What’s Hot
SEO Spotlight: Tips & Myths
You’ve probably heard time and time again that SEO is crucial for your business.
And I’m here to drill that home one more time.
SEO is crucial for several reasons.
First off, it helps drive organic traffic to your site, which means more targeted visitors who are likely
to convert into customers.
Second, a higher ranking in search engine results builds trust and credibility with your
audience. When your website appears at the top of the search results, users perceive it as more
trustworthy and authoritative. This increased trust can lead to higher click-through rates and ultimately more conversions.
Here’s 5 easy tips you can implement to start ranking higher.
- Keyword Research
- Keyword Optimization
- Quality Content Creation
- Build High-Quality Backlinks
- Improve Site Speed
Remember, SEO is a long-game. It takes time to implement and start seeing results. For a full
breakdown of the 5 tips to implement – read the entire article from our blog here:
There’s a lot of content out in the world right now surrounding SEO. With that in mind, it’s important
to sniff out the myths or false information you should avoid. We’ve compiled a list of 5 misconceptions you need to know when it comes to SEO.
5 Misconceptions about SEO
1. “More Links > More Content”
While this may have been something you were taught previously, the SEO world is constantly changing. Building links is still extremely important, but it shouldn’t be valued higher than the content you’re creating. One of the best and easiest ways to start receiving those high-quality backlinks is through
creating engaging content that other sites will want to link to.
2. “Only Link Internally To Your Own Site”
One of the most important factors when it comes to ranking higher when it comes
to SEO is providing value. One of the best ways that Google and other search engines
recognize that value is when you link externally to provide additional information. Google isn’t going to knock you down for sharing information from another website, in fact, they’re actually going to look for you to do that.
3. Local SEO Isn’t Important
If you’re a local mom-and-pop shop, optimizing your website and content for local search is one of the quickest ways to increase traffic into your store. It not only helps a person find you, but it helps local people find you who are more likely to visit your store. 46% of all searches on Google are seeking local information!
4. Mobile Optimization Doesn’t Matter
Fact: Over 60% of Google Searches are done on a mobile device. Meaning more often than not, your target customer is using their phone to search for new products or offers. This means if you’re not optimizing your site for mobile, you’re completely missing out on a huge chunk of your potential customers.
5. Meta Descriptions Affect My Ranking
Now I know this may be a shock, but the meta description has no real impact on your keyword rankings. That doesn’t mean it’s not important! What your meta descriptions DO impact is your click-through-rate – or the number of people who see your article or website on Google and decide to click and visit your site. Keep it around 160 characters for maximum effect.
SEO can be daunting. When done incorrectly, it can set you back months or even years. When done correctly, you can overtake your competition and become a dominant leader in your space.
Copy Corner
What People Really Buy When We Offer Information Products!
There’s a bit of confusion when it comes to marketing info products like courses, masterminds, coaching, newsletters, etc.
On the surface, it “looks” like we are selling “education.”
In a technical sense… yes.
However, that is NOT what prospects are actually buying.
When someone is looking to buy an info product on… let’s say… flipping real estate for profit… what they WANT… what they are actually buying is…
TRANSFORMATION!
They are buying the hope that this course will transform their IDENTITY and financial situation into that of a successful investor. The education is a NECESSARY EVIL.
They don’t want it if it could be helped.
That’s why DONE FOR YOU services sell very well.
(Remember: One of the four emotions that must be conveyed in copy most of the time is… EASY. The opportunity is easy to take advantage of. The result wanted is easy to achieve. Etc.)
What they want is to transform into a successful real estate investor (identity) who can do profitable deals.
This is very subtle and nuanced… and… therefore… missed by most marketers who don’t quite see behind the “matrix”.
This is also why marketers who really understand the game generally stay away from words like education… learn… work… study…etc.
All of these convey time intensive labor. They conjure up images of having to sit still in class
while a boring teacher yaps endlessly about Charlemagne and the Magna Carta.
Meanwhile the student is daydreaming about seeing his girlfriend at the kegger on Saturday night.
Education… learn… work… study… is NOT what they want to buy.
This point is critical to understand.
Focus on the transformation they want and minimize the “work” (like getting educated) they don’t really want in all marketing… and… usually… you get a much higher response.
Is there an exception? Yes!
When selling to people who you KNOW value education or hard work.
You can’t guess, though. You have to know the market.
P90X sold hard work, suffering in the gym, sweating, and straining to ex-high school and ex-college jocks, former semi-pro athletes and military personnel (like Marines) who either wanted to get in shape like they used to be way back when… OR… who had to be in shape to keep their job. They loved the idea of “no pain, no gain”.
