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Monday, September 24, 2007

MediaPost Survey Reveals Strength of Online Marketing

Jerry Work here. I do most of the blogging for Work Media. The way my partner/brother Chris and I work is that I do most of the content stuff, such as blogging, we both do paid search, Chris does more pure SEO, and I handle very technical issues, such as the programming of our proprietary paid search management software, which is currently in development. My point is this: I will be out of much of this week because of my five month old daughter, who is having surgery at Vanderbilt Children's Hospital, so the Work Media blog will probably not get updated that much this week. I just didn't want you to think we were abandoning you again. I know there have been times when we would go a week or several weeks with hardly any posting. This is not going to be one of those times.

Now onto other things. A recent survey of the members of MediaPost reveals that, despite the overall sluggishness of the American economy, Internet marketing is still coming on strong. An article in MediaPost that summarized the results showed the following:

70% of survey respondents said their fourth quarter online marketing budget is up over 2006.
59% increased their budgets from the second quarter to the third.
34% plan on increasing their online advertising budget in 2008, versus 7% who will decrease it.

Here is the link to the article: http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=Articles.san&s=67923&Nid=34643&p=400638

I would wager that, of all marketing media outlets, online is the only area experiencing increased budgets right now. So the time to get cracking with your own online marketing campaign is NOW!

If you need some help getting your online marketing campaign off the ground, contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net. We're here to help.

Labels: internet marketing, surveys

Friday, September 21, 2007

Generating Marketing Data with Heat Map Analysis

Heat map analysis is coming of age as a tool in the Internet marketer's toolkit. Heat map analysis creates a visual display of mouse movement or click activity over a web page. The idea is that where the mouse moves to, human eyes are following. Where the mouse sits on the screen, "heat" is displayed. The hotter (more red) the area of the screen, the more that part of the screen is looked at. Or the more clicks an area of the screen gets, the hotter it is.

Why would you need to know this? Because where people are looking and clicking on your web page, that's where you need to place your most important marketing message or your device to capture the visitor's email address. If you know what plot of real estate people are drawn to, you know where to focus your marketing.

At one time, heat map analysis was voodoo magic (as are many things associated with online marketing) beyond the use of everyday marketers, and it was very expensive. But now there are several options for generating free or low cost heat analyses for your own web site. Here are a couple of options:

www.crazyegg.com. This service, which is based on clicks, is free for users tracking less than 5,000 page views per month, and who are tracking four pages or less. Beyond that, they have pay plans that range from $9 to $99 per month.

www.clickdensity.com. This click tracking service is also free for analysis of less than 5,000 clicks per month, although it is limited to a single page. One interesting feature of some of their paid plans is the ability to do web page split-testing.

www.fusestats.com. This is a more complete analytics package that includes heat maps. Their free service is limited to 15,000 monthly page views and 15 heat maps per month, and it is based on clicks. This package can be used for paid search conversion tracking as well.

www.opencube.com. This company sells a product called Mouse Trends, which is JavaScript code that runs on your site. It allows for true mouse movement-based heat map creation, as opposed to just clicks. The cost is $149.

Spend an hour or so examining where people are looking and where people are clicking on your site. The information may be quite surprising, and could trigger some ideas on how to better present the information on your web site. The more you know, the better job you can do of crafting your marketing presentation.

If you need some help generating data for your web site to help you make better decisions, contact Work Media today at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: analytics, click map, heat map, internet marketing, seo

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

150 Blog Posts and Going Strong

This marks Work Media's 150th blog post. Whoohoo! To those of you who have been along for the ride, we thank you. If you're new to Work Media, then welcome. If you don't know, Work Media is a small Internet marketing firm based in Nashville. The company consists of the Work brothers (Jerry - 34, Chris - 28, and Corey - 20), and their partner/sister company, Frank/Best International, which is a top-10 Nashville advertising agency with clients such as Honda and AKG.

We specialize in helping companies develop and implement aggressive, multi-pronged Internet marketing attacks using paid search, natural search, and content strategies to drive targeted traffic. We have many things in the works for the coming months, including the release of our own paid search bid management tool. That is a big step for us. We want to be the THE agency in the Southeast for cutting edge Web marketing that combines technology with results-oriented marketing strategies. We also have a new book about to come out which discusses using Google AdWords Editor for efficient AdWords campaign management. And soon we will be recording our first audio podcast.

