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Creating a Brand with Social Listening and What Tools To Use

May 8, 2024/in Articles, Brand Development, Hubspot, Search & Social, SEO, Social Media /by Nicole Wagner

Social media marketing is an important part of reaching today’s modern era customers. Setting up social media accounts that prioritize providing good content can be challenging. In order for your brand to stick out, you need to learn what your customers are looking for and how to provide them with that content. This is referred to as social listening. Those who have social listening strategies worked into their social media marketing gain an edge over their competitors.

Social listening plays a key role in growing your business and increasing your company’s brand trust with its customers. The good news is that the ability to operate social media channels and create engaging content is right at your fingertips. If you are looking for ways in which you can handle all the comments, likes, and messages on your platforms, fear not because we have a strategy for you.

The below content contains ways in which you can learn about social listening as well as tools you can use to make the process easier.

Social listening is all about looking into your industry’s trends, comments, and content in order to gain insights into your brand experience. Social listening is critical for understanding how your customer feels about your brand which is commonly referred to as social media sentiment. Correctly using social listening is one of the most valuable ways to increase brand trust and create a loyal customer base. One good example of social listening is Netflix promoting a DIY sock that pauses the TV show. Netflix looked at what people were talking about on social media through comments, posts, and stories which lead to this creative invention.

Keeping up with the constant change in social trends can be difficult. Thankfully, there are many different tools and programs that can help brands keep up with trends.

Sprout Social is a premium service that helps brands and companies monitor data and trends on all social media platforms they are active on. It can also be useful for identifying social media goals that your brand can create based on the data. While Sprout Social is an excellent service and can help greatly with social media needs, they are more costly than some of the other social listening tools mentioned below.

HubSpot

HubSpot is a marketer’s dream program. Whether it be for creating inbound content, social media uploads, or advanced automation, HubSpot knows what tools a marketer needs. HubSpot has features that allow you to keep track of all social media posts, interactions, and total social media leads.

Learn more about social media campaigns here!

One of the big perks of HubSpot is the ability to easily work together with the sales team to use social media interactions as a step to making a sale. Furthermore, HubSpot is a free-to-use platform which makes it a must-have.

Also Read: Using HubSpot Lead Flows To Improve Conversion Rates

Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a service that allows users to view and interact with their social media followers in an easy and convenient way. Hootsuite’s dashboard is able to keep track of all social media interactions whether it be messages, comments, likes, or mentions without having to leave the service.

In addition, Hootsuite provides top-notch analytics and reports from all social media accounts in use. This, along with the convenient dashboard, makes Hootsuite a premium service that competes with the likes of sprout social. Therefore, the cost of the service is noticeably different than free services.

Buffer

Buffer is one of the more user-friendly tools on this list. The software application allows users to “buffer” social media posts on many accounts. The user interface is very clean and not as complicated as some other services. Buffer can respond to comments across many platforms. There is a free version available to use, however, the service will be lacking some features.

SEMrush

SEMrush is different from many of the other services mentioned above. The platform is well known for its keyword research and online ranking data. The ability to manage social media accounts makes SEMrush a valuable service to have. Want to manage all your social media accounts in one place? SEMrush has you covered. You can also use many of the SEO and keyword tools to help monitor your social media accounts.

Social listening can be tricky. Keeping up with so many accounts and followers is no easy task. Thanks to services like Sprout Social, HubSpot, Hootsuite, Buffer, and SEMRush, marketers are able to keep up with demand. Now it’s time for you to start social listening utilizing these tools. Are you ready?

Mastering the Art of Integrated Digital and Social Media Marketing

March 7, 2024/in Articles, Digital, Digital Media, Search & Social /by Nicole Wagner

Mastering the art of digital and social media marketing is no longer an option. It’s a must. Digital and social media marketing form the backbone of successful brand strategies, offering unparalleled opportunities for engagement, reach, and conversion. Let’s delve into how digital and social advertising work hand-in-hand. We will also explore the myriad ways they complement each other to amplify your brand’s online presence.

