1. Choose keywords wisely. The keywords you think might be perfect for your site may not be what people are actually searching for. To find the optimal keywords for your site, use tools such as WordTracker. Choose two or three highly targeted phrases for each page of your site. Never shoot for general keywords such as “travel” or “vacation.”

2. Create a killer Title tag. HTML title tags are critical because they’re given a lot of weight with all of the search engines. You must put your keywords into this tag and not waste space with extra words. Do not use the Title tag to display your company name or to say “Home Page.” Think of it more as a “Title Keyword Tag” and create it accordingly. Add your company name to the end of this tag, if you must use it.

3. Write at least 200 – 250 words of visible text copy based on your chosen keywords. This is a crucial component to high rankings and a successful Web site. The search engines need to “read” keyword rich copy on your pages so they can successfully classify your site. Use each keyword phrase numerous times within your copy for best results.

4. Create Heavy Meta tags. Meta tags can be valuable, but they are not a magic bullet. Create a Meta Description tag that uses your keywords and also describes your site. The information in this tag often appears under your Title in the search engine results pages. The Meta Keyword tag isn’t quite as important as the Meta Description tag. Contrary to popular belief, what you place in the keyword tag will have very little bearing on what keywords your site is actually found under, and it’s not given any consideration whatsoever by Google. Use this tag, but do not obsess over.

5. Use extra “goodies” to boost rankings. Things like headlines, image alt tags, header tags <H1><H2>, etc.), links from other pages, keywords in file names, and keywords in hyperlinks can cumulatively boost search engine rankings. Use any or all of these where they make sense for your site.

6. Be careful when submitting to directories such as Yahoo and the Open Directory Project (DMOZ). Having directory listings are a key component to getting your site spidered and listed by Google. Making mistakes in the submission process could cost you dearly as directory listings are difficult to change later in the game. Therefore, it’s important to read Yahoo’s How to Suggest Your Site and How to add a site to the Open Directory before submitting.

7. Don’t expect quick results. Getting high rankings takes time; there’s no getting around that fact. Once your site is added to a search engine or directory, its ranking may start out low and then slowly work its way up the ladder. Some search engines measure “click-through popularity,” i.e., the more people that click on a particular site, the higher its ranking will go. Be patient and give your site time to mature.

8. Don’t constantly “tweak” your site for better results. It’s best not to make changes to your optimization for at least three-to-six months after submission. It often takes the engines at least that long to add your optimized pages to their databases. Submit it, and then forget about it for a while!

If you’ve followed these tips and still can’t find your site in the engines, the first place to “tweak” would be your page copy. If you added less than 250 words of visible text on your pages, this is probably your culprit. Also, double check your keyword density, and make sure that you only targeted two or three phrases per page. Eventually, you’ll see the fruits of your labor with many top ten rankings in Google and the rest of the search engines!

You can track referrals from Facebook or Twitter in Google Analytics, but what if you want to track specific links within your social media profiles to measure their effectiveness? For example, what if I want to see how many people visit pamorama.net by clicking on my Twitter profile link? This tutorial will teach you the simple steps you need to take — and this method can be used in conjunction with any of your social profiles: Facebook, LinkedIn, or the legion of others.

1: Create a trackable link

Head over to Google’s URL Builder to create a URL that can be tracked separately in Google Analytics. Fill in the spaces as indicated in this screenshot with information about your social media profile:

2: Shorten your trackable link

Google’s URL Builder will create a very long URL, so it’s a good idea to shorten it with one of the many available online shorteners. For the example below, I used bit.ly, but any of them will do the trick:

3: Add your shortened trackable link to your social media profile

You’ve created a trackable link and shortened it — now you need to add it to the the social media profiles you want to track.

4: Track your URL in Google Analytics beginning the next day

Since you used Google’s URL Builder, the link will be tracked automatically in Google Analytics each time someone clicks on on it. You’ll be able to see your referrals by going toGoogle Analytics -> Traffic Sources -> Campaigns. Google Analytics takes about a day to begin reporting the referrals.

