TikTok is making it easier for brands and agencies to work with the influencers using its service

Tik Tok's new Creator Marketplace API allows partnered marketing companies to access TikTok’s first-party data about audience demographics, growth trends, best-performing videos and real-time campaign reporting (e.g. views, likes, shares, comments, engagement, etc.).

Creator marketplaces are now common to social media platforms with large influencer communities as this has become a standard way to advertise to online consumers, particularly the younger generation.

These type of in-house platforms make it easier for marketers to work with the wider influencer community by offering trusted data on metrics that matter to brands’ own ROI, rather than relying on self-reported data from influencers or on data they have to manually collect themselves. And as campaigns run, marketers can compare how well their partnered creators are able to drive results to inform their future collaborations.

https://techcrunch.com/2021/08/31/tiktoks-new-creator-marketplace-api-lets-influencer-marketing-companies-tap-into-first-party-data/

Google Ads To Drop Expanded Text Ads For Responsive Search Ads In 2022

https://www.seroundtable.com/google-ads-expanded-text-ads-for-responsive-search-ads-32019.html 

Found this topic very interesting as someone who is new to digital marketing and Google Ads. The first thing that stood out to me was how Google's RSA platform will be dynamic and automatically assemble the best performing ad based on their testing. This will allow businesses to operate more efficiently because they will spend less time creating ads and more time focusing on other marketing efforts. Secondly, the conversion results are better for businesses, according to Google "advertisers that switch from expanded text ads to responsive search ads, using the same assets, see an average of 7% more conversions at a similar cost per conversion."

What should be the main focus of a startup’s first in-house marketer?

 https://techcrunch.com/2021/07/09/this-early-stage-marketing-expert-says-b2b-saas-is-actually-very-very-cool-now/

Having helped build a B2B FinTech SaaS startup from the ground up, my team and I have gone through the exercise of how best to gain visibility for our company in a crowded digital space. As we were building our marketing team, we went through many of the same exercises as Lucy Henkins outlines in the above article. A few key takeaways being:

• Hiring Too Early: As Lucy points out, hiring a Marketing Head/Manager before fully figuring out the product-market fit is likely not going to end well. This very often causes a disconnect since the CEO or Head of Sales might be relying on digital marketing campaigns to drive sales but the marketing expert does not yet have key metrics around value proposition, pricing etc which can make it difficult to execute precise pull marketing campaigns/SEO efforts.

• Replicating Previous Strategies: Regurgitating the same process that might have been deployed at an earlier company is not necessarily going to yield the same results. Reason being, customers, markets and GTM strategies vary from startup to startup and so a new marketing strategy has to be designed from scratch depending on the startup.

• Main Focus: From my experience and as Lucy points out, customer research and development should be a critical focus area for a startup's first marketing hire. i.e truly understanding what drives a customer to subscribe or buy your firm's product. Once this has been successfully done, the learnings will have a major impact in determining propositions, product pricing and traction channels.

For the past week I have learned a little more about mobile Ad Monetization. I used to work in gaming as a product manager. I was releasing game features that focus a lot on pushing for IMPDAU or Ad ARPDAU. IMPDAU means impressions per daily active user. It is the count of eyeballs on an ad on a daily basis. Ad ARPDAU means average revenue per daily active user generated by ads.

There are usually two major levers that control the metrics - breath and depth. In the IMPDAU case, breath would be how many unique individuals see the ads and depth would be how many times a unique individual sees the ads. 

I don't quite understand how revenue per impression (eCPM) works before as the metric fluctuates a lot from time to time especially in the holiday season. Now I understand that it has to do with real time bidding in an Ad mediation platform. From a high level perspective, when my game requests an ad, the Ad Mediator will select the highest eCPM bidder from a list of Ad networks and settings I have chosen before, whichever gives out the highest bid wins. The tricky part here is that I can choose to limit the lowest eCPM to accept. In some cases, there will be no Ad Network bids on or above the eCPM I set causing my Ad request to not be filled. 

In summary, to maximize the revenue per impression metric, we need to find the right balance between the lowest eCPM I would accept vs. fill-rate of the ads. 

Ad network → Ad mediation → eCPM + Fill Rate → Game → Impdau

Digital Marketing in Social Media

 

As human behavior continues to shift in a digital world, so does the way we interact with brands and each other. Included in this shift of behavior is the notion that our connectedness and reliance on each other has increased in social settings. We trust what our friends buy, we yearn to be a part of the cool crowd by buying what the influencers buy, and we follow the brands we know and love. It is no surprise, then, that Snapchat, in an effort to draw marketers to their platform, has introduced a new proprietary tool called 'Snapchat Trends'. 

