Concentric Insights Blogs as seen in Digital Dollars and Sense

Establishing Consumer Trust

Thu, 09 Dec 2021 22:27:55 GMT

Your Digital Products, Services and Strategies

A growing portion of your customers have moved away from traditional sources of expertise and turned to the web as a vehicle of verification. They trust peers more and look to the recommendations, reviews, and experiences of fellow shoppers to establish trust in a brand.

One of the most common reasons for customers not completing a form, pressing click to call, and purchasing or paying online is a lack of faith or veracity. The initial absence of human interaction due to “digital” does make it more challenging to establish that bond of trust for your brand.

So, how do you demonstrate that your brand can be trusted when often the first introduction to your business is through an app, an ad or your website? Ensure that trust becomes “a filter that your marketing team thinks about as a principle of conversion” to reassure and engage customers.

Tactics like “making a great first impression” and “security items” will assist with establishing and maintaining trust. These tactics (shown below) begin with the strategic “trust focus" you build with your team and your suppliers.

Establish Trust on Your Digital Products

#1 Make a Good First Impression

Ensure your online products look beautiful across all device types and sizes. Verify they are fast & have simple plus clear, functional navigation. Outline everything a customer might want to know about your topic including clear descriptions, delivery returns and guarantees.

#2 Use Trust Signals

If your products or services are “not a household name” use clear signals like third party reviews, security seals and free returns. Provide a physical location on your contact pages to reduce any perceived risk.

#3 ”Show Off” Products

Rely on engaging visuals to help drive purchases. If you don't have the resources to set up elaborate photoshoots to showcase products or services, ensure the photos you use are clear, crisp, well-lit and “in situation”. Provide access to supporting information where it does not distract from the intent of the consumer visit and intended transaction.

#4 Make Transactional Experiences Exceptional and Rememberable

Consumers only trust systems they understand so make forms and transaction pages easy to complete. Explain the steps to completing a “transaction” upfront. Provide help clues. Communicate clearly and boldly at the end of a transaction about next steps and who to contact with questions. Make your thank you and acknowledgements big and bold.

Bottom Line: Recognizing the need to emphasize trust implies placing yourself in the same drivers seat as your customers. Thoroughly test drive your digital products. Before undertaking the tactical, establish a “trust culture” and create a “safe” environment that values the “done wells and do better” for your digital products and services. Digital can have a positive organizational impact.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Fall/Winter Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Google's Infinite Scroll

Thu, 09 Dec 2021 22:27:52 GMT

What does Googles Infinite Scroll on Mobile Mean for Advertisers

1) Advertisers may now see more mobile impressions and a lower CTR on Search, Shopping, and Local Ads

2) Organic search may be deprecated.

3) Google MyBusiness co-location with ads becomes more important

Searchers using Google on their mobile devices are now seeing continuous scroll in search results, in the USA. (and coming soon to Canada) Instead of viewing a “See More” button after about ten results, searchers must continue scrolling through approximately four pages of search results to get to the “See More” link.

According to Google, this change does not affect how the ad auction works or the way Ad Rank is calculated, However there are changes in metrics.

Ads at the Top and Bottom Google is ‘redistributing’ the number of text ads that can show between the top and bottom of pages for mobile queries. Text ads will show at the top of the second page and beyond, while fewer text ads will show at the bottom of each page,” says Google Product Management. Shopping and Local ads will remain the same.

Ads Showing Multiple Time for a Single Query Google notes that ads have always been eligible (based on Ad Rank) to show on a search results page and again on a subsequent page. Google Ad’s systems takes into account if your ad was shown on a previous page when it calculates your Ad Rank for each page.

How Metrics Will Change - According to Google - “You may see more mobile impressions and a lower CTR on Search, Shopping, and Local Ads. We expect clicks, conversions, average CPC, and average CPA to remain flat. Search campaigns may see more impressions from top ads and fewer impressions from bottom ads.”

How to Adjust Your Ad Campaigns To understand your performance, based on where your text ads show on the search results page, consider segmenting your performance data by Top vs. Other” and reviewing your prominence metrics.

Use Segments to view Google Ads tables to see how top and bottom ads perform. For mobile activity, you will have to compare information over periods of time and click type, to gauge how to adjust to this change. This Google Ads article explains how to use Segments.

Why You Should Care - This is an important change to communicate to anyone invested in the minutiae of campaign metrics. Google recommends reviewing your advertising goals and “monitoring your campaigns and continuing to optimize them based on your business objectives.” This change is only for U.S.-based queries right now but will roll out to Canada and additional countries and languages in 2022.

Bottom Line: Experience indicates that this could be a convenient change to support better usability for consumers. However, it’s not clear that this change benefits advertisers. Our initial assessment is that it may increase the competition focus for listings at the top of a page and continue to push advertisers to be more aggressive on bid strategies. This could mean an increase to advertisers daily budgets in order to maintain ad/brand placement experienced in 2021.

Alex Wozny is a digital analyst and data scientist with Concentric. Find out more about Alex here

This article is from the Fall/Winter Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Changing Consumer Behaviour Trends

Thu, 09 Dec 2021 22:27:51 GMT

9 Considerations for Digital and Your Business

It’s safe to say that COVID-19 has changed the way we live our daily lives, at least for now. It’s also changed our perception of risk and vulnerability. And it’s certainly changed the way we and your customers shop.

The days of casual in-store browsing are less frequent - shopping is now a quick, anxious, and targeted experience. Eighty-three percent of North American shoppers say their in-store shopping behaviour has changed since the coronavirus hit according to a recent survey from Field Agent .

Meanwhile, the online marketplace has been booming as the public adopts a more targeted shopping experience. Pure ecommerce platforms in the Americas have seen an 80% increase in demand since January 2021, according to emarsys .

There is no crystal ball to tell how long or if this consumer shift will last but these insights can assist in understanding what a “new normal” could look like in the future.

Flattening Curve of Confidence - Consumers acclimation to the current situation is strong with the expectation for things to improve.

Four Types of Shoppers - a) Retirees whose lives now have limited social contact b) the work-from home set c) those laid off d) those who have not changed.

Online is the New Normal - There’s a consumer expectation that most needs can be met digitally and that consumers are more comfortable in doing so.

Pivoting to Meet Demand - Retail pivoting to meet demand is the new normal under restrictions. In some cases this pivot will be permanent.

Customers OK with being Marketed to and Researched - Shoppers are more responsive to well-targeted online advertising and are starting to pay more attention to marketing messages.

Some Demand Will Recede - Not all online demand will continue to be strong as social distancing measures lift.

Ramped Up Virtual Service - Sales and customer service associates should be prepared to provide virtual service just like they have provided service in-person.

Substitution - Brand loyalty may take a back seat to newer, less-known products. Substitution is more common place. Manufacturers may leverage brand loyalty to provide direct to consumer opportunities currently fulfilled by franchises or distributors.

Virtual Shopping Experiences - There’s more opportunities for virtual shopping whether it be showroom tours linked to commerce, virtual tours of vehicles or new behaviour on clothing shopping.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Fall/Winter Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Grammar & Your Digital Reputation

Thu, 09 Dec 2021 22:27:50 GMT

The Perception of Your Company

Many people say their perception of a company changes when they notice that there are grammar mistakes on their digital products, according to recent research from Tidio.

In fact, ninety-four percent (94%) of North American respondents and 86% of respondents from the rest of the world say they are attentive to grammar. However, when shown sentences that included seven common grammar mistakes, only 2.8% of people who say they are attentive spotted ALL the issues.

The aspects of a company’s image that are most influenced by grammar usage include:

Professionalism (52%)
Credibility (35%)
Expertise (8%)
Authority (3%)
Relevance (2%)

People also say that correct grammar usage shows :

a) whether a company cares about details
b) shows how high the standards are within a company and
c) can influence a company’s professional level and creditability at the same time.

Respondents in the Tidio survey noted that they are bothered by some grammar mistakes more than others. For example, respondents gave using the incorrect context of a word a higher irritation score that misplacement of commas and punctuation.

Irritating Grammar and Spelling Mistakes

Here’s a short list of the most irritating grammar and spelling mistakes from the Tidio survey. The list is based on a scale of 1 to 7 where 1 is not irritating and 7 is very irritating) and included the following:

There vs. Their (6/7)
Their vs. They’re (6/7)
Then vs. Than (5.6/7)
Yours vs. You’re (5/7)
Weird vs. Weird (4.5/7)
Less vs. Fewer (4.5/7)
Misplaced Comma (4.1/7)

When it comes to age, pre-baby boomers consider themselves the most attentive to grammar (95.5% said so).

Millennials considers themselves very grammatically conscious. 94% of Millennial respondents noted they pay attention to grammar and spelling mistakes. This measures against the common belief that the current-“texting culture” that includes abbreviations and emojis is not paying attention. They are!

Cheryl Kenny is the Chief Marketing Officer with Concentric. Find out more about Cheryl here .

This article is from the Fall/Winter Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Ad Tech and Development

Thu, 09 Dec 2021 22:27:46 GMT

Creating Experiences that Differentiate Your Brand

Change to Ad Reach Data

The Social Network has announced that it will begin counting people who’ve not connected their Facebook and Instagram accountsas separate entities

Top Performing Banner Ad Sizes

More about most common ad sizes that generate the most amount of impressions, clicks and sales together with stats about top performing sizes.

Third Party Cookie Delays

Google is pushing back its timeline to deprecate third-party tracking cookies, giving more time to iron out plans for more targeted ads.

IndexNow Release

IndexNow is a new open protocol that can notify search engines immediately about content changes in a site. It’s a great initiative designed to keep the internet fresh and up to date.

Facial Recognition Shut Down

Facebook announces the gradual elimination of its decade-old facial recognition technology.

Remove Your Image

In a bid to “give young people more control over their digital footprint and where their images can be found on Search”, minors, their parents or legal guardians can now request Google to remove their image from search results.

digitalroadmap® Collaboration

Fri, 14 May 2021 15:24:16 GMT

6 Considerations for Great Value

A digital roadmap® is a master plan that outlines how your digital activities will support your business goals. digitalroadmaps® summarize and detail the online channels and digital tactics to deploy, investment and ROI expectations, logistics, resource requirements, critical success factors, risks and unknowns.

A critical component to digital success includes understanding areas where there are collaboration opportunities due to content “overlap”. Activities can function as interdependent processes. For example:

Content you create can support both organic and paid search activity, can be used on website landing pages, lead your blogs and be part of social media posts.
Metrics you consider part of your success factors will help identify attribution across multiple media platforms. The content components of these platforms will reflect how your target audience interacts with your brand, services and products across multiple platforms.
Keywords and search phrases you use to generate visibility will also be used within your content and possibly social media postings.

6 Areas to Consider for Great Collaboration Value

#1 Search - Paid Search - Voice Search - Organic Search. Plan for how your three strategies can overlap and support each other. See the article ‘Know Your 9 Types of Keywords’ in this edition.

#2 Content - Content in all it’s formats is one of the hardest things to create for your business. Build with cross platform use in mind. See the article on ‘Short Video Ads’.

#3 SM Channels & Web & Mobile - Choose appropriate channels. Post across channels with appropriate media. Cross populate content. Fulfill on and off platform based on visitor preference.

#4 Owned Media - eMail and Text communications have a like minded audience. Identify cross platform opportunities for this audience that continue to build engagement.

#5 Analytics - Account for audience attribution to understand how and where your audience interacts with your business and to plan/adjust activity.

#6 Life Cycles - Account for lifecycles of your business and apply the right marketing model to these life cycles.

Bottom Line: Build a digital roadmap® strategy that supports all your business initiatives. Ensure you identify the collaboration opportunities. In multi vendor environments, ensure that all parties involved will work together to take advantage of these opportunities. Be flexible in your thinking as you look to identify where ‘overlap' opportunities exist.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Spring/Summer Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Why You Want Short Video Ads

Fri, 14 May 2021 15:24:14 GMT

Video advertising adoption continues to grow. Shorter video ads now perform on par with long promotions in terms of effectiveness for brand lift and purchase intent. Short video services have driven this change together with consumer trust and preference in video.

As video consumption habits evolve, shorter video ads are now proving increasingly effective. This trend is showing itself in ad campaigns across multiple ad platforms that are running branding, lead generation and commerce initiatives. In fact, MAGNA Global, Snap Inc., an IPG Media Lab published an independent study on this topic.

As per the report: "In the early days of short video ads, they were primarily effective at generating awareness and less so when it comes to persuasiveness. Today, however, both short and long video ads have the ability to impact metrics across the purchase funnel. The change can be attributed to the rise of short form premium content, creative tailored for short form viewing, and advertisers simply getting better at communicating in short ads."

While shorter video ads are often leveraged to drive awareness, today they can be just as persuasive as their traditional counterpart - the 15 & 30 second ad. Short video - 06, 15 and 20 second ads are now proving to drive nearly identical lifts in both brand preference (+9% and +10% respectively) and purchase intent (+5% and +4% respectively)."

Condensing & Targeting Your Messages - It can be challenging to condense your messaging into a 6-second ad slot, as opposed to a longer 15-second or 30-second spot. A/B testing of multiple short video ads assists with developing messaging condensing skills.

Funnel Customization - Customizing your video messaging based on where the consumer is in a purchasing funnel only works if you have identified your funnel. Alternatives to funnel targeting is to create a series of shorter videos that you can use across all parts of your activities or to segment ad programs by goal type; brand, lead, sale, etc.

Recall - On short video platforms, both :15-second and 6-second ads are memorable, but the longer variation holds more value in terms of recall. On long video platforms, 6-second ads were significantly more memorable.

Skipping - On short video platforms both :06 and :15 second videos had low skip rates, :15 seconds videos were more likely to be skipped on long video platforms.

Persuasion - 06 ads were able to quickly get their point across to maximize persuasion - which means more people took action with the 6 second ads. 15 second ads drove higher purchase intent on long video platforms, but less direct action activity.

Age - 06-second ads were persuasive regardless of age. For ages 18 to 44 year olds, 06 sec ads were 6% to 10% more persuasive.

Bottom Line: The overall view of the data is clear - add short video ads as part of your advertising mix to support audience preferences. Segment your videos and messaging as much as practical. Build the skills to create short video ads and test formats/types to determine what’s most effective.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Spring/Summer Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Know Your 9 Types of Keywords

Thu, 13 May 2021 20:07:51 GMT

Knowing the 9 ‘types of keywords’ prepares you to choose an appropriate mix for your activities. This blog describes categories of keywords, the types of intent and conversion volumes you can expect, as well as suggestions of where/how to use the keywords.

Short-tail Keywords are made up of 3 or less words. They have a high search volume and a high competitive rate. Audiences generally use short-tail keywords when they are in the very first step of their search (broad search intent). The broad search intent generates a low conversion rate. Use as a theme keyword that appears consistently throughout your website.

Long-tail Keywords are made up of more that 3 words. They have a low search volume and a low competitive rate. Audiences using long-tail keyword have a specific search intent that generates a high conversion rate. Long-tail phrases are good for use on targeted pages such as a product page or blog post.

Intent Targeting Keywords fall into 3 categories (informational, commercial and transactional). In each category keywords should answer questions such as “what is”, “how”, “description”, “best deal”, etc. Volumes, competition and conversion rates will vary. These keywords are great to place you in locations where you provide answers (example: FAQ) and make a brand impression.

Short-term Fresh Keywords reflect a “hyped” trend such as a popular event or movie. The term usually peaks around the time of peak interest then drops sharply. Audiences using “fresh” keywords have a specific search intent that generates a high conversion rate. Good to use for up-to-date content.

Long-term Evergreen Keywords are relevant all the time. They have a moderate search volume and a medium competitive rate. They often generate a high conversion rate. Use when crafting detailed informative content that can be updated and age well.

Customer Defining Keywords target specific buyer personas (gender, age, location, job, etc.). They usually have a low search volume and low competition. Searchers have specific search intent and a high conversion rate. These keywords address your customers directly to create a sense that your product or services are tailored to them.

Product/Service Defining Keywords explain and describe your product or service. They usually have a low search volume and low competition, depending on your industry. Searchers are usually in the early stages of their purchasing decision so they have a specific search intent and a high conversion rate. Use on your product pages to stand out from the competition and match intent.

GEO Targeted Keywords target a specific neighbourhood, city, state, region. They usually have a low search volume and low competition. Searchers have specific search intent and a high conversion rate. These keywords are great for local and delivery based businesses.

Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) Keywords are thematic keywords closely related to your main keywords (example: orange tea, organic orange, orange nutrition, etc). They usually have a low search volume and low competition. Searchers have specific search intent and a high conversion rate. These keywords are great for ranking boosting and for core content and blog posts.

Bottom Line: Understanding these categories is helpful whether your are building content, working on a SEO project or selecting the best keywords to use in a paid search advertising campaign. Remember, keywords are important but not the "end all" for SEO. Naturally written content that contains keywords relative to your subject matter is still "queen or king", depending on your viewpoint.

Alex Wozny is a digital analyst and data scientist with Concentric. Find out more about Alex here

This article is from the Spring/Summer Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Content Marketing & Page Experience

Thu, 13 May 2021 20:07:49 GMT

Using Google's Page Experience Ranking Signal to Your Advantage

Google’s new page experience ranking factor can be the tiebreaker between sites with similar reputable content. It’s also a ranking factor that can allow “small” sites to compete against larger brands.

Google’s new page experience update is rumoured to be debuting in May. "Page experience" means that the elements on your site have to work well technically plus provide a good user experience.

"The page experience signal measures aspects of how users perceive the experience of interacting with a web page," said Google regarding the update. "Optimizing for these factors makes the web more delightful for users across all web browsers and surfaces, and helps sites evolve towards user expectations on mobile. We believe this will contribute to business success on the web as users grow more engaged and can transact with less friction."

Page experience will not take over as the most important factor in obtaining high page to rank, but it is expected to count for up to 10% of your total rank, which is significant. Google refers to this as “core web vitals” - see the Google Search Central page for more details.

Your Content Strategy - 3 areas to focus on with the page experience rank are content, mobile friendliness, and site security:

1. Because content is still ‘king’, websites should ensure their posts answer their customers' most important questions. Begin with ensuring the pages that bring you the most organic traffic are user friendly and technically sound.

2. More transactions and bookings are being made on mobile devices than ever before. Ensure that CTA placement and formatting are properly optimized on all mobile pages.

3 . If your website isn't secure, or has malware and phishing activity, it does not have a good page experience for users. Google will penalize the site accordingly.

Bottom Line: The ‘Google experience update’ really matters. Content teams should view the upcoming update as an opportunity to advance conversion rates and positions in SERP pages. Page Experience introduces a ranking factor that has little to do with brand. It provides an opportunity for smaller sites to have one ranking factor where they can be more competitive.

Effective Retail Marketing

Thu, 13 May 2021 20:07:48 GMT

Google Shopping "Ins and Outs"

Learn about the “ins and outs” of Google Shopping and Merchant Accounts. Understand about the ROI opportunity for your business and the foundation you need to achieve it.

Every Etail advertiser’s ambition is to be successful in online shopping. Google Shopping is an obvious place to advertise. Visually appealing ads that are contextual to your target audiences searches can appear on Search Return pages, Shopping Tab, Search Partner Sites, YouTube, Google Display, Google Images and more. Google also offers an array of shopping ad type and other options such as showcase ads, local inventory ads and smart bidding strategies. Integrating Google Shopping and deploying the right Google Shopping mix can be challenging to master, if you are not a subject matter expert.

Two Components Google Shopping has two main components - Google Ads and Google Merchant Centre. Shopping campaigns are created within the Google Ads platform. Your product inventory is placed into an inventory system known as Google Merchant Centre.

Two Accounts Your Google Merchant Centre account is separate from your Google Ads account. When setting up your Merchant Account you have to verify and claim your website, create a feed from your commerce site to your Merchant Account, sort taxes by location and link your Merchant Centre to your Ads Account.

Profitability You have to prioritize a group of components within your Merchant Centre Feed and your ads to be profitable. Components that are important to align include product extensions, shopping actions to have your products show up across the entire Google offerings, product titles for short and long tail keywords, product descriptions for SERP ranking, having high res images, negative keywords, the proper conversion measurements and segmenting budgets to target audiences. You can also test two bidding strategies; Cost per Acquisition or Return on Ad Spend.

Merchant Strategies Be prepared to consider special offers, promotions, and coupons to increase your volume of sales on Google Shopping, if you do not have a unique product or value proposition. If you have a database of customer phone numbers and email addresses you can load this into Google to assist in creating unique audience and remarketing lists. You can target specific and look-a-like locations, if you have GEO locations of where your sales are generated from. You can also use Auction Insights to understand your share of impressions and to calculate if purchasing more “impression share” will generate more sales or higher returns.

Mixing ad types is also a smart merchant strategy. If you want to simplify your Shopping Ads management you can use Google’s Smart Shopping AI to choose the right placements and ad formats. If you want to advertise locally your can use Google’s Local Inventory Ads (LIA).

Bottom Line: Expect a steep learning curve. Possibly start with a small merchant feed if you plan to manage Google Shopping on your own. Remember to keep on top of product feed optimization, campaign structure, targeting, and bidding strategies to maximize your revenue with Google Shopping. Happy etailing!

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Fall/Winter Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Digital Transformation

Tue, 08 Dec 2020 22:34:42 GMT

Lessons and Key Considerations

The web is relied on by everyone for everything and has pushed digital transformation (called DT and sometimes DX) into a critical necessity for every businesses. Recent surveys of directors, CEOs, and senior executives rated digital transformation (DT) risk as their #1 concern.

Consumer and business reliance on the Web continues unabated for shopping, customer service, ordering, research and nearly anything you can think of. How can your business transform and reorganize to measure up online?

The focus of the “How to” of DT is straightforward. The technology enabling Digital Transformation provides possibilities for efficiency gains and customer intimacy, in areas like eCommerce, digital advertising platforms, analytics and dashboards, customer service bots, social programs and more.

The biggest challenge facing DT efforts is the lack of the right mindset to change. Also, these initiatives often also fail to recognize that if current organizational practices are flawed, DT will simply magnify the flaws.

Before embarking on your transformation process (as you either refine or refocus your technology), firstly ensure you have a clear understanding of how DT will impact your business, the people in your organization and your customers. Consider then what components of technology are needed for adoption and what new or existing legacy systems are required.

DT Key Considerations

Consider the following key lessons to help your DT efforts succeed.

#1 Business Strategy

Figure our your business strategy before making any investments and guide your activities by your broader business strategy.

#2 Look Inside

Work with your current staff who have intimate knowledge about what works and what does not in your daily operations, together with outside experts vs outside experts alone.

#3 Customer Experiences

Seek in depth input from your customers. This will assist you in clearly identifying how to tailor your changes to their needs.

#4 Recognize Change
When employees perceive DT could threaten their job they resist change. Recognize those fears and explain the DT opportunity.

#5 Agility

Traditional hierarchies are often in the way with DT. Since DT is inherently uncertain changes need to be made provisionally, decisions need to be made quickly and multiple groups need to be involved.

Bottom Line: This has been a year when businesses really needed technology to assist with customer communication. And , effective digital transformation is not just a technology journey - it is a business journey, an end-to-end customer-centric overhaul that reflects your business priorities and includes processes, people, policies and tech..

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Fall/Winter Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Optimizing Landing Pages

Tue, 08 Dec 2020 22:34:40 GMT

To Generate Conversion Actions

This article discusses how to optimize landing pages for conversion and leave a strong impression of your brand, products and services.

Landing pages are often the first point of contact with your business. They provide an impression and a taste of what your business offers and invite visitors to explore further. The purpose of a landing page is to have a visitor take action such as purchase a product, download a sample and inquire for more information.

On average, it takes .5 seconds for a visitor to form an opinion bout a landing page. To generate and keep visitor’s interest, it is important to communicate your value with an appealing visual design.

