Posted by David Guerrera on Fri, Feb 17, 2012 @ 04:47 PM
Episode #188 - February 17th, 2012
Intro
- How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet!
- On the show today is Karen Rubin (@KarenRubin) and Mike Volpe (@MVolpe)
- As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review!
- Anyone is welcome to come by the show to watch as part of the live studio audience - 4pm Friday
- Question of the day: What's one tip you'd give event marketers to help keep their efforts inbound?
Headlines
Obama & Jay-Z's Town Hall
- http://www.clickz.com/clickz/news/2153145/sponsored-obama-jay-web-event
- Advertisers were offered sponsorships of an interview with the President and hip-hop mogul Jay-Z on popular video site Vevo that never happened. But before it was canceled, a sales deck offering corporate brands the opportunity to wrap their names around the White House event made its way to big digital ad agencies, and helped convince some to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars with Vevo.
- A Vevo sales deck obtained by ClickZ promoted sponsorships of the interview event with Jay-Z and Obama, which was to be held February 9.
- The President - in the midst of a reelection campaign - recently held a town hall style interview on YouTube, presented by YouTube and Google+. Like a similar town hall interview held in April 2011 on Facebook, the YouTube event served as a branding vehicle for the media outlet hosting it. Google promoted the event on YouTube and even via a rare text ad on Google.com.
- Digital brands like Facebook and Google have garnered credibility in the political world by hosting interviews with President Barack Obama. But the types of sales offerings Vevo made available to corporate advertisers in association with the event are virtually unheard of.
- Was there ever really a town hall scheduled?
- Marketing Takeaway: Stretching the truth can be effective if you do not break people's trust.
Sony Hikes The Price of Whitney
- http://thecelebritycafe.com/feature/sony-apologizes-itunes-price-increase-whitney-houston-albums-uk-02-16-2012
- Shortly after Whitney Houston’s death, U.K fans took to iTunes to download their favorite albums of the iconic legend. Little did fans realize, Sony had ‘hiked’ the cost of Houston’s albums, and today they are apologizing for the “accident.”
- Disgruntled, fans blamed Apple for the initial price hike, before the U.K news outlet, Guardian, first reported that it wasn’t Apple’s fault for the iTunes mistake, but Sony’s.
- According to the site, the change occurred when Sony Music increased the wholesale price of Houston’s The Ultimate Collection. Because of this, it also boosted the cost of other popular albums released by the singer.
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Ace ShowBiz reports that Sony has since apologized, and has released the following apology; “Whitney Houston product was mistakenly mispriced on the U.K. iTunes store on Sunday," When discovered, the mistake was immediately corrected. We apologize for any offense caused."
- Marketing Takeaway: Being 100% capitalist can hurt your brand.
American Express Fast Tracks Small Businesses to Twitter Ads
- http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2012/02/registration-for-twitter-self-serve-ad-platform-opens-for-10000-small-businesses.html
- Twitter has been working up to its more broadly offered self serve ad platform for a while now. To this point, there are about 100 advertisers that have been allowed to use the system but Twitter is about to expand that capability significantly as it looks to make 2012 a big year.
- Starting tonight, American Express cardmembers and merchants can register to use the platform on a first-come, first-serve basis and also receive $100 in advertising credits to put toward bidding on promoted tweets and promoted accounts — hopefully whetting their appetites for more.
- The American Express angle of this whole deal is interesting as well because the credit card company has been pushing hard into the small business world recently. Using Twitter as another springboard will only help to grow this reputation as small business’ friend.
- Debra Aho Williamson, eMarketer’s principal analyst notes “One of the big challenges that Twitter was going to face was keeping rogue advertising or spammers from overrunning the systems, and by partnering with American Express and focusing at first on this small subset, it provides an easier roll-out for Twitter,” she said.
- Marketing Takeaway: Partnerships with big companies are great marketing tool.
B2B Content Marketing Benchmarks & Trends
- http://www.contentmarketinginstitute.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/B2B_Content_Marketing_2012.pdf
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Just as last year’s survey showed, nine out of 10 B2B marketers are using content marketing to grow their businesses, and on average, marketers use eight content marketing tactics to achieve their marketing goals. The most popular tactics are article posting (79%), social media (excluding blogs) (74%), blogs (65%), eNewsletters (63%), case studies (58%), and in-person events (56%).
- Content marketing uptake is high across industries, with no single industry reporting below 70% adoption.
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Just as in last year’s findings, web traffic is the most widely used success metric (58%). However, this year, sales lead quality (49%) is the second-highest used metric (versus direct sales in the previous study).
- B2B marketers dedicate approximately 26% of their total budgets to content marketing initiatives
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As it was last year, the greatest reported challenge is “producing the kind of content that engages prospects and customers” (41% of respondents).
- 20% producing enough content
- 18% budget to produce content
- 40% of marketers consider themselves to be more effective in content marketing than their competitors
- Small- and medium-sized companies report higher adoption rates than the largest companies in a number of categories
- 79% of the largest companies use articles, 85% of medium-sized companies (those with 100-1,000 employees) use this tactic
- 78% of medium-size companies use social media (not including blogs), while only 65% of the largest companies do
- 68% of companies with 10 – 99 employees maintain a blog, though only 55% of the largest companies employ this tactic
- Marketing Takeaway: If content is king, conversion is queen. Use inbound marketing to bring it all together.
Marketing Tip of the Week
Posted by David Guerrera on Fri, Feb 10, 2012 @ 05:00 PM
Episode #187 - February 10th, 2012
Intro
- How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet!
- On the show today is Amanda Iglesias and Michael Mintz
- As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review!
- Anyone is welcome to come by the show to watch as part of the live studio audience - 4pm Friday
Headlines
The Superbowl
- What can you learn from these superbowl ads, the Clint Eastwood “Chrysler Commercial”, GE Cancer Survivors, & The Dog Strikes Back (VW), voted as some of the best commercials
- Why did you like them?
- Marketing Takeaways
- Understood its audience - “traditional” “heritage” sport in America, Clint is speaking directly to that audience
- Relevant - the commercial acknowledged tough financial times, placed it in context of America’s greater history
- Tapped into Emotions - Slow paced, and resonated with its viewers, and tries to remind folks of their goals
- Informative - showed how Detroit manufacturing is back
- Anchored with a Call to Action - Support Detroit, Help America come back, Buy Chrysler
Pinterest: Rising Social Media Platforms
- http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/06/tech/web/pinterest-website-cashmore/
- http://techcrunch.com/2012/02/07/pinterest-monthly-uniques/
- Really interesting article from Pete Cashbore, the founder and CEO of Mashable on CNN.com and Another article from TechCruch documenting their rise, which will both be available in the show notes
- Pinterest, a web-based pinboard, grew organically via its most enthusiastic users. Case in point: The platform has grown nearly 400% while continuing to be invite-only, made up mostly of 18-34 year old uppper income women in America’s heartland.
