Sep 20
0

Share More Or Less? Know The Right Frequency Of Posting On Social Media Platforms

By | Marketing | No Comments

More brands are realizing the power of social media when it comes to finding new customers. Social media has emerged as an alternative platform to search engines for brands to reach their audiences. Not to forget, a robust social media presence also supplements search engine performance.

Be that as it may, since many brands are new to the World of social media, there are a number of doubts and apprehensions surrounding the platform. One of the most common doubts pertains to the ideal frequency of posting on social media platforms. Several studies conducted on the subject, the results of which, we will be discussing in this article today.

However, before we jump into the ideal frequency of posting on various social platforms, it is important to understand that quality trumps quantity everywhere. That means, even if your posting frequency is ideal to success, it won’t do much to help you achieve business goals if your content is sub-par.

According to Google, there is no fixed ideal frequency for posting on a website. In a Tweet, a Google official stated that “a site isn’t a machine that pumps out content at a fixed rate” and the same is, to a large extent, true for your brand’s social media accounts. Sure, studies have shown that posting on certain frequencies translates into better social media results but it doesn’t mean that you should simply publish content for the sake of reaching that frequency. Social media success depends largely on the quality and engagement potential of your content. For this reason, it is important to understand certain “social media commandments” before we explore the ideal frequency of posting on various platforms.

  • Post consistently not frequently: The issue with “an ideal frequency” is that it does not take the various industry verticals, geographical locations, and demographics of audiences into consideration. If, for instance, the ideal frequency to post is 3 posts a day, it might work for an e-commerce or news brand, but the audience of a B2B brand may find the same disruptive. Instead of aiming for ideal times, days, and frequency numbers aim for consistency. Let your audiences realize that after a fixed period of time, they can find something new in their favorite brand’s social media page.
  • Don’t do it for the sake of doing it: Many social media platforms have modified their algorithms so that posts published by brands don’t show up on the news feed of all members of their audience. If you are not ready to pay for social ads to overcome this barrier, the other alternative is to publish content that is interesting and engaging. This way, if your audience truly finds your content resourceful or entertaining, they will consciously return to your page to check for updates. On the other hand, if you simply keep posting average-quality content to fill your social media calendar, your efforts will probably go unnoticed.
  • Align posting frequency with your objectives: Unless you have your objectives laid out, you will not be able to measure the success of your efforts on social media. In fact, the right way to do things is to first come up with a set of objectives and then design a strategy and a calendar to fulfill those objectives. For instance, if your objective is brand recognition, it makes sense to post entertaining and intriguing content frequently. On the other hand, if your objective is to generate leads, building a lead magnet and aggressively promoting it is the way forward.

Keeping these commandments in mind, let us look at what various studies say about the ideal frequency of posting on social media platforms:

Facebook:

The most popular social network is not really friendly for promotions if you are not paying for them. The Facebook algorithms are designed such that you will not be able to reach 100% of the people that follow your page. Posts on Facebook usually only show up on the news feed of the users that regularly interact with your brand. The takeaway here is that a large percentage of people that come across your post on a specific day will be the same as the previous day so posting too frequently may come off as spammy at times. Studies support the same:

Ideal frequency: According to a HubSpot analysis, the ideal frequency for brands to post on Facebook is 5 times during a week. Since Facebook wants to serve their users with “fresh” content in their feed, it usually reduces the reach of a second Facebook post published by a brand in a single day. For this reason, on Facebook, try posting once every weekday or not more than five times during a week.

Ideal days and time for posting on Facebook: According to the same HubSpot research, there isn’t an ideal day to post on Facebook. However, it has been noticed that the highest engagement for the best performing Facebook posts is on Sunday. “Best performing” is the operating phrase here because any measurable trends in clicks and engagement can be only seen in the top performing posts (part of the 95th percentile). This essentially means the time and day of posting don’t matter as long as your content is truly valuable.

Linkedin: 

In terms of algorithms, Linkedin works similar to Facebook. While reaching the full potential of your audience is possible without paying for promotions, the rest of the equation is pretty much the same. Keep in mind, Linkedin is a professional social network and appearing spammy on this platform is quite easy. 

Ideal frequency: As mentioned earlier, Linkedin algorithms work similar to the Facebook algorithms. Linkedin does not want to overwhelm their users with posts from a single brand so posting a second time on the same day may hamper the performance of your first post that day. Moreover, the HubSpot study also concluded that for a brand with 100 followers, the first two posts get two clicks each and this number then keeps diminishing. By the 10th post in a week, you will be getting an average of 0.5 clicks on your content. For this reason, a frequency of two to five posts will earn you the highest ROI. Yet again, the advice is if engagement is your objective, focus on quality and relevance of your content instead of posting frequency.

Ideal days and time for posting on Linkedin: Unlike Facebook, engagement patterns on Linkedin differ for different days. It was noticed that posts from a brand perform better on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays. This makes sense because working professionals rarely get the chance to check their Linkedin feed on a busy Monday and let’s face it, nobody wants to spend their weekend going through their Linkedin feed.

Twitter:

Twitter has fast emerged as a great platform for brand visibility. Home to numerous social media success stories, Twitter marketing is quickly becoming part of several digital strategies, regardless of industry verticals. There are several advantages that Twitter offers to brands, the most lucrative of which, is great “reach” potential. That means, no matter how many times you post on Twitter, your post will show up on the news feed of all your followers.

Ideal Frequency: Since Twitter serves content as it is posted, it is advisable to post as much as you can for best engagement. This, however, should not be taken as an excuse to spam your audiences with useless content for the sake of visibility. Let go of the “all publicity is good publicity” myth and invest real thought behind the purpose of each post that goes under your brand name.

