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  • Google Play Search Ads Now Available To All

    Google Play Search Ads Now Available To All

    Earlier this year, Google announced that it was expanding paid search advertising to the Google Play store. Given that people frequently go there to search for apps, this seemed like an obvious place for search ads, and it’s still surprising it’s taken Google this long to offer them to app makers.

    Better late than never though. Google has been testing the ads since February, but on Wednesday, announced a full roll-out to all advertisers and developers who use Search app install campaigns on AdWords.

    According to Google, Google Play reaches over a billion people on Android devices in over 190 countries, so there’s a lot of potential reach here.

    “Search Ads on Google Play can provide consumers new ways to discover apps that they otherwise might have missed and help developers drive more awareness of their apps,” says Surojit Chatterjee, Director of Product Management for Mobile Search Ads at Google.

    android-ads

    “As we expand the opportunities for developers to promote their apps, we’re also committed to providing conversion tracking tools that work seamlessly across channels and align with whichever measurement solution a developer chooses to use,” says Chatterjee. “That’s why we’re introducing Android first app opens, a new conversion tracking solution that measures when a user first opens an app after clicking on an ad and completing an Android app install. In addition to providing app conversion tracking across Search, Display and YouTube, this new solution also allows developers to better align the conversion volume they see in AdWords with the data they see in a third-party measurement solution. First app opens are the standard conversion type for third-party solutions, so we’re working with key partners like Tune, AppsFlyer, Kochava, Adjust and Apsalar to ensure data consistency and give developers the freedom to use reporting and optimization features across AdWords and third-party solutions of their choice.”

    Google says that Universal App Campaigns will soon (in the coming weeks) make it easier to promote apps on Google Play in addition to Google Search, YouTube, AdMob, and the Google Display Network.

    Images via Google

  • Google Merchant Center Gets New Feed Enhancements

    Google Merchant Center Gets New Feed Enhancements

    Google announced a pair of data feed enhancements for Google Merchant Center in an effort to help merchants better update their ads. One of them is geared toward large retailers while the other is for small ones.

    For large retailers, Google has added a new feed type called Online product inventory feeds, which let you quickly update price, availability, and sale price on key products. The reason why it’s geared toward big retailers is that they’re more likely to have to change such attributes more frequently.

    The feed allows you to submit new info throughout the day to update the attributes and/or submit updates for just a small subset of products. Google notes that if there’s an error in processing your feed, it won’t affect the full product feed. It allows allows fresher info to appear to consumers on Google Shopping.

    The other thing is a Google Sheets add-on, which lets you connect spreadsheets to Merchant Center for quicker uploads. This is geared toward small retailers because it makes it easier to get up and running with shopping ads.

    “Whether you use Google Sheets or text file formats to upload your products, these new data feed enhancements make it faster and easier to upload your most up-to-date product information to Google Shopping and find more customers online,” says Sven Herschel, Product Manager for Google Merchant Center.

    You can validate and/or upload products directly from Sheets. There sidebar in the add-on lets you validate individual rows ore the entire sheet so you can see potential errors and warnings before you upload the data feed. Also from the side-bar, you can upload your whole sheet into Merchant Center without leaving Sheets.

    If you have any trouble, you can take a look at this help article.

    Image via Google

  • Yelp Earnings Disappoint As Chairman Leaves And Company Moves Away From Display Ads

    Yelp reported its second quarter earnings on Tuesday with better than expected revenue, but worse than expected profit, sending shares tumbling. But that wasn’t the only news to come out of the company. Yelp also announced the resignation of Max Levchin from its Board of Directors, and said it will discontinue display advertising by the end of the year.

    Levchin Leaves

    Let’s start with Levchin leaving. He was Chairman and Director, and he is officially leaving “to pursue other interests”. His departure is effective immediately. The Board has yet to appoint a replacement Chairman, but says it “plans to consider the issue at the next Board meeting in September.”

    “We thank Max for all his contributions to Yelp since its founding in 2004 when he provided the seed capital to start the company,” said CEO Jeremy Stoppelman. “Max saw Yelp grow from just an idea in my head to a company worth billions of dollars with Yelpers around the world. We have mutually agreed this is the right time for him to step down given the demands on his time. I am grateful for his contributions to Yelp’s success and wish him all the best going forward.”

    “I am extremely proud of what Yelp has accomplished over the last 11 years and believe I leave it well-positioned to take advantage of the large local advertising market,” said Levchin. “I spoke with Jeremy and felt now is the right time to transition off the board. I’m confident that Yelp is prepared to continue its success as I increase my focus on my CEO responsibilities at Affirm, along with other demands on my time.”

    Display No More

    During the company’s earnings conference call, Stoppelman revealed that Yelp will phase out display advertising by the end of 2015 as it turns its ad focus to native and local products. Here’s what he had to say about it (via SeekingAlpha’s transcript of the call):

    Our mission is to connect people with great local businesses. Consumers are increasingly relying on our 83 million reviews when choosing where to spend their money, making Yelp the ideal place for local businesses to advertise. To better leverage Yelp’s strengths with consumers and local businesses, we decided to phase out brand advertising by the end of the year. We believe that eliminating brand advertising, which we also refer to as our display advertising product, will benefit the company over the long-term. The industry trend towards increasingly disruptive display advertising is at odds with our focus on the consumer experience, particularly within the app.

    Direct brand advertising sales is in decline, while programmatic advertising has its own challenges with privacy implications, ever declining CPMs, and lower ad quality. For example, ads that play video or audio intrude upon the consumer experience increasing load times and data usage on smartphones. We believe that prioritizing the consumer experience while delivering highly relevant native local advertising will provide us with the strategic long-term advantage. Given that our brand advertising as a percent of total revenues declined from 25% in 2010 to 6% in the second quarter of 2015 now is the right time for us to reallocate those resources to our highly differentiated core business

    The Results

    Yelp reported net revenue of $133.9 million for the quarter, which is up 51% year-over-year. It also reported a $0.02 per share loss, which put off Wall Street, which expected a positive $0.01 per share net income.

    Cumulative reviews grew 35% year-over-year, reaching 83 million, while mobile unique visitors surpassed the desktop number for the first time, growing 22% to 83 million on a monthly average basis. Local advertising accounts grew 40% year over year to 97,1004.

    Brand ad revenue was $8.3 million, which is a decrease of 8%.

    Here’s the full earnings release:

    SAN FRANCISCO, July 28, 2015 /PRNewswire/ — Yelp Inc. (NYSE: YELP), the company that connects consumers with great local businesses, today announced financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2015.

    Yelp logo
    • Net revenue was $133.9 million in the second quarter of 2015 reflecting 51% growth over the second quarter of 2014.
    • Adjusted EBITDA for the second quarter of 2015 was $22.7 million, reflecting a 32% increase over the second quarter of 2014.
    • Cumulative reviews grew 35% year over year to approximately 83 million.
    • Mobile Unique Visitors1 surpassed the number of Desktop Unique Visitors2 for the first time, growing 22% year over year to approximately 83 million on a monthly average basis. App Unique Devices grew 51% year over year to approximately 18 million on a monthly average basis3.
    • Local advertising accounts grew 40% year over year to approximately 97,1004.

    Net loss in the second quarter of 2015 was $(1.3) million, or $(0.02) per share, compared to a net income of $2.7 million, or $0.04 per share, in the second quarter of 2014.

    Non-GAAP net income, which consists of net income excluding stock-based compensation and amortization was$9.4 million, or $0.12 per share, for the second quarter of 2015.

    Net revenue for the six months ended June 30, 2015 was $252.4 million, an increase of 53% compared to $165.2 million in the same period last year. Adjusted EBITDA for the six months ended June 30, 2015 was $39.1 millioncompared to $25.8 million in the first six months of 2014. Net loss for the six months ended June 30, 2015 was$(2.6) million, or $(0.03) per share, compared to net income of $0.1 million, or $0.00 per share, in the comparable period in 2014. Non-GAAP net income for the six months ended June 30, 2015 was $17.3 million, or $0.22 per share, compared to non-GAAP net income of $15.0 million, or $0.19 per share, in the comparable period in 2014.

    “We continue to demonstrate solid topline growth, with total net revenue increasing 51% year over year to approximately $134 million,” said Jeremy Stoppelman, Yelp’s chief executive officer. “Consumers are increasingly turning to apps when using their mobile phones, and we are excited about the growth we’ve seen in app usage which accelerated to 51% year over year. We believe our rich content married with our highly-differentiated local advertising product will position us well to capture a meaningful share of the large local market.”

    “Our core local advertising business remains strong, and we are investing in Yelp’s future,” added Rob Krolik, Yelp’s chief financial officer. “We expect local advertising will continue to be our primary driver of growth as we work towards our goal of generating one billion dollars of revenue in 2017.”

