Enlightened Content Marketing

About This Author:

Kane is the founder of Content Harmony, a content marketing agency based in Seattle. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter at @KaneJamison.

Data Makes Your Content Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger

By: Kane Jamison 2 comments

The following audio slideshow and article is a recap of a presentation I gave for DistilledLive’s Better Content Marketing Meetup on March 5th, 2013.

Click play on the embedded SlideShare to hear my voiceover of the slides, or you can read the article version of the presentation content below that.

View and Listen to the Slides and Audio:



Links for My Co-Presenter:

I presented alongside Adria Saracino of Distilled. She gave a great presentation titled ”Making Cool Sh!t Isn’t Content Marketing” – I’d highly recommend checking out those slides as well as her recent articles on SEOMoz, “How to Get Your Boss to Care About Content Marketing“, and Distilled.net, ”Kill It In Content Creation By Knowing Your Customer Conversion Funnel.” Each article is a good precursor to her presentation.

Better Content Marketing:

The DistilledLive meetup theme was Better Content Marketing, and I want to start off by taking a second to talk about why we’re talking about better content in the first place.

I think most companies find themselves in one of two positions:

  1. Either they are in the middle of a content arms race, where their competitors are producing lots of content. They’ve got their content calendar dialed in and so does everyone else.
    AND / OR
  2. They are still getting by on crap content. Maybe they bumped it up to 600 words instead of 400 and now they add a second photo, but it’s still basically the same junk they were making in 2008/9/10 before Panda.

There’s been a lot of people talking about this lately:

  1. Crap: The Single Biggest Threat to B2B Content Marketing
  2. Cutting through the Clutter as the Content Channel Clogs
  3. Why Our Content SUCKS
  4. How to Win a Content Arms Race – Whiteboard Friday

So, I think the question we need to ask ourselves in both of these situations is this:

“How do we make better content that sticks out?”

Where Does Data Fit In?

My premise for you today is that you should be using data-based content to achieve both goals.

This is because data makes your content:

  1. HARDER to replicate
  2. BETTER than the competition’s
  3. FASTER to create
  4. STRONGER than your opinion

Data Makes Your Content Harder Better Faster Stronger

What Do You Mean By Data-Based Content?

I should probably give some examples of what I mean by data-based content. I’m not talking about data-driven content in the sense that you are driven by metrics and KPIs and things like that. That’s great but it’s not my focus tonight.

What I am talking about is more along the lines of what usually comes to mind when I say data-based content:

Infographics

Data-Heavy Blog Posts

Interactive & Parallax Scrolling Visualizations

Quarterly Whitepapers & Industry Benchmarks & Similar Reports

Data “Snippets” Mixed with Persuasive Copy

Data Built Into E-Commerce Landing Pages

APIs

Tools

These are the types of content that set you apart in a content marketing arms race.

Data Makes Your Content Harder to Replicate:

Data Makes Your Content Harder

So diving right in, data makes your content harder to replicate. I mean this in a couple ways:

1 – Data seems like a big hurdle.

It takes work. You have to find the data. You have to drop it in yourself and mess around with it before whipping it into the format that’s just right. You have to merge different data sources.

All of this is enough to scare off the lazy competition.

What they don’t know, however, is that it gets easier, especially if you do this on a recurring basis. Once you’ve done this once or twice and wrapped your head around what needs to get done, this process goes much faster and you can do a better job in a shorter period of time.

2 – By using internal data that can’t be replicated.

If you’re working with a web based or start-up company, you have no excuse to not be doing things like what Uber has done with cab rides going in and out of San Francisco. Every single startup has this type of data to work with, and I think their customers find it fascinating much of the time.

Offline companies have internal data, too – it’s not just the online companies. Examples include customer service logs, paper logs of any kind, and even custom created data for the content you want to create.

This type of content is hard to replicate by the competition, and it’s another hurdle for them to clear to catch up to you.

Data Makes Your Content Better Than The Competition’s:

Data Makes Your Content Better

Data also makes your content better than the competition’s content.

The best example I can come up with is Nate Silver and the Five Thirty Eight blog. He is a former baseball statistician who moved into politics, and upended the political election analysis industry in the process. He basically took all the same polling data and all of the same external data that all of the other political pundits had to work with and he took a science-based approach to analyzing it.

Instead of just speculating based off exit polls like other pundits, he made estimates based upon current and historical data and said “based on past results where we saw X, this is what we expect.”

His track record is great:

  • 2008 Presidential Race: 49 out of 50 states correct (98%)
  • 2008 Senate Races: 35 out of 35 races correct (100%)
  • 2012 Presidential Race: 50 out of 50 states correct (100%)
  • 2012 Senate Races: 31 of 33 races correct (94%)

If we take a look at his subdomain homepage, the social sharing data supports this. Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and LinkedIn counts were used:

  • http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/ has ~208,000 social shares.
  • http://www.nytimes.com/ has ~2+ million social shares.
  • http://www.foxnews.com/ has ~484,000 social shares

This is a relatively small team of content creators that he’s working with, and they’ve accomplished this over the past 3 years since the website was transferred to the New York Times domain.

I think in 2-3 years when we start the next presidential election process, you’re going to see a lot of attempts to copy this approach, especially at major TV networks. But, they’re years behind because Five Thirty Eight has already established themselves as the data-based coverage source.

Data Makes Your Content Faster to Create:

Data Makes Your Content Faster

It does in a couple of ways.

1 - Data-based content is easy to replicate across many pieces of content. 

I think a good example of this in SEO world is Mozcast.com, a side project by Dr. Pete over at SEOMoz.

His initial dataset has become a recurring  daily data set, and has produced a huge amount of content for him & Moz:

  1. Initial presentation when launched at MozCon
  2. Microsite / Tool
  3. He’s got blog content ideas for the foreseeable future simply by reviewing the story that the data is telling, and has produced quite a ton of content already just based off this data set.
  4. To top it all off, the domain has it’s own widgetbait.

The current results 9 months later? 421 linking root domains sitewide, and about 3000 social shares.

Pretty good for what started as a side project. I think that’s a great example of how you can produce a large quantity of quality content from one initial data source.

2 - Data-based content makes easy recurring content. 

Data-based content is great for recurring pieces of content. Things that are done quarterly, annually, etc. These are all types of content that we are familiar with:

  • Industry Benchmarks
  • Annual Surveys
  • Voting & Awards
  • Industry Trend Analysis

A great example is Mailchimp’s Email Marketing Benchmarks by Industry.

They update this periodically and over time it’s accumulated at least 220 linking root domains and ~2000+ social shares.

So that’s an excellent example of content that’s recurring, updated once in a while, but it’s an ongoing resource for people to access.

And of course, the best part about recurring content is that your outreach does itself, because you do it once, and all you have to do is keep reaching out to the same people that already talked about it and they will keep talking about it, assuming it’s still interesting.

Data Makes Your Content Stronger Than Your Opinion:

Data Makes Your Content Stronger

Finally, data makes your content stronger than your opinion.

“If we have data, let’s look at data. If all we have are opinions, let’s go with mine.”

–Jim Barksdale former Netscape CEO

At first I didn’t have an example of content for this point. But then, the day of the presentation, Geoff Kenyon published his post on testing whether 302 Redirects Pass Link Equity.

Instead of simply writing a blog post with his thoughts on what types of value search engines might place on 302 redirects, he went and tested it. Within about three hours after launch, it had 90 tweets, including tweets from some widely-followed SEOs.

Basically by going back and looking at an assumption we all thought was a closed discussion, Geoff found a way to rise above the clutter. It’s not his opinion or speculation, it’s based upon evidence – “look what I saw.”

I think that’s huge, especially in an industry like marketing where there is a lot of speculation.

But it doesn’t matter what industry you’re working in – having data that backs up your opinion makes your opinion stronger.

So here is the example that I was going to include for how to make this point actionable – it’s not all that different from what Geoff did.

  1. Pick an industry controversy or long-held assumption. All industries have some sort of controversy, even supposedly boring industries.
  2. Construct a way to test it.
  3. Execute the test.
  4. Publish the results.
  5. Reach out to all the people that have talked about this in the past.

You’ve got immediate buy-in by these people because they’re vested in the discussion one way or another. You are not trying to convince them to talk about something that they may or may not care about. So I love the fact that it also has the built in audience established before we start the project.

3 Resources For Getting Data:

All right, so now I just want to talk about some resources for acquiring data, working with data and visualizing data. Most of these are beginner friendly or should be accessible to your typical internet marketer with some technical skills.

1 – ScraperWiki

This one is an interesting one.

So a lot of times data is not accessible through a data-set or API and if it’s still public, then the next way to get it is to scrape it off of the website. Scraping is just pulling the data easy using a software. So this creator wiki tool is kind of cool. You can build scraper, but you can also fork other peoples scrapers just like GitHub. So you can borrow somebody else codes, switch a humor here and there and all of a sudden, it is doing your bidding. The other guy built it, and it allows you to save that information to a data base or data base service. You can set it up to link o your data link and you can pull it out during API or Excel file or [inaudible 00:13:11]. So I built one of these in four or five hours in Python, that would scrape a government table, that I knew is updated daily but the data isn’t released in any fashion other than a home webpage. So now I got that data in the data base, updated daily which nobody else has except for the organization themselves. You got to careful about copyrights and things but [inaudible 00:13:34] when you publish stuff. And like I said, it took me four or five hours to build in Python. I don’t work with Python, I am not a programmer. I just hacked up somebody else code and not very [eloquently], but it worked. It does not produce errors. So that’s very ready get some data that is not fully sacrificed.

2 – Mashape.com & ProgrammableWeb.com

APIs may seem a bit scary, but Mashape.com has some great resources where they actuallygive sample code to help you pull from each one of their APIs

Once you get the handle on that process, you can head over to a website like ProgrammableWeb which is an API directory with ~9000 APIs, find the data set you are looking for, and pull that data out.

3 – Visualize Other People’s Data That’s Already Seen Internet Success

So this third one is literally stolen from Russ Hudgen‘s presentation about link building by stealing. So his concept was go to website like Hacker News, where data heavy content typically does well but they don’t tend to like
visualization as a community.

Take that data heavy content that’s already produced in a cool and interesting format and visualize it, re-release it,and then reach out to the people that created in the first place and the people who talked about it in the first place.

That’s another great example where the audience is built-in before we even start the project.

2 Resources For Working With Data:

1 - Mr. Data Convertor

This is a quirky little tool – paste your CSV data in the top half, and the bottom half will spit out HTML Tables, SQL, JSON, as well as arrays in Ruby, Python, and PHP.

2 - Data Wrangler

Data wrangler is for the Excel junkies in the room who hate the whole “Text-to-Columns” and “Concatenate” dance. It kind of does this artificial  intelligence approach to unstructured data manipulation that takes so much time.

