Digital Marketing Power

What does it mean that some people, instead of just saying “by the way,” use its acronym “btw” (which actually takes fewer syllables than saying the entire phrase, fyi)? Some may say that it’s sad evidence that our language is being polluted, while others may say it’s just a reflection of modern times. Which ever side of the language debate you’re on, there’s no denying that the Internet has changed how we speak and talk. Here are a few things that have happened to the English language, thanks to the wonder of the world wide web.

 

Have you ever been at a great party and unable to switch off from work? Did you find yourself comparing it to marketing a business (sad, I know) but true never the less.

Here are some observations on the similarities between throwing a party and promoting a business online.

After offsite engagement for awareness, the next step along the route to revenue looks at the "Consideration" phase where engagement – as well as other factors – can affect click-through rates (CTR) in search results, an oft overlooked, and underrated metric in the world of SEO.

First a caveat! CTR studies are both fun and farcical. When no two search results are the same, predicting the percentage of click-throughs in certain positions, and leveraging that as a prognostication of actual traffic can, at best, provide directional data and, at worst, leave clients unhappy when targets fall short.

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Forrester’s recently published The Purchase Path of Online Buyers offers insights that aren’t surprising to many in the know. Email and search are the key drivers of online sales, with social contributing only a tiny bit.

You can of course buy  the paid report, but if you don’to, the bottom line is that smart retailers are using paid search and sophisticated email marketing to drive sales and repeat business. This article will give you the key findinds of the Forrester report.

 

Information graphics, or infographics, are graphic visual representations of information, data, or knowledge. Infographics have become a powerful, revolutionary marketing tool—a single infographic has the potential to reach up to 15 million people. As opposed to traditional posts, infographic posts perform better on Twitter, Linkedin, and Stumbleupon (as measured by tweets, shares, and pageviews). Google ranks trends from 0-100 giving a number to a keyword based on how often it is searched compared to other keywords. Based on this measure, the top six countries in the world for the keyword “infographic” consist of the following: the Philippines (60), South Africa (56), New Zealand (50), Netherlands (41), India (38), and the U.S. (38). The top six cities include Singapore, Bangalore, San Francisco, Sydney, Chicago, and Melbourne.

Some popular infographics on the Internet today include “How Much Can You Trust a Bearded Man?” and “Should I Text Him?” If you’re into dating bearded men, these infographics just might appeal to you. If you want to learn about why startups fail, how you can better handle your headaches, and the evolution of the geek, there are some excellent infographics available. Among the most popular infographic themes include business, economy, health, social media, and technology. The first infographic was published in 1626, but they have really only become truly popular since 2009. The overall popularity of infographics has skyrocketed since 2009, 2012 was the most successful year for infographics thus far.

 

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.It’s time we re-imagined the way marketing works.  This is not a new way of doing marketing.  It’s a new way of understanding it.  Content Marketing, Customer Acquisition, Inbound vs. Outbound, The Sales Funnel, Customer Retention, etc. all get revamped and refitted into one concise model — Gravitational Marketing  What you learned in gradeschool applies here.  The larger the planet, the stronger the gravity.  By increasing your planet’s (website) size with great content, you become much more attractive (think gravity) to potential clients.

Check out (and share!) this infographic, then download the accompanying eBook to fully understand the implications with lots of tips, entertaining illustrations, and illustrative data.

Neil Patel, founder of KissMetrics was recently interviewed about SEO link building. Best practices, misconceptions, and future insights for 2013 and beyond were discused in this in interesting video.

Last month, this author wrote about "How to Tell if Your Agency Sucks at Digital" and tips for selecting an agency that actually knows digital and can demonstrate their knowledge about it. Here he focuses on digital strategy and ensuring that the marketing tactics to be deployed are the right ones and will work in a unified manner to drive optimal impact on business objectives.

There's so much more to keywords than traffic. Keywords are how people remember you, so they should reflect what you do, not be picked based on search volume. Here are some ways to make sure the keywords you choose will reach the audience you want.

In any conversation about the inbound marketing space, forecasting or predicting the future is usually at the forefront. This is largely due to the fact that as inbound marketers we can’t afford to guess. Our marketing campaigns rely on our ability to see what’s around the corner so we can ensure more effective marketing campaigns. Beyond that, forecasting the future of inbound marketing impacts users and customers just as much as the marketer. Savvy customers and users should understand just this is changing and how that affects them. Whether you view yourself as a doomsday marketing prophet, or an eager inbound marketer, here are five major predictions for inbound marketing that you can use to educate both your organization and your future site visitors.

"I’ve had enough" says Scott Stratten. Every month a new “study” comes out to say when the best time is to send email out to your list/subscribers/mother.  If you're not familiar with Scott's approach then you're in for a treat.  Also check out his book 'Unmarketing' - one of the best I've read recently on online marketing.

Email marketing has become one of the principal methods business uses to market to leads and existing customers. We know it’s a cost effective method to market our business yet we don’t often see direct analysis of exactly how cost effective it is.

A recent article in the Harvard Business Review reported on an experiment proving how effective email marketing is, and HubSpot developed their numbers further to determine the ROI of the examples tested.

Over the last 6 months I have seen many briefs from brands requesting ‘content marketing’ services. Some indicate a desire to shift away from online paid media, reallocating budget into producing and seeding content. This is partly due to a view held that paid online media is a bottomless requiring constant funding, and that content marketing is more sustainable, less intrusive and therefore more effective. I’m not opening up this particular debate here, but placing content marketing in the same bucket as paid media presents all sorts of issues and should really be avoided.

Google Plus is a ghost town. Google Plus is for computer nerds or photographers. Google Plus is like a lame version of Facebook. No one reads anything on Google Plus. No one cares about Google Plus

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No so.  At some point you’re going to need to pay attention to that social network gnat that’s buzzing at your ear, and for very good reasons.  Read on...

If you hear, “Put down the burrito and step away from the re-fried beans”, coming through a megaphone from the other side of your office, you know you have a problem. Unlike when you have a problem with your email marketing efforts, there is no one with a megaphone letting you know you’re in trouble. The problem is that most people don’t realize they have a problem; unlike a bad case of you know what. We’ve all been there. You don’t know where it started. You don’t know how to fix it. And, unfortunately, you don’t know what to do about it. If, after taking a step back, you realize that your marketing strategy is about as pretty as a greasy bean and cheese burrito, on the exit, it’s time to rethink your strategy. The last thing you want is for it to get out of control. Email marketing isn't a science, but there are basic rules you need to follow.

There’s a common understanding that marketers are either creative, or analytical beings. Very rarely are they both. In traditional forms of advertising, executing a campaign on a creative basis can be just as effective as an analytical execution. However, in the new emerging digital arenas of online marketing, a creative approach to campaign execution can negatively impact return on investment. This form of advertising is one of the most accountable and measurable forms of advertising. It offers virtually real-time campaign performance tracking, which gives professionals the ability to react quickly to a flattening audience. The accountability and measurability of the campaigns can also provide a solid framework for determining how much of the overall budget is dedicated to online efforts. Measurements can also be used to determine the proportion of dollars spent on the individual services, for maximum return on investment.