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Blog Post 11: Brandon Schuster

This past week, my Digital Media class had its last guest speaker, Brandon Schuster. Brandon talked to us about what started his interest in advertising, his school and internship work, his professional work, and a lot about voice marketing. His presentation started with a funny story about the Got Milk campaigns. The most impactful advertisements Brandon saw as a child were the Got Milk advertisements. He talked about how he collected these advertisements and anytime his family saw them they would even save them and give them to him. Brandom says that the Got Milk advertisements are why he is here today and so interested in the advertising and digital media world. He even got to work on a Got Milk campaign in New York City when he worked for Deutsch. Brandon then went on to talk about his long list of experience, involving six internships and a study abroad experience in Israel. He stressed the importance of internship experience and said that study abroad was just as important as his internship experience. He said he landed his job at McCann because of his study abroad experience. 

The second half of Brandon’s presentation was all about voice marketing and different ways and examples of how so many companies use it today. The most interest example to me was the 13 Reasons Why: Talk To The Reasons. This was an online experience that let viewers interact with 13 Reasons Why characters using text, facetime, and calls. The average use time for this was four to five minutes, which far exceeds the 15 seconds something online usually catches a viewers attention for. 

Another thing Brandon focused on was virtual reality and the different types: 360 video, augmented reality, and virtual reality. I think that virtual reality would be a great innovative technology for Decks and Docks to use. VR would allow consumers to experience a deck or dock build using the materials from Decks and Docks. They could see it, walk on it, and experience what it would be like to have the product in their life, which would lead to a better chance of a sale happening. 

What is Virtual Reality? (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.vrs.org.uk/virtual-reality/what-is-virtual-reality.html

Buxton, M., & Netflix. (n.d.). Netflix Came Up With A Genius Way For Fans To Experience 13 Reasons Why. Retrieved from https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2018/05/199582/13-reasons-why-website-talk-to-the-reasons

Role of Virtual Reality in Education. (2017, December 28). Retrieved from https://www.eturbonews.com/174015/role-virtual-reality-education

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Blog Post 10: Chacka Marketing

Last week, my Digital Media class went on a field trip to visit Chacka Marketing. Chacka Marketing is a Digital Media Agency located in downtown Tampa.  We had four guest speakers talk to us while we were there, including Robert Fitzgerald, Tanya Seaward, Corey Lapp, and Jessica Prieto. Robert Fitzgerald is the account development manager, Tanya Seaward is a digital media specialist, Corey Lapp is another digital media specialist, and Jessica Prieto is the social media specialist. They talked about how they like to keep a fun culture around the office and have three core values that they focus on, including trust, pride, and hunger. Leading more into what they do, Chacka Marketing takes a channel agnostic approach to marketing, meaning they only use the channels that are right for you. Some of their clients include Car Max, Bay Care, and Shutterfly. Some things that they talked about were client partner interactions, including presentations and the flowchart, PPC, search engine marketing, social advertising, introduction to social, display, account auditing, account building and changes, client-partner maintenance, account optimization, managing client expectations, and tips for the advertising industry. 

The client-partner acquisition was an interesting topic that they covered. The parts to the client-partner acquisition are “request for proposal”, referrals, and meeting potential clients at industry events. Next comes the client partner presentation, which requires a lot of preparation, including researching the business, researching the industry, auditing the account (if possible) using Google, Bing, or social channels, conduct strategy and ideas without revealing too much technique/being too specific with ideas. The result of this is showing the client the understanding of their needs and challenges and demonstrating the skill and potential effectiveness in solving their problem. The client-partner flowchart is the last thing, which includes making contact with the client, an introduction call-discussion, an audit of the account, internal strategy discussion, a pitch to the client, and negotiating a contract. This, along with everything else they talked about during their presentations, is important to advertising because knowing exactly what your client wants, needs, and already has will lead to effective advertising and good relationships. Taking the time to research about the client and creating a relationship with them, regardless of if you end up working with them or not, is important in the advertising industry. 

Chacka Marketing | Digital Marketing Agency. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.chackamarketing.com/

Lang, P. (2016, April 18). What Does a Digital Marketing Agency Do? Retrieved from https://uhurunetwork.com/digital-marketing-agency/

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Blog Post 9: See, Think, Do

The Buyer’s Journey is the active process a consumer goes through leading up the purchase a certain product or service. According to HubSpot, every interaction your persona has with your organization should be tailored to where they are in the Buyer’s Journey. This journey has three stages: the awareness stage, the consideration stage, and the decision stage. The awareness stage is where the buyer realizes they have a problem, the consideration stage is where the buyer defines their problem and researches how to solve it, and the decision stage is where the buyer chooses a solution. We will be focusing on the Modern Customer Journey, called “See, Think, Do”.

