Transcript
Rob:
Welcome to the Marketing Download. This is Repeat Digital’s podcast. This is episode one, and I am here joined by Kam Hussain and Sam. Kam, introduce yourself.
Kam:
Yeah, hi everyone, I’m Kam. I work here at Repeat Digital as the Head of Paid Media. And on New Year’s Eve, my fun fact is I went out in Bristol and we had a few days there.
Rob:
Great, no that’s fine, I didn’t ask about your New Year’s plans but thank you. Sam, tell me about your New Year. What did you do?
Sam:
So yeah, I’m Sam. I didn’t really have an exciting one, to be honest. We had plans and then they kind of went out the window because of Covid. So, yeah, it was a night and really with a film on.
Rob:
Lovely. So what we’re going to do today is we’re going to just talk around what the trends are going into 2022 in digital marketing, particular focus on PPC and SEO. And yes, talk to the guys, really see what they see is going to happen in the next year. And of course, a lot of it will be an extension of things that happened previously in 2021. So to kick things off, privacy is going up, iOS updates, it’s all a bit of a mess. How do you think the impact of this increased privacy is going to have on PPC and digital marketing?
Kam:
I think we’ve already seen it happen throughout last year 2021, with Facebook iOS having a massive impact on all the campaigns and conversion tracking and Privacy is going to be a massive thing. It’s going to be even bigger throughout the next few years. Google expects to become cookie less as well. So we need to do better, really. We need to make sure that we are tracking things correctly and make sure that we’re looking at data a lot more regularly as well. I think since the Facebook iOS has had an impact, we’re doing a lot of things differently at Repeat Digital as well now. We’re making sure that we’re looking at conversion sales holistically, not just from the Facebook Ads platform, the Google Ads platform. We’re looking at it on a much greater scale and looking at where we can see sort of variances. So I think with, for example, Facebook, make sure you have your conversion API set up because that’s going to really help it make the data a little bit more reliable. And when it comes to sort of measuring campaigns on a month for month basis, don’t just look at the data and stats you can look at from Facebook or the platform itself. Try and see what else you can see differently.
Sam:
Yeah, I agree with you. I think a lot of people, especially since I’ve been doing the job, I think people rely too much on the stats that they’re given. So I suppose, yeah, it’s probably time to go back to basics really and start really looking at the data and not relying too much on what’s been given to us.
Kam:
Yeah. Also with that, there’s also lots of challenges that are going to be faced as well. For example, by doing this, conversion API tracking and conversion tracking, you realize there’s more things that you need to measure other than just sales as well. In the B2B platform, especially, you need to be looking at chats and phone calls and web form submissions, etc. Making sure that these are found and are being tracked correctly on all platforms and you need to have the right sort of measuring tools. Quite a few measuring tools out there that’s quite handy to make sure that you can see everything getting tracked correctly.
Rob:
I mean, I suppose just on that, people’s preferences are so varied. Originally people’s decision was to either send a letter in or have a phone call, but then email came about and you could email an inquiry or you could pick up the phone. But now, based on what you’ve said, you need to make sure that it’s as easy as possible for people to get in contact and have things like a chat function on your website. If you’re active on social media, you also need to be making sure that people know where you are and that they can contact you on messenger. But then also you need to integrate that with your analytics and make sure it’s trackable. I mean, just touching on analytics a bit, I suppose we’ve seen GA-4 has been something that Google Analytics has had for a while now, but I don’t think marketers in general have transitioned to it too much. It’s sticking with what’s comfortable. I’m not sure when Google are phasing out the current analytics. Do you have any idea on that?
Kam:
Well, at the moment, every time you create a new Google analysis code by default, you just create the GA-4, and unless you go into it, only then you can create the traditional universal analytics. So it’s kind of getting phased out, but not really. And also it’s pretty much really hard to create a universal analytics code because it’s really got a GA-4set up. So it’s kind of there, I guess, but it’s still here.
Rob:
More for Google to do to roll it out and just make it more of a seamless transition because of the moment it seems like it’s a bit of a barrier.
Sam:
Yeah I think until people are actually forced I don’t think it’s really going to happen just because people are comfy. People don’t tend to move unless you force them over.
Rob:
Maybe Google surprise us and just do it overnight and just watch chaos ensue.
Kam:
It’s definitely a trend for 2022. In general, I think everyone needs to smart enough a little bit and educate themselves on GA-4 because it’s happened to us a lot now where new accounts come on board and they do not have the Universal Analytics, they just have GA-4 and we have to sort of smarten up and educate ourselves in terms of how to use it. So definitely something that the industry as a whole needs to either do better at and also Google needs to a lot of work. There’s a lot to make the platform itself a bit more friendly. There’s lots and lots of features there that are missing out. So Google, please make it a bit better.
