Four Months of Internet Marketing at JMU in a Nutshell
My Time in Internet Marketing at JMU
Site Analytics
It has been almost three months since I first began blogging and developing my website. Upon reviewing my Google Analytics account, I noticed several trends.
Visitors
There have been 136 visitors to my site, with 33.42% and 66.58% accounting for new and returning visitors, respectively. On average, visitors spent about 00:03:19 browsing 3.35 pages. My website also had a 13.07% bounce rate.
Traffic Sources
A majority of my traffic came directly from my landing pages, consisting of 62.16% of my total traffic sources. I also had 15.29% referral traffic, with some of my biggest sources coming from Professor Theresa B. Clarke, Google, and my blog partner, Christie Belinski. I was able to drive more traffic through my SEO efforts rather than PPC. I also noticed that those who visited my site organically had a much higher average visit duration than through paid search.
Content
My pages were viewed a total of 1,335 times, with 514 unique pageviews. Visitors spent approximately 00:01:25 on each page. This seems to be good news because it would take about this much time to read through one of my blog posts, which means that many visitors were reading them entirely through.
MKTG 470
Throughout my semester in Internet Marketing at JMU, I have learned that this field is a rapidly expanding. Companies are changing their marketing strategies by focusing less on traditional media outlets and spending more time, effort, and money on their online presence through both PPC and SEO. Internet marketing is also ever-changing. As new developments are made each day, marketers must constantly stay on their toes and continue to learn.
Future Plans
The only regret I have about Internet Marketing at JMU is the fact that I was not able to take it earlier in my academic career. There is so much to learn and it is constantly growing and changing. I have learned how important it has become to all different types of companies and enjoy that it is incredibly dynamic. Having the ability to work hands on with both SEO and PPC this semester has really sparked my interest in starting a career in this field.
My Journey to the Top (of the SERP)
It’s no problem explaining all the reasons I love JMU, but optimizing my blog post so people searching on the web would actually find it was no easy task. I started with the basics learned in my Internet Marketing class by increasing my keyword page density as much as possible. The phrase “love JMU” can be found in my page title and page description, as well as numerous times in the actual body of my blog post. I also used the H1 tags to include “love JMU” in my page headline. Another on-page factor I altered to better optimize this phrase was to use an alt-tag on the image I used, titled “students love jmu.”
We’ve learned that link love is a great way to optimize a website. In order to boost my ranking on the SERP, I built links to my page through my peers’ websites. By leaving comments on their JMU pages, I was able to leave my link and increase the optimization of my website. However, my link love seemed to be a one-sided affair because I failed to have any external links pointing to my blog posts.
Over the past two months, I was able to improve my rankings on the SERP by seven pages! When my JMU blog was first posted, it fell on the ninth page; eight weeks later I am happy to say my blog appears on the second SERP and my Marketing Grade via HubSpot’s Marketing Grader improved from a 46% to a 57%. Though I have improved the optimization of my site, there are still more improvements to be made according to my Crawler FX Report. Creating links with my keywords, including supporting H2 or H3 tags, and increasing incoming and external links will all help to improve my organic rankings.
Google Webmaster Tools: An SEOs Dream Come True
The competition to get your business’s page to the top of the SERP is getting tougher and tougher. How are SEOs supposed to optimize their websites more effectively to surpass their competitors? One way is to use Google Webmaster Tools. This free service from Google allows Webmasters and SEOs to view the site they are working on similarly to how Google does as it is crawling. For marketers, this is critical. It allows them to see what aspects of their websites are not working as effectively as they want. While monitoring the performance of a site, Google Webmaster Tools enables them to make changes that will help improve site visibility.
After reading the Top Four Technical Benefits of Google Webmaster Tools, I learned that beyond providing information about site performance it also warns its users of any malware detection. Luckily, there has been no malware detected on my site. However, many other blogs and websites are not so lucky. Webmaster Tools not only keeps users alerted about any detection on their sites, but also gives suggestions on how to correct the problem immediately.
While browsing through my own Webmaster Tools account, I have learned several key things about my website that need fixing. There are several crawl errors, mainly URLs that could not be found by the spiders. They respond with a 404 response code, which denotes that the requested page does not exist. Though it explains that these URL errors will not hurt my site performance, by fixing them I can enhance my readers’ experiences on my site. I also learned that there are currently no links to my site on the web. After learning about the importance of link love, this is something I want to improve on my site.
Google Webmaster Tools provides very useful information for marketers and webmasters for free! It is a key tool to take advantage of as it provides protection against malware and key statistics to further enhance a site’s performance and optimization.
JMU Alum Lindsay Crone Keeps New Grads Optimistic About Job Hunting
One of James Madison University’s own came back to speak with our MKTG 470 class about the different ways to approach searching for jobs and the ever-changing field of Internet Marketing. Lindsay Crone, an ’08 grad from JMU is currently a Creative Editor at The Search Agency. She started off her career in Internet Marketing at AOL Advertising, and though it had not been the path Lindsay saw herself going down originally, she has never looked back!
