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Online Marketing

Step Up Your Online Marketing Efforts with These 10 Tips

by Loknath Das
written by Loknath Das

Today’s businesses need an online marketing strategy to succeed. While every business’s strategy may look a bit different, there are some common threads that hold most of those successful strategies together.

Members of the small business community have plenty of tips to share when it comes to successfully marketing businesses online. Check out their top tips below.

Make Your Way with Social Media

Social media isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution. You have to determine the strategy that is going to work best for your business, as Rachel Strella of Strella Social Media discusses here. And Strella elaborated on these suggestions in a conversation in BizSugar community here.

Super Charge Your Local Search Results

Even for local businesses, online marketing can make a huge difference. Local search, for example, can help to bring new faces to your store, restaurant or other local business. To make the most of your local search marketing, check out this Inc article by Small Business Trends CEO Anita Campbell.

Think About These Things for Your Website’s Social Sharing Features

Letting customers or followers do some of your online marketing for you can really help out and save you time. But you need to make sharing your content easy for them. So in this article at the Social Media Week, Larry Alton suggests some things you should think about when incorporating social sharing buttons into your website.

Keep Up with Marketing Technology Trends

Thanks to technology, online marketing is constantly changing. That means that you need to keep up with the new trends in order to stay relevant to tech savvy consumers. This article at Docurated by Angela Stringfellow includes some marketing technology trends that are poised to re-shape the world of marketing.

Grow Your Website Traffic

Content creation can be a key part of your online marketing strategy. But you need to build traffic in order for your content to be effective. This post on the official dlvr.it blog by Bill Flitter includes a playbook for growing traffic to your content.

Expect These Things When Joining Social Media

As a small business owner, the idea of joining various social media sites and regularly using them as part of your online marketing plan can seem daunting. But if you know what to expect, the process can be a bit easier. Here on NutsPR, Corina Manea shares some things you should expect when joining social media as a small business owner.

Use These Best Practices for Twitter Polls

Twitter’s polling feature can help you to gain insights and interaction from your followers on the platform. And the microblogging site has now revealed some of the best practices that people should use when running polls, which Matt Southern covers in this Search Engine Journal article. BizSugar members also chime in with their own thoughts here.

Consider Starting Your Own Podcast

Lots of businesses have websites and social media accounts. But starting your own podcast can really help you to stand out in today’s business world. Here, Ileane Smith shares some of the benefits that businesses could realize through starting a podcast.

Create a Content Anchor

When creating content for an online audience, the length and quality of your content can make a big difference in how many people see and interact with it. In this post on Blogger Sidekick, Will Blunt discusses the concept of a content anchor and how it could help your online marketing strategy.

Use Influencer Marketing That Works

Influencer marketing is a relatively new concept to a lot of businesses. But it can really jumpstart your online marketing efforts if used correctly. Here, Ann Smarty discusses how small businesses can use influencer marketing in a way that should work both now and in the future.

If you’d like to suggest your favorite small business content to be considered for an upcoming community roundup, please send your news tips to:  [email protected].

[“Source-smallbiztrends”]

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Online Marketing

Update Your Online Marketing Strategy with These 10 Tips

by Loknath Das
written by Loknath Das

You know all of the basic ways to market a business online: create content, use social media, buy online ads. But your competitors know all of those methods too. So you need to step up your efforts if you want to stand out. Here are some new ways to update your online marketing from members of the online small business community.

Make Your Content More Relevant in Search

In order for your content marketing to be effective, people need to easily be able to find it. And search engines are a big part of that. To learn how to make your content more relevant in search, check out this Content Marketing Institute post by Marcia Riefer Johnston.

Avoid These Common AdWords Mistakes

AdWords has been a major tool for online marketers for years. But in that time, many have made costly mistakes that have lessened the effectiveness of their ads. See some of those common mistakes so you can avoid them in your own efforts in this Search Engine Journal post by Susan Wenograd.

Create Processes for Regular Web Maintenance

Once you’ve created a great website for your business, the work isn’t over. You have to perform regular web maintenance. And creating processes can help with that. Benjamin Brandall provides a helpful checklist for doing so in this Process Street post.

Make Your Business Happy with These Landing Page Benefits

Think you don’t need to use landing pages as part of your online marketing strategy? Think again! In this post, Mike Allton of the Social Media Hat shares why you’re wrong to believe landing pages are unimportant. BizSugar members also shared thoughts on the post here.

Learn the Art and Science of Retargeting

Retargeting gives businesses a unique opportunity to procure more repeat shoppers online. But there’s a lot that goes into this process. Learn the art and science of retargeting in this Target Marketing post by Patrick Kuehn and Daniel Ripes.

