Archive for Marketing Your Business

Communication plays a vital role in any business especially in its marketing. It is a means to inform the public about the products and services and it is one of the best ways to influence or convince the consumer/prospect to take out their wallet. However, according to psychology, most of the time the prospects are only affected by a marketing strategy if it is able to stir up their emotions.

Before, a business could only convey its messages to the market through word of mouth, print ads and TV & radio commercials. That was until  blogging was introduced in the late ‘90s. Several technology savvy people would engage themselves in blogging for they enjoy disclosing their personal thoughts. In their blog sites, they can include texts and images. The content is arranged chronologically, with the latest entry placed on top of the page. It is only recently that blogging became a tool to promote the business’ expertise and communicate with prospects.

There are some business owners who only have basic knowledge about the internet. However, they could have someone who can expertly do this online activity for them – they can rely on online business manager.

But why is blogging important to every business?

Basically, with the internet’s global presence, blogging can enable one’s business to reach millions of people from all over the world. And with its right and popular keywords, the company site is positioned on top of search lists; hence it drives more traffic. Next, it is the most convenient and cheapest way for the clients to express their queries and suggestions by posting in comments section. And from these, the owner can gain new ideas and insights into its prospects and customers.

Also, since everyone is online, blogging can be one way to stay competitive with the players in the same industry. Lastly, credibility is established. By providing updated and relevant information, people are encouraged to trust in one’s business.

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Oct
12

Creating an Effective Ezine

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Creating an effective ezine involves doing a lot of various tasks. The first task that you, as a publisher, have to deal with is to search for an ezine topic. You will need to be certain about the topic which your ezine will entail before you may begin building it. When you have finalized your topic choice, you may then go on to the next step, which is to develop an effective title for your ezine. The ideal title should be one that is brief, creative and original.

The title of your ezine provides itself a unique personality that allows a distinction from other ezines. Additionally, the title could also be used to lure possible subscribers. Plenty of marketers are actually unaware of this strategy. Because your ezine title is the very first thing your clients notice, it is considered as the most persuading factor on their final choice to subscribe to your ezine. Therefore, selecting an effective title for your ezine is an excellent strategy to gather a huge amount of prospective subscribers.

Another aspect which you need to put considerable effort and time into is the ezine template. It is particularly important to use an attractive template in order to suggest professionalism to your ezine. If you do not want or are not able to design an ezine template by yourself, you can use free website templates or find a freelance template designer to create one for you.

The most vital ingredient for your ezine is its content. You need to regularly provide high-quality content on your ezine. If you cannot do so, you may hire a freelance ezine writer.

Do you need help creating or maintaining an ezine? Schedule a free consultation or download a free report 100+ ways an Online Business Manager can help boost business.

If you’re a small business owner whose company is taking off (and you’ve established an online presence to inform people about your offerings) but finding it hard to juggle so many tasks, it’s high time you get a skilled Online Business Manager.  An OBM can improve a company’s online presence and overall marketing thrust. Apart from having a visitor-friendly website, there should be a clear call to action for website visitors.

Small business owners managing their marketing activities on their own, and on a piecemeal fashion, are courting trouble. Sure, such entrepreneurs may get somewhere, but not exactly the goal they may be aspiring for.

An OBM can offer the external perspective and help in evaluating the business, including how a marketing strategy may be working and what marketing materials are still needed. An OBM can set in motion a public relations campaign and handle multiple social media networking.  An Online Business Manager can devise plans to create visibility and enable a company to reach more customers.

Smart OBMs can devise a social marketing strategy first (and figure out if the site is a good fit for prospects and/or client base) before creating an official page and posting product information in a social media site.

To see exactly how an OBM may benefit your business schedule a free consultation with Kim today!

How can one’s business benefit from social media? The answer is to actively engage in the networks, which you may consider advantageous for your business. You cannot expect the social media to work for you if you merely create a profile thinking that it will lure clients by itself.

If you deal with social media as you would in real life parties or events, you will attain greater success. Think about it this way: when you attend a networking party and you just sit in a corner without mingling with other people, you probably would not deem the party advantageous for you. The same is applicable for social media. If you only create a profile but do not involve yourself in the ongoing conversations, you would not gain any benefits.

What you should do is to allot a particular amount of time each day into engaging in social media techniques. If you opt to create blog, do not forget to update it frequently and keep the information recent. Your blog should be considered as something that your clients would be interested to read. If you do not update it frequently, why would your clients come back to read it? As aforementioned, you need to keep the exchange rolling in order to benefit from social media.

As a conclusion, social media may or may not be advantageous for your business, depending on how efficiently you use it. Just like any other marketing strategy, you have to set objectives and goals and toil hard to successfully boost your business through social media.

 

 

Entrepreneurs who know that competition can always overtake them at anytime  strive to maintain a competitive edge, offering customers extra value and understand the importance of hiring capable support staff, including an Online Business Manager (OBM). An OBM can help the business owner, first and foremost, by creating an overall communications plan. Part of the marketing communications plan is managing an ezine. Establishing the ezine publication entails continuous work. A professional ezine template must be created, content needs to be updated, and ads/promotional materials managed.

