“But it’s not as dangerous as it sounds!”




Let’s look at some examples of great viral marketing campaigns to get the full effect on how useful viral marketing really is.

Get Down with the Sickness

What was the biggest movie of 2008? If you guessed Hotel For Dogs, leave now. Get out. If you guessed The Dark Knight, then you, sir, have guessed correctly (show him what he’s won!!).

One of the reasons The Dark Knight was so immensely popular long before the movie even came out is because of the viral marketing campaign employed by Warner Bros. This viral marketing campaign was ENORMOUS. Absolutely gargantuan. Phenomenal. Ridiculously good. I’m running out of adjectives.

“Give me a minute.”




The viral marketing campaign for The Dark Knight began a full year (May 2007) before the movie was released with a website called www.ibelieveinharveydent.com (now vandalized by the villainous Joker). In its entirety, The Dark Knight’s viral campaign spanned 35 websites. Let me say that again. THIRTY-FIVE websites (all of them are now vandalized by The Joker as well).

The sites range from campaign ads, like the one seen above, to fictional cab companies, news stations and the like. Warner Bros. created the fictional city of Gotham in the real world and asked fans to participate in it. And it all started by people sharing the websites and information, and trying to unlock clues and secrets and participating in tasks to reveal pictures of the film and teasers and trailers and things like that one time where they asked people in specific cities to dress up like The Joker and….oh, sorry, I was getting away from myself there for a second. You get the picture.

The key to how a viral marketing campaign can become so successful is that half of the websites had nothing at all to do with the movie, or barely even mentioned it.

To successfully make a viral campaign work, it may not have to contain your product or company at all. A successful viral marketing campaign is the complete opposite of a traditional marketing campaign. The basic idea is to take everything that you know will work in a traditional marketing campaign and do the exact opposite. It doesn’t have to contain your product, maybe a brief shot of the product or a web address at the end, but other than that, let your imagination soar into the skies like an eagle.

Sharing is Caring

On the other end of the spectrum, and sticking with the movie motif I have going here, is the Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie. The folks over there decided that they would launch a viral campaign as well, and if you can recall, didn’t turn out too well. What was the problem with their viral campaign? The small signs posted in 10 big cities were basically the entire campaign.

In a sense, it was a great way to get people to go, “Hey, what the heck is that?” But the major problem was its ability to be shared with others over a massive scale. People in those specific cities would MAYBE see them (they placed them in pretty hard-to-spot places), but it’s not like they could share them with their friends over the Internet or through other ways. And sharing is caring when it comes to viral marketing.

Your viral marketing campaign can be enormously effective through its ability to be shared with others. The content produced has to have the ability to catch people’s attention so much that they want to tell their friends about it, tell their Internet friends about and tell everyone they know about it.

Have you ever had a friend come up to you and say, “Hey, have you seen that [insert website, commercial, video, picture, etc.]? It’s awesome.” THAT’S viral marketing at its best. This is how The Dark Knight became so successful in its campaign. People were sharing the sites with each other, participating in tasks to reveal pictures and trailers, and the word-of-mouth spread….like a virus.

If you don’t think that viral marketing can work, then you’re being foolish. Look at how successful The Dark Knight became, and how much money it made, with some of that popularity being credited directly to the viral campaign it employed. If you’re still thinking, “I don’t want any part of this funny business! It’s not for me! Blah blah blah!” Then I have one question for you…

“Why so serious?”

Chris Levkulich Want content written for your Brand that shows up #1 on Search Engines and brings you new customers? Contact us.

But they’re there because they work. Let’s take a look at how effective these ads can be when we give the people what they want.

Judging Clickability

After we see an ad, what compels us to click? A study by LightSpeed Research (pdf) outlined in the article, Online Ad Preferences Vary by Age: Discounts Appeal to Everyone, compares online advertisement preferences between various age groups. Of course everyone wants an ad that is relevant and useful because if it wasn’t, you wouldn’t click on it.

Consumers want advertisers to understand their needs and ultimately provide a solution. The difference in preference arises when an ad is either entertaining or gives you money off. The younger generation (18-24) will pay more attention to an ad if it is entertaining, while older Internet users (45-54) could almost care less, seeing how there is a significant 12% difference in preference.

Discounts are also important when judging how successful an advertisement is. The studies show that all generations are looking for advertisements to offer discounts, but 18-34-year-olds rank the highest in preference at about 40%, while 35-year-olds plus are about 10% less likely to pay attention to an ad if it gives discounts.

The difference is not huge, but during these difficult economic times, it may not be that older people don’t want to save money, but that they are less likely to even consider luxury purchases when bills, mortgages and car notes are factors concerning their disposable income. On the other hand, those younger than 35 don’t have as many obligations and are in a very mobile stage; either still living at home or in college, or they may just be starting their careers so they are more willing to view an ad with a discount and be attracted to purchasing.