Know Your Customer - Consider their motivation for the visit. Ensure your content answers what they need to know to make a decision.

Benefit Oriented Headline - A big portion of landing page success is testing to gett the headline right. Viewers focus on the headline first, so highlight the solution to your readers' problem, communicate the benefit and articulate “what's in it for them” .

Clear & Relevant Content - A landing page is more than a product listing or detail page. *It should answer questions such as a) Does this site have what I am looking for? b) Is there enough information? c) Can I trust this site? d) How long will this take? e) What’s the next step or process?

Design With Real Copy - An effective approach for landing page optimization is to adopt content-first design, and make developing content early a top priority.

One Call to Action (CTA) - Have one specific offer for each landing page, to keep the prospect focused on one thing at a time.

Benefit Oriented CTAs - Make CTA buttons and links descriptive, and include why the visitor should click the button.

Content Length - Short copy performs better when an offer is free, inexpensive, or an impulse. Long copy is more suitable for expensive or complex products. When rational thinking and analysis are factors for the purchase, longer copy with explanations, proof, and testimonials creates a more compelling case.

Other Factors - Additional items to consider include form fields, form length, image optimization, use of popups and page load time.

Bottom Line: Generating conversions from landing pages is a science and it takes time to customize the flow of your content in a manner that will take meaningful conversions. Working with an experienced team can expedite this process ensure you have the best measurement tools in place to monitor and learn from visitor activity.

Instagram vs Pinterest Ad Platforms

Tue, 08 Dec 2020 22:34:38 GMT

When to Use - How do they Compare?

How do Pinterest and Instagram compare in terms of product discovery and conversions. Which is best for you? This detailed comparison will assist you with your choices.

Traditionally, advertisers chose Instagram as a platform of choice, over Pinterest when considering discovery focused advertising campaigns . To assume that Instagram is the best platform does not paint the whole picture. Consider these statistics about Pinterest a) 72% of users are inspired to shop on Pinterest even when they have nothing in mind and b) Two-thirds of users buy products after seeing Pins from brands.

Platform - Pinterest is used for visual sharing of images to personal bulletin boards and to create micro-communities and an atmosphere within each niche. Instagram is similar to Pinterest, except with a heavy focus on imagery rather than boards, long-form videos, and other types of content. Pinterest has business tools for those who want to share and promote content. Instagram allows brands to build a following, run competitions. Both services also have ad platforms.

Purpose - Pinterest focuses on distributing and discovering. Instagram focuses on promoting and sharing. Although they both share the common factor of being image-based, users on Pinterest expect to be able to dig deeper than an image. They see a picture of a delicious meal, and they expect a recipe attached. With Instagram, the image is the focus featuring aesthetics and brand lifestyles.

Audience - Instagram has four times as many users as Pinterest. Both are strong within the 18 to 35 market. There’s more 55+ aged users on Pinterest and the average user earns over two and half times that of the average Instagram user ($75k compared to $30k). Eighty percent of Pinterest users are women vs 68% on Instagram.

Device - Pinterest was originally based on desktop but has recently made the jump across to mobile. With the infinite scrolling newsfeed, Pinterest works well on mobile. That being said, they still have a huge audience on desktop. Instagram has very little presence on desktop.

Hashtags - Instagram hashtags are incredibly valuable for product discovery when users follow hash tags. Pinterest pins already have labels and categories so hashtags are not as valuable - they essentially act as a filing system.

Shopping Features - Instagram’s product tags and Shop buttons allow users to check pricing and reach the checkout stage directly. Pinterest Lens is an innovative feature where users take a picture (or access the camera roll) and get relevant items shown based on what’s available on the platform.

Ads - Instagram offers Stories ads, video, photo and carousel ads. Pinterest offers carousels, pins, video pins and app pins - click here for details . You must be in the USA to advertise on Pinterest.

Bottom Line: Each of these platforms requires a concerted platform content plan to be effective. Extending your product listings on your eCommerce site to Instagram is an effective way to sell directly online. If you are in any country outside of the USA, Pinterest is an organic opportunity only.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Fall/Winter Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

A Proven Process for Structuring Content

Tue, 08 Dec 2020 22:34:35 GMT

For Your Website, Blog Posts ...

Structuring website content is crucial to guide visitors (and Search Engines) to the information they’re looking for. Details like the content planning process, building product listings, information pages and landing pages for your website will ensure a clear site structure and a great user experience.

Marketers still covet a Page One ranking on Google for a reason: 54% of the clicks for an average SERP go to positions 1, 2, and 3. Since 71% of all website traffic traces back to Google searches, those spots are chock-full of possibility for traffic, leads, and conversions.

Foundational Factors

Ensure you have the following four foundational items within your content and content planning process.

1. Commit to Quality and to Being Helpful The foundational trait for content that ranks and earns real positions in Search is usefulness . And, it doesn't have to be useful for everyone but especially to your target niche. Give your niche something they didn't have before: knowledge, information, guidance, answers, a great product, or even just a new idea or spark of inspiration.

Content that fulfills a need is prioritized by Search Engines and by your visitors and may save you real $$ in terms of paid search click costs for good quality scores.

2. Research Topical Niches - Choose keywords and phraseology within your content that resonate with your audience's searches, their needs, and their questions. Fewer prospects visiting your site because of very relevant, targeted content is better than “loads” of visitors from non-prospects, from a less relevant but higher-volume terms. Drill down your keyword list by using resources like social media, Quora and Answer the Public to determine the language your audience is using with your content topic. Use keyword research tools to find out if you can actually rank for your chosen terms, or whether the competition is too steep.

3. Vet Your Keywords - Start with a focus keyword from your researched list. Build your content with a focused keyword in mind. Use Google and keyword research tools to discover related keywords you can use in the same piece of content. Related keywords may additionally help fill in your content outline. To find a quick list of related keywords in Google type your focus keyword into search and look at Google autofill as you do so. Provide your unique perspective on the topic using your expertise.

4. Vet Your Content - Be the best resource on your chosen topic with more information, research and visuals. Be comprehensive. Provide data, dimensions, statistics and link these back to reliable sources. Include subheadings for readability and the ability to add key phrases related to the topic.

Bottom Line: Content that ranks in SERP is both an art and a science. You have to be strategic. Create content that matters and meets your visitors needs and blends the creativity and finesse of writing with the logic, structure, and rules of Search providers.

Alex Wozny is a digital analyst and data scientist with Concentric. Find out more about Alex here

This article is from the Fall/Winter Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

The Next Generation of Intelligence

Tue, 08 Dec 2020 22:34:32 GMT

Google Analytics 4

This October Google unveiled a new version of Google Analytics (Analytics 4), featuring "machine learning at its core”. What exactly does Analytics 4 mean to marketers and business owners?

To quote Google: "To help you get better ROI from your marketing for the long term, we're creating a new, more intelligent Google Analytics that builds on the foundation of the App + Web property we introduced last year. The new Google Analytics is now the default experience for all new properties and is where we’re investing in future improvements.”

Enhanced Monitoring - Enhanced trend monitoring is the key evolution. The new Analytics can automatically alert users to significant changes in their data. Data points such as “churn probability” can assist with how to more efficiently invest in retaining customers to use marketing budgets more efficiently.

Prediction - For eCommerce enabled sites the advanced reporting tools will provide some powerful insights, such as new predictive metrics that can forecast potential revenue you can earn from a particular group of customers. This allows businesses to create higher value audiences and run analyses to better understand why some customers are likely to spend more than others.

Advertising Audiences - With Analytics 4 you can create audiences for Google Ads, based on your Analytics data, and reach more focused customer segments, aligning with trends. You can also measure App and web interactions together, which means that you can monitor conversions from, say, YouTube video views alongside conversions from Google Display, and Google Remarketing campaigns.

You can also include organic channels, like Google Search, social, and email, within these comparisons, providing more insight into your broader marketing efforts.

Reports - Google has simplified and re-organized reporting so that you can find marketing insights based on what part of the customer journey you are most interested in. This gives you more ways to dig into the data, and hone in on specific trends.

No Cookies - No Worries - The new data points have been designed "to adapt to a future with or without cookies or identifiers". Given increased data regulation, tracking via cookies is slowly being phased out, which means that businesses need new ways to monitor and attribute audience activity. The new Analytic 4 tool and Google's data collection tools will attribute activity without the use of cookie tracking.

Converting Existing Analytics - You can set up Google Analytics 4 (formerly known as App and Web Property) with your existing Universal Analytics property. This article helps you set up a Google Analytics 4 property that collects data from the same pages as an existing Universal Analytics property.

Bottom Line: Google 4 is the new future of Google Analytics and definitely worth exploring. On the detail oriented subject of analytics, Google provides incredible value to business owners looking to gain useful insights on their customers and competition, and to determine the efficiency of your advertising spend. Measure everything you can - the more you look, the more likely you are to find!

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Fall/Winter Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here to view the complete edition

Digital Strategy ... In the Eye of the Beholder ... An Elephant Fable

Wed, 06 May 2020 21:47:56 GMT

Digital strategy is analogous with the popular John Godfrey Saxe fable of the ‘Blind Men and the Elephant’. One of the blind men feels the elephant's body and thinks the animal is similar to a wall. The other feels it’s trunk and said it was like a tree. And so forth. Each saw the elephant uniquely.

Like this analogy, in today's organization, there are many ideas of what constitutes digital strategy. A marketing executive will see a digital strategy as social media and web channels. An IT person views a digital strategy as cloud. A product manager may see a strategy as data analytics. An analyst will see it as online revenue channels. And so forth.

Internet and social media success doesn’t happen accidentally – it happens through good planning and hard work. This includes articulating your goals, developing and implementing a plan, monitoring your activities, and making adjustments as needed.

If you feel your organization is woefully lagging in digital or confused in this space, take heart - there are many others who feel the same. The whole world is being digitized right before our eyes and thus, taking the time to set a strategy for the things important to your business is essential.

Bottom Line: Digital success doesn’t happen accidentally – it happens through good planning and diligence. No matter what those blind men were feeling, the elephant is lofty and strong - like an effective strategy.

digitalroadmaps® 101

#1 Business Goals

Be aware that a “digital strategy” should be a support resource for your business activities. State your business goals prior to your digital goals.

#2 Map Your Options

There’s always more than one choice in the abundance of digital offerings available to you. Looking at each option from a “practical to implement and support” perspective, will help you choose the best strategic options.

#3 Galvanize Your Ideas

Team participation in your strategy creates support and “buy in”. Involve your team as early as practical and definitely prior to completing a final strategy review.

#4 Generate a One Page Analogy
A one page visual picture of your strategy - a digital roadmap® serves as a visual reminder of purpose and an easy reference guide.

#5 Measure and Adjust

Choose your success measurements before you start. Adjust as you gain experience.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

No SERP Content Marketing - Finding the Sweet Spot

Wed, 06 May 2020 17:51:41 GMT

As you steer your business through 2020, stay on top of no SERP Content Marketing for generating new customers and getting your brand known by a larger audience.

About No SERP Content Marketing? - No SERP - is a search return that contains zero organic results.

No SERP aka “zero click” search is when a person executes a Google search and they use the information already presented on the SERP as a means to answering their query. They do NOT click on any of the “organic” sites/listings further down on the results page.

Who Owns the No SERP - Zero Click “Space” - When looking at zero click results, the major search engine you are using is claiming the “top level” search return content. My Business listings and Top Page informational Snippets such as weather, sports news, definitions, airline flights, and more hold the coveted positions.

Simply put, Google has asserted all the “top level” search return content with My Business listings and Top Page informational snippets, above your organic listing.

No SERP - The Good, Bad and Ugly - Some would say No SERP is a “bad” thing. Some would point out exceptions such as large retailer searches (example Costco). For the majority of businesses, understanding that “No SERP - zero click” exists is a good thing, since it let’s us focus on working within “zero click” parameters.

Effective Approaches for Zero Click Positioning Website content must be deep and comprehensive, as major search engines like Google have been identifying to us for some time. Try these effective No SERP - zero click content marketing tactics:

#1 - Choose content topics that are credible and compelling to your business values. As a guide, look at what existing content was “sticky” to your target audience from your last/previous efforts.

#2 - Review what SERP pages (social and search) are crowded with similar results for the type of content you plan to create. What pages have few results? Consider how you can tailor your content to these search returns, without jeopardizing your content intent.

#3 - Featured snippets are great for informational queries and branding.Target Featured snippets that reside on SERPs that garner no clicks. Become an authority for this subject matter, provided it supports your business. Review your keywords for terms that may have conversion possibilities, with a particular focus on questions. Create content Snippets that fall into one of three formats: the paragraph, list, or table snippet.

#4 - Think about how your content can be personalized and how will it create activations.

#5 - Provide readers with the information they want, when and where they consume it. Ensure your content is repurposable across your chosen organic and paid channels. Plan your content structure to support different platform features.

#6 - Adapt your content for the regional needs and differences of each market while still conveying the main message. If you publish the same content on more than one site that you own, take measures to ensure you avoid “duplicate content” flagging.

#7 - Be concise with what you write while providing as much detail as possible.

Consider choosing from the diverse content types as shown in Figure 1.

Bottom Line: In the 2020 decade, 20/20 vision is more than hindsight. There will continue to be shifts in the online industry that enable marketing strategies, company investment and consumer/business behaviour. Pay attention to Google, focus your strategy on tools and content types that can build up your business and service your existing customers. And measure those efforts with good tracking and analysis.

A Short Summary of Google's Special Content Resource Blocks (Snippets)

“Special Search Results” are known by a number of names including Rich Answers, Knowledge Graphs and Snippets.

Rich Answers - Also known as instant answers are answered by Google with content from your site. You do not get any credit for providing this content. Google claims these answers are part of the public domain.

Knowledge Graph - Content is pulled from a variety of sources and is presented in a beautiful box to the right or above organic search results, in a photo gallery. Results are usually about brands, people or organizations.

Rich Snippet - Enhances an organic search result with information marked up from a site structured scheme from schema.org . These results include starts, product available and pricing information as well as photos for reviews.

Featured Snippets - a special block above organic search results that Google shows for certain queries. Items like YouTube and Two for One features snippets can serve as great positioning for you products and brand. Here are 3 types of featured snippets:

Paragraph Snippets that answer “quick questions” when you search for items like How to do/get…, Who is, Why is, or What is
List Snippets that are step by step numbered lists and present inform such as Recipes, DIY tasks, How to… How do I…
Table Snippets that are comprised of a bullet list, usually with some kind of extra detail to each item. Typical tables include Item Lists, Pricing, Rates and Data. Table snippets are often used for best of, ranked, unranked and feature lists.

Cheryl Kenny is the Chief Marketing Officer with Concentric. Find out more about Cheryl here .

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Choosing Your Best Digital Advertising Platform

Wed, 06 May 2020 17:51:33 GMT

The 2020 decade will continue to see a proliferation of choices for digital marketers in both ad tech and advertising platforms for your business, sales and promotion activities. This article discusses Top 12 strategies to consider when reviewing advertising platforms and campaigns to ensure your ad activities deliver results for the digital dollar spent.

#1 Intent remains a top consideration. Understanding intent is about connecting: connecting with your audiences’ hopes, dreams, values, concerns. Consider how and what you are communicating, and why your message is important? Know your target audience - and communicate to “ice cold new people” and “people who are in your funnel” uniquely. Plan for how you will manage the next steps after ad engagement.

#2 Pair your intent with the right platform and features. For example: a) search platforms tend to be used to find information on topics, products, services and businesses (both local and beyond) b) social platforms are where people connect with groups and topics they are interested in c) the explosion of video consumption makes video platforms repositories of eduction/how to topics, entertainment, news and … pretty well anything you can think of, often with the intent of learning more d) business platforms facilitate business connections (with colleagues, search for jobs) e) speciality sites (home, garden, news) allow you to communicate to a specific interest group f) large shopping platforms (example Amazon) are designed to capture purchases.

#3 Use budget planning tools for assessing one time and ongoing costs. Budgets are relative to your business and differ in every industry. Resources for budget and benchmarking, like AdStage, will give you Q1, 2, 3, 4 guidelines. Tools like Keywords Everywhere, Google Ad Planner and Facebook Campaign planner will assist you with determining an average cost per click. TIP: Be conservative with click through and conversion rates during ad planning setup.

#4 Many platforms have a unique way of allowing viewers of your ads to connect with you. Examples include Messenger for Facebook, Google Forms, Followers, Clicks to Landing Pages, Click to Call. Be familiar with each of these channels and incorporate them into your strategy and ad activations.

#5 At the outset of your campaigns, collect a segmented Remarketing list of all visitors to your landing pages, for future use. Features such as “Hot Audiences based on overall website traffic” and integrating Remarketing activities with your email lists, will allow you to quickly build and use your lists to target those showing previous interest.

#6 Network Regionality and GEO targeting are both worthwhile considerations. Network Regionality refers to choosing the best platform, based on its geographic reach or topic strength. GEO targeting to a set of specific users based on their location within these networks, can drive customers to you. Tip: Avoid any “GEO” platforms that are not permission based; particularly in this age of GDPR, CASL and other reasonable concerns on how audiences data is captured and privacy.

#7 Email remains a strong advertising channel. Unique features related to new email platforms drive both engagement and sales. Communication directly to an Inbox is still very effective.

#8 Measuring ROI may require integration of multiple vendors into an intelligent Dashboard or commercial analytics system. This integration is often done on the “front end” of your landing pages with systems such as Call Rail and on the “back end” of your measurement tools such as Google Analytics, DashThis, etc. Understand what you want to measure, architect your measurement system and add in corresponding tracking coding so that all information meshes. And auditing periodically is a valuable and necessary endeavour and may require a collaborative effort.

#9 Understanding the source of your ROI through custom tracking allows you to recognize trends and optimize non performing traffic. This is particularly effective for broad categories advertising channels where ads are trafficked based on broad match types (example Content Topics) and are reported as “not set” in your analytics tools. You want to know where your data is coming from!

#10 Optimize your GMB listing. If you use Google Search advertising, Google MyBusiness (GMB) becomes an important component to your advertising mix. It’s our experience that GMB, paired with Search ads generate complementary activity in terms of driving visits, engagement, activation and increasing ROI without additional ad spend.

#11 Imagery is still a powerful motivator. Include as many banner ad sizes as possible when creating Display campaigns. Research your target channels to understand the opportunities with placement of the different ad sizes. Ensure ads in “text format” for native placements are available. TIP: This article provides perspective on popular banner ad sizes.

#12 Key parameters to consider when configuring your online campaigns and when later optimizing your campaigns include: conversion attribution models (ex: linear, time decay, position based), campaign goals (ex: sales, leads, website traffic), bidding type (ex: maximize conversions, maximize clicks), cross platform conversion and more. Apply different tactics at different stages of your ad campaigns.

Bottom Line: It’s time NOW to advertise online - with lots of platform choices and many features for promotion and measurement. Consider a blended omni channel platform approach. Leverage every appropriate channel to take advantage of how major networks hand off to each other and complement each other. Match your advertising platform to your audience and understand what features allow you to reach them in the best way possible, at the best price point.

Happy advertising!

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Colour Pyschology - Motivate with Hues

Fri, 24 Apr 2020 21:45:09 GMT

Color psychology is a discipline that researches how colour influences human behaviour and decision making. In this article we explore how colour impacts the way we perceive a brand and interact with promotional communications.

Technically speaking: Colour psychology is a theory that’s based how our brain processes colours. The human eye has a visual response to light. Colour wavelengths create electrical impulses that go to the hypothalamus in the brain, which influences many functions in the human body including behavioural and decision patterns, appetite, and body temperature among them.

It’s proven that the use of colours goes beyond a purely aesthetic impact. Colour psychology impacts your design and influences buying choices. Estimates show that 90 percent of an opinion about a product or service is based on colours alone, as colour is often the first thing people notice. Analytic research indicates that contrasting complementary colours increase conversion rates in digital ads and interaction rates on web pages, social channels, email communications and digital content.

The "101s" of Colour

1. Stimulating or Calming - Warm and cold colours (Figure 1) have an impact on how we comprehend them. Warm colours work best when they are used as accent colours, vs using them as a basic colour. Too much of a warm colour is known to make designs look irritating and annoying. Cooler colours naturally create a calming effect but research says if they are overused they call to mind feelings of sadness.

2. Colour and Gender - There are both differences and similarities between men's and women’s perceptions of colour schemes. In depth details can be found in published research from Joe Hallock. Highlights include:

- there’s a clear preference in specific colours across gender and among the most noticeable is that both genders like blue and green
- men and women both shared least favourite colours: brown and orange
- the second favourite colour among women is purple
- purple is the least favourite colour among men
- when it comes to shades, tints, and hues, men generally prefer bold colours, while women prefer softer colours.

3. Culture Colour Preference - Colours can mean different things in different cultures. For example, in many Western cultures, white is associated with positive things, while in many parts of Asia, white is associated with mourning. As a result, it’s almost impossible to narrow one colour down to a solid meaning. One good resource to understand this further is the Colours and Materials website f rom WordPress.

Design with Colour

1. Complementary Colour Palette Choices - When selecting one colour ensure you understand colour complements. Color Hunt is a free and open platform for colour palette and complement inspiration. It helps you discover thousands of trendy hand-picked colour palettes and can provide insights for your next digital project.

2. Use Contrast for Conversion - The Button Colour A/B Tes t hypothesizes that contrast in digital content layout on pages impacts performance. The test data collected indicates that conversion and activation rates are improved with complementary contrasting colours. The best rule of thumb remains, make colour stand out and complement what is around it.

3. Colour Balance Rule - The 60-30-10-Rule (Figure 2) is one that many marketers and designers use to create well-balanced and visually interesting layouts. The 60-30-10 rule is a guide for creating balanced colour combinations that blend colour in harmonic proportions. This formula allows the eye to travel comfortably from one focal point to another.

The idea is that one colour (usually, a neutral colour) makes up 60 percent of the palette - Dominant. Another complementary colour makes up 30 percent of the palette - Secondary. A third colour, which is used as an Accent, covers the remaining 10 percent. You can see many examples of this from a simple Google image search.

4. Brand Recognition through Colour - Using a colour palette to create a distinct style that is recognized is a proven technique for Brand recognition. (ex: Can you easily identify Coke soft drinks?) Some of the most successful Instagram accounts use a consistent brand colour palette for the photos they post. Colour associations for specific industries such as white for tech, green for eco products, and red for fast food are quite common.

A digitalroadmap® for Colour Selection

There are many approaches to consider when selecting a colour palette for your digital activities. Consider the issue of colour, harmony and relevance of different colour combinations of your digital assets with different themes, and how they sit with each other. This digital roadmap ® for Colour Selection assists with choosing hues that makes our content, website and advertising initiatives standout and get noticed. Hand-picked colour palettes and can provide insights for your next digital project.

A good place to start with your Brand Colour Choices is with your business logo. As you go through your process, consider creating a ‘style guide’ and adding/incorporating your new colour selections to your style guide, website and digital properties, advertising and promotional material and your printed collateral.

Bottom Line: Having a coordinated brand statement in colour, pattern and design (Style Guide) is an important component of your business and influences how your target market perceives and interacts with you. Choosing the right colour palette that reflects the intent/purpose of your brand, can create a world of meaning for every business. Colour applications include branding, advertising, website and social page colour palettes, the imagery you choose to use on your digital products and posts … and virtually anything else related to your business communications. The colour selection process is rewarding, particularly when you can see the results “right before your eyes”.

Alex Wozny is a digital analyst and data scientist with Concentric. Find out more about Alex here

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here to view the complete edition

The Cognitive Bias Effect in Data-Driven Decisions

Thu, 25 Jul 2019 18:04:47 GMT

5 Cognitive Bias Examples ... + 58 More

In our knowledge economy, making informed decisions using data-derived insights is part of many of our job descriptions. We value the attributes and outcomes of decisions derived from data. We also like to think of ourselves as rational human beings.

