But are they getting substantial returns on their investment? Are they able to target the right segment of the audience who would actually be interested in their product as in whatever it is a movie, a documentary or a TV serial. Perhaps no!

Then why are the trendsetters not able to recognize the trend of marketing and switch to digital than still practicing the same old traditional marketing and splurging money like anything.

Let’s go ahead and see how digital marketing can help Bollywood and your business.

Specific Targeting

First thing first! Specific targeting! Spending money is not a big issue if you get an appreciable amount of customers by doing so. By advertising on TV, Radio , newspapers or through posters you simply broadcast your information to the masses and who all would interested will become your customers however how about if you can specifically target your ads to these ‘who all’ . Certainly, you will get better results and will save a lot of money too. This is what you can do in digital marketing. Whether they are the ads on search engines or various websites, they are only displayed if your buyers’ persona matches your ads. So, depending on your product, you very well know what part of the audience will need it and that through digital marketing you can extend your offer to only that part of the audience. Chances of any miss outs on it are kind of negligible here.

Cost-Effective

Not only you can put across your message to the right segment of the audience but you also save a lot of money in digital marketing. You only spend where you need to and that too far lesser than what you were paying in the traditional marketing.

Measure it at its every part

The best thing about digital marketing is that you can monitor traffic and results and optimize your advertising campaigns accordingly. The tool called analytics in digital marketing helps you measure different ad campaigns with respect to traffic and other results. Thus, you get to have a better idea of what part of your budget is bringing result and what part is going waste so that you take actions in view of that.

Customer Engagement

Being interactive in design digital marketing lets the customer to interact and get engaged. Unlike the traditional marketing, here the user has the command to browse through whatever they wish to, making it far more interactive and engaging. Gone are those days when your audience will entertain your ads even on getting interrupted by you while they are on their go. They would simply change the channel on TV or radio, or overlook the ad on newspaper. No one loves interruption marketing now. Recognize this trend and switch to digital marketing. The sooner you switch the better results you gain.

Generating awareness for your business and spreading business defying all geographical constraints are something that you can do with traditional marketing as well the only difference is that in digital marketing you do the same thing at relatively very low cost and in a more specifically targeted way. In simple words, digital marketing is far more effective than traditional marketing and that too at relatively very low cost.

The post How Digital Marketing Is Helping Bollywood? appeared first on Digitrock.

But are they getting substantial returns on their investment? Are they able to target the right segment of the audience who would actually be interested in their product as in whatever it is a movie, a documentary or a TV serial. Perhaps no!

Then why are the trendsetters not able to recognize the trend of marketing and switch to digital than still practicing the same old traditional marketing and splurging money like anything.

Let’s go ahead and see how digital marketing can help Bollywood and your business.

Specific Targeting

First thing first! Specific targeting! Spending money is not a big issue if you get an appreciable amount of customers by doing so. By advertising on TV, Radio , newspapers or through posters you simply broadcast your information to the masses and who all would interested will become your customers however how about if you can specifically target your ads to these ‘who all’ . Certainly, you will get better results and will save a lot of money too. This is what you can do in digital marketing. Whether they are the ads on search engines or various websites, they are only displayed if your buyers’ persona matches your ads. So, depending on your product, you very well know what part of the audience will need it and that through digital marketing you can extend your offer to only that part of the audience. Chances of any miss outs on it are kind of negligible here.

Cost-Effective

Not only you can put across your message to the right segment of the audience but you also save a lot of money in digital marketing. You only spend where you need to and that too far lesser than what you were paying in the traditional marketing.

Measure it at its every part

The best thing about digital marketing is that you can monitor traffic and results and optimize your advertising campaigns accordingly. The tool called analytics in digital marketing helps you measure different ad campaigns with respect to traffic and other results. Thus, you get to have a better idea of what part of your budget is bringing result and what part is going waste so that you take actions in view of that.

Customer Engagement

Being interactive in design digital marketing lets the customer to interact and get engaged. Unlike the traditional marketing, here the user has the command to browse through whatever they wish to, making it far more interactive and engaging. Gone are those days when your audience will entertain your ads even on getting interrupted by you while they are on their go. They would simply change the channel on TV or radio, or overlook the ad on newspaper. No one loves interruption marketing now. Recognize this trend and switch to digital marketing. The sooner you switch the better results you gain.