New Generation of Online Advertisements

Traditional types of media such as sponsored links, banners ads and emails are not completely out of the marketing mix because people are attracted to relevant search results to give them exactly what they are looking for. Search results also generate click-throughs by sparking some interest causing people to scan and browse an advertiser’s web page. But nowadays a simple “Click Here” is not enough.

Web surfers want to see blinking and scrolling, video seeding, audio and interactive games! All this in efforts to keep the consumer interested and entertained.

“This information is not specific to any age group; it is an average of all respondents from Figure 1.”

New forms of online advertising, like the use of sound, video, and *free Facebook gifts, are finding their place primarily in the young adult population (18-24-year-olds) while emails tend be more effective in those over the age of 25. Think about it, this data makes sense. The 18 to 24-year-old age bracket generally attend a university or college and have access to a computer, whether they are at home or on campus, and take advantage of social media networks, which give them the opportunity to be exposed to the posted advertisements. For example, Facebook started as a college social network to connect with other students attending their prospective institutions. Now, anyone can belong to Facebook, as long as they are categorized into a network; therefore, Facebook can create and market their ads to those who do not go to college or universities, but are still between the ages of 18 and 24.

On the other hand, emails generally reach an audience over the age of 25 because this population bracket is generally looking for future career paths, taking advantage of opportunities, reaching personal goals, acquiring banking accounts, accumulating expenses, paying bills, and so on, which exposes them to email advertisements and even spam. 34% of those between the ages of 25 and 34 say they have seen and sometimes clicked on an ad from an email.

*Branding Facebook gifts??

Advertisers aren’t only buying Ad space on Facebook, but branding free Facebook gifts. When you log into Facebook, the news feed updates you on upcoming events and birthdays, and then Facebook recommends giving him or her a free promotional gift, which are offered in limited supply. These gifts are are usually little cartoon trinkets like stuffed animals, a birthday cake, or bouquet balloons, but now it may be a box of Skittles Gum linked to a sponsored fan page or even a High School Musical DVD linked to its corresponding website.

Marketers are now educating themselves on this new wave of technology to find smarter and more innovative ways to penetrate the market!

Robin Miller Want content written for your Brand that shows up #1 on Search Engines and brings you new customers? Contact us.

“Meanwhile, we struggle to pick from a collection of 30 CDs!”

Quality Unique Content Makes All the Difference

Why is having quality unique content so important? Search engines are completely aware of the content that already exists on the web, so creating content that merely duplicates existing content will earn no points in the search engine rankings. Search engines revel in quality, unique content and are constantly looking for updated, fresh and legitimate websites.

Visitors to your website will also appreciate quality content. People want useful information, not just clever pics and millions of links. Unique website content will increase the number of visitors returning to your website over and over again. Value is gained when other websites want access to the unique articles on your website. And as we know, other sites adding hyperlinks to your content increases PageRank.

Unique Content: Literally Unique vs. Conceptually Unique

Because of the high volume of websites that inhabit the web, sites wishing to optimize their visibility and sustain that visibility long-term should harness the concept of having unique content. Additionally, it is valuable to understand success will come when unique content is unique from a conceptual standpoint and not necessarily a literal standpoint.

“I’ve not been this confused since Duchamp’s ‘The Fountain’.”

So, what exactly is the difference between literally unique content and conceptually unique content?

Literal
Taking the literal approach to adding unique content will likely do very little to increase the visibility of a website because the actual information on the site can be found elsewhere.

This approach provides unique syntax and diction for the information provided, but the information can be found on other websites. Here is a humorous (and not suggested) technique for those looking to add unique content to their site using the literal technique.

Conceptual
Conceptually unique content takes a little more thought than plowing through a thesaurus to reword paragraphs or throwing together keyword-rich text. Instead, conceptually unique content presents new ideas, innovations, new twists and new ways to present information to the reader.

Value is added to any preexisting information or services using this technique because the goal is to create something better or different than what already exists. Doing this takes some effort but is definitely worth the potential outcomes versus going the literal route. So, how do you go about creating conceptually unique content?

Developing Unique Content

Before developing unique content for a website it will be very useful to think about the following first:

• Nobody is going to visit a website that provides information that another website provides in a better way
• What kind of websites do you enjoy most? How are they unique?
• Observe what’s already on the web and note any holes or gaps in the content that can be filled or done better
• Make sure content is actually useful, informative and relevant

After doing this, think about the content that will be provided on the website and present the information in a different way. Try to fill in any holes or gaps that are observed on similar websites. Content becomes quality content when visitors find the information on your website valuable.

So keep the reader in mind when writing your content. Content should be relevant to the topic and informative so Web users will stay on your site and hopefully return to it again.

