Social Media
Facebook Shares Business Messaging Best Practices Based on Recent System Changes
After rolling out a series of updates to its Messenger for Business processes over the last few months, Facebook has this week published a new set of tips to help marketers looking to make best use of messaging to keep in touch with customers. And with a growing number of people now using messaging platforms, it makes sense that more brands are also looking to provide connection options through the same. The risk, however, with messaging for business is that messaging is a more private surface, and can be interruptive. Overuse of messaging can have significant consequences for brands, and for Messenger itself – which is why Facebook has implemented tighter controls on how often brands can communicate via message, and keep in touch after that initial interaction.
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Facebook Blocks Mobile App Advertisers From Using Device-Level Data
The updated terms of service explicitly state: “You will not use any device-level data collected, derived, or obtained from or in connection with Mobile App Ads, including Facebook users’ interaction with a Mobile App Ad (such as information derived from targeting criteria) or any such data received directly from us or through a Facebook-authorized third party mobile measurement partner or other service provider (collectively, “Mobile App Ad Data”) for any purpose (including retargeting, commingling data across multiple advertisers’ campaigns, allowing piggybacking, redirecting with tags, or selling to any third party) other than on an aggregate and anonymous basis to assess the performance and effectiveness of your advertising campaigns delivered on or through the Facebook Products.”
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Marketing
Yotpo Taps Bazaarvoice Network for Review Distributed to Retailer Sites
Yotpo has partnered with Bazaarvoice to syndicate reviews through the latter’s network, which includes nearly 2,000 global retail sites and reaches more than a billion shoppers monthly, according to the company. Yotpo is evolving from a reputation management platform to an “end-to-end platform” for direct-to-consumer (D2C) brands. The move is intended to expand the reach of Yotpo-managed reviews content for retailers. Below is an example of a Yotpo review residing on the Nordstrom website via the Bazaarvoice Network. (There’s a disclosure it came from the merchant on the reviews page.) 98% are influenced by ‘authentic’ reviews. Nobody questions the importance of reviews in building consumer trust and social proof. Indeed, a 2019 Yotpo survey of 2,000 online shoppers found that “98% consider authentic customer reviews to be the most influential factor in influencing purchase decisions.” Other surveys agree with this finding, although at different percentage levels. However, a 2019 study from CPC Strategy (part of Elite SEM) found that, on Amazon, price was the biggest factor in purchase decisions, followed by reviews.
For the full article click here
Uber’s New Digital OOH Unit Bring Location-Targeted Ads to Car-Top Screens
It was inevitable that Uber would get into advertising. Now it has to as the company faces increasing pressure to be profitable. Yesterday, Adweek first reported that the ride-sharing platform had partnered with Adomni to create Uber OOH and bring digital screens to its drivers in three cities: Atlanta, Dallas, and Phoenix. Competition heating up. An initial trial will run through April. After that, the program will likely expand to more cities. It’s elective for drivers; since they’re not “employees” (according to Uberall) the company can’t compel its drivers to participate. Instead, there’s a financial sign-up incentive and drivers who log more than 20 hours per week will be eligible for additional fees. However, drivers don’t receive a cut of ad revenue. Many Uber drivers also drive for Lyft, which just acquired Halo Cars, a relatively small “taxi-top” ads startup. Firefly also competes in this space, promising Uber and Lyft drivers more income in exchange for mounting digital screens on their cars. Indeed, the ride-sharing, car-top ads market could quickly become a battle for driver participation and loyalty, raising payouts and financial incentives.
For the full article click here
Daily Minute Master Series – March 02, 2020.
/by Samantha ShapiroSocial Media
YouTube Adds New ‘Creator Liason’ to Improve Relationships with Creators
Over the last year, YouTube has been working to improve its relationship with creators, after various decisions in the past which have negatively impacted monetization, distribution and more. Those efforts have seen significant improvements in its systems, and have been largely welcomed by the creative community – but then, earlier this month, the platform announced that it generated some $15 billion in ad revenue for 2019, up 36% from the previous year. That’s obviously a great result for YouTube, but creators have rightfully questioned where their cut of that huge chunk of change might be. While the systems have improved, if YouTube is generating billions off their work, there’s seemingly more opportunity for better revenue share and profit mechanisms for them. That means that YouTube may need to do more to facilitate better relationships, and ensure that its creators have an even stronger voice into the future. Aligning with this, YouTube has this week announced the appointment of a new “Head Creator Liason” who will be tasked with advocating on behalf of creators from inside the company.
