Internet Marketing Blog

Have you found that your customers are leaving you to go to your competitors – or they’ve simply not returned, and you can only assume that that’s where they have gone? You might think that this is through no fault of your own, but the truth is, if you were to examine your actions, it very likely is something you’re doing, or rather not doing, that is the issue.

Below are just some of the reasons your customers might be leaving you for your competitors. Take them on board and see what you can change to create a better customer experience:

Your Website Doesn’t Look As Professional

Your website is your 24/7 storefront, and one of the most important things about your business. If it doesn’t look as good as your competitors, it doesn’t really matter how much better what you’re offering is; they’re going to go to them. Whether you have a strange lay out, a slow loading site, or they can’t find the information they want quickly and easily, they are going to go elsewhere. Maybe bad product pictures are to blame, or something entirely different. Whatever it is, have a critical eye look over your site to help.

You’re Not Asking For Feedback

Asking your customers for feedback may make your ego feel a little bruised, but it’s important. You don’t have to change every single thing that they say, but if something crops up on a few occasions, it is definitely worth a look. Your customers are the most important group of people to your business, so show them that you listen to them.

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You’re Not Treating Your Customers The Way You Should

Customer service is so important in this day and age, especially since a bad experience can be put on the internet and spread for all to see. Customer relationship management software is a wonderful choice to help you stay on top of the game and keep your customers happy. You want to make sure you’re nurturing relationships in the long run, too, and not just giving them a good experience when they buy.

You’re Not Gathering Enough Data

Gathering data on your customers and people who visit your site is imperative for improving. You want to know how they are browsing and shopping so you can make improvements.

There Are No Incentives

Incentives to shop with you can be great and keep people coming back. Can you introduce freebies, discounts, or loyalty cards? Find a way to make your audience feel special and want to come back again and again.

Your Social Media Marketing Is Weak

You can’t get away from how important social media marketing is in this day and age. If you have a strong online presence, you’re going to look far more attractive than a competitor that doesn’t have one. Are you putting in enough effort on social channels?

Lack Of Innovation

Finally; a lack of innovation could be your downfall. If you’re falling behind, your competitors will be the innovators and you’ll be left in their wake.

Running your own online business can be tough. There’s no one telling you what to do or letting you know when things could be better. There’s no office full of people to brainstorm with, and no one else to take the blame when things fail. There is, however, an awful lot of competition and the world of online business is ever changing. New advancements, new SEO strategies, new plugins and social media platforms are popping up all of the time. Meaning you can never settle. You never have time to take a break or relax. There are always ways for your business to improve and unfortunately, if you don’t keep up and do what you can to boost your online business and implement new ideas and techniques, you will very quickly fall behind.

So, what can you do to boost your online business without spending a small fortune on expensive marketing teams, designers, market research professionals and staff? Here are some ideas to help.

Prioritize and Look at Your Goals

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When I say, there’s no one to tell you if things aren’t going well, that’s not exactly true. Your analytics will give you a pretty good idea of what parts of your business are moving in the right direction, and which areas aren’t working. You’ll quickly be able to see who’s looking at your website and when. You’ll be able to see where your traffic is coming from, how long it’s staying on your site and what it’s clicking. Your sales and conversion rates are also useful.

When it comes to boosting your business taking an in-depth look at your website analytics is essential. Look at what is working and what isn’t. Then, focus on what’s not working. Is it worth your efforts? If you spend days redesigning specific pages or elements, would it really boost your business? Or would you be better off letting them go?

If you currently get no traffic from your Pinterest profile, is it worth putting hours into it? Is that really where your target audience spends their time? Or would improving your SEO and spending more time on Facebook help? Rent an office from Level Office Circle Tower and take some time to analyze your website properly. Then, set yourself goals and prioritize where you need to focus. Remember to reevaluate every three months or so to reassess how things are working. You can always make changes.

Ask for Help

One of the great things about online business is that it’s easy to connect with your audience. If you want to give things a boost, there’s no better way to find out what it needs to improve than asking your audience. You can use social media poles, emails, surveys or just conversations to find out what your audience want and need from you. Then, take the time to find ways to give them what they want.

Add Video

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It’s thought that by 2021 video will make up 82 percent of the internet. So, if you don’t already use video, you are falling behind. There are many ways to use video online. You could host a YouTube channel with advice and tutorials. You could add videos to your sales pages to show how products work or offer advice on using your services. You could add videos to other informative content on blog posts, or you could shoot social media stories to show a more behind the scenes and personal side of your business. Take a look at other ways to start using videos online and get started.

