Monday, April 29, 2013

Google Authorship Made Easy



Establishing Google Authorship Can Be Easy

This post summarizes how to create Google Authorship on your blog posts and other content.  There has been a lot of talk about Google Authorship and I have read some excellent posts about how to be credited in search results on Google.  I have shown an example above of how my blog shows up on Google when I am logged in to Gmail in the above screen shot.  I am shown with my picture, my name as shown on my G+ profile and the number of my G+ Circles.  This type of display is the goal. +Andy Crestodina  helped me establish this authorship in search   I followed the instructions that he presented at the January Chicago AMA Meet the Experts Night.  It took a few weeks but everything is showing up in search quite nicely now.  Even in my econsultancy.com blog authorship shows up after I followed these steps.

I think the key is to understand that there is a way to do this even if you are not blogging on a domain where you have an email on that same domain.  In my classes we use publicly available tools like WordPress or Blogger so we needed a way to link authorship without the verifiable email address.

Briefly, you need the following:
1) Put a nice head shot on your  G+ Profile
2) Use the same name on your profile as your byline, i.e.,  "By Debra Zahay-Blatz"
3) Copy and past HTML code into your blog that establishes the link.  Some code is on my slideshare presentation on this subject and on Andy's blog.

I also think it is important to set up your G+ profile properly with links to everything to which you contribute so these items can all show up in search as well.  Good luck establishing authorship and don't hesitate to contact me if you have any questions.  My slideshare presentation also shows how to link Google Analytics to your blog, which is extremely helpful in tracking activity and seeing information who you are reaching and how long they stay on the page.  

The slideshare also covers assessing your online presence, Filling out your Google+ Profile, Pursuisng Authorship and how to link your blog to Google Analytics.  The byline from the code is shown below.

By Debra Zahay-Blatz.
You can find Debra on and Twitter as well as LinkedIn.

Saturday, April 20, 2013

Scholarship Awards Ceremony Honors Interactive Marketing Students







At our Scholarship Awards Ceremony last Saturday, April 13, 2013 at Barsema Hall at Northern Illinois University, we honored a number of graduates in our Interactive Marketing program.  Recipients of the Interactive Marketing Board Awards were +Sarah Harant and +Nicole Gault (shown above with +Dave Henkel and +Debra Zahay-Blatz.   The Zahay-Blatz Family Award went to +Sekou Noriega.  Joe Glaser from Glaser Direct presented his award, targeted for those interested in B2B, to +Nick Kochetta.  The Johnson & Quin Award was presented by President +Dave Henkel to +Amanda Forneck, who will be beginning a full-time position at Johnson & Quin in the Fall.   Thanks to the generosity of our Corporate Advisory Board members for these Awards.

These awards were given for scholarship and dedication to the Interactive Marketing Field.  Look for these talented graduates to make substantive contributions to careers in Search (SEO and SEM), Social Media, Email, Website Usability and Testing and other areas that are a focus for our Interactive Marketing Program.

Interactive Marketing students also receiving scholarships were +Jason Conklin and Allison Greco, recipients of the Michael T. McSweeney Endowed Direct Marketing Scholarship. Interactive Marketing Student Board President +Mike Glassberg received both the Marketing Achievement Award sponsored by the Department of Marketing Faculty and the Top Marketing Achiever Award. Student board member +Antonio Garay received the Always be Contributing Award.

A highlight for me was the fact we honored +Dave Henkel as an honorary Alumnus of the Department of Marketing at Northern Illinois University   Dave's company, Johnson & Quin, has recruited on campus most years out of the last 20 and has hired closed to 30 people out of the IM program and it's predecessor program in Direct Marketing.  Dave said the association with NIU is a good fit because our students are hard-working and come in well prepared.  Program graduates don't have to be taught the basic vocabulary of the direct and interactive business because they have already learned in in their Marketing classes and Interactive Marketing classes in particular.  Dave has been a corporate board member for almost ten years and this award was well-deserved.  Thanks to Dave for his service to NIU and the IM program and congratulations to all on their awards.
By Debra Zahay-Blatz.
You can find Debra on and Twitter as well as LinkedIn.

