Category: Digtial Marketing

Google Ad campaigns done right are a good way to drive highly qualified traffic to your website. Done wrong, you can waste money on clicks without getting conversions. The key to running a successful Google Ads campaign is to make sure people notice your ad, click on it and then call you or convert on your landing page.

Where to Advertise

Google Search Network ads, which you see on the search results page, have higher click-through rates than Display Network ads. Display ads appear on Gmail, YouTube, and other Google properties. You will get more impressions on the Display Network, however, consumers looking to buy usually start with a Google search.

Choose Relevant Keywords for Your Ad Copy

You want to bid on keywords with a high search volume which shows commercial intent. Use the AdWords Keyword Planner to build ad groups and specific campaigns with your keywords.

Next, you’ll write ad copy which reflects the user’s intent, Since you get two lines, use the second line to state your value proposition and how choosing your brand benefits the user.

Geotarget Your Audience and Schedule Your Ad 

Make the most of your Google Ad campaign budget by specifying who sees your ad. An attorney who practices in New Jersey wouldn’t want their ad shown to people in other states. If you are an online retailer who ships internationally, exclude countries where you do not offer shipping.

If you have a local business open during the daytime only, exclude your ad from showing when you are closed and there is no one to answer the phone.

Use Extensions

Extensions are very useful, especially the click-to-call extension for smartphone users. Imagine you’re frantically looking for an emergency plumber. The ad offering 24-hour service with a phone number you can click on will get more attention than one without the extension.

Quality Score

Learn how Google determines your ad’s quality score. They look at how relevant your ad is to the keyword and the quality and relevancy of your landing page. Google wants people who click on ads to have the same good experience as they do with organic listings. If your ad has a high-quality score, you’ll pay less per click and rank higher.

The concept of Digital Diplomacy (sometimes called Virtual Diplomacy) is fairly new, arguably coming to the forefront of international affairs as a result of the failed Green Revolution in Iran in 2009 where social media played a role, albeit ambiguously in its effect. Then came the Arab Spring and the use of Facebook and other tools. Today, the most active governments are the U.S. and UK in using social media as Digital Diplomacy tools. Below we’ve provided a ranking of which democratic and non-democratic countries are most active in terms of international relations through digital media in Cyberspace.

Democratic Governments Using Social Media for Digital Diplomacy
As the graph below shows, the U.S. government leads the way with a foreign affairs department using social media actively to promote its foreign policy with a close second from the UK FCO. Australia is third but coming up fast. For the most part however, most governments tend to “broadcast” and not engage in dialogue. This graph “ranks” a government based on a) volume of content created and pushed across digital channels, b) number of channels they are active in and c) number of “entities” or people that push out content from that department. The highest a government can achieve for activity is a 9.

Democratic Governments Engaging in Dialogue with Foreign Citizens for Digital Diplomacy
Without a doubt, Australia leads in terms of responding to inquiries and having, albeit short, bursts of engagement with citizens from other countries. Behind them is the Netherlands and then the UK. We term “engagement” as responding to inquiries and questions and occasionally in Twitter, re-tweeting content from someone else. Engaging in dialogue however, can be a challenge for a government in international affairs as there can be serious implications. Over time, as diplomatic services become more familiar with and comfortable in the use of social media, engagement levels will likely change.

Methodology
For this research we used our proprietary software to analyze the Twitter accounts of confirmed government foreign affairs departments and then looked at traffic and engagement across blogs, Facebook and any other social networks such as YouTube. Rankings are designed to understand the level of activity use by each government in a channel. Human analysts then completed the work through link and data verification.

Today we announced the release of our groundbreaking research into a major issue that crosses two borders – the Keystone XL pipeline and how social media was used.

We note that this was an in-house research project by our own team and was not sponsored by any company, organisation or individual. Some of the key findings of this report are;

• This issue galvanised very large numbers of people, organisations and groups on both sides of the Canada-US border and social media facilitated cross-border connections and relationships.
• Negative sentiment around Keystone has remained a majority view among people active in social media channels since this issue entered the public domain in July 2008.
• Positive sentiment, however, has gained momentum over the past year and has nearly closed the gap with negative sentiment in some channels.
• Our research also suggests that social media was vital in incorporating  the views of local, civil society groups from rural areas in a broad public debate.
• Finally, the issue also moved into the social media dialogue surrounding the 2011 Climate Change Conference in Durban, South Africa this December.

We can certainly see the social media is having an increasingly bigger impact on our world beyond just marketing. Increasingly, citizens are learning how to use these technologies to organise and drive change not just in democracies, but in dictatorships like Egypt and Tunisia.

So what do you think? Will social media continue to be as or more important in society?