Daily Search Forum Recap: January 15, 2018

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Search Engine Roundtable Stories:

• Google My Business Videos Now Live
  About 10 days ago we reported some businesses and merchants were seeing video upload features in the Google My Business dashboard. Well, Google's Allyson Wright announced in a Google My Business Help thread on Friday that this feature is now fully live...
• Google Confirms AdSense Earnings Drops, Blames Issue To Crawler Access
  We have been reporting on the ongoing issues of AdSense publishers complaining about drops in earnings and ad display issues, resulting in drops in earnings. Well, finally...
• Google Reverse Image Search Matching Images Bug To Be Fixed
  Last week we reported on a possible bug or change with reverse image search in Google. Well, it is a bug...
• Larry Markovitz - The Search Community Honors You
  This is part of the say something nice about an SEO/SEM series - feel free to nominate someone over here. Larry Markovitz lives in Miami, Florida with his family and is the CEO of Markati Group...
• Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2018 With A Google Logo & Bing Theme
  Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the day America honors the American Baptist minister and activist who became the most visible spokesperson and leader in the civil rights movement. Google honors Martin Luther King Jr. every year, it is an American holiday...
• Google Working On Cryptography? Make Payments Great Again Hat
  The other day, I spotted this photo on Twitter from one of the desks at the Google Boulder office with a ton of books on cryptography and on top of the books is a hat, a Trump style hat, that says Mak

Other Great Search Forum Threads:

from Search Engine Roundtable http://ift.tt/2DeIqVD
via IFTTT

5 Reasons You Need Healthcare Digital Marketing To Grow Your Business

by Robert Clough

Do you want to grow your medical practice or healthcare supply company? Here's 5 reasons you need healthcare digital marketing to get more customers or clients.

The use of healthcare digital marketing has increased in the last few years. This is due to the adoption of internet devices by patients and physicians alike. 72 percent of internet users got health information online in 2013.

In fact, digital marketing is fast overtaking the traditional form of marketing. When you combine these facts, the need for healthcare digital marketing becomes obvious.

If you are not tech savvy, the most obvious question here is;

What is Healthcare Digital Marketing?

It is the application of digital marketing strategies in the healthcare industry. Digital marketing strategies include;

• Social media marketing

• Mobile marketing

• Search engine marketing

• Content marketing and others

It is an excellent way of marketing because it is cheaper than the traditional form. The staggering number of internet users makes it practical too. The opportunities are abundant; it would be unwise not to use it.

Why You Need Digital Healthcare Marketing to Grow Your Business

Here are five reasons you need healthcare digital marketing to grow your business.

Your Patients Are Now Online

The birth of the internet has changed how patients find their healthcare provider. Social media platforms make it even easier. An analysis shows that online information affects the way consumers perceive their health.

Patients are using internet devices more and spending more time online. As such, a healthcare provider would be a mistake not to take advantage of it. No matter your specialization, using healthcare digital marketing is vital for growth.

An impressive online image is appealing to both existing and potential patients.

Cheaper Way to Reach the Right Audience

The modern-day marketing is more precise than it used to be. Your target audience determines the strategy used.

Basically, for every product or service, a customer is willing to pay good money for it. Customers would preferably buy healthcare products like a Green Trousers Molift Smart 150 online than work into a store. The real question is, how do you find these potential customers?

There are plenty of social media platforms with audience scattered across the globe. Pick specific people based on their interests, demographics and more. In that way, you can advertise to the right customers every time. It's an efficient way to market your business.

If your healthcare business is small and you have no marketing budget, no worries. Digital marketing is the way to go. The more prominent corporation may hold the advantage in traditional marketing.

However, digital marketing levels the playing field. It doesn't matter how small you are; online presence is all you need.

Access to relevant digital marketing tool will give you a global reach at a low price. In comparison, you won't get far using traditional tools such as;

• Television

• Newspapers

• Banners and Posters

The list shows conventional marketing channels. Digital marketing is taking over from these channels because they've proven to be more efficient.

It's a Good Way to Interact with Patients

Healthcare digital marketing helps you stay on top of patients' evolving demands. It allows you to upgrade your product as their preferences change. Here is how that happens.

Interacting with your patients through social media ensures that you know what they're interested in. Through their expressed interests, you'll know their likes and dislikes. Efficient marketing is built on information like these. They pave the way for future offerings.

Apart from interaction, you'll also have the opportunity of engaging your client. Unlike traditional marketing which is one-sided, digital marketing is a two ways communication. Hear the opinion of customers through the use of social media platforms. They get to give you feedback about your healthcare product or service.

What do you get from this? Better product and services, and a stronger healthcare digital marketing plan.

Grow Your Online Reputation

A good branding is a necessity for the long-term growth of any business. It is the perception of the patients about your business. As such, it takes years to build. That was before the use of digital marketing. Now, small healthcare businesses are in a position to do just that.

The use of social media and targeted ads helps you to create an excellent experience for clients. Combine this with interactions and engagements; you are on your way towards building a strong brand.