Generating awareness for your business and spreading business defying all geographical constraints are something that you can do with traditional marketing as well the only difference is that in digital marketing you do the same thing at relatively very low cost and in a more specifically targeted way. In simple words, digital marketing is far more effective than traditional marketing and that too at relatively very low cost.

The post How Digital Marketing Is Helping Bollywood? appeared first on Digitrock.

Facebook has impressed analysts and investors in each quarter so far this year by reporting strong growth in mobile ad revenue. The company revealed that mobile ads accounted for 41% of total ad revenue in the second quarter this year, up from 30% in the first quarter and essentially nothing a year earlier. If that growth continues, Facebook could approach or even surpass the 50% mark this quarter.

Facebook has taken steps in recent weeks to make mobile ads more effective, including testing autoplay video ads in the news feed and introducing more calls to action on mobile app install ads to entice users to click, though it’s doubtful either had much impact on the previous quarter results.

Beyond the mobile ad stats, analysts will likely be looking for any updates or hints about the company’s new and as yet unannounced ad products. Instagram is expected to introduce ads this week, perhaps finally justifying the amount Facebook paid for the company. On the other hand, Facebook has repeatedly delayed introducing video ads on the homepage raising questions about when and how the company will choose to go this route.

Overall, Facebook is expected to report earnings per share of $0.19 on revenue of $1.91 billion for the quarter, up from earnings of $0.12 a share on revenue of $1.26 billion in the same quarter a year earlier.

Facebook stock has been on a tear this year, rising to as high as $54.83 earlier this month, roughly three times the low of $17.55 a share it hit a year earlier. The stock was hovering just below $50 a share in early trading Wednesday, an increase of 1% on the day.

Image: Justin Sullivan/Getty

The post Is Facebook a Truly Mobile-First Company Yet? appeared first on Digitrock.

Facebook has impressed analysts and investors in each quarter so far this year by reporting strong growth in mobile ad revenue. The company revealed that mobile ads accounted for 41% of total ad revenue in the second quarter this year, up from 30% in the first quarter and essentially nothing a year earlier. If that growth continues, Facebook could approach or even surpass the 50% mark this quarter.

Facebook has taken steps in recent weeks to make mobile ads more effective, including testing autoplay video ads in the news feed and introducing more calls to action on mobile app install ads to entice users to click, though it’s doubtful either had much impact on the previous quarter results.

Beyond the mobile ad stats, analysts will likely be looking for any updates or hints about the company’s new and as yet unannounced ad products. Instagram is expected to introduce ads this week, perhaps finally justifying the amount Facebook paid for the company. On the other hand, Facebook has repeatedly delayed introducing video ads on the homepage raising questions about when and how the company will choose to go this route.

Overall, Facebook is expected to report earnings per share of $0.19 on revenue of $1.91 billion for the quarter, up from earnings of $0.12 a share on revenue of $1.26 billion in the same quarter a year earlier.

Facebook stock has been on a tear this year, rising to as high as $54.83 earlier this month, roughly three times the low of $17.55 a share it hit a year earlier. The stock was hovering just below $50 a share in early trading Wednesday, an increase of 1% on the day.

Image: Justin Sullivan/Getty

The post Is Facebook a Truly Mobile-First Company Yet? appeared first on Digitrock.

Facebook also disclosed that from September 2012 to September 2013, Time’s referral traffic rose 208%, BuzzFeed’s increased by 855% and Bleacher Report experienced a boost of 1,081%. Facebook also announced a feature called Stories to Share for page managers of media firms that recommends which stories to share on Facebook.

Andy Mitchell, director of partnerships for Facebook, attributes much of the growth in referrals to improvements in Facebook’s News Feed algorithm. “We’re getting better at showing the right story at people who are interested in it,” he says. In addition, Facebook has shared best practices with media firms, which help them post more effectively, he says.

New research from SimpleReach bolsters the claim. SimpleReach found that Facebook drives more traffic to media sites than any other social media platform.

Meanwhile, Facebook had some advice to media firms: Post more. Facebook worked with 29 media sites over a seven-day period recently and found a greater number of posts “frequently” increases referral traffic by more than 80%. During that test period the site posted 57% more articles, which netted an 89% increase in outbound clicks to their domains plus 10% more Likes on average. The number of net fans per page rose 49%.

