Episode 15: Ad Fraud and what you can do about it

This episode looks at the impact of fraudulent traffic on digital marketing. We’ll talk about how big a problem it is for publishers, ad platforms and advertisers. We will step through what advertisers can do to make their campaigns less vulnerable to attacks by fraudsters, and give thoughts on how to give your non-marketing colleagues reasons why it’s still good business to advertise, in spite of problems with ad fraud.

Shownotes:

Ideas and Products mentioned in the episode

Humans Account for Less than 40% of Global Web Traffic.

Pixel Stuffing (see ‘pixel stuffing’)

Ad Stacking

Misrepresentation ad fraud (video)

Ad injections

Google Data Centres

Ad Fraud Bots reported by White Ops

IAB.canada

Media Rating Council (MRC)

TAG standards

Blade Runner Voight-Kampff machine

Polygraph Machine

Ads.txt

Google Tag Manager Conversion Linker (Video) – incorrectly called it Conversion Looker in the audio.

Anti-drug PSA

Arthur Andersen & Enron conflict of interest

Script to find How much of your traffic uses adblockers

People mentioned in the episode:

Bob Hoffman (adcontrarian)

Reboot:

To see invalid traffic numbers and percentages in your Google Ads account:

login to your account and navigate to the campaign level
Click the Columns icon and add the invalid interaction data columns
If there are clicks you consider invalid that are not reported, you can request an invalid traffic investigation. Details are at the bottom of this page: https://www.google.com/ads/adtrafficquality/what-you-can-do.html

July 4, 2019October 20, 2022

Episode 12: How Traffic Makes the Whole Funnel Work

This is part of a series on Elements of Every Funnel. Today, our focus will be on acquiring traffic.

People/Things mentioned in the show:

Bob Hoffman (Ad Contrarian)

Browser Protocols like ITP

Jay Baer

Display and Retargeting Platforms:
Google Ads

Perfect Audience

AdRoll/Rollworks

Rapp Media/InSkin Media Research

Social Ad Platforms:
LinkedIn Ads

Twitter Ads

Mark Schaefer
Scott Stratten
Kamila Gornia

Native Advertising Platforms:
Taboola
Outbrain
Triplelift

Justin Mares & Gabriel Weinberg, authors of the book “Traction”

Perry Marshall

For more on this topic, check out Episode 2: https://www.funnelreboot.com/ep2/

Episode Reboot:

Check out the Acquisitions report in your Google Analytics.

June 19, 2019October 20, 2022

Episode 11: How A Call-to-Action Makes the Whole Funnel Work

This is part of a series on Elements of Every Funnel. Fifty years ago, Author and Ad Age writer Bob Stone gave a framework for direct marketing funnels: list, offer, creative. Today, we will focus on the ‘Offer,’ otherwise known as the call-to-action.

In this episode, we look at both sides of website interaction. We discuss how visitors progress through a website and how marketers make conversion offers for visitors to complete. Marketers make a critical choice when deciding the conversion actions they use, so we go through the most common call-to-action offers used on leading-edge websites. Listen in for answers to these topics:

Why do we have conversions?
How to optimize your conversion offers
How to choose what call-to-action to put on your webpage
How to effectively use chatbots, contact form, call buttons, questionnaires, etc

Ideas and Products mentioned in the episode:

Chat tools

People mentioned in the episode:

Karl Blanks and Ben Jesson, author “Making Websites Win”

Chris Goward, author “You Should Test That”

Brad Geddes, author “Advanced Google AdWords”

Tim Ash, author “Landing Page Optimization”

Sangram Vajre, Flip the Funnel

Reboot:

Enjoy this list of Conversions/Calls-to-Action from “You Should Test That” (reprinted with permission)

Lead-Generation Goals

If lead generation is your overall purpose, the goals might include any of the following specific user actions:

Request a quote
Create an online quote
Request an in-person demo
View an overview video
Request a phone call
Take a quiz or poll
Request a situation analysis
in a contest
Request market information
Fill out a needs-analysis
Book a meeting
questionnaire
Use a needs-analysis wizard
Ask a question
Use an interactive savings or RO
Complete a contact form inquiry
calculator
Download software
Click to call
Sign up for trial offer
Click to chat
Request a printed brochure
Make a phone call
Request a catalogue
Register for a webinar
Download an online brochure
Register for a conference
Download a whitepaper
Sign up for a newsletter
Download an ebook
Sign up for a blog subscription
Download a worksheet
Sign up for an RSS feed Subscription
Download a case study

E-Commerce Goals

For e-commerce, your goals might be based on any of these common metrics:

e-commerce purchase conversion rate
Average order value
Return on ad spend
Revenue per visitor

Or they might include any of the following user actions:

Sign up for an RSS feed
Request a catalog
Subscription
Ask a question
Add to cart
Click to cali
Save to a wish list
Click to chat
Sign up for auto-reordering
Sign up for a newsletter
Add accessories (up-sell)
Sign up for a blog subscription

Affiliate Marketing Goals

For affiliate marketing, your goals might include a specific revenue-per-visitor value, along with any of the following actions:

Click through to an affiliate site
Sign up for a newsletter
Sign up for a blog subscription
Fill out a needs-analysis questionnaire
Sign up for an RSS feed subscription
Use a needs-analysis wizard
Find a service provider
Use an interactive savings or ROI calculator
Find savings in your area
Create an online quote

Subscription Goals

Subscription goals might include any of the following actions and metrics:

Sign up for a free trial subscription
Upgrade subscription
Paid subscription signups
Average subscription signup value

There are many more goals you can track, depending on your business model. For each test, choose the one that drives the most revenue. Once you have identified the goals for your test, you’ll be ready to set up your conversion-optimization experiment and get testing.

April 9, 2019October 20, 2022

Episode 10: How a Tracking Infrastructure Makes the Whole Funnel Work

This is part of a series on Elements of Every Funnel. Today’s focus is the infrastructure that needs to be in place to know everything about people’s interactions with your website.

This episode covers what needs to be in place to know everything about people’s interactions with your website.

Listen in for answers to these topics:

What are the main pieces of a funnel infrastructure
What are the skills you need to set up and maintain your infrastructure?
How to track what’s happening in your site through Google Analytics, everything from a video view to use of a chatbot
Which tools manage the tags behind these conversions
What you need to run A/B testing

You’ll also hear how Mother Hubbard, Gas Tanks and the game of Plinko all relate to tracking on your website.

Ideas and Products mentioned in episode:

Installing the Google Sheet add-on

Google Analytics

Search Console

Google’s Campaign URL Builder

Google Analytics Suite

People mentioned in episode:

Sayf Sharif

Sangram Vajre

Reboot:

Please go see the Google Marketing Platform by going into https://analytics.google.com and clicking the 2 by 2 grid icon shown below.

February 3, 2019October 20, 2022

Episode 9: How Dashboards Make the Whole Funnel Work

This is the first of a series on Elements of Every Funnel. The graphic here shows how they all work together to generate a conversion.

Though it’s not an outwardly facing element, something that’s always part of the mix is the management metrics (top-right). Today’s episode focuses on how to make the dashboards that contain those metrics work for you.