Jason Abbruzzese says, “Welcome to the slightly obnoxious future.Autoplay video is going to find you. Chances are it already has, unless you live a cloistered existence and manage to avoid Facebook or Twitter or any number of media websites.When you scroll through Twitter, videos and GIFs will automatically start blaring from your computer, Twitter’s announced this week that it had introduced video and GIF autoplay to its service follows on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat (in its Discover section) and various media sites that have begun rolling clips whether or not users want to see... [...]

Wanie Mokhtar says, “Creating content, such as emails, is a great way to connect with a mass audience.But there’s a lot more to it than simply writing an email and hitting send.While you may have a dozen, hundreds or even thousands of subscribers, it’s important to remember that among that list exists a variety of individuals with different needs, motivations and experiences.As a result, this means that, sadly, not every piece of content you create will be a perfect fit for everyone.So how can you nurture your diverse audience with content that’s relevant to every individual?”.5-Minute... [...]

Anna Johansson says, “The topic of “viral” content is one of the most intriguing in the world of social media and content marketing, but it’s also one of the most elusive.Producing content is a valuable and necessary part of any online branding or visibility strategy, but only a tiny percentage of all produced content actually “go viral,” the digital marketing equivalent of winning the lottery.Seemingly on a whim, these rare pieces of content capture the interest of millions of people, first getting shared by the select few who saw it first, then getting shared by the next generation... [...]

Kristen Dunleavy says, “Got a big idea? The Draw Shop can help. The team of 20, led by co-founders Erik Kerr and Summer Felix, create attention-grabbing whiteboard videos designed to boost sales and marketing success for companies large and small.The Draw Shop works with everyone from independent authors to huge corporations like Google, collaborating with them each step of the way to create the perfect video.But when your customer base varies as much as The Draw Shop’s, how do you maintain a steady flow of highly-qualified leads? According to The Draw Shop co-founder Erik Kerr, email... [...]

Mimi An says, “Over the years, I’ve seen my fair share of bad surveys. Those tend to be easier to identify than good ones. You’ve probably taken some yourself — they often have poorly worded questions and tend to drag on forever.Good surveys, on the other hand, are forgettable. The best experience you can aim for is for the respondent to finish and think, “Well, that was tolerable.”Want to learn how to create good surveys? There are some basic guidelines to make sure people walk away without feeling frustrated from an overly complicated survey design. Here are a... [...]

Andrea Francis says, “Remember when it was enough to have a decent-looking website with a couple of your keywords on a few product pages? How times have changed! Increasingly, marketers have to come up with innovative ways to grab visitors’ attention.When infographics first blew up the internet, they had the same impact as when businesses starting publishing their own ebooks, reports, and white papers on the web. Minds were blown, hats were taken off, people applauded. Life was good. But pretty soon, infographics saturated the web and they were no longer as sparkly, shiny, or... [...]

Most famous online marketing names don’t want you digging too much into their backgrounds for fear of some of the things you might find.Not Alex Jeffreys. He openly says he started online from way below the poverty line. He’s proud of what he has accomplished.From wherever you are starting, he can help you. He started from scratch, so he knows what it’s like. In fact, since becoming a successful online marketer, he has helped many people reach online success.If you google his name, the search engines are filled with unsolicited testimonials from people whose lives he helped change.Jeffreys... [...]

Martin Beck says, “Vine has updated its iOS app to to set its search results in motion. Now people who search within Twitter’s six-second video network will be served … Vines.Previously, results were limited to Vine accounts and hashtags; users had to tap through to a tag or a person to get to Vine content. After the update, when people visit the Explore tab and tap in a search query, they will see a selection of most popular and recent Vines below the sections for accounts and hashtags.There’s a toggle to switch between top and recent posts, giving people options for exploring.... [...]

Ginny Marvin says, “You may recall that on the most recent earnings call with analysts, Google CFO Patrick Pichette said that Google’s declining ad click costs, have not been caused by mobile, as many have assumed, but by YouTube. This week, VP of search ads, Jerry Dischler, told the audience at SMX Advanced in Seattle, that YouTube has been the cause of declining CPCs not just in the past quarter, but this whole time — CPCs started heading south in Q4 2011.Last quarter, Google reported that clicks to Google sites (Google.com, Gmail, Maps, YouTube) increased by 25 percent year-over-year... [...]

Olivia Dello Buono says, “We don’t need to sell you on the power of using video in your digital marketing strategy. The proof is in the numbers:⅓ of all online activity is spent watching videos75% of people visit a marketer’s website after watching a videoWebsite visitors are 64% more likely to buy a product online after watching a videoClick-thru rates increase 2-3 times when video is included in an email(Thanks, Digital Sherpa!)So when we caught wind that our friends at Wistia were hosting their 2nd annual video marketing conference (the aptly named WistiaFest), we sent a... [...]