Why You Should Seriously Think of Including Review Generation in Your Marketing Strategy

Why reviews are so important? Because they build loyalty and show your potential customers the most prominent positive and negative angles of your business. People can surf websites, and social media with stylish company accounts, but when it comes to the real people’s opinions it appears that they are much more crucial. Negative reviews are a subject to smartly manage. But some strengths mentioned in a review can easily influence the decision about visiting a company. Today, we want to talk about how a company can motivate customers to share reviews about their positive experience? RocketData gives five useful tools for your business to try.

5 Tools for Your Business to Generate Reviews

1. The Most Traditional Way — Email

Let’s start from the most classic way to engage customers into leaving feedback. A customer receives an email when he does a targeted action — visited a company, bought a service or a product, contacted a manager. Usually, right after such moments clients are already “close enough” to share their opinion on customer service or product’s quality. So, it’s time to ask them what they think.

What should your email contain to increase the chances a customer will leave a review:

– The right subject of an email that motivates: “Get a discount for your review”, “Free consultation for your opinion”, etc.

– A specific name of a real manager and a relevant topic: “Good afternoon, this is James from Rocket Presents. You sent a present using our service and we’re really eager to know whether you’re satisfied”.

– Catch phrases
It should be clear for customers how leaving a review will bring them benefit and it’s essential for them not to spend much time on it. Here come special phrases-amplifiers like: “help others to make choice”, “just a minute to make us better” “we improve with your reviews”, etc.

– Being grateful
You can motivate customers to leave positive reviews by expressing gratitude for their feedback. Say a couple of thankful words or even suggest a discount or a bonus for their opinion.

It will also be a great idea to include in your email a request to put a rate to the company (usually, from 1 to 5, or from 1 to 10). Create different landing pages for such survey.

If the customer puts a rate up to 7, they will drop into a landing page where they will find special feedback and will be asked to write what they didn’t like or what your business and improve. If they rate your company more than 7, they will be directed to the list of company locations where they can share their positive experience.

2. Signature in Your Email

Now, we slightly move to the last but not the least part in companies’ email communications — manager’s signature. Most of businesses underestimate such a simple but influential tool to generate reviews. Here is, why you shouldn’t.

In most cases, signature is the clearest way for customers to contact your company or a certain manager. Which can also become a reason to leave positive reviews about the service in your company. But you can go even further — add to the signature an invite to leave reviews on location-based services or on your website and insert a link to corresponding site. Use the smart approach to create a catchy call-to-action so customers have no chance to miss this out.

You can generate such signatures in the following services — Hubspot Signature Generator, Wise Stamp and others.

3. Quick and Clear — Messenger or SMS

Want to interact with customers who already familiar with your brand? Then choose SMS or Messenger. SMS is a good old and quick way to ask your client for a rate or review. Or you can also use more modern option — the Messenger.

It is a short version of an email, so you can use our advice from the previous points on how to create an appealing message. Only remember that here your thoughts and CTAs should be more direct and concise. Usually, messages are sent on the net day after a customer turned to a company and smoothly show them care and concern about the quality of product or a service they got.

Here is one more important thing — get clients’ consent to newsletters before you send any messages. In other case, you may get an irritated customer and his feedback won’t be so positive as you expect. You can get consent by a special form that notifies customers that their contact will be used to send news and messages from your company or on the special page of your website. For example, when people register gift cards or other bonuses.

4. Unexpected… — Remarketing

It may seem not so obvious, but it is a great tool to collect customers’ feedback. If you take your brand for serious and are ready to invest in your image, then this is the way for you. Concentrate on the audience that visited your website, bought a product or a service from your company, create a juicy visual, relevant CTA and free your ad out.

5. A Customer-friendly Way — QR Code

QR stands for a quick response. Ideal to follow and in a second leave a review. Customers can easily scan any POS materials (menu, banners, cash register, packs, etc.) or even a sticker with an app or smartphone and get redirected to a form for leaving review. There is no long links, so you can print QR code anywhere on materials in your locations and even on different surfaces in your points of sale. Just mind that it is should be placed where it is convenient to scan for clients.

You can generate a QR code that will lead your customers to your listing in Google Business Profile or to your website form. By the way, it may be the most ecological way for customers, cause the need to make only one step to get to a review form.

Where to Collect Customer Feedback

Depending on the region, you can find a list of location-based and review services that are the most popular. You can select two types of such platforms for your business — the main (the most popular like Google, Yelp, TripAdvisor, etc.) and the additional sites (specialized on separate industries and niches, e.g., medicine, HoReCa, sports). You should define the most priority sites for your company and take care of not only being present there, but also getting fresh and positive reviews that you can analyze and improve. Marketers can always do it by themselves, but if your business has 10+ locations it can be hard to manage all the data on your own. So, it is a good idea to turn to platforms that can collect, manage, and analyze reviews in a single account.

To Sum Up

Reviews are crucial for any company, because they build a very important part of business’s reputation — customer loyalty. To say more, if a company has rating below four on Google 53% of clients even won’t consider visiting it.

Reviews help people to make right decisions about the purchases or visits, as well as help companies improve their service and products’ quality. That shows that we should bother about the stars in location-based services and work hard to generate more positive reviews from people who interact with our companies. That is, use all the ways and tool smartly and with a thorough thought, and get the results your business deserves.

The post Unobvious Ways to Stay in Touch With Your Customers appeared first on SiteProNews.

Here’s how to build your startup’s marketing strategy from scratch and set your business up for success.

Define Marketing and Business Goals

Goals are necessary for any marketing strategy. You have to know what you’re hoping to achieve with your business in order to draft a plan for how to get there. Attracting leads and prospects and converting them into customers requires a defined approach with strategic goals.

Determine your goals for the overall business, the next few months, and the next few years. With these goals defined, you can choose the best metrics to gauge the success of your campaigns in reaching them.

Determine the Target Audience

Marketing is all about targeting. You need to know who you’re selling to and what they need from your brand and product. No matter how great your marketing campaigns or products are, they’re all worthless without the right audience.

You have to define your target customer and plan your marketing around addressing their needs. Here are some things to consider:

• What are your customers’ demographics (age, location, gender, occupation)?
• What are your customers’ personalities and shopping habits?
• What are your customers’ pain points? How does your product solve them?

The answers to these questions will help you define your specific audience and ensure that your product and marketing messaging are designed for them.

Perform Keyword Research

Keyword research is necessary for successful marketing. Customers will use certain keywords to research solutions to pain points or for products that serve their needs, and they can’t find you if you don’t have those keywords in your website, content, and campaigns.

Ideally, look for keywords with high traffic and low competition. You should also use keywords that are highly relevant to your brand and your campaign goals. For example, someone in the early stages of an engineering project may search “what is a printed circuit board” to learn more about bringing their design to life. If they were searching “printed circuit board manufacturers,” they may be further along in the buying journey.

Develop Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Remember the goals you set early on? The only way to see if your efforts are working is by choosing KPIs and metrics that measure your performance. When you have these in place, you can compare campaigns against others to see what’s working and what isn’t.

Your metrics and KPIs should always be specific and measurable. Instead od saying you want to grow your social media presence in general, choose a number and a timeframe like 1,000 followers each month. Now, you have a target in mind and you can see how far above or below you came.

Your exact metrics may vary according to your business and goals, but it’s important to set them early on and use them to track your progress.

Determine a Marketing Budget

Marketing can get expensive quickly, so it’s important to have a budget in place before you plan your entire strategy. You need to know what your business can afford to dedicate to marketing efforts, and from there, you can decide which avenues offer the largest potential return on investment.

For example, if you have a younger audience that’s active on social media more than anywhere else, it may make sense to devote more of your budget to social media marketing efforts. If your blog gets most of the traffic, allocate more research toward professional writing services and content development.

Develop Your Website and Blog

Nearly all consumers expect brands to have an online presence, regardless of industry. It’s important to have a well-designed website with a blog and resources to help your potential customers. Having these assets in place establish you as a credible brand and provide your prospects with enough information and value to see why you’re the best brand for their needs.

Keep in mind that it’s not enough to simply set up a website and blog and leave it to sit. Your blog will need consistent, high-value content that addresses your audience’s pain points and drives traffic to your site. For example, if you are a manufacturer of printed circuit boards, content about how to design your first printed circuit board will be of value.

You should also have well-developed webpages and a logical site layout that directs visitors to the pages you want them to see.

Choose the Right Social Media Channels

Social media has a ton of value for businesses. Each channel serves different audiences, interests, and personality types, and many consumers expect to connect with their favorite brands on their favorite channels.

That said, not all channels are worthwhile, or even appropriate, for your brand. You could spend a lot of money and time trying to hit every channel, so it’s best to focus your efforts on the channels with the majority of your audience. Some of the most popular social media channels include Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and LinkedIn.

Work with Influencers

Influencer marketing is here to stay, and it can have incredible impact for your brand. Much like the celebrity endorsements and television commercials that once reigned, influencers are the new celebrities that are highly sought for brand partnerships. These content creators gain significant followings in their industry and have the power to influence others, so a simple product review can be enough to boost a brand’s presence.

