Conventional marketing strategies include highly targeted efforts to reach just the right audience.

But what happens when a global superstar turns that notion on its head?

The Taylor Swift effect, a cultural phenomenon referring to the often-unprecedented numbers that come from Taylor Swift’s involvement in any brand, product or person, is currently boosting NFL viewership to new heights (pun intended).

Ever since the singer-songwriter began attending NFL games to support boyfriend Kansas City Chiefs Tight End Travis Kelce, the league has enjoyed massive viewership spikes.

Taylor Swift fans, dubbing themselves “Swifties,” have brought the league a huge jump in numbers:

What can marketers learn from these numbers?

 

Welcoming a new fan base

The NFL is directly benefiting from a new, and perhaps overlooked, audience of young women. Or, at the very least, the overlooked audience of those who might not typically be thought of as sports fanatics. Forbes reports 52% of Taylor Swift’s fan base is women, mostly millennial suburbanites.

In a world where it’s possible to define a brand’s audience so specifically, the NFL’s successful embracing of a new demographic shares an important lesson. Only targeting the same audiences you always do (and that your competitors target too) limits growth opportunities. It’s causing you to overlook new potential prospects and audiences. With a big-picture approach, you can reach both your tried-and-true audience and build your brand with an audience nobody else is tapping.

But the NFL isn’t the only brand to (accidentally or not) benefit from a new or unexpected audience.

Enter Stanley, a 110-year-old drinkware company that recently discovered the power of a new audience. Previously, the brand targeted blue collar workers and outdoorsy types. Thanks to the power of social media influencers and a new female audience, the brand is now enjoying a 275% increase in sales and is the top drinkware brand in North America. Coincidentally (or not), one Stanley cup tapped into the Swiftie fan base with colors that closely align with the cover art of “Lover,” Swift’s seventh studio album.

While the intersection of pop culture and sports mania is a powerful moment, both Swift’s and Kelce’s respective influences have merged to create a unique synergy that resonates beyond the NFL’s traditional fan base.

And the NFL was quick to notice.

The league has played Taylor Swift songs at games and made savvy social media posts directly catering to Swifties. Whether non-Swiftie NFL fans like it or not, the strategy inarguably elevates the league to new fans. And Swifties are appreciative. Facebook groups filled with upward of half a million Taylor Swift fans have gone to work eagerly educating fellow members new to the rules of football.

 

Thinking outside the box

Marketers can draw inspiration from the unlikely merging of two massive fan bases.

The biggest lesson? While targeting your known, ideal audience should make up the majority of your marketing efforts, don’t miss opportunities to garner fresh audiences.

Taking risks as a brand can reap massive rewards. A survey by McKinsey found 61% of consumers say they appreciate brands that take risks and surprise them. The unexpected and massively welcomed relationship between a pop icon and NFL superstar is the perfect example.

And you don’t need an NFL megastar and global pop icon to elevate your brand. Finding emotional connections that can take a brand or product to new levels can yield similar results. For example, Gillette delighted a new and overlooked audience: caregivers who needed razors to help groom another person. With this emotional insight and the help of their marketing agency, Gillette launched the world’s first razor designed to shave someone else.

Marketers today often look to brand guidelines to dictate strategies and state-of-the-art technology that allows for precise targeting. But the Swift-Kelce story and work from brands like Gillette serve as a reminder that sometimes the most powerful tactics are those that surprise and resonate with audiences on an unexpected and emotional level.

Brands that are willing to step out of their comfort zone — much like Kelce when he invited Swift to attend one of his games — may find new audiences and lasting connections that go beyond the realm of marketing metrics.

TapClicks — an all-in-one marketing analytics platform — featured Lessing-Flynn in a case study about tracking, analyzing and acting on data in a way that helps us provide value to our clients. Here’s a sneak peek; you can read the full TapClicks case study here.

Marketing analytics problems:

Prior to TapClicks, we at Lessing-Flynn relied on Excel spreadsheets for our marketing analytics and reporting. Anyone who works regularly in Excel knows that formulas can break quite frequently. This leads to unnecessary errors and valuable productivity lost in your day. We would have to review data from multiple sources then manually enter each piece of information into a spreadsheet. This was extremely tedious and took away from analyzing the information to help find optimization strategies.

TapClicks solutions:

TapClicks created a custom dashboard that automatically pulls data from Google Analytics and a wide range of other sources. This eliminated the need to manually enter each piece of data into one spreadsheet. We’re also able to pull publisher media we purchase, trade show activity, and other traditional tactics into comprehensive client reports. Additionally, our clients can now log into the TapClicks dashboard on their own to review the data themselves. Data can be manipulated for specific date ranges to aid in client use for their own reporting needs.