Ideal days and time for posting on Twitter: The average amount of engagement driven by posts does not differ substantially on different days for Twitter. The trick to success is to treat your Twitter posts as “messages” instead of polished posts. Use the platform to drive conversations with quality content instead of promoting your brand.

Conclusion

The conclusion to everything stated above is simple, the frequency or publishing time of your posts does not matter if your content falls in the “average” category. Similarly, if you are publishing great content that is useful to your audience, it will drive engagement, regardless of the time, date, or frequency of publishing.

Sep 20
0

Do you want to know the pathways to amplify the presence of a social account?

By | Marketing | No Comments

The Internet-driven world is known for the huge amount of online activity that happens on a daily basis. The Internet is never offline, and people can make virtual visits at any time and also from anywhere. The utility of this cyberspace is manifold, and individuals use the Internet for various purposes.

In today’s time, it is quite easy to place one’s thoughts and products before others through the online medium. Composing an online travelogue or a painting exhibition is very easy because all that a person needs for constructing the virtual space for placing the talent before an audience is the Internet. The various use of the virtual medium has led the software designers to come up with novel software systems that can accommodate the increasing tasks of individuals which are done with the aid of the Internet.

The actions that can lead to the enhancement of a social page

The insertion of social media in the ever-growing online platform allowed people to use this medium for making a connection with other individuals. But very soon the primary service offered by social media underwent huge modification. The social media platform became a place for gathering followers and elevating popularity. The statistics that deem a social profile popular are the number of followers. In social sites like Instagram, the number of followers is directly proportional to the trending position of the social page. Therefore, it is important to gain followers.

The do it yourself steps that can be taken to promote a social profile includes the following:

  • Making a content rich and adequately attractive page.
  • Having a specific cause for making the social profile.
  • Finding out similar profiles that project an analogous purpose.
  • Glancing at trending profiles present on the social media platform and reviewing the content posted in those profiles.
  • Maintaining a routine when it comes to making uploads.
  • Using cropping actions for keeping videos short. This helps to build the number of viewers because the long content is usually not read by most people. This is applicable for completely new profiles which are trying to earn a position in social media.
  • Staying away from making hurtful comments on other profiles as this will affect the profile of the commenter.
  • Following pages that reveal similar interests.

However, those mentioned above are not enough to pull the profile towards the height of popularity when the profile is in its nascent stage. Other supplementary actions are also required for making progress.

The additional services acquired for augmenting follower count

It is not unusual to hear about services that help a profile in its initial stages to reach a height of importance and value. Even if the social page promotes something unique, it is very difficult to uphold that purpose through the social profile in a place where there are thousands of such profiles. As the internet is free, so space is taken up by all and hence overcrowding is a stable aspect. The problem of rising above the crowd is not so easy and cannot be taken care of single-handedly. Hence it is suitable to look for services offered by companies like Gramista for increasing the social presence.

The well-known services offered by online companies that boost an online profile or social media account are given below:

  • Likes for posts are given in an increased quantity that the post acquires a degree of visibility in the social media.
  • Follower count is increased by adding account holders of Instagram.
  • The profile of added followers is kept updated and similar to normal profiles.
  • Providing comments for new posts.

Hence, the prime action involved is to elevate the follower count and likes. This is important because until and unless a social media account has a huge number of followers, it is not considered by reigning standards as popular.

The effect of an increased number of followers for a social profile

When a profile has a huge number of followers, then it obtains a trending position. This means the profile appears in the news feed and more people are likely to visit the profile. A large number of followers also instills the curiosity of other account holders, and they might visit the profile. Notable brands often used trending profiles for brand promotion and also pay the social account holder for that purpose either in cash or kind. But apart from all these the increase in the number of followers ensures that a huge population perceives the purpose of the profile holder. Hence the dream of becoming an influential force in social media is achieved through popularity.

The apprehension associated with the use of paid services for social media accounts

There is a sense of worry among individuals who vacillate between using and not using paid services for augmenting the statistics of a social profile. It is true that some service providers provide comments of cheap quality, likes from unrelated profiles and noticeably fake follower accounts. Further, if the service provider is not up to the mark, then the end of service period might mark the sudden deletion of the follower accounts showing a decrease in follower count which will impact the social profile severely.

However, if a person acquires these services meant for the advancement of the social media account from a reputable company, then these problems won’t surface. A good service provider will always back the social profile in the best possible manner and won’t provide any loopholes that will negatively affect the popularity achieved by the social page.

Social media is becoming more prominent with each passing day, and hence it is important to make good use of this platform and for that purpose availing suitable aiding services is sensible and also necessary.

Author Bio: Harris is a leading blog writer and content marketing professional with thousands of real Instagram followers for his postings. He has affirmed the utility of the services offered by Gramista for increasing social media popularity.

 

Sep 20
0

B2B Digital Marketing Essentials

By | Marketing | One Comment

3 Do’s and Don’ts You Must Know About!

By this time, there is no second thought on internet marketing and social media when it comes to business and brand promotions. Marketers are also aware of the most scoring digital marketing strategies when it comes to connecting with potential customers and effectively communicating.

However, in terms of B2B marketing, the deal becomes strange to many. Is there any role for social media in B2B marketing or whether digital marketing has any special advantage over the conventional marketing strategies.

