The Tools of Google

Photo courtesy: via Elyse Walter

Google never ceases to amaze me with the different and innovative tools they seem to develop and introduce overnight. Google is constantly striving to make our professional (and in some cases, personal) lives easier and more effective. The tools they offer, including those for advertisers and others, definitely do just that!

As I was investigating tools that would make my digital marketing strategies more effective I found several that offer critical activities that are necessary to see success in digital marketing. They include:

Keyword Tool
Monitoring and searching for keywords - as it relates to a business, organization, product, or something else - is one of the things that has been stressed most in this class and our book (The New Rules for Marketing & PR). Google looks to make that keyword search and monitoring easier with this tool that conducts monthly search volumes on words and phrases you might be interested in. The Keyword Tool can even help you monitor the competition! What's not to love about this simple tool that takes a lot of busy work out of your day?

Ad Planner
Google's Ad Planner tool looks to help you better understand the audience you're trying to target through your business and/or organization and thus make your outreach to them more effective. Lets say you're trying to sell a specific product. This tool will tell you what kind of audience is currently searching for your product (or those like you) and what makes that audience unique. This tool helps take the guess work out of figuring out your customer base and makes your efforts more targeted and worthwhile.

Google Alerts
Google Alerts are wonderful for so many reasons. They can be used by all members of a company/organization in a pure effort to monitor news, blogs, videos, and other coverage about your business or organization and/or the products or services you provide. The Google Alerts come in these simple, short emails that provide you with a snapshot about what's being printed...said...or shared about the keywords you're interested in.

YouTube Insight
As was discussed on the New Media Driver's License blog recently, video marketing on sites such as YouTube is quickly becoming common place. But why put all the effort into developing a video to share with your targeted audiences and then never know if they're watching it? YouTube Insight allows you to monitor the videos you post to YouTube to see which ones are being watched, who is watching those videos, and even when they're watching them! As video marketing becomes more and more popular, it will be important to track its impact and effectiveness. YouTube Insight allows you to do just that!

As I continue to think about digital marketing strategies, I'm excited to incorporate these various Google Tools!