Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'The Panda Patent: Brand Mentions
Are the Future of Link Building'
Posted by SimonPenson
There has long been speculation about how Google actually measures "brand
authority." Many times over the past couple of years have those who speak
outside of those fortified Googleplex walls made it clear that brand building is
the way to win the organic visibility war.
That statement however has always sounded wooly in the extreme. How is it
possible to measure an almost intangible thing at scale and via a complex
formula? If you are Google, it seemsthere is ALWAYS a way.
A fairly innocent-looking patent filed last month, which some say could be
the Panda patentmay have gone some way to answering that question.
Within this post we dive into that patent and other supporting evidence in an
attempt tounderstand what the opportunity may be for digital marketers in the
future. As part of that attempt, we offer our interpretation of various pieces
of the patent itself, andalsolook at actual data to see if mentions are already
playing a part in the ranking of sites.
The patent in question, which can be
found here and has been expertly covered by Bill Slawski, may cover the Panda
Algorithm's key workings, but the piece we are really interested in right now is
the information around measuring site authority and relevance using a ratio of
links and mentions, or "implied links."It's this specific area that got both the
team here at Zazzle Media and also at Moz excited. You can see Cyrus Shepard and
Rand Fishkin's reaction right here:
I knew it! RT @CyrusShepard: This Google patent defines non-linking citations as
"implied links" http://t.co/cOxv0irklk Rand Fishkin (@randfish) March 26, 2014
So, what exactly does the patent imply? It is complex, wordy, and difficult to
interpret, but it starts by talking about what Google calls "reference queries:"
"A reference query for a particular group of resources is a previously
submitted search query that has been categorized as referring to a resource in
the particular group of resources."
To most of us, that statement appears as bad English at best, but there are a
couple of ways this could be used. It firstallows Google to look at what terms
people have used previously through search to find and then click on a site, or
group of sites. In doing so, it wouldthen also allow them to "map" semantically
relevant queries (and thusmentions of abrand) to a site in order to further
extend an understanding of the "popularity" or "authority" ofthat entity.
The patent also covers a mechanism for allowing Google to discount some links
and give others greater weighting based on a modification factor:
"The method of claim 1, wherein determining a respective group-specific
modification factor for a particular group of resources comprises: determining
an initial modification factor for the particular group of resources, wherein
the initial modification factor is a ratio of a number of independent links
counted for the particular group to the number of reference queries counted for
the particular group."
This could beespecially important where lots of links from the same company (or
"group") point at a site, as the search engine could discount those from the
true overall picture. It then also gives engineers the ability to look at
"quality" as a measure of the overall relevance to the queriedsubject matter,
which is called out in a separate bit of the patent:
"For example, the initial score can be, e.g., a measure of the relevance of
the resource to the search query, a measure of the quality of the resource, or
both."
Then, the patent specifically mentions that links can either be "express" or
"implied," calling out non-linkingmentions in a rather unmistakable way:
"The system determines a count of independent links for the group (step 302). A
link for a group of resources is an incoming link to a resource in the group,
i.e., a link having a resource in the group as its target. Links for the group
can include express links, implied links, or both. [...]An implied link is a
reference to a target resource, e.g., a citation to the target resource, which
is included in a source resource but is not an express link to the target
resource. Thus, a resource in the group can be the target of an implied link
without a user being able to navigate to the resource by following the implied
link.
What does all this mean? It means that once a connection is made by someone
typing in a brand name or other search query and then clicking on a site it
creates aconnection inGoogle's eyes. The search engine can then store that info
and use itin the context of unlinked mentions around the web in orderto help
weight rankings of particular sites.
If this is
the Panda Patent, as it is part of a wider algorithm, it wouldalso look at the
quality of pages on a site and how "commercial" they are in their targetingthis
wasoriginallydesigned to negatively impact content farms that created content
targeted aggressively at commercial terms those thatthink "search engine-first"
as opposed to "audience-first."
The patent publication was closely followed by a
related Webmaster video by Matt Cutts within which the head of Google's webspam
teamtalked about a "forthcoming update" that would look differently at how the
search engine measures authority:
By arguing that there is a difference between popularity and links, Cutts made
clear that his engineers are looking very closely at how to continue to tweak
the existing algo to make more popular sites rank higher.
That's a big deal.
Those two pieces of new evidence suggest there is a seismic shift underway in
how links are weighted and how relevance is measured the two building blocks of
search.
It's something
Rand here at Moz first touched on back in late 2012 and I covered in detail in
this post a few weeks later.
In it I gave a little background into why Google is hell bent on getting away
from the concept of a link-based economy:
"My view is that Google is really trying to clear up the link graph and with
it valueless links so that it can clearly understand relevance and associations
again.
It's something that web 'creator' Tim Berners Lee first wrote about back in
2006 in this magazine article and Google has been talking about ever since,
ploughing lots of cash into acquisitions to get it there.
So, why invest so much time, effort and resource into such a game-changing
project? Quite simply because its existing keyword based info retrieval model is
in danger of being bettered by semantic search engines."
Let's look into the how and why in a little more detail.
Links
Everybody who reads this article will be more than aware of the importance of
links in building authority.
A lot has changed in this space over recent years, however, as Google has
developed systems to measure where the link is coming from and assign more (or
less) value to it as a result.
The next logical step in that process could be the downgrading of the follow
link within the overall picture of ranking factors. It is something that has
been expected for some time and wasreiterated by Moz's own panel of experts in
the annual
Ranking Factor survey.
We know that follow links have been gamed "to death" in the past, so it would
make sense to make that particular element a little less important in the
overall mix. Nofollows can still tell Google a lot about a site, as can how much
people are talking about it.
Nofollow
By definition a nofollow link does not pass equity, or PageRank, to a site. We
know that for certain. What is less clear is what, if anything, it does pass.
Google certainly knows these links are there, and this latest patent could
suggest they are taking a little more notice of them than they are letting on.
The patent highlights the importance of "reference queries" and "implied
links," and also that Google looks to discount links from the same "group" or
brand and instead wants to concentrate on independent links from unassociated
domains.
Critically, PageRank is not mentioned, which suggests that other factors are
being measured in terms of how much equity is being passed by each independent
link, or mention.
Mentions
It is the "implied link"element that makes most interesting reading, as it is
black-and-white evidence that Google is looking at mentionsas a measure of
authority.
It is logical, after all, that a popular brand would have more people talking
about it online than one that is simply good at manipulating the algorithm and
has invested heavily in link building to that end.
The results from our sample research also support this, with larger,
better-known brands generally attracting greater numbers of mentions than
others.
Testing
Of course, the question remains, is this already in use? To test this properly
would require a monumental amount of measurement across a plethora of verticals
over an extended period of time, and sadly,I did not have the time or resources
to run that project for the sake of this post, but it is still worth sharing
some of the data and an overview of what may be going on.
The caveat here is absolutely that this does NOT constitute any kind of
fact-finding mission, simply an informed commentary on a few anomaliesthat
cannot be explained simply by looking at follow links alone.
To discover if there are any initial signs that this kind of system may already
be in effect, I spent some time analyzing three separate, random SERPs here in
the UK.
They were:
"Car Insurance"
"Mortgage Calculator"
"Mens Clothing"
All three are competitive terms and are "owned" in the main by what we might
know as brandsin the wider world.
Below you can see a simple chart for each of these, showing:
Follow links
Nofollow links
Follow/nofollow ratio
The number of brand mentions in the last four weeks
Ratio between links and mentions
Clearly this isn't ascientific study, but it does serve as a"finger in the
air"analysis from which a few interesting observations can be made.
The first two tables contain data examining the whole domain's link profile,
while the third looks specifically at links to the URL indexed for the
particular term we are analyzing.
The raw data is below and here is an explanation of where that data was drawn
from:
Position Records what position we saw the domain in for the given search term
in google.co.uk.
Follow link for the first two ('Car Insurance' and 'Mens Clothing') this is
the number of follow links across the whole domain. For 'mortgage calculator' it
records just the follow links into the specific URL indexing for that term. The
data is from AHREFS.
As above but for no follow links.
The number of referring domains into the domain ('Car Insurance' and 'Mens
Clothing') and the URL ('Mortgage Calculator').
Mentions How many mentions of the brand there have been in the last four weeks
(as taken from Moz Fresh Web Explorer and using exact match brand term only).
Ratio of follow to no follow links Designed to see if there is a correlation
with this and position.
Ratio of links to mentions A look at the relationship between how many links a
site has and how many mentions in the previous four weeks.
Let's now look at each table in a little more detail but with the understanding
that there are a myriad of other factors that affect the result. After each
piece of analysis I have added general comments:
"Car insurance"
Despite having considerably fewerlinks overall across the domain, Go Compare is
first. Does this suggest they have hit a sweet spot in terms of links versus
mentions and brand metrics?
Money Supermarket proves that more links doesn't win. The site has many, many
more than anyone else in the top five and yet is not first. Link volume
clearlymatters, but it is absolutely not the only factor at play.
Do Compare the Market and Confused "win" and feature in the top five on the
strength of their mention data? A higher ratio than the top three but MUCH lower
link numbers suggests that might be the case.
LV.com is the anomaly as its mention to link ratio is low. This suggests that
sheer numbers of links are potentiallyhelping it rank well as well ason-page
factors that make the brand super-relevant for car insurance.
"Mens clothing"
ASOS and House of Fraser walk away with it here, and interestingly both of these
sites have very similar ratios for both follow and no-follow linksAND forlinks
and mentions.
Next is an anomaly but only because measuring true mentions is very hard due to
the brand having a "generic" word as its "brand." Could this cause issues for
Google going forward in measuring similar brands?
Again,Burton (in particular) and Topman to a degree showthat you can earn your
place with high link-to-mention ratios.
Topman should rank higher. Is it because of link quality? Certainly the ratio
of follow to nofollow is lower than those above them.
"Mortgage calculator"
This batch looks just at the URL ranking for the term, not the whole domain, to
allow us to see both sides of the story.
The BBC clearly runs away with it in every sense and by these figures would be
almost impossible to usurp.
The data is less correlated here; suggesting that domain-wide factors are
definitely at play in factoring which URL should rank where.
NatWest is a really interesting result as it has very few links relative to
those around it. The ratio of no-follow-to-follow is very high, and the brand
gets a lot of mentions. The site is also very relevant for "mortgages" as a
percentage of overall content.
As a further piece of analysis we have also included a "random" site from page
two to support the concept that a combination/ratio of links to mentions affects
rankings.
That site is woolwich.co.uk, a small UK building society (bank). Its own
mortgage calculator page was ranking 16thwhen we ran the analysis, and
interestingly, we can see that its ratio of follow-to-nofollow is low, as is the
number of mentions of the brand in the past four weeks. On pure followed link
numbers the site should rank top five, but instead it languishes on page two.
Is there a perfect ratio?
It's clear that the small sample above is no true reflection of how the ratio
of linkstomentions affects rankings, but it has certainly raised some
interesting points for further discussion and testing.
What certainly can be said is that the measurement of brand mentions is
certainly possible, and Google certainly nowhas the patent to cover it off as a
potential ranking factor.
Mentions alone do not tell the whole story, of course, and links are still very
important in the overall mix of factors that affect rankings, but it is now time
to start thinking about how you can create brand buzz and grow those mentions.
The possible good news for the smaller guys, though, is that it does seem that
Panda is beginning to look at how much of a site is relevant to any one specific
term and giving over extra "authority" to that site in that niche.
A great example arethe building societies in the UK that rely on mortgages to
make up the majority of their business. As a result they do seem to rank better
for mortgage-related terms.
This could really help specialist businesses compete again with the "big guys."
What can you do?
The key point here is how you can utilize this data to improve your own
strategy, and while there is no conclusive proof that mentions and nofollow
links matter, the evidence is starting topile up.
Given what Mr. Cutts said in the video we mention earlier in the post, the
patent for Panda and increasing amounts of data highlighting similar findings,
the argument is certainly there.
