Most marketers have by now figured out how to use search engine optimization and ad placement optimization to yield better results from their digital marketing efforts. But they are missing a third tool to help them get the best results. In our work with clients we invariably find that earned media accounts for a sizable portion of all traffic and lead generation (it's not unusual to see it account for anywhere from 25% to 40%). Optimization experts often talk of ...

Republished From Institute For Public Relations Conversations Digest // "What do web analytics have to do with public relations?" It's a good question, given that web analytics are most often used by SEO professionals and online marketers to track visitors and sales from search results and content advertisements. The digitization of communications has enabled marketers to better understand the impact of their campaigns by directly measuring audience behavior. This is critical to companies that spend large sums on buying media placements ...

If your reaction to the headline was, “what on earth does Web analytics have to do with my job?” you probably weren’t alone. Web analytics might be thought of as the realm of SEO pros and online marketing teams, but it can be an incredibly valuable tool for PR teams too. In fact, Web analytics can give you insight into the value of PR and the types of business outcomes it helps drive in a way that hasn’t been possible ...

I saw a provocatively titled post on the PRSA wesbite yesterday, called, "Analog vs. Digital: Traditional Media Fights to Remain Relevant". Like everyone else, I've seen a lot of these stories lately and it seems that mainstream media has been pronounced dead. But, based on what I've seen in our own research on traditional and social media, calling mainstream media dead or irrelevant seems very premature and it misrepresents the actual dynamics and information exchange between mainstream and social media. The ...

Forrester and Google announced the results of their study on trends in enterprise web analytics yesterday and the results suggest that companies are starting to realize that analysts, not software, produce useful insights. The study, which surveyed the web analytics decision makers at 198 companies with annual revenues of at least $500 million, found that 60% of respondents believe that web analytics analysts are more valuable than software and that 52% prefer free tools because it allows them to invest ...