How Our Online Privacy Is Under Attack

The Hazard’s Of Our Bold New (Online) World. Danger around targeted marketing on the internet.

The internet is among mankind’s most brilliant innovations. In fact, it’s probably the single greatest. Just as our ability to control fire or grow crops led to change after radical change the world wide web has revolutionized the world. However, you can’t really distrust farming or fire. You can definitely distrust the internet it turns out. In this blog post, we’ll discuss how dangerous the internet really is and create a code of ethics for marketers who want to use the internet’s treasure trove of information.

There’s quite a bit of amazing things on the internet, so many amazing things in fact that according to a digitalinformationworld.com article (link will be below) nowadays the average person worldwide spends about 142 minutes a day on the internet. However, if you’re between the age of 16 and 24, then its closer to 181 minutes. All of these people, and all of this time on the internet you eventually have to ask, who oversees all of this? Are they watching me? How much do they know about me? The answers plainly put are as follows: governments and billion-dollar corporations, yes they are watching you, and they know a lot about you.

Depending on who you ask, how dangerous the current state of data mining and data collecting is on the internet can get a large array of responses. However, the overwhelming response is, no, the internet doesn’t protect my privacy very well. In another Digitalinformationworld.com article, only 7.5% of 5000 people surveyed said that they haven’t changed the way they use the internet since last year. That means in just 365 days over 90% of people have, partially due to the data breaches and online hacking sprees that seem to be happing more and more frequently these days. The most recent and troubling of these was, of course, the Cambridge Analytica case which revealed that 80 MILLION facebook users data was being sold off to third party websites and companies, such a big breach that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg found himself in a trial on capital hill in front of the entire US Senate. So not only is it clear that people don’t trust the internet, but it has also become increasingly clear that there will be punishments if people’s suspicions are confirmed.

On a 1 to five scale with 5 being “highly dangerous” and 1 being “not dangerous at all”, I’d say this is right in the middle at a 3. While there are definite issues, such as the Facebook scandal there is enough social awareness and people willing to make a change that crises on that level can be avoided in the future. With millennials being one of the generations with the most distrust of the internet coming into positions of power I truly think that while the internet is far too relaxed on regulations at the moment we will soon be going in the right direction.

Now as promised here is a list of about 10 ethical bullet points that you shouldn’t break. And if you do break them? Well, you might be the next CEO on top of capitol hill testifying in front of the senate.

  1. Just be a decent person. I know this sounds stupidly simple but lots of times when you see somebody folding under the pressure of trial on tv or twitter you sometimes ask yourself “how could they ever have done this?”. The answers while complicated on a case by case basis often boil down to, they lost sight of what was important in life.
  2. Just ask them. The straightforward approach has been thrown to the wayside in recent years and it really has begun to show with how many people are getting in trouble for selling data to third party companies.
  3. Don’t rely on fine text. If all of your questions about allowing data to be distributed are in the fine text, that is generally a good sign that you’re hiding something. It’s almost 2020, you should know by now that hiding things from people will only work for so long and the consequences will probably just keep getting worse.
  4. Tell people what you want from them. If you’re straight up with people you might not get as many people saying yes they’re willing to share but those who are will be able to give you much more accurate data. Remember, most times the age-old saying, “quality over quantity” holds true.
  5. Look around and see what others are doing. Sometimes it’s good to be the first to do something, it can put you on the cutting edge of a brand new field and set you up for unrivaled dominance. Other times It’s going to get you in a lot of trouble. The EU has what I predict will end up as the baseline for data collecting guidelines already mostly in place. If your ideas seem wildly out of place next to theirs, might be best to rethink it.
  6. Ask around and see what people think. Focus groups are one of the most tried and true methods of getting people’s thoughts on things. You can even use employees if you’re working with ideas that you don’t want to know about yet. Just get a random anonymous sample of your employees and see what they think.
  7. Imagine if your “secret” got out. If your company was the one that was hacked and your new method of collecting data was released, would people be upset? Think of a few of your more “anti-technology” relatives you have, how would they react if they found out?
  8. Remember there’s more to life than money. Facebook made over $11 billion on ad revenue in 2018, Mark Zuckerberg has a net worth of almost $70 billion dollars. Yet he just kept pushing for newer and newer ways to get money from people and just like all people who get too greedy, he got caught. Pair this last point with #1 on the list, just really sit back and think “Why am I doing this?” If the answer is for money or some reason that doesn’t rank too highly on a scale of niceness, probably hit the drawing board again.

