Category: Marketing

Writer’s block needs no introduction to a writer and it could seem like a dreadful nightmare without any seeming end. It usually shows up at the inception of a literary project and could last for keeps if not addressed properly. This stagnation of thought leads to frustration and a feeling of impending doom in a writer, which could even coerce him to quit writing. It is often marked with the cessation of creative ideas and jazzy thoughts which would otherwise be easily articulated by a writer. It even drives a writer to consider his work, which he spent hours working on, vile and abject. This dejection manifests itself as frustration and also transpires as anxiety, which is completely uncalled for. The problem gets worse for writers who regularly work on deadlines: creative writing becomes more of an ordeal and less of an avocation. Every cloud has a silver lining and writer’s block can easily be identified. Like they say, if you identify a problem you are half way through the solution. Since a writer’s block is no alien to a writer, every writer has his own well formulated strategy or a coping mechanism to deal with it. Given below are some of the tried and tested ways to address this despicable problem: 1.Take Proper Rest between Two Writing Assignments It may not be a feasible solution for writers who have a lot to finish, but it is certainly the most effective way to bring out the literary genius in you. Taking some time-out will help you to clear the loops of repetitive thoughts from your mind and think clearly in a new dimension. During a hiatus, one must try to steer clear of any work related thoughts and concentrate on the joys of being. 2.Take Up Physical Activity after an Intensive Writing Session It is common knowledge that brainstorming and writing for hours together can elevate stress levels and to alleviate this condition nothing works better than an intensive work out session or any physical activity which makes you break a sweat.  With alleviated stress levels you will notice writer’s block turning into a mere figment of imagination. 3.Deviate from the Given Topic and Write at Will This may sound a bit unreasonable, but it helps significantly and has proved to bring about desirable results. Spend few moments writing about anything that fancies you and you will witness an inundation of ideas which you thought you lacked. 4.Do Your Research Writing block may also occur from poor knowledge of the subject. Spend some time collecting information and delving deep into the data already available with you. This will give you a firm understanding of the subject and thereby reducing the chances of experiencing a block due to lack of knowledge. 5.Do Not Brainstorm while Sitting at Your Work Desk You cannot expect to explore all the literary avenues sitting at your desk in front of your monitor.  Thinking requires open spaces and arguably, that is how the term out-of-the-box came into existence. Take brief breaks from work and take a stroll outside and do most of the brainstorming during these brief time-outs. 6.Listen to Your Body Clock It is very important to work according to your body clock, a dozing mind is not much help in dealing with a creative block. Make sure that you understand your body clock well, and fix your writing schedule accordingly. 7.Quality Matters, But Not Always You may be pushed to deliver high quality literary work, but that does come at a cost. It drains your reservoir of creativity and unleashes the maddening writer’s block. You must learn to cut yourself some slack. It is ok to goof up and it is ok to write badly.  One must understand that creativity is not mechanical! 8.It Is Easier to Conquer Smaller Territories Most of the writers know it for a fact that a writer’s block usually manifests itself at the inception of a herculean writing project. Try to divide the project into small divisions which can be covered up in the stipulated period of time. This technique will help you to get through monstrous assignments with utmost ease. 9.Systematic Questioning Can Spell Doom for Writing Blocks Systematic questioning is often practiced to come up with a set of ideas relevant to the topic in a structured format. It helps one to device the outline of the piece to be written and maintain brevity in the text. It gives the author a clear idea about what is to be conveyed and he goes about writing a succinct piece without straying much. 10.Draw References from a Relevant Piece of Writing Go for articles with a similar subject line as that of yours and try to draw parallels. Do not make your article a mere copy of the original text, but just infuse the essence of the original text into your writing. You will see evident results in no time! 11.Limit Your Number of Breaks As discussed earlier, the importance of taking breaks while writing is crucial but one should not go over board and spoil one’s discipline. It is very important for an author to restrict the number of “coffee breaks” to maintain the discipline. 12.Pick up Easier Writing Projects There can be some writing projects which can be a tad awful and tedious; breaking your head over it just won’t help. Try picking easier projects first and finish them on time. Believe it or not it helps giving you the much needed motivation to get through tougher projects. 13.Record Your Thoughts This is by far the most well received way to skilful writing. One tends to lose one’s trail of thoughts while jotting them down, the best way to hold onto that nascent nexus of words is to utter them into a recording device. It helps you to maintain that free flowing trail of words while describing your thoughts, and when you are done with it you may play that recording device and jot them down.

