Tag Archive for: Advertising

Pinterest Begins Testing “Promoted Pins”

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Pinterest Sticker Icon by DesignBoltPinterest may only be the fourth most popular social media platform out there, but it may become a significant part of your online marketing strategy in the near future. Last Thursday, Pinterest CEO and co-founder Ben Silbermann announced the company is beginning testing promoted pins, their version of paid advertising.

The site is primarily popular with females, but it is well loved by social media marketers because its users have shown time and time again that they are more willing to purchase than the demographics using any other social media platform. Facebook may have over eight times the traffic of Pinterest, but they aren’t purchasing at anywhere close to the same rate of the Pinners. However, in the almost four years since its creation, Pinterest has never included any paid advertising.

Silbermann discussed the decision to finally venture into paid advertising in a post titled “Planning for the Future” on the Pinterest blog. He also lays out a clear idea of exactly what this monetization will look like. They haven’t established all of the details, but Silbermann does say ads will be:

  • Tasteful –No flashy banners or pop-up ads
  • Transparent – Pinterest will “always let you know if someone paid for what you see.”
  • Relevant – Pinterest is aiming to ensure the ads you’re seeing are relevant to the content you are actually looking for.
  • Improved based on feedback – The company plans to take user feedback into heavy consideration while rolling out paid advertising, as well as working to improve the experience.

The first promoted pins are being tested in search results and category feeds. If you search for “Halloween” you might get promoted pins for costumes.

Pinterest definitely isn’t leaping into the advertising options, but they are beginning a change which could be very lucrative for enterprising social media marketers in relevant fields.

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You Can Never Have Too Much AdWords Advice

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In my opinion, you can never read too many opinions and advice columns on how to manage your PPC campaigns. Sure, some may turn out to be full of bad advice, but I believe every bit of information can either guide you to improving your own campaigns, or steer you away from looming mistakes. At the very least, it’s good to see what other people are doing in order to inspire you to come up with your own methods.

With that in mind, how could you avoid Chris Kent’s article at Search Engine Journal called ’10 Golden Rules of AdWords.’ It’s loaded with good information. Some of it is bordering on cliche, such as logging in to your account at least once a day and testing every conceivable movable piece. But, even these have been repeated for a reason. They are important and are a key to building a successful campaign.

My favorite pieces of advice are a suggestion of how to determine how much to bid for certain keywords. For many, this seems to be a guessing game, which is not good. Also, remember to link your PPC ads to the specific page your ad refers to. Don’t just leave traffic at your doorstep, invite them in and put them right where you want them. In other words, bypass your homepage and get users as close to a conversion as you can.

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Bing Plans To Improve On AdWords Enhanced Campaigns

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A PPC war has started between Bing and Google and Microsoft Search Network’s GM fired the most recent shots. David Pann has bashed the effectiveness of AdWords Enhanced Campaigns for larger advertisers because of its bundling of desktop and tablet targeting options.

“For smaller advertisers that don’t distinguish between mobile, tablets and PCs Enhanced Campaigns may make sense. But for larger advertisers which understand that their messages must be different according to the device it will be harder and they will have to create workarounds,” Pann said.

Pann has a point and there have many independent reviewers who have essentially had the same critique since Google unveiled Enhanced Campaigns.

Take his opinions with a grain of salt, however, considering he is working for a direct competitor, who just happens to be rolling out their own version of Enhanced Campaigns in the coming months. Pann says Bing’s version will allow user’s to choose whether to combine mobile and desktop campaigns, or to keep them separate. Bing plans to launch their new product in beta sometime before fall and have a full release by the end of summer 2014.

For more, check out Jessica Davies article at The Drum.

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Meet AdWords’ New Keyword Planner Tool

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Do you use the AdWords tools ‘Google Keyword tool’ or ‘AdWords Traffic Estimator’? If so, this is news you’ll need to sit up and take notice of. Both tools seem to be being phased out by a new tool unveiled earlier this month, ‘AdWords Keyword Planner’.

Keyword Planner is a streamlined, focused way to launch new campaigns. Its easy to use wizard interface guides you step-by-step through the process of creating new campaigns and new ad groups.

Larry Kim, of Search Engine Land, has all the details of how to use the tool and what it is capable of doing. However, you may check your AdWords account and find no sign of the Keyword Planner. Right now, it’s only been made available in about 20-percent of accounts, but more accounts are being added all the time.

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Video Ads Coming To Facebook

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Facebook reportedly began gauging the interest of advertisers in video ad units about 6-months ago and now, as Ginny Marvin reports for Marketing Land, they appear ready to roll out video ads to newsfeeds by July.

The video ads are expected to be available for all platforms, desktop, tablet and smartphones, and at a lower CPM for broadcast television ads. However, detractors have already started wondering aloud how users will react to more ads in their newsfeed. Especially a concern about how autoplay videos will effect the site’s load times, especially for smartphone users.

Advertisers will certainly be clamoring for the ad space in the early going, but we’ll wait and see if it becomes a proven commodity.

