localbizlift

[localbizlift]

An In-Depth Guide to Google Analytics 4

NOTE: On June 8, 2022, Christopher Coomer, VP of Data, Analytics, and Insights at NPD, will cover the essentials of GA4 in a short presentation. This will be followed by an extensive Q&A session with webinar host Will Francis of DMI. Register here. Those who attend will receive a free follow-up guide to help them transition to GA4.

Google recently announced it is sunsetting Universal Analytics in June of 2023. This means if you’ve been holding out on switching to Google Analytics 4, your time is almost up.

I’ve heard from a lot of marketers and business owners who are not excited about the switch. Change is always hard, but I really think this switch is going to be a good thing. For starters, it provides a ton more data and is more customizable—which means you can track what matters to you, not just what Google thinks might matter to you.

This guide walks you through everything you need to know to make the switch, including what you can do with Google Analytics 4, how to make the switch, and how to get started with the new platform.

What can you expect? New report functions, enhanced features, and predictive insights make this new generation of GA more powerful than ever.

What Is Google Analytics 4?

Google Analytics 4 is the newest version of Google Analytics. This is a whole new generation of web analytics that will allow marketers to effectively analyze important customer usage metrics, not just track traffic.

Google Analytics 4 tracks the entire customer path across multiple platforms and leverages AI and machine learning to provide more detailed insights into how users interact with your website and app.

GA4 is also focused on customer privacy. This comes in the face of some of the latest privacy laws, such as GDPR and CCPA. With privacy-first tracking, cross-channel data measurement, and AI-driven predictive analytics, GA4 is an advanced tool that provides unparalleled insights.

What is the Difference Between Google Analytics 4 and Universal Analytics?

The most obvious difference between Google Analytics 4 and Universal Analytics is that GA4 enables you to report on activity that occurs on both websites and applications. There are a number of other differences, including:

Google Analytics 4 Has a New Dashboard

The first change you are likely to notice is the entirely new dashboard. It is more streamlined and many of the reports you are used to are gone or have been moved. The navigation bar to the right includes buttons for home, reports, explore, advertising, configure, and library.

At the bottom, under Insights, you’ll see predictive insights based on Google’s AI. I’ll dig more deeply into the features and what they mean in a later section, so keep reading!

All Measurements Are Events in GA4

With Universal Analytics, page views were the most important metric. With Google Analytics 4, all measurements are events. Instead of seeing generalized data, you can now gain a fuller understanding of how users interact with your app and website.

What does this mean for you? You can still view session-level reporting, but the ability to break it down by interaction means more in-depth reports and insights.

GA4 also has an array of new metrics. These include engagement metrics such as:

engaged sessions

engagement rate

engagement time

It also tracks a number of other dimensions, including attribution, demographics, events, and so forth.

This is a big change, but it’s actually going to make it easier to track customers throughout their journey. GA originally assumed page views were the most important metric—that is no longer true. The new parameters might have a learning curve, but you will have access to more data.

Gain Access to Predictive Insights With Google Analytics 4

While looking at past behaviors is helpful in understanding your audience, it doesn’t help you make proactive decisions. With GA4’s powered predictive metrics, you can make data-driven decisions on a large scale.

What does this look like? For most businesses, predictive analytics can significantly impact retargeting campaigns. AI metrics include:

purchase probability

churn probability

revenue prediction

With the above metrics, you can create audiences based on their predicted behaviors. For example, users who are likely to purchase in the next 7 days or users that are likely to spend more than $500 in one purchase.

These audiences can then be targeted using Google Ads campaigns or even on social media.

These metrics can also improve website performance. You can create custom funnels for different audiences based on their behaviors and needs. The suggestions will continue to improve as more data is collected.

GA4 Gives Marketers More Control

GA4 allows you to customize the dashboard, enabling you to see the reports that matter most to your business. It even works well in conjunction with Google Data Studio so you can create custom visualizations of the data collected.

You can also create custom segments based on trigger events which are essentially a subset of events that occurred on your website or application. This enables you to more accurately track customer interactions.

For example, you can create segments on all conversion events that occurred in a particular location. These capabilities make it possible to take a more granular view of your users and their behaviors.

Cross-Platform Tracking

What happens when users are active on more than one platform? With the old Google Analytics, tracking users across platforms was nearly impossible. The new Google Analytics 4 tracks both web and app data in one property (hence the beta name of Google Analytics App+Web).

Cross-platform tracking enables you to see the complete customer journey, including acquisition, engagement, monetization, and retention. You can use GA4 to track the user experience from start to finish—and from platform to platform.

This is done through unique user IDs assigned during app or website login.

With the appropriate gtag.js script, the user ID for each logged-in session will be sent from either the website or the application to Google Analytics. The ID will be reported to the GA4 property and any user metrics will be logged. When the user logs in again on an alternative platform, the reports will connect the user’s data to their unique ID and pick up where it left off.

This is incredibly useful information for any marketer, as it allows you to better understand the cross-platform experience of your users. The data can also be used to extrapolate information for a generalized demographic and build more accurate customer models

How to Set Up Google Analytics 4

Since Google Analytics 4 can be used for your website or application (or both), there are two separate setup processes. They are outlined below.

Alongside an Existing Property

If you currently have a Universal Analytics property for your website, then set up of a Google Analytics 4 property can be completed with the GA4 Setup Assistant.

In Google Analytics, click “Admin” on the lower left of the screen.

In the Account column, select the desired account:

In the Property column, select the Universal Analytics property that currently collects data for your website:

In the Property column, select GA4 Setup Assistant:

Click “Get started” under “I want to create a new Google Analytics 4 property:”

If your site uses the gtag.js tag, you can select “Enable data collection using your existing tags.”

Click “Create Property.”

If you are unable to “Enable data collection using your existing tags,” it’s for one of three reasons:

Your website builder/CMS doesn’t yet support the gtag.js tag.

You use Google Tag Manager.

Your website is tagged with analytics.js.

In all three cases, you’ll need to add the tag yourself.

Google Analytics for Firebase

To upgrade your Firebase account to Google Analytics 4, follow these steps:

Log in to the Firebase console.

Go to Analytics > Dashboard on the left panel.

Click “Begin upgrade” in the banner at the top of the page.

Follow the on-screen instructions to complete the upgrade.

Once upgraded, you can find app analytics in both the Firebase console and Google Analytics.

How Do I Use Google Analytics 4?

Now that you understand the power of the new Google Analytics platform, I’ll walk you through how to use it. I will say there is a learning curve for the platform, and that can definitely be frustrating.

Start by following the steps below. This will help you understand the basics and how to navigate the new platform. If you still aren’t seeing the data you need, consider signing up for a longer-form course or reaching out to my team for more help.

Test The New Search Bar

The search bar in GA4 lets you access more than ever, including instant answers for specific queries (such as “how many users this month vs last year”), specific reports or insights, property configuration, or to access the help content.

Try a few queries to see what you can access, such as “how to create a report” or “top users by city.” As you learn the new dashboard, the search board will be invaluable.

Get To Know The New Dashboard

Now let’s look at the new dashboard. At first glance, it might look pretty familiar. Take a look around, however, and you’ll see most of the reports you’re used to are not where they used to be.

Here’s an annotated version of the dashboard. I’ve labeled the navigation bar on the left as well as the different displays. For this walk-through, I’m using GA’s demo account (Which you can access here), so it may look a bit different than your version, especially if you’ve already started customizing it.

NOTE: A few of the navigation menu items including Audience and Library aren’t in this screenshot, but should be accessible in your dashboard if you have editor access.

Explore The Reports Dashboard

From the dashboard, click on the second icon on the left nav bar, the one that looks like a graph: . This will take you to the reports dashboard, which shows you snapshots of different reports. Most of the reports you are used to seeing are in this tab, though they may look a bit different.

There’s a ton of data here. I won’t walk through all of it because different sites will track different metrics, so yours might look different.

But let’s say you want to see how many people viewed a specific page. In this dashboard, you’d click “engagement” and then look at the “Views by page title and screen class” chart.

You can also view acquisition, monetization, and user demographics here. If you want to compare different metrics, select the + icon at the top (next to Engagement Overview.)

Customize Your Reports Snapshot

One of my favorite features is the ability to customize the reports snapshot so you can see the data that matters most to you at a glance. This will also help you get to know GA4 a bit better so you are more comfortable using it.

First, let’s create a new report.

To start, click Library at the bottom of the left navigation bar. Note, if you don’t see this option (It’s not in the demo account), it means you don’t have admin access.

Then, scroll down to the Reports table and click Create a new report. Then, select Create an Overview Report. You’ll be asked to provide the data source and GA will walk you through creating the report. (This part changes based on the type of report.)

If you want to change the layout of your overview, click the six dotsdrag indicator. This will let you drag and drop the cards. To remove cards, click the X icon. If you want to add new cards, select +Add Cards.

Create A New Event

Events are crucial in the new Google Analytics—in fact, this is how you’ll track just about everything. You will need an editor role in GA to make these changes, so if you don’t see the options I mention, that may be the issue.

To create a new event, head to Configure > Events.

Then click Create Event.

Choose the data stream (If you have more than one property in GA

#marketing

[localbizlift]

How to Track the ROI of Your Online Advertising Campaigns

You just started a new AdWords campaign.

You’re trying to drive some easy, instant sales to your site.

But you quickly realize that you have no idea how to tell if those visitors are converting. No clue if you’re wasting your hard-earned budget without a return.

You’re not alone.

76% of marketers are still struggling to track the ROI of their campaigns.

Even worse is when marketers think they’re tracking the effectiveness of their campaigns, but they’re doing it in the wrong way.

So it looks and seems and feels like they’re on the right track. All while budgets get squandered, and results continue to lag.

Here’s how to get started tracking your return on online advertising campaigns.

Outline What a “Conversion” is For Your Campaign

Conversion tracking can be complex.

It’s not cut-and-dry like most people think.

The first step to tracking the return on investment for an online advertising campaign is to outline what your campaign goals are.

Are you trying to build brand awareness? Are you trying to drive e-commerce sales? Consultations? Free trials?

Depending on your goals, conversion tracking will be vastly different.

For example, a conversion for e-commerce sales is quantifiable without much extra effort.

You can tell exactly what someone bought and how much you spent to acquire that customer via ads.

But what about consultations or free trials?

When AdWords shows a conversion for your campaign, it’s not a sale.

Meaning you aren’t getting a return on investment just yet. Your bank account isn’t increasing when someone signs up for a consultation.

So those conversions don’t tell the whole story.

If you’re not tracking something quantifiable, such as items sold or likes generated to your Facebook Page, then you need to start with some basic math.

If you are trying to get consultations (or other similar conversions) that don’t have a dollar amount to tie back to, you can set up a basic equation to give them value:

(Average Closed Lead Value X Rate of Lead Close) = Per Lead Value

This simple equation will give you insight into how much a lead is worth in your business, making it easier to tie back ROI to your conversions.

Set up Google AdWords Tracking

Setting up Google AdWords conversion tracking correctly is critical for measuring your ad ROI.

It helps you track data on how your campaigns are performing and whether or not you are finding success.

To get started, open up your AdWords account and navigate to the conversions section:

Here, you can begin setting up conversion tracking elements for multiple parts of your campaigns.

From basic call data to website conversions, you have a few different options:

Depending on your campaign, you might need more than one of these elements to track conversions.

For example, if you decide to run AdWords ads with call-based extensions, you’ll want more than just website tracking.

To get started, click on the element that you need to track.

The most common one will be your website conversions, or the people who buy a product or convert on your site.

Select the tracking type and give it a name and a category to recognize it:

Next, under “Value,” you’re going to want to input some basic numbers.

Remember that equation in the section before?

If your product/service isn’t a direct sale like e-commerce, you want to set your lead value as the conversion value here.

This will give you some insight into ROI fast without having to dig through each conversion.

Once you’re ready, save the conversion tracking element, and it’s time to install your tag.

I can tell you’re already jumping for joy. Tone it down, I know it’s exciting stuff.

Now you can scroll down to the box called “Event snippet” where you can select between two options:

The most common one will be the Page Load option.

This simply means that whenever someone lands on a page, AdWords will mark it as a conversion.

So, the key here is to place this tag on the right page.

If you place it on your landing page, your conversion data won’t make sense.

You need to place it on a thank you page that a user will land on after they’ve converted.

So, if someone fills out a form somewhere on your site, they need to be directed to a thank you page. That’s where you want to place the tag.

Simply install the code into your thank you page header, and you’ll have live tracking for your campaign.

If you want to double-check your tag installation, use the Google Tag Assistant to make sure it’s installed correctly:

Voila! That’s it.

Now you can start to track the fundamentals of ROI on AdWords.

But that’s not all. This is just the first step of tracking your advertising ROI.

It’s time to go into some depth.

Setup Facebook Pixels

Facebook advertising is amazing because of all the diverse options it gives you.

The options are virtually endless. You can create campaigns to fit almost any goal you might have.

However, that’s also part of the problem. Determining exactly how likes, comments, awareness, visits, and clicks translate into new paying customers isn’t easy.

First, you need to set up tracking scripts, just like you did for AdWords.

This is the only way to start collecting the initial data on how your campaigns are performing.

To start setting up your Facebook Pixel for tracking, head to your Facebook Ads Manager and click “Pixels” under the Assets section:

Now, click the green “Set Up Pixel” button to get started:

Facebook is easy to work with because they’ve got dozens of integrations that make installation a breeze:

If you know how to install code, you can do it yourself.

If you don’t (or you’re just lazy like me), select the first option.

Once you’ve integrated, be sure to head back to the Ads Manager to make sure there’s a confirmation in the top right corner:

This pixel script will give you the basics. You’ll start to see who does what on your site (and how it all relates back to your original ad campaigns).

But you’re going to need to take it a few steps further before you can glean any ROI insight.

Let’s do it.

Take Advantage of UTM Codes

UTM codes ‘tag’ your URLs to give you extra data about where your traffic is coming from.

For example, let’s say you’re doing paid promotion with an influencer on Twitter.

They are posting a few of your blog posts every day to get you more traffic and sales.

But when you look in Google Analytics, this is all you see:

Great. This isn’t helpful because you could be running dozens of these campaigns at one time. Or your traffic could just be high and diverse.

There’s no way to pinpoint which activities or campaigns are generating those sessions. Meaning, you have no clue if your efforts are working or not.

UTM codes allow you to add tracking data like source, medium, campaign, and even keywords to your URL to properly record each visit.

For example, here’s what a completed UTM could look like:

Here’s what your data will look like inside Analytics when you start to add UTM codes:

Now, you can tell exactly how you got the traffic, why it’s coming to you, and where it’s coming from.

So, how do you set these up?

There are a few ways to go about it.

If you’re running smaller advertising campaigns and just need to track a few links, head to Google’s UTM builder:

You can use this page to fill out the desired tracking tags like campaign source, medium, name, and keywords.

You simply type the final URL that you want to track into the “Website URL” section and generate your new URL.

Use that in your next campaign to get better data in Google Analytics.

If you run tons of AdWords ads and don’t want to make new UTM codes for every landing page, there’s a shortcut.

Head to your AdWords account and navigate to your shared library.

From here, select the URL options tab from your settings:

Then, make sure that auto-tagging is enabled. Head to the “Tracking Template” and here’s where you can enter UTM information.

Enter {lpurl}, then a question mark, and then any ValueTrack parameters you want to use, separated by ampersands (&).

For example, let’s say you wanted to track the campaign it came from. You’d add a string like this:

{lpurl}?ads_cmpid={campaignid}

Doing this will enable tracking at the account level, meaning you’ll never have to set up UTM codes for each new AdWords ad you create.

Track Your Phone Calls

Now that you’re tracking basic conversion data on the top advertising networks, along with more laser-focused link tracking, it’s time to pull it all together.

Without phone call data, you’re missing out on a big piece of the puzzle.

Tons of AdWords conversions are from phone calls.

Why? When someone is going to book something like a consultation or hotel room, they often call in.

It’s easy, especially from mobile phones.

But what happens when this is all you see in AdWords?

You ain’t got nothin’ to show who converted or where in the heck they came from.

Tracking offline events is critical to success.

If you’re getting a lot of conversions from phone calls, you need to know which ones came from advertising and which were already coming from organic traffic.

Otherwise, it’s a shot in the dark as to whether you’re better off spending your dollars on SEO or PPC.

One of my favorite tools for tracking call data is CallRail.

You can set up keyword pools on your site that give each user their own tracking data.

Using dynamic number insertion, CallRail gives each user their own phone number rather than 1,000 users seeing your standard business line.

Meaning you can track each individual as they move throughout your advertising funnel.

You can see how they got to your site, the keywords that brought them to you, and the landing page they landed on.

You can record phone calls for even better conversion tracking.

If you want to tie ROI back to your advertising campaigns, you need tracking at every level.

That includes boring, old-school things like phones.

And yes, people still call businesses (as much as we hate it).

Conclusion

When you’ve started a new online advertising campaign, what’s your first step?

If it’s not setting up conversion tracking, you might be making a big mistake.

Tracking return on investment is critical to understanding how well your online campaigns are doing.

First, you need to start by outlining what a conversion means to your campaign.

Is it a direct sale via e-commerce, or is it a consultation?

The idea here is to tie your efforts directly to ROI and understand that a conversion isn’t necessarily money in your pocket.

Next, set up tracking scripts with the top advertising outlets.

You need these to collect critical data.

Be sure to take advantage of UTM codes to get insight into where your traffic is coming from.

Lastly, track your phone calls. People often forget how important call tracking is for getting an understanding of ROI.

Want to prove that your campaigns are worth it?

Clicks don’t tell you that. Neither do leads, opt-ins, or consultations. Only revenue does.

About the Author: Brad Smith is the founder of Codeless, a B2B content creation company. Frequent contributor to Kissmetrics, Unbounce, WordStream, AdEspresso, Search Engine Journal, Autopilot, and more.

#marketing

[localbizlift]

10 Best Email Marketing Softwares for Small Businesses

Ninety-nine percent of email users check their inbox every single day. 

That’s more high-intent traffic than any other avenue or platform you can use to reach your audience.

When people sign up for your email list, they are giving you permission to sell them. You can market to them for as long as you want until they unsubscribe.

Today, some small businesses have fallen into the trap of believing that email marketing isn’t beneficial. Don’t be one of them.

Eighty-one percent of small businesses see great results when they use email to acquire customers, giving them a key competitive advantage.

Let’s look at the best email marketing software you can use to achieve your goals.

1. Best Email Marketing Software for Multi-Channel Marketing: Omnisend

Omnisend is a popular marketing tool that caters primarily to small e-commerce businesses. It helps put everything in one place including your:

SMS marketing

social media marketing

email marketing

A study performed by Dot Digital shows the importance of email marketing in the e-commerce niche. They found that email yields an approximate 42 dollar return on every dollar spent. 

With Omnisend, you can easily create emails using a variety of templates and drag-and-drop editing tools—perfect for new and novice marketers.

This email marketing software is also great at helping you increase conversions by using discount codes, scratch cards, and various informative add-ons (like PDFs).

Key Features:

Pre-built templates for attractive emails without coding or advanced email knowledge.

Workflows that help you replicate top-converting email strategies.

Lead generation pop-ups that increase ROI.

Analytics dashboard for fixing mistakes and identifying opportunities.

Pricing:

One of the best features of Omnisend is its pricing structure. It’s free for up to 500 emails per month (perfect for small businesses) and 60 text messages. This includes automation, recommended workflows, and A/B testing.

2. Best Email Marketing Software for Free Users: MailChimp

At one time, MailChimp was exclusively used as an email newsletter platform. 

Today, it’s a complete CRM platform that allows you to design landing pages, email capture forms, and much more. Its range of features helps small businesses stay organized and execute marketing strategies.

However, be warned. MailChimp does have limitations on the number of lists you can create and how accurately you can segment your audience. 

This requires you to have a firm understanding of your customer avatar.