First seen on thecustomercollective.com March 23, 2010 by Pam Dyer

Brands spend more than $450 billion each year to influence us. They wouldn’t spend that kind of money unless they knew something we didn’t know.

The most-successful brands don’t focus on what we need; they focus on what we want. We need a credit card; we want an American Express Black card. We need a cellphone; we want the yet-to-be-released iPhone 4G.

Fortunately for brands, when it comes to identifying what people want, we aren’t particularly complex. The human mind seeks to satisfy 10 primary wants. Direct your actions toward meeting as many as possible, and your brand will grow exponentially.

So what do people want, exactly?

1. To feel safe and secure.
This is reinforced through both the physical structure of the brain and our physical environment, making it one of the strongest motivating forces in our lives. The amygdale is an area of the brain whose primary purpose is to protect us. Whenever we sense fear or danger, or that things are not safe or secure, it fires. This works in conjunction with our long-term memory, which continuously references and longs for the safety and security we received as children. When Allstate tells us we’re in good hands with them, it appeals to this desire for safety and security. Who else? Volvo, OnStar, ADP, Geico, Johnson & Johnson.

2. To feel comfortable.
We all want to feel comfortable. We want to feel good, relaxed, we want it to be easy. Our brains are constantly asking, if I do this, how will I feel? We are attracted to what makes us feel good, and this is often what is most comfortable and easy — brands such as Cracker Barrel, Rockport, Godiva and Dole (what’s easier than bagged lettuce?).

3. To be cared for and connected to others.
It is human nature to want to feel that someone cares for us, that we have friends and that people enjoy our company. Humans are genetically predisposed to want to be together and to be connected. It is one of our evolutionary traits. And by observing, interacting and engaging with others, our mirror neurons allow us to learn from one another and feel what others are feeling. Think about recent communication campaigns from Olive Garden, Budweiser, Pizza Hut and Mitsubishi’s Eclipse. Further, this is one of the key wants social networks such as Twitter, Facebook and MySpace meet.

4. To be desired by others.
Some believe that all human motivation comes down to wanting to be desired by others. Freud popularized this concept pitting the id against the superego and ego. And even though brands have been targeting this want since the beginning — and people are aware of brands’ efforts in this area — it has not lost any of its effectiveness. Axe can’t make their message to guys any clearer: use our products and you’ll be irresistible. And how about Michelob Ultra, Viagra, Cadillac, Old Spice and Victoria’s Secret?

5. To be free to do what we want.
The desire to be free has been a guiding principal of humankind for the past 200,000 years. Throughout history, societies have banded together to fight for their freedom, from early civilizations in Greece, through the dark ages and Renaissance, the French and American Revolutions, and the abolition of slavery and both world wars. The desire to be free is such a dominant human want that, time after time, we have given our lives to satisfy it. Financial brands such as Fidelity, Citi and Mastercard were built by focusing on this want, as were brands such as Harley-Davidson, Southwest, Nutrisystem and even Norwegian Cruise Lines.

6. To grow and become more.
Humans, unlike animals, do not come programmed with the skills we need. We begin as blank slates, yet within the first five years of our lives, we learn to perform many of the skills we will use throughout our lifetime. But then what happens? Is there ever another five-year period where we grow as much? Most would say no, and yet our brains are conditioned from childhood to grow and learn. Because of this, our mind is constantly striving to satisfy the function it has been conditioned to perform: to grow and become more. When you think of Monster, Kindle, Bally and Kaplan, don’t they all brilliantly leverage this want to their advantage?

7. To serve others and give back.
More than 60 million people performed more than 8 billion hours of service last year. Why? As children we are fully dependent on our parents. Those early memories of our mothers and fathers serving our every need, unselfishly giving to protect, care and nurture, are deeply ingrained in our minds and condition us to want to serve others and give back. Therefore, we tend to feel good when we are making others feel good, unselfishly focusing on others. This want competes against many of our other more self-focused wants, causing an unsettling feeling when we too frequently focus on ourselves. What comes to mind when you think about Prius, Livestrong, Timberland, Newman’s Own, Make-a-Wish Foundation and Susan G. Komen for the Cure?

