 Online quizzes have taken the Internet by storm in recent months. Curious which Grease character you are? Zimbio has a quiz for that. Looking for ways to spend $100? BuzzFeed has a quiz that could help.
As useful and fun as these quizzes might be to the respondents that answer them, there’s another group that’s extremely interested in the answers given by quiz-hungry Web surfers: Marketers. BuzzFeed and Zimbio say they don’t collect quiz answers for ad purposes, but some other companies do. Increasingly, advertising companies are using quizzes as a tool to collect detailed information about the people that interact with them. That information is then sold to advertisers, advertising agencies, and other advertising technology companies to help them target and tailor online ads. Take this quiz published by Wikia.com, for example, which is powered by UK-based online ad company VisualDNA. The quiz promises to tell you about your personality based on your answers to around 20 multiple choice questions. Some of those questions include “Do you own a car?”, “Do you have children?”, and “What is your age?”, the answers to which would probably prove valuable to an automotive advertiser, for example. Other quizzes powered by VisualDNA, such as this one on travel site Explorra.com, ask questions such as “What do you like doing on holiday?”, “What’s your kind of hotel?”, and “What’s your budget?” That information might be of interest to an advertiser selling budget ski holidays. According to VisualDNA, the company has now built profiles on more than 300 million users using its psychometric quizzes. Behavioral tracking isn’t new in the world of online advertising, of course. Almost all online ad companies now track user behavior across the Web to help them target their ads more successfully. But the difference with VisualDNA’s approach is it enables specific data volunteered by users themselves, as opposed to making assumptions based on users’ behaviors. “We collect information about demographics, intent, interests, and personality. These can predict what people might be interested in buying or hearing about,” said Jacob Wright, head of strategy at VisualDNA. That information is then tied to cookies that are dropped on users’ Web browsers, which are in turn used to identify where users travel across the web. The cookie data is licensed to advertisers, agencies, and advertising technology companies looking to target those users based on the information they volunteered. According to Mr. Wright, the quizzes VisualDNA produces and powers aren’t simply lists of purchase intent questions; they’re primarily designed to provide value to users. “With our quizzes we provide tools that help people understand themselves. In general people find it positive and valuable which is why the quizzes often go viral online,” he said Going beyond marketing, VisualDNA said it’s even using data from quizzes to help predict how likely consumers are to repay credit lines. “We’ve created tests that can accurately predict loan repayments. Some people might not have credit histories, but they do have personalities,” Mr. Wright explained. But not all online quizzes collect data in the manor VisualDNA’s do. BuzzFeed, for example, says none of the answers to its popular quizzes and questionnaires are collected and tied to cookies for ad targeting purposes. “BuzzFeed does not drop cookies about whether a user got London vs Paris in a quiz result, or whether they said they prefer espresso over latte in a quiz answer. Third-party trackers are also not tied into what people answer in a quiz,” a BuzzFeed spokesperson said. BuzzFeed said it collects some data in aggregate form to help it understand what percentage of users finish quizzes and understand how that relates to social sharing. It does not “look at or care about the individual’s responses to quizzes,” the spokesperson added. Likewise, popular quiz site Zimbio says it doesn’t collect data about users’ quiz answers either. “We don’t use any of the specific results or answers to target ads or to do anything else commercial,” said Tony Mamone, CEO of Zimbio’s parent company, Livingly Media. Zimbio does gather and keep some aggregate data, however, in order to help inform the creation of its quizzes. For example, if users consistently get a question wrong, it might be swapped out for an easier one instead.” “For us this is this data is purely editorial. It’s not an ad play or a targeting data play,” Mr Mamone concluded. By Jack Marshal - read the original article at CMO Today here
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 Even if you do have the best product or service in the world, plus an awesome killer sales letter that could sell sand to a dessert rat. If you still don't have any potential customers seeing what you have to offer then obviously you won't make a penny, not one cent. Traffic is king as someone famously quoted. That's the reason why marketers like you and I spend so much time and effort, not to mention money, trying to put our offers in front of as many targeted leads as possible. But it doesn't have to be like that if you know which marketing methods actually work, and there are plenty which work and work well and there are many which I can tell you from experience simply do not work. Here are a few tactics that I use and they work well and you can implement them in your business today. 1) Social Media Marketing Any savvy online marketer will know that social media marketing as huge as it is, still remains in its infancy as the number of new users joining Facebook explodes by more and more each year and new social media and share sites pop up all over the net. Start to set up your social marketing campaigns right now and you are in a perfect position to profit from the enormous benefits in the months and year to come. As you may know social media marketing is all about building relationships with people and building networks of friend and colleagues and also new contacts. So start building a good reputation in your niche now by establishing yourself as an expert in your field and on as many social networks as you can, that way you can fully take advantage of the huge leverage you will have to market your product or service in your niche.Start With the some of the well know and largest social media sites like:
2) Search Engine Marketing (SEO) There are basically two ways to get targeted traffic fro the search engines:
3) Banner Ads and Text Ads A great way to ensure your offers are seen is by creating and placing targeted ads. These can be online or offline or better BOTH. Banner ads and text ads work well if you choose highly targeted to your niche sites to lace them on.