- One of the fastest growing social media platforms, reaching 10M Unique visitors in 9 months, in fact, TechCrunch reported that they’re currently up to 11.7 unique monthly visitors
- It’s a great source of Inbound Links: drives more visitors to 3rd party sites than Google+, LinkedIn, and YouTube combined
- How have they been so successful?
- Sharing involves less effort over time
- It’s a social site that is extremely visual
- People-centric recommendations, segmented by topics of interest
- BONUS: Network effects: you join because your friends are already there!
- What can we learn from Pinterest?
- Look for new ways to be creative with your marketing efforts. The HubSpot Marketing Blog’s recent “Ultimate Guide to Mastering Pinterest” shows you unique ways to engage with your users using this great, visual platform. Share infographics, inspiration, videos, pictures, etc!
- Make it easy for users to share your content. Much of Pinterest’s success is a result of how easy it is for users on the platform to re-share things that pique their interest with very little effort. Is your content that easy to share?
- Create gateways back to your website. New channels and platforms represent opportunities to reach a wider audience. Always include a link back to your site so that the interaction doesn’t end there!
PowerInbox
Zynga makes a deal with Hasbro to make toys based on Zynga games.
- http://mashable.com/2012/02/09/zynga-toys-hasbro/
- http://techcrunch.com/2012/02/09/social-gaming-goes-offline-zynga-signs-deal-with-hasbro-for-real-world-toys-and-games/
- The first products are expected to hit the market in Fall 2012.
- It’s a big deal since Disney, for example, made 28.6 billion from toys, t-shirts and other products in 2010.
- Parallels to Angry Birds toys.
- 227 million users play Zynga games every month
- http://businessmindhacks.com/post/this-short-quote-reveals-the-secret-to-zyngas-success-now-valued-at-10-billion
- Why Zynga is successful.
- - hired psychologists who tried to make their games addicting, and while we don’t necessarily condone that there’s something to be said for understanding your customers and prospects motivations, challenges, and goals.
- “1) Addict people with SIMPLE, low learning-curve games, that 2) are social in the way you might have played certain board games in real life in the past, and that 3) have Irregular Reward Schedules (these are the most addicting forms of behavioral reinforcers, read up on your Behaviorism 101…).
- THEN, 4) offer them little ways to essentially cheat in the games (making things go more smoothly for you), that 5) can be purchased for amounts that fall within the Impulse Purchase threshold, i.e. below the price level where your conscious mind kicks in fully and begins to wonder whether this is really a good idea, asf.”
“Eat-a-lot-of-Chocolate Day” (Also known as Valentines Day)
- Whether you are in a relationship or not, there’s still lots of chocolate involved.
- Naming makes a difference. (Catchy names last longer in the mind)
- Technology Partner sounds better than Value-Added Reseller
- A Content Optimization System sounds better than a Content Management System
- Latest trends on cards: Musical
- - Thanking your team publicly - Showing appreciation for the work they do
- - Show appreciation to your Customers, to your team members, to your service partners
- Do you want others to feel better about their great work and to motivate them into doing more great work? Then let it be known! Rypple It! Rypple lets you thank others for their awesome work.
- Marketing Takeaway - Use Valentines Day to show appreciation for your customers so that you can continue to have great business with them.
Posted by Lauren Sorenson on Fri, Feb 03, 2012 @ 04:59 PM
Episode #186 - February 3rd, 2012
Intro
- How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet!
- On the show today is Karen Rubin (@KarenRubin) and Mike Volpe (@MVolpe)
- As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review!
- Anyone is welcome to come by the show to watch as part of the live studio audience - 4pm Friday
Headlines
Patriots vs. Giants Superbowl XLVI (46)
P&G Fires 1600 Marketing
- http://www.webpronews.com/pg-cuts-1600-jobs-marketing-on-facebook-google-is-more-efficient-2012-01
- the company has announced that they will be giving the axe to 1,600 “nonmanufacturing jobs” (e.g., jobs in marketing) as they turn their marketing eye toward “digital marketing.”
- Robert A. McDonald, P&G Chairman and CEO, said his company finds “that the return on [marketing] investment can be much more efficient” through mediums like Facebook and Google. He continued, “One example is our Old Spice campaign, where we had 1.8 billion free impressions and there are many other examples I can cite from all over the world.”
- McDonald stated that P&G will continue to spend 9-11% of their sales budget on advertising, but the allocation of that money may change considerably now that the company has discovered how wildly successful the right viral ad can be for them.
- http://mashable.com/2010/12/10/pg-social-media/
- Digital media has “become very integrated with how we operate, it’s become part of the way we do marketing,” marketing chief Marc Pritchard told the Associated Press. “It’s kind of the oldest form of marketing — word of mouth — with the newest form of technology.”
- The company is an important advertiser that spends nearly $9 billion per year to advertise its products. The company is finding social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube to be more effective channels for reaching women and has spent much of 2010 experimenting with campaigns in these arenas.
- Marketing Takeaway: Embrace inbound marketing for job security.
Linked in 277% More Effective at Lead Gen Than Twitter and Facebook
- http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/30030/LinkedIn-277-More-Effective-for-Lead-Generation-Than-Facebook-Twitter-New-Data.aspx
- In a recent study of over 5,000 businesses, HubSpot found that traffic from LinkedIn generated the highest visitor-to-lead conversion rate at 2.74%, almost 3 times higher (277%) than both Twitter (.69%) and Facebook (.77%).
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1. Invest time and effort to grow that specific channel. The trick, however, will be trying to maintain a quality network as your community scales.
2. Post more of the targeted content that's working. If you notice people are specifically really enjoying blog posts, webinars, or something else -- keep offering it! How can you tell what content's working? Monitor comments, likes, shares, and clicks.
3. Find more opportunities to post relevant CTAs. Can you sprinkle more lead generation opportunities throughout your social media updates? It's quite a balancing act, but a solid mix of calls-to-action (CTAs) and other content is healthy.
4. Don't take success for granted - keep learning. It's easy to get comfortable when something is going well. Remember, there are always opportunities to improve. Keep testing, analyzing your data, and increasing results!
- Marketing Takeaway: Use different social networks differently, depending on the fit for your customers.
Hashtags Gone Wrong
- http://gizmodo.com/5880887/rims-super-cartoon-funtime-experiment-already-backfiring
- RIM's latest marketing campaign is based around a squad of cartoon characters called the Bold Team, accompanied by the #BeBold hashtag on Twitter.
- GoGo Girl, The Achiever: "Saving the day with a brilliant strategy"
- Justin Steele, The Advocate: "Always ready to stick up for his friends"
- Trudy Foreal, The Authentic: "Not afraid to call it as she sees it".
