The Business of Digital Podcast

Inspired by Copperfield and Chris Ramsay videos the guys dig into a number of things including how Marketing is a puzzle that fuels us and wears us down too.

Marketing Isn't Magic But..

Puzzles are everywhere and we humans seem to love them - marketers and developers perhaps love them a bit more. This episode idea came to Dave from watching some Chris Ramsay and recently a deep dive into David Copperfield's biggest illusions.

Many of us went to school or had careers prior to getting into Digital Marketing but somehow "fell" into what we do now.

For many the allure of the challenge of increasing ROI, of improving CTR, of getting more engagement, of getting that #1 ranking drives us and the challenge to solve the puzzle keeps our brain thinking and engaged.

The flip side to the puzzle is how it changes each day. We humans love change and challenges but even more is how much we crave routines and even why we crave them.

Never Ending Change in Marketing

We humans are also great at adapting. Think of your own social media habits when you started on Twitter or Facebook and what your habits are now? Customers and prospects move from one search engine to another and from one site or social network to another.

Are people moving away influencers just as marketers are getting there in some industries?

If you are someone that has done SEO for any period of time you will know that Technical SEO, Link Building, Local SEO, etc. has all changed and will keep changing. This constant change keeps us engaged and on our toes but also risks burning us out on the never ending change.

Avoiding Burnout by Saying No

Dave talks about a recent prospect call where he admits that there are things he says No to as he just can't do/know it all. With there being 50 puzzles (Paid Social, Social, Technical SEO, Local SEO, etc.) that create a larger puzzle (Digital Marketing) that roll into a larger one (Marketing) and that keep going up there is only so much each of us can do (or know).

Chris Ramsay Solving Mécanigma Puzzle Box by NKD

BERT Puzzle

With BERT being talked about so much and us mentioning it too - here is a great resource to dig into BERT.

Career Burnout in Digital Marketing

The guys dig into burnout for those that have been in "digital marketing" for 15, 20 and even 25 years.

Are You Suffering From Burnout? Here Are Signs Of The Invisible DiseaseEmployee Burnout, Part 1: The 5 Main CausesCEO Tenure RatesAverage Tenure of CMO Slips to 43 MonthsAverage Yearly Agency Turnover Rate is 30% - note there are likely MANY reasons for this number, not just burnout.

Influencer Klout Walk Back

Matt makes mention of a post by Cameron Olthuis and an influencer. If you want to read it all you can here.

What About You?

What part of the puzzles keep you going or that burn you out? Is the daily challenges and changes a good thing for you or do you find yourself getting burned out?

Dig into this podcast episode as the guys Breaking Down the 3 Click Rule, Mega Menus, Flat Sites & more with a host of great resources and tips.

What is the 3 Click Rule?

The first published mention of the 3 Click Rule came from Jeffrey Zeldman’s 2001 book, Taking Your Talent to the Web. In it he brings up an already popular rule with the web designer community: the 3-click rule.

Are Mega Menus Bad or Good?

So while this alone (and menus in general) could be a topic for a podcast the guys touch on the good and (mostly) bad of Mega Menus and how they fit into UX/UI, navigation and the 3 Click Rule.

What about if your Mega Menu requires 2-3 clicks to navigate just a menu and the user still ends up on the wrong page does that really count as a good experience? Sure the user got "somewhere" in 2-3 clicks but what if it took more? What if it isn't the correct page? What if they are on mobile and had to scroll and do additional clicks?

Test your site on your phone. Stop reading. Stop listening. Test your own menu or your clients' site and just try and find X on the site using the menus and mega menus.- Dave Rohrer

SEO & Clicks From Homepage

In an article from SEJ in 2018 the topic of click depth, URL structure and SEO were covered in a Google Webmaster Hangout.

So it’s more a matter of how many links you have to click through to actually get to that content rather than what the URL structure itself looks like.- John Mueller

Are flat sites better for SEO?

Short answer is... NO! Listen and you can hear a deeper explanation on why flat sites should be avoided.

