10 Reasons to Combine Search and Social

The combination of search and social is one which cannot be ignored and must be embraced by all. Search engines have changed the way they rank your business because of the integration of social media signals when looking at search algorithms.

Around 58% of consumers will go to a search engine to look for something online and 40% of consumers will seek further advice from friends or colleagues on social media. Combined, around 48% of consumers are combining both search engine and social media functionality to seek help for their purchasing decisions. Here are 10 reasons why combining search and social are important for your business.

1. Social Impacts Your Search Ranking

Google, especially have moved into making their search algorithms more social based. These changes make social signals very important when Google determines who sits at the top of search.

2. Social Search is About Relevancy & Authenticity

Connecting with your community on social media is all about offering relevant content that is authentic and helpful to their business. Building trust and a good reputation for your brand is so important so remember that ranking high in search isn’t just about keywords, its about the relevance and authenticity of your site, in general.3. Social Has Already Integrated Search

You may not know that social has actually already integrated search functionality. Facebook, Twitter and Google+ all have search functionality, along with the second biggest search engine (and also social network) YouTube.

4. Combining Search and Social Delivers Twice the Results

A business that uses a combined search and social approach for their marketing strategy receive twice the results in terms of conversion and revenue per click. If you want more profitable results for your business, you will need to combine the two (as you can see below).

5. More Exposure for Your Brand

The more exposure you can get for your brand, the more likely people are to trust your business and see you as a leader in your industry and to do that, you need to harness the power of search and social.

6. You Can Target Specific Demographics

Social media can help you easily distinguish between certain groups from a particular category or demographic and target them for marketing. Focusing your website based on your target market and what they are looking for online, combined with targeted social media marketing will help you chime in on customers you may not realise were looking for your product.

7. Connects with Mobile Search Users

With so many social media users, actually using networking apps on their mobile give you the chance to connect with these users when combining your social and search marketing approach.

8. Better Overall Promotion of Content

As with most combined marketing tools, you will increase promotion and that’s no different when combining your search and social approach. Content won’t be shared more unless it is high quality and content your target audience wants to actually read.

9. Establishes Your Identity and Ownership

When it comes to ranking in social search, your online identity and ownership is very important. You should strive to have your content verified for authorship. This can be done through Google’s Authorship programme.

10. Combined Social and Search Delivers Great Customer Service

Social media in itself, is a great customer service outlet and your business will thrive if more and more people are sharing positive comments about your business. If 48% of consumers are already using the combination of social and search, you need to be able to deliver first class customer service which will impact how well you rank in search.

via

4 Tips to Ease Top 4 Content Marketing Challenges

Top 4 Content Marketing Challenges

• 

  Top content marketing challenges as reported by the Content Marketing Institute

  Content Marketing Challenge #1: Time

57% of content marketers report being challenged with a lack of time. With small teams and a stacked workload time is always a concern.

• Content Marketing Challenge #2: Engagement

51% of content marketers report being challenged with producing content that will engage their audience.

• Content Marketing Challenge #3: Budget

48% of content marketers report being challenged by a lack of budget.

• Content Marketing Challenge #4: Quantity

45% of content marketers report being challenged with producing enough content to build an effective program.

Each and every one of these concerns is completely justified. I have been, and occasionally I still am, concerned with the same issues. But here’s the thing, as marketers we need to constantly search for creative out-of-the-box solutions to problems. Content marketing is no different, and UGC can help you settle some of your content marketing challenges.

The Emergence and Power of UGC

UGC is loosely defined as media produced in an open collaboration, often between a brand and its audience. Emerging onto the tech scene in 2005 with the likes of eBay and into the news cycle with the BBC, UGC has arguably become the most prominent form of content on the web. Today UGC is present on literally every ecommerce website to some degree, every news website and entire industries have been built based on user content (social networks would be nothing without UGC). Every review you read on Amazon and eBay, the t-shirts you see designed on CafePress, every video you see on YouTube and Vimeo, all of Facebook, every Tweet, all of it is UGC. Its power is undeniable.

In addition to the prominence of UGC across the Internet, the world has also begun to recognize it as a truly unbiased and authentic form of media. Similar to how brands employ PR to seek unbiased 3^rd party validation from journalists and news media, UGC is trusted as unbiased because it is created by the masses, not brands or governments. While one individual piece of UGC content may not represent the entire story or trend, in aggregate UGC can point to trends and sentiments across the globe, change opinions and provide the people with a collective voice.

