So let’s take a deeper look at what makes this fan page (grossing 1.5 million fans just last month) tick…

Jersey Shore Game Tab

Capitalizing on the phenomena of Farmville, MTV threw in hair poofs and ‘t-shirt time’ to create its own Jersey Shore game on Facebook.  The game awards virtual cash for activities such as going to GTL, battling (literally) other players in a mini-game, hitting up the club and answering trivia.  Players can use this money to buy outfits and accessories for your avatar, take simulated roadtrips and unlock new dance clubs in the game.

The game’s landing tab promotes a sweepstakes you enter just by playing.  The prize is a trip to New York City for you and a guest to have dinner with Vinny and Snooki, two stars of the show itself.  Certain game interactions also count toward extra entries in the contest so the more you play, the more your odds of winning increase.   This dual purpose appeals to both casual gamers (who could potentially become fans of the show) and hardcore fans of Jersey Shore playing for the sweepstakes.

The Jersey Shore game also does a good job at integrating the show in real-time.  Each week the game updates with items or avatars on ‘sale’ from that week’s episode.  This constant updating keeps the gamers engaged and also interested in the storyline of Jersey Shore.  Collecting each item gains the player a higher status in the game to unlock locations and accessories, including various battle weapons.

According to AdWeek, 1.7 million unique players interact with the Jersey Shore Facebook game each month.  MTV has also taken advantage of game traffic to promote other media by giving away ‘free cash’ to do things such as watch movie previews.  See the example below from the movie No Strings Attached where players received cash for the initial view and additional coins for each day they viewed after.

Interactive Tabs: Temptd & MTV Me!

Temptd is another interactive tab that lives on the MTV Facebook page promoting their new show, ‘I Used To Be Fat.’  The television show is an inspirational documentary of teens battling their weight the summer before head off to college.  Each episode illustrates the mental and physical struggles the teens endure, but more importantly the support system they find in the trainers that help them.

Tempted is an excellent extension of the show, embodying its ideas in two ways.  First, the application acts as a support system for those trying to lose weight and awards points for helping others as well as sharing your own struggles.  Users can gain willpower points by sharing what their goals are, such as cutting back sweets or hitting the gym.  On the flip side, users can also gain karma points by encouraging others on what they are trying to achieve.  Second, the actual trainers from the show are also interacting on the application.  They comment on certain posts encouraging users and offering advice.  The reward for fans using Temptd is gaining real-time support as well as earning different colored ‘belts’ for their achievements.

The ‘MTV Me!’ application wraps up MTV’s current tabs by allowing fans to superimpose themselves with MTV celebs in their very own MTV logo.  Fans pick a background, select their favorite MTV celebrity and add themselves into the photo to share on their own page or with friends.

MTVs Content Strategy

Wall content on the MTV page is mostly video content ranging from music video premieres to show previews.  At first glance it appears the content is exclusive to the Facebook channel, however, it all comes from MTV.com.  The wall functions more as an MTV News newsfeed—pushing out content from their site or blog and only allowing fans to comment on that content.  The Wall is not enabled for open commenting.

By disabling the wall, all comments/likes have to be associated an MTV post thus increasing their frequency in Facebook Newsfeed inclusions.   MTV could increase the value of being a fan by incorporating exclusive content on their page, such as TV show bloopers or an extended interview with an artist for Facebook fans only.  It is important to reward your fans for liking you with special exclusives when possible.

Earlier in the 26 Facebook Fan Page Examples in Detail series, Cassandra examined the Disney fan page.  In her blog post, she compared the MTV and Disney Facebook pages noting that video content performed best for MTV.  While this is still the case, you can see from the chart below that Disney outperforms MTV in terms of average fan engagement.  I found this is mainly due to the high volume of responses Disney receives from nostalgic posts, such as quoting an animated movie. MTV could try a similar nostalgic strategy on their page by posting an old music video, clip of an outrageous award show or images of their old 1980s ads along with a question that elicits a response to see how it performs.  If anything, MTV should keep executing tabs that act as extensions of their more popular shows as they prove to be a successful component of their page.

What do you think of the MTV Facebook page?  Check it out and share your comments with me below!

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Even if you follow the advice of marketing experts you can quickly find yourself with far more to do than there are hours in the day. And that’s even not counting everything else you need to do to run your business. This leads to lots of long days and late nights chained to your desk.

