows awareness to a smaller subset
3. Consideration	Further research eliminates brands, creating a "consideration set"
4. Purchase	Consumer seeks in-depth information on final subset and buys
5. Loyalty	Positive experience leads to brand loyalty

📐 Core assumptions

• Awareness is necessary: to be chosen, companies must ensure consumers are aware of them first.
  • This assumption explains the prevalence of mass marketing—it serves to create awareness.
• Progressive narrowing: consumers start with a large set and reduce options at each stage.
  • The metaphor is a funnel: wide at the top (awareness), narrow at the bottom (purchase).

🔄 The circular model challenge

🔍 What McKinsey found differently

McKinsey's 2009 research (based on ~20,000 consumers across five industries) contradicted both funnel assumptions:

• Consumers don't start with large awareness sets: they begin with limited brand knowledge.
• Options expand, not contract: the number of brands considered increases during the journey.

👟 How expansion works in practice

Example from the excerpt: A consumer wants running shoes.

• Initial awareness: Nike, Adidas, Reebok (brands with mass advertising).
• During search: uses terms like "what running shoes should a beginner get" or "reviews for running shoes 2020."
• Result: encounters new brands (Asics, Brooks, Saucony) and adds them to consideration.

Don't confuse: This is not narrowing a funnel; it's expanding possibilities through research.

🔁 Stages of the circular model

🎯 Trigger

The consumer experiences a need, a problem, or wants to achieve a goal, which initiates their journey.

• This is the starting point—something prompts the consumer to begin looking.

🧩 Initial consideration set

• Consumer considers brands based on experiences, perceptions, and recent touchpoints.
• Most influential touchpoint: company-driven marketing (advertising, direct marketing, sponsorship).

🔎 Active evaluation (the expansion stage)

• New stage introduced by McKinsey: consumer actively gathers information and shops.
• Information gathering often happens online.
• Key difference: consumers add brands here—no longer a funnel.
• Most influential touchpoint: consumer-driven marketing (word of mouth, online searches, reviews).
• Implication: brands can enter consideration sets without awareness campaigns if they help consumers make decisions or have strong reviews.

🛍️ Moment of purchase

• Consumer selects a brand and completes the purchase.

💬 Post-purchase experience

• Consumer builds expectations based on their experience.
• Second key difference: consumers create content for brands at this stage.
  • Examples: posting pictures on Instagram, writing reviews on Yelp, participating in company-supported marketing activities.
• This feeds into the "loyalty loop"—consumers cycle between using, buying again, and participating in post-purchase activities.

📱 Implications for digital marketers

📱 What the circular model enables

Two revisions open content-based possibilities:

1. Consideration set expansion during active evaluation: brands don't need mass advertising to be considered.
2. Consumer-driven marketing at post-purchase: satisfied customers become content creators.

🎯 The digital marketing goal shift

• Not: sell products or talk about the brand.
• Instead: represent the customer—understand their needs, goals, problems.
• How: support consumers throughout their journey:
  • Help them understand their problem.
  • Help them evaluate solutions.
  • Help them better understand the product.

Don't confuse: Traditional push marketing (mass advertising) vs. inbound marketing (helping consumers with their problems and evaluations).

⏰ Timing example from restaurants

The excerpt illustrates journey length variation:

Scenario	Planning time	Marketing implication
Lunch at work	Within the hour	Push Instagram ads with daily menu around 11 a.m.
Going out with friends/date	1-2 days before	Start campaigns on Wednesdays for Friday/Saturday
Travel (foodie) or marriage proposal	Much earlier	"Always-on" continuous marketing activities

🔍 Zero Moment of Truth (ZMOT)

• Google introduced this concept in 2011.
• Described as "a new decision-making moment that takes place a hundred million times a day on mobile phones, laptops, and wired devices."
• (The excerpt cuts off before fully explaining ZMOT.)

🧰 Models as thinking tools

🧰 Important caveat

It is important to understand that these are not perfect representations of reality. Rather, they are thinking tools that help us create marketing campaigns.

• In real life, people are not linear in their decisions.
• These models help structure marketing strategy, not predict exact consumer behavior.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

The Zero Moment of Truth (ZMOT) represents a critical online decision-making moment that occurs before shoppers physically encounter products, fundamentally changing how digital marketers must support consumers throughout their journey.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What ZMOT is: An online moment when consumers research products/services before entering a physical shopping environment, introduced by Google in 2011.
• How it differs from traditional moments: ZMOT happens before the first moment of truth (noticing a product in-store), creating a "zero" stage in the consumer-brand contact sequence.
• Key characteristics: Happens online, consumer-controlled (relates to inbound marketing), and involves multiway conversations.
• Common confusion: Don't confuse the three moments—ZMOT is online research before shopping, first moment is in-store noticing, second moment is post-purchase experience.
• Four ZMOT types: I-want-to-know, I-want-to-go, I-want-to-do, and I-want-to-buy moments each require different content strategies.

📚 Historical context and definition

📜 What "moment of truth" means

A moment of truth is a contact with a brand or a product during which a consumer forms an impression.

• This concept predates the ZMOT framework.
• It focuses on specific touchpoints where consumers develop opinions about brands.
• The excerpt attributes this concept to Carlzon 1989.

🔢 Why "zero" moment of truth

Before Google introduced ZMOT in 2011, two moments of truth already existed:

Moment	When it happens	What occurs
First moment of truth	Shopper notices product in shopping environment	Influences buying decision
Second moment of truth	Consumer experiences product after purchase	Forms post-purchase impression
Zero moment of truth	Before entering shopping environment	Online research and evaluation

• The "zero" indicates this happens prior to the first moment.
• It fills a gap in understanding how digital consumers behave before physical shopping.

🌐 What happens during ZMOT

💻 Concrete ZMOT activities

The excerpt lists specific behaviors that constitute ZMOT moments:

• Performing online searches
• Talking with family and friends
• Comparison shopping
• Seeking information from a brand
• Reading product reviews
• Reading comments online
• Starting to follow a brand

Don't confuse with first moment activities, which happen in physical shopping environments:

• Looking at a product on a shelf
• Reading a brochure at the store
• Talking to a salesperson
• Looking at a store display
• Talking with a customer service representative
• Using a sample in-store

🎯 Essential ZMOT characteristics

According to Google, ZMOTs have three defining features:

1. Online: They occur in digital environments, not physical stores
2. Consumer-controlled: The consumer is in charge (connects to inbound marketing philosophy)
3. Multiway conversations: Not one-way brand messaging but interactive exchanges

🗂️ Four types of ZMOT

🧠 I-want-to-know moments

• Consumers turn to search engines for knowledge-based queries.
• Focus: Information gathering and learning.

📍 I-want-to-go moments

• Consumers search to find physical locations.
• Example from excerpt: "restaurant near me"

🛠️ I-want-to-do moments

• Consumers seek help to achieve something.
• The excerpt notes that "how to kiss" was once the most-searched how-to video.

🛒 I-want-to-buy moments

• Consumers use search to help make purchase decisions.
• Most directly connected to conversion.

Why these matter: The excerpt emphasizes these are "not simply ways to understand how consumers use search engines" but rather "tools to help us create better content." Each type requires different content strategies.

🔗 Connection to consumer journey revisions

🔄 Two important journey changes

The excerpt describes how the traditional funnel model has been revised:

1. Expanded consideration set during active evaluation

   • Marketers can enter consumers' consideration without awareness campaigns.
   • If brands help consumers make decisions or have reviews online, they can be considered.
   • McKinsey identifies consumer-driven marketing (word of mouth, online searches, reviews) as the most influential touchpoint.

2. Consumer participation in post-purchase marketing

   • After purchase, consumers create content for brands.
   • Example activities: posting pictures on Instagram, writing reviews on Yelp, participating in company-supported marketing activities.
   • This feeds back into the consumer-driven marketing that influences other buyers' ZMOTs.

🎯 Strategic implication for digital marketers

Google recommends being present in moments that matter.

• This means having content and ads that respond to needs, problems, and goals consumers express through search queries.
• The excerpt emphasizes: "Our goal in digital marketing is to represent the customer: What are their needs? Goals? Problems?"
• Objectives are not to sell products or talk about the brand directly.
• Instead: "we make sales online by supporting consumers throughout their journey—helping them understand their problem, helping them evaluate solutions, helping them better understand our product."

Don't confuse: This is fundamentally different from traditional advertising that pushes brand messages; ZMOT strategy requires understanding and responding to consumer-initiated queries and needs.

🗺️ Practical application through journey mapping

🗺️ What journey mapping is

A journey map is a visual representation of the journey of a consumer.

• Brings together three conceptual tools: persona, consumer journey, and moments of truth.
• Translates generic concepts into real-life experiences.
• The excerpt stresses that staying at a conceptual level is not enough; effective strategies demand tailored understanding.

👥 Variation by persona

• Journey maps vary based on segments/personas.
• Each persona represents a different consumer segment.
• Different segments buy products differently.
• Example from excerpt: "Think about, for example, how you go about buying products and how your parents go about buying products."

Why this matters: Generic understanding of ZMOTs must be customized to specific consumer segments to create truly effective content and marketing strategies.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Journey mapping translates conceptual consumer journey stages into visual, persona-specific representations that identify concrete actions, touchpoints, and marketing opportunities at each stage.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What journey mapping is: a visual representation that combines persona, consumer journey stages, and moments of truth into a practical tool.
• Why it varies: different personas (consumer segments) buy products differently, so each needs its own journey map.
• Core components: persona, conceptual stages, concrete actions, touchpoints (yours and competitors'), and opportunities.
• Common confusion: journey maps are not just conceptual—they must translate generic stages into real-life, specific actions consumers actually take.
• Why it matters: understanding concrete consumer steps should be the starting point for creating marketing campaigns that support consumers at each stage.

🔗 Connection to ZMOTs

🔍 Four types of ZMOT moments

The excerpt identifies four types of Zero Moment of Truth (ZMOT) that interact with consumer journeys:

ZMOT Type	What consumers seek	Example from excerpt
I-want-to-know	Knowledge-based search queries	General information searches
I-want-to-go	Location-based help	"restaurant near me"
I-want-to-do	Help achieving something	"how to kiss" (most-searched how-to)
I-want-to-buy	Purchase assistance	Shopping-related searches

🎯 Why ZMOTs matter for content

• These are not simply ways to understand consumer behavior—they are tools to help create better content.
• Each ZMOT type represents an opportunity for companies to create content online.
• The excerpt asks: "What kind of content would you create for these four different ZMOTs?"

🗺️ What journey maps are

📋 Definition and purpose

A journey map is a visual representation of the journey of a consumer.

• It brings together three conceptual tools: persona, consumer journey, and moments of truth.
• It translates generic journey concepts into real-life experiences.
• Effective strategies demand a tailored understanding—you cannot stay at a conceptual level.

🎭 Why maps vary by persona

• Each persona represents a different consumer segment.
• Different segments buy products differently.
• Example: how you buy products differs from how your parents buy products.
• Therefore, journey maps must be customized for each persona.

🧩 Common elements of journey maps

🧱 Five required components

The excerpt states that journey maps exist in a wide range of shapes and forms but all share these elements:

1. The persona: the specific consumer segment being mapped
2. Conceptual stages: from a journey framework (e.g., trigger → active evaluation → purchase → post-purchase; or awareness → consideration → purchase → loyalty)
3. Concrete actions: what consumers actually do at each stage
4. Touchpoints: what consumers encounter—importantly, include both your firm's touchpoints and others' (competitors, third parties)
5. Opportunities: associated with each action consumers take

⚠️ Important distinction

• Don't confuse conceptual stages with concrete actions.
• Conceptual stages are generic (awareness, consideration, etc.).
• Concrete actions are specific behaviors consumers take within those stages.
• The excerpt emphasizes: "this is a consumer journey, you should be thinking more broadly than only your firm."

💡 How to use journey maps

🎯 Identifying opportunities

• Each action consumers take represents an opportunity for your brand to create a connection.
• Journey maps help you understand how consumers move through their journeys to address needs and problems.
• A clear understanding of concrete steps should be the starting point for creating marketing campaigns.

🔍 Practical questions to ask

The excerpt provides these guiding questions:

• What do consumers do at the awareness stage?
• How can your brand support their actions?
• Do consumers search for specific things?
• What about at the active evaluation stage?

🌉 Bridging understanding to action

• Journey maps create a bridge between what consumers are doing online and how firms can answer their search queries.
• The excerpt notes that the next chapter examines how firms can position websites on specific searches.
• This connection helps translate consumer behavior into concrete marketing responses.

📝 Practical application example

👵 RV Betty persona

The excerpt provides a detailed persona example:

Demographics and situation:

• Retired, lives in suburbs with retired husband
• Kids are self-sufficient and out of the house
• Has substantial savings, not worried about wealth
• Long-time dream of RV travel, recently retired and bored

Needs and concerns:

• Worried about logistics (utility hookups, best places to stay)
• Wants comfort for extended time in RV
• Needs extra sleeping space for retired friends
• Wants room for food and cooking
• Desires ease when traveling

🎨 Content creation approach

The excerpt asks for three pieces of content tailored to RV Betty:

1. Problem/need stage: address a problem or need she is facing
2. Evaluation stage: help her evaluate her options
3. Purchase stage: sell your product

Key reminder: "Make sure that your three pieces of content directly address the RV Betty persona!"

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

These exercises guide learners to apply persona development and journey mapping by creating content strategies, defining customer segments, and identifying touchpoints for real-world marketing scenarios.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Three exercise types: using an existing persona to draft content, creating a new persona from scratch, and building a complete journey map.
• Persona-to-content workflow: content must address specific needs at awareness, evaluation, and purchase stages.
• Journey mapping components: includes persona, journey stages, concrete actions, touchpoints, and opportunities.
• Common confusion: personas are not just demographics—they must include needs, problems, and motivations that drive behavior.
• Real-world application: exercises use concrete scenarios (RV travel, Montreal real estate) to practice translating theory into marketing strategy.

📝 Working with an existing persona

👵 The RV Betty persona

The excerpt provides a detailed persona example:

• Demographics: retired suburban woman, married, financially comfortable with substantial savings
• Goals: fulfill long-time dream of RV travel with husband
• Concerns: logistics (utility hookups, best places to stay), comfort requirements, space for guests and cooking
• Motivations: boredom after retirement, desire for ease while traveling

✍️ Three-piece content assignment

The exercise asks learners to sketch three distinct content pieces:

Stage	Content purpose	What it should do
Problem/need	Address a problem she faces	Target her worries about logistics or comfort
Evaluation	Help her evaluate options	Support her comparison of RV choices
Purchase	Sell your product	Make the case for your specific offering

Important tip from the excerpt: "Make sure that your three pieces of content directly address the RV Betty persona!"

Don't confuse: this is not about generic RV content—each piece must connect to Betty's specific concerns (logistics anxiety, comfort needs, space for entertaining).

🏠 Creating a persona from scratch

🎯 The real estate scenario

The exercise specifies:

• Target market: Montreal real estate company
• Segment: first-time house buyers
• Required elements: sociodemographic characteristics (age, revenue) plus one general need or problem

🤔 Guiding questions provided

The excerpt offers three reflection prompts:

• Why would people move to a house in Montreal?
• Are there different groups of first-time buyers? What differentiates them? Which one are you concentrating on?
• Is there one need or problem that unites that group?

Key insight: The tip emphasizes asking "why these people would need a house"—personas must be grounded in motivations, not just demographics.

🗺️ Building a complete journey map

📊 Journey map structure requirements

The exercise specifies four stages:

1. Awareness
2. Consideration
3. Purchase
4. Post-purchase

🔍 Required elements per stage

For each of the four stages, learners must identify:

Element	Quantity	What it represents
Concrete activities	2 per stage	What the persona actually does
Touchpoints	2 per stage	What the persona encounters (yours and competitors')
Opportunities	1 per activity	How your company can create connections

🎯 Applying to the real estate persona

The exercise asks learners to use the persona they created in the previous exercise and map their complete journey through all four stages.

Example structure: At the awareness stage, the persona might search for neighborhood information (activity) and encounter real estate blogs (touchpoint), creating an opportunity for educational content.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Boolean search operators help digital marketers identify exactly which webpages compete for specific keywords by filtering search results to show where keywords appear in titles, URLs, or anchor text.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Three main operators: allintitle, allinurl, and allinanchor each filter results by where keywords appear on competing pages.
• Why location matters: SEO best practices lead webmasters to place target keywords in page titles and URLs, making these operators reveal true competitors.
• Competitive analysis use: these operators create a clear list of competition for a specific search query, enabling benchmark analysis.
• Common confusion: these operators don't just find pages containing keywords—they find pages optimized for those keywords in strategic locations.
• Practical application: analyze competitor page structure, content types, and media to create better webpages that more fully answer consumer needs.

🔍 The three Boolean operators

🏷️ allintitle operator

Returns results where the keywords are in the page title.

• Syntax example: allintitle:how to bathe a cat
• Filters to show only pages that have placed your target keywords in their title tag
• Why it matters: page titles are a primary SEO signal, so pages with keywords in titles are actively competing for those terms

🔗 allinurl operator

Returns results where the keywords are in the page URL.

• Syntax example: allinurl:how to bathe a cat
• Shows pages that have structured their URL to include the target keywords
• Why it matters: URL structure is another key SEO element that webmasters optimize intentionally

⚓ allinanchor operator

Returns results where webpages are linked to using the keywords in the anchor text.

• Syntax example: allinanchor:how to bathe a cat
• Reveals pages that other sites link to using your target keywords as the clickable text
• Why it matters: being linked with keyword anchor text helps rankings, so this shows pages with strong backlink profiles for those terms

🎯 Why these operators reveal true competition

🎯 SEO best practices connection

• The excerpt explains that SEO should lead webmasters to put keywords in page titles and URLs
• These aren't random placements—they're deliberate optimization choices
• Therefore: pages found by these operators are intentionally targeting the same keywords you want to rank for

📋 Creating a clear competitor list

• Standard searches return many irrelevant results
• Boolean operators filter to show "exactly who your competition is for a specific search query"
• This precision makes competitive analysis more focused and actionable

📊 Using operators for competitive analysis

🔬 What to analyze on competitor pages

Once you've identified competing pages with Boolean operators, examine:

• Content offered: what topics and information do they cover?
• Page structure: how is the content organized and formatted?
• Media types: do they use multiple formats (text, images, video)?
• Completeness: how thoroughly do they answer the search query?

🏆 Creating a benchmark to beat

Analysis step	Purpose
Identify competitors	Use Boolean operators to find optimized pages
Analyze their approach	Understand content, structure, and media choices
Create general benchmark	Establish the standard you need to exceed
Build better webpage	More clearly and fully answer consumer needs

• The goal is not to copy but to understand the competitive standard
• Then create something that "will more clearly and fully answer consumers' needs"
• Example: if competitors use only text, adding video demonstrations might better serve users searching "how to bathe a cat"

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Boolean search operators enable marketers to identify direct competitors for specific keywords and reverse-engineer their SEO strategies to create superior content that better meets consumer needs.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Boolean operators reveal exact competitors: three operators (allintitle, allinurl, allinanchor) filter search results to show pages optimized for your target keywords.
• Why these operators matter: they surface pages that follow SEO best practices (keywords in titles, URLs, and anchor text), giving you a precise competitor list.
• Competitive benchmarking approach: analyze competitor pages for content quality, structure, media types, and how fully they answer user needs.
• Common confusion: these operators don't just find any mention of keywords—they find pages optimized for those keywords in specific strategic locations.
• Goal of analysis: create a benchmark to beat by building webpages that more clearly and completely satisfy searcher intent.

🔍 Boolean search operators for keyword research

🔍 The three core operators

The excerpt introduces three specialized search commands:

Operator	Syntax example	What it returns
allintitle	allintitle:how to bathe a cat	Results where keywords appear in the page title
allinurl	allinurl:how to bathe a cat	Results where keywords appear in the page URL
allinanchor	allinanchor:how to bathe a cat	Results where other pages link using the keywords in anchor text

🎯 Why these locations matter

• The excerpt explains these operators are useful because SEO best practices dictate putting target keywords in:
  • Page titles (signals topic relevance to search engines)
  • Page URLs (reinforces keyword focus)
  • Anchor text of inbound links (external validation of keyword relevance)
• Pages appearing in these filtered results are likely direct competitors who are actively optimizing for the same search queries.

🔎 What you get from these searches

By using these Boolean search operators, you can get a clear list of exactly who your competition is for a specific search query.

• Not just pages that mention your keywords casually
• Pages where webmasters have deliberately positioned keywords in strategic SEO locations
• A focused competitor set rather than broad, noisy results

📊 Competitive analysis framework

📊 What to analyze on competitor pages

Once you identify competitors through Boolean operators, the excerpt recommends examining:

• Content type and quality: what kind of information their pages offer
• Page structure: how content is organized and presented
• Media diversity: whether they use multiple types of media (text, images, video, etc.)
• Answer completeness: how fully they address the searcher's needs

🎯 Purpose of the analysis

The excerpt frames this as creating a benchmark to beat:

• Understand what competitors are doing
• Identify gaps or weaknesses in their approach
• Build a superior webpage that "more clearly and fully answer consumers' needs"
• Example: If competitors use only text, you might add video tutorials; if their content is incomplete, you provide more comprehensive answers.

⚠️ Don't confuse

• This is not about copying competitors—it's about understanding the baseline and exceeding it
• The goal is consumer-focused: better meeting needs, not just matching competitor tactics

🏠 Practical application context

🏠 Real estate example scenario

The excerpt includes exercises for a Montreal real estate company specializing in first-time buyers, with a persona (Bill and Jane, newlyweds planning a family, limited budget, unfamiliar with home-buying process).

🏠 Exercise components mentioned

The competitive analysis exercise asks students to:

• Reverse-engineer competitors' SEO efforts and content marketing strategy
• Examine: page title, description, URL, headings, keywords in content, alt tags
• Identify keywords articles target and their intended audience
• Find alternative, less competitive search terms to rank on

This reinforces that Boolean operators and competitive analysis are practical tools for real marketing scenarios, not just theoretical concepts.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Understanding the different types of searches consumers perform and where they are in their journey allows digital marketers to create webpages that better align with user intent, improving both user experience and search rankings.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Three search objectives: consumers perform informational searches (seeking information), transactional searches (looking to perform an action/purchase), and navigational searches (finding a specific website).
• Journey-based search evolution: consumers move from problem-focused searches early in their journey, to solution-evaluation searches, to product-specific searches near purchase.
• Common confusion: transactional searches are not only about buying—they can be broadly defined as performing any interaction, not just purchases.
• Strategic alignment: different personas have different needs, requiring separate webpages targeting specific search queries that match where consumers are in their journey.
• Competitive positioning: analyzing competitors' keyword choices reveals their targeting strategy and helps identify less competitive search queries to rank on.

🎯 Types of search objectives

🔍 Informational searches

Informational searches: when consumers are looking for information about a specific topic.

• The consumer wants to learn or understand something.
• These searches focus on knowledge acquisition, not immediate action.
• Example: "How to run a 5k?", "What are beginner's running shoes?", or "Best beginner running shoes."
• Don't confuse with transactional searches—informational searches don't signal intent to perform an action yet.

💳 Transactional searches

Transactional searches: when consumers are looking to perform a transaction.

• Two definitions exist:
  • Narrow definition: buying a product
  • Broad definition: performing an interaction
• These searches signal readiness to take action.
• Example: "Cheap beginner running shoes", "Brooks Ghost 12", or "Buy Asics Brooks Ghost 12."
• The broader definition means any interaction counts, not just purchases.

🧭 Navigational searches

Navigational searches: when consumers are looking for a specific website.

• The consumer already knows which site they want to visit.
• These searches use brand names or website names.
• Example: "Sports Experts", "Foot Locker", or "Brooks website."
• These represent the most specific intent—the consumer has already decided on a destination.

🛤️ Consumer journey and search evolution

🔎 Early journey: problem-focused searches

• Consumers start by looking for information about a problem or need they're trying to address.
• The focus is on understanding the challenge, not yet on solutions.
• Example: "how to run a 5k", "treating acne fast", "easy ways to gain muscle", or "getting a job after college."
• These align with informational search objectives.

⚖️ Middle journey: solution-evaluation searches

• As consumers move to actively evaluating options, they start weighing different approaches.
• The focus shifts from problem to comparing potential solutions.
• Example: "best training plan for 5k", "retinol vs. benzoyl vs. salicylic", "is creatine that good", or "should I register on linkedin."
• Consumers are narrowing down their choices.

🛒 Late journey: product-specific searches

• Once closer to making a purchase, consumers look at evaluating or accessing the specific product they've chosen.
• The focus is now on transaction details—price, availability, access.
• Example: "sales brooks ghost 12", "where to buy benzoyl", "creatine online cheap", "linkedin promo code."
• These align with transactional search objectives.

🔄 Journey as a process

• The three search objectives (informational, transactional, navigational) can be placed in a process.
• Someone moves from needing information → wanting to perform interactions → wanting to visit a specific website.
• This progression mirrors the consumer journey from problem awareness to purchase.

🎨 Strategic implications for marketers

👥 Persona-based webpage creation

• Different segments/personas have different needs, challenges, and goals.
• You need to create different webpages to attract different personas.
• Each webpage should address a specific need, challenge, or goal.
• First questions to ask: What are the needs of my persona? What goal are they trying to achieve? What challenges are they facing?

📝 Content alignment with journey stages

The excerpt emphasizes creating value by representing consumers rather than talking about the company. This means creating three types of content:

Journey Stage	Content Focus	Purpose
Early (Problem)	Inform consumers about their problems	Attract visitors
Middle (Solution)	Help evaluate options	Convert visitors to leads
Late (Product)	Position product as best or provide product-specific information	Convert leads to customers

🎯 Improving user experience and rankings

• Knowing why people are searching allows you to create pages that more directly align with their searches.
• This alignment helps improve user experience.
• It also helps you choose the right keywords.
• Both factors should allow your webpages to rank higher.

🔬 Competitive keyword analysis

🕵️ Understanding competitor strategy

The excerpt frames competitor analysis with key assumptions:

• Competitors create specific webpages to rank on specific search queries.
• They know where to put keywords to communicate with people and search engines: page title, meta description, page URL, headings, and body text.
• They write their page title, URL, and meta descriptions to "sell" their webpage to people on search engine results pages.

📊 Analyzing keyword competitiveness

• You can easily study competition based on specific keywords because competitors follow the same rules.
• Think of ranking on search queries similarly to selling products—you need to find optimal positioning for your webpage.
• This means finding a search query that is not overly competitive.
• You should target queries where you believe it's likely you will rank high.
• The first step is understanding how to analyze the competitiveness of specific keywords and associated search queries.

🎯 Strategic positioning

• Not all consumers use the exact same search query to address a specific need.
• Example given: consumers wanting to know how to bathe a cat might search "how to bathe my cat", "easiest way to wash my cat", or other variations.
• Understanding this variation helps identify less competitive opportunities to rank.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

By analyzing where competitors place their keywords and how competitive specific search queries are, you can identify strategic positioning opportunities for your own webpages to rank effectively.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Competitor keyword strategy: Competitors deliberately place keywords in specific locations (page title, URL, meta description, headings, body) to rank on targeted search queries.
• Competitiveness assessment: Older domains with established backlinks and content are harder to displace, making some search queries more competitive than others.
• Strategic positioning: Finding less competitive search queries that consumers still use is similar to product positioning—you need an optimal niche where you can rank high.
• Common confusion: Not all related search queries have the same competitiveness; seemingly similar phrases may have vastly different levels of competition.
• Boolean operators for precision: Tools like allintitle, allinurl, and allinanchor reveal exactly which pages are positioned on your target keywords.

🎯 Competitive assumptions and framework

🎯 What competitors are doing

The excerpt frames competitive analysis around three core assumptions about competitor behavior:

• Competitors create specific webpages to rank on specific search queries (not generic pages hoping to rank everywhere)
• They follow SEO best practices by placing keywords strategically
• They optimize their page titles, URLs, and meta descriptions to "sell" their webpage to searchers on SERPs

Why this matters: If competitors follow predictable patterns, you can reverse-engineer their strategy by examining these elements.