Digital marketing for B2B

In real, B2B marketing through digital channels and social media is as important as that in B2C in terms of the impression a business can create in front of the clients. If you want to do it well, there are certain aspects that you as the owner of a B2B company should know to create this great first impression. Further, in this article, we will discuss some key do’s and don’ts in B2B marketing.

Do’s

Choose the right channel – There are plenty of social media channels like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn to name a few, which helps you to have a substantial presence and great impression on the users. Choose the most appropriate platform/s for you.

Know the target group – Similar to B2C, companies which work with business clients also should now the nature of the potential audience to devise digital marketing strategies.

In the meantime, another big area of concern for most of the businessmen is the expenditure overhead and growing debts. Many are confused about how to cope up with it without a proper advice or financial guidance.

However, if not appropriately handled, debts can be harmful and devastating. For businesses troubled with the accounting and management of multiple loans, it is a great way out to think of a debt consolidation loan, which is meant to dissolve various existing loans into a single bigger loan and extended repayment period to pay off comfortably.

Know the trends – While using social media for business, it is essential to keep track of the latest trends to devise relevant strategies. There are many tools available for B2B companies to track the trends and keep up with it.

Don’ts

Self-promote – It may be tempting to give that extra push by liking your own posts, but this is not an ideal social media approach, especially when you have an eye on B2B marketing.

Cross the limit in terms of ‘shares’ – ‘Overdoing it’ on social media has significant disadvantages. You may be pursued as a spammer by the followers with too many shares.

Be a stalker – You may or may not get followup messages from the companies you want to connect to. If you do not get a response, don’t be a stalker. If you send follow-ups frequently to irritate them, it may have the same effect of over-sharing.

Following the above basic do’s and don’ts will be an ideal starting point for the B2B marketers coming onto the digital platform. Remember, social media is a double-edged sword which can both act on behalf and against you if not handled wisely.

Sep 19
0

How to Target the Right Market for Your SEO Agency

By | SEO | One Comment

Many digital marketing agencies jump into pitching their SEO services, only to find out that they’re talking to the wrong people.

If you’re doing the same, you’re just wasting time, effort, and most importantly, the opportunity to get a new client for your agency. What can you do to turn the situation around? It’s pretty simple – target the right market.

Before you get into the groove of selling white label local SEO services, it’s important to laser focus your efforts to the appropriate audience. One, it will help you get more targeted traffic to your site and more conversions. Second, it will help you put things into perspective and build better rapport with your prospects. Lastly, it will make selling local SEO services a breeze for your agency.

Ready?

Here are the steps:

Step 1: Conduct Market Research

First things first, you need to know who you’re going into a conversation with. That’s where market research plays in.

Market research serves three purposes: help you identify which vertical is workable for your agency, fine-tune profiles of potential clients, and understand the language of your prospects.

Some of the things you need to look into when doing market research are:

  • Industry size: How easy/difficult is it to penetrate your prospect’s industry?
  • Customer lifetime value: Do they rely on high customer lifetime value?
  • Competition: What’s the competition (nationally and locally) like for them?
  • Average dollar spend per transaction: What is the average spend of their customers? Will this be able to cover their budget for their marketing needs?
  • Networking opportunities: What unique networking opportunities are present? Do you have personal connections in that niche?

When doing market research, don’t just focus on one vertical initially. Research multiple verticals, so you can weigh the pros and cons of each. This will then lead you to the next step…

Step 2: Find the Right Vertical

This is where it gets tricky.

After you’ve narrowed down a specific niche, you need to get a clearer picture of who you’ll be serving. This boils down to finding the right vertical for your agency.

Based on the experience of the agencies we’ve worked with, here are the best options to get started with:

  • Verticals that have a high singular ticket value: These are prospects that deliver high-profit margins—great examples of these are real estate companies, cosmetic surgeons, and car dealerships. Going for this vertical makes it easier for your agency to justify the budget and help their business get back everything they spent on their SEO.
  • Verticals that provide customer lifetime value: Businesses that have recurring transactions from customers fall under this vertical. Examples of these are fitness gyms and insurance companies. Unlike in the previous vertical, you’re not cost-justifying against a singular transaction, but you’re cost-justifying against the customer transaction over time. As you drive more leads to your client’s business, they get more customer lifetime value.
  • Verticals that provide extended networking opportunities: These are prospects that can refer you to others and allow you to build relationships with them. Customers are likely to buy from someone referred to them because of the established trust. I’ll give you an example – family physicians. So, when your agency decides to do white label local SEO for physicians (and you did a great job on handling their campaign), they may be able to refer you to their other healthcare partners. As you grow your network in that vertical, so does your opportunities to close more prospects.

Growth hack: Avoid verticals that produce a low-profit-margin when you’re starting. These are businesses with a low sale on individual customers or don’t have many customers lifetime value. Most of these businesses will question your SEO pricing, and you don’t want to spend 80% of your time trying to overcome this type of objection.

Step 3: Start Building Relationships

So, what’s next? You mingle.

Don’t wait for prospects to find you—it should be you finding them and initiating the handshake. If you want to build relationships, you need to be out there.

Here are some tips:

  • Join social media groups: Businesses are flocking to social media…so why aren’t you? Join Facebook and LinkedIn communities that serve the vertical you’re targeting. The key is to get the contact details (lots of them) from potential clients on these groups.
  • Look for events, conferences, and trade shows: Use Eventbrite and Facebook to find events. Start with events around your area, but don’t go to all of them—only attend events that will help you reach out to the right people.
  • Always bring a business card with you:Even with everything being digital, a business card is still your trump card when having face-to-face interactions. Have one created for yourself (and for your sales team, if you have any).
  • Communicate with someone from the industry: This is especially helpful if you’re in the vertical that allows you to get referrals. Get someone to introduce you to prospects when you’re networking and use this as a common ground to build rapport.

