WebProNews

Category: DigitalAgencyPro

News and trends in the world of digital marketing for agency insiders.

  • Brands Are Waking Up to the Inevitable of Selling on Amazon

    Brands Are Waking Up to the Inevitable of Selling on Amazon

    “Ecommerce is essentially digital disruption,” says David Spitz, ChannelAdvisor CEO, at the recent Retail (R)evolution 2018 conference. “If you are a brand or retailer and you are in that supply chain, or flow of commerce, digital disruption for ecommerce is like what Netflix did to Blockbuster. There’s a lot of retail disruption. The alternative of being able to click and get products very quickly, where you can now get deliveries in as little as an hour, makes the value proposition of getting in your car and going to the store very diminished.” Spitz says this leaves retailers looking for what they can do to remain relevant.

    He says that if you are a brand, manufacturer or CPG type company the path to the consumer is changing very rapidly. “In the US, ecommerce is still only 10 percent of total retail spend,” notes Spitz. “Most companies are still driving 90 percent of their revenue through the traditional retail channels, but the growth is in that (ecommerce) 10 percent. The path to the consumer is changing and it’s creating a new world order with the landscape shifting very rapidly.”

    Spitz is focused on the challenges of retailers. “I’ve spent a lot of time talking to a variety of brands such as paint manufacturers, tire manufacturers, apparel companies, etc. They are in this interesting crossroads because the bulk of their revenue still comes from the traditional retail channel and those are partnerships that are important to them and they don’t want to upset those partnerships. On the other hand, if you look at the rate of growth of Amazon, they are approaching half of US ecommerce. It continues to grow at roughly twice the rate of the industry so it’s not hard to imagine waking up in a world where Amazon accounts for 60-75 percent of US ecommerce.”

    If you are a brand, how do you reach those consumers? “Consumers are saying this is how I like to shop, it’s an easy app, I click and know I’m going to get the product quickly,” says Spitz. “Last summer, Nike decided to start selling on Amazon, and Nike had resisted selling on Amazon for the last 10 years. I think there was some dawning realization at some point that this is how customers want to shop. So a lot of these brands see it as inevitable, that’s how consumers like to shop and why make life hard for your customers?”

    “I think that channel mix conflict is very much real for brands but at the end of the day, the customer is what matters the most. If the customer says this is how I want to purchase your product if you are a brand you have to listen to that.”

    New world order indeed…

  • The Rise of the Connected Marketer

    The Rise of the Connected Marketer

    Recently, at the IAB Digital Summit 2018 in Johannesburg, South Africa, Carmen Murray, Founder of Boo-Yah! spoke about the power of mobile for the connected marketer. Here’s are some key takeaways:

    Mobile has Superpowers

    It’s the enabler and the catalyst of change, it is the glue that binds everything together. If you look at the most constant thing in our lives it’s our mobile phones. We’re sitting on a 95% mobile penetration rate and 60% smartphone penetration, according to We Are Social.

    Your Digital Transformation

    You need a strategy,  you need optimization, measurement, tactics and time. All of these are very important for your digital transformation. I believe that through my many years of sitting with customers, and especially with marketers, we’re losing our way a bit. We are becoming obsessed with the new and we are overwhelmed by the pace and how quickly things are moving around us.

    At the same time, we’re using tactics instead of strategy. We as marketers need to go back to the basics in order to get us future fit for tomorrow’s realities.

    The Rise of the Connected Marketer

    It’s not anything new,  you probably should know this because it’s the underlying principles of marketing. The future marketer is going to be a conductor of Technology, creating seamless experiences, really a symphony of technology and experiences for our customers. This is going to be the future.  

    What is a connected marketer? The more connected devices we have in our lives the more constantly connected we are. The more constant connection we have, the more we go into a state of connectedness and the more we are in a state of connectedness the more our behavior is changing. That is what we call the connected individual. They are attracted to connected brands and this leads to the rise of the connected marketer.

    We’re living in the age of ubiquitous connectivity where we’re always constantly connected. This is the reality of what’s happening today. As devices inside the homes become more prevalent and we embrace IoT, the Internet of Things, this is a big drive for the connected marketer. As we go about our lives we switch seamlessly from our digital selves to the physical world that we live along with.

    Call it what you want, the Internet of Things, the Internet of intelligence, the Internet of me or the internet of everything, but as IoT starts growing and advances and is evenly distributed, we are going to collect so much data.

    Our Mobility is Changing the Way We Think and Act

    The knowledge that you are living in a state of a constant connectivity is more important than the means of connection. It’s not about the technology,  it’s about the fact that you’re constantly connected as your digital self. If we look at our young generation, the younger the consumer the more digital connections they have. But we need to understand that there is no difference for them with physical and digital.

    The smartest brands in the world know this to be true. It’s so true what Mark Pritchard said, “When 5 billion customers shift their habits, you shift with them.” When our behaviors change, we need to change with our customers.

    Today, we have the ability to be a shopper, connected consumer, connected patient and connected passenger.

    The Connected Marketer Meets the Needs of the Connected Individual

    The most important thing to remember is that the connected marketer creates, develops and maintains a brand that understands and meets the needs of the connected individual and much more.

