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“Facebook’s “Private” Feature and its SMM Implications”

As of this year’s third quarter, Facebook has reached 2.41 Billion active monthly users, making it the most used social media platform worldwide. Facebook has been the leader in social networks, as they were the first social platform to have monthly users surpass the billions by the second quarter of 2012. With the constant growth, popularity, and innovative features, such as Messenger and Facebook Groups, it’s easy to see how the conglomerate has become the choice social media platform.

It’s no secret that there have been privacy issues with the site in the past. In early 2018, it was revealed that Cambridge Analytica harvested the personal data of millions of peoples’ Facebook profiles without their consent and used it for political advertising purposes. After the loss of trust amongst its users, and millions of dollars in fines later, Facebook’s Founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, is “committed to getting it right,” he said as he opened at the F8 Developers Conference earlier this year. With four simple words projected on the screen behind him: “The future is private,” Zuckerberg explained Facebook’s decision to undergo a ground-up redesign. This redesign aims to place private community groups at the center of its experience and revamp its apps to work with one another. Why? To help people securely reach their core communities. This has been touted as the biggest change the social platform has seen in over five years.

This all begs the question: What is Facebook’s “Private” feature?

For starters, the “Private” feature that Facebook is introducing essentially allows the user to control and see data that websites and applications share between the platforms. It’s being introduced as “Off-Facebook Activity” and gives users the ability to keep track of the information that third-party applications access and what they are using it for. Along with the “Off-Facebook Activity,” they’re also updating their ad library and giving users an option to control what they see from their groups, pages, and friends with a “Why am I seeing this ad” option.

What Does This Mean for the Social Media Advertising World?

Facebook warns that its new privacy tool may impact targeting on paid ads. Whether this is the truth or not, advertisers are preparing for the change. Here at ON Advertising, we believe it will definitely be limited as more and more users will choose not to see content like paid ads. Will some of those users be ones we try to target with our client’s paid ads? Of course. That’s where adjusting the perimeters and revisiting our goals will ensure the users we want and need to see the content, will see the content. As Facebook continues to change, it’s important to get creative with marketing plans to safeguard the effectiveness of the campaigns being launched. It’s also recommended that everyone in the advertising and marketing industry should have plans in place for when the time comes to change their tactics and work to set specific goals that they set in place. After all, we like to stay ahead of the game when it comes to playing it.

How Can ON Advertising Help?

With big changes coming to Facebook and the possibility of more advancements in the future, it’s vital that a plan is implemented to produce campaigns.. Having a hard time wrapping your head around it all? ON Advertising’s digital strategy services can help you stay ahead of the ever-changing social media industry. We can assist in creating innovative and creative ways to remain on top of the competition, while still staying aligned with your goals. Contact us to see how we can help your business grow and learn more about the services we have to offer.

A woman scrolls through the Instagram app on her phone

How Instagram’s Elimination of Likes & Following Tab May Change SMM

Did you notice anything different when you recently opened up Instagram? You’re not the only one. The platform has finally decided to do away with its Following tab, a feature that has caused quite the controversy among users for its expository nature. The newly deleted tab had once allowed users to see what their friends were liking, commenting on, and who they were following in real-time.

Instagram likes are also currently the subject of a deletion rumor, and if the plan is carried out, it would mean the removal of the most popular, sought after feature of Instagram as a whole.

Why are these changes a big deal? Because it means your behavior and activities on Instagram are once again private. What does this mean for social media marketing? We’ll explain everything you need to know.

How Marketing Companies Made Use of the Following Tab

Though the feature was mostly frequented by typical Instagram users to spy on their friends, coworkers, exes, and significant others (and sometimes even their enemies), it didn’t go unutilized in the social media marketing world. In fact, according to Harper’s Bazaar, the original intention of the Following tab was to allow users to find new accounts and interests through who their connections were interacting with. This, in turn, made it much simpler for companies to actively gain information on targeting specific audiences, find competitors, and keep up-to-date with what content of their own was working well. Essentially, the feature was an extra layer of analysis and insight that businesses can no longer use as a reference.

What Now?