“TapClicks has enabled us to be much more efficient with our time and resources and quickly reference results from past campaigns, which has helped us create smarter marketing strategies,” said Shannon Hughes, director of digital and media strategy at Lessing-Flynn. “We now no longer have to rely on spreadsheets for our reports, helping us spend less time on analytics each month and share data with our clients in a visual way.”

Stellar results:

TapClicks has expanded our capabilities to include vertical and overall benchmarking for our clients. This has instilled both assurance and validation in our approach, and translating into higher client confidence and retention. By reviewing data across clients within TapClicks, we’re able to gain valuable insights into the market, repurpose this data, and provide a competitive edge for our team.

If you’re interested in leveraging Lessing-Flynn’s marketing analytics dashboard, contact our team today to see how we can partner to get you the data your business deserves.

Ever noticed the layout of a Bed Bath & Beyond retail store? All of the products are strategically grouped and positioned for maximum exposure. The circle design makes it nearly impossible to spend less than thirty minutes shopping. It’s genius.

A website can be thought of as a brand’s digital storefront, which makes website usability testing essential. It’s where first impressions are made for prospective customers and loyalty is built with current users. Unlike a physical business location, your website doesn’t have hours of operation so it’s working even when you are not.

Understanding your website visitor’s needs and delivering a solution is of utmost importance. Improving the user experience will:

Lower bounce rate.

This means decreasing the number of visitors who immediately leave (or “bounce”). If your website is a hot mess, a large percentage of visitors will not even give it a chance.

Increase time spent on site and number of pages visited.

These two very important factors measure how site visitors are engaging with your content.

Boost conversions.

Whether it’s a sale, newsletter sign up or video view, every site has some sort of “conversion” or action for the visitor to make.

Build brand loyalty.

A quality website will engage the visitor and keep them coming back for more.

One of the best ways to improve your user experience is to invest in a website usability testing vendor. First create a list of actions that a visitor might make (browse products, watch a video, fill out a form, download instructions, etc.) then send the list to a vendor (like UserTesting) to receive videos of actual people attempting the actions from your list. Sounds a little weird right? It is, but analyzing the results will help you identify the hurdles faced by site visitors when trying to complete the desired actions. Then all that’s left is to remove those hurdles.

Need a few more trusted usability vendors? CrazyEgg provides detailed heat maps showing where visitors click and Foresee provides pop-up usability surveys allowing visitors to provide feedback. Data from these sources will identify further obstacles faced by visitors to your website.

Your online storefront should make it easy for visitors to contact you, find quality information, purchase products and solve their problems. Eliminating the barriers for these actions will make for a quality user experience and a happy customer who will return often — without the lure of weekly coupons. Take that BB&B!

If you want a second set of eyes on your website to check out usability, contact our team of digital experts!

 

Originally published June 14, 2016

Just like a house needs a blueprint before you even begin building, a website, app or software experience needs digital wireframing. A wireframe is a low-fidelity “blueprint” detailing the foundation and the basic architecture of your site. Wireframes are not part of the design process of the website, but rather, part of the planning and strategy. They serve as a general guide for page design and are comprised of simple shapes, lines, boxes, copy and callouts (most of the time they are black and white).

Digital wireframing can be done in many different ways, from doing a simple line/box drawing on a white board to using wireframe tools and software like Adobe XD.

Before moving into design, wireframing will promote a deeper thinking about the site architecture, functionalities, user experience, content flow and page elements. Overall, here are seven reasons why digital wireframing is essential:

1. Visually maps out the site architecture

Taking the site map and turning the key pages or templates into wireframes will kick off the project and build the foundation. Wireframes ensure everyone is on the same page when it comes to the overall architecture of a website and seamlessly transition the strategy and structure of the site to the web designers.

2. Explores multiple layouts and page options

There are always multiple ways to accomplish any task. The same goes for website development. By exploring multiple low-fidelity website layouts and page options, you’ll ensure the best ideas and layouts rise to the top.

3. Clarifies website features before they are built

It’s important to have a website that not only looks good, but functions well too. Digital wireframing drives discussion about the scope and functionalities of website pages and is even more important in dealing with complex website pages. It’s beneficial, and more cost effective, to have functionality discussions before moving into design and development.

4. Highlights the user experience

A positive user experience is really important. How many times have you gotten to a website with a frustrating user experience and you’ve abandoned the site? Wireframing highlights the user experience and user flow by forcing website strategists to focus on the ease of use, conversion paths, call-to-action placements, content organization and more. Some tools allow strategists to go one step further and create interactive prototypes to truly put the user experience to the test.

5. Focuses on the content

Wireframes force us to pay more attention to the content of a website, rather than jumping right into jazzy design. What information will the website offer customers? What content formats will we use (video, blog posts, infographics, etc.)? What interactive elements will we use? How easy will it be to find what you are looking for and navigate around the site?