📍 Where competitors place keywords

Competitors communicate with both people and search engines through five key locations:

Location	Purpose
Page title	Primary signal to search engines and users
Meta description	Persuades users to click on SERPs
Page URL	Reinforces keyword relevance
Headings	Structures content and emphasizes topics
Body text	Provides context and keyword density

Example: If a competitor wants to rank for "how to bathe a cat," they will include this phrase or close variations in all five locations.

🎲 Positioning as strategic choice

Think of ranking on search queries in a way that is similar to selling products: you need to find a positioning that is optimal for your webpage.

• "Optimal" means finding a search query that is not overly competitive and where you believe you can rank high
• Don't confuse: This is not about choosing the most popular search term, but about finding the right balance between search volume and achievability

🔍 Assessing keyword competitiveness

🕰️ Domain age analysis

The first step to understand competitiveness is checking how old competing domains are:

Why domain age matters:

• Older domains have had more time to build content
• Older domains have accumulated more backlinks
• The older the domains on the first SERP, the more competitive the search query

How to check:

1. Pick keywords you want to rank on
2. Search these keywords on a search engine
3. Use a whois service (e.g., who.is) to check the "registered on" date

Example: For "how to bathe my cat," the first results include domains registered in 2004, 1999, and 2000—most prior to 2010, indicating high competitiveness.

🎯 Exact positioning analysis

Beyond domain age, check whether competing pages are specifically positioned on your target keywords:

The excerpt shows three competing pages all have identical page titles: "How to bathe a cat"

What this signals:

• These pages were created specifically to rank on this exact query
• The combination of old domains + exact keyword positioning = very competitive
• Ranking would require substantial work creating backlinks and superior content

Strategic implication: When you find this pattern, consider targeting alternative, less competitive keywords that consumers still use.

🔧 Boolean search operators for precision

Three operators help identify pages exactly positioned on your target keywords:

Operator	What it returns	Why it's useful
allintitle:	Results where keywords are in the page title	SEO best practice puts target keywords in titles
allinurl:	Results where keywords are in the page URL	Shows pages structurally built around these keywords
allinanchor:	Results where pages are linked to via these keywords in anchor text	Reveals pages that have built backlink profiles around these terms

How to use these: These operators give you a clear list of exactly who your competition is for a specific search query.

📊 Competitive benchmarking

Once you identify direct competitors using Boolean operators, analyze their pages to create a benchmark:

What to examine:

• What kind of content their pages offer
• How the pages are structured
• Whether they have multiple types of media
• How clearly and fully they answer consumer needs

Goal: Create a better webpage that more clearly and fully answers consumers' needs than existing competition.

Don't confuse: This is not about copying competitors, but about understanding the standard you need to beat.

🗺️ Finding strategic opportunities

🗺️ Iterative keyword exploration

When initial keywords prove too competitive, the excerpt recommends an iterative approach:

• Repeat the competitiveness analysis with new keywords
• Continue until you find a search that:
  • Consumers will actually be using
  • Is not overly competitive

Example: If "how to bathe my cat" is too competitive, test variations like "easiest way to wash my cat," "wash a cat," or "cat wash soap"—each will have different competitiveness levels.

⚖️ Balancing difficulty and opportunity

The excerpt acknowledges that ranking on competitive queries "isn't impossible to do, but it would require a lot of work."

The strategic choice:

• High-competition path: Invest heavily in backlinks and superior content
• Lower-competition path: Find alternative keywords that are easier to rank on

Key insight: Positioning a webpage on other keywords "might be an easier path" to achieving visibility and meeting consumer needs.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

These exercises guide learners through competitive analysis and campaign planning by applying the RACE framework to fitness center marketing, culminating in building a digital journey map for a specific persona.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Core scenario: learners work as a fitness center targeting people returning to exercise, focusing on a specific persona named Avery.
• Social media analysis task: compare three fitness Instagram accounts using RACE stages (Reach, Act, Convert, Engage) to understand post objectives and consumer goals.
• Journey mapping exercise: integrate paid, owned, and earned media activities across consumer journey stages.
• Common confusion: the exercises build on earlier competitive analysis methods—don't confuse evaluating competitors through SWOT with analyzing their actual digital behavior and customer journey.
• Practical application: exercises require hands-on analysis of real accounts and translating opportunities into concrete marketing activities.

👤 The persona: Avery

👤 Who Avery is

The exercises center on a specific target persona:

• Lives in a major Canadian city center
• Late twenties to early thirties
• Top 20% income bracket in their city
• Has a newborn and increased work responsibilities

🎯 Avery's situation and needs

Current state:

• Stopped exercising for several years due to life changes
• Feels sluggish and lacks energy
• Misses connection with their body
• Feels self-conscious about body transformation with age

Goals:

• Get back into weekly exercise
• Limited time available
• Low knowledge about working out or the fitness market (where to work out, how to work out)

📱 Social media analysis exercise

📱 The RACE framework task

Learners must analyze three Instagram fitness center accounts:

• @achievefitnessboston
• @lifetime.life
• @goodlifefitness

🔍 What to analyze

The exercise asks learners to:

• Group posts into RACE stages (Reach, Act, Convert, Engage)
• Identify the objectives of different post themes
• Determine goals for consumers at each stage

📊 Implications to consider

Think through how posts contribute to:

• Generating awareness
• Attracting visitors
• Creating leads
• Converting leads into customers
• Generating engagement

Example: A post might generate awareness (Reach) by showcasing facilities, while another might engage existing members (Engage) by celebrating their achievements.

🗺️ Journey map creation exercise

🗺️ The mapping task

Create a digital journey map integrating paid, owned, and earned marketing activities for a fitness center campaign.

Learners work on one or two stages of the journey and complete specific actions.

🔧 Required actions for each stage

Step	What to do
1. Consumer actions	Start with concrete actions consumers take
2. Opportunities	Identify opportunities at that stage
3. Marketing activities	Translate opportunities into concrete marketing activities
4. Media integration	Make each activity work across paid, owned, and earned media

💡 Integration requirement

The key challenge is ensuring each marketing activity spans all three media types:

• Paid: advertising you pay for
• Owned: channels you control (website, email, social accounts)
• Earned: organic mentions, shares, reviews

Example: For awareness stage, a paid ad might drive traffic to owned content (blog post), which encourages earned media (social shares).

⚠️ Don't confuse

The journey map builds on the persona (Avery) and competitive analysis—it's not a generic template but should reflect insights about what competitors do and what this specific persona needs at each stage.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Digital environments allow marketers to systematically analyze competitors by tracing the customer journey from discovery through purchase and post-purchase engagement, leveraging the fact that nearly all competitor activities are archived and accessible online.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Journey-based approach: analyze competitors by simulating a persona-related consumer moving through their entire customer journey, not just evaluating strengths/weaknesses in isolation.
• Three analysis stages: the excerpt structures competitive analysis into Reach (discovery), Act (persuasion and conversion), and Engage (post-purchase and community).
• Actionable tactics: subscribe to newsletters, follow social media, make purchases, abandon carts, hunt for ads, and check reviews to gather targeted intelligence.
• Common confusion: traditional frameworks like SWOT assess internal capabilities, but digital competitive analysis focuses on how competitors operate in practice—their actual marketing execution is now visible and archived.
• Accessibility advantage: digital marketing efforts (ads, content, emails) are readily accessible, making competitor strategy analysis more feasible than ever before.

🔍 Journey-stage framework

🎯 Reach stage questions

The excerpt asks analysts to examine how competitors attract and inform potential customers:

• How do they display products and communicate details?
• How detailed are product descriptions? What information is included or missing?
• Example: An analyst visiting a competitor's site notes whether product pages emphasize technical specs, lifestyle imagery, or customer testimonials.

💬 Act stage questions

This stage focuses on persuasion and conversion tactics:

• Where are calls to action placed throughout the browsing experience?
• What happens in newsletters—is there a planned path to maximize sales?
• Do they use abandoned-cart recovery emails? At what point and with what messages?
• Are they retargeting visitors, and based on what variables?
• Example: A competitor might send an abandoned-cart email 24 hours after abandonment with a discount code, revealing their conversion strategy.

🤝 Engage stage questions

Post-purchase analysis examines customer retention and community-building:

• What happens after a purchase?
• Do they have membership programs, online forums, or clubs?
• Do they request reviews or run consumer-generated content campaigns?
• Does their content address only new consumers or existing ones as well?
• Don't confuse: engagement is not just about making the sale—it's about fostering ongoing interactions and loyalty.

🆚 Comparison with traditional frameworks

🆚 SWOT vs. journey-based analysis

Approach	What it evaluates	Limitation noted in excerpt
SWOT	Strengths and weaknesses of competitors' digital marketing resources	Evaluates capabilities, not actual operations
Journey-based	Exactly how competitors are operating—their real marketing execution	Requires active simulation and data gathering

• The excerpt emphasizes that digital environments enable a "different logic" from strategic frameworks like SWOT.
• SWOT can assess what resources competitors have; journey-based analysis reveals how they deploy them.
• Example: SWOT might identify that a competitor has strong social media presence, but journey analysis shows exactly which platforms, posting frequency, content themes, and engagement tactics they use.

📋 Systematic intelligence-gathering checklist

📋 Concrete actions to gather information

The excerpt concludes with a targeted checklist to maximize intelligence collection:

• Subscribe to their newsletter/blog
• Follow them on social media
• Purchase a product (observe packaging, buying experience, shipping time)
• Abandon a cart during checkout
• Check their reviews
• Hunt for their ads
• Follow their publicity
• Understand their backlinks

🔑 Why this approach works

"Because everything is archived online, and because you can readily have access to marketing efforts such as ads and content, understanding your competitors' strategic efforts has perhaps never been more accessible."

• The digital environment creates unprecedented transparency.
• Analysts can experience the competitor's strategy firsthand as a customer would.
• This is not theoretical assessment—it's empirical observation of actual customer touchpoints.
• Example: By subscribing to a competitor's newsletter, an analyst sees the exact email cadence, messaging themes, and promotional offers in real time.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Inbound and outbound marketing represent two distinct strategic approaches—one that draws consumers in through content and engagement, the other that pushes messages out through advertising—and both can be integrated with paid, owned, and earned media to create effective conversion-focused campaigns.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Two core approaches: Inbound marketing attracts visitors by representing their needs (content, social media, optimized sites); outbound marketing interrupts consumers with promotional messages (ads, promotions).
• Permission vs. interruption: Inbound is associated with permission marketing and two-way communication; outbound is associated with interruption marketing and one-way communication.
• Three media types: Paid (you pay for it), owned (you host it), and earned (others share it) media activities should be integrated for successful campaigns.
• Common confusion: Inbound is not just "cheaper"—it has content creation costs; outbound is not necessarily dying, though its popularity is debated.
• Conversion framework: The RACE framework (Reach, Act, Convert, Engage) guides marketers through stages from visitor to repeat customer, with specific objectives at each stage.

🎯 Two marketing approaches

🧲 Inbound marketing: drawing consumers in

Inbound marketing aims at bringing visitors "in," drawing them to your company via, typically, content marketing, social media, and well-optimized websites.

• Core logic: Consumers find you because you represent them and their needs.
• Key characteristics:
  • Sought by consumers (not imposed)
  • One of the fastest-growing online strategies over the last decade
  • Seen as cheaper since no ad fees (but content creation has costs)
  • Aimed at customer acquisition
• Associated with permission marketing: Advertising is welcomed because permission has been obtained and is anticipated (e.g., email marketing).
• Two-way communication: Consumers can interact with the brand (e.g., comment on social media posts, blog articles).
• Examples: Blog posts, infographics, e-books, whitepapers, social media posts, tutorials.

📢 Outbound marketing: pushing messages out

Outbound marketing is the promotion of products or services through advertising and promotions, where a message goes "out" from your company and stops consumers in whatever they were doing.

• Core logic: Your message interrupts consumers (e.g., ads on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, or in articles).
• Key characteristics:
  • Imposed on consumers (they do not agree to be advertised to)
  • Decreasing in popularity, although this is debated
  • Expensive due to fees for placing ads online
  • Aimed at awareness creation (traditional advertising goal)
• Associated with interruption marketing: Marketing efforts interrupt what a consumer is doing.
• One-way communication: Consumers cannot talk back to ads.
• Examples: Any form of advertising (search ads, display ads, social media ads, etc.).

🔄 Don't confuse: cost structures

• Inbound is "cheaper" only in the sense that there are no ad placement fees.
• However, creating quality content (blog posts, videos, infographics) requires investment in time, talent, and resources.
• Both approaches have costs; they are simply distributed differently.

💰 Three types of media

💳 Paid media

Paid media are media activities you pay for, typically performed on a third-party channel that is paid by your company to conduct the activity.

• Who controls what:
  • Your company controls the content
  • The third party controls where the content is shown
• Examples: Search ads, display ads, paid influencers, paid content promotion, social media ads, product placements.

🏠 Owned media

Owned media activities are media activities that are hosted on channels that you own, i.e., on your own platforms.

• What it includes: Your web properties (e.g., blog posts on your website) and social media channels.
• Key point: You control both the content and the platform.

🌟 Earned media

Earned media activities are media impressions that you earn because your content is shared; consumers (and sometimes professionals) become the channel.

• What it includes: Shared social media posts, reviews, ratings, social recommendations, consumer-generated content (wikis, forums), and journalist coverage of your company.
• Key point: You do not control this media; others choose to share or discuss your brand.

🔗 Integration is essential

Media type	Control	Cost structure	Example
Paid	Content (you), placement (third party)	Direct fees	Social media ad
Owned	Full control	Content creation costs	Blog post on your site
Earned	No control (others share)	Indirect (quality investment)	Consumer review, shared post

• Best practice: An ideal campaign integrates all three types.
• Example scenario: Create content on your website and social channels (owned), push it via banner ads and social media ads (paid), and design it to be widely shared by others (earned).
• Real example from excerpt: Doritos 2020 Superbowl ad—hosted on their website and YouTube (owned), pushed during the Superbowl for millions of dollars (paid), and fueled by a TikTok hashtag campaign #coolranchdance (earned).

📊 Objectives, goals, and KPIs

🎯 Objectives: what you want to achieve

Objectives represent what you want to achieve for your company.

• SMART criteria: Objectives should be:
  • Specific
  • Measurable
  • Attainable
  • Realistic
  • Time-bound
• Example: "Increase product awareness" or "Increase sales through our eCommerce platform by 10% within the next six months."

👤 Goals: what you want users to do

Goals are actions that you want users to take.

• Why the distinction: Separating objectives (company achievements) from goals (user actions) makes planning clearer.
• Vocabulary note: The term "goals" is used because web analytics platforms (e.g., Google Analytics) position user actions this way.
• Examples: Subscribe to email updates, engage with a key feature, submit a contact form, use a virtual mirror feature.

📈 KPIs: how you measure performance

KPIs—key performance indicators—are metrics used to evaluate the performance of your company based on a particular objective or activity.

• Targets: KPIs typically have specific values your company aims to achieve within a certain time period.
• Examples: Number of contact forms submitted, clickthrough rate (CTR), bounce rate, share ratio/amplification rate.

🔗 How they work together

• Flow: Objectives → Goals (for users) → KPIs (to measure success).
• Example scenario:
  • Objective: Increase product awareness.
  • Goals: Subscribe to email updates; engage with key feature (e.g., virtual mirror).
  • KPIs: Number of contact forms submitted; use of the virtual mirror feature.

🚀 The RACE framework

🧩 What RACE is

The RACE framework is a conversion-based framework that explicitly aims at increasing customers.

• Part of a larger family: Similar to HubSpot's "attract-convert-close-delight" strategy (now their "flywheel business model") and the AARRR "pirate metrics" model (acquisition-activation-retention-referral-revenue).
• Core idea: Move people through four stages:
  1. Visitor (people come to your website)
  2. Lead (qualified potential customer—interested in your product and someone you want to sell to)
  3. Customer
  4. Repeat customer

🎯 R = REACH

Objectives:

• Build awareness about your brand, products, and services through offline and online media activities.
• Drive traffic using inbound and outbound marketing activities and paid, earned, and owned media touchpoints.

Focus: Address people's problems.

🤝 A = interACT

Objectives:

• Generate positive interactions on your owned media.
• Create leads (identify potential customers and qualify them—i.e., confirm they can be your customer).

Focus: Address consumers' problems and help them evaluate their options.

💵 C = CONVERT

Objective:

• Convert leads into sales.

Focus:

• Talk about why your brand, product, or service is the best option for consumers.
• Optimize owned media to maximize conversions (conversion rate optimization).

🔁 E = ENGAGE

Objectives:

• Build customer advocacy.
• Foster repeat visits and sales.

Focus:

• Build long-term engagement by continuously creating value for consumers.
• Identify engaged customers to foster participation and co-creation activities (e.g., reviews, campaigns).

📊 Evolution over time

Stage	What you do	What consumers experience
Reach	Create campaigns to attract	Discover your brand
Act	Qualify interest (both ways) and collect contact info	Explore and engage
Convert	Accompany on journey to purchase	Decide and buy
Engage	Capitalize on positive experience	Advocate and return

🗺️ From journey to conversion path

🧭 Journey map

A journey map is a visual representation of the consumer journey, transforming abstract stages (awareness, consideration, purchase, loyalty) into concrete actions and touchpoints a brand can use to create a marketing strategy.

• Purpose: Make the abstract consumer journey concrete with specific actions and touchpoints.

🛤️ Conversion path

A conversion path is a description of the steps that a company wants consumers to take so that they achieve a desired goal.

• What is a conversion: When a consumer achieves a goal you wanted them to achieve.
• Goal variety: Visit a page, click a link, send email address, buy a product, spend time on a page, view multiple pages, use a key feature, etc.
• Shortest typical path: Ad → Content → Landing page.

🔢 Touchpoints matter

• Statistic from excerpt: It takes between 5 and 13 touchpoints (interactions with your brand) to generate a qualified, sales-ready lead.
• Implication: Without planning these touchpoints in advance, it is difficult to create sales.
• Marketer's task: Bring people through a set of smaller goals (visit blog, read for 3 minutes, give email, open first email, etc.) that lead to milestones toward purchase.

📋 Planning ahead

• Key questions to answer:
  • What comes next after this ad or content?
  • What are you expecting people to do?
  • Where are you leading them?
  • What should they do once they get to this page? Why?
• Don't confuse: A conversion path is not just "create content and hope"—it is a deliberate sequence of steps with clear goals at each stage.

🎓 Example: back pain journey

Stage	Concrete action	Opportunity	Tactic
Awareness	Goes to Google: "How to reduce back pain"	Create content to inform and educate about back pain	Blog post with keywords "how to," "reduce," "back pain"; PPC campaign on those keywords
Active Evaluation	Goes to Google: "shoes vs. posture vs. exercise back pain"	Create content to inform about back pain solutions	Blog posts comparing your product vs. competitors; include keywords "best shoes," "posture," "back pain"; PPC campaign
Purchase	Goes to Google: "Brand XYZ best price sale"	Position your product as the best option	Search ad campaign on keywords ("Brand XYZ shoes," "best price"); offer 10% rebate for first-time clients
Post-Purchase	Writes product review on retailer's website	Leverage engaged consumers to create reviews	Give rebate for future purchase when writing a review

🔍 RACE for competitive analysis

🎯 Strategic value for analysis

• Turn the questions around: Instead of asking "How do I...?", ask "How does my competitor...?"
• Advantage: Everything is archived online; you can access competitors' ads, content, and marketing efforts directly.

🔎 Reach analysis questions

• How frequently are competitors running promotions? What benefits do they provide?
• Are they running contests online? What kind?
• How are they using social media channels? How do they drive people from social to website?
• What information is in their marketing banners and callouts?

🤝 Act analysis questions

• How are they creating positive interactions and transforming visitors into leads?
• Where are their calls to action? What are they about?
• Do they have a blog? How frequently do they post? What topics?
• What is the role of content on their website? How does it differ from yours?

💵 Convert analysis questions

• How do they display products and communicate details?
• How detailed are product descriptions? What information is included or missing?
• Where are calls to action? What are they about?
• What happens in newsletters? Is there a clear path to maximize sales?
• Do they have abandoned-cart saver features? When do emails go out? What do they say?
• Are they retargeting visitors? Based on what variables?

🔁 Engage analysis questions

• What happens after you buy a product?
• Do they have a club, membership program, or online forum?
• Do they request reviews? Are there consumer-generated content campaigns?
• Do they have consumer appreciation campaigns?
• Does their content address only new consumers or existing ones as well?

🕵️ Practical steps to gather information

To analyze competitors thoroughly, become a customer:

• Subscribe to their newsletter/blog
• Follow them on social media
• Purchase a product (note packaging, buying experience, shipping time)
• Put an item in your cart and abandon checkout
• Check their reviews
• Hunt for their ads
• Follow their publicity
• Understand their backlinks

🆚 RACE vs. SWOT

• SWOT: Evaluates strengths and weaknesses of competitors' digital marketing resources.
• RACE: Analyzes exactly how competitors are operating—their strategic efforts are accessible because everything is archived online.
• Advantage of RACE: Targeted, actionable intelligence on specific tactics and conversion paths.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Successful online marketing campaigns integrate paid media (activities you pay for on third-party channels), owned media (content on your own platforms), and earned media (impressions gained when others share your content), supported by clear objectives, user goals, and measurable KPIs.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Three media types: paid (you pay a third party), owned (your own channels), and earned (others share your content).
• Inbound vs outbound: inbound draws visitors in through content and social media (permission-based, two-way); outbound pushes ads out to interrupt consumers (one-way, imposed).
• Integration is key: ideal campaigns combine all three media types—create content (owned), promote it with ads (paid), and encourage sharing (earned).
• Common confusion: owned vs earned—owned means you control the channel (your website, your social accounts); earned means consumers or journalists become the channel by sharing.
• Objectives, goals, KPIs work together: objectives are what you want to achieve; goals are actions you want users to take; KPIs measure performance toward those objectives.

📢 Inbound vs Outbound Marketing

📥 Inbound marketing

Inbound marketing: aims at bringing visitors "in," drawing them to your company via, typically, content marketing, social media, and well-optimized websites.

• Consumers find you because you represent them.
• Permission marketing: advertising is welcomed because permission has already been obtained and advertising is anticipated (e.g., email marketing).
• Two-way communication: interaction between consumers and the brand is possible (e.g., comments on social media posts and blog articles).

Characteristics:

• Sought: consumers find you.
• Fast-growing: one of the fastest-growing strategies for marketing online over the last decade.
• Cheaper: no need to invest in ads (though content creation has costs).
• Aimed at customer acquisition.

Examples: blog posts, infographics, e-books, whitepapers, social media posts, tutorials.

📤 Outbound marketing

Outbound marketing: the promotion of products or services through advertising and promotions; a message goes "out" from your company and stops consumers in whatever they were doing.

• Consumers are "stopped" by an ad when scrolling on Instagram, reading Facebook, watching YouTube, or reading a newspaper article.
• Interruption marketing: marketing efforts such as ads interrupt what a consumer is doing.
• One-way communication: consumers cannot talk to ads.

Characteristics:

• Imposed: consumers do not agree to be advertised to.
• Decreasing in popularity (although this is debated).
• Expensive: fees associated with putting ads online.
• Aimed at awareness creation, as has typically been the case with traditional advertising.

Examples: advertising of any sort (search ads, display ads, social media ads, etc.).

🔄 Don't confuse inbound and outbound

• Inbound = consumers come to you; permission-based; two-way; sought.
• Outbound = you push messages to consumers; interruption-based; one-way; imposed.

💰 The Three Media Types

💳 Paid media

Paid media: media activities you pay for, typically performed on a third party channel (i.e., not your own website) that is paid by your company to conduct the activity.

• Your company controls the content, but the third party controls where this content is shown.
• Examples: search ads, display ads, paid influencers, paid content promotion, social media ads, product placements.

🏠 Owned media

Owned media activities: media activities that are hosted on channels that you own, i.e., on your own platforms.

• Includes your web properties (e.g., blog posts on your website) and social media channels.
• You control both the content and the channel.

🎁 Earned media

Earned media activities: media impressions that you earn because your content is shared; consumers (and sometimes professionals) become the channel.

• Examples: shared social media posts, reviews, consumer-generated content such as ratings, social recommendations, content created on wikis, forum discussions.
• Coverage of your company by journalists also falls under earned media.

🔗 Distinguishing the three types

Media Type	Who controls content	Who controls channel	How it works
Paid	You	Third party (you pay them)	You pay to place content on someone else's platform
Owned	You	You	You create and host content on your own platforms
Earned	Others (consumers, journalists)	Others (consumers, journalists)	Others share your content; you earn impressions

Don't confuse: owned vs earned—owned means you control the channel (your website, your social accounts); earned means consumers or journalists become the channel by sharing.

🔄 Integrating the Three Media Types

🎯 Why integration matters

• Although paid, owned, and earned are conceptually distinct, an ideal campaign will integrate them.
• This integration is the typical strategy underlying viral marketing campaigns.

🌟 How integration works

Example workflow:

1. Owned: Create content on your website and social media channels.
2. Paid: Push that content by advertising on social media websites and other websites using banner ads.
3. Earned: Make these efforts in the hopes that your content will be widely shared by others.

📺 Real-world example: Doritos 2020 Superbowl

The excerpt describes a widely successful ad for Doritos during the 2020 Superbowl:

• Owned: Doritos created an ad that they hosted on their website and social media channels (e.g., YouTube).
• Paid: The ad was pushed as a paid media activity during the Superbowl to the tune of several million dollars.
• Earned: It was associated with a TikTok hashtag campaign, #coolranchdance, which fueled earned media impressions.

"It is this intersection of paid, owned, and earned media activities that leads to the creation of successful online marketing campaigns!"

🎯 Objectives, Goals, and KPIs

🎯 Objectives

Objectives: represent what you want to achieve for your company.

Ideally, objectives should be SMART:

• Specific
• Measurable
• Attainable
• Realistic
• Time-bound

🏁 Goals

Goals: actions that you want users to take.

• The excerpt uses the vocabulary of goals to designate user's actions since this is typically how goals are positioned in web analytics (e.g., Google Analytics).
• Distinguishing between objectives (what you want to achieve) and goals (what you want your users to achieve) just makes things clearer.

📊 KPIs (Key Performance Indicators)

KPIs—key performance indicators—are metrics used to evaluate the performance of your company based on a particular objective or activity.

• KPIs typically have targets: specific values that your company is aiming to achieve within a certain time period.

🔗 How they work together

These concepts work together to help you plan campaigns:

• Objectives can be used to identify goals for users to achieve, which can be measured using KPIs.

Example:

• Objective: Increase product awareness.
• User goals: Subscribe to email updates; engage in key features you believe will help raise product awareness.
• KPIs: "Number of contact forms submitted" or "use of the key feature of the virtual mirror."

🗺️ Strategy and Tactics

🗺️ Strategy

Strategy: represents the path you intend to take to achieve a specific objective.

• This aligns with Jain's (1993) understanding of strategy as "the pattern of major objectives, purposes and goals, and essential policies and plans for achieving those goals, stated in such a way as to define what business the company is in or is to be in."
• Strategy is the overall approach or direction.

⚙️ Tactics

• The excerpt introduces the term "tactics" but does not provide a definition or further explanation in the provided text.
• (Note: The excerpt ends before elaborating on tactics.)

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Objectives, goals, and KPIs work together as a planning framework where company objectives drive user goals, which are then measured by key performance indicators to evaluate campaign success.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Three types of media: paid (you pay for placement), owned (your own channels), and earned (content shared by others).
• Objectives vs goals: objectives are what you want to achieve for your company; goals are actions you want users to take.
• KPIs measure performance: key performance indicators are metrics with specific targets to evaluate success toward objectives.
• Common confusion: don't confuse objectives (company outcomes) with goals (user actions)—they are distinct but connected.
• Integration matters: successful campaigns integrate paid, owned, and earned media rather than using them in isolation.

