Industry Focus for Friday, April 8
Every week, our team shares the latest digital marketing news and related information so that we can all stay up-to-date. Our knowledge helps our clients develop the smartest marketing strategies, particularly in the digital age of advertising.
This week, we were particularly taken with updates to Google’s Search and Ads features, with a few curve balls about artificial intelligence and social media. Here’s what we learned and ingrained in our memories.
“Go Beyond the Search Box: Introducing Multisearch,” by Belinda Zeng, Google’s The Keyword blog
Straight from the horse’s mouth comes a major announcement: Google is introducing a new way to search using text and images at the same time via Lens. The new feature allows you to ask a question about a specific object, or refine your search by color, brand, or other visual characteristics. How does it work? Using the Lens camera icon, you can snap a photo and click “+Add to your search,” to add text. Looks like SEO just got a lot more fun!
-Submitted by Brandon Davis, Paid Media and Analytics Manager
“14 Types of Google Ads Extensions and What They Do,” by Brian Frederick, Search Engine Journal
We love this handy guide about Google Ads extensions. Google adds new ones every year, and it can be hard to keep up if you aren’t dedicating a major amount of time to do so. Using the right ad extension garners improved performance and makes your marketing dollars go a lot farther in your PPC and paid search ad campaigns.
-Submitted by Alex Mead, Paid Media Coordinator
“Twitter Says It’s Testing an ‘Edit’ Button,” by Tali Arbel, NBC 4 New York
Twitter tweeted that it’s working on an edit button, quickly after edit-button supporter Elon Musk joined the board and became the largest shareholder in the company. (Twitter insists there’s no causation here.) The social media company will test the feature in its paid service, Twitter Blue. But will the new edit button change the very nature of Twitter and how it works? Our Kansas City ad agency’s social media team is skeptical.
-Submitted by Jessie Smith, Creative Director
“5 Reasons Why AI Writing Tools Won’t Replace Copywriters,” by Saffron Lacy, MUO
Artificial-intelligence-powered copywriting relies on a computer to generate content for your website or blog. Although AI tools seem pretty great and affordable, they lack the nuance, care, and grammatical knowledge a professional writer delivers. Why tarnish your content marketing efforts with a robotic voice and formulaic copy, when warm and thoughtful humans can write for you instead?
-Submitted by Shauna Shoemake, Copywriter
“SEO Best Practice for Alt Text,” by Roger Montti, Search Engine Journal
Would it really be Google advice if it weren’t mildly vague? We think not! And that’s the overall feel of their latest dish on alt text, which describes an image for visually-impaired people accessing a web page with a screen reader, an assistive device. Good alt text also helps your images appear in search engine results pages for image searches, making it an important part of your website’s search engine optimization.
-Submitted by Shirin Felfeli, SEO Specialist
“iFocus Marketing Named Best Ad Agency in Kansas City,” The Pitch
OK, no, this isn’t another article, but it is a fact that’s still trending! Our nationwide clients voted for iFocus because of our boutique service and incredible results in growing their businesses through digital marketing.
Our proof is in the data, and our business development executives would love to talk to you more about it, plus identify how your marketing strategy could better serve you, with our help. Request your free marketing audit and competitive analysis today, by sending us a message online. We look forward to hearing from you.
