Artificially inflated ads? The Dark Side of Paid Engagement

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If you’re running artificially inflated ads and your client is unaware, we need to chat. Today, we’re talking about the risk many ad companies are taking to boost engagement on their clients’ ads. Some see this as a risk worth taking, but we’re here to tell you, artificially inflating engagement on an ad can harm the client’s business. Still don’t believe us, well we’re about to burst your bubble. Keep reading and we’ll tell you why. 

What are artificially inflated ads?

Let’s start by breaking down artificially inflated ads. Artificially inflated ads are purchased advertisements injected with fake engagement by third-party apps. Advertising companies are paying third-party apps to engage with client advertisements for a more significant return on their cost-per-click metrics. Other examples of artificial inflation are fake followers, likes, and comments. 

What does Facebook think about this? 

What does Facebook think about this? Well, they hate it. Facebook is taking legal action; here’s the tea. Facebook filed a lawsuit against two app developers, LionMobi and JediMobi, over ‘click injection’ fraud against Facebook ads. These app developers allegedly created fake user clicks on Facebook advertisements giving the impression that users were engaging with the ads. The Facebook advertising system, known as the Facebook Audience Network, would then pay out cash to these apps thinking real users had clicked on the ads. As a result of this click injection scheme, Facebook refunded money back to advertisers who paid to have their ads on the Facebook Audience Network platform and had their ads clicked on via this fraudulent scheme. 

Now, Facebook and Instagram are cleaning up artificial activity by putting a stop to third-party apps, bot accounts, and influencers from engaging in such inauthentic behavior. If Facebook or Instagram discover purchased engagement such as shares, likes, comments, or followers on accounts, they will remove all inorganic content. If that doesn’t stop users from purchasing engagement, Facebook will ban accounts and permanently restrict user’s IP addresses from accessing the Instagram app or website.  

Now, if the possibility of getting banned from Facebook or Instagram for artificially inflating ads or engagement doesn’t scare you, we’ve got some more reasons why you should stop this practice asap. 

Use Artificial Engagement At Your Own Risk

Now, here is what ad companies should consider: the risks of running inflated ads. When engaging in artificial engagement or artificially inflating ads, you risk losing brand credibility, no actual monetary return on ads, and Facebook banning you. 

First, let’s touch on brand credibility. With so much inauthentic engagement, inflating ads won’t do brands any good. When running inflated ads for clients, brands are looking for a return on their investment and real engagement on their advertisements. This strategy is not only a copout to fine-tuning the type of ad that works best for the brand, but this strategy also threatens the reputation and economic growth of companies by putting companies at risk of losing out on real engagement, sales, and consumer loyalty. 

Next, if it’s not real, you won’t see a return. Fake engagement is not real business. Think of it this way: When measuring the click-per-cost return on investment, the sales won’t reflect the amount of engagement the ad reached. It would be impossible to measure how well an inflated ad organically connected with an audience based on fake engagement. 

 

We’re here to tell you that although artificially inflating ads may sounds tempting, think twice before doing so. It could cost business, valuable partnerships in the future, and could run the risk of having your social media accounts shut down. If you’re looking for a ad agency to run ads for you, send a message to info@itscreativelabel.com. We’re here to help! 

How Social Media Helped Popey’s Revenue Increase By Millions

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How Social Media Helped Popeye’s Revenue Increase by Millions.

 

Today’s blog we’re going to recap the great chicken sandwich debate and discuss its impact of social media. 

But first, a little history is helpful. Do you remember when we talked about brand feuds on our podcast and Instagram? Take a listen to our podcast and check out this post on Instagram. The long and short of it is, the fast-food industry is notorious for feuding on Twitter.

Which brings us to where it all started. Popeye’s launched a chicken sandwich, and it looked a lot like an American favorite, Chic-fil-A’s chicken sandwich. So, as petty chain restaurants always are, Chic-fil-A responded in a sublim. A sublim heard around the world and ultimately, equated to an insane amount of free advertisement for Popeye’s. #RegretMuch?