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Facebook Adds New Option to Create 3D Photos from Any 2D Image
Facebook has added a new element to its 3D photos option, with its system now able to simulate depth in any image, enabling you to convert any static picture into a 3D post. As explained by Facebook: “Our 3D Photos feature has [thus far] relied on the dual-lens “portrait mode” capabilities available only in new, higher-end smartphones, so it hasn’t been available on typical mobile devices, which have only a single, rear-facing camera. To bring this new visual format to more people, we have used state-of-the-art machine learning techniques to produce 3D photos from virtually any standard 2D picture. This system infers the 3D structure of any image, whether it is a new shot just taken on an Android or iOS device with a standard single camera, or a decades-old image recently uploaded to a phone or laptop.”
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Marketing
Amazon Search Ads: How to Advertise on Amazon – Profitably
The early days — just a few years ago — of cheap clicks, little competition and a buggy interface with little reporting are gone. Amazon advertising formats and inventory have evolved dramatically, and marketers and Amazon sellers are flocking to the platform. More competition means advertisers need to be savvier to ensure they’re ad campaigns are profitable. Calculating your COGS (cost of goods sold) and all seller fees is key to running profitable search ad campaigns on Amazon, says Kaitlin McGrew, senior SEM manager at Houston-based PMG Digital Agency. In addition to the monthly Amazon seller subscription fee and per-item closing and referral fees, you may also incur sales tax service fees as well as various storage and inventory fees if you’re using Amazon’s FBA fulfillment program, McGrew said in a talk on “Driving Profitable Sales with Amazon Search Ads” at our SMX West conference last month.
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Pinterest Reaches 60% of US Women; Here’s What They’re Searching For
Pinterest published a new report ahead of International Women’s Day which details what its largest demographic is searching for. Traditionally, Pinterest has seen more use among women than men. The report indicates that Pinterest reaches 60% of all US women, including 80% of moms and 75% of millennial women. The report also emphasizes the purchasing power of women worldwide, stating: “As the global income of women reaches trillions of dollars, women are expected to control almost 75% of discretionary spending worldwide by 2028.” In addition to using Pinterest to find ideas for dinner, travel, home and clothing, women are also looking to Pinterest for support and empowerment. “Everything from traveling solo, living (and budgeting) with a partner, negotiating a tough salary, to buying a first home — no choice is too big.”
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Daily Minute Master Series – February 28, 2020.
/by Samantha ShapiroSocial Media
Facebook Shares Business Messaging Best Practices Based on Recent System Changes
After rolling out a series of updates to its Messenger for Business processes over the last few months, Facebook has this week published a new set of tips to help marketers looking to make best use of messaging to keep in touch with customers. And with a growing number of people now using messaging platforms, it makes sense that more brands are also looking to provide connection options through the same. The risk, however, with messaging for business is that messaging is a more private surface, and can be interruptive. Overuse of messaging can have significant consequences for brands, and for Messenger itself – which is why Facebook has implemented tighter controls on how often brands can communicate via message, and keep in touch after that initial interaction.
For the full article click here
Facebook Blocks Mobile App Advertisers From Using Device-Level Data
The updated terms of service explicitly state: “You will not use any device-level data collected, derived, or obtained from or in connection with Mobile App Ads, including Facebook users’ interaction with a Mobile App Ad (such as information derived from targeting criteria) or any such data received directly from us or through a Facebook-authorized third party mobile measurement partner or other service provider (collectively, “Mobile App Ad Data”) for any purpose (including retargeting, commingling data across multiple advertisers’ campaigns, allowing piggybacking, redirecting with tags, or selling to any third party) other than on an aggregate and anonymous basis to assess the performance and effectiveness of your advertising campaigns delivered on or through the Facebook Products.”
For the full article click here
Marketing
Yotpo Taps Bazaarvoice Network for Review Distributed to Retailer Sites
Yotpo has partnered with Bazaarvoice to syndicate reviews through the latter’s network, which includes nearly 2,000 global retail sites and reaches more than a billion shoppers monthly, according to the company. Yotpo is evolving from a reputation management platform to an “end-to-end platform” for direct-to-consumer (D2C) brands. The move is intended to expand the reach of Yotpo-managed reviews content for retailers. Below is an example of a Yotpo review residing on the Nordstrom website via the Bazaarvoice Network. (There’s a disclosure it came from the merchant on the reviews page.) 98% are influenced by ‘authentic’ reviews. Nobody questions the importance of reviews in building consumer trust and social proof. Indeed, a 2019 Yotpo survey of 2,000 online shoppers found that “98% consider authentic customer reviews to be the most influential factor in influencing purchase decisions.” Other surveys agree with this finding, although at different percentage levels. However, a 2019 study from CPC Strategy (part of Elite SEM) found that, on Amazon, price was the biggest factor in purchase decisions, followed by reviews.
