Myths of Digital Marketing

Transcription

1 Myths of Digital Marketing

2 All I need is a good looking website. You may have your own ideas about website design. Have you paid thousands of dollars to a web designer only to leave it sitting on the web, disjointed from your other marketing efforts? Often, websites end up being just another billboard in the desert with a few pages of beautiful design, little content, providing zero value. A website is a starting point, not a finish line, and design is only one component to a successful website. Let s look at the five components of a good website strategy. 1. Design Any website design should be initiated with a clear purpose and consider any competitive advantage. Visit your site through the eyes of your customer. 2. Content Create high quality content focused on your customers that positions you as an expert in your industry. Would your customers share it with their friends? 3. Usability Provide your customers with an easy-to-understand, easy-to-use, and easy-toshare website. Don t be different for different s sake. 4. Accessibility Choose a foundation to build your site on that gives you the most flexibility and responsiveness for the different devices people will use to view your website. 5. Updates Keep your site fresh and up-to-date. Track your sites performance so you can adapt your tactics. Use tools to monitor your site for any vulnerabilities and take action to upgrade or perform maintenance whenever necessary. 48% of people cited a website s design as the number one factor in deciding the credibility of a business. SME Website Statistics. February Rareform New Media.

3 I need more traffic to my website Website traffic (quantity) does not equal website results (quality). Organic search drives the most traffic of all channels, and is responsible for nearly half (47%) of all visits, compared to paid search, which drives only 6% of all visits. (Conductor, 310 Million Visits: Nearly Half of All Web Site Traffic Comes From Natural Search) Quality customer relationships are built through a strategy that plans on attracting the customer, communication with the customer, and asking the customer to take some sort of action to indicate they are ready for the next step (buying). You can buy web traffic through Google Adwords or Facebook or even rent lists (don t do that) to increase your traffic but it s more important to focus on the process your customers go through. ATTRACT POSITIONING Indicates higher commitment level and readiness to become a customer. Position company as an expert and create awareness about what you can offer your targeted potential customers. ACTION CONVERSION Educate your networks about unique story through inbound/outbound strategies. COMMUNICATE FRAMING

4 I will do what my competition is doing We have a tendency to think our competitors are successful so let s just copy what they are doing. Whether you copy your competitors strategy or any of your favorite brands such as Apple or Verizon or whatever your preference, most of the time you don t even know if what these brands are doing is effective. These are known brands and the marketing you do see tends to lean to the more flashy brand awareness campaigns. Small businesses like yours have very specific resources, often limited, that you can allocate toward marketing and developing new business. The easiest plan is one you think is already working. But the copycat approach doesn t work because you don t see everything that goes into the larger strategy including the behind the scenes tracking and development among other things. Throwing money into new marketing projects in social media, investing in Google Adwords or developing interactive apps when they are not part of an integrated plan is a waste of time and resources. Your resources should work together like a team focused on one thing maximizing the value you provide to your customers and providing a return on your marketing investment. is ranked as the #1 preferred communication channel by consumers for initial introduction to a product/service, learning about a product/service, and post-purchase follow-up about a product/service. (The Economist Intelligence Unit, Mind the Marketing Gap, Mar 2013) Rather than looking to your competitors for business advice, work with someone to develop a longer more strategic plan for your business that has a proven track record. If they are doing something right it s likely they are already working with outside help.

5 I can manage everything myself I can do it myself. Well, that s great. And I m sure that most business owners understand marketing from their own different perspectives. But the reason why you downloaded this resource is because something isn t right. When you consider building your own website compare it to building your own home. If you are an architect, a plumber, a carpenter, or whatever else you need to build a home, then by all means, have at it. Go and find some land and start building. But if you are someone that has a vision of how great your home should be and how you want it to look and feel, then you hire an expert homebuilder who knows how to build the right home for you. By utilizing their expertise you don t have to worry about the specifics go into building your perfect home. When you go the do it yourself (DIY) route, you need to split your time between the piecemeal marketing and running the business. It s easy enough to create a Facebook page or have a friend or neighbor build a website but without the required attention these assets may not be integrated to produce results. You end up just being hyper-reactive to every opportunity and every new tool that comes along. Whether it s Twitter, Yelp or Facebook you can fall into the trap of just getting into the latest fad and spreading your resources too thin. Prospects receive an average of 10 marketing touches from the time they enter the top of the funnel until they re a closed-won customer. (Aberdeen Group, Marketing Lead Management Report, Jul 2013) Do you really have the time to get everything done?

6 I can t afford digital marketing You can t afford marketing? Things are good, we don t need marketing, or Things are bad, we can t afford marketing. Does this sound familiar? You re very passionate about your business and you ve built it up but now what? The internet is an amazingly effective tool and very inexpensive for generating business. Whether you are selling products or generating leads for services, it s something you can t afford not to do. Who is responsible for developing leads? Are you tracking what s being said about your business online? Are you asking for customer addresses? Are you on Facebook yet? Did you know? is almost 40 times better at acquiring new customers than Facebook and Twitter, McKinsey & Company found. 47% of Americans say Facebook is their #1 influencer of purchases. Huge opportunities are missed when you don t have someone responsible for managing the digital properties your customers are interacting with and developing content for those properties. Content marketing costs 62% less than traditional marketing. For every dollar spent, content marketing generates approximately 3 times as many leads as traditional marketing. Marketing may seem expensive if you don t have someone competent executing a well conceived plan. Digital marketing results can be found without breaking your bank.

