Q4 Marketing and Media Group

Google Adwords Top 5 Myths

2011-03-29T08:52:00.000-07:00

Google Adwords sent out a newsletter today listing the top 5 myths about using Google to drive consumers and sales for your business.

Myth 1: “Online advertising is not for local businesses.”
Actually, research says 89% of people in the US search online for products and services before they make a purchase - even when the purchase is made at a business in their area1). What most people don’t know is that with Google AdWords you can set your ads to show only to people in your area whether that’s your city, state, or just your zip code.

Myth 2: “If your business is already on Google; advertising on Google can’t help you.”
Sure, your business may already appear in the natural search results on the left side of the page. But test it: Does your website appear on the first page of search results? 2nd? 10th? Does it come up for all possible search terms that your customers may be using when they are looking for what you have to offer? Even if the answer to both questions should be "yes", studies have proven that search advertising can still increase traffic to your site. In fact, appearing both on the right and on the left side of the page at the same time increases the perceived relevance of your website and as a result even increases the number of free clicks you get to your website2).

Myth 3: “Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is better than paid search.”
Google strongly encourages you to optimize your site for search engines by applying webmaster best practices. However, paid search such as Google AdWords has a few key advantages: It is easier and quicker to setup, it offers much more control over when and where your ads appear, and its impact is easier to measure. We recommend that website owners do both apply good SEO practices and advertise online.

Myth 4: “Google AdWords costs too much, I can’t afford it.”
Long time AdWords advertisers consider Google AdWords an investment, not a cost. You only pay per click so there is a direct return on however much or little you spend. How much you spend is entirely up to you. There’s no minimum spend requirement and you only pay when someone clicks on your ad. You can even set a maximum that you are willing to bid per click and you can start and stop your advertising at any time. “With every dollar I spend on AdWords, I make $3 in sales.”– Dakota Routh, Body Renew gyms

Myth 5: “You need to be an expert to get started.”
Actually, getting started is easy - no expertise is required. You don’t need to start out with the perfect set of keywords or ads; after getting started you can see what works and what doesn’t. From there, it’s easy to adjust and fine tune your campaigns based on results.

Groupon to Launch Groupon Now - Realtime Deal Mobile App

2011-03-19T11:16:00.000-07:00

Coming in April, Groupon will be launching a new game-changer: Groupon Now, a mobile app that will allow you to find nearby deals under two categories, "I'm hungry" or "I'm bored."

With this app, users will be able to find deals by the hour.

It's like near field communications (which uses proximity sensors to get more specific with location), but for daily deals! Merchants will be able to specify exact time frames for their deals so that, for instance, restaurants that normally don't get customers between 2 pm and 5 pm can specify that window of time for their deals to get more traffic. But what they're really bound to love about it is the fact that they'll have more control over the onslaught of Groupon users they're bound to encounter. One of the complaints merchants typically have about Groupon is the fact that they might run a deal for a day, but if the expiration date is four months off, they're going to face unperdictable swarms of Groupon subscribers leaving bad tips around the clock for months.

With the new Groupon Now app, merchants can designate exact windows of time for when they're open to Groupon customers.

And then of course there are the subscribers, themselves. Think about the millions of times you've left your home without a plan for lunch--maybe you go on a day trip to visit your sister who lives three hours away. You get there, you're hungry, you want to go out, but you don't want to spend a lot of cash. Now you can have nearby Groupon deals ready for on-the-spot use at all times.

This new App means that after inventing the social commerce space, which has since been flooded with Groupon copycats, Groupon Now will finally launch it out of the water to set the company apart from the clones. Of course, one could argue that other daily deal sites can just create real-time apps of their own, but the service is so time-specific that Groupon's Andrew Mason believes that merchants will only be able to use one or two services, max.

Google Updates Algorithm

2011-02-25T13:31:00.001-08:00

Google announced what may ultimately be one of the biggest changes to their algorithm yet.

From the Official Google Blog: "Many of the changes we make are so subtle that very few people notice them. But in the last day or so we launched a pretty big algorithmic improvement to our ranking—a change that noticeably impacts 11.8% of our queries—and we wanted to let people know what’s going on. This update is designed to reduce rankings for low-quality sites—sites which are low-value add for users, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful."

Notice the language being used. Specifically, "...reduce rankings for low-quality sites..." That means it's not only individual posts or pieces of content will be penalized for being deemed "low-quality" but entire websites. The announcement also mentions "low-value add for users" and sites that "copy content from other websites." The target? Content farms, to start. These sites exist and profit based on volume. The more content produced (often for a pittance) the better they do – or did.

To most observers and users, this focus on volume resulted in millions of low-quality pieces of content cluttering the search engine results pages (SERPs). The writers producing content for these content farms are paid largely based on views. No indexing in Google, no views. No views, no pay. No pay, no writers ... and no content.

Sites such as Yahoo Contributor Network and those of Demand Media (including eHow) fit the bill, to be sure. But one must wonder if others sites such as Examiner.com or pure user-contributor sites such as Yahoo Answers will also be affected. (Read Website Magazine's in-depth review of Yahoo Contributor Network.)

The update will also impact Bing and every other search engine. Simply put, if Google's results get better in the eyes of users, Bing and the others cannot afford to be viewed as having inferior results.

Without question, the focus is now on producing original, quality content. So-called scraper sites are doomed. But even bloggers need to be careful about posting content that could be considered "low-quality" or that which could be viewed as being a simple re-publishing of existing content. In other words, if you don't have anything original to say about an existing story ... be careful. Now more than ever, the focus seems to be shifting toward quality, not necessarily quantity.

In all, this update should be a good thing for the Web – both for users and those who work tirelessly to produce quality content.

Q4 MARKETING AND GREEN AMERICA LAUNCH GREEN DEALS: “GROUPON FOR GREENIES”

2011-02-02T14:22:00.000-08:00

Online Daily Deals Available From a Variety of Green Companies Around U.S.; This is the Start of Something Big: More than 100,000 Signed up Green Deals in the Testing Phase.

Fans of deal-of-the-day sites such as Groupon and LivingSocial now have an environmentally friendly shopping option.
Boston based Q4 Marketing and Media Group and it’s partner, Green America have launched Green Deals, a Web site that provides members with daily deals from local and national online green companies. Over 100,000 individuals have already signed up for Green Deals memberships. Participating companies are carefully examined and certified by Green America for their commitment to social and environmental responsibility in their policies, practices, and products.

Green Deals also features tips on everyday green living, coupons, and other offers from their Green Approved Businesses. Recent deals have included organic chocolates, green cleaning supplies, and environmentally friendly water bottles.

Q4 Marketing President Jonah Mytro said: “We have developed a great tool to help consumer’s learn about and connect with thousands of Green Approved (and screened) Businesses of Green America’s Green Business Network. We are very excited about the partnership between Green America and Q4 Marketing and we look forward to a long and prosperous relationship offering GreenDeals to targeted consumers locally and nationally.”

Green America Executive Director Alisa Gravitz said: “Green Deals helps Americans who are tightening their belts live a green life and save money at the same time. From household necessities to great gift ideas, Green Deals provides terrific products from businesses that have been screened by Green America for their social and environmental responsibility.”

There is no shortage of green companies that want to be part of Green Deals. "While there are a number of daily deal sites on the Web, GreenDeals is composed entirely of the kind of values-driven consumers we want to reach” said Rosamaria Caballero, founder, Green Irene LLC.” They appreciate the screening Green America performs on us as a member of the Green Business Network to assess our business practices.

Jay Parekh, chief operating officer, Hydros Bottle, said: “Running a Green Deal helped connect us directly with conscious consumers that are often thought-leaders within their social networks -- the very customers that have the potential to become brand evangelists -- all within a group buying model. For us, it was a win-win.”

For more details about the Green Deals

(Green America, Q4 Marketing, and Green Deals are in no way associated with Groupon or LivingSocial. Both of those organizations are referred to in this news release strictly to encourage an understanding of the type of deal-of-the-day site that Green Deals is.)

ABOUT GREEN AMERICA

Green America is United States’ leading green economy organization. Founded in 1982, Green America provides the economic strategies, organizing power and practical tools for businesses and individuals to solve today's social and environmental problems. Green America’s green economy programs encourage corporate responsibility, tackle climate change, build fair trading systems, advance healthy, local communities, and provide green purchasing and investing information for families and businesses.

ABOUT Q4 MARKETING

Q4 Marketing and Media Group (Boston, MA) is a boutique Internet Marketing firm that has extensive experience in B2C lead generation, web site development and management, and online media buying and planning services. Our team works with clients both small and large to help them achieve their ROI goals utilizing online marketing including social media, search marketing (PPC), organic search (SEO), email marketing, lead generation, and affiliate marketing.

Don't Use These Passwords!

2010-12-21T08:22:00.000-08:00

Huffington Post published an article from the Wall Street Journal listing the top 50 most common passwords people use. Get a little creative with your passwords and protect your email accounts, banking, and other important logins.

On Sunday, hackers exposed usernames and passwords stored in the Gawker Media user database.

The Wall Street Journal analyzed the leaked data and produced a list of the top 50 commonly used Gawker passwords. Believe it or not, the list is rife with security no-nos, such as ascending numbers and easy-to-guess words.