Not all influencers are equal, however. It’s better to find an influencer in your industry and an audience that aligns with yours, increasing the likelihood that they’ll be interested in what you have to offer. The biggest influencers with millions of followers aren’t worth anything if they’re in a different industry.

Leverage a Referral Network

Word-of-mouth advertising is one of the most powerful forms of marketing, and always has been. People are more comfortable making purchases based on recommendations from friends, family, and colleagues, and you can leverage this to acquire new customers.

This strategy works best when you have some customers, but it can help you grow quickly. You have to deliver superior products and service to your customers, even long after the sale, to give them a positive experience that they want to share with others. Then, you can set up a referral program that offers them an incentive to recommend other people, such as a percentage discount, free samples, or exclusive access to a new service.

Tap Into Emotion in Your Messaging

While some sales are based on logical decision-making, emotions play a huge role in purchasing decisions. You need to connect with your customers’ emotions to inspire them to make the purchase.

Here are some emotions you can leverage:

• Happiness: Positive, joyful messaging often resonates with customers because it makes them happy. Show images of people who are smiling and laughing while using your product. Some huge brands that use happiness in advertising successful include Disney and Coca-Cola.
• Fear: A lot of marketing uses fear because it’s effective. Fear is instinctual and triggers our flight-or-fight response to threats and danger, prompting us to act. While the fear you’ll use in marketing isn’t about life or death, it can be about risks related to their problems or the “fear of missing out” on a limited-edition product. Fear needs to be used carefully, however. You don’t want to upset consumers unnecessarily and turn them off to your products.
• Anger: Another negative emotion, anger can be used to prompt people to action. Controversy, asking the important questions, or bringing up an issue can inspire action, but like fear, you don’t want to create too much controversy. Use this emotion sparingly in your efforts.

Keep Branding Consistent

Setting up the brand is one of the earliest tasks in a startup. You probably already have a logo, brand pillars, typography, and other assets ironed out. When you begin your marketing, each and every message and image needs to reinforce that solid branding to create a cohesive experience.

Startups are evolving, so some aspects of your brand may shift or change over time. That’s expected, but your overall branding should be consistent across your website, social media, content, and ad campaigns. When your brand is consistent, customers have more confidence in your business and credibility.

Refine Your Strategy

Your marketing strategy isn’t going to be perfect the first time. You will need to consistently track, measure, and tweak your campaigns as the conditions change. For example, you may find that customers respond better to certain emotions, approaches, or content types. You may see that you get more traffic and engagement on some social media channels and not others.

How frequently you measure your results will depend on your metrics. Some metrics require daily tracking, such as website visits, leads, and traffic by source, while others can be monitored less often, such as new vs. returning visitors. If you find certain things aren’t working, tweak your campaigns and see if you get more success.

Plan Your Startup’s Marketing

Developing a marketing strategy for a startup isn’t easy. It takes time, money, and strategy to succeed. By following these steps, you should have the tools you need to create your marketing strategy to get your business off the ground.

The post Guide on How to Build Your Startup’s Marketing Strategy from Scratch appeared first on SiteProNews.

Content marketing benefits are numerous, but only if you are strategic in your planning. Some of these benefits are improved brand awareness, engagement, lead generation, online reputation, organic traffic, and a company’s digital presence.

But most of all, content marketing is not a one-off transaction that gets you temporary customers.

It is a long-term strategy that works to attract and build lasting, meaningful connections with your audience.

So, what is content marketing?

It is the practice of creating and then distributing content in videos, blog posts, educational articles, or how-to tutorials through various marketing channels like Facebook and LinkedIn. One content marketing example is L’Oreal Paris Signature Faces Virtual Makeup content marketing that puts the needs of its customers at the forefront.

Usually, the primary goal in content marketing is to communicate your brand message with your audience. With that in mind, follow these steps to build your content marketing guide.

Step 1: Determine Your Objectives

A plan without an objective is like a blind man that scorns a guide. So start by determining what you need from your content marketing. For instance, do you think blog posts or a podcast will better reach and connect with your target audience?

When you look at your customer reviews, are most of your clients asking for tutorials or webinars? These and other questions will help you determine the primary objective of your content marketing, after which you can create lower-level objectives.

Once you know what you want, determine how your needs will fit into your overall digital marketing strategy – if you already have one. Also, formulate KPIs to help keep you on track once you have a content marketing timeframe.

Step 2: Assemble a Team of Professionals

One of the most significant content marketing principles to follow is to hire a team of professionals in the field. Whether you choose to get them in-house or through outsourcing or freelancing, ensure you have a good team of content marketers.

Content marketing is a profession of skill. This means that you cannot rely on using any Tom, Dick, and Harry. Instead, work on finding individuals that have a proven track record of getting results from their content.

They don’t have to be viral sensations. But they need to know how to get your name out there. And if your business cannot handle the cost of hiring many experts, get one to manage and supervise the rest of the team.

Step 3: Get to Know Your Audience

You have your objectives and professionals. Now it’s time to know your audience. Find out what they need, how they think, their struggles, who they are, what they like, their social and working status – you get the point. Seek to know everything about your potential customers.

Why is this important? The more you know about your customers, the easier it will be to tailor your products and services to fit their needs. You can provide solutions they actually can use and not what you think they want to use.

You will get the best results with market research banked on accurate data. Also, consider the places your target audience goes to find information. This will help you to formulate your content marketing ideas. For instance, if most of your target audience are busy individuals, you can convert your blog posts into podcasts.

Step 4: Start to Plan Your Strategy

Content marketing for small businesses should start with blog posts because they create a platform for gaining experience. Blog posts are also excellent because you can repurpose the content for other forms of content marketing like podcasts or YouTube videos.

This is also the stage where you start to build your brand message into your content. Create a purpose statement centered on ways you serve your customers and meet their needs. The purpose statement should carry meaning in a short, enticing format.

Step 5: Create a Schedule for Publishing Content

One other key to success in content marketing is consistency. Be consistent in the message you share with your target audience, the amount of content you produce, and the number of times you publish your content. Consistency shows your reliability.

Additionally, take advantage of promotional avenues to further expand your target reach. An excellent example is the use of influencer marketing. Another example that works is email marketing. If you don’t have the budget for these two methods, consider inviting a guest to blog on your site – or blog on authority sites.

Conclusion

Remember, nothing is set in stone. The idea is to build and rebuild until you find something that works best for your business. Keep in mind that content marketing helps with creating a long-term foundation for your business. So don’t expect immediate results.

But if you do it right, you will get the best results, eventually. In the meantime, you can conduct a competitor analysis to determine the strategies they are using and the type of content they are sharing.

You can then use this information to produce more interesting and relatable content for your audience. Fill in any gaps you identify. On that note, do you know of any gaps content marketers are yet to fill in their strategies? Let us know in the comments below.

The post Developing a Content Marketing Strategy – Step-By-Step Guide appeared first on SiteProNews.

Retailers and entrepreneurs everywhere are doing what they can to keep up with these rapidly changing trends and use them to their advantage. If you’re determined to help eCommerce businesses succeed next year, keep an eye out for these emerging trends that are vital to your marketing strategy.

1. The Increasing Role of AI

Artificial intelligence (AI) has always played a major part in the eCommerce industry. However, this advanced form of intelligence is developing an even more significant role in eCommerce.

AI can be used in a multitude of ways to enhance the online shopping experience. For example, shoppers can receive personal recommendations that are based on their unique interests and browsing history. By analyzing the online behavior of customers, AI narrows down their options and identifies the products that each person is most likely to purchase. In this way, artificial intelligence technologies act as a personal shopper for each individual consumer.

eCommerce business leaders are becoming more attuned to these product marketing strategies, which means AI is projected to become more essential to online shopping in the future. Always be on the lookout for new ways to incorporate AI into your content marketing strategy.

2. Mobile-Friendly Shopping

More and more consumers are viewing mobile shopping as a simple and convenient way to make purchases. Whether they’re using a phone or a tablet, shopping on a mobile device has become increasingly more common among eCommerce customers.

Mobile-friendly shopping experiences are only becoming more integral to eCommerce. To keep up with this expanding trend, eCommerce businesses need to be proactive in making their websites as mobile-friendly as possible. If customers find that a page takes too long to load or is too difficult to navigate, they’ll be off to another website that’s been properly optimized for mobile devices.

Don’t miss out on this opportunity while forming your marketing budget. Make your website tailored to the mobile experience to boost customer retention and keep buyers interested in your products.

3. Voice Assistants

Whether they’re searching for the next best product or making a quick purchase, consumers are relying on voice assistants to simplify nearly every step of the shopping process. With voice assistants expected to become even more prevalent in the coming months, it’s crucial for eCommerce businesses to use this emerging trend to their benefit.

As you work on improving your eCommerce marketing strategy, think about how you can incorporate voice assistance into your website. Adding voice-based navigation and voice command functions will make it easier for customers to search for the products they want without lifting a finger.

4. Digital Wallets

As mobile-friendly shopping becomes more prevalent, digital wallets are occupying a larger role in the eCommerce industry. It’s vital for businesses to accept digital wallets as a valid payment option when customers make purchases through their site. Not only will this help simplify the shopping process for your customers, but it’ll also make them more likely to rely on your website in the future.