Press releases are a great way to ensure success for your digital marketing campaign. However, much too often, we tend to make errors that result in seemingly amateurishly written press releases. In order to ensure that your press release is read by those who will eventually use it to write stories in mainstream media offline or online, it is important to keep a few rules in mind. We have listed twelve tips that we think are crucial for businesses and start-ups. The more you incorporate these tips in your release; the better shall be the chances of landing in an announcement in the media such as television, eMagazine, newspapers or websites. 1.Importance of Specificity Be specific and do not wander from the point. Journalists are swarmed by hundreds of press releases every day. To avoid further aggravating their burgeoning task of sifting through a lot of unnecessary information, the contents should be kept precise. The content should preferably be one or two pages and readable. 2.Write Killer Headlines The headline should be a feast to the eyeballs. The headline or the subject line of the press release should be such that it sums up the whole release. It should evoke interest in the mind of the reader. Keep in mind that the page should not be too cluttered, but presentable. 3.High Resolution Images Use pictures wherever possible. Photographs should preferably be in high resolution, in a commonly used format and a regular size. Make the information readily available to the reader because pictures are commonly not displayed in many mailboxes. It should not be attached to the release as it can be flagged as spam. A collage of pictures can tell a story better than a lot of words. 4.Contact Information Include relevant contact information such as email addresses, phone numbers, dates, locations, full name and postal addresses. These should be provided to interact and be communicated with the latest of the company’s developments. 5.Statistics Are Important Provide numerical data to support your claim. Statistical data should be provided to highlight the uniqueness of the product. 6.Pay attention to Grammar Keep the release free from grammatical and spelling error. Even a single mistake in your spelling and grammar could shoo away a prospective client. Proof read the release many times. The release should be a third person account and in consistent tenses. 7.Use Quotes Appropriately Enliven the release with a generous dash of quotes. Quotes from users of the product can really be an icing on the cake. The quotes should come from a diverse section of people from various walks of life- be it occupation, race or culture. They should be free from grammatical errors which are often encountered while collecting opinions. The idea of people endorsing the product can mean a lot to the release. The quotes in the release gives a human feel to it where people in the respective fields can relate to their opinions 8.Don’t Be Pretentious Overtly sophisticated and fancy words can prove to be a big turn-off. Fancy words such as adjectives- ‘number one company’, ‘leading’, ‘world class’ are ignored by reporters. Such words lack credibility. If used, reliable sources should be cited. Awards won can be highlighted. Products sparking a trend can be mentioned. 9.Target All Platforms The target should not be the print media alone. Websites, eMagazines, blogs, television and other medium should also be targeted. 10.Following up Subsequent follow-ups of the release’s status should be avoided and can be bothersome to the journalists, who are a busy lot. 11.Distribution Interacting with the publications via email is wise. Other websites can also be used such as Press Dispensary. There are a few distribution sites that journalists register with, who charge a nominal fee for the services rendered Such as Response Source, Real Wire, Source Wire, Neon Drum and PR Web. 12.References Provide relevant references at the bottom of the page. To satisfy the curiosity of the inquisitive reader, some references need to be cited. While links can be published, you should ensure that your press release does not stray away from being precise and specific. These tips can help your business to ensure that a decent press release has been written. Hiring great copywriters to write press releases is always a good idea, and if you can afford, go ahead by all means. If you cannot afford to hire good copywriters, you should follow these tips studiously.

