Black Friday sale ideas are what every business owner and marketing team is thinking about during the last weeks of November (even in previous months). How to plan a successful Black Friday marketing strategy, that’s both attractive and profitable for businesses, could be a challenge.
The significance of what could easily be the most important shopping holiday of the entire year, can’t go unnoticed. It’s imperative for e-commerce owners to step up their game and maximize revenue. Efficient communication of the Black Friday sale is key to do so, and that’s where web push notifications come in.
5 Reasons why you should use Web Push Notifications for your Black Friday Sale
1. Direct communication (Higher CTR compared to email)
Web push notifications are a direct form to communicate with users. As soon as the Black Friday sale is live on the e-commerce, shoppers will receive the notification instantly on their screen. This creates a big advantage in terms of CTR compared to any other channel, because it just requires one click to generate a session. However, in terms of email they need to first open, and then click, which requires at least two clicks.
No matter if the user is registered or not, if they allow push notifications, the message will be delivered, bringing the customer back even if they’re not navigating through the site at the moment. This tactic guarantees the most effective communication of the sale.
2. Cut through the noise
The most common channel to get in touch with customers is email. However, during important shopping periods such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday, client’s inboxes are going to be overflowing with emails from hundreds of stores, both e-commerce and physical. Web push notifications offer e-businesses an efficient way to cut through the noise and increase the odds of clients actually receiving their message.
Remember: what’s not shown is not sold. You can have the best product/sale in the market but if your customers don’t know about it, it’s like it doesn’t even exist.
3. Short, appealing and personalized messages
Having a great product and an amazing deal for your Black Friday Sale is not enough (sorry that you have to hear it from us). How you communicate the message to customers is a big part of the issue. Remember that you’re fighting with thousands of brands, asking shoppers to choose your site to spend their money.
Bottom line: keep the message clear, concise and creative.
4. The quickest way to generate sales
“The early bird catches the worm¨. On average, a web push notification is clicked after a few minutes upon receiving, but an email is opened even after hours. This is a big advantage in terms of offers which have a deadline just like Black Friday. You can generate the sessions from interested shoppers just in seconds.
Besides that, thanks to the “Time to Live” feature of web push notifications you can configure the notifications not to be received after a specific offer deadline, in order not to disturb the shoppers with an offer which is already expired.
5.Create expectation and increase your opt-in rate
If you plan your Black Friday Sale strategy with time in advance, you can start communicating with your audience a lot earlier. Create a hype around the big shopping holiday. Let visitors know in advance that you have something amazing prepared for them in the upcoming days and that you want them to be first to hear about it through web push notification messages.
During this time, you can even implement some A/B testing. Evaluate how and which messages perform and engage better with your audience. You’ll gain an amazing understanding and leverage you can use in your business’ favor when planning your final Black Friday Sale messages.
Remember to take into consideration the time frames when planning your Black Friday push notifications messages. Users should not receive BF themed shopping reminders after the sale has ended!
We hope these tips will help your Black Friday Sale planning!
For more info on how to create an effective strategy check out:
Hi again! Updating you with the most recent trends, events, and updates within the digital marketing world. In this post, we are covering all the important updates that took place in September.
1. Search Marketing Updates September 2020
Google Organic Algorithm Updates
September has been subject to a lot of volatility as many tracking tools showed erratic behavior. At first the SEO community didn’t interpret this as the early signs of a core algorithm update as the client rankings had not point in the same direction. However, things changed in a few days and the community started to talk about dropping rankings and even pages from Google’s Search Index.
Had some key landing pages dropped out the index for no obvious reason today @sengineland@rustybrick – another bug?
In the end it turned out to be a bug related issue but the rankings have been volatile nonetheless.
Free listings on shopping tab becomes available for Europe, Middle East and Africa
After its launch in the US earlier this year, free listings will be there for EMEA businesses on the shopping tab in mid-October. US businesses who used free listings to support their Google Ad campaigns saw an increase of 100% in views and 50% in visits.
That said, you don’t have to advertise on Google to have access the free listings. Retailers will be able to connect with more customers and customers will have more product options and easy access to them.
Google Ads Updates
Dynamic YouTube Lineups With Contextual Targeting
Google puts machine learning to use to analyze each channel’s content. This allows them to create dynamic lineups of channels categorized by specific topics, cultural moments and popularity.
This will enable advertisers to scale their reach while keeping the viewer relevance as high as possible. Advertisers will now be able to find new customers that are seeking content that is aligned with the advertisers’ brand, product or service making the connection at the right time and the right place.
Google gives the best example: “If you’re a home decor brand whose video ads on YouTube focus on redecorating, you can use dynamic lineups to show your ads in videos relevant to your business. These lineups may include videos of house tours, storage solutions, and home improvement projects.”
A recent Ipsos study showed ads based on consumer interest and intent caused 32% higher ad recall and 100% higher purchase intent.
2. Marketing Tech Updates September 2020
Referral Marketing
Word of mouth will yield the most outcome for most businesses when it comes to demand generation. Especially when cost of acquisition and ad spend is increasing year by year to make the market more competitive.
It’s the most authentic way you can increase your brand awareness and loyalty. If you can create a lot of advocates for your company this process will take care of itself. But there is a way to accelerate it. Instead of creating a whole plan and acquiring the resources internally to implement it, you can utilize a software to do it for you.
There are many ways to do it:
Creating gift cards to be shared online
Launching referral programs
Gathering reviews
The most important thing is to find a supplier that easily integrates with your platform and help you A/B test different tactics and show you the results with analytics.
Criteo Dives Deep Into Analytics
Retargeting ad company Criteo announced they’ll have 2 new dashboards and a new reporting tool in their suite.
The Audience Explorer dashboard will provide an exclusive dataset about recurring shopping patterns and the categories and the brands that your existing customers are most interested in.
The Audience Performance Report allows you to compare different segments by size, reach, exposure, purchasing power and gender oriented items to optimize target audiences and campaigns.
The new Shopping Journey Dashboard gives how different audiences move through your funnel. This is great for coming up with different tactics and see how much they move a group from one step to another.
3. Social Media Marketing Updates September 2020
TikTok introduces Duets
Another feature was introduced by TikTok that will increase the engagement levels and the community feel. YouTube and Instagram introduced short content features lately to keep up with TikTok. But TikTok has kept their foot on the pedal with new features.
These were the things that happened in Digital Marketing in September 2020. You can also read all updates on Digital Marketing Insights page.
Definition (what are they, what are they used for, where are they shown and in which formats)
What’s the difference between web push and mobile push notifications?
What’s the difference between pop-ups and web push notifications?
What elements compose a web push notification?
What operating systems do they work on?
What browsers support web push notifications?
What devices support web push notifications?
How do web push notifications work?
Opt-in process
Manual web push notifications
Automated web push notifications by Frizbit
Why should I use web push notifications on my website?
Retention of anonymous users
Reach users outside of the website
Desktops and mobile reach without having and app
Quick traffic generator
Time efficient
Are web push notifications effective?
High opt-in rate
High CTR
Profitable channel
How much can you increase revenue?
How do I send web push notifications from my website?
How to install web push notifications
What metrics should I track to optimize my web push notification campaign?
How to measure web push notifications performance
Metrics to keep track of
Are web push notifications GDPR compliant?
What makes a good web push notification?
It’s relevant
It’s personal
It’s specific
How to choose a web push notification service provider?
