Social, SEO, Email Or PPC - Which Marketing Channel Gets the Most Visitors - infograhic

There are dozens of ways to grow your audience and make money online, but how do the marketing channels stack up? The folks at conductor took a look at marketing industry data to find out what channel - whether social media, organic (search engine), email marketing or PPC (pay-per-click advertising) - gives marketers the most bang for their click.

Research shows that 54 percent people discover new websites through organic search, 51 percent through email, 32 percent through social media and 18 percent through PPC, but visitors from search engines are 2 times more likely to be extremely engaged and visit 5+ pages, when compared to the other channels. While social media has highest bounce rate of any marketing channel.

In addition, when it comes to ROI, organic search and email are rated as the best marketing channels.

Explore rest of the findings in below visual.

Marketing Through the Ages - infographic

Ever wondered how modern marketing has evolved through the ages? Then wonder no more! The Following infographic from tomorrow-people takes a closer look at how marketing has been reborn.

A key highlight is: Julius Caesar is considered as the inventor of marketing, he made it his mission to make potatoes the food of the Prussians choice using savvy techniques to nurture them down the vegetable pipeline (around about 50 BC).

The Golden Age of Mobile - infographic

Ever since the evolution of the mobile phone, its usage has grown in leaps and bounds, as has the technology used in developing the device into something akin to a futuristic gadget capable of so much more than anybody had even envisioned a decade back. Today, the smartphone – or at least a standard feature phone – is a necessity that almost everybody owns.

The basic reason behind the popularity of smartphones is the speed at which it has outpaced any contemporary existing technology to find its way into mainstream usage.

The infographic below from pennystocks takes a closer look at the current state of mobile market and mobile social network activity, with some mesmerizing facts and stats.

Some key highlights:

89 billion apps downloaded daily, that is over 5 times as much data that is uploaded on Facebook per day.

Average American spends 3 hours a day on their smartphone, that is over twice the amount of the time they spend eating.

Search and Social Advertising Trends 2014 - infographic

Kenshoo, released their quarterly global search and social advertising trends report in an infographic form to give marketers an idea whether search or social advertising is the best route to go.

The study found that search and social spend and advertiser revenue metrics showed strong year-over-year, but displayed typical effects of seasonality from a quarter-over-quarter perspective.

Search still represents the majority of digital marketing investment, but social is growing faster on a sequential and annual basis.

Both search and social deliver positive return-on-investment with revenue growing faster than spend across each channel.

Learn more about the trends in social and search advertising in this visual:

The Importance of Visual Content in Marketing - infographic

Did you know that 50 milliseconds is the average time it takes a new visitor to form a first impression on a website, while in next 2.6 seconds visitor decide if a site is Good or bad, and that the next 10 seconds is the average time a visitor will decide whether to stay on site or not.

What if I told you that first impressions are 94 percent based on website design and that users who stay 30 seconds on a web page are likely to keep clicking links.

In addition, visual content like infographics drive 84 percent more views and 94 percent more clicks, while conversation rates for companies using custom visual content are 7 times higher and 8 out of 10 marketing officers report content is the future of marketing.

There are thousands, if not more, facts and figures that sing the praises of using visual content in your marketing strategy. Bandwagoncreative's infographic took a closer look at why visual content is important.

What Your Marketing Dollars can do for You - A Content vs Swag Showdown - infographic

If you are a marketer, you know two things: your audiences are savvy and your budgets are tight. So why contribute to the $20 billion companies spend on swag (french for "crap") like tote bags, t-shirts and branded pens when the return on investment for content creation is so much higher? Here's a look at what your dollars can do for you - a content-versus-swag showdown.

A key takeaway from kapost's infographic:

You can buy 2,940 branded coffee mugs for $5,000 dollars, but what is its ROI: The office intern, too nervous to ask for a desk organizer, appreciates that your mug doubles as a pen holder. On the other hand, for this price you can brew up enough blog posts a week for 10 week - that's the full-bodied aroma of serious lead generation - because companies that blog generate 67 percent more leads than those that don't.

Law and Social Media: What Businesses Should Know - infographic

As social networks are becoming a major communications medium, companies are rushing to join social media, a study shows, 89 percent businesses adopt social media for brand exposure while 75 percent of businesses use social sites to increase traffic.

But relatively few brands are aware of the legal ramifications of using this channel. Therefore, some companies are getting in trouble with social media marketing, as the cartwrightking's infographic shows, in Jan, 2012 Snickers ran a Twitter campaign in which they paid stars to share a photo of themselves eating a Snickers bar, while this actually contravenes the UK's (OFT) Office of Fair Trading guidance that artists and stars must take it absolutely clear that they are endorsing or promoting a brand.

So what other issues businesses are facing with this marketing channel, find out in this visual titled: Social Media, Your Business and the Law.

Pinterest Sells! Here's How to Do It - infographic

With more than 70 Million monthly active users Pinterest is one of the most used social media sites on the globe, where 80 percent of Pins are reshared (Repin) proving that the social network can be a great tool for business marketers.
Pinterest can be a powerful, fun and creative way of marketing yourself or your business, but if you're new to the social media it can be a little difficult. Here are some tips to use Pinterest like a Pro.

How we Use Social Media in Natural Disasters - infographic

Million of people use social networking sites every day, to talk with friend and family, to promote their business, to meet like-minded people, to play games, to get latest news, and to organize events. Over the years, we've also seen an increase in the social media in the wake of natural disasters, from Hurricane Katrina in 2005 to more recent events as the typhoon that hit the Philippines or the Japanese tsunami and Hurricane Sandy. Just how does social media help?