So Which Advertising Strategy is Best? All of them! To maximize your impact and reach more people you should be implementing All of the above marketing methods into your business and you will see a huge jump in customers. Be sure to track each method in order to see where to concentrate your efforts for maximum growth. These three advertising methods are very powerful when you implement them into any business but actually that is only the tip of the iceberg... there are plenty more proven marketing methods and when you put these three together with other powerful marketing techniques, you turn on the tap and get a constant flow of new leads and prospects to convert. [update 2020] ... As a new and upcoming platform I am going to Highly recommend Webtalk because you actually get paid rev share to do what you are already doing on Facebook while building new leads and contacts even as a FREE member and as a Pro member you get to post what are called SPOTLIGHT posts which basically are posts which are also shared directly with your chosen group(s) (public, business contacts, partners..etc , you choose. Go here to Register on Webtalk Free. Check out my own YouTube video reviews on webtalk below. Webtalk benefits and how it works Webtalk 3-in1 Contact Management Promo Vid Earn points and Money when your content gets engagement on Webtalk  As an affiliate marketer, it is absolutely important for you to really get into the mind of your niche. You need to know what they talk about, how they talk about it, what they are most concerned about, what type of products they want to buy. One of the best ways to do this is by visiting niche forums. This can also be a great way to get more traffic and sales and to establish your expertise. Understanding the different uses for forums is one of the best things you can do to improve your affiliate sales.
If you’re trying to research and get to know the people in your niche, you will want to join the most popular forums. Be sure to browse the top threads in the forum, as well as the recent ones that are getting a lot of responses. Immerse yourself into this niche several times per week so you are able to become a better affiliate marketer in this niche. As you start to gain your confidence, you may want to start posting and answering questions as well. Since you’ve been doing so much research and work in this niche, the chances are good that you can answer at least the most basic of questions. This serves a good purpose because you’ll be able to start establishing yourself as an expert in the niche. The more people get to know you, the more comfortable they will be seeing what else you have to offer. That is when you want to start offering something in your signature file. Be very careful to pay close attention to the rules of the forum you are participating in. Some of them allow you to use blatant affiliate links, others only allow you to link to personal websites, still others restrict commercial advertisement of any sort. Pay attention to how the other members act and what they do and position yourself accordingly. Also, be sure to insert your site’s information in your profile link for that website. As people start to see you posting more with high-quality posts, they will want to learn more about you. When they visit your profile, information should be ready and waiting for them to hop on over to your website to join your list or read what you have to offer. Note that there is usually more than one popular forum per niche. You don’t need to spend a lot of time on these forums, but you do want to expand your reach as much as possible. By joining all the most popular forms you will really be covering all of your bases. Your list will grow larger, you can do some awesome research, you can establish yourself as an expert, you can drive traffic to your website, get backlinks to your website, and make more affiliate sales all around! The forums are definitely a great option for you as an affiliate marketer.  Do you consider yourself to be controversial? You might not at this point, but you may want to consider voicing your opinions and taking some controversial positions in order to increase your affiliate sales online! That’s because controversy truly does sell.
If you’re confused about why you would do this, think about the content that gets the most comments and traffic on the web. It is usually items that are very interesting and are slightly controversial. These types of topics tend to bring out all kinds of opinions and get people emotional and actively fired up. If you are able to post this kind of “link bait” content on your blog or website, you will most likely find that your traffic starts to skyrocket! People may publish what you’ve said on niche forums, on their own blogs, and on social networking sites. They post links to your content because they are very interested in it. Perhaps they completely disagree with you, or perhaps they think you are making good points. No matter what, this controversial content will definitely get you some attention — and possibly many more sales! Think about the standard content you might post to your website. You may get some comments here and there, but the controversial topics get the most comments of all. Now, you will need to have pretty thick skin because along with controversy often comes anger and disagreement. People may think that you’re completely nuts and will have no issues telling you that! At the same time, these people will be interested in the other things you have to say and recommend. The chances are good that if you have a good link bait piece that you will gain several new followers. They will be interested in what you have to say in the future and will come back time and time again. As your traffic increases, you will probably make more affiliate sales as well! You will probably find that people start to link to you all around the web. The chances are good that your rankings in the search engine will rise as well. This creates a cycle of even more traffic to your blog, which can help you build your list to make more affiliate sales. How controversial you should be depends on your personality and the niche you are in. Examine the niche blogs written by others and see what has gotten the most comments on their blog. This can give you some good ideas so you can take advantage of this method on your own. There’s definitely something to be said for being controversial — especially on the web where news travels fast! image credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/demibrooke/2336528544/  One of the best things about having an autoresponder list is that it can be relatively hands-off way to market for you. Of course, that means that you need to have a follow-up sequence ready to go and loaded into your autoresponder. It’s important to carefully structure these autoresponder messages so that you maximize your click through rate.