Often, this happens because you haven’t taken the time to really look at what you’ve been doing, and determine which activities are truly worthwhile. I know, it’s hard to stop and do some review, but it’s really worth it.

Because the reality is, three well executed marketing tactics done on a consistent basis can get you more business than a whole bucketful done in a scattershot manner—if you focus your time and energy on the right ones.

So how do you know which ones are the “right” ones? These are the marketing tactics that clearly have excellent ROI (Return on Investment). In other words, if you spend 8 hours a week on social media, but it’s never generated a client, that’s poor ROI.

If you spend two hours a week writing and publishing an ezine that brings you 10 new clients a year, that’s better ROI.

If you go to two, 2-hour networking events each month, and you regularly pick up a client each time, that’s great ROI!

What you have to do is look at both the fixed costs to implement the tactic and the time cost (IE number of hours times your hourly rate). Then look at the results. How many leads, clients or sales does each tactic generate as well as how much revenue?

Once you know these answers you can subtract your costs from your gross revenue for each tactic to figure out which ones are really worth the time and money. Of course, you can’t tell if a tactic is really working until you give it a fair chance. So be sure to implement any tactic for at least 3-6 months to get a good gauge.

And remember, sometimes it’s not the tactic itself that’s the problem but the strategy behind it or the execution. So you may need to tweak how you’re using a tactic to improve its ROI.

Once you know what’s working best, pick your top three and focus the majority of your marketing time and energy on those. If those become a piece of cake to do, or you automate or delegate them, then add in one more. Before you know it, you’re going to be growing your small business with way less effort.

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What I am talking about is more a descriptive term of what I see that determines success in just about anything in life, thus it transfers to the Internet marketing world as well. A grinder is defined (for the purposes of this post) as someone or something that simply does not give up. Grinders may alter their course or it may be slowed but they simply don’t quit. A grinder simply keeps grinding along regardless of the slings and arrows suffered over the course of time.

You see this a lot in athletics. I have a young son who has some real strong inherent athletic ability. I am a decent athlete but this kid got something extra and it’s fun to watch. But megadoses of God-given ability are rare. As a result, even those with much talent can simply fall by the way side because they get to a point where their talent cannot carry them alone. Grinders, however, succeed and win.

So, if most people who try to get by on natural talent find they don’t always have enough, then who is succeeding? The grinder.

In Internet marketing, grinders looks like this:

They are focused. People who rely on talent only often get distracted. They are excited by trinkets and baubles and all things shiny. Grinders, on the other hand, stay on task and work until things are finished. An Internet marketing grinder of today is someone who works to perfect the basics and doesn’t stray far from their objectives.

They are resilient. The Internet marketing game is rough. You can easily get overwhelmed by the sheer volume of things you could be doing. The things you do often break, causing obstructions that discourage and derail those working on talent alone. Grinders roll up their sleeves and push through. Often this process can look ugly—that’s why people don’t like to do it. Grinders don’t care because they know that it is just what it takes.

They are respected. Grinders who fight through things gain the respect of co-workers and industry colleagues alike. They are often people who are doing things the right way. In search terms, many very good white-hat SEOs are simply grinders. Black hats are shortcut finders and rule breakers, holding near contempt for others. Most grinders are just doing things by the book and pushing through the trouble along the way. They are respected because they don’t want to hurt anyone, they just want to be better than them.

They take care of themselves . A true grinder is not someone who just works and works until they fall over. Quite the contrary. They seek balance. That can come in the form of other hobbies. It could even be just in the fact that they will take time to learn and be trained in their craft. It’s easy to wear down. We are, after all, just human beings with limitations.

They help others. Grinders aren’t recluses.They are smart networkers and helpers. They take their eyes off their own work when they can help someone in a situation that will add value to both parties. They don’t just flit away and help everyone and they certainly, most certainly, don’t work for free. If a grinder is not exchanging money, then they are doing something that is or will be of great value, whether it’s specific networking or they are acquiring some other form of Internet marketing capital that will bring value.

They are confident. The Internet marketing industry as a whole is full of hucksters and spinmeisters that talk a good game but may not have the chops. Grinders have the chops. They know what to do. And, even more importantly, when they don’t know what to do, they admit it, then they find the answer, and then they grind some more.

