Showing posts tagged with: online marketing

July 11, 2019

Know The Common Difference: Black Hat SEO vs. White Hat SEO

If you landed on our Hawaii Marketing Tips blog by accident while searching for Team Vision Marketing, please visit our homepage, creative portfolio or client video testimonials to learn more about us.

Know the Common Differences: Black Hat vs. White Hat SEO

What is Search Engine Optimization or SEO?

If you’re not in the know, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a vital digital marketing strategy that is used to improve a website’s Search Engine Results. SEO  helps drive web traffic to your site organically. You can read more about SEO marketing and additional tips on our SEO Tips for Hawaii Businesses blog post.

Black Hat SEO vs. White Hat SEO

In this blog post, we provide an overview of the Black Hat and White Hat approaches to common SEO Marketing strategies. By understanding their differences, you can confidently distinguish which SEO marketing tactics will improve or hinder your online presence. 

You may have heard that White Hat or Gray Hat is the preferred and ethical practice of SEO marketing. This idea is prevalent because the White Hat approach follows the Webmasters Guidelines, which lists techniques that have long term benefits for your online presence. These techniques will also reduce the risk of being penalized by Google’s algorithms because they’re geared towards creating a valuable audience experience on your site. Going the White Hat route does require more effort and time on your behalf, but the payoff is well worth it. 

Black Hat SEO marketing includes “quick win” approaches that work outside the Webmaster Guidelines, thus manipulating the search engine’s algorithms to get a higher SERP ranking. Although controversial, these methods do work, but only for a short amount of time and the result of using these taboo techniques may get your web site penalized by Google and other search engines. We here at Team Vision Marketing  highly recommend avoiding the use of Black Hat SEO techniques because they cater to the search result’s algorithms, instead of benefitting your customers with rich content. Remember, the health of your online presence relies on the number of people that visit your site, how long they stay on your site, and how many pages they visit. 

What Happens When You Use Black Hat SEO?

You can’t cheat your way to the top of the SERP unscathed. Although it’s not illegal, Black Hat SEO tactics are shady tactics that violate the Webmasters Guidelines. If caught, Google will send a preliminary warning against your site and lower your ranking, giving you the chance to correct the wrong. Once you fix your SEO issues, you can submit a reconsideration request to restore your ranking. If your site continues to break the search engine’s rules, the site will be excluded from the SERP. Ultimately, this will your weaken your online presence and negatively impact your company’s reputation.

Creating Web Content

Content is one of the top key factors that affect your search rankings. However, your web page’s content is a broad web component that isn’t limited to materials created by you. It also includes the information or materials shared from other content creators.

White Hat:

White Hat SEO marketers understand that Google rewards sites that regularly post valuable content. The higher the rank, the more likely you will receive increased web traffic and new leads to your site.

Knowing this, you should create excellent content that covers trending topics, and that includes popular search words and phrases. Your content should also include credible links and share other high-quality materials, like videos or infographics, that help your audience discover new content creators or in-depth information sources. You should also regularly update older pieces of content with current information.

TIP: We suggest writing longer blog posts (current recommendation is 2,500 words or more). Longer blog posts help make your posts stand out not just to your audiences but to Google, as well. Think about it, longer content means more keywords and backlinks.

Black Hat:

When it comes to creating content, Black Hat SEO marketers will try to use auto-generated content. This is content created programmatically, using a set of rules or scripts instead of original content to trick Google filters. If you come across an online article that is full of grammatical and spelling errors, has duplicated information, is full of spam adverts, or includes nonsensical strings of keywords, it was probably auto-generated.

Adding Keywords and Key Phrases

Mixing in popular, relevant keywords and key phrases in the content, tags, and metadata are important to improving your  SERP ranking. These tactics help direct leads to your web site via search engine inquiries.  

White Hat:

The proper way of using keywords is to pair  your content with a blend of primary and secondary (AKA related) keywords. We suggest brainstorming search phrases related to your content or research keywords with tools like Google Trends, Google Search Console, and Google Correlated. You can even use the “Search related to _____” section at the end of the SERP for keyword inspiration (Image 1). 

Hawaii SEO, Black Hat vs White Hat SEO, Search Related Social Media Marketing

TIP: Optimize your content for long-tail keywords (long-tail keywords are keyword phrases that contain at least three words). They’re more specific and less competitive than generic keyword terms. Long-tail keywords are also optimized for voice searches.

Black Hat:

A common Black Hat hack for incorporating keywords into content, according to HubSpot, is keyword stuffing. Essentially, keyword stuffing is using an unnecessarily large amount of irrelevant or repetitive keywords in an attempt to rank higher for key search phrases. This is most commonly seen as blocks of text repeating the same words or phrases so often that it sounds unnatural. 