Key Features:

Loaded with hundreds of integrations (for sites like Shopify).

Boasts a CRM product suite of automation tools, behavioral targeting, and more.

Provides appointment booking.

Pricing:

If you need an email marketing tool to help you scale on a low budget, MailChimp is a great option. When you are just starting out, you can access its wide range of features for free.

However, when your list is scaling and you’re ready to start spending, you can purchase plans for up to 10,000 emails a month. With email users expected to climb to 4.6 billion by 2025, now’s the time to act.

3. Best Email Marketing Software for Segmentation: ActiveCampaign

ActiveCampaign is the best email marketing tool for selling products to lots of different target audiences. 

Its segmentation capabilities allow you to easily separate your contacts into lists and customize your marketing for hyper-personalization (which reduces opt-out rate by 50 percent.)

Using “[Name]” at the beginning of an email simply isn’t effective anymore. You need to actively write a copy that caters to an individual’s specific pain points and concerns.

ActiveCampaign helps you organize your list, target effectively, and create emails that convert.

Key Features:

Design and write emails that convert for specific audiences.

Personalize emails based on various audience segmentation variables.

A/B test to identify what converts and what doesn’t.

Landing page builder.

Pricing:

While ActiveCampaign doesn’t offer a free plan, it is transparent and upfront with its costs. For $9 per month, you get email automation, content creation support, unlimited sending, templates, newsletters, and data-backed reporting.

4. Best Email Marketing Software for Scaling Up: Drip

An average cart abandonment rate of 69.82 percent leads to missed sales opportunities that small businesses can’t afford to lose. 

When you want to scale, Drip is one of the highest recommended platforms out there. It has plans for businesses of all sizes, so your spending will only grow as you do.

The cost is uniquely catered to you based on the size of your list at the time you subscribe.

If you’re simply “dabbling” into email marketing, you can get started with Drip. If you already have a list of 10,000 email subscribers that you want to start making use of, don’t worry, they have a plan for you too.

Key Features:

The editor has both templates and drag-and-drop features.

Data insights provide behavior-based automation.

Email and website integrations.

Industry-leading customer service.

Pricing:

Drip offers a 14-day free trial and, from there, it determines how much you pay based on the size of your list.

For example, at $19 per month, you can have 1,500 contacts and unlimited emails. At $209 per month, you can have up to 15,000 contacts and unlimited emails.

5. Best Email Marketing Software for Email Design: Stripo

Not every business needs complicated email software. Stripo does one thing and does it well.

It’s an email builder designed to integrate with other platforms like GetResponse and MailChimp. Use Stripo to access beautiful templates that allow you to create on-brand marketing messages. 

Key Features:

Thousands of templates in paid plans.

Simple to use and easy to get started.

Offers HTML options for those who can code.

Integrates with other email marketing tools for automation.

Pricing:

Stripo offers a “free for life” plan that provides access to free email templates, learning software, and email support. From there, you’ll have to upgrade to the basic plan of $15 per month.

6. Best Email Marketing Software for Lead Generation: OptinMonster

At one time, OptinMonster was nothing more than a WordPress plugin. 

Today, it’s a standalone email marketing tool with many features like opt-ins, pop-ups, triggers, templates, testing tools, integrations, and analytics.

It’s the best option for businesses that want to generate leads simply because of the versatility of the campaigns you can run. Examples include an exit-intent popup, floating bar, or fullscreen slide-in. 

They have a lot of gamified options as well. If most of your target audience is Gen Y or Z, their attention spans are between 8-12 seconds. Not quite long enough to read an email. 

Gamification increases retention times, click-throughs, and conversions.

Key Features:

Great drag-and-drop templates.

Extensive integrations.

Gamified emails.

HTML and Java editing.

Pricing:

OptinMonster is so much more than an email marketing software. At just $9 per month for the basic plan, you gain unlimited access to marketing campaigns, segmentation, integrations, and a website if you don’t already have one.

7. Best Email Marketing Software for Contests and Promotions: Wishpond

Wishpond is one of the most comprehensive email marketing tools we’ve looked at so far. If you can dream it, they offer it. 

Wishpond has integrations for e-commerce, email marketing, and automation.

It also has a comprehensive landing page builder loaded with features including promotions, and a dashboard for implementing social media growth into your email marketing. 

The tool also offers online forms for you to do surveys and ask your audience what they’d like to see or hear more of. It’s a great option for small businesses with high-ticket offers.

Key Features:

Landing page builder with templates and customizations.

Easy-to-design contests and promotions.

Referral suite with lead captures, generation options, pop-ups, and link sharing.

Pricing:

Wishpond is $75 per month for the basic plan.

This price tag comes with a red flag: don’t use this tool if you don’t already have an established email list of at least 100 people.

8. Best Email Marketing Software for Automation: Sendinblue

Sendinblue’s goal is to help you automate email marketing to save costs and protect your bottom line. It offers a comprehensive CRM, email templates, landing pages, and even social media integration—all in one place.

Email has a 60 percent conversion rate compared to social media’s 12.5 percent, but it can take a long time to design and execute a successful strategy. With Sendinblue’s guidance, you can truly have the “best of both worlds” with this email marketing tool.

Automation is the main thing that stands out about Sendinblue with its great workflow, targeted campaigns, triggers, and lead scores.

Key Features:

Integrations with e-commerce platforms.

Automation elements.

WordPress plugin with a 4.5-star rating.

Free CRM system.

Multi-channel marketing.

Pricing:

Affordability takes centerstage with Sendinblue. Their free plan contains an email template library, email personalization, design tools, campaigns, and up to 300 emails a day. From there, the light plan is $25 per month with no sending limits.

9. Best Email Marketing Software for Funnels: GetResponse

Sometimes you need to build your sales funnel before you build an email list, and that’s what GetResponse is all about. You can build your entire funnel using its email marketing software, and even implement a live chat feature on your site.  

Key Features:

Powerful automation enables detailed list segmentation.

Plenty of testing options to figure out what converts.

Funnel and landing page builder.

Live chat, social media, and SEO features.

Pricing:

GetResponse has a complicated pricing structure simply because of everything it offers. If you simply want to send emails and build one landing page, you can use the free plan for up to 500 contacts. If you want to unlock the automation and segmentation features, you’ll need to get their “Marketing Plan” at $48 per month.

10. Best Email Marketing Software for Content Creators: ConvertKit

#marketing

[localbizlift]

How to Know When You Need a Dedicated Paid Landing Page

The average SEO-focused product page converts at only 2.9 percent, which is among the reasons many companies pursue paid advertising traffic to achieve their goals and KPIs.

But creating custom, campaign-specific landing pages is resource-intensive, and not every team has the necessary tools, expertise, or personnel to build the content. So, how do you know if you need a custom page or if you can safely send paid traffic to an organic page and still achieve your KPIs? This three-step, data-driven evaluation helps answer this question.

Paid vs. SEO landing pages — why have both?

Before diving into the evaluation process, you need to understand why having paid and organic pages is crucial and some of the drawbacks when you send paid traffic to your organic pages without analyzing them beforehand.

First, search intentions often differ between paid and organic users, and each group will have different content needs. We can classify these users into two groups based on whether they use high-intent or low-intent keywords.

Per WordStream’s definition, people who use high intent keywords like “best” want to conduct a transaction or perform an action, such as inquiring about a service, which can lead to an eventual conversion. This behavior aligns with the motivations of paid users, 75% of whom engage with ads because they believe landing pages make it easier to find their desired information.

In comparison, WordStream defines low intent keywords as navigational or informational in nature instead of transactional.

For example, somebody who wants to learn about a specific topic is more likely to use a longtail keyword and less likely to commit to a purchase because they’re gathering information rather than making a decision. Organic results are better suited for longtail terms, so the user will more likely engage with the organic SERP result rather than an ad.

These behavioral differences create a challenging situation for users and content creators.

Because organic content must play by Google’s rules, paid users are forced to sift through irrelevant information, which can increase bounce and exit rates and decrease conversion rates. And sadly, you can’t simply remove the extra information from the page because organic users and search algorithms need it.

Second, mixing paid and organic traffic on the same page makes it difficult to separate and track audience-specific user behavior, content performance, and conversion rationale. Without data clarity like closed-loop analytics, you can quickly get a misleading picture of content performance and miss crucial KPIs because of your clouded judgment.

Consequently, in most cases, directing the paid traffic to a custom-built, campaign-specific landing page produces higher quality conversions. You can ignore all SEO rules, which empowers you to accommodate user intentions and elicit specific user behaviors.

With the forewarning out of the way, let’s break down how organic page performance can determine if you need custom landing pages to achieve your goals.

Step 1: Gather and analyze performance baselines from multiple data sources

The first task is to gather and analyze a lot of data — from multiple sources — that shows you exactly how well your organic page is performing. Ideally, you want to scrounge up analytics data, user behavior insights, and keyword rankings. Even if you wind up making a custom paid page, this effort still pays dividends by highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of your organic content.

Analytics data

You’ll start by collecting a smattering of classic analytics data points from your preferred analytics platform to gain insights about page performance over time.

If your content is old enough, gather the following data in three-month, six-month, and one-year intervals. The breadth of data makes it easier to spot recurring themes and create a more educated guess about what will happen if you send paid traffic to the page.

Remember to filter the metrics so you’re only getting data from organic traffic sources.

Pageviews and unique pageviews

Imagine you have a well-optimized product page that converts with organic visitors at an even three percent. However, you need the equivalent of a five percent monthly conversion rate to reach the year’s KPIs and maintain a healthy company.

You can use pageview data to calculate how much missing traffic you need to conjure, either targeting new keywords or starting a paid campaign. For example, suppose you currently get 100 pageviews every month and three conversions. In that case, you’ll roughly need an additional 67 pageviews per month to get five conversions at the three percent conversion rate.

If that traffic growth is not feasible with new or improved keyword rankings, then paid traffic is a solution to consider.

Should you decide to send paid traffic to that page, you can also calculate the difference between pageviews and unique pageviews to estimate how many returning users you can effectively target in a PPC retargeting campaign.

Time on page and bounce rate

Paid landing pages are designed to be simple, straightforward, and action-oriented. The following image is an excellent example of this concept:

Lengthy or complex paid pages generally suffer from high bounce rates and low conversions. If people are spending more than one or two minutes on the page without converting, it’s a sign the content isn’t convincing enough to convert, and it needs alterations.

On the contrary, organic pages can thrive with relevant content, internal links, and other information to capture rankings and keep people interested.

You want a high time on page because that means people care about the content you provide, which sends positive ranking signals to search engines.

If you’re seeing an average time on page three minutes or more from your organic page, it’s likely not a good fit for paid users. You can always redesign or reorganize the page to accommodate paid traffic, but you risk isolating your organic users by being pushy with conversion-focused information so early.

Previous page path and conversions

Among the most challenging aspects of organic conversions is understanding what stage of the buyer’s journey somebody is in.

Are you converting with high-funnel users? Or do your users first view a case study or blog post and then visit the product page, only to leave and return later? Knowing the answer lets you see what type of content matters most from a conversion standpoint and helps determine if your content is reaching the right people at the correct time.

If your organic conversions rely heavily on return visits or high page depth, sending paid traffic to the page likely will not improve your conversions. Paid users will lack the previous knowledge and feel overwhelmed or dissatisfied, with many bouncing from the page.

Event and goal tracking data

Event and goal tracking are two types of user behavior insights you can use to determine what content users care about the most. This process also illuminates what content users often disregard, which can then be removed from the page. Knowing this information helps you determine if time-starved paid users will be interested in your existing content.

Set up the following metrics as events or goals in your analytics tool to lay the groundwork.

Hyperlinks

Do you know how many clicks each hyperlink on your page gets? If not, how do you know users find them helpful?

Traditionally, paid pages don’t have any engagement options that take people away from a conversion point. However, most organic pages do.

So, if you’re going to use an organic page for paid traffic, you’ll need to only provide internal links that add significant value and actively engage users. Otherwise, if paid users stick around, they may get lost down the rabbit hole and then abandon the site without converting.

Videos and completion rates

If you have video content, particularly content that explains your product or service, it’s crucial to know how well that video performs and how often people complete it.

If the video has high engagement and completion rates, it’s useful to include it high up on organic and paid pages. However, if most users only watch 25 percent or less of the video, then pushing it further down the organic page and omitting it from a paid page is a smarter choice.

Forms

Forms are often a high-friction page element that can easily frustrate users, especially when visiting a page with conversion intentions. Your forms need to be flawless.

If you’re noticing that users get stuck on a form or abandon it, you need to rework the form. Paid users expect forms to be simple, only require absolutely necessary information, and take very little effort. If your organic forms can’t do that, either replace the form or build a custom paid page with a bare-bones version.

CTAs

CTA location, text, and purpose dictate a lot of your page’s conversion potential. If your organic page has multiple CTAs, you need to accurately track which one gets the most engagement. If you choose to send paid traffic to the page, then the highest-engagement CTA should be the first CTA option shown.

Additionally, every CTA should be:

Visually distinct

Above the fold (in most instances)

Actionable with precise copy

Avoiding generic statements like “learn more,” “buy now,” or “subscribe”

Giving users an idea of what happens after interacting with the CTA

If you have too many competing CTAs, or for whatever reason, your organic page can’t meet these requirements, then you need to create a custom paid page instead.

Navigation interaction

Most paid pages include a link back to the main website but not full navigation options. Organic content doesn't have this luxury. Knowing how many of your users interact with the navigation after landing on the organic page in question is crucial to predicting what a paid user may do.

For example, suppose your page gets 2,500 organic visitors per month and 1,963 of them leave the page via navigation options. In that case, that’s a great sign that the page is either lacking conversion intent or doesn’t have enough information to convince users to convert. Either way, it’s not the behavior you want to see from paid traffic.

Heat mapping and click-tracking data

Once you’ve gathered your analytics data and set up event tracking, the next step is to collect and analyze data from a heat mapping tool like Hotjar or Mouseflow. The goal is to discover how users interact with the existing page, notice troublesome areas, and determine if those behaviors align with paid landing page best practices.

Let’s break down the types of information you’ll want to collect and how to evaluate it.

Heat mapping and scroll depth

Do you know how much of your organic page is seen by the average user before they leave the page or convert? Heat maps will tell you.

Paid pages are purposefully short so users don’t have opportunities to get distracted or disappointed by the content. If your scroll depth is deep enough that more than 75 percent of users see the most important content on the page, then the page layout and content priority may be okay for a paid user. However, if you’re seeing 30-plus percent of users leaving after scrolling just past the hero region, then paid users will most likely follow suit and you’ll either need to design a new page or alter the existing one.

Click tracking

Click tracking is a great way to visualize and confirm the event tracking data you set up previously. The maps can also pinpoint engagement issues or opportunities you may have overlooked.

The goal of click tracking is to figure out what content users care about the most. If you can naturally surface that information at the top of the page, then your paid users will be more likely to stick around. If that’s not possible, then you can design a paid page using the most popular organic page elements as inspiration.

Mouse flow

Mouse flow lets you observe the mouse movement of your users. Sometimes users hit friction points that we can’t detect by monitoring scroll depth, clicks, or other common engagement factors. These scenarios are where mouse flow reigns supreme.

While a mouse flow report is often an erratic mess of multi-colored blobs and squiggly lines, you can use it to understand what content your users may spend more time looking at or read more carefully based on where the mouse moves.

For example, in the following image, the mouse flow shows that more users hover their cursor in the “Inner Circle Guide to Next-Generation Customer Contact” section than any other content block.

Although the CTA associated with this section isn’t showing a high click density, the mouse flow report determines that users have some level of interest in the topic. If this example was on your website, you could shuffle the content order to prioritize the popular content or run A/B tests to determine if the language or information needs to be changed or simplified for a paid user’s short attention span.

Session recording

Watching actual users interact with your organic page is by far the most valuable way to determine what does and doesn’t work about your content. Most heat mapping tools let you set up recordings based on triggered events, such as clicking into a form.

You can observe the user’s entire interaction with your page and determine if the behavior is consistent among converting customers. If the behavior is consistent, it’s feasible that paid users may act the same way. However, if the recording behavior is erratic (and it likely will be), then you’ll want to build a custom page to provide a more “hand-held” experience.

Step 2: Map user behavior data to your KPIs

Now that you’ve collected and analyzed all of your data, it’s time to start looking for patterns and mapping the desired user behavior to the actual user behavior your data shows. If the two align, you’re in a great position to send paid traffic to your organic page and hopefully reap more conversions.

However, suppose there is a discrepancy between the desired and actual behaviors. In that case, you’ll need to map user behavior with specific stages of the customer journey and sales funnel, and then build a paid page that amplifies the desired behavior based on how you see users interacting with your organic page.

Let’s break down an example.

Recently, one of Portent’s clients chose to design a PPC version of an organic product page because the page wasn’t converting at their desired rate — despite already funneling paid traffic to it.

Before the client could design the new campaign content, they needed to determine what conversion-focused information users engage with most on the organic page. Otherwise, they risk supplying users with unnecessary information and wasting ad spend.

I analyzed three months of event tracking data from Google Analytics and Hotjar to determine exactly how users interacted with the product page. To narrow the results, I only focused on page elements with a call to action or internal link to pages that may lead to a conversion, such as the client’s demo page or case study archive.

Once I established which page elements get the most attention, I then isolated the users’ behaviors by using Hotjar’s filters to watch session recordings that contain the chosen events.

I watched 20 recorded user sessions to see what information people interacted with first and which they ignored, how long they took to digest the content, friction-causing UX elements, and what additional pages or resources they viewed. I then took these learnings and built a PPC campaign page that told the client’s story in the order converting users demonstrated.

The client is still building the page, so I can’t report on how well it performed. However, in theory, they should earn higher conversion rates on the paid campaign page because I isolated the content that converting users interacted with, which eliminated any non-esstial information.

Step 3: Make your choice

Now that you understand how your users interact with your organic page and some of the restrictions and considerations that come when sending paid traffic to organic content, you can choose. Invest the time and resources into building a custom paid campaign, or modify your organic content to try and target two user groups in one fell swoop?

Creating the paid page will likely give you better and more consistent results, but there is also little harm in trying your organic page first if you think it’s good enough. Run a small test, say 20 percent of your advertising budget for this project, and see if the page performance improves. If it doesn’t, then you have a definitive answer and you’re prepared with the resources you need to build a stellar paid landing page.

#marketing

[localbizlift]

Mastering TikTok Ads: Everything You Need to Know to Get More Revenue From TikTok

With over 1 billion users and counting, TikTok presents a great opportunity for businesses to advertise their services, grow their audience, and increase their ROI through targeted ad campaigns. 

The challenge? Standing out on such a competitive platform and ensuring the right audience sees your ads at the right time. If you want to get the most from your TikTok advertising budget, you need to employ effective strategies, so here’s how to master TikTok ads and execute winning campaigns.

Who Should Use TikTok Ads?

Anyone can advertise on TikTok. However, TikTok ad campaigns work better if you’re targeting certain demographics.

Here’s what I mean. TikTok typically attracts teens and young adults. According to DataReportal’s research:

43.3 percent of users are aged between 18 and 24.

32.2 percent are between 25 and 34 years of age.

Just over 11 percent are 45 or over, so it’s not the best platform if you’re targeting this age demographic.

We can delve a little deeper into the demographics.

Although men and women use TikTok, it’s more popular with women: females account for over 60 percent of TikTok’s user base. 

TikTok is most popular in the United States where there are over 136.4 million users. 

Say you’re targeting young U.S. women. Do TikTok ads work better for certain businesses instead of others even within this demographic? Possibly. Fitness and sports-related content are among the most popular content with over 57 billion views, while beauty and skincare content has over 33 billion views.

To be clear, TikTok is available in 154 countries, so it does have global appeal among teens and young adults.

7 Steps to TikTok Advertising Success

While there isn’t a “right” way to run a TikTok advertising campaign, there are ways you can optimize your TikTok ads and boost your chances of success. To master TikTok advertising, follow these seven simple tips.

