Market Targeting

Don't Build Things Differently. Build Different Things.

Emma Ruehl — Mon, 26 Oct 2015 17:08:40 +0000

Don't Build Things Differently. Build Different Things.

Emma Ruehl Mon, 10/26/2015 - 12:08pm

You don’t need Millennials to tell you that mobile sites matter. Mobile usage is slowly taking over desktop, and there are no signs of slowing down. Just this year, we saw the scales significantly tip towards mobile, taking 51% of the digital media time pie, compared to a 42% share for desktop. Some best practices from desktop web design carry over to mobile principles, but it would be a mistake to treat them as the same animal. As Will Critchlow, founder and CEO of Distilled, said, “Don’t build things differently; build different things.”

Stop Trying to Fit Mobile into a Desktop Box

Mobile site design shouldn’t be an afterthought anymore, and many developers even argue that you should start designing for mobile first. It’s a different experience than desktop, and people use each platform for different things. When you’re trying to find the hours of operation for a local restaurant on your phone, you may give up and go somewhere else if you can’t easily find them. Perhaps the hours are embedded in a paragraph on a less-obvious page, easier spotted on the desktop version of the site. This matters more than annoying a user; you might just be missing out on a potential sale.

4 Mobile Musts

Simple, simple, simple. Keep your content clear and focused. Users won’t take the time to search for what they’re looking for on your mobile site; they’ll go somewhere else. Navigation menus should be easy to spot and manageable in size, and for the life of me, do not make users scroll to see the whole menu.
Function over form. Performance is king on mobile. Your visitors will appreciate a site that runs fast (see earlier about winning an argument). This isn’t the place for impressive, detailed graphics that take ages to load.
Less is more. Less copy, images, and form fields. We’re talking bare essentials. Your site should feel more like a basic outline than a detailed term paper.
Build it for sharing. Be sure to give mobile users many opportunities to share content on social media (when appropriate). Chances are, when someone is looking at your restaurant menu, Facebook is open in another tab. An overwhelming 50% of Facebook and Gmail users are on mobile. Let’s give them some bragging opportunities.

A Final Note

Even if Google Analytics says you don’t have a sizable amount of mobile users who matter, don’t ignore them. Your site may not be built for a great mobile experience that encourages mobile users, which means you’re losing out on that 50% of users who could share your content on social media. More mobile users equals more shares, which could cause more mobile users, and then more shares (and potential sales). It’s a vicious, vicious cycle.

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Why Building a Retail Mobile App is Probably a Waste of Time

Amy Peveto — Tue, 14 Oct 2014 15:05:36 +0000

Why Building a Retail Mobile App is Probably a Waste of Time

Amy Peveto Tue, 10/14/2014 - 10:05am

Mobile apps have taken the world by storm. In Apple’s App store alone there are more than a million, and according to some research we’re spending more of our time online using them than anything else. Despite what some say about the value of apps for businesses, though, I’m still not convinced it’s a good investment for everyone.

Consumers spend a lot of time on apps

According to comScore, we spend 52% of our digital media time in mobile apps — that’s more than we spend surfing the web on desktops or mobile.

And there’s more numbers that look good for businesses angling for a way to profit from apps:

57% of smartphone owners use apps every single day
79% use apps nearly every day
42% of all smartphone app time happens in that individual’s most-used app

Apps can benefit your business

In a Huffington Post article Sajeel Qureshi suggests that your first digital marketing step should be building an app. Done well — as the apps he mentions in the article are — an app can help you sell products, streamline processes, and keep your customers happy.

But it’s harder than you think

In his article Qureshi assures readers that getting an app developed is “cheaper to make then [sic] you think,” and that you can “use the momentum of an app to unlock the potential of the digital marketing world.”

Maybe you can — but it’s not that simple. First you have to consider:

How does an app fits into my existing marketing strategy?
What’s the goal of my app?
Does my audience use apps?
What should my app look like and do?
Who’s going to manage and update my app?
What content does my app need, and who’s going to create it?
What happens if my app breaks?

As with every other aspect of your digital marketing, developing a successful app begins with strategy — and the value you get from it is directly proportionate to the effort you put in.

Assuming there’s any value to be had.

Because when it comes time to buy...