In a job market that is not as promising as it used to be, Lindsay gave us hope that there is a job out there for each of us. As someone who has had first-hand experience in successfully searching for jobs, she also provided us with key tips to remember when taking on this arduous task.
Lindsay stressed the importance of focusing on something. It is important to show employers that you are truly interested in a particular area they are trying to fill. Instead of being “up for anything,” having a specific interest and pursuing that niche area will impress employers and demonstrate a certain passion that competing applicants may not show.
Searching for jobs can be a difficult task, and Lindsay urges students that acting professionally at all times is very important. Whether it is a future business partner or employer, you never know who you are going to run into later in life that will have control over the fate of something in your life. She advised us to have fun in our last few weeks as college students, but to always present ourselves in a professional, respectable manner.
Another point that Lindsay made, based upon her own experience, is to be open to different career paths than you always imagined for yourself. As a Marketing major with a Non-Profit Studies minor, Lindsay always imagined herself working for a non-profit after graduation. However, in hopes of changing up her scenery and moving out of Harrisonburg, she turned down a job offer with a non-profit organization. She took a risk in searching outside of what she had always imagined and found herself exploring the new field of online marketing. By being open-minded, Lindsay has found herself in a career that she is very passionate about four years later.
Lindsay’s passion for her career in Internet Marketing at The Search Agency has inspired me to keep up my search for a job after graduation that I am truly enthusiastic about. I would like to thank her personally for taking time out of her busy day to speak with us and offer sound advice from one JMU Alum to another!
Retargeting Ads Getting Too Personal With Consumers
Consumers sometimes complain that salespeople are pushy, but have we reached a whole new level of persistence in trying to close a sale? Online consumers’ every move are being watched through an advertising technique that is not new, but becoming more and more invasive and specific. This technique is called retargeting. SEM Valet defines retargeting as “displaying ads to the prospect as they surf the internet via various ad networks that the agency buys media from on behalf of their Business Customers. This practice allows companies to continue advertising to people who have visited their websites, but have not converted into a sale.
To some extent, I think that retargeting is a useful advertising technique to help companies follow up with their consumers. Clearly they are showing an interest in one of their products, and companies want to capitalize on that interest by converting a browser into a customer. However, I do agree with Alan Pearlstein, chief executive of Cross Pixel Media, that this intense method of what consumers perceive to be stalking has been taken a little bit too far. In The New York Times article “Retargeting Ads Follow Surfers to Other Sites,” Pearlstein suggests using discount coupons to draw consumers back to a company’s website instead of displaying ads with specific products they have looked at in the past.
The fact that every single page I visit online could technically haunt me every single day after exiting the website makes me a little uneasy. If I left a company’s website without making a purchase, there must be a reason for that. Either I could not 100% make up my mind yet, or I’m simply not interested. I think there needs to be a limit to how much a company is able to push. In person, customers can tell a salesperson they are not interested and be left alone. Well, the same choice to opt out should be available for consumers online as well.
The online tracking system that enables companies to track what consumers are looking at, text files called cookies, has been around for a long time. I do not see a privacy issue here as much as an ethical issue that has me questioning how far is too far with retargeting? When will consumers be pushed over the edge that they discontinue their use of online shopping?
Retargeting seems to be a good practice if it is not used quite as invasively as it has been recently. It allows companies to pursue prospective customers, and most of the time they may be interested. But displaying ads through every internet media to capture these people is going to have a lot of shoppers intimidated to use the web and skeptical about the power of the Internet.
Why I Love JMU: The Campbell’s Soup “Condensed” Version
When I was a senior in high school, I was terrified of figuring out where I was going to spend the next four years of my life. As these four years quickly come to an end, there is no way I could imagine spending my time anywhere else but at James Madison University. There are many reasons why I fell in love with JMU. But since it would take me another four years to explain exactly why, I have condensed them into:
The TOP FIVE reasons why I love JMU
1. Choices. Upon acceptance to JMU, students are encouraged to attend “Choices,” a day-long event that showcases the millions of reasons why admitted freshman should come here. Students and families can witness first-hand the high-spirited environment that JMU offers. Decked out in purple and gold, current students excitedly answer why they love being a Duke Dog. Not only does this pump up future students, but it gives them a look at what a day at JMU is really like.
2. Great Food. JMU has consistently been ranked highly for its campus food. In 2011, it was ranked #3 by the Princeton Review’s “Best Campus Food List”. From D-Hall to E-Hall, PC Dukes to Festival, both sides of campus are flooded with tasty food to fill up hungry students (but watch out for that Freshman 15!).
3. The Campus. When looking at pictures of JMU, it is clear to see that it has one of the most beautiful campuses in the country. Students love spending sunny days outside on the Quad. The campus is so well-kept with beautiful trees and flowers, it is hard not to be in a good mood walking to class. Not only is the campus breathtaking, but the scenic Shenendoah Valley in the background is the cherry on top of this eye-catching area.
