The Daily Carnage

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Tools and Best Practices for A/B Testing Your Ad Copy

APRIL 4, 2021

“If you build it, he will come.” Originally a quote about building a baseball diamond in a cornfield, it has morphed into a general mantra about attracting people with some sort of creation. It does make us wonder – if Kevin Costner built his baseball diamond in a poppin’ location, might he have attracted some more ghosts of baseball greats? All we’re saying is a cornfield is great and all, but why not test a few other places as well?

Testing brings out great results. That’s why AdEspresso is covering the best practices for A/B testing your ad copy.

A/B copy needs time & money to work. Sometimes you need to fire off an ad immediately, and that’s okay here and there. However, it’s always best to allow a couple of weeks so you can adequately test your ad and determine which combination of copy, creative, and delivery option works best. If you can afford the time and have the funds to test, you’ll maintain a better Return on Ad Spend with your optimized version.
Do you know your power words? Leonardo di Caprio’s name on a movie poster is sure to sell tickets. While you may not have an upcoming collab with the veteran A-lister, certain words used correctly in your ad can have the same effect. Words like “easy”, “effective”, “free”, “guarantee”, and many others make your copy more compelling.
Numbers excite people in many different ways. This isn’t so much about slashing your prices as it is about presenting your prices in an optimal way. Your audience might respond better to “Save 40%” than they will to “$60.” Think about the different ways you can present your price, then test them.
We all love a good story. Stories resonate with people. It’s why we all love them so much. Use them to your advantage in your ad copy and make the reader the focus of the story to ensure it hits home.

Just a few more tips left in this article, so don’t miss them!

7 Dead Simple Ways to Reduce Bounce Rate

MARCH 31, 2021

What’s the worst party you’ve ever been to? Was it the one you thought was a costume party so you showed up as a hotdog for your niece’s graduation party? (Such a cruel joke.) Or maybe it was the high school reunion with lackluster attendance. The best thing you can do at a bad party is leave.

If your website was a party, what does it offer that makes people want to stay? Take a gander at these 7 dead simple ways to reduce bounce rate from Moz.

Be intentional. While people land on your page for different reasons, it’s crucial to satisfy the intents of their visits. Some people are looking for info and some are ready to buy. It’s always best to have a piece of content to satisfy each intent. But when it comes to broadening intent satisfaction, make sure your visitor can easily and quickly find what they’re looking for if the page they landed on isn’t it. Include related articles near the top to serve various intents.
Make sure your CTAs don’t suck. Your CTAs will be more powerful when they directly relate to the keywords that draw in your visitors. This means if someone initiates a search comparing computer models and they end up on your site where you’ve put together a comparison, you’re better off with a CTA reading “Browse All Computer Models” rather than one reading “Browse Inventory.” Find out which keywords your pages rank for and use those keywords in CTAs.
Reduce rage and dead clicks. Ever click a button or link on a site and it doesn’t do anything? Sometimes it’s not a link or button at all, and that’s the problem. If it’s not supposed to be clicked, make sure it doesn’t look like it should be clicked. Conversely, if people are clicking something that isn’t supposed to be clicked, then make it clickable.

That’s not all! Head over to the afterparty and read the rest.

The Facebook Boost Post Button: How to Use it and Get Results

MARCH 31, 2021

The Facebook Boost Post Button: How to Use it and Get Results

Everybody needs a boost here and there. Like when it’s 2:00 PM and your eyelids are growing heavy. A quick snack, a walk around the office, and maybe even an espresso shot or two (because why not) will give you the boost you need to push through the rest of the day.

Facebook posts benefit from boosts too. Not because they get sleepy, but because at a certain point they’ll plateau in reach and engagement. To help those posts thrive, Hootsuite is covering how to use Facebook Boosted Posts to get results.

What does it mean to boost a post? A boosted post begins its life just like an organic post. But after it’s posted organically, you can opt to spend some money to push it to a greater audience.

What do I gain from boosting a post? Organic reach on Facebook is declining. While it’s incredibly important to keep posting quality organic content, you’ll see more results when you pay to play. A boosted post will help you reach the right people and it only takes a couple of minutes to get up and running. Furthermore, you’ll see all the analytics surrounding your boosted post, which will help you refine your marketing strategy in the future. As a bonus, you can even extend your reach into Instagram.

How to boost, better.

Tagged in a post? Boost it. You can boost more than just posts you’ve created. If you have influencers making branded content on your behalf, then you can boost those posts too. Just head over to your Facebook Page Insights and into the Branded Content section to find eligible posts to boost.
Successful post? Boost it. Some of your organic posts may already get a lot of engagement as is. Posts like these are perfect for boosting since they have already demonstrated success in their initial limited reach.
Got data? Learn from it. With any form of ad, you’ll experience a bit of trial and error. Consider what you’re expecting to achieve from a boosted post so you can weigh your analytics against your goal.