1. Get to Know TikTok Ads Manager

TikTok Ads Manager is a hub from which you can create, run, and manage your ads. With TikTok Ads Manager, you can:

create engaging ads using different visual formats and templates;

target specific audience groups per campaign; and

track ad performance through customized reports.

How much does TikTok advertising cost? Well, TikTok uses a bidding model, so you can set your own daily and campaign limits depending on your marketing budget. As a guide, be prepared to spend at least $50 per day for campaigns, and $20 per day for specific ad groups.

Before you create TikTok ads, you need a TikTok Ads Manager account. TikTok offers a breakdown for getting going, but here’s a quick start guide. 

First, head to the TikTok for Business page and “Get Started.” From the next screen, click “Sign Up” then input your details before hitting “Sign Up” again:

Next, input some basic business details to create your account:

Once you’ve registered, you’ll need to provide a few more business details, including payment information, and wait for account approval before creating your first ad.

Creating TikTok Ads

From your TikTok Ads Manager account, click the “Campaign” button at the top of the page. 

Choose your campaign objective e.g., app installs, traffic, lead generation, or audience reach.

Set a campaign name and a budget. If you choose “No Limit,” your spend is determined by the budget you set at the “ad group” level. Or, you can choose “Daily Budget” or “Lifetime Budget,” which means you’re limited by the daily or lifetime budget you set at the campaign level.  

Create your campaign. 

Once there’s a campaign set up, you can set up an ad group and then create individual ads. The instructions are super easy to follow, and you can be up and running in minutes.

Here’s something crucial to note. Once you create a campaign, you can’t change the budget. Make sure you’re happy with your maximum spend limits before creating your TikTok Ads campaign.

2. Use Creative Elements to Stand Out

Although you can run ads for up to 60 seconds, TikTok suggests you keep most ads under 15 seconds. Given the short timeframe, you’ll want to use some fun creative elements to stand out, so here are some suggestions. 

Try “Branded Effects.” Branded Effects are elements like stickers and filters you can use to enrich your ads.

Choose your ad format wisely. In-Feed ads, for example, look and feel just like native content which helps them feel more authentic, while TopView ads appear at the top of a user’s “For You” section and might help drive brand awareness.

Add music or sound to add extra layers to your ads. Just make sure the music or sound effects match your brand’s voice.

Laneige, a popular Korean skincare brand wanted to increase engagement and encourage people to download a coupon for skincare products. They used Branded Effects to show what people may look like before moisturizing: 

Then after moisturizing:

The result? 419,000 engagements, 12,000 new followers, and thousands of coupon downloads.

Unsure of what elements to use? View popular posts in your niche, consider why they resonate with your target audience, and apply these principles to your campaigns.

3. Test Spark Ads

Ever seen someone using (and loving) your product on TikTok? Do you wish you could run this user-generated content (UGC) as part of your own ad campaign? 

Well, thanks to Spark Ads, you can take existing, organic posts from other TikTok accounts and turn them into original ad content. Why would you want to do this? Let me give you three reasons.  

Using existing content means less work for you, for one thing.

What’s more, since the content comes from real TikTok accounts, any activity you generate (such as likes, follows, or shares) is linked to your post. If you’re looking to boost your engagement, Spark Ads can help.

Finally, UGC adds authenticity to your company and helps to boost your brand’s reputation. Since customers are over two times more likely to prefer UGC to branded content, Spark Ads are definitely worth your time.    

Here’s an example. Digital bank Up targets Australians aged between 18 and 34. They wanted a creator partnership to build brand awareness and grow their audience reach. 

For their mission, Up chose an Australian finance influencer, @TashInvests. They produced Spark Ads which generated over 1.5 million impressions and 76 app downloads, which exceeded Up’s original expectations:

Here are some tips for getting the most from this form of TikTok advertising.

Opt for content with happy, positive undertones to present your products in the best light.

Use short text overlays to emphasize key points e.g. product features. 

Run A/B tests to identify which ads are performing best and revise your less successful ad content. 

Finally, always ensure you get someone’s permission before using their content in Spark Ads.

4. Test Different Targeting Options

The most successful ads target a specific audience. TikTok knows this, so the platform lets you tailor who sees your ads by excluding certain audiences and directly targeting others. 

You can target audiences by dimensions such as their age, behaviors, device, interests, and physical location. For example, maybe you want to target under-25s using iPhones, people based in Canada, men interested in soccer, and so on. 

Here’s how to do it.

From TikTok Ads Manager, go to “Ad Group,” then “Targeting.”

Then, choose which audience segment to target. For example, you might choose U.S. users aged between 25 and 44:

TikTok will then optimize who sees your ads so there’s a greater chance of running a successful campaign. Cool, right?

5. Use Data to Leverage Hashtags Effectively

Hashtags allow people to organize content into categories so others can find what they’re most interested in. For example, someone looking for Starbucks content might search for #starbucks.

While you can use as many hashtags as you want, you won’t reach your ideal audience unless you know which hashtags to target, so here’s how you might choose the right ones.

First, check out which hashtags your most successful competitors use. Chances are, it’s worth including at least one or two of these hashtags to boost your visibility.

Next, use trending hashtags. Mountain Dew, for example, targeted #nationalpetday to advertise its “Code Red” beverage in a fun, engaging way:

To find these hashtags, scroll to the “Discover” tab and check out the day’s top tags. Choose any that resonates with you:

You can also find related keywords by searching for a word and leaving the hashtag out. Tap “Hashtags” under the search bar, and you’ll see similar hashtags to include in your campaigns.

6. Create High-Quality Graphics

TikTok is a highly visual platform, so your ads need graphics and videos to stand out. If you don’t have expensive recording equipment, don’t worry; you don’t need it. Here’s how TikTok creator @lucajpeterson quickly creates high-quality visual content. 

First, film and upload your video content as usual. Before clicking “Post,” hit “More Options” and drag the “Upload HD” bar right so it turns green:

Sharp videos bring your content to life. In this Zoomerang TikTok video, for example, we get a real sense of the fabrics, textures, and colors since the brand uses high-quality graphics:

To get the most from your TikTok advertising, upload the clearest, sharpest graphics and videos you can.

Let me leave you a final tip here. According to TikTok’s own research, more than 63 percent of videos with the highest click-through rate (CTR) highlight the main focus product within the opening three seconds. Whatever your marketing goal, get to the point quickly.

7. Keep Your CTAs Simple

When it comes to TikTok ads, you might only have someone’s attention for a few seconds. This means that you need a clear, concise, and actionable call to action (CTA).

CTAs ask viewers to do something, whether it’s visiting your website, using a promo code, or downloading an app. Good CTAs can help boost sales by responding directly to users’ needs and driving specific actions.

For example, Sour Patch Kids wanted to promote its “custom mix” which lets customers build own candy bag. The display card “Make Your Mix” is colorful, engaging, and fun, and specifies the desired action: 

You can access pre-made CTA buttons through TikTok Ads Manager; however, creating your own visual inlay helps make your campaign stand out.

Focus on your goals and use as few words as possible to communicate the message. 

Choose the right color palette: your button should complement the ad.  

Try to create a sense of urgency that entices viewers to click the button. 

Use di

#marketing

[localbizlift]

The Best VoIP Phone Services (In-Depth Review)

Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.

Do you want to skip the read and get right to my top pick? The best VOIP phone services for most people are Nextiva, Ooma, or Ringcentral.

Buying VoIP for your business is going to save you money over a traditional phone line. And if you are already using a VoIP service from a clunky provider, you may be able to switch to something sleeker without losing anything except the frustration.

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) may sound complex, but it simply means making calls over your internet connection instead of using the old analog phone line. If you are thinking about switching to VoIP for the first time, you are going to be blown away by all the advantages you get with making calls over the internet. 

More than just saving money, VoIP has far more features, is incredibly portable, and very scalable.

To write a truly helpful post for my readers, my team got in touch with leaders who have used VoIP in different ways.

You can find about 80 percent of what you need to know about VoIP anywhere on the web—here’s the 20 percent you can’t find anywhere else.

We spoke with:

Gregg, who manages IT services for a living. He knows the good and bad of different VoIP options and helps businesses stay protected from hacks.

Jason, who has been working in call centers for nearly 30 years and just bought VoIP for his enterprise organization. He’s attuned to what’s important for your employees, whether they’re remote or in an office.

Makan, who’s set up dozens of high-volume telemarketing teams. He’s learned how to reduce the risk of regulatory fines and identify top performers in an industry with exceptionally high turnover.

Sarkar, who manages sales teams in the B2B SaaS space. He walked us through how to sync VoIP and CRM software with the fewest possible headaches.

Look, I know what works for a company like mine. By speaking with a range of experts, my team and this article can help a wider array of buyers with different use cases or situations than my own. 

There are companies looking to outfit offices in 20 countries. Others have to protect patient data. Some folks just want to stop using their personal mobile number for work. 

Here are the seven best VoIP phone service providers you can start using right away. After the reviews, you’ll find an in-depth buyer’s guide.

#1 – Nextiva Review — The Best Overall

I hear a lot about the trends of working from home, but I don’t think anyone can say for sure what “office life” is going to look like two or three years from now. If you want your teams to stay functional no matter which way the wind blows, Nextiva is a solid choice.

It’s cloud-based VoIP, so your employees can come into the office, set up a desk at home, or use their phone on the go. Unlike an on-premises phone system, employees can use their phone without a VPN because they’re calling through Nextiva.

So, you have way less to worry about with security—which is definitely on the minds of managers who have people calling from hotels, coffee shops, and their home network.

The experts my team spoke with categorized it as a true plug-and-play system for businesses that want a dial tone without IT headaches. If your system is built on ten phones or fewer, you will have very little trouble getting Nextiva installed. 

One thing that Jason pointed out, however, was that you’ll need to put some thought into compliance if you plan to take credit card numbers over the phone. But, for the most part, security is handled by Nextiva because everything is routed through their cloud.

Nextiva can scale to hundreds of phones if need be. There will be some backend configuration to get everything going, but Nextiva will help you deploy with a guided installation process.

And unlike some of the other companies that offer this type of flexibility, Nextiva can outfit your entire office. Fax machines, conference phones, multiple offices–whatever your setup, you’ll be able to transition it to Nextiva’s modern platform. 

Level up your business phone by connecting it with email, text, and video—or centralize every channel within a single window for your employees.

All the call handling and user administration features you’d expect are included. And when I say they are easy to use, check out the Call Flow Builder that lets visualize how routing is set up:

It can be tricky to configure auto attendants in some platforms, but it’s drag-and-drop easy with Nextiva. 

The company has done a lot to make everything as easy as possible on end users. If you’re wondering whether or not you have the necessary internet speed at your office, you can test it right now on Nextiva’s website. Simulate the traffic required for two or 200 phones. You’ll get info on speed, but also jitter and everything that goes into whether or not you can reliably make calls.

You can also use the site to test the speed of remote workers who need to be on call, which Jason highly recommended. If their home network doesn’t support VoIP, you may be looking at an expensive hiring blunder.

Nextiva offers 24/7 support for every plan. That’s not typical, especially for VoIP at such an affordable price (which is currently on sale too!)

Essential: starting at $18.95 $11.95 per month per user

Professional: starting at $22.95 $20.95 per month per user

Enterprise: starting at $32.95 $26.95 per month per user

These are the annual prices—it’s a little bit more per user to pay month to month, but you don’t have to sign a contract.

The Essential plan is going to work for many teams. It includes unlimited voice and video calling, a free local and toll-free number, and 1,500 toll-free minutes. That’s a lot more than you are going to get with other entry-level plans.

Unlike RingCentral, there’s no user cap for the Essential plan. This means you can offer more people unlimited voice and video at a low price, rather than having to upgrade once you hit 20 users.

For conference calling and business SMS, you’ll need the Professional plan. This comes with Salesforce, HubSpot, and Zendesk integration. Essential only has integration with Outlook and Google Contacts.

At the Enterprise tier, you get integrations with CRM software and single sign-on, which is a huge boon to remote workers. 

Nextiva One is the company’s omnichannel solution. If customers reach out to you through a variety of channels in addition to phones, this might be a good idea. 

Your employees can see all communication with each account, which is really helpful if people are logging help desk tickets, chatting, reaching out on social media, and so on. 

Jason argued that omnichannel also makes administrators’ lives easier. “I don’t have 10 systems to manage,” he described to us, “it’s all within the same system.” 

You can coordinate ecommerce with a call center or tie multiple brick and mortar stores into a single system.

You also have one bill as opposed to dozens and you’re not chasing down information across multiple platforms. If a customer has an issue, you can go back through the entire record quickly, regardless of how they got in touch.

Organization is just easier with Nextiva. Staying on the same page with customers and your employees is as simple as logging into the system, no matter where you are.

For teams that don’t have an office to coordinate activity, Nextiva is the best VoIP solution. 

It’s a product that employees new and old can start using immediately on whatever device they have. Should they ever have an issue, Nextiva’s reputable customer service is there to provide support.

If you are looking at the way features break down in the different packages and you don’t find a perfect fit, just reach out to Nextiva. You can purchase any feature a la carte. 

Build your system, your way, in less time with Nextiva. Get in touch for a seven-day free trial of the Essential package, or a demo of any other package they offer. Also, for a limited time get 25% off, plus a free phone, when you sign up!

#2 – Ooma Office Review — The Best for Adding VoIP to Existing SMB Phone Systems

If you are holding off on replacing that aging phone system, Ooma can help you install business-class VoIP with minimal disruption to your work.

Any phone you have that’s still working—analog or IP—is going to hook right into your new Ooma system. You can also buy phones from them at a great price and they will be preconfigured, ready to go out of the box.

Employees can make calls and collaborate with their colleagues in the Ooma mobile app, whether they are in the office or on-the-go.

One thing Gregg pointed out was how expensive it can get to customize your setup if you have to pay per extension. With Ooma, every user gets a number of free extensions: one for conferences, one for online faxing, and one for a Virtual Receptionist.

Virtual Receptionist is Ooma’s term for an auto attendant. You can set it to play custom messages about business hours, let callers dial by name, select a preferred language, or route the caller to another extension.

With other vendors—especially ones that cost as little as Ooma—you often wind up paying extra to enable online faxing. Some VoIP phone service providers don’t even accommodate it. 

When Jason sent his business requirement document to vendors, “two companies bailed out right away” because they weren’t able to set up fax machines. Most of the other vendors told him they don’t really do that, but they would try in order to get his business.

With Ooma, each of your users can set up their own fax extension for free.

Problem solved.

When it comes to integrating VoIP with existing equipment, Ooma minimizes the steps you have to take and maximizes your flexibility. Connect to Ooma Office via WiFi, ethernet, or use the base station to get analog devices on board.

Think of it as a cloud-based VoIP solution that’s really good at accommodating your existing equipment. It might take some time to configure a large office, but the administrator portal is straightforward. It’s not the prettiest interface of all time, but it’s stupid simple to use.

While Ooma offers solutions for enterprise, their VoIP phone services for small businesses really stand out from the pack.

There are no contracts—a rarity in this product space. Usually to get the best price on VoIP, you need to sign up for a year at least. Ooma’s price is what it is. For small business, Ooma pricing breaks down into two tiers:

Ooma Office: starting at $19.95 per month per user

Ooma Office Pro: starting at $24.95 per month per user

Upgrading to Pro, you get the desktop app, video conferencing, call recording, enhanced call blocking, and voicemail transcription. You’ll also be able to host conference calls of up to 25 people, whereas Ooma Office has a limit of 10.

You don’t have the choice of selectively upgrading users with Ooma Office—it’s all employees on one plan or all employees on another. But, at just $5 per user to upgrade, you’re still falling in the average range for VoIP.

And, if you upgrade, you can set people up on their computers with a softphone, which means you have less hardware to buy. 

You can avoid buying phones without upgrading by having people call from the mobile app (which is included with Ooma office), though Gregg warned us that VoIP can be hard on a cell phone. “Yes, you save money because you’re not buying physical equipment,” he said, “but it can drain the battery life right out of the device.”

Transition to the cloud at your own pace. Keep your equipment and manage it yourself with way less work than a traditional set up. Get a quote, sign up with Ooma, and start saving money today.

#3 – RingCentral Review — The Best for High-Volume Outbound Calling

RingCentral gives you unlimited calling, texting, and video conferencing at a competitive price. If you just need the phones and texting, you can get an even better deal.

Forget about per-minute charges and set up employees with VoIP that’s easy to use. For call centers, customer service, sales—anyone who has people on the phone constantly will appreciate RingCentral. This is especially true if you have to train new employees all the time.

First off, they’ll be able to use the interface. It’s intuitive to anyone who has used a computer. Administrators and managers will find they can shorten the time it takes to turn rookie hires into skilled ambassadors for your company.

“You save a lot of money because you can identify hires that aren’t doing a good job and wasting their time,” Makan told us. He’s set up a lot of telemarketing call centers with RingCentral and has really valued the ability to “tell right away who’s worth the money.”

The ability to track calls, KPIs, and listen back to recordings was like night and day for him compared to working on a landline. Teams can listen back to calls that went well (or poorly) to get a sense of how to better capitalize on each opportunity.

The reporting features aren’t going to take a data scientist to glean insights from. Find your top performers and figure out what they’re doing. Identify people who aren’t a good fit and let them go.

I hear a lot of marketing word salad like “this tool optimizes performance,” all the time. RingCentral walks the walk. 

“You can actually predict your sales,” Makan said, “I know it’s difficult to fathom, but it’s true.”

He was able to figure out that 2,500 calls lead to one listing. This told him the number of minutes people needed to be on the phone in order to stay profitable. Over time, he could see how many listings an employee should be generating in their first month, second quarter, and so on.

You’re likely going to measure different KPIs, but it’s the same idea. With the kind of visibility that RingCentral provides, you can distill the numbers to simple metrics that hold employees accountable. You know ahead of time what your sales are going to look like, and you can scale up or down accordingly.

There’s a lot about RingCentral that’s well suited for large-scale calling. Admins don’t have to be IT wizards to add new users and give them access to specific resources. They’ll be able to provision new hires quickly. When someone leaves, they’ll be able to switch around accounts and recycle the number, so you don’t wind up paying for lines you’re not using.

If you have turnover—as many high-volume calling occupations do—you need to be mindful of your database integrity. RingCentral makes it easy to limit access to resources and revoke it if need be. 

You’re definitely going to be using a CRM (or some form of database) to call at scale. RingCentral integrates with a lot of them. You want to keep that information private.

Another liability for call centers that RingCentral helps you navigate is compliance, which is crucial if you are making a lot of cold calls or using an auto dialer. There’s a TCPA safe dialer, which helps agents avoid bringing a “robo-call” lawsuit down on your company. Instead of worrying about messing something up, they can focus on the person they are talking to.

The DNC list fea

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[localbizlift]

Level-Up Your Search Strategy with the Professional’s Guide to SEO

Over 14 million people have cut their SEO teeth on our Beginner's Guide to SEO, learning the ins and outs of search engine optimization from scratch. For 16 years, it's been the go-to resource that kicked off careers and page-one rankings the world over. And now, for the first time, we're introducing the next-step resource to take you from practicing SEO to preaching it — from pupil to pro.

Read the guide!

Who should read the Professional's Guide to SEO?

You don't have to know the entire SEO Glossary by heart or get a perfect score on the SEO Expert Quiz to dive into this guide. If any of the following apply to you:

You've done SEO work, officially or unofficially, as a component of your day job;

Your title involves the words "digital marketer" or something similar;

You've read The Beginner's Guide to SEO, Moz SEO Learning Center articles, taken our SEO Essentials certification course, subscribed to the Moz Blog, and are thirsty for more;

You're ready for the next step in your SEO career;

...then this is the next-level SEO guide for you!

This resource exists to help level-up anyone comfortable with the basics of SEO, who have some experience practicing it professionally, and who crave the challenge and reward of moving from intermediacy toward mastery.