You don’t want your logistics to fail. It’s such a vital part of your business, and it’s one of the ways that you can maintain customer popularity. Because the whole chain of the purchasing and delivery process can be affected if your logistics isn’t working right. If you have a delay in delivery, which is where most companies fail logistically. But the thing is, so many parts of the logistical process are outsourced, so it is obviously hard to manage the outcome of certain parts, if you’re not the one managing it. That’s not to say you shouldn’t be doing it, we just think there are some things that you could be changing to make the whole process run a lot more smoothly, so have a read on to find out more.

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 Rely On Technology

Every business should rely on technology, it can often do so much more than we can do. Thankfully, one of the areas that technology has improved massively, is the logistics of business. It has now become so much easier to track and organise items that you might be delivering or shopping, if you rely on technology that is. It has now become so important that a company uses fleet management and logistics management software, that there are now one’s for industry specific purposes. For example, Sertica is a software specific to fleet management and document maintenance on board fleets, which should make things easier to track., This is definitely something a lot of companies are crying out for. You just have to know what bits of software you would be able to utilise.

What Can You Move In House

Like we’ve said, if you’re managing everything in house, then it’s hard to keep things in your control. Even with things such as technology, you are putting your business at risk of malfunction. But that’s just a warning, because even when you’re managing things yourself, it can go wrong. However, if you feel like too many things are going wrong with a company you’re outsourcing to, consider whether you can manage it in house. It might just mean hiring another employee, or it might be a task you feel like you can do. Or, there’s always the option of playing around with the companies that you use, and then finding one that you can build a connection with.

Streamlining The Process

Streamlining the process shouldn’t be too hard. You just need to make sure one task flows from one stage, to the next, and you take out any external factors that could disrupt this. One that really can put a spanner in the works, is the customers ordering from you. They can switch and change things that can create delays. Have a strict policy of the order being final after payment, and you might find that you save yourself time and money. The same goes with anything else that you might be getting held back with. Take out the distraction, and you will find that your business has success.

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Texting is commonplace in our societies these days, and we use it more than any other form of communication because it is fast and convenient for us to use. You may have heard of businesses using text for their audience, and you may have wondered whether you can do the same thing yourself. The main question we ask ourselves is whether or not it is professional to text our customers.

Who are you texting?

Texting within your business or outside it will be acceptable depending on the recipient of the text. For example, a texting service such as http://www.plivo.com/sms-api/ can be brilliant for sending out information and offers to your customers, and this is completely professional for you to do. However, if you want to text your superior in the workplace, this is not professional at all. It is a case of deciding who your recipient is and playing it safe.

What time is it?

It is incredibly important that you take care of the time that you send a text to your coworkers or colleagues. If you send out a text which is to do with business after working hours, this will not be well received by your colleague and is not an appropriate thing to do. If you want to send a message for someone to see the next time they are at work, send an email to their work address. When it comes to customers, you are free to send your texts at any time, however early evening is likely the best time.
Is it urgent?

The general rule of thumb within the workplace is that you should always use an e-mail to communicate between yourselves because this allows all interactions to be kept and recorded for later use. Texting should only really be used if you are out of the office and need to send a quick update, or if the matter is too urgent to write an email. People are more likely to read a text so texting is better in an urgent situation.

Is your competition doing it?

One of the things you may not have already thought about is whether or not your competitors are using text messages to communicate with their customers. If you find out that they are doing this, you may want to invest in a service yourself. There are many different ways you can use texting for business, and here are some of the things you can send: https://www.textmagic.com/blog/text-message-templates-for-businesses/. Texting your audience is a great way to stay in touch and make sure that you stay on their mind throughout the year. Take the time to come up with exclusive offers and messages to send and you will likely get a great response from it.

Texting is professional as long as you use it for the right thing, at the right time and to the right person. Texting is a part of modern life, and because of this we should embrace it and use it to out advantage, both personally and for business.

With a growing number of ways to market your business, there seems to be a bit of a debate over using traditional marketing for your business (offline marketing) or going down the online route as you could capture a new audience. So to know which may be better for your business, it is a good idea to have a greater understanding of each of them. So this article is aiming to give you a clearer understanding of each type of marketing, and the pros and cons. Then you can weigh up what will work better for you and your business.

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Offline Marketing

Marketing your business offline is a way to market your business and attract new customers using only methods like radio, print, magazines, television, and posters. If you have been in business for a while, or are only used to offline marketing, then it can be easy to see the positives of it.

Take print advertising, for example. This is one of the most traditional forms of advertising and marketing your business and getting new customers. You can use your budget to target newspapers and magazines on a national scale if needed, as well as sticking to things like posters and flyers if your business is one that is more aimed at people locally. It can be expensive to advertise in print, and you can’t be too specific with who will read your ad, but with the right publications, it can be a way to see a return on your investment.

