Weekly Marketing Update on HubSpot.tv

You Just Can't Fool Google

HubSpot Internet Marketing — Fri, 22 Mar 2013 17:57:45 +0000

Nowadays, it feels like every social network and online service has some sort of tool designed for us marketers. Whether we know it or not, many of these networks and services are adding business pages, analytics, and even automation into their function. Klout Launches Business Portal, is Gunning for Brands, From CNN Money The "social media influence" measuring startup has announced that it will be launching a business portal design to attract big-name brands. Klout is launching Klout for Business, with a goal of providing brands with an insight into their social media audiences. The free analytics dashboard for companies will allow brands to learn what social networks they resonate best on, popular topics, and how influential their fans and followers are. The dashboard also gives companies insight into when posts or tweets are most influential during the day. With 500M Push Notifications Sent Each Month, Mobile Backend Platform Parse Unveils an Analytics Service, From The Next Web Sending 500 million push notifications per month, the application development platform known as Parse has announced that it will be offering analytics on its services. Parse is a mobile backend-as-a-service that provides develops with the tools and services they need to create iOS and Android apps. A huge aspect of those tools is push notifications that developers can use to improve the user experience on these apps. Parse says that not only will they be introducing analytics on its push notifications, but analytics on how many times an app or push notification is opened. Facebook Working on Incorporating the Hashtag It seems that Twitter’s most iconic marker may soon find its way into Facebook timelines across the globe. Facebook is currently working on incorporating the all-powerful hashtag into its social network. For those of you unfamiliar with the hashtag, it is heavily used in Twitter as a word or phrase proceeded by a # symbol that groups similar topics and events. Facebook hasn’t yet decided how far they will follow in Twitter’s footsteps with the hashtags, but we’re certain that Twitter will not be happy. The two companies are already competing for online advertisers, and Facebook’s adoption of the hashtag could affect Twitters bottom line. Small Twitter Advertisers Can Now Target Ads Like Big Brands, From Marketing Land Twitter has announced that it will be providing its more advanced dashboard features, normally available only to big spenders, to smaller companies. This release of “advanced” features gives smaller brands the same tools and options that large-scale Twitter advertisers are using. Twitter warns that once users switch over to the “advanced options” there is no going back. Although these features offer smaller advertisers more options, deeper analytics, and improved targeting, it may be too complex for some. Study Finds Google’s Penguin Update Getting Stricter Over Time, From Search Engine Land A recent study by Portent, an Internet marketing company, illustrates that Google is getting fed up with spammy links floating through its search engine. Google’s Penguin algorithm will be targeting websites for a rank drop if they have as little as 50 percent suspicious links in their link profiles. Portent analyzed 100,000 links from the top 50 sites on the Inc. 5000 list of 2012. Using SEOMOZ and Majestic SEO data, they scored links as spam based on the relation of the page to the page being linked to and the page the link was coming from. Through this process they found more than 250,000 links pointing at penalized websites, and 250,000 links pointing at non-penalized websites.

The Latest Changes to the World of Social Media - Marketing Update Episode #230

HubSpot Internet Marketing — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 20:52:47 +0000