The following are the top 13 most popular passwords, according to WSJ's examination of the 188,279 passwords that were leaked:

1. 123456

2. password

3. 12345678

4. lifehack

5. qwerty

6. abc123

7. 111111

8. monkey

9. consumer

10. 12345

11. 0

12. letmein

13. trustno1

It is startling to note that over 3,000 users chose "123456" as their login password, according to the Journal. Almost as jarring: Nearly 2,000 people went with "password," and more than 1,000 users decided that "12345678" was a secure choice. The list also includes "gizmodo" (#19), "starwars" (#23), "f---you" (#31), "gawker" (#40) and "internet" (#50).

The hack has been affecting other websites: Twitter was hit by a spam attack that is believed to be linked to the Gawker hack. According to All Things D, "LinkedIn has temporarily disabled the accounts of any users whose email addresses turned up in the public database of hacked accounts. It's asking those users to reset their passwords." Given the simplicity of some of the most popular passwords, let's hope that nobody recycled these passwords for email or online bank accounts.

New Beach Volleyball Tour - The National Volleyball League

2010-12-06T07:17:00.000-08:00

With the bankruptcy and selling of the AVP assets, it will be interesting to see who steps up to promote and manage Beach Volleyball Leagues around the US. USA Volleyball has stated they plan to run 4-6 events in 2011 (mainly on the West Coast) and The National Volleyball League (launched by Albert Hanneman, 18-year AVP Alumni) will launch in 2011 and run 3 events with expansion into 2012.

Press Release from The National Volleyball League
The NVL is proud to announce plans to produce three tournaments in 2011. They will include Miami, Atlanta and Las Vegas!

We are in deep discussions with USAV and IMG to work directly with Beach Championship Series to enhance the number of quality events so that players can have a larger series of legitimate events to play in. USAV and IMG stepped up first and announced their 5 events. It is a great opportunity for the National Volleyball League to partner with the only known series for 2011 and work with IMG who is regarded as the best event company in the world. Our events will follow the BCS operational expertise and quality of execution to ensure that each tournament will be of the highest quality for players, fans, and our sponsors.

USAV will sanction National Volleyball League events as we have strategically picked our events in locations that are geographically complimentary to the BCS schedule allowing more of the country to experience pro beach volleyball. We are planning to host events in Miami, Atlanta, and Las Vegas in 2011 and at least double that number of events in 2012.

Having USAV's sanction and IMG's proven track record alongside valuable sponsors
immediately provides the National Volleyball League credibility in the fragile market
place left behind by the AVP. The fact is that volleyball is still very popular and
companies and cities are thrilled to have a fresh start and be involved with pro beach
volleyball. We will offer $150,000 prize money and set the same standards for player
services and concerns with identical referees and medical services so there is uniformity
across the board.

There are many more details about the National Volleyball League that we will announce shortly. Stay tuned!

Wikileaks forced to change domain and hosting

2010-12-03T10:11:00.000-08:00

Since the site Wikileaks published over 250k US and International documents about the war in Afgasnistan and Iraq, Amazon.com (their hosting company) and their DNS provider have cancelled their contracts, forcing them to look for international hosting and DNS providers.

BBC
Whistle-blowing website Wikileaks has been forced to change its web address after the company providing its domain name cut off service.

EveryDNS.net said it had terminated services because Wikileaks.org had come under massive cyber attacks.

But Wikileaks has already reappeared using a Swiss web address.

Wikileaks has also used the micro-blogging site Twitter to urge its fans to redistribute its "raw" net address so it can be viewed at any time.

This numerical internet protocol (IP) address remains live and accessible even when web domains - the normal "www" addresses used to access most sites - are unavailable.
More on BBC

Google to Buy Groupon for $6 Billion

2010-11-30T13:28:00.000-08:00

The Wall Street Journal published an article about Google in discussions with Groupon to purchase them for $6 Billion with a buy out of $700 million. That's 2x the $3 Billion valuation given to Groupon earlier this year.

From WSJ.com
Google Inc. has been in talks to buy Groupon Inc., a fast-growing website offering daily deals at businesses in the U.S. and abroad, according to a person familiar with the matter.

No deal is imminent between Google and Groupon, said people familiar with the matter. One of these people said that other parties recently offered to finance Groupon at a valuation of more than $3 billion.

Spokespeople for Google and Groupon declined to comment. The website All Things D earlier reported that Google has offered $5.3 billion for Groupon, with a $700 million earnout. News Corp. owns All Things D and The Wall Street Journal.

A deal to buy Groupon would boost Google's position in the race to win local business-ad dollars online, an area coveted by other large Web companies including Facebook Inc.

A deal between Google and Groupon likely would also eclipse Google's $3.1 billion purchase of DoubleClick in 2007—its largest to date—which has since helped the Internet search giant in its push in the market for online graphical ads, among other things.

What Companies Own the Smaller Well Known Brands

2010-10-18T12:40:00.000-07:00

Yahoo and TheStreet.com published an article today listing various niche (mom and pop)brands that are now owned by major corporations. Here is a quick list of the brands and their parent companies.

Seattle's Best Coffee owned by Starbucks (Purchased 2003)
Boddington's owned by Bud maker Anheuser-Busch Inbev
Tom's of Maine owned by Colgate-Palmolive
Kashi owned by Kellogg
Nantucket Nectars owned by Dr. Pepper Snapple Group
Stonyfield Farm owned by Groupe Danone (2001)
Schwinn (Bicycles) owned by Dorel Industries (2001/2002)
Ben & Jerry's owned by Unilever
Stowe Mountain Resort owned by AIG (Yes, the same AIG that was bailed out with US tax dollars of $47.5 billion!)

Full Article

Top 30 SEO Tips for Website Optimization

2010-10-06T15:18:00.000-07:00

Socialh.com has come up with a quick list of the top 30 things to consider for SEO website optimization. The list is basic but extensive for either a website or blog owner.

SEO Tips for Web Designing is a list of items for every web designers to check while designing their websites to keep the web pages optimized for search engines and achieve high ranking in major search engines.

Domain Name
Your domain name should be brandable (example: Google, Amazon, Yahoo!, etc.), easy to say, and even easier to remember. Don't worry too much about stuffing keywords into your domain name. Keywords in domain names no longer have the punch they used to.

www or not www
The choice is yours, http://www.yoursite.com/ or http://yoursite.com/, pick one and stick with it. I recommend using the www because the basic Joe Schmoe Web server tends to type in www, anyway.

Simple Design
Don't reinvent the wheel. If your design is complex, chances are it will hinder your visitors' ability to navigate and view the site plus it will slow down development. The simpler the better.

Don't create directories further than three levels down from the root directory
The closer pages are to the home page in the directory structure the better. Keep things organized but don't overorganize. If you have one file or sub-directory in a directory there should be a VERY valid reason.

File/Directory Names Using Keywords
Your filenames and directory names should contain keywords. If your page is about Design Tips then the filename should be design-tips.

Static URLs
Static URLs are URLs that are not dynamically generated. A static URL looks like You can make dynamic URLs spiderable by search engines but it's a lot easier to get things indexed with static URLs.

Think Small
The smaller your Web pages are, the faster they load. A single page should be less than 15K (unless absolutely necessary) and the entire page including graphics should be less than 50K (unless absolutely necessary). Remember, not everyone is on a high-speed Internet connection; there are still people without a 56K modem.

Hyphens
Use hyphens ( - ) and not underscores ( _ ) to separate words in directory and file names. Most search engines parse a hyphen like a reader would parse a space. Using underscores makes what_would_you_do look like whatwouldyoudo to most search engines. You should definitely separate words in your URLs.

Navigation on Every Page
You should place consistent navigation on every page of your Web site. Your navigation should link to the major sections of your Web site. It would also make sense for every page on your Web site to link back to the home page.

Site Map
You should create a site map that links to the major sections and sub-sections of your Web site. The site map should be linked to from your Web site's home page at the very least. Preferably the site map should be linked to from every page. Recommend file names for your site map are "sitemap.html" or "site-map.html."

Title
The title of the page should be used in the TITLE tag and at the top of every page. The title should be keyword rich (containing a max of 7 to 10 words) and descriptive.

Description META Tag
Some people say META tags are dead but some search engines will actually use them underneath a pages title on search engine result pages (SERPs). Use no more than 150 characters including spaces and punctuation. Your description should be a keyword rich, complete sentence.

Keyword META Tag
A listing of keywords that appear in the page. Use a space to separate keywords (not a comma). Arrange keywords how they would be searched for or as close to a complete sentence as possible. This tag is basically dead but by creating it when you create the page it allows you to come back eons later and realize what keywords you were specifically targetting. If the keyword doesn't appear at least twice in the page then it shouldn't go in the Keyword META Tag. Also, try to limit the number of total keywords to under twenty.

Robots META Tag
Some search engine crawlers abide by the Robots META Tag. This gives you some control over what appears in a search engine and what doesn't. This isn't an essential aspect of search engine optimization but it doesn't hurt to add it in.

Heading Tags
Heading tags should be used wherever possible and should be structured appropriately (H1, H2, H3, H4, H5, H6). You shouldn't start a page with an H2 tag. If H1 by default is too big then use CSS to style it effectively. Remember that most search engines like to see a heading tag then text or graphics; not H1 followed immediately by H2.

TITLE Attribute
Use the A HREF TITLE attribute (example: ). The TITLE attribute improves usability/accessibility. Be sure to include keywords as you see fit but remember it should tell your visitors where they will go when they click the link.

ALT Tags
Every image should have an ALT tag. Use a keyword rich description of what the image is. If the image contains text use the text in the image. This is also a usability/accessibility tool.

