Category: Digital Marketing

How to use the Instagram 60-Second Video Ads

August 19, 2016

It was only last year when Instagram fully opened its gateway to advertisers.  This rapidly expanding photo and video application rolled out a suite of ad formats to serve advertising content to users. Today, Instagram serves as the most powerful mobile advertising platform.  The USP of advertising on Instagram is that it is least intrusive as compared with its contemporary platforms. Instagram allows advertisers to market their product through static photo ads with embedded links, carousel ads where advertisers can rotate multiple photos in a single post, and video clips of up to 15 sec and recently up to 30 sec. Instagram introduces 60-second video Ads The new update allows marketers to add videos of up to 60 sec length. This move, that was long awaited, is welcomed by digital marketers and startups across the world. This surely is a cautious approach to incorporate sponsored content keeping in mind users’ convenience as a priority. Nevertheless, Instagram, owned by Facebook, hopes to improve its bottom line through this new feature. What does this mean for digital marketers? In a competitive advertising environment, every marketer is looking for the right spot.  The new 60-second video ads will help businesses of all sizes to share their brand story in a much better manner with their Instagram audience. Advertisers are full of creative ideas and this new feature will further help them to advance their business goals and give them more flexibility of content creation to market their products. [php snippet=1] Instagram initially tested this feature with the T-Mobile USA, a leading wireless operator; by experimenting with extended version of its successful ad campaign “Super Bowl” starring musician “Drake”, and Warner Bros that created a 60-sec trailer for its upcoming film “How to be Single”. It is interesting to note that 60-sec video ad is rolled out keeping in mind the length of an average commercial Ad. This will save advertisers from doing additional production work and expense. Besides that, it will give them more time to convey their message. The following article shares how marketers and advertises can utilize this new update to their benefit. Mobile video providers and marketers’ approach towards mobile advertising Marketers use various mobile video provider platforms like YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Vine, Snapchat etc to share videos about products and company.  All mobile video providers keep looking out for ways to generate more value for advertisers while causing minimum interruption to their users. Since every mobile video provider follows a different approach to video ads; every platform requires a different production strategy to appeal to the target audience on that platform. Instagram’s challenge and marketers’ opportunity Marketers are fast shifting their advertisement spend from TV to digital media and Instagram is all set to soak up that trend. Marketers need to customize content for Instagram Ideally, users spend only few seconds to look at a photo on Instagram or occasionally 15 seconds to watch a video clip. Many marketers use time lapse videos especially in a 15 seconds bracket. However, marketers realize that 15 seconds are too less to share a brand’s story. Looking forward, Instagram’s elongated video ad will require marketers to work out different ideas to create interesting video content. Smart marketers may create content that can be ubiquitously used on TV, Facebook or Instagram. First few seconds are extremely important to grab user’s attention Video on Instagram is by default muted.  Users are supposed to tap the screen for volume.  Furthermore, they will prefer to watch it on mute especially when browsing at public places. There is a clear signal for marketers that a first few seconds of video will matter a lot to grab user’s attention. Among this entire clamor, Instagram wants to be sure that they don’t discourage marketers to produce content that is proprietary only for Instagram.  This is the reason why Instagram allows landscape video ads which is similar to TV format. Instagram algorithm to enhance user experience will aid video marketers Instagram is working on an algorithm to display images and videos it thinks users want to see rather than follow a chronological order. This algorithm will enhance user experience and show them content in order of their affinity for it. It will diminish reliance on organic results. This will help advertisers to reach a more targeted audience. It will be necessary for brands to be selective about the content they post. They will have to pay more attention to maintaining quality and relevance of content. Interaction with branded content will improve and businesses can have a strong presence across the platform. Marketers will get an opportunity to stay relevant in time-sensitive events amidst ever-updating feed. Other initiatives by Instagram Instagram launched a premier product named as Marquee. This product is specifically designers to help brands drive mass awareness and have expanded reach in a short period of time. This would be ideal for event promotion like movie premiers or new product launch. Instagram is also testing 3D Touch ads. Advertisers will also be able to track the number of views on their video apart from usual likes and comments. Time will test the success of 60-second video Ads on Instagram Since it is a new feature, it depends whether users will be comfortable to watch long ads on Instagram.  Long ads could be boring and visitors can simply scroll past them after a few seconds.  Apart from that, Instagram may look a little more commercial than before. This feature is only applicable to advertisers whereas normal users can upload only up to 15 sec video. It is yet to be seen how brands utilize video ads on Instagram if they do. Many advertising agencies are still skeptical about the success of video advertising on Instagram. A lot will depend on the evolution of users’ behavior on Instagram. Would they like to stop often and watch longer videos? Do they still consider short videos more engaging? Are companies able to engage more visitors and generate more revenue by investing in

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Instagram Allows Account Switching. What This Means for Digital Marketers?

