Archive for January, 2010

Today, I want to discuss the various types on online marketing strategies that you can use as an intro to the upcoming blog posts on the mechanics of each.

For many, the term online marketing brings to mind a host of different thoughts. Some immediately think of search engine optimization, others may think of paid search, and yet others may think of email marketing, blogging, or social media strategies. The fact remains, that they are all components of online marketing, and frankly should all be employed at some level. Some strategies will come more naturally to you, and others will seem to give you better results. Over the next several posts, I will cover each, but today, I will leave you with a simple list of online marketing strategies to consider. To get a head start on this series of posts, I recommend doing a search on this blog to see what you can find on the topic as well as a Google search to learn more about whichever segment of online marketing you are seeking to learn more about.

Here is my list of the various online marketing strategies that you can employ. If you feel something is missing, let me know my leaving a comment below:

- Search Engine Optimization (SEO): This involves architecting your website to obtain natural rankings in the search engines. It is the most effective form of online marketing, and takes the most time to see results.

- Paid Search / Pay Per Click (PPC) Search: This involves paying for each visitor that comes to your website. The upside is that you will see results immediately; the down side is that you can lose lots of money if you do this wrong.

- Blogging: You will learn several reasons why blogging is a highly effective form on online marketing. It is one of my favorite and I cannot wait to share more on this. You can also implement blogging without spending a penny, which make it a great option for those with limited budgets.

- Email Marketing: There are two aspect of email marketing that I will share. The first is the most effective and involves emailing your clients and prospect. The second and less recommended form of email marketing it purchasing email lists (NOT spam lists) and marketing to cold prospects.

- Viral Marketing: This is a form of marketing where you share valuable information for free (from your website) and allow others to share it for free. It is a great way to get the word out about your product, service, or business.

- Social Media Marketing: Everyone is talking about Social Media these days, and it’s a great way to build a following for your brand and reach lots of prospects in a short period of time. Sadly, most don’t really understand how to implement it effectively.

- Text / Mobile Marketing: As the name implies, this is a method of reaching people via cell phones and smart devices. It is a growing field that you should not ignore.

- Affiliate Marketing: This is a powerful way to empower others to send you business. Of course, you will pay them for their successful referrals, but it essentially puts a commissioned sales force to work for you.

- Online Press / Media Relations: This is an area that many businesses neglect and it can produce amazing results.

- Online Advertising: This is closely related to PPC, yet it deserves its own category. I would recommend this only as a last resort or a supplement to a multi-channel online marketing program.

- Local Search Marketing: Reaching your local audience is critical if you are a local business, but even if you are a national business you don’t want to neglect customers in your own backyard.

Well, I am sure that gives you lots to consider. Please take the time to do some research on any of these that are not familiar with you. This way, when we reach this part in the series, it won’t be totally new to you and you will be able to ask some great questions to help you implement or optimize a specific strategy.

I am off to Louisville, KY today where I hear it will be cold, so keep sending me warm thoughts.

Have a great weekend!

Online marketing is the most effective form of reaching a targeted audience. In this weeks Fueled Friday post, I want to show you how to find out how much online marketing potential exists for your business. This is critical because if you don’t realize what you are missing out on, you might never be motivated to go after it. I will tell you this as well; most of your competitors are not paying attention to this so it will be fairly easy for you to outrank them and get the customers you need. This holds true whether you are a local business or serve clients nationally or internationally.

The most critical factor in any organic or paid search marketing plan is having keywords that heave search volume. If no one is search for terms related to your business, then online marketing may not be the best form of outreach for you. It is rare, but there are definitely cases where it is not in a company’s best interest to invest in an SEO or Paid Search campaign.

So how do you find out what people are searching on? The simplest and most cost effective way is to use Google’s free keyword research tool. This will tell you what people are searching on and how many searches are being done in a given month. If there are lots of people searching, then that means you have a high online marketing potential. If the search volume is low, then you do not have a high of an online marketing potential, but this could also be a good sign if there are fewer competitors because most of the prospects searching would end up at your website. Below is a screen shot from a search I did for local accountants in my area.

From this you can see what the search potential is for just two terms specific to “accounting in phoenix.” Let’s assume for a minute that you are going to target these two terms here which represents roughly 35,200 monthly searches. Now keep in mind that the percentage of these searchers that come to your website will be relative to where you rank for these terms. You really will need to get ranked on page 1 for to see any reasonable percentage of these searchers. Let’s say you get to position 2 and you generate roughly 8% of this traffic. That would give you roughly 2,800 visitors to your website, of which a smaller percentage will engage. We can conservatively use 3% which would give you about 84 visitors for the month. What percentage of those that contact you looking for your help do you think you can close? If we assume it’s just 20%, that would net you 16 new clients that months. Now let’s assume they are small business clients with an ongoing monthly retainer of $1,000. This would generate about $16,000 in additional monthly revenue for your business.

So now you have the formula to find out your online marketing potential. I encourage you to do your own search and plug in your numbers to see what the specific potential is for your business.

The exact formula is: “total number of searches” x “percentage of those that you can attract via paid, local, and organic search” (use 3-10% if you are on page one and zero if you are not) x “the percentage of people that land on your website then contact you (you can use 3% as an estimate) x the percentage of people that you close (use 20% but do track and find your actual closing ratio).

If your average cost per client is low, then you have to be a bit more cautious to how much you spend to generate leads online. If your average cost per customer is much higher, then you may need fewer clients to see a very strong return on investment.

