Followerwonk – The Social Analytics Tool for Twitter

I came across a really cool social tool the other day that I can’t believe more people are not using. It’s called Followerwonk and is a miracle tool for cultivating influential bloggers, guest blogging opportunities, and socially authoritative websites. The tool has both a free and paid version based on usage and can be accessed by using your twitter account. The tool has four main purposes and allows you to export your findings to a CSV file and saves your recent searches.

One of my very favorite parts of this tool is the ability to search for twitter users by keyword and compare them based on different metrics (influence, followers, following, age, etc). In practice, if you were looking to connect with authoritative social media bloggers to  promote your content, this tool will let your search, sort, and download them based on the keywords you selected. You can also follow them on Twitter right from the application. Followerwonk also shows you if your account is following the selected twitter profiles or if they are following you.

Once you have selected a short-list of highly authoritative and relevant bloggers, or websites, you can dive deeper into their twitter statistics and then start to analyze their followers (or whom they are following) to help narrow down cream of the crop. There are a ton of metrics to take into account such as the average age, language of their followers, and how active and authoritative they are.

Lastly, Followerwonk offers user twitter analytics to help monitor the progress (or struggles) of your growing, authoritative followers. Using this feature within the tool can provide a closer look at your twitter account’s followers. It can also identify your most influential followers which is a vital aspect to any social media campaign since they are your lowest hanging fruit. You can also identify followers that are recent additions or recent loses. My suggestion would be to periodically pull up your followers that have chosen to unfollow you, identify authoritative users, and then attempt to retain.

For a social media consultant like me, Followerwonk is a great addition to the social media tools we are currently usiong at Web Talent Marketing. Of course no tool has ever created a winning social media campaign. A custom stratagy and solid reporting metrics often work hand in hand to help acheive long term success within social media – but tools like this help out a whole lot!

Google Split Testing – NOT!

Recently, while perusing the performance of a client, who shall for my own job security remain nameless, I noticed that all of a sudden quite a few of my text ads were disapproved in Google Search. What the sweet Jolly Green Giant is going on here, I thought. I hovered my cursor over the thought bubble next to my Disapproved status and it very helpfully told me that all the display URLs within the ad group must be the same.

Identical, like creepy little PPC minions.

Fair enough, I thought, and I went to look through my active ads. To my not-at-all-surprise, all my active ads had identical display URLs. I figured it probably was an older disapproval and maybe I just needed to make a small edit and resubmit it. I can always go back later and put the display URL back the way I want it, all properly capitalized and looking adorable and useful. Then I clicked on the ads tab at the campaign level, and lo and behold, ALL the ad groups had disapproved ads. Mother of Pearl! I went through and edited every single one of those suckers until after about ten minutes I realized that I have edited myself into a circle, and have started re-editing ads that within the last few minutes have been disapproved AGAIN.

This looks like a job for Annoying Girl! Annoying Girl calls Adwords Support hotline (which is 866-2-GOOGLE, for any of you that do not have the secret weapon) and complains about the hypocrisy inherent within the system at length to the (I’m sure very lovely) girl on the other end of the phone. Despite my gratitude that she spoke perfectly clear and easily understandable English, the fact remains that there are built-in flaws within the Adwords system, and if I cared half as much about politics as I do about getting Google to improve this program, I would have mastered the art of making protest signs and have an arrest record the length of my leg.

Give me split testing or give me DEATH!

Here is what I was told by said lovely girl, and here is why I still don’t want to make friends with her: The display URL of all the ads that are paused and DELETED within an ad group will affect the approval of the active ads. Therefore, if you decided that you didn’t like the display URL you used last year, and wanted to revamp your company image, you would have to create an entirely new ad group to change it. Even so much as a change from mygreatcompany.com/rock-on to something more like MyGreatCompany.com will get your ads disapproved.

The whole rule about identical display URLs, to me, goes against the entire point of having multiple ads. Why can I split test everything under the sun, but not my display URLs? I know some of you are thinking that this really shouldn’t be a big deal, but it is. No, seriously it is! How can I explain the statistical reasoning behind a “best practices” of building adwords ads to a client when I cant even show them the difference in performance between their www.reallylongandobnoxiousurl.com/subdomain and my super sweet ShortURL.com/Yea. Maybe this is the lament of just one species of marketer. But I say if I deleted something, that means I no longer own it, and like wiping a misdemeanor off a minor’s record, you should not be able to hold past performance against me.

