The Work Media Internet Marketing Blog

Jerry Work here. Man, I really "mailed it in" in my last blog post. In other words, I basically just slapped some words down to get something out, but did not put much real effort into it. But sometimes you have to do that just to keep the thing going. The key to success (well, maybe not THE key, but a big key nonetheless) is consistency. It's actually a lot like working out. Once you get on a roll and get in the habit of doing it 3 or 4 times a week, it gets a lot easier. But if you stop for an extended period (as we recently did, going a month without posting a new blog) and then try to start back, it becomes much more difficult until you get back into a good groove.

Last year, when I first launched Work Media as a full-time business (rather than a sideline) it was much easier to blog regularly because I didn't have much else to do. I didn't really have any clients to speak of so I had plenty of time for marketing, such as publishing my blog. Funny how things change once you actually start getting some business.

Now there are two of us working full-time, with a major expansion about to happen that will greatly increase the number of people associated with Work Media, and it's all we can do to get our work done. So blogging has fallen way down the list of priorities. But it must be done!

Why? For one thing, it generates search engine rankings for our web site. Another reason is that it is a way for us to clarify our thoughts on subjects related to Internet marketing - a way for us to think out loud. It also helps establish our credibility by creating original writings about our industry. We have used a lot of content originally published in our blogs as material for articles and books.

So...you should do the same. Force yourself to post three blog posts every week. And on those days when you just can't come up with anything, phone it in. Just getting it done somehow is better than not doing it at all.

Work Media provides a blog publishing service. If you just don't have the time or energy to do it, we'll do it for you! Contact us today at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: blog marketing, blogging, blogging advice, blogging service, content creation, internet marketing, web site marketing

Behavioral targeting ("BT") is basically displaying ads to people based on what web sites they have visited in the past. Recent research conducted by Advertising.com demonstrated that ads displayed on a BT network generated lower click-through rates but much higher conversion rates than search-based ads.

In the study, ads were run for three sites: a finance site, an auto site, and an education site. In all three cases, click-through rates were lower than search-based ads but conversion rates were considerably higher.

Double Click has a service that displays BT-based ads. Our hope is that in the near future, Google will integrate this into AdWords, which will give advertisers one more powerful way to display targeted ads whose performance can be measured down to the dollar.

Labels: behavioral targeting, google, internet marketing

There is a fine line between running ads for enough keywords in your paid search account to generate sufficient traffic and running so many that you generate junk traffic. Unless you only use exact match (or the equivalent). But there are so many variations of keywords or themes that if you only run exact match ads, you are likely to miss a lot of relevant traffic. But there is another way to fine tune the traffic your ad draws without missing relevant searches.

It's done by using negative keywords.

Negative keywords are keywords you specify that should not be included in search queries that trigger your ad. A common example is the word "free". If you sell a product but you do not want ads for your product being displayed to those looking for something free, then you could set a negative keyword of "free" to prevent it.

For example, let's say you sell an ebook about dog training. You might run paid search ads for search phrases like "dog training", "how to train a dog", "dog training information", etc. But if you don't want your ad to be displayed for a search of "free dog training information", then you would set a negative keyword of "free".

You can probably think of some negative keywords at the start that make sense, but as you run your campaign, it really helps to know what keywords people are actually using that trigger your ad at inappropriate times. In Google, you can generate a search query report that will show you exactly what phrases have triggered clicks to your site. As you look through the report, if you see keywords that are not appropriate, then those are keywords that you should add to your account as negative keywords.

Using negative keywords is a way for you to fine-tune the traffic that you drive to your web site via paid search without limiting yourself by using exact match ads. It is a strategy we definitely recommend you look into.

If you need help fine tuning your paid search campaign, contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: google, Google Adwords, internet marketing, paid search, pay per click, ppc, search marketing, search query performance, web site marketing

LowerMyBills.com has raised quite a stir in the world of online advertising the last few years for its crazy ads featuring people dancing or creatures acting goofy. The company spends $80 million/year online running those ads. But it has paid off because the company (from what we understand) is very successful.

The company's ads often feature several identical shaded-in figures who are dancing in sync. The ads are annoying but they have accomplished their goal of getting the attention of the viewer.

Recently, we have noticed that other companies have started running ads that are almost exactly the same - shaded in figures dancing in sync. Personally, when I see the ads, I think of LowerMyBills. They've been so aggressive in running those ads that just seeing that style of ad automatically triggers thoughts of the company. Which completely defeats the purpose of having another company run the ad.

In our opinion, you do no good for your company by copying ads from already established ad campaigns. If you want to borrow the general idea, then that's fine - but you need to mix things up! Create your own wacky characters. Create your own style. Because if all you are doing is perfectly copying highly successful ads from another company, really all you're doing is emphasizing the success of the original company.

So think of your own ideas. Or if you're going to borrow ideas from others, give it your own touch. Put some effort into your marketing, and you will be much more successful in the long-term.