More text than HTML
A page should have more text content than markup language.

Anchor Text
Anchor text is the text used to link to a page. Using keywords in anchor text is a very good idea and will improve a page's performance in SERPs.

Use Text Links, Not Images
If you're going to link to something use text. Text in images can't be read by search engines. The only time this rule doesn't apply is when you're linking to something with a well known logo. Even then it's still better to use a text link. If you must use an image as a link then make sure you give it a good ALT tag.

Gobs of Content
The more content, the better. Having pages upon pages of original, relevant content is the best form of search engine optimization.

Add New Content Often
If you can add a new page of content every day then your site will stay fresh and give search engine crawlers a reason to keep coming back day in and day out.

Keyword Density
This is a touchy topic among Web developers and search engine optimizers. Some say 5% is more than enough. Chris Short says your main keywords shouldn't have a density of more than 30% and should be higher than the densities of other phrases and words.

Build It, Put It Online
Your site should be built and in "update mode" once it's uploaded to your Web server. Don't add a page at a time to your Web server when you're first building your Web site. Build your Web site first then upload it. Add new content as needed.

Use a robots.txt File
Every good crawler looks for a robots.txt file in your root directory. I would highly recommend creating a valid robots.txt just to appease these search engines and at the very least eliminate 404 errors from building up in your log files.

Validation
Every page on your Web site should adhere to W3C standards as closely as possible. Some say page validation can help your ranking in SERPs (the jury is still out on that one). But, standards compliant Web pages do help with cross browser compatibility.

Link Popularity
Once your Web site has been well established, it's time to build up your link popularity. The more relevant inbound links a Web site has, the better its rankings will be.

Analyze Traffic
Read your log files often. Make sure you're not getting traffic you don't want and getting traffic you do want. Keeping a pulse on your traffic allows you to better optimize your pages.

NO TRICKS
If it doesn't seem ethical, then it isn't a good idea. If it doesn't help your visitors, then don't do it.

NO FRAMES
Don't use frames, ever.

NO BROKEN LINKS
Linking to pages that don't exist is a very bad thing. Search engines and people alike hate that.

Boston JOB OPENING - Online Marketing AD Traffic Position - JR Role

2010-09-16T12:35:00.000-07:00

A local recruiter contacted me about an online marketing ad trafficker position in Boston and please contact me if you are interested in the position and I can connect you to the appropriate person.

Online Marketing AD Traffic Position
We are looking for a motivated, organized and energetic Ad Trafficker to join our growing team of online ad traffickers in our office. This position will report directly to the Director of Advertising Operations. The successful candidate must be a smart, energetic, organized ad operations professional. S/he must possess excellent problem solving skills, be detail oriented and have the ability to multitask in a fast paced and challenging work environment. S/he must have a working knowledge of both ad serving back-end and front-end systems, be a team player and have a positive attitude and upbeat spirit

The Ad Trafficker is responsible for the delivery of the following critical tasks.
. The trafficking and monitoring of online advertising campaigns across the company network, including creative upload, creative testing and troubleshooting, parameter set up, optimization and any applicable edits.
. Extracting delivery reports from the third party application to ensure proper tracking and on delivery
. Insuring all campaign goals are met including start and end dates, impressions delivery, and any associated actions.
. Working with advertisers and sales staff to insure timely delivery of all creative materials and their compliance with site ad guidelines and specs. Assist staff directly by helping to resolve technical problems and answer questions on creative materials.
. Performing QA on complex flash, rich media and video creative and associated code.

Contact Information: Jonah at Q4marketing.com

YAHOO and BING Partnership - 100% Organic Live

2010-08-31T11:00:00.000-07:00

Search senior vice president Shashi Seth announced last week that a key milestone in the Yahoo! and Microsoft Search Alliance has been achieved: Bing now powers 100 percent of Yahoo's organic (or natural) search results. Apparently this is the case now for both the desktop product and mobile.

"Yahoo! Web, Image, and Video search experiences on both desktop and mobile devices are now powered by the Microsoft platform in the US and Canada (English), with more markets to come," said Seth. "The speed in which this was completed is a testament to the great work and partnership between a number of Yahoo! and Microsoft employees, the ranks of which are numerous."

Earlier this month, Yahoo! and Microsoft representatives reported that the transition was underway and that just about 25 percent of Yahoo's natural search results and about three percent of paid search results were, at that point, powered by Bing. They had set as early October the complete transition for both aspects of search, so completing the organic piece of the integration just a few weeks later is testament to the speed with which the joint team is executing.

There has been significant concern among search marketing professionals that the integration of the two platforms might not be completed in time for the all-important holiday season, so achievement of this first milestone will come as some relief to all concerned.

"We continue to work hard on the migration to adCenter, and are optimistic about completing this phase later this fall," said Satya Nadella, senior vice president, online services division at Microsof. "As we have said all along, our primary goal is to provide advertisers with a quality transition experience in 2010, while being mindful of the holiday season."

Facebook buys a $10 million search company

2010-08-17T10:05:00.000-07:00

Facebook has acquired online search company Chai Labs for $10 million, in one of the social networking site's more confusing buyout deals to date.

Chai Labs is a relatively new start-up that specializes in a technology
it calls "Semantic Search," which "uses proprietary crawling, artificial intelligence and data mining technologies to analyze and extract insights from millions of real-time data points across the web," according to the company's website.

Unlike when it has snatched up online sharing sites or Web-based image-hosting companies, Facebook's purchase of Chai Labs does not have an immediately apparent value to users. While Facebook
does have a built-in search engine that lets users search the entire Internet (which is basically just an embedded Bing engine), the number of people who actually use Facebook as their online search engine is probably staggeringly low.

Although, we do have to admit that even searching within Facebook is a big annoying at times. When I try to search for a friend of mine and it brings up a completely unrelated "fan page," I can't help but feel a bit peeved.

Still, buying a sophisticated Web search firm for $10 million means Facebook obviously has something up its sleeve beyond just improving internal site searching. It gives credence to the notion that perhaps Facebook wants to become your predominant search engine, meaning you won't even have to step out of your social networking climate to go buy that book you've been meaning to get. That's of course just speculation at this point.

And given that Chai Labs was founded in part by a former Google executive, you know that Google is going to be discussing this acquisition, which is one of Facebook's biggest to date

TGDAILY.com

Blogging Top 7 To-Do List

2010-07-20T13:48:00.000-07:00

Copyblogger.com wrote a good online marketing article about how to engage users and build a "kick @ss" blog. Blogs are about engaging a user and the content and remember that you can blog about anything you want but make sure the information is relavant, informaitonal, and make it fun.

Copyblogger Blog Top 7 To-Do's

1. Have a conversation- People don’t like to be lectured or talked down to. They just like to talk.
2. Lighten up- You don’t have to tell jokes, but it’s smart to keep things light-hearted.back.3. Be yourself- After all, people are not coming to your blog just to acquire knowledge. They’re dropping by to visit you.
4. Be nice- Don’t be a diva. Answer your emails. Respond to comments.5. Get over yourself- When you think about it, blogs are really kind of egotistical.
6. Help people- Isn’t this the whole point of a blog, especially one that’s wildly popular?7. Stop trying so hard

Complete Article at Copyblogger.com

Boston Beach Volleyball Championships

2010-07-19T09:18:00.000-07:00

The Boston Beach Volleyball championships will be held at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday on a private beach behind the M Street entrance to the L Street Bathhouse in South Boston.

Two months of action has resulted in four men’s teams and six women’s teams preparing to do battle for a chance to win $1,000 and an all-expenses-paid trip to Chicago and try to earn a spot in a qualifying tournament for the AVP Beach Volleyball Tour Chicago Championship.

The men’s draw features three teams at the top that tied with 17 wins apiece, led by the experienced duo of Chad Jones and Robert Brennan, who go by the name of Chad & Booh. Jonah Mytro and Craig Martin went 2-1 during the league’s final regular-season games Wednesday to jump up from fourth place. Phil St. Pierre and David Bergman (Popeye & Badger) also held firm.

Squarely on the bubble, the local tandem of Matt Luksa and Rob Kane (Big Man & Big Rob) made the biggest move, winning all three games Wednesday to slide into the last spot.

“Any of the four can do it if they get hot,” Luksa said. “Seedings are important but anyone can win it. We’d love to be the ones to go.”

On the women’s side, the defending champions from last year’s Newport, R.I. event - Kimberly Hyde and Nicole Brehaut (Kim & Nik) - went 19-5 to claim the top seed. Right behind them are WHO DAT!?!, composed of Jessica Bensley and Jamee Stimson. Both teams earned byes for the first round.

In the quarterfinals, third-seeded Marriah Vengroff-Butts and Robin Young take on Karen Simpson and Nicole Salisbury (Shank You) while fourth-seeded Lindsay Marshall and Danielle Rogers face Nic & Heather - Nicolle Becker and Heather Larson - in the other matchup.

“Nik and Kim are a really strong team with a lot of experience,” Young said. “They definitely have a target on them. But the competition here is a high enough level that, across the board, anyone could beat you on a given day so you always have to bring your A game.”

Boston Beach Volleyball Featured in BostonHerald.com

2010-07-19T09:15:00.001-07:00

The sport of beach volleyball in Boston is on the verge of getting a level of national exposure previously reserved in New England for Newport, R.I.

Each Wednesday night since May, eight teams of men and 12 teams of women have been battling it out in the sand on a private beach behind the L Street Bathhouse in South Boston for more than just bragging rights.