5. Multichannel Selling

A rising trend among eCommerce customers is using multiple channels to shop for products and make purchases. These channels can include anything from Amazon to Facebook, and they all play a major role in each user’s shopping experience. eCommerce businesses are therefore expected to rise to the challenge and embrace multichannel selling as an essential part of their marketing strategy.

Multichannel selling can be difficult, but it often leads to tremendous success when done correctly. By offering your products across a variety of channels, you have the potential to reach a much larger group of customers and boost your revenue.

6. Environmentally Conscious Shopping

Efforts to become more environmentally friendly are being embraced by eCommerce businesses everywhere. Customers are taking notice, too, because sustainability-marketed products are growing faster than those that aren’t.

To show consumers that you’re serious about your pro-environment stance, it’s vital to make room for environmentally-friendly practices in your eCommerce marketing strategy. 

Do your research on environmental sustainability and green consumerism to determine how your own business can fit into a rapidly growing movement. For example, by offering products that are clearly marked as eco-friendly, customers are likely to gain a greater sense of trust in your company.

7. The Expanding Influence of Social Media

Social media has had a prominent role in online shopping for years. However, it’s only expected to become more relevant to your eCommerce strategy.

One of the biggest ways social media has evolved is that it’s now considered a major marketing tool. While social media sites were initially used as a means of communicating with others, companies have now utilized social media to boost market exposure and gain more loyal customers.

There are various ways to use social media to your benefit. For example, many eCommerce businesses have opted to sell their products through social media channels in an effort to reach more customers. You can also choose to promote your products via Facebook, Twitter or a similar website to make your products more visible and increase customer conversion.

8. Personalized Content

Anticipating the needs of your customers is crucial to their overall experience while shopping online. Because every consumer’s preferences are unique, the best way to ensure that their needs are being met is to create content that’s tailored to their habits.

To effectively implement personalized content, you need to learn as much about your customers as you can. From observing the activity of your social media followers to having your customers fill out surveys, there are a multitude of ways to form a more intimate relationship with each of your customers.

Once you’ve gathered enough data, you can use that information to create Google ads, Bing ads, and other types of content that are specifically tailored to your customers. These relevant offers and messages will convert customers like never before.

9. SMS Marketing

SMS marketing is set to make a big comeback in the upcoming years. This trend of sending relevant marketing messages to your customers via text message has seen significant success in past years, which is why eCommerce businesses should be prepared to make the most of it now.

According to recent data, SMS marketing campaigns have a much higher open rate than email marketing campaigns. While the average open rate for email marketing campaigns is estimated to be about 20 percent, the average SMS marketing campaign open rate is approximately 98 percent. This data illustrates that eCommerce marketers have a much higher chance of success if they send consumers information via text rather than email.

To ensure that your own business’s open rate is close to the overall average, be sure to carefully plan out the information you send to buyers. The messages you compose should contain offers that are relevant to your consumers’ needs, wants, and goals. Sending out irrelevant or unnecessary information puts you at risk of losing loyal customers and missing out on the opportunity to gain an entirely new following.

10. Subscription-Based Services

Netflix and Amazon Prime have already shown the world how vital subscription-based services are to eCommerce success. In the approaching months, these services are expected to have an even larger impact on eCommerce businesses.

When offering subscription services to your customers, be sure to include a range of options that vary in price and available features. This will give each consumer the freedom to select the offer that most closely matches their needs and lifestyle. In addition, each option should offer a sense of convenience that customers can rely on to receive the services they want.

Subscription-based services are also highly valuable to businesses. By implementing these offers into your eCommerce marketing strategy, you can save time and money while boosting customer retention in the long term.

The post 10 Digital Marketing Trends for eCommerce Businesses appeared first on SiteProNews.

This is the new kid on the block, but it can help you increase your conversions both via content marketing and SEO. As a matter of fact, if you want to build a successful SEO strategy, you shouldn’t go without it.

What is search intent?

More and more online marketers are focusing on search intent. And it’s safe to say they don’t do that without reasons. Although it won’t necessarily help you get more visitors to your site, all the audience you capture will be the kind you want. Let us explain what we’re on about.

You’ll get people with a specific intent to your site. In essence, you’ll be providing your target audience with the information they need. And best of all is that they’ll find you at the right time. If you learn how to use it effectively, search intent will keep users on your site for longer. And on top of that, it will make it easy to funnel them down into sales or leads. It really works in your favor.

But let’s see how exactly.

The basics

To put it as simply as possible, search intent is what people are trying to find when searching for something online. So, your job is to provide them with the most relevant information based on what they need. We’ll use an example to clear up any confusion.

If a user wants to buy a new phone, they’ll type queries like ”buy smartphone”, or ”buy phones online”. These are called transactional queries since the intent is to buy something. But more on types later.

When people use search engines today, they want to get concise and relevant results right away. And here, we get to the most important thing – relevance.

Google is working on improving search results so that they’re as relevant as they can be. Their users are what’s important to them. And that’s why you need to optimize your pages so that the content satisfies the intent of keywords people use. This is how you’ll get more people who need your products to check out your site.

Understand your customers

To use search intent in your strategy, you need to understand the different types. And in our experience, there are three kinds you need to know about.

• Informational. These are people looking for information. They want to learn how to do something or how something works.
• Transactional. These users want to take some actions. Here, we’re talking about people who want to buy tickets, products or do anything else that involves commercial intent.
• Navigational. These people are looking for a specific website or company. They already know about it, and they’re on the internet to find it.

No matter how big or small your business is, understanding these three types of search intent is essential. We get how you might think that if you’re a small company, it would be enough just to put up a shiny banner or lower your prices to get customers. However, these are only myths about small businesses. You have a higher chance of closing deals if you focus on getting to them at the precise moment they need you, and search intent helps you do just that.

How to use search intent in your content marketing strategy?

If you want to have an effective content marketing strategy, here’s a simple guide for you. Focus on quality content and proper use of keywords with the right intent. The more time you spend optimizing and targeting your content, the better results you’ll get. You’ll be able to convert more traffic into paying customers, and that’s what you want to achieve.

However, keep in mind that this tactic takes a lot of work. You’ll need to optimize and update your blog and site at all times. The reason behind this is simple. Customers want to get relevant and up-to-date information and chances are that the freshest content out there will be the most relevant. At least that’s how Google’s algorithms ”think”.

Using it for crafting CTAs

So, you did what you should and spent a lot of time discovering how users interact with your website. You know how they behave and what they’re looking for online. With that in mind, you optimized your site and managed to capture an audience with the right intent. 

And that’s great. Now, you hae people who you can potentially convert into paying customers. But to do that, you need to make a call to action to motivate them.

Luckily, this shouldn’t be a problem, since you already have the right audience. On the other hand, there are some rules that you should follow to optimize for transactional search intent. 

So, here are some focus points for your CTAs.

• Make them clear. All your CTAs should be clear, obvious, and eye-catching. You must make them stand out from the rest of the page. However, you also want to make sure that people understand what will happen when they click the button.
• Visual design is vital. Your visitors form their opinion of the page in under a second, and most of those opinions are based on visual design. So, try to get your message across in as few words as you can. Focus on visuals for showing value and benefits.
• Make it emotional. People decide to buy driven by their emotions. So, you want them to make them trust you. Create an emotional tie, and the decision process for the reader will be simple.

Conclusion

In the past, people were using demographics to target their potential customers. They were looking at things like gender, location, income, and so on to determine who they should market to. However, marketing has evolved. Now, you can target shoppers in smaller segments. And all of them will be likely to take action immediately.

If you use search intent in your strategy, you’ll draw people to your website who are looking to take some specific actions. And that’s why there’s so much potential here. 

You’ll position your business to deliver the information your customers need in the moment they need it, which will significantly impact your success.

The post How to Use Search Intent in Your Strategy appeared first on SiteProNews.

A Solid Digital Marketing Strategy

Granted, this doesn’t sound like a tip, but it is. There are quite a few people who fail to understand just how important this is.

The idea is that everything you do for your business or brand in the digital realm is rooted in this very strategy. More often than not, companies have a set of steps they wish to take in terms of marketing but they are not part of a strategy per se.

Keep Referring to Your Strategy

A lot of businesses make the mistake of ignoring or setting their digital marketing strategy aside once the business gets legs. 

This is probably one of the worst things you can do to your business. Why? Because you obviously invested a lot of time and effort to generate all the information contained in that document. That strategy is the very foundation on which your company’s marketing efforts stand.

Do yourself (and your business) a favor, and keep revising and updating information every few weeks or months, depending on the industry you work in.

Use It as a Yardstick

All businesses can and should measure how well they are doing in terms of how they are executing their strategy. Of course, this is going to be determined by how well the business is performing.

An uptick in sales figures, opening of new locations, new client acquisitions all translate to a job well done.

Know Your Audience

Without knowing who you’re selling to, you’re not going to be able to get them to convert.

Try to get to know you customers by finding out what their online journey and spending is like. Needless to say, all digital marketing agencies are doing just that for their clients, so you need to try a different approach.

Be creative about where you place ads, for instance. Sponsored posts are likely to get a hit during post-work hours as well.