Getting consistent traffic on your practice website is an excellent way of doing this. Here are some ideas for getting that traffic;

• Post relevant content on your social media page

• Address clients' worries in the comment section of your website

• Guest post articles on authority websites and blogs

• Join existing conversations on Quora, LinkedIn, and Twitter

The idea here is to leverage social media, your website content, guest posts, and Q&A forums to win influence, and improve your online reputation.

Other Healthcare Businesses Are Doing It

That's right; your competitors are already using it. Ignoring digital marketing in this digital world is a sure way of killing your business. A review of the marketing strategies of your competitors will tell you how many have opted for digital marketing.

You are wondering, wouldn't that be repeating what others are doing?

Yes, it is. However, the key is for you to do it differently. Do it better than they did it. There are various options to choose from when employing digital marketing. Some of them are already outlined above.

Don't be afraid to experiment a little. Combine these options to market your healthcare business and showcase you're the unique services you offer. The plan has to fit your ideology and reflect your goals. Don't forget to keep everything within your budget.

Wrapping Things Up

Growth is necessary for success in any healthcare business. This growth can be achieved by building a strong brand for your business and increasing your customer base. Using an outdated marketing technique will only impede the progress. This is why you need healthcare digital marketing.

It's a cheap way of getting a global reach. And you can provide better products and services by engaging your clients. Moreover, all your competitors are already using it, don't get left out.

Are you are interested in learning more about using healthcare digital marketing to grow your business? Search Engine Guide provides a robust resource for your online healthcare marketing needs. Click here to enjoy our search engine optimization (SEO) tools.

Be sure and visit our small business news site.

from Search Engine Guide http://ift.tt/2EM1zul
via IFTTT

Land of Talk - Loving (Live on KEXP) https://t.co/R0AndPvono via @YouTube

Embed code not available

from Twitter https://twitter.com/KevinMich43L

Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2018 Google doodle honors Dr. King & his dream for a better world

Google is marking Martin Luther King Day with a doodle designed by the guest artist, Cannaday Chapman.

According to Chapman, his image of a young girl on her father’s shoulders listening to Dr. King speak is meant to evoke Dr. King’s dream of creating a better world for all children.

“It may appear that this movement or any civil rights movement was brought about by one person, but it’s the people that have the power to bring change,” says Chapman whose artwork highlights Dr. King’s audience versus depicting an image of the civil rights champion.

Leading to a search for “Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2018,” the doodle was created in collaboration with the Black Googlers Network, an internal employee group focused on on empowering Google’s black community.

Chapman says he wants his artwork on Google’s homepage to inspire people to reflect on this moment in history.

“I would like people to remember that current events and our actions today will shape the future generations of tomorrow. What kind of example do we want to set for our children and our children’s children?”

When asked what Martin Luther King Day means to him, Chapman says Dr. King’s message is especially relevant for today and the remainder of civilization.

“Dr. King is most remembered for fighting for the rights of African Americans, but he fought for the rights of all Americans. He believed in fairness and equity for everyone,” says Chapman, “As a black man, I wouldn’t be able to do what I’m doing today if it wasn’t for him and the brave people of the civil rights movement.”

In addition to publishing an interview with Chapman on the Google Doodle Blog, Google shared a few of his initial sketches for the doodle:

Here is the full Martin Luther King Day image currently on Google’s homepage:

A professional artist and illustrator, Chapman’s work has appeared in a number of well-known publications, including The New Yorker, The New York Times, and Oprah Magazine — and now Google’s homepage in the US.

---

About The Author

Amy Gesenhues is Third Door Media's General Assignment Reporter, covering the latest news and updates for Search Engine Land and Marketing Land. From 2009 to 2012, she was an award-winning syndicated columnist for a number of daily newspapers from New York to Texas. With more than ten years of marketing management experience, she has contributed to a variety of traditional and online publications, including

MarketingProfs.com

,

SoftwareCEO.com

, and Sales and Marketing Management Magazine. Read more of Amy's articles.

from Search Engine Land http://ift.tt/2EJeKMo
via IFTTT

Google to fix reverse image search bug

Google has confirmed it is working on a fix for a bug that is affecting reverse image search, which can be used to find related images, sites using an image and other sizes of an image.

Because of the bug, first reported on Thursday, the section of those search results that typically show “Pages that include matching images” no longer display the thumbnails of matching images or their dimensions.

Danny Sullivan, Google’s public liaison for search, confirmed the reverse image search bug on Twitter Saturday. Sullivan added that a fix is in progress and that it could “take up to a week for the fix to fully roll out to everyone.”

This is what you should see in the “Pages that include matching images” section of reverse image search results:

This is how that section appears — without the thumbnail images and images dimensions — as a result of the bug.

Again, this should be resolved within a week, according to Google.

---

from Search Engine Land http://ift.tt/2DjzZY6
via IFTTT

Understanding AdWords keyword match types for manufacturers

In a previous column, I addressed the challenges paid search advertising can present to industrial manufacturers who sell capabilities versus stock products.

Another challenge is the AdWords help files themselves. As an advertising platform, AdWords is geared more to retailers — when a platform uses common retail products to illustrate keyword strategies, it’s often hard to see how the example relates to keywords for complex manufacturing capabilities.

