It’s true- there are over 2 million blog posts being written every single day. So how do you engage readers in this era of short attention spans and information overload? The only way of effectively doing this is by creating unique content. But as our clients always ask us, “is any content really unique in today’s day and age?” Of course, most topics under the sun have already been written about. But unique content doesn’t mean you have to a unique topic. What it means is that you have to bring your unique perspective to the topic, whether that’s in the way you structure your article or the personality you bring to your content. In fact, content writing in a voice that’s interesting and unique can put a fresh spin on even the most mundane topics. So without further ado, here’s our pick of the 7 most effective ways to give your content more personality. Tip 1: Don’t write, talk Does that sound confusing? Believe it or not, this is one of the simplest ways to give your content more personality. Unfortunately, ever since school, we’ve been taught that’s there’s a difference between how we speak and how we write. So long-winded sentences, extensive vocabulary, and complex ideas meant you were a better writer. But that simply isn’t true. When you create content today, it has only one main purpose— to engage the reader. So a simple technique is to just imagine your reader is standing in front of you and you’re having a conversation with them. The words will be simple and direct; and will flow naturally. And your content will automatically become so much more engaging. Tip 2: Tell a powerful story Humans have been telling stories since the dawn of civilization, and there’s a reason for that. Stories immediately hook the reader and capture interest. Of course, you’re not always writing a compelling narrative. Sometimes, you’re writing a 1000-word guide on which building materials to use. Even in that case, use anecdotes. Anecdotes are an effective way of transforming a drab and dry piece. Every time you feel the pace is slowing down try and use a compelling anecdote. Of course, you need to find an anecdote that is both interesting but also relevant to the point you’re making. Also, try and sprinkle them through the content without going overboard. Too many anecdotes can be jarring and take attention away from the meat of the content. Tip 3: Craft a detailed buyer persona A buyer persona is basically a detailed account of an average reader of your blog. Put some time and effort into cultivating a buyer persona so that you’re able to understand your audience better than anyone else. Figure out who your reader is; how old they are, what gender they belong to, what their income is, whether they have kids, where they went to school, what their hobbies are, and so on. Once you start writing, always keep this buyer persona in mind and address your post to them. You’ll notice your writing immediately becomes more intimate, personalized, and effective. Tip 4: Tug at the heartstrings Jonah Berger analysed over 7000 articles from the New York Times to figure out what made a particular piece of content engaging. He found that stories that provoked an emotional response in readers — whether that was empathy, joy, frustration, pain, or even anger — were far more likely to be shared than stories that weren’t high on emotional content. If you’re stuck wondering how to make your staid content idea evoke an emotional response, just think of it from the reader’s point of view. Which pain point of theirs are you addressing with this piece? Why will they value what you have to say? Once you figure this out, writing an emotion-driven piece shouldn’t be hard. Tip 5: Formatting The right formatting is just as important as the actual words. You need to understand that in this age of frenetic content consumption, readers don’t always “read” content. Sometimes, they just scan it. So making your content easily scannable is the key. Formatting is actually one of the easiest tools to pick up. For starters, keep your paragraphs short; ideally no more than 100 words. This helps break the monotony for readers. Another technique is using subheadings to break down the text and let the readers know what’s coming next. Other techniques include using paragraph spacing, emphasizing important words and phrases by putting them in italics, using em and en dashes, and parentheses. Tip 6: Be interested in the topic This one can be tricky, especially for those of us who are professional writers. You may not always get to work on content ideas that you find inspiring or even interesting. But the trick is to move past this. The reason you’re writing that piece of content is because it will add value to someone who’s going to read it. This means that just because you don’t find the topic interesting, doesn’t mean no one else does. Instead of writing on a topic you don’t care about, take some time out to do your research. Not research on the topic, but rather research about and around the topic. Keep doing this till you find something about the topic that piques your interest. You’ll create a much more authentic piece if you’re actually passionate about what you’re writing. Tip 7: Break the rules When it comes to modern content, you don’t need to be a stickler for grammar rules. Starting a sentence with “and” or “but” is perfectly acceptable if it drives your point home better. As is using sentence fragments and even run-on sentences. The idea is to be unique, authentic, and relatable. Your customer needs to understand and identify with what you have to say — and if some rules get broken in the process, don’t sweat it. These tactics are fairly simple to implement, but they can really
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Making the Online Offline connect for Your Campaigns
With limited attention span and mind space, most brands who want to create a sustained campaign recall tend to plan for a 360-degree campaign. This often means a campaign that encompasses print, radio, outdoors and digital. In some cases, it may also include in-store advertising and Below The Line (BTL) campaigns. Such campaigns do require a sizeable budget and a water-tight media plan to optimize spends. One of the biggest reasons to make this connection is that the performance tracking and ROI calculation becomes more tangible via the digital medium. Even if you share information vial all other media, you would ultimately prefer that your user comes and takes an action online so that the outcome is measurable. The best way to pick out ideas for such campaigns is by seeing how successful campaigns have been implemented so far. Let’s take a few examples. Online initiation to Offline execution: Events Event management is one industry that has tremendously benefited from the online campaigns resulting in offline outcomes. The simplest form of event marketing starts by creating an event page via Facebook. This works especially well for local events for a targeted user base. Let’s say you plan a conference for professionals in your industry, it will require a parallax landing page on your website along with a curated registration