The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Digital Marketing

Posted on April 10, 2023

In marketing, AI can improve various processes. It can be used to target potential customers and respond to feedback from existing ones.

AI first started being used in the 2000s. However, it was on a small scale. Only recently has it taken hold as a marketing tool. Today, thanks to the development of more powerful algorithms combined with improvements in data processing capabilities, AI is becoming a much more sophisticated, effective, mainstream marketing tool.

As technology has grown, the role of AI in marketing has become much more prominent. Now, AI is capable of performing repetitive tasks automatically, making it beneficial in creating stronger marketing campaigns at a much faster pace.

The Benefits of Artificial Intelligence in Marketing

AI makes it easier to personalize a company’s marketing efforts by analyzing vast amounts of data quickly. Such information helps generate customer-tailored experiences and messaging.

AI increases the output of valuable marketing efforts by performing jobs that would have previously taken up valuable user hours. Naturally, this frees up employees to perform other tasks.

AI’s capability to process such large amounts of data quickly and accurately makes it an ideal tool for optimizing decision-making. By analyzing a customer’s past behaviors and preferences, and using that information to make informed predictions about that customer’s shopping habits, it can provide customized recommendations and deliver relevant content.

All of this leads to greater customer satisfaction and continued loyalty, demonstrating that Artificial Intelligence is a useful marketing tool, which will continue to benefit both businesses and their customers now and in the future.

AI-Driven Marketing Techniques

AI relies on data rather than opinion. This provides an easy way to understand complex data about customers, including their preferences and habits. Using AI may also help highlight emerging trends within a business or industry.

All of these concepts can be challenging for humans to comprehend and interpret accurately, but AI can grasp these ideas in mere seconds.

Marketing techniques that are driven by AI make it possible for businesses to leverage large amounts of data and gain a deeper understanding of each customer. They can then use that information to target marketing efforts more productively with personalized messaging. This also results in better customer satisfaction because there is greater anticipation of a customer’s future needs, trends, and behaviors.

Let’s Chat About It

One of the most commonly used forms of Artificial intelligence is the AI chatbot. This is a software program that simulates conversations with human users in order to provide customer support or information.

The benefits of AI chatbots in marketing are These chatbots provide benefits like improved customer engagement, 24/7 availability, and cost savings, to name a few. However, there are some drawbacks.

Despite the impressive tech, there is still a possibility of communication errors, and regular maintenance and updates are essential. Additionally, AI takes away the personal touch that many customers prefer over automation.

Content Creation

AI manages tasks such as writing, editing, and optimizing content created for better search engine rankings, with the goal of creating high-quality content that meets user intent and adds value to their search results.

Voice Search Optimization

AI voice search optimization makes it easier to find relevant content using natural language queries, but it also requires a different approach to SEO and content creation to ensure visibility and relevance.

To optimize for an AI voice search, businesses should focus on creating conversational, long-tail keywords, providing succinct answers to frequently asked questions, and ensuring that their content is mobile-friendly and easy to access.

AI and Social Media

AI benefits social media management by improving its performance and accuracy, but one possible drawback is the fact that it lacks both the nuanced understanding and empathy needed for honest and beneficial communication with customers.

The Right Balance

The challenge with AI lies in finding the right balance between automation and the needed human touch. Using AI poses potential data privacy and security risks, as sensitive customer information is continually collected and analyzed.

However, marketing businesses can balance and negate this by prioritizing ethical data practices and cybersecurity measures. Implementing robust data protection policies, training employees on data privacy and best practices, and staying up to date on regulatory requirements is a great start!

Such methodology can be financially rewarding. Integrating AI with other marketing strategies can enhance a company’s profit margin by giving businesses a better understanding of their customer’s behaviors, leading to more successful marketing efforts.

More Advanced AI Systems

There isn’t simply one form of AI. It’s becoming a vast network many people are already engaging with, and they may not even be aware of it. Some commonly used forms of AI include:

Chatbots: These use natural language processing to engage with customers and provide specific recommendations.
Salesforce: This is a customer relationship management platform using AI to make improvements to sales and marketing processes.

