What are your customers doing online? The answer is most likely social media, according to a new survey from Experian Marketing Services, which also showed five minutes of every hour is spent on shopping. A great deal of this social networking and shopping is happening on consumers’ mobile devices, which brings up the question, how are your online marketing efforts doing? Is your business well-represented on local search sites? How does your website look on a smartphone? Are you using social media to announce new products, promote daily specials and communicate with your customer? The truth is there’s probably more you could be doing, so make it a point to find out what you don’t know about online marketing and get your business on the right track.
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Posts Tagged ‘online marketing’
10 Online Marketing Mistakes That Are Damaging Your Reputation, Part 1
April 15th, 2013 :: Monika Jansen
The online reputation you have can make or break your brand. You can only physically be in one place at a time, but online, you are in several places at once and accessible 24/7. Your website, blog, downloadable content, social media accounts – they are always “on” and ready to make a good first impression – or are they?
Here are the first 5 (out of 10) common online marketing mistakes that, if you’re making them, are damaging your reputation:
1 – Not updating or maintaining your website
Because your website is your digital calling card, it is incredibly important to make a strong first impression. Keep your website fresh with new information – new projects, clients, testimonials, press mentions, maybe a Twitter feed.
Web design and development best practices and must-have elements have changed a lot in the past couple of years. If your website includes Flash or is more than a few years old, consider having it redesigned.
2 – Using auto-play video
If you have a video on your website that automatically plays as soon as someone lands on your site (or Web page), for the love of all that is good in the marketing world, please turn it off. It is annoying, and it definitely will not win you any friends.
3 – Neglecting your social presence
Once you start a blog and make your presence known on Facebook, Twitter, etc., don’t stop. The whole point of “going social” is to be social – to have conversations, answer questions, help solve problems, provide resources, and ultimately build a community. You can’t build something by taking frequent and extended vacations.
4 – Over-communicating
This can be interpreted in two ways: sharing too much, and sharing too often.
By sharing too much, I mean sharing personal information that is totally irrelevant and inappropriate or sharing professional information that is angry in nature (like complaining about a bad client).
By sharing too often, I mean posting company-focused news/updates on Facebook and Twitter more than once a day. I have noticed that a social media marketing professional whose brand I “like” on Facebook does this every day – she sends out at least 3 posts on Facebook back-to-back every evening. Hello, un-follow button!
5 – Over-automating social media
When Twitter was first adapted by the business community, it was popular to auto-send a Direct Message to new followers. Amazingly enough, people and brands still do that, even though the practice is highly frowned upon. Do you automate your phone calls to your spouse, mom, or kids? Of course not – you’re not a robot. Well, you shouldn’t do it to your social media followers either.
Do you see these mistakes being made? Which one bugs you the most – and why?
Image courtesy of timelineimages.com
Google+The Online Marketing Project: How to Improve Your Online Presence One Step at a Time – Part 1
April 1st, 2013 :: Monika Jansen
If you’re familiar with the book (and blog) The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin, the title of this blog post series might sound familiar. In the book, Rubin works on improving a different part of her life one month at a time and offers suggestions on how to do it yourself at the end.
The Happiness Project is the inspiration for this 4-part blog post series. Because it is so much easier to reach your goals in small, doable steps, I broke down the elements of what goes into a comprehensive online marketing strategy. I don’t know if it will make you happier, but my plan will certainly make online marketing easier to put your arms around. Let’s get started!
Step 1: Audit Your Website
Because the foundation of your online presence is your website, that’s where we’re starting:
- Look at your Google Analytics data – What keywords are you being found for? Where is your traffic coming from? What pages are visitors spending time on?
- Update your website – Add new information and remove anything that is outdated. Bulk up the pages visitors spend the most time on and remove any that get no traffic.
- Proof your website – Check that all links work, spelling and grammar are correct, and the keywords you are being found for are being used throughout the site.
- Optimize your website – Work with a search engine optimization expert (ask your web developer for recommendations) to ensure your site is properly optimized. Set up a maintenance schedule with the SEO person to make sure your site keeps up with changes in technology and search engine algorithms.
Step 2: Build a Mobile Site
Thanks to the increasing use of mobile devices to access and shop on the Internet, now is the time to put together a great mobile site:
- Prioritize content – Because mobile sites have smaller screens, you want to add only the content that is most relevant to a mobile user, like hours of operation, location (with a map!), a brief overview of products and services, and contact info.
- Streamline navigation – To cut down on scrolling or tapping, make sure the developer keeps navigation super simple.
- Make contact info actionable – If you add an email address or phone number, a user should be able to tap on it and instantly connect with their email or phone functions.
Step 3: Start Listening
Now that your website and mobile sites are in good shape, time to find out what your customers and target market care about:
- Set up Google Alerts – Find out what people are saying about your business, industry, products, and services by setting up Google Alerts using relevant keywords.
- Follow trends on Twitter – If you are active on Twitter, trending topics are automatically customized for you based on who you follow. You can find them in the left-hand column.
- Ask your customers – Sometimes the most obvious solution is the simplest. Ask your customers what they care about on Facebook or with a survey. To increase the amount of feedback you get, offer a freebie.
In my next post, we’ll look at editorial calendars, social media, and blogging, but til then, what aspect of marketing do you most want to improve?
Image by Flickr user fra-NCIS (Creative Commons)
Google+The Future of Online Retailing
April 1st, 2013 :: Rieva Lesonsky
By Rieva Lesonsky
Spurred by the rapid adoption of mobile devices like tablets and smartphones, as well as by major retailers’ investment in their websites, ecommerce sales in the U.S. are projected to rise from $231 billion last year to $262 billion this year—an increase of 13 percent–according to the latest forecasts from market research firm Forrester. Three product categories account for one-third of that total: apparel and accessories, consumer electronics and computer hardware.