📺 Three types of media

💰 Paid media

Paid media are media activities you pay for, typically performed on a third party channel that is paid by your company to conduct the activity.

• Your company controls the content, but the third party controls where it is shown.
• Examples: search ads, display ads, paid influencers, paid content promotion, social media ads, product placements.
• Example: An organization pays for banner ads on external websites to promote their content.

🏠 Owned media

Owned media activities are media activities that are hosted on channels that you own, i.e., on your own platforms.

• Includes your web properties (e.g., blog posts on your website) and social media channels.
• You control both the content and the platform.
• Example: Blog posts published on your company website or posts on your company's social media accounts.

🎁 Earned media

Earned media activities are media impressions that you earn because your content is shared.

• Consumers (and sometimes professionals) become the channel.
• Examples: shared social media posts, reviews, ratings, social recommendations, content created on wikis, forum discussions, coverage by journalists.
• Don't confuse: earned media is not paid for—it happens when others voluntarily share or discuss your content.

🔗 Integration of media types

• An ideal campaign integrates all three types rather than using them separately.
• Example: Create content on your website and social media (owned), push it through banner ads and social media ads (paid), and hope it will be widely shared by others (earned).
• This intersection is the typical strategy underlying viral marketing campaigns.
• The excerpt gives a real example: Doritos created an ad hosted on their website and YouTube (owned), pushed it during the Superbowl (paid), and associated it with a TikTok hashtag campaign that fueled earned impressions.

🎯 Objectives, goals, and KPIs framework

🎯 Objectives

Objectives represent what you want to achieve for your company.

• Objectives should be SMART:
  • Specific
  • Measurable
  • Attainable
  • Realistic
  • Time-bound
• Example: "Increase product awareness" or "Increase sales through our eCommerce platform by 10% within the next six months."

👥 Goals

Goals are actions that you want users to take.

• The vocabulary of "goals" designates user actions, as typically positioned in web analytics (e.g., Google Analytics).
• Distinguishing between objectives (what you want to achieve) and goals (what you want users to achieve) makes things clearer.
• Example: To achieve the objective of increasing product awareness, you might set user goals such as subscribing to email updates or engaging in key features.

📊 KPIs (Key Performance Indicators)

KPIs—key performance indicators—are metrics used to evaluate the performance of your company based on a particular objective or activity.

• KPIs typically have targets: specific values that your company aims to achieve within a certain time period.
• Example: "number of contact forms submitted" or "use of the key feature of the virtual mirror."

🔄 How they work together

• Flow: Objectives → Goals → KPIs
• Objectives can be used to identify goals for users to achieve, which can be measured using KPIs.
• Example workflow:
  • Objective: Increase product awareness
  • User goals: Subscribe to email updates, engage with key features
  • KPIs: Number of contact forms submitted, use of virtual mirror feature

🗺️ Strategy and tactics

🗺️ Strategy

Strategy represents the path you intend to take to achieve a specific objective.

• Aligns with understanding strategy as "the pattern of major objectives, purposes and goals, and essential policies and plans for achieving those goals, stated in such a way as to define what business the company is in or is to be in."
• Strategy is the overall approach or direction.

🛠️ Tactics

Tactics are tools used to meet objectives.

• To implement a strategy and achieve specific objectives, a company deploys tactics.
• Examples: banner advertising campaigns, search ad campaigns, use of content marketing on social media.
• Don't confuse: strategy is the path; tactics are the specific tools you use along that path.

📋 Complete example

Element	Description
Objective	Increase sales through eCommerce platform by 10% within six months
Tactics	(1) Search advertising PPC campaign using specific keywords, with budget and time frame; (2) Social media campaign using Facebook brand page with marketing material
KPIs per tactic	Search: clickthrough rate (CTR), bounce rate; Social media: CTR, share ratio/amplification rate
Targets per tactic	Search: CTR of XX%, bounce rate of XX%; Social media: CTR of XX%, share ratio of XX%

🏁 RACE framework and conversion marketing

🔄 Conversion marketing

Conversion marketing is a strategic approach that explicitly aims at increasing customers.

• The RACE framework is part of a greater set of strategic approaches.
• Other examples mentioned: HubSpot's "attract-convert-close-delight" strategy (which became their "flywheel business model") and the "pirate metrics" AARRR model (acquisition-activation-retention-referral-revenue).
• These frameworks propose stages with different names, but the central idea is the same.

🚶 Four stages to convert

The central idea is to move people through four stages:

1. Visitor: people come to your website
2. Lead: visitors are converted into a qualified potential customer (somebody who is interested in your product and is also somebody you are interested in selling to)
3. Customer
4. Repeat customer

🎯 Goals at each stage

• Visitors: Create campaigns to attract people to your website.
• Leads: Once they are on your website, you want to (1) find ways to see if they are interested in your product and (2) determine if they are qualified potential customers.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Strategy represents the path a company takes to achieve objectives, while tactics are the specific tools deployed to implement that strategy and meet those objectives.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Strategy vs tactics: strategy is the overall path to achieve objectives; tactics are the specific tools (campaigns, ads, content) used to execute that strategy.
• How they work together: a company first sets objectives, then chooses a strategy, then deploys tactics to implement it.
• Measuring success: each tactic should have associated KPIs (key performance indicators) and specific targets to track performance.
• Common confusion: don't confuse objectives (what the company wants to achieve) with goals (what users should do) or with tactics (the tools used).
• Context: strategy and tactics are part of planning frameworks like RACE that guide marketing activities through stages.

🎯 Core definitions

🎯 What strategy means

Strategy: the path you intend to take to achieve a specific objective.

• The excerpt quotes Jain (1993): strategy is "the pattern of major objectives, purposes and goals, and essential policies and plans for achieving those goals, stated in such a way as to define what business the company is in or is to be in."
• Strategy is about the overall approach, not individual actions.
• It connects objectives to the methods used to reach them.

🛠️ What tactics are

Tactics: tools used to meet objectives.

• Tactics are the concrete, specific actions a company takes.
• Examples from the excerpt:
  • Banner advertising campaigns
  • Search ad campaigns
  • Content marketing on social media
  • Pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns
• Tactics are how you implement a strategy.

🔍 Don't confuse with objectives and goals

• Objectives: what the company wants to achieve (e.g., increase sales by 10%).
• Goals: actions you want users to take (e.g., subscribe to email, use a feature).
• Strategy: the path to achieve objectives.
• Tactics: the specific tools to execute the strategy.

📊 How they work together

📊 The planning hierarchy

The excerpt shows how these concepts connect:

1. Start with an objective (what you want to achieve)
2. Choose a strategy (the path to get there)
3. Deploy tactics (specific tools)
4. Measure with KPIs (metrics for each tactic)
5. Set targets (specific values to achieve)

💡 Complete example from the excerpt

Objective:

• Increase sales through eCommerce platform by 10% within six months

Tactics deployed:

• Search advertising PPC campaign (with specific keywords, budget, time frame)
• Social media campaign using Facebook brand page (with marketing material)

KPIs per tactic:

Tactic	KPIs
Search advertising	Clickthrough rate (CTR), bounce rate
Social media campaign	Clickthrough rate, share ratio/amplification rate

Targets per tactic:

• Search advertising: CTR of XX%, bounce rate of XX%
• Social media campaign: CTR of XX%, share ratio of XX%

🔗 Why this structure matters

• Each tactic gets its own measurable KPIs, making it clear what success looks like.
• Targets provide specific values to aim for within a time period.
• This structure allows a company to plan campaigns systematically and evaluate which tactics are working.

🔄 Connection to broader frameworks

🔄 Strategy and tactics in context

The excerpt positions strategy and tactics as key terms needed to understand the RACE framework (Reach, Act, Convert, Engage).

• RACE is a conversion-based framework aimed at increasing customers.
• It moves people through stages: visitor → lead → customer → repeat customer.
• At each stage, different tactics support the overall strategy.

🔄 Related strategic approaches mentioned

The excerpt references other conversion marketing frameworks with similar logic:

• HubSpot's "attract-convert-close-delight" (later became their "flywheel business model")
• AARRR "pirate metrics" model: acquisition-activation-retention-referral-revenue

All share the central idea: move people through stages using coordinated tactics to achieve conversion objectives.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

The RACE framework guides companies through four conversion-focused stages—Reach, Act, Convert, and Engage—to systematically move people from visitors to repeat customers by aligning marketing tactics with each stage's specific objectives.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What RACE is: a conversion-based framework with four stages (Reach, Act, Convert, Engage) that structure marketing activities to increase customers.
• Core conversion path: visitor → lead → customer → repeat customer, with distinct goals at each stage.
• How RACE relates to other models: part of a broader family of conversion marketing approaches (e.g., HubSpot's flywheel, AARRR pirate metrics) that share the same central idea but use different stage names.
• Common confusion: the framework is not just about attracting traffic; each stage has specific objectives—early stages focus on problems and awareness, later stages focus on why your brand is best and building advocacy.
• Integration with strategy: personas and customer journeys provide the raw material (keywords, content topics) that inform tactics deployed at each RACE stage.

🎯 Strategy implementation vocabulary

🛠️ Tactics

Tactics: tools used to meet objectives.

• Examples from the excerpt: banner advertising campaigns, search ad campaigns, content marketing on social media.
• Tactics are the concrete actions a company deploys to implement strategy and achieve specific objectives.

📊 KPIs and targets

• KPIs (Key Performance Indicators): metrics that measure tactic performance.
• Targets: specific numerical goals set for each KPI.
• Example from the excerpt:
  • Objective: increase eCommerce sales by 10% in six months
  • Tactic: search advertising PPC campaign
  • KPI: clickthrough rate (CTR), bounce rate
  • Target: CTR of XX%, bounce rate of XX%

🔄 The four conversion stages

👥 Visitor stage

• People come to your website.
• Goal: create campaigns to attract people.

🎯 Lead stage

Lead: a qualified potential customer—somebody interested in your product who is also someone you are interested in selling to.

• Three sub-goals once visitors arrive:
  1. Find ways to see if they are interested in you
  2. Find out if you are interested in them (can they actually buy your product?)
  3. If mutual interest exists, find a way to continue the conversation (usually collect email or social media follow)
• Not all visitors can become customers, so qualification matters.

💰 Customer stage

• Once mutual interest is identified, accompany people on their journey.
• Goal: convert leads into actual customers.

🔁 Repeat customer stage

• Capitalize on their (hopefully) positive experience.
• Goals: encourage co-creation (e.g., write reviews) and continue their customer journey.

🅰️ R: REACH stage

🎯 Two objectives at Reach

1. Build awareness about your brand, products, and services through offline and online media activities
2. Drive traffic using inbound and outbound marketing activities and paid, earned, and owned media touchpoints

🗣️ Content focus

• Concentrate on addressing people's problems.
• This is the earliest stage—awareness and attraction, not yet selling.

🅱️ A: interACT stage

🎯 Two objectives at Act

1. Generate positive interactions on your owned media
2. Create leads—identify potential customers and make sure they can be your customer (qualifying leads)

🗣️ Content focus

• Address consumers' problems.
• Help them evaluate their options.
• Example: at this stage, you're still problem-focused but beginning to position solutions.

🅲 C: CONVERT stage

🎯 One objective at Convert

• Converting leads into sales.

🗣️ Content focus

• Talk about why your brand, product, or service is the best option for consumers.
• Optimize owned media to maximize conversions (conversion rate optimization).
• Don't confuse: this is where you finally emphasize your specific solution, not just general problem-solving.

🅳 E: ENGAGE stage

🎯 Two objectives at Engage

1. Build customer advocacy
2. Foster repeat visits and sales

🗣️ Content focus

• Build long-term engagement by continuously contributing to consumers' lives by creating value.
• Identify engaged customers to foster their participation.
• Engage them in co-creation activities to participate in campaigns and support marketing efforts.
• Example: encouraging reviews, user-generated content, referrals.

🔗 Connecting personas, journeys, and RACE

🗺️ How personas and journeys feed RACE

Element	What it provides	How it's used
Persona	General keywords based on needs, motivations, challenges	Identifies what content to create
Journey	Specific keywords based on how users answer needs throughout their path	Tells you what content should be about (problem, solutions, your product) and how it addresses different stages
RACE stages	Framework for deploying tactics	Structures when and how to use content/ads

🔍 Example: search ads and blog posts

• Identify keywords consumers use to perform searches online.
• Create content or ads based on these keywords.
• Show up on search engines when consumers do these searches.
• The journey tells you what stage the consumer is in, which informs which RACE stage tactics to deploy.

🧩 Integration methods mentioned

• Consider who they are/what they need (persona)
• How they go about solving needs (journey)
• What they search to do so (journey, ZMOT, types)
• Benchmark against competition

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

The RACE framework (Reach, Act, Convert, Engage) translates consumer personas and journey maps into concrete marketing tactics by matching content and keywords to each stage of the customer decision process.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• RACE stages: Reach (awareness + traffic), Act (interaction + lead generation), Convert (sales), Engage (advocacy + repeat purchases).
• Journey-to-strategy connection: personas identify general keywords from needs/motivations; journeys identify specific keywords from how consumers solve problems at each stage.
• Content alignment: what you create depends on journey stage—early stages address problems and solutions; later stages position your product as the best option.
• Common confusion: don't confuse journey stages with tactics—awareness requires educational content about problems, while purchase requires transactional content about your specific product.
• Conversion path: a journey map transforms abstract purchase stages into concrete actions and touchpoints that guide marketing decisions.

🎯 Customer lifecycle objectives

👥 Visitors

• Two goals: (1) attract people to your site, (2) determine if they can be customers (not all visitors are potential buyers).
• If mutual interest exists: (3) continue the conversation by collecting email or gaining social media followers.

🔍 Leads

Leads: people with whom you've identified mutual interest.

• Accompany them on their journey to convert them from lead to customer.
• The Act stage emphasizes "qualifying" leads—ensuring they can actually become your customer.

🔁 Repeat customers

• Capitalize on positive experiences to encourage co-creation (e.g., writing reviews).
• Goal: continue their journey as ongoing customers.

🏁 The RACE framework stages

🏁 R = REACH

Two objectives:

• Build awareness about brand, products, and services through offline and online media.
• Drive traffic using inbound/outbound marketing and paid/earned/owned media touchpoints.

Focus: Address people's problems at this stage.

🏁 A = interACT

Two objectives:

• Generate positive interactions on owned media.
• Create and qualify leads (identify potential customers who can actually buy).

Focus: Address consumers' problems AND help them evaluate their options.

🏁 C = CONVERT

One objective: Convert leads into sales.

Focus: Explain why your brand/product/service is the best option; optimize owned media to maximize conversions (conversion rate optimization).

🏁 E = ENGAGE

Two objectives:

• Build customer advocacy.
• Foster repeat visits and sales.

Focus: Build long-term engagement by continuously creating value; identify engaged customers for co-creation activities and campaign participation.

🗺️ Applying personas and journeys to strategy

🔑 Keywords from personas and journeys

Personas provide: General keywords based on customers' needs, motivations, and challenges.

Journeys provide: Specific keywords based on how users solve problems throughout their decision process.

Example: A consumer with lower back pain might search "how to reduce back pain" (awareness stage) or "shoes vs. posture vs. exercise back pain" (evaluation stage).

📝 Content creation process

The excerpt outlines how to create content and search ads:

1. Identify keywords consumers use to perform searches online.
2. Consider: who they are/what they need (persona).
3. Consider: how they solve their needs (journey).
4. Consider: what they search to do so (journey stages, search types).
5. Benchmark against competition.
6. Create content or ads based on these keywords to appear in search results.

📊 Journey stages to concrete tactics

📊 Stage-by-stage breakdown

Journey Stage	Consumer Action	Search Type	Opportunity	Tactic Example
Awareness	Searches for general problem information	Informational: "How to reduce back pain"	Educate about the problem	Blog post with keywords; PPC campaign
Active Evaluation	Compares alternatives	Informational: "shoes vs. posture vs. exercise back pain"	Educate about solutions	Blog posts comparing your product vs. competitors
Purchase	Searches brand/product name	Transactional: "Brand XYZ best price sale"	Position as best option	Search ad offering 10% rebate for first-time clients
Post-Purchase	Writes product review	N/A	Leverage engaged consumers	Offer rebate for future purchase when writing review

🗺️ Journey map definition

Journey map: a visual representation of the consumer journey.

Purpose: Transform abstract purchase stages (awareness, consideration, purchase, loyalty) into concrete actions and touchpoints that a brand can use for marketing decisions.

Don't confuse: A journey map is not just a list of stages—it specifies concrete consumer actions at each stage that create marketing opportunities.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

A conversion path transforms the abstract consumer journey into a concrete marketing strategy by planning specific steps that guide consumers toward desired goals through multiple touchpoints.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Journey map vs conversion path: a journey map visualizes how consumers move through stages; a conversion path describes the tactical steps a brand wants consumers to take to achieve specific goals.
• What a conversion is: when a consumer achieves a goal the company wanted them to achieve (visiting a page, clicking a link, providing an email, making a purchase, etc.).
• The shortest path structure: typically flows from ad → content → landing page.
• Multiple touchpoints needed: it takes between 5 and 13 interactions with a brand to generate a qualified, sales-ready lead.
• Common confusion: don't just create content and ads hoping consumers visit—always plan "what comes next" and where you're leading them.

🗺️ Understanding the two frameworks

🗺️ Journey map definition

A journey map is a visual representation of the consumer journey.

• It transforms abstract purchase stages (awareness, consideration, purchase, loyalty) into something concrete.
• Shows specific actions and touchpoints that a brand can use to create marketing strategy.
• Example: the excerpt shows a table mapping stages from awareness (searching "how to reduce back pain") through post-purchase (writing product reviews).

🎯 Conversion path definition

A conversion path is a description of the steps that a company wants consumers to take so that they achieve a desired goal.

• It's how a brand enacts strategy by tying together multiple tactical activities (e.g., search ads and content marketing).
• The key difference: journey map = what consumers do; conversion path = what the brand plans for consumers to do.

🎁 What counts as a conversion

A conversion occurs when a consumer achieves a goal you wanted them to achieve.

Goals can vary widely:

• Visiting a page
• Clicking on a link
• Sending an email address
• Buying a product
• Spending a specific amount of time on a page
• Viewing a certain number of pages during a session
• Using a key feature

🛤️ Building effective conversion paths

🛤️ The basic structure

The shortest conversion path presented in digital marketing:

1. Ad → 2. Content → 3. Landing page

This is the minimum framework; actual paths are often longer and more complex.

🔗 Planning the "what comes next" question

The excerpt emphasizes that best-strategized campaigns always answer:

• What comes next after someone sees your ad?
• What are you expecting people to do?
• Where are you leading them?
• What should they be doing once they get to this page?
• Why?

Don't confuse: Creating content/ads without planning next steps = "flying in the dark" with no clear strategy for making sales.

📊 The touchpoint requirement

Concept	What it means	Implication
Qualified lead	A lead the company believes can become a customer	Not every visitor is worth pursuing
Sales-ready	A lead at the purchase stage	Ready to convert now
Touchpoint range	5 to 13 interactions needed	Single exposure rarely converts

• Without planning these 5-13 touchpoints in advance, creating sales becomes very difficult.
• A digital marketer must understand how to bring people through smaller goals (visiting a blog, spending 3 minutes reading, giving an email, opening the first email, etc.).
• These smaller goals lead to milestones toward making a purchase.

🔄 From journey stages to tactical opportunities

🔄 Mapping actions to tactics

The excerpt provides a detailed example using back pain and sneakers:

Awareness stage:

• Consumer action: searches "how to reduce back pain"
• Opportunity: create content to inform and educate about back pain
• Tactic: create blog post with keywords "how to," "reduce," "back pain" + PPC campaign

Active evaluation stage:

• Consumer action: searches "shoes vs. posture vs. exercise back pain"
• Opportunity: inform about back pain solutions and position your product
• Tactic: create blog posts comparing your product vs. competitors + PPC campaign

Purchase stage:

• Consumer action: searches "Brand XYZ best price sale"
• Opportunity: position product as best option
• Tactic: search ad campaign offering 10% rebate for first-time clients

Post-purchase stage:

• Consumer action: writes product review
• Opportunity: leverage engaged consumers to create reviews
• Tactic: give rebate for future purchase when writing a review

🎯 Connecting persona and journey to keywords

The excerpt explains how different frameworks feed into keyword strategy:

• Persona helps identify general keywords based on customers' needs, motivations, challenges.
• Journey helps identify specific keywords based on how users answer needs throughout that journey.
• Both inform what content to create and what search ads to run.

Example: If a consumer has lower back pain, they might search for solutions → opportunity to create awareness around a back pain-related product (e.g., sneakers).

📐 Designing your conversion path

📐 Path composition requirements

The excerpt mentions a term project requiring:

• Three inbound marketing activities
• Three outbound marketing activities
• Can be part of the same path or different paths
• Must clearly link tactics to making people "walk" along the created path

📐 What to indicate in your path

Each step should show:

• What you are doing (i.e., your tactic)
• What you expect consumers to do (i.e., a goal)

This ensures every touchpoint has a purpose and moves consumers toward the ultimate conversion goal.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

The RACE framework provides a structured approach to analyze competitors' digital marketing strategies by examining how they reach visitors, create interactions, convert leads, and engage customers across their entire digital presence.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• RACE as a strategic lens: the framework breaks competitive analysis into four stages—Reach, Act, Convert, and Engage—each with specific questions to answer.
• Actionable intelligence: because digital marketing efforts are archived and accessible online, competitors' strategies can be analyzed more thoroughly than ever before.
• Become the customer: the best competitive analysis involves going through the entire customer journey yourself—subscribing, purchasing, abandoning carts, and observing post-purchase engagement.
• Common confusion: RACE differs from frameworks like SWOT—SWOT evaluates resources and capabilities, while RACE examines the operational execution of digital marketing tactics step-by-step.

🎯 The four stages of RACE analysis

🎯 Reach: attracting visitors

Questions to investigate about competitors:

• How frequently do they run promotions, and what benefits do these provide?
• Are they running online contests, and what types?
• How do they use social media channels to drive traffic to their website?
• What information appears in their marketing banners and callouts?

Purpose: understand the tactics competitors use to bring people to their web properties.

🎯 Act: creating positive interactions

Questions to investigate:

• How do they transform visitors into leads?
• Where are calls to action placed throughout the browsing experience, and what do they ask for?
• Do they maintain a blog? How frequently do they post, and what topics do they cover?
• What role does content play on their website, and how does it differ from yours?

Purpose: analyze the user experience and lead-generation tactics on competitors' properties.

🎯 Convert: turning leads into customers

Questions to investigate:

• How do they display products and communicate details?
• How detailed are product descriptions? What information is included or missing?
• What happens in newsletters? Is there a clear planned path to maximize sales?
• Do they have abandoned-cart recovery features? When are emails sent, and what messages do they contain?
• Are they retargeting visitors, and based on what variables?

Purpose: understand the persuasion tactics and conversion mechanisms competitors employ.

Example: To analyze this stage properly, you should register for competitors' newsletters and abandon a cart to see what follow-up occurs.

🎯 Engage: fostering repeat purchases

Questions to investigate:

• What happens after you purchase a product?
• Do they offer clubs, membership programs, or online forums?
• Do they request reviews or run consumer-generated content campaigns?
• Do they have customer appreciation campaigns?
• Does their content address existing customers or only new ones?

Purpose: understand post-purchase strategies and how competitors build long-term customer relationships.

Example: Become an actual customer of your competitors to observe the complete post-purchase experience.

🔍 How RACE differs from other frameworks

🔍 RACE vs SWOT

Framework	What it evaluates	Focus
SWOT	Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats related to digital marketing resources	Strategic capabilities and positioning
RACE	Operational execution across the customer journey	Tactical implementation and customer experience

• SWOT assesses what competitors have (resources, capabilities).
• RACE examines what competitors do (specific tactics, customer touchpoints, conversion paths).
• Don't confuse: RACE is about understanding the "how" of competitors' operations, not just their strategic position.

🛠️ Practical implementation tactics

🛠️ Becoming a customer-analyst

To gather targeted information, the excerpt recommends:

• Subscribe to competitors' newsletters and blogs
• Follow them on social media
• Purchase a product (observe packaging, buying experience, shipping time)
• Abandon a cart during checkout
• Check their reviews
• Hunt for their ads
• Follow their publicity
• Understand their backlinks

🛠️ Why digital makes this possible

Because everything is archived online, and because you can readily have access to marketing efforts such as ads and content, understanding your competitors' strategic efforts has perhaps never been more accessible.

• Digital marketing creates a permanent, observable record of tactics.
• You can experience the entire customer journey as competitors design it.
• This level of operational visibility was not available in pre-digital marketing environments.

💡 Strategic value

💡 From questions to insights

The RACE framework transforms general competitive curiosity into specific, answerable questions:

• Instead of "What is my competitor doing?" ask "How does my competitor bring visitors to their site?" (Reach)
• Instead of "Are they successful?" ask "How do they transform visitors into leads?" (Act)
• This structured approach ensures comprehensive analysis across all stages of the customer journey.

💡 Informing your own strategy

Understanding how competitors operate at each RACE stage helps craft your own strategy:

• Identify gaps in competitors' approaches
• Discover effective tactics worth adapting
• Understand the competitive landscape consumers experience
• Plan differentiated conversion paths based on what competitors are (or aren't) doing

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Influencer marketing typically pays per post based on follower count, while affiliate marketing pays for actual conversions or actions, making affiliates focus on sales rather than awareness.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Influencer payment: mainly pay-per-post, with rates varying by follower count (from $83 for <1,000 followers to $763+ for >100,000 followers in 2017).
• Affiliate payment: commission-based (pay per sale or pay per action), so affiliates aim to convert visitors into buyers.
• Key difference: influencers are paid for content creation regardless of sales; affiliates are paid only when they drive specific actions (sales, leads, or visits).
• Common confusion: affiliate programs can participate in different stages—most focus on Convert (sales), but some pay per lead (Act stage) or per visit (Reach stage).
• How to identify: affiliate links include tracking codes (publisher ID, ad ID, shopper ID) to attribute sales and reward affiliates accordingly.

💰 Influencer payment structures

💵 Pay per post

Pay per post: the main payment structure for influencers, where compensation varies by domain and follower count.

• 2017 average: $217 per post (according to influence.co).
• By follower count:
  • <1,000 followers: $83 per post

  • 100,000 followers: $763 per post

• Agency-mediated posts: higher rates—$2,000 to $10,000 per post for influencers with >100,000 followers (via The Influence Agency).

📝 Blog collaboration pricing

Priced by monthly impressions rather than follower count:

Monthly impressions	Price per post
10,000	$175
100,000–500,000	$500
500,000+	$1,000–$5,000

🔄 Other influencer payment models

• Pay per lead: payment when a potential customer is generated.
• Pay per engagement: payment when a user performs an action (click, comment, share).
• Pay per view: payment based on content views.

🤝 Affiliate marketing fundamentals

🔗 What affiliate marketing is

Affiliate program: an agreement in which a business pays another business or influencer (the affiliate) a commission for sending sales their way.

• How it works:

  1. An advertiser (company selling products/services) offers to pay a third party (blogger, coupon site, etc.).
  2. The affiliate promotes products through online activities.
  3. When a user clicks the affiliate link and completes an action (purchase, sign-up, etc.), the affiliate earns a commission.

• Example: A blog post lists 10 books with affiliate links; a reader clicks a link and buys the book → the blogger receives a percentage of the sale.

🎯 Affiliate vs influencer marketing

Aspect	Influencer marketing	Affiliate marketing
Payment trigger	Content creation (post published)	Action completed (sale, lead, visit)
Primary focus	Awareness and engagement	Conversion (sales)
Stage emphasis	Reach stage	Overwhelmingly Convert stage

Don't confuse: Some affiliate programs pay per lead (Act stage) or per visit (Reach stage), not just per sale.

🔍 Identifying affiliate links

• Affiliate links include tracking parameters to attribute sales.
• Example link structure: https://rstyle.me/+U7XZh4aYDVf0s7elU5SykA
  • Associated with Reward Style program
  • Contains publisher ID (PID), ad ID (AID), and shopper ID (SID)
• These codes allow tracking across publishers, ads, shoppers, and reward distribution.

