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    YouTube Creative Best Practices

    Posted on by 565Media.com

    Being the world’s second largest social media platform, second only to that of Meta
    (previously known as Facebook), with over 2 billion monthly active users YouTube is
    the leading choice for video marketing in 2022.


    In previous years, businesses small and large alike have hesitated integrating videos
    into their ad campaigns because of both the idea that the campaigns are difficult to
    set up and the cost of the campaigns themselves. However, with the shift in how
    people use their devices, avoiding video in 2022 is a recipe for disaster. And the
    majority of marketers understand that.


    You can no longer afford to ignore one of the leading marketing platforms in the
    world.


    That’s why, we’ve put together this comprehensive guide, to show you exactly how to
    advertise on YouTube and get started with your first ad campaign.

    All you need is a targeted strategy and the right team, and you can easily capture the
    perfect audience by creatively using YouTube video ads. They’re the perfect tool to get
    your message to your audience (and get a buy-in) if you know the best practices to
    develop your campaign.

    The Best Creative Practices for advertising on YouTube in 2022

    Simply, remember your A, B, C, & D’s. 

    • A_Attract: Hook consumers’ attention and get them to tune in.
    • B_Brand: Help consumers see/hear your brand and stand out from the wave of advertisers on the platform. 
    • C_Connect: Make consumers think or feel something for your brand
    • And lastly, D_Direct: Drive them to take action.

    Attract

    When trying to attract the right audience there are 4 key elements that matter from
    the start of your ad: Framing, Pace, Humanization, and Surprise.


    ● Framing: Use tight framing on the subject whether it’s a product or a person.
    “Focusing on people can increase a viewer’s expressiveness (i.e., an emotional
    reaction, gauged by facial expression) as they see an ad. This increase in
    expressiveness is tied to cross funnel campaign improvement.” (YouTube
    Creative Practices 2022, Kantar)


    ● Pace: Aim for 2+ shots in the first 4 seconds, scene changes support
    engagement if the rate of change is balanced with information load. Simple ads
    with low information can have faster pacing than more complex ads with high
    information.


    ● Humanization: People like people. Utilize them when creating your ad campaign
    and include human subjects early on within the video.


    ● Surprise: Use stunning, delightful, unexpected or otherwise memorable
    imagery. You want your graphics, text, and your transitions to engage the
    viewer and keep their attention.

    Brand

    Naturally integrated products, logos and audio cues are particularly important
    elements to land your brand with the viewers, you can do this by: Introducing,
    Mentioning, Reinforcing, & Differentiating.


    ● Introduction: Introducing your product or brand in the first 3-5 seconds is
    positively correlated within all brand metrics.

    ● Mention: Audio with mentions of your brand by people who are on screen are
    associated with better results than audio mentions of people off-screen. This
    reiterates one of our first points, humans like humans.


    ● Reinforce: Logo placement matters, and the most effective placement depends
    on your marketing objective.


    ● Differentiate: Show visuals and colors unique to your brand. “Brand assets,
    such as emblems, logos, spokespeople, characters, taglines, colors and jingles
    are powerful drivers of brand associations and competitor differentiation.”
    (YouTube Creative Practices 2022, NielsenNeuro)

    Connect


    Storytelling style, message, people and audio are key to keep people watching and
    make them think or feel. This is integral to connecting with the viewer and the best
    ways to do that are: Integrate, Engage, and Associate.


    ● Integrate: Use function and emotion as levers that work together or
    independently to engage views. Functional storytelling works!


    ● Associate: Make people core to the story. People help hook viewers in ads
    opening moments and facilitate connection. (Example: celebrities or people
    ‘like me’.)


    ● Engage: Lean into emotional levers like action, humor, or intrigue when it works
    for your brand.

    Direct


    Audio and visuals are key elements to reinforce your message and encourage your
    viewers to act, and you can use these effectively when you: Prompt, Inspire, and
    Compel.


    ● Prompt: Show offers and call to action through text cards, simple animations
    or voice overs.


