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><channel><title>Yield Software</title> <atom:link href="http://www.yieldsoftware.com/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" /><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com</link> <description>Web Marketing Made Easy</description> <lastBuildDate>Tue, 12 Apr 2011 21:57:31 +0000</lastBuildDate> <generator>http://wordpress.org/?v=abc</generator> <language>en</language> <sy:updatePeriod>hourly</sy:updatePeriod> <sy:updateFrequency>1</sy:updateFrequency> <item><title>NEW FEATURES: Content, Display and Mobile Network</title><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2011/03/new-features-content-display-and-mobile-network/</link> <comments>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2011/03/new-features-content-display-and-mobile-network/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Wed, 30 Mar 2011 07:08:49 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Matt Malden</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[PPC]]></category> <category><![CDATA[SEM]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Yield Software News]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Yield Technology]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Adwords]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Bing]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Google]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Search Engine Marketing]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Yield Web Marketing Suite]]></category><guid
isPermaLink="false">http://www.yieldsoftware.com/?p=2960</guid> <description><![CDATA[<p>We are pleased to announce a huge release with a ton of new and exciting features.  These changes will allow you to continue to use the Yield Web Marketing Suite to not only manage, but also increase your marketing effectiveness&#8230;</p>]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>We are pleased to announce a huge release with a ton of new and exciting features.  These changes will allow you to continue to use the Yield Web Marketing Suite to not only manage, but also increase your marketing effectiveness across more and more aspects of your online advertising.</p><p>The enhancements include:</p><ul><blockquote><p><img
src="http://www.yieldsoftware.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Add-Campaign-Wizard-Set-Network-type.PNG" alt="Campaign Wizard Set Network Type" /></p><li><strong>Content Network Support</strong> &#8211; Create and launch campaigns on the Google and Bing content networks so your text ads can appear on third-party websites</li><li><strong>Display Network Support</strong> &#8211; Create and launch campaigns that leveraging graphical (also known as &#8220;display&#8221; or &#8220;banner&#8221;) advertising on the Google Display Network</li><li><strong>Mobile Network Support</strong> &#8211; Target mobile users by creating and launching mobile advertising campaigns on the Google Mobile and Bing Mobile Networks</li><p><img
src="http://www.yieldsoftware.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Add-Multiple-Ads.PNG" alt="Multiple Ad Creation Wizard" /></p><li><strong>Multiple Ad Creation Wizard</strong> &#8211; Easily create multiple versions of your search, content, display and/or mobile advertising with real-time ad validation</li><li><strong>Ad Cloning</strong> &#8211; Easily create copies of your existing ads and even versions of those ads targeted for different publishers and network types (e.g. display, mobile, etc.)</li><li><strong>Improved Bid Optimization</strong> &#8211; We have continued to make significant advances in our bid optimization technology to deliver even better results for your online advertising campaigns.</li><li><strong>Improved SEO Inbound Link Analysis</strong> &#8211; Our link analyzer has been enhanced to more accurately track inbound links and benchmark your link building performance comparatively against other websites</li><li><strong>Scheduling Standard Reports</strong> – You can now schedule the Natural Search Report, Paid Search Report and Landing Page Optimization reports to be automatically run and emailed to you on a weekly or monthly basis.</li><li><strong>Improved Power Editing</strong> &#8211; We have exposed more statistics for you to view and now all the statistics can be searched and sorted</li><li><strong>Real-Time Task Monitoring</strong> &#8211; You can now view and track the status of campaign imports and custom report processes as well as receive real-time notifications when these tasks complete</li></blockquote></ul><p>We hope you enjoy them and as always, if you have any questions, feedback or issues, please don&#8217;t hesitate to contact us at support@yieldsoftware.com.</p> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2011/03/new-features-content-display-and-mobile-network/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>Facebook Becoming Your Company&#8217;s New Best Friend</title><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/12/facebook-becoming-your-companys-new-bff/</link> <comments>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/12/facebook-becoming-your-companys-new-bff/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Tue, 07 Dec 2010 14:19:55 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Derek Gordon</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Facebook]]></category><guid
isPermaLink="false">http://www.yieldsoftware.com/?p=2943</guid> <description><![CDATA[<p>If you caught “60 Minutes” Sunday on CBS, you saw Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg <a
href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/12/01/60minutes/main7108060.shtml?tag=contentMain;cbsCarousel">talking about</a> – while simultaneously launching – new changes to the social network’s interface.  Such is the power of Facebook: getting “60 Minutes” to agree&#8230;</p>]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>If you caught “60 Minutes” Sunday on CBS, you saw Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg <a
href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/12/01/60minutes/main7108060.shtml?tag=contentMain;cbsCarousel">talking about</a> – while simultaneously launching – new changes to the social network’s interface.  Such is the power of Facebook: getting “60 Minutes” to agree to be the launch pad for an upgrade to your company’s main product is rare, if not unprecedented.</p><p>If you haven’t logged on and made <a
