We’ve created a large number of sliders recently that replace various legacy website features. The slider introduced in this article show selected post type content as sliding panels. The feature may be used anywhere with a drag and drop Elementor widget or shortcode, with the expectation that it will be used on the front page of your website.
The latest slider was designed for content sent to your website social and video archives – both blog-style archives of what is traditionally external content, such as social media posts and video. However, in the light of a little early feedback, we have updated the slider to include virtually all post types.
Social and Video Archive: The mortgage broker website we provide our clients includes links to the social, video, and various other archives in the website footer. The content fed to the social archives is part of the standard (and optional) distribution made available via the Instagratify and Vista social media modules (the former is an Instagram hashtag-based filtering tool while the latter is a method to post to social directly from a dedicated Outlook calendar) – both amazing tools. The video archive was formerly an automated tool but we’ve since updated the system so videos ingested by Yabber enjoy a little TLC before they’re sent. Both of these archives are presented in a blog-style format with a styled page showcasing your content. They’re both an excelling customer-focused and SEO tool that assigns ownership of the content you create back to you. If your website is the centre of your marketing universe (and it is), then your website should be an archive of your entire digital footprint – we shouldn’t allow other networks to take ownership of our content.
The Result
To return the default slider, we’ll use the shortcode of [bm_posts_slider]. The slider isn’t really intended to be used in an article, so we’ve used the shortcode attribute of truncate="16" to shorten the title, and this was done simply to ensure the title doesn’t wrap around multiple lines.
Posted 2 days ago
The Re-Mortgage adverts are actually run by a very low-performing AFG/Mortgages Australia broker (as Mortgage Magnet). It’s one of the most offensive and non-compliant pay-per-lead experiences in the industry (and quite possibly the lowest performing in the country). We actually used this product to measure the performance of our free product, but this mob does so poorly, we had to use another – It’s really that bad. The crappy performance of their ‘funnel’ is only matched by the staggering level of non-compliance and deliberate customer deception/lies. Standard compliant infractions apply. There’s also illegal baiting, false advertising, quantitative exclusions, missing disclaimers and warnings, and so on. The fake panel indicating that values are checked before a qualification message is shown is probably the most offensive part of the customer experience… but of course the leadgen company is looking to grow their own list without regard to legal obligations or best interests duty. My details clearly ‘disqualified’ me for any loan. Of course, the questions weren’t asked for my benefit, they were either asked to validate the fake ‘qualification’ message, or make it easier to assign a higher value to the sale amount of the lead. Just disgusting. I had my wife…
The Bank of Adelaide, Georgetown, South Australia, c1902. Georgetown is around 196km north of Adelaide. The Bank of Adelaide was founded in 1865. The institution was taken over in 1979 by ANZ and merged into that organisation, after bailing out a subsidiary finance company (the Finance Corporation of Australia). View on Instagram
Interior view of the Queensland National Bank, Queen Street, Brisbane, 1922. View of the main banking area (known as the ‘Banking Chamber’) showing the teller’s cages, counters and tables. The domed roof is supported by stone columns and a circular feature is imbedded into the floor at the entrance. The building remains as the National Australia Bank building at 308 Queen Street, Brisbane. View on Instagram
Union Bank, Commercial Road, Tarnagulla, Victoria, c1875. There were four banks in Tarnagulla at one stage, but two – the National Bank and the Bank of Australasia – were open for a short period only. The single-storey brick building at far left was built in 1859 and used by the Union Bank until 1888, and was later renamed ‘Lochcarron’ and used as premises by doctors and dentists. The two-storey building (right) was built in 1866 by the Colonial Bank of Australasia. Before this, the site had been occupied by ‘Foo’s shop’. Whilst it was being built, the Colonial Bank operated from Company’s Hotel (later known as Burstall Hall and the Council Chambers). The double-storey building in this image was used by the Colonial Bank from 1866 until 21st February, 1888. The premises were sold to the Union Bank for 2500 pounds. The Union Bank moved in and commenced operations on 6th June 1888, continuing until 1942. The building was later used as a general store until the 1990s. Both buildings are now private residences (pictured, both in good condition, with the two-story building showing the ‘Colonial Bank Australia’ branding). View on Instagram