    Three are four human dimensions of a connected marketer. They merge physical, digital, emotional, and sensorial brand experiences. The first one is building understanding. As marketers we know we need to build an understanding, but most of the businesses fail because they don’t understand their customers’ needs and what needs they need to fill.

  • Have You Tried ‘Doctor Fork’ Pizza Yet? Google Pushes Fake Food Ads in Marketing Experiment

    Have You Tried ‘Doctor Fork’ Pizza Yet? Google Pushes Fake Food Ads in Marketing Experiment

    Google and Unskippable Labs cooked up a new project that has marketers salivating with new ideas.

    The company created a fake pizza brand, “Doctor Fork,” as a way to challenge conventional marketing strategies and see how far they could push the advertising envelope.

    According to TechCrunch, Google conceptualized and ran 33 ads on YouTube. The clips were made from stock footage and images, focused mainly on two things—the perfect “man vs. food” ratio and whether the number of sensory cues affected the effectiveness of the ad. In layman’s terms, the former deals with the ratio of human images against shots of food while the latter deals with the cues that stimulate our senses (ex. shots of stringy mozzarella, the sounds of vegetables being chopped).

    The bogus Doctor Fork ads generated 20 million impressions and led to some useful and revealing conclusions. For one, the experiment showed that immersive experiences that utilized multiple senses provide better recall. This means advertisers should try to stimulate all of the consumers’ senses (ex. audio, text, and video).

    The company also concluded that separating audio and visuals has more of an impact in terms of brand favorability and recall. So does giving explicit instructions to the customer.

    The Doctor Fork ads also showed that when it comes to food commercials, close up shots of food get people’s motors running. The experiment also proved that the bite and smile axiom that has been strictly followed by marketers is not the sole way of presenting a pleasant food experience. This finding gives food sellers more leeway when it comes to showing people enjoying their food.

    Google’s decision to use a fake company to study how people would react to their ads was an inspired one. Legitimate companies are constrained to following certain ad styles. For instance, food commercials usually don’t show someone chewing their food while looking at the camera. But this unspoken rule has never been tested so it can’t definitively be said that chewing and looking at the audience is bad. Unfortunately, brands are not willing to branch out in terms of style since an ad that flops is costly.

    Since Doctor Fork is not real, Google didn’t waste valuable ad time or lose any real customers. The fake pizza brand provided the company with the freedom to take risks. Ben Jones, the creative director of Unskippable Ads, explained it quite well when he said that “Doctor Fork can do whatever he wants.” He added that they used “the freedom of the unbranded ad to be wrong, to push in directions and ask questions that a brand will not.”

    [Featured image via Pixabay]

  • The Challenges of Brand Search and PPC

    The Challenges of Brand Search and PPC

    Controlling the search position of your brand is very important to your business. However, this has become increasingly difficult due to changes in Google brand policies that have opened the door to competitors stealing (or buying) your brands traffic and business. Puneet Vaghela, Head of Paid Search at PHD UK, a global communications planning and media buying network recently spoke about these important challenges:

    Why is brand search difficult to control in PPC?

    With brand search, you are expected to get most of the traffic. However, what we are seeing increasingly is more and more competitors entering the market in our brand space. Back in the day, it was there but you could just get them kicked off by Google or Bing. Nowadays, it’s a lot more difficult with all of the policy changes. What this actually means is that they are not only cannibalizing our traffic but they’re also pushing up our CPCs and our CPAs.

    As a brand, you are always looking for ways to get people to your website and get them to convert more. It used to be just interest-based keywords on generics related to your own brand. Now you can cannibalize other peoples brands and get those incremental gains. The problem then is competitors coming into our brand space and pushing our ads down or increasing the CPCs on our ads. It’s not just direct competitors either, you have resellers, aggregators, etc. In the automotive space you have dealers and many automotive brands are having issues with trying to control how their dealers are bidding because dealers don’t have as much experience.

    What we are seeing now is traffic is being lost from our brands’ brand-related search terms onto our main website and it’s going away.

    This is even more important on mobile

    As you know with mobile there’s a lot less space on the SERP, and usually with the size of the ads above the fold takes up most of the space and not many people are going to scroll down all the way to the bottom. Also, with mobile, it’s when people are actually looking for stuff at the moment and they’ve got less attention span, so it’s even more important that we actually pick up this traffic. Chances are that whatever they click on they are going to then stick with that. This is especially the case for retailers and automotive businesses who have local offerings and people looking for local specific information.

    On mobile, the lower your ad position is the higher (negative) impact it has on your clickthrough rate.

    On tablet and on desktop the actual CTR decrease as your ad position goes down isn’t as significant as it is on mobile. This goes to show that on mobile we need to make sure that our ad positions are up there at the top.

    How valuable is your brand space?

    Once you have the data and you know about your brand space it’s about analyzing the data and finding out how valuable is your brand space to you? Years ago you could just log into Google Analytics and look at the value per click of your organic brand and the value per click of your paid search brand. As long as the value was more than your cost per click it made it viable to bid on your brand. It was a pretty simple analysis.

    Then seven years ago Google took away the ability to see organic keyword data and analytics have become harder. What we are seeing now is that’s it’s a lot more difficult to access this data and so people are having to think of different tests that they can come up with.