The regular season now is complete, and Wednesday night (5:30 p.m. at the M Street entrance to the building), those tandems fortunate enough to have made the playoffs will be competing for a $1,000 cash prize and an all-expenses-paid trip to Chicago for a chance to qualify for the Association of Volleyball Professionals (AVP) nationally televised Chicago Tour Championship on Aug. 29.

“This is the first time anything like this has been run in Boston for beach volleyball,” said Jonah Mytro, who is part of one of the teams competing for the prize.

Michelle DiChiara, who lives in Southie, is the founder of Boston Beach Volleyball and has been striving both as a player and coach to help grow the sport locally for the better part of the last 10 years. She was contacted by the AVP in January about getting the league to join with 13 others from around the country to hold qualifiers for the Chicago tournament as part of the AVP Next series.

Along with the AVP came a sponsor in the form of Barefoot Wine, but the tie-in made it difficult for DiChiara to secure a place to play. State law prohibits any league associated with an alcohol company from playing in a public place. However, the city of Boston has no such restrictions, so it was simply a matter of finding a private beach on which to play.

Complicating matters even further, DiChiara’s father, James, died in March. Sick of wading through red tape while also grieving, she was ready to throw in the towel. Then, as though her father somehow pulled strings from above, DiChiara found her angel in former NHL player Fred Ahern, who runs the Curley Recreation Center. Ahern helped her secure the necessary permits and gave the league a place to play at L Street Beach.

“A week after the funeral, Fred called and told me we had the permit and a place to play,” DiChiara said. “It was such a relief.”

DiChiara coordinates the women’s league and also runs the Boston Beach Volleyball website. Mytro serves as the men’s coordinator and worked to promote the league and get teams to sign up. Their hard work has not gone unnoticed by the players.

“Its nice to have the organization behind it,” said Matt Luksa, who played club volleyball at Northeastern. “To have people that put their own free time on the line to organize this, work with the AVP, work with getting everything set up for us, keeping tabs on who is playing who, the scores, and answering everyone’s needs has been amazing.”

It did not take long for local players, tired of having to trek to Newport and other faraway destinations for competitive beach volleyball, to sign up. The league drew enough interest that numerous teams were wait-listed for both leagues. The ability to play close to home was as big an attraction as the chance to qualify for the AVP event.

“This is the first time something like this has come to Boston, so it was exciting to have it where we live,” said Jessica Bensley of Somerville. “It’s the only place in New England that they have this particular league and it’s exciting that you have a chance to go to Chicago and actually get a chance to play on the AVP Tour.”

Added Newton’s Marriah Vengroff-Butts, “It’s been really fun to play at a high level and take the T to get here. We know almost everyone here so it’s like a friendly competition and it’s really convenient.”

Complete Article

Search Marketers Top 5

2010-06-16T10:19:00.000-07:00

There’s a reason why search advertising revenues in 2009 ($10.7 billion) accounted for almost half of total interactive advertising spend, according to the IAB’s most recent Internet Advertising Report. It can be a wildly successful medium – we’ve all seen ample evidence of that. It can also be time consuming, frustrating and downright confusing. This can make search marketers hesitant about expanding their efforts beyond the big search engines to include campaigns on Tier 2 search networks.

While these concerns are not unfounded, dismissing the value of the Tier 2 players can be a costly mistake – there’s a wealth of diverse traffic sources beyond what the major engines provide, and savvy advertisers understand that capitalizing on that additional traffic can take their search marketing efforts to the next level. With that being said, advertisers need to know what to look for and what questions to ask when vetting new Tier 2 search advertising partners. Here’s a helpful list of things for search marketers to be aware of when evaluating which providers might be a good fit.

1. Experience: New ad networks are popping up all of the time – some of them are reputable and trustworthy, while others are known for making unsubstantiated claims about traffic quality and ROI. Make sure the network you are considering has proven successful for other advertisers before you consider starting an account.

ASK:

* How long have you been in business?
* Do you have any case studies/testimonials/customer references you can share?

2. Volume: Most search marketers have limited time on their hands. Managing campaigns on the large engines takes time, and in order to justify starting a relationship with an additional vendor, advertisers need to make sure it’s going to be worth their while. Syndicated Tier 2 networks can aggregate thousands of incremental traffic sources together, making the move into the network realm more efficient.

ASK:

* How many queries do you process per day?
* Can you provide me with a traffic estimate for my keywords to help determine the kind of volume I might receive?

3. Platform Capabilities: It’s crucial that the networks you choose to work with have the targeting and tracking capabilities to meet your campaign goals.

ASK:

* Do you offer the following?
o Conversion Tracking: What kind of conversion tracking do you offer? What kind of visibility will I have into the traffic sources that are converting for me? How will the optimization process work?
o Geo-targeting: Will I be able to target my ads by location? How specific can I get with my geo-targeting (country, state, city, zip)?
o Day Parting: Can I schedule my ads to appear only during certain times of day (e.g. during my business hours)?

4. Safeguards for Network Quality: Click validity is an issue for the search advertising industry at large, and networks are certainly not exempt from that. Advertisers need to make sure search providers have processes, tools and partnerships in place to help ensure click quality and protect against invalid traffic.

ASK:

* Do you filter invalid traffic? If so, how?
* What kind of screening takes place before you add a new distribution partner to your network?
* Do you work with any 3rd parties, such as Anchor Intelligence and Click Forensics, to help ensure traffic quality?

5. Service: Lastly, advertisers need to make sure the search provider they are evaluating has the customer support to help them reach their campaign goals.

ASK:

* Do you offer account management services?
* Do you have a customer support line? Does a real person field those calls to answer questions and offer guidance?

Search networks can be a profitable avenue through which advertisers and search marketers can expand their PPC campaigns and drive results. It is imperative, however, that advertisers be cognizant of the above issues when choosing new partners. Asking questions ahead of time and testing new providers before moving full steam ahead are important keys to success.

Provided by Search Marketing Standard

Advertising Spending Will Grow, Report Says, But Not Until 2011

2010-06-16T08:13:00.000-07:00

This article was published by Price Waterhouse Cooper regarding the advertising industry and spending over the next 4 years.

Advertising spending in the United States will not begin to grow again until next year, according to an annual forecast from PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The 11th annual entertainment and media outlook report, to be released on Tuesday morning, predicts that ad spending will fall 0.5 percent this year compared with last year.

That is a marked improvement from 2009, when ad spending fell 15.2 percent from 2008, according to the report, but the trend would still going in the wrong direction from the perspective of Madison Avenue.

Although ad spending will increase in 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014, the report forecasts, the total in 2014 will still be 9 percent less than it was in 2007.

By 2014, ad spending in categories like Internet Marketing, television and radio is expected to exceed the spending levels of 2009, according to the report, while ad spending in categories like consumer magazines, trade magazines, newspapers and directories is projected to be lower than it was in 2009.

Newspaper ad spending is under pressure to the point, the report says, that the total amount of ad spending online will surpass the amount spent in newspapers this year.

The tough economy took its toll on entertainment and media in this country, according to the report, as total spending on them fell last year by 7.1 percent from 2008. There should be growth this year, the report predicts, albeit a tiny 1.1 percent; there will be larger gains, in mid-single-digit percentages, from 2012 to 2014.

Here are some other highlights from the report:

* By the end of next year, there will be more multi-function, converged devices, fueling additional growth in spending on mobile Internet access subscriptions.
* North America will remain the biggest market for television advertising, helped by mobile TV, online streaming sites, high-definition TV and other new technologies.
* Marketers will be increasingly attracted to video games as an ad medium.
* Box office results for movies will benefit from additional releases in 3-D because of higher ticket prices they can command.
* Magazines will gain subscription revenue from editions distributed to e-readers but circulation revenue will still decline.
* By 2014, newspaper ad revenue will total $31.9 billion compared with $36.7 billion in 2009. By comparison, the figure for the peak year, 2005, was about $60 billion.
* Satellite radio advertising will grow as satellite radio recovers from the recent declines in car sales.
* Digital billboards will help revenue gains for out-of-home advertising.

By STUART ELLIOTT - New York Times

Facebook Privacy Issues

2010-05-24T13:16:00.000-07:00

Facebook launches an all-out PR battle to save face regarding the privacy battle it started in the last 6 months

From YAHOO NEWS
Buffeted by privacy snafus and the lingering fallout from a damning, years-old instant messaging thread, Facebook chief exec Mark Zuckerberg switched into full-on damage control Monday, confessing that the sprawling social network had "missed the mark" when it comes to its complex privacy controls — and pledging to do better.

In an open letter published Monday in the Washington Post (whose chairman, Donald E. Graham, just so happens to sit on Facebook's board of directors), Zuckerberg wrote that Facebook has been "growing quickly" and admitted that "sometimes we move too fast."

"Many of you thought our controls were too complex," Zuckerberg's letter reads. "Our intention was to give you lots of granular controls" — uh, you can say that again — "but that may not have been what many of you wanted. We just missed the mark."

Read Entire Article

4 Keys to Search Engine Marketing

2010-05-11T08:06:00.000-07:00

When building a search marketing campaign, there are dozens of things to consider but only four true factors you need to focus on to create a successful search program to drive sales or leads for your business.

Prime Keywords:
Prime keywords or short tail get great volume and make a competitive stand, but yet specific enough to get you real results. These higher priced, more competitive keywords often come with a steeper price tag, but frequently contribute far superior rewards.

