“It’s time to stop thinking about new vs. old media, or traditional vs. online. The goal is engaging audiences wherever they are. Video is video. “ – Jay Fulcher, CEO, Ooyala This quote from my good friend, Jay Filcher, CEO of Ooyala, a video analytics platform to track viewer engagement with actionable metrics across all devices…. More »
Latest Facebook Redesign: Implications for Your Facebook Content Strategy
Constantly implementing new ideas and directions, the latest Facebook redesign was done with the intent of positioning Facebook as a personalized newspaper. These changes have important ramifications for your content strategy. With a strong emphasis on visual content, Facebook has made changes to create subfeeds within categories, as well as allowing larger images since, time… More »
Know Your Users: Simple Features Make the Difference
In web design, as in life, sometimes the smallest gesture can make the biggest impact. I was recently asked by a Board member of the nonprofit, Center for Domestic Peace to help them with their brand strategy. So first thing I did was look up their website (like 90% of people). What struck me the… More »
Facebook Content Strategy: Why Being Smart Is Better than Being Big
In contrast to the truly uninspired Pepsi Facebook strategy we reviewed last week, a small nonprofit here in the Bay Area, is doing something very interesting and increasing fan engagement at the same time. Probably not a coincidence! In the spirit of transparency, this nonprofit is a ThinkResults client but we did not come up… More »
Facebook Content Strategy: Why Pepsi Has It All Wrong
At the risk of getting slammed by the Pepsi brand team, I just have to point out that being a big brand and having a big budget doesn’t always equal smart. The Pepsi Facebook strategy is … lame. There’s no other way to describe it. Here are a few representative posts: Tuesday, January 15 Saturday,… More »
My virgin Virgin Experience: A Brand that Surrounds Its Customers with Care
Just had my virgin Virgin America experience and it was awesome. I am a new convert. They take air travel to a very civilised 😉 plane. Not only do they understand their travelers and what they want — flexible, personal food and drink delivery, personalized viewing options, great music, power at every seat (the only… More »
Our Latest Mission: Rebranding a Nonprofit to Win
Over the summer, we’ve been secretly working on a great project … we’re doing a pro bono brand relaunch for Operation Freedom Paws. Why? Because we are a bunch of softies here at ThinkResults. The combination of giving shelter dogs new lives as service dogs and helping veterans with invisible wounds move back into a… More »
A Nine Year Birth: The ThinkResults Marketing Manifesto
Some births simply take longer than others. This Manifesto has been nine years in the making. Now that there is a solid team here at ThinkResults, this baby was ready to come out. Thanks to the ThinkResults team for their edits, comments and feedback on my original draft. The ThinkResults Manifesto This is a living,… More »
Is Content Marketing Replacing Traditional Advertising?
We certainly think so. This new infographic report from Marketo certainly paints a convincing picture. Content marketing budgets are growing; over the next 12 months, 51% of companies will increase the budget for these programs. So what are the top reasons companies using content marketing, according to Marketo? Risk mitigation Lead generation Lead nurturing Lead… More »
Google AdWords: The Zen Moment When Your Messaging Hits the Road
We’ve often joked that you know your messaging is tight when you can get it all into a Google Ad. Seriously. With a 25-character headline, and two 35-character description lines, crafting a great on-message Google Ad is a Zen-like exercise in branding elegance. This is often where we find out how “tight” the messaging is,… More »
Is Your Website Sticky or Slippery?
One of the nice things about having been working in the web world since the mid-90s (I came out of the science world so we were “playing” with the web before it became a big popular thing), I’ve seen a lot of trends and changes. Always interesting to see how things change. Five or so… More »
Three Easy Steps for Raising Your Google AdWords Quality Score
There is a lot of blather about creating quality Google AdWord campaigns and increasing your Quality Score, but it’s really a very simple formula: Target Keyword + Repeat Target Keyword in the Ad + Repeat Target Keyword on your Landing Page = High Quality Score So in the example we had in the prior blog… More »
Do You Know Your Quality Score and How It Affects Your Google AdWords?
Did you know that a poorly executed Google AdWords campaign will make your ads more expensive and less frequent? Yup. Google has a logical system to track and rate the quality of any advertisers campaign. It’s called a “Quality Score.” This makes perfect sense from a user experience perspective. Google is in the business of… More »
Quick Tips to Prepare for the March 30 Facebook Timeline Deadline
With the March 30 deadline looming for the Facebook transition to the new Timelime format for brands, there is much to learn. Here’s another great article on some of the key new features and how to best take advantage of them: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/7-new-facebook-changes-impacting-businesses/ I particularly like Tip #4 about the new application display format and how… More »
Facebook Timeline for Brands: Big Changes
We have gotten lots of questions over the last week about the new Timeline format for brands, which will become mandatory by March 31. It’s definitely a big change in the way your brand page looks. If you’ve already converted over to the new timeline format on your personal page, it will be a bit… More »
Introducing Ready, Set, Launch!: Our New Quick Start Launch Program
Do you need to get your new venture launched very quickly and with a fixed cost? Do you need a soup to nuts identity (logo, stationery designs and a slick website)? Not sure it can be done in your crazy short timeframe? Then consider our fixed-scope, fixed-fee quick start launch program, Ready, Set, Launch! We… More »
Pinterest Is Building a Social Circle of Love
Happy Valentine’s Day everyone! Pinterest is definitely a place of love. And I expect that will continue for some time as we are highly visual creatures. It’s in our nature. (BTW, I think, as an evolutionary biologist by training, this is one of the main reasons why Facebook is much more successful than Twitter and… More »
Drinking Our Own Medicine Is Painful
For the last several months, I’ve been running ThinkResults Marketing through our own full relaunch process and it’s been a humbling experience. When we’re working with clients through a launch process, we are fully prepared for emotional reactions, for them to take longer to move through the plan than they expect, and for there to… More »