4 Resources For Visualizing Data:

1 – Timeline.JS

This one I put first because it is so obnoxiously easy. You don’t have to know any Java Script. You don’t need to know any code. All you need to know is how to copy a public Google doc template that has 5 to 8 columns.

Put some dates, titles, and text in the template. This tool will take the doc and create this cool timeline visualization. It is automatically swipeable on iPad, iPhone, tablet, etc. You can embed it into an existing site, make a micro-site out of it, all of that good stuff. Timeline.js has a WordPress plugin, too.

If you got a concept like the history of your industry, the history of your product, or the history of your company, you can create a cool piece of content in an afternoon using this tool.

2 – Google Fusion Tables Tutorials

3 – Dashing D3.js Tutorials

Both have great code examples for simple things like graphs and line charts, and they can ease you into the more advanced stuff.

4 – DataVisualization.CH

This is the first resource to check out when you are ready to do the big data-based content projects, even if you’re not going to do it yourself. It’s great for getting ideas about the types of tools available and what you can produce, even if you’re hiring a more advanced datavis expert to assist with the project.

Challenge: Stump Me

I hate doing a presentation on a topic that’s not actionable, so I’ll make you guys the same offer I made in person at my presentation. If you haven’t come up with an idea for your business or your clients after listening to the audio for the presentation, let me know in the comments what type of niche you’re working with and I’ll brainstorm something decent for you. If I can’t come up with anything I’ll buy you a beer simply for stumping me. It may need to be a digital beer or a raincheck, but damnit I’m good for it.

About This Author:

Kane is the founder of Content Harmony, a content marketing agency based in Seattle. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter at @KaneJamison.

Inbound.org: 2012 By The Numbers

By: Kane Jamison 0 comments

Table of Contents:

Click on any of the following sections to go directly to the chart for that data.

  1. Introduction
    1. Credits
    2. Creative Commons
    3. Custom Stat Requests
    4. Comments & Disclaimer on Calculations & Methodology
  2. Bird’s Eye Stats
    1. Users Bird’s Eye
    2. Article Submissions Bird’s Eye
    3. Tool Submissions Bird’s Eye
  3. Domain Stats
    1. Top 25 Domains by Total Submissions
    2. Top 25 Domains by Total Upvotes
    3. Top 25 Domains by Average Upvotes
    4. Top 25 Domains by Total Comments
    5. Top 25 Domains by Average Comment Count
  4. Category Stats
    1. Top Categories by Total Submissions
    2. Top Categories by Average Upvotes
    3. Top Categories by Average Comment Count
  5. Trends
    1. User Registration Velocity (By Day & Cumulative)
    2. Submission Velocity
    3. Upvote Velocity
    4. Comment Velocity
  6. User Stats
    1. Top 25 Users by Highest Average Upvotes per Submission (Filtered to users with greater than 10 submissions)
  7. Time Stats
    1. Submissions & Upvotes by Hour of the Day
    2. Submissions & Upvotes by Day of the Week
  8. Content Stats
    1. Crawl Results & Status Codes of All Submissions
    2. WWW vs. Naked Subdomain Usage
    3. Authorship Usage
    4. Twitter Card Usage
    5. Facebook Open Graph Usage
    6. WordPress Usage
    7. Keyword Cloud of Titles

Introduction:

In late 2012 I reached out to Ed and the team at Inbound.org and asked if I could put together a statistical analysis of the Inbound.org community’s first year.

I wanted to look at a number of basic things like:

  • most prolific websites in our community (aside from SEOMoz.org, that is)
  • how people were interacting with Inbound.org in general
  • how user interaction had changed over the course of the year (submission velocity, vote velocity, & comment velocity)
  • most popular categories of content on inbound
  • average upvotes by time of day, day of the week
  • most common voting and submission times

I also wanted to take a look at some more obscure stats:

  • what percentage of domains were www subdomain vs. naked subdomain vs. custom subdomain
  • what percentage of articles submitted contained code for Authorship (and which kind), Twitter cards, and Facebook Open Graph.
  • a keyword cloud of article titles (imagine: it’s like an actual industry thought cloud for 2012)

Thankfully they said yes, and what you see here is the result of way too many January & February nights, but I think it produced some interesting insights into the inbound.org community and what we shared and talked about in 2012.

A couple notes before we dig into the data:

Credit Where Credit Is Due: 

Many thanks to Ed Fry & the inbound team for providing the data necessary to calculate everything here. (Don’t worry, they didn’t give me any of your personal information). I could have scraped the site and gotten some of the data, but it wouldn’t have been nearly as in-depth as what’s below.

Please Feel Free to Share & Reuse Image Files: 

All of the image files and charts below are free to be used by anyone and released under CC by 3.0 US. Attribution back to this page and Inbound.org are encouraged but not necessary.

Requests for Custom Statistics: 

There’s a lot of cool statistics I probably haven’t thought of. Tell me in the comments what statistics you’d like to see calculated and I’ll publish them (so long as they’re approved by the inbound.org team).

Comments & Disclaimer on Calculations & Methodology: 

All of the data was given to me in the form of a SQL database. I recreated the database, exported each SQL table to CSV, imported into Excel, and pulled into pivot tables where I could filter and manipulate. I considered using fancier software like Tableau that can connect to MySQL and perform calculations on multiple tables, but after spending 3 hours with it I realized it was way beyond my needs (not to mention abilities) for this project, so in the end I used Excel for all numbers shown on this page.

Because the data I worked with was exported after 12:01am on Jan 1, there are some slight variations on some of the statistics. For example, if I calculated total number of votes based upon the articles database table for all articles submitted in 2012, and then compared that to the votes database table that lays out each specific vote submitted in 2012, the numbers will be slightly different since I wasn’t able to perfectly adjust the articles table to only include votes in 2012.  As another example, 6% of votes didn’t have a timestamp attached, so graphs like “upvotes by time of day” and “upvotes by day” are technically completed with ~95% of data available. I don’t know if the missing data is distributed evenly throughout the population or not. So, we’ll have to live with it.

Despite that I think the data is still representative of the year in aggregate. I’m not a data scientist, all I can say is that I double checked my calculations each time and did my best to not change any of the fields except where necessary. Maybe next year I’ll hire a statistician to verify my calculations. Then again, maybe I’ll just hire them to do the whole darn thing.

Bird’s Eye Statistics:

User Activity:

In 2012, there were 10,653 registered users

  • 5474 registered users upvoted articles that they didn’t submit (51.4% of registered users)
  • 3019 registered users upvoted more than 1 article that they didn’t submit (28.3% of registered users)
  • 2546 registered users submitted articles, tools, or discussions (23.9% of registered users)
  • 1508 registered users submitted content that got more than 1 vote (14.1% of registered users)
  • 1534 registered users left comments (14.4% of registered users)
  • 219 user accounts needed to be banned (2.1% of registered users)

Article Submission Activity:

23,256 articles submitted from 4,803 domains with 82,397 votes and 9,016 comments

  • Average of 3.54 upvotes and 0.39 comments per article
  • 12,160 of articles received more than one upvote (52.3% of articles submitted)
  • 3,737 of articles had comments (30.7% of articles that had more than one upvote)

Tool Submission Activity:

406 tools submitted with 1496 upvotes and 152 comments

  • Average of 3.7 upvotes and 0.4 comments per tool
  • 225 tools received more than one upvote (55% of tools)
  • 78 tools had comments (19% of tools)

Top Domains:

Top 25 domains were calculated by total submissions, total upvotes, average upvotes, total comments, and average comments. These statistics removed flagged URLs as well as URLs for tool submissions.

Top 25 Domains by Total Submissions

Top 25 Domains By Total Submissions

Top 25 Domains by Total Upvotes

Top 25 Domains By Total Upvotes

Top 25 Domains by Average Upvotes

This data was filtered to only include domains with at least 3 submissions. This was to remove the “one hit wonders” that had excellent posts, but only or two in total.

Top 25 Domains By Average Upvotes

Top 25 Domains by Total Comments

Top 25 Domains By Total Comments

Top 25 Domains by Average Comments

This data was filtered to only include domains with at least 3 submissions. This was to remove the “one hit wonders” that had highly-discussed posts, but only or two in total.

Top 25 Domains By Average Comments

Category Statistics:

Top Categories by Total Submissions

Top Categories by Most Submissions

Top Categories by Average Upvotes

Top Categories by Average Vote Count

Top Categories by Average Comment Count

Top Categories by Average Comment Count

Trends:

User Registration Velocity (by Day)

Registered Users per Day

User Registration Velocity (Cumulative)

Cumulative User Growth

Submission Velocity

Submissions by Day

Upvote Velocity

I also graphed this chart by week because I thought it might be a bit more clear, however the data looked very similar to this version so I opted for the more granular view.

Upvotes by Day

Comment Velocity

Comments by Day

User Statistics:

Top 25 Users by Highest Average Upvotes per Submission (filtered to users with more than 10 submissions):

Note from Kane: I decided that this was the only user-based chart that I’m going to generate. The top users by karma is easily available, and so are the most active users by frequency of submissions. But, I’d argue that this is the best metric of who’s contributing the most to the community. If the point of Inbound.org is to surface great content with less fluff, these are the people submitting the best content on a somewhat frequent basis, and not simply submitting content for the sake of votes.

Rank Name Average Votes
per Submission		 Total Submissions
1 Sean Rvll 21.29 17
2 Mitchell Wright 17.58 12
3 Dana Loiz 14.64 11
4 Ryan McLaughlin 13.65 17
5 Richard Baxter 13.46 13
6 Martijn Scheijbeler 11.96 23
7 Brandon Hassler 11.00 14
8 Alaister Low 10.90 10
9 Patrick Hathaway 10.58 24
10 Adam Justice 10.09 22
11 David Cohen 9.76 66
12 Kevin Gibbons 9.45 11
13 Nick Eubanks 9.41 27
14 Steve Webb 9.25 28
15 Ross Hudgens 8.56 36
16 Anthony Pensabene 8.27 112
17 Rudi Bedy 8.20 19
18 James Agate 8.00 13
19 Wissam Dandan 7.92 13
20 Kieran Flanagan 7.92 12
21 Jon Cooper 7.75 44
22 Anthony D. Nelson 7.53 47
23 Chris Dyson 7.48 164
24 Hasson 7.36 72
25 Alistair Lattimore 7.27 11

Time Statistics:

Submissions & Upvotes by Hour of the Day

I believe the following two charts are for the PST timezone (Seattle), but I’m checking with the inbound devs at the moment. I say that for two reasons:

  1. The original developer is from Seattle
  2. I think the increases correspond with the work day starting in the UK (GMT) at 1am PST, the East Coast (EST) at 6am PST, and then West Coast (PST) at 9am PST.

