IAB Tech Lab issues revised ads.txt for apps

The spec for app-ads.txt brings ad inventory verification to apps. The post IAB Tech Lab issues revised ads.txt for apps appeared first on Marketing Land.

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Marketing Day: Facebook search, Claritas buys Barometric, new LinkedIn privacy setting

Here's our recap of what happened in online marketing today, as reported on Marketing Land and other places across the web. The post Marketing Day: Facebook search, Claritas buys Barometric, new LinkedIn privacy setting appeared first on Marketing Land.

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Facebook confirms searches performed off the platform do not influence Facebook search results

The company issued an explainer on how Facebook search works. The post Facebook confirms searches performed off the platform do not influence Facebook search results appeared first on Marketing Land.

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Feds take down international hacker ring that cost advertisers millions

What you should know about the dismantling 3ve and Methbot botnets. The post Feds take down international hacker ring that cost advertisers millions appeared first on Marketing Land.

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Wanted: Nominations for this year’s ‘Naughty & Nice’ list

Who in marketing, advertising or search deserves a candy cane – or a lump of coal – for what they’ve done in 2018? The post Wanted: Nominations for this year’s ‘Naughty & Nice’ list appeared first on Marketing Land.

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Claritas buys Barometric, marrying user segmentation with attribution

Together, the companies say they will be able to offer targeting and optimization for ads. The post Claritas buys Barometric, marrying user segmentation with attribution appeared first on Marketing Land.

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Chevron storytelling uses purposeful immersive experiences to engage stakeholders

While a brand like Chevron may not seem an obvious choice for immersive experiences, they found success using AR and VR to explain key Chevron narratives. The post Chevron storytelling uses purposeful immersive experiences to engage stakeholders appeared first on Marketing Land.

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LinkedIn’s new privacy setting prohibits marketers from exporting emails

A new privacy setting allows users to keep their email address from being downloaded. The post LinkedIn’s new privacy setting prohibits marketers from exporting emails appeared first on Marketing Land.

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Marketing Day: Amazon’s Cyber Monday, Facebook MRC viewability audit, YouTube Stories

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Move over, Prime Day. Amazon’s Cyber Monday takes the crown.

This year’s Cyber Monday was the online retailer’s biggest day of sales, ever. The post Move over, Prime Day. Amazon’s Cyber Monday takes the crown. appeared first on Marketing Land.

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YouTube launches Stories feature for creators with 10K subscribers

First launched by Snapchat, the popular content format has been adopted by Instagram, Facebook and now YouTube. The post YouTube launches Stories feature for creators with 10K subscribers appeared first on Marketing Land.

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5 predictions for B2B marketing in 2019

As we close out 2018, most of us have already been spent the last couple of months (at least!) thinking about 2019. And as I think about the coming year, I think about “what’s next” for B2B marketers. This gets more and more challenging each year, because the pace of change has accelerated each year. But that’s also why B2B has become such an exciting and dynamic market during the past several years.

So, here are five trends I predict will be hot for B2B marketers in 2019.

1. ABM will become a core platform for marketers in the martech stack

While CRM is the system of record for all sales activity and marketing automation systems are used by almost all sophisticated B2B marketers, each carries well known limitations. In particular, both focus on known, individual contacts. In an account-based world, that’s not enough. As a result, ABM platforms are quickly becoming the third leg to the B2B marketing tech stack. Together with CRM and marketing automation solutions, B2B marketers can span individual to account, and known to unknown in their marketing and sales activities.

2. Connected data will be king

With a fragmented martech landscape, it’s easy to understand why customer information can become siloed.  Getting a true 360-degree view of the customer has been a challenge that has plagued marketers since the beginning of marketing. But connecting customer data across different marketing technologies is getting closer to becoming a reality for many marketers.

By integrating technologies such as CRM, marketing automation, and ABM platforms, marketers can start to share data across these applications. And this will start to give marketers the complete customer view that we have craved.

3. We’ll stop talking about Artificial Intelligence

For B2B marketers, AI has been front and center of the conversation for the past couple of years.  That’s about to change. Not because AI is going away. It’s just becoming a given- a set of underlying technology  that is just “there”. Like electricity. AI will become an accepted (and expected) part of all marketing, advertising and sales technology. We’ll stop talking about it watch just let it work its magic in 2019, such as anticipating which content or messages visitors to a website will find most useful at each stage of their buying journey. There are almost a limitless number of applications for AI in marketing. And 2019 will be the year that AI based becomes like a utility for B2B marketers.

