Eye Tracking: How Users' Eyes Move Across Websites

Admittedly, there's far more to building an effective website than simply choosing aesthetically-pleasing colors and typefaces; developing compelling, well-written copy and other interesting content; and offering easy navigation. While there's no doubt these are always important criteria, have you ever considered visitors' eye patterns, and how they read information on a given page? No? Not to worry...not many clients or companies we've worked with over the years have, either. Until now...

Nowadays, marketers are giving much more thought to these dynamics. Why? Because ers are fickle, and u So what can be done to facilitate quick interactions, simple navigation, and returning users? Check out this outstanding infographic, courtesy of Crazy Egg and Single Grain, which offers these tips and insights:

Four Quick Tips For Better Infographic Design

Editor's Note: The following is a guest Marketing Mulligans post written by Mickie Kennedy, founder and president of eReleases, a cost-effective electronic press release distribution service, and a widely-regarded and well-respected PR professional who maintains the company's popular PR Fuel blog. Infographics are all the rage these days; in fact, you'll find a bunch of them here on Marketing Mulligans. However, not all infographics are created equally. Some are awesome, and these present facts and figures in compelling ways. Others...eh...not so much. Here are some fast and easy ways to design outstanding infographics to boost your content marketing efforts.

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Did you know that over 80% of all human learning occurs visually? The simple truth is that most people are visual learners. Visual aids help to grab their attention, educate them, and increase their retention of new material.

That’s why infographics are such a powerful tool, and that’s why in the past I’ve talked about infographics can be a great format for your press release.

However, just because you put some information in the visual form of an infographic doesn’t mean that you’ll automatically get through to your audience. Design matters. If you can nail the design of your infographic, you’ll be able to grab readers’ attention, educate them, inspire them to share your infographic, etc. But it all comes down to getting the design right.

Here are 4 simple tips to keep in mind when designing your infographic.

1. Create A Central Focal PointThe whole idea behind an infographic is to get your information across visually in a quick and easy way. You can’t achieve this if you have a messy, scattered design. Be careful that you don’t turn your infographic into an overwhelming mess that’s impossible to follow. One easy way to avoid that mistake is to have a central focal point (one major graphic element) that attracts the eye and makes the information easy to follow.

2. Keep It SimpleYour audience shouldn’t have to work hard to understand your infographic. That’s why I suggest you avoid the use of legends that force the reader to go back and forth between the information and the legend to understand what’s going on.

3. Create Something Different
If you want to capture the attention of your audience, you need to show them something they haven’t seen before. A lot of infographics share the same basic design – pie chart, bar graph, etc. Try to come up with something new. Avoid being generic and unimaginative. Find a unique visual that corresponds with the information you’re trying to deliver in a smart, creative way.

4. Tell A Story Visually

When you get right down to it, infographics are tools for telling a story. And with infographics, you shouldn’t rely just on the words/data to tell your story; you should let your design be the storyteller. Someone should be able to quickly look at the visuals of your piece and understand the point you’re trying to convey.

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Who Is It?: Who's Using Geosocial And Location-Based Services?

Here at CMAC, we love geosocial and location-based services, such as Facebook Places, Gowalla, and Foursquare, because they're fun, and, more importantly, they provide creative depth, additional interesting dimensions, and serious promotional firepower to companies' social media marketing efforts. In addition to their use by major high-profile consumer brands (and even the White House!), local retailers across the country are effectively utilizing Facebook Places and Foursquare to drive significant in-store traffic, coupon redemption, and sell-through of specific products and services. (Here's a tip:  the next time you're at Chili's, check in to the restaurant on Foursquare, and score yourself some FREE chips and salsa for doing so!)

But who...exactly...is using these services? Unlike extensive demographic research for other social media channels, there's been little data on location-based service (LBS) users. Well, at least up until now...

According to a recent study by Column Five Media and Flowtown, men outnumber women, although just barely (59% to 57%, respectively), as the percentage of all smartphone owners using these technologies. The majority of LBS users are between the ages of 18 and 29; possess a minimum household income of $75,000; and are college graduates.