Adobe Sensei: This AI framework powers Adobe’s creative and marketing products.

Ethical Consideration in Marketing Using AI

Businesses using AI in marketing must prioritize ethical considerations such as safeguarding privacy, avoiding bias, and respecting consumer autonomy.

While AI can perform certain creative tasks, it lacks the ingrained humanity needed for true creativity to flourish. So, AI is unlikely to replace creatives, and it’s more likely to enhance their work in the future.

Future of AI In Marketing

As technology continues to evolve, the AI future looks promising. Advancements in automation, personalization, and data analysis offer businesses new opportunities to connect with customers.

No Fear In Artificial Intelligence

AI is simply a set of tools designed to enhance human capabilities while improving productivity and solving complex problems.

With the proper solutions in place, AI is poised to be of great benefit to the marketing world. Hesitation over this new technology is natural and understandable, but a responsible marketing agency can use it to benefit every client in a meaningful way.

What You Need to Know About the Shift to Google Analytics 4

Posted on November 30, 2022

computer showing google analytics

When Europe updated its privacy and security laws in 2018 aka GDPR, Universal Analytics (UA)
essentially became illegal. Many other countries followed suit in updating their privacy
legislation including New Zealand, Japan, Brazil, and even the state of California. This change in
policy resulted in Google announcing the rollout of Google Analytics 4, offering up increased
privacy, security, and control over your data.

What is Google Analytics 4?
Google Analytics 4 (or GA4) is a completely new version of Google Analytics replacing the
current Universal Analytics. It measures website and app traffic together, instead of being
tracked separately.

How is GA4 different?
GA4 and UA differ in how they view and track page views and screen views, user sessions,
content groupings, custom dimensions, and more.

Google Analytics 4 vs Universal Analytics: What’s Changing?

Data collection
With the advent of omnichannel e-commerce, GA4 collects data from both web and apps to let
businesses see unified user journeys and customer life cycles across different platforms.

Event-based tracking
UA measured users by tracking sessions on platforms and devices. This resulted in missed
opportunities and data loss when switching devices. Now, GA4 uses an event-based data model
to track user behavior. Using user IDs and unique Google signals, it’s much easier to follow
users along the customer journey.

With the shift to event and parameter tracking, GA4 introduced engagement metrics such as
engaged sessions, engaged time, and engagement rate. This is a big shift from how you were
able to track metrics in UA.

Data control and privacy
In the wake of data privacy laws such as GDPR and CCPA, GA4 offers new data controls for users
to keep their privacy. These data privacy options include the user's ability to:

● Control how their data is collected, retained, and shared.
● Decide whether the data collected can be used to deliver personalized ads.
● Delete Analytics data by submitting a request to Google.
● GA4 only stores data for 14 months and doesn’t carry over historical data from UA.
When you switch to Google Analytics 4, it only collects data going forward, so
transitioning early is critical.

No IP Collection
Unlike its predecessor, GA4 does not collect IP addresses or store cookies.

Machine learning
GA4 applies machine learning technologies to fill in data gaps versus first and third-party
cookies with UA. Predictive analytics finds trends in user behavior, allowing you to provide
more intelligent insights and create forecasts.

In-depth Reporting
GA4 introduces Explorations, which lets you access data and analytical techniques that aren’t
available in UA’s default reports. These features give you a more in-depth look at your data to
answer complex questions.

Expanded integration
GA4 was designed to work better with other products such as Google Ads, and Google Data
Studio.

I need help making the switch to GA4.

The Digital Team at AW has been hard at work transitioning our clients to GA4 to ensure
historical data is recorded and future data collection is started early.

If you need help in making the transition, ArachnidWorks is here to help. Contact us today!

Why Your Website Needs a Blog and How to Start One

Posted on September 29, 2022

Let’s cut to the chase––you need to start blogging.

Blogs are not just for those ranting because the sour cream was missing from their grocery order. Starting a blog doesn’t mean you must spill the tea on why you will never wear parachute pants again, but we’d love to read it if you do (#welovethe80s). Blogging is one of the most powerful marketing tools business owners can wield to grow their audience, boost sales and establish a brand voice. By the way, all kinds of fabulous content can help you stand out from the crowd. Yet, for this piece, we’re covering the OG.