August 4, 2016

Instagram is aggressively used by digital marketers and businesses to achieve their marketing goals. The application, launched in 2010, garnered instant success that Facebook bought it in less than two years of its launch. It is Instagram’s structure that lends it simplicity; the simplicity of displaying only one photo or video on the screen at a time. There are photo filters and minimalistic use of buttons that adds to its simplicity. This ability helps Instagram to avoid cluttering of visual content and provides digital marketer an opportunity only imagined in the past. It is easy to spread your message and get follower’s attention here. An effective e-commerce platform Instagram is the most effective platform for e-commerce to generate orders. However, even if a business does not have a physical product to sell, the sheer strength of this social media network lies in its ability to connect with users. Moreover, Instagram’s sponsored posts and advertising features are doing extraordinary work for marketers. Instagram’s sponsored posts naturally blend with existing images without causing any annoyance to the user. [php snippet=1] According to a study conducted by Forrester Research, Instagram has a fan engagement rate 58 times higher than Facebook and 120 times higher than Twitter. The astounding statistics don’t need explanation and clearly, signify the importance of Instagram. The new functionality: Switch between different Instagram accounts Marketers create different Instagram accounts to manage different sectors of their business. And to access each account, they had to logout and login through a different account. This limitation led to the waste of time and hassle because marketers were not able to focus on every account seamlessly. Today, Instagram has enabled easy account switching without having to logout from an account. This feature will further bolster Instagram’s image in comparison to its counterparts. Instagram’s monthly active users have shot up from 200 million in 2014 to 400 million today. Marketers have long waited for this functionality so that they can easily switch between their business and personal accounts. Users can switch between different accounts while keeping an eye on every account.  A user can add up to five Instagram accounts. This functionality is currently available on iOS and Android platforms through its latest app version 7.15 Setting up and managing multiple accounts is a fairly simple process. Your profile settings allow you to add accounts. A tap on username at the top of your profile enables you to switch between accounts. The feature is carefully designed so that you are absolutely sure about posting to the right account. It ensures that you don’t post personal images mistakenly to your business account. How does switching between multiple accounts help digital marketers? Earlier, many marketers used to mix a lot of personal content on their business account. It used to tone down their business image which was not good from the marketing point of view.  It led to the muzzling of brand’s message. Though they had a choice to operate another account, it was not convenient to operate two different accounts through one device.  There are some third-party tools that allow for easy switching of Instagram accounts, however, they have not been very effective and Instagram is soon going to restrict them. Explore different user-bases Instant switching will enable them to reach different user-bases through different accounts. More exposure to brand Brands will get a push through a new wave of vigor and vitality. It will enhance brand’s exposure. Post more content and always stay active  Marketers can now post more content on their business account without having to log out from their personal account and always stay alive and more active among their followers. Follow a unique strategy for every account It will help them to draw a line between two different accounts and reform their social strategy. How to manage multiple Instagram accounts? Social media marketing strategy forms the basis for success on social media.  Having multiple Instagram accounts does not guarantee success unless and until you put that extra effort to frame social media strategy for every account. A social media marketer must identify the target audience for different accounts. It is equally crucial to set social media goals and attribute KPIs to understand whether creating multiple accounts adds to sales revenue and generate sufficient ROI.  Use multiple accounts to create interactive content on Instagram An interesting way in which Instagram is being used by brands is through hosting interactive games.  Marketers can link a series of Instagram accounts and direct users to click through to each. Adult Swim, a major cable network company, linked 80 Instagram accounts to create a story.  The game is linked by tags in each image which links users to other accounts. The fans could choose tags of their choice and were rewarded at the end of the game. This promotional campaign was a creative way to build awareness about their new series Rick and Morty. Though this campaign may not work for everyone, it definitely highlights the possibilities of using multiple accounts on Instagram in an innovative manner.  Easier account switching will make it convenient for marketers to create interactive and immersive content by creating different experiences for on-platform users. Use multiple accounts for A/B testing on Instagram Marketers who have already been using multiple accounts on Instagram to test an idea will find it easier to do so through this new feature. Digital marketers may employ different ideas and tactics to understand their target audience. For this, they don’t have to temper with their existing marketing strategy. Digital marketers can explore many new ideas with account switching A digital marketer operates multiple social media accounts depending upon his business requirements. Different platforms that form part of social media strategy may include Facebook page, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Google+ etc. Every platform offers a unique set of advantages and limitations. When a marketer decides to operate multiple Instagram accounts, it is adding to the list of active social media accounts.  So, marketers should be determined to put in