Submissions by Hour

Upvotes by Hour

Submissions & Upvotes by Day of the Week

Submissions by Weekday

Upvotes by Weekday

Content Statistics:

A total of 23,669 URLs on 5,640 subdomains were run through Screaming Frog. All of the usual fields were exported from Screaming Frog, and 5 custom parameters were added to the crawl as well:

  • Filter 1 and 2 were to check for two types of Authorship markup.
  • Filter 3 was to test for Twitter Cards.
  • Filter 4 was to test for OpenGraph data.
  • Filter 5 was to see how many sites were run on WordPress.

Screaming Frog Custom Crawl Parameters

Crawl Results & Status Codes:

First off, even though I crawled 23,699 URLs, many of them were missing, redirected, or a number of other ridiculous status codes. I got some freaky exotic status codes. I mean really, 303 redirects? Shame on you NYTimes.com…

So here’s a quick rundown of status codes returned before we dig into the good stuff:

  • -1 Invalid HTTP Response: 1
  • 0 Connection Refused/DNS Lookup Failed: 173 (0.73% of URLs Crawled)
  • 200 OK: 17,605 (74.28% of URLs Crawled)
  • 301 Redirect: 4878 (20.58% of URLs Crawled)
  • 302 Redirect: 478 (2.02% of URLs Crawled)
  • 303 Redirect: 24
  • 401 Authorization Required: 2
  • 402 Payment Required: 3
  • 403 Bad Behavior/Forbidden: 49
  • 404 Not Found: 324 (1.37% of URLs Crawled)
  • 410 Gone:  2
  • 416 Requested Range Not Satisfiable:  1
  • 429 Unknown:  4
  • 500 Internal Server Error:  9
  • 502 Bad Gateway:  6
  • 503 Service Temporarily Unavailable:  32

I only used the 17,605 URLs that returned 200 status codes to calculate the following stats. Those 17,605 URLs came from 3,936 subdomains.

WWW vs. Naked Subdomain Usage:

Out of 3,936 subdomains:

  • 2261 used a “www” subdomain (57.44% of subdomains)
  • 1675 used no subdomain (naked) or a non-www subdomain (42.56% of subdomains)
    • 231 used a “blog” subdomain (5.9% of subdomains)

Rel Author Usage:

Out of 17,605 URLs from 3,936 subdomains that returned a 200 status code:

URL Parameter: ?rel=author

  • 2321 URLs utilized ?rel=author as a URL parameter
    • 13.18% of URLs sampled
  • 469 subdomains in total
    • 11.9% of subdomains sampled

HTML Attribute:

  • 10,801 URLs utilized rel=”author” as an HTML attribute
    • 61.3% of URLs sampled
  • 1657 subdomains in total
    • 42.10% of subdomains sampled

2,126 subdomains had Authorship installed using one of the methods – 54% of the subdomains sampled.

Out of the 2,126 subdomains that had implemented Authorship, 77.9% of them used the HTML attribute method.

Twitter Cards Usage

Out of 17,605 URLs from 3,936 subdomains that returned a 200 status code:

  • 4,553 URLs utilized name=”twitter:site” in the code, presumably in the Twitter card metadata
    • 25.86% of URLs that were sampled
  • 536 subdomains in total
    • 13.62% of subdomains that were sampled

Note to self: I remembered after the fact that twitter:site is not one of the required Twitter card attributes. Nevertheless, I don’t feel like recrawling at the moment. Use twitter:card next year.

Facebook Open Graph Usage

Out of 17,605 URLs from 3,936 subdomains that returned a 200 status code:

  • 10,867 URLs utilized og:title in the code, presumably in the Open Graph metadata
    • 61.73% of URLs that were sampled
  • 1,731 subdomains in total
    • 43.98% of subdomains that were sampled

WordPress Usage

Out of 17,605 URLs from 3,936 subdomains that returned a 200 status code:

  • 11,840 URLs had wp-content somewhere in the code, presumably due to the use of WordPress as a CMS
    • 67.25% of subdomains that were sampled
  • 2,432 subdomains in total
    • 61.79% of subdomains that were sampled

And Finally, The Keyword Cloud:

I’ve read that ‘trying to find patterns in a word cloud is a bit like reading tea leaves at the bottom of a cup,’ but nevertheless, here it is:

Most Common Words in Titles

That’s it. So what interesting stats did I forget to create?

Tell me in the comments and I may look at it and share with everyone.

About This Author:

Kane is the founder of Content Harmony, a content marketing agency based in Seattle. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter at @KaneJamison.

2013 Internet Marketing Trends (and How They’ll Affect Your Organization)

By: Kane Jamison 1 comment

This blog post is converted from the slidedeck of a presentation I’m giving today for the Seattle Tech Forum in Bellevue, WA. The presentation slides are embedded in the beginning, and the text that follows is the same content as the slidedeck, with added commentary similar to what was said in person. I had to type seriously fast to get this done today, so apologies for any short-hand sentences.

Introduction:

So, the purpose of this presentation is to take a look at a range of internet marketing statistics and trends, focusing on the following areas:

  1. Organic Search
  2. Paid Search
  3. Social Media
  4. Email Marketing

From there, I’m going to talk a bit about:

  1. How the adoption of mobile and tablet devices are affecting us
  2. Changes in priorities, budgets, and ROI measurements for marketing departments
  3. Where I see the near future of internet marketing, particularly outside the marketing department

In other words, this presentation if for a wider audience than the usual online marketing crowd.

Here are the slides (lacking my awesome custom fonts, however, which slideshare can’t process):



Now, let’s look at some trends:

Organic Search Trends:

Google vs the World:

As reported by Comscore in Dec 2012, Google now accounts for 65.2% of searches worldwide. That’s searches, not searchers.

Google vs. Binghoo:

The U.S. market is similar, with Google getting 66.9% of searches in October 2012 as reported by Comscore.

Core Search Entity

 Explicit Core Search Share (%)

Oct-12

Total   Explicit Core Search

100.0%

Google   Sites

66.9%

Microsoft   Sites

16.0%

Yahoo!   Sites

12.2%

Ask   Network

3.2%
AOL,   Inc.

1.8%

That’s not the end of the story, though. 2 private studies have shown a much larger percentage of search visits coming from Google.

RKG reported 78% of search traffic coming from Google in a Q4 2012 study of their clients:

RKG Search Visits

Optify reported even higher numbers for a similar study of their B2B clients (PDF link), with 88% of search visits coming from Google:

 Optify B2B Search Visits

3 Major Search Engine Trends in 2012:

1 – Google’s Continued Fight Against Spam:

Penguin in 2013, and Panda continuing from 2011, both led the fight against spammy links (Penguin), and spammy and weak content (Panda).

Results are mixed – worst offenders have been suitably punished, however many have moved to slightly less crappy link building and content practices, resulting in the bar only getting raised slightly in many markets. Other markets might as well not be affected by Penguin, based upon the tactics we see working daily.

2 – Continued Loss of Keyword Data to (not provided).

  • For clients of Content Harmony (skewed towards small/medium businesses), we’ve seen 30-40% of keywords become (not provided).
  • I’ve seen reports upwards of 50% for tech-friendly audiences.
  • RKG Q4 report said 28% average.
  • Optify B2B report said 41% average.

This has been a large driver in changing organic search metrics in my opinion, along with personalization of search results. We’re not forced to focus on landing pages and aggregate keyword data as opposed to microlevel focus on keyword performance.

3 – Emergence of Google Authorship

Authorship has 2 big implications:

  1. What is happening now. The only thing we’re fairly certain about with authorship is that it typically offers higher click through rates than the same ranking without authorship. This allows for better results for content producers that adopt it sooner, and is already rewarding companies that are producing content that is attributable to high-profile individuals.
  2. What might be happening now, and what could happen later. This is the real area of opportunity. The implications of authorship allow for brands and authors to increase rank through building followers. Moreso, it allows brands to draft on the following of authors, and authors to draft on the following of brands. I also think the implications for spam detection are positive, because faking an entire social following on Google+ will be much more difficult to scale than current link and social share metrics. The ROI of building a brand becomes better than the ROI of building fake identities and spamming the networks.

Paid Search Trends:

I don’t spend too much time doing paid search. With that qualifier, the big opportunities I see in PPC are for targeting to segments like tablets and mobile, and moving outside of Adwords and looking at alternatives such as retargeting and Microsoft/Yahoo advertising.

PPC now accounts for around 25% of search clicks, with 75% going to organic.

PPC vs Organic Clicks

Data and screenshot from presentation by Rand Fishkin and Darmesh Shah.

There are interesting opportunities in the tablet PPC market, for example:

As reported by Adobe, one study showed a similar click-through rate for tablets and desktops. However, due to a lower cost per click for tablets, and a slightly increased conversion rate for tablets, they found a 68% higher ROI for tablet PPC over desktop PPC.

***UPDATE*** A couple PPC folks pointed out to me that due to very recent “enhanced campaign” changes in the Adwords platform, this type of device targeting will be restricted for tablets (Thanks Lisa Sanner of PointIt  and Michael Wiegand for chiming in).

This MediaPost.com article describes the changes in more detail. I’m not sure why on earth Google would do that instead of focusing on raising PPC costs for tablets in general – seems like this will only annoy their biggest source of income. Any thoughts from more experience PPC professionals? The MediaPost article mentions this quote from Richard Zwicky of BlueGlass Interactive:

Optimism over what this could signal remains high, though. Richard Zwicky, CEO and Chairman of BlueGlass Interactive, believes the changes make strategic sense for Google, though acknowledges this is an aggressive first step.  “If you take a long-term perspective, Google’s Enhanced Campaigns launch may indicate their belief that the decline in desktop search – first seen in October 2012 – is going to become an even stronger trend. If this is the case, its move to do away with differentiation between mobile and desktop AdWords is quite logical and a well-thought-out, strategic move toward tomorrow,” he says.

“[M]ake no mistake, AdWords had to change. Google either had to move ahead of the [mobile advertising] market, or watch another company appear and force the issue. They chose the more aggressive route.”

Social Media Trends:

Social Media Referral Traffic

The RKG report showed the vast majority of social referrral traffic for their clients coming from Facebook and Pinterest. I’m very surprised at the low levels for Twitter, which makes me question whether their clients skew in any particular direction.

In addition, the Optify B2B study showed a different trend for B2B businesses:

Social Media Referral Traffic - Optify

Interestingly, despite only sending 32% of social media referrals in their study, Twitter accounted for an outstanding 82% of leads generated from social media referral traffic.

Facebook For Business:

On average, 6% of Facebook fans engage with brand pages via likes, comments, polls, and other means. The average engagement was less than 1 Like over the course of the eight weeks.

This data comes from a recent study by Napkin Labs that was featured on Mashable. Some notes on how the study was conducted:

Napkin Labs analyzed fan engagement for more than 50 brand pages, including consumer electronics companies, retailers and more, with between 200,000 to 1 million fans each. The researcher found that having more likes doesn’t necessarily mean having more engagement. In fact, the more Facebook fans a brand has, the lower the percentage of engaged fans tends to be. For example, brands with between 900,000 to 1 million fans had 60% less engagement than brands with 500,000-600,000 fans.

