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Tag : zoho marketing

ZBrains Omnichannel Personalization

Zoho Analytics: Customize Marketing for Omnichannel Personalization

Zoho Analytics is a powerful tool for businesses looking to achieve omnichannel personalization in their marketing strategies. As a cloud-based business intelligence and analytics solution, companies can easily create insightful reports, dashboards, and visualizations. 

With features such as pre-built connectors, dynamic dashboards, and more, Zoho Analytics aids marketers in making better decisions on how to allocate resources for optimizing campaigns across multiple channels. Here, we’ll take a look at how to put it to good use by building an omnichannel marketing dashboard based on best practices we’ve observed working with ZBrains’ clients.

How does Zoho Analytics enable Omnichannel Personalization?

Zoho Analytics offers an easy-to-use, drag-and-drop builder that allows marketers to create custom dashboards with powerful visualizations, enabling omnichannel personalization. The platform includes several features that make it an ideal tool for creating an omnichannel marketing dashboard, including:

  • Pre-built connectors to quickly and easily connect data from multiple sources
  • Dynamic dashboards and drill-down reports, enabling marketers to slice and dice their data in real-time
  • Role-based access control, allowing organizations to manage who can access and edit dashboards
  • Automated data refresh, making it easy to maintain up-to-date reports
  • Advanced analytics with powerful AI capabilities for predicting future trends

However, Zoho can’t do it all on its own. For example, data from external sources must be connected to the platform before it can be used in dashboards. For this reason, it’s essential to understand the data sources available and how to connect them to Zoho.

How to Connect Data Sources for Omnichannel Personalization Using Zoho Analytics

Zoho Analytics provides a wide range of pre-built connectors that allow marketers to quickly and easily connect data from multiple sources.

To start, log in to your Zoho account and click the ‘Data Sources tab. Here, you’ll find a list of all the supported data sources and instructions on how to connect them.

Once the data sources are connected, you can begin creating your dashboard. Zoho Analytics provides several drag-and-drop options allowing marketers to create custom dashboards quickly. You can also use templates and widgets to customize the dashboard further.

Pulling Data From Multiple Sources With Zoho

Once your sources are connected, the next step is to combine data from multiple sources within your dashboard. 

To do this, select the data sources from which you want to pull data and then drag and drop them into the dashboard. You can customize the visuals using widgets, charts, and other elements.

Metrics to Track Using Omnichannel Personalization Reporting

Depending on your omnichannel strategy, there are several different metrics you may want to track in your dashboard.

SEO and Website Metrics

Key metrics to track:

  • Organic Traffic
  • Bounce Rate
  • Conversion Rate
  • Conversion Volume
  • Time on Site

You may also want to use Zoho Analytics to track the SEO performance of your content and campaigns (i.e., keywords, topic authority, backlinks, etc.), as this will help you understand how well your content is performing in terms of search engine rankings.

Social Media Metrics

Key metrics to track:

  • Total Dollars Spent (by campaign)
  • Number of Leads
  • Percent Junk (i.e., spam)
  • Cost per Click (CPC) (by campaign)
  • Cost per Lead (by campaign)
  • Revenue Generated (by campaign)
  • Return on ad spend (RoAS)

To get a complete picture of social media performance, you should monitor qualitative metrics like sentiment and user engagement. These metrics can be a little harder to measure but can provide valuable insights into the success of your campaigns.

SEM Metrics

Since many SEM activities are paid, they share some overlap with the metrics tracked for paid social media campaigns. The essential KPIs include:

  • Cost per Click (CPC)
  • Total Dollars Spent
  • Revenue Generated
  • Return on Ad Spend (RoAS)

Zoho Analytics can also help you monitor the cost and quality of the clicks you get for omnichannel personalization. This includes metrics like ad relevancy, click-through rate (CTR), impression rate, and keyword relevance. You can also compare your ad metrics against your SEO and web conversion metrics to determine whether or not your ads are worth the money.

Traditional Media

Finally, traditional media includes channels like television, radio, print, and out-of-home (OOH) advertising. Businesses can track metrics like budget spent, impressions, reach, and audience engagement in their dashboard.

Mostly traditional media outlets are mainly used for PR campaigns. These KPIs measure brand awareness and reach, ad recall, cost-effectiveness, and overall ROI.

Tips for a Successful Implementation and Choosing What to Track

Here are a few tips to ensure you get started on the right track with your new omnichannel dashboard:

  1. Start by mapping out your objectives. Could you identify the KPIs you want to track and ensure they align with your business and marketing goals?
  2. Choose data sources wisely. You can select only the seeds that will give you the most valuable insights into your marketing efforts.
  3. Use the proper connectors and integrations. Depending on the platform you are using for your dashboard, you may need to configure special connectors or integrations to pull data.
  4. Identify key performance indicators for each channel. Each channel should have its own set of KPIs, so could you make sure to track the right metrics?
  5. Create a dashboard that is user-friendly and informative. Could you ensure the dashboard is easy to navigate, understand, and use?
  6. Automate where possible. Automation can save you time and ensure the accuracy of your data.
  7. Avoid tracking too many KPIs. Too many metrics mean more work, so focus on the most critical KPIs for your business.

