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Daily Minute Master Series – June 5, 2019

June 5, 2019/by Corey Padveen

Social Media

Instagram Will Now Enable Advertisers to Boost Branded Content Partnerships as Ads

Instagram has officially announced the launch of its new Branded Content Ads option, which will provide additional ways for businesses to maximize their on-platform influencer partnerships. Up till now, brands have been able to work with popular Instagram users on ad campaigns to promote products through branded content, but those posts would only reach the followers of said influencer. Branded content ads will enable advertisers to promote these Instagram posts just like they would any other ad, expanding the opportunities for reach and engagement. With the capacity to utilize influencer-created content in your paid promotions, you’ll have access to more insights on performance, which will extend the response beyond that influencer’s audience alone. Instagram says that Branded Content Ads for the main feed will be available to all advertisers “in the coming weeks, and for Stories over the coming months”.

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TikTok is Reportedly Testing New Ad Targeting Options to Lure Marketers

As reported by Digiday, TikTok is testing both interest-based targeting and pixel tracking, similar to the ad tools on other social platforms. Digiday says that TikTok is able to use video image recognition and user engagement as signals to help categorize audience interests, while it’s also working on more specific data options, via pixel-type tracking, which would further enhance its categorization capacity. The app has more than 500 million active users worldwide, with a rising number of those coming from the US. Brands are, unsurprisingly, keen to tap into those trends, and TikTok, with the backing of parent company ByteDance, is moving fast to cater to that demand. Whether the app is a relevant consideration for your business obviously comes down to your target audience – but given the popularity and resonance of the app, it’s worth considering, and it may be worth experimenting with TikTok’s ad options to see what results it’s able to provide.

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Facebook Video Creation Kit gets new editing, resizing options and ‘Save’ feature

Facebook introduced several new Video Creation Kit features Tuesday, including a tool that will automatically create multiple versions of a video with different aspect ratios. Video advertisers will also have access to new templates, more font options, seasonal stickers and a new feature to save works in progress. Facebook is making it easier for advertisers to optimize the size of their videos for various ad placements. The company says it takes only a “click of a button” to automatically turn a single video into multiple videos with various aspect ratios for different placements like the News Feed or Stories environments. “You’ll save time and create video ads that appear customized for each placement, without having to shoot additional content or edit manually,” writes Facebook on its Media Blog.

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Marketing

Apple Maps refresh: Better data, more detail and a new ‘street view’

Several of the updates in iOS 13, announced yesterday, are playing catch-up to Google. Among them, Apple is adding a Street-View-like feature to Apple Maps. Users will soon be able to pick a map location and launch a 360-degree photographic view of the immediate area. Apple is calling it “Look Around.” Powering Look Around is a rebuilt basemap “from the ground up.” Apple says this is the result of 4 million miles of new data, which will deliver “broader road coverage, better pedestrian data, more precise addresses and more detailed landcover.” There’s little concrete data Apple has exposed about Maps’ usage and engagement. Clearly, Apple Maps and navigation have many millions of users. But it’s also clear that the combination of Google Maps and Google-owned Waze dominate smartphone maps mindshare. At the margins, Apple Maps improvements may win back some number of users.

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Marketing Trends to Watch for in 2019

December 18, 2018/by Corey Padveen

As 2018 comes to an end, marketers are looking to predict trends in 2019.

The following are promising trends which have begun in 2018 and look promising going forward into the new year.

E-commerce Trends

Many eCommerce marketers use Facebook ad targeting for its easy of use, powerful targeting abilities, and large userbase. Although Facebook is a powerful tool its eCommerce is not as well integrated as other social platforms. The following platforms may be worth a second look as their eCommerce capabilities have improved significantly in 2018.

In 2018, Pinterest increased their eCommerce potential with the addition of shopping tags. This feature allows users to click-through to a ‘Buy Now’ page when they see an item they would consider purchasing. Best of all, this feature is free. Shopping tags is a great way to start promoting products online without spending on ads. Pinterest also sells ad space, however, and the journey from viewing a product to reaching the ‘Buy Now’ page is virtually seamless. With a growing audience of 250 million active users, marketers are considering Pinterest as a viable option for their 2019 advertising campaigns.

Instagram

Instagram also announced shopping tags in mid-2018. Instagram shopping tags can appear on posts and stories and serve as an easy way for a consumer to reach the ‘Buy Now’ page of your website with one click. Instagram’s user base has over 1 billion users with the majority between the age of 18 and 34 – a demographic with a high level of spending power. As Instagram only continues to gain popularity, it is no wonder the social media platform is on the list for 2019.

Video Trends

Video has continued to be a successful part of marketing campaigns throughout 2018 with a focus on live video, and marketers use videos to engage and excite users. According to HubSpot, adding a video to a landing page increases conversion rate by 80% and adding a video to an email boosts click-through rate by up to 300%.

Video advertising is also becoming more common and more options are available. In 2018, YouTube added the ability for advertisers to target users who watch videos on their TV screen after reporting that their watch-time of content from TVs has doubled yearly. Furthermore, this year Twitter announced in-stream video ads on a global level rather than restricting it by region. Advertisers can now reach more users making in-stream Twitter ads a more viable option

Personalization Trends

In 2019, consumers will continue to demand personalized service and marketing. This can be challenging when your business communicates with an abundance of customers. With the use of machine learning and artificial intelligence, marketers will stray away from manual targeting of specific user groups. With the introduction of Facebook Messenger chatbots, such as Chatfuel, marketers can begin to experiment with customer interaction.