4. Next best action will become feasible at scale

Marketers have long talked about taking the ideal next best action when it comes to marketing programs based on where people are in the buying cycle. But it’s been impossible to achieve without massive amounts of data being synthesized by AI in real time. Humans just can’t process that amount of information. The emergence of AI means that automated next best action triggered based on specific activity in the buying cycle will become a reality in 2019.’

5. Persona-based advertising is dead

For years B2B advertisers have used personas as a proxy for reaching the right audience: their target buyers and influencers. But personas used for advertising amount to little more than guesswork in terms of who you actually reach, so marketers waste a huge amount of money on poorly targeted ads each year. B2B advertising is one of the last frontiers of marketing to be modernized but is finally undergoing a massive transformation that will significantly improve performance and the efficiency of ad dollars. By combining an immediate understanding of the accounts marketers want to target and sophisticated intent data to identify the buying committee within those accounts, B2B advertising can achieve precision and scale in 2019. And finally replace the tired old personas that we’ve been forced to use.

Let me know if you agree (or disagree) with the predictions I’ve made and how you believe they will impact your marketing organization.

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Measuring return on content: It’s simpler (and more important) than you think

Marketers are investing billions of dollars in content marketing efforts every year, and yet many have a very weak understanding of the return they see on such investments. According to the Content Marketing Institute, a third of B2C marketers (PDF) don’t even measure their return on content. That figure grows to a staggering 47 percent among B2B marketers (PDF).

This lack of accountability is a stark contrast to the data-driven strategies that the same marketers are meticulously applying to their lower-funnel activities in search and display. Why the difference? Well, according to the Content Marketing Institute, 45 percent of B2C marketers who don’t measure their content ROI cite the top reason as “we need an easier way to do this.” That same response tops the list of reasons given by B2B marketers, right alongside “no formal justification required.”

The simple fact of the matter is that many marketers aren’t tracking return on content because they’re intimidated by what they perceive to be a seriously complicated undertaking. Or worse, they’re not even trying because their superiors aren’t asking, which suggests that they’re OK with not properly understanding and optimizing their content budgets. These marketers are at risk of having their content marketing budgets cut altogether by skeptical superiors who don’t see the return.

Don’t reinvent the wheel

Ultimately, tracking return on content in the mid-funnel – where content marketing drives consumers from awareness into the stages of consideration and engagement – isn’t all that different from tracking ROI in the lower funnel. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel. Rather, marketers need to commit to understanding these mid-funnel activities and get smart about how they monitor activity on the content being circulated by their brands.

In tracking return on content, there are two key areas where marketers should focus:

Engagement indicators

Two key engagement metrics to consider when it comes to content are time spent and scroll depth, but these measures should not be approached in siloes, where on their own they can provide false positives. For example, a person might open a piece of content and walk away from the computer, driving up time spent but never engaging with the content. Meanwhile, if a person opens a piece of content and scrolls rapidly to the bottom, there’s a good chance they never actually read the content and were instead seeking something else on the page.

Fortunately for marketers, they now have the ability to look at a content completion rate that compares the amount of time a person spends on a page against the amount of time it would take an average reader to consume the content (a measure made popular by Medium), cross-referenced with scroll data.  This more-holistic approach allows marketers to confirm with greater accuracy which pieces of their content are driving meaningful engagement with their audience.

Downstream conversions

When it comes to conversions, marketers can lean on their expertise in media attribution when gauging return on content. Using similar methodologies (e.g., tagging exposure), they can determine which pieces of content lead to specific actions within their standard lookback window. This doesn’t always have to be a purchase. It could be something more basic, such as reading a piece of content on a company’s blog and later navigating to look at products, register for an event or sign up for a free trial.

Test and learn

While it might be a relief to some marketers that their organizations don’t require them to track return on content, two problems arise in that scenario:

1. Without understanding the real-world value of content marketing, executives are likely to target these budgets for cutbacks when cutbacks are required.
2. More importantly, if marketers can’t connect their content marketing efforts to business outcomes, they will never be able to properly optimize their content, not to mention their media spend across the full funnel.

Brands, especially those in the direct-to-consumer and e-commerce spaces, spend a ton of time optimizing their landing pages and websites to improve their use of imagery and calls to action. Those very same principles should be applied earlier in the funnel as well. It’s not a matter of just creating content and blasting it out there. As with advertising and landing page elements, marketers need to take a test-and-learn approach to their content, and they can do so efficiently.