- Max Stone, The Adventurer: "Able to jump out of a plane…"
- #BeBold
- And by the way, I've never seen a BlackBerry user who would actually look good in spandex #BeBold
- You are boldly running your company into the ground #BeBold.
- @BlackBerry R U trying to STAY in the SMARTPHONE industry or Switching to CARTOON NETWORK! WTF! Is with the #BeBold Characters. R U serious?
- @BlackBerry Jesus... those #BeBold cartoon caricatures are terribad, are you trying to market BB to 9 year olds?
- Marketing Takeaway: Know your customers!
- And check out the tweets for Subway's #5DollarFootLongs
#5dollarfootlongs is trending... my wifey said she thought it was an advertisement for a cheap, but effective male prostitute service.#Breaking Snooki isn't pregnant; she just heard about the #5dollarfootlongs.- February is the month of love! You know what that means!?
#5dollarfootlongs
- It's too bad
#5dollarfootlongs aren't referring to blunts...
- Marketing Takeaway: Beware of trolls and wannabe comedians.
Inc 500 Companies are Blogging Less
Marketing Tip of the Week
- Watch the Superbowl ads, pick your favorite 3 ads, and distill the emotion or feeling that they evoke, and think about how you could evoke the same emotion for your company.
Posted by David Guerrera on Fri, Jan 27, 2012 @ 05:04 PM
Episode #185 - January 27th, 2012
Intro
- How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet!
- On the show today is Karen Rubin (@KarenRubin), Mike Volpe (@MVolpe) and Kipp Bodnar (@KippBodnar)
- As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review!
- Anyone is welcome to come by the show to watch as part of the live studio audience - 4pm Friday
- Question of the week: What's a common business blogging mistake you've seen, and how can you fix it?
Special Guest: Kipp Bodnar
- Co-Author of The B2B Social Media Book and [ ] at HubSpot
- How did the book come about?
- The first chapter in the book is titled "Why B2B is better at Social Media than B2C" tell us why?
- What are the reasons that B2B marketers don't use social media? do you have tips for how they can overcome some of these?
- You also talk about why when it comes to reach, more is always better. Does that mean in the quality/quantity debate you are on the quantity side?
- What the #1 thing you want people to take away from the book?
Headlines
#McDStories Backfires for McDonalds
- http://www.businessinsider.com/mcdonalds-twitter-campaign-goes-horribly-wrong-mcdstories-2012-1
- A twitter campaign by McDonald's backfired when people started sharing the wrong kind of #McDStories
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McDonald's kicked things off on Thursday with the hashtag #MeetTheFarmers, in a campaign meant to draw attention to the brand's guarantee of fresh produce. Later in the day, however, the burger company used a dangerously vague hashtag: "When u make something w/ pride, people can taste it," McD potato supplier #McDstories
- Fingernail in my BigMac once #McDStories
- I was surprised I didn't know there was actual meat at McDonalds #McDStories
- Ordered a McDouble and something in the damn thing chipped my molar #McDStories
- I lost 50lbs in 6 months after I quit working and eating at McDonalds #McDStories
- Emailed statement from McDonald's social media director Rick Wion
- We quickly pulled #mcdstories and it was promoted for less than two hours.
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Within an hour of pulling #McDStories the number of conversations about it fell off from a peak of 1600 to a few dozen. It is also important to keep those numbers in perspective. There were 72,788 mentions of McDonald's overall that day so the traction of #McDStories was a tiny percentage (2%) of that.
- With all social media campaigns, we include contingency plans should the conversation not go as planned. The ability to change midstream helped this small blip from becoming something larger
- How did the hashtag really do?
- Using Hoosuite, we were able to pull up the mentions of the hashtag for the last week
- 1/19 - the day the tag launched, there were 2347 mentions of #McDStories
- 1/24-1/27 - 24,115 mentions of #McDStories
- Mostly related to the press around the backfiring campaign
- Marketing Takeaway: Be fearless... but have a backup plan!
Too Many Ads is Bad, Unless you are Google
- http://searchengineland.com/too-many-ads-above-the-fold-now-penalized-by-googles-page-layout-algo-108613
- The “page layout algorithm” — takes direct aim at any site with pages where content is buried under tons of ads.
- We’ve heard complaints from users that if they click on a result and it’s difficult to find the actual content, they aren’t happy with the experience. Rather than scrolling down the page past a slew of ads, users want to see content right away.
- So sites that don’t have much content “above-the-fold” can be affected by this change. If you click on a website and the part of the website you see first either doesn’t have a lot of visible content above-the-fold or dedicates a large fraction of the site’s initial screen real estate to ads, that’s not a very good user experience.
- Cutts told me the change will impact less than 1% of Google’s searches globally, which today’s post also stresses.
- Another issue is that ads on Google’s own search results pages push the “content” — the unpaid editorial listings — down toward the bottom of the page.
- This is a site-based algorithm that looks at all the pages across an entire site in aggregate. Although it’s possible to find a few searches on Google that trigger many ads, it’s vastly more common to have no ads or few ads on a page.
- Marketing Takeaway: Be valuable to your potential customers and they will love you for it.
Google's New Privacy Policy
Facebook Timeline Coming to Business Pages
- http://www.fastcocreate.com/1679443/facebook-update-yes-brands-are-coming-to-facebook-timeline-open-graph
- "There’s a lot of speculation [about Timeline]," says Carolyn Everson, VP of global marketing solutions at Facebook. "The goal has always been to have your personal experience on Facebook not be so different than the brand or page experience. And right now, it is different. You have Timeline and you have a page-brand profile. So we are absolutely moving in the direction to sync those up. We believe that brands want to be able to curate how they’re represented in a more visually pleasing way, and we’re in the midst of trying to figure out how best to do that."
- As for the Open Graph, the platform that has enabled third parties such asSpotify and Netflix to create apps on top of Facebook’s network, Everson says the company is still in the early stages of bringing brands on board.
- "We’re just getting started with Open Graph and are focused on working with developers and brands to build good Timeline app experiences for users," the Facebook spokesperson says. "New apps are rolling out slowly, with an emphasis on the types of apps that help people express themselves on their Timeline. Brands should focus on building apps that fit people’s lifestyles, such as appealing to their love of fashion, travel, fitness, or cooking.
- But right now, the Facebook team is focused on exploring the best ways to incorporate brands with its products. "We’re working brand by brand," Everson says, "and frankly, industry by industry."
- Marketing Takeaway: Update your Facebook business page!
Marketing Tip of the Week
Posted by David Guerrera on Fri, Jan 20, 2012 @ 05:29 PM
Episode #184 - January 20th, 2012
Intro
- How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet!
- On the show today is Karen Rubin (@KarenRubin) and Mike Volpe (@MVolpe)
- As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review!
- Anyone is welcome to come by the show to watch as part of the live studio audience - 4pm Friday
- Question of the week: What are your best tips to improve online lead gen??
