user generated content

Sourcing User Generated Content

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One source of content generation you may not have tapped into yet is user-generated content. Content marketing is a critical component of any successful marketing strategy. However, it can take a lot of resources to produce your own content on a regular basis. Even if you’ve managed to regularly generate high-quality content, you should look for other ways to create new content for variety’s sake, such as high quality user generated content.

What Is User-Generated Content?

User-generated content refers to content created by consumers and not brands. Such content includes videos, pictures, reviews, articles, and more. For instance, if a consumer takes a picture of themselves using your product and posts it on Instagram, that’s user-generated content. The following are just a few of the benefits of user-generated content:

  • Free publicity

Your audience is essentially promoting your brand on your behalf. As a result, user-generated content can help increase brand awareness.

  • Free content

Creating your own content requires a lot of resources. User-generated content requires none — your audience is creating the content for you. While you don’t own it, you can share it and reap the benefits of it.

  • Positive word of mouth

Customers trust other customers more than they trust brands. Positive user-generated content can, therefore, help to boost your brand reputation by creating trust.

How To Source Usable Generated-Content

Considering how beneficial this free content can be, you’ll want to do everything you can to encourage it. However, the biggest challenge lies in the lack of control you have over the content. You can’t control the message, format, or quality, after all. But there are a few ways that you can guide your audience to create the content that will benefit you most. The following are a few tips on how to source high-quality user-generated content:

  • Encourage 

Don’t just wait for your audience to create content relevant to your brand. You need to encourage it. For instance, hold a contest on social media in which users vote on the best submission. You can then give the winner a prize. There are many ways that you can encourage content generation.

Utilize Marketing Audiences on Pinterest Today

  • Provide clear guidelines

If you’re looking for a specific type of content, then you need to provide guidelines. For example, if you want user reviews, consider providing a basic review format. Such a format could list three broad questions that users can answer in order to generate a review.

  • Provide content creation tips

Your audience does not consist of professional content creators. As such, provide tips that they can use to create higher quality content. For instance, if you’re holding a video creation contest on YouTube or on Instagram, provide your users with a list of basic filming tips. Such tips can help cut down on the amount of poor quality content that you might receive.

  • Offer an example

If you’re looking for a specific type of content, then provide an example. When users see what you’re looking for, it will help them create the kind of content you want. For instance, if you’re hosting a picture taking contest, upload a few pictures of your own that would be considered exceptional examples. By providing an example, you also make sure that users understand your instructions more clearly.

  • Identify the channel

Make sure that your audience knows where to send it. The last thing you want is users posting their content on different platforms or sending it to you via different channels. If you’re promoting a contest, specify what platform they should post to or what hashtag they should use. Provide detailed instructions on how to submit content. By making it clear what channel you’re using, it will be easier for you to track and organize user-generated content.

  • Open a line of communication

Provide a channel through which your audience can contact you. This channel should be specifically for users who are creating content. You can do this by providing a specific support email address, a phone number, or a page they can DM on social media.

  • Monitor performance

Track how the content users create for your brand is performing. By doing so, you can identify what types are the most effective. You can then adjust your guidelines and instructions to encourage the creation of that type of content.

Enhance your Strategy Today

User-generated content can go a long way towards boosting brand trust. Not to mention that it’s a great way to expand your content marketing strategy. As such, make sure that you encourage the creation of high-quality user content. You can do this by providing your audience with general guidance and encouragement to drive effective user-generated content creation.

25 Website Must Haves

The Value of Marketing Automation in 2020

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As your organization expands, so will your marketing needs. Trying to keep up with all of your marketing tasks can be challenging. Common tasks include emailing leads, posting content on a regular schedule, responding to questions, and more. Many of these tasks are time-consuming, which can make getting everything done in an efficient manner can be tricky. Because of this very reason, you should consider the value of marketing automation.

The Benefits of Using Marketing Automation

Marketing automation refers to a software solution that automatically completes certain tasks based on your instructions. One thing that’s important to understand is that the value of marketing automation goes beyond saving time. As such, the following are a few examples of why you should consider implementing marketing automation tools:

  • Improve productivity

The amount of time that automation can save will help increase productivity. For example, you can use automation tools to trigger emails based on a lead’s actions. Such actions can include downloading something from your site or filling out a form. Since your marketing team doesn’t have to do these tasks, they can use their time to address more important tasks.

  • Reduce human errors

Requiring individuals to perform repetitive tasks over and over again will increase the likelihood that they will make an error. Such errors are natural when the task is mundane and time-consuming.  Automating such tasks can help remove human error from the equation.

  • Improve scalability

If you’re using automation, then your ability to handle a larger workload won’t be affected. Without automation, your team would have trouble handling a bigger workload (which could require you to hire more personnel).

