Tag Archives: instagram

INVERSO October

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5 REASONS FOR OPTIMISM

About the book business, from Marcus Dohle.

CHEER UP

 

WALL STREET JOURNAL SEEKS WOMEN

New ad campaign targets ambitious GenZers and Millennials, especially women. “Those generations have a huge desire to make stuff happen.”

MAKE STUFF HAPPEN

 

WHERE DO I CLICK?

Instagram changes its CTA palette to reflect dominant color of the content. A good idea?

YOU DECIDE

 

BILLBOARDS THAT TELL A STORY

That is, they really have a lot of text. Not for drivers, obviously. Could be great for excerpts though, and reasonably priced.

SEE HOW THEY LOOK

Madison Square Park, NYC

Next to Now – Late June Edition

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PLUNDER THE INFLUENCE

Influencer marketing has become more widespread, with more than 200,000 such posts a month just on Facebook Inc.’s Instagram …  “We don’t want to be in the business of tricking consumers.”

Bloomberg on labeling influencer posts that are, effectively, advertising.

Ad it up.

 

POSTERS FOR POSTERS

This week we’ve seen a pleasant example of how a dominant physical presence – in this case a subway domination at the storied West 4th Street Subway Station – can lead to a huge social media presence – in this case a retweet by Stephen King to his millions of devoted followers.

Win for Winslow!

 

THE GAME OF DUOPOLY

“Two Goliaths and Not a Slingshot in Sight.” An insightful overview of digital advertising: Google, Facebook, and [that other stuff] from The Wall Street Journal.

Perpend the pretenders . . .

Next to Now – Early March Edition

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TRUTHERS EMERGE TO DRAIN DIGITAL SWAMP

Following Procter & Gamble’s call for digital advertising that is more reliable (and less “crappy”) Stein says, “it’s interesting that we’re at a point now where we question what even is real.”*

Isn’t it?

* In a meta twist, who is “Stein?”  He is not otherwise cited or named in the article!  It may be a typo for “Scott.”

 

CHOICE OF A NEW GENERATION?

“The Refresh Project accomplished everything a social media campaign is supposed to accomplish: millions of Facebook likes and thousands of new Twitter followers. But it didn’t sell Pepsi. Pepsi Cola and Diet Pepsi both lost about 5 percent of their market shares over the course of the year — a calamitous decline. The brand returned to TV.”

Turn on, tune in, pop out.

 

CHOICE OF A MATURE GENERATION

“American users aged 24 and younger may decrease time spent on Snapchat as more people check out Instagram Stories” but those book-buying 45- to 54-year olds are helping Snapchat to grow its total audience anyway.

Instantly Snap

Next to Now for December 2016

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For our final post of 2016, we wish you a happy holidays and terrific last-minute gift-finding success for all your loved ones (pro tip: look in a bookstore).

 

FACEBOOK EXPERIMENTS WITH GREATER AD CONTROL FOR CONSUMERS

This week Facebook announced that are allowing users greater control over which ads they see. First available for blocking: ads for liquor and parenting. This is ultimately a win for advertisers as well as consumers. It is a great way to prevent wasted impressions.

#facebook

 

MARKETING HACKS FOR INSTAGRAM

Instagram’s new save feature was good news for advertisers from the moment it was announced. But some marketers have taken it a step further, exploring creative ways to use the save tool to increase consumer engagement.

#instagram

 

HOW MEN SHOP

If you’re looking to reach men for holiday shopping, look to the last-minute. According to a National Retail Federation study on Christmas shopping,

“51.2% of men (compared to 48.3% of women) said they expect to buy the last holiday gift between Monday and Sunday.”

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#lastminute #men

 

WHAT’S NEW IN RUSSIAN AD FRAUD

The New York Times reports on a Russian criminal organization that specializes in using bots to fake ad impressions, pocketing millions a day from unsuspecting advertisers.  The best ways to avoid this ad fraud is to make sure you’re working with scrupulous partners. While all programmatic companies—whether it’s Google or Turn or another—are working hard to minimize the problem they haven’t yet been able to stamp it out. The surest way to avoid ad fraud is to buy directly from sites such as NYTimes.com, rather than going through dodgy 3rd party providers.

#adfraud

Next to Now for December 16

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As the holiday season lights the way from one year to the next, this week’s ad news gives us a glimpse of what’s working, what’s not working, and what’s worth testing.

