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[…]more effective than traditional marketing? When weighing the value of traditional marketing vs digital marketing for a specific campaign, what factors should you consider? If you’re a small business or non-profit, you may be struggling with these very issues. Most of our clients understand that digital marketing is important, but many wonder if digital marketing is really more effective than traditional marketing. To help them (and you) consider all the options, below are three factors to consider when launching your next marketing campaign. Before getting to those, we give you some statistics that demonstrate the current value of digital marketing […]
[…]tasks like posting, responding to messages, and developing new content for your website. What Is a Digital Marketing Strategy Template? Digital marketing is a subset of content strategy and is focused on developing marketing content for common online channels, such as: Social media: Platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram. Webpages: Including about pages, product pages, homepages, and landing pages. Blog posts: Timely posts on topics that are relevant to your intended audience. Email newsletters: Special offers, fundraising reminders, and other VIP content you send to existing customers or donors. A digital marketing strategy template is a single document that helps you run all of […]
[…]a larger organization. You need to know what’s available to you and your organization, how digital marketing is different than traditional marketing, and what skill sets you might need to learn vs. which ones you might want to outsource. It’s important to inform yourself on how you can reach new customers, donors, or clients using today’s emerging digital tools. What Are Digital Marketing Fundamentals? Digital marketing fundamentals are very different than traditional marketing fundamentals. What works in media like tv, radio, and print won’t always work online and vice versa. To be effective at digital marketing, you need to leverage the […]
[…]you may be turning off prospective customers, clients, or donors without even knowing it. How Are Digital Marketing and UX Related? If you’re not familiar with the term UX, it is short for “user experience.” As Foolproof, a UX consulting company puts it: Experience Design* is a design practice focused on human outcomes, particularly the level of engagement and satisfaction that the user derives from a product or service and the relevance of the experience to their needs and context. *Note: Experience Design, User Experience Design, and User Experience are typically synonymous terms. Digital marketing is a term you’re probably more […]
[…]need to learn to market themselves on their own. Below we give our personal picks for the 5 best digital marketing books for small businesses and non-profits. Consider picking these up yourself or giving them as a gift this holiday season. The “5” Best Digital Marketing Books for Small Businesses and Non-profits? “Why are these 5 books the best?” You might ask. And the answer is: we’ve read lots of digital marketing books in our careers, and these are the ones we keep coming back to in order to help our clients and ourselves. This is a pretty subjective list […]
[…]Beware Although there are many more tools out there to help small businesses with digital marketing, not all of them are cut from the same cloth. These are three tools we trust, but there are certainly many others. Whether you use these or other tools to help market your business, beware of seemingly miraculous claims like driving thousands of new customers to your website overnight or getting you to the first page of Google in days. Good digital marketing takes time, effort, and expertise. Tools like these can help provide a supplement for all three. Need Help With Digital […]
[…]we’ve seen with these solutions and what to ask before you buy. Myth #1: Industry-Specific Digital Marketing Solutions Are Cheaper Than Building a Website Solutions like these are often described as cheaper than building a website in something like WordPress. The “proof” of this is often that they require little to no down payment and only require a small monthly fee to maintain. The reality is that if you work with a competent web designer, the price of that custom WordPress website is only going to be a one-time cost, whereas over the months and years, that “small monthly fee” will […]
In an age when digital ad spending is overtaking traditional advertising, digital marketing myths are everywhere. Whether you are a small business owner, a non-profit manager, or even the head of a large company, you have probably been promised amazing returns for your investment in your website, social media, or online advertising. You may have encountered companies who guarantee such seemingly impossible feats as making you the #1 search result on Google for a low, low price. Like most things in life, it can be difficult to separate the truth from the hype when it comes to digital marketing, a […]
[…]own customized content streams that may or may not include your brand. How Do You Keep Track of Digital Marketing Trends? We won’t lie: it isn’t easy. And no matter what anyone tells you, there’s no one right way. With a conversation this fluid, there are going to be lots of viewpoints, lots of thought leaders, lots of right ways. There’s the right way for you and then there’s the right way for your customers. There are goals you may have as organization or for an individual project. Then there are everyday hurdles you need to overcome like converting leads to […]
[…]been offered a “deal” on a website in exchange for signing a 12 month contract with a digital marketing agency. Typically, this contract requires that any changes, redesigns, or updates go through the agency that built your website. Sometimes, the contract also offers a payment plan that allows you to pay for your website over 12 months. Though they may seem like a good idea at first glance, 12 month website contracts lock you into a relationship with a digital marketing agency and make it difficult for you to escape if things go south. Reason #1 Not to Sign a […]