Did you know that we are prone to hundreds of proven biases, that factor in our decision making abilities. Enter the cognitive bias.

Cognitive biases are those “thought traps” that cause humans to do irrational things. They can be either an asset or the “enemy” of rational decision making.

Physiologists also use the term “affect heuristic” when discussing cognitive biases. Affect heuristic is used to describe the way we allow emotions to “colour” our beliefs.

5 examples of the cognitive biases relevant to data-derived decision making are shared below. Additionally, Business Insider publishes a list of 58 cognitive biases that you can find here .

5 Cognative Bias Examples

#1 Anchoring Bias

Be aware that using the first piece of information that is presented to you as a reference point against all other options could be a mistake.

#2 The Bandwagon Effect

The probability of one person adopting a belief increases based on the number of people holding that belief, so keep beliefs private when making important decisions. Consider the value of ‘hidden votes’ in group think setting.

#3 Clustering Illusion

This is the tendency to see patterns in random events like the idea that red is more or less likely to turn up on a roulette table after a string of reds.

#4 Observer Expectancy Effect
Ensure your expectations do not involuntarily impact how you interpret results.

#5 Recency Bias

The newest piece of data is not always more important than historical data. Compare past data sets against new ones.

Decision making can be complex when using data-derived insights. A main key to success is to embrace the possibility that cognitive biases do exist and then reconfirm your data-derived relationships and biases with a critic's eye.

Bottom Line: Become familiar with your cognitive bias to assist in better decision making when analyzing your data.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Summer Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Why Do People Click on Search Ads

Thu, 25 Jul 2019 17:47:53 GMT

Better Decisions in Digital Advertising

Knowing the reasons why people click on paid search ads allows you to make better decisions about how to use and optimize search advertising in your business.

Paid search is an established and helpful tool to find your prospective customers. In fact, 75% of people surveyed believe search ads make it easier to find information online, regardless of the platform they use including Google Ads, Amazon Advertising, Bing Ads and YouTube.

Paid Ads Are Easily Recognized - 80% of people are confident they can recognize a paid ad. This identification provides a perception expectation that the ad would be valuable to them.

Demonstrated Value - Ads answering direct search inquiries and assisting with the person’s specific question, are the most valuable and rememberable.

A Familiar Brand - Branded paid search ads appeal to people who search for information about services, retail and consumer goods, and videos.

The Right Messaging - 19% of people click on paid search advertising because of a compelling title, description or image.

The Platform Matters - Nearly two-thirds of people (63%) are most likely to click on a Google search advertisement in comparison to 14% on Amazon and 9% on YouTube.

Types of Ads Clicked is Determined by the Platform Used - The paid search advertisements people click on depend on the websites they use:

More than half of people (55%) who click on Google search ads prefer the text ad format.
People who click on Amazon advertisements favour shopping/product listing ads (50%).
People engaged in activities on YouTube favour video ads (36%)

Do We Prefer Text Ads? - Nearly half of us (49%) are most likely to click on a paid search text advertisement, while around one-third (31%) are likely to click on a shopping ad and 16% are likely to click on a video ad.

Repetition from Multiple Sources - Paid search ads on multiple platforms improve click through rates.

Ad Location in Mobile - Mobile interfaces often display only paid ads above the fold on the screen. No scrolling = convenience = better performance.

Bottom Line: Y our target customers have high expectations about paid search ads. The time spent in making your brand look smarter pays off in clicks and conversions. Thoughtfully tailor your ads for best results.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Summer Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

The New Email Marketing Era

Thu, 25 Jul 2019 17:06:34 GMT

Brings Substantial Opportunities

Your email marketing subscriber database is a valuable asset to your business. It’s an opportunity to directly activate prequalified people who have shown an interest in your business.

Email systems have undergone a substantial transformation in recent years. Now at your fingertips are tools to understand customer habits, bridge SMS and email conversations, set automated workflows and easily assemble customized communications -, at prices attractive to small and medium sized businesses.

Consider these tools and features to help you decide if it’s time to consider updating your current email system.

Levels of Integration - Native integration allows you to sync your customer databases with your email profiles providing a deeper subset of information on your customers habits.

Profiles vs an eMail Subscription - With Profiles, real time data on email subscribers website visit habits can be collected by your email system. This gives you a broader picture of how a subscriber interacts with the information you publish online and in your newsletters.

Better Segmentation - You can segment your customers according to their preferences and activities. This allows you to direct appropriate communications to specific sets of subscribers. For example, you could create a list of all subscribers who purchased over $1000 of products/services from your company, send them tailored email messages and track the outcomes.

Automated Workflows - Automated workflows can be created to send timely communications to members of your lists. Workflows can also take actions like updating a specific field on a profile and integrating “web” feeds into your emails.

Enhanced Editors - Editors are intuitive allowing you to create visually appealing responsive email communications. You can build email templates and assign them to a Workflow. You can “pick” items from a website and import them into your email without having to recreate this information.

Choose the Channel - SMS, mobile, desktop - The world is your oyster - clients choose the way they want to communicate with you and you can easily communicate back using the same platform.

Site Features - Items such as email POPs can be integrated directly into your website. These marketing features can be integrated with workflows. Items such as coupons from many commerce platforms can be generated and also integrated into emails.

Bottom Line: This email automation shift is about focusing on enhancing an already important asset and generating more business opportunities. Easily accessible real-time data and optimized workflows gives email marketers more time to focus on solving business problems.

Cheryl Kenny is the Chief Marketing Officer with Concentric. Find out more about Cheryl here.

This article is from the Summer Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here to view the complete edition or dowload.

Turn Your Blog into a Video

Thu, 11 Jul 2019 23:27:52 GMT

Harness the Power of Visual Content

Video has become one of the most popular forms of communications on “the web”. Consider the mixed use of video in blogging to provide significant advantages for your business, including:

Reader Preference for viewing - many people have little time to read but will take 30 seconds to watch a video
The video medium works well in communicating information in an engaging and entertaining way
Once your video format is created it requires less additional effort to create your content
Segments of video blogs often have multi uses and can be repurposed for both content and advertising
For certain topics, quality videos are rising above quality blog posts in search results, especially on Google.

Is Video Appropriate for Your Blog?

As shown in Figure1, the Google Search bar shows you the popular media type(s) for your topic (most popular is on the left). Prior to video creation, conduct a Google search (unfiltered if possible) to determine what media type is popular with your audience and your topic.

Figure 1 - Example of Content Popularity by Topic

Does Your Blog Meet Google Criteria?

Educational category content work great in formats such as Tutorials, How-to content and Reviews and are deemed ‘high-value’ by Google. Structuring your videos in an “educational format” makes it easier for Google to recognize that your content is there to help the searcher.

Proven Video Blog Optimization Processes

The Title is Important - The name of your video file should be the same as the title of your YouTube video. When you upload the file into the platform, don't change the title. Having the same title and file name easily identifies for YouTube and Google what the content is right away.

Tag It Correctly - Always describe your video in the meta data associated with your video file on a web page. Ensure it has a proper title tag and video description and that you’ve indexed the video into Google via your sitemap and search console tools.

Thumbnails - A video thumbnail encourages viewers to hit the PLAY button. A great thumbnail makes a creator's content stand out.

Playlists - Put the video in a ‘playlist’ on your channel. Playlists are basically curated category pages that help add authority for your video content. Make sure your playlist is optimized with a top-search term and a quality description that includes keywords to help Google identify what the video content is all about.

Build links to your video - Google treats your YouTube video as a webpage; and the more quality backlinks you have directing back to it, the more likely Google is to rank your video.

Focus on YouTube First - Even though ranking on Google may be your goal, start with ranking on YouTube. You are creating videos, after all, and YouTube is the second-largest search engine in the world.

Share - Platforms on which to share educational videos include Quora, Reddit, Blogs (as embeds) and of course your social media channels.

Bottom Line: Harness the power of visual content. Mix video into your blogs if they are instructional and educational in nature. You may find a whole new audience for your content.

Alex Wozny is a digital analyst and data scientist with Concentric. Find out more about Alex here

This article is from the Summer Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

Minimalism in Web Design

Thu, 11 Jul 2019 22:40:45 GMT

6 Guidelines for a Great Visitor Experience

Minimalism in the world of design is everywhere - in architecture, paintings, sculptures and even in our lifestyles. This is initially driven by design and as it catches on becomes a consumer’s choice.

Minimalism is also on the rise in digital product design. Well-designed “web minimalist website interfaces" pair aesthetics with strong usability to create an excellent user experience. Template driven websites provide multitudes of white label minimalist examples.

While minimalist web design is attractive, it is tricky to get just right. In order to help you decide what parts of minimalism you should embrace we share six rules for creating effective minimalist designs.

The Top 6 Guidelines

Content and Features - Remove all unnecessary elements and distractions from your design. Conduct a content and feature analysis. The goal of this activity is to prioritize all content and features, so you can identify what the essential components of the design are.

The more choices you present, the longer it takes to make a decision so reduce the options and features presented. Choose elements that serve a functional purpose. Only include elements that make your message clear. Communicate succinctly. Place the most relevant content at the top.

Imagery - Minimalism includes careful choice of when and where to use images. Thoughtfully choose images that help create a focal point with asymmetrical and symmetrical balance.

Typography - Good minimalist design features clean and readable typography. Typography can be used to create focal points. Select font pallete with one or two font families. Text blocks make it easier for visitors to understand and consume the content on your site.

Colours and Contrast - The colours you choose should be as clean as your typography selection. Color can be used for various purposes including as a background texture or as an accent, or to convey a mood. Keep in mind that monochromatic colour palettes are not the be all and end all of minimalism. While it’s always better to use a limited number of colours, you should not be limited by your colour selection.

White Space - Visual clutter can be your worst enemy. Avoid having too many items fight for a visitor’s attention. In fact, use white space to force a user’s attention by increasing negative space around it. Empty space will naturally direct the eye towards the object. Avoid using multiple focal points per screen. Give visitors one thing to focus on at a time.

Visual Hierarchy - It’s said that “Good visual hierarchy moves the visitor’s eye across the page and pulls attention to certain elements.” Grid systems are effective tools to assist with achieving visual hierarchy.

Bottom Line: Find the right relationship between all the visual elements you use in a design and the visitor experience you want to provide. A well-balanced design ensures no one element will overpower the other without a good reason. When you strive for minimalism, what you are actually doing is creating simple, easy-to-use products—products that help the user accomplish something quickly and easily. This leads to first rate visitor experiences your clients will remember.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Summer Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click her e to view Digital Dollars and Sense editions and download the latest Digital Dollars and Sense ebook.

5 Elements of a Great Online Retail Experience

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Fri, 16 Nov 2018 16:42:15 GMT

digitalroadmap® Digital Transformation Strategies

Is t here still hope for retailers completing with the new giants of retail like Amazon and Alibaba? There is hope according to Doug Stephens in his 2018 High Point Market keynote as retailers rethink of their stores as a place to distribute true customer experiences.

What key elements that make up a true customer experience and a great retail experience in the digital age include:

Build stories about the products you sell. Attaching the stories to products becomes a unique selling proposition.

Use unique labelling and lexicon to bring a fresh feel to products and services (example: grande vs large).

Personalize the experience to help create a shopping experience unique to each customer.

Surprise your audience by bringing something unexpected into an online store to both catch attention and create loyalty.

Supply a steady stream of campaigns and keep them fresh so every visit is an awesome experience

Bottom Line : The goal of retailers today should include securing a place in the hearts and minds of consumer.s As an online retailer there is a strong need to innovate, like never before and those who launch a creative idea first see 30% higher revenue growth than those who follow in their footsteps.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Fall/Winter Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here to view the complete edition (it will open as an ebook or PDF)

Trends in Reach and Visibility

cheryl@concentricis.com (Cheryl Kenny) — Fri, 16 Nov 2018 16:42:14 GMT

digitalroadmap® Marketing Strategies

Consider the following trends when planning how to attract and hold your markets attention.

#1 Shopping Density Increases

Shopping tool portals such as Shopify are reporting growth of over 50% in the number of online stores being created.

#2 Social Media Diet?

Advertisers report that social activities are providing a soft return on investment. According to Hanapin studies, it takes a minimum of 8 social media interactions to generate an online sale.

#3 Start Here

Over 50% of consumers start certain search on Amazon. Over 45% of all consumers start their search on Google.

#4 Content Alignment

Building Pillar content allows you to rank higher in organic search and will decrease online advertising costs on pay per click networks.

#5 Last Year Does Not Mean This Year

Last years performance is not this year’s performance! How and where your audience finds you can shift. Monitoring your competition gives insights into possible trends.

Cheryl Kenny is the Chief Marketing Officer with Concentric. Find out more about Cheryl here.

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here to view the complete edition (it will open as a pdf or ebook).

Paid Search - An Important Marketing Channel

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Fri, 16 Nov 2018 16:41:31 GMT

digitalroadmap® Strategies for Online Advertising

Search Engine Marketing, commonly referred to as SEM, is one of the most important marketing channels to generate web traffic. It compliments SEO and content marketing and gets your brand at the top of Google, Bing and other search engine players world wide… if you play your SEM cards right.

Top reason’s businesses use SEM include:

Revenue Generation

While Bing, Baidu, Yandex and others offer profitable playgrounds for search ads to bring in more money, Google has hard data to prove it’s efficiency including the ability to drive both leads and eCommerce sales on a profitable basis.

Conversion Focus

While increased revenue is typically the main goal of marketing campaigns, other types of conversions like new subscribers, newsletter signups or in store purchase are objectives businesses are trying to achieve.

Brand Awareness

According to Studies, search ads can increase brand awareness by 80% . Consumers take notice when ads include keywords and search terms for competitor brands, as the brain is inclined to compare things that are listed side by side.

Accessible Even to Small Budgets

There’s also no minimum amount you have to spend to run online ads. As little as $5/day will get you started if you’re on a tight budget.

Great for Local Marketing

When people search online for local business services, like “dry cleaner near me” or “food delivery,” it’s local search marketing that make those queries connect with business listings and contextual ads in paid search engine listings.

Immediate Results

From the minute your ads are launched, the potential to start getting more clicks and even sales is alive. For this reason alone, SEM is one of the fastest-to-launch traffic strategies out there. Keep in mind that campaigns should still be optimized for long-term results.

Consistency

Search ads will generate traffic to your site, even when SEO and other marketing tactics fluctuate.

Qualified Traffic

One of the biggest benefits of search ads is the ability to bring in the right traffic. You can’t always control who sees your organic search results, but with SEM, you can create a custom audience that will be far more likely to see and engage with your ads than the average searcher.

Bottom Line: There is tremendous value from paid Search for your businesses. It’s as a flexible and affordable marketing channel to create brand visibility, generate new sales, subscriptions and new leads.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here to view the complete edition (it will load as a pdf or ebook depending on your browser settings)

Building the Perfect Lead Engine

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Fri, 16 Nov 2018 16:41:29 GMT

digitalroadmap® Content Marketing Strategies for Lead Generation

Did you know that 85% of B2B marketers identify lead generation as their most important content marketing goal yet only 10% believe that their lead generation efforts are effective? We asked the team at Concentric for their Top 6 tips for maximizing lead generation performance.

Tip #1 Content

Explain your product or service to the target audience in a simple, clear and concise way. Describe the benefits to your audience so it’s easy to see the value. Avoid providing long lists of features about you and focus on the benefits to them.

Tip #2 Make Your Page Scannable

Say “no” to homework! Allow prospects to scan clear and simple visuals, value statements, graphs and charts … and summarize this up in short videos for those who prefer visual or auditory content.

Tip #3 Include Contact Opportunities

Some people scan content from the top and some scan content from the bottom. Place opportunities to contact you in several locations. Qualify the intent of respondents with simple questions about their business when using lead generation forms. Always collect a phone number.

Tip #4 Be Convenient

Desktop, mobile, tablet. Let your prospects choose how they consume your content. Customize your content design based on screen size.

Tip #5 Measure What Counts

Look deeper than just online conversion data to measure lead value. Track each lead all the way to a closed sale and the revenue it generates. Create a set of accurate metrics and a measurement process. Include anecdotal information your sales team.

Tip #6 First Callback

Lead generation may change your internal sales approach. Review what information you will ask a prospective client and what approach you will use on first contact with a new lead. Learn from your initial calls. Refine your approach with your sales team. Remember this approach will allow you to gain insights into improvements to make and allow you to confirm that the leads generated are worth the digital dollars you spend.

Bottom Line: A lead generation page is part of the bigger picture of the digital sales transformation for your business. To measure true effectiveness ensure that lead generation programs include how you manage and track leads once they arrive at your doorstep.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here to view the complete edition (it will open as a pdt or ebook depending on your browser settings)

Web Design - The Balance Between Search & Content

alex@concentricis.com (Alex Wozny) — Fri, 16 Nov 2018 16:41:28 GMT

digitalroadmap® Strategies for Search

Everyone wants an SEO-friendly website optimized for search engines where listings show up at the top when consumers are searching for their products. The same site needs to be beautiful and functional that let’s visitors easily find what they want to buy or the information they need.

Consider these web design tips to get best of both worlds.

Site Navigation

SEO’s focus is on optimizing navigation for search indexing and ranking. Good design likes to keep navigation very simple. Satisfy both requirements and keep your top navigation simple so that only a few main categories are shown. Then expand navigation through subcategories and ensure the subcategories correspond to terms that you are targeting in SEO.

Our top three “Insights and Tips” to consider with this approach include a) build a new subcategory when you have more than a dozen products on a page b) use navigation bubbles that show sub navigation on hover or the use of a sidebar c) to support navigation cross link pages throughout your blogs, FAQs, and instructions to support navigation. . See a great example here .

Content Functionality

Design focuses on beautiful visuals and simple layout. SEO focuses on as much content as possible within a pillar page strategy with the goal of becoming an authority brand. To satisfy both, identify what steps you expect a visitor to take on your site to the outcome you want and think about the information that would make you take an action. Also, look at what your competition is doing. Plan your pages and their features based on the journey you map out and incorporate SEO and design elements.

Out top five “Insights and Tips” to consider with this approach include a) consider providing your customer with filters to assist them with finding the right information b) avoid design feature that could hinder search engine indexing such as overuse of Javascript frameworks c) ask the question of what information does the visitor need to leave satisfied or complete a transaction d) 40% of visitors abandon sites that do not load in 3 seconds so be sure to design for fast loading e) always ensure non text media is compressed and tagged.

Bottom Line: Informed leadership will help in creating a site that is easily found, looks great, has the optimum information a visitor needs, and loads fast. Follow these guidelines for the right balance of SEO, Design and Content to get the most out of your digital dollars.

Alex Wozny is a digital analyst and designer with Concentric. Find out more about Alex here

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here to download the complete edition (it will load as a pdf or ebook based on your browser settings)

6 Marketing Tech Development Tips

cheryl@concentricis.com (Cheryl Kenny) — Fri, 16 Nov 2018 16:41:26 GMT

digtialroadmap® Strategies for Digital Development

For your next project, here are 6 Insights and Tips to energize, and in some cases add fun to, your digital ventures.

#1 Cross Device Analytics

Understanding device interactions as part of the customer experience, will help you make better informed product and marketing decisions. Analytics can now help you understand the journey your customers take if they use more than one device to interact with your website. This means that instead of seeing metrics in Analytics that show two separate sessions (e.g., one on desktop and the other on mobile), you’ll be able to see their combined information in Acquisition Device reports

#2 Full Screen Capture

This extension for Chrome creates screenshots of a current web page in entirety and reliably without requesting any extra permissions. Click on the extension icon (or press Alt+Shift+P), watch the extension capture each part of the page, and be transported to a new tab of your screenshot where you can download it as an image or PDF or even just drag it to your desktop. The advanced screen capture technology handles complex pages including inner scrollable elements as well as embedded iframes.

#3 Be Protected

Try Sucuri - This is one of our favourite tools for assisting with unwanted access and security protection from viruses and malware. Sucuri’s site back up feature is also excellent ensuring that the value of all your investment remains in tact. It’s also great to be able to reach out to someone and get an immediate response for small items and a timely insightful answer to the larger ones.

#4 Nail Your Logo and Brand

Whether you’re updating an existing brand, or launching a brand new project, make sure your visuals are on-point. Hatchful is a beginner-friendly mobile app helps you build a visual identity and construct beautiful brand assets without the need for a professional graphic designer.

The App let’s you select a logo template, tweak colours, fonts and more. You can then download variants and the visual identity assets you need. Note you only pay when you’ve finished your edits and your ready to download.

#5 Simplify Workflow

Need a strong workflow for your next project? Consider Slack. This tool allows you to share selected channels with companies and businesses you regularly work with - like clients, vendors, and partners - to bring all the right people into the same room. You can drag-and-drop PDFs, images, videos and other files directly into Slack to get feedback on your work and create an archive of your progress. Talk it out over voice or video calls directly. And if you need to show your work, you can share your screen, too.

#6 Beautiful Visuals

Create beautiful visuals and animations on the fly for web developments and more with this tool. Bannersnack includes features for developing beautiful and appealing social media posts, video enabled features, covers and more. You can also track analytics activity for products created with Bannersnack through their embedded code feature.

Cheryl Kenny is the Chief Marketing Officer with Concentric. Find out more about Cheryl here.

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here to download the complete edition (it will load as a pdf or ebook based on your browser settings)

Digital Doll$rs & Sense Links

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Fri, 16 Nov 2018 16:41:25 GMT

From the Fall 2018 Publication

There's often short segments on topical items throughout each Digital Doll$rs and Sense publication. We've placed them all in one location for your reading and review pleasure.

Google + Closing

Reasons provided include low usage and engagement. Industry rumours speak to a data breach. Read more

Forget Me

Canada takes the right to be digitally forgotten to the Courts. Listen to the podcas t.

Voice Search Growth

This trend will effect how visitors land on your site. View the graphs describing the trend.

Make the Most Out of Welcoming New Customers

Each time a customer opens an email from your organization, they are having an brand experience that can impact the way they think of your business. So to assist with making the most of your welcome emails, review these handy tips from Ryan Pinkham.

Progressive Web Apps Extend Your Website Content

In its simplest sense, a progressive web app is a mobile app delivered through your existing website. Dozens of major brands are moving from apps to PWAs. See Why

Google Search Updates to Mark Its 20th Anniversary

Google has announced a range of updates to its search tools, each with varying degrees of SEO relevance. They include new additions such as Activity Cards, more content context, for example, with image search matches, the ability to showcase topics that could be related to your business, and more. Find Out More

New Digital Diction Added to the Digital Dictionary

Contextual Marketing - Contextual marketing delivers content based on preferences, searches and history using behavioural targeting for the purpose of brand awareness, recall and engagement.

Impr. (Absolute Top) % - the precent of your ad impressions that are shown as the very first ad above the organic fold.

Impr. (Top) % - the percent of your ad impressions that are shown anywhere above the organic fold.

Google Data Studio - part of the Google Analytics 360 Suite that allows you to turn analytics data into reports through data visualization.

Keyword Stemming - Search engines group search results not only by exact keyword matches, but also by variations of keywords in semantic groups, such as singular-plural, related suffixes and synonyms. Search engines view these similar keywords as synonyms. As a result, “keyword stemming” can subsequently help extend your reach.

Search (Absolute Top) IS - the impressions you have received in the absolute top location (the very first ad above the organic search results) divided by the estimated number of impressions you were eligible to receive in the top location.

Search (Top) IS - the impressions you’ve received in the top location (above organic results) compared tot he estimated number of impressions you were eligible to receive in the top location.

Can’t find a term? Have one we should include? Please send them to us at Digital Dictionary Access the full electronic version of the Digital Dictionary. Visit Online . New terms are added regularly!