    I like to use standard deviation to get the validity of the data in the beginning in order to measure the success of the ad test. The reason for this is that gives a much better data set to work with so once you actually have the data in you can use a range to look at the changes we see if we then turn the brand off. If it fits within this range then fine, we don’t need to work on brand PPC. If it’s outside of the range then we know that PPC needs to be turned on because it’s having a significant impact on our business.

  • People Don’t Buy Products, They Buy Stories

    People Don’t Buy Products, They Buy Stories

    Social media marketing expert and speaker Ben Malol was recently interviewed at Affiliate World Europe 2018 in Barcelona about how marketers should approach marketing. “I’d say the biggest key takeaway is that when marketers and advertisers actually go into this world, the first thing that they come in is that they want to make money, they want to be successful, so they think it’s a plug-and-play type of system, where it actually isn’t a plug-and-play system.

    There’s much more that goes on here. The biggest takeaway is the fact that you’re dealing with people, here with customers, with actual people with emotions and feelings and a history.”

    “Everybody has a different story in their mind, everybody went through different things in life, and that these numbers on our ads manager are not numbers, they’re people that see our ad,” says Malol. “When you actually know the what, the who, and the why, of the customers, that’s where you’re actually gonna be successful instead of playing a gambling game.”

    “The ‘what’ is what you are selling,” he says. “What you are selling is not actually what you think you are selling, or what people think you are selling. So if you’re selling a camera, for example, you’re not really selling a camera. Yeah, there’s a physical camera but what you’re actually selling is a specific technology that’s in the camera. You’re selling the tech of it, you are not just selling a camera.”

    “The who is who you’re selling it to,  which can be different from time to time to time,” Malol explains. “It’s simple when you think of it from a broad term, but it isn’t really.”
    Malol said, “Take for example a cucumber slicer. The mother that buys it is not thinking of how fast will I cut a cucumber, what she’s thinking of is how great would it be to finish my salad in a minute so I can spend more time with my children. She’s not buying the cucumber slicer for the for the sake of slicing a cucumber, she’s buying it because of that story that’s running through her mind.”

     

    “People don’t buy products, they buy stories,” he says. “More specifically, they buy the stories that run through their mind when owning this product.”

     

    “How do you actually take that and put it into tangible terms?” he asks. “This is where you actually put your marketing ads in. You’re not gonna have an ad saying do you like this cucumber slicer, get it for 50% off with a picture of a cucumber slicer. You’re going to have a headline saying, ‘Spend less time working, more time loving.’ The image or video will be her with her kids slicing for a salad and going to have fun in the park.”

     

     

  • Facebook is Helping Brands Skyrocket Ad Conversions by Turning Still Images Into Videos

    Facebook is Helping Brands Skyrocket Ad Conversions by Turning Still Images Into Videos

    Social media use is steadily growing each year. Research in 2017, shows that U.S. digital consumers spent an average of 2 hours and 15 minutes on social platforms every day, up 45 minutes since 2015. On average, users spent 35 minutes of that time on Facebook alone.

    In the past view years, the consumption of video on social media has exploded. Live streaming accounted for 73 percent of global IP traffic in 2016 and is expected to reach 82 percent by 2021.  Views of sponsored videos on Facebook also saw a massive increase in 2017, up 258 percent from the previous year. The data shows that video gets more attention on social media platforms, presenting an opportunity for marketers to reach more people. Unfortunately, video ads can get expensive and not all companies have the means to produce them.

    Facebook, however, has come up with a solution for companies who want to run mobile video ads without breaking the bank— Create to Convert. The social media platform’s new tool can turn still images into engaging videos.

    Creating Videos From Stills Converts Leads

    Facebook’s Creative Shop is the power behind Create to Convert. This production framework allows companies to transform still images into far more interesting video ads for their mobile audience.

    According to Facebook, brands have four options to animate still images—by adding basic movements, animating the brand, using animation to focus on the benefit, and providing an animated demo on how an application or feature is used.

    • Basic Motion: Animate still images by integrating one to two motion elements. This can create a video that’s a few seconds long and which contains a call-to-action (CTA).
    • Benefit in Motion: This style can produce a short clip that focuses on a key message (ex. special offer or testimonial) or benefit (ex. variety of products). Targeting those vital points will emphasize its value to the customer. Meanwhile, the presence of a CTA will help the audience to take the next step towards lead conversion.
    • Brand in Motion: This style brings a logo or brand to life with a few animated elements. It can be used to boot brand recognition. The addition of a CTA card at the conclusion of the short video can drive action.
    • Demo in Motion: As the name implies, this ad gives a short demonstration of how an application, feature, product, service, or website work. The CTA at the end will help push prospective clients to take the right course of action.

    How Effective is Create to Convert

    Turning still images into a direct-response video appears to be very effective at improving conversions. Facebook conducted a study involving 40 brands that used the basic animated effects. Results from the study showed that 69 percent of the brands saw their conversions improve.

    One participant, Shopback, utilized a Create to Convert video ad and saw a 5.5 times boost in its conversions. Meanwhile, their registration costs went down 7.7 times when compared to their previous still ads. Interestingly, running both video and still, ads saw a 17 percent increase in conversions as opposed to only using still ads.

