editor, Author at Mediastreet

In News

As marketplaces compete with Amazon on shipping, sellers are shouldering the burden

August 13, 2019 No Comments

As Amazon continues to set shipping expectations, competing marketplaces and platforms are racing to ensure their sellers don’t fall behind.

This week, Etsy became the latest marketplace to go all-in on free shipping, with an announcement that at the end of July, it will start ranking higher in search results U.S. sellers who offer free shipping and international sellers who offer free shipping on U.S. orders of $25 or more. In a video sent to sellers explaining the changes, Etsy said that it would feature items that ship free in its ads, through email marketing, social media and TV ads, and would provide educational tools that would help shops figure out a pricing strategy that helps them offer free shipping.

Etsy is a different type of marketplace than eBay or Amazon — it’s a place where customers go to buy one-off, handmade goods, usually from small businesses. But it’s not immune to the pressures that every marketplace is feeling to offer free and fast shipping, thanks to Amazon’s precedent. Etsy CEO Josh Silverman summed up the decision to Business Insider: “I don’t know that we ever win on shipping. We’ve just got to stop losing.” Etsy does not share how long it typically takes products from sellers on average to ship, but said during its third-quarter earnings call last November that about a third of products available on its site offered free shipping.

The most common way that marketplaces — ranging from ones that serve both big and small businesses like Amazon to second-hand markets like Poshmark — have historically tried to help their sellers offer cheaper shipping has been to try to negotiate discounted shipping rates for their sellers with the major carriers. But like Etsy, they’re now also prioritizing items that ship free in their search results.

Taking a cue from Amazon’s Fulfilled by Amazon network, companies like eBay and Shopify are also experimenting with adding fulfillment capabilities. Shopify announced at its annual Shopify Unite conference in June that it’s building its own fulfillment network, which for a fee will hold Shopify merchants’ inventory and handle shipping and delivery to customers within two days. Meanwhile, in January, eBay started inviting select sellers to participate in a pilot fulfillment program. An eBay spokesman said that in an email that around 70% of the products bought on eBay ship for free. Like Etsy will soon do, eBay said it does prioritize items that ship for free in its search results and offers sellers pricing tools to help them better figure out how to factor in shipping costs.

“Platforms and marketplaces are starting to take greater ownership over shipping,” Laura Behrens Wu, CEO and founder of Shippo, a multi-carrier software provider, said.

Free shipping is increasingly becoming table stakes. A 2018 survey of 1,400 shoppers from e-commerce fulfillment firm Dotcom Distribution found that 91% of those surveyed said that they were more likely to become repeat customers of a business that offered free shipping. Still, Andrew Lipsman, an e-commerce analyst with eMarketer, said that marketplaces have to be careful in taking “a carrot-and-stick approach” to encourage vendors to offer free shipping. They can’t take steps like prioritizing products with free shipping in search results without first giving sellers sufficient tools to help them get there, or sellers will feel like they’re being unfairly penalized.

Following Etsy’s announcement, the company hosted a Q&A for sellers that was flooded with complaints. International sellers, in particular, were upset that Etsy had made the change before rolling out a tool that would show them how many of their customers come from the U.S. — though Etsy said that it was working to make that data more readily available. And sellers of bulkier items felt that the decision unfairly penalized them, because shipping costs can vary more greatly for heavy items.

“I think the initial reaction from a lot of sellers is they feel like that burden is going to fall solely on them,” said Lipsman.

Behrens Wu said that it’s critical for marketplaces who want to push their vendors to offer free shipping to try to educate them on how to build it into their margin structures — particularly small-business owners, who might never have been taught how to do so and don’t have the resources.

Building out fulfillment centers that merchants can store their products in, like Shopify is now doing, is the most straightforward way to ensure that products can be shipped in the same number of days almost every time, and if not for free, that customers can at least expect to pay the same for shipping every time. But it comes at a huge logistical cost for the company — Shopify said it would spend $1 billion building out its fulfillment network. Still, it may be a bitter pill that other marketplaces will have to swallow.

“Free shipping is the most important driver of conversion,” Lipsman said.

By Anna Hensel

Sourced from DIGIDAY

In News

Google’s latest attempt at a social network is called Shoelace and it wants to connect more people in real life

August 13, 2019 No Comments

By Nick Bastone

Google is making another go at a social network.
Named Shoelace, the app aims to be a hyperlocal social network for people looking to connect with others (in real life) at events and nearby activities. It sounds a little bit like Nextdoor, the local social network.
“The whole premise of Shoelace is to tie people together based on their interests — like two laces on a shoe,” the team says.
For now, the Android and iOS versions are invite-only and available only in New York City.
Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.

After shutting down Google+ in April, Google is making another go at a social network.

Named Shoelace, the app aims to be a hyperlocal social network for people looking to connect with others (in real life) at events and nearby activities. On its website, the team says, “the whole premise of Shoelace is to tie people together based on their interests — like two laces on a shoe.”

These events — fittingly referred to as “loops” within the app — might include things like playing ping pong at a local bar or watching comedy at an open mic night. The idea seems somewhat like Meetup— get people together who share in common interests and maybe walk away with a new friend, or two.

In fact, on its site, the Shoelace team says the app is great for people who have recently moved to a new city or for those looking to meet people who live nearby, which also makes it seem a little bit like local social networks like Nextdoor.

Screen Shot 2019 07 11 at 10.28.26 AM — Shoelace app

Shoelace is a product of Google’s internal startup incubator, known as Area 120. For now, the Android and iOS versions are invite-only within “select communities” and available only in New York City.

