Easy share, easy sale
Facebook’s family of apps get better every day when it comes to e-commerce, with their latest WhatsApp updates making it easier for businesses to connect with customers.
After the introduction of Catalogs, here are two new features that improve customers’ experience with stores:
+ QR codes for businesses: Previously, users had to add a business’s number to their contact in order to chat with it, but QR codes make it quick and easy for companies and customers to connect.
“Now, people simply can scan the QR code a business displays on its storefront, product packaging or receipt to initiate a chat.”
+ Catalog links: If people want to share a catalog, or an item, they can simply copy the link and send it over WhatsApp or elsewhere.
Every month, over 40M users check WhatsApp Catalogs of businesses and stores, so these small updates will definitely help stores leveraging WhatsApp business.
Why what worked yesterday doesn’t work today
It might be a cliché, but it definitely has a seed of truth – things change quickly for performance marketing campaigns, and this is doubly true for Facebook! We can tell you that you’re not the only one experiencing fluctuations.
Barry Hott also has the same impression and he took to Twitter to share some observations and assumptions that some of us might have forgotten.
- The world is opening back up, so lockdown ads won’t work and social media consumption could be decreasing now that outdoor activities are a thing again.
- A potential switch back to traditional offline shops instead of online.
- News and content fatigue. Everyone is talking about the same topics over and over and some people might just be taking a break from the crowded space that is social media.
- CCPA changes, so look at the breakdown by state. Maybe your performance fluctuations are simply caused by California being a big part of your campaign.
- Angle and creative fatigue. When’s the last time you came up with something new?
What else is cooking in the Hacker Way kitchen?
Aside from Barry’s quick breakdown, here’s what else is going on with Facebook:
- US users on FB and Instagram now have the option to stop seeing all ads that contain disclaimers.
- IGTV adds new options to manage how previews appear in the main Feed and Discover.
- From the busy Facebook PR front – the independent civil rights audit the company commissioned wasn’t pretty. You can read the details on that one here.
SPONSORED BY THE ENTREPRENEUR ETHOS
What are the core values of the world’s top brands?
This is what Jarie Bolander, the host of The Entrepreneur Ethos Podcast, is trying to figure out and who else better to help than you?
Here’s what we’re asking you to do.
Complete this 3-minute survey that asks you to assign between 1 and 5 core values to 10 random brands (out of a batch of 70). That’s it!
Jarie will also share the results in a new marketing book he’s working on. We’ll also be able to share the results here with you.
Give Jarie a hand and answer this 3-minute survey.
CONTENT MARKETING
A brilliant content marketing framework for scaling organic traffic
It’s often difficult to get your most valuable pages to rank, especially when those pages are middle-of-funnel content in a crowded niche. Instead, you have to resort to creative strategies, like the ones used by Tyler Hakes from YesOptimist in this case study.
The traffic bump for HelloSign also partially contributed to Dropbox acquiring the company for $230M .
That sets the stage well enough, now let’s look at the highlights from Tyler’s process:
- Tyler created pre-funnel content as a means to build brand awareness with HelloSign’s target persona.
- By taking a deep-dive into the intent behind the buyer, the YesOptimist team created a top-of-funnel framework, classifying it into three categories: evergreen content, social-viral content, and link-building content.
- To capitalize on growing traffic and brand awareness, Tyler and his team created creative middle and bottom-of-funnel content to help prospective customers come to a decision.
Why did this work?
It’s easy to adopt a ‘post and pray’ mindset when it comes to driving organic growth, but that’s not a sustainable approach for success. The YesOptimist team was able to execute a successful campaign with HelloSign thanks to a nuanced strategy that made the most of a variety of content.
Our takeaway: leave no stone unturned when creating an organic growth strategy for your brand. You just might send your traffic skyrocketing (though, unfortunately, we can’t promise an acquisition by Dropbox).
If you want to go in-depth, Tyler shared a whole truckload of insights about the content strategy in his case study – you can show the original post some love here.
ROUNDING UP THE STACK
SEO: Should you or should you not use meta keywords? That’s the question this post by Bill Slawski tries to answer.
YOUTUBE: If you’re a YouTube creator, you can finally track your revenue per 1k views (RPM) directly in your channel analytics.
TOOLS: Fancy a point-and-click schema builder? This free tool might be for you then.
SHOPIFY: If your store is on Shopify, this is a refresher on how to make your store CCPA compliant. It’s an 11-page whitepaper straight from the team at Shopify.
CHATBOTS: Compliance for Messenger is certainly not the easiest but these cheat sheets from The Botfather should make that complicated documentation easier to digest.
TIKTOK: The company released its Transparency Report, sharing TIkTok’s content moderation practices and actions. Hint: 49M videos were removed from the app in 2019.
GOOGLE ADS: Swirl is now available to all Display & Video 360 customers, letting you create immersive 3D ads. A new way for people to interact with an ad.
BRAIN TEASER
A box without hinges, key, or lid; yet golden treasure inside is hid. What am I?
You can find the solution here.
POOLSIDE CHAT
Cool tech, (funny) business, lifestyle and all the other things marketers like to chat about while sipping cocktails by the pool.
The smartest way to price freelance projects
On a good day, freelancing can be a dream come true – and then some. Unfortunately, not every day on the job involves lounging by the poolside, and freelancing comes with its own unique set of challenges.
Chief among those challenges? Setting your rates. If you’re trying to figure out what to charge, you’re definitely not alone.
Fortunately, freelance software developer Tom Hirst recently made life a lot easier by sharing his ultimate guide for pricing freelance projects, and we think you’ll want to hear what he had to say.
Here are our favorite highlights from Tom’s guide:
- Don’t charge by the hour. One of freelancing’s biggest advantages is that it allows you to work autonomously. Hourly rates can take away that freedom and limit your room to grow.
- Don’t get fooled into working for free. If you haven’t had a nightmare experience with a client yet, odds are you will. You can reduce the chances of that happening by making sure you get a contract signed before you begin any work on a project.
- Adapt your pricing style to each project. A retainer isn’t going to work for every project, and neither is a one-time fixed price. Figure out how much money you’re going to generate for the company and charge accordingly. Value-based pricing is one of Tom’s favorite ways to figure out your rates.
Go check out his full Twitter thread if you’re hungry to learn more!