As a result of getting a few customers, you can then target them through direct mail if you have their information. This allows you to send out something specific to them, such as a birthday discount or the latest offers on the products similar to what they have already bought. While this can be a good thing and uptake is often high, it can be seen as a little bit spammy, and it won’t work for all business types.

Traditional networking is something that you can’t go too far wrong with, and it is another form of offline marketing. Talking to people, those in the industry at trade show exhibits or to potential customers on the streets, can be a good way for people to see the face behind the brand and learn more about what you offer. You can make yourself memorable in the right way, and then it could lead to other opportunities and collaborations. Having business cards to give away is a great idea too. Things that will get your name out there is key.

So as you can see, there are good things about all of these. You just need to see how effective it could be for the type of business that you have and what you need to do to see your business grow.

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Online Marketing

Because of the way that the world has shifted online, it is only natural that the way we do business and market our business has shifted as well. But what specifically is online marketing?

It can be anything from simply having a website, to blogging and working with bloggers, to using paid search engine ads, as well as looking to build your SEO and using social media. So to start with, getting yourself a website is a good way to go, along with some social media channels. If they are used regularly, then it can be a good way to market and grow your business, as you could be reaching a whole new group of people.

One of the benefits of online marketing is the specificity of the people that you will be marketing to. With a newspaper or magazine ad, you can have a rough idea about who the ad will go to. Certain demographics will read certain things; but you can’t be sure. The thing is, when you work with bloggers on campaigns, they can let you know the specifics of who reads their articles as they will have the data from their web host or Google Analytics.

Likewise, if you want to use social media for advertising, then you can also be pretty specific about who your ads get targeted to. If your business is related to weddings, you can aim your ads at engaged females, that are aged between 25 and 45 and who live in a certain state; it can be that specific! So if you want to know what you’re getting more bang for your buck, then that could be a good way for you to go.

Though it can take some legwork, in many ways, you can do your online marketing yourself. You log into your social media accounts and create the ads, or you write a blog as part of your website, making sure to link back to previous posts. So if you’re on a tight budget or a pretty small startup, then online is a way to get marketing your business cheaply, at least at first. If you’re stuck for time, though, then it can be easier to pass it over to a marketing agency to run it for you, or to use offline methods. But again, this isn’t going to be great if you’re on a budget.

While offline marketing allows you to target nationwide, it doesn’t really allow for a global reach. However, with online marketing, you can quite easily reach a global audience through the blog articles that you post or the social media accounts that you have. So have a think about what you want to do with your business and go from there. For many businesses, a bit of both is what is going to work well for you. Because although getting new customers is great, you will also want to keep old customers or get more local ones. Some businesses can thrive doing just one form of marketing. So decide on your aims and then allow your marketing to do its thing.

Good luck as you decide what direction your marketing journey will take you.

Seth Godin, a former dot com business executive and an author, said that these days we are able to turn strangers into friends, then those friends into customers, and those customers into salespeople.

And he’s right! It’s easy to turn strangers into your own friends. And if you promote your website on social media, you’re able to turn friends into paying customers. Furthermore, it’s also easy to turn customers into salespeople: just put a discount code in front of them and tell them it works only if it gathers a certain number of likes.

Over the last decade, there have been numerous social media platforms that have basically taken over the world and our lives. These social networks have reached an astounding audience, like no other form of communication before. And this is the reason why it’s important to the industry of eCommerce to collaborate with the social media platforms.

Thanks to the introduction of social commerce, your friends can become your customers on pretty much any social media platform, without having to visit your website. And that’s what makes social media so valuable to eCommerce.

The ability to purchase any product from a third-party company within the social media experience is what we define as social commerce nowadays.

Thanks to the ever-evolving strides of technology and our increased use of both smartphones and social networks, the wide world of online shopping has been changing and turning a lot more social.

According to a recent survey, approximately three out of four shoppers have been relying on social media to guide their purchasing decision. As a result, it’s quite clear that sellers need to go with whatever platform their customers are using, instead of trying to get them to leave the platform and visit a website.

We’re all seeing that social commerce is a market that has been on the rise and encompasses plenty of options. Shoppers can make group purchases, they can do this via mobile apps, there’s the option of social shopping and shopping that is integrated into social media platforms. Even retailers can add their own social features.

So it’s extremely important for sellers to be active on the big social media platforms like Facebook or Twitter. And it’s also important for the existing eCommerce giants like eBay and Amazon to collaborate with the said platforms in order to improve the entire shopping experience.

