How to Leverage Experience To Boost Your International Expansion
“Experience” is the latest (but not the least relevant) addition to “E-E-A-T,” which stands for experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness – a component of Google’s search quality rater guidelines. This concept is a mix of factors that help Google determine if the content is relevant and helpful enough for users, thereby prioritizing it in search results.
E-E-A-T plays an important role in “your money or your life” (YMYL) topics.
But what happens when you want to create international strategies? How can you leverage E-E-A-T to boost your international expansion?
In my previous article, I discussed how to demonstrate expertise and authority on an international scale, using a case study on selling a local product from Barcelona.
Now, let’s will explore how to leverage experience to boost your international expansion.
How To Show Experience
As Google defines, “experience” is the extent to which the content creator has the necessary first-hand or life experience for the topic.
In this case, there will be two main ways of demonstrating experience with a product or in relation to a topic.
One is through your own experience as a creator of the product; the other is through the experience of consumers.
So, how can an international ecommerce company leverage its experience to differentiate itself from others and compete internationally?
Which actions that demonstrate experience are more likely to influence users’ purchase decisions on international websites? Let’s explore some actions you can take.
Demonstrate Your Experience Through Your Consumer: Product Reviews
Whether locally or internationally, getting product reviews from consumers is a key factor in demonstrating the experience of using the product or service.
Providing a good experience during the purchase process, as well as a quality product or service, will help boost reviews with better ratings from users – whether within the website, in directories, or Google Business Profile.
Include A Testimonial Page
One option to make it easier for potential new consumers to find user review content is to create a “testimonial page.”
On this page, the web creator can collect users’ experience and opinions regarding the product in different formats, such as text, image, or video.
Here’s an example of a testimonial page.
In international ecommerce, providing and sharing cross-border user experience is also key to conveying confidence to users from other countries, regarding the veracity of the store.
Which Reviews Influence The Users’ Purchase Decisions On International Websites?
To create product review pages and show users the ratings, you must achieve a certain number of reviews demonstrating the user’s experience with the product.
On an international scale, there will be reviews that help not only demonstrate the users’ experience during the purchase process but also encourage new users to do the same.
Which reviews carry more weight in influencing users’ purchase decisions on international websites? And what specific actions should international businesses prioritize as a result?
Reviews For International Ecommerce Sites
When venturing into global markets, consider the user shopping experience ratings that tend to predominate and significantly impact purchasing decisions.
Case in point: high shipping costs and long delivery times.
The most common reason online U.S. shoppers abandon their carts is additional costs like shipping, taxes, and fees (47%). Also, 24% of consumers drop out of an online shopping session because shipping is too slow.
Changing the cost of shipping or delivery time from one country to another is usually not in the hands of the business but of external factors.
However, you can take these actions to get positive reviews related to shipping or delivery time – or at least prevent damaging reviews related to these factors.
- Include actual shipping times and explain them to buyers. Don’t try to risk getting more sales.
- Watch out for high-demand seasons (like Christmas and Black Friday).
- Stay up-to-date on the global international logistics situation.
- Follow up on carrier and logistics situations in your potential countries.
- Be aware of customs borders in each country.
Reviews For International B2B Or Saas Sites
While long delivery times and high shipping costs impact international sales across the board, B2B, industrial, and SaaS companies face unique challenges in achieving global competitiveness.
Factors that influence purchase decisions on international B2B/SaaS websites:
- Platform language: Lack of local language support can make it difficult for consumers to use the product.
- Price: Service or platform prices not adjusted for regional purchasing power can hurt market penetration.
- Customer support: The absence of local customer support or a contact person may impact the buying process.
- Customer service hours: Adapting to local schedules and holidays in each country is key for a good experience.
- Localization: Tailoring the product or platform to each country’s cultural characteristics or preferences helps enhance user experience.
How To Create Content That Demonstrates Your Experience
You can go beyond encouraging users to share their experiences with the products on your website.
By creating content, you can actively showcase your experience during product development or using the product itself.
Here are some ways to achieve this:
- How-to guides: Develop step-by-step guides or tutorials that show how to use the product effectively.
- Expert pages: Create engaging content (consider using photos and videos) that show how the product has been produced.
- Influencer content: Partner with relevant influencers or bloggers to share content on how they use the product.
- Forums and discussions: Build a vibrant community where users are allowed to share their experiences, ask questions, and learn from other customers about how they enjoy your product.