Tips for Decreasing Click Depth

There are many more ways to decrease click depth for a page(s) but here are some that we cover:

BreadcrumbsHTML SitemapProper Pagination (see Portent article in resources for more here)Better Internal LinksCrawl Your Site and Check Click Depth

Tools for Testing Click Depth & UI/UX

HotjarGoogle AnalyticsYour Site Crawler of ChoiceFriends & RelativesShared Screen Solutions (i.e. Zoom or others)

Site Navigation Resources

3 Click RuleHow Page Depth Affects SEO PerformancePagination Experiment by PortentBotify's Page Depth CausesSEJ's Click Depth Matters & SEO URL Structure

Former FTC Commissioner & Chairwoman Maureen Ohlhausen joins for an episode to talk antitrust, FTC, fake reviews and GDPR/CCPA.

In this episode Dave, Matt and Elmer were lucky to have a special guests to dig into a number of topics that digital marketers and business owners sometimes freak out about.

If you are interested in the intersection of antitrust with other things like data security, privacy and intellectual property you can check out the 2019 Antitrust Fall Forum Tech Summit in Washington, DC in a few weeks or be on the look out for more events put on by the ABA.

Note from Dave & Matt - the following summary is just that, a summary. We tried to only summarize what Maureen (and all on the podcast) said and it is not a word for word transcript by any means. We HIGHLY encourage you to dig in and listen to get all the details. This summary is not quotes but just us trying to summarize.

Can you explain the scope of where the FTC does get involved and where it doesn't at a high level?

i.e What does the FTC do really? For the FTC's answer you can read the site.

The FTC's goal is to promote antitrust competition and to protect consumers. In short the FTC has broad authority but historically doesnt have oversite to common carriers - railroads, old phone system or airlines.

In today's world the FTC looks at mergers across a wide range of industry but gets more attention since the start of the internet is around privacy, advertising, and fraud.

The EU has the GDPR, California has the CCPA and the US has…?

The second part to the long question:

Do you see something between the GDPR and CCPA coming to all of the US?

Maureen digs into the question in two parts but also brings up some cases that the FTC in recent years has brought up or been part of.

Ashley Madison CaseEquifax Case

As far as the GDPR vs CCPA vs Something else it is likely something we will see sooner rather than later. The group digs into how and what a state by state CCPA type thing will simply be chaotic for business. Maureen points out that the GDPR was the EU's solution to this type of chaos. We shall see how the USA handles the state vs federal privacy laws and when it will happen and what it will look like.

For more on the evolving nature of the CCPA:

Analysis of Attorney General Regulations to the California Consumer Privacy Act – A SeriesCalifornia Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA)

Maureen points out that it is possible that whatever is finally passed may be setup similar to Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA).

EU Competition Law vs. US Antitrust

More specifically the question asked:

Other countries have antitrust or competition laws that are similar to but not identical to the laws in the US. How does that coordination among different countries work and what does it mean for the big tech companies?

Elmer brought up Google vs Amazon vs Microsoft vs Apple in terms of their tech and their closed eco-systems. How does the FTC and other groups see consumer choice and ease for consumers (or consumer choice) vs. tech running into antitrust.

For more on antitrust we also did an episode in late 2018 about Google & Antitrust.

What do you think will be the next "antitrust case of the century?"

In terms of future antitrust cases that the US may bring, Maureen lays out some points from the Microsoft case that may be used again in the future.

A few recent articles state similar things around Microsoft and antitrust today:5 Lessons From Microsoft’s Antitrust Woes, by People Who Lived ItThe Microsoft Antitrust Case*

Fake Reviews & Fake Followers

Matt & Dave brought up the topic of sponsored or not sponsored posts on social media, fake followers, fake reviews and how or what the FTC is doing about these things.

Maureen gave an interesting answer that we recommend you listen too but also we suggest you look and follow their guidelines. There is no silver bullet other than to follow their guidelines, flag sponsored posts, and if you are not sure check out the Federal Trade Commission Act - Section 5:

Susan Wenograd joins for an episode to dig deeper into bidding on brand terms, how to bid and some overall tips to save you money.

Thanks to a tweet by Susan (see below) and some great timing by Dave to see it we quickly jumped into record this episode. In fact this is likely the fastest idea -> record w/guest -> publish full circle episodes we have ever done!