Western Australian Bank, Midland, Perth, c1900. The bank was built at 22 Viveash Road, Midland. Later road-name changes meant that the address changed to 12 Cale Street, Midland. The Western Australian Bank was a bank operating in Western Australia from 1841 to 1927. It was formed amidst the aftermath of the sale of the first Bank of Western Australia (1837-1841), which had sold out to the Bank of Australasia, as prominent colonists dissatisfied with the sale of the local bank to an English institution immediately responded by establishing a new rival banking operation. It was ultimately established on 26 June 1841 with a subscribed capital of 2,000. Its prospectus referred to the earlier bank as having “resolved (by a majority of six votes only) to commit an act of unnecessary and gratuitous suicide.” It engaged in a period of fierce competition with the Bank of Western Australia, which saw the earlier bank close entirely in 1845. It began operating regional branches from the 1850s, beginning with York (1855), and was the first bank to open on the Western Australian goldfields when it opened at Coolgardie in 1894. It was one of the few Australian banks to not close its doors…
A fake brokerage by the name of FinanceGroupAU making false representations is today’s Shad of the Day. Operated by a company called ‘Biz Focused’, they average around 12 compliance infractions in each of their ads and follow-on experience. Any broker using the service is willingly compromising their operation by inviting clear non-compliance into their operation. Standard BS. No comparison rate, invalid claims, unsupported quantitative statements, no disclaimers or warnings, and the typical quiz – in this case a full 14 questions with a paywall between the form and results (despite clearly not a candidate for anything). Dodgy leadgen companies will do anything for cheap leads, and they have no regard for quality, compliance, or the customer experience. Just don’t do it. Aggregation groups need to take note. View on Instagram
Shad of the Day, 20th January 2023. I don’t know if Logic Partners is a leadgen company or not, but they need to be called out for their breach of customer trust (and illegal advertising). Guys, please call me. The same customer journey applies as always. A bunch of questions are asked that add no value to the client journey, and they aren’t conditional in nature, so regardless of supplied details, the form will always return a ‘Congratulations’ message and ask for a booking (in this crappy case we see some animated fireworks). Is the ‘Success’ message is asked for the purpose of elevating client expectations, this experience is a whole new level of illegal… although we’d prefer to think that brokers simply don’t know what they’re doing. Amazing. We have a free product that is more powerful than this garbage, is fully-compliant, and it’s installed in seconds… but brokers keep using this BS. View on Instagram
We’ve just completed the most comprehensive ‘digital’ review of all brokers in Australia. We crawled every page from thousands of websites, assessed the social presence and stats of brokers and businesses, conducted a deep review of *all* broker Linkedin profiles, and then we measured everything against various performance metrics (including volume, growth, SEO etc). . In the aftermath of top-performer data making its way into various publications, we’ll usually see various stats… and they’re all completely flawed. The published lists themselves are obviously flawed, and our exercise sought to identify high-volume businesses even when they’re a relatively ‘unknown’ entity. We see a bizarre style of survivorship or halo bias, or a bias that applies when brokers look to emulate the behaviour and patterns of those brokers that they perceive are doing well, despite the fact those business behaviours and operating methods are also shared by those that are doing poorly. You simply cannot evaluate or promote the methods of any broker without evaluating a sample size of at least a few thousand… so that’s what we did. High performing brokers do a good job of keeping their ‘secrets’ closely guarded, so when these businesses do speak to groups -usually at…
#beliefmedia
Posted 3 days ago
Shad of the Day, 10th January 2023. This advert doesn’t really qualify as the daily Shad because it is legitimately the first honest advert we’ve seen from Joust. What makes the advert worth sharing is the comment from a consumer. People aren’t stupid. The entire live auction messaging is simply a lie, and Joust need to ditch this false advertising. There’s some good people in their organisation… they should take advantage of this and ditch the hyped garbage that is currently a defining attribute of their experience. Their broker-based leadgen services are obviously extremely poor. We’ve inherited brokers from this service, and their experience was garbage. View on Instagram