    ● Inspire: Use offers that inspire a sense of urgency for example, a limited
    timeframe or limited units available.


    ● Compel: Use specific call to action. Clear concise CTAs drive the most impact.


    Lastly: Bring it all together!


    Having the knowledge of the best practices is just the first step. You need the right
    team behind you that is committed to the growth of your business individually. A
    team that works with you to create ads that inspire action and compel consumers to
    care about your brand. To find this, look no further than 565 Media. We help clients
    achieve leaner growth, we are hands-on, agile & performance driven with a singular
    goal to grow revenues cost-effectively.

    Email & SMS Marketing with Klaviyo

    Posted on by 565Media.com

    Running Effective Email & SMS Marketing Campaigns with Klaviyo

    When you think of the most powerful and profitable marketing channels, email probably comes
    to mind first. And with good reason — it’s hard to find another channel that’s so scalable,
    cost-effective, and targeted.


    But without a great email marketing platform, managing these types of campaigns are about as
    easy as pleasing a tired toddler, amirite?


    There are a lot of email marketing tools out there that are fun, simple to use and grow your
    business. But none of them are as powerful as Klaviyo. Klaviyo is a growth marketing platform
    that gives businesses the power to grow faster with email marketing and automated messages
    across multiple channels.


    In this blog we’ll dig into some Klaviyo capabilities that help the best marketers create engaging
    marketing campaigns that drive growth.

    Marketing Automation: Price Drop Trigger

    Klaviyo’s marketing automation, Price Drop Trigger, is ideal for ecommerce businesses (and
    especially those with dynamic pricing strategies!) Easily set up automated emails to notify
    specific customers about changes to an item’s price. And because these customers have
    already purchased from you or browsed your website, they’re part of an audience that is already
    high-intent — they’ve indicated their interest in the product already by either purchasing from
    you or adding it to their cart. This means more sales for you, less time spent managing your
    pricing strategy, and a better user experience overall for shoppers who won’t miss out on items
    they’re interested in.

    Shopify Check-out Opt-in

    Customer engagement is essential for online businesses that want to thrive. The problem is that
    it can be difficult to make your customers feel engaged – which is why having multiple
    communications channels is recommended. You have a better chance of reaching them – and
    inspiring engagement – if you’re using their preferred channel. And more and more customers
    are preferring to opt-in to receive texts from brands they like. Klaviyo’s Shopify integration
    makes this opt-in easy, by enabling merchants to automatically capture consent from customers
    during checkout.


    This integration follows all legal requirements for capturing consent, meaning you can start
    sending text messages (SMS) right away. Texts have a high open rate, making them a powerful
    tool in your marketing arsenal. You can use them to send order updates, promotions and sales
    info, or price drops. But to do that, you have to get that consent first.

    Utilizing Data and a NoSQL Database

    An ecommerce platform collects a massive amount of visitor data. If you’re like most online
    retailers, however, you’re not taking advantage of this information to improve your marketing
    results. Klaviyo collects and organizes customer data so you can use it to target your marketing
    campaigns more effectively. Unlike traditional relational databases, Klaviyo is a NoSQL
    database, which handles data differently, processing data faster so marketers have better
    information about their customers.


    Understanding how your visitors experience your site is valuable information that helps you
    better understand your audience. If someone has been browsing on your site for several hours
    but hasn’t made a purchase yet, that’s very different from someone who drops off after only two
    minutes. You should be targeting these two groups differently from a promotional perspective.

    Key data points to track:
    ● Views of a specific product pages
    ● Return visitors
    ● Abandoned Cart rates
    ● Views of marketing messages, whether email or SMS

    Automated SMS Campaigns (and when NOT to use them)

    SMS is a marketing channel that marketers have only just begun using, but with high open rates
    and most messages viewed within minutes of being sent, it’s clear that this is a valuable tool in
    the marketer’s kit. With SMS, you’re not competing with other brands for attention because most
    businesses haven’t yet adopted this strategy.


