SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION: How Google Adwords Consumer Ratings Can Benefit Your Business

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How Google Adwords Consumer Ratings Can Benefit Your Business

2014-04-11 13:00:17-04

In March, Google announced the debut of the English-only Consumer Ratings Annotations in AdWords. Users can review ratings, social endorsements, and reviews for your business as part of your Google search ads. The ratings data makes your ads more useful to prospects and can improve ad performance, says Google. After all, people rely on the opinions and experiences of others whether searching for products or services.

The ratings data is pulled from the Google Consumer Surveys platform. Publisher sites host survey questions that appear in pop-ups as paywall alternatives. Each rating is based on approximately 1,000 consumer opinions.

At the moment Consumer Ratings Annotations are benefiting mostly large brands who have been included in surveys.… Continue Reading

2014-04-16 13:00:49-04

I've always been fascinated with crowdsourcing and crowdfunding. Hunting the subjects online, I came across Carol Tice's Forbes article about a Seattle-based company called Julep that cranks out skin care products, makeup, and funky suede-look and 3-D holographic glitter nail polish. Julep has made quite a name for itself through social media marketing and crowdfunding since its 2007 debut as a single nail salon.

Why should we care? Julep applied rapid iteration—something foreign to the beauty industry—and their ecommerce sales have skyrocketed. Forbes estimates Julep's 2013 revenue topped $20 million.That's why.

And get this—Monday Julep announced it acquired $30 million in financing from venture-capital firms, including Starbucks founder Howard Schultz's Maveron.… Continue Reading

SEO Roundup: April 18, 2014

2014-04-18 13:00:07-04

Roundup's back, and there's big news in social this week, as Facebook becomes less annoying for all of us. They've put a stop to the practice of asking for likes and shares, something they call like-baiting, in response to user reports and complaints.

Most of us already knew better than to do this, so for us this change means some news feed space has been cleared, hopefully making way for the quality posts we create on behalf of our clients. If these tactics were, in fact, part of your social strategy, consider adjusting your approach. Asking for likes is the equivalent of creating a blog post that says, "Please read my blog." That's not marketing; that's begging.… Continue Reading

2014-04-23 13:00:06-04

Creating unique content your website or blog is a challenge. Finding the right image to accompany the content—ever more so. And let's face the facts—the most critical component of content marketing is images. It doesn't matter if you are posting articles, contests, or blog posts, if there's no image or video that grabs attention, chances are the text won't be read.

The social Web is all about pictures. When you consider the popularity of Pinterest, Instagram, and Tumblr, its clear consumers like posting, viewing and sharing photos with each other and brands.

You don't have to be a Fortune 500 corporation to attract the most eyeballs.… Continue Reading

SEO Roundup: April 25, 2014

2014-04-25 15:57:37-04

The first official day of summer may still be a couple of months away, but as the weather warms throughout the U.S. many consumers are already in that summer state of mind. That means we won’t find them sitting in front of their computers as much for a while. Where we will find them, though, is on their mobile devices.

Some of the big names online have already figured that out. Google is going to start offering targeted app ads on mobile devices, and it seems they are also testing a redesign of their mobile search interface. Meanwhile, Pinterest has just launched Guided Search, a visual search and discovery engine that at first glance seems both useful and appealing.… Continue Reading

SEO Roundup: May 2, 2014

2014-05-02 15:13:26-04

Let’s start this roundup with a fun diversion from the folks over at KISSMetrics, who who shared this quiz that tells you what kind of digital marketer you are. It’s like one of those Buzzfeed quizzes that fill our Facebook feeds, but for marketers. Fun!

On a more serious topic, a marketer in the UK decided to do some digging into the backlink profiles of some high-ranking SEO firms and learned some pretty shocking things. Primarily he found that for some of these companies, doing everything wrong is working. Don’t start spamming anchor text links to the darkest corners of the internet just yet, though.… Continue Reading

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