Think about content testing the same way that studios think about TV show pilots. The studio makes one episode and tests it with a small audience screening. At that point, the episode might be taken to a wider audience and ultimately be developed into a full show – or it might be put on the shelf. In short, the studio won’t invest more deeply if the content doesn’t resonate.

In this same vein, marketers have the opportunity to test and learn with their content by posting it on owned properties and monitoring activity based on a smaller audience. The content that resonates (according to the metrics described above) is where marketers should then double-down with their paid efforts, as well as in future content creation initiatives. Done right, marketers should even be able to identify which content tends to influence higher-value purchases among consumers.

In short, there’s no good reason for marketers today do not have a handle on the effectiveness of their content marketing efforts. The metrics are simpler than many think, and the consequences of neglecting attribution in the mid-funnel have wide-ranging implications for optimization efforts across the entire customer journey. It’s time, as an industry, to get serious about measuring return on content.

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Facebook passes key hurdle in MRC viewability reporting audit

A big part of the way Facebook aims to prove its ads are viewable has just taken a giant step forward. The Media Rating Council (MRC), the industry standard keeper for media measurement, has signed off on Facebook’s process for providing data to third parties for verification.

The MRC has been reviewing how Facebook and Instagram handle data that it passes to its third-party vendors and how those vendors ultimately report on its viewability.

MRC has yet to grant accreditation to the second part of the process — which is handled by the third-party verification companies after Facebook hands over the data — but, according to a press release (PDF) announcing the news, Moat, Integral Ad Science and DoubleVerify have agreed to let the MRC audit their portion of the process, as well.

MRC’s audit process.

Why it matters

Viewability continues to be a hot topic, as advertisers yearn for standards and accountability. And after a tumultuous year, Facebook is pining for some good news.

MRC accreditation is far from a sure thing. While Facebook won accreditation for its impressions metric in April, some ad tech companies in recent months have lost a portion or all of their accreditations under MRC scrutiny, including AppNexus who withdrew from the process entirely.

While MRC’s earlier metric accreditation for Facebook concerned the impressions served, this one validates the mechanism, or Pipeline, that Facebook uses to allow third parties to report on viewability and other metrics.

There was a fair amount of glad-handing in the wake of the news.

MRC’s Executive Director and CEO George W. Ivie said, “The conclusion of this stage of our work represents a substantial milestone in MRC’s accreditation consideration of the Facebook viewability pipeline measurement process. We commend Facebook for the substantial efforts it has put forward to successfully get us to this point, which clearly demonstrate its support of and commitment to measurement that’s in accord with industry standards for quality.”

To which Brad Smallwood, VP of marketing science at Facebook said: “We share the MRC’s commitment to responsible measurement and look forward to continuing our audit work with them.”

Facebook could certainly use the MRC stamp of approval on its metrics, as its history of errors in measurement has harmed its reputation among marketers. Withstanding the audit process should go some way toward repairing that breach of trust.

More on the news

• In March, Google said it supports 30 MRC standards for clicks, impressions, viewability and more, and was currently working on getting certification for 40 more.
• The MRC is a US-based nonprofit organization that reviews audience measurement services and manages accreditation for media research and rating purposes.

 

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Marketing Day: Black Friday shoppers, Forrester buys SiriusDecisions & mobile ad fraud

Here’s our recap of what happened in online marketing today, as reported on Marketing Land and other places across the web.

From Marketing Land:

• Compare 15 top marketing automation platforms
  Nov 28, 2018 by Digital Marketing Depot

  Regardless of your company’s size and marketing sophistication, marketing automation tools can provide the following benefits to the organization: Increased marketing efficiency. Enhanced ability to generate more and better-qualified leads. A multichannel view of prospect behavior. Better alignment of sales and marketing goals. Improved lead conversion and ROI. MarTech Today’s “B2B Marketing Automation Platforms: A […]

• 165 million people shopped online and in stores over Black Friday weekend
  Nov 28, 2018 by Greg Sterling

  There were just under 90 million multichannel shoppers who spent on average $93 more than online or in-store only buyers.

• Quora unveils new Promoted Answers ad unit
  Nov 28, 2018 by Robin Kurzer

  The Promoted Answers unit has the same targeting options as the platform’s other ad formats.