See, Think, Do is a customer-first framework that delves into the stages a consumer goes through when purchasing a product as well as the problem barrier that needs to be solved. The “see” stage represents the search/discover part of the journey and the “awareness barrier”. Questions to be asked during this stage are “what is the major barrier in awareness?”, “are people having a hard time finding the brand?”, and “do enough people know about the brand?” The “think” stage represents the assess part of the journey and the “consideration barrier”. Questions to be asked during this stage are “is the problem in the consideration stage?” and “is there enough information to help people make the decision to buy your product?”. The “do” stage represents the buy part of the journey and the “repeat purchase and loyalty barrier”. Questions to be asked during this stage are “is the problem post-purchase?”, “are a number of people buying the product but not advocating it?”, and “is there lost opportunities to connect with your consumers to make them aware of other products?”

See, Think, Do is important to advertising because it helps communicate the product, service, or brand correctly and in the best way to a consumer, in return causing the consumer to buy the product. The action of buying the product is the overall goal of most advertising. 

Hintz, L. (n.d.). What Is the Buyer's Journey? Retrieved from https://blog.hubspot.com/sales/what-is-the-buyers-journey

See, Think, Do: A Content, Marketing, Measurement Business Framework. (2016, November 12). Retrieved from https://www.kaushik.net/avinash/see-think-do-content-marketing-measurement-business-framework/

See, Think, Do: A Content, Marketing, Measurement Business Framework. (2016, November 12). Retrieved from https://www.kaushik.net/avinash/see-think-do-content-marketing-measurement-business-framework/#seethinkdo

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Blog Post 8: YMMY

Last week, Alex Rodriguez from YMMY came and spoke to my Digital Media class. YMMY is a local Digital Marketing firm located in Downtown Tampa that focuses on brand development, content marketing, responsive web design, digital strategies, and online video production. The name of the company stems from always being hungry, in terms of desire, thus the name sounding like “yummy”. Alex explained a little bit more about YMMY in detail during his entire presentation. Their three main goals are as follows: 1) help companies raise visibility, 2) evolve the brand, and 3) attract more business. Helping raise visibility will help the company reach their target audience.  Evolving the brand presents the value to the consumer, and attracting more business is the objective side of it all. This all relates to advertising because these are three things that will help a brand in terms of building their brand and reaching their target audience, which is the goal of just about every brand, no matter what stage they are in.

Other than YMMY, Alex is also an author and has his own podcast. His podcast is called “The Digital Marketing Minute” and it currently has 115 episodes. Unlike other podcasts that are drawn out and can last 30 minutes to an hour, each episode of The Digital Marketing Minute is one minute long. Alex thinks getting straight to the point is important and the most useful in terms of podcasting. He gives the important facts right away, thus making his content easy to consume. This is good in relation to advertising because nobody wants to spend an hour of their life listening to a podcast that ends up giving one important point at the end. Alex’s two books are called “Digital Bacon” and “Sell You Before You Sell”. Digital Bacon is a handbook of the digital advertising world and Sell You Before You Sell is a book for any professional that wants to build a profession on the consulting approach. 

Rodriguez, A. (n.d.). The Digital Marketing Minute - Podcast. Retrieved from http://creativestrategytips.com/podcast/

Tampa Digital Agency. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://ymmymarketing.com/

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Blog Post 7: Bake More Pies

This past week my Digital Media class went on a field trip to a local Digital Marketing Agency, Bake More Pies. Bake More Pies was established in 2014 and started in a living room with one person. Now they have fifteen employees and are a full-service digital marketing agency that does it all for their clients. After getting a tour of the agency, we sat down and listened to a presentation. You might be wondering why it’s called “Bake More Pies”, as were we when we visited. The Vice President explained to us that the name comes from the idea “While everyone is fighting over the pie, we make more”. This mentality is all about putting incentives in the right places so that both the client and the agency get what they want. It also leads the agency to look for opportunities to grow revenue in places that haven’t been thought of before. The company culture is important to them. They want people that are fun, but still hardworking and willing to go the extra mile when it comes down to work.

A few things they focus on are website creation, CRM, digital content, consulting, marketing, advertising, videos, social media, email, and reputation management. Three employees that spoke to us during our visit were Jessica Beasley, Jennifer Lalji, and Emmanuel Ramos. Jessica Beasley is their Account & Production Specialist. Other than talking about her job, she talked about how important internship experience and willingness to learn is. Jennifer Lalji is their Social Media & Content Specialist. She spoke about how important communication skills are, as well as being organized, open-minded, and flexible. Emmanuel Ramos is their Videographer. He spoke about pre-production, production, and post-production of videos. Overall, everyone at the company was super interested in their workplace and said they loved the company culture at Bake More Pies. 