For example, under Basic Tips for Building a Keyword List, AdWords uses the example of men’s shoes:

If you’re a manufacturer offering a capability or products manufactured to engineers’ specifications for use in unique applications, it can be tough to come up with multiple basic categories if you’re thinking in terms of clothing items. “Well,” you might think, “we make precision machined parts,” or, “we electropolish stainless steel parts. I can’t think of another category.”

This confusion then carries over into keyword match type. “If you sell hats,” says one of the help files, then adding a “+women’s hats” will ensure your ads get shown.

“Errrr… but we do machining,” you’re thinking. “How do these matching options apply to us?”

Keyword match types — the “don’t hurt my brain” version

When you input your keywords into AdWords, you need to select the keyword match type: Broad, Modified Broad, Phrase, or Exact.

Keyword match types help control how Google searches will trigger your ads. If you match too broadly, your ads may get triggered by irrelevant searches, which can lead to costly non-converting clicks.

Match too tightly, and your ads may not trigger at all because of the dreaded “low search volume” message.

To facilitate understanding of match types for manufacturers just starting out in AdWords, I’ve used the analogy of print media advertising in the following examples. (PPC pros will know I’m taking some liberties using this analogy. But while it’s not perfect, it does communicate the main idea.)

All examples used are for illustrative purposes only. My agency has no relationship with any of the companies shown in the screenshots.

1. Broad match

Broad match is the default match type, and with it, you reach the widest audience. With Broad Match, your ad may appear when a user’s search query includes any word in your key phrase, in any order, along with variations of it — which you can see in Figure 1 for the search phrase “metal stamping.”

Notice how the second ad reads, “Stamp your own jewelry & metal,” while the third ad is for metal stamp kits from Amazon.

Using the print media analogy, Broad Match is the equivalent of putting an ad in the front section of a major urban newspaper, such as the Boston Globe. You’re reaching a wide audience with little segmentation.

Figure 1: Broad match example

2. Modified broad match

Let’s say your company makes die-cut metal parts. To segment your audience by application type, you can use modified broad match by placing a “+” sign in front of die-cut. Your keyword match would look like this: +die-cut metal stamping. The “+” sign tells Google to show your ads for broad match queries that include “metal stamping” plus this differentiator (Figure 2).

Modified broad match allows you to segment your audience while still keeping relatively high impression volumes (important if you’re also trying to build exposure for your company and its capabilities).

In print media, the equivalent of this type of matching would be placing an ad in the business section of the Boston Globe or in a trade publication the reaches multiple audience types. You still have broad reach, but you’re narrowing your audience.

Figure 2: Modified broad match example

3. Phrase match

Phrase match gives a higher level of control. When you add quotation marks to a keyword, you’re telling Google to show your ads for a phrase – including close variations and any words before or after the phrase.

For example, a company that makes machined or milled parts for aerospace applications could use the phrase match “machining aerospace.” Someone doing a search for “custom machining shops aerospace” might see the result in Figure 3.

The print media analogy here would be running your ad in a special tech section of a trade publication. You’re narrowing your reach but getting more targeted.

Figure 3: Phrase match example

4. Exact match

Exact match is the most restrictive match type. As the name suggests, your ad will only show if the user’s search query contains the exact keyword phrase or close variations thereof.

Unless you’re in a well-known industry, an exact match strategy can be tough for industrial manufacturers because it is so restrictive – and the search volumes very low for many esoteric keywords.

The analogy for exact match would be running your ad in a niche publication that targets your audience exactly — such as a tradeshow directory.

In conclusion

By clearly understanding the types of keyword matches in AdWords and how they work, you’ll achieve three things.

One, you’ll save a lot of money — because if you’ve read this carefully, you’ll know that “broad match” can quickly eat through your budget, just as it would if you advertised in your region’s newspaper.

Two, when you read through Google’s help files, you’ll have a better understanding of the concepts being communicated about keyword match types. Instead of clothing types, think industry or application type, for example. With AdWords, you want to balance getting impression share (and thus more clicks) with reaching your target audience through careful modified broad match and phrase match options.

And three, as you gain clarity, you’ll have more confidence to test match types to see what works for you.

---

Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.

---

About The Author

Dianna Huff, President of

Huff Industrial Marketing, Inc.

, helps small, family-owned industrial manufacturers grow through marketing. Dianna works with OEMs and contract manufacturers across the U.S.

from Search Engine Land http://ift.tt/2EGVkb9
via IFTTT

Automated, multichannel display advertising for small businesses finally coming to fruition

Roughly a decade ago, a variety of companies were trying to simplify and make (self-service) display advertising accessible to small businesses (SMB): AdReady, AdMission and iPromote. Today, only iPromote is still carrying that torch; the others have been acquired or exited the SMB market.

While they weren’t all the same and used different tools, it’s safe to say that these companies were well ahead of their time in one way or another. And most weren’t able to make good on their promises of simplicity and performance. Now, the market and technology have caught up and started to make automated cross-channel display advertising for SMBs a reality.

iPromote says its mission is “to make display advertising accessible and affordable to every business, regardless of budget, through technology designed from the ground up.” The company’s technology automates the ad-creation process by pulling creative assets from existing SMB websites and social media.