form and a payment gateway for paid events. Advertisements for premier events can start months before to give enough build-up time with content about the speakers, the opportunities the event brings and mirror stories about professionals attending it. Creating an online-offline campaign for the event The online channels you are most likely to use for a professional event is Linkedin which will allow you to target by industry and designation. This along with an email campaign to a relevant database can be a good starting point. After testing the waters with these channels, you can try out the search engine marketing route primarily via Google AdWords to see how it impacts your registration flow. The offline connect for the campaign can happen by directly identifying influencers for the campaign and reach out to them with an offline invite. Offline initiation for online execution: Let’s say that you want the final action of the user to happen online. Here you can create a website or microsite for the user to land on and complete the action – be it fill a lead, make a purchase or upload their contest entry. The promotion of the offer can happen via a variety of offline channels like print, in-store and radio. The online promotion can happen via a range of high-traffic websites. The best examples come from brands like Myntra, Jabong, Amazon and Flipkart who go all out to promote their sales. You’ll see their ad in newspapers, hear it on the radio and not miss it on your phone. Since most of these brands time their sales together, they also benefit by the cumulative visibility that rubs off from each other’s advertising. After all, it is a common trend for shoppers to check out multiple sites and go through endless scrolls before zeroing in on a purchase. Image Source Such campaigns have clearly proved their worth in ROI. Myntra added 5 lakh new users after its EOSS sale in 2018. This number along with a 10x sale prediction is only increasing every year. Try out an innovation One of the most innovative online-offline campaigns was done by Fox TV to promote their show The F Word. Digital posters with Gordon Ramsay were put up in the streets of Los Angeles. These were connected with microphones and cameras transmitting real-time data. As unsuspecting people walked by, the interactive poster had Gordon Ramsay speak to them real time! Another example of packaging innovation comes from McDonald’s. We all know that the children’s favourite Happy Meals comes with a toy that is the centre of attraction. In an innovation, McDonald’s converted its Happy Meal Box into a VR headset. The box came with dotted lines that could be folded into a VR contraption. Dubbed as ‘Happy Goggles’ these could be used by anyone with a smartphone to have a VR experience. Here are some quick things to remember to make your online-offline campaign successful Add online CTAs to build the offline-online connect All your offline campaigns should lead prospects to a landing page. This can be done either by directly giving them a simple, memorable URL. This can be a slightly complicated proposition if your landing page is not your homepage. In such cases, you can run promotional banners on your homepage to facilitate the journey or share a QR code. In the case of contests, you can ask people to complete an activity offline and upload their entry online to be eligible to participate. Use #tags #tags become a perfect channel for online-offline connect as it can be used and tracked across most of the popular social channels. #tags also solve the problem of having complicated URLs or avoid the trouble of scanning a QR code. Instead #tags can be used on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Create an offline story and continue it online Some brands often tend to use this style to build empowerment campaigns. Think of campaigns like Tata tea’s Jaago re which has become a movement in itself. Jaago re was popularized via TV campaigns. Today, long after the campaigns are off the TV and over a decade after it began, it continues to live on via online channels becoming a home for activism and public interest petitions. Another interesting thing to do is use the story-telling approach to narrate half the story online and ask the users to watch the conclusion online. Once you have them hooked, it is not difficult to make the sales pitch at the right time. Give out vouchers online which can be redeemed offline (or vice versa) If you are a restaurant who wants to increase walk-ins on a weekday, publicize your discount voucher online.
How to Rank on Position Zero in Google
We know that Google is constantly experimenting with search results. For search engine optimizers, goals keep shifting. SEO earlier was about ranking against competitors in the same category. Now it has moved to a point where SEO is about having a sustained approach against Google’s changing algorithm. Ranking on position 1 is yesterday. SEO is now about ranking in position zero. What is position zero? Position zero is the ‘featured snippet’ that shows above the first search result. It looks different as it is highlighted in a grey outline box and features the answer in the first few lines. For a typical query, you are highly likely to find your answer in this snippet, so much so, that you may not go beyond if the snippet gives you the answer you need. You are also much more likely to click on this result compared to others that appear below. How do featured snippets work? Here’s what Google has to say: Here’s the nice additional bit that a lot of people miss – “Featured snippets commonly contain one listing, but more than one may appear.“ This means Google is picking the most definitive reply to a query which is most likely based on its historic performance. It is highly likely that these are: It’s high ranking in organic search based on various existing parameters of the search algorithm High click rate on the query Likely answer to the exact question in the format of an answer in a few lines and also a detailed explanation for support The average amount of time spent on-page and a lower bounce rate which is a signal that the answer is relevant Are there different types of featured snippets? Well, the are different types of content that get featured. This includes paragraphs, numbered lists, bulleted lists, tables, YouTube videos, images, and charts. Why are featured snippets important? Other than the most obvious fact of added visibility, featured snippets are also what you hear as an answer if you do a voice search. Not just that, 55% of households are expected to own smart speaker devices by 2022. From this lens, if you are not in the featured snippet, nothing much else will matter. The good part is that more than one result can be in the featured snippet. Here’s an example of what multiple featured snippets looks like We searched for ‘top 10 places to holiday in India’. While the main featured snippet read ‘According to Travel Triangle’, it also had ‘View 5+ more’ on the top right corner. The result takes you to a page where Travel Triangle is still featured in the first two search results and also as a first result in the