1. What are Web Push Notifications?
Web push notifications are clickable messages sent by a website and appear on the screen of a user’s device, even if the website is closed and the user hasn’t filled any type of registration form. It is the latest and a very powerful digital channel for websites to re-engage and communicate with subscribers who opt-in to receive them, providing useful/interesting information.
What are web push notifications used for?
They’re used as a direct communication channel to keep users informed about news, promotions, abandoned products on their shopping carts or general information and updates. Web push notifications can be installed on any website: e-commerce, newspapers, blogs or magazines and their purpose is to entice users to return to the site and complete an specific action.
Where do web push notifications appear?
The format and position of web push notifications changes depending on the operative system, browser and device they appear on. They slide on the top right corner on Mac devices, on the bottom right corner on Windows devices , and on mobile they appear in the same way to a regular push notification from an app.
Windows Desktop Web Push Notification
Android Mobile Web Push Notification
What’s the difference between web and mobile push notifications?
Mobile push notifications are messages sent by an app that is installed on a mobile device or tablet. In order to receive them, users need to give permission and they’re shown on the screen of the device, no matter if the user is actively on that app or not.
Web push notifications are simply the website version of the app push notifications. They are messages sent by a website and delivered through browsers even when the users are not on that website, to both mobile and desktop devices.
The first time a user accesses a notifications-enabled website, users will be asked if they would like to to allow or block them by a browser permission prompt, just like apps would ask their users to allow notifications.
What’s the difference between pop-ups and web push notifications?
A pop-up is a message that suddenly shows-up on a website over the content while the user is currently navigating on it. The majority of them show-up as soon as a user lands on the page. In some cases they can be activated based on users’ actions, such as a click, scrolling down, spending a specific time period or closing a window (exit intent pop-ups).
Web Push Notification
Pop-up
Pop-ups can appear both on desktop and mobile, and are typically used for advertisement with the purpose of directing the user’s attention to a specific message in the site they’re visiting. User experience is usually diminished by these types of messages as they’re considered intrusive and annoying.
Web push notifications differ from pop-ups mainly because they’re shown on the screen of the user not necessarily within the browser window even if the user is not on the website, while pop-ups can only be shown within the browser window when the user is actively browsing on that website.
What elements compose a web push notification?
Web push notifications are composed of various elements that conform their anatomy. They include: icon, headline, description, call to action button, a large image and the page url from where it’s being sent. All the elements are modifiable for each notification, you can change the icon, image, text, CTA for each one if you wish to.
Icon: The icon is usually the logo of the brand. Its position inside the notification varies between different OS and browsers, but is always visible. The icon has to be a square image preferably at least 256 x 256 px.
Tips and insights: if you use your logo, you can adapt the design to match the season or a holiday!
Headline: The headline is the first text line of the notification. It usually appears in bold letters as an attempt to catch the user’s attention in most of the browsers & OS’s. The length of the visible area varies between 43 to 69 characters depending on different OS and browsers
Tips and insights: use the most appealing words at the first 43 characters of your content to make sure it’s visible regardless of the OS and browser.
Description: The description is the textual content that follows the headline and it’s used to offer a more detailed explanation. The length of the visible area varies between 50 to 136 characters depending on the OS and browser.
Tips and insights: use the most appealing words at the first 50 characters of your content to make sure it’s visible in all OS and browsers. Personalise the content using the dynamic parameters in this section as it has more area which can accommodate longer values of parameters
Large Image (Optional): An image that complements the message, it should be descriptive and appealing. It’s only visible on Google Chrome, Windows and Android OS.
Tips and insights:push notifications with images have a 20% higher CTR, according to A/B testing conducted by several Frizbit clients. The ideal ratio of the image to make it visible on all OS and devices is 2×1 horizontal, minimum size being 512 x 256 px and recommended size being 1024 x 512 px. You can read more about the ideal size and resolution for rich web push notifications here.
Page URL: Is the domain of the website that’s sending the notification, the one the user subscribed to. The subscriber can be directed to any destination URL, it doesn’t necessarily have to be the same domain.
Tips and insights: send subscribers to a page as close to the lower end of the shopping funnel as possible. This will increase the possibility of conversion. Don’t forget to add UTM tags to track the traffic coming from each different push notification campaign
Action button (Optional): Action buttons (you can have up to two) are optional buttons which can be used as call to action to tell users what you want them to do, what action is expected from them. Its visibility also varies depending on OS and device. It is possible to define a distinct URL to action buttons, other than the main URL of the notification.
Tips and insights: be precise on the CTA (Call to Action), tell the subscribers exactly what you want them to do: finish your purchase, book now. Don’t forget to add UTM tags to track the traffic coming from each different push notification campaign.
Even though all web push notifications include the same elements, how they’re shown will depend on the browser, operating system and device. Some will include the image, some won’t and the visibility of the text and action buttons will vary as well.
All the elements can be highly customised with personalised text, images and even emojis. If you make use of the dynamic parameters, you can include even more specific information such as category name, product name, product image, product price and user name to make the message as relevant as possible for each user, making them feel that you’re talking directly to them.
What operating systems support web push notifications?
Web push notifications are supported by all major operating systems, except iOS. Windows, Android, MacOS work properly with web push while iOS doesn’t support them by default.
Chrome Android Web Push Notification
Chrome MacOS Web Push Notification
Chrome Windows Web Push Notification
Firefox Android Web Push Notification
Firefox MacOS Web Push Notification
Firefox Windows Web Push Notification
Safari MacOS Web Push Notification
What browsers support web push notifications?
All major browsers, Google Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Opera and Microsoft Edge support web push notifications, except Internet Explorer.
What devices support web push notifications?
Web push notifications are shown on desktop, mobile and tablets even if the user has left the website. Their appearance and where they’re shown will vary depending on the operating system of the device.
2. How do web push notifications work?
From the publisher’s perspective
Web push notifications work for any kind of website. Any brand or business that owns a website can configure and send web push notifications very easily. No mobile app is required to do so, and the implementation is fairly simple by adding a small piece of code from a web push notification service platform to their site. We explain the process with more detail ahead in this article.
From the user’s perspective
Web push notifications is a permission based marketing channel, which means that it can be only sent to a user if they allow a website to do so. In order to start receiving web push notifications all a user needs to do is basically to opt-in (give permission to that particular website to send push notifications) and become a subscriber. This can be done by two ways:
Native opt-in: is the browsers’ default prompt to ask users their permission to subscribe to the web push notifications channel. It includes a non-customizable text and uses the language settings chosen by the user. It triggers when a user visits a site for the first time and they have to click “allow” or “block”.
Custom opt-in: is a form of opt-in which shows first a pop-up that can be customized with the website’s branding that also appears the first time a user visits the site. It offers the possibility to personalise the message and include the logo of the brand. It can be shown on the top middle of the screen and after clicking “allow” on, it triggers the browsers’ opt-in prompt, in which the user must give permission again to become a subscriber. The downside of using a custom opt-in, is that it requires two clicks from users in order to actually allow the notifications and this results in a 3x decreased opt-in rate.
Opt-out: How to disable web push notifications?