Next, it is most important to keep your website updated. As you create your website, content may become stale. Keeping a site regularly updated will increase rankings on search engines which will lead to more visits to the website. Dormant content on a website breeds no visitors; so, keep the information fresh and updated.

“Updated. Unlike your lonely daily-calendar”



For those who may be feeling inadequate in developing their own quality unique content for a website, there are options available: SEO (Search Engine Optimization) services specialize in creating effective content for websites. SEO writers work to market the website in a positive light and can be very helpful to utilize.

Branding Brand is an interactive marketing company that specializes in SEO.

What to Remember About Unique Content

Increasing the visibility and search engine rankings for your website can be as simple as making sure you have unique content for your website. Think about your target audience and what it wants that it can’t find elsewhere.

Present information in a unique light that will attract more visitors, as well as other websites that add hyperlinks to your content.

Finally, remember to keep your website updated. Fresh content will increase your presence on search results - giving your website the competitive advantage that is necessary amongst the millions of websites that exist out there in the cyberworld.

Ashley Reid Want content written for your Brand that shows up #1 on Search Engines and brings you new customers? Contact us.

What makes a good tweet, and why marketers should care

It is sweeping the nation, attracting attention with celebrities like Ashton Kutcher and Oprah. You guessed it, the phenomenon is…Twitter!

Okay, old news? Perhaps. But despite the buzz, few marketers today seem to know what to make of it.

“Their icon is equally perplexed.”


(In case you have been locked in a closet for the last couple of years, you can check out this whole “Twitter thing” via Wikipedia, another internet sharing database professionals love. Not.)

By the end of this blog, I hope to explore:

• What makes a good tweet
• What branders can learn from the technique behind the tweet

(If I were a true Twitter fanatic I could have covered both of these topics in under 140 characters.)

The Art of the Tweet

A good tweet is:

• Short and stweet *er*um* sweet… alright, I’ll stop
• Starts a conversation with the audience
• Uses the right lingo
• Creates community

Short and stweet

Luckily, Twitter puts the cap at 140 characters, but the best tweets are sometimes the shortest, leaving followers asking for more.

Starts a conversation with the audience

When author of “Twitter for Dummies,” Laura Fitton’s daughter had a bad fall in front of her eyes, she resisted the temptation to just rehash the incident on Twitter. Instead, she simply wrote, “What do you do when something really scares you?”

The predominance of individualized social media points to the fact that people don’t just want to be viewers anymore; they want to be participants. So, give them a chance to express their view!

Uses the right lingo

Abbreviations and everyday language (rather than professional jargon) is used to get the point across without “dancing around the bush.” Tweeters can search by subject; so, use the language they use, or else they’ll never come across your tweet!

Also, if your post is a direct response to another tweet, putting an “@” sign in front of their Twitter name will make it pop up on their notifications.

Creates community

Yes, social media has been all the buzz in the marketing community - the Holy Grail. Few marketing professionals dare to question its supreme power… and yet, fewer still understand why it has been so popular.

Understanding how to tweet is vital because it is a successful use of language, and creating a strong brand is all about using language to convey your overall message.

What branders can learn from the technique behind the tweet

So what does Twitter have that Ads don’t?! (and more importantly what can we learn from it as marketers?)

A recent article by Washington Post reporter Monica Hesse instructed readers on the so-called ‘art of the twitterature.’

“Twiterature?!”



But, why does this matter to professionals trying to get their brand recognized?

Perhaps celebrity Ashton Kutcher (boasting a leading 2 million followers) could answer this question where marketers have failed to do so.

More than just your average Joe, Kutcher is also a brand. He depends on brand/name recognition and positive feelings from fans to drive sales of tickets, movies, merchandise, and most recently, Nikon cameras. If he already has nearly 2 million people “following” his every tweet, imagine the kind of brand recognition he enjoys above the competition who are without the following he has.

Let’s cut to the chase.

Today, consumers (especially young consumers) are more cynical than ever about obvious advertising. In the ‘good old days’ of advertising, reaching the audience was much simpler, and let’s face it - some of the advertising that resulted had all the subtlety and finesse of the Coyote’s Acme Co. Rocket.

Consumers are simply not responding to the old and obvious ways of marketing. They’re tired of getting talked at.

They’re demanding:

• Entertain me.
• Talk to me.
• Don’t waste my time.

Virtually every medium of advertising imaginable now has a coinciding technology to block it out. Click. TiVo. Delete. Tweet.

The challenge to branders today is to connect with their audiences in a way which is conversational and engaging.

In this regard, branding professionals may be able to learn something from the short, seemingly trivial posts of Twitter. The kind of conversation across sub-groups which Twitter has so easily created is the same type of conversation branders have been thriving for forever.

The most successful marketers in the future will be those who can take the lessons of Twitter and use them to design creative advertising and PR which does not talk at the audience, but instead, meets them where they are.

