When I was little, I wouldn’t even touch peanut butter. I was a jelly kind of gal. Little did I know, adding crunchy peanut butter to my jelly-only sandwich would change my world. Peanut butter and jelly. Together. My lunches were so much better with both of them than just with one. THAT’S how you should view search engine advertising and display advertising. Because when this dynamic duo works together, you get even better results than by doing each one alone. But, before you can put them together, you need to know how each of them works to reach your target audience– and the unique flavor each brings to your online advertising. So, what’s the difference between these two digital advertising types?

What is Search Engine Advertising?

Search engine advertising a type of of paid advertising, also known as pay-per-click advertising or PPC, that gets your business found on search engines. Search advertising is a great way to compete in the online space and directly target folks in your area who are using a search engine to look for your products or services. The way it works is simple. Say you have a shoe shop. You were smart and placed a huge order of red, white and blue sandals just in time for the 4th of July, and you want to advertise on Google. When someone searches for a keyword you’ve bid on, like “red, white, and blue sandals,” their search term will trigger your text ad, which shows up in the sponsored section of the search results page. This gives you visibility on the page quickly and cost-effectively. Then, if your text ad is compelling enough, the searcher will click your ad, visit your website, and ultimately contact you. The beauty of search advertising is that you have a chance to compete with the bigger competitors in your local market without spending an arm and a leg in advertising costs. It also gives small business owners like you a way to directly target searchers based on their geography so your ads only show to people who are around your store or service area. Search advertising is like having a billboard online, but your targeting is much more effective because it is only being shown to people in your local area who are actually looking for your products or services.

What is Display Advertising?

Speaking of billboards, let’s talk about display advertising. Display advertising is a way to grow your brand’s awareness online. Display ads, also known as banner ads, are shown to your target audience whenever they are surfing online, but not searching for your product or service. When your customer is online, it’s important to keep your brand in front of them as much as possible. Think of your own online behavior. How much time are you spending doing real, honest research for a specific service, and how much time are you spending just piddling around reading sports stats and barbecue recipes? We all spend much more time consuming information on our favorite websites than we do searching for something specific. So, it’s important to put your business in front of consumers when they are surfing the web because that’s where they spend the majority of their time. Have you ever ordered a sandwich from Jimmy John’s? They make my other favorite kind of sandwich – and they’re also my favorite example of successful display advertising. Throughout my day at work, it seems like every website I visit has a Jimmy John’s banner ad somewhere on the site. That’s because Jimmy John’s wants me to remember their brand when I get a craving for a fast, yet delicious, lunch. And that’s display advertising.

How Do Search and Display Advertising Work Together?

We’ve all heard that saying, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket,” and it’s true in in advertising, too. The most successful advertising campaigns are the ones that utilize multiple forms of media. Small businesses should mimic that same strategy when implementing their advertising online to make the most of their advertising dollars. When Sally searches for the perfect pair of red, white and blue sandals, she might see and even click on your text ad, but she may not make a decision right away. So you still need a way to reach her when she isn’t searching— with display advertising. The truth is, both of these tactics work to help you get more sales. Harvard Business School’s Sunil Gupta says that because clicks lead to purchases, search advertising usually gets the credit for the sale because you can track the exact behavior of the customer from the impression, to the click, to the purchase. What gets lost is the awareness you have created by running your display campaign and helping that consumer remember your business in the first place. In fact, studies have shown that 27% of consumers conduct a search for a business after seeing their display ad, and there’s a 59% lift in conversion when users conducted a search related to a display ad. Peanut butter is complemented by jelly and vice versa, which is the same with search and display advertising. You can be successful using just one or the other; however, when search engine advertising and display advertising are used together, they help you get even better results by targeting your customer from multiple angles rather than just one, making it easier for the customer to remember your business when it’s time to make a purchasing decision.

By: Whitney Antwine (ReachLocal)

Did you know that on average, 28% of email addresses become unreachable within a year? Email marketing can be a great way for your business to communicate news and information or drive calls-to-action, but your emails have to reach a reader’s inbox first. Cleaning up your email address list is a key part of email marketing. If you haven’t cleaned your email list in a while, chances are there are some inactive, incorrect or old addresses. Going through and removing any unsubscribed or bounced email addresses can go a long way in ensuring that you maintain a list of active, interested readers. We’d love to visit with you to discuss how email marketing can help you reach your audience!

Did you know that up to 85% of visitors leave a website due to a poor design? Your website should be a virtual front door to your business or organization. It should enable visitors to access the information they want as quickly and easily as possible. 83% of visitors will leave a site if it takes too many clicks to get the information they’re looking for. A well-designed website can help ensure that users can find information about your business. A functional (and mobile-friendly), intuitive and aesthetically pleasing website makes all the difference to your visitors.
We’d love to visit with you to discuss how we can help make your website more user-friendly!

