Archives for November 2015
Search Engine Marketing | It is not about you, it is about your persona
Most old-school and even modern marketing practices, require your audience to be redirected or bothered to engage with your content – to be redirected. An email is received with a call to action that requires a click. An SMS broadcast needs a response. Social media posting is often used to drive traffic to a site. TV commercials have the same affect. The roadside billboard takes your eyes off the road. These forms of marketing require you to bother or interrupt your audience.
Most marketing fails to be targeted. Most marketing is a broad net cast among the masses trying to land a prospect. Email marketers tend to want a big list. they constantly ask, “How big is your list?” Like that's a viable tactic. Put up a billboard, and your concern is “drive by traffic counts”. Sponsor an event and the marketer wants to know “expected attendance”. Yes – marketing seems rude – it loves to interrupt and demand attention – “hey, look at me!”
Search engine marketing, unlike almost any other form or marketing, takes a potential audience down the path they desire. It is not annoying and when you nail it, it is increasingly effective. Unlike that banner ad that gets in the way.
A marketer's dream is for their audience to actually find content they want to see.
While vacationing in Maine, I searched for “Top Ten restaurants in Portland that locals love”. You know what I found at the top of the Google search? Exactly what I was looking for. Somebody keeps a list, with the article title and copy using that exact phrase. As if they knew I was coming to Portland. The restaurant we chose, we loved so much we ate there twice. I high-fived the chef. A very smart marketer, with just the right information on a blog post, scored big for that restaurant.
Internet marketing, or online marketing, refers to advertising and marketing efforts that use the Web and email to drive direct sales via electronic commerce, in addition to sales leads from Web sites or emails. Internet marketing and online advertising efforts are typically used in conjunction with traditional types of advertising like radio, television, newspapers and magazines. ~ webopedia
Search engine marketing, like no other marketing, brings an audience to you – the exact audience you want. Easier said than done? Of course it is.
If you follow our blog or attend our live Infusionsoft User Group meetings, you've heard about the importance of a rigidly defined buyer persona, understanding that buyer's pain or problem. You have been told to produce content that talks about the problems your avatar has- you have written this content using the words and phrases your buyer person actually uses. You have re-purposed this content into blogs, videos, pages or paragraphs in your web site and your web sites FAQ's, podcasts and yes even your live event speech.
Guess what – you have the foundation for a great search engine marketing program!
However, even great content can benefit from laser guided enhancements. Those enhancements mean revising your existing content and writing future content based upon what your buyer persona looks for. A well crafted blog is not like an article in a magazine. The magazine already has the person captured. Your blog has to find the person searching for what is in it.
First, let's make sure we understand some terminology. Understanding the difference here can save you a bundle of money later.
- What is SEM? Search engine marketing (SEM) is a form of Internet marketing that involves the promotion of websites by increasing their visibility in search engine results pages (SERPs) primarily through paid advertising.
- What is SEO? Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine's unpaid results – often referred to as “natural,” “organic,” or “earned” results.
- What is PPC? Pay per click (PPC), also called cost per click, is an internet advertising model used to direct traffic to websites, in which advertisers pay the publisher (typically a website owner or a host of website) when the ad is clicked. It is defined simply as “the amount spent to get an advertisement clicked.”
- What is search advertising? In Internet Marketing, Search Advertising is a method of placing online advertisements on web pages that show results from search engine queries. Through the same search–engine advertising services, ads can also be placed on Web pages with other published.
It is my experience that most organizations fail with their search engine marketing programs, because they optimize for keywords and phrases that are not specific enough or that their buyer persona does not tend to use. If you are a chiropractor, you probably use the activator method for back pain. However, your patient does not search Google for relief using the activator method. They do not call your treatment, spinal manipulation either. What do your patients search for? You better know exactly what they search for!
Success from search engine marketing comes from driving buyers directly to the content resource they are looking for. It does not come from optimizing for small keywords. What is the difference? The difference is like fishing with dynamite or a well crafted presentation at the end of your line. Crafting specific search terms that your audience actually uses is the long tail of search engine optimization. Your product name, your company name, your URL should all align with the search term your buyer persona uses.