When it comes to this channel, the users have complete control over them. In order to unsubscribe from web push notifications, subscribers just need to access their browser settings panel, look for the notifications option, find the website they would like to opt-out and select “block”. The process may vary a little depending on the browser you use, for details you can check these articles:
There are two types of web push notifications: manual and automated. Depending on the service provider you choose, you’ll have more options regarding the type of messages you can send. The difference between them is their triggering mechanism:
Manual (bulk) push notifications: manual web push notifications are used to send manually a massive communication to all or a segment of users informing about special discounts, promotions, time sensitive sales or new products. They could be understood as the push notification equivalent to email newsletters. You can send messages regarding:
News
New blog post
Event information
Flash sale
New products
Automated (triggered) push notifications: automated notifications are highly personalised messages sent to users based specifically on their individual behaviour on the site. They’re designed and scheduled to be sent automatically in predetermined time frames after a user completes an action. You can define as many scenarios as you wish to trigger an automated web push notification, depending what type of site you have:
E-commerce: you can define events that send a message to users for every step of the funnel. Ex. Cart Abandonment, Product Retargeting, Category Retargeting.
Travel: you can define events to trigger notifications to recover lost reservations of the users that didn’t complete the booking or to improve the UX of the trip. Ex. Last Seats for a specific destination, last available room, check-in, boarding, luggage reminders.
B2B/SaaS: you can generate more leads by sending a sequence of web push notifications to nurture leads that visited a page but dind’t complete a sign up.
Real Estate: you can generate more leads and interactions by communicating with users about a listing they have viewed but didn’t engage with it or recommending similar properties or announce them about new listings.
Why should I use web push notifications on my website?
Web push notifications present a direct and real-time communication channel with users. Subscribers receive the message when they’re online, which highly increases the chances of interaction within minutes of the notification being sent. There’s no other digital marketing channel that has this inherent power that web push notifications have.
Engage anonymous users
The main reason web push notifications are becoming so popular amongst marketers, is because it is a unique channel to retain users that didn’t leave any personal information on the website. To become a subscriber, a user has to simply click “allow” on the opt-in prompt without filling any form, sharing their email address or any other type of personal data. This presents a major opportunity for businesses to create a flow of communication with users that might never decide to drop their email.
Reach both desktop and mobile without having an app
One the most attractive features of web push notifications is that they don’t require an app to function. In order to send a push notification, you just need to have a website and you can reach your subscribers on both desktop and mobile devices. This means that you don’t have to wait for users to check their emails to get the message through. Being able to reach people at any time, on any device is a unique advantage of web push notifications.
Reach users out of the website
What makes web push notifications so special is that they can reach audiences even when they’re not actively browsing your website. If a user subscribes, leaves and starts navigating any other site, they’ll still receive notifications from you. There’s currently no other direct digital marketing channel you can do this with, which adds to the list of reasons why you should use web push notifications on your website.
Generate traffic in seconds
Web push notifications is a real-time communication channel. This means users get the message the moment they’re online which inmensely increases the chances of interaction. On average, most notifications are clicked within the first hour after receiving it. For example, with manual web push notifications, you can direct lots of traffic in a very short period of time. In less than a minute after sending it, you’ll see sessions being generated on your web and users engaging with the site in real-time in your web analytics solution.
Time efficient
Digital and online businesses are used to working with multiple marketing tools to get their message across. Most of the time it would seem overwhelming to add one more channel to the mix. However, web push notifications is different. The campaign setup is extremely simple and you don’t have to spend a lot of time creating each message and manually sending it. Using automation you can create templates that will be sent automatically when triggered by an event you define on your site. You’ll only need to invest some time once to configure your campaigns and that’s it!
Are web push notifications effective?
The most simple and straightforward answer is YES! But let’s dig a little deeper. If used wisely it can become the most effective retargeting channel for online businesses.
High opt-in rate
Web push notifications have proven to be much more effective than other traditional channels. They have an average 3x higher opt-in rate than emails, which can easily be related to how seamless the process is. With just one click, visitors can become subscribers without handing over their email address or other personal information. Reducing the steps one person has to follow and complete to opt-in to any type of digital communication, will decrease the hesitation and make them more open minded to subscribe.
High CTR
Stats have shown that web push notifications have a 4x times higher click through rate than emails. That’s a 8,5% over in comparison to the 2.4% CTR of emails. The hyper-personalisation capabilities of web push notifications, allow to significantly increase the CTRs. When people feel like you’re really talking specifically to them, it will translate into more clicks and that is one of the biggest benefits of using web push notifications.
Profitable channel
Web push notifications present a very valuable alternative for marketers that allocate a big part of their marketing budget to retargeting ads. Most web push notification services are based on monthly fees that vary on the amount of subscribers or visits to the website. There are no extra fees for the amount of messages sent, implementation nor PPC rates involved. You can send unlimited notifications.
This makes the cost of retaining a customer very profitable. Consider that returning users that have already converted are the biggest asset to your business. Web push notifications allow you to bring them back without having to spend a large marketing budget chasing them around with expensive retargeting ads.
How much can you increase your revenue with web push notifications?
Web push notifications offer varied results depending on the industry, type of business and amount of traffic of the site. You can access our calculator and introduce a few data to estimate how much you can increase your revenue using web push notifications in just a few clicks: https://get.frizbit.com/revenue-calculator/
How do I send web push notifications from my website?
1. Upload Service Worker
The process of implementing web push notifications is very simple and can be done in any website. The first thing you have to do is to upload the Service Worker file of your provider to the root folder of your website’s domain. A Service Worker is a file that allows a browser to run functions that don’t need a web page such as sending push notifications to a user when they are not on your site.
2. Add JavaScript snippet
The next step is to add the JavaScript snippet of your provider that will help you create a user profile for every person that visits your site, allowing you to to track their behaviour. There are two options to do this:
A) Via Google Tag Manager: most web pages nowadays already use GTM and you can easily add this snippet as a tag on GTM. Besides, a web push notification service provider such as Frizbit can offer all the implementation on GTM in a few moments.
B) Adding directly to the web: if you don’t work with Google Tag Manager, you have the alternative to directly add the JavaScript snippet by copying and pasting it inside the <head></head> section of your website.
Working with a web push provider makes the process very simple, since they can take care of all the configuration, onboarding and then they hand everything over to you. After the setup is complete, you’ll instantly start collecting subscribers when they visit your site and opt-in. All that’s left is to design the notifications. Some providers, like Frizbit, will offer you templates, advice and support for the optimization of your campaigns.
How to create a web push notification?
Web push notification service providers usually have a dashboard where you can create the content of push notifications. Frizbit’s dashboard allows you to design your messages personalising with the use of all kinds of dynamic parameters and also see the changes in your design in real time for each browser and operating system. This way you have complete control and awareness of how the notification will be shown to users.
Access the dashboard, select “New” and enter a name for your campaign
Fill in the information of the title, and description and include the icon
Select the options for Google Chrome and add a large image, write the message for the call to action. You can add a second one if you wish to.
Follow the same steps for Safari
In the “Advanced Options” tab, you can set a timer and add a tag for your campaign.
Proceed to select when and how you want the notification to be delivered: right now, scheduled, recurring or event triggered.
Next, continue with the audience segmentation. Here you can select as many filters as you wish, such as language, country, type of event, browser, device and much more.
Once you’re done, you can save your design as a draft or publish immediately. The web push notification you created, will be saved on your dashboard and you can edit it later or copy it for new creations.
Remember you can perform different versions and conduct A/B testing. You can assign percentages of users to each campaign variation and see for yourself which one performs better. Use the results to optimize your notifications as much as possible and get the best results.
What metrics should I track to optimize my web push notification campaigns?
Web push notifications significantly increase user engagement and improve retention rates. There are several metrics you should keep an eye on in order to constantly improve your campaigns.