I hope you didn’t think the sublimming was over. See Popeye’s response is below:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

23-freakin-million! Is the rumored number Popeye’s is to have made over the, “Who has the better chicken sandwich, Chic-fil-A or Popeye’s?” social media firestorm. After some digging, we figured out exactly where that number came from: 

 

Now the second great debate in this entire debacle is who is the driving force behind this trending topic–#blacktwitter or Popeye’s social media marketing.

We’re not going to choose a side on this one. We want to hear what you think! Should this hype be credited to Black Twitter users that spread the word about the new menu fare? Or do you think this was a successful ploy between two brands in industries that are constantly “feuding”? Let us know what you think in the comments!

Girlboss Professional Network: LinkedIn-Like Platform for Ambitious Women

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If you listen to our podcast, you’ve heard us talking about the new LinkedIn-Like platform created for women by women. Girlboss is a popular community created by Nasty Gal founder, Sophia Amoruso.

Throughout the last couple of years, the brand has been on a constant mission to bring new things to the community. With the creation of the professional network, their team hopes it will help connect female entrepreneurs, creatives, and freelancers with other like-minded women. Here are some ways that the Girlboss professional network works and is revolutionizing social media for ambitious women.

Prominent Female Leaders Will Host “Ask Me Anything” Sessions

Notable women such as Arianna Huffington, Beth Comstock, and Bozoma St. John are just a few examples of big names that will lead Q&A sessions. All members on the Girlboss platform will be able to interact and leave questions for the session host.

Professionalism & Sense of Self Are Elegantly Combined

Don’t you just hate those stuffy uptight vibes you get from other networking platforms? Girlbossmembers will be able to customize their profiles to not just share what they do but also capture who they are in order to bring in the important element of personality. There’s also a fun fill-in-the-blank bio and horoscope reading to create a more casual feel.

There’s a Heavy Emphasis on Meaningful Connections

In order to ensure every connection request is meaningful, members can only send one connection request daily. This encourages people to clearly state their intentions as well as truly reflect on who they want to surround themselves with as they nurture new relationships.

Membership Is Free To Ensure Accessibility

Usually, it’s women who can’t afford to join members-only clubs. So in order to make sure that career-minded women everywhere can access opportunities, the platform is free to join in an effort to truly carve out community.

Having the opportunity to show up on another platform is amazing and the fact that it’s all women makes it even better to fully embrace #WomenSupportingWomen and #CommunityOverCompetition. We love seeing like-minded women come together and help one another step into their power! 

Are you going to be joining the community? If so, just click here to join and let us know what you think in the comments below!

 

3 Tips to Handle Scandalous Influencer Partnerships

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This week we’re talking about Influencers. New age celebrities, filling our timelines with dreamy content and exclusive promo codes. Despite naysayers and eye rolls that occasionally occur when discussing influencers, they have a significant impact on brand awareness and increasing revenue (two words: Kylie Jenner). 

By 2020, the influencer marketing industry is forecasted to be worth as much as $10 billion. Today, the world of marketing recognizes these advantages so much that various brands have built an Influencer Marketing division into their marketing strategy. These divisions are important as influencers are lead-generation channels that help market products in an authentic way for brands. 

However, there are times when influencer affiliations can hurt your brand, such as the Oliva Jade scandal earlier this year (check out the recap here). Although Sephora had nothing to do with the college tuition scam directly, the multinational cosmetic chain found themselves in an awkward position: either risk guilt by association or terminate their relationship with Oliva Jade. As we all know, they chose the latter, but can we blame them? After all, show me who your influencers are, and I’ll show you who your brand is. Feel free to tweet that!

In a way, influencer marketing acts as a paradox. Influencers serve brands well because they contribute a human factor to advertising, allowing consumers to trust products and services more readily. Though, unless you’re Beyonce, humans have flaws. Therefore, risk is inherent in influencer advertising. Have no worries though; we have compiled a list of tips to minimize liability and manage scandal during influencer partnerships. Because they will happen.