This video will demonstrate how to set up geographic modals on your website. Geographic modals are modals that are shown on the basis of the resolved state of your website user, so they’re ideal for cases such as first home buyer information. In other videos we discussed entry modals, exit modals, page modals, link modals, and landing page modals. The geographic modals may be used in any of these cases as an alternative to standard modal profiles. We say over and over that the key to higher-performing digital campaigns of any type is to capture the attention of your user, and relevance is one the attributes that serves this conversion-focused objective. Geographic modals are highly effective in that they introduce clear relevance to the user; they capture attention and objectively convert more traffic than a more generic journey. On some internal pages, such as your website’s cornerstone First Home Buyer pages, you might consider a geographically resolved modal that presents information on Government grants or similar. Again, relevance is required to capture attention, and attention is a prerequisite for a conversion. Placeholders apply on all modals. This placeholder includes text such as rate data and location, and it’s the location…
This video provides an overview of Yabber’s modal system. We’re going to introduce the technical nature of modal assignments – you should reference BeLearn for a general discussion on how modals can be used to improve your conversions. The funnel overview video, in particular, should be referenced for an understanding of how modals are used in the subscription funnel to increase the number of direct bookings. Modals usage on your website is entirely optional, and they should be reserved for cases where they serve a conversion-focused objective. Your website supports a number of modal types. They are as follows: 1. Entry modals, or a modal launched on a page entry after a number of seconds. 2. An exit modal that launches on exit intent, or when a user shows intent to bounce from a page. 3. Page specific and Landing Page modals, or an entry and exit pairing of modals that is assigned to a specific page – ideally suited for granular targeting, and more importantly, landing pages. 4. Geographic modals are shown on the resolved location of the user. Ideally suited to First Home Buyer information. 5. Launching a modal via a link. These links are discussed at the…
This video will demonstrate how to set up a single entry and exit modal on your website. Other videos provide more details on the extensive features and modal types made available via the modal module. This video details the simplicity and speed that entry and exit modals may be applied. Conditional website features are a moderately advanced systems so it’s unlikely you’ll use the features immediately. You should reference the library of content in BeLearn and on our website that describes how our conditional methods significantly improve your marketing efforts. The key with all your digital efforts is to capture the attention of your user, and relevance is one the attributes that serves this conversion objective. As discussed in BeLearn, modals should only be used when they’re part of the funnel journey, when the provide information or an education, or when they’re genuinely required for escalation-related purposes, such as a bounce from the first or second page in a landing page subscription funnel. For reasons of relevance, generic one-size-fits-all modals might be avoided, and instead, page-specific modals might be assign to individual pages – the page and landing page modals are discussed in another videos.
Slider Details: Showing a slider in this narrow post isn’t ideal because much of the formatting is lost, and various spacing isn’t preserved. It’s likely we’ll have an example on the front page of this website. As we’ll introduce shortly, virtually every option in the slider may be customised (including the image shown as the ‘featured’ image). We looked at including the hashtags in various locations but ended up simply adding them to the end of the description. Note that only the most recent results will show the correct featured image and image icons until a Yabber database update is performed.
Pictured: Two slides showing post from the video archive. Note that we have ‘play’ icons that launch video modals. The featured image is inherited from the featured image defined as the video category in Yabber.
An option is made available in Elementor (and shortcode) that renders all post images as icons which will launch an image modal. This feature is enabled by default, and it is available for content other than the posts in the social archive.
