Receptional Shortlisted In The European Search Awards 2016

Last week the shortlist for the European Search Awards was released, and Receptional were nominated for not one, but two, awards. Our first nomination was for the ‘Best Use of Search – Third Sector’ for our work with leading UK charity Mencap on giving learning disability a louder voice. Mencap […]

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How to use In-Page Analytics and how it can help boost conversions

Google Analytics is most certainly complex, so naturally there are a few options and features that go unnoticed.

So where do you begin if you’re trying to get more advanced and need a place to start? In-Page Analytics is probably one of the most under-used features that can also be the most impactful to a small business.

By looking at these specific analytics you can figure out which areas of your site are most important and which links visitors are clicking when they are actually on your site.

Once you can understand some of the details associated with user patterns, you can reformat your site and optimize in ways that ultimately will boost your conversions.

How to access your In-Page Analytics

The purpose of In-Page Analytics is to be able to tell what is working visually and what is not. In order to see your In-Page Analytics data you will need to sign into your Google Analytics account. Before you can do anything specific with the report, you will have to enter the URL for the page on which you want the report to launch. You enter that URL when you edit the settings for a Reporting view.

You can access this report two ways:

• Access—Way #1
• Sign in to your Analytics account.
• Navigate to your view.
• Select the Reporting tab.
• Select Behavior > In-Page Analytics.
• Access—Way #2
• Select Behavior > Site Content > All Pages.
• Drill into a page and select the In-Page tab.
• This opens the report for that page.

In both cases you access the report through the ‘behavior’ section. Once, you click on In-Page Analytics, your website’s home page will display the exact percentage of where users are clicking on your site. Below shows where you can find the In-Page Analytics report and what it looks like:

Once again, the job of the In-Page Analytics report is ultimately to infer the number of clicks on a page element (CTA, links, etc.) from the number of times that page appears as the referrer to subsequent pages.

In this way you can see which elements are leading to the more popular subsequent pages on your website. In many cases this is not just a preference of content, but something that stood out more than other elements on your website.

Customizing In-Page Analytics

According to Site Pro News, you can also customize in-page analytics for the needs of your site, which Site Pro News also touched on here. This can directly help to optimize your site, which in turn will help boost conversions.

Here are two ideas for how you can customize the report:

Importance of setting the date range

Just as with any report, you may customize your date range by clicking on the date panel located on the top right-hand side of your analytics dashboard and choosing your own date range.

This will allow you to understand exactly what was up on your site or any changes you have made, and when. Periods of time are incredibly important to consider with this analysis, so I recommend clicking the ‘Compare To’ button to see if you’re making improvements:

Keep in mind that the only way to say whether or not your numbers are ‘good’ or ‘bad’ is to compare them to what they were in previous months, and this is especially true with this report.

Every website is different, so you’re in a competition with yourself first and foremost before worrying about competition.

Using Segmentation

There are a lot ways to segment your data on the in-page analytics platform. This will allow you to look at how users arrive on your site (for example) and then the ways that they navigate it once they are there.

You can separate, as the screen shot indicates, by categories such as ‘made a purchase’, ‘referral traffic’, ‘direct traffic’, or ‘new users’. All of this can be used to optimize your site and figure out what focus you need to have to boost conversion rates.

To create a segment, click on All Users. This will take you to a screen where you can ‘Add a Segment’ (as shown below). You can then click to create a recommended segment or create a custom one. The screenshot below, for example, has segments for Bounced Sessions, Direct Traffic, and Converters. Just hit ‘Apply’ at the bottom when you’re finished.

Note: If you’re new to segmentation, segmenting your email lists is probably one of the easiest and most important places to start. Check out this article to learn more.

Making the Most of In-Page Analytics for Conversion Rates

Just as we discussed above in the section on data customization, there are a lot of different ways to make the most of your data to enhance your conversion rates. Segmenting data is one of the more successful ways to focus on who is finding your site and how these differences might effect interaction.

If you are interested, check this out this video on the visual context for your In-Page Analytics data from Google…

So now that you know how to read the data and what to look for, it’s important to understand how exactly to customize it. Below are some tips on customization that will help you make the most of your data for conversion rates:

• Make sure you segment or have a category for each of the streams/referral sites that people may be coming from—whether it be social media or other sites.
• For each channel, you want to construct a separate report (this includes direct traffic as well). This will give a clearer picture of the differences in where your audiences are coming from.
• Make adjustments as you see fit. For example, if you have a CTA that is either not being clicked, or people are leaving your site once they do, then you probably need to readjust and reconfigure the way this particular element is presented. There may also be differences for certain audiences that you want to account for, but remember to prioritize places where you are getting the most traffic from.
• Find out where maximum click happens. For example, if it happens on the top left side of the page, then put your conversion links there. Always check this when you run your analysis and make sure you adjust accordingly, as this can change over time.
• Make efforts to reduce whenever exit rate is high, especially when it is on most-linked or top pages on your site.
• Make it a goal to check back on a regular basis, as you do with your other analytics, so you are conscious of what needs to be adjusted over time

The Takeaway

It is difficult to understand why In-Page Analytics are as underused as they are when they provide such valuable insight. Definitely do not miss out on the opportunity to look at this as a tool of change and boosting conversion rates. The ability to segment your visitors and see how they interact with your site is very valuable; so start now!

Do you have experience with Google’s In-Page Analytics? Let us know in the comments section below, we would love to hear from you.

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Google has redesigned AdWords: what does this mean for you?

Adwords has been around for a long time. When the first 350 users logged in, they were greeted by a stripped-back, spreadsheet-based display very similar to the one we see today. They were also possibly listening to ‘Bootylicious’ (but not on their phones).

The world, the ad market, and Google itself have all changed dramatically in the past 15 years, and it’s fair to say that AdWords is beginning to show it’s age.

A big part of this is down to design. Devices, interfaces and availability have all fundamentally changed the way people find things online.

According to Google’s own announcement:

“The days of predictable web sessions have been replaced by numerous short bursts of digital activity throughout the day, primarily on mobile. In these micro-moments, consumers expect ads to be helpful and relevant – whether that’s showing product details, directions to the nearest store, a phone number to call, or additional information about the business they’re interested in.”

The glimpses of the redesign that have surfaced so far all point to a focus on the visual, with material design elements throughout, and clearer graphing that should surface insights that would have required spending time with pivot tables in the past.

Will it be more useful?

It’s such an inbuilt part of our everyday workflows that it’s easy to forget just how important AdWords actually is. With revenue in excess of $70 billion last year, this is the money-printing machine that allows Google to exist. Building robotic cars and cardboard Lawnmower Man headsets are minor hobbies by comparison. If there’s one thing Google can’t afford to do, it’s upset AdWords users.

Looking at the new ‘Overview’ screen, things are undoubtedly simpler:

The most relevant metrics are front-and-centre here: Clicks, Conversions, Cost and CTR. While further down, graphs display the ad groups that are performing best, and a nice graph displaying your split across devices.

It’s also nice to see a simplified navigation menu, which should mean less time messing around in settings to find location data.

The core functions do not seem to be affected (although Google has admitted that it will keep ‘tweaking and testing’ the new design as it rolls out over the next year or so), but this clearly underlines Google’s commitment to a unified design system across all of it’s products, and a focus on usability.

Currently AdWords is very hands-on, which (as with Google Analytics) can be a good thing when you have a specific question in mind, but can otherwise be a little overwhelming.

Here there’s a fundamental understanding of how people use AdWords day-to-day, and a focus on making the most important numbers fast and easy to find. This fits nicely with the philosophy we saw with Google’s new 360 suite, where different data sets are more readily available, allowing the user to interrogate data more easily.

How important is this?

