It would have been difficult to miss the vlogger debacle that kicked off this month when YouTuber Elle Darby, with 99,000 subscribers, was exposed for asking the owner of a Dublin hotel for free accommodation…
Yesterday, popular messaging service WhatsApp announced the launch of WhatsApp Business, which it says it has designed with small businesses in mind, to help them communicate more easily with their customers. It claims it will also make…
The principles of “calm computing” and “calm technology” were coined way back in 1995 by PARC Researchers Mark Weiser and John Seely Brown, in reaction to what they saw as the rise of ubiquitous computing and consequently “feeling overwhelmed…
As we near the end of 2017, it’s customary to look back on what has been another significant year in digital, and take stock of how we’ve evolved as an industry. In particular, we thought…
As we near the end of 2017, localised content continues to be paramount for the world’s search and social media giants. Facebook is the latest in the pack to revise its local offering, relaunching its…
“At some point, we’re going to look back and think, how did we not have a digital layer on the physical world,” said Greg Jones, director of VR and AR at Google, last month. It’s a…
Twitter has unveiled a new, self-serve advertising subscription for small businesses, which it is calling Twitter Promote Mode. The service has been designed to enable SMEs to more easily run Promoted Tweet campaigns across the…
The worst kept secret is that Google are looking to monetise the local channel. By linking Google My Business (GMB) with your Paid Media campaigns your ads are eligible to appear in the local results.…
It might not have reached the UK yet, but the recent news that Google’s Home Services ad program is rebranding as Local Services by Google, and expanding to 17 US cities with plans to be in…
The festive season is almost upon us, and now’s the time for online retailers to be promoting their Christmas bestsellers, if they aren’t already. Christmas is such a critical time of the business year, and…
There has been much talk this year of voice search, yet not so much attention has been given to visual search, which has been quietly bubbling beneath the surface. There’s no denying that our world…
Getting called out for creating a racist ad once, is unacceptable and embarrassing. But being accused of making the same mistake, again, is quite frankly…mind boggling. At the start of this week, personal care brand…
What’s happened to Product Listing Ads (PLAs)? In June 2017, The European Commission slapped a record 2.4-billion-euro ($2.8 billion) fine on the world’s most popular internet search engine. A result of Google “abusing its dominance…
I recently received a letter from my local department store containing no less than six free hot drinks vouchers, and if I’m honest, it made my day! I put this down to the fact that…
Last week I followed what was quite possibly the most entertaining use I have ever seen of Twitter. It was stunningly adlib, and showcased just how effective Twitter can be when the right brains are…
The gender-neutral branding debate resurged this summer when shoe manufacturer Clarks received a barrage of complaints over its “sexist” school shoes, and in particular a girls’ range named the “Dolly Babe” (which compared with its “Leaders”…
The influencer marketing space has boomed over the past few years with brands of all shapes and sizes getting involved, largely driven by rising consumer preference for the opinion of trusted individuals, over and above…
Recently, I ran a Facebook ad campaign for a client and upon reviewing the performance, noticed that Facebook was showing me three different figures for the number of post comments. On the ads manager I…
It’s been 10 years since the hashtag first appeared on Twitter, created by Chris Messina, a developer at Google at the time. It was his idea to use the # US pound sign as a…
To understand why today’s leading digital businesses are so successful, we need to bring it back to human biology, says Scott Galloway, founder of digital performance company L2 Inc. Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple…we turn to…
Voice controlled-technology is changing computer-human interfaces in the home and across a broad spectrum of industries, ranging from medical and banking through to business applications and industrial robotics. According to Mary Meeker’s 2017 Internet Trends Report,…
In a move that’s very reminiscent of Google five or so years ago, Facebook has in the past few days made a big change to its News Feed algorithm which it says will “reduce the…
Many of our clients use Google Analytics as their main web analytics reporting tool. Therefore, we often get many queries on why “my data isn’t coming through correctly” or “not working as I would have…
