The Holy Grail of PPC & the Conversion Trinity

A the Search Engine Strategies conference in Chicago this week, Bryan Eisenberg, SES Advisory Board and NYTimes Bestselling Author, bryaneisenberg.com, gave some compelling ways of looking at conversion in Pay Per Click advertising. The session, by name, promised to unlock The Secret Formula to Boost Response:

Amplify’d from www.aimclearblog.com

The Holy Grail of PPC marketing is achieved when we as marketers align targeting with: The best ad copy A useful landing page And great CTR To reach the Holy Grail, we must be aware of the Conversion trinity: Be relevant Be valuable Make the next action obvious Read more at www.aimclearblog.com

 

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/dcss

The new role of technology in the Marketing Department

There is a fantastic post today in AdAge Magazine. "The Case for a Chief Marketing Technologist: If Technology Is Now a Strategic Dimension of Marketing, Who Should Lead It?" by Scott Brinker.

I agree 100% with Brinker that technology is taking on an increasingly significant role within marketing, but of course, whether there is a "Chief Marketing Technologist" necessary at most organizations is really a case-by-case decision. Regardless of the structure or of titles, from my experience in the past few years as a technologically savvy marketer, I believe marketing leaders who embrace the use of technology in day-to-day analytics and execution of marketing strategy and foster a collaborative environment with the IT department are likely to be more efficient and effective in achieving their goals. Brinker makes many more solid points about the role of technology in marketing, and I've highlighted my favorites here:

Amplify’d from adage.com

Analytics software shapes your perception of your audience. Automation and optimization software influences the design of your marketing operations. A plethora of new advertising, social media and web technologies directly affect the experiences your customers have with you. These aren't mere implementation details -- increasingly, they're important strategic and brand-positioning choices. Who makes them, and how?

Simply put, marketing has become deeply entwined with technology. This didn't happen overnight; it's been sneaking up on us for a while. But because technology had been so tangential to marketing management for most of our history, the organizational structure of marketing has been slow to adjust to this new technology-centric reality.

marketing must officially take ownership of its technology platforms and strategies. And the first step of such ownership is to appoint someone to lead it.

Enter the chief marketing technologist. This is a senior management position, reporting to the CMO, with three key responsibilities. First: Choreograph all the disparate technologies under marketing's umbrella. Second: Nurture a growing technology subculture within marketing, raising the department's overall technical proficiency. And third: Collaborate with the CMO on strategy, translating the CMO's vision into technology with high fidelity -- while also inspiring the shape of that vision by advocating for what new technology can enable.

the most important skill they need is the ability to effortlessly map marketing ideas to technical requirements and, vice versa, map new technologies to marketing opportunities.

This is a marketer whose expertise is leveraging, scaling and governing technology.

In this Golden Age, not everyone in marketing needs to be a technologist, just as not everyone in marketing needs to be a "creative." But relevant technology expertise must become a native part of marketing's identity and, with a chief marketing technologist, a native part of its leadership.Read more at adage.com

 

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bfk5

I'll be at Integrated Marketing Summit in St. Louis, Oct 21st

I've been asked to participate on a panel to discuss social media best practices. It will be moderated by an esteemed colleague of mine, Brad Hogenmiller (@javastl) and I'm participating alongside another great social media maven David Siteman Garland (@TheRisetotheTop). I expect to be asked about using social media for B2B marketing, and we'll probably touch on tools and tricks of the trade.

I attended Integrated Marketing Summit last year when it was also hosted in downtown St. Louis, and I found the entire day to be highly valuable. The networking was indispensable, and the sessions were informative and valuable.

From the website:

"IMS is the signature summit for Marketing, Advertising and PR Professionals in both B-to-B and B-to-C markets throughout the U.S. IMS provides actionable insights, expertise and cutting-edge information in a convenient, affordable one-day educational format. And the best continues, with next-day, hands-on workshops presented by leading practitioners."

I would encourage everybody working in Marketing in St. Louis to attend this one-day summit.

The cost is $279 for all sessions and keynotes, continental breakfast, lunch, breaks and Happy Hour/Networking.