Opt-in rate: is the percentage of the unique users on your site clicking “allow” and becoming subscribers. Keeping track of this information will give you hints on where to ask users if they want to receive notifications from your site and adjust accordingly. You can place the opt-in prompt in any page you want, and trigger it by an action of the user. It’s not necessary to ask permission within the second a visitor enters the site.
Click-through rate: is the percentage of subscribers that click the notification over the total number of subscribers you sent it to. It’s so important to keep close track of this number, because it lets you know what type of notifications your subscribers are responding to. You can test different messages changing the title, image, description and CTA and analyse which ones are resulting in more clicks.
Time spent on a page: when sending a notification, you tell users what to expect when they click on it. Directing them to a good landing page that fulfills their expectations is key. That’s why you should keep track of how much time subscribers spend on a page after they click the notification. This will give you valuable insight on how the messages portrayed in the notification meets the landing’s information. If there’s no connection between the copy of the notification and the content of the page you send users to, bounce rate will increase, letting you know there’s an issue in copywriting.
Opt-out rate: shows the number of people that unsubscribed from web push notifications from your site. This is a vital metric to keep track of. Naturally your opt-in numbers should be much higher than opt-outs. If you discover that your opt-out rates are increasing over time, ring your alarm bells and start looking for the problem. In this case it’s usually related to low relevance of your notifications, or maybe you’re sending too many notifications that your subscribers perceive as spam and decide to opt-out.
Conversion rate: this is the ultimate goal of your campaign and the main metric of any type of business. This metric indicates the accomplishment of your goal, whether completed sales, signup or another type of engagement. All of the improvement efforts for other metrics should be aimed at ultimately increasing conversion rates. You can have great opt-in rate or click-through rates, but if they’re not translating into conversions, it is time to evaluate your web push notifications campaign strategy in place, identify the problem and do whatever it requires to resolve it.
You can keep track of the majority of these metrics, setting goals on Google Analytics and checking the reports that provide your web push notifications provider.
Are web push notifications GDPR compliant?
Web push notifications are GDPR compliant by nature. They present a direct communication channel with users with no personal data requirements. This means that users have to give consent to become recipients, but they don’t have to provide their name, email, phone number or any other type of personal information.
These instant alert messages are device oriented. The user is not targeted based on some personal data they share, but to their device. The subscription information is all stored in the browser, so businesses have no access to it and can’t use it or sell it in any way.
The user is the one in complete control by having access to the notifications panel, where they can easily decide to opt-out if they wish to.
What makes a good web push notification?
The best web push notifications have three attributes that bring results: they’re relevant, personal and precise. This channel offers many possibilities that can greatly benefit your online business if used correctly. If you exploit all its features with a well-thought strategy and avoid common mistakes, you’ll be a web push notification lover just like us.
A great web push notification is:
Relevant: Tracking the user’s behaviour on your site gives you all that you need in order to make the notification as relevant as possible. Define different scenarios to trigger a specific notification based on each user activity, so that the message they receive is directly linked to what they did on the site. You also want to keep in mind user segmentation. You don’t want to send a special offer on a product today, to a customer that bought it the day before. The same way you should keep in mind to send notifications about sales or special offers during the time they’re active and deactive the campaign the minute the promotion is over. Web push notifications that are highly relevant, have much higher click through rates.
Personal: Make use of all the dynamic parameters available: user name, product name, category name, image or any other available parameter to design a super personalised notification. If a user feels that you’re talking directly to him, the message will present a higher value and the user will be more enticed to engage with it. You should also contemplate language and time zone. Customize the campaign for each language and country you’re sending it to. The content of your web push notification has to appeal to each subscriber as an individual.
Specific: Great web push notifications let the subscriber know exactly what you want them to do and what they can expect when clicking that action button. Make it clear and precise with your title, message and CTA. Write the text keeping in mind how it will display on each OS and browser. Write the most important message in the title to make sure it’s always visible and make sure you link to the right landing page where your subscribers will find all you promised in the notification.
How to choose a web push notification service provider?
There are a list of features and considerations to be made when choosing a web push notification service. It’s important that you do your research and don’t jump ahead and go for the first service you find online. The main aspects you must consider are:
Customer data protection
There are many well-known free web push notifications service providers in the market. You might feel enticed to choose one of these instead of a paid one. The thing is, that free web push notifications services might sell your customer’s information, they’re “free” for a reason. When using one of these providers, you allow them to collect and sell your subscribers behavioural data, which can be purchased by your very own competitors. You have to decide which price to pay: a normal service fee or to sell subscribers personal information to third parties.
Subscriber portability
When choosing a web push notification provider, you want to make sure you collect subscribers under your own domain. Some of the providers offer you an alternative way of subscription where the users will be subscribed to a subdomain of the provider rather than the domain of the business itself. If you agree to this, all the subscribers that accept and opt-in to notifications from you, won’t belong to your website, they’ll belong to the website of your service provider. This means that, if one day, you wish to change providers for whatever reason, you’ll lose all your subscriber’s base and will have to start from scratch.
Personalisation and automation
Make sure you select a platform that offers the option of hyper-personalisation through dynamic parameters. As we mentioned before, customised notifications that include details like user name, have higher CTRs and lower opt-out rates. The same happens with automation. Notifications triggered by the behaviour of users on the website, have high relevance that translates in better engagement.
Good customer support
Whether you’re new with web push notifications, or have been using them for a while, good customer support is extremely important. You want to choose a provider that’s always going to be present if you have any doubt, concern or issue with your campaigns. Frizbit offers its clients a step by step onboarding, ready-to-send templates for your automated campaigns and consulting of any type.
When choosing a push notification provider, seek one that offers a trial period. This will help you ensure it ticks all the boxes and put you at ease with your decision. If you want to request a demo from Frizbit, click here and let us know!
Hi again! Updating you with the most recent trends, events, and updates within the digital marketing world. In this post, we are covering all the important updates that took place in August.
1. Search Marketing Updates August 2020
Google Organic Algorithm Updates
August 2020 has been a quiet month if you don’t count the SEOs bracing themselves for not one but two Google search glitches that happened on August 10th and August 15th. The first one especially had a major impact on the results for a brief period of time. Luckily things were back to normal shortly in both instances.
Google upgrades Activity Cards for shopping, product, recipe, and job searches
Google always finds new ways of delivering what people are searching for in the most convenient way. Their newest addition is the search activity cards.
Shopping Cards
Many online shoppers go through various articles, reviews, and benchmarks before purchasing a product. This feature allows them to see relevant products from previous searches together and compare them easily.
Jobs Cards
Jobs card touches a pain point of every job seeker. It allows you to filter out newly posted job posts from the ones that you’ve already seen. This ends going through the same posts every time you do a search. Now, you’re always up to date.
Recipes Cards
Whether you make the same recipe frequently or you’re on a quest of trying every Lasagna recipe out there, Google has you covered. They show you the previous recipes you searched for and other relevant ones based on your query with thumbnails.
Google Ads Updates
Google announces the plan to add Lead Form Extensions to Display Campaign later this year
A research done by Google back in March suggests a third of online shoppers prefers to shop from business that allows a wide array of options to contact them. Lead Form extensions are a considerably way to capture leads.
This new feature generated powerful results in Jeep’s cases as they saw 10x growth in their completed forms with their Korea branch. This makes sense as these forms enter the shopper journey when the attention is captured and the intent to buy or at least to explore is high.