At ArachnidWorks, we know a thing or two about blogging. You’re kind of reading one now, right?

Right!

So, we gathered our collective marketing brains to share why your website needs a blog.

Three Little Letters: SEO

A quality blog can boost your entire website’s SEO ranking. Here’s how.

Content & Keywords – Blog posts are a form of content. Content adds keywords to your site. Search engines crawl through your site and read your content to determine what your business offers. That helps search engines find your website over others. Nice, right?
Relevancy – Blog posts are a deep dive into a topic. They help you gain traction and position your content in front of more eyes, leading to more conversions. And with Google’s latest algorithm update, there is a heavy focus on intent––your relevancy––which provides value for the posted content.
Tag, You’re it! – Categories and tags are metadata mysteries that are not so mysterious. They tell search engines where to find your website and drive users to it.
Stay Awhile – A quality archive of material keeps people roaming your site longer. Extra dwell time on pages tells search engines people loved hanging out with you because your content was on point and fabulous.
Internal Links – Links, links, and more links within a blog to your previous posts equal more clicks on your content. It’s all a part of strategic thinking to help users find your brand and message.
Share & Share Alike – Think of it as the more the merrier. Internal linking in posts means more opportunities for other websites to find and link back to your site. The more websites linking to you as a source, the merrier, right? Right! And when you tag and repost your blog on social media, you tell two friends, and they tell two friends, and so on, you’re going to have more eyes on your content.
Where the Heck Are You? – Tagging locations to your post is a must for location-based businesses. For the local donut shop that needs those eclairs to fly out the door, you want donut-lovers to know where to snag the best in town.

If You Write it, They Will Come

You want to set yourself apart as an expert in your lane. It helps customers get to know you and build trust. It’s not a matter of just writing content for content’s sake. You want to give the masses material that solves a problem, gives them actionable steps, and shows them YOU are the one who feels their pain (points).

Who Are You?

You have a brand to define for the masses. That starts with creating a voice people recognize. You immediately know when you see that circular, green sign that it’s calling you toward caffeine. That smirk on a cardboard box? Something special is on your doorstep, right? These companies have defined their brand to the point that you don’t even need a name on their logo to know who they are. You know their voice, identity, and how they improve your life with their services. You can get there too! It starts with becoming an industry expert who builds rapport and connects with others.

My People!

You can’t grow your audience without content, and content helps you grow your audience. You want traffic to be bumper-to-bumper on your site to generate new leads. These leads mean you’ve found your people! A great way to keep the interaction alive on your site is to include a call-to-action (CTA) that offers them a little something. You know what we mean by CTA. Things like:

But wait, there’s more!
Free gift just because you’re fantastic!
Act now. Space is limited!
Sign up today, and you’ll receive an invite to my virtual bad holiday sweater party!

Other CTAs we love include:

Free eBooks
Downloadable whitepages
Fact sheets
Video lessons or webinars
Free trials
Donuts. The ones with sprinkles.

Okay, maybe not the donuts, and it’s obviously sugar-rush snack time at ArachnidWorks HQ, yet you see where we’re going with this. Anything you can offer users to jump into that funnel and start a relationship can drive long-term results.

Ready to start that blog? Awesome! Want to turn to the Frederick, Maryland, marketing pros who can help you get it done? Even better! ArachnidWorks is a multi-disciplined design collective dedicated to bringing clients strategic marketing, top-quality design services, and SEO strategy that gets businesses noticed. Let us help you make some crazy-cool content. Reach out, and let’s get started!

5 Signs Your Website Needs a Refresh

Posted on April 20, 2022

Bouncing is good for rubber balls and inflatable castles, but when it comes to your website? Not so much. If you’re finding high bounce rates and low conversions on your site, it’s time for a change.

Here are five things that could be holding your website back:

1. Navigation Nightmares

User experience (UX) is a crucial factor in website design. If your potential customers can’t find what they want on your site, they’ll leave and most likely never return. An effective website is optimized for the user experience, whether it’s on desktop or mobile.

