The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has found that wireless carriers violated federal law in selling customer location data to third-parties.
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai has sent a letter to several lawmakers informing them of the results of the agency’s investigation. According to Engadget, in 2018 it first came to light that wireless carriers were selling “their customers’ real-time location data to aggregators, which then resold it to other companies or even gave it away.”
Senator Ron Wyden brought to Chairman Pai’s attention the case of prison phone company Securus Technologies. Securus was buying wireless location data and providing “that information, via a self-service web portal, to the government for nothing more than the legal equivalent of a pinky promise. This practice skirts wireless carrier’s legal obligation to be the sole conduit by which the government conducts surveillance of Americans’ phone records, and needless exposes million of Americans to potential abuse and surveillance by the government.”
Once the information came to light, Verizon was the first to promise to stop the practice, with the other three carriers following suit. Even so, the FCC launched an investigation to determine if federal laws were broken, and it appears they were.
In the letters, Chairman Pai said:
“Fulfilling the commitment I made in that letter, I wish to inform you that the FCC’s Enforcement Bureau has completed its extensive investigation and that it has concluded that one or more wireless carriers apparently violated federal law.
“I am committed to ensuring that all entities subject to our jurisdiction comply with the Communications Act and the FCC’s rules, including those that protect consumers’ sensitive information, such as real-time location data. Accordingly, in the coming days, I intend to circulate to my fellow Commissioners for their consideration one or more Notice(s) of Apparent Liability for Forfeiture in connection with the apparent violation(s).”
That last part, in particular, is an indication the FCC will take some form of action against the offending parties.
It’s one thing when companies offering a free service look for ways to profit off of their customers’ data—with the proper disclosures, of course. It’s quite another when companies that already charge for the service they offer then proceed to double-dip by selling their customers’ data, let alone doing it without properly disclosing it. It’s nice to see the FCC agrees such behavior is illegal, not to mention unethical.
The power of paid media extends far beyond the scope of organic reach.
As opposed to organic media, such as SEO, content marketing and social media posts (but not sponsored posts), or earned media, such as publicity, reviews and word of mouth, paid media refers to any content placed outside of your own real estate that you pay for, like PPC ads, display ads and search ads.
With the right paid platforms, your brand gets the opportunity to be seen by a larger and broader audience who would otherwise be out of your reach.
When you’re spending money to make money, naturally you want to see a healthy ROI. A suitable set of paid tools not only puts a limit on your spending, but saves you time by making the process of targeting users more granular and effective.
Different companies rely on different tools to analyze their media spending, but you should preferably pick one or two of the best (depending what your tasks are).
So what are the best paid media tools? Here are the top 17 tools available on the market.
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For instance, the Audience Targeting report can be used by PPC managers and brand strategists to refine their ads strategy for a targeted audience. Plus, all this is complemented by the fact that SEMrush has one of the biggest keyword databases in the world.
Top Features of SEMrush:
View PPC reports like “Shared % unique keywords”, “Keyword ideas”, “Search ad suggestions”, and “Display ad recommendations” for your website with a single click:
Find relevant details like time, location and device of the ads posted by your competitors through competitive analysis, and use the data to add extra value to your current ad strategy to avoid budget drain in display campaigns.
Find countries or regions that are more profitable in terms of advertising costs with the CPC map and modify your ad campaigns accordingly to benchmark your numbers, plan your marketing campaigns and estimate ROI.
See ads displayed for certain keywords in Google.
Use the Ad Builder feature to create profitable ads after researching how your competitors and other advertisers promote services and products in the same niches.
How Much Does SEMrush Cost?
SEMrush provides three standard monthly plans:
Pro plan at $99.95
Guru plan at $199.95
Business package at $399.95
A custom Enterprise Solution is also available.
What Users Love the Most about SEMrush:
Users love how they can personalize PPC campaigns in SEMrush to keep up with competitors online by ensuring that their ads reach the right people and their messages are aligned with the interests of the audience.
SEMrush provides better audience segmentation based on data such as user interests and demographics so marketers can deliver customized messages to audiences.
Lets you promote your content effectively and gain more earned media by mapping your competitor’s position online with SEMrush Advertising Research.
You can easily discover the difference between your and your competitors' ad strategies.
Advertisers with large accounts having numerous ad campaigns with groups often wish to optimize and manage their accounts, but worry about wasting too much time. After all, most businesses have to work with limited resources and time. This is where Google Ads Editor comes into play.
This free-to-use tool helps drive the efficiency and performance of ad campaigns. Thanks to Google’s continuous support and promotion, Google Ads Editor has become popular among beginners and professional advertisers alike, helping them manage multiple Google Ads accounts even without an Internet connection.
Top Features of Google Ads Editor:
Make changes quickly and easily to your Google Ads campaign on-the-go without Internet connectivity.
Use CSV files to import extensive changes to your Google Ads account and export campaigns as HTML or DLL files.
Apply large-scale changes to your Ads account without wasting time by adapting existing keywords to target specific locations.
Use the Find Duplicate Keywords feature to scan your account for duplicate keywords and eliminate them so they do not affect your campaign performance.
How Much Does Google Ads Editor Cost?
Google Ads Editor is a free-to-use, downloadable application. As long as you have a working Google account, you are all set.
What Users Love the Most about Google Ads Editor:
The “Recommended Budget” column that lets users properly allocate budgets so they don’t miss out on opportunities or impressions.
Users also love full-cross account management that allows them to work on all accounts from a single window.
WordStream Advisor is geared towards helping you launch paid media campaigns that offer high click-through, engagement and conversion rates.
Whether you are running social ads or paid search or both, this tool helps you optimize your campaigns so you receive the leads, visits, calls and sales to improve your ROI.
Top Features of WordStream Advisor:
WordStream Advisor lets you evaluate Google Ads account performance and receive personalized, intelligent recommendations such as improving ad extensions based on users’ individual account data.