  • Nurture leads more successfully

Using automation, you can make sure that your customer profiles are kept up-to-date. Automation tools can also help you score leads, thereby improving your sales enablement. Finally, automation can help you personalize engagement more, resulting in more effective lead nurturing.

  • Measure success more effectively

Measuring success is important to ensuring that your marketing efforts result in a high ROI. Automation allows you to monitor important KPIs in real-time. As a result, you can make adjustments to your strategy whenever you need to.

Marketing Automation and Trigger Words

Marketing Automation Tools You Should Use

There are many types of marketing automation solutions that are available.  The best way to choose an automation tool is to identify what your automation needs are. With that in mind, the following are some of the most popular automation tools currently on the market:

  • HubSpot

HubSpot is a CRM platform that you can leverage for its content marketing automation tools. For example, HubSpot has a workflow tool that lets you create highly customizable conditional workflows. Using HubSpot, you can set up automated email drip campaigns, segment your contact lists, score leads, and more.

  • Marketo

Marketo uses a Lifecycle Modeler tool that lets you automatically source and organize your leads. If you integrate Marketo with your existing CRM, it will use all of your contact data to automatically move your leads through the sales funnel. Additional features include precision targeting with smart campaigns, streamlined lead nurturing, and email marketing automation capabilities.

  • Customer.io

Customer.io is an email automation solution that you can use to create targeted messages based on how your customers interact with your business. The tool also lets you set up trigger actions using a set of predefined rules. Additional features include conversion tracking, customer profiles, in-context conversations, and A/B testing.

  • Userfox

Owned by AdRoll, Userfox is a SaaS automation solution focusing on email automation. The tool lets users set up triggers based on certain events to automatically send emails to their leads. It’s worth noting that the tool is primarily for tech companies.

  • Pardot

Pardot is a B2B marketing automation solution that belongs to the Salesforce ecosystem. Some of its many automation features include progressive profiling, email marketing, lead assignment, lead scoring, and more.

  • Ontraport

Ontraport is an all-in-one marketing and sales automation platform. The solution provides in-depth insight through its Campaign Performance Mode. Additional automation features include email automation, list segmentation, SMS messaging automation, appointment scheduling, trigger campaigns, and more.

  • InfusionSoft

InfusionSoft is a small business automation tool offered by Keap. It allows you to automatically capture and tag new leads, score leads, assign tasks, invoice clients, set up recurring payments, and schedule appointments.

Implement Marketing Automation Tools to Improve Your Marketing Success

Marketing automation tools not only help to improve the productivity of your marketing efforts, but they can also significantly improve their effectiveness. The value of marketing automation simply cannot be overstated. Because of this, you should strongly consider adopting one or more automation tools if you haven’t done so already.

Search Engine Optimization Techniques

Professional Services Marketing Automation 2

Marketing Automation Benefits During Covid-19

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COVID-19 has been a difficult time for everyone, including small to mid-sized businesses. However, just because your business may have slowed down doesn’t mean that you should stop marketing. In fact, you could argue that now is the best time to reach out to clients and prospects alike. Although you may not be closing deals, you can still nurture leads and build your brand authority. Of course, you will have to adapt your existing strategy to the current situation. One of the most effective ways to do this is to take advantage of marketing automation tools, such as HubSpot.

Ways Marketing Automation Can Benefit Your Business

Marketing automation is a process of using various tools to automate certain tasks. These tasks are repetitive and not difficult to perform. There are many different types of automation tools available that allow you to automate various tasks. You can use automation for email marketing, analytics, chatbots, blog posting, and social media posting. The following are a few of the main reasons you should lean more heavily on marketing automation during COVID-19:

  • Maximize your budget

Because business might be a little slower than usual, maximizing your marketing budget is critical. Marketing automation can help you do just that. By automating your budget, you can allocate money towards marketing efforts that are performing well. As a result, you won’t be wasting money on marketing efforts that are performing poorly. Additionally, you’ll avoid missing out on areas of your campaign that are thriving.

  • Maintain engagement

Many leads are going to have more time on their hands than normal. This means that they may try to engage with your brand at a rate you’re not used to. To ensure a quick response to your leads, you can implement chatbots. Chatbots are a form of marketing automation that allows you to respond to basic questions your leads may have. Without chatbots, you may not have the ability to engage with all of your leads in a timely manner.

  • Save time

Automation allows you to automate repetitive tasks that take a lot of time to complete manually. For example, publishing content at specific times of the day during the week. You can use automation to schedule your content to be published automatically weeks ahead of time. Another example is email automation, which lets you send emails automatically based on trigger actions. The time your team saves on these tasks can be focused on more important marketing efforts.