Avoid creating search engine-first content and prioritize creating people-first content to increase the probability of success with Google search.
How To Generate Content Ideas To Showcase Experience Internationally
Developing content that reflects your product or service’s international reach depends on the type of project, audience, and potential markets.
However, there are key strategies to assist you in coming up with ideas and focusing on creating content that highlights your global experience.
Use Commercial Keywords For Your International Content Strategy
Including commercial keywords in your content strategy shows your experience with the product. Some of these keywords are important when the potential customer is interested in the product and wants to investigate more.
These keywords often include search terms for your product or service that combine concepts like:
- Free.
- Difference/vs.
- Reviews.
- Opinions.
Get Inspired By Marketplaces And Directories
Ecommerce marketplaces and B2B/SaaS directories are the go-to sites for inspiration and ideas. These sites offer insights to inform your content strategy and help demonstrate the product experience.
By analyzing marketplaces, such as Etsy and Amazon, you can learn what people think and say about you, and see how your product is perceived globally.
What are the most highly rated factors? What do they complain about the most? What can you differentiate yourself with?
Identify Key Purchase Decision-Making Factors
Analyze the top-rated and worst-rated reviews of your competitors and understand why. This will help you identify key purchase decision-making factors for your target consumers.
Use Other Channels
Today, static content isn’t enough. You can’t just create text or image content to convey a product experience to potential consumers.
Utilize other channels, such as TikTok or YouTube, to create engaging content that showcases your experience – and expertise – with your product.
Leveraging Experience In The AI Era
Showing experience will enable you to differentiate from AI-generated content within the AI era.
You can see it with the same Search Generative Experience (SGE), where demonstrating first-hand experience will play an essential role in creating useful, quality, and helpful content.
However, as of writing, it is still not very clear what the final model will look like.
Expanding Experience Internationally
Experience, expertise, and authority are key factors that will help you achieve success in your international SEO strategies.
But Google emphasizes another key element within the E-E-A-T framework: trustworthiness, which the search engine defines as the most important member of the E-E-A-T family.
We’ll delve deeper into this element in our next article.
More resources:
Featured Image: William Potter/Shutterstock
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Google Explains Why Images Are Gone From Some SERPs
Google’s John Mueller offered a suggestion about a long-standing problem with missing images in search results for recipe sites but recipe bloggers don’t seem convinced or satisfied.
Missing Images In The Search Results
Several recipe bloggers have for the past few months brought up the issue of image thumbnails that stopped appearing in the search engine results pages (SERPs) for their websites. They previously enjoyed thumbnail images displayed but at some point it appears Google stopped showing them.
The recipe bloggers feel this is a problem that needs fixing and brought it to the attention of SearchLiaison and John Mueller but the problem keeps happening.
One of the first posts in the discussion that Mueller answered dates back to January 29th when a recipe blogger noticed that a thumbnail image stopped showing for their sites when ranked in the search results.
They tweeted:
“@searchliaison
Hi. I saw today that Google is not showing any of my featured images, not one. From the most popular recipes to any other random one I checked.
Even if the picture appears in the Carousel (below the first one), it doesn’t appear in the list (second link). Help!”
Google SearchLiaison responded that they had passed it on.
Casey Markee, founder of Media Wyse, offered some background information about the problem, explaining that the problem may be widespread.
He tweeted:
“FYI Danny, this is not a unique issue. We are seeing it on dozens of recipe sites.
Also, second issue, sites are reporting they can’t get any new recipes into the carousel in over a month!
I am going to have the sites tag you with specific examples where possible.”
Google SearchLiaison responded that he’s passed the report on to the search team and reassured that he would also discuss Casey’s feedback internally as well.
Missing Images Not An Isolated Issue
The tweets about missing images continued into February and into March when someone from the home improvement space tweeted that the missing images in the SERPs issue was affecting them as well.
@Sleblanc921 tweeted:
“It’s not just food bloggers, I’m in home improvement/ DIY and mine are gone too.”
The reports of missing images in the search results even affected travel bloggers.
The Answer That Probably Nobody Wanted
Mueller responded to the latest tweet by assuring everyone that he too had passed the feedback onto the search team.
He tweeted:
“We did pass these on, and folks have been looking into the report…”
But his tweet also contained a caveat about the image thumbnails, saying that the images don’t show for all sites.
