Leadpile’s Blog

Payday loans get a bad name, but are a necessary option for many individuals. Recently there has been a lot of bad press about payday loans and the high interest rates that are associated with them, however not all is bad about these loans. Payday loans help many people in tough times, times when they have no other option or places to turn.

According to Online PR News , a recent study shows that people living in states that currently have banned payday loans, turn to more desperate measures having far worse long term effects on the individuals financial standing. Over drafting accounts and bouncing checks is not a better option.

The benefits that payday loans can bring are enormous, allowing people to get help in times of need. At LeadPile, we generate thousands of payday loan leads and match these leads up with payday loan companies able to help them get through what they are dealing with. Payday loans are an asset, and are necessary in today’s economy.

Seeking services (lead generation) online, communicating with others (social networking), and reading the top news stories, is now all being conducted through everything EXCEPT our nation’s newspapers. In recent years, many newspapers realized this need for immediate information, therefore created an online version of their newspaper. Unfortunately, this scrambling did not prevent the potential elimination of alot of the newspapers. It’s a sad day in the newspaper world when NPR reports the fact that our nation’s newspaper circulation has dropped 10%, just in the past 6 months. Newspaper’s loss of revenue is largely caused by a decline in advertising dollars.
What does this mean to all of us? In many ways, it takes away an old tradition that many of our parents and grandparents have experienced their whole lives. More importantly, it takes away a source for all of us looking for reading material, jobs, coupons, store ads, obituaries, local and national news. The question is, where on the internet can we go to now for this sort of resource? This is something very difficult for one “website” to be able to provide, so I am not sure how we are all going to potentially survive without the irreplaceable newspaper?

This week Google launched a test for the ‘Wave”, a new interface for communication that allows group discussions, email, instant messaging, picture and video editing and posting, blogging… there really is not much that this new communication tool does not do! A selected 100,000 people were invited by Google to use this new tool during it’s testing phase, and then to supply feedback and suggestions.
The Wave is set up in a real time format allowing conversations to transition from email to live conversation such as instant messaging. According to wave.google.com, the definition of a Wave is as follows:

• A wave is equal parts conversation and document. People can communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.
• A Wave is shared. Any participant can reply anywhere in the message, edit the content and add participants at any point in the process. Then playback lets anyone rewind the wave to see who said what and when.
• A Wave is live. With live transmission as you type, participants on a Wave can have faster conversations, see edits and interact with extensions in real-time.

If the Wave is able to combine all of the forms of conversation that are currently available, how will this change an industry such as Lead Generation? Will this replace the need for topic specific forums, and blogs? If a demand for lead types is posted, and instantly a supplier is able to respond and make a connection and discuss in an open format for others to see, it could be a huge thing for brand recognition! Being able to edit content and rewind to see where posts are coming from, could be an asset when the need for “damage control” arises.
I have signed up to be on the list of hopefuls in the next rounds of invitations sent out, I can’t wait to get on this wave!

Almost anything or anyone you want to know more about can be found on the internet. However, when you go to a website is there something that stands out as something that makes you “trust” that website as a reputable source versus another website? There are in fact certain reasons consumers seem to trust one site over another. Nielson Global did a survey on consumers to see what makes them trust a particular website and it’s advertising versus another.

What this information really tells all of us in the lead generation industry is, that maybe we need to continue to focus on how we can really become a more trusted source by consumers. TV, newspaper and other sources came out ahead of methods such as banner ads, mobile and other online lead generation methods. The question then is how do we increase the trust level our consumers have for websites we are working with to generate leads? Brand recognition is pretty high on the list of trusted sources, however not everyone has a brand that is known, or the financial ability to generate that awareness.
Leadpile, and I am sure all other lead generation companies, are all looking at this sort of information as informative, but how can we take this information and apply it to what we do?

One of the newest forms of advertising is mobile adverting/SMS marketing. Being that this form of lead generation is completely different, there has to be alternative ways to measure success. After looking into this further, Gigaom.com pointed out some valid points on how mobile advertisers can effectively track stats.