To Wrap It All Up…

Ask yourself this: Will it be more productive for your agency to sell to everyone, or will it get you more results if you gun for the sure market?

The answer is pretty obvious.

If you align your goals with your audience, it will be easier for your SEO agency to scale and win more clients. At the end of the day, you want prospects to come to you and say, “You’re just the agency I need for my business.”

Author’s Bio:

Itamar Gero is the founder and CEO of SEOReseller.com, a white label SEO program and digital marketing solutions provider that empowers agencies—and their local business clientele—all over the world. When he isn’t working, he’s traveling the world, meditating, or dreaming (in code).

Social Media Profiles:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/itamar.gero
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ItamarGero
LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/itamargero

Sep 18
0

Top Reasons To Hire An SEO Agency For Your Business Marketing

By | Marketing, SEO | One Comment

Boosting the success of your business website with SEO and an advertising agency is important for every organization. This is because your website is the first point of contact for new and existing customers while on the internet. Today, a majority of consumers rely on the internet for information gathering and shopping for goods and services. This is why every business must have an online presence for them to succeed. However, with the continuous updates and upgrades of the search engine algorithms, SEO is best left to professionals. Here are reasons why you should hire an SEO agency for your business.

Save money and manpower

Handling your digital marketing needs on your own means that you and your employees will have to spend valuable resources that may be required in your actual business. You may have to hire an in-house SEO team, which means that you will spend more money on salaries and other benefits. With an SEO company, however, you will only pay for the services rendered, and you will have a team of different professionals handling various aspects of your digital marketing needs to guarantee success. Your business will save more money hiring an SEO agency instead of hiring an in-house team to handle your internet marketing.

Experience and expertise

Even though you and your employees may understand a few things about Search Engine Optimization, experienced SEO companies make a living helping businesses succeed in their SEO campaigns. As a result, they are well-equipped and have more knowledge and expertise in this field. Therefore, they will know the best campaigns and strategies that will suit your unique business needs. They will also know how best to utilize your marketing budget and still deliver excellent results. These professionals have worked with many companies from different industries, and will use their experience and skills to ensure that you get the results you want.

Better return on Investment

Search Engine Optimization involves more than just determining ways of getting more traffic to your business website. It also involves attracting the right type of traffic that can be converted into loyal clients in the long run. SEO professionals will help your business to entice prospective customers who are currently looking for the products or services that you provide. As a result, you will get higher returns than what you had actually invested, and will have a better foundation for building a brand. Furthermore, the results you achieve from professional SEO services are permanent and will benefit your business for many years.

Gain an advantage over competitors

A Seasoned Baltimore SEO agency will carry out research to ensure that they know everything about what your competition is doing to excel in SEO. As a result, they will come up with workable strategies to help your business beat these competitors and ensure that your business stands as an authority in your niche. Being at the top of all your competitors means that you will be ahead of everyone else. A good SEO team will assist you to do this in a manner that will yield results.

Save time

Most business owners have a lot of things to handle and they may not have time to deal with SEO. This means that their SEO campaigns may suffer in the long run because they will not get the attention they need. With a team of SEO professionals working for your business, you will no longer have to worry about your digital marketing strategies. This is because professionals will take care of all the essential SEO research and important keywords. They will also have the mandate to ensure that your social media marketing strategies are working all hours of the day and night. This will free up your schedule and enable you to handle other things that are important to your business.

SEO takes time

When it comes to Search Engine Optimization, there is nothing like a quick fix. Creating fresh content, writing meta descriptions and titles, and optimizing your web copy can be quite a long process. This is why you need to leave this work to the professionals because they will work extra hard every day and night to ensure that you get the results you desire. By outsourcing your SEO workload to a trusted agency, you will be able to handle your business tasks with ease.

An SEO agency will give better results

Even though your business website may be designed beautifully, it will not be serving its purpose if it does not help you get more traffic. When you work with an SEO company or professional, you will get better results. These professionals will assess your website and optimize it to ensure that it performs well. They will also ensure that your site does not just attract potential leads, but becomes a converting site. This will help to yield better results and business for your company.

Investing in SEO services is valuable and will yield desirable results for every business. However, you should ensure that the SEO agency that you work with is trusted and will yield the right results. A good company will implement strategies and campaigns that will enhance your visibility in search engines, boost your chances of reaching out to prospective customers, and also reduce your marketing budget.

Sep 17
0

Teasers and Trailers Are the Highest Converting Tools! Here’s Why

By | Marketing | One Comment

If you want a clear-cut example of the power of video in a Facebook marketing context, look no farther than the teasers and trailers that Hollywood pumps out for upcoming releases on a daily basis. Things have gotten to the point where tens of millions of people all flock to their computer and smartphone screens to view the same short ad. You can almost anticipate how much money a movie is going to make by how many people viewed the trailer on YouTube.

Have you ever wondered why that’s the case?

Teasers and trailers are conversion machines – there’s no doubt about that. But understanding why this is the case has nothing to do with teams of marketing wizards, creativity in general or really the quality of the film itself. Those teasers and trailers are so effective for a number of very simple, straightforward reasons – all of which can help you improve your own video monetization efforts.

The Power of Teasers and Trailers: Breaking Things Down

To really understand why teasers and trailers convert audiences so effectively, you need to look at them for what they really are: commercials. Yes, they’re expensive commercials filled with flashy graphics, attractive actors, pulse-pounding music and other elements, but they’re really just advertisements all the same. That static ad for a new Hollywood blockbuster that you saw online and the trailer you saw at the theater last week are, at the end of the day, trying to accomplish the exact same goal.

