Martin Beck says, “Pinterest is different.Less a social network for people to share with friends, instead “Pinterest is about me, what I want to do. What I’m thinking about doing in the future,” co-founder and CEO Ben Silbermann said during an interview on stage at the IAB Mixx conference in New York this week.And that difference, Silbermann said, makes Pinterest an especially effective forum for advertising because brands’ products and services are a natural part of that content mix. Ads on Pinterest are relatively new. Promoted Pins, the main ad product, has been around for 14... [...]

Baer says, “Traffic is nice and all, but it’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to measuring your content marketing success.Metrics are what businesses and digital marketers around the world use to determine how effective their marketing strategy is. Breaking down that data and developing a better marketing strategy is one of the keys to consistent growth.While most analytics services offer plenty of data, they don’t exactly offer much guidance when it comes to figuring out what matters. Measuring metrics can actually become intimidatingly complex, especially for the inexperienced... [...]

Brian Hughes says, “Are slow load times putting the brakes on your business’s website?Sure, no one has the time or patience to wait around all day for a slow site to load, but slow load speeds are more than just an inconvenience; they could be having a very real impact on your website’s bottom line.Load speed is a major contributing factor to page abandonment, says Sean Work on the Kissmetrics blog. With nearly half (47%) of all consumer expected a web page to load in two seconds or less, every second counts. Time can be a real killer for eCommerce and conversion rates: 40 percent... [...]

Rainmaker team says, “Creating a remarkable experience for an audience starts with authenticity, which should never be confused with transparency.In this week’s episode of The Lede, Jerod Morris and Demian Farnworth (Hey! They’re back together again!) tackle the topic of authenticity to give you a better understanding of how to create an authentic connection with your audience, no matter what type of content you’re creating.Jerod has discussed authenticity a lot in relation to podcasts. He wanted to hear Demian’s thoughts on how developing an authentic connection may differ depending... [...]

Larry Alton says, “From the outside looking in, social media and SEO look like separate aspects of Internet marketing but there’s a very real connection. Identifying where one starts and the other stops is sometimes impossible.Social media’s relationship to SEO. When examining the relationship between social media and SEO, you’ll hear industry experts discuss correlation vs. causation. Does social media have a direct effect on organic search engine rankings, or are there simply some connections? You’ll find good arguments from both sides, but it’s hard to ignore some of... [...]

Lindsay Kolowich says, “Cool topic? Check. Compelling research? Check. Accurate data? Check, check.When you’re sitting down create an infographic, it’s never a good idea to just jump in, translate all that research into bite-sized pieces one after the other, and hope people like it. Infographics don’t just randomly become popular — there’s a science to it.So, what’s the secret? Thanks to the folks at Siege Media, we have a much better idea. Using BuzzSumo, they analyzed the 1,000 most-shared infographics in the past year to weed out the common... [...]

Ben Davis says, “There are many companies reluctant to let their marketing execs have free reign with their owned and earned media.This is understandable where reputations are easily won and lost. It doesn’t pay to give just anybody the keys to your website, email builder or social media channels and ask them to go at it. Social media faux pas in particular are well documented.Whatever the benefits of managerial oversight, anyone who has worked at a digital agency or a big corporation will tell you the process of ‘sign-off’ from a director or sponsor can be torturous.A sign-off... [...]

Carly Stec says, “40,296.That’s the number of plugins on WordPress. With so many available, it’s tough to figure out the best ones to use — especially when you’re strapped for time.Here’s the good news: We’ve done the work for you. Below you’ll find 17 fantastic plugins every marketer using WordPress should know about. From writing to SEO to analytics, these plugins will help you arrive at the solutions you’re seeking while saving you a ton of time in the process.17 Essential WordPress Plugins for Marketers1) JetpackJetpack is an all-in-one... [...]

Roger C. Parker says, “The series approach to blogging, as I described in How to Turn 1 Idea Into 2 Months of Content Marketing (and More),offers an easy approach to help you plan, create, and repurpose blog posts into future content. Among the benefits of a series approach:Immediate – It removes the guesswork of choosing what to write each week. It also provides an opportunity to go deeper into topics to share more information while building market anticipation for future blog posts.Long term – It makes it easier to keep your blogging on schedule. You create content equity for... [...]

Ken Bowen says, “As marketers, we all dream of expensive radical redesigns of our websites that check off every item on our wish lists. Over the years here at MarketingExperiments, though, we have routinely discovered that with a proper understanding of customers, the smallest changes can often yield the biggest results.A recent test from our friends over at NextAfter demonstrates this fact.BackgroundAs Tim Kachuriak, Chief Innovation and Optimization Officer, NextAfter, noted when he joined us for our August Web clinic, Personalized Messaging Tested, NextAfter works exclusively with... [...]