answer box. Then you’ll see search results from competitors like Thrillophillia and MakeMyTrip among others on the same topic. Here’s another thing that grabs attention – the featured snippet is not a paragraph directly taken from the page. The snippet program is built in a way that it will scan the entire page, select content from the page in parts, gather it and show it in the more relevant and effective manner. With this instance of the Travel Triangle blog, you’ll see that Google has reformatted the content and just picked up the list for display with minimal or no text from within each list item. Another reason to care about position zero in terms of search is also that it is shown before the ads. It takes up significantly more real estate space than regular results garnering more attention – and there is no way you can pay to get here. And now the question you are really seeking the answer to – How do I get to rank in the featured snippet? As with all things SEO, there are tips and tricks to get yourself into position zero. Here are some things that can help First – get to the first page of search results – the higher the better. This is half the battle won for any SEO. Now, even a no. 10 listing on page 1 has a chance to get into position zero, however, the majority of featured snippets come from results that rank between 1 to 5. Work backward – what is the most likely question for which your particular blog can be the best possible answer. Provide the right information in the right format. Include all possible information through that one page Include rich media including infographics and video on the page in the same context Keep updating the page as often as possible. Keep a timeline check on when the page was last updated and if it the latest page is crawled Optimize the title by adding a part of the query to it as an H tag. Also, add the year/month where relevant. For example, something like ‘2019’s most definitive list to get to position zero on Google’. Keep the page engaging by opening comments so that there is always fresh user-generated content on the page that gives the impression that the page has useful information. From a content perspective, answer the 5 Ws of who, what, when, where, why. This is most likely to cover the questions in context. Google’s answer box about the topic is likely to give you the questions people are already asking. Don’t forget to answer the How. Many questions seek instructions as answers on how to do or make something. If you have a video, image or content that answers this, make sure you include it in the page Add definitions: Definitions help solve the ‘What’ part of the question in a way that can keep it simple to understand and complex enough to intrigue someone to click through. Do a comparison: An a v/s b approach can be a great winner for a featured snippet people like to get information in context. For example, do a simple cat vs dog search on Google, you will see a featured snippet, featured videos, answer
Whatsapp for Business – All you need to know and how to assess if its worth it
Most marketeers have already heard about Whatsapp for Business that launched sometime back. A few early birds have tried it out. Most others are trying to figure their way around this new and seemingly powerful means of customer communication. Let’s get into the details of what this medium is, how to evaluate it for your business and what you’ll need to get started. What is Whatsapp for Business? In simple terms, it is a way for businesses to have one on one communication with their customers. As a business, you can be a just chat away from your customer at all times. Even though businesses have always wanted to do this, there has never been an easy way to do it. Our earlier means of communication like emailers SMSes and even notifications have long reached their saturation point, enough to be partially consumed but also easily ignored. Whatsapp, primarily because of its market penetration, established usage and a huge set of the captive audience becomes a gold mine for a savvy marketer. Where is Whatsapp for business users? In case you booked a movie ticket, it is likely that your booking service provider sent an update about your ticket on Whatsapp. Same goes for a travel ticket booking or even if you are interacting with your bank and want to know your balance. Most people received their first communication on Whatsaap as a transactional message which you can’t reply to. You must not have even realized giving consent during the booking/transaction process. Now you have your ticket right in a chat window – unmissable and quick to access. This establishes a window of communication initiated by the brand – but with rules. What are the rules I need to know before I use this medium? Whatsapp currently is trying things out and they have authorized third-party vendors who can help you with the technical set up and the communication strategy. Their primary fear is that brands exploit the medium and soon make it spammy. Aren’t we already tired of the Good Morning messages from various groups? Now what if brands start selling to you on Whatsapp – it can get irritating and mostly result in people blocking brands altogether. Most service providers will share a per-message cost with you. The cost varies depending on the base number of messages you commit to per month. The cost applies if you initiate the communication, but is free for a 24-hour window if your customer messages you first Whatsapp is establishing itself as a convenient way for customer service. They are being cautious to not open the platform for promotional content which they believe can lead to it becoming spammy All message templates need to adhere to stringent guidelines and will be executed only if approved by Whatsapp If your customers being to block you and report your messages as spam, Whatsapp too will block your number The most basic but most important rule – Whatsapp requires explicit customer consent before you send a message to them. The consent can be taken on other media like SMS, email, website form, etc. The consent can also be collected in an offline form but the record needs to be preserved electronically for easy access in case of conflict. What are the types of communication possible via Whatsapp? Whatsapp can primarily hold up the burden of your transactional communication. Ticket booking confirmations, links and relevant messages on Whatsapp allows easy access. The second type of communication is initiated by the customer with a service request or query. Thus, it can be used for issue resolution. What should marketers be varied while using Whatsapp for Business? It seems like a good bet to jump on the Whatsapp bandwagon and announce to your customers. Here are a few important things to consider before you do this The opt-in process starts from scratch. You’ll have to write the right opt-in message so that your customers have set expectations from the medium. The more transactional the better initially as those come as utility messages than regular communication.7 Consider a base technical set up cost and the cost per initiated communication