IGTV, Can it Become an Important Video Sharing Platform in 2020?

“Everyone uses YouTube daily! But have you tried IGTV? To me it sounds
like some abbreviation for a company like HCL, DXC, etc. right?” - One
of my friends threw this question to me. 

And I started explaining -

Well, it’s not. IGTV stands for Instagram Television. It is an online

video posting platform, like YouTube, where Instagram users

can post their videos which can be longer than 1 minute,

anytime they like. We can say it’s a single platform for YouTube and Instagram users.

Instagram has been introducing new features and adding options to make IGTV more significant for the online audiences. One of the features is Monetization in IGTV. It seems that the low popularity of IGTV is due to the lack of monetization. According to the Instagram staff, monetization is being introduced in IGTV and is in the testing mode. It is a way of Instagram to lure the creators to gain income from IGTV videos. Another consideration which has been thought about is how IGTV will be splitting the revenue? In 2019, Instagram alone brought in $20 billion revenue. Now, we can expect Instagram to follow the 55/45 split like YouTube and Facebook, but then it’s just a probability. Let’s assume what if it happens? Then definitely IGTV can become the next bigger thing for video sharing platforms.

Instagram TV was launched in June 2018, by the Instagram CEO Kevin

Systrom. Watch the full announcement.  The unique feature about IGTV is that

it’s made primarily for vertical content, although, it can now support horizontal

videos too. Also, you can promote your content for free through Instagram. 

Instagram is smart!! To prevent its users from leaving, Instagram

has cleverly connected the Instagram photo app and IGTV together.

It allows all the posts from IGTV to be distributed to the main Instagram

app and to the followers of the users. Even if you don’t want to use

IGTV app, you can post your IGTV videos from the Instagram

app or from your profile on the Instagram desktop version. 

IGTV has specific requirements for the video postings. These can be listed as below-

1. Video length: The length of the video must be 1 minute long. Maximum upload length limit for mobile devices is 15 minutes, and 60 minutes, if uploading from the web.
2. Video file type: The supported file must be in MP4 file format.
3. Resolution and size of the video: 

• For uploading vertical video an aspect ratio of 9:16 should be considered, while for uploading a horizontal video, an aspect ratio of 16:6 must be considered.
• Videos should have a minimum frame rate of 30 FPS (frames per second) and minimum resolution of 720 pixels.
• The maximum file size for 10 minutes or less video is 650MB, whereas the maximum file size for the videos up to 60 minutes is 3.6GB.

4. Video Content: IGTV has a video content policy, where they can remove a video if it doesn’t follow their community Guidelines. If anything is against the guidelines, it can be reported in for its removal.

5. Cover Photo Size: IGTV recommends 420px by 654px (or 1:1.55 ratio) as the size for the cover photos. Right now, you can't edit your cover photo, after you've uploaded it.

Now, every social platform has restrictions. IGTV too have.
What you can or can't do? What you can do on IGTV is post videos to feed,
but you can't change the caption of the post once it’s live. Furthermore, the
captions to each of these posts are pulled directly from the title of the video,
so it is best to name videos similar to captions for Instagram, as opposed to
what you’d title a Facebook video. You can't pay to boost IGTV videos or
posts, although you can link the video to your story. Also, you can’t share
YouTube content unless it is IGTV video format compatible. The
good point to note is, the content on IGTV doesn't expire like Instagram stories.

IGTV is not very well known to everyone, but there are few famous brands
on IGTV promoting their contents namely Bacardi, Warby Parker, Louis
Vuitton, Buzzfeed, Netflix, NASA, Sephora, NatGeo, The Lily News etc.
It seems to be a great way to promote your content in an AV. So, why not give it a try yourself?

IGTV is Instagram’s way of keeping users on the app, instead of letting
them leave to go watch the same thing on YouTube or some other
social video watching platform. It is a
way to make vlogging more efficient, easier and immersive.
And with monetization feature introduced in the preliminary phase,
IGTV can be a hit!

6 Link Building Myths You Must Know

It is not enough to have a well designed website in order to draw traffic to it. If you are already a big brand then your name can do the work for you, but lesser known businesses have to struggle to draw the attention of internet users. This is where search engine optimization of SEO comes into the picture. SEO is an industry that changes colors every day. Link building is an important part of SEO and yet there are many misconceptions about it in the market. These myths can cause you to make a fatal mistake of not paying enough attention to your backlinks. Let us look at the main myths surrounding link building that you must ignore.

Myth 1 – You don’t need links for a rank

There are still people around who think that link building is not necessary for ranking.
However, the fact is that the more authoritative, relevant backlinks that you are able to
build the higher the site will rank for its target keywords.

