The Revenue-Driven CMO

Welcome back to another episode of More Than Marketing. I’m your host, Arsham Mirshah. I’m so excited to be with my main man, Nick Brown. He’s an account director, and I have so much respect for Nick because he straddles the line of marketing and technology so well. He can translate what marketing’s trying to do to the development team. He’s a renaissance man. He does a little bit of everything. In this case, what he does really well, and what we’re talking about today, is Google Ads Geo Customizers.

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Transcript:

– [Nick] The more specific you can get to what they’re looking for, the higher click the rate, the higher conversion rate, the better the user experience, and that’s ultimately what we’re trying to give is the best user experience overall, right?

– Hey, hey, welcome back. Another episode of More than Marketing. I’m your host, Arsham Mirshah. I’m so excited to be with my main man Nick Brown today. Nick, I don’t even know what to say. He’s an account director here, marketing manager. Title doesn’t matter. I think you know this, but let me just say it. I have so much respect for Nick because he straddles the line of marketing and technology so well. He can translate what marketing’s trying to do to the development team. Hey, we need to track this this way, because I need to report on it this way, or I need this system integrated with that, and I just respect that you understand the underlying technology and how it works, and I don’t know where that came from. You tell me, where did that come from?

– My background in tinkering and breaking things and fixing them and having to understand how they work. That’s like kind of, I don’t know, something that I’ve always learned. I come from a construction background with my family and that’s where that–

– He’s a tinkerer.

– Yeah, comes from. I like to break things, figure out how they work, and then try and fix them.

– He’s a renaissance man. He does a little bit of each. He does a little bit of everything. Some things better than others.

– Oh, absolutely.

– In this case, what you do really well, and what we’re talking about today, is Google Ads, and in particular, getting pretty technical with it, but you’re not technical. You tell me.

– I don’t think it’s necessarily technical. I think this is something that your everyday ads manager can definitely take. There is a little bit of tech language to it, but Google’s made it so simple that you can get the bases and the starting points right off the bat from them, and then there’s a lot of people out there that have done this type of thing.

– A lot of daily imitation.

– Not necessarily what we’re gonna talk about today, but there’s a lot of other ways you can utilize what we’re about to talk about in a more global sense, so it’s definitely more for the everyday person that’s an ads manager instead of just someone that has a ton of tech and scripting background.

– Okay, and so we’re talking about Google Ads customizers. Right? And so tell me what is Google Ads customizers. What is that?

– Google allows you to pull in information that’s different for every user that searches for an ad. There’s some great examples about these, but before we talk about that, I’m sure some ads managers are immediately like, oh, this is probably gonna be scripting in the backend.

– No, not scripting.

– No, this is all done right in-platform, and it’s super simple to do,

Welcome back to another episode of More Than Marketing. I’m your host, Arsham Mirshah. Our CTO, Dave Brong, will be discussing everything that can go wrong when your website security gets compromised and how to prevent that. We’ll mention tools and techniques you can use to prevent hacks, breaches, and employees from sharing sensitive data that can damage your company’s reputation.

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Transcript:

– [Dave] Security is not just about breaches. It’s not about just getting that information lost or stolen. It’s about what can actually happen to it. Can you go in and change a record? What’s gonna happen to it?

– Hey everyone, Arsham Mirshah your host, More Than Marketing, we’re back. Today I’m with Dave Brong, Dave Brong’s a CTO here at WebMechanix. We’re gonna talk about security. It’s More Than Marketing, true to the name, we gotta talk about security. Right Dave, you’re a CTO here, you see it.

– Yeah, it’s war stories, it’s horror stories, it’s everything that can go on when you’re not thinking about what’s going on. It’s going down to locking your door at your house at night.

– We promise not to make this very fearmongering, we’re talkin’ before this where we’re like should we drive fear into their hearts? But the answer’s no, let’s not do that. Instead, let’s get some practical tips, let’s discuss the topic a little bit and get some practical tips, so that’s what we’ll do. Alright, so gettin’ started Dave, you’re a CTO here at WebMechanix Digital Agency, so you see a lot of websites. You manage a lotta websites, you host a lotta websites, right?

– Yep, we maintain somewhere around 100, 110 different websites.

– So you know the different complexities of them, the different content management systems, mostly WordPress in our case, and how vulnerable is WordPress?

– WordPress itself, as a product is very secure. It has the community around it that open source product, very, very secure, very quickly updated also, if there is an issue. It’s the plugin ecosystem you have to worry about, because there are so many plugins available, that nobody maintains well, anybody can write it, anybody can publish a plugin.

– I see that too, just because you know, my friends kinda know I’m a tech guy, I’m whatever guy, and some of ’em run blogs and are like hey, help me out with my blog. And so I’m like okay, give me admin access. So they give it to me, I go to the WordPress blog, what do I see?