We've got a long ways to go, but judging from how busy we are, we're headed in the right direction. If there is every anything we can do for you, please call us at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: Google Adwords, internet marketing, paid search, pay per click, search engine optimization, web marketing, web site marketing, Yahoo Search Marketing

Monday, September 17, 2007

Anyone Can Be a TV Star - Capitalizing on the Online Video Trend to Promote Your Business

The movement toward online video/entertainment continues to pick up speed. There are a lot of major established entertainment industry veterans, such as Disney's Michael Eisner and the Coen brothers, who are creating content exclusively for the Web. This is a reflection of the changing entertainment viewing habits of consumers, especially those under 35.

The good news for you is that, unlike broadcast TV, the Web is a space where you can compete. You don't have to have a large budget. And you don't have to own a television network. There are two major strategies you can take with regard to using online video: release interesting content to video sources in an attempt to drive traffic to your site; or as content for your site that will result in a loyal audience.

You might want to do both. However, it is unlikely that the same video content will work for both purposes. If you are an accounting firm and create a series of videos about cutting your taxes, those would be excellent content for your web site. However, it is unlikely that there would be wide distribution of the video outside those specifically looking for such information.

For a viral video effect, your video needs to be very interesting or unusual. If it makes people laugh, then it has a shot at being spread around. Going back to the accounting firm example, if the firm could create a video that was short and humorous, that would work much better than the drier material specifically related to taxes.

So what kind of video could you create to promote your business? Just think creatively, and make sure you come up with some kind of unique angle for your content. Also, make sure you tag your videos with keywords - you need people to find your videos!

Work Media has full video production capabilities and would be happy to talk with you about using video to promote your business. Feel free to call us at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: content, content creation, internet marketing, video, web marketing, web site marketing

Thursday, September 13, 2007

Using Google's Ad Preview Tool to Verify Your Geographically-Targeted Ads

One technique for fine tuning your Google AdWords campaign is to use Google's geographic targeting options to only run your ads specific markets. One very good reason for this is if you only do business in certain markets. In this case, you will be wasting money if you run your ads nationwide. It just makes sense to only run your ads in markets where you do business.

Another reason for using geographic targeting is if you have reason to believe that your products or services may sell better in certain markets. In this case, you would want to set up a separate campaign for each market in order to generate separate performance data for each market. By doing this, you can learn exactly what markets are more receptive to your marketing message and concentrate your budget in those markets. If you already know that your products or services will sell better in certain markets, then you should just run your ads in those markets to start with. For instance, it is a pretty good bet that snow blowers will sell better in Minnesota than Arizona.

Google's geographic targeting works by examining the IP address of the Web browser and making a determination of the location of the user. It's not a perfect system, but it seems to work fairly well. The negative for you, if you are running geographic-targeted ads, is that you can only see yours ads in Google if you are actually sitting in the market in which your ads are running.

But Google provides a way for you to test your geo-targeted ads:

Visit Google.com/adpreview

This page will let you select a specific market in which to view search results pages and ads. Just type your search phrase (one of your campaign keywords), select a market, and then do the search. This will let you actually verify for yourself that your ads are running in your target markets.

If you could use some help managing your Google AdWords account, 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 engine marketing, search marketing, web marketing, web site marketing

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Advanced Bid Changes in Google AdWords Editor

In Google AdWords Editor, when you are on the Ad Groups screen/tab, there are two options for making bulk bid changes: Advanced Bid Changes and Advanced Content Bid Changes. They accomplish exactly the same thing for search and content bids, respectively.

Clicking one of the buttons brings up the Advanced Bid Changes popup screen. The tool allows you to increase or decrease bids for the selected ad groups by a particular percentage or dollar amount. You can also set a ceiling or floor for bids.

For instance, if you want to raise all of your bids by 10% but bid no more than $2 in any particular ad group, you would select the "Increase bids by:" radio button, type "10" in the text box, and set the dropdown list to "percent". Then you would click the checkbox labeled "Set bids no higher than:" and type "2" in the text box. Then click the "Change Bids" button.