4. Top-Notch Education. JMU is one of the finest universities in the United States, let alone Virginia. It offers majors across the board to match all types of student interests and passions. As student in the College of Business (COB), I spend a majority of my time in Zane Showker Hall, a place where all but business majors are afraid to explore. The COB is ranked 28th in the country by Bloomberg Businessweek’s among public and private undergraduate business schools-and we’ve earned it!
5. We Bleed Purple and Gold. There is no other way to put it: students here are just plain obsessed with JMU! The students are what make this university as incredible as it is. Dukes have so much spirit and pride in their school. JMU’s campus is always bustling with students rocking purple and gold tees or belting out the JMU Fight Song that it is hard not to love JMU!
Is Pinterest the Next Big Platform for Marketers?
Pinterest is the newest social media explosion on the Internet. As it increases in popularity among consumers, of course the next step is figuring out how companies can use it as a marketing tool, similarly to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Google+. In the article What Marketers Can Learn From Whole Foods’ Organic Approach to Pinterest, author Lauren Drell explores how Whole Foods has become one of the first companies to successfully use Pinterest to reach its consumers and ideally convert browsers into loyal users.
Through Pinterest, Whole Foods is able to promote its core values and show browsers who they are as a company, instead of promoting actual Whole Foods products. The company’s global online community manager, Michael Bepko, has expanded the Whole Foods’ Pinterest account to have over 20 boards that target all types of people.
These niche boards allow users to explore topics that they truly want to experience and are interested in. Being able to separate and categorize topics is one of the core differences of Pinterest that separates it from current social media like Twitter and Facebook. Instead of scrolling through the entire Whole Foods’ Twitter feed to find something that speaks about being vegetarian, the Whole Foods’ Pinterest account has an “Eat Your Veggies” board that strictly focuses on this topic. Bepko uses constant feedback from Pinterest users in order to fully meet what people want.
Pinterest, if used in the right way, is a marketing tool that is not focused on pushing products into the faces of its consumers, but rather connecting on a deeper level with them through common interests. Whole Foods may connect with users based on its different core values, such as valuing and promoting healthy eating or caring for the environment. Pinterest can be a method of promoting a company’s brand and brand image that creates a more meaningful relationship between a company and its consumers.
New Day, New Theme! So long Delicate…Hello Shaan!
The time has come to abandon Delicate and move on to better and brighter themes. I have selected a new theme for my site called Shaan created by Specky Geek. While browsing themes for this assignment I did not have anything in particular in mind. All I knew was that I wanted something relatively simple, similarly to Delicate, but maybe a bit more vibrant and aesthetically appealing to my eyes!
Shaan is a nice, bright blue with contrasting white text in the header. The body is simple black text, which I liked because it was easy on my eyes. Though some themes I came across during my search had more interesting color patterns, I didn’t want reading my blog to be a painful experience for my readers.
The designer also specifies that Shaan is highly customizable. I think I am going to add my own image in the header soon, I just need to browse through some of my own pictures to see if anything jumps out at me. I like this theme because almost everything I set up through Delicate remained unchanged.
I had been unsuccessful in uploading a favicon to my site using my original theme, Delicate by NattyWP, and after doing some searching through my new theme’s settings, I don’t think it is supported in Shaan as well. My sidebar still includes my recent posts, blogroll, and internet marketing links. The twitter widget is one item I have noticed is not available on Shaan. As far as I can tell all plugins are located in the same areas in my Dashboard, and the functionality is relatively similar to Delicate.
Shaan offers functionality and flare to my site! Let me know what you think of my new theme!
60 Minutes in the World of Twitter
Never in my right mind did I think that a mandatory homework assignment could consist of browsing Twitter for one full hour. As an avid Twitter-user before enrolling in MKTG 470, this assignment seemed like just another Wednesday night. However, as I’m learning in class, Twitter is much more than an endless list of what my friends are doing or thinking. After following the right people, news updates, or company profiles, Twitter is able to replace more traditional forms of advertising, like newspaper, radio, and TV ads.
It has become an essential part of the business world, proving especially useful for marketers. As a marketing major, we are taught every day that word-of-mouth communication is one of the most influential types of advertising for a company. Twitter is a 24/7 word-of-mouth advertising tool for the technology-age. Whether these are positive or negative always depends, but even a negative tweet can supply critical feedback for a company. Twitter is not only a promotional paradise, but it has become a tool for managing a company’s brand as well as its employees’ images.
Twitter allows me to stay updated on things I’m interested in, but it also helps me to promote events, fundraisers, and projects that I may be involved in personally. By sending a 140-character text message from my phone or quickly updating on my computer, I can reach almost 100 people instantly! In the past hour, I have thrown in my two cents about a friend’s comment, set up lunch plans for tomorrow, promoted JMU Relay For Life, and spread some Duke Dog pride. If that’s not a productive hour, then I don’t know what is!
My First MKTG 470 Blog Post
Welcome to my blog. I am currently enrolled in Strategic Internet Marketing (MKTG 470) taught by Dr. Theresa B. Clarke at James Madison University. As one of the course requirements, all students will be completing some of the assignments as blog posts. This is my first official blog post for Dr. Clarke’s course in the JMU Department of Marketing.