The answer isn’t clear. It looks nicer, it should save you a bit of time. At its core though, AdWords is relatively unchanged. It does seem that Google is making the service a little more ‘marketer-friendly’. In an interview with FastCoDesign, Google Head of UX Greg Rosenberg underlined this:

“We want these [insights] to pop out to people, and we don’t want people to have to read the UI.“

Essentially this is making the service more approachable, which should be good news for the thousands of smaller businesses who utilise AdWords and may not have formal training or dedicated staff running their campaigns.

For the rest of us, it’s no major shakes, but it could be read as a further indicator of a shift in focus; away from ‘words’, and towards ‘behaviors’.

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Three early results of Google removing right-hand side ads

About a month ago, Google introduced what now seems like a very obvious change to its results pages: it removed paid search ads from the right-hand side.

Apparently Google made this change based on years of testing. These tests showed that no one was really clicking on these ads and it would better align with the mobile experience if they simply weren’t there.

The impact of this means there will be less inventory, and ranking at the top of the page is potentially even more important than ever before.

So now that we are a few weeks into this change what is the impact? Did everything the industry predicted come true?

To understand the impact I ran a keyword level report that included the Top vs. Other segment, looking at three weeks post and prior to the change.

There are three things to note:

1) Inventory is down

As expected, with no more ads on the right-hand rail there are less ad spots available. As a result we are seeing a 19% decrease in total inventory. The majority of that reduction is within the Other bucket.

2) Traffic shifts

You can see from the data below that traffic for positions below the organic listings has shifted up significantly and dropped in lower positions due to inventory restrictions. You also see an increase in traffic to positions 3 & 4 in the Top ads. While the increase is still noticeable, it is still <5% of total traffic in the post-right-hand-side-ad world. This implies that either we don’t manage a lot of brands that have ‘highly commercial’ queries or that the impact of adding a 4^th position is still pretty small.

3) Despite these changes CTRs and CPCs are down

The fact that click-through rates are up isn’t that big of a surprise given the fact that more ads are seen by searchers, so you would expect more click-throughs to occur. What is really good news for advertisers is the fact that consumers are responding well to the new layout of the page: CTR is up {12%) and CPCs are down (-11%). Hopefully this will help overcome the reduction in overall inventory.

So what does it all mean?

This is a big change that seems to be having the expected impact of reducing total inventory, but increasing the amount of traffic as a percent of total impressions.

Advertisers need to be taking a look at their own data. Are they seeing different data? Are CPCs going up in certain areas given competition? Is the incremental CPC worth it to your business, or does the reduction in CPC allow you to spend more in other areas?

Staying close to your Top vs Other data segments and detailed data points will allow you to respond to this change in a smart and sophisticated way.

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Google has redesigned AdWords: what does this mean for you?

Adwords has been around for a long time. When the first 350 users logged in, they were greeted by a stripped-back, spreadsheet-based display very similar to the one we see today. They were also possibly listening to ‘Bootylicious’ (but not on their phones).

The world, the ad market, and Google itself have all changed dramatically in the past 15 years, and it’s fair to say that AdWords is beginning to show it’s age.

A big part of this is down to design. Devices, interfaces and availability have all fundamentally changed the way people find things online.

According to Google’s own announcement:

“The days of predictable web sessions have been replaced by numerous short bursts of digital activity throughout the day, primarily on mobile. In these micro-moments, consumers expect ads to be helpful and relevant – whether that’s showing product details, directions to the nearest store, a phone number to call, or additional information about the business they’re interested in.”

The glimpses of the redesign that have surfaced so far all point to a focus on the visual, with material design elements throughout, and clearer graphing that should surface insights that would have required spending time with pivot tables in the past.

Will it be more useful?

It’s such an inbuilt part of our everyday workflows that it’s easy to forget just how important AdWords actually is. With revenue in excess of $70 billion last year, this is the money-printing machine that allows Google to exist. Building robotic cars and cardboard Lawnmower Man headsets are minor hobbies by comparison. If there’s one thing Google can’t afford to do, it’s upset AdWords users.

Looking at the new ‘Overview’ screen, things are undoubtedly simpler:

The most relevant metrics are front-and-centre here: Clicks, Conversions, Cost and CTR. While further down, graphs display the ad groups that are performing best, and a nice graph displaying your split across devices.

It’s also nice to see a simplified navigation menu, which should mean less time messing around in settings to find location data.

The core functions do not seem to be affected (although Google has admitted that it will keep ‘tweaking and testing’ the new design as it rolls out over the next year or so), but this clearly underlines Google’s commitment to a unified design system across all of it’s products, and a focus on usability.

Currently AdWords is very hands-on, which (as with Google Analytics) can be a good thing when you have a specific question in mind, but can otherwise be a little overwhelming.

Here there’s a fundamental understanding of how people use AdWords day-to-day, and a focus on making the most important numbers fast and easy to find. This fits nicely with the philosophy we saw with Google’s new 360 suite, where different data sets are more readily available, allowing the user to interrogate data more easily.

How important is this?

The answer isn’t clear. It looks nicer, it should save you a bit of time. At its core though, AdWords is relatively unchanged. It does seem that Google is making the service a little more ‘marketer-friendly’. In an interview with FastCoDesign, Google Head of UX Greg Rosenberg underlined this:

“We want these [insights] to pop out to people, and we don’t want people to have to read the UI.“

Essentially this is making the service more approachable, which should be good news for the thousands of smaller businesses who utilise AdWords and may not have formal training or dedicated staff running their campaigns.

For the rest of us, it’s no major shakes, but it could be read as a further indicator of a shift in focus; away from ‘words’, and towards ‘behaviors’.

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Six tips on measurement from the IAB Programmatic Marketplace

Not getting too complicated with metrics is just one important point covered in an IAB conference session all about attribution.

Earlier this month, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) held its annual Programmatic Marketplace in New York and here are the six key takeaways from our favourite presentation: “Cross Device Measurement and Attribution: Accuracy, Efficiency and Impact.”

1.Know your audience

According to eMarketer, 84 percent of U.S. adults use the Internet. Of that group, 81 percent do it from at least two devices.

The first thing you have to do is make sure your data collection is strong. In order to measure someone’s customer journey as they toggle devices, you first have to know who they are.

The second thing you have to do is make sure your user experience (UX) is equally strong. No matter who your customer is, you can be sure that they have no patience for slow-loading mobile pages or any of the other practices that compelled the IAB to launch its LEAN Ads Program back in October.

LEAN is an acronym for light, encrypted, ad choice supported and non-invasive. In other words, all the things your ads should be, if you want people to engage with them (and not block them).

2. …and know what you’re up against

Knowing their audience is just one challenge marketers face when it comes to attribution. There’s also the walled gardens of Google and Facebook, the fact that different consumers share the same devices, and the availability of multiple demand-side platforms (DSP), just to name a few.

Multiple DSPs means attributing them, in addition to impressions and conversions. GroupM’s strategy there involves a concept the agency calls “mega DSP,” says Nikos Tsagaroulis, director of programmatic optimizations, analytics and data at GroupM Connect.

“You basically have a centralized hub where you manage which DSP is good for which campaign and which audience,” continues Tsagaroulis. “This is where programmatic measurement is moving, as well.”

3. Don’t get too complicated

There’s no question that attribution is a complicated process. But Dan Murphy, senior vice president of audience measurement and analytics at Univision Communications, points out that it’s not the metrics that are complicated.

There are really only a handful that matter: reach, duration and frequency, for example. Marketers often confuse themselves by measuring too many things beyond those basics.

“What makes [attribution] complex is, we want to make sure it’s comparable. We also want to make sure its viewable and that its seen by a human being. We want to start introducing data to qualify the audience, so all these things make it complex,” says Murphy. “It’s like a sausage; how many people really want to know what’s in the sausage? But it tastes good.”

Duration is particularly important to Tsagaroulis, who recommends factoring exposure time into DSP algorithms.