What does this mean for your brand? Does it mean you should employ customer comments on your website this minute? Should you run out and ask your customers to help you design your new t-shirt? Maybe, but that isn’t the point. The point is two fold:

1. There is so much content in the digital world that you have an endless supply of relevant information, right at your finger tips, you just need to know where to look and how to use it for your business.
2. Your customers/fans love to create content, and if approached in the right way, they just may create amazing content for your brand.

Brands who recognize the power of UGC and harness it for their programs are developing the most authentic and effective marketing. Instead of preaching their story to customers (advertising), brands allow their fans to join in creating and narrating their story. At Thismoment we call it collaborative storytelling, and the best brand marketers are taking it to the next level.

How UGC Can Ease Content Marketing Challenges

If we look at the list of content marketing challenges identified above, we can quickly identify how to employ UGC to settle some concerns, quickly opening the doors to successful content marketing programs.

• Content Marketing Challenge Tip #1: Use UGC to Help With Time Challenges

When looking at a content marketing program most marketers get hung up on the time it will take to create great content. The assumption is that for a content marketing program to work you need to create 100% unique content. This simply isn’t true. With hundreds of millions of pieces of content being uploaded to the Internet everyday there are likely a few hundred YouTube videos, Tweets, blog posts and news articles that will help you with your content project. Look to existing content on the web and learn how to repurpose or curate it for your own use. And best of all, content marketing SaaS (specifically Thismoment) has taken steps to help you secure rights clearance.

• Content Marketing Challenge Tip #2: Use UGC to Help With Engagement

Marketers know that the most engaging content on the Interest is genuine, entertaining and often comes from the minds of their own customers. How many times have you laughed at a video on YouTube that was created by a clever kid with a video camera? How any times have you marveled at how amazing it is for that very video clip to receive millions of views and comments? The video works because it is genuine and came into the world without obvious commercial intent. That same video, with equal potential for engagement, can be harnessed for your marketing program (assuming it fits your business model). Or better yet, you can engage with your audience to create content on your behalf by requesting videos or other media as part of a promotion or contest. You have customers and fans, put them to work in your marketing campaigns.

• Content Marketing Challenge Tip #3: Use UGC to Help With Budget Challenges

Best of all UGC is free, or relatively inexpensive. One of the main concerns with content creation is that it is extremely expensive to create content, especially in the scale that is needed for a substantial program. By employing UGC you can tap into endless existing pieces of content across the Internet or tap into your fan/customer base to create content as needed based on campaign specifics.

• Content Marketing Challenge Tip #4: Use UGC to Help With Content Quantity Concerns

I imagine this paragraph is unnecessary. If you have been following along you know that UGC, like the universe, is ever expanding and infinite. There are zero limitations on quantity. If you need a video of a baby monkey riding backwards on a pig to promote your Monkey Kibble campaign, you’ll find it. Entice the creator to grant permission to use it by offering major exposure to their content, once granted you have an amazing piece of relevant and credible content.

No, UGC is not a magic bullet, it will not solve every content marketing challenge and I don’t intend to over simplify the issue. I do hope that considering UGC offers a new way to think about your own content marketing challenges. Remember, you do not need to create every piece of content from scratch, you do not need to pay a lot for content, and if done right it will be remarkably engaging. Better yet, today you can easily tap into amazing content marketing software specifically designed to help you blend both branded content and UGC into engaging playlists for your campaigns. It’s the best of both worlds.

(via)

Related articles

• 4 Steps to Building an Engaging Presence on Social Media
• How to Use User Generated Content
• 4 Ways Brands Can Make Social Search Happen
• 4 Significant Social Media Trends To Watch For In 2012
• Why you need a social media landing page

14 Top-Notch Resources to Help You Become a CRO Expert

Even those considered to be CRO (conversion rate optimization) experts had to start somewhere. Nobody knows right away how to optimize websites as soon as they walk into the digital marketing world; we've all had to learn some aspects.

Thankfully, mastering the art of CRO is considerably easier now than it was several years ago, and for a very good reason: more learning resources are now available online.

Over the past few years in particular, we've seen an explosion in the number of CRO guides and tutorials. Many of them are helpful, while others were created by inexperienced CROs claiming to be veterans just trying to make a fast buck.

To help you know which ones are helpful and which ones aren't, we've collected a list of 14 CRO resources that are sure to help you become a conversion rate expert. Study up on a few of these, and you'll be up to speed with the rest of the industry in no time at all.

