Powerful Technology & Marketing Solutions…For Small Businesses ONLY
Benjamin Elias from The Click Experts will be giving an instructional work shop for the Small Business Association (SBA) on 17 tips, tools and tricks for powerful marketing in today’s fast paced business world.
Benjamin Elias with Michael Gerber
Benjamin has consulted and absorbed the best practices from industries such as: technology, financial services, import/export, software platforms, manufacturing, healthcare, staffing, database agencies, food service and real estate. Are you looking for fresh ideas, practical information and proven strategies to grow your business and increase your profitability?
In order for a business to survive, it must have customers. In order to have customers it must sell a product or service that people want or need. Then it must find ways to reach out to those potential customers in order to convince them that their wants and needs can be satisfied by that particular business. In a competitive marketplace, where every business is reaching out to a finite universe of consumers, getting enough customers “in the door” not only requires excellence in the product or service being offered, but most certainly in the ways in which the business promotes itself and markets it product or service to the public.
Without marketing, a business may offer the best products or services in the industry, but none of its potential customers would know about it. Of course, not everyone will be interested in every product or service offered, which is why one of marketing’s functions is to research a company’s target audience – those consumers who are most likely to need and purchase what it is selling. This research includes paying attention to buying trends – what people are looking for – as well as investigating what one’s competitors are selling, how they are attempting to reach a similar target audience, and how they are pricing their offerings.
Another part of the marketing process involves promotion. Once the target audience is recognized, it must be informed about the value of purchasing from a particular company – the product or service’s features and benefits have to be communicated to the potential consumer artfully, engagingly, and consistently. Promotion can include advertising, direct selling, and public relations – all are ways in which a product or service is presented to the buyer. It is impossible to overestimate the importance of promotion – the best product in the world will sit on a warehouse shelf unless it is successfully promoted in the marketplace.
Yet another part of the marketing process involves post-consumer research. Not every type of promotion will work with every consumer. It’s important to gather feedback on each part of a marketing campaign in order to determine what is working and what isn’t. A lot of money can be wasted on promotional activities that don’t resonate, and, therefore, don’t do the job they’re supposed to do, which is bringing in customers.
Ultimately, the success of any company rests not only on the quality of its product or service, but on its reputation and name recognition in the marketplace. The reason that people will, for example, spend more money for a bottle of Advil, rather than generic ibuprofen, which is the exact same product, is because the former has built brand recognition and company trust over many years of marketing. No matter how great a product or service is, without marketing efforts, there will likely be no sales – and no sales means no company.
#1: Just as it’s true with a written blog post, or, indeed, any other form of advertising, content is king. That means that your YouTube video must tell an original and interesting story. People are simply not going to have much patience with a boring or conventional video. Engaging your audience is key, and it’s not always important for your content ideas to relate directly to your product or business. This is particularly true if you’re in an industry that’s hard to get people excited about. What sometimes is more important is linking your business with content that connects your product or service with a positive emotion. Think outside the box and remember to keep it interesting.
#2: While nobody expects your video to be Hollywood quality, it’s still important for it to be watchable. That means it must be clearly seen and heard. Make sure your camera is in focus and correctly aimed on the subject you are shooting. Also, be sure that your lighting is sufficient. In addition, understand that bad audio can tank your video within seconds. Even the most polished visuals will be wasted if the sound is too low, or there is too much interference or background noise. Viewers have come to expect a credible level of technical expertise. Don’t disappoint them.
#3: Make sure your video is find-able and that it reaches its intended audience. Focus on the title, the description, the tags, and the keywords. It’s important to remember that people who find your videos on YouTube are usually in the discovery stage of the buying process and not yet ready to make a purchase. For this reason, it’s important to choose keywords that are relevant to people who are looking for new information and to provide video content that educates them based on those keywords. Remember: the goal of your YouTube video is to warm up and qualify prospects. So, use your video as a call to action and make sure it’s easy for viewers to link back to your website, where you can continue the selling process.
#4: Sad to say, in most cases, one video, however brilliant, will usually not be enough. In other words: volume wins. Publishing consistently on a regular basis creates a “cadence” with your audience. Instead of stumbling on your videos, sometimes just by chance, they begin looking for your content and make a habit of checking your channel, looking for your next YouTube gem. And it’s this cadence that you ultimately want. The more times your loyal viewers come back, the better. The best advice for creating a content cadence is to set the tone from the beginning and let your audience know what to expect. Make your first video an introduction to what sort of content you will be publishing, and how often—and then whatever cadence you set for yourself, make sure you follow through. If you don’t, your audience will leave.