Some of the most commonly used Analytics connectors include Facebook Ads, Facebook Custom Audiences, Google Ads, Google Analytics, and LinkedIn Ads. Specific integrations you might want to consider having: 

  • VoIP: Integrating with VoIP services can help you track phone calls and conversations, mainly if your organization uses a service like RingCentral or Aircall.
  • Integrations with ESPs: Integrating with email marketing service providers (ESPs) like MailChimp, Constant Contact, and SendinBlue will allow you to track the performance of your email campaigns (if you aren’t managing your email marketing within Zoho).
  • Callrail: This call-tracking software helps you analyze the performance of your calls and conversations.
  • Clearbit: Integrating Zoho with Clearbit can help you get enriched data about your customers, such as job titles and social profiles.
  • ZoomInfo: This contact database aggregates publicly available data on businesses and people. Integrating with ZoomInfo can help you get insights into your target market.

Lastly, omnichannel personalization using Zoho Analytics is a way to boost customer satisfaction and drive sales.

We understand that setting up an omnichannel marketing dashboard in Zoho Analytics can be daunting. That’s why ZBrains is here to help. Our experienced professionals can guide you through the entire process, from data integration and customization to dashboard creation and optimization.

With ZBrains expertise, you can better understand your customer’s behavior and preferences and use that knowledge to deliver personalized experiences that drive engagement and loyalty. Please get in touch with us today to learn more about how we can help you achieve your marketing goals with Zoho Analytics.

Marketing team planning a campaign

Choosing the Right Zoho App or Module for Your Marketing Automation

We get this question all the time at ZBrains: what is the difference between Zoho CRM Campaigns, Zoho Campaigns, and Zoho Marketing Automation? 

Although the names of these apps and modules are all quite similar, each has its own unique strengths. Let us take a closer look at how to use each resource, as well as the situations where it makes sense to use one over another:

What are the Marketing Features Offered by Zoho CRM Campaigns?

The Zoho CRM Campaigns module brings marketing automation features directly into your Zoho CRM to help you track the success of your sales and marketing campaigns. Depending on your business, that might mean measuring the number of deals, sales, or orders generated from a campaign. 

In any case, this module is mostly about marketing attribution, and Zoho gives you 6 algorithm modules to choose from:

U-shaped attribution and the time decay model–which attributes the most ROI to the last campaign someone was active in–are pretty standard choices for B2B businesses, while first-touch attribution is often more appropriate for small sales. Whatever you choose, all you have to do is pick the model, hit ‘Save’, and Zoho does all of the work for you.

As a note, although you can make campaigns manually in Zoho CRM Campaigns, you might not need to if you are using the Zoho Campaigns app or Zoho Marketing Automation. You also should not use Zoho CRM Campaigns to send mass email campaigns. The module does limit sending to 1,000 messages per day, but because the messages are sent from your own domain, you risk incurring penalties from Google for sending that kind of volume.

Zoho Campaigns

The Zoho Campaigns app is an email service provider (ESP) that is built to help businesses send marketing emails at scale, legally. Think of it like Mailchimp, Constant Contact, or other similar email marketing tools.

In addition to providing the standard email builder features you would expect from an email marketing solution, Zoho Campaigns gives you the option to create new campaigns in Zoho CRM Campaigns simultaneously. To set this up:

  • Click ‘Advanced Options’ inside your Zoho Campaign
  • Find the toggle labeled ‘Create campaign in Zoho CRM’
  • Toggle it to the ‘on’ position and save your changes

Then, if you log back into your Zoho CRM Campaigns, you should see your email or social campaign in your list. 

You will still need to create phone and direct mail campaigns manually, as Zoho Campaigns and Zoho Marketing Automation focus on top-rated digital marketing company. But once you have your campaigns fully integrated between the 2 apps, Zoho Campaign activities can be recorded in your CRM records, helping your salespeople better understand your contacts’ engagement.

Another key point about Zoho Campaigns and Zoho Marketing Automation is that they do not send from your mail servers (even though you use the authorization to on your DNS). Zoho Campaigns also sends emails in batches–typically smaller batches to warm up the IP of whatever server they are being sent from–so that they have a much higher chance of getting into recipients’ inboxes.

Zoho Marketing Automation

Finally, there is Zoho Marketing Automation. Going beyond the kinds of email, SMS, and social campaigns found in Zoho Campaigns, Marketing Automation adds autoresponder campaign types including:

  • Sign-up
  • Date-field
  • Closed Group
  • Calendar
  • Email-action
  • Smart Series
  • Lead Nurturing
  • Cyclic

These different autoresponder types are based on contact actions and other triggers. For example, a Smart Series autoresponder is like a newsletter–contacts can be added midway through a campaign, and they will receive new messages as they are added. 

With a Lead Nurturing campaign, on the other hand, email addresses are added directly to the autoresponder. Once they are warmed up, they are thrown over the fence into Zoho CRM for follow-up by sales.

The process of working with Zoho Marketing Automation looks very similar to Zoho Campaigns, but when you go to a ‘Journey’ in Marketing Automation, you will see that there are a lot more actions to choose from than with the comparable workflows in Campaigns. There are more entry points, more lead score calculation options, and more end-of-journey actions–it is just a more robust builder overall.

For these reasons, Zoho Marketing Automation is more comparable to a platform like Marketo or Pardot, while Zoho Campaigns is really meant for simpler campaigns built around email, social, or SMS.

Choosing the Right Zoho Marketing Solution

While there are plenty of other differences between Zoho CRM Campaigns, Zoho Campaigns, and Zoho Marketing Automation, the features highlighted above should give you a sense of when to use each:

  • Use Zoho CRM Campaigns to monitor campaign performance, but build your campaigns in Zoho Campaigns instead, where possible.
  • Use Zoho Campaigns to automate email, social, and SMS campaigns without compromising deliverability.
  • Use Zoho Marketing Automation when you need more complex autoresponders than can be achieved with Zoho Campaigns alone.

Any other questions about these tools? Reach out to the team at ZBrains if you have questions or need clarification.