Ever feel like you're going crazy trying to keep up with all of the latest marketing trends? It's hard to know what will work best for your business, and it feels impossible to stay on top of everything. In this blog post, we'll show you how using a few simple strategies can help increase your digital marketing success.
We all know how hard it is to manage a small business and make sure we're staying on top of the latest trends. Luckily, there are some really great ways that you can take advantage of your digital marketing efforts to help increase your sales. That's why I've compiled this list of 17 tips for you to review! Check them out below:
1. Create a company blog and start a conversation
You won't become your customer's best friend by just talking at them. You'll become their best friend by listening and responding. Start a blog for company employees to share thoughts and observations, and monitor what people say about you online — especially on social networks — so that when someone asks the question: "What do others think" you have a response you know reflects reality.
2. Stop marketing and start engaging
Marketing is broadcasting, like yelling at someone from across the room: "Hey! Look at me!". Instead, try to engage people with useful information (like how you can help them). Imagine something really cool that your business could make or offer — it doesn't matter if it makes a huge impact, but anything that can help your customer.
3. Create a Facebook page for your business that includes company information, products, and services.
Then take it a step further and create a Facebook group to get customer feedback. Make sure you are ready to manage a Facebook group before taking this step though as it can get rather busy and time consuming.
4. Have a "social media policy" for employees and make sure they are aware of its existence.
By doing this, it eliminates any possibility of employee shaming if an employee says the wrong thing online by mistake. Make sure to monitor what your employees are saying about you on social media so everyone knows exactly where the business stands when it comes to online presence.
5. Use Twitter to tell people what you're up to (events, blog posts, etc.), ask your followers questions, and respond when they mention you — even if they say something 'bad'. Also use Twitter for contests and other initiatives that encourage engagement.
6. Use the social news site Digg to post stories about your company or industry and let readers vote them up or down. You can also comment on other people's submissions and build a community by sharing others' stories that you think will be interesting for your audience.
7. Build a strong email marketing strategy -
Start with a list of emails you want to send and create an outline for each one. If you need ideas, sign up for other newsletters in your industry to see what others are sending. Then make better content.
Some of the most popular email marketing strategies are:
8. Build relationships in the industry by attending conferences, networking events, and trade shows. Meeting in person is invaluable when connecting with big online partners.
9. Get offline by hosting events that people want to attend.
You can also go old school with direct mail or an outdoor billboard in a high-traffic area. If you're not an event planner, it's not as hard as it looks. Make a flyer and get started.
10. Stop focusing on digital marketing in isolation — it's just one part of marketing. Instead, integrate all your marketing efforts so they reinforce each other.
11. Make sure your website is mobile-friendly so that people can find what they're looking for on their phone or tablet.
Mobile devices are the most popular way for people to access websites today, so you need to make sure your website is optimized for their mobile screens. Also, update and optimize your social media profiles — especially the ones on Facebook and Twitter — so they look good on mobile devices.
12. Improve your online reviews.
High ratings build trust and show that you're a quality business, but low ratings can ruin all of that very quickly. The best way to get customers to leave a review is to ask them, but if that doesn't work, you'll need to get creative. Luckily there are lots of tools out there that can help increase your reviews.
13. Analyze your website traffic with analytics tools like Google Analytics to find the pages on your site where people spend the most time (the "sticky spots") along with the pages that have the most exit traffic (people leaving without taking a desired action). Use these insights to revamp existing pages and create new ones.
14. Develop an SEO strategy to get more traffic from search engines like Google and Bing - include keywords in your content, use tags when uploading pictures online, have links back to your site from other sites you contribute content to, etc. Don't overdo it though. Quality and relevancy are more important than quantity when it comes to search results.
15. Use Facebook ads, Twitter promoted tweets, and other social media advertising platforms to reach the people you want to target with your marketing message (for less money than traditional ad platforms like print or TV).
The key to making social ads work is to create a specific strategy for each platform you use, and make sure your ad campaign aligns with your overall marketing goals.
16. Learn from those who have been there, done that. Try reading books about online marketing or subscribing to a relevant industry blog like Mashable, TechCrunch, etc.
17. Always be testing new strategies, with a focus on your customers instead of yourself to create better marketing content, experiences, and interactions.
There you have it, 17 Ways to Get the Most Out of Your Digital Marketing. These are just a few of the awesome ways you can amp up your online game. Try one, try them all, or create an entirely new strategy to make yourself stand out in the marketplace. The possibilities are endless!
18. Never stop trying.
Your marketing is never finished (unless you stop). But even if it's not perfected, at least you'll know you're always moving forward.
19. Make sure to get good rest, eat good food, and take time for yourself every day so that your efforts aren't wasted by being burned out.
When working in a fast-paced environment like online marketing, it can be easy to become overwhelmed and exhausted before you even know what hit you; but if you don't make time for yourself, your efforts will become unsustainable and potentially even counterproductive.
