INSIGHT blogArchive: September 2009

Archive for September, 2009

EyeTraffic Media Launches JumpReach Basic Online Viral Marketing Service

30
September
2009

Turnkey, Web-based Word-of-Mouth Marketing Solution Makes Setting Up and Managing Referral Programs Easy for Marketers

Washington, DC, October 1, 2009 – Interactive marketing consulting firm EyeTraffic Media, announced today the launch of JumpReach™ Basic online viral marketing service. JumpReach Basic is a turnkey, web-based word-of-mouth marketing campaign tool for increasing lead generation and audience acquisition through referrals. At only $99 per month, the affordable marketing tool for marketers of online publications, non-profit associations and political campaigns makes setting up a special offering that customers can share with their friends a snap. Using JumpReach Basic, customers can easily refer a product, event or subscription to unlimited contacts from their Google, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail, Outlook, and LinkedIn accounts.

Unlike typical email refer-a-friend links that only allow forwarding of generic email content to a few email addresses, referrers use the JumpReach contact importer to access their address books and send unlimited personalized invite emails with the marketer’s specific promotion or offering. JumpReach’s administration portal allows marketers to manage their campaigns, track referrals and recipients’ actions and export reports. 

WOMMA, the Word-of-Mouth Marketing Association, recently used JumpReach Basic to promote an educational webinar for their membership. 

"As an organization, spreading WOM and empowering individuals to share our content is integrated into our daily engagement efforts, said Steve Ziemba, Social Media Director at WOMMA. “JumpReach Basic enabled us to quickly and easily create a referral campaign specifically for our recent webinar, our existing marketing efforts, and in our emails and website.” Ziemba added, “With JumpReach Basic’s analytics, we could see the real-time results of the campaign and how many referrals it generated.”

JumpReach Basic links or “share buttons” work with existing email marketing programs, websites and advertising campaigns. Using JumpReach’s campaign wizard, marketers can create the content for their offering and a campaign landing page without any coding. JumpReach manages secure, CAN-SPAM compliant sending of emails.

See JumpReach in action at www.jumpreach.com/share, where you can earn a free month of service by referring your friends.

 

About JumpReach

Headquartered in Washington, D.C., JumpReach, LLC is a provider of interactive social media marketing solutions for online marketers. The company’s primary product, JumpReach™

online viral marketing campaign service, leverages a business’s biggest asset – its own, existing audience. By giving current audiences the ability to share specific information or offers with their social networks, marketers can more effectively drive traffic to their websites and generate new leads. JumpReach campaigns work with existing email marketing systems and websites and provide real-time measurements of campaign performance. JumpReach is a wholly owned subsidiary of EyeTraffic Media, LLC. For more information, visit www.jumpreach.com.

About EyeTraffic Media

Headquartered in Washington, D.C., EyeTraffic Media is a performance-driven interactive marketing consulting firm that provides unsurpassed campaign management solutions for companies and organizations seeking to more effectively connect with their target audiences. EyeTraffic boosts lead generation and customer acquisition by leveraging our expertise in search engine marketing, online media buying, email and social media, mobile marketing and web analytics. Acting as a seamless extension of your marketing team, we build, manage, track and analyze interactive marketing campaigns and programs that generate measurable results. For more information, go to www.eyetraffic.com.

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Could Monitoring Social Media Get Easier?

24
September
2009

Microsoft is developing an analytics tool that will help monitor a company’s online activity on social media sites more easily and effectively.

Christine Pepin
Media Coordinator

The way in which social media spreads like wild-fire is both a strength and a weakness. What becomes difficult is when the online dialogue picks up so rapidly that engaging in deflecting negative opinions or encouraging positive ones is unmanageable. In order to tackle this challenge, Microsoft has developed an analytics tool designed to improve an organization’s ability to react to social media quickly.

“Looking Glass,” still in prototype, will be Microsoft’s solution to managing the widespread chatter on the web.  This product will have the capability of sending programmed email alerts notifying its creator when certain content picks up. The tool’s analytics will show digital flow charts, such as which weeks generated the most activity across several social sites including Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and a variety of other social sites. Most significant of features, however, is the ability to connect feeds from the social media sites to internal CRM or customer centers. Looking Glass can also be integrated through Microsoft’s enterprise platforms; Outlook and Sharepoint.

Although this product will only be tested with a few companies in the near future, the company hopes a public release to occur sometime next year.

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New Partnerships, New Insights

23
September
2009

Nielsen conducting surveys for Facebook to measure online advertising.