    Second Quarter Operating Summary

    • Local advertising revenue totaled $107.9 million, representing 43% growth over the second quarter of 2014.
    • Transactions revenue, which was previously included in Other revenue and will be broken out separately going forward, totaled $11.3 million, compared to $1.2 million in the second quarter of 2014, primarily due to the acquisition of Eat24 in the first quarter of 2015. Transactions revenue is comprised of Eat24, Platform transactions, Yelp Deals and Gift Certificates.
    • Brand advertising revenue totaled $8.3 million, representing an 8% decrease compared to the second quarter of 2014. As of today, Yelp is announcing that it plans to phase out its brand advertising product by the end of 2015 to continue its focus on the consumer experience and its native, local advertising products.
    • Other revenue totaled $6.4 million, representing 128% growth over the second quarter of 2014. Other revenue is primarily comprised of revenue from partnership arrangements.

    Business Highlights

    • Mobile Traffic: Mobile Unique Visitors surpassed Desktop Unique Visitors for the first time in company history in the second quarter of 2015, growing to approximately 83 million compared to approximately 79 million Desktop Unique Visitors. Growth in unique devices accessing the Yelp app accelerated to 51% over the second quarter of 2014. The majority of Yelp consumer engagement now occurs on the app with approximately 70% of new reviews and photos and approximately 70% of calls, clicks for directions and map views coming via the Yelp app.
    • Local Advertising: With the full rollout of its packaged cost-per-click (CPC) advertising package inSeptember 2014, Yelp increased the percent of local revenue generated by CPC advertisers to 46% in the second quarter of 2015, an increase from 40% in the first quarter of 2015. Based on Yelp’s internal analysis, local advertisers on Yelp receive on average approximately 270% ROI on their advertising spend, demonstrating the compelling nature of its highly relevant, native advertising products.

    Business Outlook

    Yelp is providing its outlook for the third quarter and lowering its outlook for the full year of 2015 based on slower sales headcount growth and the elimination of its brand advertising product.

    • For the third quarter of 2015, net revenue is expected to be in the range of $139 million to $142 million, representing growth of approximately 37% compared to the third quarter of 2014. Adjusted EBITDA is expected to be in the range of $12 million to $15 million. Stock-based compensation is expected to be in the range of $16 million to $17 million, and depreciation and amortization is expected to be 5%-6% of revenue.
    • For the full year of 2015, net revenue is expected to be in the range of $544 million to $550 million, representing growth of approximately 45% compared to full year 2014. Adjusted EBITDA is expected to be in the range of $72 million to $78 million. Stock-based compensation is expected to be in the range of $62 million to $64 million, and depreciation and amortization is expected to be 5%-6% of revenue.

    Quarterly Conference Call

    To access the call, please dial 1 (800) 708-4539, or outside the U.S. 1 (847) 619-6396, with Passcode 40205168, at least five minutes prior to the 1:30 p.m. PT start time.  A live webcast of the call will also be available at http://www.yelp-ir.com under the Events & Presentations menu.  An audio replay will be available between 4:00 p.m. PT July 28, 2015 and 11:59 p.m. PT August 4, 2015 by calling 1 (888) 843-7419 or 1 (630) 652-3042, with Passcode 40205168.  The replay will also be available on Yelp’s website at http://www.yelp-ir.com.

    About Yelp

    Yelp Inc. (http://www.yelp.com) connects people with great local businesses. Yelp was founded in San Franciscoin July 2004. Since then, Yelp communities have taken hold in major metros across 31 countries. Approximately 83 million unique visitors visited Yelp via their mobile device1, including approximately 18 million unique devices accessing the Yelp app3, and approximately 79 million unique visitors visited Yelp via a desktop computer2 on a monthly average basis during the second quarter of 2015. By the end of the same quarter, Yelpers had written approximately 83 million rich, local reviews, making Yelp the leading local guide for real word-of-mouth on everything from boutiques and mechanics to restaurants and dentists.

    1 Calculated as the number of “users,” as measured by Google Analytics, accessing Yelp via mobile web plus unique devices accessing the app, each on a monthly average basis over a given three-month period.

    2 Calculated as the number of “users,” as measured by Google Analytics, accessing Yelp via desktop computer on an average monthly basis over a given three-month period.

    3 Calculated as the number of unique devices accessing the app on a monthly average basis over a given three-month period, according to internal Yelp logs.

    4 Local advertising accounts comprise all local business accounts from which we recognize local advertising revenue in a given three-month period.

    Non-GAAP Financial Measures

    This press release includes information relating to adjusted EBITDA, non-GAAP net income and non-GAAP net income per share, each of which the Securities and Exchange Commission has defined as a “non-GAAP financial measure.” Adjusted EBITDA, non-GAAP net income and non-GAAP net income per share have been included in this press release because they are key measures used by Yelp management and board of directors to understand and evaluate core operating performance and trends, to prepare and approve its annual budget and to develop short- and long-term operational plans. The presentation of this financial information, which is not prepared under any comprehensive set of accounting rules or principles, is not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for the financial information prepared and presented in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles in the United States (“GAAP”).

    Adjusted EBITDA and non-GAAP net income have limitations as analytical tools, and you should not consider them in isolation or as substitutes for analysis of Yelp’s financial results as reported under GAAP. Some of these limitations are:

    • although depreciation and amortization are non-cash charges, the assets being depreciated and amortized may have to be replaced in the future, and adjusted EBITDA and non-GAAP net income do not reflect cash capital expenditure requirements for such replacements or for new capital expenditure requirements;
    • adjusted EBITDA does not reflect changes in, or cash requirements for, Yelp’s working capital needs;
    • adjusted EBITDA and non-GAAP net income do not consider the potentially dilutive impact of equity-based compensation;
    • adjusted EBITDA does not reflect tax payments that may represent a reduction in cash available to Yelp; and
    • other companies, including those in Yelp’s industry, may calculate adjusted EBITDA and non-GAAP net income differently, which reduces their usefulness as comparative measures.

    Because of these limitations, you should consider adjusted EBITDA, non-GAAP net income and non-GAAP net income per share alongside other financial performance measures, including various cash flow metrics, net income (loss) and Yelp’s other GAAP results. Additionally, Yelp has not reconciled its adjusted EBITDA outlook for the third quarter and full year 2015 to its net income (loss) outlook because it does not provide an outlook for other income (expense) and provision for income taxes, which are reconciling items between net income (loss) and adjusted EBITDA. As items that impact net income (loss) are out of Yelp’s control and cannot be reasonably predicted, Yelp is unable to provide such an outlook. Accordingly, reconciliation to net income (loss) outlook for the third quarter and full year 2015 is not available without unreasonable effort. For a reconciliation of historical non-GAAP financial measures to the nearest comparable GAAP measures, see the non-GAAP reconciliations included below in this press release.

    Forward-Looking Statements

    This press release contains forward-looking statements relating to, among other things, the future performance of Yelp and its consolidated subsidiaries that are based on Yelp’s current expectations, forecasts and assumptions and involve risks and uncertainties. These statements include, but are not limited to, statements regarding expected financial results for the third quarter and full year 2015, Yelp’s ability to capture a meaningful share of the large local market, Yelp’s target revenue for 2017 and its expectations regarding local advertising as the primary driver of growth, Yelp’s estimates regarding local advertisers’ ROI on advertising spend, the future growth in Yelp revenue and continued investing by Yelp in its future growth, and Yelp’s ability to drive daily usage and engagement (particularly on mobile), increase awareness of Yelp among consumers, and deliver value to local businesses. Yelp’s actual results could differ materially from those predicted or implied and reported results should not be considered as an indication of future performance. Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences include, but are not limited to: Yelp’s short operating history in an evolving industry; Yelp’s ability to generate sufficient revenue to maintain profitability, particularly in light of its significant ongoing sales and marketing expenses; the impact of Yelp phasing out its brand advertising products by the end of 2015; Yelp’s ability to attract, retain and motivate well-qualified employees, particularly in sales and marketing; successfully manage acquisitions of new businesses, solutions or technologies, such as Eat24, and to integrate those businesses, solutions or technologies; Yelp’s reliance on traffic to its website from search engines like Googleand Bing; Yelp’s ability to generate and maintain sufficient high quality content from its users; maintaining a strong brand and managing negative publicity that may arise; maintaining and expanding Yelp’s base of advertisers; changes in political, business and economic conditions, including any European or general economic downturn or crisis and any conditions that affect ecommerce growth; fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates; Yelp’s  ability to deal with the increasingly competitive local search environment; Yelp’s need and ability to manage other regulatory, tax and litigation risks as its services are offered in more jurisdictions and applicable laws become more restrictive; the competitive and regulatory environment while Yelp continues to expand geographically and introduce new products and as new laws and regulations related to Internet companies come into effect; Yelp’s ability to timely upgrade and develop its systems, infrastructure and customer service capabilities. The forward-looking statements in this release do not include the potential impact of any acquisitions or divestitures that may be announced and/or completed after the date hereof.