8. To be surprised and excited.
The amount of stimuli that our senses can process throughout the course of a day is remarkable. While our perceptual register filters the vast majority of these stimuli, what almost always gets through is what surprises and excites us. Stimuli that could potentially cause ecstasy or anxiety are the first things to grab our attention — Red Bull, Las Vegas tourism, Disney, De Beers.

9. To believe there is a higher purpose.
Most people identify with a particular religion, believe in a god in some form and believe that when we die, there is something more. We deeply want to believe there is a higher purpose. There is not a single more important belief that has such universal acceptance yet completely lacks any form of scientific evidence. But because we so deeply want to believe, anything that can possibly support this belief is powerfully motivating. When the Marines show us a wall of soldiers standing guard over our country and ask us if we have what it takes to be among the few and the proud, they are offering us a higher purpose.

10. To feel that they matter.
This is humankind’s greatest want — that they matter. That they are worthy of attention, affection and love. It is an evolutionary trait. Released in large amounts during labor, oxytocin, a neurotransmitter, bonds the mother to a child, making it nearly impossible not to want to care for the newborn. Infants who do not receive this attention can succumb to failure-to-thrive syndrome, causing premature death. So the fact that we matter is essential to our survival. We have been conditioned from birth to believe that we matter. But as we get older, the oxytocin wears off and we feel less and less that we matter. We then spend the rest of our lives trying to get back this feeling that we once felt in such abundance, and brands such as American Express, Lexus, Rolex and Starbucks help us remember that we matter.

First seen on Advertising Age
by Brian Martin
Published: February 03, 2010

IAB Ads: 'Advertising Is Creepy'

Faced with increasing pressure from Washington, the Interactive Advertising Bureau launched a public service campaign on Thursday aimed at educating consumers about behavioral targeting.

The online campaign, created pro bono by WPP’s Schematic, features rich media banner ads with copy like “Advertising is creepy” and “Hey, this banner can tell where you live. Mind if we come over and sell you stuff?”

More than one dozen publishers — including Microsoft, Google’s YouTube, and AOL — have committed to donate a combined 500 million impressions for the initiative.

The campaign comes as policymakers are questioning whether data collection by marketers violates consumers’ privacy. Rep. Rick Boucher (D-Va.) has said he plans to introduce a bill that could require Web companies to notify users about online ad targeting, and in some circumstances, obtain their explicit consent.

In addition, the Federal Trade Commission has criticized the industry for using dense privacy policies to inform people about behavioral targeting, or tracking people online and sending them ads based on sites visited.

In a meeting with reporters Thursday morning, IAB President and CEO Randall Rothenberg said one goal of the campaign is to address regulators’ concerns that consumers don’t understand behavioral advertising.

The ad units themselves offer information about online ad techniques. For instance, users who mouse over the “creepy” banner can pull down copy stating that companies don’t use “personally identifiable information” to determine which ads to serve.

Users who click through land on the IAB’s Privacy Matters page, which includes a description of various forms of online advertising, information about cookies (including Flash cookies) and links to opt-out pages.

The portion of the landing page devoted to cookies says they “contain data that allow a Web site to customize content and advertising to your interests but generally do not contain personally identifiable information.” A section with information about geotargeting states that an IP address “reveals nothing personal about you to marketers and websites.”

But privacy advocate Jeff Chester immediately raised questions about such statements. “They are ignoring the growing consensus that cookies and IP addresses are personally identifiable,” says Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy.

Cathy Dwyer, a privacy expert and professor of information systems at Pace University, also questions whether the banners’ headlines are too sophisticated to draw in users. “Even ‘creepy’ itself is a technical term,” she says, adding that it’s mainly industry insiders and observers who use that word in discussions about behavioral advertising.

The FTC said this year in its report about online behavioral targeting that non-personally identifiable information could be used to identify specific users.