[Read the full article on MarTech Today.]

---

About The Author

Greg Sterling is a Contributing Editor at Search Engine Land. He writes a personal blog,

Screenwerk

, about connecting the dots between digital media and real-world consumer behavior. He is also VP of Strategy and Insights for the Local Search Association. Follow him on

Twitter

or find him at

Google+

.

from Sphinn: Hot Topics http://ift.tt/2EIJmhe
via IFTTT

Salesforce adds enhancements to its Commerce Cloud

 

At the NRF (National Retail Federation) Show in New York City, Salesforce is today announcing several new features for its Commerce Cloud e-commerce platform.

Instagram is now, for the first time, integrated with Commerce Cloud. This lets retailers create shoppable posts directly in Commerce Cloud — where they are already managing their commerce sites — and it also allows Instagram content to automatically update when catalog items are replaced.

Salesforce is also extending its Einstein AI layer to Instagram through Commerce Cloud. Einstein Vision can now automatically tag posts in the brand’s feed or on public Instagram feeds, where a logo or specific products appear.

Previously, VP of Product Marketing Gordon Evans told me, a retailer had to manually update Instagram to enter new catalog items, tag content or create shoppable posts in that social network.

There’s also a new connector between Commerce Cloud and the company’s Marketing Cloud for triggered emails.

The use cases cover three specific triggering behaviors on a store’s site: abandoning an online shopping cart before completing a purchase, abandoning a browsing session while in an online store or abandoning an email before taking a call to action, like clicking a link.

Evans said that, while retailers could previously have set up triggered messages in Marketing Cloud, the new connector makes it easier to implement.

Salesforce LiveMessage, which had been available through the company’s Service Cloud, is now available in Commerce Cloud. It employs preferred messaging apps like SMS or Facebook Messenger and, using Einstein-powered bots, can automatically route requests like order tracking or resetting a lost password.

An Einstein-powered mobile bot

And prebuilt, personalized customer journeys can now be deployed through Commerce Cloud to local stores and resellers.

A company’s central marketing department, for instance, might create a journey in Marketing Cloud’s Journey Builder, and the retailer can access those Journeys from Commerce Cloud in order to personalize the messaging.

Salesforce offers a use case where a national sporting goods chain’s corporate marketing team builds a customer journey for a winter sports campaign, and then local stores can customize it for winter activities popular in their area.

This was possible to do before inside Marketing Cloud, but now Salesforce says it’s easier for a retailer to do because it’s accessible in Commerce Cloud.

---

About The Author

Barry Levine covers marketing technology for Third Door Media. Previously, he covered this space as a Senior Writer for VentureBeat, and he has written about these and other tech subjects for such publications as CMSWire and NewsFactor. He founded and led the web site/unit at PBS station Thirteen/WNET; worked as an online Senior Producer/writer for Viacom; created a successful interactive game, PLAY IT BY EAR: The First CD Game; founded and led an independent film showcase, CENTER SCREEN, based at Harvard and M.I.T.; and served over five years as a consultant to the M.I.T. Media Lab. You can find him at LinkedIn, and on Twitter at xBarryLevine.

from MarTech Today | Marketing Technology News & Management Insights http://ift.tt/2DzGLH0
via IFTTT

Stop competing against yourself for your own customers

What do telecom, financial services, and CPG (consumer packaged goods) have in common?

Besides spending some of the highest amounts on digital marketing, the companies in these verticals all sell multiple product lines to the same person. Through data management platforms and identity resolution solutions, they’re now beginning to realize that, in many cases, their multiple product marketing teams have all been paying to reach the same customer.

Today, brands in these industries will often run separate marketing campaigns for each product line and designate distinct media budgets by department. This is a relic of how companies operate in silos, with separate P&Ls (profit and loss statements) due to mergers and acquisitions, having separate accounting software in the past, or just accountability structures.

For a bank, if wealth management has an acquisition target for the year, it will spend whatever it takes to reach that target, even if investment and brokerage departments are simultaneously trying to get the same existing customer to trade more with them. This not only creates inefficiencies as far as redundant or decentralized expertise and talent, but it leads to bidding up media for the same target customer — leading to more costs overall.

A CMO of one of the biggest banks in the world recently lamented to me that they have groups fighting over the same customer and bombarding a person with multiple offers a day from different groups. Every product group in this legacy structure would talk about “their” customer when in fact, it’s the company’s customer.

This bank has now made it clear that there is one owner of the customer — the company. In effect, the bank has stopped competing with itself. Why does that matter? Capping universal frequency and delivering the right product and offer has led to higher customer acquisition and not just lower costs through centralization. This achievement gets the bank closer to its goals.

Companies like this bank have growth targets. They have strategic priorities. In the digital age, they can now optimize companywide for those targets, and the CMO can move from running a loose confederacy of aligned teams to a strong federal system with a leader ruling across product lines.

Creating a customer budget

Savvy companies are increasingly choosing how to prioritize their marketing spend as they accumulate knowledge of the customer thanks to CRM (customer relationship management) and DMP (data management platform) technologies that establish a 360-degree view of customers.