If you’re a company that made particular use of the Following tab as a way to collect data, you may be wondering what tool you can now use to retrieve the same kinds of information regarding users’ patterns. That’s where the Explore page will come in handy. It may not display activity as granularly as the eliminated tab, but the Explore page will help supplement information about what is trending, popular pages, and just a general idea of what’s being liked by the people you are following. Keeping close tabs on this page, along with Instagram’s general insights, will give you an edge when it comes to content targeting and following customer behavior.

What Life Might Look Like Without Likes

According to Instagram, the idea behind getting rid of likes is to remove pressure from users to receive likes, to alleviate the need for validation, and to make an effort to help with self-esteem and mental health. While the withdrawal of the Following tab has already occurred, this change has not yet hit the entire app as quickly. Instagram tested the idea in markets like Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Japan, and several other countries, leaving users in the United States to watch its trial run from afar. Although the move may not affect the average everyday user’s experience with the social media platform, influencers, brands, and companies may be greatly impacted. With likes comes revenue, and now active users looking to grow will only have their follower numbers to increase and rely on.

How ON Advertising Can Help

With massive Instagram changes being implemented and the possibility of even greater alterations on the horizon, the way analytics and user data is gathered may be experiencing a huge shift in the coming months and years. Need some assistance making sense of it all? ON Advertising can help with that. Our agency offers Digital Strategy Services to ensure that your marketing efforts are aligned with your goals because a formal strategy puts you steps ahead of your competition. Contact us to see how we can help your business navigate these changes and continue to grow.

John Hernandez standing for a portrait in front of a city street

Our Partner John Hernadez is Featured in Voyage Phoenix!

One of our Partners, John Hernandez, was interviewed and featured in a story on Voyage Phoenix! John talks about his career starting in television before joining Ron as a partner. He also discusses the history of ON Advertising and how we have grown into what we are today.

Click here to read the full article!

A woman looks at her phone thinking of what she is going to look for. Tag reads find help Phoenix.

Looking for help? You found it!

As mentioned in some of our previous blog posts, we have helped with the Maricopa County of Public Health before to build awareness on different health issues and the general well-being of the community. This season we were tasked to create a bilingual campaign to advertise the resources on FindHelpPhx.org. Why? Because there was an alarming 69% of parents who said if they knew how to locate more family resource services, they would use them.

FindHelpPhx.org was created by the Maricopa County Department of Public Health (MCDPH) to provide residents an easy way to find social and health services. The user-friendly platform offers 1,500 resources including free and low-cost screenings, doctors, disability services, and more. Each of these services is vetted by the county and available for Maricopa residents who want to increase their quality of life. In fact, the website offers bilingual assistance in English and Spanish for those who need language assistance.

The Advertising Campaign

We were entrusted to come up with a plan of action to effectively advertise to Maricopa County families in need of guidance. We started this process by researching their exact target audience. Who are they? Where do they live? How old are they? After we dove deeper into who their exact consumer was, we evaluated where they would most likely be exposed to an ad. We determined Facebook and YouTube would be the best digital platforms, and rotating billboards on Arizona freeways would be a great traditional channel.

After we decided who their target audience was and how we were going to reach them, we brought the information to the creative team. From there, the creative team wrote a story and a narrative that would resonate with the audience to grab their attention. See the creative content below.

Maricopa County Department of Public Health / “Find Help Phoenix” (Spanish) from ON Advertising on Vimeo.

Maricopa County Department of Public Health / “Find Help Phoenix” from ON Advertising on Vimeo.

The Results

We are pleased with the performance and results that the ads have produced so far. The entire campaign launched Monday, September 16th, 2019, and will run through November 27, 2019. There have been 223,000 impressions for the Facebook campaign, with nearly 1,000 link clicks. YouTube has garnered 463,700 impressions that have generated 850 clicks to the website. For the billboards, there are 10 locations rotating weekly around Phoenix for 8 weeks, with an estimated 5 million impressions.

Here at ON Advertising, we always love working with the Maricopa County Department of Public Health because they are trying to improve the lives of their residents. However, if you or your business is interested in spreading an important message through effective advertising campaigns, contact us today.

A neon sign that reads "data has a better idea" is in front of a background of large buildings.

The Benefits of AI in Advertising

What Is AI in Advertising?