No Salesy Language

Everyone seems to be following the same template to write copy. Or so it seems. It’s time to stop pushing people to buy your product.

Adopt a “show, don’t tell” approach. It will be less annoying to audiences, and your product or service will have a higher probability of being bought.

Digital advertising is no longer “new” and so there is a lot of clutter out there that presents a great opportunity to break through.

If you don’t know how to proceed, take the time to do some research and find out what other brands are doing. There are always newer, more creative ways of going about advertising products in a way that converts to sales.

If all else fails, consider hiring a marketing copywriter. They work with several organizations and so they boast plenty of experience writing effective copy and content for the digital space. 

The Right Aesthetics

Design and branding are essential to any digital marketing strategy. Don’t make the mistake of thinking it’s superficial or that it doesn’t require substantial effort. 

However, this doesn’t mean that good design warrants you to pay through your teeth. 

All you have to do is make sure that the design is in line with who your target audience is. It needs to speak to them and tell them what they need to know before they even come across relevant copy or a brand name.

The idea is to pique their interest and get them to visit your website and find out more. 

This doesn’t just apply to websites. Your brand page on social media should have aesthetically designed posts that mirror the same appeal. There needs to be a singular thought tying everything together. One trend that has gained traction is that of “reveals.” When brands are looking to launch new products or introduce new variants, they post teasers featuring product silhouettes and/or incomplete pictures. 

Such posts gain virality as people continue to share and comment. 

Important to mention, however, is that this rule does come with a caveat. Just because a design is good doesn’t mean you’re necessarily going to strike gold with your audience. If you’re selling biking gear, for instance, your website can’t feature delicate filigree elements nor can it have a pastel color scheme.

Focus on Smartphones

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the fact that people are now consuming far more content through their mobiles than through other devices. 

Who can blame them? It’s portable entertainment that is capable of doing a whole lot more.

This is why your digital marketing strategy should have a dedicated section that focuses only on smartphones.

Also make sure you don’t fall into the trap of turning your website into one that looks good on smartphones. There is much more to designing content for mobile phones than simply optimizing a webpage for them.

Doing so is considered lazy in this day and age, especially if you’re a digital marketing agency that handles portfolios of several companies. Don’t risk losing business to your competition and keep brushing up on current trends.

Foster an Online Community

There is a lot of communication online on brands’ pages. Some wish to inquire about a certain product, while others engage in competitions, and then there are some who simply love interacting with the brand.

Whatever the case may be, it is supremely important to keep connecting with customers. It can be frustrating when individuals who are not active customers are part of an online space, but honestly, they are very likely to convert in the future. Remind yourself that there’s a reason they’re there. You’ve successfully managed to get them to like and follow your page. Now all that’s left is to keep devising new ways with which to hold their attention.

Bank on Influencers

Sure, there was a time when influencers were not really considered authentic representatives of a brand. While this still somewhat rings true, what’s important to acknowledge is that this class of people have still managed to carve out a space for themselves online.

Influencers are your brand’s representatives online, and they are hired mainly for two things. First, they need to have a decent follower count (organic, of course), and secondly, they need to be someone who your target audience can relate to.

An influencer then is someone who is singlehandedly portraying your audience. When customers can relate to them and agree with what they’re saying or how they’re carrying a product, they are pushed to purchase whatever product or service it is that they’re pushing.

A key piece of advice here would be to make sure your influencer has never been in hot water or known to voice problematic statements. 

One other thing you want to be sure of is that they’re not signed on with a competitor.

Digital Marketing for E-Books

Lastly, it’s important to understand that in the case of e-books, it will serve you well to hire a content development agency. By signing up for their services, not only will you end up with a great e-book thanks to their experienced e-book writers, you will get access to some invaluable information pertaining to marketing strategies for e-books.

Conclusion

There you have it. Some great digital marketing tips to blow your competition right out of the water.

The post Don’t Ignore These Digital Marketing Tips to Crush Your Competition appeared first on SiteProNews.

It’s a tried-and-true digital marketing strategy that can propel your company to new heights. Blogger outreach is the practice of identifying influential people in your industry and requesting them to write about your company on their blogs. It not only helps you attract more visitors, but it also helps you establish a positive brand image. The greatest bloggers continue to employ methods that distinguish their material. 

To guarantee that your material is not overlooked, you may need to do things differently from others. Unfortunately, not everyone is capable of producing such excellent outcomes for their sites. As a result, you need to hire seasoned specialists to assist you in implementing innovative tactics that will ensure your success. You can locate the perfect placement blogs and manage your campaign more efficiently with these blogger outreach services.

Top Blogger Outreach Services In 2021

Blogger outreach is straightforward, but it can be tedious and time-consuming at times. Connecting with the appropriate people in your industry takes time and effort, and maintaining outreach efforts is no easy task.

So, this year, let’s focus on some of the top blogger outreach services that may assist you in getting your duties done quickly. 

1. BloggerOutreach.io

Bloggereoutreach.io is one of a kind. This one platform efficiently offers you all blogger outreach services at a low cost. You can simply streamline all of your blogger outreach duties with the aid of this application.

Blogger outreach is a market-leading digital platform known for its content production and marketing capabilities. BloggerOutreach.io’s primary characteristics are as follows:

• The most traffic will be driven by simple dashboard and reporting approaches.
• The items that adhere to Google’s link-building guidelines will score higher. Additionally, the page’s SEO will improve.
• Because automatic reaching isn’t available, you’ll have to contact your bloggers manually to meet your needs.
• Improve in traffic directly, allowing you to increase your sales income and product sales.

Price Value: It’s also a cost-effective platform, with industry specific niches- Travel, Health, Finance, Auto, Legal, Education, and many more. Here you will get private and free login for clients. If you want to know more regarding the guest posting service, you can visit the official site.

2. Hunter

Hunter is a powerful outreach tool that has exploded in popularity in recent years. It started off as a fantastic tool for obtaining email addresses, but it has since grown to include many more elements that are essential for executing a successful outreach campaign.

Hunter has over two million clients and has worked with some of the world’s largest organizations, including Microsoft, Google, and Adobe. Let’s look at some of the characteristics that make it such a valuable tool for blogger outreach:

• Type a domain name into Hunter’s database to find emails.
• Scan all of your emails for problems and mistakes at the same time.
• With Hunter’s Chrome plugin, you can get an email address for any publication in seconds.
• Connect your Gmail account to your Hunter account to keep track of all the emails you’ve sent.
• Create and edit your own email templates for certain websites.
• Each campaign should have its own set of emails and follow-ups.

Price Value: When it comes to pricing, Hunter is, believe it or not, completely free. The free version, however, limits you to 50 requests each month. The monthly membership costs $49 and allows you to process up to 1000 requests each month.

3. SEMRush

SEMRush is not just a fantastic blogger outreach tool, but it’s also one of the best marketing apps available. SEMRush is more of a collection of several digital marketing apps that can help you take your business to new heights. 

It is quite a popular name in the social media marketing world. SEMRush provides a comprehensive analysis of all the elements that influence the success of your website, from keyword research to domain overview. SEMRush’s blogger outreach options include:

• Any domain’s backlinks can be analyzed.
• Finding prospects and sending follow-up emails is made easier with this link-building tool.
• A broad overview of a domain is provided, as well as a comprehensive study.
• Keeps track of the rankings of the terms you’re interested in.
• Looks into the trendiest subjects in your field.
• Keeps track of any brand references.
• Looks for backlinks on the websites of your rivals.

Price Value: SEMrush’s monthly subscription is $99.95, or you can save money by signing up for an annual plan. You can also join up for a seven-day trial to gain a better understanding of the site.

4. Buzz Sumo

BuzzSumo is one of the most powerful and underappreciated tools for reaching out to bloggers. It’s a fantastic marketing tool that lets you find out what’s hot in different categories.

You can also use BuzzSumo to identify relevant influencers in your business. The following are key features you can use:

• Find influential people in your field without breaking a sweat.
• Generate fresh leads and use keywords to create alerts.
• With BuzzSumo’s trend detection, you can find the trendiest subject on the market.
• Search top-rated content in your sector to see what’s working and what isn’t for your rivals.
• Examine website backlinks for new chances.

Price Value: BuzzSumo offers a $99 monthly membership that permits up to five different users. You may also set up five separate notifications every month, with a total of 5K mentions.

5. Ninja Outreach

Ninja outreach is among the top blogger outreach services that does exactly what it claims. It’s a one-stop-shop that can help you with anything from discovering niche relevant influencers to delivering personalized emails. 

It is one of the most widely utilized outreach tools, with companies such as Disney and Amazon using it. Ninja Outreach provides high-quality email management solutions to assist you in developing effective campaigns. The major features of Ninja Outreach are:

• Use your region and specialization as keywords to get new leads.
• With segmentation, you can divide your leads into multiple groups and keep better track of them.
• After you’ve sent an email, keep track of its status.
• Send emails to newly produced leads by connecting your mailbox to Ninja Outreach.
• Personalize your email templates.
• Follow-up emails can be sent automatically in response to a user’s action.
• On Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, look for niche relevant influencers.

Price Value: Ninja Outreach subscriptions start at $120 a month, and you can also sign up for a free seven-day trial to get a feel for the tool and its features.