Headlines
Is Goggle Compromising their Search Engine for Google +
- http://battellemedia.com/archives/2012/01/our-google-conundrum.php
- Given that Google+ results are dominating so many SERPs these days, Google is clearly leveraging its power in search to build up Google+.
- Google has positioned Google+ as a sort of “mini Internet,” a place where you can find results for a large percentage of your queries.(My source is pretty direct about this: “Google has decided that beating Facebook is worth selling their soul.”)
- But if that’s how the world of Google works now, that means it’s very important that you tend your Google+ pages, so that you rank well in Google search. Google has pretty much gamed its own search engine to insure Google+ will succeed.
- I really have no choice but to play Google’s game, and tend to my Google+ page, be I a brand, a person, a small business…. are you getting the picture here? If you decide to NOT play on Google+, you will, in essence, be devalued in Google search, at least for the percentage of people who are logged in whilst using Google.
- Seems a bit off. Seems like Google is taking the first click away from me and directing it to a Google service.
- Marketing Takeaway: See if G+ pages are ranking for your key search terms.
New Age Search Optimization
- http://www.kunocreative.com/blog/bid/70764/Why-SEOs-are-Finding-Themselves-Reporting-to-Content-Marketing
- Some SEO practitioners are having a hard time adjusting to the many new changes in Google’s ranking algorithm, indexing system, and Google’s plunge into social media. On the other hand, content marketers are thriving in the SERPs.
- These changes have benefited the prolific content producers while hurting the traditional mathematician-type SEO’s ability to maximize organic web visibility.
- Two years ago Google’s sweet spot was easy to identify – Sculpt on-page factors, build lots of backlinks, have clean search-friendly code and make sure website architecture is flat.
- Google's changes have pushed content to the forefront while shrinking the importance of the technical SEO tactics mentioned above. Without lots of good quality content it’s much harder to maximize organic search visibility.
- Actually, it requires traffic from the greatest number of relevant keywords regardless of where they rank. SERP results are not what they used to be. Just because you get certain results doesn’t mean your neighbor will.
- The point is that by ignoring where you rank on a keyword phrase and focusing on how many keyword phrases drive traffic you can see large growth in organic search visibility.
- Kuno has seen a 556% increase in organic traffic by taking this approach and almost a half-point increase in the organic visit to lead ratio. The MarketingTechBlog.com credits 72% of their organic traffic from phrases which appear on the second page or beyond. Since we can’t track up to 30% of our keywords isn’t it about time to stop worrying about where they rank and focus on how many there are and how much traffic they drive?
- Marketing Takeaway: Stop worrying about where you rank and focus on creating great content around traffic driving keywords.
Death to SOPA!
- http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/sopa-protests-to-shut-down-web-sites/2012/01/17/gIQA4WYl6P_story.html?hpid=z1
- Americans woke up without some of the oddball essentials of online life. No Wikipedia. No Reddit, a compendium of links to stories and funny pictures that draws millions a day. And no I Can Has Cheezburger?, the world’s best-known collection of funny cat pictures.
- http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2012/01/wikipedia-sopa-blackout-congressional-representatives.html
- Wikipedia, the largest Web player to block access to its pages for a full 24 hours, reports that a whopping 162 million people experienced the blackout on the online encyclopedia's landing page. In addition, 8 million U.S. readers took Wikipedia's suggestion and looked up their congressional reps from the site.
- Google reported Wednesday that as of 1:30 PM PST, 4.5 million people had signed its petition asking lawmakers to reject the Stop Online Piracy Act in the House and the Protect Intellectual Property Act in the Senate.
- http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2012/01/16/murdoch-launches-twitter-tirade-against-obama-google-over-online-piracy/
- Rupert Murdoch didn't waste any time using his newfound popularity on Twitter to make waves and take shots at some other major names.
- The media mogul took aim at the president and the leading Internet search engine after the White House announced over the weekend that it would not support legislation mandating changes to Internet infrastructure to fight online copyright and trademark infringement.
- @RupertMurdoch - So Obama has thrown in his lot withSilicon Valley paymasters who threaten all software creators with piracy, plain thievery.
- @RupertMurdoch - Piracy leader is Google who streams movies free, sells advts around them. No wonder pouring millions into lobbying.
- @RupertMurdoch - Understand more than all allege! Google great company doing many exciting things. Only one complaint, and it's important.
- Google spokesperson - Last year we took down 5 million infringing Web pages from our search results and invested more than $60 million in the fight against bad ads. ... We fight pirates and counterfeiters every day
- http://mashable.com/2012/01/20/sopa-is-dead-smith-pulls-bill/
- Lamar Smith, the chief sponsor of SOPA, said on Friday that he is pulling the bill “until there is wider agreement on a solution.”
- The move comes after widespread protest on the Internet on Wednesday by Wikipedia, Reddit and others. The sites signaled their displeasure with the bill by going dark. That day, several Congressmen dropped their support for SOPA and its Senate counterpart, PIPA. The latter bill has also been taken off the table for now.
- Marketing Takeaway: Controversial topics spur people to action... use that!
Social Word to the Wise: What are your best tips to improve online lead gen?
- relevant message --> remarkable, optimized content = lead generation engine
- using hubspot? ;)
- diversify lead sources, test, and abandon what doesn't work
- kylegport - Kyle Porter: become recognized in your industry for creating premium content so your stuff gets shared a ton
Scarcity of women causes men to spend more, save less
- http://www.usatoday.com/money/perfi/basics/story/2012-01-16/sex-and-spending/52604166/1
- University of Minnesota researchers asked groups of men to read news articles suggesting that their local population had either more men or women. They were then asked to indicate how much money they would save each month from a paycheck, as well as how much they would borrow on credit cards for purchases. When the articles suggested there was a surplus of men, the savings rate fell 42%, and the men were willing to borrow 84% more each month.
- The study also found real-life evidence of this behavior. In Columbus, Ga., where there are 1.18 single men for every single woman, the average consumer debt was $3,479 higher than it was 100 miles away in Macon, Ga., where there were 0.78 single men for every woman.
- While many commercials for male-oriented products feature beautiful women, the study's findings suggest that the image of one attractive woman surrounded by men would be more effective, says Vladas Griskevicius, professor of marketing at the Carlson School and lead author of the study. "That's what's likely to get men's testosterone ramped up," he says.
- Sex ratios don't affect women's financial decisions, but they do affect their expectations of how much men should spend on them, the study found. After reading an article stating that men outnumbered them, women expected men to spend more on dinners,Valentine's Day gifts and engagement rings.
- Marketing Takeaway: Try to understand the psychology that drives your buyers.
Worlds Longest Phone Call
- http://www.bostonseo.org/articles/584
- How do you market something that is not super exciting, like a phone card? Create something remarkable that is related to the producing.
- @BrianHawkins created a world record attempt for the world's longest phone call to help market Pingo's international calling cards.43 hours, 8 minutes, 55 seconds.