Here’s the two articles mentioned in the text:

https://www.digitalinformationworld.com/2019/01/how-much-time-do-people-spend-social-media-infographic.html

https://www.digitalinformationworld.com/2019/03/users-trust-internet-privacy-facebook-survey.html

What To Do When Your Website Doesn’t Rank

So, your websites not ranking well. What can you do about it? Well hopefully after reading the next few paragraphs we’ll be able to get your page into the top 10 results on the SERP. If you don’t know what the SERP is, that’s a problem but we’ll start there and try and get you caught up and put you on top.

For starters, let’s talk about the SERP. Even if you don’t know what it is, you really do, SERP stands for Search Engine Results Page. All the pages that pop up when you type in any keyword or phrase to Google, Bing, or any other search engine (but let’s be honest you probably use google). Your page needs to be in the top 10 SERP results or else honestly you don’t stand a chance, after all when was the last time you went to the second or third page of google? Now cracking the code to the SERP sounds like it could be difficult, mysterious, and expensive. Luckily it isn’t!

Search engines use various means to find, rank and display websites, so once you crack this code getting your page up in the SERP ratings is very easy. There are 6 areas of a webpage that are weighted more heavily than most other parts, the URL, the title tag (title at the top of a webpage when first opened), header tags, main content, image text, and anchor text. If you’re selling a product or service, you need the name of that product or service in all of those places at least once, and in the main content you need to add it multiple times as you can within reason. Images are a very important of all pages and can make or break the overall design of a webpage. Unfortunately search engines cannot “see”, so when you’re adding images or other media to a page be sure to save the media with the keyword or phrase in the name. Using your keyword in these 6 areas is already going to give you an incredible boost in your SERP results and trying to get you to the front page. However, there is still more to do.

In order for your page to even show up in the list of SERP, the customer must first type in a keyword or phrase associated with your page. You must be strategic in what keywords you associate with your page, you want them to have high traffic, but not high enough that your page will simply disappear or not have a chance to stand out. You want to use specific words and link them to specific products instead of just assuming that people will automatically find your page off a very basic search. Longer phrases will have less traffic but if they’re done specifically can rocket your page to the top, so don’t be afraid to have some longer, more descriptive keywords for your website. Another tip from Michigan Tech University (link will be below) is be sure to update your content regularly so you can reach newer audiences continually, and if you’re updating your content be sure to also be updating your keywords and phrases! Otherwise that new audience will never find your site.

Two more major things that are easy for you to control are the quantity of your content, and the quality of your content. Googles search engine algorithms prefer pages with more content on them, all pages should have more than 100 words on them in order to get over the baseline that google has for a page with enough content on it. But don’t just throw down 101 words at random, that won’t cut it for long. Googles search engine algorithm is run by an AI named RankBrain, and it is getting much better at figuring out what pages deserves to be in the first 10 results, and what it can put on the third page without anybody missing anything. Below is a very interesting article written by a google employee who worked on rank brain, I recommend giving it a read through and try to find any other ways you can optimize your page. Make sure you spend time on your content! Draft, edit, peer review and iterate everything at least once, otherwise you’ll just be another third page of google result that very few people care about, and even fewer people ever see.

External links:

Michigan Tech University:

https://www.mtu.edu/umc/services/digital/seo/

Rank Brain Algorithm:

https://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-algorithm-history/rankbrain/#close

5 Ways to Increase Landing Page Conversions

First off, we’ll have to discuss what exactly a conversion is. Of course, this is easier said than done because a conversion is not one specific thing, it is entirely dependent on what you’re trying to get out of a page. It is merely the outcome you or your company wishes to happen on a certain page, whether that is clicking “buy now” on a retail site, or filling out a form for an online petition.