New Google Ads remarketing features in WordStream Advisor let users stay connected with their target audience beyond email.
Get access to tools for social advertising and implement effective, streamlined campaigns on Facebook with minimal effort, thanks to prescriptive workflows and suggestions that align your business goals with other advertising campaigns online.
How Much Does WordStream Advisor Cost?
If your budget is up to $2,500 per month:
a 3-month plan costs $299 per month
a 12-month plan costs $264 per month
If your budget ranges from $2,500 to $5,000 per month:
a 3-month plan costs $429 per month
a 12-month plan costs $374 per month
If your budget ranges from $5,000 to $10,000 per month
a 3-month plan costs $529 per month
a 12-month plan costs $464 per month
If your budget ranges between $10,000 and $25,000 per month:
a 3-month plan costs $789 per month
a 12-month plan costs $694 per month
Special plans are available for budgets above $25,000 a month.
What Users Love the Most about WordStream Advisor:
Analyzes performance and implements recommendations to strategize paid search changes in accounts.
Users love how the tool drives phone calls via paid search by tracking calls back to the ads that triggered them in the first place.
Receive recommendations to save costs and achieve better resources through expansive training resources and a dedicated Customer Success Team.
WordStream Google Ads Performance Grader uses your personal details and Google Ads account information to analyze and grade your Google Ads performance. You receive a free report as well as a final grade about your Google Ads performance, based on parameters like:
Wasted spend
Quality scores
Text ads
PPC best practices
CTR, long-tail keywords
Impression shares
Account activity
Top Features of WordStream Google Ads Performance Grader:
Increases your impression share so that you get greater exposure and multiply your lead generation results.
Keeps your CTR high enough by testing various text ads so you do not lose any ground to competing advertisers.
Maintains performance by keeping your account active for longer.
How Much Does WordStream Google Ads Performance Grader Cost?
The WordStream Google Ads Performance Grader tool is completely free to use.
What Users Love the Most about WordStream Google Ads Performance Grader:
Users love how efficient this tool is when it comes to providing insightful analysis that is almost as comprehensive as audits from professional consultants or agencies.
Prevents wastage of hundreds, even thousands, of dollars each month on unnecessary ad keywords that do not convert.
Increases your Quality Score, thereby impacting your ROI, improving your rankings and reducing your expenses.
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SpyFu is a competitive intelligence and keyword research tool that digital marketers can use to enhance their online search performance. SpyFu helps identify profitable search terms in your competitors’ organic and paid search campaigns for competitive analysis.
Top Features of SpyFu:
Use SpyFu’s PPC Research or PPC Keywords features to filter out branded searches, export them to Google Ads, and gain insights from multiple keywords simultaneously.
Easily discover your top competitors with this tool.
Use the content analyzer feature to understand social media benchmarks, such as average engagement, best performing days of the week, and suitable content.
How Much Does SpyFu Cost?
The Basic Monthly Plan costs $39
The Annual plan is $33 per month.
The Professional plan costs $39 for the first month and $78 a month thereafter. You have to pay $58 per month for the Annual version.
The Team plan costs $299 monthly and $199 per month for the Annual version.
What Users Love the Most about SpyFu:
Users appreciate having the ability to search for any domain of their choice along with every space they show up in Google. You can check every keyword, organic rank and ad variations for the past 13 years.
Smart recommendations help users drive clicks to Google Ads to increase site traffic.
The tool lets you see the high-priority keywords that your site is missing and prepare ad copy that wins after repeated testing.
This is a sophisticated business analytics software that draws all your performance indicators and metrics into a unified, accessible location. This business reporting platform works with different analytics engines and tools and is ideal for gathering data and insights for devising and implementing social media, web analytics and online marketing.
Top Features of Supermetrics:
Supermetrics for Google Drive lets you run queries, refresh your data quickly, and share dashboards and reports with other team members.
Connect and fetch data from common sources like Facebook Ads, Google Ads, LinkedIn Ads, along with other niche sources, such as AdRoll.
Supermetrics pulls social media metrics from Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Reddit and others for you to create your own personalized social media reporting, including engagement and follower growth statistics.
How Much Does Supermetrics Cost?
Supermetrics for Google Sheets starts at $99 per month
The Data Studio version begins at $39 per month
The Excel version starts at $99 per month
Supermetrics for BigQuery costs a minimum of $190 per month
The Data Grabber is $19 per month
Supermetrics Functions starts at $29.99 per month
Supermetrics Uploader starts at $39 per month
What Users Love the Most about Supermetrics:
Supermetrics supports different connectors like Twitter Ads, Facebook Ads, Google ads with personalized dashboards to build client-facing monthly reports easily that contain all the necessary metrics. The reports are visually pleasing and easily understood.
Create demand for your services or products via search to reach potential consumers who are likely to express interest in what you sell.
Supermetrics pulls together different pieces of data to create a single report that shows how your website performance affects your ROI and pinpoints areas for improvements so you can make strategic decisions.
Marketers can use this analytics and call tracking solution for campaign attribution and conversion reporting from inbound phone calls.
This unique AI-powered tool provides real-time call analytics that allow marketers to make informed decisions based on specific data gathered from these phone conversations. This makes it easy to drive up your ROI by increasing conversion rates, revenue-generating calls, running highly effective campaigns and personalizing the customer journey.
Top Features of Invoca:
Use call-centric solutions like analytics and call tracking software to improve PPC and display ads.
Combine Invoca with your Google Ads campaign to view call details of individual phone calls as well as campaign details, UTM source, and the keyword that triggered the call so you can modify your paid media strategy accordingly.
Gather information from calls to optimize your preferred analytics platform.
Optimizes paid search campaigns in Google Ads.
How Much Does Invoca Cost?