A Google spokesperson told Business Insider on Thursday: “One of the many projects that we’re working on within Area 120 is Shoelace, an app that helps people meet others with similar interests in person through curated activities. Like other projects within Area 120, it’s an early experiment so there aren’t many details to share right now.”

The tech giant hasn’t necessarily had the strongest track record when building social networks (Orkut, Google Buzz, and Google+ are all defunct), but with Shoelace, the intentions, at least, seem promising. Getting more people to interact with one another offline has become less common in a sea of other social networks.

Get the latest Google stock price here.

Feature Image Credit: Google CEO Sundar Pichai Stephen Lam/Reuters

By Nick Bastone

Sourced from Business Insider

In News

Facebook Explains World Of Ad Tracking And It’s Complicated AF

August 13, 2019 No Comments

By Karissa Bell

Facebook is trying to shine a light on one of the more confusing aspects of the advertising industry: how webs of seemingly unrelated companies use your data to serve ads.

The social network is updating its advertising settings to make it a bit easier to see how advertisers are getting your information, why you’re targeted for specific ads, and how to opt out of them.

To make this happen, Facebook is making a couple updates. The most notable change are new sections in Facebook’s advertising preferences that lets you see exactly how companies wind up with your info.

The first section, labeled “advertisers who have uploaded a list with your information and advertised to it,” includes businesses you’ve frequented (either online or IRL) that have uploaded your information to Facebook.

The second section, called “businesses who have uploaded and shared a list with your information,” might be more surprising. These are the so-called data brokers — firms you’ve likely never heard of that buy large swaths of data about people that businesses are able to use for targeted advertising. (Check out BuzzFeed’s story for more details on how these companies operate.)

While these companies are well-known in the ad industry, it’s not something that the typical social media user had much visibility into until now. But with Facebook’s new tool, you can see exactly how a company with a name like “3Q Digital” or “LiveRamp” has used your info to show you targeted ads from seemingly unrelated companies.

Facebook's new settings page lets you see how data brokers share your info for other companies' targeted advertising. — Facebook’s new settings page lets you see how data brokers share your info for other companies’ targeted advertising.

It’s not a perfect explanation, but it at least exposes the relationships retailers and others have with these firms.

Additionally, Facebook is making it easier to see more about why you’re being shown a given ad. Now, when you select “Why am I seeing this ad?” on a post in your News Feed, you’ll get a more detailed look at why you’re being targeted with that particular ad. This includes Facebook’s infamous ad “categories,” the seemingly random group of interests, locations, and activities Facebook guesses are relevant to you based on your use of the service.

The updated “Why am I seeing this ad?” page will also let you dive into your ad settings to opt out of these categories. Facebook users have been able to do this for awhile now, but the setting is fairly buried so it’s likely not something most people check. Having it available directly from an ad might make it a little easier to get to.

Of course, all this disclosure still requires a good bit of clicking around to find. But, if you’re willing to make the effort, the new tools should at least help you understand how your information is getting passed around the internet, and why certain ads seem to be “following” you.

By Karissa Bell

Sourced from MASHABLE India

In News

12 Must-Have Skills for B2B Content Marketers

August 12, 2019 No Comments

By Joshua Nite

Scene from a dinner party:

“So, Josh, what do you do?”

“I’m in marketing.”

“Oh, like Mad Men? Ad campaigns and stuff?”

“No, it’s content marketing.”

“Oh, like the Wendy’s Twitter account?”

“…Sure… like that.”

I’ve had variations on the above conversation more times than I can count. I’ll usually leave it at “Wendy’s Twitter account” in the interest of changing the subject. No one has the patience for, “I write business-to-business content designed to help people do their jobs better, which also builds affinity for a client brand, with the end goal of influencing purchase decisions.”

So most people think I just write fun stuff all day, that it’s a purely creative job. But my fellow B2B marketers know better. Content marketing requires an incredibly diverse set of skills, and “innate writing ability” isn’t even the most important one.

Most people think I just write fun stuff all day, that it’s a purely creative job. But as my fellow #B2B marketers know, #contentmarketing requires a diverse set of skills. @NiteWrites Click To Tweet

Here’s my list of must-have B2B content marketing skills. If you’re looking to get into the career, fill out your team, or, say, hire a marketing agency, keep these in mind.

12 Must-Have B2B Content Marketing Skills

This list is divided into two categories: The “hard skills” that you learn through instruction, and the soft skills that rely more on personal development and human interaction.

Four Hard Skills

#1 – Search Engine Optimization
You don’t have to be a SemRushin’, Google Analytics wizard to be a content creator and strategist. But creating great content does require a solid understanding of modern SEO practices. You should know how to understand search intent, dig into ambiguous keywords, and create best-answer content that meets search demand.

#2 – Social Media Marketing
You may have a dedicated social media person or team, but content marketers should still know how to create compelling B2B social posts that attract attention without breaking the brand voice. You should be up to date on what type of content performs best on each platform.

#3 – Influencer Marketing
Content marketers should know how to co-create content with influencers. That means writing a framework that allows for collaboration, asking the right questions to guide influencer responses, and even conducting intelligent interviews. Content marketers’ expertise makes all the difference in the resulting content feeling cohesive and compelling.

#4 – Measurement
Measurement is what turns content into content marketing. Content marketers should be able to strategize, create goals and metrics that match them, track progress, and ultimately optimize over time.

Eight Soft Skills

#1 – Empathy
The heart and soul of any content marketing is empathy. You have to be able to take the customer’s perspective and make a human connection. Empathy is even more important in B2B content, because it keeps the content focused on people.

It’s easy to lose the human connection when you’re writing about container-based software-as-a-service platforms. That empathy for the people, the buyer, the end user, should be what drives the content.

