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theurbansquared · 4 years ago

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Guide To Avoiding A Loser Brokerage

by James Hill | theurbansquared

Brokers can be bastards and some even get better at it while other brokers are legitimate life-changing business Sherpas

A broker is supposed to guide you through a career in real estate much like a coach or pimp - offering protection and how to understand a complicated system better and direct it to revenue without getting your neck broke while playing the game. I created and ran the most well-reviewed, largest full-service brokerage in the fastest-growing city in America. This gave me access to nearly ever broker and their broker's pay structure and innovations. I also got the agent's version of my same broker buddies brokerages when they eventually joined my brokerage; hovering anywhere from 20–60 agents. Trending insider chatter has blame going to real estate brokers of decades past (and current) and how they’ve managed their agents - - letting unsupervised agents with no experience run wild on the streets practicing on the public wearing out Realtor love and making a need for all the Mountain Dew-made Zillow-y options that currently exist.

Brokers are out of touch more than ever with today’s current media load, having to understand and use social media platforms for their advertising (since the private Town & Country affair that real estate once was is forever over and the landscape is a bit more like a half Juggalo, half programmer flea market).

Let’s dive into some situations and tenets that most agents don’t consider when choosing a brokerage.

Sales Volume

This is a bit of negotiating psychology and due diligence. Simply ask how much sales they (the brokerage) did last year and how much they’re currently at. If they don’t know these numbers they’re goons. If they don’t give it, you guessed it - they’re hiding something; their lack of revenue. I’ve hired and fired hundreds of agents and in interviews so few ask this question but it’s one of the most important questions you can ask as an agent and you need the information. An agent that doesn’t ask this has already given a tell that they’re not a top producer since they’re not interested in the production capacity of the team they may join. No bueno. Creep the brokerage as well obvi -- reviews, FB & IG engagement and current running ads, and make sure the company Christmas Party isn’t catered by Chic-fil-a at a Burnet Road dive bar.

Office

40% of your learning and 350% of your work will be done at the office. Those numbers will make sense 90% of the time after a few years in real estate. The rest should be on the streets - your car, properties, driving 75 mph talking and sending out docs, gorging on breath mints. Office, home, tiny homes, motorhomes have all blended into one larger conversation where work/live ethos are all in re-definition.

But, when you do need a more savvy moment in any market when people talk about borrowing or selling something that’s over $100K they don’t want to hear some bullshit too loud pedantic conversation seated right next to them at Starbucks or the local kooky coffee shop. In real estate Murphy’s Law is always in effect. The super important listing sign off that has to go well and they want to hear you pitch again before deciding? There will be someone (at this super ‘caj’ coffee house meeting) there projectile vomiting, or throwing cats, or something else tiresome or bad that takes more calls.

Speech and body language are massive parts of sales so when the entire set is thrown because a barista is running through a whole Sublime album. You want the most inviting cool office you can ever pull off at any given moment in real estate . Was that ever a question? There's a balance -- you can't afford that year one or three, but it’s called real estate for a reason. Sexy, exciting buildings is what the brochure said when I joined. Also, it’s about style not size.

If you haven’t lost business to coffee house back pressure you really haven’t failed at agency properly.

Social IQ

Social reach is the only conversation now. Many brokerages won’t make it as the lead generating aspects of the industry aren't powered by a private MLS anyone and the publicly-hated ‘Realtor’ designation have both brokers and agents guessing about tomorrow. Calendars, best practices and free shitty tips & templates are the du jour of the day for anyone trying to get an agent's eyes. You can Google and get all the ‘basic’ social media dance steps, but with everyone at the same happy hunting spot, you’re being covered up, which leaves all your new artistic efforts fruitless and also squandering winning time.

Traffic, leads and engagement are all separate areas that have to be fulfilled properly and even this is in flux with historic corporations and current start ups all on the same advertising playing field. Social reach and engagement is about going to the consumer direct and becoming their friend with soft bribes -- free food, gifts, prizes (trips, events tickets) or industry work tools. The great news is, real estate has always been mostly consumer direct - start up a convoy at the grocery store (bar, church, meetup) and you’re in the car that weekend looking for houses with a new client. While you, your brokerage and the world are figuring out their exact social media mix, you need to make sure a brokerage isn’t lost on social media since many won’t be able to stay in business in the next few short years. Your brokerage needs to have a plan and and at best some presence on social media. Plus, they should be running low-cost performative marketing ad campaigns to get a feel for what and if set user groups are responding to ads. Anyone can post on IG but people engage on IG when they become inspired. A brokerage should have some sort of inspiration and relationship tied in with the local allure of their city -- or heading that direction.

Mentoring

Much like a neurotic buyer chasing an interest rate for their home mortgage (and then never buying a house) agents too focused on commission may miss the essential career need for mentoring -- for their clients and career. I had a 5 deal minimum for my new agents before they were ever unsupervised and received more commission. I've had new agents with celeb clients in hand and celeb agents with no clients in hand. No one wants to do business with someone with absolutely has no, experience but they do it because they like you as a friend or fam. Your mentor is the person riding shotgun with you at the beginning of your career. On many levels you want to be this person since they embody the position and role. You're literally and figuratively are borrowing experience from them and they deserve to be paid for it. You always have to strengthen your brand outside of your brokerage but if you don’t have any experience your brand doesn’t have ‘strength’ you simply have a logo and a drag & drop website where you're possibly talking about yourself and love of unicorns or football shit but the big boat deals you dream about in bed aren’t gotten this way. Remember, no unicorn could ever throw a football good without a lot of practice and a good mentor.

Support

Support in a brokerage is really communication and solutions for small problems, and systems for managing bigger ones with people. Most of the annoying things in real estate happen outside of the deal - contracts, calls, emails, docs, signatures, more docs. You typically want a super admin, broker, or agent manager that you can call and they pick up the phone. It’s pretty simple. With a mentor, admin, or broker you’re going to have a n 8:30 PM question or deal that’s going down. You’ll need printer help. Real estate always happens now (this was one of the main mantras in my office). Printing, prequal, weekend support and constant post dinner shenanigans.

Training

Meet Frank Miller, David Mamet, the Sex Pistols, Tony Robbins, Wayne Dyer, Hendrix, Tom Hopkins, The World’s Greatest Detective and Conan The Barbarian. We had a lot of different inspirations for the style and ethos of our urban brokerage. The World’s Greatest Detective is Batman. It was a moniker that became popular in the seventies. We used this example about how important due diligence and proper Fact Finding techniques are for serving and closing deals for clients. (It’s almost essential to be inquisitive in real estate esp about property/development to have success). Training is largely your sales meeting(s). Although I don’t come from a car background I’ve mentored many car guys transferring to real estate (they typically are out of the industry within 2 years and are there only for boom markets). Car guys have meetings every morning 6 days a week and they’re not at 9 or 10 am. They’re already working.

free module: The Burger King Phenomena: Why Agents Do Less Working For Themselves Than If They Were Working At Burger King

Many brokerages have no training/meeting schedule (monthly doesn’t count -- that’s a meet and greet company pump and catch up meeting). If a brokerage doesn’t have training on a schedule then there is no training. You’ll possibly be thrown a 3-ring binder, or given some PDF’s, or links to old bizarre training videos or a soup sandwich of all three and sometimes even a bill for the training. An agent’s training/meetings and their attendance to them are the difference between an agent making it or not when you’re 24 months or less in the role as an agent especially in the fast turbulent waters of the current 2021 market where brokerage and agent purpose and pay are under attack. From my experience, new agents that hide die.

Media

Having a background as a creative director I’m aware with great detail of agency and brokerage media needs, the cost and time they extract, and the corresponding revenue they’re projected to bring back. Brokerages are looking for their purpose now as simply having a brokerage doesn’t bring in leads like it used to. This is fitting, since the digital dumbass brokers that that didn’t understand the importance of ‘the web’ rickshawed our MLS data and sold the agent/broker centric real estate system for their benefit while current agents are left with an empty greasy enough to-go box to curl up with. Brokerages were never media houses or ad agencies but now that consumer level graphic programs and website builders are ubiquitous and any agent after being licensed for 10 days can drag & drop a website up in 4 hours and make it look like a brokerage that’s been around for years. I know I’m going wide on the subject here but stay with me because this is the crux of where the industry and consumer are renegotiating roles.

A brokerage’s value proposition has changed drastically with the telecommute revolution that was only sped and strengthened by Covid. Also, generational knowledge base gaps in technology are more apparent than ever with technology as younger agents can often be more media savvy than their broker. The market is flooded with self appointed companies or gurus that are taking on the role of the classic ad agency (Mad Men) or media production house. Also beware of real estate coaches with little or no real estate experience offering to guide you in social media. Okay media can’t be used in apex situations (such as the luxury listings you’re after) and doesn’t draw apex listings. Beware of tapioca room temperature tips and general lists from companies that can appear informative but are really boilerplate low grade data to get your attention to ultimately upsell you on a paid service.

As an agent or a brokerage, consumer level graphic and website building programs can be a death ticket to your business as your competitors have the same tools and are cranking out the same type of style of messaging you are now. Now agents, principals, admins and in art class creating flyers. This has been done since the nineties as the valleys of dead agent careers is full of 2-day Microsoft Word (or any of their shitty office offerings) seshes to produce nasty flyers and presentations. These programs are fun and making bad flyers absolutely work related - the kind of work you don’t want’ related to your business because it’s adult crayon coloring. Activity does not equal production. Staying busy doing the wrong things doesn’t make money in real estate. Rather than spending agent winning time staying in the wrong lanes for way too long, get with a team or brokerage that are providing the most exceptional visual media you can find in your market. It used to be cool 2 years ago, now it’s the only thing that matters. Visual content.

free module: Better Agent Media, Less Agent Money (media tips and hacks).

Access

This is access to your broker. Brokers with families are typically less available. Your best bet as an agent is looking for a grinder broker who sleeps on the couch at their office. This person doesn’t have kids to build into so they’ll build into your career and you’ll get the most out of these brokers. Beware of cheesedick, apathetic, rich boy, bored brokers not around and more concerned with projects like a shitty vanity wine brand that their wife’s forced them to launch since she’s not living her best life anymore as an agent.

Style

What kind of style is your brokerage? Is there an opportunity to bring more style sophistication to the market -- standout in a smaller market? Or, are you in an ultra stylish market currently and butt hurt because you already have a little story about how you’re going to keep it real and be a Dockers wearing slob for eternity? The thing about style in agency is you always need to look like you can list a million dollar house. Oh, is it really that simple? Yes it is. You complicated it. Clients always care about their housing a little bit more than they care about your real estate career. They don’t have time to figure out why you’re wearing shoe styles from 7 years ago. Don’t make it hard for people to do business with you. If you’re ugly, even better. It can be a massive advantage. Everyone on the planet loves when someone who doesn’t fall into our general current ‘attractive’ spectrum doesn’t give af, looks great and puts themselves together in a stylish way that the viewer can understand (can I get away with Teen Wolf?). A great side benefit from this step in the right direction is it’s a great way to make someone who is conventionally attractive insecure.

You want to be in the same style as the people in your area but the secret is you need to lead that style pack if you can -- you always lead and dress apex. Years ago this was anecdotal but after over 100K hours in real estate a good suite (tailored) saved my ass and literally got me business. I listed the largest house in east Austin because of a suit (and got a front page story on the newspaper real estate section for free because the owner saw me walking into the next door neighbor’s house).

Offices, dress, logo, email signature are all elements of you and your brokerage’s style. Style in and of itself isn’t enough to be a top producer in real estate. I’ve had stylish and even celebrity agents that didn't do zilch, but style often is a fingerprint to something more.

Picking the right elements for your agent style is an art because you have to offer something from yourself that’s unique enough as well as something familiar (a bridge to your uniqueness). I have a background as a musician and also as a merchant sailor. Fortunately those are easy convo starters. You could be a philatelist and have some challenges, but regardless it absolutely will take a year or three to develop your own angle and style towards the market as you learn it and the agent role more.

Things that look attractive and familiar puts client’s psychologies at ease. So, if skinny jeans are in you better get in them (that’s like five years old now). You’re on stage. You don’t wear what the worker people behind the camera wear. If you want to wear boring shit get on the other side of the camera. If you want less leads saddle up to a forgettable brokerage. People have hard days. They want you to put an effort into your real estate agency role. Currently it’s a fried role so you’re dealing with that too. People love to be smiled at and sold and especially from someone who smells good. It doesn't ever get old. Don’t make them beg for your charm. Be a nice charming person with a shirt that fits good, it’s a powerful combo.

Get My Damn Paper

If you’ve never seen a werewolf in daylight mess with an agent’s commission after the deal’s done and funded. Admin? Who is the damn person who does the admin? (accounts payable is the icey pro word if you like). That person that you contact to get your commission check cut? If that person is a weirdo, or there’s an unfriendly or sketchy quality to the office or admin staff, do not go forward (don’t confuse this with new people or industry jitters). Grab some free coffee, leave the smarm and jet to the next brokerage blind date.

Software

CRM is an annoying conversation. Here’s the things with CRM’s - for all the work CRMs curtail, because of their complexity and existence and the work(time) they take to interact with you need to consider how much work you’re putting into operating the CRM software verses how much time it’s saving. Many times brokerages have expensive yearly subscriptions with per agent fees for their CRM which can make the brokerage have a zealot meth thing for the ‘team’ software and promise you can’t have a career without taking a bump too. To understand CRM better before it was a name, Client Relationship Management is what analog Proximity became. Let me explain - being close to people in Church, bar, school, same building -- all give proximity. This becomes familiarity, then ease, then trust. People do business with people they trust & like. Once people disconnected physically and started using other means more contact attempts have to be made to work for or ‘prove’ worth.

Follow Up is a large component of most CRM’s and there are gobs of money for agents who follow up meticulously. Simply ask the broker what CRM they use and research it. Something to remember - unless you’re extremely busy with your career you don’t need a CRM. You can manage & database your clients & leads ‘by hand’ and strap it to the cloud with G-Suite/Google Sheets.

Brokerage Name

A small but important aside, if a brokerage have named themselves after a precious metal or a gem, or if it says elite in the name then it’s not elite. If it has the words prestige or worldwide or international it may not be any of those either. I know a handful of exceptions to this rule but this is a great dirty primer to use when choosing a brokerage that’s going to propel your career and have shrimp options at the Christmas Party.

#agent #realtor #realestateagent #broker #brokerage #newhomebuyer #coach #businesscoach #entrepreneurs #new agent #zillow

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fuckyeahtx · 5 years ago

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Late in the afternoon on the last Monday in June, 430 Democrats, who had paid up to $100,000 each, clicked into a private, Texas-themed Zoom call organized by Joe Biden’s campaign. They were greeted by former Planned Parenthood chief Cecile Richards, whose mother, Ann, was the state’s last Democratic governor. They heard from Julián Castro and Beto O’Rourke, and they were treated to a performance by Willie Nelson, who sang a song with his son Lukas called “Vote ’Em Out.” It began, “If you don’t like who’s in there, vote ’em out. / That’s what Election Day is all about. / The biggest gun we’ve got is called the ballot box.” And they heard from Biden, who — just four days after a Fox News poll showed him narrowly ahead of Donald Trump in the state no Democratic nominee has carried since Jimmy Carter — told them, “I think we can turn Texas blue.”

From Amarillo to Brownsville to Beaumont to El Paso, you could practically hear the sighs: Here we go again. Texas Democrats hear a version of this overture in every election cycle as outsiders swoop in citing statistics about demographic shifts. The national party has long regarded the Lone Star State’s 38 electoral votes as the just-out-of-reach golden key to perpetual success.

Still, the ex-VP is now basking in a double-digit lead nationwide, and we’re improbably entering month 17 of close polling between Biden and the president in Texas, which Trump won by nine points in 2016. The state’s Republican senators are warning that Texas will be “hotly contested” (Ted Cruz) and “at risk of turning purple” (John Cornyn). And after months of bluster from its GOP leaders — in March, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick said seniors like him would be willing to die to restart the economy — Texas is under assault from COVID-19, and frustrations are turning into fury. Governor Greg Abbott has backtracked on plans for reopening as more than 5,000 new coronavirus cases flood in each day, while Houston hospitals are at capacity and millions remain out of work.

Four months into lockdown — about halfway between being left for dead politically early in the primary and Election Day in November — the nominee and his campaign are still adjusting to political fortunes they can hardly believe all around the country, let alone in Texas. As the summer stretches on, party leaders are starting to work out whether Biden’s lead and Trump’s spiral mean Democrats can afford to experiment in conservative states or if it’s worth shining a brighter light on down-ballot races that could hand a President Biden the Senate.

Of course, no national Democratic group has spent a dime on TV advertising in Texas, and they’re unlikely to. Biden doesn’t need Texas to win the White House. Far from it: Carter is the only Democrat to win there since native son Lyndon B. Johnson. Pro-Biden groups, like the Unite the Country super-PAC, that aim to get him to 270 electoral votes have been spending money in top-tier battleground states like Florida and North Carolina, not Texas, where Trump still has a slim lead in some polls. “If we win Texas, it will be the 350th or 370th electoral vote,” says Lily Adams, a senior Unite the Country official (who happens to be Ann Richards’s granddaughter and Cecile Richards’s daughter). “Not the 270th.”

And Democrats are still haunted by their 2016 confidence, especially in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Hillary Clinton’s wasn’t even the party’s only semi-recent collapse; one July 1988 poll showed Michael Dukakis beating George H.W. Bush by 17 points. Trump’s team, meanwhile, insists it hasn’t started fully unloading on its opponent yet. But this year’s race is showing signs of becoming something entirely different: Despite being stuck at home in Delaware because of the virus while Trump soaked up the national attention, Biden held a roughly ten-point lead in national polling averages by the end of June — about four points wider than the margin at this stage of any race in recent history. It would be overly kind to describe Trump as “flailing” as his poll numbers continue to hit new lows amid the pandemic and the protests against police brutality. His answer is to desperately look for a more cutting nickname for Biden, as he’s worried that “Sleepy Joe” isn’t good enough. (The 74-year-old Trump’s allies think their best bet is to portray 77-year-old Biden as frail and deteriorating. When asked by a Fox News producer about “cognitive decline” late last month, Biden replied, “I’m constantly tested … I can hardly wait to compare my cognitive capability to the cognitive capability of the man I’m running against.”)

Biden’s leads in the crucial swing states are more solid than expected — Trump’s campaign team is already worried he may have too big a mountain to climb in Michigan, the site of perhaps his most shocking 2016 victory — but the leads are still smaller than Biden’s apparent national margin. Biden has only recently begun venturing out for campaign events and rarely travels farther than next-door Pennsylvania. Wary of distancing recommendations, he isn’t planning to hold rallies in the fall, and only now, with four months left, is he building up senior teams in Wisconsin, North Carolina, and the like, while his allies pound digital and TV airwaves in those battlegrounds with a barrage of anti-Trump ads.

