Author: orianic

I completed the Social Media Certification on HubSpot Academy which took me 4 1/2 hours, split into roughly three, 1 1/2 hour sessions.

On a scale of 1 to 5 I’d rate this certification program as a 5 and highly recommend it to a friend. I’d considered it very beneficial to anyone because, in digital marketing were taught that videos generate more user engagement and by learning through videos I felt like the material had far more meaning than had I of had to read it.

By learning through videos and a quick assessment I believe its proof to marketers how beneficial video tutorials are far better than sometimes posted content about a brand. HubSpot imitates what it teaches with engaging users, this shows marketers that if they’re highly engaged through virtual lessons, 4 1/2 hours worth, they can then imagine how their customer are engaged and will react when they generate videos and or tutorials about their brands, thus proving just how important it is.

What I liked the best is the number one topic, being dedicated to your customers, listen, respond, and always be just as engaged with the material online as your customers are. This shows just how dedicated you are to your brand and improving customer loyalty. The wasn’t anything I’d say I liked least, I did feel some information seemed repetitive but for me my attention can become distracted easily so repeating how important customers are really ingrained in my mind how important it is and kept me on track despite distractions.

Further, the quizzes were a great refresher to test the knowledge I had just learned. To be honesty I never became frustrated because I believe social media is so enculturated in our lives its important for every marketer, whether they’re living in the past or not, to be a part of and is the number one way in my opinion to reach and engage with customers.

Lastly, I’ll mention that although it’s extremely important for digital marketers to constantly be engaged with their customers, its just as important to let them be or take them offline,  if you’re getting no where with them, and all they want to do is argue about your brand. I say this only if it cannot be resolved on or offline, it’s better to just remain calm and not try to intrigue or argue with them further. This happens by participating in active listening and being aware of whats going on and being said, never interject.

 

SOURCES:

• https://cdn.business2community.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/hubspot-3-logo3.png
• https://app.hubspot.com/learning-center/5126134/tracks/29/267/1445

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is your email marketing campaign failing you? Are you finding yourself nearing the spam folder or being blocked by your customers? Here are a few tips to make you a more successful marketer with your content in one of your most important marketing channels, email.

First thing is first, in order to send the right content to your subscribers aka “customers” you want them to exist first right? Make sure you’re regularly doing an inventory of your email list. Choose the dual “opt in” option which not only has first time subscribers sign up but confirms they want to be receiving emails from you. This helps with weeding out the potential “fake” email address spammers might use to get block your emails from going to customers and ending up in their junk or spam folders, something you don’t want.

Now that your list is being monitored and cleared when necessary, what are you, first before we continue let me mention that content is key? The subject of your email is obviously the most important, being the first thing your subscribers see. Don’t fill it with to much clutter or lengthy paragraphs but instead, grab their attention. State exactly what it is that you want them to read about when they open it. Make it clear and concise, almost like a call to action. Lastly engage your shoppers. Offering something exciting and attention grabbing. When dealing with personas, imaging being in your shoppers shoes, what would grab your attention? Similar to what you’ll read about next, in instant offers with sign-up, grabbing your new, potential and don’t forget, existing customers with a free shipping or discount option. Of course always say what you mean. If you’re offering a discount or promotion, offer it and make sure the content in your email matches what the customer clicks and the landing page they’re then taken to.

An Online Retailer?

Are you trying to appeal to someone visiting your site for the first time? Try offering discount promotions to entice them to subscribe. An offering of 10 to 20% off their first purchase will increase buyers aptitude to potentially making a purchase vs customers that simply visited to browse your site.

Rather than aiming for high conversions, are you trying to Generate Leads?

Lead generating almost sounds redundant at first, well of course we want to generate leads so why is it important. It’s important because generating leads isn’t just about converting a sale immediately. It’s about building a long lasting, informative relationship with your customer so that one day when and if they’re reading to purchase what they desire, they think of you immediately. This includes tips and tidbits that continue to keep your customers engaged through the customer relationship cycle.

Search Engine 

Like lead generators, as a search engine  you’ll want to keep your customers engaged by sending them regular emails, again keeping you at the top of their minds when searching for products or services.

I’ve just only a few of content options available for email marketers. Others include B2B & online media. Once you’ve got your content figured out, timing & segmentation are key. According to this weeks text in chapter 8, segmenting your group of customers with the types of email content you provide is smart and a efficient way to send ongoing information to the right customer. You wouldn’t want to advertise to a customer that buys purses from you to, an ATV. Segmenting your email groups through software, past purchases or test are the way to go.

Lastly emails can be sent after a purchase is made. Aside from traditional type, broadcasting emails, transactional ones that thank the customer for their purchase, inform them of their tracking and deliver time frames and enticing them to purchase again with similar product emails, discount coupons for future purchase and emails that let them know they’ve left something in their carts, encouraging them to continue checkout are all methods to entice conversion and clicks through emails.

