As inbound marketers, one of the big questions clients ask us is which social networks they should be part of? “Should I join Twitter?”, “Will Facebook help build my business?”, “Is LinkedIn something we should consider?”

Twitter best for click-throughs

Our answer is always that different social networks can work well for different businesses, and each of them can be effective depending upon how you wish to use them.

Certainly here at Sticky we have found Twitter to be a very effective inbound marketing tool and the source of regular traffic for our sites, whilst we also use Facebook, Linkedin, Digg and more.

Today a new report has surfaced detailing the most effective ways for marketers to spread their message online. It covers the sharing trends and click-through rates on different social networking sites as well as email. It makes for interesting reading.

Twitter Crushing Facebook’s Click-Through Rate: Report

By Austin Carr at Fast Company

What is the most effective way for marketers to spread their message online? Facebook? Twitter? Company blogs? Email?

According to a new report by marketing firm SocialTwist, Internet sharing trends have shifted heavily shifted toward social networking, but other platforms still have a strong presence for word-of-mouth advertising. SocialTwist analyzed more than a million referral messages sent using the company’s Tell-a-Friend tool, a widget that lets users share sites through social media.

In the last year, social networking sites saw a 10% increase in usage, and a 16% bump in click-throughs. Overall though, email still accounts for 55% of referrals.

However, when it comes to click-throughs, social networking sites are far more effective, accounting for more than 60% of the market share.

Among social networking sites, Facebook is by far the most preferred service for sharing, making up more than 78% of usage. Yet other sites are gaining: Twitter maintains 5% of referrals, and MySpace, surprisingly, comes in at second with 14.5% share.

Yet Twitter has become the most effective tool for click-throughs. Twitter yielded a whopping average of 19.04 clicks, whereas Facebook only produced 2.87 clicks.

This is great news for Twitter, which has hinged its business on Promoted Tweets and Trends, tweet-size ads that companies purchase for $100,000 a day. With such a high click-through rate, it’s no wonder new Twitter CEO Dick Costolo boasted yesterday that the company has “cracked the code on a new form of advertising, and we feel like we’ve got a hit on our hands.”

Inbound marketing case study

Sticky has performed SEO contracts with ACRF in two phases. Initially we were contracted to optimise their existing website for 3 keyword terms, with the contract beginning in October 2009. The website was already performing reasonably well in most searches however, being a charity relying upon online donations in a competitive sector, the higher the search ranking the greater the returns.

Using NLYZR, we performed our standard procedures:

- Keyword Analysis

- Benchmarking

- Competitive Analysis

- Recommendations

- Refinement of SEO

Just over two months from beginning the contract, and one month from implementation of recommendations ACRF hit first place in Google global searches for all 3 terms.

We have since launched a new website for ACRF and broadened their keyword search base. We used NLYZR to benchmark the old site and its SEO then to provide post-launch recommendations for ongoing SEO improvements and broadening of the search base. Our websites are extremely search friendly and have allowed us to improve search rankings for a large number of terms. Already ACRF web traffic has increased 60% in the first month.

We think NLYZR is exceptional. We’d trailed global charity groups in three key search categories for three years, pretty much giving up on organic search. Sticky worked on it, and in just over two months, Voilà! We hit #1 in all three.

- Suzie Graham, Executive Manager, Philanthropy, Australian Cancer Research Foundation

We have been working with Sticky since last year. Over that time we have used them for optimising our website and we have just launched a new website in the last couple of months which is wonderful.

Over that time they have really helped us with optimising search on our site. Its been so exciting seeing ACRF being lifted up in the Google rankings and also seeing all the extra traffic that is coming through to the website.

They have been really wonderful to work with. I have worked with a number of agencies both big and small over the years and none have been as easy to work with as Sticky and is as passionate about our business as we are. Sticky are always on the end of the phone or email to help us out. They are always looking for new ways to better us on search and to improve our website, which is really great.
We have really enjoyed working with them.

- Claire McArthur, Fundraising Program Coordinator, Australian Cancer Research Foundation

We are proud to announce the launch of the new website for the Australian Cancer Research Foundation. The team at Sticky worked long and hard with ACRF to deliver a new website that would meet the traffic, search and usability requirements of Australia’s leading Cancer Research Foundation.