Some of the topics, as you can see from the agenda, look very interesting. Here's a link to my speaker bio: http://www.integratedmarketingsummit.com/speakers-bio.php?id=74

I hope you will join me!

Amplify’d from www.integratedmarketingsummit.com

Program A - Social Media Best Practices (Panel) Whether you are BtoB, BtoC, offering a considered purchase or selling a commodity, this multi speaker presentation will help you create an effective social media strategy that is right for your business. Moderated by Brad Hogenmiller,  (St Louis, MO). Speakers Include; David Siteman Garland, CEO/Executive Producer/Host, The Rise To The Top℠ (St Louis, MO) Erin Eschen, Online and Social Media Marketing Manager, Perficient (Orange County, CA) Leigh Mutert, Community Manager, H&R Block (Kansas City, MO) Kristy Meyer, Social Media Manager, Sigma Aldrich (St Louis, MO) Read more at www.integratedmarketingsummit.com

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bfik

Social Media Most Effective for Branding in B2B: But Can We Do Better?

What this study shows us primarily is that "In B2B marketing, social media is most effective at achieving branding goals." I agree with that, from my experience working in social media in B2B. But from my perspective, It's unfortunate to see such a drop off between increasing website traffic and generating leads. I'd like to see us as B2B marketers figure out tools or processes for closing that gap. I'd like to see more case studies and articles about those who are effectively generating very quantifiable and qualified leads into their sales pipeline directly from the relationships they are establishing with influencers and decision makers in their target demographic who are active on social media sites.

Amplify’d from www.marketingsherpa.com

Most Effective Use of Social Media In Achieving B2B Branding Goals Read more at www.marketingsherpa.com

 

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bcwt

Exciting News: We are moving back to Saint Louis, MO

This past January, my fiancé and I moved to Newport Beach, California. We have thoroughly enjoyed our time here - the weather, the beaches, the people -- everything. I retained my full-time role working remotely from home for the past nine months. Below is a recap of many of the things we've been able to to do since we moved here.

Very recently, we've decided to move back to St. Louis, MO in order to pursue a unique and exciting career opportunity for Chris! This will also allow us to spend much more time with family and friends. I am happy to say that I will remain in my full-time position and return to the office in West County each day.

We expect to be living in Clayton, MO for quite some time. Please keep in touch with me as I re-join one of the most active and connected networks of interactive media professionals in the country!

Some of the things we've enjoyed in Southern California and will never forget:

• Music Concerts at the Greek Theater, the Hollywood Bowl, the House of Blues Hollywood, the Viper Room and Verizon Wireless Amphitheater in Irvine.
• Fantastic OC restaurants: Javier's in Crystal Cove, Marche Moderne at South Coast Plaza, Andrea at the Pelican Hill, Blue Fin sushi, Napa Rose, The Beachcomber restaurant on the beach, Sapphire and the Rooftop Bar in Laguna Beach, and (of course) In-and-Out Burger ;-)
• World-class LA restaurants: Osteria Mozza, Bazaar by Jose Andres, Spago, Angelini Osteria, Mastro's and Providence
• Brunches and dinners at beautiful local resorts like Stonehill Tavern at the St. Regis in Dana Point, Pelican Hill in Newport Coast, Ritz Carlton Laguna Beach, and Montage Laguna Beach.
• Special events like the annual MLB All Star Game in Anaheim, the 2010 MTV Movie Awards and a corporate event at the House of Blues Anaheim
• Great spots on the Sunset Strip in Hollywood, including the historic Chateau Marmont, the Den, the SLS Beverly Hills (Bar Centro), Sky Bar at the Mondrian.
• Excellent musical artists we've been able to see in California: RUSH, Peter Gabriel, Sammy Hagar, David Gray, Ray LaMontagne, Asia, Night Ranger, Steve Miller Band, the Cult, the Fixx, YES, Peter Frampton, Sting, Green Day, Dave Matthews, the Scorpions, the Kings of Leon, the Eagles, as well as Muse and MGMT at Coachella
• Miscellaneous good times including bicycling with Chris through Crystal Cove State Park, sun bathing on the beach, running on the beach with my dad, grabbing a shake at the Shake Shack, riding duffy boats around Newport Beach harbor, sailing on the Pacific Ocean down the coast, shopping and dining on Balboa Island with my sister, running in Cedar Grove park with my trail running group, cycling up Newport Coast Drive with my brother, hitting the farmer's market in Corona del Mar, going to a Lakers play-off game, watching surfers tackle 14 foot waves at "The Wedge," seeing the Cardinals play the Dodgers at Dodger Stadium, having many of our closest friends visit us for long weekends, watching the Angels play at Angels Stadium in Anaheim, and running a 5K race overlooking the ocean in Corona del Mar.