href="http://www.facebook.com/about/profile/">the switch</a> yet, when you do you’ll find you have a new profile page that highlights a number of things about you right up top; recent photos that you’re tagged in; and, of course, posts to your wall.  They’ve also made the nav in the left rail simpler and a little more intuitive.  (Judging by the overwhelming number of negative comments on the <a
href="http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=462201327130">blog post</a> announcing the change, people aren’t loving the new interface, predictably.)</p><p>What’s most interesting to me about the changes is the degree to which career, and to a lesser extent education, is highlighted.  In addition to listing your jobs, including company name, job title, the time you served and a brief description of your work responsibilities, you’re now able to add projects you’ve worked on.  You can also include the people who’ve worked with you on those projects.  (It makes me wonder if LinkedIn should be worried.)</p><p>While the company name links to the Facebook Page for that brand, names you add to the projects you’ve worked on who are also your Facebook friends seem to link to their Facebook profile.  By encouraging us to provide this finer grain of detail in our Facebook profiles, we are, of course, giving up further information about what we do at work and the folks we do it with.  We’re already declaring what we do out in the world and with whom via Facebook Places.  Now we can add all our work activities.</p><p>All this should be a boon to the Facebook advertising algorithm, making the targeting of ads more accurate and relevant.  Moreover, the opportunity to cross-promote to friends who share your work or interests (as evidenced by the projects you work on together or the things you do together out in the world) must be around the corner if it isn’t happening already.</p><p>All this will all accrue to the benefit of brands / advertisers.</p><p>Another advantage for brands is the evangelism their people provide by simply declaring where they’ve worked and, over time, the projects they’ve contributed to.  As more and more employees align themselves with brands, and as the brands themselves optimize their Web sites for the Facebook “<a
href="http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/10/like-activity-showing-results/">Like-o-sphere</a>”, there will, inevitably, be ways to further triangulate relationships, interests and spheres of influence.</p><p>For instance: say I work at brand X, and I’ve contributed to the launch of a hot new product.  I’ve declared on Facebook that I work at that brand, that I was part of the team that led the launch, and which of those team members rises to the level of my friend on Facebook.  As folks check out what I’m declaring; visit a brand’s Facebook Page; visit that brand’s Web site; and maybe even purchase the hot new product, someone at that brand should be able (eventually) to triangulate who the key influencer of that purchase was.</p><p>That information is gold.</p><p>At any rate, it seems the need to optimize a company’s Web site for, and presence on, Facebook is growing daily.  In case you need reminding, SEO remains as important as ever, but it’s not the only game in town any longer.  Oh: and your employees?  (Each and every one of them.)  They’re now your new PR agency, a key driver of traffic to your Web site, and among the best influencers of purchases of your products and services.</p><p>Treat them well.</p> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/12/facebook-becoming-your-companys-new-bff/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>Holiday Web Marketing Strategies: Mobile</title><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/holiday-web-marketing-strategies-mobile/</link> <comments>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/holiday-web-marketing-strategies-mobile/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Mon, 22 Nov 2010 23:09:36 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Derek Gordon</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Holiday Marketing Strategies]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Bing]]></category> <category><![CDATA[FourSquare]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Google]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Groupon]]></category> <category><![CDATA[iPad]]></category> <category><![CDATA[iPod Touch]]></category> <category><![CDATA[local search]]></category> <category><![CDATA[mobile]]></category> <category><![CDATA[smart phones]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Square]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Yelp]]></category><guid
isPermaLink="false">http://www.yieldsoftware.com/?p=2921</guid> <description><![CDATA[<h3>Part Three of a Three-Part Series on Last Minute Holiday Marketing Strategies</h3><p>In this third and final post on last minute Web marketing strategies for the 2010 Holiday Season, we tackle mobile.  There’s a number of ways you can position yourself&#8230;</p>]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<h3>Part Three of a Three-Part Series on Last Minute Holiday Marketing Strategies</h3><p>In this third and final post on last minute Web marketing strategies for the 2010 Holiday Season, we tackle mobile.  There’s a number of ways you can position yourself for success vis-à-vis mobile devices, and because more and more people use their smart phones to locate products and services on the go it&#8217;s in your best interest to make sure your mobile strategy is in place.</p><blockquote><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">1. Search, Source, Activate</span></p><p>The primary way shoppers use their smart phones while on-the-go is to search for a product or the location of a particular retailer, or both.  Which is why it’s critical you’re <a