There are a number of social networking sites that are announced every month and most of them are forgotten by the end of the next month. Very few of them receive any attention at all and even when they do, they are gradually forgotten. Two exceptions to this rule in recent months are Vine and Pheed. While Vine is a video based iOS app announced by Twitter, Pheed is a full fledged social network that allows you to share media, photos, videos, audio and text. The network was announced late last year and was made public once again in late February. Pheed became immensely popular with teenagers and young adults and quickly became the #1 social networking app to be downloaded on iPhone. Pheed can be used as a mobile application and also on the desktop. It has a very slick and stylish interface and certainly has something in it that will make you lurk around for a little more time than you would normally on any other newer social networking site. Starting to Use Pheed – Step by Step Guide Signing up on Pheed is an easy process. You can either use your Facebook or Twitter account from the mobile application or use your email to register. In order to complete the registration process, you need to subscribe to at least three channels, which are mostly at the moment spare. Pheed offers a Twitter-like profile page, where you can add a short bio and a profile pic along with a background image. You can also choose to set your channel rating to the age group you cater to. If you plan to post adult (not pornography) content, you can choose 17 and above. Similarly, you may choose your own safety filter for the content that you get to see. Pheed also requests you to invite your friends from Twitter, Facebook an email to join Pheed. Just like Twitter or Instagram, you can type tags and usernames in order to find content and people to follow. The choices are many and you should in fact find a number of interesting people and users to follow and interact with. Pheed lets you share what you post on Pheed with your Facebook account. Similarly, you can do the same on Twitter as well. Using your Pheed timeline and filtering the content you see is just as useful. You need to tap the house-shaped icon, which reveals a dropped down of filters for you to choose from. You can choose to view all content or block remixes from appearing in your timeline. A remix is similar to retweeting on Twitter and reblogging on Tumblr. Similarly, you can choose to display only text, audio, photo, video or broadcast from the dropdown menu. There is also a Notifications bubble that lets you know when someone subscribes to your channel or interacts with you. At the moment, you can share pheeds across Facebook, Twitter or email. You may also flag or keep content, depending on how strongly you feel about it. Creating a Pheed is very easy. The interface on the mobile application looks similar to typing a tweet. It lets you add images, video or audio. Moreover, Pheed lets you type 420 characters instead of just 140 on Twitter. What sets Pheed apart is the option to copyright your pheeds. You may click on the little copyright button so that no one can publish your pheeds or content within without your explicit permission. Popularity among Youth Pheed seems to be especially popular among the young. 81% of Pheed’s users are aged between 14 and 25, though the platform is not targeted only at youngsters. One may explain that most youngsters are looking for a space of their won, and Pheed came at the right time to provide an alternate space vis-a-vis Twitter and Facebook, which are more popular among people of all generations. Pheed Has Important Celebrity Friends in Hollywood The popularity of Pheed among teenagers and young adults is also because many celebrities like Acacia Brinley, Pia Mia and others began to use it. We must note that Pheed is based in Los Angeles and the founders have noted that they have a lot of friends in Hollywood, which also explains why many celebrities have begun to use Pheed. While Hollywood connections may have helped Pheed to garner support from teen celebrities, we must not ignore the fact that it is a very well designed platform which is already the #1 application in recent weeks on App Store. This popularity should be enough for us to pay more attention to Pheed before others grab the opportunity to do the same. In fact, now may be the right time to grab your Pheed handles before someone else takes it away. Pheed Is Popular Among Creative People Apart from youngsters, Pheed seems to be especially popular among the creative types. It is being increasingly used by filmmakers, musicians, actors and designers. The network’s slick interface and ease of sharing not only on Pheed but also cross post on Facebook and Twitter alone (without actually sending a Pheed) makes it ever more popular not only as a social networking site, but also as a social networking tool that can be used to handle Twitter and Facebook. Pheed is already one of the top apps in almost 30 countries across the world, and the number is only growing steadily. Its popularity depends on its ease of use, speed, slick interface and the ability to share photos, video, text and audio. Paid Subscriptions and Copyrights Pheed lets people monetize their social status and content, something that no other social networking site has done so far. While it may sound gimmicky and you may wonder why anyone would pay money to read someone’s social posts, it makes a lot of business and commercial sense to not only Pheed but also to users to opt for such services. We can expect a lot of investigative journalists, celebrities, politicians and company