Obviously this takes a great deal of research. You have to know your audience – and not from your perspective – but from how they ‘speak' when they look for what you offer.
What is the end result? When your buyer persona searches for the long tail phrase you have built content around, they find you in their search. With one click they hit your content – most importantly they feel like they have ‘found it'! You've instantly got their attention and you did not interrupt them.
Curate and cultivate your content carefully and your marketing assets will serve your audience for years to come. Organic traffic – free hits to your site because you gave a great deal of thought to what you produced.
Copyright 2015 Viral Solutions LLC
by Thomas von Ahn | Chief Elephant Slayer
We help overwhelmed small business owners duplicate themselves – so business can be fun again.
Viral Solutions LLC is a Digital Marketer Certified Partner, an Infusionsoft Certified Consultant, a Google Partner – Certified in AdWords and a Mobit Certified Partner.
Search Engine Marketing | It is not about you, it is about your persona
Most old-school and even modern marketing practices, require your audience to be redirected or bothered to engage with your content – to be redirected. An email is received with a call to action that requires a click. An SMS broadcast needs a response. Social media posting is often used to drive traffic to a site. TV commercials have the same affect. The roadside billboard takes your eyes off the road. These forms of marketing require you to bother or interrupt your audience.
Most marketing fails to be targeted. Most marketing is a broad net cast among the masses trying to land a prospect. Email marketers tend to want a big list. they constantly ask, “How big is your list?” Like that's a viable tactic. Put up a billboard, and your concern is “drive by traffic counts”. Sponsor an event and the marketer wants to know “expected attendance”. Yes – marketing seems rude – it loves to interrupt and demand attention – “hey, look at me!”
Search engine marketing, unlike almost any other form or marketing, takes a potential audience down the path they desire. It is not annoying and when you nail it, it is increasingly effective. Unlike that banner ad that gets in the way.
A marketer's dream is for their audience to actually find content they want to see.
While vacationing in Maine, I searched for “Top Ten restaurants in Portland that locals love”. You know what I found at the top of the Google search? Exactly what I was looking for. Somebody keeps a list, with the article title and copy using that exact phrase. As if they knew I was coming to Portland. The restaurant we chose, we loved so much we ate there twice. I high-fived the chef. A very smart marketer, with just the right information on a blog post, scored big for that restaurant.
Internet marketing, or online marketing, refers to advertising and marketing efforts that use the Web and email to drive direct sales via electronic commerce, in addition to sales leads from Web sites or emails. Internet marketing and online advertising efforts are typically used in conjunction with traditional types of advertising like radio, television, newspapers and magazines. ~ webopedia
Search engine marketing, like no other marketing, brings an audience to you – the exact audience you want. Easier said than done? Of course it is.
If you follow our blog or attend our live Infusionsoft User Group meetings, you've heard about the importance of a rigidly defined buyer persona, understanding that buyer's pain or problem. You have been told to produce content that talks about the problems your avatar has- you have written this content using the words and phrases your buyer person actually uses. You have re-purposed this content into blogs, videos, pages or paragraphs in your web site and your web sites FAQ's, podcasts and yes even your live event speech.
Guess what – you have the foundation for a great search engine marketing program!
However, even great content can benefit from laser guided enhancements. Those enhancements mean revising your existing content and writing future content based upon what your buyer persona looks for. A well crafted blog is not like an article in a magazine. The magazine already has the person captured. Your blog has to find the person searching for what is in it.
First, let's make sure we understand some terminology. Understanding the difference here can save you a bundle of money later.
- What is SEM? Search engine marketing (SEM) is a form of Internet marketing that involves the promotion of websites by increasing their visibility in search engine results pages (SERPs) primarily through paid advertising.
- What is SEO? Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine's unpaid results – often referred to as “natural,” “organic,” or “earned” results.
- What is PPC? Pay per click (PPC), also called cost per click, is an internet advertising model used to direct traffic to websites, in which advertisers pay the publisher (typically a website owner or a host of website) when the ad is clicked. It is defined simply as “the amount spent to get an advertisement clicked.”