title="Local Search" href="http://www.yieldsoftware.com/local-search/" target="_blank">optimized for local search</a>, particularly if you have multiple locations.  Google and Bing are emphasizing local search results and maps more than ever in search results.  Mobile users are also doing quick comparisons either of similar products or similar retailers of those products, so make sure you’re also optimized on Yelp and other review sites.  The more good reviews you can show for your products or service, the better.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">2. Optimize PPC Ads to Drive Retail Traffic</span></p><p>Use headlines and ad copy that talk about in-store promotions.  You can also include a local phone number that folks can tap to instantly generate a phone call to a store.  Make sure whatever click-through URL you use will take folks to a light-weight, mobile-optimized landing page so that it loads fast and is easy to read.  When combined with natural search listings that highlight local, maps and reviews, a smart PPC campaign may just tip the scales in your favor.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">3. Sync Online and Offline Inventory</span></p><p>If you offer a product or service online, make sure it’s also available in your retail store.  Folks will often look to see if you offer something online and then dash into your store to buy.  If it’s not in stock, you’ll have an irritated customer on your hands, so make sure inventory is coordinated between online and in-store locations.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">4.  Mobile Coupons and Promo Codes</span></p><p>Use coupons and promo codes to seal the deal and get folks through your doors. Use promo codes in PPC ads.  Make a mobile coupon available on your Web site that folks can show a cashier at check-out.  Also make use of Foursquare, which offers a number of features that provide incentives for shoppers to choose your store.  And, use services like Groupon to drive coupon adoption (and viral sharing of your offers).  As we discussed before, consumers are more cost-conscious than ever and are looking for deals around every corner.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">5. Make Check-out Easy (and Mobile)</span></p><p>If your employees have smart phones (and I’m sure most do), put a <a
href="https://squareup.com/">Square</a> credit card processor on each one to enable everyone in your store to do check-outs wherever they may be helping a customer. If you’ve got the budget, you can provide an iPod Touch to each employee with a Square attached. You can also use Square on iPads.  Not only does this avoid lines at the check-out counters, it provides another level of intimacy between your shoppers and the person in your store helping them.  And because you’ll need to email receipts, you also get to collect your customers’ email addresses for future marketing uses.</p></blockquote><p>Black Friday and Internet Monday are just a few days away.  By putting a few last minute touches on your Holiday 2010 marketing program, you might just make a good holiday season into a great one.  Good luck and Happy Holidays!</p> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/holiday-web-marketing-strategies-mobile/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>The Booming, Bubbly Web</title><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/the-booming-bubbly-web/</link> <comments>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/the-booming-bubbly-web/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Mon, 22 Nov 2010 21:26:21 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Derek Gordon</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Industry News]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Web 2.0 Summit]]></category><guid
isPermaLink="false">http://www.yieldsoftware.com/?p=2918</guid> <description><![CDATA[<p>At last week’s Web 2.0 Summit here in San Francisco, there was a dizzying array of product announcements, number-dropping (and name-dropping, natch), and the launch of more than a few promising start-ups.</p><p>Dubbed “Points of Control”, the conference was its usual&#8230;</p>]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>At last week’s Web 2.0 Summit here in San Francisco, there was a dizzying array of product announcements, number-dropping (and name-dropping, natch), and the launch of more than a few promising start-ups.</p><p>Dubbed “Points of Control”, the conference was its usual whirlwind of activity, but the centerpiece of the three-day event was a conversation between Kleiner Perkins’ John Doerr and Union Square Ventures’ Fred Wilson.  While one described the current environment of venture-backed innovation as a “boom” and the other a “bubble,” both agree something big is afoot.</p><p>Doerr said that we’re in the middle of a huge third wave of innovation and, moreover, that today’s entrepreneurs are better and the ideas are better than ever before.  The combination of smart phones and the social graph, he said, and the friction-free way that consumers can behave within these environments makes this time more exciting than any previous one.  Wilson added that nothing great is ever created without irrational exuberance.</p><p>Though all this renewed exuberance is or will be good for everyone, it seems clear it will be particularly good for advertisers.  I also see opportunities for search marketers, both in terms of the work we do today and in the ways in which the scope of our work will shift as a result of so much innovation.</p><p>Google alone is nearly impossible to keep up with. If Google announces one more new product or one more new innovation or one more feature introduction, my head may explode.  I write a regular column for <strong>MediaPost</strong> and my <em>SearchInsider</em> colleague Kaila Colbin <a
href="http://www.mediapost.com/publications/index.cfm?fa=Articles.showArticle&amp;art_aid=139187">wrote</a> compellingly recently about Google’s growing omnipresence, and last week Gord Hotchkiss <a
href="http://www.mediapost.com/publications/index.cfm?fa=Articles.showArticle&amp;art_aid=139761">showed</a> how the right rail of ads on search results pages may be becoming extinct, among other seismic shifts in Google’s core search product.  And yet, amazingly, these seem only to be the tip of the iceberg.</p><p>Doerr said repeatedly in his talk that Amazon, Google, Facebook and Apple are the drivers of the Internet (Amazon is the cloud and commerce; Google is search, productivity and mobile; Apple is mobile, entertainment and apps; and Facebook is the social graph.)  But because Google drives search, and its search results increasingly integrate commerce, entertainment and the social graph, it is in the cat-bird seat.</p><p>On top of this layer of Web infrastructure are a growing host of important players in their own right.  Consider these numbers from the Conference:</p><blockquote><ul><li>Twitter is generating about $100,000 per day via its “Promoted Suite” line of advertising products.