Archive for January, 2009
YouTube, Vimeo, and Hulu. Are they just buzz words that have become part of our daily vocabulary or are they related to a better marketing opportunity? We’ve all hopped on the web video train in the past few years, but there are doubts about whether or not e-commerce sites have been making the most of it. New studies and recent reports indicate that adding video to your site can boost conversions, increase customer trust levels, and differentiate your e-commerce site from the competition. If you haven’t used video marketing tactics in the past, it may be time to start using them to boost the performance of your site.
According to Practical eCommerce, 8 percent of the 2.7 billion video ad impressions studied by Google-owned technology firm DoubleClick involved higher levels of user interaction – a vital element in the overall shopping experience. Another study conducted by Innovate Media, an online video production company, showed staggering increases in conversion rates ranging from 12 to 115 percent.
eMarketer also puts online video viewers at more than three-quarters of US Internet users, and estimates that percentage will rise to 88% by 2012 – in short, video is a wise choice for keeping up with the pace.
“Every page on our web site using video converts two or three times more than pages without,” says Todd Holmberg,
co-owner of AirgunDepot.com.
“Some products were gathering dust on our shelves, but we knew they were good products and people would buy them if they could see how they worked,” Holmberg says. “Two of these items are now among our bestsellers in their category. Video is 100% responsible for the change in sales.”
Uploading just any content won’t give you the results that online merchants like AirgunDepot.com are enjoying. Creating a creative, informative, and well produced video will often receive the best response. By making a clear outline of what exactly goes into producing a quality video it’ll be easier to dictate your next move and give you guidelines around which you can design your video project. Let’s take a look at some of the factors.
Content
The first and one of the most vital parts of the video creation process is deciding on the content. Product demonstrations, merchant information, and answering user questions are some of the most popular video formats for e-commerce sites, however, one form of video may work better than others. Decide which type or format of video works best for the message you’re trying to send to your visitors. Then, develop a well-written script that is easy to both perform and understand. Remember, writing for video is much different than other forms of traditional media. Develop a script that uses a conversational tone, short sentences, and gets your message across in as little time as possible. Also, brainstorm ways that you can set your video content apart from the competition. Personal or creative details may be the competitive edge you’re seeking.
Length
Remember to keep it short, sweet, and to the point. Although you may want to expound on all of the great features of your product down to the manufacturing facility where it was made, working in time frames less than five minutes will be most effective. Site visitors tend to skim product descriptions or articles, rather than spending the time to read carefully. The same principle applies to video. Visitors are looking for fast, easy to understand information presented in a short format that is visually appealing. After developing your content, practice your script to see if it needs to be trimmed to an appropriate length.
Talent
Adding a professional actor or voiceover can add value to your production, but sometimes site visitors would like a more personal approach. Starring in your own video gives your visitors a chance to get to know your site on a much more intimate level, which can increase their overall trust in your brand. This is up to you though. Professional actors are not for everyone, but the right actor can significantly enhance the quality of your footage, especially if you’re someone who doesn’t like to be in front of the camera.
Graphics
The images and text used in your video presentation can make or break the level of engagement in your visitors. Graphics can be created using special software by either yourself or a professional production company, however, be mindful of the way they are going to look on screen. Try to choose graphics, logos or colors that are easy to read and cleanly designed. Choosing opulent graphics can distort or cloud your video’s overall message or goal. Remember, keep it simple.
Music
Choosing the right music may seem easy enough, but copyright laws may indicate otherwise. When choosing music for your video, be sure that you either have permission to use it or are paying the appropriate royalties, or if you’re creative, compose your own.
Setting
Shooting video footage can be challenging depending on what facilities you have available. While the outdoors can seem like a great idea, wind and other elements can impact the comfort of your talent, the quality of your sound, and the safety of your equipment. Using a studio space would be ideal, but may not be within reach of your budget. Try to improvise by creating a well-lit, comfortable atmosphere, or be modern and go with a solid color backdrop. If you’re doing a product demonstration, put the product in a setting where it would normally be used.