Paid Social Media Ads:

A study by Vizu/Neilsen found that in-house advertisers are using paid social media ads more for branding (awareness) than direct-response (sales).

Paid Social Media Ad Objectives

 Agency marketers responded similarly, but not quite as weighted towards branding, and more heavy on both Mixed categories.

Email Marketing Trends:

This data comes from a report by Return Path on commercial email benchmarks, for Q4 2012:

Delivery Rates:

Email Delivery Rates

Open Rates:

Email Open Rate by Platform

Email Open Rates by Mobile Device

Email Read Rates:

According to Return Path the average read rate for commercial emails was 17% by Q4 2012.

Here’s what read rates looked like by industry, with year-over-year change highlighted.

Email Read Rates for Finance & Business Email Read Rates for Shopping, Travel, Education, Entertainment Email Read Rates for News and Social Networks

You can see that social networks and news sites had the worst performance – if you’re working in that segment, you’d better start delivering more value in each email.

Mobile & Tablet Adoption & Trends:

According to data from Cisco, the number of mobile devices will exceed the world population this year. We’ll hit 1.4 mobile-connected devices per capita by 2017.

Rimm Kaufman’s Q4 2012 study showed that their clients saw 25% of Google search visits coming from mobile devices that quarter. However, it was only 19% for Yahoo search traffic, and 6% for Bing search traffic.

I personally would speculate that this is a result of Google being the default search engine on all Apple and Android devices. Most users don’t care enough to go out of their way to change that default.

Tablets Convert Well:

Tablets vs. Desktop:

An eConsultancy study found that tablet conversion rates for Cyber Monday 2012 were on par with desktop conversion rates.

Another study with smaller affiliate-focused data reported conversion rates almost double for tablet over PC.

I think that’s higher than normal based on a couple of private conversations with people working in ecommerce, but they have suggested that on par or +/- 10% is pretty accurate.

As mentioned earlier, ROI for tablet PPC can be much higher due to lower CPCs.

Tablets vs. Mobile:

The same eConsultancy study of Cyber Monday 2012 showed that tablets converted 4x better than smartphones.

Tablets By Time of Day:

No big surprise here, but a Get Elastic study (they produce tablet ecommerce sites) showed that tablet conversions are highest on nights and weekends. If you’re doing email or social media marketing, take this into account when scheduling content to go out at night and over the weekend.

Arggh! So Much Data! Where Do We Focus?!

eConsultancy did a few studies in late 2012 to find out where digital marketers were focused their efforts for 2013. Here are a few of the charts along with my commentary. Charts created by MarketingCharts.com, an awesome website that I used heavily in creating this presentation.

Digital Marketer’s Top Priorities for 2013:

Digital Marketers Top Priorities in 2013

Top categories were Content Marketing, Conversion Rate Optimization, Social Media Engagement, and Targeting and Personalization, each getting 40% of repondents mentioning them as top priorities.

Which is great, but talk is cheap. What do their budgets reflect as their priorities?

2013 Digital Marketing Budgets

Boom. That’s the data I really wanted to see.

Digital marketing budgets increasing for at least 49% of respondents in every category.

65-70% of in-house marketers reported increases in content marketing, SEO, and email marketing for 2013 budgets.

Interestingly, the biggest reductions were in PPC and online display ads, both of which, in my opinion, tend to be fairly measurable in terms of ROI and conversions.

Speaking of ROI – How Are We Doing At Measurement?

Another eConsultancy study has been measuring digital marketer’s feelings on how well we understand ROI for the last few years. Take a look at Feb 2013 vs Feb 2010 – just three years ago:

2013 Understanding of Digital Marketing ROI

The number of people responding that their understanding of digital marketing ROI was Good to Very Good dropped from 67% to 50% over 3 years.

The number of people that said Poor to Very Poor jumped from 10% up to 18% over the same period.

But here’s the thing – while we don’t feel our understanding is great overall, we do feel that the ROI is above average in many channels. Take a look at this chart, without our reported feelings on ROI by channel:

ROI by digital Marketing Channel

Yowza. Let’s take a deeper dive:

Number of respondents saying that a channel had good or excellent ROI:

  • SEO & organic search – 79% of respondents.
  • Email marketing - 70% of respondents.
  • PPC - 58% of respondents.

Areas where less than 50% of respondents rated the channel’s ROI as good or excellent

  • Online display ads
  • Offline direct marketing
  • Mobile marketing
  • Affiliate marketing

Combine this ROI data with the 2013 budget data, and I think we have a good idea of where the internet marketing community is headed in 2013.

So What Changes Going Forward:

This is the part where I start speculating based upon my own feelings of growing priorities. Here are the top 3:

1 – The Content Arms Race Heats Up

Companies have seen the light. To have any chance of competing in the organic search and social space, they need content. More and more companies producing more and more content results in one thing: a content arms race. It’s been happening for years, but now is when the stakes get higher, because poor quality content is quickly getting less and less useful for SEO, and even if it gets you rankings, it doesn’t convert.

The only choice companies have in competitive spaces is to be prolific or be profound in their content creation. Preferably both.

2 – Better Data Results in Better Marketing

I mean this in two ways:

First, better data gives us better performance metrics for marketing efforts. More and more larger companies are using business intelligence platforms to analyze performance across all business segments. The marketing department is no exception. From automated dashboard startups popping up left and right, to deeper diving applications like Tableau, we’re seeing data pouring into our marketing toolset just as fast as it’s pouring into every other department.

Second, I believe that data will be one of the defining characteristics of businesses winning the content marketing war within their markets. In fact, I’m doing an entire presentation on that concept in early March, and I’ll have a corresponding post here as well.

I’ve mentioned before that I believe using data is one key to earning respect, both for individuals and for brands. I think this needs to be a central part of marketing budgets, and needs to go far beyond simply producing infographics.

3 – More and More Companies Are Going to Turn to CRO

Here’s why I feel that way. It’s only getting harder and harder to stick out as more content gets produced by companies. We need to get better at converting the eyeballs we have, which in turn maximizes investments in traffic generation like SEO and PPC. As the CRO field matures more and gets more recognition, I think it will be just as common for established companies to have ongoing CRO teams/agencies, the same way they’ve ongoing SEO & PPC efforts.

Now it’s your turn – where do you think the internet marketing space is headed?

What other studies have you seen on these marketing trends that others should read?

About This Author:

Kane is the founder of Content Harmony, a content marketing agency based in Seattle. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter at @KaneJamison.

#AdvertisingShould Be Less About Advertisers

By: Kane Jamison 0 comments

Yesterday Ian Lurie published a post on the Portent blog called Advertising should. The concept was to build on what advertising should be, rather than what advertising currently is.

It coincided with the launch of advertisingshould.com, which aggregates everything on Twitter that uses the hashtag #advertisingshould.

Ian also asked for contributions – “Tweet how you think advertising should work, and use the hashtag #advertisingshould.”

Before I throw in my thoughts, I have to admit that I’ve never felt any connection to the word “advertising.” To me, advertising is about paid media and interruption marketing, and conjures up images of large media buys, magazine spreads, and 30-second radio & TV commercials.

That world is foreign to me – I’m coming from a place of creating interesting things and spreading the word about them. I was already doing that before I ever realized that I could do it on behalf of companies for a living. That act of creating interesting things as a brand conjures up a different word to me: marketing.

So, with that grain of salt, here’s my two additions:

1) #AdvertisingShould Be Less About Advertisers Click to Tweet

Enough about you, let's talk about me!

Here’s the wikipedia definition of advertising (emphasis mine):

Advertising is a form of communication for marketing and used to encourage or persuade an audience (viewers, readers or listeners; sometimes a specific group) to continue or take some new action.

So, let’s talk about persuasion for a moment. There’s a concept created by author Robert Cialdini in his book Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion called the 6 Weapons of Influence. The 6 weapons of influence are:

  1. Reciprocity
  2. Commitment and Consistency
  3. Social Proof
  4. Authority
  5. Liking
  6. Scarcity

If advertising is about persuasion, and you want me to like you, the biggest thing advertising needs to do is focus on me, not on the advertiser.The concept is pretty straightforward – these are the 6 triggers you can use to persuade people. I want to focus on #5: liking.

Take a look back at How to Win Friends and Influence People, the quintessential guide on how to be a more likable person. Dale Carnegie lists 6 ways to make people like you:

  1. Become genuinely interested in other people.
  2. Smile.
  3. Remember that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.
  4. Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.
  5. Talk in terms of the other person’s interests.
  6. Make the other person feel important – and do it sincerely.

Advertisers – can you count how many of those items are about you? The answer is just one of them – smile – and it doesn’t involve talking about yourself.

If you want me to like you or your brand, quit talking in terms of what you offer and start talking in terms of how you help me. How do you make my life better?

2) #AdvertisingShould Be Less Deceptive Click to Tweet

Does it really Ad up? by Lab42There was an infographic released by a market research firm called Lab42 last week called Does it really Ad up? - you can click on the thumbnail to the right to load it.

They surveyed 500 people about their perceptions of advertisements. Here’s a handful of the results:

  • Only 3% of those surveyed described the claims made in ads as very accurate.
  • 87% think half or more cleaning product ads are photoshopped.
  • 96% think half or more weight loss ads are photoshopped.
  • 76% thought ads were somewhat or very exaggerated.

Ads have a reputation for deception.

Over the life of a brand, I believe persuasion by deception will hurt far more than it will help. I’m struggling to come up with some good supporting evidence for that, but I’m not sure if it’s necessary.

Let’s go back to the 6 weapons of influence for a moment:

If I, as a consumer, think your company or your ads are deceitful, you’ve instantly made me (A) dislike you, and (B) question your credibility and therefore your authority. That doesn’t mean I won’t buy from you, but it’s not the type of activity that builds brand loyalty.

If your ads aren’t working towards building credibility, authority, and brand loyalty, you’re wasting your money.

So those are the two things I think advertising should be – focused on how you can help customers, and honest.

Here’s a few of my favorite contributions:

#AdvertisingShould be measurable:

#AdvertisingShould evoke emotion:

#AdvertisingShould stop yelling:

Feel free to link to your favorites in the comments.

About This Author:

Kane is the founder of Content Harmony, a content marketing agency based in Seattle. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter at @KaneJamison.

Build A Reputation For Using Data

By: Kane Jamison 3 comments

Last year I saw a quote that managed to lodge itself in my brain for the past 6 months. It was from a crowd-sourced SEOMoz post on career advice for SEOs:

Build a reputation for using data. Why? Well, the numbers usually speak for themselves and their message is usually more powerful than yours.

-Jonathon Colman

Toss that around for a minute while I share another quote. This one is from Bill Sebald’s recent post, Case Study (Or It Didn’t Happen):

I want to see more proof.