I owe a great deal of the "joie de vivre" that I enjoy daily to Chris.  I can never thank him enough for all he does for me and for our friends and family, and I am very much looking forward to our move back "home." See you soon!

Making Social Media Work for You, a presentation by Erin Steinbruegge of TheLoudFew

Erin Steinbruegge, my former online marketing partner-in-crime, fellow SEO, and one of my BFFs recently presented to a local St. Louis area group (ISES STL) on using Social Media Marketing to drive business results. I wasn't able to attend, but I was impressed with the presentation she later posted online. It's chock full of "ah ha" tips for Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and others, and it clearly maintains Erin's un-failingly fun approach to teaching, training and consulting.

She now runs TheLoudFew, an interactive marketing agency in St. Louis. 
Catch highlights from the video of her presenting as well as her recap here.

Here's the slide show:

Beyond The Cocktail Party - Making Social Media Work for You

View more presentations from The Loud Few.

Is search really "dead?" Why Wired Magazine is wrong

Today I received our latest issue of Wired in the mail, and the bright orange cover proclaims "The Web is Dead." Along with this assertion, the authors, Chris Anderson and Michael Wolff, claim that search (i.e. using Google to find what you're looking for) is a part of this death because mass consumers are turning to applications and APIs to use the Internet to get data and information less often than they turn to the Web (websites, accessed largely through search engines) to obtain what they're looking for. Chris Crum of WebProNews provides a nice summary of why Wired thinks so, and why they may be jumping the shark a little bit too soon with this declaration:

What it boils down to is that people will not stop using search engines, they will just use them less for certain kinds of searches if they have an app that they like for that particular kind of information. This is already happening.

So essentially, if you think about the fact that you can now get weather from your Weather Channel iPhone app or the native weather app on most smart phones, or that you can get sports scores from your MLB or ESPN app, and news from your AP app -- the list goes on -- then why would you need to go to Google? It's simply not as necessary to turn to Google, Yahoo, or Bing for as much as you used to. They call this "getting."

Crum quotes the article:

"Two decades after its birth, the World Wide Web is in decline, as simpler, sleeker services — think apps — are less about the searching and more about the getting."

While this "getting" may reduce the amount of things many people use search engines to find, from my perspective, it cannot possibly eliminate the need for searching in at least three categories: 1) more obscure, long-tail needs, 2) in-depth research, and 3) to some extent, products they wish to purchase.

I love one of Crum's final thoughts on this topic:

If all of your eggs are in the search marketing basket, you better really start thinking about mobile and apps.

He's right, but don't just create a mobile app to have a mobile app, because particularly in the mobile space, the old mantra "If you build it, they will come," is almost entirely untrue. You have to have a utility for your mobile app - something that people will find useful, not just sales and marketing messages. 

More importantly -- and especially if you don't sell something that can be logically delivered via a mobile app (which mostly, right now, involves data such as weather, lyrics, scores, news, reports, content) but rather, you sell a tangible product --  look into mobile advertising before you start building an app. See how you might be able to advertise where your target market is already using apps that are relevant to what you offer. Get creative with it, but stay contextually relevant. Here is a great example of a company that's embracing mobile advertising in unique and compelling ways.

And  while it's true that search engines like Google index and provide links to the "indexable" or "crawlable" Web and cannot crawl content housed within apps (at this time), the concept of searching is at least not near it's death: Let's not forget the power (and necessity) of "searching" as it now exists within apps. Facebook has a search function, and I use mine all the time to find friends, companies, pages, etc. My weather app lets me search for a zip code or city. My Amazon app is all about search. While it recommends products I might like, it doesn't know exactly what kind of shoes I just saw on someone that I now want to buy - unless I search for them. I predict there will never be a time in which we are only "getting" and not "searching" as well.

