Archive for the ‘blog’ Category

Google Launches Near Match for AdWords

Posted on: May 16th, 2012 by Transformation Marketing No Comments

Big changes to some some primary areas in Google AdWords have been released. All ads (unless you opt-out) will be shown for close variations of search queries. Much like broad keywords, this phrase and exact match change will add more clicks to your campaign.

This wouldn’t be such big news if Google wasn’t automatically opting everyone into this keyword matching change. So if you have an active campaign on AdWords, then you will be affected by the change in the coming weeks.

For our AdWords clients that enjoy regularly optimized and maintained campaigns, this is not something you have to worry about because we’ve already started analyzing how this could effect your account and we will be making the needed changes.

For anyone that is managing their campaign themselves, please be aware of how this can change your campaign. We always encourage testing for best results. Don’t ever assume that Google has your best interests in mind. They are a very large company with different goals in mind. Google typically wants to focus on impressions and clicks, but a successful campaign will focus on conversions rather than clicks.

Never take your AdWords campaign to full auto, because Google will change and modify the standards in ways that could negatively affect your account.

GoWalla Gone AWOL

Posted on: May 9th, 2012 by Lacy No Comments

GoWalla is a Geo-Social tool (much like FourSquare or Facebook’s Check-Ins) that we at Transformation Marketing used for several of our clients. While setting a new client up a while back, I noticed that the mobile tool wasn’t working quite right and then, a couple of days later, when I went to their website it wasn’t functioning and updating correctly either. These two issues, to me, were the first warning signs that GoWalla was going away. Sure enough, here we are a couple of months later and the geo-social site has officially gone away completely. Here is the message that comes up when you go to their site:

This to us, is just another mile marker in the ever-changing world of social media. GoWalla never gained much merit in the Midwest and we do not expect this to effect our clients in any way, except possibly drive more traffic to FourSquare. We did, however, want our clients to be aware of this change in the platforms we use for them and to ensure them that this change should not effect what they’ve been seeing in their social media reports.

At Transformation Marketing, we do our best to keep up with the “latest and greatest” in social media, whether it’s popular in the Midwest yet or not. So, if in case it does catch on, we’re ready! Because of this fact, we do run the slight risk that these such issues will arise with the platforms that don’t quite make the cut. Call us today to see how we can help you with your social media and keep you up on the latest trends.

When Ads Go Bad

Posted on: May 7th, 2012 by Melissa No Comments

Welcome back to our “When Ads Go Bad” blog series! Unlike past weeks, we do not have a specific bad ads theme this week. This collaboration is just a few ads that caught our eye – but not in a good way. We hope you enjoy this week’s installment!

Shouldn’t the point be to convince the man that he wants to shell out thousands of dollars on a ring? Not to make him second guess his decision on the basis that he will lose control of everything?

Sorry to tell you (and sorry that none of your “friends” mentioned it) but your mouse doesn’t look like a mouse…

This is the first of two ads that I have found for a brand of dark chocolate. This ad is incredibly disturbing, not to mention that it’s nearly impossible to figure out what the ad is for. Now that we’ve pointed out the obvious, who’s hungry for some chocolate??

No worries, little girl, you’re friend is just poisoning your tea while trying to sell chocolate. Don’t feel bad, we don’t understand the connection either.

If you would like to report of an Ad Gone Bad, people contact us at info@transformationmarketing.com.

Note: We are a marketing firm, not a law firm. We are not aware of any copyright laws we may be violating by posting pictures of advertisements that are in the public domain to this blog. This site is just for fun. If you own the rights to any of the pictures or ads posted and feel that violated your copyright, please contact me and we will remove it. If you want us to fix your marketing mishap we can do that too.

 

Hackers are the Problem. We have a Solution!

Posted on: May 4th, 2012 by Lacy No Comments

I know… I know… We just did a blog on hackers. But we cannot stress enough the importance of this issue. We are seeing more and more websites being hacked lately. We can fix the issue after the fact, but it’s less hassle and less expensive for the client if we take measures to ahead of time to prepare for such an event.

Let’s put it this way… it’s like the plans you have at home or work in case of a fire or in case of a tornado. You make the plans,  prepare for the situation and then hope like hell you’ll never need it. But unfortunately, the difference is that you have a better chance of your website being hacked than your home or business being destroyed by a tornado or a fire.

When we, at Transformation Marketing, began to see this happening more and more, we wanted to be sure we had a way to help our clients protect themselves. So, we put together our healthy website package. Call today and ask how our healthy website package can help you prepare for the emergency of your website being hacked!

When Ads Go Bad: Poorly Placed Internet Ads

Posted on: May 2nd, 2012 by Melissa No Comments

Internet ads are a great marketing tool – if used correctly. We understand that sometimes the placement of these ads just can’t be helped. But in the case of these ads we have picked, we wish that someone would’ve been paying closer attention. Though we do get a kick out of some of these mistakes, some of them are just plain wrong. Sit back and enjoy, poorly placed internet ads.

I guess they do probably go hand in hand…can’t imagine the World of Warcraft fanatics were thrilled about this ad placement though!

 

Not the most efficient use of ad space for Folgers. I’m definitely not reaching for my second cup now!

 

 

Wait, you’re selling WHAT?!?! Guess you really can buy anything on E-Bay!

 

I’m sure this is just a crazy coincidence! I’m guessing not many people clipped this coupon!

 

“oops” would be an understatement here…

 

We hope you enjoyed Ad Placement Gone Bad. If you would like to report of an Ad Gone Bad, please contact us atinfo@transformationmarketing.com.