Social media is quite the valuable tool in an inbound marketer’s repertoire, and this is far from a secret. As social networks continue to grow, evolve, and sometimes fall out of relevancy, we must always stay up-to-date with the latest developments in the world of social media. Any inbound marketer can tell you how effective and inexpensive a well-run social media campaign can be, and that is exactly why it’s a must-have tool in your marketing arsenal. This week’s round-up will fill you in on all of the latest changes in social media that you’ll need to know to keep that edge. Enjoy! What HP’s 1 Million LinkedIn Followers Means for Marketers, From LinkedIn Blog (http://blog.linkedin.com/2013/02/28/what-hps-1-million-linkedin-followers-means-for-marketers-infographic/) HP has officially become the first company to draw in one million followers to their LinkedIn page. This is a huge win for HP because these aren’t followers you would find on Twitter or Facebook, these are a highly targeted audience of professionals that matter to their business. This means that HP is now indirectly connected to 43 million other professionals on LinkedIn, which makes up roughly a quarter of the entire LinkedIn population. Google Offers Social Sign-In Alternative to Facebook, From Ad Week (http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/google-offers-social-sign-alternative-facebook-147561) We all know that Facebook has had a pretty big monopoly on the world of social sign-ins and security, but that may be changing very soon. Google has released its own social powered sign-in option for online publishers and apps. This means that users will be able to connect with sites like USA Today, The Guardian, FitBit, Fancy, OpenTable, and more with their Google + accounts. Trendrr Reports: Social TV Oscar Activity Tripled, From Marketing Pilgrim (http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2013/02/trendrr-reports-social-tv-oscar-activity-tripled-and-the-ratings-were-up-too.html) The Oscars; usually spent in the comfort of our sweat pants while we obnoxiously rant and rave about who was dressed best, worst, and stupidest. Yes, stupidest. You know you've seen some pretty stupid looking outfits at the Oscars before. But, I digress. This year was different. This year, we made our voices heard. We took to the streets…okay, we took to our respective social networks. During this years Oscar broadcast, real-time social media tracking company Trendrr kept tabs on all of our witty and not so witty comments across the Facebook, Twitter, GetGlue, and Viggie. Spotify’s Social Network Arrives: New Follow Tab is Now Gradually Rolling Out to Users, From The Next Web (http://thenextweb.com/insider/2013/02/27/spotify-the-social-network-arrives-begins-rolling-out-follow-features-to-users/) A little ways back in December of last year, Spotify announced that it would be rolling out a slew of social media features to its popular music friendly app. Well, the time has come for Spotify to announce that its social network is ready to start shipping to a desktop near you. The latest feature to grace our computer screens is the new Follow tab that will list all of the users you are currently “following”, and will be replacing the current People tab. Spotify sees this move as a way to lessen their social dependency on Facebook, which has not reaped them many benefits. Facebook Lets Advertisers Tap Purchase Data Partners to Target Customers, Categories, Like Car-Buyers, From Tech Crunch (http://techcrunch.com/2013/02/27/facebook-ad-data-providers/) It’s no secret that Facebook has been looking to dive deeper and deeper into the rabbit hole of online advertising. The most recent news reveals that Facebook has partnered up with top online and offline purchase data providers like Epsilon, Acxiom, Datalogix, and BlueKai to provide advertisers with a hashed list of existing customers, potential prospects, and categories of people like pet lovers, soda drinkers, and car buyers. The goal is for Facebook to attract some big spenders by offering them a way to target the exact customers that have or will buy their products.

Cracking the Formula to Viral Videos: Marketing Update 2/22/2013

HubSpot Internet Marketing — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 18:33:51 +0000

