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Wednesday, September 26, 2018

Measuring the Metrics that Matter

Click-through rate (CTR) has long dominated as a core marketing metrics because it is so easily tracked. With video, new metrics, like engagement rates and completion rates (VCR), are also taken into account.
However, these metrics don’t necessarily prove the campaign is working toward the marketing goal if it isn’t defined properly.
Anthony Coleman, senior director, search and social, Digital Remedy, believes that easily-accessible metrics are not as useful as some people think. CTR only tells you how someone interacts with an ad, and can reflect some level of awareness, but not what actions the person takes in response, Coleman said. Another drawback of CTR is that it is easily manipulated to inflate numbers for more impressive results.  
“When you’re trying to run an active campaign and get new users in the door...a metric that is so easily shifted is not a good metric,” Coleman said.

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Beyond Click-Through Rates: Metrics That Matter

Tuesday, September 4, 2018

Live Event Marketing for Journalism

Even in our high-tech, hyper-connected world, people crave the type of human connection that only comes through live events. According to EventMarketer's  2018 Event & Experiential Marketing Industry Forecast & Best Practices Study, 84 percent of marketers surveyed consider events integral to their marketing operations.
Among the brands tapping into the power of live events are the local journalism outlets under the USA Today Network umbrella.  
“We’ve focused on a couple of key areas, that are passion areas for local markets and audiences,“ Andy Yost, the company’s CMO said. “They offer an opportunity connect in a meaningful and consistent way, and show that their unique portfolio of local brands can provide value beyond great journalism.”
People are not one-size-fits-all. USA Today Network crafted different types of branded events that range in price and attendance, depending on the type of event.  >
“All events are designed to show the extension of the powerful network we’ve built and to expand connection with our audiences,” Yost said.

Tuesday, August 28, 2018

Capitalizing on Holiday Marketing Throughout the Year

Labor Day
Every holiday occasions sales, though some have greater effects than others, and Labor Day is anticipated to be one of those bigger days. According to Adobe’s Digital Dollar Report, this year’s Labor Day is expected to reach the $2 billion mark in sales.
What marketers can do to capitalize on these occasions is not just to offer the usual promotional pricing but to engage customers by reaching out to them in a data-driven and emotionally intelligent way.
The data that Optimove  pulled up on holiday sales indicates Labor Day, like Memorial Day, enjoys a marked lift in sales. While the Fourth of July does occasion an increase of nine percent over an average order, which is ahead of Labor Day’s three percent and Memorial Day’s one percent, it falls behind other key measurements.

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What to Expect on Labor Day

Tuesday, August 7, 2018

What you really need to make it as a freelancer

Having been a freelancer for nine years now, I knew I'd be disappointed with the insight offered by the clickbaity title
"Do You Have What It Takes to be a Moneymaking Freelance Writer?"

But because I really am a curious  person who checks things out rather than assuming they are what I believe them to be, I clicked it to find out for myself.

All the advice in that post focuses on  writing well and being disciplined about sticking to it, reading voraciously, and being curious. In other words, we have the old cliche of work hard to follow your dream, and you will attain it.

Utter nonsense! Real life doesn't work like a Disney movie.

The difference between those who really make money and those who don't is not the skills you develop but the connections you make... and a touch of serendipity.

Why skills alone don't cut it
 You can be a writer on par with Jane Austen, but if you don't get your abilities noticed by the right person at the right time, you could end up churning out blogs for just $5- $10 a piece on sites like Upwork. Just working hard won't advance you that far.

The content mill proposition 
 In fact, that myth is what content mills use to lure writers into complicated reward structures that assure them of only fractions of a cent per view payable at some unattainable threshold level. "Just keep generating content, and you'll increase your earnings," they say, dangling that carrot that will forever remain out of reach for the poor souls caught up in such systems.

Fame without fortune
A similar ploy is used by those sites that will offer you no compensation other than exposure, which, they say, will, ultimately lead you not just to fame but at least some fortune.Don't you believe it!

Those who get sucked into such system will be mired in the false reality of low rates, which are not a reflection of quality of work as much as they are of the resources or generosity of the publisher.

The only way forward as a freelancer 
You have to connect with people who either have the power to hire or who can recommend you to those who do. You also need to get on board when the publication is flush enough with funds to offer a decent rate rather than demanding you work fora pittance. That's where the next quality comes in.