Regardless of the seemingly never-ending innovations in the world of online marketing, unique, high-quality content will continue to be the most important aspect of any campaign. However, there are some other interesting trends that the cognoscenti believe will dominate throughout 2017. They include:
• Augmented Reality – The popularity of Pokémon Go proves that enthusiasm for AR experiences is real. This year, more brands will be coming out with AR games and ads, and attempts to capitalize on the AR apps that already exist.
• Live Video Streaming – Thanks to faster internet speeds and the ubiquity of mobile devices, live video will be utilized by more and more brands and individuals.
• Data Visualization – The use of infographics will give marketers the ability to provide their target audiences with factual information via charts, graphs, animations, and other data visualization tools.
• Native Advertising – Advertising that eschews traditional formats and includes some editorial content such as a blog post or infographic helps marketers build trust and engagement.
• Niche Market Targeting – In order to break through the growing crowd of online marketing businesses, more brands will attempt to appeal to a narrower range of demographics with more specific topics.
• Immersive Experience – In addition to AR, virtual reality (VR), and formats such as 360 videos help make users experience “living in the moment.” The key is to provide some level of interaction in a way that makes people feel like they’re a part of something bigger.
• Wearable Technology – 2017 will see more smart devices such as the Apple iWatch, Google Glass, Moto 360, and other wearable devices that keep consumers connected to the digital world, all the time.
• User-Generated Content – Over the last few years, there has been a steady increase in the number of brands that use content created by consumers, sometimes called “personalized content experiences,” with their products featured in real-life situations. The trend will continue and grow.
• Dense Content – With attention spans continuing to fall, marketers are going to make sure that every word of every line of content, counts.
• Customer Service Chatbots – More chatbots will be employed in order to make customer service faster and more immediate.
• Social Messaging – Companies and brands will shift more and more to private social messaging apps, such as WhatsApp, which has over one billion users.
• Mobile Domination – Mobile will continue to outpace desktop as digital marketers experiment with more and more mobile searches, mobile payment methods, mobile apps, and mobile-only social applications to create brand value.
• Finally, search algorithms will change; and change again; and maybe even change again, proving that nothing ever stays the same in the SEO universe.
YouTube, the video-sharing website, was created in 2005, and since then has become one of the largest, most visited websites in the world. YouTube has massive traffic and viewers with over 1,325,000,000 people utilizing it for personal, educational, and commercial reasons. There are currently 300 hours of video uploaded to YouTube every minute of every day – that’s five hours of video content every second! 4,959,000,000 YouTube videos are viewed daily, and the total number of hours of video watched on YouTube each month is approximately 3.25 billion.
Today, YouTube is a critical marketing tool for any company in any industry. In fact, since its launch, the Top 100 Global Brands have published a total of 258,000 videos across 1,378 YouTube channels, attracting over 9.5 billion total views. What helps makes YouTube such an essential element of any marketing strategy is its ease of importing and uploading video content. With a simple flip camera, or even a mobile phone with video capabilities, basic videos can be created. And because of its easy-to-use format, messages on YouTube can spread quickly and efficiently across a variety of mediums including Facebook and Twitter, embedded in websites, and via email. In addition, the end user does not need a special viewer, such as Windows Media Play or Quick Time, to view a YouTube video.
Marketing experts agree that there is no simpler, more direct, and easily absorbed way to display information than through video content. 15 seconds of video can be more engaging and provide more observable information than an entire page of ads. And because consumers are no longer satisfied by physical ads or static marketing, and, more than ever, want interactive, aesthetic, and engaging material, YouTube video marketing, when used efficiently and intelligently, can help build trust and establish a company’s authority. Uploading video content, which contains a company’s views and ideas, provides an aura of expertise and influence. By uploading videos with tips and strategies, businesses can not only get attention, but also provide help and value to their customers.
Beyond viewing of the video, YouTube offers marketers several different ways to connect with their target audience. For example, viewers are able to leave feedback and comments on the videos. This allows viewers to interact not only with each other, but also with the company. This opens a line of communication between customers and company. Businesses are able to reply to comments, post questions, opinions, and engage with their viewers. This can have a remarkable impact on branding because new viewers will be able to see and read the back and forth communication between the business and other viewers. This humanizes the business, and makes them appear as approachable, professional, and helpful.