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The Relationship between Content Marketing and Conversions

July 22, 2016

An excessive amount of junk content is produced online and visitors often get overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of content. Content marketing is focused towards producing only relevant, quality and valuable content to enhance customer experience online. Content marketing is one of the most effective ways to influence visitors and take them ahead in the purchase cycle.  It is an educated way of marketing that genuinely creates brand awareness, builds trust and helps consumers to find appropriate solutions for their problems. Content marketing is a long-term strategy that needs consistent publishing of first-rate content. Marketers pursuing content marketing goals spend a lot of time and money in producing content for their visitors. However, is it worth the pain to spend all those resources on content marketing? Marketers are always skeptical to predict ROI when they go ahead with a content marketing campaign. An important parameter to calculate ROI is lead conversion. What is the impact of content marketing on lead conversion? What effect does it have on the bottom line of the company? There are different factors that affect conversion. The purpose of this article is to understand the relationship between content marketing and conversion. Content accelerates sales Purchase cycle of your company may differ from others. Ideally, it begins from an unaware customer to a customer who buys from you. It is important to design content keeping in mind the prospects in the purchase cycle.  Content needs differ at different levels of purchase cycle and it should be able to fulfill needs of prospects at every level of the sales funnel.  This brings them one step closer to purchase. [php snippet=1] On-site content improves online presence Good content attracts new visitors to your website every day It frequently provides fresh content to search engines Authoritative and authentic information builds trust among followers Educative content is always appreciated by visitors who seek more information about your product. This gives them a reason to return to your website Blogging Blogging is an effective way of sharing content as it positively affects your ROI It generates a consistent flow of traffic It improves your search engine ranking It converts your visitors into leads Role of social media to push content Marketers use user information on social media to precisely target content Marketers can freely interact with followers on social media It is a platform for visitors to openly express their opinion User sentiment on social media helps marketers to create tailor-made content Good content is always liked and shared on social media There are a number of social media platforms available. Choose the platform that is used more by your target audience. You need to identify leads from a list of followers.  Try to engage them even more through direct messaging and chatting. Go to any extent to resolve their queries. Henceforth, the probability of turning leads into customers multiplies. Content curation Content curation is a smart method of content marketing. Here, you need not create original content. Marketers need to find, organize, and add value to existing third party content. Expand your content reach You are promoting other people’s content for your benefit.  So, it is a win-win situation for both the parties.  Other bloggers and marketers get more exposure because of you. Similarly, they would be interested in promoting your content. This gives you more visibility and ultimately more leads. Summative content Curated content gives you a chance to provide visitors with all sources of information they seek.  This saves their time and they are likely to become your loyal visitors.  Loyal visitors are more inclined towards conversion. Curated content is unbiased Since you collect information from different sources, there is vastness in your opinion.  Content shared is not opinionated and visitors can form their own opinion. This creates room for healthy discussion.  Thus, curated content is more engaging. Long-form content Long-form content is an elaborative approach towards content marketing. This approach is suitable for prospects higher in the purchase cycle.  Long-form content may include research report, eBook, white paper, case study, tutorial content in the form of videos , infographic etc. Long-form content is useful for visitors who are looking forward to learn much more than basic information.  It is an interesting way to increase your email leads. Consumers are willing to share their email Id if they get something in return. Marketers often use this approach on their blogs by offering users to download content in exchange of their email id. Measure the impact of your content marketing campaign Measuring the impact of your campaign is important to understand how it adds to your sales revenue. Conversion goals should be clearly defined There are a number of tools available to measure your goals.  As a marketer, you can define a number of goals that you consider suitable for increasing conversion. Such goals may include expanding: Social media followers Newsletter subscriptions Website traffic Brand mentions Leads from task completion  How well do you measure and manage your content marketing campaign? Content marketing needs a well-defined strategy for creating and distributing content. The content you create should be evergreen and have the potency to be used time and again when required. It is essential to create metrics attributed to your defined goals. This helps you to measure the result of certain content posted on a certain platform. Accordingly, you can boost your efforts and allocate more resources for a specific type of content on a specific platform. On the contrary, it could be possible that your sales rose because of the organic upgrade in your search engine rankings due to some change in search engine algorithm and not due to the content marketing campaign. In such a scenario, you will realize that investing further in content production and distribution is insignificant. Conversion through content marketing is a long-term process It is essential to understand that the success of content marketing campaign can’t be measured in real-time. It is a gradual process that initiates with traffic generation. Once you are

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When to Use Emojis and When Not To?