Final Thoughts

Local businesses can gain success using the appropriate channels correctly. One method is to reach out to bloggers. It helps if you do it right. Avoid making typical errors like assuming it’s all about you, forgetting to track emails, or sending generic emails instead of personal ones. Failure to conduct research, follow up, or reaching out to the wrong individuals all indicate a flawed plan that will fail. Before you start, be sure you know what works.

The post Top 5 Blogger Outreach Services In 2021 – Which Is Good For You? appeared first on SiteProNews.

But the interesting thing is that it’s drastically accelerated since Covid 19. McKinsey Research shows that B2B companies expect these changes to stick in a permanent way. For those B2B business leaders who commit to further, digitizing their go-to-market strategies will drive significant competitive advantage. The result will be loyal customers—and a lot more of them—than competitors who are slower to move their efforts online.

B2B Buying Journey Has Transitioned Online

As we’ve seen, the marketing and sales funnel has dramatically changed, especially since Covid 19 hit. Traditionally, marketing has been accountable for only awareness and interest, and maybe driving a little consideration. In the new paradigm, the marketing function drives sales all the way through the funnel to evaluation. That means companies are deciding whether or not to put your business into their evaluation of products or services long before they ever pick up the phone to talk to a salesperson. 

So when CEOs are thinking about the overweighting of salespeople, and typically the underweighting of marketing in mid-market companies, they’re making a big mistake. Companies will need more marketing resources, and more marketing focus to drive those opportunities for the sales team. This shorter time that the sales force has to interact with their buyer means that businesses are coming to these discussions much more informed, and much more educated. So service and product providers are really going to have to think through what their sales enablement needs to look like.

Some Marketing Functions Have Permanently Changed 

I asked the 80+ CMOs at my company, “What are your top predictions for what’s going to be permanently changed?” These three main topics are the essence of their feedback:

1. The rapid acceleration of consumers and B2B customers accessing content online. 
2. Marketing owning a lot more of the sales process than it did before the pandemic. Buying has become largely digitized. 
3. Businesses are shifting to see that they can expand their markets exponentially, with digital marketing and remote selling.
4. Marketing generalists are becoming dinosaurs. Today there is no full stack CMO, and strategy really must be done in parallel with performance marketing. 

With this whole movement online, businesses traditionally have said, “Well, you know, this is the geography I serve,” but Covid 19 has busted open geographies. For example, there’s a church in Southern California that served its local community for years, but it finally went online during the lockdowns, and put a digital strategy together—not random acts of marketing—to reach a broader audience, and they quickly reached one million people.

How to Develop a New Marketing Strategy

If B2B business providers really want to have solid marketing execution—which is their website, SEO, and lead generation—it really needs to be informed by:

• The company, truly understanding its strengths 
• The customers, what do they truly value 
• The competition, understanding what strategies are being deployed, especially digitally 

That then informs the strategy:

• How are we different?
• What is our unique value proposition 
• How are we positioning ourselves against competitors? 
• What do we need to do in pricing?
• How do we segment our markets? 

There is no magic pill, but there are best practices. Your strategy should be informed by insights about customers—how their needs and wants have changed through the pandemic—what competitors are doing, and the strengths of your company.

The post How to Market in an Increasingly Digitized Industry appeared first on SiteProNews.

Studies also show videos to be a powerful marketing strategy, with 93% of marketers admitting to landing a new client with the help of video. 79% of consumers also say that a brand’s video has encouraged them to buy a piece of software or app. 

In short, a video is an essential marketing strategy, and if you have not yet created one – now is the time. Having a promotional video helps convert your visitors into customers.

But there is the problem of creating the actual videos. How do you make one without investing thousands of dollars into equipment and professionals?

Luckily, online video makers come to the rescue. They are easy to use and require significantly less technical experience. In fact, even novice users can use them without much design knowledge to create beautiful and engaging videos. 

And this is where this guide comes in. Here, we will tell you about some of the best online video tools to help you create videos in the easiest way possible. 

So without further ado, let’s get on with our list. 

1. Wave.video

Wave.video is my favorite online video maker for its ease of use. It is also very functional and has all the tools you need to create short videos.

One of the best features of this video maker is the availability of stock footage. Even if you don’t have your own videos, Wave.video has you covered with one of the biggest stock libraries of over 40 million stock photos and footage.

Wave.video is equipped with several innovative features like an auto caption and text animation effects. It also has 30+ video formats, allowing users to create videos for different platforms, including social media channels, with a single click. 

Wave.video is free to try out but has limited exporting facilities. You can, however,  purchase the paid version for as little as $39/month. 

2. Animoto

Another free and easy-to-use video maker is Animoto. Ideal for marketers, this video creator lets you make not only videos but also slide shows, presentations, virtual tours, and other marketing material. 

When it comes to a stock library, Animoto offers a music library and an asset of Stories. This means you will need original content or material from other sources to fill in the visual gap. Their template library, however, is vast.

Animoto’s basic features are free to use, but, beware, the free version comes with Animoto’s watermark.  To remove that, you can upgrade to a professional and team account for as low as $15/month and $39/month, respectively. 

3. Flyr

If you are more into aesthetics, then Flyr is the best option for you. With millions of videos as part of their stock library, Flyr lets you create videos quickly, even if you don’t have any customized footage of your own. Easy to use, Flyr has a lot of export options with a variety of video formats. 

One of the unique aspects of Flyr is its integration with artificial intelligence. Through this protocol, you can insert keywords and have Flyr supply a background image and color-coordinated overlays for your use. 

The only downside is that Flyr is not available on your web browser and is only accessible through iOS. Other than that, it is one of the most intelligent tools out there. 

4. Biteable

As one of the ‘world’s easiest video makers,’ Biteable allows you to create videos in an instant. You can even make one during your lunch break without any technical knowledge or experience. And with over 800,000 stock images and animations, creating a unique video is easier than ever. 

The only thing that Biteable lacks is the customization aspect. You have limited color swatches to choose from, and text capabilities are also minimal compared to other video makers in this guide.

Other than that, it’s pretty simple to use, and you can create an attractive video within 3 minutes. Besides videos, it lets you make over 40 different media types, including animations, explainers, ads, and even product demos. 

Biteable has two pricing plans: Free and Annual. The free plan gives you 5 free videos that you can only upload to YouTube and Facebook. On the other hand, the annual program has no such restrictions and gives you unlimited capabilities and no logo or watermark for $267 a year. 

5. ClipChamp

Trusted by brands like Microsoft and Dell, ClipChamp is an online video creator with almost 8 million customers. From templates to stock footage and a vast music library – ClipChamp is the perfect resource for all things videos. And, once you get the hang of the online video creator, you will not need to go anywhere else for a specific task. 

When it comes to features, ClipChamp has everything you need to create the perfect, engaging, and attractive video. However, the features are limited for free users, and you will have to purchase a premium pack for $9 and $19/per month to unlock many resources, including the stock library. 

6. FlexClip

FlexClip is a simple yet powerful video creator that lets you make videos within minutes. From family vacation videos to marketing ads, the FlexClip online tool allows easy creation of videos by both amateurs and professionals. 

One of the best things about FlexClip is that it’s completely free to use. It’s available within the browser as well, and there is no download required to use the software. 

When it comes to features, the FlexClip tool supports various templates, including text, overlays, clips, and more. You also get access to its stock library, so creating a video without custom footage is easier than ever. 

7. Adobe Spark

Lastly, we have Adobe Spark as one of the free online video makers. Adobe is a one-stop solution for all video needs with various tools in its kitty to help you create engaging videos. However, the videos can only be short… 30 seconds, so if you are looking for longer animations, you should look at some other tools listed in this guide. 

When it comes to stock footage, the users of Adobe Spark have access to Adobe Stock – a library of royalty-free pictures offered by the company. However, there are visible watermarks when you use these photos. 

Customization is top-notch with Adobe Spark and you can customize videos according to your style with the easy user-interface. 

These are just some of the online video makers you can use to create both – personal and professional footage. Try them out and you won’t be disappointed.

The post 7 Best Online Video Makers in 2021 appeared first on SiteProNews.

Along with business cards and direct mail pieces, many businesses still count on brochures as a key factor in their marketing arsenal. Printed brochures that are designed well convey relevant information that encourages potential customers to take action. This information could be based on what to do, where to go, what to buy, and more importantly, why the reader ought to buy your product or service. 

When sitting down to create the design of your brochure, you first need to consider the purpose of the brochure. Determine what information is going to go on the piece along with the image you want to convey. In order to be effective, the brochure needs to be relevant and informational. 

The content in the brochure also needs to be timely, especially if you’re using it to market or promote a new product. It is important that the highlights of your product or services come across in the brochure you use. Making sure the brochure you use for your business provides information that the readers will find relevant is one thing, but getting people to read your business’s brochure is a whole other beast. This is where the overall design of your brochure is going to matter, and where brochure design services step in. 

First Impressions Matter

When it comes to the design details of the brochure you use, it is crucial for you to maintain consistency in the font choices, ink choices (for printed brochures), images, white space, etc. Getting all of these factors right will mean creating positive brand recognition, which will give your business that much-needed boost while reaching out to a wider audience.