That empathy for the people, the buyer, the end user, should be what drives the content. @NiteWrites Click To Tweet

#2 – Creativity
I would argue B2B content requires even more creativity than B2C. The difference is having to work within strict limitations. Big B2B brands have whole departments concerned with brand reputation, brand voice, standards and practices, approved image libraries and fonts… Content creators have to produce something eye-catching and meaningful without breaking any of these limitations. And they have to know when it makes sense to push the boundaries.

#3 – Communication
The success of B2B content depends on explaining complex concepts in simple terms. You may know all the ins and outs of your solution, but odds are your audience won’t. Clear, jargon-free, conversational writing that offers value is the only way to succeed.

#4 – Organization
This skill is important for any B2B marketer, but especially if you work at an agency. We’re working on a dozen different clients at any one time, each with multiple assets in various stages of development. Without organizational skills, it would be impossible to get everything done on time (even with a dedicated project manager on staff).

#5 – Motivation
I read recently about a man who had been on the payroll of a major corporation for over a year without ever doing any work. Seriously. Somewhere between restructuring and management turnover, he simply got separated from responsibility without losing his salary.

via GIPHY

That won’t ever happen for a B2B content marketer. There’s nowhere to hide: We’re responsible for concrete, quantifiable, and quality deliverables. There’s no such thing as slacking off, and there’s no such thing as writer’s block. The ability to push past obstacles, buckle down and get the work done is vital.

#6 – Confidence
Part of the job description is defending and explaining your work to stakeholders. For an agency, that includes account managers and clients. For a marketing department, that might include the executive suite, too. B2B content marketers need the (justified) confidence to advocate for content and approach they know will be effective.

#7 – Humility
The flip-side of confidence is the ability to put the content ahead of one’s individual ego. B2B content is bound to go through layers of review, with each stakeholder adding their own critique and suggestions. Humility means that you can take in constructive criticism and apply it with an eye toward producing the best content possible. While confidence is key, knowing your way doesn’t have to be the only way is equally important.

#8 – Collaboration
Finally, B2B content marketing is a team sport. It’s not about making a name for yourself — you have blog posts for that. It’s about partnering across areas of specialty to create something stunning. I found that my content got even better when I involved the design team from the start, for example. Working closely with design, SEO, influencer and social specialists only makes the work better. Here’s a shot of the gang I get to work with every day:

B2B Content Marketing Is a Game of Skill

I’ll admit it: Before I got into the field, I thought content marketing was just getting paid to write all day. Now I know there’s a lot more to the job than just filling buckets with prose. Content marketers are writers, strategizers, empathizers, collaborators, and so much more.

By Joshua Nite

Sourced from TopRank Marketing

In News

Infographic – Top B2B Influencer Marketing Trends for 2020 and Beyond

August 12, 2019 No Comments

Sourced from TopRank Marketing

While there are some who think the expression “influencer” is an expired term, the role of influence on B2B buying decisions is irrefutable.

According to the World Federation of Advertisers, 65% of multinational brands will increase influencer marketing spending in the next 12 months and there’s good reason for increased confidence: The 2019 Content Preferences Survey from DGR reports 95% of respondents favor credible content from industry influencers as a top preference, a 30% increase compared year over year.

Not only is influencer marketing one of the fastest growing areas of our marketing agency, it’s one of the disciplines where we are seeing trend setting marketing performance.

For companies operating in the B2B space, here are 7 influencer marketing trends worth digging in to for 2020 and beyond:

Sourced from TopRank Marketing

In News

Shattering Ad Targeting’s Glass Ceiling

August 12, 2019 No Comments

By Rachel Gantz

“Data-Driven Thinking” is written by members of the media community and contains fresh ideas on the digital revolution in media.

Today’s column is written by Rachel Gantz, SVP, commercial, at Comscore.

Time’s up. #MeToo. Equal pay. This is the world many of us proudly live in.

Gender identity and norms have become more fluid and expansive – and they are often at the forefront of discussions across industries.

As a participant in the advertising ecosystem, I believe that today’s environment begs the question: Is advertising doing its part to keep up with the gender conversation? Isn’t advertising supposed to be aspirational and fill the needs we don’t even know we have? How can a successful ad guide me to my next car, or help me select my next roll of paper towels if it doesn’t reflect our modern-day collective experience?

As brands look to adapt to today’s environment and pivot their businesses to engage the next generation, it has become critically important to understand shifts in gender constructs and identity.

Thirty-five percent of Generation Z says they personally know someone who uses gender-neutral pronouns like “they” and “them,” according to Pew Center of Research, compared to 25%, 16% and 12% percent for millennials, Generation X and baby boomers, respectively.

There has been much discussion about inclusive creatives and how gender should be represented or depicted in advertisements. But what about the data used to target those creatives? How can brands refine their targeting strategies to effectively reach audiences in this new era?

And furthermore, what does this mean for data providers? What responsibility do data providers bear to help move the conversation forward?

Inclusivity in ad targeting

While gender constructs are certainly evolving as a whole, it’s clear that the advertising industry isn’t quite ready to retire basic demographic targeting, and there are several examples we can point to as evidence. Comscore data shows, for example, that 88% of consumers shopping for a BMW X7 are male, and 73% of buyers of baby goods are female.

Demographic targeting – at least today – is far from irrelevant, and for some goods it continues to be an important part of a successful ad targeting strategy. However, it’s imperative for brands to recognize today’s rapidly-changing world and that consumers are no longer defined solely by their age and gender; they’re a collection of interests, preferences, behaviors and affinities.