Equipment
Quality footage can start or end behind the lens of a camera. If you have access to professional video and sound equipment, utilize it, or hire a production company to take the headache out of filming. . If you’re working on a small budget, using a personal video camera can suffice; however, you will be sacrificing image quality. Be sure to read up on best filming practices if you’re shooting the footage yourself.
Editing
When it comes time to put it all together, you have two options. The first is to edit the video using editing software like Cyberlink PowerDirector, Adobe Premier, or Pinnacle Studio yourself. The second is to hire a professional editor. If you don’t have experience in making and editing videos, hiring a professional is the better way to go, mostly out of necessity of time, convenience, and knowledge.
Quantity
After you’ve made a successful video, try not to overload your site with too many that could make loading times slower for visitors or can bog down your server space. Try selecting some of your best performing products and creating a few videos for various landing pages, or under the “About Us” section, upload a video tour of your operations. Moderation, as in most things, will be essential. The video is supposed to add to the appearance and integrity of your site, not detract from it.
The opportunities offered in e-commerce are endless, especially for the merchant who is willing to develop and adapt his or her site to the changing needs of visitors and the demands of our economy. Investing in video this year is just what you need to give your site a boost in sales, conversion rates, and customer satisfaction. You have the ideas. You have the tools. Now it’s time to make it happen.
By Mandy Boyle
mandy.boyle@ebizinsider.com
Solid Cactus, Inc. has designed or redesigned more than 3,000 e-commerce sites. Solid Cactus is an Inc. 500 company and was named one of the "Best Places to Work in Pennsylvania" in 2006 and 2007.
We’ve all heard the tale of Goldilocks and The Three Bears – Goldilocks snuck inside the bears’ home, tested out three bowls of tasty porridge, sat on three comfortable chairs, and fell asleep in three cozy beds, but only one of each was right for her. Goldilocks wasn’t about to settle for any bowl of porridge or any bed – she wanted the one perfectly suited to her tastes. The same goes for your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) campaign – by tailoring your SEO efforts to your industry and taking advantage of the great opportunities niche marketing has to offer, your SEO will be “just right”.
Most Websites fit into a specific niche, which Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines as “a place, employment, status, or activity for which a person or thing is best fitted”. Goldilocks has an online store that sells delicious porridge. She wants to start working on SEO to increase her keyword rankings for competitive phrases in non-paid, “organic” search engine results. She wants to attract as many people as possible to her store, so she thinks it makes sense to concentrate her SEO efforts on ranking for the keyword “food”.
Not quite, Goldilocks. Sure, ranking for the term “food” will certainly increase your online visibility, but it’ll take years of round-the-clock SEO work for Miss Golden Locks to rank high for the keyword “food”. Plus, how does she know someone searching for “food” actually wants porridge? What if they want Swiss chocolates or recipe ideas? That searcher definitely won’t click on her listing, and her SEO efforts will be all in vain.
Don’t worry, there’s a better solution. Rather than striving to rank for general terms, look to your own industry. Since Goldilock’s online store sells porridge and has a great deal of relevant information about the porridge on her site, search engines are much more inclined to rank her site for targeted terms related to “porridge”. So, she’s higher up on the non-paid search engine results for porridge-related terms, and people searching for that term are actually looking for that in which her store specializes.
We all know that SEO is a long-term strategy. Instead of trying to go after those highly competitive, general terms from the start, research keywords directly related to what you’re selling, try to think like consumers – if they were looking for your products, what keyword phrases would they type into the search box? Sure, these terms may not be as competitive, but you have a much better chance of ranking high for them in a shorter amount of time, and actually reaching the audience you want to reach.
There are several ways to take advantage of niche marketing. First, make sure your site’s informational content is optimized to target the industry-specific keywords for which you want to rank. Create a resources section and include informative content about different topics related to your niche. Next, start a blog, brand it to your site, and start posting about topics related to your industry. Reach out to non-competitive sites in your industry and ask them to add your site’s link to their own Website. Point out that your site is specific to the industry, and thus will be extremely useful to visitors to their site. Research social media sites tailored to your industry, and create lively, interesting profiles and pages on those social media sites. You’re putting yourself right in front of the exact audience you want to target.