Prime keyword: Cosmetic Surgery = 90,000 monthly searches = $3.50 cost per click
Long Tail keyword: Cosmetic Surgery Procedures 9,000 monthly searches = $1.75 cost per click

SEO book offers a keyword research tool for free to use to identify prime vs long tail keywords.

Paid Search Ad Copy:
These are the snippets (between 90-145 characters) in your ad differentiates you from your competitors. You'll need a couple of different ones so you aren't always showing the same line to searchers as they head down the search path. Google and Yahoo allow up to 5 sets of ad copy and will rotate each one equally and optimize to the best performing based on click rate and landing page relevancy.

Ad Copy Calls to Action:
What is left out in a lot of ad copy is the CTA or Call to Action. Experienced search marketers will always include a CTA to drive clicks and create a sense of urgency to the users. CTA's such as "Free Info", "Click Here", "Free Trial", "Limited Offer" are all good to include in your ad copy.

Ad copy with CTA:
Bike Shop
Expert Bike Store in Your Vicinity.
Locate a REI Store & Visit Us Now!
www.REI.com/BikeYourDrive

Without CTA:
Bikes
Find Bikes Online.
See This Week's Featured Products
www.Target.com

Keyword Insertion:
Utilizing keyword insertion can increase the performance of your ad by 30-80% compared to not including it in your ad copy. Keyword insertion allows the keyword that a user is searching for to pop-out in your ad copy (bolded as well) and draw a users attention to your ad. Try adding add copy with and without keyword insertion and you will see differences in performance.

With Keyword Insertion (keyword: Bikes)
Trek Bikes - New England
A Top 100 Retailer Offering A Full
Line Of Trek Bikes. Visit Us Today!
www.Wheelworks.comMassachusetts

Without Keyword Insertion:
Pedal Power Fitness
Stay In Shape this Winter. Come See
Our Selection of Top Brand Machines
www.pedpow.com

To learn more about search marketing and management services from Q4 Marketing and Media Group, please contact us at 617.329.1821.

Managing Marketing and PR for Barefoot Wine Beach Volleyball in Boston

2010-04-20T08:06:00.000-07:00

Q4 Marketing has been chosen to handling marketing and public relations for the Boston Beach Volleyball summer league, sponsored by the AVP and Barefoot Wine.

Boston Beach Volleyball is proud to team up with the Barefoot Wine AVPNext Championship Series for this unique opportunity. The area's best men's and women's 2's players compete for a total of $2000 in prize money and a paid trip to Chicago for a chance to compete against the AVP pros.

The Barefoot Wine league will commence at L Street Beach starting May 12th 2010 for 11 weeks with playoffs on July 21st with 12 womens teams and 8 mens teams vieing for a $2000 in cash and prizes and a trip to Chicago.

Barefoot Wine, an E & J Gallo winery, and the AVP Pro Beach Volleyball Tour are kicking off the second season of the Barefoot Wine AVPNext Championship Cup with 24 leagues around the country. The Barefoot Wine AVPNext Championship Cup is a grassroots series that takes place at local beach volleyball leagues nationwide and gives amateur beach volleyball players an opportunity to earn the right to go up against the AVP’s top professional teams and win cash prizes.

13 leagues will return from last year’s 16-league competition. In addition, new 2010 leagues have been added in Atlanta; Austin, Texas; Boston; Chicago; Denver; Manhattan Beach, Calif.; Nashville, Tenn.; Point Pleasant, N.J.; San Diego; and Tampa Bay, Fla.

Each city’s winners will receive a trip to the AVP’s Barefoot Wine AVPNext Championship Cup in Chicago Aug. 27, 2010. Winners will play against each other for a chance to advance to the AVP’s main draw! In addition, Barefoot will award winners with $10,000 in cash prizes ($5,000 per gender).

Website:
Boston Beach Volleyball
AVP Barefoot Wine League

Contact:
Jonah Mytro
Q4 Marketing
Jonah at Q4marketing.com
617.821.4013

Changes in the Affiliate Marketing Industry

2010-04-08T09:05:00.000-07:00

From Pace Lattin:

I had quite a bit of mails regarding my last article and the changes the industry is going through. Many people were interested in knowing exactly what was going on in the industry, especially which companies are probably going to go out of business and which companies are having problems. I’m not going to play the name game, but needless to say there is a reason right now for the enormous changes that are happening in the industry. Companies are announcing mergers, putting themselves on the block to be sold, and many are in the final stages of shutting their doors. There is a little dirty secret that is only being talked about behind closed doors in the industry and more a lot people need to pay attention.

Last year, several major and no-so-major affiliate networks grew in leaps and bounds from nowhere. Many of these companies were making millions of dollars off of continuity programs, often with backend “flogs” and other questionable methods of promoting their programs. 2009 was a very, very good year for them, and some of them were reporting upwards of $20-30 million extra for the last quarter of 2009 in revenue from those programs lone. They went out bought other companies left and right for ridiculous amounts of money and invested in having dozens of high paid executives.

Read Entire Article

Trapping Your Visitors - Dont Do It If:

2010-03-30T09:59:00.000-07:00

From Yield Software:

Many landing page best practices dictate that you trap your visitors inside your landing page and not allow navigation to other pages within your website. The logic here is that you are after a conversion, so keep the visitor focused on converting rather than letting them wander around and forget to provide you with their info before they leave your site.

While the trapping technique can be quite effective for some advertisers, we've seen it result in complete failure for others. How to know what to do? Here are some simple criteria you can use to determine whether or not trapping your visitor will bring you the highest conversion results.

When trapping is not likely to work:

Your product offering or market space is not well-known. Do you have a new type of product or service that you are trying to sell? In this case visitors need to learn more about your offering before they will be ready to fork over their contact details or make a purchase. Your website should serve as an educational vehicle to help them understand what you do and how it will help them. Guide them through this educational process through your site with a strong emphasis on conversion along the way.

Your brand is not a known. Are you the new kid on the block? Are you the smaller, local guy trying to compete with bigger well-known national brands? In this case your website needs to be a credibility building vehicle. People are not likely to give you any information until they know they can trust you. Help them get to know you and why you are reputable throughout your website pages. Comparisons, testimonials, awards, as seen ins can all be helpful here.

Multiple offerings or conversions are available. Sometimes it's good for you to have your visitors wander around. The more they wander, the more they are likely to buy or the more conversion opportunities that exist. Also, if you have multiple offerings for them to sign up for it that are all standard, it's good to let them gather this information and choose the package that's right for them. So use your website as an upselling vehicle and let them wander and spend.

Your website facilitates the full conversion process. If you have an ecommerce site, or your website is built to facilitate the purchase of what you are offering, let the user wander around to gather all the information they need, select what they would like and complete their transaction. Some examples here include ecommerce sites and hotels.

When trapping is effective:

You have a commonly known product. If people know what they want and are familiar with your product or service, they are likely just looking for the best provider for them. In this case they don't need to comb through your website to figure out what you have to offer. It's more important to focus on the conversion when they first land.

Monetize and Leverage Facebook - 5 steps

2010-03-17T07:13:00.000-07:00

Many small business owners are already on Facebook but are either still not sure that it is a good use of their time, or they see its potential but are just confused about how exactly it can work for them. Starting a Fan Page for your business may be your answer. But how can you use a Fan Page to achieve fantastic results?

1) The first way to leverage Fan Pages is to set up your Page for success.

One of the first things you need to do when you set up a new Page is to give it a title. A tip with this is to think about using keywords related to your business that you would like to be found for.

You also want to choose a good, clear photo for your Page. Another thing to note is to make sure you have filled out the Info tab on your Page thoroughly with all the relevant information about your business.

2) The second way to leverage Fan Pages is to build your Fan base.

You have to be a little proactive about getting Fans, especially when your Page is new. An easy way to invite people is to use the "Suggest to Friends" link underneath the picture on your Fan Page. Facebook will then pull up a list of your Facebook friends and you would just click on the ones you want to send invitations to.

You'll want to consider people like former and current clients, people you've partnered with in your business, vendors you work with, people who you know have purchased from you before, etc.

3) The third way to leverage Fan Pages is to interact and engage with your Fans.

Once you have some supporters of your Page, you want to encourage more dialogue and interaction between yourself and them and even among each other. The biggest impact comes from simply having conversations with people.

One thing that I do on my Page is to just ask open-ended questions. Asking people to share experiences is another great way to get a dialogue going.

4) The fourth way to leverage Fan Pages is to provide good content.

Offering regular content will naturally encourage interaction because you are giving people something to respond to. You don't need to come up with all the content yourself, either. You might just link to an interesting article or blog post you have found on the web related to your business or industry.

What content like this does is attract comments from your Fans, which is activity that in turn goes out into the News Feed. The more activity on your Page then, the more attention to your Page you have a chance of attracting.

5) The 5th way to leverage Fan Pages is to use them to drive traffic to and from your blog or website.

To do this, you definitely want to list your website in the Info section, and you also want to share links in your updates to your own site.

You can also use an application like Notes to enter your blog feed so that it pulls your posts into your Page. You also want to add your URL to your email signature, and use the free badges and widgets Facebook provides that you can add to your website.

You can check out http://www.facebook.com/facebook-widgets for those. Once you have something like this on your site, visitors can just click on it and they will land on your Page where they can become a fan.

So, if you don't have a Page yet, head over to http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php and start one now. If you do have one set up, use these tips to help make your Page stand out, get noticed, and become a helpful destination for all of your raving Fans.

