I’m no stranger to Customer Experience. I’ve been helping companies improve their relationships with their customers for 10 years now. And every time, I see ecommerce operations view their business as fragmented marketing tactics instead of appreciating the holistic buyer’s journey.  The key to success is in cultivating a relationship with your customers and, just like with a romantic partner, recognizing that this relationship is built on countless emotional touchpoints. These interactions build a sense of security and loyalty, both on a subconscious and conscious level, which are crucia ..read more

This morning I woke up to a fresh, thin layer of snow covering the neighborhood. Central Minnesota has been unusually dry this year, so even this small amount of snow was a pleasant surprise.  Every time it snows I’m reminded of how many wild critters can be found roaming around right outside my front door every night, living their nocturnal lives while I sleep. My patio out front is covered with little footprints; no human prints in sight. I asked ChatGPT what animal it thinks these tracks might belong to. Its best guess was a coyote, fox, and cat. I’m sure my cats know them well, p ..read more

The one constant of D2C marketing is change, and companies are always looking for the next strategy that will give them an edge. Sometimes, everything old is new again: Despite the now, now, now, move fast and break things ethos so common to many D2C initiatives, occasionally the most potent tactics are those that have been around for eons—albeit with a fresh digital twist to boost their relevance to today’s discerning customers. The work I do with our clients every day makes it clear that consumers crave authenticity and connection. If you want to turn your audience into passionate fans, you ..read more

eCommerce growth soared in 2021, reaching a global peak of $28.5 trillion as Covid-19 forced consumers online to engage with brands in new ways. While many companies embraced this, overzealous growth efforts also contributed to hiring efforts at scale to grow seemingly unprepared eCommerce teams on the brand side. With an acclimation to the new-normal, growth has slowed into 2022 and beyond. This is, in part, due to consumers returning to previous buying behaviors offline, large layoffs from feverish hiring efforts, rising inflation to counter market stimulation during the pandemic, and, geo-p ..read more

The good, the bad, and the super confusing… Since January, Google has rolled out 44 GA4 updates, as listed on their ‘What’s New‘ page. These releases ranged from impactful improvements to tone-deaf updates, stirring both celebration and frustration within the community. Yet, it’s undeniable that this year has been a whirlwind of excitement for Google Analytics. Here’s my rundown of the Top 5 improvements and Top 5 duds from the 2023 Google Analytics ‘What’s New’ list Top 5 Improvements:   1. Custom Channel Groupings (Mar 14) – A key limitation of GA4 in its early stages was the infle ..read more

GA4 Migration and Session-Level Data Challenges: We are now about six months into the big GA4 migration. At this point we’ve settled into what we can and can’t do. But there is still more discomfort than what we’d hoped for six months into a new product. One of the biggest issues is the lack of session-level information. The system was not built with sessions in mind and some may argue that’s fine. But a lot of times, you want to understand how particular campaigns are working at the moment. For instance, how are your Black Friday efforts doing on, you know, Black Friday? This data is really h ..read more

The death of Google Optimize is upon us. And wowee, aren’t you a little bit heartbroken. Gone are the days where you’ll be able to switch a button on your website from red to green and run a mindless A/B test. Now you have to pay $60,000 annually for that. But wait! What if I told you that you can continue to run A/B testing FOR FREE, leveraging tools that are probably already on your website. Would you pay me $60,000? How about $2? I’ll take it… Now don’t get me wrong, you should absolutely invest in an A/B testing platform. They have a butt-ton—(can I say butt-ton?…no? Ok how about boatload ..read more

Picture this – you’re searching for the best possible mattress. There are potentially thousands of options, all touting a specific approach to giving you a perfect night’s rest. But where do you start? Most likely, you’ll use a search engine or maybe click on an ad in your social feed. You’ll come across educational content from a review site or a trusted voice in the mattress industry: someone who’s reviewed a range of mattresses in terms of price, comfort, and a brand’s attention to customer service. If that educational content or review is genuinely helpful, you won’t feel pandered to. You ..read more

Contrary to what seems to be popular belief: links still move the needle. They don’t even have to be great links (I’m not saying they shouldn’t be), I’m just saying they don’t have to be. But first a bit of background. If you run through signal analysis from many of the trusted sources in SEO, you’ll notice a link-based theme: MOZ’s 2015 ranking factors survey list of most influential factors on Google’s ranking algorithm: Source Backlinko’s study of over 1 million Google search results: Source  SearchMetrics 2015 Google Ranking Factors Study: Source  All the studies make the ..read more

The quality of the traffic you’re generating is one of the most important metrics to assess when analyzing your demand generation efforts. You may drive tons of users, but if no one is converting, your money is being wasted. Even when they do convert online, the other half of the journey still needs to be completed offline. In this webinar with From the Future’s Head of Analytics, Josh Silverbauer, to discuss the importance of data as it relates to the user journey. Learn how to avoid blindspots to make better performance-based marketing decisions. Download The Presentation! Have any questions ..read more