The market for tag management systems is gaining momentum at an impressive rate. On the surface, tag management is a rather pedestrian topic, focusing on the occasionally arcane and frequently ugly mechanics underlying our websites. Indeed, tag management seems to be worlds apart from the current marketing zeitgeist, which often directs our attention to sexy topics such as social media, tablet computers, and gamification. But if we take a deeper view of current marketing trends, it is clear that the two are actually very closely connected. Digital marketing execution and analysis are heavily dependent on website instrumentation, which by extension benefits from enabling technologies such as tag management.

Ultimately, I think the enthusiasm for tag management systems stems from the simple fact that these solutions address very real and tangible pain points felt by nearly all companies doing business on the Web. I believe that the effective use of tag management technology and governance practices can deliver significant efficiency, performance, and financial gains. And I'm not alone. Since publishing How Tag Management Improves Web Intelligence, I've seen steady and growing interest from Forrester clients on the topic.  

For a relatively young technology segment, tag management is evolving quickly. In a matter of a just a few weeks, we've seen the tag management market take several significant steps forward:

A few days ago, online coupon site Retailmenot.com released results from its inaugural holiday edition Shoppers Trend Report. A combination of consumer trend data pulled from activity on Retailmenot.com and a survey by Ipsos regarding near-term consumer sentiments, the report corroborates much of what Forrester recently predicted for this year’s holiday shopping season:

• Growth in overall retail spend will be positive but small. According to the Shoppers Trend Report, only 11% of consumers surveyed intend to increase their holiday spending.  Similarly, the National Retail Federation (NRF) and Forrester predict the U.S. will see only a marginal increase of 2.8% growth in overall retail spending this holiday season. 
• Coupon use is on the rise. 58% of US online adults say that they are more price-conscious today than they were a year ago.  Not surprisingly, Experian Hitwise has seen downstream traffic from retailers to couponing sites grow 69% in the last three years. Similarly, Retailmenot.com has seen online coupon usage increase 23% in the months leading up to the holiday season.  Seems if there’s a deal lurking out there on the internet, price conscious consumers are out to find it.
• Free shipping is preferred by online shoppers. 59%of US online adults say that they shop online more often with retailers that offer free shipping.  In fact, according to the Shoppers Trend Report, free shipping is the coupon promotional offer most favored by consumers – preferred by 26% of all shoppers.

What do Aetna, the US Army, L’Oreal, and the London 2012 Olympic Games have in common? Each of these diverse organizations has deployed a virtual agent.

Virtual agents are software services that provide automated assistance by simulating a two-way conversation with customers. And they have come a long way from Clippy the dancing paper clip. The technology has demonstrated its ability to achieve business benefits, including improving efficiencies by deflecting calls to the contact center, managing initial customer contact by collecting information to populate a service ticket, and heightening the efficiency of contact reps when a case is escalated to live help

Selecting the right virtual agent vendor can be a complex undertaking because it can have an impact on multiple functional areas, including eBusiness, business processes, IT, customer experience, and, potentially, legal and governance.

To help navigate this process, we have published a new report, Five Essential eBusiness Criteria For A Successful Virtual Agent Vendor Selection.

Unlike traditional keyword search, which focuses on words or word patterns, virtual agents use some form of natural language processing (NLP) that derives intent by utilizing complex algorithms. 

One of the questions that I am most commonly asked by eBusiness professionals is how to assess how well a virtual agent understands conversation. 

2D bar codes are one of the latest “shiny objects” in mobile marketing. And it’s no surprise — with mobile marketing spend increasing and smartphone adoption on the rise, you want to know if it’s time to invest in this mobile marketing tactic. The result?  More and more clients have come to me and said, "I'm working on my QR Code strategy, and . . ."

But in order to answer the questions that come after that statement, I wanted to explore and explain the actual benefits of this tactic (potentially huge), and the actual adoption today (still pretty low).  Here are some of the high-level findings from my research to help you de-code bar codes:

·         2D bar codes have a lot of marketing potential. They can be placed anywhere — allowing you to reach your audience at all stages of the consumer life cycle with targeted information. And they do it efficiently: they connect people with additional content immediately through a scan, require little consumer effort, and can leverage  context to provide more targeted and useful information in the moment.

·         But, consumers aren’t scanning away today. While marketers and companies are starting to dive-in, most consumers aren’t — yet. Adoption increased from 1% last year to 5% this year, and among smartphone owners, penetration is at about 15%. Why isn’t it higher? Because of basic unfamiliarity of what these codes even do, the required step of downloading a 2D bar code reader, and most importantly for marketers to note: disappointing experiences and content.