I know you may be thinking that there is no way you can afford to get to the top of the search engines, but I have to tell you that it certainly is possible. Does it have to be expensive? No. In fact, there are plenty of low cost or no cost strategies that you can use to attract people to your website (mainly blogging and social media which I did not include in the calculations).

I’d love to hear your success stories, so feel free to email me and let me know what you came up with in terms of your market potential. If this is a bit overwhelming, then feel free to contact me and I will provide a free online marketing assessment and this way you will know where you stand in terms of what it would take to get you to the top of the search engines.

Now that you have some work to do for the weekend, enjoy your Friday!

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is one of the best ways to connect with hot prospects for your business. If you are reading this, you most likely agree and have some understanding of the process. What many fail to realize is that like any other marketing strategy, SEO is not the end all, but rather a prospect generating strategy. It will allow those looking for your products or services to find you, but here is what is doesn’t do:

Answer your telephone promptly and professionally.

Greet your customers with a smile.

Give outstanding customer service to your customers.

Take messages for you when you are away.

I think you get the picture. Once you have invested in an effective SEO campaign, make sure that you have the right people to turn that prospect (or suspect) into customer, and then a brand advocate.

Yesterday, I went to a store to buy something… I can’t say what because I am in a weight loss competition and my wife will read my blog. Granted, I did not find this store via the web, but anyone who did might have had this same experience. I walked into the store and there was no one to help me. I could see someone in the back obviously doing something more important that taking money from a paying customer. I understand that people have other things to do than wait for me to walk in, but I said “hello” and was not even acknowledged. I then waited for about a minute and thought to myself “they just don’t deserve the business”, so I went to a local competitor and got what I was craving. The real good news is that when I stepped on the scale it did not have any impact.

The moral of the story; bad customer service will end up costing you more in your online marketing campaign because you will need to generate far more prospects if you aren’t taking care of them. Not only are you missing out on new business, but you are losing potential referral customers from those that get bad service and tell people (as I did).

With Valentines Day just around the corner, I am sure you have seen those little candy hearts that come out around Valentine’s with the little messages on them such as “hug me” & “kiss me.” Well, now the Sweethearts candy will have a new message for this years batch – “tweet me”. Your odds of getting one of these is about one in 60, so I assume this will help boost sales of an already popular candy.

In addition, the company is launching an iphone app that allows you to send virtual Sweethearts boxes to your valentine. Read the full story at USA Today.

So it’s 2010 and surely you have heard lots of talk about creating an online marketing plan for your business. If you haven’t, then I have a reading assignment for you – check out Search Engine Land’s Big List: 2010 Marketing Predictions & Resolutions. Don’t get overwhelmed and try to read it all, but peruse the titles and read two articles from each heading. Sure, it will be an investment of time, but it is exactly that – and investment in yourself and your business.

Now that you have your assignment, let’s get started. Before I discuss the online marketing plan, I will point out that this should be a subsection of your marketing plan which is part of your business plan. If you don’t have a business plan, then that is a great place to start; but don’t let it get in the way of promoting your business online (make a side note and put it on your long term to do list). Having a website that generates leads and business is more important that stopping the business to write the plan if you didn’t do that already.

To create an online marketing plan, you have to ask yourself what you are looking to accomplish with your website, look at what you have (or haven’t) done in the past, set some benchmarks, and take action. Although websites serve may purposes (some for profit and others not), I am going to focus on websites that generate revenue.

Step #1 – Be There
Start with the website itself. I assume that you have one, but even if you don’t, the first step is to get one up and running, no matter how simple. Something is always better than nothing and truly there is absolutely no excuse for a business to not have a website. If you don’t and you don’t have the business that you want, stop wondering why and contact me for a referral to a designer.

If you have a website that was built in 1999, then I am sure people are not as likely to do business with you than if you have an updated website. If you have outdated content on your website, it just may not be exciting for people to learn about trends from a decade ago. Make a commitment to invest in the website, because one of the worse things you can do is drive targeted visitors to a website that is ugly and ineffective.

Step #2 – Look at the Past
It has been said that “you can’t go forward while looking in the rear view mirror” and the point here is to not dwell in the past, but to look at what you did or not do to learn how to more forward.

Look at what you did and find out what worked (and do more of that). Find out what didn’t work and why; then seek to implement those strategies more effectively and chances are you will see more success provide you remove the hindrances. Finally, look at what you did not do and find out why you failed to get them done. If it is a resource issue, then outsource; if it is a knowledge issue, then go find the information you need.

Step #3 – Set Benchmarks
Consider what specific goals you want to accomplish with your website. Ultimately, your goal is to increase business, but you have to break that down intro specific targets such as:

Increasing search engine visits by “x” percent.
Adding more content to the website.
Adding a blog to the website.
Building Social Media Profiles (such as Facebook).
Increasing customer conversion rates.
Capturing more information from prospects.
Growing your in house email list by “x” percent.
Tracking website analytics.
Increase lead volume by “x” percent.

Remember that only about 3% of people write down their goals, and about 3% of people are considered successful. I would write those goals down and look at them often as you watch your numbers improve.

Step #4 – Take (Massive) Action
Once you have mapped out your strategy, get the job done. Do not stop until you do what you say you are doing to do (don’t let “YOU” down). If you need help along the way, find someone who has accomplished what you are looking to accomplish and ask them how they did it. Chances are, if it is related to online marketing and it worked well, you can find them blogging about it.

With regard to taking action, I encourage you to stay plugged in to Fueled Fridays because I will be going into very specific detail on how to implement effectively and get results.

Have a great weekend!