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Why You Should Invest in Local SEO In Cleveland, OH

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Why You Should Invest in Local SEO In Cleveland, OH

If you’re looking for a business and want to ensure your experience is a good one, chances are you start with an online search. You might look for just a name and street address, or you could be browsing online reviews to weigh your options. 

But when you’re doing that search, chances are you don’t want the best businesses in that category nationwide. You want the best experiences locally.

Local SEO has been a huge focus for Google and likewise search engine marketers since 2014, when Google My Business launched. It focuses on keywords that end with the phrase “near me” or “near” a destination that the user is looking for. 

Whether anything SEO-related makes your eyes glaze over, or you’re looking for the next way to boost your domain authority, you should consider investing in localized SEO.

Here’s why.

Customers Google Before They Buy

According to a survey by KPMG, 47% of users visit a business’s website before visiting in-person or making a purchase. By simply creating a digital presence, you’ll immediately improve your brand’s reputation over competitors who hadn’t yet established themselves online.

Optimizing your website is one of the key steps for any kind of SEO project — after all, you want to give visitors a nice landing after finding your site in organic or local search results.

That’s why being mobile-friendly is more important than ever. More and more people are accessing the internet from smartphones. Mobile friendliness is so important, it made our top 7 list of things to optimize for SEO twice last year.

More Local Visibility

Chances are, if you’re building a small or medium-sized business that’s not entirely online, you want to appeal to more people in your area. Running a national SEO campaign wouldn’t make sense — a local SEO campaign, however, does.

By building an audience that’s looking for businesses like yours near them, you’re more likely to connect with customers both interested and able to patron your products and services. Increasing visibility improves your traffic, which in turn improves the likelihood that you’ll receive leads and sales.

More Reviews Makes You a More Trusted Brand

According to a survey by Brightlocal, consumers will read an average of 10 online reviews before they feel they can trust a local business. Not only that, your business is more likely to pop up in relevant search results if you have a sizable number of positive reviews on that site’s review platform.

As a result, businesses have taken notice. Another survey by Clutch, a reviews site, says that 54% of business owners find managing their reputation online to be extremely important. Nearly half monitor their brand’s reputation over social media, but only a quarter look at Google search results. 

Having a more expansive view of your online reputation will help you identify weak points in your brand. Local SEO is not just about getting your name out there — doing it the wrong way can hurt your business instead of helping your growth. Develop a strategy to earn more reviews from customers on Google and key sites. 

Or, find an experienced professional agency to make those plans for you.

There’s More to Search Than Google

Google may be the main search engine for most consumers, but Yelp, Amazon, and industry-specific platforms like TripAdvisor use similar algorithms — and can get a hearty share of visibility with your target audience. By optimizing for your visibility on Google, you’ll see gains from searches across the board. 

Even having an online reputation builds your reputation. For example, due to our proven ability to deliver to our clients, you can find us on The Manifest — a buyer’s resource with data-driven articles and shortlists — as a top Cleveland-based SEO service provider. Companies like us are also listed on Visual Objects, a digital portfolio-sharing platform and another sister site of Clutch.

We practice what we teach, and we’re learning more and more about the SEO marketplace everyday. That’s why we’re a great fit for any business who doesn’t have the time or money to invest in SEO in-house.  If you think SEO is out of reach, start thinking local. Contact us today to learn more about how 216 Marketing can boost your local search visibility.

[216marketing]

Why Is Site Speed & Good Website Development and Planning Good For SEO?

New Post has been published on https://www.216marketing.com/blog/why-is-site-speed-good-website-development-and-planning-good-for-seo/

Why Is Site Speed & Good Website Development and Planning Good For SEO?

Between 1990 and now, the internet has continued to grow, hence, what used to work some years ago, may have changed. Have you ever wondered why your Cleveland area website has not been able to rank well in Google? We know how frustrating it can be, after putting in so much work, you suddenly discover your ranking on Google is note doing so well.

Don’t feel discouraged, do some research and find out why your site is not performing well on Google. Some years ago, the requirements for getting a positive ranking from Google did not include factors like site speed, site accessibility, and responsiveness, etc.

Recently, Google has made these factors an integral part of getting ranked on Google. This is invariably saying that if your Cleveland area website has a poor site speed, then that may just be one of the possible reasons why a site has failed to rank with Google.

With the ever-evolving trend in innovative technologies, modern sites are beginning to have more features and properties than ever before, and it has gotten to the point where a lot of these sites are constantly struggling to attain some level of performance over different devices and network conditions.

There is no doubt that performance issues occur in varying degrees; however, they either create minor delays that may briefly annoy your site’s users, or the performance issues could be really bad for them.

No one wants to spend time on a site that takes more than 3 seconds to load, and that is why we cannot overemphasize the importance of the site’s performance, as a function of the site’s speed. Performance plays a very important role in the success of your online business in Northeast Ohio.

Different researches have been carried out about site speed, and overall performance of some sites and the result showed that there were some sites that were performing well, with proper engagement, conversions and search engine results, as opposed to the sites that performed lowly.

Here are some examples of sites that performed well:

When the social media site Pinterest paid attention to their site speed and reduced the load times of the site by 40%, it was discovered that there was some increased traffic from search engines, and even sign-ups enjoyed some 15% increase.

COOK took their site load time seriously, and cut it by 850 milliseconds, and that singular action brought some positive results to the site because the bounce rates decreased by 7%, conversions increased by 7%, and also there was a 10% increase to the pages per session.

The above are examples of high performing sites, let us take a look at sites that experienced the negative impact caused by their low performance:

According to DoubleClick by Google, pages that took more than 3 seconds to load, had issues, and about 53% of the sites got abandoned by potential customers who may have been able to bring some positive feedback on the sites.

For times when the BBC site took extra seconds to load, it was discovered that they lost 10% of their site users for the extra seconds where page did not load.

Still with the aid of DoubleClick by Google, a research was carried out again, and there were clear indications that sites that loaded fast reported in monthly reporting. In about 5 seconds, it had a higher advert visibility of 25%, lower bounce rates of 35%, and longer sessions of 70%, as opposed to sites that used more than 19 seconds.

If you intend to get some information about your site’s speed and performance, with regards to the competitors, then you may use this tool: Check out the Speed Scorecard tool.

As a business owner, site speed and performance are very important factors to consider if you intend to have good conversions through better search results. It is important to know that slow sites have a lot to do with this. They usually have a negative effect on search marketing. Some sites have taken the cue to improve their organic search performance, by first reducing the page load time.

Below are some examples:

In the case of Mobify, the decrease in site load speed resulted in an increase in conversion of about 1.11%, and thus they were able to enjoy a revenue increase that was almost $380,000. Furthermore, the checkout page was not left out of the performance improvement, as the decrease in the speed of the diner was showing that there was an increase in the conversion by 1.55% and revenue of about $530,000.

AutoAnything also took the initiative of reducing its page load time, because they enjoy a 12 to 13% boost in the buckets.

DoubleClick also made a reduction, and it loaded quickly, and better than some other websites where loading.

In order for you speed up your site and rank well on Google, you need to optimize the images on your site, use compressed codes, and use much fewer ads and external scripts. The internet is evolving and also developing at the same time; hence, more people are beginning to do something about their sites, and have also begun to pay more attention to their site’s performance, ranking, and search engine optimization (SEO).