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the simulation of human intelligence processes by machines, especially computer systems. AI for advertising is an umbrella term that describes technologies like machine learning, computer vision, process automation, and dozens of others. AI has positive impacts on the advertising industry as it can analyze large sets of data more efficiently than humans. The most advanced AI learns from this data and improves its analysis, recommendations, and predictions over time. AI technology predicts how ad copy and creative will work best in an advertising campaign while using insights from consumer interaction to optimize and enhanced performance.

AI is being utilized far and wide in the advertising and marketing industries. Many tasks being handled by AI, and other machine learning, is making user experiences possible that were not achievable only a few years ago. AI is doing far more than just housekeeping, it is doing the heavy lifting to enable personalization and meet the rising demands of consumers. Keith Eadie, Vice President and General Manager of Adobe Advertising Cloud notes that features within the advertising platform can optimize search, display, and video ads, and that AI is even making adaptive ad buys based on human-set goals. In short, he says “Automation and AI are amplifying what is possible for humans to do.”

For some time, social media has been immune to AI, much of it happens in real-time and allows for real-time optimization. Working within social media you have to nail the right tone, tenor, and timing, which is something AI hasn’t been able to do. It’s machine learning, you have to teach AI what you want it to know, it can’t just “pick up” a new skill or tone of voice as humans can. But with a new dawn of technology comes new dawn of social media. The data we can now receive from AI goes beyond when our audience is online and what they’re interested in, AI can help us boost our conversion rate by drastically increasing relevance and resonance of copy and imagery. And many tools are helping social media marketers craft ads and copy based on their audience’s historical emotional engagement. How? AI.

How is AI Changing?

The marketing and advertising industries are at the center of a seismic change in the way people engage in the world around them. The AI-powered conversational intelligence and voice-enabled platforms, like Siri and Alexa, are significantly changing our idea of what digital marketing can do. Now that there are personalized ads tailored to consumers, a general message doesn’t cut it anymore.

What Does This Mean for the World of Advertising?

AI already has advanced data collection capabilities, however, with growing technology, there is always room for improvement. Within the next few years, the amount of data expected to be analyzed will double. This will allow for an increase in the number of predictions and recommendations AI will use to create better content for the consumer. With less time being spent on analyzing data, it creates more time to connect with the consumer through creative development.

How Can We Help?

Marketers are highly valuing the world of AI and are already planning to use it to better target their audience this upcoming year. ON Advertising is well-versed in using different strategies to assist and enhance your advertising experience. By using AI techniques, such as customer segmentation and content generation, we are able to personalize content to better appeal to the consumer. All social media platforms and Google offer customization to select an audience for us to target with our ads, which is done through artificial intelligence. We are able to select our audience based upon age, gender, location, behaviors, interests, language spoken and more. This allows us to run ads for many clients at one time and target different audiences based upon what we determine needs to be selected for the client. We use the audience selection to ensure that our message and ads reach the appropriate individuals without spending unnecessary money. For more information on how we can help you reach your AI marketing goals, contact us today to learn more about our services and how we can help market your business using AI technology.

A Person holds her phone towards the camera to show ON Advertising's website on a mobile device

Why Marketers are Moving Towards a Mobile-First Strategy

Mobile devices are responsible for major changes in how consumers buy, research and ultimately view a product being advertised across a wide range of industries. We are in the middle of a specific digital transformation, which is an exponential growth of consumer activity on mobile devices and an extreme increase in mobile advertising. Life seemingly revolves around smartphones, which is why mobile-friendly websites have become so important.

Mobile devices have become the preferred method of accessing digital media. ComScore found mobile devices account for more than 60% of all digital minutes. To put it in perspective, the time spent on desktops has decreased by 20% in the past year alone. The reality is that mobile advertising must be a priority for a company to avoid stagnation or even failure.

Every day, businesses are encouraged to focus on a mobile-first strategy to stay successful within their industry and here’s why.

Thank Mobile Devices for Half of the Paid Search Clicks

Mobile has become a key role in the consumer’s journey specifically when researching and creating brand awareness. Mobile devices have become a leader in the number of paid search clicks. Acquisio found that year-over-year, paid search clicks have increased by 45% on mobile phones. This means that desktop clicks have decreased by 16% and in contrast, nearly half (48%) of clicks are now happening on mobile devices.