 

BANNER AD TIPS FROM BBDO

BBDO has run a study of the best performing banner ads. What they learned is worth noting:

  • Keep copy less than 5-10 words
  • Treat them like billboards
  • Make them look like ads (don’t make them look like fake edit)
  • Keep branding consistent

#banners #bestpractices #creative

 

FACEBOOK ADMITS TO MORE MEASUREMENT ERRORS

In a recent announcement, Facebook admitted to more errors in reporting likes, reactions, and shares. While we applaud their transparency, it underscores how digital reporting is built on an inherently opaque set of data. There remains an enormous amount of trust involved in seeing data from advertising partners who have an incentive to inflate results.

#facebook #social

 

INSTAGRAM NOW ALLOWS YOU TO SAVE OTHER PEOPLE’S PHOTOS

Instagram has introduced a new feature that allows you to save photos from your timeline. This will be a nifty feature for users, but is perhaps even better for businesses since it makes it easier for consumers to bookmark products they like so they can look at them later.

#instagram

Next to Now for November 4

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PUBLISHERS RETHINK TABOOLA AND OUTBRAIN

They were supposed to be the next big thing in advertising: a kind of native advertising you could book and run programmatically. But the New York Times reports that those “Promoted Stories” style ads with rows of photos and links beneath articles are falling out of favor. While we’re fans of native advertising when it’s executed with an authentic voice, real content affinity, and true transparency, we’re not big fans of “native programmatic”—a concept that seems like an oxymoron at best. As readers continue to complain and high end website continue to notice how poorly click-bait headlines look on their pages, we expect to see less of this kind of advertising going forward.

#programmatic #native

 

IS “PROGRAMMATIC” DEAD?

OK, that headline is a little click-baity. Programmatic is livelier than ever, responsible for as much as 89% of overall banner ad  buying by some counts. The question is really: has the word “programmatic” out-lived its usefulness? This “Op-Ed” by 360i’s Kolin Kleveno argues that the term is being used so frequently that it’s becoming meaningless. He argues that the true use of the term should point to two factors in a campaign—data-driven and automated—but it’s being bandied about by every ad tech vendor under the sun. That said, even if we limit the term to those two factors,it doesn’t narrow usage down much these days. With everything from applying an optimization algorithm to running ads in emails only when they’re opened, what’s *not* data driven and automated?

#programmatic

 

REDDIT UPS ITS AD OPTIONS

Reddit, the online community of communities, is introducing a new ad option that lets advertisers target users by the groups they frequent most. As Reddit is a passionate community, this is a great way to target users by interest. Because many Reddit users are also outspokenly anti-advertising, the company is wisely providing an “opt-out” option for all users. No advertiser wants to launch their product in the face of someone who would likely turn around and trash the product, just because it’s being advertised to him or her.

http://digiday.com/agencies/op-ed-time-retire-term-programmatic/

#reddit

 

RADIO STILL RULES

A post on eMarketer suggests that listeners still turn to radio for music, followed by owned music, and then by streaming services such as Pandora and Spotify. While radio doesn’t offer the campaign metrics of streaming services, it remains a great way to reach a broad and engaged group of people.

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#streaming #audio #radio

 

INSTAGRAM V. SNAPCHAT

Instagram and Snapchat are the two most popular apps for Millennials and Gen Z. But how do they fare mano a mano? Adweek compares the two based on polling and finds that they’re neck and neck. Instagram doing a little bit better with ad recall, but Snapchat ahead by a nose in quality of features and perceived “coolness.”

#instagram #snapchat #millennials

 

HOW DO SILICON VALLEY DIGITAL DARLINGS MAKE A STATEMENT?

In print. Just saying.

#slack #apple #microsoft #print

 

BUT PRINT IS GOING TO NEED A LOT MORE STATEMENTS . . . AND QUICK

Columbia Journalism Review points to the massive decline in print ad revenue at major papers such as The Wall Street Journal—and how we’re seeing the real effects of those declines now.

#cjr #wsj #print

 

photo (c) 2016 Martha Otis

Next to Now for October 7

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THE NEW YORK TIMES GOES ALL-IN WITH FLEX

For the past year, the New York Times digital team has been testing a “Flex frame unit” that works seamlessly across devices and integrates more smoothly with the reading experience—including several tests with Verso clients. The overwhelmingly positive results of those test has led the New York Times to begin phasing out standard display units in favor of  the Flex frame unit. This does not signal the death of the standard IAB ad unit—300×250, 728×90, 160×600—yet. But it does signal that sites and platforms need to continue to evolve the best way to show ads to readers in ways that inform and delight. Here is the WSJ on the story.   