In the past, industry groups and observers defined personally identifiable information as names, addresses, phone numbers or other information that could be used to contact an individual directly.

Critics recently moved away from that definition, in part because Web users have been identified based on supposedly anonymous data. The most famous example occurred in 2006, when AOL publicly released search logs showing users’ queries and “anonymized” IP addresses for more than 600,000 users, Within days, one “anonymized” user, Thelma Arnold, was profiled in The New York Times after reporters identified her based on her search queries.

Schematic CEO Trevor Kaufman told reporters Thursday that a test of the campaign in late October and early November yielded a click-through rate of 0.5%. The trial involved 7 million impressions, mainly served on Microsoft’s Hotmail.

Separately, the digital rights group Center for Democracy & Technology also launched a privacy campaign on Thursday — although with a different goal. The CDT is hoping to persuade users to lobby Congress for online privacy legislation. The Web site for the CDT’s “Take Back Your Privacy” campaign enables users to submit concerns directly to the FTC and to send emails to their lawmakers.

first seen on Media Post by Wendy Davis, Yesterday, 6:58 PM

A lot of people still haven’t figured out Facebook Fan Pages yet. They go ahead and make these Fan Pages and expect them to grow by themselves. The thing that most people miss in the equation is that, this is social marketing which means there has to be engagement on both fronts. A Facebook Fan Page needs to be strategically planned out in advance in order to make it work. Here are a few things you can do to make your fan page grow organically and when I say organically it means you aren’t paying to market your fan page.

Feature A Fan – Contest
This is one of the strongest methods of growing your fan base. You originally start off with any fan page by inviting mostly your own friends. Now that some of your friends are fans to this page, how do you get their friends to want to fan the page? You get the fans you already have to become little ambassadors to your page by having a virtual contests. When you “Feature A Fan” you are acknowledging them as the winner by calling them out as a “featured fan” in the post of the day which goes out to all of the other fans. 

This might seem trivial to you but the users can’t get enough.You eventually will get people “liking” the posts, commenting on the posts enough for their friends to take notice and come check out what that page is all about. They then get involved in the conversation that is happening on your page and become fans themselves. Everyone wants to be a featured fan so they keep trying to win whatever contest you are having by posting their answers, commenting and “liking” posts. All of this social interaction eventually leads to more and more people fanning your page. A company that does this well is Crackle a company I just happen to work for ; )

Giveaways
Of course another aspect to a contest is obviously SWAG (stuff worth actually getting). If you have something to give away like a t-shirt, hats, beer mugs, PlayStation 3′s. People love free things, even if its the most mundane objects you would be surprised at what people will do for free SWAG. The better the item the more people who will become a fan of your fan page and participate in the conversation. These users are not nearly as valuable to the conversation because you are incentivising them with a tangible object. As soon as its gone they stop interacting. You need to continue to have these giveaways every month so you don’t lose their interest.

Whats The Best Solution?
Using a combination of both ”Feature A Fan” and product giveaways will net you the most users in the shortest amount of time. Both users act completely different so you need to cater to both in different ways. As long as you have two different approaches planned out to these very different fan bases then you should see your fan page start to grow exponentially.

Adding Twitter Into The Mix
You can also leverage your twitter following to your advantage by using twitter as an extension to your contests. You can extend your reach and push users back to your fan page with twitter or you can hold a completely separate contest via twitter and grow your following base there. In this case we know that twitter users act completely different then Facebook users do so you need to figure out what best works for you and what you’re trying to build and accomplish.

Clicks have made us fat and lazy. And when we wind up set in our ways, there’s only one solution – weaning. In this case, we need to be weaned off the click.

That’s what the online marketing world needs right now to improve branding, according to eMarketer and experts it surveyed across the Internet ad business.

In a recent study, eMarketer found that while 57 percent of marketing executives said brand measurement was not holding back online advertising, an astonishingly high 43 percent said it was.

“Clicks and banner ads tell so little of a story,” says Geoff Ramsey, CEO of eMarketer and the author of a recent report on reinventing online brand measurement.