Combining Tactics

Digital and social media marketing are two sides of the same coin, each enhancing the effectiveness of the other. Here’s how they create a synergistic effect:

Content Amplification: The content you create as part of your digital marketing initiatives possesses significant potential. This potential can be magnified exponentially through social media platforms. By sharing content on various social networks, you can extend its reach far beyond your immediate followers. This allows you to tap into new audiences and spark conversations, which enhances engagement with your brand. It also drives traffic back to your original content, increasing its overall impact and visibility.
Data-Driven Insights: The rich reservoir of user data available through social media platforms is a goldmine for marketers seeking to refine their digital marketing strategies. By analyzing patterns in engagement, preferences, and user behavior, you can gain invaluable insights. These insights will inform the creation of more targeted and effective content. This data-driven approach allows for the optimization of ad placements, therefore ensuring that your marketing efforts resonate with the right audience at the right time. This maximizes ROI.
Brand Consistency: Achieving a harmonious brand voice and message across all your online platforms is crucial for building a strong and recognizable brand identity. Consistency in your messaging and visuals across digital and social media channels reinforces your brand’s core values and promises. It also fosters a sense of reliability and trust among your audience. This uniformity ensures that regardless of how or where a customer interacts with your brand, they receive a coherent and memorable experience. This experience will strengthen their connection to your brand.

To harness the full potential of digital and social media marketing, consider the following inbound and outbound marketing strategies:

Targeted Advertising: The advanced targeting capabilities of social media platforms allow for the delivery of highly personalized advertisements directly to specific audience segments. By leveraging detailed user data, marketers can craft tailored messages that resonate deeply with their target audience. Detailed user data includes demographics, interests, and online behaviors. This precision ensures that your advertising budget is utilized more efficiently, reaching those most likely to engage with your brand. Consider hiring specific social media influencers that can reach your desired target market.
Engagement and Interaction: Social media stands out for its unique ability to foster immediate and direct interaction between brands and their audiences. This interactive environment is perfect for engaging with followers in real-time, soliciting their feedback, answering questions, and even addressing concerns. By actively participating in these conversations, brands can build a loyal community and enhance customer satisfaction. They can also humanize their brand, making it more relatable and trustworthy to their audience.
Content Diversity: The dynamic nature of social media platforms makes them an ideal testing ground for a wide array of content types. From engaging videos and informative live streams to interactive polls and captivating stories, the diversity of content formats available allows brands to keep their digital marketing strategies fresh and engaging. This variety helps attract a wider audience. It also helps maintain the interest of the audience over time, therefore leading to increased engagement rates and a stronger online presence.

Best Practices for Integrated Campaigns

For a seamless integration of digital and social media marketing, follow these best practices:

Unified Goals: It’s crucial that your digital marketing and social media strategies share common objectives. These objectives can be enhancing brand visibility, attracting more visitors to your website, or increasing sales figures. This alignment ensures that all your marketing efforts are pulling in the same direction, maximizing the impact of your campaigns.
Cross-Platform Analytics: Leveraging analytics tools to monitor your brand’s performance across various digital and social platforms is essential. This approach provides a holistic view of your marketing activities, helping you understand what’s working and what needs adjustment, thereby optimizing your strategies for better results.
Responsive Engagement: Promptness and authenticity in your interactions on social media can significantly boost your brand’s image. Being responsive shows that you value your audience’s input. Additionally, it fosters a positive brand perception, encouraging your followers to become vocal advocates for your brand.

Crafting a Cohesive Narrative

Your brand’s narrative should flow effortlessly across digital and social media platforms. It should tell a consistent story that resonates with your audience. Here’s how to achieve this:

Consistent Messaging: Maintaining a uniform message across all your marketing channels is vital. It’s important to tweak the tone and style to suit each platform’s unique environment though. This ensures your brand’s core message is conveyed clearly, regardless of where your audience encounters it, therefore enhancing message retention and brand loyalty.
Visual Branding: Employing a consistent set of visual elements such as logos, color schemes, and imagery across your digital and social media outputs is key to building a strong brand identity. This visual consistency makes your brand easily recognizable, fostering a sense of familiarity and trust among your audience. The obvious platform that can help you achieve these goals is Instagram.
Integrated Campaigns: Designing campaigns that effectively bridge digital and social media channels can leverage the inherent strengths of each platform, thereby ensuring a cohesive and impactful marketing effort. This integrated approach ensures that your campaign’s message is amplified. The amplified message will reach a broader audience and drive towards your unified marketing objectives.

Embracing the Future of Marketing

As we look toward the future of marketing in 2024, the integration of digital and social media marketing will only become more vital. Staying ahead of the curve requires a commitment to ongoing learning, adaptability, and a willingness to experiment with new technologies and platforms. By embracing the synergies between digital marketing and social media advertising, you can craft compelling, cohesive campaigns that captivate your audience. These campaigns will also drive meaningful results.