Your Cleveland area website may not be given the proper attention it needs, which is why it has not been able to get ranked by Google Bing. If you are looking to get a Cleveland Web Design, then you have come to the right place for search engine optimization Cleveland. 216 Marketing has been the Cleveland SEO experts for years.

It is imperative that you have a proper plan and SEO strategies for the website, including hiring a SEO agency that can provide the awesome SEO services and SEO campaigns. The idea is to improve the performance, while making the page loading speed faster that will enable Google and other search engines better ranking for your website.

216 is your #1 Cleveland SEO company.

[216marketing]

Why Is Site Speed & Good Website Development and Planning Good For SEO?

New Post has been published on https://www.216marketing.com/blog/why-is-site-speed-good-website-development-and-planning-good-for-seo/

Why Is Site Speed & Good Website Development and Planning Good For SEO?

Between 1990 and now, the internet has continued to grow, hence, what used to work some years ago, may have changed. Have you ever wondered why your Cleveland area website has not been able to rank well in Google? We know how frustrating it can be, after putting in so much work, you suddenly discover your ranking on Google is note doing so well.

Don’t feel discouraged, do some research and find out why your site is not performing well on Google. Some years ago, the requirements for getting a positive ranking from Google did not include factors like site speed, site accessibility, and responsiveness, etc.

Recently, Google has made these factors an integral part of getting ranked on Google. This is invariably saying that if your Cleveland area website has a poor site speed, then that may just be one of the possible reasons why a site has failed to rank with Google.

With the ever-evolving trend in innovative technologies, modern sites are beginning to have more features and properties than ever before, and it has gotten to the point where a lot of these sites are constantly struggling to attain some level of performance over different devices and network conditions.

There is no doubt that performance issues occur in varying degrees; however, they either create minor delays that may briefly annoy your site’s users, or the performance issues could be really bad for them.

No one wants to spend time on a site that takes more than 3 seconds to load, and that is why we cannot overemphasize the importance of the site’s performance, as a function of the site’s speed. Performance plays a very important role in the success of your online business in Northeast Ohio.

Different researches have been carried out about site speed, and overall performance of some sites and the result showed that there were some sites that were performing well, with proper engagement, conversions and search engine results, as opposed to the sites that performed lowly.

Here are some examples of sites that performed well:

When the social media site Pinterest paid attention to their site speed and reduced the load times of the site by 40%, it was discovered that there was some increased traffic from search engines, and even sign-ups enjoyed some 15% increase.

COOK took their site load time seriously, and cut it by 850 milliseconds, and that singular action brought some positive results to the site because the bounce rates decreased by 7%, conversions increased by 7%, and also there was a 10% increase to the pages per session.

The above are examples of high performing sites, let us take a look at sites that experienced the negative impact caused by their low performance:

According to DoubleClick by Google, pages that took more than 3 seconds to load, had issues, and about 53% of the sites got abandoned by potential customers who may have been able to bring some positive feedback on the sites.

For times when the BBC site took extra seconds to load, it was discovered that they lost 10% of their site users for the extra seconds where page did not load.

Still with the aid of DoubleClick by Google, a research was carried out again, and there were clear indications that sites that loaded fast reported in monthly reporting. In about 5 seconds, it had a higher advert visibility of 25%, lower bounce rates of 35%, and longer sessions of 70%, as opposed to sites that used more than 19 seconds.

If you intend to get some information about your site’s speed and performance, with regards to the competitors, then you may use this tool: Check out the Speed Scorecard tool.

As a business owner, site speed and performance are very important factors to consider if you intend to have good conversions through better search results. It is important to know that slow sites have a lot to do with this. They usually have a negative effect on search marketing. Some sites have taken the cue to improve their organic search performance, by first reducing the page load time.

Below are some examples:

In the case of Mobify, the decrease in site load speed resulted in an increase in conversion of about 1.11%, and thus they were able to enjoy a revenue increase that was almost $380,000. Furthermore, the checkout page was not left out of the performance improvement, as the decrease in the speed of the diner was showing that there was an increase in the conversion by 1.55% and revenue of about $530,000.

AutoAnything also took the initiative of reducing its page load time, because they enjoy a 12 to 13% boost in the buckets.

DoubleClick also made a reduction, and it loaded quickly, and better than some other websites where loading.

In order for you speed up your site and rank well on Google, you need to optimize the images on your site, use compressed codes, and use much fewer ads and external scripts. The internet is evolving and also developing at the same time; hence, more people are beginning to do something about their sites, and have also begun to pay more attention to their site’s performance, ranking, and search engine optimization (SEO).

Your Cleveland area website may not be given the proper attention it needs, which is why it has not been able to get ranked by Google Bing. If you are looking to get a Cleveland Web Design, then you have come to the right place for search engine optimization Cleveland. 216 Marketing has been the Cleveland SEO experts for years.

It is imperative that you have a proper plan and SEO strategies for the website, including hiring a SEO agency that can provide the awesome SEO services and SEO campaigns. The idea is to improve the performance, while making the page loading speed faster that will enable Google and other search engines better ranking for your website.

216 is your #1 Cleveland SEO company.

[216marketing]

Why Is Reputation Management So Important?

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Why Is Reputation Management So Important?

Reputation management is the process of influencing the public perception of an individual or group. While this originated in the public relations sphere, it has become increasingly prevalent with the advent of search results and social media. So, let’s find out why reputation management is so important.

What are the different types of reputation management?

Today, there are two different types of reputation management: online and offline.

Online reputation management is handling the content on the internet regarding an individual or group. This primarily refers to product and service search results, especially reviews given by customers or clients. This can also include the search results or social media content regarding a specific individual. Online reputation management has become increasingly important as now 65% of adults view internet searches as “the most trusted source of information” when it comes to either people or companies.

Offline reputation management deals with the control of public perception of an individual or group via their standing outside of the internet. Items of interest in offline reputation management include press releases, media content, and even displayed morals and/or ethics.

How does reputation management work?

Reputation managers work to influence how an individual or group is perceived by filtering the information the public is exposed to about them. So, reputation managers will monitor all the information that is published or distributed about an individual or group, then decide whether it will have a positive or negative influence on their potential for success. If negative, the manager will then work to hide or eliminate the content. If positive, the manager will attempt to spread it further and have it be readily available when someone goes to research said group or individual. On certain occasions, reputation managers will even reach out via email to promote more people posting their positive reviews.

Why is reputation management important?

Reputation management is crucial because it impacts major decisions, whether for one individual or a giant corporation.

Looking for a job? Applying to college? Trying to jumpstart your dating life? Well, all of these will be a lot easier if there is nothing negative circulating about you. A common problem people face in these endeavors are what happens when people put their name into a search engine, or into social media. If it is easy for a company to find a picture of you on Facebook passed out after a night of drinking, odds are they are not going to want to hire you. If someone puts your name into a search engine and the first thing that appears is a mugshot, odds are they will not be quite as keen to go on a date with you, hire you, or accept you into their school. This is the case even if the mugshot is not yours, but someone else with the same name. So, reputation managers work to have these types of negative content removed so that they will not hinder your success, or at least suppress them in search results. This is especially important as approximately half of adults in the United States state that their results in Google searches are not positive.

For companies offering products or services, reputation management is extremely important. Would you rather go to a doctor that you heard was excellent, or one your friend had a bad experience with? Would you rather eat at a restaurant that you see has 4.6 stars or one with 2.3? Would you rather purchase a product you have little to no information on, or a similar item that you can see others have had a positive experience with? Would you rather go to a spa with a review about how amazing the experience was or one where a customer has described being treated poorly? Odds are you would prefer those with better reviews, which is why reputation management is so important.