    More information about factors that could affect Yelp’s operating results is included under the captions “Risk Factors” and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” in Yelp’s most recent Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q at http://www.yelp-ir.com or the SEC’s website at www.sec.gov. Undue reliance should not be placed on the forward-looking statements in this release, which are based on information available to Yelp on the date hereof. Yelp assumes no obligation to update such statements.

    Investor Relations Contact Information
    Wendy Lim, Allie Dalglish
    (415) 635-2412
    [email protected]

     

    Yelp Inc.
    Condensed Consolidated Balance Sheets
    (In thousands)
    (Unaudited)
    June 30, December 31,
    2015 2014
    Assets
    Current assets:
    Cash and cash equivalents $ 181,460 $        247,312
    Short-term marketable securities 186,673 118,498
    Accounts receivable, net 41,339 35,593
    Prepaid expenses and other current assets 22,713 19,355
    Total current assets 432,185 420,758
    Long-term marketable securities 38,612
    Property, equipment and software, net 72,603 62,761
    Goodwill 173,296 67,307
    Intangibles, net 42,458 5,786
    Restricted cash 16,285 17,943
    Other assets 4,560 16,483
    Total assets $ 741,387 $        629,650
    Liabilities  and stockholders’ equity
    Current liabilities:
    Accounts payable $     1,706 $            1,398
    Accrued liabilities 37,716 29,581
    Deferred revenue 2,546 2,994
    Total current liabilities 41,968 33,973
    Long-term liabilities 13,254 7,527
    Total liabilities 55,222 41,500
    Commitments and contingencies
    Stockholders’ equity
    Common stock
    Additional paid-in capital 734,867 627,742
    Accumulated other comprehensive loss (12,130) (5,609)
    Accumulated deficit (36,572) (33,983)
    Total stockholders’ equity 686,165 588,150
    Total liabilities and stockholders’ equity $  741,387 $         629,650

     

    Yelp Inc.
    Condensed Consolidated Statements of Operations
    (In thousands, except per share amounts)
    (Unaudited)
    Three Months Ended Six Months Ended
    June 30, June 30,
    2015 2014 2015 2014
    Net revenue $ 133,913 $ 88,787 $ 252,421 $ 165,194
    Cost and expenses
    Cost of revenue (1) 13,057 5,845 21,756 10,922
    Sales and marketing (1) 68,014 47,798 131,280 92,919
    Product development (1) 26,345 14,726 50,305 28,708
    General and administrative (1) 19,280 13,257 39,217 26,427
    Depreciation and amortization 7,167 4,034 14,062 7,695
    Total cost and expenses 133,863 85,660 256,620 166,671
    Income (loss) from operations 50 3,127 (4,199) (1,477)
    Other income (expense), net 329 (15) 891 (17)
    Income (loss) before income taxes 379 3,112 (3,308) (1,494)
    Benefit (provision) for income taxes (1,684) (369) 719 1,602
    Net income (loss) attributable to common stockholders $   (1,305) $   2,743 $   (2,589) $        108
    Net (income) loss per share attributable to common stockholders:
    Basic $     (0.02) $     0.04 $     (0.03) $       0.00
    Diluted $     (0.02) $     0.04 $     (0.03) $       0.00
    Weighted-average shares used to compute net loss per share attributable to common stockholders:
    Basic 74,631 71,714 74,009 71,444
    Diluted 74,631 77,056 74,009 76,903
    (1) Includes stock-based compensation expense as follows:
    Three Months Ended Six Months Ended
    June 30, June 30,
    2015 2014 2015 2014
    Cost of revenue $        222 $      119 $        346 $        269
    Sales and marketing 5,654 3,728 10,591 7,125
    Product development 6,065 3,456 11,170 6,498
    General and administrative 3,575 2,780 7,080 5,647
    Total stock-based compensation $   15,516 $ 10,083 $   29,187 $   19,539

     

    Yelp Inc.
    Condensed Consolidated Statements of Cash Flows
    (In thousands)
    (Unaudited)
    Six Months Ended
    June 30,
    2015 2014
    Operating activities
    Net income (loss) $        (2,589) $         108
     Adjustments to reconcile net income (loss) to net
     cash provided by (used in) operating activities:
    Depreciation and amortization 14,062 7,695
    Provision for doubtful accounts and sales returns 6,076 2,581
    Stock-based compensation 29,187 19,539
    Loss (gain) on disposal of assets and website development costs 144 (5)
    Premium amortization, net, on securities held-to-maturity 481 93
    Excess tax benefit from share-based award activity (3,952) (460)
    Changes in operating assets and liabilities:
    Accounts receivable (7,855) (6,716)
    Prepaid expenses and other assets (7,079) (5,980)
    Accounts payable, accrued expenses and other liabilities 15,616 3,567
    Deferred revenue (426) (433)
    Net cash provided by operating activities 43,665 19,989
    Investing activities
    Acquisitions, net of cash received (73,422)
    Purchases of property, equipment and software (18,059) (7,212)
    Capitalized website and software development costs (6,012) (4,327)
    Change in restricted cash 1,672 (397)
    Purchase of intangibles (314)
    Proceeds from sale of property and equipment 109 14
    Purchases of investment securities held-to-maturity (93,914) (122,226)
    Maturities of investment securities held-to-maturity 63,870
    Cash used in investing activities (126,070) (134,148)
    Financing activities
    Proceeds from exercise of employee stock options 8,534 10,841
    Proceeds from issuance of common stock for Employee Stock Purchase Plan 5,061 4,087
    Excess tax benefit from share-based award activity 3,952 460
    Repurchase of common stock (396) (642)
    Net cash provided by financing activities 17,151 14,746
    Effect of exchange rate changes on cash and cash equivalents (598) 35
    Net decrease in cash and cash equivalents (65,852) (99,378)
    Cash and cash equivalents at beginning of period 247,312 389,764
    Cash and cash equivalents at end of period 181,460 $   290,386

     

    Yelp Inc.
    Reconciliation of GAAP to Non-GAAP Financial Measures
    (In thousands)
    (Unaudited)
    Three Months Ended Six Months Ended
    June 30, June 30,
    2015 2014 2015 2014
    Adjusted EBITDA:
    Net income (loss) $ (1,305) $   2,743 $ (2,589) $      108
    Provision (benefit) for income taxes 1,684 369 (719) (1,602)
    Other (income) expense, net (329) 15 (891) 17
    Depreciation and amortization 7,167 4,034 14,062 7,695
    Stock-based compensation 15,516 10,083 29,187 19,539
    Adjusted EBITDA $ 22,733 $ 17,244 $ 39,050 $ 25,757
    Non-GAAP net income and income per share:
    GAAP net income (loss) attributable to common

    shareholders

    $ (1,305) $   2,743 $ (2,589) $      108
       Add back: stock-based compensation 15,516 10,083 29,187 19,539
       Add back: amortization of intangible assets 1,803 629 3,034 1,255
       Less: tax effect of stock-based compensation & amortization of intangible assets
    (6,660) (4,039) (12,376) (7,899)
       Add back: valuation allowance release (net of tax) 1,958
    NON-GAAP NET INCOME $   9,354 $   9,416 $ 17,256 $ 14,961
    GAAP diluted shares 78,749 77,056 78,205 76,903
    NON-GAAP NET INCOME PER SHARE $     0.12 $     0.12 $     0.22 $     0.19

    Image via Yelp (Flickr)

  • Pandora Gives Users an Hour of Ad-Free Music If They First Pay Close Attention to an Ad

    Pandora Gives Users an Hour of Ad-Free Music If They First Pay Close Attention to an Ad

    Pandora is heralding the full rollout of its Sponsored Listening feature, which has been in beta since last fall.

    With Sponsored Listening, Pandora offers listeners a deal: You can have an ad-free hour of music, uninterrupted, if you just pay special attention to one ad first.

    “In exchange for at least 15 seconds of active brand attention, listeners are rewarded with 1 hour of uninterrupted listening. Active brand attention includes watching a video or engaging with a rich media unit, like a swipeable slide gallery or interactive 360-degree product spotlight. Within the Sponsored Listening session, the advertiser has 100% share of voice, which fosters an intimate connection between the brand and the listener,” says Pandora.

    The ads can last for a couple of minutes, however.

    “As the competition for consumer attention continues to intensify, brands are looking for advertising products that can help them create a lasting impression and resonate with their target audiences,” said Lizzie Widhelm, Pandora’s senior vice president of advertising product strategy and sales. “Sponsored Listening enhances our suite of engagement-based advertising solutions by building on products such as Brand Stations, and is another manifestation of our philosophy that what’s good for the listener is good for the advertiser.”