Here’s an example of keyword stuffing:

Honolulu, Hawaii Search Engine Optimization - Keyword stuffing example
Image 2

Another common controversial keyword hack is hiding text, which is used to trick audiences without raising red flags. This method can trick the search engines into taking account of all these keywords and ultimately result in a higher search engine ranking. 

Here are the following ways Google says that black hat practitioners can disguise text and links:

  • Using white text on a white background
  • Locating text behind an image
  • Using CSS to position text off-screen
  • Setting the font size to 0
  • Hiding a link by only linking one small character—for example, a hyphen in the middle of a paragraph

Getting More Backlinks

Backlinks or inbound links are incoming links to your web site. These links help add credibility to your content, as they are considered as a vote of confidence that your content is high-quality.

White Hat:

There are a number of authentic ways you can increase backlinks, but they do require time and effort. Here are our 3 tips on effective, Google-compliant methods of increasing backlinks:

1. Build a reputation as an expert in your field by frequently producing high-quality content, like blog posts, infographics, videos, or reports. Once established, other reputable web sites will want to share your content on their site and add backlinks to your site.

2. Network with popular blogs relating to your field or participate on news web sites as a guest blogger. Guest blogging, when executed within Google’s guidelines, is a highly effective SEO marketing strategy where you publish your content on another web site. This gives you the opportunity to increase brand awareness and create backlinks, thus enhancing your web traffic with a new set of audiences.

3. Moz.com suggests trying out “Ego Baiting”, which is a type of well-researched content that recognizes the excellence of highly reputable bloggers, industry leaders, etc. for the purpose of building a link networking relationship. “The hope is that, by being included, these people feel better about and are more inclined to share the content with a link,” according to Moz.com. This process includes outreaching to the recognized companies or individuals to encourage them to share the link to your “ego baiting” content on their site. 

Black Hat:

Creating Private Blog Networks (PBN) is a Black Hat SEO technique used to increase backlinks inorganically.  PBN are a collection of spam web sites or blogs that will backlink to a central web site (see Image 3). PBN cheat Google’s algorithm by artificially boosting the “trustworthiness” of the central web site. You can easily tell if a website is a part of this scheme if the content of the PBN web sites are basic or repetitive and if they all backlink to one site.

Hawaii SEO Tips - Black Hat vs White Hat Hawaii SEO Blog Post
Image 3

Building Structured Data & Schema

Think of Structured Data and Schema as something similar to metadata. These HTML tags help organize your web site’s data and add more descriptions to your content. This, in turn, helps search engines understand your web site better to create enhanced search results via rich snippets like reviews and phone numbers. 

White Hat:

White Hat SEO marketing will use Structured Data and Schema to enhance their look on SERP by adding extra helpful details that their search audience will find valuable. For example, a boutique hotel will add tags to include room rates (Image 4) or a cooking blog will add tags that will show the calories of their dishes (Image 5).

Hawaii SEO, Honolulu Search Engine Optimization, Black Hat vs White Hat SEO Blog Post Hotel Rich Snippet
Image 4
Hawaii SEO Strategies - Black Hat vs White Hat SEO Blog Post Recipe Rich Snippet
Image 5

TIP: Write strategically compelling tags that will help your site stand out from your competitors. Make sure to monitor your competitors search listing results so that you can evaluate and modify your Structured Data and Schema to remain competitive.

Black Hat:

Someone practicing Black Hat SEO will abuse Structured Data and Schema by providing inaccurate information to fool search engines and users into clicking onto their web site. For example, you can use Schema markups to artificially inflate your positive reviews or ratings with a fake review site, and use structured data to make the fake reviews stand out on search results pages.

 

Conclusion:

White hat Search Engine Optimization is the best way to sustain your long-term online presence and increase your overall web traffic. With our White Hat tips, you can increase your web traffic organically, build strong networks with other reputable sites, and strengthen your site’s credibility. 

Black Hat SEO techniques should be avoided as much as possible. While these shady tactics can achieve short-term results, search engines have created specialized algorithms to penalize Black Hat techniques:

  • Florida, which penalizes keyword stuffing
  • Panda, which penalizes content farms
  • Penguin, which penalizes certain bad linking practices

These penalties include lower search engine rankings, a decrease in web traffic, having your web site banned on the SERP, and a crippled reputation. 

If you found this blog post on common White Hat vs. Black Hat Search Engine Optimization techniques interesting and insightful, please give us a call at (808) 536-0416 to learn how we can help you improve your digital marketing efforts. For over 20 years, we’ve been a leading full-service Hawaii advertising agency, web design and digital marketing firm. But don’t take our word for it, please view our client video testimonials and hear directly from our key clients on how we helped grow their businesses.