There’s a time and place for theoretical marketing posts (including SEO); I’ve written my share. I dislike when these same posts suggest facts that haven’t been proven, or when they raise more questions than they answer. As content producers we need to be conscious of this.

-Bill Sebald

Both of these quotes are circling around the same concept:

Data Builds Credibility.

Justified Budget Proposals by MarketooningWhen used appropriately, data removes subjectivity from the conversation.

Good data is reliable, empirical, and objective.

Good data can back up the wildest claims.

  • Using data is like having an unwavering testimonial for the case you’re trying to make.

It doesn’t matter if you’re convincing a client that you’ve helped build sales, convincing your boss that you deserve a raise, or making a business case for a new marketing initiative – data helps you build a more credible case.

This post applies to both professionals and organizations.

Building a reputation for using data is something we need to do as professionals, and something we need to do as organizations.

Both have reputations that need to be built up carefully and purposefully, and the reputation of an organization is tied to the reputation of its people, and vice versa.

Data Depersonalizes Decision-Making.

This isn't about me. It's about the data.I borrowed this headline from Avinash Kaushik’s presentation on Seven Steps to Creating a Data Driven Decision Making Culture.

Gut decisions might feel good, but data-driven decision making takes personal conflict and feelings out of the situation, and focuses the discussion on the facts we have in front of us.

Avinash’s post talks about HiPPOs: Highest Paid Person’s Opinion:

HiPPO’s rule the world, they over rule your data, they impose their opinions on you and your company customers, they think they know best (sometimes they do), their mere presence in a meeting prevents ideas from coming up.

The solution to this problem is to depersonalize decision making, simply don’t make it about you or what you think. Go outside, get context from other places. Include external or internal benchmarks in your analysis. Get competitive data (we are at X% of ZZ metric and our competition is at X+9% of ZZ metric).

-Avinash Kaushik

This works down the corporate ladder, too:

Data gives us an objective way to deliver critical feedback without calling a person’s self-worth into question. As a manager, which of the following statements builds more respect from an under-performing employee?

  1. Your performance has been lagging compared to the rest of the customer service team.
  2. Your average response time is 35% higher than the rest of the customer service team.

Option #2 focuses an otherwise ugly conversation on a measurable performance indicator, and at the same time gives you a framework to fix the problem, rather than relying on a “gut metric.”

People Buy Things for Results.

Buy All The Things

This one isn’t rocket science - people buy things to fill needs. Basic needs, emotional needs, psychological needs, etc.

The results you produce help people quantify how well you fill their needs.

  • When clients hire your company, they’re looking for results.
  • When companies hire you, they’re looking for results.
  • When customers buy your product, they’re looking for results.

How do we measure results? Data is one of the best ways:

  • “On average our clients saw a 12% reduction in manufacturing costs, which resulted in a 240% average return on investment in the first year they hired us.”
  • “At my last job, I oversaw PR for a product launch that contributed to 25% of the company’s annual growth. We were able to tie 30% of product sales directly to press received.”
  • “Our trucks tow 20% more weight than the competition, and gets 12% better gas mileage.”

People decide which options will fill their needs best by using the information they have available. The results and the data you put forth helps them decide to choose you.

When Can You Use Data to Build Credibility?

Strive to use data to justify your position every time you make a claim while interacting with clients, managers, and peers:

  • Publishing case studies and white papers that are focused on numbers and facts, rather than conjecture.
  • Requiring the use of data as support for all business decisions in an organization.
  • Tying resume entries to results you’ve achieved.
  • Focusing on improving measurable results during ongoing client reporting.
  • Referencing data when having debates on social media and blog comments.
  • Giving customers better product information on product sales pages.

Use Data To Tell Stories.

There’s a second part of the quote at the beginning of this article that I left out:

Be a good storyteller. Except that data doesn’t speak for itself. Neither does a business case, I’ve found. Even ROI figures are open to interpretation. So the most successful SEOs add elements of human connection, drama, and creativity to the way they tell their stories. Humans evolved to share and consume stories — it’s part of the way we learn new information — and good SEOs are aware of that trait and use it to grow their success.”

-Jonathon Colman

At first I thought it was a bit funny that Jonathon started out by saying that “numbers usually speak for themselves” and moments later followed up with “except that data doesn’t speak for itself.”

After thinking about it for a bit it occurred to me that at the end of the day, as marketers, we’re using data to persuade. Persuasion requires subjectivity – persuasion requires an opinion. But by grounding our opinions in data, we can build objectivity into our arguments, and we can use data to break down objections to our case.

You can approach this two ways – observe data and make a compelling case out of it, or make a compelling case and find data to support it.

4 Ways to Make This Post Actionable:

1) Take a look back at the past year and find places for improvement.

Take a look at the claims you’ve made in the past year, either publicly or in your organization, and find one that you didn’t back up with data. Go find data that supports it or refutes it, and if you can’t, figure out a way you can test it yourself.

I personally have a couple examples of claims I’ve made in the past year that I could have supported better that I’ll be sharing here in the future.

2) Look for interesting internal data to publish.

Figure out what data your organization has that you can publish. Internal data is an immense source of content and one that no one else can publish. That makes it a great way to differentiate yourself from competitors.

Take a look at this example from CX Partners on internal Above/Below the Fold user testing data from 2009. It has 163 comments, and 47 linking root domains in Open Site Explorer.

3) Look for existing content on your website that could be improving by adding new data.

Case studies are a great place to start, because they’ll probably improve the conversion rate for website visitors already looking to hire you.

Landing Pages by Conversion RateLook through Google Analytics for other pages on your site that were frequently viewed by users prior to converting. One method is to check landing pages that end with the highest conversion rate. Those are great places to add data, even in the form of single sentences:

  • “79% of our customers say our software is now part of their daily workflow.”

E-commerce providers – start surveying your buyers with statements such as “would you buy this product again?” After gathering this data for long enough, you can publish it on the product page in a manner like this:

  • “68% of the last 156 people who bought this product said they would buy it again.”

Doing this pulls in social proof as well, and I bet doing it site wide would help conversions overall. (Did you catch that claim without data? Someone with an e-commerce store please test this and report back.)

4) Prioritize building data into your content marketing efforts more often.

This one speaks for itself. Make the use of data a habit, and you’ll build a reputation for using data.

Now I’m putting the question back to you – where else can we use data to improve our credibility?

About This Author:

Kane is the founder of Content Harmony, a content marketing agency based in Seattle. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter at @KaneJamison.

New Year’s Resolutions Are A Lot Like Starting A Blog

By: Kane Jamison 0 comments

In both instances, you’re probably setting yourself up for failure.

Are you really expecting to run blog every day for the next year? Or twice a week for that matter?

Seems a bit extreme to me.

The Science of New Year’s Resolutions:

Leo Widrich from Buffer wrote a good article earlier this week on the science of New Year’s resolutions. His four suggestions?

  1. Pick only one resolution.
  2. Take baby steps – make it a tiny habit.
  3. Hold yourself accountable for what you want to change: Tell others or write it down.
  4. Focus on the carrot not the stick – positive feedback and rewards increase your chance of success.

I agree with 1 & 2. Few people stick to absolute goals (like quitting smoking cold turkey). You’ve got a much better chance of sticking to one smaller habit change.

I don’t fully agree with his 3rd assertion. There are conflicting studies that suggest telling other people your goals makes you less likely to complete them. I tend to agree, since I’ve experienced this in the past. However, I think writing it down is a much better alternative and makes the goal more real.

Leo’s fourth point is key to me. Building some sort of positive feedback loop is essential to sticking with your goals.

How Do You Apply This To Blogging?

Pick one resolution:

If you’re looking to blog more, there’s only one goal you should be focused on: hitting publish more often.

Take baby steps:

Nobody needs to hear what you think every day. Who do you think you are, Seth Godin?

Start with a realistic goal. Hit publish once a month if you haven’t been blogging at all. Write 5 posts per month if you’ve already been writing 4.

Hold yourself accountable & write it down:

  1. Take out a big sheet of paper.
  2. Write down the one sentence goal.
  3. Tape it up behind your monitor.
  4. Smile every time you look up and know you’ve hit your goal.
  5. Not smiling? Get back to work.

Focus on the carrot not the stick:

What kind of positive feedback loops can you create while blogging? Traffic is the obvious one. Social recognition is another: tweets, Facebook likes, and other social shares can take awhile to build up depending on your starting point, but in the beginning each one can be oh-so-satisfying.

Whatever your poison, learn to relish hitting publish, and learn to love the recognition that comes from having visitors read your content. And don’t forget that coffee is for closers. Give yourself a treat once you’ve hit publish, even if it’s just a cup of coffee.

Forgive Failures:

Expect to fail occasionally. So you missed a post – either add that missed post to next month’s workload, or forgive yourself and move on.

Missed posts are a temporary setback. It only becomes a trend if you continue doing it.

According to a study of 700 New Year’s resolutions by Richard Wiseman, a psychology professor in the UK, “people who failed tended to dwell on the ”bad things” that would happen if they did not achieve their goal.”

Better Blogging Resolutions Habits:

One last thing. Try setting SMART Goals, not resolutions. Nobody keeps “resolutions.” You’ve got a fighting chance with SMART goals because they’re more like habits than an abstract resolution.

What does a SMART goal look like for blogging more? Here’s an example:

SMART Blogging Goals

More Goal Psychology Resources:

The psychology world has done quite a bit of studies on goal setting and New Year’s resolutions. Here’s a few other academic resources I found valuable:

Focus on the “Sacred” not the “Powerful”:

Marquette.edu: Big Question: Are New Year’s Resolutions A Good Idea?

Recent research in [the area of goal psychology] by Professor Robert Emmons focuses on personal strivings — various goals a person is trying to achieve in daily life. He has found that those with predominantly POWER-oriented personal strivings, such as “advance my career,” “make more money” or “control my family members,” have relatively lower levels of life well being.

He also discovered that folks with high levels of subjective well being, those who perceive themselves as experiencing lots of positive emotions, list personal strivings centering on the SACRED: “try to spend more time in prayer,” “remember to be grateful for all that God has given me” and “acknowledge the beauty and mystery in my relationships with others.”

Start Now:

University of Maryland Medical Center: Where to Begin: Expert Advice on Maintaining Resolutions

According to Hinda Dubin, M.D., a clinical assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and psychiatrist at the University of Maryland Medical Center, the key to achieving even your most lofty goals is to get started immediately.

“Action precedes motivation, not the other way around,” said Dr. Dubin. “People often think that they should wait until they are motivated to start doing something good for themselves. They say, ‘I’ll start that diet or fitness program when I’m really well rested and have a lot of energy’. But it doesn’t work that way.”

-

P.S.  - This blog isn’t a New Year’s resolution. It’s been forming in my head and on my screen for a few months. January 1st just happened to be a convenient day to launch. My New Year’s resolution for 2013 was to build more cairns.

