Marketers know they need to understand their customers, but standard demographics are no longer enough says Justin Gray, whose post on Marketing Profs outlines Four Tips for Building Fail-Proof Buyer Personas . Gray recommends going through a persona exercise to identify three to five customer "personalities" in order to get to know your buyers better. .....

Very few businesses can survive these days without some sort of digital presence. The average Canadian spends over 40 hours a week online, doing everything from chatting on social media to reading articles that interest them, researching an upcoming purchase or finding a place to go for lunch. Business buyers are online, too. 83% of B2B buyers do research online before making purchase decisions. .....

HubSpot released its 2013 State of Inbound Marketing Report today. The largest edition to date, it surveyed 3,339 respondents from 128 countries to provide an in-depth look into the strengths and challenges of brands' inbound marketing efforts. HubSpot has listed 10 takeaways from the report on their website , indicating that inbound marketing is on the rise and delivers measurable ROI, but must be integrated with other departments and with overall company goals to be truly effective. .....

Last week we published a blog post titled The New SEO is Good Content . Since then, a few people have pointed out that, although good content is essential, site design plays a role in SEO rankings as well. This is very true. Just as Google’s new algorithms reward high quality content, they also reward clean, quick-loading, easily navigable site design. .....

Microsoft's new ad campaign focuses on user privacy, appealing to customers' desire to control what information they share on the web. The campaign contrasts Microsoft against Google, which has come into conflict with the US and European authorities recently over privacy violations. .....

49% of consumers say the best improvement to their shopping experience would be better integration between in-store, online, and mobile, according to a study by Accenture reported by CMO.com . Consumers want a seamless experience across all channels including pricing, promotions, and inventory, but the study found a significant gap between expectations and reality. .....

A/B testing allows you to find the best combination of elements on your webpage, email, or other promotional materials to drive conversions and generate leads. You can test countless variables including your title or subject line, layouts, calls to action, copy, images, forms, fonts, and colours to determine which ones best appeal to your potential customers. By doing so, you improve the effectiveness of your marketing efforts and increase your marketing ROI. .....

Twitter announced keyword targeting for its promoted tweets today, adding to its existing geolocation, mobile device, and user interests filters and further expanding the functionality of its growing ads network. The microblogging site has already carried out limited trials of the new feature, with advertisers including Walgreens and GoPro reporting engagement levels as high as 11%. .....

If you work with websites or online marketing at all, you probably know that Google updates over the past year to 18 months have rendered many old SEO tactics obsolete. Tricks like keyword stuffing, content scraping, and submitting your site to link exchanges not only no longer help build your search standings, they actually get your site punished by Google and other search engines. .....

Two companies are offering ways to opt-out of ads on your mobile device. Advertising Age reports that these tools from Evidon and Truste will enable you to disallow behaviorally targeted ads on your tablet or smartphone. These apps reflect a growing desire for user privacy on mobile devices, but present a challenge for the ad industry which wants to target audiences with the most relevant possible ads. .....