- What is search advertising? In Internet Marketing, Search Advertising is a method of placing online advertisements on web pages that show results from search engine queries. Through the same search–engine advertising services, ads can also be placed on Web pages with other published.
It is my experience that most organizations fail with their search engine marketing programs, because they optimize for keywords and phrases that are not specific enough or that their buyer persona does not tend to use. If you are a chiropractor, you probably use the activator method for back pain. However, your patient does not search Google for relief using the activator method. They do not call your treatment, spinal manipulation either. What do your patients search for? You better know exactly what they search for!
Success from search engine marketing comes from driving buyers directly to the content resource they are looking for. It does not come from optimizing for small keywords. What is the difference? The difference is like fishing with dynamite or a well crafted presentation at the end of your line. Crafting specific search terms that your audience actually uses is the long tail of search engine optimization. Your product name, your company name, your URL should all align with the search term your buyer persona uses.
Obviously this takes a great deal of research. You have to know your audience – and not from your perspective – but from how they ‘speak' when they look for what you offer.
What is the end result? When your buyer persona searches for the long tail phrase you have built content around, they find you in their search. With one click they hit your content – most importantly they feel like they have ‘found it'! You've instantly got their attention and you did not interrupt them.
Curate and cultivate your content carefully and your marketing assets will serve your audience for years to come. Organic traffic – free hits to your site because you gave a great deal of thought to what you produced.
Copyright 2015 Viral Solutions LLC
by Thomas von Ahn | Chief Elephant Slayer
We help overwhelmed small business owners duplicate themselves – so business can be fun again.
Viral Solutions LLC is a Digital Marketer Certified Partner, an Infusionsoft Certified Consultant, a Google Partner – Certified in AdWords and a Mobit Certified Partner.
How to Set Up Effective Facebook Advertisements
Facebook can be a powerful marketing tool if businesses know how to use it to its maximum potential. Moving from free page posts to premium Facebook Ads can help expose your business to Facebook’s 700 million daily users.
Make sure your Facebook advertising investment is worthwhile with these tips for effective Facebook ads.
Create video content
Video content is much more engaging than pictures, and certainly more than plain text. Facebook is prioritizing video content both from advertisers and users, evidenced by their new autoplay feature. Video ads may help boost your exposure from the site. Not sure where to start on video content? Create film responses to your FAQs. Show potential customers what problems your product or service solves and how it works. Keep videos short – try to stay under 30 seconds.
Facebook advertising has turned into a necessary skill set for many digital marketers. It’s the largest social network in the world, and the amount of data they’ve acquired about their user base is nothing short of remarkable. As a result, Facebook has been a game changer for many small businesses. tristan tan / Shutterstock.com
Add the Facebook pixel to posts
Facebook offers a unique tool that allows you to track a specific goal, like sales conversions or site registrations. To unlock Facebook pixel, copy the Facebook-generated HTML code (found under the Facebook Pixel tab in Ad Manager), and paste it into to all of your webpages. You then select an objective in ad creation, select ‘Increase conversions on your website,’ and choose a specific conversion goal, like making a purchase. Facebook then tracks how often your ad led to a conversion, letting you know your ad’s value.
Create Facebook custom audiences
Custom Audiences let you reach customers you already know with ads on Facebook. You can upload a list of email addresses or phone numbers of at least 20 people and Facebook will deliver your ad to those people if they're on Facebook. You can also build audiences from the people that visit your website or from people who use your mobile app. Then expand those audiences with Lookalike Audiences. Lookalike Audiences are a way to reach new people who are likely to be interested in your business because they're similar to customers you care about. When you use Custom Audiences, you can choose to create a Lookalike Audience that targets people who are similar to one of your Custom Audience lists. Lookalike Audiences help you reach people who are similar to your current customers for fan acquisition, website registration, off-Facebook purchases, coupon claims and brand awareness.