For a full rundown on all the findings of the study, check out the infographic below, or click here for a larger view.

As more user research in this area is conducted, we will post updates, especially since demographic continuously shift over time.

Game Changer: How Social Media Is Altering The Advertising Landscape

It goes without saying that marketers today have a ton of advertising options available to them, and far more than ever before in history:  print (newspapers, magazines, newsletters, etc.); radio (terrestrial and satellite, TV (cable, network, and online); online (websites, blogs, search engines, and e-mail); product placement (TV, films, and video games); and outdoor (billboards, transportation centers, and a myriad of out-of-home options).

And for those brands fortunate enough to have the dollars to spend on multi-faceted advertising campaigns, this never-ending list of choices makes it difficult to allocate dollars to any one medium with predictable results. In the end, most advertisers throw money at a combination (or all) of these channels  to generate the widest possible coverage with their primary target audience. It's not a bad strategy, although it can be extraordinarily expensive. In addition, it's one which has been followed for years, dating back to the "Mad Men" era of mass marketing, and long before the advent of online, satellite radio, and some of the newer, more technology-centric alternatives.

So where does social media fit into the advertising picture? Certainly, it presents yet another confounding series of choices to make when developing an ad campaign:  promoted tweets? Display ads on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Myspace? A compelling viral video posted on YouTube, and then doubles as an online video ad? Some or all of these? In the end, social media has dramatically altered the landscape of advertising, but the key question remains:  for better or for worse?

MDG Advertising, an award-winning agency headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, has attempted to get to the bottom of this by mapping out the many changes in advertising between its two primary timeframes:  the mass marketing era, and the new media era (read: now).

The findings are compelling. First, in the mass marketing period, the primary objective of an ad was to deliver a message to a targeted consumer in a one-way communication. However, in the new media age, the brand has to engage the customer in a conversation, and that requires two-way communication:  message disseminated to the consumer, and then listening to and responding to that consumer's feedback. Second, there is tremendous demand for and interest in online video ads, and that interest carries over to the mobile sector.

Check out MDG Advertising's infographic below to review all of the agency's findings on how social media platforms continue to alter the landscape of advertising. Click here to view a larger version of this image:

Twitter Psychology 101: An Explanation Of Tweeting Behavior

Remember taking your psychology 101 course in college, and then using your newly-acquired knowledge to explain, and even rationalize, all sorts of normal (and since it was college, probably abnormal) behavior you saw on campus? Me, too, and I remember it being a series of eye-opening revelations.

Well, the good folks at WhiteFireSEO, a Utah-based a Utah search engine optimizer with years of experience creating popular content and optimizing websites, are equally as captivated by psychology, and decided to apply that curiosity to the petri dish that is Twitter. The company polled hundreds of marketers about their Twitter usage habits, and their rationale behind such common activities as following and unfollowing other users, retweeting content, and sharing frequency.

In some cases, the results are hardly surprising. For example, Twitter users tend to unfollow others for tweeting too much, appearing automated, or talking about themselves all the time. or being too self-promotional In other words, if you're annoying in some way, you will lose followers in a New York minute.

In other instances, the survey yielded some interesting insights, which are summarized in the infographic to the left. I was surprised at the low percentage of respondents who rely on Follow Friday to find other users of interest. That is because I use Follow Friday to recognize others that I find compelling, and to recommend them to our follower base. The same goes for people who follow me, and suggest to others to do the same. It's actually a pretty useful tool, as is Marketer Monday, but I'm careful not to overuse it, and I'm also selective about whom I recommend.

Some other findings of note:  36 tweets per day constitutes oversharing, and interesting content and humor are the best ways to garner retweets. A very good example of a power Twitter user whose content is almost always interesting and humorous is world-renowned Apple fellow, venture capitalist, and best-selling author Guy Kawasaki. With nearly 100,000 tweets to date, and a stable of approximately 400,000 followers, Kawasaki has attracted a massive audience by tweeting quirky, intriguing, and just downright funny stuff that appeals to people of all walks of life. Make sure to follow Kawasaki to see what I mean.