💳 Affiliate payment structures

💵 PPS (Pay Per Sale)

Revenue sharing model: the advertiser pays the publisher a percentage of the sale created by a customer referred by the publisher.

• Payment only occurs when a referred customer completes a purchase.
• The affiliate earns a commission (percentage) of the transaction value.

📋 CPA (Cost Per Acquisition / Cost Per Action / Cost Per Lead)

The advertiser pays only when an advert delivers an acquisition after the user clicks on the advert.

• What counts as acquisition: varies by site and campaign.
• Examples of qualifying actions:
  • User fills in a form
  • User downloads a file
  • User buys a product
• Payment is action-dependent, not impression- or click-dependent alone.

🏋️ Exercise context

🎯 Campaign scenario

The excerpt provides a fitness center campaign scenario targeting a persona named Avery:

• Avery's profile:

  • Lives in a major Canadian city center
  • Late twenties to early thirties
  • Top 20% income bracket in their city
  • Has a newborn and increased work responsibilities
  • Stopped exercising for a few years
  • Feels sluggish, lacks energy, misses body connection
  • Self-conscious about body transformation with age

• Campaign goal: target people who want to get back into shape.

• The exercise asks you to apply the payment structure concepts to this fitness center campaign.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Affiliate marketing enables publishers to earn commissions by directing customers to advertisers through trackable links, with payment structures tied to sales or specific user actions.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• How affiliate marketing works: a publisher (affiliate) shares a link; when a reader clicks and purchases, the publisher receives a percentage of the sale.
• Link tracking: affiliate links contain IDs (publisher ID, ad ID, shopper ID) that allow tracking across publishers, ads, and shoppers.
• Two main payment models: PPS (pay per sale) pays a percentage of revenue; CPA (cost per acquisition) pays only when a specific action occurs.
• Common confusion: CPA is not just about purchases—it can mean filling a form, downloading a file, or other defined actions depending on the campaign.
• Campaign planning: creating effective campaigns requires aligning ad content, landing pages, and platform choices with the target audience and campaign stage.

💰 Affiliate Marketing Mechanics

🔗 How the system works

• A publisher (affiliate) promotes a product or service through a special link.
• When a reader clicks the link and makes a purchase, the publisher earns a commission.
• Example: A blogger writes about a book, includes an affiliate link; a reader clicks, buys the book → the blogger receives a small percentage of that sale.

🔍 Identifying affiliate links

• Affiliate links are typically recognizable by their structure.
• They include tracking parameters that identify the source and transaction.
• Example: A link like https://rstyle.me/+U7XZh4aYDVf0s7elU5SykA shows association with the Reward Style program.

🏷️ Tracking components

Affiliate links contain several ID types:

ID Type	What it tracks
Publisher ID (PID)	Which affiliate/publisher generated the link
Ad ID (AID)	Which specific advertisement was used
Shopper/Visitor ID (SID)	Which individual user clicked and converted

• These IDs enable tracking of sales across publishers, ads, shoppers, and reward affiliates.

💳 Payment Structures

💵 PPS (Pay Per Sale)

PPS (pay per sale): The advertiser pays the publisher a percentage of the sale that was created by a customer referred by the publisher (revenue sharing model).

• Payment is tied directly to completed sales.
• The publisher earns a percentage of the transaction value.
• This is a revenue-sharing approach.

🎯 CPA (Cost Per Acquisition)

CPA (cost per acquisition/cost per action/cost per lead): The advertiser pays only when an advert delivers an acquisition after the user clicks on the advert.

• Payment occurs only when a specific action is completed.
• Don't confuse: "acquisition" is not limited to purchases—it varies by site and campaign.
• Possible actions include:
  • Filling in a form
  • Downloading a file
  • Buying a product
• The definition of what counts as an "acquisition" depends on the specific campaign goals.

🎯 Campaign Planning Framework

👤 Persona development

The excerpt provides an example persona (Avery) to illustrate campaign planning:

• Demographics and context matter (location, income level, life stage).
• Pain points and motivations guide content creation (e.g., feeling sluggish, lacking time, wanting to reconnect with their body).
• Knowledge gaps inform messaging (e.g., not knowing where or how to work out).

📝 Campaign elements to consider

The exercise section outlines key planning questions:

• Search ads: headline, description, display URL, keyword selection (using longtail keywords).
• Landing pages: should include five main elements aligned with campaign objectives.
• Platform adaptation: the same core message needs adjustment for different platforms (Instagram vs. LinkedIn).
• Payment model selection: choosing between CPC (cost per click) or CPA based on campaign goals.
• Influencer partnerships: identifying appropriate influencers and selecting payment models for collaboration.

🎭 Aligning with the customer journey

• The awareness stage has specific objectives for both consumers and the firm.
• Campaign elements (ads, landing pages) should reflect the stage of the RACE framework.
• Different stages require different approaches and content strategies.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Affiliate marketing enables publishers to earn commissions by directing their audience to purchase products through trackable links, with payment structures based on either sales percentages or specific user actions.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What affiliate marketing is: a publisher earns a percentage when readers click their link and make a purchase, helping connect buyers to sellers.
• How tracking works: affiliate links contain IDs (publisher ID, ad ID, shopper ID) that allow tracking of sales across different parties.
• Two main payment models: PPS (pay per sale) pays a percentage of the sale; CPA (cost per acquisition) pays only when a specific action occurs.
• Common confusion: CPA is not just about purchases—it can mean filling a form, downloading a file, or other defined actions depending on the campaign.
• Practical application: the excerpt includes exercises on creating search ads, landing pages, and influencer campaigns for a fitness center targeting a specific persona.

💰 How Affiliate Marketing Works

🔗 The basic mechanism

• A publisher (like a blogger) includes a special link to a product in their content.
• When a reader clicks the link and purchases, the publisher receives a small percentage of the sale.
• This creates a three-way relationship: the seller, the publisher (affiliate), and the buyer.

Example: A blogger writes about books, includes an affiliate link, and earns a commission when readers buy through that link.

🔍 Identifying affiliate links

• Affiliate links have a distinctive structure that differs from regular product links.
• The excerpt shows an example link format: https://rstyle.me/+U7XZh4aYDVf0s7elU5SykA
• This visible structure indicates association with a specific affiliate program (in the example, Reward Style).

🏷️ Tracking components

Affiliate programs create links with multiple ID types:

ID Type	What It Tracks	Purpose
Publisher ID (PID)	Which affiliate site	Identifies who referred the customer
Ad ID (AID)	Which specific advertisement	Tracks which content drove the sale
Shopper ID (SID)	Which visitor/customer	Follows individual user behavior

• These IDs allow the system to track sales across publishers, ads, shoppers, and reward affiliates accordingly.

💳 Payment Structures

💵 PPS (Pay Per Sale)

The advertiser pays the publisher a percentage of the sale that was created by a customer referred by the publisher (revenue sharing model).

• Payment is tied directly to completed purchases.
• The affiliate earns a share of the actual revenue generated.
• This is a revenue-sharing approach where both parties benefit from higher-value sales.

🎯 CPA (Cost Per Acquisition/Cost Per Action/Cost Per Lead)

The advertiser pays only when an advert delivers an acquisition after the user clicks on the advert.

• Payment occurs when a specific action is completed, not just when a sale happens.
• Key distinction: "acquisition" definitions vary by site and campaign.
• Possible actions include:
  • Filling in a form
  • Downloading a file
  • Buying a product

Don't confuse: CPA is broader than just purchases—it can reward any predefined valuable action, while PPS specifically rewards completed sales.

🏋️ Practical Application Exercise

👤 Target persona example

The excerpt provides a detailed persona named Avery:

• Demographics: late twenties to early thirties, major Canadian city, top 20% income
• Situation: increased work responsibilities, newborn child, stopped exercising
• Pain points: feels sluggish, lacks energy, self-conscious about body changes
• Goals: return to weekly exercise
• Barriers: limited time, limited knowledge about working out or the market

📝 Exercise components

The excerpt outlines a multi-part exercise for a fitness center campaign:

1. Search ad creation: headline, description, display URL with longtail keywords for the awareness stage
2. Landing page design: sketch using five main elements (referenced but not detailed in this excerpt)
3. Social media adaptation: transform the ad for Instagram and LinkedIn
4. Payment model selection: choose between CPC or CPA with justification
5. Influencer identification: find Instagram influencers, explain selection criteria, and choose a payment model

🤔 Guiding questions

The exercise prompts consideration of:

• Consumer objectives at the awareness stage and how they influence ad design
• How awareness aligns with the RACE framework stage
• Firm objectives at this stage and their influence on landing page design

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Landing pages maximize conversion by focusing visitors on one specific goal through a dedicated, campaign-specific page with only one possible action, rather than sending them to a multi-purpose website.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What a landing page is: a campaign-specific page, distinct from your main website, with one goal and one link (call to action).
• Two types: clickthrough landing pages (warm up visitors before sending them to a specific website section) vs. lead generation landing pages (collect personal information via forms).
• Why they work better than websites: websites offer hundreds of links and actions, making it easy for visitors to get lost; landing pages eliminate distractions by offering only one action.
• Common confusion: attention ratio—websites have high attention ratios (many possible actions vs. one goal), while landing pages should have a 1:1 ratio (one action, one goal).
• Five core elements: unique selling proposition (USP), hero shot, benefit statement, social proofing, and one link/call to action.

🎯 What landing pages are and why they exist

🎯 Definition and structure

Landing page: a campaign-specific page distinct from your main website that has one goal and one link (ideally, a call to action).

Four defining characteristics:

• Campaign specific: associated with a specific campaign (ideally, create separate landing pages for specific ads to optimize conversion).
• Distinct from main website: not accessible from any page of your main website, but still hosted on your domain (e.g., www.yourdomain.com/landing-page-campaign-A).
• One goal: visitors should be able to achieve one thing and one thing only.
• One link: only one clickable link on the page.

🚫 The problem with sending ad traffic to websites

• Ad campaigns typically aim to make consumers achieve specific goals: try software for free, register for an account, send an email, download content.
• Sending visitors to a website is counterproductive because websites are not meant to convert (i.e., make consumers achieve a specific goal).
• Websites present hundreds of potential actions (all the links available), only one of which is the desired action.
• Result: consumers get lost easily.

Example: An ad wants visitors to "try Shopify for free." Sending them to the Shopify homepage exposes them to links like "Start," "Sell," "Market," "Manage," "Pricing," "Learn," "About," "Terms and Conditions," plus scrolling options—far more than just signing up for a free trial.

🎯 How landing pages facilitate conversion

Landing pages are focused on helping consumers achieve only one goal by:

• Tailoring the page to the exact goal users should accomplish.
• Offering a clearer message (vs. the generic messaging of a website).
• Minimizing potential actions consumers can perform.
• Matching visuals of the ad with the landing page.

The excerpt notes that over time, digital marketers learned that limiting possibilities to just one action is one of the easiest ways to ensure visitors do what you want.

📋 Two types of landing pages

Type	Goal	Characteristics	Typical use
Clickthrough landing page	Have visitors visit a specific section of your website	Generally a sales pitch to warm visitors up to what is to come	Preparing visitors before sending them deeper into the site
Lead generation landing page	Generate leads by collecting personal information (e.g., email address)	Typically a form-based page; email often exchanged for content or service	Offering white papers, webinars, free consultations, discounts, contests, free trials, or early product access

🔗 Clickthrough landing pages

• Purpose: redirect visitors to a specific section of your website.
• Function: warm up visitors with a sales pitch before they proceed.
• Example: The excerpt references Fit for Life and Spotify examples (figures 5.1 and 5.2).

📧 Lead generation landing pages

• Purpose: collect personal information (e.g., email addresses).
• Function: form-based page where visitors exchange their information for something valuable.
• What's offered in exchange: white paper, webinar, free consultation, discount, contest, free trial, or opportunity to order a product before others.
• Example: The excerpt references Fit for Life and Uber examples (figures 5.3 and 5.4).

📊 Attention ratio and conversion rate

📊 Attention ratio concept

Attention ratio: a metric that measures the relationship between the number of possible actions on a page and the number of goals for consumers.

• High attention ratio (bad): many possible actions vs. what you want consumers to do—typical of websites.
• Ideal attention ratio (good): 1:1, meaning one possible action to one goal—the standard for landing pages.

Don't confuse: attention ratio is not about how many visitors you have; it's about how many competing actions distract from your one goal.

📈 Conversion rate relationship

Conversion rate: the number of visitors who achieve the goal you want them to achieve.

• The excerpt references a chart (Figure 5.7) showing conversion rate vs. number of links on a page.
• Key insight: as the number of links increases, conversion rate decreases.
• Landing pages maximize conversion rate by focusing visitors' attention on the task at hand.

Example: The Shopify ad's goal is to get visitors to try Shopify for free. The dedicated landing page allows only one action—starting a free trial—rather than the homepage's dozens of links. This focus maximizes the conversion rate.

🏗️ Five basic elements of a landing page

The excerpt describes five core components that every landing page should include:

🏗️ Unique Selling Proposition (USP)

Unique selling proposition (USP): a "unique" benefit offered by the product or service.

• The excerpt notes that "unique" is in quotation marks because companies usually present a benefit without it being truly unique.
• How it's communicated: typically through a headline and subheadline that explain the value and purpose of the product or service.
• Reinforcement: sometimes reinforced in a mid-page statement and a closing argument at the bottom of the page.

🖼️ Hero shot

• A visual associated with the product or service.
• Provides a visual anchor for the page.

✅ Benefit statement

• Explains how the product or brand helps consumers.
• Typically presented using bullet points or small paragraphs.

🏆 Social proofing

• Builds credibility and trust.
• Forms include: testimonials, awards, client list, or media logos.

🔗 One link (call to action)

• The single clickable element that drives the one goal.
• Typically presented as a call to action button or form.

Example: The excerpt references a Shopify landing page (Figure 5.10) that demonstrates all five elements working together.

🌐 Context: The Reach stage

🌐 Where landing pages fit in the RACE framework

Reach: the first stage in the RACE framework; entails the publication and promotion of content in order to draw visitors to your website.

• Two main objectives: build awareness (about your website, brand, products, and/or services) and bring visitors in.
• Methods: both inbound and outbound marketing activities, through paid, owned, and earned media touchpoints.
• The excerpt emphasizes: "Never Start A Marketing Campaign Without a Dedicated Landing Page (NSAMCWADLP)."

🎯 Goals and KPIs at the Reach stage

Goals for people at this stage might include:

• Come to our website from a SERP (search engine results page).
• Stay on our website once there.
• Click on our ads.

Internal objectives:

• Creating high-ranking pages.
• Ads with a good ad score (ad quality score can lead to lower prices and better placements on SERPs).

Examples of KPIs:

• Number of unique visitors.
• Bounce rate.
• Clickthrough for ads.
• Page authority.
• Page rank.
• Ad quality score.

💰 Paid media activities context

The excerpt mentions that the chapter covers outbound marketing activities, including:

• Advertising networks (e.g., Google AdSense) and advertising exchanges (e.g., Google AdX): entry points where advertising space can be purchased.
• Programmatic buying: the automated purchasing of digital advertising space (e.g., Facebook Ads, Google Ads platforms).
• Modern platforms use algorithms and predictive analyses to identify optimal ad placement for specific objectives (reach, awareness, lead generation).

The excerpt notes that differences between networks and exchanges are outside the scope, but both provide ways for advertisers to purchase ad space.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Digital marketers purchase advertising space through automated platforms and networks to reach specific audiences via banner ads, search ads, and social media ads, each requiring strategic keyword selection, creative alignment with platform norms, and careful measurement of cost-effectiveness.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Programmatic buying: automated purchasing of digital ad space through platforms like Google Ads and Facebook Ads, using algorithms to optimize ad placement for specific objectives.
• Search advertising vs SEO: search ads involve bidding on keywords and paying per click (PPC), whereas SEO focuses on organic rankings.
• Keyword strategy trade-off: high-volume keywords bring more traffic but cost more and may attract lower-quality visitors; combining high- and low-volume keywords balances reach with conversion potential.
• Common confusion: match types—broad match shows ads for any variation of keywords, while exact match requires the precise phrase; negative match prevents ads from showing for irrelevant searches.
• Platform-specific norms: successful social media advertising requires understanding each platform's social customs, visual trends, and technological capabilities rather than using generic ads across all channels.

🛒 How digital ad space is purchased

🌐 Advertising networks and exchanges

• Advertising networks (e.g., Google AdSense) aggregate ad space across multiple websites and sell this inventory to advertisers.
• Advertising exchanges (e.g., Google AdX) provide another entry point for purchasing ad space, though the differences are outside the excerpt's scope.
• From an advertiser's perspective, both serve as platforms where advertising space can be bought.

🤖 Programmatic buying

Programmatic buying: the automated purchasing of digital advertising space.

• When marketers use Facebook Ads or Google Ads platforms, they are using programmatic buying.
• These platforms have been transformed by algorithms and predictive analyses that identify optimal ad placement.
• Advertisers can choose specific objectives (reach, awareness, lead generation), which influences where ads appear and who sees them to maximize campaign effectiveness.
• Example: selecting "lead generation" as an objective will cause the platform to show ads to users most likely to provide contact information.

🖼️ Banner advertising types

📐 Standard and interstitial banners

• Standard banners: measured in pixels; can be static, animated, or rich media; similar to newspaper/magazine ads.
• Interstitial banners: shown between pages on a website or between screens on an app.

🪟 Pop-ups and floating ads

• Pop-up ads: open in a new, smaller window, appearing over or under the webpage being viewed.
• Floating adverts: appear in a layer over the content but not in a separate window.

🎨 Wallpaper, map, and native ads

Ad type	Description
Wallpaper adverts	Change the background of the webpage; may be clickable
Map adverts	Placed on online maps (e.g., Google Maps); usually based on keywords
Native content ads	Online version of advertorials; content matches the editorial style of the site but is sponsored by the brand

🔍 Search advertising mechanics

💰 How search ads work

Search advertising: gaining traffic on search engine results pages (SERPs) by bidding on keywords.

• Also called PPC (pay-per-click) advertising because advertisers pay search engines for each click their ad receives.
• Keywords are sold through an auction process.
• Industries with very high customer lifetime value (insurance, mortgage firms) can pay upward of $50 per click.
• Don't confuse with SEO: search advertising involves paying for placement, while SEO focuses on organic rankings.

🧩 Three main elements required

1. Keywords: the terms you want your ad to show for
2. Your ad: headline(s), URL, and description
3. Landing page: where users go when they click your ad

• The ad must be relevant to the search and attractive to the consumer.
• Guidelines for effective search ads are similar to writing effective page titles and meta descriptions.
• The ad should target a clear need or goal (information? comparison? purchase?) and include a clear call to action.

📊 The long-tail distribution challenge

• Most consumers use generic, high-volume keywords, while others use hyper-precise, low-volume keywords.
• High-volume keywords drawbacks: more expensive and less likely to bring quality traffic.
• Quality traffic: visitors who can eventually become customers (important because each visitor has a specific cost).
• Effective strategy: combine high-volume and low-volume keywords to balance volume and quality, ensuring cost-effective campaigns while supporting lead generation.

🎯 Keyword match types

🌊 Broad match

• Shows your ad for any search containing the keyword(s) you're bidding on, in any order.
• Includes variations: misspellings, synonyms, singular/plural forms, stemming, related searches.
• Example: bidding on "kitten" would match "kittens," "kitten photos," or "adopt a kitten."

🔧 Broad match modifiers

• Allow more control by requiring certain keywords to be present.
• Example: requiring both "adopt" AND "kitten" would match "adopt a kitten," "how to adopt a kitten," or "best kitten to adopt."

📝 Phrase match

• Shows your ad only for searches that include the exact phrase (or close variations) with additional words before or after.
• Example: bidding on "how to adopt a kitten" could match "how to adopt a kitten now" or "best ways how to adopt a kitten."

🎯 Exact match

• Only shows your ad for searches using the exact phrase or close variations, with no other words.
• Example: "adopt a kitten" will match "adopt a kitten" and potential misspellings.

🚫 Negative match

• Prevents your ad from showing when certain keywords are included.
• Example: an optometrist selling eyeglasses might add negative keywords for "wine glasses" and "drinking glasses" to avoid irrelevant clicks.

📈 Key search advertising metrics

📊 Performance measurements

Metric	Formula	What it measures
Clickthrough rate (CTR)	clicks / impressions	Percentage of impressions that turn into clicks
Conversion rate	conversions / clicks	Percentage of clicks that turn into conversions
Cost per click (CPC)	spend / clicks	Amount spent on each click
Cost per acquisition (CPA)	spend / conversions	Amount spent on each conversion

📱 Social media advertising strategy

🎭 Understanding platform norms

Social norms: what is considered acceptable behavior on a social platform, including social customs, shared actions, and standard behaviors.

• Understanding these norms is crucial for creating impactful campaigns.
• Successful campaigns capitalize on platform-specific trends and customs.
• Examples mentioned: transformation trends, challenge customs, platform-specific dances, and song capabilities.

🎨 Platform-specific creative approach

• Effective campaigns engage with the norms and customs of each platform.
• They create ads that generate conversation with users rather than solely talking about the product.
• They leverage technological specificities of each platform.
• Example: using songs for one platform, turning comments into controller inputs for another, using upvotes on a third.
• Don't confuse: a generic ad approach across all platforms will be less effective than tailoring content to each platform's unique culture and capabilities.

🔗 Major platform resources

The excerpt notes that instructions for posting ads exist for major platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Snapchat), though detailed platform reviews are outside the scope due to the strategic focus and the rapid emergence of new platforms.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Social media advertising supports all stages of the RACE framework (Reach, Act, Convert, Engage) by leveraging platform-specific norms, targeting capabilities, and diverse ad objectives to achieve goals from awareness generation to customer conversion.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Platform norms matter: Successful campaigns capitalize on the social customs, behaviors, and technological features specific to each platform (e.g., TikTok dances, Twitch interactions, YouTube video sharing).
• RACE alignment: Social media ad objectives map to RACE stages—Awareness (Reach), Consideration (Act), and Conversion (Convert)—with platforms like Facebook organizing objectives accordingly.
• Targeting capabilities: Platforms offer demographic, behavioral, and algorithmic targeting (e.g., lookalike audiences) to reach specific customer groups.
• Common confusion: Brand awareness vs. reach—brand awareness targets users more likely to recall ads (optimizing for recall), while reach maximizes unique viewers within budget (capping frequency).
• Influencer vs. affiliate marketing: Influencers historically focus on awareness generation (Reach stage), while affiliates overwhelmingly focus on sales conversion (Convert stage), though both can support multiple RACE stages.

📱 Platform norms and successful campaigns

🎭 What are social norms on platforms

Social norms: what is considered acceptable behavior on a social platform, including social customs, shared actions, and standard behaviors.

• Marketers who understand these norms create impactful campaigns.
• Norms vary by platform—what works on TikTok differs from what works on Twitch or Imgur.

🎯 Examples of norm-based campaigns

The excerpt provides several campaign examples that capitalized on platform-specific norms:

Campaign	Platform	Norm/Custom leveraged
Guess #inmydenim	TikTok	"Transformation" trend
#JLoTikTokChallenge	TikTok	Challenge customs
Doritos #CoolRanchDance	TikTok	Platform dances and song capabilities
Old Spice "The Man Your Man Could Smell Like"	YouTube	Two-way interactions and video sharing
Old Spice Nature Adventure	Twitch	User-directed gameplay (like Twitch Plays Pokémon)
Old Spice Smellmitment	Imgur	Gif wars and upvote capability

🔑 Three precepts of successful campaigns

All successful campaigns in the excerpt followed these principles:

1. Engaged with platform norms and customs specific to each social media site.
2. Created conversation with users rather than solely talking about the product.
3. Leveraged technological specificities of each platform (songs for TikTok, comment-to-controller inputs for Twitch, upvotes on Imgur).

• Don't confuse: This is not about posting the same ad everywhere—each platform requires tailored content that fits its unique environment.

🎯 Social media objectives and RACE framework

📊 How Facebook organizes ad objectives

Facebook divides ad objectives into three categories that align with RACE:

Facebook category	RACE stage	What it does
Awareness	Reach	Increases overall awareness or shows ads to maximum people
Consideration	Act (primarily)	Drives traffic, engagement, app installs, lead generation
Conversion	Convert	Converts users into customers

🔍 Awareness category objectives

Brand awareness

• Shows ads to people "more likely to pay attention to them."
• Designed to help advertisers find audiences most likely to recall their ads.
• Goal: increase brand recall (ties to Facebook's "Estimated ad recall lift").

Reach

• Shows ads to the "maximum number of people in your audience while staying within your budget."
• Maximizes unique viewers while capping impression frequency (e.g., one per day).

Key distinction: Brand awareness optimizes for recall (who will remember), while reach optimizes for volume (how many unique people see it).

🎬 Consideration category objectives

These objectives overlap with multiple RACE stages:

Traffic

• Addresses Reach by growing "the number of people visiting your site, app or Messenger conversation."
• Also associated with Act because it aims at "increasing the likelihood they'll take a valuable action when they get there."

Engagement

• Can be seen as both Act and Engage activity.
• Gets more people to follow your page or engage through comments, shares, and likes.
• Can also optimize for event responses or offer claims.

App installs

• Can be Act or Convert depending on strategic goal.
• If the app is free and purchases happen within it → lead generation (Act).
• If it's a paid app → convert activity.

Lead generation

• Includes a menu where users can directly enter personal information.
• An Act activity that aims at creating leads.

💰 Conversion category

Conversion ads

• Align with the Convert stage.
• Help convert users into customers.
• The algorithm targets ads to people more likely to convert.
• Some objectives offer specific ad types: catalog (catalog sales), form (lead generation), redirection (app installs).

🎯 Targeting capabilities

🔍 Basic targeting variables

Targeting capabilities: how platforms allow you to display ads to specific groups of people.

All platforms allow targeting based on:

• Demographics
• Location
• Interests

Each platform also has specific capabilities—for example, LinkedIn allows targeting by:

• Company size
• Seniority
• Professions
• Other professional variables (using LinkedIn audience segments)

🎭 Behavioral targeting

Behavioral targeting: ads delivered based on purchase behaviors, intents, or people who have a specific kind of connection to your page, app, group, or event.

Example: Advertisers could target users who have engaged with their content across the Facebook family of apps and services.

🔄 Lookalike audiences

• Introduced by Facebook in 2013; other major advertisers like Google followed.
• Uses platform algorithms to create groups on social networks that resemble other groups.
• A new and unique targeting method "never before possible."
• Can help companies "unearth some group of consumers who would be highly qualified but have not yet been identified by the company."

What lookalike audiences can be based on:

• A previously highly engaged audience (finding another group with commonalities that will also make them highly engaged).
• An existing segment of customers.

💳 Payment structures for social media advertising

Structure	What you pay for
CPM (cost per thousand)	Every time 1,000 users view your ad
CPC (cost per click)	When a user clicks on your ad
CPA (cost per action/acquisition)	Only when an ad delivers an acquisition after the user clicks (definitions vary: filling a form, downloading a file, buying a product)

👥 Influencer marketing

📱 What is influencer marketing

Influencer marketing: a form of social media marketing that capitalizes on people or organizations with large followings who exert some sort of influence over others because of their expertise or charisma.

Scale of the phenomenon:

• More than 3.7 million ads by influencers on Instagram in 2018.
• Market estimated to reach US$10 billion by 2020.
• 90% of Instagram campaigns in 2018 used micro-influencers.

🔬 Micro-influencers

Micro-influencers: influencers who have somewhere between 1,000 and 100,000 followers.

• Represent about 25% of the Instagram user base (about 250 million people).
• Most charge a few hundred dollars per post; top ones can charge upward of US$50,000.
• Recent trend: marketing budgets moving from top influencers to micro-influencers.
• Believed to have a "stronger connection with their followers and thus generate stronger engagement."