Implement These Marketing Automation Workflows

Online marketing can be a time consuming undertaking. But you can save time and increase effectiveness by automating certain processes. In this SUCCESS Agency post, Mary Blackiston suggests seven marketing automation workflows that you should implement in order to save time.

Use These Affiliate Marketing Strategies for Success During the Holidays

The holidays are quickly approaching, providing opportunities to boost sales with unique holiday promotions. And affiliate marketing can be a huge part of your strategy. In this Marketing Land post, Adam Weiss offers some affiliate marketing strategies you can use for success during the holidays.

Boost Retention Rates with These Customer Support Hacks

Online marketing isn’t just about gaining new customers. You also need strategies for retaining current ones. The customer support hacks listed in this Post Funnel article by Sam Hurley can help in that area. And you can also see commentary on the post over on BizSugar.

Avoid These Common Blogging Mistakes

Blogging has been a popular way for businesses to promote their offerings and earn extra income for years now. But some are still just getting started with blogging, meaning they could be more prone to mistakes. To learn more about some of the common mistakes to avoid, read this Basic Blog Tips post by Erik Emanuelli.

Maximize Your Email Marketing Strategy with These Platforms

Through all of the changes to online marketing tools and platforms, email remains a powerful way to communicate with customers and potential customers. If you’re looking to maximize your email marketing strategy, this SMB CEO post by Megan Totka may be able to provide some useful insights.

If you’d like to suggest your favorite small business content to be considered for an upcoming community roundup, please send your news tips to: [email protected].

[“Source-smallbiztrends”]

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Blogging

5 Guest Blogging Tips That Build Your Brand Successfully

by Loknath Das
written by Loknath Das

Over the years, it’s become clear that the quickest way to build a brand online is to invest in content marketing, and link up with bloggers and authoritative industry leaders. All you need to support this theory is to look at brands like HubSpot and KISSmetrics, which hit the ground running with massive guest blogging campaigns and impressive visuals.

If you’re looking to experience an equally fast start for your brand – or are looking to give an existing brand a much needed jolt – there are certain strategies you need to pursue.

Benefits of Guest Blogging

The entire blogosphere gasped when Matt Cutts told the world guest blogging was over. But what did he really mean? Was he saying that all guest blogging was bad and should be done away with?

Not quite.

What he said was that guest blogging as a primary source of link building was over. He warned companies to quit relying on guest blogging as a link-building strategy and to instead only use it for brand awareness.

While this statement should have provided more clarity for companies on how to approach guest blogging as a brand play, it instead scared many off from the practice altogether. However, the truth is that guest blogging is still very much alive and is a perfect opportunity for growing a brand. But you must understand the difference between linking up with spammy sites and using credible channels to disseminate your content.  Here are a few of the major benefits of partnering with credible bloggers:

Awareness

The primary benefit of guest blogging is that brands are able to reach entirely new segments of the market. Instead of relying on your own reach, you get to tap into someone else’s group of followers and readers.

Credibility

The more exposure your brand gets on a variety of different blogs and platforms, the more credibility you gain. Each place your name appears – assuming it’s not negative – is a virtual vouch for your brand.

Relationships

While you’re trying to reach a large audience of readers, the fact is that linking up with a guest blogger serves as an effective networking tool that could pay dividends in the future.

Link building

And while guest blogging shouldn’t be your primary form of link building, it’s certainly a form of link building. When used in conjunction with other strategies, it does add value. 

The Key to Successful Guest Blogging

What Matt Cutts warned people against was linking up with low quality blogs and using those connections to create spammy content. So, if you’re going to continue guest blogging, that means you need to find influential bloggers. Furthermore, you need a specific strategy for researching and monitoring which guest blogging opportunities provide the highest return.

Unfortunately, only six percent of B2C marketers claim their organizations are “very successful” at tracking ROI, while an incredible 30 percent either don’t track at all or aren’t successful.

Top Tips for Brand Building with Guest Blogging

If you believe guest blogging could give your brand a boost, here are some of the top tips to propel you in the right direction.

Keep Track of Your Efforts

According to Brand24, a leader in social monitoring and tracking, it’s critical that you keep track of all your guest blogging efforts so you can accurately understand whether you’re getting a valuable return. Using a proven software or online tool can make this process exponentially easier.

Implement a Closing

While many bloggers have very specific rules, some may give you more flexibility. If possible, find a way to implement a strong closing with a call-to-action. This CTA allows you to engage with your audience and may even encourage readers to click on your link or share your post.