They could care less about the spotlight . This is not to say that they stay out of the spotlight. Grinders often get thrown into it, but the difference is that they don’t have to have it to get success. They will use it and that is fine. Grinders earn the spotlight though rather than demand it.

They never say die. Grinders push through and plow through things. Most people hit a speed bump or a real issue and they crumble or they don’t react well. Grinders just keep moving. In the Internet marketing space, this is an invaluable trait.

So why do I even bring this up in a blog like Biznology? It’s because over the years I have seen all types and I know what makes a winner. Now remember, winning is not always about the one with the most toys. Remember that company No Fear and the shirts that used to be so popular with their slogans? I saw one that made the most sense to me but I was never able to find it again. Why? Because it wasn’t a popular saying, it was simply a true one. It said “He who dies with the most toys still dies.”

That’s a grinder’s mantra. It’s never about acquisition it’s about doing a good job. The stuff that comes with doing a good job is nice but it’s doing the job well that creates the pleasure for a grinder.

If you are a businessperson and you have a grinder on staff, give them a raise. If you have a grinder as a consultant, pay them on time and never complain. They are rare.

I want my kids to be grinders and I am finally learning how to be one myself. It’s this realization that has me thinking about another philosophy for another day which is to finish strong.

Here’s to grinding it out and finishing strong. Salute!

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In my last post, I took a similar look at the traditional practice of Targeted Marketing. A practice with a long, proven record of success but which has, unfortunately, been attached to consumer channels that are in the process of dying – making it ever less relevant to today’s marketing.

The core Targeted Marketing process involved a fair number of steps, but two of them embody the key “magic”:

2.    Enrich your knowledge of that population (if necessary) with data that can be tied to targetable properties such as attitudes, needs or desires (Name Lookup, Household data, Census Data)
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5.    Create a link between the targetable properties, the behaviors you want to incent, and the messages most relevant to each combination of target group and desired behavior (Survey data in our case – most often with additional behavioral data in commerce targeting)

In Step #2 of the process, we accumulate potentially significant data about an individual. In Step #5, we create a connection between the available data (targetable properties), the outcomes to incent, and the key attitudes that drive toward the outcomes.

It should be fairly obvious that the Web analytics “assumption of intentionality” is directly related to Step #2. If Web behaviors are indicative of interests, then these Web behaviors are targetable data. They become “facts” about individuals that could be integrated into a marketing process.

What’s more, Web analytics techniques are highly suitable to achieving at least part of #5. The proper application of Web analytics techniques is designed to link the targetable properties (navigational behavior) with key outcomes (purchase, registration, viewership, etc.).

However, Step #5 of traditional Targeted Marketing also links targetable properties to attitudes that drive to significant outcomes. In the political world, we used opinion research to create both the links to outcomes and attitudes. In the Web analytics world, we can often use behavioral data to link targetable properties to outcomes. Not so when it comes to attitudes. Is there a way to link online behavior to attitudes that might help target campaigns and creative to drive to the desired outcome?

There are actually three different methods for doing this – all potentially valuable:

1. Online Survey Research: Identical to our technique in Database Marketing – ask a sample of the population and correlate attitudes to targetable properties
2. Inference from Meta-Data about Content: Use information about what the content is to infer visitor attitudes – if the visitor looks at pricing first, pricing is a significant concern
3. Testing: Generate multiple content alternatives and test to identify the messaging (and, by implication, the attitudes) best linked to conversion.

What’s notably missing from the Targeted Marketing process is any equivalent to the limitations of “natural structure” that impact Web analytics. Targeted Marketing techniques don’t have any similar limitations, and that’s a big part of why Targeted Marketing folks have struggled with Web analytics data. They have no experience in the tools and techniques necessary to control for the impact of the natural structure of the Web site on the use of the targetable data and they tend to miss or misunderstand the problem.

Compounding this problem, Targeted Marketing folks have struggled to use any of the three methods for linking Web targetable data to key attitudes. This is less surprising around the second two reasons than the first; after all, Survey Research is a key technique in traditional Targeted Marketing to drive exactly this type of link.