How much of this guide do I need to read?

If you're serious about mastering advanced SEO techniques and being able to apply them in a professional setting, we recommend reading the Professional’s Guide to SEO front-to-back. We've tried to make it as concise and easy to understand as possible so you can learn at your own pace.

The guide has nine chapters focused on actionable tips and insights for a successful career in SEO, including:

Advanced SEO Strategy:

All About Google: The Algorithm

All About Google: The SERPs

Keywords & Content:

Link Building & Link Earning Tactics

Technical SEO

Competitive SEO

Measuring and Tracking SEO

Working in SEO

If you want to take a more organized approach to learning SEO or training your entire team, check out the Moz Academy Technical SEO Certification. We've consolidated all the resources you need to learn and apply advanced technical SEO techniques alongside unique learning strategies, task lessons and quizzes to test your knowledge. You can also display your knowledge with your LinkedIn Moz SEO Essentials certification badge.

Getting excited yet? You should be! Search engine marketing is a fascinating field and mastering advanced techniques will take your professional skills to the next level. We're looking forward to you coming on this journey with us!

Read the guide!

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[localbizlift]

Best VPS Hosting Plans

Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.

Do you want to skip the read and get right to my top picks? The best VPS hosting services for most people are Hostinger or Bluehost.

Upgrading to one of the best VPS hosting plans will drastically improve your site performance if you’re currently using shared hosting.

VPS stands for virtual private server. It means you get a private slice of server resources–no more sharing them with other websites–and the ability to customize the server, which you can’t do with shared hosting.

You get the exact resources your sites need, but you don’t have to pay hundreds of dollars a month for an entire dedicated server of your own.

Or, maybe you need VPS for a different reason, such as corralling all the data from a fleet of smart devices or vehicles, running gaming servers, or computing ungodly amounts of data.

Don’t worry, I’ve got you covered. Using VPS servers for edge computing offers a far more efficient way to get data to the end-user than sending everything through a single central server.

Let’s run through everything you need to know to make an informed decision. I’ll start off with in-depth reviews of my top recommendations for VPS hosting and conclude with a brief buyer’s guide to help you select the best fit for you.

#1 – Hostinger — The Best VPS Hosting for First-Timers

Hostinger has some of the most inexpensive VPS plans and an approachable interface that makes it perfect for new users. 

You won’t get as much assistance setting things up as you do with a fully-managed plan, but it’s a fraction of the cost to unlock the enhanced power of VPS over something basic like shared hosting.

As such, it’s the ideal choice for folks looking the make their first hosting upgrade from what they started out with (and have outgrown).

It’s not like you don’t get support. Far from it. Hostinger has customer service agents available. 24/7/365. The company promises short wait times for answers whenever you reach out, even though it’s an unmanaged plan.

And compared to some of the unmanaged plans aimed solely at developers, Hostinger is a lot more welcoming. You’re not expected to know everything, and helpful context is always linked or a click away.

Consider how easy it is to backup and restore your VPS server. Weekly or daily backups are generated automatically, depending on your plan, and available in your control panel. 

You can also create a snapshot of the VPS at that exact moment whenever you want. This is great if you are about to try a major change on your site. Something goes wrong, just restore your site to the way it was before in a couple clicks. No harm, no foul.

You get a solid range of OS choices: CentOS, Ubuntu, Fedora, Debian, or Suse. These are one-click to install.

Hostinger describes its plan structure as “semi-managed” VPS hosting. It’s good for starting out because you get a mix of support and freedom at a really low cost.

Hostinger doesn’t include licenses for cPanel with the budget VPS hosting plans. There’s just no way they can give it away when you are only paying a few bucks a month for VPS hosting.

The good news is that it’s cheaper to get cPanel with Hostinger than it is with any other host, starting at $1.95 per month.

Hostinger has six levels with increasing amounts of server firepower. VPS levels 1-4 are shown below:

Start off small and scale as big as you want. VPS 1 is an excellent price for getting your feet wet, and comes with more than enough resources for your first project. If you have to upgrade, you have options that remain extremely affordable.

To get the lowest price, you’ll have to sign up for a four-year deal. This might be a turn off if you are just looking to experiment, but it’s pretty great to be able to lock in 48 months of VPS hosting for just a single outlay starting as low as $143.52

And if you just want to pay month to month, the price of VPS 1 is only $9.99. That is still really reasonable.

Honestly, that is a normal price for shared hosting, and this is way more powerful.

The last thing you need to know about Hostinger is the 30-day money back guarantee. It’s zero risk to try and easy to start using. 

If you’ve ever thought of seeing how VPS hosting could give you a leg up on the competition, give Hostinger a shot today.

#2 – Bluehost — The Best For New Sites that Need Top Performance

If you have a new app, project, or website that needs it’s own dedicated set of server resources, Bluehost has you covered.

You can get a VPS set up for a great price, without adding a ton of complexity to your IT maintenance. 

Everything is easier to configure with Bluehost’s enhanced cPanel, which comes free with all VPS plans. You’ll be able to manage emails, domains, websites, and more within the user-friendly interface.

Usually you have to pay extra for even a basic control panel. Not with Bluehost, though, which starts at $18.99 per month.

And Bluehost includes a lot of services in every VPS hosting package. This means less to spend and try and figure out on your own. You’ll get:

Free domain name (for the first year)

Free SSL certificate

24/7 Customer support

Multiple FTP accounts

Multi-Server management

Role based access control

You’ll be able to manage all of your sites from a single location with multi-server management. This is helpful if you have sites that are fine on shared hosting and only need the VPS for a particular site or application.

Bluehost offers three different plans for VPS hosting.

The Standard plan is on the low-end of pricing, especially when you consider that cPanel is included for free. This is normally going to cost you $10-15 per month extra.

Bluehost has also improved the control panel with specific tools for managing your VPS.

You can definitely get a cheaper VPS if you are a DIY type who doesn’t want cPanel taking away from their VPS resources. But for your typical user that just wants a simple interface to manage their VPS, Bluehost is a bargain.

Getting the domain name free for the first year is another $10-15 saved.If you are thinking about VPS hosting for a new site or app, you should definitely consider Bluehost.

#3 – HostGator — The Lowest Cost for Managed VPS Hosting

For many people, HostGator is going to be the cheapest way possible to get a managed VPS plan–that means high-power servers with low-stress maintenance for a great price.

In fact, the only reason I can’t say this is the cheapest managed VPS plan for everyone is that you have to use cPanel for server management. If you use something else, HostGator can’t provide the full-service management that makes this option so attractive.

It’s a little unusual, the fact that the hosting control panel impacts the level of service you get. But given that cPanel is one of the most widely used options on the planet, many users are going to be able to benefit from HostGator’s excellent managed VPS plans.

Why am I such a big fan? 

First off, the generous amount of resources you get. The entry-level HostGator VPS plan comes with 2 GB RAM, 120 GB storage, and unmetered bandwidth. That means you won’t get charged based on a set level of traffic coming to your site.

Obviously there’s an acceptable use policy, but you don’t have hard fast limits.

You’ll have root access and total control over what you install on your VPS. The Softaculous script installer (included free) lets you load hundreds of the most popular web apps onto your server in a single step.

Whenever you run into trouble, day or night, you can reach out to HostGator by phone, chat, or Twitter, if you really want to catch HostGator’s attention. Premium support comes with every managed plan, as well as server monitoring and remediation. 

You can definitely find unmanaged plans for cheaper, but having a service team there around the clock to troubleshoot issues is a tremendous value. 

HostGator’s support really goes to the next level with free content transfers. Sign up and HostGator will transfer everything from your old site to its new home–files, databases, scripts–you don’t have to stress or worry. 

With HostGator, everything is set up right the first time and you have all the help you need moving forward. HostGator provides courtesy weekly backups, which is helpful, but you can also schedule your own backups and create them on-demand.

Such flexible backup capabilities can easily run $10-20 per month if you purchase them separately (to say nothing of the time it takes). Affordable hosting plans usually cut corners, but HostGator is loaded with cost-saving features:

Unlimited email

2 dedicated IPs

Unmetered bandwidth

Softaculous script installer

Free SSL certificates

DDoS protection

You have the option of going with a semi-managed plan or a fully-managed plan. The prices you see below are the semi-managed plan:

For people who know their way around the command line, or already have a hosting control panel they like, these semi-managed plans will be great. But if you want the fully-managed services, you will have to purchase cPanel, which is $10 per month more.

It’s still a great price, especially when you think about the 24/7 premium service and all the backups and security responsibilities that are taken off your plate.

CentOS is the default operating system, so there is a little less flexibility than some of the other web hosts on my list. That said, for most people, this is going to be fine.

So there are a few limits and asterisks to this deal (you have to use cPanel, for instance), but they are not going to get in the way of most people seeking a managed VPS plan.

Give HostGator a call today and have your site migrated for free.

#4 – Liquid Web — The Best for Upgrading From Shared Hosting

Liquid Web doesn’t offer shared hosting, and if you want to leave that world behind, the company has a great deal to get set up. 

Go with one of the managed VPS plans, and Liquid Web throws in a free migration. This involves a team of specialists moving all of your content and data over to the new hosting. I think that’s a pretty big deal because it saves you money, time, and the cost of screwing something up.

And once you get set up, you kind of get to keep the good parts of the shared hosting experience without the downsides. 

VPS with Liquid Web is still really affordable, especially when you consider what a dedicated server costs. So you are not breaking the bank to get the increased VPS performance and stability you need.

Plus you get to keep a relatively low-key maintenance schedule, which is something people really love about shared hosting. There’s more to do with VPS, for sure, but much of the backend legwork is handled by Liquid Web if you want.

If you are happy managing your server, get an unmanaged plan. If you want to avoid all responsibility, get a fully managed plan. And if you fall somewhere in between, you can check out the Core VPS plan, which Liquid Web describes as semi-managed.

Just pick the level of support that matches your technical confidence and time constraints.

Bear in mind that the support level you choose for your plan is an additional level of premium support on top of Liquid Web’s customer service team. No matter what plan you pick you can connect with an on-site service agent by phone, chat, and email 24/7.

So you have more freedom to build, better resources to do it, and support whenever you run into issues. It’s an all-around improvement from shared hosting, complete with:

Integrated firewall

Remote backups by default

DDoS prevention

Proactive monitoring

ServerSecure protection

You won’t have to worry about managing any of this. It just happens in the background while you focus on your business.

Liquid Web offers a range of plans and bundles with extremely low introductory pricing. Upon renewal, it goes up to the monthly rate.

To get the lowest price, you have to sign up for a 2-year deal. I think it’s definitely worth it, although it’s a higher upfront cost. You just save so much money by doing this. Looking at the 2GB packages, it’s normally $59 per month and worth every penny.

I mean look at the bandwidth. 10 TB is far and away the most you will see with an entry-level plan. Getting that for $25 a month is an outrageous monster-step up from shared hosting at basically the same price.

You can also go with a Value Bundle, which is available for any plan. This gives you business email service, and additional 100 GB of remote backup, and additional security benefits.

There is also separate pricing for using Windows servers. The resource allocations match the 4, 8, and 16 GB plans you see above, but start at $65, $85, and $145 per month, respectively.

I recommend going with CentOS, if you can, because then you can use Interworx as your control panel for free. If you want to use something else, you’ll need to get cPanel or Plesk, which is included as an extra charge.

So if you are looking at VPS as a way to boost the performance you’re getting with shared hosting, Liquid Web is a really good option. You’ll get the blazing speed you need without a ton of additional maintenance headaches associated with private servers.

And remember, Liquid Web will bring everything over from your old host for free. This is the easiest and most affordable way to get your online assets the dedicated server resources they deserve.

If you pay monthly and use coupon code NEIL40, you can get 40% off your first four months. Get started with Liquid Web today.

#5 – Scala Hosting — The Best VPS Hosting for Scaling on the Fly for Free

VPS hosting is the most powerful game in town outside of having

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[localbizlift]

The Best Blogging Platforms (In-Depth Review)

Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.

Do you want to skip the read and get right to my top pick? The best blogging platform for most people is WordPress with Hostinger hosting.

I’ve been making a good living as a blogger for over a decade. This is an area of the internet I know really well.

But a lot’s changed since I started. Site builders have become more powerful while also making it easier to start a blog than ever. And now you call sell products within your blog posts, instead of just leaning on them to market your business.

Below, you’ll find the five best tools for starting your blog today. Some of them I’ve used myself and like a lot; others are really good for bloggers with different needs and goals than my own.

By the end of this article, you’ll have found the right tool for starting your blogging journey. 

#1 – WordPress Review — The Best for Creating a Unique Blog

WordPress is the most popular blogging platform in the world. It’s free to use and the potential to create is boundless.

You can blog for free at WordPress.com. The company hosts your site and gives you a subdomain. The downside is that it’s supported by running its own ads unless you upgrade your plan.

Alternatively, you can download the platform for free at WordPress.org and use it on a site you host yourself. Hosting isn’t free, but if you go with a high-quality WordPress host like Hostinger, the whole thing winds up being less expensive than going with a similar website builder.

The payoff is that you can build whatever you can imagine with your WordPress blog.

The whole WordPress.com vs. WordPress.org concept can be a little confusing, but both options work on the same platform. Personally, I prefer WordPress.org, because you are unrestricted in how you can bend and shape the platform to make it look and function exactly the way you want it to.

Plus, using WordPress.org and paying a hosting provider for web hosting tends to be a more cost-effective option than paying for a WordPress.com plan.

Either route you choose, it starts with choosing your WordPress theme. Think of it like a template that formats your whole site as opposed to just one page. There are a ton of amazing free themes to promote your content. These will keep your blog on brand and help you curate posts for your readers.

To add more functionality to your blog, there are tens of thousands of WordPress plugins you can use. These will help with SEO, site security, setting up newsletter subscriptions, and so much more. Lots of useful plugins are free.

There are also premium plugins and themes you can buy to add rich capabilities or custom looks for your site.

Since WordPress is open-source and ridiculously popular, there is an active community that is constantly building new features for today’s challenges. These are just some of the reasons more people choose WordPress for their blog:

55,000+ plugins to extend the functionality of your site

Thousands of free and premium themes

The Gutenburg block editor

Advanced user roles and permissions

Powerful media management

A massive community of experts

Infinite design control

You can get plugins and themes to take your site wherever it needs to go, and if you can’t, there is probably someone working on a solution right now.

With Wix and Squarespace, you are paying for an all-in-one platform. With WordPress, the platform is free, and you can purchase what you need à la carte. Choose your own mix of plugins and themes to get exactly what you need.

Turn your blog into a social media forum or host member’s only content behind a paywall. Anything you want is as simple as finding the right plugin.

Wix is going to be easier to use, especially at first, but WordPress is by no means difficult.

If you start building out a really complex site with a lot of plugins, sure, it’s going to be more work to maintain, but you’ll also have a blog that’s much more unique than what you could assemble on Wix.

In terms of day-to-day editing, though, WordPress is a breeze. The Gutenberg editor simplifies that process of arranging and refining your blog. You can work in HTML or edit visually, block by block, and effortlessly add content from your media library.

For the non-technical user, building a custom blog that’s rich with images and videos is incredibly easy. Gutenberg can even help you cut down on the number of plugins you need, which can start to cause conflicts if you are using too many.

Looking at the all-in costs of using WordPress as a blogging platform, it really depends what you are trying to do. And, of course, which version of the platform you use.

WordPress.com lets you start completely for free, but there are several paid plans that allow you to do more. For $4 per month, for example, you remove WordPress ads and get a custom domain included. These plans scale all the way up to $45 per month for an ecommerce-focused package.

But WordPress.org is completely free forever. It’s just about keeping in mind the associated costs.

One such cost is utilizing themes and plugins. Many free ones are available, but premium ones will usually cost you some cash.

The other big one is hosting, which you’re on the hook for with WordPress.org. Fret not, though, because you can find a great deal on hosting that costs significantly less per month than any of WordPress.com’s paid plans.

If you are just starting your blog, I’d recommend Hostinger’s WordPress Starter hosting plan. It starts at $3.99 per month. They give you a free domain name free for the first year, automatic WordPress installation and updates, and a fantastic site building wizard.

The whole process takes minutes instead of hours. It is affordable, easy to set up, and Hostinger takes over some of the maintenance. For all these reasons, I recommend Hostinger as the best way to start a WordPress blog.

#2 – Wix Review — The Best for Launching a Beautiful Blog Right Now

If you are looking for the shortest distance between you and a working blog, go with Wix.

There are other great options on my list, but nothing is as easy to get started with. 

It’s an excellent choice for beginners interested in creating a full-fledged website with a blog included.

Getting things set up is as simple as using the drag-and-drop editor to design your site. There’s no code necessary.

Wix is highly template-driven, but there are an astonishing range of options available. You’ll be able to find something that fits with your brand and tweak it to match the vision in your head.

Alternatively, you can use Wix Artificial Design Intelligence (ADI). Just answer a few questions about who you are and the purpose of your blog, and Wix ADI will create a website for you. I’m not kidding:

And even if you want to design your own site, Wix ADI will help you figure out which layouts work best by letting you preview your content before making a decision.

Everything looks crisp with very little configuration on your end. Your final product is going to make a professional impression, whether visitors are on a laptop or mobile phone.

And if you are an on-the-go person, don’t worry. The Wix mobile app lets you design and blog right from your phone.

In terms of growing your audience, Wix comes packed with powerful tools to help you increase your reach and engage meaningfully online:

Industry-leading SEO tools

Social media tools

Visitor analytics

Post scheduling

Embed HTML codes

Categories and hashtags

Advanced search capabilities

Collaborators

Easy image editing

From site building to outreach, Wix a lot more than just a blogging platform. You can get started today and use Wix free forever.

A free Wix account keeps things simple and still gives you access to the world-class site building tools. But your site will have wixsite.com in the web address, and you’re limited to 500GB bandwidth, which basically means it only works for small sites without too much traffic.

The other drawback of the free-forever plan is the Wix ads, which enable the company to offer the free version. If you are running your blog as part of your business, do you really want another company’s advertisements?

If you upgrade, Wix removes the ads and gives you a custom domain name free for the first year. Your blog is fully yours, which I think is more than worth it.

Premium Wix plans are broken down into three groups: Websites, Business and Ecommerce, and Enterprise. 

If you are looking for a straight-up blogging platform, Wix has a few different plans that get the job done:

Plans start at $16 per month for Combo, which is good for personal use, and range up to $45 per month for the VIP plan, which has a lot more storage space and tools to grow your brand. This price includes web hosting, which normally costs around $10 per month. Really, Wix includes everything you need as part of the premium package.

Business and ecommerce plans start at $27 per month and allow you to accept payments online. Sell products and services directly from your blog. Even for more complex sites, the Wix set up process will still be very user-friendly.

Wix is an excellent choice for individuals and small businesses trying to get the word out. There’s a 100 page limit for Wix websites (excluding blog posts, of course), and site performance may suffer if you start to hit the upper limit.

If this is a concern, I’d just go with WordPress, which can grow as big as you need. That said, Wix offers custom solutions for enterprise clients that start at $500 per month.

For most users, especially those looking to get their blog up and running without any stress or frustration, Wix is fantastic.

Try Wix Premium today free for 14 days, or blog free as long as you like.

#3 – Squarespace Review — The Best for Bold Branding Without a Web Designer

Squarespace is an all-in-one website builder, like Wix. However, it’s famous for aesthetically pleasing templates, making it perfect for visual-based businesses like photographers, designers, and artists. 

Looking at the clean, beautiful brand presentation on Squarespace blogs, you might think that everyone hired a designer to get there. In reality, it might be that person’s first website ever.

Don’t get me wrong. Graphic design gurus can take Squarespace to amazing places, but I think the draw of the platform is that non-technical folks can spin up an striking site themselves.

For the entrepreneur or small business looking to build their online presence, Squarespace is a phenomenal choice. They can get the sleek blog they want without having to hire a web designer or developer.

