Use Open Graph to Get Video Thumbnails into Search Results. Joel Harvey is, among other things, the Video Scientist at Conversion Sciences. Over the past four years, he has developed video strategies for a large number of online retailers. We’ve found that video is great for drawing and converting qualified search traffic, so I asked Joel to tell us his tricks for getting video ranked on Google. He doesn’t disappoint. Search marketers are always looking for strategies to give them an edge.
Ever since Google first announced Universal Blended Search results in 2008, search marketers have been looking for ways to consistently use the blended results to their advantage. The Opportunity According to Joel, one of the most mysterious and difficult universal channels has been video, particularly getting video thumbnail images associated with the search results that you rank for with your domain. Notice how video thumbnails make search entries stand out.
The Problem In the beginning of Universal Search, Joel used a process that was relatively easy: eBags Zappos.
Lack of Measurement of Social Business Initiatives a Key Issue. While survey respondents most frequently cite “a clear vision” and “leadership” as critical to adoption of social software, the most common answer to the question “How do you measure social software use?” Is Do Not Measure. It’s a disconnect, and it’s significant. On the one hand, respondents to MIT Sloan Management Review’s recent survey on how companies use social business tools most frequently cite “a clear vision” and “leadership” as critical to adoption of social software. But on the other hand, the most common answer to the question “How do you measure social software use?”
That suggests that an important resource is missing — measured results on just what, exactly, is going on in companies. This disconnect on the need for leadership vs. the lack of metrics is one of the key findings of the 2012 Social Business Global Executive Study and Research Project, presented online in a special report on social business.
Measuring the Effectiveness of Social Business Initiatives. Invisible Businesses In Google's Local Search - The Problem No One Sees. Local businesses are often mystified as to why they don’t appear prominently in local search. Yet, when their online marketing is audited from a local SEO perspective it becomes clear that their lack of search optimization has effectively cloaked them — they’re invisible! So, how is it that these businesses have made themselves invisible? To answer that question, we only need to look towards one of the most basic, foundational elements of a company’s online identity: the Category. I’ve written about business categories a few times previously (see Double Your Traffic Using Optimal Category Names, and Leveraging Business Categories for Local Search), because a company’s categorization is so influential for its presence in local search results and its rankings for queries for types of businesses and keywords closely related to the category.
But, the most serious issue of all is invisibility! For example, a search for “nonclassified establishments” in New York, NY, returns over 11,000 results: Facebook Says It Can Take A YEAR To Get Results From Its Ads. Study Reveals How Activity on Facebook Can Affect Web Traffic. By now it’s pretty clear that the “if you build it, they will come” stance doesn’t really work with social media . But despite activity, many brands still struggle with getting fans to buy their products. Virtual Pageviews Or Event Tracking – Which Is Right For You? An interesting challenge came across my desk this week. A site owner had installed a new contact form plugin on their WordPress website and they were struggling with tracking the submissions.
The form submit button triggered some JavaScript and didn’t then open its own thank you page within the site. The problem? Virtual Pageviews were previously chosen as the necessary method of seeing submissions. The new form was not recording those Virtual Pageviews. Something was wrong with the tracking setup when using the new contact form handling system. Unfortunately, the need for this new form was predicated by an old SEO company removing a form from the client’s site when the client decided to move on to a new SEO firm. My first question was: why use Virtual Pageviews and not use Event Tracking? I generally prefer Event Tracking for most button click actions that we want to track. According to Google Analytics help, figuring out what and when is pretty simple. Pros: Cons: Pros Cons. Facebook Mobile Apps. Destroying the 7 Myths of B2B Social Media. Jay Baer Keynotes Wednesday Lunch Session at 2012 Marketo Summit There has long been a widely held (and incorrect) belief that social media is a B2C sandbox. ’Stay out B2B marketers, this social thing has nothing to do with you.’
Of course, there have been countless studies that have documented B2B marketers successes in driving results in social. With the notion that social is only for B2C debunked, in its place now are new myths. Each chalked-full of misinformation and hyperbole regarding B2B’s ability to implement, engage and monitor social. Jay Baer, President of Convince & Convert, lead a high-impact and high-energy presentation at the Marketo Summit aimed to call-out and ‘destroy’ some of the more prevalent myths.
The session was titled ‘Destroying the 7 Myths of B2B Social Media‘, and here are the 7 myths Jay shared. 1. As Jay puts it, the people who believe this are projecting their own lack of social media adoption. 2. 3. Awarenesssalesloyalty 4. 5. 6. 7. Google Analytics Social Reports Provide Huge Metrics Edge | social media measurement. Corporate Blogging - 5 of the Most Important Success Tips You Can Implement Today. The tendency for corporate marketers and their agencies to chase shiny social objects seems to be manifesting as conflicting trends in the usefulness of social media for business.
Companies that execute their social media marketing tactics poorly often conclude the channel doesn’t work. A good example is the “corporate blogging is dying” story which contrasts with a study that shows blogging is the second most effective B2B lead generation tactic. I’ve always said that tools are only as good as the skills of the people using them and the moving target of social savvy customers along with a rapidly evolving social web make social media marketing skills acquisition a bit tricky. I think part of the answer to the distracted approach to social media marketing efforts like corporate blogging could be arrested by mastering these basics. 1.
The “customer” for your blog need not be limited to people who buy. 2. 3. 4. 5. Business blogging is a journey, not a destination.