A Biden sweep still isn’t certain, which is why he probably won’t go all-in on a state like Texas. “My grandmother used to say, ‘You don’t know the size of Texas until you’ve campaigned in it,�� ” warns Adams. O’Rourke’s race against Cruz was the priciest Senate contest ever — and he still lost. But, Adams continues, “what you may be witnessing is a confluence or perfect storm of events that is making Texas more competitive this cycle than any other in recent history.”

Three Democrats independently used the “perfect storm” metaphor in conversations with me to refer to the pandemic, Trump’s plummeting popularity, and demographic shifts that have increased the state’s number of Latino voters and city dwellers. (A fourth called it a “perfect shitstorm.”) While that combination doesn’t yet have party leaders considering Texas a central swing state, it has forced them to shift it solidly into their expanded conversation about electoral battlegrounds, just behind Georgia.

Those closest to Biden have better things to worry about than these debates — like picking his running mate and designing his coronavirus-recovery proposals. When they do get sucked in, though, the pro-Texas-investment arguments usually start by noting that this ain’t the Bushes’ Texas anymore. O’Rourke, whose presidential campaign manager, Jen O’Malley Dillon, now runs Biden’s effort, came within three points of Cruz in 2018. That was just four years after Abbott beat Democrat Wendy Davis by 20 points, and the state’s briskly growing cities and suburbs are sprinting away from Trump’s GOP. Long-term trends have seduced Democrats: The Census Bureau in June reported that Texas’s Hispanic population grew by more than 2 million in the past decade. And the state’s present crisis has only sped things up. It’s the latest stage in a four-month saga during which Trump’s polling has dropped precipitously, but it mirrors similarly dire pictures for Trump in Florida and Arizona. “It’s 24/7, all over the place on TV, on their cell phones, as counties send out emergency texts to every single person in the county,” Castro, the former presidential candidate, tells me. “People are putting two and two together that this is the direct result of a failure by Donald Trump and Greg Abbott.” Whereas Biden has lagged previous Democrats a bit in popularity among Latino voters, Latino communities have been hit especially brutally, causing many to turn hard against Republicans.

The party’s wallet will stay shut for now anywhere but Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, North Carolina, Arizona, and Florida. Still, before Willie Nelson and his guitar took center stage that Monday afternoon on Zoom, O’Rourke warned that if the vote tally is tight on Election Day, “I believe that the current occupant of the White House — who does not believe in the rule of law, who does not respect the Constitution, who will do anything he can to maintain and increase his purchase on power, will exploit a close outcome to attempt to steal the election.” But, he continued, “the greatest safeguard against that outcome is Texas.”

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schraubd · 5 years ago

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Handicapping the Senate

It's less than six months from election day, so why not handicap the current state of the 2020 Senate races? I'm going to list the (competitive) races in order of likelihood to flip to the opposing party. 1. Alabama (Doug Jones - D): You know that West Wing plot where the Democratic nominee in a super-Republican district dies before election day, and Sam Seaborn offers to run in the special election if the dead guy somehow ends up winning? And then every confluence of luck and God and good fortune smiled and the dead guy did win, forcing Sam into a congressional run doomed as soon as it began? That's kind of Doug Jones re-election campaign. Everything -- everything -- had to break in increasingly ludicrous fashion for a Democrat to win a Senate seat in Alabama, right down to his opponent being an actual pedophile. And it still was a 2 point race. This was a great victory, and Jones deserves to be showered with plaudits and praise for it. But it'd take another miracle for him to win in 2020, and I don't see it. The only bright spot is that former Auburn football coach Tommy Tuberville looks likely to best ex-Senator and former Trump AG Jeff Sessions to become the GOP nominee -- not because Tuberville is better, but because one of the few joys of the Trump era has been watching him repeatedly wreck the careers of his erstwhile friends. 2. Colorado (Cory Gardner - R): Colorado, like Nevada, is a state that seemed to go from red to light blue skipping entirely over purple in the process. Cory Gardner never got the memo, and has legislated like a GOP diehard for his entire first term -- never even gesturing at a pivot toward the Senator. The reward for his Trumpist loyalty is to be polling down double digits against Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper (doing the right thing running for Senate instead of a quixotic Presidential campaign). It's hard to see how he survives -- he ranks below Jones only because Colorado isn't so solidly blue that a Republican victory would require divine intervention. 3. Arizona (Martha McSally - R [special]): Every once in awhile, one comes across a politician who seems perfectly fine on paper, who doesn't seem to have any particular attributes that make her especially lovable or loathable, yet who voters for whatever reason just don't cotton to. Martha McSally seems to be one of those pols. She just lost a Senate race in 2018 to Kyrsten Sinema in a mild upset that presaged Arizona suddenly becoming a real Democratic target, then immediately got appointed to fill the shoes of departing Republican Senator Jon Kyl. Now she's polling down again to Mark Kelly (astronaut husband of shooting survivor and ex-Rep. Gabby Giffords), in a state where Biden is posting some very impressive numbers. Other politicians might be able to reverse the tide. But McSally just doesn't seem to vibe with the folks she needs to, and the trend lines aren't pulling her way. The most recent poll to drop in Arizona has her losing by a crushing 13 point margin. 4. Maine (Susan Collins - R): This would be among the sweetest fruits for me, and Sara Gideon has a very strong shot to take out Moderate Republican(tm) Susan Collins. Maine remains blue at the presidential level, and Collins once sky-high approvals have been in free fall as she's played loyal foot soldier to McConnell and Trump. Yet it's hard not to imagine she's stockpiled some good will from her (however tattered) reputation as a moderate, and Maine more so than anywhere in New England has some areas that are surprisingly Trump-friendly. This will be a real slugfest. 5. North Carolina (Thom Tillis - R): The "new south" -- educated, suburban, professional, racially diverse, and increasingly blue-friendly -- is creeping up and down the Atlantic coast. Virginia's already been taken over. Georgia an increasingly plum target. But the next domino most likely to fall is North Carolina -- still the palest shade of red leaning, but a place where Democratic fortunes appear to be waxing. Tillis has two other things cutting against him: he'll be sharing a ballot with wildly popular Democratic Governor Roy Cooper (who appears to be thrashing any GOP challengers), and a flood of bad press hitting his Senate colleague Richard Burr for allegedly dumping stock before the coronavirus news really broke. Democratic nominee Cal Cunningham is polling well here -- either moderately ahead or at worst tied. 6. Montana (Steve Daines - R): Governor Steve Bullock is another entry in the "thank you for abandoning a ridiculous POTUS bid and running for Senate instead" list, and he instantly turns this race into a real Democratic opportunity. Montana has been quietly getting more competitive over the past few years as the western half of the state and what passes for "cities" turn bluer, and Democratic Senator Jon Tester won a hotly contested 2018 Senate race by a close but not squeaky-thin 3.5% margin. Daines has the advantage of incumbency plus Trump's coattails, but Bullock is popular statewide. This has flown under the radar a bit, and I think Bullock's got a real shot. 7. Georgia (Kelly Loeffler - R [special]): This would place a lot higher if I was ordering based on "likelihood the incumbent loses". Loeffler, only recently appointed by Governor Brian Kemp, is abysmally unpopular in the Peach State, and right now she's polling fourth in a free-for-all election (behind fellow Republican Mac Collins and then two Democrats). The reasons are myriad -- Trump made it clear she was not his choice for the appointment, and she too has gotten into hot water over coronavirus-related trading -- but the end result is she's unlikely to even advance to the run-off. Unfortunately for Democrats, run-offs in Georgia have tended to sharply favor the GOP, so the most likely person to emerge from the scrum is Collins -- an even further-right Trump loyalist. There's also the alarming possibility that, in a highly fractured field, Loeffler manages to squeak into second and lock Democrats out entirely. Of course if that happens, Loeffler's only hope to prevail is to attract cross-over votes .... 8. Michigan (Gary Peters - D): Outside Alabama, this is by far the GOP's best chance for a 2020 Senate pickup. John James is a very strong candidate who ran a surprisingly close race against Debbie Stabenow in 2018, and he's back for a second crack at the Senate. Peters is not as well established as Stabenow was, and 2020 will likely not be as big a blue wave year as 2018 was. On the other hand, Democratic fortunes in Michigan seem to be on the rise, and Biden should perform better there than Clinton did in 2016. That's enough to make Peters the favorite, but not an overwhelming one. 9. Iowa (Joni Ernst - R): Once the ultimate bellwether, Iowa has seemingly been largely written off as a legitimate Democratic target, and for a long time Joni Ernst seemed to be coasting to re-election. But her numbers are surprisingly soft -- two polls this month have her deadlocked with her two most likely Democratic challengers -- and Democrats did win three of four Iowa House seats in 2018. She's definitely still the favorite, but an upset can't be written off. 10. Georgia (David Perdue - R): The other Georgia race, minus the particular "complexities" raised by Loeffler's unique unpopularity. That means most of the above analysis applies, but only more so for the Republicans. Georgia continues to creep towards purple status, but odds are it won't quite get there in 2020. 11. Kansas (Open [Pat Roberts] - R): Kris Kobach blew the Governor's race for the GOP in 2018, but that hasn't deterred him from seeking the Senate nod in 2020. It's possible he'll get it, and so it's possible he'll lose again. Democrats have rarely been competitive in the Sunflower State, but 2018 showed they had a heartbeat. Meanwhile, the state Republican Party has been in a state of near-civil war for years between (relative) moderates and true firebreathers. The latter camp had their man in the Governor's mansion in the form of Sam Brownback, and his experiment in scorched-earth conservative governance led the GOP to unprecedented unpopularity in a state they normally dominate in. 12. Kentucky (Mitch McConnell - R): I know I said Susan Collins would be the sweetest fruit, but if Mitch McConnell goes down I'll revise that assessment. It's unlikely -- Kentucky is blood red at the Presidential level, and McConnell has effectively infinite resources at his disposal. But Andy Beshear's win of the Governor's mansion showed that Democrats still can win statewide if the stars align, and McConnell, for all his power and sway, is actually very unpopular in his home state. A definite long shot, but not wholly out of range. via The Debate Link https://ift.tt/2AP3523

#Democrats #Election 2020 #Republicans #Senate

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marsjapanaspenbloomfield · 5 years ago

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Random facts about Japan

Vending machine ratio. To every person there is approximately 23 vending machines. You can get anything in a vending machine including cars, lettuce, hot ramen, and eggs.

Gambling is illegal. There are no gambling stations in Japan however there is one game called pachinko which isn't illegal because it is a popular game and is disguised, in the game the payer buys tiny meatballs which are slotted into the machine. the balled that win are exchanged for prizes or tokens which can be exchanged for money.

Fake Food. Outside of most restaurants, you will find fake replicas of the food that the restaurant serves! You may also find ones that move! Yes, animated food – only in Japan.There is a street which is unofficially known as kitchen street, but the formal name is Kappabashi Street. It’s located between Asakusa and Ueno. This is where restaurants purchase their kitchenware and fake food! It’s a street lined with shops selling beautiful Japanese kitchenware, from hand-painted bowls to every kitchen gadget you could think of, it’s a kitchen-lovers dream!

Japan has the third-highest life expectancy in the world. Japanese have the highest life expectancy in the world due to their diet and lifestyle. They are very healthy people and exercise regularly.On average men will live until their 81 years old and women 87 years old. This is causing a crisis in Japan because there’s a lack of childbirth also. Now there are more seniors than children and this is causing a problem for the Japanese economy.Apparently, Japan sells more adult diapers than children’s

There are over 6800 islands.

Oldest people in the world. One of the most beautiful islands that mirror paradise is called Okinawa. On this island are the two oldest people in the world (116 & 117 years old)!

Honshu is one of the four main islands and where Tokyo is located. The other 3 main islands are called Hokkaido, Shikoku and Kyushu.

Slurping your noodles is not considered rude. It’s considered polite to make slurping noises and means that you’re enjoying the food and you appreciate it.

Japan eat the most seafood in the world. The Japanese eat over 17 million tonnes of fish per year. The Japanese are the largest importer of seafood.You will seafood as a staple food for the Japanese and included in most meals. Over 20% of their protein is from seafood!

You’re allowed to take naps on the job. Yes, that right! In fact, naps are encouraged on the job because this improves workflow and speed.It’s also considered a sign that you are dedicated to your job and have worked hard and long for your job!

They eat KFC for Christmas dinner. Apparently, over 3.6 million people in Japan celebrate their Christmas with a KFC dinner.So how did this come about in the first place? Well, it was just a good marketing campaign when the first store opened in 1970. KFC started a ‘Party Barrell’ based on an American Christmas dinner but with chicken of course instead of turkey. Somehow it caught on and the rest is history.Christmas is not considered a big event as less than 2% of Japan is Christian.

Tokyo is the most densely populated city in the world. Around 38 million of Japans population live just in Tokyo. Japan has a population of 127 million, so that’s a lot of people in a small space!You can see how busy Tokyo is during rush-hour easily by trying to hop on a train within the city or walking the busiest crossing in the world – Shibuya.

One of the safest countries in the world. Japan’s crime rate is so low is basically non-existent. The Japanese are very honest people, reliable and law-abiding.The Japanese law is strict, so people tend to not go off the rails and on the wrong side of the law.

Don’t wear your shoes inside. Before entering a house, you will be asked to take off your shoes. You will be given a pair of slippers usually. It’s considered rude to wear your shoes inside.This Japanese custom was mainly a thing because back in the days the Japanese used to eat off the floor and obviously didn’t want dirty shoes ruining where they were about to eat.

They have a high suicide rate. Unfortunately, Japan has one of the highest suicide rates in the world. Last year Japan youth suicide’s hit a record high in 30 years.The suicide forest is the second most popular place to commit suicide after San Francisco golden gate bridge. The forest is located at the base of Mt Fuji and is said to where most people enter and never come back.The rate of suicide is due to not enough access to therapists as well as work pressures. Japan has announced that they are working on better programs, especially in schools to help cut the rate of suicide.

The toilets sing for you. This is probably the weirdest thing about Japan, the toilets! They do just about anything, even sing.You can also press a button and the seat will warm up, so your bottom doesn’t get cold!

Square melons are a thing. There is such a thing as square watermelons! Apparently, they are grown like this for decoration and cost as much as $100!

They have a penis festival. The Kanamara Matsuri festival is held every year. It started in 1969 just outside of Tokyo and celebrates the penis and female fertility!

Eating raw meat is common. You will notice on your trip to Japan that eating various types of meat raw is totally the norm. Raw fish is commonly found in sushi. Homemade sushi tastes best and you’re lucky if you can find a guesthouse with a welcoming host to serve you local food.One of the delicacies in Japan is raw horsemeat. It’s called Bashari and is thinly sliced and eaten raw.

No 4’s please! It is common in Japanese culture to totally avoid the number four because the word sounds the same as the word death. Buildings will commonly not have the 4th floor, cutlery is sold in sets of 3 or 4 and the number of guests invited to a tea ceremony will never be 4!

The Japanese are some of the friendliest in the world.This is a cold hard fact! The Japanese are awesome, to say the least. They are incredibly friendly, gentle and conscious people.

Fruit is the best gift you can give. If you don’t know what to get your host, then gift them fruit. You will notice the price of fruit is astronomically high.There’s a fruit gifting shop in Tokyo and fruit can be as expensive as $27,000!

The face mask is used by the sick. When I first visited Japan, I thought the face mask was worn because people don’t want to get sick and wanted to avoid other people’s germs. But, it’s actually the other way around.If you are sick you wear the face mask, so you don’t get others sick. Again, this shows how nice the Japanese are! Always thinking of others!

You can rent a cuddle. Yes, you read that right. There are businesses where you can go in and pay for a cuddle. Turns out people are lonely and just want a good old-fashioned hug sometimes.

Maid café. In Japan, there are maid cafes where the staff dress up in maid costumes and treat you as their master. Now, you may be thinking that it sounds sexual, well it’s not meant to be that way at all. It’s just a café where the staff are dressed in cosplay.The cafe is strange, fun but maybe a little cringy all at the same time. It’s just basically a café where everyone dresses up!

About 1500 earthquakes a year. Tokyo lies on an active area where earthquakes are extremely common, and they have over 1500 of them a year. But really this is nothing for me because New Zealand has over 15,000 per year.

They take cleaning seriously. Cleaning is taught in school and is a serious part of Japanese culture. Students and children clean their own school!