My advice would be to begin thinking outside of follow links. Be happy to earn
(and build) nofollowed links and mentions. Think outside the link, because there
IS value in driving mentions and building brand.
How do you do that? The simple answer is to get creative with your
communications strategy and build content that will make people talk about you
and share. At the heart of that is a great ideation process, and I have
previously shared Zazzle Media's own way of creating great ideas consistently
here.
Think particularly around creating content that plays on core emotions and also
give things away. In a detailed report first shared in 2010, titled "
Social Transmission, Emotion, and the Virality of Online Content," the authors
discovered there is a strong relationship between emotion and how likely it is
your content will "go viral."
Amongst the many eye-opening discoveries the publication discusses:
Negative content tends to be less viral than positive content
Awe-inspiring content and content that surprises or is humorous is more likely
to be shared
Content that causes sadness can become viral but is generally less likely to
Content that evokes anger is morelikely to be shared
And finally, make sure you start tracking and reporting mentions and nofollowed
links. Knowing how you are performing can help you iterate your PR and content
strategies to achieve greater traction.
In short, compelling content, created over the long term WILL now win, as it is
being rewarded.
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Wednesday 30 April 2014
[Build Backlinks Online] TITLE
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'Brand Mentions Are the New Links?' 
You may view the latest post at http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/WordStreamBlog/~3/9Cp2Rgy_mrU/brand-mentions-are-the-new-links You received this e-mail because you asked to be notified when new updates are posted. Best regards, Build Backlinks Online peter.clarke@designed-for-success.com
Over at Moz, Simon Penson just wrote an interesting post about a "Panda Patent" which may shed light on how Google will rank sites in the future, "using a ratio of links and mentions, or 'implied links.'" With penalties flying and the value of the almighty link coming into question, could Google be looking for new signals of authority? We think so, but are brand mentions the answer?
The relevant part of the patent is this:
The system determines a count of independent links for the group (step 302). A link for a group of resources is an incoming link to a resource in the group, i.e., a link having a resource in the group as its target. Links for the group can include express links, implied links, or both. An express link, e.g., a hyperlink, is a link that is included in a source resource that a user can follow to navigate to a target resource. An implied link is a reference to a target resource, e.g., a citation to the target resource, which is included in a source resource but is not an express link to the target resource. Thus, a resource in the group can be the target of an implied link without a user being able to navigate to the resource by following the implied link.
"Express links" versus "implied links"? Am I the only one who thinks this is a very strange kind of back-pedaling? I've got a couple of questions for Google:
Why didn't they focus on mentions in the first place?
The fact that Google is calling brand mentions or citations "implied links" shows how wedded they are to the idea that links are everything. No, a mention isn't an "implied link," it's a mention – people mention stuff and link to stuff for different (though sometimes overlapping) reasons.
Generally, you link because you believe the reader will get some benefit from visiting the page in question – because it contains further information or value that isn't contained on your own site. You might mention a person/site/brand for any number of other reasons – possibly to give them credit for something, or just because you like them, or perhaps because you hate them.
Even if they're talking shit, at least they're talking about you.
I can see the ratio of links to brand mentions being a useful signal – for example if a site has tons of links but very few mentions, that might by a sign of a spammy site. The funny thing is, you don't need fancy technology to measure brand mentions. This is pretty easy stuff*. So why has Google always emphasized the value of links over mentions? They just figured out that brand mentions are a sign of popularity? I know patents take a while to process, but this seems like it should have been built in from the get-go. What gives?
*Actually, it's only easy if your brand name is unique. For example, I'm the only Elisa Gabbert in the world, as far as I know, but there's more than one Larry Kim. This is the advantage that links have over mentions; domains are unique, while names and brands are not. I'm not sure if Google's usual handling of synonyms in search is enough to overcome the synonym problem in brand monitoring.
Aren't mentions at least as gameable as links?
It seems even easier to game a system based on mentions rather than links. Mention-building could be as scalable as link-building:
- You can buy brand mentions
- You can get brand mentions through guest posting (and you don't have to worry about over- or under-optimized anchor text)
- You can score a bunch of brand mentions through "linkbait" like infographics (mention-bait!)
So … what's the difference here? Wouldn't the "mention graph" eventually be as corrupt as the link graph? If Google has trouble distinguishing natural versus unnatural links, how will they distinguish between natural and unnatural brand mentions? (BRB, adding Brand Mention Optimization to my LinkedIn profile.)
Since big brands already have a lot of citations and smaller sites may have focused on links rather than a broader strategy of content quality and PR, they'll have catching up to do, so this could buy Google some time. I don't see it as a definitive spam-killer over the long run.
Google Still Needs a Better Satisfaction Index
A mention-to-link ratio might be a good patch for the holes in the link graph, but I think Google will eventually need to move to a very different system for judging site authority and popularity (not, as Matt Cutts notes, exactly the same thing). This system might be something more like the Quality Score system it uses for ad ranking, where user engagement trumps all.
Still, in the near term, this is an interesting development in the ongoing saga of the link. The question is, what took Google so long?
This post originated on the WordStream Blog. WordStream provides keyword tools for pay-per click (PPC) and search engine optimization (SEO) aiding in everything from keyword discovery to keyword grouping and organization.
Tuesday 29 April 2014
[Build Backlinks Online] Free Local SEO Education for Businesses on a Shoestring Budget
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'Free Local SEO Education for
Businesses on a Shoestring Budget'
Posted by MiriamEllis
I've written this post for two of my favorite groups of people: local SEOs and
local business owners.
Local SEOs: We've had this conversation again and again in the community over
the years. On a regular basis, you receive calls...
You may view the latest post at
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/seomoz/~3/HqLnw1cVmmI/free-local-seo-education-for-businesses-on-a-shoestring-budget
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Build Backlinks Online
peter.clarke@designed-for-success.com
Businesses on a Shoestring Budget'
Posted by MiriamEllis
I've written this post for two of my favorite groups of people: local SEOs and
local business owners.
Local SEOs: We've had this conversation again and again in the community over
the years. On a regular basis, you receive calls...
You may view the latest post at
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/seomoz/~3/HqLnw1cVmmI/free-local-seo-education-for-businesses-on-a-shoestring-budget
You received this e-mail because you asked to be notified when new updates are
posted.
Best regards,
Build Backlinks Online
peter.clarke@designed-for-success.com
[Build Backlinks Online] TITLE
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'The 10 Best PPC Tips from My Inbound.org AMA (Ask Me Anything)' 
You may view the latest post at http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/WordStreamBlog/~3/wrXm2maxtjE/best-ppc-tips You received this e-mail because you asked to be notified when new updates are posted. Best regards, Build Backlinks Online peter.clarke@designed-for-success.com
I recently had the opportunity to be the subject of an AMA (Ask Me Anything) at Inbound.org and was blown away by the response. Not only were there a ton of questions, but they were really, really good!
These questions led to a lot of great discussion and advice on PPC and AdWords, in particular. But in case you don't want to dig through the whole thing, here are my top 10 best PPC tips from the Q&A.
1. What's the greatest, but most underused, opportunity in AdWords?
Q. Kyle Petzinger asked, "What would you say is the single largest, mostly unused opportunity that AdWords advertisers can take advantage of? I realize this is pretty open-ended, but feel free to just spit out the first 'OMG DO THIS. WHY IS NO ONE DOING THIS' thought that comes to mind. Thanks a ton in advance! Love your work!"
A. Remarketing. Lot of companies are slow to adopt it. Possibly because the Google Content Network used to be a joke and got burned. But it's gotten a lot better and we're using it like crazy. I can't think of a reason why content marketers shouldn't be investing in remarketing. Also check out my top 10 AdWords features of 2013.
2. What are your best PPC tips for a brand new paid search advertiser?
Q. Dejeesh Dev asked, "What is your advice for a newbie paid advertiser?"
A. The types of businesses that do great on paid search are those where people know what they're looking for but not where to get it. Hard-to-find specialty items (e.g. industrial-sized air conditioners, etc.) or services with decent margins or the possibility of repeat business (dentists, for example) are the best.
Most of the PPC accounts out there are run by lazy account managers. A small amount of work every week (tweaking your keywords, bids, landing pages, ad copy, etc.) would put you ahead of 99% of them.
3. What is the best defense against click fraud and wasted spend?
Q. Kevin Scarselli asked, "What's the best defense against click fraud and wasting ad spend on competitor clicks? I manage legal PPC campaigns, mostly for mass torts that can have CPC's upwards of $100. And I truly believe a large portion of ad spend goes to unrecognized invalid clicks -- mostly other lawyers/legal marketers checking out other landing pages, but more than average click fraud too from competition as well. We could lose thousands a day in just unrecognized invalid clicks... any tips on how to combat this?"
A. Google lets you block 50 IP addresses, so if you have a few IP addresses that appear to be doing bad stuff, you can block those from seeing your ad. Another idea would be to use remarketing lists for search advertising (RLSA). For example, I could decide to show search ads only to people who visited my blog in the last week. This would cut down on a lot of the fraudulent clicks since people who click would have had to have visited my blog in the last week.
4. How much impact do PLAs have on e-commerce campaigns?
Q. Vinny LaBarbera asked, "How significant of an impact (on average) have you seen PLAs make on e-commerce campaigns?"
A. PLAs are HUGE. Consumers are now seeing +80% of the above-the-fold SERP space dominated by ads for commercial searches.
What you might not know is that the fancy Product Listing Ads you see are commercial intent-sucking monsters and are stealing all the conversions from both the organic and non-PLA search results. PLAs are especially compelling with their images, descriptions and pricing info. Organic clicks still win when you're talking about all queries in general, but for those high intent, commercial keywords, ads are getting over 64% of clicks. People are actively looking for rich, detailed information in search when they're ready to buy and PLAs are the ticket for getting in front of them. [Note that Product Listing Ads are eventually being switched over to Shopping Campaigns.]
5. What do you say to all of us churning out "safe" ad copy?
Q. This question came from Ginny Marvin at Search Engine Land: "You're known for your position that QS matters, and you've also presented on writing 'Unicorn' out of the box ad copy to get better click-through rates. Ad headlines and copy are nearly identical on the SERPs because people are nervous QS will suffer if the keyword isn't in there at least once, twice, three times. What do you say to all of us churning out 'safe' ad copy?"
A. In AdWords, it's incredibly difficult to see the forest for the trees. You know that your CTR is 2%, or your conversion rate 5%, but what you dont see how great it could be, since Google doesn't tell you how other accounts are doing. It's really hard to get a sense of where you stand competitively. I'm in a unique position in that I've looked at over $10 billion in AdWords spend across over 100k accounts, and what I found is that there is a big difference between the top 10%, or 5%, or 1% of accounts vs. the average or below-average accounts. There is a huge advantage in being remarkable and Quality Score is a big piece of that puzzle.
Your CPCs can be 600% less than another advertiser bidding on the exact same keyword. Your CPAs can be 80% less than another advertiser doing something very similar to you. The only way to see this is to step outside your comfort zone and try out insanely great ads and insanely great landing pages/offers. Safe ad copy generally tends to only generate average or slightly above average results.
We've looked into the habits of the average AdWords advertiser before and let me tell you, the bar is pretty low. If you want to reach that top 10% or even top 1%, it's completely possible with a solid understanding of Quality Score optimization, better offers/ad creative and smart account management.
6. What are the best PPC resources out there?
Q. Marco Nobili asked, "What are the best resources about PPC/AdWords to know as much as you know (except experience)?"
A. I'd say if you don't know PPC/AdWords yourself, the people who are working in it daily and sharing their PPC tips and expertise are your best bet! WordStream Blog, PPC University, and PPC Hero are great resources. Also, try asking questions using the hashtag #PPCchat on Twitter. Lot of smart SEMs hang out there.
7. How is Google coping with the shift to mobile?
Q. Moz's Dr. Pete asked, "How do you think Google is going to cope, from an ad revenue and format perspective, to our shift to mobile? 'Enhanced' campaigns made it clear they see this shift as a real threat, and they're designing more and more with a mobile-first philosophy. Do you think their $60B advertising juggernaut is in real danger?"