Tips For Leveraging Marketing Automation Successfully

As you now realize, there are major benefits to using marketing automation, especially during COVID-19. However, the success of your marketing automation efforts depends on how you use the tools at your disposal. The following are a few tips to keep in mind that will help you use marketing automation effectively:

  • Don’t overuse email automation

There’s a temptation to use automation to ramp up your email messaging. While you do want to engage leads during the pandemic, you have to remember that everyone is doing the same thing. Don’t try to take advantage of the pandemic as a marketing trend. If you’re constantly sending emails to your audience, they may grow tired of you. Perform an audit to determine how often your audience actually wants to hear from you. And segment your email list so that when you do send automated emails, they’ll be relevant.

Email Metrics You Should Keep in Mind & What They Mean

  • Use automation to encourage online shopping

In-store visits are down for obvious reasons. Many stores aren’t allowed to be open. Not to mention that customers aren’t visiting stores nearly as often even if they are open. Because of this, consider creating automated campaigns that encourage offline shoppers to shop online. For example, you can target offline customers with a special online shopping reward program.

  • Take advantage of real-time data

Because of how new the pandemic environment is, new search trends are bound to emerge every day. Use data analysis and reporting to keep track of what customers are searching for and what pages they’re visiting. Use your data to adjust your marketing efforts whenever appropriate to make the most of your budget.

Implement Marketing Automation Solutions Today

COVID-19 has everyone on edge. The pandemic is causing significant business disruptions as well. While it may not be business as normal, you can still have an impact if you can adjust your marketing efforts accordingly. As a result of social distancing and state-wide lockdown, now is the time to engage with leads and to nurture them. You’ll find that your ability to do so will dramatically improve through the use of marketing automation. By successfully leveraging marketing automation tools like HubSpot, you can save time, maximize your marketing budget, and continue to build your brand reputation.

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inbound marketing strategy

Developing Inbound Marketing Strategies For Your Business

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Everyone is familiar with traditional marketing. Traditional marketing includes TV commercials, radio ads, magazine ads, billboards, and more. While such marketing can still be very useful, it’s not always a cost-effective option for smaller businesses. It’s one of the reasons why most businesses have set up websites and social media pages (such as on Facebook). What you may not realize is that marketing your company online in such a way is known as “inbound marketing.” You should also know that a lot more goes into inbound marketing strategies than just setting up a website.

What Is Inbound Marketing?

People often think of inbound marketing as being the same as online marketing. However, while online marketing is often a form of inbound, they are not the same. Inbound marketing refers to any marketing strategy with a focus on attracting an audience. Most traditional marketing strategies, such as TV commercials, directly engage an audience. This type of marketing is known as “outbound marketing.”

How Is Inbound Different Than Outbound Marketing

Instead of directly engaging an audience, inbound marketing involves letting your audience come to you. To achieve this, you need to put yourself in a position to be found. For example, when someone does a Google search and finds your website on Google’s SERP (search engine results page) and they visit your site as a result. This is a form of inbound marketing.

The Benefits Of Inbound Marketing Strategies

First of all, inbound marketing is the most affordable option for companies with a smaller budget. What’s particularly beneficial about inbound marketing is that you can scale your efforts as you grow. It’s also a more effective way to build your brand authority, thereby helping to increase your reputation while building a larger audience.

Inbound Marketing Is A Long-Term Strategy

In addition to being cost-effective and easier to scale, inbound marketing is also a long-term strategy. You’ll rarely see significant results from your inbound marketing efforts the moment you implement them. But if you keep at it, you’re much more likely to achieve long-term success. This differs from outbound marketing, which tends to be more short-term in its results.

5 Essential Inbound Marketing Tips

Hopefully, your business has a website or a social media page. Most small businesses, including mom and pop shops, at least have a Facebook page. This is a good start; however, you’ll want to expand your inbound marketing efforts to increase your chances of success. The following are five essential inbound marketing strategies that you should adopt:

1. Create Attention-Grabbing Content

To attract people to your business, you need to have something of value to offer.  Because of this, you need to create content. Content is the reason people use the Internet, whether they are doing research, looking for help, or seeking entertainment. By creating website content, you put yourself in a position to be found. The content you create can continue to attract new leads over the long run. However, not just any content will do. You need to develop content that’s relevant to your business and that provides value to your target audience.

2. Promote Content On Social Media

Creating high-quality content is the first step. However, you need to promote it to attract as many potential customers as possible. Social channels are arguably the best way to promote new content since billions of people use social media. By posting content on social media, you will generate awareness of that content to your followers. Additionally, you will have a chance of attracting more leads if your followers share your content.

3. Set Up A Blog

The blog is one of the most effective ways to generate and organize content. By setting up a blog, you create a dedicated section on your site where you can publish new content. Your audience will know that they can continue to visit your blog to view new content in the future. As such, a blog also makes it easier to nurture your leads and maintain your audience.