Consumers abandon apps in favor of mobile websites.

Your app might be fun and cool, but if it’s not building your brand or bringing you business, why spend time and money on it?

Focus on your mobile experience instead

Before you jump on the app bandwagon, visit your website on a tablet or mobile phone. Is it a good experience?

80% of B2B (and 84% of B2C) brands don’t have a mobile strategy. As you can see in Karen McGrane’s SlideShare presentation, this unacceptable in an age when many people access the Internet using only their phones.

I believe your money is better spent on improving your customers’ mobile experience than on building a mostly useless — and profitless — app.

The Mobile Content Mandate from Karen McGrane

Why Lame Email Subject Lines Damage Your Marketing

Amy Peveto — Tue, 16 Sep 2014 14:37:47 +0000

Why Lame Email Subject Lines Damage Your Marketing

Amy Peveto Tue, 09/16/2014 - 9:37am

We hear a lot about how email open rates are a vanity metric that shouldn’t be trusted, but the truth is if you can’t get prospects to open your emails, your email marketing will fail. Here’s just a few reasons why not doing enough to create awesome email subject lines can spell email marketing doom.

Decrease deliverability

Email clients like Gmail and Yahoo! Mail are cracking down even harder on spam; your email has to make it past these guys before it’s allowed into your prospect’s inbox, and systems’ filters are set to “finer than fleas’ whiskers.”

A poorly-written subject line is a signal to these systems that a particular email could be spam. Rather than risk their customers’ ire (who doesn’t hate getting spam?), the systems automatically shunt suspicious emails right into the spam or trash folder.

Your prospect never sees the mail, and as a bonus it gets reported to your email marketing platform as spam — and it takes surprisingly few complaints to result in a banned account.

Decrease open rates

Let’s assume your email makes it past the first round of defense and actually hits some inboxes.

Don’t start celebrating yet. Your email now has to make it past an even more discerning filter: your busy prospect.

Consumers hate getting emails with unclear, boring, irrelevant, and/or overly-long subject lines. If it doesn’t entice them immediately, your email will never get opened — or worse, the reader will mark it as spam.

Increase spam complaints

Spam complaints are bad for business. Not only do they mean that your prospects see your content as worthless, they can also result in your email marketing platform’s banning your account and preventing you from sending emails to anyone (even those who haven’t flagged your emails as spam).

Tips for writing awesome email subject lines

The bad news is that it’s easy to write spammy or otherwise crummy email subject lines; the good news is that’s it’s almost as easy to learn how to write awesome ones.

Writing an irresistible email subject line is an art that requires a great deal of practice, but here are a few evergreen tips to keep in mind:

Be specific - Make it clear what your email contains and who it’s from
Keep it pithy - Emails with shorter subject lines have higher open rates
Avoid spammy words - Words like “free,” “help,” and “reminder”
Go easy with punctuation - Nothing screams spam like four exclamation points
Test - A/B test to see which subject lines get the best results

Warning: don’t stop at subject lines

Awesome subject lines are just the tip of the email marketing iceberg, and should never be considered the entirety of your email marketing strategy.

The best way to keep open rates (and click-throughs and conversions) high over time is to keep your email opt-ins above-board, build a list of qualified leads, and routinely send your prospects and customers content they love and find valuable.

Need help with your email marketing?

[photo credit: e_lisewin via photopin cc]

Consumer Privacy from the Perspective of a Digital Marketer

Wes Mills — Wed, 07 May 2014 15:31:53 +0000

Consumer Privacy from the Perspective of a Digital Marketer

Wes Mills Wed, 05/07/2014 - 10:31am

Privacy, especially on the Internet, is something that’s prevalent in the minds of just about everyone. And when the finger isn’t being pointed towards certain government organizations, people are quick to get out their pitchforks and head for marketers and the organizations that “sell your data.”

But it’s nonsense, for the most part. I’ll offer up insight in the context of marketing on how it can incredibly beneficial for both consumers and businesses.

Spoiler alert: We actually don’t even care who you are.

What data we actually care about

Any professional marketer likely has far too much data to single out individual people. And we’re talking about marketing here, so what’s the value in doing that anyway?