    Company owners and marketers alike understand the challenges that accompany a mobile-first marketing strategy, especially if it involves video. Kim Weiner, VP of Shuttlerock North America, acknowledged that finding the perfect balance between the quality, speed, and the scale of producing a video can be difficult.

    “We’ve found that by partnering with Facebook on creative considerations for lightweight video we can eliminate some of those barriers to deliver value for both people and businesses,” Weiner said.

    [Featrured image via Facebook]

  • How to Harness the Combined Power of Search and Video to Increase Ad Conversions

    How to Harness the Combined Power of Search and Video to Increase Ad Conversions

    One of the most powerful ways for a business to drive sales is via video reviews on YouTube. Earlier this year, Google made that even more effective by combining the power of video on YouTube with Google Search. Nicky Rettke, YouTube Group Product Manager for Video Ads spoke to an audience at Search Marketing Expo 2018 (SMX) and explained exactly how easy it now is for businesses to make use of this marketing one-two punch summarized below:

    As you know we’ve been we’ve been working on direct response video formats for ad promotion for quite a while now, but we haven’t had a comprehensive solution for driving web conversions until now. I’m going to share some of our newest innovations that help you harness the combined power of search and YouTube together.

    I want to start off by just having everybody take a minute to think about the things that you bought last week and how you decided what to buy. If you’re like most people, 86% to be exact, then you know you turned to Google for help where we have the world’s information at our fingertips when we’re shopping. We can read reviews, we can search product details, and we can even watch videos to help us make the best decision possible.

    What that means is that even small everyday purchases like a toothbrush can kick off a big research project. Did you know that mobile searches for toothbrush reviews have more than doubled in the last two years? Whether it’s a car or toothbrush, we want to literally see things in action before we buy them. This is why people are increasingly turning to YouTube in addition to Search for help with their purchase decisions, and we can see this trend in YouTube search data.

    Over the last two years, review videos on YouTube have had over 50,000 years worth of watch time on mobile alone. That’s over 438 million hours!

    It’s not a hard jump to go from review to purchase. We’ve seen 100 percent increase in online conversions coming from YouTube ads globally over the last 12 months. That’s showing that consumers are coming to YouTube not only to research but to take action.

    3 Features Helping Brands Harness Commercial Intent on YouTube

    1. Custom Intent Audiences – Find People Who Recent Searched

    Remarketing lists on search used to be the only way that you could re-engage users who did not immediately convert with custom intent audiences. You now have a second chance at winning them over using the most persuasive tool in the world… video.

    Custom Intent Audiences allow brands to reach people who searched for relevant keywords on Google. All you have to do is create a keyword list, or you could just repurpose the keyword lists that you’re already using on your search campaigns.

    Purple, the online mattress retailer, used Custom Intent Audiences to sell mattress protectors. Targeting YouTube viewers who had recently searched for queen bed sheets, they were able to lower the cost per visit by over 30 percent and they saw a 3x increase in the number of people searching for Purple on Google.

    2. TrueView for Action – Make it Easy to Take Action!

    Once you have found the people with the strongest intent, the next step is to make it really easy for them to take action. TrueView for Action is YouTube’s new format optimized to do exactly that. You can use it to drive whatever action is most important to your business, like clicks to your website or new signups.

    It’s most powerful if you combine it with Custom Intent Audiences, that way you can reach people who are just on the brink of making that purchase decision.

    3. Target CPA Bidding – Auto-Optimize for Results

    TrueView for Action campaigns use target CPA bidding to automatically optimize bids using Google’s advanced machine learning technology. Simply put, you can now bid and buy for your video campaigns just like you do on search today.

    Combining Video with Search Improves KPIs

    This suite of features makes YouTube more actionable and early adopter brands are seeing it in the KPIs that matter most to them. Whether it’s the investment startup, Betterment, who increased their return on ad spend by 6x or the online education platform Masterclass, who grew class signups by over 140 percent, or travel giant Kayak, who reduced their CPA by 80 percent, brands around the world are using YouTube to drive meaningful and efficient business results.

  • Benefits of Adding In-App Advertising to Your Marketing Strategy

    Benefits of Adding In-App Advertising to Your Marketing Strategy

    In-application marketing has grown by leaps and bounds, thanks to the prevalence of mobile devices. With more people utilizing gadgets connected to the internet, companies are now spending more of their marketing budget on mobile web advertising.

    One strategy on the forefront of mobile advertising is in-app marketing. As the name implies, in-app marketing is any campaign or message that’s specifically designed to appear within a mobile application while the consumer is using the app. Unlike emails or push notifications, which engage the consumer outside of the company’s app, in-app ads take advantage of the moment and hook customers in real-time.

    Digital marketing strategies, like geo-targeting, are still important but brands and marketers believe that in-app advertising is the way forward. As a matter of fact, it has been estimated that global in-app revenue will reach $189 billion by 2020.

    Worldwide in-app advertising and app store revenues of mobile apps and games in 2015 and 2020 

    [Graphic via Statista]

    Aside from the fact that in-app marketing is a money-maker, there are also other benefits to utilizing this strategy.