#nyt #flexframe

 

“HOW ADVERTISING WORKS TODAY”

A recently released study from the Advertising Research Foundation, “How Advertising Works Today,” investigates best practices for advertising across TV, print, radio and digital in 45 countries. Here are the key takeaways cited by Marketing Land: 

  • “Spending across multiple platforms delivers greater ROI than investing in single platforms.” For example, a campaign across two platforms generally delivers 19 percent more return on investment than on one platform. For three platforms, it’s 23 percent more; for five, 35 percent.

  • “There is actually a “kicker effect” when television is added back to digital spending.” Digital plus TV, the report found, can increase ROI 60 percent.

  • “This is also true for millennials who consume both traditional and new media.” Even for consumers aged 18 to 24, for instance, the optimal mix was found to be 71 percent traditional media (TV, radio, print) and 29 percent digital (including video, display and paid search). In other words, it’s not just mobile.

  • “’Silo investing’ in some digital formats too heavily can have diminishing returns and even cause sales to decline.” However, this finding was derived primarily from banner desktop ads — not exactly the most engaging format.

  • And the most impact for creative comes from an approach that is unified/connected across platforms, but tailored to each platform. “When campaigns are unified [creatively] across platforms,” ARF SVP Dr. Manuel Garcia-Garcia told the audience at the presentation, “memory activation is enhanced.”

While book publishing budgets do not often allow for including TV in the ad mix, it’s worth noting the bolded bit again based on the 5,000 campaigns included in the study: “The optimal mix was found to be 71 percent traditional media (TV, radio, print) and 29 percent digital.”

#data #research #mix

 

“CAPTIVATE VERSUS AGGRAVATE”

The same article in Marketing Land points to a study conducted by mobile ad firm Kargo together with neuroscience research firm MediaScience called, “Captivate vs. Aggravate.” The study looks at performance of common mobile units—the Adhesion Banner, the In-Stream Banner, the Interstitial—as well as a unit proprietary to Kargo called the Sidekick. It found that of the three common units, the Adhesion Banner had “fewer people [looking] at these banners for less time. Interstitials were considered the most “annoying,” drawing attention mostly from people looking for the X to make the ads go away. In-Stream Banners got the most positive results for time spent looking at the ad as well as for feelings about the product.

#mobile

 

CAN A NEWS BRAND GAIN TRACTION ON INSTAGRAM?

A report from Digiday suggests that Fox News is taking advantage of Instagram’s recent approval of longer video clips to gain a major audience on the platform.  With over 3 million comments, likes and regrams in September—growing faster than Business Insider, Washington Post and BuzzFeed, and out performing such stalward social news powerhouses ads the New York Times, BBC and CNN. Digiday notes a similar success for the brand on Facebook, and we would add that this report is consistent with the high engagement we’ve seen with ads across Fox News platforms. If you provide content that appeals to the conservative audience, a digital campaign on Fox News is one of the best ways to reach them.

#instagram #fox

 

CELEBRATING AMARO

We are thrilled to welcome into the world a bouncy bundle of bitter joy, AMARO: The new book that gives you a delicious introduction to  the bitter liqueurs known as Amaro by drinks expert, Ten Speed author, and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Director of Culinary Marketing, Brad T. Parsons. Here’s a link to the New York Times piece on the book. A book authored by a Verso client at one esteemed publishing house and published by another? That’s AMARO. Cheers!

#amaro #drinksforeveryone

 

Photo taken under the stars in Brooklyn during a celebration for AMARO's publication (c) 2016 T. Thompson

Next to Now: Friday links for Sept 9.

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PODCAST ADS CREATE HALO EFFECT

While podcasts still don’t deliver the ad metrics of other digital products, evidence continues to mount that podcast advertising is effective.  A new Edison Research study commissioned by the IAB suggests that 65% of podcast fans “are more willing to consider purchasing products and services they learn about during a podcast.”

#podcasts

 

INSTAGRAM IS BIG & GROWING WITH MILLENNIALS

Four charts from eMarketer show how Instagram’s U.S. audience is substantial and growing, that more than half of US millennial internet users are “active” on Instagram, how the app is favored by college students, and how their user base trends toward higher incomes among U.S. teens.

#instagram #millennials #social

 

INSTAGRAM IS KING FOR RETAILERS

As reported in Mediapost, a new study from research company L2 suggests that Instagram is the top social platform for retailer engagement:

“’Instagram remains the king of engagement,’ with interactions that are ’10 times higher than Facebook, 54 times higher than Pinterest, and 84 times higher than Twitter.’