 

Contact Us:

Phone: (808) 536-0416

Email: info@www.teamvision.com

Web: www.www.teamvision.com

Hear directly from Dolly Moreno, Dirctor of Sales & Marketing at Honua Kai Resort & Spa, on her experience working with Team Vision Marketing.

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Sources:

https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/331480

https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/black-hat-seo

https://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-link-building/tactics

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March 6, 2019

Let’s Get Personal: How To Win At Personalized Marketing

If you’ve landed on our Hawaii Marketing Tips blog by accident while searching for Team Vision Marketing, please visit our homepage, creative portfolio or client video testimonials. If you’re interested in learning more about Personalized Marketing, please continue reading.

Let’s Get Personal: How To Win At Personalized Marketing

How sweet is it when brands remember your birthday or curate suggested items that are complementary to your taste? It’s as if the brands really know you and really go the extra mile to give you great customer service. This level of VIP treatment can be accomplished by personalized marketing, a very important branding tool.

Today, brands are constantly seeking out technologies and strategies to efficiently pursue a deeper relationship with their consumers and increase brand awareness by personalizing their brand experience. For a lot of local Hawaii businesses, it is almost impossible and highly impractical to execute a well thought out personalized marketing strategies without the aid of Artificial Intelligent (AI) technology or the help of a competent advertising and marketing agency.

Personalized marketing and using AI technology is tricky because it can easily give an impression of a brand being invasive or annoying to your consumers. To guide you, here are some recommended personalized marketing strategies for you to try out in 2019. If you need help in setting up these personalized marketing strategies into your 2019 marketing plan, give Team Vision a call at (808) 536-0416.

But What Is Personalized Marketing?

Personalized marketing is any marketing strategy or campaign that goes into a personal level with your consumers. The main goal of personalized marketing is to convert your consumers into brand loyalists. This is vital to branding your business. It’s believed that personalizing marketing strategies will make each individual feel extra special and form a deeper connection between consumers and your brand, despite the fact that thousands of other people received the same messaging.

What Role Does AI Technology Play In Personalized Marketing?

AI is one of today’s best marketing tools. When combining data analysis and AI, brands can deliver curated messages and other marketing materials based on customer data.

AI commands high interest and investment from businesses around the world. A 2018 PwC survey reports that 27% of companies around the world use AI technology, and 20% more plan to utilize it later in 2019. Recent predictions foresee that companies worldwide will spend $11.45 billion on AI technology.

With AI Technology, Marketers Can Achieve:

Collecting Insightful Consumer Data

The more information collected, the more you understand your consumer. This will help you develop and target your personalized marketing more efficiently and accurately.

Sorting And Organizing Data

Segmenting the data into groups helps brands identify not only who to they can direct their personal marketing strategies to, but what type of information they prefer to receive.

Finding The Best Channels To Reach Their Audience & Sending Automated Personalized Responses

This function will free your employees from doing the mundane, repetitive tasks to focus on higher-value work

Recommended Personalized Marketing Strategies Using AI Technology:

Create Automated Follow-Ups Or Reminders.

Local businesses can send an automated follow-up after consumer registration, an event, purchase, or delivery. While, Hawaii service-based industries, such as doctors or hair salons, can send automated reminders for upcoming appointments. This strategy is ideal for encouraging repeat purchases, maintaining good customer service, creating a following, and engaging with audiences.

This can also remedy the abandoned cart issue. Brands can either send a soft follow-up or offer an incentive to encourage their audience to complete their purchase.

Check-In And Ask For Feedback On Your Products And Services.

We recommend offering an incentive to encourage participation. For example, participants can receive 10% off their next purchase if they complete a short survey on their latest purchase.

Create Personalized Emails And Enewsletters.

This strategy might include emailing reminders for restocking products, sending educational materials, etc. Personalized emails are great for encouraging monthly subscriptions and ensuring that you’re giving great customer service.

Take this opportunity to expand your brand’s awareness by educating your consumers on your products or services. Show your audience how you stand out from your competition and why you are the best choice for their future purchases and orders.

Personalize The Opt-in and Opt-out Options.

Let the consumers decide the frequency and the type of marketing materials they will receive. It makes them feel more in control and gives insightful information on what materials your consumers prefer to receive. Most importantly, your brand won’t be a nuisance to the consumer.

Create Interactive Materials.

Marketing is now all about tailored experiences. Let your consumers explore the product, service, or your brand on their own terms with impressive functions, such as an interactive site map or a tutorial.

Curate Or Cater Marketing Strategies Based On Consumer Data.

