Half-Geek | Web 2.0 Strategy

banner ads you cannot click...

When I first started working in the area of online marketing, I was quickly made aware of and forced to join the 'banner ad's don't work' movement. I was working with search marketers who were committed to educating me in the ways of the new breed of online marketing geek. Maximizing online media ROI was the goal.

These guys had the low down on the hard numbers that proved beyond all doubt that, when purchased on a CPM basis, banner ads quickly become too expensive as a traffic acquisition tactic. More importantly, even when a banner campaign drove an acceptable level of traffic, it was typically very un-targeted traffic that was far less likely to take a specific desired action.

Therefore- banner ads purchased on a CPM basis provide a relatively low ROI when compared to other more targeted online media tactics (SEM, email, affiliate marketing etc...). You can only successfully interrupt people a certain number of people with fancy creative as they read the daily rag online. The ones that you can interrupt and get a click from probably aren't thinking about your product or service.

So what the hell are KFC thinking when they choose to run banner ads on the herald that you cannot click? On one hand I almost admire the fact that by doing this, they seem to have given into the fact that banner ads don't supply a good CTR. On the other hand I'm thinking, they have completely missed the point of online marketing- Engagement.

KFC- the internet is not a big magazine. If by chance I want to interact with your brand via some expensive interruptive media tactic- you had better let me.

Un-clickable banner ads? I just don't get it........?

facebook applications one year on

Facebook applications are nothing new these days. It's coming up to nearly a year since facebook revolutionized the online social networking industry by opening up their platform, allowing developers to create create utilities and the like for facebook users.

So as we approach the one year mark its interesting to note the various facebook application strategies. What has been successful? What hasn't been successful? What is the definition of a successful facebook application?

The first sign that facebook applications were definitely something that warranted potential investment had to be the acquisition of the 'Where I've Been' application in August 2007. The simple maps mash-up that allowed facebook users to plot the various places they had visited on a world map was picked up by Trip Advisor for a cool sum of $3 million (USD). At the time this equated to roughly $1.30 per registered user. A benchmark had been set.

On the other side of the coin, we have the interesting case of Scrabulous. A play on the legendary board game scrabble, scrabulous allows users to have an ongoing game of scrabble with each other on the facebook platform. The thing is that the scrabble brand is owned by the global toy manufacturer Hasbro who (unlike Trip Advisor) moved to shut down the popular facebook version of their board game instead of shelling out and taking ownership of some hot online property.

Since then there have been literally thousands of applications built. The facebook application market has been flooded with everything from virtual food throwing apps right through to the wildly popular Texas Hold'em game.

The other day I was stoked to receive a comment from Dave at 500 hats on my post about facebook's monetization strategy. Dave provided a couple of links to some guys that are doing some pretty smart thinking around facebook apps.

One in particular that stood out to me was an in-depth review of why most facebook apps are devloped for fun rather than being developed as utilities that help people do more meaningful things. I found this to be a very interesting read......

What's your opinion on facebook apps? Are they a waste of time? Have you, like me, removed most of them from your profile?

cracked the hundy mark - thanks everyone

It's back pat's all round at half-geek at the moment (well me patting myself on the back anyway). Yesterday it was all about Search and page rank boosts and today feedburner confirmed that I have finally cracked a mini milestone of 100 RSS subscribers. (shameless RSS feed plug #1)

So thanks to everyone who has subscribed (shameless RSS feed plug #2) to my RSS feed and continues to read half-geek, especially given the fact that my posting frequency has been pretty pitiful of late. Seeing my RSS subscriber number tick over into three figures has given me a renewed energy level.

I plan to get back into a more regular posting frequency again. I am fortunate to be part of a very smart group of people at Tribal DDB who are creating some pretty cool digital work. Everything from Search engine marketing to cutting edge flash development. Where possible and appropriate, I plan to start talking about some of the cool stuff we are doing.

Thanks once again for everyones support. Tell your mates!

new zealand page rank update

Whoaaaa half-geek has definitely been feeling the love from Google lately. My search traffic has received a nice boost. The page rank of my home page has stepped up to 4 from 3. It's a nice little reward for my hard work in 2007.

Funny thing is that I have been so busy at work in 2008 that the issue of page rank has been the last thing on my mind. Many search marketers will suggest that this is a good thing, they say page rank doesn't matter anyway.

But I have to say I was pretty happy when I eventually noticed......

It all started with my noticing some healthy rankings around some reasonably competitive terms like "facebook" and iPhone. The ultimate impact of higher search rankings is obviously higher traffic levels from search.

