PR and marketing

Next Digital has relaunched their brand to reflect their growth as one of the Asia Pacific’s largest full service digital agencies.

As a once traditional digital solution based agency, the rebrand represents Next Digital’s focus on customer and social media engagement through ideas based digital campaigns.

Along with their original target market they will also be focusing on those clients that wish to use digital as a key channel in their overall strategies.

Creative Director, Hayden Peters said, “This rebranding of Next Digital encompasses our expansion into Asia and aligns itself with our focus on becoming a creative leader in Australia and the wider region.”

In accompaniment of the social led nature of their recent expansion into South East Asia, Next Digital has relaunched its brand to provide a direct view of the key services provided: creative, marketing, strategy and technology.

“Our traditional brand was not reflecting where Next Digital is, and what we provide, as a company. We needed to externally showcase what we can offer as a strategic and marketing led agency,” Mr Peters said.

“When we deconstructed the original brand, we had a look at what digital was in regards to what we offer and then looked at other agencies and how they reflect and engage. We found many agencies to be quite insular in how they communicate and we wanted to be different,” said Mr Peters.

Next Digital has created a global voice including a platform for their employees to discuss, in all honesty, their opinions about their brand.

“Next Digital’s voice is the voice of a global collection of people speaking through the brand. We even have a mascot – MicroChip – a little robot that represents the fun persona of the brand,” said Mr Peters.

The success of the relaunch will be measured through online analytics including the amount of engagement Next Digital receives from their Facebook campaign ‘Love digital like us’.

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For further information or interviews please contact:
Lauren Milne
CP Communications
Phone: 02 9460 9200 


About Next Digital
Next Digital is a leader in creating successful digital strategies for clients throughout the Asia Pacific region. They combine exceptional marketing thinking, regional understanding and technical firepower to develop and deliver broad digital programs.

Their love for all things digital has been going strong for more than 16 years. That journey has helped them hone their delivery and engagement approach, and has shaped how they innovate and keep in front of a fast changing digital space.

Next Digital is a true full service digital agency with over 170 talented digital specialists working throughout offices in Brisbane, Kuala Lumpur, Melbourne, Shanghai, Singapore and Sydney. www.nextdigital.com

In a competitive market for website development, Next Digital has identified that there are customers looking to partner with experienced agencies who can help them take their existing Sitecore website to the next level. In response to this, Next Digital have launched the ’Next Digital Sitecore Service Package’.

Next Digital Solution Architect and Sitecore MVP, Alistair Deneys, said, “Through our experience with Sitecore, we began to see a niche that was yet to be filled. We found, through developing this package, we could help add value to Sitecore clients who either had no further support by their website developer or no ongoing support program from their current provider.”

The Next Digital Sitecore Service Package consists of two parts. The first is an audit to assess the code base and configuration of an existing Sitecore website, the second is an ongoing ‘Maintenance Package’, which provides access to a dedicated team of certified Sitecore developers.

The audit is designed to assess the health, stability and performance of an existing Sitecore website. With over eight years experience and more than 100 Sitecore websites under their belt, Next Digital believes they are in a unique position to provide this service to the market. As part of the audit, Next Digital provides a report which details the audit findings and recommendations to achieve optimum performance.

“This package allows our Sitecore technical team to sit with the client and discuss issues and ideas around building on their current system. This will be of great value to clients who have an issue and don’t know how to fix it or just aren’t getting enough support from their current provider,” said Mr Deneys.

The ongoing ‘Maintenance Package’ provides the client with access to a dedicated team of certified Sitecore developers, capable of providing assistance and support for the long term.

“We aren’t just targeting clients who want to redevelop their website, we are also providing assistance and support to those Sitecore users who are looking to grow their business through this system and build a long term relationship with a trusted partner.” said Mr Deneys.

Next Digital has been a Sitecore partner since 2004 and within that time has helped build over 100 Sitecore websites for more than 30 clients. Next Digital’s Solution Architect, Alistair Deneys, is the only Sitecore MVP that has been awarded twice in Australia and is one of only 57 worldwide.

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For further information or interviews please contact:
Lauren Milne
CP Communications
Phone: 02 9460 9200
Email: lauren@cpcommunications.com.au

About Next Digital
Next Digital is a leader in creating successful digital strategies for clients throughout the Asia Pacific region. They combine exceptional marketing thinking, regional understanding and technical firepower to develop and deliver broad digital programs.

