A/B testing works… some of the time. Barely. A tiny bit. If you’re lucky . And when it does, a 1% increase to show to bosses and clients is what you’ll get. That’s a problem. Because how much time did that 1% cost you? How much effort did you exert chasing it? All that time and effort, largely…

Facebook is closing in on nearly two billion monthly active users! There was even an 18% increase from 2016. If you think about the sheer size and scope of Facebook, it’s mind-boggling. And when you consider the fact that one in five pageviews in the United States occurs on Facebook, the power of…

Facebook Live , YouTube Live, Periscope. All the major social platforms are integrating live streaming in some form. Several up-and-comers, like Meerkat and MeVee, are also creating buzz. And this all means one thing: Live video is hot. Scorching hot. It seems everyone is now using live video in…

The success of your company depends on the performance of your sales funnel. No matter what product or service you offer, it can significantly contribute to getting qualified leads and driving more sales. Fortunately, when it comes to optimization of your sales funnel, you don’t have to make drastic…

It sounds like the premise for a new sci-fi flick: an advanced species, the Quants, arrive with incredibly deep knowledge on data from a variety of sources, and can test, manipulate and model it to confirm or disprove theories, allowing a far greater understanding of what makes people (and the…

Remember the good old days? The 2005-era SEO? White keywords on a white background. #1 on Google. Collect your paycheck. Call it a day. Things were so… refreshingly easy. Since then, it’s becoming anything but. A few zoo animals made SEO exponentially more difficult. Then the number of competition…

China’s first domestically designed large solar-powered unmanned plane reached above 20,000 meters in altitude on its test flight in the country’s northwest regions recently. The drone was developed by the China Academy of Aerospace Aerodynamics (CAAA), it’s developers kept the exact size of the…

If you’re like most SaaS managers, you’re committed to running and growing your business. But to do that, you need to ensure you’re meeting the needs of your customers, and that includes reducing churn. With companies spending anywhere from 5-25 times more to acquire a customer than keep an existing…

Instagram recently announced it reached 700 million users ! Of those users, 100 million signed up in the last four months, marking the platform’s fastest-ever growth rate. If you’re wondering how it stacks up against other major networks, see for yourself: It’s currently the third most popular…

Marketers continue to embrace personalization and all its benefits. But in this day and age, greeting customers by their first name in an email is no longer enough. And lumping them all together based on demographics won’t cut it either. Typically, marketing segmentation looks squarely at a user’s…

I’m a curious person by nature. I find myself constantly doing research on nearly every topic under the sun. If I’m chilling at a restaurant with friends and someone wonders about a current event or mentions a fact, I’m Googling it on my phone. (Yeah, I’m that guy.) A lot of my Google searches begin…

A few weeks ago, Kissmetrics CEO Brian Kelly announced the new phase of Kissmetrics – Customer Engagement Automation. Customer Engagement Automation (CEA) is a platform that allows marketers and product teams to fully understand and drive customer engagement. It combines person-based digital…

When sending out automated emails to your list, how personalized are they? I’m not talking about things like $firstname , or order by $date for free shipping – but actual personalization based on their behavior . According to MarketingSherpa , 39% of marketers found that sending emails automatically…

Copywriting, when compared to other forms of writing, is a different kind of animal. It’s not necessarily about writing well. It’s about writing persuasively. It doesn’t matter if you’re a world-class wordsmith or a literary genius. If you can’t effectively move readers through the proper sequence…

Fear works. Except for when it doesn’t. There’s no better way to force prospects to pay attention than by striking the fear of God into them. It interrupts patterns and interests the unaware. But. That doesn’t mean it always works. In fact, in many cases using fear or negative messaging can actually…

Modern Marketing Blog Subscribe to email updates Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Google Plus YouTube Instagram RSS Product News | May 30, 2017 Share This week, AgilOne announced new integrations with Oracle Marketing Cloud. With AgilOne’s customer data platform powering engagement through Oracle Marketing…

“I got 99+ endorsements, and they all help prove my proficiency in key areas.” That’s what Jay Z might say if he was optimizing his LinkedIn profile. Hopefully you get the reference. But seriously, LinkedIn endorsements are really important. In fact, they’re one of the most effective ways to prove…