If you know what a customer is worth today in each product line, you can decide as a company how to target your buyer and then personalize which product to offer first.

Telecom firms have been among the earliest to adopt this strategy. They recognize that a large percentage of the country is already a customer so they must be smarter about spending their marketing dollars to reach prospects and upsell current customers.

When a third of the country is buying one product from you already, you need to make sure you aren’t already wasting 33% of your budget sending an acquisition message to an existing customer of a certain product.

So, companies now consolidate their media spend across all product lines and create essentially a “customer budget” instead of a “media budget” where they decide how much they’ll spend to get new customers, upsell existing ones, and let consumers know about new functionalities or announcements.

These pioneering companies implement customer journey and off-site personalization strategies where they prioritize which products get marketed first, what gets shown if a customer isn’t converting for that product or what product to show if a consumer already has the product. These companies achieve targeted messaging without overpaying for hyper-targeted or overbidded media.

Financial services with their credit cards, loans, checking, and investment products are close followers in this trend. CPG — with their multiple daily use products and e-commerce operations increasingly selling the full portfolio — are next in this adoption curve. Travel platforms selling upgrades, activities, hotels and airfare are getting there.

Eventually every sector will have a customer budget and customer marketing, and we’ll stop thinking of marketing products first and start thinking of marketing to customers first.

---

Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily MarTech Today. Staff authors are listed here.

---

About The Author

Honored in AdAge’s 40 Under 40 while still in his 20s,

Thunder

CEO Victor Wong has been the guiding force in the company’s vision and success since its founding in 2008. He served as the IAB Local Committee Co-Chairman in 2010 and coauthored the IAB Local Targeting Guide. Victor holds a BA in economics from Yale University and is a fellow of the Yale Entrepreneurial Institute.

from MarTech Today | Marketing Technology News & Management Insights http://ift.tt/2D4rNb2
via IFTTT

What Rehab & Addiction Facilities Need to Know About Recent Google Policy Changes [Data]

There’s no hiding from the opioid crisis that became a national emergency in 2017. An estimated 20 million Americans, or one in every 12 adults, suffer from drug or alcohol addiction. These facts are important and difficult to dismiss. Addiction is a complicated disease with no simple cure. But nearly every recovery program agrees that the first step is to seek help. And as these 20 million Americans, their friends, and their families search for help, many turn to Google to find answers.

However, recent Google ad policy changes complicate the picture of what results people get when they search for keywords related to rehab and drug treatment.

According to a September 14 article in the New York Times, Google released a statement that the search engine has “started restricting ads that come up when someone searches for addiction treatment on its site.” Google cites that some rehab clinics advertising through Google AdWords do not provide the quality care that addicts need to successfully overcome their disease. In response, Google claims to have “stopped selling ads related to those searches.” Following an investigation from The Sunday Times, Google similarly pulled rehab ads in the United Kingdom last week.

It doesn’t appear that these ads have disappeared completely, however. Google Trends data shows that drug rehabilitation searches are steady, while data from 29 rehab facilities advertising through Google AdWords reveals that the number of ad eligible searches on these queries has decreased significantly – down 96%. But Google is still showing some ads on these queries.

Apart from their statement to the New York Times, Google has been quiet about the change to their ad policy. Advertisers bidding on rehab-related keywords were not notified of the change. They did not have their ads or keywords disapproved, but instead suddenly started seeing far fewer ad impressions from these keywords.

Although Google is certainly restricting ads for common terms like “Drug Rehab,” as it said it would, it does not take much work to find other common queries serving a full pack of rehab ads:

It’s not clear whether Google changed how it serves organic listings for these rehab-related searches. If not, search engine users would be able to find those misleading or poor-quality sites anyway.

Google also did not announce additional restrictions for its In-Stream ads on YouTube or its image ads across the Google Display Network (although Google will continue to restrict advertisers from targeting individuals based on sensitive information related to these issues, such as through remarketing.) Additionally, Bing has not changed the way it serves ads for these kinds of searches.

Which Keywords Are Affected?

This policy change leaves rehab advertisers, good and bad, in a confusing gray area. All advertisers are showing fewer ads on rehab terms, but what is and isn’t allowed is unclear to many. Although advertisers are eligible to show on 96% fewer searches containing the word “rehab,” not all keywords are equally affected. Common searches and restrictive keyword match types, such as Google’s exact and phrase match keywords, are showing almost no ads at all, whereas ads are much more common on long-tailed searches, geo-related search terms, dynamic search ads, and modified broad and broad match keywords.

To complicate matters more, impacts to these ads differ vastly among different common semantic strings. Whereas Google is very restrictive of “rehab” keywords, it’s much more lenient on “treatment” and “addiction” related keywords, which still show about a third as much as they did before the new policy. Some advertisers may have discovered that “counseling” related keywords have been unaffected, resulting in twice as many ads from these keywords now.

More complex and long-tailed keywords may also be further exempt from Google’s policy. Searches about different kinds of substance abuse are treated differently – keywords around “substance abuse” are largely ineligible for ads, whereas “drug abuse” or “alcohol abuse” keywords now serve even more ads.