After collecting consumer data, either through surveys or past purchases, organize your consumers into databases. Then, create marketing materials specifically for each database. Consumers might appreciate this because it saves them time from browsing or, discover new products or services.

For our client, Castle & Cooke Hawaii, we designed and programmed their Web Advantage Program (WAP), which logs registered prospective buyers into databases in exchange for exclusive benefits, such as information on upcoming real estate projects. During the WAP registration, prospective buyers are required to answer engaging questions in our quick questionnaire. Based on the results of their questionnaire, the program segment the prospective buyers into databases based on when they expect to be buying a home if they have a family, or what community are they interested in learning more about. The WAP program databases help our team create the best marketing programs and target the best people for them.

Remembering Birthdays, Anniversaries, And Other Celebratory Occasions.

This is an extra bonus, but when companies like Sephora, wish you a “happy birthday” or offer a free sample or a birthday discount as a gift, anyone would feel special.

Tips:

Develop More Personalized Messages.

Put more effort into the messaging and make it sound more relaxed and casual than corporate. Make it enjoyable and easy to understand.

Make The Questions On Your Surveys And Questionnaires Short And Sweet.

Instead of having your consumers fill out 100 questions, take it apart into 10 or even fewer questions and send it periodically. Consider writing concise questions and simplify the selection of answers with pictures, provide a rating scale, or create multiple choice answers.

Get Creative And Make It Fun.

Design something engaging to encourage participation. Give the questionnaire a theme or create a “personality” quiz. Check out BuzzFeed quizzes for inspiration.

Don’t Go Full Out On AI Tech.

It’s important to add actual human elements. This is especially true for customer services. Customer services can use AI to help the consumer find the right department to talk to and collect data on what the brand needs to improve on.

 

In order to efficiently pursue a deeper relationship with their consumers in today’s market, local Hawaii brands need to invest their efforts into incorporating personalized marketing strategies into their new year’s marketing plan.  AI technology and the help of an accomplished advertising and marketing agency, like Team Vision Marketing, can offer a simplified, smooth execution.

To help you set up and recommend the best personalized marketing strategies or AI technology, reach out to Team Vision. We are more than happy to help you with all your marketing needs.

Team Vision Marketing has been serving local brands from O’ahu, Maui, the Big Island, and Kaua’i for over 20 years – check our past creative works in our portfolio. Then, subscribe to our marketing tips blog to stay up to date on today’s advertising and marketing trends.

Listen to what Harry A. Saunders, President of Castle & Cooke Hawaii, has to say on his experience working with Team Vision.

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January 3, 2019

What is Remarketing and How Do I Get Started?

What is Remarketing and How Do I Get Started?

Remarketing is a powerful way to reconnect with customers who have already visited your web site. It provides you with the opportunity to place highly targeted ads in front of a defined audience of users that have already visited your web site and know about your brand – as they browse through other web sites across the Net. Here at Team Vision, we use our own remarketing ad campaigns to remind past visitors about our brand with fun and creative messaging.

If you’ve landed here on our blog while searching for our main site, please visit the Team Vision main site.  Otherwise, please continue on.

Why Should I Use Remarketing Campaigns?

There are many reasons why we highly recommend Google remarketing to our clients. First, unlike traditional display advertising, you are not casting a wide net and just hoping your ad gets in front of someone who is actually interested in your product or service. With remarketing, you are speaking directly to prospective customers who have already visited your web site and know about your company. Remarketing gives you the immediate opportunity to remind those prospects about your business and with a very targeted message. For example, if your goal is to sell a product or service, you can put a special offer in the ad that relates to specific pages those prospects went to on your web site. If you’re looking to improve brand awareness, you could craft a clever branding message and run the campaign over a period of time (flighting) targeting your key target audiences.

Team Vision Self Promotion Remarketing ad

How Do I Set Up a Remarketing Campaign?

If you have experience using AdWords, Google Analytics, and some basic web site management skills, you may be able to set it up and manage the program yourself. However, we recommend working with a company that has experience creating and managing ongoing remarketing campaigns for multiple clients because they will know how to most effectively optimize your campaigns for the lowest CPC (cost-per-click) and greatest ROI based on their ongoing experience and learning. First, you will need to add a remarketing tag to all pages of your web site code (Note: You must achieve 100 Cookie ID’s on each remarketing list before your campaign will become active). Next, you will need to set up your campaign criteria such as targeting, bid type, ad schedule (day and times you want your ads to run), conversion tracking, max bid cost, etc. Finally, you will need to design your display ads and upload them to AdWords. There are quite a few standard display ad sizes. At Team Vision Marketing, we normally create 15 to 18 ad size variations for each campaign so that we achieve the most placements, and so our ads run in their original format and are not distorted or resized.