Target your audiences even further
This is the process of defining an audience for your ads. In the audience section of ad creation or Power Editor, you can choose to target people based on their interests. Interests may include things people share on their Timelines, apps they use, Pages they like and other activities on and off of Facebook. Interests may also factor in demographics such as age, gender and location. For example, if you're a yoga studio in San Francisco, you may select interests that are more broad, like “Fitness and wellness” as well as very specific interests related to Yoga, like “Bikram Yoga.”
Use custom links to track metrics
If you have a Google Analytics profile for your website (and you should), you can use its capabilities to track which pages are looked at most, and which sites are referring visitors. Take advantage of these features by creating custom URLs to insert into your ads. Shrink the URLs with a service like Google URL Shortener or Bitly to make them easier to insert in posts. Then, track which links produce the most traffic and which are more likely to lead to purchases. There’s a large amount of learning potential: you can use this method to test ad copy, determine whether video or photo is more effective, find out whether or Facebook or Twitter leads to more conversions.
Contact us today at Viral Solutions for more social media marketing tips and tricks.
Copyright 2015 Viral Solutions LLC
We help overwhelmed small business owners duplicate themselves – so business can be fun again
Viral Solutions LLC is a Digital Marketer Certified Partner, an Infusionsoft Certified Consultant, a Google Partner – Certified in AdWords and a Mobit Certified Partner.
How to Build Better Customer Relationships through Twitter
Twitter is a do-it-all tool that can help companies with their marketing, sales and customer service. More importantly, it gives customers power to interact with a company using their own platform, rather than in a company’s building or through their website. Here’s how to take advantage of that organic conversation and better connect with your customers.
Find your voice and use it
Be true to your business, brand and customers. If you’re a funky local coffee shop serving a hip community, your tweets should reflect a voice that matches your brand. If you’re using Twitter for B2B marketing, you may want a professional but approachable tone.
Engage in social media
Don’t treat Twitter like conventional marketing, where you simply make your announcement and hope the sales increase. Social media strategy should be aimed at encouraging conversation and interaction. Ask your customers questions, respond to and share relevant posts, and reply to tweets that mention your business. BE SOCIAL! Have a real person monitor your Twitter account and physically respond ASAP!
Respond to criticism as well as praise
Now that you’re regularly responding to customer tweets, don’t pretend you can’t see the complaints. Twitter is increasingly used as a customer service platform. Check any airline company’s timeline and you’ll see a stream of responses to complaints. Twitter allows you to turn a negative experience into an authentic interaction by responding as you would to a customer in your store.
Don’t stress over your number of followers
Theoretically the more followers you have, the more people you’ll reach. But your strategy should not solely focus on gaining numbers. Build relationships with followers you have first to solidify your audience. Loyal customers will share your content with their followers, helping you build your audience.
Build relationships with other companies
If you partnered with another business on a project or event, give them a virtual shout-out. Not only is this advertising what your company is doing, the other business may retweet your post, exposing your content to their followers. They may also return the favor and continue to tag your business in related posts.
Above all, be authentic
Customers readily follow their favorite brands, especially when they post quality content. Post shouldn’t feel like an advertisement, but rather helpful information shared by a friend or a trusted resource. Don’t spam your followers or push the hard sell; share your knowledge and build a community loyal to your business.
Contact us today at Viral Solutions for more tips!
Copyright 2015 Viral Solutions LLC
We help overwhelmed small business owners duplicate themselves – so business can be fun again
Viral Solutions LLC is a Digital Marketer Certified Partner, an Infusionsoft Certified Consultant, a Google Partner – Certified in AdWords and a Mobit Certified Partner.
Business Strategy: How does strategy impact training?
What is a business strategy? How does strategy impact training? Does the current business strategy support the talent development needs? Business strategy is simply the plan that brings together organizational goals, processes, and initiatives. The shaping, implementation, and monitoring of business strategy impacts ever aspect within an organization. Business strategy requires effective preparation of physical and financial capital resources. Physical capital includes facilities, equipment, and technology. Financial capital includes cash or other convertible assets to fund business strategy. Funding the business strategy requires careful preparation and analysis of key initiatives. Key initiatives can come in many forms, but for purposes of this article, the scope is in regards to how business strategy impacts training.