Alternately, if you want to decrease all bids by $.50 but want to maintain a minimum bid of $1, you would click the "Decrease bids by:" radio button, type ".50" in the text box, and set the dropdown list to "USD". Then you would click the "Set bids no lower than:" radio button and type "1" in the text box.

If you are on the Keywords screen, you have a similar option (also labeled "Advanced Bid Changes") that does the same thing for keyword bids, but it also has a couple of extra options. One option is to raise the minimum cost per click for selected keywords that are inactive to the minimum for activation. The other option is to remove keyword-level maximum CPCs and use the default ad group bid. There is also an additional constraint option to disallow setting keyword maximum CPCs to values lower than their minimum CPC bids.

If you could use some help actively managing your Google AdWords account, contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

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

Monday, September 10, 2007

Google AdWords Editor: Replace Text & Advanced URL Changes

When working with text ads (in the Text Ads tab) in Google AdWords Editor, at the very bottom of the screen are two very handy functions - Replace Text and Advanced URL Changes.

Replace Text does just what it says - it replaces text. It works just like find/replace functionality in word processing software. First you select an ad or a group of ads, then click the "Replace Text" link. In the box that appears, type the text you want to replace in the "Find text" text box and the text you would like to replace it with in the "Replace with" text box. You can specify whether to replace text in all of the ad fields, or in a particular one such as the headline, display URL, or one of the description lines. When you are ready to run the replace function, just click the "Find Matches" button. A popup box will appear that will require you to confirm the replace if any matches are found.

The Advanced URL Changes function allows you to do the following for a single ad or a group of selected ads:

Change the URL. To do this, type the desired URL in the "Set each URL to:" box.

Append a text string to each URL. To do this, type the string in the text box labeled "Append this text to each URL:". This is a very handy function if you want to append a parameter to a set of ads for tracking purposes. For instance, if you want to append a parameter to each URL so that you can identify the source ad group that generated traffic to your site, you could set the string to something like "?Source=Google-Ad_Group_Name". Then when you look at the analytics for your site, you can identify the traffic that originated from the ad group because it will have the ad group name appended to the end of the URL.

Remove a parameter from each URL. To do this, type the parameter name in the text box labeled "Remove URL parameter with this name". Continuing with the example above, if each URL already has the Source parameter but you want to remove it, you could type "Source" into the text box to remove it from a set of ads at once. To remove it from all ads, you would need to make sure that all ads were selected.

These functions let you make changes to your destination URL in bulk, which can save you a lot of time. Play around with them and see what uses you can come up with.

For help making the most of your Google AdWords campaign, please contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

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

Friday, September 07, 2007

Making Use of the Google AdWords Editor Tools Menu

The Google AdWords Editor has a Tools link on the main menu that has four options: Find Duplicate Keywords, Keyword Grouper, Show Ads with Selected Images, and Settings.

Find Duplicate Keywords is a very useful function for making sure you are not duplicating keywords across ad groups. To use it, select Tools/Find Duplicate Keywords, then select strict or loose word order (whether or not the separate words in the keyword have to be in the same order), whether to search for duplicates account-wide or within a specific campaign or ad group, and whether or not the keywords have to have the same match type to qualify as duplicates. Then click the "Find Duplicate Keywords" button.

The keywords found to be duplicate are listed in the Keywords screen/tab, grouped together by ad group. To eliminate any duplicates, you can select the keyword, then delete it, or right-click/cut, or set its status to Paused. We recommend pausing them, just in case you decide to use it again later.

The Keyword Grouper tool will automatically divide a set of keywords in an ad group into many smaller, more specific groups. One of the keys to successful pay-per-click campaign management is having ad groups devoted to a specific, finite set of keywords so there is tight congruency between the keywords and ads. The Keyword Grouper tool makes this easy because it does the work for you. It is often the case that an AdWords account begins with just a few ad groups which each contain lots of keywords. This helps keep things manageable and makes it easier to launch the campaign. But over time, as more time is devoted to the campaign, it becomes clear that there are sets of keywords that would probably perform better if they were broken out into their own ad groups.

To use the Keyword Grouper tool, select Tools/Keyword Grouper from the main menu. Then select the campaign and ad group within the campaign you would like to break up. Then click the "Generate common terms" button. This will extract the keywords from the specified ad group. To focus the generated keyword list, you can type words that should not appear in any of the returned keywords by typing them into the "Ignore these words" text box. Then click "Next".