A well-made marketing brochure matters because first impressions matter. The truth is that customers judge a brand within a few seconds of their first interaction. Since we humans are visual creatures, this judgment is often based on the visual appearance of the business. This means the design of your website, mobile app, business card, your brand logo, and brochures are under immediate scrutiny by the consumer. 

You might have an amazing product or service, but if the consumer’s having a hard time getting past an underwhelming first impression, they aren’t likely to do business with you or buy your product. 

Communicates Your Brand Message Correctly

When you’ve worked so hard to deliver the perfect product or service to your customers, you will want to make sure that your marketing collateral reflects the right message of your brand. Hiring the expertise of professional brochure design services can help you use brochures to promote the professional image of your brand. 

Provides Consistent Branding

If the brochure you design is out of sight, it probably won’t take long for it to be out of mind. This is a challenge that digital marketers and those who post ads in newspapers are faced with constantly. However, when it comes to brochures, they give brands a longer duration of exposure since many folks carry brochures along, making them easier to recall. 

While you will want to include all the relevant you can on your product or service in the brochure, you need to create a brand identity that will set your business apart from the rest. By using consistent and focused colors, graphics, and your brand logo, you can create memorable brochures for your business. 

Reaches a Wider Audience

A professionally designed marketing brochure can help businesses reach out to a wider audience as compared to using product ads in local magazines or newspapers. An eye-catching brochure for your product enables your business to grab more attention from your target audience. 

Hiring brochure designing services will ensure that your brochure is professionally designed, making it easier for you to market almost any product in style. In fact, it wouldn’t be wrong to say that brochure design services can make the difference between attracting just another browser or a paying customer. 

Ending Note

The best part about using brochures is that the subject matter is endless. Regardless of the content your brochure contains, the basic building blocks of brochure design remain the same. Once you get these factors right, the marketing brochures you create could be ideal vehicles to deliver relevant and valuable information to the consumer. 

In short, a brochure (whether digital or printed) is so much more than just a fancy advertisement; it can convey character, depth, and context in a conveniently sized package, but only if you do it the right way. If you’re having trouble with the design of your business’s brochure, then why not hire the experts. 

Professional brochure design services can get you high-quality brochures that are inviting, stand out, and are tailored to be visually appealing while providing your audience with the information they need. 

The post Why Are Brochure Designs Still Relevant for Your Business in 2020? appeared first on SiteProNews.

Branding

Branding is a marketing practice of creating a name, symbol, or design that identifies and differentiates a product or service. When determining what your brand is, you should ask yourself several questions beyond industry generalizations and services or products offered to identify who you are as a company. Questions to ask can include answering the following:

• What are your core principles and values?
• What is your mission statement?
• What inspired your business?
• What makes you unique?
• How do you want people to feel when they think of your company?
• How do you want customers to describe your company?

Remember that your brand is your promise to your consumer. It lets your customers know what they can expect from your product or service, and it sets you apart from your competitors. Your brand is derived from who you are, who you aspire to be, and whom consumers think you are.

The foundation of a company’s brand is its logo. It is best practice to communicate your brand by integrating your logo on your company’s website, packaging, and promotional materials.  Logos are crucial to a company’s branding because it’s the first thing that people see and how they will identify or recognize your company’s product or service.

Brand strategy is the how, what, where, when, and to whom you plan to communicate your brand messaging. Where you choose to advertise is a part of the brand strategy. Distribution channels and what you communicate visually and verbally are also a part of your brand strategy. Social media distribution channels are the go-to in branding and marketing strategies in getting the attention of today’s digital audience.

Choosing distribution channels is only part of the branding strategy process. You have to be consistent. Consistency in branding creates substantial brand equity and can add value to your product or service. This added value can allow you to charge more than other identical, unbranded products or services. This branding strategy is easily seen in the top nationally and internationally known companies. 

Marketing

Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and the process of creating, communicating, distributing, and exchanging offerings that are of value to consumers, clients, partners, and society in general. Marketing has four basic steps, known as the 4 Ps of Marketing.

1. Product 

The set of attributes that includes its features, functions, and benefits that can be exchanged or used.  A product can come in the form of an idea, a physical entity, or a good or a service.  It can also be a combination of all three. The term “products and services” is still used, “product” is a term that includes both goods and services.

2. Price

The amount a customer pays to acquire a product. The formal ratio indicates the number of money, goods, or services needed to get a set amount of goods or services.

3. Place (Distribution)  

The act of marketing and delivering a product to consumers. The placement also describes the extent of marketing coverage. There are a variety of distribution channels to choose from when marketing your product. As previously mentioned, social media channels are popular among businesses to reach their target audience. Companies can advertise on social media websites, like Facebook and Instagram, by placing ads on these platforms that can be viewed by their chosen demographic.

4. Promotion 

The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) defines promotional marketing as tactics that encourage short-term purchase, influence trial, and purchase amount. They are measurable in volume, share, and profit.

According to the (ANA), there are different marketing strategies used by individuals and companies depending on their product and target audience.

Influencer Marketing is the act of leveraging specific individuals who influence potential buyers and centering marketing activities around these individuals that will drive a company’s brand message to a broader audience. The focus is on inspiring or compensating influencers that include celebrities, content creators, and customer advocates rather than marketing directly to a group of consumers.

Strategies and tactics that segment consumers to build loyalty are known as relationship marketing. This method leverages database marketing behavioral advertising and analytics to focus solely on consumers and develop loyalty programs.

Another type of marketing that is well-known in today’s online social media society is viral marketing. Viral videos are spread continuously across social media and often make an appearance on television news media. This phenomenon encourages people to share a specific marketing message. This particular strategy is nicknamed “viral” because it imitates the spread of a virus or disease passing from one person to another.

Companies whose mission is to produce, promote, and package products that are sensitive or responsive to ecological concerns use a method called green marketing. This style of marketing involves the creation and marketing of products that are perceived as environmentally safe. These products are developed to lessen the adverse effects on the environment or to improve its quality.

If your goal is to reach your target audience with the right message at the right time, then keyword marketing may be best suited for you. This strategy consists of placing a marketing message directly in front of users based on keywords and phrases they will use to search.  Marketers use this method because it results in an ad’s placement in front of potential buyers when they search for specific keywords or phrases.

Marketing Research is what links the consumer, customer, and general public to the marketer through information. Marketers use this information to identify and define opportunities and issues, generate and refine, assess actions, monitor performance, and improve marketing comprehension as a process. This research is necessary because it specifies the information needed to address issues, outlines the method for collecting information, maintains and implements the data collection process, analyzes results, and communicates these results and their implications.

There Can Be Overlap

Being that branding and marketing are so intertwined, there will be some overlap. Overlap happens when you choose your company’s imagery that will be used continuously. Your choice of colors, graphics, and logo for your company will first represent your brand, but they will also be a crucial part of your marketing campaigns.

Which Should You Do First – Brand or Market?

Since branding is your company’s identity and the core of your marketing strategy, it should come first naturally.  Even if you are a start-up business, defining who you are as a brand before you commence marketing methods or tactics is crucial. It would help if you had consumer loyalty, so you will ensure that customers will keep coming back by focusing on building your brand. Think about businesses like restaurants and stores that you frequently use, whether they are locally owned or a part of a major franchise. You and your family have probably been a customer of those businesses for a long time. Your genuine commitment to go back is because they have developed trust and loyalty with you through branding.

Marketing strategies will always change or evolve since they need to respond to current trends and industry changes in society. Branding remains the same. There may be some adjustments to your brand over time, but it will usually be in response to your company’s growth or the expansion of services. It is extremely rare for a company to change its mission, core principles, and values entirely.

Branding is done daily and achieved through every transaction processed and communicated to customers by phone, email, or other channels. You and your employees are always representing your brand. Marketing, on the other hand, can be done partially or entirely through outside sources. When looking at branding versus marketing, remember that branding is your identity, and marketing is how you get consumers’ attention.

The post Branding vs. Marketing: What’s the Difference? appeared first on SiteProNews.

People block ads for a variety of reasons:

The most prevalent one is that they’re interruptive. Internet users want a seamless browsing experience. In other words: they want to enjoy their content without the annoyance of ads.

It’s no surprise then that content marketing is one of the most effective forms of marketing. 72% of marketers say that it’s more effective than advertising in a magazine, while 69% of them agree that it’s more effective than PR and direct mail.

Pretty much every statistic out there spells one thing: content marketing should be your marketing strategy’s main character. This is where most of your resources should go.

Even despite all the numbers and all the reports, there are still skeptical marketers out there. And that’s perfectly alright – challenges are always welcome in this field.

But here’s what happens when skepticism gets left behind and you go all in with your content marketing investment.

4 companies that dominate their industries thanks to content marketing

Content is part of any marketing strategy. Even if it’s just social media content or web content that you don’t plan on changing for years to come – you still have some content.

But there are companies that do more than that. Way more. 

Let’s take a look at them and at how they managed to leverage the incredible power of content marketing:

1. HubSpot

Anyone who has anything to do with marketing knows about HubSpot. When I first started out, I took their academy courses and read everything they published religiously.