Saying goodbye to outdated stereotypes

Already, we see emerging trends that defy traditional stereotypes. Per Comscore data:

Only 55% of video game console and accessory buyers are male, defying the accepted thinking that gamers and the surrounding markets are nearly all men.
Forty-one percent of visitors to sports sites are female, even though the common perception is that men consume most sports content.
Nearly half of social media site visitors are older than 45, despite conventional wisdom that younger generations are power users of social media.

If you’re targeting based on assumptions and preconceived notions, you’re likely missing out on a large group of in-market, high-value consumers. At best, this simply results in wasted spend. At worst, mistargeted creatives could annoy and even offend particular groups, possibly damaging a brand.

It’s clear that the currency of decades past is no longer sufficient in today’s climate. Brands, agencies and data providers must pivot quickly to a more comprehensive, advanced and inclusive set of targeting criteria.

The targeting for many industries must go beyond age and gender. The advancement of behavioral-based targeting audiences furthers this cause and deserves more buy-side attention.

But how can brands and agencies do that successfully when they are faced with hundreds of demographic data providers and thousands of targetable audiences in any DSP or DMP? Blaming brands and agencies for not digging in deeper on what data they use and settling for cheap alternatives is easy, but it’s just as much on data providers to hold themselves to a better standard.

Inclusivity and quality amid targeting clutter

Our industry is undergoing a reckoning of purging low-quality targeting data (finally). Recently, Oracle Data Cloud announced a set of premium data partners (Disclosure: Comscore is included). Even the Interactive Advertising Bureau is getting involved, as evidenced by their new data label initiative. This is critical not only for the betterment of the industry but is also a key driver for more inclusive advertising.

While these are important first steps, more is needed.

If a brand wants to target a baseball fan, it should be able to target a baseball fan, and not just a man (this from an avid female sports fan).

When our family and friends ask what we do for a living, instead of saying “we keep the internet free,” perhaps it’s time to say, “We keep it free, relevant – and, most importantly – inclusive.”

Follow Comscore (@Comscore) and AdExchanger (@adexchanger) on Twitter.

By Rachel Gantz

Sourced from ad exchanger

In News

LinkedIn goes niche

August 9, 2019 No Comments

By Sara Fischer

LinkedIn announces algorithm changes made over the past 12-18 months to favour conversations in its Feed that cater to niche professional interests, as opposed to elevating viral content, its executives tell Axios.

The big picture: News feeds that were fundamentally built to connect one voice to many are struggling to deliver on value as communication trends move to more personal and ephemeral conversations.

Driving the news: Users may have noticed that their notifications or engagements on LinkedIn have increased lately.

LinkedIn has done this in part, because internal research found that participation wasn’t even across the platform, and that much of the attention in on LinkedIn was skewed towards the top 1% of power users, according to Tim Jurka, Director of Artificial Intelligence at LinkedIn.

Changes include:

Elevating content that users are most likely to join in conversation, which typically means people that users interact with directly in the feed through comments and reactions, or people who have shared interests with you based on your profile.
Elevating a post from someone closer to a users’ interests or network if it needs more engagement, not if it’s already going viral.
Elevating conversations with things that encourage a response (like opinions commentary alongside content), as well as posts that use mentions and hashtags to bring other people and interests into the conversation and elevating posts from users that respond to commenters.
Elevating niche topics of conversation will perform better than broad ones. (When it comes to length, LinkedIn says its algorithm doesn’t favour any particular format, despite rumours that it does.)

Be smart: If this sounds familiar, it’s because LinkedIn is the latest social network to change its feed algorithm to get people to engage more, instead of just passively scroll through the app and website.

Facebook began talking about changes it was making to its News Feed to favour posts from close friends over brands and publishers in 2018.
Snapchat separated social from media on its app in 2017 to keep conversations intimate among friends.

Why it matters: Higher-quality engagement matters because its often more attractive to advertisers, according to Pete Davies, Head of LinkedIn Feed Product.

“Member engagement is at an all-time high, driven by record levels of engagement in the feed and content being shared,” says Davies. “LinkedIn Marketing Solutions revenue is up 46% year-over-year.”
Last year, Axios reported that LinkedIn planned to bring in $2 billion from its marketing solutions business.

Between the lines: LinkedIn has been hinting at this for a while.

Audience development managers tells Axios that LinkedIn editors have been asking publishers to have their reporters share content to boost posts from authoritative individuals, as opposed to having content come from brands directly.

Feature Image Credit: Photo by studioEAST/Getty Images

By Sara Fischer

Sourced from AXIOS

In News

How to Market an Event: 15 Event Marketing Tips

August 9, 2019 No Comments

By Michael Brenner

A well-planned promotional strategy is vital for a successful event. These event marketing tips will help you get the word out about your event, reach the right audience, and build buzz for your conference, trade show, or corporate event in the run-up to its launch.

Quick Takeaways

An integrated marketing strategy is essential to maximize attendance and build buzz in the run-up to your event.
You should use a combination of content marketing, social media, email marketing, and video and podcast marketing in order to get the best results.
Marketing should start several months before your event and continue during and after the event, especially if you’ll be running it regularly.

1. Setup a Website for Your Event

While you can just put a basic landing page and contact form on your existing website, setting up a standalone website for your event means you can focus your branding and SEO efforts on the event itself.

Make sure you come up with a memorable domain name and build the design around clear CTAs that funnel visitors to a registration page.

2. Use Pop-ups on Your Site

Pop-ups may be controversial but there’s no denying that they can boost your conversion rate. Putting a pop-up on your website makes sure that visitors find out about your event and you can direct them to your dedicated site or landing page.