“What that means is, there is a set of placements or a set of audiences or a combination of the two that has been proven – always in real time – to have high exposure time,” he says. “Through linkages provided, you can say those are definitely joined to drive high conversion rates and ROI.”

4. Find a measurement balance

“Always in real time” was an important distinction in Tsaragoulis’ point. Today’s technology allows marketer to understand the impact of their campaigns as they happen.

For example, you may have noticed that over the past few months, ClickZ has been less newsy, with more of a “best practices” focus. That decision was based on our Google Analytics, which let us know the kinds of posts that resonate most with our readers. For March, our most read so far teach you about executing Facebook ads and collecting data.

The benefit of real-time is that if you wait six months to measure something, by the time you’re ready to act, everything has changed anyway. But at the same time, it’s important not to get too deep in real time. Measuring on a minute-by-minute basis results in way too much noise.

5. Involve creative

Data and creative are often separate entities, but they shouldn’t have to be. In fact, they shouldn’t be. Dynamic creative – ads that change depending on who’s being targeted – is growing in popularity. Google even incorporated the practice into its Web Designer in November, following some very successful tests with a 580 increase in click-through rate (CTR) and a 75 percent drop in cost-per-click (CPC).

“On the fly, machines are getting smarter and smarter,” says Tsagaroulis. “You are basically reconstructing pieces of content that you have already, but now you’re tailoring it to the location, the audience, the weather.”

The rise of dynamic creative means that data dictates your creative. But it also makes it more measurable at the same time.

6. Road less traveled

Tsagaroulis recommends doing as much testing as possible because “everything is changing as we speak.” Murphy adds that it’s important to not to employ a tactic just because you’re comfortable with it.

For example, Last-click attribution is a fairly traditional method of analytics. But its star is fading, as marketers increasingly long for something more sophisticated.

“The road less traveled makes all the difference,” says Murphy. “We need to stay away from the easy short-term money when we know the short-term negative consequences.”

This article was originally published on our sister site ClickZ. We’re republishing a handful of their recent articles over the Bank Holiday weekend. Go give them some love.

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Facebook Apps for Marketers: What You Need To Know

As you may know, Facebook has 1.59 Billion active users. But, did you know? A whopping 90% of users access the platform via their mobile devices.

This means businesses have to stay nimble with fast-loading content a la Instant Articles (coming to everyone on April 12th). And, this means you need to be able to manage your Facebook business activity on the fly. Be sure to tap into the power of the various Facebook mobile apps, as I wrote about in my latest post for Social Media Examiner.

Every Facebook Page Admin should be using the Pages Manager app for prompt access to messages, as well as scheduling content, and responding to comments and posts by your audience. Plus, the Facebook Ads Manager is super helpful for monitoring your ad campaigns and/or creating quick ads while away from your desk.

On another note, for a quick summary of the new Facebook Pixel, check out the latest #MariMinute video on Business.com.

Facebook Business Workshop: Join Mari & Team in San Diego!

Facebook ads got you down? Could you use some help mastering your Facebook marketing for much improved ROI? Come learn the very latest and best practices for your Facebook marketing. Join me and my team of professionals in San Diego, California on April 20th at this small-group, hands-on Facebook Workshop.

This is the blog version of this week’s issue of The Social Scoop. I confess, we had a typo this week in the email. I goofed and put 1.59 million Facebook users instead of billion … gah!. Thanks heaps to my subscriber Michael Carrubba for pointing out the typo! 

Btw, if you’re already subscribed to The Social Scoop, you’ll continue to receive the email on Fridays. If you’re not yet signed up and would like to be, please enter your name and email in the box to the right (desktop) or below the post (mobile). Thank you!

Mari’s Top Social Media Picks – March 25, 2016
Issue #193

Greetings! Please enjoy this week’s top articles we’ve hand-picked for you!

1. Facebook Mobile Apps: A Guide for Marketers

by Mari Smith on SocialMediaExaminer.com

The majority of Facebook’s active users are on mobile. Are you using mobile apps to connect with them? Here are the key things you need to know!

2. Too Many Channels, Too Little Time: Build a Social Media Strategy that’s Right for You

via BuzzStream.com

There are so many channels that you could spend your time on: Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram, Medium, Pinterest and the list goes on! But trying to be on all of them just because they exist isn’t a good plan. This terrific post takes you through evaluating your social media and selecting a strategy that works for you and your business.

3. Grow Your Community on Instagram in 4 Simple Steps

via Socialbakers.com

Grow Your Community on Instagram in 4 Simple Steps https://t.co/IBtcEgsAsX via @socialbakers | Nice!

— Mari Smith ?? (@MariSmith) March 21, 2016

We’ve heard a lot about Instagram recently because of the new ‘Facebookification’ change to the feed (posts are no longer in chronological order). As expected, Instagram users are a bit upset. However, Instagram is here for the long haul and is still an important network to use. Read on to learn ways to grow your community. And regarding the feed changes, this post from WeRSM explains what they will mean for businesses. That’s all for this week’s issue of The Social Scoop! Here’s wishing you a glorious Easter weekend and a lovely week ahead! I heart my peeps! On a personal note, I’m delighted to be at home this weekend ready to enjoy a very special, quiet and meaningful Easter break with my partner. Wow, looks like we’re in for sunshine and 80 degree weather. By the way, I had another quick trip to Salt Lake City, Utah this week (Sun-Tues) – working with one of my top clients (a startup in the beauty industry!). Although some days are warmer and springlike in SLC, they also still get snow just now… and I did a fun Facebook Live video as the snow was falling, sharing Facebook Live tips!

Facebook Live Tips … live from snowy Salt Lake City, Utah! ???* If you don’t yet have Live on your personal profile…

Posted by Mari Smith on Tuesday, March 22, 2016

Cheers,
Mari

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Three recent changes to Google Shopping you need to be aware of

If you haven’t noticed by now, Google Shopping is taking center-stage for retailers as we move deeper into 2016 – with more traffic, more tests and more features.

You certainly wouldn’t have missed Google removing text ads on the right-hand rail of their search engine results pages, leaving the space wide-open for even more product listing ads (PLAs).

With this update, it’s important to understand the changes taking place made to accommodate for an increased amount of advertisers spending on Google Shopping Campaigns.

Here are some of the latest updates you need to be aware of:

PLAs getting more third-party traffic

In 2014, Google announced it was partnering with a number of retail and ecommerce sites to allow them to show product listing ads on their web properties. This was dubbed ‘Adsense for Shopping’, and after some initial buzz in the paid search community — all we heard were crickets.

Fast-forward to Merkle’s recent Digital Marketing Report and you can see huge spikes to Google’s Search Partners’ share of PLA traffic in Q3 of 2015. Sounds like the partnership is ramping up and hopefully will continue to do so into 2016.

What it means for you: were you a retailer running Shopping Campaigns in Q3/Q4 2015? If so, check your metrics, did you notice an increase in impressions YoY attributable to this? Did CTR and CVR metrics stay stable?

Google’s expandable and scrollable PLA tests

In January 2016, we reported on seeing an expanded PLA view – showing up to 16 products at one time. This allowed PLAs to take up the majority of above-the-fold real estate on the SERPs – likely causing an increase in impressions and clicks – especially for retailers who don’t typically fall into the “first five”.

Now, in March, many advertisers are starting to see ‘scrollable’ PLA results on desktop, almost like a carousel. The emulates the scrollable results seen on mobile search for PLAs.

What it means for you: Google is always testing different formats and we can see its attention is currently on the right experience for PLAs. Do a few, quick searches for your products and see how they are showing up. Have you seen any fluctuations that might be due to a new format?

These insights are hard to nail down since we don’t know the testing parameters or have insight into the backend data, but at least sharing the story of what’s going on behind the scenes should help explain some performance.

