By Gabrielle Diepenbrock, Account Manager and Social Media Manager In 2016, 40% of marketers reported social media has become more challenging — with changes in search algorithms, emerging trends, and a decline in organic traffic. Organic traffic has especially become difficult for marketers. A Facebook page with over a million likes averages a 2.27% engagement…
Read moreCultural Travel By Pixel
Week of March 13, 2017 [row] [span1] [/span1] [span7] Snapchat is Gaining Popularity Among Adults. [button text="See Full Article" link="http://adage.com/article/digital/adored-teens-snapchat-popular-parents/308110/?utm_source=digital_email&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=adage&ttl=1488910927&utm_visit=1984901" style="default" size="normal" target="_blank" display="inline" icon="no"] [/span7] [/row] [row] [span1] [/span1] [span7] Google Improves its Location Tracking and Geo-Targeting Abilities. [button text="See Full Article" link="http://marketingland.com/googles-location-tracking-better-now-ever-208347" style="default" size="normal" target="_blank" display="inline" icon="no"] [/span7] [/row] [row] [span1] [/span1] [span7]…
Read more4 Tips to Consider When Implementing an Influencer Marketing Campaign for your Destination
By Gabrielle Diepenbrock, Account Manager According to Nielsen, 92% of consumers say they trust earned media — or recommendations from individuals (friends, family, acquaintances, etc.) — over all other forms of advertising. Adweek also reports findings from a survey asking marketers their thoughts on influencer marketing. Based on that survey, 94% of those who have…
Read moreCultural Travel By Pixel
Week of February 13, 2017 [row] [span1] [/span1] [span7] Competitors Leave Twitter in the Dust [button text="See Full Article" link="https://www.statista.com/chart/5358/twitters-user-growth-in-perspective/" style="default" size="normal" target="_blank" display="inline" icon="no"] [/span7] [/row] [row] [span1] [/span1] [span7] Facebook Opens Itself to Ad Measurement Audit, Giving Brands More Control Over Video Ad Buys [button text="See Full Article" link="http://marketingland.com/facebook-opens-measurement-audit-gives-brands-control-video-ad-buys-206387" style="default" size="normal" target="_blank" display="inline"…
Read moreThe Need to Focus Advertising Dollars in Mobile and Social is Paramount as the New Year Rolls In
By Gabrielle Diepenbrock, Account Coordinator The ever-changing digital world has brought much upheaval to the e-commerce landscape for the last several decades — and this new year is no different. But while change is inevitable in the ecommerce industry, it’s also growing at a great speed, with experts predicting that worldwide sales will surpass $2…
Read moreRetailers testing Google Maps mobile Promoted Places ads include MAC Cosmetics, Starbucks, Walgreens
The promoted pins in Google Maps are being tested on Android devices. Ginny Marvin on December 15, 2016 at 3:00 pm Google is continuing to test its new promoted pin ads — now formally dubbed Promoted Places — in Google Maps with a small group of retailers. The pilot is running in the Google Maps…
Read moreFacebook’s latest measurement error undercounted Instant Articles traffic
For those keeping count, this is the fourth time Facebook has disclosed measurement errors in as many months. Tim Peterson on December 16, 2016 at 11:00 am It’s happened again. For the fourth time since September and the second time this month, Facebook has disclosed a measurement error. Facebook had been undercounting iPhone traffic for…
Read moreReserve with Google: Deeper booking integration through search and Maps
Online booking is becoming mainstream, with the principal points of entry being Google, Facebook and Yelp. Greg Sterling on December 15, 2016 at 11:32 am Local search is becoming much more transactional. Google previously worked with a range of third-party providers to bring online reservations to the Knowledge Graph. Now the company has gone much…
Read moreCultural Travel by Pixel
Week of December 19, 2016
Read moreMarketing a Small Town
Maximizing Budgets and Promoting Inherent Resources By Chloe Ayres, Senior Graphic Designer One of the principles of successful marketing (especially when marketing a destination) is to capitalize on honesty. Small towns and/or smaller destinations often imitate larger destinations in order to attract visitors, but that completely misses the point. Visitors go to smaller destinations for…
Read moreSnapchat shuts down Story Explorer feature in Live Stories
Snapchat has removed its Story Explorer feature that allowed people to view specific moments of a Live Story from different perspectives. Tim Peterson on November 30, 2016 at 11:00 am A year after introducing Story Explorer as a way for people to view the events documented in Live Stories from many different angles, Snapchat is…