15 Cartoon pie png for free download on mbtskoudsalg. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://mbtskoudsalg.com/explore/cartoon-pie-png/

CRM 101: What is CRM? (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.salesforce.com/crm/what-is-crm/

Home. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://bakemorepies.com/

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Blog Post 6: Chris Morata

This past week, Chris Morata came to speak to my Digital Media class about User Experience (otherwise referred to as UX). Chris has a B.A. in Digital Media focused on Internet & Interactive Systems from UCF and is currently the Vice President of product at Qgiv. His presentation was focused on defining User Experience and the three aspects of it: 1) Visual Design, 2) Form Design, 3) Mobile Design. 

Chris started off by talking about how technology is always changing, therefore problems are always changing in terms of user experience. User experience’s goal is to reduce the cognitive load on people. This means reducing the amount of time people have to spend thinking about problems. For example, when using an app that requires you to type in your phone number, a good user experience would be the number keyboard coming up for you to use. A bad user experience would be the regular keyboard coming up because it would take longer to type in your phone number.

User experience isn’t only for technology. It can be applied to almost every situation. Another example would be door handles. A bad user experience would be the wrong door handle in relation to pushing and pulling or a non-specific door handle. A good user experience would have a handle for a pull and a flat area for an indication that it is a push door. 

In terms of visual design, Chris talked about white space, size and scale, grouping and organization, color and contrast, and consistency. With form design, he talked about keeping things simple, labels, microcopy, calls to action, feedback, and making things mobile friendly. In terms of mobile design, people should think in a “mobile first” mentality. 

One of the biggest takeaways from this presentation was that things are always changing, so UX is always changing. This is a challenge to companies but also gives them the opportunity to learn and grow. In terms of advertising, knowing the rights and wrongs of UX is key. Making the user experience as easy and efficient as possible will help advertisers keep people interested and coming back for more.

Google Search, Google, www.google.com/search?q=user experience photo&rlz=1C5CHFA_enUS685US685&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwipsfbvi_rdAhVR61MKHVlyDXUQ_AUIDigB&biw=1259&bih=630#imgrc=jjjMCCa8nGj55M:

Inc. “Accept Donations Online, On-Site and by Text.” Qgiv Blog, www.qgiv.com/.

“The Definition of User Experience (UX).” Nielsen Norman Group, www.nngroup.com/articles/definition-user-experience/.

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Blog Post 5: Jenni Mullins

This past week, the guest speaker that visited my class was Jenni Mullins. Jenni is a practicing digital marketer with over ten years of experience. She also is the owner of Moxie Digital. Jenni came to speak to my class about Digital Content Marketing and Socia Media. She started her presentation by providing some great examples and statistics to get the class thinking. The statistics she provided were as followed:

“88% of business to business (B2B) marketers use content marketing to generate leads.” 

“126% more lead growth from small businesses with blogs vs. small business without blogs.”

“60% of marketers create at least one piece of content each day.”

These are all interesting statistics because they might be things people don’t always think about. Advertising is becoming more and more focused on content creation for targeted audiences, which is not how advertising has always been. The success of blogging is definitely something I think most businesses don’t know about but should. A lot of people also don’t know what content is defined as. Content can be anything that is created by someone, including a blog, social media posts, videos, newsletters, in-person events, and more. 

The content marketing process includes 6 steps, which are creating a plan, knowing your audience, knowing your story, knowing what channels to create content for, and knowing how to measure your plan and achieve the goals. These steps are important to advertisers because each step helps make content made by those advertisers successful. Having a plan helps to make sure the marketing process runs smoothly. Knowing how to identify a target audience ensures that the content advertisers are creating is being delivered to the correct people (people it appeals to). Having objectives and goals helps increase brand visibility, increase targeted traffic, establish a company in search, identify new partnership opportunities, and increase social media growth and traffic.

Creating great content is one of the most important things for companies right now. Advertising is content centered right now and getting a lot of great content out there for consumers to see is what is helping companies thrive today. Whether it’s a social media post, a blog post, a video, or an event, any type of content, if done with the content marketing process in mind, will help a company. 