July 4, 2016

Smileys, then emoticons and now emojis; the basic idea behind these stylized facial representations is the same.  Emojis are digital images, not limited to facial expressions, used to express an emotion in electronic messages.  Its use became widely prevalent that it found the place in Oxford Dictionaries as its 2015 “word” of the year. Emojis are not only used casually amongst friends but in businesses across the world. Emojis are used in market research and opinion surveys, charitable causes, business promotion, email marketing, by publishing houses, bloggers, and social media marketers and so on. Digital communication means have evolved over the years and use of emojis has become strikingly significant among people; though it is generally seen that younger generation is more perceptive and receptive to the use of emojis. Smartphones and social media platforms have played a major role in this and have witnessed a steady rise in the use of emojis. Perception about emojis People have a different opinion about the use of emojis professionally. Some marketers think it assists them to connect with target audience while others consider its use unprofessional.  Some feel that it saves time and easily express what they want to communicate while some consider its role very limited. The purpose of emojis in marketing communication is still not clearly defined. Despite the fact, many marketers have already incorporated emojis into their campaigns. According to a report by Appboy, a marketing automation company, emojis are more in use among mobile marketers for email marketing and push notification campaign. It also revealed that retailers and e-commerce marketers are more likely to use emojis in their campaigns. USA today experimented with emojis on front page headline. Many agencies criticized it stating that it compels people to react in a particular manner to a news item. It is tough to express seriousness and sadness with emojis, as found by USA Today, which is not a good news for publishers. This article will help you to understand when it is appropriate to use emojis in business communication. Advantages of using emojis: Emojis bring along an element of fun and excitement into conversation Emojis help you to beat the clutter in emails When words fail to express an emotion, emojis can be your best companions Emojis can be used to give a quick response to something Emojis hardly consume any space especially when you have character limitation as in Twitter Emojis are trending right now. Using them in communication clearly signifies that you are in line with the trends Disadvantages of using emojis: Every brand has a different image in the market. Emojis just can’t gel with brands with a serious image and its forced use may look unprofessional thereby affecting brand image Incompatibility between emojis and device it is consumed on. Emojis may look different on a different device or may not open correctly due to rendering issues.  This may irk consumers and damage brand image A marketer may look desperate with frequent use of emojis in emails. Consumers tend to ignore such emails and your email will soon land up in the junk folder Emojis may look offensive and insensitive to some customers Emojis can be easily misconstrued by the different set of customers. For instance, if you post something on Facebook criticizing a technology or a product. And your customers react to it using an “angry” emoji. It could have different meanings. Customers may be angry with your post (that you criticized something they like) or they could be angry with the technology or product in question. There is ambiguity Is your brand fit to use emojis? Not every brand is suitable to use emojis. A lot depends on your clientele, type of product / service and brand image. Answering these questions may be of some assistance to decide on that. Are you clearly a professional and prudent brand? Do you serve high-profile businesses and individuals? Are most of your customers older? Does your clientele appreciate the use of emojis? Emojis should not be used in businesses where it takes you to extremities or overdoes something. For instance, a customer may generally like to react in a relieved manner for a recurring glitch you were able to resolve. In such a scenario, if you show excitement or great achievement through emojis; you may look foolish or a smug. Though it matters what kind of emoji you use, but at certain places, it may be completely unfit to use. Who can marketers use emojis with? Emojis give brands a chance to customize a part of the digital language. Facebook recently released its new Reaction update that adds six emoji response buttons to existing “Like” button.  The popularity of emojis is expected to rise with this introduction.  However, expressing negative opinions still remains a limitation through emojis. Marketers can selectively use emojis with the older audience even if they are not tech-savvy. Women are more inclined towards use of emojis than men, which is good for women-oriented brands. Surprisingly, emojis can be helpful to motivate employees within a company. However, there should be a serious code of conduct for employees to know what, where and when to use emojis with customers or not use it at all. Conclusion: Can marketers successfully engage customers through emojis? Emojis do add a character to marketing communication, but it is hard to say right now how customers respond to it in the longer run.  Marketing campaigns are resource intensive. Marketers who wish to use emojis should always test them before fully implementing them in their campaigns. No matter what, marketers should pay attention to the context in which they use emojis. These digital images are swiftly becoming part of daily communication and are hard to ignore.  A marketer must be cautious about when to use emojis so as not to offend customers and also to convey the right message in line with brand’s image. It is also important to note that emojis can never replace direct verbal or written communication because

