Innovative Marketing Trends to Date from 2013

There are many timeless elements to creating top-notch, results-oriented online marketing campaigns. If it’s not engaging, memorable, or oozing with a little wow factor, there won’t likely be much fanfare. Every year, however, smart folks figure out new and innovative ways to lure in the masses, manifest a rags to riches story, and create tools and campaigns that become bona fide trends and legends.

We may only be in the fall of 2013, but already there have been many notable new movements that have created a stir in the world of marketing. It’s a bit early to tell which of these have significant staying power, but here are a few of the most critical innovations that business owners should take notice of.

It’s a Gamer’s World

Gamification may not be a new term, but it’s proving to be a trend that seems to grow and grow. Business owners have become hip to the essential element of engagement through all marketing channels, and there are few activities that prove more engaging than an addictive video game. Couple that with the game-playing obsession proudly touted in younger generations, and it’s clear to see how and why adding gaming elements to websites and marketing campaigns is exploding.

2013 has likely seen more gamification growth thanks to platforms like PunchTab and BigDoor, tools that make the integration of gaming elements into many business models a more seamless and organic process. Plus, apps like FourSquare have turned mundane tasks like running errands into a fun-filled, social-centric gaming experience. If you haven’t integrated a level of status or fun into your efforts yet, and your industry is appropriate for the task, make this a top consideration.

Refocusing on Retention

When we think of internet marketing, most people conjure up thoughts of acquisition efforts – ad banners, viral campaigns, and anything that brings eyeballs to websites. Marketers have been more and more aware that retention – or loyalty – marketing can be far more profitable (and honestly, a lot more fun, too). Existing customers are feeling a whole lot more love this year, as trends point toward rewards and bounties for loyalty, not just for new sign-ups.

It’s a brilliant move, overall, because potential customers that witness how well existing customers are taken care of won’t need a newbie promotion to lure them in. The promise of long term care, discounts, and overall attention can do plenty to move your acquisition numbers, too.

Crowdsourcing Goes Mainstream

These days, what can’t you crowdsource? It all started with sites like Kickstarter and IndieAGoGo, which allowed folks to fund projects (not businesses, mind you) by asking the entire internet for assistance. Now, you can crowdsource non-profits, start-ups, college tuition – even design options for your company’s website or logo (99Designs is an absolute sensation.)

Can you crowdsource marketing ideas? Heck yes you can. Leaders in the field are using social media platforms to crowdsource all manner of marketing strategies, getting real-world feedback about ideas without spending thousands of wasted dollars on directions that your audience won’t respond to. Companies like Zappos have had tremendous success with this process – there’s no reason why you can’t do the same.

Locals Have Their Heyday

Entrepreneurs that run local businesses suddenly have an influx of tools specifically geared toward local Best Online Marketing. SEO experts often focus solely on local results, leveraging geo-targeted tools and techniques to reach communities outside your door. Marketers have become wise to the fact that even local businesses can adeptly use online strategies to find new customers, and just as important, keep existing ones engaged.

Put the Multi in Multi-Screen Marketing

75 percent of the world now has access to cell phones, and if you’re not attempting to reach them, you are definitely losing out on a massive market share. Utilizing either responsive design or taking a multi-screen development approach is no longer an option to consider, it’s often a first priority for new startups. All signs point to this trend continuing, too, meaning mobile is really king of the screens, and the once mighty PC has taken a backseat. Keep this in mind as you launch or redesign your online site – make sure it rocks on a small screen too.

The Rise of Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing is a relatively new expression, and in many ways, the biggest contribution 2013 has offered up to the world of marketing. This focus involves content creation, conversation-starters, and resources that lure in customers through valuable information shares, rather than hard-selling tactics. More and more companies are launching blogs that showcase information about their industry, often with little to no mention of their business at all. While that may sound counter-intuitive, it’s SEO gold, and just as precious to users that want value before traditional marketing messages. If you hook a potential customer by providing something meaningful, you’ve already helped to establish loyalty. The great thing is, stellar content also woos search engines too, so this is a double bounty.

Whatever tactics you employ, remember that today’s online user is savvier and more discerning than ever before. Honesty trumps slickness, transparency trumps trickery. The more human you allow your campaigns to be, the more engaging and appealing your brand will feel.

What new marketing tactics are you noticing or employing this year? How have your overall results looked?

resource:http://www.sitepronews.com/2013/09/27/2013-innovative-marketing-trends-date/

Beyond Web 2.0: How to Prepare for the Next Online Revolution

What’s the next online revolution? That’s as much of a question as asking to predict the future of all events on the planet, even though there’s always flag-waving clues along the way. In the case of going beyond Web 2.0, we can already see what the future is going to hold at least through the end of the decade.

The focus for Web 3.0: video and mobile. Just how much will they shape the Web experience over the next 10 years? You can take what’s already happening and merely triple the exposure.