</li><li>LinkedIn is adding one new member per second and has 85 million users (which would be a more impressive number if Facebook didn’t have more than 500 million…)</li><li>Yahoo! serves 18 billion ads per day.</li><li>The Zappos CEO has only three pairs of shoes.</li><li>Zero: Microsoft’s new Kinect is very likely sold out for the holidays even as I write this.</li><li>More than 420 million people in China now have Internet access and 99 percent use Baidu.</li><li>In about five years, most households will have some form of IPTV.</li><li>Zynga’s Frontierville has 650,000 same-sex marriages (oh: and 320 million people worldwide have played their games.)  And they’re just three years old, a billion dollar company and profitable.</li></ul></blockquote><p>The big, overarching take-away message from Web 2.0 Summit, however, is that mobile is a monster market trend, as Doerr put it, and is just getting started.  If we’re in a bubble / boom, it’s because everyone is re-thinking every service and every function in an increasingly networked and mobile economy.</p><p>Another trend is the war for talent.  While the rest of the country may be suffering nine percent unemployment, employers in the Bay Area and New York are struggling to find and acquire talented, experienced people to work in proliferating, fast-growing venture-backed companies.</p><p>It’s clear that with a computer in nearly every person’s pocket, combined with a growing social graph, all aided and abetted by search, the opportunities for advertisers – and everyone – are more abundant than ever on the booming, bubbly Web.</p> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/the-booming-bubbly-web/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>Enhanced Power Editing Now Live</title><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/enhance-power-editing-now-live/</link> <comments>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/enhance-power-editing-now-live/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Mon, 15 Nov 2010 20:00:15 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Derek Gordon</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Yield Software News]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Yield Technology]]></category> <category><![CDATA[iPad]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Power Editing]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Yield Web Marketing Suite]]></category><guid
isPermaLink="false">http://www.yieldsoftware.com/?p=2910</guid> <description><![CDATA[<h3>Take a Look on Your iPad!</h3><p>Our awesome engineering team is constantly releasing upgrades and fixes to our Web-based Yield Web Marketing Suite and this last round, released on Friday, had some pretty great new feature upgrades.</p><p>First and foremost, our Power&#8230;</p>]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<h3>Take a Look on Your iPad!</h3><p>Our awesome engineering team is constantly releasing upgrades and fixes to our Web-based Yield Web Marketing Suite and this last round, released on Friday, had some pretty great new feature upgrades.</p><p>First and foremost, our Power Editing feature was upgraded to include a terrific new graphing function that enables you to visually evaluate the performance of campaigns, or ads or individual keywords for any given period of time.  And because Power Editing allows you to change ads (i.e., change the URL copy for multiple ads at once) without deleting or disabling them, you&#8217;re able to see campaign performance prior to a change and after.  For those importing a campaign from Google to our system for the first time, our system will also import your history so you&#8217;ll be able to see a graphic display of your campaign&#8217;s performance.</p><p>What&#8217;s so great about this, I think, is that when looking a rows and rows of numbers, it can be difficult to see the forest for the trees.  But when visualized, that same data is brought into more specific relief, revealing trends and performance that can be instructive when making choices for how best to optimize your campaigns for Google and Bing/Yahoo.</p><p>There&#8217;s one other cool piece of news: our application is now optimized for iPads and other devices that don&#8217;t recognize Flash.  You can now monitor and manage your search marketing campaigns on the go using any number of mobile devices and tablets.  Here&#8217;s a screenshot of our upgraded Power Editing feature with the graphing function as seen on an iPad:</p><p><a
href="http://www.yieldsoftware.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/power-editing-graphs.png"><img
class="alignnone size-full wp-image-2911" title="power editing graphs" src="http://www.yieldsoftware.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/power-editing-graphs.png" alt="power editing graphs" width="380" height="491" /></a></p> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/enhance-power-editing-now-live/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>Increase Traffic, Conversions During the Holidays</title><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/increase-traffic-conversions-during-the-holidays/</link> <comments>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/increase-traffic-conversions-during-the-holidays/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Mon, 15 Nov 2010 19:30:31 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Derek Gordon</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Holiday Marketing Strategies]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Holidays 2010]]></category><guid
isPermaLink="false">http://www.yieldsoftware.com/?p=2906</guid> <description><![CDATA[<h3>Seven Tips for Success in 2010</h3><p>The October 2010 retail sales measures are in and retailers (particularly the automobile segment) had one of the best months since the Great Recession began.  As a result, analysts are bullish on the 2010 Holiday&#8230;</p>]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<h3>Seven Tips for Success in 2010</h3><p>The October 2010 retail sales measures are in and retailers (particularly the automobile segment) had one of the best months since the Great Recession began.  As a result, analysts are bullish on the 2010 Holiday Season.</p><p>Since it would seem consumers are loosening their wallets just a little more this year, be sure you’re doing everything you can generate as much traffic to your site while ensuring you’re converting as much of that traffic as possible.</p><p>Here’s some tips for achieving both objectives:</p><blockquote><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">1. Differentiation.