Aight crew, we’re calling out “All Aboard” and going full steam ahead. You ready? Good.

Ahrefs is showing us some tricks to fully utilize Google Alerts for marketing. Yeah, we’re pumped too. Let’s do this!

Tip 1: Monitor for mentions and attack
Links matter with Google ranking and navigation. So when someone mentions you/your brand and doesn’t link back to you, that’s just a bunch of bologna.

To find these mentions, you need to set up Google Alerts for any brand-related terms. When you find a new mention check to see if it’s unlinked by viewing the source code and search for yourdomain.com using ctrl/cmd F

Reach out to the author to get your link added! And use this opportunity to build a relationship by commenting on the article.

Bonus Tip: Keep track of reviews and on top of negative nancy’s by using [Brand Name] +intitle:review

2: Don’t fall victim to spam.
Ya know those no good, rotten, whippersnappers inserting malicious links into a site? Alright, here’s how to quickly address that.

Set up an alert for a bunch of keywords synonymous with link injections. Restrict the results to only those from your site.

It would look something like: [site:(yourdomain.com) + “viagra” OR “botox” OR “casino”]

Add as many trigger words as possible and you’ll want to check alerts asap. Keep in mind false positives happen but better safe than sorry.

3: Keep eye on Competitors
It’s kind of Marketing 101. Plus, it kinda makes you a super spy.

Doing this will help you discover new blog topics and let you know if competitors publish competing content.

Using Google Alerts would look like: [site:competitor1.com/blog OR site:competitor2.com/blog]

Bonus Tip: Handle the constant bombardment of emails
The secret sauce is Google Inbox. You can easily exclude all Google Alert emails from your main inbox. It’s not deleted but is hidden in a folder that you’ve named.

We’ve only covered 3, but there’s 10 total, and the info is honestly fantastic. Check it out!

Gonna take a guess and say that most of us have a love/hate relationship with Facebook.

Organic reach is so bad on the platform that it’s barely worth putting effort into. At the same time, most of our audience is there so we have to put effort into the platform.

What’s a marketer to do? Buffer has a few answers that might help you revamp your marketing strategy. Let’s start with the stats they uncovered by analyzing 43 million Facebook posts.

• Top Pages are posting a lot more. Buffer analyzed the top 20,000 brands on Facebook and found that there’s been a 24% increase in the number of posts per day compared to Q1 2017. In Q1 ’17 there were 72,000 posts per day. In Q2 2018, there were 90,032 posts per day. That’s just over 4 posts per day per Page.
• Overall Page engagement is (still) declining. Not surprising. In the past 18 months, the average engagement per post has dropped by over 65%. Going from 4,490 engagements per post to 1,582 engagements per post. Yikes.
• Facebook engagement down for video, images, and links. If you’re thinking video is going to save you on Facebook, think again. Average engagement per video fell from 5,486 to 2,867. Images and links show a similar drop in engagement. Interestingly between images, videos, and links, images still get the most overall engagement.
• Posting 5 times per day resulted in highest overall engagement. One post per day doesn’t do much, and 10 does even less. 5 seems to be the number that gets the most average engagements per post.
• Top Page categories experienced 49-70% overall drop in engagement. It really doesn’t matter what industry you’re in, you’ve likely seen at least a 50% drop in engagement. Artist Pages lead the pack though with a 70% drop in engagement.

Read the rest of the post from Buffer to read more insights, and learn how to improve your Facebook marketing strategy…

It’s a brand new day with the same old question, “What’s for dinner?”

Just like clockwork, that same question gets asked. But don’t worry, today someone new is answering. And that someone is Colonel Sanders.

This iconic character is taking charge of family dinner in KFC’s newest commercial. The segment acts as the opener of an 80s sitcom starring — you guessed it — the Colonel himself and his $20 Family Bucket.

This cheery sitcom bit takes us from a happy-go-lucky family meal to a somewhat creepy life swap where the Colonel ends up as the mom, dad, neighbor and…couch?!

We can’t make this stuff up. You’ll have to just watch for yourself.