1. The Beginner's Guide to Conversion Rate Optimization (Qualaroo)

This lengthy 12-chapter monster is a great guide to kick off our list. Qualaroo, a premium vendor of a CRO tool that's been used by Yahoo, Vimeo, and Intuit, provides a basic yet comprehensive overview of what CRO is really all about.

In the early chapters, you'll get definitions for some CRO jargon (if you haven't yet figured out what MVT, CTA, or A/B testing means). Chapter 4 – my personal favorite – teaches you how to create an optimization plan.

At the end of each chapter, you're also given links to 3-5 complementary blog posts on other websites that are sure to help you as well.

2. Conversion Rate Experts Blog

The resoundingly obvious domain name aside, Conversion Rate Experts is one of the top CRO service providers. Work with them, and you'll be working with the guys who helped Apple, Google, Sony, and Facebook increase their website revenue.

Their blog, although infrequently updated, has numerous advanced conversion rate tips and case studies, besides more general digital marketing advice.

KISSmetrics and CRE teamed up to create this infographic on nine steps to better conversions. The graphic itself nearly merits a sole spot on this list. You can't go wrong about checking out the resources available from Conversion Rate Experts.

3. ConversionXL Blog

Two and a half years ago, Peep Laja started blogging about practical conversion advice. But his blog was different from almost every other "mainstream" digital marketing blogs. Peep gave specific instruction and direction for marketers and CROs, backed up by both his own testing experiences and the results of his extensive research.

Today, Peep is one of the most respected bloggers in the industry. On his YouTube channel, Peep does detailed reviews of the optimization levels of his readers' websites every week. Advice from an experienced consultant for 100 percent free? Sign us up for that.

4. The Definitive Guide to Conversion Rate Optimization (QuickSprout)

If there's one thing Neil Patel's QuickSprout blog is known for, it's the series of 30,000+ word guides he produces on a regular basis. Neil's already covered SEO, content marketing, growth hacking, and consumer psychology – one of his more recent guides is on CRO.

Neil and I teamed up to create a thorough, eight-chapter guide to increasing conversions. It's one of the most thorough out there, but I'll let you be the judge of how helpful it is since I'm obviously biased.

Not only is the content helpful, but the format is also aesthetically pleasing, with tons of visuals and custom graphics to help you digest the info.

5. Which Test Won

Which Test Won releases a summary of an A/B test every week. On the homepage, readers can test their conversion optimization knowledge by voting on whether the control or the variable had a better performance.

For an additional $25/90 days, you can get access to their library of 453 conversion case studies.

6. Guide to Conversion Rate Optimization (SEO Gadget)

SEO Gadget created a beautiful infographic detailing both the good way and the bad way to get started with conversion optimization.

The infographic can currently only be viewed on Moz, as SEO Gadget is rebranding to Built Visible and hasn't yet had an opportunity to post the infographic on their website.

7. The Small Business Guide to Conversion Rate Optimisation (Simply Business)

This Simply Business resource presents a step-by-step guide to CRO in unique fashion. Tailored for small businesses, the guide provides an in-depth introduction to the technical aspects of optimization testing: the basic tools required, and how to use them.

8. 100 Conversion Optimization Case Studies (KISSmetrics)

They say that the best way to learn is by example. While that isn't always true in conversion optimization (you need to test everything before blindly applying the tactics that worked for one website to your website in a different industry), there is a good deal of information to be gleaned from CRO case studies.

In this KISSmetrics blog post, 100 case studies (yes, that many) are listed with accompanying pictures and key takeaways for each.

9. Visual Website Optimizer Case Studies

One of the most popular A/B and multivariate testing tools around, Visual Website Optimizer has a huge archive of case studies run by VWO customers.

What's more, the case studies listed can be filtered by the business's industry and the element that was tested, so you can get advice tailored to your business.

10. Unbounce Blog

Unbounce is a popular distributor of landing page optimization software. Their blog is a priceless resource, with literally hundreds of CRO-specific posts that help you boost your digital marketing ROI.

One of my favorite blog posts on Unbounce is their curation of 666 conversion rate optimization tips. Oli Gardner, the brain behind the post, went out of his way to read each tip listed. What's more, you can be sure that the advice is relevant to you today, as almost all of the curated posts were written within the last year.

11. WiderFunnel Blog

WiderFunnel is a popular marketing optimization service provider. And they know what they're doing.

Their blog – although very rarely updated (think less than once a month) – is a must read for anyone serious about CRO. The blogger, Chris Goward, brings a wealth of digital marketing expertise to the table and has done landing page optimization for several Fortune 500 companies.

