DigitalBestPracticesPDF

BestPracticesinDigitalMarketing
fortheOilandGasIndustry
The oil and gas industry’s marketing landscape is evolving faster than ever before.
Marketers have access to new digital channels that weren’t available just 10 years ago.
To help you stay in front of the latest digital marketing trends, Hart Energy, in partnership
with Unleaded Communications, Savage Brands and Foster Marketing, collected expert
insights and live campaign data for this white paper.
Partners

2Best Practices in Digital Marketing for the Oil and Gas Industry
Today’s oil and gas marketers have a multitude of mar-
keting channel options as compared to their peers
only a decade ago. Beyond the traditional forms of mar-
keting, such as trade show exhibits, print advertising, and
direct mail, new digital forms have emerged. These new
channels make marketing decisions (and budgets) more
complex, and present a learning curve to understand not
only the newest buzzwords, but how each channel can
affect ROI.
In this paper, we will explain many of the new marketing
channels available to oil and gas marketers, and hear from in-
dustry experts on how methods like native advertising, social
media, geo-targeting, mobile advertising, and video market-
ing work for them.
Native Advertising
To veterans of the oil and gas business, native advertising
is very similar to what was referred to as “advertorials.” In
the past, these took the form of paid placements, designed
to look like an article. Most recently, native advertising has
taken on many different forms.
The current definition of native advertising is different from
the characterization a decade ago. The Interactive Advertis-
ing Bureau (IAB) defines native advertising as “a form of paid
media where the ad experience follows the natural form and
function of the user experience in which it is placed.” The
concept of native advertising has become so complex, the IAB
has developed a set of categories to differentiate between
the different ways it can be used. And within all of those
categories, print advertising does not appear.
The two most prominent places to find native advertising are
search engines and social media. Complex and ever-chang-
ing algorithms can determine users’ likes and dislikes, search
histories, and even geographic locations to generate targeted
native advertising fit for the user. While sometimes viewed
as both a nuisance and an infringement on the privacy of the
user, native advertising has proven to be very successful.
Modern technologies such as digital native advertising,
geo-targeting, and even social media are relatively new in
the oil and gas arena. In many companies, seasoned veterans
are reluctant to adopt these new methods. But as “the great
crew change” continues, younger marketers who have grown
up with these technologies are more than eager to use them.
Ankit Shah, group media director for Houston-based Un-
leaded Communications believes there is room for both
older and new technologies when it comes to oil and
gas marketing.
“I think it depends on the client,” Shah said. “At Unleaded
we are seeing our clients spend more on digital, but there
are, and always will be, clients who still require print, de-
pending on their target audience. Let’s face it; print is not go-
ing away, especially in the B2B environment. When you talk
about oil and gas companies and the need to reach their cus-
tomers, there will always be reliability on trade publications.
BestPracticesinDigitalMarketing
fortheOilandGasIndustry

3 Best Practices in Digital Marketing for the Oil and Gas Industry
I believe that’s still the industry’s main source for receiving
content. It’s not going to go away, but we’re using it as part
of the multichannel process of reaching the end user.”
Sarah Salimi, digital strategist for Savage Brands in Houston,
is one of the new breed of digital marketers. How does she
determine when native advertising and other digital strate-
gies are right for Savage’s clients?
“We look at what a lot of our clients are doing and evaluat-
ing, and then we make sure the two align with the compa-
ny’s goals as a whole. Working from an integrated market-
ing approach and really trying to figure out the best avenues
to achieve their goal is of utmost importance,” Salimi said.
“Often our recommendations leverage quite a bit of digital
marketing, but what we are getting now (since the drop in
oil prices) is a lot of pushback on the spend because it’s still
relatively new within that realm. People don’t necessarily un-
derstand it and they want to learn more before they’re willing
to commit large sums of money to it.”
Still, Salimi and her peers at other agencies are finding that
the clients who are willing to invest in digital are finding suc-
cess, especially when it comes to things like social media.
The following graphic is a good example of native adver-
tising from Forbes online magazine. The article looks like
news, and in fact, does present important facts regarding
pension buyouts. But it is actually paid for by Fidelity In-
vestments, who is quoted heavily within the article. In
addition, the Fidelity logo is there (and clickable), as well
as social media “bugs” to follow Fidelity. And notice that
the Forbes logo stays at the top, giving implied third-
party endorsement.
Social Media
Kristy Bonner, vice
president of digital
services at Foster Mar-
keting is a strong pro-
ponent of social media
marketing in the ener-
gy industry.
“Social media for the
oil and gas industry offers an avenue to reach out to a
broader audience in an instant using various types of con-
tent and an infinite number of messaging options – in a less
expensive way,” Bonner said. “Print and direct mail efforts
can take a great deal of planning, list preparation, creative
work, determining the right method to measure success and
time. Social media channels have built-in measurement
capabilities and a target audience. You can go from idea
to activation much faster. Social media also allows you to
promote a single article, news item or an event quickly and
begin interacting with your customers, prospects and the
press immediately.”
Social media is used in almost every industry now, but most
experts warn that not all forms of social media will fit into
a particular industry. For oil and gas, LinkedIn, Facebook,
and Twitter have the best track record, albeit a fairly short
track record at this point. Other platforms such as Pinterest,
SnapChat, and BuzzFeed are designed more for personal
use, and have limited B2B application.
Source:Forbes