Yes, maybe, or no. For reluctant buyers, they aren’t quite certain whether your product works for them. The consumer isn’t sure if the product’s features will actually help them. Tackling this segment of buyers is an issue facing most SaaS companies. The competition and the demand for the new best…

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand the correlation between testimonials and higher conversions . As humans, we’re wired to seek feedback from others. But testimonials may carry even more weight than you may have thought. Research found that customer testimonials are considered to be…

With the launch of Campaigns this month, we have given our users incredible flexibility to create any automated, behavioral emails they can imagine. If you already have sophisticated behavioral email programs up and running, then…good news…you don’t have to read any further. However, if you are just…

As you are no doubt aware, Google recently added additional reporting and transparency to the Quality Score (QS) metric that’s all-important in terms of calculating Ad Rank. (If you’ve never watched the updated Ad Rank explanation video by Hal Varian, Google’s chief economist, I recommend you take a…

Have you ever tried to take apart a high-end file cabinet? We’re talking about the kind built with such thoughtful design that it makes a room look like the “after” shot on an HG-TV home makeover show…instead of the dingy unfinished basement “before” shot. If you have, you know that taking apart a…

Local Sign up for our daily recaps of the ever-changing search marketing landscape. It's official, Google is rolling out the more graphical user interface for hotel reviews. on May 24, 2017 at 2:34 pm More Google has confirmed with Search Engine Land that it is now rolling out a new user interface…

Do you like to binge-watch a TV series? I don’t do it often. Hardly ever, in fact. But yep, I’ve done it before. For me, it’s one of life’s simple pleasures. Every once in awhile, I’ll find a series totally “binge-worthy.” It can make you a little crazy, especially if you spend the better part of…

A new consumer survey from Nielsen, commissioned by Yelp, argues that review sites drive higher conversions than search and social media. The survey of 2,000 US adults found that 92 percent of respondents said they made a purchase after visiting Yelp, “at least sometimes, frequently or almost…

Analytics & Conversion Sign up for our daily recaps of the ever-changing search marketing landscape. on May 19, 2017 at 8:03 am More Currently, the way Google Analytics separates users on AMP and non-AMP pages can make it difficult to get a full picture of user behavior across the two page formats.…

Last month, Search Engine Land reported that changes to Quality Score reporting may be on the way . That day is here. Google has added seven new Quality Score reporting columns that will provide much more visibility. The big new development is advertisers will finally get some historical Quality…

A good friend of mine and truly the best SEO expert I have had the privilege working with, Gregory Gromov, once referred to the Google algorithm updates and tests as “Google storms.” The coined phrase made all the sense in the world. Per Gregory, a solid SEO program provides the ballast to weather…

Google has been steadily increasing distribution of Shopping ads, including to YouTube , Image search results and third-party retail sites in the Search Partners network. The inevitable extension to the Google Display Network is now here: the company has launched a pilot called Retail Shopping on…

Merkle’s Digital Marketing Report for Q1 points to strong growth from Google and the continued strength of PLAs (Google Product Listing Ads). Expanded text ads have yet to yield promises of CTR gold. Bing and Yahoo’s lack of mobile market share is hampering growth. Here’s a look at some of the key…

We’re two weeks away from the MarTech Conference in San Francisco, May 9-11 — the world’s largest independent marketing technology conference designed for senior-level marketers and technologists. I stress the the word independent because unlike most of the big marketing events these days that are…

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Bing updates its DMCA take-downs and copyright removal process Apr 21, 2017 by Barry Schwartz Bing Webmaster Tools gains a content removal section for viewing and…

As many as 60 percent of the Kenyan population now has access to electricity according to official data. But in neighbouring Tanzania, the penetration rate is less than half of that and sparsely populated rural communities are especially neglected.

Two patents were recently granted to Google that paint a very interesting picture of the future of search. These patents are: Detecting and correcting potential errors in user behavior Guided purchasing via smartphone Before we dive in, I feel it’s necessary to point out that having a patent granted…

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Siri is Google’s nearest mobile search competitor [Report] Apr 6, 2017 by Greg Sterling According to a survey from Fivesight Research, Siri had a larger share of…