The good news is the Lead Form Extensions will be available for display campaign later this year.
Easy import for offline conversions
Most of the time a buyer’s shopping journey is not as seamless as marketers would like to simplify with their funnels. It is often we see that the product discovery and vendor comparison is done online but the actual purchase takes place in the brick and mortar world.
Google makes it easier to import offline conversions to your CRM. Now vendors can bridge the gap in their CRMs in cases where a journey started with a click on an ad or call from that add. It sounds like a great way to understand what kind of ads work and drives acquisition beyond the online world.
ZenBusiness, a company that helps other businesses, experienced a 400% increase in customer acquisition year-over-year when the utilized the offline conversion data with the Smart Bidding feature to single out and target high-intent customers. There are specific instructions for those who use Salesforce Sales Cloud and Zapier.
2. Marketing Tech Updates August 2020
Chatbots
Although Chatbots are not new, they’re gaining momentum and it seems they’re here to stay. As in most cases marketers want to automate the grind work with chatbots.
Some of the things including a Chatbot in your omnichannel strategy are as follows:
lead generation
lead qualification
lead nurturing
increased engagement
faster one-touch sales
traffic segmentation
scheduling meetings
sharing short surveys
and more…
The aim is not to remove the personal touch out of the interaction. The aim is to save time, engage prospects, and help those who seek instant communication with a conversational approach.
3. Social Media Marketing Updates August 2020
TikTok introduces analytics
This month TikTok launched its analytics page for the Pro accounts. The analytics page provides an overview of historical performance analytics such as video views, profile views, and the number of followers.
The content section shows the trending videos you have and view numbers for the past 7 days. The followers section on the other hand help tracking the audience growth and the number of likes, shares, and comments.
Instagram challenges TikTok with Reels
TikTok has been dealing with being deemed as a potential threat to US national security. As if it wasn’t enough, now things got, even more, rockier for the Chinese app with Instagram’s new feature launch, Reels. Instagram wants to broaden its capabilities in the short-content sphere.
Reels give you the chance to create and edit 15-second multi-clip videos with audio, speed setting, and AR effects.
These were the things that happened in Digital Marketing in August 2020. You can also read all updates on Digital Marketing Insights page.
Hi again! Updating you with the most recent trends, events and updates within the digital marketing world. In this post, we are covering all the important updates that took place in July.
1. Search Marketing Updates July 2020
Google Organic Algorithm Updates July 2020 mainly has been a calm month regarding google organic algorithm updates, even calmer than June. There was no official update declared by Google.
There is only one probable update as far as some SEOs mentioned some changes on their organic traffic on July 23rd & 24th. The general comments of the SEO community, again, have been negative. There is no specific type of websites or queries being affected more than others, according to the comments of webmasters.
The impacts of the probable Google Algorithm update on search results, by Semrush
The impacts of the probable Google Algorithm update on search results, by CognitiveSEO
Google Ads Updates
Zero commission fees on Google Shopping when product is bought on Google
Google continues to shake up the dynamics of the e-commerce websites.
The first wave was in April 2020. Google had announced that they made all the listings on Google Shopping in the U.S. for free in the pursuit of enriching the number of the products listed there, as all products will be listed no matter if they are paying or not. (It was just the Shopping tab at first)
Then, the second wave took place at the end of the last month. At the end of last month, Google announced that they made the free shopping listings also available on the main Google Search results page in the U.S. This helped shoppers choose the products and sellers that will serve them best, from the widest variety of options.
The third and the final (at least for now) wave was announced in July 23rd. Google is now launching “Buy on Google” checkout experience and the retailers who participate in this program will be able to sell products directly in search results and they no longer have to pay a commission fee for sales made via the ‘Buy on Google’ option. This is a payment option that lets customers buy products without leaving Google search results.
New Product Attributes in Shopping Ads
Google started showing product attributes such as “Material” in Shopping ads, which is a new feature that e-commerce marketers have to pay attention and don’t forget to add these attributes to their product feeds. This is very new test which has been caught up by a Jackson Lo as you can see on this tweet.
Google displaying “Material” in their shopping ads.
Introducing new features for responsive search ads
Responsive Search Ads (RSA) are the new type of search ads which allow marketers to add multiple alternatives to headlines and descriptions to the text ads and machine learning optimizes the performance of the campaigns by showing more relevant combinations to increase engagements. Now you can use location insertion to dynamically add where your product is offered. After having it set up, the ad can automatically include city, state, or country names based on the locations of potential customers or their areas of interest.
How to add location insertion to the responsive search ads
2. Marketing Tech Updates July 2020
A continuous growth in the marketing tech industry has shown a lot of potential as one of the most in demand tech solutions. But as new, popular markets evolve, changes are bound to happen.
Deloitte publishes the 3rd Edition of their survey “State of AI in the Enterprise”
In July, Deloitte publishes “Thriving in the Era of Pervasive AI“. According to Deloitte’s survey of 2,737 information technology and line-of-business executives taken in late 2019, 61% of respondents said they expect AI to substantially transform their industry in the next three years. Adopters are making significant investments with 53% spending more than $20 million in the past year on AI and talent. The category of adopters has increased from 21 percent to 26 percent since the 2018 survey.
We are back! Updating you with the most recent trends, events and updates within the digital marketing world. In this post, we are covering all the important updates that took place in June, on the following topics:
Search Marketing Updates
Marketing Tech Updates
Content Marketing Updates
Social Media Marketing Updates
1. Search Marketing Updates June 2020
To start off, we will take a look at the Google algorithm updates of June 2020.
Google Organic Algorithm Updates June 2020 mainly has been a calm month regarding google organic algorithms. There was no official update declared by Google. However, some SEOs mentioned some changes on their organic traffic and some claimed that these are enough to claim these are the signs of a big update. The majority of the fluctuations reached a peak on 23rd of June.
The general comments of the SEO community have been negative. They claim that some old outdated sites improved ranking in google, even some of the not mobile friendly ones. They also claim that the local results got worse.
Google algorithm impacts on SEO
Google Ads Updates
Keyword Planner New Beta Feature: Refine Keywords
Find relevant keywords to your product, service, website or landing page with Keyword Planner. With new possible refinement suggestions, related keywords suggestions will be grouped together based on the attributes of your product or service–like color, size, etc.
Keyword Planner with its new beta feature: Refine Keywords
View explanations for conversion changes
Understanding changes in conversion volumes could be difficult, since so many factors come into play. In order to make the diagnoses easier, users are now able to request explanations in Search campaigns. Instead of spending time on allocating the issues, more time can be spent on optimizing the performance.
Explanations for conversion changes in app campaigns.
Feeds in App campaigns
Help and provide users fast solutions for their needs or questions with easy-to-use feeds in apps. This update comes with new and improved formats, expanded query eligibility and deferred deep linking for a more integrated onboarding experience. For now, it is still in its beta version but according to Google this will be rolled out entirely in the coming months.
An improved onboarding experience with feeds
2. Marketing Tech Updates June 2020
A continuous growth in the marketing tech industry has shown a lot of potential as one of the most in demand tech solutions. But as new, popular markets evolve, changes are bound to happen.