 

About This Author:

Kane is the founder of Content Harmony, a content marketing agency based in Seattle. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter at @KaneJamison.

The 8 Best Content Strategy Presentations of 2012

By: Kane Jamison 6 comments

You may be able to win a battle with a good piece of content, but you can’t win the war without a good content strategy.

Here are our favorite content strategy presentations and slide decks of 2012:

A Content Strategy Roadmap

by Kristina Halvorson (@halvorson) of Brain Traffic. Presented at UX London.



Highlights:

Content strategy plans for the creation, delivery and governance of useful, usable content. Not just What… but, What, Why, How, When, For Whom, With What, Where, When, How Often, & What Next.

Description:

How to make a website: discover, define, design, develop, deploy. It’s a familiar framework for most of our project processes. Now along comes this content strategy thing. Sure, it sounds like a great idea, but how does it fit in with what we’re already doing? Walk through a a typical website project to find out how content strategy fits (and why it will make you so happy!)

Getting Unstuck: Content Strategy for the Future

by Sara Wachter-Boettcher (@sara_ann_marie). Presented at Web Directions South.



Highlights:

We can’t make more content for every device and channel. It’s time we make our content do more. Click to Tweet

Description:

Responsive. Adaptive. Mobile first. Cross-channel. We all want a web that’s more flexible, future-friendly, and ready for unknowns. There’s only one little flaw: our content is stuck in the past. Locked into inflexible pages and documents, our content is far from ready for today’s world of apps, APIs, read-later services, and responsive sites—much less for the coming one, where the web is embedded in everything from autos to appliances.

We can’t keep creating more content for each of these new devices and channels. We’d go nuts trying to manage and maintain all of it. Instead, we need content that does more for us: Content that can travel and shift while keeping its meaning and message intact. Content that’s trim, focused, and clear—for mobile users and for everyone else, too. Content that matters, wherever it’s being consumed.

The Strategic Side of Content Marketing

by Rand Fishkin (@randfish). Presented at MozCon 2012.



Highlights:

Content Strategy ≠  a list of viral content you think will get you links. Click to Tweet

Content Strategy ≠ a list of influencers/publications you want mentioning your brand. Click to Tweet

So what IS a “Content Marketing Strategy,” and what does the process look like to develop one?

 Description:

An in-depth look at the structure of great content marketing campaigns including how to set up your site, content, and team for success.

How to Build SEO Into Content Strategy

by Jonathon Colman (@jcolman). Presented at 2012 Content Strategy Forum.



Highlights:

Bottom Line: Bad SEO is a disaster. Good SEO is very helpful. So let’s build a bridge:

Between content strategy over here…

…and SEO over here. Click to Tweet

Description:

Let’s be honest: for most content strategists and other people working with online content, SEO is The Worst Part Of The Job.

It’s hugely technical, it’s shrouded in mystery, it seems to be focused on robots instead of people, there are unspoken rules, everything can turn on a dime, and it never, ever seems to end.

But SEO doesn’t have to be this way. It’s time to begin a conversation between these two disciplines – they’re far more alike than you might think. And when they work together on behalf of users and customers, amazing things can happen that will drive your organisation forward.

I can’t promise to change your mind about SEO, but you’ll leave this session understanding how to build the essentials into your work in ways that are simple, make sense, and are pain-free. You’ll see what business impacts and wins for the customer SEO and Content Strategy have had at REI, a major retailer in the US. And you’ll have the vocabulary, understanding and tools that you need to talk with your SEO… or to take it for yourself.

Drive traffic, amaze your visitors, and Win the Internet — with SEO and Content Strategy working together.

What’s Your Perception Strategy? (Why It’s NOT All About Content)

by Stephen P. Anderson (@stephenanderson). Presented at IAS 2012.



Highlights:

Your brain constructs (an experience of) reality.

Perception is not a process of active absorption but of active construction, based on prior experiences and memories. Click to Tweet

So, in terms of an experience, it is not all about content. External and internal context affect user perception.

&

Brain scans confirm that people don’t just think the more expensive (but identical) wine tasted better – it actually really did taste better… Click to Tweet

Description:

If we focus too much on content, we ignore what we know about how our associative brain comes to makes sense new information. Think about how many people respond before reading past the first sentence of an email, or how a magazine article doesn’t get the same reaction when displayed in HTML. Or consider how knowing the author of a publication influences your judgement of that content.

Picking up from the session Stephen P. Anderson gave last year on “The Stories We Construct” (a biological look at the narratives that influence behavior), this session focuses on how we come to perceive—and respond to— information. From phantom limbs to magicians fooling our senses, Stephen proposes a model that makes sense of how we truly experience information. Practical? You’ll leave with a deep understanding of everything UX is about and an awareness of common practices that don’t account for this knowledge.

Content Strategy: What, Why, Why Should You Care?

by Margot Bloomstein (@mbloomstein) of Appropriate, Inc. Presented at IA Konferenz 2012.



Highlights:

Deliverables are merely punctuation in the conversation. Don’t let them replace the conversation. Click to Tweet

&

Why Content Strategy? Because we all want the same thing, but content keeps getting in the way. Click to Tweet

&

If you don’t know WHAT you need to communicate, how will you know HOW, or if you succeed? Click to Tweet

Description:

Are you ready to add content strategy to your resume? We’ll gain some practical, hands-on experience together. Let’s put a few sample organizations through the paces of “typical” process in a website redesign engagement. First, we’ll discuss how to prioritize communication goals and develop a message architecture with a hands-on exercise—ideal whether you’re designing for the web, a mobile app, social media, or an offline experience. Then we’ll discuss how you can use this foundation to conduct a content audit, and work together to do it. Finally, we’ll ask “so what?” We’ll uncover the implications of a content audit through a gap analysis that points to content needs and next steps for our sample organizations. You’ll leave with the confidence and savvy to bring content strategy techniques and thinking back to your own organization.

A Blog Is Not A Content Strategy

by John F. Doherty (@dohertyjf). Presentation reformatted from original post.



Highlights:

Content Marketing vs + Content Strategy = WIN. Click to Tweet

&

A blog cannot meet all user needs. Click to Tweet

Description:

Blogging has the following purposes, in my opinion:

  • It shows your thought leadership;
  • It can be used to consistently educate your readers;
  • Depending on your niche, it can drive conversions and business inquiries.

But a blog isn’t the only way to do this, and many times a blog does not fit a specific vertical. If you’re just blogging to blog, you’re wasting your time. The brands winning online are not just blogging anymore.

Content Strategy for Mobile: The Workshop

by Karen McGrane (@karenmcgrane) of Bond Art + Science.



Highlights:

4 Content Truths:

  1. Content matters on mobile.
  2. Strive for content parity.
  3. It’s not a strategy if you can’t maintain it. Click to Tweet
  4. You don’t get to decide what device people use. They do. Click to Tweet

Description:

You don’t get to decide which platform or device your customers use to access your content: they do.

Mobile isn’t just smartphones, and it doesn’t necessarily mean you are on the move. It’s a proliferation of devices, platforms, and screensizes — from the tiniest “dumb” phones to the desktop web. How can you be sure that your content will work everywhere, all the time?

So – did I miss any great content strategy presentations?

You can upvote this post on Inbound.org.

About This Author:

Kane is the founder of Content Harmony, a content marketing agency based in Seattle. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter at @KaneJamison.

What is Content Harmony?

By: Kane Jamison 1 comment

Content Harmony is about finding a balance across the entire content marketing process.

From content strategy, to content creation, to promotion of content, to analytics of content performance, organizations need to find a balance in all aspects in order to see great results from their content marketing efforts.

This Venn diagram shows what happen when one of those elements is missing:

What is Content Harmony?

Content Creation:

Most companies dipping their toes into the water of content marketing understand the content creation element. A lack of content creation results in shortage of content to promote, plain and simple.

Content Promotion:

Content creation without content promotion results in a lack of audience. For growing brands, this could mean lack of outreach to get in front of your intended audience. For established brands with an audience already built, this could mean lack of communication about content being produced.  Either way, regardless of how established your brand is, you need to find a happy balance between creating content and making sure the right people know it was published.

Content Strategy:

Aside from lack of promotion, lack of an actual strategy is the other major error in content marketing. It’s one thing to understand that content creation and promotion can result in traffic to a site, but it’s another thing to tie those content creation and traffic goals to your larger business goals, like sales, customer retention, or building your email list.

Bringing Harmony to Content Marketing:

In art, the concept of harmony refers to the combination of elements to form a consistent and orderly whole.

Content Harmony is about achieving that with your organization’s content. Forming an orderly and consistent message across your body of work, and building unity in every element of your content marketing efforts.

Our goal as an organization is to help our clients find harmony in their content marketing, and highlight great content marketing practices through our blog and the other content we produce.

About This Author:

Kane is the founder of Content Harmony, a content marketing agency based in Seattle. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter at @KaneJamison.

8 Basics of Small Business PPC Management

By: Kane Jamison 0 comments

This article was originally published at HoodWebManagement.com in Nov 2012 and was migrated here in May 2013.

For a small business needing an immediate source of traffic and potential customers and leads, PPC is an essential tool. But like any tool, PPC is much more useful when you learn to use it correctly. Here are 8 basics we use with our small business PPC management clients that all small businesses should consider before getting started.

1 – Figuring Out Your Budget

Deciding how much to spend could be the hardest part for a beginner. You should start with a good handle on how much you’re willing to spend per month, while knowing in the back of your mind that you’ll make some mistakes upfront and “lose” some of the money you spend. So, in the beginning, don’t spend more than you can afford to comfortably lose. Once you know what you’re willing to spend on a monthly basis, divide that amount by 30 and that will be your daily budget for the campaign.

Gambling on PPC

2 – Figuring Out Your Cost Per Click (CPC)

So the next step is figuring out how much you’re willing to pay per click. This metric is called cost per click, or CPC for short. Early on this is going to be difficult, because there’s a number of variables in play that you’re not going to know yet. The rough formula that you’ll be optimizing over time is this one:

Figure our your average revenue per sale (e.g. $500)

Figure out your average cost of goods per sale (e.g. $300)

Which leaves you with your average profit per sale (e.g. $200)

From your profit per sale, figure out how much you’re willing to budget per sale (e.g. $180)

Figure out your conversion rate (e.g. 2.5%)

Multiply your budget per sale by your conversion rate to find out your maximum cost per click (CPC) (e.g. $4.50)

Let’s walk through that one more time:

You spend $300 on labor and materials to provide a service that sells for $500. For the sake of simplifying this example, let’s pretend that the $300 includes both fixed and variable costs. So your profit per sale is $200.

Your total profit per sale is also the most you should spend to get one sale. You wouldn’t spend $250 on advertising to get one sale worth $200 in profit, right?