from your end. Consider resource requirements to handle Whatsapp messages. This is similar to having people on standby for a live chat with your customers on your website. Except, many customers may think it is OK to reach out to you at an odd hour. Invest in training people who will be actually answering customer queries. If the first people in the line of fire fall, the whole system can crumble very quickly. We can see screenshots from Whatsapp chats floating on Twitter on how an irate customer service reacted on chat. Keep a thorough quality check on the responses delivered and be agile to intervene and change processes where required In spite of your best efforts, some disgruntled customers are likely to block you because of an unrelated issue. Because the line here is unclear, Whatsapp is more likely to side with your customer than you. How can you evaluate if Whatsapp for Business is right for you? To evaluate Whatsapp for Business, you need to have a handy document that establishes the business case. Here’s how you can do this: Get clarity on all customer-facing functions in your organization. In most companies, you’ll have a customer service team and a sales team in this line. Others may include finance (governing transactions). The sales may further split into offline and online sales depending on your business model. Collect volume data on communication from each of these functions. Understand how many touchpoints exist for each function (emails, SMSes, notifications), who they reach out to, how much overlap exists and the frequency of communication. This will help you get to a rough ballpark on the number of messages that you are likely to initiate via Whatsapp and what the cost will be. Shortlist which functions really need Whatsapp and which
How to Edit Social Media Posts That Have Already Been Published
When it comes to content, the competition becomes more intense every day. And for any brand that hopes to capture that slice of the customer’s attention, posting quality content simply isn’t enough. I can post a great Insta story or a witty meme with an even wittier caption, but if I’m doing it once in two weeks, there’s simply no point. Consistency is key — everyone from the biggest online brands to fledgeling Youtubers swears by this one rule. But consistency comes with its own issues. When you’re posting twice a day on Facebook, thrice on Instagram, four times on Twitter, and so on, chances are you’ll make a mistake or two. From racking your brains to create memorable copy to finding/creating that perfect image, there are way too many things that go into a social media post. Sometimes, the mistake may be as trivial as a misspelt word (which can still have a strong impact on your reputation) or you may just upload a completely wrong image! Whatever be the issue, here’s the complete guide on how you can resolve it. We’ve broken down editing options by social media platform, along with instructions on how to make things right. So here we go: Facebook Facebook is the one platform that’s part of the default marketing strategy for most brands. Given how frequently we end up posting on Facebook, it’s important to know how to quickly backtrack when necessary. What can be edited You can easily edit wrong spellings, poorly worded captions, and even entire textual content. Basically, as long as you’re dealing with the written word, Facebook lets you edit the post whenever you want. In fact, you can even change or add tags, whether that’s for brands, individual, or even locations. You can also edit posts with the Facebook Page Manager App. Keep on mind that edits on Facebook can be made by any Page admin. Plus, edits are also visible on the platform, including the ones that have been made before the post was published. Finally, the post’s edit history is actually public so any user can really look at the editing history if they really want to. This obviously shouldn’t deter you from making the edits you need to, it’s just something to keep in mind. How to edit Simply click/tap on the three dots which are present on the top right-hand corner of the actual post. Then select “Edit Post” from the drop-down menu that appears. Make your changes and just click “Save”. What cannot be edited Unlike textual content, photos and videos cannot be edited on the platform. So if you attach the wrong image or video to the post, you’ll simply have to delete the post and start from scratch. The only exception is if you are editing your post in the Facebook Pages app and you need to change an image. In that case, you can upload the new photo to a post and save it. Once you save the post, go to editing mode and delete the old photo. Importantly, if a post has been boosted, or is part of an ad campaign, it cannot be edited. So when you’re advertising on Facebook, please make sure your post is perfect before it goes live. Otherwise, you’ll have to keep deleting the old post and creating a new one. Twitter Twitter is the one platform where posting frequency is the maximum. In fact, many companies run a thriving customer support channel on Twitter. What can be edited Nothing! Unfortunately, there is no option of editing tweets as of now. This has been the subject of a lot of discussions but as of now, there is no move by the platform to provide an editing option. The company feels that giving the edit option would take away from the free-flowing nature of the platform. At times, Twitter has indicated that it might provide an editing option, with an ‘editing window’ of around 5 minutes after the tweet has been posted. However, there is no concrete progress on this as of now. How to edit Since there is no real editing option for tweets, if you make an error you simply have to delete the tweet and start again. Luckily, the limited size of a tweet makes it much easier to accomplish this. Instagram Instagram has become the most popular social media platform after Facebook. Plus, its young demographic (more than 600 million followers are under the age of 34) and high engagement rates means its often the primary platform for many marketers. What can be edited Just like Facebook, you can change textual information on Instagram. Which means you can edit your caption, add or change any location tag, and add or delete account tags. You can also add and edit alt text tags. How to edit Keep in mind that you can’t edit captions on the desktop version of Instagram. It can only be done within the app on your mobile. To edit the caption, go to your post and click the three dots on the top right side. Then tap the ‘edit’ button after which you can make changes like editing the caption, changing location, and adding account tags to the photo or video. Once the editing is complete, tap the “Done” button on the upper right side. What can’t be edited Similar to Facebook, you cannot edit the videos and images in a post once you’ve uploaded them. You’ll have to delete the post and start again. LinkedIn In recent years, LinkedIn has become the go-to platform for every B2B brand and two professionals join LinkedIn every second. What you can edit You can edit posts both from the Company page as well as your personal profile. Once again, you can only change the text. How to edit To edit your post, go to the page you posted from, and find the post. Click on the three dots on