In order to maximize YouTube’s potential, the following best practices should be followed: • Produce video content as consistently as possible. The best-performing brands publish high volumes of content on a regular schedule.
• Learn and perfect YouTube’s architecture and SEO rules. The best-performing brands take more care in optimizing their videos and channels, and maintain more playlists and video tags.
• Videos do not need to be over-produced; content tends to be more important than video quality.
• Integrate YouTube videos with all other online marketing strategies. Facebook and Twitter are among the most important sources of traffic on YouTube.
• Apply branding consistently and methodically. Top performers brand their videos in both the video content itself as well as in metadata, which includes titles, tags, and descriptions.
Social media marketing is the use of social media platforms and websites to promote a product or service. Most social media platforms have their own built-in data analytics tools, which enable companies to track the progress, success, and engagement of their ad campaigns. Companies can address a range of stakeholders through social media marketing, including: current and potential customers, current and potential employees, journalists, bloggers, and the general public.
Social networking websites are based on building virtual communities that allow consumers to express their needs, wants, and values, online. Social media marketing then connects these consumers and audiences to businesses that share the same needs, wants, and values. Through social networking sites, companies can keep in touch with individual followers.
To this end, companies make use of platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram to reach a much wider audience than they can through the use of traditional print, TV, and radio advertisements alone, and at a fraction of the cost. In return, customers can now post reviews of products and services, rate customer service, and ask questions or voice concerns directly to companies through the same platforms. This has changed the ways that companies interact with customers, as a substantial percentage of consumer interactions are now being carried out over online platforms with much higher visibility.
In fact, today, over 80 percent of business executives define social media as important, and over 97 percent of all consumers search for local businesses, online. 25 percent of all mobile phone usage is dedicated to social networks, 75 percent of consumers say they rely on social media to influence their buying decisions, and 47 percent of Americans say that Facebook is their number one influencer of purchases.
Other commonly-used social media platforms include: Google+, LinkedIn, Whatsapp, Yelp, Foursquare, and YouTube. However, there are dozens of new social media platforms popping up all the time, as the use of social media marketing becomes more ubiquitous and sophisticated. Below are a few, lesser known platforms:
• Engagor – a comprehensive platform that helps businesses better engage with their customers in real time, by monitoring conversations about a brand or product across all major social networks, news websites, blogs, and forums.
• SocialCentiv – This self-serve platform lets users comb Twitter for potential customers using highly targeted metrics, such as those in their neighborhood or those seeking their specific product and services.
• HashAtIt.com – Dubbed as “The Social Search Engine,” HashAtIt.com collects status updates, tweets and other posts, allowing users to search for the most popular hashtags on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest — all in one place.
• Sparksfly – Sparksfly offers meaningful, targeted consumer engagement based on user-generated data.
• Sociota – Sociota is a social network management and monitoring platform offering the ability to integrate multiple Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Google+ accounts.
• Pushup Social – Pushup Social is a plug-in that lets businesses easily integrate a social network into their existing websites.
• HootSuite – With HootSuite, users can manage multiple social networks, schedule messages and tweets, analyze social media traffic, track conversions, and measure campaign results — all in one user-friendly dashboard.
• LeadSift – LeadSift mines millions of social media conversations, cutting through the noise to deliver relevant, quality leads based on metrics set by users, such as geographic information and keywords.
• SnapRetail – SnapRetail turns the average small business owner into a social media marketing powerhouse with ready-to-use social media content. The service offers a library with thousands of customizable, prewritten social media posts to choose from, eliminating the difficulty of crafting attention-grabbing updates.
Ecommerce continues to grow and competition will ramp up, as well, in 2017. This means that customers will be harder to win, easier to lose, and fussier on price and user experience. The low barriers to entry and the fact that consumers can switch from brand to brand with the touch of a button, means that those who fall behind when it comes to customer experience and pricing strategy will lose out. So, the savvy online marketer will have to keep up with the latest trends in order to stay ahead of the pack.
Here are some tips for online marketing in 2017:
Influencers are becoming increasingly important because they are considered credible and, unlike classic advertising, their opinion is trusted. To be successful in 2017, you will need to cooperate with bloggers, YouTubers, etc., and win them over with your products and services.