This is huge, because you’re not having to pay anyone to create your site or having to scramble to find assistance when something breaks.

And if something does go wrong, Squarespace has highly-responsive customer service available 24/7. The relatively small monthly fee for the sitebuilder is probably a lot less than keeping a professional designer on retainer. 

Think of Squarespace as a middle-of-the-road option between Wix and WordPress—it’s got a little more freedom to customize than Wix, though not as much as WordPress. But it’s going to be easier to use on day one than WordPress.

Like Wix, you start with templates and customize from there. Squarespace templates are very elegant, and the editor is drag-and-drop, which means no coding to get started.

What you see is what you get in terms of design, so you are not having to preview your page constantly to make sure everything is placed where it needs to go.

Squarespace is not quite as intuitive a design interface as Wix, but it’s not hard to get the hang of it. And once you do, you’ll find that you have more control over what you can do with the color palette and layout. 

This freedom is why a lot of artists, designers, and creatives flock to Squarespace.

Not that you need to be a designer to achieve an elegant blog on Squarespace. People without an artistic bone in their body are creating amazing sites on the platform every day. 

For a company that wants a beautiful blog, but doesn’t want to hire a designer to babysit it, Squarespace is perfect.

Out of the box, you get:

Free blogging templates to help you get started

Categories, tags, and featured posts

Built-in post scheduler

Contributor permissions

In-depth analytics

SEO and social media tools

Email marketing tools

Expert customer service

Mobile app

Now you won’t have total control to customize, as you do with the thousands of plugins offered by WordPress.

That said, all of the add-ons and third-party extensions in Squarespace are built into the platform—this means no maintenance or updates for you.

This is going to be less work than managing WordPress plugins and themes.

Adding ecommerce functionality to your Squarespace blog is extremely easy. Launch an online store, book appointments, create and sell member’s only content. 

Get these features set up in minutes and drive the right type of traffic to your blog with Squarespace’s excellent marketing and SEO tools. Everything you need for a complete website for your business is just as easy to set up as your blog, and it’s all going to look sharp.

Squarespace plans start at $14 per month for a website, and as low as $23 per month to add ecommerce functionality:

The Personal plan is more than enough to power your website with a very good looking blog. You get the rich design and editing features I’ve described, as well as access to basic website metrics and the Squarespace extensions, which can expand your site with third-party features and content.

The

#marketing

[localbizlift]

Best Auto Dialer Software

Disclosure: This content is reader-supported, which means if you click on some of our links that we may earn a commission.

Want to jump right to the point? Nextiva is my top pick for the best auto dialer software.

You’re making a lot of calls, but leads aren’t converting and agents are losing track of conversations.

These are just two of the problems that businesses solve with good auto dialer software. It automates thousands of repetitive manual tasks—not just dialing—and optimizes the experience of everyone involved.

Agents can focus totally on customers. Managers get real-time KPIs at a glance. Customers never get another 2 a.m. phone call.

What I’m saying is: everyone loves these products. 

Here are the top seven auto dialer software options on the market. They’re helping companies revolutionize outreach and connect agents with a more high-quality leads per hour. 

Which one is right for you? Let’s find out.

#1 – Nextiva Review — The Best for Calling Quickly Within Your CRM

I like a good auto dialer, but I love my CRM more.

And while many auto dialers can integrate with my CRM (and others just have their own built-in), I prefer the approach Nextiva takes to make outbound calling more efficient.

Other auto dialers don’t seem to sync as cleanly as Nextiva does with HubSpot, Zendesk, Salesforce, and all the other big names in CRM space. And, though Nextiva doesn’t offer a true auto dialer with their VoIP communications platform, integration with any CRM unlocks super useful one-click calling.

So, instead of an program churning through a list for reps, you can use the segmented lists in your CRM, share those with reps, and they can just click the phone icon next to each contact to immediately initiate a call in Nextiva.

You can even do the same when searching your whole contact list. Search for any qualification, segment, or demographic split and then dial away, one click at a time.

Nextiva’s telephony syncs with your CRM through Go Integrator, which is why it’s so easy to use one tool in the other.

Not only do you insert one-click Nextiva calling into your CRM, but it enhances Nextiva’s call and contact pop as well. Reps get a quicker view of each contact they’re calling and get that same benefit with inbound calls as well.

So, although not a “true” auto dialer, Nextiva’s one-click calling still massively streamlines your efforts and improves your reps’ output—especially if you’ve already been smart enough to segment your CRM contacts into targeted lists.

This all comes as part of Nextiva’s all-encompassing VoIP solution. I love that you can get this benefit while also improving your overall communications through Nextiva’s voice and video calling, texting, team messaging, and faxing.

To properly wield Nextiva’s CRM integration, you’ll need either the Professional or Enterprise plan which are both currently on sale for a limited time.

The former allows for syncing with the big names in CRM: HubSpot, Salesforce, and Zendesk. If you’re using Oracle Sales Cloud, ServiceNow, or others, go for the latter. There’s only $10 difference between the plans, which both scale in overall cost based on the number of users.

Professional starts at $21.95 per user per month for a team of 100 or more. Fewer users raise that rate a bit, up to $27.95 per user per month for a tiny team of four or fewer.

If you’re like me and your CRM is the beating heart of your sales efforts, go with the VoIP solution that brings out the best in your CRM and your reps—go with Nextiva.

#2 – PhoneBurner Review — The Best If Your Sales Team Isn’t In An Office

Need an auto dialer that works whether people are in the office or not? PhoneBurner should be one of the first tools you check out.

There’s no special equipment necessary. Employees can log into the dialing platform from their browser or call in from their phone. From there, they can start to make 60-80 calls per hour. All the wasted time from manual dialing is gone.

There is no lag in the calls between when a person answers and your reps start talking. It’s not like someone knows they’re receiving a call from an auto dialer, which does a lot to help first impressions. Get the call-quality you’d expect from an office landline anywhere you call from.

Using the PhoneBurner interface is stupid simple. Critical information is prominently displayed, and any action a rep needs to take has been streamlined. With one click, they can drop a voicemail, log a call, send an email follow-up, and more.

There’s a lot you can do to automate workflows in PhoneBurner, but no code to worry about. Everything is handled with clicks. Move prospects automatically from one group to another based on whether an agent reaches them, gets a busy signal, or hits a fax machine.

That’s just one small example, but sorts of post-call busy work can be completely eliminated. Now it will take some setup. But once all of your configurations and phone scripts are ready, they can be shared easily in PhoneBurner.

These collaborative features become really important when employees aren’t always in the office. Admins can add seats that are perfectly tuned for new employees with the click of a button.

Managing a high-volume of calls in PhoneBurner’s LeadStream platform is no problem for supervisors. This is crucial considering a small team will be making several hundred calls an hour.

Select from distribution types like depending on the nature of the calling. Do you want to divide up leads evenly or make sure your most experienced agents are getting the hottest leads?

There’s no need to be in an office to make sure that every lead is getting the attention it deserves.

Every call is tracked in PhoneBurner’s built-in CRM. It’s easy to stay organized, monitor agent performance, and manage contact lists. Alternatively, you can connect PhoneBurner to your own CRM. There’s a direct integration with Salesforce, and connections via Zapier to hundreds of other apps.

For my part, I think of PhoneBurner as a suite of best-in-breed outreach tools. Reps love to use it because the platform has been trimmed down to the essential features. There’s no clutter, and every feature available does exactly what it needs to.

Sending an email or text followup is one click. And unlike many other platforms, reps will be able to tell which emails have been opened. Work those metrics into your calling lists to hit contacts that are showing interest.

PhoneBurner is an all-in platform. You’re not paying extra for per-minute charges. There are simply no hidden fees. Admin accounts are free unless they want to dial.

Pricing starts at $124 per user per month for a yearly subscription or $149 monthly for the Standard plan.

There’s no set up cost, which is remarkable because PhoneBurner will onboard your team. By onboard, I mean they will help train your admins and agents. This includes understanding how to configure and use the platform to reach your business goals.

The company works with you to make sure that you are getting the most out of the auto dialer software. This includes team training and guidance building your first reports.

PhoneBurner insists that you use the free trial to get acquainted with the platform and see what it can do. Your trial can be as many users as you need to get an actual feel for how it will perform.

If you are in the market for an all-in-one auto dialer solution that helps your team perform at the top of their game, no matter where they are, this is a great option.

Try PhoneBurner today for free, no credit card required.

#3 – RingCentral Engage Voice Review — The Best for Fearless Nationwide Telemarketing

Anyone who reads my blog knows I’m all about growing your business as fast as possible. 

If you are working auto dialer software into a go-big game plan, I support you and highly recommend RingCentral Engage Voice.

No other option is going to reduce your risk of regulatory violations, which is important if you are looking to hit the telemarketing game hard.

Cast a wide net. Hit a super-diverse audience. But do it carefully, respectfully, and most of all, legally. 

Something as simple as calling a cell phone that hasn’t opted into a campaign could result in a fine. Or maybe a new rep forgets to read a mandatory disclaimer before ending a call. A single violation can be thousands of dollars—a string of them is a lot worse.

RingCentral Engage Voice is an auto dialer that’s been designed for safe outreach on a large scale. 

There are easy-to-use tools for scrubbing your lists of numbers on national and state cellular Do Not Call lists. RingCentral can also run a time check to ensure that people aren’t called outside of authorized time windows.

These hands-off features help you stay compliant without taking a hit to productivity.

One of the key elements is the TCPA Dialer, which is purpose-built for keeping your callers compliant. It’s a separate manual system that fits into your auto dialer work flow. It adds the minimum number of steps to get around the restrictions against calling cell phone numbers with an auto dialer.

The powerful scripting features included with RingCentral Engage Voice help you craft call scripts that are effective and compliant. Customize scripts for every situation, then quickly revise and update them whenever you need to within a simple drag-and-drop builder.

Lots of other “safe” dialing solutions are really cumbersome. RingCentral has streamlined everything so your teams can focus on conversations instead of compliance.

You can also create guided workflows that help new hires learn the ropes. Make it as easy as possible for them to remember mandatory disclaimers, consent to record, and all that annoying but super important boilerplate.

It has basically everything but an attorney to keep you in the clear. Supervisors have a complete view of what’s happening. They will have robust real-time and historic reports, as well as the ability to drill down into individual performance.

You’ll have to get in touch with RingCentral for Engage Voice’s pricing. One of the sales team members will put together a custom package that includes all the tools you need. 

RingCentral connects to hundreds of popular tools: dozens of CRMs, marketing automation software, merchant services, and more. No matter what other channels you are using to increase your reach, you’ll be able to keep everything centralized.

Some companies work off highly curated lists of corporate clients. They probably don’t need the advanced compliance features as much. 

But if you are looking to reach out on a grand scale, you want an auto dialer that’s built to match. RingCentral offers the complete arsenal of tools to ensure that your newest rep has everything they need to start having courteous conversations on day one.

#4 – VanillaSoft Review — The Best For Managing a Long Sales Cycle

Not everyone needs an auto dialer simply to reach more leads. For some, the real benefit lies in staying connected with prospects over months (if not years) and never once missing a follow up call.

VanillaSoft is a great option for people who have to navigate these long, complex customer journeys. 

The auto dialer is supported by lead tracking and routing capabilities that put people on the phone with the person they need to talk to next. Leads are tracked, scored, and prioritized according to rules you set.

And you’re going to have a lot of control. Intellective Routing allows you to be really granular with how leads are managed. Prioritize based on job title, company revenue, or use geolocation data to get leads to reps based in that territory.

VanillaSoft makes it as easy as possible to keep track of everything you learn about potential buyers. 

You can create custom fields, which let reps track whatever metrics and information are actually important. Reps are prompted to collect data at the right time, so you’re not making people remember more.

It’s barely any extra work, but it ensures you’re capturing all the relevant information and getting higher quality data. Your reporting will improve tremendously.

Another helpful feature is the Corporate View, which lets you keep track of multiple people at the same organization. 

This helps reps keep things straight dealing with different points of contact. They’ll be able to see the whole conversation, not just one voice, and you can set it up so all calls from a company get routed automatically to the same rep.

It’s rarely a straight path to reaching the decision maker, and it may be the case that influencing people in their orbit winds up being more important.

Appointment setting couldn’t be easier. You can tell VanillaSoft was designed with input from busy sales reps. Little things like having calendar items displayed in the contact’s local time help minimize errors. 

No more double booking, or accidentally scheduling a demo outside business hours for your first international prospect.

With one click, you can set up automated text and reminders sent to prospects once you get something on the schedule. It also gives your prospect more channels to get in touch when they are ready to take the next step.

VanillaSoft pricing is very straightforward. Start with the base sales engagement platform, and add on the features you need: dialing, recording, VoIP, and SmartCaller ID. The base plan starts at $80 per month, but you will need to request a quote for the add-on features you want.

If you purchase quite a few add-on services through VanillaSoft, the total price will come in on the high end. But if you already have a business phone service or VoIP set up, VanillaSoft will plug into that just fine, and the price drops to the lower middle of the pack.

A company that only needed the base platform plus auto dialer would be looking at approximately $110 per month per user to start, which is an exceptional price on a premium product. (You will need to request a price quote to learn your specific price, though.)

I highly recommend VanillaSoft to companies that don’t have a CRM they are in love with. The sales engagement platform is worth every penny. You’ll be able to track and nurture leads with high levels of control and visibility. 

It also works very well for people using Salesforce, as VanillaSoft offers direct integration.

You can also use Zapier to connect VanillaSoft to other CRMs and business applications to automate data transfer. It may take some doing to set everything up, but it’s very worth it in the long run to be able to manage a massive number of leads at different stages of the buying journey.

If you are looking for an auto dialer that helps you stay in touch over the course of a long and productive relationship, VanillaSoft is the best tool for the job. Request a free demo to see how VanillaSoft performs.

#5 – Voicent Cloud Review — The Best Pay-As-You-Go Auto Dia

#marketing

[localbizlift]

The MozCon 2022 Final Agenda Is Here!

Hold on to your bucket hats, this year's MozCon is right around the corner, and we couldn't be more excited to be back in-person in Seattle!

On July 11th, 12th, and 13th, join Ranger Roger at camp MozCon for insights and tactical presentations from industry leaders, plus the opportunity to connect and network with fellow attendees!

And since we know budgets are tighter than ever, we’re extending our early bird pricing through June 30! Tickets are just $1,099 for Moz subscribers. Can’t make the in-person event? Grab yourself a Livestream pass for $449. Both options include access to the professionally produced video bundle (a $300 value!), providing incredible marketing thought leadership at an unheard-of price:

Save my spot at MozCon!

We’ve been hinting at the lineup of talks with our Initial Agenda drop in April and our Community Speaker reveal and today, we’re ready to share the full and complete Final Agenda. With the schedule set and our speakers putting the final polish on their presentations, here’s a look at the three action-packed days we have planned.

Sunday, July 10th

12:00pm–4:00pm – Optional early registration & badge pick up

Arriving in Seattle early and want to get a jump on picking up your badge? Drop by registration to check in and pick up your badge. 

Monday, July 11th

7:30am – Breakfast & registration

9:00am – Welcome to MozCon 2022!

Cheryl Draper

Our own MozCon Event Manager will be kicking things off early on the first day of MozCon with a warm welcome, laying out all the pertinent details of the conference, introducing our Emcees and getting us in the right mindset for three days of learning.

9:15am – SERP Strategies

Andy Crestodina

Every key-phrase is a competition. But the best competitor for that competition depends on what you see in the SERP. Getting your page to rank organically is only one of the many possible strategies. In this talk, Andy will explain big picture strategies in the context of ever-more crowded search results pages.

9:50am – Search What You See: Visual Search Tactics, Tools, and Optimizations

Crystal Carter

Visual search has been at the forefront of Google’s search and product innovations in the last year. Join this talk for “search what you see” optimizations via Google Lens and more.

10:25am – Morning break

10:50am – Unlocking the Hidden Potential of Product Listing Pages

Areej AbuAli

E-commerce website product listing pages contain hidden potential. This talk is all about unlocking the magic of your listing pages by making the most out of filters and internal linking. Instead of being fixated on those landing page head terms, let’s turn our attention to the indexability of long-tail pages with high conversion. Whether you work in e-commerce or not, we’ll also cover how to embed yourself within tech teams and analyze impactful changes.

11:25am – Community Speaker – Get Your Local SEO Recipe Right with Content & Schema

Emily Brady

Local SEO can be so much more than off-site listings, so let’s talk about it! By using content and schema on local landing pages, businesses can create unique value that satisfies customers and search engines.

11:45am – SEO Gap Analysis: Leverage Your Competitor's Performance

Lidia Infante

Ranking is as easy or as hard as doing better than your competitors. For that, you have to benchmark the sites on your search landscape, meet them where they are, and gain an edge. In this talk, Lidia will share how she built SEO strategies off the back of a gap analysis, along with her templates and success stories.

12:20pm – Birds of a Feather lunch discussion tables

1:50pm – The Future of Link Building: What Got Us Here, Won’t Get Us There

Paddy Moogan

Ten years ago, Paddy stood on stage at MozCon and shared 35 ways to build links in 35 minutes. This year, he is going to talk about lessons he has learned during the last 10 years, some reflections on what he got right and wrong, along with what the future holds for link building.

2:25pm – Community Speaker – How to Capitalize on the Link Potential of a Research Report

Debbie Chu

There are many types of link magnets, but there's one that'll never go out of style: data-backed research reports. When done well, you're creating a piece of content that helps your E-A-T, drives backlinks, and is genuinely interesting content for your target audience. This talk will cover the different steps needed not just to create a research report, but to create one that can get links.

2:55pm – Breaking into new areas with Topic Maps

Miracle Inameti-Archibong

In this talk we'll go beyond keyword research to explore how to build topic maps, and internal linking maps (that align with Google's understanding) to help you conquer new SERPS and win more budget from stakeholders along the way.

3:30pm – Afternoon break

3:55pm – Moneyball is the Future of SEO

Will Critchlow

Advanced statistical analysis has changed the face of professional sports, and similar insights are changing the way we do SEO. In this talk, Will is going to share the approaches he's seeing from the most forward-looking SEO teams, as well as the lessons learned from their analysis of what's working and what's not.

4:25pm – Titans of Tech: A Campfireside Interview

Vivek Shah & Special Guest

5:25pm – Day 1 Presentations conclude

7:00pm – Monday Night Welcome Party

Join us at Optimism Brewing in Capitol Hill. Meet with fellow attendees and speakers over light refreshments and snacks, music, and catching sun on the patio. We look forward to bringing our community together to kick off MozCon 2022 on this special night. See you there!

Tuesday, July 12th

7:30am – Breakfast & registration

9:00am – Day 2 Opening Remarks

9:10am – More Than Pageviews: Evaluating Content Success & Correcting Content Failure

Dana DiTomaso

Throw that tired pageview- and-bounce-rate-heavy report right out the (virtual) window — we can do better than that! Dana will peel back the layers on measuring content success. You'll learn which metrics will actually tell you if your content is doing what it's supposed to be doing, and how to link these metrics to your SEO strategies and tactics.

9:45am – Trash in, garbage out: A guide to non-catastrophic keyword research

Tom Capper

Keyword research is one of the first and most basic tasks that SEOs learn. And yet, it's strewn with pitfalls and ubiquitous errors, even for experienced practitioners. In this talk, Tom will talk you through the various ways the wrong data can lead you astray, and how to leverage the right techniques for the right tasks

10:20am – Morning break

10:45am – SEO In the Enterprise: Tips and Tricks for Growing Organic Traffic at Scale

Jakie Chu

In this talk, Jackie will show us how to identify, prioritize and get buy-in on large-scale SEO campaigns to drive traffic and revenue.

11:20am – The Future of Local Landing Pages

Amanda Jordan

Visual search has been at the forefront of Google’s search and product innovations in the last year. Join this talk for “search what you see” optimizations via Google Lens and more.

