The Web Uncovered

Youtube has already been determined as the victor in the world of user-generated video.  This isn’t news.  However, the relatively recent addition of insights in Youtube reveals something that all marketers fear.  What if your content is attracting the wrong audience?

Let me give you an example.  You are selling lingerie, and your target audience is women from ages 20-40.  You find models who make your product look very good, or vice a versa, and you post your video on youtube.  Within a week you have over 1,000 hits, and a 10,000 within a month.  While you are excited about the virility of your campaign, you don’t understand why it is not generating traffic to your website or any signicant sales increase.  Then you look at Youtube Insights at demographics, and find that 80% of the viewers were men, ages 14-24.

The Takeaway:

Remember, segmentation and product placement are not enough alone.  You have to generate content based on the values of your target segment.  Using themes like pricing and value, or improved body image, could better focus this campaign.  While Youtube gives you only basic segment data, this is enough to know if your framing of content is seriously flawed.

Marshall Mcluhan often criticized poor media placement based on the effects of the medium upon the content which was being presented. He best defined these terms by separating media into categories of “hot” and “cool.” In short:

Hot Media is media that is ready-made, in that it requires very little participation from the media consumer. Action movies are hot media, as little is left to the imagination, and it has a beginning, middle, and end.

By contrast, Cold Media, requires a certain level of participation, whether it be imagination, input, a vote. Forcing interaction between the medium and consumer, it wears away the consumers’ ability to remained detached.

Is the internet hot or cold?
Neither is the best answer, both is another possible one. While video, radio, and other inherently hot media are available, they often times can have a cool aspect such as video responses, polls, blogging, and more. It becomes paradoxically both. Facebook is detached enough that you are safe in the confines of your own home, that is completely cool in that all of its content is user generated.

The Takeaway: When creating anything online, you want it be initially hot enough to attract your audience, but cool it down quick enough that your audience response in the way you want, whether it be to buy now, read more, or tell a friend.

Having collected or gained access to a thousands, or even just a few, of potential clients is one sure way to get business moving. Direct marketing, both online and offline, has been seen as one of the best tools to generate real results. However, the question is, once you have your email addresses, what do you do with them?

Rather than creating your own excel files that require upkeep or trying to draft your own html emails (or worse send basic text emails), an email management system is definitely the way to go. We here at The Web Uncovered are crazy about one in particular, Constant Contact, as it has the most value-added systems for its cost.

Not only can you import and export your email lists through Constant Contact, but you also are html email templates that you can customize for your campaigns, such as name-addressing, adding your logo, and more. Also they have a feature to add polls, which is a good way to create user interaction.

Takeaway: Now this is a paid service, so you need to evaluate how much time you think you will save, and how much you think you will use it. For me personally, the feature that put me over the edge was the analytics feature, where you can see who clicked on links in your email. Not only does it give you great feedback on your campaign overall, but I have used this to create personal follow-up emails that closed deals. All-in-all, this is a technology that is unappreciated and may become a make more vital part to online marketing in the year to come.

While there are many aspects to running an effective online marketing campaign, including video is seen as imperative, especially if there is an intent for going viral. The billion dollar deal that brought Youtube into the Google fold only reiterates this fact. Before we can appropriately address how to approach the use of video in online marketing, we need to understand why it works with people.

Coming back to Marshall Mcluhan, media is either hot or cold, either interactive or ready-made. The internet transcends these boundaries. I won’t divulge too much here as this is a post of it’s own. However, beyond the fact that humans are visually-based, and that culturally we put a visual emphasis on everything (“’see’ what I mean?”), video has been and will likely be the quintessential example of hot media. Whether it is a cooking recipe, a guitar lesson, or your product commercial, people will choose a video over a typographical description 99 percent of the time.

Another reason for this is that Video is a mixed medium. It can be visual, audio, and typographical at the same time. This solidifies it as a hot medium.

The Takeaway: Taking this all into consideration, your target audience wants to come as close to experience your service, product, etc, as possible within the confines of technological ability. If you don’t have a video showcasing your value-added, your competition will, and likely already has. To have an online presence to be multisensorial in a mixed medium.

While Facebook once was reserved for college kids, its universal adoption has led many middle-aged subscribers to sign up and log on.  Facing the higher unemployment and tougher competition for the job market, employers and jobhunters alike have resorted to using social networks as a hiring aid.  This in result means that your profile will like become your digital first impression.  This has several rammifications, of which we will explore here.

Firstly, for those of you who are within the original Facebook users, who signed on while in college and have since entered the job market, this means you need to review your profile with a HR Manager’s eye.  Pictures of you doing kegstands at your best friend’s fraternity rush probably won’t create the impression that screams “management.”  Akin to this, you should review all your online content accordingly.  You do not necessarily need to delete your wall posts or take down pictures, but simply need to change your privacy settings so that your public profile is professional while you’re friends can still connect with you as they usually do.  The best starting point is to remove network access to your pictures and wall posts.  If a boss or someone you want to impress Facebooks you, you can also create custom settings to limit their ability to see anything other than your work history (for instance, once I got over the shock of being Facebooked by my mom, I changed the privacy settings so she couldn’t see the PG-13 wall posts between my girlfriend and I).  Facebook has created the technology to adapt your profile for all contexts, but you have to take the time to properly utilize them.

For you older and likely newer users of Facebook, the thing to remember is that Facebook is not LinkedIn.  Your potential employer has your resume and cover letter, so rather than making your profile an opportunity to reiterate your credentials, utilize the space to reveal dynamic qualities about yourself.  If you have a blackbelt, speak Italian, or volunteer with a community organization, this is a great space to showcase it.  However, remember that unless you change your privacy settings, such details as marital status, sexual orientation, age, and other information illegal for your potential employer to ask becomes readily available. 

The Takeaway:   Untag the pictures of yourself drinking to the brink of consciousness, add your work experience, and review your privacy settings.  While Facebook has been used by countless people to gain employment, I personally know of several people being rejected solely based on their Facebook profile’s content.  Similarly, for those of you employed, you may want to rethink your privacy settings as well.

For those looking to explore the possibilities on PPC advertising (that’s pay-per-click for you newbies), Facebook generates a strong appeal. No longer representing a slice segment of the market, Facebook has quickly become the standard social network, leaving Myspace and others in the dust.

Their advertising interface is extremely easy to use, and requires very little technology comprehension. This should be highly attractive to those looking to spread their wings in the world on PPC. Furthermore, their segmentation abilities are amazing; not only can you target based on age, location, and gender, but you target consumers based on religion, sexual orientation, and relationship status. Even more amazing is their ability to create search parameters within users profile to advertise (e.g. “target anyone who lists Tool as their favorite band and Watership Down as their favorite book”). If you choose a larger campaign, you create a plethora of ultra-targeted ads in a sort of micro-segmentation.

The Catch:
While these technologies are great, for those companies leading larger campaigns, Facebook’s cost per ad is much more expensive than most other PPC opportunities. For those selling a product rather than promoting a campaign, this will take a big bite out of your ROI (return on investment). This is a huge drawback for those on limited marketing budgets as well.

The Takeaway:
If you want to test content in a limited fashion, or have a high-end product that doesn’t require widespread response, the segmentation abilities of Facebook ads are great. This is especially true for those who are not technologically savvy. If you want to run a larger PPC campaign, many other opportunities exist that will give you better ROI. Remember, even if the segmentation ability isn’t there, if only interested people are clicking on your ads, you are still reaching your target audience.

For more specifics as to how to execute a Facebook PPC campaign, look at Facebook Ads 101.