So why does one work better than the other? For starters, it’s because human beings are visual learners – always have been, always will be. According to one recent study, the human brain processes images literally 60,000 times faster than text. Not only that, but 90% of all information transmitted to the brain, to begin with, is visual.

This means that we’re always going to A) process, and B) understand things better when they’re presented to us visually versus through other avenues. But once you get those two things out of the way, the analytical part of the brain is more or less satisfied. You understand what you’re looking at and the larger context surrounding it.

This gives something like a teaser or a trailer the perfect opportunity to cut through all that noise and go right for the thing that matters most: your emotions.

Teasers, in particular, are especially effective because they’re even more bite-sized than their longer counterparts. Teasers can be anywhere from 30 seconds to a minute in length, while full trailers are usually about two minutes or more.

To help illustrate this, consider the last time you watched a teaser that really got you excited for a movie. The movie that teaser is advertising doesn’t actually matter. It probably has a few core elements on display. First, there’s almost no indication of the story behind the film to speak of – you’re just getting hit with visually arresting, simple images that sort of give you a feeling for the tone and little else. Next comes the music, which is the through line that lets the teaser naturally move from one seemingly-disconnected image to the next.

Everything builds and crescendos into one final, arresting image… before you get hit with a logo and a release date. Usually, this is the only text that will be present and there’s a very important reason for that: it’s the only thing a marketing company actually needs you to remember.

More often than not, that’s all it really takes to get you into that seat at the cinema.

Oftentimes, you’ll go see the movie and you’ll have a decidedly different experience than the one the teaser promised. Maybe you didn’t even like it. You go back home, hop on YouTube and watch the teaser again – and despite the fact that you were underwhelmed by the movie, you still look at that teaser and go “hey, that looks pretty good.”

That’s because this is exactly what the teaser was supposed to do. It’s the only thing the teaser was supposed to do. The quality of the large film that teaser or trailer represents is irrelevant.

(Having said that, if you haven’t seen “Superman Returns” in awhile, you should really give it a second chance. It’s a lot better than people remember, for the record).

Not only are people 85% more likely to buy a product after viewing a product video (and that’s exactly what a trailer is), but you actually retain more information for longer periods of time if that information is paired with a relevant image. That’s why a teaser trailer (and normally a full trailer) keep text and other important bits of info to the bare, bare minimum. They don’t need you to remember the inner workings of the government system behind the Galactic Empire and the Rebel Alliance. They need you to remember that the new “Star Wars” comes out in December.

And rest assured, you will. Your brain almost won’t be able to help it.

These are the types of things you need to remember when you sit down with Uscreen or some other type of video CMS to work on your apps and other branded video content. You absolutely don’t need to overthink the way you’re making that connection with your target audience – the connection itself is powerful enough. Once it’s been established, it’s up to you to do something about it.

Sources:

http://misrc.umn.edu/workingpapers/fullpapers/1986/8611.pdf

https://www.inc.com/larry-kim/visual-content-marketing-16-eye-popping-statistics-you-need-to-know.html

http://newsoffice.mit.edu/2014/in-the-blink-of-an-eye-0116

Sep 17
0

How to Generate Potential Customers from Facebook for Your E-Commerce Business

By | Ecommerce | One Comment

Owing to the new technology, e-commerce has increased at an exponential rate and is still pacing forwards with giant leaps. People’s busy lives do not allow them to go and visit physical stores of the things they want. E-commerce comes to their rescue and enables them to browse through all the items they want through different e-commerce stores/platforms like Amazon and Shopify.

Since we have established that e-commerce is a growing industry, it is necessary to take measures that will bring customers to your brand. One of the ingenious ways to do that is generating potential customers from Facebook. Let’s take a look at that.

  1. Create a Page

Creating a Facebook page of your business is the first and most important step in setting up your Facebook customer base. You need to put up everything related to your products or services. Your consumers need all the information they need about your company from Facebook.

Add contacts and product reviews to establish credibility so your customers will have an impressive image of your company. Some other things you can add are:

  • Well-photographed pictures of your products in both the profile picture and cover
  • Your brand story
  • Links to your other social media networks (Instagram, twitter, etc.)
  • Detailed information of the products
  • Product numbers
  • Shipping details and policy
  • Customer service
  • Privacy policy
  • General information about your company/motto
  1. Bring Your Ads

Social media marketing has the same basics as ground marketing. If you want people to know about your brand, you need to market it well. Create ads on Facebook and arrange them to be featured on the pages that are most frequently visited by potential customers.

You need to keep this fact in mind that there are going to be a legion of other brands marketing themselves in the form of ads as well. Yours should be captivating enough to grab their attention and make them remember you. Use creative ad strategies by adding multiple product ads or using dynamics to make your campaign stand out. Moreover, you can target your ads to a specific audience depending on their location, age, frequently searched items, etc.

There are various ad options that are now available to the advertisers on Facebook. The Facebook Ads platform is designed to cater to different marketing objectives of an ad campaign. From the brand outreach to engagement and sales, Facebook ads provide a great way to tap into the behavioral patterns of the customers and create ads for them.

A great example of this is by Zappos.com who are running carousel ads to generate traffic for their website and product pages.  Carousel ads are one of the latest and advanced types of ads offered by Facebook in order to generate traffic for your website. They can be dynamic in nature as well and could be created to re-market to the customers who have already engaged with your brand and website.