In the end, check out WhiteFireSEO's survey takeaway:  tweeps don’t care if you give them things or ask them to help; they’ll retweet you if they like your stuff or think you’re funny.

Amen to that.

To peruse a larger version of this image, please click here.

Weird Science: Even In Social Media, Timing Is Everything

As I've noted numerous times before here on Marketing Mulligans, content plays an obvious and critical role in the success (or failure!) of any social media campaign. However, so does timing, and and so does how that content is shared. For several years now, these dynamics have been extensively researched by brands and marketing professionals, with varying results.

Enter the latest round of data from KISSmetrics concerning the best times of the day when your social channel audiences are most likely paying attention, and when you can generate the best possible exposure for your updates and content.

The research, which focuses only on American users, reveals some intriguing insights. For example, on Twitter, combined users in the Eastern and Central time zones represent almost 80% of the U.S. population; approximately 6% of all retweets occur at 5:00 p.m. ET; and higher click-through rates can be secured by tweeting 1-4 times and hour, midweek or on weekends, and either at noon or 6:00 p.m. ET. On Facebook, Saturday, by far, is the best day for sharing content; noon is the optimum time; and 0.5 posts per day is the most effective frequency for sharing.

For a full run-down of the research, check out the infographic below:

Based on my four years of experience using Twitter, I find it best share my most important content twice per day:  once in the morning, from 8:00 - 11:00 a.m., in your own time zone, and then again about six hours later. This means my tweets are seen by my followers in my geography in prime time, and also by colleagues in other time zones when they're online. Obviously, with the high volume of tweets and users these days, there's never a guarantee that all of my content will be seen, but it's all about being in the right place at the right time to maximize visibility.

You should give this strategy a try by adjusting your posts accordingly!

Everything You Wanted To Know About Twitter...But Were Afraid To Ask

As useful and as popular as Twitter is (and incidentally, we LOVE it!), it's also sort of the like the Wild West still in many ways:  lots of gunslingers kept in check by marshalls, with many citizens (i.e., users) simply trying to survive. But that doesn't take away at all from its power and influence, let alone its use as a cost-effective marketing tool for brands, entertainers, and professional athletes. It's a wonderful mechanism for getting up-to-the-minute news and information from just about any source or personality on the planet, but it's also highly useful for engaging and interacting with a wide range of consumers and businesses from around the globe.

For these reasons, and particularly because of Twitter's ever-growing popularity and increasing user base, much time, effort, and money has been invested in determining what drives Twitter traffic, and how its demographics, psychographics, and usage patterns are constantly evolving. It's almost a science in and of itself, and the regularly-updated results are fascinating.

Case in point:  this outstanding summary of recent Twitter (and some Facebook as well) statistics compiled by TechKing, an IT, Web design, and technology firm. So, test your knowledge:  how many of these facts did you know?

One stat that is quite intriguing: If Twitter were a country, it would be the twelfth largest nation in the world with over 105 million people!

Minute Man: Every 60 Seconds On The Web

Have you ever wondered what really happens every minute online, particularly with the extensive traffic on some of the major Websites and social media services?

Well, now you can see it all thanks to the highly-creative folks at Go-Globe.com, an international Web design firm, who have summarized a fascinating collection of stats which boggle the mind. In the short amount of time it's taken you to read this, the following has happened:

Search engine Google serves more that 694,445 queries.

6,600+ pictures are uploaded to Flickr.

600 videos are uploaded on YouTube videos, amounting to 25+ hours of content.

695,000 status updates, 79,364 wall posts and 510,040 comments are published on Facebook.

70 New domains are registered.

168,000,000+ emails are sent.

320 new accounts and 98,000 tweets are generated on Twitter.

iPhone applications are downloaded more than 13,000 times.

Check out the image for a full run-down:

Amazing! A larger vision of the infographic may be viewed by clicking here.