Stefanie Berliant
Media Coordinator

Nielsen BrandLift and Facebook have teamed up to measure the effectiveness of ads shown on Facebook. This campaign will be using opt-in polls on Facebook Hompages to measure consumer attitudes and purchase intent on the ads that appear within Facebook.  Facebook’s global reach is the perfect platform to gather data for Nielsen to analyze and provide marketers with best practices on how to improve ad campaigns within Facebook. Nielsen BrandLift will be measuring the effectiveness of aided awareness, ad recall, message association, brand favorability and purchase consideration

Facebook generates its revenue mostly from the ads shown within the social network. This is a great way for Facebook to gain more insight as to what significantly impacts these audiences. As a marketer, I appreciate the extra mile Facebook and Nielsen are going to gather this data. Facebook ads can already be targeted by age, geography, education level, gender, organizations, relationship status, languages, and keywords. These ads can be shown on a CPC or CPM model and budgeted on a daily spend. By conducting this research, Facebook is continuing to prove its effectiveness of its ad serving technology.  Couple the findings from this research with the new version of Ads Manager Facebook has pushed into beta over the past week, and I expect to see a lot of changes within Facebook’s ad serving platform in the near future.

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EyeTraffic Adds New Client, Mervis Diamond Importers

18
September
2009

We are extremely excited to announce our newest client, Mervis Diamond Importers.

Keith Vera

Client Services Manager

We are extremely excited to announce our newest client, Mervis Diamond Importers. Mervis is the authority for diamonds, engagement rings, wedding bands, and diamond studs in DC, Virginia, and Maryland.

We look forward to building and tracking measurable interactive marketing campaigns that create lasting relationships between Mervis and their customers.

Learn more about diamonds from Mervis here. We’re fans of Mervis, and you can be, too at http://www.mervisdiamond.com/facebook.

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What is Google Caffeine and how does it impact SEO & Social Media?

15
September
2009

Google’s next gen search engine Caffeine became availabe in Aug 2009

Andrew Bates

Client Services Manager

In Aug ’09 Google unveiled its next generation search engine called Caffeine.  Likely in direct response to Microsoft’s Bing search platform, Google Caffeine is focused on faster, more relevant search that takes into account social and viral media sites.  With improved “temporal relevance,” Caffeine is said to have better results than the old Google when returning breaking information.

SEO and social media thought leaders have been putting the new Google through its paces at the publicly available Google Caffeine test sandbox.  For comparison, initial tests focus on: Speed, Accuracy, Temporal Relevance, and Index Size. 

What are the differences between Google Caffeine, old school Google, and competitors like Bing? 

Well the speed is definitely noticable.  Search comparisons show that Caffeine is easily two times faster than the old Google. 

Old Google search for “Dog” yields results in .25 seconds:

Google Caffeine search for “Dog” yields results in .12 seconds:

What about the accuracy?  Although all blended search options do not seem to be live in the new Google, there does seem to be an increase focus on keywords.  Time will tell, but so far Google Caffeine is incredibly accurate.

How is Caffeine on Temporal Relevance and finding breaking news?  The jury is still out.  Google Caffeine frequently returns the exact same results as the previous Google or Bing.

Where is the most noticeable improvement next to the speed?  The new Google Caffeine index appears to be many times larger than that of the original Google, but Bing still seems to return the greatest number of indexed results on a consistent basis.

Mashable’s SEO expert Ben Parr gives a great overview in his recent post “Google Caffeine: A Detailed Test of the New Google” with some excellent examples of searches he performed in all 3 environments.

 So how will Google’s Caffeine search platform influence SEO and social media? 

First Google Caffeine impressions:

-       It is fast, with a deeper index

-       There is an increased focus or weight on keywords

-       There may be an increased weighting on domain authority & some authoritative tag type pages ranking (like Technorati tag pages + Facebook tag pages) with potentially slightly more weight on exact match domain names

-       Caffeine likely has an improved comprehension of related words and synonyms

-       Google’s new search may have increased the relevance associated with video and image results while decreasing the volume of multi-media returnWhat do you think?  Try Google Caffeine against your favorite search site at Google Caffeine test sandbox and let me know what results you see.

- @AndrewBates

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Short Attention Span Monday: 11 Facebook Tips in 140 Characters or Less

11
September
2009

Pithy social media advice on the Internet’s dominate social network … for now.

