DCP Dialogue

Why is Drupal Gaining Popularity?

Is it just me, or is anyone else noticing that more and more people are talking about redesigning their organization’s website using Drupal? DCP is currently working on three website redesign proposals for organizations that know they want to shift to Drupal.

I did some quick internet research and came across several interesting articles that explain 1) who is using Drupal?, 2) why are people moving to Drupal?, and 3) what is Drupal?

Take a look….

Who is Using Drupal?

Click here for a summary of over 70 well-known brands and not-for-profit organizations currently using Drupal. They fall in the following categories: Corporate, Entertainment, News, Academia, Government, Non-Profit.

Some of the impressive names include: Mattel, Zappos, Nokia, ABC, Virgin Radio, Duke University, Rutgers University, InfoWorld, Fast Company, Oxfam International, Amnesty International, and last but not least, Whitehouse.gov.

Click here for Drupal Usage Statistics from Builtwith.com. This article states, “We know of 9,390 websites using this within the top million sites on the internet and an additional extended total of 54,175 websites that are using Drupal." The CMS Distribution of the top web technologies shows that Drupal has 41% of the market share which is by far the most.

Why are People Using Drupal?

In this recent article, Big Drupal: Ten Trends for the Enterprise, Jeff Walpole says,

“Of particular note this year is the adoption of Drupal as the platform of choice for large established organizations in the publishing, media, entertainment and government spaces. To me, the embracing of Drupal by large organizations defines the point at which a technology "has arrived" on the scene and is likely to be taken seriously. It is also a good sign that it will stick around as an important technology with an installed base for a while to come.

Why is this all happening now? It is likely a combination of many things: maturity of the product itself, size of the installed base, growth in community popularity and participation, and lack of affordable alternatives for comparable web 2.0 functionality. I actually prefer to view it more as the maturity of Drupal as a platform through which the Drupal technology community is pushing Drupal forward - potentially straight into enterprise software territory. Here is my "top ten style" list of the technology trends I see fueling this growth."

What is Drupal?

From Drupal’s official website, you’ll learn that, “Drupal is a free, open-source software package that allows an individual, a community of users, or an enterprise to easily publish, manage and organize a wide variety of content on a website. Hundreds of thousands of people and organizations are using Drupal to power an endless variety of web sites.”

Go to the Drupal site to find out details about the built-in functionality available with Drupal, as well as the thousands of freely available add-on modules.

 

Omniture Survey Says…Online ROI Measurement is Important, But Hard to Implement

According to the results of the 2010 Omniture Online Analytics Benchmark Survey, the majority of marketers value the importance of measuring ROI from online marketing activities but 55% can’t effectively measure it. The survey results also reveal that only 14% of respondents currently use all three emerging channels (mobile, social media, video) in their marketing efforts.

I was surprised by these numbers! I expected that more marketers would be using emerging channels and would have systems in place for measuring results. Take a look at the highlights below or click here for more survey results. What's your reaction to this?

ROI
80% of respondents believe ROI from online marketing activities is important to measure, but only 31% of marketers can effectively measure it.

Social Media
69% of respondents are using social media in their marketing efforts however, 41% lack a mechanism to measure social media conversion.

Mobile
23% of respondents are currently using mobile in their marketing efforts. Of these people:

• 73% can measure if website visitors are coming from a mobile device
• 30% are able to measure their mobile app conversions

Video
43% of respondents are using online video in their marketing efforts. Of these people:

• 59% feel that post-video conversion is one of the most important video metrics, yet 70% are unable to measure post-video conversion.
• 40% are using online video lack a mechanism to measure video starts.

Conversion
86% of respondents think conversion rate from online marketing activities is important to measure, but 25% cannot effectively measure it.

Results of the survey included here are as of May 7, 2010.

Digital Magazines vs. Online Magazine Microsites vs. Websites

What’s the Best Solution?

There are many options for presenting magazine-style content online. How do you know which approach is ideal for your publication? You can start by answering three simple questions.

1. Is your online magazine an extension of a print publication?
2. Do you want to optimize your online magazine for web viewing?
3. Will you update your online magazine content regularly?

First, what are the different solutions?

If we put online magazines on a continuum with print-centric solutions (PDF/Digital Magazine) on the left to web-centric solutions (full featured website) on the right, magazine microsites would fall in the middle. Below are explanations of each.