Marketing Strategy Trends

By 2019, marketers should know there is no excuse for any guess-work when it comes to marketing strategy. Data is abundant, available, and ready to be analyzed. The only reliable, cost-effective way to market your company successfully in 2019 is through a data-centric campaign, specific to your company’s needs.

A concise, effective model to follow when creating a data-driven marketing campaign is the BEACON strategy. This encompasses Branding, Engagement, Audience, Content, Organization, and Network.

Branding

Brand awareness is important to grow any business. The voice of a brand should be consistent and the persona of the brand should be developed through generating content. Content should be optimized on-site and for search engines to ensure discoverability.

Engagement

Marketers should analyze data and set goals. First, benchmarks must be set to measure the outcome of your efforts. It is important to understand your analytics by looking at engagement ratios, conversion rate, creating a content-engagement correlation analysis, tangible metric analysis, etc.

Audience

Marketers should identify hyper-targeted audiences to zero-in on the unique customer traits that lead to high conversion. High-value audience identification is then important to understand which members of your audience have these traits. Once this has been recognized, marketers can then identify areas for growth and target new audiences that have not been reached. Once new audiences are identified, messages to the audience should be optimized to fit in well with the idiosyncrasies that make each audience subset unique.

Content

Marketers should make sure their message comes across clearly through content message optimization. Messages should have voice consistency and have clear calls-to-action. Content should also be as diverse as possible for discoverability and authenticity and should be optimized for your audience. Content strategies should be analyzed, revised and renewed frequently to maintain effectiveness.

Organization

Marketers should analyze their current strategies and question if they are both applicable and effective in different real-world settings. Workflow should be optimized in the most time and cost-effective way possible using marketing software. Marketers should also create more cohesiveness between marketing and the operations of the company to ensure the company operates as a unit.

Network

Marketers should conduct reviews and audits of their channels to improve the aesthetic and function of brand pages. Paid and earned media should also be monitored and audited to understand and improve its effect on your brand. Marketing channels and media should be interconnected and smooth to enhance brand experience. A mobile audit should also be performed to understand how mobile integrates into your efforts.

Following these trends can help you make the right decisions for your 2019 marketing budget.

A Step-By-Step Guide to Selecting Marketing Technology [New eBook]

May 23, 2016/by Corey Padveen

With so much on the market, selecting marketing technologies can feel like a daunting task.

Every year, it seems as though the market for marketing tech expands significantly. The reason why it feels that way is pretty simple: it is. Since 2011, the market for marketing technologies has increased roughly thirtyfold! With so much out there, it can feel like choosing the “right” tool is next to impossible.

Our latest eBook covers the process of selecting a piece of marketing tech, and what steps marketers need to take in order to ensure that they are choosing the right piece for their needs. Click on the image below to download the eBook and learn about the steps you need to take in order to select the right tool for your needs!

When Should You Address Negative Comments on Social Media?

July 13, 2015/by Corey Padveen

This post originally appeared on CoreyPadveen.com.

When should negative comments on social media be addressed, and how?

I was recently speaking at a conference in Las Vegas, and a particular question kept popping up: “How and when should I deal with negative comments on social media?”

Photo credit: emich.edu

The most common answer is that every brand needs to deal with every negative comment that arises for fear that a single, unaddressed issue will sink a company. But that’s not true. I know that this opinion isn’t the most popular one, but it’s the reality. If we truly aspire to transition into fully integrated social enterprises, then we are going to have to implement a strategy that evaluates, grades and prioritizes negative comments on social media on a case by case basis.

Negative comments and remarks on social channels can be fairly tricky. On the one hand, you want to address those that openly criticize your brand. On the other hand, you don’t want to get into an argument on a public forum. Jay Baer puts it really well: Anything past a second comment, and you’re in an argument.(I’m paraphrasing, but that’s the idea.)

There are two things you want to consider when it comes to handling negative comments.

First, when it comes to a large scale crisis, you want to have a carefully laid out plan in place. When there are comments coming from every which way, you’re simply not going to be capable of handling every one. That is especially true for a brand with a large following. So you’ll want to have a certain set of criteria that outline who gets attention. Does they user have a large following? Have they been a longtime, loyal customer? Do they hold a degree of influence with social users that you would deem to be of high-value to your business? Are they making a valid point, or simply trying to cause a problem by leaving a comment?

These and several other factors should determine the priority by which you answer unhappy customers. You also want to set a cutoff time. If you respond to someone hours after they tweet about your brand, you might revive a sentiment that they had long since moved past, and that presents a whole new problem.

On a smaller scale, when someone posts a negative comment, you will want to have a strategy in place to deal with it sooner rather than later. Again, responding on a public forum hours or even days after a post appears can be as detrimental as ignoring something.

Identify whether or not a user has a legitimate complaint. (After all, sometimes so called ‘trolls’ just want to smear a brand, at which point blocking them might be a good option, but use that carefully.) If they do, handle it as you would any customer service issue. Showcasing that you care and are interested in finding a solution is something people appreciate – whether they issued the complaint or are simply monitoring the conversation.

Often times, addressing negative comments is a case-by-case issue, but having strategies for both versions in place so that you can deal with these issues easily and without any major hiccups is important.