The Video Revolution

According to the video-making service WIP, videos are projected to dominate about 86 percent of the online world by 2016. That’s a huge jump from where it is now at 51 percent. But that shouldn’t surprise anybody when YouTube has a channel for nearly everything and where businesses are bringing in profit by posting hundreds of videos every day. Much of that, however, has to do with videos that are more than a little pithy.

The advent of Vine and Vine Mobile has created the new template for how videos will look over the next decade. Some companies are still trying to adjust to the problem of advertising in short, six-second bursts, even if plenty of wit can still come from such a format. The real story, though, isn’t one video with a short length and more in creating multiple videos with equal short lengths.

If you have to guess the evolution of video, it’s going to be in creating micro-videos that tell a compelling story inside and out about a business. By the end of the decade, we may see every online business feature a main page video that tells you everything you need to know about products and the business’ back story. With that comes a sense of personalization to help companies of all sizes find customers easier (through social media’s help) and enjoy larger returns on investment.

How those videos will be watched is another matter.

The Mobile Revolution

There still seems to be a drive for businesses to go mobile in every way, and it’s slowly getting there. Yet, the ubiquitous nature of mobile technology is still growing. Even Google chairman Eric Schmidt a couple of years ago wrote his vision for what the mobile revolution will look like. Much of that involves doing nearly everything on our Smartphones, as well as making them affordable so everyone around the world can have one.

On the business front, the real mobile revolution is advertising and using adaptive and responsive design to make that happen. We’re already on the cusp of an adaptive design revolution in helping ads from a business automatically adapt so it fits onto a mobile screen. Regardless, it’s not as easy as it might seem and may not be standard until the end of the decade.

In the meantime, we’re doing considerably more with mobile technology. We’re starting to watch videos and look up information on our Smartphones more often than we ever have. Mobile apps in all categories ‘are going through the roof,’ especially in the realms of retail.

Does it mean the desktop and the laptop becoming archaic as part of Web 3.0? Probably not entirely, despite it being clear that we want to do most things online while on the go and not necessarily while driving.

Whether that means taking the time to watch slightly longer videos someday will remain to be seen. One thing we can be sure of in the next online revolution is that videos can’t really become any shorter.

resource:http://www.sitepronews.com/2013/09/24/beyond-web-2-0-prepare-next-online-revolution/

New Lessons in Creating Unforgettable Content

Looking at today’s mass media can be a depressing. We live in an age when CNN makes Miley Cyrus’ twerking a cover story. Sites like Buzzfeed flourish by publishing “articles” such as 24 Inspiring Photos of Pigeon Street-Style. On the surface, it appears as though the internet is nothing but a rehashed version of a shallow gossip mag.

Thankfully, that’s only an illusion. Because the web is, in essence, a comprehensive library for all of global consciousness, it’s natural that some questionably valuable content be at the forefront. Not every site rising in the popularity ranks leaves us questioning the validity of evolution, however; some support the notion that great content can truly equal huge success.

Can Positivity Finally Rule?

Many have lamented for years that mass media content – online and off – almost always maintains a depressing tone. Yet few sites have attempted to quell these concerns by presenting positive and intelligent spins on current news stories, and even fewer have seen any level of success. That is, until now.

Cue Upworthy, a ridiculously savvy and upbeat news site that is exploding onto the scene. Launched in March of 2012, Upworthy has a familiar news model, with a twist. The site’s “curators” search for fascinating content on the web, and then present it with immensely articulate and witty insight. Unlike Buzzfeed’s obsessive, regurgitated lists, Upworthy takes the unusual and interesting, and tells these stories from a whip-smart, and upbeat, perspective. It’s wonderfully refreshing, and catching on like wildfire.

The Upward Climb of Upworthy

Since its conception, Upworthy’s stated mission has been to “host the intersection of the ‘awesome’, the ‘meaningful’, and the ‘visual.” The site has significant know how in the form of its founders, too. Co-created by Peter Koechley, formerly of The Onion, and MoveOn.org main organizer Eli Pariser, they made it their mantra to only publish content with heart, meaning, and significance.

These are subjective terms, sure, but it’s easy to argue that articles like What the Future Might Look Like if We Don’t Push for Gun Control (a top story at the time of this writing) easily trumps the value of Miley’s offensive dance moves.

The public seems to agree. In just over a year, Upworthy has hit several significant milestones. They’ve seen over 30 million unique site visitors, with an impressive 6+ minutes average time spent. They have over 3 million social media subscribers across all networks and newsletters, and their content accounts for one fifth of all social signals that social measurement company SimpleReach measures – that’s from a pool of over 5,000 publishers.

Late last year, they also received $4 million in financing from some major social media players, namely former Facebook executive Chris Hughes and Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian. Upworthy is definitely on the upswing.

How Upworthy’s Success Can Inspire all Content Marketers

There are many fantastic lessons the rapid popularity of Upworthy can teach all content creators about how to play big, play fair, and come out on top. Their rapid rise negates all those that lament that only the content scrapers, negative ninnies, and SEO black hats get their just desserts. Good guys finish first sometimes too, and you can follow suit by absorbing these teachings:

Keep content fresh: Upworthy posts new goodies daily, thus pleasing people and search engines equally.

