Digital Marketing Tips from Rocks Digital Marketing Conference, June 30 2019, Dallas

The Rocks Digital Marketing Conference was held on June 30, 2019 in Plano, Texas just outside Dallas. The annual digital marketing conference was attended by over 100 digital marketers in the areas of social media, search marketing, SEO (search engine optimization), mobile marketing, integrated marketing, content marketing and more.

Gold Mango Design, Tanuja Mahdavi, attended the conference. There were some great presentations on digital marketing topics. Here are some insights from this information-packed event.

This is not a complete list of presentations since I missed a few of them.

Opening Keynote – Facebook – The Future?

The opening keynote panel discussed the changing face of Facebook. The panel consisted of Giovanni Gallucci, Heather Nichols, Nicole Wight and Cameron Gawley.

The panel discussed that the Facebook layout is evolving. The Newsfeed is changing. Video is becoming more important. Facebook is becoming more Pay and Play. The Facebook organic approach has moved to communities.

Quick tips to try:
• Start an online community for your brand. Use custom audiences.
• Videos are more important. Post videos to increase awareness. Be authentic.
• Use SEMrush to research topics. Also talk to your customers to find topics that interest them.
• Use YouTube autocomplete to see what people are searching for.
• Use other tools like BuzzSumo.com and AnswerThePublic.com to research which content is doing well.
• Use TubeBuddy.com to optimize your videos for SEO.
• Use Scribe.com to get content transcribed.
• Post your videos on YouTube.

How to Create LinkedIn Video Content for Your Day Job

Presented by Rachel Chang.

Digital marketing is projected to pass TV marketing by 2022. LinkedIn is boosting more niche content. Videos shared by employees are more popular.

Tips for video:
• Face sunlight when taking a video
• Good acoustics are important. Cars are perfect.
• Center yourself in the frame. Use the rule of thirds.
• Look at the camera, not at your face.
• Loosen up.
• Don’t spend too much time introducing yourself.
• Hashtags are really important.
• Keep your copy to about 1300 characters.
• Track your analytics.

Rocks Talks

There were 3 presentations on digital marketing topics.

• Voice Search Revolution, presented by Abhi Vyas

  • 20% of searches are currently voice. Expected to be 50% by 2020.
  • Amazon Alexa is the market leader with 50 million users. Alexa is also the technology of the year.
  • Google Home and Apple Siri are the competitors.
  • Make Voice part of your 2019 digital engagement strategy.

• Bad Data is a Big Deal- Why and How to Cleanup Local Citations, presented by Justin Liles.

  • Consistency is key for brand data.
  • Bad data affects search engine visibility.
  • Make sure your brand information is correct on local listings – including address, hours, website URL and category.
  • Check your address on Google Maps.

• Local Search Success in the Age of Automation, presented by Joe Youngblood

You Got the Opt-in- Now What?

Presented by Patty Farmer.

Patty talked about the importance of engaging people with both social networks and email marketing.
• An Email Drip campaign is a series of emails that are sent at regular time intervals. It is time based.
• A Nurture sequence delivers targeted info that guides buyers through the buying process. It is behavior based.
• Use the Drip campaign and Nurture sequence together for best results to:

  • Build an engaged community
  • Expand on know-like-trust factor
  • Grow social reach
  • Become the go-to expert in your niche
  • Drive repeat traffic

• Use Stick strategies for client attraction – what makes the client stay?

  • Know your audience
  • Know your target buyers vs target market
  • Listen for the problem that you can solve

• Focus on service and relationships.

Local Search Day Panel

The Local Strategies panel consisted of Bernadette Coleman, Jerry Campbell, David Hunter and Chris Silver Smith.

Local strategy tips:

  • Optimize your Google My Business (GMB) profile for your business.
  • To rank on the local pack, use GMB messaging, photos, posts.
  • Get reviews. Respond to every new review within 48 hours.
  • Google allows you to report fake reviews.
  • Proximity, Prominence and Relevance are very important.
  • Citations (local directory listings) are still major.
  • Reviews indirectly help with search rankings.
  • Keywords in reviews are valuable.
  • A newer feature in Google My Business is Q & A.
  • Near me searches are increasing. Use the phrase variants like “nearby”, “close to me” in content.
  • Mobile features on GMB are more than desktop.
  • Claim the short URL for your business.