This infographic from our pals at  WhoIsHostingThis visualized the social media's impact on natural disasters.

Some key stats from visual:

People often use social media to alert their friends and family that are safe. Nearly 25 percent of the general public and nearly 33 percent of the online population use social networks to notify family and friends about their safety. They may also use it to provide current status info, or offer help to those in need.

What Passwords to Change: The Heartbleed Checklist for Social Media Users

Heartbleed bug is a major security flaw in OpenSSL, and is one of the biggest threats ever to face the online community.

Conflicting web articles and reviews have led to panic – nobody seems to know which social networking sites and other popular services have been affected.

Thanks to Ivpn folks who have created a checklist that tells you which sites have been affected by the HeartBleed virus, and whether it's safe to change your password or not.

A key highlight from visual: (after the heartbleed news) It's highly recommended to change your passwords right now if you've not already done so, especially if you are using Blogger, Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr, YouTube (and yes Pinterest too which is not in the infographic).

Tip: You can check if any website is vulnerable of heartbleed bug with this tool: lastpass.com/heartbleed.

Why Snackable Content Should be Deployed in your Content Marketing Strategy - infographic

Sorry to break it to you... but we are officially attention deficient.

What cut it a decade ago in marketing world just doesn't cut it anymore, unless of course your consumer is a goldfish.

According to a research, 14 years ago human's average attention span was 12 seconds, and in 2013 it fell down to 8 seconds, while a goldfish have an attention span of 9 seconds.

In short, our brains make a decision in just 8 seconds whether to stay focused, or skip and relocate to a new topic.

So make your marketing strategy bitesized or be left behind.

Take a look at this infographic by eloqua titled Content Smorgasbord: Top Examples of ‘Snackable’ Content delineating why your marketing content should be digestible in a lunch-break.

Twitter Best Practices for 2014 - infographic

Twitter started in 2006 as a side project by Jack Dorsey while he was working for Odeo (exactly - who are they?), 3 more smart guys joined him and after 8 years, it now has over 645 Million registered users posting a staggering 790 Million tweets a day! Over 60 percent of users access Twitter using their mobile phone and interestingly their fastest growing demographic are 55 - 64 year olds.

For those of you new to the chatty network or new to using it for business, here is an infographic from passiondigital proposes some best practices, including latest profile and cover photo sizes, that help you leverage Twitter like a boss.

Remember that everyone's audience is different, and in time, you may learn that your fans are more receptive to tweets with images, or they retweeting your weekend posts, and that's awesome! There is no guarantee with social, you can only go with what you believe suits your fans the most, test, analyze, learn and repeat! In time you'll be churning out engaging content in your sleep.

Key takeaways from visual:

Get A Good profile photo! If you're a business, of course your logo is fine. If it's a mug shot, make it a good clear photo at least 400 x 400 pixels.

Write an awesome bio! Your bio section is a 160 CV of your amazing self. It can be funny or serious, but make it clear what you do. Use hashtags to identify your interests or handles to identify people you post with.

Focus on your passion! Stick to tweeting about what you know best as people will go to you as an influencers in that industry.

6 Tips For A Cohesive Social Media - Affiliate Marketing Campaign

Affiliate marketing is a moneymaking course where rewards for an “affiliate” come with each completed sale. Unlike the usual selling of products, you earn every time a customer you directed from your site makes a purchase on the merchant’s website.

When Facebook soared on top of the world, the entire social media realm followed effortlessly. It made the world smaller and people get more connected via messaging app, engaging games and interactions. Never in the history of ever that we had something that hosts billions of active users. Social media has transformed the way we live everyday and ushers the evolution of business.

The fusion of affiliate marketing and social media is inevitable. But, is it worth trying? It could be. But, before jumping into the bandwagon, here are some tips on how to make this partnership work.

Talkin' 'bout My Generation - Make Peace with Millennials by Giving Them a Voice - infographic

To gain insight into how Millennials (18–33 years of age) view brands and their thoughts on brand loyalty, Adroit Digital team conducted a study to ask Millennials how they think about brands compared to how their parents think about them, and how brands can gain their future loyalty.

Some key insights gained in the survey and put together in an infographic by Direct Marketing News are:

73 percent of Millennials think they are making smarter brand choices than their parents because of  their knowledge, familiarity and access to the digital world at large.

43 percent of respondents indicated they use many of the same brands as their parents, but not all the same brands.

78 percent said, brands will have to work harder to earn their brand loyalty than they did to earn their parents' loyalty.

For brands prospecting new customers, TV and social media will pave the way with Millennials: 29 percent and 26 percent indicated TV and social media, respectively, as the media most likely to  introduce them to a new product for trial.

60 percent said that social media advertising has the most influence over them in how they perceive a brand and a brand’s value. This compares with TV at 70 percent.

Your Guide to Benefiting from Social Media - infographic

What is social media? Why you should use it in your marketing mix? How will it benefit your company?

Well, "social media marketing is creating and maintaining customer relationships using the internet technology. Customer relationships have always been built on great customer service, listening and responding to concerns, and making them feel important. New customer relationships come from having current customers refer or sell your brand to their connections. All of these functions of marketing can be done successfully and easily through social media. It is an ideal tool for listening and responding to current customers as well as for reaching out to new ones."

The following infographic created by zionsbankblog takes a closer look at how to get your small or large company started on social media (like Facebook, Twitter, blogging etc.) and how to understand this continually evolving landscape.