</span> As you build your advertising campaigns, be sure to focus on those things that make your business different – great service, convenient location, lowest prices, best quality – and then clearly state that in your ad.  If you’ve gotten an award or received an outstanding review, be sure to state that in your advertising. Find ways to stand-out from your competition and then highlight that over and over again.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">2. Promotions.</span> If there’s one trend we’re seeing across the board, it’s promotions to both entice customers to visiting a site and then to win their business in the final analysis.  Free shipping is big this year.  So are low price guarantees (“we won’t be beaten on price!”).  Still others are preserving shipping and pricing, but sweetening deals with a gift-with-purchase offer.  Bottom line: while consumers are spending a little more this year, they’re still looking for the best possible value wherever they can find it.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">3. Landing Pages.</span> One routinely neglected aspect of many marketing campaigns is the landing page associated with any given ad.  It is of vital importance that the ad that generated a click is mirrored in the landing page folks arrive at.  If an ad features a promotion or special pricing, be sure that’s highlighted in the landing page.  Make sure there’s an image of the product or service being sought.  Finally, be sure there is a clear call to action above the fold—a “buy now” or “add to cart” or “call now” button.  One final note: as people move from the landing page into the shopping cart flow, do everything possible to reduce friction along the way; make the purchasing or registration process fast and easy with as few fields or screens as possible.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">4. Eggs and Baskets.</span> Too often, busy or harried marketers will decide to put all their marketing eggs in one basket.  This is a very risky decision.  By choosing to advertise via multiple channels, there is a better likelihood of optimal performance of your marketing campaigns.  When doing search marketing, for instance, don’t limit yourself to <strong>Google</strong> alone; be sure to also use <strong>Microsoft’s</strong> adCenter (for <strong>Bing</strong>).  Look at running ads in <strong>Facebook</strong> or <strong>LinkedIn</strong>.  Tap into display ad networks.  Look at <strong>YouTube</strong> and mobile ad strategies. If you&#8217;ve built a <strong>Twitter</strong> following (and I hope you have!), be sure to activate your followers with special promotions, sales, or something to share with friends and family. It may take just a little extra effort, but it will be worth it.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">5. Testing.</span> Be sure to create multiple versions of your principal ad so you can test a variety of headlines, copy points, promotions or calls to action to determine which generates the most / best clicks in each of your ad channels.  Then, test multiple versions of the landing page for each ad campaign to test which version converts best from your best-performing ads. (Our <strong>Yield Web Marketing Suite</strong> has a <a
href="http://www.yieldsoftware.com/product/product-overview/#lpo">Landing Page Optimizer</a> that will help you to do this quickly and easily.)  Once you’re clear which of your ads and then which of your landing pages are leading to the best possible conversions, keep an eye on their performance in case any degradation begins to set in.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">6. SEO.</span> As you get your ad campaigns put to bed and you’re assessing test results for both your ads and your landing pages, be sure to keep an eye on SEO.  If you have a large product catalog, make sure you’re using <strong>Google Merchant</strong> and that your inventory is regularly updated.  Make good use of your blog and use photos (with correct photo tags) and video where that will help educate consumers who are doing comparison shopping (which they’re doing more and more of these days.)  Be sure to regularly assess the health of your site (you can use our free <a
href="http://www.yieldsoftware.com/product/seo-analyzer/">SEO Analyzer</a>, for instance); don’t let broken links or errant title tags sink your natural rankings.  If you’re a business with one or more bricks-and-mortar locales, make sure your Google and <strong>Facebook</strong> Places pages are up-to-date.  Be sure you have a presence (and good reviews) on <strong>Yelp</strong> and <strong>Foursquare</strong>.  And do whatever you can to <a
href="http://www.yieldsoftware.com/seo/link-building-seo/">build quality in-bound links</a> to your website.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">7. Late-Season Shoppers.</span> Inevitably, there will be those who wait to the last minute to do their holiday shopping.  Be sure you have a strategy in place for those people.  Know when the last day is that you can reasonably ship product in order that it is received on time.  For folks who have no hope of getting something shipped in time, provide a gift card option – you can even use online gift card generators so that the shopper can simply color-print a visually lovely version of your coupon once the sale is complete that can then be folded and slipped into a card (you can use a special code for use in online orders or a bar code for use in-store.)</p></blockquote><p>In our third and final blog post for the 2010 Holiday Season, we’ll look at strategies for mobile and ways to optimize your PPC advertising to increase traffic to your site.</p> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/increase-traffic-conversions-during-the-holidays/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>2010 Holiday Season and Web Marketing: Part One</title><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/2010-holiday-season-and-web-marketing-part-one/</link> <comments>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/2010-holiday-season-and-web-marketing-part-one/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Tue, 09 Nov 2010 16:47:26 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Derek Gordon</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Holiday Marketing Strategies]]></category> <category><![CDATA[Holidays 2010]]></category> <category><![CDATA[online marketing]]></category> <category><![CDATA[web marketing]]></category> <category><![CDATA[web marketing strategies]]></category><guid