Brafton. (n.d.). Business-to-Business (B2B) Marketing. Retrieved from https://www.brafton.com/glossary/business-to-business-b2b-marketing/

Content Marketing: Process. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://contentmarketinginstitute.com/process/

Quality Content KEY to Google RANKINGS !!! (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.zoomyourtraffic.com/blog/quality-content-key-to-google-rankings/

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Blog Post 4: Andrew Mimault

This past week, my Digital Media class had another guest speaker named Andrew Mimault. Andrew is a practicing digital marketer who also owns his own business. His presentation covered a lot in terms of Google AdWords and other paid search platforms, Campaign Structures,  and Pay-per-click (PPC) ads. He started off by going over the basic of learning any kind of software or platform. His main point of this was to just do it. Working on a software or platform is the best way to learn it. Andrew went over four paid search platforms, including Google AdWords, Bing Ads, Amazon Marketplace, and Apple Ads. 

Google AdWords is the most commonly used paid search platform because it has the greatest scale. It is also the most competitive and most expensive of all the platforms. Anybody wanting to use Google AdWords should have a decent sized budget or being successful on this platform will be difficult. Bing Ads is the second most common platform. It doesn’t have the scale that Google AdWords has, but it does have lower competition and it hits a different market than Google AdWords. Amazon Marketplace is a newer platform that only shows ads to people searching on Amazon. Since two-thirds of product searches begin on Amazon, this platform is great to be on. Apple Ads is the place to be for apps, but it is the least scalable of all the platforms. Overall, paid search platforms are the place to be right now for digital advertising. For an advertiser, this means that if you aren’t using at least one of these platforms, then you’re behind. 

Next, Andrew went over the three most common campaign themes in regards to keywords, which are Brand, Non-Brand, and Competitor. A brand theme contains all of an advertiser’s brand terms, any term that is in the clients brand name or any variation of this. A non-brand campaign contains any terms outside of the advertisers brand name, but that aren’t competitors. A competitor campaign contains the names of competitors you are competing against. Other campaign types include search network only, universal app campaigns, display network only, remarketing, shopping, and video. 

The end of Andrew’s presentation was all about how to write successful ads. According to Google, ads should always be designed for a “mobile-first” world, containing Headline 1, Headline 2, Description, and Paths. Some more tips included rewriting copy instead of just adding more headlines, including the most important message in the headline, writing so it speaks to users on all devices, including top keywords in the path fields, and keeping ad extensions updated. All information should also be clear and consistent across all Google Search Results. The three essential components for a great search ad are 1) Ad Relevance, 2) Value Proposition, and 3) Call-to-Action. Ad relevance refers to your keywords being represented prominently in the ad copy. Value proposition refers to stating what is unique about your product/service. A call-to-action tells the user what you want them to do after reading the ad. 

This is all important to advertisers because having a good search ad is the best way to reach users. Including the key things in your search ad will make sure that a user is getting all of the information that they need while viewing your ad. This will have a large impact because having great ads is becoming more and more important in our digitally driven world. The market is oversaturated with tons and tons of ads, so it is important to capture users with just a few words of your ad and uphold whatever is in your ad when the user visits your website. 

(n.d.). Retrieved from https://ads.google.com/start/?sourceid=awo&subid=us-en-ha-g-aw-a-awc_1!o2~-1520377331-289046098315-kwd-12340353&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIopO8z4vX3QIVByUrCh0RxA3fEAAYASAAEgJThPD_BwE&dclid=CPOO99CL190CFUx8wQodGPED1g#?modal_active=none

How it works. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://advertise.bingads.microsoft.com/en-us/h/a/bingads/works

PPC Adevrtising Techniques - Clematis Advertising. (2018, January 10). Retrieved from http://clematisad.com/ppc-learn-basics-pay-per-click-ppc-marketing/ Sonoma City @ Amazon.com. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&node=8296344011

Search Ads - Apple. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://searchads.apple.com/

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Blog Post 3: Brian Swanick

Brian Swanick is a freelance digital marketing professional who came as a guest speaker to my Digital Media class to speak to us about the Foundations of Digital Marketing. The main focus of the presentation was “value” and why it is important. Value is the base of all digital marketing and most marketing in general. If you are not providing value to your client then why would they want to pay you for your product? Brian said that companies are not just providing value for their client, but for the client’s customers as well. A product or service has value when it helps someone achieve something or it helps them fulfill a desire. It impacts everything you do in terms of digital marketing, including the segments, channels, messaging, and the website. 