In the ad shown above, Facebook displays a left to right scroll carousel with product images and description. If the user takes action on this ad, they are re-directed to the website or the product page via deep linking. The above ad is a great example of how an ad should be, simple yet contains all the information necessary.

  1. Contact Social Media Influencers

Social media blogging has become one of the most flourishing industries these days. People look up to their role models or influencers. They trust them and are inclined towards their opinion. This is a strategy that is being used profusely by a lot of brands and they are bearing the fruit of this opportunity.

All you need to do is contact an influencer(s) you believe will be the best to market your product or service. Have a professional conversation with them and bring the demands of both parties in the open so there is no problem later because a conflict of this sort can ruin the goodwill of your brand.

They will market your product and this will attract customers who loyally follow them. It will be a great step to bring potential customers to your organization.

  1. Post Unique Content

One of the best features that Facebook offers is the unlimited freedom of words. There is no limit on characters or pictures. You can use this to your advantage by adding different and one of a kind sort of posts so the content remains in the sight of your audience. Furthermore, you can use engaging colors and patterns to grasp the eyes of your reader.

This will make you stand out among other brands. Make sure that the things you post are not very monotonous or boring. You can share any product or service from your website or introduce deals or discounts to keep your page being visited.

An example of unique content posted by a brand can be taken of Sophie and Trey on their Facebook. They seem to follow a very interesting video content strategy where they come to live on their Facebook page and exhibit the dresses to their customers on the live feed.

This helps give the customer a real feel of the product that they are going to purchase. They take turns to go change into different outfits that have just recently arrived and are available for sale. As the atmosphere of the video is totally natural, it helps create a connection with the customers and they can ask questions or their queries live.

This is a great way to establish brand authenticity too and turn your would-be customers into definite customers.

  1. Up-to-date Content

One of the biggest mistakes companies make in Facebook marketing is that they only keep their page active through their own posts. If there are no new products to show, they keep on bringing up the old ones. This can be clever to an extent but can be detrimental to your brand image. One of the most effective ways to stay active and likeable is to post about current affairs.

Give your stance on the ongoing situation of the country or society. Address social issues. Bring awareness. Write interesting posts about these. Empathize with the people in calamities and initiate some steps for the betterment. Announce them on your Facebook. This will create a remarkably positive image of your brand in front of the audience and they will be inclined to buy from you.

A perfect example of this would be by 6pm.com who post regular updates for their customer and fans/followers on their Facebook page.  In the example shown below, you can see the necessary details about the product as well as providing their ‘Deal of the Day’ with discounts.

The product link to the website is mentioned in the post and the post also includes a good product photo. This is how a product post should be. Short, attractive and catchy!

However, posting up to date content isn’t enough. When it comes to e-commerce, the customers often inquire about the products in the comments. The brand/business has to be vigilant in order to respond to their queries in a timely manner.

On the same product post, 6pm.com replied to a query which caught our eye. It was smart and witty as well as giving out the solution to the inquiry made. Take a look:

Judy must’ve felt special to have received this kind of attention from the brand. Updating your fans/follower or potential customers in all ways and forms is absolutely necessary.

The aforementioned points cover the question of how to generate potential customers from Facebook for Ecommerce. We hope that these steps help your business and your e-commerce flourishes.

Author Bio:

Jenny Harrison is a passionate marketing and business blogger. She loves to engage with readers who are seeking B2B and B2C marketing related information on the internet. She is a featured blogger at various high authority blogs and magazines in which she shared her research and experience with the vast online community. Currently, she is associated with an Orlando based SEO Company ‘PNC Digital’. Follow her on twitter @MJennyHarrison for more updates.

 

Sep 14
0

Six Essential Link Building Tactics for Ecommerce Businesses

By | Marketing, SEO | One Comment

As an eCommerce business, your entire livelihood essentially relies upon the Internet. If you don’t attract visitors to your website you won’t make any sales, and if you don’t make any sales, you’ll quickly go out of business.

There are many different ways to attract people to your website, but one of the most fundamental is through search engines. Search engines are now the primary way we gather information, making it important that you rank highly within the search results. To do this, you need to focus on link building.

Link building is defined as “the process of exchanging links with other Web sites to increase your own site’s backlinks and quality backlinks.” Search engines place a large emphasis on the links to your web pages, so you need to be strategic in how you get them. Here are six tactics you can use to get started:

Work with Brand Influencers

One of the first things you can do is work with people who are popular across social media. We call these people Influencers. Today, most people, especially those in the younger generations, are not looking to be sold to in the traditional methods. They are less responsive to television ads or sales calls.

Instead, they want to see people they look up to and admire enjoying your product. Think of it like a celebrity endorsement, only in this case the celebrities are people who are popular on social media in particular niches.

For example, if you run a business that produces a skin care product, you could partner with someone who produces popular makeup tutorials online. You then pay them to promote your product links to their followers. If you don’t think you have the time to do all of this yourself, consider hiring a social media manager.

If this sounds like a strategy that might work for your business, you can learn more about using social media influencers from this guide.

Turn Customers into Ambassadors

Along the same lines of using influencers is to turn your current customers into brand ambassadors. Brand ambassadors are people who go out and talk about your product, trying to convince others to try it. However, unlike influencers you find on social media, brand ambassadors are people who have a passion for your product. These are the people who even if you weren’t offering a reward would talk about your product anyway.

There’s a lot that goes into starting a brand ambassador program for your business. If you’d like to find out more about the benefits and what it requires, you can check out this article. Once you have the program set up, you’ll have people who are passionate about your product sharing links to it all across the web.