    According to Pandora, the beta test has been promising, yielding a 12 percent lift in brand awareness and a 30 percent lift in purchase intent for advertisers who participated. So far, that’s included brands like Land Rover North America, Corona Extra, Gatorade, TruTV, Yeungling.

    Today, Pandora is opening it up to all ad partners.

    “Sponsored Listening is truly a win-win ad format. No music lover should be without it, and brands everywhere should look to it as a new gateway to authentic consumer attention,” says Pandora’s Jonathan Eccles.

    If you’re a Pandora user, you can try it out now on mobile.

  • Instagram’s New Focus on Search Should Excite Marketers

    In 2013, boasting a little under 100 million users, Instagram finally decided to pay some attention to its web presence. The social network updated its barebones website to finally offer the ability to browse your feed. Before that, Instagram on the web only allowed you to look at user profiles and like photos. Since then, it’s been adding more and more features to the web.

    Still, Instagram is, was, and will always be a mobile-first network. Instagram.com lags behind the company’s mobile apps in terms of functionality. You just can’t do as much on the web as you can on iOS or Android. This isn’t an accident. Instagram doesn’t hate the web, it’s just content that it’s always been a mobile, on-the-go type service and emphasis has always been placed on chronicling life in the moment.

    Having said all that, Instagram is definitely looking at the potential of its web interface. Instagram has over 300 million monthly active users, which are sharing over 70 million photos a day. Last month, Instagram’s web embeds generated over 5.3 billion impressions. Point is, there are plenty of eyes for Instagram to catch with a web version that at least doesn’t completely suck.

    Are you excited by Instagram’s focus on helping users surface content? Do you see the potential in Instagram search? Let us know in the comments.

    Earlier this week, Instagram finally brought search to the web interface.

    Instagram’s desktop search allows users to search for hashtags, locations, and people.

    Screen Shot 2015-07-24 at 10.38.36 AM

    A hashtag search, for example, opens up a page featuring “top posts” at the very top, followed by a real-time stream of the most-recent posts below. Same for a location search.

    Screen Shot 2015-07-24 at 10.41.27 AM

    The implications for marketers are pretty clear – Instagram is making it easier for users to surface all types of content on the web.

    And when users surface said content, it’s going to look much, much better than it has in the past. Instagram’s website just received a big redesign with bigger photos. As a marketer, your content will look even more appealing when a user happens upon it via hashtag, profile, or location search on the web.

    But it’s not the current search interface that should excite advertisers – it’s what the future could hold.

    As of now, Instagram’s only ad unit is in-feed ads. Advertisers can create photo, video, or even carousel ads to display in users’ feeds – but that’s it. Instagram has been extremely cautious in rolling out ad formats and volume, as past dustups with users have shown it that it’s best to take things gradually. The Facebook-owned property knows it has to maintain a delicate balance between monetization and user growth.

    But the Instagram of the future could easily integrate search ads into this framework – and having that on the web would be a huge bonus for marketers.

    Instagram could easily introduce promoted posts for hashtag, user, and location search results. It could also promote certain accounts and hashtags in the search field. You can expect marketers to clamor for these options as we move forward.

    – – – – – – – – – – –

    Instagram has expanded its search options even more on mobile, and it’s a preview of what could eventually hit the web as well.

    The company recently unveiled some big content discovery improvements – a new Explore page on mobile that not only added the more powerful search that you now see on the web, but also sections for “trending” hashtags and places.

    “Through trending Tags and trending Places, you can experience moments like #bonnaroo or #fathersday from every perspective,” Instagram said in a blog post. “Rich visual content captures everyone’s unique take — not just what the community is talking about, but also what they’re doing and seeing.”

    Screen Shot 2015-07-24 at 11.02.04 AM

    It’s not hard to imagine how these curated sections could be gold for advertisers. Instagram hasn’t yet opened up on any plans to monetize this Explore tab, however.

    – – – – – – – – – – –

    Even without the ability to buy ads based on these new search options, businesses really benefit from users having more ways to discover content.

    This is especially true of the places search. Searching for a place on Instagram on the web now displays a map and the same top posts / recent posts stream.

    Screen Shot 2015-07-24 at 11.10.35 AM

    – – – – – – – – – – –

    Up to now, Instagram has been slow to open its ad product to smaller businesses. This fall, that’s going to change.

    Here’s what Jim Squires, the director of marketing operations at the company, had to say in a recent interview:

    We’ve spent the last 18 months establishing the platform for large brands. The next logical step is to empower businesses of all sizes. Being able to target narrower segments and achieve different types of objectives is essential. We want to offer a complete solution that allows businesses to purchase through self-serve interfaces and achieve the objectives they want to achieve.

     

    We’re testing the action-oriented formats and buying through the API now, and we will be doing that through the summer with select partners and clients. Then we’ll be opening up globally and to all advertisers in the early fall timeframe.

    So, within months, Instagram is going to open the floodgates (the ads will come with “algorithmic approaches” to keep them up to quality standards, utilizing signals like negative feedback rates, engagement rates, and comments – so it won’t be a free-for-all).

    Will Instagram begin to put ads inside search? It’s hard to imagine it won’t, at some point. The company is sure laying the groundwork.

    Does Instagram’s new search focus make it more attractive, from a marketing standpoint? Let us know in the comments.

  • Doing This Will Make Your Facebook Marketing More Cost Effective

    Doing This Will Make Your Facebook Marketing More Cost Effective

    When you promote a Facebook post, do you do so to people who have already liked your Page or to people who have yet to do so? Some mix of the two? You might be interested to know that unless your ultimate goal is just to get more Facebook fans, you’re probably better off promoting to people who have already liked your Page.

    When you promote posts on Facebook, are you largely promoting to fans non-fans, or a combination? Let us know in the comments.

    According to new research from Socialbakers, marketers on Facebook are getting a lot more bang for their buck when they promote posts to fans instead of non-fans.

    This isn’t exactly surprising, but it’s worth looking at just how much of a difference it makes.

    Screen shot 2015-07-22 at 4.40.48 PM

    “At each turn, ads targeted to Fans outperformed those targeted only to non-Fans,” says Socialbakers social media analyst Phillip Ross. “They cost roughly the same per impression, but engagement metrics like cost-per-click and click-through rate make it clear just how much more valuable Fan targeting really is.”

    “While targeting some ads to non-Fans will always be necessary for expanding your audience, promoting engaging content to Fans remains the most valuable action for Facebook marketers,” he adds.

    Earlier this month, Facebook redefined how it calculates cost-per-click. From now on, CPC will only account for what Facebook calls “link clicks,” which are clicks related to certain ad objectives like: visiting another site, installing an app, or viewing a video on another site. This also includes call-to-action clicks and clicks to Facebook Canvas apps. It will no longer account for what Facebook refers to as “engagement clicks,” which include likes, shares, and comments.

    Facebook is also ramping up its video efforts, which stand to give advertisers as well as those looking to boost organic Facebook marketing new opportunities and a better alternative to YouTube.

    Facebook announced a couple of updates aimed at giving Pages more control over how their videos are organized and shared. These include improved upload tools and a new Video Library feature.

    “Page owners now have access to enhanced control and customization features when uploading videos, like the ability to set an expiration date or to add a custom thumbnail for a video,” a spokesperson for the company tells WebProNews in an email. “We’re also introducing a suite of new distribution options, like secret videos and the ability to prohibit embeds on third-party sites.”

    Secret videos enable Page owners to upload videos that are only accessible via a direct URL, keeping them from being searchable or otherwise found on Facebook. This brings Facebook’s video product more in line with YouTube’s offering.

    Page owners can also restrict the audience of a video by age and gender. They could already do so by location and language. They can set an expiration data for a video and retain its insights even after it has been removed. They can also publish videos directly to the Videos tab on their Page without distributing it to the News Feed or Timeline.

    There are some new customization options as well, including the ability to add custom thumbnails by using your own image or a suggested thumbnail and the ability to label videos based on interest categories.

    “The new Video Library enables Page owners to easily organize and update their videos. Changes can be made on a per-video basis, or in bulk,” the spokesperson says.

    The Library feature lets you edit a video’s metadata (including subtitles and thumbnails) after upload, manage distribution options, search and filter videos by title, description, etc., and view and manage secret videos.

    All of this will become available to all Pages over the coming weeks.

    Facebook also announced a new Video Ad Creative spotlight aimed at helping you learn how to create better Facebook video ads.

    The company is also offering new interesting 360 video options, which YouTube also just announced this week. It’s clear that Facebook and YouTube are in hot competition for your ad dollars as well as your organic efforts.

    Facebook flat out tells people who post YouTube videos that they’ll have a better chance of increased reach in the News Feed if they use native Facebook videos.

    Is Facebook becoming a better video advertising option than YouTube in your opinion? Share your thoughts in the comments.