Has anyone else been feeling some google.co.nz page rank love lately? I'd really like to know the actual date the update happened...

landing page design

Landing pages have been top-of-mind for me lately at work. I have been working on a Search Engine Marketing campaign that is going to have a very specific target audience.

Landing pages should be a crucial component of any online media strategy and they become even more important with a niche SEM campaign using Googles search and contextual network. I want to make sure that the visitors that I acquire via my text advertisement have a seamless experience, landing on a page that is relevant and reflects the message in the advertisement that they just arrived from.

But above all, I want need the visitor to take a specific desired action.

So mulling over all these landing page thoughts has meant that I have been very aware of the various landing pages that I see online in NZ at the moment. I have been clicking away wildly on ads that I would normally ignore, all in the hope that I may pick up some good landing page ideas.

You would think that the likes of say..... Vodafone, with their massive budgets, would be doing some smart landing page work. They are pretty much fully e-commerce enabled, making their online strategy a prime target for a big landing page component.

I recently clicked on a social ad that vodafone are running on facebook (see the ad at left- click to enlarge).

When you think about it, a social ad on facebook targeting pre-pay subscribers and asking them to top-up online is not a bad idea.

Vodafone are likely to be buying this media on a Cost-per-Click basis (or one would hope so) and their new site gives subscribers the ability to pay for a top up online quite easily (I can attest to this).

To make matters even better for Vodafone, I actually need to top-up my prepay card. I am a prime target. I click the ad in anticipation of a super smart landing page experience. This is what I get (click to enlarge):

 

This landing page is wrong in so many ways. For Christ sake, you asked me if I wanted to top-up my prepay phone! I do, so I am clicking on your ad with the expectation of being able to top-up, but where on the page do I click to do just that?

That big red box that says, "Top up your pre-pay now and receive 20% extra" is not even clickable! Arrrrrrgggghhhh.......

There is actually a link to top up- its in the far right 1-of-3 cell at the bottom right of the screen. The link is too small and its in the worst place. There are like a bazillion links for me to choose from.

A screen with no main site navigation, A nice headline, small body copy, and one big fat red call to action to login and top-up is the answer in this situation.

Vodafone marketing- drop me a line and lets talk landing pages.

facebook lexicon

"Facebook Lexicon counts occurrences of words and phrases on Walls over time."

If it's not already clear to most online marketing geeks that facebook is on the fast road to becoming the social equivalent of the almighty search giant Google, it should be now.

Facebook lexicon is, without a doubt, the fast moving social network's answer to the Google Trends application. I have alread had a bit of fun with the new app comparing some of my favourite things.

For example, a comparison between the popularity of my favorite baseball team (The Yankees) against their arch rival (The Red Sox) shows and unfortunate 'victory spike' to the latter around October last year. No surprises here really, as The Red Sox made the world series and eventually won in October 2007.

Interestingly, the same comparison using Google trends suggests a consistently higher level of search demand for the yankees. The spike for the redsox world series victory in October 2008 is definitely there, but no where near as prevalent as the facebook lexicon spike. Google also mashes up key events from their news channel which can help users identify the drivers behind major dips and spikes.

When one considers Google's core business model (selling adwords), one can see that the Google Trends application serves as an excellent support application for advertisers. Research plays a big part in setting up successful adwords campaigns and Google trends aids in this research.

Facebook are going through a defining period as a business. They need to monetize the huge online social community that they have created. This needs to happen much in the same way that it did for Google when they launched adwords in order to monetize the enormous volume of searchers that they created with their superior search engine.

It seems that Mark Zuckerberg is taking the smart online entrepreneurs route by not trying to re-invent the wheel. He identified a gap in the global market (social networking) and he is now leveraging the lessons learned by the likes of Google to help in successfully monetizing facebook.

Lexicon serves as a great example of this in my opinion. It's a great application to support those who want to use the facebook social ads offering in the same way that Google Trends helps adwords advertisers.

Zuckerberg continues to impress me.....

poor old mark

Reading the herald today about the latest slap-n-the-facebook for Mark Zuckerberg made me wonder- could there be a worse place to start a business than Harvard University?

Zuckerberg develops the next big thing on the internet, leaves university early to pursue his future as an internet entrepreneur, and all his mates stay behind and (presumably) study their backsides off in order to leverage their legal ability against Mark when he finally succeeds.

My thoughts may seem a little far fetched, but this is America that we are talking about here.....