A. Google has placed many bets on mobile and I think they'll do great. We're actually finding that calls from mobile devices are worth 3x more than clicks to a website (since the intent is stronger on mobile, people are looking to buy something right at that moment). Most businesses haven't figured this out yet since it's hard to measure, but when they do, I think mobile CPCs could go up! [Google's recent announcements around app marketing and better mobile measurement just reinforce this.]
8. What are the biggest mistakes PPC agencies make in early days?
Q. Michael Erikson asked, "What are some of the biggest mistakes PPC agencies make in the first 3 years?"
A. The biggest is failure to understand churn and the impact of client churn on their financials. The second biggest mistake is closely related – the failure to adopt strategies and tactics to reduce client churn.
9. Should you outsource or handle PPC in-house?
Q. Alexander McGregor asked, "Would you advise a small business (under 200 employees) to run their own PPC programs or would you advise them to outsource?"
A. Depends on your budget. Obviously it doesn't make sense to hire a dedicated in-house person to manage a $2k / month budget and it would be very difficult to find an agency willing to take on such a small account. Conversely if you were spending millions on paid search per month, I'd think that you'd want to bring that in-house. I don't think the number of people in a company really matters in terms of making this decision.
10. What skills translate over well from the PPC world to social ads?
Q. Inbound.org's Dharmesh Shah asked, "We're seeing increasing interest in the social ads space (primarily Facebook and Twitter). What skills do you think translate over well from the PPC world?"
A. In general (and sorry for generalizing here; I'm not saying this is always the case), PPCs are super data-oriented and obsessed with key metrics like cost per conversion and return on ad spend. I think that's a super-valuable skill that is much needed in the social ads space.
Want More PPC Tips? Ask Me More Stuff!
If you missed the AMA, drop your big PPC question in the comments and I'll do my best to answer them here or in a future post!
This post originated on the WordStream Blog. WordStream provides keyword tools for pay-per click (PPC) and search engine optimization (SEO) aiding in everything from keyword discovery to keyword grouping and organization.
Monday 28 April 2014
[Build Backlinks Online] How to Save Time on Competitor Social Media Reports
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'How to Save Time on Competitor
Social Media Reports'
A foundation of our work is benchmarking our clients social media efforts
against their competitors. RivalIQ is our new go-to software for this kind of
reporting. It's a HUGE time-saver. I like the company so much, I invested in it.
Here's why...
You may view the latest post at
http://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-media-measurement/how-to-save-time-on-competitor-social-media-reports/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=how-to-save-time-on-competitor-social-media-reports
You received this e-mail because you asked to be notified when new updates are
posted.
Best regards,
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Social Media Reports'
A foundation of our work is benchmarking our clients social media efforts
against their competitors. RivalIQ is our new go-to software for this kind of
reporting. It's a HUGE time-saver. I like the company so much, I invested in it.
Here's why...
You may view the latest post at
http://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-media-measurement/how-to-save-time-on-competitor-social-media-reports/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=how-to-save-time-on-competitor-social-media-reports
You received this e-mail because you asked to be notified when new updates are
posted.
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Build Backlinks Online
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[Build Backlinks Online] The Advertiser's Guide To Surviving Reddit
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'The Advertiser's Guide To
Surviving Reddit'
Posted by anthonycoraggio
If you've so far neglected the advertising and marketing opportunities on
Reddit, you're not alone.Historically, the relationship between Redditors and
those who market to them has been contentiousReddit is a cohesive community in a
way that social platforms like Facebook or Twitter are not, and Redditors will
fight to protect its integrity from spammers and lazy attempts at commercial
gain. Done well, however, advertising on Reddit represents a tremendous
opportunity. The site is one of the fundamental drivers of internet culture, and
boasts roughly115 million monthly unique visitors, low ad costs, and high
potential for engagement and virality. Even better, Reddit is finallygetting
serious about monetizing the business and attaining profitability, rolling out
new features for advertisers and even offeringfree campaigns for international
advertisers to get started. Reddit can be a tough nut to crack, but handled
correctly it can become your secret weaponand I'm here to show you how.
There are three main things you need to know to successfully brave the brash,
quick-witted, and anonymous crowds of Reddit as a paid advertiser.The raw
materials: What kind of inventory is there to work with? The culture: What makes
Reddit tick? How to execute: Bringing it all together without ticking Reddit
off.
Alright, pencils ready? Let's get rolling!First things first: Advertising
options on Reddit
Before I delve into working with and advertising to the Reddit community, let's
get familiar with the tools at your disposal. Reddit offers a number of options
you can mix and match as appropriate in the lifecycle of a campaign or larger
marketing strategy here's a quick rundown of what they are and where they fit
into the Reddit ecosystem.Self-serve advertising: sponsored links
Reddit's self-serve advertising is the best place to start for the novice
Reddit advertiser. Cheap, easy, and surprisingly flexible, they are the
"promoted post" of the Reddit world.
A sponsored link, as seen live on Reddit
As you would in typical Reddit use, you have the option of submitting either an
external link or an internal link to a text post, which users may then
upvote/downvote or comment on. Your money buys you the top-of-page spot for your
link in the feed of either Reddit's front page or a topic-specific subreddit of
your choice.Cost
Reddit is currently offering a flat $0.75 CPM for self-serve advertisingyou'll
get the same price regardless of the choices you make in targeting or content.
There is a minimum buy of $5 for any individual sponsored link (which you'll
also have to pay for individually). This isn't a big hurdle budget-wise, but can
be problematic when there isn't $5 worth of impressions left to buy in your
chosen timeframe. Smaller, niche subreddits are particularly vulnerable to this
issue, and it's not yet possible to make multiple-subreddit buys through the
interface. Plan early and don't wait until the last minute to make your buys, or
you might get shut out entirely!
Inventory is limited; act fast!Content
You'll be given space for a title and either an external URL or a text post.
There are no hard limits here in character length like you'll find on AdWords,
Bing, or Twitter, but don't get caught up writing a novel. Your title should be
punchy and engaging to draw interest, and if you use a text post be clear and
concise in communicating your message and actions for the reader. You'll also
note that you have an option to allow or disallow user comments. I strongly
recommend you allow them to get the most bang for your buckI'll circle back to
that here in a minute.Performance data
Reddit's traffic data isn't the prettiest, but you'll get a solid picture of
spend, impressions, and clicks down to the hour. In general, you can expect
clickthrough rates similar to most display advertising (0.10-0.20%), but
exceptionally well done campaigns can reach far higher. Remember, you'll need to
manually tag your links before you submit your ad so you can track your campaign
performance properly in analytics!Restrictions
One more caveatyou can't launch your ads near-instantaneously as you might on a
platform like Facebook or Twitter. It can takeup to 2 days for your ads to be
reviewed and set live, and the interface will typically not allow you to choose
same or even next day start dates.Display ads
Display advertising on Reddit runs on the AdZerk engine, and is much closer to
what you might find on a standard network, with a couple of twists. Users can
upvote and downvote banner ads (the latter will block the ad for that user in
the future), and while banner ads don't quite fit into the normal discussion
thread flow, each is linked to a unique comment thread on asubreddit designated
for discussion of banner ads on the site.
Reddit sidebar banner, with downvoting options selected
To buy these ads you'll need to get in touch with Reddit's ads team directlyyou
can choose from homepage or subreddit roadblocks, individual banners, or the
design and creation of cobranded ad units with the Reddit team.Sponsored Q&As
Sponsored Q&A's are similar to Reddit's popular "Ask Me Anything" threads, but
are set up directly with Reddit and targeted for promotion across select
subreddits. These can run over the course of a few hours or a few days, with
specified times set for your Q&A experts to interact with the Reddit community.
You can check out an examplehere, a Q&A with the physicists behind the Higgs
Boson discover for Particle Fever.
Right then! Now that we know what we have to work with, let's learn how to be
good citizens of Reddit.Reddiquette for advertisers
I am writing this article both as a Redditor and a professional in advertising
- I believe good advertising should bring value to the audience as well as the
advertiser, and nowhere is that principle better enforced than on
Reddit.Reddiquette is Reddit's informal code of conducta codification of the
values that have grown organically within the community. Taken as a whole, it
creates an environment that demands five key things of marketers who want to
participate in this community. Defy these at your own peril!1. Bring something
of value to the table
This is possibly the most important and fundamental law of advertising on
Reddit. If you're not contributing, you're wasting your time. The essence of
being successful in Reddit advertising is the same principle common to social
media and content marketing in general: Contribute value to the community. As an
advertiser you've already been marked "sponsored"a potential invader to be
scrutinizedand have to meet a high bar to prove you're not a faceless corporate
con man come to poison the well or game the system. This doesn't necessarily
mean you can't sell a product;you just have to deliver it the right way, to the
people who are going to smile when they see what it can do. For example:
The above image is an ad run on
/r/showerthoughts, "asubreddit for you to share all those thoughts, ideas, or
philosophical questions that race through your head when in the shower." Note
the 323 upvotes, and the subsequent comments:
2. Be transparent
Don't try to game the system or trick users into clicking to your
over-optimized conversion page. Redditors live the internet, are thus experts at
spotting cheap online marketing tactic, and you will get mauled if you
contaminate their precious community with scams or clickbait. Instead, be
honest, straightforward, and prepared to communicate. Who are you? Why are you
here? If you are questioned in the comments, respond as a real person. This
alone won't guarantee you success, but it will earn you sorely needed respect.3.
Have a sense of humor
Redditors are for the most part here for entertainment, socializing,
discovering new things, and generally just to waste time. If you get in the way
of that or take yourself too seriously, they will take corrective action and
you'll likely wind up skewered in the comments.Take Woody Harrelson'scalamitous
attempt to hawk the movie Rampart in an "Ask Me Anything" (AMA, in Reddit lingo)
thread as a cautionary tale.4. Speak the language
Know your subreddit's cultureany specific rules, language used, common posts,
themes, or memes. If you haven't spent at least a half hour on that subreddit
reading comments and following links, you're not ready to run an ad there.5.
Roll with the punches
Get comfortable with anonymity and brutal honesty. If you screw up, Redditors
will let you know about it. Sure, you could disable comments, but this is merely
avoidance, and tosses out the baby with the bathwater. Think of this as the most
honest focus group in the worldif Redditors think it, they'll probably post it.
Respond (again, with good humor), validate any concerns, and use the feedback to
juice up your next run.
These rules can be a little tough to process if you're not a Redditor yourself,
so before we move on I'm about to give you the best assignment of your working
life. Just use reddit. Find fun topics. Comment, post, and find part of the
community that speaks to you. Native advertising works a lot better if you're a
native yourself!Bringing it all togetherPick your audience and stay with them
Of course, to run an engaging promotion on Reddit, you need to start by talking
to the right people and hold up your end of the conversation. You might be
surprised at the breadth and depth of audience you can find on Reddityes, you
will find a lot of geeky males aged 18-29, but the user base and the interests
represented on the site go far beyond that stereotype. You can find subreddits
dedicated to everything from ethnomusicology to baking. Take the time to do your
research and find the parts of the community that will really care about what
you have to say.
Once you find the right spot for your promotion, don't simply fire and forget
or use the same subreddits every time. Check back every time you launch a new
campaign and stay up to date on the doings of your target subredditsmoderation
controversies can lead to the breakout, similar subreddits with different
standards of conduct that may be better or worse for your purposes as a
marketer.