It also says Instagram users are considerably more open to what brands have to say on that platform, with 50% of users following brands. ‘Not all brands are benefiting equally on the platform,’ it says, ‘with the top seven brands in terms of engagement capturing 77% of total Index brand interactions over the past year.’

Further, a third of Instagram users made purchases on their phone, which makes them 70% more likely to do so than non-Instagram users.”

#instagram #retailers

 

WHY FACEBOOK LIVE IS WRONG FOR ADVERTISERS

In an article for Ad Age, Carrie So argues that Facebook Live mid-roll ads are stuck in the past: 

“Essentially, the concept strives to resurrect the 20th-century TV broadcasting model within the context of a 21st-century social network. Having just recently started testing mid-roll ads, Facebook Live wagers that viewers who log onto the site to see photos and updates from family and friends will not only want to watch live broadcasts — but will also stay tuned for the ads that scroll in the midst of the live programming.”

The two main problems: (1) mid-roll ads are easy for users to skip since it’s so easy to put down your phone during a break in the programming, and (2) there’s a distinct lack of quality control; even major publishers such as the New York Times are forced by their deals with Facebook to stream too many video hours to sustain high standards.

#facebook #streaming #video

 

AD FRAUD REPORT POINTS TO CHROME AND INTERNET EXPLORER

A recent ad fraud report cited by the Wall Street Journal suggests the most ad fraud happens with Google’s Chrome and Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browsers. While both companies fault the study, it’s clear that since the two companies have the most users they also make the most attractive targets for fraudsters. While Microsoft has failed to patch security holes on IE (especially discontinued but still popular iterations), Google continues to work hard to try to stay ahead of the fraud where possible.

#adfraud #microsoft #google

 

PEW RESULTS ON AMERICAN READERSHIP

The Pew report on reading in America is out, with results in line with what we’ve seen in recent years: overall adult reading is slightly down, ebooks remain plateaued, and the core demos of America’s strongest readers remain affluent, educated women:

“In the most recent survey, those most likely to be book readers included women; young adults (those ages 18-29); [and] those with higher levels of education and higher household income . . . These patterns largely hold for overall book reading and for the different reading platforms – printed books and e-books.

“The average woman read 14 books in the past 12 months, compared with the nine books read by the average man, a statistically significant difference. The median number of books read by women was five, compared with a median of three for men, which was not statistically significant.

“Those with higher levels of education were more likely to have read multiple books than those with high school diplomas or less. The typical college graduate or someone with an advanced degree read an average of 17 books in the previous year, compared with nine for high school grads and three for those who did not graduate from high school.”

#pew #readers #demos

 

FACEBOOK’S FIRST VERTICAL VIDEO ADS

The first vertical video ads have gone live on Facebook, and the results suggest a 3x improvement in performance and efficiency. This might be simply an example of a format getting increased attention mostly because it’s new, but given how video and social consumption have moved to mobile, we do think vertical video is here to stay.

#facebook #video

 

BILLBOARDS CONTINUE TO MAKE NEWS

The New York Times reports on the continued importance of out of home advertising, even as online ads steal budgets from print and broadcast. The continued growth of digital innovation with billboards—both with creative and with user targeting—means the venerable ad platform is just as vital today as it was 100 years ago.

#outofhome

 

MOBILE APPS CONTINUE TO GROW

An article in Marketing Land points to a new report from ComScore that shows that two-thirds of all time is spent on mobile, and over half of time spent on mobile happens within apps.  But while mobile has most total user hours, desktop still is king of the conversion. When the consumer is ready to pull the trigger, s/he still heads for the desktop. Here’s Business Insider’s take on the ComScore report.

#desktop #mobile #apps

 

Ceiling photo detail (c) 2016 Martha Otis

Next to Now for August 25

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IS THE FUTURE OF ADVERTISING A BOT?

Venture Beat details how messenger bots in services such as Facebook Messenger, Kik, and more are changing the nature of how we can advertise, bringing the promise of 1:1 customized marketing closer to fruition. While current messenger bots are fairly crude, more nuanced bots are in development:

“A.I. bots with advanced brains . . . will change the advertising industry — both online and offline — forever. They can create and deliver completely measurable advertising campaigns that bring together all the elements of integrated marketing: video, mash-ups, voice, music, images, photos, personalization, and mass coverage on an individual basis. They do this by automating their analysis of ‘conversation logs’ generated in the code’s back end when you interact with a bot — with your permission, of course.”

#bots #messaging

 

INSTAGRAM KEEPS UP THE PACE OF INNOVATION (OR IS THAT COPY-CATTING?)