Studies show that a large percentage of people are using social networking sites to increase business contacts, and reading online articles to update their knowledge. An OBM can tap into this trend and highlight the unique selling propositions of a business.

The Online Business Manager can manage lists and solo emails sent to the list. Having more people in the company’s mailing/subscription list can increase the likelihood of generating sales. By handling all these tasks, the OBM frees up time for the business owner to concentrate on business operations and long-term planning.

Being skilled in article writing, publicity & PR, the OBM can help implement the business owners marketing plan to  attract visitors by offering interesting website content in various formats — text, audio, and video. The OBM will also likely be able to spot outdated information and review autoresponders regularly. Beyond this, the OBM can take charge of execution of strategies and utilization of resources by team members. An Online Business Manager is also skilled in negotiating with other parties for cross promotions, laying the foundation for greater business success.

Want to work with a certified online business manager, schedule a free consultation today!

Sep
09

What Can you Do with PLR Articles?

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You may have seen the term Private Label Rights or PLR articles being tossed around frequently lately. PLR articles are articles you can buy (usually in packages or as part of a membership) that you may edit and use as you wish. Unlike free reprint articles, you are not required to link back to anyone else’s website which makes them appealing to many web publishers.

Once you understand the concept behind PLR articles, you can see why they are appealing. Most people can envision the value of adding the articles to their websites. But, did you know there are more ways to use PLR articles than that?

1. Add them to your blog.
Similar to adding PLR articles to your website, you can take excerpts and use them on your blog for fresh content. Whether you take a portion and use it as a “tip of the day” or use the entire article, PLR articles can be a huge time saver for you.

2. Send them in your newsletter.
Need content for your newsletter? PLR articles are an option. Of course, if you’re developing a relationship with your readers, you may wish to edit the articles to make them your own voice. However, you can pull a section from a PLR article – use it as inspiration — and whip out a newsletter in minutes.

3. Start an ecourse
If you purchase a package of PLR articles based on a theme, it’s quite easy to turn them into an ecourse simply by adding them to your auto-responder. Something as simple as “Five Ideas for Kids Lunches” can become a 5 day ecourse to grow a big newsletter list.

4. Use them in your podcast
Take a PLR article and use it as inspiration for a podcast. Add the content and you’re done.

5. Send them in a print mailing
Direct mailing is huge. If you have a list of postal mailing addresses, put together a free report from PLR articles and send it out.

6. Create a special report
Simply bulk together some PLR articles that have the same topic, and make them flow into a special report. Turn it into a pdf file and give it away to your website visitors.

See how easy that is? The only hard part is finding a PLR service that is high quality and fits your niche. Look around. Make sure the PLR package or membership you choose provides you with high quality articles so you can create something you’ll be proud of.

Article written by:

Nicole Dean is the owner of  www.EasyPLR.com – where you’ll find high-quality PLR articles sold in very limited quantities.  The PLR articles at EasyPLR are professionally written and professionally edited — top quality at an affordable price.

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Jun
12

Automated Marketing

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In recent years I had really lost faith in the whole notion of automated marketing; especially when it came to email campaigns. Seriously, how many of us even pay attention to emails anymore? So you can see how easy it was for me to dismiss the very real worth of automated marketing.

Then Infusionsoft entered the world of automated marketing. Infusionsoft gave a whole new meaning to the power of what  automated marketing can accomplish.

Automated marketing has a real, integral attraction in that by it’s very nature, it’s automated. Everyone can understand how easy it is to be drawn to a marketing strategy that does its thing while you do your own.

Infusionsoft succeeds where other automated marketing strategies fail. Email campaigns have inherent issues that Infusionsoft overcome. Particularly if you are in email marketing, you will love this program because it is designed especially for internet marketers and the inherent issues that come with email campaigns. Here are just a few reasons that you will love Infusionsoft:

As we all know emails are often hard to deliver, and worse – they are terribly easy to ignore. So one must connect with those potential clients via other modalities…telephone, fax, voicemail, text, instant messaging, letters, etc. One of the fabulous features of Infusionsoft is that all of these are built into the automated sequence.

  • Emails tend to feel so impersonal. A potential client can tell the difference between “just another email” and your desire to really connect with them. A good marketing strategy accomplishes this in one way or another. Think of getting an actual phone call after signing up for a newsletter…..I would be blown away, wouldn’t you? Infusionsoft makes that personal follow-up easy.
  • It is difficult to make emails relevant to everyone. Automated marketing like any effective marketing tool needs to be relevant to the person it is sent to. Take those emails generated when someone signs up for your newsletter….when is the last time you checked to see if they are still relevant and valuable to the person that signed up? Outdated marketing is worse than no marketing at all!

Emailing each individual would be almost impossible, but Infusionsoft allows you to segment your lists. Instead of a blanket email you can actually create a custom fit – reaching people according to where they are or what they do. For example, you can create a link in your ezine that leads a person to your new program. Then based on what action they take from there you can follow up. Maybe an email thanking them for visiting or one saying “I noticed you didn’t sign up….” And from there you can continue the conversation.