Cracking the Formula to Viral Videos - Marketing Update - Episode #229 With Mike Volpe (@Mvolpe) and Laura Fitton (@Pistachio) This weeks round up will give you some insight into what changes are going on with our social networks and how new technologies are being used to serve and deliver marketing to individuals on many different levels. Twitter Now Reducing Some Tweets to 117 Characters, From Mashable (http://mashable.com/2013/02/20/twitter-tco-length/) If a limit of 140 characters per tweet wasn’t difficult enough to get your thoughts across, try doing it in even less. As of Wednesday, Twitter has reduced the limit of characters to 118 for tweets sent with a URL and 117 for tweets sent with an https link. This is going to be an important change for marketers to take note of because it could affect any scheduled tweets you created prior to these new limits. 59% of Top Brands are Active on Instagram & Those Photos Are Shared to Facebook 66% More Than Twitter, From Marketing Land (http://marketingland.com/report-59-of-top-brands-are-active-on-instagram-photos-shared-to-facebook-66-more-than-twitter-34062) We all know why we love Instagram and Pinterest; it’s all the pretty pictures that tickle our fancy. Recently, these social networks have grown to be more than just digital catalogs and photo albums. In the past three months, top brand adoption of Pinterest has risen by 10% and Instagram by 9%. This is a strong indication that marketers are utilizing the potential of Pinterest and Instagram to build social engagement and expand overall reach. ESPN is Now Targeting You Via Online Radio, From Ad Week (http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/espn-now-targeting-you-online-radio-147388) It seems ESPN is looking to up their game in the world of digital advertisements though its online radio. With over 3 million downloads of its mobile radio app, it make sense that ESPN has been concocting ways to tap into this audience with some well targeted ads. This new cloud-based ad insertion program aims to target listeners by location, device, age, and gender in real time during live national broadcasts. The company responsible for this new age technology is the online radio provider known as Abacast. Contextual Content Engine Vurb Raises More Than $1.5M From Max Levchin and Others, From Tech Crunch (http://techcrunch.com/2013/02/20/contextual-content-engine-vurb-wants-to-make-the-internet-seamless/) With the hundred of online services, search engines, and social networks, it is still a chore trying to compile all our information into one place. I’m sure many of us have wanted to make a reservation at a restaurant through Open Table and wished that it would also suggest show times for new movies, buy the tickets, and send us directions without having to open the quadrillion tabs we normally would. Well, the start up Vurb is working on a contextual content engine that connects and compiles relevant information from services like LinkedIn, Yelp, Google Maps, Amazon, and many others in an attempt to unify our Internet shenanigans. LOL + WTF = $: An App That Shos Why Videos Go Viral, From Fast Co Create (http://www.fastcocreate.com/1682441/lol-wtf-an-app-that-shows-why-videos-go-viral) Ever wonder how to you can make the next Gangnam Style or Harlem Shake? Well TubeRank may have found a way to help you figure out what you need to do to create the next viral video on YouTube. The app was recently launched by Rubber Republic, a London-based content creation studio responsible for a number of viral videos.

The Future of Social Media Advertisement. Introducing the New HubSpot Marketing Update 2/15/2013

HubSpot Internet Marketing — Sat, 16 Feb 2013 20:16:02 +0000

With the growing demand for more sophisticated, automated, and farther reaching ad services, a number of companies are making serious moves to give these marketers what they want. This weeks marketing round ups will fill you in on what you need to know about upcoming products and changes to existing social networks around mobile and social advertising. Facebook Prepares to Amp Up Its Ad War With Google With Atlas http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57569212-93/facebook-prepares-to-amp-up-its-ad-war-with-google-with-atlas/ The social networking giant, Facebook, is expected to purchase an extensive ad-serving technology known as Atlas, from Microsoft. The advertising platform will be tasked with handling Facebook’s ever growing advertising empire in an effort to overthrow Google as the current king of display advertising. This purchase will allow Facebook to deliver socially powered ads outside of the social network and tap into a much larger market of advertisers. Twitter Prepping Bigger Ad Play http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/twitter-prepping-bigger-ad-play-147209 With social networks like Facebook and LinkedIn offering ad APIs of their own, Twitter has decided to jump on the display advertisement bandwagon. Twitter will be turning up the heat on its advertising platform by introducing its new ad API this quarter. The product will allow brands to create and run a variety of ads in a more automated and sophisticated manner, like they would on Facebook. Twitter has been busy promoting its ad API to a number of agency execs and social ad firms in preparation for its launch. Social Authority: A Measure of Twitter Influence http://www.seomoz.org/blog/social-authority SEOmoz has recently announced the release of "Social Authority," their new metric for determining the influence of Twitter users. Social authority’s metrics are based on the number of retweets a user receives. The metrics give users a number of features that include ordering all active Twitter users by influence, dissecting your social graph, and finding new followers who are most important. Salesforce Alums Raise $3 Million to Bring Analytics to Stores http://mashable.com/2013/02/12/nomi/ It’s no secret that brick and mortar retailers sometimes lack the tools they need to track and nurture their customers like online retailers are able to. Marketers for e-retailers can tap into a number of metrics to ensure their marketing is working. That's why it's pretty cool that a company called Nomi is stepping up to the plate and offering brick and mortar retailers a solution to this problem. Nomi has created a platform designed to "track customers’ movement across online, mobile, and in-store channels." The company was founded by three Salesforce alums in August of 2012, and has raised $3 million in funding from various investors to get the product off the ground.