• Data privacy: Will the industry emerge stronger following the Facebook fallout?
  Nov 28, 2018 by Adam Corey

  New regulation will push transparency to be normalized so advertisers must communicate simply and openly about how audience data is used.

• Why Disney, Microsoft and Home Shopping Network attend SMX West
  Nov 27, 2018 by Marketing Land

  For more than 10 years, marketers have attended Search Marketing Expo – SMX® West for a variety of reasons. Here’s what a few of them had to say about the experience: “… changes in search marketing are impacting the variety of stakeholders in the industry. It is too easy to get stuck in one’s own perspective alone, and SMX […]

• Cheetah mobile and another Chinese firm accused of mobile ad download fraud
  Nov 27, 2018 by Greg Sterling

  A Q1 report from AppsFlyer said that mobile ad fraud is costing brands $700-$800 million globally on a quarterly basis.

• Forrester decides to buy SiriusDecisions
  Nov 27, 2018 by Barry Levine

  This latest expansion by the Cambridge-based research firm adds marketing, sales and product operational methodology, as well as the SiriusDecisions’ “Demand Waterfall.”

Recent Headlines From MarTech Today, Our Sister Site Dedicated To Marketing Technology:

• For many marketers, platform integration is a ‘must have’ for new tools
  Nov 28, 2018 by Barry Levine

  What is often hidden in organizations’ software choices is that many marketers will only select from the application ecosystems of Salesforce, HubSpot or other major platforms.

• Teach yourself about machine learning and artificial intelligence
  Nov 28, 2018 by Pamela Parker

  Shifting to data-driven marketing requires hiring or training staffers familiar with the latest technologies. Bolster your staff development with these free educational resources.

• MarTech Today: Forrester buys SiriusDecisions, foldable screens and five essential strategies for B2B marketers
  Nov 28, 2018 by Barry Levine

  Here’s our daily recap of what happened in marketing technology, as reported on MarTech Today, Marketing Land and other places across the web. From MarTech Today: Forrester decides to buy SiriusDecisions Nov 27, 2018 by Barry Levine This latest expansion by the Cambridge-based research firm adds marketing, sales and product operational methodology, as well as the […]

• Redefine your marketing’s capabilities. Learn the new, new rules of marketing, only at MarTech
  Nov 27, 2018 by Scott Brinker

  “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald Successful marketers routinely hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time… and function spectacularly. Exhibit A may very well be the new, […]

• Forrester decides to buy SiriusDecisions
  Nov 27, 2018 by Barry Levine

  This latest expansion by the Cambridge-based research firm adds marketing, sales and product operational methodology, as well as the SiriusDecisions’ “Demand Waterfall.”

Online Marketing News From Around The Web:

• A Business With No End, New York Times
• Amazon gets most of its ad revenue from its virtual store, Quartz
• Connecting People to Local News and Their Communities, Facebook Newsroom
• Instagram is now using AI to describe photos for users with visual impairments, The Verge
• Social Media Marketing: How To Master The Art Of Going Live, Forbes
• Steemit is laying off close to 70% of team to cut operating costs as cryptocurrency prices drop, The Block
• YouTube launches ‘Pods’: Skippable back-back video ads, Netimperative

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For many marketers, platform integration is a ‘must have’ for new tools

Marketers have many criteria for software tool selection, and the marketers of those tools have many angles to pitch.

But one factor turns out to be a necessary first hurdle for many business tool customers:

Is it integrated with [my favorite platform]?

‘Everything in one spot.’ That is, many firms — small-to-medium-sized businesses (SMBs) in particular, but also some enterprises — are heavily dependent on, say, Salesforce or HubSpot, so they prefer tools that are natively integrated with those platforms.

For inbound growth agency Nextiny Marketing, for instance, the universe of available software tools starts — and mostly ends — with those integrated with HubSpot, since the Sarasota, Florida-based firm is “built around HubSpot,” according to CEO Gabriel Marguglio.

If it’s marketing, sales or service software, he told me, it has to be part of HubSpot’s ecosystem for Nextiny to consider it. His company frequently uses HubSpot-compatible business analytics dashboard Databox, video hosting environment Wistia, email optimization tool Seventh Sense and CallRail phone tracking.

The Hubspot ecosystem, he said, offers “everything in one spot,” including integration with the platform on which Nextiny is based, and partnerships to co-market software.

“I will not choose a software [tool] that is not on Hubspot,” he said, except for the few standalones that don’t really need that platform or ecosystem alliance, like collaborative workspace Slack or a project management tool.