How Does Google Remarketing Work?

Remarketing works by placing a cookie on the devices of those visitors who already visited your web site, and who also meet the predefined criteria you set up in AdWords. Their cookie ID is then added to your remarketing lists. Your targeting can be broad (i.e. you can target anyone who visited your web site, or you can target visitors who visited a specific page on your web site but didn’t make a purchase or complete an action). You can set up multiple remarketing lists in your campaign, and you can create display ads that speak directly to the prospects on each list.

Team Vision Remarketing Ad 1

Where Will My Remarketing Ads Show up?

Your remarketing ads will appear on any web site that participates in the Google AdWords Display Network. The Google Display Network is the largest and most visited website group on the internet. In fact, the Display Network has the ability to reach 90% of Internet users worldwide. Through AdWords, you have the ability to target specific sites as well as exclude sites that may not be inline with your brand (i.e. sites with sexual content, violence, politic sites, etc.). You have the ability in AdWords Placements Report to see exactly which sites your ads appeared on.

        Access your Placements Report

  • Click into your display campaign
  • Select “Display Network” Tab
  • Select “Placements”: This will give you all the high-level domains showing your ad

How Will I Know If My Remarketing Campaign Is Successful?

The great thing about any digital online marketing campaign is that everything is 100% trackable. At a basic level, you will be able to monitor impressions, click-throughs, cost-per-clicks and cost per conversions on a daily basis. With conversion tracking code implemented, you will also be able to track sales revenues by campaign, by ad set and by specific ad. Another great benefit of remarketing is that you can easily modify campaign settings and ads on a regular basis until you achieve the goals you initially set out to accomplish.

What If I Need Help Getting Started?

If you’d like even more in-depth information about Google and Facebook/Instagram remarketing programs, or if you need help setting up and managing your program, contact us at (808) 536-0416, visit our web site at www.www.teamvision.com, or email us at info@www.teamvision.com

View samples of our online marketing, banner ads and remarketing ads in our extensive online portfolio at www.www.teamvision.com/portfolio.

Links to Team Vision Remarketing Campaign Examples:

Honua Kai Resort & Spa

Castle & Cooke Hawaii

Ke Kailani

Wailele Ridge Maui

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November 22, 2018

Busting Social Media Myths #4

Busting Social Media Myths #4

It’s common knowledge among digital marketing agencies that Social Media Marketing is an essential marketing tool, but some businesses still believe in some misconceptions surrounding it. Believing in these myths can affect the quality and growth of your brand’s social media presence. Team Vision Marketing’s team feels obligated to bust some of these common myths and help guide your business in the right direction. In this edition of Busting Social Media Marketing Myths, our team will weigh in on which online advertising networks are most popular, audience targeting, and sustainable methods for growing your social media follower counts.

Make sure to read Busting Social Media Marketing Myths #1, Busting Social Media Marketing Myths #2, and Busting Social Media Marketing Myths #3 for more busts on social media marketing myths.

MYTH 1: Facebook And Instagram Are The Only Effective Social Media Platforms To Advertise On.

Although Facebook Ads, which distributes social media ads on both Facebook and Instagram, is the dominant social media advertising network, agencies and brands shouldn’t disregard advertising on other social media platforms, such as YouTube and SnapChat. In fact, these other social media advertising networks have been improving their operating systems to increase advertising effectiveness and ROI. Digital agencies recognize the potential and value of these smaller social media advertising networks, as seen in the graphic below by Clutch.

Most Valuable Social Media Advertising Platforms for B2B and B2C

Team Vision Marketing recommends that brands be open-minded and research how you can potentially utilize these smaller social media advertising networks in your digital marketing plans.  Here are some pros and cons of each.

 

YouTube:

Pros

    • YouTube is used by a wide range of age groups.

YouTube Useage by Age Groups

  • It’s a creative platform with six different ad formats. Skippable video ads (a.k.a. TrueView ads), Non-skippable video ads, 6-second Bumper ads, Overlay ads, Display ads, and Sponsored cards.
  • There are 1.5 billion monthly users that watch one billion hours of YouTube videos daily. YouTube mobile video consumptions are increasing by 100% every year, according to HubSpot.
  • Video ads are an effective form of digital marketing/advertising. A 2016 study by Google and comScore found that 48% of online video viewers prefer YouTube as their top video site. Videos provide agencies and brands the opportunity to tell their story and educate their target audiences with their products or services in a creative way. With video ads, advertising can be engaging, compelling, and entertaining.
  • Keyword targeting on YouTube can be less expensive than keyword targeting on Google with views costing an average of $0.06 per click on YouTube (HubSpot).
  • YouTube Ads and videos can improve your SEO ranking.
  • There are new audience targeting developments. In addition to the YouTube behavioral video viewing algorithm, YouTube advertisers will be able to target viewers based on their past Google search history of products or services in the near future (HubSpot).
  • Another form of YouTube Advertising can take form as a collaboration with YouTube influencers. Influencer marketing can be effective because some consumers like to watch testimonials, reviews, or product demo videos before buying a product or service (Forbes). In fact, more than 80% of people trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations, like unboxing videos (Forbes). 90% of YouTube users say that product videos are helpful in the decision process and after watching a video, 64% of users are more likely to buy a product online (HubSpot).