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The Best Practices of Video Marketing for eCommerce

August 31, 2015

A number of companies are realizing the importance of video marketing when it comes to boosting profits and reaching to a larger target audience. The fact is, many people prefer an audio-visual experience more than a textual one. This is apparently true among younger audiences and those who are unable to read for a long time. For such people, video marketing may seem like a better option. Moreover, very busy people will probably want to watch a 30 second video to understand the crux of the matter than read it. In this article, let us take a look at some of the best practices of video marketing for eCommerce. 1.      Start making explainer videos Explainer videos are videos that offer reasons and explanations as to why an individual  must choose a particular service or product. An advertisement is persuasive but an explainer video is informative and persuasive. It helps to know why we must buy a particular product and how it can be used. Explainer videos briefly describe the uses of explainer videos and ensure that people understand the need for a solution, how it can be solved with a certain product and finally, actually buy that product or service. 2.      Make a paradigm shift from textual content to audio-visual content Most companies still believe that textual content is all that their clients and customers want. This is not quite true. It is a well known fact that people process more information when information is provided in an audio-visual format. This helps people to understand what you are talking about in a very short period of time, instead of having to read through reams of textual content. Moreover, people are gradually realizing that they do not have a lot of time to spend on reading. Thus, they end up watching videos on YouTube, Vine, Vimeo and other websites where one can learn about products. Thus, making the paradigm shift from textual content to video is becoming apparent. 3.      Keep your videos short Videos should be short and sweet. No one really has the time to spend a lot of time on watching your videos, if they run into more than 60 seconds. They simply will get bored of your product and will move on to the next one. If you are making videos to market your products, you should ensure that they are around 30 seconds and that they explain clearly why a person must choose this product over some other product. Short videos help to retain people’s attention, and they will also be able to remember what they watched when they are short. Thus, it is important to keep marketing videos short in order to achieve eCommerce success. 4.      Make videos an important part of your marketing strategy While content writing is still the most important form of our marketing strategy, one must also make videos a part of our marketing strategy. ECommerce sites do not exist in islands. They depend on social shares, viral sharing and conversations on the Internet. For this to happen, a video is the best bet. One can easily make videos a part of a company’s marketing strategy and also save money in the process. There are professional agencies that make explainer  and other forms of videos in a short period of time and will also teach you how to market those videos to boost traffic to your eCommerce website. All that you need to do is include videos as a part of your marketing strategy. Final thoughts Video marketing need not even be expensive. Some of the techniques used in video marketing include using videos instead of blogs and marketing with product videos, video ads and explainer videos. It is important to remember that reading takes a lot more effort and time for people than watching videos. With these factors in background, it is safe to say that a number of companies are looking towards video marketing solutions. Ecommerce websites are particularly interested in video marketing as it helps to showcase products and services in a better light, and in a more sensual way (audio and visual senses). If you wish to increase sales and boost traffic to your website, choosing video marketing may be one of the better options.

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An Overview of Indus Net Technologies’(INT.) Exclusive Digital Marketing Workshops

