Yogi Land

Join us along with the best and brightest in digital advertising, Nov. 4 to 6

Another week, not just another conference in New York.

If AdWeek is the stately Rolls Royce of advertising conferences, ad: tech is definitely James Bond’s Aston Martin, complete with picture phone, ejection seat, smoke screen and laser beams hidden in the fenders. At ad:tech, the best minds in the next generation of digital advertising—brands, agencies, publishers and service providers—come together to share knowledge, network and do business. In keeping with the James Bond theme, this conference even boasts a keynote by an actual Knight of the Realm.

And, of course, we’ll be there. (Hey, we invented this industry, remember?)

What: ad: tech, New York
Where: Javits Convention Center, 655 West 34th Street, New York, NY
When: Nov. 4 to 6, 2009
Why: Because your business is worth it!

Yahoos to look for and listen to include:

Wednesday, Nov. 4

3:10 to 4:00 p.m.
Ramsey McGory, V.P., U.S. Partnerships
“So Many Networks, So Little Time”: Ramsey and other experts offer actionable advice on how to best leverage digital networks.

Thursday, Nov. 5

2:10 to 3:00 p.m.
Becca Paoletti, Director, Video Strategy
“Online Video Industry Forum (hosted by the IAB Digital Video Committee)”: Becca and fellow panelists offer insights on where digital video is headed, and how you can get the most out of it.

4:10 to 5:00 p.m.
Dave Zinman, VP and General Manager, Display Advertising
“What’s Wrong (and What’s Right) with Digital Display Advertising?”: Dave and others share insights for advancing digital media to drive business results.

4:10 to 5:00 p.m.
Dev Patel, VP, North America Region Custom Products and Solutions
“The Science of Targeting”: Dev and friends show how you can turn data into scalable, actionable insights.

And there will be lots more going on. Be sure and swing by our booth in the Exhibit Hall and pick up your decoder ring (or maybe just a flashing Yahoo! bouncy-ball).

Tags: internet marketing, search engine, SEO, Yahoo!

Here is a captivating way to look at your Google Analytics data in a Treemap visualization. You can visualize your own data with our live demo. (Note: IE currently not supported for visualization part.)

Tags: analytics, google, internet marketing, search engine, SEO

New Yahoo! research offers five tips for making the best of a tough sell

Hey, it’s a touchy holiday season this year. Though the economy appears to be seeing the proverbial light at the end of the clichéd tunnel, consumers are still feeling the pinch. According to new Yahoo! research, most U.S. consumers surveyed say that they expect to spend less this holiday season.

Sound bleak? Wait, there’s more. The research also indicates that consumers will be starting their gift searches online rather than in brick-and-mortar stores, are starting their shopping earlier, and, better still for online marketers, online spending is expected to increase even as overall sales dip.

Based on our research, here are five challenges and solutions for making your holiday selling season a success.

Challenge: Some 85 percent of shoppers surveyed say they will spend less this year than they did last year.

Solution: Appeal to conservative shoppers with incentives, coupons, sales, free shipping and other promotions.

Challenge: Holiday shopping starts earlier every year. Back in 2006, consumers generally started their holiday gift searches around September 30. This year they started around August 8—16 weeks before the start of the Christmas season!

Solution: Start your promotions early and get out in front of the competition. (For more, see “Black Friday is the New Cyber Monday.”)

Challenge: With earlier holiday shopping, holiday seasons tend to overlap—that is, Halloween and Thanksgiving shopping overlaps with the big, end-of-season holidays like Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa and New Years. Note that a good percentage of holiday shoppers are searching for holiday décor.

Solution: Employ an “always on” strategy to reach consumers across overlapping holiday seasons, because shoppers clearly aren’t taking a break between the big days. Just because it’s Halloween, that’s no reason not to promote Thanksgiving, Hanukkah or Christmas. This should be reflected in your keywords and ad copy.

Challenge: More and more consumers are looking for coupons and codes. In fact, the research revealed a 61 percent year over year increase in searches for retailer coupons.

Solution: Make it easy for consumers to find out about your holiday deals. Your keywords and ad copy should include your special offers.

Challenge: Interest in free shipping increases as shipping deadlines get closer.

Solution: Remember your customers at the end of the transaction, not just at the beginning. Make their searches easier by adding keywords and ad copy that reflects your intention to offer free or discounted shipping.

— Michael Mattis

Tags: internet marketing, search engine, SEO, Yahoo!