In order to remedy this situation, I had to go through all paused ads and edit them, thus losing my historical data. To find the data that once was, I have to go through deleted ads and guess which one it was. Google, if you could possibly, I would really love it if you could make my job a little harder. Kthnx. So, I’m sorry Very Lovely Adwords girl, whose name I cannot remember, I don’t think I will be adding you as a friend on Facebook, and please tell your employer I think they smell.

Google Analytics Intelligence: An Underused Asset for SEOs

In 2009, Google quietly released its intelligence module for Google Analytics. This feature allows SEOs and webmasters to create custom alerts for a wide variety of metrics and segments. It is my experience that most Internet marketers are not using this feature to its full potential. There are many benefits that one can obtain from early warnings that allow marketers to respond quickly to changes in their digital landscape.

Monitoring Changes in Traffic

By setting up a custom alert, SEOs can be notified about gross changes in traffic, both positive and negative. You can segment these to cover both organic and paid mediums while  being alerted of traffic changes as well. A useful scenario would be implementing the alerts to detect large-scale traffic drops from keywords week-to-week or day-to-day. We have used intelligence reporting to track visits and conversion changes from targeted keywords and to alert us about changes in algorithms (like Panda).

Monitoring Changes in Conversion

Monitoring conversion rates amongst all or selected traffic sources can help identify daily changes indicating a potentially devastating set of circumstances or a tremendous market opportunity. With custom email alerts, Google intelligence reports could notify you when your conversion rate decreases by massive amounts (like 60%!). This allows you you access your analytics easily to fix any potential problems and address potential issues in traffic quality or quantity at first notice, rather than letting days or weeks pass before you notice a problem.

Monitoring Brand Impact

With Custom Alerts you can quickly monitor your brand’s impact on the web. This is pretty easy to setup in analytics by creating a weekly report to show changes in brand related keyword searches (or any specific keyword for that matter). You can set up the account to email you when metrics experience a heavy spike or decline. This could also be a great metric that can be correlated with your company’s online reputation management efforts.

Monitoring decrease in ROI or Revenues

Revenues are at the heart of every online business. Having a daily or weekly alert set up to monitor massive changes in cost per conversion, ROAS or generated revenue could also be a helpful way to stay ahead of the curb. Once an alert is dispatched your company can pull resources and address any potential problem or get an early warning to secure inventory if there is a spike in demand for your product or service.

You have nothing to lose!

It’s amazing that most people aren’t taking advantage of this free feature in Analytics. The UI is very simple to use and the module has a pretty low learning curve.  The Google intelligence feature allows marketers and SEOs to be proactive and hyper reactive to changes affecting their client’s business and search marketing efforts.  To learn more about how to use Google Intelligence I recommend reading some of the advanced Analytics help that Google has on their website.

Create Ads in 5 Minutes or Less with AdWords Express

There is a new and easy tool that Google has created to simplify the advertising world. To help business ads appear for the right prospective customer and their search, Google has launched AdWords Express. This new approach to online marketing allows businesses to advertise in the ads section of Google and Google maps easier and faster than ever before. In less than five minutes, you can have a limited pay-per-click campaign. AdWords Express provides you with less features than a full AdWords campaign, but it easy and simple to setup and use. When you choose AdWords Express, you’re asked to pick a category that best fits your business and choose a monthly budget for your advertising campaign. You provide some basic business info, and then Google determines the keywords that are most relevant to your ad and category selected. Like always, you only pay when potential customers click on your ad. There is no need for ongoing management of your ad campaign, because AdWords Express optimizes your ad for you. Its simplicity is designed for local businesses that are new to online advertising or have very low budgets that do not justify professional management… You can have an ad for your company up and running in five minutes!