When it comes to consumers, I don’t care what their name is, who they’re in a relationship with, or what they did on Spring Break back in ‘03. That’s a little too personal. And to be honest, there isn’t much value in trying to figure out all of that.

What I do care about is demographics and psychographics like:

Interests
Age
Gender
Location
Values

Targeting at this level turns everything into just a numbers game. Marketers always want the largest reach for their target audience, which means you’re dealing with thousands of individuals.

Using Facebook as an example, I may only care about a target audience if they all live in a certain zip code, own a house, are married, and the audience size is greater than 10,000 people. Once my ads run, I can analyze the key performance indicators, then test different demographic metrics and see which combinations perform better.

Consumers become numbers in spreadsheets and the goal is to improve those numbers with testing and optimization.

What information Google and Facebook give marketers

This may come as a surprise to some, but Google and Facebook don’t give detailed information on individuals. In Facebook’s Power Editor and ad builder, you select which demographic metrics you’re targeting, and the only thing Facebook gives you is a potential size of your audience.

Google AdWords may be even less intrusive than that, since most of the emphasis is in the search term and not the individual searching with it.

You can, however, target people who have already visited your website. Remarketing can seem intrusive, understandably — but it’s not possible to see any visitor’s entire web browsing history.

Google goes a step further and applies a threshold in both Google Analytics and AdWords that won’t show any data if the sample size isn’t large enough.

Everybody wins

The traditional rhetoric you hear may lead you to believe that no consumer likes targeted ads. But the data and results tell a different and more compelling story.

I’ll put myself in the shoes of the consumer to conceptualize my point. I’m 23, male, and my browsing history and Facebook indicates that I like cycling. So browsing around the web, naturally I’d expect to see ads about cycling deals, upcoming cycling events, etc. I would find these relevant and some may even inform me of an offer that’s available on a product I was considering purchasing.

Now what if highly targeted ads didn’t exist, and the ads I saw were about baby products, retirement homes, and low-APR mortgages? The ads become annoying, irrelevant, and from the businesses point of view, they aren’t reaching the customers they need to.

TL;DR

From the standpoint of a marketer, consumers’ privacy isn’t confiscated in any way. Marketers tell large advertising platforms like Facebook and Google what kind of people they want to share their ads with, and Facebook and Google make it happen. They then give the performance results back, so the marketer can make adjustments as necessary.

The goal for marketers is that consumers can see product and service offerings that appeal to them, while a business gets a higher ROI because the targeting is more efficient.

Have you tried advertising online?

There’s something to gain from digital advertising for every business. Whether it’s reinforcing your brand, engaging with your target audience, or spreading awareness about a promotional offer.

If you own a business, or are a part of a business that wants to venture out on the digital advertising frontier, drop us a line here. We’re trusted by Google, and we know what it takes to produce meaningful results on all digital advertising platforms.

[Image credit: g4ll4is]

Submitted by Bert Powers on Thu, 05/15/2014 - 8:12pm

A rare concept in todays cyber world, where it seems everything is for sale.

Submitted by Wes Mills on Fri, 05/16/2014 - 10:09am

I agree — it does seem everything is for sale. Thanks for reading, Bert!

Social Media Marketing Takes Over in 2014

Jennifer Edwards — Wed, 23 Apr 2014 13:32:24 +0000

Social Media Marketing Takes Over in 2014

Jennifer Edwards Wed, 04/23/2014 - 8:32am

As we fly through another year (is it really almost May already?!), the emergence of social media platforms continues its upward growth. We are seeing a shift in the need for businesses to implement some sort of social media marketing from a suggestion to a necessity.

The benefits of integrating your business’s social media with your content strategy are evident; however, don’t waste time and resources on platforms that aren’t going to help.

It’s important to research where your specific audience is — what social networking sites are they connected to? To help you further, here are some social media platforms predicted to dominate in 2014.

A picture is worth a thousand words

Image-based social media sites are becoming increasingly popular. I’m constantly hearing teens and tweens say, “Insta[gram] pic!” or “I found it on Pinterest!”

Visual content is growing rapidly, and so are the platforms available on which to share that content. Image-based social media sites — like Slideshare and Tumblr — are potential platforms on which you can share your business’ content.