    Automating SMS campaigns can help you triage customer communications so employees can
    focus on genuine customer issues faster. Issues like customer surveys, review requests and
    shipment tracking likely don’t need much human involvement, so those types of messages are
    easy to automate. But being able to respond to a disgruntled customer within a couple of hours,
    or even mere minutes, goes a long way to repairing the situation – and those interactions
    shouldn’t be automated.

    Coordinate SMS + Email Marketing Campaigns

    Communicating with your audience through a combination of SMS and email is a great way to
    boost your marketing ROI. Your audience is more likely to see your message, since you’re
    sending it through multiple channels. This is especially true for SMS: the average text open rate
    is 98%, while the average email open rate is roughly 20%.


    When you use both SMS and email marketing, you can test which formats and messages work
    best for your audience. Some audiences prefer one channel over another, but others will
    respond well to both.


    The marketing messaging shouldn’t be exactly the same though. Texts should be short with only
    one call-to-action (CTA), while emails can be longer and include multiple CTAs. Texts can work
    extremely well for price decreases or limited-time-only promotions, while emails are better for
    sharing your latest blog post, lookbook, or new brand collaborations.

    3 Klaviyo Workflows to Use Right Now to Increase Engagement (and Revenue!)

    Email marketing campaigns can be useful for a wide variety of communication needs – but
    manually managing those campaigns is a chore. These three automated workflows will help to
    address potential gaps in your sales funnel, build stronger customer relationships, or recapture
    interest.

    ● Back in Stock
    Automatically sends an email to customers who have signed up for product notifications
    when an item has been restocked.


    ● Thank You
    Let new and returning customers know you appreciate their business with a customized
    thank you email.


    ● Abandoned Browsing
    An abandoned browsing email flow can capture customers that may not be ready to buy they didn’t put any items in their cart – but they have shown interest by viewing one or
    more product pages. These emails should share additional benefits of the product or
    recommend similar products.

    Conclusion

    Marketing with Klaviyo allows marketers to create a data-driven marketing strategy that will
    deliver more effective, targeted outreach. The platform is all about connecting you to the right
    customers, making it the perfect tool for digital marketing.


    Need some help setting up email and SMS campaigns that deliver measurable results? Contact
    the team at 565media.com.


    Tik-Tok 2022 Best Practices

    Posted on by 565Media.com

    TikTok, whether you love it or hate it, you’ve heard of it by now. It’s the world’s most
    downloaded social media app for short-form videos and has successfully attracted an
    audience even past that of Gen Z and millennials, all while offering engaging, consumable
    content. Over 500 million people actively use the app globally and as of now, the app is
    available in 141 of 155 countries, which means a broad reach for brands and influencers
    alike.


    It’s increasingly becoming a platform to help skyrocket a brand’s social media presence,
    and in turn, their profit. And it can all be done with only one viral video. So, you know you
    should advertise on TikTok, but how do you succeed? Should you mass-post? What
    format should you use? How long should my ad be? Is there a right song or a wrong
    hashtag? In this article, we will cover the best practices to be successful, not only by the
    benchmarks set by the platform but by the community itself.

    So, what should I do?

    In 2021, TikTok introduced some of the best creative practices and what each of their
    top-performing ads has in common. The most of which is using it’s own video creation
    tool. This can be used within the app itself and has a plethora of creative filters, trending
    sounds, and engaging options for call to actions, all right there at the tap of a finger. The
    use of the video creation tool can ease the creative process as well as help your business
    look native to the platform itself. This is a key component when creating ads for TikTok.
    But what are the other practices? We’re going to break down what exactly those are, what
    they mean, and how you can utilize these practices to exponentially grow your business.
    Here are some best practices marketers and content creators on TikTok need to follow:

    1. Vertical Videos are a must. TikTok is an app that prioritizes vertical 16×9 videos,
      what does this mean for you? That you should do the same. When creating an ad
      for the platform, think natively. This means your video should be produced
      vertically while encompassing the full screen. “Video orientation matters as well.
      The vast majority of TikTok videos are shot in vertical format which means TikTok
      users aren’t expecting to have to rotate their screen to watch the next video on
      their For You Page. Videos shot in vertical format see a 40.1% lift in impressions
      compared to videos using a square or horizontal aspect ratio.” (TikTok Creative Best
      Practices)
    1. Make the video lengths impactful, not long. Ultimately, the length of your
      TikToks should make sense for the message you’re trying to get across, but overall
      shorter videos perform better. It only takes a moment for a user to swipe away to
      consume the next video. Because of this, it’s important to have an engaging start
      to your video, while producing an effective call to action, rather quickly before your
      viewer can move on to the next viral video.
    1. Don’t forget the music! If you’re unaware, TikTok actually originally was called
      Musically, an app kids used to make dance videos (sound familiar?) to different
      trending songs. While the name has changed, and there’s far more content on the
      platform now, some things never change – and that’s the importance of music in
      your videos. Including sound – a music track, voiceover, or just you talking to the
      camera – in your TikToks is more than a best practice; it’s a must-have for this
      sound-on environment. Adding audio of any kind causes a significant lift in
      impressions compared to videos without audio, and more than 93% of
      top-performing videos use audio.
    1. High res videos? Yes please. Quality matters – don’t let grainy videos prevent
      your message from getting through. There are a plethora of videos that have gone
      viral on TikTok solely because of the quality the video was shot in. What does that
      tell you as far as ads go? Your message is more likely to be retained if the quality
      of the video is the best that it can be. “The overwhelming majority of
      top-performing TikToks, 83.2% to be specific, have a video resolution of 720p or
      higher. These videos see an average 5.4% lift in impressions.” (Best Practices)
    1. What’s trending? Use it to your advantage. TikTok trends, whether it’s a
      trending sound, a dance, or a video concept, have historically been the reason
      businesses have gone viral using the platform. But how do you know what exactly
      is trending? Use the platform! Become your audience (if possible) and engage with
      the community that you’re trying to reach. Take Duolingo, for example. Their social
      media presence on TikTok alone has created an environment for their ads to be
      consumed in a way that never have before, all because they’ve taken to the trend
      of commenting on everything.

    I know what to do, but how do I do it?

    Well, that’s where experts come in. It’s important to have a marketing firm that will stand
    behind you, explain the trends, and create concepts that are unique to your brand and
    your message. To find this, look no further than 565 Media. We help clients achieve leaner
    growth, we are hands-on, agile & performance driven with a singular goal to grow
    revenues cost-effectively.

    How to Make TikTok Ads Work for Your Business

    Posted on by 565Media.com

    If your audience is primarily Gen Z and Millennials, TikTok is a great place to advertise. As the
    latest mobile-first platform that’s allowing businesses to reach a massive audience, its users are
    highly engaged. How engaged? According to Backlinko, the average TikTok user in the U.S. is
    on the social platform for more than 30 minutes a day. And with an average session time of
    more than 10 minutes, this is a prime opportunity for businesses to engage with a captive
    audience – and generate significant results.

    Why is TikTok such a valuable platform for marketers?

    Over 800 million people use TikTok every month, making it the world’s fastest growing social
    media platform. And about 70% of TikTok users are between the ages of 16 and 24. If that’s
    your target demographic, running advertising and influencer marketing campaigns on this social
    network are a no-brainer.


    With an ads platform that’s still relatively young, much of the content is user-created and the
    costs are still lower compared to Facebook or Google ad buys. Businesses can take advantage
    of a lower barrier to entry – on both basic ad cost and video-production cost. On the flip side,
    you’ll need to get creative to get the most out of your ad spend.

    Before diving in and setting up your first TikTok campaign, there are a few additional
    considerations to make. Any ad campaign is an investment, so make sure you’re going to get an
    ROI before you get started.


    Here’s what you need to know before you start an advertising campaign on TikTok.

    Is your product or service the right fit for TikTok Ads?

    Not all brands are going to be the best fit here. Businesses that are highly visual – fashion, food,
    lifestyle and beauty brands, for example – usually perform better than B2B brands, which usually
    have sales content that is far more complicated or text-heavy.