Reach

Mobile enables a closed loop functionality like no other medium. Transactions are essentially a measure of the “true” ROA. We need to measure how a campaign impacts a company’s bottom line. If the campaign doesn’t move the needle over time, it didn’t really work, but we won’t know whether or not it has without measuring.

Leadpile has seen some successful publishers generating quality leads through mobile advertising, however after reviewing some of these point, maybe there are some enhancements Leadpile and other networks need to look at implementing. How big will mobile advertising get?

A daily conversation that myself and others in the affiliate marketing world deal with is the question of the form/ad/banner sizes. Leadpile is a perfect example of someone that has revolutionized a “smaller” version of forms and banners with the Microclick form, but is it more effective? ….OR is it more effective to have a larger leaderboard size banners or ad? How about a full size form on a website that does not allow as much content on the site, is that better? According to the Bizreport.com, banner size could in fact matter with the effectiveness of it’s message and goal.
Ultimately, all of us that are in the lead generation business and want to maintain longevity must always keep the user experience in mind to maintain effectiveness. The bottom line is consumers need to feel a sense of security when clicking on or filling out any form. Maybe having more content around the form instead of the larger form/banner occupying a large part of the site, might be a better idea for the consumer. The jury is out on what really is more effective, but I will say Leadpile Lead Exchange believes a form/banner like the size of the Microclick form is the most effective for the consumer’s experience.

In an effort to boost some new car sales, GM has teamed up with the online shopping marketplace eBay. Previously, eBay was a place you could purchase a car, however purchasing a brand new car was not necessarily available. The NY Times is reporting, “The venture will involve about 225 dealerships in California at first, but G.M. hopes to expand it nationally as soon as September.” Hopefully, in combination with the Cash For Clunkers program and this sort of exposure, GM will see some positive things happening. Many reports are showing that the Cash For Clunkers program has allowed more auto finance traffic to start coming in to lead generators. If that is the case, hopefully we will see a high acceptance of this lead type by our buyers.

I don’t know about you, but can you remember the last time you went to a post office or mailed something? In the wake of email, online banking and other electronic methods of paying bills and communication, our post offices are suffering. MSNBC is stating that our nation’s post offices are looking at a potential loss of $7 billion this year. This means that the ability to operate all these post office locations is in jeopardy. There are nearly 33,000 post office locations and my guess would be the ones that could be in trouble would be the less populated areas. That only makes sense, but I think that we need our post offices to deliver to those that do not have computer access, those that need to still deliver registered letters/packages, and for those that still choose to receive “paper” copies of their bills.
So what is the resolution to this money issue with the post office besides just closing down offices? Could we see mail getting delivered less than 6 days a week? Leadpile and other lead generation companies are not necessarily focused on direct mail, however this is something that we are considering utilizing as a source of lead generation. I don’t really see the post office issue as affecting that decision.

I don’t think there is a day that goes by where something about Twitter is not being talked about. That’s great for them, but what is it really bringing them as far as money in their pockets? It seems they are still working on long term initiatives that would help them make money off it’s popularity. However, for now they are continuing to come up with ideas that will help the current users make money. In the next few days, they will be rolling out the first phase of educational information for businesses on how they can effectively use Twitter to generate revenue for their own company (big and small). Twitter will continue to roll out educational information so they can help their users become more Twitter savvy with Tweeting. They see their site as a great tool for businesses to use to help generate revenue. Does this mean if they are going to help educate businesses on how to make money, then they must have something planned for themselves on how THEY are going to make money? I hope so!
Twitter is looking to be looked at more like a communication network, versus a social network. They have forecasted that they will have revenues of around 4 billion for the 4th quarter, but I am not sure how they will achieve that with the way the site is currently. Maybe they have something “big” up their sleeves????? Leadpile Lead Exchange uses Twitter on a limited basis, however maybe with some new tools available we could look at using it even more! Are other lead generation companies using Twitter to generate leads? I would be curious to see how affiliate marketers and other lead generation companies are utilizing this “communication network” to help their business?

