#can you no longer post tiktok links on tumblr now because of the american tiktok ban or what is going on?
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It´s a mashup between Metallica´s song "One" and the Spice Girls song "Wannabe"
also I´m pretty sure a tiktok made it famous (don´t know if it´s the same creator tho or who is the original creator)
#i need a full version#< here you go#the full version isn´t it but this part is fire#Youtube#can you no longer post tiktok links on tumblr now because of the american tiktok ban or what is going on?
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RECENT NEWS, RESOURCES & STUDIES, late-January 2020
Welcome to my latest summary of recent news, resources & studies including search, analytics, content marketing, social media & ecommerce! This covers articles I came across since the mid-January report, although some may be older than that.
Right now I am trying to get at least 2 of these out each month. Is that enough? Too much? Am I missing topics you want to see covered? Please let me know! Comment here, message me through Tumblr, Twitter, or my website.
Also, I am once again working on plans to start an ecommerce business forum, where small business owners can learn and discuss topics like the ones I post about here. If you have any preferences for a suggested platform/forum space,please let me know! I will be running a survey once I narrow down my list.
TOP NEWS & ARTICLES
Etsy introduced alternative shipping for US sellers shipping outside of the US & Canada, run by Asendia. Etsy Labels will no longer offer USPS First Class International for those shipments, but faster levels will still be through USPS. The Help file doesn’t give that much more detail; discussion is here.
Having educational/information pages on ecommerce websites can help product page search rankings. Blog posts, pillar pages and tutorials can all be a good investment.
Excellent article on how to keep your existing buyers (aka customer retention) rather than always going after new ones. It cites decent research in the area, with examples. (As regular readers know, I love Help Scout’s customer service articles!) For example, “When it comes to highly rated customer service, quality and completeness matter more than speed. According to research from Gallup, customers were nine times more likely to be engaged with a brand when they evaluated the service as “courteous, willing, and helpful.” “Speedy” service, on the other hand, only made customers six times more likely to be satisfied.”
ETSY NEWS
More updates to listing categories, including a new Presets & Photo Filters category, and Cribs & Cradles is now called Moses Baskets & Hammocks.
Tips on marketing your Etsy listings for weddings. “Etsy wedding shoppers are often drawn to Etsy because they identify as creative people themselves, an asset you should consider when developing and marketing your products. By offering DIY versions of some of your popular items, you can draw in crafty shoppers, who may end up purchasing a finished handmade item from your shop instead. Offering both options can also be a great way of hitting multiple price points.”
If you sell jewellery and/or accessories, here is Etsy’s advice for marketing in the first half of the year. “While high-end jewelry is often a carefully considered purchase, more affordable everyday items make easy impulse buys and gifts due to their small size and approachable price points.” Also, people are still shopping by gender: “70% YoY increase in Jewelry, Accessories, and Bags category searches containing “him”. “We expect the bags category to grow the most out of these three categories in the next year, led by the increasing popularity of small leather goods such as wallets, dopp kits, and items for travel. A recent increase in average order value within the Bags category suggests buyers are willing to pay more for high-quality materials like leather.” But note that “Buyers tend not to use the term "purse" in their searches.” Finally, “From July through September 2019, over half of Etsy US and global GMS came from purchases that shipped for free.”
In case you missed it, Disney is going after Etsy sellers of Baby Yoda merchandise. Some speculate that they are mostly focusssing on the listings making the most sales. More sarcastic & humorous take here.
Interesting interview (podcast & transcript, including a pdf) with CEO Josh Silverman, on business strategies. I do like this quote: “When you’re successful, what can be really hard is to tell you’re successful because of some things and in spite of others.” To be very honest, I have this problem a lot, and have seen other business people misjudge their success as well. This is telling, though “And you have until December 31st to ship it.” I have a hunch that is what happened with Etsy Ads and the free shipping tools. So they shipped unfinished tools, and that was bad for the business. Finally, “HOFFMAN: Until this point, Etsy’s focus had been on its sellers. It saw itself as a marketplace for handmade items, and the people who made them. Josh knew he had to change this perspective… SILVERMAN: It was a really big shift in focus. I think Etsy, like many two sided marketplaces, has very deep empathy for sellers, so much so that it can forget to have empathy for buyers. And when you talk to your sellers, they really mostly want three things. They want buyers, they want buyers, and they want buyers – in that order. In order to serve the sellers, you’ve really got to focus on buyers...By the end of my fifth week almost everyone in the company had a new job.”
SEO: GOOGLE & OTHER SEARCH ENGINES
Google confirmed a core search update that started to roll out January 13 and took about 3 days, and showed substantial changes on most tracking tools. Early analysis indicates this has once again affected sites based on trustworthiness, but big winners and losers are still unclear. The take from Moz is that this hit health sites like previous updates, but also hurt diverse sites such as Orbitz, Yellow Pages, Poshmark, USA Today and Forever 21. RankRanger noted that there was more volatility in finance rankings than the December update.
