Today in Digital Marketing - Aug 24 — I BEG YOU. STOP USING THIS MUSIC. (Ep 221)

Starting point is 00:00:00 Today, here are the three reasons a Google engineer says your brand's website lost ranking. TikTok is set to move firmly into the e-commerce space. Facebook adds a handful of upgrades to its ads platform. And it wasn't just you, the web video conferencing tool of the year suffers a huge crash. It's Monday, August 24th, 2020. Happy National Parks Day, Costa Rica. I'm Todd Maffin from EngageQ Digital, and here is what you missed today in digital marketing.

Starting point is 00:00:32 I'm sure it's happened to you. You worked really hard on your brand's website. You got the SEO keywords sprinkled in all the right places. You installed a CDN to get to your site faster. And it paid off. You made it to the first page. Hell, you made it to the top three. You showed your boss, your client, your ranking, and as prophesied, they saw that it was good,

Starting point is 00:00:50 and you stayed on top for years. Then, suddenly, poof, you were gone, relegated to page two, or as it's known by SEO people, non-existent. So what happened? You didn't make any changes to your website. Your server is still fast. Google's John Mueller fielded that question recently during one of his live streamed office hours. And he says, actually, it could be one of three reasons. It's other sites, it's Google, or it's your website visitors. In general, just because a site was appearing well in search results for a number of years does not mean that it will continue to appear well in search results in the future. These kind of changes are essentially to be expected on the web.

Starting point is 00:01:34 It's a very dynamic environment. On the one hand, things on the web change with your competitors, with other sites. On the other hand, things on our side change with our algorithms in search. And finally, on the user side as things on our side change with our algorithms in search. And finally, on the user side as well, the expectations change over time. So just because something performed well in the past doesn't mean it will continue to perform well in search in the future. So let's break those down. First, other sites. Remember that Google has not just your brand site indexed, but also the site of your competitors. When they move position, you move too.

Starting point is 00:02:06 After all, there can only be one number one. If they somehow outrank you, it doesn't just push them up, it pushes everyone else down. Also, let's face it, your brand's website isn't locked down with content that never changes. You publish blog posts or add products or change service descriptions. Changes to content on websites happen all the time, and those changes can affect your ranking. Second, maybe it was Google. I'm sure you've heard of the big Google algorithm updates. Sometimes they give them code names like BERT and PANDA and MAVERICK. Those changes to their ranking criteria get a lot of attention because they're pretty big.

Starting point is 00:02:42 But what you may not realize is that Google actually tweaks its algorithm code once or twice a day. These tiny adjustments don't have large-scale impact, but they can move rankings around. And finally, maybe it was your customers who caused your website ranking to fall. One of Google's key factors in how high to rank your site is how much your website visitors like the site. How do they measure that? Bounce rate. If someone clicks a link in Google to your site, they take one look at it and hit the back button right away, Google notices and thinks, hmm, I wonder if there's something wrong with that site. So, lots to consider. Now you know why SEO is its own art and science. While we're on the topic of Google's advice, you have to admit,

Starting point is 00:03:33 they have a vested interest in keeping some things close to their chest. And while it's great that engineers like John Mueller give out advice every week on YouTube, people wonder, are we getting the straight goods here? Like, do Google's staff people sometimes just straight up lie to us in order to protect the search engine from people who want to black hat it? John Mueller himself posted a Twitter poll today that read, do you blindly believe what John Mueller says on YouTube? With more than 2,000 votes at the time I wrote the script, 34% said no, they don't always believe him. About 24% said they only believe him sometimes. 18% voted cheese. Yes, for some reason, the options included the word cheese.

Starting point is 00:04:13 I guess who doesn't love cheese? There's a link in the notes if you want to read the thread. But basically, most people who weren't going for a joke said they do believe him, but not blindly. They test first. Like Reagan said, trust but verify. TikTok this week will venture further into e-commerce. In a collaboration with a home shopping network,

Starting point is 00:04:36 they'll be broadcasting a shoppable live stream featuring a limited edition collection of clothing designed by an artist. Quoting Within.co, a video stream on TikTok Live offers early access to the collection, which will link to a pop-up page that allows customers to purchase products without leaving the app. TikTok's venture into shoppable videos will make the app more transactional, while also converting passive viewers into active shoppers, driving revenue. This experiment with shoppable videos comes at a time when companies are trying to boost e-commerce revenue, an area that has

Starting point is 00:05:11 seen a massive boost thanks to the pandemic, unquote. So yes, e-commerce, yada yada. Don't be blinded by the shiny object here. This is in fact a direct smack to Instagram, which has been building up its own shoppable platform as well. And Instagram's owner, Facebook, recently added Facebook Shops, which help brands turn their Facebook pages into online e-commerce stores. A year ago, this headline wouldn't have ever been a thing. But today, CNN, CNN reported that Zoom went down today. Apparently, first in the East Coast of the U.S., then it started to spread further as the morning went on. The outages hit the U.K. as well. Seemed to be a bad crash, too.

Starting point is 00:05:56 People couldn't visit the site. They couldn't start meetings. They couldn't start webinars. In Atlanta, public schools had been scheduled to start up virtually today using Zoom. Anyway, it does seem like they've fixed it, but if you are still having problems, it should resolve itself in the next couple of hours. A handful of nice updates to the Facebook ads platform. Looks like the Call Now call to action, the one where you can actually put a phone number in that's tappable, is no longer only available on reach campaigns. You can now use it with a website traffic campaign with mobile-only device targeting.

Starting point is 00:06:36 Toronto ad strategist Corey Dobbin, who is a longtime listener of this very podcast, this morning tweeted, The Facebook gods have answered our prayers. You can now use existing story posts as story placement ads. Note that you can't use existing stories with emojis, gifs, or stickers, and they cannot be used for carousel ads. And it looks like Instagram is now letting businesses run ads on Instagram without connecting to a Facebook ad account. This is a little strange given how much Facebook really forced businesses into a single business manager and connect their Instagram accounts that way. Maybe Zuckerberg's getting a little strange given how much Facebook really forced businesses into a single business manager and connect their Instagram accounts that way.

Starting point is 00:07:07 Maybe Zuckerberg's getting a little touchy about the antitrust investigations. And finally, can we talk about this piece of music? I hear it in every damn corporate video now. Every cute Pinterest announcement. Every, hey, we're friendly and we're just like you. Like, I don't know where this music came from or why it's so prolific, but it's everywhere. Fellow digital marketers, I think it's time we retire this one. Well, I try really hard to make this podcast a good use of your time.

Starting point is 00:07:39 Short, punchy, no rambling. And if you find it valuable, I'd really appreciate if you'd take a minute to rate and review this podcast. I've made it easier than you think. There is a link in this episode's notes. It will take you right to the review page of your app. I'm Todd Maffin. Talk to you tomorrow.

Today in Digital Marketing - Aug 24 — I BEG YOU. STOP USING THIS MUSIC. (Ep 221)

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