Is Google selling leads in the UK?
Every so often a simple Google search reveals a hint at a new Google initiative.
In recent months we've seen various different types of ad extension formats and it seems that selling leads rather than clicks could be the next big push in Google's continuing search for revenue streams away from the simple click.
Peter Bell from Fuse Lead Marketing (@fuselead) recently alerted me to an interesting discovery which seems to have appeared over the last few weeks in the UK.
If you are signed into one of Google’s services (LeadPoint uses Google for email) you might stumble across a new type of ad extension in the top ranked ads – namely a way for the advertiser to capture your contact information and permission to contact you without clicking through.
Twitter showdown: Virgin America vs United
For today's Twitter showdown, we're moving away from the shelves and into the skies. With a look to two of the most talked about airlines, we're pitting Virgin America against United Airlines.
With different approaches to social media, which airline do you think will win today's social media media battle?
The mainstreaming of content marketing: ten implications
Let's face it, content marketing has gone mainstream. That kind of sucks, really, because it used to be a hugely powerful differentiator in most markets.
Soon it will just be the price of entry. Everyone will have a rich content library, so a new eBook or video won't be enough to make you jump out from that pack of pesky competitors.
So how will the world of digital marketing change when content marketing becomes the norm for everyone?
Here are ten predicions and what you can do about them...
Five ways to optimise your online video
A great video strategy can be a lot of work. Coming up with a good concept, producing the video, and editing are all vital steps in the process, but it does not end there.
All too often, businesses will invest serious time and effort into producing great video content only to lose steam once they get the videos online.
Your online video strategy should not end at the upload. Really great content can and often will go far on it’s own, but there many tactics that can be employed online to reach your video’s full potential.
Here are five post-upload steps you can take to ensure your video marketing strategy is a success.
Seven top tips for improving viral campaign success
There’s clearly no secret formula for viral success otherwise we’d all be doing it.
In fact, there’s nothing worse than a client briefing an agency to devise a viral campaign as it completely misses the point about how good ideas are generated.
A viral campaign is a desired outcome, not the basis for developing break-through campaigns or memes. That said, there are definite skills, techniques and approaches which we can deploy to improve our chances of viral success.
In fact, Propagation Planning is a relatively new school of thought which is dedicated to this very concept. In theory, the more we understand how communities behave and share ideas, the better we’ll get at creating compelling advertising campaigns which self-propagate.
As Griffin Farley, Strategy Director from BBH succinctly puts it “Plan not for the people you reach, but for the people they reach”.
Peugeot uses Pinterest to launch puzzle competition
Peugeot Panama has launched a Pinterest-based competition that asks people to complete puzzles by repinning images of its cars.
Last week the brand created several boards depicting different models with pieces missing.
People can search for and find these pieces, pin them on their own boards and share it with Peugeot. The first five people to complete their boards win prizes.
17 tips for choosing a B2B content marketing agency
As content marketing leaps 'the chasm' and lands in Geoffrey Moore's back garden, more and more marketers are on the lookout for a B2B content marketing agency that can make them famous.
That's a good thing. But almost every B2B agency out there is hurriedly carving a new 'Content Marketing' sign for their front door.
So it pays to have a think before you get yourself committed.
Eurostar claims to be first to integrate social mentions with "large-scale" advertising
Eurostar is to integrate social media mentions with advertising, promoting its connection from London to Amsterdam in the run-up to the Olympics.
The brand claims to be the first to integrate real-time comments and photos from Facebook, Twitter and more with “large-scale” advertising, predicting that it will place 4,000 mentions per day onto digital screens around London and the South East
Lings Cars and the art of persuading visitors to buy
Now and again you see a website so different to the norm that you can’t help but be intrigued. Lings Cars reverses perfectly in to that space.
The easy option here would be for me give the site a good going over with a usability stick, but I wouldn’t be the first to do that and quite frankly I don’t want to have Ling Valentine breathing now my neck and boxing me into submission....
Instead, what I want to hopefully do in this article is identify a wide range of persuasive, psychologically rooted design techniques that this website uses to a) build trust and then b) encourage you to hire.
Stay with me on this, I know when you first see the site you may well have a WTF moment and wonder how anyone would/could find their way around the site, but if you don’t know already Ling shifts quite a few cars over the course of the year: £35m in 2010 in fact.
Digital talent: the innovative & integrated marketing brain
Sometimes it’s easy to forget that we only use between 10 and 20% of our brains and, with hot debate surrounding the convergence of so many digital channels and disciplines, it’s important to make sure we know how best to use it.
While some integrated marketers simply get on with it, others argue and engage in constant conflict.
What channel to use, which is the best, where does this channel fit, how do we structure and adapt to change?