Ranked PLAs for key searches

Though it’s been in testing since 2014, a new PLA ranking system has just come out of beta. Now, when a user types in a keyword with a modifier like ‘best’ or ‘top’ they will provide a tiny grey number icon to rank the items.

Wait, isn’t that unfair? According to Google, no. The way it works is simple – on queries containing ‘best’ or ‘top’ only the top-rated products are selected to participate in the auction. Once in the auction, the products then compete against each other for ad position.

Essentially as a user you won’t always be getting the ‘top’ product – you’ll be seeing a list of top products with the how much the advertisers are paying being taken into consideration.

What is means for you: check out those ratings of yours and make sure your products are ranking high enough to be considered for auctions like this.

Another thing to do is pull a search query report for your Shopping Campaigns to see how many times your products have matched to queries like ‘best’ or ‘top’. How are those terms doing for you? With strong performance, you might want to start caring about your reviews even more.

Since these are just a few of the tests and features rolling out for Google Shopping Campaigns in 2016, please comment below with any features you’ve seen and of course, what they mean for you.

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RankBrain Judgment Day: four SEO tactics you’ll need to survive

The way 30 trillion web pages are ranked changed forever on October 26, 2015. That’s when the world became aware of RankBrain, Google’s machine-learning artificial intelligence system.

Google calls RankBrain, when it’s in use, “the third-most important signal contributing to the result of a search query.”

Google’s mission: to terminate any web pages from its results that don’t provide the highest-quality content and to find the most relevant answers for users.

Now marketers who want to gain precious visibility on always-shrinking organic SERPs must prepare to fight a new war: the war against the machines.

The pre-RankBrain machines

Google has sent two other major algorithms to strike at websites.

In the year 2010, Google sent a G-800, codename Panda, to hunt and kill the rankings of websites producing low-quality content.

Image from Grindstore

The second algorithm – a G-1000 known as Penguin – was sent in 2012 to find websites with unnatural link profiles and terminate them from the search results.

While neither algorithmic update was perfect, both succeeded in their overall mission. Now Google is sending a third.

RankBrain: analyzing page relevance on a 1-10 scale

Now, as before, Google has sent a G-X, a new machine learning system that will change SEO and the organic search results as we’ve known them.

RankBrain will analyze web pages for relevance. Every page will get a score between 1 and 10, with 1 being a dubious result and 10 being extremely strong.

But wait! This RankBrain technology is eerily derived from earlier G-350 technology. You may know it better as Google AdWords’ Quality Score. This intelligent AdWords technology never needed external signals (e.g. links) to rank paid search ads for relevance. Soon it will be the same for organic search.

Is this it? The SEO apocalypse? Whoa, oh, oh, oh, oh.

No, it isn’t. I’ve come from the future to share the secret solutions used in the past to help you today as your prepare for the rise of the machines.

A group of resistance fighters have already fought, and won, great Quality Score wars. Resistance fighters like myself, Frederick Vallaeys, and a squad of highly-trained AdWords Quality Score experts have learned to fight back and win. Now it’s time to share our intel on how to defeat RankBrain.

There’s no fate but what we make. Today I’m sharing four key strategies to prepare for RankBrain in order to prevent your website from facing Judgment Day.

Hang on… Judgment Day? Overdramatic much?

Imagine one day you wake up to find your website gone. Just gone. The fate of your site decided by a new order of machine intelligence in just a microsecond.

In the future RankBrain will take over the search results. All of them. In one possible future, Judgment Day happens on September 27, 2018* – Google’s 18th birthday. (*Standard Time Travel Causal Loop Disclaimer: igve or take a few months – time travel and navigating these time lines is quite tricky!)

For now, RankBrain is mainly used on complex long-tail search queries. But assuming RankBrain will only ever be used on long-tail queries would be dramatically underestimating its potential.

Google has pointed out that 15% of the millions of queries it handles have never been searched before. Additionally, for upwards of 99% of content across the web, Google simply doesn’t have enough signals (insufficient link and historical page data) to determine the most relevant search result for users. There are also whole niches that lack reliable natural link data (authoritative sites rarely link to porn, for example).

So now, with RankBrain, Google is learning in a very advanced way exactly what people click on and whether or not they are satisfied with the result when they click through.

Yes, Google is only using it on some queries for now. But when you create a new system like RankBrain, you wouldn’t initially test it on your big-money head terms – just as you wouldn’t replace a wildly successful paid search ad with an experimental one. You test on the things you’re least confident in.

There’s less downside and risk if Google’s RankBrain results aren’t as good in the early days. They will learn and come up with better answers based on analysis of user success metrics. Over time, Google’s confidence in RankBrain will grow and the signal will get more and more weighty.

Judgment Day is when RankBrain becomes the #1 ranking factor.

The link and on-page SEO signals won’t go away completely (they can always be used to corroborate other factors). But one day, they won’t be the most important factor in rankings. RankBrain will.

Rand Fishkin has warned SEOs of the possibility of a future where Google leverages algorithmic inputs for search rankings without requiring human intervention – an idea which was predictably dismissed by Google (what would you expect them to say…)

A relevance score. That sure sounds a lot like Quality Score, doesn’t it? Google already uses a relevance score with AdWords, the Display Network, YouTube Ads, and Gmail Ads. They just call it Quality Score. It’s been so wildly successful that Twitter Quality Adjusted Bids and Facebook Relevance Score are largely the same concept.

Organic search will be next.

Now, on to those four RankBrain strategies you’ll need to survive in the new world.

1. High organic CTRs: your highest probability for SEO success

Google uses its Quality Score algorithm to rate the quality and relevance of your keywords and AdWords ads. Click-through rate, the relevance of each keyword to its ad group, landing page quality and relevance, ad text relevance, your historic AdWords performance – all of this ultimately determines your cost per click and your ad rank in the ad auction process.

The key to beating the Quality Score algorithm is just a matter of beating the expected click-through rate for a given ad spot. Important: There is no one expected CTR – CTRs will vary by time of day, device, location, and other factors.

This graph (based on WordStream client data*) maps Quality Score against the ratio of actual click-through rate to expected click-through rate by position. As you can see,  the AdWords Quality Score algorithm is largely just a matter of beating the expected click-through rate for a given ad position.

The better your ad does compared to the expected CTR, the higher your Quality Score.

By looking at millions of ads (from WordStream client accounts*) and averaging their click-through rates by ad position, we were able to reverse-engineer the expected CTR of an ad, and this is what we found:

If your ad is in position 1, you don’t have extra points for having a 5% CTR – Google expects your CTR to be that high when you’re in that position. You need to do even better than expected to prove to Google that your ad is especially high-quality and relevant to users.

What does this have to do with SEO, in a world where ‘content is king’ and backlinks are critical to better rankings? Well, that’s where you need to start adjusting your thinking.

The future of SEO isn’t about beating another page based on content length, social metrics, keyword usage, or your number of backlinks. Better organic search visibility will come from beating your competitors with a higher than expected click-through rate.

Put simply: people are both the problem and the solution. RankBrain is learning from human decisions – specifically what they click on. Attracting higher click-through rates will be critical to your SEO success, just as it is the most important component of PPC success.

To figure this out, go into Search Console in Google Webmaster Tools. This will show you average position and click-through rates for the queries you rank for.

Figuring out what’s a good click-through rate for organic search is beyond complicated. There are a lot of factors, like query type, number of ads, personalization, location, and the presence of Knowledge Graph, a featured snippet or other Google SERP elements (plus this data comes from the future and is not set in stone). But you’ll notice right away that the CTR for your #1 rankings is super-high (over 32% for ‘marketing ideas’, above) compared to lower rankings, even relatively high average positions like 3 (under 3% for ‘ppc’, which Google interprets as a commercial query).\

In Google Organic Click-Through Rates on Moz, Philip Petrescu shared the following CTR data:

So, as a very basic example using the chart above, if you’re in Position 1, and you have a CTR lower than 30%, you’re in danger of losing your spot once RankBrain finds a relevant page with a better-than-expected CTR for its current position. If you have a much higher than expected CTR in a lower position (e.g., if you have a 15% CTR in Position 3), you should expect a bump up to at least the #2 position.