6. Determines website responsiveness

It’s easy to focus on the desktop design of a website, but the reality is many people use their phones, tablets and other devices to access websites on the go. Wireframes help determine what the website will look like in responsive design (i.e. on a tablet or cell phone). Different usability and design considerations come into play as screen sizes increase and decrease.

7. Saves time on the entire project

Digital wireframing helps work out the kinks from the beginning, thus saving time and money by avoiding costly design and functionality errors.

Need help will your website development? Contact the experts at Lessing-Flynn!

 

Originally published June 7, 2016

Email is a great medium to reach customers and prospects. Despite predictions of its demise in the early 2010s, email has continued to grow steadily. This is in part because you can reach people directly once you have their email address. You don’t need to rely on algorithms or paid efforts to get in their inbox. However, reports have found that on average people get 126 emails each day. So how can you stand out? Beyond your subject line and an optimized send time strategy, the best way to capture attention and convert is the actual template or custom email design and the content.

Email design can be very tricky. There are a vast number of apps, platforms and systems that can read and receive emails, from Gmail to Outlook, cell phones to desktop computers, Safari to Internet Explorer. (Fun fact: Outlook actually reads HTML files as if they were Word documents, which is why they are most prone to misreading HTML and formatting emails incorrectly!)

Creating a unique design that matches your content and prominently displays calls to action is important. Sometimes it can feel overwhelming trying to decide how to make your design unique. You could go the custom-coded email route or leverage a template from a tool like MailChimp or Constant Contact. We’ll break down the opportunities with each below.

 

Benefits of custom email design:

Cons of custom email design:

Benefits of template email design:

Cons of template email design:

The bottom line:

There is a time and place for custom and templated email design. If you’re on a budget and time constraint, consider using a template email design. If you want to make a creative splash or are sending via a third party, consider using a custom email design. Neither format is right or wrong. Creating interesting and engaging content and visuals will help you engage your customers and prospects, whether in a template or custom format. If you aren’t sure what you should choose, the Lessing-Flynn digital team can help!

Types of media advertising, or as Lessing-Flynn (LF) often refers to it, media placement types, continue to grow in variety and scale as people absorb more and more media on an array of platforms. But what are all of these types of media advertising and how do you create a media mix that drives brand awareness, recall and most importantly a desired action or conversion?

While it is important to be able to identify these different advertising placement types, understanding how people are consuming media today is step one. Before I throw a bunch of stats at you, let’s call out the obvious! As we progressed through 2020, it changed the way people look for and consume content. 82% of U.S. consumers are regularly spending more time with at least one device since the beginning of COVID-19. When the world shut down, anything and everything digital went WAY up. Here is the proof.

The marketing funnel

The marketing funnel shown below is often one of the first chapters in a marketing 101 book. Why? Because you can tie almost any product or service consumption to following these steps. Granted, there are some that are missed in the cycle, or some funnels that use different terms – but either way, this is a good staple to tie ad placement types too. As we walk through the different types of media advertising, you will notice we have mapped them to different levels in the funnel. This is a great tool to help ensure, as you are promoting your products/services, you are not leaving all the work at the top of the funnel. Your paid media investment is working to draw people down and through it. It then becomes the company’s job to build customer advocacy.

 

 

Types of media advertising

Connected TV (CTV)

Traditional TV spot style purchasing through the use of Smart TVs and streaming devices that are attached to TVs. Audience targeting is layered outside of typical programming or station targeting. Mobile and desktop devices are not included under the term CTV.

High-impact

Animated or static ads that are typically used to capture a user’s attention before navigating through the rest of a website. These ads are oftentimes bigger or intrusive.

E-newsletters

An ad shown within an e-newsletter.

Out-of-home

An advertising tactic aimed at reaching a consumer on the go by targeting them outside of their homes. Billboards are typically known as the most common tactic of out-of-home advertising.

Over-the-top (OTT)

Streaming media service (ex. Hulu) offered directly to viewers via the Internet. OTT bypasses cable, broadcast, and satellite television platforms, the companies that traditionally act as a controller or distributor of such content.

Video pre-roll / in-stream video

A sponsored video that appears before or during the video an individual is viewing. May be skippable or mandatory viewing.

Radio

The buying of radio commercials, frequently called spots, to promote a client’s products or services. Most commonly purchased in 15-, 30- or 60-second increments.

Streaming audio

Audio ads that are run on websites, apps and platforms used to stream radio, podcasts and other forms of audio. Oftentimes in the form of 15-, 30- or 60-second spots and accompanied with a display ad.

Television

The buying of TV commercials, frequently called spots, to promote a client’s products or services. Most commonly purchased in 30-second increments.

Social

Advertising focused on social networking sites, like Facebook, in which advertisers can use a variety of targeting options to ensure their ads are reaching an appropriate audience.