How to Get High-Quality Backlinks: Strategies That Work in 2019
A young startup recently came to us thoroughly confused and exasperated by SEO. They had begun to think of SEO as this black box where things are constantly shifting and they just never quite knew how to get it right. There were so many elements to SEO — content, keywords, website optimization, meta tags and so on — that they often ended up feeling confused and directionless. Plus, with SEO evolving so much every few months, what worked one day would just not be as effective later. However, as we explained to this client when it comes to SEO, there are some things that are evergreen. And one of these is high-quality backlinks. A quality backlink basically says that a well-reputed website considers your content relevant enough to send their audience to it. In Google’s eyes, that automatically increases the value of your content and brings it much higher in the search engine results. Yet, most people, just like our client, are so intimidated by the idea of generating high-quality backlinks that they simply don’t know where to start. So, we decided to break down some of the strategies that have worked really well for us in the recent past and are likely to work in the near future as well. Reporting Broken Links This is a way to build high-quality links with some smart research and well-timed outreach. Here’s how: For starters, you need to find a list of sites that have either changed names, stopped offering a service, moved to a new URL, shut down, etc. Of course, these sites should have content similar to the content you offer. Use a backlink checking tool like Ahrefs to see which websites had links to these sites that are now defunct. In other words, all these websites will now have broken links that don’t lead to real content, undermining their user experience in a big way. Then email the people who are still using these outdated links and give them a heads up. In the same mail, you can mention that they could link to your website content instead. Chances are they’ll be a lot more receptive to your outreach because you’re doing them a huge favor. Skyscraper content A great way of generating high-quality backlinks is to create that one piece of content in your industry that truly stands out. It should be evergreen, comprehensive, extremely detailed, and at least 5-10x better than any other article on the subject. To know what to build this content around simply find a piece of content in your industry that has already performed well in terms of backlinks. And then create a more comprehensive, in-depth piece on the same subject. Make sure you aggressively share the article with influencers and bloggers in your industry as well as companies and brands that have been mentioned in the article. This will ensure you get the retweets and shares that you need. Before you know it, your content will generate the maximum number of backlinks for you. Turning brand mentions into backlinks This is a simple one. Use a social listening tool to get an alert every time someone mentions your brand on their blog. They’ve mentioned you so you already know they like you. All you need to do is send them a friendly email requesting them to convert the mention into a link, and voila, you have a high-quality backlink right there. Guest Posts Guest posts used to be one of the most effective methods for link-building. Over time, companies began mass-producing low-quality guest posts and publishing them across websites. This led to Google issuing a warning about guest posts with the result that a lot of marketers began staying away from this technique. However, guest posts continue to be one of the most effective ways of building high-quality backlinks. It’s a win-win situation where the owner of the blog gets free content and you get a quality backlink. The key is that the content should be top-notch. Also, it’s important to find the right websites for guest posts. A great starting point is to do some research on the guest posts of your competitors. If these websites have published something from competitors, they’re likely to accept guest posts from you. Use content formats that have a proven track record Did you know that 75% of all online content gets 0 backlinks? It’s very easy to create content that falls into this category. To create content that is among the other 25%, you should stick to content formats that have been proven to work. Take a look at this table for instance: As you can see, things like videos, infographics, lists, “how-to” and “why” posts are particularly successful when it comes to link-building. Of course, this doesn’t mean you should just create lists, how-to guides, and infographics. But they provide a good starting point around which you can build a comprehensive content marketing strategy. Find authority resource pages Authority resource pages are absolute gold when you’re looking to generate high-quality backlinks. Here’s an example of the perfect resource page: Hence, all you really need to do is find relevant resource pages and then send them the link to your content, simply asking to be added to the list. Of course, most people don’t refer to them as resource pages so finding them can be a little tricky. People usually refer to them as “helpful resources”, “useful resources”, “further reading”, and “additional resources”. So simply google any of these phrases together with the relevant keywords to find the right article. Conclusion Many people are still skeptical about whether link building actually works. Of course, misguided black hat SEO techniques like link building generators will only be counter-productive. However, painstakingly building high-quality backlinks is still the best way to build SEO in the long run. The techniques listed in this article should be your go-to as you look to build a long-lasting and
5 Amazing Home Page Design Templates That You Can Use