Remember Google’s algorithm change late last year, called BERT? George Mueller offered a bit of advice [text and video] on how to optimize for it: “if ... there’s anything that you can do to kind of optimize for BERT, it’s essentially to make sure that your pages have natural text on them...So instead of stuffing keywords as much as possible, kind of write naturally”
Google is now highlighting some products (clothing & accessories) in organic search results on mobile in the US & India; you have to have a Google Merchant Centre account set up, but you do not need to buy ads to get this organic boost. Here’s the Google help file on how to optimize.
If your website has many related pages on a specific topic, organizing the info on one “content hub” (aka pillar pages, or even category pages in some cases) is an excellent way to get user and search engine attention.
Brief video from Google for SEO beginners: how to optimize images for Google search. They also link to their support file on this question, which has more advanced info. And here is another beginners video on Google SEO considerations for your website. (More links in the video comments.)
Google has a “SafeSearch filter” that removes porn and other mature content from search results, but sometimes it catches innocent sites as well.
Another good article on how internal linking can serve multiple purposes on your website, especially keyword ranking.
Sites that get the “featured snippet” position in Google search results can no longer get organic ranking on the first page. This could change, though.
CONTENT MARKETING & SOCIAL MEDIA (includes blogging & emails)
Excellent tips & advice on how to make email marketing work for you. Not using emails? You should. “...email has over 3.8 billion daily active users. Take a minute to think about that. Most people who use email probably fall between the ages of 15 and 64, and since there are only about 5 billion people on the planet in that age range, that means email has over 75 percent market penetration.” And “Almost three-fourths of people prefer to hear from businesses via email.”
Do you think that every email campaign needs its own landing page? I’m not sure, but there are some convincing arguments here. And don’t forget to plan to send your emails at the right time for your list subscribers.
Updated for 2020, HubSpot does an excellent holiday calendar that can help you plan social media posts and other content ahead of time, including hashtags where applicable.
Tips on converting your existing content (blog posts etc.) into podcasts. “Podcasts tend to be longer-form content than video or blogs. Many videos that companies produce are relatively short, ~2 minutes. For someone looking to listen to your podcast, this may not be substantial enough in terms of the information covered.”
Here’s a useful list of demographics of social media users - think about which sites would work best for your business based on who is using them.
Reddit is an excellent source of content ideas (video & transcript), as people are usually discussing and upvoting things that interest them, and it is all organized by topic for you.
Instagram is adding direct messaging (DM) access to their website.
Facebook is accused of denying data access to potential competitors.
A surprising number of American adults use LinkedIn, and their numbers are growing faster than expected. “LinkedIn users make up around one-third of all social network users in the U.S.”
ONLINE ADVERTISING (SEARCH ENGINES, SOCIAL MEDIA, & OTHERS)
Another tutorial on setting up a Google Ads account.
Google ads were less evident in organic search results, for about a week. This mirrors the changes on mobile several months ago, & includes favicons next to brand sites. But more people complained about the desktop layout, so they have backed down and will continue to test new versions.
Facebook, Google & Amazon are not the only advertising options out there.
Short infographic on how to advertise on TikTok.
STATS, DATA, OTHER TRACKING
If you haven’t set up Google Search Console for your website or blog, you should. [YouTube Video, from the Beginners series]
A good basic guide to using the Google Keyword Planner, including more tips on how to get in without setting up a paid ad campaign.
Instagram is most useful when you track your stats - use Insights to track your reach, clicks, impressions etc.
ECOMMERCE NEWS, IDEAS, TRENDS
The growth of ecommerce purchases has been detrimental to US retail sales overall, due to brick and mortar store closures, lower b&M profit margins, and fewer jobs. Remember that Amazon now gets around 50% of ecommerce purchases in the US, meaning that the increase of online retail is more consolidated than the lost brick and mortar sales.
Amazon will now be reporting counterfeit goods sold on its site to the authorities: "The hope has been that Amazon’s coveted data will help law enforcement make connections about criminals."
Amazon has started a delivery program in Australia called Amazon Flex. Requiring drivers to sign up for shifts up to 4 hours that they choose, driving their own vehicles, the program is being compared to Uber.
Shopify now has over 1 million merchants, and is growing rapidly. “This past Black Friday/Cyber Monday weekend, the company saw $2.9 billion in total sales; during its peak, Shopify software was processing $1.5 million in sales and 16,000 checkouts a minute.”