11:55am – Birds of a Feather lunch discussion tables

1:30pm – Community Speaker – How Marketing Data Intelligence Skyrocketed Our B2B Conversions

Tina Fleming

If you want to geek out on data, you've come to the right session. And we're not talking about Google Analytics or your plain old CRM data. We're talking about de-anonymizing your website traffic, providing one-on-one personalized user experiences, shortening your lead forms without missing out on valuable information, and doing everything you can to get to that SQL. In this presentation, Tina will demystify the basics of marketing data intelligence, reveal actionable strategies for your day-to-day conversion marketing, and share real examples of how her agency has skyrocketed B2B conversions with the addition of marketing intelligence.

1:50pm – Achieve Accessibility Goals with Machine Learning

Noah Learner

3.8 million U.S. adults aged 21-64 have a visual impairment, but 98% of the world’s top 1 million websites don’t offer full accessibility (despite legislation to encourage this). This leads to 1 in 3 baskets being abandoned, leaving an estimated 13 trillion up for grabs. One of the top issues is image alt text. This text is essential for making images accessible - however it isn’t always a priority when it comes to SEO strategy, due to the challenges of implementing it on a wider scale. This session walks you through easy, scalable alt text generation - an intuitive and easy to understand tutorial, with most of the heavy lifting already done for you.

2:25pm – Community Speaker – How True Leaders Transform a Marketing Department into a Dream Team

Paxton Gray

There are hidden, structural factors holding stellar marketers (and their teams) back‚ and it's not their fault. Discover what these factors are, how to root them out, and how to help your existing team members reach their potential.

2:45pm – Afternoon break

3:10pm – Myths, Misconceptions, & Mistakes (Lessons Learned from a Decade in Digital PR)

Hannah Smith

For more than 11 years, Hannah’s been tasked with coming up with content ideas that people will share and journalists will write about. In this session, she’ll be sharing some of the most important lessons she’s learned along the way.

3:45pm – E-Commerce SEO Horror Stories: How to tackle the most common issues at scale and avoid an SEO nightmare

Aleyda Solis

Between a dynamic inventory, complex categorization and filtering options, lack of unique product descriptions, and well-established global and local competitors, e-commerce sites are known to be amongst the most challenging types of sites when it comes to doing SEO, and often result in some pretty frightening horror story scenarios. But, it doesn't have to be that terrifying. In this session, Aleyda will take us through the most common issues, and show how to effectively address them at scale, before they become real nightmares.

4:30pm – Day 2 Presentations conclude

Wednesday, July 13th

7:30am – Breakfast & registration

9:00am – Day 3 Opening Remarks

9:10am – Why Real Expertise is the Most Important Ranctor Factor of Them All

Lily Ray

In this presentation, Lily will use real data to demonstrate how the rise of E-A-T has led to Google prioritizing expertise and authority above all else.

9:45am – To Be Announced

Amanda Natividad

10:20am – Morning break

10:45am – Rabbit Holes: How Google Pushes Us Down The Funnel

Dr. Peter Meyers

As an SEO, you've probably fallen down the rabbit hole of "organic" results that lead to more Google SERPs. If you map that rabbit hole, you'll see a systematic effort to push searchers down the funnel to commercial results. Why is Google doing this, what does it mean for SEO, and what can we learn about our own customers' journeys?

11:20am – Community Speaker – Beyond the Button: Tests that Actually Move the Needle

Karen Hopper

In a world that has a million different options for every creative element... where do you start? How do you know this or that element is where you'll see an impact big enough to make a difference for your bottom line? This is the number one question CRO strategists get asked, and the answer every time is: it depends! This session will walk through how to understand your testing opportunities, generate test ideas, and measure your results with scientific accuracy.

11:40am – Understanding Key Performance Factors: Using Data to Make Smart Decisions for Organic Search

Joe Hall

What KPIs are actually key? In this talk, Joe shows how organizations can use their own data to ascertain what’s relevant for actionable insights, in the hopes of helping you to develop smart SEO strategies.

12:15pm – Birds of a Feather lunch discussion tables

1:50pm – Leadership and Community in Search MarketingL Strong Teams, Better Results

Amalia Fowler

As search marketers, we spend a lot of time optimizing our campaigns, but don't have the same time to put into nurturing our teams. This is especially true when faced with things like a global pandemic, the great resignation, increased competition and the whims of Google. It's easy to forget that taking purposeful action in our working relationships can help lead us to better results. In this practical and actionable talk, we'll bust the myth that you have to be a manager to have influence, discuss the importance of leadership and community, identify three key characteristics strong teams have in common, get tips on fostering those characteristics regardless of your role, and discuss how taking the time to do this serves all of us, clients included.

2:15pm – Community Speaker – Things I Learned from Sales Teams that Every SEO Should Know

Petra Kis-Herczegh

Whether you're trying to build a business case or get buy-in for your SEO project, some of the core challenges will come down to the same thing: How well can you sell it? As SEOs, we often forget that, even though we spend our day-to-day analyzing data and optimizing content and websites for bots, at the end of the day, we are working with human beings — and some of those people have decision-making power over what we can and can't achieve in our roles. This is where learning a good set of sales skills becomes crucial. In this talk, Petra will explore some of the key skills and methods sales teams use, and how you can apply these to your SEO work.

2:35pm – The Untapped Power of Content Syndication

Amanda Milligan

Many marketers have long wondered whether syndicated content has SEO value. To help provide an answer, Amanda walks through case studies that illustrate the significant impact syndicated content strategies can have on your site's authority, rankings, and traffic.

3:10pm – Afternoon break

3:40pm – Community Speaker – Advanced On-Page Optimization

Chris Long

Take your on-page optimizations to the next-level using advanced tactics for one of the most common SEO tasks. This presentation goes beyond simply adding keywords. Chris will show you how to utilize tools such as IBM's Natural Language Understanding to find semantic entities of competitor pages, how Google's EAT guidelines apply to content, and what actionable steps you can take to improve content, perform on-page content experiments, and measure the impact of those tests.

4:00pm – Keyword Research for Thanks Instead of Ranks

Wil Reynolds

Seer Interactive has used keyword research methods to uncover ways to help clients understand their customers better. From diversity and inclusion, to hopes and fears, customers are leaving clues in their long tail searches. Wil demonstrates why you should spend the time to find them.

4:45pm – Day 3 Thank you & Farewell

7:00pm–10:00pm — Wednesday Night Bash

Bowling: check! Karaoke: check! Photo booth: check! Join us for one last hurrah as we take over the Garage. You won't want to miss this closing night bash — we'll have plenty of games, food, and fun as we mix and mingle, say "see ya soon" to friends new and old, and reminisce over our favorite lessons from the past three days.

See you there?

Chatting with speakers, connecting with peers and potential partners in Birds of a Feather lunch tables, absorbing all the knowledge for another fruitful year of marketing... we can't wait to share it with you! Get your ticket now and we'll see you in July!

#marketing

[localbizlift]

Using Ubersuggest for E-Commerce: Everything You Need to Create a Killer Online Store

Despite the growth of social selling for e-commerce, SEO keyword optimization is still crucial to long-term business success. Why? Because that’s how most customers find you.

Search traffic is responsible for 65 percent of e-commerce sessions. If you’re not optimizing for keywords, buyers won’t find you among your competitors.

SEO offers many other advantages. SEO offers many other advantages. For instance, it has a fantastic ROI when done correctly. 

If you want further proof of SEO’s advantages, case study after case study shows how a few tweaks can potentially get your site to the front page of Google. 

A few words of warning before I move on: 

Don’t expect results overnight. SEO can take time to yield results, but it’s a valuable investment that pays off long-term. 

Don’t let SEO overwhelm you. There are numerous areas of SEO I could discuss here, but let’s just focus on keywords for now.

Why Should E-Commerce Companies Care About SEO Keywords?

With an estimated 4.2 million e-commerce businesses in North America, there’s a ton of competition. 

To stay ahead of the curve, you need to do everything possible to optimize your site, rank higher in SERPs, and increase visibility. You’ve probably guessed by now, but one of the best ways to do this is with strategically chosen keywords.

For guidance, your chosen keywords should be:

Relevant to your product and target audience. 

Attainable in search results.

Lucrative in terms of driving targeted, profitable traffic to your online store.

When it comes to finding keywords, you need resources to help you along the way. This is where Ubersuggest comes in. 

Ubersuggest is a free tool that makes it easy to research keywords and identify which ones to target. 

But, you don’t have to take my word for it. Let’s talk about how Ubersuggest helped our e-commerce customer, Portrait Flip, improve traffic and drive ROI. 

Portrait Flip is an online store that creates real portraits by real artists from customer photos around the world. Using Ubersuggest for its keyword research, the company increased its organic traffic by 70% in just two years and increased revenue by 32.33 percent over their goal. 

Perhaps you think that’s unattainable. However, there’s a simple reason behind the enhanced results: you drive more relevant, organic traffic to your website by optimizing your pages by targeting the right keywords.

How to Use Ubersuggest to Create a Killer Online Store

From SEO audits and competitive analysis to monitoring results and adapting your approach, plenty goes into running a successful online store. However, there’s no need to get overwhelmed. With the right tools, creating a killer e-commerce store isn’t complicated. 

Below are five steps to creating a killer online store using Ubersuggest. (link to each section)

Create a project from your dashboard in Ubersuggest,

Perform an SEO Audit.

Find the right keywords to target. 

Conduct Competitive Analysis. 

Create a Backlinks Plan. 

Track Your Progress. 

I’ll walk you through each step of the way. 

Step #1 Create a project in Ubersuggest

If you’re new to Ubersuggest, you need to start with the basics.

Begin by registering for a free account.

Once you do that, go to the dashboard and click on “Add Your First Project.” Next, add your website URL and name.

It’s also essential to connect your project to your Google Account to see how your keyword strategy is affecting your Google presence. Here’s how to do that:

Go to the dashboard.

Select the project you want to connect to Google Search Console. 

Click ‘connect with Google.’

Connect the account or select the ‘Use another account’ option.

Remember, SEO takes time, and there might be some trial and error along the way. Therefore, once you’ve set it all up, I recommend you use Ubersuggest at least once a week to: 

Check-in on your SEO progress (you can use the different weekly alerts to help you understand where to focus your efforts).

Work through the suggestions in your dashboard.

See what your competitors are up to and take small steps each week to compete against them.

Find new keywords to target on your product pages (try A/B testing product pages with different keywords to see which one ranks higher).

Portrait Flip did this and achieved significant success and savings:

“We were able to create and implement a clear SEO strategy with Ubersuggest starting in January of 2020 that helped our organic traffic take off. We’ve saved thousands of dollars on paid advertising by keeping Ubersuggest at the heart of our SEO, and we’ve watched our SEO and our revenue grow exponentially, too.”

Step #2 Perform an SEO Audit.

The Ubersuggest Site Audit is the best place to start with your Keyword Strategy. When you perform this analysis, you get a general overview of your website’s SEO standing. 

From here, you can understand where your website ranks in terms of industry-standard for optimal SEO health.

To perform a site audit:

Go to the project dashboard.

Find SEO explorer on the left side menu and select ‘SEO Analyzer.’

Wait for the analyzer to create a report; your report sorts errors by difficulty and how fixing them impacts your SEO.

Review your report. Pay careful attention to the ‘See All SEO Errors,’ on the associated tab.

Click ‘What is this, and how do I fix it?’ on the associated tab. 

Once you’ve reviewed the major issues, select the ‘SEO Analyzer Overview’ option. This takes you back to the site audit main page.

Now, you’re ready to review the second part of your audit report, which details your desktop and mobile web speed. Use the orange circular toggle, to switch between Desktop and Mobile reports.

Fix the issues, return to the ‘SEO Analyzer’ overview, and choose the ‘recrawl’ button at the top of the page.

Finally, review the report to see if you’ve fixed the errors or if there are any fresh ones. 

Here’s how Portrait Flip used the site audit feature.

First, Portrait Flip optimized its results by focusing on the ‘Broken Link’ finder.

This helped the business understand where it was losing potential customers due to broken product links. 

At first glance, this might not seem like an important issue, but broken links negatively impact your SEO and the customer experience.

Portrait Flip also found the ‘Page Load Time’ report invaluable, as the company was keen to see if any added website code was inadvertently increasing its load times.

Again, this may not seem like a significant issue. However, speed is crucial for online shopping. Ideally, you want your e-commerce store to load within two seconds. Anything above that adds to your bounce rate and customer dissatisfaction and leads to lost sales. 

After fixing simple issues on the Portrait Flipw website, 98 percent of the revenue generated from its SEO and PPC efforts in 2021 came from organic search. 

Step #3 Research Keywords to Target

Now, this is where the fun starts. 

You can use the Ubersuggest Keyword Reports to understand which keywords to include in your content to drive relevant and lucrative traffic.

There are two main features to focus on here. 

1. Keyword Overview 

The keyword overview allows you to see how competitive a keyword is and its search volume trend over time. To narrow down your keyword choices, think of the general search terms your target audience might use when searching for a product you sell.

2. Keyword Ideas  

The keyword research feature shows you how people search for keywords related to your business and your products. It enables you to uncover valuable keywords that other competitors aren’t targeting.

How Portrait Flip uses these tools:

Content marketing is at the heart of Portrait Flip’s efforts to attract traffic to its site. For example, the business used blogging and posted regularly on its social media channels. However, these efforts weren’t driving traffic the way the company hoped. 

This is where Ubersuggest proved its worth.

The Keyword Overview report enabled Portrait Flip to find relevant keywords to focus on and that prospects use in their searches. 

Next, Portrait Flip optimized its blog posts and e-commerce product pages with new keywords. 

Finally, Portrait Flip used the Keyword Idea and Content Idea reports to help them plan out their next blog topics. 

The results were exceptional.

Portrait Flip exceeded their traffic expectations in one quarter by over 27 percent—and that’s without any paid advertising. If you’re planning on using these reports, here are a couple of tips to get the most out of it them: 

Find The Most Competitive Keywords

Use the ‘SEO Difficulty’ filter to help determine which keywords are more competitive than others. Be intentional in comparing this with the ‘Paid Difficulty’ feature to help decide if you should pay for Google Ads against the keywords. 

NOTE: Keywords with high Paid Difficulty are usually lucrative. However, they are almost always more expensive.

Search by Location

If you want to attract a worldwide audience, search for global keywords on the ‘location’ tab. You can target your geographical search towards specific local traffic or by country. This can help you find unique keywords in different regions to target.

Step #4 Conduct a Competitive Analysis

Competitive analysis is an essential part of any effective SEO strategy. By understanding your competitors, you can learn what techniques and keywords they’re using to rank well in search engines and replicate their successes.

Ubersuggest makes this task more manageable than ever. Just use the following tools: 

Keywords by Traffic: Go to Ubersuggest, enter the competitor domain URL, and hit “Search” to find the top keywords that the website ranks for. Note any organic keywords and monthly traffic, the domain score, and backlinks. You can also add your competitor’s URL as a project in your Ubersuggest dashboard for regular tracking. 

Backlinks Opportunities: Discover what websites are linking to your competitors and get a detailed overview of who to reach out to request links back to your site. Here’s how: 

1. Enter your domain name or URL from your site into the Backlinks Opportunity tool. (Linked above).

2. Enter a competitor domain or a URL from their site. 

3. Click ‘search.’

You can also use the Ubersuggest Chrome Extension for keyword analysis directly in Google search results, YouTube, AND Amazon pages for further insights.

Here’s how you’ll see the data in your SERPs: 

You can also remove competitors or add them.

You’ll also see monthly search and CPC: 

#marketing

[localbizlift]

E-commerce Optimization: 6 Steps to Boost Your Conversion Rates

For online stores, increasing conversions is the key to long-term success.

After all, if visitors don’t buy, then you’re not making any money! And with $7.31 trillion dollars projected to be spent on e-commerce retail by 2025, you want to make sure to optimize your CRO so you can receive as much of that spend as possible.

That said, optimizing your e-commerce store can be confusing.

Even if you’ve done everything right, from driving traffic to your website to running digital ads, you might still see low conversion rates. The average conversion rate for US e-commerce stores was 2.8 percent in the second quarter of 2021 (which is the most recent data available).

So what gives, and how can you push past a three percent conversion rate? E-commerce optimization is all about making it easy for your visitors to buy from you.

How do you do that? It starts with diving into your analytics to see where visitors are getting stuck. If that sounds complicated, don’t worry—I’m going to walk you through it.

First, however, let’s talk about why CRO is different for e-commerce websites.

How Is Conversion Optimization Different for E-commerce Stores?

Conversion rate optimization (CRO) for e-commerce stores is different because e-commerce stores sell physical products, which can be more complex and time-consuming to purchase than, for example, a service – which has an average 9.3 conversion rate across the industry.

The difference in average conversion rates is partially because a service website might have one or two steps in the checkout process, while an e-commerce store could have five or six – meaning it’s all the more important for you to optimize your CRO.

This means e-commerce stores need to pay more attention to the purchase process, from product pages to the checkout page.

E-commerce stores have unique friction points, such as shipping and returns, which can impact purchase decisions.

Because of this, e-commerce owners need to take a holistic approach to optimizing their stores.

This might mean looking for opportunities to increase customer confidence through social proof and streamlined checkout processes.

Ultimately, e-commerce owners should focus on creating a frictionless purchase experience to boost their conversion rates.

E-commerce CRO Strategy #1: Add Recommended Products

Adding recommended products to your e-commerce store is a great way to increase conversion rates.

When someone visits a product page, they want information about the product and how it can meet their needs.

If you suggest additional products that might be of interest, you can help guide their purchase decision and increase your conversion rate.

Invespcro found that 37 percent of shoppers clicked a recommended product during their first return visit to a site.

Similarly, shoppers that click on product recommendations are four and a half times more likely to add items to the cart and complete a purchase.

Amazon, for example, recommends products based on previous purchases or items you looked at. This helps keep customers engaged with the site and increases sales.

They also use “Frequently Bought Together” prompts to show customers related items they may like.

Recommending relevant products to your customers also improves the personalization of your e-commerce store.

Website personalization and product recommendations can be further enhanced by using AI, trending data, and previous shopping experiences.

86 percent of consumers say website personalization affects their purchasing decisions. This is an e-commerce conversion rate optimization tactic you don’t want to miss out on.

You can add recommended products in several different ways. Some examples include:

adding recommended products at the purchase stage, somewhere above or under their shopping cart

adding recommended products in the confirmation/transaction email you send to customers when they make a purchase

add recommended products on search results pages for similar/related products

The steps for adding recommended products will vary based on your e-commerce platform. Here are instructions for the most popular platforms:

Shopify

Big Commerce

WooCommerce

E-commerce CRO Strategy #2: Make Sure Your Product Pages Shine

High-quality product pages are key to your e-commerce success.

When customers can see what they’re buying and get an idea of how it will look and function in their lives, they feel more confident about the purchase.

Since your visitors can’t touch and feel your products, you need to make sure the media you use on each product page does them justice.

Start with high-quality photos that depict the product from various angles at different levels of detail.

Make sure your photos are high enough resolution to support a zoom feature to show texture and details.

If you have the space, add a 360-degree view of the product so customers can get a complete look.

If your e-commerce store sells clothes or accessories, use models to show how the items look on various body types.

Besides images, consider using demo videos or explainer videos to show your products in action.

Remember, you don’t have to generate all the content yourself either.

Encourage customers to submit visual content or source your images and videos from social media, which perform double duty as social proof, which will help increase conversions.

Product descriptions that highlight key features are also key to getting shoppers to buy.

Be sure to include all pertinent information, such as size, color, and fabric content.

Use clear and concise language to avoid confusion and highlight the unique features of your products.

E-commerce CRO Strategy #3: Streamline Navigation

You can’t make sales if site visitors can’t find what they want.

Your site’s navigation is often the first place shoppers look if they have a specific product or category in mind.