Google anything related to content or digital marketing in general and you’ll get a HubSpot page among the top three results. Blog posts, topic clusters, whitepapers, webinars, e-books – you name it, they have it. And it’s good, nay, GREAT content.

One might actually be tempted to think that HubSpot is just an online publication that lives out of their paid courses. But it’s not.

Most of their content is free because what they actually sell is a CRM or an integrated marketing platform. And since they cater to marketers in every niche (and especially agencies), they put out a lot of content for marketers.

Now HubSpot is worth almost $8 Billion!

But back in 2006 they were just a startup that no one had heard of. How did they change that?

They put out amazingly good content that was 100% free. All you had to do was leave your email address so you could download their reports, whitepapers and ebooks. Yes, gated content is what turned HubSpot into a multi-million brand back when very few people even knew the term.

The HubSpot lesson: great, hyper-targeted content always yields amazing benefits in the long run.

2. Cisco

You can’t speak about networking without mentioning Cisco, the biggest name in the industry. They don’t just meet the standards in their field, they create them.

A Cisco certification can be the key to a networking specialist job or even to getting hired as a technical writer.

You’d think that such a big name could simply rely on the quality of their products, right? Right. But how do you let people know when you’ve launched a new product?

Turns out that content marketing is Cisco’s go-to as well.

A few years ago, Cisco launched a new router and decided to promote it solely on social media. The goal of this experiment was to measure the effectiveness of their content marketing and social media tactics.

The result?

They reached their sales goals AND spent $100,000 less than they had initially anticipated.

The Cisco lesson: don’t just create content for the sake of it. Always track your content marketing KPIs to know where you stand and what your ROI is.

3. Xerox

This is one brand that everyone’s heard about. When they became popular, content marketing was far from the industry it is today.

Xerox became synonymous with their main product: photocopying machines. In fact, they became SO popular that “Xerox” even became a verb that’s a synonym to photocopying – “need me to xerox that for you?”.

Ironically enough, this created a whole new problem. You see, Xerox offers more than photocopying machines. They also offer IT outsourcing services, for instance. But no one knew about that.

That’s until they created their own digital magazine, Real Business. The content they published was SO good that it didn’t just help them get traction in an industry no one knew they were in but also turned them into a publisher other brands pitched stories to.

The Xerox lesson: a blog or an online magazine are the perfect tools to build a presence in a new, overcrowded industry. But only provided that you can create top content.

4. Buffer

Buffer is one of the most well-known social media marketing tools. But they were a startup no one had ever heard of, too, just a few years ago.

The Buffer founders had bet on the power of content marketing from the very beginning. When their tool was ready, they pitched it to big publishers and big marketing blogs in the hope that their editors would write about Buffer.

But they were ignored.

So they had to change their strategy.

This is when founder Leo Widrich realized that if you can’t get the mentions you need in other people’s articles then you might as well write your own articles.

He started guest blogging. Heavily. In less than 10 months, he published more than 150 posts on various websites.

The result?

Guest blogging got them 100,000 users. That’s 10,000 users per month!

The Buffer lesson: don’t rely entirely on your own audience if that audience is still small. The best SaaS startup content strategy is to expand your reach by guest posting or partnering with other publishers.

How to make it big through content marketing

There are countless companies with similar success stories. Our clients at Copywritech can tell a few such stories too. Take a look at our case studies to learn how our clients managed to rank for all the keywords they wanted or generate high-value leads – all through content marketing.

I’ve seen content marketing help businesses meet all kinds of goals – from lead generation to lead conversion and incredible brand awareness. Whatever your goals are, the way to meet them is governed by two simple rules:

1. Set goals that are clearly set and easily measurable. This way, you can measure your success and adjust your strategy as you go.
2. Create GREAT content. What all the brands above have in common is the disdain for mediocrity. They managed to stand out from the crowd in their highly competitive industries by creating stellar content that truly helps their target audience.

Need help creating content that stands out from the crowd – even in the most saturated industries? Our specialty is helping tech startups gain the traction they want through content and copy designed to convert and rank. Let’s talk!

The post 4 Tech Companies that Made it Big through Content Marketing appeared first on SiteProNews.

Social media and smartphone technology, with the abundance of the Internet, have made customers truly the king. Now they have total control over what they see and what they like. Their handheld devices are a source of immense power and knowledge for them and so they use it relentlessly. The digital era has brought on many new things and challenges, and no one has felt its sting and tasted its sweet nectar more than businesses. While they have been immensely enabled by the latest inventions, they have had to find a way to use them to reach more customers. That meant unlearning all they thought they knew about marketing and business, and learning the rules of this new digital business era. 

But, it is not as complicated as it sounds. Countless businesses around the world are generating more profits than ever before and all because of their properly calibrated marketing tactics, tailored for this new era. So let’s take a look at some of the tactics that you can employ to improve your marketing strategies.

But first…

What are the benefits of forming a sound Marketing strategy?

Some of the key benefits of a well-marinated marketing strategy are:

1. Helps you in identifying your customer group
2. Helps you focus your efforts on your target population
3. Increases your market visibility
4. Helps you in making good relations with your customers
5. Gives you the power to control people’s opinion about you
6. Helps you in getting more leads
7. Increases brand awareness

Now that that is out of the way…

Tips to help you make a better marketing strategy

1. Know Your Customers

You cannot please everyone at the same time. So it’s futile to even try. You have a product or a service and you know that there is a market for it out there, but this market consists of a certain type of buyer- people who can benefit from your product. You need to take a good look at your product/service and ask yourself, who is most likely to buy it?

To help you better understand this concept, take this example- A man looking to build a website might be interested in your cloud storage services for small startups. But a Fortune 500 company that has greater needs and can afford to build its own cloud infrastructure, may not. So all efforts in that direction are just a waste of time, money and energy. 

Some of the ways to find your ideal customers are:

1. Maintain an ideal customer profile and a buyer persona and update it frequently.
2. Hang out on forums and groups; you will learn a lot about customer needs and what their sentiments are towards a particular product or service.
3. Social media is always a good place to look for customers.
4. Apart from that, analytic reports and face to face interviews with customers will help you in pin-pointing your customers and understanding their needs.

2. Use Social Media Relentlessly

If there is a tool out there to be used, the prudent thing is to use it. Social media is a red hot nexus of power for people who know how to effectively use it. But there is a stigma that has been carried forward from the early years of the digital era that only youngsters use social media and that too for the sole purpose of having fun. This has not been the truth for a long time. 

Everyone is on social media now, doing much more than just socializing. Social media has allowed artists to showcase their work, provided people a platform to spread awareness and obviously, sell things. Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, all of these are powerful tools with powerful features for businesses. Strong social media presence not only allows you to generate better connections with your customers but brings you closer to them. This in return allows you to be in front of their eyes all the time. 

Research has found that an average person spends 142 minutes on social media. With this chunk of their day spent on these platforms, if they come across a post from you or an ad from you even two times a day, they are going to eventually be intrigued about you and your product.

3. Curate for Customers

Having a website and a social media presence is not enough; you have to generate the perfect content and post it at the right time. The content generation part depends directly on your target demographic. People in different age groups, or any other divide, are attracted to different types of content. For example, it won’t be a problem if you use slang words for posts that are directed towards Millenials, but will be a problem for baby boomers or people who are very particular about language.

 Similarly, the visual identity of your post will hinge on your customers as well. So make sure that you generate content that is in parallel to what your target customers want.

4. ‘Why You’? over ‘Why You, Too?’

One of the most horrible mistakes that you can make while marketing your product is to compare it to some other product based on their similarities. While of course there are going to be similar products, you should try your very best to distance yourself from them and instead, focus on your USP (unique selling point). 

If you market on similarities, then the first question someone is going to ask is when there is already a product that does the exact same thing as your product, why would I go for yours?

So try and sell what’s unique about your product. Entice your customers with something extra that only you can provide.

5. Partner with the Right Partner

You will need to partner with other people and businesses to increase your brand awareness, so the smart thing to do is find partners that can help you achieve your marketing goals. Also, make sure that you take a long look at your prospective partner’s background and work history; you are going to invest money, so better to be smart about it. 

6. Invest, but Smartly

Investing money is something every new marketing effort needs direly. You can plan all you want, but until and unless you have the muscle and the money to bring all of it to fruition, you won’t be able to achieve much. Setting up ads on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, getting good video creators to make videos for you, hiring the right people and stacking them up with the proper tools, all of it will require money. So the best thing to do is make a detailed budget and stick to it. And having a marketing strategy, in the end, will help you with that, too.

7. Think Outside the Box

You have to be innovative. You need to understand that the goal is to be noticed and you need to do whatever you can to make that happen. That includes making marketing videos, replying frequently on places like Quora, optimizing your website for search engines, blogging frequently and blogging relevantly. The point is, keep thinking of new ways to spread brand awareness.  

8. Be Clear of your Goals

Marketing today is a maze with either danger or a dead-end always a turn away. So if you charge in guns blazing, chances are, you are not going to go too far. It is better to have a solid plan that you have perfected while keeping your needs in mind and knowing where you want to be. Defining your goals will allow you to always move in one direction and will save you a lot of money and power because your efforts will always be highly focused.