🎯 How influencers support RACE

• Can be used throughout all RACE stages.
• Historically used as an awareness generation channel (Reach stage).
• Most main objectives reported by brands relate to Reach: improving brand awareness, share of voice, reaching new audiences, managing reputation.

🔍 Choosing influencers

Ideal approach: Firms should choose influencers who correspond to the size of their business.

• Smaller firms → easier to create relationships with micro-influencers.
• Create influencer personas representing the kind of influencer to recruit.

Alignment criteria:

• Align with brand identity.
• Resonate with the brand's customers.
• Help achieve objectives (different influencers for different goals: reaching wide audiences, generating leads, converting customers).

Questions to ask when choosing:

• Who are their followers? Are they my targets?
• Are they real?
• Do they release quality content? (Can it be matched with your product?)
• Have they worked with your category? With a competitor?
• Do they promote products often? How do their followers react?
• What platforms are they on?
• Can you use their content?
• How long does their content stay online?

🤝 Working with influencers

Support influencers' efforts: Provide marketing materials.

Understand influencer motivations: Different influencers have different goals:

• Some want to push products they strongly believe in.
• Some want to be a positive influence on their followers.
• Some are in it for the money.

Recruitment routes:

1. Using influencer agencies, networks, or platforms (centralize interactions between firm and many influencers).
2. Contacting influencers directly (send personalized messages showing you understand who they are and why there's a fit).

💰 Influencer payment structures

Pay per post (main structure):

• Varies by domain and influencer.
• 2017 average: US$217 per post (according to influence.co).

Breakdown by follower count:

• Fewer than 1,000 followers: $83 per post
• More than 100,000 followers: $763 per post
• Through The Influence Agency (100,000+ followers): $2,000 to $10,000 per post

Blog collaborations (priced by monthly impressions):

• 10,000 monthly impressions: $175
• 100,000 to 500,000 monthly impressions: $500
• 500,000+ monthly impressions: $1,000 to $5,000

Other payment structures:

• Pay per lead
• Pay per engagement (when a user performs an action: click, comment, share)
• Pay per view

🔗 Affiliate marketing

📝 What is affiliate marketing

Affiliate programs: an agreement in which a business pays another business or influencer ('the affiliate') a commission for sending sales their way.

Different approaches:

• Comparison-shopping websites
• Coupon websites
• Email lists
• Reward websites

🔄 How affiliate marketing differs from influencer marketing

Key distinction: Affiliate marketing is "overwhelmingly focused on the Convert stage."

• Pay is typically associated with making sales → affiliates aim to convert people to sales.
• However, some affiliate programs pay per lead (Act stage) or pay per visit (Reach stage).

⚙️ How affiliate marketing works

1. Advertiser (company selling a product/service) offers to pay a third party to help promote and sell.
2. Affiliate (e.g., blogger, coupon website) conducts online activities to sell products/services.
3. When a user clicks the affiliate link and makes a purchase, the affiliate receives a small percentage of the sale.

Example from the excerpt: A blog post presents "10 scary reads" for Halloween. Each book is associated with the affiliate program Reward Style. When a reader clicks a book link and purchases it, the blogger receives a commission.

🔍 Identifying affiliate links

Affiliate links are typically easy to identify.

Example link structure: https://rstyle.me/+U7XZh4aYDVf0s7elU5SykA

• Shows association with Reward Style program.

What affiliate links typically include:

• Publisher (affiliate) website ID (PID)
• Ad ID (AID)
• Shopper (visitor) ID (SID)
• Allows tracking of sales across publishers, ads, shoppers, and rewards affiliates accordingly.

💳 Affiliate payment structures

Structure	What you pay for
PPS (pay per sale)	The advertiser pays the publisher a percentage of the sale created by a customer referred by the publisher (revenue sharing model)
CPA (cost per acquisition/action/lead)	The advertiser pays only when an ad delivers an acquisition after the user clicks (may be filling a form, downloading a file, or buying a product)

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

These exercises guide you through applying content marketing principles—persona targeting, journey stages, gated/ungated content, and pillar pages—to a fitness center campaign aimed at a specific persona named Avery.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Who the persona is: Avery is a late-twenties to early-thirties professional in a major Canadian city, high income, new parent, wants to get back into exercising but lacks time and knowledge.
• What you must do: identify fitness account exemplars, choose the best fit for Avery, create topic-based Instagram posts for different journey stages, and design a gated/ungated content campaign.
• How content is structured: break a topic into multiple posts targeting different journey stages; support a gated pillar page with three ungated pieces.
• Common confusion: gated vs ungated—gated content requires user information (lead generation), ungated is freely accessible; the strategy uses ungated pieces to "bring people to the gate."
• Why it matters: the exercises operationalize the content calendar and pillar page concepts introduced earlier, ensuring content addresses all personas, journey stages, and RACE objectives.

👤 Understanding the persona: Avery

👤 Who Avery is

Avery: a person in their late twenties to early thirties, living in a major Canadian city center, top 20% income, with increased work responsibilities and a newborn.

• Current state: put exercising aside for a few years; feels sluggish, lacks energy, misses connection with their body.
• Motivation: body has started to transform with age; feels self-conscious; wants to get back into weekly exercise.
• Constraints: doesn't have much time; doesn't know much about working out or the market (where to work out, how to work out).

🎯 Why Avery matters for content strategy

• The persona defines who the content is for.
• Content must address Avery's lack of knowledge, time constraints, and self-consciousness.
• Example: a post explaining "quick 20-minute workouts for busy parents" would resonate with Avery's time constraint.

📱 Social media content tasks

📱 Task 1: Identify fitness account exemplars

• Use the #fitness hashtag on Instagram to find two exemplars of fitness accounts.
• The excerpt does not define "exemplar," but context suggests accounts that demonstrate good fitness content practices.

🔍 Task 2: Choose the best fit for Avery

• Out of four exemplars (two from the textbook, two you found), select the one most appropriate for Avery.
• Criteria (implied): aligns with Avery's constraints (time, knowledge level), tone, and goals (getting back into shape, not advanced fitness).

📝 Task 3: Develop a topic and three Instagram posts

• Think of a topic important to Avery on social media.
• Break the topic down into three potential Instagram posts.
• Target each post to a different stage of Avery's journey.
  • Don't confuse: the same topic can address awareness, consideration, or decision stages depending on how it's framed.
  • Example: Topic = "Getting back into exercise"
    • Post 1 (awareness): "Feeling sluggish? Here's why exercise helps energy."
    • Post 2 (consideration): "3 beginner-friendly workout options for busy parents."
    • Post 3 (decision): "Join our intro class—designed for people restarting fitness."

🚪 Gated and ungated content tasks

🚪 Task 6: Design a gated pillar page

• Think of an idea for a gated piece of content that can be transformed into a pillar page for the fitness website.
• Recall from the excerpt: pillar pages are extensive, long-term investments for lead generation and web referencing.
• Example: "Complete Guide to Restarting Your Fitness Journey After Parenthood" (requires email to download).

🔓 Task 7: Support with three ungated pieces

• Sketch a short campaign where you support the gated piece with three ungated pieces of content.
• The excerpt states ungated content is "freely accessible" and used to "bring people to the gate or foster interactions."
• Example: three blog posts or social media posts that preview parts of the guide and link to the full gated version.

📝 Task 8: Explain each idea briefly

• Explain in a short sentence what each idea (the three ungated pieces) is about.
• This ensures clarity on how each piece relates to the gated content and Avery's needs.

🗺️ Task 9: Map the ungated content flow

• Sketch (map in boxes and arrows) how the three ungated pieces connect to the gated content.
• The excerpt does not complete this instruction but implies a visual diagram showing content relationships and user flow.
• Example: Ungated Post 1 → Ungated Post 2 → Ungated Post 3 → all lead to Gated Pillar Page.

📅 Connection to content calendar strategy

📅 Why these exercises matter

• The excerpt introduces content calendars as a way to map future content creation activities and ensure strategic distribution.
• A content calendar answers:
  • Who is this content for (personas)?
  • Which stage of the journey does it address?
  • What topic and keywords does it cover?
• The exercises operationalize this by forcing you to:
  • Target a specific persona (Avery).
  • Address multiple journey stages (Tasks 3, 5).
  • Plan gated and ungated content (Tasks 6, 7).

🔄 Reflexive intent

• The excerpt emphasizes reflexive intent: making sure content is created for all stages of the journey, all personas, and all objectives of the RACE framework.
• By planning in advance and mapping personas, topics, journey stages, and RACE objectives, a firm avoids privileging certain personas, stages, or objectives over others.
• Don't confuse: ad hoc daily posts (Facebook, Instagram, blog) should still be integrated into a mid-term strategic approach via the content calendar.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Lead generation transforms website visitors into identifiable prospects by encouraging positive interactions and capturing contact information, addressing the problem that up to 96% of visitors leave without buying.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• The core problem: the vast majority of website visitors (up to 96%) do not purchase, so firms need a strategy beyond just driving traffic.
• Two Act-stage objectives: (1) encourage positive interactions on the website and social media, and (2) generate leads from visitors.
• How to measure success: goals include time on site, page views, registrations, and newsletter sign-ups; KPIs track conversions, cost per lead, and quarter-over-quarter growth.
• Common confusion: a visitor is not yet a lead—lead generation is the process of converting anonymous visitors into identifiable contacts.
• Strategic planning: content should be mapped in advance to personas, journey stages, and objectives to avoid unbalanced efforts.

🎯 The Act stage objectives

🎯 Encouraging positive interactions

• The first objective is to get visitors to engage meaningfully with your website or social media.
• Goals that indicate positive interaction:
  • Spending a certain amount of time on the website.
  • Viewing a certain number of pages.
• When consumers achieve these goals, the firm can assume it is meeting this first objective.

🎯 Generating leads

• The second objective is to convert visitors into leads by capturing their information.
• Goals that indicate lead generation:
  • Registering as a member.
  • Signing up for a newsletter.
• Achieving these goals means the firm has acquired leads.

📊 Key performance indicators (KPIs)

Goal type	Example KPIs
Positive interactions	Time spent on site, page views
Lead generation	Number of members, newsletter subscribers (increase quarter-over-quarter), cost per lead, percentage of visitors converted to leads

🔄 The lead generation challenge

🔄 Why lead generation matters

• The excerpt highlights that up to 96% of visitors will not buy anything on their first visit.
• Firms invest significant resources (content creation, advertising) to drive traffic.
• Without a strategy for what to do once visitors arrive, many opportunities are missed.
• Example: An organization spends budget bringing visitors to its site, but if those visitors simply leave without any follow-up mechanism, the investment is largely wasted.

🔄 The fundamental question

How do we turn a visitor into a lead?

• Digital marketers use lead generation as the answer to this conundrum.
• The excerpt frames this as addressing the gap between traffic and conversion.
• Don't confuse: driving traffic is not the same as generating leads—lead generation is the next step after a visitor arrives.

🗺️ Content planning and distribution

🗺️ Mapping content in advance

• The excerpt emphasizes planning content two steps in advance.
• Each piece of content should clearly address:
  • Personas: which target audience segment.
  • Topic: what subject matter.
  • Journey stage: where the person is in their decision process.
  • RACE objectives: which marketing goal (Reach, Act, Convert, Engage).

🗺️ Avoiding unbalanced efforts

• By mapping content systematically, a firm ensures it does not privilege certain personas, stages, or objectives over others.
• This creates distributed efforts across the customer journey.
• Example: If all content targets only one persona or only the awareness stage, other segments and stages are neglected, leading to gaps in the marketing funnel.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

By mapping content to specific personas, journey stages, and objectives in advance, firms ensure balanced efforts that generate and nurture leads through strategic interactions rather than letting most website visitors leave without engagement.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Content planning prevents imbalance: mapping personas, topics, journey stages, and RACE objectives ensures no group or stage is neglected.
• Act stage has two objectives: (1) encourage positive interactions and (2) generate leads.
• Most visitors don't convert: up to 96% of website visitors will not buy anything without a lead generation strategy.
• Goals vs KPIs distinction: goals are what consumers achieve (e.g., time on site, newsletter sign-up); KPIs measure whether objectives are met (e.g., cost per lead, conversion percentage).
• Lead generation solves the visitor problem: it addresses how to turn a visitor into something more valuable than a one-time page view.

🗺️ Content planning strategy

🗺️ Mapping content in advance

• The excerpt emphasizes planning "in advance" by clearly mapping four dimensions:
  • Personas: who the content is for
  • Topic: what the content covers
  • Journey stage: where the audience is in their decision process
  • RACE objectives: which marketing goal it serves
• Why this matters: without mapping, a firm may accidentally create "distributed efforts that privilege certain personas, stages, or objectives over others."
• Example: If all content targets only awareness stage, later-stage prospects (ready to buy) are neglected.

🎯 Ensuring balanced coverage

• The goal is to avoid over-investing in one area while ignoring others.
• "Distributed efforts" means spreading content creation across all relevant combinations.
• Don't confuse: this is not about creating equal amounts for each category, but ensuring no critical gap exists.

🎬 Act stage objectives and goals

🎬 Two core objectives

The Act stage focuses on:

1. Encourage positive interactions (engagement with the site/content)
2. Generate leads (capture visitor information for future contact)

📊 Goals consumers achieve

Objective	Example consumer goals
Positive interactions	Spend a certain amount of time on site; view a certain number of pages
Lead generation	Register as a member; sign up for a newsletter

• Goals are actions the consumer completes.
• When consumers achieve these goals, the firm knows it is "attaining" its objectives.

📈 KPIs that measure success

The excerpt lists specific KPIs for the Act stage:

• Time spent on site
• Page views
• Number of members and newsletter subscribers (increase quarter-over-quarter)
• Cost per lead
• Percentage of visitors converted to leads

Don't confuse goals with KPIs: goals are what the visitor does; KPIs are what the marketer measures to assess performance.

🔄 The lead generation problem

🔄 Why lead generation matters

The large majority of visitors to a website—some say up to 96%—will not buy anything.

• Bringing visitors to a site requires significant resources (writing content, publishing ads).
• Without a strategy for what happens after they arrive, firms face "many missed opportunities."
• The excerpt frames this as a "conundrum" that digital marketers address through lead generation.

🔄 The core question

• Digital marketers ask: "How do we turn a visitor [into something more valuable]?"
• The excerpt cuts off mid-sentence but implies the answer is through lead generation activities.
• Example: A visitor arrives, reads one article, and leaves forever vs. a visitor who signs up for a newsletter and can be contacted repeatedly.

🔄 Resource investment vs. outcome

• All the effort to attract visitors (content creation, advertising) is wasted if 96% leave without any way to re-engage them.
• Lead generation creates a "second chance" by capturing contact information before the visitor disappears.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Structuring content creation requires distinguishing between gated and ungated content to guide consumers through a lead generation funnel, while building topical relevance by systematically addressing many subtopics within a broader domain.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Gated vs. ungated content: gated content requires users to exchange personal information to access it; ungated content is freely accessible without forms.
• Strategic relationship: ungated content (social posts, blogs) drives traffic toward gated content (e-books, reports), which serves as the conversion endpoint.
• Building topical relevance: a long-term strategy that breaks down consumer needs into key topics, then creates many pieces of content addressing specific searches within each topic.
• Common confusion: gated content is not just "any premium content"—it must be more extensive, harder to find, and unique enough to justify the information exchange.
• How to identify topics: use customer-driven methods (search data, surveys, interviews) and keyword analysis to find domains relevant to consumer needs.

🔐 Gated vs. Ungated Content

🔐 What gated content is

Gated content: any type of content that viewers can only access after exchanging their information; essentially, the content is hidden behind a form.

• Companies use it to generate leads and, ultimately, sales.
• Users must provide personal information (e.g., email, name) before accessing the material.
• Example: "Download our exclusive trend reports" requires filling out a form first.

🌐 What ungated content is

Ungated content: any content that users can freely access without having to exchange information.

• No forms or barriers; anyone can view it immediately.
• Typically includes social media posts, blog posts, and other freely available materials.

🎯 Characteristics of gated content

Gated content should be:

• More extensive than ungated content
• Harder to find (not readily available elsewhere)
• Rather unique, so as to entice users to exchange their personal information

Examples of high-value gated content:

• White papers
• E-books
• Reports
• Templates
• Webinars

Don't confuse: Not all "valuable" content should be gated—only content that is sufficiently extensive, rare, and unique to justify asking for personal information.

🚀 Strategic Flow: Ungated to Gated

🚀 Why gate content

• The typical answer is to generate leads, such as in a lead generation landing page.
• Gated content should be thought of as the endpoint of a lead generation campaign.
• When consumers provide their personal information, the firm can then enter into lead nurturing efforts (covered in the next chapter).

🔗 How ungated and gated content work together

Content Type	Role	Examples
Ungated	Drive traffic; support campaigns	Social media posts, blog posts
Gated	Conversion endpoint; capture leads	E-books, reports, webinars

The typical flow:

1. A firm creates ungated pieces of content (e.g., social media posts and blog posts).
2. These ungated pieces drive consumers to a piece of gated content.
3. The content supporting the campaigns is ungated; the endpoint where a visitor is converted into a lead is gated.

Example: A blog post is linked to an e-book—readers click through from the free blog post and then fill out a form to download the e-book.

🌳 Building Topical Relevance

🌳 What building topical relevance means

Building topical relevance: part of a firm's longer-term strategy for positioning itself and its web properties; it entails breaking down the general needs and challenges that consumers are experiencing into key topics that will orient marketing efforts.

• It is not about creating one-off content; it is about systematically covering a domain over time.
• Each piece of content addresses one targeted search, contributing to the firm's overall authority on a topic.

🧩 How topics and subtopics relate

• A topic is a general domain (e.g., "content marketing").
• Within that topic, there are hundreds of subtopics associated with specific searches (e.g., "better writing skills," "how to create a content calendar").
• Each piece of content (e.g., a blog post) aims at addressing one targeted search.
• Example: A blog post positioned on the keywords "better writing skills" answers a piece of the puzzle of content marketing—how to improve one's writing skills.
• Over time, covering many subtopics builds the firm's relevance on the broader topic.

Visual summary (from the excerpt):

• General topic: Content Marketing
• Subtopics: better writing skills, content calendar, SEO for blogs, etc.
• Each subtopic = one or more pieces of content

🔍 How to identify topics

Two main approaches:

1. Customer-driven methods:

   • Look at the type of searches being carried out by consumers (tools: Google Trends, Search Reports in Google Analytics).
   • Survey and interview consumers to better understand what is relevant to them, what their key needs and challenges are, and how they turn to the web to help address these.

2. Keyword analysis:

   • Use keyword research (as discussed in Chapter 3) to find domains with search volume and relevance.

📅 Planning the strategy

Once a topic has been identified (e.g., content marketing):

• Firms will plan their strategy to slowly build their relevance on that topic.
• Viewed from this perspective, each piece of content aims at addressing one targeted search.
• There might be hundreds of subtopics associated with a specific topic, opening further opportunities for content marketing efforts.
• A topic is thus a general domain that can tie together many specific searches.

Don't confuse: Building topical relevance is not the same as keyword stuffing or creating random content—it requires a coherent, long-term plan to systematically cover related subtopics within a domain.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Content marketing strategy should align with each stage of the consumer journey (awareness, evaluation, purchase, and beyond) by creating targeted content—educational at the top of the funnel, solution-focused in the middle, and persuasive at the bottom—to build topical relevance and guide consumers toward conversion.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Funnel stages map to RACE: Top of funnel (ToFu) = Reach/awareness; Middle of funnel (MoFu) = Act/evaluation; Bottom of funnel (BoFu) = Convert/purchase.
• Content purpose shifts by stage: educate and entertain at ToFu, facilitate solution evaluation at MoFu, persuade and convert at BoFu.
• Building topical relevance: creating many interconnected pieces of content around key topics improves SEO and website authority over time.
• Common confusion: don't treat all content the same—match content type and messaging to where the consumer is in their journey (problem awareness vs. solution evaluation vs. product purchase).
• Strategy extends beyond purchase: post-purchase content for retention and engagement is essential but often overlooked.

🎯 The Three-Stage Funnel Framework

🔝 Top of the Funnel (ToFu)

ToFu content targets the awareness stage of the consumer journey and aligns with the Reach stage.

What consumers are experiencing:

• Symptoms of a need, problem, or challenge
• Varying levels of abstractness (e.g., "lower-back pain" or "need new running shoes")

Content goal:

• Educate and entertain
• Address problems in ways that match consumer experience

Example search: "How to get dog hair out of my carpet?"

Example content: "Everything you need to know about getting dog hair out of carpets and furniture"

Typical formats:

• Blog posts
• Webinars
• Pillar pages
• Comprehensive guides
• Videos
• Infographics

🔄 Middle of the Funnel (MoFu)

MoFu content targets the active evaluation stage and aligns with the Act stage.

What consumers are doing:

• Looking to evaluate solutions
• Comparing options

Content goal:

• Facilitate active evaluation
• Bridge from education to your product/service
• Balance representing the customer with warming them to your offer
• Start generating leads

Example search: "Vacuum vs. sticky roll" or "Bissel Dog Eraser vs. Dyson Top Dog"

Example content: "Why vacuums are superior to sticky rolls"

Typical formats:

• Lists (e.g., "Top 10 solutions for lower-back pain")
• Case studies
• How-tos
• Product descriptions (educational, not sales-focused)
• Quizzes to help discover solutions
• Templates

Don't confuse: MoFu is about solutions in general, not just your product—maintain credibility by being helpful first.

🎯 Bottom of the Funnel (BoFu)

BoFu content targets the purchase stage and aligns with the Convert stage.

What consumers are doing:

• Ready to buy
• Evaluating specific products/services

Content goal:

• Inform and persuade about your specific offering
• Convert leads into customers

Example search: "Best price Bissel Dog Eraser"

Example content: "Save on the Price of Bissell Dog Hair Eraser"

Typical formats:

• Testimonials and reviews
• Product offers
• Trials, coupons, samples
• Demos
• Free assessments or consultations
• Persuasive product descriptions
• Sales-oriented webinars

🌱 Building Topical Relevance

🔍 What topical relevance means

Building topical relevance: part of a firm's longer-term strategy for positioning itself and its web properties by breaking down general consumer needs into key topics that orient marketing efforts.

How it works:

• Identify a core topic (e.g., "content marketing")
• Create many pieces of content around that topic: blog posts, social media posts, gated content
• Each piece addresses one targeted search or subtopic

Why it matters:

• Helps websites rank higher on search engine results pages (SERPs) over time
• Facilitates cross-links between pages
• Increases time on site and page views
• Consumers enter on one page, click to related content, boosting engagement metrics

Example: A visitor reads about "better writing skills," then clicks a recommended post on "generating blog post ideas."

🗺️ How to identify topics

Customer-driven approach:

• Look at actual consumer searches using Google Trends or Google Analytics Search Reports
• Survey and interview consumers about their needs and challenges
• Understand how they turn to the web for help

Keyword-driven approach:

• Use keyword analysis tools
• Identify search volume and competition

Strategic planning:

• Each piece of content addresses one targeted search
• Hundreds of subtopics can exist under one main topic
• A topic is a general domain tying together many specific searches

📄 Pillar Pages Strategy

🏛️ What a pillar page is

A pillar page: a comprehensive resource page that covers a core topic in depth and links to high-quality content created for supporting subtopics.

Key characteristics:

• Very long content
• Multiple media types (text, images, videos)
• Well integrated with many cross-links
• Answers many problems around one topic

🎯 Pillar page objectives

Objective	How it helps
Building topical relevance	Provides central, extensive resource on major topic
Attracting visitors	Becomes reference material, earns backlinks
Converting visitors to leads	Can include gated content, opt-ins, calls to action
Converting leads to customers	Demonstrates expertise and value

📊 SEO benefits

Pillar pages help with ranking factors:

• Reduce bounce rate (visitors find what they need)
• Increase time on site (extensive content to explore)
• Boost pages per session (many cross-links)
• Extensive content with many keywords
• Multiple media types
• Attract referring domains and backlinks

🔧 How to build a pillar page

Core structure:

1. Identify a core topic of interest
2. Break down into topic clusters (subtopics)
3. Create comprehensive sections for each cluster
4. Organize with clear navigation

Example: "How to squat" pillar page with clusters:

• Introduction
• Safety
• Technique
• Common issues
• Common squat pains
• Stretches
• Equipment
• Variations
• FAQs

Don't confuse: Pillar pages vs. traditional approach—instead of separate blog posts for each subtopic, pillar pages group everything on one comprehensive page.

🚀 Pillar page lead generation strategy

Two approaches:

Approach 1 - Direct lead capture:

• Include gated content within the pillar page
• Add opt-in forms requesting email addresses
• Embed calls to action throughout

Approach 2 - Longer-term strategy:

1. Initially create as gated e-book for lead generation
2. Break e-book into smaller pieces: blog posts, videos, social media posts
3. All smaller pieces link back to gated e-book
4. After lead generation campaign, convert e-book to ungated pillar page

Strategic steps:

1. Find core problems of your persona
2. Group problems into core topics
3. Build each topic with subtopics
4. Identify content ideas for subtopics
5. Write extensive piece of content
6. Fragment into multiple formats and parts
7. Extend reach through owned and paid media

📅 Content Calendar Planning

🗓️ What a content calendar does

A content calendar: maps future content creation activities to ensure strategic, distributed efforts across personas, journey stages, and objectives.

Key questions it answers:

• Who is this content for (personas)?
• Which journey stage does it address?
• What topic is it on?
• What keywords does it cover?

Operational information:

• Date to go online
• Author responsible
• Content type
• Channel
• Headline
• Copy
• Call to action

🎯 Strategic benefits

Ensures balanced coverage:

• All journey stages represented
• All personas addressed
• All RACE objectives covered
• No over-privileging of certain areas

Planning approach:

• Plan one to two months in advance
• Map personas, topics, journey stages, and RACE objectives for each piece
• Review distribution to identify gaps

Reflexive intent: By visualizing the full calendar, firms can ensure they're not neglecting certain personas, stages, or objectives in favor of others.

🔄 Beyond the Purchase Funnel

🤝 Post-purchase content strategy

Objective: Retain and engage customers, not just acquire them.

Activities to motivate:

• Social sharing
• Testimonials and reviews
• Loyalty through online customer events

Typical content types:

• Customer support and help documentation
• Contests and giveaways based on product use
• Community forums
• User-generated content strategies

Why it matters: Content strategy shouldn't stop at purchase—ongoing engagement builds long-term customer relationships and advocacy.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Pillar pages are comprehensive resource hubs that cover a core topic in depth with linked subtopics, helping firms build topical relevance, improve SEO, and support lead generation across the customer journey.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What pillar pages are: long, comprehensive resource pages that cover a core topic in depth and link to supporting subtopics, using multiple media types.
• How they differ from traditional content: instead of separate blog posts for each subtopic, pillar pages group all related content into one extensive page with cross-links.
• Why they boost SEO: they improve ranking factors like time on site, pages per session, reduced bounce rate, content length, and keyword density.
• Common confusion: pillar pages can be either gated (for lead generation) or ungated (for broader access); firms often start with gated e-books, then convert them to ungated pillar pages after the lead campaign.
• Strategic use: pillar pages support multiple RACE objectives—attracting visitors, converting them to leads, and converting leads to customers.

📋 What pillar pages are and how they work

📋 Core definition and structure

A pillar page is a comprehensive resource page that covers a core topic in depth and links to high-quality content created for the supporting subtopics.

• Pillar pages are typically very long.
• They use multiple types of media (text, images, videos).
• They are well integrated within their domain with many cross-links.
• They answer many problems around a topic of interest for consumers.

🎯 The topic cluster approach

The main idea is to:

1. Identify a core topic of interest for consumers
2. Break down this topic into topic clusters (subtopics)

Example: A pillar page on "how to squat" includes subtopics like Introduction, Safety, Technique, Common issues, Common squat pains, Stretches, Equipment, Variations, and FAQs—all grouped into the same page rather than separate blog posts.