Cons

  • It can cost a company a lot of time and money to produce high-quality video ads. There are numerous case studies that show that YouTube ads successfully increased brand awareness, conversions, and web site traffic. However, a successful YouTube ad depends on the quality of the video or if the YouTube influencer has a positive review of your products or service. Now that YouTube’s Director On-Site program has been terminated, small businesses will have to rely on in-house resources, an advertising agency, or YouTube recommended third-party video creating platforms to make video ads. For businesses that want to self-produce their YouTube ads, understand that it takes time to conceptualize the storyboard, write dialogue or copy for the ad, and block out shooting days. Then, it might be expensive to hire the right people to shoot, produce, and edit the video. In addition, your team might have to hire talent, rent a space to film at, and so on. Hiring or using one of the YouTube recommended third-party video creators might be a more affordable option. But the process will still require a lot of time and coordination between you and the third party video creator to create the ad.
  • Influencer marketing could be costly and might not produce the results you are looking for.
  • YouTube ads can be annoying. YouTube ads that play before or in the middle of a YouTube video can be seen as annoying by some. It’s easy for your audience to skip right past your ad and not pay attention to the message at all. Even so, these ads can be used effectively to create brand awareness, even with minimal viewing times.

SnapChat:

Pros:

  • Agencies and brands can reach millennials and Gen Z audiences.4 million 12- to 17-year-olds will use Snapchat. Emarketer.com estimates that Snapchat will add 1.2 million new users in that age group by 2022, while Facebook will lose 2.2 million.
  • About 187 million people use SnapChat 25 times per day.
  • SnapChat has high engagements. SnapChat says that for every 1,000 followers a profile has, 900 of them will watch their story (Hootsuite.com). Taco Bell reports that 80% of their approximate 200,000 SnapChat friends saw their stories (Hootsuite.com). Not to mention that it’s one of the best platforms for User-Generated content.
  • SnapChat has cool, interactive digital ad formats. SnapChat has three interactive ad formats: Snap Ads, Sponsored Geo-Filters, and Sponsored Lenses. When SnapChat users touch a Snap Ad, the ad can expand to a full screen video with audio, link to the brand’s web site, install an app, lead you to a long form video, or download an exclusive lens for the user to interact with. Sponsored Geo-Filters are great for increasing brand awareness and expressing the brand’s creativity. Sponsored lenses are interactive face filter animations that are really great for brand awareness and collecting user-generated content.
  • SnapChat made some cool marketing upgrades. SnapChat has updated its insight features to track more valuable analytics data and improved their targeting features. According to AdWeek.com, SnapChat now offers pixels that can track web traffic, conversions, and create retargeting and lookalike audiences lists. AdWeek.com also reported that SnapChat advertisers can now upload customer email lists to match their SnapChat ads to the users.
  • Ads are seen as less disruptive. Unlike Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, ads don’t pop up on SnapChat’s feed or interrupt the user’s content. Instead, ads run in the Discover tab on the SnapChat app. Also, sponsored Geo-filters, like the ones we designed for Honua Kai Resort & Spa and Dole Plantation, and Sponsored Lenses only show up if the SnapChat user is within a brand’s geo-fence.
  • Advertising costs for Sponsored Geo-Filters went down. SnapChat dropped their expensive advertising daily fees and opted to start using auction bids, like Facebook Ads and Google Ads (AdAge.com). However, according to Hootsuite, Geo-Filters can be as low as $5 to reach within the immediate location or $45 for 2 days to reach people in a city. According to AdAge.com, SnapChat is also developing a “Reach and Frequency” option for guaranteed prices according to approximate audience sizes.
  • There’s less competition on SnapChat than Facebook and Instagram. This means that, potentially, the keyword targeting bids are cheaper on SnapChat Ads than for Facebook Ads. It could also mean that there is less noise for the SnapChat audience, so viewers may be more willing to watch your brand’s ads.