Infusionsoft has conquered so many of the “impersonal issues” that come with internet marketing and the automated side of the business and it has completely restored my confidence and passion for automated marketing. Take a moment to think of how you could put Infusionsoft to work for you in your business. Like me, I bet you are already abuzz with new ideas and the excitement they bring!

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When Twitter first came out, everybody was apprehensive that it will eventually amount to something. Now, with billions (trillions?) of subscribers, there is no more reason to be apprehensive about using Twitter – especially if you’re a business owner looking into building your brand.

So okay, Twitter only allows you 140 characters to get your message across. How is that enough to let people know about your brand? More than enough – especially if you have planned out exactly what it is you want to accomplish.

There are so many ways to utilize Twitter to your business’s advantage. But here are just a few of them. Read on.

1. Schedule Meet-ups: To be successful, you would have to meet-up with not just customers but also vendors. Twitter allows you to periodically announce upcoming meetings with local users.

2. Feedback Gathering: In 140 words, you can ask your customers questions regarding your products and services. In those 140 words, you get a lot of thoughts from your own customers as Twitter-ing gives way to almost instantaneous replies.

3. Grow Traffic: Almost all businesses nowadays have their own website. Twitter allows you to promote your website and, therefore, increase traffic.

4. Relationship Building: Twittering links of interest makes you worthy of following. Doing this means two things – a) more people will follow you; and b) more businesses of the same nature will want to join your network.

5. Know Who’s Following You: Know just what people think about you by doing a #yourcompanyname search. This way, you’ll have enough information as to how you can possibly improve what you have – or keep those that people already like.

6. Connect With Leaders of the Industry – Almost everyone has a Twitter account nowadays, perhaps even that business person you’ve been admiring for so long now. Get tips straight from that person by checking out his tweets.

7. Promote Content: Sales, product launches, and service offers are best promoted in fewer words – like Twitter. And it even gets the word out faster.

8. Answer Queries: Some people have loads of questions and they want them answered before buying. Twitter gives a venue for asking and answering those questions.

9. Competitive Research: Scope out the competition, check out their Twitter.

10. Contests: People love winning. And by promoting your company contests through Twitter, you get more traffic than you could possibly imagine!

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You have successfully set-up your website. The thing is, nobody’s buying. Why?

It’s a fact that not all visitors of your website will want to make a purchase – especially if they are first-time visitors. Somebody compared the picture to wine being poured into a funnel with leaks all over it. The wine is your website visitors – whoever decides to make a purchase gets to make it to the spout on the bottom and those who escape the leaks are the visitors who just might not visit your site again.

Don’t fret, though: there is still hope in minimizing those that escape through the leaks. Increase your visitors and you increase the chances of customers. Someone went on to say that profit is directly proportional to the product of visitors and converted customers – 100 times traffic means 100 times profit. Or simply:

Traffic times Conversion = Profits

Is this goal realistic though? Of course! If your website has a conversion rate of 3%, that’s not bad – but that means 97% of your visitors choose to “walk away” (or in this case, click another website). So how do we avoid this?

Build their trust. Make them see you as a trusted supplier. It’s easy: just feed your visitors with information that can be useful to them through an automated follow-up process. With technology being the way it is recently, this has thankfully become cheaper.

If you decide to take on this challenge of increasing your traffic and conversion rate, the first thing you need to do is to evaluate where you are right now. Evaluate the following things:

• Number of website visitors
• Location of your visitors
• Page views (and just how long people stay on these pages)
• Sales conversion rate
• “Value per Visitor”

After answering thee, then you are on the first step to luring in more customers.

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Some businessmen tend to overlook one online technique that is effective in luring in more business: ezines.

Ezines have been in existence over the Internet in one way or another the past few years. Technically an online newsletter, ezines are considered an easy and popular way of increasing credibility and reader relationship.

Here are five reasons why, if you still haven’t done it, you should publish an ezine ASAP:

1) Build relationships with those visiting your site.

When you build relationships with your readers, you strengthen your credibility. And the more they get to know you, the more they trust you. And as any good businessman knows, trust makes people buy from you.

2) Build your list through email capture.

It is known that not all first time visitors will buy from you. But having them on your email list through their subscription means you can recycle traffic. By contacting people from your email list, there is a higher chance of them buying from you.

3) Offer advertising and further increase revenue.

Offering advertising means people get more information about your products or services through same or related products and services. Doing this also means you get additional revenue as these are paid.

Two types of advertisements you can offer are ezine-placed ads and solo ads. Solo ads are those you send out individually.

This trick though should be used carefully: do not accept ads from direct competitors. Also, avoid bombarding your readers with too much solo ads or overpopulating your ezines with ads. Doing so runs the risk of reader isolation.

4) Provide more information.

Your ezine offers a wide range of content in different formats – text, audio, and video. Articles, reviews, and product comparisons can also be included in your ezines. With endless possibilities, ezines keep your visitors interested.

5) Advertise content that cannot be acquired elsewhere.

Offering exclusive content means not only more people will subscribe but also that they will stay subscribed. Having more people in your subscription list means more possibility of sales.

So what are you waiting for? Get started on that ezine today!

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