Business strategy has a direct impact on the effectiveness of training and vice-versa. Business strategy impacts training options by time, money, access, and content.
Time
Neglecting the time needed to make talent development initiatives a reality and doable, requires a clear understanding of the time it will take to support such initiatives.
The time within the scope of business strategy and talent development is paramount to the success of initiatives. Allocating a specified amount of time for the creation, implementation, use, and evaluation of talent development initiatives is key to ensuring that there is a balance in the time needed to learn, apply, and grow. Business strategy must consider a realistic timeline of key actions needed within each phase of a talent development strategy. Neglecting the time needed to make talent development initiatives a reality and doable, requires a clear understanding of the time it will take to support such initiatives. Due to the diverse nature of job design, the time may have based on the mix of skills and knowledge per department, position, and so on. It is also important to consider a customized training plan, systematically distribute training, or randomly facilitated are also factors in time for initiatives.
Money
Business strategy must be quantified. Understanding the indirect and direct costs associated with talent development initiatives that align with business strategy will help to justify the specific initiatives. To effectively quantify the 
investment of such development tools, resources, and the time it will take to need to be quantified from a micro and macro perspective. Micro – regarding the specific position and training initiative. Macro – regarding the total package of aggregate training and positions. Metrics should also be established to measure the outcomes to develop a running understanding of the ROI on training initiatives. Crafting metrics requires careful analysis and estimation from internal, and perhaps, external consultants.
Access
The key is understanding the needs, gaps, initiatives needed to develop talent to support the business strategy, and access to those that need training.
Identification of the audience for specific talent development initiatives is an essential to aligning training needs with business strategy initiatives. In a perfect world, training would be accessible to everyone in the firm. However, financial and physical assets may not provide that option. Therefore, identification of the specific needs of the workforce, competency needs, and estimated impact training is paramount to crafting talent development plan. Think of it regarding logistically crafting strategies that will have the greatest impact on the short and long-term initiatives. The ranking of training will vary by firm due to the variances in business strategy, resources, talent, and operations. The rankings can change on peaks and valleys in the firm, resources available, and needs of the workforce. The key is understanding the needs, gaps, initiatives needed to develop talent to support the business strategy, and access to those that need training.
Content
Content is critical. The needs assessment aims to identify the specific competency gaps in skills, knowledge, and resources for training initiatives. Crafting the scope and objectives of training needs are foundations to shaping the curriculum, platforms, and delivery. Research and analysis of best practices will aid Talent Management professionals with up to date and realistic approaches to creating innovative training that support the initiatives of the firm. Internal and external consultants may help with the analysis of content development to ensure that expertise is accurate, reliable, and specific to the needs.
In essence, business strategy impacts talent development, and vice-versa. The effective identification and evaluation of initiatives needs and gaps in the workforce to achieve initiatives. Balancing internal resources to implement talent development initiatives that align with achieving organizational goals is paramount. Breaking those actions down within the scope of time, money, access, and content will help align business strategy and the competencies needed to support carrying out initiatives.
by Katie Doseck, PhD MBA
Chief Visionary and Strategic Ace Up Your Sleeve | Viral Solutions LLC
Copyright 2015 by Viral Solutions LLC
Katie Doseck, PhD MBA | Chief Visionary & Strategic Ace Up Your Sleeve. I catapulted my experience with extensive education, trainings, and personal coaching; earning a PhD in Organizational Management with a specialization in Human Resource Management, MBA in Organizational Leadership, and BA in Law & Liberal Arts. Subject Matter Expert (SME) areas: Human Resource Management, Employment Law, Organizational Change, Change Management, Resource Planning, Strategic Planning, Talent Management, Selling & Sales Management, Training & Development, Decision Making Models, Project Management, Customer Relationship Management, and Motivation. Dr. Doseck is based out of Logan, Utah.
We help overwhelmed small business owners duplicate themselves – so business can be fun again
Viral Solutions LLC is a Digital Marketer Certified Partner, an Infusionsoft Certified Consultant, a Google Partner – Certified in AdWords and a Mobit Certified Partner.