Don’t settle for any old SEO campaign. Just like Goldilocks, be sure your SEO efforts are just right for your industry. Follow the tried-and-true SEO tactics such as search engine optimized content, link building, and social media optimization, but tailor them to your industry. You’ll be reaching the customers who are actually seeking your products, and in time, you can step ahead as a leader in your industry. Seems like Goldilocks knew a thing or two, after all.
By Alicia Magda
aliciam@ebizinsider.com
Solid Cactus, Inc. has designed or redesigned more than 3,000 e-commerce sites. Solid Cactus is an Inc. 500 company and was named one of the "Best Places to Work in Pennsylvania" in 2006 and 2007.
Imagine for a moment that you had the ability to make your Pay-per-click ads as targeted as possible, so that every time a user saw your ad, that user thought, “Hey! That’s exactly what I was looking for!” If you’ve taken the time to develop a detailed structure to your PPC campaigns, you’re halfway there already. Assuming your keywords are broken up into tightly woven groups of relevant phrases and ads, you are primed to take advantage of another great tool that the search engines offer.
Take a moment to search some of your top keywords on Google’s Ad Preview Tool (http://www.google.com/adpreview) . Now look at your ads and your competitor’s ads. Some of the ads will probably have bolded words in the ad text. This happens whenever the keyword searched matches the words in the ad text. All the major search engines reward advertisers for taking the time to create relevant ads that include keywords in the text with this bolding feature. The bolding makes your text stand out from the crowd and will help pull a searcher’s eyes to your ad.
But what happens when you have one hundred different keywords that all belong in one ad group? After a certain point, it doesn’t make sense to continue to break up your list if all the keywords in a group are related. Most small business owners don’t have the time to write a targeted ad for every single keyword on which they want to bid . Rather, you’ve probably grouped similar keywords in one ad group, such as “chocolate bars, milk chocolate bar and chocolate candy bar”. It makes perfect sense, but you can’t fit all three of these keywords in the ads for this group. This is where Dynamic Keyword Insertion comes into the picture. Rather than spend the rest of your days writing ad text, you can write one ad that will automatically insert the correct keyword for you!
When you are writing your ad text, use this tag to dynamically insert keywords in your ads: {KeyWord:Default Text Here}. Now the engines know they should replace this section of text with whatever keyword triggered the ad. It’s important to take the time to replace the default text with text that makes sense and that will still be relevant to your ads. Regular character limitations still apply, so if the keyword that’s triggered makes your ad too long, the search engines will fall back on the default text you’ve supplied them. For example, if we were to use a dynamic ad for our chocolate example above, it would look like this inside our Pay-per-click accounts:
{KeyWord:Yummy Chocolate Bars}
Buy Your Favorite Chocolate Candy
Bars & Other Treats On Sale!
SolidCactus.com/Chocolate
However, when a user searches for “milk chocolate bars” they will see:
Milk Chocolate Bars
Buy Your Favorite Chocolate Candy
Bars & Other Treats On Sale!
SolidCactus.com/Chocolate
Please keep in mind, Dynamic Keyword Insertion is not a one-stop solution for PPC campaigns. Some advertisers will attempt to throw all their keywords in one ad group with a dynamic ad. While on the surface your ads will look relevant and targeted, the search engines may penalize you for not taking the time to properly structure your account. That being said, it’s still a good idea to test some Dynamic Keyword Insertion ads in your accounts. It’s a fantastic tool for increasing the relevancy of your ads and just may be what you need to help take your Pay-per-click marketing to the next level!
Solid Cactus, Inc. has designed or redesigned more than 3,000 e-commerce sites. Solid Cactus is an Inc. 500 company and was named one of the "Best Places to Work in Pennsylvania" in 2006 and 2007.
LinkedIn tends to be touted as “Facebook for adults”, despite launching a year before Mark Zuckerberg’s uber-popular website. Still, LinkedIn is considered a social networking site that lets users make a virtual resume and create a network of friends and colleagues called connections. A user’s network consists of his connections plus the connections’ connections – to whom a user can get introduced through the mutual contact.
In the early days of LinkedIn, that was it. Like Facebook without applications or photos, there wasn’t much to do except acquire new connections and hunt for jobs. Instead of being “Facebook for adults”, LinkedIn only got updated when a user needed work, a problem further compounded by Facebook opening its doors to the public in 2006.