[…]we lay out some of the most impactful ways small businesses are marketing themselves right now. Digital Marketing Fundamentals First, if you’re not aware of the full scope of digital marketing, you might want to check out this handy-dandy article we wrote on this very topic: Digital Marketing Fundamentals Everyone Should Know A Mobile-Responsive, SEO-Friendly Website The first must-have for marketing a small business is a website that works well on any size screen and that is SEO-friendly. 50% of consumers who conduct a local search on a smartphone visit a store within a day. This means your website needs to […]
[…]business. If you have a website, mobile app, or social media presence, you have users for those digital points of contact. And if you have users, then those users come with certain expectations. Whether those expectations are met determines whether they interact with you, become leads, or eventually become customers. This means that, regardless of the type of product or service you’re selling, if you have a web presence, you need to think about user experience (or UX). What Is UX for Small Business? Let’s start with what UX is, as that is a common question we get from clients. […]
[…]type of advertising you need? Check out this article on the differences between traditional and digital marketing: Traditional Marketing vs Digital Marketing: 3 Things To Consider Situation 3: When You Are Creating Content For a Website or Other “Free” Venue One of the best ways to advertise your organization is by crafting blog posts and downloadable content for potential consumers. Original blog posts can be unique pages on your website that get archived by Google for unique keywords. You can also woo potential customer or donors by creating a short white paper on a topic in which you have expertise. […]
[…]are searching for (search volume). More people really are searching for a keyword like “digital marketing” then they are searching for a keyword like “digital marketing firms greenville nc.” So, you want to get the most people possible to see your content, right? So, the short-tail keyword is what you want to shoot for, right? Actually, long-tail keywords can be more valuable, especially for smaller organizations trying to attract people within a specific service area. Think about it: if you sell shoes in a service area with a diameter of 120 miles, do you really care if someone outside that service area knows […]
[…]the following two examples from our own website: “digital marketing agency” “digital marketing agency greenville nc” The first keyword is a national keyword because technically anyone searching for a digital marketing agency in the U. S. might use this keyword. This keyword is thus very competitive and difficult to rank for. The second keyword is limited to users searching for digital marketing agencies in or around Greenville, NC, the city in which we’re located. By using this location-specific keyword, we’re more likely to attract visitors to our website who are searching for local digital marketing agencies. This also means that […]
[…]your business, you need to grow your business online. Outbound marketing vs. inbound marketing Digital marketing is very different than traditional marketing. Advertising over radio and television and in newspapers and magazines involves a lot of preliminary market research. Advertisers need to know who is listening to a radio station, watching a television channel, or subscribing to a newspaper or magazine. Based on these demographics, broadcasters and publishers then sell space or air time to advertisers, who then sell ads to businesses who are trying to reach customers that fit those demographics. This marketing is outbound: you are trying to […]
[…]network already who can help solve your problem at a price point you can afford. Need Help With Digital Marketing or […]
[…]know that money is typically tight, leaving little room for a marketing specialist or expensive digital marketing tools. You may not be aware that there are lots of free options for non-profits looking to explore digital marketing, however, including: A 10,000 per month AdWords grant available from Google Free e-mail newsletters for up to 2,000 subscribers available through MailChimp The Donate Now button available on Facebook Below we explore each of these options in-depth so you can decide if they’re right for your organization. Why Free Online Fundraising Tools for Non-Profits Fail Many of our non-profit clients come to use with grand […]
[…]a basic knowledge of the following skills: Content writing Website management SEO Social media marketing Email marketing Essentially, you need to be able to write effective content and you need to be able to write it in a way that is optimized for the channels you’re publishing it to, including search engines, social media platforms, and email platforms. If this list seems daunting to you, start with what you know and learn the rest as you go. Start Small to Grow Big Once you have a basic plan for your content marketing, start small. Figure out what you can do […]
[…]the years, and while they serve as a solid foundation for basic advertising and promotion, content marketing issues still plague businesses who try to use these methods. Common Content Marketing Issues Businesses Face In this post and attached infographic, we are going to focus on some of the most common content marketing issues, where and how they can happen, and how to properly avoid them. The most common issue businesses experience is mismanagement of their content marketing efforts. According to recent research, only 18% of all marketers said their organization had the right technology and resources to manage their marketing […]