– 50 plugins.

– That was the exact number I was gonna use, exact number. 50 plugins dude.

– 30 active and a lotta inactive ones.

– Inactive, how many are out of date, right? And it’s just like well no wonder your thing is slow, your site is busted, this and that, right? Nah I get it, that’s kinda the. Also the benefit of WordPress is someone who doesn’t have–

– It’s so extensible, you can add stuff in so quickly when you need to. The consideration on the backend side of it is what are you actually doing in the first place? Are you just trying to solve an issue quickly, or really think about the long-term benefit of your site?

– And I think that’s the thing, I think that’s the problem is the plugin is like okay, quick fix, right? It’s like instant messenger, I got a quick kinda.

– Just want it done so I can move on to my next task.

– Yeah, so I can move on to the next thing. And then the problem with that is plugin goes out of date,

Oops! For the More Than Marketing Show, I forgot to add the correct direct download link to the latest podcast episode (#14), so it uses the wrong episode audio for anyone who is following us through a podcast platform like iTunes or Castbox. Since it takes up to 24 hours to refresh the feed and […]

Welcome back to another episode of More Than Marketing. I’m your host, Arsham Mirshah. I’m joined by Paul Field, a marketing consultant who has worked for decades in the highest levels of the advertising industry, including in New York. Early in his career, Paul would see people in meetings lead the discussion and have their thoughts and recommendations respected. Over the years, he’s developed a framework called The Essential Seven to help you recreate these results in your meetings, approach marketing assignments efficiently, and identify important problems and opportunities for a business.

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Transcript:

– [Paul] The Essential Seven is solving marketing problems and getting the right answer at the right time. I welcome anybody who has a marketing kind of an assignment to use this as a framework.

– Hey, hey, we’re back. Another episode of More Than Marketing with me. I’m your host, Arsham Mirshah. Today, joined by the infamous Paul Field.

– Infamous indeed.

– Infamous indeed. Really excited to have Paul here because Paul, first off, he was in the Marines. So we’re gonna thank you for your service.

– Thank you.

– First and foremost.

– Thank you for the thank you.

– Of course, a lot of respect there. And also a lot of respect, this is Mad Men. Mad Men, he was literally hanging out with Don Draper. Don Draper, the character, on Madison Avenue. What was it, 285 Mad–

– 285 indeed.

– 285 Madison Avenue in the late ’60s, ’70s.

– Yep.

– So, that’s– We literally have a Mad Men of the agency world with us today on the podcast. Really excited to have you. Thanks for being here.

– Thank you. Thrilled to be here.

– It’s really cool and Paul’s also been consulting us here at WebMechanix. And he’s got a lot of good stuff to add, a lot of stuff we can learn from your years of experience.

– Thank you.

– Yeah, so thank you for that as well. And today, what are we– First of all, I’d love if you can kind of give a little bit more about your background.

– Okay.

– To start off.

– Well Sham mentioned that I was in the Marines. I found myself a year out of college commanding 15 Marines in Vietnam. And when that was over I found myself with Young and Rubicam, 285 Madison Avenue, being yelled at by the most junior copywriters and art directors.

– My how the times have changed.

– Quite a transition. But anyway, I spent a career in advertising, working for a couple of the best agencies in America, in New York. And then I ended up in Baltimore as Senior Vice President of a large agency for 17 years. And after that I started consulting with agencies and with their clients and branding. I have refocused the brands of some 23 companies in the last few years. And worked with–

– Wow.

– 20 or 30 agencies. So, I have some experience in marketing.

– Seen a thing or two.

– I’ve seen a thing or two.

– About the marketing and advertising world, agency and, but always agency side, right? You haven’t been on the client side?

– Well, early on after I started at Young and Rubicam, I thought I’d like to see what the client side was like.

– Uh-huh.

– So I went to work for Avon which at the time–

– Okay.

– Was at 30 Rock. And I had some exciting experiences on the 43rd floor of 30 Rock.

– Okay, cool. So you had that end as well.

– And I decided I like the agency side better.

Every day, new social media apps emerge with the intent of going viral. Some are focused on connecting people through personal statuses, some focus on growing business relationships, and others simply provide answers to questions.

A majority of the time, these new social media platforms don’t achieve a large enough user base to leverage advertising in order to fund their continued development, marketing budget, and overall profitability. This becomes the case for most apps, making it virtually impossible for them to survive among the giants.

But then there are times when a social media network grows to millions of active daily users, creating a domino effect that, in turn, makes it one of the most commonly downloaded apps.

Regarding the latter, I’m talking about Reddit: the front page of the internet.

It’s a fitting slogan—Reddit is the 19th most popular website on the internet (6th in the U.S. at the time this blog was published), with over 330 million average monthly active users and 14 billion average page views per month. No matter what industry your target market is in, you’ll likely find potential customers on Reddit.