Serendipity
The way I ended up writing on tech was due to serendipity. In 2010, when I was starting to see possibilities in freelancing, I discovered an ad for work on Internet Evolution (it no longer exists). It was offering writers $10 per comment (that not per blog but just per comment). It seemed easy enough, so I signed on and then signed on to comment on additional sites form the same publisher.

 After a short while I was invited to writer at the rate of $200 a blog. For someone who was still at the beginning of her writing career, it seemed to be pretty good rate, particularly as it had the buying power beyond what $200 buys today. In fact, some would still consider that a good rate because there are publishers out there that won't pay more than $100 or even $25 a blog. I know this because every once in a while I reach out to a publication or have it reach out to me and get offered those very low rates despite having hundreds of publications to my name now.

The point is that without having connected with the people who were then offering a rate that they considered fair rather than what they considered what was the least writers would settle for, I had an anchor amount that didn't put as far down as those plugging away for $25.

As it turned out, my timing was especially fortuitous because some time later the comment compensation dropped to $5, and newer sites tried to get writers to work for just $150 a piece. I only still got the $200 because I insisted on it.

Myths of merit 
Did I retain what was becoming a higher than average rate  it because I'm that much of a better writer? No, nor do I believe that writers who have positioned themselves to consistently earn $1 a word are necessarily better wordsmiths than I, though they likely are better negotiators and networkers.

That  merit is always rewarded and that better performers are always compensated better because they're worth is is a myth.  While it's good to read myth-like stories and  fairy tales to build you imagination as a writer, it's not good to believe that virtue, hard work,  or event talent is inevitably rewarded in real life.

Reality
 As in any business, for freelancers to prosper, they need to make those vital connections that will give them opportunities for work and income.

Not Your Parents' Back-to-School Marketing

pic from https://images.pexels.com/photos/207658/pexels-photo-207658.jpeg?cs=srgb&dl=back-to-school-conceptual-creativity-207658.jpg&fm=jpg
While the heat of summer draws us to the beach, marketing campaigns pull us in another
direction – back-to-school season. Yes, it’s that time of year again, and today’s marketing campaigns must work with the expectations of parents -- and students – to be successful.
The back to school shopping season is a big deal for retailers. The National Retail Federation (NRF) estimates the spending for back-to-school shopping to hit $82.8 billion this year. That’s one of the highest on record.
According to a recent JLL Retail survey, low costs and wide selection are important factors to the majority (70 percent) of parents. They favor stores associated with low prices, ranking Walmart (50 percent) and Target (47 percent) among their top picks, and far ahead of Amazon (16 percent). Kids have substantial influence on purchases. More than 57 percent are involved in deciding which store to shop at, and specific items to buy.

Read more in 

Back-to-School Marketing Trends: It's All About Gen Z

Blockchain Could Track Ads

Digital ads have the advantage of scaling personalization effectively. But with the rise of ad fraud pushed forward by “bots,” numbers can appear inflated way beyond true human audiences. Some see blockchain as the most promising solution to this problem, given its function to act as an immutable ledger,
Blockchain has the potential to play a significant role in marketing and advertising. That vision is now being realized, thanks to the increasing awareness of digital ad fraud that is prompting marketers to seek greater transparency -- a primary attribute of blockchain technology.
The revenue currently lost to ad fraud is staggering. According to Juniper Research, losses will amount to $19 billion this year, which translates to roughly $51 million a day. Those numbers are expected to more than double over the next five years, to the tune of $44 billion. 
Shidan Gouran, president and CEO of Global Blockchain Technologies Corporation,says the problem is exacerbated by “programming bots to emulate human behavior to simulate engagement and traffic to earn revenue from those ads.” But he sees the possibility of curbing the fraud through blockchain by implementing solutions like adChain.  

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Using Blockchain To Beat The Bots

A different lookalike strategy to fit GDPR

Privacy concerns, and the need for GDPR compliance for any company that is globally connected has made it necessary for brands to find ad targeting alternatives.
The question is: are marketers going to step back, or take a step forward, with a new paradigm of lookalike data?
The trend in programmatic advertising has been to tap into more -- and more -- data about individuals, to deliver more personalized approaches. But with the rise of GDPR, not all data is fair play in the EU, and that changes the rules of the game.
Some companies are rolling back personalization and reverting to more traditional forms of contextual advertising. Others are looking forward by leveraging data in new ways.  
Earlier this week, Cedato officially released its Contextual Lookalike Targeting technology for programmatic video. 
Read more in 

Redefining Lookalike Strategies For GDPR Compliance