Wondering how important reviews really are? A 2016 study showed that 90% of customers read through online reviews before visiting a business, and online reviews influence 67.7% of purchasing decisions. Every additional star on the website Yelp has found to yield an additional 5-9 percent in revenue for a business.

Not only is reputation management important in driving business, but it also reinforces employees’ commitment to the business, and gives them confidence in the brand, further benefiting the company as a whole.

Now, there is an easy solution to many reputation management problems. Software has been created that can easily monitor reviews, ensuring they do not get missed. Negative content can easily dissuade customers from making purchases, and harm business. Negative reviews can be left at any time, day or night, so software solutions are often the best resource, as they handle the content as soon as it is posted. These forms of software can also create an analysis of an individual or company’s current online reputation, and offer suggestions on how to maintain or increase this level. There is also social media monitoring software that can track comments, subscriptions, likes, and more to ensure your business looks its best online.

[216marketing]

Why Is Reputation Management So Important?

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/AAFdq4

Why Is Reputation Management So Important?

Reputation management is the process of influencing the public perception of an individual or group. While this originated in the public relations sphere, it has become increasingly prevalent with the advent of search results and social media. So, let’s find out why reputation management is so important.

What are the different types of reputation management?

Today, there are two different types of reputation management: online and offline.

Online reputation management is handling the content on the internet regarding an individual or group. This primarily refers to product and service search results, especially reviews given by customers or clients. This can also include the search results or social media content regarding a specific individual. Online reputation management has become increasingly important as now 65% of adults view internet searches as “the most trusted source of information” when it comes to either people or companies.

Offline reputation management deals with the control of public perception of an individual or group via their standing outside of the internet. Items of interest in offline reputation management include press releases, media content, and even displayed morals and/or ethics.

How does reputation management work?

Reputation managers work to influence how an individual or group is perceived by filtering the information the public is exposed to about them. So, reputation managers will monitor all the information that is published or distributed about an individual or group, then decide whether it will have a positive or negative influence on their potential for success. If negative, the manager will then work to hide or eliminate the content. If positive, the manager will attempt to spread it further and have it be readily available when someone goes to research said group or individual. On certain occasions, reputation managers will even reach out via email to promote more people posting their positive reviews.

Why is reputation management important?

Reputation management is crucial because it impacts major decisions, whether for one individual or a giant corporation.

Looking for a job? Applying to college? Trying to jumpstart your dating life? Well, all of these will be a lot easier if there is nothing negative circulating about you. A common problem people face in these endeavors are what happens when people put their name into a search engine, or into social media. If it is easy for a company to find a picture of you on Facebook passed out after a night of drinking, odds are they are not going to want to hire you. If someone puts your name into a search engine and the first thing that appears is a mugshot, odds are they will not be quite as keen to go on a date with you, hire you, or accept you into their school. This is the case even if the mugshot is not yours, but someone else with the same name. So, reputation managers work to have these types of negative content removed so that they will not hinder your success, or at least suppress them in search results. This is especially important as approximately half of adults in the United States state that their results in Google searches are not positive.

For companies offering products or services, reputation management is extremely important. Would you rather go to a doctor that you heard was excellent, or one your friend had a bad experience with? Would you rather eat at a restaurant that you see has 4.6 stars or one with 2.3? Would you rather purchase a product you have little to no information on, or a similar item that you can see others have had a positive experience with? Would you rather go to a spa with a review about how amazing the experience was or one where a customer has described being treated poorly? Odds are you would prefer those with better reviews, which is why reputation management is so important.

Wondering how important reviews really are? A 2016 study showed that 90% of customers read through online reviews before visiting a business, and online reviews influence 67.7% of purchasing decisions. Every additional star on the website Yelp has found to yield an additional 5-9 percent in revenue for a business.

Not only is reputation management important in driving business, but it also reinforces employees’ commitment to the business, and gives them confidence in the brand, further benefiting the company as a whole.

Now, there is an easy solution to many reputation management problems. Software has been created that can easily monitor reviews, ensuring they do not get missed. Negative content can easily dissuade customers from making purchases, and harm business. Negative reviews can be left at any time, day or night, so software solutions are often the best resource, as they handle the content as soon as it is posted. These forms of software can also create an analysis of an individual or company’s current online reputation, and offer suggestions on how to maintain or increase this level. There is also social media monitoring software that can track comments, subscriptions, likes, and more to ensure your business looks its best online.

[216marketing]

Just get it.  #nevertoolate #216marketing  https://216marketing.com/

[216marketing]

The Best 5 Digital Marketing Tips to Get More Leads for Loan Officers

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/MBDHkC

The Best 5 Digital Marketing Tips to Get More Leads for Loan Officers

You could be the best loan officer in the mortgage industry, but let’s face it – if you aren’t marketing properly, you won’t be driving business. So, make sure you are incorporating these digital marketing tips into your strategy.

Create High Quality Content

Regardless of whether you are using email blasts, Facebook posts, or Instagram stories to reach potential clients, ensure that the content you are producing is of high quality. That means no cliché stock images, and absolutely no typos. You want your online presence to reflect the professionality you offer in real life.

Be sure to rely heavily on visual content, as it grabs consumers’ attention quickly. Plus, it is four times as likely to be shared than a post of text. Looking to spread some expertise on loans, or homes in general? Throw in an infographic. They are easy to generate and are sure to make an impact.

Boost Your Social Media Presence

As in any industry, social media has taken over. That means that part of your job is to use it to your advantage.

Ensure that your social media platforms give a clear picture of the services you offer, display your expertise, and stay up-to-date. Make it easy for anyone on your account to immediately understand your business. Always include a call to action in your posts, and have your contact information clearly accessible on your page.

Of course, social media is about more than just the content. You could have a stunningly designed page filled with information, but still struggle to get followers. To amplify your reach, there are a couple things you can do. First, be sure that you have your social accounts on your business card, and encourage pre existing clients to add you on these platforms. Second, you can pay to have your posts reach more people. If you are looking to gain traction, this may be a worthwhile investment.

Email Effectively

While it is tempting to try to sell yourself whenever you are reaching out to leads, this has shown not to be the most effective approach. So, do not send out constant blasts about what you offer; instead, write about the industry at large, showing your own expertise.

Keep a schedule with your newsletters, so your audience knows when to expect content from you. Do not bombard them, or they may unsubscribe, but email frequently enough to keep them interested.

One strategy to keep your readers engaged is to write about one of your most compelling experiences in the industry, but instead of giving it all away at once, leave a cliffhanger so they will be sure to open your next email with the continuation of the story.

Again, as with any piece of marketing, do not send an email out without including a call to action.

Don’t have time to write your own emails? Not a problem! You can always hire freelance writers that are versed in the topic via popular companies like Upwork or Scripted.

Interact

An important aspect of a successful marketing campaign is to promote engagement. There are a few different ways that as a loan officer you can accomplish this.

First, the easiest way to connect in general – ask questions! Generate authentic conversations with your audience without exclusively thinking of the bottom line. Never underestimate the power of word of mouth, and people are more likely to recommend someone if they have had a positive personal interaction. So, talk directly to the people who are following your marketing! Ask questions, discuss, and always reply to comments or queries. Plus, asking questions will also give you information about consumer behavior that might be difficult to attain otherwise.