- http://www.ustream.tv/CHANNEL/AWORLDRECORDATTEMPT
- Two students from Harvard University inhabit two separate performance spaces, carrying on a conversation over the phone. The artists subject themselves to rules that a Guinness World Records official has mandated, and ordained referees are there to officiate, about what makes an authentic conversation. They are only allowed to pause for ten seconds between comments. Each performer must make a meaningful contribution, consisting of more than yes andno. They are not allowed to read or cite or script. They must never return to the same topic" twice. They must address only each other. But the biggest rule is … the conversation has to last.
- Marketing Takeaway: If you have a boring product, create something remarkable that is related to it.
Marketing Tip of the Week -
Posted by David Guerrera on Fri, Jan 13, 2012 @ 05:35 PM
Episode #183 - January 13th, 2012
Intro
- How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet!
- On the show today is Karen Rubin (@KarenRubin), Mike Volpe (@MVolpe) and Jeanne Hopkins (@jeannehopkins)
- As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review!
- Anyone is welcome to come by the show to watch as part of the live studio audience - 4pm Friday
Special Guest
- Jeanne Hopkins - HubSpot VP of Marketing & co-author of Go Mobile: Location-Based Marketing, Apps, Mobile Optimized Ad Campaigns, 2D Codes and Other Mobile Strategies to Grow Your Business
- Why should people go mobile?
- Is mobile just for B2C companies?
- What are some companies who do a really good job at mobile? / What is your favorite example of a mobile marketing campaign?
- How should a marketing professional get started with mobile What are the first couple steps?
- What's your favorite tip from the book about going mobile for marketers?
Headlines
#iLoveWalgreens
- https://twitter.com/#!/search/%23ILoveWalgreens
#ilovewalgreens cause its a pharmacy where you can buy sweatpants and vodka. #louisck#ILoveWalgreens because I know I can always find the ingredients to make meth there.- Drop off a prescription, get told it's an hour wait. come back 2 hours later and it's still not filled.
#ILoveWalgreens
#ILoveWalgreens cuz they got the best deals on magnums!-
#ILoveWalgreens =promoted TT. I feel like they're trying to Jedi mind trick us into loving Walgreens. So far, Force is not strong in them.
- So, Walgreens had to pay Twitter to get
#ilovewalgreens to trend - like a sad teenager mailing himself love letters; without the sincerity.
- Marketing Takeaway: Authenticity matters!
Everything Marketers Need to Know About SOPA
- http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/30720/Everything-Marketers-Need-to-Know-About-SOPA.aspx
- SOPA is the acronym for the "Stop Online Piracy Act," a bill that was introduced to the House of Representatives in October and would would give U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders greater power to fight online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods and
- PIPA ("Protect Intellectual Property Act") is the Senate's version of SOPA and is about enhancing enforcement against "rogue websites operated and registered overseas" and defines infringement as the distribution of illegal copies, counterfeit goods or anti-digital rights management technology.
- Your Website Could Unfairly Get Shut Down/Blacklisted: If the government or the owner of copyrighted material identifies your website as hosting copyrighted material and falling guilty of copyright infringement, penalties could include disabling online advertising networks and payment facilitators (e.g. PayPal) from doing business with your website, preventing search engines from linking to your website (bye-bye, SEO!), and enforcing that internet service providers block access to your website.
- If SOPA gets passed, it would override such safeguards, enabling judges to immediately shut down websites found guilty. Websites will only be able to defend themselves after their site had been taken down, when the damage will have already been done.
- The bill also holds for some very steep ramifications for websites that stream copyrighted content without authorization: up to 5 years in prison!
- Sites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and the like whose sites are posted with countless links from users daily would literally be unable to function, as the amount of copyright infringing content that gets posted would be completely beyond their control.
- Many of these websites are publicly opposing the bill and have even threatened to initiate an "Internet Blackout," during which several of the biggest sites on the internet -- including Google, Facebook, PayPal, Wikipedia, Twitter, and Amazon -- will shut down to emphasize the damaging effects SOPA could have on the internet.
- Marketing Takeaway:
How a 9 Year Old Newsjacked the GOP Primary
- http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/30646/How-a-9-Year-Old-Successfully-Newsjacked-the-GOP-Primary.aspx
- Journalist Darren Garnick and his 9-year old son Ari did some very cool "newsjacking" recently.
- Darren wanted to find a fun way to teach Ari about politics. Given Ari's fascination with superheroes, they hit the campaign trail asking every GOP candidate the question, "If you could be any superhero, who would you be, and why?"
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=m_GiWjuA_aQ#!
- Most of the candidates chose Superman, which is about as safe as it gets, and missed an opportunity for differentiation.
- Media training is all about ATM. Answer quickly/directly and Transition to your Message regardless of what the question is. Rick Santorum builds his campaign on family values. Without skipping a beat, he chose the Incredibles because the Dad. On the other hand, the charmless Ron Paul said "I don't know" and impatiently turned away.
- Although the GOP primary is absolutely saturating the airwaves, Ari and Darren had a fun angle on this topic, quickly rising above the noise.
- The PR lesson for candidates and businesses here is that the individual voter/consumer has potentially the same media impact as the TV networks.
- Marketing Takeaway:
7 Signs Your Mobile Marketing Sucks
- http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/30418/7-Signs-Your-Mobile-Marketing-Sucks.aspx
- Your Marketing Approach isn't Local - Whether your business has one location or five -- or 500 -- you can't fail to understand that despite being able to hold the entire world in the palms of their hands, mobile consumers are by and large concerned with the here—right here—and the now—right now.
- You Mobile efforts are not social - For mobile consumers, it’s not just what they’re doing that’s important, but where, with whom, and when.
- You don't give customers what they want - By taking the time to understand how your customers operate in mobile mode—whether that’s by thinking it through from their perspective or, better yet, conducting research and surveys—you ensure your mobile strategy is properly focused.
- You're looking at the wrong metrics - In a mobile environment, you have to track not only how many visitors come to the mobile site, but also how many leave it and go to your desktop site, indicating something is lacking in the mobile version.
- Your Team Doesn't "get it" - if your staff isn't properly trained and well-versed, they are unable to explain the benefits of your mobile channel to customers and will consequently prevent you from maximizing your investment in mobile marketing.
- Your Website is not mobile optimized - Pages load slowly, once-familiar buttons are now off-page and out of sight, and copy needed to intelligently and coherently comprehend the message are off-screen.
- You're App-solutely Wrong - Mobile apps are all the rage. There are a more than 1 million apps now, which (in 2011) were downloaded about 18 billion times. Still, marketers must ask themselves, “Do we need an app?” and if so, “Which type of app is best for us?”
- Marketing Takeaway: Desktop marketing and mobile marketing serve similar purposes but each require a different approach based on how your customers will use them.