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seawolvesanddragons · 7 years ago

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Merlin Short - The Youtuber AU

Alright, to start with, Gwaine [Username: AngrIrishman] mostly does prank videos; his is primarily a comedy channel. It starts off as in the moment pranks (probably while he is uni). As he gains more followers and grows more confident he starts doing a few sketches, usually the same characters in different scenarios (the series “drunk Irishman confused by British things is the number one favourite.) After a semester or two he drops out of uni, deciding it isn’t for him and he was only following family pressure, and he wants to do follow this youtube idea. He mostly pranks friends and family, all harmless stuff. After he meets Merlin he does a good deal of his pranks on him, but Elyan and Percival show up the mst as his victims (or partners in crime) since he’s lived with them both. He’s always willing to help out his friends with their videos, and often appears in Percival’s gaming competitions. Occasionally, for when Gwaine wants to address something serious or do a straight video of something bothering him, he has a series of “what’s aleing me today” where he talks about the serious stuff under the guise of drinking. His is one of the bigger youtube stars and his fame only skyrockets after he meets the others. Percival [AllTankedUp] started in youtube as just responding to some of the more ridiculous challenges (planking, cinnamon challenge, parkour, etc) but ended up accidentally setting a ton of records. He started getting a lot of followers suggesting more challenges for him to do. After a year or two he began

uploading video game run throughs after he purchased a video game and streamed playing it, not expecting anything big to come of it. The first video ending up trending for a few hours and requests came pouring in. However his biggest project, and the one he is most proud of and best known for, comes along in year three, after he met Elyan. They began recreating live action versions of video games, giant board games, etc. The internet fucking loses it over these videos. Most of them are endearingly low budget - the first is a live action super mario, where they had set up mushrooms and platforms in the park and a plushie princess peach is the prize. Elyan did MATH for this, guys. Percival has to do exactly what Elyan tells him to do when Elyan holds the “controller” and vice versa. The video is ten minutes long and mostly consists of them falling over. Percy barely wins in the end, but he holds the plushie up all proud, looking adorable. By the next day they have over a hundred subscribers asking for more. Some of the live actions are HUGE events, brining in all of Percy’s friends and acquaintances and even family members but that’s usually only once a year. Typically, it’s no more than Percy, Elyan, and Gwaine or Leon or Merlin. Elyan helps out a lot with most of the recreations, but Percival came up with the idea and is the driving force behind it. He also has a side channel for workout videos after 2 1/2 years of requests, where he posts irregular updates. Elyan [Elyuminati] gets pulled into youtube by Gwen, and starts out as the occasional guest star in her vlogs, before submitting the odd vlog video himself, usually just him ranting about whatever in his life is annoying him at the time. It was meant to just be a way to let off steam, he didn’t expect anyone to watch them, but Elyan has a certain kind of odd charm and humor that attracts a humble but loyal following. During his gap year he travels around Europe and posts a lot of video diaries as a way of keeping in touch with Gwen, and it steadily improves over time. He starts doing “day in the life of” or “creepy ghost tour” or just sharing crazy stories about his travels. Elyan’s not a bad artist, so he’ll sometimes recreate brief sketches of the crazy stuff that happened to him while narrating what is going on. After his gap year (which almost turned into two) he returned to the UK and ended up rooming with Percy, who he knew from youtube, and started getting a degree in maths. His channel with Percy to do live action games took off, and he ended up being offered a job at a radio station after a year or so. The radio felt he had a personality that worked over radio just as well as camera. His radio show has a little bit of everything in it: acting as a voice of the millennial people, sharing whatever crazy thing happened to him that week, traveling and reviewing places and (his latest obsessions) weird news stories and conspiracies. (Leon and Gwaine could be blamed for the last one.) He doesn’t post as much except for the game videos or guest starring in others, since’s he’s busy with his radio show, but he will occasionally do a vlog session now and again, usually on his theories on conspiracies, game of thrones, and why the cosmos hates him enough to stick him with Gwaine. Leon [GiantRedGnomes], unlike Percy and Elyan, actually means to start a youtube channel. He starts off with gaming videos, including a dramatic series of the SIMS that everyone gets a little too invested in. However Leon is very conscious of the good that youtube can do, and so he also starts doing more educational style videos with fun animation. His main topics are history (but the fun kind, he focuses a lot on the weird parts of European history that no one ever talks about) space and alien life, etc. He also reviews a lot of popular tv shows and movies and shares his thoughts, opinions, and predictions for them as well as how the nerdier stuff checks out. Being the gentleman that he is, he typically tries to post both spoiler and non spoiler versions. He and Merlin start a Dnd series where they do short campaigns with different members of their friend group and other willing youtube stars. Lancelot [Lancephew], like Leon, does youtube “for the greater good.” He started youtube in high school as a project to bring “truly great people” into the spotlight by interviewing the people in his town about amazing things they had done in their lives, and he still tries to post videos like that whenever he can. Half of his videos are him taking news stories, politics, economic theories, etc and explaining it in layman’s terms for the average viewer. He shares his own opinions in the video as well. During college Lancelot started adding a musical element to his interview stories, writing his own songs to bring into the background. This branched out into him writing instrumental music, which he often shares on youtube and itunes. Lancelot is currently doing a YouTube Red project in aide of a charity that is about small town civilians having to deal with a zombie dystopia in a realistic manner - asking questions such as “do we still have to pay for data?” “Can someone take my braces off.”) Also, he’s dating Gwen and they do really cute “ask us questions” and dating game videos that the internet loves. There are also several videos of his dog doing crazy things he manages to catch on film. Gwen [GwenSmash] is mostly a youtube vlogger, and she shares a little bit of everything. Her day to day life, sped up streams of the cosplay outfits she makes the group, sims and gaming videos, ask/advice videos, review videos, and stories in a series called “Growing up Gwen” where she shares moments of her childhood/teenage years having to deal with being the only girl in a household of guys, such as buying a bra, trying to find a video game character that is a female without exposed breasts, etc. After she gets to know all the guys better, she will share moments of being one of the few girls among many guys, and has no shame in calling them out. Half of her twitter is photos of the guys holding up a sign saying “I said/made *insert sexist remark here*.” She doesn’t really try to limit herself to one brand and just does all kinds of videos. She and Morgana are often work together/guest star in each other’s videos as flatmates and best friends. Morgana [ExplodingSparkles] got into youtube during college at Gwen’s encouragement. She liked to create her own music mashups and Gwen starting encouraging her to share them on youtube. Nowadays, she and Lance will team up occasionally to do music together, and she has written a few of her own songs, all released on youtube/itunes. A LOT of her video vlogs are feminist, LGBTQA, and wealth inequality rants, typically following her having to talk to Uther. She as a popular series called “Ask Morgana” where she answers questions her subscribers ask her. The beginning/middle of her channel (when it was getting big) has a lot of anger and rant videos about everything wrong with the world. Morgana eventually grew out of her angry stage, and began discussing the issues from a healthier pov, such as how you can be an ally, etc. She also started doing a lot more comedy sketches, all written and directed by herself. Some of them just have her in it as multiple people, others have her and Gwen or other guest stars. Some of them are just sketches about funny moments in her life, but most are original content, such as “Smart Shakespeare in Five Minutes” where she acts out a sketch of Shakespeare’s plays where everything goes very differently, usually based on one character making a smarter decision. Arthur [KingCamelot] started doing youtube in his final year of boarding school, and for the first year or so he and Morgana both tried to hide the fact that they were doing youtube from each other, until one day Morgana stumbled across his channel after it was recommended after one of Gwen’s videos. This was over summer break and the result was her barging in during one of his vlogs, and the entire (loud and hilarious) conversation was caught on film. Arthur later uploaded it to youtube, and neither will admit it is one of their favourite videos. Arthur kept it in a vlog style during uni, sharing his thoughts on current events, challenge videos, his favourite books and tv shows, his daily life and his struggle with uni/the business degree his father wanted him to get. He ended up switching to film editing sophomore year after Morgana, Leon and other youtuber friends supported his ideas. While it made things rockier with his father, Arthur was much happier. Videos became much more frequently after that, and Arthur began to guest star in his friends videos as well. Arthur became a big name on youtube almost instantly, largely because of his good lucks and his notoriety as the son of a famous parliament member, but remained a big name through his own merit. About midway through his time at uni Arthur began to post videos about insightful topics about things that suggested he was starting to see the world a bit differently. After he graduated about 4 years ago, it started to turn into full blown advocacy and outreach videos raising awareness for social change. Of course, Arthur didn’t get to that point by himself. Enter Merlin, stage right. Merlin [MerlinTrixx] started youtube HIS final year of public schooling, about two years after Arthur. He started with just short simple vlogs and magic tricks that even professional magicians couldn’t figure out. He followed Gwen and Morgana and saw Arthur a few times in their videos or recommended suggestions. After picking up on Arthur’s rather one sided view of how wealth and poverty work he called him out on it in a private message. Arthur did NOT take it well. There began a video war where both boys passive aggressively mentioned the other. Before it got to far, however, they accidentally ended up meeting at a youtube convention. (Arthur was there to speak on a panel, Merlin went to learn editing tips). The recognized each other and ended up talking for the remaining two days of the convention and became fast friends. Gwen, who had known Merlin through uni for about a year now, had had no idea that Arthur and Merlin had been complaining to her for the past few months about each other and was ready to knock sense into both of them when she found out. After becoming friends, Arthur and Merlin began showing up in each other’s videos more. Merlin, who hated his roommates, began hanging around more at Arthur and Leon’s flat (they went to a different uni in the same city, but had moved off campus) instead of Gwen’s as much. By the end of sophomore year, Merlin had gained a decent number of followers and his channel consisted of vlogs, his magic tricks, him and Arthur hanging out and being weird, and sharing his vast and unparalled knowledge of all things fantasy and nerdy. He, Leon and Gwen get into the longest discussions when they do reviews together. Merlin takes some time off of school, still unsure what he wants to do beside youtube, and moves in with Arthur to split the rent. The videos continue in earnest, and views/followers for both boys continue to grow as they feed off of one another, make more compilation videos, and add more content. After a couple of years, more than half their followers are wondering if they are more than just flatmates, but they are keeping quiet on the matter. The both still have their own channel, which they update frequently, but they also have a shared channel where they do reviews of shows they both like, ask/challenge requests, gaming videos, a few prank videos - they got into a prank way with Percy, Elyan and Gwaine once. Morgana and Gwen somehow won. They also do a deep discussion on Arthurian legend and other mythos, in comedic style. They are known as the “Avalon Nine” - a nickname given to them by the internet after they learned they all knew each other and they frequently appear in each others videos now that they all live in the same city. Morgana and Gwen had met in boarding school, and are currently living together after Morgana moved back after Uni until Lancelot finally asks Gwen to marry him, which Morgana suspects will happen soon. Gwen met Merlin at their uni, the same city that Arthur and Leon were going to uni in. Arthur already knew Gwen through Morgana and they had hung out fairly often, which only increased after they both befriended Merlin. Merlin and Gwen both met Lancelot separately at youtube conventions, and thought it hilarious the day they found out they both knew him. Lancelot moved to the city after graduating uni. Elyan met everyone through Gwen and Morgana met everyone through Gwen and Arthur. Gwaine met Merlin at a convention and later Merlin recognized him auditing his film class for “free editing tips/ideas.” They became fast friends and Gwaine spent a few nights in Merlin’s dorm when his water or heat wouldn’t work. He moves in with Elyan when he comes back from his gap years. Lancelot and Percival, who knew each other prior to the rest of the group, lived with each other for a while before the landlord sold the building. Lance moved to a single while Percival moved in with Elyan and Gwaine. There have been a series of “who knows you better” challanges and games throughout the group, including ones based off of dating games, best friend games, and family games. Merlin and Arthur have won them ALL. Even against Lancelot and Gwen that one time. Leon shared in one of his videos that Arthur and Merlin are also banned from teaming up in charades, pictonary and catch phrase in the gaming videos because they are undefeatable and possible psychic. Bonus: Mordred is obviously much younger than the others (just now starting Uni while the others are in their mid to late twenties). So he grew up watching a lot of their earlier stuff and he just idolizes them. He somehow managed to befriend them through social media/convenstions and is a bit surprised he is actually on first name basis with these amazing, talented (giant dorks). He appears in their videos sometimes but is hesitant to upload anything on his own channel for a long time, since it is harder to get started on youtube now than it was for his older friends. After some encouragement he uploads a few, and the whole group advertises him since they all kind of adore him, he’s like a little brother. Unlike the others though, Mordred doesn’t vlog or do video games or reviews or anything. Oh no. His videos are all freestyle rapping/spoken word poetry. About whatever catches his fancy. The weirdest thing is they’re GOOD. Its at such odds with his personality but it is what it is. Gwaine has started a betting pool on when Mordred reaches 1,000 subscribers. Cenred is a little asshole who does mean/staged prank videos and blogs full of sexist and racist remarks on youtube. The group hates him, half of youtube boy cots him and he has had several scandals. Elena is a youtube they all know and are friendly with, but because she lives in Scotland they aren’t as close. She does a lot of gaming videos, embarrassing stories from her life, and videos about her horse. Morgause is a powerful admin/part owner of youtube and constantly makes decisions that hurt most independent and creative youtubers. At one point she tried to flag coming out videos or videos with content/opinions she didn’t agree with. She also pressures them to do advertising and tampers with the recommended and trending list. The group pushes back against these regulations, and it turns into an all out war, where Gwaine, Merlin and Arthur are all nearly banned from youtube before Morguase is fired.

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yujachachacha · 7 years ago

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Nope.. nope.. nopee.. if fairness is the cause of You being sidelined, i can't accept that.. every midpoll that show You being no.1 in that poll, everyone seems like united to bring her down.. if that bcs of fairness, why they vote yoshiko again (like in sif poll) not the other member that never get elected and she's still get more screen time in the anime... fck that!

Whoa there.

I’m a You fan too, so I’d also love it if You got more screen time. It’s all right to be disgruntled about it, but I still think that You being sidelined is at least understandable. I also think there are perfectly valid explanations as to why Yoshiko gets so much attention.

In fact, if you take a closer look at the polls, Yoshiko doesn’t have as many major “wins” as You does.

Look at what I said before: Yoshiko shows up more because she’s a character that needs more growth and development. As you can see in S2E11, Yoshiko still struggles with the fact that she’s not exactly a popular gal (within the anime-verse, not in real life lol). We get that nice little scene with Riko and Maru at the fortune-telling tent because it shows that Yoshiko has friends at her side who support her when she’s down. The audience needs to be told that there’s nothing to worry about - even though Yoshiko’s still kind of a hot mess, she’s working on it with the help of her friends.

I think part of the reason why so many people flock to Yoshiko is that they feel a bit of pity for her. She’s always plagued by misfortune, whether it’s being caught in the rain at inopportune moments, or missing her middle school trip due to catching the flu (see Question #6 in her Q&A section). You, on the other hand, is a popular girl who is well-liked by everyone and quite successful at almost everything she does. If You is already popular in the 2D world and Yoshiko isn’t, why not make it “fair” and give Yoshiko some well-deserved recognition in the 3D world?

As for Yoshiko’s screen time, well…it does certainly help that Yoshiko is a popular character and great for comic relief. Again, like I said before, You is more of a stabilizing force in the group (apart from moments like the being-crushed-by-Maru running gag in the Hakodate episode). She’s there for moments like Chika’s late-night MIRACLE WAVE practice, and for keeping Chika grounded when the mikan-loving leader gets panicked about the school closing down.

I think the fact that You doesn’t show up too often gives these moments more value. When You tells Chika that she’s always wanted to do something with Chika and will always be there for her in S2E11, it’s a very crucial scene. This is something that she’s said before, in S1E1 (when she tells Chika that she’ll join the school idol club) and in S1E11 (in her conversations with Mari and Riko). We don’t see her say it again until S2E11 because You is, at her core, a very private person when it comes to her feelings.

In S1E1, when she briefly showed a sentimental side of herself to Chika, You was quick to wave aside the moment with a giggle and cheerfully hand over a club application; in S1E11, You doesn’t talk about what’s bothering her until Mari directly confronts her about it; in S2E11, You checks to make sure she’s alone before re-enacting the club recruitment calls. We don’t really need to see You declaring her support for Chika too often because we know that she’s the first member who joined Aqours and the most dependable person in the group. When You does say her feelings out loud, however, it’s at moments when You is so full of emotion that she can’t hold herself back. That’s how heartfelt these declarations are.

Is it frustrating that we don’t get more cute and funny filler scenes from You? Sure. But the scenes we do get are pivotal - You rushing to hug Chika after their all-nighter at the deadline for saving the school speaks volumes about how well she knows Chika, and how much she cares for her best friend’s well-being.

I’m getting a bit off-topic here though. Let’s go back to the subject you brought up: the polls. Here are the results of the polls that have been done so far, roughly in chronological order of when the results were revealed; I’ll only be listing the top three for each:

2nd center election (KoiAqua): Midpoll = You / Ruby / Riko; Final = You / Ruby / Riko

Numazu Gamers poster girl: Midpoll = You / Yoshiko / Hanamaru; Final = Yoshiko / You / Hanamaru

Dengeki G’s cover girl: Midpoll = Hanamaru / Yoshiko / You; Final = Hanamaru / You / Chika (Note: Voters had to pick both a girl and a date spot, so some girls showed up multiple times in the final rankings, e.g. You + Date Spot 1 followed by You + Date Spot 2)

7-11 image girl: Midpoll = You / Riko / Hanamaru; Final = Riko / You / Hanamaru

3rd center election (HPT): Midpoll = Yoshiko / Kanan / Hanamaru; Final = Kanan / Yoshiko / Hanamaru

SIF Winter Promo UR (Snowboarding You): Midpoll = Hanamaru / You / Kanan; Final = You / Hanamaru / Kanan

Uraraji hosts (GuuRinPa): Midpoll = Yoshiko / Dia / Kanan; Final = Yoshiko / Dia / Chika (Note: Chika was in 4th place in the midpoll results)

Sega image girl: Midpoll = You / Chika / Hanamaru; Final = Hanamaru / Chika / Yoshiko

LisAni cover girl: You / Kanan / Chika (Note: AFAIK midpoll results weren’t released)

SIF 5th anniversary campaign girl: Midpoll = You / Riko / Yoshiko; Final = Yoshiko / Mari / Riko

I might have missed one or two, but these are all the polls I can recall at the moment. Using these results, here’s how many times each girl has won an election:

3 times = You, Yoshiko

2 times = Hanamaru

1 time = Riko, Kanan, Dia, Chika

0 (*Chika voice* It’s so frustrating!) = Ruby, Mari

Just based on the final results, you can guess that You, Yoshiko, and Maru are the most popular girls, with Ruby and Mari being near the bottom. And yes, with these numbers, it does seem that Yoshiko is abnormally popular. However, when you take some additional factors into account, Yoshiko’s ranking actually drops below You’s.

Here’s what you need to consider: why did a certain girl win a poll? And how much weight should you give that poll?

While the elections and polls do indicate a character’s popularity level, they only do so to a certain extent. You topped out polls very often in the early days, with her crowning moment being the KoiAqua center election. Winning a center election, especially at such an early stage for Aqours, is a really big deal.

Recall that when KoiAqua was released, the anime hadn’t aired yet, so many of the characters lacked substantial depth. In fact, the KoiAqua audio dramas provided the most character development at that point, as it established things such as: (1) You knowing when to hold Chika back to prevent poor Riko from going insane, (2) Kanan and Mari being chill while Dia stresses out in the background, and (3) Hanamaru getting along surprisingly well with Yoshiko’s fallen angel antics while also doting on Ruby. Our favorite yousoro kid provided the most interesting character profile at the time (Anchan once mentioned how “yousoro~” was already popular with crowds back in 2015 when they were promoting the KimiKoko album), and established herself as a popular character from very early on in the history of LLS.

To make it fair for others to get their chance in the spotlight, most people opted to vote for other characters in later polls. Even as a You fan myself, I didn’t vote for You in the 3rd single center election (for HAPPY PARTY TRAIN), and wasn’t really rooting for her in subsequent elections either. Poll results tend to be skewed because people want the distribution of wins to be “fair”. Chika and Riko don’t score too well in center elections because they had “Kimi no Kokoro wa Kagayaiteru kai?”, and You slipped down to around 5th place for the 3rd center election. This doesn’t mean they got less popular - it just means that the votes are going to other characters that deserve a shot at winning.

A center election is kind of like the ultimate prize - the character gets to have the main solo of a song, and be the star of an animated PV. Center elections have been a key part of the LL history ever since the inception of µ’s. These songs are “the story we realize together” as fans can influence what they want to see in the next single. Everyone knows that You is the center of KoiAqua, as it’s a major part of LLS history and is guaranteed multiple performances in live concerts. How many LL fans can you say will remember who the 7-11 image girl is in a year or two? Like, if I had to assign each poll a score of how important it is from 1 to 5, I’d probably give something like the LisAni cover girl a 1, the Sega cover girl a 2, and the center election a 10. Yes, you read that correctly. With how crucial music is to Love Live, you can’t really say that winning the rights to a limited-time figurine or one-time illustration tops a center election win.