    Image via Socialbakers

  • YouTube Launches 360 Degree Video Ads

    YouTube Launches 360 Degree Video Ads

    Google just announced the launch of 360 degree video ads on YouTube.

    Google introduced 360-degree videos on YouTube back in March. From the viewer’s perspective, they were particularly cool when viewed on Android, as you could move your phone around to alter the perspective. You could use your mouse to drag it around on the desktop, but it just wasn’t the same. Google added support to iOS as well as its Cardboard virtual reality platform in May.

    In an announcement on the AdWords blog, YouTube Ads product manager JR Futrell says:

    We’re thrilled that as soon as the ability to create 360 video became available to YouTube creators, brands immediately began experimenting with this new tool to deliver engrossing consumer experiences. Since then, we’ve seen stunning videos from Coca-Cola, Stella Artois and Nike, among others (check them out onCardboard!). And for those videos that were run as ads, campaign results have been impressive: for instance, Coca-Cola’s 360 video celebrating the 100th anniversary of their iconic bottle design outperformed standard in-stream video ad view-through rates by 36%.
     
    And today, Bud Light becomes the first advertiser in the US to launch 360 video running in TrueView ads. The series of ads feature three different events from Whatever, USA – Bud  Light’s takeover of Catalina Island. The immersive ads drop you right in the middle of the action, including a performance by Diplo, the welcome parade, and the “Turn of An Era” 1920’s themed party.

    The ads are compatible with YouTube HTML5 Rich Media Mastheads and TrueView in-stream and in-display units.

    Special cameras are required for creating the videos. Models include Ricoh Theta, Kodak SP360, Giroptic 360cam, and IC Real Tech Allie, all of which are already available or coming soon.

    Here’s an example from Bud Light:

    YouTube has step-by-step instructions for uploading 360 degree videos here.

    360 degree video ads on Facebook are happening as well as the social network continues to position itself closer and closer to YouTube. Facebook also announced 360 degree videos for the News Feed at its F8 conference in March. Last month, they debuted 360 degree views in mobile ads at Cannes Lions.

  • Bing Launches Native Ads On MSN For Search Marketers

    Microsoft announced the beta launch of Bing Native Ads, which let advertisers target intent outside of search. According to the company, the strongest intent signals on the web are users’ interests expressed by prior search queries, signals from the content of the experience in which they’re at at any given point, and user actions like looking for products or taking actions on advertiser sites.

    Bing’s new native ads make use of all of these and combine them with “naive experiences,” which the company says are relevant and natural. Here are some examples on MSN:

    bing-nat

    msn1

    msn2

    The ads also offers the same targeting or bid boosting functionality that’s already available from Bing Ads. This includes location, device type, time of day, day of week, and site remarketing.

    “Bing Native Ads is a native offering optimized for search advertisers,” says Bing’s Raj Kapoor. “Therefore ease of use for search advertisers is a key aspect of the product design. Search advertisers focus their efforts on optimizing the relevance and ROI of their campaigns using search ad platform workflows, interfaces, and reporting. The management and controls for Bing Native Ads are fully integrated with standard Bing Ads workflows, and all the advertiser interfaces, reporting and conversion tracking available from Bing Ads platform are available for Bing Native Ads. This makes it very easy and effortless for search advertisers to take advantage of this native offering and expand their reach targeting user intent.”

    “Bing Native Ads are designed to deliver good ROI for advertisers leveraging intent signals & algorithms, and also come with bid modifiers for advertisers to manage their participation in and ROI from native ads,” Kapoor adds.

    The ads will display on MSn in the U.S. at first. Presumably they’ll be expanded to other markets later in the year.

    Images via Bing

  • Instagram Ads For Businesses Of All Sizes Coming In The Fall

    Last month, Instagram announced some new ad formats and ad targeting options and that it would open up its ad platform to businesses of all sizes in the coming months.

    eMarketer has a new interview with Jim Squires, the director of marketing operations at the company, and he says Instagram ads will be available to all this fall:

    We’ve spent the last 18 months establishing the platform for large brands. The next logical step is to empower businesses of all sizes. Being able to target narrower segments and achieve different types of objectives is essential. We want to offer a complete solution that allows businesses to purchase through self-serve interfaces and achieve the objectives they want to achieve.
     
    We’re testing the action-oriented formats and buying through the API now, and we will be doing that through the summer with select partners and clients. Then we’ll be opening up globally and to all advertisers in the early fall timeframe.

    In addition to the video, photo, and carousel ad formats Instagram currently has, it will let people take action directly from an ad to sign up on a website, but a product, or download an app. According to Squires, the ability to take action right from Instagram has been one of the most requested features from both users and advertisers.

    The ads will come with “algorithmic approaches” to keeping ads up to quality standards, utilizing signals like negative feedback rates, engagement rates, and comments, Squires told eMarketer. Targeting options will be expanded to mirror what’s offered on Facebook, which is pretty comprehensive.

    When Instagram made its announcement last month, it said it would also leverage the best of Facebook’s infrastructure for buying ,managing, and measuring ads.

    You can take a look at the official announcement here.

    Related Reading: Here’s Why It’s Getting Harder To Ignore Instagram For Marketing

  • Google Just Revealed A Bunch Of New Shopping Features

    Google announced a bunch of new features for advertisers to encourage more sales from shoppers.

    For one, a new enhancement to product listing ads on mobile devices expands the ads as the user swipes to show more information such as product ratings and availability at nearby stores. Google says this will result in more qualified traffic driven directly to retailers.

    swipe

    The feature will hit Chrome for Android this month and iOS in the coming months.

    There are also new efforts in conversational search aimed at helping shoppers and advertisers.

    Vice President of product management Jonathan Alferness explains, “On searches for the top-rated products, such as ‘Best women’s Nike running shoes,’ we’re starting to show newly-designed shopping ads with authoritative rankings and product ratings. The new design is so helpful to those specific users that we’ve seen click-through-rate increases of up to 11% for retailers for these queries.3 Product queries that include ‘reviews’ or ‘recommendations’ are also increasingly common, so we’re showing new product review cards with product ratings and snippets from the most useful reviews from around the web. Finally, shoppers who want to learn more about a product’s features, like the resolution of the camera they’re considering purchasing, may now see a product attribute card with the most relevant information.”

    conversational

    Google is also going to start showing more local inventory ads than before, prioritizing them over over shopping ads on local intent shopping queries, such as “coffee maker near me”. Google says this increased clicks on shopping ads by 85% for such queries.

    coffee

    Google is also releasing two new shopping cards for Google Now – the in-store card, which appears when a shopper is near a store and the price drop card, which highlights price reductions.

    google-now-cards

    Google is working with select shopping apps like eBay, Flipkart, and Zalando to add dee plinks to their apps in the shopping ads.

    deep

    Finally, the new feature that is getting the most buzz is the ability to purchase right on Google.

    Alferness explains, “To help smartphone shoppers buy with ease from their favorite retailers, we’ll be testing Purchases on Google. When a shopper searches on mobile for a product such as “women’s hoodies”, she may see a shopping ad with ‘Buy on Google’ text. After clicking the ad, she’s taken to a retailer-branded product page hosted by Google. Checkout is seamless, simple, and secure, thanks to saved payment credentials in her Google Account.”

    POG - Under Armour

    Google says this leads to better mobile conversions because of a simplified checkout process, and those using it only pay for clicks on the shopping ads to the product page. Clicks and interactions on the product page (which Google hosts) are free. Google provides purchase protection for customers, but retailers “own the customer communication” and can offer the option to receive marketing and promotional messages.

    According to Google, mobile devices used before or during shopping trips influenced nearly a trillion dollars in the U.S. (about 28% of in-store sales).

    Images via Google

  • Is It Time For Flash To Go Away?

    Is It Time For Flash To Go Away?

    The writing has been on the wall for quite a while. Flash is dying a slow death, yet it continues to gasp for air. After some new vulnerabilities were discovered, many have been calling for the plug to be pulled.

    Do you think there should be an industry-wide halt in Flash use? Let us know what you think.

    Facebook’s Chief Security Officer called for its demise the other day.

    “It is time for Adobe to announce the end-of-life date for Flash and to ask the browsers to set killbits on the same day,” he said. “Even if 18 months from now, one set date is the only way to disentangle the dependencies and upgrade the whole ecosystem at once.”

    Then, Mozilla blocked all versions of Flash in Firefox after security researchers discovered vulnerabilities that affect various operating systems, that hadn’t been patched.

    Yes, this was temporary. Adobe issued an update on Tuesday about a resolution for the vulnerabilities. Here’s the company’s statement in full:

    A few days ago we were notified of two vulnerabilities within the Flash Player that could potentially allow an attacker to take control of an affected system. Upon investigation, we confirmed and fixed the issues, and took steps to ensure that this class of attack cannot be used as a future attack vector.