Invoca offers a demo version to users. If you find it useful for your business, you can contact Invoca for detailed pricing information.
What Users Love the Most about Invoca:
Users appreciate being able to integrate the tool with Google apps, social media platforms, Salesforce Sales Cloud, Adobe Experience Cloud, and Salesforce Marketing Cloud.
The system is easy to use and lets users quickly analyze small and large datasets to improve call tracking KPIs.
Leadpages is perfect for small businesses and marketers who want to meaningfully engage with visitors on third-party channels like social media websites.
This tool directs your traffic to dedicated landing pages where the target audience can learn more, purchase and convert accordingly. Use Leadpages to more effectively use your landing pages in your marketing and paid media campaigns, keeping in mind what you’re offering, to whom, and where the audience comes from.
As if that’s not all, Leadpages helps you promote your landing pages on channels other than Facebook. Instead of following the trend and chasing the next top-trending platform, this tool helps you focus on social media websites that have the biggest and the most engaged following.
Top Features of Leadpages:
Agile and flexible, Leadpages landing pages can easily be integrated with paid ads for a high return on ad spend.
Visitors can now share pages easily on their preferred social media sites, including LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter, increasing visibility and driving more traffic.
Add or customize your page’s Open graph tags so you get better control over how the content gets displayed on your targeted platforms.
How Much Does Leadpages Cost?
The Standard plan costs $37 per month
The Pro plan costs $79 per month
The Advanced plan costs $321 per month
What Users Love the Most about Leadpages:
Lets you capture leads quickly by integrating with Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other platforms.
Users appreciate how they can acquire 5x more qualified Facebook Ad leads as well as optimized landing pages.
Digital advertising on social media gets easier by integrating Leadpages with Google Ads and Facebook Ads for increased traffic when specific PPC landing pages for targeted keywords are added.
This all-in-one platform is primarily meant for SEO but can easily handle all your paid media needs. Easily research PPC keywords with the tool and take advantage of the search questions option. Also optimize your site for Google Ads with the AdWords Keyword tool so you can stay ahead of the competition.
Top Features of Serpstat:
Instead of keyword density or exact-match, Serpstat uses semantic analysis against your competitors’ content to increase the relevance of your page in Google’s eyes and convert the data into actionable insights for your social media and PPC teams.
Check the PPC Research section to gain insights into your paid competition, gather their paid ads and keywords, recognize gaps in your own PPC campaigns, and uncover growth opportunities.
How Much Does Serpstat Cost?
Serpstat offers a free plan that has limited functionality along with various paid subscriptions:
The Lite plan costs $69 per month
The Standard plan costs $149 per month
The Advanced plan costs $299 per month
The Enterprise plan costs $499 per month
What Users Love the Most about Serpstat:
Serpstat has its keyword clustering tool for sorting keywords by topic, but what makes this unique is how it analyzes meaningful connections between different keywords and splits them into intelligent hierarchies.
Serpstat provides data based on keyword information and geographic region, offering information on more than 180 million domains.
Identify the best-performing keywords of your competitors and imitate their success to reap rewards.
Acquisio is solid campaign management software that helps you optimize your digital advertising campaigns. Thanks to this tool, you can manage and report various marketing initiatives through a single, streamlined dashboard.
Digital marketers, local resellers and direct advertisers will find customer acquisition easier with this powerful solution that combines sophisticated ad platforms with data science tools for optimizing and automating the online customer acquisition processes.
The fully stocked ad management software comes with campaign management, branded report, chat support, social ad optimization, and bid and budget optimization.
Top Features of Acquisio:
PPC advertisers can use updated Google Ads benchmarks on Acquisio to determine whether or not their PPC performance is good relative to other industry competitors.
Harnesses the power of machine learning to reduce CPA and CPC, and improve key PPC metrics, like CVR and CTR.
Fast-track the success of your paid media advertising efforts on Instagram, Facebook and other platforms with integrated A/B testing, advanced analytics and campaign improvement tips.
Manage your budget through customer targeting and social media monitoring.
How Much Does Acquisio Cost?
The Starter Plan supports 5 accounts and costs $199 per month
The Standard Plan supports 25 accounts and costs $899 per month
The Professional Plan supports 50 accounts and costs $1,899 per month
What Users Love the Most about Acquisio:
Users love how they can optimize campaigns easily with 24×7 bid and budget management without any historical data thanks to machine learning.
Acquisio Turing is an AI-powered cross-channel PPC management technology that supports bid and budget management, local lead estimation and budget distribution for optimizing spend and increasing conversions or clicks.
Users find it easier to hit monthly budgets across search and display channels with Acquisio generating more conversions and improving chances of SEM success drastically.
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Crazy Egg is an online tool that uses eye-tracking tools like Heat Maps, Overlay, Scroll Maps and Confetti in order to understand customers' interests on any given website and thus increase conversions.
Crazy Egg can track a whopping 1,111 visitors for every dollar spent on it.
Top Features of Crazy Egg:
Heat map: Reveals where users have clicked on a page, how far they have scrolled down the page, and even show results of eye-tracking tests.
Scroll map: Shows how far down the page people scrolled and reveals where visitors abandon the page.
Overlay: The overlay report shows the number of clicks made on each element of a webpage.
Confetti: With confetti, you can distinguish all the clicks on a site segmented by referral sources, search terms and more.
What Is the Price of Crazy Egg?
Crazy Egg starts at $9 per month and comes with a free 30-day trial for all plans.
What Users Love the Most aboutCrazy Egg:
The Facebook Ads application integrated with Crazy Egg allows businesses to amplify their posts for reach, engagement, click-throughs and impression based on their needs.
Users love how Crazy Egg’s functionalities integrate with various third-party websites, serving as alternatives to Google Analytics to measure the success of your site.