Blake Bowyer
Media Program Analyst

Not all social networks are created equal. Some are faster, some are slower. Some are private, some are public. Some require more diligence, some demand deeper conversation. Facebook is unique in many ways as the preeminent social network for users in the United States. It continues to grow, expand, and develop … maybe to a fault. 

However, its diverse, enormous audience make it a vehicle for visibility, satisfying customer relationships, and unique marketing opportunities. To use it for these purposes and countless others, your company must realize its advantages and its limitations. When developing your social media strategy, consider these 11 Facebook tips:

  1. This isn’t Twitter. No matter how hard Zuckerberg and Co. try, they will always serve different purposes. Don’t treat them as one format.
  2. As such, don’t publish identical content across social networks. Keep users coming back to each facet of your social media prism.
  3. However, make sure your efforts are part of an integrated message and consistently branded. It’s a delicate balance, but has huge potential.
  4. Embrace user content. If people feel passionately about your brand, allow them add to the mix. Find your advocates, they hold more influence.
  5. Conversely, if people aren’t actively passionate about your brand or organization (the case for most), reach out and see how/if they contribute.
  6. You send an update, every fan sees it. It’s not a feed, but another message in an inbox. Treat it with the discretion you would an email.
  7. Facebook is less ephemeral. Use it as a tool for feeding stakeholders promotions, event dates, and info that is relevant in the future.
  8. Fan pages aren’t groups. You might want both, but leave group activity to people of similar interests. You want fans who found you on their own.
  9. Don’t create related interest pages (e.g., “Yoga”). It’s deceptive. Embrace your Web identity. If you lack fans, there’s a bigger problem.
  10. Facebook has become the hub of many users’ Internet experience. If you’re ignored on Facebook, you might not reach those users. Period.
  11. Know your Facebook audience. It might not be representative of your usual customer base. Adjust and talk to the fans you’re attracting.

That’s it. These all tie into one thing: Facebook marketing means talking, sharing, and empathizing with your audience, not broadcasting one-way messages that lack mutual value. Keep that in mind with every event, photo, update, and post. They made the effort to become fans, now it’s your turn.

What would be #12 on your list?

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Social Media: Not a Fad or a Revolution, But an Evolution

4
September
2009

Focus on the social aspect of new media, don’t get lost in the hype

Blake Bowyer
Media Program Analyst

Scouring your Twitter feed, try not to come across an update with a link to an article chiming in on the newest great debate: social media – fad or revolution? It’s near impossible. Expectedly, you’ll find an overwhelming number of scoffs and a biased collective opinion on Twitter, but the question still lacks a substantive answer. Maybe it’s because A) Fad or B) Revolution aren’t sufficient options.

By definition, media are distribution channels for information, entertainment, opinion, etc. As users, we consume media with our eyes and ears and – until we develop nifty information microchips or memory implants – that’s how we’ll continue to consume them. In that most basic, fundamental sense, social media are no different than established media.

The staggering new user sign-ups on Facebook, Twitter, and the like might give them the adoption curve of a fad looking to flame-out, but that’s because of the Internet, a true media revolution. The statistics for social media can’t be ignored, but let’s not get carried away.

Posing and supposedly answering this question, a video is floating around comparing the adoption rates of TV, radio, and other traditional media and how social networks have found more users in fractions of the time. However, it’s absurd to compare actual equipment to platforms, because no one would question that it’s a tad easier to sign-up for a free Facebook account anywhere you can get a Web connection than to buy a TV in 1930 for the current equivalent of $1,600 and only available in a handful of places in the entire world.

The point is, Mark Zuckerberg, Evan Williams, and their peers didn’t reinvent the wheel, they just gave it performance treads. What changed is the way information is shared, not how it is introduced. Firms, brands, and consumers still send and receive the same basic types of messages, but how that information spreads is much different. It’s still media, but they’re social and therefore all must participate. The firms that succeed will be those that look beyond the message they create and deliver; otherwise they’re playing the same game in a different ballpark.

With social media, our networks as individuals exploded and became easier with which to interact. That is the evolution of media, but it’s not a revolution. The relationships are still based on exchange, just more fulfilling exchanges. Ultimately, social media will benefit consumers and firms, because they are platforms for better solutions. Just as radio gave us sound, TV gave us sight, and print gave us feel, social media will appeal to another sense – engagement.

However, for those in the space, we should be cautious to herald social media as the end-all, be-all. We are, after all, nanos gigantum humeris insidentes – standing on the shoulders of giants.

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