Shane Smith Want content written for your Brand that shows up #1 on Search Engines and brings you new customers? Contact us.

“I did want that watch…”




Read on to learn how to use various micro-conversion actions in the categories of:

• Page Views
• Participation
• Purchasing

Page Views

You can use page views and related statistics to measure significant micro-conversion actions. One significant micro-conversion action is the click-through-rate.

Click-through-rate:

• Measures how many people click through to another page on your site
• Gauges the effectiveness of your website
• Easily measured
• Informative

However, the click-through rate is not the most effective measure in every situation. For advertisers, for example, page view statistics can be more important than click-through rate. Internet users rarely click on ads; instead, they remember the product or service and come back to it later. Ash also mentions the average advertising revenue per page view as a measure for advertising effectiveness and micro-conversion actions.

Page views are also important for websites with an educational focus. Whether you are a non-profit organization trying to raise money for political campaigns or a business selling a highly specialized product or service, many websites target education of customers as a primary goal. In this case, page view statistics as well as time spent on the pages serves as a good measure of a micro-conversion action.

Participation

“Put me in, coach!”



Many websites are structured so that visitors can participate without actually having to make a purchase. This participation represents important micro-conversion actions that can later lead to large sales.

The download rate or printout rate of special offers or coupons is one good measure. Many websites offer free online offers that do not require customers to submit personal information, hoping that this will inspire them to return for more products. The rate at which these offers are downloaded, printed, or used is an important measure of a micro-conversion action.

The form-fill rate measures more involved participation by the visitor. The form can vary from a brief survey to a highly detailed form or application. The form-fill rate is an excellent concrete measure of smaller conversion actions and provides consumer information which can lead to larger ones.

Purchasing

A purchase is always viewed as a conversion action, but there are several ways to measure how successful and profitable the conversion was.

The sales conversion rate is the most basic measure; it is the percentage of visitors to your site who complete a purchase.

The shopping cart abandonment rate is used to see how many visitors start the check-out process but never finish it. See this Branding Brand blog post for great tips on how to avoid shopping cart abandonment.

“Not everyone embraces the cart the way these guys do!”


The revenue per visitor and profit per visitor statistics can be more detailed and useful. Revenue per visitor is particularly useful when deciding which products or services to focus on. If you have a high sales conversion rate but are selling only your cheapest products, you can change the focus of your site in order to raise revenue. Using both statistics allows you to measure the effectiveness of the changes; if your revenue goes up while your sales conversion rate goes down, your website is successfully channeling customers through desired conversion actions.

Measuring revenues, as with other conversion actions, doesn’t have to be limited to retail sales. This article describes how to adjust the revenue per visitor statistic to apply to other aspects of business, such as marketing, advertising, and customer support.

Similar adjustments can be made for any of the measures discussed in this article. The important thing to remember is that you can measure conversion actions in any way tailored to your business, as long as they are easily defined and concretely measurable.

Profit per visitor is closely related to revenue per visitor, but useful in a different situation. If your products have different profit margins, you can use this measure to determine how much profit you are making. Your revenues can be very high while your profit is still low, and using both statistics allows you to catch this and work to correct it.

Clearly defining small conversion actions along the path to the ultimate conversion action increases the effectiveness of your website. Targeting many of these defined conversion actions at once is the most effective way to lead your customers to the the big sale. Micro-conversion actions aren’t limited to the ones listed here, nor do they have to be specific to retail sites; they can be tailored to any business or organization and used to increase the ultimate conversion rate.

Eliza Dreier Want content written for your Brand that shows up #1 on Search Engines and brings you new customers? Contact us.

• What is link building?
• How can link building help you and your website?
• What types of links exist?/How are they acquired?

What is link building?

Link building is the process of establishing internal and external links to a website. It’s an integral part of search engine optimization because links can attract users to different websites.
Link building is all about increasing the number of high quality, relevant links to a website in order to raise its visibility in search engine results.

How can link building help you and your website?

“Building confidence, one link at a time!”




A link to your website shows that someone has confidence in your content. Passing on a visitor/ recommending your content suggests that you are following the same topic, which indicates a community. Link building is crucial for obtaining high ranking pages on keywords. A search engine recognizes a websites popularity by its links. This recognition will boost your rank, increase your exposure, and ultimately improve your sales.

Now the most critical portion:

What types of links exist?/How are they acquired?

These questions are paired because they aren’t mutually exclusive.

“Sorry gamers, we’re not including this link…”

There’s 2 major groups of links:

1. Editorial Links

These are links obtained without paying, asking or trading to be linked to. These are links which a website draws organically, because that site produces good content and markets that content with social media sites.

