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Performance Pricing and Building True Client Partnerships

I recently came across a post on DigiDay.com, which is fast becoming one of my new favourite blogs, called Agencies Must Embrace Performance Pricing.

The gist? Old-school agencies, be warned: your clients want you to put your money where your mouth is.

The article argued that the shift to performance pricing is inevitable.

Business leaders and their marketing heads expect more from their marketing dollars. They want partners who truly understand marketing’s responsibility beyond just impressions. Those who can build a brand by directly building revenue and market-share are the agencies that will endure in the 21st century. [Read more...]

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5 Key Things About Google Plus Pages for Your Business

Google+ for Business Google+ Page

This week Google announced that they’re opening up their Google Plus social network to let businesses join the party, through something they’re calling “Pages for Business”.

Businesses need to think carefully about results before they commit to a new social networking platform. If you’re a business owner or marketer, here are the things you should consider before deciding to set up your Page or to give it a pass.

Read the rest on Technorati.com…

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5 Common Misconceptions and Assumptions New Clients Have About Google Adwords

This blog post is long overdue.

Let me explain.

Recently, we’ve had a few situations with new clients who are working with us to get better results from Google AdWords.  Specifically, after a month or so, they’ve voiced similar concerns about how their campaigns were performing.

This is a common occurrence with new clients unfamiliar with Google AdWords a.k.a Pay-Per-Click (PPC) search engine marketing.  In fact, many of our Toronto-based clients who are familiar with AdWords often have the same concerns (or misconceptions) when they first start working with us to optimize existing online marketing campaigns. [Read more...]

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How Google+ changes (almost) everything for businesses (part 2)

Last week I wrote about how Google+, Google’s new social networking platform, has the strong potential to be a game-changer when it comes to how businesses do search engine optimization for their sites.

This week, I want to talk about how Google+ could change the landscape of the online advertising world.

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How Google+ changes (almost) everything for businesses (part 1)

I’ve been exploring Google’s new Google+ social networking service over the last week or so, and my initial conclusion is that it’s going to have huge implications for the ways businesses, and especially SMBs, market themselves on the Web.

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Measuring SEO — why you should think beyond your search ranking

Search-Engine-Marketing

Most businesses that I talk to about Search Engine Optimization have only one objective and one success metric in mind when they’re planning SEO campaigns — they want to be in the top X results for relevant searches.

On the face of it, that makes sense. The top results for the top searches have the most visibility, so they should drive the best Return on Investment, right?

Sometimes.

Maybe.

But not always.

Here’s a story to illustrate what I mean.

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What is SEM / Search Engine Marketing?

Despite Google’s search engine being 15 years old, search engine marketing still mystifies most business people.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not referring to Google’s “back-end.”  I’m simply talking about the basics as it applies to promoting your website through search engines.

Searching is one of the most popular activities on the Internet.  Yet, many still ask, “what exactly is search engine marketing?”  Besides people asking about Social Media (in general), this is one of the most frequently asked questions I receive from prospective or new clients.

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