Australian Cancer Research Foundation website

The website is a source of much of the foundation’s donations, so it was crucial to create a site that would enable them to increase traffic and subsequent charitable donations.

Whilst the site was built with a big emphasis on search engine optimisation, we are also excited about ACRF’s strong push into social networks and inbound marketing. The site incorporates and extensive menu of sharing options, an embedded Twitter feed and several ways to connect with ACRF.

Already the site has seen a substantial increase in traffic (it actually launched quietly in early May) and we will be pulling apart the analytics and performing heat mapping to study visitor responses in order to improve the site even more. We have already used NLYZR to improve the search engine optimisation for ACRF, but now the site is launched we can continue to broaden the search base and maximise search traffic.

Most importantly, we will be focusing heavily on turning traffic into donations so that Australian Cancer Research Foundation can fund even more crucial projects.

Inbound marketing case study

Colliers International contracted Sticky in 2009 to initially optimise their website for 6 keyword terms after failing to achieve any SEO success with their previous suppliers. Prior to commencing work on the Colliers website they were not ranked in the first 100 results on Google for any of the agreed search terms.

We performed our standard procedures in a staged roll-out:

Keyword Analysis

Benchmarking

Competitive Analysis

Recommendations

Refinement of SEO

First page Google results were achieved rapidly. The first term we targeted reached Pages 1 within 2 weeks. The second term reached Page 1 in 1 week. The third term jumped to Page 1 in just two days. By the end of the initial contract, 4 months, all 6 terms were on Page 1 of Google.

We’ve been working with Sticky since about mid 2009 on our Search Engine Optimisation. We’ve been absolutely thrilled with the results we have received within the last six months from Sticky. We went from not being found on Google, to being on page one for every single search term within a period of about 3months.

One of the main advantages of Sticky is their NLYZR tool. This reporting system gives us really in-depth reporting and creates the competitive landscape for us and gives you a really good understanding of where you are in the market.

The customer service at Sticky is fantastic. They are always coming to us with ideas and with insights and recommendations on what they would think would be the best results for us.

Over the past 6months we have been so impressed with Sticky with our corporate website that we are actually now rolling out a plan with all our partner and franchise networks to include Search Engine Optimisation in their online strategies.

One of the best things about Sticky is their understanding of our business, they really took the time in our initial stages of our development to really understand what our requirements and needs were. And they came back each and every time, on time, with reports that were just perfect for us.

- Justine Dyball, Marketing Coordinator | Corporate Marketing & Communications, Colliers International

StickyTV

Our website analytics tool, NLYZR, introduces us to a range of excellent and innovative new websites every week. We’d like to feature the best and most interesting on our new Web TV show, Sticky TV. It gives us a chance to discuss different organisations and their online success with a view to encouraging growth and quality in the industry.

Beginning today, every site submitted to our Free Web NLYZR has the option to be considered for a feature on Sticky TV. We’ll only be selecting good sites to showcase, so don’t be afraid of negative reviews…..its all about promoting quality, innovation and excellence.

So please, if you think you have a great website, test it out on NLYZR. If we agree, we might feature it on Sticky TV and introduce it to a wider audience. And if it doesn’t quite stack up you’ll still receive a free website analysis showing the strengths and weaknesses of your site.

Sticky has just launched a new website for innovative Newcastle financial advisers Gen-X.

The modern design and creative content is a deliberate departure from the typical financial services style. Owners Dustin and Cassandra Kavanagh told us they wanted to create a site that spoke directly to generational investors and included pop-culture references. It was a refreshing approach to a normally traditional industry.

We particularly like the generational information & YouTube videos of Sesame Street mixed in with excellent investment advice.

www.genxadvisers.com.au

After 13 months of development, we are about to launch our ANLYZR Pro package to the business community. This is a comprehensive Search Engine Optimisation and Inbound Marketing Analytics package that delivers outstanding results.

We have been beta testing for the last 4 months and are happy to say the results have been fantastic. In fact, the results have been almost too good.