The days of newspaper and magazine advertising seems to be becoming more and more extinct as businesses turn to online direct response advertising. Online direct advertising incorporates lead generation, search and online directories into one category and then there is national and local digital media. Businesses seem to be turning more and more to generating clients through search and other more “targeted” media because of the better end result = more business. The costs to print newspapers and magazines has not become as profitable as in previous years because many are not turning to print to get their news, they are turning to a more instant “fix” like the internet. Knowing this, publishers and advertisers are also turning to the internet for customer’s attention. Lead generation companies, like Leadpile, have become more and more in demand as the cost to convert even things such as a television ad to a interested customer rise.
Biz report points out that, “Besides online search, the forecast predicts that online direct response marketing, a new category in 2009, will increase by 2.9%.” Other reports show that by 2014 this sort of advertising is set to increase by 10%. This is great news for lead generation companies and our search engines. However, the picture does not seem as good for national digital media (rich media, online video, email, display and mobile) which is set to decrease by 11%, and local digital media (ie: television, radio and newspapers) to decrease by 5%. The good news is the report also points out that both are set to rebound in future years.
My question is how are other advertising sources, besides online media, going to adapt to increase their revenue? This has to be something that is very challenging for many companies who have built empires by using these non-online media companies (ie- newspapers and magazines). I can’t imagine how people survived in earlier years without the internet, and the capabilities it has to reach so many people in such a little place (computer). This reminds me of growing up and parents stating they did not have televisions or things like calculators in their daily life. I could never understand how they survived, which I know now sounds silly. What will be the next innovative creation that will change our world???????? Who will discover it?

Can it really be? Facebook to make billions within the next 5 years? Reuters is reporting that one of Facebook’s board members is predicting this. It seems that promoting more advertising, to really capitalize on the massive amounts of traffic frequenting the social networking site, is key. 225+ million users are on the site, so there has got to be some way to monetize this site to maybe earn these billions that are being predicted. However, will it follow the trends of Twitter where there are massive amounts of traffic not being capitalized on yet? I think the future of social networking really depends on these sites figuring out an effective way to capitalize on the users on their sites. What way(s) of monetizing the social networking site(s) will work best? What are the demographics of the Facebook? Who is coming and going on the site?
The users on Facebook seem to be a lot more diverse than the other large social networking site (myspace.com). However, where did myspace go wrong………. or did they NOT go wrong? They dominated the net just a few years ago, yet times seemed to have changed when the site became more of an advertising site than a place for people to network. Let’s keep an eye on Facebook and see if they stay on the right path to really do the right thing for their network… AND earn this BILLIONS of revenue! Maybe Facebook should contact Leadpile to do some lead generation!

In years past, online media was not an option. Years ago you did radio, television, mail or things like billboard advertising. However, in recent years performance advertising has been something most companies are venturing into to promote their product(s). Lead generation is a performance type of advertising, however not all are embracing it because of various objections they have to it.

1. No money to do lead generation
2. Lead generation does not work
3. They do not know how to set up CPL campaigns
4. They do not have any creatives to do a lead generation campaign
5. They don’t have any incentives to offer the consumer on a CPL campaign
6. They don’t really care about leads
7. They don’t have the time to work on a lead generation campaign

These are all commons excuses companies will make instead of moving forward with a lead generation campaign. Mediapost.com points out all these excuses companies have on why they are not getting into lead generation.
These are all legitimate objections to lead generation, however companies like Leadpile are open arms to speak with anyone that has any questions or concerns about doing lead generation. Where else can you get a targeted consumer that is opting in for a specific product or service? Lead generation allows companies to focus less on generating clients and more on handling the targeted ones that they are working with in their lead generation campaigns. As a company trying to generate business, would I want to send out a 1000 mailings or purchase leads of 50 people who opted in for my service? Hands down lead generation produces a higher ROI if you are utilizing your lead generation campaign effectively. Ask a lot of questions of the lead generation company you are potentially working with, so you know the process from A to Z. Know how the leads are being generated, where they are being generated and what the cost to you is. You will see, lead generation will be an effective way for you to spend your advertising dollars.