The way you do this will depend on your plans for your autoresponder. If you’re using the method where you have one content-based e-mail, one slightly promotional e-mail, then one fully promotional e-mail, the way you write each e-mail will differ. In the first type of e-mail you may not put any links at all. With the second type, you’ll likely have a lot of content with a brief mention of a product that can help towards the end. That doesn’t mean that you won’t expect to get any sales from this type of e-mail! You still need to pay attention to how you insert the link and what you say to get people to click through. It can really help you structure the e-mail in a way that captures their attention, stirs up some emotion, and leaves them to realize that you have found a solution to their problem. Then, you can insert the link where they can find out more information. Have a strong call to action to get a very high click-through rate. When you structure your e-mail in this way, it is very natural for people to click to see what else you have to offer. If you have a strongly promotional e-mail, things will be set up slightly differently. You still want to stir up that emotion and guide them to the fact that you have a solution. The hope is that you have warmed them up by this point with your other content from the previous parts of the autoresponder. You might want to insert your link more than one time if it makes sense to do so in the copy. As further enticement, you may want to specify that you have given a full review or special bonus following the link you want them to click. No matter what you do, it’s key to capture people’s attention. As was mentioned in another lesson, you need to examine what other marketers do successfully and model your techniques after them. Everything from the subject line of your e-mail to the closing sentence needs to be carefully prepared to maximize click through rates. Remember — if people don’t open your e-mail in the first place, the rest of what you write doesn’t matter. The great thing is that after you’ve written your follow up sequence and start to get more and more people on your list, the sales will start to come in in a hands-off way for you! image credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davichi/2927561056/  There are way too many marketers out there who are just in it for the quick sale. You want to be different! You want to be that marketer that people in your niche turn to time and time again for advice and product recommendations. The best way to do that is to build a great relationship with your list.
One of the biggest reasons why you’ll want to do that is because it will improve your bottom line. Not only that, but you’ll be giving a lot of value to your subscribers. It really is a good feeling to have done so, and it will help to establish your expertise in the marketplace. First impressions are always very important. They should feel like they are getting a lot of value from the time they enter their name and e-mail address into your opt-tin box. That is part of the reason why giving away a valuable free report is such an effective technique There are differences of opinion when it comes to how many marketing messages you should send out versus how many sales type e-mails. You will definitely want to test and track what works best for you, but many people find that that a ratio of content, content with light promotion, and promotion works well. When you do it this way, you are gradually steering them in the direction you want them to go in — making a purchase! The people are your list won’t feel like you are just trying to make a buck with them. It’s a great ratio if you want to build a relationship, offer a lot of value, and make some great sales at the same time. You can also repurpose content you have written for other avenues. The people on your list will appreciate seeing this content if they have not had a chance to before. This can cut down on the amount of work you have to do, but it will be much appreciated. Remember to have your own style and personality as a list owner. You want them to not only love your content, but to love you. When they think of getting information and product recommendations in your niche, you want to be the first person that comes to mind for them. If you go about building a relationship in the right way, this will not be an issue for you at all. The chances are very good that you are on a few autoresponder lists yourself. Do yourself a favor, and start to monitor the messages you receive yourself as they come in. Which ones do you find yourself opening, and why? Which ones do you delete right away and why? If you’ve made a purchase based on an e-mail you’ve received, why did you end up making that purchase? Asking yourself these questions is one of the best ways to ramp up your list marketing efforts and to gain your footing as you start to develop a great relationship with your list. image credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kyz/4355957331/  Hopefully you have already started building your list and are seeing some good numbers from your efforts. It’s time to take things a step further with advanced list building techniques. This will help you get more subscribers so you can put more money in your pocket.