Research from iProspect and Forrester found that Internet users were more apt to search for a product, brand or company – or even type the company’s name into a browser bar – than to click on a promotional ad. That’s why measuring time spent, influence, engagement and responsiveness to ads is more important than measuring the actual click.

“People don’t just see an ad or billboard and do something immediately – it happens over time,” Ramsey says. “What we have to do is the hard work and wean ourselves off the click.”

Of the $25 billion spent on online ads each year, about $7.7 billion is allocated to branding ads, such as display and video. “But unlike search, which is a $12 billion business, we don’t know what that $7.7 billion is doing for us,” Ramsey explains. “If we figure it out, that number will grow. Search and online video are the two engines driving Internet growth, and search has slowed. We really have to figure out the branding component and apply to video or we will be stagnant.”

Working collaboratively to share data points can help. In addition, the solution will likely include attribution modeling, or capturing the data around both online and offline ad exposure and giving each their due. But the answer also lies in an old-school method, one that for better or worse has worked in television for more than 50 years – Gross Rating Point (GRP).

Nielsen is not perfect, yet it has become a common currency and people say we need to embrace the grp to get Internet into the media mix more,” Ramsey says. “If you can’t talk the language of the marketer, which is grp, then you are missing something and not getting on brand marketers’ tables.”

Young-Bean Song, senior director of analytics at Microsoft’s Advertising Institute (formerly Atlas) agrees. He told eMarketer, “I think it’s not having those foundational reach, frequency and GRP metrics. You will never see P&G and Unilever spend more than single digits [in millions] unless we give them reach, frequency and GRPs.”

Ramsey is one of many voices in the industry that has been calling for big change in how Internet marketers evaluate the effectiveness of a campaign. Gian Fulgoni, the chairman of comScore, has also said at MediaPost events that clicks are no longer the Holy Grail of online measurement, with time spent and brand lift being more important metrics. Similarly, Microsoft’s Advertising Institute recently said in a report that conversion should be measured across the entire digital purchase funnel and not merely by the last ad seen or the last click.

Indeed, measurement is the constantly hashed and rehashed topic at industry events, but perhaps the answers lie not in more data but in a better way to capture the interactions consumers have with brands online, relying on some tried-and-true methods, some sharing and some new strategies.

First seen on Media Post by Daisy Whitney

In 2009 we saw exponential growth of social media. According to Nielsen Online, Twitter alone grew 1,382% year-over-year in February, registering a total of just more than 7 million unique visitors in the US for the month. Meanwhile, Facebook continued to outpace MySpace. So what could social media look like in 2010? In 2010, social media will get even more popular, more mobile, and more exclusive — at least, that’s my guess. What are the near-term trends we could see as soon as next year? In no particular order:

1. Social media begins to look less social
With groups, lists and niche networks becoming more popular, networks could begin to feel more “exclusive.” Not everyone can fit on someone’s newly created Twitter list and as networks begin to fill with noise, it’s likely that user behavior such as “hiding” the hyperactive updaters that appear in your Facebook news feed may become more common. Perhaps it’s not actually less social, but it might seem that way as we all come to terms with getting value out of our networks — while filtering out the clutter.

2. Corporations look to scale
There are relatively few big companies that have scaled social initiatives beyond one-off marketing or communications initiatives. Best Buy’s Twelpforce leverages hundreds of employees who provide customer support on Twitter. The employees are managed through a custom built system that keeps track of who participates. This is a sign of things to come over the next year as more companies look to uncover cost savings or serve customers more effectively through leveraging social technology.

3. Social business becomes serious play
Relatively new networks such as Foursquare are touted for the focus on making networked activity local and mobile. However, it also has a game-like quality to it which brings out the competitor in the user. Participants are incentivized and rewarded through higher participation levels. And push technology is there to remind you that your friends are one step away from stealing your coveted “mayorship.” As businesses look to incentivize activity within their internal or external networks, they may include carrots that encourage a bit of friendly competition.