Unfortunately, most sites have failed to create the necessary integration to make this linkage happen in the online world. In traditional targeted marketing, the link between survey data and the database is typically driven by demographics. The customer database contains key demographic facts like age, gender, estimated income, geo-location, and more. In the opinion research, those same facts are collected and tie directly to attitudes and outcomes. The link is obvious and allows conclusions from the Survey data to be immediately used for targeting against customer data.

It doesn’t work that way in the online world, because the targetable facts (Web behaviors) aren’t tied to any demographics. To use Survey data, you first need to integrate it into the Web behavioral data (you might want to check out my Whitepaper on this) and then correlate survey attitudes to the targetable facts. Since most sites haven’t done this, there’s no traditional and obvious way to link targetable online behavior to key attitudes – a major stumbling block when it comes to digital marketing.

In these past few posts, I’ve tried hard to show that Web analytics data and techniques CAN be used to drive targeted, personalized marketing type efforts. I’ve also tried hard to develop what is sometimes called a failure or error theory – an explanation of why very few organizations have been able to do so. It all boils down to this: Web data is intentional – and it can be used to create targetable data based on Web behavior and it can be linked to both outcomes and attitudes. These are the two essential linkages necessary to create effective targeted campaigns.

So why hasn’t it been widely and successfully done?

First, the people currently using and expert in Web analytics data are – almost without exception – entirely ignorant of basic targeted marketing. When you hire experts and consultants whose background is in operational BI (best case) or Omniture tagging and reporting (worst case), why should you be surprised that they know next to nothing about targeted marketing?  Asking people who’s professional life has been consumed by Web analytics process, by setting up tags, and by creating dashboards to suddenly build targeted marketing campaigns is highly unlikely to be effective.

From the other side of the equation, experts in Targeted Marketing have to face two significant difficulties in bridging their discipline to online data. The very fact of a “natural structure” to the Web site limits the interpretation of Web behavioral data and makes the brute force application of standard statistical techniques unproductive. Second, the linkage of Web behavioral data to key attitudes doesn’t work the same way in digital as it does in traditional marketing. It’s harder, and one of the key integrations, survey to Web analytics data, is often missing.

In my next posts, I’m going to expand on how we at Semphonic solve these two significant difficulties and have built up a powerful set of techniques for bridging the gap between Web analytics and Targeted Marketing to create a powerful Digital Analytic Marketing discipline. These techniques – from our Two-tiered Segmentation and Behavioral Audience Segmentation, to survey and behavioral integration, to site structure mapping, to Functional and Behavioral Use-Case analysis – all tie together to create the foundation of a fundamentally different and better kind of Digital Analytics Marketing practice.

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For individuals inside the industry this question typically comes with the obvious answer that SEM agencies cost different prices because they offer different qualities of SEM services. That being said, for individuals outside of the industry, services may seem very similar and thus the drastically different price tags just doesn’t make sense.

So I’ve decided to take it upon myself to present a short list of phrases that should raise a caution flag for SEM shoppers as well as provide follow-up questions that SEM shoppers should ask to receive information that may make the price tag difference a bit more clear.

Caution Flag Phrases & The Right Follow-Up Questions to Ask:

Caution Flag Phrase #1: “Our company has X number of employees”

The number of employees a company has tends to simply be a figure to show the size of the company. Especially, when shopping for SEM services, you’ll probably notice that agencies that offer SEM services also offer additional services such as webdesign, consulting, etc.

Therefore, when an agency presents how many employees are with the company you, the SEM shopper, should ask the following questions:

• How many employees specialize in SEM?
• What makes these employees qualified in SEM?
• How many employees will be dedicated to my SEM campaigns?

Caution Flag Phrases #2: “We guarantee #1 rankings”

The truth is, no agency can guarantee #1 rankings for any keyword. If they do, it’s time to start asking these questions:

• How can you guarantee #1 rankings in an ever changing market?
• How long will it take to reach #1? (This is kind of a trick question, because no agency should be able to give a definitive answer)
• Will you be writing this guarantee in my contract?

Caution Flag Phrase #3: “Setup Starting at X dollars and monthly management at X dollars”

“Setup” and “Starting at” could actually be 2 separate caution flag phrases in my book. When it comes to SEM it is relatively impossible to ever complete the “setup” phase. With keywords, competitors, algorithms, products, etc. changing everyday, SEM is an ever evolving space and campaigns need routine “setup”.

