Category: Sales & Marketing

When it comes to internet marketing, most small business owners are reluctant to start. They can only imagine spiralling costs in a highly competitive market – but with the right strategies, that won’t be the reality. In fact, you can conduct your internet marketing on a shoestring budget and still get your name out there. Here’s a quick guide on how to do it.

Use social media

This is the number one strategy that you will be using, and it should be a constant process. Social media is free, and that means you can do as much of it as you need to get those sales in. First, set up an account in your business name on all social networks – even if you don’t intend to use them all at first, at least you have reserved it for later. Set up a regular posting schedule, using scheduling software if you want to make it easier. Use hashtags and other best practices to ensure that as many people as possible see your updates and start following your brand. 

Encourage customer posts

When you have your social pages up and running, don’t forget to get your customers posting too. Use certain hashtags to promote your brand, and ask customers to tag their purchases when they snap pictures of them. You can include hashtags with a delivery note or product information, so it won’t take up any extra printing budget to get this information out there! Once your customers are posting, reward them by showcasing their best shots on your own page. This gives a new view on your products and also encourages even more people to post about them, thus spreading the word even further.

Work with influencers

It might not be cheap to work with every social influencer out there, but many of them might be happy to feature you in return for a sample or two. You may even find you only have to pay a small fee for those who have a bigger reach. People pay attention to what influencers say and the products that they recommend. This means that you are likely to grow your following and get extra orders right off the back of that promotion, so it’s a great strategy for growing quickly and maybe even going viral.

Use Facebook or Instagram ads

Even though you only have a small budget, you might still be able to reach people by advertising on Facebook or Instagram. The ad campaigns you can run there start from a very low price, and you can use their targeting algorithms to ensure that you only hit the kind of people who will be interested in buying from you. It’s very important to be as precise as possible, as this is how the ads work best. If you leave the options more open, you may end up spending more but getting worse results.

Have a blog

The best way to increase your website’s SEO is to have a blog which you update on a regular basis. You can do this weekly, or even more frequently. It will provide content for you to share on all your social media pages, as well as giving people another reason to stop by your side. Make the blog relevant to your products so that you attract interested buyers, instead of all manner of other people.

Using these strategies will hardly cost you anything, but it could increase your sales hugely and raise your brand profile. That makes them immensely cost-effective, especially when all you need to spend is time!

Michelle Arios works as Marketing Assistant for BizDb.co.nz– New Zealand business database

Article Contributed by Anand Srinivasan

Startup entrepreneurs have a very distorted view of how discount marketing campaigns work. It is commonly believed that the only way to penetrate a saturated market is by offering massive discounts. In other words, discounts are merely seen as a way to generate sales where none exist. However, this couldn’t be further from the truth. Discounting campaigns go beyond price wars and are instrumental in changing consumer habits and behavior.

Creating incentives for new customers 

Products and services cost money. This creates a barrier for prospective new customers to try them out on a whim. This is especially true for customers who are not already paying for an alternative. A good example of this is Uber. Unlike on-demand cab services, traditional taxi systems do not require passengers to share their credit card information. This creates a hurdle for companies like Uber that want customers to try their service. One way to bring down the barrier is by offering free rides for new registrants. The prospect of riding the service for cheap creates an incentive for users to provide their credit card information. This way, services like Uber and Lyft successfully bring new customers to their system.

Changing consumer habits 

If you are entering an industry where your competition is already well-established, then a discount on new registration would only help with customer acquisition and nothing more. Retaining these customers and training them to habitually move away from your competitor’s product to yours takes a lot more effort and resources. This requires a sustained strategy where discounts are recurring in order to nudge the customer towards developing a habit over time. For instance, online food delivery startups send promo codes to customers everyday during lunch and dinner hours to building this habit in consumers. The actual return on this investment is only gained after these consumers become regular users who order food even in the absence of discounts.