That said, Mitchell does acknowledge that the law of diminishing returns applies: At some point, you can overload fans with too many posts. Facebook doesn’t have a recommended number of posts. Mitchell says media properties have to determine a figure on their own.

Along the same lines, Stories to Share helps those media firms figure out which stories to post next. The recommendation widget is pretty straightforward: It analyzes your homepage to see which stories people are sharing the most on Facebook even though the media property hasn’t yet shared it through its Facebook account. That feature is going live on Monday with 1,5000 news organizations. Stories to Share had been in beta with a handful of news organizations (the company declined to identify which ones) over the past few weeks.

The emphasis on media partners comes as Facebook has recently revved competition with the much-smaller Twitter for ad-spending opportunities related to real-time marketing like second-screen conversations and trending news items. Encouraging news organizations to post more often will aid a Trending Articles feature that seems to be a likely next move for the company.

Image: Getty/KIMIHIRO HOSHINO

The post Facebook Average Referral Traffic to Media Sites Up 170% This Year appeared first on Digitrock.

The study, “Big Five Personality Traits Reflected in Job Applicants’ Social Media Postings,” identified links between job applicants’ online behaviors and characteristics that might impact their work performance.

Unfiltered personal communications and photos, comments about others, and references to alcohol and drug use are the key indicators of personality traits that job applicants truly possess — traits that may actually suggest a candidate will be a great hire, according to the study, which was conducted by researchers in North Carolina State University’s department of psychology and published recently in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking.

According to the researchers, a job applicant’s social media activities reflect the following five personality traits: extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability and openness to experience.

To get a better idea of what social media postings reveal about personality traits, researchers focused on two broad posting types: those that demonstrated badmouthing behavior, and those that referenced drug and alcohol use.

For instance, those who rated highly in agreeableness and conscientiousness were unlikely to badmouth others in social media, the study found. This doesn’t mean, however, that conscientiousness has any bearing on posts that employers often consider red flags.

“Companies often scan a job applicant’s Facebook profile to see whether there is evidence of drug or alcohol use, believing that such behavior means the applicant is not ‘conscientious,’ or responsible and self-disciplined,” Dr. Lori Foster Thompson, co-author of the study and a professor of psychology at NCSU, said in a statement. However, the researchers said there is no significant correlation between conscientiousness and a job applicant’s propensity to post about drug or alcohol use on Facebook.

“This means companies are eliminating some conscientious job applicants based on erroneous assumptions regarding what social media behavior tells us about the applicants,” said Will Stoughton, lead author of the study and a Ph.D. student at NCSU.

Extraversion is also a trait that’s often misunderstood. Consider, for instance, sales and marketing positions that require candidates to have extroverted personalities. Based on data presented in the study, extroverts are more likely to post about drugs or alcohol on Facebook; thus, employers will be limiting their sales and marketing pool of candidates if they automatically red flag those who exhibit drug- or alcohol-related behaviors on social media, the study found.

“If employers plan to keep using social media to screen job applicants, this study indicates they may want to focus on eliminating candidates who badmouth others — not necessarily those who post about drinking beer,” Stoughton said.

Have something to add to this story? Share it in the comments.

Image: Jason A. Howie

The post What Social Media Can (Really) Tell You About Job Applicants appeared first on Digitrock.

Those who have used Ads Manager and Power Editor in the past know that neither tool is the simplest or most logically designed. Previously, ad buyers were asked to choose from a range of ad options and then select their campaign objectives and optimization methods.

Now, more reasonably, advertisers are first asked to identify their objectives. That could be a sales conversion on a website, for example, or an increase in mobile app downloads. Other objectives include increasing total page Likes, increasing engagement with particular posts or a Facebook app, boosting in-store Offer claims and upping RSVPs to a Facebook event.

Once an objective has been identified, Facebook guides advertisers to the most appropriate ad. It’s up to the advertiser to choose where that ad appears — in the News Feed, for example, or alongside it.

In addition to the new ad-buying interface, users can also now upload multiple images for a single campaign, allowing five different ads to run at once. In the analytics dashboard — also part of the overhaul — they’ll be able to quickly assess which images are performing best. They can also easily sort all of their campaigns to see which delivers the best conversion value.

