What’s The Next Major Internet Device? The TV! July 6, 2014

What’s The Next Major Internet Device? The TV!

According to an eMarketer study, 54% of Americans will have at least 1 internet connected TV. By 2018, the study says 71% of every American will have one.

What does this mean for marketers and small businesses?

The biggest impact is that it’s going to drive up the inventory of how much open spots there are for banner ads.

Which will thus drive the cost down even more, even with the cost already being dirt cheap.

Almost every single large company advertises with online banner ads. But a vast majority of small businesses still do not do banner ads. Why is this?

A lot of marketers in the industry that have had experience with banner ads misunderstand the value. Most marketers try and get clicks from banner ads to boost calls and new customers.

But banner ads are like TV advertising. Just because someone advertising an airport transportation company, doesn’t mean that an ad is going to convince them to buy plane tickets and make a town car reservation to take them to the airport.

The value of banner ads is to build brand awareness. It’s to boost the image of a company by advertising on other well known brands. It’s to increase the conversion rates between clicks to calls and calls to customers. It’s to build up a remarketing list to stay in contact with as many interested potential customers as possible. And for what it’s worth, Google is supposedly favoring websites that have bigger brands in search engine optimization.

All that being said, the more people that have TV’s that connect to the internet, the lower the price will go for what the banner ads cost. That’s the biggest take away here.

 

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Why Do You Need A Marketing Company To Help You Get On Google? (It’s Probably Not What You Think) July 6, 2014

Why Do You Need A Marketing Company To Help You Get On Google? (It’s Probably Not What You Think)

Why can’t you just do it yourself?

It would take a little work, but you could probably figure out how to pay Google to be advertised. But advertising on Google is different from most advertising platforms.

Most advertising platforms, you pay for say a full page ad in a magazine. And then whomever calls, calls. And you get what you get.

But Google is different because their pricing is auction based. What does that mean? It means the price per click is determined by what your competitors are bidding and willing to pay, per click.

The #1 reason why you need to hire a marketing company for advertising on Google is because if you don’t know how to target within Google, you’ll get a lot of junk calls and it’ll be hard to make money off the Google advertising. In other words, instead of making a profit off the Google advertising, you’d lose your money.

What is a junk call? A junk call is when someone calls you up asking you for a product or service you don’t have, don’t do and or don’t want to do. Or the person calling is too far away for you to help them out.

Most of your competition has hired marketing companies to do advertising on Google for them. Which means that they’re probably able to do the targeting better and getting better quality calls than you if you were doing it yourself. What does this mean?

With less junk calls and more quality calls, it means they’re likely getting more customers and making more money than you-doing-it-yourself. Why does this matter?

Because when your competition is making money from doing good targeting, they don’t mind spending more per click. Because even if the cost goes slightly up, theyre likely still making money.

But if you-doing-it-yourself is not making money and your cost goes up, it makes it even harder for you to profit off Google advertising.

What is targeting? It’s making sure the quality score and click through rates are as high as possible to drive down the actual cost per click. It’s making sure your business is advertising on the right platform. It’s making sure your business is advertised in the right cities and not advertised in the wrong cities. It’s making sure we have the right negative keywords to weed out the junk (our negative keyword lists are usually around 500). It’s making sure the right delivery method is chosen based on your business’ budget. It’s making sure to use the mobile bid adjuster if necessary. It’s making sure the call extension is set up correctly. It’s making sure to set frequency capping if needed. And the list goes on.

I definitely believe most small business owners can figure out how to pay Google for advertising, get clicks to their website. And even get calls. But calls aren’t good enough. Business owners spend money advertising because the goal is to get customers and in order to get customers, you have to get the right calls and have the right targeting.

If the targeting is done correctly, 80% of your calls should be quality and 20% junk. If half of your calls are junk, it’s going to be tough to make money. Meaning that you might get a customer or two, but it won’t be enough with the cost being so high.

Not knowing how to target within Google and getting too many junk calls is why most small businesses need a marketing company to make sure they’re getting quality calls that will lead to customers.