Do your research

Common mistakes brands make when outsourcing an influencer is solely relying on vanity metrics, such as follower count. Just because someone has 100k on Instagram does not mean they will reach your brand’s target audience or that their following is real. It is essential to include preliminary research to ensure the influencer and the brand have aligned values. Study past content, comments, interviews, etc. to spot any potential red flags. Sephora could have never predicted the Oliva Jade College Admission scandal, yet if they monitored her past Youtube content, they would have been alerted with Jade’s offhand comments devaluing education. Would these comments have served as glaring red flag worth terminating their partnership, likely not. To drive the point home, context clues can be found throughout an influencer’s social media, so it’s important to do your research. 

When you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready

Our digital space society is hyper-reactive and breeds “cancel-culture.” Because of this marketing teams must implement a crisis management strategy. If you’re reading this and thinking, “K. We don’t have one of these.” Here are a few tips. Within the crisis plan, conduct social monitoring and listening techniques on various social platforms that give you a sense of how audiences are reacting to your brand during a scandal. In addition to social listening and monitoring, consider consulting legal counsel to serve as a guide for proper terminology to protect you from other legal implications. After collecting the data and seeking legal advice, form appropriate, transparent responses to address the public. Let this plan be loose and fluid, as not all influencer marketing scandals are the same, and you’ll want to deal with each accordingly.

Honesty is the best policy

Due to the nature of the Olivia Jade scandal, Sephora ultimately released the following statement, “after careful review of recent developments, we have made the decision to end the Sephora Collection partnership with Olivia Jade, effective immediately”. The statement proved necessary to protect the integrity of the brand. When it comes to any PR scandal, honesty and transparency are key. A scandal is not the time to be defensive; it is the time to master the art of apologizing. Apologies should not read as curated scripts, but rather authentic, humble, and remorseful. Consumers have more respect for brands that acknowledge wrongdoings, show remorse, and vow an act of change. 

If you have experienced any unfortunate scandals with influencer marketing, spill the tea in the comments down below. If you have any questions or simply want to gain more insight on influencer marketing, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us at info@itscreativelabel.com.

The New Rules for Using Instagram Hashtags

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Ever feel like hashtags are this super magical mythical creature everyone is raving about yet you still don’t get how to find them, much less use them?

We feel you. Let us explain.

While hashtags alone might not save your entire social presence, you certainly shouldn’t neglect using them. Think of hashtags like your brand’s personal cheerleader helping you get seen or like a google search helping you get discovered. We’re going to break it down for you with 5 essential tips to own your hashtag strategy with every single post from now on. Let’s go! 

Using enough quality tags

Every time someone forgets to hashtag their posts, our social media manager cries a little  #facts. Ok, ok, maybe we’re kidding but we just want you to know how important they are. Posting without hashtags or just one tag is basically like placing an ad in the middle of the jungle. We suggest using as many tags as you can that are relevant to your business. 

Ask yourselves the following:

  • What might your dream clients be obsessing over on Instagram that you can tag?
  • What tags are similar pages using that have a good-sized following?
  • What are some keywords that your brand could fit under? Make sure the keywords are relevant to the image being posted to prevent getting flagged

Every time you type up a tag you’ll see a little dropdown showing you the number of posts using that tag. The sweet spot for hashtags is those that fall under 500K uses to have better chances of being discovered without gambling on too small of an audience.

Switching up tags to avoid spammy behavior 

Sick of those “nice one” or “great photo.” You know, those spammy emoji comments? Ugh, we hate them too! You can’t always eliminate them but you can definitely reduce the amount you get by switching up your tags.

When you use the same exact groups of hashtags every single time this can signal to the mysterious Instagram algorithm that your behavior is “spammy”. You want to avoid falling under this umbrella even if you’re not actually doing something considered spammy. When it comes to hashtags, the best way to avoid this is to have different sets of tags. Put simply, don’t use the same ones for every post.

Also, important sidenote, avoid cheesy tags like #likeforlike or #follow4follow. These are typically used by spam bots so avoid them to keep your account in good standing.

Adding hashtags to stories for increased discovery 

Ok, people! All our tips here may take a little effort, but this one here is a simple and super effective one that sooo many people ignore or don’t even know about!

Use hashtags on stories!