His tweet continued:
“…but in general, we don’t guarantee that images are shown with search results, so sometimes things are just shown without them.”
The travel blogger, @flyingwithbaby, tweeted:
“Hi @JohnMu it seems to be affecting my site ( family travel) for every post- everyone else’s has an image next to theirs but mine have gone. Content is super helpful according to readers , own photos etc. and it’s harming what little has been left :-(“
In response to the travel blogger, John Mueller reiterated his previous response with a possible explanation of why the images are no longer appearing.
He tweeted:
“Like I mentioned, it’s not expected that every post / search result has an image next to it. I imagine things would look pretty cluttered if that were the case.”
@flyingwithbaby responded:
“I get that- but from my experience, it was all showing before and I’m unsure why my entire site is being singled out. Seems that others are having the exact same issue. It always showed before. …I’m not sure how more helpful this can be with personal experience, unique photos and content ( which others have copycatted) and then now even the image wiped off next to the search results.
It’s crippling John & so frustrating “
Indirect Statements Perpetuate Confusion
John Mueller’s answer implies that Google’s search results are working the way they’re supposed to work.
But the problem with implying is that it doesn’t explicitly say that there is no bug, it doesn’t explicitly say that there is no outage.
It might not be Mueller’s fault that his language is not more explicit, there may be a prohibition on mentioning specifics. Or it could be that he doesn’t even realize that a more explicit statement that there is no outage is what users might need to hear.
Regardless, Mueller’s statement does imply that there is no outage and that the decrease in image thumbnails is the new normal.
Recipe bloggers raised concerns to Google SearchLiaison and John Mueller about the image thumbnails that used to appear alongside their search results, advising that their images completely stopped showing and that it was affecting their visibility. Images in rich results draw attention to a search result and helps them attract clicks.
Food and recipe sites invest time and money into equipment for photographing food to accompany their articles as well as in researching and testing recipes. That explains how disheartening it must feel to see those image thumbnails disappear.
The issue with the missing image thumbnails in Google search results extends beyond recipe blogs and also impacts home improvement and travel sites as well, which may indicate that the problem is widespread.
Featured Image by Shutterstock/Roman Samborskyi
What SEO Experts Have To Say About Leveraging SGE In 2024
Google Search Generative Experience (SGE) has come a long way since its experimental launch in May 2023.
Starting out by simply generating paraphrased snippets for search engine queries, SGE now offers more comprehensive summaries and source links.
Essentially, Google’s SGE is an interactive generative AI-powered feature that uses existing results to answer search queries.
Think of it as a chatbot — but Google’s organic search results power it.
Every indexed webpage that crosses a search engine results page (SERP) helps teach SGE what it knows.
As exciting (and partly terrifying) as the feature is, you may be trying to understand its true potential to leverage it for your businesses.
How Does Google SGE Work?
SGE offers comprehensive answers to search queries, just like Open AI’s ChatGPT, but SGE cites sources.
To see SGE in action:
- Navigate to Google to begin a search.
- Enter a search query or question into the search bar.
- Watch as multiple search results are written as a conversational response to your question.
Context and more information are added to your result through SGE, especially when compared to the old featured snippets, which only displayed a snippet or sentence without its full context.
As you can see, pre-SGE days allowed you to sift through multiple websites, giving each result traffic to their respective webpages.
Now, SGE takes up the space where direct webpage results used to display, meaning that many websites may no longer get the traffic they used to get.
How Will SGE Change How Google Search Works?
As you can imagine, many SEO experts believe SGE will eat into organic traffic from top-of-funnel queries.
There are three key reasons for a potential drop in organic traffic from SERPs:
- Featured snippets only offer one clickable source, while SGE offers many. If you owned the top position, you may now be sharing clicks with multiple sources.
- SGE takes up too much space on the SERPs, pushing the traditional SERP below the fold, resulting in fewer clicks.
- You can ask follow-up questions right, which keeps searchers on the SERP instead of traveling to a site for more information.
That said, there is still potential for pages to get traffic as long as the content answers the query.
SGE Sites Pages That Are Not In The Top 10
There have been many instances where SGE cites pages that don’t rank in the top 10 results — indicating that the data is pooled from a larger sample.
However, you should adapt your strategy as SGE emerges from its experimental phase.
A recent study found that 49% of consumers are interested in AI-powered searches, indicating that AI-generated SERPs are perceived positively.