Cons:

  • This digital advertising network is still new, and the audience is smaller than Facebook and Instagram’s advertising audience.
  • Audience exposure to SnapChat ads is limited to the users that browse through the app’s Discovery tab.
  • This digital advertising network is best for reaching younger people. If the target audience is older than teens and younger millennials, then it will be more effective to advertise on a different platform, like Facebook and Instagram ads.
  • Sponsored Lenses can be very expensive. This ad format is not suitable for smaller businesses due to the costs required to create and code lenses, and the ad space. This is why mainly big-name brands, like Urban Decay or Pepsi, uses Sponsored Lenses.
  • Designing custom Geo-Filters can be, potentially, expensive.
  • SnapChat Geo-Filters are best for brand awareness. These ads can be less effective for generating increases in conversions.

MYTH 2: Targeting A Broader Audience With My Social Media Ads Will Give Me The Best Results

Yes, targeting a broader audience can generate more impressions, a greater reach, and increased clicks for your brand’s digital marketing ads, which is why this targeting strategy is ideal for increasing brand awareness, lead generation, and collecting customer data. For example, using a broad audience targeting strategy, a boutique hotel on Maui might target West Coast USA markets and bid on more vague search phrases, like “Hawaii Hotels”, instead of a more targeted phrase like “West Maui boutique hotels”. However, using less targeted filters for your brand’s digital marketing campaigns also means that the ads won’t attract the highest quality audience. You’ll wind up paying more (because you’re reaching a much larger audience), but since your audience targeting is less specific to your brand, you won’t necessarily see a proportionate increase in conversions.

If your company wants to increase sales and attract a higher quality audience to your site, then consider marketing to a specific audience with targeting filters, like location, interests, income, age, groups, and likes. For a specific audience targeting to work efficiently, your brand needs to have existing customer data, a solid idea of who your customer is, or buy data from a third-party data sharing firm. For example, a local Hawaii furniture store advertising on social media will want to specifically target an audience who is at least 25 years or older and interested in home decor or home improvements. For Google Ads, this local furniture store would find that bidding on search phrases that name a specific location or product, like “Contemporary Furniture stores on Oahu” or “Where to buy couches on Oahu”, is more effective than “couches” or just “Hawaii furniture stores”. However, targeting a highly curated audience or bidding on really specific search phrases may counteract the effectiveness of the campaign by attracting too niche of an audience, or by being too expensive.

Team Vision Marketing recommends that brands first establish their marketing goals and objectives and then determine which type of targeting strategy to implement.  For our clients, we normally recommend a healthy mix of broad targeting (to attract new customers) and specific targeting (to increase conversions of existing customers) as there are benefits to both strategies.

MYTH 3: The Best Way To Gain Followers Is To Follow A Lot Of People And Then Unfollow Them.

Mass social media following, and unfollowing is an unsustainable follower growth strategy and it makes your brand seem unauthentic. And, having a lot of followers doesn’t necessarily mean that your social media profile produces great content. In fact, having a large follower base, but only receiving a small number of likes per post on Instagram, will seem strange. Brands can still follow a lot of social media profiles, but the motivation behind your follows should be that the brands you follow are somehow relevant to your business, or they produce great content of interest to you and your customers.  Our recommendation: don’t follow people and brands for the sole purpose of trying to get them to follow you back.

The best way to grow your social media followers is to produce quality posts and to interact in a meaningful manner with the pages you follow by liking and commenting on posts you enjoy.

Here are a few more suggested tips from Team Vision Marketing that will help you gain followers:

  • Create a good social media strategy.
  • Use free social media insights or social media analytics tools to determine the best times to post and what posts work for your business.
  • Use hashtags and tag a location on your posts.
  • Post high-quality content that brings value to your audience consistently.
  • Follow relevant profiles, companies, and influencers.
  • Promote your page or sponsor posts when relevant.
  • Collaborate with another profile with a bigger following, or with a social media influencer.
  • Incorporate promotions and/or incentives to encourage people to follow you. But remember, to keep them as followers long-term, you’ll have to consistently produce quality content.

It’s important to note that these social media marketing strategies and tactics will require a substantial investment of your time and energy on an ongoing basis. If your company doesn’t have an in-house social media management expert, it’s recommended that you hire a social media management team or a digital marketing agency to manage your social media accounts.

Does your business need assistance with managing your social media accounts? Give Team Vision Marketing a call and let us help you out. Be sure to check out some of our creative social media campaigns and promotions on our web site portfolio at www.www.teamvision.com/portfolio/#social-media.

Phone: (808) 536-0416

Email: info@www.teamvision.com

Hear from Bruce Barrett, VP of Sales & Marketing at Castle & Cooke Hawaii, on his experience working with Team Vision Marketing.