    But that doesn’t mean that B2B companies can’t win here. To succeed with TikTok, regardless of
    industry, you need to create a highly creative campaign that will appeal to users’ emotions and
    sense of humor. Tap into what they’re already interested in – like pets, food or tech.

    Even industries that are typically viewed as ‘less-than-flashy’, like banking or insurance or
    enterprise software, have an opportunity to reframe their products and services in a way that’s
    fun and unexpected.

    TikTok rewards creative content

    TikTok is growing so fast because it’s doing something different from other social media
    platforms. It encourages people to express themselves in a more authentic, in-the-moment way.
    People who watch these videos are more inclined to share them with others, making TikTok the
    perfect tool for marketing your products and services.


    The challenge is that TikTok is incredibly noisy, with hundreds of millions of videos being
    uploaded every day. To stand out, you need to find a way to make your ads creative and
    entertaining, so that they can grab people’s attention.
    Here are some ways you can do this:

    ● Defy expectations. What do consumers think they know about your industry? How can
    you present your business in a way that flips that on its head?


    ● Go niche. Don’t try to appeal to everyone – narrow down your audience and look for a
    specific niche of users you want to reach. For example, you might want to target only
    teenagers who live in a specific country or city. The ability to micro-target users can help
    you to find an audience that is much more receptive to your message and brand.

    ● Go off-topic. Don’t limit your creativity to topics within your particular industry. Have fun
    with memes, holidays, your teams’ interests. Show the faces behind the brand and
    connect with a new audience in a meaningful way – even if it’s silly.

    Influencer/Brand Takeover collaborations

    Influencers can help get the word out about your brand on TikTok and increase its visibility in the
    process. Be strategic with how you approach these influencers, though. Many of them have
    strict guidelines that they require their sponsors to follow. Be sure to read over these guidelines
    before contacting them with your proposal so that you can avoid any hiccups.


    There can be huge benefits to pursuing these types of campaign collaborations. You’ll be
    introduced to their audience – but you’ll also earn ‘trust through association’. By aligning your
    brand with an influencer, they’re telling their audiences that your product or service is worth their
    time and money.


    Influencer campaigns can fast track your brand awareness, but it’s smart to experiment with
    TikTok before diving into one. First, gain a clear idea of who your audience is, what content
    they’re already engaging with and who they trust.

    Track Success with your TiKTok Ads Campaign

    Know your campaign goals before getting started. Whether you want to increase brand
    awareness or drive new sales, tracking ad performance is an important piece of the puzzle. By
    regularly checking in with your metrics, you’ll know when something isn’t working and adjust
    accordingly.

    Does video production quality matter?

    This is one area of video campaigns that scare off a lot of would-be marketers. Historically,
    video production has been an expensive endeavor requiring the hiring of a full crew and hours
    invested in production and editing. Without deep pockets, it can be difficult – even impossible –
    for small businesses and start-ups to adopt video in their marketing efforts.


    The good news is that money is no longer a barrier to entry. In fact, the more Hollywood-quality
    your ad is, the less likely it will be viewed as authentic. TikTok is about sharing your experiences
    in a fun and light-hearted way – and the vast majority of content is filmed on a smartphone.

    That said, you don’t have to make a video yourself — there are social marketing agencies that
    specialize in creating TikTok ads.

    Know your TikTok ad types

    There are several different types of TikTok ads, each with their own pros and cons. For today,
    we’ll focus on three of the most popular for businesses – TikTok’s In-Feed Ads, Top View Ads
    and Spark Ads.


    ● In-Feed Ads
    Shown inside the user’s ‘For You’ page, In-Feed ads blend into the user’s existing feed.
    They’ll be seeing your ad while scrolling between videos from the accounts they already
    follow. In-feed ads are excellent for engagement, since users can interact, comment and
    share your ads with their followers.