He raises controversial points like your conversion rate doesn't matter and why too much segmentation is bad for your marketing.

Whenever they publish a new post, rest assured that you'll be hanging onto every word.

12. Content Verve

The Content Verve blog is especially helpful for learning how to write better-optimized copy. Again, posts are few and far between, but each is so well-written that you won't be able to refrain from signing up for email updates.

13. LeadPages Blog

LeadPages is a provider of landing page templates of all varieties: you can pick up sales pages, launching soon pages, squeeze pages, upsell pages, and much more.

Their blog is consistently updated with split testing case studies for their customers.

14. Optimizely Blog

Optimizely's blog is one of the greats in the A/B testing and CRO niches. Between blog posts written by the guy who made Obama $60 million in the 2007 elections (Dan Siroker) and controversial items that spark extended comment threads, you'll fall in love with the "conversion rate optimism blog you'll actually read."

Wrapping Up

Two metrics ultimately define your marketing success: the cost to deliver visitors to your website, or cost per click (CPC), and your conversion rate. Improving these metrics will obviously improve sales, cost per acquisition, cost per lead, and most KPIs that matter to marketers and business owners. You don't always have control over the CPC, but you're 100 percent responsible for your conversion rate.

Bottom line: it's becoming increasingly expensive to drive traffic to your website. The only way to maintain or improve results is to increase your conversion rate. There is a huge opportunity to help companies improve conversion rates and position yourself as a CRO expert.

(via)

Related articles

• How to Kick Start Your Conversion Rate Optimization Campaign
• Top Google Website Optimization Resources
• Testing and Conversion: What SEO Copywriters Need to Know Now
• Big Data Analytics for Small Business - Improve Your Customer Intelligence
• 5 Tips to Boost Your Facebook Ads Conversions

Instagram Video and What It Means For Your Business

Video marketing is definitely a hot topic. In fact, it always has been—but it might just be about to take off in a whole new way.  In the past there have been sites like Youtube (the giant for search and users), Vimeo (for the more professional user) and, more recently, Vine.

There's been quite a lot of buzz generated from the release of Vine earlier this year.  Vine is Twitter's attempt at making video easy to create and share.  The problem with Vine, for me, is that it requires a lot of creativity with little return. 

Facebook and Instagram might have a new solution for marketers to get into the video game.  Facebook unveiled that Instagram will now also allow users to take and share short videos.

Some Stats About Video Marketing

• About 46% of people say they’d be more likely to seek out information about a product or service after seeing it in an online video. (Source: Eloqua)
• The average user spends 88% more time on a website with video. (Source: Mist Media)
• Video and e-mail marketing can increase click-through rates by more than 90%.(Source: Mist Media)
• Video equals higher viewer retention. The information retained in one minute of online video is equal to about 1.8 million written words. (Source: Brainshark)
• Video attracts two to three times as many monthly visitors, doubles their time spent on the site and has a 157% increase in organic traffic from search engines. (Source: MarketingSherpa)
• Of the 80% of internet users who watched a video ad, 46% took some sort of action after viewing the ad. (Source: Video Brewery)

Why Instagram Video Could Be Huge

As Vine was a brand new tool, users had to create their followings from the ground, up. Instagram's video platform might have the upper hand due to the previously existing Instagram networks in place.  If your brand is already on Instagram with a following, you'll be able to skip the part where you have to put a ton of effort into growing your network.  

Video provides an excellent way to share what's happening with your brand, not to mention it also gives more personality to your brand by projecting a moving image with the addition of sound, instead of just a basic photo.

Another benefit of using a service like Instagram, as opposed to Youtube, is that the users are a bit more forgiving.  They're used to the point-and-click format with little editing.  You don't have to produce something top quality in order to see results.  However, if you want to succeed on Youtube, you're better off having a professional or semi-professional video.

How You Could Use Instagram Video For Your Business

There are tons of things you can shoot video of.  Here are some examples:

* A message to your fans

* The announcement of a sale

* A new item your store just received

* A testimonial from a customer

* Your office in action

* A video of a fashion show

* A flash sale

* Just about anything, really!

As this is a brand new service, I'll be testing it out and - of course - keeping you posted.  Have you dabbled in video yet?

(via)

Related articles

• 3 Ways to Prepare for Video on Instagram
• 5 Creative Ways to Drive More Traffic to Your Blog Posts
• How Facebook Hashtags Can Impact Brands
• The Basics of Video Storytelling
• New Google+ Features Hit the Web
• 50 Top Tools for Social Media Monitoring, Analytics, and Management