PDFs are the simplest online versions of a print magazine. You just post the PDF file of your magazine online and allow people to view it. But it’s not very compelling for readers because:

• Large files are often blocked by firewalls and slow to download
• Readers don’t want to download big files onto their computer
• Reader experience is cumbersome—you have to read pages sequentially
• No interactive content

This option is also limiting for publishers—you can’t add rich media or new content, you can’t track viewer activity, and search engine optimization (SEO) is limited. This solution is quickly becoming obsolete.

Digital Magazines (flip books) are high-quality online replicas of print publications that offer value-added functionality such as interactive media and live links. There’s no file downloading and it’s easier for readers to navigate with a flexible control strip and search functionality. Advertisers like this approach because they can replicate print advertisements online and embed active links to their website. However, people find these solutions hard to read because they’re based on PDFs that were designed for print viewing, not for the Web. Reading requires a lot of zooming in and zooming out. And publishers can’t add new content. Digital magazines are a lively way to view a static print magazine online.

Online Magazine Microsites are HTML-based solutions that take advantage of the design and interactive possibilities of the Web. Based on a print publication or an online-only magazine, it’s a dynamic gathering place where readers peruse your magazine content, view rich media (videos, podcasts, slideshows), and link to your social media sites. Online magazines replicate the magazine-reading experience with a flag treatment, Table of Contents, feature stories, and departments. By mixing custom designed feature articles with various article templates, you don’t have to design every page from scratch. Instead, you upload content as often as you want using a simple Content Management System (CMS). Readers prefer this solution because articles are easy to consume and graphically compelling, content is updated regularly, plus navigation is highly intuitive.

Websites can be used to house online magazine content for organizations’ whose primary business is magazine publishing. For these companies, the main website is an extension of the magazine. For organizations that do more than magazine publishing, articles posted on the primary site get lost unless they’re packaged in a magazine microsite.

What are the ideal scenarios for each solution?
Getting back to the original questions….

1. Is your online magazine an extension of a print publication?
2. Do you want to optimize your online magazine for web viewing?
3. Will you update your online magazine content regularly?

If your online magazine is based on a print publication you can consider all options. But if you’re creating a web-only magazine it makes sense to focus solely on web-centric solutions. Why create a print-centric publication to be viewed online? Why invest in designing each and every page of your publication from scratch when it’s never going to print? There are much more efficient ways to do this. If you plan to update your content regularly, PDF/Digital Magazines are not a viable solution—an online magazine or website is the way to go.

The ideal scenarios for each solution are:

PDF/Digital Magazines
You have a print issue and have already invested in the design of each page. Repurpose it. Don't want to add any extra content; just want to replicate your print piece. Great for magazines with ads—publishers can sell online ad space in addition to print.

Online Magazine Microsites
You want to extend your magazine's brand online and give your magazine lovers a solution optimized for the Web. Regularly post fresh content to keep your audience engaged. Make your magazine a two-way conversation with your audience through article commenting.

Websites
Your company is all about your online magazine. Readers don’t distinguish between your magazine’s brand and your organization’s brand.

Social Media Marketing: Not the Leading Marketing Tool

The title of a recent Junta42 Content Marketing blog entry caught my eye--“Five Reasons Social Media Marketing Comes Last”. When every other blog entry, email subject line, whitepaper, and webinar advocates the high priority of social media marketing, it was refreshing to read something different.

Based on an excerpt from Shama Kabani’s new book, The Zen of Social Media Marketing, this blog entry explains why social media marketing should come last in your marketing plan, yet why it must be there.

The main distinction Shama makes is that social media is a consumer platform, not a marketing platform. With a consumer-owned platform, you can listen and you can participate in the conversation but you don’t control what or how much is said. You still need a marketing platform—a one-way communication vehicle that enables you to deliver your marketing message to the consumers you want to reach.

Since social media is where your customers are, you have to be there. But don’t forget that while social media provides a great place to meet and greet customers, you still need traditional marketing platforms (i.e. advertising, websites, email, e-newsletters, PR, webinars, special events, catalogs, etc.) to communicate your comprehensive marketing message.

SEO: The real reason for corporate blogging

Many companies develop corporate blogs with the primary goal of building a large subscriber base and generating a loyal readership. From this ongoing relationship they hope to build brand awareness and promote goodwill. Maybe that’s why 77% of business bloggers are unhappy with their current blogging efforts (according to Forrester Research.)

