Mad 4 Blog

These days, it seems like everyone has a blog. In fact, most business websites would not be complete without one. The trick is to stand out from the herd—because in today’s fast-developing and competitive world of websites, just having a blog is only status quo. In fact, it may even be a waste of time and money if your voice is only going to get lost.

But before you can adequately market your blog, you have to understand the reasoning behind it. Not all techniques are suitable for all blog types, so what you use should be determined by the site’s overall goal. Some people build a blog in order to increase traffic to their website, while others create blogs in order to generate revenue. Of course, many blogs are also stand-alone pages created to exist as singular discussion forums.

In terms of marketing, most blogs are used to enhance SEO. They help business-oriented websites attract attention, build brands and communicate with prospective clientele. With this in mind, here are three top tips for marketing your blog:

1) Create an e-Newsletter.

Whether or not your company already sends out a regular newsletter, embedding links to your blog or even re-posting eye-catching selections from its posts might engage current e-mail recipients while informing new subscribers that the blog even exists. You can also see who’s using the links to click through to the blog to determine which posts and topics are generating the most interest. Just remember, re-posting your blog posts in full is a bad idea; it deters readers from ever actually needing to visit your website.

2) Build a Community.

Having individuals visit your blog on a regular basis is excellent. But each lone reader is actually an opportunity to expand your entire community. The first thing you want to do is inspire readers to leave comments so that they can bond with other forum members, who can serve as a reason for readers to return. This can often be done by including interesting topics and asking questions directly within the content of your post. You’ll also want to visit blogs similar to your own and get to know the readership there; as discussed above, it’s easy to make connections and participate by replying to others or leaving your own comments. You can also ask these website owners if they’d like to participate in cross-posting, guest posting, link exchanges or other ideas that allow websites serving the same readership to gain exposure on your blog while you contribute a new voice to theirs. In blogging, there is a focus on community, not a sense of competitiveness—and this benefits everyone in your interest group or business field.

3) Ensure Consistency and Quality.

No matter how well you succeed in attracting readers to your blog, your endeavors can never succeed if visitors only stop by once. In the blogging world as much as in the real world, first impressions are vital. To keep readers coming back again and again, an attractive website with appealing content is necessary. Next week, we further discuss how to encourage return readers and turn them into customers and clients–or just loyal fans.

So come back next week to find part two of the Top Ways to Market Your Blog.

On the heels of this article, which explains how Hulu.com uses surveys to gauge an audience’s opinion on ads, comes a recent story out of Australia. The down under nation’s Advertising Standards Bureau (ASB) is dealing with less-than-positive feedback on its published content. But not only is this feedback negative, it’s also out of left field. Naturally, when you ask for your audience’s opinion, you have to take what you get. And as every suggestion-box-key-holder knows, every informed and constructive comment comes with a dreary downside: the throngs of merciless, inapplicable complaints.

Surveying is one of the most useful tools for marketers, and having eyes and ears in the field is invaluable. How else to accurately and objectively measure how well your work is doing? But when you solicit for comments, it means taking the good with the bad (and having the wisdom to know the difference). Someone has to read them, and someone has to sort them, but is there any easy way to whittle down the winners from the whiners?

As outlined by the Sydney Morning Herald, examples of useless reports included:

- A dancing child as being too perverse.
- A child eating an ice cream cone as being sexualized.
- A rude redhead as being vilified for her coloring.
- An errant wool ball as promoting violence against Victorians.

Tactfully, the ASB states that the real problem comes down to allocation of resources, stating that time and money can’t be spent addressing irresolvable issues. Marketing survey site Mumbrella, which analyzed a sample of received complaints earlier this year, was far less restrained, calling the task a matter of dealing with “idiots” and “single-issue zealots.” Many of the criticisms led the agency to believe that complainers might even be reporting out of spite for a particular brand or product, rather than actually taking issue with the commercial itself. However, due to quality control regulations currently in place, even one raised issue warrants an investigation by the ASB. And the number of incoming complaints has more than doubled in the past half-decade alone.

Even if a significant percentage of feedback is coming from “the nutty fringes of society,” according to the ASB, how can the bureau separate the wheat from the chaff? A system of standards is being implemented that takes into account a new set of clauses dictating what is and isn’t nationally pre-approved. For example, dogs on a leash are not examples of animal abuse. While it may seem painstaking to parse out the more minute depictions of questionable behaviors, these guidelines are expected to make it that much easier to quickly sort and reduce complaints so that only the most practical are left to consider.

Chief Executive Fiona Jolly of the Advertising Standards Bureau informs that an estimated 10-30% of incoming complaints would be filtered out by this system. The percentage of previously discarded pre-filter complaints is unknown, but at least will be markedly reduced—making it that much easier to focus on the comments that can actually be used to approve quality advertising content that appeals to most audiences.