Before we introduce the simplicity of Elementor, consider the shortcode necessary to render the next slider. Shortcode of [bm_posts_slider post_type="post" truncate="16" meta_margin_top="-12" include_first_image_as_featured="1" slide_speed="6" number="14" items="1" truncate="50" apply_shadow="0"] returns the following:
Posted 8 hours ago
We’ve created a large number of sliders recently that replace various legacy website features. The slider introduced in this article show selected post type content as sliding panels. The feature may be used anywhere with a drag and drop Elementor widget or shortcode, with the expectation that it will be used on the front page of your website. The latest slider was designed for content sent to your website social and video archives – both blog-style archives of what is traditionally external content, such as posts and video. However, in the light of a little early feedback, we have updated the slider to include virtually all post types. The Result To return the default slider, we’ll use the shortcode of . The slider isn’t really intended to be used in an article, so we’ve used the shortcode attribute of to shorten the title, and this was done simply to ensure the title doesn’t wrap around multiple lines. An option is made available in Elementor (and shortcode) that renders all post images as icons which will launch an image modal. This feature is enabled by default, and it is available for content other than the posts in the social archive. Before…
Blog & News
Posted 1 week ago
A few brokers have contacted us lately to ask if we ‘assist with lead generation’, and the confusion is one that is easy given we invest quite a lot into a . The reason we apply effort to your website because it leverages your promoted (and organic) funnels enormously. You cannot and will not enjoy without a compelling digital presence. This article introduces the Instagram Post Slider – another feature that’ll support a more engaging website experience. The Result An Instagram Post Slider will show the latest Instagram posts from one or more accounts in a fully customisable rotating carousel. Each carousel shown on your page can be unique in terms of the posts displayed and the hashtag filtering applied, and each may inherit its own style. For the purpose of our in-post examples, we’ll use shortcode to return a result, but it’s expected that clients will use the drag-and-drop Elementor block introduced shortly. For the first example we’ll return a ‘default’ carousel with the shortcode of . The result isn’t ideal because we’re limited to just two results in a post-style format when the intended purpose is for usage on a wide page (if you’re on a mobile, you…
Posted 2 weeks ago
Of all the calculators you will use on your , the Debt-To-Income Ratio Calculator and LVR Calculator are the easiest to use. They both accepts just two fields, and both return a relatively generic response. This article introduces an additional LVR Calculator, and a new DTI calculator tool. The mortgage broker website we supply clients includes a comprehensive with around 40 calculators shipped by default – this includes a number of our own tools, and some supplied under licence to you by the MFAA or FBAA. Our broker website includes a full archive of calculators with a dedicated page for each calculator, although calculators can also be accessed via modals. Most calculator tools we’ve created (until now) are designed to be rendered inline (such as the , or the Limited Guarantee Calculator), and the inclusion of a calculator on the page a user is actually reading vastly improves on the authoritativeness score assigned to that page, and the calculators we’re introducing are designed to support that usage. Until now, we would generally create a ‘form-style’ calculator with a submit button to record results. The reason for this form-based methodology was to gain an understanding of general interactions, and it provided…
Blog & News
Posted 2 weeks ago
Some time back we introduced our basic form. Unlike the typical industry experience employed by many brokers, our Fact Find report will immediately return results back to a user based on lenders for which you’re qualified, it’ll send a PDF report to the user based on their report responses, and an integrated (optional) calendar booking form will enable easy contact. The standard third-party plugins that are used by the broader industry often claim to ‘Qualify’ a user, when the sole purpose of the exercise is to bait a user into the subscription experience with no intention of returning any information of value back to them. Completely contrary to the very basic and core funnel attribute stating that the customer journey is used to qualify you and not the client, the typical experience is one has no place in the industry. Leads converted via a dead-end leadgen form are delivered by accident – not on purpose. This article introduces an alternate means to return a into your website, although the form itself is virtually identical to that of the original, with the exception of revised formatting and the stepped nature of the questions. The form emulates a form that you might…
Blog & News
Posted 2 weeks ago
For as long as we’ve been operating, we’ve had a suite of complimentary plugins made available to mortgage brokers. The most ‘valuable’ of these plugins is one that we called Funnels – a completely complimentary plug-and-play website plugin that’d create full-featured funnels on activation. To obtain the plugin, we required that a user simply download our (rather outdated) marketing manual and wait for the download link to be sent via email. Every now and again we’d post a direct link to our . The purpose of the free product is clear: abolish overpriced leadgen companies that deliver a costly, (usually) non-compliant, and fractionalised lead generation experience. When measured against the ‘everything-ify’ style of service, and the various others floating around the market, our free Funnels product routinely and consistently returns an ROI that exceeds that of pay-per-lead services by around 35X (usually far higher). Our aim was to provide an always up-to-date and ever-evolving product that’d deliver a best-practice, fully-owned, and compliant solution with the click of a button. Many marketing agencies love to belittle the services provided by their competition, but we’ve never seen or inherited a product that outperforms any of the free funnel products we’ve ever given…