I'm having a ton of interesting Twitter conversations about bidding on brand vs. not bidding on brand. I'm tempted to make a tweet storm about it, but figure it's probably better relegated to a blog post. :)

Should You Bid on Brand Terms?

In Episode 116 Dave and Matt dug into bidding on brand terms so this episode they let Susan dig in and give her take. Of course it depends (Dave & Susan agree on this) but in the end you need to test it.

There are a number of reasons that you should and just read on to find a large number.

Test Brand Term Bidding. Test Not Bidding.

Susan talks through a month long test they did with a large client. This client is not spending 500 or 50,000 but 100s of thousands a month and much on brand. They tested for a month turning it off and quickly turned it back on the next month. For them the test showed that the brand bidding lifted all boats.

Be aware of what else you are doing one month to another. Did you run radio or TV ads one month and not the next? Was there a large event or conference that perhaps drove more brand searches one month versus another? Be aware of the PR that may be going on to capture all searches.

Reasons to Bid on Brands

It is short sighted to build brand awareness and over $.25 to $.75 a click why not finish converting someone?Due to the SERPs changing, you can't expect Organic clicks to always capture people. Google Maps, competitors, Knowledge Graph, and a host of other options exist for people to click that are NOT the page you want them to go too.Control where they land - give offers, promote products.Capture PR waves and other radio/TV/channels brand search and not miss brand searches.Are you doing brand awareness campaigns? Do you want to miss out on an opportunity to capture them?Short term or weekend promotion - can you get an Organic page up and ranking or do you want to push the sale? i.e. Cyber Monday

Ways to Optimize Your Brand Bidding

Jobs, careers, address - these type of brand terms are likely NOT buyers. Include them in your Negative keyword lists!Names of the CEO, Founder and such should be also included into your Negative list or you should frame your Ads differently.Look at the intent and really test keywords. Test the match type and think through what someone might want, what they were looking for and just dig into the search queries (not the search term!)What are people doing once on the site? Are they engaging with the site? Are they logging into something? Are they just bouncing?

How to Keep Brand and Not Brand Separated

Dave asked Susan how or what she does to keep brand and non brand split. She recommends applying brand as a negative to all non brand campaigns. Set it as a global negative and make sure that it isn't showing up in the Search Queries going forward.

On brand campaigns she always has the brand set to modified plus.

Long Story Short From Dave, Just Test it.

In the end you need to test. Test bidding on brand. Test not. Test different landing pages. Test different ads. Test. Test Test.

The guys thought it was time to talk about how GOOD customer service can completely CHANGE a brand, SEO and business with a mini case study from Matt.

Customer service isn't just good for your SEO it is good for your BUSINESS! The guys thought it was time to talk about how GOOD customer service can completely CHANGE a brand and business with a mini case study from Matt.

How can Customer Service Help SEO?

Matt talks about how a project that he is involved with now was initially struggling and what they did to turn around the business. Did they redo the product? Nope. Did they change up their marketing strategy? Nope. They flipped how they looked at customer service and how they treated customers and prospects. Listen to what and how they did it!

Customer Service Stats

80% of people expect companies to respond to social media posts within 24 hours50% of people claim they will stop working with a company that does NOT respond to a negative social media post62% of people are influenced by negative social media posts that they would stop buying from a company32% expect a response in 30 minutes, 42% expect a response in 60 minutes

Is Customer Service Helpful to SEO?

Good lord yes. It is helpful to SEO, your Social, your retargeting - your business! But guys you keep talking about Social Media examples, how does this impact SEO?

Barnacle SEO (aka Parasite SEO)

Reviews. Your Brand. Your Reputation. It really can create a brand or reputation management issue. If every place online has bad reviews and no conversation from you the owner, it is a flag to users. So your Tripadvisor, Yelp, Google, Angieslist, G2, etc.

Even if you are able to get onto these review sites your low review score and lack of interacting will turn off prospects and hurt your brand and bottom line.

Digital Marketing Isn't A Silver Bullet

Often people think hiring someone to help with Social Media, Paid, SEO, CRO, etc. is what they need to do to grow their business. In reality they need to work on their customer service, their product or often even their business model.

Recently Ryan Jones had a great Twitter thread that we think you should also check out.