Making Smart Online Forms

Nearly every sales or marketing web site has online form somewhere on the site. It could be a Shopping Cart, a Contact form, a Bid form, an Information Request form, or some other type that allows the user to communicate directly with the web site owner. Too often these forms are poorly designed and written, and quickly developed without appropriate thought given to ensuring the form is beneficial to the person who will use it.
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The Internet is the single most important tool for consumers seeking information about university degree and certificate programs. According to the Prospectiv Survey of Online Consumer Confidence, nearly 82 percent of respondents said they begin their education research efforts through online channels such as websites, e-mail, and online advertisements.1 These online channels are the key drivers of higher education leads.

With online lead generation, potential students are requesting information – they are asking to be marketed to. If these leads are properly administered, educational institutions can save time and money while increasing enrolment by ensuring their enrollment reps are focusing only on those students who are most likely to enroll in their programs, or integrating longer term leads into “nurture” programs to keep the institution in the mind of the prospect.

Successful online lead generation efforts include several critical steps:
•    Know who you are marketing to – Identify your target audience and find out where they travel on the web. This is important prep work. Integrate your efforts with Enrollment and Marketing to find out who actually enrolls, where are they from; demographics, personalities, programs – what messages have they responded to or ignored in the past? Where do they “hang out” on the web? Are you marketing directly to prospects, or to parents?

• Develop a campaign strategy – Set your lead generation goals and a media plan that leverages a mix of online channels to reach your highly qualified potential students.
• Focus your efforts – target your highest value prospects to generate qualified leads. Qualified leads are the key. Thousands of unqualified leads slow the process of reaching the high value leads and cost your organization time and money.
• Measure your results and refine – All good online lead generation efforts are at their core, flexible. Results will indicate quickly if your approach is working, but if it is not working to your expectations, you must be able to discover why and make changes. Is it the message, the offer, the target, the placement or even the form itself? If you understand your end goals and your plan, you should be able to test revisions quickly and continue to adjust for optimum results.

Jere Doyle, writing for UniversityBusiness.com provided these very helpful reminders regarding lead generation tactical strategies – best practices:

Seek Permission
A quality lead must be permission-based. That means the consumer has provided you explicit permission to use his or her personal information to market course or degree program information to them.

Respect Privacy
Education marketers must state how consumers’ personal information will be used through a clear and simple privacy policy. Building this trust is key to long term success.

Communicate Something Meaningful
Be certain to deliver relevant, compelling messages in a timely manner. Not only does this increase the chances that they will respond to your marketing efforts, but it is also key to securing their enrollment. Be ready to contact consumers immediately.

Give Prospects Final Authority
Give prospects what they want: control. Let them tell you what educational offerings information they are interested in, and how they want to receive it.

Using PDFs as Online Forms

Online forms present a number of business challenges, especially when you need to keep an offline (paper) version of the form available for use by employees, vendors or customers. The software company Adobe Systems revolutionized the business world in the 1980s with the introduction of the Portable Document Format, or PDF file. This file format allows you to create a document and then save it in a digital format that another computer can read without needing the original application. This revolutionary technology was expanded to allow it to read and write data, making it ideal for online form applications.

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Whenever business is conducted, you can be sure that somewhere in the process, there will be forms. After all, businesses rely on forms to keep their products and services moving efficiently and effectively. Application forms. Order forms. Employment forms. Tax forms. Registration forms. Medical forms. Inventory forms. All waiting to be downloaded, filled, submitted, checked, revised, approved, and archived. Read the rest of this entry »

2010 was a year of expansion for Technotribe:

• We expanded our client base
• We expanded our resource base
• We expanded our skills and knowledge base
• We expanded our waistlines (well some of us did…)

and we were awarded an increasing number of projects. We are thankful for our clients who put their trust in us and in the solutions we turn into business tools and techniques for them. Following is a partial list of accomplishments for 2010.

January

• Launched APP Online Product Editor with Exclaim
• Awarded Kendall College Web Site “Engagement Tools” Update
• Launched Kendall College Web Site Portal
• Launched Redesigned LSAV Website

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Google Analytics is a powerful tool for monitoring and reporting on your web site activity. It’s easy to install. There are lots of reports on Visitors, Traffic and Content activity. And even cooler reports on geotargeting, conversion funnels and on-the-fly visitor segmentation. Don’t forget the integration with AdWords too! In fact there is so much you can do in Google Analytics – you can forget the purpose for installing it: measuring the success of your web marketing plans.

I recently gave a presentation on using Google Analytics to a group of hospital marketers. The health care industry is increasing its online marketing efforts, and these marketers were looking for ways to report on their online tactics and the results they were achieving. But they were overwhelmed with the possibilities available when using Google Analytics. Read the rest of this entry »

In July of 2009 Technotribe, working in conjunction with Catalyst Communications, launched the new DuraMark website. DuraMark is a newer business that has never had a web presence prior to the launch of this site.

As a part of the initial site launch, Technotribe included a full Organic SEO program focused on industry related keywords and location based keywords. Over the next 90 days, the success of this SEO project became clear. Measuring key metrics via Google Analytics, the DuraMark site organic search results quickly exceeded all standard benchmarks for success. Every desired category was up month-to-month, bounce rates were significantly reduced and targeted, new visitor traffic was greatly increased.  A summary of the results is provided below: Read the rest of this entry »

We recently partnered with Catalyst Communications, to design and develop a business-to-business website for a new client in Cary, Illinois. DuraMark, Inc. does custom industrial and promotional laser etching of almost any type of material; from aerospace parts to medical and surgical supplies, and everything in between.

DuraMark wanted a web presence that was search engine optimized, well designed and cost effective to develop and maintain. Technotribe and Catalyst delivered with a site that exceeded their expectations. Read the rest of this entry »

“Can you make my site appear in search engines?”

At Technotribe, we are asked this question frequently. Search Engine Optimization is an essential piece of any online marketing campaign. I’ve written about our approach in SEO: Synergize your keyword investment. I’d like to share some results from a recent SEO campaign we performed as part of a new web site launch.

Some of the statistical highlights include…

• All 18 targeted keywords we optimized for are now appearing in Search Engines. The baseline report only showed 6 appearing originally (all low).
• Dramatic upswing in results for Google…
  • 9 #1 placements
  • 12 top 10 placements
  • 17 top 20 placements Read the rest of this entry »

I’m sure you’ve heard someone remark… “I know I should be using Twitter, but I just don’t know a meaningful way to incorporate Twitter into my business or marketing plan.”

Good question.

Without a plan, you may just be spinning your wheels or even worse, you could damage your business’ reputation or brand. Developing a strategic plan and identifying resources is essential to a successful social media campaign.
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