Befriend Social Media

Companies who fail to utilize and maximize their social presence on Facebook, Instagram, and other social platforms are subjecting themselves to a very small advertising box. When you compare the total U.S. ad spend in 2014 to 2018, the shift is very clear. An MDG study found that “brands are devoting 33 percent of ad spend to digital platforms—up from 25 percent in 2014 while television’s ad spend is decreasing this year.” Because mobile advertising is becoming the most popular and effective type of advertising, it takes engagement, shared content, and an appropriate strategy to be successful as a mobile ad platform.

Videos are the New Billboards

Video ads are the fastest-growing mobile category. Platforms like YouTube and Facebook are visible on mobile apps, emails, social sites and more. Mobile marketers can promote their ads on a pre-roll to capture the short attention span of the audience. This allows the user to watch the advertisement without making them feel pressured to purchase a product. Video advertising combines sound and motion to create connections between the buyer and the brand by evoking emotions. When it comes to social platforms, YouTube is on top. Forbes conducted a study and found that “73 percent of adults spend their screen time on the video-sharing site. Social networking giant Facebook ranks second, with 68 percent of consumers spending time on the platform.”Mobile users are viewing content more than ever, so logically they view more ads in the long run.

How can ON Advertising help?

There are many different ways to adhere to mobile-first advertising, which can be overwhelming and leave a little confused. Now is the time to work towards a mobile-first strategy. Not sure where to begin? We can help! ON has researched new and innovative ways to market, advertise and promote your business using a mobile-first strategy. Contact us to explore how mobile-first strategies can help your business grow.

Mikaela Copley goes over an assignment with Amanda at her desk in the ON Advertising office

The Ultimate Guide to Advertising to Gen Z in 2019

From Millennials to now what we call Gen Z, the personalities, attitudes, and values have shifted from generation to generation. As new generations are introduced, it is often hard to keep up with and understand them all.

Each generation has had a significant event or tragedy strike in their lifetime; defining who they are, how they live their lives and the decisions they make. Gen Z’s significant life event was the Great Recession/Housing Recession back in late 2007. Watching the rate in which their lives changed and those around them impacted them in a huge way. One way is how they handle their finances. They are careful and meticulous and never make a decision on a whim, instead they research. Looking into every purchase to ensure they will remain financially safe.

The technology era is also a huge turning point for Gen Z. With such technology, they prefer connecting via smartphones rather than face-to-face interactions. They would rather shop online than spend time at a brick and mortar. In addition, print has been undervalued as they prefer getting their news from online sources or through social media.

A bigger and more pressing question is raised, for businesses at least: “How do we advertise to Gen Z?”

1. Leverage Video Communications

As previously stated, Gen Z prefers connecting via technology; however, they never leave voicemails and prefer text to email. They also are one of the first generations to frequently use, and prefer, YouTube, Netflix, and Reddit. If you can catch their eye and appeal to them in 5-7 seconds with your 2-minute ad before their chosen video begins, then your campaign is a success.

2. Utilize Influencers

Gen Z was born into a world where social media became incredibly prominent. They value the impact of social media and celebrities influencers which help them to make a decision. Influencers spend a considerable amount of effort and time creating content that will appeal to their accounts followers. When followers are genuinely engaged, it creates a long-lasting relationship with the influencer that they are following. When this happens, it builds trust and loyalty in their minds to believe and trust the advice and recommendations from that influencer.

3. Mobile Strategy

Gen Z values their time spent on mobile devices which is why, on average, they engage in over 10 hours on online mobile content per day. By making sites mobile-optimized, they are more likely to be viewed more often. Say goodbye to desktop web browsers and emails, mobile strategy is the way to go!

4. Be Entertaining

As we know, Gen Z values are connected online. They expect authentic, entertaining interactions and experiences that provide what they need before they tell you. To win them over, marketers and advertisers must evolve from simply informing their audience to catching their eye and keeping them entertained.

5. Provide Them With Information

Gen Z values being well informed before making any big decisions. They want to know who they are doing business with before they do it. Share your company’s message with them, be precise, informative, entertaining, and transparent with what you are selling. Gen Z is different than any other generation, they do their homework!

Catering to different generations through advertising can take time to get a hang of, but as we grow to find new and innovative ways to and become proficient in how to market and advertise to Gen Z, the creative options are endless which opens an entirely new door for the advertising and marketing industry.