New Yahoo! research offers five tips for making the best of a tough sell

Hey, it’s a touchy holiday season this year. Though the economy appears to be seeing the proverbial light at the end of the clichéd tunnel, consumers are still feeling the pinch. According to new Yahoo! research, most U.S. consumers surveyed say that they expect to spend less this holiday season.

Sound bleak? Wait, there’s more. The research also indicates that consumers will be starting their gift searches online rather than in brick-and-mortar stores, are starting their shopping earlier, and, better still for online marketers, online spending is expected to increase even as overall sales dip.

Based on our research, here are five challenges and solutions for making your holiday selling season a success.

Challenge: Some 85 percent of shoppers surveyed say they will spend less this year than they did last year.

Solution: Appeal to conservative shoppers with incentives, coupons, sales, free shipping and other promotions.

Challenge: Holiday shopping starts earlier every year. Back in 2006, consumers generally started their holiday gift searches around September 30. This year they started around August 8—16 weeks before the start of the Christmas season!

Solution: Start your promotions early and get out in front of the competition. (For more, see “Black Friday is the New Cyber Monday.”)

Challenge: With earlier holiday shopping, holiday seasons tend to overlap—that is, Halloween and Thanksgiving shopping overlaps with the big, end-of-season holidays like Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa and New Years. Note that a good percentage of holiday shoppers are searching for holiday décor.

Solution: Employ an “always on” strategy to reach consumers across overlapping holiday seasons, because shoppers clearly aren’t taking a break between the big days. Just because it’s Halloween, that’s no reason not to promote Thanksgiving, Hanukkah or Christmas. This should be reflected in your keywords and ad copy.

Challenge: More and more consumers are looking for coupons and codes. In fact, the research revealed a 61 percent year over year increase in searches for retailer coupons.

Solution: Make it easy for consumers to find out about your holiday deals. Your keywords and ad copy should include your special offers.

Challenge: Interest in free shipping increases as shipping deadlines get closer.

Solution: Remember your customers at the end of the transaction, not just at the beginning. Make their searches easier by adding keywords and ad copy that reflects your intention to offer free or discounted shipping.

— Michael Mattis

Tags: internet marketing, search engine, SEO, Yahoo!

Cut through the glut of typical holiday messages by promoting these offbeat holidays in November and December

’Tis the holiday season again—and I don’t just mean the major ones like Veterans Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas. I like focusing on the more obscure holidays, like National Rad Tech Week, Sandwich Day and National Tie Month.

These are some of the special months, weeks and days that business organizations or Congress have designated to promote various causes. Depending on your business, you might be able to turn these offbeat holidays into a new ad campaign and ring up some extra cash. Below are some examples:

In November for example, booksellers have a number of offbeat days to choose from, including Indian American Heritage Month, National Young Reader’s Week (Nov. 9 – 15), National Bible Week (Nov. 22 – 29), National Game and Puzzle Week (Nov. 22 – 28), National Author’s Day (Nov. 1) and National Young Readers Day (Nov. 10).

Food and desert retailers have plenty of marketing choices in November, as well. These include: American Diabetes Month, National Georgia Pecan Month, National Peanut Butter Lovers Month, National Pomegranate Month, Sweet Potato Awareness Month, Vegan Month, Sandwich Day (Nov. 3), National Men Make Dinner Day (Nov. 5), National Bittersweet Chocolate with Almonds Day (Nov. 7), World Diabetes Day (Nov. 14), Homemade Bread Day (Nov. 17) and Turkey-Free Thanksgiving (Nov. 26).

Here are a sampling of other specially designated dates in November and December that, with a little creativity, you might be able to organize a search marketing campaign around:

November:
National Adoption Month
National AIDS Awareness Month
National Animal Shelter Appreciation Week (Nov. 1 – 7)
Intimate Apparel Market Week (Nov. 2 – 6)
World Toilet Day (Nov. 19)

December:
World AIDS Month
Spiritual Literacy Month
Cookie Cutter Week (Dec. 1 – 7)
National Hand Washing Awareness Week (Dec. 6 -12)
World AIDS Day (Dec. 1)
National Dice Day (Dec. 4)
Poinsettia Day (Dec. 12)

Best of luck with your campaigns, and happy holidays!

— Colin Kingston, Listings Editor

Tags: internet marketing, search engine, SEO, Yahoo!

Last week, we announced a bundle of new enterprise-class features in Google Analytics. Over the next few weeks, we'll do posts which go into depth on each new feature. Here is the first, which goes into detail on the expanded and improved goals in Google Analytics (related video). It's very clearly and insightfully written by our friends at WebShare, a Google Analytics Authorized Consultant, with links to related help center articles.