4. Monitor Social Media And Website Analytics

You’re going to have a difficult time determining the success of your inbound marketing efforts if you can’t judge their performance. Fortunately, there are tons of website and social media analytics tools that you can use. By tracking various KPIs, you can identify what inbound efforts are performing well and which ones are doing poorly. This data can help guide your future marketing efforts.

 Six Steps to Better Use of Marketing Analytics & Dashboard 

5. Use SEO For Your Headlines

Search engine optimization makes it easier for Google to identify what your content is about and how engaging it is. It factors these things into ranking content. The better your content ranks, the more organic traffic you’re likely to receive through Google’s search engine. As such, make sure that you optimize your content’s headlines using strong, relevant keywords.

Develop an Inbound Marketing Strategy Today

As beneficial and cost-effective as inbound marketing can be, it’s important to understand that it’s not superior to outbound marketing. Inbound marketing is just a different type of marketing strategy than outbound. The best approach is to use both inbound and outbound marketing strategies that work with each other. Either way, you’ll want to make sure that you use the right inbound marketing strategies to get the most out of your inbound marketing efforts.

 

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

30 Ways to Boost Instagram Engagement & Following

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Looking for ways to boost your social media brand presence? Knowing how to increase brand engagement on Instagram, the latest and hippest social media platform app, is a great start. People are online all day due to working from home. Virtual shopping has risen due to restrictions and pandemic fears. As we have geared toward a more online world, your brand’s presence on the web is more important now than ever.

Why Instagram?

According to Forbes, 80% of Instagram users follow at least one business or brand, and 200 million users on Instagram visit business profiles daily. 70% of users turn to Instagram to look up a brand, and 60% learn about new products using Instagram. Now is the time to catch up with the competition that is already using these trends to their advantage.

Here is a compilation of our 30 best marketing tips for businesses to grow Instagram engagement and following in 2020:

Instagram Profile and Posting Habits

  1. Get to know the Instagram app and master how to use its basic features such as uploading posts and stories.
  2. Write a compelling Instagram bio and integrate it into your brand personality.
  3. Keep posts visually consistent to meet your brand’s style guide and tone.
  4. Incorporate categorized pinned stories on your Instagram page so it is easily navigable and can be used as a resource for sharing your brand identity to consumers.
  5. Optimize captions using brand hashtags and relevant hashtags with high popularity. (Determine if a hashtag is trending by typing the hashtag in the instagram search bar to see how many posts come up with the hashtag.)
  6. Use tools such as Hashtagsforlikes to optimize hashtags to use for your business sector.
  7. Create and promote a specific branded hashtag for a campaign. Encourage others to share the hashtag with it theming around a relevant, trending topic that consumers are passionate about.
  8. Use local hashtags and geotags on posts in order to attract local users on Instagram in a similar way SEO works for the web.
  9. Post consistently with both posts and stories, including videos, polls, and other interactive elements to keep followers engaged and entertained with your content. 
  10. Start conversations using Instagram stories stickers and polls.
  11. Schedule Instagram stories to generate more views.
  12. Keep in mind that 40% of Instagram videos do not have sound on, so ensure you caption relevant verbal content.
  13. Convert instagram followers into email subscribers by making your Instagram a business account and promoting your email subscriptions in your Instagram posts and stories.
  14. Monitor your tagged photos to ensure a good reputation, and un-tag your account on posts that are irrelevant or spam, so they do not appear on your profile.
  15. Add a link to instagram stories in order to generate website traffic.
  16. Use humor through gif’s and memes to execute your brand message through a creative angle.

Increasing your Instagram following

  1. Optimize SEO on instagram by paying vital attention to your Instagram handle and name. It is very important that your handle (@…) reflects your business industry. Try to make it short, sweet, and with relevant words. The account name should reflect the account handle and industry because it is what Instagram checks its searches against when users type a word or emoji in the search bar.
  2. Partner with micro influencers.
  3. Run a contest, giveaway, or raffle entry through your account page.
  4. Invest in Instagram ads, which targets customers with personalization and buyer persona techniques.
  5. Create “savable” content, or posts that are aesthetically pleasing, informationally useful or relevant. This will entice followers to save the content to their library and increases the chances of further brand awareness. Simultaneously, creating desirable content provides people a reason to continue following your page and share your content.
  6. Participate in popular conversations on accounts with high following and public relevance in order to get your instagram handle out there and quickly generate new followers.
  7. Encourage followers to re-share your Instagram stories through incentives of discount promotion codes and/or contests.
  8. Open up about your business with a weekly featured vlog of the day in the life of an employee, an interesting biographical picture and captioned story of the founders, or inspirational quote from the CEO.
  9. Follow relevant accounts and users following competition in your industry to gain followers back.
  10. Promote your Instagram on other social media accounts. Feature your Instagram account in your Twitter and Facebook bios, and make a post promoting your Instagram page with a link.
  11. If your Facebook has many likes or followers already, consider linking your Facebook and Instagram together to boost your Instagram following.