Don’t let your social media content marketing efforts go to waste — make sure your current social media visual content is shareable. Pictures from your website or blog can be shared on these image-based social media sites, providing new ways to reach customers (just make sure to include a link back to your original content!).

Micro-video on the rise!

At first Vine was primarily used by younger users, which eventually led to the hilarious trend “Do it for the Vine.”

However, some businesses have expanded their marketing content to this application and have been doing some pretty cool things. Check out how Lowe’s is leading the pack on developing some unique marketing content on Vine.

Although this hasn’t become a main platform for social media marketing yet, video-sharing sites might soon change the playing field in the consumer world.

The comeback kid

Believe it or not, Myspace is making a comeback! With some re-branding efforts and a complete design makeover, Myspace is back on track to become a popular platform again. With its new iPhone app, Myspace is allowing its users to send private messages, network, and even listen to their own radio station!

Although Myspace may never be able to truly compete with Facebook or Twitter, it is developing a strong market position. With its expansion into music, Myspace is increasing its market of potential users. Overall, Myspace is becoming a promising social networking site, expanding out to new audiences.

Google+, no surprise here!

Google has always managed to stay ahead of the curve by constantly improving their applications. Google+ specifically has seen a lot of innovation and growth resulting from it recently. Although Facebook still takes first in terms of number of active monthly users (1.15 billion users counted in 2013), Google+ is right on their heels!

Google+ is becoming more than a social media platform. With Google’s focus on collecting personal information (i.e. demographics, age, etc.), it is forming itself to be an all-in-one social network.

Since the platform is acquiring personal information, it is contributing to Google’s attempt to provide a more personalized search in terms of SEO and social signals.

Although it is not very clear if it is Google+ growing individually or as result of Google’s auto-creating a Google+ account for every Google account, it’s obvious Google+ will eventually become the platform with all the information.

Get linked with LinkedIn

LinkedIn is currently the top social networking site for professionals, with a booming user base of 238 million users! However, instead of just relaxing and enjoying its fame, LinkedIn is working to provide even more for its users.

LinkedIn launched its Influencers program in the past year, giving users the ability to follow influential professionals in various industries. Now not only is this platform a professional networking site, it also provides sources for content generation and other strategies.

As LinkedIn continues growing and accumulating more users, the professional networking site will become increasingly valuable, especially with B2B marketers.

Now get started

Now that you have an idea of which social media sites will be beneficial, you can begin integrating your content strategy on these sites. By researching and developing your target audience, you will be able to reach them more efficiently through social media platforms. If you know where your target audience is located, you can ensure you don’t waste time and resources on the wrong platforms.

The social networking sites mentioned above show promise of growth and great advantages for businesses, continuing to expand the social media marketing world as we blaze through 2014.

[Image credit: Jason Howie - creative commons license]

Facebook Advertising Just Got Much More Powerful

Wes Mills — Wed, 02 Apr 2014 20:43:53 +0000

Facebook Advertising Just Got Much More Powerful

Wes Mills Wed, 04/02/2014 - 3:43pm

Up until now, targeting your ads on Facebook to those who have visited your site had to be done through a third-party company, like AdRoll. Yes, remarketing — that’s what I’m talking about. As excited as I am that it’s finally available to advertisers, I can’t believe it’s taken this long. But it’s powerful and everything I could’ve hoped for.

Remarketing is a wonderful thing

I’ll preface with providing a context about why remarketing is incredibly important and why Facebook’s new change is a big deal. It’s a way to re-engage your target audience.

When you’re browsing around the web and notice ads from the websites you’ve recently visited, you’re being re-engaged and exposed again to the brand. Traditionally, users who visit a website from a remarketing ad are much more valuable.

For those indecisive visitors who haven’t converted yet, or those who visited your site and have forgotten how amazing it was, this is your opportunity to invite them back.

But not every visitor is the same and you can’t market to them like they’re all the same. And this is why Facebook’s refresh of custom audiences is awesome.

It’s time to get creative

Facebook’s new custom audiences can be broken down into three levels:

All visitors
Visitors of a specific set of pages
Converters

From a marketing perspective, it’s instinctual that all three of these categories are marketed to with their own unique messaging. This is where we can be creative.