Run of site / run of network (ROS/RON)

Display ads that run across an entire website (run of site) or network (run of network), meaning they could appear on any page within that site or network of sites.

E-blast

An HTML message sent via email on behalf of the advertiser.

Native

A content-based ad that mimics its environment. Can include images, headlines, shortened teasers or fully hosted articles.

Search text ads

Ads that are charged upon that click and serves said ad in search-engine results whenever someone searches for the services or products offered by the advertiser.

Targeted custom message

A form of communication, whether it be via email or text message, where the advertiser can interact one on one with their intended audience. Targeted custom messages typically use publisher data to reach the most accurate

consumer.

Text message

A text-based ad sent directly to an individual’s phone number from an advertiser. These are to be distributed as one of the following:

Multimedia message service (MMS): Text with accompanying video or image.

Rich communication service (RCS): Interactive communication similar to bot-style messaging.

Short message service (SMS): Text only.

 

Now that you have the foundation of the various types of media advertising and how they relate back to the marketing funnel, check out a few more of our blogs that give great tips on implementing these media placement types into your annual media plan.

 

Sources:

 

One of the biggest marketing challenges is generating leads. Do you ever find yourself asking, “What is lead generation in digital marketing?” Not only is it challenging to find leads, but it is another hurdle to gather quality leads that will convert to sales. So, where to start? We’ve gathered up a handful of lead generation strategies for you to implement in a timely manner (like yesterday). Implement the following lead generation techniques and then test and optimize to grow short and long-term engagement with existing and potential customers.

 

Lead Generation Technique #1: Ads on social

Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn all allow for paid lead generation ads. And according to Sprout Social, businesses show a 24% increase in revenue when utilizing social media for lead generation.  Targeted lead ads seamlessly allow users to provide their contact information without leaving the social media platform. If your audience likes what they see — perhaps an offer or promotion, demo request or event registration — they may click on the ad. Plus, the forms automatically fill out with the user’s profile information, which leads to more completions! If you want to step up your game even more, lead generation ads can be connected directly to your CRM so all leads can be contacted immediately.

Bonus tip: Keep your forms as simple as possible so that basic information — name, phone and email — can auto-populate. Only request additional information if it is critical for the follow-up.

 

Lead Generation Technique #2: Contests

Looking for ways to generate leads organically — without spending actual hard costs — on social media? Implementing contests is a great way to build interest, introduce and product or brand and engage followers. There are a couple of ways to get a contest running:

User-generated content: Encourage fans of your product to share photos or videos for a chance to win free prizes. This not only builds a loyal fan base, but you can stockpile the submissions to use in your content calendar. This content is relatable and valuable as a customer testimonial.

Bonus tip: If you want to implement a contest for higher-qualified leads, make sure the “carrot”  is more valuable to new customers. For example, offer a free or discounted service or an extra perk with a product purchase to seal the deal.

 

Lead Generation Technique #3: Gated content

If you have valuable content such white papers or guides, consider “gating” the content. That means the content is only available to those that supply the necessary information needed to gain access. Leads will provide basic contact information to access the content and give you, the marketer, valuable information to pass along to the sales team. We recommend keeping such gated content on a dedicated landing page with only one conversion goal — fill out the form or leave the site.

Bonus tip: Don’t keep all downloadable content under lock and key. If your entire site seems inaccessible, building trust will be difficult.

 

Lead Generation Strategies: BONUS! Native content publisher partnerships

Many publishers offer partnerships to showcase your valuable content on their website, social channels or embedded on an eNewsletter. We call native content like this “Smart PR,” because your content can live on the site longer than if traditionally placed and recycled within 24 hours. These placements may come at a higher cost, but they guarantee for high-quality leads that stand out from typical banner ads.

Bonus tip: Make sure to request daily reports from publishers once your content is published. This ensures that leads are collected and followed up with in a timely manner.

 

Your leads are waiting

All lead generation strategies take time to implement. It also takes time to create valuable content that is unique to your industry and ultimately valuable to your customers. Building brand loyalty on social media platforms can also be a lengthy process. Experiment with a few trial-and-errors and then determine what resonates best with your audience. Be patient. Experiment. Explore new ways to get the ball rolling.

Looking to get your marketing team’s lead generation strategies mapped out? Download our Jumpstart Plan to access our test 7-step process to get started! 

 

Originally published May 26, 2019

Lessing-Flynn is here to keep you up-to-date on the always-changing digital world. Check out what you might have missed in the last month that may impact your business.

 

AI trends to watch in 2021

Get used to hearing about AI for the next few years — the technology has seen extraordinary growth in the last few months. More and more companies have begun adopting AI in some form or the other, whether it’s a chatbot, autonomous driving delivery truck or something else. One of the big areas of opportunity: Marketing. Expect AI to continue optimizing targeting and customer experience. This article lays out the four trends you need to watch for in the next year.