On the heels of introducing its version Snapchat Stories, Instagram introduces a new channel called “Events” that will live within its “Explore” tab and allow for live video. Innovation or high-speed copy-catting, either way it will prove a serious entry in the live video market with Periscope and Facebook Live.

#events #streaming #video

 

IN HOLIDAY EMAIL MARKETING, IS GREEN THE NEW BLACK?

A study from Yes Lifecycle Marketing suggests that the best time to send a holiday marketing email might be December 12, 2016—a date dubbed “Green Monday.” A retail industry-created holiday like Black Friday or Cyber Monday, Green Monday  falls on the second Monday of December:

“Only 10% of retailers deployed Green Monday campaigns in 2015, according to Yes Lifecycle Marketing, indicating that competition for the inbox may be lower than more popular retail holidays such as Black Friday or Cyber Monday.

Green Monday saw an average email open rate of 14.5% in 2015, while open rates for Cyber Monday email campaigns has an average open rate of 12.9%. In addition, Cyber Monday open rates fell year-over-year while Green Monday open rates have increased.”

#email #holiday

 

THE STATE OF FACEBOOK (FOR MARKETERS)

eMarketer posts seven charts about the current state of Facebook: over-35-year-olds v. millennials, mobile v. desktop use, and more.

#facebook #userdata

Corn at Union Square Market photo (c) 2016 Martha Otis

Next to Now: Fresh Tips for Book Advertisers

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TO STRIVE, TO SEEK, TO SHARE, BUT NOT TO READ

Click Z reports on a study that reveals that most shared items are never read:

“In news that will embolden some, depress others and possibly surprise nobody, a new study by computer scientists at Columbia University and the French National Institute reveals that 59% of links shared on social media have never actually been clicked.”

At least for advertising purposes, web sharing still shows an increased level of engagement. But it’s not necessarily as complete a transaction of enthusiasm as we would like. The ClickZ article does a good job of going in depth into engagement numbers across several platforms and reveals why huge follower counts are often inversely proportional to click through rate. So we really do think you should click on this link and read it!

#social #sharingiscaring #butnotnessarilyreading

REDDIT IS BUILDING SAFE (WELL, SAFER) TOOLS FOR ADVERTISERS

Reddit comment streams have been difficult waters for advertisers to navigate, since the flow of talk can turn negative very quickly. Recently, Reddit has been working on some advertiser-friendly tools that are encouraging big brands to start exploring, gingerly, paid ads on some of the site’s threads. Adweek reports:

“In March, Reddit poached Google engineer Toby Segaran to build out an ad-tech platform. In his first three months, Segaran has launched programmatic buying and a search-based targeting tool akin to Google’s AdWords that lets marketers zero in on chatter surrounding specific keywords. Given the site’s volatile nature, there are also some clever workarounds with Reddit’s technology that avoid negative chatter altogether in subreddits.”

#reddit

TWITTER OFFERS MORE VIDEO DATA FOR ADVERTISERS

Starting this week, Twitter is offering increased engagement metrics for all advertisers that use their Amplify program. The announcement is part of Twitter’s recent overall emphasis on video advertising:

“Twitter and video company Innovid have announced a partnership that gives Amplify advertisers—Twitter’s premium offering that runs preroll ads before video clips from 300 media partners including AOL, BuzzFeed and ESPN—viewability stats and numbers about who is watching their ads. Amplify is a revenue-sharing program that splits ad money between content creators and Twitter.”

#twitter #video

CUSTOM PODCASTING

As podcasting continues to grow with the success of shows like Reply All, Death Sex and Money, and Serial, some podcasting media groups are starting to create stand-alone podcasts for brands. While we continue to believe in the benefits of advertising on podcasts with existing highly engaged audiences, it is worth considering a custom podcast to help boost a book series with an established brand to help grow its dedicated audience.

#podcasting

INSTAGRAM IS GETTING MORE FEMALE

A chart released by eMarketer shows that Instagram’s proportion of female users has been growing since 2014 and is set to continue to grow in the near future:

instagram userseMarketer comments:

“More than one in four people in the US will use Instagram regularly this year, making it the second most popular social network in the country after Facebook. According to recent research, women are more active than men on Instagram and prefer the platform more than other social networks for engaging with brand content.”

Since the book buyers are predominantly female, that makes Instagram a player to watch for book advertising going forward. The link to the eMarketer article works for subscribers only. 

#instagram #targeting

 

photo at Union Square Market (c) Martha Otis