Because You won a major election, that does incentivize people to not vote for her in these polls. However, I think it speaks to You’s popularity that she gets 1st place in nearly every midpoll result despite this. Her ultimately failing to get 1st place at the end of the poll is less of an effort by others to “bring her down”, and more of a push to “raise others up”. Before the midpoll results come out, most people tend to vote haphazardly. After the results come out, people usually choose someone within the top three (as those girls have a better chance at winning) to support and then vote in a more organized manner. That’s how Suwawa and Aikyan ended up in an aggressive Twitter campaign for their girls during the HPT center election - Yoshiko was shown as 1st place while Kanan was 2nd in the midpoll results. The fact that You is nearly always in 1st place before this targeted voting begins is a sure sign that she’s generally popular overall.

It’s not like You never won a poll after the KoiAqua election, either - she won the SIF promo UR election last year, plus she became the LisAni cover girl earlier this year. Granted, the LisAni girl appeals were done while Season 1 was airing, and were made by the seiyuu to boot (so this might be a case of Shukashuu’s popularity helping out), but the fact still remains that it’s You who graced the cover of LisAni Vol. 29 back in May.

Now, what about Yoshiko winning the SIF Anniversary election? Since she already had two wins under her belt, wouldn’t it seem fair to give it to someone like Mari or Ruby?

First off, I did say that these polls aren’t necessarily a popularity contest, but that doesn’t mean that popularity has no effect on the results. The SIF 5th Anniversary Election was a unique poll because unlike other recent polls, it was literally a popularity contest (with a touch of nostalgia, as evidenced by Nico getting first place for µ’s). That meant that people would cast aside whose “turn” it was to win something, as they’d simply be voting for the campaign girl of their choice.

You also have to remember that this poll was a lot more well-known to the global community than other (non-center election) LLS polls due to it being SIF-based and involving all three LL generations. Like, I was actually surprised that Mari scored 2nd place for Aqours in the final tally because she’s not that popular in Japan. However, Mari does enjoy a lot of popularity in the English-speaking community, so I suspect that might have played a role in her final rank. The fact that Mari has yet to win anything might have boosted support for her as well.

As for Ruby - well, I predict that because of the Hakodate arc, we’re going to see a lot more love for Ruby in future polls. I’ve already heard stories of people going to shops and finding that prices for Ruby merchandise have started going up. But because those episodes started airing right as the poll was ending (S2E8 first aired on November 25, and the poll closed on November 26), Ruby was still suffering from relative unpopularity at the time. So, although it would have been nice for either Mari or Ruby to win, they simply didn’t have the numbers to support them.

I think that Yoshiko won the SIF election, and deserved to win, for two reasons: (1) Yoshiko is legitimately a popular character, and (2) Yoshiko hadn’t really won a major popularity contest before this.

Let me explain the second point. Recall that earlier in this post, I asked, “why did a certain girl win a poll? And how much weight should you give that poll?” I answered the second question, but didn’t fully address the first. What the first question amounts to is that if you look at Yoshiko’s two other wins, they were given to her for a specific reason rather than out of popularity.

We can illustrate this with another poll result. Hanamaru was 3rd place in the Sega image girl midpoll results, but ended up first place. If we consider the fact that people have a tendency to avoid voting for You because of KoiAqua, then why not vote for poor Chika instead, who’s never done well in polls? Well, in Hanamaru’s focus episode, she became strongly associated with Rin due to their shared self-consciousness about their femininity. Guess who the Sega image girl for µ’s was?

If it wasn’t obvious, then yes, Rin was the former Sega image girl.

So was this poll really an indication of popularity/fairness, or more like people voting for whoever they thought was the “rightful” winner of a certain prize?

A more famous example is the 3rd center election. This is a story that many people probably know by now, but I’ll tell it just in case: Kanan ranked last place in the 2nd center election, and had been in the bottom ranks for other polls before. The 3rd center election happened to start after S1 aired, and everyone was feeling particularly sensitive about how much Kanan had suffered (both in the anime sense during the Mijuku DREAMER episode, and in the meta sense for not getting a lot of lines initially in S1). People were insanely emotional about Kanan being able to go from the neglected character to the adored, beautiful star of the next major Aqours album, and celebrated triumphantly when it turned out that she actually won the election.

What’s important to remember with these “rightful” wins is that they have no bearing on whether it was that character’s “turn” to win - because if that win should have been given to the character in the first place, why should it count? (Song center elections are an exception to these wins not counting as a “turn”, which should hopefully be obvious by now after my explanation of their importance in LL.)

With that in mind, let’s look at Yoshiko’s first win - the Numazu Gamers election. Yoshiko was perceived as the “rightful” winner of that one because she was the Aqours member who had Numazu featured prominently in her character profile. You does also live in the area, but IIRC this fact was never established until the anime started airing. In addition, Yoshiko is described as an avid fan of gaming - and who better to represent a Gamers store than a gamer herself? Yoshiko did really deserve to win this one.

Now, how about the Uraraji poll? I’m gonna be honest here - I consider this more of a seiyuu poll than a character poll. Because Uraraji is hosted by the seiyuu, the voting for the hosts was really done with the seiyuu in mind. Kanan probably performed well in the midpoll results at first because Suwawa has such a calming radio voice, but ultimately most folks decided that someone else should have a chance to be a radio host. Ainya and Suwawa already have radio shows, and Kinchan has a regular gaming stream, so they were probably set aside for that reason. As entertaining as Shukashuu, Furirin, and Rikyako are, they’re kind of erratic on air and prone to wild behavior (LOL sorry guys).

Anchan was the first host of Uraraji, and has proven herself to be a capable leader of Aqours. She’s also hosted her own radio show before, so it’s likely that she was voted as a safe choice. Arisha, despite her busy schedule, was probably voted in as a combination of (1) being able to keep everyone in line during the show and (2) people wanting Dia to get some love in the polls.

So, what about Yoshiko/Aikyan?

All right, now here’s something I personally remember from Twitter at the time - the Uraraji election was done after Kanan was crowned the winner of the 3rd single election. When Aikyan found out that Yoshiko had slipped from 1st place to 2nd place, she posted an absolutely heartbreaking message about it. I’m too lazy to look for the original tweet, sorry…but roughly, she said something along the lines of it being frustrating to have been so close to winning, despite all the work she put into campaigning for Yoshiko (seriously, Aikyan and Suwawa were spamming tweets every day towards the end of the 3rd center election, going as far as snapping cute selfies to entice people to vote for their character). She vowed that the 4th center election would be her time to be victorious (as 4 is a number associated with death in Asia; quite fitting for a little demon).

(In fact, while it seems like Hanamaru is on most people’s minds for the 4th election - or at least that’s what I’ve seen on social media - I’ve already decided to vote for Yoshiko on behalf of Aikyan. )

I don’t remember where the idea spawned, but I did see a lot of talk afterwards about giving Yoshiko the #1 spot in the Uraraji poll to sort of “make up” for the 3rd center election loss (and also safeguard against Aikyan possibly getting crushed again if Yoshiko happened to not stay within the top 3). Granted, Yoshiko had already been doing pretty well in the poll, but the number of people pledging support for her grew exponentially during this time. Thus, even if you ignore the fact that the Uraraji election was more of a win for Aikyan than Yoshiko, it also happened to be a consolation prize. :\

So with that, we have You with two popularity contest wins under her belt (SIF promo UR poll and LisAni girl) plus a center election win (which alone probably counts as winning, like, 5 polls lol). Yoshiko has one (the SIF Anniversary poll), plus two wins that were sort of given to her. I think it’s safe to say that it seems pretty “fair” for poor Yoshiko to get some love.

In the end, you are allowed to be mad about You not getting more screen time. Does it seem unfair that she’s not winning more polls or getting more screen time? A little, yeah. But the fact remains that she’s a bit too popular for her own good, and she already won a major election (KoiAqua). It’d actually be unfair if You got to have a center song under her belt plus a lot of screen time plus more poll victories. When you take certain factors into consideration, the SIF Anniversary poll is really Yoshiko’s only legitimate popularity vote win. Please don’t abuse the poor fallen angel - she already goes through enough;;

And as a final note: honestly, I don’t really think the polls have too much impact on the anime. It’s already established that the anime-verse is separate from other branches of the series (e.g. Dia not being a school idol fan in the SIF stories, Kanan being the first one to join Aqours in the manga, Maru’s childhood friend being Ruby rather than Yoshiko in the SIDs). Necessities of plot and character growth are what mostly make up screen time. Why would the fact that one of the girls got to be a Sega image girl or a SIF campaign girl have anything to do with this…?

#love live! sunshine!!#love live sunshine #tsushima yoshiko #watanabe you #analysis #my ramblings #yujachask #anonymous #offering a glimpse of some youchan analysis while i work on my ep11 ask lol #also pls anon calm yourself #i understand that you're upset about this injustice #but don't pour your salt onto other characters #there's nothing that genuinely pisses me off more than hating on a LL character

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aurelliocheek · 4 years ago

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Nailing Creative Development to Make Your Advertising More Effective

The elements that go into a great ad, such as text, images, and buttons, shouldn’t be a mystery to any marketer. But the value of an ad creative testing framework is often underappreciated.

Testing has a long history in advertising. As far back as 1923, Claude C. Hopkins wrote in his famous book, Scientific Advertising, “Almost any question can be answered, cheaply, quickly and finally, by a test campaign.” In 2021, there are many more tools at a marketer’s disposal.

The newest development, automation, enables marketers to test every single element of a campaign, thousands of times over. This state of play can overwhelm marketers. Too many options make it difficult for marketers to use the data at their disposal. Messy testing processes can even promote poorly-performing ads and increase the chances of leaving the best on the cutting-room floor.

To scale your user acquisition effectively, you need a bulletproof testing process that selects the best ad at every new iteration. At Liftoff, we developed a framework in-house, used by the Ad Creative team to develop campaigns for many clients in different categories. By using the framework you can begin to start creating an efficient cycle that will help you build better ads.

5 Steps to Building Better Ads

There are several steps in our ad building process. A/B testing is a critical part of this process, but it’s not the full picture. In fact, testing creative elements is only step four in a cycle of ad creation:

Here’s each step in more detail:

Brainstorm creative concepts: First, we develop narratives for an ad: what will happen, which product to show, and what outcome we plan to deliver (such as a reward for clicking through). These ideas inform all the creative variations that follow.

Build mockups of the best ideas: From all of the ideas we have, we then make the ads. For bigger campaigns (particularly video), we usually storyboard the creative to guide production.

Produce creative variations: Once we have a general creative concept and a single ad created, we begin to make variations of the ad, changing text, button colors, and so on.

A/B test the creative: Next, it’s time to set up experiments (in the form of campaigns) that compare our creative variations’ performance.

Analyze the outcome: The final step in the cycle is to monitor our experiments’ performance to see how well those creatives do.

Follow this simple structure to frame your ad creative production process. It’s easy to find new components to flesh out an ad creation process that makes sense for your team. Let’s now talk about what Liftoff’s Ad Creative Producers do when we’re onboarding a new app to show you how we think when creating new ads.

Improving Your Approach To The Creative Ad Production Process

It takes new ways of thinking to improve creatives. With every new campaign, we hone in on what users find more interesting. Here are some things we think about when trying to discover improvements:

1. Find the key benefit of the app: Every app has a few features that make users excited. We want to find out what that benefit is early in our A/B testing plan to develop from there.

2. How can we make the concept better? This question usually comes before building an animation or interactive that will provide the user with more information in a simple way.

3. Small changes can make a big difference: Tiny optimizations frequently apply across creatives.

4. Optimize! Continue to validate the hypothesis and strategy through A/B testing.

Ad Creative Frequently Asked Questions

Now that we’ve approached a process and improved our thinking let’s tackle critical questions you may have regarding the process.

What’s the Difference Between Incremental Tests and Concept Tests?

There are two kinds of tests you can conduct: incremental and concept testing. Incremental tests experiment with a single aspect of an ad, such as background or a single foreground image. Concept tests pitch two completely different creatives against each other.

Incremental testing allows you us to find the small wins that build best practices for a customer. Once you’ve optimized significantly in one direction, more extensive concept tests will enable us to find a completely new path to find opportunities. If marketers create a new offering, concept tests allow them to hone in on what works before optimization can occur.

How Do I Come Up With so Many New Concepts?

When adopting an ad creation process, you’ll quickly find that it’s often more challenging to generate entirely new concepts versus delivering variations on those concepts. Coming up with new ideas is difficult, especially without support or a process you fully own.

Keep this rule in mind: because it’s hard, take your time. Your goal should be to produce a steady stream of new concepts that outperform your competitors, not just your older ads. So, work to create new ideas in a way that fits your and your team’s preferences and capabilities. Brainstorms are only one of many techniques that help the Ad Creative team generate ideas, but we also like to share inspiration from creatives in different regions, ads in the wild, and from the world around us.

What Are Some Tips on Conducting A/B Tests for Creative Ads?

Testing can sometimes become a matter of quantity over quality. As Eric Seufert of Mobile Dev Memo writes, “the only way to optimally pair creative with segments that ad platforms algorithmically define is to test a massive number of ad creatives.” While that’s true, testing must have a goal in mind, or your campaign performance can drop massively.

Anything you add or change in a campaign creates fluctuation, whether positive, negative, or neutral. And what feels like a few tests can become an aggregate of thousands of different variations that don’t perform as well as if you were only running your best ad. You must balance testing and performance to even out potential dips or spikes in spend.

If that doesn’t change your mind on mass testing, bear in mind that we’ve seen a typical win rate (where new creative A beats high-performing creative B) reach 20 to 25% over the years. It’s remarkable that one in four ads has a chance to beat the status quo, but it still means for every four tests you could be running three poorly-performing ads. Knowing what doesn’t work is a valuable exercise, but marketing outcomes should not suffer from over-eager testing.

How Long Should I Be Testing an Ad For?

Time spent on a test isn’t as important as the number of installs and impressions an ad receives. Depending on your app’s popularity and budget size, tests will run quicker or slower. This makes setting an overall benchmark challenging. Here are the main metrics Liftoff’s creative team uses to ensure a test is going to plan:

Ads tests must be statistically significant, meaning that there’s no chance that higher performance was due to anything other than the creative. At Liftoff, we look for a confidence interval of 0.01 or below, meaning that we are 99% (or more) confident in the results shown. If you want a primer on statistical significance, Harvard Business Review has a full write up to learn from.

Each ad variant must receive a minimum number of impressions. Your testing figure will vary depending on traffic (some ads will need hundreds of impressions, others hundreds of thousands).

We also set a target for installs. This benchmark will vary depending on your app. Usually we need around 80 installs to analyze the best-performing ad.

Why Do I Need to Produce New Ads Constantly?

You might have heard of the Mere-exposure effect, which describes the phenomenon where “people tend to develop a preference for things merely because they are familiar with them.” Advertising operates on exposing the brand to people as often as possible to build familiarity. However, ads themselves have a half-life on a viewer’s attention. Known as “ad fatigue,” users will quickly get bored if they see the few same ads over and over again.

An advertiser should seek to find that point of deterioration where new ads begin to perform less well. You must replace a creative before performance collapses entirely. To do that, you need to start looking for a replacement as soon as the creative launches.

4 Small but Powerful Best Practices Behind Great Mobile Ads

There are a handful of best practices that help good ads become great. Here’s what we always consider when creating new ads:

Define objectives for your creative concepts, and develop a straightforward story around them

For ads to be effective, they need to be understood by the user. Simplicity always wins.

Don’t stuff your ads with features—it will dilute your creative and confuse your audience.

Be contextually creative

Ensure your creative is relevant to the user’s state of mind.

Make your ads cross-screen ready and available across all formats.

Mobile ads are different from social ads. What does well on Facebook may not perform well elsewhere.

Localize! It’s almost impossible to succeed in different markets with one language.

Use and reuse great assets

Ads must load quickly on mobile. File sizes must be small and adhere to technical restrictions.

Use high-resolution assets. Most phones have retina displays which require double the amount of pixels (640×100 versus the usual 320×50).

Reuse your collateral to create consistent App and/or Play Store pages.

Guide users with clear CTAs

Create a consistent, clear and direct call-to-action.

Work on your wording: “Tap to expand” or “Play the games” could be more effective than “Tap to learn more.”

Any button should have a clear CTA with a tappable ad element. Don’t include buttons that users cannot use.

Go Get ‘Em, Tiger

Surprising users with delightful copy is one thing, but making sure your ad sparkles throughout is much harder. By using Liftoff’s framework, you can begin to iterate on your best-performing ads faster and more effectively to get the most out of your user acquisition efforts.

For more on ad creatives, we’re soon releasing a new Ad Creatives Index, which you can use to discover the latest creative format trends. For now, you can learn how to optimize video campaigns with lead Ad Creative Producer Thomas Zukowski or discover the benefits of banner ads with an in-depth study on the blog.

The post Nailing Creative Development to Make Your Advertising More Effective appeared first on Liftoff.

Nailing Creative Development to Make Your Advertising More Effective published first on https://leolarsonblog.tumblr.com/

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clarencenicholsonata · 4 years ago

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9 Tips for Audience Segmentation in Ecommerce Email Marketing

Audience segmentation should be a no-brainer, whether you're running another Amazon or shipping colorful bracelets from your garage. Ecommerce audiences are diverse, and knowing how to capitalize on that can pay off big time.

Email segmentation is a technique of splitting your email subscribers into smaller, more focused groups. These can be based on typical demographics (age, gender, education, etc.) and a lot more than that. The result is a more personalized experience and more relevant content delivered to your leads' inboxes.

This, as a result, can bring tangible benefits to your business. According to research, segmented campaigns lead to 14.31% more open and 100.95% higher clickthrough rates than their non-segmented peers. What's more, personalized emails can result in even a 760% increase in revenue.

Audience segmentation isn't a difficult topic. It can often be done with a simple Excel spreadsheet or with the basic functionalities of ecommerce marketing automation tools. The key is doing it in the first place and capitalizing on the knowledge that's already at your fingertips.

Let's talk about how to do it right.

1. Start By Getting the Data You Need

Any interaction with a potential customer can be an opportunity to get to know them a bit better. This can be a simple survey at the end of a welcome email. It can be a few questions that pop up when they browse your site, letting them customize their experience. Opportunities are plenty.

The key thing on your side is to decide what's relevant for your business. Gender and age will play a significant role in nearly any fashion retailer. Will it matter much for those of you selling car accessories?

Probably not much. You're much more interested in the brand of the car they own and their income level.

Try to figure out what's going to be meaningful from the marketing standpoint. At the same time, please don't overdo it with questions. Statistics show that the more questions you ask, likely the lower the conversion. Just because a visitor agreed to click through a few questions doesn't mean they're up for a few dozens.

Try to find a sweet spot that will get you just the right data and won't scare the users off. Barkbox offers a gift (who wouldn’t want that) with its subscription if you agree to share a few details about your dog - its name, size, breed, and others.

It’s a fun thing to click through, personalized (the dog's name you insert on the first page shows up throughout the form), and it’s quick to complete. And best of all, most clients will genuinely want to share all these details so they can receive the right gift for their pet. Win-win for all.