Source: Christine Gallagher, founder of CommunicateValue.com,

Ten Ways to Win the “Speed Dating” Test

2010-03-16T13:51:00.000-07:00

Finding a mate can be a laborious process when you think about how many single people exist. So speed dating was developed to eliminate some of the time out of this process.

If you think about it, every time you search for something you go through a sort of speed dating process. You know what you want, but then millions of potential matches appear. So, you speed date the landing pages on the first one-to-two pages of the search results to see if you can quickly find a website you’re are willing to give your personal information to in hopes that there might be a future there that satisfies your needs.

We’ve compiled ten tips to make sure your landing page can pass the speed dating test and get you those digits:

1) Be Hotter Than Everyone Else.

Before you have a searcher visit your site, survey the room and check out your speed dating competition. Take snapshots of all the competitive landing pages on the first page of the search results for your top keywords. View these snapshots in a line along with yours. If you wouldn’t pick your landing page as the hotty in the group, redesign your page elements until it becomes the clear winner.

2) Be Visually Engaging.

Searching is even more shallow than dating because we don’t feel bad about not giving a website the time of day if it doesn’t look perfect. If you want the searcher to even bother reading your spiel you had better look your absolute best. Use engaging colors, rather than being drab. Use images and video to immediately visually engage the searcher. But don’t go overboard here. If you have too much eye candy on a single page, you’ll just appear like the used car salesman with one too many gold chains.

3) Be Trendy.

If your dress is out of date you are not desirable. If you haven’t updated your website style in the last two years or are using design techniques that were popular years ago it’s time for a redesign. Just do a search for “great websites” and there are plenty examples of very cool sites to re-use concepts from. If you don’t have time to get with the times, hire a personal shopper – aka, a web designer. The money you spend will be well worth it to boost your image. With a trendy site, you may even find yourself getting phone numbers when you aren’t even trying.

4) Speak Clearly & Memorably.

Once you are the hottest website in the room, you’ll get a chance to explain who you are and why you are awesome. Clearly articulate what it is you do and why you are the best in large font using plain simple words. Don’t use words that you would use to think about what your business does, but rather words your searcher would use to describe you. With speed dating, no one has room to absorb fluff like “long walks on the beach” – so review your page and remove all of your fluff terms such as innovate, synergy, unique, focused on, leverage, leading provider, cost effective, next generation, etc. Stating who you are in plain terms allows a searcher to “get you” right away and will also give the searcher a much better chance of remembering who you are at the end of their speed dating session.

5) Exude Confidence.

Insecurity leads to loneliness. Show the searcher your confidence in what you have to offer. Do you offer a guarantee? Do you have testimonials? Don’t use unsure words such as “could be considered”, “on average”, or “for some.” Write with strength and confidence that you are simply the best and you stand behind it.

Complete Article at Yield Software

Google Testing TV

2010-03-16T13:32:00.000-07:00

Google Inc. is testing a new television-programming search service with Dish Network Corp., according to people familiar with the matter, the latest development in a fast-moving race to combine Internet content with conventional TV.

The service, which runs on TV set-top boxes containing Google software, allows users to find shows on the satellite-TV service as well as video from Web sites like Google's YouTube, according to these people. It also lets users to personalize a lineup of shows, these people said.

Full Article

Yahoo and MSN SEM Partnership - Approval?

2010-02-18T11:52:00.000-08:00

Yahoo and MSN have received approval from the Justice Department to move forward with their advertising partnership (finalized last Summer '09) and it will be interesting to see how the partnership will improve Yahoo's Search Marketing platform and results.

FROM YAHOO INC
Yahoo! and Microsoft have now received regulatory clearance to form a search alliance. This is a significant milestone and an exciting first step in our combined effort to help you reach even more customers with greater ease and efficiency.

What's Ahead
There will be no immediate changes to your Yahoo! Search Marketing account. Both companies are committed to making this transition as seamless and beneficial to you as possible. Our aim is a high quality transition of advertisers and partners in at least the U.S. prior to the 2010 holiday season. However, we may wait until 2011 if we determine this will be more effective. Approximately three months in advance, we'll begin providing you with detailed information about what to expect and how we will assist you.

How the Yahoo! and Microsoft Search Alliance Will Benefit You
Once implemented, the Yahoo! and Microsoft Search Alliance will enable you to:

Reach more customers.
• Reach up to 150 million searchers1 and get approximately 62% more search volume2 than on Yahoo! alone through a new, unified search marketplace combining the Yahoo! and Microsoft networks.
• To help drive future growth in search volume, Yahoo! will continue to significantly enhance the search experience on our leading web properties.

Save valuable time and effort.
• You'll log into one place–Microsoft's adCenter–to manage campaigns, for greater efficiency and a better ROI.
• With just one buy, you'll reach users on Yahoo! and Microsoft sites, as well as other premium partner sites.

Benefit from rapid innovation.
• Yahoo! will deliver new features and innovations to the world's favorite online destinations, content, and web products used by hundreds of millions of consumers to connect to the people and things that matter to them most.
• Microsoft will innovate the underlying technologies that drive high quality algorithmic and paid search results.

BostonBloggery.com features OneDaySave.com

2010-01-26T08:27:00.000-08:00

There's been quite a bit of activity over the least year or so with the group deal websites. You know, the sites like Groupon and BuyWithMe and what not - one of my friends is addicted to those sites. I was just reading last week about how one of them secured some VC funding which leads me to believe that these sites (as a concept) have been doing decently well. They're all in the business of saving us money, which is awesome, pretty much a win-win situation for us as the consumer. The latest site to join the mix for those of us in the Boston area is OneDaySave.com

OneDaySave.com is a new consumer oriented website being launched by Q4 Marketing and Media Group to help savvy shoppers get great deals from the best restaurants, retail stores, entertainment, and even Online. Everyday you will find a new and exciting offer from a local advertiser in your area.

I checked it out and today's deal is a one hour massage at Gregory Beale Massage for $45. Sounds like a pretty good deal to me. The one and only time that I've gotten a massage in Boston was at the Sports Club LA a few years back after a really stressful week of work. I think it cost me upwards of ~$100. So $45 sounds like a bargain to me.

From Bostonbloggery.com

5 Tips for Measuring Social Media

2009-12-29T07:29:00.000-08:00

Article Written by XDXY Marketing

Social Media is becoming one of the most important online marketing tactic. More and more companies jump into social network marketing field to promote their brand or product, and they brought huge amount of marketing dollar in as well. Since all marketing investment need to be evaluated returns, the question comes up: how to measure the performance of social media marketing?

I would like to share some tips about social media marketing performance measuring:

1. Impression. It’s not as easy as banner Ad to figure how many times of your page have been impressed, but you can still consider below points as performance evaluating:

* How many Social Networking platform you registered accounts?
* How many connections/followers you have?
* How many groups you joined as member?
* How many discussions you participated?

2. Traffic. One major purpose of social media marketing is to drive traffic to website, it’s all free and can be tracked clearly. If you are selling advertise on your website as well, use CPM (Cost per Mil) to calculate the ROI of social media performance.

3. Shares. People on social network platform do love to share their ideas and links with friends. They submit website links & content to major platforms, when they think either interesting or informative. It’s been called ‘word of mouth online’. So consider below 2 points on social media marketing shares:

* How many of your website / pages have been submit to digg, StumbleUpon, etc..?
* How many of your company name or product name has been mentioned over twitter, facebook, Linkedin?

4. Contacts acquisition. Acquire new contacts is one of most important thing for online marketing. The normal way is like: ’subscription box’, ‘ask opt-in in online survey’ or ‘list buy’, and you can also leverage social media marketing to acquire new contacts. People come to social network platform is intend to make friends, so be friends with them, influence them in each update, convert them as your client. How many contacts you acquired from social platform is critical factor to measure social media marketing performance.

5. Revenue contribution. Check how much revenue the social media contribute is the most direct way to evaluate social media marketing performance. Embed tracking code for all the social network post links (hide them by short URL service, like TinyURL if you want). If you sell products online, it’s not hard to track how much social media contribute.

OCMP FACEBOOK CONTEST

2009-12-20T16:28:00.000-08:00

This coming January the Off Campus Meal Plan card for the university will be getting a makeover, and one university student who is a member of the program will have his or her picture printed on each card.

Jonah Mytro, CEO of the Online Marketing and Media Group for OCMP, said students from the university are encouraged to submit a picture of themselves or their friends using or holding the OCMP card.

The card is a preloaded debit card to be used on food purchases throughout the semester at various participating restaurants along Main Street.

“It’s really just a great way to get people excited about the program,” Mytro said.
Contest submissions can be made online until the Dec. 15 deadline. He said the program has had the same face for the past two years and he said he hopes this contest will help bring the company closer to their target audience.

The company is looking to get a few hundred contest entries before choosing a winner, Mytro said. However, as of Nov. 16, he had seen only approximately 30 photos submitted.

He said they are hoping to have chosen a winner and have someone in place as the new face for the university program by Jan. 15, in time for the new semester to begin.

David Diana, the creator and CEO of the program, said this is the first time the company is hosting a contest to find a new face for their campaign.

“We really wanted to get make the company more personal,” Diana said. “We thought a contest like this would bring us closer to our members.”

Diana said he runs programs at schools all over the country but the university was chosen as the focus for this contest because it is one of the most successful programs he oversees.

