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Which should your small business choose? Google Ads or Google Adwords Express? This is one of my favorite questions, and I answer it pretty emphatically in this keynote at the Mt. Juliet Chamber of Commerce Small Business Boom (during the Q/A Session at the end).

When recently speaking at the Mt. Juliet (TN) Chamber of Commerce about Google Analytics, Google My Business and Google Ads, I was asked - "Don't most people skip the Google Results that say Ad?" The proof is in the data, they don't. In this video I explain Google Adwords Express, how it works and how you can make it work for your business to generate phone call leads.

My WordPress Content Manager friends, this one is for you. You don't need a developer to make your CAPTCHA in the footer of your website not look horrible. This video shows you how to use Gravity Forms Conditional Logic to only show CAPTCHA after a user enters their email address in the field. This prevents email spam that you DON'T want on your lists. For the Data Driven Daily Tip that shows you how to add CAPTCHA to your Gravity Forms, click here.

I had a blast at the Mt. Juliet (Tennessee - close to Nashville) Chamber of Commerce Small Business Boost, discussing how to prevent "Small Business Injuries" by increasing productivity, increasing visibility on Google, and Tracking Results using Google Analytics, in what I called the Google Geek Session.

Amid the mad dash to try and grow your Business' Facebook Following, it's easy to forget about the why behind it. You want to connect with your target audience, understand who they are, and how you can better engage/help them. That's why it's important to look at who is following your page / liking your page. This video shows you exactly How To Find A List Of Your Facebook Followers, and it's not where you'd think it would be. :) You're not going to go to "More" > "Insights" at the top, but rather, "Settings" > "People and other Pages." Why Facebook makes it so confusing and keeps changing things, we'll never really know, but in the meantime, Data Driven Design will always be here to help you as your digital marketing strategists!

There are many different web hosting companies for Managed WordPress. The top ones include WP Engine, GoDaddy, BlueHost, HostGator and AWS. However, there are also several smaller ones. The best quality service provider related to these services is WP Engine, and this is NOT a sponsored post, it's based on years of experience trying a ton of different webhosting platforms. Clearing your website's Server Cache is something that your webhost needs to offer, but it's done in different ways depending on the platform. This podcast shows how to clear your cache on WP Engine.

As it relates to Search Engine Optimization (SEO), I love trying a ton of things and seeing what works. One platform I've seen work very well for Small Business SEO over the last two years is Google My Business. Having an accurate, optimized profile, as well as posting regularly are things that can really help small businesses succeed in terms of being found on Google above their competitors. Another thing that everyone already acknowledges as very important is generating positive customer reviews on Google. But what businesses don't realize is that replying to each Google review is also a best practices that should always be implemented. This podcast explains how and why.

As an Alexa Skill Developer, you have to be aware of how to pick Alexa-Supported Launch Phrases, also known as Invocation Names. It's not too complicated, and I'm still learning as I go, so I just wanted to share one specific thing with you. Amazon Alexa allows Alexa Skill Developers to pick three basic invocation names that essentially launch their Alexa Skills. These start with the word(s), "open," "launch," "load," and even "begin." If you use one of these words with the name of your Alexa Skill, it's going to work and you'll pass the Alexa Skill Submission process, as seen in my video. But when you want to include an Intent in your invocation, things change a bit. An Intent, or Intent Block if using a third party tool like Voiceflow to build your Alexa Skill, essentially skips ahead of a skill's opening message to a point where the skill does something specific for the user. For example, in one of our Custom Alexa Skills called Ask Data Driven Design, you can say "Alexa, open Data Driven Design" and the Skill will open and start giving you prompts for how to get information from it. This invocation is a basic one. But, we've also added Invocations with Intents paired with Connecting Words. These examples include: “Alexa, ask Data Driven Design how my web traffic looks” “Alexa, ask Data Driven Design what my bounce rate is” “Alexa, ask Data Driven Design where most of my web traffic is coming from” “Alexa, ask Data Driven Design what are my top viewed pages” These intents skip the opening, and just start reading you what you asked for. More on these can be read here in the Alexa Developer Console documentation, or on this blog about tips for creating certifiable phrases for your Alexa Skill. This video walks you through how to avoid putting intents with connecting words in your opening invocations, in the event that your Alexa Skill isn't properly coded with intent blocks.

What’s up everybody? We had an amazing event, the Nashville Voice Conference, on July 31, 2019, and we are already making preparations for Nashville Voice Conference 2020. One of the things we wanted to do with our event, was create a Snapchat GeoFilter around the location of the event, which was held at Thistle Farms in Nashville, TN. I had one of my teammates, Tanner Boriack, help me prepare this Data Driven Daily Tip. Here is how to create a Snapchat filter. 1. Go to Shapchat.com 2. Click on Create. 3. You’ll see a few different options. Community Filters, Filters and Lenses. Select “Filters.” 4. Then click “Create Now” next to Filters. 5. You’ll see a couple different options. You can use Snapchat’s own pre-loaded options/designs, or you can design your own filter with creative tools like Photoshop, Illustrator, or even my own personal favorite – Canva! 6. Take note of the size of the file. Make sure it’s 1080 px wide by 2340 px tall. 7. Make sure you have a transparent background as part of your image, where the users would be shown in their photo, in the upper two-thirds portion of your design. 8. Also make sure you have a contrasting background with your text color in the lower third portion of your design. 9. Upload a png file of your design by clicking the “Upload” yellow button. Preview your design. 10. Click the yellow “next” button to select the day and time of when you want your filter to show (we set ours for a couple hours before the event, to a couple hours after the event). 11. Click next again. 12. Select the GeoLocation of your event. Start by typing in the address or name of the business location at which your event will occur. 13. Create your GeoFence by following the instructions within Snapchat (minimum size, click and drag). 14. Checkout – enter payment information, check settings and click Submit! Boom, your Event will now have a really cool Snapchat Geo-Filter!

So, the other day I was sitting in a meeting with a marketing director at large college in the State of Tennessee, and they asked me at the end of the meeting if I thought WordPress was the best solution for their website.   What I wanted to do was get up on the table and start yelling and screaming "yes, yes, yes... you have to go with WordPress!"   But that would not be as powerful as me just simply looking at the data and educating her on the fact that WordPress is the most widely used content management system (CMS) in the world, by a long shot.   There is a website out there called wappalyzer.com and it’s actually also a Google Chrome browser extension the tracks millions of websites across the world and understands usage statistics for everything from the website content management software (CMS) being used, to payment gateways and even marketing automation software.   I have watched Wappalyzer grow exponentially over the last year or so, and aggregate data from more and more websites across the world.The number one thing that stands out to me is that WordPress is far and away the most used content management system in the world at 80.6%.   That's right, 80.6% of the websites in the world use WordPress.   And if you don't think Wappalyzer is a legitimate source, consider the fact that companies like Google, Amazon, IBM and others use it to understand what technology is being used on web apps and websites across the globe.   So my question to you, small business owners and mid-level marketers, is - why would you want to go with anything other than WordPress?   It’s free, open source software. There’s hundreds of thousands of themes out there that you can buy for less than $100, and then you can have just about any web developer in the world (worth their salt) work with you to help you get past whatever blockers or hurdles you're having.   Many clients have come to us after struggling and fighting with Wix, SquareSpace, Drupal and other platforms, as they did not allow their websites to be the marketing tool and operations friendly system that it is supposed to be.   Start with WordPress, and build the best possible website presence for your small business. And feel free to contact me directly for a free consultation at paul@datadriven.design.