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🔍 3D cars in Google search

Good morning, Search Marketer, are you ready for more sunshine?

If you're in the northern hemisphere, you might have noticed that the days have become shorter as the nights have grown longer — that is, until yesterday. Beginning today, the days will gradually be getting longer.

This year has been a hellscape for so many people, and if you're fortunate enough to have made it this far unscathed, then you probably know someone who has suffered a few setbacks. We could all use a little more brightness in our lives and, if you're kind of a hippie like me, this is a welcome change.

If you're in the southern hemisphere, then your summer is about to kick off. Wherever you are and whatever your plans are, if we all prioritize safety, perhaps we can get back to social gatherings and enjoying our favorite pastimes together sooner rather than later.

George Nguyen,
Editor

 
 
 
PPC
 

SMX Overtime: Eternal testing, the key to Facebook Ads success

At our fall virtual edition of SMX, Cultivative's Amy Bishop led a session on leveraging tests to identify new opportunities to achieve your business goals. During the Overtime Q&A, she fielded a range of questions.

Here's one of those answers.

Q: Why would learning be limited on an ad campaign that has a bigger budget and more conversions than the other ad campaigns? The audience is large, from the client's email list, with a lookalike audience.

A: Facebook's learning phase requires 50 optimization events and any changes that are made can send it back into learning mode. So, there are a few things that could be happening here

  1. The audience may be bigger, but it may not have hit the threshold of 50 optimization events yet.
  2. Each ad set enters and exits the learning phase individually, so even if the campaign has hit the threshold of 50 optimization events, it could be that not all ad sets have achieved that threshold yet and some could still be in the learning phase.
  3. There may have been recent changes that could have sent parts of this campaign back into the learning phase even if it was out of learning mode before, such as new ads, budget changes, bidding changes, or changes to targeting. You can check this by looking at the recent changes to see if any edits were recently made. At that point, another 50 optimization events would need to happen after the most recent significant edit in order to exit the learning phase again.

Get more here.

 

What 129 million calls can tell us about the state of inbound marketing

Sponsored by CallRail

Inbound marketing has become a strategy small businesses must invest in — but you probably already knew that. What's more compelling is how the results show that call-tracking software is one of the best tools available for measuring attribution and optimizing the effectiveness of your inbound marketing and phone calls.

We analyzed more than 129 million calls across 12 industries to understand inbound marketing's impact on generating calls from leads.

Find out more »

 
Augmented Reality
 

3D cars in Google search

On Android devices, Google launched its first cloud streamed 3D content in Google search. This allows searchers to see cars in high fidelity and with a set of cinematic 3D backgrounds to get the most photorealistic 3D experience to date. To see this yourself, search for Corvette, 2020 Audi R8, or 250+ more models. Note, this is not available for iOS users.

Is this a good thing for car dealerships or manufacturers? Well, it might result in less clicks to their web site but the car purchase cycle is a long one and people usually do a lot of research before buying a car. So, offloading this feature from your web site and onto Google's site might be a benefit.  

 

Unlock proven tactics to measure search marketing success

Join us online, February 23, 2021 at SMX Report: a deep dive into everything you need to know about analytics for search marketing. Book now for just $99!

Register now »

 
Search Shorts
 

Machine learning in Google Search

Machine learning in Google. So we know all search engines use machine learning for crawling, indexing and ranking purposes, but Google is selective in how it uses it. Google's John Mueller said on Twitter "there are always so many algorithms in play; some are more suitable for ML than others. Suitability also requires room to remove bias, allow debugging, allow critical corrections, etc. — in addition to delivering better results."

Google Great Conjunction doodle. The great conjunction was yesterday, last time we had one was like 800 years ago. Google had a double Doodle, one for the winter/summer solstice and the other for the great conjunction where Jupiter & Saturn high five.

 

Top MarTech trends for agencies

Read up on the latest MarTech topics and trends, and learn what's working (and what's not) for agencies like yours. Sharpspring surveyed leading marketing professionals from across the U.S. to find out the most sought-after MarTech trends and the challenges they're facing right now.

Read more »

 
 
 
What We're Reading
 

We've curated our picks from across the web so you can retire your feed reader.

Can Google Ignore Portions Of Your Site For Accessing Quality – Search Engine Roundtable

December Core Update Analysis: Sorry Google, You Have a Spam Problem – SEObility

DOJ antitrust case against Google may not go to trial until 2023 – Engadget

Google's December 2020 Broad Core Algorithm Update: Analysis, Observations, Tremors and Reversals, and More Key Points for Site Owners [Part 1 of 2] – GSQI

Impact analysis of Google's 2020 December Core Update – Kevin Indig