6 Social Media Trends to Follow in 2020

Keeping Track of your Instagram Performance

  1. Ensure your account is in business mode to automatically receive valuable insights and analytics on how your posts are doing.
  2. Regularly test and analyze new content to post to your Instagram.
  3. Use a free follower tracking app to regularly unfollow accounts that do not follow yours back in order to maintain a good follower/following ratio while continuously following new accounts.

We hope these 30 tips with various resources serve you well on your journey to becoming an Instagram lead-generation powerhouse. Happy “gram-ing”!

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buyer persona

Lessons Learned: Buyer Persona Gone Wrong

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Before a company can establish a solid marketing plan, it must be aware of the specific target markets or customer profiles it has the best chance to attract to its product or service. Creating a buyer persona is essential to effective attraction marketing.

Market Segmentation

In order to perfect your approach in buyer persona launch, these are some common mistakes to avoid:

  1. Don’t Forget to Focus on the Buyer Decision

The most common mistake marketers make is solely defining a buyer persona by the buyer profile, rather than putting detailed consideration in what is most useful: the buyer decision.

How to fix this:

Aside from using previous data, we recommend using the research questions provided by 5 Rings of Buying Insight™, which incorporates every aspect you need to know about your buyer persona’s decision making process:

  1. Priority initiatives – What causes certain buyers to invest in solutions like yours? What is different about buyers who are satisfied with the status quo?
  2. Success factors – What operational or personal results do your buyers expect to achieve by purchasing this solution?
  3. Perceived barriers – What concerns cause your buyers to believe that your solution or company is not their best option?
  4. Buyer’s journey – Who and what impacts your buyers as they evaluate their options and make a selection?
  5. Decision criteria – Which aspects of competing products, services, solutions, or companies do your buyers perceive as most critical? What do your buyers expect for each?

Ultimate Guide to the Buyer’s Journey- Find out What Each Stage of the Buyer’s Journey Entails

  1. Keep Your Research Questions Simple and Sweet

Marketers often stray from insightful target market findings if they use too much detail in their research questions. When conducting research about your buyer persona through surveys or focus groups, avoid questions that are overly personal or technical. This may deviate your campaign away from any productive findings that would help you truly get to know your ideal customer niche.

How to fix this:

When developing questions, it is best to start by establishing what the key problems or questions are that you ultimately want answers for.  You may start with a larger, broader list of questions… however, do not make the mistake of forgetting to shave it down. In the end, all questions should lead to answers that are simple, sweet, and directly related to the problem trying to be solved at hand.

 

  1. Assuming About the Buyer Persona Leads Campaigns Astray

It is important to remember that the most helpful information comes directly from the customers. When researching a potential buyer persona, it is crucial to avoid filling in the blanks, skipping the interview, or assuming anything about the client. A campaign could go in the complete wrong direction if this occurs.

How to fix this:

Rather than making an incorrect assumption based on survey results, in-depth conversations with people can provide the answers you need to bring your brand to the next level. Additionally, a small sample size may lead to incorrect assumptions. Since quality > quantity, and many agencies fixate too much into demographic or other obvious information rather than actually helpful insights, in-depth interviews are again a solution to avoiding this mistake. In order to avoid an over-reliance on anecdotes, always ensure they are backed up by data. You know what they say about assuming… it definitely does not make an accurate buyer persona!

 

  1. Less is More: Master One Buyer Persona First!

It is important to focus on mastering one target market rather than taking on too many to handle. Trying to tackle too many buyer personas at once can overwhelm. This results in a lower quality of target profile insights and vague understanding of individual buyer personas.  Before deciding to take on another buyer persona, it is important to know that this new initiative will bring about sufficient revenue and that your company has the resources necessary to execute.

How to fix this:  

Instead of pondering how many buyer personas to generate, it is important to first focus on establishing how many ways your company needs to market its product or service as the solution for a given buyer persona. Once these are established, it is much easier to gauge if another buyer persona should emerge.

 

  1. One Stock Photo Cannot Fit All

Though stock photos incorporate a creative, personable, and emotion-driven touch to a targeted campaign. However, marketers often forget that one stock photo cannot fit all customers within a buyer persona. Do not make the common mistake of overthinking a stock photo to the point it (mis)leads your campaign into the (wrong) direction.

How to fix this:

In order to solidify your campaign, be sure to start the buyer persona creation process with fleshed out, concrete ideas about who exactly your target market is. Only then should you allow yourself to do the fun part of depicting this persona; stock photos should embellish your envisioned buyer persona- not create it.