3. Include Guest Speaker Pictures and Bios

Popular speakers can be a huge draw for your event. Make sure you include a speaker page that includes photos of your guest speakers as well as their credentials, experience, and why they’re qualified to speak at your event.

4. Create Videos Showcasing Your Event and Speakers

Videos can be a highly effective form of event marketing, particularly when distributed across social networks like YouTube and Facebook.

You can easily put together a basic video to generate enthusiasm for your event using shots of the venue, details of the schedule, and footage of past events if you’ve run them before.

You can also use individual videos to showcase your speakers, including clips of them speaking. This can also set the mood, showing attendees what they can expect at the presentation.

5. Use Email to Market to Your List

Email can be one of the most effective marketing channels if you already have a list of loyal followers.

Start your email campaign several months before the event by announcing early bird ticket prices and the speaker lineup. You should continue sending emails regularly as the event approaches, with reminders about deadlines on discounted tickets and a finalized schedule and the last push for registrations a few days before the event.

6. Create a Hashtag for Your Event

Before you start promoting your event on social media, choose a hashtag that’s short and easy to remember and use it on every post.

This helps people looking for information about the event find all relevant posts easily, and it’s also a great way to boost engagement and buzz in the run-up to and during the event.

7. Rebrand Your Social Media Profiles for Your Event

The banner graphics on your Facebook and Twitter pages are great places to show off your event and make sure the dates, hashtag, and website are always prominent.

If your event is very large, you may want to consider setting up separate social media accounts for the event. This provides a place for attendees to engage prior to the event and is a handy way to distribute news and updates as you approach the launch day.

8. Blog About Your Event

Writing blog posts about your upcoming event is an easy way to increase interest and push for registrations. It also helps to improve your SEO and attract a new audience who may be interested in attending.

Publish posts regularly in the run-up to your event. They don’t have to be detailed articles – just quick updates to the schedule and guest speaker profiles are enough to keep your readers interested and boost engagement.

9. Utilize Influencer Marketing

Inviting influencers in your industry to your event can be a great way to reach a wider audience and boost registration.

Having influencers at your event can also help greatly to promote it, particularly if you plan to run a regular event. Make sure you choose a photogenic venue and encourage attendees to post on social media with photos and live video during the event to get the most out of influencer marketing.

10. Create an Affiliate Program

As well as offering free entry and other perks, an affiliate program can be an effective way to encourage influencers to write and post about your event.

Create a unique promotion code for each partner that offers a discount on registration. Each person signed up for your affiliate scheme can then use this code when they post about the event on social media. Promotional codes not only encourage more people to sign up (everyone loves a bargain) but they also enable you to track who is generating the most referrals. You’ll pay a referral fee to your partners for each ticket sale they generate.

11. Write a Press Release

Distributing a press release about your event is the most effective way to get it picked up by media sites and news portals.

Journalists are more likely to use your press release if you can find a unique, newsworthy angle. Make sure to include all relevant dates, details of speakers, and how readers can register for the event.

You can also invite journalists and local media to your event and offer extra opportunities such as an interview with a guest speaker.

12. Use Paid Ads

PPC ads targeting keyword terms on search engines like Google and paid advertisements on social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram can also be a good way to increase awareness of your event and attract more registrations.

Social media advertising, in particular, enables you to target your ads to individual markets, and you can even retarget those who have visited your event website but haven’t bought a ticket yet.

13. Be Interviewed on Relevant Podcasts

Podcast interview marketing can be a fantastic way to build buzz about your event in certain industries. Some studies show that traffic from podcast interviews converts 25x better than blog traffic.

You can also encourage your guest speakers to be on podcasts, talking about their own work and brand, and mentioning your event.

Another option is to sponsor podcast episodes. With this paid method of advertising, the podcast host will introduce and talk about your event before launching into the main topic of the podcast. This can be particularly effective if you offer a promotional code for discounted registration to podcast listeners.

14. Optimize SEO on Your Event Website

Making your event landing page or website friendly to search engines is vital for attracting visitors who may not already know about your event and brand.

Optimizing for terms such as the topic and location of your event is essential as people looking for events like yours will be typing these terms into the search engine. For example: “digital marketing conference Florida” or “baby product trade show Chicago”.

Make sure to include your SEO keywords in the title and headings of your website, and add as much content as you can to create more opportunities for attracting search engine traffic.

15. Submit Your Site to Industry Websites and Directories

Many industry websites include a calendar or list of upcoming events that may be of interest for their followers, for example: Smashing Magazine’s directory of web design conferences.

These lists are often well established and have strong SEO, so it makes sense to get your event listed on as many of them as possible.

Content Marketing for Events

Need help with content marketing for your next event? If you are ready to get more traffic to your site with quality content that’s consistently published, check out our Content Builder Service. Set up a quick consultation, and I’ll send you a free PDF version of my books. Get started today and generate more traffic and leads for your business.

By Michael Brenner

Sourced from Marketing Insider Group

In News

How I Grew My Dying Facebook Traffic

August 9, 2019 No Comments

By Neil Patel

Is it me, or does Facebook just want to keep you on Facebook?

Every time I post a link to my site, I get less and less traffic. And it’s been this way for years.

In other words, my organic reach on Facebook was dying.

And to make matters worse, they give you hope every time they launch a new feature.

For example, when they launched Facebook Live, you used to be able to get tons of views because they promoted it organically… but not really anymore.

The same goes with Facebook Watch. I used to easily get 30,000 plus views per video when Facebook Watch came out… again, not anymore.

Now I am lucky to get 10,000 views.

But hey, I can’t really hate on Facebook. They are a business and they have to do what’s best for them. So instead of getting upset at Facebook, I decided to run some tests to see if I could find a way to get more organic traffic.