Search is still definitely alive, but it is evolving, as are many other aspects of the Web, to adapt to the smart phone revolution. Yesterday's launch of Facebook's Places (currently limited to the Facebook iPhone app) makes a lot of sense at this time. Given the success of FourSquare and GoWalla, it's clear that people want to engage with the places and things they like to do when they're out and about with friends, smart phone in hand.

What do you think?

• How can we, as brands, serve them not just our address and venue name, but a rich experience with recommended menu items, favorite products, deals, etc? 
• Is your team having this conversation internally to see how mobile fits within your overall marketing strategy?  
• What have you tried that works? 
• Where are you running into road blocks? Do you agree that search is dying and won't evolve and sustain itself?

Additional rebuttals against Wired's article:
Wired Declares The Web Is Dead—Don’t Pull Out The Coffin Just Yet (TechCrunch)
The Web is Dead: Long Live the Cloud (NetworkWorld)
No, Wired, the Web is not 'dead' (Washington Post)
Blowback to Wired's "The Web is Dead" story (FierceCIO)

6 Great Social and Digital Media Articles

Flipboard App - for the iPad

I've been finding a lot of gems lately when it comes to write-ups about social media and becoming more successful in your digital marketing career. This is largely thanks to Flipboard on the iPad. If you own an iPad and you haven't downloaded this free (and revolutionary) app yet, you're missing out. It's the first visually appealing and immersive way to browse your Twitter and Facebook feeds as well as any RSS feed, article site, or Twitter list (activities I participate in almost hourly). 

When I discovered each of these articles, I shared them on my Twitter feed @ErinE - you can follow me there. 

The Inside Scoop on How Intel Manages Its Facebook Page
How to Write a Great Blog Post in Just 15 Minutes
eBay Ink Profiles Social Media Sellers
6 Principles for Success in Your Digital Career
A 3-month plan for adding social to your marketing mix
15 Essential Tips for Harnessing Your Creativity

Do you have another article that became particularly valuable to you lately? What about your blog? What are you writing about? Share it in the comments here.

How does Google use "conversion data" for organic search rankings?

A colleague of mine had been reading about the fact that Google uses "conversion data" to help determine quality of a site for ranking it in a SERP (Search Engine Results Page) for a keyword search. He had some questions about how Google obtains this data. Essentially: How does Google determine that a user is converting after the click? Especially if Google Analytics is not being used by the visited site. I wanted to share my perspective on my blog. This is related to the May Day Google algorithm update.

His question:

A quick question on bold text below – how would you interpret this?  “behavior data” - CTR on organic links in SERPs?, time on site?  “conversion data” - what do you think they define as a conversion on a site?  Thanks in advance.

The problem with long tail keywords are that despite generating some absurd percentage of overall site traffic for well-optimized content, most of the time the quality of traffic isn't good enough to convert.  I would guess a significant percentage of long tail visitors are sent to a website because search engines aren't quite sure whether your content is up to snuff for shorter, highly competitive, generic keywords.

Maile Ohye all but confirmed the fact Google is moving to user behavior data as a better signal than say keyword density to rank content in the SERPs.  She also hinted at Google using conversion data for organic ranking signals as well, which got me worried yet again about what Google considers a conversion for my websites (heck, I might introduce a quality score all my own to Google on that one!).

Source

My response:

From what I've read, there are at least two ways for Google to gauge conversion on your site:

1. A large percentage of visitors who click on your organic listing do not return quickly or at all to the SERP by clicking back to it or do not return to Google quickly to conduct another same or similar search. Also, if they do not perform the same keyword search or a refined search on the same keyword phrase, they likely found what they were looking for on your site. They can assume amount of time spent on your site by when a visitor returns by clicking back or by when the same user returns to Google to conduct another similar search.