If people link to you, intending to cite your original content, then those links are more trusted:

“Website gets on Social Media Site > Blogger sees story > Blogger likes story > Blogger writes about site > Blogger links to site.”

2. Acquired Links

These are acquired by the site owner via payment or distribution.

They can include:

• Paid linking
• Reciprocal linking
• Article distribution
• Directory links and comments on forums, blogs and other interactive forms of social media

Search engines are less inclined to value these rankings as highly because they are self-promotional.

Just as the types of links vary, the views on each type vary. Some types are more valued than others. Google tends to look down on paying for links. Some people feel it’s an equally fruitful method. But everyone agrees that acquired links (such as paid and reciprocal links) need to be augmented.

Link building strategies need to be diverse, utilizing different options for optimizing your results and guaranteeing safe linking strategies.

There are many differing opinions about what works, what doesn’t and which methods are more valuable than others.

Like any good project, you must do research before you even begin to work. Design and develop your link building plan before you implement it; this generates better results for your campaign.

“You do want a successful campaign, right?”




One recommended strategy is to craft your campaign based on your competitors:

• Get the pagerank info of your website and your competitors; this way, you can set appropriate targets for yourself.
• Know your competitors’ actual link building strategies, rather than just their pagerank. It won’t hurt to emulate some of your competitors’ methods.
• Do they utilize blogs? News sites? Social Media?
• Implement your own ideas, too. Diversifying strategies is a good strategy in and of itself.

People need a reason to link to you. The best way to achieve that is by writing great content. This can be anything from an article, to an online tool, to a funny video. People need to have confidence in your content before they pass it on to others. They will have confidence if your site is informative and entertaining - having the user enjoy his time on your site is crucial. This helps to develop a good relationship with new and long-time customers, which can spur customer referrals and eventually help to build a larger community.

A community’s important because it’s a signpost of quality. Quality revolves around the relevance of the linking site. A topically relevant link indicates it’s from a community.

There are other ways to engage customers and supplement a community, like getting them to write reviews on their site. This can come in handy with smaller, local businesses trying to build links with local search terms. This can help your website and theirs gain exposure through newspapers, blogs, popular sites and events.

Link building usually takes center stage during SEO and SEM discussions, and rightly so. Link building is a complex and vital pillar of SEO and SEM and can make or break your business.

“Get ready to take notes!”



So read on and become learned:

• But why?
• What is PageRank?
• How does PageRank affect rankings?
• How can I see PageRank?

What’s the Point?

Hopefully, you remember from the last article why PageRank was created. But, let’s briefly review. The men behind Google’s PageRank wanted to create a search engine that beat out the competition - those that analyzed text. Text analysis wasn’t enough - it lacked the human factor. (For those of you who don’t trust the intelligence of the general populace, the rest of this may scare you. But give it a chance!)

PageRank helps Google return results that human visitors find important.

“Human visitors?”

What is PageRank?

Basically, Google assigns a numerical value on a scale from 0-10 to every URL. This numerical value is its PageRank, or PR. According to its creators, PageRank is “an objective measure of its citation importance that corresponds well with people’s subjective idea of importance.”

According to Google’s Technology Overview, PageRank:

• Measures the importance of a webpage
• Considers the importance of each page that links to a webpage

Every URL (webpage) starts with a small amount of PR that increases as other pages link to it. We can assume of course, that these pages are run by people - so in essence, a person, rather than a “page” has linked to that site. Therefore, the aforementioned “human factor” is taken care of.

We can assume (except for you skeptics of human intelligence out there) that people link to pages they consider important, and thus, PR is a reflection of this importance. The higher a webpage’s PR, the more important it is.

Each time a person links to a page, he/she is casting a vote that says, “I think this page is important.”

It’s pretty democratic, except that:

• A page (person) can vote more than once
• Pages with a higher PageRank have weightier votes

So, if I am running a website to promote my organic farm that uses organic pesticides, I’d rather get a link from EcoSMART.com (PR 5) than from HowStuffWorks “Organic Pesticides” (PR 3).

How does PageRank affect rankings?

Google’s Technology Overview says:

“We use more than 200 signals, including our patented PageRank™ algorithm, to examine the entire link structure of the web and determine which pages are most important. We then conduct hypertext- matching analysis to determine which pages are relevant to the specific search being conducted. By combining overall importance and query-specific relevance, we’re able to put the most relevant and reliable results first.”

Although PageRank is helpful, it is not the only or most important component of Google’s website ranking. Other factors, such as relevance, are essential. Consider what happens when you conduct a Google search to see why:

1. You enter a search query into Google.
2. Google scans its index for the words in your query.
3. Google sorts through and selects pages relevant to your query.
4. Pages are sorted by PageRank and other signals.
5. Your results appear.