isPermaLink="false">http://www.yieldsoftware.com/?p=2902</guid> <description><![CDATA[<h3>Getting Your Online House in Order</h3><p>Although the Great Recession has officially ended, most consumers don’t yet believe it, and they certainly aren’t seeing any tangible evidence of it.  So it’s understandable that retailers are approaching this holiday season with something&#8230;</p>]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<h3>Getting Your Online House in Order</h3><p>Although the Great Recession has officially ended, most consumers don’t yet believe it, and they certainly aren’t seeing any tangible evidence of it.  So it’s understandable that retailers are approaching this holiday season with something like fear and trepidation.  The big news from the 2009 holiday season, however, is that online did really well, and the prediction is online will grow again this year.</p><p>So it’s important for every business concerned with sales during the holiday season to leverage online in a big way.</p><p>Since it’s getting late, we’ve assembled a three-part series on things you can still do to make the holiday shopping season a big one for your business.</p><p>In part one of our series we cover some basics – things you can do this week that will ensure you’ve got a good foundation for all your online holiday promotion and sales efforts.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">First: Integrate offline and online</span>.</p><p>Make it easy for people to do business with you. All printed promotional materials should, at the very least, include your phone number, email address and website URL.  This includes printed flyers, print publication ads, outdoor ads and any sponsorships of local events, charities or organizations.  If you’re into social media (and you should be), include your Facebook and Twitter URLs, too.  If you’re holding an event – whether virtual or face-to-face – develop a special landing page on your website where people can sign-up and use this URL on all promo materials.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">Second: Join the conversation</span>.</p><p>Whether you like it or not, people are talking about your company and its products. You can either ignore this conversation or promote it. When the group Msyto &amp; Pizzi did a video to the Geico theme song, rather than ignore it <a
href="http://www.geico.com/about/commercials/music">Geico added it to their website</a>.</p><p>If you haven’t already, develop a Twitter profile, a Facebook Page, a Google Places page, a YouTube channel, a blog – or even an iPhone or iPad app.</p><p>Once you’ve developed your social media presence (make sure you follow all the prompts around adding your contact lists so you develop a good list of followers or friends, also making sure to follow / friend folks in return), reach out to the people already talking about your company. Retweet their tweets, thank them for their contributions, promote their videos, and even ask them the write guest blog posts. You’ll create more buzz – and more sales.  You’ll also help your website’s SEO prospects.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">Three: Test, test, test your infrastructure</span>.</p><p>In his book, “<a
href="http://www.slightware.com/">Slightware: The Next Great Threat to Brands</a>,” Kenneth J. Weiss talks about how poorly branded and badly-executed software-powered applications negatively affect your customers and your brand.  This includes landing pages where the order process is broken (or those e-tailers that make people register before making a purchase – my pet peeve!) or even something “small” like making people call to RSVP for an event versus signing up online.</p><p>Once your website and holiday campaign components are in place, test them – and have your family members test them, too, from their clunky home computers and smart phones. What works? What doesn’t? Listen to feedback from your testers and fix the bottlenecks.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">Four: Look at last year’s performance.</span></p><p>Check your weblogs or Google Analytics to see where your peak days online were during the last holiday season:</p><blockquote><ul><li>What sources were the best generators of your traffic last year?</li><li>Look at which pages got the most traffic.</li><li>Note which promotions worked, on which days and why.</li><li>If you had already integrated a blog and other social media components during the last holiday season, understand which of these seem to drive the most traffic and conversions.</li><li>Look at the keywords people most often used to get to your site via both organic and paid search sources.</li><li>Evaluate your landing page performance—see which of your landing pages produced the best conversions. If possible, look at how the traffic to that page got there and learn from that click behavior: what inspired the click; which source generated the click; did a promotion or pricing strategy have any impact.</li></ul></blockquote><p>Learn well from the past and repeat what worked this holiday season.</p><p><span
style="text-decoration: underline;">Five: Implement efficiency measures for the management of your efforts.</span></p><p>Technology is a beautiful thing and many of the marketing, promotion and sales tasks that make up your online holiday effort can be made more efficient and effective with automation.  Businesses are able to reduce labor cost, increase sales, and improve overall operational performance using Web applications like ours and many others.  Don’t let aversion to technology or Web-based applications keep you from trying tools and solutions that can potentially make the difference between an okay holiday season and a blow-out one.</p><p>In my next post, I’ll cover strategies you can use to increase traffic and conversions for the holiday season.</p><p>If you haven’t already, be sure to download our free e-book, <a
href="../../ebooks/linkeconomy">The Link Economy: Why It Matters to Small and Growing Businesses</a>.  In it you’ll learn why integrating your campaigns is important and how our <a