    Benefits of Using In-App Marketing

    Consumers Spend A Lot of Time on Apps

    Brands should take advantage of the fact that the majority of smartphone users are spending a lot of time on apps. According to a 2017 US Mobile App Report, people are spending about 87 percent of their time online on mobile apps compared to just 13 percent on the Web. This gives companies that use in-app ads an opportunity to focus on a large market, boost their brand visibility, and improve lead generation and conversion. 

    Mobile Internet users in US Spend Most of their time on Mobile Apps, 2017

    Higher Click-Through Rates

    Another advantage in-app ads have over mobile ads is their higher click-through rates (CTRs). As it stands, CTRs for mobile web ads is at 0.23 percent while in-app ads are at 0.58 percent. In-app ads also perform 11.4 times better than conventional banner ads. This means that in-app advertisements not only raises lead generation numbers, they also help capture and convert these leads.

    More Focused Targeting

    Advertisements displayed in the brand’s application are designed within the app’s context, making them look natural and more organic. Many apps also opt for interactive formats, which gives advertisers the option to choose when it will be shown. This ensures a seamless transition for users. In contrast, other types of mobile advertisements, particularly pop-ups, can be quite disruptive. They interrupt the prospective consumer and could cause them to be annoyed, thereby dissuading them from making a positive decision.

    Image result for banner mobile app vs in-app

    Marketing inside company apps also gives advertisers a specific view of their target market due to geo-location data and the apps’ capacity to pull in the exact demographics. This increases the chances that the audience reached is aligned closely with the company’s advertising and marketing efforts. Highly targeted marketing also means that less money is wasted on consumers who are unlikely to make a purchase via the ad.

    Ads are More Memorable

    Research has shown that in-app ads are more effective because they’re more memorable when seen on the application. This is due to users being more engaged in the app right from the start, particularly in the social network and gaming niches. The personal nature of mobile gadgets, which people use during their leisure time, also gives people a more positive attitude towards brands they see advertising in-app.

    With in-app marketing, marketers can move away from generalized ads and instead focus on ads that are designed specifically for the brand’s demographic. This marketing strategy also reaches a lot of people in a very short time, thereby giving brands more reach and higher ROI.

    [Featured image via Pixabay]

  • 7 Most Attention-Grabbing Words to Use in Your Online Marketing

    7 Most Attention-Grabbing Words to Use in Your Online Marketing

    Words are powerful. For marketers, they can mean the difference between successful conversions or a failed campaign. Certain words can pique a customer’s attention while others might repel them. So what words have the most power to get people interested in what you have to offer?

    7 Words That Will Grab the Attention of Your Customers

    1. Free

    People love to get free stuff, so it’s no surprise that “free” is one of the most persuasive words in the English language. It’s often the primary factor in what product a customer chooses.

    While the word can help with conversions, be mindful that it will also attract those who prefer bargains, and this might not be the type of customers you want. Instead, use it as a way to draw attention to your business, maybe by offering free guides, seminars, support, information, etc.

    2. You

    Using the word “you” in your marketing can be as attention-grabbing as calling someone by their name. It personalizes your message and helps you to quickly connect with your customers.

    You can use this personalization to great effect in your email marketing. Make it more effective by developing distinct lists for your products and the customers who would prefer them. Integrate “you” in the message for a more personal touch.

    3. TryImage result for 14-day trial

    If your product is new to prospective customers, they’ll likely need time to decide on whether they want to buy it. Using the word “buy” can seem aggressive and could make the customer feel pressured. A better word to use is “try” since it’s non-threatening, but can still motivate people to act.

    Give your customers a little push by encouraging them to try your product or service first. Offer a 14-day free trial period to test drive your brand or send them samples so they can know exactly what to expect from you.

    4. New

    When it comes to marketing, people prefer a recognized (or old) brand but love “new” products. This is due to the novelty aspect of an experience. It activates the brain’s reward center and is a great way to keep customers alert and interested.

    You can keep your customers engaged by refreshing your website’s design or changing your product packaging. Add new features or find a different way of sending a message or making an offer. Your customers will be interested even in something as simple as a new background color for your ad.

    5. Now

    Delayed gratification has no place in marketing. Most customers want things immediately. So it’s no surprise that “now” is among the most powerful words in marketing. The word easily evokes your fear of missing out and pushes you to action. Your brain also gets all fired up as it imagines the rewards it will soon be receiving.

    Make the most of the word and use it in your headlines, email subject headings, and calls-to-action. Boost the chances of instant conversions by making easily realized promises, like giving customers “Access Now” to services or by giving direct instructions on what they should do (Subscribe Now! Shop Now!). You can also use the word “instant” as it provides the same effect. In some cases, it might even generate a more powerful response.

    6. Best

    Image result for best selling

    People love knowing which items or services are popular, especially when it appears to come from word-of-mouth. This is why consumers look for best sellers or are interested in the best products that a company has to offer. It also gives the impression that many people have already bought the product and had good results.

    7. Easy

    People want products or services that will make their lives simpler and easier. Use this adjective to call attention to the fact that your product will make things easy for them. Easy is also a very positive and encouraging word to customers.