August 28, 2015

It goes without saying that digital marketing is growing rapidly and has immense potential for further growth. This form of marketing has the best tools and techniques, which can be analyzed to understand what is working and what is not in the marketing attempts of an organization. However, your Digital Marketing efforts should have a consolidated analysis of the inclinations and expectations of the consumers across different digital media channels including direct mail, web, social media, mobile or point of sale. The Importance of Digital Marketing Demystified (DMD) A strategic Digital Marketing method helps the marketers create a consistent and appealing marketing strategy. Such a process enhances the prospect of increasing and improving interactions and relationships with the existing and the potential clients. Founder and CEO of Indus Net Technologies(INT.), Mr. Abhishek Rungta, also a commended Digital Strategy Consultant, strongly believes that like any other initiatives, Digital Marketing needs a proper strategy and creative execution. He says, “deeper the insights about client behaviour and preferences, the likeliness of a higher consumer engagement.” The DMD Workshops of the Year Such a belief has inspired Mr. Rungta to organize several Digital Marketing Workshops across different parts of India. He plays an active role in providing strategic Digital Marketing roadmaps for the leaders and professionals in the Marketing domain. Certainly, this acclaimed specialist with over 17 years of experience in the use of Digital Media and Technology is encouraging Digital Marketing Demystified (DMD) sessions all across India. He is also helping it to gain the requisite momentum. The recent DMD sessions at Oberoi Grand and Hyatt Regency, Kolkata, were quite effective in highlighting Digital Marketing as an important part of a long term business strategies.  However, DMD is not just restricted to Kolkata. Like last year, it has recently travelled in Mumbai at Trident Hotel, in Siliguri at Summit Milestone Hotel, and would also make a move to other renowned cities in the near future. The Big News Besides, Indus Net Technologies (INT.) has also come up with a workshop on “Using Digital Technology for effective Government Citizen Interface,” on 28th August, 2015 at the Hyatt Regency, New Delhi. This exclusive workshop on how ‘Digital technology’ and ‘Digital Media’ can be used for better citizen interface demonstrated how technology is transforming the way we work, communicate, or buy and sell. Mr. Rungta also illustrated the use of Digital Technology to gain innovative responses for the needs of our society in various fields. These include healthcare, remote working and collaborative intelligence, education and culture as well as the digital urban transformation. Apart from Mr. Rungta’s session, there were three other eminent speakers in this workshop-  Mr. Gaurav Dwivedi, CEO, MyGov India, spoke about the impact of MyGov in the society  Mr. Sanjeev Gupta, Addition Chief Secretary, Govt. Of Himachal Pradesh, talked about mKisan  Last but not the least, Dr. Ravi P.Singh, Secretary General of Quality Council of India had a discussion on Zero Defect Zero Effect (ZED) It is indeed a privilege for Indus Net Technologies  to conduct a Digital Marketing workshop for the Government officials. The Goal These one day workshops have proved to be immensely effective as they’re designed to walk you through the strategy building exercise. The whole purpose is to make the industrial leaders take a better control of their Digital Marketing campaigns. Not only the leaders, people who are seeking more insights and information on what kind of Digital Marketing strategy should be adopted to grow their business can also equip themselves with the best strategy to implement. No doubt, an integrated Digital Marketing strategy offers a strong foundation for all the key online marketing activities and helps in taking the right business decision. To quote Mr. Abhishek Rungta, “Digital marketing strategies enable industrial professionals to progress and make continuous improvement of the key aspects of their businesses.”

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5 Effective Online Marketing Channels for Successful SEM

August 24, 2015

An online marketing channel can either make or break your search engine marketing campaign. It is important to know what one is getting into and which channel is most suited for one’s needs. On this note, it makes sense to familiarize oneself with the five most important online marketing channels that have been around for a while, and that which refuse to vanish from the face of SEM. These online marketing channels ensure that you have a good traffic driven back to your website. They also ensure that you get the kind of traffic you are looking for. In this article, let us take a look at five of the most important online marketing channels which help in optimizing search engine marketing. 1.      Search Engine Optimization done the old-fashioned way Organic SEO depends on good quality content and ethical SEO practices. This means, fixing your meta-tags, adding images in the right places, fixing broken links, weeding out spammy backlinks and ensuring that the website is administered well. It also means that you will often need to maintain the website so that error pages, slow browsing and other problems are weeded out in order to boost traffic. Organic SEO is still one of the most important sources of traffic and it is known for its high quality leads. 2.      Search engine advertising Advertising on Google, Bing, Yahoo! and other search engines are very important to divert traffic. Paid advertising is a tried and tested online marketing channel that ensures a high rate of success, when it comes to driving traffic. There are different kinds of paid advertising and you could choose the one that will best suit your company and its products. Pay Per Click, Pay Per Impression, Cost Per Lead, Cost Per Action and other forms of paid advertising have been around for a long and will continue to be so. 3.      Referral and affiliate marketing Affiliate marketing is still one of the more reliable forms of SEM. They can be particularly useful for retail ecommerce. Performance-based marketing can be very useful, and, as it makes use of the Internet to get referrals, it is one of the cheapest and most effective forms of search engine marketing (SEM). Another way of getting traffic and leads is through referral traffic. This involves capitalizing traffic that arrives from other blogs and websites. This kind of traffic depends on a number of factors and one needs to work constantly on nurturing those referral sources. 4.      Content marketing and its growing importance This is one of the most important forms of online marketing channels today. While it is not as obvious and in-your-face as a banner ad or a PPC campaign, content marketing builds referrals and helps you with organic SEO as well. In the long term, publishing great content and marketing it to the right target audience will help you to crystallize your authority and thus gain a higher SEO ranking. Ultimately, content marketing is one of the most important channels of SEM and this phenomenon is only likely to grow and increase further. 5.      Social media, social signals and social networking With the advent of social media marketing and with Google placing importance to social signals, SEO professionals have realized the importance to marketing on social networking sites in order to boost SEO. Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn have all proven to be important platforms to market online. All of these social platforms offer various advertising options to companies. Moreover, being active on these social platforms will help to build audience organically, which place an important role in ensuring that you rank high in search results. Looking forward Every business wants traffic that could probably lead to more sales. This means, we need to channelize traffic from sources that are reliable and targeted. We must remember that all channels are not made equal and, some channels may work great for some, while others may not work at all for someone else. With this in mind, the 5 tried and tested online marketing channels we discussed above will surely boost traffic to your website and help you with your SEM, no matter what kind of business you run.  