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here to view the complete edition (it will open as a pdt or ebook depending on your browser settings)

Work Better Than Ever - 4 Tasks to Increase Sales

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Thu, 10 May 2018 13:41:53 GMT

4 Digital Marketing Tasks to Increase Sales

As business owners and marketers, we purposefully develop habits that contribute to our business success. With so many moving parts in “digital” what habits are important to develop?

According to Business2Community and other industry studies, marketers with track records of delivering results pay attention to the following:

Purpose of the activities; in terms of how do activities support their goals (not lead their goals).

The competition, to gauge (and adjust) the positioning of products and the business, the target market’s purchase habits, likes, dislikes and identify marketing opportunities.

Time (and money) consuming Content investments deployed on branded digital marketing channels.

Telling metrics that provide insights into online sales contribution versus digital tinkering of online channels.

4 Digital Marketing Tasks to Increase Sales

#1 Always Ask Why There’s numerous DM tasks to consider and more being introduced. Be clear on the purpose of new and existing tasks; Why are we running this blog? Why are we growing this list? …

#2 Monitor the Competition Specifically consider using these two tools to for passive observations; Google Alerts for search queries, Social listening to understand what customers are saying about your brand and your competitions. In terms of active monitoring, understand which sites link to your competition, evaluate the quantity and quality of competitors links to your links, determine which back linking sites and pages are most popular and relevant and use these in your link building strategy.

#3 Create Relevant Content Using competitive data and your own content ideas, plan an editorial calendar that identifies the content you will publish and which channels you will share it on. Monitor interaction. See more on Content Types to Create the Right Response here

#4 Measure Activity Build a dashboard that focuses on 3 to 5 key metrics such as web traffic, lead/sales quality - CTR and volume, content rank for target keywords, engagement, exposure/authority, and/or customer service inquires.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here or on the cover (below) to view the complete edition plus articles such as Continuous Digital Improvement .

Content to Create The Right Customer Response

cheryl@concentricis.com (Cheryl Kenny) — Thu, 10 May 2018 13:21:26 GMT

To quote Barry Feldman - we won't perform a “funnelectomy” in this article by dissecting the Marketing Funnel metaphor. What we are sharing is a guide to the type of content that performs well for each stage of a marketing funnel. You can use this information to guide your content plans, to assist with generating leads, creating online sales or having more brick and mortar visits to your business.

Top of the Funnel (TOFU)

TOFU content aims to educate, problem solve, entertain, or inspire. Types of content that perform well include Blogs, Social Media Updates, Infographics, Pics, Digital Magazines, Books, Podcasts, Microsites and Newsletters. The best use of TOFU content is to a) increase awareness about a solution for a problem b) grow retargeting lists c) increase engagement d) increase traffic to your site.

TOFU Metrics include a) awareness rate b) retargeting list growth c) site engagement d) number of inbound links e) traffic by channel

Middle of the Funnel (MOFU)

At this stage visitors are aware of your brand and what you have to offer. You are starting down the path of building a long term relationship with them and so awesome content with strong calls to action become important. Content types that perform well include Educational Resources (case studies, white papers, reports ), Useful Resources (templates, tool kits …), Downloads, Discount Coupons, Webinars, Surveys/Quiz and Events. The key goal for sharing this content is to grow your email and retargeting lists and customer acquisition. Measurements are based on leads generated, offer conversations, list growth, newsletter opens and newsletter CTR.

Bottom of the Funnel (BOFU)

This is where we determine what content converts consistently to a lead or sale; the purchaser makes an informed decision and converts. In theory, your visitors have read your Blog posts and your Case Studies, and now it’s time to provide them with content that’s highly specific.

BOFU content types include a) demo/trial b) customer stories c) comparison sheets and d) classes on how to use your product. Content is focused on nurturing leads/customers, maximizing share of wallet, increasing retention and increasing buyer frequency. Some of the metrics become more granular and include the number of qualified leads to sales ratio, offer conversion rate, average customer value and buyer recency/frequency. In effect, you are grooming your “money tree”.

Bottom Line: Guide your content and visitor cycles. Don’t ask for too much on the first visit. Find out where in the buying cycle your visitors are at and be aware of what content they are consuming. Adjust the content you present based on your goals of lead generation for offline or online sales given the differences in each type of conversion activity.

Cheryl Kenny is the Chief Marketing Officer with Concentric. Find out more about Cheryl here.

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here or on the cover (below) to view the complete edition and read more articles such as 7 Types of Digital Marketing Tofu for Your Content Marketing !

GDPR Facts - New EU Privacy Policies

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Thu, 10 May 2018 13:07:19 GMT

Need to Know Facts About New EU Privacy Policies

The EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is set to make marketers earn their customer's attention in a way they've rarely had to before. With GDPR, companies will have to collect EU residents' consent to use personally identifiable information - such as email addresses, birth dates, government-issued identity numbers, credit card and bank account information, IP addresses, mobile device numbers, and biometrics - for explicit purposes. Moreover, companies will have to work just as hard to maintain the right to communicate in this fashion: GDPR mandates that customers be able to access and change their preferences at any time.

To assist you we’ve compiled guidelines to consider in relation to GDPR compliance.

Third Party Processors - Companies like Google, MailChimp, HotJar, Salesforce, etc. are considered third party processors under GDPR. They are processing a controller’s data on their behalf. Google, MailChimp and HotJar for example have indicated they are going through the process of becoming GDPR-compliant. In compliance, Google Analytics does not collect personally identifiable information and in most cases uses pseudonymous identifiers which under the GDPR is acceptable. You may wish to turn on IP Anonymization as a precautionary measure. Hot Jar is offering features such as suppressing session recordings, consent for feedback modules and the ability to withdraw consent - visit podcast. MailChimp is offering tools related to consent and individual rights to comply with GDPR.

Your Website Take a personal data audit of your website and ask what are you using the data for, where is the data stored and if you still need it. Check the respective privacy policies of your third party processors and enhance your website’s privacy policy to tell your visitors about how and why you are using their data, plus give them a way to request a copy of their data or have it deleted.

Social Media We understand that social networks are updating their privacy policies to comply with GDPR. For example Twitter’s recent announcement includes a statement that the Privacy update should not have any effect on Twitter accounts. Check with all your social network providers.

Bottom Line: Consider the impact of GDRP today - the live date is May 25th. If you have serious concerns on GDRP and the impact to your business you may wish to speak to someone who specializes in data privacy legal compliancy services.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here or on the cover (below) to view the complete edition plus articles such as Landing Page Benchmarks and Trends .

How to Use Paid & Organic Search to Drive the Best Results

alex@concentricis.com (Alex Wozny) — Thu, 10 May 2018 12:50:26 GMT

The results from the Clutch and Ignite surveys are in! They confirm that using paid search and organic SEO are an important combined strategy, given the trends in customer buying journeys, mobile search and the longer consideration and decision making periods by website visitors.

Paid Search Complements Organic

Over 60% of companies focus on both paid and organic search. Many find paid search and the tools within paid search campaigns provide useful feedback in terms of keyword research, audience targeting, insights into communication styles and content that triggers a response, synergy in relation to organic search rankings, plus brand strength and organic click through rates.

“The ability to receive immediate feedback on keywords that have the highest conversion rates, which type of audiences get the highest conversion rates, and which type of ad copy and landing page copy get the best results truly support the development of a more effective SEO strategy when compared to blindly deciding to target certain keywords for SEO” was a common theme from respondents.

Says John Lincoln of Ignite ““While you will get a better ROI on organic search long-term, … always start with paid. Even mature websites that get millions of visitors a month from organic should invest in paid. The two complement each other. Paid is a bit more precise and controllable," said Lincoln. “… It’s all about knowing the right time to use each one and when to use them together.”

Bottom Line: Maintaining best practices for search was found to be particularly challenging given constant change from search engines and consumer trends. The study found businesses usually partner with an expert firm for paid Search services. In-house SEO staff, were found to excel at general services like social media and creating content to earn links.

Alex Wozny is a digital analyst and designer with Concentric. Find out more about Alex here

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here or on the cover (below) to view the complete edition and read more articles such as Pillar Pages - Search is Responsible for More Website Traffic Than Social .

No HTTPS = No Visitors from Google Chrome

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Thu, 10 May 2018 12:30:29 GMT

Avoid Full Screen Warnings

Is your site SSL enabled? We turn to the internet for everything. From selling to buying, we are dependant on having a wired world at our fingertips. With this dominating trend, online security has become a necessity.

In 2017 Google Chrome possibly flagged your website if it did have an SSL certificate, by displaying a ‘Not Secure’ in the URL bar. In 2018, Google Chrome users will soon encounter a full-page warning whenever visiting a website whose SSL certificate is not registered with a public certificate log.

SSL is the primary cryptographic standard by which HTTPS connections are secured, ensuring that data transmitted between web servers and website visitors remains secure and private. An SSL certificate uses a public and private key to encrypt data; whenever you go to a website, an authentication server ensures the SSL certificate used by the site is properly signed by a trusted Certificate Authority, which maintains a copy of the public key. It also ensures the key is not expired or revoked.

This system ensures that visitors to a website can communicate (and vice versa) over an encrypted link, protecting financial information, passwords, and other sensitive data from anyone who would try to intercept it. Chrome’s new policy is known as “certificate transparency.” This means a certificate authority (CA) must maintain a public log that offers cryptographic proof that the certificates issued are authentic. If a website holds a certificate issued by a CA that has not been submitted to one of these public logs, then users will be warned.

Bottom Line: Avoid having potential visitors deterred from visiting your site. Add an SSL Certificate with the help of your hosting provider and trusted technical advisors.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

This article is from the Spring Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense. Click here or on the cover (below) to view the complete edition plus read more articles such as Continuous Digital Improvement .

Your Modern Marketing Stack

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Fri, 26 Jan 2018 23:24:54 GMT

Digital Marketing Strategy

Marketing technology is increasingly affecting all businesses and being technologically savvy is now considered an essential basic marketing requirement.

The Marketing Technology Council survey from over 300 senior-level marketers reveals that the majority are struggling to cope with the growth in the martech landscape (currently over 5381 solutions offered and growing).

Chronic problems across company sizes and industries include: a lack of integration and the use of “too many technologies” resulting in poor ROI. There is digital pressure to stay ahead of the marketing curve. The cost of falling behind is too high. And, keeping pace with the introduction of new marketing technology is not slowing down.

To support members the Council released three recommendations for building and managing a marketing stack. A marketing stack is a group of technologies that marketers leverage to execute, analyze and improve their marketing activities. This includes all technologies that marketing teams use, from marketing automation to data enrichment and analytics.

Recommendations for building and managing a marketing stack can be found in the right column of this article and a full list can be found at this link (registration required).

3 Steps to the Modern Marketing Stack

#1 Align Sales and Marketing data, digital roadmap® and strategic priorities

What type of data enrichment will enhance your decision making and sales objectives ? Over 70% of marketers see their top business goal as providing more leads/sales and increasing customer acquisition/retention, but only 12% say the technologies they use help them with their goals. Most companies report sales and marketing are misaligned. Resolve this issue by defining mutual objectives for sales and marketing and by defining the mutual data needed to measure and meet these objectives.

#2 Buy Technology Strategically

Ensure your marketing tech (such as marketing automation and CRM) meets your aligned needs before you buy. Establish a formalized process of identifying where and when a new technology is required; whether it is possible to integrate, the top vendors , and how best to do so.

#3 Start by Improving Productivity

Make martech acquisitions that automate or speed up the repetitive, tedious elements of your work a first priority, so you can focus more on doing things technology can't do—such as building and executing creative campaigns, content marketing and big data analysis. Ultimately technology should improve our business lives and allow marketers to carry out tasks more quickly and effectively.

Bottom Line : Review your marketing automation plans. Help your creatives and marketers:, adopt and manage new technologies. Implement the best martech to achieve your Marketing Stack Strategy .

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joe's author site of joewozny.com

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PPC Advertising - 7 Trend to Know About

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Fri, 26 Jan 2018 23:24:52 GMT

7 Trends to Know About

Every year trends help define the marketplace in digital advertising. With the need to become more visible and reach more customers, digital advertising continues to advance technologically to support consumer demand for a more integrated experience. We suggest advertisers should currently be aware of the following trends in regards to this demand.

#1 Audience Targeting - Google spent much of 2017 rolling out new audience targeting features. It’s believed the primary reason for this is to offer robust automation beginning in 2018.

#2 More Targeted Ads With Specific Purpose - Advertisers are learning that single purpose ads cut through minimal attention spans. Ads will become more singularly purposed in nature, with a very specific goal and goal conversion place in mind.

#3 Artificial Intelligence - The most interesting use of AI, is in creative. All major platforms benefit if CTR increases, yet many advertisers do not have a structured process for ad creation and testing. Things like Dynamic Search Ads from Google and Dynamic Creative from Facebook are examples of new applications of AI for creative in 2018.

#4 Voice - Amazon is working on making big strides to monetize voice search with Alexa ads . This advertising is focused on big brand advertisers, like Clorox and P&G. For now, keyword additions will allow most advertisers to target voice queries and thus capitalizing on the increase in volume. See our Voice Search article on page 5.

#5 Contextual Targeting It will be more complicated for ad tech vendors to track user behaviors with cookies. Audience targeting strategies will be replaced by contextual targeting strategies. Advertisers will need to understand the context of each web page for targeting and brand safety purposes.

# 6 eCommerce - For advertisers, it's advantageous to decide where Amazon fits. Do you join them potentially creating competition for yourself or do you ignore them; choosing to fight the largest eCommerce platform? We’ve seen evidence that advertising through Amazon is the right path for many businesses.

#7 Chrome - The launch of the built-in ad blocker is slated for mid-February. The impact for most is expected to be low.

Bottom Line: The main trend drivers are the big players desire to capture more demand and increase CPC rates. Trends that meet these criteria will most likely become “permanent” features on major advertising platforms.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this author site at joewozny.com

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Long-From Content Drives Results

alex@concentricis.com (Alex Wozny) — Fri, 26 Jan 2018 23:24:50 GMT

6 Steps on How to Create

Content that consists of more than 2000 words has been proven to perform better in terms of Online Visibility, Social Shares, Links, Website Authority and search ranking.

L ong form content also drives social results. Research shows that social posts and social interactions are improved, in terms of getting more attention when delivered with long form content.

We share this Infograph with you to assist with your Content Plans and organic search activities.

Thank you very much to SERPLogic and all sources including KISS Metrics, Buzzsumo, Search Engine Watch, Search Engine Land and CrazyEgg.

Alex Wozny is a digital analyst and designer with Concentric. Find out more about Alex here.

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Rocket Launcher Content Strategy

cheryl@concentricis.com (Cheryl Kenny) — Fri, 26 Jan 2018 23:24:48 GMT

Content Marketing

The combination of well defined buyer personas and adopting current web trends can boost your content strategy “to the moon”! We share the following tools to assist with Buyer Persona creation. Watch for these web trends to facilitate how to best communicate your content to your target audience.

Five Tools to Map Your Buyer Journey

Our favourite tools offer different views of data. Combine this data to assist you to create detailed profiles for your buyer personas.

#1 Google Analytics - View Traffic from networks, social and sites. See what pages perform best. Measure conversions.

#2 SEMRush - See competitors ads and find keywords your personas use the most. Optimize SEO.

# 3 Fanpage Karma - Compare engagement across social networks. Discover which pages your audience views and shares.

#4 Buzzsumo - Find the most common questions on topics & See shared content.

#5 Hotjar - Visually view clicks, moves & scrolls on your webpages. Survey the audience.

Web Trends for Your Content Strategy

1.0 Bright and Bold Minimalism for messages

2.0 CSS Grid for customized creative layouts

3.0 Brutalism for specific target audiences

Cheryl Kenny is the Chief Marketing Officer with Concentric. Find out more about Cheryl here.

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Optimizing for Voice Search

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Fri, 26 Jan 2018 23:24:40 GMT

... and Voice Assistants

As noted here in the Advertising section on page 4, the need for a “voice specific strategy” is not yet upon us. Optimizing for voice search currently is all about data structuring, website additions and keyword optimization. Paying attention to these three items will allow you to capitalize on the increase in volume that is is being introduced by voice search.

Some 40% of adults use voice search once per day, and Google voice search queries were up 35 fold in 2017 from 2008 levels

Source:comScore

Questions Over Keywords

Voice searches are largely about answering questions. Ensure that your Search Terms include phrase targeting for voice queries. Ensure that your FAQ page contains commonly asked questions related to your business. Review and expand these as a team. Review Search Console and Analytics tools to capture data on what is driving visits.

Mobile Responsiveness

Most voice searches are performed on some sort of mobile device. So ensure that your site is good to go on mobile.

Be aware that search engines are using mobile-first indexing, which means that it doesn't really matter how responsive your desktop site is; if your mobile site is a dud, your search ranking will be a dud, period. Creating a positive mobile experience means your content must be digestible to the user. Long paragraphs should be reconsidered in favor of short, 2-3 sentence tidbits.

Data Structuring

One thing you can do is make sure you’re structuring data on your site according to Schema Markup. Voice will rely heavily on this markup vocabulary. Ad extensions for voice will also most likely be based on the use of structured markup.

Local Search Optimization

This is one of the biggest uses of voice search today. A large driver is Google My Business, so ensure that your My Business listing is accurate and that you are responding to all reviews. Consumers do use positive reviews to inform their purchase decisions.

Video Content

It turns out that YouTube videos do show up in voice searches. This could be an entry path for some businesses into voice search rankings. Ensure you use proper titles and descriptions to capture question related queries such as “how to ….”

Bottom Line

Try to put your voice strategy into the parameters of answering questions. Spend time with schema markup or ensure your content management system does. Include phrase targeted keyword searches within your PPC programs.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and on Joe's author website of joewozny.com

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Digital Transformation - Successful Digital Marketing Models

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Wed, 11 Oct 2017 23:04:11 GMT

Successful Digital Marketing Models

We bring to you our updated research on successful Digital Marketing Models.

As you know, changes in digital technology are fundamentally altering the way that consumers and business engage with brands before, during, and after a purchase. Your target audience expects to browse, research, solicit feedback, evaluate, push the “buy” button at their own pace, ... and at the time and place - and via the platform of their choosing! They also continue to engage with your brand online after a purchase, and to share experiences with one another. Business is transforming to catch up.

A great deal of “big data” has been collected over the last 20+ years on the topics of Digital/Social Marketing and Digital Transformation. Analysis of this data indicates that there are a number of Digital Marketing Models that are proving successful for organizations as they plan and execute their digital roadmap®.

As noted by Laura McLellan, former research V.P. at Gartner, “For marketers..., it's less about digital marketing than marketing in a digital world.” And the CEO of M&C Saatchi Group notes that “Business needs to ‘stop thinking of digital as separate to marketing’ and start using it with an imagination and scale that we haven’t seen before.”

Types of Digital Marketing Models

Digital Branders - Focus is on building and renewing brand equity. They reimagine how to engage their target market with digital experiences that connect in new ways.
Experience Designers - The marketing model for experience designers is built around customer service. They love wowing customers at multiple touch points to build a loyal customer base.
Demand Generators # 1 goal is to drive traffic from digital to convert to as many sales as possible. All digital assets are tailored to boost sales and increase loyalty.
Innovators - Digital marketing is a tool that helps identify, develop, and roll out new digital products and services. This increases the value of the Innovator by nurturing new sources of revenue.

Bottom Line : Adopting a digital marketing model for your business is a good step forward and can have a direct impact on your business success.

Download the Full Report - FREE Get the full 8 page report here!

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and j oewozny.com

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Google Keyword Changes - 10 Things Advertisers Should Know

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Wed, 11 Oct 2017 22:33:39 GMT

10 Things Advertisers Should Know

This article by Joe Wozny was published in the PR News Guidebook 'Google for Communicators’ .

This Spring, Google announced changes to keyword Exact Match types. The feature is currently live for all English and Spanish language campaigns and is expected to be implemented for all other languages by the end of 2017.

Depending on your business, consider the pros and cons to the Google Exact Match change for more effective keyword targeting and management. This article describes how Exact Match changes can affect your advertising campaigns, and work for or against you.

What are the Exact Match Changes

The major changes relate to the definition of what an Exact Match is. Exact Match previously mean’t that ads were only served to an advertiser provided specific keyword phrase, for example: “Orca Whale Sightseeing in Vancouver”. Without an exact match, ads were not served.

Exact Match now means, that ads will be served for an Exact Match with keyword variants including:

different case types of the keyword
where words are not spelled correctly
where additional non-standard characters such as @, $, ? … are used
using singular/plural versions of the keyword
using a grammatical variant of the keyword such as (-ing, -ed)
where the words of the keyword are out of order
when function words, such as articles, prepositions, and conjunctions are included or not included For example: An Exact Match for “Orca Whale Sightseeing in Vancouver” where an ad would be served can now include: “Orca Whales Sightseeing in @Vancouver” or “SightseeOrca Whales in Vancouver” or “Orca Whales Sightseing in Van” …plus any number of other permutations.

Why Are They Important and Who Do They Impact

Preliminary research indicates there’s a possible cost impact to advertising budgets. Although Google says this is a fairly unnoticeable, change industry measurements during the first 3 weeks of this change, indicate an increase of approximately 8% in ad impressions, a 10% increase in clicks and an 11% increase in costs (WordStream, 2017).

One of the big pluses for small and medium businesses who create a large number of exact match phrases, is the time you’re saving! You no longer have to manually discover and enter every permutation for the exact match you are targeting to complete a transaction with a click from either ad page

10 Considerations For Your Campaigns

This is a short list of items to consider if you’re concerned about how this change will impact your advertising activities. Use this list as a framework when deciding if you need to update your advertising programs impacted by these Exact Match changes.

1. Review Intent. This change is an opportunity to review and and confirm, that the intent of your campaigns, keywords and landing pages are all aligned to your goals. The big question to ask is if the order of Exact Match keywords could change the meaning of a search and if this change then impacts the visitor intent you are targeting. The benefits from this alignment include efficient spending, better conversion rates and happy visitors.

2. Broad Match Keywords. Broad Match campaigns, by their nature, are a “catch all” that allow you to show ads to a wider audience including searches that have misspellings, synonyms, related searches, and other relevant variations. The Exact Match change has little impact on this advertising approach.

3. Broad Match Modified Keywords (+). Ads that may show on searches that contain your modified term, (or close variations, but not synonyms) are not expected to be impacted.

4. Phrase Match Keywords. Phrase Match keywords may make a resurgence for some advertisers who retired them in leu of other match options. If search term word order is important to you, consider using phrase matching. (to help negate the change to Exact Match keywords) Keep in mind that your ads may be served with additional words entered at the beginning and end of your phrases

5. Negative Keywords. Ensure that you give your negative keywords the diligence required to offset the Exact Match changes. The largest impact will be reviewing the need to expand your keywords in order to maintain the specificity benefits Negative Keywords provide to your campaigns.

6. Duplicate Keywords. We all try to avoid an overlap of keywords as part of delivering the right advertising message, reducing the risk of having campaigns compete against each other, and as part of cost management. Consider taking a “deep dive” into the keywords in your campaigns to ensure that Exact Match changes do not introduce duplication.

7. No Worries on Numbers. This change does not impact the order of any numbers, hyphenation in numbers and bar codes.

8. Abbreviation Relief. Abbreviations such as LA for Los Angeles or NY for New York should not be affected with Exact Match Changes. This includes abbreviations that are subsets of broader abbreviations such as NYC for New York City.

9. Every Language. At the time of publishing this article, Exact Match changes are currently implemented for English and Spanish speaking accounts. This change is expected to be live for all languages by end of the calendar 2017 year.

10. Only Google? We know most keyword based advertising services are fast followers to Google and will now include features in their advertising services such as grammatical variants and misspellings. So it’s possible we’ll see these type of Exact Match changes introduced in other networks. Ask your advertising network .