When an agency says they “charge a setup fee starting at”, I encourage you to ask:

• What does the setup fee include?
• Are there additional fees each time the campaign setups are changed? If yes, how often are the campaign setups changed?
• What will the setup fee for my SEM campaigns actually cost? And what will the monthly management fees actually cost?

The bottom line is, not all SEM services are the same when you look at the fine print between the lines. Be cautious as to how costs are stated, how a company’s specialties are described, and what results are guaranteed. I love a good deal just as much as the next gal… probably more… but when it comes down to SEM you often get what you pay for.

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I spent the last week reading many recaps from other blogs and media properties, as well as looking back on some of the most noteworthy developments over the course of 2010. I originally planned on creating a list of the top ten trends I’ll be watching for and sharing with clients, but as I compiled this list I found myself landing on 15 big trends instead. Below is an embedded presentation detailing the 15 trends, and they are highlighted in short form in this post as well.

1. Likeonomics
2. Approachable Celebrity
3. Desperate Simplification
4. Essential Integration
5. Rise of Curation
6. Visualized Data
7. Crowdsourced Innovation
8. Instant PR & Customer Service
9. App-fication of the Web
10. Reimagining Charity
11. Employees As Heroes
12. Locationcasting
13. Brutal Transparency
14. Addictive Randomness
15. Culting Of Retail

What do you think about this list? Are there any others you would add that you’ll be watching for in 2011? Share them in a comment and I’ll add a few of the best suggestions to the list.

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The AdAge Power 150

There are hundreds of thousands, (maybe millions) of sites that cover marketing.  Many are written by people who call themselves experts, yet who have little if any marketing expertise.  It’s simple and inexpensive to create a professional looking site and just as simple to attract thousands of social media followers, using software.  The end result is that for a very small investment, it’s easy to produce fake “social proof”, that someone is a leader in their field.  The AdAge Power 150 was developed, to help people find sources of marketing information they can trust.

Advertising Age, who produce the AdAge Power150 list, is not some new Internet business.  It is an industry respected publication, which was founded in the 1930′s and which I have been a reader of, since entering marketing over 20 years ago!  Their list is an index of the world’s leading marketing blogs, based on a number of metrics, including things like the number of times a marketing blog has been linked to and how many readers it has etc.

The Adage Power 150 List: Who’s on it?

Some of the blogs in the list will be very familiar to you, such as; Seth Godin’s blog, search engine land, copyblogger, problogger, SEOmoz Chris Brogan’s blog, spinsucks and the brand builder.  I’m proud to say that Jim’s marketing blog is now in the AdAge Power 150 too.

I can’t promise that you will like every blog on the list.  Equally, I know there are MANY wonderful blogs NOT listed.  However, I believe that if you want to quickly discover some great new marketing and social media blogs, the AdAge Power 150 is a terrific place to start.

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As it relates to marketing though, I firmly believe that the online marketer of today is being pushed into behaviors that mimic those with serious disorders that hamper their ability to concentrate on one thing long enough to see it to fruition. This point was driven home today in a post from Paul Gillen about Social CRM. What Paul describes so well I have been thinking for a while. Every time I see the idea of social CRM come up I wonder how in the world that would even begin to work when we haven’t even figured out CRM first! Here are some of Paul’s thoughts.

CRM is a well-established discipline that presumes that the more information we can capture about a customer’s interactions with our company, the better we can deliver products and services that the person wants to buy. It seems only natural that online social interactions should be part of this profile. Vendors of CRM services, who are always looking for differentiation points in that crowded market, have lately been talking up this social dimension as a kind of CRM 2.0.

The problem is that most of their customers are still struggling to get CRM 1.0 right.

As a result, marketers are being pushed to look ahead before they have created a strong foundation on what they are presently working on. The rapid pace of ‘advancement’ is forcing people to leave projects behind unfinished because if they are not riding the next wave they will not be part of the future.

This makes marketers look at and over evaluate every shiny object that crosses their path. Then they wonder why their systems are in disarray. It’s obvious. Whenever you put together a motor (in this case the system) with only partially finished parts and section, that engine motor will not run. It’s that simple.

