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Blog: Fresh Tilled Ideas

Why Everyone Needs A Digital Media Strategy

Posted On: June 24th 2009
By: Richard Banfield

Whether you are selling umbrellas out of your home or medical equipment to every major hospital in the country, the failure of some businesses and the success of others relates directly to a company’s ability to adapt to a web-based world. It’s not presumptive to suggest that without a comprehensive digital strategy all businesses face an uphill battle. Harnessing the advantages of this tech tidal wave while understanding why and how it is superior to the way your business used to function, could be difference between bankruptcy and booming business.

Traditionally, companies followed a systematic, one-dimensional approach to establish a marketing campaign. This has been referred to by some authors as directional innovation and refers to the incremental changes to an existing strategy. Put simply, until the web came along ad agencies followed a typical path to delivering a strategy. First they developed a creative strategy to brand and position a company and then they located a media outlet with which to distribute the campaign. In the age of the web this approach is fundamentally backwards. The old approach assumes to many things. It assumes that the creative approach will work and that their choice of media channels will succeed. There are too many variables at play that can ultimately be detrimental to the paying client. What’s really scary is that this approach gives the client no other option than to trust in, and rely on, several intermediary agencies and proxy companies to promote their business and measure the outcome.

In the old world of advertising direct relationships between the client and the media channels are non-existent. Marketing companies develop relationships with public media outlets, and traditionally receive a cut of the funds a client pays to advertise their business. In this model, businesses must trust that the media source chosen by a marketing company is the best possible way to publicize their services or product. The business man is essentially at the mercy of the marketing man, since he selects the media source that will offer the largest profit cut, instead of the source that might best benefit the client’s sales objective. These relationships established between marketing firms and media outlets complicate this business model, and can ultimately compromise the client’s best interest.

The media sources in this traditional methodology are strictly one-way outlets—print and television ads, billboards, and the like. These forms of media don’t reveal whether a marketing technique is actually effective or just a waste of company cash. Though the business can measure the number of sales that occurred when the campaign was launched, there is no way to confirm that one necessarily caused the other. One-way media outlets can estimate the degree of exposure a particular campaign receives, but can’t measure how much of it actually influenced consumer sales. This lack of data lets marketing and advertising agencies evade responsibility for failed campaigns. What’s worse, the client’s financial loss is still always the marketing and advertising agency’s gain.

Today, the emergence of digital media companies offers clients recourse; new technology has disrupted the traditionally linear relationship between the client, marketing agency, advertising firm, and media outlet. Two-way media has changed the face of consumer marketing, contributing new resources that have restructured the balance of power between each of the traditional players. As a result, the current business model is now a dynamic, overlapping web with digital media rapidly coalescing at its core.

To put it simply, the internet has had a serious impact on how companies approach marketing today. In an age where the web is more highly trafficked than any non-virtual location, older media sources such as print, billboards, and even television ads are becoming increasingly obsolete. We turn to the internet for shopping, research, business and socializing; it’s no great surprise that advertising in this arena will achieve the most exposure for your business.

Beyond the sheer volume of the consumer audience that exists on the web, digital media companies have the technology and know-how to provide clients with extremely valuable information about how effectively your campaign has attracted consumers, who these consumers are, and if this attention has directly resulted in an increase in sales. Digital media companies not only impart this invaluable consumer data to businesses, but are also held accountable for the measurable outcome of their services on product sales and consumer response.

The services and skills of individuals working in digital media are in increasingly high demand; marketing agencies are struggling to maintain clients as digital media companies are becoming full-service agencies, streamlining the traditional marketing process to a one-stop shop for clients. Companies still relying on the traditional marketing process cannot sustain the pace established by competitors working under the digitalized system, who are developing closer relationships with other companies and online media sources, resulting in increased efficiency in terms of the speed of each transaction and the overall market outcome. It’s been projected that by 2010, company expenditures on 2-way media sources will be at an all time high, (while one-way media will experience serious budget cuts,) with digital media leading the way at a one hundred percent increase in funding.

Within the past few years, social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, and Linked In have become a cultural phenomenon; online networks have provided a wealth of information to companies regarding consumer preferences and feedback. Essentially, the opportunity for businesses to interact so closely with consumers has provided a window for companies to find out what consumers want and then give it to them. Social networking sites give consumers an interactive forum to discuss products and voice opinions, stimulating a self sustaining form of product promotion on a whole new scale. Studies have revealed that product referral and reliability is by far more important to consumers than advertising appeal; social networking has fostered a virtual environment that has given consumers a locale to discuss likes and dislikes. For companies, this chatter is all good, (even a portion of the consumer dialogue is negative,) because it continually provides them with a wealth of knowledge regarding how to improve products to encourage consumer brand loyalty and sustained enterprise.

