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British Airways has utilised a number of social media platforms to unveil its London 2012 Olympics advert, according to an article published by Marketing Week.
Entitled ‘The Race’, the 60-second advert debuted on the airline’s Facebook page yesterday; it was then made available on Google+ – a platform expected to become hugely popular amongst social media marketing professionals – shortly after.
The light-hearted advert features British Airways staff and follows a young girl as she eagerly awaits her British bag, as it races against luggage from rival nations to make it first to the baggage collection hall.
Other parts of British Airways London 2012 Olympics campaign include a print advert, emphasising the fact that the airline’s cabin crew will serve passengers with enough tea to fill three Olympic-sized swimming pools this year alone, while another ad will feature a gold medal with the tags “To Fly. To Serve” and “2012. We’re Ready.”
‘The Race’ is set to make its TV debut tonight (February 10) during Coronation Street on ITV.
News brought to you by ClickThrough – a best practice Internet Marketing Agency.
It is well-known that huge amounts of effort put into SEO can bring significant rewards. However, it should also be noted that there are a number of quick tasks that you can carry out to keep your overall SEO effort ticking over.
Writing for Search Engine Watch, Josh McCoy, has highlighted a number of these tasks – which can be done in under 15 minutes.
Here are just a few of those tasks in a summarised form:
- Review your Robots.txt file; assess your Meta Robots tagging – This can be done by checking /robots.txt. In the process of doing this you may find that images, folders and pages on your site are being withheld from search engines – preventing traffic from being driven to your site.
McCoy also recommends running “a site scan with a tool such as Screaming Frog to assess if there are any pages on your site you are excluding via a meta robots tag.”
- Review your site for duplicate title elements – Checks for duplicate title elements can be carried in Google Webmaster Tools.
McCoy adds: “Checking this Google property feature can quickly show you these issues and give insight into whether you need to spend the next 15 minutes writing unique title elements, creating redirects, or thinking about which of the multiple pages should include a certain keyword term.”
News brought to you by ClickThrough – experts in SEO, PPC, Multilingual Search Marketing and Website Conversion Enhancement services.
Unofficial Google+ statistician, Paul Allen, has forecast that Google’s first foray in the world of social networking sites will reach 100 million users at some point this week, according to an article published by ITWeb.
Allen’s prediction follows an official announcement made by Google’s CEO Larry Page in mid-January; Page revealed that Google+ had 90 million users at that point.
The ancestry.com founder has also forecast that Google+, which is expected to become a popular platform for social media marketing initiatives, will have a user base of 400 million people – almost half the size of rival, Facebook – by the end of 2012.
He said: “If that rate holds steady, Google+ will end the year with 345 million users. But as I have said before, Google has many dials and levers to use this year to increase sign-ups and usage, including its Android 4.0 roll-out. I stand by my prediction of at least 400 million users by the end of 2012.”
According to unofficial statistics, Google+ is currently growing at a rate of 750,000 new users per day.
News brought to you by ClickThrough – experts in Search Engine Marketing & Internet Marketing.
A recent study has revealed that not only is Facebook the most popular social networking site in general, but it’s also the social network of choice for marketing and advertising executives, according to an article published by BtoB Magazine.
Conducted by California-based firm, the Creative Group, the study asked: “If you had to limit yourself to only one social media platform, which of the following would it be?”
Just over half (56 per cent) of the 500 marketing and advertising professionals interviewed for the study chose Facebook; while LinkedIn came in second with 12 per cent; Google+ rounded out the top three with 4 per cent stating that they would limit themselves to the search engine giant’s first social media offering.
The participants were also asked what they thought was the most common mistake made by creative professionals when using social media sites.
Responses ranged from not updating their profile enough (29 per cent) to providing inappropriate information (24 per cent).
The release of the study results follow Facebook’s – a platform popular amongst social media marketing professionals – decision to file an IPO (initial public offering) application.
News brought to you by ClickThrough – specialists in Search Engine Optimisation and Internet Marketing.
Google has launched a new initiative to get more small businesses using 360 degree and high quality images on search pages, G+, Google Maps, and Google Places and local pages. The new Google Business Photos site includes a list of Trusted Photographers in and around a limited number of UK cities, but Google are actively seeking businesses requesting photographers to join the program and help businesses to use images in search and on Google properties more effectively.
