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DaBrian Marketing Blog: News, Insights, and Digital Marketing

Privacy Protection on Search Engines & Social Media vs. Value of Data

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USA Today recently ran an article about Facebook’s data collection methods and the issues they raise with privacy protection. Although there is very good reason for these concerns to be voiced, consumers should still be aware that not all monitoring is a bad thing, and in fact, a lot of the monitoring that marketing and business intelligence departments do often benefits consumers greatly.

Check out our latest YouTube video that we released earlier today discussing this hot topic:

So what are you thoughts on this? Be sure to leave comments on both the blog and the video!

Don’t forget to subscribe to our blog as well as to our YouTube Channel to stay up-to-date on the latest issues, news, and tips on internet marketing, web analytics, SEO, & more! Also be sure to follow DaBrian Marketing Group on Google+!

Why You Shouldn’t Ignore Mobile Accessibility of Your Website

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One of the most common mistakes made in the web and e-commerce worlds is the dismissal of the importance of mobile accessible websites. Mobile activity on the web is increasing exponentially every day as more and more consumers trade their laptops and desktops for smartphones and tablets. Society wants to be mobile and less constricted by the ball-and-chain of cables and cords, yet there are still countless websites that fail to accommodate for this properly.

So what excuse is there NOT to optimize your website for mobile visitors? Web Analytics data and reports have proven this traffic has been increasing hand-over-fist every day. Further analysis even indicates these visitors are trying to access what they need and engage with the website (multiple pages viewed per visit), however they tend to leave before they actually convert. A glance to the average amount of time that they spend on the website compared to normal traffic provides a clear picture of just how much trouble they’re having. If the time they spend is significantly more, it means they’re finding the use of the website difficult or perhaps load times are taking a lot longer than they should because of large images.

More often than not, however, the decision makers will not make a move on a mobile solution based upon website performance metrics alone. That’s when you take a look at the market statistics and demographics. The visual below (from the article located here) shows the breakdown of tablet users according to their social status as well as which age groups they are from. Keep in mind, the visual above is only covering the tablet users, which is only a segment of the total mobile visitors out there. Even more people have smartphones than tablet devices. The performance metrics are there. The demographical data is there. Don’t ignore the writing on the walls! Optimize your website for mobile!

Video: Capabilities of Multichannel Analytics

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One of the greatest challenges in the past has been effectively tracking traditional marketing methods like billboards, direct mail pieces, and print advertisements alongside internet marketing efforts.  This is much more attainable nowadays via Multichannel Analytics.  DMG’s Web Analyst Brandon Wensing describes some of the benefits of using this method to yield imperative insights into your high level marketing efforts:

Five Reasons to Monitor Your Internet Marketing Efforts

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Over the past several years, the greatest challenge facing internet marketers and web analysts has been convincing superiors and clients of the value of monitoring all of their web-based efforts. All-too-often, they will fire back with something along the lines of “Oh, we know how many visits we’re getting to the site.” This statement usually comes from an organization that has their overworked IT department “monitoring” their site’s activity. Little do these organizations know that the visits metric means little-to-nothing in the grand scheme of things, especially if you are not using it in unison with the countless other metrics that are available.

So perhaps you’ll be making a pitch to the higher-ups in your company about implementing a web analytics strategy, or maybe you are one of the higher-ups and are curious to see whether or not it’s worth it. Well, here are 5 great reasons to use web analytics to track your website and internet marketing efforts:

  1. Visits Don’t Mean Anything! As mentioned before, simply knowing how many visits your website received in a month does not mean you know how your website is performing. There are so many more metrics that should be considered that can be combined to yield more detailed and useful statistics about the website.You can have all the visits in the world, but if they’re not converting, then they’re practically worthless.
  2. Discover Where Marketing Efforts Should Be Focused. Not only can Web Analytics solutions uncover where your visitors are coming from, but it can also shine light on where your organization should be focusing its marketing and internet efforts.
  3. Know What Your Visitors Are and Are NOT Looking For. Paying attention to what pages and content your visitors are viewing most often can uncover what your consumers are actually looking for.Just the same, it can also show what visitors are less interested in, so you can save your company’s time and efforts in pushing the wrong products, services, or information.
  4. Monitor Traditional Marketing Effectiveness. Web Analytics isn’t just limited to seeing how well your website is doing or where your visitors are coming from. When implemented by web analytics ninjas, you can also see how effective your more traditional marketing methods are at driving traffic, and more importantly, conversions, to your website.
  5. Hone in on Your Target Market. Using methods like advanced segmentation and conversion tracking, you can identify who is spending the most quality time on your site and who is most likely to spend money. In doing this, a much clearer picture is painted of who your organization should be reaching out to the most.
There you have it- Five great reasons to seriously consider Web Analytics for your organization. In an economic climate like today’s, your organization cannot afford to turn its nose up to this, as monitoring your internet marketing strategies and efforts yields crucial insights into increasing conversions and sales.

Testing Changes in PPC Advertising

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As many of you have probably heard, both Google AdWords and Microsoft adCenter are testing multiple aspects of PPC advertising. Some items being tested include placement, layout, ad extensions, images within text ads, and more.Descriptions of each follow:

Placement

It has been reported that text ads have been spotted with the organic results on search pages.

Layout

The Headline can sometimes include the first line of description and the URL has jumped to just under the Headline.

New Ad Extensions

These let you have searchers request that you contact them via phone of email directly from your ad.

Images within Text Ads

Lastly of the ones that I am mentioning is the ability to show off products being advertised or the company logo within the contextual ad space.

To wrap up, keep an eye out for some, if not all, of these aspects being tested to be implemented into either Bing Ads and/or Google AdWords. Also remember that no matter how frustrating these changes are to keep up with, both Google and Microsoft are trying to improve their services so that we as online markets can improve our CTR and Conversions.

Monitor Phone Lines, Billboards, Direct Mail Pieces, and More Using Multichannel Analytics

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Most people involved with the marketing facet of a company would agree that there are countless avenues to market with.Websites, banner advertising, e-mail marketing, direct mail marketing, cold calling…the list goes on and on.Over the past decade, it’s become increasingly important to monitor marketing effectiveness.Web analytics tools have been improving as quickly as the rest of the internet has, allowing for more dynamic, in-depth analysis with every new update.With these new updates and improvements, it has now become possible to monitor much more than just a website.

When implemented properly and in the hands of a web analytics ninja, platforms like Google Analytics can be used to monitor and track the effectiveness of more than just websites.Using advanced integration methods such as event tracking, virtual pageviews, and cross-domain tracking, these tools can be used to track everything from your organization’s social media efforts to phone calls.That’s right: phone calls. Call tracking is the latest trick in the analytical magic bag, using a hidden, blank web page bound to a specific phone number to track calls via “pageviews”.  Call tracking isn’t the only trackable avenue of marketing that isn’t limited by the internet.Using things like custom phone numbers and vanity URLs, it is also possible to use web analytics platforms to effectively track direct mail and even billboard advertising.

As human beings, we can’t help but think in silos.In today’s marketing world, it is crucial that we break away from this old way of thinking and see how all of these facets and avenues of advertising are tied together.When data from all of these areas of marketing is combined, it can generate crucial business intelligence and reveal insights that could give your organization the edge it needs.