What ways can I include useful content on my website, without cluttering it?

Perhaps the site that you have put together has the content that matches search engines requirements and even the visitors but not yours. So making any changes will effectively be undoing all you efforts.

You may be developing a good page rank, but there are hundreds of ways to improve a site and get it noticed. Making the site bigger is one way; putting more pages on with appropriate content will start new rankings.

Having said that, why is content so important? Google works on words, it reads them and determines the relevance of the site, and this is called indexing. So, the more information that is visible to a search engine the better, this will improve your chances to be targeting against more terms.

Each page will therefore acquire its own rank, the more pages the better the content that a search engine will recognise more.

So back to the original question – What ways can I include useful content on my website, without cluttering it?

You may have noticed that many sites have a blog or a news section. This is all about up to date content that is constantly being added. The more appropriate content that is added the better as this will improve the website and make it more receptive to an internet search.

Many sites put blogs or new updates on a fresh new webpage. This then opens the door to incorporate links across the website (ideally to what you want them to see or buy).

The blog content needs to be relevant but also varied so that it brings a wider audience. A blend of company news and industry news is a good place to start.

Another addition to a website that also promotes good ranking and content is a FAQ page. You may think that the FAQ is for visitors that may have a question; you may think that the FAQ is just to the customer so they can get an answer about delivery times or ways to pay. This is content again, that is both beneficial to the visitor and your site.

With the FAQ make sure that they have a positive outcome and always point towards the money pages of your site.

Always try and stay away from adding a page for the sake of doing so. This may deter visitors and they move away from the site altogether. Keep all the pages on your radar and keep the pages flowing. New rankings are not as beneficial as your main search terms, so don’t compromise those. Even updating the content and getting them re-indexed will improve the site performance so make sure that the site is with the trends.

Mobile Ad Spend Increase is Enjoyed by Affiliates.

The mobile device sector is the number 1 growth area in the advertising world. The ad spend for mobiles has more than doubled over the last year. This is what affiliates want to see.

In addition to that, many businesses are operating or at least developing a mobile marketing strategy. This strategy will include a mobile specific website and a mobile payment service that is usable and secure. The increase in spend is set it continue and could top the previous year.

These specific differences to traditional market advertising and spending has forced many marketing companies to review the investment plans as the target audience may be different, but by how much?

Currently, marketing in apps is a key area that highlights the ongoing strength of the online advertising. This will maintain the investment in affiliate marketing. Also, there has been an emergence of social media .ads on personal network websites, especially with the ‘like’ icon that is an accurate and live indication of your popularity. Those that do ‘like’ will then get any post about offers and promotions – an instant link to a receptive audience. The last area that is being more recognised as good practice is incorporating online video advertising into social catalogue websites like YouTube and to a lesser extent ITV player.

Crucially however, the mobile is generating new activities from its users. Learning this array of habits is very important as marketing teams target a growing audience. A fully developed mobile site is key otherwise people shopping on the move will move to a different website to shop.

Marketing teams do have an ace in up their sleeve because they can use the affiliates to gauge the tactics and mindset of the mobile shoppers and visitors. Gaining these behaviours and tactics is very importing for planning your next online marketing budget.

Video Marketing is the new ad platform

According to substantial evidence including spend and research by industry leaders, video marketing shows the fastest amount of growth online.

Stats show that video advertising grew by 40% in 2009 and held its pace through 2010. This pace is set to continue through 2011.

The pace is now being recognised more and more by marketing companies, in conjunction with the social media and the receptive multimedia audience. Marketing teams without a video campaign will be left behind.

Video marketing has many benefits hence its popularity. The video marketing is easy to target demographic or behavioural sectors. Promoting a brand identity/recognition is very well received by the audience. The online presence is enhanced, with more traffic from the social corner of the internet.

Any modern online business should invest in a degree of video advertising to connect with a new audience as the online video becomes an increasingly powerful tool.

Becks Beer Launch Digital Pub Crawl

Famous beer brand ‘Becks’ has recently launched a digitally led pub crawl campaign in celebration of its Arts Labels. 

Over the years artists have been commission to use the beer label as a blank canvas to create limited edition are labels.  Now 8 of the limited edition art labels will be on show in 8 different pubs as part of this art crawl.

Customers wanting to take part can access the details, map and list of the pubs joining in the crawl from the Becks website.

There are eight pubs involved and each pub will represent one of the Arts Labels.  Players who use their mobile to check in at the pub on Facebook will enter a draw to win a limited-edition print of the art works or free beer.  They are also given the opportunity to listen to an exclusive audio interview with the artist.