But recently, LinkedIn has expanded what its users can do in three important ways. While critics deride the site’s new functionality as a copy of features on other sites, the unique business-oriented focus of the site makes that functionality more useful.
1. LinkedIn Answers
LinkedIn Answers is the most useful of the new features. That is, the one that you are likely to use the most. Like Yahoo! Answers or the newly launched Mahalo Answers, this feature allows users to pose questions that can be answered by other users in the community.
The benefit of using LinkedIn Answers as opposed to those others I mentioned above is twofold. First, the trust level is increased because you can see the real names of the respondents along with their profiles. This allows you to determine the “expert” status of the person behind the response. On other answer sites, you are often reliant on the username (often an amusing Internet sobriquet like “TwilightFan999”) rather than a name, title, and company. Second, The focus of the community means that the snarky comments and joke answers are a rarity, if they appear at all.
You can also recommend an expert on the subject within the LinkedIn Network for the questioner to contact.
2. LinkedIn Groups
Yahoo!, Google, and Facebook, have group functionality, but once again, LinkedIn’s version benefits from being more user-friendly than the first two, and with a better, higher signal-to-noise ratio than the latter (where groups can be as off-the-wall as “I love beer!”)
Participating in LinkedIn Groups is a good way to network with other professionals who have similar interests or work in the same industry. Groups encourage discussion and debate more fully than Answers do, so they can be an even better platform for getting to know other users.
3. LinkedIn Applications
Just a few months ago, LinkedIn introduced applications that users can add to their profiles. Again, you’re thinking “Just like Facebook,” and this isn’t untrue. There are still very few apps available, but every one of them is useful in some way. If you have a blog, you can now connect it to your profile and show people browsing your most recent posts. Other apps allow the sharing of Word and PowerPoint documents, as well as other files – a great way to display work samples. The app “TripIt” shows where your network is traveling and when you and a Connection will be in the same city – an extremely useful tool for those of you who live from trade show to convention to conference. A market research app was recently rolled out that allows users to poll the community.
The Cost?
Although LinkedIn runs on a “freemium” model, where a paid membership garners extra features, all of the features above are available to anybody at no charge.
Your Reputation
At the very least, you should be using LinkedIn as a reputation management tool. Take a few minutes and create a profile; it will show up in the first couple of pages when your name is Googled. Linking your profile to your blog or personal website can bring in traffic. Unlike other outposts you might use to promote your business, LinkedIn is about promoting yourself. If you run a B2C e-commerce store, being active on LinkedIn might not lead directly to an increased conversion rate, but you’ll be seen as more of an expert in your product than others without profiles. Also, a savvy B2B store owner could leverage additional business.
Summing up
What’s the best way to use LinkedIn? Like any social network, it depends on what you want out of it. It can be a good tool for lead generation or finding freelance work, or just to establish your expertise among your peers. Being an active participant will raise your, visibility and get you noticed, as well as increase your authority
Solid Cactus, Inc. has designed or redesigned more than 3,000 e-commerce sites. Solid Cactus is an Inc. 500 company and was named one of the "Best Places to Work in Pennsylvania" in 2006 and 2007.
… Solid Cactus… they watch our site and, as
we grow, help us by making recommendations to our online marketing strategy
—Dr. Dan Schlenger, OVitaminPro.com
The vitamin market segment on the web is a very crowded place that includes everything from wholesalers to Mom and Pop shops selling home remedies for “what ails you.”
When the owners of OVitaminPro.com launched their site in January 2008, their goal was to reach out to specific consumers – those who have a higher than average interest in their health as shown by their willingness to research conditions and use lab results to determine their product choices. Thus, using internet marketing search terms such as “vitamin E” or “fish oil” was not going to be particularly useful. Enter Solid Cactus’ pay-per-click (PPC) strategy using a combination of broad, phrase and exact match terms for maximum return.
To target those health-conscious consumers, Solid Cactus created an Internet marketing strategy that used specific ads written for each product on the site with small, targeted Ad Groups. The combination of high-quality products, compelling copy and the promotion of value propositions such as $1 shipping produced strong conversion rates.
