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How Consumer’s Media Behavior is Impacting Advertising

Posted on June 14, 2013 by Natalie Busacca

According to an article by The Nielson Company, the average American spends more than 41 hours each week engaging with content across all devices and screens. More importantly, 67% get their content from devices other than a television.

- 37% via Computer
- 16% via TV Internet
- 8% via Smartphones
- 6% via Tablets

In 2013, marketers are responding to this rising trend by increasing their use of social media by 70%, mobile advertising by 69% and video advertising by 64%. Marketers are moving towards advertising on the smaller screens rather than the big screens.  

Just because companies are putting more effort into online advertising, does not mean that they will be spending more. In fact, it is cheaper to advertise online than on television.

According to Nomura Equity Research, a leading financial service group that specializes in Global Research, online advertising is taking market share and driving ad rates down. Because of which, online display advertising is enabling advertisers to reach their target market with less ad budget growth.

Nomura Equity Research advises that with more companies focusing their efforts on online advertising, television ad growth is slowing. The large media corporations will likely feel more pressure to raise the prices they charge TV distributors which will put more pressure on distributors to raise subscribers monthly bills. In the end, it will only increase the percentage of people who view their content on other devices.

As you can see, there is a major impact on advertising which derives from consumer’s media behavior. With Americans spending over 41 hours each week engaging in content, 67% viewing on devices other than a television, marketers are quickly moving towards online advertising.

If you are looking to take advantage of this large consumer base, please feel free to contact me. I will be happy to discuss an online advertising campaign tailored around your business needs.

My goal is to help you achieve online success one step at a time!

Natalie Busacca
Director of Sales, Local Gold

Posted in Business Startups, Customer Tracking, LocalGold | Leave a comment

A Bit About Bing

Posted on June 6, 2013 by Liz Harvey

By now we’ve all heard about the Bing it On challenge where users perform 5 searches and vote on which blind search results they like best. The test results reveal either Bing or Google. If you haven’t already, you can try it yourself at www.bingiton.com. The nationwide ad campaign that Bing launched around this challenge has brought to light the fact that Bing is gradually grabbing market share away from Google and becoming a serious contender in the search space.

Data shows that the Yahoo! Bing Network now represents 30% of the search share in the US. Bing offers a variety of unique features that set them apart from Google including their homepage design which features a different image every day. Bing refers to the homepage layout as “Stunning, smart and always fresh”. In keeping with that theme, here are other Bing features and products that every smart business owner should utilize to stay fresh in the search marketing space:

Bing Ads
Advertisers are always looking for new customers or “unique visitors” to come to their site. If you are looking to broaden your reach beyond Google AdWords and attract new customers then advertising on the Yahoo! Bing network should be your next move. Bing makes it easy to get started. They assume you already have a Google AdWords account (who doesn’t?) and they offer tools and tutorials to walk you through the import process or the process to create a brand new campaign. To keep it fresh, Bing offers new bells and whistles on these paid ads called Ad Extensions that include Location Extensions, Call Extensions and Sitelink Extensions. Here is a breakdown of the 3 Extension types:

Location Extensions show the address and phone number of your local business. This is very useful for customers searching on their Smartphone because they can simply click the number to call.

Call Extensions allow the advertiser to display a phone number that is not associated with a local location rather one phone number that covers all locations where the ad is displayed. Call Extensions allow you to designate your ads as call only locations, without a physical address.

Sitelink Extensions are additional links in your ads that take users to specific pages on your website. This allows the advertiser to promote specific products, services or other areas of the website.

Bing Places for Business
To compete with the growing demand for online local business listings Bing has recently re-launched the Bing Business Portal under a new name, “Bing Places for Business”. The concept is simple: list your business on Bing, but the process to claim or submit your listing is a bit more complicated. Bing allows you to search for your listing and if you find it in their search results you can edit it and claim it. If your business listings is not listed you can create a new listing. In both cases you must create a Microsoft account and verify the information before Bing will publish your listings.

These are just a few ways that local business owners can promote their businesses with Bing. It seems new features and enhancements are launching every day and it’s important to stay on top of the search engine game. Local Gold can help you manage your online presence with our team of experienced marketers. Give us a call today to learn how we can help your business grow.

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Consumer Wallets Are Opening … Are You Ready?

Posted on May 28, 2013 by Dawn Oesterle

Consumer confidence is on the rise! Business owners can look for an uptick in consumer spending over the next year according to Nielsen survey scores. Consumers are cautious, but are opening their wallets to investments, vacations, clothing, home improvements, entertainment, and technology.

The Nielsen Global Survey of Consumer Confidence and Spending Intentions was conducted between February 18–March 8, 2013 and polled more than 29,000 online consumers in 58 countries throughout Asia – Pacific, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Africa and North America.

In the latest round of the survey, consumer confidence rose in 55 percent of markets measured by Nielsen, compared to a 33-percent increase reported in the previous quarter (Q4 2012). North America reported the biggest quarter-on-quarter regional consumer confidence increase of four points in Q1 with a score of 94.

“Americans are in phase two of the economic recovery, however, for many, it just doesn’t feel that way,” said James Russo, senior vice president, Global Consumer Insights, Nielsen. “At the height of the Great Recession (2008–2009), consumer confidence averaged an index of 81 and remained stubbornly low at 82 throughout 2010–2011. Since 2012 however, consumer confidence is averaging an index of 90, which is still below the pre-recession average of 103 (2005–2007), but illustrates a sustained positive movement. Three years of strong gains in the equity market are balanced by five years of declining median household incomes, which highlights the economic divide and precarious state of the recovery.”