Make Stuff that is Shareable

Next, you want to make it easy for people to share information about you online. There are several ways you can do this. You can create helpful infographics, produce tutorial videos, or write in-depth blog posts, among other things.

If the things you are creating have value, other people will want to share them with their family and friends. To make it easier for them, include links or buttons on each item you create that allows someone to share it directly to their social media accounts. Now not only are you getting your name out there, but you’re getting links back to your site.

Get as Many Reviews as You Can

Most people like to conduct research before they purchase a product. Once they see a product they think they might like, they’ll often head over to Google and search for reviews. By seeing what other people thought of the product they can better determine if they should make the purchase.

To that end, you’ll want to get your products and business reviewed online. When people type your business name or product names into a search engine, you want them to find reviews so that they feel more comfortable buying it.

There are several ways you can start getting reviews. When you launch a new product, provide some samples of leading blogs or YouTube channels in your niche. Create business listings on sites like Yelp and Google and ask your customers to leave feedback. Doing this will not only help people feel comfortable about your product, but it will provide useful links back to your website.

Form Partnerships

We’ve talked about working with people who are popular in your niche, but what about other businesses? Forming partnerships with other businesses can, in fact, earn you a lot of backlinks, if you do it right.

For starters, you don’t want to partner with businesses you are in direct competition with. This is counter-productive. Instead, find a business that operates within the same niche as you, but that doesn’t compete with you. Going back to our skin care example, you could partner with a business that sells hair products, for instance.

When you partner with this other business, you promote each others’ products. With this arrangement, you will gain more traffic from that other business’s website, and backlinks at the same time.

Work on Internal Links Too

Finally, link building isn’t only about getting outside links to your website. You’ll also want to focus on the internal links within your own website. Having a solid link structure in place will help your rankings within search engines, and make it easier for your customers to find their way around.

One easy thing you can do is promote similar products and guides on each product page. Amazon is a great example of this. Whenever you shop on Amazon, you see a list of related products on the product page. So even if you don’t want that particular product, you are directed to others you might have an interest in.

You can do the same thing on your website, either by adding the links in manually or using a plugin that displays similar products. This will hopefully help with not only your link building efforts but with customer retention as well. To learn more about optimizing your internal link structure, check out this guide.

Make Link Building a Priority for Your eCommerce Business

If you use some, or all, of the strategies above you, should find your website rising through the search engine ranks. However, keep in mind that link building is not a one-time activity. Your competition is likely to link building as well, so you have to keep on it, constantly looking for new places to get links or ways to reach your customers. Doing so will help your business grow and keep you ahead of your competition.

About the author:

Dave Schneider is the founder of LessChurn, churn reduction app. In 2012 he quit his job to travel the world and has visited over 65 countries. In his spare time, he writes about SaaS and business at DaveSchneider.me.

 

Sep 14
0

Hobbies Matter: How Side Projects Are Making You More Productive

By | Marketing | One Comment

When you’re having trouble maintaining your flow, engagement, and discipline in your job – just work more… right?

Well, it definitely seems like the recipe to work tirelessly (even more so when you hit an obvious productivity slump) is widely suggested and applied. But it is coming to light that this approach to work is actually what’s hurting our productivity in the first place.

The truth is that no matter whether you love your job or not, the “grit and grind” mindset is bound to get the better of you at some point. It’s unsustainable and conducive to burnout, which is a common issue in the workforce nowadays, especially among entrepreneurs. Most importantly, it goes against our innate need to engage and expand our minds with diverse tasks and challenges.

That’s why companies such as Google have applied the 80/20 rule, which encourages employees to work 80% of the time on the job they were hired for and use the other 20% to pursue personal projects that may contribute to the company in some way. Now, you likely don’t have this perk on your day job, but making time for hobbies and side projects outside of work can actually make you more productive in the long run, and here’s how.

Bringing something new to the table

Maybe you don’t consider yourself a creative person.  You’re wrong.

The thing is, creativity takes on different forms and can be approached from different angles. It’s about working the different parts of your brain, perceiving the world in different ways, and finding hidden connections between concepts. Once you make a point of doing this, you’ll find that creativity is found in everything we do.

Working on a personal project is bound to be different from the things you do at your job. It may be completely unrelated to your job or it may have some touching points, but either way, it will provide you with a creative outlet that gives you a different perspective. This fresh perspective and having to think from a different angle, along with having to develop a different set of skills, will prove beneficial to your job, even though you may not expect it.

Making up for what your job doesn’t give you

Even the most creative job such as facebook ads marketing can end up draining you mentally and becoming too repetitive or burdened with processing tasks. That’s only natural, because your job can’t really reflect all of your personal interests. And what makes us so disengaged and unmotivated in our jobs is very often that feeling that we’re not fulfilling our lives, not doing the things we deeply care about.

When you work on something that speaks to your personal interests and passions, you’ll have an outlet that makes up for what your job can’t provide you with. This makes you more fulfilled as a whole, creatively charged, and more ready to engage in your day job.

Maintaining the “flow state”

When you pursue something you genuinely care about, no matter what it is – a business idea, social work, crafting, learning a new skill, training for a marathon – you enter the so-called “flow state”, where you’re highly engaged and concentrated.

Psychologists recommend hobbies as a way to boost focus and problem-solving skills because the benefits they provide for your mind will extend beyond the time you spend doing them. In short, by immersing yourself in a personal project, you’ll simultaneously restore your energy and put your mind into motion. This will reflect on all the other aspects of your life, including your job, where you’ll be more mentally awake and energized for the tasks you’re given.