Another great way to promote interactions is to ask customers for reviews, ideally right before the closing date on the loan. Certain sites have sections for reviews, or you can ask them directly. Future clients will feel safer trusting their money with someone with good reviews, so having these available will be beneficial. If someone leaves a review that highlights your expertise, feel free to highlight it on your social media, or quote it in your marketing content!

Be sure to thank your customers for positive reviews! If you do receive a negative review, be sure to comment publicly and apologize, offering to fix the issue if applicable.

There is some software out there like Trustspot that can assist with the process as well.

Create a Database

Creating a database is crucial in maintaining organization and growing your network. An effective marketing strategy is not only reaching out to potential leads, but learning from their answers to your questions. From this, you can gain valuable industry insights.

You should also be tracking which of your platforms gains the most traction, then go on to analyze which types of posts spark engagement. Whichever are the most successful can be emulated in the future.

We know how much time this can take up, if you need any assistance, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

[216marketing]

The Best 5 Digital Marketing Tips to Get More Leads for Loan Officers

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/MBDHkC

The Best 5 Digital Marketing Tips to Get More Leads for Loan Officers

You could be the best loan officer in the mortgage industry, but let’s face it – if you aren’t marketing properly, you won’t be driving business. So, make sure you are incorporating these digital marketing tips into your strategy.

Create High Quality Content

Regardless of whether you are using email blasts, Facebook posts, or Instagram stories to reach potential clients, ensure that the content you are producing is of high quality. That means no cliché stock images, and absolutely no typos. You want your online presence to reflect the professionality you offer in real life.

Be sure to rely heavily on visual content, as it grabs consumers’ attention quickly. Plus, it is four times as likely to be shared than a post of text. Looking to spread some expertise on loans, or homes in general? Throw in an infographic. They are easy to generate and are sure to make an impact.

Boost Your Social Media Presence

As in any industry, social media has taken over. That means that part of your job is to use it to your advantage.

Ensure that your social media platforms give a clear picture of the services you offer, display your expertise, and stay up-to-date. Make it easy for anyone on your account to immediately understand your business. Always include a call to action in your posts, and have your contact information clearly accessible on your page.

Of course, social media is about more than just the content. You could have a stunningly designed page filled with information, but still struggle to get followers. To amplify your reach, there are a couple things you can do. First, be sure that you have your social accounts on your business card, and encourage pre existing clients to add you on these platforms. Second, you can pay to have your posts reach more people. If you are looking to gain traction, this may be a worthwhile investment.

Email Effectively

While it is tempting to try to sell yourself whenever you are reaching out to leads, this has shown not to be the most effective approach. So, do not send out constant blasts about what you offer; instead, write about the industry at large, showing your own expertise.

Keep a schedule with your newsletters, so your audience knows when to expect content from you. Do not bombard them, or they may unsubscribe, but email frequently enough to keep them interested.

One strategy to keep your readers engaged is to write about one of your most compelling experiences in the industry, but instead of giving it all away at once, leave a cliffhanger so they will be sure to open your next email with the continuation of the story.

Again, as with any piece of marketing, do not send an email out without including a call to action.

Don’t have time to write your own emails? Not a problem! You can always hire freelance writers that are versed in the topic via popular companies like Upwork or Scripted.

Interact

An important aspect of a successful marketing campaign is to promote engagement. There are a few different ways that as a loan officer you can accomplish this.

First, the easiest way to connect in general – ask questions! Generate authentic conversations with your audience without exclusively thinking of the bottom line. Never underestimate the power of word of mouth, and people are more likely to recommend someone if they have had a positive personal interaction. So, talk directly to the people who are following your marketing! Ask questions, discuss, and always reply to comments or queries. Plus, asking questions will also give you information about consumer behavior that might be difficult to attain otherwise.

Another great way to promote interactions is to ask customers for reviews, ideally right before the closing date on the loan. Certain sites have sections for reviews, or you can ask them directly. Future clients will feel safer trusting their money with someone with good reviews, so having these available will be beneficial. If someone leaves a review that highlights your expertise, feel free to highlight it on your social media, or quote it in your marketing content!

Be sure to thank your customers for positive reviews! If you do receive a negative review, be sure to comment publicly and apologize, offering to fix the issue if applicable.

There is some software out there like Trustspot that can assist with the process as well.

Create a Database

Creating a database is crucial in maintaining organization and growing your network. An effective marketing strategy is not only reaching out to potential leads, but learning from their answers to your questions. From this, you can gain valuable industry insights.

You should also be tracking which of your platforms gains the most traction, then go on to analyze which types of posts spark engagement. Whichever are the most successful can be emulated in the future.

We know how much time this can take up, if you need any assistance, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

[216marketing]

9 Tools To Boost Small Business Social Media

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/R6h88C

9 Tools To Boost Small Business Social Media

  Sometimes, navigating through social media advice is just like sailing through treacherous waters. Some digital marketers have got it right, while others use methods that will take up all of your time.

I’ve heard some people say that social media management requires a personal touch to connect with users on an individual level. What I’ve found out is that you need to use social media tools to help you be more efficient and productive.

These tools can help make your social media management and marketing a success. They can keep you organized and help you accomplish your goals with ease. Most importantly, some of these tools have a free plan or trial offer, so you don’t have to spend any money until you’re sure you can’t do without it.

Here Are 9 Tools To Boost Small Business Social Media:

1. Hootsuite

Whether you are a digital marketer handling different accounts, or a small business owner trying to get a handle on things, HootSuite will make posting on social media easier. You can add your social media accounts and schedule posts across several networks at once.

Also, Hootsuite has a robust training platform where you can learn not only about the tool but about social media networking as a whole. It has a free plan that is great for small businesses who don’t have the budget for fancy tools.

Here’s what the Hootsuite free plan offers:

Ability to manage 3 social profiles

Schedule posts for up to 30 days in advance

Generate leads by creating social contests

It also comes with basic analytics for monitoring your account and activities. The insights offered can help foster growth and makes decision making so much easier.

2. Buffer

Posting on social networks is the main activity that builds up your audience over time. But when you create content, is not always the best time to post it!

Just like Hootsuite, Buffer can help you post to multiple social media networks on a schedule.

After spending time researching and developing content, you will want to post it at different times of the day or week for maximum visibility. The Buffer app helps you solve this problem by allowing you to schedule your posts for sharing at specific times of the day. And not only that, Buffer provides other amazing features such as analytics for all of the posts you send out.

3. Trendsmap

Trendsmap allows users to view trends at a glance. You can see what Twitter users in different geographical locations are talking about.

From a global viewpoint, you can see what people in London, Ontario, Sydney etc. are talking about. This is a really good way to stay updated and post content that is deemed as ‘currently relevant’.

It easier to make trending topics become viral. So if you post engaging content that is trending in your location, chances are that it could go viral. At least, it will get a lot of engagement through user-generated content.

4. Google Alerts

If you haven’t been using Google Alerts, then you’ve been missing out on a very valuable digital marketing tool. It is one of the most widely used business tools on the web and most importantly, it’s free.

With Google alerts, you can keep up with specialized topics or someone in the news you want to monitor. Simply enter a search term and set up a Google Alert to notify you by email when there’s news on the topic.

With Google Alerts you can grow your traffic, brand, and revenue by accessing thousands of targeted data right in your inbox.