Invest in Shelf Life

A well-written blog can realistically hang around for years and still produce results. While there is certainly a time for writing time-sensitive content regarding current issues, it’s a much more valuable long-term strategy to write content that can remain effective for a long period of time.

Find Syndicators

One thing successful brands are good at is finding syndication partners to redistribute existing content to new audiences. The huge benefit here is that you don’t have to write anything fresh. You simply have to contact these sites and make a simple request. In addition to guest blogging, consider syndication for content you own.

Invest in Research

Prior to implementing a guest blogging strategy, you should make sure you’ve done your research. Whenever considering a new blog or channel, check to make sure it’s audience would resonate with you, that the bloggers are invested in quality content, and that Google and the other search engines don’t see the site as spammy.

Guest blogging is still a great brand building strategy and can be used to garner positive traction on the internet. Use these tips to make the most out of your efforts and always remember to track and monitor your influence to ensure you’re getting the maximum return on investment.

 

[“Source-smallbiztrends”]

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Online Marketing

Eight tips to help you avoid making online marketing mistakes

by Loknath Das
written by Loknath Das

online marketing

Diving into content creation and digital marketing as a young business can be a daunting prospect, but luckily there’s plenty of social media and marketing experts around to share tips on what not to do when promoting your business online.

Writing for Entrepreneur, social media strategist and blogger Lesya Liu revealed her first foray into blogging and content creation lead to a “ton” of rookie marketing mistakes, including accidentally posting a cat article to her company’s social media page.

While the article actually received a high level of engagement, Liu says there are plenty of other common marketing mistakes being made online, any one of which could have a “much more significant negative effect on your digital presence than an accidental cat post”.

Here are her eight tips to avoid making a digital marketing mistake.

1. Don’t think if you blog it, they will come

“Don’t rely on someone accidentally stumbling upon your blog; even the best content needs promotion,” Liu says.

“Assuming your content is top notch, you still need to be active on social media sites to push this content where people will see it.”

2. Keep old posts updated

A common misconception when curating blog posts is to keep making new ones when you have a fresh take on an idea you already covered, but Liu says this mindset can leave you struggling when trying to attract traffic to your website.

“Updating an old article is a very effective blogging technique. If you’re trying to build thought leadership, you have to ensure that every page on your website is true and accurate,” she says.

“Opinions, trends and data change over time. Links get broken. However, instead of writing out a whole new thing, just update an older post,” she says.

Liu also notes that Google also indexes updated pages better due to increased “relevancy”.

3. You don’t always need new content

“While you do need to post something consistently, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time. Take your most popular blog post and reuse the content by creating an infographic, creating a video, developing a webinar or podcast series to further expand on the topic,” recommends Liu.

“Different forms of content will also attract new audiences who prefer one content form over another.”

4. Collect emails always

Even if you’re not planning to send out a newsletter or something similar any time soon, Liu advises businesses should endeavour to collect readers’ email addresses wherever possible to prepare for a potential newsletter in the future.

“Your email list is still your biggest asset; this is a single digital marketing channel that brings in the best ROI,” she says.

“People who are willing to share their email address with you signal their interest in your content or possible products. Don’t reject their interest, because once you have a product, a launch, or just a simple newsletter, you’ll be able to let these people know.”

5. Don’t choose every social platform

While spraying your content across every social platform you can find might sound like the best way to get noticed, Liu thinks business owners should choose a few and concentrate on them.

“Instead of spreading yourself thinly, build meaningful connections and impressive following on just a couple of networks, where you can consistently bring value and quality,” she says.

“Think about your content and where it would be most appropriate.”

6. There’s no such thing as a free like

“There is still some kind of stigma, where if companies promote their content it’s looked down upon. Well, smart marketers understand the need to boost their content reach to see real results,” Liu writes, in reference to boosting and promoting posts on social media.

“Never promote your stuff just to be seen by anyone. Use highly-targeted strategies that will ensure that your content is seen by the audiences who need to see it.”

7. Keep sharing your content

Developing a top-quality, polished piece of content to promote your business is useless if you only promote it once, says Liu, who recommends budding online marketers share their content multiple times for the best effect.

“You have to post the content more than once to ensure that a lot of people see it. Experiment with different copy, headings, and images for social updates. Share your older posts you feel especially proud of,” she says.

8. Get personal, but not too much

“While no one wants to read your rants or complaints, or see obsessive amounts of cute cat photos, showing your human side is ok,” says Liu.

“You might be surprised at how much engagement you can get on a simple post talking about your interests and hobbies, because passion is what really drives humans.

“Social media is about being social, so encourage conversation, encourage information exchange and sharing. Because, you know, sharing is caring.”

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[“Source-smartcompany”]
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