The Evolution Of Spam: A Timeline Of The World's Most Hated Messages

I've been using e-mail now for business purposes for just over 15 years, and sending personal e-mails (anyone remember CompuServe or Prodigy???) dating back to my college days almost two decades ago, but it seems that spam has been omnipresent the entire time. That's probably no exaggeration, since I can remember receiving unsolicited messages from the next dorm over about some harebrained scheme concocted by a cadre of aerospace engineering students. In any case, with the advent and proliferation of social networks, the global spam epidemic (read: scourge) has become even more dangerous, problematic, and dare I say annoying, than ever before.

And that's what is so appealing about this infographic, courtesy of Column Five for Marketo, and showcased in this piece on AllTwitter. For the first time ever, check out the evolution of spam, including the interesting origin of the term (a tip of the hat to Monty Python) and how the world's most hated messages have changed over the past 150 years:

Please feel free to click here for a clearer and much larger view!

The Quora Quotient

Quora is one of several highly-popular social media companies, including Groupon and LivingSocial, that is absolutely white-hot at the moment, and attracting a ton of user, media, and investor interest. But is all this interest translating into increases in user sign-ups, of which we count ourselves as one of them)? O.K., technically, we're not brand new to Quora, as we began using it several months ago, but we're still interested in this subject to see how Quora's subscriber growth mirrors that of other social media firms. And, by the way, you can follow us and check out are contributions on Quora by visiting here.

As it turns out, Quora is not just a social question-and-answer site where users just ask and respond to questions of all sorts. According to this study by KISSmetrics and Semil Shah, some subscribers vote on answers, while some users send private messages to other users based on similar interests and activities.

For a full rundown on how Quora users are utilizing the site, check out this cool infographic:

It will be interesting to monitor Quora's subscribe base and usage patterns over time to see how these metrics change...if at all. However, if the growth and usage arcs of other social media companies are any indicators, we can expect to see several significant changes in the next 6, 12, 18, and 24 months as the Web 3.0 world evolves.

Professional Networking Site LinkedIn Hits 100 Million Member Milestone, Preps For IPO

As LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional online network, rapidly closes in on its eighth birthday in May of this year (almost a lifetime for Web-based businesses these days!), the company just surpassed another major, and even more spectacular, milestone yesterday: the 100 million member mark.

Interestingly enough, more than 50% of the company's members come from outside the United States, with one-quarter alone based in Europe (20+ million) and the United Kingdom (5+ million). Nearly 10%, or just over 9 million, are in India. Overall, LinkedIn has members in over 200 countries and territories.

The diversity and accelerated growth in membership are impressive, and certainly represent attractive qualities as the company races toward its highly-anticipated initial public offering (IPO) in 2012. Another big sign of growth? LinkedIn started off 2011 with nearly 1,000 full-time employees located all around the globe, up from around 500 at the beginning of 2010.

To commemorate the membership milestone, LinkedIn produced the following infographic which details interesting membership figures and demographics. Check it out by clicking on the image for a larger view:

Keep your eye on LinkedIn over the next 12 months as it prepares to go public. The company has been introducing features and services left and right for companies and individual professionals, and it promises even more to come. And as Facebook continues to focus more on consumers than businesses, LinkedIn may become the de facto social media outlet for companies of all sizes.

The Evolution And History Of Social Media: Another Timeline

At CMAC, we love history, timelines, and infographics. So why not combine the best of all worlds, especially when it comes to social media? Ask, and you shall receive...as the saying goes.

Beginning with the introduction of the very first social networks, Friendster and MySpace, to the worldwide successes of Facebook, social media marketing campaigns, and Twitter-using celebrities and professional athletes, this amazing infographic from Edelman Digital offers some fascinating statistics and a stunning pictorial of the social media domain and the people in it. Check it out:

The CMO's Guide To The Social Landscape

In my experience, I have encountered occasions when even the most insightful, experienced marketing professionals, including chief marketing officers (CMOs), are not as up to speed as they should be on certain tactics. Doesn't matter if it's online advertising, viral marketing, direct mail, or search engine optimization (SEO). It's not necessarily because they're not savvy, knowledgeable, or experienced about these strategies. Rather, it's usually because they've only worked in organizations where more traditional approaches were required, or perhaps, they lacked resources (usually financial) to design and execute fully-integrated, comprehensive campaigns...even though the intent to do more was there. In other instances, the dynamics of the organization and industry simply demanded that a limited number of marketing channels be employed to achieve desired results. It happens. No one company can absolutely do everything in the marketing realm; it's virtually impossible.