AdWords Editor will then show you a preview of new ad groups it would create from the list, based on common terms shared among groups of the keywords. If you plan on creating new ads from scratch for all of the new ad groups, check the radio button that says "No, don't create any text ads...". However, it will probably save you some time to check the radio button that says "Yes, copy text ads..." This will automatically populate the ad groups with the same ads used in the original source ad group (or another ad group that you specify). Then you can go back through each new ad group and modify the ads as necessary. Finally, click the "Finish" button.

The Settings option on the Tools menu lets you specify various options, such as whether to hide deleted campaigns, ad groups, or ads. You can also specify if you want to download deleted and ended campaigns and ad groups. You also have the option to connect to an HTTP proxy and the account language.

The Tools menu contains some powerful features that can save you a lot of time. Get to know it - it could become your best friend.

If you could use some time-saving help for managing your AdWords account, contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: AdWords Editor, google, Google Adwords, internet marketing, paid search, pay per click, ppc, search engine marketing, search marketing, sem, sponsored search, web marketing, web site marketing

Thursday, September 06, 2007

Google AdWords Editor: Importing and Exporting Data

Google AdWords Editor lets you export AdWords account data in several different formats - as a CSV file, as an AdWords Editor archive file, as an AdWords Editor sharing file, and as an HTML file. File exporting options are available via the File link on the main menu at the top of the interface, or by right-clicking on an account, campaign, or ad group name.

The "Export for Archiving" and "Export for Sharing" options do essentially the same thing. They both export AdWords Editor data in a format that can be re-opened in AdWords Editor. For example, if you wanted to move your account and data settings from one instance of AdWords Editor to another, you could export the account data with the Export for Archiving option, save the file (a .aea file) to your computer, then move the file to another computer. On the new computer, you would use the File/Import Account Snapshot links to import the data into AdWords Editor. Imported data can be in either the .aea or .aes file format. The .aes files are created by using the "Export for Sharing" option to export your data, rather than "Export for Archiving".

The other two export options, "Export to CSV" and "Export to HTML" are for exporting the data to look at in other programs. The CSV option creates tab-delimited text files which can be opened up in spreadsheet software such as Microsoft Excel. This is useful for analytical types that like having all the data displayed for them in one big file.

The HTML option creates a nicely-formatted HTML option that can be viewed in a web browser. This option is useful for creating a file that can be easily viewed by anyone. If you have clients or other interested parties who want to see the keywords and ads that comprise an ad group or campaign, you can create an HTML file and give them exactly the information they need. Work Media has used this option on numerous occasions to get client approval for the keywords and ads we are using before launching a campaign.

What exactly you can export depends on what is selected in the left-hand side of the screen. For instance, if the account name is selected, from the File menu you have options to export the entire account or export the current view (if exporting to CSV). If a campaign is selected, you have options to export the entire account or the currently selected campaign. If an ad group is selected, you have options to export the account, current campaign, or the current ad group.

Using AdWords Editor's file exporting options, you have a lot of freedom to export all or part of your AdWords account in several different formats - either for data movement purposes or account viewing purposes.

If you would like help managing your Google AdWords account, contact Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: AdWords Editor, google, Google Adwords, internet marketing, paid search, pay per click, ppc, search engine marketing, search marketing, sem, web marketing, web site marketing

Wednesday, September 05, 2007

A Walkthrough of the Google AdWords Editor Tabs

We thought we would step back a moment in this blog post and discuss each of the tabbed sections on the right-hand side of the Google AdWords interface.

The right-hand side of the Google AdWords Editor is divided into eight different screens, with tabs at the top to move from one screen to the next. The screens/tabs are: Keywords, Sites, Negatives, Text Ads, Image Ads, Mobile Ads, Ad Groups, and Campaigns. Following is a description of each screen.

Keywords. The Keywords screen displays all the keywords for the campaign or for a specific ad group, if an ad group is selected on the left-hand screen. By default, the information displayed for each keyword is the type, status, minimum CPC, and destination URL. If stats are turned on, then it also displays average CPC, total cost, average position, conversions, conversion rate, and cost per conversion.