Because there has to be a way, right?

Well, there is. 🙂

And here is my traffic from Facebook over the last 7 days:

facebook traffic

That may not seem like a big increase, but I generated 10,621 visitors the month before. In other words, I took my Facebook traffic from 10,621 visitors PER MONTH to 10,085 visitors PER WEEK.

I am getting roughly the same amount of traffic I used to get in 30 days from Facebook, now in just 7 days.

So how did I do this?

Taking control of your own destiny

As marketers, our faith typically relies on the big giants… you know, Google, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram…

If they decide to change their algorithms your traffic could go up, down, or stay flat.

For that reason, over the last few years, I’ve been building up marketing channels that aren’t as reliant on algorithms.

For example, you may learn about new blog posts I publish through my email lists because every time I publish a new post, I usually send out an email blast.

Or it could be through browser notifications.

subscribers

Every time I release a blog post or a video… again, I send a message out through push notifications.

But why can’t we do the same with Facebook?

Sure, you can post on your wall or page like everyone else, but if Facebook doesn’t want to show it to people they don’t have to.

So, I decided to push really hard on Facebook Messenger, which gives you the same ability.

In other words, you can send a direct message to everyone on Facebook through their chat feature and share a message or a link to your website.

Something that isn’t too controlled by an algorithm… similar to text messaging or email marketing.

I built this list of 129,560 Facebook Messenger contacts and leveraged them to continually generate traffic back to my blog.

Now before I break down the exact steps I took to do this, the tactics here take execution and elbow grease. It isn’t rocket science, it’s not hard to do, but it does take a bit of work.

But first, let’s go over how Facebook Messenger marketing works.

Facebook Messenger

grow facebook messenger list

First, let’s back up on why Facebook Messenger is working so well today.

Facebook Messenger open rates are 50-80% click-through rates post elite stats.

When you send an email campaign, you can expect a 20% open rate on a really good day. On average, I get 28 to 31% with my NeilPatel.com email list.

In other words, if you send your email newsletter to 100 people, 20 people will open it. If you scrub your list and work really hard like me, roughly 30 people will open it, which still isn’t great.

However, when you send a Messenger message to 100 people, 88 people will open it and read it.

We’re talking about an 88% open rate on Messenger. That is crazy!!!!

Now over time, you will notice that it will go down, but it is still substantially higher than email.

But here is where it really gets interesting.

With email marketing, you’ll typically see a 2% to a 4% click-through rate. So for every 100 emails you send, you will get 2 to 4 clicks back to your site.

To give you a benchmark, again, I spend a lot of time fine-tuning my emails and I can get about 6 clicks for every 100 emails I send.

Better than the 2 to 4 percent most people get, but still not life-changing.

With Messenger? You can get 20% click rates.

Over time, you will see it go down, but it is still substantially higher than email marketing.

And it is not just marketing, it works with pretty much any industry. Here’s an example of a real estate company that leverages Facebook Messenger:

As you can see from the screenshot above, Facebook Messenger works like how you would chat with a friend on Facebook or even email. You don’t always have to promote or link, you could just have a conversation with a friend.

This is why their adoption rate is continually climbing in the United States.

That’s almost 140 million users that are projected to use Messenger.

Messaging apps are also surpassing social networks in popularity. Just ask yourself… how many times do you use WhatsApp each week?

But the key is to start now because it will become saturated just like every other marketing channel that works. So whoever builds the biggest list early on will have the best shot of doing well in the long run.

If you are already leveraging Messenger, great, just skip to the tips below to start growing your Facebook traffic.

If you aren’t, just like email marketing you are going to need software so you can send the messages on Facebook. You can start off with this free software called MobileMonkey.

Now let’s get into how you can build your Messenger list and get consistent Facebook traffic.

Tactic #1: Website Messenger widget

My own tests have shown that chat on a website can boost conversions 45%.

So I wondered, what would happen if I installed a Messenger bot on a website?

What’s great about adding this is that visitors get answers to their questions immediately, 24/7. Say goodbye to conversion bottlenecks.

But also, everyone who starts a chat on the site becomes a new contact in my Messenger list.

So how does this work?

Add a Facebook Messenger bot to your website with a widget.

Everyone who visits your website is invited to become a Messenger contact. Website traffic turns into Messenger contacts.

Most users are already logged into Messenger on their desktop or device. So when they have questions or want info and see the Messenger widget, they tap it and boom — new Messenger contact.

If your site is on WordPress site like 34% of the world’s sites, a WordPress plugin called WP-Chatbot is the quickest way to add Facebook Messenger chat to your site.

Install the plugin on your WordPress site and you’ll have Messenger chat on your site in just a few minutes.

This widget makes list building easy. An active website could get hundreds or thousands of new contacts from the visitors on the site who engage the chatbot every day.

Think about yourself.

Are you more likely to search for a contact form on a site, fill it out, and sit back and wait who knows how long for an answer to your question?

Or are you more likely to pop open the chat window, ask your question, and get an immediate response?

Tactic #2: Run Facebook click to Messenger ads

You can do a lot without leveraging paid traffic, but if you really want to put some fuel on the fire, a few hundred dollars goes a long way.

And for the purpose of this blog post, I spent $391.58 just so I would have some stats to share with you. 🙂

Facebook Messenger ads are a Facebook Ad format in which the user who clicks on the ad is immediately added to your Messenger contact list as opposed to going to a landing page where they may bounce or exit, anonymously.

Everyone who clicks the button on the ad converts when they send the advertiser a message — becoming a permanent Messenger contact.