AdWords Express notices when a potential customer searches for a product or service you offer. Your Ad is shown on the top or right hand side of the result pages, or in Google Maps with a blue pin (instead of a red one for organic results). Your potential customers can even see your ad on their mobile phone.

Check out these two AdWords Express videos to learn more and see for yourself how truly simple it is to set up your own advertising campaign!

Google AdWords Express Video 1

Google AdWords Express Video 2

Video Marketing Is More Important For Your Business Than You May Think

Video is sometimes a topic that many business owners are instantly skeptical about implementing as a seriously advantageous tool for their company. This is mostly because it is often associated with amateur viral clips rather than valuable content. However, video is extremely important to a website because it shows potential customers that you are an actual breathing human being, and that you are passionate about what you sell. Here are some tips on what type of content to include when thinking about making a video, and how to make it accomplish something: bring in customers and generate business!

What type of video content is right for your company? How can you make it succeed?

1. Make sure that your video content satisfies a customer’s need—capture attention and create interest by meeting the information need of your audience. Don’t know what kind of video you want to make? Consider these creative options:

 

• Product Review and Demonstration Video- Show how to use the product you sell, what the best parts about it are, or what it does that makes it worth the customer’s dollar. What’s new or different about it than your competitor’s version? Creating project demonstration videos can impress potential customers forever. There is an increasing audience for video tutorials—for all of the “do-it-yourself” fans out there, you can feed their appetite for personal assistance while also showing them you are a real person behind your website because you know how to create, use, and fix what you sell.
• Post-Sale Support and Maintenance Video- Make a video that shows your customer troubleshooting tips that he or she may run into upon setup, how they could fix a simple problem they may run into. More importantly, it is always helpful to create a maintenance video that simply shows how to keep the product in its best condition or gives advice on how to avoid future dilemmas.
• Success Story (Case Study) Video- Nothing convinces a viewer more that you are a reputable and successful business then the accounts of those who have entrusted in your services and left satisfied. Upload video testimonials of happy customers. Use real customers and their first-hand experiences; they will carry more weight than text ever could. They will serve as a success story that highlights what your company provides. Think of them as an authentic walking and talking case study! Tip: Consider interviewing satisfied customers for video content to engage a conversation if you think your customer cannot sing your praises eloquently without some form of guidance.
• Video-Submission Contest- Sponsoring a contest is inexpensive and free publicity if your customers are submitting their video to you and posting it elsewhere on the web. Contests promote brand awareness and get video creators talking about your business. Even if you only have a few submissions, those video creators are spending time on your site and spreading word of mouth about their new project that they’re working on for your company.
• Man-In-The-Street Interview- Show real people and what they want, do or don’t like, how they’ve been treated by other companies, etc… transition to how your company can save the world! Just kidding, but you could switch over to showing how your business alleviates their previous struggles and satisfies what they’ve been looking for. Customers enjoy seeing ordinary people just like themselves incorporated into a video because it shows that your business aims to please the average Joe with cordiality as its primary concern.
• Event, Conference & Trade Show Communications- Show what your company does when its not servicing customers. Showing prospective customers how hard you work to research your area of business in order to stay ahead of the curve will show you are sincere about your business goals and prove once again that you are a real person selling a service or product—not a face-less website.
• Video Press Release- Have something new and important to say that you want to get out to your customers in a personable and quick way? Need we say anything more?
• Email Newsletter Video- Sending out a video to your email mailing list will help elicit specific conversion through a purpose-built video if you offer something in the video that the customer needs. You can track the responses that you get from whatever you offer in the video, and see how many people are watching what your posting, and how greatly the video has attributed to an increase in business.

 

2. If you post your video on YouTube, understand the power of demographic profiling. YouTube has analytic software that gives you invaluable data regarding who watches your video and what that viewer searched to come across your video. Small and large businesses can leverage demographic information from video statistics to better understand their customers in the real world. Not to mention, a YouTube video tells you and the customer how many times the video has been watched, which can entice the viewer to watch, and also help you better understand if the video is gaining success or hitting a plateau.

 

3. Encourage users to subscribe to your YouTube channel or company email newsletter at the end of your video. Take advantage of the fact that they are already interested in what your company does since they’ve clicked play and watched until the end of the video. Now, show them how they can stay connected to your company with special offers.