Saturday, April 13, 2013

The Shocking Truth About Content Marketing




Who Are You?

We are in the middle of a seven week social media module in my Marketing Technology Class.  I wanted to share some of the learnings from our class, particularly on branding and strategy  and how they relate to content marketing.  Even a personal social media plan, which is one of our projects, can relate to how a company does business because you  can't 'tweet' without self-knowledge.


Let's work backwards to illustrate this point.  Content marketing, as I mentioned in this blog previously, makes sense of social media marketing  because it puts it all together.  The company (or individual  creates content, as show in the figure above, and then puts it out through multiple communications outlets, social media or otherwise.  So a white paper I might write on how to hire students in interactive marketing could be transformed into a few blog posts, a couple of tweets, an article in the college magazine.  We might say content marketing is also another way to think of integrated marketing communications, where our visual message but also our content message is consistent across channels.

What is Your Story?

This approach is all great but the biggest challenge for students (and companies) not what to create as appropriate content but what basic story they have to tell.  I have challenged them to think about their professional passion, what they are good at and their story (their personal brand).  That thought process is the hard work.  Once they defined themselves, they were able to create solid profiles on LinkedIn using key search terms relating to their areas of interest.  One student, +Megan Meyers, said she improved her LinkedIn profile by expressing her career interests in social media marketing and within a day was receiving jobs from LinkedIn that were targeted to her personal interests.

How Should Customers Think About Your Brand?

So the shocking, or maybe not so shocking,  truth is that content marketing really comes down to telling a story.  Content marketing is the work of creating the story, aka the brand image, that is the most difficult part of marketing.  I often walk into potential consulting projects and the client thinks they need a new web site design.  However, when we talk, we find out what they really need first is something to put on the web site that demonstrates a solid brand positioning.   Good branding requires self-knowledge and a knowledge of their target market.

Things are going well in class.  The students are all complaining that they suddenly have to manage all their new social media interactions.  I tell them that engagement is good and that is the goal of creating a powerful branding story that we can distribute through a content marketing program.

So YOUR assignment for the upcoming week is to think about your brand story.  Who are you and who is your audience and how do they want you to think about them?  Then and only then can you create your content marketing program.

By Debra Zahay-Blatz.
You can find Debra on and Twitter as well as LinkedIn.

Monday, April 8, 2013

New Media Secrets from the Chicago Blackhawks



Adam Kempenaar, Senior Creative Director of New Media
& Creative Services at the Chicago Blackhawks with our IM Student Board

Chicago Blackhawks Come to Campus

Adam Kempenaar, Senior Creative Director of New Media and Creative Services for the +Chicago Blackhawks visited our University last Wednesday April 3. He spoke to a packed room of about 100 students, many of them interested in sports marketing, many of them in our Interactive Marketing Certificate Program and nearly all of them sporting red NIU shirts or Blackhawks gear.  That's our Interactive Advisory Board in the picture above with Adam at the Center.  Board President +Mike Glassberg, who spearheaded this effort to bring the BlackHawks to campus, is two people to the left of Adam.  The board presented him with a personalized NIU hockey jersey after his talk.  Below is a summary of advice on social media marketing and how to find a fulfilling career.

It All Started with Video

As you can imagine, for an exiting game like hockey, video is an extremely important part of the marketing communications mix.  Adam started out with a communications and radio background and his first job at the Hawks was to record and produce videos.  The Blackhawks post a lot of videos on their site and also stream the morning skate and other events.  The team has branched out into YouTube but really wants people on their own official web site.  Adam said, as we teach in our classes, the website is still the best way to communicate to fans and the first place people go to learn about their team.  Video and photos provide a way to give rare behind-the-scenes access to fans.

