The CDM Summit: Navigating the Digital Landscape and Its Impact on Affiliate Publishers
On September 17-18, we had the pleasure of attending the Canadian Digital Marketing Summit at Kwantlen Polytechnic Institute. For two days, content creators, agencies, and future marketers eager to hone their skills and network descended on the Surrey campus. The Summit covered everything from improving your SEO to gaining favor with the TikTok gods and, most importantly, how to truly connect with your audience.
Our Fintel Connect publisher team gathered some of the hottest trends and tips from the industry leaders, and we’re excited to share them with you. We hope these insights help you apply them to your content, boost your traffic, and engage your audience effectively.
Improving Your Organic Traffic Strategy
The Summit kicked off with a top-of-mind topic for many affiliate publishers: “Who Killed SEO?” presented by Mark Fuston. He shed light on why organic traffic across industries has been dropping at an alarming rate.
Traditionally, you could maintain your SERP ranking by leveraging session behavior with the following key metrics:
- High traffic
- Longer session duration
- Multiple pages per session
- Strong backlinks and out-links
= Good Search Ranking!
But here’s the shocking news: In 2023, 96% of websites had zero organic traffic, despite 3.1 trillion searches. How? About 25% of searches are now completed without a single click—users get their answers directly from search engine results, never visiting a site.
And it’s not just search engines anymore. Players like OpenAI (generative AI), Meta, and IoT devices (like Google Home and Amazon Echo) have entered the arena.
So how do you keep your organic traffic up? Fuston shared three strategies:
- Session Behavior – It’s still important, but not the only focus.
- Off-site Optimization – Go beyond traditional SEO and think about how your content could train large language models (LLMs) or rank for IoT and AI-driven queries.
- Topic Ownership – Ensure your content is the most informative on the subject, and use forums like Quora, Reddit, and Discord to learn what your audience is really asking.
Leveraging TikTok to Engage Your Audience
On Day 2, we dove into a session with TikTok’s head of industry, Zack Grossman. There’s nothing more mystifying—or soul-crushing—for a marketer than the TikTok algorithm. With only 3 seconds to hook a viewer and 6 seconds to introduce your brand, it’s a battle for attention.
Grossman offered some key tips to help you navigate this:
Do’s:
- Grab attention within the first 3 seconds, introduce your brand within 6.
- Face the camera when delivering your hook.
- Use text overlays so viewers can still engage even with the sound off.
- A/B test your hooks and see what resonates.
- Tap into community trends (e.g., “Get Ready with Me” or popular sound trends).
Don’ts:
- Don’t stray too far from your content formula to make branded content—find creative ways to incorporate the brand naturally.
- Avoid fleeting viral trends that don’t align with your content. If it doesn’t fit, let it go.
Takeaways
While we’ve only touched on two sessions from the Canadian Digital Marketing Summit, a central theme stood out: Why should your audience care? What sets your content apart from your competitors’?
As an affiliate publisher, it’s easy to get caught up in tracking product updates and offer changes. But don’t forget to ask yourself the key questions that will keep your audience coming back. Focus on owning your topic and sticking to your content formula, and you’ll build an audience that views you as a thought leader in your industry.
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