Facebook Flyers Make Room for Facebook Targeting.
When I first experimented as an advertiser with Facebook Flyers, I could purchase impressions for a flat fee and target it to a university. At least, that’s how I remember it going. As a Facebook user, I saw a slew of generic ads for affiliate programs and university apparel, amongst those that I remember showing up in the era of Facebook Flyers.
Now, Facebook ads can be targeted based on all sorts of things: location, gender, keywords, education status, workplace, political view, and relationship status.
Prior to Facebook Flyers being turned off, I was still receiving ads that said, “Single?” Even after, I’m still getting ads for dating sites, though fewer of them.
The following advertisers I assume are doing a good job and are targeting their ads to my marital status as “engaged”:
Holiday E-Commerce Marketing Roundup
Tips, Steps, and Best Practices to Improve Your E-Commerce Holiday Sales
In September, Taming the Beast covered what it takes to have your customer service ready for the holiday season.
Offer discounts, increase server capacity, learn from your competitors, and bundle products are just some of the 25 E-Commerce Holiday Tips for Your Website.
Check out the step-by-step synopsis and critique of Network Solution’s 7 Steps to Improve Your Online Holiday Sales Whitepaper in Improving eCommerce Holiday Sales Whitepaper Is Really A Best Practices List.
Search Engine Optimization for the Holidays
Make sure you’re getting the basics of SEO right with 25 eCommerce SEO Tips.
Don’t forget that the keywords that drive traffic to your site on a regular basis may not be the same keywords that can drive traffic around the holidays and that you can find out when keywords are searched during the year, with Rebecca’s Plan for the Holidays Nice and Early By Analyzing Search Trends.
And in the event your on-page SEO is top-notch already, you should definitely work on these 9 Linkbuilding Tips for Ecommerce Websites.
How E-Commerce Sites Can Embrace Social Media
There are answers to questions about how e-commerce sites can reach social media users, and which social media sites to target in the Practical eCommerce Interview: Ecommerce Implications From Social Media.
And whether you’ve started blogging for your e-commerce site or not, you’re sure to find tips and tricks in this monster list of ECOMMERCE BLOGS: 75+ Community Sites of the Top Online Retailers.
Pay-Per-Click Preparation for the Holidays
Just like this post probably comes too late in the holiday season to implement everything, regarding your ppc campaigns, you should have fleshed out your keywords, developed holiday ad copy, and focused on the buying cycle. Check out Holiday PPC Preparation: You should have started yesterday for suggestions on writing ad copy for holiday shoppers.
Mistakes can effect the performance of your PPC campaigns. Just check out this post on E-Commerce PPC Campaign Metrics with stats to prove the point!
Google Analytics Tracking E-Commerce Sales
Google Analytics can do a whole lot of things, and sometimes, a nice soul will go step-by-step to help you get your reports to Match Specific Transactions to Specific Keywords.
Shopping Cart Usability
I’ve argued that SEO is more than just on-page and off-page optimization, but includes driving visitors through a funnel. Usability and conversion really needs to be considered a part of SEO. Until it is, you might enjoy the eMarketer graphs on conversion rates and this post that says, “Your Ecommerce site ranks, but boy does it suck.”
And when you’ve been shocked into realizing your site can convert at a higher rate, you’ll be well served to check out eCommerce & Shopping Cart Usability: 21 Best Practices
Online Press Conference - Social Media-Style
What would a press conference look like online that embraced social media? After hearing of a fake news conference, I began thinking about “alternatives” to the traditional news conference where a spokesman stands before a press audience who is prepared with disarming questions and critical minds. While the initial thought was to hold the conference in Second Life, there are obstacles to getting the software installed, people flying around or sitting in place, chatting out of turn, and most importantly, the documented scalability issues of having too many people in an area.
Unfortunately, when I began to flesh out the idea for this post, I ran into several issues regarding the temporary nature of a live press conference, where, even when there is video present, that video is not generally seen in its recorded version later, and cannot be commented on by the general public as readily as a recorded video at YouTube. How does one take a medium that keeps everything publicly searchable and available seemingly forever (i.e. the Internet), and make it temporary like a medium where even when content is archived it remains mostly unseen (i.e. Live Television.) YouTube video of a pre-recorded statement would receive comments for an indefinite period of time. This would not be in the same vein as a live press conference, so it is scratched.
Here is the potential model I came up with:
Write a traditional press release and/or invitation to the press that you will be unveiling big news under your Digg username at a specific time and date. This will bring the press to your Digg profile, awaiting your submission. The number of Diggs received is not ultimately important, it is to drive the press and bloggers to the press conference. The dugg page holds a short introduction and an embedded, streaming video of a pre-recorded statement. Comments will not be allowed during the video. Upon driving people to watch the pre-recorded statement, the press would then be directed to a live video cast where corresponding chat would serve as live press questions. And Twitter would serve as the ultimate press response and spin.
How would you model an online press conference?