Bottom Line: I’ve spoken to many advertisers about these changes and the “happiness factor” based on the Exact Match changes is mixed and really depends on individual strategy behind Search Advertising. Everyone agrees that they must pay attention in order to avoid increased costs or a decline in the visitor intent because of keyword mismatches.

Small and Medium Businesses (in Tourism and eCommerce in particular) who use few automated tools for campaign management are happy for the reduced workload. They expect to require less Exact Match phrase variants in their accounts, in order to have their ads included in all semantic keywords. They have confidence in Google to ensure they are efficiently covering their local market.

Niche advertisers know they have homework to do to ensure they revise their keywords to target the correct search intent and managing their advertising budget correctly.

Joe Wozny is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and j oewozny.com

Bloggers are Part of Influencer Marketing Too!

cheryl@concentricis.com (Cheryl Kenny) — Tue, 10 Oct 2017 22:50:23 GMT

Social media influencers are the latest advertising craze for brands and of course the use of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat as their platforms is what often comes to mind. Social media platforms can’t be ignored because of the sheer amount of time consumers spend on them - the average person spends 15 minutes per day on Instagram alone …but the influencer content from social networks does have shortfalls.

For one, social influencers rely on the algorithms behind each platform's feeds to reach their followers, so having more followers doesn’t necessarily mean they’re reaching more people. According to our internal influencer data, most social media posts have a fleeting life span, with 85% of views occurring within 24 hours, effective for driving impulse purchases

Bloggers as influencers, on the other hand, provide one of the oldest and most robust influencer platforms on the web. A blogger’s audience is comprised of two types of people: searchers and followers. Searchers are intent-driven, and they land on an article after searching a topic, while followers follow the blog because they want to read the blogger’s posts again and again

Collaborating with Bloggers

The goal of any influencer collaboration is to deliver top-of-funnel awareness - and ultimately drive sales - so it’s important to choose the right blogger who has the potential to get you in front of your best audience, and to get their attention focused on your product.

Blogger Assessment

Google can provide you with a quick assessment of the bloggers reach. Use Google Analytics to see how deep the organic reach is of a blogger. The key is to ensure blogger activity is regularly read and shared by returning visitors and to avoid bloggers whose posts have no regular visits or interactions.

The blogger’s email list is also very important. Email marketing is still alive and well, so find out how many people are subscribed to the Blog’s email list. A large email list means your article will be in the inboxes of all those readers.

You also need to read your influencer’s Blog. Seek out bloggers whose styles and identities most closely match your brand’s, and visualize your brand as part of their story.

Helpful Resources

Paid Influencer List More
How Marketers Find Influencers More
Social Media Influencer Mistakes to Avoid More

Cheryl Kenny is the Chief Marketing Officer at Concentric. Read more from Cheryl on this site in the Blog section.

Building Long Term Organic Visits

alex@concentricis.com (Alex Wozny) — Tue, 10 Oct 2017 22:50:21 GMT

Takes Hard Work and Creativity

This article provide a number takeaways to consider for your SEO strategy. The goal is to build a solid baseline of authority and trust with your website, providing definitive content/answers for the questions your intended audience is asking, beginning with targeting low value content and then competing for higher-value terms once your content authority is established. This requires an investment in building quality content and matching link acquisition strategies to the stages of your growth. Keep in mind that as website traffic grows, expectations and goals will also grow.

The Right Opportunities

On your website, review locations where you can build a better landing page - something that searchers would prefer. Use search engine results that have poor/bad exact-match domains, a lack of big name brands, low quality or outdated content, pages with low links, and/or content without latent semantic keywords. Once you find these opportunities, build fantastic content that targets the pages SERPs. Fantastic content includes: custom build graphics, compelling copy, original photography, optimal formatting.

Securing Links to Converting Pages

Search engines have become more sophisticated in how they evaluate links, placing more emphasis on quality and less on numbers. securing links to bottom-of-the-funnel pages is extremely difficult because these pages exist to drive conversions, and that doesn’t usually compel other sites to link to them. A short term strategy to deliver links includes using hyper focused link pages, influencer bait, local vendor and review page that are relevant to your content

Passive Link Acquisition Channels

One method of establishing Search Visibility is to create high-quality original photography and share this under a Creative Commons license, that allows others to use the photos as long as they link back to your site. You can do the same with video, quotes or other compelling data. The key is to create something original, and then make it easy for others to cite (link to) you as the original source.

Strategic Content Creation

This strategy usually focuses on the middle and top of the funnel. It involves creating a body of content, rather than just a page of content, on a topic that your audience is interested in and that relates to your business - content themes. The themes become the baseline from which all content (video, social, text, informational, images, etc) derives it’s strategy. One key for success with this strategy is to find keywords and keyword themes that are less competitive and again usually have bad landing page matches which your content can better serve.

Bottom Line: Establishing a solid baseline of authority and trust provides the ability to compete for higher-value terms. Seeing returns, will allow you to undertake even bigger bets on the content you need to create to sustain organic positioning.

A Guide to Ad Retargeting

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Tue, 10 Oct 2017 22:50:20 GMT

Retargeting = Remarketing

Welcome to the world of retargeting, aka remarketing. This feature has grown in popularity and acceptance over the last few years. This article looks at how retargeting works, and which platforms offer retargeting options through their audience settings. Our goal is to provide insights about retargeting so you can decide when/if it can be effective to use in your advertising efforts.

What is Retargeting/Remarketing?

Retargeting, in a digital marketing context, is the process of targeting your online advertising to reach people who've already visited your website or are already in your database as a lead or customer, based on their previous internet actions. You can retarget people based on a range of criteria and activity, dependent on each platform and the back-end data collection methods you've set up.

How Does Retargeting Work?

You can retarget based on a Pixel or you can retarget based on a List .

Pixel-based retargeting places an unobtrusive piece of JavaScript (also referred to as a cookie) into a visitors’s web browser to track the pages and products viewed on your webpages. The cookie then notifies the ad networks chosen by the advertiser to serve specific ads to that visitor, for a predefined period of time, based on what they browsed.

List-based retargeting uses your email list to create a target audience. The audience includes people from your list and people who have a similar “profile” to those on your email list.

Platforms Offering Retargeting

Facebook a nd Instagram offer retargeting with many options. You can choose from features such using a Contact List, Matching/Customer Audiences who have interacted with your ad, App users and Dynamic Ads which are used to promote products to people who've already expressed interest in your website or app. In some cases you have to upload your product catalog to Facebook or Instagram to help them find the right people for each product.

Twitter offers 'Tailored Audiences' that lets you target relevant influencers based on emails of current customers or Twitter names, Web targeting to previous visitors of your site and of course App targeting to people who are using your App.

Google including YouTube offers both pixel and customer match based retargeting. Customer match requires you to share your email list to assist Google with building your audience. Pixel targeting is based on matching ads to webpages that use Google’s Remarketing pixel.

LinkedIn now offers website retargeting, which enables advertisers to segment website visitors based on pages they've visited on your site.

Pinterest’s r etargeting aims to reach pinners who've interacted with your Pinterest campaigns in the past with personalized content to create your audience. You can also target Events and URLs.

Continued from Digital Dollars and Sense Fall 2017 Edition

Insights for Your ReMarketing Campaigns

Frequency cap your ads to limit the number of times a targeted user sees your ad. Avoid ad burnout
Understand what your customers have done on your site and create your ads accordingly
Use a burn code (burn pixel) to untag users who actually followed through in making a purchase, ensuring you aren't serving ads that can annoy people.
Include as much data as possible to segment your marketing to reach the right people (Facebook).
Add correct product IDs to Facebook pixel and App events.
Use the "expand reach by targeting similar users" option when you have a small audience or to drive higher campaign volume. (Twitter)
Choose a URL rule that aligns with your retargeting campaign goals and check the "Verified" tag status of your designated audience segments after 24 hours.
Include lookalike audiences to expand your reach to chatters similar to your target audience (Snapchat).
Refine your targeting with specific categories such as topics, interests, keywords, demographics, etc. and combine your remarketing lists to customize your targeting (YouTube).
Use keywords to define your target audience to reach them while they browse and search on Pinterest and ensure your tag is verified in the tag dashboard (Pinterest).

Bottom Line: There’s a plethora of supplier options for you to consider with Retargeting and it all depends on which network matches your audience.

Joe is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and j oewozny.com

7 Current SEO Trends to Watch

alex@concentricis.com (Alex Wozny) — Wed, 17 May 2017 16:48:15 GMT

From Google’s reliance on artificial intelligence to the much-awaited Google Penguin, the SEO landscape has seen a lot of developments. Our perspective of the top trends and shifts include:

1. Schema Markup that allows search engines to understand the website, is more important than ever. See more on Schema here .

2. Google has been experimenting with making the snippet width longer. This would allow for longer site descriptions for search users.

3. Sites adopting Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) to improve performance of the mobile web will be favoured in a carousel of local results and identified with a small “lightening bolt” icon.

4. Content Density, as a measurement of the actual value of content on a page in terms of “per word value” will gain more traction. This favours less dense sites which do not force people to read the entire page(s) to understand a topic.

5. Personal branding will gain more traction, as social media sites continue to refine their algorithm to favour personal posts and brand authority over posts created by business pages.

6. User experience (dwell time) optimization could become critical to rank.

7. Voice search is on the rise. These queries will drive more Rich Answer results. Consider how your pages can be formatted to include rich answers in your content.

Chatbots Helping Business

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Tue, 16 May 2017 20:24:17 GMT

An Inventive Part of the Digital Horizon

Chatbots. We’ve all heard of them. But if you are like most busy people, we’ve given little thought to them. According to Microsoft’s CEO Satya Nadella “Bots are the new Apps”. And cases for where bots are starting to be used “effectively” to make online interactions easier for customers, are appearing.

For example, Uber uses chatbots on Facebook Messenger that let you request a cab and to provide cab status updates. Pizza Hut uses bots to help you order, connect to your account so you can review your order history and to make pizza suggestions. Bank of America uses chatbots for real time alerts, plus suggestions on savings and payment habits.

Building Your Own Chatbot

Chatbots could provide the opportunity to make your business “better”. And just like any other digital development project you should state what you wish to achieve together with the business reasoning before you begin.

Often a narrow focus of what you want your chatbot to do well, will assist with success. Since it is a different form of Conversational User Interface you need to ensure that you bot is deployed in the right context and for the right situations/opportunities.

Developing a scope document and specification will help you assess the best resources to select for building your chatbot (there are plenty of resources available and you could waste time without a plan).

A good place to start defining how your chatbot should work is to use other chatbots to see what features you like and dislike. Apps such as Botframe , Chatfuel , Botsify , and OnSequel can assist you with creating live and screenshot editions of a prototype to test if your bot idea is sound.

Insights Tips and Advice

Chatbots can be a great way to answer common questions and free up customer service agent time. Chatbots can’t replicate the spontaneity and ingenuity of human interaction, but they can be fun for your customers.

The sophistication of a chatbot depends on the quality of the scope of pre-determined answers and keywords that are compiled. Chatbots can use machine learning to get smarter with more intereactions. You can integrate your chatbot with your brand’s app or eCommerce platform

Even though chatbots create human-like responses, always build in ways to get in touch with a human

Bottom Line: Chatbots are set to become an inventive part of the digital horizon. Six ways chatbots succeeding for brands. Read the Article

Joe is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and joewozny.com

Instagram Stories Ads

cheryl@concentricis.com (Cheryl Kenny) — Tue, 16 May 2017 19:01:53 GMT

Now Available to All Advertisers

Instagram Stories ads are now available to all businesses looking to reach the 150 million people who use Stories daily.

Stories ads are a mixture of video, text and images. They can be up to 15 seconds in length and are currently only available on a CPM basis. Ad views are counted as soon as the ads appear – there’s no three second view threshold like there is with other video advertising formats from competitors.

How effective Stories are is not totally clear yet – a recent report suggested that 69% of Snapchat users (a similar service) skip ads on the platform “always” or “often”, a figure that increases to 80% percent among 18 to 24-year-old users. We’d recommend considering Story Ads when they have a cost per click model.

More details available here.

Engaged Customers in Digital

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Tue, 02 May 2017 16:10:44 GMT

Customers are in the Digital Drivers Seat Like Never Before

User Experience, Dwell Time, Long Clicks, Time on Site, Bounce Rate, Conversion Rate, Digital Transformation, RankBrain …

You may notice renewed emphasis on these terms in 2017. The terms are a supporting “cast of characters” used in the digital industry to explain and measure how your current and potential customers interact with your digital channels. The terms and their metrics are important because they let you understand how you well your channels are performing including how your channels rank against your competitors.

At the heart of what’s driving this focus is an engaged (or not engaged) visitor, their interest in your content, if they find it “easy to digest”, if it matches their search intent and what they do during their visit.

In this ebook edition of Digital Dollars and Sense the focus is on the “Engaged Customer” and your digital success! You can read the edition for free here . You can also read articles from the edition in the Blog section of this site.

Engagement Drives SEO Page Rank

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Thu, 27 Apr 2017 22:52:07 GMT

Over the past year the SEO industry is observing a change in how pages are ranked by Google’s core algorithm (including Google’s RankBrain machine learning elements). It appears that pages which have high visitor engagement are rewarded with higher search rankings.

Higher visitor engagement is often referred to as a long click where a visitor performs a search, clicks through on a result and remains on that site for a long time. In general, long clicks are a proxy for satisfaction and success.

Higher visitor engagement measurements can include organic click through rate (CTR), dwell time, bounce rate and conversion rate. These measurements align with having a visitor experience that meets the intent of their search.

Knowing about these types of measurement can assist with prioritizing your SEO activities and knowing what’s important to measure and monitor.

Bottom Line: Pages that currently rank high in SEO but have below or near average “time on page” could be at risk to loose ground in terms of where they appear in Google Search Engine Return Pages (SERPs). Put these pages at the top of your list for rewriting or adjustment so they better align with visitor intent.

Joe is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and at joewozny.com

Get the Most from LinkedIn

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Thu, 27 Apr 2017 22:52:05 GMT

The New Linked In at a Glance

For business people, it’s important to keep up with the latest news and changes on LinkedIn. It’s one of the premier business social networks to share knowledge, connect with business colleagues and clients, develop new business opportunities and more. LinkedIn updated their desktop layout in January 2017 … and now after a few months of member input, the feature changes appear to be permanent and will soon apply to all accounts.

LinkedIn says the intent of the new feature changes are to put “content and conversations at the centre” and hence the reason they have changed to support “Facebook” type features. Specific changes from LinkedIn include:

The main news feed has more visibility and shows posts from connections with the ability to comment, like, share
The new universal search box is inclusive of all content on LinkedIn and LinkedIn says it will deliver more relevant results
You can now exchange messages in real time with connections
Recommendations will provide more relevant suggestions for jobs, connections, ads, your profile
Free members can now check out who is viewing their content
Navigation is now consolidated into 7 main areas: Home (Your Feed), Search, Jobs, Messaging, Notifications, My Network, and Me

Take Advantage of LinkedIn Changes

Engage more with your connections - Now it’s easy to like, comment on and share posts. Take advantage of this to reach more people and be more actively in touch.
Add more posts and articles - It’s easier for others to see your content, so posting regularly on LinkedIn is more beneficial than ever before. In addition to posting to your timeline, post longer articles for greater exposure- simply click on the 'Write an Article’ tab.
Update your profile - Stronger profiles get more views. LinkedIn’s recommendations are based on the new layout and optimizing your profile for this new layout. Adding skills is always important for attracting potential employers or clients.

Authors Note:
One of the most thorough articles/posts I've come across on this topic and profiles for LinkedIn in general is from Top Dog Social Media as written by Melonie Dodaro. Click here to view.

Joe is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and joewozny.com

Conversion Rates & Your Landing Pages

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Thu, 27 Apr 2017 22:51:38 GMT

Industry Measurements & Key Findings

Imagine having access to a large plethora of actual data on how visitors react to landing pages? This information could save you time and contribute value for your digital marketing conversion activities.

Unbounce Media generated a fantastic study on successful landing pages and analyzed over 74.5 million visits that 64 thousand landing pages received in the travel, real estate, business consulting, business services, credit/lending, health, higher education, home improvement, legal, and vocational studies/job training industries. Findings include:

Pages measured at a sixth grade level convert nearly twice as much as pages written at a university level
Landing pages containing 800 words or more have a lower median conversion rate (CR) that pages with shorter word counts of less than 200 words
Every industry has it’s own unique CRs. For example, a median landing page CR for business consulting firms is 5% and for Real Estate firms it is 2.8%
Conversion rates are a function of a ton of variables…and a good data scientist!

The Unbounce Conversion Benchmark Report allows you to compare your conversion rates to see how your pages stack up against the competition. Download the report (sign up required) here .

Joe is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and joewozny.com

Digital Value Marketing Loop

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Thu, 27 Apr 2017 22:51:36 GMT

Digital Transformation for Your Company

Digital transformation and it’s impact on marketing and sales in your business is important. This article, (and these practical 3 Steps) share practical methods of supporting digital transformation by creating a “marketing value loop” for your company.

So, what is a marketing value loop? Simply put, it’s integrating customer insights, comments and criticisms into your products and services, so they better serve your customers. Put another way, you currently have unprecedented access to customers’ preferences and behaviours from their digital activity … so why not use it to shape your business, generate more or new revenue, create referral business from happy customers, and ensure existing developments are on target.

Two Challenges

There are two challenges to be aware of when implementing a value loop:

Challenge #1 is determining the frequency and amount of “feedback” data needed to make informed decisions.

Challenge #2 is deciding how to manage decision making within your organizational structure. Incorporating regular feedback often results in the need to break down traditional organizational silos (marketing, strategy, sales, finance, HR, etc.) while still involving every group in integrating digital insights and transformation. It’s important to get this right since “culture is known to eat strategy for breakfast”.

3 Steps to Success

There's 3 steps to a successful implementation:

Step 1 - Social Listening and Observation - "Tune In” to your social media environments, web platforms, client posts/likes/emails/dislikes/suggestions and email communications. Use simple analytics tools to access online conversations and customer experiences about brands and topics. This can reveal opportunities to increase brand awareness or reputation.

Step 2 - Digital Insights - Link the digital data from social media, Web data and research, to paint a picture of the current situation. Identify trends, “good news” and “bad news”. Closely monitor trends. Integrate the insights you gain with branding, positioning and product development.

Step 3 - Digital Foresight - Review consumer trends, your competitors and media reporting. Visit your top 3 competitors digital product and read what people say. Use SEO and AdWords tools that monitor to see how you compare to your competition. Incorporate this information as insights that provide a sense of competitive overlap and to integrate into you business/product plans and decision making.

Bottom Line: Harvest value from your digital assets and insights from others. Maximize the information being gathered using the 3 steps to success.

Suggested Additional Reading

PwC, Digital IQ report
Using Digital to Enhance Customer Experience

Joe is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Read more about Joe on this site and/or joewozny.com

High ROIs for Digital Marketing Efforts

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Fri, 03 Mar 2017 23:52:48 GMT

From 5 Different Industries

Are you getting a measurable ROI for from your dollars spent on digital marketing? Well, as reported on Entrepreneur, there's companies in 5 industries are reporting returns of at least $5 in revenue for every $1 spent on digital marketing (March 2017). Incredible and fantastic!

The five industries are Law, Auto, Food, Entertainment and Health Care. .... And the activities they are undertaking to produce 5 to 1 ROI "numbers" appear to be natural extensions of activities traditionally conducted offline, for some time. Here's a quick summary:

Law firms are standing out in blogging and in providing explanatory content. There's plenty of people researching legal information, and law firms who share some of their knowledge, are driving leads to their door.

The Auto industry is finding success in digital advertising. Through digital advertising they are able to segment their advertising and/or communications to different target audiences and deliver the appropriate content at the right time along the consideration and purchase cycle .

The Food industry from Cooking Shows to Food Manufacturers social networks and advertising on services like Instagram are driving food interest. These campaigns have created a high degree of direct customer engagement, a large volume of content is relatively easy to create and this content ties directly to their target market's emotional connection to food.

In Health Care informational content is "king" ... or "queen" ... depending on your perspective. Standing out by providing websites with great informational content and reference links helps patients become more knowledgable and creates loyalty and trust .

The Entertainment industry has a large consumer following (we love movies), plus a strong tie to entertainment (movies, tv, gaming ...) as a social activity. A large number of consumers love social media and social media sharing. It's natural for the entertainment industry to share information too - from photos, trailers, behind the scenes looks, even live videos ... and it's a great place to encourage target viewership to “watch this movie, find out about programming, understand how it works, etc.".

Bottom Line: What's a natural extension for your brand? Can digital support this extension to help you with your marketing goals. If you can, try and quantify the ROI of digital marketing programs. If you can't check your digital marketing strategy to see how you have defined and planned to do this. No strategy ... plan for one immediately in 2017. This blog may be helpful with your planning.

Read supporting materials here:

Smart Insights Study on the number of businesses that have a defined strategy for digital marketing

What is a Good Marketing ROI

5 Industries Getting the Most ROI. Thanks for Lanre for catching our attention with his article.

Marketo blog on digital advertising ROI

Joe is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Visit joewozny.com and/or concentricis.com for more.

Retail Wins Offline!

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 22:30:59 GMT

The Internet has forever changed how retail businesses operate and how consumers shop. I enjoyed this infograph and wanted to share it with you since the stats are well researched and the impact offline to retail is quite astounding. Looking forward to new advertising tools that will allow retailers to track instore visits from an ad click as discussed in the Spring edition of Digital Dollars and Sense . Full credits to the infograph’s publisher and creators are provided below.

What I found very interesting is that a number of retailers have still not adopted use of the "Internet", whether it be social media, mobile or a web presence. Those that have appear to be better prepared to service customer inquiries (example from smart phone searches), provide shoppers with a sense of how happy customers are (online reviews) and entice shoppers to come in for a visit or make a inquiry (online assets such as a web page).

Keywords - The Extra 50%

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 22:22:57 GMT

In many SEO activities there’s a tendency to pick popular industry keywords that describe your products and services - implement these keywords, and voila the work is complete! However, using only popular keywords in your program leaves you with half of the work completed, and the easy half at that.

The problem with stopping after basic keyword selection is that all of your competitors are doing the same thing, which means the keywords you select may be the same ones your competitors are using. The result? Your content gets thrown into Paid and Organic indexing algorithms with nothing to make it stand out. And depending on your industry and location, the results may be mixed.

To avoid this result and make your programs truly effective it’s important to understand three concepts: a) Monthly searches b) Difficulty/Competition c) Rank. Visit the Digital Dictionary page for definitions.

With these concepts in hand:

1. Expand your basic keyword activity by looking for the starting keywords from your personal demographics.

2. Select good long tail keywords that describe your topic in detail.

3. Add your keywords in the “right” way in your title, url, alt text, meta description.

Keep in mind that a single piece of content can impact your ranking, but improving your ranking takes consistency and dedication. Also, do not overuse keywords (between 1 and 4 times per piece of content) Read a good supporting article here

Three Predictions for Content Marketing in the Coming Year

cheryl@concentricis.com (Cheryl Kenny) — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 22:21:24 GMT

After review of much research, we feel safe in the following predictions for Content Marketing:

#1 Video will dominate all Consumer platforms putting pressure on B2C companies to make it part of a content mix. B2B will experiment with video but are not being pushed as hard as B2C companies to adopt video.

#2 Interactive content (example - build & price) drives engagement. More companies will find opportunities to make their brand stand out by turning customers into active participants.

#3 Influencer marketing results will be directly correlated with budgets. Content marketers will reach a larger audience with an influencer marketing program provided they can afford the commercial rates that influencer(s) are going to charge to leverage their audiences.