Quality definitely, definitely trumps quantity: You won’t see archives of endless posts from Upworthy, but what you will see is a nice bundle of articles or videos you actually want to read and watch.

Headlines are crucial: skim through the various content titles, and you’ll find snazzy headlines like “Who Doesn’t Like to Watch Half-Naked Girls Dancing? These Guys, After They See Why It’s Happening” and “Dear Religious Extremist: The Cameras are Staying, and That’s Final”. These are anything but the typical mundane openers, and they’re enticing readers to click in droves.

Social signals matter: Upworthy heavily encourages users to link to their content through social networking sites, calling their business a “mission-driven media company.” According to Scanvine, Upworthy is now the number one most shared website on all social media channels. This is a major factor to their seemingly overnight success.

Venture beyond the usual: In the words of co-founder Pariser, “We go for visible, sharable stories and really stay away from doing more typical, text-driven articles and blogging. We lean into images and videos.”

Have a brand identity: Upworthy is not afraid to let their curators voice strong opinions, but it’s done so with a consistent overall identity. Editor-in-Chief Koechley states that, “What’s important is that the content itself, the message itself is ‘upworthy’ and not a blatant play to cover up what the company is about. I don’t think we’re going to work with Chevron CVX +2.69% saying what they’re doing is great for the environment.”

Adhere to honesty, and a commitment to the community you serve: Upworthy never hides the fact that the content they present is normally gathered from other sources. Pariser explains it this way: “A lot of organizations and brands come to us with content that’s upworthy. There’s an opportunity to do right by them and by our community as well by elevating that content to our audience while being really transparent about the fact that it’s promoted.”

Distribution is critical: While great content is obviously a focus, Upworthy puts just as much, if not more, effort into intelligent distribution efforts. As Koechley told VentureBeat, “Having good content doesn’t mean anything if you aren’t actively trying to get people to see it.”

The explosion of this savvy media site is indeed great news for all those content creators who have never given up on quality. The web will likely always have a soft spot for celebrities and their embarrassing habits, but there’s a huge market for intelligent and world-changing content as well. Let Upworthy’s success inspire you to reach new content and marketing heights too.
resource: http://www.sitepronews.com/2013/09/06/new-lessons-creating-unforgettable-content/

Google Asks Court to Dismiss Gmail Scanning Lawsuit

Google attorneys are asking a federal court to dismiss a lawsuit seeking the ban of automated scanning of Gmail messages for the purpose of serving up relevant ads to it users.

The class action complaint, a multi-district litigation, says Google’s scanning of e-mail messages is illegal because it is being done without the sender’s or the recipient’s consent. The lawsuit also accuses Google of breaching the Federal Wiretap Act and the California Invasion of Privacy Act because it reads e-mails not only to filter out spam, but for the express purpose of targeted advertising.

Google lawyers, however, say the lawsuit is an “effort to criminalize ordinary business practices that have been part of Google’s free Gmail service since it was introduced nearly a decade ago.”

“While Plaintiffs go to great lengths to portray Google in a sinister light, the complaint actually confirms that the automated processes at issue are Google’s ordinary business practices implemented as part of providing the free Gmail service to the public,” Google lawyers say in a court filing.  “This is fatal to Plaintiffs’ claims.”

Google says all users of its service, including the plaintiffs, consent to targeted advertising and the use of automatic spam filters as laid out in Gmail’s privacy policy when they sign up for the free service.

Under the ‘How we use information we collect’ heading in its privacy policy, Google says it uses “the information we collect from all of our services to provide, maintain, protect and improve them, to develop new ones, and to protect Google and our users. We also use this information to offer you tailored content – like giving you more relevant search results and ads.”

The company’s lawyers also pointed out that Gmail is a free e-mail service, which means Google has to make its money off of advertising as opposed to services that charge users a fee.

“Just as a sender of a letter to a business colleague cannot be surprised that the recipient’s assistant opens the letter, people who use Web-based e-mail today cannot be surprised if their e-mails are processed by the recipient’s [e-mail provider] in the course of delivery,” reads an earlier court filing.

Google is also using Smith v. Maryland, a 1979 Supreme Court decision that upheld the collection of electronic communications without a warrant, to back up its dismissal request.

Google has been lambasted by privacy advocates for its stance.

Consumer Watchdog, the most vocal advocate group, is urging anyone who cares about their privacy to stop using Gmail.

“Google has finally admitted they don’t respect privacy,” says Consumer Watchdog’s Privacy Project director John M. Simpson in a press release. “People should take them at their word; if you care about your e-mail correspondents’ privacy don’t use Gmail.”

resource : http://www.sitepronews.com/2013/09/06/google-asks-court-dismiss-gmail-scanning-lawsuit/