Just as influencers need be enlisted, so must users. Users who are convinced of something are an ideal marketing instrument because they transfer their conviction to the wider market.
Customers will have to be better informed and more inspired; it’s no longer enough just to offer products that are accompanied by a description. Shoppers want more. Products must be accompanied with ancillary information and collateral subject matter. The inspiring and informative incorporation of products and services into offers will influence purchase decisions and increase visitor numbers in 2017.
Chatbots are small programs that function like a real chat partner. For this reason FAQs can be found on practically every internet site. But clicking through a long list of questions is often frustrating. Chatbots can perform these tasks considerably better. The user can ask his questions and the software answers interactively. Interested parties as well as customers arrive at their answers quickly, and receive the desired assistance in short order. So Chatbots will make customer service and customers’ lives easier in the year 2017.
Live video is becoming increasingly important. With live streaming, the interested party feels more connected to what is shown. It’s an especially powerful tool to introduce a new product or service.
Old SEO tactics are becoming outmoded. For example, beginning in January, advertising that customers are unable to bypass will be used as a criterion by Google to rank a site lower. So in addition to inspiring content in order to rank high, websites will have to put the user first. Say goodbye to annoying pop-ups.
Native advertising is gaining importance. This includes articles in blogs, portals etc. that have not been created by an editorial team, but by an advertising agency or a company’s marketing department. Good native advertising is characterized by high-quality content. The reader is encouraged to read the article, although it is still advertising. (Native advertising should always be identified as such; otherwise blogs and advertisers are gambling with their credibility.)
Virtual reality and augmented reality will make completely different marketing measures possible in 2017. They allow the user to be involved, and not just to stare at a screen.
Platform as a Service is now one of the hottest trends in ecommerce. Just look at the incredible success of Platform as a Service businesses like Uber, Spotify, and AirBnB. The smart online marketer should consider selling anything that is used or consumed regularly via a subscription model. The high disposable incomes of today’s Millennials means plenty of cash for subscriptions, but their low wealth means there is never much in the bank for big one-off purchases. So, there really has never been a better time to sell your product via a subscription model.
Mobile devices now make up over half of all web traffic and continue to grow in importance. However, mobile (phone and tablet), while accounting for 59 percent of all sessions by device on ecommerce sites, count for just 38 percent of revenue. In 2017, the smart online marketer will understand that mobile is king for research, but desktop is still where consumers do their buying.
Salesforce.com is a cloud computing company headquartered in San Francisco, California, with regional headquarters in Morges, Switzerland, India, and Tokyo. The company was founded in 1999 by former Oracle executive, Marc Benioff, and his partners, Parker Harris, Dave Moellenhoff, and Frank Dominguez. The company specializes in SaaS – Software as a Service – a licensing and delivery model in which software is licensed on a subscription basis and is centrally hosted.
In June 2004 the company’s initial public offering was listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the stock symbol CRM and raised $110 million. Today, Salesforce is one of the most highly-valued, American cloud computing companies with a market capitalization above $55 billon. It has nearly 20,000 employees and revenues of $7 billion per year. Salesforce.com has its services translated into 16 different languages and has over 2.1 million subscribers.
Salesforce’s main product is a CRM (Client Relationship Management) system that helps companies automate such tasks as customer information, contact and case management, communication tracking and scheduling, and sales opportunities and forecasting. It gathers, organizes and disseminates everything there is to know about which products are selling, which customers are buying, and how the sales force is performing. With all of a business’s information on customers, prospects, and leads stored on a single online platform, everyone in the company has access to the latest information.
And because Salesforce is in the cloud, it can grow and scale as needed. It’s full-on CRM product starts at $65 per user per month and the most expensive version goes for $300. Features can be added without adding costly infrastructure and upgrades are instantly implemented as soon as they’re available, without disruption. Salesforce’s CRM system is fully mobile, so that data is available on any connected device, at any time – desktops, laptops, tablets, and smart phones. In addition, its common platform works across all channels, including social, Web, email, and customer call centers.
Salesforce.org is the philanthropic arm of Salesforce.com. Salesforce.org donates one percent of the company’s resources (defined as profit, equity, and employee time) to support organizations that are working to “make the world a better place. Salesforce.org provides a full-featured, ten-seat user license available to nearly all United States 501c3 non-profit organizations or overseas equivalents. Additional licenses are deeply discounted for public interest groups. As of March 2014, Salesforce.org supported 20,000+ higher education and non-profit customers, and has donated $53+ million in grants. In addition, as of July 2015, Salesforce employees have collectively donated more than 1,000,000 hours in volunteer labor to thousands of charitable organizations worldwide.