🔄 Traditional vs pillar approach

Traditional Approach	Pillar Approach
Separate blog posts for each subtopic	One comprehensive page with all subtopics
Content scattered across multiple URLs	Content organized around a central hub
Harder to navigate related topics	Easy navigation throughout related content on same page

🚀 How pillar pages improve SEO

🚀 Impact on ranking factors

Pillar pages help with all major SEO ranking factors:

• Direct visits: become reference pages on topics
• Time on site: extensive resources keep visitors engaged longer
• Pages per session: many cross-links encourage exploring multiple pages
• Bounce rate: comprehensive content means visitors find what they're looking for
• Referring domains and backlinks: more likely to be referenced by other websites
• Content length: naturally extensive
• Keywords: allow for many keywords in body, title, and meta descriptions
• Video on page: support multiple media types

🎯 Building topical relevance

• Provides a central and extensive resource on a major topic
• Can be well referenced (linked to) by other websites
• Helps organize website content around a core topic
• Addresses topics or problems that personas care about
• Provides great user experience through easy navigation

💼 Using pillar pages for lead generation

💼 Direct lead capture methods

Pillar pages themselves can include:

• Gated content: sections requiring email or contact information
• Opt-ins: forms on the pillar page asking for consumer's email address
• Calls to action: prompts to take next steps

Example: A pillar page on "how to DIY a truck camper" redirects consumers to a free gated resource about becoming a digital nomad.

🔄 Long-term gated-to-ungated strategy

A common strategic approach:

1. Initial phase: Create content as a gated e-book to generate leads
2. Supporting content: Break down the e-book into smaller pieces:
   • Short blog posts (e.g., "3 tips for a better squat")
   • Short videos (e.g., "the right squat position")
   • Social media posts (statistics and quotes from the e-book)
   • Webinars about the topic
3. Final phase: After the lead generation campaign, convert the e-book into an ungated pillar page

All smaller pieces of content link back to the gated asset during the lead generation phase.

📊 Real example: Conversion Centered Design

The excerpt describes how one firm used this strategy:

• Started with a gated e-book
• Created supporting ungated content: blog post, SlideShare deck, guest blog post
• Created additional gated content: webinar requiring registration, landing page for webinar recording
• Eventually transformed the e-book into an ungated pillar page
• Broke down the webinar into six YouTube videos

Don't confuse: The same content asset can serve different purposes at different stages—first as gated for lead generation, later as ungated for broader reach and SEO.

🛠️ Creating a pillar page strategy

🛠️ Step-by-step formation process

1. Find the core problems of your persona
2. Group these problems into core topics
3. Build each topic with subtopics
4. Identify content ideas for subtopics
5. Write an extensive piece of content
6. Fragment this piece into multiple pieces with different formats and different parts that can be used to bring people to the gate or foster interactions
7. Extend the reach of these parts on owned media and using paid activities

🎯 Alignment with marketing objectives

Pillar pages help achieve two important digital marketing objectives:

• Building topical relevance
• Supporting content strategy RACE objectives:
  • Attracting visitors
  • Converting visitors to leads
  • Converting leads to customers

📅 Integration with content calendar

Content strategy should be planned mid-term through a content calendar that maps:

• Who the content is for (personas)
• Which stage of the journey it addresses
• What topic and keywords it covers
• Date, author, content type, channel, headline, copy, and call to action

The excerpt emphasizes reflexive planning: ensure content is created for all stages of the journey, all personas, and all objectives of the RACE framework.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

A content calendar organizes scheduled social media posts by week, network, timing, content type, topic, copy, and links to coordinate multi-platform publishing.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What it tracks: week, network (e.g., Facebook), time of day, content type, topic, copy text, and links.
• Content variety: includes new blog posts, curated content, videos, promotions, and live news updates.
• Timing strategy: posts are scheduled at different times throughout the day (e.g., 07:00, 10:00, 12:00, 15:00, 17:00).
• Purpose: helps plan and coordinate content distribution across platforms to maintain consistent engagement.

📅 Structure and components

📅 Core fields in the calendar

The excerpt shows a content calendar table with the following columns:

Field	What it captures
Week	The week number and specific date (e.g., "week 1: Monday, date xx/xx/xx")
Network	The platform where content will be published (e.g., Facebook)
Time	The scheduled posting time in 24-hour format (e.g., 07:00, 10:00)
Content type	The format or category (e.g., new blog post, curated content, video, promotion, live news)
Topic	The subject matter (e.g., silent video, new features, music resources, product launch, news update)
Copy	The actual text that will accompany the post
Link	URLs to be included (shown as http://ow.ly placeholders)

🕐 Timing distribution

• Posts are spread throughout a single day at five different times: 07:00, 10:00, 12:00, 15:00, and 17:00.
• This spacing allows for multiple touchpoints with the audience throughout the day.
• Different content types are assigned to different times, creating variety in the daily feed.

🎨 Content type variety

🎨 Five content categories

The excerpt shows five distinct content types scheduled for a single day:

1. New blog post (07:00): Focuses on optimizing video for silent viewing.
2. Curated content (10:00): Shares external content about new features (infinite snaps, loops, magic eraser).
3. Video (12:00): Provides resources about music for video content to avoid account issues.
4. Promotion (15:00): Announces a product launch (Liftmetrix – Hootsuite impact) with new offerings for measuring ROI.
5. Live news (17:00): Summarizes recent social media updates and invites audience reaction.

📝 Copy examples

Each entry includes specific copy text:

• The copy is conversational and action-oriented.
• Example: "Are you optimizing your video for viewing without sound? You should be."
• Example: "Don't risk your video being removed or your account killed. Here's the full list of free resources:"
• The copy often includes calls to action or questions to encourage engagement.

🔗 Links and tracking

🔗 URL shortening

• All links in the excerpt use shortened URLs (http://ow.ly format).
• Some entries show partial tracking codes (e.g., "tNx530bKlqN," "zkjS530bKlqN").
• Shortened links help track click-through rates and save character space on platforms with limits.

🔗 Link placement

• Not every post includes a visible link in the excerpt (some entries show incomplete information).
• Links direct users to blog posts, external resources, product pages, or additional content.
• Example: The video post about music resources includes a specific tracking link: "http://ow.ly.tNx530bKlqN (insert vide" [text appears cut off in the excerpt].

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

These excerpts describe automated email workflows, sales funnel metrics, landing page evaluation criteria, and a value chain framework showing how customers co-create value at different stages.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Email workflow logic: actions like Unsub, Open, Click, or Subscribe trigger different next steps in a multi-week sequence.
• Sales funnel structure: tracks conversion from inquiries through leads, MQLs, SQLs, opportunities, to closed-won deals with target conversion rates at each stage.
• Landing page scoring: each page element (headline, form, CTA, etc.) receives a score based on effectiveness criteria.
• Value chain co-creation: customers contribute value through activities like online communities, lead user innovation, user-generated content, and seeding.
• Common confusion: "Open" vs "Open + Click"—opening an email may lead to one path, but clicking within it often triggers a different, more engaged workflow.

📧 Email workflow mechanics

📧 Week-by-week progression

The excerpt describes a multi-week email sequence where each email's outcome determines the next action:

• Week 1 (Email 1): initial send

  • Unsub → no further action
  • Non-Open → may optionally resend
  • Open + Click + Subscribe → jump to Email 4 (loyalty)
  • Open + Click or Abandoned Subscribe → move to Email 2

• Week 2 (Email 2): extra incentive

  • Unsub → no further action
  • Open + Click + Subscribe → jump to Email 4 (loyalty)
  • Open + Click or Abandoned Subscribe → move to Email 3 and receive Email 5 (survey)
  • Non-Open → may trigger telesales or direct mail (DM)

• Week 3 (Email 3): extra incentive offer ending

  • Open + Click + Subscribe → move to Email 4 (loyalty)

🔀 Action-based branching

• The workflow uses behavioral triggers: Unsub, Non-Open, Open, Click, Subscribe, Abandoned Subscribe.
• Different combinations lead to different paths—e.g., "Open + Click" without Subscribe follows one route; adding Subscribe jumps ahead.
• Example: A recipient who opens but does not click stays in a slower nurture path; a recipient who clicks moves faster toward conversion or loyalty messaging.

Don't confuse: "Open" alone vs "Open + Click"—the excerpt treats them as distinct states with different consequences.

📊 Sales funnel structure

📊 Funnel stages and targets

The excerpt presents a funnel with six stages and specific numeric goals:

Stage	Target	Conversion Rate to Next Stage
Inquiries and Web Visits	9,550	10%
Leads	9,550	20%
MQLs (Marketing Qualified Leads)	1,910	20%
SQLs (Sales Qualified Leads)	382	50%
Opportunities	191	35%
Closed Won	67	—

• Goals: $5M in new customer revenue, $75,000 average sales price, 67 closed-won contracts.
• Each stage filters the previous stage by the conversion rate shown.

🎯 How conversion rates work

• The conversion rate is the percentage moving from one stage to the next.
• Example: 9,550 Leads × 20% = 1,910 MQLs; 1,910 MQLs × 20% = 382 SQLs.
• The funnel narrows at each step, reflecting increasing qualification and commitment.

Don't confuse: the target number at each stage is not independent—it is calculated backward from the final goal (67 closed-won) using the conversion rates.

🖥️ Landing page evaluation

🖥️ Element-by-element scoring

The excerpt shows a landing page broken into components, each scored individually:

Page Element	Content Example	Score
Headline	"Ocean of data instantly becomes security intelligence"	0
Subhead	Whitepaper download ("The next generation firewall is here")	2
Hero shoot	Photo of a man holding paper (partially obscured)	1
Intro	"WatchGuard XTM is the Next Generation Firewall…"	0
Bullets	"Blazing fast throughput," "Best-in-class security…"	0
Form header	"Download your whitepaper! Complete the required fields"	1
Form fields	Country, province/state, phone number	0
Testimonial	"I began using WatchGuard products more than eight years ago…"	0
Learn more	"Learn more about WatchGuard Dimension"	0
Why	"Best-in-class security," "Easy-to-manage solutions…"	0
Privacy statement	"We will never sell your email…"	0
Call to action	"Get my offer"	0
Total		4

📝 What the scores mean

• The excerpt does not define the scoring criteria, but it shows that most elements scored 0, a few scored 1 or 2.
• The total score is 4, suggesting the page has room for improvement.
• Example: The subhead (score 2) is the highest-scoring element; the headline and most other elements scored 0.

Don't confuse: a score of 0 does not mean the element is absent—it means the element's content did not meet the evaluation criteria (which are not detailed in the excerpt).

🔗 Value chain co-creation

🔗 Activities and co-created value

The excerpt presents a table linking business activities to customer contributions:

Activity	Co-created Value
Market search	Online communities
Design and innovation	Lead user innovation
Production	User-generated content and funding
Marketing	Seeding on (incomplete in excerpt)

🤝 What co-creation means

• Co-created value: customers actively participate in creating value, not just consuming it.
• Example: In "Design and innovation," lead users contribute ideas or prototypes; in "Production," users generate content or provide funding (e.g., crowdfunding).
• The excerpt shows that different stages of the value chain involve different forms of customer input.

Don't confuse: "user-generated content" (production stage) with "lead user innovation" (design stage)—the former is content creation; the latter is contributing to product design or features.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Conversion rate optimization is the systematic process of improving webpages and websites to increase the percentage of visitors who complete desired goals, whether purchases or other actions.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What conversion means: a user achieving a goal by taking a desired action—not limited to purchases.
• What conversion rate measures: the percentage of page visitors who complete the desired goal (conversions divided by visitors times 100).
• The convert stage focus: maximizing conversions across the consumer journey and improving lead-to-customer conversion.
• Common confusion: conversion is not only about sales—it includes form submissions, clicks, and other goal completions.
• KPIs for this stage: sales, lead-to-sale conversion percent, average order value, cost per conversion, abandoned carts, and sales per source.

🎯 Understanding conversion

🎯 What conversion is

Conversion: a user achieving a goal by taking a desired action.

• It is not restricted to completing a purchase.
• Any webpage with a firm-defined goal can have conversions.
• The excerpt emphasizes that "many other goals" exist beyond purchases.

📊 Conversion rate definition

Conversion rate: the percentage of people that visit a page and achieve a desired goal or action.

• Formula: conversions divided by number of visitors, multiplied by 100.
• This metric applies to individual pages, not just entire websites.
• Example: if 100 people visit a page and 5 complete the goal, the conversion rate is 5%.

🔍 Types of conversion goals

The excerpt mentions several possible goals beyond purchases:

• Submitting a form
• Clicking on a specific element
• Other desired actions (not fully detailed in the excerpt)

Don't confuse: conversion with only sales—the excerpt explicitly states "many other goals can be set up."

🔧 The convert stage

🔧 What the convert stage emphasizes

The excerpt identifies two main focuses:

• Maximizing conversions across the consumer journey: improving conversion at multiple touchpoints.
• Improving lead-to-customer conversion: moving leads closer to becoming paying customers.

📈 Key performance indicators

The excerpt lists multiple KPIs for measuring and improving conversion:

KPI category	Examples
Sales metrics	Sales, average order value, sales per source
Conversion efficiency	Percent conversion of lead to sale, cost per conversion (per channel)
Process metrics	Average conversion time, abandoned carts

• The choice of KPI depends on "what exactly we are trying to achieve."
• All indicators are associated with "measuring and improving conversion."

🛠️ Conversion rate optimization process

🛠️ What CRO involves

Conversion rate optimization: the process of improving webpages and websites to increase conversions.

• It is a process, not a one-time fix.
• The focus is on systematic improvement.
• The excerpt positions this as the main objective of the convert stage.

🎯 Where optimization happens

• Any webpage with a goal can be optimized.
• The excerpt mentions "improving webpages and websites" (plural), suggesting optimization happens at multiple levels.
• Example: a form submission page, a product page, or a landing page could each be optimized for its specific goal.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Lead generation transforms website visitors into potential customers by capturing their information and qualifying whether they are worth marketing to, addressing the problem that up to 96% of visitors will not buy anything on their first visit.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• The core problem: up to 96% of website visitors will not buy anything, so firms need a strategy beyond just driving traffic.
• What lead generation does: stimulates and captures interest to build a sales pipeline by gathering visitors' personal information for future marketing.
• Two-part definition of a lead: (1) a qualified potential buyer who (2) shows some level of interest in purchasing.
• Common confusion: not all visitors who provide information are qualified leads—some may be doing it for fun or lack the resources to buy.
• Act stage objectives: encourage positive interactions (time on site, page views) and generate leads (registrations, newsletter sign-ups).

🎯 The Act stage framework

🎯 Two core objectives

The Act stage focuses on:

1. Encouraging positive interactions on the website and social media
2. Generating leads that can become customers

Positive interactions facilitate lead generation, which in turn leads to acquiring customers.

📊 Goals and KPIs

Objective	Example goals	KPIs to measure
Positive interactions	Spend certain time on site; view certain number of pages	Time spent on site; page views
Lead generation	Register as member; sign up for newsletter	Number of members/subscribers (quarter-over-quarter increase); cost per lead; percentage of visitors converted to leads

• When consumers achieve these goals, the firm is attaining its objectives.
• The excerpt emphasizes setting up measurable goals that align with each objective.

🔍 Understanding leads

🔍 The 96% problem

• The large majority of visitors—up to 96%—will not buy anything on their first visit.
• Given the resources invested in bringing visitors (writing content, publishing ads), simply driving traffic without a follow-up strategy leads to many missed opportunities.
• The key question: How do we turn a visitor into a potential customer?

📝 What lead generation is

Lead generation: "the marketing process of stimulating and capturing interest in a product or service for the purpose of developing sales pipeline." (Marketo definition)

• The goal is to gather visitors' personal information so the firm can market to them personally in the future.
• It also helps identify whether or not the firm wants to market to them—not all visitors are worth marketing to.

🧩 The two-part definition of a lead

A lead is (1) a qualified potential buyer who (2) shows some level of interest in purchasing a firm's product or service.

Part 1: Qualified potential buyer

• The visitor could eventually purchase the product.
• Many visitors do not meet this criterion.
• Example: A car configurator (like Ferrari's) allows visitors to build their own car by choosing options (colors, engine, wheels, etc.). At the end, visitors provide their email to receive more information or save the configuration. This indicates potential interest.
• But: Are all visitors who build their own Ferrari potential Ferrari customers? Probably not—some do it for fun, others lack the financial resources to buy a Ferrari. These visitors are not qualified.

Part 2: Shows some level of interest

• The visitor has taken an action that indicates interest (e.g., filling out a form, saving a configuration).
• This separates casual browsers from those who might be persuaded to buy.

⚖️ Qualified vs. unqualified leads

A qualified lead is a lead that has been deemed likely to become a customer.

• Firms qualify leads through lead scoring (discussed further in the excerpt but not detailed in this section).
• Don't confuse: providing information ≠ being a qualified lead. The firm must assess whether the visitor is a realistic potential customer.
• Example: In the Ferrari configurator case, visitors who lack financial resources or are just playing around are unqualified, even if they provide their email.

🛠️ Lead generation in practice

🛠️ Gathering personal information

• The primary mechanism is to collect visitors' contact details (e.g., email address) so the firm can market to them later.
• This is done through forms, account creation, newsletter sign-ups, or interactive tools (like configurators).

🚗 Example: Car configurator

• What it is: An interactive tool where visitors build their own car by selecting options.
• How it generates leads: At the end, visitors are asked to create an account or fill out a form to receive more information or save their configuration.
• Why it works: It captures interest (the visitor spent time customizing) and gathers contact information.
• The qualification challenge: Not everyone who uses the configurator is a realistic buyer—some are just exploring or cannot afford the product.

🔄 From visitor to lead to customer

1. Visitor arrives (through content, ads, etc.)
2. Visitor interacts (spends time, views pages, uses tools)
3. Visitor provides information (fills out form, signs up)
4. Firm qualifies the lead (assesses likelihood of purchase)
5. Firm nurtures the lead (markets to them personally over time)
6. Lead becomes customer (makes a purchase)

The excerpt emphasizes that without a strategy for steps 3–5, the firm misses opportunities even after successfully driving traffic.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Lead generation transforms website visitors into qualified potential buyers by capturing their information and assessing their purchase readiness, enabling firms to focus marketing efforts on those most likely to become customers.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What a lead is: a visitor who is both interested in the company and whom the company is interested in—requiring both qualification and demonstrated interest.
• The conversion challenge: up to 96% of website visitors won't buy, so lead generation strategies capture opportunities that would otherwise be missed.
• Lead stages and qualification: visitors progress from lead → marketing-qualified lead (MQL) → sales-qualified lead (SQL) → customer, with scoring determining readiness.
• Common confusion: not all email addresses are equal—a visitor who fills out a form may want free content but not be a qualified buyer; lead scoring differentiates these.
• Form field trade-off: fewer fields increase conversion rates but collect less qualifying information; more fields reduce conversions but improve lead quality.

🎯 What leads are and why they matter

🎯 The visitor conversion problem

• The excerpt states that up to 96% of website visitors will not buy anything.
• Firms invest resources in content and ads to drive traffic, but without a strategy for what happens after visitors arrive, many opportunities are missed.
• Lead generation addresses the question: "How do we turn a visitor into a potential customer?"

📋 Definition of a lead

A lead is (1) a qualified potential buyer who (2) shows some level of interest in purchasing a firm's product or service.

Two required components:

• Qualified potential buyer: the visitor could eventually purchase the product (not everyone who visits qualifies).
• Shows interest: the visitor has demonstrated intent, not just curiosity or desire for free content.

Why both matter:

• Example: A car configurator (like Ferrari's) lets visitors build a custom car and provide their email to save the configuration.
• Many visitors use configurators for fun or lack financial resources to buy—they are not qualified.
• Others provide emails only to access gated content (reports, guides) without purchase intent—they show no real interest.
• A true lead is "a visitor that is interested in a company and that the company is also interested in."

🔍 Qualified leads

A qualified lead is a lead that has been deemed likely to become a customer.

• Firms qualify leads through lead scoring (discussed later in the excerpt).
• Qualification filters out visitors who are not viable customers, saving marketing resources.

🪜 Lead stages and qualification types

🪜 Visitor progression stages

Visitors move through stages before becoming customers:

Stage	Description
Visitor	Someone browsing the website
Lead	Visitor who provided contact information and shows interest
Qualified Lead	Lead assessed as viable (MQL or SQL)
Customer	Lead who completed a purchase

• An alternative model mentioned: lead → prospect → opportunity.

🏷️ Marketing-qualified lead (MQL)

MQL: viable leads that should be marketed to.

• Visitors who gave their email address and whom the firm has established could be potential customers.
• They are visitors "that the firm is interested in."
• Indicates the lead is worth continued marketing efforts.

🏷️ Sales-qualified lead (SQL)

SQL: a lead that is sales-ready.

• A lead moving close to the purchase stage.
• Important because it indicates what kind of marketing activities should be conducted.
• The excerpt notes: "we talk differently to consumers depending on whether they're at the awareness, active evaluation, or purchase stages."
• Knowing the stage helps create the right marketing message.

🎣 How to generate leads

🎣 Lead generation definition

Lead generation (from Marketo): "the marketing process of stimulating and capturing interest in a product or service for the purpose of developing sales pipeline."

Goals during lead generation:

• Gather visitors' personal information to enable future personalized marketing.
• Identify whether the firm wants to market to them (not all visitors are worth marketing to).

🛠️ Lead generation methods

The excerpt provides a non-exhaustive list of ways to get leads:

Content-based (with lead magnets):

• Whitepaper, e-book, checklist, demo, course, presentation, tool, or webinar

Online campaigns:

• Contests, giveaways
• Social media lead generation ads (Facebook, Instagram) or redirects to landing pages

Combined with traditional marketing:

• Collecting emails at trade shows
• URLs or QR codes in direct mailing campaigns directing to landing pages
• Collecting emails at showrooms

Opt-ins on websites:

• On scroll down, in the footer, midway through blog posts

• Generally: "any marketing activity that leads consumers to give a firm a piece of personal information qualifies as a lead generation opportunity."

📝 Lead forms

Lead forms: web forms that allow firms to capture consumers' email addresses and sometimes other information.

• Great tool to build a mailing list.
• When done correctly, help to score leads.
• The excerpt notes consumers take "less than 10 seconds" to decide whether to give their email address.

⚖️ The form field trade-off

⚖️ Balancing conversion rate vs. lead quality

The excerpt describes a study from Marketo showing the impact of form field count:

Form fields	Conversion rate	Cost per lead
5 fields	13.4%	$31.24
7 fields	12%	$34.94
9 fields	10%	$41.90

What this shows:

• More form fields → lower conversion rate → higher cost per lead.
• Cost per lead increases because ads cost money to run; fewer conversions mean each lead costs more.

🤔 Why not just use one field?

• Fewer fields generate more leads, but you lose important qualifying information.
• Example: The 5-field form did not capture number of employees, industry, CRM system type, or job function.
• Not all email addresses are equal.
• If a firm specializes in a specific industry and company size (e.g., SMEs in the fashion industry), collecting extra information may be worth the additional $3.70 per lead.
• Collecting qualifying information saves money in the long run during lead nurturing campaigns.

Don't confuse:

• High conversion rate ≠ high-quality leads.
• The goal is not just to maximize email addresses, but to get qualified leads worth marketing to.

📬 Types of opt-ins

📬 Opt-in placement and triggers

Opt-ins appear in various forms and locations:

Placement:

• Footer of webpages
• Middle of a blog post
• Bottom of a content page
• Welcome gate (pop-up when first visiting a site, e.g., Neil Patel's website)
• Lightbox (overlay box) pop-up

Triggers for pop-ups:

• Spending a specific amount of time on site
• Scrolling to a specific section (e.g., scrolling all the way down on Zoella's blog posts)
• Entering a specific page
• Viewing a specific number of pages

🔐 Opt-in types by consent level

The excerpt (citing Marketo's Definitive Guide to Email Marketing) characterizes opt-ins on two dimensions: whether consumers explicitly know they're entering a lead nurturing campaign, and whether the firm confirms the opt-in.

Type	Description	Engagement level
Implicit opt-in	Visitor fills out a form (e.g., download content, register for webinar); privacy policy states this opts them into email marketing	Low effort, lowest engagement
Explicit opt-in	User voluntarily signs up, e.g., checking "I want to receive news and updates"	Higher engagement
Single opt-in	Subscriber enters email and is immediately subscribed; receives next email in nurture campaign	Faster but less verified
Double opt-in	Subscriber enters email, receives confirmation email, must click link/button to confirm	More verified, higher intent

✅ Best practice

• The excerpt states: "an explicit double opt-in is often seen as a best practice."
• Why:
  • Consumers are more likely to open emails when they clearly know they signed up.
  • Double opt-ins ensure consumers want to receive emails and that the email address is valid.
• Transparency has become increasingly important in online marketing.

🎯 Lead scoring

🎯 What lead scoring does

Lead scoring: an approach to ranking leads based on their value to a firm, which supports marketing and sales activities.

• Helps qualify leads.
• Indicates whether efforts should be devoted to marketing to a particular lead.
• The excerpt mentions this topic but does not provide further detail on scoring methods.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Lead scoring ranks leads by their value to a firm using observable characteristics and behavioral data, helping marketers decide which leads to pursue and when to move them from marketing-qualified to sales-qualified status.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What lead scoring does: ranks leads based on their value to support marketing and sales decisions about where to devote effort.
• Two types of data used: observable/explicit characteristics (e.g., job title, firm size) and behavioral/implicit characteristics (e.g., email clicks, product page views).
• How scoring works: firms identify relevant data points, assign weights to each characteristic, and calculate scores to determine lead qualification levels.
• Common confusion: explicit vs. implicit data—explicit is what you ask for directly (forms, calls), implicit is what you track from online behavior (clicks, page views).
• Progressive profiling: collect information gradually over time through multiple interactions rather than asking for everything at once.

📊 What lead scoring is and why it matters

📊 Core definition and purpose

Lead scoring: an approach to ranking leads based on their value to a firm, which supports marketing and sales activities.

• It helps qualify leads—determining whether marketing efforts should be devoted to a particular lead.
• It tracks lead movement throughout their journey and indicates when they reach the purchase stage.
• The score helps distinguish marketing-qualified leads (MQLs) from sales-qualified leads (SQLs).

🎯 Common scoring frameworks

The excerpt lists several established approaches:

Framework	What it stands for
BANT	Budget, Authority, Need, Timeline
MEDDIC	Metrics, Economic buyer, Decision criteria, Decision process, Identify pain, Champion
CHAMP	Challenges, Authority, Money, Priority
GPCTBA/C&I	Goals, Plans, Challenges, Timeline, Budget, Authority / Negative consequences & positive implications
ANUM	Authority, Need, Urgency, Money
FAINT	Funds, Authority, Interest, Need, Timing

🔍 Two types of scoring data

🔍 Observable or explicit characteristics

Observable or explicit characteristics: data that a firm can readily collect by asking consumers or observing them (e.g., on their LinkedIn profile).

• Collected by asking consumers directly (forms, phone calls) or looking them up online.
• Examples include:
  • Job title
  • Firm size
  • Personal or firm revenue
  • Company size
• Marketo offers more than 50 observable/explicit characteristics in their lead scoring guide.

🖱️ Behavioral or implicit characteristics

Behavioral or implicit characteristics: data acquired through the tracking of online activities to measure the interest of a lead in a firm's product or service.

• Collected when a lead visits the firm's website, interacts with emails, and responds to offers.
• Examples include:
  • Clicking on a link in an email
  • Viewing a product page
  • Watching a video demoing a product
  • Viewing multiple pages during a session
• Marketo offers more than 200 behavioral/implicit characteristics in their lead scoring guide.

Don't confuse: Explicit data is what the lead tells you directly; implicit data is what their actions reveal about their interest level.

⚙️ How to implement lead scoring

⚙️ The scoring process

The excerpt outlines a three-step process:

1. Identify relevant data: Determine which characteristics matter for your specific business.
2. Assign weights: Give point values to each characteristic based on importance.
3. Calculate scores: Use the weighted points to establish qualification levels.

Key questions to guide data identification:

• "Who is responsible for making purchases?"
• "Does my consumer need to have a certain revenue to buy my product?"
• "What kind of actions can I make consumers take that show that they have an interest in my product?"

