The Workbox development, marketing and analytics team met in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia last week to outline our business goals and plans for the upcoming year. And, naturally, we did some “team building” (which typically involves, you guessed it, vodka!).
Here are some of the themes we covered this year:
Mobile First
If you can nail your site’s mobile architecture, UI and design first, the rest is easy. Why is this important? Some estimates indicate that 35% of your market’s first impression of your brand will come from a mobile device, and that % is expected to increase. In other words, your mobile (or immobile) site will be the first thing many people see.
And why is mobile site design difficult? You have a lot less space on a mobile site, so you really need to get your message, calls to action and hierarchy solid before you can start designing. If you think that’s easy and all your internal stakeholders agree on this hierarchy … well, I want to work with you!
So, let’s all get ready now and think “mobile first” for any new online marketing projects (painful admission – the Workbox site is woefully dated, but is being redesigned as we speak).
WordPress Plugins
Interest increases and suggestions for improvement keep arriving for our little WordPress video gallery plugin. We seem to have stumbled upon something and are committed to making it even better.
Also, we’ve been neglecting our pdf tracking plugin for Google Analytics, but that’s going to change! Our next iteration will give you the ability to track anything, and I mean ANYTHING, that happens on your site through Google Analytics. At least that’s the goal. We’ll have more on this soon.
Analytics and Reporting
At Workbox, we have a saying: It’s all about the reporting.
KPI’s are set. Reports are generated. KPI’s are changed and new reports are generated. That’s the way of online marketing, and each round should get your team closer to understanding what works and implementing programs that improve the bottom line.
To help us improve our analytics and reporting capabilities, Workbox has teamed up with online marketing veteran (and friend and business partner) T.K. Iwata of Apogii Consulting Group to make us faster, more accurate and efficient. Our clients should be seeing improvements soon.
Cossacks
We didn’t actually invite any Cossacks to our conference (they’re often on horseback and swinging sabers, so I doubt they’d be allowed into the hotel). But we did see the Кубанский Казачий Хор (Kuban Cossack Choir). To put it bluntly, this is real Russian stuff, and one of the cultural highlights of my many visits to Russia!
Here’s a sample: http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=
Thank you for reading and happy online marketing!
Yours, Eric Weidner