So in this example, we want to spend less than $200 on PPC ads in order to produce one sale.  At this point you need to decide on a buffer. Are you comfortable spending $180 to get a $200 profit? Or would you be more comfortable spending $100 to get a $200 profit? Early on, this is going to depend on your personal comfort level. I’d suggest staying conservative and getting more aggressive with your numbers as you get more comfortable with PPC in general.

Our conversion rate going to be the hardest number to calculate for your first PPC campaign. Your conversion rate is the percentage of website visitors that will purchase our product or service. A conversion rate of 2.5% would mean that for every 40 visitors to our site, 1 of them converts to a sale. When we multiply our PPC budget per sale (let’s say we’re comfortable spending up to $180 per sale) by our conversion rate (let’s say it’s 2.5%), we now know that we can spend up to $4.50 per click ($180 x 2.5%) and still produce profitable sales. 

Note: Your maximum CPC is not necessarily the amount you’ll spend on every click. Many times your clicks will be cheaper. The maximum CPC is just like a bid in a silent auction where the highest bidder pays a price slightly above the second highest bidder.

Adwords Campaign Screenshot

3 – Figuring Out Your Keywords

There’s a temptation to list every service you offer and every keyword variation you can think of right off the bat. Don’t do it. Start with a single service line, and focus on the keywords that you think are most likely to convert into a sale. You can always add more keywords to test later – for now we want to focus on a small enough handful that you can manage them all comfortably. Also, don’t be afraid to get specific. If “bathroom remodels” produce more profit for your construction business than other types of remodels, start with that before you start targeting broader terms like “remodels”.

If you’re not sure what keywords someone might use to search for your business, start playing with the Google Adwords Keyword Tool. Enter a few terms and click search. You should get a variety of results – select the best options and focus on those.

Learn More: Read the Google Adwords Guide to Building Better Keyword Lists.

Adwords Keyword Tool for PPC

4 – Using Negative Keywords to Improve Conversion Rates

If you’re running a landscaping business, do you want to be buying clicks from people searching for “cheap landscaping companies” or people looking for “do it yourself landscaping“? Probably not, which is why we use negative keywords to remove certain types of searches we don’t want. Here’s some examples of types of negative keywords that may produce poor quality clicks for your business:

  • Price: cheap, free, bargain, inexpensive, overstock
  • Poor Quality: worst, scam, bad
  • Job Seekers: jobs, careers, hiring, internships
  • DIY & References: how to, diagram, examples, home made, diy, do it yourself
  • Education: classes, course, training, program, university

Learn More: Click here to find a much longer list of 200+ negative keywords to consider for B2B PPC.

Negative Keywords in a PPC Campaign

5 – Writing Your Ad Copy

There are entire books written about the copywriting you use for ad headlines and how to go about testing it, but here’s a few tips to start with:

  1. Include the keyword you’re targeting in the headline. Searchers will be on the lookout for that keyword phrase, and it shows up as bold if it’s in your headline.
  2. Try to include some sort of feature or benefit, such as ‘free consultation” or “expert” or “winter special”.
  3. Use proper capitalization, and test whether you capitalize the first word of the line or the entire line of text (Like this example OR Like This Example)
  4. Try starting with 3-6 version of your ad at first. Avoid the temptation to test 20 different versions – you won’t have any idea what to do with all of them.

Learn More: Take a look at PPC Hero’s PPC Ad Copy Writing for Beginners articles to learn more about writing better ad copy.

6 – What Page to Send Visitors To

Most of the time, you’ll want to send PPC visitors somewhere other than your homepage. A good start is to send them to your service page for that keyword. An even better solution is to set up a landing page, dedicated to that service, that encourages the visitor to do what you want them to do (typically call you on the phone, or fill out a contact form).

You can create the landing page on your own, hire someone to do it, or you can use paid services like Unbounce that help you create and optimize landing pages without having to edit your own site.

Learn More: To learn more about landing page basics, take a look at KISSMetrics infographic on the Anatomy of a Perfect Landing Page.

Elements of a Perfect Landing Page

7 – Make Sure You Have Google Analytics Installed

You’ll be able to track some data in Google Adwords, such as which ads generate more clicks, and how much clicks cost for different keywords. But, the data you really need to know is how many of those clicks get to your website and buy something or contact you for more information. You can’t do that unless you have Google Analytics installed. It’s free to use, and fairly easy to install if you’re comfortable editing your own site.

Once you’ve got Google Analytics installed, Google Adwords should be set by default to add tracking codes that Google Analytics can read and use to tell you what keyword site visitors used to find your page. You can also see how long they spent on the site, what pages they looked at, and more advanced data once you dive deeper.

I’d also recommend having an experienced Google Analytics user set up Goal tracking on your site. Goal tracking can be used to figure out which site visitors complete your contact form, purchase a product if you have a shopping cart, or even which customers call you if you opt for a paid phone tracking solution (contact us if you want to learn more about that).

Google Analytics Visits by Channel

8 – Use Geographic Targeting to Pick Your Best Clients

There are tons of approaches to targeting users geographically – by zip code, city, county, state, radius, and more. Pick the one that makes the most sense and covers the area your clients are most likely to come from, and focus there.

Geo-targeting PPC Traffic

More PPC Basic Resources:

Looking to dive deeper? Here’s a few of our favorite resources for beginners:

Photo credits: Poker Chips by yashima

About This Author:

Kane is the founder of Content Harmony, a content marketing agency based in Seattle. You can find him on Google+ and Twitter at @KaneJamison.

MozCon 2012 Live Blog – Day Three

By: Kane Jamison 0 comments

This article was originally published at HoodWebManagement.com in July 2012 and was migrated here in May 2013.

Mozcon 2012

At the last marketing conference I attended (SearchFest in Portland in February) I walked away with 7 pages of handwritten notes after a single day. But, handwritten notes don’t do me or anyone else any good, they just get locked away in the file cabinet. So for MozCon I’m going to publish my notes here. I’m not promising a hardcore live blogging session, but I’ll publish notes on everything that I feel is worth writing down.

You can also find me tweeting @KaneJamison - I’ll try to embed any important tweets from myself and others into this post.

Previous Days: MozCon 2012 Day One Recap & MozCon 2012 Day Two Recap

Other Live Blogging Sessions and Recaps I’m Aware Of:

More recaps and liveblogs to be added here when I find some, Tweet @KaneJamison to get added to this list…

Friday, July 27

If MacGyver Did SEO - Martin Macdonald

Download Presentation Here: https://seomoz.box.com/shared/static/747d18a4ea05ecf20480.pptx

Description: Martin looks at how you can push Excel to do much more than you ever thought possible. In this case, build an index of the web to give you early warnings about index updates and get the full picture of your vertical.

  • Ranking data is the #1 indicator of Google’s algo, and we don’t understand the factors quickly enough
  • If you’re in-house there’s no reason not to be analyzing 25K keywords for your industry daily
  • Martin has created a way of tracking ranking changes over time in Excel
  • Factors Tracked:
    1. Domains
    2. Landing URLs
    3. Keywords
    4. Keyword Volume via Adwords
    5. Keyword Rankings by date
    6. SEO Metrics
    7. Social metrics via socialcrawlitics
  • Full positional data is available in a drill down by site, by day, by keyword type
  • This is awesome -> SocialCrawlitics.com – in beta mode – this is like a crawler version of SharedCount.com – it will crawl all URLs on a site and pull those metrics. Really happy to see this developed – it’s not tricky we just needed to have it built, and it will make it easier to pull in social metrics the same way we currently get link data.
  • Recap of Functionality:
  1. Competitive market analysis
  2. SERP tracking
  3. Opportunity finding
  4. Ranking analysis
  5. Quick and easy algo update data
  6. Fully built in excel – no coding required
  7. Interfaces with 4+ API’s

SEO Project Management - Aleyda Solis

Download Presentation Here: https://seomoz.box.com/shared/static/487002593e5b680351b2.pdf

Description: Learn how to make the most out of project management best practices and methodologies when implementing SEO in big companies and how to sniff out what’s working and what’s not.

Notes:

  • “Even for good SEOs, issues always happen with projects”
  • Situation 1 - Client always complaining regardless of performance
    • Solution involves improvement in communication process
    • Go overboard on setting expectations
    • Agree on necessary resources and timing from the start
    • Identify potential risks from the start
    • Aleyda’s post on Setting SEO Goals
    • Define the communication channels well
  • Situation 2- The Developer messed up
    • Best practice checklists are a great way to implement some structure, accountability, and reliability
    • Ask for early tests to check changes before authorizing a complete roll out
    • Use SEO task schedules as a spreadsheet to make sure everyone is on the same page.
  • Situation 3- The SEO process with no control
 

Attribution Modeling: Why You Must Be Doing It and How To Do It Easily With Google Analytics - Mike Pantoliano

Download Presentation Here: https://seomoz.box.com/shared/static/581717f1788143a61aa6.pdf

Description: Figure out what’s working for your site with attribution modeling. Mike takes two basic tools: GA and Excel and turns them into a goldmine of information.



  • http://bit.ly/excel-ninja - beginner guide to excel that Mike wrote
  • @SpaceTheShiba – 21 year SEO industry expert
  • Attribution modeling is crediting the entire customer journey from discovery to purchase rather than last-touch attribution (at time of sale)
  • Attribution Modeling is all about finding the actual ROI for digital marketing
  • Attribution modeling very often helps SEO channels get credit for sales they’re responsible for
  • Attribution models:
    • Glengarry Glenross – always be closing (last touch attribution)
    • Madonna – first touch (like a version)
    • Oprah – equalized across channels
    • Beavis & Butthead – U-curve – first touch and last touch get most credit, some equalized in the middle
    • Cell phone bars – time decay model – where last touch is most and first touch is least
    • Custom modeling – less credit or more credit depending on where your efforts are focused or other criteria
  • Default in Google Analytics
    • Path length report
    • Assisted conversions report – gives you the real ROI of social media, which last-touch modeling doesn’t give enough credit to
    • Use custom channel grouping rather than default Google reports to get way better value – affiliates and other partnerships for example.
    • Splitting branded and non-branded organic search is one of the essential segmentations
  • Google Analytics premium is pricey (over $150,000 per year) and has true attribution modeling, and is a data geek’s wet dream
    • http://bit.ly/mozmodeling is a free Excel doc version of this attribution modeling that GA Premium does.
    • Sweet and easy to do by exporting a specific report from GA
    • GA has 30 days of data so works poorly with longer sales processes
  • WANT MORE BUDGET FOR ORGANIC SEARCH? PROVE YOU’RE WORTH IT WITH CORRECT ATTRIBUTION MODELING <– Good takeaway
  • “Attribution modeling gives you the confidence to invest in channels that you didn’t know were killing it” – @MikeCP 

Estimating Traffic Based on Keyword Research - Jessica Bowman

Download Presentation Here: https://seomoz.box.com/shared/static/918bd422a6bb8de802c2.pptx

Description: Don’t let changes in Google’s tools get you down. Jessica’s going to improve your spirits by showing you how to estimate your keywords’ traffic with the data at your fingertips.