Ahrefs is a well-known name when it comes to competitor research and SEO, and has the largest backlink index. But it also doubles as an efficient paid media tool.
For users running a PPC campaign, they can use Ahrefs to improve their ROI and get the maximum value out of their ad investment. This tool shows the top landing pages bid on by the competition so you clearly understand which pages are converting well for them.
Ahrefs offers a considerable amount of data for PPC agencies, allowing users to view the keywords that others are bidding on along with CPC rates, search volume and ads. Spy on competitor ads to see the ad keywords they're targeting.
Top Features of Ahrefs:
Get information on social media shares with the integrated content tool from Ahrefs that boasts a large database and make your content better than the competition's.
Comprehensive view of competitor PPC and social media content strategies lets you to find gaps and improve your own strategies.
Filter results by social channels to understand which types of content and which topics perform better on specific social media channels.
How Much Does Ahrefs Cost?
Ahrefs has 4 pricing plans with a 20% annual discount if paid upfront:
The Lite plan costs $99 per month
The Standard plan costs $179 per month
The Advanced plan costs $399 per month
The Agency plan costs $999 per month
What Users Love the Most about Ahrefs:
It has one of the largest crawlers after Google and one of the largest keyword databases.
Ahrefs lets you see the exact keywords your competitors are bidding on and also see the percentage of traffic they are generating.
With competitor keyword tracking, you can track whenever new keywords or ads are added by your competitors.
Sizmek is an independent buy-side advertising platform for advertisers and agencies concentrated on doing digital advertising campaigns.
The open ad management stack of Sizmek delivers the most creative and effective multi-screen digital campaigns across the globe, powered by an unrivaled data engine.
Top Features of Sizmek:
Supports the building of media plans easily: creates advertisements, activates data, manages assets, evaluates results, and much more.
Sizmek has a functionality that imports users' data into the platform for meaningful targeting and segmentation.
The Dynamic Creative feature allows users to create numerous versions while fetching data from all campaign components in a centralized location.
It optimizes creation automatically against the KPIs that are set in place, so you can use the tools for end-to-end ad attribution and serving.
It offers in-depth analytics on every ad campaign with unique IDs to track the performance of ads.
You have the power to control your advertising data without over relying on Google.
How Much Does Sizmek Cost?
Sizmek is a quote-based system; both SMB and enterprise pricing depend on the number of users. Contact the company for a quote.
What Users Love the Most aboutSizmek:
Suitable for small businesses, medium businesses and large enterprises.
Very easy to use and gives excellent value for the money.
Supports uploading multiple ads in bulk.
It has a great customer service-dedicated account team to support questions.
What makes SE Ranking a standout from other paid media tools on this list are its powerful social media management capabilities.
This tool provides scheduled publishing, extensive reporting, and helpful ranking data to show you what’s working for your business and what needs your attention to attract valuable traffic to your website.
Top Features of SEranking:
You can find a full list of paid media competitors simply by entering keywords.
You can identify the historical advertisers for a particular search query.
View the best time to publish social media posts to better interact with your target audience.
You can easily find keywords with similar meanings and discover the most popular ads of your competitors.
Check detailed information about user activity, bookmarks, retweets and demographic data.
How Much Does SE Ranking Cost?
SE Ranking offers different payment plans, priced according to the frequency of ranking checks and tenure of subscription:
A free-trial option
An optimum plan for $18.60 per month
A plus plan for $42.50 per month
An enterprise plan for $90 per month
What Users Love the Most aboutSE Ranking:
SE Ranking lets users look beyond organic rankings and into paid Google rankings by tracking not just their keywords but the competition's as well.
Use the On-Page Checker to optimize your web pages for a certain keyword based on the recommendations.
As the volume of your advertising and digital data increases, you struggle to handle all your Google Ads and Google Analytics data. The problem worsens when you have to share simplified, streamlined reports with company leaders. Google has developed the Google Data Studio for this very reason.
This data visualization and reporting tool gathers data from up to twelve separate sources, including Google Analytics, and collates them into easily shareable, easily modifiable, and easily understandable reports.
The platform also includes graphs, maps, charts and widgets for improved data visualization.
Top Features of Google Data Studio:
Save money and time by creating, sharing and reading reports quickly and efficiently.
Help your team and business make quicker decisions and get improved results thanks to Data Studio’s versatility and usability.
How Much Does Google Data Studio Cost?
It is available for free.
What Users Love the Most about Google Data Studio:
Everything from colors to font sizes to adding images is customizable.
Extreme Data source flexibility; can use Excel files, Google Sheets, CSVs and more.
Easy-to-use interface. With basic familiarity with Microsoft Excel, it's easy to master.
The reports produced are interactive and easily shareable.
Optmyzr is PPC marketing software and was named one of the best paid media tools in the U.S. Search Awards 2018. It gathers raw Google Ads and Bing Ads information into extensive visualizations, so account managers can follow highlights and trends and direct their optimization strategies.
The tool is suitable for both beginners and PPC experts. You can automatically build campaigns from your inventory and use machine learning to instantly optimize your campaigns.
Top Features of Optmyzr:
One-click optimization helps improve PPC account performance in minutes.
Automates data analytics so paid media marketers do not need to go through multiple spreadsheets looking for key data points.
Automated bids and budgets help meet goals for traffic, ROAS, CPA and conversions.
Complete control over the bidding process so you get the best value for your money.
How Much Does Optmyzr Cost?
Optmyzr offers a free trial and four payment plans, including quote-based enterprise pricing for larger businesses and corporations:
The Lite plan costs $116 per month
The Regular plan costs $224 per month
The Pro plan costs $449 per month
The Enterprise plan is quote-based
What Users Love the Most about Optmyzr:
Optmyzr supports one-click optimization that automates data analytics without having to go through spreadsheets looking for main data points.