Marketing Takeaway
Posted by David Guerrera on Fri, Jan 06, 2012 @ 05:00 PM
Episode #182 - January 6th, 2011
Intro
- How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet!
- On the show today is Karen Rubin (@KarenRubin) and Mike Volpe (@MVolpe)
- As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review!
- Anyone is welcome to come by the show to watch as part of the live studio audience - 4pm Friday
Headlines
New York Times Wrongly Emails 8 Million People
Eye Popping Marketing Statistics
- http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/30495/25-Eye-Popping-Internet-Marketing-Statistics-for-2012.aspx
- In 2012, the audience of internet users in the U.S. will expand by 3.1% to 239 million, representing 75.6% of the total population.
- Smartphone users will reach 106.7 million in 2012, up 18.4% from 2011.
- In 2012, 94% of smartphones users will be mobile internet users.
- Tablet users will reach 54.8 million in 2012, up 62.8% from 33.7 million in 2011.
- About 2/3 of web users will use social networks in 2012.
- 53.5% of the population and 70.8% of internet users (up 7.1% from 2011) will watch online video in 2012.
- 88.1% of US internet users ages 14+ will browse or research products online in 2012.
- Marketing Takeaway: Know your customers!
POLITICS
Rick Santorum's Little SEO Problem
- blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/30525/How-You-and-Rick-Santorum-Can-Fix-a-Damaged-Search-Reputation.aspx
- The sex columnist Dan Savage redefined "Santorum" as something dirty in response to Santorum's negative comments about homosexuals
- Now when you Google "Santorum" or "Rick Santorum" the dirty definition is near the top of the search results
- Santorum is concerned "that his children cannot Google their father's name"
- How do you fix this?
- Do an audit, Make sure your SEO is good, Publish more, Attract more links - you have to create more and better content that will push down the undesired result, and prove to Google that your content deserves to rank higher (through links and social proof).
- Marketing Takeaway: Google determines your brand, start SEO before it is too late.
Obama Newsjacking
- http://www.webinknow.com/2012/01/president-obama-newsjacks-iowa-caucus-by-joining-instagram.html
- On Tuesday, the Obama campaign joined Instagram, using the @BarackObama ID. The account will be managed by his campaign staff.
- By attracting the attention of some of the world's media as they are intensely focused on the results of the Republican contest, President Obama shines a small amount of light on himself and his campaign.
- I really want to see a photo of his view from the podium while delivering the State of the Union speech, which is currently scheduled for the evening of January 24, 2012.
- Marketing Takeaway: See if you can do some newsjacking of your own!
Huntsman, did you know 2/3's of web users will use social networks in 2012?
- http://www.webinknow.com/2012/01/marketing-advice-to-jon-huntsman-and-his-daughters.html
- Huntsman's campaign is an excellent example of buyer persona marketing. He is focused on voters in New Hampshire who want to meet the candidate in person.
- He has also been using mainstream media in a big way, doing lots of interviews with New Hampshire mainstream press and scoring some key endorsements.
- He decided not to market to the Iowa buyer persona.
- And, significantly, he has chosen to downplay the buyer persona who wants to get to know candidates through social networks.
- I had wanted to ask him about social media, but despite emailing theHuntsman for President media office and talking to his media people at the event, I didn't get a chance. However, several television stations scored interviews. Clearly, mainstream media is more important than social media for the campaign staffers.
- Despite dissing Twitter and Facebook, last night Huntsman made a big deal out of introducing his daughters who were in the balcony by talking up their Jon2012girls YouTube channel.
- Marketing Takeaway: Know where your customers hang out.
Marketing Tip of the Week
Know your customers. Be where they are. Be what they want.
Posted by David Guerrera on Thu, Dec 29, 2011 @ 04:53 PM
Episode #181 - December 30th, 2011
Intro
- How to interact on Twtter: Include #HubSpotTV in your tweet!
- On the show today is Karen Rubin (@KarenRubin) and Mike Volpe (@MVolpe)
- As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review!
- Anyone is welcome to come by the show to watch as part of the live studio audience - 4pm Friday
Doing It Wrong
- http://penny-arcade.com/2011/12/27
- http://kotaku.com/5871479/pr-trolling-ocean-stratagy-out-of-business-avenger-controller-maker-asks-for-forgiveness
- The issue came to light today when emails between Kotaku reader Dave and Paul Christoforo, the president of PR firm Ocean Distribution, were sent around to a number of sites including Kotaku. In them, Christoforo antagonizes, name-calls and belittles customer Dave after being asked why his order for an Avenger controller was delayed.
- put on your big boy hat and wait it out like everyone else.
- Grow up you look like a complete child bro. I Don’t have my controller so im gonna cry to the world … Really ?? Hey take that free time and do something more productive.
- As news of the exchange began to spread, gamers began to attack Christoforo and the Avenger controller.
- Christoforo, we're told, is no longer working with N-Control. Effective today, the company is now doing all of their marketing with a new marketing manager who works directly for the company.
-
N-Control's new marketing manager, Eli Schwartz, spent today trying to do damage control and deal with a flood of what he believes are unwarranted negative ratings for the Avenger on Amazon. "At this point I'm just trying to point out that, what was said was someone who we hired, what he said should not reflect on the product itself," he said. "So far the Amazon rating on the Avenger has gone from 4 and 1/2 to 1 star in around 8 hours. None of the reviews are true, they all just appeared today out of pure hate trolling."
- Marketing Takeaway: Customer service matter, make sure those representing you understand how you want to work with customers.
Headlines
Fasting Rising Global Google Searches
Google+ Updates Showing in Search
- https://wiki.hubspotcentral.com/display/marketing/Marketing+Update+on+HubSpot+TV+Scripts+Episodes+150+to
- Google is amalgamating Google+ updates into its search engine results in two ways:
- Brand Pages Updates in Organic Search Results
- When searching for a certain keyword or phrase, status updates are now appearing from actual brand pages. For example, when searching 'HubSpot brand,' a photo upload on the HubSpot Google+ account from November resulted on the very first page.
- This is huge, and it makes a big case for why your brand should create a Google+ business page and start sharing content there ASAP. If you already do, be sure to optimize your status updates. While your updates should be unique, interesting, and have a clear voice reflective of your brand, they should also be search engine optimized. Just as you include certain keywords in your blog posts to help them rank well in Google without taking away from the overall quality of the post, you should do the same for status updates on Google+.
- Personal Page Updates in Organic Search Results
- For example, upon searching 'Marketing Grader,' a status update from HubSpot CTO Dharmesh Shah's personal Google+ page is displayed as a result.
- Create valuable content to share via your Google+ business page that other people will be inclined to share.
- Marketing Takeaway: Google+ DOES impact search results, don't miss the opportunity for rankings.
Who Owns Your Twitter Account?