Ads That Get Your Attention

alex@concentricis.com (Alex Wozny) — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 22:17:39 GMT

Which online ad creative elements capture consumers attention and are most likely to be seen the most?

Researchers from Fairfax Media presented a range of different ads and tracked eye movement/gaze in their study. Participants also engaged in an ad-recall exercise and experience discussions.

Top elements included:

1. Contrasting colors/brand colors

2. Simple, concise messaging

3. Clear, uncluttered design

4. Prominent brand logos/symbols

Ads that matched brands' other online/offline campaign elements also had higher engagement/recall. Read the Study (It’s free on sign up!)

Feed the Need - Deliver Content Marketing ROI

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 21:19:00 GMT

Believe it or not, any reason we engage with content boils down to one simple motivation: filling a need.

Being aware of the needs of your audience, and how your content is meeting those needs is critical.

Developing or adopting a framework for needs assessment is important and part of ensuring you get a ROI for your Content Marketing efforts.

A good needs assessment framework has three components, in our opinion. First define the “buyer personas” of your target audience. Second, match your company, product or service value statements to the buyer personas. Third, prioritize the attributes of each value statement against a needs hierarchy (for example Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs).

With this “functional information in hand” create your content in the form you believe it will best be consumed, shared and published on multiple platforms. Read a good supporting article here.

Measuring Ad Conversions From Mobile Phones

alex@concentricis.com (Alex Wozny) — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 20:57:08 GMT

As spending on digital channels increases, so does pressure on marketing teams to prove and improve ROI; and that can be a challenge. Benchmark data such as CPL (cost per lead) and CPA (cost per acquisition) help take the guesswork out of decision-making by enabling teams to optimize for what’s really driving leads, customers and revenue.

Call conversion measurements are very important as more people respond to ads through their Smart Phones. Meaningful measurements for Call Conversion include a) the marketing source b) the caller’s path through your website c) who the caller is (phone number) d) time of day - Using different telephone numbers assists with granular tracking of responses for companies with a diverse product mix.

Tracking the result from the call (did it produce a sale, inquiry, visit, etc.) together with the callers telephone number is a must do activity for your business team. This information can be matched with analytics data to provide insights into the effectiveness of phone response to ads. Read a good supporting article here

4 Reasons to Invest Part of Your PPC Ad Budget on Vertical Site Searches

cheryl@concentricis.com (Cheryl Kenny) — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 20:53:35 GMT

PPC Vertical Search advertising can be a hidden gem for advertisers. And it’s growing in prominence and impact as the Internet moves to paid placement.

Vertical Search sites are singularly focused information portals such as Kayak, Yelp, MyInsurance, Amazon, etc. These sites are not new. However they are unlocking new value for advertisers through PPC offerings. Benefits include:

1. The customer base has high purchase consideration intent

2. The amount of data you can identify and engage with a very focused target audience

3. You can deliver messaging matching what the consumer is searching for at the moment

4. Ad pricing with some sites can be on a PPC basis, which is an alternative to impression pricing from sites such as those operated by media publishers.

Read a good supporting article here .

Be Smart With Your Marketing Efforts - Your Competition Is

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 20:41:36 GMT

All companies jump into the world of digital marketing with strong expectations to get the most out of their advertising and marketing activities. The “jumping” step is important as it signals intent. And supporting this intent through a digital strategy is the next necessary step in the process of maximizing the effectiveness for digital marketing programs and actions.

The reasoning for a digital strategy is simple. Like any successful business project, digital marketing demands a wholesome strategy and cohesive planning. In fact, that’s why you see business and government, on mass, adopting digitalroadmaps ® for any number of their activities.

There’s a number of ways to plan strategy and ways to be strategic with your digital marketing budget. Chapter 9 of The Digital Dollar book is good starting point. It provides a process to follow when creating your strategy and identifies outcomes that every strategy should include.

To help you with your strategy decisions, reference articles are included below. They speak to the broad topic of digital strategy and the many different dimensions of strategy to consider. Click on each “blue title” (below) to read the article.

Sustainable Competitive Advantages in Digital Marketing

This articles speaks to how a strategy can produce a huge advantage over your competition and build sustainable competitive advantages … which is something every business has an interest in.

Why Not Having A Digital Marketing Strategy Is A Waste Of Your Marketing Efforts?

This article speaks to why the direction a strategy provides is important, how you will connect better with your audience, how you can track progress and therefore ROI.

What to do About Lack of Strategy. Why Your Marketing Plan Isn’t a Strategy

Want to know what “strategy” is and why should you care, then read this. A favourite part of the article is what you can do about a lack of strategy and how deciding on what to measure is a key element in moving forward and being successful.

Do You Need an Online Marketing Agency? Take This 5 Minute Quiz

This Forbes article and survey makes you think about budgeting, what are your goals for digital marketing, how you want to grow your business and how any current products you may have deployed are performing.

Bottom Line: Think strategically on digital marketing investments. There’s a plethora of activities to select from. And focusing on two or three activities is guaranteed to produce a better outcome than “ready, fire, aim”.

Joe is a digital thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and CEO of Concentric. Visit joewozny.com and/or concentricis.com for more.

Fall 2016 New Digital Advertising Opportunities

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 20:33:12 GMT

Paid Search Ads Come to App Store

Apple has rolled out the ability to place Search ads in the Apple App Store. As an introduction, Apple is offering a $100 credit for a first time campaign.

Analysts argue that the main rationale for this new product appears to be app discovery and that Apple is simply mirroring what Google has had with search ads in the Play store for well over a year.

If you are considering this opportunity, keep in mind that roughly 50 percent of smartphone owners don’t download any new apps in a given month, while the other 50% download two apps/mo. on average.

Twitter Moments for Everyone

Twitter has made Moments available to everyone. This is a good free brand advertising opportunity for your company.

You can pull tweets from your favorites (“Tweets I’ve liked”), by account, via a Twitter search, or you can add them directly using the tweet’s link. When finished, a Moment can be shared via a tweet. Others can then flip through your Moment right on Twitter, or embed it elsewhere on the web.

Google Pop Up Penalty in 2017

Pop Ups - also known a interstitials – are forms of online advertising on the World Wide Web intended to attract web traffic or capture email addresses. Pop up messages are often frowned upon by visitors, as they create a barrier to content when you enter a website.

Google has announced that beginning in 2017, they'll be penalizing sites that use an interruptive pop up, especially pop ups that “coverup” a significant amount of content.

If this changes your advertising mix, or makes you need to consider adjusting your website, read this opinion article on ways to achieve the same, if not better, results with your pop up advertising.

New Features for Canvas Ads

Facebook Canvas ads are virtually mini-websites hosted on Facebook that are designed to load quickly on mobile devices. They have been found to be appealing for businesses struggling to improve their mobile responsiveness.

According to Facebook, people have spent over 150 years of viewing time watching Canvas ads since their commercial introduction in 2016. Facebook has not released analytics on interaction rates and engagement, and at this time, conversion data is also not available to understand the ROI metrics.

In order to simplify the creation of Canvas ads, Facebook is adding design templates. Facebook is also adding 360 video elements which will allow visitors to move through the content by tilting their phones. Facebook says these immersive features could make Canvas Ads a more accessible option for more businesses, and further enhance the use case for Canvas content.

Don’t Miss Out on Google My Business

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Thu, 06 Oct 2016 18:13:35 GMT

Google’s My Business listing, sometimes called the “Google Knowledge Panel” (see Figure 1) is an important digital business asset for your company. It appears on the right hand side of Google organic search return pages (SERPs) when someone searches for your company, or related keywords where your company is the authority brand. According to the Google My Business team (Sept 2016), a My Business listing also assists with your organic search ranking. Your My Business listing assists with professionally branding your company, on the web. Configuring your My Business listing correctly and in the right order, allows you to integrate other Google products (examples: Google+, YouTube, Search Console, AdWords Location Extensions,etc) within your marketing and advertising mix. … Integrating your Google products is a wise decision, given the wide use of Google as an information resource by both business and consumers.

Clarification - With My Business listings, a business address appears as a Google Knowledge Panel in SERPs. My Business listings without an address (Brand pages) do not appear as a Knowledge Panel and become a Google+ page. In the writers opinion, the Brand page option, does little to assist with the main objective of Google My Business - to be found professionally and loudly in organic search. Also a My Business listing is not the same as a Knowledge Graph, which can also appear in the right hand side of a SERP, at the sole determination of Google. (See the Fall 2015 Edition of Digital Dollars and Sense for information on configuring a Knowledge Graph.)

Choosing the Right Login Credentials is Important - We advise all businesses to plan on creating a My Business listing with a business address. The main item to be aware of is that Google My Business creates a Google+ page that is integrated with your My Business Listing. The Google+ page is also associated with services such as a YouTube channel. Video placed on this channel will appear on your Google+ page. Based on this, consider the following: if you have an established Google Account tied to a Google+ page for your business then create your MyBusiness listing through this Account. If you do not have an established Google+ Page then establish your MyBusiness listing with a Google Account that best suits your business.

Have Only One Google+ Page - Google notes that it’s important, from an organic search perspective, that you only have one active Google+ page related to your business. There is no way to port content or amalgamate pages. Consider these implications if you have an active Google+ page for your business now.

Reviews Are Important - Reviews and testimonials on your My Business page will assist with search rank. Harvest and reply to reviews from your customers. See Sensible Business (this edition) for more on establishing a Testimonial program.

Work it Hard - Having an active Google+ page contributes to your search ranking and where your sidebar will be shown on related search pages. Share all the content you publish on your website with your Google+ page.

Share the Work - You can share management of your Google MyBusiness and Google+ pages through the Google My Business main menu. Integrate these opportunities with programs such as Google AdWords.

Bottom Line: Your brand’s My Business Knowledge Panel is a great digital business card and creates the first impression of your brand, so be sure to tell Google what content needs to be there. It’s also “FREE” and a great opportunity you do not want to miss.

Creating Credibility Through Customer Testimonials

cheryl@concentricis.com (Cheryl Kenny) — Thu, 06 Oct 2016 18:13:19 GMT

The sharing of positive customer feedback shows potential customers that they can trust you, and that you have a history of providing what you promise in your marketing materials, sales copy, and conversations. Its been proven that customer testimonials are an effective and trusted form of information about your brand, product or service. And in today’s socially plugged-in business environment a little positive word-of-mouth can go a long way!

So, how do you ask your happy customers and clients for a testimonial? How do you provide that little nudge for their endorsement? Consider the following approach and list of questions to choose from when asking for a testimonial.

1. Decide What You Are Asking For

Prior to speaking to your clients decide what you’re asking for. Choose three options from the list below to assist your clients with providing their feedback.

Are you satisfied with the result of hiring our service?
How does our strategy and advice benefit your business?
How did you benefit from working with the COMPANY NAME team?
I really like COMPANY NAME because . . .”
What do you think of the work we do for you?
What about the strategy and advice we share?
What value do you get from us, and value added?
Why did you chose to work with us and the results?
Why our work is great?
What specific key aspects or support you like the most in the duration of having our service?
Would you recommend our services? If so, why?
Describe why you feel that working with COMPANY NAME was successful.
If a potential client was on the fence about whether to work with COMPANY NAME, what would you say to them?
What do you love about working with us?
If you were to recommend us to your colleagues, what would you say?
After you started working my COMPANY NAME, did anything surprise you? What has pleased you the most about working with us?

2. Decide on the Channel(s) You Want Testimonials Published On

Once you’ve decided on the questions to guide testimonials decide where/how you would like them published. Do want testimonials on your social media channels (example: LinkedIn), on your Search Return pages (example: Google My Business) or on your website. In some cases you may ask your clients to post on more than one social channel and you may have to provide directions on how to do so.

3. First Contact and Follow Up - The METHOD for Getting a Testimonial

Start by asking your valued client by phone call, or in person. Follow up with an email request to “get the ball rolling!” A sample email request, to follow up your initial conversation, could look like this:

Dear Valued Client,

Working with clients like you makes my business a great joy. Thank you for agreeing to provide a testimonial for our web and social sites. To help you get started, I’ve included a few questions, but please feel free to write whatever you like. [Include two to four questions, using the above list as a guide.] Thank you for your time and kind support. We value your business. Please let me know if there is anything further I can do for you.

With best regards,

4. The Thank You

When your valued client shares a testimonial with you, be sure to send them a hand written thank you. It may seem old fashioned, but a note of appreciation to your clients is a sincere personal touch that means a lot!

Bottom Line: We do rely on the opinion and positive experiences of others when making purchases decisions. Testimonials on your web and social media channels about your business are one of the best tools to enhance your online reputation, give your business a welcome sheen of success and achieve positive results.

Most Effective Pay Per Click Channels

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Thu, 06 Oct 2016 18:12:58 GMT

With the State of PPC, Hanapin Marketing’s looked under the hood of advertising’s fastest-growing industry to find out what makes it tick. This year, hundreds of marketing professionals—both influencers and decision makers from a variety of brands and digital marketing agencies—completed the Hanapin survey and collectively reached some very clear conclusions including:

Proven ad channels, like Text Ads, Mobile, and Remarketing continue to gain steam, with Social Advertising, particularly in Facebook, following closely behind.

Programmatic is proving to be not as popular a choice for advertisers, nor is it a very effective channel for those that are using it.

CPC pricing has remained much the same, but with an increase in conversions, social is becoming a popular choice for advertisers.

Our Synopsis: This report confirmed many of the items the Concentric team has experienced when managing and optimizing paid advertising programs for our clients:

Some 86% of respondents say text PPC ads have been an effective marketing channel for their business this year.
Remarketing units rank second (65% say they have been effective), followed by mobile (56%), social (42%), shopping (31%), and display (21%).
Some 83% of respondents say they feel good or very good about their PPC success this year; 11% say their efforts have been fair, 6% say poor, and 1% very poor.
Two-thirds (68%) of respondents say they feel better about the PPC advertising market this year vs. last year.
Campaigns do convert to new business and conversions are starting to come from mobile ads.

Visit this page to download the full report (registration required)

Take Control of the Google Sidebar Panel

Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:26:52 GMT

Would you allow someone to redesign your website, online store and unique voice without being involved? If you answered no to this question then read on ... because there's a great opportunity for you to develop the integrity of your brand message prior to Google's Knowledge Graph doing for you.

The Knowledge Graph is Google's big data machine, now matured. It stores more than data points and facts about your company. In fact, the Knowledge Graph is being programmed to recognize relationships between those data points and facts.

In search returns, information from the Knowledge Graph shows up on search Sidebar Panels (see Virgin Atlantic example) and may have the biggest branding implications ... and opportunities for your company.

Sidebar Panels are training searchers to look to the sidebar for quick answers, and to trust the information they find there. As more brands show up in sidebar panels, searchers are increasingly expecting to see your brand there, and when it does they will trust what they see.

Taking Control of Your Sidebar Panel

There are 3 steps to taking control over what is displayed about your brand in your Sidebar Panel.

Step 1 Wikipediais one of the main sources that feeds the Knowledge Graph. For brands, that means displaying basic info and a synopsis of your business model. If you do not know how to optimize Wiki then review the following resources:

Wikipedia: Writing an article

Wikipedia: Manual of Style

Wikipedia: Editing Guidelines

Step 2 Google Plus. A lot of marketers and business owners been disappointed with Google+ as a social tool. Listen to their sage advice, but right now you can't afford to not have it since the Knowledge Graph pulls information from Google+. Ensure the brand page you create is kept up to date so your latest changes are displayed in the Sidebar Panel. Resources for optimizing Google+ include:

10 Brands with Great Google+ Pages

How to Make Your Google+ Page a Local Page

How to Build a Successful Google+ Brand Page

Step 3 Schematic Markup. Schema language code tells search engines what the words on your page actually mean. They isolate key pieces of data, so that Google knows which words/phrases are your brand name, business hours, founder's name, address, etc. Google is really clever but it doesn't hurt to help it along — especially if there is a piece of data you really want to see in your panel. Resources for Schema include:

Specify Your Social Profiles to Google

How to Boost Your SEO By Using Schema Markup

How to Use Schema Markup for SEO

Bottom Line: Your brand's Sidebar Panel is your new digital business card, your brand's first impression, so you need to tell Google what content needs to be there. Use search to find examples of Sidebar Panels you like prior to customizing yours. This will save both time and effort when making any structural changes to Wikipedia, etc.

Alex Wozny, is a digital analyst with amazing research skills. Through Concentric, he helps businesses develop, measure and optimize their digital advertising as well as their marketing initiatives.

Block Shock - Advertising Blockers and Display Ads

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:26:50 GMT

As Featured In

People today care about data security and privacy more than ever before, and new behaviours have arisen that affect all advertisers. With online advertising, readers' tastes and habits can be tracked, and ads tailored accordingly. But consumers are increasingly using software that blocks advertising on the websites they visit. If current trends continue, half the ads aimed at consumers are forecast to never reach their screens (Economist 2015). This puts at risk online publishing's dominant business model, in which consumers get content and services free in return for granting advertisers access to their eyeballs.

GlobalWebIndex (GWI) surveyed online adults to see how prevalent these behaviours are. Survey results indicated that many have been acquiring the help of ad blocking methods to protect their online footprints. According to GWI, 46% of online adults are using a private browsing window, which prevents cookies from saving any online activity and another 40% are deleting cookies off their computers manually.

Ad blocking software, an additional blocking method, allows consumers to never see web ads created by independent ad serving networks. Globally, 27% of online adults say they routinely use ad blockers on their computers, and Europe ranks the highest in ad blocking activity at 29%. By some estimates, more than 200m people worldwide are now regular users of ad-blocking programs (PageFair, Adobe 2015).

It's not a small wonder that web publishers have started to take action. Some are switching to subtler means of advertising, such as promotional articles written in a similar style to a site's editorial content, referred to as Native Advertising. Others are trying to educate their audience. Ad-blocking visitors to the website of the Guardian, a British daily, for example, are greeted with the message: "We notice that you've got an ad-blocker switched on. Perhaps you'd like to support the Guardian another way?" A few publishers are taking a more robust approach. Some sites, such as Hulu, an online video service, block users who try to block its ads. Also, some internet firms, including Google, are said to have cut a deal with Eyeo (ad blocking software) to have their ads included on the firm's "whitelist" (Google declined to comment on this) (The Economist, 2015).

Advertising pundits are already starting to weigh in in the growing ad blocking trend. Some say that ad blocking makes native advertising far more advantageous than non-native formats. Native ads are placed within a user's newsfeed(s) (such as Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn). Ads within mobile apps are still displayed to users who are using web ad blocking software in their browser.

Adobe's recent study found that the global Facebook Click Through Rate (CTR) continues to grow and has created a 75 point gap in growth rate of the CTRs on Display ads, over Google. Some of Facebook's increase is due to new, more engaging, Right Hand Side Ads, but the overall trend aligns with the advantages of Facebook advertising, with Facebook ads in the users newsfeed as effectively 100% viewable. The same cannot be said for Google display ads, where Google itself has reported that only 44% of Google display ads are viewable (Salesforce 2015).

As a large portion of desktop based web traffic migrates to mobile, one can't help but wonder it's impact on advertising. Apple's recent iOS 9 supports content blockers, and Apple's Mobile Safari dominates usage statistics on mobile - which could mean that veto power over ads, Googles' revenue platform, is increasingly under the control of a major rival, Apple. More to watch on that front!

Bottom Line: Online Advertising is never boring. Ad Blocking could create a serious impediment to the reach and cost effectiveness of all advertisers campaigns. Ask your advertising company about how ad blocking affects your current campaigns. Keep abreast of new solutions that work within the contrasting demands of consumers and advertisers

Joe Wozny, author of The Digital Dollar: Sustainable Strategies for Online Success, is a digital and online media thought leader, strategist, author, blogger and international presenter on strategies to improve the reach and success of Internet, social and digital media initiatives. Through Concentric, he helps leaders leverage their businesses using smart, well planned digital strategies. For more information on Joe as an author, please visit joewozny.com , and follow him on Facebook and Twitter

SEO in 2016 - Evolve or Be Left Behind

Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:26:49 GMT

The future of SEO continues to be very relevant to any organization who wishes to be found in Search by their target audience. In 2016 these trends will be important to maintain and grow your organic search engine positioning.

Attention Grabbing Features Compete with your Organic Listings . Click-through rate (CTR) will continue to be correlated with search return positions. However, there are new attention grabbing opportunities to be found at the top of search engine return pages (SERPs). This includes Paid Ads, Carousel results, Knowledge Graphs and Rich Snippets ... and the way searchers interact with a SERP, given theses opportunities, varies from query to query. Action : Review your SEO strategy and add attention grabbing opportunities on key SERPs.

Rich Answers are on the Rise. I'm sure you have noticed 'rich answers' appearing at the top of your search returns, particularly around topics that are public domain data (like Prime Ministers of Canada or Song Lyrics). If your SEO strategy was built on public domain data, it's now time to update it. Google has focused their returns on Rich Answers product and is now returning 35% of all answers to these types of queries on SERPs (a 38% increase in the last 6 months). Action: If you have high-quality, proprietary content that can help Google answer searcher's common questions, then Rich Answers is an opportunity for you.

Page Speed is Very Important. Page speed is considered a ranking factor. If all other things are equal, page speed will outrank a competing site. For example, Google has allocated a specific time for crawling your site and Google's bot will only stay on your website for that specific period of time. But more important is your visitors perception. Research indicates that 40% of visitors will abandon a site if it takes longer than 3 seconds to load and 50% of visitors expect a site to load in 2 seconds. Also, one second in loading speed is shown to decrease conversions by 7%. (ex: Form completions, eCommerce, etc.) Action: Less pages may get indexed by Google if your pages are slow to load. Test your pages for loading speed and adjust slow loading pages. Google Search Console is a good place to start to check page load times.

"Dark Traffic" Affects Organic Reporting. According to Define Media Group, (November 2015) when Google Analytics is unable to identify where your site visits are coming from, the visits are now recorded as direct traffic. These "less precise" reports do not allow you to fully understand how organic, social and mobile traffic is growing and reported in relation to your marketing efforts. Is this happening in your reporting environment? Action: Begin reporting on Dark Traffic as part of your marketing measurements. Create a direct traffic report in Google Analytics and filter out the traffic to pages that are naturally visited "directly", such as your homepage, front pages and important content sections.. Also, if you identify this as an issue and have the budget consider other tools to assist with your marketing reporting/analysis.

Keywords have become Thematic. Google's Hummingbird update shifts the keyword research focus from researching separate keywords to researching keyword groups. Now that Google is able to recognize the meaning behind a search query, it gives a common answer to a number of "different-in-keywords" and "same-in-meaning" queries. This means your pages can be relevant not only to the core term, but for a whole group of its synonyms and related terms. Action: Consider a shift in focus to groups of related terms instead of individual keywords.

User Behaviour may soon be a Ranking Factor. Search engines deny this exists but many experiments prove the opposite. Action: It's important to a) revise your page titles and descriptions for accuracy b) examine the way users engage with your content (do they go back and select another page? do they stay on your page, proceed to other pages, or bounce in a second or two?) c) review the social signals/metrics as experiments show that pages with a lot of activity and fewer links outperform those with more links and fewer shares.

Bottom Line: To maintain your digital dollar investment and stay on top of search trends and ranking, include these new SEO activities as part of your digital marketing strategy in 2016.

Goodbye to Google Right Hand Side Paid Text Ads

Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:26:47 GMT

Right Hand Side Paid Text Ads are gone and with it much speculation on the impact of Google's new policy to advertisers, business, industry related companies and users of Google's search engine.

What's the Google Change? There will now be four paid search ads at the top of a search return page now that Paid Search Text ads have been removed from the right hand side of search return pages (SERPs). With the addition of a fourth paid search ad at the top of the page, this pushes organic search return listings further down the page and in some cases, organic search return listings will only be "below the fold." The Bottom paid search ads remain unchanged. Google Knowledge Graph, Rich Answers and Shopping Feeds also remain on search pages, in the same location.