Snapchat Trends primarily serves as a way to uncover trends, fads and other noteworthy happenings in the social space by allowing users - including Marketers - to find the most searched for elements on the platform. As users search for the latest pumpkin-themed creations, various keywords will bubble to the top that'll allow users to compare various stats related to the fall phenomenon. Understanding what's trending among the users of Snapchat would be especially viable information as companies today are doing everything in their power to understand Gen Z. By building this tool, Snapchat has positioned itself to be a valuable social platform for more companies and has formed a viable complement to other keyword search tools. It'll be interesting to see if other platforms follow suit but in the mean time, get ready for more pumpkin themed products in your feed! 

Source and more info: https://www.digitalinformationworld.com/2021/08/snapchat-introduces-new-tool-trends.html

Understanding Signals is Key for Successful Growth Marketing

https://techcrunch.com/2021/09/15/in-growth-marketing-signal-determines-success/

In this article the author discusses the importance of understanding signals to successfully optimize the right parts of a campaign.  A signal in growth marketing in this context refers to the event data, or action of a customer/user, that is tracked and analyzed to guide decision making in where to optimize, i.e. invest more time, money, and effort, to achieve business goals.  The author explains that it can be tempting to optimize for events that are either generating a lot of clicks and therefore on a cost per click metric seem inexpensive or to optimize events that have a high cost per click but result in the ultimate goal of the campaign, i.e. signing up for your companies subscription as given in this example from the article.

However, as the author illustrates the conversion rate from landing page view to subscriptions is only 0.61% but it is higher for other events.  It’s important to understand the likelihood of converting on your main goals for each event to make sure you’re not throwing money away by optimizing what at first glance looks like a sure bet. This was a useful article for me in that it reminded me of how in digital product management you can sometimes be led down a wrong path by looking at what are referred to as vanity metrics.  It may look like your efforts are performing better than they are if you do not dig deeper into the analytics. 

Signal strength is a new term for a concept that is very familiar to me in my day to day as mentioned above.  Another interesting thing to learn was that there are solutions that can be implemented to enhance the signal of digital marketing campaigns which the article discusses further.  Ultimately, it’s important to not only understand how to read and action signals but to also make sure you are tracking the right events and there are solutions out there than can help. 

Selling FinTech marketing schemes to a traditional manager...

 https://latana.com/post/fintech-marketing-strategy/

First, and candidly, I am taking this class because I am pretty frustrated with my firm's marketing strategy. I manage a good portion of the sales team and have for years hoped for a more nuanced approach...now on another CMO, I am starting to lose faith. But, hope springs eternal, lets ask some questions that might help us know if we are getting it right and what my firm might actually want to incorporate, a la the numerous FinTech approaches (great article above).

Customer centricity: Does our product or its promotion actually align with our target's desired attributes? I think our marketing process should provide this kind of feedback...FinTech gets this.

Experiential: So, so many traditional managers have white papers and offering sheets galore on their website. But what if we designed our website to interact with our targets? Many examples. Also, if effective, wouldn't we mine a ton of additional data?

Education: We think we do this via our white papers...how can we find out if we are a trusted source? Note: we actually did find out once! We started an impact investing website without our branding. New hires and colleagues throughout the industry mentioned the site as a great source. But how could learn this via our marketing technology?

Game-ifcation: Um, we don't do this...I am thinking we should start, no? Many high growth firms do...

Affiliates: This one I will take on directly: we should be doing this, formally. We offer a singularly focused product, unlike our diversified peers. We could establish arms length, beneficial relationships with firms working with or trusted by our targets. 

Call of the great outdoors fades for advertisers during muted commuting

 https://on.ft.com/2XDdSYN

At first glance this article seems to be focused on a non-digital form of advertising as it references the large decrease in profits for companies like JCDecaux, whose main focus is on outdoor advertising through billboards and relies heavily on commuters taking public transportation. 

Interestingly, as it did for many industries, the pandemic has accelerated change within the outdoor marketing space; the article comments: Digital out-of-home advertising holds particular promise, allowing the same space to be sold to multiple advertisers with a premium charged for video messages. 

No more commuters looking at that big billboard sign? No problem. Agencies are using the effects of commuter worries about germs and sanitizing to their advantage, using digital as a means to communicate a brand message from Dettol to those commuters who are now highly concerned with hygiene. 

The force of digital is that it remains relevant: 

Messages were tailored to localised restrictions in particular areas and could be updated within hours of the rules changing.

Now we're all reaching for that dettol bottle!