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Why Customwave Doesn’t Do Social Media Marketing June 12, 2014

Why Customwave Doesn’t Do Social Media Marketing

Last night, I was watching the Angels game and it so happened to be “social media night” at the stadium and it reminded me of people asking me from time to time if we do social media marketing, since it’s pretty trendy these days. My reaction is “no, we currently don’t”. And a lot of people are surprised, asking, “Well, if people want to do it for their business, don’t you want to make money off of it?”

2 Main Reasons Customwave Doesn’t Do Social Media

1) There’s two main ways to do social media marketing. The first is by spending time having conservation with people. It’s really no different than networking face to face. Something we can’t really do for a client.

I mean, some marketing companies try and network for small business clients, but it’s a double-edged sword. Meaning that there’s a lot of times networking with a client’s customers and potential customers, that the conversation could go bad and lead people to not like the business, rather than the other way around. So we stay out of it because we don’t want to do anything that would endanger Customwave’s most important asset: our business relationships with our clients.

2) The second main way to do social media marketing is to pay for Facebook pay-per-click ads.

For big companies, the advertising on Facebook is a decent deal because they like their brand everywhere. For small businesses, Facebook advertising is a rip off.

Yes, I know. Shocking thing to say right? Well, let me explain. I have specific reasons that have led me to this opinion.

The two main ways Facebook ads try and bring value is by helping the business get more customers and building brand awareness. Facebook fails at both.

For trying to get new customers, the biggest problem is that the pay-per-click price on Facebook is almost as much as Google. My theory is that marketers think clicks on Facebook are just as valuable as clicks on Google.

But Facebook and Google are two completely different advertising platforms.

Google has branded itself as a destination for people that have a need. That have intent to pay for something. When they’re ready to do something, they go to Google.

Facebook is a place where people go to socialize, relax, see how people are doing. Oh look, there’s an ad for something you’re interested in. Out of curiosity you might click on it. But just because the ad represents something you’re interested in, doesn’t mean you’re ready to call or pay money.

That is the fundamental difference between search engine marketing and display banner advertising. Someone going to a search engine like Google is way further in the sales cycle as being close to purchase. Where someone that clicks on a banner ad could be anywhere in the sales cycle.

For all the data Facebook has and all the targeting they can do, it doesn’t change the fact that Facebook sells banner ads.

Yet, the cost per click is almost as the same as what the clicks cost on Google. This is what leads businesses like Priceline to realize that Facebook advertising is not effective at bringing in new customers because the cost of the website traffic is way more expensive than it should be.

So you could say, OK, Facebook ads aren’t effective at getting new customers, but surely they would be good at boosting brand awareness, right? Well, it depends on if you don’t mind paying a premium for the privilege of advertising on Facebook.

What do I mean?

If you compare the cost of how much Facebook banner ads costs versus the cost of banner ads inside Google’s website network, the Facebook banner ads can cost double, triple, and sometimes quadruple what they cost on other websites.

In case you didn’t know the cost of each click is most determined within an auction format. Each advertiser puts in a bid of the max price they’re willing to pay per click and that’s the biggest factor in what the actual cost per click is.

Social media marketing is most effective for big companies that have tons of customers. Facebook, Twitter, etc. can be used to provide (or try to provide) better customer service. And they don’t mind paying a little more money to advertise on Facebook because they view it as a “relevant” placement. Which would then help make their brand more “relevant”.

It’s not that Facebook advertising doesn’t work for or doesn’t build brand awareness for small businesses. It does. But it’s just not a good deal when you can get banner ads on websites like nasdaq.com, forbes.com, latimes.com, cbssports.com, cnn.com for half the price. Or in some case a fourth of the price.

Plus, if we have a client that wants to do banner ads to increase brand awareness, an argument could be made that advertising on nbcsports.com, usatoday.com, tmz.com and others is more prestigious than Facebook.

If you’re running a small business, think about it. What makes you look like a bigger deal? An ad on Facebook? Or an ad on foxsports.com? An ad on Facebook? Or an ad on the chicagotribune.com? Ad on Facebook? Or an ad on abcnews.com?

