Using Google Product reviews to drive SEO

If you have an online shop, you are getting people to buy your products and hit that ‘buy me’  button at the end of the line. Be a smart cookie and make the product descriptions engaging, lively and accompanied by good pictures to illustrate those products to increase your conversion.

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A blog, among many other channels, is important to keep people updated about your products at all times and making them feel important as well as involved in the process. Not even thinking about Google Product Reviews is like forgetting to add the chocolate chips in your cookie-dough, you’re missing out on so much chocolate chipness. Here you’re missing out on some great and strong opportunities to convert readers into buyers and drive significant traffic to your website.

Product Ratings show on PLAs (Product Listing Ads) with a 5 star rating system and a total amount of reviews present per product. Google Product Ratings is a very efficient way to drive traffic to your website. Indeed having those yellow stars show up under your product provides a nice extra feature when selling a product. This programme is growing at the moment, and more countries are being accepted at this stage.

As indicated in the Google Merchant help Centre:

 A product must have at least 3 reviews in order for product ratings to be eligible to show on Google.com. A merchant must also have 50 reviews total across all products in order to participate in the programme.

If you try duplicating any reviews in order to get over 50, you will be caught with your hand in the cookie jar!

The distribution of your Reviews is verified by that Team, and if you do not follow the requirements, your feed might be ineligible based on their content guidelines regarding the rating distribution.

Indeed the distribution needs to have an equal balance of star ratings, including 1 and 2 stars. Why not only  5 star ratings, well that’s the way the cookie crumbles.

However, it is often that merchants will not see all their products with reviews shown on PLAs. The system will determine if it is accurate or even relevant to the user. Google Product Reviews help consumers make better purchasing decisions.

It has been pointed out that the CTR (Click Through Rate) has increased of 5 percent on PLAs with Product Ratings since the US launch in July 2014.

Dave Abbott, Vice President of Online Marketing for The Home Depot mentioned that:

Customers look for product validation through reviews and ratings. Providing this info is valuable to our customers and provides The Home Depot with a competitive advantage on Google.

What do you think of Google Product Reviews? Would you use that programme for your product ratings? More importantly, who wants to eat cookies now you’ve read this article?

Have a Lovely Day. X

References: 
https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/6059553?hl=en-GB
http://adwords.blogspot.ie/2015/03/product-ratings-on-google-shopping-now.html

 

The French lexicon on the Social media platform Facebook

What are the different word formation processes present on Facebook?

One of the main processes is code switching as we all know Facebook was invented by an American called Mark Zuckerberg, obviously the first and main language of Facebook is English.

Code switching occurs when you alternate between two or more languages, here between French and English.

The French use different social media networks but many of them are not translated therefore only fluent English speakers would use them in France. That is the reason why Facebook is the media that has the highest amount of users and whatsapp isn’t used as much as in Ireland or in other parts of the world, because it is part of the selection of platforms that are not translated into French.

According to the Web Digital Agency Strasbourg,  for Facebook there are 1.49 Billion active users in the world (in July 2015), including 23 million in France. For Youtube, there are 1 billion users in the world (March 2013), including 23 million users in France (Médiamétrie 01/09/15). Google + comes up next, then Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Snapchat, WhatsApp, Viadeo, and finally Pinterest leaving WhatsApp quite far behind for French users.

Even though it’s a translated platform, the French like to use English words to sound cool. Obviously Ze French love Zeir langouage. So some words are simply the translation of the word, like a friend is un ami, or a friend request is une demande d’ami ou d’ajout. But then there is the code switching feature we mentioned above. The words such as ‘liker’ or ‘taguer’ are composed of the English verb and the French ending. So ‘like’ with the ending of the infinite verb  ‘er’ from the French language and ‘tag’ + ‘er’ both give ‘liker’ and ‘taguer’. You can even conjugate it such as ‘j’ai liké’. But the French users also use the translated version of ‘like’ which is ‘j’aime’, which makes more sense.

oh la la t’as vu il a liké la photo où tu es tagué

You also have ‘poke’ as in the following sentence: ‘Je t’ai poké sur facebook’.

Many French users like calling Facebook ‘fesses de bouc’ which means ‘goat’s butt’ because the syllables ‘face’ and ‘book’ have the exact same pronunciation as the words ‘fesses’ /fes/ (butt) and ‘bouc’ /buk/ (goat) if you have a French accent. Obviously not if you have an English accent (‘face’ is /feis/ however the word ‘book’ is similar to the French pronunciation).

Even some painters such as a French artist, Pampouille (Pampouille’s art) , have found an interest in these phonetic ethics, creating humouristic paintings on this phenomenon using a phonetic diversion.

Now if you’re looking for a guide to Facebook lexicon for French users, this blog is pretty cool: Top 100 must know French words for facebookoholics.

Quote of the day

I seem to enjoy this concept of searching a quote that corresponds to the day I’m having or the way I want to feel that day. It is just an automatic routine of mine I have come to acquire a few years back. I know I sound like an old lady. But I love to write what may seem as unnecessary to the eye of many people. Quotes help me remember these moments.

I love to read about all kinds of things: Linguistics, crafts, sports and Digital Marketing among many different other intellectual and non-intellectual topics. I keep in my golden leather notebook a list of my favourite quotes that inspire me or even enlighten my day on a cold windy morning.
Today is a mysterious day. Today Mr Pickles, my cat, seems to be mysterious.

“I wish I could be as mysterious as a cat.”

What is your favourite quote?

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