In the past few years LinkedIn has proved to be a lifeline for recruiters and job seekers. It is believed that every second two profiles are created on this social networking site and every user wants to be viewed by potential recruiters. In this hope users try what not to make the most of their profiles and in the process they often end up bungling up. This platform can very well be used to one’s advantage and can provide a significant boost to one’s career, all one needs is a little guidance to optimize results from this social networking site. As we know, LinkedIn mostly focuses on working professionals and helps them to showcase their skills, expertise, experience and academics qualifications, which can help in roping in the best suited job opportunities. This is one social networking site which has the most promising results, but to reap the benefits you need to make your profile as effective as possible. It is not a myth that recruiters spend long hours scanning and skimming profiles on LinkedIn, this social networking site is frequented by recruiters and is probably the only social networking site which recruiters are allowed to access from their workplace without any hassles. Here is a list of few quick tips which can increase traffic to your LinkedIn profile exponentially and help you in picking the best possible option from the surge of job opportunities. 1.Ensure that Your Profile Is Complete It is the primary and yet the most important step to direct traffic to your profile. Incomplete profiles never surface and hence are never picked by recruiters. It is very crucial for you to fill in all the necessary details to ensure the completeness of a profile. Sometimes a trivial section like uploading your picture can render your profile incomplete if not filled in. Remember, every section is vital and needs to be filled in, by doing so you will not only improve the appearance of your profile, but also improve the results you expect from it. 2. Use the Headline of Your Profile to Your Advantage In a typical LinkedIn profile the headline shows up right below your name and briefly focuses on what you are associated with and what you want to associate with. It is advisable to add keywords to your profile headline so that it easily gets picked by the search engine. While adding keywords, remember the idea is to just add keywords and not a prolix speech, strictly maintain brevity in this section. Being greedy may help you get that extra slice of cake but in this section it may prove extremely detrimental for your profile. No recruiter would want to read a long-winded headline, it should only reflect the essence of your professional being. Another approach that can help you score well with recruiters is to add descriptive key words to highlight your multiple current roles. For e.g. Author: Vogue, CEO@ WritersSay, Specialist in Search, Content marketing and social media. 3. Share Your Relevant Past Experience LinkedIn provides an excellent platform to exhibit your professional and academic accomplishments. There is also a section which gives you the opportunity to speak about your company and your role in that company, this space can be utilized to focus on how you have grown in an organisation as a professional and at the same time manifests your expertise to the recruiters.  This is the space to fill in the details and the intricacies of your job you would like to project. LinkedIn gives you an option of providing the job details of all your past jobs thereby multiplying the chances of exhibiting your professional expertise.  Ladle out as much relevant information as you can in this section for the designations have worked in. 4. Never Skip the Summary Section It may appear to be unreasonable and unnecessary as it only summarizes your entire profile, but this section is way more important that you think it is. Recruiters and viewers seldom spend enough time on your profile to go through the intricate details mentioned in it, most of them skim through the summary section to get a rough idea or a gist of your past professional experience. It is important as just any other section, as it not only projects your past experience but can be used to give out additional relevant information as well. Here you can mention your achievements and your future goals. In this section you can also include links and direct your viewers to the WebPages you want them to view, they could be created by you or could be reflecting the work you were associated with. You can also use this feature to direct visitors to view the intelligent presentations made by you, a presentation has a more lasting impact than a prolix speech. 5. Get Your Skills Endorsed The skills you mention on your LinkedIn profile can easily pass for bluff unless you get them endorsed. Getting your skills endorsed increases the credibility of your skills; in turn it increases the credibility of your profile and makes it more believable.  