And this scenario is often found with social media, which leaves many senior executives scratching their heads, particularly about its utility, revenue generation, brand awareness increase ability, return on investment, and the list goes on and on. Typically, they know they should have some sort of program, but they're not sure how to structure it, fund it, or manage it. Much has been written about how to obtain buy-in on these initiatives from the C-suite, so I won't cover that ground again here.

However, what I will present today is one of the most comprehensive guides I've ever seen that spells out, in very clear terms, exactly which social media platforms should be used to create certain marketing outcomes. For the C-suite, it doesn't get any better than this.

Check out this handy guide, entitled "The CMO's Guide to the Social Landscape," and developed by CMO.com and SEO firm 97th Floor, have created the chart below showing which social networks are best to achieve various organizational, customer relationship management (CRM) and marketing goals. How useful are Facebook and Twitter for SEO purposes? Can Flickr actually drive Website traffic? Is LinkedIn useful for customer communications? If dealing with these questions are part of your day-to-day responsibilities, then you'll definitely want to check this out and then save it.

Make sure to click on the image to view this amazing infographic in PDF format, and then add this to your resource folder. We did!

Cupid ♥ Social Media: The Latest Valentine's Day Stats

Obviously, today is Valentine's Day, and love it or hate it, this faux-holiday is responsible for billions of dollars in consumer spending annually: everything from traditional and electronic greeting cards and flowers, to candy, jewelry, cute stuffed animals, and countless other red, heart-shaped gifts and accessories. Frankly, it's just too big to be ignored.

And so it goes in the social media space. With the explosion of social media sites worldwide, and with users frequently discussing the status of their relationships (for better or for worse) openly on these forums, the social media realm provides some unique insights into the nature of today's relationships. In addition, it also yields several interesting perspectives on how social media enhances, or detracts from, Valentine's Day plans and gift-giving.

As explained in this story yesterday in Mashable, a recent study of 400 Facebook and MySpace users by Lab 42 offers a solid overview of how Americans perceive their relationships, use social media to describe them, and summarize their Valentine's Day plans. It's all laid out in this intriguing infographic, which may be clicked to reveal a larger view:

The story astutely points out of telling findings. For example, 16% of singles have their current relationship status on Facebook listed as “dating,” “engaged” or “married.” However, no married respondents called themselves “single.” A staggering 88% would rather receive a Valentine's Day gift at home, which we find funny because our two decades of experience in the workplace has been just the opposite. Why? People like to receive their gifts at work to flaunt them in front of their co-workers. And probably the most compelling result is that 41% of the users polled claimed they said "I love you" to their significant other in three months or less. This figure goes up to 63% when factoring in a timeframe of six months or less. Really?

In any case, whatever your status is, have an enjoyable Valentine's Day, and we hope you're spending it with someone special. If for some reason you're not currently in a relationship, then make sure to treat yourself in some way. You deserve it!

The Social Media Version Of The Mood Ring

Even though we're only four days into 2011, amazingly insightful research regarding Twitter usage and demographic statistics continues to pour in from all corners of the globe. Case in point: the recently-released results of a joint study by Harvard and Northeastern University which tracked the nation's tweets minute-by-minute over the last three years to determine precisely what their mood is at various time of the day.

A waste of time, you think? Perhaps not. The research revealed that Americans are happiest in the morning and late evening, and most depressed on Thursday afternoons. Interestingly enough, Americans are happiest on Sunday mornings, the study found. Some of these variations can be explained by the three-hour difference between the West and East Coasts; essentially, this means that the West Coast is happy three hours after East Coast residents. A detailed analysis of the study can be reviewed in this post on Business Insider.

