Customer retention gains momentum with India marketers

Customer retention shows a sharp increase as a marketing goal in the 2015 edition of Octane India Annual e-Marketing Study.  While a majority of marketers still vote for customer acquisition as their primary marketing goal, customer retention has witnessed an 80 per cent growth since 2011.

Some other key findings of this annual research study are: 

• Top 3 marketing investment areas for India marketers in 2015 include social media marketing, websites & email marketing

• Content marketing is earning its place with India marketers, where 61 per cent marketers believe'blogs and newsletter' is the most effective content marketing tool. However for education (63%), retail & e-commerce (71%) and travel (55%) sectors, social media acts like a more robust tool for content marketing

• India marketers report increased brand exposure as the leading benefit of social media campaigns. Lead generation from social media is reported lowly at No. 5 in terms of benefits/Social Media ROI.

• Around 57 per cent India marketers think that in 2015 integrated campaigns will lead to'significant impact' on conversion rates, this shift saw an increase of 84 per cent(57 per cent in 2015 vs 31 per cent in 2011) over the last five years.

• Mobile marketing continues to grow, where 40 per cent India marketers think that over 50 per cent of emails in 2015 will be viewed on mobile devices, seeing a YoY growth of 25 per cent.

• Over the last two years, marketers are getting more dependent upon their ESPs (Email Service Providers) for their campaign success, seeing a growth of 70 per cent since 2012.

Octane has released the fifth edition of its Annual India e-Marketing Study and it captures key trends on how online marketing in India has changed over the last four years (2011 - 2014) and predicts what India marketers are planning for 2015 in-terms of strategy, budgets and plan for online marketing.  These insights are derived from a study with an active participation of 465+ India marketers from 399 organizations and 12 industry verticals and notably the support of Industry associations - DMAi, IAMAI and RAI. Commenting on its release, Punit Modhgil, Managing Director & Co-founder, Octane Marketing, said, "Digital in India has arrived. In 2015, it is no longer the future. Therefore, the theme of this year's report reflects upon how online marketing is indeed the DNA of India marketing plans.”

The study report also looks at the forecast for India online marketing for 2015, in-terms of specific trends and predictions for 2015. According to Modhgil, "Digital 1:1 marketing (Email and SMS) is growing in India, with BFSI and retail sectors at the forefront of employing this technique for greater marketing ROI. Additionally, more India marketers feel that integrated campaigns have a significant impact on campaign success with more and more marketers deploying such campaigns.”