Read morePinterest launches Showcase to give brands a way to shape their stories
Pinterest has launched a showcase feature to give brands the ability to present their best selves. Tamar Weinberg on December 1, 2016 at 3:35 pm Pinterest has given brands an edge with a new update on its user interface. Announced today, the platform has launched a new feature it calls Showcase, allowing visitors who interact…
Read moreThe Goss Agency Presents On Digital Marketing At AB Tech
Ryan Laffler and Gabrielle Diepenbrock, Digital Director and Social Media Manager respectively, at The Goss Agency presented at AB Tech’s Hospitality Marketing Class early this month. Ryan and Gabrielle discussed digital marketing strategy and channel structure/opportunity. Ryan began with a roundup of weekly digital news. The Goss Agency reviews and profiles digital media by channel…
Read moreHow The Cultural Traveler Uses Social Media
By Gabrielle Diepenbrock, Account Coordinator/Social Media Manager The internet has given a wealth of information to today’s consumer. And people do take the time to research. They want to make the best decision with the time and money they have. Cultural travelers are no exception. Cultural travelers are looking for destinations that will provide them…
Read moreClassic Creative – Haywood County
Haywood County, after our branding workshop filtering and prioritizing all the features and visitor experiences, determined that the authentic Appalachian culture and clean natural environment were the assets that rose to the top. Thus, “Haywood County, Authentic Appalachian, pure and simple” was born. A new logo was created by illustrating the landscape in a turn-of-the-century…
Read moreFour Tips on How to Use Instagram to Reach Millennials
By Travis LeJune, Account Intern Who is using Instagram? Right now, about 46% of millennials have Instagram, and by 2019, it’s predicted that nearly two-thirds of millennials will be using Instagram. It is one of the most consistently and quickly growing social media platforms; but most importantly, it is one with the highest engagement, especially…
Read more4 Ways To Attract Millennials To Your Destination
By: Courtney Jacobs, Account Intern Millennials are armed to be the driving force behind the travel industry. They use travel to go on adventures, learn other languages and study. Why are they so eager to travel? This generation was jaded by the recession and now places less importance on saving for retirement and instead values…
Read moreQ+A: How Do I Optimize Pinterest For My Destination?
By Gabrielle Diepenbrock, Account Coordinator and Social Media Manager 1. Why is Pinterest important for travel destinations? You may ask: Isn’t Pinterest just a website where stay-at-home moms find cool recipes and quirky DIY crafts? While there may be some truth in that, there is so much more to Pinterest that your destination can benefit…
Read moreWhy You Need to be Focusing on Native Advertising
By Ryan Laffler, Account Manager & Digital Director Display ads, the advertisements that you see on the top and sidebars of almost every webpage nowadays, are in decline. One part of the problem is that they are rarely relevant to the user. While this has changed somewhat with Google Adsense’s targeting algorithm, it started to…
Read morePin It! – The 3 Most Important Tips to Optimize Your Pinterest
By Travis LeJune, Account Intern Do you have a Pinterest yet? If you are a shopper, you should definitely get one. If you are a seller, you MUST have one! Sure, it is still a fairly young social media platform, but it has been churning up some extremely surprising statistics we think you should know…
Read moreADmirable: Chipotle’s New Campaign
Fast food giant Chipotle recently came out with an animated short about two kids who grow up locked in competition with each other. The heartwarming video works because it captures Chipotle’s brand distinction in an entertaining way that resonates with others. Memorable brands don’t just offer great products or services, they connect with their audience…
Read moreTop 5 Mobile Advertising Trends in 2016
By Ryan Laffler, Digital Director, and Rachel Hornay, Art Direction/Copywriting Intern 1. FORGET YOUR WALLET Mobile wallets have become the new way to pay. Once companies proved that mobile wallet transactions were properly encrypted and secure, mobile wallets began to take off. Many top brands such as Apple, MasterCard and Android now offer mobile payment.…
Read moreDigital Advertising Statistics You Need to Know (Infographic)
Ever since the turn of the century, Digital Advertising has been changing the ways brands communicate with their audience. The number of tools and techniques that have surfaced over this time can be a little overwhelming, but with the right strategy and agency behind you, digital advertising can produce tremendous returns for you and your…
Read moreYOUR EMOJI SAYS IT ALL
