Archive for 2017

Jumping In or Just Dipping Your Toe Into Digital?

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Are you ready to jump in or still wondering how to get started with digital advertising? Are you trying to evaluate whether it should be a more important focus in your marketing plan? With the incredible amount of data for targeting and reporting ROI, digital advertising is easily scalable to increase sales and generate new leads.

With so many mediums to run ads on, it is important to understand each medium and the benefits of going digital. Defined as any kind of marketing that is digitally displayed, common types include:

  • Social Ads
  • Desktop and Mobile Display Ads
  • Search Ads (Google, Yahoo/Bing)
  • Email Marketing
  • Interest-based Gmail Ads
  • Streaming Radio Ads
  • Video Advertising
  • In-Game & In-App Advertising
  • Influencer Marketing
  • SMS and OTT Messaging

No matter what platform, network or medium you choose, the benefits of digital advertising over traditional media are readily apparent.

1.    Audience Micro-Targeting

Go beyond geographic and demographic targeting. From interest-based targeting to placements on sites your audience likes to retargeting, audience segmenting options for digital advertising are truly powerful and unlike other forms of traditional advertising. If you want to reach graduates of UTSA who have pet frogs and drive Mini Coopers, we can probably do that.

2.    Sleuth-Like Tracking

If you can’t measure results of a campaign, how can you determine success? Using pixels, custom URLS and tracking codes, digital advertising can provide crystal-clear clarity into campaign ROI. No need to collect returned postcards or rely on the front desk to ask, “How did you hear about us?”

3.    Real-Time Updates

Unlike most forms of traditional advertising (i.e. direct mail, print, billboards), digital advertising allows for easier optimization over time and at a much lower cost. As you track performance, you can optimize campaigns by adjusting bids, testing new headline copy and updating ad placements. There is no need to wait for the next issue and no cost to “reprint vinyl.”

Setting Your Campaign Up For Success

Many of our clients own mid-sized businesses and don’t have unlimited advertising budgets. When every dollar counts, digital advertising proves to be more flexible, provides a better ROI and demonstrates more reliable tracking mechanisms than traditional mediums. Are you ready to try digital advertising? Let’s talk >

Is Influencer Marketing Right for You?

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How to Find Customers in a Digital World

Social media connects the world and has become such a large part of our everyday lives. It only makes sense that it is the first  place people go for recommendations, advice and endorsements. Enter the social media influencer, also known as Bloggers, Vloggers, YouTubers and Instagrammers. With the right strategy, tapping into these influencers can help drive your brand message to a large group of potential buyers. Do you know how to put influencer marketing to work to meet your goals?

Here are some of the top benefits of working with Influencers.

1.    Connect with an Engaged Audience

The best influencers know their audience and what makes them tick. If you are trying to reach a niche audience, working with an influencer can get your company or product in front of tough-to-find or tough-to-engage audiences with already established credibility. Influencers exist for all kinds of topics and industries, from mommy bloggers to financial experts to IT gurus, and more.

2.    Build Trust with Your Audience

There is an authenticity to influencer marketing unlike other tactics. It’s not the brand speaking to the audience, it is someone that your audience is looking to for information and that they have put their trust in. Aligning with these influencers adds an authenticity to your brand that is harder to come by with purely brand-generated content and advertising.

3.    Enhance a Content Marketing Strategy

For B2B companies, the sales cycle can sometimes last anywhere from 6 to 18 months, with multiple touch points and opportunities to win over a potential buyer. A good content marketing strategy hits each of those touch points with tailored messaging mapped to specific points in the customer journey. Incorporating an Influencer strategy into this process can help add credibility with trusted subject matter experts speaking to the benefits of your product.

4.    Cut Through the Noise of Digital

According to Business Insider, Ad Blocker usage grew by over 30% in 2016. Between this increase, the lack of transparency into ad performance from the major platforms and the increasing competition for real estate in the news feed, finding alternate ways to reach your target audience is now more important than ever.

5.    Capture Higher-Quality Leads

If you’re reaching 11 million people and generating 100 leads but only 2 end up as closed sales, are you finding the right people? Better-targeted audiences, trusted recommendations and higher engagement rates all can help lead to higher quality leads from an Influencer Marketing program compared to other digital and traditional marketing tactics.

As with any new initiative, outlining a plan with clear goals and measurable objectives is the first step to building a successful Influencer Marketing Program. Think this is the right solution for you? Have questions about getting started? Let us help >

How is Your Brand Adapting to the Latest Facebook “Fake News” Changes?

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Did you notice a change this month in how your posts look on Facebook? If you typically adjust the copy and images on web links when you post to Facebook, and are noticing those options are no longer there, then you’ve been caught in the crossfire of Facebook’s war on fake news.

How it Used to Work
When you posted a link to your website on Facebook, you had an option to change the photos and text for the post if you didn’t like what popped up. Unfortunately people abused this feature leading to all sorts of misleading images and “click-bait” style headlines being attached to news articles and other content,. That is what we now know as Fake News.

How it Works Now
Now Facebook auto-generates the headline and copy from the web page or article, without the option to manually change them. However, that doesn’t mean your content strategy is dead. There are steps you can take to get current and work within Facebook’s new system.

What You Can Do
Facebook pulls the information for the posts you create much the same way that Google does when your site shows up in search results. And just like you can optimize your site for search engines, you can optimize the appearance of your links on social media.

There is code that can be added to the back end of your web site to tell Facebook (and other social platforms) which copy and image to use. This code can be preset for the entire website (for example, to pull the top image, or to pull the logo). Or it can be customized on each page, by specifying which image you would like used from a particular page or post (it could be the top image, one from a gallery or one further down the page).

The same kinds of options exist for the copy. You may want to pull in the page title or the headline or the subhead or the first paragraph. Or maybe you want to be able to specify it from page to page.

You have the control to do this, but it isn’t something that you will do through Facebook, it’s something that you will do by updating the code on your website.

Facebook is Just the Start
Facebook led the charge against fake news and they know its affecting legitimate businesses.

“By removing the ability to customize link metadata (i.e. headline, description, image) from all link sharing entry points on Facebook, we are eliminating a channel that has been abused to post false news. We also understand that many publishers have workflows that rely on overwriting link preview metadata to customize how their content appears to audiences on Facebook. We’re committed to a solution that supports them.”
-Facebook Developer Blog

But it’s only a matter of time until other social media platforms like LinkedIn or even Pinterest start putting in these types of restrictions to fight against the spread of fake news. So now’s the time to adjust your strategy . Don’t get caught with bad images and copy on your social links.

Not Sure if This Will Affect Your Business?

  • Do you promote content from your site such as blog posts, news articles or key pages?
  • Do you use paid social advertising to direct traffic to your website?
  • Do you have events that you share or promote via social media?
  • Do you have a social media strategy, or plan to build one in the future?
  • Do you use PR services that promote your company in the news?
  • Do you or any key members of your business write guest Op-Eds, blogs or other pieces of content for other sites?
  • Do other people or businesses regularly link to your website on social media?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, then your business is going to be affected by these changes.

Need Help?
Whether you’re building a new website, or just managing your current one, you should always have a knowledgeable web partner. Firms which aren’t used to providing technical website updates might not know how to make the back end changes that you’ll need to stay up to date with this changing landscape, or how to give the level of control you need from page to page.

If you need any help with your website or social media marketing, please contact us for more information.

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