[iframe src=”https://www.youtube.com/embed/RtFlAicK3xw?rel=0″ width=”560″ height=”315″] Over the past few days, a new documentary about the history of SEO has been released, produced by digital marketing firm Ignite Visibility. ‘SEO:The Movie’ has already amassed more than 81,000 views…
ITV recently said that it plans to launch addressable TV within the next 12 months, enabling smaller and local businesses to target ads on a household-by-household basis. Its intention is to persuade smaller advertisers to divert…
Often, research into digital behaviour is segmented by age or generation, and by demographic group, but rarely are trends investigated between cities. A new US-focused study by The Local Search Association, which looks at digital…
It’s a sign of the times, and the state of print journalism in the UK, that The Guardian and its sister Sunday paper The Observer will become tabloid newspapers from early 2018. Their shrinking size,…
This morning in Britain we woke to the news of a hung parliament, with the Conservatives having failed to secure a majority vote. There will be lots to play for in the coming days, and…
The world of customer reviews is changing. There was a time where a customer had to go into a store to complain; this then evolved into phoning customer services to resolve a query; then came…
Setting its sights on the restaurant sector first, Microsoft Bing has begun integrating chatbots into its local business search results. Through its newly launched Business Bot program, bots will automatically be created from data in Bing…
Companies with sites that target time sensitive terms, for example, ‘flowers’ and ‘chocolates’ around Valentine’s Day or Mother’s Day, need to make sure that both their technical SEO and content is correctly implemented well ahead…
A new Gigya poll of 4,002 adults, spanning the UK and the US equally, has found that 68% of consumers don’t trust brands to keep their personal information secure. It’s a worrying finding in light of the…
Last month DAC London and Ambergreen (the newest member to the DAC family) held an breakfast at Clerkenwell London called the New Consumer Journey. Over croissants and coffee, we discussed how brands, through the use of…
Mobile apps are today used more than mobile browsers. They currently account for 84.9% of total mobile time spent (a 10.3% increase on last year), and nearly 20% of total media time, for US adults.…
With today’s consumers being attracted by authenticity and increasingly resistant to traditional advertising methods, it’s no surprise that the popularity of native advertising is growing steadily. Forecasts highlight its potential to soon dominate advertising with…
Reports of ‘fake news’ and the millennial and Gen Z population becoming increasingly sceptical of traditional news sources, have been rife this year so far…but despite this, online news and media consumption is booming. A…
Over the past few days, a flurry of high profile brands and organisations, including French advertising group Havas, M&S, the Guardian, BBC, J Sainsbury Plc, Audi, Transport for London and the UK Government, have pulled…
Guerrilla marketing is often associated with the radical and extreme. Once a fringe movement in the world of advertising, it has easily made its way into the mainstream, providing an effective way for breaking through…
This year we received a commendation from the Drum DADI awards for our work with Dreams, where we achieved an extremely impressive ROI and facilitated a massive improvement in their store visibility. Take a look…
When designing for mobile it is important to use the correct screen resolutions for each device to create a sharp product. With the extensive range of devices available to users, it’s a huge pain having…
For many businesses, data analytics is currently used for reporting the success or failure of business performance rather than helping to driving vital decision making. 2017 is the year this changes according to top analysts…
The average click through rate on a digital ad is 0.17%; less than two clicks per 1,000 impressions. Consumer trust in brand-driven advertising is in sharp decline and has been for quite some time; eye…
Tone of voice is absolutely essential to every business in helping it to develop an emotional connection with customers. Some of the most successful brands are so because they have a distinctive, consistent, effective tone…
With the limp body of English hopes in the Euros barely cold, preparations have already begun for gearing up for the summer’s next big sporting event. Take down the St George’s Crosses and put out…
2015 has been a good year for the podcast, taking them from an unnoticed tab in the iTunes menu to the boredom killer of choice on those long commutes. I constantly notice the odd chuckle…
This week The Barclay’s Premier League announced that it was stripping away its sponsorship and is set to become The Premier League from the start of the 2016/17 campaign. With this came an overhaul of…