For the full article click here
Uber’s New Digital OOH Unit Bring Location-Targeted Ads to Car-Top Screens
It was inevitable that Uber would get into advertising. Now it has to as the company faces increasing pressure to be profitable. Yesterday, Adweek first reported that the ride-sharing platform had partnered with Adomni to create Uber OOH and bring digital screens to its drivers in three cities: Atlanta, Dallas, and Phoenix. Competition heating up. An initial trial will run through April. After that, the program will likely expand to more cities. It’s elective for drivers; since they’re not “employees” (according to Uberall) the company can’t compel its drivers to participate. Instead, there’s a financial sign-up incentive and drivers who log more than 20 hours per week will be eligible for additional fees. However, drivers don’t receive a cut of ad revenue. Many Uber drivers also drive for Lyft, which just acquired Halo Cars, a relatively small “taxi-top” ads startup. Firefly also competes in this space, promising Uber and Lyft drivers more income in exchange for mounting digital screens on their cars. Indeed, the ride-sharing, car-top ads market could quickly become a battle for driver participation and loyalty, raising payouts and financial incentives.
For the full article click here
Daily Minute Master Series – February 27, 2020.
/by Samantha ShapiroSocial Media
Twitter Outlines Major Events for March to Assist With Strategic Planning
Twitter has this week outlined all the major events and celebrations of note in March 2020 to help with your strategic planning and campaign tie-ins for the month. Twitter’s notes act as a complement to its 2020 major events calendar, which you can download in full here, and can be a major help in mapping out your campaigns. Twitter also notes that the platform itself actually turns 14 on March 21st. It seems weird doesn’t it? It doesn’t feel like Twitter has been around for 14 years, yet, it’s also become so ubiquitous that it’s increasingly difficult to recall what things were like when Twitter, and social media more broadly, didn’t exist.
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New Report Looks at TikTok Best Practices and Benchmarks for Brands
While TikTok has been getting a heap of attention from consumers, it’s still largely new ground for brands, and amid the various concerns around the platform’s moderation policies and data privacy regulations, many are still unsure as to whether to take the leap and try to connect with audiences through the platform’s short video clips. And even then, how do you do it? The other issue with the platform being so new is that there are few best practices established, particularly in this case because TikTok’s algorithmand distribution processes are different to other platforms. That’s where this report comes in. To help provide more context as to how brands can best use TikTok, the team from Conviva have put together a 34 page eBook which outlines key best practices, provides an overview of TikTok analytics, and lists industry-specific benchmarks for performance to help provide some perspective.
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Marketing
Google Search View in 3D Now Live for E-commerce Sites
At Google I/O last year, Google announced 3D images with augmented reality in search. Google even posted live examples of this last year. But now it is showing up for some e-commerce sites. Glenn Gabe of G-Squared Interactive shared an example on Twitter based on this article of a Burberry bag showing up as a “view in 3D” option in the Google search results. When you click on view in 3D, Google will show you the image using AR, augmented reality, as if it is in front of you through your mobile phone’s camera lens. And you can also see it as a 3D object. You can rotate the bag around and see the various angles.
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The Benefits of Using Marketing Automation
Marketing automation platforms offer numerous benefits bystreamlining manual B2B marketing tasks, including lead management, email campaign development and landing page creation. The proliferation of digital channels and devices has made it more difficult for B2B marketers to accurately target prospects with the right messages, on the right devices, at the right times. Prospects are managing more of the buying process themselves, creating decision short lists by researching brand websites and social channels without ever speaking to a sales rep. Faced with these challenging market dynamics and increasing ROI pressure, B2B marketers at companies of all sizes can gain these benefits from a marketing automation platform.
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Daily Minute Master Series – February 26, 2020.