    We released an update to Flash Player this morning, and are proactively pushing the update out to users. We are also working with browser vendors to distribute the updated player.

    We would like to thank Dhanesh Kizhakkinan of FireEye and Peter Pi of TrendMicro and slipstream/RoL for reporting the issues and working with us to help us quickly address them.

    Flash Player is one of the most ubiquitous and widely distributed pieces of software in the world, and as such, is a target of malicious hackers. We are actively working to improve Flash Player security, and as we did in this case, will work to quickly address issues when they are discovered.

    We continue to partner with browser vendors to both improve Flash Player security as well as invest in, contribute to and support more modern technologies such as HTML5 and JavaScript.

    Nothing in there about killing Flash. Still, the calls for its death continue.

    Wired, one of the most well known magazines in tech, published an article on Wednesday called, “Flash. Must. Die.” In that, the technology is called “That insecure, ubiquitous resource hog everyone hates to need.”

    The headlines related to Flash are rarely positive. Earlier this year, YouTube deprecated Flash embeds and its Flash API. Then Google started automatically converting Flash ads to HTML5. Flash can potentially hurt websites in search rankings. Google even announced that it would try to save people’s laptop batteries by pausing Flash in Chrome.

    Despite the wide disdain for Flash, it’s still being very heavily used in advertising. We recently looked at a study from Sizmek, which called this a “major issue”.

    What’s happening is that Flash ads that would otherwise be dynamic are appearing as static images on mobile device, and this can ultimately cost the advertiser clicks and conversions.

    “This raises questions as to whether or not marketers are aware of how many of their ads are not being seen properly and how much ad spend they are wasting,” a spokesperson for the firm tells WebProNews.

    “As mobile inventory grows, the channel is also changing, particularly in the realm of rich media. The days of Flash-supported inventory on mobile devices are numbered,” the report says. “iOS devices have never had native Flash support, and it’s been six full operating system versions since Android devices supported Flash. This means that only 11% of Android devices are capable of supporting Flash, and those devices are running significantly out-of-date software. Because mobile support for Flash inventory is nearly extinct, rich media ad formats that rely on Flash are likely to default – or revert to a single, static image – nearly 100% of the time. This means 5.35 billion rich media impressions served to mobile devices were squandered in Q1 of 2015 alone.”

    According to Sizmek’s findings, only 8.3% of HTML5 impressions defaulted, while these formats represent less than half of rich media ads served to mobile devices.

    “The Flash mobile default problem isn’t exclusive to just a few advertisers,” the report notes. “Among campaigns that served at least 1 million impressions in Q1, the average default rate was 35.2%. Many advertisers had it much worse than that – 36% of the advertisers in this sample defaulted much more than average, including the 12% of advertisers that never successfully served a rich media ad to a mobile device. The rate of rich media failure was much lower on desktop inventory, where 60% of advertisers defaulted at a rate of less than 3%.”

    You can take a look at the full report here.

    Are you still using Flash for ads? Should Flash continue to be supported? Share your thoughts in the comments.

  • Bing Shopping Campaigns Now Available To All In The U.S.

    Earlier this year, Microsoft introduced Bing Shopping Campaigns in beta aimed at making it easier for businesses to advertise products from their Bing Merchant Center stores. On Tuesday, the company announced that they’re now available to all U.S. customers.

    In fact, they’ll soon be the default campaign type for running product ads on Bing. They’ll sunset the traditional way of managing product ads in the fall.

    “Bing Shopping Campaigns (BSC) beta was launched in April to participating advertisers. Advertisers tested BSC for capabilities that allowed them to organize, track, and manage their Product Ads in a more efficient and optimal manner,” says Bing’s Neha Mohan.

    “Bing Shopping Campaigns is a new campaign type in your UI that makes it easier than ever to advertise your products from the Bing Merchant Center store,” Mohan adds. “It is the latest and greatest way to create and manage Product Ads, streamlining the traditional process so you can get your ads up and running in no time.”

    In addition to the increased availability, there are some new features for Bing Shopping Campaigns. Bing provides a feature rundown, which includes a comparison to Google’s offering:

    bsctable

    You can find an overview here as well as set up guidance and optimization tips from the company.

    Images via Bing

  • Selling To Customers Through ‘Shoppable Videos’

    Selling To Customers Through ‘Shoppable Videos’

    Everyone knows online video can be a great way to market businesses and products, but some businesses are finding that it can be quite beneficial for actually selling products. “Shoppable video” is a trend that has been slowly rising for several years, but new capabilities from a variety of platforms indicate that it could be poised to become much bigger.

    Is video already a part of your marketing strategy? Is it part of your selling strategy? Tell us about your efforts in the comments.

    “Retail video brings merchants’ products to life in a way that only e-commerce video can, often resulting in higher customer satisfaction and higher retail sales conversion,” says video marketing news blog ReelSEO.

    YouTube for Shopping

    Greg Jarboe writes on the site that YouTube Shopping is the new window shopping and that “unlike the mall, YouTube never, ever sleeps.” He cites data directly from Google claiming that one third of all shopping searches happen between the hours of 10PM and 4AM.

    A couple months ago, Google announced that it is extending its product listing ads (PLAs) to YouTube with TrueView for Shopping, its new format that lets businesses run product ads with related videos.

    “Whether it’s watching a product review or learning how to bake a soufflé, we look to video in countless moments throughout to the day to help us get things done,” Google said in a blog post. “We call these micro-moments – when we reflexively turn to our devices to learn more, make a decision, or purchase a product.”

    It said it launched TrueView for shopping to “connect the dots between the moment a person watches a video and the moment they decide to make a purchase,” while also making it easy for viewers to get more info on the business’ products with the option to click to buy.

    With these ads, businesses can showcase product details and images, and users can click and purchase from a brand or retail site from within the video ad. The option is available for TrueView in-stream video ads, and works across mobile, desktop, and tablet. 50% of views on YouTube come from mobile.

    The ads are integrated with Google Merchant Center, so you can connect campaigns with a Merchant Center feed to dynamically add products and customize ads through contextual and audience signals such as geography and demographic information.

    “Brands that have participated in our early tests of TrueView for shopping have seen strong results for driving interest and sales,” Google noted in the announcement. “Online home goods retailer Wayfair, for instance, saw a 3X revenue increase per impression served when compared to previous campaigns. And beauty retailer Sephora took advantage of this new ad format to drive +80% lift in consideration and +54% lift in ad recall, and an average view time of nearly two minutes.”

    If You Teach Them, They Just Might Buy

    In an article last week, the National Retail Federation looked at how Williams-Sonoma, in partnership with Visa Checkout, became one of the first brands to utilize the new TrueView shoppable video ads:

    Shoppers viewing a series of videos created by Tastemade, a global food lifestyle network for digital platforms, can buy the featured items — including glasses, cocktail plates and platters — directly from the video. The campaign “clicks” on multiple fronts — engaging and informative videos showcasing products that can be purchased in just a few clicks point to how marketers are increasingly focusing on visual elements to provide inspiration on mobile.

    “The videos don’t feel promotional. They teach viewers how to prepare a summer meal using Williams-Sonoma products, which can be purchased easily using Visa Checkout,” says Chris Curtin, chief brand and innovation marketing officer at Visa. “Visa Checkout is a simpler payment system. It takes 44 fields of information and compresses it into just a few clicks. The combination of shoppable video and a faster transaction give new meaning to the idea of instant gratification.”

    Google recently gave marketers some best practices for capitalizing on major growth in how-to searches on YouTube. Believe it or not, these types of searches have seen 70% growth year-over-year. A whopping one hundred million hours of such content has already been watched in North America in 2015, it says. According to Google, people look for how-to videos increasingly on mobile with 91% of smartphone users turning to their devices for ideas while completing a task. These searches are on the rise across all age groups, but millennials are especially likely to search YouTube for how-to videos. 67% of them agree that they can find a YouTube video on anything they want to learn.

    “When people ask how to do something, that’s a need,” wrote David Mogensen, Head of B2B Product Marketing for YouTube and Google Display. “That’s someone asking, ‘can you help me out?’ Digital media let brands respond to those questions and be there at the very moment someone needs them most. Brands that successfully do this can win loyalty and drive sales to boot. In fact, nearly one in three millennials say they’ve purchased a product as a result of watching a how-to video.”

    He talked about how Home Depot has a bunch of how tos for home improvement and how Valspar has content about various paint-related subjects. Home improvement, beauty, and cooking are among the most popular categories for how-to searches.

    As far as best practices, Google said to identify the “I-want-to-do moments” in which people have a need that your brand can help with. It says to find these moments across the whole consumer journey and put them at the center of your strategy. You should also figure out what questions and concerns people have related to the types of projects you sell or the projects they’re used for, and then create the content to serve as resources for those, it says.