Improving self-efficacy

Self-efficacy is an important and slightly misunderstood concept in psychology. It has been defined by some experts as “the belief we have in our own abilities, specifically our ability to meet the challenges ahead of us and complete a task successfully”. Although it’s closely related to self-esteem and largely contributes to it, it’s a separate construct because it deals specifically with achieving goals and overcoming challenges, rather than being a general idea of self-worth.

How do hobbies and side projects relate to this?

Quite simply, immersing yourself in them will result in setting goals, overcoming challenges, and having to learn new things. These new things might be skills or even qualities such as patience or meticulousness. For example, if you pursue a hobby such as sewing, which may have absolutely no touching point with your job, you’ll inevitably be practicing patience, attention to detail, and precision.

Along with overcoming the challenges that your side project will bring, acquiring new skills and desirable qualities will help you develop this sense of self-efficacy. It’s an invaluable trait that makes you take pride in the things you do and helps you overcome the challenges in your work with zeal. It can also lead you to take on new challenges and pursue bigger goals, perhaps within your company or as an entrepreneur.

You’ve surely heard how some of the most successful companies and popular products are the result of side projects – Slack, Twitter, Udemy, just to name a few. Who knows, your side project could be the next big thing too, but don’t burden yourself with that idea. Pursue your passion without pressure and the benefits will inevitably follow, seeping into every aspect of your life to make you more creative, fulfilled, and productive.

Sep 12
0

Pocket-friendly Link Building Tactics That Provide Good Returns In Content Marketing

By | SEO | 4 Comments

Earning a link from some other website sends a signal to Google that someone has liked your site and has come forward to link with it. For Google, it is a recommendation for your site just like a vote that denotes the liking of the voter. The signal goes a long way in influencing search rankings and is the precise reason why link building is so important for SEO. It will not be wrong to say that link building had been and still is the backbone of SEO. Studies have revealed that there is clear proof of the direct relationship between the search ranking and the number of domains linking to a page. For search engines, when several domains link to your website, it shows how much reliable and valuable your site is to others. Naturally, the site qualifies for earning higher ranks.

Organic link building is most preferred, but you must adopt the correct link building strategies to achieve it.  If you are worried about the expenses involved in implementing link building strategies, then take heart from the fact that it will never cost you a fortune. Instead, the spending would be minimal if you can choose the strategy and tactics with some good thinking. To create cost-effective link building strategies, you have to be smart by keeping away from the traditional methods and have the courage to think out of the box. You will be surprised how much effect the strategies can be with optimal spending.  Here you will find some pocket-friendly link building strategies that you can try out.

Explore opportunities in broken links

Every website contains broken links that hold enough promise for using it to your advantage for earning links.  Make a list of sites in your industry niche that have a similar business profile as yours and scan these websites carefully to identify broken links. Surely, you would find some reasonable amount of broken links on each site. Since these links do not have any value to the website owners, you can approach them with a request to replace those links with a link from your website related to your services, content or resources. To identify broken links, you can use some tool that checks for broken links once you enter the URL and presents a list of broken links.

Collaborate with experts

Identify the experts in your field and build relationships with them so that they accept your offer to contribute content, whether it is article or post, for publishing on your website.  You need not spend any money but need good PR skills to convince the experts to collaborate with you.  As the experts exert ample authority in the field, they also have a good following, and you must reach out to the right people. The experts would be happy to contribute content as everyone wants to expand their popularity and make use of new opportunities of being heard. When you publish the article or post of the expert, his or her followers will start linking to it, and suddenly you find links flowing to your website from all directions.

Voice, the opinion of experts

The experts at San Francisco SEO Kotton Grammer Media suggests that interviewing industry experts and publishing it on your website is another method that helps to acquire links very quickly. Choose some topics related to your business that the target audience is interested in and create a series of interviews with established experts in the field. Firstly, your website earns the distinction of a reliable source of information, and secondly, links would start flowing in. The interview must revolve around some special insights, tips or some expert hacks that the audience is anticipating.  The interviews might become so valuable that you can even try to offer it to other publishers that open the gates for inviting more links. The principle of this type of link building is to create valuable resources that attract high-quality links.

Guest blogging

The method of guest blogging is similar to what you have done when inviting experts to publish content on your platform. The only difference is that the persons you approach to contribute content may or may not be experts but have the credentials of being the right influencers with an established band of followers. By scanning the links that you have already earned, you could identify the persons behind it and invite them to publish content on your website.

Similarly, you can also spread your outreach by making them agree to publish your content on their website. The mutual arrangement is highly beneficial for both parties as the number of links flowing to the sites keeps multiplying. Some amount of effort and PR skills is all that you need to succeed with this method.

List your website of Resource Pages

Many sites have a Resource Page that contains a list of other relevant resources and sites that could be useful for the audience. Identify some credible websites pertinent to your business that have such provision and connect with them to enlist your website on the Resource Page. Once you get your site listed, you not only get a link from that website, but it opens immense possibilities of earning more links when others click on your site on find it in the Resource Page.

Create reviews for products or services

Creating product reviews by authentic people who wield some authority is a great way to garner attention and acquire new links without any investment. Identify bloggers and other respected people in your field who regularly review products and services as well as influencers on the social media and request them to write reviews that you can publish and create a new avenue for earning links. To attract people to review your products, you can offer them some freebies or discounts that motivate them.

These strategies of link building should work well when you include it in your content marketing strategy, and the highest satisfaction is that you do not have to spend any money to get things done.