Part of this experience is page loading times. Customers expect a seamless website experience with a loading time of two seconds or less. A recent survey found that half of all visitors will leave a site taking more than six seconds to load. If potential customers can’t find what they need on your site or leave before it loads, you’ve already lost them.

2. Do You Need Pest Control?

Bugs aren’t popular, whether they’re crawling on the ground or invading your website. If you find you’re spending too much time fixing issues, or if visitors are complaining about crashes and other issues with the site’s functionality, it’s time to upgrade to a new site.

3. Google Doesn’t Like You

If your site isn’t showing up in the search rankings on Google, it isn’t optimized properly. The best-performing sites are on page one. If you don’t see yourself listed there, consider it a sign that you need to step up your game.

One of the most important parts of a professional website upgrade will involve technical SEO audits and optimization.

4. Old Site, New You?

Some businesses evolve over time, whether it’s through their audience, culture, or the goods and services they offer. If you fall into this category, make sure your website evolves with you.

Some signs that you’ve outgrown your site can include:

Inquiries about products you no longer carry
Inquiries that are not related to your current business model
Google lowered your rank
You’ve taken no actions to align your business and site since a major change
You’ve seen a drop in sales and conversions after rebranding

5. Your Website is Unappealing

Like it or not, browsers are judging you by your website. If your website screams “1990s,” it may be time for a new coat of paint (and probably a look under the hood). Updating graphics, changing fonts, improving the UX, and streamlining navigation are all ways to make a website more appealing to browsers.

Is it Time for a Website Redesign?

We’re marketing experts with a personal touch; we listen to your needs and align your website design solutions to your business. It’s not one-size-fits-all, it’s a personal and highly customizable journey for each of our clients. Ready to take your business to the next level? Contact us now and let’s get started.

Top 7 Things to Avoid When Sending Email Newsletters

Posted on January 11, 2022

Sure, you may have worked for days on your newsletter content, and it looks great, doesn’t it? The truth is, a newsletter is only an effective marketing tool if it’s opened. How do you avoid “trash,” “unread,” or even worse, “reported as spam?”

Here are some of the top things to avoid:

1. Making Your Newsletters too Generic

Your newsletter is your chance to appeal to not just any audience, but your audience. A great way to do this is by list segmentation, the process of creating smaller, more targeted email lists for special news and events. Once you do this, you can create the content that each segment will want to read rather than generic content that doesn’t focus on any targets at all.

2. Accidentally Triggering Spam Alerts

On a personal level, you know the words that make you delete emails unopened, or report them as spam. These words include “free,” “promotional,” and “buy now.” To make things even more complicated, Gmail has a tab that specifically filters messages containing certain trigger words into a “Promotions” tab. It’s a pretty sure bet that your Gmail readers rarely, if ever, open this tab. You can bypass these disastrous results by avoiding the common spam trigger words and encouraging your readers to whitelist your email to keep it out of spam or promotional folders.

3. Ignoring The Wonders of Modern Technology

It’s estimated that over half of all users access email through their smartphones. If you haven’t designed your emails with these users in mind, they won’t engage with your content. Designing emails for mobile devices includes formatting to fit screens, compressing images, and using shorter, more pointed subject lines.

Continue reading →

6 Components of an Effective Landing Page

Posted on November 11, 2021

landing page on computer

We’ve all yawned our way past boring and ineffective landing pages, frequently clicking out of them before they’ve even loaded. So what’s the secret to making an effective page that converts users to contacts or customers?

Here are the 6 components of an effective landing page you should consider:

Continue reading →

The Top 7 Digital Marketing Myths of 2021

Posted on August 20, 2021

digital marketing on computer screen

Marketing is constantly changing, evolving to meet new technologies and audiences. One thing remains constant, however: digital marketing holds the key to a business’ success or failure.

If you’ve been researching your own digital marketing strategy, chances are you’ve read a lot of misinformation that will make even the best plans ineffective. We call these marketing myths. Here are the top seven digital marketing myths of 2021.