For example, a banner ad for the film
Under The Skin featuring an underwearclad Scarlett Johansson was recently
placed on the /r/gentlemanboners subreddit, which I expect the advertiser (not
unreasonably) assumed would appreciate the ad. No dicethe subreddit is strictly
PG-13 and doesn't permit images without full clothing. The community and
moderators responded harshly, and the ad was actuallytaken down.Use Reddit as
Reddit, not just another line ofadinventory
You can run basic, conversion focused ads pushed to a PPC style landing page,
like the Audible and Aquanotes examples above. But don't think of Reddit as just
a set of ad inventory. Rather, consider it as a social ecosystem, enhanced with
the power of paid promotions tools. You can still ultimately point users to a
conversion, but don't waste the opportunity to do more. Ask questions, share
opinions, and start a conversation. You can also offer incentives unique to
Redditors to make your message that much more specialthis recent ad by Vodo
created in partnership with Redditis an excellent example:
There's alsoa lot of value to be had in launching your content marketing into
the Reddit universe to be shared, talked about, and built upon. It can be
challenging to get off the ground at times, but that's where the paid
advertising comes inpoint a few thousand users at your piece, hit critical mass,
and the ball rolls from there.
You can also find success by intertwining organic and paid activity,for
example,using a sponsored Q&A or paid promotions to redirect people to visit
anAMA so others can tweet it, share it on social media, and multiply your
impact.Degree antiperspirant's clever use of anAMA withBear Grylls is a classic
example, sending Twitter traffic to the thread and creating storm of reciprocal
visits and coverageacross various channels.
In a more recent example,Ethan Hawke's AMA gathered 9.6 million unique viewers
in 24 hours and generated press coverage that brought in 15 million more. Not a
bad bit of marketing!Parting words
Social media outlets like Reddit havedone nothing more than they have scaled
word of mouth marketing - to succeed in Reddit advertising, you need to
understand the community and participate in it honestly.Don't abuse the
privilege of running ads here by spamming users with a hard or gimmicky
sellyou'll burn away any trust and goodwill might have quickly.To paraphrase
Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, honest conversations from honest people about
quality, relevant products and services are what shape opinions and produce
results on Reddit. Go forth and be good!
Have a question or experience advertising on Reddit? Share it in the
comments!Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the
top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz
team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt
down but want to read!
You may view the latest post at
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/seomoz/~3/oocxOKmBdN4/the-advertisers-guide-to-surviving-reddit
You received this e-mail because you asked to be notified when new updates are
posted.
Best regards,
Build Backlinks Online
peter.clarke@designed-for-success.com
Surviving Reddit'
Posted by anthonycoraggio
If you've so far neglected the advertising and marketing opportunities on
Reddit, you're not alone.Historically, the relationship between Redditors and
those who market to them has been contentiousReddit is a cohesive community in a
way that social platforms like Facebook or Twitter are not, and Redditors will
fight to protect its integrity from spammers and lazy attempts at commercial
gain. Done well, however, advertising on Reddit represents a tremendous
opportunity. The site is one of the fundamental drivers of internet culture, and
boasts roughly115 million monthly unique visitors, low ad costs, and high
potential for engagement and virality. Even better, Reddit is finallygetting
serious about monetizing the business and attaining profitability, rolling out
new features for advertisers and even offeringfree campaigns for international
advertisers to get started. Reddit can be a tough nut to crack, but handled
correctly it can become your secret weaponand I'm here to show you how.
There are three main things you need to know to successfully brave the brash,
quick-witted, and anonymous crowds of Reddit as a paid advertiser.The raw
materials: What kind of inventory is there to work with? The culture: What makes
Reddit tick? How to execute: Bringing it all together without ticking Reddit
off.
Alright, pencils ready? Let's get rolling!First things first: Advertising
options on Reddit
Before I delve into working with and advertising to the Reddit community, let's
get familiar with the tools at your disposal. Reddit offers a number of options
you can mix and match as appropriate in the lifecycle of a campaign or larger
marketing strategy here's a quick rundown of what they are and where they fit
into the Reddit ecosystem.Self-serve advertising: sponsored links
Reddit's self-serve advertising is the best place to start for the novice
Reddit advertiser. Cheap, easy, and surprisingly flexible, they are the
"promoted post" of the Reddit world.
A sponsored link, as seen live on Reddit
As you would in typical Reddit use, you have the option of submitting either an
external link or an internal link to a text post, which users may then
upvote/downvote or comment on. Your money buys you the top-of-page spot for your
link in the feed of either Reddit's front page or a topic-specific subreddit of
your choice.Cost
Reddit is currently offering a flat $0.75 CPM for self-serve advertisingyou'll
get the same price regardless of the choices you make in targeting or content.
There is a minimum buy of $5 for any individual sponsored link (which you'll
also have to pay for individually). This isn't a big hurdle budget-wise, but can
be problematic when there isn't $5 worth of impressions left to buy in your
chosen timeframe. Smaller, niche subreddits are particularly vulnerable to this
issue, and it's not yet possible to make multiple-subreddit buys through the
interface. Plan early and don't wait until the last minute to make your buys, or
you might get shut out entirely!
Inventory is limited; act fast!Content
You'll be given space for a title and either an external URL or a text post.
There are no hard limits here in character length like you'll find on AdWords,
Bing, or Twitter, but don't get caught up writing a novel. Your title should be
punchy and engaging to draw interest, and if you use a text post be clear and
concise in communicating your message and actions for the reader. You'll also
note that you have an option to allow or disallow user comments. I strongly
recommend you allow them to get the most bang for your buckI'll circle back to
that here in a minute.Performance data
Reddit's traffic data isn't the prettiest, but you'll get a solid picture of
spend, impressions, and clicks down to the hour. In general, you can expect
clickthrough rates similar to most display advertising (0.10-0.20%), but
exceptionally well done campaigns can reach far higher. Remember, you'll need to
manually tag your links before you submit your ad so you can track your campaign
performance properly in analytics!Restrictions
One more caveatyou can't launch your ads near-instantaneously as you might on a
platform like Facebook or Twitter. It can takeup to 2 days for your ads to be
reviewed and set live, and the interface will typically not allow you to choose
same or even next day start dates.Display ads
Display advertising on Reddit runs on the AdZerk engine, and is much closer to
what you might find on a standard network, with a couple of twists. Users can
upvote and downvote banner ads (the latter will block the ad for that user in
the future), and while banner ads don't quite fit into the normal discussion
thread flow, each is linked to a unique comment thread on asubreddit designated
for discussion of banner ads on the site.
Reddit sidebar banner, with downvoting options selected
To buy these ads you'll need to get in touch with Reddit's ads team directlyyou
can choose from homepage or subreddit roadblocks, individual banners, or the
design and creation of cobranded ad units with the Reddit team.Sponsored Q&As
Sponsored Q&A's are similar to Reddit's popular "Ask Me Anything" threads, but
are set up directly with Reddit and targeted for promotion across select
subreddits. These can run over the course of a few hours or a few days, with
specified times set for your Q&A experts to interact with the Reddit community.
You can check out an examplehere, a Q&A with the physicists behind the Higgs
Boson discover for Particle Fever.
Right then! Now that we know what we have to work with, let's learn how to be
good citizens of Reddit.Reddiquette for advertisers
I am writing this article both as a Redditor and a professional in advertising
- I believe good advertising should bring value to the audience as well as the
advertiser, and nowhere is that principle better enforced than on
Reddit.Reddiquette is Reddit's informal code of conducta codification of the
values that have grown organically within the community. Taken as a whole, it
creates an environment that demands five key things of marketers who want to
participate in this community. Defy these at your own peril!1. Bring something
of value to the table
This is possibly the most important and fundamental law of advertising on
Reddit. If you're not contributing, you're wasting your time. The essence of
being successful in Reddit advertising is the same principle common to social
media and content marketing in general: Contribute value to the community. As an
advertiser you've already been marked "sponsored"a potential invader to be
scrutinizedand have to meet a high bar to prove you're not a faceless corporate
con man come to poison the well or game the system. This doesn't necessarily
mean you can't sell a product;you just have to deliver it the right way, to the
people who are going to smile when they see what it can do. For example:
The above image is an ad run on
/r/showerthoughts, "asubreddit for you to share all those thoughts, ideas, or
philosophical questions that race through your head when in the shower." Note
the 323 upvotes, and the subsequent comments:
2. Be transparent
Don't try to game the system or trick users into clicking to your
over-optimized conversion page. Redditors live the internet, are thus experts at
spotting cheap online marketing tactic, and you will get mauled if you
contaminate their precious community with scams or clickbait. Instead, be
honest, straightforward, and prepared to communicate. Who are you? Why are you
here? If you are questioned in the comments, respond as a real person. This
alone won't guarantee you success, but it will earn you sorely needed respect.3.
Have a sense of humor
Redditors are for the most part here for entertainment, socializing,
discovering new things, and generally just to waste time. If you get in the way
of that or take yourself too seriously, they will take corrective action and
you'll likely wind up skewered in the comments.Take Woody Harrelson'scalamitous
attempt to hawk the movie Rampart in an "Ask Me Anything" (AMA, in Reddit lingo)
thread as a cautionary tale.4. Speak the language
Know your subreddit's cultureany specific rules, language used, common posts,
themes, or memes. If you haven't spent at least a half hour on that subreddit
reading comments and following links, you're not ready to run an ad there.5.
Roll with the punches
Get comfortable with anonymity and brutal honesty. If you screw up, Redditors
will let you know about it. Sure, you could disable comments, but this is merely
avoidance, and tosses out the baby with the bathwater. Think of this as the most
honest focus group in the worldif Redditors think it, they'll probably post it.
Respond (again, with good humor), validate any concerns, and use the feedback to
juice up your next run.
These rules can be a little tough to process if you're not a Redditor yourself,
so before we move on I'm about to give you the best assignment of your working
life. Just use reddit. Find fun topics. Comment, post, and find part of the
community that speaks to you. Native advertising works a lot better if you're a
native yourself!Bringing it all togetherPick your audience and stay with them
Of course, to run an engaging promotion on Reddit, you need to start by talking
to the right people and hold up your end of the conversation. You might be
surprised at the breadth and depth of audience you can find on Reddityes, you
will find a lot of geeky males aged 18-29, but the user base and the interests
represented on the site go far beyond that stereotype. You can find subreddits
dedicated to everything from ethnomusicology to baking. Take the time to do your
research and find the parts of the community that will really care about what
you have to say.
Once you find the right spot for your promotion, don't simply fire and forget
or use the same subreddits every time. Check back every time you launch a new
campaign and stay up to date on the doings of your target subredditsmoderation
controversies can lead to the breakout, similar subreddits with different
standards of conduct that may be better or worse for your purposes as a
marketer.
For example, a banner ad for the film
Under The Skin featuring an underwearclad Scarlett Johansson was recently
placed on the /r/gentlemanboners subreddit, which I expect the advertiser (not
unreasonably) assumed would appreciate the ad. No dicethe subreddit is strictly
PG-13 and doesn't permit images without full clothing. The community and
moderators responded harshly, and the ad was actuallytaken down.Use Reddit as
Reddit, not just another line ofadinventory
You can run basic, conversion focused ads pushed to a PPC style landing page,
like the Audible and Aquanotes examples above. But don't think of Reddit as just
a set of ad inventory. Rather, consider it as a social ecosystem, enhanced with
the power of paid promotions tools. You can still ultimately point users to a
conversion, but don't waste the opportunity to do more. Ask questions, share
opinions, and start a conversation. You can also offer incentives unique to
Redditors to make your message that much more specialthis recent ad by Vodo
created in partnership with Redditis an excellent example:
There's alsoa lot of value to be had in launching your content marketing into
the Reddit universe to be shared, talked about, and built upon. It can be
challenging to get off the ground at times, but that's where the paid
advertising comes inpoint a few thousand users at your piece, hit critical mass,
and the ball rolls from there.
You can also find success by intertwining organic and paid activity,for
example,using a sponsored Q&A or paid promotions to redirect people to visit
anAMA so others can tweet it, share it on social media, and multiply your
impact.Degree antiperspirant's clever use of anAMA withBear Grylls is a classic
example, sending Twitter traffic to the thread and creating storm of reciprocal
visits and coverageacross various channels.