I’ll use a home builder’s website to conceptualize my point here. On this website, there’s a portfolio that’s organized by varying styles — all of which are unique. We’ll call one of the organized sections “Contemporary Living” and another “Classical Charm.”

With Facebook’s custom audiences, advertisers can now create one audience who has viewed the “Contemporary Living” portfolio and another audience that viewed “Classical Charm.”

Separating these audiences will now allow for highly targeted ads that you already know appeal to those users.

A good example of this would be two different sponsored stories, each targeted to the two the organized sections. Each ad could contain one of the popular pictures from the section on your site, with a call-to-action that may look like “View our most recent Contemporary Living homes by subscribing to our blog!”. This may be not the best call-to-action, but hopefully you get the idea.

This is just a simple example. The possibilities are endless, of course, but let’s look at how it can get more complex.

If you love Google Analytics as much as I do, you’re probably familiar with reverse goal paths and knowing which of the pages on your site create conversions. With this knowledge, you can easily create a custom audience that only includes visitors of those pages.

But wait, there’s more!

There’s one caveat to all of this: you have to have a significant amount of visitors to your website for your campaigns to have any kind of traction. But Facebook has a solution to that, too.

Facebook has always given the option to create a lookalike audience. After creating a custom audience, Facebook will look into a number of different variables and turn that audience into millions.

This was always a great option when creating audiences from email lists, but it just got much more valuable now with remarketing.

[Note: Facebook is somewhat ambiguous as to what exactly they’re looking at, so testing and pulling reports regularly is highly recommended when using a lookalike audience.]

For most businesses, the most valuable visitors are those who convert. Now that Facebook has remarketing available to those converters, the “create a lookalike audience” gives you a plethora of Facebook users to are similar to those who already converted on your site.

For those of you who are perspicacious, the ideas are probably already flowing through your head!

Pro tip: don’t be creepy

It’s important when developing your remarketing strategy to take your mind out of the context of the business and put your consumer hat on for a moment.

Remember to have your messaging highly targeted, but not so targeted that the audience becomes uncomfortable, which can be really easy to do.

A good example of this was an ad I saw on Facebook that used my name. While this was great targeting, don’t do this. With the thought of privacy very prevalent in everyone’s mind nowadays, it’s best to be discreet about knowing who your audience is. Admittedly, I thought it was awesome and immediately Google’d how they did it. But I won’t use it and you shouldn’t either!

Frequency plays another role in not being creepy. Facebook gives you the option of how long to keep a user on your remarketing lists, with a maximum of 180 days.

This is all dependent on your business, obviously, but don’t overdo it. It’s not beneficial to keep showing your ad to someone who has visited your site once 60 days ago and has not been back since.

Google Tag Manager can be your silver bullet

This is really where you can create endless possibilities with your Facebook advertising strategy. Google Tag Manager is a tool that deploys JavaScript snippets across your site asynchronously. But with each “tag” or snippet of code — like the Facebook remarketing code — comes a custom firing schedule.

Depending on your level of expertise with JavaScript, you can define custom rules that will only fire for certain web browsers, operating systems, mobile phones, or after a visitor has spent a certain amount of time on a page.

I doubt that Facebook will release these as native features anytime soon, or at all, but I am a huge fan of Google Tag Manager and the wonderful things it can do.

Is your mind blown yet?

You still have to be marketing smart

Facebook’s new robust audience options are great, but they don’t do everything for you. To leverage them correctly, you still have to be a great marketer and understand who your audience is and what they respond to.

But if you don’t have a clue, no need to worry. Luckily for you, we’re digital marketing experts and know what it takes to reach success with Facebook advertising.

Do you feel that you’re not getting the most out of your Facebook advertising? Or are you ready to start leveraging the most ubiquitous social platform in the world to drive valuable leads to your business? Drop us a line here, and let’s talk about how we can help.

Are You Sabotaging Your Own Website?

Amy Peveto — Tue, 18 Feb 2014 14:52:40 +0000

Are You Sabotaging Your Own Website?

Amy Peveto Tue, 02/18/2014 - 8:52am

Recently I attended “Don’t be a 5-Second Site,” an AMA San Antonio-hosted meetup where presenter Brittany Tradup of Robot Creative spoke on the challenges of web writing. Tradup shared some great tips on writing for the web, and I want to add more context around the entire subject of website copywriting.