2. Explain Why You Want to Know More

The increasing numbers of internet users are hesitant about sharing anything about them that's not necessary. And with the various privacy scandals unfolding almost regularly, it's certainly not a surprise.

At the same time, you don't have bad intentions. You don't plan to sell this data. You're not making any money off it. If that's the case, it often pays off to be straightforward about what you need the information for. After all, shoppers will care about receiving just about the deals they care about.

For example, I'm an avid cyclist. I will gladly shop at Dick's or Decathlon whenever I have a chance. I will be reasonably happy to receive the deals on cycling outfits or accessories I actively shop for.

But as much as I admire gymnasts, I'm not likely to be shopping for the brand new model of a pommel horse, no matter how discounted it is. And I will gladly share where my interests lie, if only they ask (or figure out in some other way).

I'd avoid the general "improve your experience" or "enhance your shopping" phrases. Try to be honest about why you want to know someone's demographics or interests. Or, take a different approach and offer a small reward for sharing a few details, as HermanMiller does in this email:

For more check out these guides to getting the data you need without being sleazy and using it to help increase your sales: *10 Brilliant Ways to Collect Customer Testimonials with Instagram Marketing *How to Leverage eCommerce Consumer Reviews For Higher Conversions in 2020 *7 Easy & Effective Ways to Drive Customer Reviews

3. Use the Data From Your Emails

Analyzing such basic things as email open rates or link click throughs can give you lots of data about your audience's preferences.

With virtually any ecommerce email automation tool, you can see opens and clicks for each recipient. If you're sending a weekly newsletter with the latest discounted products and they never care even to open it, there's a meager chance they'll open it again.

But if they suddenly get active when a significant seasonal offer lands in their inbox, moving them to a different basket may be worth an effort. You could, for example, halt the regular well-designed newsletter for them but, instead, intensify the campaigns around the big shopping sprees such as Black Friday.

And better yet, ask them about their preferences on the next occasion.

Analyzing clicks can be even more powerful, mainly if you include multiple CTAs in your mailings. This is very straightforward. If specific followers click only on items related to children's toys or clothing but ignore everything else, you can safely assume this is where their interest lies. If a lot more readers show similar patterns, it might be worth moving them together to a basket more focused on this particular segment of your assortment.

If a bunch of readers clicks on any links leading to the latest promo you have in store, it may be worth following up on them a few days later. At the same time, you may not necessarily do the same for those that repeatedly ignored such offers.

Followup email from Forever 21, referencing the products a reader has viewed and those that may be relevant to them.

Maximize your ads for email marketing with Wishpond's all-in-one marketing tools. Click here to get started.

4. Find More Data Points Than Just Emails

Analyzing emails is helpful but won't always give you the full picture. You'll get it if you start analyzing multiple channels and use this data to segment the audience.

The most critical data for an eCommerce store is knowing how users interact with this very store. Whether it's a web portal, a mobile app, or both, you can record thousands of data points related to customers' behavior. You can then use them to segment users.

Here are some patterns that tell a lot about visitors preferences or decisions they're planning to take:

Visits the same category of products on multiple occasions

Adds certain products but abandons the cart

Starts browsing related products to the one they recently bought

Adds items from specific categories to their wish lists or asks to be notified when they're back in stock

When you spot such patterns, it's worth tagging visitors with certain tags and treating them a bit differently than the general public. For example, if a visitor wishlists several popular wedding gifts on Etsy, my inner Sherlock Holmes will immediately tell me they're onto something. Pushing a top10 selection of unique wedding gifts to them right after the weekend will be my top priority.

5. Beware of Loopholes

You notice someone is very interested in a particular topic, so you immediately retarget your campaigns to convert a lead. More often than not, it will benefit you greatly. Keep looking at the data, though, because your assumptions won't always turn out to be accurate.

Suppose someone (a male) is looking for a gift for a female friend. They'll explore your store, checking several categories their friend has a keen interest on. They may end up buying something as well. Unless they're very much into this friend, they're not likely to be buying her gifts anytime soon.

The data, though, would suggest sending them a lot about women apparel and purses. Not only will they probably never open these emails but are likely to unsubscribe rather quickly or report your emails as spam.

Prevent such situations by analyzing the data of newly formed segments with the necessary diligence. If someone doesn't open the first two or three emails with your newly-formed campaign, it may be worth moving them back to a general basket. Again, consider asking them about their preferences in one of the emails or via a popup on a website.

6. Don’t Get Overwhelmed with Segmentations

Because of the above, if you haven't been segmenting your audience before, I highly recommend that you start slowly. Building a few segments, and seeing how they perform first is the way to go.

Sure, you may have lots of data already. You may be anxious to set up 50 custom segments and push to customers precisely what (you think) they need right now. Unless you get the whole team involved, you'll likely have problems tracking each segment's performance.

You may miss a vital detail and send a wrong campaign to the wrong audience. You may miss the loopholes and quickly lose the audience that has zero interest in their new campaigns.

Start with 3-5 segments based on basic demographics. Then, expand them into behavior-based campaigns, adding more and more data points and, at the same time, keeping in check how the existing campaigns perform.

7. Benefit from Refills & Subscriptions

There are certain products that its users need to buy with some, at least, regularity. Think about dog food, contact lenses, medicines, electric toothbrush's heads, or virtually any kitchen or bathroom supplies.

Unless the clients changed their habits, they'd be inclined to buy those again and again. And if they purchased from you before, why not make it easier to re-purchase?

With most products, you'll be able to estimate the lifetime of a product sold. If you're selling a pack of three monthly contact lenses, an email sent 2,5 months after initial purchase will likely be met with a favorable reception.

Rather than sending them a broad selection of contact lenses every month, consider such timely notifications. They're almost guaranteed to give you much better results.

8. Use Past Purchases to Help Drive Sales

Past purchases can give you precise insight into customers' interests. They also can tell a lot about the person's income level or just the amount of money they're willing to spend on certain products.

If you're selling jewelry, you're likely to have a wide range of prices across your products. It makes sense – some will spend $10 or $30 and will be entirely happy with their purchase. Others won't even look at the sub-$1000 items.

If someone only bought the inexpensive, discounted products in the past, sending them a luxury item isn't likely to get them to convert. Same way, sending cheap necklaces to the more (seemingly) affluent customers could even cost you a quick unsubscribe. Use the data wisely.

Oh, a protip – don't name your segment "Poor People" or something similar. Some email sending providers include the list name on emails confirming a subscription or an unsubscribe.

9. Find the Right Time to Send

Much research has been done on the perfect times and days for sending emails. Different times work for typical 9-to-5 office workers and different for the stay-at-home tribe.

Something else will also work for students or teenagers. What works best differs also based on industry and type of product on offer. You'll need to figure it out.

The bottom line is that people are more likely to open emails and interact with them at certain times. If you drop them the latest promotion at 9 am right when they're starting a busy day at work, they likely won't even recall it when they're out of their focus zone. Delivering some fantastic deals right when they set off for a lunch break might do the job, however.

Many email marketing automation services will determine the client's timezone for you with high accuracy. You can also double-check it against their purchase history if there's any.

Needless to say, it's worth checking what works for this particular audience. Sadly, there's no ideal time that will work for all, but the amount of data on this subject is abundant.

Wrapping up

Email segmentation is a vast topic that requires deep thought but can yield some fantastic results. No matter the type of business you run, I believe it's worth your time.

There are many factors you should take into consideration. First of all, figure out the type of data that defines your customers well and explain why you need it in the first place. Then, gather insights from past emails and website behavior. Often, the audience will let you segment itself nicely if only you ask, and this should make the job easier for you.

And when you have what you need, start building segments one by one. Analyze the performance of each before you proceed with more. Beware of loopholes that can derail your segmentation outcome and take advantage of some of the tips I mentioned - individual sending time, financial criteria, or the need to refill certain products.

If you did the homework, you'd soon start seeing the improved engagement, and the boost in sales and retention will shortly follow. Best of luck!

About the Author

Piotr Malek is a Technical Content Writer at Mailtrap, a product that helps people inspect and debug emails before sending them to real users. Piotr is also a traveler, an avid cyclist, and a runner.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8230801 https://ift.tt/36tp8IP via IFTTT

#IFTTT #RSSMix.com Mix ID 8230801

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gameplayandtalk · 4 years ago

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Tetris Effect: Connected - Review

2020 hasn't been the greatest year for... well, humanity. But it is shaping up to be a great year for Tetris players.

The last decade has had some ups and downs as well: Tetris Ultimate from Ubisoft was destined to be the new mainline Tetris game of choice, but was plagued by issues early on and failed to excite the fanbase. The popular “Tetris Friends” website was phased out in the middle of 2019, leaving a hole in the multiplayer online scene. Then there are some bright points: Tetris 99, the collaboration between Arika and Nintendo, brought Tetris into the battle royale scene for Nintendo Switch players free of charge (as long as you had an online membership.) Fan-made Tetris “inspired” clones (essentially Tetris in all but name) such as JSTris and Tetr.io have also sparked a resurgence in the online multiplayer scene with robust customization options and stat-tracking.

Another bright spot (like, REALLY bright — think lens flares and supernovas) was Tetris Effect, a VR Tetris experience. It’s safe to say nobody really asked for it, but there it was, and it was beautiful. It wasn’t simply Tetris with a new coat of paint though: Tetris Effect had plenty of new modes that kept veteran players coming back.

In Tetris Effect, the main single player campaign known as “Journey Mode” featured a new signature mechanic: the “Zone Meter”. This meter charges up as you clear multiple lines or perform combos, and once activated, the action freezes on-screen, allowing you to rack up as many line clears as you can before the meter runs out. Instead of disappearing, the finished lines sink to the bottom and glow. The resulting clears are named depending on the number of lines cleared, such as Octotris (8), Decahextris (16), Perfectris (18) and the very-difficult-to-achieve Ultimatris (all 20 rows). Unless you’re working your way from the bottom to the top, you will quickly run out of room as the clears push your board out of playable range, meaning your placement to achieve an Ultimatris must be perfect.

This board clearing mechanic, along with other great new single-player modes such as Purify, solidified Tetris Effect among fans of all types who had previously seen it all. However, Tetris Effect had no real multiplayer mode, and when Tetris 99 arrived on the scene about four months later (seemingly out of nowhere), it grabbed the spotlight in a big way.

Now, almost two years after Tetris Effect was initially released, Tetris Effect Connected brings back everything that made the original great, along with some of the most innovative multiplayer the series has ever seen. And the long wait was so incredibly worth it.

Let’s get the unfortunate news out of the way: People who already own Tetris Effect on PS4 or the Epic Store release on PC won’t be able to play Tetris Effect Connected on the legacy versions until the summer of 2021. In another casualty of timed exclusives, you will need to play Tetris Effect Connected on either Xbox One (and above) or on PC via the Microsoft Store, where Tetris Effect is appearing for the first time. Yes, just in time for the Xbox Series X/S launch.

I can’t imagine fans of this game will want to drop full price again to play it on a different platform, new modes or not. Luckily, the game is included with Xbox Game Pass as well as its PC counterpart. PS4 owners will likely be stuck shaking their fists until Summer, but for those of us who have already been playing on PC, I really recommend you go with this option and just install it again. Xbox One and new Series S/X users have absolutely nothing to lose.

Getting “Connected”

The centerpiece of Tetris Effect Connected is the new “Connected” mode. This mode actually isn’t competitive at all, but cooperative. While this isn’t the first time a version of Tetris has adopted a co-operative mode (Tengen’s version of Tetris for the NES and Tetris the Grandmaster 2’s Doubles mode come to mind), this mode is balanced in such a way that avoids that overbearing “too many cooks in the kitchen” feeling. Teams of three are matched together to take on several AI controlled bosses named after zodiac signs.

The action starts with each of you controlling your own boards, trying to charge a shared meter between the three of you by making clears. As you do this, the AI is charging its own meter that hits all human players with various status effects. These can range from things as simple as dropping random junk onto your screen, all the way to making your entire playfield temporarily invisible. Oh, and it is as hard as it sounds (Luckily, you can still see about where your piece will land in relation to the board thanks to the still visible “ghost piece”). Nevertheless, this is what tends to wreck most Connected players, if limited online experience up to now is any indication.

Your best chance against these zodiac-themed killer CPUs is to get your shared meter up to full charge and enter this mode’s spin on the “Zone” mechanic. The music motif will ramp up and prepare you to get in the zone, which happens automatically within a few seconds of maxing out the meter. Then, your boards collapse down, leaving no gaps in the columns, and all player boards are combined into one giant board.

The objective, much like elsewhere the Zone mechanic is used in the game, is still to clear as many lines on the board as you can, but this is much harder considering the now huge width of the board, and the fact that each player takes turns placing their own blocks. The first time you see it, you’re likely to feel completely stunned, but it’s important to keep dropping blocks. You’re likely to get a few third wheels on your team who take all the time in the world looking for the perfect spot, but the perfect placement rarely exists. The best strategy is just to keep moving, and if someone does accidentally foul up your progress placing over a gap, there are shining purple blocks randomly given out to the players that will push down all columns under them to iron out the kinks in the board. You’ll likely have to get your meter back up several more times to make each AI boss top out, so it’s important to stay diligent.

If that wasn’t enough, log in during what the game calls a “full moon” phase. Tetris Effect players might remember that on Saturdays, playing “Effect Mode” games online had a special collaborative leaderboard feature for a subset of the game’s many special modes, and if enough people sent in their high scores, a special goal would be met. Tetris Effect Connected also has a special feature for you on Saturdays: Connected Vs. mode. This time, a fourth human player takes the place of the boss AI character. Human bosses are even harder to take down, and there are special unlockable avatars for players who can rack up boss wins with the different types of zodiac characters.

Of all the modes on offer, “Connected” seems to take it home: Co-operative Tetris play has rarely been tried, and yet it just works here. The shared torment of all the status effects raining down on you and your teammates, combined with the rush of taking turns completing a giant board, brings about a feeling of camaraderie that is unmatched. That is, when you’re not yelling at the slackers to “JUST DROP IT SOMEWHERE!” You’ll also have, like in all modes, a letter grade and stats waiting for each player after the match, to show just how much you were carrying your team. It’s as competitive as co-op can get.

The game’s take on the standard “versus” mode is also something you can’t get anywhere else. You’ll be sending garbage to your opponent like usual, but you’ll also be building up a zone meter to use against each other. This mode is named “Zone Battle”.

Admittedly, the first time I saw the zone mechanic in single-player, it was charming but felt a bit supplementary. However, nailing a Perfectris in a match against another player (I’m sure some are crazy enough to try an Ultimatris in a heated match, too) is akin to the rush of pulling off a “Fatality” in Mortal Kombat. The feature makes so much more sense in this context. When you hear your opponent beginning a zone attack, going a note up the scale each time a line is cleared, you know something big is coming, and you’d better have something to counter it, preferably starting your own zone attack. Being a master at traditional versus Tetris isn’t a guarantee you will succeed here, as a well-timed and effective zone attack can quickly change the tide of battle.

The last two modes are Score Attack and Classic Score Attack. This might be what ends up sealing the deal for most Tetris maniacs. Amazingly, Classic Score Attack feels just like watching a match of Classic Tetris World Championships on Youtube. With the help of CTWC veteran Greentea, the developers were able to adapt the feel of NES Tetris to Tetris Effect, while still being its own thing.

It’s important to know just how different Tetris is between these two generations. In modern Tetris, the pieces are handed out in what is known as “7-bag”: You’ll get some configuration of the seven pieces randomly dispersed and then handed out again. This means another long block is never more than 12 pieces away. No such thing in classic Tetris: the pieces can feel truly random here, and you could be waiting forever in what competitors call “droughts”. Your longest drought will be counted up and presented at the end of the match along with your rate of “Tetris” clears as a percentage, among other info.

Obviously, there is no holding pieces, but also no hard-dropping (instantly dropping your piece), and your pieces will lock into place nearly as soon as they hit another piece. Most important to remember is the dramatic difference in scoring between “Tetris” clears and all other line clears. As the game gets faster, “Tetris” clears are worth more and more. It’s good to start stacking for Tetris’ early and often if you want to win. All of this is made even more foreboding by the spine-chilling remix of the classic theme.

If you wanted the feel of competitive NES Tetris at home, you would have to set up two systems and tube TVs back to back, whereas this mode truly brings the experience home by counting up the points for who is currently in the lead and by how much. It was wholly unexpected for Tetris Effect to try to tackle classic Tetris, but they completely nailed it. If this sounds like hell, and you’d rather be setting up Triple T-Spins, the regular Score Attack is also available to settle the score with other players.

As far as complaints are concerned, matchmaking in the “Connected” mode seems to have dropped off since launch. This is perhaps because tackling the hardest modes is best suited to a proven team of online friends.

Also, as of this writing, in both score attack modes, the game has been designed to let a winner continue playing even after the loser has topped out and is no longer able to play. This is leading to a lot of people closing the game out of impatience, as they have no other option but to let the winning player keep playing while they watch for the final results. If a topped-out player does this, the remaining player does not get credited a win, and their score ranking also goes down! I’m hopeful this will eventually be fixed, but in the meantime, be sure to top out once a losing player is no longer able to play. This is the best way to ensure that they will not try to disconnect and essentially take the win from you.

Another concern is more a request to developers for future updates than a warning for players, although it can be both. As I mentioned, it has become increasingly difficult to get matched up in the “Connected” mode. It’s easiest to find players at the first difficulty level, the only one available upon first entering the mode. However, some of these beginner players don’t seem to understand that your move once entering “the zone” isn’t complete until hard-dropping the block. I realize that some might not even know the default button for this, so from a design perspective it would be best to prompt players how to drop their block (along with the button assignment), especially if their move has taken an excessive amount of time. This will move the action along for the other players.

I would also like to have seen a multiplayer take on “Purify”, the game’s garbage clearing mode where you are tasked with clearing as many purple blocks as you can before the infection spreads. However, what is here is such a surprise.

Tetris Effect Connected is a labor of love by Tetris fans for Tetris fans, much like the many fan games out there. Certainly Tetris 99 was an upheaval of what people expected from Tetris, but thanks to this game and the popularity of CTWC and fangames, a complete resurgence of the game has finally been cemented. I may be preaching to the choir at this point, since most people reading probably already know of Tetris, but if it’s been a while, time to check back in. It’s better than ever to be a Tetris fan, and it seems we are here to stay. To those angry about double-dipping, yes, it is unfortunate. If you do take the plunge, however, I think you’ll be extremely pleased. I’m also confident the game will only get better from here on out!

See you on the battlefield. Thanks for reading!

Hi-Res Screenshots

#review #tetris #tetris effect #tetris effect connected #tetris effect multiplayer update

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theliterateape · 4 years ago

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Election 2020: Swimming in Sewage Toward a Different Kind of More Hopeful Cesspool

by Don Hall

8:00 a.m.