Posted 2 weeks ago
All website users have different objectives, or they are looking for your experience to return a specific type of relevance, and you cannot and will not achieve the degree of success that digital is meant to return by a linear customer journey when that excursion is taking them in the wrong direction. Nor will you possess an understanding of your digital efforts if funnel interactions are ignored. Belief’s proprietary framework – built in-house by our team of former brokers, and designed specifically for the finance industry – remains the first and only conditional experience in the mortgage market, and we provide the only integrated marketing funnel experience in the industry. This nested architecture is part of the reasons our clients’ organic website results are phenomenal, and part of the reason our promoted campaigns – such as those run on Facebook – returns results that consistently outperform competing experiences by a ridiculously high margin. This digital success is because we’re the only end-to-end digital experience in the market, and a part of this digital success is by virtue of a framework that delivers a conditional experience, or a funnel experience that is crafted out for a user in real-time based on…
Blog & News
Posted 3 weeks ago
In this article we’re going to show you exactly why our standard Facebook and organic funnels returns than competing products. Without exposing our closely guarded secrets, we’ll show you a mechanism that’ll optimise just your top of funnel subscription, or that part of the funnel that ingests a user into your early funnel journey. What we’re describing is just one of about 20-or-so funnels routinely applied by mortgage brokers. It needs to be understood that once a user is subscribed to an experience, or a user has made early contact, a deep, immersive, engaging, and education-based journey continues to apply, and it’s the latter funnel excursion that is just as important as the initial transaction. How long will it take to implement the funnel we’re describing in this article? About 5 seconds. If you’re using our complimentary plugin, you simply activate the plugin and the necessary pages are created (an experience identical to that described below is created). If you’re a client, you may create the experience via the in Yabber. Note that at the time of writing, we’re using the holiday period to update both the plugin and Solis module, so they’re both offline. Our broker clients alone return…
Blog & News
Posted 3 weeks ago
Before Roger Bannister first broke the 4-minute mile on the 6th May 1954, John Landy, an Australian runner, had run the mile in 4-minutes and two seconds on multiple occasions, but he described the barrier as a ‘brick wall’. It took Bannister to break down that wall before Landy himself achieved the same milestone (when competing against Bannister at the 1954 Commonwealth Games). Bannister drew inspiration from the ascent of Mount Everest and early medical advancements (including an early Polio vaccine)… and he knew that barriers were more of a mindset than any hard limit. We discussed the race in an article titled “The Truth Behind The 100-Million Dollar Mortgage Broker” at a time before the pandemic, lower rates, and the apparent normalisation of triple-digit volumes, and the article focused on dismantling the arbitrary volume and growth targets many businesses impose upon themselves. We’re now just seeing a new breed of broker: the broker that is looking to achieve a billion in individual volume. What are they doing differently? In a sense, and from what we’re able to resolve, these successful operations have simply detached themselves from the Groupthink collective and are instead forking off in new and creative ways,…
Blog & News
Posted 4 weeks ago
This month we introduced some changes to our . For many brokers, their priority is owning a website that provides a compelling funnel-based presence that genuinely converts, but they’re not necessarily interested paid or promoted lead generation options – the reason for which the early framework was built, so we have recently commitment additional resources on our end to support more robust and powerful website features and modules in the future. This article details what the current mortgage broker website framework looks like. This article will provide a type of visual sitemap of the pages shipped with the website framework, and we’ll details a few of the modules that are forthcoming. The website is now far more of an organic tool in that we have far more capacity to add various pages, or make certain types of content available to you, as a managed resource. The website is owned by you, so some parts of the product are fixed on delivery, although this provides you with the capacity to take ownership of the asset and develop it in creative and unique ways. The website is supported on the backend by , our . Yabber contains hundreds of marketing modules that…
Blog & News
Posted 4 weeks ago
Some time back we introduced a relatively obscure module on your website to support and courses. Introduced as a module that was “useless until proven otherwise”, it wasn’t linked in any serious way because the delivered product didn’t include any tutorials or courses. The idea was that the resource might be developed by brokers in their own time in order to support organic and promoted funnels. The problem? Despite our expectations, very few brokers built course material of any kind. Those that did have a program in place obviously saw success, with some promoting their work with extraordinary results. However, most brokers haven’t touched the module, and a vast majority of our clients wouldn’t know where or how to start. We get it – you’re busy and don’t have time… so the comments are simply observations in light of an operational reality – they’re not intended as criticism in any way. In fact, this reality Is the reason we’ve committed to building courses as one-click website inclusions. This article describes the revised format of the education module, and it provides an understanding of what you might expect over coming months. The primary reason for introducing the updates now is because…