That could be because we’ve only been able to use the full ANLYZR Pro system on sites we have created, sites that we know have been built with search and inbound marketing in mind. These sites react exceptionally well to ANLYZR Pro’s analysis and recommendations.

So now we need to really challenge ANLYZR Pro by putting it to work on sites we haven’t built…..sites that perform badly in search….sites that have disappointed their owners.

Here’s your chance to receive over $12000 worth of analysis and recommendations for FREE.

Submit your site via the form below and we’ll select one site to participate in our case-study and receive the full ANLYZR Pro package for FREE. Any business site, large or small, can qualify.

The only thing we’ll ask in return is to be able to publish your site’s performance in a case-study and a testimonial once we’ve achieved the agreed goals.

Here’s what ANLYZR Pro does:

• Rank ANLYZR – Reports on a site’s rankings for dozens of keyword searches with all major search engines.

• SEO ANLYZR – Reports on site’s optimisation levels. Includes summaries and recommendations.

• Link ANLYZR – Reports on links coming to nominated site, including PageRank & recommendations.

• Keyword ANLYZR – Reports on a site’s current keyword optimisation plus recommendations on keywords to target.

• Competitor ANLYZR – Reports on the level of competition for given keyword searches including recommendations.

• Tracking – Charts your site’s progress as it’s optimisation improves and continue the recommendations.

The end result is professional and comprehensive optimisation of your website allowing you to compete successfully for almost any relevant term and build traffic. Follow ANLYZR’s recommendations and you’ll see substantial improvement.

Conditions:

This offer is only to Australian business websites, no bloggers. We will select one site to receive the free ANLYZR Pro package. We reserve the right not to select any competitors from the advertising, web design or SEO industries. The site will be selected based on its potential for improvement and overall suitability. If no suitable sites are received by deadline we reserve the right to extend the deadline or not select a site for the study. The owner of the site must consent to a case study and testimonial once the study has been completed. We reserve the right to choose more than one site for the free ANLYZR Pro study. The selected participant must agree to follow the recommendations provided in order to complete the case-study in a timely manner.

Deadline:

Submit your site for consideration by 5pm (AEST) 22 July 2009. We will contact the owners of successful submission the next day.

[contact-form]

One of our new clients, Sunengy was featured on ABC Television’s New Inventors last night discussing their innovative and affordable solution for capturing solar energy.

Sunengy’s liquid solar array concept could be an amazing breakthrough, delivering viable and affordable solar power to the world.

Sticky has been working with Sunengy over the last year to develop their marketing and new website, including an informative video presentation about solar energy, the need to harness it and how Sunengy is tackling the issue.

The Sunengy website launched just 24 hours prior to the New Inventors broadcast.

Sunengy

Hunter Laser Vision team of Ophthalmic Surgeons has been performing laser eye surgery for thousands of people in the Hunter Valley and Newcastle Region since 1998.

Their team of professionals can perform a range of treatments to address issues such as Myopia (short sight), Hypermetropia (long sight), and Astigmatism.

Hunter Laser Vision came to Sticky wanting a new website that could showcase their services, reflect their professionalism and be easy to manage. While search engine optimisation wasn’t as high a priority for them as many clients, we wanted to ensure that the site was found at the top of all relevant searches.

Since launching the new site ion January 2009, Hunter Laser Vision have cemented their place at the top of all our targetted Google searches

www.hunterlaservision.com.au

An inbound marketing strategy has delivered great results for Newcastle Golf Club.

Newcastle Golf Club is one of the best courses in Australia. But like most small clubs, they have a limited marketing budget and were struggling to increase revenue and memberships.

They first approached Sticky to discuss more traditional marketing, however we encouraged the committee to look at the opportunities an online strategy would create.

We created a new website to marry in with their existing members-only site and then went to work on improving their search engine optimisation. Within 3 months the club was on the first page of Google for all targeted keyword searches. We created content that was picked up by other sites too which helped their links and Depth of Presence.

Web traffic increased dramatically with the new site and the committee report that their membership inquiries have now grown strongly against a declining market trend.

The only marketing the club has done since launching their new site has been online and it has resulted in excellent growth.

Newcastle Golf Club – GetSticky Testimonial from Sticky Advertising on Vimeo.