According to Bonner, by leveraging the right social
media channel, marketers can engage customers and pros-
pects. But as with all marketing, it comes down to having
good content.
“Quality content is king in any digital medium, and that espe-
cially goes for social media,” Bonner said. “If you post arti-
cles, videos, photos and updates your audience cares about,
they will engage. The goal is to be really relevant to your
target audience in a way that complements your goals. If you
want to be a thought-leader for all things artificial lift, write
about your challenges and success in that arena – and not
just on your social media channels. Reach out and join the
discussion in groups on LinkedIn, too. And, of course, when
you hit on something that works with your audience, use it.
For some oil and gas companies, it could be video of a test
well; for others, it could be a webinar post with follow-up
questions on your Facebook page after a live event.”
Salimi and Savage Brands take a slightly different track.
“With most of our clients, we don’t typically recommend a
full blown social media push,” Salimi said. “It depends on the
goals, of course.”
Social media can be an incredible tool for oil and gas shows
and events – and these are items you can plan for in your
social media content calendar, according to Foster’s Bonner.
“Plan out pre-show posts with a registration link two weeks
before, reminders and suggestions about what you can see at
the show one week before; and, of course, push your booth
number and press conference/live event schedule,” she said.
“During the show, photos and quick posts using the appropriate
hashtags and @ links should be in your plans, too. Our clients
have had positive feedback that customers found their booth
using Google+ posts and use Facebook to check for in-booth
presentation schedules they’d like to attend. If you are host-
ing an oil and gas event, promote the hashtag (#) so everyone
knows what to include. We saw an incredible social media out-
pouring during LAGCOE’s last show with #LAGCOE2013.”
Salimi noted that Savage Brands has seen much more success
using social media for the HR/Marketing function, especially
with younger, more tech-savvy talent. “We have had a lot more
success with new hire recruitment utilizing social media such
as LinkedIn or the other talent tools that are out there,” she
said. “It’s typically the most successful because the new work-
force tends to look to social media to get results.” But Salimi
points out that LinkedIn isn’t just for recruitment, it can be just
as effective for trade show and new product promotions.
“We definitely use social media in the oil and gas industry
trade show environment,” she said. “For example, before the
show we advocate utilizing LinkedIn mainly because that’s
where a majority of our particular users are right now, given
the type of industry. That’s where we see the most traction.
It’s not Facebook, it’s not Twitter, and it’s not SnapChat. So
we will promote the event on LinkedIn specifically in special
interest groups. If it’s a special type of event, we might tar-
get those groups on LinkedIn and then tie it in with ads you
can purchase on LinkedIn that allow you to get fairly targeted
viewership. There are a lot of things that should go on before
Hart Energy’s DUG conference series