Social Media Exploded with the Team's Success

Social media did not exist in 2002 when Adam started with the Hawks, but now the team makes extensive use of social media and was voted the best brand on Twitter in 2009.  Adam said it just happened that as the team was really getting 'hot' there was a great new way to get the news out to fans in the form of social media.  The team seeks not to just push content but to engage its fans and answers tweets from fans.  Adam wants to engage customers and not just sell t-shirts and tickets.

The team has 1.3 million Facebook fans, 300.000 Twitter followers and is in about 73,000 G+ circles and connects with 54,000 fans on Instagram.  It views Facebook as a way to push out content but the other social media networks as a way to be more engaged.

Adam said his job is to get content out to the world  and his department is the gatekeeper.  He appreciates the emphasis on quality that the team has and credits the recent management team with contributing to the team's success not only on the ice but also in communicating with its fan base.  It takes a real commitment to make it all happen and the team work together.  Adam has a relatively small team of professionals and interns that work nearly nonstop during the hockey season to communicate with fans.

Students Need to Find their Own Professional Passion

At the end of the talk, Adam spoke to students on their careers.  He spoke of his own career path and gave three pieces of advice:

  1. Find your passion:  Adam had a good job doing something else that he did not feel passionate about, but when the Blackhawks opportunity came up, he knew he had found his dream job and went for it.  To his surprise, he was just what the Hawks were looking for and got the job.
  2. Communicate:  Write well and opportunities will come to you.  Adam had the chance to write a key letter for an executive early in his career that that success opened up doors for him.
  3. Just 'do it':  If you want to be in social media, start a blog, create and disseminate content.  You have to show that your really are interested in this field.
We all thank Adam for taking the time to speak to our class.  We teachers thank him for reiterating the things we say in class about finding your passion and job hunting, writing well and creating content.  Go Blackhawks and good luck!

By Debra Zahay-Blatz.
You can find Debra on and Twitter as well as LinkedIn.

Monday, April 1, 2013

JRIM Special Issue: The Past, Present and Future of Interactive Marketing



Special Issue Announced

As Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing, I am pleased to announce that we have established a partnership with the organizers of the Direct and Interactive Marketing Research Summit.  The Conference is in Chicago,  October 12th and 13th of 2013, and is sponsored by the DMEF (Direct Marketing Educational Foundation).  JRIM is to provide a $500 award for the best research paper submitted to the conference.  If you are not familiar with the conference, it is a two for one opportunity.  Not only do participants get a specialized academic conference in our area of direct and interactive marketing, but the first academic registrants also may attend the annual DMA conference and have access to top-notch practitioner presentations and the exhibit floor.

Cash Award Available

Speaking of a two for one opportunity, there is something different this year.  While last year we also offered a cash prize for best Research paper, this year the top papers submitted to the Research Summit will be given consideration for publication in a special issue of our Journal on The Past, Present and Future of Interactive  Marketing.  The process is twofold.  Submit papers for the conference here.  After receiving feedback from the conference, please then submit papers to our special issue on The Past, Present and Future of Interactive Marketing here. The paper deadline is August 30, 2013.

Suggested Topics

Topics for the special issue may include but are not limited to:


  • Branding challenges and opportunities
  • Business to business marketing developments
  • Communications and new media channels
  • Consumer behavior theories and applications
  • Educational issues/challenges
  • Internet strategy formation/implementation
  • Linguistic issues related to the changing vocabulary of marketing
  • Mobile marketing implications
  • Marketing communications channels
  • Measurement and attribution issues
  • Other managerial aspects of internet marketing, such as product, distribution and pricing
  • Organizational aspects of interactive marketing
  • Political/legal issues and agendas
  • Social network marketing.

We are open to these and other topics as well.  A lot has happened in interactive marketing in the last twenty years but the field is still in its infancy.  We are looking for thought leaders to help define where the field is and should be headed.  Please see me for any questions at zahay@niu.edu or contact +Lauren Labrecque  +Andy Rohm or +George Milne who are organizing the acdemic conference.  We hope to see you at the DMA/DMEF in Chicago in October!

By Debra Zahay-Blatz. You can find Debra on and Twitter as well as LinkedIn.