href="../../product/product-overview/">Yield Web Marketing Suite</a> can help you manage your search marketing campaigns.</p> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/2010-holiday-season-and-web-marketing-part-one/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>Kicking It Up a Notch</title><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/kicking-it-up-a-notch/</link> <comments>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/kicking-it-up-a-notch/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Tue, 02 Nov 2010 11:26:33 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Daren Drummond</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Google Analytics]]></category> <category><![CDATA[SEM]]></category> <category><![CDATA[bounce rate]]></category> <category><![CDATA[relevance based conversions]]></category> <category><![CDATA[time on site]]></category><guid
isPermaLink="false">http://www.yieldsoftware.com/?p=2896</guid> <description><![CDATA[<h3>Time on Site, Bounce Rate and Relevance Based Conversion</h3><p>If you&#8217;re a seasoned marketer you&#8217;ve undoubtedly experienced the five stages of grief when confronted with unexpected bounce rate or time-on-page metrics for your landing page.  First there is denial: “What?!  There&#8230;</p>]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<h3>Time on Site, Bounce Rate and Relevance Based Conversion</h3><p>If you&#8217;re a seasoned marketer you&#8217;ve undoubtedly experienced the five stages of grief when confronted with unexpected bounce rate or time-on-page metrics for your landing page.  First there is denial: “What?!  There is no way my site&#8217;s bounce rate is 90%!”  Then anger: “lying piece of @#! software.”  Bargaining for performance: “Hmm, maybe if I exclude the stats before October&#8230;.”  Depression about  the content: “My blog is no good.  No one but my mom cares what I have to say&#8230;”  Finally, acceptance sets in: “Okay, this isn&#8217;t working.  Time to start over.”</p><p>Stop being so dramatic!</p><p>Although Google&#8217;s Page Views, Time on Page, and Bounce Rate are important measures of relevance, they hide instances of quality user engagement for single page-view sessions.  Google Analytics computes the Time-on-Page metric by subtracting the time stamps between page views for each page request in a user&#8217;s session.  This is a scalable way to compute this statistic for your whole site, but it falls down if a visit only has one page view.  This is a problem for millions of bloggers who write single page blog posts.  As an example, I frequently land on an interesting tech blog, read the page for two minutes and “bounce” away to another site.  Although I spent two minutes on this page, time stamp-based analytics products (like Google Analytics) records my visit as a zero second page hit.  Not only does your analytics software fail to record the Time on Page for this visit, your Average Time on Page statistic is skewed by all of these zero values.  Ouch, double whammy!</p><p>For those astute readers out there this is really just a specific example of how time stamp-based computations don&#8217;t give you Time-on-Page durations for the last page of a user&#8217;s session because its not possible to record the time stamp of the request leaving your site.  And yes, this phenomenon also throws off your site-wide statistics as well as your cumulative averages for individual pages.   So how can you overcome these problems to accurately assess the relevance of your content and the effectiveness of your PPC, SEO and landing page optimization initiatives?  Enter Yield Software.</p><p>Yield Software actually records when a user unloads the page from their browser so that you get real data for the last page in a user&#8217;s session (including single page visit sessions and mutli-tab sessions).  This is great news for all of those one-page bloggers out there, but this is especially great news for users of Yield Software&#8217;s PPC bid management system.  Armed with accurate time-on-page metrics, the Yield Software bidding algorithm has an additional measure of relevance to consider when evaluating the effectiveness of a given keyword/match type/ad combination besides the often-scarce conversion rate statistic.</p><p>Yield Software is also smart about computing bounce rates and conversions.  By default, a single-page visit is not considered a bounce if the user spends more than 20 seconds on a page.  We find that this definition of bounce rate presents a much more accurate picture of your content&#8217;s relevance.  Yield Software can even be configured to record conversion events when visitors spend more than a certain amount of time on a specific page, on your entire site, or if they visit more than X pages in a session.</p><p>So don&#8217;t despair if your time-on-site and bounce rate seem ridiculously low, because you probably don&#8217;t have all of the facts!  This is especially true if you want to measure relevance beyond the black-and-white nature of the standard conversion rate favored by shopping cart sites (bloggers I&#8217;m looking at you).</p> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/11/kicking-it-up-a-notch/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>Good Link or Bad Link?</title><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/10/good-link-or-bad-link/</link> <comments>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/10/good-link-or-bad-link/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Tue, 19 Oct 2010 18:20:13 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Derek Gordon</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Link Building]]></category> <category><![CDATA[SEO]]></category> <category><![CDATA[link building]]></category><guid
isPermaLink="false">http://www.yieldsoftware.com/?p=2876</guid> <description><![CDATA[<h3>How Do you Judge a Link?</h3><p>Links, links – we all want them.  Some of us hire external help to get them; others of us are constantly on a hot pursuit for cultivating them ourselves; and some of us just try&#8230;</p>]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<h3>How Do you Judge a Link?</h3><p>Links, links – we all want them.  Some of us hire external help to get them; others of us are constantly on a hot pursuit for cultivating them ourselves; and some of us just try to make amazing content and hope that they will come.</p><p>But links are not a game of quantity, but rather a game of quality.  How can you tell if a link is really valuable?  Here’s an 10-point cheat sheet to see if your inbound link passes the sniff test.   Each of these criteria has its own merit, but the combination of them should give you pretty good insight into the links that are giving your page the most juice.