Interest targeting enables targeting by 350 interest categories and @usernames
Importance: [rating=3]
Recommended link: Twitter advertising blog
The Twitter advertising blog has announced an improvement to targeting of its Promoted Tweets advertising which takes it closer to Facebook’s targeting options. Dubbed “interest targeting”, there are two options for targeting:
1. Targeting by 350 interest categories
Broad categories of interest can be targeted using selection from these categories:
2. Targeting by @username
Although the category-based targeting was most widely covered, more intriguing is the targeting by @username. This looks more useful for micro-targeting since you can create a custom segment based on related brands and celebrities. It’s similar to the Facebook feature to target ads according to the Likes of users. Note though, that this does not enable you to target specific users. Twitter explains:
“Custom segments let you reach users with similar interests to that @username’s followers;…
It depends whether you're content sharing or starting conversation
With so much written about the importance of marketing automation these days, the argument has touched on social media many times.
It makes sense too as social media becomes more important, we want to use social media more within our personal or brand marketing, so in turn we want to make that a good investment. Born from the world of email marketing automation of years ago, we now have products like Eloqua, Marketo and Genius, as well as smaller players such as Office Autopilot, all of which can enable large scale automation.
So can social media marketing be automated?
Of course it can - most importantly within Facebook and Twitter - Hootsuite is probably the best tool to use, and it's relatively cheap. Yet I have Scott Stratten's hilarious comment that that a unicorn is killed every time someone sends an automated tweet, I…
5 Steps to an effective SEO migration from an old to a new site
Whether it's upgrading hosting, improving your URL structure or simplifying information architecture upgrades to your web presence are inevitable for every company.
As more companies reach the limits of their current web investments, many are worried that significant change will impact their organic listings and SEO performance. I've even seen a company maintaining two websites, frightened that merging would reduce their organic rankings, even though it was near impossible for users to find anything.
Whether you are an in-house marketer or an agency specialist, in my experience if you are able to plan ahead and factor in SEO migration tactics to your project you will find a smooth transition. Often the very fact you engage with the search engines can provide improved rankings on the other side.
In this article I look at 5 tactics to help you in the…
A reminder about the importance of Google's 2012 Venice update and Google+ Local for local business services
Did you notice how, earlier in the year, the results Google produced for local queries changed dramatically to give even more prominence to local search? We thought it was worth a reminder, because quite a few companies we've spoken to weren't aware of this and it's really important as a potential source of leads if you have a local business.
The update was quite hidden in Google's February announcement of 40 search quality updates, which maybe explains why it didn't have prominence. The relevant part of this update explaining the differences to local search is:
“Improvements to ranking for local search results. [launch codename “Venice”]. This improvement improves the triggering of Local Universal results by relying more on the ranking of our main search results as a signal.
"Improved local results. We launched a new system…
An interesting compilation for email marketers working in B2C, B2B, Event, Charity or Ecommerce marketing
All email marketers like to know how their open and click rates compare, although it's really the conversion rates and value generated per email that's important (and more difficult to measure).
Here's a great piece of new research from email service provider Adestra that dissects engagement with email across sectors that I thought was worth summarising here. I'd recommend downloading a copy of the full report if you work in email marketing, lots of "food for thought".
Which subject line length works best?
The report starts by looking at engagement with the email based on length. The research, based on nearly a billion emails shows that short or long tend to work best.
Less than…
Showing how great content generates more backlinks AND social shares
Value: [rating=4]
Recommended link: SEOmoz post by DanZarrella
Dan Zarrella, the “social media scientist” who works for Hubspot these days, has created a lot of interesting analysis over the years which is great for giving practical ideas of how to improve social media communications - the infographic at the bottom of this post on what is effective in Facebook is one example.
He recently wrote a guest post on SEOmoz I thought was worth sharing since it gives some evidence to help answer the often-asked question - “(How) does Social media marketing support SEO?”
Of course, the number (and especially quality) of inbound links is vital to effective SEO in competitive markets, so this research looks at the correlation of sharing on the social networks with number of backlinks for content share. The results show some positive correlation:
…
HootSuite leading the way in the social media tools market even amongst large companies
Source: Royal Pingdom survey
Value: [rating=4]
Our Commentary
Recent data compiled and released by website monitoring business Pingdom looked at the top 100 brands in the world and which Social Media Management Tools (SMMT) they are using. While the survey reviewed Twitter, many of these tools support multiple social networks including Hootsuite, are service of choice at Smart Insights and First 10 (it support Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, but not yet Google+.
While a typical Twitter user would use the Twitter website or one of the Twitter owned applications to publish to their profiles, naturally businesses require a little more management. For example, they need multiple people to have access, the requirement to schedule & monitor results.
Most popular social media management tools & the companies that use them
HootSuite – 20 accounts (20.8%). Used by @hm, @tiffanyandco, @gap, @hp, @ebay, @porsche,…
Models, tools and tips to help with content curation
Online spaces like your website, blog, Facebook page and Twitter accounts need recent and relevant content to retain readers.
To stay ahead, your social footprint needs a regular supply of content. You can create original material or you can ‘curate’ content.
What is content curation?
The definition of the art of content curation is where the publisher (in our case a business looking to use content curation as part of content marketing) researches and gathers the best content on a niche topic that is aimed at a certain audience, all of which is relevant to their business, and then adds to this content personal opinions and expertise thus enhancing it.
Note that curation is not just repeating earlier information, but it’s about re-interpreting, re-telling or re-shaping earlier stories or images.
The personalisation makes…
Currently for big brands only
Importance: [rating=3]
Recommended link: Google employee announcement
Google Plus has announced via the G+ page of employee Saurabh Sharma that brands can now use specific URLs to promote their Google+ brand or company page via offline media. About time too! Although to be fair, it took Facebook and LinkedIn a while after launch to offer this for company or brand pages. It was certainly clunky before.
The vanity URL uses a "+" (what else?). For example, Toyota can now use this URL…
http://plus.google.com/+toyota
(which redirects to http://plus.google.com/+toyota/posts)
rather than…
https://plus.google.com/110937137992985950150
You can find out more details about this update via the post on Saurabh Sharma’s profile:
Marketing implications of this change for company Google+ pages?
Most companies will have to wait until Google announces further details to make…
By
09 Aug 2012
Generate a buzz with your marketing content by making it viral
Getting your content to "go viral" must appeal to every digital marketer, so I thought it would be worth sharing this recent viral video on successful viral marketing plus some tips on different types of viral "hooks".
The video talks about the history of online viral video and goes into detail about why and how they happen, as well as the impact viral videos are having on mainstream culture.
Lisa Romagnoli, Assistant Producer, Off Book says:
"whether rooted in comedy, spectacle, schadenfreude, cuteness, politics, performance, or deep meaning, the idea of viral videos, and the huge audiences they generate, have forever changed the values and potential impact of video online".
Six viral marketing hooks
I also noticed an interesting …