All integrated with Salesforce. Since his company is using these tools and sometimes recommends them to its customers, Nextiny often partners with those software companies in a co-marketing arrangement. Of course, Marguglio could partner with an application like Wistia without its being part of the HubSpot ecosystem, but he said the integration makes the partnership more valuable because it ties into the other tools.

One question, of course, is which ecosystem of applications to use when there are so many platforms with integrated software.

Marguglio said he has worked with Salesforce’s AppExchange, and could utilize the ecosystem spun off by a number of Hubspot’s 200+ tools, like Databox, but he hasn’t found another ecosystem outside of HubSpot that satisfies his requirements for marketing, sales and service tools that are all in one place.

Chris Elam, founder of Manhattan-based Misnomer Dance Theater, similarly selects his applications mostly from ones integrated with his favorite platform, in this case, Salesforce. Over the last few years, he told me, he’s utilized about 55 different applications that are integrated with Salesforce, such as electronic signature provider DocuSign.

“All applications we use are integrated with Salesforce,” he said. A key advantage of that arrangement, of course, is that the application can be tested out for its compatibility with that platform, without requiring coding.

Why this matters to marketers. The increasingly common first hurdle for software selection — that it must be part of the natively-integrated ecosystem of a favorite platform – is not always factored into assessments of how marketers choose tools or market their own software products.

While this platform-oriented approach has many benefits, it can also have some important limitations. A recent survey of more than 700 small and midsized business leaders by software review service Capterra found that identifying the right technologies for their businesses was the top challenge for nearly a fifth of respondents. Given their relatively small budgets, they have little room for error in their software choices.

Almost half — 47 percent – said they factor tech trends and advancements into their strategic planning, like AI, conversational user interfaces, data/information security, digital marketing and The Internet of Things. Smart tech choices can give them a competitive advantage beyond their size.

But, while SMB leaders say they consider tech trends as part of their strategic decision making, the range of tech trends they can include is limited by the extent of the ecosystem attached to their favorite platform, if they make software choices like Nextiny does.

This story first appeared on MarTech Today. For more on marketing technology, click here.

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Teach yourself about machine learning and artificial intelligence

Though you’ll hear near universal praise for data-driven decision-making, many companies haven’t yet been able to put such a strategy into practice. Why? Well, one barrier, acknowledged by 75 percent of marketers surveyed by Econsultancy last year, is that too few in the marketing realm have the requisite training and education on data and analytics, particularly in the areas of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning.

This situation leads both to hiring challenges and to great opportunities for those who possess or can develop the necessary skill set.

If your company or agency doesn’t already have training programs in place, you’d do well to take matters into your own hands, as there are myriad online offerings that allow you to school yourself on the latest technologies. And they’re not all oriented toward programmers, meaning they can help marketers understand the best use cases and necessary building blocks for employing machine learning and AI to best advantage.

1. Amazon’s “Machine Learning University”

The retail giant decided this week to open up its internal training programs to the wider world. Though Amazon’s own AWS offerings are a focus of a lot of the tutorials, these more than 30 self-service self-paced free digital courses also cover more general concepts that can be applied on other platforms.

The path most suitable for marketers will likely be the one aimed at business decision-makers and perhaps, for the geekier among us, those for data scientists.

Dr. Matt Wood, shown here in his Twitter profile image, heads up AI and machine learning for Amazon Web Services

“Regardless of where they are in their machine learning journey,” wrote AWS’ GM of AI, Matt Wood, “one question I hear frequently from customers is: ‘how can we accelerate the growth of machine learning skills in our teams?'”

Each training path progresses from courses aimed at defining and demystifying artificial intelligence, to classes that explore specific applications of such technologies (using AWS applications, natch). Each course is labeled as foundational/fundamental, intermediate or advanced, so you can proceed at your own pace.

Example courses:

• Demystifying DL/ML/AI (fundamental)
• Machine Learning for Business Challenges (fundamental)
• Machine Learning Use Case: Call Center (fundamental)
• Communicating with Chat Bots (intermediate)

2. Learn from Google AI

Just as Google offers its own cloud services related to machine learning and AI, it also aims to educate developers and business decision-makers about the technologies’ capabilities.

The Google resources include everything from videos to hour-long courses to example code and hands-on guides. As with Amazon, you can select your role to find resources that are most likely to be useful, at the correct depth and applicable to the stage of the AI/machine learning process you’re engaged in. The options here that seem most applicable to marketers include: business decision-maker, data scientist and … curious cat.