I rest my case.

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People Do Not Like Stalker Ads June 11, 2014

People Do Not Like Stalker Ads

Have you ever gone to a website, leave the website, then see banner ads popping up all over the place for that website you’ve been on before? That happening is a new marketing technique called remarketing, which is great both for advertisers and consumers alike. I mean, if a consumer is going to have to look at ads anyway, better they look at ads that actually interest them, right?

Unfortunately, some marketers abuse this technique. Have you ever gone to a website, leave the website, then see banner ads popping up all over the place for that website you’ve been on before? And then see the same banner ad pop up 10 times a day? 20 times a day? Feeling as if the ad is stalking you, following you on every website you go on?

Yes, that happening is what is known in the industry as “stalker ads”.

Surprise! People do not like stalker ads.

So here’s the lesson: If you’re a marketer, do not run stalker ads. It will actually hurt your client’s brand and cause consumers to not like your client. I mean, businesses’ aren’t paying you to ruin their brand, right?

So here’s what you do! There’s a setting known as a frequency cap. It can set a max of how many times a day each person sees your banner ad. Perfect!

At Customwave, we usually set our frequency cap at 2 views per day. This way, our client’s banner ads blend in with everyone else’s banner ads and it just looks like the client advertises a lot, which is good for the brand!

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How To Market If Customers You’re Targeting Don’t Have Money June 10, 2014

How To Market If Customers You’re Targeting Don’t Have Money

From time to time people ask me what’s the biggest problem in internet marketing today in 2014. My response is that our client’s customers are broke and don’t have money.

Now, it’s not like this in every industry. Business executives still need airport transportation. People still need important packages delivered ASAP. But other industries like home remodeling, sign makers and even lawyers are struggling.

Specifically, the two problems is that some businesses are in the “WANT” business. Where customers want your service, but dont “NEED” your service. Someone might really want to remodel their kitchen, but they don’t have the money right now and have other, higher priorities. For lawyers and other businesses that charge a lot for their products or services, the problem is that the cost is too high.

It’s important to keep the clients customers in mind when figuring out the marketing strategy.

For instance, if I’m talking to a client in the “WANT business” that has a marketing budget of say $500 a month, my advice on how best to spend the money will be using it to stay in touch with every person that visits the website.

Because if the money goes towards Google advertising, the Google ads will get people to the client’s website. It’ll get the client calls. But it won’t likely produce customers for the client with the customers likely not being ready for one reason or another.

So what do we do?

Start with remarketing. With remarketing, we have the ability to track and stay in touch with every single website visitor by serving them banner ads on different websites throughout the internet. For instance, have you ever gone on a website before and then later on, start seeing banner ads for that website all over the place? That’s what remarketing is.

So let’s say there’s 100 people going on your website each month. Every month that goes by, you’ll be tracking and serving banner ads to another 100 people each month. After 6 months, you’ll be advertising to 600 people that have been on your website before. After 1 year, you’ll be advertising to 1,200 people that have been on your website before. And so on.

The value in this is that sooner or later, your former website visitors will be ready to do business with someone. Might be 2 weeks. Or 2 months. Or 6 months. But a lot will be ready at some point. In the meantime, you’re advertising your brand everyday to them. Reminding them. Building top of the mind awareness. And then the day will come when that former website visitor clicks on the banner ad and likely not only calls you, but becomes your customer too.

What else can you do?

Email marketing. There are ways we can collect email addresses from some of the people that go to your website by offering them discounts or free amenities if they submit their email address. So sending out an email blast every couple weeks is another way to stay in touch with people until their ready.

Regular display banner ads on different websites throughout the internet is a low cost and effective way of getting lots of people to your website and also increasing brand awareness. This will help too.

And finally, having a good reputation is important too. Like if you go to Google and type in your company name, it’s important no bad reviews or customer complaints pop up. If potential customers find bad reviews about your company, this can cause potential customers decide to not do business with you.

But vice-versa, positive reviews for your company can help lead to someone to be more likely to become your customers.