Thanks to the Enhanced Scripts feature that provides marketing automation, Optmyzr can optimize bidding for mobile ads on a daily or even hourly basis.
Optmyzr has flexible spending settings that help you keep to your budget by pausing ads, ad groups, campaigns or keywords when a specific spending threshold is achieved.
Every marketer understands how crucial timely operations are to the success of their paid media campaigns.
This is where Microsoft Advertising Editor comes into play, saving both time and money and improving the performance of your search marketing campaigns in the process.
Editor is available for download and you get a clean, intuitive desktop application that streamlines your entire PPC campaign management, both offline and online.
Top Features of Microsoft Advertising Editor:
Microsoft Advertising helps your business reach out to more high-quality customers and improve your ROAS with PPC campaigns.
Enjoy lower CPC and CPA than other similar Google Ads campaigns.
Examine and adjust your keywords and keyword bids with Microsoft Advertising.
Run reports and refine ads and keywords to continually improve your paid search ad performance, improve conversions and cut costs.
How Much Does Microsoft Advertising Editor Cost?
You can download this tool online free of cost.
What Users Love the Most about Microsoft Advertising Editor:
Users love how the new Microsoft Advertising tool lets them compare the performance between two campaign variants to optimize CPA and curb excess spend.
Target relevant consumers on social media with profile targeting that zeroes in on the correct audience.
Drive PPC with the action extensions feature that adds a CTA button beside ads in the search results and links to your preferred landing page.
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Concluding Remarks
Whether you're a beginner or a PPC expert, every digital marketing campaign requires the use of paid media tools. All the tools mentioned above have been designed to help businesses optimize and manage their spending in order to improve their bottom line in the long run. Each of the tools has its own share of advantages, so you should consider factors like pricing and specific features to make an informed decision before choosing.
Verizon has now hit 34 cities with its 5G roll out, adding Cincinnati, Little Rock and Kansas City, according to a company press release.
Verizon made headlines at the end of last year for meeting, and surpassing, its goal of rolling out 5G in 30 cities by year end. By the end of 2019, it had reached 31 cities. In the first month of 2020, the company has now hit 34.
Because Verizon is focusing on high-band, mmWave 5G, the new service does not cover all areas of the cities. While mmWave is the fastest flavor of 5G, with speeds measured in gigabits, it has very limited range and building penetration. As a result, only parts of the new cities have coverage.
Cincinnati’s coverage is “concentrated in parts of Downtown, Mt. Adams, West End, Evanston, Walnut Hills, Corryville, Clifton, Price Hill, Over-The-Rhine, Mt Auburn, Avondale, Newport (KY), Dayton (KY), Bellevue (KY) near landmarks such as: Great American Ballpark, Duke Energy Convention Center, Serpentine Wall, City Hall, Xavier University, Cincinnati Zoo, Hebrew Union College, Cincinnati Christian University and Newport Waterfront (KY).”
In Kansas City, service is based “in parts of Downtown, Midtown-Westport, Plaza Midtown, Olathe and near landmarks such as: The Garment District, Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts, Rockhurst University as well as inside and around the professional football stadium.”
In Little Rock, service is “concentrated in parts of Midtown, University District, Birchwood, Otter Creek and near landmarks such as: UAMS College of Medicine, University of Arkansas at Little Rock, Rock Creek Square Plaza Shopping Center, and Outlets of Little Rock.”
Once customers move outside of 5G range, their devices will automatically transition back to 4G LTE. Even with the geographically-limited rollout, however, Verizon’s 5G will bring a welcome performance boost to customers, as well as help ease the strain on their 4G network in heavily populated areas.
Apple's first Watch launched before it was fully baked, but early access helped users and developers learn what worked -- something the AR industry needs.Read More
What follows are the most popular articles that we published in January 2020. Articles from early in the month are more likely to make the list than later ones.
Google Analytics is a powerful tool that’s unprecedented in its ability to measure your website’s performance. The data it gathers is invaluable to you as a marketer. They can give you a clear view of what decisions you need to make to benefit your brand. Data, however, are just numbers and graphs. On their own, they cannot tell a story. It’s your job as a marketer to deduce that story through sound and unbiased analysis and not fall for Google Analytics myths.
If Google Analytics terms and data confuse you more than they enlighten you, this article will help you understand four Google Analytics and SEO-related myths you need to avoid.
How do I use Google Analytics?
Business owners use Google Analytics (GA) to see what they’re doing right, in terms of getting quality traffic to their sites. If you’re a business owner hoping to expand your presence in online spheres, you’ll need analytics to measure your success.
With the use of metrics, Google Analytics tracks who visits your site, how long they stay, what device they’re using, and what link brought them there. With these data, you can discover how to improve your online marketing and SEO strategies.
Google Analytics basics
At first, it may seem like Google Analytics is serving you raw data that are too complicated to digest. Learning to speak the analytics language, though, it is easier than you think. Below are some basic terms to help you better understand the data reported by Google Analytics:
Pageviews
Pageviews are the total number of times a page on your site that users have viewed. This includes instances in which users refresh the page or when they jump to another page and promptly go back to the page they had just left. This underlines what pages are most popular.
Visits/Sessions
Sessions are measured by how much time users spend on your website, regardless if they spend it navigating only one or multiple pages. Sessions are limited to a 30-minute window. This means that if users stay on the site for 30 minutes but remain inactive and non-interactive with the page throughout, the session ends. If they leave the site and go back within 30 minutes, though, it gets counted as a session.
Average session duration refers to the average time users spent on your site. Pages per session, on the other hand, is the average number of pages that users view on your site within a single session.
Time on Page
This refers to the average time users spend on a page on your site. This can help you determine which pages users typically check out longer. This starts the second a pageview is counted until the subsequent pageview ends it.
Traffic
Traffic refers to the number of people accessing your website. This comes from a traffic source or any place where users come from before they are led to your pages.