Last minute deals 

If you are in a business that deals with branded products (smartphones, computers, etc.), then no matter how loyal your customer is to your store, they are likely to shop for cheaper deals before making a purchase. It may however not make sense to advertise promo codes right on your website. In doing so, you could be losing out revenue from customers who may have purchased from you even without a discount. What companies like Walmart do instead is to promote discounts as direct mail coupons. This way, customers shopping for coupon codes get access to these during the purchasing process while other loyal customers who are not seeking discounts may transact at the market prices.

A discount on the selling price is a notional loss for your business. You should therefore discount marketing very judiciously. It is important to identify specific challenges and metrics where you want the needle to move and launch discounts that target these metrics specifically. Launching a marketing campaign that offers an umbrella discount on all products and to all kinds of customers is a money sink and should be strictly avoided at all costs. This is especially true if you are a bootstrapped startup that does not enjoy the luxury of big spending like VC-funded startups.

Trade shows are a fantastic opportunity for businesses of all sizes to publicize their products and make new leads. But a bit of prior planning can make all the difference to an average trade show, helping to make it into a success for your business.

If you are planning your next trade show, here are some tips to help you plan for the event so that you can take full advantage of it.

Hand Out Useful Freebies

First of all, you need to take some freebies with you. Do yourself a favor and provide freebies that are actually useful, even if they seem unoriginal. Things like pens and magnets are always going to attract people.

Even better, people will continue to use these items for months or years to come, which is great for long-term branding.

Make Good Use of Social Media

Smart use of social media can help to turn your next trade show into a bigger success. Publicize your presence well in advance to your social followers so they know that you will be there and where to find you. Appoint someone to update your social networks during the event using the appropriate hashtags.

Go one step further by making creative use of social media. Take a photo of attendees in front of your display and then tag them on Facebook, and this will then be seen by their friends and could reach many thousands of people.

Or set up a photo booth based on your brand and allow people to take their own photos and upload them to social media.

Market Your Presence in Advance

Social media can also be used to inform your followers that you will be attending the trade show. Talk about it in posts leading up to the event and encourage people to visit your stand by dropping hints about your freebies or anything special you will be doing on the day.

You can also take this further by advertising online using AdWords. Target people who are looking for information about the event and your ad will show up in the search engines, which could help to attract more people.

Be Different

It can be hard to stand out at a trade show but do your best by doing something different from the other businesses. For example, you could create unique banners, launch a game that people can play, and make it entertaining.

If you’re going to an outdoor event, check the weather beforehand. Use an app that forecasts the weather for Android devices so you know exactly what the weather will do. If it’s going to be hot, set up some umbrellas for shade. If it’s going to be wet, provide cover from the rain.

Check out this resource for some great ways to make your exhibit unique.

Hold a Prize Draw

One of the best ways to generate interest is to hold a prize draw. Make sure it’s a prize worth winning, and then publicize it widely. Get as many people to sign up as possible, and it also gives them a reason to come back to your stall later in the day.

Get Even More from Your Next Trade Show

These tips will help you when it comes to planning your next trade show so you can take full advantage of it and get more from the effort you put into the event. Take a look at your previous trade shows and have a think about where you can make improvements, then plan to make your next event the best one yet.

One of the most important things tied to high conversion rates is making an effective call-to-action (CTA) on your website. Engaging your audience and visitors in this way may be exactly what you need to boost your business and see your business flourish.

There are some tactics you should keep in mind when approaching CTA implementation to your website and we’ve summarized some of them for your better understanding of the process. Making a compelling CTA can be tricky, u don’t want to be too aggressive, yet, you don’t want your CTA to seem like something visitors would rather avoid than click on it. Here are some things to keep in mind when making an effective call-to-action on your site.

What is CTA?

Basically, CTA is a button on your page that helps you make leads out of your visitors, by filling out a form on your landing page. CTA button takes your potential customers to your higher-value offers page – the landing page.