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How Mobile Devices Are Driving the Future of Search

August 17, 2015

Back in March 2014, a study conducted by online advertising platform Marin Software revealed that more than 50% of all paid search links would arrive from mobile devices by the end of December, 2015. Jessica Lee wrote that cost per click (CPC) on mobile devices increased at an incredible rate, when compared with CPC on desktops in 2013. Moreover, tablet CPCs outranked desktop CPCs. A lot of naysayers had predicted that tablets would be irrelevant. Throughout 2014, we have only seen people purchasing more tablets and cellphones with which most people access the Internet today. In fact, a majority of search queries come from mobile devices, as opposed to desktops. This fundamental change in the way people access the Internet has contributed to a paradigm shift within SEO circles. Today, SEO professionals understand that the money is in mobile devices. People simply do not use computers anymore, especially, in developing countries where large computers are more expensive and unaffordable for a large number of people. Thus, mobile devices have given the power of using Internet to many people who, otherwise, would not be privileged enough to be online. It is not just the poor who access the Internet using mobile devices. Most affluent people use mobile devices to conduct searches, look for products and also to simply browse. This change in user habits is mostly because of increased screen sizes of mobile devices. In this article, let us take a look at how mobile devices are driving the future of search. What is the status of mobile Internet usage today? Today, it is no longer relevant to describe how important mobile devices are and why we need to focus our SEO strategies on mobile devices. What is important is to understand the statistics so that we are in a position to create targeted search campaigns, which help us to create SEO strategies that are effective and useful. Danyl Bosomworth wrote that a whopping 80% of people used smartphones to search the Internet, whereas, another 47% of those interviewed used tablets as well. 91% of those interviewed still used a PC or a laptop to search the Internet. What this really tells us is, mobile devices cannot be ignored anymore. They are an important part of the search ecosystem and it is crucial to understand how people use their mobile devices when they search so that we can build better websites and come up with more targeted SEO campaigns. Searching begins on search engines but mobile apps are not far behind Danyl also wrote that 48% of them start searching on search engines. Another 33% start searching on branded websites, whereas, 26% of those interviewed searched on branded apps. This piece of data gives us a very valuable piece of information. People have already begun to use branded applications to search for products. For instance, people would download Macy’s application to check which products are available because they trust Macy to sell the best. Likewise, it is becoming increasingly clear that people now use applications to search for not only products but also trivia, information, news and many other things. We have already moved towards an app-centric world, where the browser is slowly losing its significance. This is not really a bad thing to happen. It is just that we need to get used to the new way of browsing and searching for information. The future is the mobile app Mobile apps are going to get bigger this year and this will partly be the reason why it is important to focus our SEO strategies on optimizing applications for search. This will help us to guide users to arrive at information that they want and also help clients in increasing sales. Applications will continue to take precedence over websites in the near future. He also continued to write that 89% of time spent on media by users was through mobile apps. People spent only 11% of their time viewing media on mobile browsers. This leads us to believe that if people are going to look for images or videos on their mobile devices, it is mostly through applications. If you have an e-commerce store, it makes more sense to make it app-friendly, rather than having a completely new mobile website. This also brings us to the topic of responsive websites. Responsive web design for better mobile search With mobile devices coming in different screen sizes, designers need to focus on various screen resolutions. This impacts the way online search takes place. If websites are not optimized for a mobile experience, they will receive very few visitors and search traffic. Responsive design ensures that a website looks good on all screen sizes, thereby, enhancing the stickiness of a website. Responsive design is also SEO-friendly and is a great method to ensure that mobile websites are SEO-friendly too. It also removes the need to design separate mobile websites. Local search and geo-location data If you have ever used one of those taxi-hailing applications, you will know the importance of geo-location data. Dating applications have mushroomed over recent years, thanks to GPS and the ability to locate like-minded people nearby. Searching on mobile phones is more local than ever. In fact, local search is the singular most unique feature of mobile search. Businesses can now optimize their physical stores to appear in the search results of mobile users who are in the vicinity. If you run a restaurant that sells Thai food and someone who likes Thai food is nearby, you will probably end up in the search results. All that you need to do is optimize your store locator pages in order to help the searcher locate you. GPS has, in fact, changed the way we search completely. Searching has truly gone local, thanks to geo-location information. One does not need to describe one’s physical presence in detail. Turning on the GPS needs to be enough to help customers locate your office or store. Moreover, a mobile user’s geo-location data gives you