Example courses:

• Introduction to Machine Learning Problem Framing (course)
• Data Preparation and Feature Engineering in ML (course)
• The 7 Steps of Machine Learning (AI Adventures) (video)

Yufeng Guo uses down-to-earth examples to explain AI concepts.

3. Elements of AI – Reaktor and University of Helsinki

Finnish business consultancy Reaktor, which works with clients like HBO, Airbus, Nokia and News Corp, collaborated with the University of Helsinki to put together this in-depth online course series, which begins with “What is AI” and continues to explore both the applications and implications of the technologies.

Though the curriculum is designed, according to the site, to expect no pre-existing knowledge beyond basic math, the courses will require a significant commitment. Going through the entire series is expected to take 6 weeks or more — though the designers recommend setting yourself a 6-week deadline to get the most out of the material. Each of the six parts is designed to take 5 to 10 hours, depending on how much you explore related links.

Unlike some of the other possibilities, Elements of AI is completely text- and image-based — though there are sections that ask you to interact by making a drawing, taking a quiz or doing something similar — and therefore it may be more difficult than getting a grasp on these concepts with the help of video.

It’s also structured as one course for everyone, regardless of their business role or area of interest, which inevitably means that it’s more general. The positive there is that it’s a great easy-to-understand primer, and you can even get credit for taking the course through the University of Helsinki’s Open University program.

Example courses:

• What is AI?
• AI Problem Solving — which uses a search engine as an example
• The Implications of AI

4. Resources on MarTech Today

Though we don’t have hour-long courses or quizzes, MarTech Today (Marketing Land’s sister site) is a great place to get specific information on how AI and related technologies can be applied to marketing problems. Following are some of the foundational articles that will help you get up to speed.

• What is machine learning and why should marketers care?
• The future is now: How AI, blockchain may solve some of the industry’s biggest challenges
• What does artificial intelligence mean for marketing agencies?
• How machine learning works, as explained by Google
• What the heck is machine learning, and why should I [as a search marketer] care?

And some more advanced articles about putting AI and ML to work for you:

• Your AI does not need tickets to the big game
• From artificial intelligence to tangible action: Executing on AI insights at scale
• Building an AI mindset: Time to identify and develop skill sets now

You’ll also find that our Machine Learning & Artificial Intelligence archives hold a wealth of valuable information for marketers.

Do you know about other great resources marketers can use to teach themselves about AI and ML? Send them along and we’ll consider adding them to this guide.

This article originally appeared on MarTech Today, where you can find much more coverage of marketing technology.

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Compare 15 top marketing automation platforms

Regardless of your company’s size and marketing sophistication, marketing automation tools can provide the following benefits to the organization:

• Increased marketing efficiency.
• Enhanced ability to generate more and better-qualified leads.
• A multichannel view of prospect behavior.
• Better alignment of sales and marketing goals.
• Improved lead conversion and ROI.

MarTech Today’s “B2B Marketing Automation Platforms: A Marketer’s Guide” examines the market for B2B marketing automation software platforms and the considerations involved in implementing this software in your business.

This 48-page report includes profiles of 15 leading B2B marketing automation vendors, capabilities comparisons and recommended steps for evaluating and purchasing. If you are a marketer looking to adopt a marketing automation software platform, you need to read this report. Visit Digital Marketing Depot to download your copy.

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165 million people shopped online and in stores over Black Friday weekend

Pre-Thanksgiving surveys indicated that more people intended to shop online this year than in the past. That sentiment did translate into actual behavior, as Black Friday in-store traffic was down according to retail analytics firms.

Store traffic down somewhat vs. 2017. RetailNext reported that on Thanksgiving and Black Friday sales in stores were down 4 to 7 percent and foot traffic was down 5 to 9 percent. Rival ShopperTrak said visits on Thanksgiving Day and Black Friday were down 1 percent for the two-day shopping period and down 1.7 percent on Black Friday compared with last year.

The National Retail Federation (NRF) reported that over the past weekend 165 million people shopped either online or in stores or both. That compares with 174 million a year ago. NRF estimated that there were 67 million people in stores on Black Friday versus 77 million in 2017.