But again, CTR varies greatly based on so many different factors that simply using these static benchmarks isn’t a perfect approach. What’s an SEO to do?

Thankfully the notion of trying to achieve an above average click-through rate is not a new concept, at least from a PPC marketer’s perspective, and there are ridiculously smart PPC tactics that SEOs can borrow from.

Keep in mind: PPC marketers obsess about getting high Quality Scores (which is essentially above average CTRs for your query type and average position). It’s among the most important AdWords success KPIs. Below average CTR results in terrible things.

Figuring out your “organic Quality Score”

The challenge is that in SEO, Google doesn’t provide you with a Quality Score number to tell you if your content is above or below the expected click-through rate. But I’ve developed a hack to determine which of your keywords are most likely underperforming compared to the expected click-through rate: The Larry RankBrain Risk Detection Algorithm.

Just download all of your query data from Webmaster Tools and plot CTR vs. Average Position for the queries you rank for organically, like this:

Next, plot an exponential trend line. The queries that fall below your average CTR are your queries that are likely most at risk for future RankBrain updates. Conversely, the queries that score above the trend line are most likely to get a boost from future RankBrain updates.

If you then do a secondary sort on your most ‘at risk’ pages using a metric like pageviews or conversions generated by those keywords, you can prioritize your optimization efforts on the most important, most at-risk pages on your site. The Larry RankBrain Risk Detection Algorithm is very similar to what PPC marketers do on a regular basis – which is to prioritize the optimization of low Quality Score keywords and ads first, because that is where you have the least risk (it’s less risky to fix your losers) and most potential upside.

Bottom line: you must beat the expected CTR for a given organic search position. Optimize for relevance or die.

2. How to optimize your SEO headlines and descriptions for above average CTR

‘SEO’ headlines (title tags) and meta descriptions do okay. But keyword-optimized titles are the equivalent of ‘Dynamic Keyword Insertion’ for PPC ads. Take a look at the WordStream client data* below for ads with DKI. They generate above-average returns:

However ads using DKI are actually less likely to produce ads that are among the top 5% or top 1% of ads with highest click-through rates, normalized by ad position (AKA unicorn status).

Just look at these ads for [big data solutions].

These ads are OK, I guess. They probably perform well enough. But, like many search-optimized titles, they’re also pretty boring, generic, and average. I don’t want to click on them. Do you?

To beat RankBrain, ‘Okay’ isn’t enough. Your organic listings must have REMARKABLE click-through rates.

Our research into millions of PPC ads has shown that the single most powerful way to increase CTR in ads is to use emotional triggers. Like this PPC ad:

Tapping into emotions will get your target customer/audience clicking! Anger. Disgust. Affirmation. Fear. These are some of the most powerful triggers not only drive click through rate, but also increase conversion rates.

Don’t make changes willy-nilly. Test out headlines as paid search ads or as social media updates linking to your content using different headlines – look at click through rates. Audition your headlines, eliminate the losers and use your winners as your SEO titles.

By no means should you forget about keywords and focus just on the emotion. Focusing on just keyword optimization or just emotion is a recipe for average titles and descriptions. Plus, without keywords, how will Google even know to try out your content on the SERP and see what kind of CTR it gets? (Google does this regularly with ads; that’s how it knows if your ad beats the expected CTR for its position or not.)

No, you need to combine keywords and emotional triggers to create SEO superstorms that result in ridiculous CTRs and leave your competition devastated.

Bottom line: use emotional triggers + keywords in your titles and descriptions if you want your CTR to go from okay to great.

3. Optimize for task completion

One of the hidden things that Quality Score measures is task completion rates (i.e. conversion rates). Google definitely knows what your conversion rates are.

How the heck does Google know your conversion rates? Well, the machines have learned to tell whether traffic to your site converts.

Now in organic search, a conversion may not equate to completing a form. If you’re pushing a piece of content, Google can look at engagement metrics like time on site and bounce rate, because higher engagement correlates with higher interest/relevance.

Google has seven products that boast more than a billion users – Android, Chrome, Gmail, Maps, Play, Search, and YouTube. So Google can tell in a lot of different ways when signed-in users are successful or unsuccessful at their tasks.

Plus, Google Analytics tracks millions of sites. And Google gets tons of insanely valuable data from AdWords – task completion technology was rolled out to advertisers as smart goals, a way to track conversions on advertiser websites without having to install additional conversion code.

Basically, you need to strive to have higher than anticipated or expected engagement metrics, based on a variety of criteria, including query and device type, location, and time of day. Your task completion must also be better than other similar sites.

Let’s say you work for a tech company. Your visitors, on average, are bouncing away at 80% for the typical session, but users on a competing website are viewing more pages per session and have a bounce rate of just 50%. RankBrain views them as better than you – and they appear above you in the SERPs. In this case, the task completion rate is engagement.

Bottom line: if you have high task completion rates, Google will assume your content is relevant. If you have crappy task completion rates, RankBrain will penalize you.

4. Increase search volume & CTR using social ads and display remarketing

People who are familiar with your brand are 2x more likely to click on your ads and 2x more likely to convert. We know this because targeting a user who has already visited your website (or app) via RLSA (remarketing lists for search ads) always produces higher CTRs than generically targeting the same keywords to users who are unfamiliar with your brand.

So, one ingenious method to increase your organic CTRs and beat RankBrain is to bombard your specific target market with Facebook and Twitter ads. Facebook ads are proven to lift mobile search referral traffic volume to advertiser websites (by 6% on average, up to 12.8%) (here’s the research).

With more than a billion daily users, your audience is definitely using the Social Network. Facebook ads are inexpensive – even spending just $50 dollars on social ads can generate tremendous exposure and awareness of your brand.

Another relatively inexpensive way to dramatically build up brand recognition is to use the power of Display Ad remarketing on the Google Display Network. This will ensure the visitors you drive from social media ads remember who you are and what it is you do. In various tests, we found that implementing a display ad remarketing strategy has a dramatic impact on bounce rates and other engagement metrics.

Bottom line: If you want to increase organic CTRs for your brand or business, make sure people are familiar with your offering.

People who are more aware of your brand and become familiar with what you do will be predisposed to click on your result in SERP when it matters most, and will have much higher task completion rates after having clicked through to your site.

A note of caution

Aspiring RankBrain spammers, take note:

Marketers are famous for taking any technique that works and beating it to death. We’ve seen dozens of once-effective link-building methods get crushed (Wikipedia and forum spamming, comment spamming, embeddable widgets and infographics, guest posting exchanges, etc.) because of this sequence of events:

• Marketers realized it was effective
• They started doing it excessively, manipulatively or even abusively
• Google caught on that the link type was no longer a signal of quality and shut it down via manual penalties or algorithm changes, OR
• Our audiences just got sick of it and it stopped working

I know some of you are reading this article and thinking, “If CTR affects ranking, I can game the system!”

A word to the wise: Don’t go down this road. DO NOT try to outsmart RankBrain using bots. RankBrain is very strong. Google has been building PPC ad click-fraud detection systems for over 15 years now. You cannot beat a bot at their own game.

RankBrain: rise of the learning machines

An unknown SEO future rolls toward us. But now you can approach it with a sense of hope.

You must take the necessary precautions. Ensure above average click-through and task completion rates for your main organic keywords before Judgment Day, at which time the computers will take over the ranking, much like how it is done in AdWords using no external inputs (e.g. links).

The future of SEO isn’t set. There’s no fate but what we make for ourselves. It is our destiny to survive Judgment Day, together.