 

Emojis solidify their place in communication

With so many people working from home, emojis have become more important in conveying tone and intent. As we return to the office, this trend is unlikely to revert back to pre-pandemic levels. What that means for brands is that it is definitely not unprofessional for a CEO to include an emoji in their internal communication or a brand to send an email with an emoji in the subject line. We’ve seen emojis pop up in advertisements, company core values and customer conversations this year. Explore the psychology behind using emojis in a professional setting. Are you trying emojis in your marketing?

 

Social media platforms all start to blur together

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then the social media world was very flattering this month. Spotify has decided to get in on the Stories game with an initial offering featuring your favorite musicians.

Snapchat has launched a TikTok rival called Spotlight, and they’re incentivizing content creators in a big way — $1 million a day through the end of the year for the content creator that gets the most views each day.

An unlikely platform just joined the timeline feed party — Google Maps is launching a feed that will allow local businesses like bars and restaurants post updates. The goal is to help small businesses capture a captive audience already searching for nearby locations on Google Maps, and help the platform compete with tools like Yelp.

Last but not least, Instagram has added keyword search, which opens up a whole new world of optimization opportunities beyond hashtags. Instagram can already feel like a virtual mall, with highly targeted advertisements and shoppable posts. With keyword search and its new move to place the shopping tab prominently on the home screen, now is the time for your brand to start preparing your virtual storefront on Instagram.

 

Substack is creating a new era of newsletters

With unemployment high and media jobs hard to come by, a go-it-yourself route has opened up with Substack. This platform that allows paid subscriptions for newsletters. Email newsletters continue to grow in popularity as an alternative to the algorithmic world of social media content. This long-read dives into the Substack eco-system and what makes a good paid newsletter. For brands, there’s plenty to learn from these popular paid newsletters that could be implemented to reach prospective customers.

 

Creative ways to use influencers

The influencer industry is expected to be worth more than $15 billion within the next two years. Utilizing influencers doesn’t always mean cash or free product for a promotional post, though. As the industry has evolved, so have the brand partnership formats. If your brand hasn’t tapped influencers yet, take a look here for five creative strategies to leverage influencers and talk to Lessing-Flynn for help getting an influencer campaign started!

More and more B2B brands are becoming fearless when it comes to digital ad services. Would you be shocked if I told you, two of our current ag clients have exclusively digital paid media plans?

Digital advertising, has been trending in the B2C industries for years but it’s finally starting to gain traction with B2B. Just seven years ago, LF’s client media plans had 15% or less of their total budgets dedicated to digital. Now we typically recommend a 60/40 or 50/50 split between traditional (e.g., print, radio, etc.) and digital placements.

This is the second year in a row that the Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs study found B2B brands shifting more of their total spend in the direction of digital marketing tactics.

Digging into digital

Some of the biggest confusion is what is considered digital paid media. The days of relying on website display banners is long behind us. While those are still valuable placements and tactics — new digital ad services have emerged. Some examples include email blasts, text blasts, video, native (check out my Native Advertising vs. Content Marketing Mythbusters) and the list goes on. We define these as publisher direct placements — meaning we partner with publishers who have first party data or develop relevant content on their website to our targeted industry. Additional examples that we define as digital non-direct (not directly purchased through publishers) include SEM, YouTube, remarketing, display campaigns, social and programmatic ad buying — many of these are purchased through the specific channel where they run (think Google, Bing, Facebook, etc.).

Agriculture: digital vs. print data

The 2017 Farm Journal Media Digital Audience Research study found that 85% of farmers have adopted mobile technology, 73% use websites to learn more information and 57% read e-newsletters. While these numbers are not staggering — the growth from five years ago is. The 2013 Farm Journal Media Digital Audience Research study also found that an average of 28% of respondents utilized the internet weekly for ag-specific information. Successful Farming’s 2017 Farmer’s Use of Media Study also found that 99% of farmers use agricultural magazines, while 71% utilize websites via their desktop or mobile device. When looking at all these stats — you might be wondering, how digital is trending when studies show that print is still the primary medium for the ag industry and others? Why should we invest more dollars in a channel that is not reaching the entire audience?

So glad you asked.

Why make the switch to digital ad services?

They are trackable – all of it is. Whether you are measuring overall campaign reach, engagement or generating hard sales leads. Because of this, there are even more benefits. You can test which messages, campaigns, offers and placements to see what drives the action you are measuring success with, using your key performance indicator (KPI). Digital advertising also allows you to target your exact audience by location, crop size, crop type and number of livestock head just to name a few examples. That means, you are investing only in an audience who will be interested in your message, product or service.

Are you ready?

When should you make digital ad services more of a priority? While this is a large question that should really warrant a separate blog post — the below are some good rules of thumb.

