10 Reasons Why Social Media is Good for Business [INFOGRAPHIC] – Some say social doesn’t make business sense. Those folks are wrong. This infographic covers 10 reasons why social is good for business and why you should be doing it too. AllTwitter
Bing Launches Conversational Search – In its continued drive to build a search platform based on entity and conversational understanding, Bing has launched a new feature that enables the site to keep the context of a search from one query to the next. Search Engine Land
Facebook Drives More In-Store Sales for Small Businesses Than Pinterest or Twitter [Study] – A new study from digital marketing company G/O Digital shows that compared to Twitter and Pinterest, Facebook is better at driving offline sales for small businesses, with 84 percent of respondents saying that local deals or offers on Facebook heavily influence their decision to make in-store purchases. ClickZ
Reddit Announces ‘Pressiquette’ Guidelines for Journalists – Reddit now has guidelines for journalists who wants to source, link, quote or use its public forum for news content. Want to use an image or source a Redditor? You’ll need to get permission. SocialTimes
LinkedIn Goes Transparent, Gives Users More Data Control – LinkedIn announced this week that it is giving users more control over their data on the network. Marketing Land
STUDY: 84 Percent Claim Facebook Offers Can Influence a Purchasing Decision – According to a new study by G/O Digital, when people want to find out more about a local small business — they check Facebook more than any other social channel. G/O Digital, a Gannett company, found that when asked which social channel users go to in order to find out about a local business, Facebook led the way at 62 percent. Pinterest was second at 12 percent, and Twitter third at 11 percent. AllFacebook
Facebook Now Tells Whether Mobile Ads Lead to Desktop Purchases – Facebook is trying to show advertisers how powerful its mobile ads can be when it comes to driving sales. The social network announced on Wednesday that it would start telling advertisers on what device people saw an ad and on what device they took an action, such as buying a product or signing up for a test drive, as a result of seeing that ad. That means Facebook will be able to credit mobile ads that lead to desktop sales and desktop ads that result in mobile purchases. AdAge
North American Mobile Ads Doubled to $8.1 Billion in 2013 – Spurred by smartphone proliferation and the expansion of low-cost cellular data plans, dollars spent on mobile ads increased by 122% to $8.1 billion in North America last year, compared to only $3.6 billion in 2012. Regionally, Latin America posted the biggest growth at 215%, while spending in Europe rose 90%, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s (IAB) Global Mobile Advertising Revenue study. Direct Marketing News
Farewell ‘Pure’ Exact Match, AdWords Will Soon Require All Campaigns To Use Close Variants – Last week Google has announced that in late September, AdWords advertisers will no longer have the ability to de-select close variants. All campaigns will now include these variants, something that advertisers could previously opt out of. The way close variants will work is completely the same as it has been since 2012. Search Engine Land
Google Guidelines Update: Low Quality Guest Blogging Considered Content Spam – Google has quietly updated their Webmaster Guidelines, the little or no original content section. They added a example reference there for “low-quality guest blog posts.” Brian was the first to spot this change. Search Engine Roundtable
YouTube Stars More Popular Than Hollywood Celebrities Among Teens – YouTube is undoubtedly one of the biggest cultural touchstones of the Internet. YouTube captures more viewers aged 18 to 34 than any cable network and more than one billion unique users every month. A recent study from Variety confirms that YouTube stars are becoming more popular than Hollywood celebrities among 13- to 18-year-olds. SocialTimes
Snapchat is now More Popular Than Twitter Amongst 18-34 Year-Olds [STUDY] – Remember when Snapchat had the audacity to turn down a $3 billion buyout offer from Facebook? Turns out that might have been a very smart play, as the photo-sharing and chat app is now more popular than Twitter amongst the key millennial demographic, and has Instagram up next in its sights. AllTwitter
From our Online Marketing Community:
On What’s Next in B2B Marketing? #MPB2B Interview with Scott Stratten @UnMarketing, Gabe Chesman said, “Well done! I almost forgot the discussion was about marketing because of how witty and funny Scott is. He hits the nail on the head with the point that, while being personable on social media is crucial, it shouldn’t dwarf the quality of your product.”
2PartsAnalog also commented, “This article brings to light the need for the organic factor to be present in the marketing process. The human factor is the best element in the marketing factor.”
And Kostas Chiotis added, “Another great interview Lee. I love Scott’s analogy of sending a Mannequin to network for you! I feel the same way about automated SMM – If you genuinely do not have time then hire someone who understands your brand enough to do it for you!”
What were the top online and digital marketing news stories for you this week?
Thanks for reading and have a great weekend!
Infographic: AllTwitter