Traffic is classified into direct and referral. Direct traffic comes from pageviews triggered by specifically typing the whole URL or when a user is given a URL directly without searching for it. Referral traffic is directed from links on other sites, like search results or social media.
Unique Pageviews
Unique pageviews are reported when your page is viewed once by users in a single session. These don’t count the times users navigated back to that page in the same session. For example, a user navigates the whole site in one session and navigates back to the original page three times; the Unique Pageview count is still at one, and not three.
Unique Visitors
When a user visits your site for the first time, a unique visitor and a new visit for the website is counted. Google Analytics uses cookies to determine this. If the same user comes back to the site on the same browser and device, it’s only counted as a new visit. But if that user deletes their cookies or accesses the site through a different browser or device, they may be falsely added as a unique visitor.
Hits
Hits are interactions or requests made to a site. This includes page views, events, and transactions. A group of hits is measured as a session, used to determine a user’s engagement with the website.
Clicks
Clicks are measured by the number of clicks you get from search engine results. Click-through rate (CTR) is the total amount of clicks divided by impressions or times you are part of the user’s search results. If CTR is dropping, consider writing titles and meta descriptions that capture your users’ attention better.
Events
Events are actions users take on a particular site. This includes clicking buttons to see other pages or download files. You are looking at what kind of content encourages users to interact with the page, thereby triggering an event.
Bounce rate
Bounce rate refers to users’ single-page sessions wherein they click on a page and exits quickly without interacting with a single element on the page. A high bounce rate can mean either that a user has swiftly found what they were looking for or that they did not think the content on the page was interesting enough to stay longer and engage.
Goals
You can input goals in your Google Analytics account to track user interactions on your site. These interactions include submitting a report, subscribing to your newsletter, or downloading files. If the user performs an event that you’ve identified as a goal, Analytics counts this as a conversion.
Four common Google Analytics myths debunked
Now that you have an overview of Google Analytics terms, below are five common misconceptions surrounding those terms and how to avoid these as a marketer.
1. The more traffic that goes to your site, the better
The myth
Generally, you’d want more people to visit your site. These huge amounts of visits, though, won’t matter if they don’t turn into conversions. Even if thousands of people flock to your webpages each day, if they don’t take the desired actions your SEO campaign is aiming for, these visits won’t provide any benefit for your site.
The truth
A good SEO strategy is built upon making sure that once you’ve garnered a pageview, the quality of your content drives the user to the desired action such as subscribing to a newsletter, for example.
Keyword research can help make sure that you use the right terms to get you a higher ranking on SERPs. The material on your site, however, is also crucial in satisfying your users’ queries, enough to get a conversion.
2. Users need to spend more time on webpages
The myth
Users spending a few quick seconds on your page is not entirely bad. This may mean that these users are looking for quick, precise answers. Quality SEO delivers this to them through well-placed keywords and concise content. Hence, if they quickly get the answers they need, they tend to leave the site immediately.
The truth
Quality SEO content ensures that your material is written in such a way that it invites users to learn more about the subject, which can be seen when they are led to another page on your site. This leads them one step closer to taking the desired action on your site.
3. The amount of unique visitors is an accurate metric to measure audience traffic
The myth
The upsurge of unique visitors on your page doesn’t necessarily mean that the amount of your audience is blowing up. Unique visitors are measured by cookies used by Google to determine if it’s a user’s first time on a site. The same user accessing the same page through a different browser or a browser whose cookies have been cleared is counted as a unique visitor too.
The truth
If you’re looking to study your audience, it’s not enough to look at how many of them go to your page. You can refer to the Audience > Demographics tab and see who are navigating your site and from what marketing links they were directed from. With this information, you can determine what types of content gather the most traffic and from what avenues this traffic comes from such as SERPs or social media posts, for example.
4. Traffic reports are enough to tell if your campaign is successful
The myth
Looking at traffic reports alone is not enough to determine whether your SEO campaign is successful, or that your keyword research paid off. Although at first, it seems as though heavy traffic signals an effective online marketing strategy, it only counts the quantitative aspect of your campaign and dismisses the qualitative side.
The truth
Maximize all the reports on GA. All these are correlated with how your campaign is going. Reports are valuable in comprehensively addressing issues instead of nitpicking on a single aspect of a campaign because, for instance, a report suggests it’s not doing its job.
These points will help you clear the air when it comes to Google Analytics and help you correctly derive insights.
Here is a list of product releases and updates for late-January from companies that offer services to online merchants. There are updates on shipping, visual search, augmented reality in shopping, order management, and headless ecommerce applications.
As misinformation about the coronavirus outbreak continues to spread, Facebook has announced several countermeasures. This is the new reality.Read More
This week Robert Rose pays tribute to the disruptive influence of Clayton Christensen. He shares a new global report that names two fields you know well as the jobs of tomorrow. And he talks risk-taking with the person of the week. Continue reading →
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The European Union (EU) “lawmakers voted 582-40 in favor of a resolution to spur action by the Commission on a single charging solution for smartphones,” according to AppleInsider.
Two weeks ago EU regulators issued a statement detailing their intention to push for universal phone charger connectors. Regulators had been ‘encouraging’ companies to unify around a single standard for years, but were disappointed those companies had failed to follow through. As a result, they were preparing to push for mandatory measures that would force companies to adopt a single solution.
Apple, in particular, has been vehemently opposed to the measure, as they have the most to lose thanks to their proprietary Lightning connector. With an installed base of some 1.5 billion devices, there’s an entire ecosystem of companies, devices, peripherals and more—all built around the Lightning cable.
Unfortunately for Apple, their arguments do not appear to have made much of a difference. As AppleInsider highlights, the European Parliament may well have had Apple in mind when saying “the use of wireless charging technology entails additional potential benefits such as mitigating e-waste; highlights that many mobile telephones already use wireless charging methods and that fragmentation in this area should be avoided; calls, therefore, on the Commission to take measures to best ensure the interoperability of different wireless chargers with different mobile radio equipment.”