In a more recent example,Ethan Hawke's AMA gathered 9.6 million unique viewers
in 24 hours and generated press coverage that brought in 15 million more. Not a
bad bit of marketing!Parting words
Social media outlets like Reddit havedone nothing more than they have scaled
word of mouth marketing - to succeed in Reddit advertising, you need to
understand the community and participate in it honestly.Don't abuse the
privilege of running ads here by spamming users with a hard or gimmicky
sellyou'll burn away any trust and goodwill might have quickly.To paraphrase
Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, honest conversations from honest people about
quality, relevant products and services are what shape opinions and produce
results on Reddit. Go forth and be good!
Have a question or experience advertising on Reddit? Share it in the
comments!Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the
top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz
team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt
down but want to read!
You may view the latest post at
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/seomoz/~3/oocxOKmBdN4/the-advertisers-guide-to-surviving-reddit
You received this e-mail because you asked to be notified when new updates are
posted.
Best regards,
Build Backlinks Online
peter.clarke@designed-for-success.com
[Build Backlinks Online] TITLE
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'UGC 101: Guide to User-Generated Content Marketing' Reddit
Facebook
Twitter
Pinterest
Instagram
What is the fabulous and extraordinary thing that is UGC? No, it's not the latest clog variation of UGG boots – it's none other than user-generated content!
Today we're looking at different kinds of user generated content, examples of user-generated content, where to find it, how to use it, and more!
What is User Generated Content?
A user generated content definition: UGC is anything on the web that users have a hand in making. Most of the photos, videos, and posts you see on the web are pieces of user generated content. Basically, UGC is anything not made by a brand, though brands do leverage user-generated content for ranking.
Different Kinds of User Generated Content
The variations of UGC are endless. Some major kinds include:
- Blog comments
- Facebook comments or posts
- Reviews
- User generated videos
- User generated blog posts
- Forums
- Podcasts
Some popular streams of UGC involve collaboration between a brand and a user. Take for example, the Christmas Jib Jab "Elf Yourself" videos that tend to re-emerge every holiday season. Jib Jab let users upload photos of friends and family member's faces, which are then pasted onto Jib Jab's animated dancing elves. In the example video below, one users uploaded Harry Potter characters for an special Hogwarts-ian Elf Yourself video.
These videos have been hugely successful – Jib Jab provides the tech and tools while users bring their unique creative flair to the table, creating custom UGC that people LOVE to share.
User Generated Content Examples: How Brands Can Repurpose UGC
In a previous Facebook advertising post, we showed how several brands are doing a great job of repurposing user generated content for their own benefit, sharing brand-inspired fan art and customer testimonials across various social networks. Here we're highlighting a few of our favorite user generated content examples once again.
This eloquent endorsement posted by a Twitter fan was taken by Dominoes and then pasted over an image, creating a new visual piece of UGC that could then be shared on Facebook (and other networks).
M&Ms likes to do a Fan Pic Friday, in which a UGC piece is shared on various social networks. This is another great example of a user generated content marketing strategy that capitalizes on users' creativity.
Starbucks also posts fan generated content every so often – people love their coffee, and Starbucks isn't afraid to share user generated content that shows off how beloved they are.
GoPro is another brand that has done a fantastic job of utilizing fan generated content. GoPro will often share and promote impressive customer-created videos on their YouTube channel.
All this user generated content marketing has meant tremendous things for GoPro. As GoPro videos become increasingly more popular, more users get excited at the idea of making their own mini-films for their own five minutes of fame. Those users naturally go out and buy a GoPro before creating even more unique UGC videos, which in turn promote the GoPro brand and increase sales. It's a marketers dream cycle!
Reviews are another form of user-generated content that can easily be re-formatted for different mediums. A stellar Amazon review might do a lot of good repositioned on your website.
Big Barker Dog Beds make smart use of Amazon reviews on their website.
Make the most of your user generated genius – you're letting your fans do the work for you. When you have a popular brand that generates fan attention, the user generated content that rolls in is immensely valuable. Why? Well for one, there are some pretty creative people out there who find fun and innovative news ways to talk about your product or brand. Ways you may never dream of. The creative culture of user generated content is quite impressive – even the big buck marketing teams would be hard pressed to compete with the creativity of fans.
The work of a mad man
There are dozens of ways user generated content can be repurposed across various web identities – an Instagram post tagging your business can be shared on Pinterest! A shout out on Twitter can become a Facebook testimonial. The possibilities are endless. Don't let your UGC go to waste – make the most of it!
Where to Find User Generated Content
Maybe you're getting excited now about all that high class, super UGC ripe for the taking. But where to find it? There's all sorts of user generated content sites across the web, but it helps to know where to look. Some UGC powerhouses included…
Devianart
Devianart is the #1 spot for blossoming artists of the world to show off their wares. Every kind of art imaginable can be found on this online haven for the artistically inclined (from fabric design and computer generated art, to 3D modeling, drawing, and more).
Flickr
As one of the few (if not the only) photo-hosting sites giving away a whole terabyte of space for free, Flickr has a lot of users posting their photography work. If you see something you love and want to use, reach out to a user and ask.
Don't feel like panhandling for photos? Alternatively, search Flickr via Creative Commons for photos that can be used for free in exchange for attribution. These photos can also be found by conducting an Advanced Search in Flickr, and checking of the Creative Commons-licensed only option at the bottom.
Reddit presents a heap of UGC in the form of images, forum discussions, and comments. If you're looking for authentic user generated content, you'll likely find all sorts of stuff on "the front page of the internet."
Where there are users, there is user generated content. And boy howdy, there are tons of folks on Facebook! The semi-recently updated Facebook search tool can help you find discussions revolving around your brand.
It becomes pretty easy to find user generated photos and posts about your brand with a quick Facebook search. Try it out and reap the rewards.
Twitter is a hot spot for discovering conversation surrounding your brand. Just hashify your business and see what's the buzz! The Advanced Search feature is also useful for finding what people are saying about a topic during a given time frame. You can even embed relevant tweets right into your content.
YouTube
YouTube is home to the crown jewel of user generated content – video of course! The King Kong of content, video can captivate and hold the attention of viewers much longer than text or photos.
There's been a lot of hype surrounding Taco Bell's new breakfast menu (oh man, the 1st world in which we live), and sure enough, when I search "taco bell," on YouTube, quite a few user generated video reviews pop up.
Assuming they have good things to say about you, user generated video reviews can be prime UGC to show off and repurpose for your business. Video user endorsements can carry tremendous word-of-mouth power, all the more mighty because you're seeing the real people who recommend your product, making their opinion exponentially more trustworthy. Text reviews on the other hand, while still very valuable forms of UGC, can be mistrusted by skeptical users who see the reviews as potentially artificial. The Internet's trust factor when it comes to quoting individuals has been seriously damaged.
In case the hilarity of this image sails over your head – it's a quote from Yoda (Star Wars), attributed to Dumbledore (Harry Potter), with an image of Gandalf (Lord of the Rings). For optimal misquotation, the link to this image should say "My favorite Star Trek quote."
Pinterest is another great source for user generated content. People just love posting pics on Pinterest – especially food pics. Again, search your brand and wander through pins to see if anything juicy shows up.
Instagram has become the #1 spot for mobile photo-sharing fans. There's a ton of great UGC on here, and it's a great spot to host a contest or giveaway in order to obtain user generated content (more on that strategy later).
I recommend using GramFeed to search through Instagram photos – it's a handy little site that lets you search through instagram posts by topic or hashtag.
Amazon Reviews (& Other Reviews Sites)
As discussed with regards to YouTube videos, reviews are great for swaying the opinions of hesitant buyers. Scour popular review sites for shining endorsements of your biz – try searching through Amazon customer reviews or Yelp reviews for starters, as that's where the majority of online evals take place.
People take online reviews quite seriously (although there are tons of hilarious funny Amazon reviews out there as well) and put a lot of thought and consideration into their evaluations. Use the good ones to your advantage!
No Brand UGC? No Problem – Go a Bit Broader
The best user generated content is content that relates directly to your brand. That tailored fan content works for you on so many levels – it serves as a word-of-mouth endorsement, helps with brand development, and engages with audiences on their level. Basically, personalized user generated content is just the best – it's the bee's knees!
Adorable bee from cartoonist Gemma Correll
But sometimes the "best" just isn't attainable, in which case, the next best will do just fine. If you have a tough time getting your hands on specific brand-related UGC, fear not! Instead, seek out user generated content that is related to your industry. For example, if you sell mountain hiking gear, you might be interested in user generated content from outdoor junkies. Look for photos, blog posts, gear reviews, or videos from campers.
Goal Zero sells portable solar panels for charging goods on the go, but they'll often share UGC that will interest their audiences, such as a guest post about fly fishing.
Of course, whenever sharing user-generated content, it's important to give credit where it is due; be sure to call out those awesome content creators for sharing their experiences.
Want Custom User Gen Content? Just Ask For It!
Sometimes, getting what you're after is a simple as saying, "please." You'll be rolling in UGC in no time if you organize a contest that require a piece of user-generated content as a submission.
Take for example, a current Pillsbury contest asking fans to submit by posting a photo to Instagram of their brightest and boldest baked goods.
It's a simple concept, but bakers from all over are more than happy to oblige, and the user generated content has been steadily coming in.
Contests are often used to build brand awareness and reach, but involving user-generated content adds a huge bonus element, as the brand earns a collection of great fan crafted content that can be implemented for different purposes and on different mediums for years to come.
Winning photos can be curated into a blog post (which fans will doubtlessly share for self-promotion sake), posted on Pinterest, tweeted on Facebook, and so much more. What's not to love?
Communal Blogs
Another way to get user-generated content is to host a communal blog or forum.
For example, YouMoz is a communal posting space where community members can share their own blog posts and content on Moz. Members vote on the posts with a thumbs up or down – if the article gets enough positive votes, the post is promoted to the main blog. Online community-oriented sites like this are great for building community and serve as a smart source of high-quality user-generated content.
User Generate Content Blues? Fake it 'Till You Make it
Still having a hard time getting your hands on UGC? Try creating your own! OK, it won't really be user-generated content if you're making it yourself, but you can replicate the user-generated style that will likely appeal to users over more blatant branded advertising.
User generated content statistics from Crowdtap show that Millennials consider UGC 20% more influential and 35% more memorable that branded messages. They also are 50% more likely to find UGC trustworthy as opposed to branded advertising. So even if your marketing content isn't authentically user-generated, that style of marketing will appeal much more to younger audiences than classic branded marketing.
It's unclear if this photo posted on Starbuck's Facebook page is fan-crafted or the company's creation, but regardless it has the style and concept (pop-culture oriented) of a UGC piece. Naturally this got a TON of likes and shares online. Nothing hits quite as hard as nostalgia.
We've made a pretty strong case for user generated content. If you're not foaming at the mouth for that home grown UGC by now, you'd best re-read this post! Your quest for fantastic user generated content may take you to some strange places, but as long as you come up with some UGC spoils, it'll surely be worth the ride.
Do you have a piece of user generated content that did a ton of good for your business? Share your experience in the comment section below!
This post originated on the WordStream Blog. WordStream provides keyword tools for pay-per click (PPC) and search engine optimization (SEO) aiding in everything from keyword discovery to keyword grouping and organization.
Sunday 27 April 2014
[Build Backlinks Online] How To Make the Perfect Thumbnail for Your YouTube Videos
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'How To Make the Perfect Thumbnail
for Your YouTube Videos'
Everyday, millions of people are flocking to YouTube searching through an
endless sea of videos. They want to find information, they need a laugh, or even
if they just want to be entertained they can rest assured that YouTube is the
place to find just ...
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for Your YouTube Videos'
Everyday, millions of people are flocking to YouTube searching through an
endless sea of videos. They want to find information, they need a laugh, or even
if they just want to be entertained they can rest assured that YouTube is the
place to find just ...
You may view the latest post at
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/BasicBlogTips/~3/g_kna_a4Zlo/perfect-youtube-thumbnail.html
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Friday 25 April 2014
[Build Backlinks Online] The Greatest Misconception in Content Marketing - Whiteboard Friday
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'The Greatest Misconception in
Content Marketing - Whiteboard Friday'
Posted by randfish
It's probably pretty clear to everyone that content marketing takes time, but
there's a common misconception in just how much time. In today's Whiteboard
Friday, Rand warns us of an overly optimistic mindset, and shows us how
things...