Visual search results of Pinterest
Pinterest has been making changes by adding new ecommerce features to appeal more businesses. This time the company has added the lens visual search results for an effortless search for products to buy. Open the camera in-app or upload a picture and a tab ‘Shop’ will show up with the same or similar products for you to buy instantly. Pinterest hopes to encourage businesses to add their whole catalogue and increase ecommerce engagement. Especially now since it has seen a significant increase in traffic due to the pandemic. Producing search results by means of pictures could improve the overall user experience and it will be no surprise if other platforms eventually also add this helpful feature.
Pinterest’s visual search results
3. Content Marketing Updates June 2020
Building a strong and desirable image in the eyes of the consumer by spreading the corresponding content is a vital part of retention. Although it can be hard at times as the consumers and trends are continually changing.
Live video streaming
Broadcasting live through video form is known as streaming. The streaming platform Twitch has succeeded to attract big audiences, mainly with videogaming streaming. Due to the growing demand for video content and videogames, live video streaming services are showing much monotization potential. Ad breaks allows marketers to reach these audiences by inserting unskippable advertisements during the stream. Also, the highly interactive channel can be used to communicate with customers in new manners. For instance, by streaming product launches, tutorials or exclusive behind the scenes.
Podcasts
Just as live streaming, the audio-based channel has grown to be widely used worldwide. In-podcast ads have much potential but what might be more interesting are branded podcasts. The Dutch Airline KLM, Slack and even McDonalds have aired podcasts with huge success. Often with an engagement time of 30 minutes or even longer, the one-on-one time with a brand creates a trustful relationship without making it too branded and ‘in your face’ all the time. By hearing a human voice, people feel more at ease and are willing to embrace new ideas.
User-generated content
Seeing branded content of our peers is more impactful than another traditional advertisement. User-generated content is content created and shared by unpaid customers. Oftentimes it is done by encouraging the customers to engage and partake in the promotions. For example, Coca Cola introduced the Share a Coke bottles. The campaign encouraged customers to find a bottle with their name on it and share it on social media.
Coca Cola user-generated social media content
Or more recently, clothing websites have been uploading more content of users, often from influencers with an existing following.
Asos user-generated content on their website
4. Social Media Marketing Updates June 2020
Read about the most important updates in the social media branch. What are the most popular platforms, tools and features?
Snapchat’s ad templates
The platform is simplifying the process of ad formatting by offering templates through Ads Manager. It is easy to use and always shows a clear overview of relevant product information. Also, it is possible now to link it to the inventory, showing customers the availability of the product.
Easy to use templates on Snapchat
Facebook allowing switch between personal and business accounts
Facebook’s Messenger app will enable the possibility to easily switch between personal and business accounts. Since many business pages admins also use the app for personal use, two separate apps would be redundant. With the increased popularity of messaging platforms, this simple but useful feature caters to its new market environment. However, this new update might not be for everybody considering the very fine separation between work and personal life.
TikTok for business
The popularity of short videos and TikTok has been shown very evidently. As one of the most downloaded apps at this moment, more ecommerce opportunities arise. TikTok has launched a website for businesses, essentially a manual for marketers on the platform. Insightful tips, links and case studies for the optimisation of the performance. In the near future, a new feature for data collection will be introduced.
Hopefully you are still all well and healthy at home. While the world has been put to a halt, Digital Marketing has seen some changes. In this post we will cover these important updates that took place in May 2020, on the following topics:
Search Marketing Updates
Marketing Tech Updates
Content Marketing Updates
Social Media Marketing Updates
1. Search Marketing Updates May 2020
To start off, we will take a look at the Google algorithm updates of May 2020.
Google Organic Update
The second Google algorithm update of this year was released on May 4th.
Later today, we are releasing a broad core algorithm update, as we do several times per year. It is called the May 2020 Core Update. Our guidance about such updates remains as we’ve covered before. Please see this blog post for more about that:https://t.co/e5ZQUAlt0G
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) May 4, 2020
It took exactly two weeks to be fully implemented as Google Search liaison Danny Sullivan said: the rollout is complete on May 18, 2020.
The May 2020 Core Update rollout is complete.
— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) May 18, 2020
However, the overall consensus of this update was mainly expressed with dissatisfaction. The Search Engine Results Page (SERP) has changed drastically with only some major businesses benefitting from it. Noticeably, big brands such as Pinterest, Amazon, Etsy and similar businesses have seen increases in their SERP positions. While many think there might be an error, some speculate it is related to quarantine search trends. Unless Google publishes a comment on this, this will remain unknown.
Google Ads Updates
Hotel ads product
In order to support the travel business during COVID-19, Google will introduce a new program for Hotel ads partners globally. Instead of fixed commissions, partners will only need to pay a commission if the traveller stays at the hotel. Also, a “Free Cancellation” filter will be made available when searching for hotels. Partners will be able to easily share their policies through Google.
New tools for Business Profiles
Businesses will be able to communicate with consumers through their Business Profile. First of all, asking for support from customers will be made available through donations or gift cards, also called ‘support links’. Also, any changes made to operations can be displayed, such as adding ‘online classes’ or ‘online appointments’. Online bookings will be connected to Google Calendar, in case the business wishes to integrate Google’s program.
Support links in a Business Profile
2. Marketing Tech Updates May 2020
A continuous growth in the marketing tech industry has shown a lot of potential as one of the most in demand tech solutions. But as new, popular markets evolve, changes are bound to happen.
Salesforce offers new commerce cloud templates
The leading Customer Relationship Management platform Salesforce has offered possible solutions to COVID-19 related problems and needs which businesses might experience and helps them react accordingly. For instance, ‘Quick Start Commerce for Grocery and Food Service’ enables the businesses in this industry to build new websites fast and allows customers to order online and pick up curbside. The new feature also offers cloud templates for retails of essential goods, business-to-business and any who need online buy and pick up in store.
Quick Start Commerce for Grocery and Food Service
Online and virtual workplaces
To become accustomed to working remotely, businesses have introduced many tools to help users along the way. Facebook already had Workplace but is coming with new features to cater to the new needs which have developed since COVID-19. Firstly, Facebook has moved their already existing ‘Messenger Rooms’ to Workplace, making online meetings for business purposes only possible. This update was only natural since the demand in video calling platforms is increasing. Also, it has been made possible to host live streams with automatically translated subtitles and a Q&A section. However, the most remarkable announcement seems to be Virtual Reality workplaces. It has been used in some sectors and businesses in collaboration with Oculus for Business.
Oculus for Business
In addition, Run The World, a quite new but booming business on the video platform market, offers users to host any type of events. Such businesses allow conferences, fundraisers, panels and many more activities to be held responsibly while practising social distancing. Run The World has been able to raise 10.8 million USD in funds and is expected to become a strong competitor in the market.
3. Content Marketing Updates May 2020
Building a strong and desirable image in the eyes of the consumer by spreading the corresponding content is a vital part of retention. Although it can be hard at times as the consumers and trends are continually changing.
Augmented Reality campaigns
In the blog post of January, we mentioned Augmented Reality (AR) becoming a marketing tool. Amidst the quarantine and the rising usage of in particular video apps, Snapchat has been utilising the potential of AR Campaigns. These brand partnerships most often enable users to see the advertised product or try it on by using the lens in the app. For entertainment purposes every lens is usually accompanied by aesthetically pleasing or funny effects. Due to COVID-19, Snapchat has also made it possible to donate money with this tool. The lens itself gains attention and by clicking on ‘more’, the user will directly be forwarded to the website of the organisation.