At this rate, it seems likely a future generation of iPhones will be sporting an entirely different type of connector.
Electrek is reporting that Elon Musk has said “it won’t be long before Model S has a 400-mile range.”
One of the biggest limitations of electric vehicles is range. While they are ideally suited for city and suburban travel, their range can often be a limitation for rural drivers or those wanting to take them on long road trips.
While the Model S currently has a maximum range of a 373 miles, battery technology is reaching the point where the company expects to cross the 400-mile threshold soon. Musk attributed the improvements to changes to the core chemistry in the vehicle’s batteries.
The end result, according to Musk, is “we’re rapidly approaching a 400-mile range for Model S, for example. So, it won’t be long before Model S has a 400-mile range.”
This is good news for Tesla customers, or those interested in making the jump to electric vehicles.
Watching sports may never be the same if a demo by telecommunications company Optus is any indication.
ZDNet is reporting on a demonstration Optus put on at its headquarters in Sydney, in partnership with mixed reality firm Unbnd, combining the power of mixed reality and 5G. Mixed reality (MR) is the term that covers both augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR).
According to ZDNet, in the presentation Optus and Unbnd demonstrated “a 360-degree ‘virtual theatre’ that allows viewers to experience National Basketball Association (NBA) content in either 2D or 3D, such as live games and replays, while also providing access to additional mixed reality information like scores and statistics, as well as the ability to buy NBA products such as basketball jerseys.”
The technology could eventually allow viewers to watch and essentially ‘participate’ in sports that would otherwise be too dangerous for the average person. As an example, according to ZDNet, the demo “showcased an immersive sportscar racing experience which was streamed to a 5G-capable handset. In that mixed-reality experience, viewers could see three 4K video streams concurrently — ranging from driver POV streams to the main race coverage — in addition to real-time statistics such as the positions of race cars on the track map and the speed of each driver that are tracked by Internet of Things sensors.”
Optus and Unbnd’s demo is an amazing example of what’s yet to come as 5G is paired with other revolutionary technologies, such as MR.
Apple has been working on improve Maps since 2018 and the company announced the new version has rolled out to all U.S. customers.
Image Source: Apple
Apple Maps has lagged behind Google Maps since its introduction, but Apple began an intense effort to close the gap, deploying fleets of camera-equipped Apple Vans to gather much more detailed information about roads, buildings, landmarks and topography.
“We set out to create the best and most private maps app on the planet that is reflective of how people explore the world today,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of Internet Software and Services, in the press release. “It is an effort we are deeply invested in and required that we rebuild the map from the ground up to reimagine how Maps enhances people’s lives — from navigating to work or school or planning an important vacation — all with privacy at its core. The completion of the new map in the United States and delivering new features like Look Around and Collections are important steps in bringing that vision to life. We look forward to bringing this new map to the rest of the world starting with Europe later this year.”
Maps also offers a similar feature as Google Maps’ Street View.
Image Source: Apple
“Maps offers interactive street-level imagery with high-resolution, 3D photography and smooth and seamless transitions through major cities with Look Around. Customers from anywhere in the world can navigate through New York City, the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Houston and Oahu, with many more places to come.”
One area where Apple has worked to differentiate itself from Google and other tech companies is its strong commitment to privacy. The company took the opportunity to point out how Maps respects user privacy.
“Apple is committed to keeping personal information safe and has built privacy into the core of Maps. With Maps, no sign-in is required and it is not connected to an Apple ID in any way. Personalized features, such as suggesting departure time to make the next appointment, are created using on-device intelligence. Any data collected by Maps while using the app, like search terms, navigation routing and traffic information, is associated with random identifiers that continually reset to ensure the best possible experience and to improve Maps. Maps goes even further to obscure a user’s location on Apple servers when searching for a location through a process called “fuzzing.” Maps converts the precise location where the search originated to a less-exact one after 24 hours and does not retain a history of what has been searched or where a user has been.”
It remains to be seen if Apple Maps completely matches Google Maps, but today’s announcements and the myriad improvements are a good start.
After eight years as CEO of IBM, Ginni Rometty is stepping down and Arvind Krishna has been elected to replace her, according to a company press release.
Rometty is the first woman to hold the top position at IBM and oversaw the company during a period of transformation and disruption within the tech industry. She led IBM as it dealt with the rise of cloud computing, artificial intelligence and more. During her tenure, the company bet big on the hybrid cloud market, as well as its acquisition of open-source software company Red Hat.
Arvind Krishna will pick up where Rometty left off. In fact, Krishna is responsible for some of IBM’s strategic moves under Rometty. Specifically, he was the architect of the Red Hat deal, and has been a staunch proponent of IBM’s hybrid cloud approach.
“Arvind is the right CEO for the next era at IBM,” said Rometty in the press release. “He is a brilliant technologist who has played a significant role in developing our key technologies such as artificial intelligence, cloud, quantum computing and blockchain. He is also a superb operational leader, able to win today while building the business of tomorrow. Arvind has grown IBM’s Cloud and Cognitive Software business and led the largest acquisition in the company’s history. Through his multiple experiences running businesses in IBM, Arvind has built an outstanding track record of bold transformations and proven business results, and is an authentic, values-driven leader. He is well-positioned to lead IBM and its clients into the cloud and cognitive era.”
Krishna struck an optimistic tone that IBM will continue to innovate and play a pivotal role in the tech industry.
