Today in Digital Marketing - How to Jump the TikTok Algorithm Queue

Starting point is 00:00:00 Today, your brand's website is ranking higher in Google, then why is your traffic and click-through rate down? Google's new Holiday Guide has some solid advice for e-commerce managers, your podcast download stats may look different, and the pop culture history behind a new effect being tested on Facebook organic posts. It's Thursday, November 5th, 2020. Happy Guy Fawkes Day and Bonfire Night, fellow members of Her Majesty's Commonwealth. I'm Todd Maffin from EngageQ Digital, and here's what you missed today in digital marketing. Social media content managers don't often get a bypass on the algorithms,

Starting point is 00:00:37 a way to jump the queue and guarantee your content will show up. Well, not for organic posts anyway. But every once in a while, the platforms juice their algos in such a way as to give more weight to new features. Remember when Zuckerberg was infatuated with live broadcasts? And for one glorious week or so, if your brand did a live, you'd get really good ranking.

Starting point is 00:00:58 Those temporary boosts come and go. And now a new one appears to have arrived, this one on TikTok. If you use TikTok with any regularity, you'll know they've been experimenting with a separate section where educational videos live. Now, it seems they're getting ready to launch that as a full and separate feed on the app. Right now, TikTok has two feeds, Following, which are the accounts you've followed,

Starting point is 00:01:21 and For You, which is a collection of people you've followed and other videos TikTok thinks you'd be interested in. This new setup adds a third, called Learn. Some users are seeing that third heading at the top of their feeds now. It's all part of the company's $50 million Creative Learning Fund, which it launched earlier in the year. They've given grant money to more than 800 influencers, media outlets, schools, and experts. But it seems you don't need to be one of the chosen few to get into this curated feed. Hashtagging your post with learn or providing what is clearly educational content could get you in there. It would certainly get you more higher up in the feed than relying on the more

Starting point is 00:02:00 general for you column. So here's a conundrum. Your website's position on Google has improved dramatically. That's great. But traffic to your website from Google is down also dramatically. What gives? How could that be possible? That's what a travel blogger was asking on Twitter recently. She wrote, quote, position, she means how high up the results page she is, is up in the current period over last year, but how can increased position cause a 41% loss in impressions, 60% drop in CTR, and 76% decrease in clicks? Danny Sullivan, one of the Google staff people

Starting point is 00:02:43 who are the unofficial spokespeople of the Google index replied, quote, you write about travel. The biggest factor in all of this is the pandemic. That's clearly changed interests. And you could be ranking as relevant to some places, but maybe there are some pandemic specific articles slightly more attractive to searchers, unquote. So yet another reminder that what counts to Google is the quality of your content, and how they measure that is mostly how well does your webpage answer someone's question.

Starting point is 00:03:15 Sure, there are little technical things that help, making sure your site is fast, having your metadata tags in place, but by far the number one factor, quality of content. Also with Google for a moment, they have published a new report detailing shifts in consumer behavior and a forecast of what digital and e-commerce marketers can expect for this holiday season. There's a link in the transcript of today's episode if you'd like to download it yourself, but some highlights on recent search behavior.

Starting point is 00:03:45 Searches for the phrase available near me have doubled globally when measured year over year. Also, huge jumps, as you might expect, for things like curbside pickup and online stores, which is a good reminder that if you offer curbside pickup, or it wouldn't be hard to implement, that would be a good thing to call out on your site and put in the copy of your ads. 69% of American shoppers plan to shop online for the holidays more than in previous years, and about the same number said they were open to buying from new retailers. The most important takeaway, though, I think was this one. Almost two-thirds of U.S. shoppers will start their shopping earlier this year than they usually do. Why? Because they're afraid of items being out of stock.

Starting point is 00:04:32 Now, I'm not suggesting you use phrases on your website like, better buy now in case we go out of stock. Totally not suggesting that. Again, you'll find a link to the full report in today's transcript. Did you know the full transcript of every episode, word for word, including links for more information on each story, are always available on our website, todayindigital.com. If you use Anchor as your podcast host, you may notice some changes to how it's measuring your download numbers.

Starting point is 00:05:04 This because of their recent certification by the IAB. If you use Anchor as your podcast host, you may notice some changes to how it's measuring your download numbers. This because of their recent certification by the IAB. Quoting the Spotify-owned company, Quote, We improved the way plays are counted to more precisely filter out noise and duplicate traffic. Podcast metadata and non-human downloads, such as those from bots or search engines, are no longer counted toward plays. Anchor Analytics now show your unique listeners in the last seven days, giving you an additional metric to measure your audience

Starting point is 00:05:31 and evaluate the success of your show. Unquote. The company does say some podcasters may notice what they call a very slight decline in play counts as a result of this more stringent measurement, but for the most, everything will look about the same. This change only applies to plays moving forward. Previously accrued played counts will stay the same. Sometimes, filmmakers use a particular style of filming so much that it becomes tied to their name.

Starting point is 00:06:01 Alfred Hitchcock, for instance, used the dolly zoom so much that people widely credit him with the technique's invention. You've seen this a lot in horror films. The camera lens zooms out while the camera itself is physically moved closer to the object. It creates a kind of creepy jarring effect. Same with documentary filmmaker Ken Burns, who would take still images and slightly pan or zoom them to provide a bit more of a visually interesting look than just a static image. Hitchcock didn't invent the dolly zoom, and Ken Burns wasn't the first to use the technique which today bears his name, but for whatever reason, it stuck to them. Well, Facebook is testing a Ken Burns effect on still

Starting point is 00:06:42 images uploaded as organic posts. In the screenshots being leaked on Twitter, the animation options are Flash, Slide, and Highlight. You can put a number of images in different configurations, Columns, Banner, and Frame. They do really look nice. They're definitely more eye-catching than just an image up there. It's similar to the Animate function that they added for Stories this past spring.

Starting point is 00:07:03 Funny story about Ken Burns, by the way. You'll see his name in Apple's Final Cut Pro video editing software. The effect is literally called the Ken Burns effect. Turns out, Steve Jobs actually contacted Burns to get his permission to use the name. Burns said no. He didn't believe in his name being used for commercial purposes. So Jobs sent him a bunch of equipment, and presto! The Ken Burns effect is now in the software. To be fair, Burns says he donated the equipment to a non-profit. He also says, to this day, strangers will stop him on the street

Starting point is 00:07:35 to enthusiastically describe how they used his namesake effect in their videos. Burns says, despite how his name's used in relation to video projects, he's actually not that good with technology. Calls himself a Luddite and says, most of the time, he really has no idea what these people are talking about and tries his best to make a quick escape. And wrapping up, a bug over at Hootsuite earlier today affected a number of core features.

Starting point is 00:08:03 Apparently, those issues were across the full dashboard. Looks like they've fixed that now. More than 200 digital marketers just like you are in our Slack community. Inside, you will find exclusive deep dive episodes. Jobs get posted there. People use it to get advice, all sorts of stuff. It's free to join. Just tap the link in this episode's notes or go to todayindigital.com slash slack.

Starting point is 00:08:27 Talk to you tomorrow. It's my way, but the highway Live and love and only for today And throw it all away

Today in Digital Marketing - How to Jump the TikTok Algorithm Queue

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