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- The Search Engine Optimization market is over $10 billion in North America alone. The biggest question isn't whether you should utilize Search, but rather who will manage your campaigns. What should your organization do? It depends. When you review your options for in-house or outsourced Search or pay-per-click bid management, consider ... more
- Consumers are beginning to take environmental impact into consideration in purchase decisions. Businesses that demonstrate environmental responsibility have the opportunity to contribute favorably to their images while aligning themselves with the preferences of their customers. To get the full value out of green practices over time, companies need to let the ... more
- As YouTube, Google and MySpace announce that video advertising will become a key driver in their future revenue strategies, the glitzy, anonymous ads we have been used to for years will have to change course. Ads need to be intriguing in some way; they need to urge us to watch them. more
- If you want to be cutting edge, the way to do it is with audio and video. more
- When the clients of SalesTrac, Inc., were looking for more in-depth consumer insight to determine the effectiveness of their promotional events, SalesTrac seized the opportunity to provide increased value through an all-in-one system that added survey management and real-time reporting of consumer feedback to its services. Check out the results. more
- If you practice Internet marketing, you know the importance of a high-converting "landing page"—also called a promotional page, jump page, or squeeze page. Regardless of the specific purpose, one fact remains the same—you want the user to take some type of action. Here are seven landing-page best practices for increasing ... more
- Housing booms, dot-coms, high-tech, bio-med, religious fervor, Republican or Democrat regimes, peace-war—all of it... all the best (and worst) bubbles have, or will, pop on their way back to the center. In terms of the "Greening of America," we are currently on the thesis end of the pendulum, with a fair ... more
- Privately held Pavilion Technologies knows how important it is for businesses to track ROI. But two years ago, its marketing department realized it was having trouble tracking its own ROI. Pavilion ultimately found a solution through a software system that helps monitor all prospects who visit its Web site. more
- Each year, we ask decision-makers at a group of 100 leading brands: "At pitch, what are the specific reasons for choosing one agency over another?" In the latest results, "good chemistry" ranked as the leading factor. Here's a full list of the top 20 factors. more
- Landing pages have become the Omega-3s of Web marketing: if you're not using them and optimizing them ad infinitum, you're squandering your online ad dollars. Or so the landing page optimization crowd would have you believe. In the spirit of probing the pros and cons of this popular post-click marketing format—and, ... more
- Everyone has heard the common complaint that America is becoming less literate, but the onus for this alleged circumstance is nearly always placed on the reader (or, rather, non-reader) instead of where it often belongs: the writer. Many professional writers seem to have lost the ability to write clear, comprehensible copy ... more
- In the old days, marketers could use hype and exaggeration to get noticed and people would simply accept it. Not anymore. Today, if you want consumers to pay attention, you had better be truthful. And if you want them to fondly remember your brand, you'd better be emotional. more
- Monster.com, an established online staffing firm, needed new ways to reach its core audience of busy corporate human resources professionals. In the third quarter of 2006, Monster revamped its main email marketing campaign to make it more interactive and personal. Monster representatives now send their contacts a short text email ... more
- Let's give it up for Unilever! This company has not made any false moves on the marketing-to-women front, and the "presenting" sponsorship for its Pond's brand is another smart strategy in a long line of savvy business decisions. With its sponsorship of "The Starter Wife," Pond's gets its name linked ... more
- Numerous people have studied the process that creative people go through to develop their ideas. Most of these students of creativity agree that ideas come from a subconscious process that takes two relatively unassociated thoughts and combines them together to produce a new thought—a new idea. more
- Before it was released on July 4, 2002, many expected the $7.3 million game would join the ranks of the $436 hammer and $640 toilet seat as a study of excess. Few predicted "America's Army" would become the artillery's most effective marketing tool, conveying the authentic military experience in a ... more
- Marketing within social networks and Virtual Worlds is becoming a viable means for reaching and influencing the attitudes and behavior of consumers in ways that was never before believed possible. In fact, marketers who have dabbled in Virtual Worlds recognize the enormous potential of the medium... but have ventured only ... more
- BearingPoint, a global provider of management and technology services, had won a major contract to implement a complicated voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) system for a financial company and wanted to leverage off that success. But it was competing with larger telecommunications brands to educate potential new customers about the ... more
- If your business targets a local region, the trick is connecting with those in your own back yard. It's wonderful to rank well in search engines for a competitive search phrase, but if your product is only available to a small subset, how much time and bandwidth can you afford ... more
- With spring comes not only a new season but a "sticky" new segment. Book Club is back for "Round Three" with the hottest book of the year, "Made To Stick" by Chip and Dan Heath. "Made To Stick" analyzes why some ideas survive while many others die. But that's not ... more
- In an era of increasing federal regulation and greater competition in the mutual fund market, a financial firm found itself needing to modernize its marketing efforts. Rydex Investments, a private company that sells funds and other financial products primarily to institutional investors, decided to try some new techniques to get ... more
- There is no reason why every company can't deliver an exciting image to its audience; one that generates the kind of buzz and excitement usually associated with companies like Apple, Victoria's Secret, Benetton, Absolut Vodka, and Sony. It may seem impossible to produce a whole lot of steam for things like ... more
- The complaints against advertising are seemingly endless, limited only by the creativity of its critics. But advertising is fundamentally benevolent, the author says. Advertising is a communication technique that attempts to influence the behavior of others—no more nor less so than the techniques used by parents, journalists, teachers, and politicians. more
- Should your organization get into mobile marketing? The evidence shows that mobile marketing skews toward the business-to-consumer segment, and (slowly but surely) it is starting to gain momentum. Read on to find out whether the vehicle might be right for you. more
- Reflecting on past green products that were moving toward mainstream but failed, illustrates some of the challenges of legitimacy that innovation can face. On the other hand, monitoring those who have been notoriously self-serving and successful reveals marketing efforts to exemplify emotion, evade rationalization and drive profits. more