The first thing you need to make sure of is that you give people many opportunities to subscribe to your list. This goes beyond just having a squeeze page — you need to have an opt in box on your blog or website. You might even want to test having more than one opt-in box per page, such as having one pop up as a person starts to leave your site. Remember, you always want to give people good reason to join. They are not going to join out of the goodness of their hearts! The most basic thing you can do is give away a free report or another type of free gift in exchange for their name and e-mail address. Another thing you can do is enter your free product into a giveaway site. These are win-win situations for everyone. They are basically collections of freebies in a certain niche (most commonly in the internet marketing niche). You put your product up for download in exchange for an opt-in, and you can get a lot of exposure as many people promote the giveaway. Look for one of these in your niche, and you’re sure to find that you get an incredible response. If you’ve set up a blog, you can also get people to sign up for your RSS feed. That way, they will receive notification every time you post something on your blog. You can make use of this for sure! Whether they are on your main autoresponder list or not, your RSS feed can keep you on the top of their mind. You can make some great affiliate sales as people visit your interesting and highly targeted posts. You can also have people refer friends that might be interested in your newsletter. This works best if your newsletter is highly informative and has a lot of value. People will WANT to pass your content along then! It’s a great way to expand your reach and get more people to join your list. Make it clear that your content can be passed along. Don’t be afraid to ask people for a referral if they think their friends would enjoy getting your information. Make it as easy as possible for people to pass along your content, and you’ve got it made as far as list building. Selling low end products is another good way to get people on your list. As you start to establish a buying relationship with people in your niche, the chances are good that they will like to hear from you again with product updates, new recommendations, and other information. This will fill your list with buyers rather than freebie seekers. Be creative! There are many different ways to grow the size of your list. Remember, it is important to have a balance between great content and marketing messages that will dramatically increase the money you earn. image credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/coletivomambembe/4305859123/ Online marketing may have developed a sudden surge these past few years, but many in the know how have felt its rise even from way then. As more internet based businesses are put up, the need to develop new marketing skills and knowledge based on this new medium have arisen. More and more marketing strategies are being discovered and developed to cope with the changing face of business the business world.
The demand for online marketing tips and strategies have drastically grown and a new form of business has been born, internet marketing strategies. While there are companies that are all too eager to help your site and business build a clientele for a fee, there also many ways that can spread the word about your sites subsistence in a more cost free way. One of this is Opt-in email marketing, also known as permission marketing. Opt-in marketing requires the permission of a willing customer to subscribe to your marketing materials, materials that take form in newsletters, catalogs and promotional mailings via e-mail. The more opt-in marketing mail is sent, the more chances there is to bag sales and more sales. To do this, you must build a list of all those who wants to subscribe to your opt-in marketing list. From your list, you will get your targeted customer, this is a good list since they already have shown interest in what you have to show and sell since they have willingly signed in for your list. These are the people who have liked what they have seen in your site and have decided they want to see more and maybe even purchase what ever product or service your company and site has to offer. Many people would think that building their lists would take hard work and a lot of time to build and collect names and addresses. This is not so, it takes a bit of patience and some strategies but in doing this list, you open your site and your business to a whole new world of target market. Take the effort to take your business to a new level, if traffic increase and good profits are what you want, an opt-in list will do wonders for your business venture. There are many sources and articles in the internet available for everyone to read and follow in building a list. Sometimes they may be confusing because there are so many and there different ways. Different groups of people would have different approaches in building an opt-in list, but no matter how diverse many methods are, there are always some crucial things to do to build your list. Here are four of them. 1)Put up a good web form in your site that immediately follows the end of your content. While some may say this is too soon to subscribe for a website visitors application, try to remember that your homepage should provide a quick good impression. If somehow a website visitor finds something that he or she doesn't like and turns them off, they may just forget about signing up. A good web form for subscribing to an opt-in list is not hard to do. Just write a simple short statement about how they would like to see more and get updated about the site. Then there should be an area where they could put in their names and e-mail address. This web form will automatically save and send you the data's inputted. As more people sign in, your list will be growing. 2)As mentioned in the first tip, make your homepage very, very impressive. You need to have well written articles and descriptions of your site. Depending on what your site is all about, you need to capture your website visitor's fancy. Make your site useful and very easy to use. Do not expect everyone to be tech savvy. Invest in having good programming in your site, make your graphics beautiful but don't over do it. Don't waste your time making the homepage too overly large megabyte wise. Not all people have dedicated T1 connections, the faster your site gets loaded, the better. Go for a look that borders between simplicity and sophisticated knowledge. 3)Provide good service and products. A return customer is more likely to bring in more business. Even then and now, a satisfied customer will recommend a business always. Word of mouth and recommendations alone can rake in more business than an expensive ad. As your clientele roster grows so shall your list. With more members on the list, the more people will get to know about what you have new to offer. 4)Keep a clean and private list. Never lose the trust your customers have entrusted you. If you provide e-mails to others and they get spammed, many will probably unsubscribe to you. Remember, a good reputation will drive in more traffic and subscribers as well as strengthen the loyalty of your customers. |
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