If Google wants to stay competitive, especially with Bing Search’s hard comeback last year, SGE will eventually be a permanent part of the SERPs.
What SEO Experts Have To Say About SGE’s Impact On Digital Marketing
Many businesses, like yours, rely on Google for their revenue. Whether that’s in the form of ads or organic results, SGE is set to disrupt both of these formats.
How SGE Impacts Organic Traffic
On the organic side, achieving the top 3 positions could lead to lackluster results.
How SGE Impacts PPC
On the advertising end, you might be safe, as Sponsored results appear above SGE.
However, that only pushes organic results even further down.
Some experts believe SGE to be like Featured Snippets but on steroids. Ihor Rudnyk, CEO of Collaborator, explains:
We saw sites that gave simple and fast answers lost some of their traffic. That’s because users receive these answers directly in the SERPs. For example, weather prediction, currency rates, short facts, etc.
Businesses focused on short, easy answers and fast information are in the worst position. I don’t see how you can change it without creating additional value for users. However, it’s easy to predict that the importance of brand awareness and direct traffic will continue to grow.
Additionally, there will be a larger focus on creating pages with depth. It could be in the form of original data, a differentiated view or commentary on trends.
SEO professionals will start to become more quality-focused, and quality will be defined as bringing something new, original or interesting to the debate in contrast to what it is defined as now — being ‘comprehensive’ (code for boringly covering the same stuff the next guy does).
— Patrick Herbert, Director at Singularity Digital
What Can You Do To Leverage SGE For Your Business?
So, how can you prepare to stay relevant on the SERPs as SGE will soon dominate?
Here are a few tips to get you started:
1. Move From Informational To Transactional Content
SGE is the biggest threat to informational content — especially concise content.
Businesses that create thin content optimized for search will suffer. Creating more transactional pages could help you avoid this issue.
Transactional content is more nuanced and requires extensive research, so users will be more likely to dig deeper into product/service websites.
Not only that, but it also allows you to appear in SGE for high-intent search terms, which is the goal for businesses.
2. Monitor Changes In Search Intent Over A Period
Many marketers will soon shift their reliance on traditional keyword metrics like keyword density (KD) and search volume to search intent.
Even with high KD and search volume, ranking for these keywords can be difficult. So, with SGE, it doesn’t make sense to go after such queries unless you’re prepared to write ultimate in-depth guides.
This is why you need to look at search intent first.
Ask yourself:
- Does the topic make sense?
- Can I realistically rank for this topic or at least get credited by SGE?
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Reddit In The SERPs Lacks Credibility
Google dramatically increased the amount of Reddit answers in the search results in order to surface actual user opinions but it’s becoming increasingly apparent that it’s having a negative effect on the quality of search results. Everyone seems to know it but Google.
Lack of Expertise But Makes Sense
User generated content that is typically found in product reviews, travel reviews, Reddit and in web forums are opinions formed by anonymous people of unknown experience and expertise. It is based on personal opinions and biases that are limited to each person’s experience and unfortunately, a lack of experience has never stopped anyone from expressing their opinion.
The frightening quality of user generated content typically found on Reddit is when an opinion “makes sense” (regardless of factual accuracy) it is practically guaranteed that it will get upvoted by all the other similarly experienced users who lack the expertise to tell the difference between inaccurate opinions that “makes sense” versus factually accurate opinions.
All you have to do is look at the SEO community running from one trend to another because the ideas make sense and are inevitably discarded.
Ideas that make sense are similar to AI hallucinations. AI hallucinations “sound right” but sounding right is not the same as factually accurate. The legacy of things that make sense is the idea that the sun revolves around the earth, which “made sense” for millenniums.
Common sense is a big problem at Reddit because it allows those who lack experience and expertise to share plausible yet factually inaccurate opinions.
I asked Chef Allen (Facebook Profile) about the expertise of the food and recipe discussions on Reddit.
She shared her expert opinion:
“Reddit is not a reliable place to get recipes. From untested recipes to improper measurements and lack of instructions, finding a trustworthy recipe on Reddit is nearly impossible. People mean well, but most responses to recipe requests are met with what is sure to be disappointing results if one were actually to attempt to make the suggested recipe.
Reddit just isn’t designed for sharing tried-and-tested recipes from experienced recipe developers.”
Example Of Facts Versus Reddit Opinions
There are many examples of how a lack of expertise by Redditors leads to opinions and biases that override facts and negatively impacts the quality of the content.