5. HubSpot Website Grader

While there are many tools that help you create and publish social content, Hubspot makes it easy for you to monitor and access vital reporting data from a URL.

What this means is that you can see what channels drive the most engagement, and also monitor your campaigns and sales funnels to see what content and strategies are driving actual leads and sales.

6. TweetDeck

If Twitter is key to your social media success, then TweetDeck is probably the most valuable social management tool for you!

With TweetDeck you can leverage the power of custom timelines to organize and manage your lists and searches. You can also add team accounts to this free and effective Twitter management tool.

Even though TweetDeck is not an all-in-one solution, it is an excellent tool for digital marketers who manage several Twitter accounts at once and need a way to centralize live conversations for business success.

7. Splice

Video marketing is important in today’s social media campaigns. It captures the imagination of your followers and keeps them more engaged than texts or images.

If you’ve ever created videos for your social media accounts, then you probably know that even a short one-minute video can take hours or days to produce.

Thankfully, Splice will help make the video creation process easier and more intuitive. It has an easy-to-use app on iPhone and produces some amazing and eye-catching videos that you can share on social media literally only a few seconds after production.

8. AdEspresso

AdEspresso is a social tool that makes Facebook advertising more effective. You can manage your Facebook and Instagram ads and A/B test your campaigns.

Many marketers overlook the importance of optimizing their ads after it’s live, but for the best results, every campaign you run should be tweaked to make it even more successful. AdEspresso can help you achieve just that!

9. Canva

They say a picture is worth a thousand words and on social media, this is a FACT.

Have you ever posted an image that got more attention than a post that you spent so much time developing?

Well, this happens all the time.

Visual content can really boost social campaign results and with Canva, you can create great quality visuals without the help of an expert designer.

Canva simplifies DIY image designing allowing just about anybody to easily and quickly create professional banners, memes, and images for their social and blog posts.

The toughest part of social media marketing is staying relevant. Even big brands sometimes have a problem connecting with their fan base. These tools can help make your social media activities more engaging and most of all, productive.

But remember, simply using a productivity tool is not all you need to get results. You need expertise and skill to grab a chunk of your target market. This is where an experienced social media manager can help.

[216marketing]

Facebook Ads For Beginners

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/YW5ZeC

Facebook Ads For Beginners

Facebook is huge. As the largest social networking community in the world, it has an estimated 2.2 billion monthly active users. This social network went from being unknown a little over a decade ago, to now having billions of people on it today.

With such a huge community, ignoring Facebook is definitely not an option for digital marketers. One thing is for certain: your target market is using Facebook almost every day, even with the new data leak. The question you should ask yourself is how to use Facebook and Instagram to reach and grab your market share.

Thankfully, Facebook has made this easy for businesses by providing an advertising platform that allows marketers to zero in and target specific user groups. Your Facebook ads can target users by location, interests, demographics, and much more.

Getting started with Facebook ad campaigns is easy. I’ll show you how you can use the advertising platform to your advantage. This guide is aimed at beginners who want to run ad campaigns on the largest social network for the first time. But, old timers can also benefit if their Facebook ad campaigns need some finetuning.

You’ll find answers to many questions, including:

How to get started with Facebook ad campaigns?

How to set goals for your campaign?

How to use Facebook Ads Manager?

How to choose an audience?

How to select ad placements?

How to set a budget?

How to create your first ad?

If your goal is to go from a Facebook ad newbie to an experienced ad manager, then go ahead and read the whole guide. I promise you’ll learn some new tricks while creating ads that will convert.

Getting started with Facebook ad campaigns

Facebook Ads isn’t like Google’s Adwords. Nobody is searching for your content or website on Facebook for the most part. What this means is that your ad must stand out and get in front of your target audience for it to yield some return on your ad investment.

So you need to understand a few factors in order to get great results.

1. Set Your Goals

It’s easy to dive in and start creating ads on Facebook. But you must first set your goals. Why are you on Facebook and what are you trying to achieve?

Many marketers fail because they did not have definite goals and without a specific intention, they couldn’t define their audience correctly. Before you click on the “Create Ad” button, you must first set a goal. Here are some examples:

Grow your audience on Facebook

Get more traffic to your website

Brand awareness

Get signups for an event

Sell your products or services

These are typical goals most marketers will set before creating a campaign.

2. Choose an Objective

Go to Facebook Ads Manager and choose an objective. Facebook Ads Manager is where all the magic happens on Facebook’s advertising platform. So you want to get familiar with this section real early.

Here you can create your ad and choose your marketing objective. Now, this is different from the goals I mentioned earlier. Your marketing objectives are broken down into 3 categories:

Awareness – Campaigns with this objective are designed to get your brand noticed on Facebook. This could be for your posts, page or website.

Consideration – These are ads that get users to click through to your page or website. They are designed to pique users curiosity and could be for the purpose of engagement, app installations, website traffic, etc.

Conversion – This is the most profitable objective because you are basically converting your leads into customers. It could include goals such as software installation, freebie offers, website registrations, app installs and much more.

After choosing the category that best suits your marketing goal, it’s time to save the campaign and move on to the next step.

3. Your Target Audience

Choosing the right target audience can REALLY be a challenge, so you want to put some forethought into the choice you make at this stage.

Pick users that fall into the location of your business. This one is a no-brainer. If you cast your net wide, you’ll effectively not “catch any fish”. You want to narrow down to the area where your target audience resides. But if your business isn’t dependent on location, then other factors like age, gender, language, interests, behaviors, and connections will be useful for your ad.

The key here is to target your audience in a way that will benefit your business. You will effectively be wasting your marketing dollars targeting people who speak Spanish when your product or service is in English. So choose carefully!

4. Ad Placement

Where do you want your ads displayed? Facebook offers placements on other networks like Instagram, Audience Network, and Messenger.

Allowing Facebook to automatically place your ads where they’ll perform best is a good option here. Unless you’re very experienced in preselecting ad placement positions, it’s best to leave these to Facebook’s algorithm.

5. Choose a Budget

This decision is one you’ll have to make on your own. How much have you allocated to Facebook ads? Bear in mind that you can simply set your daily maximum or total spend for the entire campaign.

Choose a date range and when you want the ad to start running.

6. Create Your Ad

You have to choose a format for your ad. The options available are a carousel, single image, single video, and slideshow ads. These formats available are directly related to the objectives chosen from the start.

You will need to upload an image or video; depending on the format you choose. The good news is that Facebook offers a free library of stock images that you can use for the ad. So if you don’t mind generic photos, then this is a great tool to use.

Finally, you have to add content to your ad. Every marketer worth a pinch of salt knows that your ad copy can make the difference between success or failure. So you should pay extra attention to the content you create.

That’s it, you’re done! Just click the confirm button to submit your ad and add your payment information. Facebook will review the ad to make sure it’s within their terms and conditions and then they’ll activate it. This is usually done no more than a few hours later.  Give it a try, start with $5, it’s easy and fun!

As easy as this is, some people just don’t have the time. We can take care of this for you if needed without pay per click advertising and more.

Contact Us Today!

[216marketing]

SEO Cleveland

[216marketing]

9 Tools To Boost Small Business Social Media

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/R6h88C

9 Tools To Boost Small Business Social Media

  Sometimes, navigating through social media advice is just like sailing through treacherous waters. Some digital marketers have got it right, while others use methods that will take up all of your time.

I’ve heard some people say that social media management requires a personal touch to connect with users on an individual level. What I’ve found out is that you need to use social media tools to help you be more efficient and productive.

