By Peter Klein | SVP, Media Services
With last week’s news of a major affiliate network closing its doors, we wanted to remind you that MonetizeIt, the MediaWhiz affiliate network, remains one of the strongest affiliate networks in the industry. It was just three months ago that mThink ranked MonetizeIt as the No. 5 affiliate network in the world.
We’re rapidly expanding our affiliate network to include new offers in mobile, as well as game and app downloads, dating and entertainment offers. These are in addition to MediaWhiz’s extensive selection of branded campaigns in verticals such as finance, education, health and beauty and insurance.
A full listing of all of our campaigns can be found by logging into MoneitizeIt.com. And if you’re not a MediaWhiz affiliate, what are you waiting for? We’ve made it easier than ever to join our affiliate network and start monetizing your site(s).
Editor’s note: This is the second post in a three-part series on the best free SEO tools. A more detailed analysis can be found in MediaWhiz’s new report, “10 Free, Must-Have SEO Tools.” Download here.
By Marc Purtell | Director, SEO
It’s not uncommon in today’s SEO landscape to wake up and find a sudden drop of organic search traffic and/or keyword rankings. When such a disaster occurs, most large brands have access to a qualified SEO agency or robust in-house team to identify and rectify any issues that led to the drops. For smaller brands with limited budget allocated to SEO, this could mean the end of the organic search channel as a driver of business.
It doesn’t have to be this way. As I explore in a new report, “10 Free, Must-Have SEO Tools,” there are a variety of excellent free SEO tools that marketers can use to analyze the situation and identify the problem and solution.
By taking advantage of the intelligence that is available for free, brands with low budgets can recover from SEO issues in order to return to leveraging the organic search channel as a revenue generator. Below is a review of three such SEO tools.
RELATED: 3 Free SEO Tools for Identifying Target Keywords (more…)
Editor’s note: This is the first post in a three-part series on the best free SEO tools. A more detailed analysis can be found in MediaWhiz’s new report, “10 Free, Must-Have SEO Tools.” Download here.
By Marc Purtell | Director, SEO
Choosing the right target keywords builds the foundation for an entire SEO campaign. If the right keywords with the highest potential for return are not selected, the foundation of the campaign will be weak and, therefore, success is nearly impossible.
In order to select the right keywords, data must be collected and analyzed so projections on return can be made. Gathering the necessary data, however, can be expensive and many businesses will not invest in best-of-breed SEO tools.
For those with limited budgets and without access to paid SEO tools, impactful keyword data is not out of reach. There are plenty of data sources and tools that can be used for free or offer free versions. By leveraging several free tools, advertisers can generate enough information to make informed decisions on keyword targets and set themselves up for successful SEO campaigns.
Below are three such tools. In subsequent posts, I will examine the best free SEO tools for auditing, troubleshooting and gaining competitive intelligence. For a full account of the 10 best free SEO tools, download MediaWhiz’s new report, “10 Free, Must-Have SEO Tools.”
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By Marc Purtell | Director, SEO
Today, we’re releasing a new eBook in our growing stable of Insights reports (read them all here). Titled, “10 Free, Must-Have SEO Tools,” the report outlines our top picks for the best free SEO tools and resources marketers can use to identify target keywords, audit and troubleshoot onsite SEO issues and gain competitive intelligence.
Below is a snippet of the many useful insights you’ll find inside the eBook. Download your free copy to find more.
Performance in organic search engine marketing requires an investment. Depending on the goals of a search engine optimization campaign, that investment can be quite substantial. Budget often must be allocated strategically in order to stretch it enough for success.
Part of the investment in any SEO campaign goes toward tools that help brands analyze data, strategize and track results. To do so, marketers need a bevy of tools and resources. (more…)
By Keith Trivitt | Director, Marketing and Communications
In the Digital Age of marketing, connections are everything. Whether it’s connections with consumers (what modern marketers now call “engagement”), connections between consumers and brand advocates or consumer-to-consumer-to-brand connections by way of online review sites, we live in an increasingly interconnected world. Our offline lives have largely merged with our online lives.
Yet one critical aspect of consumers’ offline and online connections has been missing — until now. The announcement by Facebook of the launch of new “partner categories” marks a critical turning point in marketers’ quest to connect offline consumer purchasing habits and intent with online advertising opportunities.