Opposed to the old model wherein an advertising agency devises a slogan, digital media companies can create customize product branding that is rooted in analytic data gathered from each specific client; they collect information that ensures that the placement and branding of each product is aligned with a distinct target audience. The popularity of certain brandings with specific consumers as well as the desirability of certain products with a particular audience—all of this information, gathered and interpreted via media gurus, is what has located digital media at the core of current and future business models. An entire new spectrum of improvement is at work as analytics are attained and marketing techniques are concurrently revised; this allows companies to continue to hone in on precisely the best way to maximize product exposure and sales.

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The perfect way to use Twitter to launch a campaign

Posted On: June 24th 2009
By: Richard Banfield

This is an example of how to build and manage the perfect digital campaign. Our friends at Campaign Monitor have created a website advocating for Microsoft to fix Outlook.

Here is the context of their site...

Microsoft have confirmed they plan on using the Word rendering engine to display HTML emails in Outlook 2010.

This means for the next 5 years your email designs will need tables for layout, have no support for CSS like float and position, no background images and lots more. Want proof? Here’s the same email in Outlook 2000 & 2010.

Outlook 2010 is still in beta and Microsoft wants your feedback. It’s time to rally together and encourage Microsoft to embrace web standards before it’s too late.

Let’s use Twitter to send a clear message to Microsoft.

Join 8,863 others asking Microsoft to improve standards support and make sure you include fixoutlook.org in your tweet. We’ll pull together every tweet that includes the link here to give Microsoft a unified message from the community

The site was launched this morning and within a few hours had close to 9,000 tweets. Initially they only used their email distribution list and Twitter. Soon after they hit 6,000 tweet they attracted enough attention to be mentioned on TechCrunch. The reason this campaign works so well for Campaign Monitor is that it uses a bigger social issue to build empathy and action to bring attention to its own services. This is a smart way to push an agenda without doing heavy sales.

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Creating an Effective Keyword List is an Essential SEO Tool

Posted On: June 19th 2009
By: Timothy Lupo

At the start of any SEO campaign we ask our clients to send us a list of keywords they would like to target throughout the campaign and hopefully rank well for in search engine results. We then review these outlined keywords, adding additional keywords to the mix so that we can have a variety of interrelated terms to use. Keyword research is a very important task and it’s crucial to spend the time developing a strong keyword list.

There is one common mistake that most individuals make when they do keyword research and that’s creating a keyword list that is far too short. Spending the time developing an extensive keyword list will help you open up the search engine ranking doors and expose you to areas that your competition may not be utilizing and/or have realized.

Of course this post isn’t meant to explain every detail of keyword research, but I would love to outline the basic steps to get you started. A good place to start is always with the Google Keyword Tool. This tool will help you establish a strong base; offering suggestions of similarly related keywords to use. Many individuals may only input one keyword and call it a day, but that’s not enough. Let me build upon the last example I used in my previous post entitled, “The Power of A Long Tail Keyword Strategy.” If you are a small rental car company in Boston you may only search for the term “rental car,” but there is a problem with this approach. First, if you are using only one keyword or one keyword combination the keyword you are researching may be far too competitive for your website (Think how hard it would be to compete using the keyword, “car rental” with Hertz, Enterprise and/or Avis). Secondly, you are limiting the amount of possible directions you could be building using specific, less competitive keywords.

There is a better way to conduct keyword research in terms of SEO. First, do a little brainstorming and figure out a variety of similar inter-related keywords that are less competitive, such as vehicle rentals, vehicle rental, rent a vehicle, cars for rent. Then focus specifically on your industry and geographic location to develop a set of very specific keywords: boston rental vehicles, boston car rental, boston vehicle rental, boston car for rent and so on. Find synonyms of the words you are trying to target, to develop a broad range of keywords. Use the Google keyword tool to find additional keyword recommendations. Spy of your competitors by viewing their title and description tags to see what keywords they are ranking well for. Add keywords that are specific to particular services/products you provide because customers may be searching for these exact terms.