North America led the global regions for spending intentions over the next 12 months. Forty-two percent of North American respondents said they plan to spend on discretionary items during the year—a six point rise from Q4 2012, which signaled a welcomed increase from the 33 percent average reported over the past three years.

Are You Ready?

As cautious consumers are ready to start spending again, small business owners should be at the top of their game in their local markets. Learn how Local Gold can help a business owner promote their brand and dramatically increase their online presence for the economic turnaround. A small business owner can focus on doing what they do best and know that our online marketing experts will handle the rest!

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5 Ways to Ensure People Attend Your Workshop

Posted on May 20, 2013 by Natalie Busacca

There is nothing more embarrassing then hosting a workshop and having little to no people show up. So how can you ensure that people attend your work shop? Keep these 5 tips in mind when hosting your next workshop.

Pick the Right Topic – Often times businesses owners will give a workshop on a very specific topic not realizing that it will limit their audience as well. Choose a topic that is general enough to attract a large audience but targeted enough to provide significance.

Map out Your Registration Strategy – Give yourself plenty of time to advertise your workshop. Offer a discount for those that sign up for your workshop before a certain date.

Before you reach that date, send a weekly reminder about your workshop and advertise limited seating or that there is only a certain amount of seats remaining. Lower the amount of available seating each week to show the popularity of your workshop and that time is running out to sign up.

a)     Send informative reminder emails – Continue to send reminders all the way up until the event. People sign up for workshops weeks in advance and you want to make sure to keep your event on their radar. Show the value of your workshops by including a few free facts in your reminders as well.

Incentivize – No matter how important the topic or great the content, people need a reason to attend your workshop other than “free information.” Entice people to take time from their busy schedule to attend your workshop. Incentives are a great way to get people in the door.

Advertise a free coupon for one of your services, giveaway tickets to a major sporting event or movies, free food and beverages. You have to offer something that will get people excited and talking to their friends/family about attending your event.

Choose the Right Date/Time –  Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are the best days to host a workshop.  When planning your workshop make sure you to choose a date that is not close to any holidays. People’s schedules are busier around a holiday. National holidays create a short work week for most which can change availability.

Make sure you give your attendees plenty of time to arrive to your workshop on time. You also don’t want to start your workshop too late because most people don’t want to be out late during the work week. Plan to start your workshop a half hour after the advertised start time to allow for late arrivals and networking before your workshop.

Market- Use social media to market your workshop and build your audience. Be sure to use pictures, articles, videos and make mention of your incentives when posting to your social media pages. Your workshop updates need to stand out from your usual posts. They should leap off the page and grab the viewer’s attention.

If you have any questions on how to market and plan your next workshop, please feel free to contact me directly.

My goal is to help you achieve online success one step at a time!

Natalie Puzio
Director of Sales, Local Gold

Posted in Business Startups, LocalGold, Social Media, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Spring Cleaning for Online Marketing

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Liz Harvey

It’s an age old tradition that we embrace (or dread) year after year. Spring Cleaning! As a child tasked with washing windows and “brushing screens,” I learned at an early age that some of the hardest tasks produce the best, most rewarding results. This is true in all aspects of life! The concept of Spring Cleaning should be applied to your marketing strategy as well. Remove the dust, dirt and clutter and replace it with fresh new content and ideas. Here are some ways to spring clean your online marketing:

New Products and Services: Take inventory of the products and services you have listed on your website and in your marketing campaigns. Have you launched any new products or are you offering any new services? Have you discontinued anything, but forgot to remove the content from your website? Your website content should be updated and your keyword search campaigns should be enhanced with these new product keywords. Conversely, the old product and service content and ads should be removed.

New Promotions: Offer something new! Have you been running the same promotion for over a year? If it is working well for you, you should keep it running but do not be afraid to add a new promotion in addition to it. Add the promotion to your homepage and create new ad campaigns around it. If you create a separate campaign in Google or Bing, you can easily deactivate it when the promotion is over.

New Videos: When was the last time you filmed a testimonial or showcased a new service or product? If you have new products and services, you should be speaking about those and highlighting them in your video. Again, if your video is still relevant and you like it, you can simply move it to another page on your website and keep it in your YouTube channel.

Refresh Online Ad Campaigns: Your online ad campaigns should be dusted off and polished up. If you haven’t updated your campaigns recently, now is the time. Here are some areas to focus on:
1. Review budgets: Dive into the reporting and analytics to identify the campaigns that produce the best return on investment (ROI) and make sure you have enough budget allocated. You don’t want your highest performing keywords capping out every day if your budget is set too low.
2. Write new ads: One of the best ways to freshen up ad campaigns is to write new ad copy and incorporate new ad features. If you have new promotions you should be writing new text ads with a new call to action. You can also revisit your existing ad groups and rotate in new ads with a fresh message.
3. Add new keywords: There is always room for more keywords and key phrases. Google and Bing both have keyword suggestion tools that offer terms that you are not currently advertising. If you recently added new products and services, you should add all related keywords in highly targeted ad groups.

Update Social Media: Update sites with fresh content, pictures and videos. Make a schedule with your team to update these sites regularly. Make sure you have a presence on the major Social Media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.

The bad news is that it’s Spring Cleaning time; the good news is that we can do it for you! Staying on top of your game with online marketing isn’t a job for the weary or the inexperienced! Spend your time and expertise working on your business and spend your money wisely by letting an industry leader like Local Gold create and manage your online marketing presence. We are experts in marketing local businesses online utilizing highly effective strategies. Call 1-800-850-0493 to speak with us today or contact us here.

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