Remarkable Marketing Moments from 2012: Marketing Update 1/4/13

HubSpot Internet Marketing — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 00:18:42 +0000

Episode #227 - January 4th, 2012 Intro How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet! On the show today is Karen Rubin (@karenrubin) and Mike Volpe (@mvolpe) As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review! Happy New Year! Remarkable Marketing Moments from 2012 http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/33896/20-of-the-Most-Memorable-Marketing-Moments-in-2012-INFOGRAPHIC.aspx January Google + data gets added to search results Pintrest Nascar driver tweeted from his car in the Daytona 500 and got more than 10K followers Stop Kony Facebook acquires Instagram Facebook IPO Facebook hits 1 billion users Yahoo hires Marissa Meyers as CEO SF Giants got a 99 on Klout because of great socail media presence during the world series Gangnam Style Starbucks Launches a $1 Reusable Cup http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/01/02/starbucks-reusable-cup-trash/1804095/ Amid public pressure to curb trash from disposable cups, Starbucks is rolling out a novel possible solution Thursday: a $1 reusable tumbler. FTC Offers $50K to End Robocalls http://money.cnn.com/2013/01/02/pf/ftc-robocalls/ The Federal Trade Commission is currently running a contest to find a solution to block the pesky calls on landlines and cell phones. The winning submission will get $50,000 and a trip to Washington, DC to present the solution. The FTC has already received 230 submissions.Suggestions, so far, include a 24-hour hotline to report robocalls and blacklists to block repeat offenders. Is the Marketing Campaign Dead? http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/33998/Is-the-Marketing-Campaign-Dead.aspx

The Instagram Debacle & The End of The World: Marketing Update 12/21/12

HubSpot Internet Marketing — Sun, 30 Dec 2012 16:51:20 +0000

Episode #226 - December 21st, 2012 Intro How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet! On the show today is Karen Rubin (@karenrubin) and Mike Volpe (@mvolpe) As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review! Instagram TOS Debacle "You agree that a business or other entity may pay us to display your username, likeness, photos" http://mashable.com/2012/12/20/instagram-updates-its-terms-of-service/ The photo sharing site -- which Facebook purchased in April -- introduced its plans for new terms of service on Monday. Users reacted negatively to the new terms, threatening to boycott the service and delete accounts if the terms weren't amended. Even after Instagram's co-founder Kevin Systrom tried to clarify the changes -- including the fact that Instagram wouldn't be using user photos in ads -- prominent brands and users stillexpressed their dissatisfaction with the updated terms. Today, Instagram is trying again. The company posted a new entry to its blog, outlining its"new" new Terms of Service, which include some changes that should appease its most vocal critics. Oracle Acquires Eloqua http://www.forbes.com/sites/forrester/2012/12/20/oracle-acquires-eloqua-a-do-over-for-the-era-of-digital-disruption/ The End of the World http://www.adrants.com/2012/12/7-companies-that-are-capitalizing-on-the.php Listening to Your Customers is GOLDEN http://www.getthefive.com/articles/the-marketeer/hasbro-to-make-an-easy-bake-oven-thats-gender-neut/

Marketing Predictions for 2013: Marketing Update 12/07/12

HubSpot Internet Marketing — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 17:44:55 +0000