These tools can help make your social media management and marketing a success. They can keep you organized and help you accomplish your goals with ease. Most importantly, some of these tools have a free plan or trial offer, so you don’t have to spend any money until you’re sure you can’t do without it.

Here Are 9 Tools To Boost Small Business Social Media:

1. Hootsuite

Whether you are a digital marketer handling different accounts, or a small business owner trying to get a handle on things, HootSuite will make posting on social media easier. You can add your social media accounts and schedule posts across several networks at once.

Also, Hootsuite has a robust training platform where you can learn not only about the tool but about social media networking as a whole. It has a free plan that is great for small businesses who don’t have the budget for fancy tools.

Here’s what the Hootsuite free plan offers:

Ability to manage 3 social profiles

Schedule posts for up to 30 days in advance

Generate leads by creating social contests

It also comes with basic analytics for monitoring your account and activities. The insights offered can help foster growth and makes decision making so much easier.

2. Buffer

Posting on social networks is the main activity that builds up your audience over time. But when you create content, is not always the best time to post it!

Just like Hootsuite, Buffer can help you post to multiple social media networks on a schedule.

After spending time researching and developing content, you will want to post it at different times of the day or week for maximum visibility. The Buffer app helps you solve this problem by allowing you to schedule your posts for sharing at specific times of the day. And not only that, Buffer provides other amazing features such as analytics for all of the posts you send out.

3. Trendsmap

Trendsmap allows users to view trends at a glance. You can see what Twitter users in different geographical locations are talking about.

From a global viewpoint, you can see what people in London, Ontario, Sydney etc. are talking about. This is a really good way to stay updated and post content that is deemed as ‘currently relevant’.

It easier to make trending topics become viral. So if you post engaging content that is trending in your location, chances are that it could go viral. At least, it will get a lot of engagement through user-generated content.

4. Google Alerts

If you haven’t been using Google Alerts, then you’ve been missing out on a very valuable digital marketing tool. It is one of the most widely used business tools on the web and most importantly, it’s free.

With Google alerts, you can keep up with specialized topics or someone in the news you want to monitor. Simply enter a search term and set up a Google Alert to notify you by email when there’s news on the topic.

With Google Alerts you can grow your traffic, brand, and revenue by accessing thousands of targeted data right in your inbox.

5. HubSpot Website Grader

While there are many tools that help you create and publish social content, Hubspot makes it easy for you to monitor and access vital reporting data from a URL.

What this means is that you can see what channels drive the most engagement, and also monitor your campaigns and sales funnels to see what content and strategies are driving actual leads and sales.

6. TweetDeck

If Twitter is key to your social media success, then TweetDeck is probably the most valuable social management tool for you!

With TweetDeck you can leverage the power of custom timelines to organize and manage your lists and searches. You can also add team accounts to this free and effective Twitter management tool.

Even though TweetDeck is not an all-in-one solution, it is an excellent tool for digital marketers who manage several Twitter accounts at once and need a way to centralize live conversations for business success.

7. Splice

Video marketing is important in today’s social media campaigns. It captures the imagination of your followers and keeps them more engaged than texts or images.

If you’ve ever created videos for your social media accounts, then you probably know that even a short one-minute video can take hours or days to produce.

Thankfully, Splice will help make the video creation process easier and more intuitive. It has an easy-to-use app on iPhone and produces some amazing and eye-catching videos that you can share on social media literally only a few seconds after production.

8. AdEspresso

AdEspresso is a social tool that makes Facebook advertising more effective. You can manage your Facebook and Instagram ads and A/B test your campaigns.

Many marketers overlook the importance of optimizing their ads after it’s live, but for the best results, every campaign you run should be tweaked to make it even more successful. AdEspresso can help you achieve just that!

9. Canva

They say a picture is worth a thousand words and on social media, this is a FACT.

Have you ever posted an image that got more attention than a post that you spent so much time developing?

Well, this happens all the time.

Visual content can really boost social campaign results and with Canva, you can create great quality visuals without the help of an expert designer.

Canva simplifies DIY image designing allowing just about anybody to easily and quickly create professional banners, memes, and images for their social and blog posts.

The toughest part of social media marketing is staying relevant. Even big brands sometimes have a problem connecting with their fan base. These tools can help make your social media activities more engaging and most of all, productive.

But remember, simply using a productivity tool is not all you need to get results. You need expertise and skill to grab a chunk of your target market. This is where an experienced social media manager can help.

[216marketing]

Facebook Ads For Beginners

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/YW5ZeC

Facebook Ads For Beginners

Facebook is huge. As the largest social networking community in the world, it has an estimated 2.2 billion monthly active users. This social network went from being unknown a little over a decade ago, to now having billions of people on it today.

With such a huge community, ignoring Facebook is definitely not an option for digital marketers. One thing is for certain: your target market is using Facebook almost every day, even with the new data leak. The question you should ask yourself is how to use Facebook and Instagram to reach and grab your market share.

Thankfully, Facebook has made this easy for businesses by providing an advertising platform that allows marketers to zero in and target specific user groups. Your Facebook ads can target users by location, interests, demographics, and much more.

Getting started with Facebook ad campaigns is easy. I’ll show you how you can use the advertising platform to your advantage. This guide is aimed at beginners who want to run ad campaigns on the largest social network for the first time. But, old timers can also benefit if their Facebook ad campaigns need some finetuning.

You’ll find answers to many questions, including:

How to get started with Facebook ad campaigns?

How to set goals for your campaign?

How to use Facebook Ads Manager?

How to choose an audience?

How to select ad placements?

How to set a budget?

How to create your first ad?

If your goal is to go from a Facebook ad newbie to an experienced ad manager, then go ahead and read the whole guide. I promise you’ll learn some new tricks while creating ads that will convert.

Getting started with Facebook ad campaigns

Facebook Ads isn’t like Google’s Adwords. Nobody is searching for your content or website on Facebook for the most part. What this means is that your ad must stand out and get in front of your target audience for it to yield some return on your ad investment.

So you need to understand a few factors in order to get great results.

1. Set Your Goals

It’s easy to dive in and start creating ads on Facebook. But you must first set your goals. Why are you on Facebook and what are you trying to achieve?

Many marketers fail because they did not have definite goals and without a specific intention, they couldn’t define their audience correctly. Before you click on the “Create Ad” button, you must first set a goal. Here are some examples:

Grow your audience on Facebook

Get more traffic to your website

Brand awareness

Get signups for an event

Sell your products or services

These are typical goals most marketers will set before creating a campaign.

2. Choose and Objective

Go to Facebook Ads Manager and choose an objective. Facebook Ads Manager is where all the magic happens on Facebook’s advertising platform. So you want to get familiar with this section real early.

Here you can create your ad and choose your marketing objective. Now, this is different from the goals I mentioned earlier. Your marketing objectives are broken down into 3 categories:

Awareness – Campaigns with this objective are designed to get your brand noticed on Facebook. This could be for your posts, page or website.

Consideration – These are ads that get users to click through to your page or website. They are designed to pique users curiosity and could be for the purpose of engagement, app installations, website traffic, etc.

Conversion – This is the most profitable objective because you are basically converting your leads into customers. It could include goals such as software installation, freebie offers, website registrations, app installs and much more.

After choosing the category that best suits your marketing goal, it’s time to save the campaign and move on to the next step.