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Content Marketing - Whiteboard Friday'
Posted by randfish
It's probably pretty clear to everyone that content marketing takes time, but
there's a common misconception in just how much time. In today's Whiteboard
Friday, Rand warns us of an overly optimistic mindset, and shows us how
things...
You may view the latest post at
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/seomoz/~3/aQiRusriLdE/the-greatest-misconception-in-content-marketing-whiteboard-friday
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[Build Backlinks Online] How to Create a Thriving B2B Advocacy Community
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'How to Create a Thriving B2B
Advocacy Community'
Giving Back to Your Top Influencers Back in 2003, VMwares online community was
centered around a forum. Today, despite the fractured social media landscape,
their community still has one central home on the web: the VMware Community
site. This one page aggregates all of the data from Twitter, Facebook, blogs,
the community forums, and any []
You may view the latest post at
http://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-pros-podcast/how-to-create-a-thriving-b2b-advocacy-community/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=how-to-create-a-thriving-b2b-advocacy-community
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Advocacy Community'
Giving Back to Your Top Influencers Back in 2003, VMwares online community was
centered around a forum. Today, despite the fractured social media landscape,
their community still has one central home on the web: the VMware Community
site. This one page aggregates all of the data from Twitter, Facebook, blogs,
the community forums, and any []
You may view the latest post at
http://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-pros-podcast/how-to-create-a-thriving-b2b-advocacy-community/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=how-to-create-a-thriving-b2b-advocacy-community
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Thursday 24 April 2014
[Build Backlinks Online] TITLE
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'Huge Google Keyword Planner Updates: Now with Mobile/Contextual/Trend Data'
Keyword research is a critical component in every successful paid search strategy. In fact, our internal data shows that search marketers spend nearly 25% of their time on keyword research.
Google has quietly rolled out a number of significant changes and updates to Keyword Planner that should not only reduce the amount of time spent in the tool, but make it exponentially more useful, as well. The updates rolled out this week make it highly visual and more powerful, with a definite mobile focus. It’s the first major refresh since the tool was introduced about a year ago.
(Warning: the new version is way more fun – you might actually spend MORE time in Keyword Planner. Try not to get distracted by the pretty shiny things.)
So what’s new? Check out the new Keyword Planner features:
Visualize Search Volume Trends
The first thing you notice here is that when you do a keyword search, you get this beautiful chart illustrating the keyword volume trends from month to month. This is super helpful for businesses with seasonally trending products or services.
Previously, this data was jammed into a column and was hard to decipher.
Compare vs. Previous Time Period
Google has added the ability to do a keyword volume comparison against a prior time period.
In the date range, pick a monthly range, then turn "Compare" on.
Now you can see how search volume changed over time, versus a specific time period. For example, look at how the volume spiked for ‘Malaysian Airlines’ last month, due to the terrible MH370 tragedy.
Of course, all of this data shows up in your dashboard and can be exported. Helpful!
Visualize Mobile Trends
We live in a constantly connected world, so Google is now showing the distribution of mobile vs. desktop searches in Keyword Planner.
In this search for locksmiths, you can see just how many more people use mobile to search on this keyword. Marketers can use this insight – readily available in a visual, easy to understand format – to find opportunities for logical mobile bid adjustments.
Breakdown of Search Traffic by Device
Whoa, look how much greater mobile traffic is than desktops, in this example using ‘pizza restaurant’ as the search term! No wonder Google uses pizza as their go-to example for mobile. This data wasn't even available before.
Breakdown by Location
How cool is this: Keyword Planner now breaks down the search volume based on the different geo-targeting options you choose.
To add/remove locations, just go to the targeting area:
More Powerful & Detailed Estimates
Once you've selected/added some keywords into your plan, you can get more granular estimates – these weren't previously available. You can do the same device and location segmentation, but look at how Google customizes the clicks, cost, impressions, etc., according to your bid and daily budget:
All Hail the New Google Keyword Planner
It's about time Google updated Keyword Planner, and this is exactly what it needed. Mobile is set to overtake desktop by end of next year (according to some estimates) and isn’t it Google who are constantly telling us what a connected world we’re living in?
These new features bring the Keyword Planner out of the desktop world, to help you connect with the right people, at the right time, in the right place. The new mobile, location and trending data paired with these super-useful visualizations are certainly a step in the right direction and should help marketers realize the benefits of this new marketing paradigm.
We give the revamped Keyword Planner two thumbs up – what say you?
This post originated on the WordStream Blog. WordStream provides keyword tools for pay-per click (PPC) and search engine optimization (SEO) aiding in everything from keyword discovery to keyword grouping and organization.
[Build Backlinks Online] Social Media Highlights From The Boston Marathon
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'Social Media Highlights From The
Boston Marathon'
With the eyes of the world on the Boston Marathon this past Monday, The Boston
Athletic Association leveraged social media to bring people together, while
communicating important race information. From providing real-time race updates,
to commemorating this years marathon as one of remembrance and celebration, here
are a few social media content highlights from the event.
You may view the latest post at
http://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-media-case-studies/social-media-highlights-from-the-boston-marathon/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=social-media-highlights-from-the-boston-marathon
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Boston Marathon'
With the eyes of the world on the Boston Marathon this past Monday, The Boston
Athletic Association leveraged social media to bring people together, while
communicating important race information. From providing real-time race updates,
to commemorating this years marathon as one of remembrance and celebration, here
are a few social media content highlights from the event.
You may view the latest post at
http://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-media-case-studies/social-media-highlights-from-the-boston-marathon/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=social-media-highlights-from-the-boston-marathon
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[Build Backlinks Online] 8 Stops on the Path to a Better Blog
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, '8 Stops on the Path to a Better
Blog'
Your blog is a powerful tool for building authority and thought-leadership, but
do you need some help to get it where it should be to grow visits and
engagement? This month on Blog Rescue, we offer eight affordable ways to
encourage community and engagement around your blog.
You may view the latest post at
http://www.convinceandconvert.com/content-marketing/8-stops-on-the-path-to-a-better-blog/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=8-stops-on-the-path-to-a-better-blog
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peter.clarke@designed-for-success.com
Blog'
Your blog is a powerful tool for building authority and thought-leadership, but
do you need some help to get it where it should be to grow visits and
engagement? This month on Blog Rescue, we offer eight affordable ways to
encourage community and engagement around your blog.
You may view the latest post at
http://www.convinceandconvert.com/content-marketing/8-stops-on-the-path-to-a-better-blog/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=8-stops-on-the-path-to-a-better-blog
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[Build Backlinks Online] The #MozCon 2014 Agenda is Here!
Build Backlinks Online has posted a new item, 'The #MozCon 2014 Agenda is Here!'
Posted by EricaMcGillivray
*drumroll* ... That's right, friends, the MozCon 2014 Agenda is here! You can
now showthis to your boss to get that final approval and start making plans for
how many notebooks you'll be filling with ideas and tips.
But first, I'd be remiss if I didn't remind you to buy your ticket today, as
MozCon has sold out the last several years.
For the best current deal on MozCon, make sure you're a Moz Pro subscriber. If
you're not, you can sign up for
a 30-day free trial and get the Pro subscriber MozCon price immediately. Cancel
your subscription at anytime if it's not for you, and we'll see you at MozCon
2014 either way!
Okay, let's talk about justhow greatthis MozCon's going to be. We have topics
ranging from technical mobile SEO and A/B testing to "big content" idea
generation and getting maximum value from your PR efforts. There is truly
something for every type of online marketer.We have returning MozCon favorites
such as Wil Reynolds, Dr. Pete Meyers, and Nathalie Nahai, as well as new
speakers like Kerry Bodine, Cindy Krum, and Jeremy Bloom. Plus, we're trying a
new formata fireside chatwith our CEO Sarah Bird, so we can really dig into what
life at Moz has been like since she and Rand switched places.
Not to mention all the photos with Roger, the wonderful swag, yummy food, and
all the other MozCon trimmings you expect. And yes, we're letting Cyrus Shepard
emcee again. (I'm pretty sure it's in his Moz employment contract.)
Wil Reynolds at MozCon 2013The MozCon Agenda
8:00-9:00am Breakfast
9:00-9:20am Welcome to MozCon 2014! withRand Fishkin
As our ever-changing industry keeps us on our toes, Rand gives a look at recent
changes and where he sees the future of search and online marketing going.
Rand Fishkin is the founder of Moz, and he currently serves as an individual
contributor, blogging, speaking, designing tools, and helpingmarketers worldwide
level-up their game.
9:20-10:20am Broken Brand Promises: The Disconnect Between Marketing and
Customer Experience withKerry BodineCompanies chase the business benefits of
customer experience, but advertising and marketing communications that arent
aligned with the true capabilities of the organization foil these efforts.
Kerry Bodine is the co-author of Outside In: The Power of Putting Customers at
the Center of Your Business. Her ideas, analysis, and opinions appear frequently
on sites like Harvard Business Review, The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company,
Forbes, USA Today, and Advertising Age. She holds a masters degree in
human-computer interaction and has designed interfaces for websites, mobile
apps, wearable devices, and robots.
10:20-10:40am AM Break
10:40-11:20am Improve Your SEO by Mastering These Core Principles withLindsay
WassellDiscover how SEO tactics that win in the long run complement web-friendly
business practices and core principles, and how to incorporate this approach
into optimization strategies for changes in search results.
Lindsay Wassell is the CEO at
Keyphraseology, an Inbound & Search Marketing agency. Prior to Keyphraseology,
she led the Moz SEO Consulting Team.
11:20am-12:00pm How to Use Social Science to Build Addictive Communities with
Richard MillingtonRichard will explain how you can use proven principles from
community science to build highly addictive online communities for your
organization.
Richard Millington is the founder of
FeverBee, an organization which has figured out how to apply proven science to
build powerful communities from any group of people.
12:00-1:30pm Lunch
1:30-2:30pm Architecting Great Experiments withKyle Rush
A/B testing will no longer be a mystery after Kyle does a deep-dive on every
part of the experimentation process.
Kyle Rush is the Head of Optimization at
Optimizely. He uses a data-driven engineering approach to execute hundreds of
A/B tests.
2:30-3:10pm Mobile SEO Geekout: Key Strategies and Concepts with Cindy Krum
Learn all the technical nuances necessary to make your websites rank and
perform well in mobile and tablet search!
Cindy Krum is CEO and Founder of
MobileMoxie, a mobile SEO consulting and tools provider based in Denver, CO.
She is also author of Mobile Marketing: Finding Your Customers No Matter Where
They Are, which is the first book to explain mobile SEO and gets 4.5 out of 5
stars on Amazon.
3:10-3:30pm PM Break
3:30-4:00pm Local Lessons from Small Town USA with Mike Ramsey
Whether your audience is in one region or thousands of major metros across the
world, these small town lessons will guide you through the complex world of
local search.
Mike Ramsey is the president of
Nifty Marketing with offices in Burley and Boise, Idaho. He is also a Partner
at LocalU and has an awesome wife and 3 kids who put up with all his talk about
search.
4:00-4:30pm Top 10 PR Tactics and Strategies of Successful Content and Link
Building with Lexi Mills
Everyone's had an outreach pitch rejected, but Lexi will show you that by
slicing and dicing your content, you can turn those nos into yess.
Lexi Mills is a PR SEO specialist, with over eight years experience working
with both small firms and big brands. She has designed and implemented
integrated PR, SEO, content, and social campaigns in the UK, Europe, and USA for
B2B and B2C clients.
4:30-5:10pm Digital Body Language with Mike King
No matter your business goals, Mike will teach you how to harness the power of
lead qualification and nurturing through both implicit and explicit user
information.
Currently a consultant,
Mike King hasled teams covering consumer insights, content, social strategy,
and SEO for Enterprise brands. With working for brands like HSBC, SanDisk, Ralph
Lauren, Johnson & Johnson, and Citibank, his breadth and depth of experience
continues to fuel game-changing insights. Mike is a frequent speaker, blogger,
and a published author that loves to share his insights on how to do better
marketing.