1. Does your website look, feel and move visitors down the conversion funnel the way you want? There is no sense in driving traffic to a website that’s not performing.

2. Do you have the ability to generate forms via your website or develop a landing/squeeze page? Certain campaigns and ad placements are designed for lead generation or to elicit some specific action.

3. Are you developing strong thought leadership content via a blog or other means? Native advertising is trending and for good reason, it works! The best native campaigns help solve industry problems or answer questions instead of advertising their product. This builds a relationship with your customers through thought leadership.

4. Have you been slowly migrating toward digital? We do not recommend turning off traditional forms of media, rather making the transition over a few years. This allows you to understand what works and your customers to get used to seeing and learning about your brand digitally.

5. Do your ad campaigns have a strong call-to-action? It’s important to have a desired action to drive and measure success.

6. Do you have a dealer co-op program that supports traditional media expenses on a local level? Investing in local and trusted print publications and radio provide a great supplemental and trusted consumption of advertiser’s message. This type of ad placement and messaging allows for different calls to action than a national media plan can – examples include speaking about available inventory, where someone can buy, local case studies, etc.

Mini case study

In 2017, we ran two campaigns for a single client using publisher targeted custom e-blasts, t-blasts, e-newsletters and ROS (run-of-site) display banners. One campaign offered a finance incentive and the other offered a branded Yeti® if the customer completed our desired action (pro tip: using a nice incentive is important to get the customer to follow through). Each campaign ran for one month to six weeks. Both campaigns combined, generated over 275,000 impressions, 2,200 clicks, more than 100 leads on landing pages and resulted in over $1 million in sales. This is a perfect example to show that digital ad services will pay dividends, if planned and purchased in a strategic and thoughtful manner.

Learn more

Our team is ready and willing to answer your digital media questions! Let us help you find the right balance of print and digital paid media for your brand — contact us today.

 

Originally published March 26, 2020.

Digital design and developing advertising for the digital world is just as much a science as it is an art. If you’re not accounting for both, you’re probably not maximizing your investment. I spent time visiting with a team of resident LF experts to provide insights on how to effectively design for digital advertising. Here’s what Digital Marketing Specialist Laura Plumb (LP), Graphic Designer Tiffany Rasmussen (TR) and Creative Director Chris Hanson (CH) had to say.

How do you approach designing digital ads?

TR: “To start, you have to put yourself in the viewer’s shoes. Your message has to be clear, consistent with the brand and have a strong call-to-action. One trick I’ve learned in digital design is that it’s important to review the ad as it will be displayed — not blown up on a big screen. This gives you a more real sense of how the viewer will see it.”

LP: “So much of digital advertising is mobile today that it’s important to approach it with a mobile-first mentality. That means button sizes need to be big enough, usually at least 48 x 48 pixels. File sizes need to be kept low — under 40 kb if possible. And you need to design to fit within a “grid format” so websites that are responsive are able to display your ads correctly.”

CH: “There are simple things to consider as well. The text should be in web fonts so they display correctly. Often people have their browsers set to turn images off. If you build an ad that is graphics only, they will not see the message. If you don’t maintain a level of consistency in fonts, colors, and imagery, you can lose brand consistency.”

Explain the biggest difference between digital design and design for traditional print advertising.

LP: “There are a lot of things to consider with digital ads. The biggest is that it can be displayed on any number of devices. If you’re designing for a magazine, you know your ad will be printed on paper in a specific size. But when it’s digital, your ad will display a number of different sizes on various mobile phones, tablets, or computer screens. Your ad is going to appear different on each one.”

TR: “From a design standpoint, readability is key. The space is small. You can’t have a lot of text. You almost have to think of it as a billboard. Seven words and a strong call-to-action. If you try to do too much, people will just ignore your ad.”

CH: “One thing is that frequency of the ad is much higher. Someone might see a print ad in a magazine once, but they not see it again for a month (or again for that matter). But with digital, you might see the same ad 20 times in a week. So there’s a balance between what we call ad fatigue and also making sure you’re being consistent with the brand.”

What other trends are you seeing in digital design?

TR: “I don’t know if I’d call it a trend, but designing with high contrast in colors is important – especially for those with impaired vision. It’s just smart design and it shows that your brand is aware which puts it in a positive light in the eyes of viewers.”

LP: “We also see things like Apple’s switch to allow people to use “dark mode“. This means that the look of an email, for example, can be completely different. You need to design things with that in consideration. Using a smaller color palette is smart. When designing video ads, using text or subtitles is smart, as a majority of video ads are played without sound.

CH: “There are a lot of new ways to expand or extend your digital ads. Video and gifs bring motion to ads. Carousel ads, for example, allow the viewer to interact with your ad. There are new formats being launched all the time. The one thing you need to be careful of is that search engines like Google give sites a lower rank for using ad formats that some would consider large and intrusive. That means you risk potentially less traffic.”