The conversion process from visitors to leads can even lead to getting more paying customers, so it’s important to address it in the proper way. CTAs are the first step in the conversion process. They are what starts the conversion as they promote an offer and links which take to your landing page, where the conversion process takes place.

CTA Sequencing

There are many various examples of CTAs, as they are a part of the majority of websites with any interest in the conversion process. Luckily, learning from those examples showed us general practices, which can help us define the best applications for the successful conversion process.

Generally, here are some examples, and only one of those is really able to give the wanted results.

• CTA > Blog Post > Landing Page
• Landing Page > CTA > Thank You Page
• CTA > Landing Page > Thank You Page
• Blog Post > CTA > Landing Page

As you can see, some of these examples include CTAs with blog posts, which, in practice, don’t really affect conversion rates that much. The second and the third examples include the landing page, but that’s where you need to take your visitors, so the choice is obvious.

The ideal sequencing for a good CTA strategy is to have a call-to-action that takes your visitors to the Landing page, and after they’ve filled out the form, they are taken to the Thank You page to collect the offer.

Best CTA Practices

There are some great practices that have proven to be quite successful in elevating conversion rates. There are 5 major things to keep in mind as noted by Only SEO Gold Coast:

• Standing out – the more your CTA grabs your visitors’ attention, higher conversion rates are imminent. Make sure your CTA is consistent with your website, but it should be quite visible or stand out in best possible way.
• Action orientation – take care of your wording. If the visitors have to think hard about their next step, then something is wrong. Tell them what to do and aim them in the right direction.
• On-Page placement – CTAs should stand out, but they should also seem like they are the part of the page. You don’t want CTA buttons to seem like they don’t belong, for it may throw off your visitors from clicking on it.
• Consistent keywords – if you use the same keywords and phrases for the full conversion process, your visitors understand what to do and where are they going to get. Look at the entire process as a whole and you can get great results.
• Test changes (A/B testing), analyze results – when experimenting with CTA changes start small. Implement a small change and watch it perform. Changes like color, font style or the wording should all be tried on its own, in order to see what the true results are.

Great goals to have in mind when analyzing your CTA are 1 – 2% click-through-rate and 10% for click-to-submission rates. When your CTA has these numbers, you know you’re doing something right.

Great CTA Examples

We’ve selected a few of the best CTAs that we think do their job great. You can see the different design techniques used to achieve amazing conversion rates.

• Dropbox – Always simple with a lot of negative space, Dropbox is always aiming at the subtle and simple approach. Thanks to this, their CTAs stand out by merely using the same color as the logo, making their page consistent, and visitors clear of what they should do next.
• Netflix – Biggest fear when it comes to signing in, for most visitors is – will I be able to cancel my subscription later on? Netflix solved this in a neat way. They have simple, yet quite noticeable CTAs stand out, but the content and the text around it indicate that users are free to “Watch anywhere. Cancel anytime”. This has helped their conversion rates grow significantly.

Conclusion

Creating an enticing CTA can really help any website’s conversion rates expansion, and they can help your business evolve. Using proper techniques and strategies, you can adapt your CTAs in best possible way, and maximize the full potential of your website.

Not-So-News Flash: Paid Traffic costs money… sometimes lots of it. So, the last thing you want to do is drain your marketing budget to paying for low-quality, unengaged traffic.

To help you make the most of your marketing dollars, here are some key questions to think about before you begin your next paid traffic campaign.

1. Who’s your target audience?

This is a simple question, but fundamental. If you’re selling designer fitness wear, then you may want to define your target more narrowly than ‘Men and Women between ages 18 and 24.” Otherwise, you’ll end up paying for whole swathes of people who don’t know the difference between Lululemon and citrus fruit.

Put your thinking cap on and figure out who you expect to buy your product. Who’s your ideal customer? Break out a white board and write down everything you come up with. Take that information and boil it down into a customer avatar.

As an example, here’s a customer avatar we created for Drop Ship Lifestyle.