/by Samantha ShapiroSocial Media
Twitter Shares Some Simple Tweet Copy Tips to Improve Campaign Performance
This week, Twitter has launched a new initiative which aims to provide simple tips to help businesses improve their tweet copy. The new program is titled ‘Good Copy, Bad Copy”. As you can see in this clip, Twitter creative lead Joe Waddington has outlined a set of simple, actionable tweet tips, which, while simple in themselves, can significantly improve tweet presentation and performance. As with everything in social media marketing, these are not definitive ‘rules’ as such, but guidelines worth considering. You may want to add them into your process and see what results you get, but it is important to keep tabs on your tweet analytics in order to ensure that any such changes are helping you move towards your goals.
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TikTok Adds Sticker Pinning in Video Clips
TikTok has this week launched a new sticker pinning option in videos, which enables you to attach a sticker to an object in the clip and it will stay in place, and change size relative to the video’s movement. As you can see in the demonstration above, you can pin a sticker by selecting where you want to attach it in the video, and you can use the slider underneath to find the right point. You can also choose how long you want the sticker to appear in the video with the ‘Duration’ option. Once attached, the added graphic will shift in time with the video. The option is similar to the same on both Snapchat and Instagram.
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Marketing
Vimeo Launches ‘Vimeo Create’ to Help Marketers Create Better Videos for Multiple Platforms
Video platform Vimeo has this week officially launched its new Vimeo Create platform, which provides a range of templates and tools to help marketers create more effective video content, for multiple purposes. As explained by Vimeo: “Never picked up a video camera before? Never worked with editing software? Don’t have the budget? Don’t have time to think about making videos for your business? Fantastic. We made Vimeo Create specifically for you. This fast, simple solution gives you exactly what you need to deploy impactful social videos for whatever you need. Think: Stories, ads, customer engagement, and beyond.”
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Amazon Just Made the $30k Amazon Retail Analytics Premium Data Free
Overall this move is consistent with Amazon’s recent movements to make selling most palatable for brand owners. Last March, Amazon sent out emails to many Vendors inferring that to be able to stay on the platform, they need to register for Brand Registry. This newest update aligns with many of the changes that happened in the last two years with advertising products on Amazon. Programs were all renamed to provide consistency between Vendor and Seller Central. If you are a brand or manufacturer that has been putting off getting your trademark, you should consider the Amazon IP accelerator program. More and more, the most powerful tools for optimizing and increasing sales on Amazon are only available to Brand Registry Participants.
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Daily Minute Master Series – February 25, 2020.
/by Samantha ShapiroSocial Media
Facebook’s New Creator Studio App Helps With Managing Pages On the Go
Facebook is launching a Creator Studio app for iOS and Android that assists users with managing page content and monitoring performance. This marks the first time Facebook’s Creator Studio has had a mobile app, which is designed to be a companion to the more robust desktop app. In an announcement, Facebook states: “The app is an evolution of and mobile complement to Creator Studio, the desktop hub dedicated to helping creators and publishers manage their content, track performance, and connect meaningfully with their audiences on Facebook. The new experience offers the same actionable insights and meaningful engagement metrics, all from the ease of a mobile device.”
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Snapchat Adds ‘Ground Transformation’ AR Effects, Showcasing Evolving AR Capacity
Snapchat has launched a new ‘Ground Transformation’ AR effect, which, as it sounds, can change the ground in your Snap camera view into water or lava, or other variations. As explained by Venture Beat, the new option utilizes Snapchat’s evolving AR tools to create the visual effect: “The real-time ground segmentation system uses machine learning models to understand geometry and semantics, isolating obviously ground-based objects from contrasting backgrounds.” Snap has used similar in the past for sky segmentation, isolating specific elements in your field of view through advanced visual understanding.
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Marketing
3 Tips for Optimizing Paid Social Campaigns for Seasonality
Planning your paid social campaigns well ahead of your peak periods — whether seasonal, holiday or promotional — help ensure you hit your goals. Michelle Stinson Ross, marketing operations director at Apogee Results, offered tips on how advertisers can get the most out of seasonal social ads at SMX West in San Jose last week. As part of a deep focus on digital commerce marketing, speakers discussed ways social commerce and shoppable media are transforming the way online retailers approach digital marketing.