9. Reward Loyalty

Referral programs are important in today’s world when there are so many businesses for customers to switch between. As we said in the beginning, we live in a time when the customer is truly king. Customers have choices and, if you don’t keep them happy, someone else will. It may sound a little harsh, but it’s true. So you need to keep them hooked. Keep them surprised and give them something extra every now and then for sticking with you. Not only does this satisfy your customers but also compels them to stay loyal to you and then go and spread the word about you. This in return brings you more customers.

Speaking of Loyalty…

In the spirit of rewarding loyalty, since you read all the way through this article, here are some extra tips that might help you. 

Make sure that you provide great customer service. But, this doesn’t mean that you only have to worry about the hotline. No, in today’s world, it means constantly replying to your customer’s queries via mail, messages, etc. and replying to their comments on Play Stores, if you have an app. You need to make them feel needed and heard. 

Also, they like to be heard. So make sure that you give your customers a place where they can come and interact with you and listen to what they have to say. Take their reviews as gospel and act on them. 

Tracking your growth and checking the ROI of your strategy will help you in finding what really works for your company. This will also help you in saving money on things that you might be doing that aren’t getting the expected results, or to find a cheaper alternative. 

And lastly, persevere. Even the most genius marketing plan in the history of marketing plans won’t generate results overnight. So you need to be patient and you need to be calm. If you stick to your strategy, sooner or later, good results will show.

The post 9 Tips to Execute the Perfect Marketing Strategy for Your Business appeared first on SiteProNews.

Platforms & List

One of the most important parts of starting a cold email campaign is using a platform that allows A/B testing, great follow up and personalization. These are the 3 key elements that are going to make your campaign win.

And win they will. I can’t stress enough how much cold email still works for growing any type of business, if you put time and energy into it. I’m not going to suggest any platforms but there are many to choose from and they all have the same basic offering. I have my personal favorite but it’s no different than many others, I just like the design better and think it’s a little easier to use.

The second part of cold email that will make or break your campaign is how you’re building your list. Are you buying a list? If so you’re off to a very bad start. Pre-made email lists are generally low quality and been hit up hundreds of times. In short, these people are used and sick of it. It will be very hard to convert them.

What I will suggest for building a list is LinkedIn Sales Navigator. It’s easily the best prospecting tool around right now, especially for B2B. You can search the entire LinkedIn network and start building prospects with some of the best targeting around.

The List building is the most time intensive part of the entire process. Do it correctly and you will get higher open rates. Can’t stress enough how important it is to build a clean, new list.

A/B Test the Subject Line

Subject line has one goal right? To get opened. One of the best ways to do this is to avoid the line “Quick question”. I’ve noticed it’s a lot of marketers go to subject line and it’s one of the most overused subject lines in existence. Come up with something original, even think about including their name. “Quick question Gilman” will have a higher opening than quick question but it’s still not original. Personalization matters.

When coming up with a good subject line to test, one of the best strategies I’ve used is coming up with at least 30. Yes 30. I’ve read some places 15, is a good number. For me, it doesn’t allow for enough creativity. You can come up with 15 ways to say the same thing but 30 actually takes some creativity. Push yourself and come up with 30 subject lines, narrow it down to your best 5.

After you have your best 5 subject lines, that still might be too many to A/B test depending how big your list is. Take those 5 and ask some friends / team members which they like best, narrow that down again to 2. Once you get to 2, you’re ready to start sending an A/B testing.

A/B Test the Body

With the body, you can A/B test it the same time as the subject line – Because the only goal of the subject line is to get opens. The goal of the body is to get replies, or clicks depending on your goal. In my opinion, the goal should be replies. You can always go for clicks after or in a follow up response. They are tracking two different metrics, so feel free to A/B test at the same time.

The body is the scariest part of designing a cold email, because it will be the part that decides if you get marked as spam or not. Make sure, if you must promote a link – do not promote more than one or people will definitely mark you as spam. I prefer zero as I let my signature do the talking which we will get to later.

There’s 3 core elements you want to take into account when designing a cold email:

• Personalization
• Start with delight
• Ask a question

Personalization is a big one. I like to send mine with just a first or last name, the full name seems a little like an automated bot to me. Hey Gilman, seems a lot more natural than Hey Gilman Haris.

After the hey comes the delight. If you have the time, invest it into a little research on the person and comment on something they’ve done lately – A funny tweet, a blog article, a new job, anything that they’ve done recently so they know you’ve done the research. It’s a quick way to get some respect and make them a little more open to the next part of your email.

The ask. I generally keep the ask very small and casual. I’ve seen some very long emails that work and very short. 

Either can work despite common advice saying keep it short only — The rule should be keep it good. When asking, I’ll say something along the lines of “Thought you might be in the market for X” – It’s that small. No links. No nothing except a “Cheers,” and wait.

Signature Link

This is where I put my link. If people are reading your email, they’re going to check your signature as well. And they’re going to click it.

Keep your signature very focused with a single link. Think about it like a landing page, everything has 1 CTA – Your CTA here is going to be the link. I link to the website I’m trying to get customers for and let them check it out for themselves. It works.

Follow Up

Follow up is the most important part of any cold email campaign. If you’re not doing it, you’re failing. I read somewhere that around 13% of your target market at any time is in the buying stage. That means 87% is not ready for your product yet, but they will be one day.

On top of that, many of your emails won’t get a reply – I find very often that we do get a reply in the 2nd or 3rd email. If you’ve neglected this part of campaign in the past, it’s a huge factor in campaigns failing.

What I like to do is set 2 follow ups scheduled to the recent future – one might be in 2 days and another in 5 days. After that, since I know only 13% are in the market – I’ll set a 3rd follow up in a month or two. Hell, now that I’m writing this – I don’t see a downside in setting a 4th in another few months after that. You have nothing to lose.

What we’ve gone over today is everything a cold email takes. I’ve sent more than most people ever will and the only difference between a successful campaign and a losing campaign is the amount of effort people put into every single one of these categories. Cold email is alive and well. It’s up to you to make it work. Just like anything else.

The post Long Live Cold Email appeared first on SiteProNews.

Social media should be a major aspect of a business’ marketing strategy – no matter how big or small your organization is – and, given that it doesn’t have to be a costly investment, you could be missing a big opportunity to reach your target audience. In fact, 64% of sales teams have used social media to hit sales targets – so what are you waiting for? 

Let’s take a look at some of the brands who are taking their social strategy above and beyond:

Using employee advocacy to drive engagement 

One brand that has embraced the social media limelight in new and innovative ways is marketing software company HubSpot. 

As an organization, their belief that outbound salespeople aren’t fundamental to increasing brand awareness has been pivotal – and their focus on inbound marketing was born, as a result. HubSpot’s mentality is that, when marketers within the brand share relevant and beneficial content, sales increase. 

Their presence on social media is noticeable; HubSpot shares tips, step-by-step guide videos, and valuable information with their followers, which their employees then go onto share too. With the use of employee advocacy, they’re not only increasing engagement and reach but also adding to the credibility of their reputation and generating positive exposure to a vast audience. 

Considering 84% of consumers value recommendations from friends and family above all other forms of advertising, employee advocacy should be a tool that all businesses are incorporating into their social strategy. 

View your social media followers as a community 

Next, let’s take a look at sports brand Nike – without a doubt, a force to be reckoned with in the social media world. 

Through the use of video content, working with charities and not shying away from diversity-focused campaigns, the brand is a natural at interacting with their customers through starting conversations on social media. 

Ever heard of #justdoit? Of course, you have – it’s renowned as one of Nike’s taglines, which they’ve used consistently over the years as part of their marketing activity. 

Through this community they’ve created, they’ve been able to become an engaging and credible brand in the sportswear industry – especially through their efforts to cater to each of their target audiences by creating unique pages on its social platforms – such as Nike Skateboarding and Nike Golf. 

The use of consistent and relevant hashtags has been a clear benefit to Nike’s strategy – and one of the biggest lessons we can take to enhance your social strategy.

Draw attention to your work culture  

If you’re looking for a way to use social media to boost the morale of staff, look no further than cloud-based software company Salesforce. 

Their social media is focussed on sharing content relating to employees’ success, and not just sales wins; their social media is engaging and warm, which is a known way to attract new hires to your organization, as well as provide current and prospective customers with a clear insight into your values. With 90% of 18-29 year olds looking to social media to get in contact with potential employers, you’ll be missing a trick if you don’t use the platform as a way to share your brand’s values and mission. 

Authenticity and credibility are key to a strong social media strategy, and the only way to do this is to keep content in-line with your brand’s culture. 

Deliver unforgettable customer service 

When looking for a brand with the most unique and personable tone, Innocent Smoothies undoubtedly stands out. With the right amount of funny and informal posts, whilst still providing valuable information and responses to customers, the drink company is continually growing in popularity. 

However, what other brands can learn and mirror in their own social media strategies, is how Innocent aims to respond to as many tweets from its customers as possible – even if the tweet is unrelated to a product or consumer-related questions. 

With 67% of consumers using social media to find resolutions for their questions or issues with a brand, it’s vital that brands have the steps in place to cater to this. 

The post Creating a Solid Social Media Strategy: What can We Learn from the Best in the Game? appeared first on SiteProNews.