In an age of downloadable music that is listened to online or on your phone or on an iPod—not to mention any other ubiquitous handheld device—is it still relevant and cost-efficient to advertise on the radio? At Mad 4 Marketing, we are frequently asked about the merits of radio advertising. The truth is that there are still plenty regular radio listeners out there—approximately 230 million, in fact. But the trick is knowing who is listening and when. As with most marketing formats, the greatest value in radio advertising comes from doing your homework in order to hit your niche demographic as often as possible with a memorable, informative ad.

Picking the right station and time slot for your ad to air is rather important, but you also have to buy enough time. Radio commercials are traditionally offered in 30-second formats, although you may also be able to purchase a full minute of air time for a steeper price. Another option might be to sponsor a section of radio programming, so that announcers themselves mention your product (and this can be backed up by regular advertising during commercial breaks). Regardless of the amount of time one commercial takes up, it is vital for that commercial to be heard over and over again. One trick is to continuously buy air time during the same short time period (such as 12-2pm). That way, the same very targeted audience (like workers who have a daily lunchtime commute) will hear your commercial over and over again, giving it time to sink in. Exposure on the radio is known as ‘frequency’—which is not the number of times your ad airs overall, but how much exposure you have to your preferred audience.

When it comes to crafting commercials for radio, you must keep in mind your formatting. Creative cannot take on the same hurdles as print, television or online advertising, which come with enticing visuals and interactivity. With radio, sound is the most important factor. Your ad needs to catch listeners’ attention with the right music, jokes and sound bytes. And because listeners cannot click on your ad or rewind it, key messaging must be extremely tight and make an impact the first time around. Contact information must be at the forefront—after all, what good is even the most entertaining, persuasive call to action if your potential customer cannot reach you?

Additional benefits to advertising on the radio include:

• Cheaper than television commercials, but with the same big-audience outreach
• Smaller cost to produce than television commercials or broad online campaigns
• Can be used to supplement other marketing efforts (‘See our ad in the Daily Post’)
• Easy to adapt and re-place ads according to effectiveness
• Catches the same people at the same time on a regular basis (built-in audience)
• Utilize trusted on-air personalities by buying sponsored segments or endorsement

Interested in discussing the logistics and pricing for how to put your business on the radio? Contact Mad 4 Marketing as the radio media buying experts to get you the most effective scheduling at the best cost so that you can be heard. Contact us for a consultation.

We have previously mentioned the importance of being transparent when advertising on the Web. As page viewers become increasingly frustrated by pop-ups, covert ads and run-arounds, they reciprocally appreciate websites that are up-front about what elements are sponsored–as well as those that tailor advertising to most accurately reflect products and topics that readers may actually want. When distrust brews toward online advertising, the entire framework of interactive marketing–and how it can positively impact and support websites and businesses–is compromised. Earlier this year, popular review site Yelp.com came under fire for practices that walked too close to the fine line between acceptable and deplorable ethical behavior.

Yelp is a website that features every kind of business (from restaurants to dental practices) and allows anyone to sign in and post a review about that business–good or bad. That way, interested parties can get an unbiased, comprehensive overview of that company. Yelp offers free listings as well as paid memberships which come with additional features such as enhanced content control, videos and photo slide-shows. Paid accounts may also add sponsored posts–which means that their business page can come up first in a search for chosen key words, or an ad can even show up on a competitor’s page. Cost may depend on impressions or clicks, according to individual account terms.

Problems began to arise when it seemed like Yelp was ‘selling’ positive reviews to paid members through ‘Favorite Reviews.’ This feature pushed better reviews to the top of the page, and confused the matter of what were reviews and what could be constituted as advertisements. Even when these were genuine reviews–that is to say, not written by a company exec–the confusion and doubt that page visitors experienced when they saw positive reviews highlighted was enough to draw ire and attention to the site’s other questionable policies.

Another practice that bore review was Yelp’s filter, which automatically removed some reviews according to a quality control algorithm. Because only paying members had the filter in place, which most often managed to weed out negative reviews, this device made business pages seem even more like ads in disguise. For example, when soliciting paid accounts from businesses that were currently listed for free, Yelp made offers that essentially said negative reviews could disappear…for the right price. Many of the businesses that were contacted found the offer extortive, and some went so far as to contact authorities. The wording seemed to take advantage of a not-quite-illegal loophole–but one that could still be considered immoral.

In the spirit of total transparency, Yelp now offers readers the option to view every single review written, regardless of relevance or content–but only through a special, segregated link. Some critics have frowned upon this compromise. They believe that all posts should be shown at all times–or that the filter removal should be more prominently feature on the site (it is currently tucked into the bottom of review pages). However, having this option—and other changes that Yelp has made in recent months—have thus far been enough to satisfy contemporary ethical guidelines for transparency on the Internet.