A segment is a group of people who value your product in terms of pain points and the channel is where you can find those segment groups. For example, if a group of people all are driving and have sun in their eyes, that is their pain point. They would all then go buy sunglasses, thus finding value in the product because of their pain point. Channels that you could find these people on could be social media channels, such as Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. The messaging is important because it is what conveys the value to the channel you are talking to. According to Medium.com, “Digital Marketing allows you to interact with people at every stage of the buyer’s journey”. Messaging depends on both the segment and the channel and also includes visuals (and sometimes a call-to-action). The last thing that Brain focused on was when consumers end up on the companies website. Your messaging could be spot on, but if you don’t have a good website to back it up, then consumers will be confused on uninterested. The website has to align with the ad the consumer saw and then some. 

Overall, digital marketing is always concerned with value and getting that value and message across to potential consumers. 

S. (2018, February 20). What value can Digital Marketing bring? – Subsign – Medium. Retrieved from https://medium.com/@subsign/what-value-can-digital-marketing-bring-8a8164261fe0

Pain Points: A Guide to Finding & Solving Your Customers' Problems. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2018/02/28/pain-points

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BLOG POST 2: Largest Digital Media Trend for Advertisers in the Next 5 Years? Podcasts

Advertising has both changed and stayed consistent over the years. Traditional forms of advertising have become less effective as the consumers and the market has changed. Digital media is becoming more and more useful in the advertising world today, but which type should advertisers be using? The answer to this question is podcasts. Thepodcasthost.com defines a podcast as "a series of spoken, audio episodes, often focused on a particular topic or theme, like cycling or startups. You can subscribe to the show with an app on your phone and listen to episodes whenever you like on your headphones, in the car or through speakers”. According to a timeline found on Internationalpodcastday.com, podcasts have been around since 2004 and have been used for several different things since then, including education, entertainment, and even politics. Podcasts can be important to advertisers because they do not take much money to set up and you can create content almost anywhere. As long as you spend the money on good equipment an have an internet connection you can create a podcast. This cost efficiency and mobility are what differs podcasts from other forms of advertising the most. A lot of advertising costs a lot of money and many brands do not have the money or the desire to purchase expensive advertising. Another great thing about podcasts is that people can listen to them while they drive, while they get ready in the morning, while they walk to class, while they are at the gym and many other places. This is important because consumers can not always be looking at a screen. Screen-dependent advertising includes things like television commercials and social media video advertisements, which are two big forms of advertising that are used in 2018. While you can still just listen to these advertisements, the visuals are just as important to understand the message. With a podcast, the consumer can just listen and not worry about missing a scene from a commercial. Consumers today also get bored of old or overused things so just the word “podcast” would be intriguing to many people. While podcasts are not huge yet, they will be up and coming in the next five years and for years to come. 

What is a Podcast? Learn about podcasting and how to listen. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.thepodcasthost.com/listeners-guide/what-is-a-podcast/

Podcasting Historical Timeline. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://internationalpodcastday.com/podcasting-history/

DeMers, J. (2017, July 11). Why Podcasts Are Popular (And 4 Content Lessons To Learn From Them). Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/jaysondemers/2017/07/11/why-podcasts-are-popular-and-4-content-lessons-to-learn-from-them/#eaaf92618f60

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BLOG POST 1: SEO

Everyone’s first thought when they don’t know the answer to something is to Google it. Search engines, Google in particular, are continuously growing every year. With billions of Google searches each day, it is more important than ever for a company, product, brand, or service to show up at the top of a Google search, but how do they do that? The answer is SEO, or search engine optimization. 

Some might say, “why would I focus on SEO when I can just advertise and get the same results?”. The problem with this thought is that SEO and paid advertising do not get the same results as one another. Only 2.8% of searches result in the searcher clicking on a paid advertisement, while 62.2% of searches result in an organic click powered by SEO. Even though these numbers differ greatly, SEO and paid advertising actually work better together than alone. Conversion rates are found to be higher when using both SEO and paid advertising together, so if your company is looking for revenue and long term results, the combination of both is your best bet. Your advertisements will be almost useless if there isn’t any brand awareness to boost them. SEO helps get your brand name out there, which leads to searchers recognizing your brand, which leads to trust, which leads to clicks, which leads to sales (not necessarily that easily, but you get the point). 

Another great thing about SEO in comparison to paid advertising is that once you’re at the top, you no longer have to pay for it like you would for paid advertising. As long as your company, product, brand, or service stays popular, it will continue to appear at the top of people’s searches. For a paid advertisement to stay at the top, you would have to continuously pay for it.

People might also say that social sites are more popular than search engines, but again this is not true in terms of searching. For example, if we compare Google vs Facebook, 92.1% of searches take place on some sort of Google property, while 0.69% take place on Facebook. Even though social sites are huge right now, Google is still the main place for searching, which is another reason why SEO is so important, even in this social obsessed age.