Here’s how AdExchanger described the new ad targeting tool:
“Facebook is adding new offline purchase data from Acxiom, Datalogix and Epsilon. Advertisers can now target people who buy lots of frozen veggies, for instance, or children’s cereal. They can pluck these segments from Facebook’s self-serve interface, alongside its own social data. … It’s just the latest move in a sustained effort by Facebook to absorb the methods pioneered in traditional display over the past decade.”
What ‘Partner Categories’ Mean for Performance Marketers
Facebook’s new ad targeting tools will have a significant positive effective on many aspects of online marketing and advertising. Performance marketers may benefit the most from this new advertising tool. The ability to connect consumers’ offline purchases with potential intent to purchase via Facebook, and then to serve that consumer a relevant ad or lead generation opportunity, has long been one of performance marketers’ top wishes for Facebook advertising.
Here’s how MediaWhiz Senior Vice President of Media Services Peter Klein put it when I asked him yesterday for his thoughts on these new ad targeting tools from Facebook:
“This is a great move by Facebook. Facebook’s “Partner Categories” ad targeting tool clearly lends itself to better targeting of consumers and less irrelevant ads. (more…)
By Marc Purtell | Director, SEO
Location, location, location. Every business owner knows that for retail traffic, it’s all about your location. Increasingly, this adage is being applied to search marketing and search engine optimization campaigns. Yes, we have entered the era of geo-targeted digital marketing.
Given the current state of both consumer search behavior and evolving search algorithms in search engines and social media platforms, geo-targeted marketing is moving closer and closer to the center of many digital strategies. Search engines have long been customizing search results based on users’ IP addresses and delivering search results relevant to users’ location and recent searches.
Whereas IP-based search represented the first phase of digital services focusing on user location, the SEO landscape has fully blown open to the possibilities of geo-targeted marketing. Location-based user experience variations are a huge part of mobile search, as well as social media search (specifically with the introduction of Facebook Graph Search).
Let’s examine why that is the case.
The Emergence of Mobile Search
A strong local search presence is important not only to occupy more relevant real estate within search engine results (organic and local listings) but also to stay competitive with the growing market share of Web users who are searching on mobile devices. There are approximately 187 million Americans accessing Web browsers on mobile devices. This number is increasing at a rate of more than 50 percent year-over-year, while the year-over-year increase of those accessing browsers on desktop devices was only 3%, according to the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism 2012 State of News Media report.
With more Americans using mobile devices for Web searches, and the search engine results on mobile devices becoming more geo-centric, having a location-based digital strategy is essential. (more…)
By Keith Trivitt | Director, Marketing and Communications
ad:tech San Francisco, the online marketing industry’s premier conference, is next week (April 9-10) and we couldn’t be more excited. Every year, we look forward to this event. We reconnect with old friends and industry colleagues, see the latest trends in online marketing and advertising and get a good sense of how the rest of the year will shake out.
Oh, and we also like to show off our own work. Who doesn’t?
With that in mind, you can find the MediaWhiz team joining our colleagues from Matomy Media Group at the Matomy booth, #2217.
We’re especially excited to showcase MediaWhiz Mobile, our just-launched mobile performance marketing practice. We’re thrilled to now provide advertisers and publishers with mobile performance marketing campaigns and offers across a wide range of online marketing channels, including affiliate marketing, email, social media, display, search, SEO and lead generation.
If you’re in San Francisco next week of ad:tech, be sure to stop by the booth #2217 to chat with MediaWhiz and Matomy Media Group. We hope to see you there! (more…)
By Marc Purtell | Director, SEO
In recent months, content marketing has moved beyond trendy buzzword to a full-fledged marketing strategy. Increasingly, the discussion has turned to its value to brands as it relates to SEO.
Some believe content marketing will take over SEO. I don’t. As I outline in a new report, “Content Marketing Like a Pro: Tactics and Techniques to Increase Search Engine Visibility,” content marketing should be used as a way to supplement existing SEO efforts and become a lead-generation source in and of itself.
RELATED: How to choose the right content types for SEO value
In order to maximize the impact of content marketing, both as a driver of leads and sales and as a way to augment SEO and drive organic search performance, marketers should utilize the following 10 best practices:
- Know Your Audience. In order to engage with potential customers through content marketing, it is important to first know who they are, what they want and what they value. This starts with market research. Identify the customer segment and find out the types of websites they frequent. These websites provide an initial list of publisher prospects for the content.
