[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]
‘Annoying Ads’ to be filtered and blocked worldwide, starting July.
Last month, we brought you an update about Chrome launching a set of user protections against “abusive experiences”.
This month, Chrome announced a step further into filtering and blocking “annoying ads” that don’t adhere to the “Better Ads Standards”.
What ad experiences will be identified as Annoying Ads?
For Desktop Placements:
- Popup ads.
- Prestitial ads with countdown timers.
- Auto-play video ads with sound (Outstream).
- Large sticky ads.
For Mobile Placements, the above-mentioned placements plus:
- Full-screen scroll over ads.
- Poststitial ads with countdown timers.
- Ads with density > 30%.
- Flashing animated ads.
These updates were rolled out almost a year ago to websites in North America and Europe. It will now be rolled out globally, beginning July 9th, 2019 and we have a feeling some landing pages will suffer from this…
How can you verify and be sure your landing pages and websites are not violating this update?
- Verify your sites on Google Search Console. Once done, you can find both desktop as well as mobile violation notifications under the Ad Experience Report.
- Read the in-depth FAQs to learn how it works, who is affected and what it means.
New Google Plug-in Update:
How many of you use WordPress to run your websites? One of the easiest blogging and CMS platforms in existence today. Most of us who do, are not really coders or webmasters. And that’s exactly why we chose WordPress in the first place, right?
Here’s the good news! You don’t have to access your Google Search Console, Analytics, AdSense, Pagespeed Insights, etc. anymore.
All that information will soon be accessible right in your WordPress dashboard.
Thanks to Site Kit, a new plug-in introduced by Google, all this will now be possible! And not just that. Site Kit will also provide deep links into Google products for advanced reports and product configuration capabilities.
Those interested in the plugin can sign up for the beta version here.
E-COMMERCE
Chinese New Year disrupts e-commerce. And a cool 54-day-email sequence to steal!
Before you start accepting your orders, there is something you have to know. And there is something you should know even before you collect those last leads.
Your products may not be delivered!
Whaaat? Why? When? In case it slipped your mind, from 15th January to 21st February, China celebrates New Year.
Most likely, the Chinese suppliers you work with, will take some holidays and stop working during this time. Most of them anyway…
Get in touch with your suppliers and organize your schedule! And even inform your customers of possible shipping problems!
Though, if you find out that the Chinese New Year Celebration means holidays for you too, take this time to elaborate a long, thorough email sequence like the one below.
Why?
Do you know that common saying about emails “Money is in the list”? Well, following this, today we thought to deep dive and take you inside Birchbox’s email sequence.
How to always ask leads to buy, without being pushy.
First of all, what is Birchbox? It’s a monthly cosmetic subscription box.
Franco Varriano shared its email sequence on the Shopify blog and there are some things we can learn from it.
Birchbox works with large cosmetic companies. And it distributes their products to hundreds of thousands of customers. Enough people to split test email, huh?
What are they doing differently? They have a “choose your own style opt-in”. Asking as much information about their prospects as possible to come up with a well-segmented email list.
Looking at all the 21 emails that Franco received in 60 days time, we can’t say they share much content with their leads. All the emails are about promotions, gifts and discounts. Yet, they have the right touch and avoid making it look sales-ey.
Let’s have a look at their welcome email. This email is crafted to make a strong first impression and get you excited about what Birchbox can do for you.
Their purpose with this email is to:
- Show you where to start shopping with them.
- Present their core value proposition in a story or journey format.
- Give you a reason to make your first buy: a 15% discount.
Jumping to email number 3, we find a promotional message: “We Just Added 100+ Items to Our 40% Off Sale” is the subject line.
What are the key takeaways?
- The message communicates that promotion itself is impossible to miss. Besides, the copy repeats the promise made in the subject line of “100+ New Items” on sale.
- A section where they give their subscribers a chance to have their voice heard. They can share their thoughts about products.
- Social proof like brand logos or community award programs. What’s the purpose? They incorporate a feeling of belonging to something bigger than an email list.
Going to the 21st day of the sequence, you get email number 13. What is it about? An event, right before the International Women’s Day. And of course, the event was about a collaboration with female-founded brands.
What can we learn?
