The Found Gen

Marketing That Works.

Search Results for: data

by

Grammar Friday: The Apostrophe

The Apostrophe.

Strong. Silent. Willing to shoulder the grammatical burden of the possessives that choose him, and the heavily accented literary figure. Given responsibilities which often change dramatically and increase in number without warning.

Strives to be taken seriously. And yet, is here to help a lonely ma’am along the way.

Apostrophes do, after all, exist only to aid us in our language. Just like many forms of punctation, the apostrophe is–at times–overused and underappreciated. That’s why we’re taking a moment today to shine a little light and give some much deserved (and needed) attention to this floating friend of ours.

Here’s a quick-to-reference, handy guide for all your apostrophe needs throughout the year (and really, life).

When you do need an apostrophe:

  • In a possessive singular noun: The girl’s hat.
  • In possessive plural nouns that don’t end in -s: The women’s movement.
  • In a possessive plural noun that does end in an -s: The boys’ game.
  • In contractions which show the omission of letters: Don’t = do not
  • In a plural, lowercase letter: Minding your p’s and q’s.
  • In the word ‘it’s’ when it should read “it is”, not when it is the possessive ‘its’: It’s going to be a cold one today.
  • To indicate non-standard, accented, English: Top ‘o the morning to yee.

When you don’t need an apostrophe:

Plural Nouns:

  • Yes: Our neighbors, the Johnsons, are away for the weekend.
  • No: Our neighbors, the Johnson’s, are away for the weekend.

Plural Abbreviated Years:

  • Yes: The 80s
  • No: The 80’s

Posessive Pronouns:

  • Yes: That game is ours.
  • No: That game is our’s.

These are the basics.  The workload of the apostrophe, however, extends well into the late-night-frantic-google-search arena in which you feel utterly confused and reach towards the white light of your computer screen for help.  The apostrophe will be there to quell your confusion.  But before you type, “how do I refer to my neighbor’s multiple cats in my written request to the board of my apartment building (don’t ask),” into the Google Machine, check out these links for some help:

by

Character Limits on a Meta Title: Are They In The Right Range?

Businesses everywhere are struggling now more than ever to keep up with the fast pace of technology and its impact on advertising. These days the answers to everyone’s questions rest in search engine results, and getting your business’s message to appear near the top of Google results depends on how strong your meta title (and meta description) is.

What’s a Meta Title?

Put simply, meta titles show the name of a web page. It’s the headline that you see on Google and are a main factor in correctly indexing a given page on your website.

What’s a Meta Description?

Meta descriptions are the HTML attributes used to summarize in what your website is all about. They are literally the text you see in the results that appear after you have entered a search. For example, if you were to ask Google “Who sings that Italian song from ‘The Sopranos’?”, among your mixed results you would find several blue hyperlinks (meta-titles) to various websites with a few words (meta-descriptions) that give you a little more information about what the site contains, all before you eventually were able to discover and put “Con te Partito” on repeat and identify with Carmela.

The goal here is obviously to get your message as close to the top as possible and persuade users to trust that message enough to click on it.

How to optimize your meta title and meta description

Brevity is the soul of wit, and the programmers responsible for social media and search engines know this. Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, et al know their audience and distinguish themselves from Polonius by putting limits on their content, appealing to short attention spans everywhere. Search engine giants are no different. Just type “what happens to hamlet” in any search engine, and of the 4,690,000 results that come back in 0.34 seconds, some number of the top 10 will have meta-titles and descriptions that both spoil a wonderful story and are cut off and shortened by ellipses…

This is because search engines truncate results that are too long. When filling in your meta-data, use your keywords intelligently but economically. Create a compelling and concise description—ideally between 150-160 characters long—that is both readable and relevant to increase click-through rates and get the most out of your search marketing.

It’s worth noting that the meta description tag is not something Google’s algorithm takes into consideration when delivering results. It’s real marketing value rests in the people who actually read it, for oftentimes it is the first thing people will read about your business.