Continue reading →

Top 5 Logo Mistakes to Avoid

Posted on June 21, 2021

Remember, first impressions count. Your logo is the first thing your potential customers and clients will see.

Here are the top five logo mistakes to avoid when designing your masterpiece.

1. Poor Font Choices

Remember that each font has a personality, and it’s all about choosing the right “persona” for your brand. If you are a stockbroker, for instance, using the Comic Sans font for your corporation’s logo probably isn’t the best way to project trustworthiness and reliability. A party supplies company, meanwhile, may not want to present their customers with a dark, heavy font.

Match the style of your font with the style of your icon to avoid competing with it or overwhelming it. For a better selection of fonts, choose professional font foundries such as MyFonts rather than free website versions.

Choosing a font is more important than you probably realize. It’s setting the tone and the expectations of your business.

2. Contradictory Messages and Unclear Intentions

The second fatal logo mistake is when it sends an inconsistent message about your company or brand. This emotional perception of your message is a combination of your font, colors, and images.

Since customers will associate your company with your branding, the messages and emotions you want associated with your business need to be immediately apparent. Remember, first impressions count.

Let’s revisit our stockbroker. This is a profession that requires trustworthiness, reliability, and expertise. A bright design featuring a clown, for instance? Not the best choice. Our party supply company, however, will send a clear message of “fun” with brighter colors, lighter fonts, and maybe even our stockbroker’s unused clown.

3. Too “Busy”

If there is visually has too much going on, it’s forgettable. This logo mistake will also undermine the importance of your message and lessen its impact.

Your brand will be recreated in a variety of applications for your business, from digital to print. Keep in mind that a busy, complex design will lose its detail if its size is reduced. A simple, clean design will be far more versatile than a complex or “busy” design.

Stick with a few simple elements:

Your business name
Your icon
Your tagline
No more than two fonts
No more than three colors

4. Too Reliant on Colors

It’s tempting to want to make your logo really stand out with bold, bright splashes of color. If you’re too reliant on color, however, you will lose its efficacy when it’s reproduced in black and white. Too many colors also confuse the eye, making your branding appear “busy” and sloppy.

If your brand can’t stand on its own in black and white, it’s not a strong one. Create your initial concept without using colors, shadows, layering, or other design elements. Once you’ve created something that can stand out in black and white, it’s time to choose your colors.

Remember to keep your design under three colors, and choose them widely. Color, as we talked about above, play a large role in your logo’s intent. Certain colors convey strong emotions, such as red or black.

If your colors clash with each other, overwhelm your icon, or don’t match your intention, your logo will be far less effective.

5. Neglecting Visual Hierarchy

We’ve all come across words painted on the road near an intersection that read “stop here,” with the word “here” overtop the word “stop.” The idea is that you theoretically should read the words in the order that your car approaches them, reading “stop” before “here.” The majority of people, however, will read the words painted on our theoretical road from top to bottom: “here stop.” But why?

We are all programmed to visualize things in a certain way, seeing bright colors or large, bold writing before noticing smaller writing or duller colors. This programming creates a logical way to consume information. Visual hierarchy is a design element that uses this logic to encourage a viewer to read or notice important information first.

Think about visual hierarchy. What part of your design catches your eye? Does the flow make logical sense? Are the important pieces being overshadowed by bright colors or other strong design elements?

Want to avoid these common logo mistakes?

Whether you’re thinking of a complete overhaul or simply giving your existing one an update, ArachnidWorks has talented creative teams ready to help. Let us help you design your next logo to help you stand out from the competition.

AW President & CEO Monica Kolbay Participates in Digital Marketing Webinar

Posted on March 31, 2021

As we return to more normalcy after a year of pandemic-enforced restrictions, we’ve noticed that many of our clients are asking us to help them embrace more aspects of digital marketing. Obviously, digital marketing has been trending upward for the past 10 years or more, but recent factors have caused interest to skyrocket.

Our President & CEO Monica Kolbay recently joined two other thought leaders in the digital marketing field in a one-hour webinar entitled “Banking on Digital Marketing with Stories That Connect.” Jay Sedgwick, Banking Industry Specialist of WebbMason Marketing, led the webinar.
Continue reading →