Marketing Predictions for 2013: Marketing Update 12/07/12 from Weekly Marketing Update on HubSpot.tv. Like this? Watch the latest episode of Weekly Marketing Update on HubSpot.tv on Blip! http://blip.tv/marketing-update/watch Episode #225 - December 07, 2012 Intro How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet! On the show today is Karen Rubin (@karenrubin) and Mike Volpe (@mvolpe) As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review! Headlines The Danger of Ranting on Yelp http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/06/jane-perez-yelp-review_n_2250302.html Jane Perez, a Virginia woman who wrote a scathing Yelp review of the contracting company that worked on her home, is being sued by Christopher Dietz for $750,000, according to the Washington Post. Dietz, the owner of Dietz Development, filed the Internet defamation lawsuit filed last month, stating that "plaintiffs have been harmed by these statements, including lost work opportunities, insult, mental suffering, being placed in fear, anxiety, and harm to their reputations." Perez's Yelp review accused the company of damaging her home, charging her for work that wasn't done and of losing jewelry. The lawsuit follows an earlier case against Perez, which was filed in July 2011 by Dietz for unpaid invoices. According to the recent filing, the two were high school classmates. Marketing Takeaway: CEO Blunder? or SEC Dinosaurs? http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2012/12/latest-ceo-nominated-for-social-medias-hall-of-shame-is-reed-hastings-of-netflix.html Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) is in big trouble with the SEC. Reed Hastings, its CEO, posted information to his Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) page that the regulator says was “material” to investors. In this case, the Wells notice relates to information Hastings disclosed on his Facebook page (where he has 200,000 followers). In July Hastings said Netflix users had streamed 1 billion hours in June for the first time ever. Netflix’s stock jumped 6% on the news. The SEC thinks it was material information that should have been more formally announced. http://www.webinknow.com/2012/12/sec-action-against-netflix-ceo-over-facebook-post-is-completely-wrong.html The US Securities and Exchange Commission is considering taking action against Netflix and its CEO Reed Hastings because of a Facebook post.The agency says that the update to Hastings' 200,000+ subscribers where he said"members had enjoyed over 1 billion hours in June" violated the SEC Regulation Fair Disclosure (Reg FD) rule The SEC is completely wrong - The issue is not with Netflix. It is with the dinosaurs at the SEC. This is not a stock story. It is a real-time communications story. The post that Hastings sent out was to his Facebook PUBLIC followers list which currently numbers 245,000 people. Anybody can subscribe to the list and anybody can access the content at any time without subscribing. I do not subscribe and it took me less than five seconds to access it – go to Facebook and type 'Reed Hastings' in the search bar. Bingo. The SEC considers press releases to be the acceptable way to comply with RegFD. Press releases are fine, but in 2012 saying that only press releases qualify for fair disclosure is like saying the only way to watch movies is in a theater. In fact, when I looked for press releases from Netflix it took me much longer than five seconds to find the relevant pages. Marketing Takeaway: The Social Media Report http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/social/2012/ App usage account for a third of all social networking time across PCs and mobile devices Users increased their app time by 76% over last year Women spend more time on social media Facebook, Blogger & Twitter are the top social networks, Pintrests was 6th, Google+ was 7th, mySpace was 9th Pintrest had 4,225% growth on mobile devices over last year 94% of us use the computer, 46% use a mobile phone to connect on social media 32% of 18-24 year olds use social media in the bathroom 51% of 25 to 34 year olds use social media in the office Marketing Takeaway: Marketing Predictions for 2013 http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/33895/8-Insightful-Marketing-Predictions-for-2013-and-Beyond.aspx In the past 24 months, we’ve seen the overlap between search, social, and content increase at a rapid pace, spurred on by innovations from the search engines, and reinforced by the correlations of social sharing and linking/ranking behavior. In 2013, I expect to see many of the most successful marketers treat these practices not as disparate channels, but as optimizable elements of a whole.” - Rand Fishkin, SEOmoz With such a dramatic shift toward more personal, unsolicited marketing, 2013 will see much more targeted, segmented email campaigns aimed at delivering more relevant content to recipients.” - John Bonini, Content Marketing Manager, IMPACT Branding & Design For CMOs, the pressure is on. CEOs are paying more attention to Marketing’s contributions and are holding them more accountable for revenue generation. Because of this, we’re starting to see a shift in how marketing is measured … to quotas and SLAs that are more aligned with sales goals.” - Greg Alexander, CEO, Sales Benchmark Index (SBI) In 2013, CMOs and senior executives will allocate more resources to creating a strong inbound engine -- generating interest, traffic, leads, and conversions -- to support the demand generation engine. “Marketing automation systems will provide more unified customer views across channels and systems. The goal of not merely importing data from multiple systems, but of integrating that data so interactions of the same individual are combined even when they take place in different channels will be increasingly realized. This is a critical capability since all analysis is based on this unified customer view.” - David Raab, Analyst, Gleanster "In 2013, we’ll see many more marketers take advantage of the power of real-time communications to grow business....Success comes from engaging your buyers when they’re ready, not when it’s convenient for you.” - David Meerman Scott, Best-selling Author “New technologies (mobile devices of all shapes and sizes, and location based services) will continue to grow, but the best marketers will realize its not about how to jam more ads into new platforms -- it's about how to use the new technologies to enhance your inbound powers of attraction.” Dharmesh Shah, CTO, HubSpot