One of the most important things to remember about reputation management is that there’s tons of review websites out there, but the only way someone will ever go on any of them is if they show up in Google if someone types in your company name. So the main thing is to make sure is to focus on the review websites in the first 5 pages of Google when you search your company name. And if you have the budget, make sure you have no bad reviews in Bing and Yahoo as well.

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The Arms Race Is On: AT&T Buys Directv May 19, 2014

The Arms Race Is On: AT&T Buys Directv

The TV industry is about to go through some rapid changes due to people realizing they don’t have to pay their cable bill or dish bill when they can watch TV through the internet. And with more and more HD flat screen televisions having the ability to connect to the internet, this phenomenon has been accelerated.

About a month ago, Comcast announced they were buying Time Warner Cable. Now AT&T buys Directv. What does this mean?

Time Warner Cable and Directv knew they were facing extinction. So they figured now was a good time to cash out.

AT&T and Comcast both have tons of products and services beyond selling TV.

Mark my words: AT&T and Comcast have Netflix and Amazon in their cross hairs. They now believe the future of TV is what Netflix and Amazon are doing and AT&T and Comcast believe they have the resources to do it better. Stay Tuned.

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Would Remarketing Work For My Business? May 18, 2014

Would Remarketing Work For My Business?

Some marketers that are naive think that there’s a one size fits all solution for every business. But the reality is that depending on what business you’re in, what your businesses’ location is and what your goals are, will ultimately determine which internet marketing techniques are the most applicable to deploy.

Remarketing is currently one of the more trendy marketing techniques out there right now and it’s trendy for a reason. Because it’s working.

So what types of businesses benefit most from remarketing? Businesses that are in long sales cycles.

For instance, when we’re doing marketing for taxi companies, the taxi customers usually need somebody now.

But for other businesses that sell musical instruments, the customer will usually do a lot of research on which type of guitar they want. And what price range they should purchase in. And maybe even save up money to buy.

So if you have a store that sells musical instruments and you’re marketing on Google, there’s a pretty good chance that website visitor is not ready to buy through no fault of the business.

So with remarketing, the banner ads are served to these people of interest. Where they’re seeing your brand at least a couple times a day. And then the day will arrive when they are ready to buy and hopefully after getting familiar with the brand, the business might get first crack at getting the customer and making the sale.

Businesses that do remodeling. That sell used cars. Any business that sells a product or service that’s more of a want, than a need. Where there isn’t as much urgency for the customer. For these types of businesses, remarketing should be the most important and effective part of your internet marketing rolodex.

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What Is The “Do Not Track” Internet Controversy About? May 1, 2014

What Is The “Do Not Track” Internet Controversy About?

I read a press release this morning from Yahoo saying that they will no longer have a “do not track” setting in their internet browser due to “lack of industry standard.” And it reminded me that from time to time clients ask me what the “do not track” controversy is about and if it concerns them.

Let me make this clear: there are A LOT of people that misunderstand what “do not track” and what the controversy is about.

“Do not track” has to do with a technique in website banner advertising known as “remarketing” aka “retargeting” aka “retagging”. When you go to a website, like nordstrom.com, most likely, Nordstrom’s is doing remarketing. Remarketing gives Nordstrom’s the ability to put a cookie in the web browser on your device so they can stay in contact with you serving banner ads to you on websites and mobile apps with the banner ad network Nordstrom’s uses.

A lot of people think “do not track” has to do with companies tracking which websites people go on, giving them the ability to look over your shoulder. This is not the case and does not happen.

The problem is that the industry has allowed the politicians to call this controversy “do not track” just to get attention. It’s a horrible way of defining the situation because then people think that they’re being tracked or followed. A more appropriate way to define the situation is “custom advertising” or “stay in contact advertising.”

People are going to see banner ads on websites no matter what. Remarketing doesn’t cause people to see an increased amount of banner ads. Do people get annoyed sometimes when they see the same company showing the same banner ad over and over again, 20 times a day? Yes. But marketers are smartening up to knowing that showing their banner ad over and over again to people in the same day, annoying them is bad for business.

