Marketing Blog

Don’t forget to check out part one (keyword selection) and part two (keyword traffic estimation). 

Now that you’ve selected targeted keywords for your AdWords campaign, it’s time to start creating your ads. Google has a specific set of character limits that you must follow in each of your ads –

Title (Blue underlined text): 25 characters

Ad Text: 70 characters

Display URL (Green text): 35 characters

There are also a set of parameters around your ad content including:

• User experience
• Accuracy
• Legal...

Pay-Per-Click Advertising Tips #2: Keyword Traffic Estimation

Don’t forget to check out part one of this series, Pay-Per-Click Advertising Keyword Selection.

Now that you have selected your pay-per-click keywords, you need to get an idea of how many clicks you can plan on receiving to help set your pay-per-click (PPC) budget on a typical day.

For example, let’s say that by using the Google Keyword Tool, you chose the following five keywords (hooded sweatshirts, zip hooded sweatshirts, hooded...

Over the next several weeks and months, we’ll be running a series of pay-per-click advertising tips to help you get your first pay-per-click campaign up and running or make modifications to improve an existing campaign.

After getting your pay-per-click advertising account setup, the first step to a successful campaign is proper keyword selection. So, how can you find information on the keywords that are going to be the focus of your advertising campaign? Google, of course!

Google provides a...

With all of us experiencing the harsh new economic realities, how do you plan to market your brand in the coming year? One thing is for sure, if you want to be successful, the same old strategies will not work as well as they once did.

Marketing Web has compiled a list of 10 marketing and branding trends that you’ll want to keep in mind for 2010. For more detail on each trend, click here to view the full article.

1) Value is the new black

2) Brands increasingly a surrogate for "value"

3) Brand...

Some of these opportunities may apply regardless of whether your business is conducted as a sole proprietorship, partnership, limited liability company, S corporation, or regular corporation. Other opportunities may apply only to a particular type of business organization. This Tax Letter is organized into sections discussing year-end, and year-round, tax-saving opportunities for:

1.      All businesses

2.      Partnerships, limited liability companies, and S corporations

3.      Regular (C)...

Chances are, your business can’t afford to have a celebrity like LeBron James or Peyton Manning extolling the virtues of your product on national television, but have you considered a celebrity endorsement via the social networking site Twitter? It may be more realistic than you might think.

There are now many companies specializing in “sponsored tweeting.” These companies pair advertisers with relevant Twitterers, for a fee, of course.

Looking to reach an audience interested in home...

Just in case some companies missed the memo that paying bloggers for reviews of their products usually comes back to bite you – exhibit A and exhibit B – the FTC has stepped in to put an end to this practice.

According to the New York Times article, “The F.T.C. said that beginning on Dec. 1, bloggers who review products must disclose any connection with advertisers, including, in most cases, the receipt of free products and whether or not they were paid in any way by advertisers.”

So what does...

Security technology company, McAfee, Inc released its list of most dangerous celebrity search terms. Topping the list this year was Jessica Biel. According to McAfee, searches for Biel have a one in five chance of landing on a malicious web site.

Coming in second place for most dangerous search term this year was Beyonce, followed by Jennifer Aniston, Tom Brady and Jessica Simpson. Brad Pitt topped last year’s list.  

Looking for a way to protect your network from dangerous searches? filterITis...

Has your organization been slow to implement social media tactics? Here’s yet another article, posted on the Employers Resource Council Blog, that gives you plenty of good reasons to get involved.

If the article itself isn’t enough incentive to get started, it also links to some prominent Northeast Ohio organizations that are involved in social media to give you an idea of how local companies are getting involved.

Need assistance launching your social media campaign? Contact Skoda...

Sports Sponsorships – Inside the Lines

With the economic downturn hitting the sports world just as hard as any other business – just ask the hometown Cleveland Indians – teams are looking to squeeze out any extra bit of possible revenue.

Walk into any professional sports stadium today and you’ll immediately be bombarded by advertising in a variety of different formats. In fact, it might seem that you see ads everywhere except for on the field. That is, unless you attend certain NFL training...

Next time you’re out shopping, take notice of the amount of products claiming to be “environmentally friendly.” Do you believe these claims?

TerraChoice, an eco-consulting firm, took a closer look at the claims of almost 4,000 products claiming to be “natural and environmentally friendly.” The results were surprising – almost all of the claims were found to be “false or misleading.” Greenwashing, as it is known, means that consumers may find it harder than ever to know what claims to trust.

Wal-...

Despite a difficult economy, you may want to think twice about cutting events from your marketing budget. Events are great way to not only attract prospective customers to your product or service, but they also present a chance for you to stay top of mind and potentially drum up business from your existing customers. 

Here are a few tips to lower your event budget:

Partner up to bring costs down: Rather than hosting an event solo, consider adding a partner to the event to help cover costs....

Ever wondered why car manufacturers abandoned the descriptive car names of the good ole’ days such as Rabbit, Monte Carlo or Imperial in favor of the seemingly random assortment of letters and numbers such as the DTS, CLK or the G6-GXP?

According to this article, the trend originally began with luxury car manufacturers in the 1970s that found it easier and less expensive to advertise and build the name of one brand with various model numbers rather than multiple model names.

This naming...

The Magis Advisory Group of John Carroll University is offering a seminar providing continuing legal education credits for attorneys, continuing education credits for certified financial planners, and continuing professional education credits for certified public accountants in estate planning, advanced planning for the family owned business and business and asset valuation.

Our own Robert A Ranallo, CPA/ABV, JD, CVA, CFF, will be presenting the "Business and Asset Valuation" session on Friday,...

Has social media made its way into your marketing budget? If the answer is “not yet,” that may be changing very soon. According to a forecast from Forrester Reasearch released at the Forrester Research Marketing Forum, social media spending in the U.S. will increase from $716 million to more than $3.1 billion in 2014 – a 34% compound annual growth rate. According to the report, other interactive channels will grow at 17% rate.

With the number of social media users growing each and every...

Selling a business can be one of the most challenging tasks that business owners face. Click here to read “Avoiding Seller’s Remorse,” featuring our own Robert A. Ranallo, CPA/ABV, JD, CVA, CFF.

Need assistance valuing your business? You can contact our team of Certified Valuation Analysts at 440-449-6800.

Skoda Minotti is a CPA, business and financial advisory firm with offices in Cleveland and Akron.

You’ve probably heard the phrase that Facebook “isn’t just for kids anymore.” That’s true. In fact, according to this cnn.com article, the most popular social networking site in the world is more about tracking grandkids. That’s right, the world’s most popular social networking site is currently growing most quickly among women older than 55.

So what does this mean to a business looking at online marketing tactics? It means that no matter which demographic you target, you can find them on...

If you’re familiar with Facebook, you’ve no doubt heard at least one of your Facebook friends complain about the popular social networking site’s new look. (If you’re not familiar with Facebook, stop reading this article and join the 175 million users around the world – after you’ve done so, come back, finish the article and learn how the new Facebook can be beneficial to your business).

What may have been lost in the shuffle amongst the discussion over the look of the personal profiles is the...

Looking for a Cleveland public relations consultant? Contact Skoda Minotti Marketing Services at 440-449-6800.

Sometimes we need a reminder to do our homework – especially when launching a national rebranding campaign of a popular product. Tropicana recently provided us with a text-book case study of why it pays to know your audience before you go to market.

Only months after introducing a new look for its Tropicana Pure Premium Orange Juice, the company is scrapping the new packaging to return...