Backs is also encouraging UK art college students to design a new art label via the Beck’s Vier Facebook page.  The 6 chosen winners will then be displayed on a mural in east London.

The crawl ends on the 28^th April

Do you use online videos in your marketing campaign?

You may or may not know that YouTube is the second largest search engine after Google. YouTube over took Yahoo in August 2008 for the number 2 spot.

Brining you up-to-date, YouTube is owned by Google but this has had no influence on the figures, YouTube has almost 20% of the US search market and it contributes to 30% of Googles owned sites search total.

Despite not being known as a search engine, there is evidence that people are researching and looking for information through this search feature. Plus, there are thousands of users optimising their videos to be listed under the natural listing results. This then opens the door for international exposure and a great method to promote brand identity at a very minimal cost.

That’s the theory, and the practice is very good as well. Research shows that during November 2010, 34.7 million UK internet users watched 6 Billion videos. On average there are 6 videos watched per session. These stats also include content from the BBC and VEVO. This user engagement is seen as a growing market, this market in the future will include more high definition videos.

These high definition clips will be accompanied by business videos as they incorporate video marketing into their marketing budgets. Brand identity will be the big winner as businesses reach out to a massive social following. Video is a very social medium, so management teams will have a difficult job blending the marketing message into a social audience.

Back in the day, YouTube was perhaps a website that you would click around in your social time. However, there will be more marketing campaigns showing with its current content.  While clicking around, stats also show that users will leave a comment on the site about the video that we have just watched. The comment ratio is about 1 in 3, 1 comment per 3 clips watched. So, these comments then start to form a blog or forum.

Perhaps making a video for your brand or even a special promotion does not fit in the existing marketing budget; there is also on YouTube the option to advertise on posted videos. The evidence, 23 million users in the UK watched 5.3 million video ads during November. If a video is not possible, a spot of video advertising might be.

The key point is that video marketing is growing and is likely to keep growing; video demand is a large social requirement. With the right video or advert banner, you will be able to see the rewards of the social nature of video.

UK mobile networks step up SMS marketing services.

UK mobile networks are ramping up their marketing efforts with SMS and MMS ads that are proving increasingly important for brands like Coca-Cola, Burger King, and Domino’s.

Many big brands are seeking to gain revenue from the mobile market that is estimated to be worth £43.8 million in the UK by 2015. Vodafone will become the third network provider to launch this new marketing service that will introduce its customers to brands via a text message.

Other networks have been using the text service to drive business and Orange will be rolling out its Orange Shots service that was launched last year. Also, O2 Media is increasing its attendance at many more O2 events that uses a location service that is now responsible for over 50% of the O2 More bookings.

It has also been reported that the total ads spend on mobile marketing last year was £83m. Mobile messaging was just £1.6m despite the advances O2 and Orange had made launching their messaging services.  The Oranges Shots campaign was effective and will be introduced to its T-mobile brand later in the year.

It has been discovered that the over 24 age group is more receptive to the mobile marketing – possibly because of having more disposable income.

Vodafone UK are currently the only major network that does not offer this type of service but the requests are in from agencies to start a mobile ad messaging service and that should change the mobile messaging spend a bit.

O2 Media’s work force has increased almost three-fold since the You Are Here location services started. The SMS campaigns that are generated by the You Are Here messaging are starting to be accepted by the target audience. This success has increased the O2 More customer base to £2.5m and has also drawn interest from brands including Burger King and Marks and Spencer.

As the Smartphone technology improves and becomes more popular to the consumer, more SMS and MMS will be ran as the audience grows and is more receptive. It could include in the future, MMS messages that have a video message perhaps using flash, or other digital solutions.

One taxi company is using the location based mobile messaging to get its core message across that one of their cars is not far away. The O2 More campaign has been very effective for use in driving business via a marketing channel that is accepted. 

Mobile search is now being observed by marketing teams as a way that mobile users require information.

How would you increase your Online Brand?

With more and more people turning to the internet for so many essential and non essential duties, the internet is developing into the first point of contact. Managing a brands online presence might appear to be a bit of a military operation. However, you can challenge these concepts and turn them into a positive aspect that will improve your online marketing strategy. So, the three biggest challenges are talked about below.

As we perhaps all recognise, we get hundreds of marketing messages thrown at us every day. The main issue that a brand has is getting noticed. As with all brands, the larger your brand is the easier it is to overcome this exposure issue. A strong brand icon/logo has an instant connection to a service or a product that stands out on a search engine results list. Plus, as a strong and reputable brand you may have links to your website from customers that have already experienced your services and have made comments on your brand that could help your search campaign.