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Facebook Ads Know Your Offline Buying Habits

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Facebook has long struggled with how to monetize the site without alienating its users. Though there have been many outspoken critics at every new ad update, for the most part the number-one social networking platform has done an admirable job. There newest innovation, however, might rub the public the wrong way.

Julianne Pepitone reports for CNN that ‘Partner Categories’, Facebook’s newest feature for advertisers, allows users to be grouped based on purchases made both online and in a physical store. That’s right. If you hold a membership card at your local grocery store and purchase a larger than average supply of one item in particular, Facebook, and its advertisers are going to know about it.

As an advertiser, you’re probably pretty excited about this development. While you won’t be able to see specifically who you are showing ads to, you will be able to see how many people fall into each category and why they were placed there, meaning what buying habits they exhibited to fit in this particular group. In this way, you get a more focused audience and can only show ads to people likely to be interested in your product.

As a typical Facebook user, you may feel that your privacy is being infringed upon. Previously, advertisers could only group you based on the information your volunteered on your profile and your online activity.

So, is Facebook going to far with this new feature? Regardless of your opinion, I’m guessing ‘Partner Categories’ isn’t going anywhere and similar innovations will be popping up for advertisers on other platforms soon.

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The Alphabetical Guide To Great Banner Design

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Image courtesy of Alex Ford

Image courtesy of Alex Ford

We see banners everywhere, especially in advertising. Whether they’re online, printed on cloth and draped across an entrance, or splashed across a billboard, banner ads all have the same core principles.

You wouldn’t think there is an entire art to making visually exciting and engaging banner ads, but if we can devote more than one article to the skill of making simple and attractive logos, Onextrapixel can devote each letter of the alphabet to effective banner advertisements.

Some of the entries are a little obvious like “grab attention” but they go the extra mile (or pixel if you enjoy the same type of lame humor I do) by explaining shock or surprise isn’t the real way to grab attention. Making viewers want to interact is the real trick to getting someone’s full attention.

Some of the other seemingly obvious suggestions shouldn’t need to be said, but so clearly are needed in the current marketing environment. There are only so words you can fit on a banner before it becomes illegible, and complex fonts make that word limit somewhere between one and five words. If someone can’t tell you what your ad said with just a one to two second glance, you’re trying to squeeze too much in.

Seriously, clarity is so important their list includes it three times with the entries “Message Clarity” and “Succinctness” and I don’t fault them for it. Keep your banner short. I’ve seen far too many ads at the top of my screen and running along the tops of subway cars absolute packed with words in a variety of fonts and all they ever do is hurt my eyes. Viewers remember the short and sweet.

There is obviously more to banner design than keeping it simple, but it opens up the big question addressed by many more of Onextrapixel’s list; “how do I convey a memorable message with so little?” If you can find an answer to that question, you are already well on your way to a great banner.

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Keys To Using Long Tail Keywords

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You’ve probably read plenty of articles, including some on this blog, that have informed you how important your keywords are to your PPC advertising campaigns. If you’re using short, broad, generic keywords, however, you’re missing out on a more engaged and qualified audience. Using long tail keywords, which are simply longer, more precise search terms, narrows your target audience.

The PYXL blog has some valuable information about how to use long tail keywords to drive more traffic to your site or blog and get more views and clicks on your ads. This is not only a money making option, but also a money saving option as you can eliminate extraneous traffic and hone in on the users who will convert.

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Bing Fires At AdWords ‘Enhanced Campaigns’

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Bing Ads is the clear runner-up in to AdWords in the search engine advertising game, but they’ve seen a way to set themselves apart and give users something AdWords is not. Recently, Bing jumped on AdWords introduction of ‘Enhanced Campaigns’ and, more importantly, the vocal concerns of some users. The general manager of the search network, David Pann, announced that Bing would not be bundling mobile, desktop and tablet advertising together and would give users the flexibility to control their own campaigns.

Not only is this a clever step by Bing to promote itself while putting down Google, but it also gives advertisers an alternative to ‘Enhanced Campaigns’. There’s never been much of a difference between Bing and AdWords, but now you can trade one for the other based on your preferences. Of course, one still comes with a fairly significantly larger audience.

Read more about Bings recent announcements, including some planned changes and the future direction of the product at Search Engine Land.

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Areas For Improvement In Your AdWords Campaign

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Unfortunately, there’s no magic equation that can turn any company’s AdWords campaigns into efficient, low-cost, money makers. There are so many variables that you simply have to do your own leg work to find what works and what doesn’t. But, you aren’t completely on your own. There are some tips and tricks that will help you find your way and Lisa Raehsler has a handful of them for you at Clickz.

As you may have noticed, you’ll want to focus on keywords and ad scheduling to make the most productive impact on your campaigns. You can save money and deliver a more focused audience by simply paying attention to the details in these two areas.

You may also want to toy with the automatic bidding option to reduce your cost-per-click. Whatever you do, don’t settle. Continue to tinker and improve.

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