The Week in Review

5 Reasons Mobile Video Ads Outperform Online Video Ads

Video ads shown on tablets, smartphones, iPod touches and other portable devices "drastically" outperform traditional online video ads. Rhythm NewMedia’s completion rates for mobile video ads average 88 percent, far exceeding the 54 percent completion rate for online video ads observed by FreeWheel. Among the five reasons for the strength of mobile video ads are: mobile video is more immersive, mobile video is full screen and mobile video ads are precisely frequency controlled. (MediaPost)

The Lost Art of the Personal Link Request

"Where have all the honest, compelling, link requests gone?…It makes me wonder if people have just given up on the real pursuit of links through sincere one-to-one contact." Personal link requests are still one of the best ways to get high-quality links. It’s not glamorous or easy work, but it’s effective. It’s about relationships, branding and staggered links. (Search Engine Watch)

WhereBerry: A Social Network for Future Plans

Status-update fields on social networks are almost always for what you’ve already done or are doing right now. WhereBerry wants to expand into the future — specifically, what you want to do. "On WhereBerry, which opens to the public Tuesday, people post activities they want to do someday, like restaurants they want to try, movies they hope to see or events they plan to attend. Their friends can comment and make plans." This kind of information isn’t "super-sensitive," according to one of the company’s co-founders. WhereBerry has raised $150,000. (NYTimes.com)

Facebook Users Are OK With Company Pages, Not With Intrusive Ads

A study from the University of Florida found that college-age students have "positive feelings" about business pages on Facebook, but find banner ads and sponsored posts to be intrusions. "Of the three types of paid advertisements included in the study, sponsored stories — or news feed ads — seemed to bother students least. Actually, people are likelier to pay attention to them than the other types of promotions, but the viewers still don’t like them." (All Facebook)

The Unique Selling Proposition: The Key to Thrive in Crowded SERPs

Google recent comments and actions have shown us that "the little guy" with just SEO tactics doesn’t have a good chance to compete with the big boys with deep pockets. The weapon of choice in this uphill fight is the unique selling proposition (USP) — "an aspect of a service or good that differentiates it from similar services or goods" However, a USP must be bolstered by the fundamentals of your market. Here are five steps on how to define your USP. (SEO Book.com)

Bing Uses Likes to Re-Rank SERPs

Bing using Facebook data is old news — what’s a bit new now is the extent to which the search engine is integrating Facebook data and likes. The three components of the "new, more social Bing experience" are: Trusted Friends, Collective IQ and Enabling Conversations. (Search Engine Land)

A Look at Facebook’s Upcoming Ad Platform

Many Facebook advertiser accounts have been updated to the new version of the system, which offers beefed-up access to metrics and insights. All advertisers will get the new system on May 25. In the meantime, here’s a look at the new ad platform. Among the new, impressive features are the ability to edit ads and campaigns within a single screen; comparing your actual to your targeted audience; and previewing ad-target options. (The Next Web)

11 Ways to Find New Content for Social Strategies

"Content is the fuel for your social media rocket ship and the foundation of any solid presence in the social sphere." So if you’re running dry of content ideas, it might be time for an inspirational spark. To deepen your well of ideas, turn to things like RSS readers, LinkedIn Groups, making tag clouds, crowdsourcing and "frankenblogging." (Social Media Examiner)

Using Google Docs for Competitive Analysis in Under 60 Seconds

Evaluating the competition to discover what sites are ruling SERPs for a client’s keywords is time-consuming work. This free Google Docs tool will "automagically" do this for you. Here’s an overview of how to configure the tool, how to use it and what you’ll see, among other things. (SEOmoz)

Display CPMs Rise, Impressions Fall in April

According to the Efficient Frontier, display CPMs rose 64 percent in April from March, but fell 39 percent from April of last year. Meanwhile, impressions fell 46 percent month-over-month, but rose 158 percent year-over-year. (Efficient Frontier)

How Facebook Enables Google’s Social Scraping

Facebook make some unfavorable headlines last week when it was revealed that the company had hired a PR firm to pitch negative stories about Google to newspapers and bloggers. The social networking giant claimed that Google was scraping social information for its Social Circles platform. Facebook should realize that it’s the enabler in this scenario. (Search Engine Land)

Facebook Sued Over Unauthorized Sharing of User Data With Advertisers

Two individuals from California are filing a lawsuit against Facebook alleging the company of “sharing users’ personal information with third-party advertisers, specifically sharing the username, or user ID, of Facebook users.” While a judge threw out most of the claims in the lawsuit, he said the whole suit shouldn’t be dismissed in its entirety either. (TechCrunch)

Hard-to-Find: The New PageRank

Direction requests could be a potential new Google Maps ranking signal. According to the expert, “certain very large search engines have massive logs of people asking for directions from A to B, hundreds of millions of people and billions of A to B queries. And, it appears this data may be as or more useful than user reviews of businesses and maybe GPS trails for local search ranking, recommending nearby places, and perhaps local and personalized deals and advertising.” (Local SEO Guide)