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Competition Forces Retailers to Rethink the Role of Branded, Non-Branded and Trademark Traffic
When it comes to Google Ads, most retail marketers are interested in a single KPI – return on ad spend. To increase ROAS, some marketers devote the majority of their ad spend to high-converting, branded traffic. While a focus on efficiency still serves retail marketers well today, it’s more difficult to improve ROAS than ever. That is because investing primarily in low-funnel, branded traffic limits reach to the shoppers who already know your brand. This customer pool is both finite and shrinking. Google Ads is also saturated with competition and constantly changing. Players including Amazon and Walmart are buying up the SERP and often outbid other retailers on their most lucrative keywords and products. Dwindling real estate for organic ads creates additional pressure to spend more to remain competitive. To combat these challenges, retail marketers must adopt a more holistic approach to Google Ads. It’s important to understand how to acquire new customers and continue to retain existing ones by targeting diverse traffic types.
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Daily Minute Master Series – February 24, 2020.
/by Samantha ShapiroSocial Media
LinkedIn Lets Users Showcase Samples of Work on Their Profiles
A new addition to LinkedIn profiles will allow users to highlight samples of their work for others to see. In this new ‘Featured’ section, users can include work samples such as: LinkedIn posts that you’ve created or re-shared. Articles that you’ve authored and published on LinkedIn. Links to external websites, for example your personal blog or portfolio. Media that you can upload, for example your images, documents, presentations, and videos.
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Facebook Tests Format for Separate Facebook Stories Discovery Page
Every time Facebook tries out another Facebook Stories addition, a part of me does feel like its a bit Regina George. But Facebook is certain that Stories are the future of social sharing, and the way more users are heading – and it has the stats to prove that more people are, in fact, using Facebook Stories every day. Whether that’s because Facebook is so dedicated to pushing the feature or people are proactively adopting the option is difficult to say – but this week, Facebook has continued its onward march with Facebook Stories by testing out a new format for its separate Stories discovery page, which you can access by tapping on the ‘See All Stories’ prompt underneath the main Facebook Stories bar.
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Marketing
Introducing the Periodic Table of Digital Commerce Marketing
If you’re a retailer or manufacturer of goods sold online, you may be overwhelmed by the new digital marketing opportunities popping up nearly every day. Whether it’s new Google Shopping campaign options, shoppable posts on social media, or advertising opportunities on Amazon or Walmart, there have never been more ways to market products online. And, of course, each option has its variations, its pros and cons and its emerging best practices. Today at our SMX West conference in San Jose, Marketing Land editor-in-chief Ginny Marvin unveils a new resource to help you get a handle on this rapidly-growing space — the Periodic Table of Digital Commerce Marketing. In the same way our other periodic tables make sense of SEO, paid search and email deliverability and optimization, this fantastic resource pulls together and organizes an astonishing amount of information. Plus, it’s darned good looking and makes for handsome wall decor.
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InVideo’s AI-Powered Editor Automates Video Creation Process
The video creation platform InVideo has released a video editing tool that uses artificial intelligence to automate the video creation process. InVideo’s “Intelligent Video Assistant” comes with real-time design suggestions on font choices, animations and color palates, and an auto-correct assistant feature to avoid technical design mistakes. “Our Grammarly-like editor means no more time wasted over common technical mistakes or frustrating visual design decisions. We’re using AI to automate the entire video-making process,” said InVideo CEO Sanket Shah in a release announcing the tool. InVideo’s new video-editing tool includes: Video-formatting capabilities for Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube and WhatsApp. A video and picture library with more than 3,000 designs and premium templates. Subscription pricing range from $10 to $30 a month.
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Daily Minute Master Series – February 21, 2020.
/by Samantha ShapiroSocial Media
Are Twitter Stories Coming? The Company Buys Stories App Developer Chroma Labs
Twitter has acquired Chroma Labs, the company behind the Chroma Stories app — a short-form video and photo creation tool that offers Stories templates and filters for creating Stories on various social sites. Twitter confirmed the Chroma Labs team will join Twitter’s product, design, and engineering teams. “Their expertise in creative tools that help people connect and share completely align with our work to serve the public conversation,” said Twitter VP of Design and Research Dantly Davis in a Tweet.
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Facebook Tests Easier Access to Chronological News Feed and Other Feed Sorting Options
Facebook’s infamous News Feed algorithm has helped the platform maximize engagement, and boost time spent in-app – but it’s also long been a major bugbear for many users. The complex algorithm, which aims to show users more content that they’re likely to be interested in, uses a range of factors in its equations, including when something is posted, how often you interact with the creator, what type of post it is, and more. That means that users generally see posts that are seeing higher levels of engagement appear closer to the top of their feeds. But is that a better experience? Would you be better off just seeing a feed of all the posts from all the people and Pages that you’ve chosen to follow in reverse chronological order – ala Facebook pre-2013?