3. Your Target Audience

Choosing the right target audience can REALLY be a challenge, so you want to put some forethought into the choice you make at this stage.

Pick users that fall into the location of your business. This one is a no-brainer. If you cast your net wide, you’ll effectively not “catch any fish”. You want to narrow down to the area where your target audience resides. But if your business isn’t dependent on location, then other factors like age, gender, language, interests, behaviors, and connections will be useful for your ad.

The key here is to target your audience in a way that will benefit your business. You will effectively be wasting your marketing dollars targeting people who speak Spanish when your product or service is in English. So choose carefully!

4. Ad Placement

Where do you want your ads displayed? Facebook offers placements on other networks like Instagram, Audience Network, and Messenger.

Allowing Facebook to automatically place your ads where they’ll perform best is a good option here. Unless you’re very experienced in preselecting ad placement positions, it’s best to leave these to Facebook’s algorithm.

5. Choose a Budget

This decision is one you’ll have to make on your own. How much have you allocated to Facebook ads? Bear in mind that you can simply set your daily maximum or total spend for the entire campaign.

Choose a date range and when you want the ad to start running.

6. Create Your Ad

You have to choose a format for your ad. The options available are a carousel, single image, single video, and slideshow ads. These formats available are directly related to the objectives chosen from the start.

You will need to upload an image or video; depending on the format you choose. The good news is that Facebook offers a free library of stock images that you can use for the ad. So if you don’t mind generic photos, then this is a great tool to use.

Finally, you have to add content to your ad. Every marketer worth a pinch of salt knows that your ad copy can make the difference between success or failure. So you should pay extra attention to the content you create.

That’s it, you’re done! Just click the confirm button to submit your ad and add your payment information. Facebook will review the ad to make sure it’s within their terms and conditions and then they’ll activate it. This is usually done no more than a few hours later.  Give it a try, start with $5, it’s easy and fun!

As easy as this is, some people just don’t have the time. We can take care of this for you if needed without pay per click advertising and more.

Contact Us Today!

[216marketing]

6 Reasons Marketing Automation Software is a MUST For Small Businesses

New Post has been published on https://goo.gl/ZnnYo2

6 Reasons Marketing Automation Software is a MUST For Small Businesses

At its most fundamental level, marketing automation software is all about optimization. It helps you optimize your employees time, optimize the focus and efforts of your sales team, optimize your digital marketing campaigns and so much more.

The scope of a marketing software goes far beyond automating your marketing departments repetitive tasks. It can help you measure your marketing activities and campaigns, which will ensure that you beat your competitors, understand your customers and increase sales.

If you’re not using a marketing automation software in 2018, you are missing out on a great tool that can help you enhance your digital marketing efforts.

Here are 6 benefits for your small business:

1. It will help you generate targeted leads

There are many marketing strategies that can help you get people interested in your business and products. But will these prospects convert to paying customers?

Getting leads through inbound and traditional marketing methods is great, but it does your business no good if these leads do not become real customers.

This is one of the main reasons marketing automation software is recommended by many experts. It will help you target leads at every point of your sales funnel. What this essentially means is that the prospects you target will likely become customers.

A good marketing automation software can generate better and high-quality leads. For example, a marketing automation software like HubSpot can help you segment your leads into varying stages of a buying cycle.

HubSpot will deliver critical data so that you can have a clear idea about the specific interests of your prospects. You will know how long your prospects have been looking for the solution, what their expectations are and what it’ll take to convert them.

With this kind of information, you can make actionable decisions with the marketing data you have at hand.

2. Reduce conversion time and increase revenue

Marketing automation software will make your sales process more efficient and effective. It will reduce the time required for a prospect to transition to an actual customer.

Let’s look at Thomson Reuters 2013 case study. When the company integrated an automation software into their marketing processes, Thomson Reuters discovered that its lead conversion time dropped by a whopping 72%. This is a huge number and produced a 175% increase in revenue.

Increasing revenue is what most businesses strive for. So why do so many people ignore marketing automation?

The results always justifies the upfront investment. You can increase conversions, sales, improve revenue and hit your bottom line faster than if you hadn’t used a marketing automation software.

3. Loyalty and Customer retention

For continuous growth, there must be a balance between customer acquisition and retention. The reason most first-timers become return customers is simply out of loyalty.

While the idea of converting new leads is an exciting one, keeping them loyal can get tricky.

Marketing automation software is an effective tool used by many fortune 500 companies to retain customers. It usually comes with some type of marketing intelligence feature that provides insight into your customers.

With the data, you can assess the needs of your customers and make decisions that will help retain them.

4. Improve customer relations

One of the most common mistakes made by marketers today is that they overlook the importance of customer relations. In order to increase conversions, you must know your customers and prospects better.

Customer relation strategies will help your small business improve its customer retention rate. By focusing on customer satisfaction, your customer retention rate will go higher.

With customer satisfaction high, you will get enough repeat business and word of mouth publicity, which is a powerful marketing tool.

Marketing automation software can be personalized to boost your relationship with customers and prospects. It will help you implement effective marketing strategies that include lead scoring models, customer nurturing, lead qualification, digital footprint analysis and so much more.

5. Maximize email marketing

Being connected to your leads and customers is vital to the longevity of your small business. One of the most commonly used tools for business connectivity is emails.

Digital marketers realized this decades ago and users were flooded with spam from cold calling and even businesses they were interested in. That is why today, email marketing efforts need to be strategic to produce any viable results. Massive emailing does not work and can actually be counterproductive.

For example, a tool like ActiveCampaign can help you create behavioral based system automation. It is a gem for automating your email campaigns because it triggers when a customer updates their contact details, unsubscribes from your newsletter, when a message is opened, when a link is clicked and so much more.

With this type of data, you can personalize your emails and design a campaign that will not spam your users. It will create a system that will fit the recipient’s interests. By segmenting your lists based on user’s behavioral data, you will maximize the reach and power of your email campaign.

For instance, if a user never opened your emails you can program your automation software to email the user less frequently. If some users open the emails at a certain time of the day, you can program your automation software to send out emails at given times when it will most likely be read and not drowned out by other emails.

6. Improve your social media activities

An effective marketing automation software will include a social media component that will help you automate your social media activities.

No need to use a different social media scheduling tool that will be separate from your marketing system. With this feature, you will save time as all your key marketing tools will be in one place.

It will help you monitor all your social accounts with ease. When it comes to insight and analysis, you can get a bird’s eye view of how well your brand is performing in your social communities. This will enable you to create campaigns that align with your business goals.

Marketing automation software is the future of marketing. It provides huge productivity gains for small businesses and is a MUST-HAVE tool for digital marketing.

Integrating your existing CRM and marketing systems with a marketing automation software like HubSpot is necessary to rip the full power of its automated processes. If you need help getting setup, send us a mail and we will be glad to help.

[216marketing]

6 Reasons Marketing Automation Software is a MUST For Small Businesses

New Post has been published on https://goo.gl/ZnnYo2

6 Reasons Marketing Automation Software is a MUST For Small Businesses

At its most fundamental level, marketing automation software is all about optimization. It helps you optimize your employees time, optimize the focus and efforts of your sales team, optimize your digital marketing campaigns and so much more.

The scope of a marketing software goes far beyond automating your marketing departments repetitive tasks. It can help you measure your marketing activities and campaigns, which will ensure that you beat your competitors, understand your customers and increase sales.