Thus far Jessica’s presentation is over my head, but she just mentioned an Excel doc to make things easier so I’m warming up to it… apparently we need to email her for the XLS sheet, will post the link if she allows.

Tweets to embed:

A New Form of CRO - Joanna Lord

Download Presentation Here: https://seomoz.box.com/shared/static/16a7f03100a99a8f7cd4.pptx

Description: Are you ready to rock Conversion Rate Optimization? Joanna walks you through the psychology of the new consumer and how to rethink traditional CRO to capture more conversions, more engagement, and keep customers happy.

  • A marketer’s job has gone way beyond our websites – we have so many social and third party sites we need to work on.
  • So what should we spend our time on? Joanna has 10 suggestions for us:
  • 10 – Your Story – test and improve your story
    • http://bit.ly/dcDsbx - must watch Ted Talk regarding the Golden Circle Theory
    • Focus on
      • Why? The Cause
      • How? Value Prop
      • What? Product/Services)
    • Kiva is a great example of getting your story in people’s faces
  • 9 –  Your Pillars
    • These are the things that are never changed on your site (navigational pieces, core pieces)
    • You need to test these aspects of your site – be prepared for pushback
    • Dropbox is a great example – homepage has a video and a download button, and small text links below that.
  • 8 – You Relationships
    • Rethink how your partnerships with other sites are providing value and whether it can be improved or should be changed.
    • Things to test:
      • words
      • placement
      • photos
      • who
      • context
      • video
  • 7 – Your Triggers
    • These are things like Call to Actions and similar site elements.
    • People have 3 brains:
      • New Brain – appeals to our sense of logic, ration, and reason
      • Middle Brain – emotions, gut feelings, spans the two other brains
      • Reptilian Brain -
  • 6 – Your Unique Value Proposition
    • Testing this doesn’t mean putting it everywhere
    • Figure out new UVPs depending on audience and specific product
    • Zappo’s main page has different UVP than their Juniors page, which focuses on getting it now.
    • Pottery Barn calls out shipping when appropriate and pricing on a different product where customer sensitivity matters.
    • Is your UVP still the same as what it once was?
  • 5 – Your Schedule
    • Testing WHEN you do things – time / day of week
    • Testing your email triggers after a sale or signup
    • What are you scheduling? What else could you be scheduling instead?
  • 4 – Your Tools
  • 3 – Your Thank You
    • Optimize how you thank your customers. This is your job, not just customer service.
    • Chill is a great example of thanking customers at the one-month anniversary (by providing a good video of a dog)
    • Make sure your emails don’t bore people to death…
  • 2 – Your Feedback Channels
    • How can people tell you their problems?
    • Do your pages have a quick access way for people to ask questions?
    • Places to improve:
      • Analytics
      • Survey Tools
      • Live Chat
      • Cancel Forms
      • Help Tickets
      • Listening Tools
  • 1 – Your Biggest Success
    • “Dare to change your best performers for more win in less time.”
    • This is as risky as it gets, and this is how big companies get subsequent successes
  • Stop “setting up tests”
    • I think the takeaway is to continue testing, not just testing it once and accepting it
  • Stop waiting for resources
    • outsource
    • do it yourself
  • Stop owning it
    • It’s not all about you – it’s a team effort. Let others take responsibility for tasks, too.
  • Stop pushing pennies
    • “Think bigger” -Tom Critchlow to Joanna
  • Stop stopping
    • Part of determining your value is how determined you are to being valuable
  • So what is Conversion Rate Optimization nowadays?
    • story optimization
    • relationship optimization
    • process optimization
    • value optimization
    • loyalty optimization
  • “It’s more than running tests, and it demands that we think bigger”
Holy cow… excellent presentation.

Special Session: Community Speakers

Community Speakers: Dana Lookadoo, Darren Shaw, Jeff McRitchie, & Fabio Ricotta

For the first time ever, MozCon invites four speakers from our community based on their amazing pitches to deliver quick, actionable tips directly to you. Prepare to be blown away.

Rock Your SEO With Structured Social Sharing – Dana Lookadoo

Download Presentation Here: https://seomoz.box.com/shared/static/11890d611d77870bf980.pptx

Description: Get the best practices for optimizing social sharing and how this structured markup makes a difference for SEO. Get tips on optimizing pages to create and tracking the best share snippet. Plus, quickly and automatically create UTM variables to track the effectiveness of each social share with an Excel spreadsheet to make everything easier.



10 Steps for Optimized Engagement With Microdata & Analytics

  1. OG:Title
  2. OG:Description
  3. OG:Image
  4. OG:Type
  5. OG:Url
  6. UTM Variables
  7. Share blurb for Facebook & G+
  8. Hashtags
  9. Twitter/Retweetable
  10. Document & Track

The Best Citations to Get and Other Local SEO Tips - Darren Shaw

Download Presentation Here: https://seomoz.box.com/shared/static/b81fa0b53eeb1f48bde8.pptx

Description: Get the best local citations for your city. Darren gives his tips over 93 cities with 650+ keywords in 71 different business categories. Time to start building your local rankings today.

  • Basically Darren pulled SERPs for local businesses in 93 cities
  • Pulled stats on how well a Local portal (e.g. Yelp or FindLaw.com) was ranking for keyword sets
  • FULL LIST OF SITES IS PUBLISHED HERE: http://getlisted.org/resources/local-citations-by-category.aspx
  • 2nd list is for Moz only – can’t publish link or password
  • Other places to find citations
    • Link Prospector
    • Citation Finder
  • More tactics:
    • site:.edu portland oregon sponsors
    • Write for local pennysaver papers with a citation/link at the end
    • Find local G+ users and get them to come to your business
    • G+ local pages are getting treatment that past local pages didn’t get – and you can build links to them ;-)
    • Use a “near=” URL parameter to tweak google results
    • Offer other local non-competitors a coupon for their customers and a link to the coupon page
    • 5th Google review is a big booster
    • Learn to use Mapmaker
    • G+ probably looking at CTR – get 10 reviews to get Zagat rating and increase CTR

Creating Awesome Video on a Budget - Jeff McRitchie

Download Presentation Here: https://seomoz.box.com/shared/static/338baaf8d587a692717d.pptx

Description: Having trouble finding the ROI for your video marketing initiatives? Video doesn’t have to be hard or expensive anymore. Learn to create awesome video content that supports your SEO efforts without spending a fortune. Jeff shares how he’s created 500+ videos in less than a year all for around $50 each.

  • Any one video they create doesn’t get many users that need it – so they need to produce 1000s affordably to get a positive ROI
  • Goal for 2011 – create over 1000 videos with positive ROI
  • They figured three ways to do that:
  • 1 – Leverage existing content
    • Cost per video to add a opening and closing branding credit was under $5 per video, but they couldn’t control the message well
  • 2 – Use animation
    • Cost using animated static images was not bad, less than $10 per video, but customers told them it sucked and wasn’t helpful
  • 3 – Use demo and how to videos
    • Cost stayed around $50 per video and has been very successful
    • They’re making about 10 videos per week now

Tips on Getting This Done:

  • DON’T use faces in video so you don’t have to sync voice
  • DON”T script, just talk
  • DO Brainstorm lists of what customers care about
  • DO Group similar videos to save on recording costs and get lots done at once
They have attributed sales to video more than covering the production costs (Positive ROI!)
  • Regarding Hosting: Their website hosts a self-hosted version for their site, and they post a version to Youtube that gets embedded on their blog.
  • Where to Get Materials($500 budget setup)
    • 8 foot table
    • Wide piece of paper with stand
    • Lighting from amazon (kits) $300-400
    • Kodak ZI8 cameras for $90 and have since upgraded
  • ShahMenz asked about comedic videos and creative angles – Jeff said that some has worked and some has fallen flat – but worthwhile

E-Commerce SEO — Tips & Tricks - Fabio Ricotta

Download Presentation Here: https://seomoz.box.com/shared/static/e7469ced3c52d6c2754e.pptx

Description: US consumers will spend $327 billion online in 2016, and the competition’s getting really serious. To succeed, sites need to improve their advanced strategies because everyone’s doing a good job on the basic key SEO factors. This session covers tips and tricks such as link building strategies, scalable content creation, and measurement and reports with Google Analytics, developed for one of Brazil’s biggest online retailers.

I had to miss this preso and I never touch e-commerce so I’m not the best guy to comment on it.

Head-to-Head: How to Build a Content Marketing Strategy - Rand Fishkin

Download Presentation Here:

Description: An in-depth look at the structure of great content marketing campaigns including how to set up your site, content, and team for success.



Rand said “don’t try to take notes…” – we’ll see about that:
  • A list of content you think is going to go viral, does not a content strategy make
  • Content marketing is one way of solving the customer acquisition process
  • Roadmap for a Content Strategy:
    • What are your ultimate goals?
      • Customer acquisition? Retention? Hiring?
      • Usually it’s traffic, awareness, retention, or sales/conversions.
  • Where is your target group on the web today?
  • Executing against this well-designed strategy is far easier.
  • Checklist To Produce A Content Strategy:
    • Marketing Goal(s)
    • Target Customer(s)
    • Target Channels
    • Influencers
    • Experience to Deliver
    • ROI comparison against other marketing channels (PPC, offline, etc)
  • Tips
    1. Invest for a 5 Year ROI
    2. Don’t “Target” Influencers, Involve Them
      • Tableau Marketing
    3. Good Artists Borrow, Great Artists Steal
      • Don’t be afraid to take someone else’s good idea and make it better
      • Steal from the media – they’re going for pageviews and can’t deliver the branded experience that you can provide.
    4. Expand Your Definition of “Content”
      • Not just blog articles and photos and press releases, etc.
      • APIs
      • 404s
      • Comments
      • News
      • Your employee benefits (if they’re unique)
      • Your workplace (if it’s worth talking about)

Seattle Children’s Hospital Video that Rand Played:

Head-to-Head: How to Make Your Content Marketing Efforts Reach Further - Tom Critchlow

Download Presentation Here:

Description: Detailed tactics to make every piece of content you create have more social shares, earn more links, and bring more and more valuable traffic to your site.

  • The SEO industry has been chasing tactics, but we’re getting beat out at producing awesome content by ad firms and creative agencies.
  • “Influence online sits with the people who have highly-engaged specialized audiences, not NYT & traditional media companies”
  • Kapost eBook on the ROI of Content Marketing
  • “Content for Huffpo? Has to work for everyone. Content for Tim Ferris? Only has to work for Tim Ferris.
  • Lots more to Tom’s presentation that I probably won’t write here… (and he ended up winning the head to head)

Wrap-Up: Give It Up Session w/ Closing Thoughts - All Speakers

Description: All our speakers take the stage to give you their nifty techniques to send you home with your brain buzzing with more awesome. Plus, some closing thoughts and extra MozCon love.

Not supposed to blog this I think… attendees only.