How to Effectively Reach a Millennial Market [New eBook]

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The latest eBook in the How 2 with t2 series reviews the steps that marketers need to take in order to effectively target a Millennial market and drive new business with the coveted demographic.

One of the most significant problems that marketers face when they attempt to target a Millennial market with campaigns, advertising, offers or other marketing initiatives starts long before the strategy is developed. It starts with the process through which marketers define the term Millennial.

In the latest How 2 with t2 eBook, we review the definition that marketers need to adopt when it comes to Millennials in order to effectively target the group. We then talk about the idiosyncrasies that make Millennials so attractive when it comes to marketing, review the psychographics that can help us adapt to the Millennial mindset, and review some examples of brands and organizations that have perfected the art of connecting and communicating with this coveted group.

Download the eBook here or by clicking on the image below and learn how you can effectively market to a Millennial audience!

How 2 with t2 - Target the Millennial Market

Pokemon GO and Local Advertising

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With the explosive popularity of Pokemon GO, it definitely leads marketers to wonder how the app can be a factor in local advertising initiatives.

In a matter of days, Pokemon GO has taken the world by storm, shifted a lot of popular paradigms and brought augmented reality to the forefront of everyday life. That’s a pretty impressive checklist, and it’s not all. Estimates suggest that Nintendo’s stock surge has led to the company valuation being up nearly $11 billion, and daily usage time for the app is higher than WhatsApp, Instagram, Snapchat and Messenger, and while installs of Tinder – another location-based application – have been flat, Pokemon GO installs on Android have surpassed it significantly (see the graph below). So what does this all mean for marketers and, more specifically, local advertising?

Pokemon Go installs versus Tinder

Image Credit: SimilarWeb

For the first time, the now-tired expression of local-mobile-social has become a reality that can be leveraged by marketers, and it will surely be expanding from here. It is still early to make any definitive claims as to how Pokemon GO and local advertising will work together, but there are already some brands jumping on the opportunity, and there have been hints as to what marketers can expect in terms of ad opportunities. Here are a few confirmed strategies and predictions.

‘Luring’ Clients

You might have heard a few of the not-so-pleasant stories of criminals using the app to attract people to a specific location, then proceeding to rob them. There will always be bad apples out there, and one can only assume that after this story broke, increasing security measures (in some way) became a (if not the) top priority. But the ability to lure players to a specific spot is a great tool when it comes to marketing.

Set a lure on Pokemon GO and local advertising

Image Credit: iMore

If you’re using Pokemon GO and you find that a PokeStop is close to your business (or request that one be created around your business) leverage the ‘Lure Module’. This will increase the frequency of Pokemon around your location and certainly lead to increased foot traffic while that is happening. From there, you can offer discounts and specials to players as they pass by your business. (Catching Pokemon is tiring work after all!) Find out how to use your ‘Lure Module’ here.

Building Relationships

One of the most incredible things about Pokemon GO (and one of the reasons why we note that it really does transcend that local-mobile-social triad) is the fact that virtual relationships can transfer into real-life connections around the game (in a Gym, for example, where you might battle another player).

Brand humanization has long been a cornerstone of a successful social business strategy. Combining elements like the Lure and engaging in a game with a prospective customer (or creating a space in a store, for example, that doubles as a Gym and welcomes players from the area) creates an entirely new method of driving real traffic and building real relationships.

Sponsored PokeStops

This is a no-brainer. It shouldn’t be more than a few months before every major brand has found a way to leverage the augmented reality feature with brand prominently featured in the application. McDonald’s is already in talks to find a way to become a part of the phenomenon, and other brands are surely in talks with the developers as well.

As to what will be involved in Sponsored PokeStops and gyms remains to be seen, but there are sure to be methods used by these brands to drive up both traffic, brand awareness and, of course, sales. Which brings us to our next point…

Pokemon GO Specials

When it comes to local advertising, there is no easier way to appeal to your audience than by talking to them in their language, and offering them products, services and discounts based on their tastes and preferences. In this case, those tastes and preferences are almost certainly going to be Pokemon GO related.

We have already started to see a few examples creep up of stores and pop-up locations taking advantage of the foot traffic, but it certainly won’t be all that long before in-game integrations, offers, coupons, bonuses, etc. become available for brands to purchase and take advantage of in order to drive up direct conversions from the app.

Conclusion

20 years ago, Pokemon was the most popular game for children, teens and young adults. You would be hard pressed to find someone between the ages of 7 and 30 that wasn’t playing or at least very familiar with the game. Now, for the first time ever there is a product on the market with uniform affinity across the entire 18-49 demographic. That has never happened before and it helps explain this unprecedented growth.

We’re sure to see lots of creative uses of the app and a major expansion of the product once it comes time for monetization. It will be exciting to watch it grow!

14 Google AdWords Tips for Better Results

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With so much changing when it comes to your search engine marketing, having a few simple (and easy-to-remember) Google AdWords tips might be exactly what you need to start increasing your clicks and click-through rates without breaking the bank.