Sites. The Sites screen is only enabled for site-targeted campaigns. By default, it displays the site URL, status, maximum CPC, and destination URL for each site in the campaign. If stats are enabled, it also shows the clicks, impressions, click-through rate, average CPM (cost per thousand impressions), cost, conversions, conversion rate, and cost per conversion for each site.

Negatives. The Negatives screen shows negative keywords or sites for a campaign. It also displays the type.

Text Ads. The Text Ads screen shows the headline, first line description, second line description, display URL, destination URL, and status for each text ad in an account, campaign or ad group. If stats are enabled, then it also shows the clicks, impressions, CTR, average CPC, Average CPM, cost, average position, conversions, conversion rate, and cost per conversion for each text ad.

Image Ads. The Image Ads screen shows the image, name, dimensions, display URL, destination URL, and status for each image ad in the account, campaign, or ad group. If stats are enabled, it also displays the clicks, impressions, CTR, average CPC, cost, average position, conversions, conversion rate, and cost per conversion.

Mobile Ads. The Mobile Ads screen displays the headline, description, business name, business phone, country, display URL, destination URL, markup language, status, and mobile ad type for each mobile ad in the account, campaign, or ad group. If stats are enabled, it also displays the clicks, impressions, CTR, average CPC, cost, average position, conversions, conversion rate and cost per conversion.

Ad Groups. The Ad Groups screen displays the ad group name, status, maximum CPC, maximum content CPC, and maximum CPM for each ad group. If stats are enabled, it also displays the clicks, impressions, CTR, average CPC, cost, average position, conversions, conversion rate and cost per conversion.

Campaigns. The Campaigns screen shows the campaign name, status, daily budget, start date, end date, whether or not search or content is used, whether or not specific content bids are set, and if budget optimizer is turned on for each campaign. If stats are enabled, it also displays clicks, impressions, CTR, average CPC, cost, average position, conversions, conversion rate, and cost per conversion.

For each screen described above, clicking on an item in the data section displays details/options about that item in the box below. For example, clicking on a campaign name on the Campaigns screen results in the display of a series of text boxes that contain the campaign name, daily budget, status, search or content networks, and the start and end dates for the campaign. You also have options to edit the language and geographic targeting of the campaign.

Now that we have described each screen in detail, we advise you to just click around the AdWords Editor interface to get comfortable with it.

And, as always, please call Work Media at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net if there is anything we can do to help your paid search campaigns be successful.

Labels: AdWords Editor, google, Google Adwords, internet marketing, paid search, pay per click, ppc, search engine marketing, search marketing, sem, web marketing, web site marketing

Tuesday, September 04, 2007

Creating Draft Campaigns in Google AdWords Editor

Google AdWords Editor lets you create draft accounts, which are accounts that do not get uploaded when you click the button to post selected changes. The reasons you would want to set up a draft account are numerous, including:

You want to build out a new campaign and set everything up before actually adding the campaign to your account.

You want to build out new ad groups while maintaining existing ad groups through AdWords Editor.

You have a planned schedule of campaigns or ad groups and want to work ahead and to build out the campaigns without adding them to the account.

Or maybe you just want to practice building campaigns without risking negative effects on the account.

Whatever your reasons, AdWords Editor makes it easy. Here's how. Right-click on the account name on the left-hand side of the screen and click either "Add Draft Keyword-targeted Campaign" or "Add Draft Site-targeted Campaign". Or you can click the Data button on the top menu, then Campaigns, then the link to create a keyword or site-targeted campaign.

Once you create the campaign, you do the same thing you do with any campaign - specify the campaign name, daily budget, status, start/end dates, and whether the campaign is for search, content, or both. You can also specify the language and geographic targeting. The first time you set the campaign details, you will also have a form below that to add your first ad group. Type in a name and maximum cost per click, then click the Create Ad Group and Go to Keywords button.

When the time comes that the campaign is ready to be launched, all you have to do is change its status to active or paused.

Work Media is here to help you maximize the effectiveness of your paid search campaigns. Call us today at 888-299-4837 or email Info@WorkMedia.net.

Labels: AdWords Editor, internet marketing, paid search, pay per click, ppc, search engine marketing, search marketing, sem, sponsored search, web site marketing

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