These days, more than ever, it’s not enough just to be good at your business – you have to know how reach your customers and potential customers where they live. And, today, more and more of them are living online. So, if they can’t find you on their computers, tablets, and smart phones, then you are probably losing them to your competition. Here are some tips that will help them find you when they look:
1.You must have a professional looking website that is highly functional and easy to navigate. If your customers can’t get the information they are seeking within seconds, they will hit the back button and go looking somewhere else. Make sure that your website meets current usability standards and that it is optimized for use on a mobile phone; that the information is correct and up-to-date; and that it is easy for a potential customer to do business with you.
2. Concentrate on your local market as most consumers still prefer to do business with those nearby. Search engines like Google, Yahoo!, and Bing provide business owners with a free way to get businesses listed ahead of all the search results via their default map systems.
3. Get listed on review sites. People want to know that others have done business with you and have had positive experiences.
4. Attract buyers by blogging. Blogging not only elevates your professional profile, it can help raise your company website to the top of the search engines pages.
5. Use social media. People buy into you before they buy from you. Social media lets you connect with potential customers without coming on too hard as a salesperson. By having an open, interesting dialog with people who may be interested in your goods or services, you stay in their minds. Then, when they are ready to buy, they are more likely to remember you.
6. Use online press releases. Think about all the new and interesting things going on in your business and write an article about them. Embed a few links back to your website, and send the release to the most appropriate online press release services.
7. Shoot a video and upload it to YouTube, or any of the other video sharing sites, and be sure to link it directly to your website. Then promote the video with social media to increase your online presence.
8. Send out regular email newsletters to current customers and anyone else who has contacted you in one way or another. By sending out fresh, new content on a regular basis, you’re reminding your customers that you’re still out there.
9. Content is still king. Create useful content and give it away free to your customers on your website. There are many types of online content: white papers, articles, reports, case studies, and webinars, for example. In addition, the more useful and original your content, the higher your site will rank on search engines.
10. If your budget allows, pay for online ads with Google Adwords and/or Bing Adwords. Paid placement will get your business on the front page of their search engines when customers are surfing the web. Get some professional advice, though, before you spend a dime. Doing it right can help your business thrive; doing it wrong can wreck your bottom line.
Remember the old conundrum: If a tree falls in the forest and there’s nobody there to hear it, does it make a sound? Well, if your customers are looking for you, but can’t find you, can you really do business with them?
Search engine marketing has become an integral part of a business’s online strategy, and paid search is one of the top sources for driving traffic to a company’s website. In fact, PPC (pay-per-click) advertising provides the highest ROI (return on investment) of any type of online marketing scheme.
The two main search engine platforms for PPC campaigns are Google AdWords and the Yahoo! Bing Network. Each one has its pluses and minuses and depending on a business’s market, budget, competition, etc. one may be a more viable solution that the other.
Google AdWords is the leading search engine with 67 percent of the market share. It consists of two networks: Google Search Network and Google Search Partners. Google AdWords is generally considered an easier platform to manage; it’s user-friendly, has a high search volume, and more advertising extensions than Bing. It’s better for medium or low competition markets with a clear advertising strategy and flexible budget.
Like Google, Bing also allows businesses to advertise through two different networks: Bing Search Network and Bing Content Network. Bing Ads has less competition than Google and its CPC (cost-per-click) are 50-70 percent cheaper; its impressions are 90 percent cheaper, as well. With Bing Ads, small businesses can easily rank higher while getting increased ad exposure, despite relatively small marketing budgets. So if cost and high competition levels are major factors in a company’s advertising budget, then Bing could be a better choice, resulting in low cost-per-acquisitions.
In addition, Bing allows a business to assign different campaigns, different time zones – Google does not. Bing also has a very helpful customer service department willing to help small companies that spend at least $500 per month, whereas Google’s ante for good customer service is $500,000 per year.
So, for a more user-friendly platform with high search volume, Google AdWords is often a better choice. Bing prevails for high competition, low-budget startups. For businesses that have the budget and ability, working with both platforms gives them the best of both worlds.
1-844-47-Click (1-844-472-5425)