Sound like a platform brimming with opportunity? That’s because it is—keep reading to learn how you can integrate Reddit advertising into your digital marketing strategy.

The front page of the internet: What is Reddit?

Reddit is a unique social media platform that allows a diverse community of users and interests to come together via posts, comments, and a simple upvote “karma” system that launches the most popular content to the front page. The official Reddit app was launched in April 2016, making it easier for users to find, submit to, and interact with over 137,000 active subreddits—self-moderated forums that revolve around a single topic of interest, like photography, video games, or life advice.

Reddit describes itself as a growing family of millions of diverse people sharing the things they care about the most. That statement could not be more accurate and is the driving force for new advertisers adopting the platform as part of their digital marketing strategy.

It’s unlike any social network we’ve ever seen. The site’s users—Redditors—form a tight-knit community that supports the app and its contributors.

How to advertise on Reddit

Just about anyone can run Reddit ads. In fact, doing so is getting easier and better every year. In March 2017, Reddit redesigned the interface of its ad platform, adding in new metrics and abilities to make the dashboard more useful to advertisers.

To start, you can head over to redditinc.com/advertising/ or click the Advertise link in the sidebar on the home page, both of which take you to ads.reddit.com. From there, you can set up your account and begin building out your campaigns, audiences, and ads.

Reddit ads are broken down into a structure similar to that of the Facebook ads manager:

* Campaign. Here, you decide on your campaign name and objective (which includes metrics such as brand awareness/reach, traffic, conversions, and video views).

* Ad group. In this section, you define your budget, bid, and schedule in addition to your targeting (by location, subreddit, or interest). Interest targeting can be as broad as “animals and pets” or as specific as particular sports, like track & field, or genres of television, like anime, comedy, and so on.

* Ads. This is where you actually create your ad. You can build out your ads using customized ad copy, images, or videos (which can be up to 15 minutes long),

Welcome back to another episode of More Than Marketing. I’m your host, Arsham Mirshah. I am joined by Miss Charlee Bonne, a senior digital media strategist, specializing in B2B social media marketing. We’re gonna be discussing:

* why should B2B use social media (and reasons they’re on Facebook even if you think they aren’t)

* B2B social media marketing tips

* the current social media advertising landscape

* emerging techniques and platforms make her most excited

* what formats and B2B marketing strategies on social media are working and not working right now

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Transcript:

– [Charlee] It’s not new anymore, so you have to do something to keep people there and keep people engaged, and reel them in. Excitement is gone, and a little lackluster, so I think they need to keep changing in order to keep our attention.

– Welcome back to another episode of More Than Marketing. I’m your host, Arsham Mirshah. I am joined by Miss Charlee Bonne, not Charles.

-Yes.

– Charlee with two Es, a female, right?

– Yes, thank you.

– I’m sorry that people confuse it. I guess I kind of could understand why. But anyway, doesn’t matter.

– Appreciate the clarification.

– Yeah, you got it. If anyone watching the video, I think it’s very clear, right? But, so Charlee’s a senior digital media strategist here, specializing in social media, organic and paid, on the advertising side as well. Add, change, delete anything?

– Sounds good to me.

– Sounds good to you, okay, perfect, I like it. So, on the bleeding edge of social media. I remember when social media just came out, right?

– Me, too.

– You do, right.

– Yeah, I was in middle school.

– And so, what do you remember about it?

– I remember I actually hated it at first.

– Really?

– Yeah. I was like, this is too creepy. I’m not comfortable, what’s the point? Takes too much time, yeah. So I had Facebook when it first came out, and then I got rid of it and I didn’t get it back for, like, five years.

– But when Facebook first came out, I don’t think they were calling it social media then. Maybe they were, I don’t know.

– I don’t think so.

– But that term is like, now it’s ubiquitous, right, social media is ubiquitous and there’s always a new platform. But, I remember when it first came out, it was like, we had just started WebMechanix and it was like, as marketers and advertisers, it was like, oh my god, you have to be on social media! If you don’t have a social profile, what are you doing?

– Yeah, you’re not real.

– You’re not real, right? And do you think that that’s true still today?

– 100%, even if I’m looking for something and they don’t have a good website or social media, I don’t trust it, you’re sketch, I don’t believe you.

– I know, and it’s funny because, like, I for so long, I wanted to say, I wanted to fight, I wanted to be on the opposite. I wanted to oppose that. And I still think that there’s some validity to some opposition, so, for instance, if you’re like a B to B, maybe you don’t need Snapchat. You know what I mean?

– It’s about finding the right platform for wherever your audience already is. They’re definitely using social media, it’s just a matter of which one.

– That is absolutely correct. So thank you, so that’s right because, now, if you’re B to C,