Online Advertising: Still a Good – No Make that Great - Investment

According to a report by Online Media Daily*, online display ads’ click-through-rates (CTRs) were going through a period of decline since the financial crisis became our reality. However, online advertising has now reached a state of equilibrium and the CTRs are no longer declining.

I have to say that my clients have had great success with their online advertising.  We haven’t experienced a decline in CTRs. The worst months have had somewhat flat performances but no declining CTRs. And, our online campaigns continue to bring exceptional and cost-effective brand building opportunities to our clients.

A research report by comScore stated that “two-thirds of Internet users do not click on any display ads during the course of a month, and only 16% of Internet users account for 80% of all clicks.” The comScore research also indicated that “display advertising continues to have an influence on user behavior even at low CTRs.”

Perhaps, part of the decline in CTRs was not because of the effectiveness of the display ads but due to the fact that many ineffective ads have been written and many campaigns have not been setup as well as they could have been.  Advertisers wanted to jump on the online advertising bandwagon but didn’t really understand the mechanics of a successful campaign or how to write the best online ads.

So, I continue to recommend online display ads (specifically Google & MSN PPC ads) to clients because we’ve seen some great results in building brand awareness, CTRs and conversions. I also continue to recommend you get professional help for the most successful online advertising campaigns.

Happy Friday!

Carole

*The complete Online Media Daily article. 

The Health Benefits of Social Media Marketing

Medical studies have determined that being social can lower your risk for illness. What many have not yet realized is that being social can fix what ails their businesses. Social Media may be just what the doctor orders to help your company begin the healing process.

Just what are some of the benefits of Social Marketing?

• Buzz Creation
• Lead Generation
• Opportunities to Promote Products & Services
• Build Relationships with Past, Present & Future Clients
• Increase Web Traffic
• Build or Repair Your Reputation
• Improve Brand Recognition
• Real Time Search Engine Placements

Awareness Creation now has Social Media Marketing services and Social Media setup services that help your company get on and stay on a healthy regimen of Social Media - one of the most effective and least expensive channels for online advertising. Social Media is no longer just an online party for those under 21:  

• More than 1.5 million local businesses have pages on Facebook.
• Executives from all Fortune 500 companies are LinkedIn members.
• Twitter has nearly 175 million registered users.

If you would like more information about Social Media Marketing, just let us know and we''ll send you a copy of our Social Media Marketing Overview. Or, just visit our Social Media Marketing web page.

Be Social & Prosper!

Carole

During Your 2011 Marketing/Advertising Budget Planning - Remember: There’s a Great Future in Internet Marketing!

For many companies, it’s budget planning time. Departments scramble to gather the proof of their value to the company so they can get as many dollars as possible to support their initiatives and existence. For those Marketing and Advertising folks that are beginning this yearly ritual, I just want to say two words to you – just two words – are you listening?  Internet Marketing.

More and more companies are realizing that Internet marketing has great advantages over traditional marketing. One of the top advantages of online advertising is the lower cost per marketing impression compared to traditional advertising. (Thanks to J Buschlen on HubPages for the following numbers):

•  A 30-second television commercial on a highly-viewed, mid-week evening show that has an estimated 22.9 million viewers will cost $705,000. Because this program has such a high number of viewers the cost per impression is calculated at $0.031 per impression.
• A full-page, Sunday edition ad in the New York Times costs $145,278 and reaches 1.65 million people resulting in a $0.088 per impression.
• A 30-second ad on an adult hits radio station in Los Angeles (1.4 million listeners per week, or 4,167 listeners during any one 30 second period) costs $1,083 – a cost per impression of $0.26 which is more than print and TV advertising.

(All of the numbers used for the cost per marketing impression data, above, are definitely for the high-end advertisers; scale back the numbers that are more in line with your expenditures and you’ll get an idea of the range of costs per marketing impression you can expect with a smaller budget.)

But, consider this:

• A monthly Search Engine Optimization investment of $2,750 resulting in 670,000 targeted, search engine impressions comes out to only $0.004 per impression.

Traditional marketing and advertising uses “old media” that is losing its oomph while making line items appear as though they are screaming “CUT ME! I’M CLEARLY AN OVER-PRICED, UNDER-PERFORMING, OUT-DATED EXPENSE THAT IS NOT EVEN IN ALIGNMENT WITH THE ‘DOING MORE WITH LESS’ PHILOSOPHY THAT THE EXECUTIVES OF THIS COMPANY HAVE SO STRONGLY EMBRACED!”