How can ON Advertising help?

Above are just a few of the types of ways to market and advertise to the newest generation. Finding new, creative, and innovative ways to appeal to a technologically driven audience can be difficult. At ON Advertising, we have done the research for you to bring high investment to your business. We have found new ways to market, advertise and promote your business with the help of our social media and strategy team. Check out some of our many content strategy services and ways that we can help you. If you would like to learn more about content marketing and how it can benefit you, Contact us today!

Mikaela working on storyboards for a project while writing on a dry erase board

Content Marketing is Still King

Content is important to Businesses, Consumers, and Search Engines. In today’s competitive climate, one cannot afford to pass over the pull and power of content marketing. With technology advancing, the number of small and large businesses increasing and the competition between them becoming more intense, it raises the question between these establishments – “How will we stand out among the others?” The number of extreme similarities of services and products that businesses are selling makes for a competitive market in most modern-day retailers. To be successful in these types of markets, the quality of the product that is being sold does not totally determine its success. To be competitive, it is becoming more and more apparent that how you market and advertise your company pulls a heavyweight on its triumph.

Content is as important as ever because it not only serves as a way to create customer loyalty and build trust between your company and the consumer but also encourages dialogue and conversations by giving them what they need. This, in turn, allows them to make an educated purchasing decision, which has become a new normal from the consumer side.

Content marketing in itself is helping to develop what the consumer expects from the brand that they are interacting with, which is why it is vital to have quality content to correctly and effectively advertise and market a company. By creating a strategic marketing approach, it focuses on distributing relevant, valuable, consistent, and specific content to retain and attract a specific audience. This ultimately creates profitable consumer action and neglecting or overlooking content marketing can create a setback that any brand can not afford. In this day in age, what fashion, food, or travel brand can exist without components like campaigns, videos, or an eye-catching Instagram feed?

In 2019, there are countless types of content ranging from blog posts to videos to infographics and so much more. Each of these components is vital to your brand and company as a whole and how it is being marketed. Let’s dive in and find out how each of these types of content can benefit your business.

Blog Posts

Blogs are one of the most popular types of content marketing for businesses and for a good reason! Blogging is the foundation of Content Marketing and has become commonplace in the business world. It allows consumers to access high-quality information for free. Blogs are one of the best ways to improve SEO and create more organic traffic to your website from search engines like Google. Not only does blogging improve search engine optimization, but it also builds relationships with current customers and leads.

Videos

Videos are oftentimes a change in pace that is more engaging to your consumers. Videos are a great content marketing tactic especially for small businesses because they provide an appealing return on investment. They help increase the time spent on site which greater the company’s chances of making a sale.

Infographics

Infographics often assist businesses in educating an audience by providing information that can add value to the consumers. Consumers take value in research and statistics on how useful the product they are looking to buy before they buy it. This makes infographics so useful to better visualize data, such as statistics so they can have a better idea of how valuable or how the service works.

How can ON Advertising help?

Those are just a few of the types of content marketing that can be used to market your business. Content marketing can be difficult, however with research and effort, it can be worthwhile and bring high investment to your business. If your company is not taking part in any of the content marketing techniques above or any at all we are here to help. At ON Advertising, we are constantly looking for new and innovative ways to market, advertise and promote businesses. Check out some of our many content strategy services and ways that we can help you. If you would like to learn more about content marketing and how it can benefit you, Contact us!

At ON Advertising, our team of talented web developers and graphic designers come together to create an innovative solution for all your website development needs. We know the vast amount of competition that takes place between businesses online and we recognize how important it is to be unique and stand out amongst the crowd. Our team is well equipped to build an eCommerce site from scratch or fix an existing one. Contact us today if you’re ready to take your site to the next level.

Top 15 eCommerce Design ON Advertising banner showcasing mock-up websites

Ranked 12 in eCommerce Design

Recently, ON Advertising was voted one of the Top 25 eCommerce Design and Development companies of 2019, according to DesignRush. DesignRush, a B2B digital marketplace that connects brands with agencies, discovered the leading eCommerce design and development firms that can provide custom eCommerce solutions, build functional websites, and ultimately increase online conversions. We are pleased to announce that we ranked number 12 out of the 25 of the top agencies in the nation!