There are many misconceptions that home pages simply don’t matter anymore. Why bother with a perfect home page when you can just create targeted landing pages for each of your marketing campaigns? But the truth is that the homepage is here to stay. Whether you like it or not, it’s the face of your company, especially when someone searches for you online. It welcomes new users and explains what your company is all about. However, what is changing is the way we visualize and design home pages. There was a time when the home page crammed in as much information as possible. They tried to tell users everything they could in just that one page. But that led to extremely overwhelming and confusing user experience. For instance, many homepages had carousel sliders that allow you to showcase multiple things at once. But over time, tests showed that they ended up negatively affecting conversions, SEO, and page loading speed. Today, homepage design is all about user experience. This means keeping things clean, simplistic, and minimal while telling users what they need to know when they first come to the site. Here are 5 diverse homepage design templates. Over the years at JustWords we’ve found that close to 85% of our clients’ websites fit into one of these design templates. You can figure out which one suits you best and adapt it for your own site. Template 1: Mint.com Mint is a budgeting app that people use to plan and manage their personal finances. With products like Mint that handles confidential financial information, designers always have to find that line between building trust and still being extremely user-friendly. The Mint homepage finds the perfect balance. The first thing that strikes you about the Mint homepage is that the design is extremely simple, without any added frills. The headline and sub-headline are strong and impactful but without having any unnecessary jargon. Their CTA is both simple and compelling – “Sign Up Free”. Finally, the homepage doesn’t try to perform too many functions at once. Its purpose is simply to tell you what the app can do for you and every section talks about this in different ways. Template 2: Kiva Kiva is a microlending platform that connects smaller entrepreneurs in developing countries with sponsors and donors from all over the world. Kiva had a dual goalkeeping things simple and impactful while also motivating people to take action. Here’s what they get right: Their template is extremely minimalist. The design is as simple as possible and there are plenty of white spaces. The headline and sub-headline are really hard-hitting. Being an impact sector company, Kiva’s goal is to showcase the impact of what they do. And the headline and sub-headline together with the cover photo do this very effectively. Their home page feed tries to accomplish only 3 goals — build trust in Kiva, showcase the range of offerings and get people to take action. There is no overcrowding and confusion on the home page. Finally, Kiva also needed to find a way to make visitors understand what value they could get. Hence, they decided to go for a pop-up overlay with a simple email subscription. This can be a risky move that may backfire. However, with clever content and right timing, a pop-up overlay can exponentially increase conversions. Doing several rounds of A/B testing to find the right content and timing is the way to go. Template 3: Jill Konrath If your business is built around your personal brand, Jill Konrath’s homepage is one template you need to see today. Whether you’re a life coach, a freelance copywriter, or a dietician, this homepage is personal branding 101. There are no frills and unnecessary technical terms. The headline and sub-headline tell you exactly what Jill Konrath is all about and why she’s so effective. A large part of Konrath’s website is about establishing her credibility as an authority in the sales field as well as her credentials as a keynote speaker. She has all her thought leadership materials as well as her press coverage prominently displayed on the homepage. With a personal brand website, there are two things that become even more important — making it easy for people to reach out to you and getting more subscribers to your content. Both the Contact Us and the Newsletter subscription are very accessible on the homepage. Image Source Template 4: MailChimp If you want to build a homepage with a razor-sharp focus on conversions, look no further than MailChimp. MailChimp has just one CTA (Call to Action) button above-the-fold on the home page. Above-the-fold refers to what you see when you first click on a website without scrolling down. In a way, this completely reduces the choices the user has when they visit the website. Given that more choices actually lead to higher decision times and sometimes no decisions, this is actually a good thing. MailChimp also uses negative spaces or white spaces very effectively. All the white space around the primary CTA makes it that much more prominent. The MailChimp homepage also uses a photography trick called the “rule of thirds” which means it puts the most important elements in the middle of your line of sight. In the example below, the design is helping you subconsciously prioritize a page hierarchy. Template 5: Evernote Evernote is a really interesting homepage design because, over time, the product evolved from a simple notes app to a whole range of productivity software. This could potentially make for a very messy website but Evernote navigates this problem successfully. Evernote emphasizes on the broad range of its tools but summarizes them into a few important benefits. This keeps the messaging simple but still shows customers the range of functions. The background colors are rich and muted which in turn makes the CTA (Sign Up for Free) more prominent. Conclusion Your homepage is the storefront of
11 Must-do Tactics for High Ranking Videos on YouTube
If you’ve been looking for YouTube video optimization ideas, you’ve most likely been through the regular tactics – adding proper tags, adding keywords in the title or description and the likes. This article is ideally for people who want to delve deeper into the core aspects of YouTube SEO, to go above and beyond and experiment, and find their niche to rank better. So let’s start with the fundamentals. People search differently on YouTube and Google This is one big reason why YouTube optimization can’t simply be an extension to your regular search optimisation process. You need to remember that the consumption of content is very different depending on the medium delivering it. The same video may have a lower watch rate on Facebook and higher one on YouTube. The rate of consumption also changes drastically on whether a video is sponsored or organic. This core understanding allows one to think differently on how you are creating videos and how you are disseminating it. You can rank and rank well even if you don’t have a huge subscriber base If you can engage, entertain, you can gain visibility even if you don’t make videos for the masses and are limited to a specific industry. SEO cannot outperform content Being visual, engaging and also a medium of choice, the quality of content you create here is directly proportional to the rank you achieve (all other factors of SEO being equal). The easiest example is the scores of recipe videos available on YouTube. If you look for Broccoli soup, you’ll see videos where the chefs are ambling for a while about the benefits of Broccoli before getting to the actual recipe. Within the recipe too, some spend time to show the detailed chopping of vegetables just to prolong the video. Other videos will simple show the accelerated recipe with captions describing the ingredients and method. While both show the exact same recipe, no prizes for guessing which video is likely to have a higher watch and completion rate. So now let’s get down to business What is YouTube SEO? YouTube SEO, as Google describes, is the process of optimizing your videos, playlists and channel to rank high when searched on YouTube. Videos are ranked based on their title, description and content. This definition, while sounding simple, allows us to form the base