Myth 2 – Only links with high domain authority are useful

Of course if you are building links then it is always advisable to target
sites with high domain authority. However, these are not the only prospects
that you should worry about. Sometimes a low domain authority simply
means that the site is a new one. Then again along with authority, relevancy
also matters a lot. If a link prospect is properly relevant to your website then
you should opt for it even if it has a low domain authority.

Myth 3 – You need to build links to pages where you are looking to convert

There are pages on most websites where you are looking at converting visitors into leads
or leads into sales. Some people think that all traffic should be directed to these pages,
but this is not an advisable technique. This is because such an approach will appear
spammy or aggressive to the sites you are approaching. Then again the visitors will
want information first before they convert. Hence build your back links in such a
way that the both the target sites and the visitors feel comfortable with.

Myth 4 – the more websites you approach, the more links you will get

There are the people in SEO industry who believe in sending emails across to all
the websites that they can where there is even the slightest relevance to their own site.
But this approach does not lead to quality link building. For this you need to send
an outreach which is more thoughtful and personalized. That is when your chances
of getting quality backlinks are more.

Myth 5 – Link building is only for the Google algorithms

Of course, link building is essential in order to rank for your target keywords in Google.
However, the benefit of link building is not just algorithmic. In fact,
your brand will become more visible and users will come across a resource with your
link they are more likely to click it and increase the traffic on your website.

Myth 6 - Nofollow Links Have Zero Importance in Link Building

Normally, a link that is attributed with a no follow link delivers a signal
to Google and other search engines not to follow. Still, these links play their role
if they have key ranking factors or keywords. Google may not follow
the links but do recognize the existence and extract whatever it wants from the links.
This can also lead to improved ranking.

There are many more misconceptions about link building in spite of the fact
that this technique has been in use for a long time. Hence make sure that you
do not commit the mistake of falling for one of these lies about link building.

Why Your Website Should have Good Page Speed

Page speed optimization is another service which has been prioritized by web designing companies. Greater page speed optimization is definitely a plus point if companies want better user experience for online business enterprises.  Page speed optimization service is a service that basically deals with increasing the speed of the website page’s loading time. With these services, content will be fetched from the servers and pages will be rewritten with the help of web performance practices.  Various end users are brought through Google servers all across the globe. There are various factors such as geographic location, pages and browser that help in determining the kind of page speed that websites have. Websites that have a greater page speed are liked by the search engines.

In case a person is looking out for page speed optimization for the website and also for delivering the content quickly to the users, there are many website designing companies that provide assistance with the same.  The content as well as the look of the website will not be tampered with or changed. The score of the website page speed can also be checked from time to time. For this, a step by step process is followed.  Google Labs Page Speed is one of the best ways to test the speed. After that, the option of Analyze Performance should be checked. If the score is 90+, one can be sure that an enhanced visibility will be enjoyed by the website. However, if it is below 90, it is time for considering the problem.

The content will be rapidly dispersed on the website in all the directions. The website will become breezier for users and will load very quickly. The HTTP requests that come to the server will be slashed down. After doing so, the downloading time of web pages will be reduced.  The cache control header for static as well as dynamic components on the website will be used and thus, the browsers can read the web pages very quickly. The documents and style sheets will be compressed, thus reducing the heaviness of web pages and thereby slashing the bandwidth.  Thus, availing the services of web designing company will definitely prove to be beneficial.

An Efficient and Powerful eCommerce Platform - Magento

Magento has created a rage in the digital world as an efficient and powerful ecommerce platform. Though the webmasters and the expert web developers in the initial stage of its existence were unable to accept and digest its revolutionary features but now the scenario has witnessed a paradigm transformation. From just a software application to a new wave of ecommerce solutions, Magento has displayed its credibility in terms of flexibility, cost-effectiveness and user friendly access.

Talking about the ecommerce picture in the Indian market, there are endless numbers of online shops dealing in both B2B and B2C transactions. These are known to experience heavy visitor traffic and increasing number of buyers with each passing day. Eventually it has become a strong bridge between sellers and buyers where buying and selling both have become convenient and hassle free. Large companies and business associated have started to look upon the user-friendly features and numerous advantages of magento to ensure that their business works on its maximum potential.

Furthermore, there is an increasing number of magento Development Company in India known to create web based shops with a modular architecture and versatile interface while reducing all types of constraints on business workflows.