This is one example that is related to SEO.
Two facts about links:
- Googler Gary Illyes explained at Pubcon Austin that links aren’t in the top 3 of ranking factors anymore.
- Then consider that in March 2024 Google’s spam policy page deemphasized links by stating they’re a ranking factor but no longer saying they’re an important ranking factor.
On Reddit today someone observes that links aren’t playing as strong a role as in the past.
Screenshot Of A Reddit Post About Links
And several Redditors argue against it, including sine who joined Reddit within the past few years and may have entirely missed the heyday of when links were the undisputable #1 ranking factor.
Here’s one person’s response:
Here’s another example. A top ranking Reddit thread for how to make birria de res, which is a Mexican braised meat recipe for cooking goat meat that originated in the Mexican state of Jalisco.
The first person to answer is someone who is guessing what type of meat is good for a birria.
Redditor Guessing An Answer
That person posting a guess is typical of the responses given in not just that Reddit thread but in any number of discussions. That’s not to say there aren’t experts on Reddit but for those of you with years of experience in SEO, when was the last time you turned to Reddit for SEO advice?
Lack Of EEAT In User Generated Content
The idea of ranking the views of real people makes sense, perhaps more in some contexts than others. For example, when it comes to saltwater fishing I would 100% take the opinion of someone posting on a dedicated east coast fishing forum like Stripers Online or from one of the writers at Surfcaster’s Journal who all have decades of hands-on fishing experience. I value the expertise of of Surfcaster’s Journal so much that I pay for access to their content. It’s that good.
But what about Reddit? I have expertise in saltwater and freshwater fishing and truthfully, Reddit is the last place I would ever turn to for fishing advice.
For example, it’s well-known that the best time for catching striped bass on the east coast is at night when striped bass sneak around in the dark to ambush prey. They can be caught during the day but the night time is without question the best time for catching the larger keeper size fish.
Yet many top ranked discussions on Reddit focus on daytime fishing.
Example Of Personal Bias In A Reddit Answer
Contrast that with the logo of Surfcaster’s Journal where it’s clear that fishing at night is the heart of the sport of striped bass fishing.
Recipe Sites Versus Reddit
Casey Markee (@MediaWyse), a well-regarded search marketing consultant specializing in optimizing recipe and food blogs agrees that Reddit threads in the search results are a poor experience for users.
He explained:
“Although Google has argued that the proliferation of Reddit results is to provide more first-hand experience to guide users, rarely does this result in superior results in the recipe niche. Especially for more complicated recipes, the detailed step by step instructions and expert tips that come with those recipes, fare outshine what you’ll find in a ranking Reddit thread.
For example, a complicated recipe like “Beef Wellington” has a lot that can go wrong, especially with regard to the phyllo dough and getting clean cuts when it’s done. You need only look at the Reddit result returned for this query, and compare it to the many better written and more detailed recipes, to see how large the gap is between presented expertise.
You absolutely wouldn’t want to rely on a Reddit thread alone to make even the average complicated recipe. The results will not be satisfying. Most Reddit threads are “too general” and really don’t provide the needed level of expertise to ensure a recipe is done ‘perfectly’ the first time.”
Top Reasons Why Reddit Should Not Be Highly Ranked
- Lack of Expertise
This is self-evident by now. - Anonymity
The anonymous nature of Reddit among the millions of users makes it easy for anyone to post anything without experiencing the self-moderating effects of a forum community where expert members are always near to pick apart poor advice. - Bias
Reddit answers tend to reflect the biases of the users, some of which arise from a lack of experience - Subjectivity
Reddit posts tend to be based on the preconceptions or tastes that may have more to do with their geographic and cultural background than facts, experience and knowledge. - Echo Chambers
This is a well-known effect where likeminded people will coalesce and reinforce each other’s preconceptions and biases. - Cognitive Biases
A common trait in social media and user generated content is that cognitive biases like the Dunning-Kruger effect are amplified. The Dunning-Kruger effect is when someone who lacks expertise overestimate their subject matter knowledge and contributes to the overall decline of understanding. - Oversimplification
This relates to what Casey mentioned about Reddit threads being “too general” and one of the reasons for this is that the people who are answering the questions lack the contextual understanding and all of the nuance that goes with that which leads to oversimplification of any given topic.