For the lesser brands that are normally just online based, the efforts to promote brand awareness are a far bigger challenge. First of all, getting noticed is difficult, if you do achieve this then you have to engage and interact with them online. The way to improve this is to find an appropriate strong position for the website. This will involve monitoring SEO and collecting search results.  The SEO will be a critical cog in the website; the more affective this is, the stronger the brand, just like traditional brand management. The website with SEO is essential to building brand awareness in connection with Online Brand Management – this will then engage with customers and forces a mental link from the brand to the service or product.

Using SEO is a strong start towards managing an online brand. However, there are more aspects that have to be combated. One of the other aspects that need to be managed is control, or perhaps the lack of control. The lack of control over content that is published about brands that is established and unknown is another key issue.

The number of forums, blog platforms, and even review platforms is always increasing and what is written on one is normally copied onto another. What customers write and post on these websites is beyond the control of any brand manager/team. So, is this impossible to eradicate? Yes, is the short answer. 

However, as a part of the strategy, there should be allocated time that includes reviewing the review sites and the forums to make sure that there are no negative or damaging comments. If they are found, it is good practice to investigate the claims and make sure that they don’t happen again and attempt to rectify the problem. On the flip side of that is to thank those that have left positive comments/posts to add creditability to the brand name.

Forums as opposed to review sites tend to be more locally based and concentrate on an individual organisation.  They are crucial to be reviewed as a massive amount of feedback can be discovered (both positive and negative), including the type of consumers that their brand attracts, what they feel they need in addition to what is currently offered and also data for new markets and innovations. So, being registered on local forums would be a part of the strategy.

Blogs take a slightly different twist on things as the content that is posted is traditionally by industry experts or perhaps the trend setters in a specific market. If the content on the blog is negative it will persuade others to take on board these negative comments. It is massively important that the blogger is contacted and explains the content – this must be handled and changed while investigating the evidence.

Any negative reputation will not go away over night, stats show that if you have a bad experience you will tell more and write more about it in contrast to a great experience. The perception of a brand that occasionally receives poor comments; this has to be offset by long term positive comments. When the positive posts and comments are submitted they should be embraced and recognised.

Developing a business profile is a great way to increase awareness. Unfortunately, there can also be danger at your door, as an online business profile can be duplicated in your business/brand name with no need to verify them. This will affect business and your brand if this happens. If it does this may cause more bad content on review sitse and forums against your brand name that has nothing to do with you.

Keeping a close eye on business directories is important. The business directories details need to be accurate; otherwise you will be missing enquiries and potential business. Making sure you are aware what websites your business details are on i.e. Yell.co.uk, is good practice so that they can be reviewed and made sure they are right. Plus, if you have to change addresses or a sales email address you don’t have to search for these sites, because you already have a list.

Finally, people have the ability to interact on social media with one-another, but it is also used for checking out brands. Let’s be honest – that was going to happen anyway. The brands do have the facility to edit the post and comments on a public domain of social media. Social media is a good platform as long as the content that is posted is accurate and interesting. Perhaps including top offers, amusing office pictures and the occasional embarrassing charity events, as long as the audience is entertained this will increase brand awareness and brand trust.

Without trust, the marketing message that is shown is nothing and is never going to result in a purchase. The level of difficulty does vary depending on the status of the business (established or unknown). Trust can be encouraged by having a very simple and transparent order process that includes a process line. Each page should have a contact number or a chat window for assistance and a statement that highlights their data protection procedure after the order is placed.

Once these areas have been improved, you will see a gain in orders and revenue. The next stage is to embed a customer’s loyalty to your brand. The internet has made it very easy to shop around and compare. So, when the brand identification and awareness is growing, how are you going to defeat the shopping and comparison and build that loyalty?

I have a high bounce rate, how can I reduce it?

Some of the best websites on the planet along with the worst ones will all suffer from what’s called a bounce rate. This rate is generated when visitors are directed to your website from a search engine results list and exit the site either back to the results list or elsewhere without interacting with the page or processing through the site.

There is not a magic spell that you can put on this problem that does cost money with no return. However, there are some things that you can do that will help reduce it. As with so many things, first impressions are vital. This is totally the same with websites – especially when you have not been on them before. This bounce rate is not just influenced by the landing page but the content. The style of the website needs to be consistent throughout, making sure that you have good, useful information with appropriate clear and engaging language.