“UDel just has a great location for a program like this because all of the restaurants are so close to campus so a lot of students take advantage of the program,” he said. “We have tremendous success here.”

The contest running now is for the university program only, but Mytro says he has high hopes for the winner of the contest.

“After somebody is chosen as the winner he or she will be the face for the UD program,” he says, “But there could be opportunity for that person to expand to become the face of the entire program.”

University student Alexandra Boris is a member of OCMP and heard about the contest on its Facebook group page. She said she became interested in the contest because she is an OCMP member.

“I wanted to support them,” Boris said. “Mostly because I love having OCMP as a food option.”

Boris said she had thought OCMP was very popular, but then realized many of her friends were not members. She said she would be happy to win the contest.

“I would feel a little cheesy,” she said. “But it would be a great thing to add to my resume, maybe I would even get some free OCMP points.”

Enter the Fresh Face of OCMP at Facebook.com

OCMP Featured in UNCW Student Newspaper

2009-12-20T16:15:00.000-08:00

Students can now use a meal plan to eat off campus.

"Our meal plan allows students a choice in when and where they want to dine at. In addition to meal variety, our meal plan costs 20 to 30 percent less than the university meal program" said Jonah Mytro, the CEO of Q4 marketing, the online marketing company for the Off-Campus Meal Plan (OCMP).

OCMP is an off-campus option for students who want to eat at local restaurants around campus. The network of restaurants that are included in the plan are 14 fast food and sit-down establishments. Chili's, Quizno's, McAlister's Deli, Krazy Pizza and Jersey Mike's, are some of the restaurants included in the plan. More restaurants are being added to the OCMP network next semester.

The OCMP program is primarily for students living off campus; however students living on campus can have the meal plan as well.

Seven different meal plans are offered by the OCMP program. Students can get from two to three meals per week, which costs $290.59, to a plan with three meals a day, costing $2,175.46.

"We allow the students to choose what meal plan best suits their needs and adjust as needed." Said Mytro, "We have students who start out with a supplemental program (two to three meals per week) while on the UNCW dining program to test out, then moved 100 percent to the OCMP program after they found how convenient it was to use."

UNCW senior Amber Cox has the smallest plan offered by the OCMP.

"I like being able to go to each of the places on the plan that are in areas all around town. I'm on the go all the time and, between the two plans, I can get a meal at anytime." said Cox.

To get a meal plan, students can go on the OCMP program Web site, select the number of meals they want for the semester and purchase the meal plan online. Students can refill their meal plan at any time and the meals are available instantly.

"You can visit any participating restaurant and, based on what you order, the restaurant will swipe your OCMP card (like a credit card) and meals will be debited from your meal total," said Mytro.

OCMP has been designing off-campus meal plans for almost 15 years. They operate at over 30 campuses around the country and work with over 1,000 restaurants.

"We are excited to be offering this program to the over 10,000 students attending UNC Wilmington. There currently are no meal plan options for the off-campus students and we feel that the students and local restaurants will benefit greatly by this program," said David Diana, the CEO of OCMP.

Q4 Marketing Launches Affiliate Network Targeting Small Businesses

2009-12-09T07:44:00.001-08:00

December 9th, 2009 (Boston, MA) – Q4 Marketing and Media Group launches an Online Affiliate Network targeted to small businesses focused on lead generation and customer acquisition. Small business owners now have an affordable, efficient, and performance focused platform to manage affiliate relationships to grow revenues and customer acquisitions. Firms that currently have a website can utilize the self-service affiliate platform and manage affiliates for a small percentage fee or use the full-service package that includes affiliate recruitment, campaign management, creative design, landing page optimization and consulting services.

“There are dozens of affiliate networks that work with the mid to large size companies and we see a necessity to focus on the smaller firms that do business in niche industries. Small business owners are the back-bone of our economy and we want to provide them an affordable and straight forward application to manage affiliates and promote their company and products.” said Jonah Mytro, CEO and Founder of Q4 Marketing

Q4 Marketing’s Affiliate platform allows an advertiser the ability to track sales and conversions, manage banner and email creative, manage affiliates, monitor fraud activity, and have complete control over their affiliate program with no upfront costs, setup or maintenance fees.

Mr. Mytro stated, “Any business with a website can benefit from affiliate marketing whether their goal is lead generation, acquiring new customers, or increasing sales. We built this system to allow the novice internet marketer to benefit from the affiliate marketing industry and grow their business.”

Q4 Marketing and Media Group is a online marketing and consulting firm located in Boston, MA specializing in helping businesses increase their sales through all facets of online marketing including search (SEO and SEM) , media buying and planning, email marketing, affiliate marketing, social media and lead generation.

Contact:
Press@Q4Marketing.com

Yahoo Mail outages Monday Oct 26th

2009-10-26T14:21:00.000-07:00

My yahoo mail has been down since 9am and after reading some blogs about it, it seems a majority of the Yahoo Mail users reported problems today with the service inaccessible for some and spotty for others.

TechCrunch noticed a Twitter spike in reports of problems with Yahoo Mail, and another company called Downrightnow also reported problems accessing the service over the last several hours. Several CNET employees reported that they could access their in-boxes, but mine is unavailable. Yahoo Messenger and Yahoo's home page appeared to be working fine.

Yahoo Mail is the most widely used Web e-mail service in the world by a wide margin, with over 100 million unique users in July, according to ComScore.

4 Landing Page Optimization Tips

2009-10-13T14:32:00.000-07:00

I recently worked with Green America Today, a niche green and socially responsible company that runs Green Festivals around the country to help them improve their registration conversion for their trade show. Here are some things you can consider when trying to maximize your landing page conversion (especially when a credit card is required to register).

1- Minimize the Registration Process: Its industry average that for each additional page you send a user to, you will loose roughly 50% of your audience. Starting with 100 users who intend to complete the reg path, including a 3-step registration process will net you roughly 12 registrations. Minimize your reg path to 1 or 2 pages max. Simplify it, make it easy for users to complete the form.

2- Add Life to the Page: Simply put, this mean adding images and/or people to the page to add life and a warm, inviting feel for the user. Check out inexpensive images at Istockphoto.com

3- Remove Distracting Links and Banners: Your goal is to convert a user and get them to input their credit card and complete a transaction...so remove anything that will distract them from this goal. Links, banners, pop-ups are no-no's..You have spent time and money to get them to your site, keep them focused on completing the form. If you have to include links or banners, make sure they load in a new window, keeping the reg form in front of the users.

4- Use Arrows and Symbols, not Words: People don't read, its a simple fact...minimize the amount of copy on the landing page and utilize arrows, symbols and images to push the user through the registration process.

Samples of Good Landing Pages
https://register.ad-tech.com/Default.aspx?e=New+York+2009

ADtech NYC - Register before October 2nd 2009

2009-09-29T14:25:00.000-07:00

ADtech, one of the largest online marketing and media conferences and trade shows in the world is now charging a small fee of $35 for exhibit hall passes if you register after October 2nd and before the day of the show. On-site registration fee is now $75 (up from $50 last year) and make sure to register by Friday to take advantage of the free exhibit hall pass.

The show is also moving to the Javits Center from the New York Downtown Hilton (which was becoming cramped due to the tremendous amount of attendees and exhibitors.)

Register at ADTECH/NYC

Product Reviews = Best Marketing Tool

2009-07-01T08:58:00.001-07:00

From Advertisingage.com

Last fall, executives from Oriental Trading Co. read a product review from a woman planning her autumn wedding complaining that her order of fall leaves didn't look anything like the picture on the website. The execs went straight to the warehouse, pulled the product and compared for themselves. She was right -- it didn't look the same. The explanation: The company had recently switched vendors for that particular product, and the new vendor's version wasn't up to snuff. So the company pulled it.

While the first lesson of the story is that you never want to disappoint a bride, the more important one is that marketers are learning to listen. And for all the ink spilled on the importance of Twitter and Facebook as feedback and customer-service channels, there's another social-media tool marketers are increasingly finding useful, not just as an online-shopping tool but as an internal, culturally changing consumer-criticism channel: the humble product review.

The right way to use reviews

EMBRACE THE FEEDBACK. Sure, it's scary to let customers say what they will about your products on your home turf -- your website. But both the positive and negative feedback provides hints to what you're doing well and where improvement is needed. FIGURE OUT WHO NEEDS TO KNOW. Assign a team to read all the lowest reviews. Make sure it includes the right mix of people who can react quickly and fix the problem -- before more customers can get riled.

TOUT YOUR CUSTOMERS' FAVORITES. While negative ones give insight into manufacturer or customer support problems, positive ones can make great ad copy. Use them in circulars, marketing material and on store shelves.

INCORPORATE CUSTOMER SERVICE. Negative reviews can tip off your customer service and support teams to issues that they'll soon be dealing with. Use them as early warning signs.

DON'T STOP THERE. Oriental Trading started with reviews but after seeing how people liked to share their opinions, it has turned its website into a more robust community. It asks users to help solve each others' problems and share their stories, using Bazaarvoice's other tools.
The feedback is altering not just how the marketing department works but also how companies design their products and work with suppliers. And it's not limited to small, nimble players; companies using product reviews range from niche retailers such as Oriental Trading Co. to big, broad-based behemoths such as Walmart.

Samsung used consumer reviews and insights to modify the speaker placement on its flat-panel TVs. After hearing complaints that the speakers on the side of the TV, which add a few inches, rendered them too wide for many customers' entertainment cabinets, it redesigned the product to hide the speakers underneath.