If anything can be learned, its a lot of information, but taking these few steps are a great way and start to increase the percentage of conversion rate you get from email advertisements.

Retrieved from https://edify.stukent.com/app/publication/d801ea3f-55b7-4374-ac5a-03d0e2cff93f/417149a8-ec84-467e-97c5-5e8291f3d39a/df379fe6-e176-4d04-a6e9-a10b7c1887be/0ef456ef-1524-4e57-8414-a117d48a3173/view

 

How the internet is shaping our biases and the dangers associated with the current online model of advertising has consumers concerned on what and how they’re shopping and what and how they buy.  With the continued advancement of technology its changing our direct buying behavior. Do you think this is a problem? Here’s why it might be.

On a scale of 1 to 5, 5 being the most dangerous, I’d rate the current online marketing model at a 3, only because we as consumers have a chance to protect ourselves from these online markets and swaying the way we think, in what we need to buy. What happened to offering our customers a product, convincing them why they should trust us when all it seems that happening is trickery.

I think a code of ethics to back a moral operating system, like mentioned in the Ted Talk given by Damon Horowitz, needs to be created for marketers to follow in order to protect themselves but to instill faith in their consumers when buying their products online, they outline the following:

1. Informative: Online marketers need to be transparent with people and communicate their messages effectively. Why do you really want me to click on your ad or buy your product?

2. Regulation: Companies should continually and consistently monitor the practices of their online marketers presence.

3. Social Media: Being one of the prime dividers and sources information, social media sites should be held accountable, like marketers, for what they post inaccurately, forcing people to believe false information.

4. People: We as consumers must stand up in the face of false marketing practices and voice our opinions.

5. Civil Law: State and federal laws should prohibit marketers from praying on isn’t consumers and force penalties upon those you don’t adhere to the guidelines. Similar to how the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) and like groups does.

6. Community: It takes a joint community effort among people to stand up for whats right in the face of marketers.

7. Consumer: Marketers should place themselves in their consumers shoes and ask themselves if their tactics would be OK for a friend or family member of theirs.

8. Companies: Companies need to and marketers alike need to keep each other honest, most importantly in the tactics they use against consumers and call each other out of propagated content.

Sources:

• https://www.ted.com/talks/damon_horowitz#t-277812
• https://www.ted.com/talks/zeynep_tufekci_we_re_building_a_dystopia_just_to_make_people_click_on_ads#t-35232
• https://blog.ed.ted.com/2017/01/24/how-to-protect-your-online-privacy/
• http://digitalmarketingmagazine.co.uk/digital-marketing-features/what-have-ethics-got-to-do-with-digital-marketing/4031
• https://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images?p=danger+imaghe&fr=mcafee&imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Fmoziru.com%2Fimages%2Fdanger-clipart-warning-sign-3.png#id=-1&iurl=http%3A%2F%2Fmoziru.com%2Fimages%2Fdanger-clipart-warning-sign-3.png&action=click

Did you ever wonder how odd it was that google knew where to find the nearest Red Robin and your location wasn’t even on nor did you tell it which one? Well local search and many other factors are actually just part of organic search engine optimization and a set of guidelines to rank key phrases, developed by your’s truly, Google. As a new marketeer, fresh in the field you may think you understand the basics to optimizing keyword phrases to help businesses generate traffic to their desired web pages but soon you find that the giant Google’s ranking these phrases poorly and hindering your success. Well don’t fall victim to poor click through rates and and follow these recommended techniques below, to help you perform.

Relevance is Key

• Are the keywords your traffic searches for, relevant to the web pages you intend for them to go? If a search for a recipe for chicken noodle soup is performed do you want the first link to be how chickens are raised? Certainly not so utilizing key words and phrases that are closely matched to where you intend your user to end up is key.
• Avoid Duplication: If another user is searching for a car, specifically a minivan and you’re a local car dealer, do you want every search for a minivan to land on the your home page, possibly, but not highly recommended. Instead you want that user to be directed to your page of minivans or similar family type vehicles. Another customer looking for a truck wouldn’t want to be directed towards the homepage or minivans, instead trucks or utility type vehicle searches would direct them here as well. The point is use unique and different key word phrases so that when an organic search is performed the SERP matches the key word on a specific page and doesn’t lead the customer to all the same pages.
• Your relevance (keyword/phrases) can also be maximized through the  URL, Title Tag, Header Tags, Main Content, Image Alt Text and File Name and Anchor Text. 