- http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/26/technology/lawsuit-may-determine-who-owns-a-twitter-account.html
- October 2010, Noah Kravitz, a writer who lives in Oakland, Calif., quit his job at a popular mobile phone site, Phonedog.com, after nearly four years. While at the company, Mr. Kravitz, 38, began writing on Twitter under the name Phonedog_Noah, and over time, had amassed 17,000 followers.
- The company asked him to “tweet on their behalf from time to time and I said sure, as we were parting on good terms,” Mr. Kravitz said by telephone.
- But eight months after Mr. Kravitz left the company, PhoneDog sued, saying the Twitter list was a customer list, and seeking damages of $2.50 a month per follower for eight months, for a total of $340,000.
- “This will establish precedent in the online world, as it relates to ownership of social media accounts,” said Henry J. Cittone, a lawyer in New York who litigates intellectual property disputes. “We’ve actually been waiting to see such a case as many of our clients are concerned about the ownership of social media accounts vis-á-vis their branding.”
- Marketing Takeaway: Make sure you've worked out ownership of your important social media assets.
Digital Publishing in 2012
- Daylife, a cloud publishing platform for traditional, emerging and brand publishers is forecasting what we can expect in 2012 in the Digital Publishing scene.
-
The Internet Will Become Hyper Personalized:
- 2012 will be a decisive year in the move toward the personal Internet. This personalized Internet will allow users to create their own seamlessly integrated collection of education, information, entertainment, social environments and commerce experiences within a diverse range of hardware to be consumed however they choose, wherever they choose, whenever they choose.
-
The Enterprise CMS Will Move to the Cloud:
- As more and more companies embrace the cloud for every aspect of enterprise IT operations, expect to see more major publishers and Fortune 2000 companies embracing cloud-based and open-source CMS solutions
-
The SmartAd Will Change Advertising as We Know It:
- In 2012, advertising technology will catch up with the ways in which people access the Internet (desktop, tablet, mobile), enabling the creation of ad units that are highly interactive, contextual, constantly updating and which feature topical customized content – all with increased measurability and improved ROI.
-
20th Century Marketing Speak Will Die:
- Consumers are tired of carefully crafted messages and want to believe in companies whose values conform to their own. Moreover, consumers want to engage corporate brands on landscapes that are less like traditional Web sites and are more like interactive, constantly updating destinations that are useful and have value to them.
- The Role of Curator Will Go Mainstream:
- Thanks to the rise and ubiquity of social media virtually every person who spends time online anywhere in the world will become a curator. By filtering and presenting the best of the media any one person may encounter online or in the world, and sharing that across social graphs, personal blogs and broadcast mediums such as Twitter, every individual on earth is destined to become an unwitting curator.
-
The Media Geyser Will Be Harnessed:
- In 2012, semantic algorithms and new architectures for better organization, distribution, and storytelling will be refined and emerge. Backend technologies will harness the best information and make new distribution models available, creating new opportunities for publishers of all sorts to better present constantly changing, always updating funnels of news, information, education and entertainment.
- Marketing Takeaway: No matter what 2012 predictions come true, creating remarkable content is key to an inbound marketing strategy.
Marketing Tip of the Week
Kick off the new year with a rocking Inbound Marketing resolution. Do you need to blog more? Engage in social media more? Level customer service as a marketing effort? Pick a resolution and work towards it each day!
Posted by David Guerrera on Wed, Dec 21, 2011 @ 05:05 PM
Episode #180 - December 21st, 2011
Intro
- How to interact on Twtter: Include #HubSpotTV in your tweet!
- On the show today is Karen Rubin (@KarenRubin) and Mike Volpe (@MVolpe)
- As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review!
- Anyone is welcome to come by the show to watch as part of the live studio audience - 4pm Friday
Groupon Spins Amazon for PR
- We had previously reported
- http://www.dmnews.com/genius-groupon-glove-slaps-amazon/article/220148/
- Amazon.com is taking shots from every direction. Ever since the company launched its Dec. 10 Price Check mobile app promotion, the company has been called everything from “evil” to “anti-small business.”
- Groupon is “firing back” by offering a “Buy Local” promotion that gives customers $10 in Groupon credit for purchasing a daily deal in a physical store.
- http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2011/12/20/groupon-launches-anti-amazon-promotion-of-sorts/
- Amazon, the world’s biggest online retailer, on Dec. 10 offered customers discounts if they used its price-comparing smartphone app in a physical retail store. During the one-day promotion, shoppers could have gotten a 5% discount, up to $5 each, on up to three qualifying items.
- The daily-deals site’s offer comes after Amazon’s major online competitor, eBay, last week offered its own brick-and-mortar promotion. EBay said participating retailers such as Toys ‘R’ Us, Dick’s Sporting Goods and Aeropostale would give customers $10 in in-store credit if they bought $100 worth of merchandise from the respective retailer’s websites.
- Marketing Takeaway: Turn your competition's moves against them.
For Local Business, SEO Trumps Social
- http://pewinternet.org/Reports/2011/Local-business-info/Overview.aspx and http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2011/12/research-says-social-media-is-not-the-place-people-get-local-business-data.html
- Some 55% of adults say they get news and information about local restaurants, bars, and clubs. When they seek such information, here are the sources they say they rely on most:
- 51% turn to the internet, including: 38% to search engines, 17% specialty websites, 3% social media
- 31% rely on newspapers
- 23% rely on word of mouth
- Some 60% of adults say they get news and information about local businesses other than restaurants and bars. When they do:
- 47% rely on the internet, including: 36% search engines, 16% specialty websites, 1% social media
- 30% rely on newspapers
- 22% rely on word of mouth
- Marketing Takeaway: Local or not, search engines are critical so work on your SEO.
Marketers Gone Stupid Over Video Ads
- http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2011/12/video-ads-increase-in-spite-of-measurement-concerns.html
- The numbers come from Break Media’s “Digital Video Advertising Trends: 2012″ report and overall, it shows that video advertising is on the rise. Mobile shows the most growth going from use in 39% of video ads in 2011 to an anticipated 55% in 2012.
- Advertisers spent 29% more on video ads than they planned over the past year and two-thirds of advertisers said they’ll spend even more in 2012.
- Nearly half of all respondents said ROI was hard to measure and 35% said they could measure it but there wasn’t a big enough return.
- Marketing Takeaway: Don't be a lemming, follow ROI not the masses.
Social Media Feature War Update
- http://www.allfacebook.com/facebook-timelin-2011-12 AND http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/29982/Google-Finally-Allows-Page-Admins-Rolls-Out-Other-Improvements.aspx
- Google +
- Google+ finally responded to what anecdotally seemed to be the most requested feature addition -- the ability to have business page administrators.
- Previously, users had to set up Google+ page accounts using a communal login, but now you can assign up to 50 administrators to your Google+ brand page.
- Page notification - Instead of navigating to the content to see what it is, there are now sneak previews that show what's new in your stream. You can also now see the +1s and shares your posts have generated since you last checked.