Snapchat’s partnership with the World Health Organization
Besides Snapchat, Facebook has been making advances with AR technology too. Currently, it is testing the tool to its Marketplace. Sellers will be able to create a 3D view of the product; which buyers can view in the same three-dimensional image. Seeing the product in its full state, provides the buyer an adequate glimpse without having to see it in person.
Online content on TV screens
The significant shift from traditional TV programs to online video content, has created many opportunities for platforms such as YouTube and Netflix. The easy accessibility to any content at any time has become immensely popular. However, nowadays people are more at home thus watching content on big screens is as effortless. YouTube is expecting this shift in behaviour and will be adding new options for marketers to reach the TV-connected audiences. For instance, the surveys will be made possible for bigger screens with the possibility to use the remote to interact.
4. Social Media Marketing Updates May 2020
Read about the most important updates in the social media branch. What are the most popular platforms, tools and features?
Users support businesses
Social media platforms are taking initiatives to support the businesses which might be struggling in these trying times. Facebook and Instagram introduced ‘Support Small Business’ options, giving users the option to donate money or promote the products and services. Furthermore, Facebook is offering a grant programme for small businesses of 100 million USD in cash and ad credits. On Instagram users can add a sticker to their picture and upload it in their story. The audience of the specific user will be able to click on the sticker and visit the business profile. Word of mouth marketing is becoming more prevalent these days in the online community.
Instagram’s Support Small Business
Pinterest introduces Business Community
Strengthening the community of businesses on a platform leads to better commercial content and appeal. Pinterest has launched ‘Business Community’, for businesses to share knowledge, give advice and ask questions related to Pin campaigns. By signing up and creating a profile, you will have access to the informative conversations.
TikTok’s new music regulations
So far businesses have been able to use music without having to deal with any royalty matters on the platform TikTok, but from now on this will not be possible anymore. TikTok has a multitude of music licensing agreements for users to use, royalty free. Previously, businesses were also allowed to utilise this in their TikTok marketing. Now however, only the ‘Commercial Music Library’ will be free to use for promotional content. Licenses can still be obtained if one wants to make use of any other song outside of the library.
Facebook’s new calling app
CatchUp, the new app for audio only calls introduced by Facebook has been launched. The app works with the phone’s contact list, thus a Facebook account is not needed. By letting the people who have you in their contacts list know that you are available, it hopes to encourage engagement.
Facebook’s CatchUp
Ads in IGTV
Instagram’s video platform IGTV will be working with 200 approved creators to begin playing ads. The revenue of the ads will be shared between the creators and Instagram. Ultimately, the intent is to implement these partnerships worldwide and attract more monetisation.
Hopefully you are still all well and healthy at home. While the world has been put to a halt, Digital Marketing has seen some changes. In this post we will cover these important updates that took place in April 2020, on the following topics:
Search Marketing Updates
Marketing Tech Updates
Content Marketing Updates
Social Media Marketing Updates
1. Search Marketing Updates April 2020
To start off, we will take a look at the Google algorithm updates of April 2020.
Google Ads Updates
Google Trends
In these changing environments it can be hard to determine the wants and needs of consumers. With Google Trends marketers are able to explore the most popular search terms and statistics which can be helpful when creating new advertising campaigns for instance.
New features in Ads Editor
After publicising advertisements, the Ads Editor offers multiple features to change or assess those. For now, Google has improved the edit pane, added shared budgets and optimisation scores. These optimisation scores are particularly interesting since it indicates the effectiveness of the ads with numbers.
Optimisation scores in Ads Editor
Call Ads
Advertisements on Google can now incorporate their phone number in the featured snippet with a call ad. For businesses that mostly operate by calling, this could increase the engagement with customers and generate more leads. The number will be automatically called by clicking on the number.
Call advertisement
2. Marketing Tech Updates April 2020
A continuous growth in the marketing tech industry has shown a lot of potential as one of the most in demand tech solutions. But as new, popular markets evolve, changes are bound to happen.
Internal communication & collaboration platforms
With a lot of people working from home, communication has become a bit harder. Without the weekly or even daily meetings and face-to-face (small) talks, the physical distance can easily result in communicative problems. Hence more businesses are offering online services for sharing, planning and working unitedly. In addition, already existing platforms are improving their service in order to keep up with the changing environment. For instance, Facebook Workplace has added new features to improve internal communication, such as a Q&A option. Here are some internal communication systems:
Facebook Workplace
Slack
Trello
Asana
Podio
Monday.com
Video calling & webinar softwares
In addition to a rise in internal communication systems, other communication platforms are becoming more prevalent nowadays. It is used to get in touch with family, friends, colleagues, and clients. Video calling is just a little bit more personal than only calling and webinar softwares are used to hold seminars online. We have listed a few softwares which might be useful to you:
Zoom
Skype
Google Meet
Microsoft Teams
Livestorm
Toasty
Circl.es
3. Content Marketing Updates April 2020
Building a strong and desirable image in the eyes of the consumer by spreading the corresponding content is a vital part of retention. Although it can be hard at times as the consumers and trends are continually changing.
Video platform competition
The rising popularity in video content has intensified the competition in this industry. Whereas new video platforms like TikTok have seen major success, others are trying to compete by adding new features. As for now, it seems brief videos in particular are taking the market by storm. YouTube reportedly will add a feature called ‘shorts’, similar to TikTok, which is supposed to compete.
In-Game Marketing
The gaming market has been steadily and rapidly growing. With more than 2.5 billion gamers worldwide, this market has an enormous target group with a lot of marketing potential. In-game marketing is already being done. However, it is of importance that it does not interfere in the players’ enjoyment, which could be difficult. Nonetheless, this month Travis Scott has shown that games could be used in ways we are not used to by having a tour consisting out of five virtual concerts in the game Fortnite. The event was watched by millions.
GTA IV and in-game marketing
4. Social Media Marketing Updates April 2020
Read about the most important updates in the social media branch. What are the most popular platforms, tools and features?
Advertisement guides by Facebook
Facebook is offering businesses assistance with the swift changes as a result of COVID-19. Such initiative by the platform is not unusual, in February of this year similar support was offered to businesses impacted by the bushfires in Australia. This time three new guides have been published in regard to advertisement and how businesses can respond to the virus.
Twitter allows COVID-19 ads
While most platforms have systems in place to prevent the misinformation about COVID-19 which ban certain content such as advertisements, Twitter is opening itself up again to coronavirus-related advertisements and has lifted the ban. However, brands will still need approval and are still bound to some regulations.
Pinterest capitalising on its potential
The increasing growth in users, the marketing potential and the rise of ecommerce have made it easier for Pinterest to capitalise on its opportunities. From now on, products featured in pins or boards can be bought or added to the collection. Also, the platform will be able to implement more personalised advertisements or recommendations.
Pinterest in-app shop
Gifts through TikTok
In collaboration with its partners, TikTok is introducing a new program wherein users can gift their friends and family with ‘Small Gestures’. These gifts are mostly so-called freebies, so promotional materials for free and can be sent up to three times per user. Although the app had not found a suitable way to monetise before, this might be the definite direction they will be going. The Chinese version of the app ‘Douyin’, has already successfully implemented this.
TikTok’s small gestures
Social Media Insights
Due to COVID-19 we have seen a major increase in internet usage and changed user behaviour. Multiple social media platforms have provided insights into the impact of the virus on the users.
LinkedIn has published an infographic, in particular to inform the Marketing Community. The data-based article ‘Navigating Today’s Evolving World of Work’, shows the trending hashtags, engagement growth and other related numbers.