What's the Impact to Google Paid Advertising Campaigns?

A decrease in "above the fold" Paid Search advertising opportunities, means there will be more competition for the top 4 placements, which could translate to higher CPC costs.

You may wish to consider other Google paid advertising products such as Google Shopping feeds to ensure you have paid advertising placements above the fold - (Figure 1 below).

Figure 1 - Example of Shopping Feeds - Right Hand Paid Advertising Placement on a Google SERP

Quality Score continues to be very important to your Average Position on any page and your Cost per Click

WordStream notes (Feb 2016) that Side Ad and Bottom Ads impacted by this change account for 14.6% of total click volume. ... And 78% of SERPs show less than 4 PPC ads above organic results, leaving opportunities for your ads to be in one the top 4 positions.

The "real estate" of your PPC ads has been expanded. For example, if your Paid Search listings include a "period" on the first description line of your ad, it will now appear as part of the ad title.

Ad Extensions continue to make your ads stand out, in any position.

What's the Impact to Google Organic Search?

There are more organic results below the fold. We understand that, there are nine "blue" links and two news stories, which is an improvement.

To enhance your organic positioning (Figure 2 below) as noted in 'SEO in 2016 - Evolve or Be Left Behind' (DD&S - Winter 2016) - look out for attention grabbing opportunities at the top of SERPs including

Knowledge Graphs and Rich Snippets. Keywords have become thematic - an opportunity to target pages which speak to your web page content and be shown above the fold

Figure 3 - Right Hand Attention Grabbing Feature

Bottom Line: *Compete for the top 4 paid positions as your budget allows. *Consider targeting some SERPs that have a commercial opportunity for your business and that have fewer than 4 ads above organic results. *Always include ad extensions where possible. *Don't miss out on attention grabbing organic opportunities that are above the fold.

Five Big Changes Coming to Google Adwords

Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:26:46 GMT

In our Spring edition, I discussed changes to how Paid Search Text ads have been removed from the right hand side of search return pages (SERPs) and the possible impacts to your business. This edition shares a brief overview of the 5 BIG changes Google announced shortly after Paid Search Ads.

Google continues to emphasize mobile-first, which means that the look of the SERP is changing in ways that favour the mobile experience. Paid ads are adapting to the mobile-first world including new ad formats and features you want to know about.

Search Ads to Appear on Google Maps - Get Local! Maps will be part of the Search Network moving forward. Expect to see significantly more ads appearing on the map platform. New ad formats allow you to place brand logos and offers directly on the surface of the map, rather than just alongside the map. Google Maps now has more than a billion users and people visit 1.5 billion destinations based on their Google searches. As Google noted, location-related searches account for nearly a third of all mobile searches and have grown 50 percent faster than overall mobile searches in the past year.

Expanded Text Ads Get Double Headlines & More Characters - Sorry Mobile SEO Text ads are about to undergo a significant change through expansion. With new, expanded text ads, headlines are about to get much bigger – advertisers will soon be able to have two 30-character headlines, up from a single headline of just 25 characters. In early testing, Google found this change dramatically increased CTR – by as much as 25 percent. In addition to more clicks, Google said longer headlines will be more useful for advertisers in terms of better qualified traffic. This change is huge, particularly with so little space on the smartphone screen, and for Organic in Mobile, this change has large implications.

Better Measurement of In-Store Conversions - See Sensible Business in this Edition Now you will be able to know how many people clicking on your AdWords ads are visiting your local business. This begins to bridge offline and online and the measurement that Google plans to use to measure in-store conversions. Google says it plans to look at phone location history to determine whether the person who searched and clicked on your ad ended up walking into the store. We trust this will be opt-in! And as an example, Nissan UK notes that 6 percent of people who clicked on ads went to the dealership, resulting in 25x ROI, during their testing.

New Responsive Display Ads - Ads Created from Your Inventory With this feature, you will give Google an URL, headline, description, and image, and Google will create responsive display ads for you. This means that ads will adapt to the content of the websites they're on and apps in the GDN, including native ad inventory.

Changes to Device Bidding - Hurray for Decoupling Currently, advertising pricing is based on desktop bids with a multiplier for mobile bids. Going forward, bids are being decoupled providing the ability to set mobile bids, desktop bids, and tablet bids independently or make them dependent on each other. More flexibility and further support of Google's mobile-first viewpoint.

Bottom Line: In a mobile world Google will give you great flexibility. Desktop ads continue to improve. Organic search is impacted for mobile and we suggest you consider your media mix (seo and paid) carefully.

Your Identity and Google+

Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:26:42 GMT

It's often said that Google+ is perceived as just another social network. Common refrains about Google+ include - "it lags behind in registered members when compared to Facebook." - "I don't understand how to use it." - "it's empty and the Media say its not worthwhile to consider adopting".

Yet despite the underlying negativity and perceived confusion, Google continues to build on Google+ and introduce integrated product changes that do affect you, your business and products and the activities you undertake (SEO, content distribution, marketing, social networking, etc.) to be "visible" online.  Consider the following:

+ More than one half of all searches on the world wide web are completed through Google. As Google owns both the search engine and social media network it stands to reason that both will be interlinked and that your Search Engine Optimization programs should include Google+.

+ Google+ Authorship connects your Google+ account with the content you produce. To use it you simply insert a short piece of code from Google+ into any article, blog, newsletter, etc you publish. The inclusion of the code links the content to your Google+ account and Google+ image in the search results page on Google. This type of presentation is proven to both create more click results and to provide your content with a small boost in page rank - all because Google acts as a "verification source" noting that your listing is a "top quality result". As Eric Schmidt, Executive chairman of Google, says: "Within search results, information tied to verified online profiles will be ranked higher than content without such verification." (Wall Street Journal 2013).

+ Unlike other social media networks, Google+ uses a system called 'Circles' to group people with similar interests. As we all have experienced, Google algorithms tailor internet search results to your browsing history and interests. So, if a search "user" on Google is searching for a term relevant to your content and that searcher is included in your circles on Google+, any content created by that you will be more likely to appear higher in search results.

+ Lastly, and again with Circles, content published and distributed through Google+ will appear in the timeline of those who have circled the page. Visitor engagement with your content - through posts for example - will add weight to your brand, your content and your website; all of which lead to greater visibility in search results.

Bottom line. The impact that Google+ has on "visibility of you, your business and your products" is only going to increase and your use of Google+ could be a deciding factor on what content gets ranked in Google. So... when you have the time, pay attention to Google+ this year and put it on you list of items to engage about. If you post content online for public consumption, ensure that you attribute these postings within your personal or business Google+ profile ... and don't forget to grow your Circles in a similar fashion to how you grow your other social media, fans, followers and connections.

Cheryl Kenny, is a digital and online media marketer, editor, researcher and branding guru. Through Concentric, she helps businesses maximize their communications opportunities using innovative and measurable digital strategies, marketing and advertising programs.

The Click as a Performance Metric

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:26:40 GMT

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One of the primary advantages "digital" promises over traditional media is the ability to directly attribute the value online channels provide to your business (performance metrics). This was an attractive advantage/benefit over television or print, where a deep level of attribution is still challenging, despite big steps in the right direction.

This article discusses the "click" as a common performance metric, where it's best applicable, how to improve click as a measurement and insights into the questions to consider when looking at your latest analytics reports.

Counting Clicks

When it comes to online advertising, clicks are one of the most common measurements of success. It's tempting to look to clicks as "THE performance indicator" because they represent a very tangible action. But while clicks are often an accurate measure of effectiveness for search ads, when it comes to display, the click does not correlate well with ad effectiveness and is not the outcome you should be optimizing for.

A comScore study, for example, found that clicks had absolutely no correlation with conversions for display ads. So even if people click on your display ads, they're no more likely to convert than those who didn't. With display campaigns, clicks are rare, but that doesn't mean the ads don't work. Evidence suggests that clicks are not an accurate measure of performance for display.

View-Throughs

The idea that display ads lead to conversions even when users don't click (referred to as a view-through conversion) is often met with skepticism. But there is strong evidence to suggest that display ads can and do encourage users to return to a website directly or through using a search engine.

Salesforce has reported that running display campaigns led to an 80% increase in branded search, or users searching directly for the brand name, which means that people who saw an ad used a search engine to visit Salesforce.com instead of clicking on an ad.

A more comprehensive comScore study found that retargeting campaigns, on average, led to a 1,046% increase in branded search—a clear indication that retargeted users were using search engines to return to the advertiser's site. The comScore study covered 103 campaigns run by 39 different advertisers in 7 industries.

Retargeting

Retargeting, also known as remarketing, is a cookie-based technology that uses simple code (pixel) to anonymously 'follow' your audience all over the Web. This unobtrusive code is placed on your website. Every time a new visitor comes to your site, the code shares an anonymous browser cookie. When your cookied visitors browse the Web, your advertising provider will serve your ad on sites within their retargeting network.

Retargeting advertisers who have set up tests to check the validity of view-throughs consistently find that retargeted users convert at higher rates than those who don't.

Setting up a test to ensure view-throughs are valid can be a good strategy, but the evidence consistently shows that view-throughs are valid.

Bottom Line: Make your display ad campaigns work harder for you. A click doesn't necessarily indicate brand recognition, recall or awareness, and for display advertising it may not correlate directly to sales. Configure retargeting in your display ad campaigns to assist with understanding the view-through component of your advertising digital dollars.

Google Anouncment Forces Mobile Adoption

Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:26:37 GMT

Can your company afford to ignore the rapidly expanding mobile marketplace?

In short, no … To quote Google, businesses ‘best friend’ for being found online, “Starting April 21, we will be expanding our use of mobile-friendliness as a ranking signal. This change will affect mobile searches in all languages worldwide and will have a significant impact in our search results. Consequently, users will find it easier to get relevant, high quality search results that are optimized for their devices.” (Source; SMTD February 26th 2015)

As a business leader, easing your organization into the mobile cultural shift is necessary ... at minimum to preserve your current return on investment in Search ... and to get the best return on your digital dollars. With mobile culture-building and mobile leadership in mind, here are six tips to consider within your organization to take advantage of this opportunity.

1. Understand the context: mobile apps vs. mobile pages

Outside of advertising, essentially, you have two main approaches to mobile in terms of content. "Mobile Web" refers to browser-based access to the Internet or Web-based applications using a mobile device. "Mobile app" refers to a software application (it could also connect to your website) that usually resides on a smartphone or tablet.

2. Commercial Web services drive mobile visits

Today, various commercial Web services present/provide information in a mobile-compatible form. Visitors can navigate large service providers such as Facebook, YouTube, Google Search, and Amazon with browsers on their smart devices. Accordingly, the information placed within those services is also mobile-enabled. Ensure your Web pages are "mobile-enabled" to ensure your visitors receive the best experience when viewing from their mobile device.

3. Your Web pages are a good place to start

Making your Web page "mobile-compatible" is a practical way to join the mobile evolution vs. creating an app. Many website content management systems offer responsive-design features so Web pages are displayed in a mobile-compatible manner. Commercial services such as Mobify and Duda Mobile allow you to create mobile versions of your Web pages ,if your website does not include responsive-design features.

4. Subscribers read and share your communications via mobile devices

Mobile does not end at a website. Many device owners read their email using their smart phones and tablets... and some of those device owners are most likely subscribers to your email communications. Ensure the email you send out as newsletters, marketing messages, etc. are mobile phone, phablet and tablet compatible.

5. Mobile can provide a new set of metrics

Mobile analytics offer a new way of looking at how customers interact with your products and brand. You may gain a deeper understanding of visitor habits that help you grow your business, so ensure that you isolate and include mobile visits in your analytics to see whether new patterns emerge.

6. Outbound opportunities also abound!

Mobile advertising, is still not proven for many. However, if you do execute mobile campaigns ensure features such as click to call and social sharing are enabled on your landing pages to provide convenience for visitors. Assess your campaign analytics validation and ensure your ads are as targeted as possible.

Bottom Line: Given Google's announcement, mobile usage and growth trends, "the shift" to mobile is upon us. Don't forget to include a mobile strategy when looking for opportunities to extend your online efforts and when looking for ways to make your products accessible to all markets.

Building an Authority Brand - Association with Success

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:26:36 GMT

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An authority brand on the Internet is a brand and domain name that dominates non-paid organic and social search return listings pages for a particular subject category. Authority brands usually possess the following characteristics:

Visibility – they are found everywhere, sometimes in different domains.

They make the company the "go-to location" for related subject matter.

They dominate the majority of search terms for a specific information category.

Online, authority brands have the ability to shape market discussion and harvest new customers. They enable companies to establish a strong leadership position online. They can service and represent a specific geographical region.

Once a basic "digital" infrastructure has been established, a goal of many online strategies is to have their products recognized by search and other digital technologies as the authority brand in a certain subject matter/topic category. However, building an authority brand takes time, concerted effort and digital doll$rs. Characteristics typically associated with authority brands and their creation include:

Relevant and on-topic content is associated with the domain name (both self and community generated).

Domain name recognition is often supported both by paid advertising and word-of-mouth social tools.

Digital products (web, mobile, social etc.) have been created and maintained in accordance with proven SEO structuring practices, ensuring they are in the top listing locations in organic and social search returns.

A number of deep inbound and outbound links from authority figures have been established.

When combined with social media and the ability of social media participants to share information quickly, authority brands have infinite opportunity - and great potential for stumbling blocks. Dominating search engines using content and SEO techniques is still important, but, in the transparent world of social media – where customer commentary influences service and product adoption and purchasing decisions – authority brands have to ensure they deliver a truly valuable customer experience and encourage their customers to tell their social networks about it.

The Contractor Services category provides an example of the dominance an authority brand can have. TrustedPros , a Canada-based company, is the "authority brand" in Canada for the home contractor category. HomeAdvisor dominates the same category in the USA. Both companies amalgamate contracts and contractor listing content to gain this positioning. Home and Garden TV, due to content leadership and publishing in multiple media (unlike TrustedPros and HomeAdvisor), is also an authority brand in this category. In other words, two completely different types of services are authority brands in this category and both are driven by providing relevant content to their target audiences. Visit trustedpros.com and homeadvisor.com to view how both companies have similarly structured their Websites, navigation, SEO configurations, social and content to establish their positions. Note that the relative rank of each site is based on regions served.

Bottom Line: There's great value in having a simple digital naming strategy to represent your business, product or service and taking the time and effort to become an authority brand. Represented as an equation, the value of an authority brand in relation to making it easy to find and to remember (Value of an authority brand = VAB) can be stated as follows:

VAB = Easier for Customers = Benefits to Businesses and to Customers = Increased "Word of Mouth" = Benefits to Businesses

Finding New Customers Through Social Media

Wed, 21 Sep 2016 17:26:34 GMT

One of the biggest reasons business is involved and/or interested in social media marketing is to find new customers for their products or services. Social customer service is important, but without finding customers in the first place, a business would have no one to serve.

Does social actually help find us customers? The answer is yes but you have to choose techniques appropriate to the social network you participate in, and you have to choose a network appropriate to your B2C or B2B focus. Current research from Salesforce.com shows that:

54% of B2B marketers say they've generated leads using social media

77% of B2C marketers have acquired customer on Facebook

43% of B2B marketers have found customers of LinkedIn.

34% of Marketers generate leads through Twitter and if you can get someone to follow your brand on Twitter, that person is 67% more likely to buy your product than a non-follower.

The Top 5 techniques for acquisition include:

Understand and adopt the top brand and industry keywords that describe your product or service.

Utilize brand advocates.

Get involved in relevant groups and chats.

Post on networks that create a lead generation opportunity.

Adopt a paid social program. Most social platforms offer lead and advertising solutions even for small budgets.

7 Tips for Creating a Mobile Aware Marketing Culture

Mon, 29 Aug 2016 22:00:59 GMT

Can your company afford to ignore the rapidly expanding mobile marketplace?

A recent poll from the Mobile Marketing Association (see Figure 1) confirms that disregarding the mobile market is a mistake that business owners and marketers want to avoid. Tech research firm Gartner finds that global sales of smartphones and tablets will surpass 1 billion units in 2013. ("Smart device sales to hit 1B next year," Mobile World Live); sales estimates for 2012 exceed 800 million.

As a marketer, are you ready to ease your organization into yet another cultural shift related to online marketing?

Yes, most of you have just finished with the social media shift and many are still working through the integration of analytics with your marketing programs. But, as noted by Pete Christothoulou , co-founder and president of Marchex, "Executives are demanding that their marketing departments have a mobile strategy." (AllThingsD).

The next cultural shift must be to ask that your organization pay attention to mobile marketing—at the strategic planning level (while building your mobile digital road maps) and at the tactical level (while you pick "low hanging mobile fruit").

With mobile culture-building and mobile leadership in mind, here are seven tips to consider within your organization.

1. Understand the context: mobile apps vs. mobile pages

In the most basic terms, mobile devices—smartphones and tablets—come in many forms; but, essentially, you have two main approaches to mobile for using those devices in marketing.

"Mobile Web" refers to browser-based access to the Internet or Web-based applications using a mobile device. "Mobile app" refers to a software application (it could also connect to your website) that usually resides on a smartphone or tablet.

Mobile apps take considerable time and money to develop and maintain. And after a mobile app has been created, you will most often need third-party infrastructure to help deploy (e.g., the Apple or Google app platforms).

Mobile Web development also has time and dollar costs associated with it; however, you can often use your website as its content and infrastructure base, allowing for a quicker deployment to your market.

2. Commercial Web services drive mobile visits

Today, various commercial Web services present/provide information in a mobile-compatible form. Visitors can navigate large service providers such as Facebook, YouTube, Google Search, and Amazon with browsers on their smart devices. Accordingly, the information your organization places within those services is also mobile-enabled, including organic search results pages commonly found from searches on Bing, Yahoo, and Google, or from your listing on eBay and Craigslist.

Finding your Web page should be just as easy for a Mobile Web user as it is for a desktop computer user. However, unless your Web pages are mobile-enabled, your visitors may not be receiving the experience you want them to receive when they click through from one of these services to visit you.

3. Your Web pages are a good place to start

Making your Web page "mobile-compatible" is a more practical way to join the mobile evolution that creating a mobile app. Many website content management systems offer responsive-design features that detect mobile device visits and display Web pages in a mobile-compatible manner.

Services such as Mobify and Duda Mobile allow you to create mobile versions of your Web pages if your website does not have responsive-design features. Take these considerations into account as you make your Web pages mobile-compatible:

How visitors surf on smart devices is different from how they surf on a personal computer. Define the navigation and content of your mobile-compatible pages accordingly.

Not all phones support technologies such as Flash, and visitors would prefer not to increase their data-plan bill due from downloading graphics that do not provide value.

If you plan to use a third-party service to create your mobile pages, check to see the type of HTML standards your pages should be compliant with (such as those of the WC3).

For page access, will your pages have their own mobile URL (for example: m.NAME.com), or will you will use the existing URLs of your Web pages?

4. Subscribers read and share your communications via mobile devices

Mobile does not end at a website. Many device owners read their email using their smart phones and tablets... and some of those device owners are most likely subscribers of your email communications.

Ensure the email you send out as newsletters, notifications, marketing messages, etc. are formatted for mobile phone or tablet viewing and interaction. Your subscribers also share the emails you send them, so ensure that your new-subscriber forms also support mobile devices.

5. Mobile can provide a new set of metrics

Mobile analytics offer a new way of looking at how customers interact with your products and brand. You may gain a deeper understanding of visitor habits that help you grow your business, so ensure that you isolate mobile visits on your analytics to see whether new patterns emerge.

6. Mobile opens new doorways

After joining the mobile evolution, you may find that new marketing options are available to you.

Among the activities that organizations consider after clearing the first mobile hurdle are segmenting email to mobile and nonmobile campaigns; using quick response (QR) codes within advertising campaigns, packaging, or at tradeshows; and delivering new information services to customers via SMS (text messaging).

Mobile marketing can open up new doorways for "out of the box" thinking that enable your business to better apply "traditional" Web services and offerings.

7. Outbound opportunities also abound!

Mobile advertising, such as display ads, can build brand exposure and heighten awareness. Display advertising is easy to buy and relatively inexpensive, so keep an eye on mobile advertising trends to see whether an opportunity is right for you. As with all advertising, ensure that you receive campaign analytics validation and make sure your ads are as targeted as possible.

Without a doubt, the mobile segment is one of the largest and fastest-growing segments of online growth; better yet, it is being fueled by consumer and business demand. As Carolina Milanesi of Gartner notes, "the ubiquity of smartphones and the increasing popularity of tablets are changing the way businesses look at their device strategies and the way consumers embrace devices." (Mobile World Live).

Given the market forecasts and trends, "the shift" to mobile seems like a logical choice for marketers to focus on when building and expanding the marketing culture within your organization.

Consider a mobile strategy when looking for opportunities to extend your online marketing efforts and when looking for ways to make your products accessible to all markets.

How Organizations Can Measure Digital Success

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Mon, 29 Aug 2016 22:00:58 GMT

As Featured In

Success comes in many forms . . . including digital marketing success. The digital marketing promise has always included the ability to measure the impact of your online marketing dollars. Delivering on this promise has been a challenging activity that many leaders grapple with when measuring digital marketing benchmarks for success.

How can digital marketing deliver on measurement – particularly in an increasingly, socially saturated world? Should and can digital marketing success be gauged on items broader than just analytic measurement?

Framing ROI

The reality is: business needs to measure things. Measurement creates a context of success and progress. Without measurement, you can't address where you are generating value or profits nor gauge where new or continued efforts should be directed.

Regardless of how it's asked, "are we earning a return for our digital dollars" is a "hot button" marketing question poised by leaders, management and operating staff. Agreeing to what is being measured, and how to measure it, are natural follow up questions to this "hot button" item.

To address return on investment in the digital landscape, many organizations collect digital marketing costs and then treat these costs as a percentage of sales, on an overall or per unit basis. This measurement, while good, can fail to answer the question of effectiveness. In others words, what/where amongst our multiple digital channels is delivering the best return and what/where requires more focus, etc . . .

Understanding what comprises the digital marketing "envelope" prior to creating return on investment calculations is an important step. From experience, many organizations differentiate between digital marketing, digital business and digital branding to make calculations easier to manage and understand:

Digital Marketing can refer to online programs, that activate an audience to take a specific and directed action and which provide an ROI measurement

Digital Business – can refer to engineering or re-engineering the way business is conducted online. This can include modifying processes to create efficiencies in areas such as accepting customer service inquiries, or publishing a frequently asked question and reference material database.

Digital Branding – can refer to placement of content, brand messages and your brand in online "locations" to create associations and a perception of your organization, for example, sponsorship of a community event. Subscriber growth, not ROI, can often be measured.

Digital Marketing – ROI Measurement

Digital marketing measurement presents the challenge of knowing which metrics are most relevant to pay attention to, given the plethora of activities you can measure. Some measurements become indicators that help with operating and strategic direction. Other measurements provide hard ROI data.

The Cost Per Acquisition – CPA measurement is a ROI measurement used in digital marketing. CPA is a measure of the total digital media or channel cost divided by the number of completed actions. For example, if your objective is to drive purchases through an email campaign that cost $1,000 to prepare and you activated 500 purchases during the campaign execution, your Cost Per Acquisition is $2.00.

It's relatively straightforward to generate a CPA model for a paid online advertising program, and for your SEO initiatives. Analytics can tell you which of these channels (down to the specific ad) are driving leads or online sales. By reviewing ads (display, CPC) you can also gain insights into the messaging that generated activation, allowing you to further optimize your marketing communications programs.

Social media can provide the same CPA opportunities when call to action messages are integrated into activities that are measurable (example an activation page). Experts suggest that engaging your customers in social media naturally results in more sales. They point to the fact that engagement correlates with reach and reach should translate into sales.