Basic Info

Name: Jacob

Age: 34

Relationship Status: Married

Household: 2 KidsEducation: Bachelor of Arts in Sociology

Employment: Information Technology Specialist

Household Income: $130,000/yr

Interests: Technology, Golf, and Travel

Religion: Non-practicing Catholic

Favorite Brands: Apple, Under Armour, Nike, Chipotle

Favorite Websites: Facebook, Reddit

Personal Goals: Improve his handicap (golf) and find meaning at work

Business Goals: Build a second source of income alongside his day job

Family Goals: Secure finances, spend more time with the kids, and take more vacations

What problems is Jacob currently experiencing?

Jacob’s hit a ceiling at work. Dissatisfied with his position and income, he wants to go into business for himself. With a wife and two kids, however, he can’t give up his day job. He’s investigated different side businesses, but everything seems too expensive or time intensive.

What’s the worst that could happen if I don’t help Jacob?

Since Jacob is unhappy at work, his performance may suffer. He could potentially lose his job. He’ll have to drain his savings account to support his family. Eager to take the first job that comes along, he may find himself in an even more worse job situation than before. With such a hit to his finances and ego, he may never find the confidence to start a business.

What keeps Jacob up at night?

Jacob is plagued by the thought that he could spend his entire life toiling away at a job he doesn’t love and still not be able to put his kids through school or buy his wife a new car.

What does Jacob want more than anything else?

To supplement his income so that he could bring in a few thousand dollars a month without having to leave his day job.

What would he be willing to drain his bank account for?

Jacob would gladly pay someone to show him how they were able to build their own side business without investing a ton of their own money or leaving their day job.

How does my product match up with Jacob’s situation?

Right now, Jacob doesn’t know what he needs. He wants to become an entrepreneur, but reading hundreds of articles on Entrepreneur.com has only left him confused. With DSL’s coaching program, we can introduce him to eCommerce and show him how to build a lucrative, scalable business with a minimum of time and money invested.

2. Where does my target audience spend their time?

Of course, you’re not going to look for Jacob specifically—we made him up out of thin air, remember? Still, you’re going to want to find people just like Jacob. To do that, you need to know where those types of people hang out.

Are they on social media? Can you find them on Facebook or Reddit? Twitter or Youtube? If so, then those would be great options for your paid traffic campaign.

On the other hand, maybe they’re members of that rare breed who choose not to use social media. Perhaps they’re more into browsing “serious” outlets like CNN or NPR. In that case, either you can advertise directly on those sites or use Google Adsense to retarget those users.

The basic principle is what matters here: think hard about where your target audience spends their time on the web and tailor your ad campaigns to hit them where they already are.

3. How do I get my target audience to notice and respond?

Whether you’re optimizing an ad itself or its corresponding landing page, you absolutely must speak in a way that resonates with your target audience and convinces them you’re worth engaging with.

If for example, your paid traffic is pointed at a lead magnet of some sort, you need to convince people that it’ll tangibly improve their lives. Make sure your copy clearly answers this question: why should they fork over their private contact information to download your content?

Here are a few ways we like to do that:

• Make sure your audience knows exactly what they’re getting.
• Capture their emotions by painting a picture of how your content will benefit them.
• Clearly explain to your audience how they can use your content to succeed in life.
• Provide examples of real people who’ve succeeded with this specific piece of content.

Remember to treat your audience as you would a friend. Put yourself in their place and ask, “what would I need to hear to be convinced that this product is what I need?”

Conclusion

Take the time to answer these three questions honestly and comprehensively. Think hard about who your ideal customers are. Then, find out where they hang out and how your ads can meet them there and to compel them to act.

If you can line up your answers to these three questions, you’ll never again let your paid traffic dollars go to waste.

About the Author

Caitlin is an Austin-based digital marketer with a passion for content and social media marketing. She is the newest member of the Performance Marketer team and brings years of writing and marketing experience.