7 I need someone who understands my industry The principles of digital marketing apply to any industry. So often, business owners think that the process of generating traffic, communicating with a potential lead, and converting that lead into a customer is unique to their specific industry. The marketing process doesn t change. Understanding the demographics of your target audience and the language needed to communicate with that audience is critical. But whoever you work with, whether you hire a marketing consultant or an employee, they need to understand all aspects of digital marketing. How do you get action from specific offers? How do you write copy? How do you optimize your website and other relevant content for search engines? How do you generate leads? How do you use content to generate those leads? If you are using paid advertising, like Google or Facebook, how do you manage that? How do you direct your ad traffic to somewhere it can produce results? How do you integrate all of this with things like social media? Per dollar spent, content marketing produces 3 times more leads than paid search. Additionally, it costs less than paid search: 31% less for small and mid-sized companies and 41% less for large companies. (Kapost, Content Marketing ROI, Jun 2012) Make sure that you are asking the right questions.

8 Anyone can help me, the cheaper the better A brilliant individual once said The only thing more expensive than hiring a professional is hiring an amateur. The journey from apprentice to master is an arduous one. Of course you need to pay attention to your budget but you need to hire a marketing manager for their depth of experience and not the numbers on their invoice. Here are a few questions to ask potential marketing consultants: How much experience do you have (or does your team have)? Consider how many years they have been in business, their client list, and recommendations from past clients. What s your approach to the marketing process? How are you going to get my business results? Can you provide examples of your most recent client work? Who will be managing my account? Make sure you meet the person responsible and have ongoing contact. How often will I have contact with my account manager? How do you communicate with clients about projects? What resources do you use to share information? Do you use freelancers? How often? What is their experience level? Who do I call if I have a problem? For creative projects, how many revisions are allowed? How am I billed? Are there cancellation fees or longterm commitments? What do you look for in an ideal client relationship? By spending as little as 6 hours per week focused on social media marketing, 64% of marketers see lead generation benefits, and nearly half say their marketing expenses have decreased. (Social Media Examiner, 2013 Social Media Marketing Industry Report, May 2013)

9 Digital Marketing Since 1996 The difference between success and failure. One click. Net One Click provides full service outsourced marketing services to small to midsize businesses. Our Platform Marketing System focuses on strategic development of core assets that provide our clients with a unique competitive advantage to develop, engage, and acquire customers for life. About Kris Kiler You will work directly with Kris to get the site your business needs. Kris is the president of Net One Click. Kris passion for Internet marketing began in 1996 when he started using the Internet to market products and services. Since then he has worked with hundreds of companies to create and execute internet marketing plans that grow new customer channels, build upon current customer networks, and design brands that people love. An experienced entrepreneur, he understands making decisions with limited information in this complex world and approaches all clients with a strategic, results-focused approach. Prior to founding Net One Click, Kris was president and chief executive officer of an organizational development company that focused on human performance training, book publishing, and Internet services. There he launched more than sixty products; including trade publishing books, adult learning materials, and psychological assessments; launched a line of human performance trainings to Fortune 500 companies, and developed and launched a cutting edge client management and assessment delivery software-as-service (SAS) product. Kris has a passion for understanding what it takes to create great leaders. He is a certified Job and Career Transition Coach and an experienced instructional designer which provides him with skills in understanding how adults make decisions and learn new information. He was involved in the training and development field for over 15 years. Kris works directly with all of Net One Click s clients to craft a plan that is unique to their business, industry, and budget. He is the author of Ready, Aim, Capture!: The Secret to Successful Internet Marketing, Optimize Your Web Platform: A Small Business Guide to Internet Marketing Automation and coauthor of Creating Multiple Streams of Income with Information Products: Turning Your Ideas Into Assets. Get started today. Call or visit Kris brings you the best of both worlds. He s able to integrate all your social media and internet marketing, your campaigns, integrate all that with your website on an ongoing basis so that you continue to grow your business. You need a company like NetOneClick to take care of your website, advise you on what s best for it, at the same time able to optimize it for SEO and for the user s usability of it. Because you want to make sure it s easy for your potential customers to navigate your site. I can tell from our bottom line that things are getting better and better each and every single month. Manny Oliverez Capture Medical Billing My income more than doubled in one year while working with Kris! The website he helped me create, his hard work managing the production of my product, and his overall strategic thinking had an enormous impact on my growth. Dr. Michelle Finkel Insider Medical Admissions I ve been working with Kris for the last 6 months as he helps me reposition my consulting practice. His insight, advice, and experience have been of immense benefit, saving me a ton of time and wasted effort. Scott Campbell Core Factors Helped me re-think my entire marketing philosophy. Convinced me to re-focus my business message, making my site more relevant to my customer base with information readily accessible and with easier navigation. As a result, I m getting more traffic to my site, and an increase in business. Vicky Jo Varner Type Insights

10 Platform Marketing System Idea Generation Problem Solving Action Planning Strategy Process Building Branding Design Asset Review Optimization Positioning Content Adaptation Framing Consultation Calls Review KPI s Decision Making Landing Pages Blog Development Social Media Analytics Inbound Networks Reporting Outbound Review Campaigns Aggregate Results Monitor Progress Communications PPC Advertising Marketing List Building 88% of consumers who search for a type of local business on a mobile device call or go to that business within 24 hours. SME Website Statistics. February Rareform New Media. Digital Marketing Since 1996 The difference between success and failure. One click. Net One Click provides full service outsourced marketing services to small to midsize businesses. Our Platform Marketing System focuses on strategic development of core assets that provide our clients with a unique competitive advantage to develop, engage, and acquire customers for life. Get started today. Call or visit