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Marketing
Google to Highlight Image Licensing Information in Image Search Results
Google is beta testing a way for sites to highlight licensing information about content that appears in image search results. The changes to image search results include a small badge indicating a particular image is “licensable.” After clicking on the image to expand it, Google will show where the image can be licensed from. These changes aren’t live yet, but sites can begin preparing their content for it ahead of time and ensure their images are eligible to display licensing information. In order for content to display licensing information in Google Images, the site must be utilizing image license metadata. Metadata should be added to each licensable image on a site. Site owners can add the required metadata either with structured data or IPTC photo metadata. Further instructions, and exact code snippets, can be found in Google’s official developer document.
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What You Need to Know About Walmart Marketplace’s Sponsored Products
Originally created for a handful of select sellers, the Walmart Marketplace is actually 10 years old. It has slowly grown from there to 33,000 sellers today – with 10,000 sellers added in the last year alone. (For comparison, Amazon has more than 3 million sellers today.) This means that technically, competition is much lower for sellers, and advertising. The first step being that seller piece. There is an application process and sellers must pass through a few gate checks on the way, but if you’re currently selling on Amazon or eBay, chances are you’re fairly set up for this. If you’re not, this isn’t something to enter in lightly. You must be able to meet seller standards, which means retail readiness – and that is a whole other, lengthy post. There are a lot of great seller guides out there for Walmart specifically and for multi-marketplace selling (if you’re already on Amazon) sellers if you want to expand your reach.
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Daily Minute Master Series – February 20, 2020.
/by Samantha ShapiroSocial Media
Snapchat Launches ‘Swipe Up to Call’ Ads in the US
After launching its new ‘Swipe Up to Call’ ad option in the Middle East last December, Snap has announced that it will now offer the same to US businesses. As per Snap: “This new ad product will allow automotive businesses to scale test drives and feed their leads funnel. Real estate companies will have another strong tool to increase the reach and prospect volume by getting consumers to immediately call their sales representative to book an apartment showing. Restaurants will be able to use Swipe Up to Call to drive reservations and food orders.”
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Pinterest Publishes Data on Trending Searches by Women
Ahead of International Women’s Day 2020, Pinterest has this week published a new report which looks at trending searches among female users, and what they mean with respect to how the platform is being utilized by women. As explained by Pinterest: “As the global income of women reaches trillions of dollars, women are expected to control almost 75% of discretionary spending worldwide by 2028. These women are using Pinterest to find ideas for dinner, travel, home and family clothing choices. But, the how-tos and inspiration go beyond recipes, holidays and styling as women also use the platform for tips for buying their first home, traveling solo, and negotiating salary.”
For the full article click here
Marketing
YouTube is Testing a New Way for Creators to Make Money From Viewers
YouTube is currently testing a new form of monetization which lets creators earn money directly from viewers. With this new feature, viewers can support their favorite creators by purchasing “applause” on videos they enjoy. Applause is similar to purchasing SuperChats on live YouTube videos, with the key difference being that it can be purchased on any video at any time. Viewers receive nothing in return for purchasing applause, it’s simply designed as a way to personally support YouTube creators. Think of applause like a donation, in the sense that buyers get little more than the satisfaction of knowing they compensated a YouTuber for their work. Donations such as this are popular on platforms like Twitch, where donations account for a significant portion of revenue earned by streamers.
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What the Changes in the Google Partners Program Means for Agencies
Before we get started I want to make one thing clear: I would love nothing more than for Google Partners to be great. To be a thriving community of learning, trust, and credibility. For it to be a place where I can send employees to confidently learn fundamentals. To be a location that is helpful to both agencies and their clients. A program that helps everyone succeed with Google Ads. It would be more than welcomed, it is a need. The changes announced to the Google Partners program last week aren’t that. In fact, just when you thought the program couldn’t get worse, it had a “Hold My Beer” moment. Instead of positively changing the program to create and cultivate a community empowered to serve their clients, the new rules are soiled with sales initiatives that strong-arm agencies to do Google’s bidding – and to do so to the detriment of their clients.
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Daily Minute Master Series – February 19, 2020.
