After many successful years, and so many assignments that helped clients, Harbrooke Group is closed, as of January, 2019.
Howard Greenstein has taken on a full time role and will no longer consult under this incorporated name.
Our contact information is still valid if previous clients have questions or need referrals. We wish everyone success in their journeys.
As 2016 comes to a close, we at the Harbrooke Group wish our clients and friends a Happy New Year and wish you all the best in 2017.
A player in the Pokémon world, with PokéStops and a Gym in the Distance. -Credit @vanhoosear on Flickr
I was recently asked by my friends at the Coburn Ventures group to share some thoughts on digital and cultural trends for their weekly call. I decided to focus on the phenomenon of the month- Pokémon Go, a game app for iPhone and Android. Many adult friends have wondered “What’s all the fuss about” or have derided “Those kids looking down at their phones” without a clear understanding of what’s actually going on. I have taken the time to gather some thoughts to help give some context for Pokémon go to the skeptical, the uniformed and the “haters.”
It’s two weeks before a charity event that I’m personally raising
funds for, and almost no one I know is aware of it. At least, not many
of my social media friends. You see, in the past several years, I’ve
raised significant funds (thousands of dollars) via social
networks like Facebook and Twitter for the CT Challenge and the MS Society with my bike rides.
This year, however, I’m getting almost no response on posts that link
to my fundraising sites. A recent post with a beautiful photo
in my state park that referenced my fundraising got 4 likes, and no
comments or shares.
Click Here to Donate
How *Do* you track and measure social media marketing? It is all about figuring out what things you’re sharing are bringing people back to your sales funnel. Whether you’re a B2B or B2C business shouldn’t matter.
I’ve had the privilege of researching this particular subject and interviewing some really great experts, Marshall Sponder, Justin Cutroni and Christopher Penn, for this paper I authored, which was just released by Vocus. You should download it now to understand:
Please let me know if you like it, or what other questions you have on the topic.
I recently contributed a Facebook Marketing whitepaper to Vocus. In that paper, I talked about Facebook’s new Graph Search. In the two weeks since that paper was released, Facebook rolled out Graph Search for everyone in the US. What does Graph Search mean to your business?
As you can see by the example above, Graph Search lets Facebook users search things like “Restaurants in CITY my friends have been to.” If you’re an in-person, brick and mortar business, this kind of searching may change the way you get customers. People often rely upon the suggestions of friends when they’re making choices for restaurants, stores, or other places to make purchases. Facebook is making that data more easy to find. Additionally, they’ve added a “nearby” feature to the mobile app, letting you see places your friends check into and like that are near where you are.
For more about the New Ways to Get Found on Facebook, check my guest post over at Vocus.
Facebook briefed analysts and reporters last week about an effort to simplify both the number of ad choices and the flow by which advertisers reach customers. Most of the rollout will occur between now and the end of the 3rd quarter of this year, though some products will disappear within the next few weeks.
Facebook product managers explained that advertisers currently have 27 choices when deciding how to reach their market on Facebook, from Page Posts to Promoted Posts to Offers. They are looking to reduce the total number by roughly half. The crux of the move is meant to help marketers to reach their objectives more easily, without having to choose different ad units, according to Facebook Product Marketing Director Brian Boland. “Advertisers want to drive business outcomes and measure effectiveness of their campaigns. If we make it easier for an advertiser to pick the right audience, and the right format, it also improves user experience by putting more relevant information in front of user.” This means that the right ad, to the right customer, at the right time, should get better response and be more relevant.
While Facebook didn’t show reporters the actual workflow, the idea is that marketers will be able to decide on an objective, such as increasing Page Likes or driving app installs, and Facebook will recommend the correct type of ad unit and the type of targeting. As an example, if you created a Page photo post this week, you would also want to create a sponsored story so that a user “liking” it would cause the ad to show for their friends. The new workflow will just “provide the ad with social context on top.” No extra steps to purchase different units.
According to Fidji Simo, Product Manager for Ads, they’ll be removing the Questions product for Pages in July because marketers can simply ask a question in a post and get answers in comments. They’ll also be removing the online Offers product in favor of Post Adslinking to an online site, but the in-store promotion Offers product will remain. This element was confusing, because companies that have both online and in-person presences will now have to run 2 different kinds of ad units – an offer for those coming to the store, and a Page Post ad linking to the online offer. This seems to go against the simplification trend. When I asked this question during Q&A, there was not a clear response.
Facebook will be also be making the creative unit sizes more consistent, to allow companies to provide fewer sizes of art and copy to create ads. The ads themselves will be more consistent on the desktop and in mobile. There’s also a implication that, since mobile is now where over 30% of Facebook’s revenue is derived, and on Mobile there is no right hand column, having ad unit sizes be more consistent helps solve some interface challenges.
This briefing was clearly the start of a discussion about how Facebook advertising will change over the next few months, and a way to prepare reporters and businesses for a group of small announcements and changes that will happen over time. You can read Facebook’s official release and see their graphic examples at their newsroom site.
Harbrooke was privileged to get a writing assignment for Vocus on Local Marketing. The paper is out and available for download from the Vocus site.
Whether you work for a local restaurant chain or a regional architecture firm, the marketing function works to raise prospects’ awareness of your prod- ucts and services, and then to turn them into customers. If you’re a marketing officer of a mid-sized company trying to reach local customers, you already know those customers are looking for you online and you’ve likely done something about it. In the last two years, almost 79% of businesses have created a social network presence, up from 45% in 2010.
In the paper I covered social media, search marketing and SEO, email marketing, PR and metrics. It also includes the importance of mobile search, location based services, and use of social media on the go.
I wouldn’t have been able to do this paper without help from some great businesses and consultants who contributed their knowledge and experience to the piece.
Thank you to:
Heidi Cohen at RiversideMarketingStrategies.com
Allison Lynch of Baskervill
Ric Dragon of DragonSearchMarketing
Joe Sanders at Meatheads
I hope you’ll read it and provide any feedback or suggestions for future things to write about.