</p><p><strong><em>Evaluating the link itself:</em></strong></p><blockquote><p>1)      <strong>Anchor text relevancy</strong>:  Is the anchor text of the link relevant to the keywords and theme of your page?  And beyond the anchor text – how about the content on the linking page that surrounds the anchor text – is that relevant as well?</p><p>2)      <strong>Anchor text variety</strong>:   A caveat to number one  is that all the anchor text of the links coming to your page should not be identical, but should have a wide variety.  It&#8217;s completely ok if some of them don&#8217;t include your keywords at all and are more generic.  Having too much of the same, indicates there might be foul play at hand.</p><p>3)      <strong>Authenticity of the link</strong>:  If you can place links on the page yourself, or it’s just a random link stuffed at the bottom of the page, it won’t be adding much value to you.  But if it’s clear that someone put the link there because your webpage offers valuable, related content, then it will count for much more.</p></blockquote><p><strong><em>Evaluating the linking site:</em></strong></p><blockquote><p>4)      <strong>Relevancy of the site’s url</strong>:  If the linking site’s url is strongly related to your keywords this is a big bonus.</p><p>5)     <strong> Relevancy of the website’s content</strong>:  Is the content on the linking page valuable, unique and relevant to the keyword theme of your page.  Industry-themed sites can often offer a large value to your page.</p><p>6)      <strong>Site’s rank for your target keywords</strong>:  Does the linking site rank well for the keywords you are targeting.</p><p>7)      <strong>Uniqueness of the site</strong>:  Does the linking site offer some unique, valuable content that is related to your keyword theme.</p><p>8)      <strong>Age of the linking site</strong>:  Has the linking site been around for more than a couple of years?</p><p>9)      <strong>Page rank of the linking site</strong>:  Is the page rank of the linking site and that linking age at least reasonable?</p><p>10)   <strong>Number of outbound links</strong>:  Are you a prominent related mention on the page, or just part of a massive unrelated list?</p></blockquote> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/10/good-link-or-bad-link/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> <item><title>PPC Adsaurus</title><link>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/10/ppc-adsaurus/</link> <comments>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/10/ppc-adsaurus/#comments</comments> <pubDate>Wed, 13 Oct 2010 20:23:41 +0000</pubDate> <dc:creator>Derek Gordon</dc:creator> <category><![CDATA[Ad Copy]]></category> <category><![CDATA[PPC]]></category> <category><![CDATA[adsaurus]]></category> <category><![CDATA[pay per click]]></category> <category><![CDATA[PPC ad copy]]></category> <category><![CDATA[PPC ad optimization]]></category> <category><![CDATA[thesaurus]]></category><guid
isPermaLink="false">http://www.yieldsoftware.com/?p=2865</guid> <description><![CDATA[<p>So you get what a thesaurus does, right?  In PPC, we have an informal corollary which we jokingly call Adsaurus &#8212; that is, looking at how to say the same thing in multiple ways.</p><p>Saying the same thing using different words&#8230;</p>]]></description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>So you get what a thesaurus does, right?  In PPC, we have an informal corollary which we jokingly call Adsaurus &#8212; that is, looking at how to say the same thing in multiple ways.</p><p>Saying the same thing using different words can have a surprisingly dramatic impact on your pay-per-click performance.  It can:</p><ul><blockquote><li>Make your ad stand out more</li><li>Evoke a stronger click response among searchers</li><li>Cause more searchers to complete a conversion once they get to your website</li></blockquote></ul><p>Following are some common concepts advertisers try to portray in their ads, along with some alternative ways to say the same thing:</p><ul><blockquote><li>Free, $0, Complimentary</li><li>Affordable, Won’t Drain Your Wallet, Cheap, Bargain, Deal, Budget, Special, Reasonable. Manageable, Low Cost, You Can Afford, Cost Next to Nothing, Get Your Money’s Worth</li><li>Amazing, Dazzling, Jaw-Dropping,  Impressive, Rockstar, Thrilling, Awesome</li><li>Quote, Estimate, Proposal, Evaluation, Assessment, Personal Price, Size Up, Find Out How Much</li><li>Fast, Speedy, Quick, Expedient, Instantly, Overnight, In 5 Minutes, Over Lunch</li><li>24/7, Day or Night, Anytime, All the Time, Always</li><li>Large, Enormous, Wide,  Huge, Gigantic, Massive, Humungous, Jumbo, Mammoth, Infinite</li><li>Expert, Well-versed, Know It All, The Source, Experienced, We Know Our Stuff, Pro, Hot Shot, Guru, Veteran, Well-Versed, Whiz</li><li>Leader, Favorite, Top Dog, Top-Notch</li><li>Award-Winning, Top-Rated, Highly Acclaimed,</li><li>Reduce, Lower, Knock Down, Slash, Crush, Eliminate, Trim, Tame, Lighten Your Load</li><li>Fast, Warp Speed, Speedy, Zippy, In a Jiffy, Rapid,  In a Flash, Presto</li><li>Improve, Transform, Boost, Skyrocket, Multiply, Turn It Up a Notch, Step Up</li><li>Simple, Easy, Natural, a Cinch, a Snap, No Sweat, No Hard Work Required, No Learning Curve,</li><li>Dramatically, Significantly, Meaningful, Substantially, Fundamentally, Extremely,</li><li>Responsible,  You Can Count On, Responsive, Trustworthy, Top-Notch Service, Come to Expect, Unwavering, Reliable, Safe, Reputable, Committed</li><li>Guaranteed, Warranted, For Sure, Or Your Money Back, We Promise, Our Pledge, Give Our Word, Our Commitment</li><li>Now, Immediately,  Today, Pronto</li><li>Instant, Immediate, Right Away, Straight Away,</li><li>Limited Time, Brief Time,  Won’t Last Long, Act Now</li><li>Voted, Named, Called , “”, The</li><li>Call Us, Give us a Jingle, Pick up your phone, Dial, Give us a Buzz, Ring Us, Get in Touch, Holler, Shout Out</li></blockquote></ul><p>Trying out new alternative content in your pay-per-click ads can bring about dramatically better results in both click-through rates and conversion rates. Ad testing is a continual process, which should never be stopped, so we hope you’ll find our adsaurus helpful in your constant pursuit of the best possible performance.</p> ]]></content:encoded> <wfw:commentRss>http://www.yieldsoftware.com/2010/10/ppc-adsaurus/feed/</wfw:commentRss> <slash:comments>0</slash:comments> </item> </channel> </rss>
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