I wake up a few hours ago. Slept like the dead. I read through the same bullshit with poll numbers and predictions with the same combination of hope, certainty, uncertainty, and boredom as I did yesterday and the day before. Yeah. Trump is a full-blown dickhead. Biden is a truly nice guy. Will Texas go blue? Do I even know anyone from Texas anymore?

My wife wakes up. She’s helping friends move to North Carolina by helping them drive their shit for the next week as if today is not anything big. She gives me a blowjob and gets a bagel.

I’m not worried about the results of today. I truly am confident that the nation will tip back into some semblance of rationality and dump Trump. I’m more interested to see how it all unfolds and if the deposed Mad King will take a shit on the desk in the Oval as a parting gesture in three months.

I have this image of he and his whole skeleton crew, fully repudiated by a massive and historic blue wave, sitting in the White House like squatters, selling off pieces of our national history on Ebay and hiding from His Majesty as he stomps through the hallways screaming at portraits of presidents past about the unfairness of it all.

In tandem is the image of the cultural left sharpening their knives to go in full attack once Biden is sworn in to remake the country into some bizarre Maoist Shangri-La doing what the Left always does — cannibalize it’s own — while the defeated Republicans pretend they were never in league with Trump but held hostage by him like the rest of us.

Fuck me. This is going to be a long day, isn’t it?

10:00 a.m.

I’m not terribly worried that Trump & Co. will steal the election.

I remember years ago a prominent Chicago poet who dressed and spoke like a rap star telling me “It ain’t the n****rs who talk about shit you have to worry about. They’re all bark and no bite. It’s the quiet ones you need to keep an eye on.”

Trump has been barking about stealing the election for months now and I’m pretty certain a man so overwhelmingly incompetent as the one who completely blew both his debate appearances and fucked up a national response to an epic pandemic so horribly that a retarded child could’ve done better is not going to suddenly reveal that he is an evil genius capable of stealing one of the most televised elections in history.

I’m likewise less concerned about the rabid, angry Trumpers wreaking havoc on the country. They were never in this for a long campaign. They couldn’t even take COVID seriously enough to wear masks. They’ll make some noise, get into some melees for a few days and then slink home and grouse just like their hero.

I wonder what the Antifa crowd will do once Trump is deposed? Start an emo band? Go back to working at Starbucks and REI? I hope they decide to occupy Kentucky and reign terror on Mitch McConnell. It’s a terrible thing to say but the party I’ll throw in my semi-quarantined apartment when Trump loses tonight (this week? Next month?) will be nothing when compared to the full-on Mardi Gras parade I’ll throw when the Evil Senator from Kentucky dies. I’m known to say that I can’t hate someone unless I’ve met them but I fucking hate Mitch.

I read a weird op-ed online that essentially thanks Trump for giving us four years reprieve from the cultural warriors of the Far Left. I wish I read it in a paper so I could wipe my ass with it because an iPad makes for an uncomfortable symbolic gesture.

I shower and get dressed. I’m on shift tonight at the casino so I’ll be dealing with the regular crowd while history unfolds like a soiled sheet and you can’t quite tell if that’s a bloodstain or merely ketchup.

For our sixth anniversary, Dana got me my eleventh tattoo. She came up with a cool design concept: a Chicago tattoo for my right back shoulder that included the baby in the clamshell from the City of Chicago flag, a light blue background and three of the red six-point stars of Chicago, each representing one of my three decades there. She booked an artist in a very chic studio who happened to be a great trace artist but not so much with the original design thing.

As it stands, it’s a fine tattoo with some elements that look like a child drew them with a Sharpie. Not great but growing on me. But the odd thing is that it being being on back, I don’t see it so I forget it’s there. Reminds me that as Americans we tend to dwell on history but not what is directly behind us. We’ll send Trump packing and immediately forget how embarrassing he was and set into attacking the new administration because it isn’t as brazenly Marxist as we fought for (I use ‘we’ although I actually voted for Biden’s moderation).

12:00 p.m.

Dropped Dana off for her trip. Ran some stuff home. I’m now actively avoiding anything news related. I receive an email that our division of casinos is not putting the election coverage on the screens in our Sportsbooks and I’m relieved.

2:00 p.m.

At the casino now. It’s pretty empty and I’m unsurprised. I’m informed that the larger properties and on the Strip there are special task force groups of LVMPD set up at every location to stem any bad partisan behavior in the casinos. For our property, I’m the task force.

I recall clearly the night four years ago when so many of us were so certain Hillary had it in the bag only to be gut-punched around 9:00 p.m. with the news that Trump had won the thing. Unlike so many, I accepted the result regardless of fact that she won the popular vote. Until we sack up and remove the Electoral College, that’s a legitimate win.

5:25 p.m.

I checked. I couldn’t help myself. The only thing that pisses me off is that Mitch won Kentucky, that sour, putrid fuckface.

Yeah. I really want the Dems to sweep this up. The question I’m asking myself is if we repeat 2016, why? The answer so many gravitate to is that half the country is racist but I’m not buying that reductive bullshit. If I had to guess, half the country doesn’t buy into the identity politic of the Far Left.

Alright. Enough. Optimism. Fucking optimism.

7:30 p.m.

At this point I have to remind myself that Dems voted overwhelmingly early and so many of those votes are still to be counted. I’ll admit, I’m surprised that Trump is even competitive but given my disdain for the Wokesters I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. If I can’t take them someone from the rural side of Texas probably hates them as much as I hate Mitch.

I was hoping for a blow-out but it’s looking more and more like this thing will get decided in the courts over mail-in votes.

On the floor, no one is talking about the history unfolding. By now, the place is about half-full and people are far more concerned with getting their comp drinks and hitting payouts. I overhear a couple of guys at the blackjack table. They think the Dems are going down. One thinks it’s because of Kamala Harris. I walk away without saying a word.

If there’s anything we should have learned from 2000 is that, under no circumstances should the Blue concede until every last vote is counted. Every last fucking vote.

I’m finding a bit of Zen. We aren’t going to know who won tonight. In some ways this is a good thing. It means Trump will be wrapped up battling the process rather than losing and tearing shit apart out of petulance. We still have a raging pandemic and our economy is shredded.

The divide in this country is not one of race or racism. The divide is between city mice and country mice. As the picture emerges, the urban centers of almost every state skews left in statewide seas of rural red. It also demonstrates how deeply unpopular the extremes are with the opposing sides. The racial identity politics of the Far Left — you know, the folks who flatly state that all white people are racist — and the strident authoritarianism of the Far Right — you know, the ones who love the police and lotsa guns — are so toxic that equal measures of citizens will vote with little more than a passionate hatred for one or the other despite a host of rational reasons to vote the other way.

9:40 p.m.

We won’t know until later in the week.

Votes are still uncounted in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. We wanted a decisive repudiation of Trump and, once again, half the country (and much closer to half than four years ago) took that away.

From one angle, this is the best outcome. Uncertainty as to who won means all those businesses boarded up can breathe a sigh of relief. With no clear winner so far, there isn’t a reason to riot in the streets. A couple weeks of legal battles and ballot counting and the assholes on both sides will get bored.

I was humbled in 2016. I thought I knew how it would go because I was so certain my worldview was so obviously right that how could anyone not see it so? I’ve been ready for this. Like so many, I felt the surge of certainty once again with the polls and how incredibly monstrous Trump became in the last days of his campaign. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

Don’t get me wrong. I still believe Biden will be our president on January 21st, 2021. I just wish it had been an easier road.

#election 2020

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marketingcomcaio · 5 years ago

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Marketing Trends for 2020: Here’s What Will Happen That Nobody is Talking About

The new year is right around the corner. And I know you are already prepared because you read this blog and tons of other marketing blogs, right?

But here is the thing: I also read most of the popular marketing blogs, follow all of the marketing YouTube channels, and listen to the same podcasts you do.

And I’ve noticed that very few people are talking about what’s really going to happen in 2020.

Sure, they will tell you things like voice search is going to account for over 50% of the search queries next year but all of that stuff has already been talked about.

And there are actually more interesting trends that will affect your marketing that no one is really talking about.

So, what are these trends? What’s going to happen in 2020?

Alright, here goes…

Trend #1: Companies who rely on Google Analytics will get beat by their competition

We all love Google Analytics.

Heck, I love it so much I log in at least 3 or 4 times a day. And here is the kicker: I get so much traffic that my Google Analytics only updates once a day.

I really need to break that habit but that’s for another day.

You are probably wondering, what’s wrong with Google Analytics?

There actually isn’t much wrong with it. It’s a great tool, especially considering that it’s free.

But here is the thing… marketing has been changing. New channels are being constantly introduced, such as voice search.

And transactions no longer are as simple as someone coming and buying from you and that’s it.

These days there are things like upsells, down sells, repeat purchases, and even checkout bumps. On top of that, there are so many different ways you can generate revenue for your online business, such as partnerships, affiliate marketing, and even webinars.

This has caused companies to start using analytics solutions that tie into their database better, such as Amplitude. Or better yet, you are seeing a big push into business intelligence.

A central place where you can tie in all of your data and make better-informed decisions so you can optimize for your lifetime value instead of your short-term income.

In 2020, you will see more companies adopting business intelligence solutions… from paid ones to free ones like Google Data Studio.

If you haven’t checked out Data Studio, you’ll want to start now because it is easy to pass in all of your business and marketing data into one place. For example, you can pass in more granular data from your Facebook ad campaigns into Data Studio while that would be a bit difficult to do with Google Analytics.

Trend #2: Companies will optimize for voice search, but not for revenue

According to ComScore, over 50% of the searches in 2020 will be from voice search. But that’s not really a new trend… everyone has been talking about that for years.

So, what’s the big deal?

Optimizing for voice search is a great way to get your brand out more, but how is that going to convert into sales?

I haven’t seen too many solutions so far when it comes to capitalizing on your voice search traffic, but so far there is Jetson.ai.

If you aren’t familiar with Jetson.ai, it makes it so people can buy from your site using voice search. It doesn’t matter if it is Alexa or Google Home, they work with most of the popular devices.

vimeo

What’s cool about Jetson.ai is that it can learn from each customer and customize the interactions.

For example, if I keep ordering the same toothpaste from a specific store using voice search, Jetson.ai keeps track of that so you can easily keep ordering the same product over and over again with little to no friction.

Heck, it’s easier than logging into your computer or pulling out your phone to make a purchase.

Trend #3: Your lists won’t convert as well, so you’ll have to look for alternative communication channels

Email, it’s something we all use in the corporate world.

But here is something interesting when it comes to marketing emails… I’m in a group with a bit over 109 email marketers across different industries in different parts of the world.

And can you guess what we are all noticing?

Our open rates are staying roughly the same and that’s largely because we all know how to clean and optimizing for deliverability.

But our click rates are going down.

So far as a group we have seen our click rates drop by 9.4% in 2019.

That’s crazy considering as a group we have over 146 million email addresses.

Now does this mean email is dead?

Of course not!!!

Email is here to stay and will be here for a very long time.

But what companies will have to do in 2020 is to leverage more communication channels.

Chatbots will take off drastically. Not necessarily the Intercom’s or Drift’s of the world but more so the solutions like ManyChat and MobileMonkey.

ManyChat and MobileMonkey leverage Facebook Messenger and as they connect it with Instagram and WhatsApp it will get even more popular.

In addition to chatbots, you’ll see more people leveraging tools that allow push notifications like Subscribers.

It’s so powerful, here is the impact I’ve been able to generate from push notifications so far using Subscribers.

You can wait till next year to lever chatbots and push notifications, but I’d recommend you start sooner than later. 😉

Trend #4: Moats will almost be non-existent, other than brands

You’ve probably heard the word “moat” before. If you haven’t, just think about water around a castle.

Back in the day, they had water all around the castle and they used a drawbridge to get in and out of the castle, so it would protect them from invaders.

With your business, you may have a moat. It could be a feature, your cost structure, a technological advantage, or even a marketing advantage.

Over the years, moats in the online world have slowly been disappearing.

It’s easy for anyone to copy these days. So, what’s separating you from your competition?

Something could work right now, but it won’t last forever…

But do you know what will still be a strong moat in 2020 and even a stronger one in the future?

It’s branding.

People buy Jordan shoes because they love Michael Jordan. His brand is stronger than ever even though he hasn’t played in the NBA for roughly 16 years.

His shoes are so popular, it’s helped him boost his net worth to over a billion dollars. Plus owning a basketball team doesn’t hurt either. 😉

But what’s interesting is he’s made more money after retirement than he did as a basketball player.

And it’s not just Jordan who built a strong brand… so have the Kardashians.

Kylie launched a billion-dollar company according to Forbes and it was all because of her personal brand. Her cosmetic company isn’t doing anything revolutionary. She just has a strong brand… and good for her for monetizing her brand.

The same goes for companies like Nike, Ferrari, Tesla, American Express… and the list goes on and on.

It’s why companies are spending over 10 billion dollars a year on influencer marketing.

Just look at my agency NP Digital. It’s literally one of the fastest-growing ad agencies out there. And when I look at all of my competitors’ numbers, we are growing at a much faster pace because of my brand.

Yes, we have a great team, but again, that really isn’t a moat as a lot of agencies have great teams. It’s my brand that gave us a really fast kick start and continues to hopefully push us up.

You’ll want to build a brand in 2020. Whether it is personal or corporate, it’s the best moat you can build in marketing. Plus, it will help you with Google’s EAT.

Trend #5: Marketing will become a more even playing field, you’ll have no choice but to use automation

When I first started off as an entrepreneur, I turned to SEO because I couldn’t afford the big ad budgets as my competitors.

Heck, I couldn’t even afford to run any paid ads.

Over the years, the playing field has become more level.

There are credit card companies like Brex that make it easier for startups to get approved for larger limits and you may not have to pay them back right away.

There are financing companies that will give you cash to spend on marketing, so non-venture funded companies can more easily compete.

There are even companies like Lighter Capital that will give you loans without all of the headaches based on your existing revenue.

And to top it off, software solutions are now starting to integrate AI to give better recommendations. From Clickflow and RankScience to Distilled ODN… everyone is trying to use AI to make SEO and other forms of marketing.

Heck, BrightEdge can even automate your SEO (or at least a large portion of it). According to them, their automated SEO solution increases page views per visit by 60% as well as provides 21% more keywords on page one.

Keep in mind their clients are really big (their software starts in the thousands of dollars per month) so they would probably see better results than most companies, but still, you will start seeing many more software companies leverage AI.

Even with Ubersuggest, I’m working on creating AI that does the SEO for you so you no longer have to spend endless hours while, at the same time, saving you thousands of dollars.

In other words, the marketing playing field is getting more even. And if you want to do well, you are going to have to leverage AI and automation.

If everyone else is using it and you aren’t, you are going to get crushed because it will make changes faster and more accurately than a human. Again, it’s the only option you’ll have if you want to continually compete.

But don’t worry, there will be affordable/free solutions that exist, it’s just a matter of time. 😉

If everyone is leveraging the same AI marketing technology, how can you beat your competitors?

Well, it will come down to everything else… price, customer service, upselling, operations, sales… All of the small stuff is what’s going to help you win.

Trend #6: There will be no more silver bullets, we will all have to optimize for marginal gains

A lot of businesses were built off of one marketing channel.

Dropbox grew through referral marketing. Invite more friends, get more free space.

Facebook was built off your email address book. Facebook used to tap into it and invite all of your contacts to use Facebook on your behalf.

Companies like Quora and Yelp were built off of SEO. All of those rankings really help drive their businesses.

But you no longer can build a business through just one marketing channel. Good channels now get saturated extremely fast.

Even if they work and cause explosive growth, it will only last for a short while before your competitors jump on board and make it harder.

Marketing is now heading in the direction of being about “marginal gains.”

There’s a British cycling coach named Dave Brailsford. His belief was that if you improved every area related to cycling by just 1 percent, then those small gains would add up to remarkable improvement.

And he’s right, that’s how you win a race.

The same will be with your marketing. There will be a big shift from people focusing on one channel and trying to find the “Holy Grail of marketing” to working on slightly improving each area of your marketing.

From split testing your title tags to get a few ranking improvements to adding checkout bumps to your order page so you can spend a little bit more on your paid ads to using Google Data Studio so you can better optimize for your lifetime value…

It’s all about the little things. That’s what is going to add up to winning.

That’s what you’ll have to shift your mindset to in order to win in 2020 and beyond.

Trend #7: Personalization is the new marketing

The problem with marketing as it exists today is that 95% of your visitors will never convert into a customer. And that’s if you are lucky.

Chances are you are more likely looking at 97% plus of your visitors never converting.

The big reason isn’t that your marketing sucks or that all of those visitors are junk and unqualified.

It’s that your message doesn’t fit every single one of your visitors.

But through personalization, you can convert more of your visitors into customers.

A basic example of this is Amazon. When you go to Amazon, they know your patterns and what you typically buy so they show you what they think you want to see in order to boost their conversions.

And it works! When I log into Amazon I see tons of household supplies because that is what I buy the most often. I never buy dog food (which is smart because I don’t have a dog) so I’ll never see ads for dog food.

Businesses are also trying to personalize each and every single experience both online and offline.

Companies like Amperity are trying to create a customer relationship engine so you can better serve each of your customers, whether it is online or offline.

Marketing is going to become a game of personalization. With ad costs and even general marketing costs rising, you have no choice but to figure out how to convert the 97% of your traffic that just never comes back.

You’ll see a big push for this in 2020.

Conclusion

I know a lot of the stuff I mentioned above isn’t talked about a lot and they aren’t popular marketing topics that everyone wants to hear… but it is the future.

These are trends that will come true, some already are, and you have to adapt for them.

Here’s the beautiful part, though. You just read this, and now have a chance to act on the information before your competition. So, make sure you go and do so.

I want to see you not only succeed but I want you to beat your competition. And I believe you can, whether you are a big company, or just starting off with very little to no money.

So, what do you think of the trends above? Do you see any marketing trends that will come true in 2020 that few people talk about?

The post Marketing Trends for 2020: Here’s What Will Happen That Nobody is Talking About appeared first on Neil Patel.

Marketing Trends for 2020: Here’s What Will Happen That Nobody is Talking About Publicado primeiro em https://neilpatel.com

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yourhelpfulaffiliate · 5 years ago

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18 Tips and Tricks to Get More Followers and Engagement on Pinterest

18 Tips and Tricks to Get More Followers and Engagement on Pinterest Pinterest can be a very powerful resource for driving traffic. I personally use Pinterest to get people to visit my blog website. Gaining followers and engagement can be tricky. I have put together the best tips and tricks I have found for getting more followers on Pinterest.

Tip #1 It's Not Social Media, It's A Search Engine

While some aspects of Pinterest are social in nature, if you want to gain followers, views, repins and more you need to treat it like a search engine. People come to Pinterest to search for things. If you take this into account when setting up your profile, titles and descriptions it will help a lot. Focus on the keywords for your niche. A good way to do this is to find related keywords that people are searching for. To do this type the basic idea for what you are pinning. For example "Affiliate Blog". When you do this other suggested search terms will show up. These are terms that real people are searching for, so you should work them in where you can so your pins will show up in more searches. Basically work on your SEO or search engine optimization.