Rob:
Yeah, definitely. And I suppose on conversion tracking, we mentioned iOS before. We talked about it at length about how the attribution was an issue and how we need to be more holistic and make sure that we understand that the trend if they’re working with an agency and they’ve seen an increase in conversions overall and a lot of it might be attributed elsewhere. You’ve got to ask the question, how important has my agency been in increasing all areas of traffic? Because it all integrates. So you’ve got to be coming to a client with an integrated marketing strategy and looking at that whole view. I suppose one of the other things iOS brought was hide my email. I myself have used it a couple of times, but I’ve not really used it any other times apart from that. I mean, I find that when you’re inputting your email anyway, you’re usually already comfortable enough to give them your data. So what do you think about hide my email? Is that something you’ve been doing?
Sam:
It’s not something that I’ve done personally, no. I can see, I suppose, why people would want to do it, but it’s not great for us as marketers, really.
Kam:
Me as a marketer, I don’t have an Apple, I’m an Android user. But even as a marketer, I try to give as much information as possible to the platforms just so they they get better, and I get the customized apps and ads. I could imagine a lot of people do use that function.
Rob:
I think from an email marketing perspective, it’s going to be about making sure the person who’s managing that campaign assesses the segments and assesses its email list and whether there has been a sharp increase in Icloud email addresses and if there has, continue to clean up emails on a six monthly basis, annual basis. I know from a PPC perspective, we’re often seeing the value, or have in the past, of actually using email lists to benefit PPC.
Kam:
Yeah and I also I think looking at trends for 2022, I think from our perspective, we were seeing that they aren’t as useful as they used to be in the past, and using lookalike audiences from email lists. However, I think email as a channel itself has really helped with PPC. For example, integrated marketing solutions. So whenever you have a promotion that runs on an email and you run a similar sort of promotion on Facebook or Google Ads, it really ties in quite well with each other. We’ve seen that work and that’s probably one of the key ingredients to success here. And because I found with the tracking issues on Google, Facebook ads, email has played like a really, really massive part for ecommerce clients, a lot more than it has done in the past. So it’s just been a champion for a lot. And I think it’s going to be a big, big trend for this year as well.
Rob:
Yeah, I think people still think email is dead. You still hear that conversation, but it certainly isn’t an ecommerce. We see that a lot of clients that we bring on aren’t utilizing it to it’s max potential. And you can get some of the best conversion rates from email because they have trust and they know who you are. They gave you their data, so why wouldn’t you use it?
Sam:
Yeah, I think a lot of people kind of go to PPC and think that’s it, their marketing is done, but so much more should be done on the back end. Whether it be email marketing, SEO, general PR, it all should kind of tie together, really.
Rob:
And that’s what our best clients do. Our best clients, biggest clients, they have so many channels and they’re very diverse in their marketing approach. Rather than let’s just pay for that and get results. It can get results and it can work really well. But it works even better when you’re integrating it with email marketing. Maybe you’re doing a bit of PR, you’ve got a referral channel going. There’s loads of different areas and socials as well, of course.
Sam:
Yeah. All ties them together and it all makes your business more stable and in the end you get better results. So you should be looking to diverse rather than just stay down one channel, really.
Rob:
One of the things I’m also seeing is the change in how ads are delivered and the importance of user created ads and influencers as well. So TikTok’s a huge channel now, and a lot of businesses are a little bit scared, a little bit cautious about their approach to it. But those that are approaching it have two different ways of doing so. You often you see them just promoting as a hard promotion of their product, if it’s a bicycle or whatever it might be. And then you also see what I always like, is seeing an unboxing, a user talking about their experience of the product and it’s a softer sell. It’s still very clear it’s an ad. People don’t like seeing ads. They don’t like being advertised to so much. But I think people are more accepting of it if it’s less of a hard push, particularly if it’s coming from someone who they follow, someone who they’re familiar with. So Kylie Jenner, for example, if she pushes out, if she tries to promote something, people are going to listen and pay attention to it. What are your thoughts on TikTok ads and how you’d go about it nowadays?
Kam:
No, I think that’s a great point. I think obviously the next trend will be to diversify your channels. And that’s something that we’ve had to do with Facebook ads. I think we’ve had quite a few problems with Facebook ads where issues such as iOS updates, issues such as ads getting disapproved and banned temporarily. So this is where we have to try different channels. For example, going back to Google Ads and obviously Snapchat or TikTok Ads. And TikTok Ads has been one where it has been really good for some clients. I think a lot of brands could definitely do more with and often you’d be surprised, like if you think it’s a SaaS company and you think you won’t get results on Facebook ads, but you often do, you get higher reach, higher intent when people know about your brand a lot more. Often get more leads through that.