Note: We are a marketing firm, not a law firm. We are not aware of any copyright laws we may be violating by posting pictures of advertisements that are in the public domain to this blog. This site is just for fun. If you own the rights to any of the pictures or ads posted and feel that violated your copyright, please contact me and we will remove it. If you want us to fix your marketing mishap we can do that too.

Most Common Mistakes Made on Social Media

Posted on: April 27th, 2012 by Lacy No Comments

If we’ve said it once, we’ve said it 100 times… Social Media Works! (But only when used correctly.) There are many things you can do to reverse the effectiveness of your social media efforts. Today, we will go over a few of those things.

Over Posting/Over Tweeting
There was a particular musical group I was following on Twitter for a while, one morning, they tweeted over 30 times in 30 minutes (more than once a minute). I “unfollowed” them and have never checked out their Twitter feed again. Now, while this might be a bit of an excessive story, the point is: don’t be obnoxious.
Some basic guidelines to follow for this (keep in mind that there are rare instances where guidelines need to be broken): 1. Don’t post more than once an hour. 2. Don’t post more than 3 times in a day. (Try to keep it to once in the morning and once in the afternoon, if you can.)

Who Cares?
Don’t talk just to hear the sound of your own voice. In other words, don’t tell your followers and fans things they don’t care about. Make sure when you’re posting it’s something relevant. And never be afraid to ask your followers/fans what they want to hear about!

The Hard Sell
Your social media should primarily be used to connect with customers and potential customers. By doing this, we obviously hope that you will generate more loyal as well as new customers. But would you like to know a good way to not generate more loyal and new customers using social media? Constantly try to sell them on your product! Tell them every day to buy your product because it’s the best. You’ll lose followers/fans faster than you can say “Buy my product.” Now, pictures, fantastic. Informing them about your product, that’s fine. Letting them know when you are running a special, they’d love that! Just do it in a way that’s not an in-your-face sales pitch. They don’t want to hear it.

Preventing Interaction
I went to a page a couple of weeks ago to post something and realized they had the page set so that fans could not post. In our eyes, that basically defeats the purpose. Social media is about interaction. While there are times censor your page (see Negative Feedback – How it can help your Company), it’s typically good to see the feedback, both good and bad.

So, there you have it! Some of the most common mistakes made on social media! Unfortunately, that doesn’t even begin to cover them all. We didn’t even get into… having the wrong type of page (This needs to be it’s own blog in order to cover everything that needs to be covered. We will be doing this in the near future!), not giving enough variety in your posts, not encouraging interaction, and so many others. If you’d like help avoiding social media mistakes that would prevent your campaign from seeing results, give us a call! At Transformation Marketing, we have experienced professionals who recognize what works (and what does not) with social media and can help you maximize your results!

Best Day and Time To Tweet

Posted on: April 24th, 2012 by Transformation Marketing No Comments

As a business on Twitter you can’t afford to spend all day posting updates and links that aren’t bringing in any new traffic or leads to your business. For that reason we’ve got a study from KissMetrics that will help you determine the best times to post a link to Twitter. These numbers are based on the times when you can get the best click through rates on your links.

Best Time of Day
The best time of day is in the afternoon. However, the largest percentage of retweets happen around 5pm. If you are looking for the best CTR then try noon and 6pm.

Best Day of the Week
The best day of the week is typically in the middle of the week or on the weekend.

Best Way To Tweet
This is the most important part of a successful business Twitter campaign. You can not post something that is not interesting or insightful and expect it to do well for CTR and retweets. You must have something of value that your followers will appreciate. Many businesses focus too much on the total number of their followers. Instead, make each tweet count and the followers will quickly increase.

It’s best stated with the old saying “if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all”.  At Transformation Marketing we take the headache out of social media marketing. We can help get your business the followers, likes, and subscribers by posting interesting content focused on your industry.

Old Ads Gone Bad

Posted on: April 23rd, 2012 by Melissa No Comments

While there are some wonderful things to remember about the 1950′s, like Explorer I, the first U.S. satellite to successfully orbit the earth, Alaska and Hawaii becoming the 49th and 50th states and Rosa Parks refusing to give up her seat on a public bus, these methods of advertising are not some of them. We will share with you here some of the ads that might have worked during this era, but certainly would not fly in this day and age. You will notice a common theme of sexism against women and other socially unacceptable means of marketing. We hope you enjoy “Old Ads Gone Bad”!

 

With women being the most influential buyer in the household here in the 21st Century, this ad certainly would not fly these days.

Just wondering if anyone really thought this through? These days, this would be considered pretty racy.

Men as the dominating gender is a common theme for this era. Can’t say we care for it… Nor would we recommend it these days.

Annnd, here it is again! Not only is this belittling to women, but this ad would have a whole new meaning these days.

 

These ads just prove that the line we hear oh so often, “Well, it’s worked for us in the past,” just doesn’t fly. It is important to keep up with the times in your business and in marketing. Otherwise, your company could be left in the smoke.

 

We hope you have enjoyed Old Ads Gone Bad. If you would like to report of an Ad Gone Bad, please contact us at info@transformationmarketing.com.

Note: We are a marketing firm, not a law firm. We are not aware of any copyright laws we may be violating by posting pictures of advertisements that are in the public domain to this blog. This site is just for fun. If you own the rights to any of the pictures or ads posted and feel that violated your copyright, please contact me and we will remove it. If you want us to fix your marketing mishap we can do that too.