10 Blue Links, All Below the Fold

Presented by Ryan Jones.

Rocks Digital Marketing Presentation

Ryan talked about the changes in Google search results as Google continues to add more sections above the organic search results. As a result, the organic search results are being pushed lower on the page.

• The Google search results page (SERP) is changing. Some of the items that are being featured include:

  • 4th paid ad in paid search ads
  • Map pack
  • Images
  • Carousels
  • People also ask
  • Instant answers
  • Image results
  • Featured snippets

• SEO is changing

  • 12.3% of queries have featured snippets.
  • 31% of queries have People Also Ask.
  • 48.96% of queries have zero-click searches.
  • More traffic is going to the Local 3 pack.

• Rankings are changing

  • Out of 16 ranking positions, only 9 are organic listings.

• Image search is important.
• Google Maps are more important.
• Use Google Posts.
• Work on Q & A content.
• Use Schemas for articles, breadcrumbs, FAQ, how to, Q & A, product, events, reviews.
• Use Google My Business posts to get into Maps.

Local that Every Marketer will Love – 0 to 50,000 in Organic

Presented by Jason Hennessey.

Jason talked about a los angeles dui attorney website that he acquired and built up. He grew organic traffic from 0 to 50,000 visitors in 4 years!

Some of his tips include:
• Buy a domain name with some age to it
• Add about 20 pages of content per month to the website
• Define a content strategy
• Link out to local links
• Take questions that are ranking and build a FAQ section
• Look at Analytics and Search Console for questions to write content on.
• Tools he recommends include SEMrush, Ahrefs, and SERPs.com
• Wikipedia is a good model for internal links
• Create videos based on questions and keywords

Closing Keynote – Deconstructing Marty’s Integrated Marketing System that Delivers Results

The closing keynote was presented by Marty Weintraub.

Some of his tips include:
• Ample marketing success works if search and social work together.
• Branding is required for ultimate integration.
• Targeting channels

  • Brand and non-brand PPC – Google and Bing
  • Social display
  • Twitter social display
  • Organic and direct web visitors
  • YouTube customer match

• Retargeting Channels

  • RLSA (Remarketing Lists for Search Ads) – Google & Bing
  • Facebook retargeting
  • Twitter retargeting
  • Google display
  • Bing display
  • YouTube

• Brand Lift Measurements

  • Google & Bing brand search – keyword frequency
  • Google Trends
  • Paid brand traffic
  • Organic brand traffic
  • Lower overall PPC (pay-per-click) dollars

Summary

The 2019 Rocks Digital Marketing Conference in Dallas was an informative conference on digital marketing. There were several great presentations on search and social media marketing. The speakers shared some great insights with the audience.

• The Facebook layout continues to evolve.
• Voice search is growing rapidly. Voice is expected to be 50% of the search market by 2020.
• Video is getting very important on Facebook and LinkedIn.
• Optimize your Google My Business page and ensure local citations have consistent data.
• Engage people with both social networks and email marketing.
• Google search results are changing to include more items above the organic search results.
• To grow your website traffic, use a well-defined content strategy and regularly add new content to your website.
• Search and social need to work together for marketing success.

We hope these digital marketing tips from the 2019 Rocks Digital Marketing conference will help you with your own digital marketing strategy.

If you need help with digital marketing, contact us at Gold Mango Design in Plano, TX.

All pictures taken by the author.

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Gold Mango Design LLC. helps small and medium businesses build a strong online brand with professional websites and digital marketing strategies. Our digital marketing services include Responsive and Mobile-Friendly Websites, WordPress Web Development, SEO (Search Engine Optimization), Google Ads PPC marketing and Digital Marketing Consulting services. We are located in Plano, TX right outside Dallas. Contact Us at https://goldmangodesign.com