Navigation that is confusing, too complex, or difficult to understand will cost you sales and customers. In fact, a HubSpot case study found that simplifying or removing navigation elements from middle-of-the-funnel landing pages resulted in a 16-28% increased conversion rate!

There’s no one-size-fits-all solution for e-commerce website navigation. The best way to design a website menu depends on the nature of your products and how your customers like to organize information.

Here are a few steps for creating effective e-commerce website navigation:

Use heat maps or do user testing to find how and where users click.

Prominently display categories on every page.

Include clear labels and concise descriptions for all menu items.

Create intuitive and logical menus based on how your customers browse your site.

Avoid burying essential menu items in nested sub-menus.

Test different navigation structures to see what works best for your customers.

An example of great e-commerce navigation comes from Apple.

If you have a large number of products, a drop-down menu that lists everything can be overwhelming.

If Apple included all its products and services in a drop-down menu, its website would have very clunky and confusing navigation.

Not only would that work against the brand’s minimalist image, but it’d also be hard for customers to find what they need.

Instead, Apple opts for clean top navigation with no dropdown or secondary menu item:

When visitors click on a top navigation item, they’re directed to a menu page that lists options within the category:

Doing away with a complicated drop-down also helps streamline the mobile user experience, which is increasingly important.

Clear navigation also has SEO and UX benefits.

Providing a clear path to the products customers are looking for makes it easier for shoppers to find what they need on your site—which increases sales.

This can help improve your search engine ranking, as Google (and other search engines) favor sites that are easy to navigate.

If you’re unsure if your site is easy to navigate, or have seen drop-off points in your analytics, consider using a heat map tool like Crazy Egg to see where people click on your pages.

You can also use a tool like Optimizely to test different versions of your navigation and see which one leads to more conversions.

Once you’ve identified any potential drop-off points, it’s time to start making changes!

E-commerce CRO Strategy #4: Add a Wish List or Favorite Option

Wish lists and favorite options allow users to save items they might buy later.

This is a great way to increase conversions because it gives users the opportunity to “test drive” your site and come back later to buy products they love.

Creating a wish list also requires customers to create an account for your e-commerce store.

This allows you to offer relevant promotions and gather customer data to improve user experience and increase sales.

Wish lists can help you:

alert customers about special offers available for items on their wish lists

deliver targeted content based on items they’ve shown interest in

identify retail trends and seasonal activities to improve demand forecasting

understand what your customers are looking for and offer similar products

Research from Google found 40 percent of online shoppers think their experience would be better if they were offered a wish list.

In addition, make it easy for your customers to create wish lists on other platforms. For example, enable “Pin It” buttons so visitors can share your products on their Pinterest wish lists.

Or, promote the use of the “Save” feature on Instagram and Facebook.

There are many ways to make it easy for your customers to save products they are interested in.

If you use Shopify as your e-commerce platform, you have two options for adding a wish list feature: add custom code to your site, or add a wishlist app, like Wishlist Hero.

On BigCommerce, all you need to do is enable wishlists in your shop’s settings.

WooCommerce offers an extension so you can allow users to add items to their wishlist when they shop your store.

E-commerce CRO Strategy #5: Streamline the Check Out Process

According to the Baymard Institute, 69.82 percent of e-commerce carts are abandoned at checkout.

This rate increases on mobile and desktop devices, which have some of the highest cart abandonment rates.

Cart abandonment rates by device:

desktop: 66.1 percent

mobile: 80.6 percent

To avoid losing customers at the checkout, make the process as quick and easy as possible.

This means offering clear and concise shipping information, providing a guest checkout option, and ensuring all payment methods are available.

You should also ensure the checkout process is easy to navigate with all required information requested upfront.

Here are a few ways to streamline the checkout process:

Use a single-page checkout: This will keep customers from going through multiple pages to check out.

Save billing and shipping information: Customers hate having to enter their information each time they make a purchase, so make their checkout process easier by saving and auto-filling their information.

Use a progress bar: Let customers know how far along they are in the checkout process so they don’t get impatient.

Offer a shipping calculator: This will help customers determine how much their shipping will cost and whether or not they want to continue with the purchase.

Personalize page to their local currency: Customers feel more comfortable when they’re making a purchase in their local currency.

Reduce clicks: Try to make the checkout process straightforward, so customers don’t get frustrated and leave.

Provide order confirmation: Once a customer has completed their purchase, send them an order confirmation to let them know everything went through successfully.

Include trust symbols: Add trust symbols like security seals to reassure customers their information is safe and their purchase is legitimate.

Remember, the easier you ca

#marketing

[localbizlift]

5 Surprising SEO Test Results

SEO testing expert Emily Potter joins us once again to wrap up this season of Whiteboard Friday! Today, she takes you through a few tests that generated unexpected results for her team at SearchPilot, and what those results mean for SEO strategy.

Enjoy, and stay tuned for the next season of Whiteboard Friday episodes, expected later this summer!

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Howdy, Moz fans. I'm Emily Potter. I'm Head of Customer Success at SearchPilot. If you haven't heard of us before, we're an SEO A/B testing platform. We run large-scale SEO tests on enterprise websites.

So that's websites in industries like travel, e-commerce, or listing websites, anything that has lots of traffic and lots of templated pages. Today I'm here to share with you five of our most surprising test results that we've run at SearchPilot. Part of a successful SEO testing program is getting used to being surprised a heck of a lot, whether that's because something you really thought was going to work ends up not, an SEO best practice test that ends up actually hurting your organic traffic, or something that you've tested just because you could that ends up being a winner.

All of our customers and us as well get surprised all the time at SearchPilot, but that's what makes testing so important. If you're a large enterprise website, then testing is what gives you a competitive edge. It helps you find those things that your competitors maybe wouldn't, especially if they're not testing, and it helps you stop yourself from rolling out changes that would harm your organic traffic that you maybe would have had you not been able to test them.

Or sometimes it's as simple as giving you a business case to get the backing that you need to roll out something on your website that you were going to do anyway but maybe didn't have the buy-in from other stakeholders. If you want to learn more about how we run tests at SearchPilot and how we control for things like seasonality, algorithm updates, and all that, go to our website and there's lots of resources there.

1. Using 'data-nosnippet' to force Google to show custom meta descriptions

Okay, the first test I'm going to share with you today is a customer that used the data-nosnippet attribute to force Google to respect its meta descriptions. As you probably know, Google now overwrites meta descriptions as well as title tags, and this can be really frustrating. In the case of meta descriptions, sometimes it brings in text that's strung together with ellipses, it's not very readable, it doesn't have good grammar, and a lot of SEOs find this frustrating.

So to get Google to show our meta descriptions instead, our customer added the data-nosnippet attribute to the body tag. What the data-nosnippet attribute does is it tells robots, like Googlebot, I don't want you to scrape any of this content. So by putting it on the body tag, we effectively forced Google to use what was in the head, i.e., the meta description.

As you can see, this was negative. It led to a 3% loss in organic traffic. As far as SEO tests go, that's actually a pretty small loss, but that's still not something you want to deploy and why would you lose any traffic at all if you know that's something going to hurt. So in this case, it turns out Google maybe is actually better at writing meta descriptions than we are.

So maybe meta descriptions aren't a thing we should be spending so much time on as SEOs. Meta descriptions we're finding at SearchPilot are very hard to ever come up with something that's positive, and oftentimes, we've run this a couple times on different industries and different websites, actually Google is better at writing them than we are anyway.

So maybe let's just let the robots do the work. 

2. Increasing the number of related article links

Our second test was on an e-commerce website. This was on the blog portion of their website, where they had blog content related to their products. At the bottom of every article, there were two related article links. In this test, we increased that from two to four.

Now running internal linking experiments is complicated because we're impacting both the pages where we're adding the links and we're impacting the pages that receive the links. So we have to make sure that we're controlling for both. Again, if you want to learn more about how we do that, you can check out our website or follow up with me after. Now, in this case, this was an 11% increase in organic traffic, which maybe doesn't seem surprising because it's links, we know that they work.

Why do I have this included on five surprising test results then? I have this included because actually this was to the donor pages. So by that I mean the pages where we added the links. The pages that were receiving the links, actually we didn't see any detectable impact for organic traffic. That was really surprising, and it goes to show that links do more than just pass on link equity.

They actually help robots understand your page better. They can be a way to associate different bits of content together. So they actually might have benefit to both pages. This is also why it's so important to make a controlled experiment if you're doing internal linking tests. One, if we were just measuring the impact on the pages that were receiving them, we wouldn't have found this one at all.

Or oftentimes, not often but sometimes at SearchPilot we've actually seen this be positive for one group and negative for another. So it's really important to find out the net impact. 

3. Localizing product content on U.S. e-commerce website

Our third test that I'm going to share with you today is when we localize content on product pages for an e-commerce website in the U.S.

So that was changing things like trousers to pants. This was a website that was originally based in the UK. They rolled out in the U.S. market, and they just kept the UK content when they did that. So we wanted to figure out what would happen if we updated that and made it actually fit the market that we were in. This was a 24% increase in organic traffic.

Now, to me, that was surprising the magnitude of how much of a difference that made. But I suppose that isn't surprising if you think about it. If trousers doesn't get very many searches per month in the U.S. but pants does, then I guess you would expect localizing that content to improve your organic traffic.

So places where this content existed was like the meta title, the meta description, H1, and things like that. If nothing else, this is just a nice indication that sometimes normal SEO recommendations actually work, and this was a great example of one that they were able to make a business case to get their devs to implement a change that they might not have been able to convince them was very important otherwise.

4. Adding prices to title tags

Test number four, adding prices to the titles. Again, an e-commerce website. You would think best practice recommendation have the price in the title. That's something users want to see. But, as you can see here, this was actually negative, and it was a 15% drop to organic traffic, so pretty substantial.

Important context here though. One of our hypotheses was our competitors in the SERP weren't using prices in the title tag but instead had price snippets that were coming from structured markup. So maybe users just didn't respond well to seeing something different to what other competitors had in the SERP.

It's also possible that our prices weren't as competitive, and putting them front and center in our title tag didn't help us because it made it clear that some of the other search competitors we had had better prices. In any case, we didn't deploy this change. But this is an important lesson in no two websites are the same.

We've run this test a lot of times at SearchPilot, and we've seen positive, we've seen negative, and we've seen inconclusive results with this. So there is no one-size-fits-all approach with SEO, and there's nothing that's an absolute truth and even something as simple as adding prices to your title tags.

5. Adding keyword-rich alt text

The final test I'm going to share with you today was when we added keyword rich alt text to images on the product page. As you can see, this had no detectable impact, which this is a common SEO recommendation. This is a common thing that comes up in things like tech audits or big deliverables that you give to a potential new customer.

Here, we found it actually didn't have much of an impact. That suggests that alt text doesn't have much impact on rankings. However, there are other really important reasons we would implement alt text, and we decided to deploy this anyway. Number one being accessibility.

Alt text helps your images become more accessible for those that maybe can't see them, and it helps bots be able to explain what's on the page. Or if something is just not rendering, then it helps people be able to still know what they're looking at. So alt text, although maybe not a big winner for SEO traffic, is still an important implementation and not something we want to forget about.

That's all that I have to share with you today. If you thought this was interesting and you want to get more case studies like these, you can sign up to our case study email list, which every two weeks we release a case study email and that includes a different case study. You can also find all the ones that we've done in the past on our website. So even if you can't run SEO tests or you're not a large enterprise website, you can still use the learnings that we have to help you make some business cases at your company.

Thanks for having me. Bye, Moz.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

#marketing

[localbizlift]

5 Types of Marketing Organization Structures That Will Fuel Your Growth

Successful marketing requires a focused strategy and an outstanding team to bring it all together. However, introducing an effective marketing organization structure can take your business to the next level.

With a solid marketing structure in place, your staff knows exactly what is expected of them. With everyone clear on their jobs and their roles in the company’s success, everything operates more smoothly, and it enables your team to work in unison.

However, not all business models are suitable for all companies. If you want to choose the right marketing organization structure, you need to know which type is best for your business.

How do you choose? Let’s talk about the five most common structures, how they work, and the pros and cons of each one.

What Is a Marketing Organizational Structure?

A marketing organizational structure is the setup of a company’s marketing department. It determines the leadership chain and sets out your business’s goals. It also defines employee roles, establishes employee structure, and organizes teams.

Organizational structures in marketing come in many shapes and sizes, but they all serve the same purpose: to create a system that enables the marketing department to function effectively and achieve its goals.

As Gartner’s Marketing Organization Survey 2020 notes, marketers are continuing to strive to create “more effective and responsive organizations” while minimizing disruption.

According to their research, 27 percent of marketers use functional marketing organization structures in their business.

Why a Marketing Organizational Structure Is Important

Setting up a structure benefits your company in multiple ways, empowering employers, allowing better focus, and enabling agility. Let’s look at this in more detail.

Improves Agility

Today’s businesses need to be agile. Agility is essential in fast-changing sectors, allowing your team to enhance efficiency, prioritize workloads, create relevant products, and allocate budgets more effectively. It also makes it easier to shift when technology, trends, or Google’s Algorithms change.

Agile marketing is increasing in areas like content creation and creative services, with 77 percent of businesses taking this approach.

Empowers Your Employees

If you want your business to succeed, you need the best people for the job. A functional marketing organization structure groups your team based on skills, ensuring you have the right person for each job and they have the support they need.

When employees are in positions that fit their skills and the support they need, they are empowered to succeed—which improves loyalty and your bottom line.

Improve Employee Focus

When employees have clear goals, it’s easier for them to concentrate on their tasks. When every employee on the marketing team is working with the same focus, it streamlines the process and enables collaboration.

Additionally, focus keeps team members engaged. This is crucial because, according to Gallup, engagement increases productivity by 18 percent. Further, it increases profitability by 23 percent, while decreasing absenteeism by 81 percent.

5 Types of Marketing Organizational Structures

There are several types of marketing organizational structures. Each model has its own advantages and disadvantages, which we detail in this section. Keep in mind what works well for your business may not be suitable for someone else.

A company’s structure depends on its size, products, customers, and type. Below, we’ll cover the most common systems and who should consider using them.

1. Functional Marketing Organizational Structure

A functional marketing organizational structure describes a company’s design and is built around the marketing functions it has to perform. As detailed in the intro, research by Gartner shows 27 percent of marketers use this model.

The functional structure allows for clear communication and cooperation between different departments. It also makes it easy to identify and assign specific tasks to individual employees.

It looks like this:

This type of structure allows for greater specialization and expertise within the marketing function, leading to improved efficiency and effectiveness in marketing operations.

Amazon uses this structure for its e-commerce business because it’s well-suited to the sector. Additionally, the functional marketing organization structure is favored by larger organizations and is ideal for companies with a stable environment.

Despite the positives, this structure can lead to communication breakdowns, decreased creativity, and inflexibility. Additionally, it may be difficult to move people around within a functional frame, potentially impacting the company’s ability to respond quickly to market changes.

Finally, functional structures can be difficult to manage when a business grows too large.

2. Segmented Marketing Organizational Structure

Segmented marketing organizational structures allow firms to tailor their marketing efforts to specific customer segments. For each segment of customers, a different team is responsible for understanding their needs and creating tailored marketing programs.

The structure usually works well for companies with a large customer base and a complex sales process. Businesses can ensure customers are constantly engaged, and it allows the streamlining of communication between different departments.

Additionally, organizations using this model can decide how best to segment depending on their aims and the resulting customer insights.

Advantages of this model include:

Improved customer engagement due to increased focus.

Improved communication and collaboration due to smaller, more focused teams.

Increased efficiency due to specialization.

The ability to spot new trends faster.

Customer trust through relationship building.

However, this structure can also be costly because it requires multiple teams with different skills and knowledge.

3. Product Marketing Organizational Structure

Product marketing teams have a multitude of tasks, including target audience research, content marketing, and analytics. Then there are co-branding partnerships to consider, with research showing 71 percent of consumers enjoy multiple brands working together to make a unique product.

With so much going on, what’s the best way to coordinate? By introducing a product marketing organization structure.

In this model, each group has its team of marketers responsible for developing and executing the marketing strategy for their specific product line. A product marketing organizational structure is the preferred model for businesses with different lines of products/services and looks like this:

This model allows organizations to respond to changing trends and meet customer needs while concentrating on targeted market sectors.

However, it can be difficult to track and measure the effectiveness of the marketing activities due to a lack of central control and duplicate roles in different divisions. To work around this challenge, businesses may consider grouping similar products together.

4. Digital Marketing Organizational Structure

A digital marketing organizational structure is essential for any company looking to create an online presence. If your business has a dedicated team to handle all digital marketing tasks, you can make and implement a cohesive strategy to reach your target audience.

The structure of a digital marketing department varies by company size but often includes a mix of people with various backgrounds and skillsets.

With a digital marketing organization structure, the company can have specialized teams that focus on different aspects of digital marketing, such as search engine optimization (SEO), paid search engine advertising (PPC), graphic design, and content marketing.

This specialization allows each team to become an expert in their area of focus, which leads to better results for the company.

Depending on which model you use, your structure might look like this:

You might also choose to have different organizations for paid versus organic, social versus content, and so forth.

5. Hybrid Marketing Organizational Structure

In today’s business world, companies need to adapt to the ever-changing market. One way to do this is through a hybrid or matrix marketing organizational structure. This structure allows companies to have the best of both worlds by combining the advantages of both functional and divisional systems.

Both of these structures have their advantages. For instance, a functional structure works on a centralized basis, with each department reporting to a single leader. This allows for better communication and coordination between departments.

By contrast, a divisional structure is centralized, with each department having its own head and reports to a different leader. This allows for more local decision-making but can lead to duplication of efforts and coordination problems between departments.

In practice, your hybrid/matrix marketing organizational structure might look something like this:

The flexibility of the hybrid model means it’s enormously popular among businesses, with 72 percent of employees working in matrixed teams.

A big advantage of a hybrid marketing organization is they tend to be more responsive to changes in the market. Because it is flexible, it can quickly adapt to new conditions.

However, a hybrid structure can lead to conflict between departments or divisions, and it’s sometimes hard for departments to coordinate. Gallup’s research also uncovered a lot of overwhelm with the hybrid model, with 45 percent of employees saying they spend most of their day responding to requests from coworkers.

Companies often use the hybrid model in dynamic environments which move from project to project.

More Tips to Pick an Organizational Structure

The market organizational structures listed above are among the most popular, but there are more you could choose from.

For instance, a linear organization structure is a management style where all employees and managers report to one boss.

This type of organization is common in small businesses and marketing organizations. The linear organization structure is easy to understand and can be effective when the company is small, and everyone reports to the same person.

In a marketing firm, you can use the linear form to control the flow of information from the top down. However, this can also be limiting because it does not allow for horizontal communication among employees.

Finally, projectized organization structures are organizational structures in which specific, temporary projects are given to their departments that report directly to top management. In businesses with high fluctuation in workloads, this type of structure makes it possible to quickly set up and disband project-specific teams as needed.

A typical projectized organizational structure would look something like this:

When choosing an organizational structure, think about both your current needs and your future needs. If you plan to launch several products in the next year, for example, it makes sense to create a product-based marketing structure from the start.

Marketing Organization Structures Frequently Asked Questions

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[localbizlift]

25 Ways To Drive More E-commerce Store Traffic Without Buying Ads

It’s no secret that e-commerce is here to stay.

With more consumers shopping online than ever before, retailers must work hard to get noticed.

What if you don’t have the budget for ads? Are you doomed to fade into the online abyss?

Absolutely not.

Over half of consumers prefer to shop online. Great news for online retailers like you, right?

With the growth of online marketplaces and hoards of choices available to consumers, it’s tough to get the attention you need to drive traffic and revenue.

Today, I’ll share 25 e-commerce tips to get more visitors to your site—without spending a dime on paid ads.

Best of all, many of these tips are easier to implement than you might think.

What Are the Benefits of Using Non-Paid Strategies to Increase E-Commerce Website Traffic?