Snapchat has given an overview of their users’ top concerns, indoor activities, feelings regarding their situation and the impacts on brands. From the results of the conducted survey it is concluded that empathy is key for brands since it resonates with the users. This includes advertisements in which people are being helped or just simply products to be used at home.
Pinterest has listed the top trends which could be very helpful with understanding the changes and pinpoint the correct marketing efforts to match it. The most popular topics are health & wellness, parenting, food and beauty & personal care.
First of all, we hope you are all well and healthy at home. The corona virus has affected many people’s lives and also affected the Digital Marketing world. Some industries such as e-commerce are mainly affected positively and trying to keep up with the rapidly increased demand, while the majority of other industries are affected negatively such as travel, entertainment and dining. There have been some important changes. So, in this post we will cover these important updates that took place in March 2020, on the following topics:
Search Marketing Updates
Marketing Tech Updates
Content Marketing Updates
Social Media Marketing Updates
1. Search Marketing Updates March 2020
To start off, we will take a look at the Google algorithm updates of March 2020.
Google Ads Updates
New Google Ads mobile app features
The Google Ads mobile app enables users to easily monitor and review performances. After a few months of receiving feedback, the app has some small but new features in order to better the user experience. This includes Dark Mode, notifications with specific changes and the ability to prioritise recommendations.
Ensuring high-quality ads
Using highly automated vetting systems in order to disapprove certain ads which are against policy or incorrect, sometimes leaves room for mistakes. This new feature creates the possibility for advertisers to assess the issue and change the ad accordingly if needed. Thereafter an appeal can be submitted and the advertisement will be evaluated again.
App campaigns insights
Promote your app on platforms such as YouTube with app campaigns from Google. A few features have been introduced to improve performance and better the provided insights. Performance ratings will be defined more clearly to help you determine the actual performance of one particular campaign in comparison to the rest. Also, performance charts will be made available for the assessing of long-term performance.
2. Marketing Tech Updates March 2020
A continuous growth in the marketing tech industry has shown a lot of potential as one of the most in demand tech solutions. But as new, popular markets evolve, changes are bound to happen.
Slack
The automation of marketing has lately been progressing towards a centered approach: one system, centrally operated, for multiple marketing activities. Slack is a communicative tool which has been trying to cater to marketers by assisting them with problem solving and monitoring marketing efforts in an automated way. For instance, by adding apps to Slack, it allows instant sharing and collaboration, meaning the sharing of files and the synchronisation of tasks, calendars with the possibility to meet-up online via video calls. If you are interested in integrating Slack to keep track of different events on your website, such as new signups, cart abandonment or new messages submitted, contact Frizbit.
Frizbit linked to Slack
Near Field Communications
WebNFC is a technology for wireless transmittance of small amounts of data on a short range, already used in cards to scan when entering a building. Although it might not be new technology, developers have been trying to integrate it with mobiles. With the Chrome 81 which is in its beta version since February 13, a simple NFC card game app is made available to its users. For marketers this could mean a new way to communicate with their customers. Just as AR, this could be integrated into new marketing strategies. For instance, by scanning products with an app you will be able to receive information about it.
Web NFC on mobile with Chrome v81
3. Content Marketing Updates March 2020
Building a strong and desirable image in the eyes of the consumer by spreading the corresponding content is a vital part of retention. Although it can be hard at times as the consumers and trends are continually changing.
Influencer marketing
A new but very prominent way to market is by means of influencer marketing. Influencers can be defined as people with the ability to influence potential buyers and an audience to promote a product. Seeing one’s favourite influencer using a particular product or brand has proven to have a positive effect on the profits and image. Since the buyer feels a connection to the influencer, he or she is more likely to buy the product and has a level of trust in the quality. Also, the targeting is overall more accurate since the buyer apparently already is aligned with the values and interest of the influencer.
Videos and meme’s related to COVID-19
As we have noticed and written about in the last two blogs, video and meme’s have been increasingly popular communication formats. With the drastic changes we have undergone in our daily lives for the past few weeks, such as quarantines, social distancing and the fear of running out of toilet paper, new relatable content has come out. The content which everyone can relate to all over the world, is in a way uniting us and humoristically keeping the mood up in these times.
COVID-19 related meme
Webinars
Social distancing or even fully going in quarantine is essential in preventing COVID-19 to spread so quickly. Adhering to this, all the face-to-face gatherings are canceled for the time being with online gatherings being held instead. For many businesses, web conferencing or ‘webinars’ have become an important way to communicate with their audience. The host or speaker of the webinar is able to speak to the attendees live with audio and visuals. Also allowing interaction by means of Q&A features.
Tips on how to work remotely
For this quarantine special we have listed a few tips on how to work remotely:
Online communication
Make use of the advanced technology of online communication. Skype, Zoom, Google Meet and many more provide us the option to have meetings from home.
Schedule your day
It is easy to get lost in a sea of time; what and when should you do everything? The important thing is to keep a daily rhythm allowing yourself some free time while having some fixed activities.
Create a workplace
You will be spending quite some time working in that space. Assure a quiet and relaxed surrounding for you to work at ease.
Stay productive
Do not let yourself get distracted by the TV, chores or other disturbances at home. Create a task list in which you can see your progress or lack of. Also, be aware that it does not mean you should not take breaks or work longer.
4. Social Media Marketing Updates March 2020
Read about the most important updates in the social media branch. What are the most popular platforms, tools and features?
Facebook fights coronavirus related ads
Due to misinformation around the coronavirus and the desire to keep users calm, Facebook has taken new measures. Which includes the ban of advertisement and commerce listing selling products such as medical face masks and other related products. These advertisements, most of the times accompanied by text meant to raise panic, are seen as opportunistic and exploitative. In addition, all content is being moderated to combat the spreading of incorrect information. However, because of some complications as a result of the virus, Facebook warns its users and advertisers for delays and errors.
Reddit capitalising on its growth
The platform Reddit has resisted those eye-catching promotional messaging for a long time. However, with the increasing growth in users, their undeniable advertisement potential can not go unnoticed anymore. From now on, it will place the advertisements in more noticeable places. This will be a stepping stone to opening its platform to more opportunities in the future. Nonetheless, the reaction of the users, also called ‘redditors’, will be the deciding factor whether this change of policy will be an actual success.
More prominent placing of advertisements
Instagram monetising its IGTV
Instagram, used for sharing pictures and videos, is branching out with a new app for longer videos which could be watched vertically. But users are also able to watch the content of it within the existing Instagram app. IGTV is entering a market with a few powerful competitors and will need to prove its potential by alluring to the masses and its ability to advertise. Monetising content allows creators to have advertisements in between their content and receive a share of the profit. The rest of the profit goes to the platform. It is speculated the rate of IGTV will be 55%.
LinkedIn increases CTR with conversation ads
By observing its users behaviour, LinkedIn has noticed the shift from mass communication to one-to-one conversation. Messaging apps have gained significant big amounts of users and the increased time spended on it, have made it very advertisement friendly. LinkedIn is coming out with Sponsored Messaging, a message-based ad format highly customised with call-to-action buttons.
Conversation ad with CTA buttons
Brand loyalty programs on Facebook
Still being tested but showing much potential are the brand loyalty programs on Facebook. By linking a new or existing account of the brand to Facebook, users will be able to receive benefits such as discounts and points. The system enables the strengthening of brand loyalty while also improving the hyper-personalisation and targeting.
Conversation ad with CTA buttons 