This means that no matter how high a page’s rank is, it won’t appear unless the page is relevant. So, if you do a search for “Mexican restaurants in Pittsburgh,” you can count on receiving a list of Mexican restaurants in Pittsburgh (even if they’re PageRanks are no higher than 3), not a link to Facebook, even though its PageRank is a 9.

“Wait, that’s not a taco…”

How Can I See PageRank?

Now that you know what it is…you’re probably curious as to how you can see the PR of a webpage.

Here’s 2 ways - download one or both:

1. Google Toolbar to see the PageRank meter - the more green that shows in the meter, the higher the PageRank.
2. SEO for Firefox tool - this shows the PR under every Google search results - either automatically or on-demand, depending on your settings.

Realize that these give general measures that are sometimes outdated. They still help as they say something about a page, nevertheless.

Up Next…

You’ve only taken one delicious bite of what PageRank really is. To feel more satiated, stay tuned for the next article to learn how PageRank is measured.

Kara Arnold Want content written for your Brand that shows up #1 on Search Engines and brings you new customers? Contact us.

“Customers mutter to themselves about their frustrations.”




It makes your customers angry and just want to forget about the whole thing. Shopping cart abandonment has become an ever-increasing problem for online marketers. This article offers some insight as to how to make the online checkout process a little less painless for all involved based off of the advice of online marketing expert Bryan Eisenberg.

Read on to learn about:

• Less elusive shopping
• Interactive virtual shopping cart
• Pain-free checkout

Less Elusive Shopping

Online shopping might be increasing in popularity, but some people still have their qualms about taking the leap into “cyberspace shopping.”

Call-in or Mail-in Forms
For those that aren’t quite ready to take the leap, having the option of calling-in orders or mail-in order forms should still be intact.

Security
The baby-boomer generation is concerned with security and making sure that things are indeed legitimate. Online marketers should be aware of this market segment, and features to focus on in the online checkout should include assurance of 3rd party reinforcement along with logos to make sure that all of the info entered is indeed safe.

Accessibility
To go along with this, warranties should be made apparent on the site, instead of being hidden somewhere. Everyone always says, “Read the fine print.” While this is true, it shouldn’t take forever to find this information on the website.

If your customers aren’t satisfied with the products and find that they can’t return their new pair of shoes or their new sweater, they’re probably going to be pretty upset. Most people want to know what they are up against when they have to deal with the big, bad exchange/return monster.

“They have to deal with the big, bad exchange/return monster?”

Interactive Virtual Shopping Cart

When customers finally start to go through the stages of the checkout process, there are a lot of things to consider on the designing side of it all.

Thumbnails
A lot of people are visual learners so having a thumbnail picture of all the items in the cart is often a desired feature. This also helps when cross- and up-selling are trying to take place. If there is a picture of what the person is intending to buy, it is going to be a lot easier to show them items that could either complement or supplement the product that they are already intending to purchase.

Recommend a Purchase
If other products are recommended based on what others are buying, this will give the buyer a sense of belonging and being able to identify with a group of similar people (or so they think). Also, along with the picture, a link back to the original product should be included. This gives the consumer the option to go back and look at product details one last time to make sure that this is really what they want.

Pain-free Checkout

Once your customers decide what they really want and don’t want, then it’s time to proceed to putting in all of the information that seems to take close to FOREVER. (Unless of course one has cookies. And I mean, who doesn’t love cookies?) During this process, it is very important to ensure accuracy on both parties’ parts, as well as making the final process relatively pain-free so your customer doesn’t just give up and click that X button on the top of the screen. You can bet it’s going to be tempting for them if your information page is not user-friendly.

“Cookies save your customers’ time.”



From here, they can then go to enter the coupon info or promotion code, which should not only be labeled well, but placed somewhere on the page where it makes logical sense. Marketers need to make their pages user-friendly to increase sales and customer interaction, and more importantly, time spent on the site that might then lead to a sale.

Payment Possibilities
Next comes the payment information. Now in this day in age, most people own credit or debit cards, so this should not be a problem. However, not everyone has these, and seeing as how no one should be left out of this whole cyberspace shopping experience, make different payment options.

Throw in some PayPal, check or money order options if you can swing it. If people feel like they are being catered to, they are probably going to be more likely to order that new coat or boxed DVD collection.

Now that all of the information is in, they’ll click that confirm order button and voila, online purchase complete. This whole thing from start to finish should be relatively pain-free. Otherwise, neither party is going to benefit here. Depending on what shipping method your customer chose, the product will be to them in 1-6 weeks.