Marketing in the Metaverse

Recently, Mark Zuckerberg announced his plans to shift Facebook into a "metaverse" company, bringing alive a vision of an online world populated by avatars and accessible by Facebook's Oculus VR technology. The idea of a "metaverse" was coined by Neal Stephenson in his novel Snow Crash and various proto-metaverses have emerged over the years: arguably Second Life, Minecraft and even immersive games like Skyrim, GTA V or shared MMPORG environments reach towards an idea of a persistent online world that we not only visit, but live in.

Zuckerberg's vision is a little different because it aims to be a place we work, play and meet with avatars representing our real selves, and given that we now find ourselves working remotely more and more, there is a something seductive about the idea that we might be able to gather together virtually in an online environment that is sufficiently immersive that we can be as productive in such a space as we might have been in person.

At it's heart though, Facebook is an advertising company, so although Zuckerberg leads with a work/live/play utopia not subject to the limitations of geography, there's no question that this utopia is about marketing and advertising. The Social Dilemma illustrates how we companies like Facebook have developed algorithms to capture attention, to sow that attention with the messages and solicitations of advertisers, and to absolutely maximize the amount of marketing messages that can effectively be delivered to its users without turning them off completely. 

The metaverse is an extension of that idea - maximizing the amount of time that a user spends on Facebook's properties in order to market to that user. Imagine a platform, in which you live and play for most of your day, where every surface, every item you interact with, was rendered by Facebook technology and therefore able to support marketing messages ad infinitum. A Facebook owned-metaverse a la The Matrix would give Facebook the opportunity to own digital marketing channels far in advance of anything its competitors could offer - giving Christof-like powers to the curated Truman Show experience of its users.

More:

• What is the metaverse and why does it matter?
• The Metaverse is a clean slate for the ad-industry post cookies

Monetization of Digital Marketing Certification Programs?

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/kaplan-agreement-digital-marketing-institute-120000048.html

I found this article very interesting with Kaplan, one of the world's most diversified global education organizations, announcing an agreement with the Digital Marketing Institute to offer two recognized industry certifications. The first thought that came to mind with a for-profit name like Kaplan is they are trying to monetize on the growth of digital marketing. While certainly a plus to prospective employers as they sift through numerous resume to see a candidate that has two internationally recognized industry certifications, it probably comes at a cost to the candidate to join the Kaplan Credegree Program (note, I did not click through to talk to a professional to actually see, but assume it costs some money as the landing page does not provide any pricing information). Just goes to show the growth and importance of digital marketing when educational giants such as Kaplan are joining the fray.

The Rising Costs Of Digital Advertising Will Force Spending Shifts

The Rising Costs Of Digital Advertising Will Force Spending Shifts (forbes.com)

The average cost-per-click (CPC) of amazon ads in the US increased over 60% in June of 2021 versus the same time a year ago.  Contributing to the increase cost is a perfect storm of rising digital advertising prices and less efficient digital targeting linked to Apple’s new privacy measures.  Apple’s launch of a new mobile operating system, iOS 14.5, on 26 April has had an impact. Many brands saw the costs of acquiring new customers on Facebook leap by double digits.  Is it fair to conclude that social media’s high cost will veer advertising to lower cost direct communications like direct mail?

The New Rise Of Contextual Advertising

https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2021/07/22/the-new-rise-of-contextual-advertising/?sh=2575bf175e5d

Targeting at the right audience is imperative to a successful marketing campaign.  With third-party cookies, company can easily collect visitors’ online behavior data and build customer profile. However, once the third-party cookie is banned, advertisers will be facing a lot of challenges to target and engage relevant potential customers. From this article, it looks like contextual advertising is one of the solutions. The idea is to match the advertisement to what info are displayed on websites. Without knowing the visitor’s profile, one would still believe that people who had an interest in reviewing the web content would have a better chance to respond to a relevant advertisement. Secondly, I thought it was interesting from the article that companies might also be able to use the contextual advertising approach to keep its advertisement away from some unwanted negative keywords/content to protect their brands. The last takeaway for me is that content creation on company’s own website will become more critical. It will allow companies to build and maintain direct relationships with its customers by providing relevant information on its own website and accumulate customer insights through its first party cookie.

One type of digital marketing - Email Marketing

 https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/what-is-digital-marketing#role-of-digital-marketing

Email marketing is a type of digital marketing that make consumers aware of discount information and new products. When people went shopping in the shopping mall, different brands will encourage customers to sign up an account by using email address. They will also provide new user discount to lead customers sign up and leave email address. Since consumers won’t check each brand’s official website or go to stores every day, email marketing helps to build a solid relationship between consumers and companies.