an event. But when people are actually at the event, there
are a lot of different ways to get them. One particular method
we like is geo-targeting.”
Geo-targeting
Geo-targeting is not only a favorite of Savage, but many other
agencies that are at the forefront of the digital revolution.
Geo-targeting technology uses the actual location of a mobile
device, whether it’s a tablet or smartphone, to send notifica-
tions or ads within a certain context or parameter.
There are many different ways you can segment it. The most
popular seems to be based on location. For example, if a pros-
pect or customer is at the Offshore Technology Conference
(OTC), a parameter can be set up around a specific area that
sends notifications such as “come visit our booth and see our
new product.”
To take it one step further, it can be isolated to within feet of
the intended recipient. That is referred to as geo-fencing. It’s a
feature in a software program that uses the global positioning
system (GPS) or radio frequency identification (RFID) to define
geographical boundaries. A geo-fence is a virtual barrier. An
example of usage involves a location-aware device of a loca-
tion-based service (LBS) user entering or exiting a geo-fence,
such as a trade show. Entering that “fence” triggers an alert to
the device’s user as well as messaging to the geo-fence oper-
ator. This info, which could contain the location of the device,
could be sent to a mobile telephone or an email account.
It’s a technology that Shah at Unleaded has embraced.
“The whole idea behind this strategy is that eventually we can
hyper geo-target people who are at a spe-
cific location,” Shah said. “To be able to
target message them directly while they
are at a trade show is phenomenal. With
this software, we can tell when they have
entered an exhibit hall somewhere. All
we need is a specific address so that when a person walks into
the parameters of that address, within say 100 yards, the soft-
ware automatically generates a message saying ‘come to our
booth, you are very close’. We have received great feedback
from the client side when we do things like that. But obviously
the client has to be ready with specific questions and pitches
when the person enters their booth.”
All that is needed by the unsuspecting prospect or customer
is a smartphone, and based on a report this year by the Pew
Research Center, in April, the number of cell phones in America
outnumbers human beings. And that brings up yet another rap-
idly growing method of marketing - mobile.
Mobile Marketing
In addition to the Pew research study, another report released
last summer noted that in August of 2015, mobile advertising
oupaced desktop advertising. Yet another example of how im-
portant it is to reach the oil and gas industry through their mo-
bile devices. Unleaded’s Shah agrees.
“I think mobile marketing is very important in our industry be-
cause it allows for immediacy and location-based targeting un-
like any other form of marketing,” Shah said. “With the release
of the study that showed mobile advertising surpassing desk-
top, it’s looking that by 2018, those numbers could double. In
the end, desktop is not really going to go away, but it’s going to
stall and slowly we will see an even bigger increase in mobile
applications.”
According to Shah, people are actually viewing mobile content
and interacting with it more than on desktop or other appli-
cations. E-commerce has blossomed with the spate of mobile
apps as well.
Site Traic Mobile Device Browser
84.21% non-mobile 50.21% Apple iPhone 45.28% Internet Explorer
15.79% mobile 19.18% Apple iPad 28.66 Google Chrome
Average mobile traffic over a 12-month period for Hart Energy’s Oil andGas Investor,Midstream
Business,E&P and Unconventional Oil and Gas Center websites.