This whole process isn’t that painful, but there are 3 major ideas to keep in mind for online marketers in order to keep their site retention rates high among their online shoppers:

1. Have a progress indicator at the top of the screen the whole time the customer is going through the purchasing pages. The customer will know there isn’t much further to go and is more likely to stick with it than just forget about it.
2. Try to have them take an exit survey for those that do actually fall to temptation and cancel their order by clicking that X button at the top of their screen. Find out why they didn’t complete that order. This can only improve services to the customer in the future. Heck, even try to give the survey to the people that actually did complete their orders. Feedback of any kind will help the marketers increase their retention rates online.
3. Make a distinct difference between the cancel order and continue buttons. Too many times, people will accidentally click the cancel button and just give up, because they don’t want to start the whole process over again.

Following these three ideas will make everything else run smoothly.

Clearly, even though online shopping is growing in popularity, there are still some glitches and things that need to be worked on before it lives up to its predicted potential. However, I truly think that it is going to be the way of the future.

The ultimate goal is to completely wipe out consumer frustration and avoid shopping cart abandonment at all costs. I mean, wouldn’t it be great in the future to avoid Black Friday mass mayhem and shop online in your PJ’s with your cup of coffee, and then just head back to bed once you are satisfied? I’ll shop to that.

Kyra Pritchard Want content written for your Brand that shows up #1 on Search Engines and brings you new customers? Contact us.

“Unfortunately, we’re not talking about this duo.”




What’s more important than your PageRank? Okay, not a lot. But the ability to trust your Web site is definitely up there. In fact, the SEO Book recently said trust is the new competitive advantage in Web sites. Imagine you’re writing a research paper about George Washington Carver and how he invented peanut butter. Which source would you prefer - Jif.com or an old Geocities site called “george washington carverz world!!!”? Some of us are a little nostalgic and may want to choose the latter, but we all know a professor would only accept a professional source - one which people know they can trust.

So how do sites become trustworthy? Read on for the Branding Blog’s Top 5 Trust Techniques

1. Now You See Me, Now You Don’t: Be transparent.

People will only begin to really trust you if they have a sense of who you are. This doesn’t mean giving out your full name, address, BMI or any other information you’re uncomfortable with sharing. But a brief introduction, perhaps with a photo, will show visitors that you’re a real person.

“Show visitors that you’re a real person.”




Even a paragraph explaining what your site is about, maybe with a brief mission statement, will show readers that you really care about what you’re talking about.

For example, if you manage a blog about Akron Ohio’s emerging art scene, explain that you have lived in Akron for 25 years and your art has been featured in a number of local galleries. This type of information can be elaborated upon with testimonials, which is discuss later in this article.

2. My, What A Lovely Font You Have: Look and sound professional.

The Look
Anyone can take a template and make a blog or Web site. But it takes real know-how to make a site look great.

Personalized banners and layouts are what will get your site noticed and trusted. A sleek, modern site shows visitors that you’re hip to the kids’ jive - that is to say, you know what you’re doing.

Meanwhile, a blog in Comic Sans and side-scrolling banners might repel readers away. Take a quick lesson in graphic design by looking at other popular Web sites - Helvetica, lowercase titles, dark and neutral color schemes; seeing a pattern yet? Don’t directly imitate other designs, but use them as inspiration for your own. Take some pointers from this Web site - it lists some of the worst-looking sites around.

The Language
Looking professional is one thing, but sounding professional is another can of worms. Gone are the days of simply hitting “Spellcheck” to ensure your spelling accuracy; there’s grammar, structure, and vocabulary to worry about.

The best course of action is to have coworkers or friends proofread your writing over and over.

3. Don’t Take My Word For It: Use testimonials.

Testimonials are like having an army of press secretaries for free.

• Encourage users to leave feedback and use their reviews to your advantage by posting them on your site.
• Be sure to include names, occupations, ages; any details to prove that these comments are coming from real people.
• Consider devoting an entire section on your page to testimonials or reviews.

“Testimonials are like having an army of press secretaries for free.”




If your site has been featured in a popular blog, magazine, newspaper or television, don’t be afraid to list every single one. They can only increase your credibility and show visitors that you know what you’re talking about.

Never ever make false testimonials or get your friends to write testimonials for you. It may seem like no one would ever know, but if it somehow got out visitors may never trust you again. Not to mention the gods of branding have a way of knowing when you’re lying and making you pay for it later.

4. Keeping It Real: Don’t delete comments.

You wake up one morning to find that one of your most recent posts has been blasted by a famous blogger. She says your articles are “uninformed, biased, and downright horrible,” and she encourages the rest of your readers to boycott your blog.

You may find that you’ve unconsciously directed your cursor over the “delete” button, which is a natural reaction - but hold it right there! This fiendish foe may have just spiked your readership by simply mentioning your blog in her post.

Famous celebrity battles have always made headlines, like last year’s Donald Trump v. Rosie O’Donnell debacle. Each party faced a lot of criticism from the opposition, but the battle boosted popularity for both of them.

Deleting negative comments will always have readers thinking you have something to hide. Keep the comment and politely defend yourself. If your site is really trustworthy you should have nothing to hide.