Although their interfaces are the same, the Power Editor will continue to offer additional functionality to ad buyers. In addition to the new streamlined buying process, Power Editor users can also manually select their ads.

“Ad managers know how to buy ads already; we don’t want to make ad changes forced,” David Baser, product manager at Facebook, said.

Images: iStock, hh5800 and Facebook
Source : Mashable 

The post Facebook Radically Simplifies Ad Buying appeared first on Digitrock.

Some businesses say otherwise. Wixon Jewelers Online Marketing Director Jayme Pretzloff thinks that social media is going to be more important for sales than any other metric in 2013, as the platform continues to receive user acceptance and integrates into the overall marketing strategy.

70% consumers suggested that social media didn’t have any impact on their purchase decision in 2011, a percentage that was cut in half in 2012. Such statistics provide helpful insights to marketers as they look to make the most out of their time and investment.

Policies of social media companies also had a significant impact on referrals. There was a time when a post on Facebook fan page was seen by every follower/fan of the brand, but after policy changes, any post shared by a brand today is only seen by 10% of the total number of people following the page. Unfortunately, and fortunately for Facebook, you now need to pay for greater outreach.

This also shows that just because a particular social network has a huge user base doesn’t mean it’s an ideal place to get referrals. For example, tech sites usually concentrate a lot on Facebook, but they would be better off with Google+.

Likewise, a DIY jewelry brand may not get any retweets, but drive loads of traffic from Pinterest. Trying and testing the engagement ratio (the percentage of fans responding/number of fans present on the page) on different sites can help your brand to create a better online experience.

It is also important to note at this point that though referrals through social media are crucial for brand awareness, you shouldn’t give a wide berth to other referral resources. Doing so would be a BIG mistake. This is because social media doesn’t have the same level of intimacy as other sources of referrals like face-to-face networking, phone call, live chat etc.

The right approach

Some brands are smart enough to use all sources. For example, Blinds.com, told us “We encourage customers to refer Blinds.com on social media, and we also invite customers to contact us via phone or live video chat if they have any questions about our products. Referrals are important to us, as is customer retention; over 60% of our business comes from referral or repeat customers.” Food for thought.

However, other forms of referral networking can turn out to be inefficient, which is the main reason why social media referrals have a future in business marketing. It’s not a surprise to see businesses, especially new ones, struggle at networking events. The end result can be hours spent at a networking, only to walk away with a couple of business cards (Zoinks).

Social media, when being used as a major referral tool, should be supported by creative and relevant content. Businesses that establish themselves as credible and trustworthy providers of fun, inspiring and highly engaging content will be able to reach thousands of prospects through social channels. It requires a significant amount of time and investment, so it’s time that you take a closer look at your customer preferences and content sharing strategy.

Photo Credit: Social Media Referrals/shutterstock

Source: socialmediatoday.com

The post Do Social Media Referrals Have A Future In Your Business? appeared first on Digitrock.

In order to make the most of the available space, we took a look at how you can optimize your avatars and cover photos on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and Google+.

Read our guidelines below, which include the optimum sizes for imagery across all sites, and some handy tips and tricks to bear in mind when choosing the right photographs.

Facebook

Facebook profile photos are cropped square, so we advise you to use an image that is already in this ratio — that way, you can avoid hastily cropping it right after you upload it. Profile pics are displayed at 160 x 160 pixels, but the image you upload must have minimum measurements of 180 x 180 pixels.

Cover photos come in at 851 x 315 pixels. While the minimum size is 399 x 150 pixels, images that are smaller than the optimum dimensions will get stretched and look awful.

Your profile photo is the one that’s seen most around the site (next to posts, comments, etc.), so it’s important that your choice works well as a small, standalone image. However, if you want to get creative by making your profile pic and cover image work together, note that your profile image displays 23 pixels from the left side and 210 pixels from the top of your cover photo.

If you’re all about fast load times, it’s worth noting that Facebook recommends your cover photo be an sRGB JPG file that’s 851 pixels wide, 315 pixels tall and less than 100KB. If your image is logo- or text-based, then Facebook suggests using a PNG file to get higher quality results.

Twitter

Twitter displays profile photos really small, so it’s important to choose an image that works in miniature. Twitter also uses square profile pics, so be sure to scale yours appropriately before you upload it.