The current drug and alcohol addiction crisis is a complex one and unfortunately may not have any simple viable solutions. Seeking help and starting a conversation will always be the first step to recovery, and Google and its advertisers have a real responsibility to provide answers to those seeking help. Google’s new ad policy may remove some qualified professionals from that conversation. At worst, the unclear policy change could restrict policy-abiding advertisers and open loopholes for sketchy advertisers to benefit from.

Data Sources

Data is based on a sample size of 29 accounts (WordStream clients) advertising on keywords related to drug and alcohol rehabilitation and similar services on the Google Search Network between September and December 2017. Ad eligible searches were calculated by estimating the number of ad impressions these keywords would have with 100% impression share.

About the author

Mark is a Senior Data Scientist at WordStream, focused on research and training for the everchanging world of PPC. He was named the 5th Most Influential PPC Expert of 2017 by PPC Hero. You can follow him on Twitter, LinkedIn, Google +, and SkillShare.

from Internet Marketing Blog by WordStream http://ift.tt/2mHV2tZ
via IFTTT

High-level search marketing: How to keep your momentum from the holiday season going

Businesses tend to have a huge marketing push right before, and often during, the holidays, but often times these marketing campaigns fizzle out after the new year.

It’s easy to dial back your marketing efforts and budget after a busy season, but if you’re smart you’ll keep that momentum up well into the first months of the new year.

Here’s how you can keep up your push in marketing efforts in 2018.

Start email marketing campaigns early and target right

If you played smart during the holidays, your email leads should’ve increased significantly. The best practice is to act fast. Your new leads may have purchased their holiday gifts already, but that doesn’t mean they’re done shopping. Understand that your customers want to hear from you, so it’s best to act fast.

This starts with targeted email campaigns. Instead of doing the hard work yourself, use the help of marketing automation software to determine which content fits each audience. For example, automation software looks at the previous purchases of customers and prompts emails for similar products.

Keep in mind that you don’t want to overdo it with the emails. This will turn your customers away quicker than they came. Offer valuable content in your emails early on and you’ll keep your customers coming back.

Some ways to add value to your email marketing campaign:

• Reach out to customers who purchased their products as a gift. Use similar product suggestions for future gift purchases
• Contact customers who left an abandoned cart. Customers often use their shopping carts as a “wish list” of sorts. Reach out to those customers to see if they plan to complete their purchase
• Offer a discount to entice customers to purchase. Free shipping adds tons of value. Make your discount exclusive to email subscribers to further add value.

Continue to use paid ads

You already have your paid ad campaign underway from the holidays. Don’t let those ads go stagnant as you start the new year.

Leading up to (and during) the holidays, ads from all over are competing. That energy slows down as the holidays end. Take advantage of both lower competition and less expensive ads during the aftermath of the holidays.

This is a new year, which means it’s the right time to switch up your strategy. You’re no longer in holiday mode, but laying out the foundation for the rest of the year.

Do you normally bid second position keywords throughout the year? Change your strategy and look for keywords that are first position. The holiday campaign may have busted your budget, but that doesn’t mean you should pull back on your paid ads. You’ll actually spend more money in the long run, and completely kill your momentum from the holidays.

Keep your paid ads running throughout the year, so you’re not halting traffic and trying to build it back up after you run your ads again.

Take advantage of keywords around new year’s resolutions

“New year, new me” is the mantra for most people after the holidays are finished. A new year means a fresh start, and regardless of your market, customers focus on improving their health and well-being. Use these trends to benefit your business. This means creating impactful content that’s valuable to customers and their goals for the new year.

Use your content to promote your products and services in a way that appear useful to your customers. How can you portray your products as a tool for achieving customer goals? This tactic is possible to spin no matter what industry you’re in.

For example, let’s say you’re a company that specializes in green cleaning products. Cater your content towards improving health and keeping chemicals out of the home.

You know keyword choice is imperative when working on your search marketing campaign. Take advantage of new year resolutions by choosing keywords that match. For instance, words like “get healthy” and “get organized” are keyword phrases that tend to pop up as the new year approaches.

Look at last year’s organic keywords. Which were the best performing, and which could you stand to ditch?

Take a peek at your competitors’ keywords, too, to see what they’re ranking highly for. Incorporate these keywords into your blog posts and social posts to drive traffic to your company’s website.

Review your data and strategize for the upcoming year

No doubt about it, the months of January and February are slow months for everyone, no matter your industry. The best way to push forward is to take a look at what worked and didn’t work during the holiday season.

It’s also a great time to learn more about your new customers. This gives you great leverage to start working on your campaigns throughout the new year.

Look at things like your timing and segments. Who responded well to specific emails? Which groups brought you the most ROI? How was the timing of your campaign? When looking at your new customers, figure out which of these groups fit well for your business.

As far as your website goes, A/B testing will tell you which pages of your website responded well with your customers. Test your non-holiday specific landing pages and compare them to your holiday pages.

Notice the shift between the two and apply those shifts to your new year campaign. Take this information and tweak the things that didn’t work and apply those changes to your upcoming campaigns.