 

4. Think about posting or stating some type of promotion somewhere on your site, like “Print the step-by-step instructions for (whatever your video content is about) to receive 10% off our in-house evaluation by visiting www.mysite.com/youtube”. The customer’s action will translate into your value because a unique URL with the incentive of a discount equates to a measurable way to determine the success of your video.

 

5. Encourage a discussion—have someone in your company post a comment under the video to spark conversation. The more comments below a video, the more worthy of debate it appears, and the more important it looks.

 

6. PUSH PUSH PUSH! You ultimately want your video to be viewed by as many people as possible, because the more its viewed the more important it appears, giving prospective viewers the incentive to click “play” and learn more about your business. At some point in your video, market your company directly. After making the video, post it everywhere—your Facebook business fan page, your Twitter profile, your blog, your website, and any other social media network that you use.

You Gotta Have Search Engine Optimization (SEO) or You’re Missing Out

Search engine optimization is the process of making a website "likable" by search engines. Having relevant, up-to-date content, proper website coding, inbound and outbound links to other sites that are relevant, all contribute to "good" search engine optimization. However, these items are only the beginning. True SEO goes very deep and get complicated, as such it requires monthly or quarterly updates and monitoring.

The internet is a very competitive space. While you are optimizing your site, your competition is doing the same. SEO can be extremely profitable and yield bushels of new leads for your business.

Search engine optimization coupled with proper website conversion tracking, telephone tracking, email conversion rate monitoring as well as consistently adding relevant content are the ingredients needed to succeed.

Below is another great article by American Express OPEN on Search Engine Optimization (SEO). We subscribe to the American Express OPEN newsletter to receive updates weekly about particles that are relevant to what we do. I strongly urge every small business owner to fill out a brief profile on the OPEN website so you start receiving articles that are relevant to your business. The articles can help you manage your organization more efficiently, reduce operating expenses, derive new methods of conducting business, and much more.

When customers search for products and services to purchase, they go to search engines. And when your site ranks highly among those search engines, you (the business owner) stand to enjoy tremendous profits. If your site is not being "seen" by the search engines, then you’re missing out on a ton of opportunity!

Click here for the full Search Engine Optimization Article.

Advertising Tracking… Learn what works!

When your telephone rings do you know where the caller originated from? What campaign, what made them call and what is the probability they will purchase?

More than ever before, tracking advertising efforts has become incredibly important. In today’s economic times you do not have the ad budget to hope for the best. In general, advertising is very uncertain. You allocate funds where you *think* the best returns will be. However, you rarely know how many phone calls or website hits you receive from a single ad campaign.

New technology allows us to track our ad campaigns in a way that removes virtually ALL THE UNCERTAINTIES of advertising. If you know where your revenue is coming from you can better maximize the benefit from that ad campaign.

Imagine having a Google Pay-Per-Click campaign with 200 phrases. Your total budget is $1000 per month. You spend on average $4 per click and get about 250 clicks per month spread between 200 phrases. Currently you only know that the campaign gets clicks and brings traffic to your site – perhaps you track how many people submit email forms for more information. Ad Track allows you to accurately and effectively determine which of your 200 phrases are bringing the most phone calls that ultimately turn into sales.

After running the Ad Track system for a couple months you would have enough data to eliminate a portion of your 200 keyword list, freeing up more dollars for the phrases that produce sales. Imagine if your list went from 200 to 25 high producing phrases – you would now get almost 10 clicks per phrases (before you were getting 1.25 clicks per phrase). Where you were getting 1 phone call you could be getting 10.

What if you could track phone calls that originated from various Internet Marketing campaigns?

What if you could record the call to better anticipate and prepare for pre-sales questions, aid in sales training efforts and much more?

What if you knew 80% of calls from Google Organic lead to sales and 60% of calls from Google Pay-Per-Click lead to sales – or vice versa?

What if you knew phone book advertising only brings 10 calls per year and only 20% turn into sales?

We like to call it Advertising Accountability and Advertising Forensics.

The time is now to start strategically measuring the performance of virtually every advertising campaign you deploy.