If you’re doing internet marketing (which lets face it, who isn’t), then you need to be aware of two changes that will affect you.
Hot off the Press Item 1: Twitter is Changing
Twitter is changing. Not from the 140 character as it was suggested earlier in the year but it is making four changes that will really enhance the twitter conversation. This is directly from the twitter blog.
- Replies
When replying to a Tweet, @names will no longer count toward the 140-character count. This will make having conversations on Twitter easier and more straightforward, no more penny-pinching your words to ensure they reach the whole group. - Media attachments
When you add attachments like photos, GIFs, videos, polls, or Quote Tweets, that media will no longer count as characters within your Tweet. More room for words! - Retweet and Quote Tweet yourself
We’ll be enabling the Retweet button on your own Tweets, so you can easily Retweet or Quote Tweet yourself when you want to share a new reflection or feel like a really good one went unnoticed. - Goodbye .@
These changes will help simplify the rules around Tweets that start with a username. New Tweets that begin with a username will reach all your followers. (That means you’ll no longer have to use the ”.@” convention, which people currently use to broadcast Tweets broadly.) If you want a reply to be seen by all your followers, you will be able to Retweet it to signal that you intend for it to be viewed more broadly.
These changes will be rolled out over the coming months but certainly they are great additions to the twitter space.
Hot off the Press Item 2: PPC or Google Adwords is Changing
Another significant change that was announced this week is to Google Adwords.
- Bigger Ads
And just bigger ads, 50% bigger ads. A great addition in my mind is longer headlines – you can have headlines twice the length of the current ones. The copy is doubling so you’ll have 80 characters now. You’ll be able to explain (concisely still of course) with a few more words which will get you more clicks, more traffic and improve your quality score. - Separate bidding for mobile and tablets
Right now Google makes it impossible to bid for either mobile and tablets. I know some of my client’s accounts see way more engagement on mobiles than tablets or tablets than mobiles but we’re paying for both. This is frustrating esp if you’re seeing more conversions from tablets. Be frustrated no more, as you’ll be able to bid for tablets separately. - Demographic bidding
I use demographic bidding all the time on Facebook adverts for myself and for clients. It’s phenomenal. PPC never had the ability. Until now. You will be able to reach gender and age of your choice. I’m looking forward to seeing that.
Once you know what you’re doing, then these changes could seriously impact the spend and traffic that you see through PPC. Exciting times ahead. And just like Twitter, these changes are not happening now, they will be phased in over the coming months.
My mantra for 2016 is less information, more implementation. So if you’re thinking about jumping on board, do it now. Implement, implement, implement – it’s all about the action.
Feel free to email me if you have any questions about these changes and how you can make them work for you.