Shoppers by Channel

Source: NRF (11/18)

Multichannel shoppers spent more. Overall, NRF said there were roughly 90 million multichannel shoppers. That was up roughly 40 percent from 2017. In addition, the multichannel shopper spent on average $93 more than single-channel buyers. NRF added that the most popular shopping destinations over the weekend were the following:

1. Department stores
2. Online retailers
3. Specialty apparel stores
4. Grocery stores
5. Discount stores
6. Electronics stores

Walmart dominated visitation. Location analytics firm Reveal Mobile measured real-time Black Friday store visits. The company said that Walmart received 3.4 percent of all U.S. retail store visits on Black Friday. That was followed by Target (1.8 percent), Verizon Wireless (1.4 percent), Home Depot (1.4 percent), Lowe’s (1.2 percent), Spring (0.8 percent) and Best Buy (0.7 percent). Combined, these account for roughly 11 percent of all retail store visits on Black Friday.

Source: Reveal Mobile (2018)

The company also said that early morning Black Friday lines are becoming a thing of the past. According to Reveal, Black Friday “rush hour” occurred between 11 a.m. and 3 p.m.

Related Resources

• Take our survey and help us understand the evolution of digital agencies
• From Black Friday to Cyber Monday, consumers spend more than $4 billion on mobile
• State of the Google Shopping auction heading into the 2018 holiday season
• Google launches special Black Friday, Cyber Monday deals ad unit

What matters to marketers. There are a number of takeaways from this and other data released over the past several days. Online revenues set records, but it remains to be seen how stores performed. Overall there should be sales growth when online and offline results are combined.

Historically online and offline shopping have been seen in opposition. As more direct-to-consumer brands open physical stores and as more traditional retailers concentrate on growing the online channel, we’ve entered a more complex and dynamic retail era.

And, while online did capture some share from stores, more consumers are relying on multiple channels before buying. Stores are also instrumental in supporting online shopping, especially for Millennials.

The post 165 million people shopped online and in stores over Black Friday weekend appeared first on Marketing Land.

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Quora unveils new Promoted Answers ad unit

Quora unveiled a new native ad unit Tuesday called Promoted Answers, which offers marketers the opportunity to promote organic content posted on the site by themselves or others. Featuring a question, a portion of an answer and a link that takes the users to the full answer, a Promoted Answers ad can be targeted in all the same ways as other units on the platform.

Though all of Quora’s ad units mimic the look of the site and are referred to as “native,” Promoted Answers is Quora’s first ad format that promotes organic content, similarly to Twitter’s Promoted Tweets or Facebook’s Promoted Posts.

Here’s the ad creation interface for advertisers using Promoted Answers.

Why it matters

In a blog post announcing the launch, Quora said that this ad unit extends the reach that many businesses are already getting through answers organically.

Though brands can promote any answer they want, the format lends itself to answers that show thought leadership. Quora says that advertisers are already seeing success with the new format, adding that client DuckDuckGo’s promoted answers were viewed over 200 times more than their non-promoted content — garnering them millions of views.

“The format provides a flexible canvas to share detailed information about your product or service that goes beyond the characters allowed in normal ad copy and helps to facilitate engagement through upvotes, comments, and follows,” Ryan Browne, director of product management at Quora, said in the blog post. “If Quora users are already discussing your business, Promoted Answers are a great way to join the conversation surrounding your brand.”

What else you should know

• Quora has been steadily rolling out enhancements to its ad platform since launching in 2017.
• Quora claims an audience of more than 300 million monthly unique visitors, rivaling Twitter and Pinterest.
• To promote an answer, get started here.

The post Quora unveils new Promoted Answers ad unit appeared first on Marketing Land.

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Why Disney, Microsoft and Home Shopping Network attend SMX West

For more than 10 years, marketers have attended Search Marketing Expo – SMX® West for a variety of reasons. Here’s what a few of them had to say about the experience: “… changes in search marketing are impacting the variety of stakeholders in the industry. It is too easy to get...

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Cheetah mobile and another Chinese firm accused of mobile ad download fraud

A Q1 report from AppsFlyer said that mobile ad fraud is costing brands $700-$800 million globally on a quarterly basis. The post Cheetah mobile and another Chinese firm accused of mobile ad download fraud appeared first on Marketing Land.

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Forrester decides to buy SiriusDecisions

This latest expansion by the Cambridge-based research firm adds marketing, sales and product operational methodology, as well as the SiriusDecisions’ “Demand Waterfall.” The post Forrester decides to buy SiriusDecisions appeared first on Marketing Land.

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