At Customwave, when we do remarketing, we set a “frequency cap” at 2 views per day. Meaning that people we do remarketing to, we don’t show our clients banner ad more than 2 times per day to each person. This way, our clients banner ads blend in with all the other banner ads and people don’t get annoyed.

Remarketing can be a double edged sword, because when you annoy people by showing the banner ads too much, you’re spending money to damage your brand. And obviously you don’t want to do that ; )

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Had A Bad Experience Marketing On Google? The Problem Is There’s Not Enough People That Know What They’re Doing. April 28, 2014

Had A Bad Experience Marketing On Google? The Problem Is There’s Not Enough People That Know What They’re Doing.

The biggest problem in internet marketing is that there aren’t enough people that know what they’re doing.

Wall Street Journal recently put out an article detailing how big companies like Reach Local and Yodle are good at acquiring small business clients, but then the actual campaign work is done by automated software. And then when the small business owner gets bad results they call and talk to someone in a call center that isn’t properly trained and doesn’t really know much about marketing on Google.

For all the demand out there (millions of small businesses) there’s just simply not enough supply (marketing people that know what they’re doing).

And im skeptical about campaigns being run by automated software because the biggest challenge in making marketing dollars on Google work is producing quality phone calls. In other words, getting the small business the types of customers they want.

For instance, let’s say you’re working with a limo service small business that wants to get customers wanting a limo ride to the airport.

A marketer that knows a little bit of what they’re doing will target “limo lax” as a keyword. The problem is that the default setting is broad match. And when the setting is under broad match, it means Google will advertise the client for not only the keyword you’re targeting but also for other keywords Google considers “similar and relevant”. So when you target “limo lax” with broad match, your going to get a lot of clicks where people actually type in “taxi lax” or “shuttle service lax”. All three keywords are similar in the searcher needing airport transportation, but a limo service business usually doesn’t have taxi cabs or shuttles.

A marketer that doesn’t know anything about what they’re doing will just target “limo” or “limo service” and boy do the results get bad from there lol. Then you’re getting clicks from people looking for just limo pictures or someone looking to see if there’s a school for limo drivers or someone searching “how to do a limo business”. All of these searches are junk to the limo service small business that wants customers that want to ride in a limo to the airport.

But even these super basic steps are unknown to most novices that work in bigger internet marketing companies. Thus the results are bad.

My best advice to small business owners to find an internet marketing company that knows what they’re doing (be it Customwave or anyone else) is ask lots of questions. And then see if the person you’re talking to gives you specific, detailed answers or vague, generalizations.

It’s easy to make promises to people. It’s also free and costs no money. Anyone can do it. But how many marketers can articulate their service, what they’re going to do and the value of doing it. That’s what you want to look for. If the marketer you’re talking to caan’t smoothly detail and walk you through what they’re going to do, youre marketing dollars are in trouble.

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Are Filters The Future Of Search Engines? April 28, 2014

Are Filters The Future Of Search Engines?

Last Friday, Google announced a new filter that comes along with their search engine for when you’re searching for local restaurants.

The different options within the filter allow people to search for restaurants within their price range, whether the user only wants restaurants with good reviews to pop up, what food you want, and (my favorite) if the restaurant is open currently.

When you can narrow down a search based on your preferences, it saves time and makes the user experience exponentially better. And for those that forget, a good user experience is, and will always be the #1 thing Google cares about.

As a professional internet marketing prognosticator, I can see this filter being successful and Google possibly creating a filter for every business industry.

If that does happen, where filters start to peculate every business industry, it’s a good thing for marketers.

Almost every client I talk to has a specific type of customer they want. And if Google uses filters to determine what type of customer is searching, it’ll allow marketers to target the customer the client wants.

For instance, if a small business runs a steakhouse, they won’t want to get clicks for somebody that types “restaurant los angeles” into Google, but that person that’s searching doesn’t even like steak. So the the small business steakhouse has no chance getting the searcher as a customer. But with the filter, it could eliminate the chance that the searcher clicks on steakhouse ad by filtering out steakhouses.

We shall see what Google does from here!

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