Plus, if you are going to convince people that the website is credible and deserves their time, you will also need to ensure that the site is very easy to navigate, clearly designed and is compliant with all offers in the press. If these key areas are not completed and managed then the bounce rate will not improve. When all key areas are running at 100% the visitor will be assured that the website is professional. Some of the largest companies on our planet have a good reputation, but if you didn’t know them and only looked at the website you may click away.

As already mentioned, the first click or first sighting of the website is very important in reducing the bounce rate. Sometimes the most obvious errors to a visitor are not always spotted by a web developer. So be very thorough when checking images, content, miss- spelt headlines, and even HTML code, as the smallest error could cause the biggest problem.

If say, you have an ad on a PPC campaign and content does not match the landing page, and the visitor clicks ‘back’ to get to the results list to try again on another website, this counts as 2 bounces. This is a double problem, highlighting the importance of the first page and first impressions.

As a target you may think that a 10% bounce rate is acceptable, but 30% is actually very good, particularly from a PPC campaign. This rate is a very good measure of concise delivery and a logical website. A 40% rate is good and 50% is acceptable. The lower the better, but it will never get to 0%.

Do you struggle with your conversion?

The internet market is expanding and it is very important that your website conversion rate is always increasing. There are many aspects that have to be managed and analysed when looking to boost conversion and ultimately sales.

So, below is a condensed list of 6 aspects that you can review to make your conversion rates better.

First of all is landing page relevance. Perhaps you have done a search online and have clicked through to then be directed to a page that has nothing to do with the initial search. Research suggests that the 21st century internet user does not even scroll down the page after the redirect. So, if the site or landing page from the results list is not 100% accurate against the search then they will click away and that will kill conversion.

Accuracy on the PPC ad is also a problem area. An example would be when you have clicked on a result from a search because the ad states ‘Free Delivery’ or ‘20% off your first order’. However, on the site that the advert is for there is no evidence of this. Sometimes a customer may click on the back button to return to the search results which means the advertising company is just wasting money.

Let’s assume that the landing page reflects the research and the prices seem competitive, but online shoppers will use more comparisons than just relevance and price. Another big conversion killer is the dreaded ‘P + P’. If your postage and packaging is 1p more than the competition then you will be waving business good bye. So, make sure that you are under cutting the competition and so giving you no reason for your visitors not to buy.

Research does also highlight that buyers and more importantly ‘best deal shoppers’ use certain keywords to show they are in buying mode. To increase conversion, include search terms such as Buy, Cheap, Discount, Sale, Order and Purchase. These key words will funnel visitors to buy because they see the word that they want to see.

As per pervious blogs, negative words are also critical to make sure that the results from the search are accurate because this is the beginning of the cycle and if results are not right the conversion will be affected. Filtering out irrelevant search terms will ensure that the results put you in good stead, and your ad will be in front of visitors that are looking for that very thing. The more negative words the better, to keep the results right.

The end goal of all of these aspects is revenue and sales. So the order process must be easy and logical, and not taxing. Many purchase processes can be very off putting and can cause an issue for the visitor; the easiest thing for the visitor to do is not bother – oops! So, to defeat this drop-out at such a critical level is not to remove the home, back button or any other options from the screen, but to ask a 3rd party, perhaps somebody that is not completely up-to-date with the online world. Ask them to make an order, but more importantly watch the mouse movements and how logical it is for them. Try not to give any instructions while making notes of any sticking points or problems.

So, some top tips to make your conversion better. Make sure that you are on it to boost your rates!

Big Brands are Beginning to Shun the Apple iPad

Digital marketers and media agencies are refusing to risk heavy investment for advertising on the iPad because publishing prices are too high and there aren’t sufficient download figures available.

Media agencies with high-end magazine clients are now shunning commercial opportunities on the iPad due to inaccurate download figures, inadequate reporting and high production costs.

This is not good news for Apple given that the iPad was only released 6 months ago and the release of the iPad2 is imminent.

Because Apple keeps a tight grip on content, publishers are restricted in what they can provide advertisers with.  This has resulted in investment being stifled and compounded brand confusion.  Due to the lack of reporting from Apple, publishers have had to create their own reporting systems for the device.

One major brand currently using the iPad for advertising is Toyota.  Brand communications manager at Toyota, Lisa Fielden, said:

“Media costs for iPad campaigns are about twice the production costs. If we had this across the rest of our marketing, we wouldn’t see any return.”

“We need to get to a wider audience and to access different target markets, such as young women, or buy a specific audience. I don’t want to just buy a broadcast audience,” she added.

It looks like we will have to wait for the iPad2 to be revealed later today to see if Apple has also made any inroads into addressing this problem.