Managing Your Brand: Marketing Update 11/29/12

HubSpot Internet Marketing — Sun, 02 Dec 2012 22:15:06 +0000

Episode #224 - November 29th, 2012 Intro How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet! On the show today is Karen Rubin (@karenrubin) and Mike Volpe (@mvolpe) As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review! Headlines Google Acquisition is a Hoax http://money.cnn.com/2012/11/26/technology/google-icoa-hoax/ A spate of press reports on Monday heralded Google's latest takeover deal: An apparent $400 million purchase of ICOA, a Warwick, R.I., company that makes Wi-Fi hotspots for public areas like parks and airports. Then the retractions began pouring in, as ICOA and people familiar with Google's operations began to deny the report. "This was a hoax," George Strouthopoulos, CEO of ICOA, told CNNMoney in an e-mail. "This is NOT TRUE!! Never had any discussions with any potential acquirers!! This is absolutely false!" ICOA's total market cap is less than $850,000, and its shares trade for under a penny. Someone moved piles of ICOA's stock on Monday: Nearly 330 million shares changed hands, according to OTCMarkets.com, compared with the stock's usual daily volume of around 2.6 million shares. Marketing Takeaway: Smashing Your Brand http://www.getthefive.com/articles/the-marketeer/starbucks-smashes-its-brand-and-sells-it-as-pixela/ Brand guru Martin Lindstrom suggests the “smashing your brand” test to examine the quality of your branding by acknowledging the value that every single element at play in defining your brand's identity. Starbucks collaborated with the designers at Rodarte—a fashion label, to create a fewlimited edition gifts during the 2012 holiday shopping season. They designed a tumbler, a tote bag, a reusable up sleeve, and a Starbucks card. Rodarte’s Starbucks logo is highly pixelated. At first you might think your eyes are playing tricks on you—and they are. The pixelated logo still screams Starbucks with its familiar greens and grays, and the vague suggestion of the mermaid logo. It is all there—just not the way we are used to seeing it. Marketing Takeaway: Virgin's #Nerdbird Cyber Monday Deal http://www.getthefive.com/articles/the-marketeer/virgin-america-offers-cyber-monday-nerdbird-charte/ Cyber Monday sales, Virgin America is offering the ultimate “geek-sweet ride” on the Nerdbird—a chance to charter the aircraft to next year's 2013 International CES (Consumer Electronics Show) in Las Vegas Jan. 8-11. The airline is teaming up with Gilt City to offer a "nerdbird for hire" charter flight. The company gets inquiries every year from local tech companies and entrepreneurs asking to charter aircraft to head to CES, said Luanne Calvert, vice president of marketing at Virgin America. “So we thought it would be fun to answer the call and work with Gilt City to create the ultimate geek gift," Calvert said in a release. "Plus, if being the first airline to offer fleetwide WiFi and having an entertainment platform that runs off LINUX isn't evidence enough, we're kind of geeks ourselves." The flight was already purchased for $49,000, but there is a waitlist. Marketing Takeaway: Is Google Responsible for Search Results Contents Do Google search results amount to content that the company “publishes” and is responsible for? One high court in Australia says yes — and the decision, if unchanged on appeal, could have far-reaching repercussions. For starters, Google will be forced to pay $200,000 to music promoter Milorad Trkulja, the plaintiff in this case. Trkulja brought the suit in 2009 after Google refused to remove links to sites that claimed, incorrectly, that the promoter has connections to organized crime in Melbourne. Google only got itself in ‘trouble’ after it did not follow through on a take down request. The courts didn’t feel that how Google put the results in the order that it did was wrong but they felt there was an issue when the complaint to take down the information was not granted. Marketing Takeaway:

Halloween Marketing At Its Best: Marketing Update 11/2/12

HubSpot Internet Marketing — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 13:40:52 +0000

Episode #223 - November 2nd, 2012 Intro How to interact on Twtter: Include #MktgUp in your tweet! On the show today is Karen Rubin (@karenrubin) and Mike Volpe (@mvolpe) As always, all the old episodes are in iTunes. If you like the show, please leave a 5-star review! Headlines Halloween Marketing At It's best blog.mrhandyman.com/pumpkin-carving/ Mr. Handyman with the help of their Inbound Marketing Agency realized that there is lots of interest around Pumpkin Carving before Halloween and tied it to their brand by focusing on "Pumpkin Carving with Power Tools" First, a video brought their pumpkin carving ideas to life. A unique, interesting twist on pumpkin carving and a video that clearly explained the concepts made broadcasters interested inviting Mr. Handyman franchise owners to come in for live TV appearances to share their pumpkin carving expertise. Mr. Handyman turned TV viewers into website visitors, by offering Free Pumpkin Carving Templates, which were branded with the Mr. Handyman logo and contact information. The pumpkin carving templates, also generated lots of traffic from pumpkin carving searches and inbound links to their site. http://www.rei.com/features/infographics/zombie.html 13 Essential Tools for Surviving a Zombie Outbreak Infographic Details on the tools you need and tips on how to properly neutralize a zombie or set up a trip wire http://www.innerduck.com/ Oriental Trading Post created a cute game to find out what your inner monster duck is Allowed you to easily buy your duck or share the game through social media Marketing Takeaway: Companies of all sizes can leverage holidays in their marketing. Good Customer Service as Marketing http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2012/10/dominos-and-starbucks-turn-customer-behavior-into-customer-service.html In the UK, Domino’s is offering a new twist on dinner and a movie. When you order a pizza, you’ll also get a code to stream a movie from Lionsgate while you eat. Starbucks is using 17 locations in that city to test a wireless charging mat built right into the table. You’re going to lay your phone down while you drink your coffee anyway, so why not charge the battery at the same time? Adding Duracell Powermats to every table in the chain will cost the company Venti bucks and since they aren’t charging customers to use the service, it’s not a revenue stream.Because Starbucks knows that the longer you sit in their store, the more likely you’ll be to buy another coffee or a muffin or lunch. http://www.getthefive.com/articles/the-boardroom/the-wall-street-journal-and-the-new-york-times-lif/ Harkening back to the days when journalism was a public service, The New York Times and The The Wall Street Journal have placed a crack in their firewall to give readers free access to vital information about Hurricane Sandy—the “Frankenstorm” currently spreading across the East Coast. Marketing Takeaway: Treating your customers right is always good marketing. Direct Mail 2.0 http://www.postcardmania.com/direct-mail-2.0/ Brought to you by postcardmania The main idea behind Direct Mail 2.0 is to take a marketing classic (direct mail) and bring it into the future by seamlessly integrating it with newer marketing tools like Google Remarketing and digital call tracking. Postcards are a tried and true marketing medium that produces results by delivering your artfully designed and clearly written message right to your prospect's mailbox. Using a system we designed ourselves, we track the mailing process of your order. This allows you to know exactly when your cards are due to arrive in prospects' mailboxes. This helps you plan for the influx of new customers. Google Remarketing is an online follow-up tool that enables your text and banner ads to follow prospects around the internet once they leave your site. So if leads don't take the desired action (fill out a form, buy, etc) on your website the first time, you stay in touch. No leads left behind. We use a unique phone number to track the number of calls your mailing generates. You can use this data to gauge the effectiveness of different strategies and marketing messages. It also records calls so you can check for quality in your lead reception and sales processes. Marketing Takeaway: Small Businesses And Social Media http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/33776/43-of-Small-Businesses-Spend-6-Hours-Per-Week-in-Social-Media-INFOGRAPHIC.aspx Infographic from Vertical Response 43% of small businesses -- are spending at least 6 hours per week on social media, with a large focus on Facebook (90% are using it) and Twitter (70% are using it). Only 50% of small businesses are using Linked In AT ALL Only 32% of small businesses are using Google + AT ALL Marketing Takeaway: Google+ influences search results, you can't afford to not at least have it set up!

