What’s the difference between a landing page and a microsite? About $3,000... I’ll be here all weekend folks, and don’t forget to tip your waiters.
A landing page is a singular page that helps a client complete a call to action. It provides a limited amount of information on a very specific product or service, and usually has some way for the client to acquire the product or service. It shouldn’t focus on more than one aspect of your business.
A landing page is the final step in the process. As such, the branding of the site should be congruent with the branding found on your traditional site. Think of your landing page as the cash register in a brick and mortar store, as many times, it can function like one. The customer has already seen the entire store, and is there to finish the transaction. They don’t need to be introduced to the brand, or start to formulate new questions. They need to buy, schedule an appointment, etc.
A microsite is completely different. It isn’t limited to a single page. It often times has its own landing page attached. It is a tool used to introduce your product in a different light than normal. Therefore, the branding can be different from your traditional website, and skewed towards a specific audience. It can have a different look and feel than anything else the business has produced in the past.
The advantages of this are excellent. You can introduce new product or services without effecting your current branding. You can launch campaign specific ads, that speak to your target demographic in ways that differ from your main page. You can restructure your business to meet the needs of an exact customer, and highlight your company in a completely different way.
For an example, look at:
http://www.coca-cola.com/en/index.html
http://www.thecoca-colacompany.com/
The first site changes its skin often. It has a different look and feel, depending on the current campaign that is running in their marketing efforts at the time. The second site, the corporate site, changes a lot less. It has a full menu, to get to all aspects of the Coca-Cola universe.
One-off ads should have landing pages, to help create ROI statistics. Cross medium campaigns should have microsites that tie together all aspects of the current marketing campaign. Figuring out which tool works best for your marketing needs is just one more reason to work with a seasoned account executive when creating advertisements.
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
How important is People Talking About on Facebook?
On Facebook, I think everyone will agree that likes are good. The more likes, the better the potential to reach people. A goal of reaching a higher number of likes, or percentage growth of likes over a specific period of time, is a decent goal to have. Likes are a requirement on Facebook. If no one is liking you, then all you have is another area to post advertisements and contact information. Everyone agrees, Likes are nice.
People Are Talking About This, on the other hand, is excellent.
Lots of things fall into this catagory. Here’s a list.
So what is it about Talking About that makes me consider it substantially more important than Likes alone? A Facebook user has the ability to easily hide posts from his or her wall. That means that they can like you, but never see any of your postings. Therefore, Like is a requirement, but not an accurate measuring tool as to how many people are engaging with your brand. Talking About, on the other hand, shows that there is engagement.
Likes is a number. It doesn’t tell a story to you, the admin of a page. Your likes typically don’t go up due to new content, unless it is shared by someone. Your likes don’t change due to a funny picture, unless someone interacts with it, and someone new sees that interaction. It’s harder to recognize trends around Likes. Meanwhile, you can see trends on Talking About. In fact, monitoring these trends can tell you what type of content is more engaging to your audience, and can help you see what you need to post more of, or what to stay away from. You can’t do that with Likes.
People Are Talking About This, on the other hand, is excellent.
Lots of things fall into this catagory. Here’s a list.
- liking a Page
- posting to a Page’s Wall
- liking, commenting on or sharing a Page post (or other content on a page, like photos, videos or albums)
- answering a Question posted
- RSVPing to an event
- mentioning a Page in a post
- phototagging a Page
- checking in at a Place.
So what is it about Talking About that makes me consider it substantially more important than Likes alone? A Facebook user has the ability to easily hide posts from his or her wall. That means that they can like you, but never see any of your postings. Therefore, Like is a requirement, but not an accurate measuring tool as to how many people are engaging with your brand. Talking About, on the other hand, shows that there is engagement.
Likes is a number. It doesn’t tell a story to you, the admin of a page. Your likes typically don’t go up due to new content, unless it is shared by someone. Your likes don’t change due to a funny picture, unless someone interacts with it, and someone new sees that interaction. It’s harder to recognize trends around Likes. Meanwhile, you can see trends on Talking About. In fact, monitoring these trends can tell you what type of content is more engaging to your audience, and can help you see what you need to post more of, or what to stay away from. You can’t do that with Likes.
For more help decoding all of the insights that Facebook provides you, click the Feedback button.
Thursday, March 1, 2012
Timelines for Business, Facebook Business Changes
In case you were overzealous on celebrating Leap Year, and missed the news on the many changes that are happening or have occurred on Facebook, we’re going to give you a brief summary, with some friendly advice. There’s a whole lot going on with the changes to business pages, and some of it can be very confusing.
You have probably noticed Timelines on your personal profile or on friends’ profiles. Timelines have come to pages. Your company is no longer forced to work with the 200 pixel wide image. You now have a small image, and an entire canvas (that is 850 pixels wide) to fill. That means you can focus all of your artistic flair on the cover image, and allow your logo to remain consistent. No longer do you have to try and modify your company logo to fit the seasons. You can maintain your branding, and simply change out the cover image to allow for expression.
The “Info” portion is now front and center. Make sure your store hours, phone numbers, etc. are all completed. You’ll also notice something else front and center: your apps. This causes a very large change for some companies. If your strategy was using a like gate that loaded instantly, and forced your prospective fan to like you before continuing, it’s time to come up with a new strategy. The fact that you can now have graphics that represent your apps, and that they are in what I would consider a more highlighted area means that your app quality needs to be maximized.
Speaking of apps, you will notice that you only have room for 3 “above the fold” apps. Put your very best stuff right on top, as only really loyal fans are going to open the drop-down to see your additional apps. If you have multiple locations tied into one Facebook page, I suggest using the Facebook Map app. It’s a sweet way to have a single page, but still have the ability to easily point out all of your locations, and it uses location based information to lead your fan to the closest location. Lastly, most of your old apps are now out of style. You need to go back, and make them fit to the 810 pixel canvas.
As an admin you have additional control over the postings. You can now star posts, which makes them double wide. This can draw extra attention to wide graphics. You have the ability to back date, so you can fill in information from years ago. Milestones are an excellent tool to use when you want to backdate your past events. Rather than simply putting in posts, and backdating them, use milestones to create important events. Use this for big, important events that happened throughout history.
Post of the Week basically bookmarks a specific post, and keeps it at the top of your timeline. It makes sure that the most important post doesn’t get slipped down the timeline. You can also do this with questions, polls, photo galleries, etc. Therefore, if you have something that specifically asks non-fans to like you, it may be a way to ask for likes. It won’t substitute a like-gate, but it is an option.
Admin panel is completely redone. There’s a real reason they are calling it “Mission Control”. It gives you front and center what is happening on your page. It shows all of the social tools you need right away, such as insights, page tips, new likes, etc. Now that pages can message back and forth privately, instead of just on the wall, it will provide this information right away. There’s going to be new admin permissions. You don’t want everyone to be able to control the whole page? Not a problem. Coming later in March, there will be 5 different admin levels. You can give your customer service level people one type of access, without fear that they are changing permissions or moving apps around.
All in all, the changes are good. For the psychology behind the changes, stay tuned.
You have probably noticed Timelines on your personal profile or on friends’ profiles. Timelines have come to pages. Your company is no longer forced to work with the 200 pixel wide image. You now have a small image, and an entire canvas (that is 850 pixels wide) to fill. That means you can focus all of your artistic flair on the cover image, and allow your logo to remain consistent. No longer do you have to try and modify your company logo to fit the seasons. You can maintain your branding, and simply change out the cover image to allow for expression.
The “Info” portion is now front and center. Make sure your store hours, phone numbers, etc. are all completed. You’ll also notice something else front and center: your apps. This causes a very large change for some companies. If your strategy was using a like gate that loaded instantly, and forced your prospective fan to like you before continuing, it’s time to come up with a new strategy. The fact that you can now have graphics that represent your apps, and that they are in what I would consider a more highlighted area means that your app quality needs to be maximized.
Speaking of apps, you will notice that you only have room for 3 “above the fold” apps. Put your very best stuff right on top, as only really loyal fans are going to open the drop-down to see your additional apps. If you have multiple locations tied into one Facebook page, I suggest using the Facebook Map app. It’s a sweet way to have a single page, but still have the ability to easily point out all of your locations, and it uses location based information to lead your fan to the closest location. Lastly, most of your old apps are now out of style. You need to go back, and make them fit to the 810 pixel canvas.
As an admin you have additional control over the postings. You can now star posts, which makes them double wide. This can draw extra attention to wide graphics. You have the ability to back date, so you can fill in information from years ago. Milestones are an excellent tool to use when you want to backdate your past events. Rather than simply putting in posts, and backdating them, use milestones to create important events. Use this for big, important events that happened throughout history.
Post of the Week basically bookmarks a specific post, and keeps it at the top of your timeline. It makes sure that the most important post doesn’t get slipped down the timeline. You can also do this with questions, polls, photo galleries, etc. Therefore, if you have something that specifically asks non-fans to like you, it may be a way to ask for likes. It won’t substitute a like-gate, but it is an option.
Admin panel is completely redone. There’s a real reason they are calling it “Mission Control”. It gives you front and center what is happening on your page. It shows all of the social tools you need right away, such as insights, page tips, new likes, etc. Now that pages can message back and forth privately, instead of just on the wall, it will provide this information right away. There’s going to be new admin permissions. You don’t want everyone to be able to control the whole page? Not a problem. Coming later in March, there will be 5 different admin levels. You can give your customer service level people one type of access, without fear that they are changing permissions or moving apps around.
All in all, the changes are good. For the psychology behind the changes, stay tuned.
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