If you were Google and your raison d’etre was to, essentially, send users elsewhere, how do you keep your homepage fresh and interesting? In Google’s case, it’s by consistently surprising users with different logos, to celebrate a variety of dates, including of course their own birthday.</p> <p>14th birthday marked with cake</p> <p>This year, September 27th marks Google’s 14th birthday, and their eleventh birthday logo (they didn’t mark one, two or three). The logo (known as a doodle) this time is a cake with 14 candles that are gradually extinguished, the cake is then eaten away to leave a remainder that spells out the word “people”. Or actually, as Searchenginewatch notes, it looks more like “poople” – but we’re guessing that’s not intentional. </p> <p>A variety of doodles continue to mark interesting events </p> <p>Over the years Google has marked a variety of historical events with logos, both real and imaginary. For example, during the Olympics they produced some interactive logos that enabled users to play games such as hurdles, canoe slalom, and basketball; the famous American chef, Julia Child, was honoured by a doodle displaying her next to a range of culinary delights, whilst the 46th anniversary of the original Star Trek was marked by an interactive doodle that explored a significant amount of the Star Trek universe, including the transporter room. </p> <p>Of course, while this is all very entertaining, there is a serious marketing point to these doodles; how else do you get people talking about a webpage that contains no other original content? As ever, Google shows that a little clever thinking can bring big PR dividends.<br />

Content marketing could be the answer</p> <p>With the advent of new Kindle models and the uptake of digital e-reader products rocketing, it has never been a more difficult time to be a publisher or retailer of paperback and hardback books. Is this the start of the end for the paper book? Well, the Content Marketing Institute don’t think so, and here’s why.</p> <p>The publishing industry urgently needs its own online platforms</p> <p>According to the Institute, to secure a positive future the book publishers need to develop their own online content marketing platforms, through partnerships with both authors and non-authors. An online community based around an area of interest that the publisher has expertise in, could, ideally, lead to a multitude of types of purchased content, not just books. Leveraging the authors – not just their books – into an ongoing resource of information and entertainment would extend their appeal and widen selling opportunities via online seminars or virtual book signings. Authors could contribute blog postings, take part in webinars, speak at events, submit exclusive articles/chapters/stories that could be individually paid for, and this content would be promoted using email and social media. </p> <p>Authors must be involved</p> <p>To work effectively this strategy requires the authors to be engaged as active online contributors, which probably works better for writers in Content Marketing Institute’s sweet spots than for many other markets. However, the principles still stand; ultimately, the goal is not to sell one item, one book, but to create an ongoing relationship with readers, in which they feel engaged with the brand and the content on an ongoing basis and will then return to buy when ready.<br />

Given that some 75 per cent of travel research in the UK now takes place online, and with a third of hotel revenue now coming from online bookings, using great content to boost the search and social media presence of your travel brand should be a given, correct? Interestingly, some new research suggests that travel aggregator sites are doing somewhat better with their online visibility than some individual big brands.</p> <p>Booking.com achieves highest social ranking</p> <p>A new report from the data-tagging experts QuBit, looks at both the search performance and social presence of a number of top UK hotel brands and aggregators. These included, Booking.com, Hotels.com, Hilton, Marriott and Holiday Inn. The brands were all given a “social score”, calculated on their reach across the social networks weighted by time spent and revenue generated. According to QuBit, it’s not a hotel brand that tops this ranking, but Booking.com, which enjoys significant numbers of fans/followers across a range of networks, especially Facebook. </p> <p>Hotels.com wins in search</p> <p>On the search side, QuBit examined the results from brand searches and some key search terms; “Hotel Rooms”, “Hotels”, “cheap hotels”, “hotels UK” and “book a room”. The winner here was Hotels.com. It received high visibility across brand and keyword searches in both organic and paid-for results. Interestingly, the major brand Hilton didn’t appear on any of the key search term results top pages.</p> <p>It would seem at present that price-driven aggregators are stealing a march from the brands themselves in terms of both search and social media visibility, suggesting that their content strategies are poor. There must be high-quality content on sites these days if they are to enjoy a high ranking in Google. Over time, this failing is likely to hurt margins, so we’d suggest it is time for some travel brands to up their game in this regard.<br />

According to a new survey by Deloitte Digital, nearly half of the smartphone users in the UK have used their phone to research product information before or during a shopping trip; this is likely to include a significant amount of price comparison. Another survey, this time from Tradedoubler, suggests that around 42% of smartphone owners in Europe have used their phone to compare prices in store. Some 13% actually changed their purchasing plans by switching stores after having made this comparison. </p> <p>Some 10% of electronics sales influenced</p> <p>According to Deloittes, this behaviour means that some 6% of in-store retail sales will be influenced by smartphone use this year in the UK, which equates to just over £15 billion in sales –almost double the value of sales made directly through the mobile channel. This compares favourably with the same research done in the US, which suggested that 5% of store retail sales there were influenced by the mobile channel. Of course, the amount varies by product; some 10% of electronics sales were thought to be affected, while just 2.9% of convenience store purchases are; it’s worth the effort to save 10% on a TV, but not on a packet of plasters. </p> <p>Mobile research improves conversion</p> <p>According to the research, using smartphones for product/price research also seems to increase store conversion; apparently some 74% of the 2,000 respondents who visited a store’s mobile website or app prior to their real life visit actually made a purchase. In store mobile payments have yet to take off though; just 1% of respondents had used their phone in that way.<br />

<br /> When most of us post on Facebook, it’s an update of something we’ve done, or we think, or a repost of something that amused us and it takes little thought. If you are using Facebook as a business tool though, you need to take a lot more time and consideration over the content of your posts if you are to get the required response, as a new article at Searchenginewatch comments. </p> <p>Think about each post as a piece of marketing</p> <p>Effectively, the article says, every post you make (and by extrapolation every picture or video you post) is a self-contained piece of content marketing, and should be thought of as such. Think about the specific message you are trying to communicate; you can of course target different audiences, so think about very tailored messages rather than one-size-fits-all if you can. Pages with more than 5000 likes can now target by a range of criteria, including age, gender, location, education and even relationship status. </p> <p>Get your timing right</p> <p>Next, add a relevant and striking image, something people will want to forward, to add to their pinterest board for example. Don’t just take something from the print or banner campaign; it won’t fit and it won’t be original. </p> <p>Finally, get the timing right. When are your fans reading your page? Before breakfast, over lunch, with a glass of wine in the evening? What other events are going on that you should avoid, or piggyback on? Only by thinking about all these facets will your Facebook content entice and engage both old and new fans.<br />

If you run a successful online content and technology business and you have a neat new content tool to enable people to find interesting content and explore what’s out there, you’d shout about it, right? Well, no, not if you are Google, whose latest “Easter egg” has snuck in under the wire quietly and without fanfare, or at least it had until the folks over at Searchengineland spotted it.</p> <p>“Bacon number” functionality quietly revealed</p> <p>The little addition to the functionality of the world’s biggest search engine is the capability of calculating a celebrity’s “bacon number”. It’s obviously based on the popular party discussion game “Six Degrees Of Bacon”, in which people have to figure out how different actors are connection to Kevin Bacon through films they have in common. Now Google’s new capability is set to be the arbiter of many a dinner party argument; all you have to do is enter “‘celebrity’ bacon number”, say “George Clooney bacon number” and the result will appear on at the top of the results. For the record, George has a bacon number of two, and a virtual clap on the back if you can figure how what the two steps are.</p> <p>Google’s penchant for “Easter eggs” remains undimmed</p> <p>It’s by far from the first “Easter egg” Google have sneaked into their service, and we’re sure it won’t be the last; favourites include “zerg rush”, in which a flurry of Google “O”’s start to eat up your search results, and of course “do a barrel roll”, which makes your search results do exactly that. What’s your favourite Google Easter egg?<br />

Whilst most of us have a smartphone with internet access these days, the connection to the web when out and about can be patchy at best, as we have all experienced. However, that is all set to change soon, with the UK's first fourth generation (4G) mobile service being rolled out across 16 UK cities by the end of 2012.</p> <p>EE to launch 4G across UK over next year</p> <p>The phone operator, Everything Everywhere, previously T-Mobile and Orange, is currently testing the service in London, Birmingham, Cardiff and Bristol, and plans to expand to another 12 cities in “weeks”. The operator – which will now be known as EE – hopes to get 4G connections out to 98% of the UK by 2014.</p> <p>So what difference will this make to you? Well, 4G should provide faster, more reliable web connections when using mobile devices, both outdoors and indoors – which are likely to see an increase in the demand for mobile content and applications. Consumers will need a new phone to use 4G - adaptors will be available to allow laptops to access the network. </p> <p>Mobile content demand set to boom</p> <p>No costs have been released, and other operators remain angry that EE has effectively got a jump-start, as they won’t be able to compete until they can buy spare spectrum in 2013 - the UK market has been held up thanks to these wrangles. None the less, it would appear that many people will be getting 4G phones in their stocking this Christmas, which is likely to see a rise in demand for mobile content immediately in 2013 – are you ready to meet the demand?<br />

The online search market is one of the most established and most robust online marketing channels, with studies regularly showing double-digit growth year after year; this did drop over 2008 to 2010. Now a new study suggests that the robust growth is back, thought the market is now facing new challenges.</p> <p>Search grows 18% a year in North America</p> <p>The study, the eighth yearly “State of Search Study” from SEMPO and Econsultancy,states that the North American search industry was worth around 19.3 billion US dollars in 2011, and will grow to around 26.8 billion dollars in 2013, growth of around 18% per year. This growth is seen across the various strands that make up the search market, though unsurprisingly mobile search and spend on SEM technology are both forecast to be especially strong. </p> <p>However, search hasn’t escaped the overall marketing trend towards looking more towards the whole customer journey as opposed to one little piece of it – often “the last click” – which historically awarded a disproportionate amount of the credit for a sale to that search-driven click. Respondents are increasingly using brand goals as success measures for their search investments, whilst interestingly social media investors are moving the other way, away from vague “branding” goals towards measureable traffic generation or customer satisfaction goals. </p> <p>Google algorithm changes hit many</p> <p>The survey also reveals that Google’s recent changes to their search algorithm have had a major impact, with 87% of respondents calling them “significant or highly significant”, whilst many of those experimenting with PPC on Facebook appear to have stopped, though many of these seem to have been SMB.<br />

The idea of generating news content from online consumers rather than paying seasoned professional journalists to write it, is hardly a new one, but when politicians leap on the bandwagon you know it’s really hit the mainstream (or, arguably, even passed its peak…)</p> <p>#Waywire launched to “disrupt” democracy</p> <p>Now a US politician has decided that the market needs another social news platform, this time a video news platform, because he thinks that “the power of the people is more important that people in power”. The app, entitled #waywire, is now in private alpha, and is intended to allow users to gather and curate online video news and share it with their friends – becoming a personal BBC, if you like. </p> <p>Newark Mayor Cory Booker (who boasts 1.2m Twitter followers), alongside star backers such as Eric Schmidt (current executive chair of Google) and Oprah, suggests that the service can be used by consumers to “disrupt our democracy”. Users sign up and connect with social media services such as Facebook to share out the videos they pick, though the service has a strong bent towards younger users – their algorithm is aimed at pulling in videos that appeal to those aged 18-29.</p> <p>Original footage enables unique programming</p> <p>The service also offers a unique, raw database of original footage from 60 partners including Reuters, meaning users could really stumble across footage never seen before and broadcast it themselves. Over time, users will be able to upload their own video responses to news content they have seen elsewhere.<br />

<br /> Since the internet developed into being a mass market, the concept of “crowdsourcing” – using the mass of online connected consumers to come up with product or marketing ideas – has been a popular one, though it is often misapplied. Getting users to vote on a list of product names is not, for example, crowdsourcing – it’s simply voting!</p> <p>Volvo and Coca-Cola reaching out for consumer ideas</p> <p>However, with social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook now offering easier ways to access thousands of target users, big brands are beginning to use crowdsourcing (or canvassing consume input) in a more concerted manner as an often cheap way of creating online content. </p> <p>Both Volvo and Coca-Cola have recently launched new campaigns that invite consumers to create content for them, which is then shared with the universe of fellow brand fans. Volvo’s campaign involves interactive outdoor marketing (at areas such as bus stops), inviting consumers to design their personal version of Volvo’s new V40 vehicle. Users can chose colour, trim and alloy options to create their own vehicle, and once completed, will be shown an interpretation of their personality based on the options they chose. This content will also be shown on large outdoor screens at various UK railway stations. </p> <p>Coke looking to increase “happiness” with Facebook campaign</p> <p>Meanwhile, Coca-Cola is reaching out to its 50 million fans on Facebook to ask them to create ideas (or tag individuals who are doing so) that help drive activities that make others happy. Fans will also be invited to help shape and promote the ideas. </p> <p>Of course, not all fan-driven content will actually be any good, and it certainly isn’t a replacement for high-quality, original brand content; but as an addition to a strong content marketing strategy, it can provide a unique, cost-effective source of innovative ideas.<br />