Check out the rest of the tips!

How Marketers Are Optimizing Their Email Marketing, According to Research

MARCH 29, 2021

Slow to get moving in the morning? Get some coffee in your system. Bam. Optimized. Usual traffic on the way to work? Leave 5 minutes earlier. There. Optimized. Locked yourself out of your house? I wish we had more for you than our sympathies.

Optimization makes things better. It makes us better. It makes our work better. And the sky’s the limit. Today, Convince & Convert is revealing how marketers are optimizing their email marketing with research to back it up.

What is email optimization?

It’s a simple question, and there’s no need to overthink the answer. Email optimization is whatever you can do in your email marketing to make recipients happier while increasing ROI and conversion rates. So what are the bigger challenges email marketers face when it comes to optimization?

Maintaining an engaged list takes the lead with 45% of marketers surveyed indicating this as the number one challenge.
Reducing spam complaints came in second place with 37% of marketers surveyed selecting it as a difficult objective.

While these are two different concerns, emphasis on the first one can help alleviate problems with the second. In other words, improving the relevancy of content will help with engagement and will decrease the perceived spamminess of an email.

Get the Fundamentals Right First

Don’t put the cart before the horse. Optimization begins before you send the email. Lock down the design of your email and make sure it looks good across desktop, mobile, and different browsers. Breaking down what marketers said in the Email Marketing Optimization Survey:

Design was at the top of attributes to test prior to launching email campaigns with 43%. The design needs to work and create an easy flow of information.
Deliverability was next with 36% of those surveyed saying it was one of the most important attributes. Deliverability is crucial because without it you won’t have any engagement at all. Go figure.

There’s more where that came from, go see the rest!

9 Tactical Video SEO Tips to Improve Your Content Performance

MARCH 28, 2021

How many of you think you could walk across a balance beam a thousand feet in the air? Don’t worry, we’re not going to put you to the test. But what if the beam was on the ground. A bit easier now, huh? (But maybe not after happy hour…)

Something similar occurs for digital marketers. We have tons of best practices and general rules to follow and we become masters of them. But then we take on something a little more unfamiliar and it can feel like an entirely different game despite following many of the same rules. Case in point: SEO vs. video SEO. Check out the lowdown from Wistia on video SEO with 9 tactical tips to improve your content performance.

Video titles matter. Maybe you already have the perfect title. Maybe you don’t. 🤷‍♀️ That’s okay. The point is, you should be thinking about a video title. While the file “client_video_FINAL_complete_4” tells you what the video is, others won’t have the slightest clue. Be sure to change the title to something other than the file name.

A thumbnail that screams ‘pick me’. Remember the days of hopping in the car with the fam and picking out a movie at Blockbuster? It was always much more exciting to see the actual movie cover rather than just a generic Blockbuster logo with a title. Your video thumbnails need to entice people to click. Put together an image that isn’t just a screenshot from a section of your video and make it easily viewable at 116 x 65 pixels.
Create a video sitemap. Google was made to crawl websites to find and index content to match with relevant queries. Whenever you upload a new video that will appear on your site, be sure to include a sitemap. This tells Google what the video is and can help indicate which other content it’s relevant to.

Keep reading for 6 more tips.

Twitter trending topics: How they work and how to use them

MARCH 23, 2021

Twitter trending topics are enough to make your heart skip a beat. Though oftentimes the news is positive, trends can sometimes confirm our worst fears. Just a few weeks ago we saw skinny jeans trending and not for any reason we wanted. Don’t even get us started on the mass panic whenever Tom Hanks surfaces in the trending section.

Trending topics on Twitter are incredibly useful. Not only do they help us stay current on the latest news and pop culture phenomena, but they also provide information we can use to market brands, improve campaigns, and connect with audiences. Sprout Social is highlighting how Twitter trending topics work and how to use them.

How Twitter trending topics work.

In a nutshell, Twitter’s algorithm will display hot topics people are talking about right now. The latest trends will always take priority, but what you’ll see is partially tailored to the people you follow and the niches they occupy. You can personalize trends based on location as well. Also, if the highlighted trending topics aren’t helpful to you, then search a topic or hashtag or subscribe to specific topics to get more targeted info.

How can marketers strategically leverage Twitter trends?

Understand audience sentiment around major topics. When people talk about your brand or products, you’ll want to know if what they’re saying is good or bad. Positive sentiment can help inspire future campaigns while negative sentiment can alert you about a change you need to make.

Use hashtags to join the conversation. Insert your brand where it makes sense. You don’t need to use hashtags for every trending topic to stay relevant. Just stay on top of what is pertinent to you.
Use Twitter Promoted Trends for a paid marketing solution. You can run an ad right within the trending section. This is a great way to get people talking about a new product or campaign.

See the full scoop for more ways to utilize trends.