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Sources:

https://www.godaddy.com/garage/google-adwords-vs-facebook-ads-which-is-right-for-your-business/

https://adespresso.com/blog/facebook-ads-vs-google-adwords/

https://www.hubspot.com/marketing-statistics

https://www.facebook.com/business/help/203183363050448

https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/retail-consumer/assets/consumer-trust-global-consumer-insights-survey.pdf

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/04/cowen-facebook-vs-google-digital-ad-business.html

https://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-advertising-stats/

https://www.cpcstrategy.com/blog/2017/11/facebook-broad-audience-targeting/

https://later.com/blog/get-more-instagram-followers/

https://blog.hootsuite.com/how-to-get-more-instagram-followers-the-ultimate-guide/

https://forbusiness.snapchat.com/

https://www.adweek.com/digital/snapchat-story-ads-work-heres-how-to-see-success-in-seconds/

https://neilpatel.com/blog/explore-snapchat-ads/

https://blog.hootsuite.com/snapchat-ads/

https://www.emarketer.com/content/facebook-is-tops-with-everyone-but-teens

https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/youtube-video-advertising-guide

https://neilpatel.com/blog/how-to-use-youtube-ads-to-grow-your-business/

https://techcrunch.com/2018/03/20/get-ready-to-start-seeing-more-local-ads-on-youtube/amp/

https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2018/06/26/how-small-businesses-can-leverage-influencers-when-advertising-on-youtube/amp/&ved=2ahUKEwj0z5zlsdjdAhV0CTQIHV1iDBA4ChAWMAR6BAgBEAE&usg=AOvVaw2L0rd9-od7FbNZk2fKvabj

https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/video-marketing-statistics#sm.0000h4rgwfoa1fouwqm23llpma557

https://www.blog.google/products/ads/six-online-video-insights-from-comscore-to-inform-your-2017-media-plan/

August 24, 2018

Advertising on Amazon

Advertising on Amazon

Already established as a revolutionary online retailer, Amazon is now becoming a major advertising network. Still comparatively small to Google AdWords and Facebook Ads, only making $1.7 billion in ad revenue last year, it’s still a unique advertising environment that could catch up to the major advertising networks in the next few years. This is because, unlike any other advertising networks, Amazon is a popular online marketplace, which attracts 180 million US visitors a month, and the company has a trove of valuable customer data.

Currently, all online marketing and advertising is supervised by Amazon Media Group (AMG). AMG has two advertising platforms: Amazon Marketing Services (AMS) and Amazon Advertising Platform (AAP). Both platforms can reach audiences on the Amazon app, web site, and on Kindle and Fire products.

 

Amazon Marketing Services (AMS)

There are three Pay-Per-Click products:

Sponsored Products

  • Keyword or product targeting
  • Appears on Search Results page

Headline Search Ads

  • Keyword or product targeting
  • Appears on Search Results page

Product Display Ads

  • Keyword or product targeting
  • Can also target specific Amazon Standard Identification Numbers
  • Available in self-service portals

Amazon Advertising Platform (AAP)

A Demand Side Platform that allows brands to reach Amazon consumers beyond the web site via:

– Desktop and Mobile Display Ads
– Mobile Banner Ads
– Mobile Interstitial
– Video Ads

AAP can break down the audience into segments based on these unique factors:

  • In Market: People who might make a purchase in the product category
  • Lifestyle: Habitual long-term buyers of a category
  • Contextual: Ability to reach the audience in real time while they browse through Amazon
  • It can also target people based on who has looked for the brand and saw its products
  • Service can be managed by Amazon Media Group or self-service
  • Recommended more for brand awareness, not to increase sales
  • Only way advertisers can buy ad space on Amazon’s own websites

Amazon is a forward-thinking company that has evolved beyond their core online retailer identity. Although their online marketing and advertising operations are fairly new, Team Vision Marketing highly recommends brands consider launching online marketing and advertising campaigns on Amazon, as we anticipate rapid growth in their offerings over the next couple years.

If your business is in need of a full-service advertising and marketing agency to help you with advertising, web site development, social media and digital marketing services, give Team Vision Marketing a call and let us help you out. In the meantime, check out some of our online marketing campaigns, social media programs and promotions in our online portfolio at www.www.teamvision.com/portfolio

Phone: (808) 536-0416

Email: info@www.teamvision.com

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Sources:

www.adage.com/article/digital/amazon-a-plan-profitable-advertising/311992/

www.marketingprofs.com/chirp/2018/34935/the-inner-workings-of-advertising-on-amazon-infographic

www.advertising.amazon.com/

www.forbes.com/sites/kirimasters/2018/06/08/a-simple-guide-to-amazons-complicated-advertising-business/#189bbb963910