You can use up to 10 hashtags for your stories and apply the same principles from our first tip with making sure they’re quality tags. This way not only will your posts be discoverable but you’re opening up even more opportunities through your stories. Getting featured on a story for the hashtags used is the jackpot here.

Using insights to pinpoint best tags

Have a business account? Perfect! If not, you need to go switch on over like yesterday. Take a look at your top-performing posts on your business page insights and save the hashtags used for these top 9 posts. This is a great way for you to start curating groups of tags with a more strategic angle to them. If you have social media scheduling software, such as Later, chances are you also have access to analytics showing you which tags are associated with popular content.

We know data can sound scary but it’s about to become your brand new business bestie, we promise

Using 3rd party tools to search and save tags 

We love making our workflow as efficient as possible. So we’re definitely using a variety of tools to help us achieve that.

In addition to the tip above on using insights, we highly suggest picking a social media scheduling software with analytics. You’ll be able to search for tags without having to go on Instagram as well as build out groups of tags. How cool is it that at a click of a button you can auto-populate a full set of 30 tags that you’ve tested and loved?

Woah, so this was a whole lot of golden tips that we really hope you’ll put in action and find helpful. For those of you who are just too busy to keep doing it all yourself and are ready to hand over the responsibility to a team of experts, you know that Creative Label is the one for the job. Shoot us an email at info@itscreativelabel.com and we’ll help you get started on putting together your hashtag strategy.

Instagram Starts Testing Invisible Likes. Here’s What That Means For The Future of Instagram

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Imagine yourself scrolling through your Instagram feed and not feeling such a heavy weight on your shoulders when you don’t get enough likes on your photo. Although this can totally be an issue rooted in a lack of self-confidence, it happens to even the most confident where likes dictate how you feel about yourself or what you posted.

So if the possibility of Instagram hiding your likes has driven you into panic mode, worry no more. We’ve touched on this topic and its implications previously on our podcast, The Label, and today we’ll be digging even deeper. As these changes continue to roll out and people continue to freak out, we’re here to help you understand exactly what these changes mean and why you have nothing to worry about. Let’s get started!

Producing meaningful and quality content will become more important than ever.

When you create focusing solely on vanity metrics such as likes and follows, you tend to disconnect from what makes you who you are. You begin to create content that doesn’t truly speak to you and your audience. This happens because you’ve based so much importance on these metrics to dictate how well you do.

Here’s the thing. Although having a ton of likes is great, it’s also about the quality of these interactions. It’s better to have 300 likes from people who actually love what you do and will eventually buy from you rather than likes from 1,000 people who just don’t care.

Removing likes from the public eye will help content creators produce material that’s more in alignment with who they are. But also, it’ll change the social dynamic so there are less mental health concerns around basing your worth on superficial metrics.

Genuine comments and story mentions will be the next visual measurable metrics.

As these changes roll out, the quality of your social interactions will become the primary measure of your performance. People will look to how many comments you have as an indication of a well-performing post. Following the comment section, story mentions will be insanely important. If you want to boost the quality of the comments and overall interactions you have on social media you have to go after them. That means, be more social! Don’t wait for the party to come to you, be the party and go say hi to people who look like they’d enjoy what you’re all about. Do this multiple times a week and eventually your comments and DMs will look less like “nice feed👍” and more like “wow, you read my mind! I need this in my life.😍”

What does this mean for users purchasing their engagement?

We hate to be the bearer of bad news but it’s only because we love you and want what’s best for you! Honestly, you have nothing to worry about with these changes as long as you don’t purchase your likes, comments, follows or automate your activity on social media. But heads up if you do! Instagram doesn’t play when it comes to this and they will at best shadowban you from appearing to new accounts and at worst they’ll delete you. No warning at all. So if you’ve been trying to fake it ‘til you make it by buying engagement, stop now.

Nowadays, brands who want to work with influencers have access to some software that helps them see who is purchasing their engagement. There are also a few free tools online who estimate how many followers are real on your account. It’s normal to have a few fake ones even if you’ve never broken the rules so don’t worry!

After reading this, what kind of content will you create that you think will resonate the most with your audience? Comment below!