[…]SEO Tip #2: Use SEO Tools to Help You With Best Practices Perhaps more than any other element of digital marketing, SEO is a highly technical field that can be difficult to break into. A little knowledge is also not enough to be effective at SEO. You need to be doing things the right way from the beginning or you will run into trouble later on. Or worse: you will completely waste your efforts or even harm your search presence. Good tools can give you concrete recommendations as you build a website, optimize an existing website, or start a new content […]
[…]three strategies for generating high -quality emails and using the features of popular email marketing services like MailChimp to deliver targeted, captivating messages to supporters of your organization. Non-Profit Email Marketing Tip #1: Showcase Accomplishments How much money did your organization raise at the annual gala? How many hours did volunteers clock in last quarter? What did your organization do with the state grant you won 6 months ago? While it is important to foreground the need to continue doing the work you do, it is equally important to highlight your organization’s accomplishments (big and small). Both numbers and stories […]
[…]next thing you should think about when launching a new website is branding. As people who run a digital marketing agency, we see badly-branded websites all the time. Branding is different than functionality. Some of the most easy-to-use websites are also the most poorly branded and vice versa. Branding is also more than just the look and feel of your website. As John Williams has defined a brand strategy: Your brand strategy is how, what, where, when and to whom you plan on communicating and delivering on your brand messages. Where you advertise is part of your brand strategy. Your […]
[…]words help people remember you? This graphic from Salesforce guides you. Need Help Improving Your Marketing Copy With Power Words? This is a guest blog post by Jonha Richman. She is a marketing strategist with over 9 years of experience advising tech startups. She’s also a staff writer at Small Business Trends and her works were featured on The Huffington Post, Fast Company, Business Insider, among others. Via […]
[…]and effectively market your organization. To help get you started, below are some Twitter marketing strategy tips we’ve used with our clients. Twitter Marketing Strategy Tip #1: Use Appropriate Hashtags It comes as no surprise that one of the most important things to consider when posting on Twitter is the use of hashtags in your posts. Hashtags can help users on Twitter find your posts when searching for a particular hashtag, or help your tweets pop up for others when a particular hashtag is trending. The tricky part is determining which hashtags are best for your small business or non-profit, […]
[…]they will interact with businesses that interest them and that they find to be worthwhile. Email marketing can be used to gain and retain loyalty amongst your customers. It’s important to start an email marketing campaign ethically and responsibly, however. Instead of paying for consumer information (such as names and emails), your business needs to entice customers to sign up for your newsletter. You need coax them to sign up while they are at the checkout line or on your website through a well-crafted proposition for what they will receive: valuable rewards on a consistent basis. But what counts as […]
[…]accounts is a good way to continue your brand recognition for your users and followers. Instagram Marketing Marketing Tip #2: Use Hashtags Just like your small business should do on a platform like Twitter, hashtags are an important way to engage with your followers or allow new followers to find you. Creating hashtags that are relevant to your business and your overall industry will increase your visibility within Instagram and help you reach new followers. Instagram Marketing Marketing Tip #3: Mix Photos and Videos Consider a mix of both picture-based posts and video-based posts. What makes Instagram marketing for your […]
[…]for small businesses. Our answer is always the same: it depends on your goals. Like all digital marketing efforts, you should start small with a manageable group of keywords that are: Specific to your business Have a high amount of search traffic Have a low index for competitiveness You should not try to leverage every keyword out there that you think applies to your business. Doing so will only hurt your SEO. As a rule: the more specific you get with your keywords, the better. Tip #2: Build a Keyword Matrix To help you make choices about what keywords to focus […]
[…]social media accounts and reply to all comments. According to CMI, “The most common content marketing delivery mechanism is social media, used by 87% of marketers,” and this means you must use social media effectively in order to be competitive. Create a Marketing Strategy that Works Whether you are focused on your social media presence, creation of great content, or your SMS texting campaign, you have to come up with a strategy that works for you and your business. You must determine who your target audience is and work hard to focus your efforts on reaching that demographic. The content […]
[…]to help you promote your content online, you may find there aren’t a lot available. Content marketing is relatively new in the world of marketing, and software developers are just now beginning to create packages that help people develop and deploy killer content. Many of these packages are incredibly expensive, however, and include thousands of dollars in miscellaneous “set-up fees,” putting them out of reach for the average small business owner or non-profit manager. To help you get started with some of the tools we love, below we give our personal picks for 3 of the best, and most affordable, […]