Never stop fighting. The battle against RankBrain has just begun. You are our only hope. Join the SEO resistance!

*Data sources:

Conversion rate data is based on a sample of 2,367 US-based WordStream client accounts in all verticals (representing $34.4 million in aggregate AdWords spend) who were advertising on Google AdWords’ Search and Display networks in Q2 2015. “Averages” are technically median figures to account for outliers. All currency values are posted in USD.

Click-through rate data is based on a sample of approximately 2,000 US-based WordStream client accounts in all verticals who were advertising on the Google AdWords search network in Q3 and Q4 of 2013.

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How To Run A Business Blog That Converts Leads Into Sales

Sure, you know you ’need’ a blog – but it’s either still on the ‘to do’ list or it’s been tacked on as an afterthought. Either way, you’re probably here because you’re not getting much success from it and want to change that. Used correctly, a business blog has the […]

The post How To Run A Business Blog That Converts Leads Into Sales appeared first on Receptional.com.

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Six essential steps to present data persuasively

“The graphic method has considerable superiority for the exposition of statistical facts over the tabular. A heavy bank of figures is grievously wearisome to the eye, and the popular mind is as incapable of drawing any useful lessons from it as of extracting sunbeams from cucumbers.”

-Arthur Briggs Farquhar and Henry Farquhar from Economic and Industrial Delusions

In a previous column, I shared that data visualization is your secret weapon for storytelling and persuasion. I wanted to follow that up with actionable tips for how you can be more successful with your own efforts sharing data with your team.

I’ve been in countless meetings over my career where clients or colleagues presented data to me …painfully. When I say painfully, it wasn’t because they didn’t work hard on a campaign or project and have amazing insights to share. But the actual presentation/delivery of insights and actions could have been far more effective. And very worth the effort.

Presenting data persuasively is a ‘last mile effort’, because you’ve already done the work, mentally feel ‘finished’, and are now just sharing learnings and next steps. This is understandable and basic human nature. The work feels finished, which is why many content creators throw slides together haphazardly as they are ready to move on to the next thing. Today I’d like to persuade you not to do this and instead to take time to present your data thoughtfully.

If you follow the following six steps, your next meeting with a boss or client will not only go smoother, you will have much higher odds of influencing that person to take the action you want.

I’ve thrown in a few examples to illustrate my points.

1. Before you get into the data, set up the situation

Never just start presenting to a group by throwing charts and graphs on a screen. And never present to a group just by sharing a Google Sheet or projecting Google Analytics reports on the overhead.

Make a quick deck – not only is this better to present it, but gives the team a takeaway that’s easier to circulate internally and senior execs who get forwarded the content are far more likely to open and click through.

So you’ve started a presentation. First, spend time to take people through what you did (visually, ideally). For example did you just run an A/B test on a new landing page? Great, show a slide with the old page and new page before you dive into results so we can see what you did, along with a goals of why you ran this specific test in the first place.

The benefit here is now everyone will begin your presentation immediately following your logic and you’ll get far fewer questions. Your team may have initially signed off on the project but it’s more likely they don’t remember everything. Help them out.

As an example, if my colleague Krista Seiden was going to present the results from her project redesigning the Google apps for Business site, before diving into the data she should start by showing what the old site looked like.

2. Have one clear takeaway per slide, fix broken, confusing or misleading visualizations

Too many times I’ve seen young account executives throw all their data on one slide (perhaps not even visualized just as a list of numbers) because they feel a need to get everything across up front and more data must be good, because it looks more official, right? Wrong.

Never have a slide with more than one chart – it’s just too much material, no one is going to absorb it and people’s eyes will gloss over. This is simply too much information for wrap our mind around and still listen to a presenter.

When you try to say everything, you say nothing. An example of what not to do (four charts on one slide, just far too much):

Even more important, never mislead your audience! This visualization scale in the below chart is not only totally broken, but the “cute” attempt to use people icons to represent the bars in the chart simply adds more confusion. It’s difficult to take anyone seriously who uses these sort of graphics, however well-intentioned.

Some graphs are just hopeless …the below not only has 3D bars which you should never, ever use as they are incredibly confusing, but the icons above the chart add even more confusion. Not to mention the fact that this chart has no label! The only thing this chart would persuade someone of is that the person who created it probably shouldn’t be presenting data to your team. And by the way, this was a real chart someone presented in an agency meeting (edited to protect the innocent).

Via Ian Lurie

3. Present data as simply & cleanly as possible (now let’s see some good examples)

If you wanted to compare the growth of different revenue streams or consumer preference in a sector, you don’t need to do anything fancy. Just plot the data in a simple line graph with labels, sources and titles. Easy and the results are very clear!

We know from looking at the below chart that between 2017 and 2018, online video service revenue is projected to eclipse box office. There’s no room for confusion or any way to misinterpret.

It happens to us all – you created a chart that’s not very clear. But, this is fixable: figure out what point you want to get across and remix the data to portray, clearly, what you want to communicate.

The huge takeaway of the below chart is the massive 216% growth of internet as a source of news over the last 10 years for consumers. But you can’t see that very well in the first chart. Bold the one datapoint you want to use to make your point and also consider calling out percentage change to focus your audience on how big the trend is.

Source: flowingdata via one of their ‘Visualize This’ challenges to make data visualizations better

4. Always present data with context – never assume people know what you do, even your own team

So, for example don’t just show a trend of metrics via this month, but overlay what last year looked like to quickly see what this means compared to previous timeframes.

Google Analytics makes this super easy to do and it’s far more helpful than a chart that looks pretty and is going up and to the right. Sure, that looks nice, but what does it mean? Are these numbers good? We don’t know. Context answers this.

Additionally, never simply show a chart like this by itself – instead, have a text box below with something like a percentage change call out you want to draw attention to and the reason for it. Tell us what you want us to take away from the data.

And remember, someone should be able to click through your slides and get a clear understanding of what you wanted to communicate without needing you to present.

As analysts interpreting not just the ‘what happened?’ but ‘why?’ and ‘what does it mean?’ are what separates the good from the great. A hint for making your life easier: use annotations in Google Analytics to add callouts to interesting events right in the product, and later when you need to share data you won’t have to worry about forgetting what happened during that timeframe.

5. Have additional details in an appendix, but you don’t need to go through it

You don’t need to go through every single KPI and indicator metric in your presentation, especially the ones not core to your project. It’s actually what you don’t show that makes presentations better. Not only does more data not help you tell your story but it’s going to tire everyone in the room out and you’ll lose attention.

There’s only so much we can absorb in one sit down, plus it’s our job as analysts and marketers to share only the key information. Offer an appendix to both CYA but also provide detail if someone does want to understand more. They can do this offline and not waste the group’s time.

6. Have a ‘next steps’ slide where you summarize exactly what you want accomplished next

You’ve presented your project, goals, results and insights. You’ve made your points and have everyone persuaded to think the way you want them to (seeing reality, hooray!).

Now summarize with what, specifically you are going to do with this data in the form of a task list and team deliverables (such as running a new test, getting people started on that badly needed new site design, or removing products no one is buying from your ecommerce catalog).

Bonus tip: review your slides/presentation before you present

Practice makes perfect with presenting, and while you likely don’t need to go to the length of someone preparing to keynote an event, you should do at least do a quick dry run of what you want to say.

It’s worth the effort, even one or two rehearsals through something will not just get you comfortable with the material but also make it clear what you can remove from your presentation.

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Blenheim Chalcot acquires analytics firm iJento

Last week, Blenheim Chalcot announced the acquisition of customer journey analytics firm iJento.

I’ve been talking to Jonathan Attwood, CEO of fospha and iJento, about the tools and the thinking behind the acquisition.

What’s the reason for the acquisition of ijento? 

Blenheim Chalcot has hosted iJento’s clients in the UK and US for many years and is excited about the opportunity their technology and team delivers for organisations.  