BUSINESS & CONSUMER STUDIES, STATS & REPORTS; SOCIOLOGY & PSYCHOLOGY, CUSTOMER SERVICE
Smartphone purchases continue to increase: $5.9 billion spent on Black Friday & Cyber Monday, and 48% of online purchases in the US on Christmas Day.
Supposedly, USPS is the most trusted brand in the US, followed by Amazon, Google, and Paypal. Actual quote: “levels of distrust are high in America, but it found that brands can win trust by protecting consumers' data privacy, not hiding important information in fine print and treating employees better than the minimum required by law.” I’m struggling with Amazon & Google in the top in particular, given that quote, but at least Facebook didn’t make the top 25. 😉 Note that age is a differential factor here: “Google is the most trusted brand among Gen Z and millennials, while USPS is the most trusted among older generations like Gen X and baby boomers.” Study details & top 25 list available here. (There is a large difference between the generations, according to this study; it’s worth a scan.)
MISCELLANEOUS
If you are looking for a new search engine, here are 7 that aren’t Google. Some of you probably hadn’t heard of all of them, because I hadn’t.
Anti-virus software Avast is still selling user data to major companies.
#SEO#search engine optimization#search engine marketing#EtsyNews#etsy#analytics#stats#statistics#Social media#contentmarketing#content marketing#Ecommerce#Smallbiz#SEOTips#customer service#ppc advertising#Onlinemarketing#CindyLouWho2NewsUpdates#ecommercetips#emailmarketing#socialmedianews
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RECENT NEWS, RESOURCES & STUDIES, April 6, 2021
Welcome to my latest summary of recent ecommerce news, resources & studies including search, analytics, content marketing, social media & Etsy! This covers articles, podcasts, videos and infographics I came across since the early March report, although some may be older than that.
I am hoping to launch a new ecommerce resource page on my website in May, although that is looking a bit ambitious with everything else I have on the go. (I've released the latest version of my Etsy search ebook, and am working on updating the keyword research ebook this week as well as still drafting a few new blog posts on Etsy search.)
If you have any questions, please drop me a line here on Tumblr, reply to this post, email me, or contact me on Twitter.
TOP NEWS & ARTICLES
Etsy Ads have been turning themselves on without sellers taking any action. There are threads here, here, here, and here. There is a video here with more people reporting the issue in the comments. A few cases seem to be related to using vacation mode, and at least one person reports a much higher budget than they would have chosen. So go check to make sure they ae still off (unless you want them running).
eBay, Etsy and some other marketplaces have formed a coalition to lobby against proposed laws they say could harm small sellers and microbusinesses. The Coalition to Protect American’s Small Sellers (PASS Coalition) is currently fighting the INFORM Consumers Act, which “would require online marketplaces to disclose third-party seller information to consumers, including name, address, email and telephone, or face civil penalties.” An Etsy rep said that this would be problematic because it would affect the privacy of sellers, and could potentially move communications off-site meaning Etsy would have less “ability to ensure seller integrity and consumer protections.”
PayPal is now allowing Americans to pay using cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin; this is rolling out over the next few months.
ETSY NEWS
Remember when Etsy Ads got way more expensive and stopped working for some people? Here’s the technical explanation of what they changed. [It is very technical in some parts, so most people will struggle with a lot of it] Note they explain that the Etsy Ads algorithm “ranks listings based on their bid price, multiplied by their predicted click-through rate”, and that they added contextual factors such as the time, the day of the week, and the buyer’s platform to tailor the bidding, and the expected order value is supposed to be part of the final bid calculation. They also mention that the current system is using the “30-day listing purchase rate” as a factor. The results of testing: “[t]he buyers saw more relevant results from ads (+6.19% CTR), the buyers made more purchases from ads (+3.08% PCCVR) and the sellers received more sales for every dollar they spent on Etsy Ads (+7.02% ROAS).” It’s clear that Etsy Ads are designed for the really big spenders, not small shops.
April’s attribute updates include candles and desks.
In their latest sustainability initiative, Etsy will now offset carbon emissions from packaging.
Etsy’s “disaster relief fund” has launched, but it is only available to US sellers, which is something not stated until you click to the application form. The FAQs actually state it is available to “all sellers”. Because everyone on Etsy is American, right?
Etsy donated $500,000 to two groups working against Asian hate. Ironically, they also got called out for having an algorithm that was surfacing “erotic” photos of Asian women as recommendations on listings that were completely unrelated items with only “Asian” as a common keyword. The issue was also noted in searches for “Asian photo”. Etsy’s response was to remove 3 listings and to promise to “continue to work on improving our algorithm to avoid surfacing recommendations where not relevant or appropriate.”