Many marketers focus on paid e-commerce strategy because they think it’s the only way to outshine the big brands, but that isn’t always the case.

With 95 percent of website traffic hitting the first page of Google, all the traffic you could hope for is there, waiting.

One of the most obvious benefits of non-paid e-commerce strategies is you don’t need to invest money to drive traffic. You’re not trading dollar-for-dollar; instead, you’re trading time or resources for sales.

Another benefit is focusing on non-paid traffic means building a better, easier-to-use website. According to a study done by Amazon Web Services, 88 percent of online shoppers won’t return to a site they had a bad experience on.

With all the options for e-commerce shopping, why would they?

We’re completely inundated with options. The threshold for mistakes and user experience problems is getting lower and lower.

Finally, thinking outside the box helps build a real business with long-term potential.With paid ads, as soon as you turn off your budget, your traffic will plummet.

SEO, email marketing, and on-page experience are long-term strategies that pay off over time.

25 E-Commerce Strategies to Drive Traffic (Without Paying for Ads!)

Overall e-commerce sales have grown steadily year after year and show no sign of slowing down. By 2025, e-commerce sales could hit nearly 7,400 billion dollars. If you’re having trouble getting the traffic you want, there are tons of opportunities to get a piece of the pie.

Here are some e-commerce tips you can implement today to get more traffic to your site.

1. Start a Referral Program

Leads that come from referrals convert at a 30 percent higher rate than any other marketing method. If you don’t have a referral program for your e-commerce store, it’s never too late to get started.

Keep in mind, it doesn’t have to be elaborate.

Take GetResponse, for example. You get a $30 account credit for every person you refer to the software.

Offer something of value to existing customers for every customer they bring to you; it’s as simple as that!

To get started, find a referral program platform, then use these tips to drive sign-ups.

2. Build Out Your Blog

Google controls more than 92 percent of the search market, which means if you want traffic, you need to invest in SEO. Investing in a blog and delivering valuable content is one of the best e-commerce tips I can offer.

Start producing content regularly whether you have to hire someone or write everything yourself. I’m definitive proof that this strategy works.

If you don’t currently have a blog on your e-commerce website, starting one is easy. Most e-commerce platforms like BigCommerce and Shopify have built-in blogging templates to help you get started.

3. Improve the On-Page Experience

Google makes it crystal clear that the on-page experience is one of the most important factors they look at when determining whether a site should rank.

On-page experience refers to (but is not limited to):

core web vitals

mobile optimization

user-friendliness

To use these e-commerce tips, start by running the reports linked above. Google will offer you tips and strategies to improve your on-page experience.

Improving these factors helps increase your e-commerce traffic because your site looks better in Google’s eyes, and it’s easier for users to navigate, which keeps them coming back.

4. Build an Email List

Repeat customers spend 67 percent more than new customers—and one of the best ways to bring them back is by building an email list.

Why?

You’ve already established trust with them, and they know what you have to offer.

Take a look at this example from Birchbox:

Offering a unique promo code encourages customers to return and makes the offer feel exclusive and like they’re getting something that isn’t available to everyone.

To build an email list, try these strategies:

Offer a small discount (10 to 15 percent) for users that sign up for your email list.

Make your list feel exclusive by promoting new products only in your email list.

Post teasers about an upcoming email announcement on social media to encourage followers to sign up.

5. Retarget Email Subscribers

Once you’ve built out an email list, you’ll want to retarget users based on onsite behavior. Retargeting, in this case, means sending an email to someone who has shown interest in your business but didn’t take the action you were hoping for. (It can also be used for paid ads, but in this case, we’re covering non-paid strategies.)

Abandoned cart emails are one of the most effective ways to leverage email retargeting. In fact, they’re responsible for recovering nearly 30 percent of abandoned carts.

You can also send current customers suggested products related to a previous purchase. As we already covered, it’s easier to go after customers you already have than find new ones.

Here’s a quick guide to retargeting your email subscribers:

Look for ways to retarget users in your email marketing platform. For example, MailChimp has a retargeting email guide that walks its users through the process.

Implement the easiest retargeting campaigns first. Generally, abandoned cart emails and recommended products are easy wins.

Test other retargeting campaigns to see what works. For example, ask for reviews a week or so after purchase or suggest a new collection.

6. Optimize Your CTAs

Only around two percent of your web traffic will convert on the first visit, so capturing email addresses through your CTAs is crucial.

You need to experiment a bit to see what works. Even something as simple as the color of your CTA button can make a difference.

For example, Performable found that switching their CTA button from green to red boosted their conversion rate by 21 percent.

Try different CTA buttons and phrasing to see what works and test them side-by-side using A/B testing.

Don’t stop at colors, though. You can also test your CTA’s:

copy

placement

font type/size

including images

landing page

Offer

7. Improve Your Checkout Process

Nearly 70 percent of people abandon their cart. This can be due to hidden fees, shipping costs, too many steps, and a poor overall experience. The best e-commerce tips build on what you’re already doing, and the checkout process is a great place to start.

While people are more comfortable than ever shopping online, they also have high expectations for the process. How do you improve the process? Here are a few tips:

Get rid of hidden fees and be upfront about pricing.

Share shipping fees early in the process.

Limit the number of clicks to convert.

Scandiweb did a great case study of the steps to improve their checkout experience. You don’t need to go nearly this far, but it’s a smart e-commerce strategy to implement no matter how big or small you decide to make it.

8. Develop a Rewards Program

A white paper by Altfeld shows that when selling to an existing customer, the probability of closing that sale is as high as 70 percent.

What’s the most effective way to bring customers back? Loyalty programs!

Rewarding customers for returning and doing business with you again is a brilliant and timeless strategy.

Take Sephora for example.

For every dollar spent, you earn one dollar in rewards. The more you spend, the more rewards you’re eligible for, including discounts and free shipping. It’s so simple when it’s broken down this way, but the hard part is coming up with a smart rewards program.

To set up an effective rewards program, you’ll want to:

See what your most profitable customers have in common (location, products, interests, etc.)

Look at data to see what drives purchases. This will help you set up a reward program. Do they like free shipping? Discounts? Access to new product lines early? Use a survey to ask customers if you aren’t sure.

Look for e-commerce reward and loyalty tools and plugins to implement your program.

9. Add Internal Links to Your Site

I’ve mentioned SEO already, but this step focuses on internal linking within your e-commerce website. How can this improve e-commerce traffic?

Sites without proper internal linking don’t rank as high as those with a solid link-building strategy.

By creating a web of links on your site, you’re telling Google that you are an excellent resource for what people want to buy and you’re a wealth of knowledge in whatever niche it is you sell in. That will improve the user experience while also improving your worth to Google.

Here are a few tips for adding internal links:

Identify hub pages—these are important pages you know your users want to see. Add links where it makes sense that point to these pages.

Link to related products on your product pages. If you sell tents, link to other camping gear, for example.

Use “breadcrumbs” in the navigation to help users quickly navigate back to core pages.

Use easy-to-understand anchor text, like this: Here’s more information about internal linking best practices. It’s clear what you’ll get if you click the highlighted text.

10. Get Active on Social Media

Ninety-one percent of people read at least one review before making a purchase. Where is a great place to get a lot of customer reviews?

Social media, of course.

Are you using social media to drive traffic to your e-commerce store?

Are you using it as a place for customers to land if they have something positive or negative to say about your business?

You should be doing both things because it helps show customers that you’re a real business with real people and not just some brand.

Here’s how to build a social media strategy for your e-commerce business.

11. Incorporate Chat on Your Website

You need to be there for your customers. Sixty percent of people want to connect with someone during the sales process.

Remember that one time you were in a brick and mortar and wanted help finding something, but you walked around and couldn’t find anyone to help you?

How did that make you feel? Unimportant?

As people turn to e-commerce, they expect to have the same customer service experience they get in person. That means you need to be available to answer questions and assist throughout the sales process.

There are plenty of live chat software to make this process simple. Leveraging chatbot automation, which answers common questions before connecting users to a live person, can also make it more affordable.

12. Focus on Value Upfront

Your e-commerce strategy cannot revolve around you asking your customers to do things without making them feel like they’re getting the most for their time and money.

A great example of this is email marketing. We all know we need a

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[localbizlift]

The 15 Best A/B Testing Tools That Are Guaranteed to Boost Your Conversion Rates

What is your website’s conversion rate? What about your paid ads, forms, and landing pages?

No matter your conversion rate, there’s a good chance it could be better.

That’s because user preferences change over time. People get burned out by seeing the same ads and images, and styles change. Even the platforms where users hang out can shift.

There’s only one way to know if your ad, landing page, CTA, or entire website could convert better—and that’s to test it.

According to Invesp, 71 percent of companies run at least two A/B tests a month.

However, only one in eight A/B tests drive significant change. That means a lot of companies are running A/B tests but not seeing results. A/B testing tools provide the framework and data you need to run better tests.

Why You Need A/B Testing Tools

A/B testing tools streamline the A/B testing process by making it easy to design, launch, and analyze tests. Is it worth the investment, though?

If you want to see real results with A/B testing, I strongly recommend using A/B testing tools. They can help by:

Tracking data: It can be hard to track clicks, conversions, and other significant KPIs. Many A/B testing tools track the data to ensure you have access to the information you need to make critical business decisions. They’ll even generate snazzy reports, so you look smart to your boss or clients.

Protecting your SEO: A/B testing won’t impact SEO—if you do it correctly. A/B testing tools help ensure your tests don’t run afoul of Google’s rules.

Automating testing: The more full-featured tools leverage automation to ensure testing is as efficient as possible. For example, automatically turning off ads that aren’t performing well, so you have more time to focus on running your business.

Streamlining the test creation process: Creating A/B tests can be time-consuming. It’s easy to get caught up in the details (Should this button be blue or green? Is this CTA good enough?). A good A/B testing tool makes building, launching, and tracking your tests easier.

Increasing your conversion rates: The most significant benefits of using A/B testing tools? They can help improve your conversion rates, lower bounce rates, and drive more sales. That’s because most offer recommendations based on AI or proprietary data.

If you’re still not sold, let’s look at how subscription-based mobile phone provider Ben used A/B testing to drive conversions.

Ben began offering its customers access to the latest mobile devices in addition to affordable data and voice plans. They wanted to make sure customers knew they could choose the color of their phone, not just the model.

However, the company wasn’t sure how to share that news with customers. Using VWO, they ran two tests—one with the color palette under the phone image, and another with a menu option alongside the subscription choices.

After running the test for two weeks, they found that allowing users to choose the color option alongside their plan increased conversion rates by more than 17 percent and reduced customer calls to change device colors.

One simple test resulted in a large increase in conversion rates. Now, imagine if you continually ran tests like this. A/B testing tools make that possible.

The Best A/B Testing Tools

There are a ton of options when it comes to A/B testing tools. In fact, the A/B testing software market is expected to be worth $1,151 million by 2025, which means finding the right tool requires sifting through dozens of options.

No single A/B testing tool will work well for all businesses. An enterprise e-commerce site, for example, has far different needs than a local plumbing company.

To help you find the right one, we’ve analyzed the top A/B testing tools to compare features, pricing, and ease of use.

1. Google Optimize: Free A/B Testing Tool With Solid Features

Pricing: Free

Google Optimize is Google’s free A/B testing tool. The platform integrates with Google Analytics, making it easy to see how changes have impacted site performance.

With Optimize, you can create, launch, and track A/B testing performance all in one tool. If you’re already using Google Analytics or other Google tools, it’s simple to launch and set up your first test.

Main features include:

Ability to run several types of tests, including, A/B, multivariate, split URL, server-side experiments, and personalization.

Visual editor allows you to easily create tests.

SEO features to keep your tests from impacting your ranking.

Detailed reporting tools, including customizable reports and an experiment summary for a high-level or granular view of test results.

Built-in or customized objectives to set goals for your tests.

Experiment manager to see how tests perform over time and schedule experiments in the future.

Integration with all other Google tools including Analytics, AdSense, and Search Console.

Getting started is easy. Simply head to the Google Optimize page and click “Start for Free.” Once you accept the terms and conditions, you’ll be prompted to create your first experience.

Select the type of test you want to run, choose the URL, and then design your test.

There are a few drawbacks to Google Optimize. For starters, you can only run five experiments at a time. A few reviewers say the A/B testing preview tool is difficult to use and has a few bugs, which is another thing to consider.

For smaller sites that don’t need to run more than a few tests at a time, however, Google Optimize is a solid option.

2. Optimizely: Paid A/B Testing + CRO Tool for Fast-Growing or Enterprise Brands

Pricing: Call for a custom quote. According to Capterra, plans start at $50,000 a year but may be less for smaller sites.

When it comes to full-features A/B testing tools, Optimizely is one of the best on the market. This powerful tool offers a wide range of testing and tracking features, including:

Ability to run A/B and multivariate testing.

Advanced testing, including coding.

Exclusion groups enable you to run multiple tests on the same page without impacting SEO or UX.

Targeting and personalization dig deeper into the customer journey.

Powerful visual editor allows marketers to create tests—no dev needed.

Drag-and-drop templates to make creating tests easier.

Detailed reporting tools to highlight which experiments impact performance.

Optimizely is powerful—but it can also be intimidating for first-time testers. If you don’t have a large site and haven’t run A/B tests before, Optimizely may be challenging to use. However, if you have a large site and want to dig deep into your data and find out what customers really want, it’s worth a closer look.

To get started, reach out to their customer support team. They’ll ask for information about your website and traffic and then explain the full scope of features. Their team can also provide a customized demo so you can see the tools’ true potential.

3. AB Tasty: AI-Driven A/B Testing + Experimentation for Enterprise

Pricing: Call for a custom quote. TrustRadius reports pricing starts at $40 per month.

AB Tasty is an AI-powered A/B testing tool designed to help your business drive more conversions while providing world-class UX. They are trusted by more than 900 enterprise companies, including Sephora, Papa John’s, Walmart, and USA Today.

While it might not be ideal for smaller sites, it’s a good fit for enterprise companies looking to improve A/B testing and run more out-of-the-box tests.

Core features of the platform include:

The ability to run A/B and multivariate testing on mobile, app, or desktop platforms.

AI-powered targeting allows you to create incredibly granular segments based on user behavior.

Drag-and-drop text editor makes it easy to test any feature of your site, from the navigation bar to coding.

A broad range of goals including actions like demo requests, browsing behavior, and conversions.

Bayesian statistics engine doesn’t just track tests; it helps you understand the significance of tests by offering gain probability and media value.

There are a few drawbacks. AB Tasty doesn’t currently offer heat map tracking, while Optimizely does. Personalization features are in a separate tool, so it could cost more. Since they don’t list pricing on the site, it’s difficult to say for sure.

They also don’t support testing for paid ads, while Google Optimize does.

Is AB Tasty right for you? I don’t recommend it for smaller sites or those just getting started. It’s a full-featured tool with tons of options and ways to test, so it’s a great choice for enterprise companies, especially those in e-commerce.

4. Apptimize: Omni-Channel A/B Testing for Mobile-Focused Customer Journeys

Pricing: Contact for custom pricing. However, they do offer a 30-day free trial.

Having an app is good for business. A recent study found that 57 percent of shoppers prefer shopping in an app over other channels. However, A/B testing on apps is more challenging.

If you have an app or a buyer journey that crosses platforms, Apptimize might be a good solution for A/B testing. Apptimize provides A/B testing tools for web, mobile, OTT, and in-store. They specifically focus on testing for companies with frequent product rollouts, such as software companies.

Is it the right fit for your business? If your customer journey crosses platforms, it’s a solid option. Features include:

Robust A/B, multivariate, split testing, including in-person, in-app, website, and mobile sites.

Access controls and permissions limit who can make changes.

Funnel analysis to see how your test impacts conversions and other goals.

Activity dashboard to quickly see historical testing stats.

In addition to A/B testing tools, Apptimize offers features for workflow management to make the entire process smoother.

Overall, the Apptimize website is a little light on specific features, but they do focus on helping product teams test and personalize rollouts and manage new features.

If your goal is to figure out which color CTA button to use, this tool isn’t for you.

If you are constantly rolling out new features, want to better understand who your customers are, and want customers to enjoy a personalized experience across all devices, Apptimize is worth a try. Plus, they offer a free trial, so you can see if it’s a good fit.

5. Adobe’s Target Testing Tool: Full-Featured, Enterprise A/B Testing + Personalization Tool

Pricing: Contact for custom pricing. Plans vary based on product options, volume, and whether you need omnichannel testing. No free trial.

Adobe Target is a full-featured testing platform that allows businesses to test the entire customer experience, including images, copy, UI, apps, layout, background colors, and more. It can also test personalization’s impact, which is essential considering personalized CTAs convert 202 percent better than default CTAs.

Adobe Target includes:

Strong A/B testing features allow you to test just about every part of the user experience.

Visual composer makes it easy to create and run tests.

Multivariate and multiarm bandit testing to funnel traffic to the most successful experience earlier in the process.

Easy to set up, guided workflow enables you to quickly set up, test, and launch.

The ability to test on the client-side, server-side, or both.

Target also integrates with other Adobe products in Adobe Experience Cloud, so this is a great option if you’re using Adobe for analytics, insights, and content.

According to online reviews, Target is not beginner-friendly, so it’s probably not ideal for those just starting out. However, if you’ve used other A/B testing tools or are familiar with Adobe’s suite of tools, you likely won’t have any issues. Adobe also offers plenty of training modules to get you up to speed.

6. Intelligems: A/B Test Pricing for E-Commerce Stores

Pricing: Contact for pricing.

Most A/B testing tools focus on titles, headlines, and button colors. When it comes to driving e-commerce conversions, however, pricing can have a huge impact on conversion rates. Intelligems is an A/B testing tool designed for Shopify store owners to test pricing changes.

Does dropping your price a few cents impact conversions? What about raising prices? The only way to find the perfect price point is to test.

With Intelligems, you can easily test how pricing and features like Subscribe and Save impact LTV, checkouts, and long-term growth.

Features include:

Easy-to-use test creator so you can test and launch tests faster.

Sophisticated data collection is turned into an easy-to-read data dashboard where you can see results at a glance.

A flexible testing structure allows you to see how shipping, discounts, and pricing (or any combination of the three!) impact a range of data points.

Expert recommendations ensure you develop a solid strategy based on expert insights.

This tool is relatively new but could be a game-changer for e-commerce stores. They are accepting suggestions for new features, so hopefully, they’ll expand testing options in the future.

7. VWO: Similar Features to Optimizely, but More Affordable

Pricing: Contact for full pricing, but Capterra reports pricing starts at $199.00 per month, which is far below Optimizely’s rate.

VWO is another full-featured testing tool similar to Optimizely and Google Optimize. If Optimize isn’t quite enough for your needs, but Optimizely is too pricey, VWO may be the perfect fit. It offers sophisticated testing funnels that are insanely customizable at more affordable rates.

VWO features include:

Create and launch tests for a range of tests, including A/B, split URL, multivariate, abandoned carts, and landing pages.

Targeting based on audience, behavior, campaign, and context.

Drag-and-drop test creator.

Engagement tracking and goal setting.

Customized visual reporting tools.

Mobile website testing.

VWO also tracks more than just traffic and conversions. It also leverages advanced tracking methods such as heatmaps, pageviews, screen activity, and user interactions.

The platform offers three plans, with higher plans offering additional features like campaign scheduling and custom JavaScript targeting.

One drawback is the lack of data storage. Heatmaps tests, for example, only store testing data for 60 to 90 days according to some reviews.

8. Unbounce: Landing Page Builder With A/B Testing Tool

Pricing: Paid plans start at $90 a month for up to 500 conversions and 20,000 visits. Unbounce offers a free 14-day trial.

Most of the tools we’ve covered so far are stand-alone A/B testing tools. You add a tracker to your website, then you can build, test, and launch A/B testing.

Unbounce is a little different. It’s actually a

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