⚖️ Weighting characteristics

• Not all data points are equally valuable.
• Example from the excerpt: having the right job title might be worth less than viewing a product demo or requesting a sales call.
• By assigning points to each characteristic, firms can establish whether a lead is qualified and track movement through their journey.
• Leads reaching certain score thresholds become marketing-qualified; higher scores indicate sales-qualified status.

🏛️ The BANT framework example

🏛️ BANT as a scoring approach

BANT (budget-authority-need-timeline) framework: a historically heavily used framework by firms throughout the world.

The excerpt uses BANT to exemplify lead scoring focused on observable/explicit characteristics. Firms create forms or collect data during calls by asking questions in four categories:

💰 Budget dimension

Core question: What is the budget of the potential customer? How does it align with my product or service?

Questions to ask the lead:

• Do you have a budget set aside for this purchase? What is it?
• Is this an important enough priority to allocate funds toward?
• What other initiatives are you spending money on?
• Does seasonality affect your funding?

👤 Authority dimension

Core question: Who makes the decision to purchase?

Questions to ask the lead:

• Whose budget does this purchase come out of?
• Who else will be involved in the purchasing decision?
• How have you made purchasing decisions for products similar to ours in the past?
• What objections to this purchase do you anticipate encountering? How do you think we can best handle them?

🎯 Need dimension

Core question: What is the need of the lead? Can my product or service answer this need?

Questions to ask the lead:

• What challenges are you struggling with?
• What's the source of that pain, and why do you feel it's worth spending time on?
• Why hasn't it been addressed before?
• What do you think could solve this problem? Why?

⏰ Timeline dimension

Core question: What is the purchase timeline of the lead? How does this align with my sales process?

Questions to ask the lead:

• How quickly do you need to solve your problem?
• What else is a priority for you?
• Are you evaluating any other similar products or services?
• Do you have capacity to implement this product right now?

🔄 Progressive profiling

🔄 What progressive profiling is

Progressive profiling: the idea that you should collect information from potential customers throughout their interactions with your firm.

• The excerpt emphasizes you can't ask a lot from visitors when they fill out a form without hindering conversion of visitors to leads.
• Solution: collect bits and pieces of information over time rather than all at once.

🔄 How to implement progressive profiling

Two main approaches:

Dynamic forms approach:

• Use progressive profiling technology and dynamic forms.
• Firms set up many forms ahead of time that iteratively collect information based on what a consumer provided on a previous form.
• Example: If consumers give their name and email in the first form, the second form will ask for pieces of information that have yet to be obtained.

Combined scoring approach:

• Combine explicit and implicit scoring.
• Score a lead over time as they interact with a firm's website.
• This allows gradual data collection through both direct questions and behavioral tracking.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Lead nurturing is a purposeful, staged process that engages qualified leads with relevant, persona-specific information at each step of their buyer's journey to position the firm as the best solution and convert them into customers.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What lead nurturing is: a purposeful process of engaging qualified leads (MQLs) with relevant information at each stage of the buyer's journey, not random outreach.
• Core principle: one size does not fit all—campaigns must be tailored to specific personas and their journey stages.
• Progressive profiling: collect lead information gradually over time through dynamic forms and implicit scoring, rather than asking for everything upfront.
• Common confusion: lead nurturing is not immediate selling; promotion comes at the end, once the lead reaches the purchase stage.
• Key activities: getting permission, educating/entertaining with relevant content, monitoring progress through lead scoring, and promoting the product only when the lead is ready.

🎯 What lead nurturing means

🎯 Definition and purpose

Lead nurturing: the purposeful process of engaging a defined target group by providing relevant information at each stage of the buyer's journey, positioning your company as the best (and safest) choice to enable them to achieve their objectives.

• It is not random email blasts; it is a purposeful process with a clear script.
• The firm knows what comes next at every step: what email to send, what action to ask the lead to perform, what the lead should achieve.
• This ties to having clearly defined conversion paths—the steps a lead should go through to become a customer.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Defined target groups and personas

• Lead nurturing engages a defined target group, not everyone.
• Firms should have clearly defined personas they want to engage.
• Campaigns are persona-specific because what motivates one persona will differ from another.
• Campaigns are also stage-specific within the buyer's journey.

📍 Journey-stage relevance

• Lead nurturing provides relevant information at each stage of the buyer's journey.
• To create relevant content that varies by stage, firms need a clear persona and a clear understanding of their journey.
• Example: a lead reading about "back pain" should receive different content than one who clicked an ad for "comfortable shoes."

🛍️ Selling comes last

• Firms practice lead nurturing to sell products, but this should come at the end of the process.
• Promotion happens only when the firm believes the lead has reached the purchase stage.
• Don't confuse: lead nurturing is not immediate selling; it's a staged engagement process.

🔄 Progressive profiling

🔄 What progressive profiling is

Progressive profiling: the idea that you should collect information from potential customers throughout their interactions with your firm.

• You can't ask a lot from visitors in the first form without hindering conversion.
• Instead, collect information slowly over time, in bits and pieces.

🧩 How it works

• Use progressive profiling technology and dynamic forms.
• The firm sets up many forms ahead of time that iteratively collect information based on what the consumer provided in a previous form.
• Example: if consumers give their name and email in the first form, the second form asks for information not yet obtained.
• Another approach: combine explicit and implicit scoring and score a lead over time as they interact with the firm's website.

🛠️ Four main activities in lead nurturing

✅ Getting permission

• This is what the firm achieves during lead generation.
• The lead provides their email address, granting permission to market to them.

📚 Educating and entertaining

• Provide relevant information that aligns with the lead's stage in their journey.
• Content should address the lead's needs, challenges, and motivations.

📊 Monitoring progress

• Use lead scoring to track how leads move through the funnel.
• On average, consumers receive ten marketing touches from the time they enter the top of the sales funnel until they become a customer.

🎁 Promoting the product

• Promote your product only once the lead has reached the purchase stage.
• This is the final step, not the first.

📧 Email marketing lists and segmentation

📋 What to include in email marketing lists

To facilitate segmentation for lead nurturing, firms create extensive email marketing lists with the following information:

Information type	Purpose
Sociodemographic information	Facilitates targeting activities
Acquisition date	Helps know whether the lead aligns with typical sales timeline for that persona
Frequency	How often the lead wants to receive emails
Lead score and assumed journey stage	Helps tailor which email to send depending on their stage
Persona	Helps tailor the message
How/where you acquired the lead	Helps continue the conversation started with the consumer

🔍 Why acquisition source matters

• Continuing the conversation is critical.
• Example: a consumer who signed up from a blog post on "back pain" from a shoe manufacturer should receive different information than one who signed up after clicking a search ad for "comfortable shoes."
• The better the information caters to a lead's needs, motivations, and challenges, the more likely they are to engage and ultimately buy.

🎯 One size does not fit all

• Lead nurturing campaigns should be clearly tailored to personas and the stages they are in.
• Generic campaigns are less effective than targeted, stage-appropriate campaigns.

📊 Email campaign metrics

📊 Key metrics to track

Metric	Definition
Bounce rate	The number of email addresses that had a bounce back from the ISPs
Open rate	The percentage of emails opened out of the total number of emails sent
Clickthrough rate	The number of subscribers that have clicked on at least one link in your email
Click-to-open rate (CTO)	The percentage of recipients who opened the email message and also clicked on any link in the email message
Unsubscribe rate	The percentage of subscribers who opted out from your list (unsubscribed number / emails delivered × 100)

🔍 What metrics reveal

• These metrics gauge the level of engagement of leads with email marketing campaigns and where there might be issues.
• Example: if open rate is great but clickthrough rate is abysmal, this probably indicates something is wrong with the way the email is crafted, or the content does not align with the subject line.

📬 Onboarding emails and drip campaigns

📬 What an onboarding email is

Onboarding email: the first email in an email marketing campaign that should guide leads and educate them about what is about to come.

• This email should help make a lead take the next step in the series of planned activities a firm has sequenced.
• Often, onboarding emails tell leads what to expect: the content of future emails and how often they will be sent.

📧 Drip email sequences

Email drip campaign: a form of automated sales outreach comprised of a series of emails automatically sent to a specific audience after they take a specific action.

• Example: if a lead downloads a whitepaper on recruiting best practices, they might be placed in a drip campaign sharing relevant recruiting content. The final email might include a call to action to request a demo for recruiting software.
• The exact steps and content depend on the stage at which a consumer signed up (e.g., awareness post vs. solution-focused content).

🔢 Typical drip sequence structure

Each email serves a dedicated function:

1. Onboarding email: explains the value of signing up for the newsletter
2. Problem- or solution-focused email: depends on where the consumer is in their journey
3. Promotional product email: to conclude a sale
4. Reminder email: if the sale hasn't been concluded
5. Re-engagement email: makes sure the consumer still wants to receive emails (since the sale still hasn't been concluded)

🤖 Marketing automation

• Real life is not straightforward; use behavioral scoring and decision trees to strengthen conversion chances.
• Did they open the email? Click on the link? Read the blog post?
• Emails and other marketing activities should be informed by what the consumer has done with the last activity they interacted with.
• Marketing automation helps create more complex campaigns based on how a user interacted with a previous marketing activity.

✍️ Tips for writing effective emails

📐 Structure and hierarchy

• Information should be well hierarchized.
• The main message and call to action should be located above the fold (before any scrolling happens).
• Emails should be short, with little to no scrolling.

📝 Subject line and transparency

• The subject line should include a call to action.
• Be transparent about the content of the email.

🎯 Conversion-focused emails

• Emails aiming at conversion with a clear goal can benefit from being associated with a landing page (the click leads the user to a landing page).
• Other landing page tips, such as maintaining a low attention ratio, can be useful to create highly converting emails.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

These exercises ask learners to apply conversion optimization principles by redesigning a landing page and identifying retargeting opportunities across an eight-step customer journey.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Exercise 1 scope: optimize a specific landing page and explain the reasoning behind changes.
• Exercise 2 scope: identify where retargeting ads fit within a predefined conversion path from search ad click to final conversion.
• Common confusion: retargeting vs remarketing—retargeting is automatic and behavior-based; remarketing uses email lists and requires manual setup.
• Practical focus: both exercises require applying concepts from the chapter (conversion optimization, retargeting, and remarketing strategies).

📝 Exercise 1: Conversion Optimization

🎯 The task

• Learners must optimize the landing page located at bit.ly/34muGIR.
• They must explain the reasoning behind their optimization choices.

🔍 What this tests

• Application of landing page best practices covered in the chapter.
• Ability to justify design and content decisions based on conversion principles.
• Example: A learner might simplify the headline, add a clearer call-to-action, or reduce form fields—each change should be tied to a conversion optimization principle.

🎯 Exercise 2: Retargeting and Remarketing

🗺️ The customer journey

The exercise provides an eight-step path from initial contact to conversion:

Step	Action
1	User clicks on search ad problem
2	Arrives on clickthrough landing page
3	Clickthrough to blog, reading a few articles
4	Opts-in on scroll-down pop-up to newsletter
5	Receives onboarding email and access to blog content
6	Receives second email and reads blog content
7	Receives promotional offer
8	Clicks and converts

🎯 The task

• Identify where retargeting ads could be used along this path.
• The question asks "where could use your retargeting ads?"—learners must pinpoint stages where automatic, behavior-based ads would help move leads to the next step.

💡 What this tests

• Understanding of retargeting as automatic and behavior-triggered (not email-based like remarketing).
• Ability to recognize drop-off points or transition moments where ads could re-engage users.
• Example: After step 3 (reading blog articles), a firm could retarget visitors who didn't opt in yet; after step 6 (reading emailed content), retarget those who haven't clicked the promotional offer.

⚠️ Don't confuse

• Retargeting works automatically based on behaviors (clicking, viewing, abandoning cart).
• Remarketing requires an email list and manual campaign setup.
• The exercise focuses on retargeting opportunities, not remarketing, because the path includes specific behaviors at each stage.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Customer engagement strategies—including retargeting, lifetime value optimization, and co-creation—drive profitability by retaining customers who are far more valuable over time than through their initial purchase alone.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Retargeting mechanics: Serve ads to people who performed specific behaviors (clicked ads, visited pages, gave emails) to guide them to the next step in their journey.
• Why engagement matters: Loyalty leaders grow revenues 2.5× faster than peers; acquiring new customers costs much more than retaining existing ones.
• Customer lifetime value (CLV): Measures total profitability over the entire relationship, not just the first sale; helps price acquisition and retention strategies.
• Common confusion: First-sale profitability vs. lifetime profitability—firms often "lose" money on acquisition but profit over the customer's lifetime.
• Co-creation: Customers can create value at every stage of the value chain (research, innovation, production, marketing, sales, support).

🎯 Retargeting strategies

🎯 What retargeting does

Retargeting: serving ads to consumers who have performed specific behaviors that indicate interest or progress along a purchase path.

• The excerpt emphasizes behavior-based triggers: clicked an ad, read a review, gave an email address.
• The goal is to move personas from one step to the next in a predefined path.
• Example: A car company runs product-review ads on social media, then retargets anyone who clicks to read the reviews, identifying consumers looking to purchase in that category.

🛤️ When retargeting works best

• Firms need a clear path for each persona—what steps should they take to make a purchase?
• Retargeting is "highly customizable and automatic," so options are "almost limitless."
• The key is identifying which behaviors are "interesting for scoring leads or identifying their stage in the journey."
• Don't confuse: retargeting is not random ad repetition; it's tied to specific actions that signal readiness for the next step.

💰 Customer lifetime value (CLV)

💰 What CLV measures

Customer lifetime value (CLV): a customer's profitability over their entire relationship with the business.

• The excerpt provides a simplified formula:
  CLV = average profit per sale × number of repeat transactions in a period × retention time
• This is "not something we would recommend using in a real-life setting" but illustrates the concept.

🧮 Example calculation

• A subscription business with 2% monthly churn rate:
  • Retention time = 1 ÷ 0.02 = 50 months
  • Average profit per sale = $30
  • Repeat transactions per period = 1 (monthly subscription)
  • CLV = 30 × 1 × 50 = $1,500
• The first sale brings only $30, but the customer is worth $1,500 over their lifetime.

📊 Why CLV matters

Use case	What the excerpt says
Pricing acquisition	Helps decide how much to spend to acquire a customer
Evaluating profitability	Determines if acquisition strategies are profitable over time
Retention strategy	Guides how much to invest in keeping customers
Persona prioritization	Some personas have higher CLV; firms can "fire" low-CLV personas

🧭 Two rules of thumb for acquisition profitability

1. 12-month recovery: Do you recover your cost per acquisition (CAC) in the next 12 months?
   • In the example: CAC = $160, but 12-month revenue = $30 × 12 = $360 ✓
2. 3× ratio: Is CLV more than 3 times CAC?
   • In the example: CLV/CAC = $1,500 ÷ $160 = 9.375 ✓

• Don't confuse: losing money on the first sale does not mean the strategy is unprofitable; the lifetime relationship is what counts.

⏳ CLV varies over time and by persona

• Customers rarely bring the same amount throughout their lifetime.
• Some markets (videogame consoles, eyewear) have long gaps between purchases; others (groceries) see continuous purchases.
• Some markets (diapers) see high early spending that declines as needs change.
• CLV differs by persona; firms should allocate resources accordingly.

📈 Measuring engagement

📈 RFM analysis

RFM: Recency, Frequency, and Monetary value—an analytical method to segment customers by their last purchase date, purchase frequency, and spending.

• The excerpt defines:
  • Recency: how recently the last purchase occurred (in days)
  • Frequency: how often purchases happen (e.g., over three months)
  • Monetary value: total amount spent in that period

🔢 How RFM works

1. Assign each customer a score (1, 2, or 3) for recency, frequency, and monetary value.
2. Create segments by combining scores:

Segment	Recency	Frequency	Monetary value
Best customers	1 (very recent)	1 (very frequent)	1 (high value)
Loyal customers	x (any)	1 (very frequent)	x (any)
Big spenders	x	x	1 (high value)
Lost/almost lost	3 (not recent)	1 (very frequent)	1 (high value)
Thrifters	3	3	1

3. Code each customer and assign them to a segment.
4. Develop targeted strategies: retention campaigns for big spenders, recovery for almost-lost customers, appreciation for best customers.

• Example: If a persona is mostly detractors, rethink acquisition efforts for that group.

📊 Net Promoter Score (NPS)

Net Promoter Score (NPS): a single-question survey measuring likelihood to recommend, described by Harvard Business Review as "the one number you need to grow."

• The question: "How likely is it that you would recommend our company/product/service to a friend or colleague?" (0–10 scale)
• Calculation: % promoters − % detractors (ranges from −100% to +100%)

Category	Score	Behavior
Promoters	9–10	Satisfied, loyal; will recommend; repeat buying, higher basket, longer retention; account for most referrals
Passives	7–8	Satisfied but neutral; firms should work to convert them to promoters
Detractors	≤6	Unhappy; will not recommend; may engage in negative word of mouth; high churn rate

• Firms should learn from promoters: What makes them satisfied? Which persona? How were they acquired?
• Firms should recover detractors and ask similar questions to identify problems.

🤝 Co-creation activities

🤝 What co-creation means

Co-creation: the joint creation of value by a company and its customers.

• The excerpt states "most marketing activities can be co-created with consumers": market research, product innovation, advertising, customer support.

👥 Two categories of co-creators

Type	Description	Motivation
Lead users / user innovators	Highly involved and competent consumers	Participate to answer their own needs or desires
Everyday consumers	Not particularly involved or competent	Participate because it serves their needs, is part of their activities, or is fun

• Example of lead users: surgeons with 3M, athletes in windsurfing/snowboarding, computer geeks in open-source software.
• Example of everyday consumers: using ATMs or self-checkout, posting on social media, entering naming contests.

🔗 The value chain framework

Value chain: a tool that conceptualizes where value is created in firm activities.

The excerpt lists six marketing activities where co-creation can occur:

1. Market research
2. Design and innovation
3. Production
4. Marketing
5. Sales
6. Customer support

🔍 Co-creation examples by activity

Activity	How consumers co-create	Example from excerpt
Market research	Share opinions, spot trends	DeWalt "Insight Community" (saved $5M in 2016); Trendwatching's global network
Design/innovation	Discuss ideas, compete with designs	Lego Ideas, BMW Co-Creation Lab, Heineken Open Design
Production	Produce content or products	Social media content; 3D printing designs; NikeID customization
Marketing	Diffuse campaigns, create content	Viral marketing (Spotify Wrapped, Dietz & Watson ads); hashtag campaigns
Sales	Share links, promo codes, reviews	Testimonials, positive reviews
Customer support	Answer each other's questions	Apple Support Communities, Tesla Forums, YouTube how-to videos

• Don't confuse: co-creation is not just user-generated content; it spans the entire value chain from research to support.

---

Note: The excerpt includes exercises and author biography sections that do not contain substantive conceptual content for review purposes.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

This excerpt contains only metadata and supplementary material (author biography, versioning history, and figure descriptions) without substantive content on the topic "Convert."

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What is present: author credentials, publication history, versioning log, and text descriptions of figures from other chapters.
• What is missing: no conceptual explanation, theory, or instructional content related to "Convert" as a marketing or digital concept.
• Figure descriptions: the excerpt includes accessibility text for figures covering segmentation types, customer personas, KPIs, and conversion frameworks (AARRR, RACE).
• Common confusion: the title "Convert" suggests marketing conversion content, but the excerpt is purely supplementary material from a textbook's back matter.

📚 Supplementary sections present

👤 Author biography

• The author has published in journals such as Journal of Retailing, Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing Research, and Marketing Theory.
• Research focus: complexity of markets and how people and organizations manage complexity.
• Funding: over $700,000 from sources including the Social Science and Humanities Research Council.
• Role: editorial review board member and instructor responsible for digital marketing undergraduate courses.

📝 Versioning history

• Version 1.0 (Fall 2020): pilot version released.
• Version 2.0 (September 2021): major update including reorganized book structure, added list of figures, and additional resources and exercises.

🖼️ Figure descriptions (accessibility text)

🗂️ Segmentation types (Figure 2.2)

The excerpt lists four segmentation categories without explanation:

Category	Examples
By Behavior	Benefits sought, usage rate, usage situation, buyer status and loyalty
By Demographics	Age, income, gender, family life cycle, ethnicity, occupation, education, religion, social class
By Geography	Region, city size, population density, climate
By Psychographics	Activities, interests, opinions, values, attitudes, lifestyles

👵 Customer persona example (Figure 2.3)

• Persona name: RV Betty.
• Profile: recently retired, lives in a Canadian suburb, plans to travel across North America with her husband.
• Needs: comfortable RV with extra sleeping space, easy travel experience, room for hosting friends.
• Concerns: utility hookups, where to stay, tire blowouts, route planning.

📊 KPI and framework examples (Figures 4.2, 4.3, 4.4, 4.8)

📈 KPI structure (Figure 4.2)

• Objective: product awareness.
• Goals: user subscription to updates; user engagement with product types and features.
• KPIs: contact form submissions, email subscribe form submissions, virtual mirror use, product content popularity.

🚀 AARRR framework (Figure 4.3)

A pirate metrics framework for tracking customer lifecycle stages.

• Acquisition: How do customers find you?
• Activation: How quickly can you reach the customer's "Aha moment"?
• Retention: How many customers are retained, and why are others lost?
• Referral: How can you turn customers into advocates?
• Revenue: How can you increase revenue?

🎯 RACE framework (Figure 4.4)

A goal-setting framework for digital marketing.

1. Reach: create awareness, drive visits, create positive interactions.
2. Act: generate leads.
3. Convert: convert leads to paying customers, create loyalty.
4. Engage: create advocates.

🛤️ Conversion path example (Figure 4.8)

The excerpt shows two paths with four stages each:

Path 1:

• Reach: sponsored Instagram ad (outbound 1).
• Act: giveaway on Instagram (inbound 1).
• Convert: retargeting email campaign (outbound 2).
• Engage: create entertaining content (inbound 2).

Path 2: mentioned but details cut off in the excerpt.

⚠️ Content limitations

❌ No substantive "Convert" content

• The excerpt does not explain what conversion means in marketing, how to optimize conversion, or conversion strategy.
• All content is supplementary: author bio, version log, and figure alt-text.
• The RACE framework mentions "Convert" as one stage (convert leads to paying customers), but no explanation or mechanism is provided.

🔍 What is missing

• Definition of conversion in digital marketing context.
• Conversion rate calculation or optimization techniques.
• Factors that influence conversion.
• How to design conversion paths or measure conversion effectiveness.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

A/B testing enables firms to systematically improve conversion rates through small, compounding gains by comparing two webpage variants and selecting the better performer.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What A/B testing is: a randomized experiment comparing two versions of a webpage where one element differs, measuring which performs better on a specific goal.
• How it works: traffic is split 50/50 between version A and version B over a set period, then performance is compared to determine the winner.
• Marginal gains compound: individual tests produce small improvements (e.g., 1-2% weekly), but these accumulate to substantial differences over time (like compound interest).
• Common confusion: don't expect massive single-test improvements—the power comes from consistent, incremental optimization over months and years.
• Anything can be tested: headlines, images, calls to action, signup requirements, banners, social proof elements, and more.

🧪 What A/B testing measures

🔬 Definition and structure

A/B tests "consist of a randomized experiment with two variants, A and B. It includes the application of statistical hypothesis testing or 'two-sample hypothesis testing' as used in the field of statistics. A/B testing is a way to compare two versions of a single variable, typically by testing a subject's response to variant A against variant B, and determining which of the two variants is more effective."

• In plain language: compare two versions of the same webpage where one element differs.
• Examples of elements to test: call to action, background image, heading, signup requirements, banners.
• The test isolates a single variable to understand its specific impact.

🚦 How traffic is split

• Using software solutions, half the traffic goes to version A, half goes to version B.
• The split happens over a specific period of time (e.g., one week).
• After the period ends, performance on the page's goal is compared.
• The better-performing version is kept, then another element is tested.

📈 The power of compounding improvements

💰 Marginal gains add up

• A/B testing typically produces marginal gains—it is rare to see massive differences between two versions.
• However, small improvements compound over time, similar to compound interest.
• Don't confuse: the value isn't in one dramatic win but in consistent, incremental optimization.

🧮 Concrete example from the excerpt

The excerpt compares two scenarios over three years:

Scenario	Weekly improvement	Year 1 gain	Year 2 gain	Year 3 gain	Final conversion (starting at 10%)
No A/B testing	0%	0%	0%	0%	10%
1% weekly factor	1% per week	1.39% better	2.97% better	4.76% better	14.76%
2% weekly factor	2% per week	—	—	—	21.77%

• Example: A landing page starting at 10% conversion with 1% weekly improvements reaches 14.76% after three years.
• With 2% weekly improvements, it reaches 21.77%.
• The key insight: "Like compound interests, small differences add up to large differences over time."

🛠️ Practical A/B testing process

📝 Step-by-step workflow

1. Identify underperforming element: e.g., signup rate is lower than expected.
2. Form hypothesis: e.g., "the headline is not convincing enough."
3. Create variant: e.g., change headline from "It has just become easier to develop your fitness potential" to "Transform yourself with Fit for Life" (clearer call to action).
4. Run test: split traffic 50/50 for a set period (e.g., one week).
5. Compare results: determine which version performed better on the goal.
6. Keep winner and iterate: implement the better version, then test another element.

🎯 What can be tested

• The excerpt emphasizes: "Anything can be A/B tested."
• Examples mentioned:
  • Mandatory signup requirements for an app
  • Banner ads and cart elements
  • Social proofing (testimonials on product pages)
  • Headlines and calls to action
• Note: one case study used multivariate testing (testing three variations simultaneously) rather than simple A/B testing.

🔗 Connection to conversion funnels

📊 Context from the excerpt

• A/B testing is described as "one of the main tools in the arsenal of conversion optimization."
• It works within the broader framework of conversion funnels, which track user progress through steps toward a goal.
• Example funnel: Homepage → Product categories → Specific product → Product page → Checkout → Purchase.
• A/B testing helps optimize individual pages within these funnels to minimize exits and maximize goal completion.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Conversion-centered design principles prioritize achieving specific user goals over aesthetic appeal by focusing attention, building trust, and creating clear pathways that guide visitors toward completing desired actions.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Core philosophy: Design for single, measurable goals rather than purely aesthetic purposes—form follows function.
• Attention ratio matters: Fewer links and options on a page correlate with higher conversion rates; landing pages should aim for a 1:1 attention ratio (one goal, one call to action).
• Consistency across touchpoints: Ads, search results, and landing pages must match in both message (copy/phrasing) and design (visuals/colors/structure) to reduce friction.
• Common confusion: More choice seems better, but research shows more options make people less likely to choose and less satisfied with their choice.
• Compound improvement: Small weekly A/B test gains (e.g., 1-2% improvements) compound dramatically over time, similar to compound interest.

🎯 The Seven Core Principles

🎯 Create Focus

Attention ratio: the ratio between goals and links on a page.

• Analysis of 20,000+ lead generation landing pages found a negative relationship between conversion rate and number of links.
• Best practice: Aim for 1:1 attention ratio—one goal, one associated call to action.
• Landing pages should make visitors accomplish one goal and one goal only.

How different site types implement focus:

Site Type	Strategy Above the Fold	Maximum Options
SaaS products	One personalized CTA per persona/role	1 primary action
Single-product sites	Sign-up or use product, repeated below fold	1 main CTA
Online retailers	Links to shop sections or product categories	Maximum 3 options

• Don't confuse: Focus doesn't mean removing all navigation; it means prioritizing the primary goal visitors should accomplish on that specific page.

👁️ Draw Attention

Four visual techniques direct visitor attention to goal-related elements:

📦 Encapsulation

• Bound important elements in boxes or figures to draw focus.
• Example: Putting a form or CTA button inside a bordered box makes it stand out from surrounding content.

🎨 Contrast and Color

• Contrasting colors draw attention to specific elements like buttons, sentences, or forms.
• Use color theory tools to find optimal contrasting colors.