What is a “5-second site”?

Have you ever come across a website that is so bad you immediately hit the “Back” button? That is a five-second site.

The average page visit lasts less than one minute, and many consumers decide within seconds whether or not your website is worth their time. If you don’t provide the answer they need, off they go — possibly to your competitor.

7 steps to a better web page

If visitors come to your website and are overwhelmed by volumes of bad content, you will never convert them into customers.

Tradup’s presentation centered around the argument that web writing is not the same as writing for print; web visitors need content that is concise, scannable, and objective (so ixnay on the sales pitches).

Here’s a quick look at Tradup’s steps for “translating” printed copy to the web:

Cut 50% - Remove boastful marketing text, sales-related hyperbole, and “fluff” content
Break it up - Each paragraph should express only one thought, and take up no more than four lines on the (digital) page
Add headings - Readers should get the main points of your entire article just by looking at the headings
Use lists and links - Bulleted/numbered links and hyperlinks catch the eye and are easy to skim
Don’t underestimate page design/layout - Keep the page simple and easy to take in at a glance
Add graphic and videos - Share your message in visual as well as textual ways
Have a CTA (call to action) - Tell readers what to do next

These are fantastic recommendations from which many websites could benefit, but they’re not the whole story.

You can have the most beautiful, best written content in the world; but if it doesn’t matter to your audience, it will never lead them to convert.

Step away from the keyboard

Before you start writing content or adjusting your printed materials for the web, take a step back.

It’s great that you’re finally getting that brochure turned into a piece of digital content, but does your audience care about the topic? You’ve followed step one of Tradup’s plan and cut the fluff, but does the remaining content provide value to your visitors?

Strategy comes first

Think strategically before you think tactically. Spend the time it takes to properly develop buyer personas; don’t waste time creating content that doesn’t interest your target audience.

The goal of your website is to give visitors the information they want as quickly as possible. If yours is a dreaded five-second site, you should be thinking, “I need a redesign.”

Let’s get started

Submitted by Dwight Cocran on Tue, 04/01/2014 - 12:04pm

Hi Amy,

This article contains very useful information which makes so much sense it is almost scary. I guess if ones intention is just to write for writing sake, but I believe that writers write so they have people who read it. Therefore unless the content is written to either entertain, problem solve or educate then why is someone going to read it.

You are completely correct in saying find out what people want and give it to them.

Cheers
Dwight

Submitted by Amy Peveto on Tue, 04/01/2014 - 12:12pm

Thanks, Dwight! The presenter at the event had a lot of great info to share, but I wish she'd at least mentioned the higher-level goal of creating content that appeals to your audience.

The content we create as marketers or employees or business owners needs to look good, yes, but it ALSO needs to solve customers' problems...otherwise, as you say, why would someone read it?

Facebook Advertising: A Love-Hate Relationship

Wes Mills — Tue, 11 Feb 2014 14:11:47 +0000

Facebook Advertising: A Love-Hate Relationship

Wes Mills Tue, 02/11/2014 - 8:11am

After using Facebook Ads regularly for the last five months, there’s a lot I’ve found to love. There’s also a few things that make me want to pull my hair out. Hair-pulling aside, the ubiquity of Facebook makes it an incredibly powerful advertising medium with enough targeting options to keep anyone busy with A/B testing.

The love

The targeting options Facebook gives advertisers are wonderful. And this is arguably my favorite part about advertising through Facebook. Even if your target audience is broad, you can get creative with your messaging and targeting. Just how creative can you get? Here’s a screenshot of just a few of the categories in Power Editor:

Now this is just an example. Each of those categories expands into more subcategories.

Compared to Google AdWords, Facebook makes getting your message across a little easier — you’re not limited to 35 characters. At least when you’re using Page Post Ads, like the example shown below.

I look at this as a trade-off, though. While Google limits your character space, your ad is shown to people actively searching for your keywords. On Facebook, your ad is shown based on your targeting criteria that you’ve outlined. Meaning, you tell Facebook what kind of people you want to see your ad. That aside, being able to include a picture, video, etc. tied to your messaging and product (with a link to your page) is insanely awesome.

