Learning the art of learning

I have learnt a lot more in the last 15 to 20 years than I ever intended. It wasn't intentional... the aim was that I left school and university (actually, it was a Polytechnic until the last year I was there) then went & got a job.

I thought I was done with learning. I'd never really enjoyed studying whilst in the education system. I'd coasted through on the minimum of effort, didn't try to learn any more than I needed to and got distracted by cars, girls, TV & computer games along the way.

But something has happened since then:

1. I now enjoy learning

2. I've learned to learn

3. I now learn so I can can tell others

Nobody told me how to learn, instead I had to work hard at it. This meant spending a lot of time reading, re-reading and focusing on truly understanding a subject.. enough to be confident that I could put it into my own words for others to comprehend it too. However, it has now got to the point that when I'm half-way through browsing through an article or online blog posting I suddenly think "oh, that makes sense... I need to blog about that".

Perhaps now I understand the Oscar Wilde phrase:

"It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines what you will be when you can’t help it"

Google Shopping becoming a paid-for service

Google Shopping, the comparison shopping engine from Google, is about to change in the UK and several other countries from today. From 13 February it is moving from a free service to a paid-for one, in an increasing attempt by the UK & Europe’s biggest search engine to monetise its functionality.

 

However it will take a little while to transition over from the free service and the change will not be completely implemented until around the end of Q2 2013. Based upon Cost-per-click (CPC) bidding for each product, the system will be run from your Google account .It will then work in a similar way to the AdWords system that is used to display advertising alongside the organic search results (SERPs)

So....Are you ready for Google’s newly-monetised service?

If not,there are certain things you can do to prepare yourself

1. Create an AdWords account
   If you do not have an AdWords account already, you will need one if you want to keep your products showing up… but it will cost you when someone clicks on one of your products.
2. Make sure your bidding is competitive
   Just like pay-per-click costs, bidding on Product Listing Ads is not just based on what you want to pay for a visit, but what your competitors bid. Setting maximum daily budgets is therefore the obvious way to avoid any financial surprises.
3. Understand the work involved If you currently manage your free listings yourself and have little knowledge of the Google AdWords system, you could be in for a steep learning curve.
4. Make sure your feeds are correct
   The slightest error in your feed to Google Shopping could break the entry for your products in the Google Merchant Center account. These feeds also need to contain as much information as possible and be completely up-to-date (so you’re not paying for products you no longer sell or have stock of).
5. Keep a close eye on your analytics
   Remember, the number of visits to your site is not usually the best indicator that your paid-for campaigns are optimised. Ensure your analytics account (e.g. Google Analytics) has your goals set-up around conversions and then adapt your product listing adverts to get the most sales.

I’ll be following this new service as it gradually gets rolled-out to users. If you have any experience of paid for PLA’s(e.g. tips and hints) I’d love to hear your thoughts.

7 reasons your content marketing is crap

There, I've said it and it's time to admit it. Basically a lot of the current hype around content marketing is crap and so are a load of blog posts about the subject.

Here's my thoughts on why a lot of efforts into the latest online marketing trend are going to be poor, very poor:

1. You have no content plan
Are you publishing content with no editorial calendar and therefore no schedule for seasonal changes? Good content begins with a good plan of what you're going to write and when you're going to publish it,

2. You have based everything around search engine optimisation
On-page optimisation of your content is one of the key focuses of SEO, however just writing content for the search engines (and not really for your readers) isn't the right way to get engaged readers

3. You're not encouraging sharing
So you're making it harder for your readers to post the URL to different social networks or to share content with their peers. Why exactly?

4. You're not linking off to other parts of your site
Part of your reason for writing content should be that it actually drives people around your site and triggers your other site KPI's. Have you got an eCommerce site and yet you're not linking off to products you feature in your blog?

5. You're not reading what you're writing.
The way to create a sustainable audience of any long term value is with the deployment of quality, original and engaging content. Like a chef who doesn't eat what they make, you need to write stuff that you believe in. which ultimately means you have to be the first consumer of your content.

6. You're not properly measuring what you're doing
How are you going to optimise your content if you don't actually collect data about what is working for you and what isn't? Ensure you have the right goals measured and that you get regular feedback on these.

7. You're not learning
Content marketing optimisation is a slow process of test and learn, where you not only have to spend effort producing content... you have to also gain insight into what is actually working. And then you have to actually tell yourself some home truths about what isn't!.