More on Buyer Personas:

buyer persona guide for business

 

social media trends 1

TikTok Advertising Strategies Are Becoming More Common

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Most businesses these days are using at least one or two social media channels to market their brand. However, new social channels emerge every year, many of which are worth your attention. Take TikTok for example. Although initially dismissed by most as another social media platform for teens, more businesses are taking notice. This is because they are beginning to realize that TikTok is attracting more adult users every day. As such, TikTok advertising is well worth considering.

What is TikTok?

TikTok started off as a platform on which users could upload videos of themselves lip-synching to music videos. These videos were no more than 15 seconds long. In a way, they were like a more niche-based version of the now-defunct Vine social platform. As such, it was no surprise that the platform attracted a younger audience. However, older users began taking advantage of TikTok’s audience to showcase themselves in different ways. For example, comedians would upload short videos of stand-up routines. Another example is of skateboarders, who would upload tricks that they landed. Soon, TikTok allowed its users to upload videos up to 60 seconds long.

Who Uses TikTok?

TikTok still has a userbase that leans on the younger side with more than 66 percent of its users under the age of 30. However, if you have a younger target audience, then TikTok is very much worth your time. This is especially true when you consider the fact that more parents are using TikTok on a daily basis (it’s estimated that 41 percent of dads have used TikTok). Not to mention that TikTok currently has over six million users in the U.S. alone.

Video Marketing Ideas: Using Storytelling in Social Media

How Can You Leverage TikTok To Market Your Brand?

If your buyer personas match the target audience of TikTok, then you may be curious as to how you can use the platform to your advantage. The following are just a few effective tactics when it comes to TikTok advertising:

  • User-generated content

TikTok is a great platform for encouraging user-generated content. Instagram is the other social channel where user-generated content is incredibly effective. One of the reasons user-generated content is so successful on both of these channels is because it encourages active audience engagement. Not only will they be engaged with your brand, but they will also generate content that helps promote your brand. In a sense, you’ll be getting free advertising. Users are more likely to participate using TikTok as well due to the platform’s focus on video creation.

  • TikTok challenges

One of the reasons why TikTok’s popularity has exploded over recent years is due to the challenges that users engage in. For example, one type of challenge involves doing a specific dance move or physical challenge (such as taking off your shirt while doing a wall stand). Many of these challenges go viral organically, but businesses have begun creating their own challenges in an effort to engage more users. When creating a challenge, make sure to use a hashtag along with an appropriate title. Doing so ensures that the challenge has a better chance of being found and shared.

  • Influencer marketing

Just like Instagram, TikTok is home to users with enormous followings. As such, you should consider influencer marketing. Influencer marketing involves building a relationship with someone on the platform with a large influence (number of followers). As long as your brand is relevant to them, they will be able to influence their followers’ awareness and feelings about your brand. For example, if you create a challenge, you can get it exposure by having an influencer take part in that challenge. They can also encourage their followers to do the same.

  • TikTok’s advertising platform

Like other social platforms, TikTok does have its own advertising platform that you can use. Some of the TikTok advertising options include in-feed videos, brand takeover ads, branded AR content, and more. TikTok can even help assist with your influencer marketing campaign via its customer influence package. Additionally, you will can customize your targeting options using website traffic, ad engagement, app activity, or customer contact data.

Begin Integrating TikTok Advertising As Part Of Your Social Marketing Strategy

Although TikTok has a younger user-base, it is continuing to grow, attracting more and more older users. As such, it’s worth considering TikTok advertising, especially if any of your buyer personas match with TikTok’s current audience.

 

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Marketing Strategies In Times of Fear and Uncertainty

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In order to have reassured customers, they must first be reassured by your marketing strategies. Unfortunately, there is much uncertainty in the world, and that’s truer now than ever before. It’s no secret that the coronavirus has left many people in a state of fear, anxiety and grief. We know this is a great time to be marketing- but perhaps unsure what is best for every customer during these times. While these concerns are well-founded, it’s important to keep a positive attitude. Your marketing strategies should therefore be about helping your customers keep that positive attitude. Here are a few ways to help them do just that.

Love Your Customers

A great idea is to reach out to every one of your customers. Either that or have your sales and client service teams send personal notes to check in on your customers. Now is the best time to thank them for their support and their business. Do more than just a company email. Ask how they are holding up. It’ll will go a long way in cementing your relationship with your customers.

Reconsider Your Marketing Mix

Another idea to consider pulling any outbound advertising. Shift those funds into content creation. Amplify your best thought leadership and share your articles.

More than likely your annual event schedule is either not happening or is cancelled. Consider how to make it an amazing virtual experience. Bring in experts in your industry to speak to the latest trends. Get your customers to share their success. And create a plan to use all that content and re-purpose it into articles you can share on your website.