The takeaway

After the surge of the holidays, most SEOs and marketers feel they’ve exhausted their resources and budget. This doesn’t have to be the case. The success of a holiday campaign should continue well into the new year. Keep these things in mind during your slow months and you’ll keep the momentum up to prepare you for spring and busier selling seasons.

How do you keep your momentum going into the new year? Let us know what has worked for you in the comment section below.

Amanda DiSilvestro is a writer for No Risk SEO, an all-in-one reporting platform for agencies. You can connect with Amanda on Twitter and LinkedIn, or check out her content services at amandadisilvestro.com.

from Search Engine Watch - Latest http://ift.tt/2ELdTel
via IFTTT

Why Great Content Aligns Your Brand and Prospects – Here’s Why #149

A fortune teller looks for meaning in the alignment of the planets, but if you’re a content marketer, it’s more important to you that there’s alignment of your content between your business goals and the needs of your prospects.

In this episode of our popular Here’s Why digital marketing video series, Stone Temple’s Mark Traphagen explains what that alignment looks like, and why it is critical to your content marketing.

Don’t miss a single episode of Here’s Why with Mark & Eric. Click the subscribe button below to be notified via email each time a new video is published. Over a half million views on YouTube!

Subscribe to Here’s Why

Resources

• The Three Marks of Great Content
• B2B Buyers on What Content Works…and What Doesn’t
• See all of our Here’s Why Videos | Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Transcript

Eric: Mark, what do you mean when you say that great content aligns your brand and prospects?

Mark: Eric, that came out of my intensive study of the most effective content marketing by brands. Now, over time, I came to realize the best brand content has three characteristics in common. It’s useful, unique, and aligned. Now, by aligned, I mean that there’s a proper balance in the content between the business goals of the brand and the wants and needs of its prospects and customers. 

Eric: What does that balance look like?

Mark: It’s probably easiest to illustrate that by talking about content that’s out of balance on either side. So when content is skewed too heavily to business goals, it’s typically salesy and self-promotional. It’s not about helping and engaging your prospects but tries too hard to push whatever you’re trying to sell.

Direct selling content can be useful content if you’re moving somebody to the point where they’re considering buying from you, but it totally fails at breaking through the natural sales resistance in people who aren’t comfortable with you yet. 

Eric: But you can be out of balance on the prospect side as well, right?

Mark: You sure can, and that happens when your content is trying so hard to catch attention, or get engagement, that it loses any connection to the business and the goals to which it wants to move the prospect.

An example of that is Super Bowl ads. You’ve probably seen the surveys that they take after the big game, right? Most of the people can recall many of the most entertaining ads in great detail, but few can actually name the brands that they were advertising. The advertiser spent so much attention on just gaining that attention, that they failed to make a strong association with the brand or product.

Eric: How do brands create content that’s balanced and better aligned?

Mark: I think we need to think of every content piece like we’re trying to build a bridge between our business and its prospects. Start with your business goals, whether that’s brand awareness and reputation, creating community around your brand, or making people aware of your products or solutions. 

Think of content as trying to build a bridge between your business and your prospectsClick To Tweet  

Then put yourself in your prospect’s place, and think about his or her needs, desires, and pain points. As you construct your content, seek to build a bridge between those two things.

Ask yourself how this piece of content is relevant to your business, but also why should it matter to your prospects. What does it do for them? That’s the content development bridge, and when you build it properly, your content starts working for you. 

Eric: Thanks, Mark. Folks, you really should check out Mark’s in-depth examination of effective content, “The Three Marks of Great content.” You’ll find it here.

Don’t miss a single episode of Here’s Why with Mark & Eric. Click the subscribe button below to be notified via email each time a new video is published.

Subscribe to Here’s Why

See all of our Here’s Why Videos | Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

from Stone Temple Consulting http://ift.tt/2Dkhhj2
via IFTTT

Google My Business Videos Now Live

Google Adds “Best Answer” to the Search Results for Q&A Page Results

Google Confirms AdSense Earnings Drops, Blames Issue To Crawler Access & Other Changes

We have been reporting on the ongoing issues of AdSense publishers complaining about drops in earnings and ad display issues, resulting in drops in earnings.

Well, finally, Google has confirmed with Marketing Land that the issue is around crawler access.

Google's AdSense bot cannot gain access to the page and thus is unable to properly show the right ad or any ad. Google said you can check crawler access issues in your AdSense console under Settings > Access and then > crawler access. There is a help document on this over here.

Why is this happening now? Well, Ginny Marvin explains "Google is making some changes to buying processes on the Google Display Network. As a result, Google will not automatically monetize sites or pages that the AdSense bot can’t crawl, Marketing Land learned Friday. The AdSense crawlers categorize, classify and label content for monetization."

This is not fully rolled out yet, so the issue continues to grow for some AdSense publishers.

So if you see your AdSense earnings drop due to ads not showing up, you can probably associate the issue to this.

You should try to make sure Google can crawl those pages without being blocked and use the crawler access report for help.