5 Social Media Mistakes That Will Cost You Sales

If you’re sharing too much personal information, promoting yourself too much or ignoring negative comments, you’re making yourself look like a social media amateur – and you could be losing out on some sales. This post includes five mistakes you should be on the lookout for. (KISSmetrics)

Holiday SEO Success Without Paid Links or Penalties

Using Mother’s Day as an example, this post offers an overview of how to find holiday-related SEO success the right way. Using multiple channels to push out your message via SEO and social media fans and brand influencers is a good route to go. “The real formula for success is to really think about the resources you have to share valuable content with other sites to obtain relevant links in return. Avoid shortcuts and tactics that will be easily exposed to others.” (Search Engine Watch)

Zanran: Google for Data in Charts, Graphs and Tables?

Google and its cohorts do a decent job of finding results for data-based searches, but what about when the data we’re looking for isn’t in text form, but found in graphs, charts and tables filled with numbers? Zanran purports to be the solution for this. It’s far from a perfect tool just yet, but the potential for a helpful niche search engine is certainly here. (Search Engine Land)

60 Ways Personalization is Changing Marketing

Ads are getting better and better at knowing your preferences. The evolution of personalization is in full effect, and this wave is giving marketers better chances to convert prospects into customers. Among the 60 ways personalization is changing marketing are that there is growing willingness to swap privacy for a personalized experience, personalization has moved beyond segmentation to algorithmically driven content and location-based marketing and services are going to be key for companies trying to reach consumers via mobile. (HubSpot)

Does the Number of Ads on Your Site Affect Its Linkability?

The short answer, according to this writer, is yes, it does. Recommendations regarding this issue include: try to look at your site from a user’s perspective, look at your ad placement to see if it’s too aggressive, and try to find a balance that enables you to make money without repelling the linkerati or discouraging social sharing. (Graywolf’s SEO Blog)

Facebook Caught Using a PR Agency to Spread Negative Stories About Google

Facebook had a very devious plan in motion, but it quickly blew up in its face. The social networking giant hired Burson-Marsteller, a big public relations firm, to pitch anti-Google stories to newspapers and bloggers. A Facebook spokesman confirmed that the company did, indeed, hire the PR agency to carry out this plan. (The Daily Beast, TechCrunch)

Email Subject Lines Need More Inspiration

Copywriters deserve some more love and attention. If you’re the one writing the copy for your emails, it’s time to find some inspiration – move beyond those subject lines touting free shipping or X percent off of a product, with the recipient’s name. Four tips for better subject lines are to remember that your subject line is part of your creative process, avoid replicating your headline as your subject line, forget about character counts and let the standardized subject line die. (MediaPost)

Windows Phone Boasts the Best Mobile CTR

Forget Apple iOS and Google Android – the mobile operating system with the best click-through rate is Windows Phone, according to Smaato. Windows Phone has a global index score of 143, followed by Nokia’s Symbian with 122, Apple iOS with 103, RIM BlackBerry with 71 and Android with 55. In the U.S the ranking is Windows Phone, Symbian, iOS, Android and BlackBerry. (Smaato)

Online Video: More Than Views and Clicks

“If digital media planners and buyers remain focused solely on click-through rates when assessing an online video advertising campaign, well, they just don’t get.” Clicks within a video are powerful data, but that doesn’t mean evaluations should stop at click-through rates. Among the best practices for deriving value from this data are aligning research with campaign goals, effectively measuring every element of the ad, and understanding and using the data. (Econsultancy)

Email Innovation in 2011 Puts Marketers on Notice

Email user interfaces (UI) have come a long way since 2009. UI advances have impacted marketers in a number of ways, and marketers should expect more of the same in 2011. Which mailbox provider other than the major four will make a big investment in fancier UIs, filtering and message categorization? Will mailbox providers or startups create technology to sit on top of existing interfaces? How are mailbox providers going to innovate with functionalities like active views and enhanced email? (MediaPost)

Google Aims at Much More Than Information

At Google I/O, Google is revealing its hunger for far more than just information. It’s revealing a desire to assert itself in our homes and notebooks, too. This was evident when the company was developing a driverless car. As Sergey Brin said, “There are pieces of the company out there trying to improve the world beyond information.” (GigaOM)

How to Set up a Mobile Paid-Search Campaign

Launching a mobile paid-search campaign isn’t just duplicating your desktop campaigns. “Mobile users are looking for relevant information, quickly. In order to succeed in mobile search, marketers need to target their mobile campaigns to the specific needs of mobile searchers.” Here’s a walkthrough for setting up your campaign, targeting mobile users, optimizing content, optimizing landing pages, measuring data and managing bids. (The Search Agents)