The key part is… they need to send the advertiser a message. In other words, if you don’t get them to send you a message they won’t be added to your Messenger contact list so you won’t be able to send blasts to them.

That’s why you want to use an autoresponder. If which you automatically start talking to each person to increase your chance that they will get added to your contact list.

Here’s an example of an ad:

How much will Facebook click-to-Messenger ads run you?

I personally haven’t scaled a campaign too large yet, but with a $391.58 test budget, I’ve been able to generate leads for roughly 62% less than traditional Facebook ads.

But again, the key with all of this is in the autoresponder. Without that, your numbers won’t be too great.

Within MobileMonkey, use the bot content builder to create the autoresponder to your Facebook Ad.

Then create a new Messenger ad in MobileMonkey to connect your autoresponder to your Facebook Ad.

Next, pick the autoresponder from a drop-down of all your bot dialogues and connect it to your Facebook Ads Manager account.

The result is a low-cost ad campaign that drives more contacts into your Messenger list.

Facebook Messenger ads work time and again across industries, including e-commerce and service businesses.

Now, if you are like me and you prefer to do things a bit more organically and save some money, here’s how you generate more contacts without spending money.

Tactic #3: Use organic Facebook post autoresponders

Growing your list with a little ad spend goes a long way, but this next list building power tactic is totally free.

Anyone who comments on your Facebook Page posts instantly becomes your Messenger contact.

A Facebook post autoresponder adds people to your Messenger contact list if they comment on any Facebook post.

Here’s how it works.

You post to your Facebook Business Page.
Someone comments.
A Messenger bot automatically responds and as soon as that person replies, they’ve become a contact in Messenger.

You can see an example of this tactic in action here:

The more engaging your Facebook post, the more likely it will be that people will want to comment on it.

These kinds of posts always get a ton of comments and contacts:

Quizzes
Contests
Riddles

You could ask fans to post a GIF in response to a question. “Describe your boss with a GIF.”

Or ask them to tell a story or ask them a question like “What industry are most of your clients in?”

Even just asking them “what do you do?” is super-engaging because people love to talk about themselves!

This store asks fans to name how many duck species are in the photo. Comment with your guess and get a discount code in the autoresponder follow-up.

You can create the Messenger dialog for this technique in MobileMonkey with the “FB Comment Guard” tool.

That feature is what allows you to add the autoresponder to an organic post.

I love this technique because it converts my hard-fought organic Facebook engagement into a list of contacts I can follow up with.

Tactic #4: Convert page fans into Messenger contacts

I’m a fan of cross-promoting, traffic-sharing, and allowing various marketing channels to build off each other.

After all, if someone follows you on one channel, they may want your updates on a different channel as well. This increases your odds of connecting with them and amplifying your content reach at any given time.

This tactic combines several methodologies for a boost to Messenger contacts.

If you’ve gone to the effort of building a robust Facebook page, you will want to convert these fans into Messenger contacts. Fans are great, but Messenger contacts are better because Messenger is personalized, interactive, one-on-one, and has way more visibility than Facebook News Feed.

Organic reach on Facebook is very low. Maybe 1%, of your fans on your Facebook Page will even see your post.

Using Facebook Messenger changes this. Instead of a low organic reach, you’re getting high-powered interactions that are personalized.

This is important because page fans aren’t automatically Messenger contacts. You have to invite them or connect with them in Messenger first.

Here are three ways to convert your Page fans into Messenger contacts.

First, and this one is pretty obvious, you can change the CTA button on your Facebook Page to “Send Message”.

Right now your Facebook Page CTA button might be sending traffic to your site with a button like “Learn More”.

Hover over the button until you see “Edit Button.” Then choose the option to “Contact you” and “Send Message.”

Customize the message that people will see when they click that button in MobileMonkey.

Boom. Now anyone who clicks the “Send Message” button from a Facebook Page will become a Messenger contact.

Second, create a Facebook Post Autoresponder (see tip #3).

This autoresponder was a simple invitation — Stay in touch! Sign up for Messenger updates.

Third, you can then use Page fan audience targeting of a click-to-Messenger Facebook Ad campaign.

Remember, your existing Page fans are more likely to take another step into more interaction with a brand that they know and trust.

Tactic #5: Turn your email subscribers into Messenger contacts

Email marketing has a low engagement rate.

Facebook Messenger has high engagement.

Would you rather send your content to your subscribers in a channel with a 2% click-rate or 20% click-through rate?

Ideally, you should do what I do and leverage them both.

Send your email list an invitation to join your Facebook Messenger list. Those who choose to do so will become email subscribers and Messenger subscribers, but their engagement level (and therefore your reach) will increase using Messenger.

One of the most effective marketing methods is to convert your existing contacts into more effective marketing channels.

Using MobileMonkey’s chatbot builder, you can create an opt-in page consisting of a quick and simple “Want to receive occasional updates?” invitation.

Link to that invitation anywhere you’d normally include a link.

Link to that invitation in a button, like the examples below.

And here:

Link to your Messenger experience in your:

Email signature
CTAs in blog posts
Business card in QR codes
Landing pages
Newsletter subscription forms

The list is as long as you are clever. And it works very well!

Conclusion

You are always going to deal with algorithms, but if you want more consistent traffic you need to take matters into your own hands.

Just look at me, I leverage email marketing, push notifications, and even Facebook Messenger marketing.

I’m now looking into leveraging text messaging too.

Sure, I leverage SEO, content marketing, paid ads, social media marketing… and every other major channel out there.

But I focus a large part of my efforts on controlling my own destiny and you can too.

If you haven’t started, start with Facebook Messenger. It works so well right now and I expect it to last for a while. The key is getting in on the right time and time is right now.