Their love for all things digital has been going strong for more than 16 years. That journey has helped them hone their delivery and engagement approach, and has shaped how they innovate and keep in front of a fast changing digital space.

Next Digital is a true full service digital agency with over 170 talented digital specialists working throughout offices in Brisbane, Kuala Lumpur, Melbourne, Shanghai, Singapore and Sydney.
www.nextdigital.com  

The Performance Network (TPN), a premium performance based advertising network, has launched a co-registration (co-reg) option offering publishers a new revenue stream at the same time as offering advertisers increased customer leads.

Co-reg is a form of online lead generation that involves asking consumers if they would like to opt-in for third party offers when they have signed up on a site, it’s already widely used especially in the UK and USA, however this trend has only recently started to hit the Australian market in a significant way.

By having the option to purchase co-reg via a network advertisers are able to easily take advantage of this more contemporary online marketing tactic to expand their campaign beyond the usual display advertising (banner ads).

Jaysen Du Plessis, Head of TPN, is already seeing more and more advertisers adding this additional component into their marketing mix, as the resulting increase in the advertisers’ return on investment is significant.

“Advertisers are only paying for actual leads they receive rather than paying per ad impression or per click.”

“One of the most frequently asked questions we get from publishers is how can they make more money from their site. Co-reg is a great solution as publishers can earn money on a variety of offers being made on their site and the consumer does not even leave their website,” Mr Du Plessis said.

It is often difficult for publishers to offer co-reg to their advertisers owing to the amount of technical development and campaign management involved to ensure that the information gathered is verified as well as not a duplicated lead already held by the advertiser.

TPN has created an ad platform that manages this whole process as well as offers real time reporting. All a publisher needs to do is copy and paste some code on a page and the network will do the rest.

With co-reg, a relationship is formed between a website publisher and advertiser, where the advertiser can use the consumer information provided to the publisher to communicate directly with the consumer once they give their permission.

As consumers have specifically chosen which offers they are interested in before an advertiser can contact them it means the consumer expects to be contacted, they are genuinely interested in learning more and the advertiser therefore has a higher chance of achieving a conversion or sale.

TPN are offering co-reg campaigns across a range of premium Australian and New Zealand websites and are looking to expand this in 2011. Leads can include email, phone or postal data.

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About The Performance Network (TPN)
The Performance Network (TPN) (a wholly owned subsidiary of Q Ltd ASX:QXQ)  is a premium performance based advertising network offering key benefits to many of Australia’s and new Zealand’s leading advertisers and publishers.

TPN offers a wide range of CPC (Cost per Click), CPA (Cost per Acquisition) and CPL (Cost per Lead) opportunities across display, email, links and co-registration media placements. TPN is committed to maximising advertisers’ response rates and publishers’ earnings via a meaningful, transparent and intelligent engagement with both parties. http://www.tpn.com.au/ & http://www.tpn.co.nz/

 

@www Group Managing Director, Josh Frith said, “We believe ‘above the line’ and ‘below the line’ thinking is out of step with contemporary audiences and marketers need a new approach for increasing engagement with consumers.”

“In the past digital has focused on supporting above the line and below the line. Audiences have made a significant move into social environments and the focus is now on building relationships.”

“@www shifted to reflect this change and we began heavily concentrating on engaging with audiences and aligning brands with this engagement process.”

 “Dubz.tv came about a couple of years ago from our work with media groups in the UK and the need for branded content approaches to incorporate their sponsors from on-air.” 

“The Dubs is simply no longer a traditional web development agency, it hasn’t been for some time – hence why we changed the name; as digital has diversified and stitched deeply into marketing we found far more of our work started with defining strategies rather than just the production approach alone.”

 The Dubs is a long standing indie in the digital industry with offices in Sydney and London. The agency has 15 years experience working with brands, content producers and their audiences such as ING Direct, AMP Capital and Bayer Animal Health in Australia and media groups such as the BBC, ITV and FremantleMedia in the United Kingdom. 

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The Let’s Talk Business seminars kicked off on Tuesday 15 June with a group of SME owners eager to absorb the panel’s best advice on digital marketing strategies.

With the speakers exploring marketing topics including social media, mobile and search marketing-the audience were able to take away concepts they could implement for their own businesses.