Webinars are certainly another great place to start. Setup monthly sessions to stay connected with your prospects. One thing that may be a concern: so many companies are making this shift. Think about how you can be different? Use professional speakers. Conduct an ask-me-anything. Maybe even offer a prospect some free advice or assessments. Long term thinking is exactly what we all need to do right now. Any video content at this point is doing extremely well; as people are home and watching more and more.

Similar Article: What’s Trending In Marketing For May 2019

Be Thoughtful and Intentional

Over the last few months, we have seen business leaders and marketers acting thoughtfully and with intention. Changing business operations to include “social distancing,” mandating that all workers able to work remotely do so, moving as much work online as possible, and limiting the amount of in-person interaction possible. These decisions are all thoughtful and intentional choices that demonstrate concern for individuals.

Marketers should be continuing to be thoughtful and intentional in their marketing strategy efforts. It’s ok to still post blog posts as long as the topics are worthwhile to the audience. It’s ok to send an email newsletter if the content is sensitive to the audience and offering value. Remember that many folks are taking their additional time right now to improve their skill set or expand their knowledge. They are focusing on the future and your content or materials will help to educate them while also letting them take their mind off the uncertainty surrounding them.

Connect with Your Teammarketing strategies2

Get together with your marketing colleagues and brainstorm new ideas. Reach out to your colleagues in the sales organization and find out what needs to be updated. Get time with executives and stakeholders across the company to reset expectations.

Everyone is feeling the same way: worried, anxious, afraid. So reach out and connect with them personally. If you don’t already have one, check into the opportunity for mental health services for your company; make sure everyone is aware of tele-health options for doctors. This may sound like HR stuff, but we’re great communicators in marketing. Let’s help everyone out!

Stay Positive and Optimistic

The most important marketing strategy to keep in mind is this: things will get better. People are still shopping and researching, but maybe just not this paycheck. We need to continue marketing and stay top of mind. Try and find the stories of hope that keep you positive. Think about all the healthcare workers putting their lives at risk to help others. As well as the volunteers who have signed up to offer free mental health support.

In conclusion having these marketing strategies is very important in long- term and short- term for several reasons. That is because, we still have an important job to do. Like those on the front lines of every crisis, we try and help out a little more, in any way we can.

A GUIDE TO EFFECTIVE MOBILE MARKETING TECHNIQUES
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How to Implement a Successful Digital Word of Mouth Marketing Strategy

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A good word of mouth marketing strategy has always been incredibly effective. It occurs when customers spread positive information about their experience with the company on their behalf. For example, if a customer recommends a product to a friend, that’s a form of word of mouth communication. The reason it’s so effective as a marketing strategy is that people tend to trust the word of other customers over that of a company. As a result, customers can help to build your reputation, increase brand awareness, and even generate leads for you by way of word of mouth.

While some word of mouth marketing is organic, you should encourage it as much as possible. This is especially true in this day and age when word of mouth can spread like wildfire online. With that in mind, the following are six tips to help you implement a successful digital word of mouth marketing strategy:

1. Encourage Customer Reviews

Due to how easy it is to find information online, the majority of customers will research a company before making a purchase. Part of this research entails reading through customer reviews left online. Customers can leave reviews on social media channels, on Google, and on a variety of third party websites that are review focused (such as Yelp or Angie’s List, to name a couple). The more positive reviews you have across platforms, the better your word of mouth will be. As such, encourage customers to leave reviews, not just of their customer experience with your company, but also for the individual products or services that they purchased.

2. Create Customer Testimonialsword of mouth marketing2

Testimonials are similar to reviews but tend to go more in-depth. Customers who are particularly happy with the customer experience are more willing to provide a testimonial. This can be done in the written form or in the form of a video. Video testimonials are particularly effective because people will have an easier time connecting to the customer giving the testimonial on an emotional level. Not to mention that it’s much easier to trust a video testimonial than a written one.

3. Connect With Influencers Online

Influencers are a little different than the traditional consumer. An influencer is someone who often has hundreds of thousands of followers on social media. They are considered an authority and are highly trusted, which means that if they promote a certain company’s product, their followers pay attention. Basically, they can help spread a positive word of mouth using a digital loudspeaker. You should look to connect with both macro and micro-influencers, both of which can help improve brand awareness and help spread your message.

Similar Blog Article: The Advantages of Using Public Relations In Your Marketing Strategy

4. Encourage Customer Referrals

Although many customer referrals happen organically, you should encourage them as much as possible. Individual referrals are often incredibly effective. Leads that are referred to you by an existing customer are going to be much easier for you to close since they will already be further down the sales funnel. There are several ways that you can encourage customer referrals. The first way is by simply offering an incentive. Provide customers with a link that they can use to refer another customer (such as a link leading to a service they can sign up for). If someone signs up to your service using that link, you can provide the customer with a discount or free gift as a reward.