[…]simply through up a business page and posting to it. Here, we’ve gathered some tips on facebook marketing for small businesses to help you make the most out of this important platform. Tip #1 for Facebook Marketing for Small Businesses: Complete Your Business Profile It may sound too simple to be a tip but one of the biggest things that will help your Facebook page stand out against your competitors’ is making sure you complete all the information in your profile. For example, each Facebook page for business allows up to 154 characters as a “bio description.” Make sure to […]
[…]history behind your organization and get your audience engaged, wanting to learn more. Instagram Marketing Marketing Tip #2: Use Hashtags Relevant to Your Cause Just like on Twitter, hashtags are an important way to engage with your followers and to help new followers find you. Creating hashtags that are relevant to your non-profit and the causes that it supports will increase your visibility on Instagram and help you reach new followers. Try to find other non-profits that are similar to yours, follow them, and use any hashtags they’re using that apply to your organization, as well. Using some of their […]
[…]Who Are Killing It To help you continue the process, we’ve gathered a few tips for Facebook marketing for non-profits. Read on to help take your Facebook game to the next level. Facebook Marketing Tip #1: Planning Ahead and Creating a Social Media Schedule One of the most important things to develop for your organization is a content strategy. A content strategy template is a single document that contains all the information you need to develop, maintain, and deliver your web-based content for your organization. If you want to learn more about what a content strategy is and how to […]
[…]collateral,” it refers to all the media you have to produce in order to engage in marketing. As for what “content marketing” is, we have a 3-part post that answers that question. Content marketing collateral can include any or all of the following: Textual content written in long-form (an ebook) or short-form (a tweet) Graphical content such as photos, logos, diagrams, and illustrations Video footage of interviews, tours, events, etc. Content feeds from influencers within your industry It may sound overwhelming to think about producing all these types of content. And it can be, if you don’t have a good plan in place. […]
[…]host of other marketing gurus is content marketing, which he defines in the following way: Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly-defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action. If you’re a small business like us, however, you may find this new type of marketing intimidating, to say the least. These are just a few questions our clients ask us when we introduce them to this relatively new approach to marketing: How does content on the web attract people to your business? […]
[…]really increased. Your phone isn’t ringing off the hook. Is your plan working? Does content marketing for small business even work?! Content marketing for small business is a long-term game, not a short-term one. This can be frustrating for small business owners, many of whom live and die based on their ability to generate new leads. Because of this, it’s not wrong to supplement content marketing with other approaches, such as paid campaigns on platforms like Google Adwords or Facebook Ads. Paid solutions tend to work faster than content marketing. The trick is to balance these efforts with your overall content […]
[…]on. If you’re not sure how to get started, however, check out our 3 tips for LinkedIn marketing below. Why LinkedIn Marketing Is a Great Way to Reach People Many smaller organizations focus on Facebook because it’s familiar to them and is still the most popular social media platform. Facebook is a great tool for creating awareness, brand engagement, and paid advertising, emphasis on the paid. It’s very difficult to reach people organically on Facebook. It’s becoming a paid advertising platform where you have to put money in if you want to reach new leads. LinkedIn also has a paid option, which […]
[…]month, or they might lose interest and switch channels. Next Post: How To Improve Your Content Marketing Plan Over Time In our final post in this series, we’ll explain how you can improve your content marketing plan over time through regular checkups, maintenance, and strategy sessions with your team or other trusted advisors. Need Help With Content […]
[…]your store because they asked their smartphone for services near them. We are all dependent on digital points-of-contact for everything from marketing to customer service to following up after a sale. All of our customers are now users, in other words, and the experiences we provide to them will determine whether they stay our customers or whether they seek out someone who better understands their needs. So, now we have a better understanding of what UX is. How do we stay on top of UX trends? 1) Find UX Thought Leaders You Trust and Follow Their Lead According to Forbes: A […]
[…]be. We should be using that technical content throughout the customer journey, including: Marketing Lead generation Customer service Customer support Loyalty experiences (VIP events, existing customer newsletters, etc.) Businesses can either support their customers with the technical information they need throughout the customer journey or they can be sure that a competitor will. And the next time a customer enters the active evaluation phase of the buying process, they’ll probably choose to buy from the brand that has supported them the most during that process. Need Help With Technical Communication and Content […]