By Neil Patel

He is the co-founder of Neil Patel Digital. The Wall Street Journal calls him a top influencer on the web, Forbes says he is one of the top 10 marketers, and Entrepreneur Magazine says he created one of the 100 most brilliant companies. Neil is a New York Times bestselling author and was recognized as a top 100 entrepreneur under the age of 30 by President Obama and a top 100 entrepreneur under the age of 35 by the United Nations.

Sourced from https://neilpatel.com

In News

Carole Cadwalladr: the ad industry is ignoring Cambridge Analytica fallout

August 8, 2019 No Comments

By Rebecca Stewart

Prominent UK journalist Carole Cadwalladr, who led the reporting on Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica data scandal in 2018, has cautioned the advertising industry that it has a collective responsibility to tackle the issue of data misuse.

Speaking during an unscheduled event at Cannes Lions last week (20 June), the reporter called out the advertising ecosystem for its role in funding the platforms she accuses of undermining democracy – including Facebook – as well as a perceived lack of action in tackling the issue head-on.

“It’s really funny being here in the heart of the ad industry and seeing the yachts, the money and the beach clubs – while its central, central role in what’s going on here is being ignored,” she said.

Accusing the adtech yachts parked in Le Viex Port of “monetising a total surveillance apparatus” that was “exploiting [people] in invisible ways,” Cadwalladr said the lack of discussion around the issue on Cannes Lions’ main stage was “depressing”.

“In terms of responsibility, there’s something really key about Cannes Lions and the ad industry’s involvement in this,” she explained. “This is where the money is coming from. It is kind of depressing that there’s not a single talk happening in this entire week [about data misuse] with money swishing down through the streets.”

While there were talks hosted in the Cannes Palais around data and marketing technology, there were none with a specific focus on data misuse or ethics.

Cadwalladr said: “I know that individuals here are really troubled by what’s going on but as a collective industry level, it just seems to be that it’s being swept under the carpet.”

The Guardian and Observer journalist, who has been fiercely critical of Facebook, also called out chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg for attending the festival but failing to “give answers to MPs in parliament” about Cambridge Analytica.

“As far as I’m concerned, Facebook is a foreign company which represents a national security threat and it shouldn’t be anywhere near our elections,” she said.

Sandberg appeared on the main stage on the Wednesday of Cannes where she simply said it needed to be “clearer” about the way it uses data. She was also invited to speak at WPP’s Beach event where, in conversation with chief executive Mark Read, she admitted that Facebook had to “earn back” trust.

Hacking Nix’s Cannes appearance

In one of the most controversial events at Cannes, former Cambridge Analytica executive Alexander Nix had been scheduled to appear on the main stage on Thursday (20 June).

The headline event was billed as his first speaking appearance since the firm sunk into administration after allegedly harvesting Facebook user data to influence the outcome of the 2016 US presidential race.

However, Nix pulled out the day before he was due to appear following criticism from various corners of the industry – including one ad director who penned an anonymous letter to organisers, describing the inclusion of the exec on the programme as a “monumental act of self-harm.”

His withdrawal also followed on from Cadwalladr announcing she was to host her own event during the festival.

Gillian Tett, The Financial Times’ editorial board chair and US editor at large, had been due to chair the discussion with Nix on “the morality of data” but instead found herself hosting Cadwalladr’s ‘Great Hack’ event with BBC journalist Jamie Bartlett in which they screened a documentary taking a deeper look into the Cambridge Analytica data scandal.

Tett said she had hoped her conversation with Nix was going to be a way to focus the topic of data misuse that was lacking throughout the festival, and get answers to some of the “bigger, more existential” questions.

She detailed how Nix had been “on and off” and “back and forth” with her in the weeks before Cannes Lions, finally withdrawing from the appearance.

“I’m not sure as to why he pulled out – you’d have to ask him,” she asserted. “We’ve been up and down and round the blocks on that one, he’s been cross with me, then not cross with me and there’s stuff I’ve written he doesn’t like.”

Discussing the practical ways in which the ad industry could help ensure people got real value in handing their data over to advertisers, Bartlett – who covered the use of data and tech in the 2016 elections – said GDPR was too reliant on consumers issuing companies with requests.

“People need to be aware of what they’re trading and what they’re getting back in return. At the moment it’s very one-sided and not very informed,” he said.

“People have no idea, they give away their data for a good Google search result or product recommendation, but they don’t know what the scale of that trade is because they don’t see what’s on the other side of it and they don’t fully understand who is going to misuse it in future.”

Bartlett said he wanted people to make informed choices about when they give their data away and for it to be as easy as possible for them to get it back.

He suggested that the advertising industry had the power to build the technology that could allow people to do just that – bundling up consumer data and repackaging it in a way that it could be sold, with both parties getting a share of the profit.

“We need the private sector to incentivise people to make money out of their own data. You can’t do it on your own, it’s not valuable but it is if you do it collectively. It will take decades for that to happen, the culture needs to change.”

As well as the Nix controversy, Cannes Lions 2019 was disrupted by protesters from climate change activist group Extinction Rebellion, who crashed spots like the Palais and Facebook beach, urging the ad industry to act on the climate and ecological emergency facing the world.

With a heavy theme of brand purpose and business for good running throughout the week, the lack of interest from ad execs in supporting the group’s mission has been lamented as “hypocrisy” by Extinction Rebellion’s team and other industry commentators.

Feature Image Credit: Cadwalladr called out the advertising ecosystem for its role in funding the platforms she accuses of undermining democracy / TED/YouTube

By Rebecca Stewart

Sourced from The Drum