Posted 4 weeks ago
Shortcodes are a ‘find and replace’ feature on WordPress websites. A shortcode pattern is identified in your post or page, and that string of shortcode text is replaced with dynamic or other content. Your blog article content should be dynamic and come alive, and shortcodes might play a big part in making this happen. It isn’t reasonable or feasible to introduce all the shortcodes packed into your , so this article will simply demonstrate some of those that you’ll use more often than others. Despite providing a suite of drag-and-drop that incorporate a large number of finance-related features, the website we supply clients includes over 100 shortcodes… with most of them currently undocumented. This article will introduce some of the lesser-known shortcode features made available in our standard website, and we’ll touch on a few that we’ve introduced in the past. The purpose of this article isn’t to understand how to use shortcodes. The article seeks to: introduce the Shortcode Editor that negates the need to remember any shortcode markup. introduce the type of content that may be submitted with managed articles. Our articles are sent only to clients (and often, partners), so we know that if we introduce a…
Blog & News
Posted 4 weeks ago
We recently updated our ‘s ‘Education’ module to be more robust and scalable, and more importantly, we created the mechanism for the inclusion of one-click on your website. In order to test the back-end tech required to push courses of various kinds, we created a basic RBA page as a ‘demo’ of what a course might look like. In creating the page we pushed around 220 RBA Monetary Statements to the website, and we built a policy archive that will update when a new monetary media release is published. The RBA topic wasn’t ideal as a ‘course’, but it was a suitable resource for testing the methods we’ll use on our end to manage more feature-rich education content. The reason that the RBA Policy statements weren’t ideal as a course is because it isn’t a course – it’s just information. However, the ‘Education’ module – as the name implies – is more than courses – it’s for content that provides users with a better understanding of ‘anything’. In fact, the exact same method we’re introducing on this page is employed to render ” articles to your website (another resource that is now shipped by default). We created a single page…
Blog & News
Posted 1 month ago
We’ve recently updated the employment module on our . Designed to mimic the presentation of various job search websites, such as Seek, the facility provides a secondary method for you to make employment known. Since the tool is very rarely used, this module was formerly managed by the standalone ‘BM Employment’ plugin, but with our updated framework we’ve added additional pages to support mentoring (discussed shortly) so it made sense to finally rationalise the experience. The employment module is simple, and it’s not designed to replace those websites with broader reach. However, in the case of larger organisations, growing businesses, or franchises, the module provides the capacity to quickly disseminate and manage available employment to multiple websites. The Result The employment entry page shows all available positions. Clicking on any listing expands an accordion that provides a general overview. A link will direct the user to a page with further details. The featured job page page is defined in Yabber and includes the job title, company name, location, category, type, salary, hours, overview, requirements, call-to-action, video, and link. Most of the fields are optional. When rendered, the page will show similar to that shown below. When a video is defined…
Blog & News
Posted 1 month ago
We recently updated the Reviews module on our . The module takes full advantage of Yabber’s automation, and the system seamlessly integrates with the Elementor framework that is the backbone of our website architecture. The former Reviews module wasn’t nearly as robust as required, and it only provided for a shortcode option to render a result, so it was generally a ‘lacking’ solution for those that prefer visual design. This article introduces the functionality made available via the revised Testimonial module – we don’t discuss the value of reviews themselves. As shown on our , the result of the Testimonial Slider is pictured below. Note that every element within the panel may be customised, and we’ll detail these variables shortly with the introduction of the Elementor block. Reviews are assigned to a category, with the category being the network where the review was written, and by default all reviews from all categories will show in the slider. You may, however, only select a block of your ‘best’ or ‘featured’ reviews to show on your front page, or anywhere any occurrence of the slider is shown. Note that while creation of reviews in Yabber is the preferred method of sending reviews…
The example does illustrate how the slider may be used for alternate post types, and at the moment it supports posts from the following post types: instagram and video posts (intended usage), posts, pages, FAQs, resources, and education. Standalone sliders exist for post types such as testimonials. In the above example, we’ve applied the ‘meta’ data which shows icons for images associated with each post, but this is an option we’ve enabled.
Our shortcode editor will make light work of applying this style of ‘complex’ markup, but until then, Elementor is far easier to use.