    Make the most of the word by using it to emphasize how easy your product is to use or operate. You can also interchange easy with other adjectives like “simple” or “hassle-free.” But be careful since the former tends to generate a simple response while the latter could cause customers to just focus on “hassle.”

    And the Runner Up is…

    If those seven words are the winners, then “sale” and “tips” are the runners-up. Sale is actually the granddaddy of advertising words. After all, who doesn’t love a good sale? The word also has the power to motivate customers into buying something. Meanwhile, customers love to receive suggestions on how they can do things better. This is why emails or blog posts with tips about a product or service are always appreciated.

    Conclusion

    You have to grab your customer’s attention if you want to win in digital advertising. These seven words are simple and can easily be included in any ad or conversation, yet they are powerful enough to generate interest among consumers. Learn to use them in the proper context and improve your online marketing.

  • 5 Ways to Stop Ad Fatigue From Killing Your Facebook Campaign

    5 Ways to Stop Ad Fatigue From Killing Your Facebook Campaign

    The Internet and social media have made it easy for brands to get their message out to millions of people. In fact, the average American is reportedly exposed to 4,000 to 10,000 advertisements every single day. But this accessibility has also led to “Banner Blindness,” a psychological effect wherein people become blind or indifferent to the ads they see.

    Banner blindness is essentially the consumer’s defense mechanism in the face of an abundance of information. This means that at some point, your ads will no longer be effective as your audience starts to suffer from ad fatigue.

    Understanding Ad Fatigue

    Ad fatigue occurs when your target market becomes so used to your advertisements that they become bored and stop paying attention to them.

    One platform where ad fatigue can be felt is Facebook, where account holders frequently see advertisements fighting for space amidst the numerous statuses and photos on their News Feeds. Marketers understand the impact ad fatigue can have on a company’s investment. When the Frequency rate of a Facebook ad goes up, its click-through-rate (CTR) tends to go down. Conversely, the cost-per-click for the company will increase.

    Luckily, the platform’s robust rotation display and audience-targeting network mean there are strategies that can be utilized to prevent ad fatigue from setting in.

    5 Ways to Prevent Facebook Ad Fatigue

    1. Change Your Headline and Use Power Words

    Image result for free

    Mix up the wording in your ad. Consider changing your headline to include a question, your brand name or even a call-to-action (CTA). Another option would be to change the language to target a specific audience. For instance, men would prefer a more humorous content while women opt for something subtle. Power words like “Instantly,” “Sensational,” “Free” and “Now” can boost the odds of having a more positive response to your ads.

    2. Tweak Ad Displays

    Tweak the design of your ads to capture your audience’s interest once more. Something as simple as changing the background color can make a huge difference so try experimenting with different hues. You can also utilize a simpler image to catch people’s eyes. A photo of a happy woman apparently works best in Facebook ads. Avoid images with lots of details and keep the use of text in the picture to a minimum.

    3. Rotate Demographics and Audience Network

    When you keep utilizing the same group on the platform’s Audience Network, desktop, and mobile iterations, the ad frequency will increase, thereby raising the dangers of ad fatigue. Separate your ad groups for every placement. This will make tracking bidding and frequency rates more effective. You should also consider rotating your ads and the target audience every few days to reduce individual ad frequency and keep things fresh.

    4. Try Out Different Call-to-ActionsRelated image

    Your ad requires a strong call-to-action if you want to nab those conversions. Test five to six distinct CTAs as you rotate your ads and see which one gives the best result. For instance, you can start with a straight CTA this week (ex. Take that vacation now!). You can then try one that begins with a question (Need a break from work?) the following week.

    5. Stop Underperforming Campaigns

    If all else fails, you have the option to stop underperforming campaigns until you can develop something better. Evaluate every aspect of your marketing campaign, from the images you used to the target groups to the value proposition, to see what is causing the sluggish conversion rates. You can also freeze your ads once the frequency becomes too high and wait until people don’t recognize them anymore.

    Fighting ad fatigue on Facebook is crucial to the success of your campaign. Utilize a variety of strategies like changing background colors or rotating the audience network to keep things interesting. Bear in mind that these ads are pay-per-click, so you have more than enough leeway to try something different.

  • 5 Ways to Establish Core Brand Values

    5 Ways to Establish Core Brand Values

    Your brand is more than just your company or product name. It’s one of the best ways of setting yourself apart from your competitors. Unfortunately, many business owners are confused as to what “branding” really means and how it affects their company.

    In a nutshell, your brand value reflects the values your company holds. It embodies your company’s history, vision, and mission. It also stands as your promise to your client with regards to what they can expect from the products and services you offer.

    Consider brands like Nike and Apple. These two companies success can be attributed to how well their brands reflected their core values. Nike’s logo and “Just Do It” tagline resonates not just with athletes but people who are looking to channel their drive to succeed. Meanwhile, Apple’s “Think Different” slogan makes it clear to everyone that the company is all about developing the best and most innovative products that are within everyone’s reach.

    Defining your brand and the core values it embodies is challenging as it entails time, patience and a little bit of self-discovery. Here are five ways to establish your business’ core brand values:

    1. Pick Values That Resonate With Your Business

    Discovering your company’s core brand values is a challenging process. One way to go about this is to make a list ofSwan, Towel, Flower, Holiday, Hotel, Bed, Djerba traits that are important to you. But this should go beyond listing down nice sounding adjectives like “trusted” or “reliable.” You have to dig deeper and look beyond your idealized vision of a perfect company.