During the first month on Google, the Return on Ad Spend (ROAS = Sales Value/Ad Cost) was a remarkable 3,506%. This trend continued during 2008 (see chart) with an average Google and Yahoo! ROAS through three quarters of 3,405%. This is a strong result for their specific market segment and target audience.
OVitaminPro’s commitment to customer service and insistence on quality products has built strong repeat business as proven by high traffic through the site’s Login feature, which allows customers to save items, create a wish list, create a registry, and keep track of past orders. This is a logical outcome of the marketing efforts, as most people purchase vitamins and supplements on a monthly basis. The combination of word-of-mouth and Internet marketing bodes well for OVitaminPro.com’s future. In order to grow the customer base even more, PPC campaigns continue to drive approximately 20% of the site’s sales.
“One of the things we really like about Solid Cactus is the way they watch our site and, as we grow, help us by making recommendations to our online marketing strategy,” said Dr. Dan Schlenger, co-owner of OVitaminPro.com. “It’s a constant puzzle and they sort through the pieces to find the ones that fit.”
Perhaps the most important measurement for OVitaminPro is the low CPC (Cost Per Click). The industry norm is $0.52. However using several targeted campaign strategies, Solid Cactus has built “Quality Score” which directly influences CPC and as a result, the average CPC for OvitaminPro is a mere $0.25. (see chart)
Quality Score is a dynamic variable calculated for each of your keywords. It combines a variety of factors and measures how relevant your keyword is to your ad text and to a user’s search query.
Since the marketing focus is brand-centric, the campaigns take advantage of relatively low search volume and fewer competitors. This is confirmed by the high proportion of exact match conversions versus broad or phrase conversions. Additionally, click through rates (CTR) of 4.28% have consistently stayed above the industry average of 2.47%
Click, Click
|
Q3 ‘08
|
Industry
|
OVitaminPro
|
|
CPC
|
$0.52
|
$0.25
|
|
CTR
|
2.47%
|
4.28%
|
CPC (Cost Per Click) – This is the average cost the advertiser is charged when someone clicks on your PPC ad.
CTR (Click Through Rate) – The percentage of people who clicked on a PPC advertisement to go to your site. This measures how persuasive your PPC ads are. Literally, CTR is # clicks/# impressions where impressions are the number of times your ad was displayed.
Recently, OVitaminPro.com added international AdWords campaigns targeting Canada, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands which have already borne fruit.
“This is still new for us and we ran into shipping issues that stumped us,” noted Mary Schlenger, OVitaminPro.com co-owner, “but our relationship with Solid Cactus helped us there too. We had attended one of the e-commerce Boot Camps and were able to call some of the other companies we met there who gave us great advice and suggestions from their experience.”
OVitaminPro.com will probably hire its first employee soon, giving the Schlengers a respite from their 24/7 involvement with the company. “It might also give me time to update our blog more often,” laughed Mary. “We know people read it and Solid Cactus keeps reminding us how important it is for Search Engine Optimization.”
OVitaminPro.com, using a combination of PPC keywords, content campaigns and geotargeting is trending towards record sales months. Add in their commitment to superior customer service, and you have an unbeatable marketing plan. OVitaminPro intends to provide the highest quality professional nutritional supplements with the efficacy proven in their clinic. The website is the result of 25 years of passion about improving the wellness of the health-conscious community.
About OVitaminPro.com
OVitaminPro.com, headquartered in Minden, Nevada, provides vitamins and health supplements at competitive costs. Owned and operated by the husband-wife team of chiropractor Dr. Dan and nutritionist Mary Schlenger, the couple has been providing patients at their clinic with experience-proven advice for more than 25 years. Wanting to provide the highest-quality professional nutritional supplements with the efficacy proven in their clinic, they launched OVitaminPro.com in January 2008. For information, visit
http://www.ovitaminpro.com or call 877.465.0844.
By Leigh McGlynn
leigh.mcglynn@ebizinsider.com
Solid Cactus, Inc. has designed or redesigned more than 3,000 e-commerce sites. Solid Cactus is an Inc. 500 company and was named one of the "Best Places to Work in Pennsylvania" in 2006 and 2007.