If you’re not using a marketing automation software in 2018, you are missing out on a great tool that can help you enhance your digital marketing efforts.

Here are 6 benefits for your small business:

1. It will help you generate targeted leads

There are many marketing strategies that can help you get people interested in your business and products. But will these prospects convert to paying customers?

Getting leads through inbound and traditional marketing methods is great, but it does your business no good if these leads do not become real customers.

This is one of the main reasons marketing automation software is recommended by many experts. It will help you target leads at every point of your sales funnel. What this essentially means is that the prospects you target will likely become customers.

A good marketing automation software can generate better and high-quality leads. For example, a marketing automation software like HubSpot can help you segment your leads into varying stages of a buying cycle.

HubSpot will deliver critical data so that you can have a clear idea about the specific interests of your prospects. You will know how long your prospects have been looking for the solution, what their expectations are and what it’ll take to convert them.

With this kind of information, you can make actionable decisions with the marketing data you have at hand.

2. Reduce conversion time and increase revenue

Marketing automation software will make your sales process more efficient and effective. It will reduce the time required for a prospect to transition to an actual customer.

Let’s look at Thomson Reuters 2013 case study. When the company integrated an automation software into their marketing processes, Thomson Reuters discovered that its lead conversion time dropped by a whopping 72%. This is a huge number and produced a 175% increase in revenue.

Increasing revenue is what most businesses strive for. So why do so many people ignore marketing automation?

The results always justifies the upfront investment. You can increase conversions, sales, improve revenue and hit your bottom line faster than if you hadn’t used a marketing automation software.

3. Loyalty and Customer retention

For continuous growth, there must be a balance between customer acquisition and retention. The reason most first-timers become return customers is simply out of loyalty.

While the idea of converting new leads is an exciting one, keeping them loyal can get tricky.

Marketing automation software is an effective tool used by many fortune 500 companies to retain customers. It usually comes with some type of marketing intelligence feature that provides insight into your customers.

With the data, you can assess the needs of your customers and make decisions that will help retain them.

4. Improve customer relations

One of the most common mistakes made by marketers today is that they overlook the importance of customer relations. In order to increase conversions, you must know your customers and prospects better.

Customer relation strategies will help your small business improve its customer retention rate. By focusing on customer satisfaction, your customer retention rate will go higher.

With customer satisfaction high, you will get enough repeat business and word of mouth publicity, which is a powerful marketing tool.

Marketing automation software can be personalized to boost your relationship with customers and prospects. It will help you implement effective marketing strategies that include lead scoring models, customer nurturing, lead qualification, digital footprint analysis and so much more.

5. Maximize email marketing

Being connected to your leads and customers is vital to the longevity of your small business. One of the most commonly used tools for business connectivity is emails.

Digital marketers realized this decades ago and users were flooded with spam from cold calling and even businesses they were interested in. That is why today, email marketing efforts need to be strategic to produce any viable results. Massive emailing does not work and can actually be counterproductive.

For example, a tool like ActiveCampaign can help you create behavioral based system automation. It is a gem for automating your email campaigns because it triggers when a customer updates their contact details, unsubscribes from your newsletter, when a message is opened, when a link is clicked and so much more.

With this type of data, you can personalize your emails and design a campaign that will not spam your users. It will create a system that will fit the recipient’s interests. By segmenting your lists based on user’s behavioral data, you will maximize the reach and power of your email campaign.

For instance, if a user never opened your emails you can program your automation software to email the user less frequently. If some users open the emails at a certain time of the day, you can program your automation software to send out emails at given times when it will most likely be read and not drowned out by other emails.

6. Improve your social media activities

An effective marketing automation software will include a social media component that will help you automate your social media activities.

No need to use a different social media scheduling tool that will be separate from your marketing system. With this feature, you will save time as all your key marketing tools will be in one place.

It will help you monitor all your social accounts with ease. When it comes to insight and analysis, you can get a bird’s eye view of how well your brand is performing in your social communities. This will enable you to create campaigns that align with your business goals.

Marketing automation software is the future of marketing. It provides huge productivity gains for small businesses and is a MUST-HAVE tool for digital marketing.

Integrating your existing CRM and marketing systems with a marketing automation software like HubSpot is necessary to rip the full power of its automated processes. If you need help getting setup, send us a mail and we will be glad to help.

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Slow Website? It's Killing Your Page Rank

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Slow Website? It's Killing Your Page Rank

Google has indicated that site speed will be one of its ranking factors in the upcoming mobile-first index. But what does this mean? Well, it’s simple, you can no longer expect your slow loading website to rank high in the SERPs. If your website is slow, then search engines will only crawl fewer pages.

Recent research revealed that a website’s bounce rate increases by 32% when a page load time goes from 1s to 3s, and when it gets up to 5s, it increases the site’s bounce rate up to 90%.

For search engines, page speed is a sign of a healthy website and will help you retain more customers. You should carry out SEO and on page optimization tasks to increase your page speed because Google will reward you with a higher page rank.

Does Website Speed Affect Page Rank?

Google uses several factors in determining how to rank a website. Generally, these factors include different elements such as on page optimization, page speed, website relevance and many more.

So to get a higher ranking, you’ll need to make sure that your website loads in record time (1-3 seconds). But this isn’t the only reason to want a faster website. User experience can also be tainted by a slow website. So even if page ranking isn’t a major need for you (I fail to see why not!), customer satisfaction should be one of your priorities.

Imagine visiting a website for the first time that takes long to load or render images and videos? How frustrated will it make you feel? This is a common experience that causes many prospective customers to abandon a website and look elsewhere.

As search engines crawl your site less and less, and users bounce off because of the load time, your website will drop lower and lower in the SERPs. Finally, when your website disappears into the obscurity of result pages with double digits, so will your users and page rank. Page speed is definitely a major factor that can affect your visibility and revenue.

But what causes slow website speed?

Many people ask this question because they are hoping that slow speeds can be a quick fix. Sometimes it is, but in many cases, you’ll need to dig deep. Below are some of the key elements of your website that could cause it to load slowly.

Cascading Style Sheet (CSS)

The downside of CSS scripts is that they can slow down your page speed. When it is poorly delivered, a users browser has to download and process the style sheet data before displaying it to your visitors. This is why it’s critical to minify your CSS for better website performance.

Javascript

JavaScript is a really amazing scripting language for front-end development. It is great for creating interactive and rich websites. However, when used without skill it can be a double-edged sword. You should minimize the use of JavaScript, especially external ones that have to be fetched to your server before being processed.

It is common practice to place Javascript inline to avoid extra network requests. When your scripts are combined, they become smaller and can be executed quickly.

Images

Optimizing your images makes it load faster in your browser. For images, using a caching method is an effective way of optimizing your images. The key is to optimize your website images so that they reduce in size and not lose their visual quality.

Redirects

Some websites redirect multiple times and can slow the overall load time of a website. When you have more than one redirect to your landing page, it will generally cause the page to load slower. A redirect will trigger an additional HTTP request and delay the request-response cycle.

Server response

No matter how optimized your website is, your server response time will ultimately dictate how fast your site is. If your server is experiencing a temporary lag, then a content delivery network (CDN) will come in handy.

Many skilled SEOs use a CDN to optimize page load times because it acts as an intermediary between site servers and visitors, using the website cache to deliver faster results.

With all the above factors, you can see that slow speeds can arise in almost any situation and requires continuous monitoring to ensure that all new content or scripts are optimized for better performance.