People who endorse your skills are ideally people you have worked with or have been associated with and when they endorse your skill their names show up against the skill they endorsed. Usually it takes an endorsement to get endorsed, a give and take relationship that was defined by ancient LinkedIn users. To have others vouch for your skills makes your profile more reliable and recruiters pick such profiles like hotcakes. 6.  A Good Recommendation Is a Valuable Testimonial You can have your connections on LinkedIn write a good recommendation for you, it is another parameter recruiters take into consideration while evaluating your profile.  Make sure that your recommendation has what you want to project in your profile. Since it is usually asked for, you can even express what you are looking for in a recommendation to your connections. Putting words in someone else’s mouth here won’t be a bad idea after all. It

Customers form the very backbone of businesses and they constitute the very essence of a flourishing business. Indeed, they should be treated well so that it paves the way to a prospering business. With over 175 million registered users, Twitter is a place where small businesses thrive by connecting with a huge number of followers. The main goal of small businesses should be to get acquainted with their followers and retain them. If you neglect your followers, you could lose them. This exodus of people to greener territories can be more or less attributed to a host of factors- as we see in the next section. 5 Tips to Avoid Alienating Twitter Followers 1. Never Stop Connecting and Building a Relationships with Followers There is nothing worse than having an official Twitter account and constantly churning out marketing tweets. It is important to engage with your consumers for they are people and not just a Twitter statistic. Offer discounts, seek feedback for your products and services and indulge followers when they speak highly about your business. Offer a discount, retweet when they have something personal and happy about themselves to say and basically, be cordial. Sometimes, you could share some anecdotes, comment on celebrities, news material and other news items trending on Twitter. 2. Build a Specific Target Audience and Nurture It For example, if teenagers or college students are targeted, the posts need to have an amount of ‘coolness quotient’. On the other hand, Twitter uses SMS lingo for sure, but that does not mean there can be mistakes in the lingo. It doesn’t go well with most followers and you will not be taken seriously. You need to groom your brand to meet some specific requirements. Understand your target audience and limit tweets that can come across as off-putting. 3. Stop Being Offensive Never Engage in offensive comments, ridiculing people or rude behavior: This can get you mired in a controversy. Be outspoken but do not be nasty, which can shun followers and kick up a storm, as it can be detrimental to your brand. It is also wise to refrain from posting sensitive information which can offend certain groups. Recently, Olivia Wilde was at the receiving end of numerous hate tweets from Justin Bieber’s beliebers. The trigger, according to her, was a harmless suggestion to her ‘brother’ to stop roaming topless on the streets, as seen in a recent picture of him on the internet. In another incident, a comment made by a boy on Twitter did not go down well with an emir, who awarded him a 5 year jail term for insulting him, in the neighboring country of Kuwait. Make sure you live in a safe place if you want to extend your freedom to your Twitter channel. 4. Be Grateful Write a few congratulatory tweets when required. If someone retweets something about you in admiration or is in awe of you, saying that you have done a great thing do reply with a thanks. This, if not done, can end up with you being typecast as arrogant or rude. This could be less than amusing to your consumers/followers and they will eventually click on the ‘Unfollow’ button. Be respectful of the time and attention showered upon you by your followers, as they surely deserve it from you. Spare them a thought. Not doing so is a sure way of alienating your followers. 5. Do Not Be an Automaton While automating some amount of social posts is unavoidable, do not do it flagrantly. Too much of automation can be a big turn-off to your consumers. You should be communicating a lot with your consumers for that is what a social platform is all about. If you rely a lot on timed tweets, other than in emergency or on weekends, your followers will eventually desert you. You must also not send automated tweets such as “Let’s see how many likes for this pic”. This won’t do any good. Such begging of likes and comments can alienate your followers. If you really want to retain your followers, keep a tab on the statistical data accumulated over a period of time. This can tell you a lot about consumer behavior. Being nice, polite and courteous and finally, being real will ensure that you will not alienate your followers. Anything that seems to sale-sy or unreal will alienate your followers and that is not what we want from a successful digital marketing campaign.