Rob:
No. Even if you use it for remarking, right. So it’s not your core channel where you’re focusing on that. You approach someone who’s more bottom of funnel and has a higher intent. And you say, right now, let’s try and put some remarketing out, do that on YouTube and various other channels as well as Facebook.
Kam:
Exactly. I think that is the key, making sure that you use all your channels that you can do. And I think TikTok has shown to be quite important. I think there’s still some bugs that that need to be fixed in in terms of ads. There’s a few metrics kind of missing. It’s a bit behind other platforms, but it definitely has been something that more and more brands can get used to and work on.
Rob:
Yeah, I suppose Amazon ads as well, right. So there’s so many platforms now and they’ve got different ways that you create ads and you monitor and report on these ads. And people get very comfortable with one method. But then you see other companies like Amazon, they know that Google has the best in class analytics compared to other channels because they’ve been going for so long. So I typically see that, I think this year you’re going to see more of the sort of analytics that you get from Google Analytics being applied to TikTok, Amazon as well. And then, yeah, I think it’s just important for marketers in general to be more agile and understand all those platforms a little bit more.
Kam:
Yeah and the next big trend, and it’s always a trend every year, but I think it’s even more important this year, would be testing. For example, obviously, there’s platforms such as Snapchat and there’s stories on Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn as well. But with testing, you need to make sure that you can test between different placements, different audiences, different creative, messages, etc. Just to try and find out what’s working, what’s not working as well. And that’s going to be something that’s going to be even more important this year, I believe.
Sam:
Yeah, testing as well, this probably ticks onto more like automation, but things like expanded text ads are going in sort of June this year. It’s bringing in responsive search ads. But responsive, obviously, you can’t test so much. So it makes perfect sense, until June at least, to be testing or placements for ETAs and different messages etc. for responsive search ads. There’s so much that you can test until June, but I think you’ve really got to get in beforehand because it’s so limited afterwards.
Kam:
Yeah and I think as marketers, we’ve had to learn how to actually analyse these different types of ads. It’s not how we used to test ETAs or expanded text ads. It’s not as easy, I don’t think. You have to look at the assets. You have to look at each headline individually or each sort of description individually. The way we test now, the way we sort of look at our data, it’s definitely different how it used to be.
Rob:
Yeah, definitely. I’d say one of the other things with ecommerce and different ad platforms is they’re trying to set themselves up for ecommerce a lot more. Last year we saw Instagram shopping became more intuitive, Facebook ads, being provided within that platform. I think we’re going to see more and more of that this year. Some people don’t necessarily need to go right the way through to a website, but they might click an ad and potentially get taken to a Facebook store or whatever it may be, and just buy within the ad platform so they don’t need to leave that app. I think people can do that a lot more when they’re more comfortable with the brand and they’ve bought from Nike in the past, for example, or wherever it may be. But yeah, I think that’s going to be a huge change in ecommerce, people buying more and more from the actual social platform.
Kam:
Yeah. And I think the trend for 2022 will be buying more on platforms, but also how do we get the right content? Because a lot of people are using stories or different reels now, that was quite new in 2021 whereas a lot more people using it now. What marketers and brands need to be using more of is video in general, or GIFs, or just being more creative with their imagery and using it as a way to story tell. Obviously, television advertising is quite traditional advertising. What’s so good about television advertising is it tells you a story, it tells you a story, it’s quite emotive. What we need to do as market is also become storytellers on our placements. Try and get that emotion of that message across from there, too.
Sam:
Yeah, I think they have to be quite snappy, though. I think I read a stat that people sort of click off a video within about 10 seconds or less. So you really have to reel them in instantly really.
Rob:
Yeah and one of the other trends for 2022 is programmatic advertising, and a lot of that will involve display video and various other things.
Kam:
It’s about choosing your placements. I would normally say, like choosing what website to put on, but no, it’s about placements and with programmatic advertising you get to sort of choose by where your ad gets shown. Now obviously there are other platforms such as Google ads who have Google Display Network or Facebook who has the Facebook platform but they’re not quite programmatic in the sense because you can’t really choose a placement. I think programmatic is a harder entry for a lot of brands to get into and get their ads seen.
Rob:
Yeah well, I suppose that does bring us to an end of the first podcast, episode one. Hopefully it’s been a good background to some of the stuff that happened in 2021 and the trends that we expect to see in 2022. So thank you guys. Thanks for joining. I’m sure we’ll see you on future episodes as well. If you want to follow along with the podcast and you want to be kept up to date with when the next podcast is going to be released and what it’s about then please sign up to our newsletter, so thank you again. It’s Rob, Kam and Sam at The Marketing Download. Thank you. Bye.