Any final takeaways?

CH: “The last thing I would say is that it’s important to think through the entire experience. Does your ad stand out on the site? Is it easy to read and understand? Does it have a strong call to action? When you click, does the experience continue with a landing page that makes sense, or are you dumping them on a home page, expecting them to figure out what to do next? Are your retargeting ads complementary to your brand and the experience they have already had? Brand experience plays such an important role in credibility. If your brand is choppy from the viewer’s perspective, they may be less inclined to take the next step.”

It is clear that design for digital isn’t as simple as print ads were back in the day. That’s why we’re here to help. Ready to chat? Give us a ring and let’s drum up something great.

Why should I invest in SEO?

Digital marketing is an ever-growing industry with many different fields that can be targeted, but many people still don’t understand why search engine optimization (SEO) is important for a website. SEO is often seen as the black sheep of the industry or even just ignored altogether when it is time to plan the budget. Search engine optimization has a tendency to be seen as an expensive and pointless process. I’m here to change that perspective.

 

Investment vs. Expense?

Most businesses opt to put their money into paid advertising to see immediate results, and I don’t blame them one bit. Who wouldn’t want that? It’s so satisfying to see your impressions and clicks spike after one day of running ads. But, in the long run, are you really getting better results?

 

When should SEO be used for my website?

When it comes to SEO, I’ll admit, results aren’t immediate. It could take up to six months before you see anything. But with time you start to see your website move up on Google search result listings. As that happens, you start to see high quality traffic driven to your website month after month. SEO is a hard sell because you’re not giving business owners the traffic and results they want right away. But, down the road, SEO brings more high-quality traffic into the site than any other form of digital marketing.

 

It’s a marathon, not a sprint

Now I know you might be thinking “why keep reading if it’s not going to get me the immediate results I’m looking for?” Simple. Because while you’re not getting the immediate results you’re looking for, you ARE getting the quality results you deserve. Investing in SEO is like investing your time into becoming a runner. You start slow and progressively add miles (or tasks) on to hit to your goal. While it takes time and patience to achieve this goal, once you get there, it’s all worth the blood, sweat and tears (maybe not literally if we’re talking SEO). Don’t rush it — good things take time, people.

 

Organic vs. Paid Traffic

Let’s rewind and get to the importance of organic traffic. Organic traffic is some of the most important traffic that gets driven to your website because these users are landing on your site at their own will. Paid visitors are more likely to click on your ad “for fun” then bounce off your site. With paid advertising you also take the risk of serving ads to irrelevant audiences and spending money in an area where it could be directed towards organic traffic. Organic users typically know exactly what they are after, making them a high-quality traffic source.

 

How SEO Optimization Works

To reach these high-quality users, you have to make sure your website is providing them exactly what they are looking for. You need to hook from them from the minute they click your listing on the search engine results page (SERP) and enter your site. This is where search engine optimization comes into play. Start thinking about which SEO techniques are popular. Various best practices include:

>> The Case for Keywords: Why Keywords are Still Essential for SEO

You Can Do It

With these tactics, your website could jump from page four to page one of Google search results. What business owner wouldn’t want to be at the top of the first Google search results page? If you answered “not me” to that question please call us, I’m worried about you.

 

It all comes down to your business goals. Are you wanting to sell more products? Sell more services? Get more people to sign up to volunteer? Whatever it might be, SEO can help you tackle that goal. SEO is the secret superhero of digital marketing. So as your fiscal year comes to an end, or as you are strategizing for upcoming months, start to consider SEO as a tactic that could seriously change your business plan for the better in the long run.

Do keywords still matter in SEO? It’s a question heavily debated for the last few years within the SEO and digital marketing industry. Some argue the keyword is dead and we should focus on providing only great content. Others say there is still value in focusing on interspersing keywords throughout your content.

We believe both sides are correct. Google has made it abundantly clear that providing quality content that answers user’s questions is the way to get both rankings and engaged traffic. At the same time, recent studies continue to show a well-executed keyword strategy leads to rankings and metrics improvements. So with that being the case, what makes a good keyword and how do you come up with and execute an effective keyword strategy?

What is a keyword?

Let’s start with the basics. What is a keyword exactly? It’s a question we get all the time, and admittedly, it can be a little confusing. Is a keyword just one word or a long string of words? Is it conversational? Again, the answer here is all of the above.

The term “keyword” sounds singular. It actually refers to a word or phrase that best summarizes or defines the essence of your content. Sometimes it can be fairly simple, such as “area rugs” for example. Other keywords are more robust, like “how much to water a potted Boston fern.” Both are perfectly acceptable for their respective content.