4 Ways To Use IG Stories To Grow  Your Email List

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4 Ways To Use IG Stories To Grow  Your Email List

Picture a bridge between you and a sale. Every brick making up this bridge is comprised of the trust you create, the value you provide, and the entertainment factor you incorporate. These essential building blocks are what helps bridge the gap from follower to customer.

This may sound overwhelming. Don’t fret. We’re here to help. Today, we’re going to let you in on 4 of our favorite tips & tricks to use Instagram Stories to grow your email list.

For those of you who are total newcomers to the world of Instagram marketing, your goal is getting people to take action beyond the platform. In a perfect world, people would always go straight from follower to purchase through the link in your bio, swipe up on Instagram Stories or shop on your IG. But, unfortunately, things aren’t always that easy! Capturing emails is a great way to take your follower through your branded user experience on your website and, ultimately, the sales process. So it’s time to stop focusing solely on just growing your following and more on taking them to the next step. Are you ready?

#1 Create An Enticing Digital Download

A freebie is not something free to give out just for fun. It’s a way for you to capture people’s information while also providing them with immense value in exchange. The latter is usually where most brand’s go wrong. You see, a high-performing freebie is born from knowing your audience through market research. In more basic terms, it’s a product of really knowing who you are and who you want to attract.

If you have over 10K followers on Instagram, you can take advantage of using the swipe up feature prompting people to swipe up to get the download. If you don’t have access to the swipe up feature, you can always direct them to either the link in bio or to DM you, which brings us to our next tip.

#2 Just Ask Them To DM Their Email To Attract Your Most Loyal & Qualified Leads

Generally speaking, the rule of thumb is to create as little steps as possible from point A to point B in whatever action you want a person to take. Think of point A as the platform you’re interacting with a user on and point be as your goal or objective such as purchase product. The more steps to get from point A to point B, the higher the drop-off rate.

But, sometimes, there’s an exception to the rule. If you’re trying to find your real MVPs, having them contact you is a way to attract quality over quantity.

A way for you to do this is to have a simple conversation on your stories or tell a story in a caption. You’ll want to plan out how to word things to ensure you’re quickly and clearly addressing your audience’s innermost desires, what your helpful solution is, and how they can get it. How they’ll get it is by asking them to shoot you a DM with their email so they can access whatever super special thing you’re offering.

#3 Tell a Story and Use a Sticker

You’ll notice a trend, storytelling is really important. It doesn’t always cut it to just tell people to go do something without any context or persuasion. The Instagram stories question sticker is a really fun way that people tend to host Q&As. It’s also a highly efficient, and underused, tool to get email signups.

Whether you’re promoting a freebie, your next product launch, or early access to your shop, you’ll want to take advantage of this. Once you’ve taken the time to tell your followers how much you care about them and why what you’re promoting is important for them, throw in a question sticker prompting them to leave their email address.

#4 Create a Special Insiders Club with the Close Friends Feature

Technically, this isn’t grabbing emails but it’s a way to create much more targeted stories for a hand-picked audience.

When you add people to your close friends’ list on Instagram, only those you pick get to see stories you mark for their eyes only. Not many brands have taken advantage of this feature. Usually, people assume it’s just for sending personal Instagram stories to your friends’ accounts but it’s powerful for brands as well as long as you get creative with it!

This is a great way for you to show appreciation to your most loyal followers by offering them a discount code or freebie! So brainstorm some content ideas to announce your invitation. Don’t forget the reward too. You’ll always have a better turnout when you’re offering something desirable to your followers. You could even go ahead and add a handful of followers who are always DMing you and the first to watch your stories. They’ll be pleasantly surprised to see they made it to your VIP list!

Which of these ideas will you implement first? We’d love to know! Comment below which you’ll be testing out first and any questions you might have.

 

5 Design Issues Resolved In Your Content Marketing

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Five design issues resolved in your branding

Design is often an underestimated element that belongs to a strong strategy. You can have what looks like the best marketing plan on paper but if your visual branding isn’t on par, nobody will be doing any double taking, clicking through, or purchasing what you have to sell. We’re on a mission to help you unlock the next level of growth for your brand. Today, we’re helping you achieve that through understanding the 5 Design Issues Resolved In Your Content Marketing. What does that mean? We’ll show you how to put together a better design for your content marketing. Don’t be alarmed though! You don’t need to be a graphic designer to really get these tips and implement them. So read up and drop a comment below if you have any questions!