Google Is Using Content Of Dubious Expertise
The definition of dubious is something that cannot be trusted or and is doubtful. Opinions shared on Reddit by people who lack expertise and are sharing opinions in anonymity qualify as dubious. Yet Google is not only favoring Reddit in the search results, it is also paying millions of dollars for access to content that is lacking in expertise, experience, authoritativeness and trustworthiness.
Google has stated that it is prioritizing content from actual people with experience, which makes sense in certain contexts such as their experiences with products. But does prioritizing Reddit content stray too far from surfacing content with actual expertise?
Featured Image by Shutterstock/Roman Samborskyi
Daily Search Forum Recap: March 26, 2024
Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.
Google Search Console is testing an Android App. Google is testing places and places sites in the search bar menu. Google spoke about if a business should have a website and a blog. Google added 3D models to product structured data. Google Search does not support AVIF images, yet. Mikhail Parakhin stepped down as the head of Bing Search and Microsoft Advertising.
Search Engine Roundtable Stories:
-
Google Search Console Tests Android App
Google seems to be testing an Android App for Google Search Console. This comes several weeks after I reported that Google has no plans for a mobile app for Google Search Console. -
Google Tests Places & Places Sites Search Bar Filter Tabs
Yesterday we reported Google is testing products and products sites in the search bar tab in the European regions. Today, Google is testing places and places sites in the search bar tab in the European regions. -
Google: Should Small Service Businesses Start A Website & A Blog?
Google’s Search Liaison, Danny Sullivan, was asked about if a business should always have a website and if so, should they also have a blog. Sullivan replied that he believes all businesses should have at least a basic website, but when it comes to a blog, that depends on what they have to say on that blog. -
Google Adds 3D Models Markup To Product Structured Data For Linking
Google has added new 3D models markup support to the product structured data documentation so that you can connect, associate or link your products to the appropriate 3D model. -
Google Search Does Not Support AVIF Images Just Yet
Did you know that Google Search does not support the AVIF image format? At least not yet. Google Search doesn’t list it on its supported image formats and Google Image Search simply won’t index them. But John Mueller of Google said on X, “I’m sure this won’t be necessary long term.” -
Mikhail Parakhin Steps Down As Head Of Bing Search & Microsoft Advertising
Mikhail Parakhin, the head of Bing Search and Microsoft Advertising, is stepping down from that role as Parakhin “decided to explore new roles.” We’ve quoted Mikhail Parakhin here countless times over the past couple of years, to hear that he is leaving the role makes me super sad. His transparency and willingness to listen to the community was amazing. -
St. Patrick’s Day Dancers At Google Ireland
Here is a video I found on Instagram from the Google Ireland office of dancers performing at the Google office in celebration of St. Patrick’s Day. It looks like they call themselves the Golden Beats.
Other Great Search Threads:
Search Engine Land Stories:
Other Great Search Stories:
Analytics
Industry & Business
Links & Content Marketing
Local & Maps
Mobile & Voice
SEO
PPC
Search Features
Other Search
Feedback:
Have feedback on this daily recap; let me know on Twitter @rustybrick or @seroundtable, on Threads, Mastodon and Bluesky and you can follow us on Facebook and on Google News and make sure to subscribe to the YouTube channel, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or just contact us the old fashion way.
LinkedIn Ads launches dynamic UTMs for campaign tracking
LinkedIn is launching a new solution for monitoring campaign performance without third-party cookies.
Dynamic UTMs, which will be available to all users globally by the end of March, simplify adding custom tracking elements to campaign URLs, improving tracking accuracy.
Previously, marketers had to manually create UTM parameters for their campaigns, but with Dynamic UTMs, this process is automated.
What are UTMs? UTM parameters, short for Urchin Tracking Module parameters, are small pieces of text added to the end of your ad’s destination URL that can help you track information about the source of an ad click. For example, you can add tracking parameters to help measure how many clicks to your website were from a specific campaign or placement.
Why we care. UTMs are essential for marketers to grasp a campaign’s performance, especially in a privacy-focused landscape, as they don’t rely on third-party cookies or IP addresses for ad measurement. However, creating them manually can be time-consuming, inefficient and prone to errors. This solution looks address these challenges.
Supported URL tracking parameters. You can add both static and dynamic URL parameters to your campaigns (see the screenshot below). When adding a URL parameter, you’ll need to add both the parameter key and value.