Make Writing Easier, Without Lowering Your Standards

MARCH 22, 2021

Infomercials are the best. All it takes is, “DOES THIS EVER HAPPEN TO YOU?” and we’re hooked. Cue the black and white scene revealing the ridiculous, yet somewhat relatable struggle of a clumsy person followed by the full-color clarity in the next scene where they find the solution. Whatever product these Oscar-winning ads show off happens to make everything easier.

Well, the black and white struggle of writing is about to turn to full color because Copyblogger is showing us 3 ways to make writing easier without lowering your standards.

Capture your ideas. If you have a password manager, you know how much easier it makes your life. Capture all your ideas just like you save your passwords: write them down. When inspiration strikes, don’t bank on your brain remembering; bust out your notes app or a small journal and scribble away. Our minds can move a mile a minute, so it’s important to keep a log. This can be for solutions to problems, dumb ideas that don’t work, or just any general observations from your daily life.

Recognize that self-doubt is normal. Writing content can be a breeze at times and at other times it’s an enduring struggle. One feels great and one feels awful, but if you’re having real trouble it’s not because you’re bad at it. Struggles lead to breakthroughs, so don’t get hung up on the number of rewrites you’ve needed or the creative block you’re experiencing. What matters is you push through, because if you do, then more often than not you’ll produce something worth reading. Imposter Syndrome be damned!
Get into a framework. Defining your framework will help you to launch into your process. Your framework could be a numbered list of points to hit in a blog post. It could be a morning yoga routine. Maybe it’s a podcast focusing on creativity. Your framework should get you into the right headspace to do your best work.

Read on for the full scoop.

4 Trends to Expect for Spring 2021 Fundraising Campaigns

MARCH 21, 2021

Y’all ready for some spring cleaning? Yes, it’s time to part with those beloved socks that allow your big toes to peek out and say hello. And you may not want to hear it, but your Christmas poinsettias are ready for a new life in the compost bin. Spring holds so much promise, and some changes are needed.

New campaigns are probably in the works for you as well. Say goodbye to things that haven’t worked in the past, because it’s a new day and a new opportunity to refine your strategies. If fundraising is the name of the game for you, then check out these 4 trends to expect for spring 2021 fundraising campaigns from Top Nonprofits.

Emphasizing Mobile Giving. Just about anything we do on desktop can be done on mobile. Marketers know the importance of reaching people where they are, and many people are on-the-go. Mobile giving allows convenience since people don’t need to wait until they’re back home or at their desk to give. Ensure your website is optimized for a flawless mobile experience or else your follow-through on mobile giving will dwindle.

Appealing to Younger Donors. Are you targeting Gen Z within your fundraising campaigns? Right now, Gen Z is made up of people aged 10 – 25. The older segment of this generation tends to advocate for social causes and things they believe in more than their counterparts of other generations. Include this segment in your campaigns and consider fun, socially-distanced events they can attend to learn more about your organization.
Revisit Your Corporate Partnerships. Many organizations are keen to align themselves with Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) efforts. When someone makes a donation, they may not know about their employer’s CSR initiatives. This could include a donation match or a volunteer grant program. Both of these programs would offer added incentives for employees to donate and volunteer, so encourage your donors to check for these initiatives before donating.

Keep going for #4.

The 7 Best Ways to Grow Your Instagram Audience in 2021

MARCH 17, 2021

Growth is the goal for many of us in some way or another. We go to school, move up in careers, start families, and many other things that aren’t easy. When all is said and done, we’re better than we were before. So don’t despair when you’ve hit the bottom of another Ben & Jerry’s pint during your weekend-long binge of The Crown. At the end of the day, you come out on top with all the growth you’ve achieved. Plus, it’s not like the weather was nice outside that weekend anyway. Then again, your blinds were down the whole time…

Growth is important on social as well. Millions of thumbs skate across Instagram feeds every day, and it’s all about getting them to land on your content. Here are Jeff Bullas’ 7 best ways to grow your Instagram audience in 2021.

Use an Instagram growth service. We’re not talking about buying a bunch of bots to increase your follower count. This isn’t about buying followers at all. A quality growth service will target your ideal audience and like their content in order to prompt them to check out your page. This can seriously boost your existing growth efforts.

Plan and schedule content. You want to reach your followers with fresh content when they’re active. Instagram insights can show you during which times your audience will likely be active. Use this knowledge to schedule your posts for these ideal times and tweak the times as needed. Scheduling is easy in Creator Studio, but a dedicated calendar and scheduling tool will better help you stay on top of your posts.
Optimize your profile. Your profile is where followers can learn more about you and your business and follow through on your CTAs. Tell people what they need to know about you with the 150 character allotment in your bio. Use a tool like Linktree to increase the number of links you can showcase, and create highlights so people can easily navigate to the content they’re looking to find.

See 4 more in the full article.