YouTube is the best medium to share videos and engage with audience who share similar interests. It is no wonder then, that marketing strategies involve utilizing YouTube and increasing subscribers’ to one’s channels. After Google, YouTube is now the second largest search engine. While Google dominated the Internet when it comes to looking for information on anything, YouTube has grown much more popular as people would rather listen to and watch than read and understand. Making use of YouTube in the best possible way is not known to many. There are a few ‘must do’ actions to market your video the best possible way, which will help you reach out to scores of people with similar tastes or people who are plain interested in your video. Gaining publicity on YouTube is not only easier, but there are wide opportunities stemming from making your online presence entertaining and enlightening. Two reasons why it is necessary to have a presence on YouTube: 1. It’s Free Apart from the time taken for you to construct a video and make it entertaining, it is simply free. Unlike a billboard or a TV ad, you can post your video on YouTube and even edit it by making additions whenever you desire to. You can also keep adding any number of videos in your name, creating a niche for yourself. 2. Creativity as its Best: You can get all creative and add your touch to the video, ensuring the message you want to deliver is portrayed the best way possible. As many people prefer watching to reading, a video is now the best option. Making it creative will also excite people and urge them to let it go viral without being asked to. 3. Free to choose your Target Audience: If you desire to showcase your video to a certain set of people around the globe, you are most welcome to do so by using the right set of key words that would direct your video to the audience you choose. Once you have posted a video, you cannot just sit back and expect it to gain a million views. Simply posting it might fetch you a handful of viewers, you need to do a bit more to ensure your video is among the popular videos viewed. You will need to build your own set of followers or subscribers (YouTube terms) who because of your video content have become ardent fans. These fans/followers/subscribers will watch, comment and share your video with others simply because they like what you have put up. A few simple ways to get these followers to follow you: 1. Ensure Regularity: Keep creating new content and make it available with a set list of people, informing them that they have something new to look forward. By creating a cycle, they will know what to expect when. If you get a poor feedback on any one posted video, go back and review your work. Make sure that your video is interesting, exciting and has something new to offer to your viewers. 2. Ask for Subscribers: Don’t imagine your viewers to know what you are thinking. Some might assume that you do not like your video to go viral and hence would enjoy it and keep it to themselves. So, ask your viewers to subscribe the video by clicking the ‘Subscribe’ button placed right above your video. Tell them why you would need your video to be subscribed and even tell them how they can do so. 3. Use Annotations: Annotations are those multicolored notes that you see on a person’s YouTube video. Unfortunately this tool has been overused. Using it to the most of your advantage can give you the best results.  Add a ‘speech bubble’ as an annotation placing it directly under the subscribe button. Do this to all your existing and old videos 4. Publicize your YouTube Widget: Ensure people know that you have a YouTube channel going. Provide a direct link to your video on your blog, email and any other personal communication tool that you use. 5. Show your Interests: Share with people what you like also showing them that you appreciate another person’s work as much as you would want them to appreciate yours. You can do this by adding on your YouTube page other’s video links you like and have shared All these are beginners list to get you quite a number of subscribers, building your publicity even when you are fast asleep.