5. Check The Expiration Date: Update often.

Nothing sours the stomach more than finding a site that hasn’t been updated since 2001. But even blogs that haven’t seen an update in a few weeks will quickly be dropped from bookmarks if not rehabilitated promptly. Remember, the decision to make a Web site is an important one, and it’s a pretty big responsibility.

“Keep things fresh!”



Even if your site is centered around something simple like a small town bakery, it is extremely important to find something to keep it current by:

• Giving a first-time visitor a reason to return to your site.
• Removing items that aren’t pertinent anymore to minimize confusion. If you have an event calendar from 2006, it’s time to get let it go.

In the case of the small town bakery, posting a daily menu of specialty items or a list of each week’s best-sellers are great ways to keep things as fresh as their goods.

Pam Hanlin Want content written for your Brand that shows up #1 on Search Engines and brings you new customers? Contact us.

Web advertising is becoming increasingly popular as the Internet becomes more and more critical in our everyday lives. And why not? There are several benefits that advertising on the Web offers that other advertising mediums lack, including:

• Being able to target a specific niche
• Immediate statistical return for how the ad is doing
• Building brand awareness and customer relationships

“Targeting specific niches makes bank!”



This article covers:

• Main goals of Web advertisement
• Types of Web advertisements
• How Web ad success is measured
• The Impact of ad size and position
• Other Ways to make a Web ad more effective

Main Goals of Web Advertisements

You may think that Web advertisers’ main goal in creating these ads is an evil scheme to trap you into a world chalk full of diet pills, pornography and celebrity IQs, taking you to sites which cause your computer to freeze at the worst possible moment with the worst possible pictures held up on the screen, scarring you for life, but that is not the truth.

“You may think their main goal is to trap you…”

The main goal of Web ads, as in most advertisements, is mere exposure and brand awareness. A study by Hot Wired found that Web banner exposure can increase consumer brand loyalty from 5 to more than 50 percent, whether or not the viewer even clicked on the ad.

The ability to click-through is just an added bonus to advertising on the Web.

Types of Web Advertisements

Web ads, or banners, come in several different formats. Included among these are:

• Rectangular banners (large horizontal banners)
• Popup banners (everybody’s favorite)
• Button banners (the smaller banners)
• Skyscraper banners (large vertical rectangular banners)

How Web Ad Success is Measured

As I mentioned above, a big benefit of Web advertising is its ability to instantaneously give statistical feedback, in order to evaluate how the ad is doing.

There are 3 main ways in which the effectiveness of Web advertisements is gauged:

• Impressions
• Click-through rates
• Conversion rates

Impressions
Impressions are simply views of the ad. This is how all forms of advertisements are measured. On the Web, it can be measured by how many times someone visits a particular site and actually sees the ad. For example, if there is an ad for a diet pill on AOL.com, and someone goes there three times, then they would have three impressions. Impressions are also the way in which most Web ads are priced.

Click-through rates
An ad’s click-through rate is just like it sounds. It is the percentage of those impressions that actually click on the ad. In the U.S., click-through rates are very low, averaging at about 1 percent and continuously declining.

Conversion rates
Conversion rates are the percentage of the people who saw the ad and performed a specific action. For example, if an ad were trying to get someone to sign up for a newsletter, it would be the percentage of the people who saw the ad and signed up for the newsletter.

Impact of Ad Size and Position

Using the statistics of impressions, click-through rates and conversion rates can show which ads perform better than others. Web advertisers have performed a lot of studies trying to gauge what sizes of Web banners and positions on the page are the most effective.

“Many studies have been performed to optimize ad effectiveness.”


Rectangular banners, popup banners and skyscraper banners have demonstrated higher conversion rates, according to a study by Advertising.com, Inc. Wider formats also perform better, but this is not a steadfast rule, due to a lot of success having to do with how the advertisement fits in with the site, according to Pheobe Ho of Google AdSense’s Optimization team.

Larger ads have higher click-through rates, but smaller ads have a higher conversion rate and perform better in driving purchases. This may be because those who click on the smaller ads are more motivated to get the product and fit the niche better.

Position of the ads is also important. According to a DoubleClick study, banners at the top of the page do twice as well as the average. Banners at the center, near site navigation or images, above the fold and at the end of articles also do better than others.

Other Ways to Make a Web Ad More Effective

So, by now, we’ve covered effectiveness of ad size, type and position.

Here are a few more rules for making your Web ad sparkle and fighting off “banner immunity”:

• Use keywords, such as FREE or CLICK HERE
• Make the ad interactive and/or animated
• Have an attention-getting element or a reason for the audience to click-through
• Ask questions
• Utilize bright colors
• Avoid trying to create a sense of urgency in the audience
• Stay simple to encourage the message while avoiding distraction from it