Crate & Barrel kids-furniture subsidiary Land of Nod reissued a $400 activity table with a more-durable wood when consumers complained it was too soft and showed punctures and dents from normal kid use. Even though return rates were still low -- who wants to bother shipping disassembling and shipping back a clunky table? -- the reviews uncovered the problem.

Scouring every complaint
"We're not just guessing, we know exactly which products have issues and what exactly the issue is," said Oriental Trading CEO Sam Taylor, who logged time at HP, Best Buy, Land's End and Disney before heading up the Omaha, Neb., party and craft supplier. "We put together a cross-functional team that cuts across product development, merchandising, sourcing, inventory, e-commerce, creative and quality. The team reads every single one- and two-star review."

Reviews are growing in importance to marketers struggling to figure out how to turn social-media conversations into insights that directly affect sales. But the good and the bad reviews are valuable. Walmart is using them to highlight customers' favorite products in its circulars; Sephora is using it in-store, via mobile phones.

And while Twitter conversation and Facebook chatter is interesting and important, it's not structured, and can be difficult for marketers to implement into their processes. Review data, on the other hand, address a particular product -- and when a consumer is in the mode to talk about it.

"A tweet doesn't give you a whole lot of insight except it's positive or negative, while reviews are about the product, what you like and don't like," said Sam Decker, chief marketing officer at Bazaarvoice, an Austin, Texas, company that manages product-review platforms for both retailers and manufacturers, including many of those mentioned in this piece. His offline analogy is a room where everyone is there to talk about your product vs. a room where they are there to talk about anything.

But even if reviews offer structured data, it's not easy to make them an integral part of a company's internal process and the ones who do have well-defined methods. Samsung uses its product-review information for four purposes: to listen and keep its ear to the ground, to enhance the shopping experience for consumers who are increasingly seeking more information, to build community among consumers and let them talk to each other and to improve customer service and support by helping them be aware early of issues that may arise.

Reviews easiest
Even before Samsung added reviews to its site, it launched an internal process for disseminating that information, said Kris Narayanan, director-marketing at Samsung Electronics America, and that included getting it in the hands of product managers and marketing managers as well as the service and support group. And in some cases, they'll make sure they filter into the R&D group.

Samsung is also listening to consumers in places such as Twitter, Facebook and on blogs, but the challenge there is that content is "very diverse" and finding patterns in it "is nontrivial."

"We use tools to track buzz, track mentions of products and brands and there's a method to the madness but I can't say anyone's discovered it," he said. But "reviews are more structured, we quite often know specifically what products they own and that provides so much more transparency for us in terms of consumer opinion vs. tracking the tremendous volume of buzz.

Interview with Cost Per Lead Expert - Jonah Mytro

2009-06-29T15:33:00.000-07:00

From Clickz.com - Jonah Mytro discusses the cost per lead industry and getting started with a performance based internet marketing campaign for lead generation.

Performance media buying is one way to minimize risk associated with media dollars in these strange economic times. I've written plenty on this topic, so this time I decided to get the scoop from an expert in the space: Jonah Mytro, director of Mediaspike, based in Brookline, Massachusetts.

Harry Gold: Please tell me about yourself and your company -- basically, what do you do and whom do you do it for?

Jonah Mytro: We are an online marketing and business development firm focusing on the development, launch, and management of Web sites in a variety of different industries including online education, debt settlement and consolidation, travel, scholarships, and parking. We own and operate each of our Web sites and generate leads and inquiries for our clients on a performance model. Clients only pay per qualified lead or inquiry and are very ROI [return-on-investment] focused.

HG: So you're not an agency then?

JM: Mediaspike is not the traditional agency where we buy media on the client's behalf. Our goal is to deliver qualified leads and inquiries to our clients who pay us on a cost-per-lead basis. From the client perspective, they are reducing their risk and only paying for a qualified lead, which they can monetize. We are focused in certain areas so we can go very deep into certain verticals and develop mature lead channels.

HG: So basically you sell media to certain industries on a cost-per-lead basis?

JM: Correct. So my expertise is in both the buy side and sell side of performance or cost-per-lead media.

HG: So in your world, what is performance media?

JM: Basically [it's]...cost-per-lead media where we, and our clients, buy media on a cost-per-lead basis. Some would consider it cost-per-click or cost-per-interaction performance media as well. But for us, it is cost per lead.

HG: So how do you generate leads for your clients?

JM: We essentially do it two ways: we have straight cost-per-lead buys via long-term partnerships with other sites and we buy and optimize our own CPM [cost-per-thousand] and CPC [cost-per-click] media as any media buying department would do. When we buy the media on a CPC or CPM basis, we need to constantly be evaluating and optimizing the media we buy so we can capture leads for less then we are selling them for. When we buy leads we need to optimize on lead quality, as our clients can and do reject bad leads.

HG: What is the difference between performance media buying and affiliate marketing?

JM: When utilizing a public affiliate marketing platform like LinkShare and CJ [Commission Junction], we find that it is hard to know exactly what all the affiliates are doing out there to generate your leads. Many might maintain compliance with the way you want your brand or client's brand represented, but all in all, you have very little control over what people do with your brand once they grab your creative and start driving traffic. They could be spammers (although they are not supposed to) and worse.

So with the Wild West atmosphere of the affiliate landscape, you really don't know what a lot of your affiliates are doing to get you leads. When we do cost-per-lead [CPL] media buying, we try to do long-term CPL contracts with sites we trust. We also work with them to create a viable flow of quality leads that works for us and them. Otherwise, the relationship will not last.

Often affiliate channels, even if they work, can be hard to set up consistent relationships -- an affiliate is less likely to work with you to dial the program in over the long haul. They are also more flighty -- even if it works, they may have something else they think will do better on so they swap you out for another affiliate deal.

HG: Can you tell me how you structure performance deals?

JM: When buying leads we are successful because we have a deep focus in specific areas and can buy a large volume of leads from a site -- much more then one individual business could commit to. So it is worthwhile for sites to come to us since they know they will benefit from a long-term relationship. We provide them with a significant and consistent revenue flow that is not dependent on a single buyer of leads. The key thing is we get them to commit to really making it work with us -- and work with us not only to optimize on lead volume, but lead quality.

HG: How do you track and gauge lead quality?

JM: We work with over 60 media partners each month and we pass media partner reference IDs to each of our clients that accept them. This technology allows us to review the conversion or lead rejection data by media placement so we can optimize the quality of our leads across our entire channel.

Ultimately, as the overall quality of our leads grows, so does the value of those leads and the price we can ask for them. The way to optimize CPL is on lead quality so it is critical that you have a fast way to gauge the quality of your leads and source them back to the property you are buying them from.

HG: Out of search, banners, links -- all the things you do, is there anything that you think is the clear winner from a performance perspective?

JM: Besides buying straight leads, there isn't one type of media placement that consistently performs better than others; it really depends on the messaging and the landing page. We have had success with all of the units you have mentioned.

HG: What's the best way to get started with a performance-based media buy?

JM: Before you venture out and start the media planning process, you have to decide on your goal metrics and campaign measurement methodology. We work with a lot of education lead-generation clients and their key metric is a cost per enrolled student. Figure out how you are going to monetize a lead or inquiry (follow-up with a phone call, e-mail, brochure, media kit), develop an ROI model you want to achieve. So one is make sure you (or your client) are able to react to the leads you generate quickly. In this business, speed wins. It is very likely that the lead or prospect has made inquiries with more then one organization. Also remember cheap leads are not always good leads. Have a feedback loop in place that lets you quickly gauge the quality of leads from your different sources.

HG: OK, then what?

JM: After that, go out and start talking to sites about creating long-term relationships where you agree to buy all the leads they can generate for you forever. Remember, sites are not interested in assuming the risk for your marketing if it is for a short-term small deal. They want to make money too and only have so much real estate on their properties.

It helps if you go out the door with pre-optimized creative that you know works. Finally, be open-minded about where the conversion happens. It does not always have to happen on your site. Let the site host your landing page and send you the leads. In these cases, you only have to gauge the quality of the leads coming down the pipe and the site does not have to lose a site visitor.

HG: Have all the brand advertisers coming into the online space over the past couple years bit into the availability of performance inventory?

JM: There are plenty of opportunities on the Internet and even with traditional media (radio, television, and print) that you can use for performance media buy. Most brand advertisers aren't utilizing these performance placements since they are more focused on brand awareness compared to being ROI focused so they want premium placements.

HG: Where do you see the future of performance media buying going?

JM: I expect that over the next 12 months we will see a change to more ROI-focused media campaigns due to the current state of the economy. When the economy hits a downturn, the first thing that is cut is the marketing budget, and the idea of lower risk marketing programs is very appealing. I see also more agencies creating specialty performance-based media buying offerings who actually buy leads of properties like ours.

HG: If an individual business or agency wants to get into performance media buying what can you suggest?

JM: Here are some quick tips:

Make sure you or your client has a system to quickly react to the leads coming in.

Develop a system for tracking and optimizing on lead quality.

Know that you have to structure long-term deals with your media partners.

Get over the idea of premium real estate.

Make sure you are going out with pre-optimized creative and offers -- a site will not stay with you if they cannot make money of generating leads for you because your creative and offers are bad and your conversion rate is low.

Consider letting sites host your landing page and conversion [events].

HG: Thanks Jonah. This is really good information.

Clickz.com
Harry Gold
Overdrive Interactive Marketing