So marketers, before you are distracted by some sales pitch or blog post that says “Get on board or else your career will be choking on our exhaust!” take a step back. Chances are that the engine you would be hitching your wagon to is suffering from the same kind of ‘half done is better than not done’ thinking that we have created in the Internet marketing space.

Be the tortoise rather than the hare and be satisfied. You’ll survive without every latest and greatest ‘revolution in marketing’. In fact, you’ll probably pass right by that new ‘can’t live without’ as it struggles to get itself out of the ditch on the Internet’s super highway. How did it get there? It forget to keep its eye on the road as it was trying to sell itself to people like you.

Stay focused and don’t get distracted by every little ‘next greatest thing’. You’ll be happier and more successful for it.

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Below is a breakdown of the sections of a text ad and certain items that should be contained within each section.

Headline:The headline helps you catch the eye of the searcher and should immediately proclaim ‘Hey! I am relevant to what you are looking for!’ If you look at the ad below you can see the term ‘Contact Lenses’ (the search query entered) appears in the headline, letting the searcher know that the ad is offering what they are looking for.

If you have created very granular ad groups you can create text ads that utilize keywords or keyword phrases within the headline. I recommend staying away from DKI (Dynamic Keyword Insertion). This can lead to you ad using lowercase letters in the headline.

If you have enough remaining characters you can highlight other specifics about your product or service. For example high lighting things like ’99% Approval Rate’ or ’15% Off’ can help increase your CTR and set you apart from your competition.

Description Line One:The first line of your text ad description must do two things – answer the searchers questions and include the keyword or keyword phrase.

If someone is searching for discount contacts or cheap flights like the following text ad, let them know that you are the solution to their question.

If you include the exact keyword within your description line it will not only be bolded and catch the eye of the searcher but also show relevancy to the query.

Description Line Two:In the second line of your text ad it is important to set yourself apart from your competition. If you do not require credit checks for loans or you have more products available then your competition, let them know through your text ad.

Most importantly your second line should contain a CTA or Call To Action. If you are attempting to have site visitors sign up for free information using a CTA like ‘Sign Up Now!’ will set an expectation of the potential visitor. If you are driving searchers to your site to apply for a loan using a CTA like ‘Get Cash Now’ or ‘Apply Now!’ can help lead to conversions.

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BTW, landing pages could be considered any page on your site, but for the purpose of this webinar the focus was on pages designed to get someone to take a desired action, such as request a quote, sign up for an email newsletter, etc. Although not necessary, these pages might be outside the normal navigation of the site, and only linked to from an ad or banner on another page.

• Don’t overwhelm people with form fields. Keep them as minimal as possible, asking as few questions as possible.
• Look at value vs. cost in the eyes of your prospects. If the cost (whether it’s time, effort or price) outweighs the perceived value you’re going to fail.

How do you fix this? Reduce the perceived cost and increase the perceived value.

You can reduce the perceived cost by reducing friction. Friction might come from unnecessary length or difficulty on the landing page. Look at your landing pages now. Is there too much text? Too much scrolling? Too many pages to purchase?

You can further decrease perceived cost by quickly answer the visitor’s questions:

• Where am I?
• What can I do here?

According to Flint you have “four inches and seven seconds” to answer these questions. If you don’t, your visitor will click the back button and you’ll lose the lead. When someone firsts gets to your landing page there’s a moment of disorientation; confusion is a big contributor to friction, so answering these two questions immediately will increase your conversion rate.

The next big fix is to increase the perceived value of your offering. Do this by identifying and communicating key factors that differentiate your from your competition. Use specific, quantitative & “instantly credible” language. Even if you’re not going head-to-head with your competition, you should still try and be as specific as possible.

I sometimes struggle with this (specificity) myself for our own landing pages. Do our web sites have 4x the awesome sauce of our competitors’ sites? Will signing up for our email newsletter make you 176% more smarterer? I’m still working on those metrics.

Some other bon mots I wrote down:

• Lose all caps in your headlines…difficult to read and frustrating to visitors.
• Use a strong headline; big, bold and dramatic.
• Include at least one paragraph of text, w/bold and/or italicized text to highlight the important ideas. This paragraph needs to overcome the natural cynicism of anyone surfing the net.
• Use images that draw the eye to the text, not that compete with it.

OK, now I’m off to optimize some of our pages and try some A/B split testing on them. Wish me luck!

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