    ● Top View Ads
    A Top View ad is a branded 60-second vertical video spot — similar to Snapchat’s
    Discovery format — that users see when they open the app. This type of ad will appear
    at the top of your audience’s For You feed to grab their attention right away, but it will
    only play sound if they tap on it.


    ● Spark Ads
    Spark Ads offer marketers the ability to use organic posts or a TikTok creator’s organic
    posts to drive greater brand awareness and engagement. This is an ideal choice if you
    already have a library of existing content. (Because this ad format relies on content that’s
    already created, it’s easier and faster to kick off a campaign.) Like other ad types, Spark
    Ads drive excellent engagement, allowing users to comment, share and like posts. With
    one tap, users can visit a brand’s profile, and marketers can include a CTA on their post
    to drive conversions.


    Overall, the best way to make TikTok ads work for your business is to plan carefully and to
    create a clear strategy around your campaign. We believe that running a TikTok ad campaign
    can be useful for businesses in achieving their goals – if it’s applied correctly. From minding the
    ad format options, to providing high quality images and videos (and actually interacting with
    users), a little forethought, creativity, and intentionality can go a long way. And hopefully, if you
    decide TikTok is right for you, it can go even further.

    Google Ads: 2021 Holiday Planning Checklist

    Posted on by 565Media.com

    The global pandemic caused a massive shift in consumer behavior in 2020. With fears of sickness and health spreading, ecommerce shopping and at-home delivery saw a sudden and sustained increase in demand. And yet, despite a tumultuous year filled with upended business models, total retail sales during the 2020 holiday season rose 6.5% over the previous year. 

    As the Delta variant of the Coronavirus reinforces those consumer behaviors of staying at home, online shopping and generally avoiding public spaces, we can expect to see the trends experienced in 2020 continue into the 2021 holiday season. And because online businesses and retailers have now had a year’s worth of experience under their belts, we further expect to see more advanced marketing techniques to capitalize on these demands.

    In this article, we’ll explore the consumer trends for the holiday season from 2020, make some predictions for shopping behavior in 2021, and review the most important things to keep in mind when creating a marketing plan for the upcoming holiday season.

    Download the PDF checklist and follow along!

    2020 Holiday Season Was Huge for Ecommerce

    Source: Salesforce

    The holiday shopping season in 2020 experienced an unexpected increase in overall sales. Despite some statewide shutdowns and health considerations dampening the public’s eagerness to go shopping in person, total spending in the retail sector was up 6.5% during the holiday season to $1.064 trillion.

    Of that total, brick-and-mortar sales grew 2.2% to $878.26 billion, while ecommerce sales increased from 32.5% to $185.88 billion. That paints a pretty clear picture of what shopping trends to expect in the future, especially if statewide shutdowns and mask mandates continue to be commonplace.

    “In 2020, global holiday digital sales topped $1.1 trillion. 45% of all digital holiday spend happened by the end of Cyber Week.” 

    Source: Insider Intelligence

    2021 Is Predicted To Be Even Bigger

    According to a study by Intelligence Insider, the market forces that shaped the 2020 holiday shopping behaviors are expected to continue into 2021. Brick-and-mortar stores may continue to grow at a slow pace, but consumers are expected to further push online sales to new heights in the upcoming holiday season. 

    “We expect 2021 holiday retail sales to rise 2.7% to $1.093 trillion, with brick-and-mortar increasing 0.9% to $885.99 billion and ecommerce climbing 11.3% to $206.88 billion.”

    We would also expect to see a continuation of consumer behaviors that emphasize curbside pick-up or ship to store services.

    Source: Insider Intelligence

    Shifting Consumer Behaviors

    According to a survey by Google, there is a strong desire to head back in-store this year. 85% of holiday shoppers indicate that they plan to return to brick-and-mortar stores in some way. And yet, despite this reported desire for physical locations, 58% of holiday shoppers report that they plan on doing more online shopping than in previous years.

    What does this mean? There’s a growing desire to go back to the way things were before the pandemic, but consumers are still likely to increase their online holiday shopping behavior. The convenience of ecommerce shopping appears to be driving more marketing growth.