Impersonal Stock Photography Images

Ever notice how many brands in the same field seem to be using the same popular stock images. These vary from trendy architectural structure or a really nice picture of a donut? We have, and it gets old! That being said, it’s time for you to go against the flow by adding in your brand’s uniqueness and personal touch.

With tools like Canva & Over App, you can easily take that stock photo (or not) and bring in elements that’ll incorporate your brand’s colors. So maybe you take that picture you really liked of a meal for your food blog but you overlay some text and shapes to make it your own. It takes 1-minute of your time to leave a lasting impression through memorable visuals.

We recommend, however, taking your own photos. Don’t let a digital camera scare you. iPhones take great photos these days. Plan out a photo that will really relay what you’re trying to convey in your food blog, snap it, edit it, and post it! This will really set you apart.

Leveling Up Your Design with Typography

You know when you’re scrolling through Instagram or reading a new blogger’s blog and all of a sudden what’s supposed to be 5 paragraphs is just one massive blob? Ya, we hate it too! Rule of thumb, whether you’re building out your next caption or 1,500-word blog post – break it up. We repeat. BREAK. IT. UP. Not only does breaking up your text make it easier to read but it aesthetically it looks so much better. If you’re writing a blog, take advantage of subheadings, avoid extra wide paragraphs, and try your hardest to be clear and concise.

Where’s Your Branding? Identify your signature design

Just because today you like the color purple and tomorrow you like the color yellow it doesn’t mean they both belong in your brand’s content design. Think of your brand as an incredibly confident person who knows exactly what they want and who they are, with little to no variation. Consistent branding creates an identifiable personality for the brand, one that is easily distinguishable and recognizable..

Even though your brand may not literally be a person, think of it like one. Every artwork you put out with your content is an extension of your brand’s expression & personality. Ask yourself, does this match up with my brand or is it confusing & off-brand? Deciding on 1 to 3 colors for your brand and sprinkling them in is a simple and solid starting point to create a cohesive feel.

Ignoring The Data When Putting Out New Designs

What does data have to do with something as artistic as design? Everything, here’s why. The data from your blog, ads, social media etc can help you piece together patterns.

For example, when looking at your top performing posts on Instagram over the course of a 1-year period you should look at the top 9 posts from a variety of angles. One of those angles is design. We look for any patterns when it comes to photography style, colors, filters, props, angles, or even outfits used. This approach works across the board with anything else online that you can pull data from. We encourage you to do the same for your highest converting ads or most-clicked-on blogs and see if there’s a visual pattern to them.

Design and the Psychology of Color & Clear Messaging

Say you own a spa. Using colors like red as your most dominant color doesn’t exude the relaxing atmosphere you want your potential clients to feel.

Oftentimes, people will select colors based on their own personal preference. The thing is, your personal preference may not align with the psychological meaning behind each color. So we’ve taken the time to help you understand the emotions associated with colors. Bookmark this article so you can always come back to it later when you need to.

Meaning behind colors

At Creative Label, we basically eat, sleep, and breathe design. If you’re having a hard time connecting the dots and executing a clear & branded content marketing strategy just send us an email at info@itscreativelabel.com. Let us help you with what we do best while you focus on what you do best. We would love to help you bring your branding to life!

Does Clickbait Really Work?

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Create brandtrust with clickbait

To clickbait or not to clickbait? Does it increase engagement? Does it lose brand trust? These are the questions many marketers and business owners are pondering. Look no further, we are sharing with you three ways to incorporate clickbait while maintaining brand trust. 

Make sure you’re accurately describing your content.

Here’s the thing, you want to drive traffic back to your website. So from that perspective, sure, having a clickbait title that piques curiosity and generates traffic makes sense. However, when viewing the long-term gameplan, using clickbait to lead views to a piece of content that isn’t accurately described by the title causes your audience to lose brand trust.