Ecommerce currently accounts for some 8 percent of overall U.S. retail sales (or 11 percent, if grocery sales are excluded). Growth in online retail sales is projected to outpace the growth of traditional retail sales in the next five years. By 2017, total ecommerce sales in the U.S. should hit $370 billion.
Forrester says the increased use of smartphones and tablets is a major factor powering ecommerce growth. With over 50 percent of U.S. online users owning smartphones, many smartphone owners use any spare moment to go online. As a result, people are spending more time overall online than they would if they had to go to their PC or laptop to shop—and that means more browsing, shopping and purchasing.
Another driver behind ecommerce growth is that major retailers are rapidly making investments in their ecommerce divisions in order to better integrate their in-store and online shopping experiences. Even customers who head to a brick-and-mortar store now often end up buying merchandise online within the store, or using smartphones to find the same products elsewhere and order them online.
Surprisingly, new shoppers coming online for the first time are not a major factor in the growth of ecommerce. Just 4 million people are projected to buy online for the first time this year. Instead, growth is coming because people who are already comfortable with online shopping are now spending more money online, ordering more often, and buying a wider range of products from a variety of sites. Forrester says online shoppers typically become comfortable with ecommerce by purchasing low-risk items such as downloadable music or movies. Only then do they move up to more expensive purchases such as appliances or home furnishings.
Forrester’s report has some more good news, not just for ecommerce vendors but also for the economy as a whole: Ecommerce companies are powering employment growth. Currently, Forrester says, U.S. ecommerce businesses employ over 400,000 people, and that figure is expected to hit 500,000 by 2017.
Image by Flickr user Mosman Council (Creative Commons)
Google+Cross-Channel Marketing: How the Nation’s Top Retailers Do It
December 31st, 2012 :: Rieva LesonskyBy Rieva Lesonsky
Are you a brick-and-mortar retailer who also has a website to sell your products? Wouldn’t it be great if you could get more customers shopping at both your physical store and your website? You can. Just learn a lesson from what some of the nation’s most successful retailers are doing to market their products in multiple channels.
Internet Retailer recently examined the habits of some of the nation’s top retail chains and here are the most common tactics they found:
Promote in-store only discounts or deals on your website or via email marketing. For instance, you can email a coupon good only in your store (but include links to your website so customers can shop both ways).
Offer online ordering with in-store pickup. This appeals to customers who are in a rush to get the product or don’t want to pay for shipping. More retailers are offering shorter time frames for in-store pickup, such as Staples, which promises to have shoppers’ orders ready in two hours. If you make such a promise, be sure you have the manpower to fulfill it.
Offer online ordering and in-store payment. Some consumers still don’t feel comfortable using credit cards online or prefer to pay in person for other reasons. You can attract those users by enabling them to reserve a product online, then pick it up and pay in-store.
Do a subtle upsell. Apple, for instance, urges customers to shop online but then come into a store to pick up the product and get “personal assistance.” If your product, like Apple’s, is one where customers could benefit from additional assistance, this approach can get them to come in and spend more in-store than they might have online.
If you’re offering the pickup or pay-in-store option, make sure the area where customers go to pick up their products is merchandised attractively. For example, you could display items related to commonly ordered products (such as cords or accessories if you sell electronics) or impulse buys such as gift wrap or small-ticket items.
Make sure your website has multiple ways for users to find your physical store/s, such as a map and directions, address, and a phone number to contact you. Also make certain that information about days and hours you’re open is prominently displayed.
Increasingly, consumers expect a seamless experience that allows them to shop how and when they want, so make sure your website encourages shopping in any possible sales channel.
Image by Flickr user Jamison_Judd (Creative Commons)
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The Online Marketing Habits of Highly Successful Small Businesses
December 10th, 2012 :: Rieva LesonskyBy Rieva Lesonsky
How can your small business reach the elite group of high-achieving small companies? Online marketing is the key, suggests a new Forrester research study commissioned by Act-On Software. In the face of continuing economic uncertainty, the study, “Driving Revenue in a Volatile Economy, found that the top-performing small businesses are those that truly embrace online marketing.
The study identified these lessons small businesses can take from top performers and large companies:
- Don’t automatically cut your marketing budget in a down economy. Top performers were less likely than bottom performers to cut their marketing budgets (33 percent vs. 56 percent). On the contrary, top performers prove that maintaining or increasing marketing spending does pay off in terms of revenues.
- Take lead generation seriously. The top-performing small businesses carefully manage sales leads, vetting, qualifying and nurturing them before handing them off to sales to close. They were also willing to spend more to get new leads, while bottom performers spent their time and money trying to squeeze new sales from existing customers.
- Adopt digital marketing techniques. All small businesses in the study focused primarily on traditional marketing techniques, such as print advertising, tradeshows, events and seminars. However, top performing businesses were more likely to have adopted digital marketing tactics and technology tools to help scale their marketing efforts.
- Get serious about social marketing. While larger businesses are realizing that “social media” is not just an abstract tool for generating buzz, small businesses are lagging behind in developing a social media strategy and making social media part of the sales pipeline.
- Increase collaboration between sales and marketing. By working together, these teams can drive leads more effectively and close more sales.
- Invest in marketing automation. Companies that automated marketing functions had better results. For example, 61 percent of top performers used CRM vs. just 46 percent of bottom performers. And only 5 percent of bottom performers used marketing automation, compared to 28 percent of top performers.
- Measure results. Nearly half of the bottom performing businesses did not measure any aspect of their marketing. In contrast, top performers measured everything.
Visit Act-On’s website for a free ebook, 7 Marketing Habits of Today’s Highly Successful SMBs.
Image by Flickr user ganesha.isis (Creative Commons)
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