    Google also suggested looking at when how-to searches occur, and making your videos easier to find by adding descriptive titles, details, and relevant tags to each video. Promoting the videos is another option.

    One thing that Mogensen didn’t really get into that is certainly worth considering is how frequently videos appear in Google search results. You have to imagine that there are plenty of these how-to searches happening right on Google.

    We recently looked at a study on Google Universal Search trends, and video is the most frequent type of universal result Google shows. They appeared in 55% of search results pages analyzed. While the percentage of search results pages showing video results actually fell over the course of 2014, videos appear more often than anything else by far. 80% of videos displayed in Universal Search results came from YouTube.

    Growing Opportunity in Social

    Look for Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest to play bigger roles for shoppable videos as time goes on.

    Facebook is doing everything in its power to compete with YouTube in video advertising, and it’s even currently testing a feature, which could greatly increase the amount of video people actually consume on Facebook. They’re letting users continue to watch videos via a pop-out box as they continue to browse their News Feeds.

    Once this goes live on a wider scale, people will no longer have to stop what they’re doing on Facebook to consume a video. They can hit the button and play it while they go about their browsing business. It’s not inconceivable for Facebook to show related ads in the News Feed as they continue, though we’ve seen no indication so far that this is the plan.

    In addition to stepping up its video game, however, Facebook is also making moves to become a better place for businesses to sell things. In fact, there are even new reports that it’s working on some kind of virtual assistant to help people buy things.

    There are companies focusing on bringing shoppable videos to Facebook as we speak.

    Much like Facebook, Twitter is also rampantly trying to become a better place for businesses to sell items. It recently showed off some new product pages that show a great deal of potential. It’s also trying to get businesses to use video more.

    Pinterest is now offering “buyable pins,” and let’s not forget that Pinterest isn’t just about static images. It’s also full of video.

    Shoppable video on YouTube is one thing, but we can expect social to become a much bigger part of the picture once these endeavors get into full swing.

    “For shoppable video to be a more effective tool, marketers need to incorporate it into their broader content marketing strategy and use it as an assistant help the customer in their buying journey,” says Vebeka Guess at Econsultancy.

    She suggests using video as an overview guide to products or services, as a catalog, or as a how-to. She goes on to note that marketers can have trouble quantifying their ROI on shoppable video mainly due to a lack of standardization, which makes it difficult to capture data. She says to find a tech partner that will help you own creation, management, and delivery of shoppable video content and allow for “seamless capture and reporting on meaningful metrics”.

    According to her, this is the key to shoppable video becoming more widely adopted.

    Do you see this becoming part of your strategy in the future? Have you already experimented with it? To what end? Discuss in the comments.

    Images via Thinkstock, Google, Facebook, Twitter

  • Google Makes Some Changes To AdWords Express

    Google has updated the AdWords Express app for Android with a new design as well as some adjustments that make it easier to manage your campaigns.

    adwords-express

    Google launched the AdWords Express mobile app roughly a year ago as a way for small businesses to have more control over their marketing efforts on the go.

    Google briefly explains the new changes in a post on Google+:

    The AdWords Express Android app has gotten a makeover, so it’s even easier to check your stats and make edits on the go. Clicks, views and calls from your ad are now shown in a single graph right when you open the app. When you make edits to your ad text, the ad preview updates above where you’re typing. Now you can always see what your customers will see.

    Looking to show off your business? Reach more customers by advertising through AdWords Express on Android (goo.gl/H9kldd) and iOS (goo.gl/61a3AH).

    The app is also available on iOS. It’s unclear if and when similar changes will be made on that version. You can download the Android App from the Google Play Store of course.

    Images via Google

  • Google AdWords Gets New Automated Bidding Tools

    Google announced the launch of new automated bidding tools for setting performance targets in AdWords. These are target opt-in recommendations and the Target CPA Simulator.

    As the company notes, automated bidding is key to “setting smart bids at scale and maximizing conversions or revenue from your spend.” Google explains the new tools in a Google+ post:

    New target opt-in recommendations help you select the right performance target when first setting up an automated bid strategy for target CPA or target ROAS . After you’ve chosen which campaigns to apply a bid strategy to, we’ll recommend a performance target based on your actual CPA or ROAS performance from the past few weeks. This helps you maintain CPA or ROAS performance while the automated bid strategy optimizes to increase conversions or revenue at that similar target.

    We’re also introducing the Target CPA Simulator to help you estimate the conversion impact of adjusting your target CPA. We first announced this feature during the AdWords livestream 2015 and it’s now fully available to all advertisers. Using this, you can see how many conversions you might lose by decreasing your target CPA or conversely, how increasing your target could unlock additional conversion opportunity.

    Say, for example, you have a current target CPA of $9 and drove about 740 conversions in the past week. Using the Target CPA Simulator, you can see that with a target CPA of $11.30, you might have generated about 280 incremental conversions.

    Last week, Google launched new engagement columns in reporting for Lightbox ads in AdWords and announced the launch of a new email newsletter to give advertisers updates on paid search best practices.

    Via Search Engine Land

    Image via Google

  • Paid Search Spend Continues Strong Growth In U.S. Driven By Mobile Usage

    Paid Search Spend Continues Strong Growth In U.S. Driven By Mobile Usage

    IgnitionOne released its Q2 2015 Digital Marketing Report this week, highlighting data and trends in search, programmatic display, social, and mobile advertising. The company manages over $1.5 billion in digital spend and tracks over $30 billion in customer revenue.

    It found “strong” growth in paid search spend in the U.S. for the third consecutive quarter, up 22% year-over-year.

    Screen shot 2015-07-10 at 12.09.01 PM

    According to the findings, and not surprisingly, mobile search growth was the main driver of this paid search spend growth. Mobile phone spend in general was up 71% yearover-year. Growth for tablets was up 22%. Smartphones accounted for the greatest growth in mobile spend at 59% of spend compared to tablets.

    Screen shot 2015-07-10 at 12.10.16 PM

    “Despite gains in search market share made by Yahoo!/Bing in previous quarters, Google reclaimed much of its lost ground,” IgnitionOne says. “Google took in 75.5% of U.S. paid search spend, as opposed to Yahoo!/Bing’s 24.5%. The search giant was outpaced by Facebook in display growth, however, dropping -9% YoY compared to Facebook’s 48% growth in display spend.”

    Meanwhile, programmatic display grew 33%. This category has shown growth for two quarters. It did see a decrease in impressions thanks to Facebook changes.

    “As industry giants battle over market share it only serves to highlight how important it is for marketers and their technologies to be publisher-agnostic,” said IgnitionOne CEO Will Margiloff. “This report once again validates sophisticated marketers paying close attention to individual customers and delivering messages at the right time, efficiently, no matter what publisher or what device.”

    You can find the full report here.

    Images via IgnitionOne

  • Advertisers Are Using A Nearly Obsolete Technology Way Too Much

    Flash is bordering on obsolete at this point thanks to the rise of mobile and HTML5, yet advertisers are still running a ridiculous amount of Flash ads despite the fact that they default to static displays on mobile devices, which likely means fewer clicks.

    Sizmek has released a new study, which illustrates just how common this is and notes that it’s a “major issue”.

    “This raises questions as to whether or not marketers are aware of how many of their ads are not being seen properly and how much ad spend they are wasting,” a spokesperson for the firm tells WebProNews.

    “As mobile inventory grows, the channel is also changing, particularly in the realm of rich media. The days of Flash-supported inventory on mobile devices are numbered,” the report says. “iOS devices have never had native Flash support, and it’s been six full operating system versions since Android devices supported Flash. This means that only 11% of Android devices are capable of supporting Flash, and those devices are running significantly out-of-date software. Because mobile support for Flash inventory is nearly extinct, rich media ad formats that rely on Flash are likely to default – or revert to a single, static image – nearly 100% of the time. This means 5.35 billion rich media impressions served to mobile devices were squandered in Q1 of 2015 alone.”

    According to Sizmek’s findings, only 8.3% of HTML5 impressions defaulted, while these formats represent less than half of rich media ads served to mobile devices.

    Screen shot 2015-07-09 at 11.38.28 AM

    “The Flash mobile default problem isn’t exclusive to just a few advertisers,” the report notes. “Among campaigns that served at least 1 million impressions in Q1, the average default rate was 35.2%. Many advertisers had it much worse than that – 36% of the advertisers in this sample defaulted much more than average, including the 12% of advertisers that never successfully served a rich media ad to a mobile device. The rate of rich media failure was much lower on desktop inventory, where 60% of advertisers defaulted at a rate of less than 3%.”

    Screen shot 2015-07-09 at 11.40.11 AM

    As the report points out, a lot of advertisers may see the defaults as not a big deal since viewers are still seeing the ad in some form via a static image, but it also points to data showing that HTML5 ads get much better click and interaction rates.

    You can take a look at the full report here.