You can probably think of more than four things you'd like your visitors to be doing when they visit your website. Until last week, Google Analytics had limited the number of configurable goals per profile to just four. Sure, you can create 50 profiles and thus track up to 200 goals, but having to switch back and forth in your reports can be a bit cumbersome. Well, here's some very welcome news: comprehensive site performance measurement just got easier. A newly released feature in Google Analytics now lets you create up to 20 conversion goals per profile, including new Engagement goals.

What is it?

Each profile now can be configured with up to four “Goal Sets”, each capable of housing five individual goals. In your Traffic Sources reports, each goal set appears as its own tab (see screenshot below) and the goals associated with the set are listed out in plain text, just as before, to show you how your visitors are accomplishing the objectives of your site. (Click any image to enlarge it.)

In the screenshot above, you can see that Goal Set 1 is comprised of five individual goals. Look in the white boxes under "Goal Set 1" and you'll see "Goal 1: Newsletter Signup", "Goal 2: Contact Us Page", "Goal 3: New User Registration", "Goal 4: Webinar Signup" and "Goal 5: Catalog Request". Goal Sets 2, 3, 4 contain various other goals, and a simple click on the tab puts the numbers you need right at your fingertips.

When viewing your Goal reports, you'll now see up to 20 individual goals in the “Select Goal:” dropdown list, so you can quickly and efficiently look at trend data, funnel visualizations and more:

Setting Up Your Goals

Goal configuration has a new look which follows the goal set organization. For each goal set, you can add up to five individual goals (the remaining number of goals in each set are conveniently noted for you). To add a new goal, just click on the “Add goal” link for the goal set you wish to add a goal to.

With all of these new goals to configure, it's a good practice to use your goal sets to group your goals strategically. For example, you might use Goal Set 1 to track a set of e-commerce related goals such as Successful Purchase, Added Item to Shopping Cart, Deleted Item from Shopping Cart, and things of that nature. For your next set, you might want to track interaction goals such as Newsletter Signup, Followed us on Twitter, Logged In, etc... The sky's the limit, but make sure to consider how you'll want to use your reports when configuring your new goals.

New Goal Types - Engagement Goals

Another change you'll notice is the addition of two new goal types called Engagement goals: Time on Site and Pages/Visit. Previously goals could only be counted when a particular page URL was visited, but Engagement goals will allow a conversion to be recorded when a visitor reaches a certain threshold of involvement with your site. For instance, do you have an ad-serving site and want to record a conversion when a visitor has seen 10 pages? Now you can. Or, are you serving up audio/video or longer content pieces and want get an idea of how long people are listening, viewing or reading? A Time on Site goal can help.

Time on Site allows you to specify a greater than or less than value of time spent on your site as one of your goals. The following goal would fire once a visit passes five minutes in length:

Pages/Visit allows you to set a greater than, equal to or less than value to a pages-per-visit value. The following goal would fire upon the 6th pageview of the visit:

As always, if you'd like a monetary value to be assigned to any of your goals and used in cost and revenue calculations, just enter the amount in the "Goal Value" field.

Note: funnels do not apply for Engagement type goals. Speaking of funnels...

Goal Funnels

One more change to the goal creation page is the goal funnel creation step. The setup is collapsed by default (as it is optional), but if your URL Destination goals follow a path and you'd like to see how users are entering, following and abandoning that path, this is something that you can take advantage of. To create a funnel, just click on the “+ Yes, create a funnel for this goal” link and start entering the URL path to your goal, adding up to 10 steps.

Happy Goaling!

With this new addition to Google Analytics, opportunities to understand and then cater to your visitors abound. So the question is, how will you take advantage of this for your site?


Posted by WebShare, A Google Analytics Authorized Consultant

Tags: analytics, google, internet marketing, search engine, SEO

Altered ad ethics; tweeting for fun and profit; get your phone to yodel; marketing that breeds like bunnies, and more

Should altered photo ads carry warning labels?
“Truth in advertising” is mandated by the Federal Trade Commission. And we’re all for it. But what if an ad does not contain an explicit promise—such as “contains zero grams of fat”—but merely an implied one? What if the ad is just an image of a pretty girl or boy plus a brand name? New York Times columnist Randy Cohen (“The Ethicist”) thinks ads that use digital enhancements to make fashion models look so thin they seem in desperate need of a sandwich should carry the equivalent of a warning label.