The question of balance between digital branding activities and digital marketing activities is an important item to pay attention to. Social media followers, when surveyed, note that they will not recommend a social media channel to their trusted networks if the channel focuses solely on solicitation.

Frequently Asked ROI Questions

These frequently asked questions resonate with the theme of "where's the return for our digital dollars"? Your digital marketing, business and branding success will benefit if these issues are clearly addressed within your organization.

1. Is our email communications "sticky"? . . . meaning do we have an email database that we can activate. Email marketing is an excellent vehicle to connect with your subscribers. Email analytics provide great insights into who is active and what content in your email communications resonated with your readers. CPA can measure customer activation.

2. Is social "working" for us? . . . meaning how do we turn these participants into customers. Social media builds a connection to your business. The best recommendation for your products is from a trusted source – your followers, fans, etc. Ensure your organization agrees to and understands what activities are digital branding related and which activities are digital marketing related.

3. Do people read the content we post on web pages? . . . meaning is the web page messaging, positioning, etc. hard working enough to provide value. If your page content is 'call to action oriented' you can use CPA to measure it. If the page is informational in nature, it's purpose is related to digital business or branding. Analyze the frequency of visits and what actions the visitor takes when they leave the page.

4. Where are we getting the best return on our "digital dollars"? . . . meaning give me the short answer on what is either activating visitors or generating visibility. Always understand the marketing mix between digital marketing and digital branding. Apply CPA calculations (on a per online channel basis) for digital marketing activities where relevant.

5. Do we have a strong online presence/brand? . . . meaning can we or are we recognized as an authority brand. Combining CPA calculations with the visitor insights on a per channel basis could provide a great starting place for a discussion.

6. How are we doing in search? . . . meaning do we show up when people look for us. Analytics on what type of visitors you are are attracting (by interest or their activity) should be at your fingertips. CPA for your organic activity is easily measured. There may also be additional insights from visits that you can use to assist in digital business and digital branding activities/initiatives.

7. Is our online advertising working? . . . meaning what's the return on investment for the money we are spending. Start with separating the online advertising used for branding purposes and online advertising used for activation purposes. Then provide CPA analytics together with insights (analytic plus anecdotal) gained from branding advertising activity.

Final Word . . . for now . . .

Digital marketing success includes leading and sometimes wrestling with the measurement of return on "digital dollar" investments. In fact, the act of assessment opens broader opportunities for your organization as you discuss where and how you can measure ROI.

Be sure to educate your organization so that all participants understand the difference between digital branding, marketing and business activities. Open up debate on social call to actions and create an analytics culture. With these foundational concepts in place, your company will be well underway to make decisions on new digital opportunities as they come your way.

Creating a Successful online Strategy

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Mon, 29 Aug 2016 22:00:56 GMT

As Featured In

Five-Step digitalroadmap Process

Martin Zwilling recently noted in a Forbes review of The Digital Dollar that “The route to success is not a random walk.” (Forbes, 2012). He further notes that “From a strategic perspective, all the above should start with an overall digital roadmap, where you define your goals, outline the steps required, and articulate your success measurements.” Click here to read Martin's review.

This article outlines one proven method of creating an online strategy through the digitalroadmap process found in The Digital Dollar: Sustainable Strategies for Online Strategies. The key components of roadmap building are reviewed together with Insights, Tips and Advice including the “Must Haves” to to review or get started on your process.

“Must Have” Prerequisites

Successful online strategies are created when you have the following in place:

• An articulated vision, business plan or list of business goals you wish to accomplish. Online programs are enablers for organizational goals, they are not business drivers, so. Without clear stated business goals and objectives, a digitalroadmap has nothing to enable. 

• The ability and culture to factually audit your existing online programs, and their performance where necessary. You may find yourself asking questions like, “Is what we are doing now working?” or “How are we measuring it?” or “How is this information we are collecting meaningful”, etc. 

• In general terms, a practical and clear idea of the human and budget resources available to allocate to any plans made, so the planning process can make realistic recommendations. 

• Not absolutely necessary, but highly recommended, is access to a trusted,, neutral source of information to help answer any questions that may arise around the online products and services you are considering. Knowledge resource(s) are important to the success of any venture.

Building a digitalroadmap

Following a defined process assists you in synthesizing the best ideas into a customized strategy suitable for your situation, business and objectives.

Step 1 – Frame the Objectives and Deliverables
In this step, define the specific goals, deliverables, project sponsors and team members your business wants to get from its online activities. This can be done in a one-page document often referred to as a “project scope”.

Step 2 – Assess Your Current Environment
Current situation analysis and summary – In this step, note and assess your current online channels and how these are performing in relation to your goals, costs, and time taken to maintain them. It’s often helpful to use analytics tools to understand how your organization is found online and who your customers are, as well as their current comments about your products and services.

It is also important to understand how much social or community equity you have during the assessment step. Questions to ask include - Who are your advocates? Who is in your immediate community? Who comprises your indirect community? What is their opinion on your brand, products and services? How do they react to items you request from them? Who are the influencers? Who are the followers? etc.

Step 3 – Option Mapping
It’s time to look at your online product and service (channel) options, once you have defined your goals and how you are doing now in relation to your goals. One of the challenges we all face in the online world are the number of channel options to choose from. The channel options you review and eventually choose should be determined by how they can assist in furthering your business goals - for example Facebook is a great channel to connect and engage with consumers where as LinkedIn is a great channel to connect and engage with business contacts.

Each channel will consume a portion of your budget and available resources. You will need the ability to deliver meaningful content to your audience through the channel. So review your options and assessments from this perspective as well.

Step 4 – Collaborative Review
Now that you have developed the basic outline of a strategy, review this strategy within your organization, with all your stakeholders. These discussions form the basis of recommendations and uncover any items not yet fully explored. Include discussions on how services from strategy decisions will be deployed and operated. Examine worst case scenarios to test how you would overcome adversity in your plan.

Step 5 – Recommendations and Communications
Your strategy needs to be documented and reviewed with all parties who will help you implement and
maintain it. The detail within your documentation depends on the culture of your organization. Effective plans should include a one-page visual document outlining what actions you plan to take over time, key speaking points, and resource requirements - see Figure 1. Always include a budget with estimated one-time and ongoing costs and of course state your assumptions about your strategy plan so you can refer to these as your get measurable results, plus new information about your activities and the activities of your competition.

Figure 1 - Example of a One Page digitalroadmap Visual Summary that was used by a financial organization.

Insights, Advice and Tips Proven experience shows you should:

• Include your team when creating your roadmap. This helps build consensus and galvanize your online plans. 

• Carry out regular Roadmap checks; online changes and your roadmap will require adjustments along the way

• Document your starting point in order to create a baseline to measure your accomplishments from. 

• Celebrate when you get to each destination (roadmap goals or milestones). 

• Post a one-page summary of your roadmap in a location where it can act as a reminder of your goals and activities.

Final Word - for now - Don’t stop what you are doing online today. Modify and adjust and use the roadmap process as a way of assessing your current activities and, if possible, building on your strengths.

6 Name Reservation Ways to Position Your Brand Online

Wed, 24 Aug 2016 17:29:19 GMT

In the brick-and-mortar world, individuals and companies are investing a lot of time and money generating the best name and brand for their businesses. In the online world, it’s just as important to reserve a name for your product, brand, and/or business. This requires research, co-ordination, registration and documentation skills, and sometimes a bit of luck, too. Business leaders should continuously devote time and effort to reserving names as part of their ongoing operations and strategic initiatives.

Reserving your name is a little more complex than purchasing a domain name, particularly in this age of social media. A coordinated naming strategy requires making name reservations across multiple online channels — like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn among others — if you plan to expand your business or products beyond a simple domain name.

If you do not pay attention to name reservation it could cost you time and money in the future. You could end up having to change business or product names mid stride. You may have to make a compromise around a brand you feel attached to. You could bring the momentum you have with your online initiatives to a halt until a good naming convention across online channels is established. Figure out your online “name game” first!

So given the importance to your online identity that naming can have, here are a few “Insights, Tips and Advice” ideas to consider for Name Reservation:

1.) Establish your name in an uncontested fashion in every digital doorway possible, even if you don’t think you will use the name now or in the future. As you work to establish a master domain name, verify that the same name — or a very similar one — is available with the many social networks or service providers whose networks your organization may use during its digital lifecycle (examples: LinkedIn, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter).

2.) Conduct the same thorough due diligence on a desired Internet name as you have in the brick ‘n mortar world to make sure the desired name does not conflict, business-wise, translation-wise or legally, with any currently in your target market.

3.) For a business — even one serving a limited geographical area — target the purchase of a . com name for your website. For the present and the foreseeable future, consumer perceptions equate .com to business.

4.) Prior to reserving a name in the brick-and-mortar world, it is a good idea to check domains on the Internet to see if there are domains that:

as closely as possible reflect your business name or an abbreviated version
are available to purchase at an affordable price
have other derivatives available, such as .ca and .net, that can also be purchased in order to ensure that customers find your business
have common “misspelt” domains similar to the master domain available

5.) Once you have registered a name, verify registration by logging on to the service. While logged on, pause the service specific to your name registration, so visitors searching for your business do not encounter “empty” pages before you are ready with your messaging in place.

6.) Ensure you store your names, IDs, and passwords and even the email they were registered from on a list that is in a safe place. This information is a corporate asset and should be treated as such.

I admit, naming and name research can be a tedious process. But it’s well worth the time — safely reserving name space for your organization across all networks can preserve the integrity of your identity in the future, make it easier for customers to find you, and helps to build and execute a solid online strategy.

5 Step Advertising Solution for your Business

Wed, 24 Aug 2016 17:29:18 GMT

Choosing the best advertising solution for your company involves many factors, not the least of which are a) your level of experience with configuring and managing an advertising campaign, and b) your spending preferences. These five steps should help you choose the best solution for your organization.

Step 1 – Define Your Customer

Defining your customer (demographics, geographies, interests, related activities, and so on) is necessary if you want to be efficient with advertising dollars and ensure they are targeted to generate results.

Step 2 – Define Your Offer and Goals

Be clear on what action you want the customer to take in terms of value measurement (goals). For example: visited my store, completed a survey, became a “friend” and so on.

Step 3 – Set Your Budget Range

Budget will dictate the type of service you choose. Small budgets often have simple solutions since spreading a small advertising budget over too many suppliers may not provide the volume of impressions to make an impact in the marketplace. Larger budgets allow you the flexibility to try more options, which may require more complex solution reviews and supplier contracts.

Step 4 – Understand Where You Are in the “Advertising Cycle”

Twenty percent of solutions work for eighty percent of organizations.

Industry reports ( Advertising Age , 2011) and activity tracking counters ( gs.statcounter.com ) tend to mirror this “rule of thumb.” Examples of solutions that may work for your organization include:

The “Testing the Water” Method — You’re new to advertising and most likely have a “smallish” budget. Many companies in this category consider search advertising with the most popular search suppliers given search popularity, self-management tools and pricing.

The “Surround Sound” Method — Your budget is usually larger and your goal is to ensure your ads are in as many customer “doorways” as possible. You are most likely running a branding campaign or a campaign where CPA is difficult to measure. Search, ad network, publisher, daily deals and social ads often will comprise your advertising mix. Usually the most popular and topically relevant publisher/ad networks are chosen as suppliers; however, supplier longevity depends on the CPA they provide.

The “Only Want to Pay for Completions” Method — You may have a large budget and can negotiate a deal with most suppliers of any network type. If your business model is to only pay for leads and your budget is small, affiliate networks may be your only choice, since daily deals programs may be too expensive. Services such as affiliatedirectory.com are good sources to review when looking for the right affiliate network for you.

The “Hyper Community” or “Local” Method — You need to connect to a specific community and most likely have tried out — or are already using search advertising, media Websites, social sites, and daily deals, which often provide the opportunity to connect to specific communities. Local dominant media sites can be found through a simple Web search. For many businesses, social sites for advertising usually include only the Big 4.

“Less Travelled and Complex” Method — You have the time to consider researching and reviewing a number of niche networks to add to your current advertising strategy. You usually have a larger budget and are constantly looking for alternatives. You have someone on staff whose job it is to manage advertising, or you’ve hired an agency to perform this work.

Step 5 – Choose Your Preferred Network

Understanding your supplier options is very important. Suppliers generally fall into the following categories:

Search ad networks such as Google, YouTube, Baidu and Bing. These networks are known for “selling/renting space” for text format ads. However, they also support other formats, including display ads and video ads. Some also offer features such as re-marketing, which is a tactic that allows networks to display ads to Internet visitors who have already shown an interest in them through their browsing or searching history. Advertising is almost always sold on a CPC basis. Advertising can be targeted toward many of your customer attributes, including their keyword search patterns, age, geographic location, language and content consumption type. These networks provide a number of tools to allow you to self-manage and report on your campaign (ad creation, tracking, modifying a campaign, bill payment), if desired. Search networks are the place to start for new advertisers, and are a necessary part of the mix for the majority of advertisers. Consider social search networks as equivalent options and refer to comments in the Social Search Network section.

Website ad networks such as Casale, ValueClick and 24/7 Real Media often amalgamate a number of private Websites into a network and sell the ad inventory — usually in a display format. CPC and CPM rates are often available and a minimum budget commitment may be required. Re-marketing options may also be available. In some cases, you can manage and report on your campaign and options, though this varies by network. In most cases, you should have covered the basics with search and social pay-per-click advertising networks prior to using these advertising networks, unless one of the networks provides access to the perfect demographic you can’t reach in any other way.

Publisher Websites such as local newspapers, radio stations and subject matter portals (example: cars, cooking, Chinese language, weather). In some cases, publishers own more than one Website. Ads are usually in a display format. CPC and CPM rates are often available and a minimum budget commitment can be required. In most cases, tools to self-manage and report on your campaign are not available; instead, reports/status updates are provided by the publisher. These networks can be great after you’ve covered search and/or social pay-per-click advertising, or if you need to reach a target language/culture demographic you can’t effectively reach with search mode .

Social ad networks such as Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace now sell ads in multiple formats, mostly on a CPC basis. For example, Facebook ads include an image and text. Such sites provide a number of tools to allow you to self-manage and report on your campaign (ad creation, tracking, modifying a campaign, bill payment) if desired. Don’t forget StumbleUpon, which has a completely different and intriguing CPC model on the way to execute a campaign on their network. Paid social network advertising often delivers a tremendous number of clicks at a low price per click. However, check the bounce rate in your analytics to ensure the clicks are delivering real value (see the Measurement section). If your traffic is not “bouncy” then social ad networks are a good option to consider in conjunction with paid search networks .

Affiliate ad networks operate differently. They usually charge only for a completed action. Ads are placed on a target network of online products (Websites, browser bars, and such), often in a display format. How you manage and report on your campaign and options can vary by network. Affiliate networks have earned a bad reputation due to the amount of spam-related advertising people associate with them. If you can profitably set up a network where there is no spam included in your advertising, the audience matches your target market, and you can maintain your brand integrity by vetting the sites that run your ads, then consider this solution.

For the right retailers, daily deal networks such as Groupon, Living Social, and Dealfind — which promote discounts (often in coupon form) to their subscribers — provide a good option. Industry studies show that using an existing social media infrastructure, particularly Facebook, improves participation and success.

Link ad networks sell link opportunities.

Choosing a paid advertising solution based on the above five-step process is sometimes an easy decision:

“We’re a small company with a limited budget and limited time. We chose two large search engine suppliers as our solution. Pay based on demand and the fact that so many prospective clients use search were part of our considerations.”
– Mark Lyle, owner of a local auto dealership.

In other cases, choosing an advertising solution can be a more complex decision:

“Search is great and we have it covered. We’ve had time to experiment with our messaging, ads that get a response and how we measure success. We now need to surround all spaces where our target customers are active when they shop, research or need to know about products like ours. We know our customers also visit dominant subject-matter sites like the Weather Network and Yahoo Weather, and we are looking for opportunities to communicate to them through these sites and others. Some sites are not part of a search supplier content network, so we have to deal directly through an ad network.”
– George Savice of Umbrellas to Go.

digitalroadmap® Strategy, Success and Engagement

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Wed, 24 Aug 2016 17:29:08 GMT

Urban myth leads many to believe that Online, Internet and Social Media success stories are created by happenstance. Common sense, however, suggests that success using Online is created through good planning and hard work.

That includes articulating your goals, developing and implementing a plan, monitoring your activities, and making adjustments as needed.

Online success is also defined in terms of your intent. For many businesses, this means profits and return on digital dollar investments from their activities. For brand marketers, governments and not-for-profit organizations, this could mean growth in both audience and their engagement. For individuals, it could mean designing and creating your own website page, analyzing and creating a great linking strategy, ensuring your business is advertised correctly in directories, or setting up and executing your own paid search advertising campaign. Regardless of what success means to you, the common elements in reaching it must include both planning and follow-through.

If you agree with what you've just read then you need a digitalroadmap. From a strategic perspective, digitalroadmaps ask you to define your goals, review your options, document a direction and articulate your success measurements. From an implementation and operations or tactical perspective, digitalroadmaps allow you to plan content, product, service and communications activities, ensure the product and services you implement become part of your new day-to-day activities and review performance against your original goals.

Figure 1 - Example of a digitalroadmap Strategy Summary

While the digitalroadmap methods can contribute to success, they are not its sole determining factor. It's been my experience, after working with numerous organizations of all sizes, that in order to create success, engagement with plan creation, implementation and adjustment is required at all levels of an organization. New habits may have to be developed, particularly in the management of social media activities, and like with many new habits, it may take time to see the results of your actions.

The engaged organization is able to understand and appreciate the transformation that is taking place through digitalroadmap planning and implementation. It is also able, upon comparing planned to actual results, to make necessary adjustments in a seamless manner while promoting a positive organizational culture. This capacity creates an environment where it can be fun and extremely motivating to work, and such an atmosphere can also create a better focus for the work at hand.

The Importance of Good Strategy

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Wed, 24 Aug 2016 17:29:05 GMT

I started asking my 'Strategy' question again after recognizing the anxiety that is felt with the accelerated pace of online (web, social media, mobile ....) changes and the pressure felt by organizations wishing to stay current and capture the best “business value” from the digital medium. We refer to this concern as ”digital” anxiety.

My ‘best guess’ is that digital anxiety is created from the overabundance of information and options available on the internet. Think about it…whether it’s from a perception that the competition is doing something, the media world telling us about the latest digital contribution to a success (or failure) story, advertising about the latest and greatest new digital services, or just the people around us consuming digital media (texting, cell call, chat, facebook me!) a businesses place in the digital world can seem unsettling.

And to top it off, the digital world is getting more intricate. Not necessarily in terms of good business thinking but in terms of the digital networks, platform options, news and the complexity and amount of information available. Did you know that if all the information on the internet were to be written down, it would take 57,000 years to get through it all - reading non-stop 24 hours a day, seven days a week? (source - Harvard’s Berkham Institute)

With a good strategy in place you can maximize how your activities will provide measured results. Prior to starting an initiative you can discuss, plan and strategize around the outcomes you wish to influence. You can potentially eliminate some risks. You can communicate and “level set” expectations. You can alleviate digital anxiety. And most importantly your strategy can lead to improved profits, supporting learning and positively impacting corporate culture.

A business needs a platform to grow on. People like to understand what their efforts are contributing to. Conversely, heading down the wrong digital path can be costly: non-working programs, time expended, motivation lost, etc..Such roadblocks within a corporation can hinder the ability to capture value from digital initiatives. It might even possibly create a negative brand impression by not fulfilling on visitor expectations and brand engagement.

Here’s a quick test to see if your current or future digital initiatives are strategic and if they are going to bring you clear and measurable value. Answer 'yes' to the following statements:

1. I can tell you the specific purpose of my company's digital initiatives in two sentences or less.

2. I can show measurements confirming that our actions are meeting the goals we established.

3. I can assess new business opportunities against our digital plans.

Answering yes ensures that you have most likely establish a solid roadmap for your success. A no should get you started on defining or refining your strategy, casting aside your ‘digital anxiety’ and enjoying the digital drive!

Mobile Web Strategy and Tips

duda@concentricis.com (Joe Wozny ) — Wed, 24 Aug 2016 17:28:53 GMT

This blog speaks to the rapid changes Concentric has experienced in the use and importance of Mobile Web. In the blog, opportunities and the practical methods of taking advantage of these opportunities are identified. Steps to consider during strategy and planning are discussed.

So first - what is Mobile Web? Well... Wikipedia defines it as: “The Mobile Web refers to browser-based access to the Internet or web applications using a mobile device - such as a smartphone - connected to a wireless network. Moving forward, the distinction between the Mobile Web and native mobile applications is anticipated to become increasingly blurred, as mobile browsers gain direct access to the hardware of mobile devices (including accelerometers and GPS chips), and the performance of browser-based applications improve (speed- and capability-wise)....” In other words, presenting all or part of your website to people who surf the Internet via their cool smart phones (which have true web browsing capabilities).

What’s the difference between a Mobile Application and Mobile Web?

From Wikipedia the definition of a Mobile Application is: "software that is developed for hand-held devices such as personal digital assistants, enterprise digital assistants, or mobile phones. These applications are either pre-installed on phones during manufacture, or downloaded by customers from app stores and other mobile software distribution platforms." This page provides great examples of mobile application platforms.

So the big difference in technology is that Mobile Web is an extension of your website to a smart phone that has a web browser. And Mobile Application is a software application (that could connect to your website) that resides on a person’s smart phone, ipad, or other device.

Another big difference, from a business perspective, is the cost. It takes (considerable amounts of $$) to develop and support an application over multiple smart platform types. In the majority of cases it takes less $$ to extend your website to the new generation of smart phones . I’ve also found that Mobile Applications are more expensive to market since the platforms for downloads and advertising are relatively proprietary at this point.

In some cases it may not be $$ that are important since Mobile Applications can send out an important brand message; and in some cases you may wish to use both the Mobile Web and a Mobile Application to support your business.

Why could Mobile Web be important to your organization?

Think about who has cool smart phones. Is this growing, upwardly mobile, young plus established, technology savvy with disposable income group, possibly your target audience? For demographic information insights enter the following keywords into your favorite search engine:

If you answered “yes” to the last paragraph continue reading...

What’s the best method of facilitating Mobile Web?

I suggest - as always - that you define a strategy. This does not have to be a huge study or expense. Ask yourself the following question: 'what you would like to initially deliver to your customers (or potential customers) cell phone that would benefit them, what will be the impact, and how will you measure it? Once you have this answer there’s a few key items to put in place. The short list includes:

1 Define the application you will be presenting to mobile phones; review the features and review the content that will be presented.

2 Determine if the current live pages on your website will be able to be used “as is” or if you will need to generate a few new pages (for example: some phones do not support flash...mobile surfers don’t appreciate increasing their data bills to download large graphics that provide little value).

3 Determine what tool you can use to 'condition' website pages for smart phones with browsers? For example, does your content management system have a mobile browsing plug-in; does the plug-in allow you to choose which components on a page will be displayed; would a tool like Mobify that is designed for Mobile Web presentations suit your needs?

4 Ensure that your website HTML standards are compliant (WC3) to work with your tool of choice.

5 Decide if you want the website to automatically identify a Mobile Web surfer and present your Mobile Web version your website to them; or, do you want to establish a new mobile web URL (for example: m.NAME.com).

6 Decide which types of phones you would ideally support and test on.

7 Decide what method you will use to monitor and analyse activity.

8 Review the impact on your customer service parameters for this new service.

Do people actually use this stuff?

Definitely yes! We’ve implemented Mobile Web solutions that provide direct customer satisfaction and reduce call centre telephone calls. In some cases the Mobile Web has been used as a shopping tool to provide information at the time of demand. All in all, this is an interesting area of digital media for organizations to explore as we extend the boundaries of digital media beyond the simple website.