Why Blogging is Your #1 Search Marketing Tool, an interesting and thorough whitepaper produced by Compendium, provides lots of statistics that point to the real reason why companies should blog—to drive your Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Below are some of the statements I found most compelling:

• As much as 80% of all web activity begins with online search.
• Historically, 85-95% of clicks on a search engine results page (SERP) occur in the organic section of the results page—not in the Pay Per Click (PPC) section.
• Statistics indicate that a consumer’s capacity for corporate blog subscriptions rarely exceeds 2-3.
• Corporate blogging is not about establishing a following—it’s about creating keyword-rich, relevant and personal content that resonates with your target market helping them solve their problems via search.
• A common misconception among corporate bloggers is that they’re writing for regular, repeat customers when—in actuality—those who read corporate blogs tend to skew toward first-time visitors by an 80% margin.
• With valuable and relevant content, frequent updates, and subject specificity, corporate bloggers can greatly improve their search engine rankings.

I encourage you to download this 12-page document and read it from start to finish. You’ll find useful tips on how to select titles and keywords for your blog, how frequently you should blog, who should blog, how short a blog entry can be, and much more.

The Ultimate Online Magazine Solution

As a marketing director, I’m well aware that you’re not supposed to plug your own company’s products on your blog. So please pardon me for breaking this rule but I really think you should take a look at a powerful new online magazine tool from DCP.

Over the years, we’ve provided our clients with different ways to publish their valuable print content on the Web. We started by offering a basic HTML version of their print publication that we call an ePub™.  Functional and inexpensive, this simple solution does a nice job of converting print content into an HTML-based online publication. But its templated approach doesn’t take full advantage of the design and interactive possibilities of the Web. While it replicates the print content, is doesn’t give clients the ability to extend it.

When the digital “flip-book” products gained popularity, DCP jumped on that trend. The good news with the digital magazine solution is that you preserve the beautiful layout of your print issue. The bad news is that it’s hard for your audience to read digital magazines because the print layout doesn’t translate well to a computer screen. The font is typically too small to read when viewing a full page, causing readers to have to constantly zoom in and out. Navigation is also a bit tedious. Clearly, this is not the most user-friendly solution.

DCP performed extensive research to find the best solution to bring a print publication to life online. WebExtra™, our new product, is a powerful, cost-effective online magazine tool that allows you to extend the reach and effectiveness of your magazine without spending an arm and a leg!

Some of the biggest advantages of WebExtra:

• With an easy-to-use Content Management System (CMS), you can regularly post fresh content — including articles, videos, slideshows, and audiocasts—that keep your audience engaged 24/7/365.
• Make your magazine a two-way conversation with your audience through article commenting and Ask the Expert features.
• Extend the content from your print edition by linking readers to relevant videos, podcasts, slideshows, etc.
• Promote news, events, or whatever you want in real time with WebExtra’s built-in event calendar that is highlighted on the home page.
• The custom designed feature stories look even better online than in print!
• This fully hosted solution presents no burden on your IT department and links seamlessly to your main website.

Take a look at the latest edition of WebExtra produced for UC Hastings College of the Law at magazine.uchastings.edu . Imagine what WebExtra can do for your print content!

Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, Oh My

Not sure where to start with your social media efforts? It’s always useful to read case studies of how other organizations are tackling similar challenges. On the one hand, it’s great when you can pick up a few valuable tips. On the other hand, it’s nice to confirm that you’ve already been doing things right.

That’s how I reacted to the lead article in the September/October 2009 issue of Spectrum, SHSMD’s bimonthly member newsletter, “Launching Our Hospital’s Social Networks: An Insider’s Perspective.” It tracks the steps that Swedish Covenant Hospital in Chicago took to develop a social media presence. Written by two of the hospital’s marketing professionals, Leigh Ginther and Laura Prusik, this case study presents an intelligent process and meaningful observations.

Is There a Quick and Easy Way to Build Quality Email Lists?

Over the past several months, I’ve noticed a considerable surge in the number of emails I receive from people trying to sell me email lists. Today I received five. I’ve been encouraged, thinking that perhaps this intensified marketing effort is a sign that there’s new data supporting the viability of purchasing email lists. Wouldn’t it be great to buy a list of email addresses and suddenly multiply your avid subscriber base without much effort? So I decided to do some investigating.

What I found is that nothing has changed, only email list marketers have become more aggressive. Unfortunately, it’s still true that you can’t simply purchase subscribers. But I did come across several articles that provide useful tips on how to build your lists.

In the Bionic List Building Guide from Lyris we’re reminded, “Although there are many strategies for list building, the main thing to remember is that the possession of an email address does not mean you have the owner’s explicit permission to market to them via email. By law, you must get them to opt-in.” This guide goes on to provide a useful list of techniques to convert raw names into opt-in subscribers. You can subscribe to download it.