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Deep dive. Read LinkedIn’s announcement in full for more information.
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Turn data into meaningful customer moments by Edna Chavira
In today’s experience economy, customers expect personalized and relevant experiences at every touchpoint. But maintaining that level of personalization at scale is becoming even more challenging with third-party cookies going away.
Join our expert panel to learn how Salesforce allows marketers to unify customer data into a single view – helping you drive true omni-channel personalization without relying on third-party tracking. You’ll see how AI and real-time data activation can help you:
- Establish a comprehensive, single view of the customer by using Data Cloud
- Deliver personalized experiences across sales, service, and marketing channels through first-party data
- Use AI-driven insights to continually optimize and enhance customer experiences
Don’t miss this opportunity to learn from the experts and unlock the full potential of your customer data. Register now to save your spot!
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YouTube issues guidance on when to post content to boost reach
YouTube issued guidance to creators and marketers on the best times to upload videos for maximum reach.
For news, trends, or content with a shorter lifespan, it’s best to post as soon as possible. However, if you’re sharing evergreen content, the platform suggests posting at whatever time suits you prefer.
Live videos. To maximize reach with live videos, YouTube advises going live when your analytics chart indicates that most of your audience will be available to watch.
Off-hour posting. YouTube Liaison Officer Rene Ritchie mentioned on X that if you post during “off hours,” like the early morning, the initial boost in views might be slower. Therefore, it’s important to adjust your expectations. However, he pointed out that over a few weeks or a month, the total views usually even out, regardless of the initial posting time.
Why we care. This guidance provides valuable insight into easily increasing reach by posting more strategically. However, if your content isn’t time-sensitive, YouTube confirmed that you don’t need to stress about researching optimal posting times– meaning one less thing to worry about in your content strategy.
What YouTube is saying. YouTube Product Lead Todd Beaupre said in a video shared on X:
- “The way we designed the algorithm, we want to give audiences videos and other content that they’re going to be the most satisfied by. If the audience doesn’t really care whether you uploaded it at three in the morning or seven at night, then the algorithm shouldn’t care either.”
- “What I encourage creators to do is when they have some of these questions, and they immediately think about the algorithm, replace the word algorithm in their question with the word ‘audience.’ That’s going to give you a better answer because we’re aiming to serve the audience.”
- “The more you focus on understanding what your audience wants and finding the best fit with them, the algorithm is going to match that.”
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Deep dive. Read our guide on how the YouTube algorithm works for more information.
YouTube warns creators not to delete videos
YouTube advised creators and marketers against deleting videos from the platform. Additionally, the app strongly suggested avoiding making videos private.
The Google-owned site explained that removing content from the app or restricting access could disrupt your channel’s connection to people who have watched that video and negatively impact ranking.
What YouTube is saying. YouTube Product Lead Todd Beaupre said on X:
- “YouTubers: Don’t delete videos unless you have a very, very good reason. When you delete a video, you delete your channel’s connection to the audience that watched that video.”
- “If you want to maximize your growth, keep your videos public or unlist then if you must.”
What this means. In simpler terms, YouTube’s algorithm recommends videos within its search results by connecting the dots between each upload. When you take away one of those dots (aka video on your channel), it is a bit like taking away a jigsaw piece. This means deleting or hiding content could lower your overall channel ranking and limit reach because it disrupts the pattern of your content.
Why we care. It might be tempting to delete or hide content you’re not happy with, however, unless the video is really bad or harmful, it’s best to keep it on your channel. Otherwise, you could end up hurting your channel’s overall ranking.
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Deep dive. Read our guide on how the YouTube algorithm works for more information.
Google expands Product Studio to Australia and Canada
Google Product Studio is now available to merchants based in Australia and Canada.
Previously, the suite of free, AI-powered tools was only accessible in the U.S., however, Google has confirmed it is planning to roll out the feature to more markets throughout the year.
What is Product Studio? Product Studio is a tool you can use to create unique, high-quality product imagery across your marketing channels. Its tools can be used to generate scenes, increase image resolution and edit backgrounds.
Why we care. Creative can be a headache for many SMBs, but Product Studio’s free tools offer a potential solution.They enable quick testing of diverse creative strategies, saving valuable time and resource.
Getting started. You can access Product Studio’s tools in Merchant Center Next or in the Google and Youtube app on Shopify.
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Deep dive. Read Google’s announcement in full for more information.
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