Optimize & Prophesize – @jonathanmendez

  • The Next Generation of Digital Marketing Agencies

    A few weeks ago I was listening to an interview with the President of a digital marketing agency conglomerate and heard the following: “You think, what do I want the consumers to do, and then you plan your campaign from there.” Here’s how I would rephrase the comment: “You think, what do consumers want to…

  • Diving Into Google Directions

    I know Stanford has a great swim team and many, many Googlers come from Stanford but these Google directions results prove a couple of things. First, mapping directions is a very difficult task for computers and algorithms. Second, the folks at Google have a sense of humor. Note direction number 20. I love the estimated…

  • 5 Lessons From Multivariate Tests on Buttons

    Conventional wisdom from the Information Architecture and User Experience gurus tells us that buttons and calls to action should be the same across the user experience. The thinking is that messaging, shape, size and color are all elements that if consistent will allow users to locate and click buttons and calls-to-action more easily and more…

  • Google Pay Per Action Reaction

    With Google’s announcement that pay-per-action (PPA) ads are launching beta (on AdSense) the world of optimization and analytics may be forever changed, or not. As it works, you get to name your price and it will be Google that is measuring conversion and optimizing the serving of ads based on PPA. This becomes a real…

  • Buy Branded Keywords? A Case Study on Traffic, Conversion and RPV

    Part 3 of 3 This is the last part of my deep dive into a question that is asked quite often. Brand keywords have seemed to be a conundrum for many in the Marketing and Brandings worlds. This series of posts and research has yielded some interesting data. Like any good testing and optimization they…

  • 5 Lessons from Multivariate Tests on Google PPC Ads

    Search ads are the bridge of relevance between the keyword query and the landing page. They are a key factor in your Quality Score, affect the traffic to your site and thus your spend and budgets. They set user expectations for the landing page and influence conversion. At OTTO Digital we’ve been working with clients…

  • Why You Must Exceed User Expectations

    Apple has an automatic pause of the track when the iPod is playing and your headphone plug comes out of the jack. The first few times this happened to me the pause was unexpected, but I was psyched each time I plugged back in and didn’t miss a beat. In fact, it didn’t really occur…

  • Information & Intent: Optimizing Content and the User Search Experience

    Everyone has a limited amount of attention to devote to searching for and consuming information. Each day a staggering amount of new information is added to the web and indexed by the search engines. How can your content get the attention of users? I spoke about this yesterday at the 49th Annual Conference of the…

  • Speaking at NFAIS

    It’s with great privilege that I was asked to speak at the NFAIS (National Federation of Abstracting and Indexing Services) annual conference in Philadelphia next week on Tuesday the 27th. The conference title is Creating Change: Opportunities for Growth in the Wake of Disruption. My presentation is: Web 2.0: Maximizing Content and the User Search…

  • Marketing Bout: Data vs. The Gut

    There is a reason that humans will always be better marketers than algorithms. The human mind can process information and data and spit out predictive models based on the tangible and intangible person-to-person experiences that make up life. It is this knowledge that allows our minds to triumph over machines anytime a measure of creativity…

  • 7 Ways to Optimize Your YouTube Tags

    I can’t get YouTube off my mind. With apologies to Gil Scott Heron, the revolution is being videoized. Contrary to popular opinion it just may be an ad revolution. H&R Block’s recent promo for their TaxCut online filing includes the most linked to comedy video in the history of YouTube. There has also been a…

  • 7 Rules for Landing Page Optimization

    This is by no means a definitive look at what matters on landing pages. There are more than seven rules. For additional insight I would direct you to this three-part series on Landing Page Optimization. However, these seven basic elements are ones I’ve used consistently for many years now with great results. 1. Have a…

  • The Sphere of Information Distribution & Consumption

    It’s a simple truth: we gravitate toward the information we are interested in. This information sits in many different places. We access it in many different ways and we use it in infinitely more ways. In the online world these 0s and 1s are the window to our life. Information on the work we do,…

  • Google Personalized Search: Goodbye Search Engine, Hello Find Engine

    For tens of millions of users, multiple times a day for each, Google just improved and it will keep on improving. All users need to do is continue using Google. That’s a pretty great way to create brand loyalty! How many products continue to get better the more you use them? A baseball glove, maybe…

  • Marketing Darwinism: Is Anheuser-Busch’s $40M Gamble on Digital Content Moving Online Marketing Forward or Back?

    This Sunday New York Times Magazine will run a piece titled “Brew Tube” that focuses on Monday’s launch of Bud.tv, an effort of A&B’s marketing team to reach the young and wired demographic with a marketer owned channel of original digital content. I read the article with some skepticism as to the effect that this…

  • More on the Promise of Behavioral Targeting

    Phil Leggiere has another great interview in today’s Behavioral Insider column titled “Beyond CPM: Bidding and Behavioral Data.” This time it’s with Alex Hooshmand of Right Media. Right Media is a transparent auction based platform that matches advertisers and publishers and optimizes ROI based on targeting. The exchange (RMX) officially opened to publishers this week.…

  • Real Behavioral Targeting Focuses on Intent

    Dave Morgan of Tacoda has an insightful essay “When Will We Deliver the Promise” that addresses a question asked to him by WSJ technology writer Walter Mossberg: when will online advertising deliver on the promise of right ad, right, customer, right time? The question is great one. However, I’m afraid the folks in display media…

  • Targeting Based on Category Affinity

    One of the more interesting things we’re doing at OTTO Digital is pushing the envelope on content targeting and re-targeting based on source and behavior. Presently we’re working with a major retailer on delivering contextually relevant content on their homepage to return visitors (either in-session or on subsequent visits) based on what category the user…

  • ROI Factors of Brand Keywords: Paid vs. Organic

    Part 2 of 3 In part 1 I discussed the thinking and strategy behind running tests on whether it was worth it for our client to have ads running on their brand keywords, especially in light of the recent Google changes to the result presentation. Would these clicks just end up going to the natural…

  • Do I Purchase My Brand Keywords or Has Google Improved So Much I Don’t Need To?

    Part 1 of 3 Recently Google has changed the way search results on brand queries appear for many businesses. They have provided them with added real estate at the top of the SERP by listing four links to internal sections below the main result and description (interestingly it seems for everyone but Amazon & their…

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