So much so that they  acquired the business and have put their venture building track record, funding and client footprint to work developing iJento’s core sectors of customer journey optimisation and marketing analytics and extending its capability to analyse fraudulent and malicious behaviour.  

We are also adding our machine learning tech iJento.

Can you tell me a little about what ijento does?

iJento is built to help organisations understand today’s connected customer, whose buying journey is complex and cuts across multiple channels.  

Beyond page clicks and views, iJento enables you to capture, analyse, predict and shape customer behaviour.  Letting you take the right action at the right time to increase customer value across all touch points: web, mobile, social and offline.

iJento allows you to easily bring together all your customer data into a single location.  Centralising multi-device, multichannel data.  

Creating a single customer view and stitching multi-device activity.  It builds powerful customer profiles and transforms customer data into actionable insight that can be used to reduce advertising spend, increase sales and improve customer engagement.

It’s predictive tools allow you to understand customer intent and engagement in real time in order to influence customer behaviour.

How does it capture data as customers move between channels? 

Multichannel data is gathered from a range of sources, including in-browser tags, server-based tags, mobile app tags, data imports of offline sales and other back-office data, API feeds for campaign costing data, mass email data and more. 

Its unique ETL processing then matches data across sources and channels ensuring the new truth is reflected through the entirety of the customer’s history.

 

Who are its clients?

They include Ft.com, Cox Media Group, Direct Line Group, LV= (Liverpool Victoria), Allianz Ireland, and Cheapflights.

Why is this significant for brands and retailers today? 

Brands who learn from their data significantly outperform the who don’t.

Simply relying on old siloed tools that track lagging often product centred data is not enough. Brands need to be able to link all their customer data together across any device and source.  They need to be able to easily understand and make use of it in real time.  

They need to be able to be predictive and personalise user experiences.  Those who do this will have a significant advantage over others

Where will it fit into Blenheim Chalcot? 

The iJento toolset is unique in its ease of implementation and ability to help transform an organisations data and make a measurable difference to their business. We will accelerate iJento growth by continuing to invest in the team and technology.

ClickZ is part of the Blenheim Chalcot portfolio.

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Paid search and social: an introduction to your first steps in digital marketing

So you’ve realized, for one reason or another, that it’s time to crank up the volume of your business and invest in digital marketing.

You’ll be faced with an immediate question: there are so many different channels in digital marketing, which one do you try first?

Well, the first step is knowing what each channel does, then we can narrow down your options with some recommendations.

Breakdown of channels

SEO

Search engine optimization is the process of optimizing a webpage to increase the volume of traffic entering the site by obtaining a high-ranking position on search engine results pages (SERPs).

SEO is typically a long-term play, can take months of optimization to increase rank and requires tons of maintenance to hold or improve your position.

Paid search

Paid search (also know as pay-per-click – PPC) is a method of online advertising used to direct targeted traffic to websites through search engine results. This is done by bidding on keywords to enable your ads to show for relevant searches.

Paid social

Paid Social advertising involves placing ads on social networks like Facebook and Twitter, directly in the news feeds of targeted users.

Display

Display advertising consists of banner ads on targeted websites that present your product/service to large sets of audiences.

Native

Native advertising is promoting branded content that matches the form and function of the user environment it is served in.

Which one do I choose first?

No doubt there are lots of options to choose from. If you’re a small to medium size business, chances are you’re looking to kick-start your growth and want traffic to come in fast, but also to keep ROI and efficiency as a focus.

With this in mind, you can narrow things down to paid search and social as these are the channels that can bring in volume faster than the others while also offering plenty of levers which you can pull to optimize efficiency.

Paid search

The biggest benefit of paid search is that you’re reaching an audience with high intent – meaning the audience is already searching for your product or service. By choosing the most relevant keywords, you can get your brand, product or service in front of searchers who need it.

The great thing about reaching audiences with high intent is that you are getting the best quality traffic – essentially, the audience knows they want the product/service, so if you are able to capture that audience’s attention, the more likely they are to convert.

Now of course in this situation, you are also competing with others who are trying to get in front of the same audience.

So your ad will be listed alongside your competitors’ ads, and it’s not just a matter of who has the highest bid, but also the most relevant ad, landing page and user experience. In this situation you need to make sure the product or service you’re offering is advertised as attractively as it can be.

Given the high-intent audience, many verticals have very competitive markets, so the cost-per-click to get your ad in a high-ranking position can get very expensive. A great way to get a sense of the competition and what you will likely be paying is by using Google’s Keyword Planner tool:

Another thing to note is that, in order for search to work, there actually needs to be demand for your product or service. If not many people are searching for it, you really aren’t going to get much traction. This is where social comes into play…

Social

If you have just come up with a new product or service that has never really existed before, or hasn’t become popularized, social is the play for you. Because if people don’t know such a thing exists, that they need it in their life, how do they know to search for it? Therefore paid search becomes moot. (Think Tivo in 1999.)

In the above situation, you will be doing ‘pull’ marketing (a marketing approach used to draw customers to a brand where the goal is to strengthen awareness to the brand/product/service and essentially generate demand).

So you might say, “I can do pull marketing with display as well, so why go the social route?” The benefits of social, and more specifically Facebook, is that you have thousands of different data points to use, different targeting levers to pull, and the ability to really hone in on very specific audiences by using Facebook’s different technologies.

Another reason you may want to go the social route vs. PPC is in the scenario where competition in PPC is very high, making it expensive for you to get in front of your target audience. In a highly competitive environment, not everyone can afford to reach their audience. Facebook is a great way to get in front of your target demographic and familiarize them with your brand.

If you’re in ecommerce and have visually appealing products, then social is another great route to take.

The combination of brand awareness and visual products show that for small brands using Facebook, there is a differentiation opportunity. The opportunity is for brands (which happen to be in a highly competitive market) to differentiate and compete on head terms.

For example: a ‘newer’ high-end fashion line would be going after expensive head terms in search – keywords like ‘women’s clothing’, ‘men’s clothing’, etc. With only text elements in paid search, these prohibitively expensive terms make it hard to differentiate your brand from the sea of competition.

With social, users are not necessarily in a state of purchase intent, so ads serve the purpose of creating demand where it may not have already existed.

Ultimately, both channels have their own benefits in bringing traffic to your site, but if you are in a position where you only want to test in one first, then it’s definitely important to consider the nuances of each.

Sana Ansari is the General Manager of 3Q Accelerate.

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Google AdWords average conversion rates by industry [study]

When you evaluate your Google AdWords performance and conversion rates, what are you comparing against?

If you’re like most advertisers, your primary source of insight is probably your own historical data. As long as you’re trending towards better than worse, you’re doing great… right?

Not really.

It’s important to track your performance over time and make sure you’re constantly improving, but using only your own data tells you nothing about how you’re doing against your competitors (AdWords is a live auction, after all).

We recently ran an extensive analysis of more than 2,000 client accounts in all verticals, representing over $34 million in AdWords spend, to establish current, accurate average conversion rate (CVR) benchmarks for both Search and Display ads across 20 different industries: Advocacy, Auto, B2B, Consumer Services, Dating & Personals, E-Commerce, Education, Employment Services, Finance & Insurance, Health & Medical, Home Goods, Industrial Services, Legal, Real Estate, Technology, and Travel & Hospitality.

What is the average conversion rate on Search & Display?

So how do you know whether you’re middle of the road, or getting left in the dust?

We found that on average, Google AdWords advertisers are seeing conversion rates of 2.70% on the Search network, and 0.89% on the Display network.

Benchmarks are an important consideration on top of your own data, because if you were getting 1% conversion for your Search ads and doubled it to 2%, you might think that was pretty awesome. You doubled your CVR, that’s amazing! Woot!

Except you’re still doing 0.7% crappier than the average, and the average isn’t exceptional. It’s just… average.