By: Kris Kiler The marketer’s conventional wisdom seems to suggest that you should redesign your site every 2 or 3 years to keep your business fresh. Unless your business is having challenges generating new business or supporting your current customers through your current site, you may consider holding off. Rather than focus on time between designs, it’s important to look at the contribution your website is or is not making to your business.

Here are 4 reasons why you need to start developing a new website.

Low Conversions

You likely see a lot of talk about the importance of converting business from your website. But the fact is most businesses don’t think about or care about conversions when it comes to their website. Most want their website to generate business but typically people are looking at levels of website traffic and search engine optimization indicators. And when they do care about conversions, most don’t have an accurate picture of what a conversion looks like or how it should be tracked so they have no data to use to support their decision making process. Typically there is just an intuition that the website isn’t producing business so they seek out someone to redesign the site.

The catch: Depending on who you select to redesign your website, your web designer may not focus on whether your website will support your business at all. A lot of website designers are graphic designers who know how to make a website look spectacular–but fail to ask you any questions about how your business works, your marketing activities, business process, or overall goals for the website. If you’re in the market for a new website design for your business, make sure your marketing agency or web designer is asking you real questions about your business and your processes for selling and serving your customers. In the end, you don’t need to win awards for design, you need your website to serve your business.

Little to Zero Business Functionality

Many local businesses need a website because it’s the first place people go when they are looking for local business information. The Pew Research Center reports that 62% of Internet users age 18 and older and 72% of adults in households earning more than $75,000 or more (mass affluent) are using the Internet as their main source for information about local businesses.*

In this scenario, how can your website help your business function more efficiently?

If you’re a local restaurant, just providing your menu as a PDF file isn’t enough. Mobile browsing is too popular for you to not be providing your menu directly on your website in text. Viewing PDF’s on a phone is still a clunky experience and having your content on your page can provide some additional optimization for your site.

If you’re in the medical profession, are there forms you need patients or customers to fill out that you could add to your website? You can also consider using an online appointment system–most of which easily integrate with any website.

If you’re a coach or counselor, you can use membership sites to lock down client-only content for use before or after your sessions. If you’re using a special access site, it’s good to highlight throughout the site to promote the benefit of getting access to restricted content.

Not Integrated with Other Marketing Activities

Integration with offline and online advertising is essential to a good website design. Too many business offering deals on sites like LivingSocial, AmazonLocal or Spreebird Deals don’t integrate their offers well with their website. A lot of people want to investigate the business behind the offer and will click on the website link provided on the offer page. Investing in these deals and then sending people to a generic website homepage (link from offer) will only make people work harder to find out what they are getting and who they are getting it from. Having the ability to add landing pages to your website in order to support your offers and other promotions can have a dramatic effect on your overall results with both offline and online advertising.

Design is No Longer Competitive (aka: Your site is ugly)

Most website redesigns are initiated because the site just doesn’t look good. You can tell if your website isn’t up to par and if your competitors have upgraded their look then it might be time to take action. There are a lot of businesses that are doing well with horrible looking websites so having an ugly website doesn’t necessarily mean you need to invest in a new one.

If you’re getting comments from customers about the look of your site or from your staff that the website design is hurting sales, then it’s an obvious decision. If your ugly website is a blow to your ego, then it’s more of a personal decision. Either way, if you think your website design is effecting your business then it’s a no-brainer.

There are blogs about it. Mile-long comment threads on Facebook. And even press releases dedicated to announcing it. We’re talking about the swag. It won’t be the sole thing you’re focused on as you plan a race, but it certainly contributes to a lot of participant buzz.
Fun and light-hearted, participants received an official race apron or cape, and a chocolate turkey at an event organized by ShaZam Racing.

Creative? Yes. Popular? Definitely. But instead of staring at your race checklist and stressing about coming up with your own brilliant idea for race swag, start by trying to get inside the heads of your participants. What would they think is cool and special? How can you provide that to them? And we’ll leave you with one final note: Stop filling your race swag bags with nothing but crap in them. Put all coupons and paper on your website and put something in that bag that really represents your event!

Article Source: http://www.chronotrack.com/2015/05/top-10-race-swag-bags/?utm_source=social&utm_medium=post&utm_campaign=blog

Promoting your business on mobile is essential in local marketing today now that 65% of Americans now own smartphones – and it’s the primary way many of them access the Internet. Of the many ways to do this, perhaps the most effective method is in-app advertising, which allows you to show display ads to consumers in real time while they are using mobile apps – like entertainment, news, radio, weather, and more.

But of course, when evaluating a new marketing solution for your business, it’s important to make sure it will help you achieve your business goals. So, ask yourself these three questions to determine whether mobile in app advertising is right for your business.

Does your target audience use apps on their smartphone?

Consumers spend over 3 hours of their day on smartphones, on average. And 88% of that time is spent in mobile apps. Here are a few mobile app stats from comScore to help you better understand today’s app audience:

– Smartphone users earn a median salary of $61,000 (Android) and $85,000 (iPhone)

– Consumers aged 25-34 are the biggest app audience, though usage is pervasive amongst most age groups

– The median age of all app users is 40

With smartphone and app usage being so common across consumer groups, there’s a good chance your target audience is spending a lot of their time there.

Do you want to reach consumers when they are near your location?

One huge feature of in app advertising is its ability to target consumers who are within a specific geographic area using their smartphone’s GPS. That means your ads are only shown to consumers when they are near your business – even if they don’t live or work near you. This hyperlocal targeting ability helps businesses drive more foot traffic and impulse purchases both from local consumers and from those who may be visiting your area.

Can you easily create a compelling coupon or offer?

Aside from showing your ads to consumers when they are near you, in app advertising can also attract them with coupons or discounts that they can redeem through your business. For instance, if you own a restaurant, you can include an offer in your ad for 20% off a customers’ first purchase, helping more people come in and buy from you.

Google announced that it will place more weight on how mobile-friendly a website is when users search from a mobile device starting April 21st. That’s just around the corner! The company says this will affect mobile searches in all countries, and will have a “significant impact” on search results. What does this mean? This means that if your website is not mobile-friendly, your company will not appear in Google’s top search results for mobile. Period. What can you do? Check to see if your website IS MOBILE-FRIENDLY. If so, great! If not, let CSM know and we can help with your online presence. If you’re not sure, give us a call and we’ll help you check! If you need your site “mobilized” here are a couple of options for you: 1. If you have a WordPress site, we can install and customize a plugin that will convert your site to a mobile-friendly site. 2. For other types of sites, we can customize an external program that will convert your site to include a standalone mobile-friendly website that will be referenced when someone searches for your company using a mobile device. 3.We can rebuild your website using a new mobile-friendly (i.e. responsive) platform.

By: Tamara Weintraub (ReachLocal)
In the past, you may have received visits to your non-mobile website from consumers who were using Google to search for your products or services on their mobile devices.
But now, not having a mobile website can drastically affect how many people visit it from the search results, for a variety of reasons.

First, Google now displays a “mobile-friendly” tag on links for sites that display optimally on a mobile screen. This means that mobile searchers will be more inclined to click links to load pages that they know will work well on the device they are searching from.
Plus, if your site doesn’t have Google’s stamp of approval for mobile, it could perform poorly in mobile organic search results – which experts say Google is now factoring into its mobile search algorithm.
But, thanks to the search results tag, even if your non-mobile site does appear in Google’s mobile organic search results, consumers may skip your site in favor of a mobile-friendly site that probably belongs to your competitor.
This is just one more reason why it’s so important to have a mobile-friendly website.

How Do You Know if Your Site is Mobile-Friendly?

Google has created a set of criteria that you can verify your site against by simply entering its URL into Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test website. If your site doesn’t pass the mobile-friendly test, the tool will tell you which elements of your site need to be updated for mobile users.
In addition, Google is sending warnings to users who verify their site using Webmaster Tools but do not have a mobile-friendly site. The warning lets the website owner know that it may not perform well in mobile search results,and how to fix any issues it encountered.

What Criteria Makes A Site Mobile-Friendly?

A site that’s considered mobile-friendly can be viewed correctly on mobile screens like smartphones and tablets. Displaying correctly includes the automatic sizing of text, images, navigation elements, links, and other important site components so a viewer doesn’t have to zoom or scroll on the page in order to use it effectively. In addition, mobile-friendly sites avoid using software like Flash that limits site functionality on a mobile device.

A Mobile Site or Mobile-Responsive Design?

Because responsive site design adjusts the content to the screen being viewed, there is no need for an additional mobile website, which is best for both SEO and usability. Not only do you have to maintain just a single version of your site, including content, meta-descriptions, and code, but viewers can get the full experience of your site no matter what type of device they’re using. And because search engines like Google only have one site to index, having a responsive website helps improve the accuracy of matching your site to a user’s search query.