“I am thrilled and humbled to be elected as the next Chief Executive Officer of IBM, and appreciate the confidence that Ginni and the Board have placed in me,” said Krishna. “IBM has such talented people and technology that we can bring together to help our clients solve their toughest problems. I am looking forward to working with IBMers, Red Hatters and clients around the world at this unique time of fast-paced change in the IT industry. We have great opportunities ahead to help our clients advance the transformation of their business while also remaining the global leader in the trusted stewardship of technology.”
VentureBeat is reporting that Facebook Gaming is adding a dashboard and toolkit to help streamers deal with trolls.
Facebook Gaming is tied with Microsoft for a distant third placing among game steaming services with 3% market share. The company is working hard to change that, however, and its latest features is sure to win fans, namely the ability to limit the impact of trolls.
According to VentureBeat, “with the new toolkit, creators and moderators will still be able to remove comments, mute viewers for a short period of time or ban people from their Page or stream. Once someone is banned they will still be able to watch the stream but won’t be able to comment or react to the stream or other people, and their previous comments will be removed.”
Facebook worked with the Fair Play Alliance, a coalition of companies dedicated to promoting healthy online gaming. Together, they worked to create rules that would help tackle the growing problem of online trolls and harassment. As popular streamer Melonie Mac highlighted in an interview, this is especially a problem for women streamers, and the new tools have already improved her experience on the platform.
You aced that last exam, waltzed across the stage in your cap and gown, and you’re eager to start your career. The only problem: you’re about to dive into the uncertain abyss that is post-grad life and the only certainty, is that your diploma will arrive in 6-8 weeks.…
Verizon’s quarterly results were a mixed bag, offering both good and bad news for investors, according to Bloomberg.
On the one hand, Verizon added 1.25 million subscribers, beating analysts’ expectations of 1.23 million. The added growth was, at least in part, aided by Verizon’s deal with Walt Disney Co. to provide subscribers free access to Disney+ for a limited time. On the other hand, that deal ate into profits, as Verizon is essentially footing the bill for its subscribers, although the exact cost has not been disclosed.
The cost of 5G roll out has also been cited as a reason for the company missing estimates. A separate report by Bloomberg, however, highlights why the company is pushing as hard as it is on 5G. According to the report, analysts at LightShed Partners are saying that Verizon has used up most of its available airwaves in Miami, Chicago and other cities. The firm’s report is based on their own research, as well as data provided by mobile testing firm Opensignal.
“They have used spectrum to fuel capacity growth and improved speeds, and now they have a limited amount left,” said Walt Piecyk, LightShed analyst.
As a result, Verizon needs to roll out 5G as quickly as it can, especially in cities, to ease the strain on its network. If its 5G delivers on the promise, however, the company should have no trouble growing its customer base and revenue even more.
At Seer, we believe that behind every search is a person. We believe that we should spend as much time understanding your audience as we spend on understanding Google. So we include audience research as a vital part of our SEO strategy.
According to GeekWire, a group of senators led by Senator Maria Cantwell are pushing to use proceeds from an upcoming 5G spectrum auction to boost rural broadband.
According to the Pew Research Center, despite improvements in recent years, there is still a significant gap in broadband service between urban/suburban and rural Americans. While 79% of suburban residents enjoy home broadband and 75% of urban residents do, that number drops to only 63% for rural Americans. Some 83% of urban and suburban Americans enjoy broadband access on their smartphones, compared to only 71% of those who live in rural areas.
Senator Cantwell hopes the upcoming 5G spectrum auction may provide the funds to help close that divide. According to GeekWire, “Cantwell introduced legislation this week that would ensure some of the proceeds from a public auction of C-Band airwaves would be invested in rural broadband deployment and next-generation 9-1-1 networks.”
The C-band spectrum is currently used by satellite companies for video and radio programming, but the FCC plans to free it up for 5G wireless. If Senator Cantwell and her colleagues get their way, rural Americans may gain better access to broadband options.
On January 24, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued a report signaling the federal government’s intention to crack down on ecommerce sales of counterfeit goods. In the report, the federal government all but declares that ecommerce is a threat to national security.
Facebook released its quarterly results Wednesday and it was not good news for investors, according to ABC News.
The company posted ongoing growth, slightly beating analyst predictions, but its earnings were plagued by high expenses and legal settlements. In particular, the company has tentatively agreed to a $550 million settlement in an Illinois class-action lawsuit.
According to ABC News, CFO David Wehner said the expenses were “largely driven by higher legal fees and settlements.”
“This includes charges related to a $550M settlement in principle we reached this month in connection with the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act litigation,” he continued.
The Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act stipulates that users must be informed when their data is stored, why it is being stored and for how long. Facebook was sued because accusers say its photo tagging feature violates the law.
The stock price was down approximately 7% in Thursday morning trading following the revelations.
If you want to start creating effective landing pages to generate more leads and sell more products, Instapage is one service you’ve probably heard of. Providing you with a professional set of modern landing page templates and a powerful page builder tool, it certainly sounds like a capable product. But is it as good as... View Article
While the year may still be new, our devotion to giving back to the WordPress community is not. Tomorrow, January 31st, marks WebDevStudios’ first Five for the Future in 2020. One of our goals this year is to dedicate the last Friday of every month (subject to change, depending on client work) to this WordPress initiative.
Take a look at what we accomplished last month during our final Five for the Future (#5ftf) of 2019. Keep up with our contributions tomorrow by following us and the hashtag on Twitter. We invite you to join us and tweet us your #5ftf contributions.
Today is #5ftf at @webdevstudios a day allowing us to give back to the WordPress community! I’ll be spending my day working on multi site blog content for churches.
Today I went out to help those in need in the WordPress Support Forums for #5ftf and was able to help a few people overcome their struggles and continue enjoying WordPress! @webdevstudios thank you for empowering and encouraging us all to give back!
Yesterday was #5ftf @ @webdevstudios , I have the chance to work on my talk/post about a cool JS library that you should use when developing Gutenberg blocks. Stay tuned 😉