Remember that it’s very important to develop a broad keyword list, but remember it should also be focused. Do not choose keywords that are not relevant to your site. Overtime you will be able to re-evaluate your keyword list and access what terms you want to continue to use and what additional terms you would like to add to the list.

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The Power of a Long Tail Keyword Strategy

Posted On: June 5th 2009
By: Timothy Lupo

It’s always a great idea to formulate a list and/or a variety of keywords you want to rank well for in organic search. Remember to generate keywords that are relevant to the content on your site. Remember that these keywords will eventually be the driving force behind your sites ability to index organically well for particular terms, so take your time with this process.

Although you may want to optimize for one particular keyword/term, the online market may already be saturated with that term. This is when it’s appropriate to develop a long tail keyword strategy. In its simplest form a long tail keyword strategy includes keywords that are still specific to your business, but longer in length. Individuals using these terms within their search are usually already aware of what they are looking for. The benefit to this is that long tail keywords/terms are usually easier to rank well for and individuals searching for these terms are more likely to be converted to buyers/leads.

Let’s say you are a small rental car company in Boston. (Yes, a sexy topic/business I know... but for this example it works perfectly). Of course you want to go after the keywords, “rental cars” “car rental” but this market is already saturated with the well known car rental companies such as Avis, Enterprise and Hertz. Try getting past these big dogs in Google search results. So it’s essential that you devise a strategy of long tail keywords. You will want to create a combination of longer, more specific and geographically targeted terms, which could include “affordable car rental,” affordable car rental boston,” “car rental agency,” “car rental deal” and a variety of other combinations. These terms will give you more opportunity to rank well in search engines and help build -up your online organic search presence.

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Using Your Company Blog to Attract More Leads

Posted On: June 4th 2009
By: Kaitlin Hertel Counihan

While blogging has become an extremely popular trend, in both the personal and business community, many still don’t realize the importance of having a company blog. Company blogs can attract thousands of viewers through search engines and social media websites and lead them back to your main company website. Blogs are also a great way to build the brand of your organization.

One of the most beneficial reasons for starting a company blog is that it can alert potential clients of new products that you may be offering, and, can be an extremely useful tool in generating leads for your organization. Doing this however, is easier said than done, so here a few tips on how to use your company blog to effectively generate leads.

Think Quality Not Quantity: While it seems to make sense that the more content you publish on your blog will generate more leads, the opposite seems to be true. Too much content will overwhelm your viewers, and will end up deterring them from following through. The most important thing about a blog is to generate readers, so focus on well-written, interesting posts that keep the reader in mind. More readers mean more potential leads, so by focusing on quality, rather than quantity, you will see an increase of leads in no time.

Entice Readers with Persuasive Offers: Once you have gained a following of readers, it is important to use offers to entice people with something in exchange for their contact information. This is so that viewers can get to know your organization better, and in time, become a potential lead. Instead of just having one offer to entice readers, it is recommended that you tie your offer to the content of a specific blog post.

Grab the Viewer’s Attention: After you’ve come up with a smart idea for an offer, the final “step” is to inform the viewers about the offer through a Call to Action. This is what the reader will physically click on to receive the offer, and acts as a substitute sales pitch. It’s extremely important that this link is able to grab viewer’s attentions, so feel free to play around with sizes, fonts and colors to create the most visually attractive link. It’s also important to think about where the link will go on your blog, so make sure to experiment with different placements.

Keep these tips in mind, and you’ll be on your way to gaining more leads in no time. Have fun!

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Incorporating Multimedia into your Small Business SEO Strategy

Posted On: June 4th 2009
By: Timothy Lupo

It’s becoming increasingly important, from a search engine optimization (SEO) stand-point, to create a wide variety of dynamic content on the web. An effective strategy used to be based solely on text-based results, but this is no longer the case. Although it is still important to create good quality, text-based content there are a variety of other platforms that can be utilized to help your organization rank well within the search engines.

Google has changed the name of the game (among many other search engines) and has started incorporating a variety of other platforms into search results. This allows for a more “blended” type of search. It is now estimated that roughly 1 in 4 Google search results incorporates this type of “blended” search result. This means it’s time to re-evaluate current SEO strategies and create not only quality text but additional video, images and news content.

Now that search results are moving on the direction of a “blended” approach there is less real estate within the first page of Google for text-based content. This means its time to start creating your YouTube and Flickr profiles, tagging these videos and images with a good quality title, description and set of keywords. These videos and images are also visually appealing with will increase the likelihood that individuals click on your link.