The resulting photos after a shoot are stitched together using panoramic technology to create a 360 image which allows zoom, pan, tilt etc and hence permits website visitors to get a great experience of how it will be to visit your business. This is not only suitable for retail outlets, museums, gyms and salons, but also for restaurants, cafes, hotels, B and Bs – infact, nearly every business could benefit from this.
The photos are stitched together – you can do this yourself with apps such as Photosynth – and can then be used on your own website, as well as on Google properties such as Google Places etc. You can also upload your own 360 photos to Google Places etc if you wish, and embed these photos elsewhere with a small HTML snippet.
There would seem to be a likelihood that Google is looking to add an extra dimension to Streetview by allowing users of SV to virtually enter businesses with these photos, which would be an interesting development, and make a useful marketing addition to SV for businesses.
AdWords Express vouchers are being offered to the first who take up this offer, but the vouchers expire on 31st March 2012 so you need to act fast.
Google has warned Welsh businesses that they could be missing out on Internet marketing opportunities, as figures have shown that around 40 per cent of small firms based in Wales don’t operate a website, according to an article published by BBC News.
The message has coincided with the announcement that Google will work with the Welsh government as part of a year-long campaign to boost the presence of Welsh businesses on the Internet.
Google’s Laurian Clemence stated: “You are really missing out if you can’t be found online.
“We do believe there are definitely more benefits than not. The key thing is that people who have their business online see their business grow four to eight times faster than those that don’t.
“We realised that Wales was lagging behind in the adoption of web presences for SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises),” she said.
Clemence concluded: “There ia lot of opportunity there to help them get a website for the first time or if they do have a website improve it.”
As part of the project Google will be providing one-to-one advice sessions for small and medium-sized businesses, as well as a roadshow featuring tutorials, workshops and advice from experts.
Edwina Hart, business minister, said: “We welcome this initiative to help companies gain maximum benefits from using and exploiting digital technologies to innovate, grow and access new markets, driving business growth.”
News brought to you by ClickThrough – a best practice Internet Marketing Agency.
In 2012, the majority of big companies operate, or have at least dabbled with, social media marketing campaigns on a regular basis; despite this many still struggle to get a ROI (return on investment), according to Kritsta Neher, writing for ClickZ.
As a relatively new marketing platform, mistakes are, and will continue, to be made on social media sites, such as Twitter, Facebook and now, Google+.
Neher has created a list of common errors made by businesses when conducting social media marketing campaigns; here are just a few of them:
Too much focus on fans/friends/followers – By and large people determine the success of their social media marketing campaigns based on how many fans/friends/followers they’ve gained – this shouldn’t be the case.
A recent study, conducted by PageLever, revealed that just 3 to 7.5 per cent of fans of a business’ Facebook page see the posts produced. Instead of obsessing over fans/friends/followers, look to produce the highest quality content you can – this will get more people reading what you produce and improve your ROI.
Not knowing how to respond to questions posed by fans – People who take notice of your social media presence do so for a reason – they expect your business to communicate and provide regular updates. Be prepared to answer the questions and queries posed by those who take the time to follow or like you.
A non-response won’t do your reputation any good. To prepare Neher recommends: “Make a list of the top ten questions you’re asked on the phone. Also make a list of the top ten PR crises that you have had in the past five years. Be prepared to handle these on social networks.”
News brought to you by ClickThrough – a best practice Internet Marketing Agency.
In their PPC marketing efforts, small, local businesses hardly ever use Google AdWords to its maximum potential. Writing for Search Engine Watch, Howie Jacobson has highlighted three ways in which local businesses can benefit from AdWords.
Here is just one of those aforementioned three ways suggested by Jacobson, in a summarised form:
Test Messaging For Other Media – AdWords can be used to test for the best possible ad copy for other platforms – such as print ads.
Jacobson states: “It’s not unusual for one a to perform two to five times better than another.” As most offline advertising is “of the ‘interruption’ variety” it is possible to use the Display Network, AdWords’ interruption arm, to test other ads.