- Include Images. Part of the goal of producing and promoting great content is to influence customers and prospects to share your content with their online communities. Use large, engaging images within your content so that when it is shared via social media, the summary that is visible to other users will include a thumbnail. This will draw more attention to it and garner higher click-through rates. Don’t forget to properly tag your images so that they, too, show up in search rankings and improve the authority of your brand’s content.
- Curate Content. Regurgitated information from another source is not likely to draw much attention from your target audience. Your content should offer a fresh perspective and draw from multiple sources. Curate content from a variety of trusted sources in order to provide readers with a new perspective or insight they may not have already seen.
- Promote. Use multiple channels to promote your content. Leverage your current marketing channels, including email, social media, public relations, display advertising, etc., to inform your customers and prospects about new content resources.
- Reference Industry Influencers. When discussing a specific topic within your content marketing piece, it can be helpful to reference and cite individuals who are known to the audience and have authority on the topic. People love to see their own names published and will likely promote the content on their own for free, thus further spreading the exposure and influence of your brand and its expertise. (more…)
By Keith Trivitt | Director, Marketing and Communications
LeadsCon, a lead-generation conference, wrapped up its West Coast show in Las Vegas last week. The MediaWhiz team was all over the conference, starting with the first day’s Buyers Summit (March 18), and ending with an afternoon panel March 20 on mobile lead generation.
Beyond the ideas and insights our own team brought to LeadsCon, we learned a lot from the dozens of other speakers and vendors who were in attendance. Below is a quick synopsis of our top-3 takeaways from LeadsCon Las Vegas 2013.
RELATED: Check out our photo slideshow on Facebook from LeadsCon Las Vegas.
Trend #1: Mobile Here, Mobile There, Mobile Everywhere
Not surprisingly, mobile dominated many of the panels and presentations at LeadsCon.
Taking a page from that meme, we launched MediaWhiz Mobile at the conference. Serving as our official mobile performance marketing practice, MediaWhiz Mobile offers clients and publishers mobile performance marketing campaigns and offers across a wide range of online marketing channels, including affiliate marketing, email, social media, display, search, SEO and lead generation.
In a March 20 panel hosted by MediaWhiz (“Taking Lead Gen Beyond the Desktop”), panelists discussed best practices for mobile lead generation. One issue panelists highlighted was the need to prepare call centers for the potential flood of incoming calls that could result from making mobile landing pages too easy to convert.
Overshadowing that issue, though, was the bigger concern over whether many companies were even prepared to move beyond the current focus on mobile branding. As Rebecca Madigan of the Performance Marketing Association noted, “Mobile lead generation is a huge ‘money to be had’ opportunity for advertisers and marketers.” A great way advertisers can tap into performance marketing’s mobile lead-gen opportunities is by setting up click-to-call campaigns, according to Madigan. (more…)
By Hakan Lindskog | CEO
Last week, we announced the launch of our new mobile performance marketing practice, MediaWhiz Mobile. While it doesn’t mark our first foray into mobile marketing, it does represent our most significant and dedicated focus on the immense online marketing and advertising opportunities of mobile.
What this launch means for MediaWhiz, however, is insignificant compared to the value we believe it offers our clients. MediaWhiz Mobile will help advertisers more profitably engage, acquire and retain customers across what has rapidly become the most relevant and important digital marketing channel: mobile.
Why the launch now? As I told A4U in announcing the new service, we absolutely believe that mobile lead generation is the future of online marketing.
Consumers are projected to spend $119 billion worldwide on goods and services from the mobile and tablet devices by 2015, according to ABI Research. And with upwards of 70% of online advertising spend in the United States going toward performance-based advertising, it’s clear that advertisers are hungry for performance-based mobile marketing services that do far more than branding. They want mobile marketing services that help their brands profitably engage, acquire and retain customers in the mobile space.
Increasingly, consumers are ditching their desktop computers in favor of their smartphones and tablets. The opportunities these devices offer brands and marketers to reach, connect with and influence the purchasing habits of consumers is beyond what many of us considered possible just five years ago. More importantly, mobile and tablet devices offer advertisers an immense opportunity to acquire customers instantly and to generate leads at the click of a button.
MediaWhiz Mobile is here to service those opportunities across a variety of online marketing channels, including affiliate marketing, display advertising, search, SEO, lead generation and email. (more…)