The Secret to Pinterest Success: Marketing Update 10/26/12

HubSpot Internet Marketing — Fri, 26 Oct 2012 03:21:02 +0000

Episode #222 - October 26, 2012 The Secret to Pintrests Success http://allthingsd.com/20121020/the-secret-behind-pinterests-growth-was-marketing-not-engineering-says-ceo-ben-silbermann/ Pinterest, which CEO Ben Silbermann describes as a tool that helps people find inspiration, is now the third-largest source of referral traffic on the Internet. In 2010, three months after Pinterest launched, the site had only 3,000 users. But some of them were active users, and those people loved the site Pinterest started to have meet-ups at local boutiques, and to take fun pictures of people who attended them, and to engage with bloggers to do invitation campaigns like “Pin It Forward,” where bloggers got more invites to the site by spreading the world. “A lot of people in Silicon Valley didn’t get, and I don’t know if they still get, Pinterest,” Silbermann said. “The fact that it made sense to someone is what really mattered to me.” But ultimately, Pinterest didn’t need better engineering, said Silbermann. It needed better distribution. Marketing Update: Nutella Stops the Nutella Shake http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mobileweb/2012/10/18/nutella-boloco_n_1981925.html Ferrero, which owns Nutella, recently sent a cease and desist order to Boston-basedBoloco, which sold a "Nutella Milkshake" made with Nutella, skim milk, and frozen yogurt for 14 years without incident. Pepper told the Boston Herald that Nutella's legal team is fine with him selling the product, but doesn't "endorse the use of Nutella or the Nutella brand in frozen beverages." It's possible the cease-and-desist letter was partially motivated by broader concerns of Ferraro's. Earlier this year, the company paid $3 million to settle a class-action lawsuit that alleged that Ferraro overstated the health benefits Nutella in its advertisements. Marketing Takeaway: The Cost of Data http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/facebook-permissions/ Facebook Permissions are a Facebook feature that allows the social network and businesses that use Facebook for marketing purposes to collect information about users. When a user agrees to “allow” Facebook, or a business, to broadcast a user’s Likes or other information, the user has granted Facebook permission to do so. Facebook Permissions are not only on custom apps. Any time that you connect to Facebook from an outside website, you’re giving that website permission to access your basic information on Facebook. With each data field a business asks for online, the opt-in rate drops by 10% (I heard this from a Facebook product engineer). That means if gaining access to your app requires customers to tell you anything at all, you could lose 10% of your potential users right off the bat. Marketing Takeaway: When the Internet Breaks http://www.getthefive.com/articles/the-boardroom/when-the-internet-breaks/ Amazon Web Services, which is the major cloud host for web-based businesses large and small, experienced an outage and brought down a sizable chunk of the Web as a result. Pintrest, Foursquare, Airbnb, Reddit, Github, Flipboard From AirBNB to Foursquare to Reddit to Coursera to Flipboard, big chunks of the Web were down for much of the day while Amazon scrambled to get its servers back online. Think about that: everything from room rentals to news sites to education providers was out of commission for most of the day. No transactions. No eyeballs. No revenue. Nothing. While the services that were out don’t represent particularly vital businesses – no lives were lost because they were down (so far!) – it does illustrate the degree to which our everyday lives are increasingly tethered to cloud-based services. One way to mitigate the chances of a company being brought to its knees due to a single outage at a place like Amazon is to spread the risk. What else can Marketers do to help prepare for situations like this? Marketing Takeaway: