What is Attraction Marketing And How Can It Set Your Business Apart

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Attraction marketing is the culmination of your marketing efforts to draw customers to you and your brand. As with any marketing strategy, attraction marketing focuses on setting your brand apart from your competitors by making your company attractive to potential buyers. This is accomplished through developing your brand marketing strategy by evaluating your marketing goals, evaluating how your are performing, and adjusting your plan using metrics.

Attraction Marketing Strategy and Story

Attraction marketing is all about making your brand more attractive to your buyer personas as well as attracting them to you through inbound marketing. The two work hand-in-hand and should be a pillar of your marketing efforts, and it all begins with your attraction marketing strategy or strategies as the case may be — there is no one “right” way to market your brand but there are many tried and true ways to do it.

Strategy alone, however, doesn’t necessarily flow through to your customers but your story does and storybranding is how to give your brand an enduring and lasting impression on your clients. Be careful though, as storybranding and storytelling are two different animals.

Get Found and Be Seen

Your brand story sets up the foundation for who you are and what you do and, if done right, will be the thing that your buyers admire as they meander through your sales funnel. Of course, all of that magnificent storybranding will be for naught without a quality website and some killer SEO which is exactly why you need to shore up your website: to be seen.

We’re talking, of course, about your internet presence and how it affects your attraction marketing campaigns. The gateway to your brand story and to your attraction marketing as a whole goes through your website which may very well be your most valuable sales asset. Most importantly, it puts you on a level playing field with your competition through the necessary exposure of the internet.

Getting folks to that site comes down to search engine optimization which spans both organic and pay per click by optimizing your website for greater results. While SEO is an intrinsic tool to have, the quality of the content you provide on your site is what keeps buyers there and hooks them in to your sales process.

Want to learn more about how to create quality content? Read this article on how to create content for each sale funnel stage.

Thought Leadership

Possibly one of the most useful parts of attraction marketing for your business is that you become the thought leader in your industry. Buyers as well as industry leaders will turn to your brand to help solve their problems as you make them more aware of the issues they face.

Thought leadership though is more than simply having quality content and making that content relevant to your target audience. It deals with the entire suite of broadcasting your brand, who you are, and what you know about your industry and the solutions you have available across many different avenues. Social media, trade shows, marketing metrics, and lead nurturing all make up vital pieces of your thought leadership toolset.

More than that, the importance of thought leadership for your brand is to continue to set yourself up on a higher plane than the rest of your competition by delivering what you already know and conveying it in a way that attracts people to you.

Lead Nurturing Throughout the Buyer’s Journey

Once you’ve got a lead whether from a trade show, through your inbound marketing, or through social media, it’s time to nurture them through your sales process and guide them through their own buyer journey.

While there are many ways to nurture leads, keying in on how your specific buyer responds to different stimuli is necessary for landing sales. Tactics including drip emails, lead nurturing campaigns, and remarketing are all tools that should be part of your lead nurturing tool box. Additionally, towards the end of your buyer’s journey, your sales and marketing staffs should be on the same page for sales-ready leads.

Finally, you’ll need a way to evaluate your marketing efforts. Inbound marketing software, analytics, and metrics can certainly help, but having a strong OODA loop within your organization will aid in making decisions. Remember, it all starts with data.

The Nitty Gritty: Why Attraction Marketing?

The question you’re undoubtedly asking is why attraction marketing is useful to your business which is a very valid one. Think of attraction marketing as the magnet that draws customers to your brand at large. The deeper aspects of attraction marketing such as your content, thought leadership, and brand story make your brand something that sticks with them.

30 Greatest Lead Generation Tips

What General Data Protection Regulation Means For You

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GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) is legislation that went into effect in May of 2018 which gives you as an individual more rights and protection over your personal data.

Companies will have to be transparent about what data they hold about you and why, and will no longer be able to spam you with unwanted marketing material or share your data with third parties without your knowledge. In our opinion, this is a hugely positive step forward for the rights of the individual in the context of the current multi-billion dollar data industry and the wake of the Facebook/ Cambridge Analytica scandal.

GDPR affects all businesses operating within the EU in terms of how they collect, use, share and store personally identifiable data such as names, addresses, phone numbers and emails. There is a misconception that GDPR only affects B2C businesses. GDPR also affects B2B businesses because client and employee names, emails and job roles can all be used to personally identify individuals.

How Will Businesses Need To Change?

Businesses require new procedures, contracts, rules, and other paperwork that was in place by May 25, 2018.  As part of this, your website will need to be GDPR compliant. However, it’s important to note that your website is largely a reflection of your internal policies and processes; you can’t update your website without first looking at your business. So before we jump into how to get your website GDPR compliant, let’s start with reviewing some of the key aspects your business will need to consider in light of GDPR.

Going forward, you must be upfront and honest about how you will use personal data e.g. letting individuals know why you’re collecting it and what you will do with it. You must ensure that all data you collect is lawfully processed e.g. if you’re an accounting firm, you can’t collect data about your clients’ political beliefs as it’s simply not relevant. You must also specifically name any third parties with whom you’re sharing personal data, and have new contracts in place with them as data processors.

Additionally, you must always give individuals the option to opt-in rather than opt-out of direct marketing – that means no more pre-ticked boxes saying ‘I want to receive promotions and updates, and you should check that any individuals currently on your mailing lists have consented to receive updates from you.

You must have adequate measures to securely store and protect personal data and can only store it for a valid time frame – this means you can’t keep data on your ex-clients years after they’ve ceased being your client. Upon request, you must also be able to give an individual a breakdown of all the data you hold about them and delete it permanently if they so wish. To see how ready your company is for GDPR, complete the governing body ISO’s checklist for getting ready for GDPR.

How To Be Sure Your Website Is General Data Protection Regulation Compliant

1. Cookie Policy

A page on your website that states what cookies are used on the site, both yours and from third parties and what data you capture with them and what you do with it. An example of a typical compliant cookie policy can be seen here on our website: Privacy Policy

2. Cookie & Privacy Popup Notice

You don’t need to have one but you do need to state what cookies are used and what the privacy policy is at the first point of arriving at the website – so a pop-up is the most logical and well-established solution. It needs to state that cookies are used on the site and that the user needs to agree to the use of the data as set out in the privacy and cookie policy.

The policy pages state what cookies are used (both yours and third-party ones) and that you have to agree to the terms in order to fully use the site. It is very possible that, as some cookies are purely functional and not data gathering tools, the site won’t work properly for you. You will, of course, have the right to request the website owner to disclose what information you hold about the user and it is permanently deleted.

The use of the website must not be limited to those who accept the use of the cookies. The user must be given the option to use the site without the use of cookies and decline the use of cookies for their session. It must be explained to them the cookie notice that if they decline the cookies the site may lose some functionality.

3. Privacy Policy

A privacy policy is a more thorough document that states the website owner’s full statement of what data is captured, when it was captured, what the data is used for, the third party’s details and the process, including the DPOs (Data Protection Officer) details as well as the process of requesting the user’s details and request that they be permanently deleted.

4. SSL certificate

Secure Sockets Layer certificate – it’s the encryption code process that sits on the hosting space of your website. It is the thing that makes the browser bar display a secure notice and sometimes go green and show a padlock symbol. The purpose is to securely encrypt all the details that are entered into any forms or fields on a website. A variety of SSL certificates are available.

5. Pseudonymization or Anonymization

– This one’s harder to resolve.

General Data Protection Regulation

Most websites that have user accounts and store information about their users (like your Amazon account storing your name, address, date of birth etc) store that data in an SQL database. This is a web-based database that the website calls to, queries and delivers your details when you sign in. In most instances, unless it’s online banking, these details will not be stored encrypted and so if the SQL file was accessed the content could be clearly read.

It’s very hard to both store and retrieve data in an encrypted way and that is why most sites don’t. However, as part of GDPR, ‘pseudonymization’ means that websites will need to start moving towards the users being identified by a username only and that the rest of the data is encrypted so that there is no possible connection between the user and the stored details. You will need to speak to your website developer and host about planning this change as it will take time, and planning and require a budget.

6. Newsletter Signups And Other Forms

If you have the facility for users to sign up on your website to receive a newsletter from you, you need to make sure the user has opted in to receive that subscription and you can ONLY send them what they signed up to receive.

You need to seek consent for each method you plan to email them, indicating how it is to be used and how you can unsubscribe. You cannot automatically assign users to receive the information they did not consent to. There must be separate opt-in boxes for each type of subscription/email content you wish to send.

E.g If a user signs up for a service they buy on your website, they will have to check a box to accept the terms of that service. If you offer a monthly marketing newsletter there will need to be a separate check box for them to select. It cannot be a ‘required’ field. You’ll also need to provide another separate check box if you also give the user’s details to another party. 

Read our article: Choosing HubSpot CRM As Your CRM Solution

General Data Protection Regulation states that it must be just as easy to withdraw as it was to sign up. Make sure you keep your contact preferences page easy to find. In addition, you may consider segmenting topics of interest and providing an opt-out checkbox for each one. Including easily identifiable opt-out links in all marketing emails can also help to remain GDPR compliant.

7. User Account Creation

If your website is an eCommerce one or allows a user to set up an account for access to services behind a login area, you will need to ensure that you have both the SSL installed and also work towards the data being stored using pseudonyms. Recent headline examples (Uber, TalkTalk, Experian) have shown that even major internet giants aren’t doing this so better to talk to your web developer about how you can move towards this process.

8. Payment GatewaysGeneral Data Protection Regulation

If you have an eCommerce website and use one of the popular payment gateways, such as PayPal, Sagepay, Worldpay or Stripe, you need to make sure that (as well as ensuring the processes are followed in line with the above points) the payment gateway privacy policies are checked and referenced in your own privacy policy. If they are UK (or European) based, they will need to be GDPR compliant, if US-based, Privacy Shield compliant. The storage of actual payment details on a website falls under and is regulated by PCI compliance.

9. Enquiry & Contact Form

If your website has an enquiry form for people to send you messages, you need to ensure the following are adhered to:

  • The website has an SSL
  • The details are not stored in the website’s SQL database unless stored encrypted
  • If they are sent to you by email, your email service provider adheres to GDPR rules and that the email is stored and sent according to GDPR secure methods. Many email service providers, like Google email and Outlook 365 are updating their terms of service in accordance with GDPR – it’s worth checking their policies to make sure your email provider complies. Email is one of the most common places private data gets abused and lost or misused.
  • Do you print out the email with the enquiry details? If you do, this is also a data risk. Ensure you have a shredding process in place to make sure that emails with users’ private details aren’t just put in the bin!
  • No pre-checked boxes to automatically sign the enquirer up to a newsletter.

The enquiry is explicit to that instance. You cannot then add the user’s details to your marketing database unless they have explicitly agreed to it using a separate check box.

10. Live Chats

If you have a live chat service on your website, you need to make sure that you refer to this third-party service in your cookie policy and privacy policy and that you review their GDPR/Privacy Shield policy. You may think the data isn’t being stored anywhere, but it is – very often the transcript of the chat is emailed to both parties once completed. The above principles of storage and use apply here, too.

11. Connected Email

While not strictly website-related, all email services and the storage of email from all with whom you are connected must be stored in accordance with DPA (Data Protection Act) & GDPR guidelines. In short, make sure you store your email data securely, use good anti-virus applications and archive and delete unnecessary emails completely. And have a Data Retention policy – a statement by your organization follows in terms of how you store data and for how long before it is deleted.

12. Social Media Account Connection

Using social media sites for your organization also falls under GDPR. While you do not need to seek permission from each person who ‘likes’ your page or ‘follows’ you, you do need to ensure that any information gathered directly from people with whom you interact on these sites is handled in accordance with the GDPR privacy guidelines. If you’ve had a chat using Facebook Messenger with someone about an enquiry, make sure the chat history is completely deleted when it’s done. Get the person to email you so that you can hold the formal connection outside of a social media channel.

You also need to make sure that your privacy policy refers to these third-party data controllers, especially as people use SSO (Single Sign-on) for logging into sites and also using their social media account logins for convenience. You also need to ensure that, if you use the details of your customers or connections on your social media page to promote your business you have their consent to do so.

General Data Protection Regulation

13. Google Analytics And Other User Tracking Systems

If you run Google Analytics on your site (or any other tracking service) you will need to make sure that it is referred to in the cookie policy and the privacy policy and that you ensure you check the third party’s own privacy policy to ensure they comply. While we know that Google Analytics will be both GDPR and Privacy Shield compliant, other, lesser-known tracking services may not be.

You must enable the anonymization option in Google Analytics to properly conform to GDPR. Google Analytics records users’ IP addresses in visitor reports and this is deemed as ‘identifiable information. You don’t really need it so turn it off. What’s not fully clear right now is how this will affect geographic reports. We’ll update you on this in the coming months.

14. CRM Connection

Related to points 6, 7, 8, 9 & 10. If your website captures a user’s data and then writes it into a CRM, such as Salesforce or Pardot, you need to make sure that the data collection process is secure, as previously referred, and that you refer to the third-party service in your privacy policy. Additionally, if your website automatically sends the enquiry directly into the CRM, the date, time, reason for capture and consent details are also captured. As a user, they have the legal right to ask you where you captured their details, when, was it explicit how the data will be used and how the details can be permanently deleted (also known as ‘request to be forgotten).

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has actually launched a dedicated advice line to help small organizations prepare for the new data protection laws (GDPR). The service is aimed at people running small businesses or charities and recognizes the particular problems they face getting ready for the new law.

Organizations Need To Make Sure They:

Have a Data Breach Process

The General Data Protection Regulation requires the data controller to have suitable processes defined and in place in case of a data breach. Depending on the severity of the breach, the data controller has a legal obligation to report a data breach (of identifiable or un-pseudonimised data) within 72 hours. Further information on the reporting of a data breach can be found on the Information Commissioner’s Office website.

Appoint a Data Protection Officer (DPO)General Data Protection Regulation

All public authorities and any organization that processes personal data (the data controller) on a significant scale must appoint a Data Protection Officer (DPO) responsible for monitoring internal compliance of the GDPR regulations within the organization. Even if you don’t feel that your organization falls into this category we think that it is a good idea to appoint a DPO for your organization. This person can keep data protection high on the organization’s agenda and ensure that GPDR compliance is achieved and then maintained.

Have a ‘Right to be Forgotten’ Process

An organization must have a Privacy Policy statement on their website. This statement, amongst other things, must include what data is captured about the user, what it is used for, how long it is stored, whether it will be shared with anyone (and detailing who), and the process for a user to request to be provided with full exposure of what data is held about the user and the process for them to request it is completely removed from the organization’s system – aka ‘the Right to be Forgotten.

Have Good Default Privacy Settings

If your website captures any sort of user data or details, such as an eCommerce website or one that allows the user to have an account with some sort of profile that identifies them, make sure the website is set to the highest level of privacy for the user by default and that there are settings the user can choose to downgrade their settings if they wish – a bit like your privacy settings in your social media apps. DPOs should be checking that only data that is absolutely essential be captured.

Improve Data Encryption and Work Towards Storing User Profiles As Pseudonyms

Basically, if you’re storing personally identifiable data on your website (user accounts that have their names, email, shipping/billing addresses etc) you need to be working towards getting that data stored so that it is stored encrypted. Peudonymization is also something that should be considered. This basically means that account profiles have usernames or login methods that are not visibly connected to the actual individual – usually, this is done by having two databases for the website – one for the pseudonym and that database connects to the actual account details so that the whole profile does exist in one place. This reduces the exposure of PII (personally identifiable information) becoming exposed in the event of a data breach or hack.

The first step is having an SSL (secure sockets layer) certificate on your website that encrypts all the data entered into a website through form fields (like when you set up an account, buy something online or sign up to a newsletter etc. However, the data is most likely not stored encrypted. Most CMS systems, like WordPress, Drupal and Joomla don’t do this and you’ll need to have some customization done to your site to make the data get stored encrypted so that in the event of a breach, the data is useless and cannot show identifiable information to individuals.

Inbound marketing will help you grow your business by attracting website visitors, converting them into leads and closing leads into customers

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Does Direct Marketing Have A Role In Inbound Marketing?

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With the proven success of inbound marketing, you might be wondering if there’s a point to some of the traditional marketing strategies you may have once leveraged–for example, direct marketing. A lot of brands assume that direct marketing, which is the strategy of sending leads newsletters or flyers through the mail, no longer has a place in today’s marketing world, especially since email marketing is so effective.

However, you would be mistaken to dismiss traditional forms of B2B marketing such as direct marketing. The following are a few reasons why you shouldn’t abandon traditional marketing strategies, such as direct marketing.

1. Build Trust With Potential Leads

Direct mail has a higher trust level than online marketing. Online, anyone can send you an email, including scammers. It takes a lot more time and money to produce a direct mail campaign that’s a scam. This means that potential leads are more likely to take the direct mail they receive much more seriously than an email, especially if they don’t recognize your brand.

2. Target More Specific Demographicscompetitive advantage

When it comes to direct mail, you know exactly who you’re sending it to. A lot of inbound marketing requires that you implement numerous strategies (such as SEO) in an attempt to position yourself to be found by your target audience. This means that you can achieve a greater level of demographic specificity in a direct mail campaign. All you have to do is to rent lists of businesses that match your buyer persona.

Read More Related Article – The Use of Inbound Marketing in the Manufacturing Industry

3. Supplement Your Inbound Efforts

Direct mail can be extremely effective in helping to supplement your inbound marketing efforts simply because of their level of trust and the ability to achieve greater demographic specificity. Once your mail is in the hands of your potential lead, you can direct them using a call-to-action to go to your website or to sign up for a newsletter. You can offer them free downloadable content if they go online and even add a QPR code to your mail to make it easier for them to engage with your brand online immediately.

4. Keep Brand On Top Of Mind

Even if the lead you’re sending your direct mail to is familiar with your brand already but doesn’t follow your call-to-action, direct mail will help to keep your brand at the top of your mind. This is actually a bigger advantage than you might think–many businesses have given up on direct mail completely and are purely focused on email marketing and other inbound techniques. This means that direct mail is an excellent way to stand out from the crowd.

These are a few examples of how direct marketing can continue to be a relevant part of your marketing strategy. Although inbound marketing is one of the best ways to reach your audience, don’t just abandon all of your traditional marketing efforts. Traditional marketing can still play an important part in your overall marketing efforts.

Inbound marketing will help you grow your business by attracting website visitors, converting them into leads and closing leads into customers

How Will Inbound Marketing Help Me Sell Custom Homes?

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As a home builder, you might assume that traditional marketing efforts are all that’s required to find new clients. Building homes is not something that’s done on the Internet, after all. However, you shouldn’t discount the importance of inbound marketing and the benefits that it can offer. The following are a few ways that implementing inbound marketing to your overall marketing strategy can help you to sell more custom homes.

1. Make It Easier To Be Found Online

Setting up a website is the first step toward being found online. There are many potential clients out there who are thinking about building a custom home. They are likely to start their research online before they even know who you are. They will begin looking for information on building custom homes and will look for home builders in the area that they want to live in. If you don’t have a website or pages on social networks, odds are they will stumble upon your competitors first.

However, setting up a website isn’t the only part of being found. You’ll want to optimize your website and all of the content you produce for your site using SEO. This means using strong keywords and earning links from outside sources to boost your SEO rankings, which, in turn, will help make it easier for people to find you when doing Google searches.

2. Increase Awareness Of Your Home Building Business

The bigger a presence you build online, the more awareness you’ll generate for your home-building company. For example, if you regularly produce content for a blog on your website, your regular readers will be more likely to share that content on social media. This is a great way to generate more awareness for your business. That one person who shares your blog post on Facebook, for example, may not end up using your services. However, that content will be exposed to their social circle. Someone in that social circle may take note of your company and may, in fact, be looking for a home builder themselves.

You can also use PPC (pay-per-click) advertising to generate awareness for your company on Google’s SERP (search engine results pages).

Read More Related Article – The Silent Generation & Senior Real Estate Marketing

3. Improve Your Authority As A Custom Home Builder

Reputation matters. By producing high-quality content that’s relevant to custom home building on your website on a regular basis, you’ll soon establish yourself as an authority. This is especially true if other websites begin linking to your content. Brand authority is important because it helps strengthen your brand identity as well as build trust throughout your audience. When you’ve established yourself as an authority, potential clients are more likely to choose to work with you because they trust that you will do a good job.

4. Engage Directly With Potential Clients

inbound marketing

The ability to speak directly with potential leads to answer any questions that they may have is invaluable. By establishing a presence on social media and regularly interacting with your audience, you can do just that. Social media will allow you to post questions, articles, links, and more. You can even join various discussions that are relevant to the home building industry to make connections with potential clients as well as business partners. Social media channels like Twitter make it easy for your audience to get in touch with you in a convenient manner as well.

5. Nurture Future Clients

Not everybody that interacts with you on social media or that checks out your website will be ready to begin the home-building process. They may be on the fence, or it may be a while before they will be able to begin the home-building process due to a variety of reasons. You can use inbound marketing tactics, such as regularly posting blog content to keep you at the top of your mind or by regularly sending them email newsletters, to nurture them so that when they are ready, they’ll reach out to you.

As you can see, the use of inbound marketing can be incredibly effective for home builders. By leveraging inbound marketing as a major component of your overall marketing strategy, you can increase awareness, improve your reputation, and attract more potential customers.

Inbound marketing will help you grow your business by attracting website visitors, converting them into leads and closing leads into customers

Using a Website Redesign Checklist

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When it comes to redesigning your website, there are a lot of different elements you’ll need to address, which is why you should use a website redesign checklist. The following website redesign checklist will help you gather all of the data you need as well as address the most important aspects of your website’s design:

Analyze your current website

If you’ve committed to investing in a complete website redesign, then you probably know what you want to improve. However, you should use analytics to diagnose your site’s issues so that you know exactly what’s wrong. For example, if you’re visitor conversion rate is lower than you would like, look at data such as bounce rates, page load times, CTA click-throughs and shopping car abandonment rates to pinpoint where your issues lie. Other metrics you’ll want to pay attention to include:

  • SEO rankings for important keywords
  • Total number of sales generated
  • Number of visitors
  • Number of unique visitors
  • Domain authority
  • Number of new lead form submissions.

Establish your goals

If you don’t know what you want your website to accomplish, then you won’t know what direction to take your website redesign in. Without goals, you won’t know what to focus on, nor will you know whether your website redesign is successful once it’s up and running. Make sure that when you set your goals, you can tie them to measurable results. For example, if increasing your brand authority is your main goal, then track metrics such as:

  • The number of unique visitors,
  • Time spent on page
  • Social signals (shares, likes and comments)

Determine what works

Just because your current website might have a few issues doesn’t mean that there aren’t elements that work really well. For example, maybe you’re redesigning your site because you want to update its look; however, your content is actually very effective at drawing in visitors and capturing leads. More specifically, you’ll want to make sure that high ranking pages are kept in place. When auditing your site, take note of what you think is successful as well as what needs work.

Analyze your competitors

In addition to auditing your own website, you should audit the sites of your main competitors. Take note of everything you like and don’t like about their site. Your aim shouldn’t be to just copy what they do but to get an idea of what they are doing so that you can create a superior website experience.

Identify your UVP

Your unique value proposition (UVP) indicates exactly what your business does and what makes your services or products unique. A UVP helps you stand out from the competition. You need to know what your UVP is because it will inform all of the content that you create for your website.

Keep buyer personas in mind

Your website should appeal to your target audience. Your visitors need to be able to connect to your brand’s messaging, after all. To make sure that this happens, all of your content should cater to your buyer persona. A buyer persona is a fictional representation of your ideal customer created using the available data you have from current and past customers, such as:

  • Demographics
  • Past purchases
  • Online behavior
  • Motivations
  • Needs
  • Wants
  • Concerns
  • Personal histories
  • Income

Here are the reasons why buyer personas are so important to a business

Map your buyer’s journey

Every visitor that comes to your website is going to be at one of three stages of the buyer’s journey. The first stage is the awareness stage, in which the buyer is seeking information that helps to define their problems or needs. The second stage is the consideration stage in which the buyer defines their problem and is searching for solutions. The final stage is the decision stage, in which the buyer chooses a solution. Your website needs to cater to visitors at every stage of the buyer’s journey in order to attract their attention, keep their attention and, finally, to convert them.

Set benchmark metrics

The goals you set should be general yet measurable. For example, the goal to increase brand authority is a long-term goal that doesn’t end. Because of this, you should set benchmarks so that you can judge your site’s performance. For example, social signals are a good metric for measuring brand authority. You could set benchmarks for how many shares you want to average per blog post by a certain date. If your metrics meet this benchmark by this date, then you know that your redesign is working and you can set the goal posts even further. If you don’t meet this benchmark, then you may need to make more adjustments.

Optimize your site for SEO

Implementing a strong search engine optimization (SEO) strategy is vital to consistently attract new visitors. Google takes into account a variety of factors, including keywords, link juice and social signals. You’ll need to do keyword research to identify unique keywords relevant to each page. These keywords should be used naturally in your titles, headers, body content, anchor text, alt image tags, HTML tags, meta tags and title tags. External links are earned by promoting and linking to your website’s content via social media, submitting your website information to local directories and by writing guest blogs. Social signals are earned by getting visitors to engage with your content, such as by liking, sharing or commenting on it.

Optimize your site for mobile use 

Many people use their smartphones and tablets to browse the Internet. This means that your website will need to load and display properly no matter how small the screen size is. The easiest way to ensure that your site is mobile-friendly is by using a responsive design. You can check to see if your current site is mobile-friendly by using Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test. Just type in the address for each webpage and it will determine how mobile-friendly it is.

Find opportunities for conversion

Calls-to-action should be used on every page to encourage visitors to convert. Without calls-to-action, visitors won’t know what you want them to do. Not only should you use relevant CTAs on every page, you need to offer something of value to visitors in return for opting-in. Depending on your what your business offers, this could include downloadable eBooks and white papers, email newsletter subscriptions, product discounts, free trials, free consultations and more. Unique landing pages should be crafted for every call-to-action that focus on the visitor’s needs, your UVP and how what you’re offering can benefit them.

Implement a content strategy

Whatever your goals are for your website, their success will depend on your content strategy. You need to provide high-quality content that is relevant to your buyer persona’s needs and concerns and that is informative, helpful and unique. The best way to do this is through a website blog. Additionally, you’ll need to regularly publish new content to keep your audience engaged and to make sure that they return to your site. While writing good content is important, you’ll need to market it as well. An important part of your content strategy is establishing exactly when you publish your content (it should always be on the same day at the same time) and where and how you promote your new content.

Continually improve

Don’t assume that once you’re done with your website redesign that you’re finished. A good website design is one that is always being improved. You should track your metrics and make adjustments to your design whenever needed. If you meet your goals, you should establish new ones. Move your goal posts further so that your website can continue to grow and improve. Additionally, you should always be uploading new content to keep your website fresh, thereby maintaining or improving your search engine rankings.

Want more resources on how to redesign your website? Click here!

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How Using Data Can Inspire Great Marketing Campaigns

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One of the biggest benefits of online marketing is that it allows you to collect valuable data about your customers as well as your target audience in general. It also gives you a chance to pinpoint what is and isn’t working as far as your marketing efforts are concerned. However, collecting all this data is useless if you don’t leverage it to your benefit. In fact, the information you have can help to inspire creative ideas to help craft great marketing campaigns.

How Data Can Spark Creativity

Data doesn’t just help you figure out what’s working and what isn’t, it can help drive creative decisions that allow you to create great marketing campaigns. A good example of this is Netflix. Everyone knows that Netflix has an absolute treasure trove of behavioural data from their subscribers. They leverage this data to inform the content that they produce.

For example, many critics were bewildered when they gave Adam Sandler a huge four-movie deal. Saying that his movies are panned across the board is putting it mildly, after all. However, according to their data, his older films were streamed an absurd amount. They knew that even if critics didn’t like his films, their subscribers certainly did — and that’s why they signed him to produce Netflix-exclusive films.

Netflix will often look at subscriber viewing habits and look at where they overlap to find a niche that they can fill with their original content. For example, the popularity of older series on Netflix has often resulted in revivals, such as Fuller House and Arrested Development.

Another good example is Equifax. Using their data, they realized that the average person’s credit score depended heavily on how old they were. They used this data to create a great marketing campaign that provided tailored benefits information to people at different stages of their lives.

How to Incorporate Email Marketing into B2B Campaigns

How To Use Your Data To Inform Your Creative Marketing Campaigns

How you use your data to influence your creativity and create great marketing campaigns depends heavily on the specifics of your business. However, the following are a few basic ways data can help you connect to your audience on a more emotional level when creating new marketing campaigns:

  • Learn what your audience connects with

    Look at how your audience engaged with previous campaigns. By looking at what worked and what didn’t work, you can figure out exactly how your audience was able to engage with you on an emotional level. For example, maybe certain types of content posted on social media were commented on and shared much more than other types of content. This will give you a better idea of what your audience is looking for, which can give you better direction on how to reach your audience on a more personal level during future campaigns.

  • Learn what your audience’s needs are

    You can figure out what your audience wants by analyzing certain sets of data. For example, you can compare two PPC ads promoting the same product in two different ways. You can then use the conversion rates of both ads. The ad that converts more leads is probably presenting a solution that fulfils a need that your audience has more effectively than the other. This information can be used to reach your audience more successfully with future ads.

  • Continually improve your campaign

    Once you launch a new campaign, don’t just stay the course if it’s obvious something isn’t working. You should continually track the results of your campaign based on your specific goals. The data you gather can help you figure out whether your creative decisions are having an impact on your audience or not. If they aren’t, you can make adjustments even as your campaign is ongoing.

When building new marketing campaigns, make sure that you make use of the data that you have. Your data can be the difference between creating great marketing campaigns and failed marketing campaigns.

Inbound marketing will help you grow your business by attracting website visitors, converting them into leads and closing leads into customers

What Are The Benefits Of Using HubSpot Marketing Automation Tools

The Use of Inbound Marketing in the Manufacturing Industry

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When it comes to B2C marketing, inbound marketing has long surpassed traditional marketing as the most popular way to advertise a business. However, many businesses, especially manufacturers, still assume that traditional marketing is the best way to go when it comes to B2B. This is no longer true. In fact, there are some real benefits when it comes to inbound marketing for manufacturers that you will want to take advantage of.

What is Inbound Marketing?

The big difference between inbound marketing and traditional marketing (which would include TV commercials, print ads, direct mail, etc.), is that inbound marketing is essentially done online and focuses on positioning your company to be found by other businesses. For example, instead of sending out a pamphlet highlighting your manufacturing capabilities, you would publish content relevant to the manufacturing industry (and whatever niche within that industry you occupy) online. This content lives online from that moment on, giving visitors the chance to find it at any point.

Inbound marketing involves using a variety of strategies (such as creating a user-friendly website, producing high-quality content, using SEO, engaging on social media) that makes it easy for your target audience to find you online and to do a majority of the research about your company and services on their own. This is different than traditional marketing, which involves finding your audience and directly advertising to them.

How Can You Keep Up With the Future of Inbound Marketing?

The Benefits of Inbound Marketing for Manufacturers

The following are four reasons why you should strongly consider implementing an inbound marketing strategy for your manufacturing business:

1) Businesses are doing research online first

Around 70 percent of buyers will do research about manufacturers online before they make the decision to reach out to a potential partner. For example, maybe a buyer is looking for a PCB (printed circuit board) assembly manufacturer for their electronic products. They will probably begin researching PCB assemblies by looking for general information online. This will lead to them to a variety of blogs with informative content that they can read at their own time. Content that strikes them as particularly helpful will stand out, and they will do more research into the manufacturer that published that content. If you do not have an online presence, then you’re missing out on buyers like these. A good inbound marketing strategy will help position yourself online to be found by buyers who are doing research.

2) Inbound marketing provides long-term results

As you build your online presence through inbound marketing techniques, you’ll have the opportunity to nurture many potential leads over the long term. For example, let’s say you’re a PCB manufacturer. You have a blog on which you regularly produce PCB-related content (such as, for instance, the benefits of flexible circuits). There may be leads out there who read your content regularly and have done so for years. They may build their own PCBs in-house and a change in strategy has resulted in them deciding to outsource its build. At that point, they’ll be familiar with your site and will be more likely to reach out to you. Traditional advertising doesn’t have such a long-term impact. 

3) What worked once won’t always work

You may have had a lot of success with traditional marketing methods–and you may continue having success with those efforts. However, if you expect to grow your business, then you’ll want to expand your customer base, which means that you shouldn’t limit your advertising efforts. Otherwise, the day might come where your traditional marketing efforts aren’t as effective as they once were, and you’ll be left scrambling to implement an inbound strategy.

4) Find out what your audience needs

Unlike traditional advertising, inbound marketing allows you to engage directly with your target audience, making it easier to develop relationships, receive feedback, and discover the needs of your leads.

As you can see, there are many benefits to inbound marketing for manufacturers. By implementing an inbound marketing strategy in your advertising efforts, you can position your company for marketing success well into the future.

Inbound marketing will help you grow your business by attracting website visitors, converting them into leads and closing leads into customers
What Are The Benefits Of Using HubSpot Marketing Automation Tools

The Use of Inbound Marketing in the Manufacturing Industry

/in , , /by

When it comes to B2C marketing, inbound marketing has long surpassed traditional marketing as the most popular way to advertise a business. However, many businesses, especially manufacturers, still assume that traditional marketing is the best way to go when it comes to B2B. This is no longer true. In fact, there are some real benefits when it comes to inbound marketing for manufacturers that you will want to take advantage of.

What is Inbound Marketing?

The big difference between inbound marketing and traditional marketing (which would include TV commercials, print ads, direct mail, etc.), is that inbound marketing is essentially done online and focuses on positioning your company to be found by other businesses. For example, instead of sending out a pamphlet highlighting your manufacturing capabilities, you would publish content relevant to the manufacturing industry (and whatever niche within that industry you occupy) online. This content lives online from that moment on, giving visitors the chance to find it at any point.

Inbound marketing involves using a variety of strategies (such as creating a user-friendly website, producing high-quality content, using SEO, engaging on social media) that makes it easy for your target audience to find you online and to do a majority of the research about your company and services on their own. This is different than traditional marketing, which involves finding your audience and directly advertising to them.

How Can You Keep Up With the Future of Inbound Marketing?

The Benefits of Inbound Marketing for Manufacturers

The following are four reasons why you should strongly consider implementing an inbound marketing strategy for your manufacturing business:

1) Businesses are doing research online first

Around 70 percent of buyers will do research about manufacturers online before they make the decision to reach out to a potential partner. For example, maybe a buyer is looking for a PCB (printed circuit board) assembly manufacturer for their electronic products. They will probably begin researching PCB assemblies by looking for general information online. This will lead to them to a variety of blogs with informative content that they can read at their own time. Content that strikes them as particularly helpful will stand out, and they will do more research into the manufacturer that published that content. If you do not have an online presence, then you’re missing out on buyers like these. A good inbound marketing strategy will help position yourself online to be found by buyers who are doing research.

2) Inbound marketing provides long-term results

As you build your online presence through inbound marketing techniques, you’ll have the opportunity to nurture many potential leads over the long term. For example, let’s say you’re a PCB manufacturer. You have a blog on which you regularly produce PCB-related content (such as, for instance, the benefits of flexible circuits). There may be leads out there who read your content regularly and have done so for years. They may build their own PCBs in-house and a change in strategy has resulted in them deciding to outsource its build. At that point, they’ll be familiar with your site and will be more likely to reach out to you. Traditional advertising doesn’t have such a long-term impact. 

3) What worked once won’t always work

You may have had a lot of success with traditional marketing methods–and you may continue having success with those efforts. However, if you expect to grow your business, then you’ll want to expand your customer base, which means that you shouldn’t limit your advertising efforts. Otherwise, the day might come where your traditional marketing efforts aren’t as effective as they once were, and you’ll be left scrambling to implement an inbound strategy.

4) Find out what your audience needs

Unlike traditional advertising, inbound marketing allows you to engage directly with your target audience, making it easier to develop relationships, receive feedback, and discover the needs of your leads.

As you can see, there are many benefits to inbound marketing for manufacturers. By implementing an inbound marketing strategy in your advertising efforts, you can position your company for marketing success well into the future.

Inbound marketing will help you grow your business by attracting website visitors, converting them into leads and closing leads into customers
Website Redesign

Top 5 Critical Website Redesign Analytics Tools

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Your website is the most important marketing tool you have—so it’s no surprise that its design is essential to your success. However, both technology and user behavior are constantly evolving. As such, you need to update your website to stay ahead of the curve. If your website is more than a few years old, it may be time for a website redesign.

The Benefits of Redesigning Your Website

Unless your website is completely broken, you may wonder if it’s worth it to invest money and resources into a website redesign. This is especially true if it seems like your website is performing just fine. The following are a few major reasons why you need to redesign your website:

1. Improve The User Experience

If your website is outdated or difficult to use (due to poor technical SEO or poor design), it can cause a poor user experience. As a result, visitors may not stay on your site for very long. A redesign can make your site more user-friendly and easy to navigate. As a result, it will keep visitors on your site longer and encourage them to come back.

2. Increase Web Traffic

If your website is outdated or not optimized for search engines (such as through SEO or mobile optimization), you won’t get as much traffic as you could. A redesign can help improve your site’s ranking and make it more visible to potential visitors. The more visitors you get, the better a chance you have of generating more leads.

3. Enhance Branding

If your current website does not reflect your brand well, a redesign can help to better align your website with your brand. This is especially important if your business recently underwent rebranding. It’s critical that your website reflects your branding in terms of both the look (such as the logos, colors, and fonts) and the messaging. If it doesn’t, it can confuse visitors, thereby hurting your brand identity and your ability to convert leads.

Website Redesign Analytic Tools You Should Use

If it’s been a while since you built or redesigned your website, then you should do a comprehensive audit to determine if your site need work. The following are five analytic tools that can help guide your website redesign:

1. Google Analytics

Google Analytics is a free tool that provides a wealth of data about your website visitors. This data includes how visitors found your site, what they did, and whether or not they converted. This data can help you understand what you need to improve. For example, you can use Google Analytics to see which pages on your site are the most popular and which ones have the highest bounce rate.

2. Crazy Egg

Crazy Egg is a heat mapping tool. It lets you see how users interact with your website. This includes where they click, how far they scroll, and where they abandon your site. This data can help you understand what users are looking for on your site and where they are getting stuck. It can also help you to determine what parts of your website you need to redesign to improve the user experience.

 

Website Redesign Process

Read About “The Website Redesign Process- Why Content Comes First?”

3. Screaming Frog

Screaming Frog is a tool that crawls websites and shows you how search engines see your website. It can help you identify technical SEO issues, such as broken links and duplicate content. It can also help you evaluate your website’s structure and identify issues that are causing problems with search engine crawlers.

4. Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test

Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test is a tool that allows you to see how well your website is optimized for mobile devices. If your website isn’t mobile-friendly, then you’re losing potential visitors because your site isn’t loading properly on smaller screens. This data can be extremely helpful in understanding what needs to be fixed to make your site more mobile-friendly.

5. Semrush

Semrush is a tool that allows you to see how well your website is performing in search engines. This includes understanding your organic traffic, the keywords you’re ranking for, and your backlink profile. This data can be extremely helpful for identifying what you need to do to improve your visibility in search engines. You can also use Semrush to see which keywords you’re not ranking for that you should be, and which competitors are outranking you.

These are just a few of the many different analytic tools that you can use to assess your website’s performance. By taking the time to understand what’s working and what isn’t, you can improve your website’s design, functionality, and performance.

25 Website Must Haves
Inbound marketing

How can you keep up with the future of inbound marketing?

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Running a business is difficult, no matter how big or small it is. To successfully maintain and grow a business, you need to retain existing customers as well as reach new ones. As such, a good marketing strategy is essential to the success of any business. Marketing helps you communicate with your target audience, build relationships, and generate leads. But how you market your business will make all the difference in the world. learning the future of inbound marketing is important for a good marketing strategy.

In this day and age, almost every business has an inbound marketing strategy. Inbound marketing is extremely cost-effective, making it an ideal strategy for startups and smaller businesses. However, inbound marketing is constantly evolving. What worked today may not work tomorrow.

As such, to ensure that your inbound marketing strategy remains effective, it’s wise to stay on top of the latest trends. This way, you can adjust your marketing efforts as needed.

What is Inbound Marketing?

When it comes to marketing, there are two primary methodologies: outbound marketing and inbound marketing. Outbound marketing is the more traditional approach that involves actively reaching out to customers. Common outbound strategies include TV and radio advertising, cold calling, and email blasts.

In contrast, inbound marketing is a methodology that focuses on attracting visitors or customers to your company through organic channels. Basically, instead of finding new customers, you’re putting your business in a position to be found by them instead.

The Future of Inbound Marketing

The landscape of inbound marketing is always changing. As new platforms and technologies emerge, new ways of reaching and engaging with customers have to be developed. With that in mind, the following are some of the current inbound marketing trends you should know about:

Influencer marketing

Influencer marketing involves building relationships with people who have a large following on social media. These influencers can help you reach a much bigger audience. Although new social media platforms are constantly popping up, there will always be influencers on every channel.

To be successful with influencer marketing, you need to choose the right influencers to work with. Look for influencers who have a genuine interest in your brand and who have an engaged following. If your business focuses on a niche industry, consider building relationships with micro-influencers. Micro-influencers are individuals with smaller followings who typically have more engaged audiences.

Customer data

Data is essential in the world of marketing. The more data you have, the better insights you can gain into your target audience. This, in turn, allows you to create more targeted and effective marketing campaigns.

To collect data, you need to have some sort of tracking system in place. This could be something as simple as using Google Analytics to track website visitors. Or it could be using a CRM system to track leads.

Analyze your data regularly and look for patterns and trends that can help you better understand your customers. Additionally, the insights you gain from your data can help you make more informed marketing decisions.

inbound marketing solutions

Check out: Why Inbound Marketing Solutions Are Integral To Your Success

A more personalized buyer journey

Customers expect a personalized experience from businesses. As such, you need to focus on creating a smooth buyer journey. It should be a seamless experience from the moment they learn about your company to the moment they make a purchase.

One way to improve the customer experience is to create more targeted content. Segment your audience and create content that appeals to their specific needs. Doing so can make the buyer journey more relevant and enjoyable for them.

Another way to improve the customer experience is to make sure your website is easy to use and navigate. Build a well-designed website that is mobile-friendly and user-friendly. You should also consider implementing chatbots or live chat features so customers can easily get in touch with you.

Content clusters

Content is the backbone of any successful inbound marketing strategy. However, simply producing great content is not enough. You also need to make sure that your content is properly structured and organized by using content clusters.

A content cluster is a group of related pieces of content focused around a specific topic. Content clusters are designed to help improve your website’s search engine optimization (SEO). They also make it easier for your audience to find the information they’re looking for.

To create a content cluster, start by identifying a topic that you want to write about. Then, create your pillar content (such as an article or blog post) that covers this topic in depth. Once you have your pillar content, develop supporting content that all relate back to the pillar content.

Content clusters will improve your SEO and make it easier for your audience to read or view your content. Not to mention, it will make it easier for your audience to understand your message.

Interactive content

This is a type of content that requires the audience to participate in some way. Interactive content can include anything from quizzes and polls to games and augmented reality (AR) experiences.

There are two main benefits to creating interactive content. First, it helps keep your audience engaged and interested in your content. Second, it allows you to collect data about your audience’s preferences and interests. This data can be extremely valuable in helping you better understand your audience. Not to mention that this data can be used to create even more targeted content.

Stay Informed About The Future of Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing is a constantly changing field. With that in mind, these are some of the trends that are shaping the future of inbound marketing. By keeping up with the latest trends, you can stay one step ahead of the competition.

Inbound marketing will help you grow your business by attracting website visitors, converting them into leads and closing leads into customers