2.  Another way they can gauge conversion is if you have Google Analytics turned on, and even better: If you have conversion tracking turned on and if you are advertising via Google AdWords. Similar additional ways they gauge conversion: Sites using Google Checkout, people using Google Chrome.... Interesting, although a tad "conspiracy-theory" article on their data collection here.

SEOMoz is a well-respected SEO source, and they concur:

First, let me state that I do think they use all the data they collect (or will collect) from search query logs, Google Analytics, Google Adsense, Google Toolbar, browser extensions, Doubleclick, FeedBurner, etc. to improve both their ranking algorithms and ads targeting technology. That is the reason, in my opinion, they offer all of these tools for free.  The data they collect is far more valuable.  It is so valuable that Ask is even considering selling this data.

and then also this, which confirms my statement above under #1, and speaks to your comment about CTR from the SERP page:

if we know that people are clicking on the #1 result we’re doing something right, and if they’re hitting next page or reformulating their query, we’re doing something wrong.

Source

Fascinating, huh? ;)

Top 10 Metrics for Email Marketing Success

In this article, I've listed for you all of the metrics I recommend any email marketer be tracking, recording and analyzing as part of their email marketing campaigns. Too often, companies push messaging out to their subscribers or purchased email lists and don't pay attention to the results in an effective way. Almost every email marketing tool out there provides a majority of these metrics if not all of them, so now is the time to start yourself a good old fashioned Excel spreadsheet (at a minimum) and begin tracking each of these items so that you can make more informed decisions about campaigns to come and make the most of your spend (in time and money).

What you can do with each of these metrics is:

1. Try to determine what the industry average is. Look at reports from Forrester or ClickZ or hire individuals to manage your email marketing who have worked in your specific industry.
2. Look at past stats for your company to set a benchmark for a minimum level of success. You can always be improving.
3. Set a desired state for each metric at the industry average, twice your existing stat, or whatever feels most comfortable as an aggressive yet attainable goal.

You should be tracking as many of these metrics as possible by campaign.

Metrics:

• Sales: Quantity of leads, quantity of sales converted off of an email referred website visitor, or actual revenue generated off of those click-throughs.
• ROI: Calculate the costs (in both software, tools and time spent) for each email campaign and subtract that from the total revenue generated. You can get pretty complex with ROI calculations beyond this simple formula, but I won't get into that here.
• Conversion Rates: The % of email referred visitors who convert into a sale or lead.
• Value of an email subscriber: The number of subscriptions divided by the revenue generated from email marketing.
• Total number of email subscribers.
• Unsubscribe Rate: Usually you can get this from the tool you're using to send & manage your email list, provided to you by campaign.
• Customer frequency: Average number of unique visitors driven by email each month.
• Open Rate: This is a good guage of how effective your subject line is in grabbing the attention of recipients. Also mixed into this is a value of your brand's awareness or affinity among subscribers - loyal customers may be more inclined to open regardless of the effectiveness of the subject line, eager to find deals and promotions being announced.
• Click-through Rate: The % of opened emails that generated a click through to your desired URL. Similar to "Open Rate" but this one is a measure of how effective your email's content is in generating enough interest to drive that recipient to become a web-site visitor to get more information.
• Deliverability: In some tools, you can also find a metric called "Bounce Rate" which will tell you the % of emails sent that came back as "Undeliverable" because either the email address is no longer valid or the email could not be delivered for another reason such as that email service provider's server was down.

More on deliverability:
You should learn to cleanse your list based on which emails are reported as undeliverable so that you don't continue sending emails to these over and over. However, more importantly, if the % is high, look at two things:

1. The source you used for obtaining the email. If you purchase emails from a list and this particular list has a high bounce rate, you'll want to talk to the source to make sure you're getting your money's worth. 
2. The lead capture form you are using to capture emails from subscribers yourself: 

 If you are obtaining the emails yourself but the bounce rate on deliverability is high, consider putting in an "email verification" process where you provide two fields for entering email and make sure they match (this prevents what's called "fat-fingering": a mistakenly inputted email address) or an email verification link sent to that address after the form is submitted. In the latter case, you plan not to use the email address in marketing campaigns until the link is clicked to verify the address is correct, however this is likely to bring down the likeliness that each person will fully convert into a subscriber since it requires an additional step.