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Metrics Drive Decisions

Earlier this year WebStrategies conducted proprietary research focused around how consumers living in the Richmond, VA area interact with the internet and how they shop for products and services. The purpose of the survey was to gain a deeper understanding of how consumers use various media resources when they are shopping for products and services, and share this information with the local business community so they can better serve their customers.

Instagram, the popular photo sharing network acquired by Facebook in 2012, has announced plans to open its feed to advertisers by winter 2015!

The holidays are right around the corner and if you haven’t already done so now is the time to plan for PPC success.

In today’s business environment there are ever-increasing ways to connect with your buyers. Who do you know that hasn’t complained about too many emails? Have you heard enough yet about how social media will transform business? And who doesn’t have (or at least want) a smartphone? With so much information about how to market and sell, we must ask ourselves “what’s the best way to connect with my particular buyers?” This article provides a summary of consumers’ expectations and a method for matching what your buyers want and how to deliver it.

I’m often asked how Google and Facebook compare to one another as advertising platforms. The answer comes down to who your audience is, and how and when you need to reach them.

Pay-per-click marketing is synonymous to Sponsored Link marketing and we'll refer to it for now on as PPC. You know - those search results at the top of the page and along the right side of the page. Each time you click on one of those links, it costs the company advertising the link some money - hence "pay-per-click".

How much should I be investing in marketing? How much of my marketing budget should be directed to online marketing vs. offline. These are questions I get asked frequently. So, recently I experienced an intersection of data from credible sources that combined go along way to answering these important questions. The two sources referenced in this post are the annual survey of CMO’s by CMOSurvey.org sponsored by the American Marketing Association and the Duke University Fuqua School of Business; and a recent report by Forrester Research Group about interactive marketing trends and predictions.

Much is being written about the success of sites like Groupon and Living Social. A recent blog post expressed concern that these kinds of location-based promotional sites will ultimately lead to merchants competing on price only. An excerpt from the post read as follows:

Going through some of the finer points in Google Analytics - Conversion University caused me to ask "why don't more people embrace the richness of web analytics data?" I think about some of our clients and many people I run in to who are struggling to be effective marketers and then I look at the power of the data you can get from Google Analytics. I just shake my head in amazement that more aren't embracing the data.