Zoosk on Mobile Marketing Metrics, Creatives, Opportunities and Defining Goals
Guest Blog: Katherine Knight was formerly Director of Marketing at Zoosk, where she had been responsible for both user acquisition and brand marketing for the past four years.
Katherine got her start in mobile marketing as a country manager at Zoosk, overseeing user acquisition in Spain. Her language skills (fluent in both Spanish and Portuguese) and knowledge of international markets helped get her foot in the door. Within a year of starting she had grown her market portfolio to five countries, including Brazil, and led an initiative to grow Zoosk’s global presence on native mobile ad placements.
ON METRICS
“What is the goal?” is the first question a marketer should ask before running any campaign. It sounds simple, but in a world of seemingly infinite amount of metrics one could potentially look at, establishing the right KPIs aligned with your business goals is the first critical step before spending your marketing dollars.
ON CREATIVES
Many times, performance marketers overlook or underestimate the importance of ad creative. Successful marketers know that creative is critical for the success of any campaign. In my personal experience, the human mind never ceases to, well, blow my mind, and you’ll never know if a creative “works” until you test it out.
Bottom line: Test or die. A strategy that has worked for me is to implement two types of testing: (1) A/B testing of key creative elements like CTAs, copy, etc., and (2) concept testing. I’ve seen marketers make the mistake of getting obsessed with testing small ad details while forgetting to refresh their creative and test larger concepts. Stale creative not only kills your CTRs but often leads to negative ad-feedback from potential customers. Keep it fresh and you’ll reap the rewards!
Learn more about Katherine from her Mobile Heroes profile.
ON OPPORTUNITIES
Everyone knows the saying, “curiosity killed the cat,” but what most don’t know is that there’s a rejoinder to that proverb, “but satisfaction brought it back,” which completely changes the meaning. In my opinion, a curious mindset is critical for success in mobile marketing; it’s the lack of innovation and curiosity that will actually kill you, or at least limit your success as a mobile marketer!
My biggest learning in this business is that what works today won’t necessarily work tomorrow, and what once worked in the past might work again. And so I am always exploring new channels, new partners, new creative and new opportunities, and testing them all.
THE LAST WORD
Establish your goals. Test or die. Innovate like your (professional) life depends on it.