Elementor Widget
As with all our primary tools, a drag-and-drop Elementor Widget is made available that’ll allow you to place the slider on any post or page. The widget includes customisation options for virtually every aspect of the slider style. Additional options will be added as they’re requested.
Pictured: The Elementor Post Widget. Drag and drop the widget onto a post or page, select the post types to show, and the slider will start showing results. A large number of options apply that alter the style and formatting of the rendered slider.
Shortcode is available, but the large number of options introduce a complexity that is best avoided. That said, rendering a default slider with only minor changes takes just a few seconds.
Updates to the Social Archive
In building what was a ‘simple’ slider, we encountered a ‘problem’ (and an opportunity). In the past, Yabber would create a social article on your website based on the attributes of the post content… but it wouldn’t create tags or categories. However, social posts are based on hashtags, so it only seemed appropriate that we’d assign them to each social post created. The assignment of tags (or, in this case, hashtags) means that all content connected via a hashtag may be navigated independently of other content, thus providing a more usable and engaging customer experience.
Pictured: The social archive on this website showing images associated with the #bankhistory hashtag. The archive allows a user to experience your social archive as if it were a social network by bouncing around content based on the hashtags associated with the post. This new archive presents some interesting social options we’re yet to fully explore.
The framework is now shipped with a social tag archive that is linked to from the tags associated with each post (meaning you’re able to browse your own social archive in the same way that you would Twitter or Instagram).
In terms of the slider itself – the primary reason the above changes were made – we now have the capacity to include hashtag links from within each panel, thus giving your website visitors direct access to social, video, and other content that interests them most.
In creating a searchable archive for the social media custom post type, we were required to create a ‘hashtag’ taxonomy (which is basically an association that connects the hashtag to the post), and we were required to build in a searchable hashtag archive page (or a paginated archive that shows all posts containing a single hashtag). If you’re sporting a framework that was delivered anytime before January 23rd, the searchable hashtag archive will not work, and you shouldn’t include hashtags in your social slider (or anywhere else) as the tags will link to an invalid page; this restriction only applies to social panels as it’s the only location the tags are shown.
For those with an existing website, we’ll provide video instructions on how to perform the update yourself (changes were already made on managed client websites). If you’re an active social media user, and you’re using our social systems, then we’d recommend an update.
Ironically, archived social media posts on your website will almost always have a higher reach than content posted to social media platforms.
If you expect to use the slider, consider the following:
The feature is very new so you can expect minor bugs. Please report them as they’re found. Please also forward any feature requests and we’ll include them in the next plugin update.
Continued Development
One of the features we’ve considered implementing into the website framework is the history of lenders and banks in Australia. We’ve built up a significant archive ourselves, and as we post finance history to your social channels via the managed program, and as you post your own content, we can link that content to a ‘history’ page with more information. It’s a little ‘outside the box’ so we’d appreciate your feedback on this type of feature.
Aggregation & Franchise
While it’s yet to be used, Yabber provides for an aggregation or franchise group to include a full library of social content from all brokers on a dedicated or company website, with each post linking back to the original author – this style of social tool may also be suitable for an operation with a larger number of independent brokers. The idea is that we want our social media efforts to be archive and come alive before its buried deep down under thousands of feet of cat pics and dancing babies.
We’re often required to explain why a company often perceived as a ‘lead generation’ company applies so much effort into building industry leading website tools… and the answer is a simple one: your website is required to support a full-stack marketing funnel, so the persuasiveness and value derived from your broader digital experience contributes towards your conversions. Simple.
While the slider is a fantastic tool that elevates the awareness of your social media content, it’s the evolution of the social media archive that is probably more significant. Hosting your own social and video material gives you complete ownership of your own content. The searchable hashtag archive makes your website come alive with a complete searchable library of the content shared to social, and the system adds significant SEO value in the process.
Coming Soon: One of the more significant steps we’ve taken in this whole process was the modification of the backend framework to support a facility that will permit you to post to social media from within your social media archive. In other words, you will create content on your website, and the content and media associated with the post will send to selected social accounts. This tool will supplement the Vista and Instagratify tools, and will arguably be a more efficient mechanism for creating social content.
The last of a slider-style tool that we’ll build in the short-term will return selected videos uploaded to YouTube and/or Wistia in a video slider, and the Elementor tool is expected next week.
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