/by Samantha ShapiroSocial Media
22 Proven Ways to Get Followers on Instagram
When we write content, we labor over ideas, delivery, and optimization. It should be no different when we share photos and videos on a business or brand’s Instagram account. Take the time to brainstorm clever content ideas that align with seasons, holidays, your business’ upcoming events, and, most importantly, your overall traffic and sales goals. You can still be flexible and post spontaneously as ideas come to you, but having a library of ideas and a (tentative) schedule will keep you ahead of the game instead of scrambling for something to post. Depending on your business, you could potentially post several times a day or several times a week. Make a realistic goal and stick to it.
For the full article click here
Facebook Tests Easier Access to Chronological News Feed and Other Feed Sorting Options
Facebook’s infamous News Feed algorithm has helped the platform maximize engagement, and boost time spent in-app – but it’s also long been a major bugbear for many users. The complex algorithm, which aims to show users more content that they’re likely to be interested in, uses a range of factors in its equations, including when something is posted, how often you interact with the creator, what type of post it is, and more. That means that users generally see posts that are seeing higher levels of engagement appear closer to the top of their feeds. But is that a better experience? Would you be better off just seeing a feed of all the posts from all the people and Pages that you’ve chosen to follow in reverse chronological order – ala Facebook pre-2013?
For the full article click here
Marketing
Marketers Are Spending More on Data Management Platforms Than Operational Tech
Marketers are investing more of their budgets in databases and analytics management technology platforms than operational tech solutions like campaign and decision management tools, according to Merkle’s Q1 2020 Customer Engagement report, released Tuesday. The survey, which polled 400 U.S. and UK based marketers, found that 29% said theyspend more on management tech than operational tech, with another 29% reporting they invest only in management technology solutions versus spending on both.
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Google Ads Makes it Easy to Share Audience Lists Across Accounts
Google Ads is introducing an easier way for manager accounts to share audience lists across all accounts. Before today, sharing audience lists from manager accounts to sub-accounts would have required multiple steps to set up. Now, advertisers can simply opt-in via the settings panel. A new feature, called continuous audience sharing, is something advertisers can activate in their account settings as shown above. When opted in to continuous audience sharing, any remarketing lists created in a manager account will be automatically shared with all existing and future sub-accounts. Accounts can receive lists from multiple manager accounts, and you’ll still be able to control which audience lists are active. Sub-accounts cannot yet share audience lists with manager accounts, but that’s an option that will be available in the coming months.
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Daily Minute Master Series – February 18, 2020.
/by Samantha ShapiroSocial Media
25 Interesting Snapchat Facts You Need to Know
Snapchat isn’t just about keeping up with the Kardashians. Neither is it limited to sharing silly/cute/spontaneous selfies with friends, or stories of chocolate margaritas. Snapchat is more than all of that. In fact, if you use it strategically, it can be a powerful tool for marketing your brand. Sounds exciting, right? It is. But before you start marketing on Snapchat, you first need to know everything you can about the app. Why? Because you need to know who’s on Snapchat, how users behave, and what a successful Snapchat marketing campaign looks like. (Also, being a know-it-all is fun!)
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#SMTLive Recap: Social Media Auditing 101
If editing is the most important part of writing, then reporting and auditing is the most important part of social media marketing. Just like editing, analyzing your content’s performance on social is the only way to optimize. How else would you know how to improve your content if you don’t take some time to think critically about what you’ve created already? Because social media auditing is obviously so crucial to this industry, we wanted to open up the metaphorical floor to our #SMTLive audience on the topic. Reporting and auditing is a complicated and technical part of the job for anyone in social media, so we wanted to hear how our community on Twitter gets it done.
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Marketing
How Marketers Can Utilize Insights-Driven Marketing
Consumer demands are evolving quickly, and many marketers are turning to insights-driven marketing to stay ahead. This technique provides a new way for marketers to utilize insights from data analysis, collected through consumer interactions, to drive business performance, and optimize their overall digital marketing efforts. According to the Altimeter’s 2019 State of Digital Marketing report, many businesses are aiming to improve their data-driven marketing – 41% of companies report data analysis as the most-desired skill for new digital marketing hires.
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How to Use Location Data to Outsmart Competitors & Win Market Share
While location-based marketing is widely practiced, understanding and effectively using location-based audiences remains a challenge for small to mid-sized agencies and brands. Digital marketers are faced with a myriad of tools, jargon, and technology that makes what should be a straightforward process more complex than necessary. On February 12, I moderated a sponsored Search Engine Journal presented Dan Dillon, VP of Marketing at Reveal Mobile. Dillon shares tips on how marketers can use location data to acquire new customers and steal market share from competitors.
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