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Facebook and Instagram issue rallying cry for social media marketers to meet customers on their terms, Shell investigated over "drive carbon neutral" claims, UK 2020 Budget and what it means for marketers

Welcome to this week's news roundup, where we're taking a look at a couple of important social media updates, a key investigation into a fossil fuel company's bold "sustainability" claims, and what the UK 2020 Budget could mean for marketers both within the UK and internationally.

IGTV re-sharing live videos update

Breaking the 60-second limit, Instagram’s IGTV - the vertical video platform for influencers, brands and fans alike - has made headlines this week.

After a rocky start (who wants to be the first to produce an hour of content for their followers?), Instagram has made a number of strategic decisions to increase IGTV traction. By introducing IGTV previews into users’ Instagram feeds, it attempted to bridge the gap between…

Embarking on my marketing journey at university, I learnt about the 4 Ps of marketing. However, since I left the classroom, I've found a disproportionate focus on promotion over the other Ps.

The 4 Ps are fundamental to any marketing strategy and explain the core concept of what marketers do. Any marketer worth their salt should know:

Product Price Place Promotion

However, as important as promotion - or marketing communications - may be, in their book ‘How Not to Plan’, Les Binet and Sarah Carter explain that econometrics consistently show that the effects of the other three Ps are as important for sales and profit. Without the right product, at the right price and distributed in the right places, it makes our jobs as marketers very difficult to promote.

Binet and Carter’s book reaffirmed the importance of these three Ps in my mind and gave me…

Organizations and brands thrive on strong repositories of digital marketing assets. Finding what you’re looking for, however, can be a challenge. Learn how to improve your metadata — and your team’s efficiency.

Metadata has been around since Callimachus invented the Pinakes at the Library of Alexandria. But now, we are no longer cataloging scrolls. In today’s digital enterprises, file volumes can easily eclipse the tens of thousands of items held in that ancient repository. Without a more sophisticated solution for describing and registering holdings, we might as well still be using papyrus and reed brushes.

[si_blog_banner_cta] Metadata is essential for allowing people to quickly and easily find the files they’re looking for. When applied efficiently, metadata improves nearly every marketing and creative workflow — plus it increases the value of your digital assets. No matter how much money is invested in a document, video, photo, logo, music track,…

Depending on what business you’re in, typically anywhere from 2%-15% of your online visitors convert into customers. That means 85%-98% don’t. So, wouldn’t you like to know why?

You can, by gathering some critical customer feedback with some very affordable methods and tools. Best of all, all of these analyses can be done for less than $1000 (USD).

I call this ‘taking the pulse’ of your prospects and customers — from two angles, and using multiple methods. By two angles I mean doing both quantitative and qualitative analysis. And the methods include:

Reviewing your analytics data Reviewing your visitor clickstream data Gathering ‘voice of customer’ data Running an eye-tracking study Launching a one-question poll Getting expert conversion review [si_monthly_campaign_blog_cta_banner id="150538"]

Why so many methods? Well, your medical doctor doesn’t just check your blood pressure, then say, ‘OK, we’re done,’ and send you on your…

Nobody can deny that the rise of video has drastically changed the way we consume content.

Video allows customers today to get all the information they need about your brand in a matter of minutes, with as little resistance as possible. Importantly, brands using video can engage customers more intimately than ever before.

Statistics about video marketing that will blow your mind

A study conducted by Hubspot showed that 78% of people watch videos every week, while 55% of people watch videos daily. Hubspot found that 72% of customers want to learn about brands through video and 85% of businesses now use videos as a marketing tool. Cisco predicts that in 2020, there will be close to 1 million minutes of videos uploaded to the internet per…

Coronavirus impacts business operations across the globe, a swathe of marketing events have been canceled or moved online, ASA addresses volume of gambling ads, impressive new O2 campaign makes customer “Headline Act”

You guessed it - the theme of the day is coronavirus! You may be fed up with hearing about it but it’s here to stay; impacting global the economy as well as businesses' operations. Elsewhere, we’re seeing marketing summits and conferences from the likes of Google and Adobe scrapped or moved online in the wake of the spread of the virus. We’ll also take a look at the ASA’s attempts to curb the negative effects the gambling sector may be having on the advertising industry as a whole. There’s also a new campaign by mobile network giant O2 that does everything right when it comes to continuing the brand’s focus on customer experiences.

Businesses seek to mitigate the impact of Coronavirus

With Coronavirus spreading…

Highlights, insights, and lessons from some of Smart Insights’ best marketing guides

The world of marketing is constantly changing and modern marketers are expected to have an increasingly diverse set of knowledge and skills. Although the internet offers a vast wealth of information, it’s often difficult to judge what is and isn’t good quality. Although biased, I believe that Smart Insights provides a wide range of quality marketing resources, from daily blog posts to quick guides and toolkits. Smart Insights has over 200 different guides that marketers can access (depending on your subscription) - as well as online training and e-learning - to learn about everything from how to set up a social media campaign to managing a digital transformation strategy. I’m a big believer that marketers should always be learning and looking to build their skills and capabilities. But with so many resources, where should you start? The answer to this question…

How to rank higher on Google and what to do if your traffic suddenly drops

Everyone knows the importance of providing consistent and high-quality content on your website but determining what quality content actually looks like can be a bit tricky.

Why?

Because quality is subjective, of course, and while one person may enjoy one particular style of content, another may find it too long, not relevant enough or simply uninspiring.

Then, of course, you have Google. The Holy Grail of search engines. Everyone wants their content to rank highly on the site that receives over 63,000 searches every second.

That’s around two trillion searches per year by the way.

[si_guide_block id="11668" title="Download our Individual Member Resource – SEO strategy audit checklist" description="This SEO strategy audit checklist gives you a comprehensive list of activities to grade your organization against. By completing this checklist every three/six months, you'll be…

Having a domain name that stands out in your communication can help make your message more effective

Marketing is not what it used to be. The Internet has radically transformed how we conduct and promote our business. Today, with digital marketing at the forefront, there are abundant resources and venues available than ever before. Do you want to drive more leads to your website? Or maybe generate more awareness about your product? If done tactfully, digital marketing can help you achieve all this and turn your business into a profit. However, even with digital marketing, there are two big challenges: Businesses do not have clear goals of what they want to accomplish from their marketing. Everyone is doing somewhat the same thing, in turn, adding to noise instead of being heard.

How to create a robust digital marketing strategy?

A good digital marketing strategy addresses the two challenges mentioned above in these simple ways:

1. Create…