In his article Email Address Lists: Buy, Rent or Leave Alone? Mark Brownlow discusses the benefits of list rental compared to the risks of buying a list. This article is not new, but the content remains relevant. In reference to buying bulk email lists, Brownlow says, “At best, your messages to that list just elicit a poor response. At worst, you’re labeled a spammer, which has numerous practical consequences—all of them bad—for your brand, bottom line and ability to do business over the Internet.”

The challenge is to take a list of raw names, presumably people who are interested in your company’s products and services, and get their permission to send them regular marketing communications or newsletters via email. To summarize, the main tips are:

• Ask for opt-ins at every chance you get—in phone calls, newsletters, social media, home page of website, email signature, trade shows, direct mail, etc.
  
• Partner with complementary organizations to attract their subscribers to opt-in to your list.
  
• Offer incentives to motivate people to subscribe.
  
• Ask your subscribers to share the word and forward your message to a friend.

The bottom line is, there is no substitute for building your own email list of people who have expressed an interest in your company's products and services.

Paper vs. Electronic Communications—Can paper be better for the environment?

Everyone’s thinking green these days. We’re all aware that we need to do our part to protect the environment. So we cut down on our print communications to save trees and in turn we increase our electronic communications. This requires that we keep our electronic devices current and rely on them 24/7. We feel good about our personal and professional commitment to preserving the environment.

Now a paper company has compiled some facts that imply that paper communications can be better for the environment than electronic communications. Is this possible?

As part of their “Down to Earth™” promotional series, International Paper poses and answers the question, “Are pixels greener than paper?” Some of the interesting points pulled directly from their brochure include:

• Every decision to communicate has some impact on the environment.

• Effective stewardship requires a careful examination of the larger picture that compares the entire lifecycle, from raw materials to energy use and end of life, to fully understand the impact and performance of both electronic media and paper. Here are some of the facts:
  •     Raw Materials 
    Paper: The paper and forest products industry replenishes more than it takes and ensures the sustainability of our forests by planting 1.7 million trees every single day, more than three times what is harvested.
    Electronic: Making a computer typically requires the mining and refining of dozens of minerals and metals, as well as the extensive use of plastics and hydrocarbon solvents. 
  •     Energy Consumption
    Pulp and Paper Industry: Sixty percent of the energy used to make paper in the U.S. comes from carbon-neutral renewable resources and is produced on site at mills
    Electronic Data Center Servers: Internet servers use more than 90 percent fossil fuels purchased off the grid, which are greenhouse gas emitting. 
  •     End of Life
    Paper: Nearly 60 percent of all paper in the U.S. is recycled and more than 63 percent of the fiber used to make new paper products in the U.S. comes from recycled sources.
    Electronics: Only 18% of all electronic devices are currently recycled. E-waste now constitutes our single largest toxic waste export.  
• A government study estimates that the rise in gadget ownership and the switch from analog to digital TV could boost the electricity usage on the consumer electronics sector by 60 percent by 2010.

Is it possible that a complete shift from paper to electronics is bad for the environment? Is this brochure a great marketing campaign for paper or a valid argument?

What do you think? Weigh in and let’s start a conversation.

Who Is Using Social Media and How Do They Use It?

I was surprised by a few statistics quoted in the recent DMNews article, Boomer women get social. According to Facebook, since September 2008, the fastest-growing age group on the site is women over 55. And according to Forrester Research, more than 60% of boomers—both men and women—are regular consumers of social media.

This data motivated me to investigate Facebook demographic trends over the past few years. According to iStrategyLabs’ 2009 Facebook Demographics and Statistics Report, in the past year there has been a 276% growth in 35-54 year old users and 194% growth in the 55+ group.

This means that the percentage of Facebook users who are 18-24 years old is rapidly declining:

• In 2007, 62% of Facebook users were 18-24
• In 2008, 54% of Facebook users were 18-24
• In 2009, 41% of Facebook users are 18-24

So what does this trend mean for marketers? In this article, you’ll gain many interesting insights from Carol Orsborn and Mary Brown, the co-authors of the book Boom: Marketing to the Ultimate Power Consumer – the Baby-Boomer Woman. Some of the key points are:

• “Boomers interact differently online than younger generations.”
• “Content is key to drawing this audience into social networking conversations.”
• “Boomers take more time making connections, with longer emails or texts.”
• “Content is king—it leads to social networking, not the other way around.”
• “Boomers are outspending younger consumers two to one.”

The bottom line is that our social media marketing strategies today need to target all age groups, and organizations targeting women over 35 years old should consider social media as a viable vehicle.