Another way to encourage customer referrals is to set up a referral program. This is a more official way to incentivize your existing customers to make referrals. A referral program will make it much easier for customers to make referrals. It will also make it easier for you to monitor your customer referrals and to measure their success.

5. Encourage And Leverage User-Generated Content

User-generated content is content showcasing your brand or products created by your customers. This type of content helps to build trust and showcases the positive aspects of your brand or products. Not to mention that people tend to engage more successfully with user-generated content. All of these elements make user-generated content an effective vehicle for spreading word of mouth. You can encourage user-generated content by simply requesting it on social media or by holding contests. For example, a contest on Instagram for the best picture showcasing how customers used your product.

6. Provide The Best Customer Experience Possible

In the end, none of these digital word of mouth tactics are going to be very effective if you’re not providing a good customer experience in the first place. Customers don’t want to help brands that gave them a poor experience, after all. With that in mind, focus on providing the best customer experience you can and you’ll find that a positive word of mouth will begin to spread organically.

Word of mouth marketing can be a powerful way to increase brand awareness and to generate more leads. Not to mention that a word of mouth marketing strategy is an incredibly cost-effective strategy. Consider using these six tactics to encourage the spread of a positive word of mouth online.

A GUIDE TO EFFECTIVE MOBILE MARKETING TECHNIQUES
micro influencer marketing1

Micro Influencer Marketing Benefits

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Influencer marketing has been growing in popularity over the past few years. The idea is simple: connect with someone who has hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of followers on social media. By connecting with an influencer, you in effect obtain access to their audience. As a result, you can significantly boost brand awareness as well as increase your own audience. While many businesses have been scrambling to develop relationships with such influencers, more crafty businesses have been adopting a different strategy: micro-influencer marketing.

What is Micro-Influencer Marketing?

Traditional influencers are individuals who have name recognition within your industry. They have enormous audiences who trust what they say and what they do. When they promote a brand, that brand will get a lot of attention as a result. Micro-influencers don’t usually have as much name recognition. In fact, many of them are not widely known at all. They have audiences that are much smaller. Typically, they will have less than 100,000 followers. In some cases, they may have less than 10,000 followers. Micro-influencers also tend to focus on more niche subject matter as opposed to traditional influencers (or “macro-influencers”).

The Benefits of Micro-Influencer Marketing

micro influencer marketing2At first glance, it might be difficult to see any benefits of targeting micro-influencers instead of macro-influencers. After all, why would you want to target an influencer who seemingly has much less influence? The following are  some of the reasons why micro-influencer marketing can actually be incredibly effective:

Less competition

Most businesses are familiar with influencer marketing. Any business that has decided to invest in influencer marketing is likely going to target individuals with the most influence. This makes sense, as these influencers likely have millions of followers and lots of name recognition. The problem, however, is that all the businesses within your industry are going to be targeting the same couple of influencers. Because micro-influencers are much less well known, it will be much easier to get into contact with them and to develop a relationship with them. Not to mention that most micro-influencers are more niche-oriented, meaning that they will be relevant to fewer businesses in your industry.

Enjoy The Article: The Power Of An Influencer Marketing Strategy: How and Why It Works

Less expensive

Influencers who have millions of followers are going to have tons of suitors lining up to pay them for their influence. This means that getting a macro-influencer to highlight your company in some way is going to cost you a lot of money. Since micro-influencers are less well known within your industry, they are going to be much less expensive.

More relevant audience

Even though micro-influencers have smaller audiences, they are likely going to be much more relevant to your company. This is because micro-influencers are focused on a specific niche. If that niche is related to your offerings, odds are their audience will be your audience. When it comes to macro-influencers, their scope tends to be much broader. This means that your brand may not be relevant to a significant number of their followers. As a result, not only are micro-influencers more affordable, but you’ll be using your money in a more effective way, leading to a higher ROI (return on investment). It’s one of the reasons why conversion rates using micro-influencers tend to be higher as well.

  • More engaged followers – Macro-influencers may have millions of followers, but many of those followers are only following because of the influencer’s name recognition. Because the influencer isn’t niche-oriented, many of their posts may not be relevant to all of their followers. Micro-influencers, on the other hand, tend to have followers who are much more engaged due to their niche focus. Micro-influencer followers often engage on a daily basis, which means that they pay much more attention to what they have to say. They are also more loyal than the followers of a macro-influencer. This means that your message will get across more successfully when relayed by a micro-influencer.

Consider Targeting Micro-Influencers

While you shouldn’t completely give up on macro-influencers (especially if you have the budget required), you may find that targeting micro-influencers will end up being much more effective. Not only do micro-influencers cost less, but you’ll also have a much better chance of reaching and engaging their audience, leading to a higher conversion rate and a higher overall ROI.

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