Travis Bliffen says, “What a brand thinks they are doing right versus what they are actually doing right/wrong is often very different, as marketers can very easily focus their attention on metrics that don’t help them reach their goals. This is what Yes Lifecycle Marketing recently found to be the case in its survey of nearly 250 marketers at the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) conference in Oct. 2014. The survey found that 33 percent of marketers sourced building long-term relationships as a main goal for 2015, yet most weren’t focusing on important indicators of loyal customers,... [...]

Travis Bliffen says, “Most Web professionals have heard of the potential SEO benefits of including a blog on their websites and updating it regularly. After talking with countless business owners though, it became apparent that many of them do not understand why blogging helps with SEO and with that, why it fails sometimes as well. Why Do Blogs Help SEO? Whenever you add a blog post to your website, you are really just creating another page. As with any page on your website, attracting inbound links will improve the authority of that page and, through internal linking, will improve other... [...]

Aaron Agius says, “Want to succeed online? It’s pretty much universally agreed upon that, to do so, you need to appear high in Google’s organic search rankings. Unfortunately, this is getting more difficult to achieve, due to two factors: not only do the organic results found on pages with Google’s paid ads experience lower click-through rates (CTR) than those on pages without the ads, Google is also reducing the amount of space available for organic listings in order to promote its own content. In fact, according to the Blumenthal’s post linked to above, Google has recently achieved... [...]

Melissa Butler says, “On the Internet, the cost barrier to starting up a business is far lower compared to that of starting up a brick-and-mortar business. Low cost and time required starting an online business means more people are using the Internet to create businesses and generate revenue. Contrast that with the multitude of expenses incurred with a physical business and it is easy to see why so many people are opting for the online route. What isn’t talked about often in the world of online businesses, however, is that they really are businesses in the most traditional sense of the... [...]

Allison Howen says, “Visual marketing automation company Chute has unveiled a new solution that helps companies tap into real-time insights from consumer photos and videos shared on Twitter and Instagram. The solution, dubbed Chute Insights, aims to help marketers learn more about their customers, band, industry and competitors. With Chute Insights marketers have the ability to filter their view to examine data such as sentiment, purchase intent, geography and emerging trends. Marketers can also search by keywords and people through the solution. “Marketers face the constant challenge... [...]

Derek S. says, “Video is one of the most beloved forms of media on the Internet with Cisco predicting 74 percent of all Internet traffic in 2017 will be from video. What’s more, the ever-popular form of media has flexed its muscles in the digital advertising industry with 58 percent of marketing professionals stating that digital video ads drive better engagement than TV ads according to an Invodo report. Understanding mobile’s importance to advertisers, Leadbolt, a mobile marketing platform, has unveiled support for in-app video ads within its Direct Deals Marketplace, an ad... [...]

Derek S. says, “For advertisers, understanding how much to bid for each ad is tricky. Bid too little and your ad will not get displayed but bid too much and you risk blowing too much of your overall budget. To help solve the problem Bing Ads has recently announced the availability of Auction Insights to marketers around the world. The feature, initially available to those in the U.S. only, shows advertisers how they are performing in comparison to other advertisers who are competing against them in the same auctions as they are. While this feature will not reveal the actual amount that competitors... [...]

Derek S. says, “As millennials age and become responsible for more purchasing power brands will be forced to understand how the much maligned age group prefers to communicate and interact with them. NewsCred, a content marketing platform, has announced the results of a new study on millennials titled “The Millennial Mind: How Content Drives Brand Loyalty,” which details the importance of quality online content for brands looking to drive deeper engagement from millennials. The study, conducted in October 2014 surveying 501 US millennials, revealed that nearly two out of three (62 percent)... [...]

Milad Oskouie says, “If you run a software-as-a-service (SaaS) business, or you only have one product to sell, then you probably have one single, dedicated pricing page. Here’s how to make sure your pricing page is effective: 1. Keep It Simple, Stupid Let’s start with some basic truths. People don’t go to the Web to read. When they are presented with something to read on the Web, they skim. If it’s too complicated to figure out, they skip. If they skip too much, they give up. It makes sense to keep your pricing model simple, so when you start to build your pricing... [...]

Travis Bliffen says, “Many of you are familiar with the positive impact that SEO can have on your website and more importantly, on your ability to generate leads and sales online. While you can’t deny the importance, many of you never get around to taking advantage of this great profit driver for one primary reason, you don’t have time. While keeping up with the latest happenings in SEO can be pretty time consuming and running a full-scale SEO campaign will definitely leave you short on time, here is a simple strategy you can implement right away, so you can improve your site’s... [...]