If you need help implementing an online marketing campaign for your business, contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: advertising, banner ads, branding, internet marketing, online branding, search engine marketing, search marketing

There seem to be some technical issues going on at Google related to reporting. We have one client who is unable to change the range of data reported in his control panel. To see a specific range of data, he has to go through the full process of creating a report. Here is Google's response to the problem:

Thank you for your response. We do have a workaround for this issue for you to create a report. Please follow the instructions given below to create a report on demand:
1) Sign into your AdWords account.
2) Go to the 'Reports' tab.
3) Click on ' Create a Report Now ' link and create a report following the instructions given.
Please continue to manually generate reports until we find a solution to this issue. Also, our engineers are currently working towards resolving this issue. I apologize for the inconvenience caused.

And we have another client for whom conversion data is being reported incorrectly. This is a serious problem since we use conversion data as the basis for our actions. Conversion rate is a much stronger basis for determining the success of a keyword or ad than click-through rate. So the lesson here is to make sure you double check the data in your reports. And if you are having trouble (with date ranges, conversion data, or anything else) make sure you contact Google AdWords customer support (there is a contact link inside the control panel). We have found Google to be fairly responsive when it comes to these issues. Which you would expect them to be since having people run ads is how they make their money!

If you need any help managing your Google AdWords campaign, please contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: google, Google Adwords, Google Analytics, internet marketing, paid search, pay per click, ppc, search engine marketing, sponsored search, web marketing

One of the most important rules of paid search marketing is that there must be a strong connection between the search phrase used in the search engine and what is shown on the page when the visitor arrives. In other words, if a person clicks on your search engine ad after searching for "binoculars", then, if possible, he should arrive at a page that talks about binoculars. This will tend to greatly increase your conversion rates.

The same concept holds true for natural search rankings. If that same person searching for binoculars clicks on your organic search engine listing, then you have a better chance of doing business with the person if he arrives at a page about binoculars. The problem is that organic search engine rankings are much more mysterious and out of your control than paid listings. And generally, the page on your site that is listed in the search engine results will be your front page.

So how do you create this same kind of congruency between the search phrase and the web page content? The answer is to use scripting to detect the source search phrase, parse it out, and then display custom content based on that phrase. For example, keeping with the same example, if the search phrase was "bargain binoculars", then your web page script would parse out each word and compare it to some kind of database table of pre-populated words. So when the script makes a match with the word "binoculars", it would display whatever content is indicated in the database table.

The specifics of how to do this are beyond what we can go into in this article, but if you discuss this idea with a competent web programmer (not a "designer", but a real programmer), he should be able to figure out how to do it.

If you need help thinking up or implementing strategies to generate search engine rankings and improve conversions on your web site, please contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

One of the most important rules of paid search marketing is that there must be a strong connection between the search phrase used in the search engine and what is shown on the page when the visitor arrives. In other words, if a person clicks on your search engine ad after searching for "binoculars", then, if possible, he should arrive at a page that talks about binoculars. This will tend to greatly increase your conversion rates.

The same concept holds true for natural search rankings. If that same person searching for binoculars clicks on your organic search engine listing, then you have a better chance of doing business with the person if he arrives at a page about binoculars. The problem is that organic search engine rankings are much more mysterious and out of your control than paid listings. And generally, the page on your site that is listed in the search engine results will be your front page.

So how do you create this same kind of congruency between the search phrase and the web page content? The answer is to use scripting to detect the source search phrase, parse it out, and then display custom content based on that phrase. For example, keeping with the same example, if the search phrase was "bargain binoculars", then your web page script would parse out each word and compare it to some kind of database table of pre-populated words. So when the script makes a match with the word "binoculars", it would display whatever content is indicated in the database table.

The specifics of how to do this are beyond what we can go into in this article, but if you discuss this idea with a competent web programmer (not a "designer", but a real programmer), he should be able to figure out how to do it.

If you need help thinking up or implementing strategies to generate search engine rankings and improve conversions on your web site, please contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: conversion strategy, internet marketing, scripting, search engine marketing, search engine optimization, search marketing, seo, web site marketing

Well, we've done it - we went a whole month between blog posts. I am definitely not proud of that fact. Hey, business is good, but that's no excuse to let our blog die. So let's try this again.

One problem we've had with Google up to this point is that if you ran geographically targeted ads, and you were physically located outside of the area, you had no way to preview your ads. There was no geographically-based preview.

Fortunately, Google has changed that. Check out the following URL:

https://adwords.google.com/select/AdTargetingPreviewTool

This page lets you type in a keyword and then specify a geographic location for which to view ads that are currently running for that keyword. Finally, you have the ability to run specific ad campaigns in different geographic areas other than your own and actually verify that your ads are running and see how they look. You can even specify particular geographic coordinates if you need that level of detail.

So that is today's Google power tip. Hopefully we'll find the time starting next week to get back on a regular schedule, bringing you tips and information you need to be successful with your online marketing.

If there is ever anything we can do to help you in your online marketing efforts, contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: google, internet marketing, paid search, pay per click, ppc, search engine marketing, search marketing, sem, sponsored search