of the important factors that form the foundation of SEO for videos The title and description are super important – You need to feature your keywords here It is important to align with the user’s search intent – Think of the context in which you want your video to rank, evaluate who is already ranking and then provide a better context. Your video should be engaging enough: Engagement has many metrics on YouTube. It depends on how many people watch your video for the first six seconds and then go beyond it. It checks on how many people watch the full video – a metric that works disproportionately for longer videos. Here is a checklist of the top YouTube video optimization techniques. Searching for the right video keywords: The way we search has generally evolved with the adaptive intelligence of search engines or vice versa. From searching for ‘London Hotels’ to ‘Which hotel in London has the best reviews’, the way people search is now conversational. In YouTube too, you will see a lot of keywords starting with ‘How to…’ like “How to make Sanjeev Kapoor style butter chicken”. Tools for video keyword research Google Keyword Planner: Just like you do for regular search, pick out the keywords with the highest potential search volume. These give a base to start cover your ground, especially for the tags you’ll add during the optimization process Youtube auto suggest: Start typing the most likely terms someone might use to search for your video and YouTube will automatically drop down a list of phrases that are being searched. These give an idea on how to frame your title AHREF YouTube keyword search volume: AHREF comes the closest in terms of providing the YouTube search volume for keywords and phrases. Competitors: Stealing keywords from competitors isn’t a new SEO practice. Tools allow you to swoop on enough and more information on competitor strategy. See who is currently ranking for your prized keywords, analyze their video length, quality, backlinks, title and description optimization and also engagement ratio. This will give you a fare predictive model on what you need to achieve in the next three to six months to beat your closest competitors. How to optimize the title and thumbnail of your video The book is only as good as its cover. In this case, the title (a key part of your cover) is a big contributor in allowing easy discovery of your video. YouTube titles are similar to your blog headlines and you can pretty much use the same guidelines to create click-worthy headlines. A few tips to remember Include your most important keyword phrase in your title: Including the key phrase in your title gives validation to the user that your video is close to being the answer to what they are searching for. Solve a problem in your title: The intent to click on a video is high if the video is closest being the solution to the user’s query. For example, if the user is typing “How to make Origami Peace Crane”, having ‘Origami Peace Crane’ in the title is a must. Along with it, also include words like the easiest tutorial or quickest tutorial or such phrases that make your video closest to the user intent of learning to make the origami crane. The video thumbnail is essentially the make or breaks factor when it comes to clicking on your video. Choose your thumbnail to either include the finished product or value proposition so that viewers know what to expect by watching. Optimize your tags for SEO Tags give you the perfect opportunity to add Latent Semantic Indexing
How Customer Reviews Can Bring a Whole New Meaning to Your Content Marketing
Content Marketing and Customer Reviews have traditionally been two very different things, belonging to completely different domains. Content Marketing is used to build interest and educate users while customer reviews come only after the product has been purchased. Yet, in a world of peer reviews and social proof, the lines between the two are blurring rapidly. Let me give you an example. One of our clients that has a very niche B2B product, came to JustWords claiming that they simply didn’t have enough content surrounding their product that users would actually be interested in viewing. The product they sold was extremely vital for most businesses, it just wasn’t particularly interesting or exciting. We realized we didn’t have to inform or educate users through the content, we simply had to convince them of the credibility of our client’s product. We also found that our client had a solid and loyal base of existing customers. So our content marketing strategy really became about showcasing why customers loved the product through different channels and content formats. Simple and yet very effective. It’s not hard to understand the appeal of customer reviews — people tend to trust each other more than they trust businesses. With social media becoming such an integral part of everyday life, this peer reviewing has become even more important. A Brightlocal survey found that a whopping 84% of people trust online reviews as much as they trust a personal recommendation. Not only are peer reviews becoming more trustworthy, but people are actually using them to make purchase decisions. For instance, the same survey found that 70% of consumers need to read at least 4 online reviews before they trust a business. Tips to integrate customer reviews If you want to revamp your content marketing strategy to make sure it incorporates customer reviews, here are some key tips. Make it easy to collect customer reviews The first step towards creating a content marketing strategy based on reviews is to make sure you have a steady stream of positive reviews coming your way. For starters, make it as easy as possible for people to leave a review. Use email software like ActiveCampaign or MailChimp to send an automated mail to customers requesting them to leave a review on your preferred platform. Make sure you also leave a link on your home page to make it easy for people to leave a review on your preferred website. You can also ask customers for more detailed feedback through an online form submission. You can use this longer, more personalized feedback on important landing pages or critical content pieces. Use an independent review platform For reviews to be taken seriously, you need to make sure they are published on an independent, third-party platform that customers trust. If your reviews are not trustworthy, all the effort spent in collecting them will be wasted. There are two ways to approach this. The first is to find a platform that works for your industry. Zomato for restaurants, Amazon for e-commerce, and TripAdvisor for travel and hospitality are some credible forums. The other approach is to collect your reviews on a review platform like Trustpilot. In any case, make sure you check the site’s policy on sharing reviews before you make it your go-to review platform. Use embedded reviews in your website Well researched articles, versatile writers, and wide coverage of topics! Posted by Arielle Ann on Friday, February 3, 2017 Embed reviews from the third-party platform within your website, especially those critical landing pages. When users