It’s important to create a wide variety of content (text, video and image based) on the web. How do we use this content to not only drive traffic to our site, but attract and establish credible leads/customers? Adding links from the YouTube videos and Flickr images to your website, or to a useful blog post will definitely be beneficial. It’s really about connecting your audience to your brand/business through a variety of platforms and engaging these customers in a creative/useful way.

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Mastering CSS Hierarchies

Posted On: May 28th 2009
By: Alex Fedorov

When designing on the web, we often tend to write so many style rules in CSS for div tags that sometimes conflicts arise. Here's a great tutorial that one of our senior designers, Kristine, found on how CSS weights style elements based on the hierarchy of the way it's written and relationship to tags and containers:

http://css.maxdesign.com.au/selectutorial/advanced_conflict.htm

Happy reading... and debugging!

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Murdoch still doesn't get how media is changing

Posted On: May 7th 2009
By: Richard Banfield

The Guardian reports that Rupert Murdoch is planning the release of an ebook reader. Here's his comment when asked about the Kindle...

"I can assure you, we will not be sending our content rights to the fine people who created the Kindle," he said. "We will control the prices for our content, and we will control the relationship with our customers."

Control? Seriously? Doesn't he read his own newspapers? Big corporations are so worried about losing control over their brands and content. They try to control the delivery and interaction while at the very same time consumers are becoming more invested in brands that reward participation.

Murdoch says, "The current days of the internet will soon be over" and yet he's still making the same noises the dying newspaper industry has been making for years. Their conventional wisdom is to create a single blockbuster story and distribute it to millions of people. The web no longer works like that. We're all participating in millions of separate and unique conversations that are not blockbusters but rather a series micro-exchanges. Now that's a story worth writing about.

Some of my best friends are newspaper men/women but if they continue to sing this tune they are all headed the way of the Dodo.

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Creating Quality Content for Your Business

Posted On: May 5th 2009
By: Timothy Lupo

It’s always important to generate and create strong quality content. Distributing distinct and thoughtful content is pivotal in increasing the likelihood that you will be found online. Even with that said, many businesses drop the ball when it comes to the content creation game.

For many, creating content is an overwhelming process and just another tedious task to complete (among many others). Some people even cringe at the thought of someone else reading their writing. It’s important to not think this way. Now don’t be fooled, producing dynamic and entertaining content for your audience is challenging, but the hard work is definitely worth the reward.

When it comes to “winning” the SEO game it’s really all about content, content, content. The more distributed content you have the more likely you will be found online. There are some pretty useful strategies that can help you generate strong content in less time and effort, by taking what you already do (probably on a daily basis) and turning it into content.

Think “Blog Post”: Anytime someone asks you a question tell them you will answer them in written format. This way you not only answer their question, but then have the ability to turn this answer into a blog post. Written format gives you the time to develop a thoughtful answer.

Put your Thoughts on Paper: Anytime you develop a presentation or have an idea write it down. This not only helps organize your thoughts, but also allows you to use these ideas to create blog posts that are based on a particular topic you are researching.

Interview others in your Field: Take the time to get to know other individuals in your field and ask them relevant questions you would love answers to. You can then post these answers on a public platform for others to review. It’s a win-win situation for not only you, but other individuals reading your post.

Share what you Learn: I am constantly learning new strategies and techniques in the field of SEO/SEM. I’m always blogging about what I have learned and trying to help others understand. Remember that the best advise is always free and it’s not only beneficial to others but yourself. It’s a great way to document what you have learned and you can even pull from it when you need to.

It’s about combining processes, so that you are able to create relevant and strong content in much less time and effort.

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Using Custom Templates in Wordpress

Posted On: May 1st 2009
By: Alex Fedorov

Recently, we were configuring a site with both a Blog as well as Pages with the content being managed through Wordpress. The odd thing is there didn't seem to be clear documentation in Wordpress about how to save a template (for ex: page.php or index.php) and then hook it up simply into Wordpress to be able to tie a Page to the new template.

Then I stumbled across this post:
http://www.binarymoon.co.uk/2007/06/wordpress-tips-and-tricks-custom-templates/

Looks like it's as easy as saving an existing template like page.php as a new template (ex: custom.php).
Then you would open custom.php and paste the following PHP tag at the top of the page:

<?php /* Template Name: Name of template here */ ?>

Lastly, you go into Wordpress, click Pages, select the page you want to manage and your new template should now appear as an option to choose.

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