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Why You Must Stop Writing Pretentiously

August 10, 2015

It is a well-accepted theory that if you need a dictionary to understand what a writer is trying to communicate, he or she is a bad writer. There is a tendency among writers to use complex and convoluted words in order to come across as educated, advanced or even sophisticated. This sort of bloated and pretentious writing neither works well in literature nor in content marketing. Oscar Wilde, James Joyce and others often spoke derisively about other writers who wrote in an indulgent manner. They believed, writers who write pretentiously do a disservice to the art and craft of writing. They believed that it was unimportant how complex a particular word is. What is important is, if it is well-understood by the intended target audience. They wrote literature and were not aware of either the Internet or content marketing as we know it today. Those were the times when writing was still an elitist skill that had a sense of awe built around it. Pretentious writing and content marketing Today, we are discussing pretentious writing in the context of content marketing. Content marketing only works when your target audience understands what you are trying to say. Use one wrong word or one difficult word, your audience will get irritated and will move away. If you use a word like “ameliorate” instead of “improve” in your tweet, a lot of people will simply get annoyed. It is not a matter of your target audience’s intelligence but it is a matter of cognitive processing. No one really has the time to process the word “ameliorate” even though most of us know it means the same as “improve”. On the other hand, “ameliorate” sounds pretentious as well. As this particular word is not used as often as “improve”, a number of writers fall into the elitist trap that it should be somehow better to use it because not many people use it. This sort of elitism is only going to harm your content marketing strategies. If you know a content writer that consistently uses bloated, indulgent and pretentious words or phrases, a request to use simpler & more democratic words might be in order. Pretentious writing is about social class and economics All of pretentious writing is really about social class and economics. Some writers often want to align themselves with obvious signs of elitism, which in the case of writing, happens to be complex words. These words are, usually, derived from Latin or one of the other classical languages. Sometimes, writers also have a tendency to use French or German words to sound educated and cultured. Some of the obvious choices are “rendezvous” in place of a meeting, “gateau” in place of “plain old cake” and many others. This tendency goes back to the days of Middle Ages, when it was considered mandatory for every cultured English citizen to know Latin or French. Latin was previously the language of the educated and was replaced by French during the reformation age. French was later replaced by English after the Treaty of Paris, when France ceded its colonial territories in India to England. Yet, the fascination for using foreign language words is quite obvious. The writer takes a superior approach and uses words that a large percentage of his readers would find artificial. Pretentious writing irritates and alienates people While writing pretentiously or indulgently might boost a writer’s morale, it alienates the reader. The reader often feels he or she probably does not understand what is being written and will simply move on to a less complex writer. Or, if the reader is educated and cultured in a less benign sense, he or she will immediately recognize the writing as pretentious & thus, not credible enough. In content marketing, we are trying to build credibility. We are trying to reach out to a target audience. If we are pretentious and self-indulgent, the purpose of content marketing is defeated. People will neither be impressed by content nor will they proceed to follow you on social media and finally, your sales & profits will not improve. If you write pretentiously, you risk alienating ad irritating your target audience, which is the worst thing that any writer can do. Writing is about communication and presenting ideas in a manner that is coherent, cohesive & within content. If these three criteria are not met, it is not good writing. If you write pretentiously, you will come under negative scrutiny Most writers who write pretentiously do not realize that they are asking for negative criticism and unwanted scrutiny. It attracts scrutiny and distracts people from the actual message, no matter how useful & important it is. If we have to write about SEO and begin a sentence like “For the purpose of elevating the current status of search engine results, one could engage in professional entities that assist in these matters”, the message is lost. You could just say “To enhance your SEO, you could hire a professional agency”. This might sound simple but only experienced writers can understand the difference between using simple words to communicate and avoiding complex words when they are not required. Novice writers often use a lot of jargon, complex words and even lengthy sentences to look professional, intellectual and elite. Unfortunately, this attracts negative attention and scrutiny & dilutes the initial message. This is one of the reasons why we need not ever engage in pretentious writing, no matter how tempting it is. Writing pretentiously affects your content marketing strategy Nothing is worse than a piece of pretentious copy to ruin your entire content marketing strategy. If you do not understand what your content writer writes, do not use that piece of content. If you yourself do not understand, why would your audience? Unless you have reasons to believe that the writer has used complex sentences and foreign words to make a valid point, you could ask for a re-edit. If your writer is a novice, he or she will use this

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