Is there still a place for traditional marketing and advertising? Of course there is. One long-standing marketing tenet is that a marketing mix = good marketing. (I have to say this to be fair and somewhat realistic. But, I truly believe that an Internet marketing mix = great marketing. Funny though, when you think about it, the term “marketing mix” was coined waaaay back in 1953…hmmm. Could that term really continue to be relevant 55+ years later?!). So sorry – I got side-tracked.

However, for your 2011 budget, look at the traditional marketing mix you’ve used for years and find those expenses that can be replaced by more cost-effective, results-oriented, forward-thinking Internet Marketing strategies.

Random Reciprocal Link Exchanges - For-GET About It!

I just watched Donnie Brasco again and was reminded about one of my favorite parts in the movie – the “forget about it” explanation.

“…But then, if you disagree, like a Lincoln is better than a Cadillac forget about it you know. But then, it's also like if something's the greatest thing in the world, like mingia peppers, forget about it.”

My inbound link building version:

“…But then, if you disagree, like about natural inbound link buidling is better than reciprocal linking  forget about it you know. But, it’s also like if quality inbound link building is the greatest thing in SEO, forget about it.”
So – thank you Donnie Brasco for giving me the best way to respond to the frequent requests Awareness Creation gets for random reciprocal linking  – forget about it!

Learn more about acceptable, up-to-date Inbound Link Building for Powerful SEO
 
Carole

Blogging for SEO

When you hear terms like  “blog development”, “blog seo”, “blog management” do you feel like you want to run as fast as you can to a familiar, comfy marketing place somewhere in the 1980s? Well, try to get over that one.

If you’re looking for ways to improve your SEO and increase your brand awareness, get a blog. Blogs have three main advantages:

• Search engines frequently check out blogs and will reward topic-focused, content-rich blogs with higher search listings.

• Blogs build inbound links which strengthen your SEO Strategy

• You can build a reputation as an industry leader/expert because of the information you provide and your improved search listings.

Google now has a blog search filter that will help your audience find information about your company. Once your blog has been indexed by Google you can increase your company exposure by getting a good position in Google Blog Search (as long as you have an optimized blog) – and that’s a great inbound link to acquire.

To find the Google Blog search feature, go to the Google home page, select “More” in the search option and select the “Blogs” link. You’ll be taken to the Blog Search Engine where you can begin to explore the blogosphere – the place where you will want to have company exposure.

Carole Keller

Do It Yourself SEO -

This is a re-creation of a conversation I had just last night:
 
New Contact:  "We're going to have a new website for this business so we'll probably be giving you a call to get our new site going."
 
AC:  "Great. We'd love to help. One of the most important services we offer with website design is SEO. We like to make sure our clients have an understanding of SEO and how it will impact their bottom line. We infuse good design with a solid SEO Strategy to ensure good Internet  exposure that helps your target market learn about your service right from the start..."
 
New Contact:  "Oh, my dad has done a lot of reading about SEO and keywords and stuff like that. I'll let him handle it."
 
AC: "Is your dad in the Internet Marketing business?"
 
New Contact  "No. He's a retired business consultant."
 
AAAARGH! Let me tell you what I see all the time:  a company thinks that they can do their own SEO with no help from a professional. They Google SEO, read articles, blogs, maybe read a book, then they think they've got it mastered.
 
They "do" their SEO, don't get results (and can, in some cases, actually do damage to their search positioning) then say that SEO  doesn't work. This also happens when companies decide to go with some automated SEO systems or low cost services.  
 
Needless to say, I  don't believe in do-it-yourself SEO no matter how much research you've done. I also don't believe in going with cheap SEO services that guarantee top results in 3 days.
 
There are reputable SEO consultants out there that are very affordable. And,since I do believe in shamelessly promoting my services on my blog: check out http://awarenesscreation.com/SEO.html.
 
Think of all the plumbers who have been called in to fix homeowners' do-it-yourself repairs. The homeowner usually makes things worse and ends up paying more just to get the job done right.
 
Same thing with SEO! Before you make things worse & more expensive, call a professional!
 
Carole