Google AdWords can be a fairly tricky landscape to navigate. The search giant has made its advertising platform easily accessible, but with so many features, options, and capabilities, running an optimized campaign can seem like a daunting task. These Google AdWords tips might seem rather straightforward, but there is no doubt that by taking these into account during your next campaign, you’ll be sure to drive improved results.

Build a Strategy

This might seem pretty obvious, but driving clicks to your website shouldn’t be the only goal of your AdWords campaign. Before building out your dashboard and spending ad dollars, develop an objective-oriented strategy that can consistently be used as a point of reference.

Google AdWords Tips include a strategy

Smart Budgeting

When it comes to AdWords, you might be surprised at how easy it is to spend money. Set a budget early and pay close attention to it. This is particularly important early on as you’ll want to ensure that your budget is working to achieve the goals in that strategy.

Research

Take advantage of the tools Google offers, like Keyword Planner. Google’s Keyword Planner will help you get a better idea of what keywords you should be using and how much it might cost you to run your campaign (and what changes you might need to make to those keywords in order to drive that cost down).

Click-to-Call

As mobile becomes more and more important, click-to-call campaigns become increasingly valuable (assuming, of course, that they make sense for your business and objectives). These mobile-only campaigns help drive immediate, intent-driven action from your mobile audience.

Google AdWords Click-to-Call

Google Search Only

Oftentimes, the highest quality traffic comes from Google itself, as opposed to the Search Partner Network. When running a search campaign, it is wise to focus on Google specifically as opposed to opening your campaign up to the Search Partner Network.

Location Targeting

Take advantage of the fact that you can target your ads by location. Leverage Google Analytics in order to identify where your most valuable audience is coming from, then focus (at least initially) your campaign on those regions.

Language Targeting

Take those best practices when it comes to your location targeting and do the same with regards to the languages spoken by your audience. English audiences should be targeted with English ads, German audiences with German ads, Japanese audiences with Japanese ads, etc.

Manual CPC

If you’re looking for complete control over what you’re spending, then this is the option you’ll want to select. You’ll control your bids but will need to keep a close eye on the campaign in order to ensure that your ads are showing (based on what you’re spending).

Enhanced CPC

If you’ve run campaigns in the past, then this setting will allow Google to adjust your bid for you (by up to 30% of your designated max).

Auto Tagging

Make sure that you’ve enabled auto-tagging in order to automate the process of tagging your AdWords campaigns in Google AdWords. This way, a lot of the data segmentation (that becomes extremely important as your campaigns expand) is done for you.

Scheduling

If you know when your visitors are mostly likely to convert and when the competition is low, you’ll want to start scheduling your ads to show at those times in order to maximize your budget.

Individual Quality Score

When you enter your keywords dashboard, you’ll see a small chat bubble next to each of your keywords. By clicking on this or hovering over it, you’ll see the individual Quality Score of each of your selected keywords. Try to ensure that your active keywords have a Quality Score above 6, and pause those keywords that are below it.

Landing Pages

Your landing pages need to be on topic with the ads that sent them there in order to keep your campaign’s Quality Score high. At (virtually) all costs, avoid sending visitors to your homepage, and try to send them to a page on your site with more valuable information, related to the ad that they clicked on.

Dynamic Search Ads

Dynamic Search Ads are a great way to research the ways in which visitors are arriving at your site, and what pages they engage with most. Running a Dynamic Search Ad will allow your landing page and headline to auto-populate based on the category of your website and the keyword used by the visitor. Paying attention to these ads is a great way to improve your manual search campaigns, as they provide insights into what is driving visits from search.

Conclusion

These are just a few key elements you’ll want to pay attention to when you’re running your next AdWords campaign. Of course, there is a lot more to Adwords than what’s listed here, but keeping these points in mind from the get-go is a good start.

How to Use Snapchat for Brand Marketing

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In our latest “how-to” eBook, we breakdown how to use Snapchat for brand marketing.

The unstoppable juggernaut that is Snapchat has a lot of marketers scrambling to answer a simple question: how can we use Snapchat for brand marketing? Considering its popularity and the way in which it engages Millennials, it is an asset that virtually every marketer is trying to learn as much about as possible in order to incorporate it into a marketing strategy.

Snapchat has very deliberately made its user interface somewhat challenging to navigate. That is particularly true when it comes to marketing and advertising on the platform. What’s more, the nature of the platform is such that brands need to follow a very specific set of guidelines in order to effectively engage their audiences.

In this latest “How 2 with t2” eBook, we run through the basics of the platform, the different ways in which brands can leverage the app and its audience in order to captivate Millennials, and some of the best practices that exist when it comes to Snapchat. Click on the image below to download the eBook, or you can get it here!

How 2 with t2 - Use Snapchat for Brand Marketing - Cover

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