Other Key Ranking Factors:

These next factors also make up the big picture in how Google ranks your ads and key words. Through the use of many Google programs you to can stay on top of your marketing game. The following will generate higher rankings on Googles scale:

• High Click Through Rate from SERP A website can influence its pages click through rate through (title tag, the snippet (summary underneath the title), and the choice of URL)
• Low Bounce Rate from Landing Pages-When a customer clicks your link and instantly goes back. Content if a big part of this, especially if the customer immediately saw something they weren’t looking for.
• Short Load Times (time it takes for the website to load) (Google Page Speed Insight tools for help) if you page isn’t loading in a timely manor, whether on a desk top or most importantly, mobile device traffic can be deterred. Don’t let this happen to you!
• Original/Fresh Content (don’t duplicate, like I mentioned before, make quality count!
• Quantity Content (A lot of content means a lot of pages and every page should have at least 100 words of content)
• Quality Content Thanks to Googles RankBrain, artificial technology, might be so sophisticated that SEO efforts should focus more on creating quality content rather than formatting that content for the benefit of search engines.
• According to, Digital Marketing Essentials, e-text, utilizing another one of Googles many tools, Search Console, can constantly monitor all pages located within a website. By doing this you can discover that even though you may have great content, if search engines can’t optimize or access the page with the great content, due to lack of proper indexing because of technical issues, customers and google cannot find these key words within a web page. Key words left out due to in access to the adjacent web page will then hinder your ability to rank high.
• Poor optimization, not just being desktop friendly but google even ranks those who don’t consider their mobile users into account and will give them poorer rankings because of it.
• Security is of concern as well and is considered a minor but important ranking to keep servers and clients transaction in tact and hidden from the black hat hackers.

How do Small Businesses Survive?

• Local Search brings up results for local area rather than cross county searches (restaurants for example)
  1. Registering with MyBusiness, a google program helps keep your business, site and  information credible, having been verified by google.
  2. NAP (Name, Address, Phone number) offers your result to display this important information alongside.
  3. Structured Citations (Yelp for example) & most importantly Reviews

Lastly if you’re having a hard time coming up with the right key words and phrases, be the consumer! How would you search for something and what would you expect to come up? Use phrases that you think people would also use, whats popular and has high relevance to your product, Google offers a program for that to! Utilize every tool your given to your best advantage. Are you looking for coffee or are you looking for Starbucks?

• Larson, J., & Draper, S. (2017). Digital marketing essentials.
• https://twicesocial.com/4-crazy-reasons-your-website-isnt-ranking-on-google/

Do you know what NSAMCWADLP stands for? Yeah, neither did I until I read further. Now if reading further doesn’t intrigue you let me give you a brief run down.  According to Digital Marketing Essentials, it stands for “Never Start a Marketing Campaign with a Dedicated landing page”. Whether you’re a seasoned marketer or like myself, very green in the subject matter your main concern with the development and implementation of of a landing page is because you’re trying to attract consumers to your campaign and to come up with a solution to their problem, right? Well look no further my friend because here are 5 ways to increase the traffic (people) that come to your page, whether it be by pure accident, organic search or you’re offering a product or service they may or may not already have in mind, that lead to conversions, or what we hate to call or refer to as purchase. In other words what is so grasping about your landing page that it not only attracts the customer in but increases their chances or purchasing your product or service.

1) According to Ryan Osman, Senior SEM (search engine management) manager at Obility, one way to increase landing page conversions is what is apparent above the fold, when they land on your page. Meaning, what is the first things they see and catching to the eye upon first glance? From my brief experience, large pictures, symbols and a clear message that entice your customer to want to continue to scroll.

2) Usability of your page. Can they access further downloads, are your colors bold and bright or is there to much wordy, verbal explanations that are over bearing and over whelming. I’d like to note that attractiveness of your web page isn’t everything but something simple and eye catching that make your customers want to seek your product or service further.

3) Do you have a visible call to action, once you’ve got the attention of your participants what do they do next? Download your book? Fill out a form to generate a lead, make this clear as day and even offer a second option to entice them if they second guess themselves. This is especially important with retail outlets. Don’t cloud their judgment by offering a niche product on your landing page but having something entirely different when they decide to search your domain and launch your website.

4) Does your landing page match your web page? If your marketing to a target audience, whats your audiences personas (tastes)  and are you appealing to them, as different or as similarly as they may be? Are you offering products they like that would entice them to optimize their search and continue to your page. Do they see what they were looking for? This is especially important.

5) Lastly A/B testing. Never settle for a solid landing page, always be trying to improve to satisfy you’re customers ever changing tastes and preferences. It might be helpful to enlist the help of a professional who can test your current page and help you develop a potentially more attractive version based on click through rates. People, people are your greatest since of accomplishment and critique, have them test our your site and provide you with feedback, never give up and always listen to them as they could potentially be your future customer.

• Larson, J., & Draper, S. (2017). Digital marketing essentials
• MRKT 484 Ryan on testing landing pages. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://media.oregonstate.edu/media/t/0_j1xoorhb

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