- Stream management - adding "graphic-equalize" controls that let you decide which posts are most important to you, and by extension, adjusting what appears in your stream.
- Facebook
- We’re all learning about how best to use timeline right now, so it’s probably a good thing that brand pages haven’t migrated to this new layout yet.
- Likes - Consequently, stories posted when users like your brand’s page may not be shown as the top story on their profile pages for long. Brand likes will be collected together and displayed as a group within the time period the actions were taken. This means that they may drift down the page and be shown with older content.
- Apps - Graph Rank adds open graph to the equation, including factors like how often you or your friends interact with content posted by an app. This rewards apps that are popular by pulling them to the top of the feed and highlighting their use. “How often will this app be used?” is a question we should strongly consider when designing apps that only publish stories once (for example, when you first use them) will be less valuable to brands because they are less likely to earn high Graph Rank and will tend to drift to the bottom of the pile.
- Marketing Takeaway: Keep your company pages up to date.
How People and Brands Interact
- http://www.nmincite.com/?p=6051
- http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/29897/21-Captivating-Social-Media-Stats-How-People-Interact-With-Brands-INFOGRAPHIC.aspx
- People add Facebook friends because they know them in real life or are friends of friends
- People remove friends because they say something offensive, they don't know them well, or they try to sell them something.
- Men use social media more for career, networking and dating, and women use it more for a creative outlet, coupons and deals, and to give positive feedback.
- 66% of of people who have Liked a brand have 100+ friends on FB but only 46% of those who have not have 100+ friends
- Most preferred methods of communication: 32% short updates, 27% email, 22% traditional offline ads
- Least preferred methods of communication: 25% audio / podcasts, 23% email, 15% traditional offline ads
- http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/29997/Inbound-Leads-Cost-62-Less-INFOGRAPHIC.aspx
- 9x decrease in credit card direct mail response rate
- 28% decrease in importance of tradeshows in the last 6 months
- 44% of direct mail is never opened
- 86% of people skip TV ads
- 91% of US Adults use social media monthly
- 64% of US internet users read blogs
- 62% of companies say their blog is critical
- Marketing Takeaway: Research YOUR audience and given them what they want.
Marketing Tip of the Week - Take advantage of the time over the holidays to spruce up your company social pages with new photos and other features.
Posted by David Guerrera on Fri, Dec 16, 2011 @ 07:09 PM
Episode #179 - December 16th, 2011
Intro
- How to interact on Twtter: Include #HubSpotTV in your tweet!
- On the show today is Karen Rubin (@KarenRubin) and Mike Volpe (@MVolpe)
- As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review!
- Anyone is welcome to come by the show to watch as part of the live studio audience - 4pm Friday
Headlines
No More Loud Commercials!
- http://www.cnn.com/2011/12/13/us/fcc-loud-commercials/index.html
- Television commercials that are a lot louder than the program will be prohibited under rules adopted Tuesday by the Federal Communications Commission.
- It may take a while to get people out of the habit of hitting the mute button on the remote control, since the rules limiting spikes in volume don't take effect for a year.
- The agency chief said "the Commission has received almost 6,000 complaints about loud commercials since 2008," but it took congressional legislation to grant the FCC the authority to act on the problem.
- Marketing Takeaway: If you have to yell, you're doing it wrong.
The Numbers on Email Viewership
- http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/29765/7-Staggering-Statistics-on-Email-Viewership-Data.aspx
- Email opens on mobile devices increased by 34% from April 2011 through September 2011 as compared to the previous 6 month period.
- Relative number of opens on webmail and desktop, however, decreased by 11% and nearly 9.5% respectively.
- As more people go to their mobile devices to read email -- of those that do, 43% check email four or more times per day according to Markle
- 'Finance' and 'shopping' show above average webmail views as compared to other industries, at 49% and 48% respectively.
- 'Software' and 'automotive,' which scored the lowest in average webmail views, saw the highest percentage of average desktop views at 48% and 47% respectively.
- The industries leading the way in mobile email views are, not surprisingly, 'social networking' (27%), 'publishing' (26%), and 'entertainment' (27%).
- Marketing Takeaway: Make sure your email is mobile optimized (HubSpot makes it easy!)
Billboard Marketing Strategy
- http://www.christianpost.com/news/atheists-claim-america-not-founded-on-christian-faith-in-new-billboard-64384/
-
A California-based atheist group known for its anti-Christian advertising campaigns and events is to host a press conference Friday, under its newest “Treaty of Tripoli” billboard in Costa Mesa, Calif.
- The group, called the Backyard Skeptics, has been sparking controversy locally and nationwide by putting up roadside billboards questioning God's existence, as well staging controversial events like ripping up Bible pages or distributing flyers encouraging recipients to doubt the Scriptures.
- The new 48x14-foot billboard raised above 1526 Newport Boulevard in Costa Mesa Tuesday reads: “America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.”
- One of its previous billboards attempted to convince observers to “Make this a better world. Reject all religious superstitions.”
- Marketing Takeaway: Sometimes the real purpose is not the ad, it is the buzz and the conversation.
Facebook Controls 52% of Online Sharing
- http://www.clickz.com/clickz/news/2132180/addthis-facebook-controls-online-sharing
- Facebook now controls a thin majority of online sharing, according to data released today by AddThis. The social giant makes up 52.1 percent of all sharing on the web for the year 2011 to date, up from 44 percent last year and 33 percent the year before.
- The statistics were gathered through the ClearSpring-owned company's sharing plugin, which is used by more than 11 million sites.
- 73% of the top 10 shares were related to death and disaster
- Twitter makes up 52% of sharing in Japan
- Google sharing declined by 8% even with the addition on the + button
- Marketing Takeaway: The key is not Facebook, is is creating something worth sharing.
New Machine to Profile Prospects
- http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/story/2011-12-13/face-recogniton-sampling-machine/51890500/1
- Today, Kraft Foods, the nation's biggest foodmaker, will roll out in Chicago a device that dispenses its mousse-like Temptations dessert by Jell-O, but only to the product's target market: grown-ups.
- The machine, developed by Intel, can detect facial age with a special camera that scans your face and determines if you're an adult or a kid.
- If the machine detects a child, it shuts down and asks the child to step away.
- But Seth Godin, a prominent marketing blogger and author, says it's lame. "It's a goofy gimmick, not a useful innovation," he says.
- The food and beverage industry alone spends upward of $1 billion annually on product sampling. In the end, it's all about getting the right sample in the right person's hands — or mouth.
- The machine does not capture individual photos or videos. It's a detection device that analyzes, compares and stores metrics. When it looks at a face, it might compare the distance between your eyes or ears to help determine your age.
- Marketing Takeaway: Experiment with new twists on old techniques.
Marketing Tip of the Week: Try something new, even just a new twist on an old technique.