Forum discussion at Twitter and WebmasterWorld.

from Search Engine Roundtable http://ift.tt/2B0JkPD
via IFTTT

Google Reverse Image Search Matching Images Bug To Be Fixed

Last week we reported on a possible bug or change with reverse image search in Google. Well, it is a bug, not a feature or change. Google said the "pages that include matching images" is a bug that will be fixed in the upcoming week or so.

Danny Sullivan from Google posted on Twitter:

The team tells me the issue with "pages that include matching images" not containing actual matching images and missing dimensions is indeed a bug and a fix is in process. Maybe will take up to a week for the fix to fully roll out to everyone. Thanks for your patience.

— Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan) January 13, 2018

Rado from Google posted in the Google Web Search Help thread:

Thank you for bringing this to our attention! The issue with "Pages that include matching images" not containing actual matching images is indeed a bug, and should be fixed shortly.

I did not see mass complaints about this either because it is a limited bug or not that many people use reverse image search.

Forum discussion at Twitter and Google Web Search Help.

from Search Engine Roundtable http://ift.tt/2r6sgHX
via IFTTT

Larry Markovitz - The Search Community Honors You

This is part of the say something nice about an SEO/SEM series - feel free to nominate someone over here.

Larry Markovitz lives in Miami, Florida with his family and is the CEO of Markati Group, which he runs with his wife Shiri Sarfati. He is extremely helpful and sharing with the SEO and SEM community and has helped so many people in a mentorship role with their SEM careers. Larry is also one of the first to share all the honor stories here as well.

He is very active on social media, chiming in on conversations, resharing content and publishing his own content both with tactical advice and also with efforts to improve the community at large. In addition, he is very behind the scenes - you don't hear much about him in public, but he often will send a colleague an email or Facebook message when he feels he can help them or offer assistance in any way.

Paul Shapiro nominated Larry and wrote:

We talk a lot about mentorship in SEO, but I think it's actually pretty rare. Larry has acted as a mentor to me since I started working in the industry and even today continues to provide me valuable insights for my life and career. Larry is a mensch.

A mensch indeed!

Larry Markovitz Bio: A seasoned digital marketing professional with 17 years of e-business experience managing affiliate, search (SEO, PPC), social media, digital PR, direct response and content marketing strategy for many of the largest and globally known companies including Apple, BlackRock, SAP, and Colgate as well as helping entrepreneurial businesses promote their brands online. He has written several articles for industry websites including ClickZ and was an invited guest presenter at ClickZ Live, digital marketing and advertising conference.

Lawrence is a graduate of The Art Institute - Toronto where he earned a degree in Digital Media and Design & Marketing.

Favorite thing about the SEO community? As an SEO, we somehow are all connected by a shared knowledge and common language. It’s a little global community of like-minded individuals and no matter where we are in the world we can connect. I live in Miami, FL, and recently Chris Semper was in town for a conference and we decided to meet up for dinner and drinks. We spent a couple of hours just chatting about SEO and it was energizing. This is the power of the SEO community. We are all in it together working towards a common goal.

One piece of advice to the SEOs out there? Seek out a mentor. I was fortunate in my career to have mentors in my life that have helped catapult my career as an executive in some of largest advertising agencies working with some of the biggest clients in the world. And I have mentored a few people who have gone on to become true leaders and experts in the SEO community and we continue to share information and ideas on a regular basis. It’s this type of knowledge-sharing that allows the community to grow and attract new talent and new ideas.

Favorite things in general? I love American comfort food and will never say no to a great slice of pizza or juicy burger. I could live in my blue jeans, a button down and a pair of kicks. I love spending time with my family – my two boys and wife – whether exploring the burgeoning art scene in Miami, discovering a new foodie destination or just hanging out at the beach.

What you want to be known for in the SEO space? People know me as an honest, results-driven SEO that has integrity and is always willing to share my knowledge with others – whether they understand the lingo or not. I’m always looking to simplify SEO for my clients and also share with them the whole picture. There is no silver bullet to SEO. But you can definitely see results in a couple of days not 6 months to a year. My clients don’t want to wait that long to see results.

On the flip side, there is a lot of black hat SEOs out there that give the industry a bad name. I think we can do better, advance the industry with better insights and provide a better experience for people online.

You can learn more about Larry on LinkedIn.

This is part of the say something nice about an SEO/SEM series - feel free to nominate someone over here.

from Search Engine Roundtable http://ift.tt/2D7y9GI
via IFTTT

Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2018 With A Google Logo & Bing Theme

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the day America honors the American Baptist minister and activist who became the most visible spokesperson and leader in the civil rights movement. Google honors Martin Luther King Jr. every year, it is an American holiday.

This year, Google has a Doodle depicting a "young girl perched on her father’s shoulders, enthralled by the power and eloquence of Dr. King’s words." It was designed in collaboration with the Black Googlers Network (BGN), one of the largest employee resource groups at Google.

You can learn more about the Google Doodle over here.

Bing also has a theme, as they do every year as well, theres is a slideshow from the day of the speech as well:

Here is last years set of logos.

Forum discussion at Google+.

from Search Engine Roundtable http://ift.tt/2Deg0Lq
via IFTTT