Tip #2 Brand Your Pinned Images

Adding your website or brand logo to your pinned images looks more professional and lets people know who you are and where to find you.

Tip #3 Pin Videos

Pinterest now allows you to pin videos, which I do not see many people doing. This means the market for videos on Pinterest is prime for anyone to take advantage of. Go for it!

Tip #4 Mimic What Works

Do some research on the niche you are posting in. See what the most popular posts looks like, are about and how they set up their title and description. Without copying them, make similar content. You know it is already working so this will save you a lot of time in trial and error.

Tip #5 Join and Post on Group Boards

When looking for group boards to join I suggest joining boards that line up with you niche. Joining large boards that do not have much direction usually just puts you with a bunch of spam and you do not want that. Joining like minding group boards will grow your audience and help you gain follows and repins as well as trust.

Tip #6 Write With The Spirit of Pinterest

Pinterest is a place where people to find inspiration. Writing dull and lifeless titles and descriptions is not the way to go. Be uplifting and positive as much as possible and Pinterest and its users will reward you for it.

Tip #7 Get A Business Account

Signing up for or switching over to a Pinterest business account is really pretty easy, plus it is free to do. Making this change will give you more analytical information about your Pinterest account. Having Pinterest Business account verifies that you are are living breathing person, gives you a place to add a website on your profile, lets you set up ad campaigns on Pinterest and gives you key analytic information. This is really a worth while tip.

Tip #8 Use Rich Pins

Rich pins just contain more keyword data than normal pins, which mean they have more SEO juice, which is good for you. Use them. Rich pins work 70% better than normal pins. This is huge!

Tip # 9 Be a Master Pin Sorter

Pinterest and Pinterest users love when pins are put in relevant boards. If you create and populate boards with multiple well placed pins you will be rewarded for it.

Tip # 10 Be Active

Pinning a ton one day out of the month is not the way to go. If you work out a schedule where you pin at least ten times everyday, this will work much better for you. I know pinning daily is a big ask. Luckily Tailwind is here to help. Tailwind is an awesome free service I suggest you get and use for many reasons. Tailwind has an automatic Pinterest post scheduler. This means you can do all your pinning one day out of the month. Just schedule the pins to be posted using Tailwind. This will post your pins throughout the month saving you time. If you want to sign up for Tailwind you can do so by clicking on my invitation link here. Signing up through my link gives you a free month of Tailwind Plus! It also gives me a $15 Tailwind credit. If you sign up for Tailwind you will be given a referral code just like mine, which can earn you credit.

Tip #11 Have Beautiful Pin Images

Finding a way to create awesome pin images is pretty tough. Many successful Pinterest users use Canva, a free to use image editor, to create their pins. Pinterest is a visually driven app, which means if you have stunning photos your pins will be more successful.

Tip #12 Have Text on Your Images

Adding text to you images increase the chance someone will either click the pin or save it for later. Not everyone reads descriptions right away but everyone can see text you add to your pins.

Tip #13 Add a Pin It Button to Your Website

A Pit It button allows your website visitors to pin any image on your site. More pins equals more traffic so this makes a lot of sense to me. I wish all website came with this built in. I know of one called Sumo Me but I am sure there are others out there.

Tip #14 Follow Your Future Followers

Gaining new followers can be tough. When I first started using Pinterest I would follow anyone hoping they would follow me back. As time as gone on I have become better at find the people who are most likely to follow me back. To find "my future follows" I find people in my niche and look at their follows. When choosing who to follow I pick from these people. I pick only people who have pictures of their faces. This reduces the number of spam accounts I follow. I also look at the names and if they look too spammy I don't follow them. You can follow up to 50 every 2 hours. Over time this method will gain you followers.

Tip #15 Follow What is Trending

Following trends is a good why to gain attention. If you know what is most popular and can post something similar or even better, it is a good idea to do so. You already know people like it. Use that.

Tip #16 Have a Solid Foundation

One of the main goals when using Pinterest is getting people to look at your profile. If your profile is not set up or looks half assed it is a real turn off. Make sure people can tell what you are about and what you can do for them. Be uplifting and friendly and avoid looking spammy at all cost. Pinterest users hate spam and they can see it from a mile away. Having a profile set up properly goes along way to gaining new follows.

Tip #17 Have a Winning Profile Picture

Looking good is hard, but if you have a killer picture of your face as your profile picture people will connect with you on a person to person basis and this will increase their trust in you. Knowing you are a real person is important to a lot of Pinterest users and something about a picture of the human face really does it. People like People. Trust is important on the internet. Take every chance you have to show how trustworthy you are. If your Pinterest account if for your business or website a logo is good, but I think a picture of your smiling face will work better.

Tip #18 Use Tailwind (again)

Like a said early, Tailwind is just an awesome tool to have when trying to gain Pinterest follows. You already know about the pin scheduler, now I am going to tell you about Tailwind Tribes. Tailwind Tribes is just a killer idea. You join a tribe (a group of people posting pins in your niche) and share their pins. They will in turn share the pins you ask them to. Pretty cool. This stacks up pretty quickly and will get more eyes on your pins. Tailwind Tribes has a free and a paid service. For starting out the free plan should be just fine. If over time you want to gain the paid features, just sign up for the $15 a month plan. I think it is well worth the money. You can sign up for Tailwind by clicking my invitation link HERE. Signing up through my link gives you a free month of Tailwind Plus! It also gives me a $15 Tailwind credit. https://youtu.be/RqiIl746atc Read the full article

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progressiveparty · 5 years ago

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Our latest rankings of the 2020 Democratic candidates

There are (still) 20 candidates running for the Democratic presidential nomination, but only half of that number will appear on the debate stage a week from today in Houston.

That split shows the difference between running for president and having a real chance to be the Democratic presidential nominee. The broader group is running for president. The smaller one has a real chance of actually being the Democrats' choice to face off against President Donald Trump in November 2020. Sure, the 10 men and women not on the stage will argue that the Democratic National Committee's rules on how to qualify for the Houston debate (2% in four early state or national polls and 130,000 individual donors) are unfair and favor front-runners. To argue that, of course, you have to say that 2% support is too high a bar, which is a tough case to make -- especially with the primary and caucus season getting closer and closer. The reality of this primary process is that if you aren't on the stage in Houston next week, you aren't going to be the Democratic nominee. You can keep running for president for as long as you'd like. But that's not the same thing as having a viable shot at being the nominee. Maybe harsh. But absolutely true. Below, our rankings of the 10 Democrats who have a real chance at being the party's standard-bearer in 2020. 10. Julián Castro: The good news for Castro is that he made the debate stage next week. The bad news is he has the fewest qualifying polls of anyone debating. We've pointed out over and over again that Castro has a unique story to tell (e.g. making immigration revisions a hallmark of his campaign), but he's polling poorly. Even at this point, candidates polling at around 1% nationally and in the early contests rarely go on to win nominations. (Previous ranking: 9) 9. Andrew Yang: We dropped Yang from our last rankings after having him in our top 10 for the past few months. In retrospect, that was a mistake. Yang is currently running sixth nationally, according to the Real Clear Politics polling average, and will be in the next two national debates. The big question for Yang is whether and how he can move beyond his ardent base to actually challenge the first-tier candidates. (Previous ranking: Unranked) 8. Amy Klobuchar: If this election is about electability, Klobuchar has a leg up on the competition. No 2020 presidential candidate has won so frequently in the pivotal Midwest by margins as large as she has. Yet Klobuchar continues to languish in the polls. It's gotten so bad that one Klobuchar-endorser, former Vice President Walter Mondale, has called her bid "a prayer." Klobuchar needs moderate Democrats backing her, but, unless Biden falters, it likely won't happen. (Previous ranking: 7) 7. Beto O'Rourke: The former Texas congressman (still) hasn't found his mojo in the race, but it's hard to make the argument he is any less likely to win the nomination than any of the three candidates ranked below him (or even the candidate ranked directly above hum.) O'Rourke will be in the next two debates and should be able to dine out on his strong early fundraising. He is making a big bet that his anger and frustration over the lack of congressional action on gun legislation will be his ticket to relevance in the race. Maybe. (Previous ranking: 8) Gather Signatures - Become publicly searchable

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6. Cory Booker: The truth is that candidates six to 10 on our list are all polling well below 5%. What makes Booker stand out is that he has shown an ability to debate well and supposedly has a strong campaign infrastructure in the early states to take advantage of any surge. The problem is that Booker hasn't moved at all in the polls. Maybe with just one debate stage in September, Booker will finally see a bump. (Previous ranking: 6) 5. Pete Buttigieg: After sprinting into the top tier in polling in the spring, the South Bend, Indiana, mayor has spent the summer doing the unexciting work of building organizations in key early states. He's able to do that because of his massive fundraising haul in the second quarter ($24.8 million). The question for Buttigieg is whether, with those organizations now well on the way to being built, he can (re)seize the excitement and energy that got him to this point in the first place. (Previous ranking: 5) 4. Kamala Harris: The deal with Harris is quite simple: She has a ton of potential, and that potential isn't being realized at this point. Twice in this campaign -- her announcement and her first debate moment versus Biden -- Harris has jumped in the polls and then fallen as voters took a closer look. She has more endorsements from major politicians than anyone but Biden. For now, though, we can't ignore the fact that she's polling well behind any of the top three candidates. (Previous ranking: 3, TIE) 3. Bernie Sanders: It still feels to us that the senator from Vermont and his neighbor to the south -- Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts -- are on a collision course in this race. They are both competing for the same chunk of most liberal voters in the party, and it's hard to see either one of them winding up as the nominee without knocking down (or off) the other. But so far in the race, Biden and Warren continue to run nearly equal -- and equally behind former Vice President Joe Biden. (Previous ranking: 3, TIE) 2. Elizabeth Warren: Warren has good crowds, has plenty of dough and has moved securely into a tie for second place with Sanders in the polls. Unlike Sanders, she doesn't have the baggage of running against Hillary Clinton in 2016. Moreover, Warren is going to finally be on the same debate stage as Biden. The big questions are 1) whether she can expand beyond her well-educated, white base and 2) whether she'll be able to handle any added scrutiny that is sure to come with her climb in the polls. (Previous ranking: 2) 1. Joe Biden: The former VP has a theory of the case that is fundamentally different from his main rivals -- he believes that Trump is an anomaly in the country and the Republican Party and, if the President loses the election, things will return to normal. It's not a popular view among the liberal Democratic base, but Biden is banking on the idea that there are a lot more Democratic voters in the party than just the most activist and loudest liberals. And he's betting that they'll vote on the candidate who polling says is best-positioned to beat Trump. Maybe! But it's a big risk. (Previous ranking: 1) Gather Signatures - Become publicly searchable

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This Piece Originally Appeared in CNN Read the full article

#AmyKlobuchar #AndrewYang #BernieSanders #BetoO’Rourke #CoryBooker #ElizabethWarren #JoeBiden #JuliánCastro #KamalaHarris #PeteButtigieg

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ralphlayton · 5 years ago

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Key Insights from the New Email Marketing Benchmarks Report Q1-Q2 2019

Email marketing strategies and their effectiveness change every year.

To know what does and doesn’t work, it’s a good idea to keep an eye on the trends and average performance results achieved by companies in your industry

To make that easier, we’ve once again updated our Email Marketing Benchmarks report to bring you the latest email marketing statistics.

With these, you’ll be able to check and see how you compare in terms of email open rates, click-through rates, click-to-open rates, and other fundamental email marketing metrics with those scored by other email marketers.

This time, we analyzed over four billion emails sent by GetResponse customers between January and June 2019.

Below, you’ll see a snapshot of the key findings.

Prefer to dive into the data right away? free to explore the Email Marketing Benchmarks report for the latest email marketing statistics.

Now let’s take a look at seven key email marketing insights – and what they mean for your business

1. Embrace automated emails

Still think email marketing is simply sending email blasts? Think again!

Once again, we found automated emails outperform manual ones.

On average, automated emails (what we call triggered emails) generated a 44.05% email open rate and a 10.39% click-through rate (CTR).

Although these results are slightly lower than the Q3-Q4 2018 period data we’ve previously reported on, the numbers still show that automating your email campaigns should be your top priority in the upcoming future.

Autoresponders (also known as drip emails or follow up emails) were just as impressive – with an average 29.77% open rate, and 5.92% CTR.

Similarly, we saw a small dip in the level of impact these types of email generate, but nonetheless, they’re great for lead nurturing campaigns and driving long-term customer engagement.

Welcome emails also saw impressive engagement rates – with an average of 82.21% open rate, 26.76% CTR, and 32.55% click-to-open rate.

This shouldn’t be of surprise to anyone, anymore. Welcome emails can help you build strong relationships with your customers, drive conversions, and improve your email deliverability.

Imagine how high your CTR could go if your welcome email had a strong incentive (like a discount code) to click through to your website?

Source: reallygoodemails.com

What this means:

On average, recipients will open more than four out of ten automated emails, and click through to one in 10.

And engagement rates are even higher when you send specific campaigns like welcome emails.

Now compare these results to your other marketing channels.

Notice the difference?

That’s why across all online marketing channels, email marketing drives the highest email marketing ROI.

Related reading:

30+ automated email campaigns to inspire you

A beginner’s guide to email marketing

2. Don’t fear the new regulations

Email legislation changes are enough to make even the savviest marketers tremble.

Last year, it was GDPR that shook the email marketing industry. This year will probably be no different, as the new CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act) comes into force.

But now that the dust has settled, how did GDPR affect industry results?

It turns out, after the initial chaos and flood of GDPR-related emails, the results haven’t changed all that much.

For European customers, who have been most affected, metrics look as follows:

Average email open rate: 26.77% (Q2 2018), 26.91% (Q3-Q4 2018), 26.84 (Q1-Q2 2019)

Average click-through rate: 4.58% (Q2 2018), 4.61% (Q3-Q4 2018), 4.35% (Q1-Q2 2019)

At the same time, we’re seeing that the the average global email statistics have slightly dipped – around 1 percentage point – when compared YOY.

What this means:

There’s no need to worry about the new regulations impacting your campaign performance.

If you stick to email marketing best practices, you’ll do well.

Want to get ready for the CCPA? Check out our article below, plus our copywriting hints based on GDPR emails.

Related reading:

GDPR emails: 6 lessons from a copywriter’s inbox

How to get ready for the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA)

3. Create compelling campaigns

It’s an obvious – and maybe even boring – insight, but now we have the data to back it up.

Take a look at the average open and click-through rates by industry report.

What do you see?

The industries with the highest average results are also the ones we tend to care the most about – or are most likely to respond to.

The restaurants and food, non-profit, and publishing industries scored an average open rate above 33%, and between a 3.46% and 6.46% CTR.

Why would industries like travel or real estate score lower?

Chances are, it’s because we only tend to go on vacation once or twice a year (52.5% of SMB marketers took their last vacation over a year ago). And we rent or buy property even less often.

How can you beat the industry benchmarks? Focus on creating engaging content, and pinpoint the best way to deliver your emails.

We’ve already looked at how marketing automation can boost your engagement rates, so now let’s turn to videos and images.

Our data shows emails with video content beat the industry averages for opens and clicks.

Campaigns linking to YouTube (the most popular video hosting platform) observe a 28.62% average email open rate and a 4.92% click through rate.

Also, campaigns with images outperformed text-only emails with an email open rate of 24.64% compared to 16.28%, and a click-through rate of 3.74% compared to 2.74%.

What this means:

Keep your email program versatile.

Use marketing automation to send your emails at the best time and make them relevant.

Try more engaging content formats like videos, graphics (e.g. GIFs or interactive content), user-generated content, and personalization.

Use these email tactics to enhance your current email marketing program, but remember newsletters or broadcasts also deliver a lot of value – and probably generate a significant portion of your sales revenue, too.

Related reading:

Are interactive emails the next big thing?

30+ best email campaigns and why we loved them

4. Trim your list and use double opt-in

What’s the email marketer’s biggest fear (other than legislative changes, of course)?

Losing subscribers.

We’ve always said email list quality beats the quantity.

But it’s tricky convincing marketers to trim their lists.

That’s probably why in Q2 2018 we saw marketers importing single opt-in lists, and unanimously dropping the double opt-in.

They seemed afraid to lose some of their lists, if they didn’t reach out to them before GDPR kicked in.

Thankfully, the use of double opt-in has picked up again both in Q3-Q4 2018 and Q1-Q2 2019.

And as you can see in the report, most of the industries using confirmed opt-in tend to have the highest average open and click through rates, too.

Now let’s look at a slightly different set of data: the average email marketing results by list size.

From the following table, you can clearly see marketers with smaller lists tend to drive higher engagement (in terms of average email open rates and click through rates), than those with larger databases.

Why? It could be because those marketers know their subscribers better, and so can engage them more effectively.

But here’s a counterargument:

Shouldn’t marketers will larger lists have more insight into the email tactics that get the best results?

There’s no simple answer.

My experience running email campaigns suggests it’s easier to handle smaller email lists.

When you know your contacts and their preferences, it’s easy to generate high click-through rates.

But the challenge isn’t necessarily about knowing their needs and wants.

It could be that running large-scale personalized email campaigns (often a hard and time-consuming task), stops you from achieving better results.

Whatever the case, try personalizing email marketing campaigns whenever relevant – and focus on list quality, not size.

What this means:

Don’t be afraid to remove your inactive subscribers.

Recipients who don’t open your emails and click the links are a deadweight that will affect your email deliverability.

Try retargeting or reactivating them first, but don’t worry if you have to unsubscribe some of them.

Marketers with smaller lists tend to beat the industry averages, and so can you.

Start by segmenting out the inactives for your next email campaign.

You’ll then see you can generate more conversions with fewer email addresses.

Related reading:

Emails going to spam? 12 reasons why that happens and what you can do about it.

Inspiring ecommerce win-back campaigns

5. Pick your best send day – and stick to it

Marketers always want to know the best day and time to send their campaigns.

But as with any other marketing channel, it depends.

As you can see in the below chart, there are big differences in the send time. But the day doesn’t matter as much – except for weekends!

There’s only around a 0.4 percentage point difference between the best five days.

So if you don’t send emails on the weekend – when both competition and average results are lower – then any other day should work.

But there’s another way to look at it.

If weekends aren’t as busy, it could be an opportunity to stand out in the inbox.

While that won’t work for most, some marketers and niches could get great results.

Our data suggests that this may be a strategy worth looking at especially if you are in a busy niche or your competitors have stronger brands.

While email campaigns sent during weekends didn’t get nearly as high open and click-through rates, they scored best with regard to click-to-open rates (CTOR).

What this means:

Picking the best send time and day may seem tricky – if you do it manually.

But with tools like Perfect Timing – which can automatically adjust the timing of your sends – it’s simple.

Prefer to do it yourself? Experiment until you find the best time – and then stick to it.