[…]projects, but can you tell us, from your point-of-view, why you think UXPin is a good tool for digital agencies? MARCIN: I think UXPin is an essential tool for a digital agency of any size. The speed with which you can build your wireframes and prototypes, get feedback, and test ideas with users is invaluable for collaboration with a client. You can get better, faster results and can streamline your process to build products that are going to exceed expectations. CONTENT GARDEN: What sense do you have about the future of UX as a field? What are new challenges that you […]
[…]shift or are there other factors? A few years later, do you still stand by your assertion that marketing is the future of tech comm? Scott: Everything is marketing. If it can have an impact on how a consumer feels about a brand, that content is marketing. Period. End of story. I don’t just believe that, I know it’s true. Science tells us this. Even our parents and teachers tell us this from the time we are just children. Impressions matter. Especially first ones. Documentation is one part of the customer experience. Customers also experience content when they interact with […]
Are you leveraging your technical content to attract and retain customers? If you’re not sure about your answer to this question, Guiseppe Getto, the President and Founder of Content Garden, offered a webinar for the Content Wrangler on June 16th, 2020 entitled: How to Use Technical Content to Attract and Retain Customers. Today’s customers are increasingly savvy. They do a ton of research before purchasing a product or service. You may think that your content is too dense for your customers. Information like product specifications, technical requirements, and process workflows may seem like information that should never leave your organization, but […]
[…]grows in importance, from marketing to follow-up after a purchase, technical communicators, digital marketings, and other communication professionals will need to rethink their strategies for developing and deploying useful, usable content to a wide variety of audiences. Content Strategy in Technical Communication, a collection published with Routledge under the auspices of the ATTW Book Series in Technical and Professional Communication, seeks to provide a window into just such strategies. This book can help you learn content strategy through easy-to-understand examples, best practices, and guidelines. What Does Content Strategy in Technical Communication Contain? Content Strategy in Technical Communication provides a balanced, comprehensive […]
[…]we break down a few of our favorite features that MailChimp can offer you and your team. Email Marketing Messages One of Mailchimp’s flagship functions is its email marketing power. If you’re looking to send emails to your current customers or subscribers, MailChimp can offer you templates to customize your messages and what you want to deliver to your audience’s inbox. Then, once your messages have been sent, MailChimp offers analytics to check your progress, what your audience does with your messages, and more. Instead of having to email your subscribers one by one, you can send a blast to […]
[…]many different forms of content. There lots of different definitions for this term in the world of digital marketing and UX. We like to think of content as “useful information that people will see.” Of course, this begs the question: what people? Some people you might want to think about in relation to your content can include: Leads: You want to think about how people who aren’t already customers will encounter your content. What happens when someone lands on your website homepage for the first time? What happens when someone first follows you on Twitter? What will they see and do? […]
[…]again: many of those customers are also users. People are now about as likely to shop first at a digital storefront as they are to shop in a physical store. Customers ranging from patients to students to campaign donors now want to keep track of a wide variety of information, often in real time. Without in-depth knowledge of what makes their core users tick, most large organizations will struggle to successfully meet the needs of those users. Churn rates will increase. Customer satisfaction will plummet. Good UX is now becoming a key benchmark for pretty much every organization with at least […]
[…]like not knowing the best metric for tracking a specific process (i.e. the ROI of social media marketing). Or it may be more complex like not knowing much about an emerging field (i.e. UX). You won’t have a good experience with any consultant if you’re not clear what you need from them. You bring plenty to the table besides money and time. You bring expertise in your business, which includes expertise in a particular industry. And no one knows everything. Just be clear about what you don’t know so you can find the right person for the job, namely someone […]
[…]Information on Products and Services While you should treat your website as more than just a digital pitch for your business, you need to foreground what you can offer to potential customers on your website. Potential customers are making decisions about whether or not to engage with you based on the information that you provide them on your website. As much as possible, you need to tell them what you can offer them if they choose to become your customer. At minimum, your description of products and services should include: Accurate and adequate descriptions (including possible drawbacks) Availability Methods of […]
If you have a website, mobile app, or social media presence, you have users for those digital points of contact. And if you have users, then those users come with certain expectations. Whether those expectations are met determines whether they interact with you, become leads, or eventually become customers. This means that, regardless of the type of product or service you’re selling, if you have a web presence, you need to think about user experience (or UX). What a UX Toolkit Is and Why You Need One Let’s start with what UX is, as that is a common question we […]