By Rachel Hornay, Art/Copy Intern They say that a picture is worth a thousands words, especially with today’s language evolving with the usage of emoji characters. Emojis are intended to illustrate, or in some cases replace altogether, the words we send each other digitally, whether in a text message, email, or tweet. Instagram calls emoji…
Read moreSustain Your Brand using Instagram and Food
By Courtney Jacobs, Account Intern Brands are constantly looking for ways to engage with consumers on social media. However, one challenge is noticing the trends occurring on various platforms and capitalizing on them successfully before the competition. One such trend that is growing in popularity centers around food. It’s hard to find someone who doesn’t…
Read moreVine on the Decline
By: Ryan Laffler, Account Manager Vine has had a rough year. The popular social media app that allows users to string together a series of videos up to six seconds long in all is quickly losing market share in the digital advertising industry. Competitors like Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Snapchat are all moving to capitalize…
Read more7 Digital Marketing Takeaways from the Digital Summit 2016
By: Gabrielle Diepenbrock, Account Coordinator/Social Media Earlier this month, I was privileged to represent The Goss Agency while attending The 2016 Digital Summit Conference in Charlotte. I was able to gain knowledge from industry leaders during those two days. I almost felt a tad nostalgic of college lectures as I quickly scribbled down note after…
Read more6 Tips To Succeed In Real-Time Marketing
By Dari Mullins, Senior Account Manager As the capacity of digital devices continues to increase and the craving for new, current, engaging content from consumers rises – Brands have to act quickly to stay ahead of the emerging trends. Real-time adverting has been around for several years, but it’s popularity continues to grow on Social…
Read moreYouTube Introduces a New Ad Package
By Brady Rothschild, Intern YouTube is introducing a new ad package for companies looking to advertise through them. Last Tuesday (on April, 26, 2016) they announced the start of bumper ads. Bumper ads are 6-second ads that you can’t skip, rather than the traditional 30-second YouTube ad that you can skip after five…
Read moreHow Facebook’s Big Conference will Impact Businesses
By Brady Rothschild, Account Support The Facebook Development Conference (F8) took place in California this week. Facebook laid out their strategy for the next ten years and many of the announcements will make a direct impact on businesses. This shows how they are going to keep people as well as businesses connected in every possible…
Read moreHow Instagram’s New Algorithm Affects Your Business
by Ryan Laffler, Account Manager Algorithms are everywhere. On your smartphone, at the ATM machine, while waiting at a stoplight, I literally mean everywhere. And that’s a good thing! At their core, an algorithm is a formula or a set of processes to solve a problem. They’re especially useful when dealing with enormous amounts of…
Read more5 Takeaways from Social Media is a Behavioral Shift
Today on Social Media Today, Andrew Hutchinson discussed how we have to stop talking about the individual social platforms so much and start talking about what audience trends the usage of these social networks reveals about these audiences. Here are 5 key takeaways from his analysis.
Read moreHow to Leverage Hashtags for Business on Different Social Media Platforms
By Gabrielle Diepenbrock Hashtags have become a common way for millennials and individuals to express themselves on social media and reach out to the world around them. They can join in on conversations revolving around a certain topic and spurt their opinions to everyone interested in that topic. But while hashtags are popular for individuals,…
Read moreAnchor: The Next Big Social Media Platform?
By Brady Rothschild, Account Services What is Anchor? Anchor is an app that allows one to create content in real time and share it with one’s friends, followers and others who are just browsing the Internet. It works very similarly to Twitter, or Instagram, but instead of text or pictures, talk is used to engage with other…
Read more4 Ways to Use Facebook Advertising
Social advertising is here to stay, and you can take advantage of these low-cost, low barriers to entry social ads on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, and Linkedin. Here are 4 easy ways to dip your toes into Facebook advertising for your business page. Boost Your Posts This is one of the easiest ways to advertise on…
Read moreTreat Each Social Media Channel Differently
We constantly hear about how overwhelmed people are by social media and it usually stems from people failing to treat each social media channel differently. Typically, this anxiety happens when organizations don't do one or all of the following...