To summarize their results, Harvard and Northeastern researchers created the following time-lapse video showing a typical day's tweeting activity, with red being grumpy and green being happy:

And the insights don't end there. According to the researchers, several interesting trends can be observed in the data on both daily and weekly bases. Check out the following graphs, as well as the cartogram illustrating state-by-state variations:

Daily Variations

Weekly Variations

Cartogram

For additional insight on Twitter usage statistics, please check out our pre-Christmas post, entitled "The User Demographics And Usage Patterns Of Twitter," which discusses the prestigious Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project's findings that only 8% of American adults that are online are now using Twitter, among other interesting data.

The User Demographics And Usage Patterns Of Twitter

According to the findings of a recent study conducted by the prestigious Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project, only 8% of American adults that are online are now using Twitter. This statistic was widely reported last week by many mainstream media outlets and technology blogs when the study's results were first released, but a deeper analysis of the research reveals some additional..and truly surprising...insights.

Interestingly enough, in the 10-year lifespan of the Pew Internet Project, this is the first time the organization has surveyed users about a single, company-specific online application or activity because the Project's mission is to look generally at online usage patterns rather than at specific brands or technologies.

First, let's take a look at Twitter's current demographics:

As this chart shows, groups notable for their relatively high levels of Twitter use are:

~ Young adults: Internet users ages 18-29 are significantly more likely to use Twitter than older adults.
~ African-Americans and Latinos: Minority Internet users are more than twice as likely to use Twitter as are white Internet users.
~ Urbanites: Urban residents are roughly twice as likely to use Twitter as rural dwellers.
~ Women and the college-educated are also slightly more likely than average to use the service.

Secondly, how are all these groups ACTUALLY utilizing Twitter? Check out this great chart which compares the frequency of different activities. The service is primarily used for posting personal updates, although 62% post work updates and just over 50% of all Twitter users share news stories and communicate directly with others users via direct message:

So what does all this mean? Even with all the hype and buzz surrounding Twitter as a micro-blogging platform, and its willingness to be embraced by techies, politicos, professional athletes, recording artists, film and TV actors, and many other individuals, the service has much room for improvement in attracting an ethnically-diverse range of users and compelling them to utilize Twitter in a broader spectrum of ways.

Given the success of and reception to this study, I'm sure we will see follow-up surveys from Pew which will attempt to update these findings. Stay tuned...particularly as Twitter's usage and popularity continue to evolve.

The History Of Social Media: A Stunning Visual Timeline

Now here's something you don't see every day, and is definitely worth a look. We, here at CMAC, love this, and we especially love well-designed images like this.

According to Barry Ritholtz on his blog, The Big Picture, we all know social media has become an integral part of modern society. It's as common nowadays as, well, breathing and blinking. Currently, there are popular social networks with user bases larger than the populations of most countries. In addition, there are niche sites for virually every special interest in existence. And there are countless sites to share photos, videos, and status updates, as well as online destinations for new people and connecting with family members and old friends. In the final analysis, there are social solutions for just about every communication need in the world.

So, at this point, now is as good a time as any to take a look at the history of social media...rendered in the following amazing and informative infographic with a comprehensive global history of the medium. You can click on the image for a larger, more detailed view:

Take A Ride On The Reading: Social Media Monopoly

I love playing Monopoly, although, admittedly, I'm not very good at it. In fact, my wife not only schools me at regular Monopoly, but she also whips me at Golf Monopoly, Disney Monopoly, Simpsons Monopoly, and basically every iteration of the popular Hasbro game we've every played. Ironically, I'm the one with the MBA, but I digress. It never makes a difference.

However, I wonder how she WOULD fare if the social media space were turned into a Monopoly game? I'd love to find out by playing this version of the game, courtesy of Barry Ritholtz's great blog, The Big Picture:

Click on the graphic for a larger, more detailed version; it's worth a closer inspection.

Naturally, Facebook and Twitter are the most expensive properties, taking the place of Broadway and Park Place. Instead, of Chance and Community Chest, this version sports Technorati and Mashable, while the railroads, such as B&O and Reading, have been replaced with key smartphone platforms like Droid and iPhone.