    How to Prepare Your Marketing for the Holiday Season

    Mark Key Dates In Your Marketing Calendar

    Make sure that your marketing portfolio is prepped and ready to capitalize on spikes in consumer interest. Flash sales, email marketing, affiliate coupons, social media promotions, etc. Your announcements and marketing language should be prepped and ready to go for the following dates:

    November:

    Diwali (11/4)

    Singles’ Day (11/11)

    Thanksgiving (11/25)

    Black Friday (11/26)

    Small Business Saturday (11/27)

    Hanukkah (11/28 – 12/6)

    Cyber Monday (11/29)

    December:

    Last shipping day (12/21-12/22)

    Christmas (12/25)

    Kwanzaa (12/26 – 1/1)

    Boxing Day / Post-season (12/26-12/31)

    January:

    New Years’ Day (1/1)

    January sales (1/1-1/31)

    Budget Time and Money for the Holidays

    It’s standard practice among retailers and online advertisers to plan ahead for a spike in Q4 spending. But when and how much of that marketing budget to prepare for is the question. 

    According to Google, 45% of all digital holiday spending happened by the end of Cyber week. So we recommend that your online marketing budget focuses a proportional amount, (with at least 30% headroom), for the weeks leading up to the end of November. For big events like Black Friday and Cyber Week, we suggest a short, sudden burst of spending on search, shopping and display ads around 500% your normal spending levels.

    In Nov-Dec 2020, global digital revenue from e-commerce saw a year-over-year growth of over 50%. And that trend is expected to continue upwards for 2021. We recommend taking a look at your business’ historical spending levels for the holiday season from past years, and extrapolating the expected growth in demand, structuring your marketing budget to anticipate these spikes in shopping behavior.

    Google’s Recommendations for Holiday Advertising

    Audit Your Website’s Performance Tracking

    Before making any changes to your budgets or capitalizing on the expected increase in holiday shopping, we recommend performing a quick audit of your performance tracking settings. This will make sure that the performance data that your marketing mix relies on is as precise as possible.

    • Assign conversion value to all conversions – For e-commerce businesses, make sure that your data layers are functioning correctly and display the correct conversion value for any individual product sale. For online businesses that rely on more nebulous conversions such as contact form submissions or calls to the office, refer to this guide on estimating conversion values. With a specified conversion value for every goal, your online advertising can take advantage of smart bidding strategies and optimize your marketing budget.
    • Remove old goal conversions – Many Google Ads accounts that have been active for a few years will start to build up a large list of tracked goal conversions. Even if your campaigns do not include some of these conversions as goals, they may still confuse the machine learning algorithms for Smart Bidding strategies. Consider removing any goal conversions that are outdated or irrelevant for your active campaigns.
    • Implement Google Analytics 4 – As of Q3 2021, Google is still beta testing the next generation of GA, called Google Analytics 4. This will eventually become the standard for web analytics, and looking into the future, historical data will be essential to optimizing your website and marketing in 2022. You can add GA4 to a site that already has Analytics to continue tracking your current performance while collecting next gen data in the meantime.

    Google Merchant Center Settings

    If your business runs on e-commerce, or your Google Ads accounts rely on Shopping or Product Search ads, it is absolutely essential to make sure that your Google Merchant Center settings are up to date and optimized for success.

    • Diagnostics – In your Merchant Center account, check the “Diagnostics” section to troubleshoot any account issues, feed issues or item issues. Google provides individual errors and warnings that may be causing issues with how your product feed appears in the search results. Keep in mind that it takes up to 2 business days for any new product feed updates to be reviewed, so your Shopping campaigns won’t see any instant fixes.
    • Activate your Shopping Campaigns – In order for your products to be featured in a Shopping campaign, each product needs to meet the following criteria: The product is approved in your Merchant Center account, the product is active, and the product is in stock. Make sure that you take time to revisit and improve your titles, description, and product images to reflect any seasonal products or offerings. For out of stock products, use the excluded_destination attribute to temporarily opt items out of paid listings

