Cloud marketing involves migrating marketing assets to an existing customized portal. Once online, authorized parties can create, modify, use and share these assets accordingly, based on the set requirements of the business. Most people do not have ample time and sufficient resources to do their own marketing. This means that the availability of an automated system, with unlimited marketing resources, can help to get more work done within the least time possible and without worry of the resources to use because they are provided in cloud computing system. Generally, this marketing approach involves two parties or channels – your business and a third party. In its simple definition therefore, it is traditional marketing plus software as a service. The technique is quite simple. Since most of the work is already done for you by the third party, all you need to do is focus on what will make your business a success. Usually, the vendor will provide you an access to their portal and update their end. You will then get information and place it on your website. Content may be already automated by the time it reaches the VAR websites. In this marketing technique, each partner has effective time to market, a custom control to meet their specific relationship with the vendor and the freewill to select the bit of information they want to appear on their business websites automatically. Cloud marketing technique has three main advantages. First, it enables businesses to use limited budget and reach their marketing target successfully. Secondly, if you are a marketer with the largest channel presence, you will be able to come in and capture a larger portion of the market. Lastly, it helps to limit the encroachment of the competitor and allows your business to capture its market share with ease. A standard cloud marketing solution has advanced metrics and analytics that makes it easy for businesses to monitor their marketing efforts across the channel. The Benefits of This Marketing Approach You do not expect cloud marketing approach to be similar to traditional marketing. The evolution, change and advancement in technology have made it easier for people to do business across various platforms. Almost everyone involved in business, at some point even without his or her knowledge, has used a cloud computing system to do business. Facebook and Gmail, for instance, are great examples of cloud computing systems that make it easier for businesses to market their brands successfully. Some of the benefits of marketing your brand using this marketing approach include the ability to save time and money, increasing sales value hence the profits and reducing the general operational costs of marketing. The technique also makes it easy for businesses to implement their marketing campaigns, establish seamless communication and maintain consistent messaging throughout the business marketing lifecycle. The technique also helps to eliminate competitor encroachment because you are able to capture a larger portion of the market than you would with traditional marketing alone.

Creating a Cloud Marketing Strategy

Cloud systems have become quite famous and useful in modern businesses. Expectations are high regarding these systems. Their ability to deliver value while reducing operational costs can never be underestimated. However, you need a professional and useful strategy to make Cloud Marketing technique useful for your business. Below are list of ideas that can help you create one of the most effective marketing strategy in the remaining part of 2014. Planning for Hybrid Architecture Experts argue that cloud computing needs to mature more to be able to take on all business application. Your strategy should therefore focus on selecting a hybrid architecture that provides agility as well as security. It is obvious that the speed of deployment, customization and subscriptions always attract many businesses to the cloud. However, do not be fooled into believing that all cloud system are safe, at least they are not. In fact, despite the speed factor, the difficult problem of licensing, legacy system integration and security actually slows the adoption of the cloud system. Do not trust every cloud system. Before you move your entire Information Technology system to the cloud, develop a strategy that will help you assess the security and authenticity of the system and thereafter, make a decision based on your findings. Reorganizing Your Information Technology System Your strategy should include a plan to reorganize your entire Information Technology system. This will deliver a greater business agility and support in your marketing force. Doing this makes you business more strategic, making it possible for you to grow the business from time to time. It is important to note that you are reorganizing your Information Technology System to be more service driven and not entirely technology based. This will help to deliver the right information and intelligence to your enterprise as a whole. Recruit, Train & Retain Cloud Specialists The cloud system is huge and there is more to it than you can handle on your own. You will need help to manage your marketing tasks in one way or another and finding specialist who can help you manage your marketing activities is essential. With thousands of professionals out there, it should not be difficult to find engineers, support and service professionals, developer and other specialists who can help make your business activities on the cloud a success. Include in your plan how you intend to manage this team and what the core values of the business will be. Focus entirely on making your marketing sale to the targeted audience, now just growing a huge marketing channel. Have a Plan to Build Software as a Service Review Building a Saas (Software as a Service) framework will help to deliver a greater transparency by the vendors. The framework should include security and multitenancy audits. Make sure your framework includes a Service Level Agreement. However, it is important to note that that SLA (Service Level Agreement) might be a bit of a challenge due to the inflexibility of many vendors. Because of this inflexibility, it is highly unlikely that vendors will agree to or comply with the Service Level Agreement. However, make sure that your Cloud Marketing platform has an ISO 27001 certification and a Statement on Standards Attestation Engagements. This is the only way to show that the investor is making investments in security and performance levels with a killer cloud marketing strategy.