In Gmail, there is a sort named "promotion". All advertising emails are in this sort. 

So I am curious about ROI on email marketing. Since those emails won't come to primary inbox, I won't check them at all.

Here are screenshot of my promotions inbox. Those advertising emails remain unread since I won't check them and I received too many emails from those brands.

SEO is a never-ending journey

Leading Digital Marketing Agency in Auckland Explains SEO in Business Leaders' Language (https://www.globenewswire.com/en/news-release/2021/09/12/2295417/0/en/Leading-Digital-Marketing-Agency-in-Auckland-Explains-SEO-in-Business-Leaders-Language.html)

We all know SEO is the process of ensuring a website is finely tuned to display as high as possible on any searches. But did you know it is also 'a continual process of refinement of a long series of very technical digital items and a continual candid assessment of what people are typing when they search' per this New Zealand based marketing agency? 

For a long time, I have people coming to me and trying to 'help OMAO improve its SEO'. I have always thought it is an one-time project. But it sounds like there is a lot more to it and SEO will be a never ending journey!

Social Media as revenue generating stream

I was always fascinated by how digital marketing is generating revenue streams through social media. One of the reasons for taking up the Digital Marketing course was to not just do this through luck but through logical steps and avoid making obvious mistakes when I launch my business eventually. Social media is the top channel for marketing efforts going forward. Social media is not just for branding and communications it’s also an important advertising channel for digital marketing. 

Consider that Snapchat which sells ad units reaching more than 20 billion video views per day. While Snapchat may not seem relevant to business, but not so long-ago Facebook was disregarded as an ineffective channel for advertising. Today, it generates significant revenues for many types of businesses. In fact, it is gaining on Google. But that is not the only revenue-generating channel but there are other options such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest. All major communities where people spend significant time. 

It’s a huge mistake to overlook these digital marketing opportunities. But the thing to remember is to focus on quality over quantity. In terms of revenue-generating channels, it is also observed that paid search vastly outperforms social media in terms of the quality of opportunities. This makes sense, as people tend to focus their searches more narrowly as they close in on a purchase. That said, social media is a viable marketing channel due to all the activities taking place on it.

Firing Neurons - Exposure Without Clicks

 Firing Neurons - Exposure Without Clicks

When ads follow you around the internet, the images become imprinted upon your mind. The repeated firing of those image sensing neurons builds and builds 

until 

BAM!

they reach saturation and you are compelled to engage and maybe even make that purchase.

Now you have that brand or product top of mind and they have captured mind space. 

SUCCESS!

But no ads have been clicked, no banner ads, no videos, no social ads despite seeing dozens.

As a digital marketer, if I am paying 10x or 100x or 1,000x as much for a click as I am for exposure then why am I so focused on clicks? Is it just because of trackability and attribution through a funnel? How does this exposure-sale vs. click-sale vary by type and quality of the product? 

If my product is great, do I need the directness of attribution for clicks or do I trust that just awareness of my superior product will deliver the results when the need arises?  

Does the product fill a NEED or am I trying to promote WANT?  If NEED, how likely is the consumer going to have that need at the moment they are seeing the ad? If you have the exposure do clicks (a signal of whether need exists at that moment) really matter?

Its time to optimize our digital marketing strategies for exposure and prime the neurons of the market to fire when needed.

Instagram and Youtube marketing comparison

 https://www.skymetweather.com/content/lifestyle-and-culture/instagram-vs-youtube-which-platform-is-best-for-marketing/

Youtube and Instagram are great tools for advertising. Before choosing which one to use there are three thin good to keep in mind:

• Relatable content: Will my follower or viewer feel related to it?
• Relevance: what sort of target audience to meet
• Reach: Number of people you can hypothetically meet

Youtube corporates lots of individuals with different interests, which especially good for sharing content when you need to develop your brand. The absolute web traffic allows it to stay the site. However, the cost is comparatively higher than Instagram.

Instagram is an effective tools for marketing among targeted audience. It cost less and also provide different approaches to enhance engagement, like using short video, pictures to captivated impatient customers.

Performance Max Campaigns In Google Ads

https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2021/09/03/what-you-need-to-know-about-performance-max-campaigns-in-google-ads/

Recently released Performance Max, part of Google Ads, is a campaign type that helps maximize ad performance. It works by using machine learning and automation to find targeted customers on the web and deliver ads based on the data programmed when setting up a campaign.

This new tool helps make the digital marketer’s job easier and more efficient at reaching potential new customers and supporting goals such as Sales, lead generation, and clicks.