You don’t want to lose brand trust.

Your audience’s trust is priceless, especially nowadays where consumers care more about the who & why behind the brand. Through brand trust, powerful relationships are born and nurtured, which ultimately creates a sale.

Three ways to build trust.

So how are you supposed to entice people without clickbait? Here’s a couple tested & proven methods to attract people without sacrificing the brand trust factor.

  1. Post a ‘how-to’ piece showing your audience how to do something. Studies show that these type of articles gather a 76% engagement rate.
  2. Make a ‘why’ post to explain to viewers why one should do something. This style of post gathers a 74% engagement rate on average.
  3. Create a list-format post such as ‘7 Ways To Wear Pink This Spring’

Mirror your top performing posts.

Another strategy to incorporate brand trust, while incorporating clickbait, is checking out the top performing posts from your competition to understand what are the buzzwords that make people engage? Be sure to cross-reference is the title is purely clickbait or an enticing title that corresponds with the topic. Make a note of any words that might trigger this effect and plug one into your next headline.

Before submitting the post for publishing, always ask yourself “if I were one of my followers, would I want to go and read this post specifically instead of any others like it? Why?” Asking this question is important to ensure you’re maintaining brand trust. Digging deep to uncover the value of your content not only helps you assess if the blog is read-worthy but helps you perfect the title to something relevant and catchier.

Want to know the ultimate solution though? Stop driving yourself mad with the guesswork and let our team of creatively strategic minds do it for you. You have a business to run and focusing on writing up the perfect headlines shouldn’t be something that slows you down. If you’re looking for blog strategy, shoot us a message at info@itscreativelabel.com. We can’t wait to hear from you!

 

youtube-monetization

YouTube + Monetization

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YouTube Makes Serious Changes to Monetization Eligibility

YouTube has made a new announcement, and it’s terrifying for small content creators. This week, YouTube released a statement regarding changes to their guidelines for monetization. If you aren’t quite sure what that means, it means YouTube is now making it more difficult for content creators to make money. Before this week, in order for a YouTuber to make money, their channel needed to have a total of 10,000 views on their videos. Here’s what a content creator has to do to make a little extra dough now:

 

What Are The New Rules?

1. Before qualifying for monetization, a channel must have 4,000 hours of watch time within the past 12 months.

2. Before qualifying for YouTube monetization, a channel must have a total of 1,000 subscribers.

Dang, Why Would YouTube Do This?

There are many reasons why YouTube could have chosen to do this, but the main reason seems to be to please those who are advertising on the platform. By making it harder to monetize, YouTube will be able to control the content that plays before or after advertisements. These changes come shortly after YouTube sensation Logan Paul posted a video showing the corpse of a man. All in all, it makes it easier for YouTube to shut down inappropriate videos.

Another important note: If your channel is currently being monetized and you do not meet these new requirements, monetization will be disabled on your account on February 20, 2018.

How Can You Keep Up?

1. Don’t get frustrated too easily.

We know! It’s easier said than done. Try your hardest to not get frustrated with YouTube’s new policies. Getting frustrated will only make you more discouraged. As long as you continue to provide your viewers with original content and stay true to your brand, it is possible to get 4,000 hours of watch time or 1,000 subscribers.

2. Continue to post on a schedule.

Do not stop posting your scheduled content! Your audience will still be expecting your videos to be posted at your scheduled times. For example, if you usually post every Wednesday at 3 PM, you should continue to do so.  If you can post an extra video a week that would be even better!

3. Engage! engage! engage! 

One of the easiest things you can do to help increase your own subscriber count is to engage with others on YouTube. Respond to those who comment on your videos, and support other YouTuber’s by watching their videos.

4. Use other social media platforms to promote your channel.

Be sure every time you post a video on YouTube, you make an announcement on your other social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. This will help to increase your view count for each video by driving more traffic to your YouTube channel.

Overall, it can be very hard when social media platforms make unexpected changes. If you feel like you are at a standstill and need additional help with content development or rebranding, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at info@itscreativelabel.com. We are always here to help!

What do you think about YouTube’s new changes? Leave us a comment below! 

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