Google AdWords and other PPC methods can seem easy and understandable. When months pass and you need an audit done for all your PPC accounts, you may end up doing a biased job that supports your own work as a business or miss out on important deficits and lacking in the campaign which an outsider could have noticed. With that in mind, in this article, let us discuss what PPC account audits are, who should do them and when they should be conducted. Why Should PPC Accounts Be Audited Regularly? PPC accounts need to be audited regularly so that you understand and reevaluate the bigger picture in which your PPC campaigns are embedded into. There may be opportunities that you may otherwise miss, or you may be sticking on to campaigns that are no longer useful. A third person’s point of view is always important and crucial for us to understand how PPC accounts are performing. Most of the times, a company is faced with the question of how often they should perform an audit in order to understand the larger picture. The answer to that question is rather simple. It should be at least 4 times a year. A quarterly analysis helps you to correlate your PPC campaigns with quartile sales data. A year end analysis in the same way will help you to gather a larger picture. Importance of Third Party PPC Audits A good third party audit helps you to quickly identify problem areas when your budget does not align with your overall goals. An audit will quickly tell you if that PPC campaign you ran during the festive season was worth the trouble or not. Based on that, you can repeat the campaign next year or choose not to repeat it ever again. Whether you choose to hire an outsider or get someone from your company to perform the audit, you should ensure that it is not the same person who runs the PPC campaign who also gets to do the PPC audit. The end result will invariably be colored and biased. Instead, hire a consultant or an agency that can perform the audit from an unbiased and objective perspective. It helps you to get a third party to point out flaws and assess a PPC campaign for what it really is. If you do not wish to share your information with outsiders and do not want a third person audit, you can choose someone from your own company who does not work with the PPC team. The idea is to get an outside professional’s valued opinion regarding your PPC campaign. Problems with In-house PPC Audits: Lack of Objectivity and Honesty The problem with in-house audits is that it is easy to postpone dates and be satisfied that everything is going according to the plan, when it actually is not. Self congratulatory audits lead PPC campaigns nowhere and ultimately, it results in a lot of money that is not well spent. The in-house professional who conducts the audit may not make all the suggestions he or she thinks need to be made, because they may believe their suggestions may not followed. The end result is an audit that is not honest, objective and unbiased. With this in mind, it is always a good idea to hire someone from outside or at least someone who does not work closely with people responsible with PPC accounts. You may save a lot of money by hiring someone from your own company to do the audit, but it just will not help you in the long run. An audit will tell you how your PPC is actually running and how it ran during specific periods. For this reason alone, it is important to engage your content development and marketing teams when the audit is finally out. It helps them to make better choices and write copy that is more effective, and also choose keywords that are more effective in PPC campaigns. An audit helps you to gain insight that you did not possess earlier and help you to look at things from a new perspective. An honest and unbiased PPC audit can breathe in new life into your PPC campaigns.

As the number of banner ads is increasing, it has created a situation among Internet users, called “banner blindness”. Banner ads which are glaring, in the face, congested with content or even too repetitive will be avoided and in fact ignored. This is something a marketer has to take care of. There are certain tips and tricks which we can employ in order to make banner ads more successful. Before discussing them, let us understand the three different types of banner advertising used in the World Wide Web. Pay per Click: In this method the host website on which you have placed your ad, gets his share of profits as soon as someone clicks on your banner ad. Cost per Impression / Cost per 1000 impressions: For each set of 1000 visitors to your ad, the host company is paid a certain discussed amount. Pay per Sale: The host company is paid depending on the number of sales generated through the banner ad placed on his site. Depending on the product which is advertised and the type of host site/publisher, a combination of these can be used to suit each one’s requirements. In this article, we will discuss a few key points that will result in a successful banner ad creating much needed awareness. Few Basic Tips to Create Successful Banner Ads: Research Well: There are plenty of banner ads out there, observing them will give us a chance to learn from their mistakes. Notice how and where they are placed, how much of content is included, the type of message, color combinations and such details. This will give you a fair idea of how your banner ad needs to look to attract consumers’ attention. Keep It Clutter Free: Make sure your banner ad is clutter free. An ad with too many images and text will distract the mind from the actual message losing out on the sole purpose of the banner ad. It is best to advertise a single product or service on your banner ad and link the ad to the particular page on the website. Choose Luring Text: Attract consumers’ attention with the messaging on the ad. Short and witty messages will do the trick. Also make sure that the font size is big. Medium font and a short message will definitely attract consumers’ attention to your ad. A Light File: You may or may not have size constraints but having a low file size banner ad, will work in your favor. For an average banner ad 45 to 70 kb is a good size that will load faster ensuring its visibility to consumers. Customize your Banner ad: Make your banner ad the prettiest amongst the lot. Colour your banner ad to go in line with the host site. Since, we are talking ads on the internet, it is easy to change the colors of the banner to suit its context. Place it Right: Your banner ad needs to be positioned at a place that will attract a lot of eye balls. You would have created your ad keeping in mind a target audience, so ensure the positioning of your ad at a place where this target group will most likely visit. For this you can use Google Analytics, which tells you where your website traffic is being drawn from. You can find this under the ‘Traffic Sources’ button. Keep a Watch: Ensure that you have something exciting to offer to your visitor who has just clicked on your banner ad. The page you link the ad to should be interesting and informative to turn your visitor into a customer. Your website/store and your banner need to work in tandem to get most sales. One way of doing this is to track your success through banner ads, find out your Return on Investment (ROI), which means to see how many of the clicks have turned into sales. This will give you a better picture of which banner ad is attracting sales and which isn’t, helping you to reposition the ads which are not attracting the desired attention. Banner Ads are a sure shot way of driving traffic to one’s website directly. Looking at the amount of time people spend on the internet, banner ads have proved to be a very successful way of garnering the right attention.