But this is the minority of the population. When in doubt, err on the side of transformation without the hard work.
Use copy that allows prospect to “picture with pleasure” the end result they want.
CASE STUDY: The Art of Ad Optimization
Our creative team is constantly looking for new ways to optimize and improve our clients’ ad campaigns and performance.
One of our core values is “Results Rule. Period.” – so we gather data and insights from the results of our ads, and apply the learnings to the next batch of creative we produce.
A perfect example of this can be seen in one of our latest campaigns for a client called Bellus Academy.
We’ve been running a Meta campaign for Bellus that promotes a free guide for users titled “The Ultimate Guide to Starting a Career in Beauty.”
One set of ads we’ve been running was focused on highlighting the bright future of the beauty industry.
Our thought process was “what better way to get someone interested in a beauty career than show them their job security in the future will be great?”
The ad that was responsible for 61% of our leads this month is below:
This ad compares the “human touch” to Artificial Intelligence, highlighting the fact that AI will never be able to replace humans in the beauty industry, something that not many industries can say the same about.
When our team saw that this ad was performing well, we decided to make a few more iterations of it to keep fueling the fire.
Here’s a concept we came up with, sharing the design format of the previous ad, but now comparing Bellus to its competitors, as well as the prospects “before” and “after” state of attending Bellus Academy.
Although this is still an ongoing test, early results have indicated that this ad will beat out the previous versions.
Moral of the story is never stop optimizing! You never know when a small tweak or change can result in a big increase in ROAS.
DSA: Social Media Day Recap
As Strikepoint continues to build a strong presence in the world of Social Media and content creation, I was fortunate enough to be asked to speak at DSA: Social Media Day 2023 along with Strikepoint’s Chief Digital Officer Erin King.
There were some serious heavy hitters in action.
Scott Kramer, Mike Ganino, Henna Pryor, and Frazier Brooks were a few of the names speaking during the jam-packed day.
If you’ve ever wanted to learn how to unlock social media success for your personal brand, look no further. My keynote was all about how you can leverage insights from big brands to scale your personal brand with social media.
One of Strikepoint’s core values is Deposit More Than You Withdraw. We’re always trying to add immense value for all of our readers – and we want to help take your social media to the next level.
If you’re a brand or business looking to elevate your social media presence, click here to get a complimentary Social Scorecard from the Strikepoint team.
We’ll audit your social media for the following 7 key performance indicators:
- Brand Alignment
- Content Mix
- Frequency
- Engagement
- Relevance
- Responsiveness
- Social Proof
What are you waiting for? Get started with your custom Social Scorecard today.
Speaking of social media – we briefly touched on this in last month’s report, but I wanted to re-emphasize the importance of the TikTok Ads Library.
This resource gives you the ability to research based on advertiser name OR keyword, giving you even more data to sift through. This allows you to keep closer tabs on your competition, while also allowing you to source new ideas and inspiration.
In addition to the TikTok Ads Library, TikTok has also begun improving the functionality of their pixels by collecting and using landing page information such as metadata and button clicks, two things they previously did not collect.
This new information will allow TikTok to provide recommendations on how to enhance your pixel event setup and even offer automated solutions for doing so. This can improve your ad delivery to better optimize future ad campaign delivery.
What’s Hot At Strikepoint
Can you believe we’re already into Q4? Time really is flying this year. We’ve had ups and downs like any industry, but we’re still thriving and growing!
Strikepoint was lucky enough to find two new rockstars to add to the team this past month – Welcome Dan and Nate!
Dan is joining us as our Media Buying Director, and he’s hit the ground running providing our team with new strategies and insight that have already had a huge impact on client campaigns.
Nate has joined our Direct Audience Bookings team as Director of Advertising Monetization.
We’re so glad to have the two of them on board, and we wish them both the best!
On top of adding to our team, when members of Strikepoint go above and beyond, we always like to honor and recognize them with a well-deserved promotion. That’s true for Natalie Buntich, who has embodied our core values and has made a huge impact in less than a year. She was recently promoted to Project Manager and we’re so proud of her! Congrats Natalie!
Are you shopping around potential agencies?
So many clients have shared their horror stories with us that we’ve made it our full-time job to prove that we’re different. Notice any of these red flags with your agency? Then it’s time for a change. We’ll be right here whenever you’re ready.
As we approach Halloween, expect to see a shift in ads and messaging to embrace the spooky season, especially in the eCommerce and DTC world.
That’s it for this month’s edition of the C2C Report!
As always, if you have a question, or if there’s anything you’d like to see more of or that we can do better, please shoot me an email and let me know directly.
Jeremy Blossom
CEO, Strikepoint Media
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