Source – AdWeek, February 24 2015
Facebook now has 2 million advertisers, a milestone CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced in a video post on the social network. Zuckerberg and COO Sheryl Sandberg thanked small-and-medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and entrepreneurs for jumping on board with the platform, helping it attract 500,000 new advertisers in the last year.
“Millions of businesses like yours are using Facebook to connect with their customers and reach the world,” Sandberg remarked in the clip.
Just a few years ago, Facebook was an unknown quantity when it came to local advertising for SMBs—the platform was perceived to be more for direct e-commerce players and big brands. That small-business challenge appears to have been met.
“What does stand out here is that Facebook is making it easier to advertise, particularly for small- and medium-sized businesses,” said Rebecca Lieb, a Facebook analyst. “Much like search engines developed tools 10 years ago to serve targeted ads, Facebook is doing the same and removing a lot of friction for these businesses.”
Reaching 2 million advertisers is yet another indication of Facebook’s growing dominance in digital, getting more businesses to market to its 1.4 billion users. The social network is changing the face of digital advertising much the way search redefined the marketplace more than 10 years ago, according to Lieb and other industry watchers.
Facebook also launched a mobile app to help businesses manage marketing campaigns. And it’s these types of “turn-key” products for small businesses, which are often less socially savvy, that are making it possible to advertise on Facebook, Lieb said. “Targeting, segmenting, day-parting—this is not their core competency,” she said, referring to the thousands of small businesses that have to learn a whole new marketing language for the social network. “Facebook has to go into local markets and show them this is how you as local advertisers leverage the platform.”
The fact is that to reach fans on Facebook, big brands and small businesses have to pay for promoted posts. There is no such thing as free reach, according to Jordan Kretchmer, CEO of social marketing software firm Livefyre.“Facebook has become one of the best paid media channels out there,” Kretchmer said. The social network is developing the ads, the networks, the tools and data collection capabilities that hold promise for marketers to reach consumers in the most targeted way possible, online and via mobile devices. However, its total control also creates the risk that businesses will become overly reliant on Facebook to reach audiences.
Big brands have already reacted to Facebook’s dominance by investing in their own data and audiences, like Taco Bell building an app last year to own access to its user base, Kretchmer said. “If Facebook changes something tomorrow, these brands can jump away from it and not miss a beat,” he said. “Small businesses are at a disadvantage. They are beholden to pay Facebook to drive traffic.”
Last quarter, Facebook ad revenue was $3.6 billion, an increase of almost 60 percent year over year. It is the No. 2 digital ad business, still far behind Google, but comfortably ahead of companies like Twitter and Yahoo.
Of course, it also has rivals like Snapchat, coming up today much like Facebook was 10 years ago. That’s why Facebook bought Instagram and WhatsApp, which have more than a billion users combined.
“Marketers flock to media that collects the most users, that’s just how it is,” said Nate Elliott, a Forrester researcher. So Facebook’s size is drawing the biggest brands, which are having the most success at the moment marketing there, he said.
The large companies have the advantage because they have their own data, and Facebook can be stingy when it comes to sharing its data.
“It’s perverse. Facebook knows more about customers than anyone ever, yet marketers are forced to bring their own data to the party,” Elliott said.
Marketing experts said the data question is the next one Facebook has to address with small businesses. Kretchmer said companies like his Livefyre are developing ad-targeting and data tools that have only been accessible to large brands so far.
“Getting to relevancy is more difficult for smaller businesses than larger ones,” said Debra Aho Williamson, eMarketer’s principal analyst. “For one thing, they don’t tend to come into Facebook with their own large data sets, as do many of the larger companies that advertise on Facebook. This presents an opportunity for Facebook to educate small businesses about the best way to create and target ads to achieve relevancy.

Central States Media was honored with 7 American Advertising Awards. Central States Media received Gold Awards for its work on the Running Central Grand Opening campaign, ShaZam Racing’s website design, ShaZam Racing’s mobile website design, and for the on-going Walters Brothers Harley Davidson email campaign. Silver Awards were presented to CSM for their work on Illinois CancerCare Foundation’s “The Power of Hope” Direct Mail campaign, Running Central’s Event Calendar mobile app, and for the rebranding of the Peoria Symphony Orchestra. “I cannot be more pleased and proud of the work our team has accomplished,” said Ann Johnston, President, Central States Media. “We share these honors with the clients we’ve had the privilege of working with to create such dynamic projects. To be honored with 7 American Advertising Awards is phenomenal.” Sponsored by the Peoria Ad Club, the local awards recognize creative excellence in advertising and design of promotional materials The awards were announced during the annual American Advertising Awards Gala held February 19, 2015 at the PAR A DICE Hotel in East Peoria. Conducted annually by the American Advertising Federation (AAF), the American Advertising Awards are the advertising industry’s largest and most representative competition. The local American Advertising Awards is the first of a three-tiered national competition. Concurrently across the country, local entrants vie for recognition as the very best in their markets. At the second tier, local winners compete against other winners in one of 14 district competitions. District winners are then forwarded to the third tier, the national American Advertising Awards competition.