“Take Google for example,” Shah continued. “They’re inter-
ested in having the best user experience possible so they’re
coming in the market and really pushing all of us to make
mobile marketing a first priority. We’ll always have to think
about mobile content in terms of things we want the end user
to do, whether it’s filling out a form, learning about a product,
or providing their email address. Experiences are different
between desktop and mobile. The way you use the devic-
es are completely different. We see more engagement on
the mobile side of things and we use it more for those exact
reasons. Every asset we create has a mobile side to it. Even
if it’s just display banners or a trade publication, we’re also
providing mobile banners because we know the site is not
just being viewed on desktop, it’s also being viewed on smart
phones and tablets.”
All three experts we talked to believe the oil and gas industry
in general is a little behind in adopting mobile technology.
But they feel it’s time clients and others in the industry start
thinking about it, because without addressing the burgeoning
mobile market, they will begin to see lower traffic numbers,
weak engagement, and fewer leads.
And that relates to the generational gap within the oil and
gas industry we discussed earlier. Shah has found that to be
especially true in the mobile genre.
“I think when you talk about the oil and gas industry specif-
ically, the numbers are skewing higher among the millenni-
als and the Gen-Xers than in the other groups,” he said. “A
lot of the audience that we’re going after is younger, but we
also have the older demographic that we’re trying to reach as
well. After all, they are still in the industry, and they might
be the decision-makers. What we’re telling our clients is we
need to be where our audiences are. We need to make sure
we have something integrated, not siloed. We are educating
them, but we’re trying to educate them in terms of this whole
mobile phenomenon, which definitely skews to the younger
side of our client base.”
The change in marketing techniques from traditional meth-
ods to digital doesn’t just affect the clients and end-users;
it has changed the structure and hiring practices of agencies
as well. According to Shah, it’s not only about educating the
clients; it’s about educating internal agency people too. “So
much of it is making sure the internal people know what’s
going on in the overall industry, and making sure we adapt,”
Shah said. “A lot of us have grown up with the traditional
agency setups with art directors, media buyers and tradi-
tional things like that. Smart agencies are investing more
in marketing managers and people who understand digital
much more. Clients are asking more for metrics and track-
ing. Things like ‘how do we do attribution across multiple
channels’ and ‘how can marketing increase our ROI.’ These
are questions that were not asked before, so there’s a need
to hire digitally savvy people.”
Video Marketing
Who isn’t watching video these days, especially with mobile
capabilities? It’s easy to go to YouTube first when you need
information on any topic – whether your dishwasher is broken
or you are trying to set your watch. That applies to the oil and
gas sector as well.
Video has been a marketing tool for decades. But with the
advent of smaller hi-definition cameras, smart phones with
An example of the data available throughYouTube.We encourage our cli-
ents to promote their videos on industry sites and social media channels.

video capability, and sites like YouTube, video has surged in
popularity - specifically within the energy industry. Produc-
tion costs have dropped drastically due to the availability of
quality cameras, and marketers are thinking more about their
target audiences’ likes and dislikes. In short, the whole genre
of marketing-based videos has changed, starting with how
long a video should last, and where it should be placed.
Foster Marketing’s Bonner has a simple formula that has
worked for her firm. “For YouTube videos, I aim for two minutes
or less,” she said. “Like any post, videos should complement a
company’s image and brand standards. Providing information is
powerful, and adding a bit of polish to your videos doesn’t hurt.
The key is to see what works best for your company and audi-
ence. For example, if your people are your key assets, briefly
sharing stories of how your company helped a customer could
work well. Also, don’t underestimate the potential of a video
demonstration done in your yard or warehouse. I’ve watched
a few live presentations that used these ‘home-made’ demo
videos. If you can get a room of 100 people to “ooh and ahh”
over a video, get it on YouTube as fast as you can.”
Unleaded’s Shah agrees video is a very powerful way to go
when developing a marketing plan for clients. “More and
more we’re talking to our clients about creating a video se-
ries, whether it’s educational or how-to videos,” Shah said.
“Those are very important for this type of oil and gas audi-
ence. Typically they are not in their office, they are on the go
working on projects. The challenge is how do we let them
know we have the best product? I think when you do educa-
tional or instructional videos about the product, you see a lot
more engagement than with standard display ads or standard
mobile ads.”
With new tracking software, as well as a different form of
geo-tracking specifically for videos, it’s easy to identify who
is watching your video and for how long.
There are programs available that can tell you how many
people clicked on the video, what percentage of the video
was watched, what action was taken upon completion, how
many pages (if any) were visited as a result of the video, and
if viewers went to a search engine to look for that specific
product later.
“The software can attribute these actions back to the initial
impression, said Shah. “That’s the kind of measurement we’re
giving our clients. It’s not just about a click; it’s much more
than that. It’s about who gets on your landing page after seeing
Set Video to Auto-play
While you may see a slight drop in
viewership at the beginning, auto-play
will deliver better engagement over time.
Auto-play will not work on all mobile
devices, so you will typically see more
impressions than you will actual video
views. he variation will become more
signiicant if your site is optimized for
mobile devices.
Video Length
Of Hart Energy’s top 30 videos, we
found the optimal video length was 2:15.
his is based on the overall engagement
score, the number of times the video was
viewed, and viewership at key thresholds
such as 50% completion of the video. In
essence, this best practice, coupled with
other recommended approaches will
maximize the likelihood that viewers will
watch your entire video.
Call to Action
When incorporating a call to action in
your messaging, never rely exclusively on
the post roll/end of your video to include
your message. More often than not, once
a viewer reaches the end of the video/
credits, they will instinctively drop of.
Video Marketing Best Practices