Now that we have the definition out of the way we can hop into what this whole article is about, 5 ways to increase landing page conversions.

  1. The first step is pretty simple, NBALPWACG. This acronym stands for Never Build A Landing Page Without A Campaign Goal. So the first step to increase conversions should be taking place before you’ve even begun making your page, you have to make sure that you or your company have a solid, measurable, understandable goal already in mind when making the page. If not you’ll be far more likely to get distracted and lose focus on what you’re trying to accomplish on the page itself.
  2. The next step in increasing conversions is making sure you have a low attention ratio, as close to a 1:1 ratio as you can get. An attention ratio is a measure of the number of other links you have compared to the one link or button the customer is required to hit in order to get a conversion. So if you want somebody to click a button in order to buy a product, but have loads of other links on the page redirecting them, offering them advice, or showing them where to read reviews of the product you will have lower conversions. It’s a simple formula: as the attention ratio goes down, the conversion ratio goes up.
  3. Next is following the seven principles of conversion-centered design. The seven principles are placed in a certain order, this order is as follows: Attention(grabbing the attention of your viewer), Context(making sure the content matches up on your page with the link taking the viewer to it), Clarity(making sure it is clear to the consumer where to complete the conversion), Congruence(making sure everything else on the page lines up and or directs people to your conversion), Credibility(showing people reasons to trust you, product reviews for example), Closing(having that low attention ratio so you complete more conversions), and Continuance(retaining the customer, offering other products/opportunities then and in the future for them). When it comes to rating your campaign all of these seven principles are then rated on a scale of friction to delight. Friction is for all negative experiences and delight denotes the positive ones, ideally, you will have no friction at any point of your campaign but in all honesty that is an unrealistic expectation. The good thing about rating all experiences (even the negative ones) is that you can see where your campaign is succeeding and where it is failing and you can course-correct as needed.
  4. The fourth step is pretty simple, make sure your content matches the ad. There are multiple types of ads, with multiple media, whichever you chose you have to make sure all of the different media add up. If your ad is just text-based, make sure the message they see on the ad matches the one they see on the page (a callback to the context on the previous hint). If your ad has text and an image or a color scheme, make sure on the page that exact image or color scheme is present so people know they’re on the right page.
  5. The last step in today’s blog post is to use existing media channels! If your company already has social media, or influencers or blogs set up then be sure to use those to your advantage! Casting a wide net is a sure way to get more traffic to your page and therefore(if it’s done right) more conversions!

Sources:

  • Council, Forbes Agency. “13 Tips To Help Businesses Boost Sales Conversions Through Social Media Marketing.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 19 June 2019, https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesagencycouncil/2019/06/18/13-tips-to-help-businesses-boost-sales-conversions-through-social-media-marketing/.
  • Smarty, Ann. “5 Conversion Tips to Add to Your Social Media Strategy.” Social Media Week, 4 Oct. 2019, https://socialmediaweek.org/blog/2019/10/5-conversion-tips-to-add-to-your-social-media-strategy/.
  • “The 7 Principles of Conversion Centered Design.” Stukent, Stukent.com, https://www.stukent.com/expert-sessions/the-7-principles-of-conversion-centered-design/.
  • “MRKT 484 Ryan on Testing Landing Pages.” OSU MediaSpace, Oregon State University, https://media.oregonstate.edu/media/t/0_j1xoorhb.
  • “MRKT 484 Ryan on Testing Landing Pages.” OSU MediaSpace, Oregon State University, https://media.oregonstate.edu/media/t/0_j1xoorhb.
  • Leist, Rachel. “How to Write a Blog Post: A Step-by-Step Guide [ Free Blog Post Templates].” HubSpot Blog, 6 May 2019, https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/how-to-start-a-blog#sm.00007ssv1q6ovdkcq1p1c0jjakt6m.