Read moreSnapchat Explores Audience-Targeted Advertising
By Ryan Laffler, Account Manager Four years ago, Snapchat burst onto the social media scene with a novel idea: an app that lets users share photos and videos that are only viewable for a limited amount of time (as of today, the range is from 1 to 10 seconds). The idea started out as a…
Read moreBest Travel Brands on Social Media
Travel brands showcase the power of pictures, real-time content, and useful information on social media, and these are lessons that all businesses can learn from and incorporate into your social media efforts. We take a look at posts from 5 travel brands and show how they ‘get’ social media. We utilize the recent eValue Analytics…
Read moreWhy Twitter Still Matters
Some businesses have ignored being consistent on Twitter because they don't understand it or think there is no way to stand out with millions of tweets streaming every hour...
Read morePinterest Promoted Pins
For our client, Brandzaffair, we decided to experiment with the new Pinterest promoted pins opportunity. Before we share our results, we thought we’d round up a few expert opinions and information about the advertising tool. According to Quick Marketing, “These advertising options give businesses the opportunity to pay and feature selected [Pinterest promoted] Pins…
Read moreFacebook Overtakes Google as Top Website Traffic Driver to News Sites: What It Means For Your Business
Google has long been the king of driving traffic to websites. For years, businesses have worked to make Google happy by being conscientious of certain key website factors: search engine optimization, keywords, meta-tagging, including images, posting new content frequently...the list goes on. Yet, Parse.ly has revealed that Facebook has now overtaken the web search giant…
Read more5 Things You’ll Learn From a Digital Audit
The rapid pace of social media means that sometimes, businesses fail to take the time to assess if what they're doing aligns with best practices and you're hitting your goals. Hopefully, you're already doing monthly reports to see growth and impressions for each of the channels you are utilizing, but this report is only showing you a piece…
Read more5 Tools to Get More Out of Instagram
Instagram can net some powerful results for businesses thanks to its quick and easy ways for your customers to engage with just a tap on the screen, and its scroll-ability keeps people glued to their feeds. An image posted to Instagram can easily gain tens or hundreds of likes or comments, whereas a Facebook or Twitter…
Read moreBranding with Periscope
Social media is one of the most powerful tools a business has in its arsenal. Need to respond to hundreds of customer inquiries from multiple countries before lunchtime tomorrow? No problem...
Read morePromoting Your Social Media Channels
All too often, we see clients and potential clients fail to promote their social media presence. It’s important to use your website, newsletters, blogs, and other visible places to promote the fact your company is on social media...
Read more5 Quick Fixes for Your Facebook Page
We spend a lot of time on Facebook for clients, for our agency and for ourselves, and we see some mistakes over and over that can be quickly fixed to up your Facebook game immediately. These updates will make your brand look more professional online and could help generate new leads or new stories to be…
Read more10 Reasons Your Brand Should Utilize Video Marketing
In the one minute it takes you to read this text, 100 hours of video will be uploaded to YouTube. That’s 250 days of video every hour, 16.4 years of video every day, and six millennia of video every year! As the world’s largest repository of moving images, YouTube is the 3rd most visited website…
Read moreSocial Media Marketing Resources
To finish our social media blog series, we've rounded up a few resources we trust to give us up-to-the-minute, useful ideas for our clients and our own social media. Find which expert or website appeals to you the most, then sign up for their newsletter or follow them on Facebook to stay informed. 1. Convince and Convert At…
Read more3 Possible Agency Roles for Your Social Media: Management, Guidance, or Training
Social media changes on a monthly--sometimes daily--basis, so it’s important that you evaluate your company’s digital presence frequently as well as taking the time to keep your social media knowledge up-to-date...
Read moreSocial Media: One Is (Always) Greater Than Zero
This month, we’re talking about social media on the blog. To start, we’ll look to Gary Vaynerchuk, one of the leading experts and authors in the field whose company, VaynerMedia, just won the...
Read moreEffective Social Media Tools: TweetDeck
There are many tools you can use to monitor Twitter, but my personal favorite is TweetDeck. With it's super-organizable column structure, you can follow lists, search terms, activity, notifications, and more...
Read moreNational Tourism Week 2014
National Travel and Tourism week starts Sunday, May 4th and runs through Monday, May 12th. For those in the industry, this presents a great opportunity to join in on a nation-wide conversation...
Read moreYour Brand on Social Media: To Troll, or Not to Troll
David Griner's post over on Adweek Year of the Troll: Brands Learn to Love Messing With Consumers brings up some interesting points about the latest social media stunts being used by brands...
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