Tweet all about it!
Unless you live in L.A. or have an expense account fat enough for your company to fly you there, you’re probably missing the 140 Character Conference (#140), yesterday and today. Well, never fear, Twitter is here. Follow the Tweets by conference-goers, including our own Jeff Sweat.

Dialing for yodels
OK, most phones don’t actually “ring” anymore. They chirp, ping, buzz, vibrate, and sing “Crazy Train” or just about any other song. But now you can get your phone to actually yodel. Not only that, you can make it yodel in just about any style you want: hip-hop, a cappella, R&B, reggae, bluegrass, what-have-you. To get your own yodel and for info on other Yahoo! innovations this week, click over to Yodel Anecdotal.

Oh, the stories they could tell
Over at Search Engine Land, Ciarán Norris talks about the best (and worst) stories that brands have told via social media.

Viral marketing…with Bunnies!
Here’s a quick case study on how to make your viral marketing breed like rabbits: At the recent premier of “Rabbit Fever,” a funny documentary about competitive bunny breeders, the producers gave out bunny ears to everyone in the theater, and took photos. Then they put the photos on Flickr, knowing that everyone in the audience on Facebook or Twitter or with a blog would post about it (like we are right now). Talk about cheap, effective viral marketing. (Full disclosure: The author of this post was in that audience. See if you can find him in his rabbit ears on Flickr.)

Tags: internet marketing, search engine, SEO, Yahoo!

Last call to get your campaigns ready for holiday shoppers—the blitz begins next week

Previously we discussed the four major days that generally make up the holiday shopping season. Clearly, the opportunities for holiday advertising are plentiful, and if now is the time to get your holiday campaigns in order, so that they’ll be ready when consumers are.

But to use a holiday-esque metaphor: Knowing where the chimney is is useless if you don’t know how to get down it. To make sure you don’t wind up with the proverbial lump of coal in your stocking, this shopping season, put these tips and tricks on your To-Do List:

Let’s make a deal
Without a doubt, the best advice we can give this holiday season is to offer consumers a deal they simply can’t refuse. Now more than ever, shoppers are on the lookout for ways to save money. Nothing turns heads faster than coupons, discounts, free shipping and anything else that helps shoppers save a few bucks.

If you offer any kind of promotional deals or savings, be sure to call them out in your ad copy this holiday season. Users are definitely looking for ways to save, so if you offer deals that might turn their heads, be sure to let them know.

However, if your deals come with qualifiers, be sure to explain those, too. Users expecting free shipping may abandon their items at checkout if that’s when they discover that the free shipping doesn’t kick in until they spend a certain dollar amount, etc. Promote the heck out of your deals, but always be upfront about them.

Get ‘er done
Whereas users are always interested in fast (and preferably free) shipping, when the holidays roll around, they’re also interested in timely shipping. Shopping early helps, but so does guaranteed delivery, which more and more merchants are offering at the holidays. Letting potential customers know that you’ll be able to get their gifts where they’re going in time is a great way to get them interested in you.

Insert keyword here
Users want to see search results that are relative to the keywords on which they’re searching. Getting vague, general results on highly specific keywords is almost always a deterrent to a sale. This can easily be rectified using keyword insertion in your Sponsored Search account.

Keyword insertion places the keyword in question into your ad copy, making it more relevant to the searcher. Of course, keyword insertion has to be carefully set up, with ad titles and descriptions that can accommodate the keywords in a way that won’t cause the ads to read oddly. But it’s worth the small amount of time it takes to set up keyword insertion, because ads that specifically reflect the keyword simply connect better with users.

Additionally, alt text can be used in place of keywords that wouldn’t work if inserted, such as purposeful misspellings or keywords that are too long. The overall goal is to create ads that seem specific and unique, because users tend to skip right over ads that seem like they were generated by a computer. Wouldn’t you?

Highly gifted
If you offer gift cards, be sure to call that out in your ad copy. If you offer e-gift cards, that’s even more important. E-gift cards can be sent right up until the very last minute, so consider promoting the heck out of them. What a fantastic last-minute stocking stuffer!

Proofread!
As in school, grammar and spelling count. Users tend to ignore poorly written ads that are hard to decipher, or those that simply indicate a lack of attention. A handwritten ad may be better than one written by a machine, but a nonsensical ad can be just as a much of a stumbling block. Take the time to make sure that your ads are smart, concise and well written. Clearly explain who you are and what you’re offering, and do it in a clear, easy-to-read way. If your website is a house, your ads are the welcome mat. So why not make them as appealing as possible?