4. Your company will have a social media policy (they might enforced it)
If the company you work for doesn’t already have a social media policy in place with specific rules of engagement across multiple networks, it just might in the next year. From how to conduct yourself as an employee to what’s considered competition, it’s likely that you’ll see something formalized about how the company views social media and your participation in it.

5. Mobile becomes a social media lifeline
With approximately 70 percent of organizations banning social networks and, simultaneously, sales of smartphones on the rise, it’s likely that employees will seek to feed their social media addictions on their mobile devices. What used to be cigarette breaks could turn into “social media breaks” as long as there is a clear signal and IT isn’t looking. As a result, we may see more and/or better mobile versions of our favorite social drug of choice.

6. Sharing no longer means e-mail
The New York Times iPhone application recently added sharing functionality which allows a user to easily broadcast an article across networks such as Facebook and Twitter. Many websites already support this functionality, but it’s likely that we will see an increase in user behavior as it becomes more mainstream for people to share with networks what they used to do with e-mail lists. And content providers will be all too happy to help them distribute any way they choose. These are a few emerging trends that come to my mind — I’m interested to hear what you think as well, so please weigh in with your own thoughts. Where do you see social media going next?

First seen on http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/cs/2009/11/six_social_media_trends.html

What Does Apples to Apples mean?
Simply put “apples to apples” in this case means you are taking multiple creative that look exactly the same in every way, shape and form except one single variable and testing them against each other. This one single variable is the most important part of the testing methodology and could lead to 25-50% improvement in your marketing campaigns (see below).

Control Creative
So as you can see above all your creative remain the same except for that one variable. In this case the background square highlighting the silhouette of the girl changes and everything else stays the same. Although this seems like a simple example, the testing method is simple by nature. As you can see below one creative is the clear winner with an increase click through rate (CTR) of one hundred and thirty percent, not bad for your first test.

 
Statistically Relevant Sample Size
The sample size is the number of impressions you run against your creative. Different creative sizes have different statistical relevant thresholds. Here are the thresholds:

425×600 – 500,000 – 750,000 impressions
300×250 – 750,000 to 1 MM impressions
160×600 – 800,000 – 1 MM impressions
120×600 – 900,000 – 1.1 MM impressions
728×90 – 1 MM – 1.2 MM impressions
468×60 – 1 MM – 1.5 MM impressions

In this case you need to test all of your creative at the same volume of impressions. For example: If you have four different creatives measuring 300×250 in size you would run the control creative at 55% while running the other three at 15% till you reach the statistically relevant number above. The reason you keep the control running at a higher level of 55% is to maintain a successful campaign while you test. Just because your testing doesn’t mean you should sacrifice the already proven success of your control, you might end up finding out the control beats all of your tests in the end anyway (this happens quite often actually). If you can’t afford the amount of impressions it takes to run a 4 creative test then just reduce the amount of test creative you run at one time. This will allow you to garner results at a faster rate which will turn into dollars before you know it.

Call To Action
You need to test your call to action just as much as you test different layouts, background colors and button colors. Think about what you want your customer to do:
“Watch Now”
“Buy Now”
“Register Now”
You need to have your call to action very clear and concise so that the customer doesn’t have a chance to forget what you want them to do. Don’t forget when your testing your call to action, you can’t be testing anything else at the same time. You need to isolate one variable at a time or you will never know if it was that change that made the difference.

Landing Page
When you’re creative testing you should send all of your users to the same landing page which is consistent with your creative’s look and feel. Consistency in your messaging along with the same look and feel can increase your conversions up to 35%. Again don’t forget, you can only isolate one variable at a time. If you test landing pages at the same time you are testing creative you will never know if it was truly your creative that made people perform the action you are asking them to perform or was it the landing page? That’s why isolating this one variable at a time method works so well, you know what you changed and you know if that one thing made a difference.

I hope this simple “Apples to Apples” creative testing explanation helps you and your marketing efforts in the future. feel free to post any questions and happy testing.