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MARKETING
Taking ripping to the next level?
OK, so we initially didn’t want to mention this because it seemed like just some random drama without much going for it… We were wrong. It caught quite some attention and started some discussion.
Long story short, Orit Cox posted in the Purple Knowledge Lab Group saying that Ronnie Sandlin ripped her pages. Nothing big here, people rip pages or funnel hack all the time.
What is new? Well, Orit Cox seems to be Ronnie’s student. And also Ronnie then passing that page as his own successful page that he gives away to his students.
Is this any different from the regular way online marketers take what’s working and use it for themselves? Pretty sure it is!
Without going much into the drama and where to draw the line, let’s just jump straight into…
The Crew’s Thoughts:
The state of online marketing, especially affiliate marketing is certainly not on an uptrend. And that’s usually why you see more and more people teach rather than do.
Don’t get us wrong, education is a valid business but the more people do it, the more likely the average quality drops.
And the higher the likelihood of questionable practices. Stay safe out there! Do in-depth research. But always remember YOU have the biggest impact on your own results, no matter the course.
There’s plenty of info available at without paying, and many people who like helping ambitious, hard-working marketers. Paying for education can be part of your learning path but never expect it to be a magic bullet.
Oh, and get out your popcorn GIFs if you’re gonna follow the drama!
Square vs. Landscape images: What works best?
On 7th November, Facebook introduced a new ad format, giving advertisers the chance to use square images (1:1) for Link Click Ads, in addition to landscape images (1.91:1).
So, one question that immediately comes to every advertiser’s mind is: which one converts better?
AdEspresso tried to give an answer with a $1200 experiment. And given that learning from other people’s mistakes is cheaper, let’s have a look at the experiment and see which format led to better results.
Experiment Setup
- Objective: The test was a lead gen campaign using one of their e-books as a lead-magnet. So they used the website conversion objective.
- Creative: They used two identical images, but one in landscape and the other in the square size. Same copy, same headlines, same landing pages.
- Placement: Facebook desktop newsfeed, Facebook mobile newsfeed, and Instagram newsfeed.
- Campaign structure: Six ad sets: desktop placement with a landscape image, desktop placement with a square image, mobile placement with a landscape image. Instagram newsfeed placement with a square image and Instagram newsfeed with landscape image. One ad per ad set.
- Budget: $200 per ad set, spread across 4 days. Amounting to $1200.
- Optimization for conversions.
Experiment Results
The main takeaways are:
- For FB, landscape images on Desktop and Mobile saw a higher CTR.
- On Instagram, square images had a higher CTR.
- Square images produced a lower CPA. Both for desktop and mobile placements in the Facebook Feed, square images saw a CPA 10% lower than landscape images.
- The largest difference was on Instagram: CPA of landscape images was 2.5 times higher than square images. $15.24 compared to $6.04.
“From initial testing, we also saw that 1:1 image link ads showed significant improvement in click-through rate and conversion rate”
This is what Facebook claimed when they introduced the square images format. However, the results don’t seem to be like that. The CTRs are higher for landscape images, but, what counts more, CPAs, are better for square images.
So, we could say that square images work better. AdEspresso suggests turning completely to square images.
We might not completely agree with that conclusion for all situations. We can just let you draw your own conclusions and keep testing for yourself!
An indisputable advantage is that it’s easier to produce content in portrait format for Stories and then crop it to the square one.
A new competitive metric for Search advertisers
Google recently introduced four new ad position metrics to help bring more clarity to the ad performance of our search campaigns.
To allow search advertisers to get a better sense of their campaign performance, Google has now introduced a new competitive metric, Click Share!
This rollout is a new addition to other similar metrics like “Search impression share”, “Search Lost (rank)”, “Search Lost (budget)” etc. that were previously available to search advertisers.
How is this helpful?
- For starters, it tells you how many clicks your ads received compared to the total estimated number of times your ads could be clicked.
- It also tells you how effective your ads are in engaging users compared to your competition.
- It is a more insightful metric than “Avg position”, which has become less useful after the removal of right-side ads on Search.
- Impression share, on the other hand, only tells you how effective you’ve been at getting your ads shown to users.
- A high impression share and low click share might indicate that your budget and bids are high enough but your ads are not resonating well with the users.
Availability of Click Share:
- In the coming weeks, it will be rolled out for all accounts running Search campaigns.
- It will be available at the campaign, ad group and keyword levels.
Plan of Action: It is also recommended to continue to monitor your CTRs to analyze ad copy performance relative to other ads. And use click share to view click growth chances with more extensions or bid or budget increases.
Related Activity Cards on Google
Well, what’s the one thing for which we all turn to Google? A quick answer to our queries!
And we almost always find what we are looking for. At times, we want to revisit the same sites a few weeks later but we don’t remember those websites or the search terms we used.