Features that have made Magento a powerful ecommerce platform:

 ·        Unmatched flexibility in terms of content, functionality and usability

·         Dynamic interface for all controls and access

·         Excellent support network at all levels of transactions

·         Incredible user experience with variety of user-friendly features

·         Advanced communication and interaction between sellers and buyers

·         Powerful built-in tools for SEO, marketing and promotion

·         Provides wide options in templates to choose from

·         Great social media experience through extensions like Facebook and Twitter 

·         Community extensions like blogs, photo galleries and personalized links

·         Flexible shipping rates with the ease of payment options

·         Data management and module integration

·         Convenient options for customization

What Do You Prefer for Efficient Digital Marketing - Fanpage or a Personal Page

With the very frequent use of social media platforms, Facebook has been extensively used for Business Promotion. But, there are still many enterprises that are not aware about the specialized features that Facebook has brought up to promote businesses. 

Due to lack of proper awareness, there are a number of business owners using personal profiles to promote their brands. It can’t help them get desired professional benefits as it is possible only by smartly utilizing the features offered by the platform. 

It’s better to understand that Facebook offers separate services & features for social networking (Personal Purpose) and brand promotion (Professional Purpose). 

Facebook Profile is for → Personal Use

&

Facebook Business Page is for → Professional Use

One needs to strictly follow this to reap the actual benefits of both. To maintain its purpose, now Facebook has started taking aggressive steps to remove and block personal profiles that are being used for business purposes such as brand marketing and promotion. 

Why Business Page is an apt space for your brand promotion than Personal Profile -

·         Your personal profile is restricted to 5,000 friend count whereas a fan/ Business page can have infinite number of fans and followers. This can help you get better exposure to customers and prospects across the globe.

·         You can reap the benefits of better SEO because Facebook fan pages are already indexed on search engines. Hence, you can easily drive large amount of qualified traffic to your website.

·         A fan page helps you drive active engagement with your customers and followers absolutely free of cost.  Here you can easily respond to their queries, know their feedback's and resolve their issues if any.

·         Anyone can tag your fan page in pictures and posts on their fan page or personal profile page. This will help to showcase your brand and newsfeed on so many pages while improving your engagement with Facebook users.

·         You can have an analytic insight to your fan page. It helps you track and analyze the number of views, the target audience and your reach. This proves to be significant when it comes to maximizing your potential by delivering the right information to your fans.

·         You can enjoy the benefits of several Facebook tabs and applications that are not available on personal profile pages.

·         With a fan page you have the authority to grant admin access to as many people you wish to. They can be your managers, marketers or SEO team. You even have the freedom to choose their accessibility on the page and have a complete check on their performance.

·         A fan page allows your user to check into your brand and interact with you.

·         You can showcase other fan pages you are connected to on your fan page. You can even comment on other brand pages, posts and updates using your brand name.

·         Daily updates on the fan page with automatically direct you on the newsfeed of your fans. This newsfeed marketing is certainly one of the best ways of social media marketing, a driveway for your brand.

Why Having Social Media Presence Puts Great Impact on Business?

Back in the day, Social Media was a digital place to communicate or ‘hang out’ with people you knew or people of similar mindsets or interests. It majorly served as a form of entertainment for people. But not so anymore. The past few years have seen immense growth in the field of social media thanks to smartphones. Now, one may go as far as to say that any enterprise lacking a Social Media presence cannot thrive! Why do companies need digital presence?

I’ll let numbers explain the importance of Social Media Marketing -

• 92% of marketers claim that Social Media is important to their businesses. 
• 84% CEOs and VPs have faith that Social Media aided them to take decisions related to purchases
• 83% people learnt about a brand or product on Social Media before getting to know about it from any other source!
• 58% of marketers who were on Social Media for at least a year reported better search engine rankings

Aren’t these facts impressive enough to know its importance? I will take the liberty to enlist a few important reasons ‘Why a smart presence on Social Media is becoming synonymous to business growth’??? 

Because Social Media -

• Provides you with various techniques and tools to build brand recognition without spending large amounts, thereby increasing sales. Also you can increase inbound traffic by maximizing your reach to all types of audience. 

• Boosts search engine rankings as you get number of platforms to leave a mark on the Internet by putting quality content. 

• Aids you in gaining brand recognition by making the target audience notice your business via various platforms.

• Assists you in building credibility for your brand by providing interactive platforms where your customers can post reviews and comments on your products/services. This creates a good image in front of new and potential customers since people tend to trust the feedback from customers instead of you.

• Lets You offer solutions to customers and make a good impression on other potential customers who are reading the conversation which implies how helpful and customer friendly you are. People like being helped and generally stay loyal to such companies/businesses who supports and guides them.

• Is being used by Your competitors and they are gaining benefits from it everyday! Each Social Media platform you reach will take you one step closer to a large number of targeted traffic. Every post you share will take your product/service to at least a few new people each day. The possibilities are countless. You just have to make proper and wise use of it!!

And if you still have your doubts then ask yourself … 

Will it hurt to bring your business online? What is there to lose in doing so? If your answer is positive, then why wait? Get online today and reap the benefits tomorrow!