While I could go on about the things that are great about Facebook Ads, I’ll refrain and direct you to Jon Loomer’s blog, which has a plethora of valuable information regarding Facebook Ads.

The hate

When it comes to digital marketing, there’s a fine line between “the bad” and “the ugly.” So I’ll tread carefully here to outline “the bad” on Facebook Ads.

Facebook’s Ad Manager

Above, I mentioned Facebook’s Power Editor. If you’re familiar with AdWords Editor, it’s essentially the same concept — it allows you to work offline and make bulk changes that would take much longer in the Ads Manager, along with a plenitude of other options. I learned to master Power Editor before really delving into the traditional interface. So perhaps I am biased.

I preface with that to provide a contrast against the ad creator that Facebook provides in the Ad Manager. To put it bluntly: it sucks. It feels like an incredibly watered-down version of Power Editor with less options to the advertiser. There’s no ability to save audiences, post texts are limited to 90 characters, and there’s no ability to copy and paste from different campaigns (if I’m missing some options, please feel free to let me know where to find this in the comments below).

I’m not entirely sure who Facebook made the interface for. By the looks of it, probably a elementary school student wanting to get into the digital marketing world. I honestly don’t think anyone who is serious uses this. If they do, it’s because no one has been kind enough to tell them about Power Editor.

Nothing is perfect

Alas, Power Editor isn’t perfect. The hair-pulling generally comes from one critical option that is missing — you can’t edit Page Post Ads after you create them. “What?!” you ask?

Yes, if I create a PPA (Page Post Ad) in Power Editor and change my mind about something or find a typo, I have to create a whole new unpublished post. Which isn’t necessarily time consuming, but more of an annoyance than anything. Here’s what you have to fill out and get right the first time (It’s taught me to proofread like no other):

The worst formula, ever

There is just one last thing that I feel has to be mentioned and that’s Facebook’s formula for showing your ad. To provide some context, Facebook wants to make money. So they only want to show ads that:

Are on a CPM (cost per thousand impressions) structure; OR
Have a relatively high CTR (click-through rate)

While this doesn’t seem troublesome on the surface, it makes A/B testing incredibly hard.

When you first post an ad, Facebook will show your ad briefly. If it doesn’t get any clicks in that short amount of time, your ad won’t gain any more impressions (on a CPC bidding structure). This is a big deal because there’s a lot of factors that determine when people click on ads (like time of day, day of week, etc). Unlike Google AdWords, where you can optimize two weeks or a month down the road, not much optimization can be done. In fact, if your ad shows a certain amount of times with no clicks, Facebook will literally quit showing it at all — I’ve seen an ad stop showing after just 20 impressions.

For some anecdotal evidence, here is a situation that happened last month.

Generally I’ll start a campaign with only one ad. If it does poorly, I’ll pause it and run another variation. I do this because the audience I’m targeting is somewhat small, so this is the best approach for A/B testing.

In January, though, I mistakenly paused and then un-paused the same ad after it had shown about 100 times with no clicks. The ad started getting impressions again, and ultimately became the highest-converting Facebook ad I’ve done. Without changing a thing.

So from an analytical standpoint, one can see how this is frustrating when it comes to optimizing your ad spend. Impossible, though? No, but it definitely presents a challenge.

It’s mostly love for Facebook

Despite my much longer rant of things I disliked, the good definitely outweighs the bad. Facebook is an amazing medium not only for branding, but audience engagement, too. It’s unique and has an incredibly large reach — which is all a marketer could ask for.

Do you need help whipping your digital marketing strategy into shape? Luckily for you, that’s what we do. We’d love to give you a free consultation and explore how we could help you grow your business.

Wedding Marketing Sucks! Or, Why I'm Very Wrong

Valarie Geckler — Wed, 15 Jan 2014 14:21:18 +0000

Wedding Marketing Sucks! Or, Why I'm Very Wrong

Valarie Geckler Wed, 01/15/2014 - 8:21am

The wedding industry banks billions every year and the marketing machine behind it is impressive and the envy of any good marketer. But I’m in the group of nine million American couples planning to get married in the next 12 months. And I hate wedding marketing.