To help you with these ongoing search journeys, Google has launched Related Activity Cards to help you pick up where you left.
- You can find an activity card at the top of the results page. You’ll find links to pages you’ve visited in the past, along with searches you’ve done.
- If you want to mark a page to read or reference later, just touch and hold the link to quickly add items from your activity card to a collection.
- You can control what appears in your activity card by pressing to delete an item or you can turn off cards by tapping the 3-dot icon.
- For more options to customize your Search experience, you can access your full history and settings right in Search.
How can this impact advertisers?
As shared in this article by PPCExpo, there can be both positive as well as negative aspects of it in the long run.
Pros:
- Advertisers can leverage search history records for patterns, trends, and user behaviours to craft ads that are more likely to be of their interest. By looking at data patterns, advertisers can learn if a search term is being selected from the history card or if it is a new search term.
- You will be able to target users who have already searched for your keywords in the past. Bring on that retargeting!
- With more targeted, relevant ads, your quality score will benefit. It might help in improving ad-visibility and hence, more conversions.
- These cards will display your website as a related suggestion if it is relevant to the user’s current history.
Cons:
- Increased focus on historical search terms may restrict targeting new search terms.
- Branded keyword use might increase.
- Ad auctions might get more competitive, leading to fewer clicks and increased CPCs.
- When people return to the same sites and sources, you may struggle to get a lot of new ad impressions.
New performances tools on Reddit
Reddit has been working hard this year to bring more advertisers to its platform. After launching PPC ads last month, Reddit has now announced two more performance-based tools.
- App Install based campaigns – on CPC bidding.
- Improved conversion pixel.
Previously, Reddit Pixel was only able to track a single event. However, it can now track 8 different conversion events. Including tracking of View-through and Click-through conversions. Its attribution system is also now on par with other ad providers with the addition of 1, 7 and 28-day attribution windows.
As per the 2018 Comscore data, 17% of Reddit users don’t use Facebook; 28% don’t use Twitter; 33% don’t use Instagram; 43% don’t use Snapchat.
In the coming months, Reddit plans to be more proactive in its own marketing efforts. They aim to make the buying experience on its platform more like Facebook, Google and other ad platforms.
In fact, the company recently closed a $300M funding round at a $3B valuation. Its total funding is now at around $550M.
This ad platform is now equipped with performance-based ads, a developed pixel, more granular reporting, ad targeting and campaign management tools. Helping them position themselves as a serious advertising option for brands.
A web-version of DM’s on Instagram
Small but useful update from Instagram: They are testing a web version of Direct Messaging that lets people chat without the smartphone app.
When this rolls out, you’ll be able to send and receive Instagram messages on your web devices such as a PC or Mac.
AMAZON
Amazon launches its own shopping channel
Being able to go Live seems to be the new in-thing. And maybe, Amazon was feeling a bit left out in this regard. So, they made up for it. They announced the launch of its own shopping channel, Amazon Live.
Amazon is looking to use this feature to aggressively promote their own products. And why not? They already control about half of the US e-commerce market.
It will feature live-streamed video shows from Amazon talent as well as those from brands that broadcast their own live streams through their new app, Amazon Live Creator.
Amazon Live streams multiple videos at the same time, so shoppers can tune to the one that most interests them.
The company is very confident that live-streaming videos will drive more sales. Why? They allow brands to interact with their customers in real time using in-built chat and hence, reach more shoppers.
This is what one of the brand owners had to say: “Live streaming has helped us increase daily visits to our product detail pages by 5x and significantly grew our sales.”
POOLSIDE CHAT
Cool tech, (funny) business, lifestyle and all the other things affiliates like to chat about while sipping cocktails by the pool.
Mars One goes from space to digging graves… Starting with their own
What is the space equivalent of the Fyre Festival? It’s Mars One. A company that claimed to colonize Mars. But never had a proven scientific plan!
Unfortunately, their mission came to an end as the company went bankrupt.
The problem was that Mars One was more grounded on computer-generated imagery, videos and marketing hype for a Mars mission reality TV show than any kind of scientific reality.
Not only they wanted to build a community on Mars. They even wanted to make a reality show around it.
Just like the failed Fyre festival, the marketing operations were good. But the execution… kinda failed.
Initially, they were so ambitious they wanted to bring humans to Mars with a $6B budget. Cheap mission, compared to the hundreds of billions in budgets used by NASA for these kinds of operations.
Mars One financial reality looked like one of ‘dem marketing schemes:
“When you join the ‘Mars One Community,’ which happens automatically if you applied as a candidate, they start giving you points. You get points for getting through each round of the selection process… and then the only way to get more points is to buy merchandise from Mars One or to donate money to them.”
Talk about having your head in the clouds…
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