    Google Ads Settings

    • Stress test smart bidding – In testing, more data means more confidence. And Google Ads smart bidding technology relies on account history, so we recommend taking a closer look at campaigns that have good historical performance data. Try running an experimental split at 50% with a significantly higher budget, and then comparing the results. The Drafts and experiments will alert you when a test has reached statistical significance. 
    • Setup Google Ads Tag – Google Ads allows advertisers to import goal conversions from either a Google Analytics tag or a Google Ads tag. There are pros and cons to each, but for e-commerce businesses especially, the Google Ads tag is recommended because it provides more up to date performance data and better attribution settings. 
      • If your account currently uses Google Analytics tags for tracking conversions, consider switching over. Add the Google Ads tags for your most important goal conversions, allow them to run simultaneously (set to “Do not include as conversions” in the settings), and then after about 200 conversions on the new tags, switch the Google Ads tags to be included as conversions, and the Google Analytics tags to not be included as conversions.

    Meet demand with Search & Smart Shopping Ads

    According to Google, total search traffic increased during the 2020 holiday season. We expect to see the same in 2021. When using Search and Shopping ads in your marketing mix, it is important to focus on which user searches are most relevant to your brand, and what types of ads are most likely to match the user intent behind each query.

    • Shared budgets – In Google Ads, you can assign an average daily budget to each individual campaign, or use shared budgets to allocate budget across multiple campaigns. For holiday seasons especially, we’re likely to observe quick shifts in consumer behavior. Using shared budgets for Search allows advertisers to adjust quickly to shifts in demand.
    • Predict competitive positioning – It won’t just be your business that increases their marketing budgets before the holidays. It is important to try to predict what your biggest competitors will do, and factor those predictions into your spending strategies. First, evaluate your impression share metrics for the previous year’s holiday period performance. Then check the auction insights report in Google Ads to consider your competitive positioning. Use these insights to ensure that your bidding strategies are optimized.
    • Prepare for spikes in demand – The Google Performance Planner uses historical performance data to provide estimates for when the peak season occurs, and how much of your budget to put aside for each spike. Use this tool before the season starts to plan optimal budget and bid settings regularly throughout peak season.
    • Use the best Smart Bidding strategies – It is important to make sure that each of your campaigns are running optimally before the holiday spending blitz happens. Depending on your business goals, there are a number of different Smart Bidding strategies to utilize. Check out our expert’s guide to Smart Bidding strategies for which ones work best. But if you are unsure of which will work best, consider running an A/B experiment beforehand to assess the performance of each.
    • Segment your most important products for Smart Shopping campaigns – If you’re segmenting your Smart Shopping campaigns, use custom labels in your feed. For example, if you want to promote your holiday decorations at a lower target return on ad spend than the rest of your items, add a custom label to your feed and create a Smart Shopping campaign which includes those products. 

    Acquire customers with Discovery Ads and Video Action Ads

    Not all online shopping is done in the search results page. If you have reliable and accurate data on your target audience, consider using display and video ads to generate top-funnel interest.

    • Discovery Ads – Reach up to 3 billion people as they explore their interests and search for inspiration across their favorite Google feeds (YouTube, Gmail, and Discovery). The 2021 season is the first to feature Discovery Ads, which showcase your brand or your products in a swipeable image carousel, and include additional information to drive action.
    • Video Action Ads – Over 40% of global shoppers say they have purchased products they discovered on YouTube. Use Video Action campaigns to showcase your products, and help close the sale.

    Feeling Inspired?

    Do you want to know more about our Google Ads agency services at 565 Media? Have questions about search ads marketing or digital strategy in general? Don’t hesitate to contact us or call (323) 902-7439. Our experts will come up with optimized ad campaigns tailored for your business. 

    If you’re looking to effectively and efficiently boost ROI with your marketing budget, 565 Media is your top choice. Simply connect with our on-demand team of full stack developers and start with a list of what problems you need solved. Our team specializes in developing customized, scaled marketing campaigns geared towards generating profitable leads and growing your business.