A PPC account manager handles all things related to a Pay-Per-Click campaign and ensures that the money that is spent on PPC campaigns is translated into profits and revenue in the short and long terms. The reason why companies must focus more on PPC account managers more than the immediate campaigns is because it is the managers who run and monitor these campaigns and those who have the best managerial skills will also be the most successful ones. The Need for a Good PPC Account Manager Managers who are well acquainted with PPC accounts previously will be able to ensure that goals are met on a priority basis. They will know how to cross off to-do lists when they are not required and they will also know how to focus on priority tasks instead of just crossing them off. The idea is to hire an accounts manager who knows how to differentiate between getting rid of unwanted tasks and pushing less priority tasks to the corner so that important tasks can be handled immediately. Good PPC account managers should also be able to seek help when they need, whether in-house or outside. They should know whom to contact, when to contact and why they should contact anyone at all in the first place. A Well-balanced PPC Account Manager Can Increase the Success of Campaigns Ideally, your PPC account manager should be a calm and well balanced person who knows that reacting strongly to negative situations will only lead to further failures in PPC campaigns. A PPC account manager who knows how to deal with good and bad situations when it comes to PPC campaigns will be better able to turn advertising money into long term profits. PPC Campaigns Can Be Affected by Short Term Changes A PPC campaign can go wrong within a few hours. Considering how fickle minded Internet users are, and how keywords are either in focus or not in focus depending on various points in a day, a PPC account manager should understand the importance of immediacy. Thus, he or she should be able to spot difficulties and issues within 24 hours of them happening. Fixing issues within a span of few hours will always help account mangers to rectify issues before they blow out of proportions and cause huge losses to the campaign or to the company itself. Pay per click advertising changes with time, just as Internet evolves over a period of time. Personal Qualities of a Good PPC Account Manger Managers who are willing to learn, adapt to new situations and train themselves to be open-minded are the ones who will achieve the most success. PPC accounts need people who are malleable and ready to be subjected to rigor, scrutiny, stress and failures. All may not go well with a PPC campaign and a good PPC account manger should know this. He or she should be able to identify when things are not going well within a few hours and chart out plans that will effectively target the root problems. A good manager will be able to understand the nuances of keywords and keyword allocation. He or she should be good at linguistics and at playing with words. This helps the manager to pick keywords that will particularly fetch good results when it comes to targeting various market segments. While he or she need not be a copywriter, he or she should be able to think like one. A good PPC account manager should also be good at social media, public relations and computer skills. A manager who can understand and use a little bit o coding can prove to be a valuable asset to a PPC campaign. With so many qualities required for a good PPC account manager, it shouldn’t come to us as a surprise that it is quite difficult to hire outstanding and effective managers. However, with a little patience and a few rounds of interviews, one should be able to spot that PPC account talent which is elusive and difficult to find. Once a good PPC account manager is hired, one can rest assured that the campaign will last long and will reap a lot of benefits.