enter a new website, they are immediately looking for signals to confirm the credibility of the product. Embedded reviews from a credible, independent site like Yelp, Trustpilot or TripAdvisor can go a long way in building credibility right off the bat. In fact, customers won’t even need to go elsewhere to look for social proof; they will find it on your website itself. Use the latest marketing tools to incorporate reviews into your marketing content Recently, Promo.com and Trustpilot came together to create an integration that makes it extremely simple to incorporate customer reviews into your marketing. Promo.com is a tool that makes it easier for people to create marketing videos while Trustpilot is an online community for trustworthy reviews. With this integration, Promo.com customers can now identify important customer reviews on Trustpilot and easily incorporate them into their marketing videos. Similarly, rich-snippets stars that show up on SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) as a result of reviews can lead to an increase to a 10-20% increase in CTR (Click Through Rate). Reviews also help businesses to qualify for Google Seller Ratings which is an automatic extension in Google Ads that can lead to higher CTRs. Do some research and use the many different tools available to incorporate reviews into your digital marketing effort. Use customer reviews as an inspiration for other content Many times, we don’t know how to create content that is valuable to users without directly promoting the product. Did you know that 79% editors end up turning down guest blog pitches because they’re over promotional? For instance, if you’re looking for content to promote your gourmet snack company, a blog entitled “5 Reasons Why Our Snacks Are Amazing” isn’t going to go down well. A great way to combat this problem is to actually go through customer reviews. Many customer reviews will have detailed insights into how your product is solving customer pain points. For instance, a customer may have written, “I love your snacks because I know they are good for me. They also tend to fill me up without bingeing and leave me feeling full for hours afterwards.” This could inspire you to write a blog post titled “How to Snack While Also Taking Care of Your Body”. Understanding customer pain points through meaningful reviews is a great place to look for content marketing ideas. Summing up Companies are always on the lookout
Google and the Future of SEO
This is one undisputed fact – Google, being one of the top search engines, has a massive influence on key SEO practices. The algorithm used by Google can essentially make or break the future of your online venture by determining its positioning in the search engine results. While Google fervently guards its search algorithms to provide unbiased information to its users, savvy SEOs have, over the years, developed a pretty good knack of getting an idea of what works and does not work in that mechanism. To keep its secret sauce really secret and prevent people from manipulating it, Google keeps changing its algorithms. This makes it essential for SEOs to remain updated. Here are some of the most prominent changes brought about by Google which may help you in redesigning your SEO strategy in an optimal manner. 1) Getting on the first page just got more difficult One of the most significant tweaks made by Google is related to the number of results displayed on the first page. It is a fairly known fact that search listings beyond the first page get significantly lower organic traffic, so SEOs try their best to hit that golden spot. The top listing on the Google search page may get 33 percent of the traffic while for the second position holder, the traffic drops down to 18% and keeps getting lower for subsequent listings. However, Google now frequently features less than 10 listings on its first page. Keep this in mind while designing your new SEO strategy so as to ensure that your website features on the first page. 2) Richer Snippets Google has changed its layout in a way that in many cases, the users do not even need to click on the relevant links to get the desired information. Snippets have now become the new battling ground for SEO. It has been observed that when there is a featured snippet, the topmost organic search result gets less than 20% of all the click-through. The richer content in the snippets now translates to lesser traffic for the concerned websites. In such cases, SEOs may need to redesign their websites to ensure that more Google users are converted into traffic for the website. Using a table with summary on your website or designing your website to be mobile friendly is a clever strategy to harness this new development. Further, you can rearrange the information on the website in such a way so that the snippet readers are motivated to get further information by visiting the website. These snippets are mainly based on the meta-description of the page and hence it may help to tweak the meta-description of different pages on your website. Ideally, the meta-description should be 300-320 characters long and should also be relevant to the content of your page. 3) Paid Search Results Google constantly revamps its search page to increase its efficiency as well as monetary value. Lately, these tweaks have brought paid search results to the fore. These paid results are displayed more prominently than organic search results as Google is all set to have four text ads instead of the current three, right above the organic listings. Hence, it is advisable for SEOs to remain vigilant and adaptable to ensure that their strategies are able to make the best of this situation. A smart mix of SEO and paid ads can be employed or better content and headlines can be used by a business to attract more traffic and distract them from paid ads. 4) Combine SEO with Other Tools While SEO is here to stay, the developments have made it imperative for marketers to combine SEO with other online marketing tools. Some of the most important such tools are page load speed optimizer and whole query placement. It is also time to pay attention to informative and high-quality content rather than just cramming it with keywords. You should also use relevant images to improve the overall readability of the website. As a matter of fact, 1 image for every 100 words is considered to be ideal these days. Regularly updating the website to provide the most relevant information is another way to ensure that your website is featured high on the search page. Also, keep in mind that a large population of the world is still offline. The SEO scene is likely to change drastically as more and more people go online. Overall, it is safe to assume that Google will keep playing a big role in online marketing policies adopted by brands. However, to stay on top of these developments, it is important to have a well-diversified online marketing strategy, using a wide range of tools. The SEO strategy also needs to be flexible to incorporate new changes without requiring substantial alterations and expenses. So, work today to make your SEO strategies future proof.