Reasons I Hate Wedding Marketing

During wedding planning I’ve been marketed to in a number of personally distasteful ways:

Your wedding is your one perfect day! I hope my life isn’t peaking this early, y’all. I’ve got plans.
Click here to lose weight for your big day! Yup, women appreciate the implication that they should be skinnier. You know, we just don’t hear that enough these days.
[This thing] will be the thing everyone remembers most about your wedding! Hand to God, I’ve heard this about the dress, the decorations, the food, the cake and the venue. If there was a wedding planning drinking game every time someone said this phrase, we’d be totally tipsy.

Why I’m Completely Wrong About It

For me, the emotional appeals common in wedding marketing raise my hackles. I’m turned off by attempts to manipulate my emotions, especially with saccharine ploys. Talk to me about services and benefits; talk to me about budget and I’m yours.

While these common tactics and messaging feel disingenuous to me it’s clearly a successful approach for a large swath of the wedding industry audience. According to IBIS World (2011), the wedding industry is worth $48 billion. The persona the industry is catering to clearly responds to the tactics and messagine they’re using today.

Marketing takeaway: What you like and what your audience will like are two different things.

Don’t let your personal preferences for marketing tactics stop you from trying those tactics for your business. My personal dislike aside, I recognize that I may not be the typical audience wedding vendors are aiming for. (I ask about bugets too much.) If I were marketing to engaged couples I’d recommend similar emotion-laden messaging because it’s proven to work.

What does that mean for you? Maybe you’d be caught dead before clicking on a Facebook ad, but that doesn’t mean the same is true for your audience. Even if you personally hate Facebook ads or email newsletters or mobile websites your customers may love them. Don’t let your personal bias impede you from trying new tactics and making new sales.

[Image credit: ShellyP - creative commons license]

Content Marketing Lessons from 1888

Amy Peveto — Tue, 10 Dec 2013 14:40:07 +0000

Content Marketing Lessons from 1888

Amy Peveto Tue, 12/10/2013 - 8:40am

With its signature yellow border and glossy pages, National Geographic is a staple of every classroom and magazine basket in America, but its beginnings are humble. In order to make the magazine a success, its founders and writers had to get creative — and their tactics sound familiar…

Masterful storytelling

At first blush the magazine’s topics don’t sound particularly interesting — river maps, rainforest precipitation charts, and volcanology reports aren’t the most exciting things. But National Geographic solicited articles from some of the greatest explorers and scientists of the age, and men like Admiral Richard Byrd and Roald Amundsen filled the magazine with detailed personal accounts of the thrills and challenges of exploration.

Telling these stories made the information in those dry maps and charts more compelling, more human. Readers could vicariously experience the heart-pounding terrors and thrills that were the early days of world exploration, and hear stories of people and places more amazing than they ever could have imagined.

The lure of exclusivity

In 1897, with the number of National Geographic subscribers stuck at around 1300, society founder Alexander Graham Bell devised an audience-building strategy based on the lure of exclusivity.

Imagine receiving a high-quality letter from the National Geographic Society that begins, “I have the honor to inform you that you have been recommended for membership,” and is personally signed by Alexander Graham Bell.

Let’s get visual

After featuring several full-page photos of Tibet in its January 1905 issue, National Geographic shifted away from a text-based “scientific journal” feel and toward the picture-centric magazine it is today. Readers wanted to see what they were reading about, and by 1908 pictures took up more than half of each issue.

Then things got really get interesting in November 1910, when the magazine featured 39 full-color images of Korea and China. Soon these were joined by images of Russia and Japan and illustrations of birds and dogs.

Today the magazine’s images are iconic, and its creators are responsible for many photographic innovations in the quest to please their readers, including:

The first flashlight photographs of wild animals in their natural habitats
The first natural-color photographs of undersea life
The first photos taken from the stratosphere

21st century takeaways

All this is further evidence of the long history of content marketing, as well as an indicator that the more things change, the more they stay the same. Whether you’re selling magazines or software or websites or printing services you must:

Tell a great story
Use a hook
Be visual

By 1950 National Geographic was one of the top monthly periodicals in the world; today it has a global readership of 60 million, and is published in 37 languages.

What are you waiting for? Start exploring new ways to grow your business.

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