Saturday, March 30, 2019

Social Media & SEO

So we probably have a pretty decent grasp on what SEO is.  Why it's important, and hopefully some semblance of how to achieve it.  But did you know that Social Media can also be an important part of SEO.  I for one didn't until this past week.

It makes perfect sense.  We want to be able to have back links to us from trustworthy, reliable sources. Hello Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, and everyone else. These are all trustworthy, well-known, reliable sites. So it is easy to see how they help out with SEO.

However, here is the tricky part.  Which one should you use for your company? Well in all honesty it depends on lots of different things.  An example is when I made a random company last semester based on information regarding travel to Disney World.  I had 2 different Social Media marketing strategies happening simultaneously.  One of them was on Facebook, and the other was on Twitter.  My Facebook marketing worked really well, I quickly gained followers and had friends sharing posts etc.  However, my Twitter account was a total dud. As you can see, which platform you choose should be important to you.

If you have a company that is selling product I would recommend something like Instagram so you can show off what you are selling.  If you are providing a service maybe something like Twitter or Facebook where you can really talk it up.  Each platform has it's own weaknesses and strengths.  It is our job as we strive for SEO to pick the right one for our circumstances and then run with it.  Though I would recommend doing some research first to find out where your target audience hangs out, and where your competition is looking for new customers.  This is more than likely where you will want to go to as well. 

Saturday, March 23, 2019

More on SEO

So the main point we studied this week was SEO, Search Engine Optimization.  In short this is a complex calculation that web engines such as Google or Bing use to decide where you are going to rank, and how often your ad will display to potential consumers.
         As you can tell this is pretty important if you plan on being successful, and want something more out of your enterprise than a money sucking black hole. 
Some of the things we learned about are pretty simple and common sense.  This includes having your keywords show up in your body copy.  Being an overall reliable website aka not crashing all the time or having links to dangerous sites.  Having a strong title etc.
         There are however, plenty of nuances to all of this.  Some things you may not think about is what the title of your pages are within the HTML code.  Unless, you hand coded your site you may not be aware of what the title is or how to change it to optimize your place in the world of Search Engines.  Certainly, something worth investigating and finding out.  This also applies to alt names for your photographs you may have on your site.  Who knew that knowing a little about HTML could pay out dividends in the world of business.
          As you can see there is a lot that goes into this, and some of it may be hit or miss.  As most things with running your enterprise there is a touch of trial and error to the mix.  The most important thing though is not be afraid to try.  And as Thomas Edison famously said "I did not fail, I simply learned 999 ways  how not to make a light bulb." 
        So hang in there and keep pushing forward, all the effort will pay off in some measure.  Whether it's learning how not to do something, or learning how to make your company soar.

Friday, March 15, 2019

ROI Oh my!

This week we were discussing ROI (Return On Investment) as well as ad optimization. 

ROI is critical to any business.  If one isn't recouping the money they expended on the product or the ad, then they are losing vital financial stability and the house of cards will quickly crumble and fall.  The way we determine ROI is that we first look at the expenditure, and then we look at the return.  In the case of what we were studying this week it would be the cost of advertising vs. your conversion rate.

If an ad is successful, that means that you have a good conversion rate.  A conversion rate is getting the consumer to do something.  This could be anything from signing up for an email, to purchasing an item, it is really up to the individual business owner to try and decide what a conversion is to them.  Now that we understand what a conversion is, we need to determine how much the conversion cost us in terms of advertising costs.

If the conversion was purchasing a product, and the product sold for $10.00 and our ad cost us $3.00 at the time of conversion, then it can be said that our ROI is $7.00.  In other words we made money after we adjusted for the investment that it took to make the money.  So you can see it's actually pretty simple to calculate.

Now on to ad optimization.  This really boils down to how to make your ad more successful, and get rid of the bad clicks.  We need to focus on good keyword choices, good negative keyword choices, and using google ads to tell us when we have a bad score. 

As with anything we are learning that is new to us, it can be a bit of trial and error.  However, the key is to keep tweaking and doing our best to get it "just right..."

Saturday, March 9, 2019

Relevance and Quality Score

Did you know that GoogleAds has an ability to tell you how your ad is actually performing?  Honestly, I had no idea there was such a thing.  However, this week that is what we discussed and learned about.

Google has an algorithm that uses "Power of the Crowd" to estimate how successful or unsuccessful your ad is.  This is vital information for the advertiser because it tells us what is or isn't working.  When we are given this vital information we are able to make changes to hopefully develop a more successful ad.

The Quality Score is a score ranging from 1-10.  1-2 is an awful score and tells you that you need to shape up and definitely change something.  It is also costing you significantly more for your Price Per Click.  Up to 400% more.  A score 3-4 is still poor and means your ads aren't showing very often, and when they do you are paying more than the average cost.  This again means that you need to stop and think about what is going on with your ad and how to adjust it. 5-8 is a good score and means you are on target for the most part, there is still room for improvement but you are definitely doing okay.  When/if you reach 9-10 this is the A++ of Quality Score and you shouldn't change a thing.

As you can see with that brief overview of Quality Score.  It gives you a ton of quick and easy information and data to use to tweak and adjust to make your ad the best it can possibly be.

Saturday, March 2, 2019

Google Ads

This week we began studying about google ads.  Specifically we were learning about how to write a good solid Google ad that would result in a higher rate of conversion.

In my opinion one of the most important things we need to think about when creating a new ad is keeping it simple.  Simple doesn't mean that it won't work, rather it is straight forward and shows the consumer what we have, and why they want it.

When we are keeping it simple there are a few things that we need to keep in mind.  We need to make sure that it is clear what we are offering.  For example if we are showing something on sale we need to make sure that our landing page offers that item immediately.  The consumer that clicked on the ad should not have to search for what we were advertising.   We also need to make sure there is a call to action.  We shouldn't just say we having something for sale.  We want them to take the action of coming to our site and for all intended purposes purchasing one of our products.

I believe that as we keep things simplified and focused it will help us run a successful ad campaign.  It helps draw people to us that are interested in our product, and it helps keep things brief and to the point.  Too often we have a tendency to over complicate an idea rather than just giving it breath and letting it breathe.

So in the words of the ARMY make sure you are KISSing your ad.  KEEP. IT. SIMPLE. STUPID.