I think it has become extremely clear that now a business really needs to be ever present on social media, especially from an advertising perspective. Of course, it isn’t an essential aspect of your day to day business, but it can certainly help the business grow, digitally and on a face to face aspect. However, if social media or even internet promotion and content is not your strong point how do you deliver engaging content that will work for your business? There are some fail-safe ways you can do this and I wanted to share with you what some of them are.

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Consider the content you create

Social media is all about the content you create and how consistent you are in creating it. So it is very important to consider the type of content you want to be posting online. Do you want to share information and tips as well as promote your business? Do you want to give an insight into what your business is doing day to day? For example, this might mean sharing the progress of jobs you are working on, things you are installing, or latest promotions on products you have available. The type of content doesn’t all necessarily need to be typed words. You could share images, you could share video, the options are endless. So it is definitely worth looking at what you are comfortable with sharing and then remaining consistent with it.

Gain interest by inventive methods of content

You may want to think about some of the ways you can grow your audience, so you could try some inventive methods in doing that. For example, you could choose to share content that has a call to action. Where you are wanting people to respond to a question you have asked, share a status you have uploaded or simply like your content. This helps your business be seen on other people’s feeds. Another option could be to run a giveaway, but there are certain terms you need to abide by, so that might be worth a little research. But this could encourage people to like your business and share your posts.

Get the help of the experts to give your strategy a boost

Not all of us are internet savvy, and social media can feel a little confusing at times, especially when it comes to the right times to post to different platforms. So it might be worth enlisting the help of digital marketing services who know this area inside out. They can devise a strategy, help with content creation, and even enable you to grow your audiences on your social media platforms.

Don’t try to do too much too soon

Finally, there are so many options of social media and promotion out there that it can be far too tempting to be ever present on all of them. But this can become a job in itself, so instead focus on different areas like one platform at a time, or use scheduling tools to help you share content across different platforms.

I hope that this helps you to boost your business social media presence.

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Developing the best business effectiveness usually means finding the best equipment to fulfill your daily tasks with. After all, rising to relevance in your industry is not a singular achievement, it is something which must be developed day by day and maintained, using the best possible methods for doing so.

So, find the best possible methods! If we were to ask you what equipment is used the most to gain a business advantage from day to day, which would you suggest is the most important? It wouldn’t be going too far to assume you’d consider your IT solutions as this most important tool. Your employees will only ever be as good as the tools they employ, so taking the time to sit down and truly assess how your IT framework can yield great results.

Of course, IT solutions are only the canvas of setting up your enterprise. The meat of your operation comes from the apps and programs you use. These are the true tools your employees will use every day in the fight to please shareholders and become a more profitable, ethical, and worthwhile firm.

Here are some you should install and purchase licenses for:

Adobe Creative Suite

If you’re interested in content creation of any level, it’s likely you can benefit from the Adobe creative suite. There are multiple different programs in this suite, and you can purchase licenses for solely the ones you want. Photoshop, After Effects and InDesign, are the most popular and famous programs. They consider and help you edit images, motion graphics and publishing spreads respectively. There are multiple more programs to help you for any small consideration or professional endeavor you have or would like to try. What’s more is that Adobe has recently listened to complaints from personal hobbyists and businesses about the cost of purchasing licenses for these programs. Taking this on board, Adobe now offers variant subscription models which can benefit you and your business, regarding keeping your business online or opening a publishing house from modest financial means.

Office 365

Office 365 is the complete Microsoft Office suite, and it’s certainly popular for a reason. Not only have Microsoft optimized and made the platform more effective over the years, but compatibility with cloud storage and inter-commentary shared user potential allows for some wonderful collaboration between employees and departments. The Office package includes Word, Excel, Powerpoint and OneNote, all tools which are now considered industry standard. If you are using the Windows 10 platform (advisable) as your business-wide operating system, the compatibility and constant stream of security updates makes Office 365 much more preferential than the Google Suite platform, despite the latter being free. For the best insight check out Better Online to see how you could install the package today.

VPN Service Of Your Choice

While VPN services are a must-have in today’s online corporate climate, there are many worthwhile choices to make your decision a little more difficult to make. The most famous and celebrated VPN’s as of the time of this writing (Fall 2017,) are TunnelBear, Windscribe, and Speedify. These are speedy and reliable services that help encrypt your web traffic.

Never be afraid to secure yourself online through these parameters, especially if you are interested in preventing a malicious hacking attempt to steal your vital information. Employees working from home or in a cafe may also be working from an unreliable or unsecured connection, so it’s important to give them a platform to securely conduct their work, and not have to worry about the variable connection they might be executing their tasks from.

With these software services, you can be sure that your IT functionality is firing on all cylinders from the early days.