    You can utilize your own negative experiences with other brands. For example, your stay at a glamorous B&B with perfect amenities might have left you feeling disconnected by its cold and snobbish staff. So instead of focusing on “great amenities,” make your mark by offering services that will make your “customers feel welcomed” and loved. And once you’ve chosen values that truly resonate with you, start focusing your energies on that.

    2. Be the Best Representative of Your Values

    What do your customers say about your brand? Are they impressed with your customer service or with the low price? Find out what traits your customers already associate with your brand and build on that.

    Let’s say your customers love the effort you make in answering their queries, then you can make “going the extra mile to answer your questions and meet your needs” as your core value. And since you’re already known for it, make sure you keep representing your core values through advertisements and innovations.

    3. Understand Who Your Competitors and Customers Are

    You should also consider what your customer needs and expects from your brand while also taking into account what solutions are already being offered by your competitors. Analyzing what your rival is offering can reveal a gap that you can fill, or it can give you ideas on how you can offer a different solution that will better reflect your values.

    4. Create Ways to Showcase Your Brand

    Image result for taste happiness coke

    Once you have established your core values, you have to think about how you can simplify them down to a few key words that will act as a reminder for your business team. Think Coke’s “Taste Happiness” or Nike’s “Just Do It” slogans. This will also help your employees understand and live your values.

    Having clearly defined core values will also make it easier for your company to showcase your brand. Aside from your logo, tagline or slogan, there are also other methods you can use to push your brand, like creating your voice or using a unique color scheme.

    5. Develop Relationships That Embody Your Values

    You can also strengthen your core brand values by using it when building business relationships. Refer to these values in your recruitment and marketing and sales strategies. Hire people who believe in the same values and who are willing to share and spread these ideals.

    It’s essential that you establish your core brand values from the start. These will act as the building blocks of your business and will attract consumers who believe in the same values.

    [Featured image via Pixabay]

  • Twitter’s New Ads Transparency Center Reveals Who Buys Ads on Its Platform

    Twitter’s New Ads Transparency Center Reveals Who Buys Ads on Its Platform

    With the midterm elections coming up, Twitter users will have to brace themselves for a barrage of ads. But this time around, they’ll also be getting information on who paid for those ads and why they received said advertisement.

    Twitter recently announced that it’s making more critical information accessible in its Ads Transparency Center. Users now have a dashboard where they can check up on an advertiser on Twitter and see the ads that they ran on the social media platform that week.

    Additional information will also be provided for political ads that are linked to specific politicians and campaigns in federal elections. The Ads Transparency Center will make critical details open to the public, like how much advertisers have paid or spent and the factors used to target particular users. Twitter will also be marking those ads with a badge to indicate that it’s a political advertisement.

    According to Bruce Falck, Twitter’s Revenue Product general manager, the badge and extra information will “allow users to easily identify political campaign ads, know who paid for them, and whether it was authorized by a candidate.”

    The news about the Ads Transparency Center came on the heels of American lawmakers questioning social media platforms like Facebook, Google, and Twitter about political messaging during the last presidential election.

    Lawmakers have previously asked these companies what they were doing to ensure that political ads running on their platforms were legal and followed campaign laws on finance. This is crucial, especially in the wake of intelligence agency findings that the Russian government may have instigated an online campaign of division and misinformation.

    Facebook, Google, and Twitter have already committed to doing more to classify political ads and inform users on who bought them. Facebook rolled out a searchable political ads archive on its platform as well as on Instagram in May. Meanwhile, Google announced it would soon release a report regarding political ad spending on its services.

    [Featured image via Pixabay]

  • Google Rebrands AdWords, Introduces ‘Smart Campaigns’ for Small Businesses

    Google Rebrands AdWords, Introduces ‘Smart Campaigns’ for Small Businesses

    Google has revamped how its ad services and products are organized and sold in a bid to make its advertising system easier for brands to understand.

    After two decades, Google is retiring AdWords and DoubleClick names and rebranding them instead. They are also being reorganized in order to better showcase their capabilities and growth trajectory. DoubleClick products and the Google Analytics 360 Suite will now fall under the umbrella of Google Marketing Platform. DoubleClick Ad Exchange and DoubleClick for Publishers will be integrated into the Google Ad Manager while AdWords will now be called Google Ads.

    The newly introduced Google Marketing Platform is designed to assist clients in planning, buying, measuring and optimizing their digital media and customer experience. The decision to merge the DoubleClick and Analytics 360 Suite brands was the result of marketer feedback regarding the advantages of using analytics and ads technology to create improved customer understanding and bigger business results.

    Meanwhile, Google Ads will represent the extent of the company’s advertising capacity across its numerous properties, like Google Maps, Google Play, and YouTube. Google Ads will also roll out a new type of ad strategy called Smart Campaigns. This feature will be utilizing machine learning technology and focuses on small businesses. It will be the default experience of start-up companies.

    As for the Google Ad Manager, the unified programmatic system is developed to help partners to generate higher revenue in a more efficient manner.