According to Jacobson, the Display Network generates around 10 times the amount of traffic yielded by search and the clicks are considerably cheaper. He concludes: “So the Display Network is the perfect place to find messages, offers, and calls to action in offline media.”
News brought to you by ClickThrough – experts in SEO, PPC, Multilingual Search Marketing and Website Conversion Enhancement services.
There does seem to be a constant erosion of privacy by social networks, and the announcement this week that Google’s latest privacy changes will use data across the entire product set is already subject to criticism. LinkedIn introduced social ads last summer which had a default opt-out setting for your name and photo to be used publicly in advertising on the network. Facebook has caused untold furores with its many privacy changes and this week is ‘forcing’ users to adopt the new Timeline.
The need to monetise social networks and apps and services is of course standard business practice. However, the consumer created content which leads to the growth and potential of services such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Youtube etc should not come as cheaply as it does to the network. The harvesting and use of personal details in order to attract advertisers is the payment that the users have to make in order to generate the profits for the network. This is not on a commission or affiliate level, but is ‘gifted’ freely to the network to do with as they choose. However, the depths to which some social networks seem willing to go in order to maximise this “free” content seems to increase rather than decrease over time. It is this seemingly never ending of the pushing of the limits of privacy decency with little respect for opt-in, permissions, or even the awareness of the users, that is worrying privacy advocates.
Despite protestations to the contrary, there would seem to be a casual yet ruthless attitude towards users’ privacy, mainly due to the cut throat market the networks are in. Facebook has been forced to add the strapline – it’s free and it always will be – after unfounded rumours that users would be charged to use the social site, leaving Facebook with one less route to capitalising on their enormous user base. (Friends Reunited, for instance, made its money by charging a nominal £4-5 per annum to access additional data on friends such as email addresses). However, the continuous drip drip introduction of default settings that require action by the user, rather than opt in, is telling about the attitudes which prevail amongst the internet giants.
LinkedIn require you to opt out from having your name and photo used on advertising across the site. Although this was introduced last summer, it is likely that a vast proportion of the users of LinkedIn remain unaware of the change. For many, the account and privacy settings on Facebook are simply too complex to work out what is being shown to whom. Google+ endeavoured to address these concerns by allowing you to choose precisely the people with whom you shared content, but the inclusion of Google+ posts in top search results, as well as the latest privacy changes across all of Google’s real estate, may have unravelled that feelgood strategy.
There have been users leaving the social networks in protest, but for many the privacy issue, or rather the possible results of such policies, is still unclear – what harm does it do me? Meanwhile, there are a number of start ups looking to create privacy enhanced and open source social networks, but the real benefit of social networks is when *everyone* you know is on them and a start up with limited members will struggle to compete with the phenomenal global user base that is Facebook today. (By the end of 2012, it is estimated that more than a billion people will be using Facebook).
How do you feel about the social networks use of your personal data? Would you leave a social network because of its privacy policy? What changes would be one step too far for you to stay?
Traditionally social media rivals, Facebook, Myspace and Twitter have grouped together to create a new tool, aimed at drawing users’ attention to the “biased” results provided as part of Google’s Search Plus Your World, according to an article published by the Telegraph.
Entitled “Don’t be evil” (a nod to one of the search engine giant’s early mottos), the browser add-on is currently only compatible with Firefox.
The tool has been created to prevent Google searches returning content that’s been ‘ranked up’ by Google from its own social network, Google+.
A recent change has seen Google searches return Google+ content at the top of search results – a change previously announced as part of Search Plus Your World – at the expense of results from Twitter and Facebook.
Google has explained how the new update – which could affect SEO – worked.
A post published by Google read: “Starting today, if you search for a topic like (music) or (baseball), you might see prominent people who frequently discuss this topic on Google+ appearing on the right-hand side of the results page.”
The search engine giant has yet to respond to the launch of ‘Don’t be evil’ – which is currently only available in America. However, Google did previously say it had tried to strike a deal with both Twitter and Facebook to include their results in a prominent position – but wrangles over cost and privacy scuppered such a move.
News brought to you by ClickThrough – a provider of SEO Services & Pay Per Click strategies.
