E-COMMERCE
Google is getting serious about e-commerce
Everyone wants a bigger piece of the e-commerce pie, announcing cool updates for merchants. Google is the latest on this list.
The company announced two updates for YouTube and Google Shopping:
Viewers will be able to buy products directly from livestream videos. For the time being, this pilot test will be limited to a few brands and creators.
Beginning today, when shoppers browse shopping search results, they’ll see a “Deals related to your search” section highlighting the best deals.
How to get included: Head to your Merchant Center and upload your promotions. Google was kind enough to provide a guide for doing this.
Beginning in October, Google Shopping will also highlight deals for major seasonal events such as Black Friday. To be listed there, you need to first create a deal page.
Merchant insights: Google also announced a few updates to their best sellers report to help you better predict consumer demand. Nobody wants excess inventory.
Whew! That’s a lot of updates. You’ll (probably) have to wait a bit for the YouTube live streaming feature. However, for the Shopping update, you can get your hands dirty right now in the Merchant Center.
CLUBHOUSE
Clubhouse is opening up to everybody
No more invites. Woo-hoo!
Clubhouse has announced that after 16 tedious months of building, they’re out of beta, ditching their invites and opening up to everyone.
Too little, too late? According to data from Sensor Tower, Clubhouse app store rankings have been steadily declining. On May 2nd, for example, they were ranked 664th. Today they are at the 975th spot.
The Crew’s take: We’re hoping this announcement gets them back on track. Back in March, Clubhouse was all the rage and everyone thought live audio was the future of social networking.
But then, summer happened (and a few other things.)
The general consensus appears to be that, while live audio may not be the game-changing innovation everyone expected, it will eventually become a substantial feature to most major social networks.
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FROM THE CREW
You tell us your monthly ad spend, we’ll give you a gift
We want to get to know your advertiser (and media buyer) habits a bit better. We’re looking for some information about your ad spend.
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SEO
Journalism tactics you can use to add SEO muscle to your content
Ron Lieback has been in journalism since 2001 and he’s been doing SEO since 2010.
And he says that when journalism and SEO join forces, they explode into a mix that blows away the competition.
Journalism tactics can help your writing while simultaneously fueling Google’s E-A-T guidelines (Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness).
Ron shared 9 journalism tactics to boost your ranking in the search engines. The first one is a concept that every journalist learns about:
+ The inverted pyramid: You start with what’s most important to the article in the first paragraphs, and structure the content from most to least important. You can provide the most crucial information first within an engaging lede, followed by a body of info that supports that information.
SEO benefit: This helps to hook the reader from the first moment and keep them engaged for the rest of the article.
+ Answer the 5Ws and 1H: Who, what, when, where, why, and how. Answering the who, what, when, and where within the lede will increase engagement. Then through the body, address the how and why.
SEO benefit: You’ll be frontloading some vital keywords that search engines may see as important.
+ Engaging lead: Attention is precious these days. And the first step to keep the attention of the reader is writing an engaging lead. The goal of your opening lines is to heighten the interest of the reader, emotionally and intellectually. Here’s how to accomplish this:
- Provide a unique fact that triggers curiosity.
- Show don’t tell: paint a picture in their mind.
- Create an open loop so the reader wants to keep reading.
SEO benefit: When the reader clicks on your article, reads the first paragraph and then goes back to the Google search, you’re sending bad signals to Google. But when you hook them, so they consume your whole article and it satisfies their search, Big G will send you love.
These are just three of the 9 tactics shared in this Search Engine Journal post. And as these three, the central point is engagement. This is critical in journalism, as well as in SEO.
ROUNDING UP THE STACK
FACEBOOK: If you’re in the medical niche (telehealth, prescription drugs) and use Facebook Ads, this is a must-read.
COPYWRITING: Homepage headers. They sound boring, but can have a big impact on your conversion rate. Joe Cunningham goes into greater detail about the 3 questions your homepage header should answer.
TIKTOK: If you want to make a music hit, TikTok might be your most important acquisition channel. This article has some data to demonstrate why.
INSTAGRAM: 60 is better than 30. At least when it comes to Instagram Insights, which extends the max date range of metrics you can see from 30 to 60 days.
WORDPRESS: Dropping IE 11 support but adding WebP support. These are some of the new features in WordPress 5.8.
INSTAGRAM: Instagram is testing a “collab” feature for posts in India and the UK.
BRAIN TEASER
2, 3, 5, 9, 17, 33. What number comes next? (Hint: Yes, this is a logical sequence.)
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.
Nasa will grow chili peppers in space
Because living in space is more interesting when you spice things up.
NASA has started an experiment to grow chili peppers on the International Space Station (ISS).
The experiment is called “Plant Habitat-04” and the goal will be to grow the peppers over the next 4 months.
So far NASA has grown: pak choi, lettuce, radishes, and more. Growing peppers will be a “more complex” experiment because they take longer to grow than other vegetables.
There’s a Red Hot Chili Peppers joke in there somewhere…