The Spring and Summer Trend Report is out, with the usual detail on trending items and keywords used. Some of the search trends:
“143% YoY increase in searches on Etsy for checkered prints”
Things like mushrooms, and “waves and squiggles” are hot
Outdoors, plants and gardening, staycations & decor related to travel are all expected to continue to be popular
“286% YoY increase in searches on Etsy for vintage colored glassware”
“42% YoY increase in searches on Etsy for pendant necklaces”
“86% YoY increase in searches on Etsy for clothing patterns”
SEO: GOOGLE & OTHER SEARCH ENGINES
If you are fairly new to SEO for search engines such as Google, you may find that it seems way too complex, and you might worry that you are missing something. Here is a great basic checklist for websites. Most of these items will not apply on marketplaces such as Etsy; e.g., Etsy rewrites the file name, and doesn’t allow you to create an URL separate from the listing title, or a meta description different from the listing description.
One of the most common questions I get is “how do I get backlinks”? Fortunately, Moz just came out with the Beginner's Guide to Link Building.
You know that links are very important for Google ranking, but do you know how Google decides that? Read this, and you will. [text with lots of graphics]
If you really want to know everything about SEO, Search Engine Journal compiled a fabulous list of resources. Some get very technical, so this list is definitely not for everyone.
A new study says that ⅔ of Google searches do not result in a click; people are getting the information they seek from various Google features on the search page. The study does not separate out simple searches such as the temperature outside, or a spelling check, in which users wouldn’t benefit from clicking. But while the click rate is dropping, users are still growing, so the total number of clicks continues to increase. Here’s a bit of commentary on the study.
Although Google says it likely won’t change ranking much, here’s a good overview of the upcoming Core Web Vitals algorithm update.
Good news! Bots don’t hurt your Google ranking.
SEO for videos on Google, appropriately in the form of a video. [links and highlights in the video’s description]
Former Google employees are involved in Neema, a subscription-based search engine which will protect users’ privacy. The site is currently in beta and there is a waitlist.
(CONTENT) MARKETING & SOCIAL MEDIA (includes blogging & emails)
Trends in the best headline/caption/title for sharing have changed. BuzzSumo’s review of 100 million posts shows that emotional phrases are no longer as big as they were in 2017, and the most shared headlines are now shorter: only 11 words/65 characters. There is a lot of analysis of Twitter and Facebook as well as general info here.
Ideal image size is different on every social media platform; this infographic gives you all the sizes for the major sites.
Reminder: don’t buy Instagram followers. A lot of the services sell bots and inactive accounts, which means you won’t get any engagement. The article ends with a few tips on how to get authentic followers that will actually help you.
Coming to Instagram: the ability to save drafts of Stories.
Reddit has opened a Canadian office, a logical decision since Canuck Redditors are the third-largest country base, and are increasing by 40% a year.
Which app was downloaded the most in the first quarter of 2021? You will be unsurprised to hear it is TikTok.
ONLINE ADVERTISING (SEARCH ENGINES, SOCIAL MEDIA, & OTHERS)
You can’t know how successful your ads are, or how they could be improved, if you aren’t paying attention to several different metrics. Here is what to watch on Facebook.
Here is an overview of what we know about how Google is doing away with advertisers’ third party cookies; the new set up is called Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLoC).
Ad design can be tricky; here are 11 tips for creating Facebook ads that will work.
TikTok is forcing users to see ads related to their TikTok history; as of April 15, you will not be able to opt out of ad personalization. You can still refuse to let them use your activity on other sites, though.
STATS, DATA, OTHER TRACKING
Here’s an overview of how the new version of Google Analytics works.
Facebook Analytics will be retired June 30, 2021, and some people do not feel there are adequate alternatives.
ECOMMERCE NEWS, IDEAS, TRENDS
Poshmark now has listing videos. Any videos added also show up on a seller’s Posh Stories. eBay is also rolling out videos on listing pages and storefronts.
Walmart’s Marketplace now allows sellers from outside the United States; the first new group is from China.
Hudson’s Bay Company is the latest to invite third-party merchants to sell on its site, the Hudson’s Bay Marketplace. There isn’t much there yet, though.
BUSINESS & CONSUMER STUDIES, STATS & REPORTS; SOCIOLOGY & PSYCHOLOGY, CUSTOMER SERVICE
Half of Americans hate seeing the same ads all of the time. 40% were interested in learning about deals through ads, while almost as many want ads that are “entertaining”.
Make sure you are using the correct words to get buyers to convert. This infographic lists some of the most useful psychological trigger words, depending on your goals.
Increasing the average order value is a smart way to increase your income without adding more new customers. Here are 4 pricing strategies to get you there.
Ecommerce spending is projected to continue increasing, and installment plans have been popular early in 2021.
How fast a website loads is directly related to sales and conversions. “If a page’s load time slowed from one second to three seconds, the chances of a bounce increased by almost a third (32%). And going from one to five seconds increased bounce rate by a whopping 90%!”
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