If your content is engaging, recipients will routinely check their email inbox for a new message – especially if you let them know on your website and other communications when they can expect them.

Related reading:

What is the right newsletter frequency?

Email marketing best practices for 2019

6. Give yourself enough time to collect data

How long should you wait before checking out your email analytics reports? And how long do your have to wait to follow up and retarget your email recipients?

It depends how time-sensitive your campaign is.

Let’s take a look at the data:

On average, 50.39% of your email messages will be opened within the first six hours of the send.

And you’ll see 52.52% of all clicks within the first four hours.

That means the people who are most likely to engage with your content will be the first to do it.

Also, four to six hours is generally enough for you to forecast the general outcome of your email campaign (at least in terms of opens and clicks).

In the first 24 hours after your send, you should see 73.5% of all message opens and 80.74% of all click throughs.

What this means:

It’s useful to know how long it should take for you to get a general sense of your email campaigns success rate.

After four to six hours, you should be able to decide what other steps you need to take into consideration.

For example, if you’re not satisfied with the open rate, perhaps you’ll want to test a different subject line on those who haven’t opened yet? Or maybe use it for a different segment you haven’t yet included in your campaign?

Alternatively, if you’re happy with the results, maybe it’s worth launching a social media campaign to increase the buzz around your brand?

What you find out within that time-frame will affect how you go about your campaigns on other channels, too.

This includes retargeting, if you’re using Facebook or Google ads in your marketing funnels.

If you start running your retargeting ads too soon, you might burn your budget – because recipients could have converted without seeing the ad.

At the same time, if you wait too long and your offer is time-sensitive, you might end up leaving money on the table.

Related reading:

The ultimate step-by-step Facebook retargeting guide

7. Want higher conversions? Promise value and act on it

Ever wondered whether using particular words in your email subject lines correlate with higher open rates?

Words like “free”, “you”, or other ones we’ve written about on this very blog before?

We sure have, and that’s why we’ve decided to see what the numbers have to say about this.

For now, we haven’t managed to go through the full list of the common “power” words in the English language. Nonetheless, the results we’ve gathered are pretty interesting.

Words that focused on content and value, like “ebook”, “pdf”, and “newsletter” scored very high in terms of opens, clicks, and click-to-open rates.

Surprisingly, the same wasn’t the case for the word “video”, which some marketers have previously suggested being a foolproof way for lifting your open rates.

Phrases that revolved around the sense of urgency, such as “now” and “quick”, didn’t get nearly as good results.

Perhaps they’ve been used by marketers too frequently, which caused their effectiveness to dip.

Marketers who used the phrase “fw” in their subject lines observed unexpectedly high average open rates. This wasn’t followed by high click-through rates, which may suggest that the recipients who’ve opened such messages weren’t entirely satisfied with the content they’ve received.

What this means:

We take these results as an indication that there are no shortcuts to generating high outcomes with email campaigns.

Using a particular phrase or word in your subject line may help you increase your open rates, but it won’t guarantee that you’ll meet your business goals.

It may be that pairing a well-crafted subject line with email content unsatisfying to the recipient will have an overall negative effect on your conversion rates.

Think of it as going to the cinema based on the fact that you found the movie trailer interesting.

If the movie itself doesn’t live up to your expectations, your overall experience may be worse than that if you haven’t even watched the trailer. That’s because you might be feeling that you’ve been mis-sold or mislead.

Related reading:

Email subject lines: specific is the new short

What to do next

Email marketing is always evolving, so it’s worth keeping an eye on the latest trends and developments.

Come back to this article, as we’ll keep adding new insights from our email marketing benchmarks report.

Once you’ve set a goal you’d like to achieve with your email statistics, take a look at this guide that contains 20 tips on how you can improve your opens, clicks, unsubscribes, and spam complaint rates.

To learn more how you can up your email marketing game, visit the GetResponse Resources.

Have a question – or need feedback? Just leave a comment below.

Good luck!

Email Marketing Metrics: Everything You Need to Know

Email Marketing Best Practices for 2019

The post Key Insights from the New Email Marketing Benchmarks Report Q1-Q2 2019 appeared first on GetResponse Blog - Online Marketing Tips.

Key Insights from the New Email Marketing Benchmarks Report Q1-Q2 2019 published first on yhttps://improfitninja.blogspot.com/

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clarencenicholsonata · 4 years ago

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7 First Class Tips to Increase Your Pinterest CTR to Boost Sales & Readership

With the strong growth of Pinterest, the platform is becoming increasingly competitive. While it is still possible to get quality organic traffic from day one, nowadays you have to strategize more before you will get the results.

Every digital marketer has the matra of keywords, ranking, and backlinks deep in his head. This approach has to shift to be successful on Pinterest.

Pinterest is a visual search engine, and though we can apply many similar strategies as for other search engines, we have to think differently.

In this post, we will go over several points to make sure your pin design is as optimized as possible for clicks.

Create Multiple Pin Designs

As in everything marketing related - testing is the key. For every link that you are trying to promote, create several designs, I go with 5 - 10 depending on the importance of the link.

In many cases, I am surprised which Pin works the best. As the one that just seems a bit off, usually will outperform all others. This can be attributed to many conditions but when you see the same design (that you initially did not like) work again and again - always an interesting experience.

Notice that all the designs are different. From 7 designs on average, 1-2 will be winners that I will keep working with. In the following point, we will go over what makes a winning design.

Make the Pin Stand Out

Ugly right? Well, it works. CTR on this one 14%. What makes it stand out is ...that it is ugly. If you put “how to make money on Pinterest” in Pinterest search, you will be greeted by this:

Those are the pins of well-established accounts. For example, the first one belongs to FinSavvyPanda which has over 2mil. monthly views and 18k followers.

Sure, there is nothing bad in getting inspired by pins of others, but it was obvious to me that my (fairly young) account will not be competing for the first page.

To stand out at least a little bit. And it seemed to work. By now you may have noticed a common denominator between all those pins.

Big letters. I would like to get this message over to you - do not be afraid to make big letters and all in all - make the text dominant, if appropriate for the topic.

Choose an appropriate image

In many cases, Pinterest is alchemy. You never know which pin/topic/title/board combination will give you the best results. So you test and test and test until you have the golden formula.

Wondering where to get new images for all of your pins ideas, we got you covered. Here are a few resources where you can use images for free:

Unsplash

Pixabay

Pexels

...and other 20+ free resources

You can find their pictures for any occasion. In case you are looking for something specific or just want to have some genuine pictures made for your needs, I suggest going to Fiverr or Upwork. There you can get to choose from a wide array of photo professionals.

As I told in the previous sections, I am all about testing. You start easy, A/B/C titles testing, design but You want to grow so you start testing new things. Some of them do not work, that is one of them.

One of the popular Pinterest searches is “Habits of successful people”. I had many pins with this title and would like to share a testing result. It might seem obvious for some, but better to know it.

After clicking on any of the pins you have, Pinterest will also suggest some “More Like This” pins, for the image above these are the “similar” images:

All is well. The pin is about having money and the similar pins suggested by Pinterest are about money. Budgeting, saving, debt issues.

Here is another pin with the same title:

Similar logic as in a previous pin. But check out the pins that interest suggests:

Macarons recipes, weight loss, desserts, etc.

This means two things:

The title is not clear enough. While in the first example Pinterest clearly understood what the topic is, and provides relevant pins to accompany it, the second one is completely off.

The image is not relevant to the topic. This mistake is at number two, this was caused primarily by the title. (If it wasn’t, why did Pinterest not put “similar pins” of bags, etc?). But retrospectively, the image is not relevant enough to complement the topic.

These two issues caused lower impressions of the pin, not enough repinning, and all that resulted in the low overall clicks.

2. Do Not Overuse Templates

You created 50 designs, 5 seem to work well, so you make a template out of them and just keep re-pinning similar designs again and again.

Do not do it. There are several reasons why you should not go overboard with templates.

Pinterest likes new content and new images. Whenever I load new pins with new designs I can see a bump in the overall impressions, which will slowly fade out as I am re-pinning the same image again and again. Keep it fresh.

Popular Pinterest profiles completely revamp their designs from time to time. Sure, they keep some elements that reflect their branding, but they are constantly trying to come up with something different.

Tools like Canva can help, as they offer you figuratively speaking - an infinite amount of choices and combinations to try for your Pins.

Let’s have a look at one of the more successful profiles on Pinterest of The Savvy Couple:

Notice that while they keep the same branding, the designs are always different. You can see that they share similar features, but from the perspective of Pinterest - these are completely different designs that will get good traction.

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3. Use The Text To Your Advantage

Yes, Pinterest is a search engine that heavily relies on the visual side of things, but that does not mean it ignores the keywords.

First of all, Pinterest reads the keywords that are on the picture, and second (but equally important) users are reading it too.

To get clicks from your Pins you have to get users to do a “Close-up” which means that somebody clicks on your Pin to have a closer look at the description.

Use several fonts, but no more than 2-3

Emphasize (in bold, or a dominant font) the main keyword

Make sure the size of all the text is sufficient so users can read it without problems

The keyword here is Home Business Ideas. So if we would quickly through this example we would see:

The keyword is on a pin (2 fonts are used, or rather one font but subtitled in cursive).

Keyword is repeated in the title.

For the third time the keyword is repeated in the description.

If you will proceed to that particular Pinterest account (with several millions of viewers per month) you will notice that there are many pins like that - meaning that these types of design work.

When matched correctly you can be looking at the following results with some of your pins:

There are not so many impressions, but what is important that the vast majority of the ones who clicked, continued to post on the site - which is the main goal here.

4. Test Your Texts

We talked about testing the designs of your pins, but I would like to also emphasize the importance of testing the texts that you put on them. The goal is to get traffic on your site, so you must test several calls to action.

I recently conducted a small experiment on a post of mine. I compiled a list of over 640 Inspirational quotes, with various categories. Quotes seemed to be a good middle ground between what Pinterest likes and the overall theme of my site.

15 Pins were drafted to test the best angle.

Here are the keywords that were used for testing:

Inspirational quotes

Positive Wise Words

Success Quotes

Quotes Positive Happiness

Life Quotes

Motivational Quotes For Kids

Motivational Quotes For Life

Motivational Quotes for Success

Quotes About Strength

These keywords both matched the content of the post but also most importantly they matched the search queries and trends on Pinterest.

After a couple of days, these were the best performers in terms of Closeups

This means that:

Inspirational Quotes For Kids

Inspirational Quotes Positive Wise Words

have quite a strong performance that should be developed further (creating more pins focused on these keywords). Unfortunately, I create a very weak generic description, so even though Pins had a good amount of closeups, the CTR rate was minimal (under 0,1%)

So take my advice - I will be working with variations of these two pins testing multiple descriptions, so make sure that the future closeups convert into clicks.

5. Do Not Give The Answer In Your Pin

Your goal with Pinterest is to get clicks. Remember it when designing a pin. The visual has to be interesting enough for the user to want to know more.

If the viewer will receive the answer right there on the pin...why would he/she click to your site?

Let’s have a look at some account examples. Here are pins from MakingSenseOfCents which have over 2mil. viewers.

The goal of your Pinterest endeavors is to get traffic. So you talk about a topic that will interest your audience, but you do not explain it on the pin or in the description - you rather ask them to come to your site for more information.

Let’s take the pin of “How blogging paid off my student loans” a bit of clickbait, but nothing too bad about it. It is interesting, how could blogs pay for the loans? Users click and read the info on the page.

If that pin would also say “With ad-networks, affiliate marketing and growing my blog for 6 years” the CTR would drop. The answer is already there, no need to go any further.

Have you ever noticed that when you are googling for translation? Let's say “manufacturing in Spanish” and go you go past Google Translator results, you see this:

Notice that none of those “snippets” gives you an answer. The reason is still the same, they want you to go to the website to get your information.

What about videos?

“How to make a bow from ribbon” is one of the most popular Pinterest search queries. These are the first few top results:

20% are videos with detailed explanations of how to make a bow from a ribbon. Others are pictures that are there with the goal of getting you to click through to the site.

In the case of videos, you can also get clicks as users will want to see description and other details, but some will just watch it, save the pin and that is it.

What about Infographics?

A nicely done infographic will work well both on Pinterest and outside of it. With SEO you may get backlinks, on Pinterest you may get many repins, saves, and maybe even new followers. So they can be used to grow your profile in the future, but they will not get you to click in the short term.

In conclusion to this section - make pins that are related to the search queries and further lead users from Pinterest to your website.

6. Use Warm colors

While the blues, greens, and yellows can work well. In my opinion red, orange, burgundy, dark pink worked the best.

This study shows that red, orange, and brown performed better than blue 2:1 in repins.

According to, Curalate(published on Wired.com) this is scientifically the best-colored pin:

While this post was written in 2013, do you want to see what is my most successful pin?

Sure, it is not an exact match, but I am sure you can see some resemblance.

What if “warm” colors are completely incompatible with your brand? Well, do not change your whole brand because of Pinterest. See if you incorporate the more “Pinterest friendly” colors.

If that is not possible, keep in mind that color pallets are just one part of the whole “alchemy” of Pinterest algorithms. What you will lack in color you will pay back in content, titles, descriptions, and much more.

7. Avoid Faces

While the strategies of different pinners are different, this study shows that brand images without faces receive 23% more repins. Even though the study is possibly outdated (Pinterest trends change very quickly) I usually tend to avoid them, as I feel that people want to imagine themselves on the pin.

On average the pins with faces will get up to 1% CTR for me, while pins without a face will be higher. On The other hand, these are some of the recent pins of Chasing Foxes (over 10mil monthly viewers).

They repin them constantly - meaning that it works. But they also have over 360k followers, strong boards with high engagement...so you will just have to test for yourself and see if it works for your brand.

Examples Of Successful Pins

In this section, we will go over examples of pins that worked well for me. I will illustrate how various pins behave in different niches so you can plan your Pinterest strategy accordingly.

Recipes

Recipes are one of the top categories on Pinterest. So it is no wonder that I had to try how it works. Though recipes are completely off the main topics of my website, I needed to do some pins and post for testing.

With 8% Closeups, 1% Saves, and 4% CTR this is one of the best pins I had tried. By best I mean that it delivered the most clicks.

As you can see this checks all the boxes in terms of design and color. Red themed picture with a red text background.

In this case, the topic is of great importance. Recipes, fashion, decor, design, travel are all hugely popular on Pinterest.

“Shakshuka recipe for one” is quite a niche search query on Pinterest which does not have many exact results. As you can see the keyword is on the pin, in the title, and description, these all help Pinterest algorithms to discover and further share your pin.

Good Habits

Lifestyle is one of the most popular niches on Pinterest where you can find a wide array of topics. One of the “classics” are topics “Habits of people who…” you can complete with interesting Pinterest trends such as who has money, who stays confident, who stays healthy, who are happy, and so on. Seeing this being a topic on many profiles I had to try for myself.

3% Closeups, 1.5% CTR and 0 Saves may not seem like a hugely successful result. The interesting thing is that the potential of this topic (and related ones) is possibly limitless.

You may see that there are just slight changes but this pin (pinned at nearly the same, on same boards) received 2% closeups, 1% Saves, and 1% CTR.

No matter how many times you will pin for this topic, you will receive constant results. It does not seem to die out.

Continuing on the topic of habits, this fairly simple pin receives over 5% CTR. Which is quite over the average CTR on Pinterest, for your comfort on the right you may see the “scientifically perfect pin” that we discussed earlier.

Personal Finance

Another of the favored topics on Pinterest and I of course had to try how a very basic pin will do.

With 3% closeups and 3% CTR this design seems to be easily replicable. Meaning that changing it to different topics and varieties is not an issue.

As in Good Habits sections, these topics (while less popular than their recipes/fashion/lifestyle counterparts) are bottomless. There are so many angles to take when you are discussing money management, savings, how to manage debt, etc.

This is just another use of the same design, delivering similar results. 2% closeups, 1% saves, and 1% CTR.

Personal Development

Personal development and motivation are very solid choices of a topic for Pinterest, so I wanted to give it a shot with a post on leadership qualities. This pin delivered 1% closeups, 0.5% saves (one of my top repined images by total number), and 1,5% CTR. That can be considered a good result for a topic that is not “dominant” on Pinterest.

This pin delivered 1% closeups, 0.5% saves (one of my top repined images by total number), and 1,5% CTR. That can be considered a good result for a topic that is not “dominant” on Pinterest.

Digital Tools

The main topics of my site are digital tools and creating a business online. So of course I took my knowledge of Pinterest to the test on these topics too. Some time ago I created a post about webinar tools.

While my expectations for this topic were quite low, there were quite a few positive surprises. 2% Closeups, and close to 1% CTR. Saves were under 0.5% so something to work on in the future.

Another example of a simple design that worked even in the digital marketing tools niche is a pin about comparing email marketing services.

These were the testing pins:

After a couple of weeks, the best percentual rates were on this pin:

Closeups rate of 2%, save rate of 1%, and CTR of 2% is a great result for a pin in a more difficult niche.

The issue with these Pins is that they get impressions very slowly, digitals tools is a true niche sector on Pinterest. It takes the right boards and a lot of time to get the pin going. That being said - you can see that it is possible to drive clicks even in niches like this one.

Main Takeaways

We had a look at some pins that worked well for me, now I would like to provide the main takeaways and actional steps that you can take with your pins.

Do 5-10 testing pins for each post. Out of them, 1-2 will be performing above average.

While warm colors seem to be performing well (and better in some niches) do not limit yourself to this rule.

Test your pins with and without a face. While statistics speak clearly, it seems that some niches work better with faces, some do not.

Keep your pins 2:1 or 1000:1500 size. It is the optimal pin size for mobile, which is the dominant platform for Pinterest users.

Modify your keyword to be in line with search queries and Pinterest trends.

Text on the pin should be readable, do not go overboard with fonts.

Check the Pinterest search bar and Pinterest trends for search query suggestions.

Keywords should appear on the pin and in the title and description.

The pin should hint that the question will be answered in the post.

Conclusion

In this post, I shared the tips that I use when creating a pin. Pinterest is growing and changing, and the successful pins change too. Still, some basic rules remain the same.

While we went over the design of the pin and most of its intricacies. I strongly suggest that you read more on the topic of Pinterest boards. After all, if your great pin is pinned on a bad board, you will get nowhere.

Pinterest is a lot about experimenting with designs, descriptions, topics, time of pinning, and boards. While it may be tedious to try to combine all these, once you succeed you will experience an immediate inflow of traffic. This feeling will never let you go, so you might consider yourself “pinned” for life (pun intended).

You might want to check:

10 Amazing Pinterest Board Examples Critiqued (with Best Practices)

Pinterest SEO: A Guide for Businesses

How 5 Businesses Are Using Pinterest Boards to Creatively Promote Their Products

About the Author

Vlad is a founder and a blogger at Costofincome.com a blog about online business and video converters and digital marketing tools.

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