➡️ Directional Cues

• Serve two purposes: (1) direct attention to pointed-at elements, (2) create reading patterns for users to follow.
• Should be supported by overall website structure (image and text positioning).

⬜ White Space

• Empty space around elements makes them stand out and draws visitor attention.
• Not just "blank space"—a deliberate design tool.

🏗️ Build Structure for Clarity

Information and visual hierarchy: More important information should be better positioned, bigger, brighter, and/or more colorful on the page.

• Follow the principle of Sullivan ("father of skyscrapers"): Form follows function.
• Design should support goal achievement, not serve solely aesthetic purposes.

⏱️ Five Second Test

A method of user research that measures what information users take away and what impression they get within the first five seconds of viewing a design.

• Quick test to verify if a page achieves clear structure.
• Commonly used to test whether webpages effectively communicate their intended message.

🔗 Stay Consistent

Key questions for consistency:

• What search led the consumer to see my ad or result?
• Is my ad/result well aligned to answer that search?
• Is this information repeated on the landing page?
• Do I create expectations that I thoroughly answer on the page?

💬 Message Matching

Repeating the copy or phrasing of your ad or search result in the webpage where users land.

• Ensures users know the page will answer their query.
• Example of failure: Ad says "Get a dozen roses for $29" but landing page says "Great deals on beautiful bouquets."
• Example of success: Ad and landing page headlines are identical or nearly identical.

🎨 Design Matching

• Repeat visual elements of the ad on the landing page.
• Match visuals, colors, and structure between ad and destination page.
• Reduces cognitive friction and confirms users are in the right place.

🛡️ Build Trust

Social proof: Proving something is noteworthy or trustworthy because it has been adopted by others.

Trust-building elements:

• Testimonials and reviews
• Client logos
• Numbers (clients, downloads, sales)
• Awards and accolades
• Media mentions

💭 Testimonial Best Practices

• Use headshots to show testimonials come from real people.
• Use full names (not "Andre H.") to increase credibility.
• Highlight key product features in the testimonial.
• Use multiple testimonials.
• Make social proofing stand out using visual principles covered earlier.

🧩 Consider Congruence

Congruence: The alignment of every landing page element with your single campaign goal.

• If copy or images aren't aligned with the campaign goal, they create friction and hurt conversion rate.
• High-level conversion-centered design principle.

📊 Congruence Evaluation Method

Evaluate each page element against the goal:

Core landing page elements to check:

• Headline: Does it relate to the goal?
• Subheadline: Does it support the goal?
• Hero shot: Is it goal-related?
• Benefits: Do they explain what users get by completing the goal?
• Call to action: Is it goal-specific?
• Testimonials: Do they relate to the goal (not just the general product)?

Example: If the goal is downloading a white paper, every element should discuss the white paper specifically, not just the company's general product.

🔄 Think Continuity

Principle of continuance: A conversion-centered design technique that uses the momentum of one conversion to drive a secondary conversion request, like a social share or newsletter signup.

• Every conversion is an opportunity for another conversion.
• Confirmation pages and thank-you emails are prime channels for continuance.

🗺️ Clearly Defined Conversion Paths

• Know in advance what series of steps consumers should take to complete macro conversions (e.g., making a purchase).
• Always ask: What comes next?
• Example: If consumers sign up for a newsletter, you should know exactly what they'll be asked to do next.
• Optimizing conversion requires creating clearly defined paths so each step and the relationships between steps can be analyzed.

📈 The Power of Compound Improvement

📈 A/B Testing Over Time

Two websites start with similar conversion rates:

• Website A: Static, no testing, stays at ~10% conversion.
• Website B: A/B tests weekly with 1% improvement factor (e.g., 8% → 8.08% in week one).

Results after compounding:

• End of year 1: 1.39% better
• End of year 2: 2.97% better
• End of year 3: 4.76% better (10% vs. 14.76% conversion rate)
• With 2% weekly improvement: 21.77% better

Like compound interest, small differences add up to large differences over time.

🧪 What Can Be Tested

• Anything can be A/B tested.
• Examples from practice: mandatory signups, banner ads, carts, social proofing (testimonials on product pages).
• Note: Some tests use multivariate testing (testing three or more variations) rather than simple A/B tests.

🎯 Remarketing and Retargeting

🎯 Definitions and Differences

Aspect	Remarketing	Retargeting
Also called	List-based retargeting	Pixel or behavioral retargeting
How it works	Uses collected email lists	Targets based on previous behaviors
Targeting method	Upload email list to ad platforms	Uses tracking pixels
Common use	Email-based ad targeting	Behavior-based ad targeting

• Both serve ads to specific consumers, but differently.
• Both help during lead nurturing to maximize conversion opportunities.
• Typically target qualified leads (MQL or SQL).
• Can be used at any stage: generate leads, qualify leads, or convert to purchase.

📧 Remarketing Process

1. Create an email list during lead generation activities.
2. Use targeting options on advertising platforms (e.g., Facebook Custom Audience, Google Customer Match).
3. Serve ads to people on that email list.

Don't confuse: Although discussed at the conversion stage, remarketing and retargeting can be used to convert for any goal (webinar signups, blog visits, purchases, etc.), not just final sales.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Remarketing and retargeting are two distinct targeting strategies that serve ads to specific consumers—remarketing uses collected email lists while retargeting automatically responds to previous behaviors—and both help nurture leads through their conversion journey.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Core difference: remarketing targets via email lists; retargeting targets via behavioral triggers (clicks, page views, cart additions).
• When they're used: both strategies work at any conversion stage—lead generation, lead qualification, or final purchase—not just at the end of the funnel.
• Automation trade-off: retargeting is automatic and behavior-based; remarketing requires manual list creation but offers high customization.
• Common confusion: the terms are sometimes used interchangeably online (e.g., Google calls both "remarketing"), but the mechanisms differ—email lists vs. pixel/behavior tracking.
• Strategic value: both maximize conversion opportunities by serving ads to qualified leads (MQL or SQL) at the right stage of their journey.

📧 How remarketing works

📧 Email-list targeting

Remarketing (sometimes called list-based retargeting): uses emails collected during lead generation activities to target leads.

• The firm first builds an email list from previous lead-generation efforts.
• Then uploads that list to advertising platforms (e.g., Facebook Custom Audience, Google Customer Match).
• The ad campaign is shown only to consumers whose email addresses match the list.

🎯 Use cases and advantages

• Often used in retention strategies (targeting existing customers), but not limited to that.
• Can personalize campaigns for leads at specific journey stages if the firm tracks which stage each email belongs to.
• Advantage: highly customizable because you target known individuals by email.
• Example: A firm segments its email list by lead stage and serves different ads to early-stage vs. late-stage leads.

⚠️ Limitations

• Email mismatch: a lead may have provided an email they don't use on Facebook or Google.
• Not automatic: requires manual list creation and upload (compared to retargeting).

🔁 How retargeting works

🔁 Behavior-based targeting

Retargeting (also called pixel or behavioral retargeting): targets consumers based on previous behaviors.

• Triggers include: clicking a link, adding a product to cart, viewing a specific page, spending time on a site, liking/commenting on a post.
• The excerpt describes a common scenario: after abandoning a cart, the same product appears in ads across multiple websites.
• Why it's automatic: once a behavior is defined as a trigger, the platform serves ads without manual intervention.

🛠️ Strategic applications

Retargeting is versatile across the funnel:

Stage	Example use
Lead generation	Target people who clicked on product-category content (e.g., car reviews) to identify purchase intent
Lead nurturing	Retarget anyone who downloaded gated content to push them to the next step in a planned path
Purchase completion	Show ads for abandoned-cart items to encourage checkout

• The excerpt emphasizes: retargeting works best when firms have a clear persona path mapped out, so each retargeting ad moves the lead to the next step.

🎨 Customization and flexibility

• "Almost limitless" options: any behavior the firm deems interesting can trigger an ad.
• Firms identify behaviors that signal lead scoring or journey stage, then serve tailored ads.
• Example: A firm creates a blog post to generate leads, then retargets anyone who gave their email to accomplish the next goal (e.g., sign up for a webinar).

🚨 Caution

• The excerpt warns: "it is important to ensure you identify the right actions!"
• Poorly chosen triggers can waste ad spend or annoy consumers.

🔄 Comparing the two approaches

Aspect	Remarketing	Retargeting
Targeting basis	Email lists	Behavioral triggers (clicks, views, etc.)
Automation	Manual (requires list upload)	Automatic (once triggers are set)
Customization	High (target known individuals)	High (any behavior can be a trigger)
Common issue	Email mismatch	Must choose the right actions
Typical use	Retention, stage-specific nurturing	Lead generation, nurturing, purchase push

🤔 Don't confuse with...

• Terminology overlap: online sources (including Google) may use "remarketing" to cover both practices; the excerpt distinguishes them by mechanism (email vs. behavior).
• Conversion-stage only: both can be used at any goal stage—not just final purchase—including webinar sign-ups, blog visits, or lead qualification.

🧭 Strategic context

🧭 Lead nurturing and conversion paths

• Both strategies support lead nurturing: engaging leads at the right stage with the right message.
• They typically target qualified leads (MQL or SQL), but can also generate or qualify leads.
• The excerpt ties this back to the principle of continuance: every conversion is an opportunity for another conversion (e.g., after a newsletter sign-up, prompt a social share).

🗺️ Importance of planned paths

• Retargeting and remarketing are most effective when the firm has clearly defined conversion paths.
• Knowing "what comes next" allows the firm to optimize each step and the relationships between steps.
• Example: A planned path might be: search ad → landing page → blog → newsletter opt-in → onboarding email → promotional offer → purchase. Retargeting can be deployed at multiple points along this path to keep the lead moving forward.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

The exercises task students with designing six distinct co-creation activities for Spikeball—two targeting lead users and four targeting everyday consumers—each addressing a different stage of the marketing value chain (market research, design and innovation, production, marketing, sales, and customer support).

📌 Key points (3–5)

• Structure of the assignment: create six co-creation activities total, split between lead users (2 activities) and everyday consumers (4 activities).
• Value chain coverage: each activity must target one independent stage—market research, design/innovation, production, marketing, sales, or customer support.
• Lead user focus: identify who Spikeball's lead users are and design two activities specifically for them.
• Everyday consumer integration: find a method to identify which everyday customers are most likely to participate, then design four activities to integrate them.
• Common confusion: the six activities should not overlap—each must correspond to a different marketing activity along the value chain, not multiple activities targeting the same stage.

🎯 Lead user tasks

👥 Identifying lead users

The first task asks students to determine who could be lead users for Spikeball.

• Lead users are typically early adopters or highly engaged customers who push product boundaries.
• For Spikeball, this might include competitive players, tournament organizers, or enthusiasts who modify gameplay.
• The exercise does not provide the answer; students must infer based on Spikeball's context.

🔧 Two lead user co-creation activities

Students must design two distinct co-creation activities for lead users.

• Each activity should target a different stage of the value chain.
• Example possibilities (students must create their own):
  • Market research: lead users could spot emerging trends in outdoor games or competitive play formats.
  • Design and innovation: lead users could propose new product variations or rule modifications.
• The activities should leverage lead users' advanced knowledge and engagement.

🌍 Everyday consumer tasks

🔍 Identifying participating consumers

The third task requires finding a way to identify which everyday customers are most likely to participate in co-creation.

• Not all customers will engage; the exercise asks for a method to find those who will.
• Students must propose identification criteria or mechanisms (e.g., social media engagement, purchase frequency, community membership).
• This step is preparatory—it enables the next four activities.

🛠️ Four everyday consumer activities

Students must design four co-creation activities for everyday consumers, each targeting a different value chain stage.

• The four activities should cover four of the six stages not already addressed by lead user activities.
• Example possibilities (students must create their own):
  • Production: consumers could customize Spikeball sets or 3D-print accessories.
  • Marketing: consumers could share viral content or participate in hashtag campaigns.
  • Sales: consumers could share promo codes or write testimonials.
  • Customer support: consumers could answer questions in forums or create how-to videos.
• Each activity should be distinct and appropriate for everyday (not expert) consumers.

📋 Assignment structure requirements

📊 Value chain independence

Each of the six activities should target the six marketing activities of the value chain independently, i.e., one activity for market research, one for design and innovation, and so on.

• No overlap: students cannot create two activities for the same stage (e.g., two marketing activities).
• Complete coverage: the six activities together should span all six stages: market research, design and innovation, production, marketing, sales, and customer support.
• Don't confuse: this is not about creating one comprehensive co-creation program; it is about designing six separate, stage-specific activities.

🎬 Spikeball context

The exercise references a video about Spikeball (a physical game product).

• Students are asked to assume the role of Spikeball's marketing team.
• The video provides context about the product, though the excerpt does not describe its content.
• All activities should be realistic and appropriate for Spikeball's product category and customer base.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Retargeting campaigns guide prospects through the purchase journey by serving ads based on specific behaviors, while customer lifetime value (CLV) demonstrates that long-term customer relationships—not first sales—drive profitability.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What retargeting does: automatically serves ads to people who performed specific behaviors (clicked, read, gave email) to move them to the next step in their journey.
• When retargeting works best: when firms have a clear path mapped out for each persona, so campaigns can maximize the chance of completing each next step.
• Why engagement matters: loyalty leaders grow revenues roughly 2.5× faster than peers and deliver 2–5× shareholder returns over 10 years; acquiring new customers costs much more than retaining existing ones.
• What CLV measures: the total profitability of a customer over their entire relationship with the business, not just the first sale.
• Common confusion: the first sale typically does not bring revenue because acquisition costs are generally much higher—profit comes from repeat purchases over the customer's lifetime.

🎯 How retargeting works

🎯 Core mechanism

Retargeting: serving ads to people based on specific behaviors they have already performed.

• The excerpt describes retargeting as "highly customizable and automatic."
• A firm identifies behavior that signals interest or a stage in the journey (e.g., clicked an ad, gave an email address, read a review).
• The system then serves ads to those specific consumers to accomplish the next goal in the path set up for that persona.
• Example: A car company advertises product reviews on social media; anyone who clicks to read the reviews is retargeted to engage in lead generation activities.

🗺️ Journey-based retargeting

• Retargeting campaigns work best when firms have a clear idea of the path their persona should take to make a purchase.
• The campaigns can then maximize the chances that a persona at a specific step will continue and perform the next step.
• The excerpt emphasizes: "options when using retargeting are almost limitless" because firms can target any behavior they deem interesting for scoring leads or identifying journey stage.

🔍 Retargeting for lead generation

• Retargeting can identify consumers who seem to be looking to make a purchase in a specific product category.
• Example: targeting people interested in a product category, then retargeting those who click on ads to read reviews—this helps generate leads by identifying purchase intent.

⚠️ Identifying the right actions

• The excerpt warns: "it is important, though, to ensure you identify the right actions!"
• Not every behavior is meaningful; firms must choose behaviors that truly signal progress toward purchase or engagement.

💰 Customer lifetime value (CLV)

💰 What CLV measures

Customer lifetime value (CLV): a customer's profitability over their entire relationship with the business.

• CLV is not about the first sale; it represents the total profit from all transactions over the customer's lifetime.
• The excerpt provides a simplified formula (not recommended for real-life use, but illustrative):
  • CLV = average profit per sale (AP) × number of repeat transactions in a period (RTP) × retention time (RT)

🧮 Example calculation

The excerpt walks through a subscription business example:

Parameter	Value	Explanation
Churn rate	2% per month	Rate of customers leaving per period
Retention time (RT)	50 months	1 ÷ churn rate = 1 ÷ 0.02
Average profit per sale (AP)	$30	Profit per transaction
Repeat transactions per period (RTP)	1	One transaction per month
CLV	$1,500	30 × 50 × 1

• Over their lifetime, each customer brings the business $1,500.
• Churn rate is defined as "the rate of customers leaving a company per period."
• Retention time is calculated by dividing 1 by the churn rate.

🔑 Why CLV matters

• The first sale typically does not bring revenue: acquisition costs are generally much higher than the revenue from the first sale.
• Profit comes from repeat purchases: the objective of firms is to engage customers to increase their lifetime value.
• CLV helps firms:
  • Price their customer acquisition strategies.
  • Calculate return on investment (the excerpt mentions "calculate their return" but cuts off).
• Don't confuse: CLV is about the entire relationship, not individual transactions.

🤝 The Engage stage

🤝 Definition and objectives

Engagement (Forrester definition): "creating deep connections with customers that drive purchase decisions, interaction, and participation, over time."

• The two objectives of the Engage stage are:
  1. Foster loyalty.
  2. Co-create value with customers.

📊 Key performance indicators (KPIs)

KPIs at this stage measure success in achieving engagement objectives:

• Number of shares, brand mentions, referrals, repurchases, reviews.
• Ratios: comments to posts, comments to likes, reviews to sales.

💡 Why engagement is profitable

The excerpt lists several reasons why working on engagement is profitable:

• Loyalty leaders grow faster: they "grow revenues roughly 2.5 times as fast as their industry peers and deliver two to five times the shareholder returns over the next 10 years."
• Retention is cheaper than acquisition: acquiring customers is much more costly than retaining and selling to existing ones.
• Repeat customers spend more: repeat consumers tend to spend more than new ones.
• Engaged customers facilitate research: they are more willing to interact, leading to groundbreaking insights; you can identify what makes loyal customers loyal and develop winning strategies.
• Engaged customers co-create content: they work on your behalf, creating content that other consumers use throughout their journey.

🔄 Engagement activities

The excerpt mentions that the chapter covers:

• How to evaluate and encourage customer engagement and loyalty.
• How to foster co-creation by engaged customers.
• Consumption communities (mentioned but not detailed in this excerpt).
• Co-creation activities (mentioned but not detailed in this excerpt).

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Co-creation activities—where consumers participate in market research, design, production, marketing, sales, and customer support—generate significant value and cost savings for companies while transforming consumers from passive recipients into active contributors across the entire value chain.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What co-creation is: consumers actively participate in creating value alongside companies at different stages (market research, design, production, marketing, sales, support).
• Cost and value benefits: companies like one example saved approximately $5 million in market research costs in 2016 by using consumer communities instead of traditional firms.
• Two types of participants: lead users (highly engaged innovators) vs. everyday consumers (broader community members).
• Common confusion: co-creation is not just about product design—it spans the entire value chain from research to customer support.
• Platform vs. content distinction: social media firms provide platforms but users produce what is consumed, illustrating co-creation's business model implications.

💡 Co-creation across the value chain

🔬 Market research co-creation

• Companies use consumer communities instead of traditional market research firms.
• Crowdsourced research firms: Trendwatching relies on its TrendWatching Global Insight Network (tw:in), an international community of trend watchers who spot and share emerging trends.
• Cost savings: one company estimated saving about $5 million in market research costs in 2016 alone by using community-based approaches.
• Example: Instead of hiring expensive research firms, an organization taps its customer community to identify market trends and preferences.

🎨 Design and innovation co-creation

• Consumers contribute innovative ideas and product concepts.
• Discussion-based initiatives: platforms like Lego Ideas and BMW Co-Creation Lab where everyday consumers discuss new product ideas with firms.
• Competition-based initiatives: lead users compete against one another, such as Heineken Open Design and Anheuser-Busch "King of Beers."
• Don't confuse: these are not just feedback surveys—consumers actively generate new concepts and designs.

🏭 Production co-creation

Multiple forms of consumer participation in production:

Production type	How consumers co-create	Example
Social media content	Users produce content that other users consume	Social media platforms where everyday people create posts, not just celebrities
3D printing	Consumers download designs and manufacture products at home	Designs downloaded online for home production
Maker activities	Making something is the consumption activity itself	Sewing or knitting from patterns
Product customization	Consumers make design decisions	NikeID where consumers customize their products

• Platform business model: social media firms provide the platform and monetize with ads, but users produce what is consumed.

📣 Co-creation in marketing and sales

📢 Marketing co-creation

Co-created marketing activity: any marketing campaign based on word of mouth where consumers participate in diffusion.

• Viral marketing: consumers become co-creators by participating in campaign diffusion.
• Shareable content: Spotify yearly "Wrapped" or entertaining advertisements like Dietz & Watson Dietz Nuts recruit consumers as channels for ad diffusion.
• Hashtag campaigns: consumers' role is heightened as they also co-produce content, not just share it.
• Example: A sender creates shareable content; receivers become channels by forwarding it to their networks, actively participating in the campaign's spread.

💰 Sales co-creation

Consumers contribute to sales in multiple ways:

• Sharing product links or promo codes.
• Contributing to sales pitches by writing testimonials or positive reviews.
• These activities turn consumers into active sales participants rather than passive buyers.

🛠️ Customer support co-creation

💬 Forum-based support

• Brand-owned forums: Apple Support Communities and Tesla Forums where consumers answer each other's questions.
• Independent communities: consumers answer questions in communities not directly owned by brands.
• Content creation: consumers create blogs and social media content (e.g., YouTube) explaining how they addressed issues.

🔑 Why this matters

• Companies offload support costs to the community.
• Consumers gain peer-to-peer help that may be more relatable than official support.
• Don't confuse: this is not just user-generated content—it's consumers performing a traditional business function (customer support).

👥 Types of co-creators

🚀 Lead users

• Highly engaged innovators who participate in specialized co-creation activities.
• Often recruited for design competitions and innovation challenges.
• Typically more involved in early-stage activities (research, design).

🌐 Everyday consumers

• Broader community members who participate in various co-creation activities.
• More likely to participate in production, marketing, sales, and support activities.
• Companies need strategies to identify which everyday customers are most likely to participate.

📋 Strategic approach

The excerpt emphasizes targeting activities independently across the value chain:

• One activity for market research.
• One for design and innovation.
• One each for production, marketing, sales, and customer support.
• Different consumer segments (lead users vs. everyday consumers) may be better suited for different stages.

🧭 Overview

🧠 One-sentence thesis

Customer lifetime value (CLV) measures total profitability over a customer's entire relationship with a business and guides decisions on acquisition spending, retention investment, and resource allocation across customer segments.

📌 Key points (3–5)

• What CLV measures: the total profit a customer generates over their entire relationship with the company, not just the first sale.
• Why CLV matters for acquisition: acquisition costs typically exceed first-sale revenue, so firms must evaluate whether acquisition strategies will be profitable over the customer's lifetime.
• Two rules of thumb for profitability: (1) recover acquisition cost within 12 months, and (2) CLV should be more than three times the cost per acquisition.
• Common confusion: CLV is not uniform—it varies by persona, market, and purchase patterns (subscription vs. occasional vs. declining over time).
• Strategic uses: CLV helps price acquisition campaigns, calculate ROI, guide retention strategies, decide which personas to prioritize, and determine when to "fire" unprofitable customer segments.

💰 What CLV measures and why it matters

💰 Definition and basic formula

Customer lifetime value (CLV): a customer's profitability over their entire relationship with the business.

• The excerpt provides a simplified formula: CLV = average profit per sale (AP) × number of repeat transactions in a period (RTP) × retention time (RT).
• This is illustrative only; the excerpt notes it is "not something we would recommend using in a real-life setting."
• The key insight: CLV shifts focus from single transactions to the entire relationship.

🔄 Why the first sale is not the goal

• Acquisition costs are "generally much higher than the revenue a firm will make on its first sale."
• The objective is to engage customers to increase their lifetime value, not just win one transaction.
• Example from the excerpt: if acquisition cost is $160 and first sale profit is $30, the firm "lost" $95 initially—but over 50 months at $30/month, the customer brings $1,500 total.

📈 The business case for engagement

• The excerpt cites research showing loyalty leaders "grow revenues roughly 2.5 times as fast as their industry peers and deliver two to five times the shareholder returns over the next 10 years."
• Retaining and selling to existing customers is "much more costly" to acquire than new ones (the excerpt states "acquiring customers is much more costly than retaining," meaning acquisition is the expensive part).
• Repeat consumers "tend to spend more than new ones."

🧮 Calculating CLV: a worked example

🧮 Subscription business scenario

The excerpt walks through a subscription business (period = 1 month):

Component	Value	How it's derived
Churn rate	2%	Percentage of customers leaving per month
Retention time (RT)	50 months	1 ÷ churn rate = 1 ÷ 0.02
Average profit per sale (AP)	$30	Given
Repeat transactions per period (RTP)	1	One transaction per month
CLV	$1,500	30 × 50 × 1

• Churn rate is defined as "the rate of customers leaving a company per period."
• Retention time is calculated by dividing 1 by the churn rate.
• Over their lifetime, each customer brings the business $1,500.

🔍 Don't confuse: churn rate vs. retention time

• Churn rate is a rate of loss (2% leave each month).
• Retention time is the average duration a customer stays (50 months).
• They are inversely related: higher churn = shorter retention time.

🎯 Using CLV to evaluate acquisition strategies

🎯 Pricing customer acquisition

The excerpt explains how CLV helps firms decide whether an acquisition campaign is profitable:

Example scenario:

• Total campaign cost: $20,000
• Landing page visitors: 2,500
• Conversion rate: 5% → 125 new customers
• Cost per acquisition (CAC): $20,000 ÷ 125 = $160

At first glance, the firm loses money: first sale profit is $30, but acquisition cost is $160 (a $95 loss per customer initially).

📏 Two rules of thumb for profitability

The excerpt provides two quick checks:

1. 12-month recovery rule: "Am I recovering my cost per acquisition over the next 12 months?"

   • In the example: $30/month × 12 = $360, which exceeds the $160 CAC.
   • Answer: Yes, profitable.

2. 3× rule: "Is my CLV more than three times my cost per acquisition (CLV/CAC > 3)?"

   • In the example: CLV = $1,500, CAC = $160 → CLV/CAC = 9.375.
   • Answer: Yes, highly profitable.
   • The excerpt notes "the firm should be happy to pay up to $500 per acquisition" (since $1,500 ÷ 3 = $500).

🧭 Strategic questions CLV answers

• "Is this profitable?"
• "What is my return on investment?"
• "Should I continue running this acquisition strategy campaign?"

CLV provides the long-term view needed to answer these questions, even when the first sale appears unprofitable.

🎨 Strategic uses of CLV beyond acquisition

🎨 Retention and customer support

• "By knowing the lifetime value of customers, firms can more easily price retention and support strategies."
• CLV tells you how much to invest in trying to retain customers.
• Higher CLV justifies higher retention spending.

👥 Persona-level decisions

• "CLV varies per persona, where some personas will be worth more over their lifetimes than others."
• Firms can decide:
  • Where to spend extra resources (prioritize high-CLV personas).
  • Which personas to pamper a bit more.
  • Whether to "fire" a persona: minimize efforts for already-acquired customers and stop acquisition for personas with "drastically lower" CLV than others.

🔄 Recognizing variation over time and markets

The excerpt warns against assuming uniform CLV:

• Between personas: some are worth more than others.
• Between markets:
  • Infrequent purchases (videogame consoles, eyewear): extended periods between purchases may encourage churn.
  • Continuous purchases (groceries): consumers make purchases throughout their lifetime.
  • Declining over time (diapers): significant uptick at the start, then declining sales as the baby ages.
• The relationship between customer and firm evolves over time.
• The customer journey "expands beyond their first purchase."

🔮 Analytical tools

• The excerpt mentions predictive analysis as the "new approach."
• Earlier tools like RFM analysis (recency, frequency, monetary value) "provide information regarding some of these aspects" and "help us understand the basics of analyzing customer behavior to make strategic decisions."
• (The excerpt cuts off before fully explaining RFM.)

🔗 CLV and the Engage stage

🔗 Why engagement drives CLV

• The Engage stage focuses on fostering loyalty and co-creating value with customers.
• Engaged customers:
  • Are "more willing to interact with you, facilitating market research and leading to groundbreaking insights."
  • "Work on your behalf, co-creating content" used by other consumers throughout their journey.
• Identifying "what makes your loyal customers loyal" helps develop "winning engagement strategies."

📊 Key performance indicators (KPIs)

The excerpt lists KPIs for the Engage stage:

• Number of shares, brand mentions, referrals, repurchases, reviews.
• Ratios: comments to posts, comments to likes, reviews to sales.

These metrics help measure success in achieving engagement objectives and increasing CLV.