that first impression and what they do after that point. It’s no
longer about a click-through rate anymore. The important thing
now is how many people actually engaged with the content or
did what we asked them to do, even if that was three or four
impressions later? The technology and programs are there for
us to be able to track all that and attribute where they first saw
the ad and first learned about the product.”
“People aren’t really clicking on ads anymore, which is why
we don’t put a lot of emphasis on click-through rate,” Shah
said. “They may see a video and go back later or even look up
the name of the company on a search engine, and we will still
be able to track where it initially came from, not necessarily
from clicking on an advertisement.”
According to research by Smart Insights, in 2015, the average
click-through rate for a display banner and B2B advertising
is 0.06%, so over 99% of the people don’t click on ads. That
compares to the very first banner ad (placed by AT&T on Hot-
Wired in 1994), which had a 44% click through rate. Clicks
have been declining steadily for the past seven years. Ac-
cording to Shah, viewers may look at an ad to see what the
company is trying to promote, and if they’re interested, they
may go to a search engine or they may go directly to the web-
site. The agency can see that, based on the impression that
was delivered through the ad server.
The tracking of those potential customers is not only import-
ant, but fairly easy to do with today’s technology. If a person
is working offshore and clicks on a video but doesn’t get to
watch the entire thing using his mobile phone, he may wait
until he gets back on shore. If he then watches the remain-
der of the video on his own computer or tablet at home, he
can still be identified as one unique user since technology
allows companies to identify several different things such as
IP address, cookie-level data, behavior on the site, and social
profile. The programs do the best job they can to manage all
the data to determine if it was the same person looking at
the video.
Savage’s Salimi has a simpler view of the effectiveness of
video.
“We use video quite a bit,” she said. “Typically if it’s not on
the website first, we might have a larger video at a trade
show exhibit to show a product demonstration or the value
proposition if it’s a product launch. It really depends on the
client as to how we are using video, but it does add tremen-
dous value. In today’s society we are all about instant gratifi-
cation. We want it to be quick and we want it to be concise,
and video seems to be the best method to get that. People
aren’t sitting and reading multiple pages of the website any-
more. We have to find ways to deliver the same content but
in a better way, and videos are a key tool in doing that.”
But in the end, it’s all about leads and sales, and Bonner
knows that any campaign, digital or otherwise, must be done
right and measured well.
Hart Energy evaluated the top 20 banner advertising
campaigns across Oil and Gas Investor, E&P, Midstream
Business, and Unconventional Oil and Gas Center websites.
Here are best practices we identiied.
Static Versus Motion:
We did not see higher click through rates for ads created with
motion compared to static ads.
Call to Action:
To maximize engagement, we recommend including a call to
action or incentive for interaction. Examples include: watch
our video, receive a white paper, learn more about our product/
ofering, win a prize/giveaway.
Font Size:
Viewers are attracted to ads with large font and clear, concise
messaging. Avoid text-heavy ads.
This chart demonstrates average ClickThrough Rates (CTR) by ad size/
position.Many of our clients’ campaigns outperform these averages.
Average Click hrough Rate by Position Type:
Interstitial/Roadblock: .96%
Leaderboard: .11%
Top Medium Rectangle: .09%
Lower Medium Rectangle: .058%

“Measuring success in any digital effort is always a hot
topic of debate for the oil and gas sector,” said Bonner.
“Showing click-throughs, trafﬁc numbers and impressions,
new visitors, followers and likes does not necessarily equal
ROI. Most of us don’t have an online cart to instantly mea-
sure sales. That said, I recommend monitoring trends over
time. For example, a one-week boost in Twitter followers
is good, but the real goal is steady and continued growth
within in your target audiences. Likes are good and show
you are interacting with your followers but a better goal is
quality feedback. I value quality versus quantity when mea-
suring success. When you post a photo with a message on
LinkedIn about a successful project recently completed in
North Dakota and someone posts a comment saying they
have personally used your company and highly recommend
your services; that is gold in my book.” n
Kristy Bonner
Vice President, Digital Services
Sarah Salimi
Digital Strategist
Ankit Shah
Group Media Director
hank you to the following subject-matter experts who provided
valuable insights in this white paper

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