Good Read: Drake Morton

Activating Social Extensions For Google AdWords

by Janet Driscoll Miller , Tuesday, Nov. 29, 2011

Not long after Google enabled Google+ Pages for Business earlier this month, it also enabled a new Google AdWords ad extension type: social extensions. Like other types of ad extensions, social extensions provide a way for marketers to add additional information to their ads, making them larger and more visible, helping an individual one to stand out in a sea of ads on the page. Social extensions add Google+ social information to an ad, including information such as:

How many +1s you have, tallied together.
Specific friends/connections who have +1’ed your website, ad, or search result.
Social extensions are free and fairly simple to add to your advertisements.
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Just in case, I think you need to know: Drake Morton

 What Are Teen Girls Really Talking About?

By Denise Restauri  Wednesday, Nov. 23, 2011

We need to be a part of their conversations, but what are their conversations?  What are the topics they are talking about and more importantly, what are they really saying – their words, their voices?

Who is this teen girl? She’s the girl who loves herself. She’s the girl who hates herself. I poured through hundreds of blogs written by teen girls– here are their top 20 topics in random order.
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You should know: Drake Morton

Of Principles, Solutions And Pilots

(No, We Are Not Creating PSPs)

by Sherrill Mane, Tuesday, Nov. 22, 2011

The ecosystem-wide initiative, Making Measurement Making Sense (3MS) is now moving from guiding principles and recommended solutions to testing, which is the first phase of implementation.  This is the stage where we will learn what we don’t know.  Moreover, after acquiring information, we will be able to course-correct together.

The ANA, 4As and IAB embarked on the 3MS journey starting in February 2011.  Since then I’ve had the privilege of watching some of the smartest people in marketing and advertising collaborate to create proposed solutions to the challenge of capitalizing on the many metrics available in digital media. In tandem, they are forging a path to cross-platform measurement.

This is no small task.  It has taken giant minds and courageous souls to get us to the point where testing can begin.  As a matter of fact, nearly 40 business leaders and functional experts, all senior executives, participated in 3MS.  And the members of the ANA, 4As and IAB were joined by NAA and the OPA in supporting the work of these executives as facilitated by Bain & Company and MediaLink LLC.
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Need to Read: Drake Morton

Your Email To-Do List For 2012

by Loren McDonald, Thursday, Nov. 17, 2011

It’s that time of year for articles predicting marketing trends for 2012. For this column, however, I’m taking a different approach and outlining several tactics that should be on your 2012 to-do list.

Some of these are tactics that will help you keep up with your competitors, while others could move you ahead of the pack. All are designed to help you deliver a more effective email program — and, ultimately, achieve your business goals.
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Great Read: Drake Morton

November 17, 2011

70% of Online Video Ad Viewers Visit Site or Buy

According to a Burst Media survey of online U.S. adults aged 18 or older, 71.6% of web users overall watch online video content in a typical week, and 39.0% of all viewers spend between one and five hours per week with online video. Men aged 18-34 are the heaviest consumers of online video content, with 19.7% saying they consume 10 or more hours of video on the web per week.

39.1% of viewers say they typically watch full-length television shows, movies and/or sporting events on the Internet. 25.5% of online viewers watch news, sports and entertainment highlights of regular television programming online, and 49.7% say they also watch user-generated content.

Comedy is the most popular form of online video content among all viewers (38.8%), followed by news (33.3%) and music (31.2%). However, there are some dramatic differences between what men and women typically watch online:

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Good Read: Drake Morton

Be Smart, Be Social

by Jeremiah McMillan , Wednesday, Nov. 16, 2011

As “content everywhere” business models continue to expand at a rapid pace, it becomes abundantly clear what the devices and platforms defining and driving TV and digital entertainment contents convergence are.

With convergence, content providers and producers need to know and have survival skills to compete in “content everywhere” markets — including what the revenue, brand and digital extensions mean to the bottom line.

A few market shifts are painting a much clearer picture. Understanding “smart” platforms and devices, and what defines “social TV” content engagement, especially for the younger generations, is crucial to content business models in a “content everywhere” world.

Basically, multi-screen content strategy for 2012 and beyond is all about being “smart” and being “social.”

This is clear from the attention on a few new research studies that show global online TV and video revenues hitting $22 billion by 2016, up from $3.4 billion in 2010.

U.S. executives can look at with anticipation, or concern at the prediction that the U.S.’s share of that market will drop from 54% to 36% as the “globalization of content” and how people receive it takes off, with connected devices and platforms in Europe and Asia driving the growth in on-line video and TV revenues more than any other.

Smart And Social Digital Extensions:
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Good Read: Drake Morton

Video is Evolving — Don’t Get Left Behind

by Craig Wax , Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2011
Consumer usage of video is increasing at an astonishing rate. Cisco has estimated that video will increase from 30% of Internet traffic in 2010 to 90% by 2013. Online retailers are already using video, and service companies, manufacturing, and many others are also hopping on board. The scope of businesses that employ video and the different uses for video are expanding.

The message is clear: Consumers expect online video as a central element of a company’s communications strategy. No matter what sector of business you are in, incorporating video is an essential step in preparing yourself for the future of marketing.

73% of online retailers use video on product pages, which means that if you’re a retailer and you don’t have video on your site, you are officially in the minority, according to eMarketer. Other sectors of business are beginning to follow suit. A recent survey by Industrial Marketing Today  found that 50% of B2B manufacturers use YouTube as a channel to connect with their customers. Even service companies such as Charles Schwab are starting  to include videos on their websites.

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Good Read: Drake Morton

How Retailers Can Curb SPAM And Increase Engagement

by Neil Capel , Monday, Nov. 14, 2011

Every time I make a purchase online, another retailer makes me sign up for their email service. Jeans on sale today at 9 a.m., free shipping for the next two weeks, tips for fall fashion, and more enter my inbox every morning. Three months later, I’ve opened zero emails from the retailer and the brand is a permanent fixture in my spam folder.

Brands tend to think about direct to consumer email in the simples of ways: the more email I send, the more money I make. The fail rate on an average email, though, is well above 20%, according to Return Path. So in reality, the more emails you send the more one-time customers you bring in the door and push right back out the door when you bombard them with email.

Here are our five tips for retailers looking to increase engagement with their users and get out of that SPAM folder. (more…)

Need to Know: Drake Morton
by Bryan Boettger , Friday, Nov. 11, 2011

10 Factors Of Viral Propensity 

I don’t believe you can make a “.” There. I said it.

However, you can game the system. In a media landscape where earned media continues to gain greater and greater importance, we find ourselves consulting brands on analytical ways to judge a qualitative product. A way to judge propensity.

And, sometimes, you can do it by analyzing 10 factors…

1. Authenticity
. It can be planned out, but the video must feel in-the-moment. No one wants to be a shill for your blatant marketing.

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Good Read: Drake Morton

by Daniel Ambrose , Thursday, Nov. 10, 2011

Moneyball for Ad Sales

How many of you find yourself competing with the “big guys” on a smaller budget?

Billy Beane, the Oakland A’s general manager, was determined to find a way for a low-revenue professional baseball team to compete successfully with teams spending two or three times as much  on top player salaries.  He found a way, with strategies vividly described in the book “Moneyball” — and now the much more widely consumed movie.

The defining scene, for me, was the conference room discussion of whom to draft, where scouts recommended players in part on how they looked, and if they had a good-looking girlfriend — an ostensible sign of their self-confidence.  The girlfriend line, as far as I can tell, was a scriptwriters’ device to summarize all the ways traditional baseball looked at the wrong things.  If you read the book you’d read a less-fictionalized account of the real process that is no less off-base.
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