Short-tail and long-tail keywords

A keyword consisting of just a few words is considered a short-tail keyword. Keywords consisting of more than three to four words are considered long-tail. Each has its benefits.

Short-tail keywords are more competitive to rank for, but help drive more traffic since users are searching with fewer words. Long-tail keywords are usually easier to rank for and will attract highly engaged traffic, but most likely less traffic overall.

Probably the most important factor to consider with either type is to choose strings that are conversational and fit easily into your content. There’s nothing worse than a keyword that feels out of place or forced. For example, if you’re trying to rank for “best area rug Paducah, Kentucky” it would be quite difficult to try and slip that into a sentence. It would be better to try keywords such as “best area rugs in Paducah” or “quality area rugs in Kentucky.” Those are much more natural and will benefit your content, users, and overall keyword strategy.

How keywords are evolving

As with everything SEO, things are constantly changing. While the definition of a good keyword applies today, algorithms and technology are always evolving. So what does the future hold for keywords?

Going beyond exact keyword phrases

If Google’s updates (like 2013’s Hummingbird) are any indication, search engines will focus less on specific, exact keywords. In the future, they will focus more on the overall meaning, quality and context of your content. Search Engine Land sums up Google Hummingbird’s intentions well, saying:

Hummingbird is paying more attention to each word in a query, ensuring that the whole query — the whole sentence or conversation or meaning — is taken into account, rather than particular words. The goal is that pages matching the meaning do better, rather than pages matching just a few words.

As search algorithms continue to grow smarter, they will be able to examine your content as a whole rather than as a culmination of various words and phrases.

Conversational and voice search

In the future, keywords will also be much more conversational than they are today. As we become more connected with voice search and artificial intelligence (think of Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant), people are expected to perform an increasing number of voice searches. In fact, one study commission by Google showed 41 percent of adults and 55 percent of teens conducted at least one voice search a day. When users perform a voice search, they’re much more likely to use natural language than the disjointed terms we type into the search bar today. So instead of “best seafood restaurant Lebanon, Kansas” they might instead search by saying, “Hey Siri, what’s the best seafood restaurant in Lebanon?” The differences are small but important.

In the not-too-distant future, gone will be the days of jumbled, seemingly unrelated terms making up a focus keyword. They’ll be replaced by coherent, conversational sentences reflecting natural language. Not only will they be more understandable, but they will also make more sense contextually. This will help ever-learning AI programs serve users the most relevant content based on their search.

Why keywords are still important.

As much as we would like to zoom ahead to a world where algorithms are smart enough to determine context and intent of content without the use of keywords at all, keywords are still important to the process.

A thoughtful keyword strategy integrated into a well-executed SEO content plan can still be extremely effective in boosting website rankings. It’s all about using keywords as a part of your overall SEO strategy as opposed to keywords being the foundation of your strategy. These days, many other factors can weigh just as heavily on your search ranking score.

And experts in the SEO field agree. Keyword research is still an important part of the optimization process. As leading SEO authority Moz puts it:

You should still do keyword research. Keyword research is always going to be essential. But you should also consider the bigger picture, and as more tools that allow you to use natural language processing become available, take advantage of that to understand the overall topics you should write about, too.

Though the framework of how keywords are being used is changing, there will always be a need for comprehensive, focused topic research when creating content that users and search engines love.

How to use keywords effectively.

We’re going to sound sort of like a broken record here, but it bears repeating. Fit in keywords as naturally as possible within your content and keep user readability at the top of the priority list. After all, your content is worthless if nobody consumes it. If it’s clear you only wrote it with the intent to boost your rankings, people will bounce. If a piece is stuffed with keywords but offers no insight, you’ve already failed before hitting the publish button.

Instead, as a content creator, you should be using your keyword strategy as a guide through the entire content development process. Reference your strategy — including keywords and broader topics — as you brainstorm blog ideas, write and edit. Don’t focus as much on including keywords into your content word for word. Make sure your content is focused on the broader theme of your keywords. In doing so, words from your keyword list should naturally flow into your content.

Don’t overthink or over-complicate this process. Many people do to little effect. Think of this in the simplest terms. If you create quality, cohesive, informative content that answers your audience’s questions on a particular topic, keywords should naturally occur.

Use your keywords!

Keywords are still an important part of SEO and content creation, but only if they’re used in the right way. One-line summary? Use keywords as a guide to drive quality content rather than a number of mentions within an article.

Google has positioned itself to value quality, informative content with the audience in mind over content created for rankings and search engines. In the end, keeping user intent as a top priority is the way to a solid keyword strategy.

Not sure where to start on an SEO strategy? Our digital team will execute a free SEO audit of your brand’s website to understand how you rank today.

Editors note: This article was originally posted on August 8, 2017. It was updated in 2020 to reflect the ongoing changes in the SEO world.

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