- You can sell your products and spread your brand awareness at the same time. Bitchbox promoted its collaboration with female-founded brands. And at the same time, they aligned the meaning of the International Woman’s Day to their core principles.
- Mission focused CTA: you can have a CTA more elaborate than “Order Here”.
- Infographic style that encourages you to scroll more.
As it would take a lot to go through all the 21 emails, there are some general lessons we can learn from Birchbox:
- Consider letting subscribers tell you what they’re interested in when they opt-in. Yesterday we talked about personalization. This is a reminder!
- How to frequently send discounts without looking pushy.
- The prospect of free gifts can help ensure your subscribers stay on your list.
- Find authentic ways to be part of larger conversations and build a brand purpose that focuses on people.
- Keep a consistent header and footer to train your prospective customers to look to the centre of the email for the offer.
Well, if you believe in the “money is in the list” saying, you must look at this case study.
NATIVE
Question Retargeting on Quora launched!
From time to time, we bring you some less-popular but fast-growing native ad-platforms to buy your ad spots from. And Quora has been one such platform we love to talk about.
The reason? Well, Quora is a no-fluff platform. Millions of information seekers post questions. Community members answer them. And the masses upvote the content they find most informative and valuable.
All of this collectively means Quora users are highly engaged with the topics they interact with.
And well, we are excited to bring you the news about the launch of “Question Retargeting” on Quora.
What does this mean?
- Advertisers can now target ads towards users who visited specified question page(s).
- You can also choose the date ranges (e.g. the last 30 days).
- You can pick the timeframe for retargeting that is appropriate for your campaign.
- Your ads will be shown across Quora for your target audience, not just on those specific Question pages.
- Additionally, you could also “Promote an Answer” or even “Host a Session”.
If you are new to Quora Ads, an easy to get started is by registering for a business account here .
And we might just have the offers for you to test from today’s sponsor…
SPONSORED
The Industry’s Best Kept Nutra Secret?
Progress is impossible without change. Change makes us grow – and change is exactly what’s happening at Wewe Media.
They are the “hidden gem” of affiliate networks that once specialized in mobile and cc trial sweepstakes but recently have been making waves behind the scenes to build out a new division in nutra.
“New year, new me!” they say. And that’s music to any affiliate’s ears. Why? Because everyone is eager to put out the best version of themselves in 2019 and you can find those products to help them get there at Wewe Media.
They are opening up the floodgates to new verticals and geo’s every day. Check out the newest and biggest opportunities in US Teeth, Skin, Keto, Diet, Lash, Muscle – ALL TRIAL, ALL DIRECT.
Their nutra division is made up of industry experts who have been around the block and they know their stuff.
Wewe has got the cap space to handle the New Years Rush. It’s the 2nd week of January, you are already late, don’t waste any more time and secure your budget today. Sign up here and use the code – NUTRA to be directly handed over to their nutra specialists.
Oh yeah, if you do $80k revenue with them within your first month, they send you an iPhone Xs. Can it get any better?
POOLSIDE CHAT
Cool tech, (funny) business, lifestyle and all the other things affiliates like to chat about while sipping cocktails by the pool.
Apple’s fighting for the Troll King crown…
When you don’t attend a party, but still, you want to make your enemies feel your presence. What do you do?
Ask the Apple marketing team! And how they came up with the giant outdoor ad they placed in Vegas for CES 2019.
Yes, Apple didn’t attend CES. But they didn’t miss the chance to troll Android in front of millions of people.
They placed a giant outdoor ad on the sides of a Marriott Hotel in Las Vegas.
Why is it strange? The ad shows the outline of an iPhone with the slogan “What happens on your iPhone stays on your iPhone.” And at the bottom of the poster, is a URL pointing to Apple’s privacy policies.
This is an arrow thrown at Google. In fact, the ad plays on the users’ fears that the Google-operated mobile system leaks their data. Be that to governments or to hackers.
There is more to this though…
The ad stands next to the Las Vegas’ monorail system. And guess what? The shuttles are emblazoned with ads bought by Google, that say: “Hey Google”. This creates a spontaneous joke:
“Hey G|oogle|, what happens on your iPhone, stays on your iPhone”
Hey Google, what’s your answer to this?
[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]