— Noah Belson, Content Quality Analyst

Tags: internet marketing, search engine, SEO, Yahoo!

Since we launched the Google Analytics Individual Qualification (IQ) program, many of you have asked for a way to prove to others that you have passed the Google Analytics IQ test and are therefore Google Analytics qualified. We're pleased to announce that you are now able to create and publish a link to your official test record. You can publish this link on your website or share it with others however you wish. When someone clicks on your link, they'll be taken to a page that looks like this:

Your test record can also display your test score and a contact email address if you wish to share this information. You can even create multiple test records -- for example, one that includes your contact email address and one that doesn't -- to share with different people.

Here's how to set it up. Go to the Google Testing Center and sign in to your account (using the same email to log in that you used when you took the test). Once you've signed in, click the Manage Your Test Records link (highlighted in yellow on the screenshot below).
You'll then see this screen (below). Click the Add link (highlighted in yellow).
On the next screen, you select the information that you want included in the test record. The Description can be any name you want; you'll be the only one who sees this name.
Save the record. You'll now see a test record. Click the record (shown in yellow, below) to get the link.

You'll now be able to share your test record by copying and pasting your link.
We encourage you to share and publish links to your test record, but please remember that you may not create logos or graphics (or reuse any logos that you find online) to promote your Google Analytics qualification. The link to your test record is your official proof of qualification.


Posted by Alden DeSoto, Google Analytics Team

Tags: analytics, google, internet marketing, search engine, SEO

Now there are even more shopping days to reach your customers

Soon, it seems, every shopping day between Thanksgiving and New Years will have its own title.

For shoppers and retailers, the winter holidays aren’t just a fun few days, they’re an entire event that starts the day after Thanksgiving and lasts right up until the end of December. “The most wonderful time of the year” is right around the corner, so let’s highlight the key shopping days to look forward to after Halloween and Turkey Day are behind us:

November 27: “Black Friday”
Known as the biggest shopping day of the year, Black Friday has gotten even bigger thanks to the Internet. In recent years, numerous sites have sprung up, each dedicated to alerting consumers to Black Friday deals, which stores will offer which bargains, available discounts coupons, etc. Interest in shopping on Black Friday continues to climb among consumers; according to the National Retail Federation’s 2008 Black Friday Weekend survey (conducted by BIGresearch), more than 172 million shoppers visited stores and websites over Black Friday weekend in 2008, up from 147 million shoppers in 2007 and 140 million in 2006.

With the current economic crunch and saving more important than ever, it’s logical to assume that 2009 will see just as many (if not considerably more) shoppers embracing Black Friday and all of its savings goodness.

November 30: “Cyber Monday”
Interest in Cyber Monday has been growing stronger with every passing year. The theory is that when consumers return to work on the Monday after Thanksgiving, they’ll continue the shopping they started on Black Friday. As such, Cyber Monday has become the online equivalent of Black Friday, with retailers competing to offer the best deals to deskbound shoppers.

According to Internet researcher comScore, while online retail shopping fell 2% last November, it rose a whopping 15% on Cyber Monday. comScore also reported that Americans spent $846 million online on Cyber Monday, which proves that when it comes to online shopping, Cyber Monday is a day when consumers are ready, willing and able to load up those shopping carts and spend.

December 7: “Green Monday”
The moniker “Green Monday” (meaning green as in money, not Mother Nature) was actually coined by eBay, after the company discerned that its sales peaked on the first or second Monday in December. Other sites have chimed in to follow suit, and “Green Monday” has now become a genuine shopping event, widely recognized as the heaviest online shopping day of the season. This is likely due to the closeness of the holidays and because Green Monday is often the date on which online retailers begin their free shipping offers.

December 14: “Brown Monday”
Another newly minted descriptor, Brown Monday is the day that many retailers offer the heaviest, most aggressive promotions and discounts, such as last-minute free shipping with guaranteed holiday delivery (hence the “brown,” from all the packages going around).

How do you get ready?
As you can see, there’s more than enough holiday cheer to keep advertisers hopping all throughout the season. This means that advertisers need to get started now, to make sure that their campaigns are ready when consumers are. To help with that, we’ll follow up this post next week with tips and strategies for getting your holiday campaigns ready for the rush. It will outline what to do (and what not to do) to wrap up your ads up in a nice, neat package.

Until then, enjoy the calm before the storm, because the holiday madness will begin even before you eat the last of your leftover turkey.

— Noah Belson, Content Quality Analyst

Tags: internet marketing, search engine, SEO, Yahoo!