How Far We’ve Come….

Today, none of us could imagine not having email, the internet, being able to shop online, do our banking, watch videos and share our thoughts, etc.  But go back to the 1990’s and you can see how far technology, and the use of it, have come.  I love this clip from the

TodayShow in which they are trying to figure out what the @ sign meant.

That was less than 20 years ago!  Just think what the next 20 years will bring.

Scott

LinkedIn – The New Reverse “Spam-a-Lot”

LinkedIn.com has become the latest digital spam system.  I noticed this issue a little more than 18 months ago, when I began to get numerous s solicitations from a host of odd individuals and companies.

We all know the purpose of LinkedIn is to connect people across business lines, regions, etc.  And I concur this is a great business value.  However, I’ve found a few disturbing issues as well.

-          Reverse Invitations -- Is where someone contacts you and asks you to send them a LinkedIn request.   So you ask yourself, “Why wouldn’t they invite me?”  More than likely the answer is LinkedIn has flagged them as spammers so they can no longer send invitations without knowing the email address of the invitee. 

-          Invitation Bait and Switch – where you receive an invitation from someone who claims to be a “student” or such with very low current LinkedIn.com connections.  They also seem to all have graduated from schools in EMEA. 

So I tested both situations over the past 6 months by complying with only 1 request from each of the above. 

What happened next nearly stunned me… within 72 hours’ both my email spam folder and LinkedIn profile were overwhelmed with offers, reverse invitations and the like.

Fast forward to today, the number of spam emails is still high, but the number of LinkedIn reverse invitations has decreased by ~40% my conclusion, these dubious invitations are merely a way to consolidate and sell email addresses to fast moving email spammers.

So beware of those invitations…

Scott

Pixel Renting

Location, location, location -- we've all heard it before, it's the key to the Real Estate Industry.  And yes location is critical for eCommerce and web sites.  Where we put our copy, focus points, purchase buttons, etc.

One of the challenges we face is multiple clients who want to be on the "home page" or want to take over specific high value areas of the site.  And in some companies the ownership of the site is assigned to the business... in which they can do whatever they want with their portion of the site.

However, if you're like many, the webmaster or eCommerce Manager owns the site and works with the businesses to align objectives, etc.  But you have the problem as everyone wants that valuable location.

A thought to begin instilling into clients as the owner is the idea of "Pixel Renting."  If you think of your site just like a piece of real estate, you're renting the locations to your clients.  I like to tell folks, I'll put the most successful businesses or campaigns in the locations which have the best revenue.  So, how do you determine this and level the playing field?  I do it by determing the "Revenue per Pixel" measurement.  Just like retailers figure the revenue per square foot... so should digital marketers.

Revenue per Pixel is calculated by taking the amount of revenue and dividing it by the number of pixels.

When you use this simple calculation you can create value based on location and drive the businesses to create impactful campaigns, etc.  You can run A/B tests between different business groups and use the calculation to be your tie-breaker on who gets what.

Give it a try.

Scott