So keep it short and sweet and describe the content as accurately and colorfully as you can. If you need more help coming up with a meta-tag to boost your search marketing results, feel free to give us a call today.

by

What the World Cup Can Teach Us About Marketing Strategy

As one witty person at ESPN said, ‘Every Four Years, The World Has One Time Zone.’

The kind of rapt attention the World Cup generates, where the world grinds to a halt and billions of people become glued to their phones, tablets and TVs, is a marketers dream. This is why so many of the largest companies spend millions to become corporate sponsors of the Cup to get their logo front and center. But this doesn’t mean small and medium sized businesses are relegated to the sidelines without any recourse. In fact, the World Cup has quite a few lessons it can teach even the smallest businesses about marketing strategy. Here’s where to start:

Follow the Crowd

There are few things that are like watching a game with 80,000 of your closest friends. Everyone is on the same wavelength and has the same goal in mind.

With your marketing strategy, do some research and see what your clients are paying attention to. Is it a specific website or trade publication? If so, find a way to become a guest blogger on that site. If it’s a trade show, make sure you are front and center: get involved and make sure you’re part of the executive committee to put on their next event.

Getting that exposure not only cements your status as an expert in front of your current clients, but it also puts you in front their entire industry.

Pull their heartstrings

Very few things can bring nations of grown men to tears or spark generations to remember where they were for 90 minutes decades later.

Go beyond identifying pain points and your solutions to them. Focus your marketing on getting an emotional response from your target audience.

Be Willing to Shift Your Marketing Strategy

From tough draws and injuries to missteps and howlers, there are always hiccups to the plan. To win, you have to roll with the punches and improvise on the fly.

Marketing, and online marketing in particular, is an ever-changing industry. What was a brilliant white-hat SEO strategy in 2010 will get you delisted today. To stay on top, you need to not only keep your long-term goals in mind but also be willing to change your strategy based on the data you have available. For example, if you’ve stopped getting returns on your Facebook marketing, shift your resources to another platform.

Most importantly, keep at it. The team that is going to win this cup isn’t thinking about hoisting the trophy today; they’re thinking of their next match. Marketing is the same. It can feel like a slog at times (everyone has had the thought, ‘is this blog post really going to bring someone in the door?’) but focusing on doing the best job today is the best way to ensure success over the long-term.

 

by

10 Common Myths About Social Media

It seems like everyone today has got an opinion about how you should use social media to find success online. And like most topics where opinions are shared readily, most of these points will lead you astray.

The fact of the matter is social media is a lively, vivacious entity where you are allowed to connect, build relationships and engage with your audience while simultaneously establishing your brand’s overall tone, personality and message.

The key is, don’t get weighed down by the onslaught of ridiculous advice that many charlatans are trying to spew in attempts to label themselves as “social media experts.” No one is an expert in social media—we’re all learning, playing, engaging. Social media, like most marketing and tech-based tools and tactics today, is ever-changing—and the one guaranteed true piece of advice for any brand is to stay true to yourself.

In the meantime, I’ve broken down the top 10 most ludicrous myths about social media. These are stories we’ve heard and things that you should be weary of when launching your own social strategy:

10 Big Social Media Myths:

  1. The More Followers, The Merrier: This is probably the most common thing we hear day-in, day-out. Businesses are constantly in search of garnering thousands of new followers, instantly. Brands typically go to the point of buying followers from fake accounts to give the impression that they’re popular on a given social platform. This is absurd. While we’re all big fans of the “fake it til you make it” mantra—this takes it just a step too far. One hundred loyal fans, who interact with your brand regularly and who buy your product, are 100x more valuable than a list of a thousand subscribers who either don’t know you exist or worse, don’t exist themselves.
  2. Social Media Is Your Own Personal Broadcast Channel: As much as any given person may be the biggest fan of your brand—they do not want to hear all about you, all the time. Just like in any relationship—social media is a give and take. It’s something we say to all our clients—with social media you have to earn the right to bring the conversation back to you. You cannot start off just talking about you, your product, your service. People tune it out. Rather, start a dialogue with your audience about them. Get to know them, their interests and then find a way, once you’ve established a connection, to bring it back to your goals.
  3. Social Media Can Replace Your Website: While Facebook, Twitter, and even Google+ are great platforms to showcase your brand and your services—these are just platforms. They’re compliments to your overall online identity. A website is your first and last line of defense online. When a potential customer searches for you—they immediately check for your site. After that, they go to your Facebook or Twitter profiles—which should inevitably send them back to your site. Social media provides a fun foray into the mind of your brand—but your site will always serve as the main place for converting a lead to a client.
  4. You Can’t Track Success or ROI: Fiddlesticks. There are plenty of cool assessment and analysis tools out there today. Good content marketing experts will provide you with monthly, bimonthly or quarterly assessments—where you can track where users are coming from, demographics, psychographics, and even identify actions taken on your site (purchases, article devouring, listening to a podcast or watching a slide-show). From there you should be able to leverage all your known data and apply it to create a more streamlined and targeted approach to your marketing.
  5. Blogging Is a Waste of Time: No matter what anyone tells you—blogging is never a waste of time. It’s the most essential part to any social & online strategy. We’ve talked about it before—keeping a regular blog schedule helps raise your rankings on Google, establishes you as a thought leader, and generates a loyal following of readers. If time is really an issue, you can hire a content marketing team (ahem, cough, cough—like us), to handle all the writing, management and strategizing behind your blog.
  6. You Have to Be Everywhere! The only person who has to be everywhere at once is Santa Claus. And even that’s only one night a year. Beyond that, no one has to be everywhere and certainly not at once. Certain platforms are better suited for certain businesses. Some platforms shouldn’t even be considered for certain brands, as it’s a drain of energy and resources. It’s best to create a social strategy that focuses on your brand’s strengths and target audience. It’s better to be strongly situated and active on 2 platforms, than spread out across 6 or more where you rarely, if ever, post or interact.
  7. There’s No Point to Google+: Oh, silly you. Did you fall for that line? It’s okay, that’s a pretty common occurrence. Google+ (now Google My Business) is either being heralded or slammed—it seems like it just depends on the day. In fact, Google+ is a great platform for multiple reasons, the main being it’s relationship to SEO rankings. Posts from Google+ are being indexed in the SERPs, and authors’ profile pages show up next to results, improving click-through rates on any given search. But again, like I mentioned in #6 above, this isn’t a site to just set-up and leave. Make sure that if you pursue G+, that you understand your audience, community and how to leverage the SEO benefits.
  8. Respond Immediately, Or Else: Despite popular belief, social media will survive—and people will be able to handle it—if you don’t respond to a tweet or Facebook post instantaneously. Like email, the invention of smart phones has destroyed us a bit on what we deem an acceptable lead-time with response rates. But social media, in essence, is managed by real people. We all have a myriad of things going on at any given moment. The world will continue to revolve, and your brand will survive, if you wait an hour or ten. Promise.
  9. The More Hashtags, The Merrier: Oh dear lord. When was the last time you searched for something solely by looking up the hashtag? #justinbiebergotarrested. Well, this may come as a shock, but social platforms are getting better at search. You can find a subject matter without the cute little pound sign. And hashtagging up a tweet just distracts people from your message. Granted, who doesn’t love a good hashtag? Just, use them wisely. #no #sense #going #overboard.
  10. Social Media Gives People a Space to Bash My Brand: I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but if someone wants to say something negative about your brand, they already have a venue. And it’s a big one: the internet. Not having an active Facebook, Twitter, or Yelp page doesn’t protect you from angst-ridden wrath. In fact, social profiles have proven to be more beneficial in helping brands get through a negative moment. Skype grew their following by being aware of issues, talking directly with customers during a service blackout and more. Surprisingly enough, you can build more credibility for your brand by using social media than by avoiding it all together.

So there you have it. Ten myths that you can now set free as you embark on your social strategy for the year. The bigger message is: jump on in, the water’s great!