7:00-9:00pm #MozCrawlMore details coming soon!
8:00-9:00am Breakfast
9:00-10:00am How to Never Run Out of Great Ideas with Pete Meyers
Learn how to stay afloat in the coming flood of content, as Dr. Pete provides
concrete tactics for sustainably creating high-value content.
Dr. Pete Meyers is amarketing scientist for Moz, where he works with the
marketing and data science teams on product research and data-driven content. He
has spent the past year building research tools to monitor Google, including the
MozCast Project, and he curates theGoogle Algorithm History, a chronicle of
Google updates back to 2003.
10:00-10:30am Scaling Creativity: Making Content Marketing More Efficient with
Stacey Cavanagh
Stacey will talk you through tactics and tricks to help you scale your content
marketing efforts without cutting corners on quality.
Stacey Cavanagh lives in Manchester, UK, and works as head of search for
Tecmark. Stacey also blogs regularly on digital marketing, social media, and
her favorite TV ads.
10:30-10:50am AM Break
10:50-12:10pm Community Speakers!
While not finalized, community speakers are one of our most popular sessions.
Four speakers from our community will give 15 minute presentations on what
they're passionate about. This year, Moz's Director of Community, Jen Lopez,
will be introducing them.
12:10pm-1:40pm Lunch
1:40-2:20pm Keep the Focus on the Doughnuts with Marshall Simmonds
If you're in a time and resource crunch, Marshall will share which tactics you
should implement and prioritize, from the basic to thehighly technical, based on
measured and quantified data from billions of page views.
Marshall Simmonds has been involved in the search industry since it began. Over
the past 17 years, he's solidified himself as one of the top consultants in
publishing and enterprise audience development. Many of the tactics you continue
to employ today as best practices were either developed or refined by this guy;
he's "Internet Old."
2:20pm-2:50pm Dare to Fail: How the Best Lessons Come in the Form of Defeat
with Jeremy Bloom
Everyone experiences failure, but Jeremy will share the lessons he's learned
from an athlete to start-up CEO in how to leverage adversity and turn it into a
road-map for success.
Jeremy Bloom is a world-champion skier, a two-time Olympian, a World Cup gold
medalist, and a member of the United States Skiing Hall of Fame. He played
professional football in the NFL for the Philadelphia Eagles and the Pittsburgh
Steelers. In 2008, Bloom founded Wish of a Lifetime, which grants lifelong
wishes to 80-, 90-, and 100+-year-old people, and in 2010, Bloom co-founded the
marketing software company
Integrate. Integrate has raised over $20M of venture capital from Comcast,
Foundry Group, and Liberty Global. Itwas named "Best New Company" at the 2011
American Business Awards in New York.
2:50-3:30pm Supercharging Your Digital Analytics! with Justin Cutroni
Despite having lots of analytics tools, we too often settle for the default
data and reports so let's look at a few ways that you can get more insightful,
actionable data to make better decisions!
Justin Cutroniis an author, blogger, father, skier, and the Analytics
Evangelist at
Google. He is a long-time fixture in the digital analytics community and has
been nominated as the most influential industry contributor for the past four
years.
3:30-3:50pm PM Break
3:50-4:20pm Developing a Formidable Social Platform with Amber Naslund
Learn what makes for a compelling online presence, balance your personal and
professional self, and build a system to keep yourself sane.
Amber Naslund is a business strategist and the president of
SideraWorks, a social business advisory firm that helps companies adapt their
culture and operations to the demands of the social web. Shes the co-author of
The Now Revolution, and you can find her on Twitter at@ambercadabra.
4:20-4:50pm Shop 'til You Drop: Google Shopping PPC with Elizabeth Marsten
If you're wondering what happened to Google Shopping, Elizabeth will explain
all, including how to set up PPC the right way and why it matters for your
overall marketing.
Elizabeth Marsten is the Vice President of Search Marketing at
Portent, Inc. here in Seattle. She is a PPC person at heart, but also oversees
the SEO, Social, Content, and Project Management teams.
4:50-5:30pm YouTube: The Most Important Search Engine You Haven't Optimized For
with Phil Nottingham
Phil will take a deep-dive into YouTube, the world's second biggest and most
forgotten search engine, looking at the best ways to use the channel on both a
strategic and tactical marketing level, no matter your budget.
Phil Nottingham is the video strategist at
Distilled, where he works with businesses of all shapes and sizes to define
their approach to video on both a creative and technical level. He joined
Distilled in April 2011, after impressing the company founders with his ability
to look like a serviceable pirate, following minimal costume changes, and has
since spent loads of their money on cameras and lights.
7:00pm-12:00am MozCon Party at Garage Billiards(MozCon badge required!)
8:20-9:20am Breakfast
9:20-10:20am You Are so Much More than an SEO with Wil Reynolds
The label's irrelevant as you have skills, tools, and knowledge to help get
rankings and so much more, and Wil will show you the marketing goldmine you've
been sitting on.
Wil Reynolds founded
SEER Interactive in 2002, which now employs over 70 people and is among the 100
fastest growing companies in Philadelphia. In addition to digital marketing, Wil
is also passionate about giving back to the community and sits on the advisory
board of Covenant House.
10:20-10:50am Beyond SEO - Tactics for Delivering an Integrated Marketing
Campaign with Paddy Moogan
Everyone talks about the need for SEOs to diversify, but Paddy will give you
actionable tips to go away and do it, no matter what your current role is.
Paddy Moogan is Head of Growth Markets at
Distilled, working in their London office. He is a comic book geek and loves
Aston Martins. His heart lives with the Hobbits in New Zealand.
10:50-11:10am AM Break
11:10-11:40am A Mozzy View with Sarah Bird and John Cook
Moz CEO Sarah Bird sits down with GeekWire's John Cook for a candid discussion
about risk-taking, thriving with constant change, and the future of Moz.
Sarah Bird serves as CEO and as a member of Moz's board. She loves and welcomes
conversations on inbound marketing, business models, entrepreneurship,
productivity tips, women in tech, and fostering inspiring company culture.
Sarah's sharp business acumen is always paired with her passionate belief in
TAGFEE, Mozs core values.
John Cook is the co-founder of
GeekWire, a leading technology news site and community based in Seattle. A
long-time tech journalist, John has covered hundreds of startup companies over
the years, everything from aQuantive to Zillow.
11:40am-12:20pm Developing Your Own Great Interactive Content - What You'll
Need to Know with Richard BaxterEven if you're not a technical genius when it
comes to interactive front-end web development projects, Richard will show you
how to make something the Internet loves from ideation and conceptualization to
rapid prototyping, launch, and huge coverage.
Richard Baxteris founder and CEO of
SEOgadget, a digital marketing agency specializing in conversion rate
optimization, large scale SEO, keyword research, technical strategy, and link
building in high competition industries, with offices in London and San
Francisco. He is a regular SEO industry commentator and proud Moz Associate.
12:20-1:50pm Lunch
1:50-2:30pm Demystifying Data Visualization for Marketers with Annie Cushing
We've all been frustrated with not knowing how to corral data into cool, sexy
visualizations, but Annie Cushingwill pull back the curtain and provide tips,
tricks, and hacks to transform raw marketing data into works of art in plain
English.
Annie blogs at
annielytics.com, teaching marketers how to scavenge for marketing data and then
make it sexy.
2:30-3:10pm Prove Your Value with Dana DiTomasoDana will show you how to report
so there's no doubt in your client's mind that they'd be lost without you.
Whether at a conference, on the radio, or in a meeting, Dana DiTomaso likes to
impart wisdom to help you turn a lot of marketing BSinto real strategies to grow
your business. After 10+ years, she's seen (almost) everything. It's true, Dana
will meet with you and teach you the ways of the digital world, but she is also
a fan of the random fact.
Kick Point often celebrates "Watershed Wednesday" because of Dana's diverse
work and education background. In her spare time, Dana drinks tea and yells at
the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.
3:10-3:30pm PM Break
3:30-4:10pm The Psychology of Persuasive Content for "Boring" Industries with
Nathalie NahaiIf your content needs a jolt of life, Nathalie will show you how
to apply targeted persuasion throughpsychology.
Nathalie Nahai, also known as
The Web Psychologist, is a best-selling author, consultant, and international
speaker who specializes on the psychology of online persuasion. With a
background in psychology, web design, and digital strategy, Nathalie coined the
term "web psychology" in 2011, defining it as "the empirical study of how our
online environments influence our attitudes and behaviours."
4:10-5:10pm Mad Science Experiments in SEO & Social Media with Rand
FishkinWhether it's anchor text or sharing on Google+ instead of Facebook,
Rand's spent the last few months formulating hypotheses and running tests, and
now he'll share these fascinating results to help you.
Rand Fishkin is the founder of Moz, and he currently serves as an individual
contributor, blogging, speaking, designing tools, and generally trying to be
helpful to marketers worldwide.
Now, are you ready to buy your ticket? :) We'll see you there!
Get Your MozCon Tickets
Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten
hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think
of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but
want to read!
You may view the latest post at
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/seomoz/~3/Gg6Cx7c7_GI/mozcon-2014-agenda
You received this e-mail because you asked to be notified when new updates are
posted.
Best regards,
Build Backlinks Online
peter.clarke@designed-for-success.com
Posted by EricaMcGillivray
*drumroll* ... That's right, friends, the MozCon 2014 Agenda is here! You can
now showthis to your boss to get that final approval and start making plans for
how many notebooks you'll be filling with ideas and tips.
But first, I'd be remiss if I didn't remind you to buy your ticket today, as
MozCon has sold out the last several years.
For the best current deal on MozCon, make sure you're a Moz Pro subscriber. If
you're not, you can sign up for
a 30-day free trial and get the Pro subscriber MozCon price immediately. Cancel
your subscription at anytime if it's not for you, and we'll see you at MozCon
2014 either way!
Okay, let's talk about justhow greatthis MozCon's going to be. We have topics
ranging from technical mobile SEO and A/B testing to "big content" idea
generation and getting maximum value from your PR efforts. There is truly
something for every type of online marketer.We have returning MozCon favorites
such as Wil Reynolds, Dr. Pete Meyers, and Nathalie Nahai, as well as new
speakers like Kerry Bodine, Cindy Krum, and Jeremy Bloom. Plus, we're trying a
new formata fireside chatwith our CEO Sarah Bird, so we can really dig into what
life at Moz has been like since she and Rand switched places.
Not to mention all the photos with Roger, the wonderful swag, yummy food, and
all the other MozCon trimmings you expect. And yes, we're letting Cyrus Shepard
emcee again. (I'm pretty sure it's in his Moz employment contract.)
Wil Reynolds at MozCon 2013The MozCon Agenda
8:00-9:00am Breakfast
9:00-9:20am Welcome to MozCon 2014! withRand Fishkin
As our ever-changing industry keeps us on our toes, Rand gives a look at recent
changes and where he sees the future of search and online marketing going.
Rand Fishkin is the founder of Moz, and he currently serves as an individual
contributor, blogging, speaking, designing tools, and helpingmarketers worldwide
level-up their game.
9:20-10:20am Broken Brand Promises: The Disconnect Between Marketing and
Customer Experience withKerry BodineCompanies chase the business benefits of
customer experience, but advertising and marketing communications that arent
aligned with the true capabilities of the organization foil these efforts.
Kerry Bodine is the co-author of Outside In: The Power of Putting Customers at
the Center of Your Business. Her ideas, analysis, and opinions appear frequently
on sites like Harvard Business Review, The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company,
Forbes, USA Today, and Advertising Age. She holds a masters degree in
human-computer interaction and has designed interfaces for websites, mobile
apps, wearable devices, and robots.
10:20-10:40am AM Break
10:40-11:20am Improve Your SEO by Mastering These Core Principles withLindsay
WassellDiscover how SEO tactics that win in the long run complement web-friendly
business practices and core principles, and how to incorporate this approach
into optimization strategies for changes in search results.