Don’t settle for average conversion rates – be a unicorn in a sea of donkeys

Who the heck aspires to be average?

If you aren’t even doing as good as middle of the road, average might seem pretty attractive, but you can do so much better than that.

The range on conversion rates varies so greatly that the top 10% of advertisers are regularly getting conversions FIVE TIMES better than average. Not only can you be better than average, but once you surpass that plateau, you can do incredibly well in AdWords.

It’s crazy; there are all these accounts seemingly content to hover around slightly below or slightly above average. I call these advertisers the donkeys. They stubbornly just sit there, waiting for something to happen.

But then you have the unicorns; those accounts that are not only doing better than average, but slaying the averages by converting at exponentially higher rates – up to five times higher. These advertisers enjoy not only more conversions, but typically a way lower cost, too, as more engaging ads drive higher Quality Scores and lower CPCs as a result.

Don’t be a donkey.

So which industries convert best on the Display network?

The surprising top converting industry in Google Display ads

You might think that Travel & Hospitality or maybe Dating & Personals ads would kill it on the Display network, because they’re just so much sexier and exciting than other industries, but you’d be wrong…

They actually have the lowest conversion rates among industries for Google Display ads!

So which super sexy industry does best with Display ads? Well, um… it’s Home Goods. Would you believe ads about couches, lamps, desks and other furnishings and goods for the home convert at an average rate of 2.19% in Display? That’s higher than any of the twenty other industries we evaluated.

The top five best converting industry types for Display are:

• Home Goods with an average 2.19% CVR
• Finance & Insurance: 1.75% avg. CVR
• Real Estate: 1.49% avg. CVR
• Employment Services: 1.28% avg. CVR
• Technology: 1.04% avg. CVR

And who fares the worst? The average CVR in the Advocacy industry is an abysmal 0.37%.

Top converting industry average Search CVR is almost 3x higher than overall

In the Search network, one industry is killing it to the extent its average conversion rate is nearly three times higher than the average CVR across Search as a whole.

Insurance and Finance ads enjoy an average 7.19% conversion rate on the SERPs, a full 2.19% higher than the next highest industry average:

1. Insurance & Finance: 7.19% avg. CVR
2. Consumer Services: 5.00% avg. CVR
3. Advocacy: 4.61% avg. CVR
4. Real Estate: 4.40% avg. CVR
5. Legal: 4.35% avg. CVR

Understanding these averages is critical, because how you fare against others in your area can seriously impact your costs and ROI. For example, you could be converting at 3.5% and think that’s pretty decent, yet find it hard to justify what you end up with as your cost per acquisition. That might leave you thinking AdWords just doesn’t work for you.

But if you’re in Consumer Services, where the average conversion rate is actually 5%, the reality is that you’re seriously underperforming. If you’re converting less than average, your ads aren’t resonating, your QS is going to suffer, and you’re going to pay MORE for each click.

Check out the average Conversion Rates across the 20 industries we analyzed and see how you stack up:

For new Google AdWords benchmark CPCs, CTRs and CPAs by industry, see our full analysis on the WordStream blog.

from Yong Johnson’s DM blog http://ift.tt/1UdES6Y via transformational marketing
from Tumblr http://ift.tt/1UfhxSs

Google AdWords average conversion rates by industry [study]

When you evaluate your Google AdWords performance and conversion rates, what are you comparing against?

If you’re like most advertisers, your primary source of insight is probably your own historical data. As long as you’re trending towards better than worse, you’re doing great… right?

Not really.

It’s important to track your performance over time and make sure you’re constantly improving, but using only your own data tells you nothing about how you’re doing against your competitors (AdWords is a live auction, after all).

We recently ran an extensive analysis of more than 2,000 client accounts in all verticals, representing over $34 million in AdWords spend, to establish current, accurate average conversion rate (CVR) benchmarks for both Search and Display ads across 20 different industries: Advocacy, Auto, B2B, Consumer Services, Dating & Personals, E-Commerce, Education, Employment Services, Finance & Insurance, Health & Medical, Home Goods, Industrial Services, Legal, Real Estate, Technology, and Travel & Hospitality.

What is the average conversion rate on Search & Display?

So how do you know whether you’re middle of the road, or getting left in the dust?

We found that on average, Google AdWords advertisers are seeing conversion rates of 2.70% on the Search network, and 0.89% on the Display network.

Benchmarks are an important consideration on top of your own data, because if you were getting 1% conversion for your Search ads and doubled it to 2%, you might think that was pretty awesome. You doubled your CVR, that’s amazing! Woot!

Except you’re still doing 0.7% crappier than the average, and the average isn’t exceptional. It’s just… average.

Don’t settle for average conversion rates – be a unicorn in a sea of donkeys

Who the heck aspires to be average?

If you aren’t even doing as good as middle of the road, average might seem pretty attractive, but you can do so much better than that.

The range on conversion rates varies so greatly that the top 10% of advertisers are regularly getting conversions FIVE TIMES better than average. Not only can you be better than average, but once you surpass that plateau, you can do incredibly well in AdWords.

It’s crazy; there are all these accounts seemingly content to hover around slightly below or slightly above average. I call these advertisers the donkeys. They stubbornly just sit there, waiting for something to happen.

But then you have the unicorns; those accounts that are not only doing better than average, but slaying the averages by converting at exponentially higher rates – up to five times higher. These advertisers enjoy not only more conversions, but typically a way lower cost, too, as more engaging ads drive higher Quality Scores and lower CPCs as a result.

Don’t be a donkey.

So which industries convert best on the Display network?

The surprising top converting industry in Google Display ads

You might think that Travel & Hospitality or maybe Dating & Personals ads would kill it on the Display network, because they’re just so much sexier and exciting than other industries, but you’d be wrong…

They actually have the lowest conversion rates among industries for Google Display ads!

So which super sexy industry does best with Display ads? Well, um… it’s Home Goods. Would you believe ads about couches, lamps, desks and other furnishings and goods for the home convert at an average rate of 2.19% in Display? That’s higher than any of the twenty other industries we evaluated.

The top five best converting industry types for Display are:

• Home Goods with an average 2.19% CVR
• Finance & Insurance: 1.75% avg. CVR
• Real Estate: 1.49% avg. CVR
• Employment Services: 1.28% avg. CVR
• Technology: 1.04% avg. CVR

And who fares the worst? The average CVR in the Advocacy industry is an abysmal 0.37%.

Top converting industry average Search CVR is almost 3x higher than overall

In the Search network, one industry is killing it to the extent its average conversion rate is nearly three times higher than the average CVR across Search as a whole.

Insurance and Finance ads enjoy an average 7.19% conversion rate on the SERPs, a full 2.19% higher than the next highest industry average:

1. Insurance & Finance: 7.19% avg. CVR
2. Consumer Services: 5.00% avg. CVR
3. Advocacy: 4.61% avg. CVR
4. Real Estate: 4.40% avg. CVR
5. Legal: 4.35% avg. CVR

Understanding these averages is critical, because how you fare against others in your area can seriously impact your costs and ROI. For example, you could be converting at 3.5% and think that’s pretty decent, yet find it hard to justify what you end up with as your cost per acquisition. That might leave you thinking AdWords just doesn’t work for you.

But if you’re in Consumer Services, where the average conversion rate is actually 5%, the reality is that you’re seriously underperforming. If you’re converting less than average, your ads aren’t resonating, your QS is going to suffer, and you’re going to pay MORE for each click.

Check out the average Conversion Rates across the 20 industries we analyzed and see how you stack up:

For new Google AdWords benchmark CPCs, CTRs and CPAs by industry, see our full analysis on the WordStream blog.

from Donald Jarrett digital marketing news http://ift.tt/1UdES6Y via transformational marketing
from Tumblr http://ift.tt/1nNCm9y