    Images via Sizmek

  • MRC Releases Ad Viewability Test Results

    The Media Rating Council (MRC) has released the results of the third phase of its viewability measurement reconciliation testing. It had conducted two prior phases, which identified requirements for vendors to follow in order to “minimize discrepancies in viewability measurement.”

    This most recent phase is the final phase of testing. The MRC received data from campaigns accounting for about four billion served ad impressions across a wide range of site, placement, and creative types for both display and video ads. It found that for about two thirds of campaigns, differences between vendors’ viewable impression counts were within what was deemed an “acceptable” range. For the other campaigns, there were differences of more than 10%. They found more variability in smaller campaigns of less than 100,000 viewable impressions.

    54% of the difference was a result of differing treatments of mobile viewable impressions in vendors’ reporting, the MRC says, adding that 28% of the difference resulted from vendors treating multi-ad units in different fashions for measurement and reporting purposes.13% of the difference was from differences in whether vendors opt to measure ad traffic served in a campaign by ad servers other than themselves. 2% was from differences noted in the application of certain ad verification processes and the reporting of viewable impressions within said processes, and 3% was from other causes, including issues that were previously identified in earlier testing phases.

    The IAB gave us this statement:

    From the moment that 3MS (Making Measurement Make Sense), a joint effort by the ANA, the 4As and the IAB, put forth guiding principles of measurement in 2011, the IAB has consistently advocated for viewable impression currency. Every ad should have the opportunity to be seen.

    Today, many publishers, agencies and advertisers are employing the MRC standard for a viewable impression along with the IAB Viewability Transaction Principles. This is all good.

    The findings from this most recent round of measurement reconciliation work by the MRC support the IAB Viewability Transaction Principles published at the end of 2014. In that document, we cited reasons why measurement and technology improvements would be required to get to 100% Viewability and stated that in 2015, a 70% Viewability threshold for campaigns was a reasonable goal.

    In February 2015, at the IAB Annual Leadership Meeting, David Morris, Chief Revenue Officer, CBS Interactive and Chairman of the IAB Board of Directors, called for rapid improvement in the amount of media measured, the ability to measure all ad units and the need for standards and accurate measurement in mobile. Clearly, the MRC analysis demonstrates the need to move faster in solving for the root causes of measurement disparity and inadequacies. The IAB has maintained that 2015 is the year of transition. As long as we continue to make progress in isolating the causes of measurement inconsistency and remedying them, thus achieving accurate measurement, we believe that 2016 will be the year of even greater Viewability and measurability.

    Now is the time to move from good to great. The path is mapped out for us: all vendors must follow the MRC recommendations to improve Viewability measurement and they must do so as rapidly as possible (lest they risk losing accreditation).

    The IAB looks forward to working with all partners in this dynamic ecosystem to provide 100% viewability, based on accurate measurement, to our advertisers.

    You can find an in-depth review of the study here.

  • Here’s How Facebook Just Redefined Cost Per Click

    Facebook is changing how it measures cost per click (CPC) for advertisers. This comes as part of its latest Ads API release.

    From now on, CPC will only account for what Facebook calls “link clicks,” which are clicks related to certain ad objectives like: visiting another site, installing an app, or viewing a video on another site. This also includes call-to-action clicks and clicks to Facebook Canvas apps. It will no longer account for what Facebook refers to as “engagement clicks,” which include likes, shares, and comments.

    Do you think this is the right approach for Facebook to take? How do you expect it to affect your campaigns? Discuss.

    As a result of the changes, Facebook says advertisers who care about link clicks will see better returns on their ad spend and more efficient spending of budgets.

    “As a result of this change, some campaign reporting metrics related to clicks may look different,” the company notes. “By excluding likes, shares and comments, CPC may increase but will also become more valuable as it counts only the clicks you want. Similarly, it may look like your click-through rate (CTR) has decreased; again, this is because the CTR will no longer factor in the additional clicks.”

    “If an ad has lots of likes and shares, that’s a signal of high-quality content being delivered to the right people,” it adds. “This positive signal helps ads perform better at auction, and advertisers can still bid for engagement clicks (including comments, likes and shares) by choosing other optimization options if they wish. These outcomes, however, will not be tracked in the updated definition of CPC.”

    So what do advertisers really think of the change? Well, opinions are varied, but there is a a pretty good amount of optimism.

    “CPC bidding could become a lot more efficient,” says Brad O’Brien, Director, Paid Social for digital marketing agency 3Q Digital. “I don’t think it means CPCs would go down; in my mind it probably means they will go up. If there were 5+ means by which Facebook considered a ‘click’ and now there’s just one – overall click volume will go down and likely mean a bit more costly, but more efficient clicks.”

    “This will also give you a truer measure of conversion rate, and conversion rates will go up,” he adds. “You’re only looking at real clicks to your site or app. The possible higher CPCs and the likely improved conversion rates are something to keep an eye on in the coming weeks.”

    Internet Retailer shares some additional thoughts from industry folks:

    The new definition will help advertisers, says David Zelniker, product manager for digital marketing vendor Kenshoo Ltd. “This change allows our clients, focused on performance marketing, to pay for the action they care about most,” he says.
     
    The change also aligns Facebook with industry standards, says Yaniv Makover, CEO of content marketing startup Keywee Inc.
     
    “This is another step in Facebook’s move from a social platform measuring social clicks to a premium platform for advertisers,” he says. “By changing the CPC to this new definition, it is more aligned with the rest of the industry, and it shows that Facebook is confident it can deliver.”

    Those who buy through Ads Manager or Power Editor won’t have to do anything for the time being. Facebook will share further info accordingly. Those buying through a Facebook Marketing Partner are urged to speak with that partner to get an idea of when they’ll be implementing the new API with the updated CPC.

    Those buying through the Ads API (v2.4) can begin buying ads with the updated CPC immediately. Facebook will still support the old way until October 7.

    If you’re a developer using Facebook’s Marketing APIs, you’ll probably want to read this.

    Related Reading: Salesforce Report Looks at Facebook Ad CPM Trends

    Let us know what you think about Facebook’s changes to CPC in the comments.

    Image via Facebook

  • Twitter Gives Mobile App Advertisers 3 New Features

    Twitter Gives Mobile App Advertisers 3 New Features

    Twitter is giving mobile app advertisers a new video app card, optimized action bidding, and cost per install bidding. The company announced that it would roll the features out to advertisers globally over the coming months.

    The video app card enables them to showcase their apps within video ads in what Twitter describes as an “immersive experience” aimed at driving higher quality app installs.

    video-app-card

    Optimized action bidding allows advertisers to optimize their bids according to install, while still paying by app click. The company paints this as another way of lowering the cost per install and getting higher return on investment.

    Finally, cost per install bidding lets advertisers bid, optimize, and pay by install. Twitter says this gives them cost-efficiency and “maximum control” over cost per install.

    Twitter says mobile app marketers will also soon be able to leverage its unique targeting to reach mobile users across partner apps on over a billion devices.

    The announcements come as the company celebrates a year of mobile app promotion. As part of the celebration, it released the following infographic looking at its efforts in this area.

    “Everyday, people use Twitter to discover new ideas, trends and products — including apps,” says product marketing manager Sherene Arjani. “A year ago, we launched mobile app promotion to help marketers drive cost-effective app installs and engagements. Along the way, we’ve enhanced the product suite with new targeting, creative and measurement features – enabling our advertisers to more effectively connect with the right audience on Twitter.”

    “These product improvements are delivering high returns on investment for clients across all verticals, from tech to entertainment to retail,” Arjani adds.

    app-promotion

    Images via Twitter

  • Google Launches ‘Paid Search Best Practices’ Email Newsletter

    Google announced the launch of a new email newsletter, which it will send out once a month to subscribing advertisers. It’s called Google Best Practices, and aims to give advertisers advice on improving their campaigns.

    “We get it. You’re busy. Staying on top of your AdWords game is important, but there are only so many hours in the day (or week {or month}) to read guides and watch webinars,” Matt Lawson, Director of Performance Ads Marketing at Google writes on the Inside AdWords blog. “That’s why the Google Best Practices team put together a brand new newsletter. It’ll be an email per month, and we’re designing it to take approximately three minutes to read in its entirety. We want the insights and recommendations in it to be worth the time you put into reading it. Even if it only takes three minutes to read, we want those to be three valuable minutes.”

    “Whether it’s a quick video or recommendations on using a new feature, we hope to include the type of insights that make you better at doing what you do, all while getting you back to doing what you actually do as quickly as possible,” he adds.

    There’s a sign up form here, which lets you o[pt in to receive email communications from “the latest in digital marketing news, research, insights, product updates, and event invitations from Google.”

    From the form, they’ll let you choose your industry and platform of interest so you can limit the emails you get accordingly.

    You can also keep up with our own AdWords coverage here.

    Image via Google