While the maximum file size for a Twitter avatar is 2MB, it will show only as 73 x 73 pixels on your profile page and a teeny 48 x 48 pixels in tweets.

However, if people click through to your profile and then click on your avatar, it will show up larger (as it will in some Twitter clients), so it’s worth uploading an image that will display bigger than the small, default sizes.

Twitter header photos can be up to 5MB in size. The recommended dimensions for these images are 1252 x 626 pixels. Bear in mind your Twitter account name, handle, bio, location and URL will all appear over your header image, so you need to consider choosing a photo that will work behind text and will not obscure the text.

Google +

Photos are a bit different on Google+, where the network crops profile photos as circles. You’ll need to consider what kind of image will work in a round format.

Your avatar is displayed 120 x 120 pixels on your profile, but not all of that will show up due to the round crop. With images showing up as small as 48 x 48 pixels in posts and just 28 x 28 in comments and other activity, this is another example of needing to choose a pic that will work well on a small scale.

The Google+ cover, or feature photo, is a tricky one, as it dynamically resizes depending on screen area. As far as measurements go, the minimum size is 480 x 270 pixels, and the recommended size is 960 x 540 pixels, but if you want your image to look good on large or retina displays, you’ll want to upload a photo that’s 2120 x 1192 pixels.

However, keep in mind that unless anyone takes the time to scroll up on the default desktop view, there is only a small area of the cover photo that will be seen on your profile — the very bottom.

YouTube

Since Google linked Google+ page identities with YouTube, your YouTube “channel icon,” or avatar, is linked to your Google+ profile photo.

YouTube offers detailed information on how to optimize your other channel imagery though, including downloadable templates to help.

Similar to Google+, your cover photo, or “channel art” as YouTube calls it, will auto-rescale to fit the size of screen on which you’re viewing a video. In order to get “optimal results on all devices,” YouTube recommends uploading a 2560 x 1440 pixel image (including a “safe area”).

The minimum display size for channel art is 1546 x 423 pixels, so you can be sure nothing within this area, such as text and logos, will be cut off.

LinkedIn

As a professional social networking site, LinkedIn has some official guidelines as to what kind of photo you can use. The site states that “a photo can be removed by LinkedIn if your profile image is not your likeness or a headshot photo,” so it’s best to stick to the basics.

With a max file size of 4MB, you can upload a square JPG, GIF or PNG. The default size for a LinkedIn avatar on your profile page is 200 x 200 pixels, but users can click to enlarge the image up to 450 x 450 pixels.

Company pages are a little different. The standard company logo displayed on LinkedIn pages is 100 x 60 pixels, and the square logo is 50 by 50 pixels. You can also upload a homepage cover photo-style image to a company page. The minimum recommended size is 646 x 220 pixels.

Image: Flickr, baldiri

The post How to Optimize Your Profile Photos Across Social Media appeared first on Digitrock.

But, beyond anecdotal evidence, it can be hard to parse just how many fans use which networks and where the greatest opportunities for marketers are. Catalyst PR, recently acquired by sports marketing titan IMG, is the latest to take a stab at quantifying where sports fans hangout online and how they can be reached.

The results of Catalyst’s survey provide some interesting food for thought.

Released this week, Catalyst’s fourth annual fan engagement study surveyed 2,100 sports fans between the ages of 16 and 64. That group encompasses fans of the NFL, MLB, NBA, college football, college basketball and soccer.

A couple of thousand fans don’t speak for everyone who follows sports, of course. But it’s an interesting starting point for considering trends in the industry. Here are a few of Catalyst’s most interesting findings:

• Nearly twice as many respondents use Facebook compared to Twitter, at 73% to 37%. But on game day, they check Twitter about 1.5 times as often as they do Facebook.

• Google+ and YouTube are on the rise among fans. When fans responded to a question about which platforms they use to “disseminate and acquire sports information,” those two platforms showed the most year-over-year growth, at 94% and 35%, respectively.

• Seven out of 10 sports fans who Like or follow a brand online say they’re open to sharing brand content, buying goods or engaging with social posts.

For more findings, check out the infographic below. Then let us know what you think in the comments.

Image: Nicolas Asfouri/AFP/Getty Images

The post How Sports Fans Engage With Social Media – Social Media Marketing appeared first on Digitrock.