Lindsay Wassell is the CEO at
Keyphraseology, an Inbound & Search Marketing agency. Prior to Keyphraseology,
she led the Moz SEO Consulting Team.
11:20am-12:00pm How to Use Social Science to Build Addictive Communities with
Richard MillingtonRichard will explain how you can use proven principles from
community science to build highly addictive online communities for your
organization.
Richard Millington is the founder of
FeverBee, an organization which has figured out how to apply proven science to
build powerful communities from any group of people.
12:00-1:30pm Lunch
1:30-2:30pm Architecting Great Experiments withKyle Rush
A/B testing will no longer be a mystery after Kyle does a deep-dive on every
part of the experimentation process.
Kyle Rush is the Head of Optimization at
Optimizely. He uses a data-driven engineering approach to execute hundreds of
A/B tests.
2:30-3:10pm Mobile SEO Geekout: Key Strategies and Concepts with Cindy Krum
Learn all the technical nuances necessary to make your websites rank and
perform well in mobile and tablet search!
Cindy Krum is CEO and Founder of
MobileMoxie, a mobile SEO consulting and tools provider based in Denver, CO.
She is also author of Mobile Marketing: Finding Your Customers No Matter Where
They Are, which is the first book to explain mobile SEO and gets 4.5 out of 5
stars on Amazon.
3:10-3:30pm PM Break
3:30-4:00pm Local Lessons from Small Town USA with Mike Ramsey
Whether your audience is in one region or thousands of major metros across the
world, these small town lessons will guide you through the complex world of
local search.
Mike Ramsey is the president of
Nifty Marketing with offices in Burley and Boise, Idaho. He is also a Partner
at LocalU and has an awesome wife and 3 kids who put up with all his talk about
search.
4:00-4:30pm Top 10 PR Tactics and Strategies of Successful Content and Link
Building with Lexi Mills
Everyone's had an outreach pitch rejected, but Lexi will show you that by
slicing and dicing your content, you can turn those nos into yess.
Lexi Mills is a PR SEO specialist, with over eight years experience working
with both small firms and big brands. She has designed and implemented
integrated PR, SEO, content, and social campaigns in the UK, Europe, and USA for
B2B and B2C clients.
4:30-5:10pm Digital Body Language with Mike King
No matter your business goals, Mike will teach you how to harness the power of
lead qualification and nurturing through both implicit and explicit user
information.
Currently a consultant,
Mike King hasled teams covering consumer insights, content, social strategy,
and SEO for Enterprise brands. With working for brands like HSBC, SanDisk, Ralph
Lauren, Johnson & Johnson, and Citibank, his breadth and depth of experience
continues to fuel game-changing insights. Mike is a frequent speaker, blogger,
and a published author that loves to share his insights on how to do better
marketing.
7:00-9:00pm #MozCrawlMore details coming soon!
8:00-9:00am Breakfast
9:00-10:00am How to Never Run Out of Great Ideas with Pete Meyers
Learn how to stay afloat in the coming flood of content, as Dr. Pete provides
concrete tactics for sustainably creating high-value content.
Dr. Pete Meyers is amarketing scientist for Moz, where he works with the
marketing and data science teams on product research and data-driven content. He
has spent the past year building research tools to monitor Google, including the
MozCast Project, and he curates theGoogle Algorithm History, a chronicle of
Google updates back to 2003.
10:00-10:30am Scaling Creativity: Making Content Marketing More Efficient with
Stacey Cavanagh
Stacey will talk you through tactics and tricks to help you scale your content
marketing efforts without cutting corners on quality.
Stacey Cavanagh lives in Manchester, UK, and works as head of search for
Tecmark. Stacey also blogs regularly on digital marketing, social media, and
her favorite TV ads.
10:30-10:50am AM Break
10:50-12:10pm Community Speakers!
While not finalized, community speakers are one of our most popular sessions.
Four speakers from our community will give 15 minute presentations on what
they're passionate about. This year, Moz's Director of Community, Jen Lopez,
will be introducing them.
12:10pm-1:40pm Lunch
1:40-2:20pm Keep the Focus on the Doughnuts with Marshall Simmonds
If you're in a time and resource crunch, Marshall will share which tactics you
should implement and prioritize, from the basic to thehighly technical, based on
measured and quantified data from billions of page views.
Marshall Simmonds has been involved in the search industry since it began. Over
the past 17 years, he's solidified himself as one of the top consultants in
publishing and enterprise audience development. Many of the tactics you continue
to employ today as best practices were either developed or refined by this guy;
he's "Internet Old."
2:20pm-2:50pm Dare to Fail: How the Best Lessons Come in the Form of Defeat
with Jeremy Bloom
Everyone experiences failure, but Jeremy will share the lessons he's learned
from an athlete to start-up CEO in how to leverage adversity and turn it into a
road-map for success.
Jeremy Bloom is a world-champion skier, a two-time Olympian, a World Cup gold
medalist, and a member of the United States Skiing Hall of Fame. He played
professional football in the NFL for the Philadelphia Eagles and the Pittsburgh
Steelers. In 2008, Bloom founded Wish of a Lifetime, which grants lifelong
wishes to 80-, 90-, and 100+-year-old people, and in 2010, Bloom co-founded the
marketing software company
Integrate. Integrate has raised over $20M of venture capital from Comcast,
Foundry Group, and Liberty Global. Itwas named "Best New Company" at the 2011
American Business Awards in New York.
2:50-3:30pm Supercharging Your Digital Analytics! with Justin Cutroni
Despite having lots of analytics tools, we too often settle for the default
data and reports so let's look at a few ways that you can get more insightful,
actionable data to make better decisions!
Justin Cutroniis an author, blogger, father, skier, and the Analytics
Evangelist at
Google. He is a long-time fixture in the digital analytics community and has
been nominated as the most influential industry contributor for the past four
years.
3:30-3:50pm PM Break
3:50-4:20pm Developing a Formidable Social Platform with Amber Naslund
Learn what makes for a compelling online presence, balance your personal and
professional self, and build a system to keep yourself sane.
Amber Naslund is a business strategist and the president of
SideraWorks, a social business advisory firm that helps companies adapt their
culture and operations to the demands of the social web. Shes the co-author of
The Now Revolution, and you can find her on Twitter at@ambercadabra.
4:20-4:50pm Shop 'til You Drop: Google Shopping PPC with Elizabeth Marsten
If you're wondering what happened to Google Shopping, Elizabeth will explain
all, including how to set up PPC the right way and why it matters for your
overall marketing.
Elizabeth Marsten is the Vice President of Search Marketing at
Portent, Inc. here in Seattle. She is a PPC person at heart, but also oversees
the SEO, Social, Content, and Project Management teams.
4:50-5:30pm YouTube: The Most Important Search Engine You Haven't Optimized For
with Phil Nottingham
Phil will take a deep-dive into YouTube, the world's second biggest and most
forgotten search engine, looking at the best ways to use the channel on both a
strategic and tactical marketing level, no matter your budget.
Phil Nottingham is the video strategist at
Distilled, where he works with businesses of all shapes and sizes to define
their approach to video on both a creative and technical level. He joined
Distilled in April 2011, after impressing the company founders with his ability
to look like a serviceable pirate, following minimal costume changes, and has
since spent loads of their money on cameras and lights.
7:00pm-12:00am MozCon Party at Garage Billiards(MozCon badge required!)
8:20-9:20am Breakfast
9:20-10:20am You Are so Much More than an SEO with Wil Reynolds
The label's irrelevant as you have skills, tools, and knowledge to help get
rankings and so much more, and Wil will show you the marketing goldmine you've
been sitting on.
Wil Reynolds founded
SEER Interactive in 2002, which now employs over 70 people and is among the 100
fastest growing companies in Philadelphia. In addition to digital marketing, Wil
is also passionate about giving back to the community and sits on the advisory
board of Covenant House.
10:20-10:50am Beyond SEO - Tactics for Delivering an Integrated Marketing
Campaign with Paddy Moogan
Everyone talks about the need for SEOs to diversify, but Paddy will give you
actionable tips to go away and do it, no matter what your current role is.
Paddy Moogan is Head of Growth Markets at
Distilled, working in their London office. He is a comic book geek and loves
Aston Martins. His heart lives with the Hobbits in New Zealand.
10:50-11:10am AM Break
11:10-11:40am A Mozzy View with Sarah Bird and John Cook
Moz CEO Sarah Bird sits down with GeekWire's John Cook for a candid discussion
about risk-taking, thriving with constant change, and the future of Moz.
Sarah Bird serves as CEO and as a member of Moz's board. She loves and welcomes
conversations on inbound marketing, business models, entrepreneurship,
productivity tips, women in tech, and fostering inspiring company culture.
Sarah's sharp business acumen is always paired with her passionate belief in
TAGFEE, Mozs core values.
John Cook is the co-founder of
GeekWire, a leading technology news site and community based in Seattle. A
long-time tech journalist, John has covered hundreds of startup companies over
the years, everything from aQuantive to Zillow.
11:40am-12:20pm Developing Your Own Great Interactive Content - What You'll
Need to Know with Richard BaxterEven if you're not a technical genius when it
comes to interactive front-end web development projects, Richard will show you
how to make something the Internet loves from ideation and conceptualization to
rapid prototyping, launch, and huge coverage.
Richard Baxteris founder and CEO of
SEOgadget, a digital marketing agency specializing in conversion rate
optimization, large scale SEO, keyword research, technical strategy, and link
building in high competition industries, with offices in London and San
Francisco. He is a regular SEO industry commentator and proud Moz Associate.
12:20-1:50pm Lunch
1:50-2:30pm Demystifying Data Visualization for Marketers with Annie Cushing
We've all been frustrated with not knowing how to corral data into cool, sexy
visualizations, but Annie Cushingwill pull back the curtain and provide tips,
tricks, and hacks to transform raw marketing data into works of art in plain
English.
Annie blogs at
annielytics.com, teaching marketers how to scavenge for marketing data and then
make it sexy.
2:30-3:10pm Prove Your Value with Dana DiTomasoDana will show you how to report
so there's no doubt in your client's mind that they'd be lost without you.
Whether at a conference, on the radio, or in a meeting, Dana DiTomaso likes to
impart wisdom to help you turn a lot of marketing BSinto real strategies to grow
your business. After 10+ years, she's seen (almost) everything. It's true, Dana
will meet with you and teach you the ways of the digital world, but she is also
a fan of the random fact.
Kick Point often celebrates "Watershed Wednesday" because of Dana's diverse
work and education background. In her spare time, Dana drinks tea and yells at
the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.
3:10-3:30pm PM Break
3:30-4:10pm The Psychology of Persuasive Content for "Boring" Industries with
Nathalie NahaiIf your content needs a jolt of life, Nathalie will show you how
to apply targeted persuasion throughpsychology.
Nathalie Nahai, also known as
The Web Psychologist, is a best-selling author, consultant, and international
speaker who specializes on the psychology of online persuasion. With a
background in psychology, web design, and digital strategy, Nathalie coined the
term "web psychology" in 2011, defining it as "the empirical study of how our
online environments influence our attitudes and behaviours."
4:10-5:10pm Mad Science Experiments in SEO & Social Media with Rand
FishkinWhether it's anchor text or sharing on Google+ instead of Facebook,
Rand's spent the last few months formulating hypotheses and running tests, and
now he'll share these fascinating results to help you.
Rand Fishkin is the founder of Moz, and he currently serves as an individual
contributor, blogging, speaking, designing tools, and generally trying to be
helpful to marketers worldwide.
Now, are you ready to buy your ticket? :) We'll see you there!
Get Your MozCon Tickets
Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten
hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think
of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but
want to read!
You may view the latest post at
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/seomoz/~3/Gg6Cx7c7_GI/mozcon-2014-agenda
You received this e-mail because you asked to be notified when new updates are
posted.
Best regards,
Build Backlinks Online
peter.clarke@designed-for-success.com
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