The panel on the night included:
Rob Hudson-National Digital Director, George Patterson Y&R
Sally Davies-Digital Capability Manager-Mobile, Sensis
Stuart McKeown-Product Director Search Marketing, Experian Hitwise

For those who were unable to make the first of the Let’s Talk Business seminars below are some of the key lessons business owners learnt on the night.

Social Marketing
Many big companies make the mistake of wanting to broadcast to their customers rather than have a conversation. Small businesses can learn early on that conversation starts by being a good listener and finding out what people are saying about you. Rob Hudson’s top five tips for social marketing include:

Top Tips
1) Don’t sell-nothing is less appealing in social media than someone trying to force a sale on you.
2) Ask questions- this will initiate conversation and help you find out what customers want.
3) Social media is happening all day, every day. Make sure you have the time, money and staff to use social media properly before jumping in. It may be worth outsourcing.
4) Honesty is the best policy. People will find out if you hide behind a mask or are not truthful.
5) Social media is about sparking an interest. Think about what will stimulate conversation and interest people. It doesn’t hurt to create a little bit of friction.

Mobile
Mobile marketing is relatively new and the first step for any SME is to figure out if mobile marketing is right for their business.

People don’t usually browse on a mobile, they use it to search for something they need at the time like a hairdresser, a restaurant, a plumber or even a shoe shop. Therefore a mobile website needs to be simple and to the point, providing the details they need.
 
Mobile needs to be part of an integrated marketing message, it does not work alone. It can link to your main website and be referred to by print as well.

Sally Davies explained that one of the key features of mobile marketing is the fact that we always have our mobile phones on us. A mobile can show the user’s location and this means a marketing message can target the audience based on their location, making the message much more relevant.

A business needs to think about what their customer needs and how they can help them.

Mobile can really bring print ads alive, use a call to action and provide incentives for people to engage with.  As mobile advertising provides such a relevant message, the conversion rate is generally very high.

What to consider before using mobile marketing:
• Is your business right for mobile?
• Who are your customers?
• Choose your call to action
• Choose your level of investment
• Integrate with the rest of your business
• Measure success

Search Marketing
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) can be confusing at first but is essential for building awareness of your brand and gaining exposure on search engines so potential customers can actually find your business when they are looking for the product or services you offer.

We’ve taken some of the best advice offered by Stuart McKeown and ‘translated’ it further for those who have very limited understanding of this important aspect of marketing.

• Include words in your content and title tags that relate to what people are looking for: eg Hairdresser, Randwick
• Backlinks (when someone else’s webpage has a link to your page) search engines use backlink information to decide that your website has authority.
• New websites that lack authority take longer to rank than older websites
• Search engines like good URL structures-avoid long, meaningless URLs
• If you want to change a URL but your page currently ranks well use the 301 redirect. This method keeps the search engine rankings of your old page but redirects people to your new site or page. Learn how to use the 301redirect method
• Search engines look at the ‘anchor text’ of a link to help understand what the website is about. Anchor text is the words used in a hyperlink to explain what the page is about (example 301 redirect above is anchor text) so avoid using ‘click here’ or ‘more’ as a hyperlink as it doesn’t tell the search engines what the page will be about.
• SEO doesn’t provide results immediately it can take a few years for a good ROI (return on investment
• SEO increases brand awareness with searches and allows you to target the right customers with the right keywords.

The City of Sydney Let’s Talk Business series has three more seminars coming up. It’s $50 a ticket and you can find out more information here http://www.letstalkbusiness.nsw.gov.au/

BUILD A BUSINESS ADVISORY TEAM - 6TH JULY 2010: 6-8.30pm
Customs House, 31 Alfred Street, Circular Quay, Sydney
How do you choose and manage your ideal accounting, mentoring and legal team? They could make or break your business. You need objective advice to achieve your goals and trusted advisors to make your business profitable.

WHAT’S YOUR BUSINESS REALLY WORTH? - 3RD AUGUST 2010: 6-8.30pm
Customs House, 31 Alfred Street, Circular Quay, Sydney
What sets apart a high-value business, and how to set your business up to maximise profits and value. Learn what you need to do to maximise what your business is worth.

MEASURE YOUR MARKETING 31ST AUGUST 2010: 6-8.30pm
Customs House, 31 Alfred Street, Circular Quay, Sydney
When you measure your marketing, you can fine tune your efforts to ensure you get the best return on your investments of time and money. Discover the best methods to measure your online and offline marketing spend.