    The three new brands are being hailed as a way to help all advertisers and publishers pick the right solutions for their business, regardless of the size. It also aims to make it easier for companies to provide consumers with trustworthy ads and an improved experience regardless of the channels and devices used.

    The restructuring of its ads business was announced on Tuesday by Sridhar Ramaswamy, the SVP of Ads at Google. According to Ramaswamy, the company’s extensive ad offerings is challenging for advertisers, ad agencies, and publishers to navigate. He also mentioned that while advertising opportunities have never been greater, it has also become more complicated.

    “It is harder for advertisers, publishers, and agencies that help them choose the right products for their business and know how to use them,” Ramaswamy said.

    Despite the changes, brands have nothing to worry about as Ramaswamy emphasized that Google’s “underlying products aren’t changing.” But while the rebranding is basically just a name change, there will be small changes in some ad interfaces that will streamline the different services that the company’s advertising and marketing products offer.

  • Bing Gets New ‘Visual Search’ Feature, Competes With Google Lens

    Bing Gets New ‘Visual Search’ Feature, Competes With Google Lens

    Microsoft is not going to let Google have all the fun. The company has recently unveiled Visual Search for Bing, a feature that’s expected to complete with Google Lens.

    Visual Search is a new AI-powered search function that builds on the Intelligent Search feature that Bing rolled out in December of last year. The feature allows users to search the web or look for products via photos saved on their camera rolls or pictures they have taken. For instance, you can find more information about an unfamiliar flower or an interesting building you came across by taking a photo through the Bing app or by uploading it from your device. The Visual Search feature will then identify the subject and provide you with links containing key information about it.

    Consumers will also be able to shop for clothes, accessories, or furniture in the same way. Let’s say a woman sees a necklace she likes. She can take a shot or upload a picture of the item and Visual Search will send her information on where she can buy the necklace, the price, and other details. The feature can also send her similar-looking products.

    According to Vince Leung, Microsoft’s product lead, there are instances where “it is almost impossible to describe what you want to search for using words.” Visual search will certainly ease that dilemma, especially as the algorithm the program uses is continuously learning. Since the algorithm works by using data that contains millions of images, the more data is searched for in Bing, the better the algorithm becomes.

    Bing’s core team stated that consumers can expect the Visual Search feature to expand and improve continuously. You can now avail of the function’s latest version in the Bing app for Android and iOS. It’s also available on Microsoft Launcher and the Edge browser for Android. Visual Search will also be available soon on the Bing.com and on Microsoft Edge for iOS.

  • 5 Ways to Boost Your Brand Using Social Media Polls

    5 Ways to Boost Your Brand Using Social Media Polls

    If you’re managing a small business or start-up brand on social media, getting people to interact with you can be challenging. This is where polling comes in handy since it encourages engagement and improves the visibility of your brand. Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, have polling features that you can tweak and use to listen to your target audience, similar to doing marketing research. Because choices are provided, users can participate in the polls without fear or apprehension of giving a wrong answer. And since replies remain undisclosed and anonymous, users tend to be more honest with their responses.

    Here’s how you can use social media polling to improve your marketing strategy and boost your brand on several platforms:  

    1. Gather feedback and insights.

    Creating a poll is one of the ways to know what your audience likes and dislikes without disrupting their user experience. By posing a quick question, your brand will be able to get instant feedback from customers about the products and services you offer. If users feel that their opinions are valued, then they are more likely to be loyal to your brand. Gaining invaluable insight from a poll also allows you to identify areas for improvement and factor in suggestions from customers.  

    2. Drive product decisions.

    With polls and surveys, you can determine which products or promos interest your target audience right away. This real-time information can be crucial for driving product decisions and possible sales leads for your company. Last Halloween, Hello Fresh used an Instagram Stories poll to help determine which one of its recipes customers preferred most. This simple poll not only helped generate positive sentiments towards the brand, but it also allowed customers to feel that they made an impact or contribution to the company’s meal kit options. You could do the same for your brand, too.

    3. Get ideas for content.

    Coming up with fresh content on social media can be a big undertaking but polls can help you overcome that hurdle. By asking what your audience wants to see or read next, you encourage engagement by listening to their opinions. Consider a cross-channel approach in creating social content, like using Instagram Stories in polling what to include in your next Facebook post. Users are more likely to be pleased by seeing curated content across platforms based on their interests.

    4. Break the monotony.

    Polls that are too focused on business can cause your audience to lose interest in your brand. So even though this type of polling offers a wealth of marketing data, try to come up with entertaining and fun polls every once in a while that strengthen your brand’s voice and maintain engagement. Furthermore, this makes your brand look more approachable.

    5. Increase engagement.

    You don’t have to limit your brand to a specific market since social media polling allows you to tap into a larger audience. When users check out your poll, they tend to visit your profile as well, thus increasing your visibility on the social platform. Remember to be responsive to every comment or like, even after the poll has ended, to keep up a dialogue between you and your audience and increase the likelihood of future engagement.

    As social media polls become increasingly useful to understanding your audience, it pays to use the feature as part of your marketing strategy. Learning from and listening to your market will help you take the next step in scaling up your business.  

    [Featured image via Pixabay]