The interplay between digital and social media marketing is not merely a strategic advantage but a necessity in today’s digital landscape. By understanding and leveraging this integration, you can elevate your brand’s online presence. You can also engage more deeply with your audience, and achieve your marketing objectives with greater efficiency and impact. The journey towards digital marketing mastery is ongoing. At its heart lies the powerful duo of digital and social media marketing. The two work in concert to propel your brand to new heights.

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Optimizing Your Social Media Strategy: SEO Pitfalls to Avoid

February 16, 2024/in Articles, Search & Social, SEO, Social Media /by Nicole Wagner

Crafting an effective social media strategy is essential in today’s digital marketing landscape. A well-optimized approach can lead to increased brand visibility, engagement, and conversions. However, various SEO pitfalls can hinder these outcomes. This comprehensive guide explores crucial SEO issues to avoid, ensuring your social media efforts are both effective and rewarding.

First, let’s take a look at SEO’s Role:

Enhances content discoverability on search engines: Implementing SEO practices can significantly improve the likelihood of your content appearing in top search engine results. This visibility is crucial for attracting potential customers who are actively searching for related topics or products.
Applies to websites and social media profiles/content: SEO is not limited to websites alone; it extends to social media profiles and their content. By optimizing social media posts and profiles with relevant keywords and metadata, you can boost their discoverability both on social platforms and search engines.
Increases visibility and drives traffic: Effective SEO strategies lead to higher visibility online, making it easier for your target audience to find you. This increased online presence directly contributes to more traffic to your website or social media profiles, potentially leading to higher engagement rates and conversions.

Platform-Specific Optimization

Optimizing content for each social media platform’s unique algorithms is crucial for maximizing engagement and reach.

Unique Platform Algorithms:
- Each social media platform operates with its own set of algorithms and best practices that dictate content visibility. Understanding these can significantly enhance your content’s performance.
- Tailoring your content and engagement strategies to align with each platform’s specific algorithms can lead to better visibility and interaction rates.
Examples:
- Instagram: This platform’s algorithm prioritizes engaging visual content and the strategic use of hashtags to increase discoverability among targeted audiences.
- Twitter: Known for its preference for brief, impactful content paired with timely and relevant hashtags, Twitter is ideal for real-time engagement and news sharing.
- LinkedIn: As a professional network, LinkedIn values insightful, industry-related content that fosters professional growth and networking opportunities.
- Facebook: With its diverse user base, Facebook’s algorithm promotes a variety of content types, from videos and images to in-depth articles, to engage a broad audience.

Interested in learning more about how SEO benefits your future? Click here.

Overlooking Keywords

Incorporating relevant keywords into your social media strategy is essential for enhancing visibility and attracting the right audience.

Keyword Integration:
- Embedding well-researched, targeted keywords into your social media profiles, posts, and hashtags can greatly improve your content’s searchability and reach.
- Conduct thorough keyword research to identify terms that your target audience frequently uses, ensuring your content resonates and is easily discoverable.
Balancing Act:
- Achieving a balance between incorporating relevant keywords and maintaining a natural, engaging content flow is key to keeping your audience interested while optimizing for search engines.
- Avoid overusing keywords in your content, as this can lead to a decline in content quality and user engagement, potentially harming your brand’s reputation and reach.

Now Lets take a look at the top SEO Issues that can sabotage your efforts:

1. Ignoring Local SEO

Geographic Targeting:

Incorporate location-based keywords for businesses with a physical presence or local target market
Utilize geotagging features in posts and profile settings
Local Engagement:
- Engage with local communities and events
- Share location-specific content to enhance local relevance and visibility

2. Inconsistent Branding and Messaging

Brand Identity Consistency:

Maintain a uniform brand voice, imagery, and messaging across platforms
Use consistent logos, color schemes, and brand messaging to reinforce brand recognition

Content Cohesion:

Align content themes and messaging with your overall brand strategy
Ensure all posts contribute to a cohesive brand narrative

3. Ignoring Visual Content Optimization

Visual Appeal:

Use high-quality, engaging visuals in line with brand aesthetics
Optimize image sizes and formats for each platform

Alt Text and Captions:

Include descriptive alt text and captions with relevant keywords
Enhance accessibility and SEO with meaningful, keyword-rich descriptions

4. Neglecting User Engagement

Interactive Content:

Create posts that encourage user interaction, such as polls, questions, and calls-to-action
Monitor and respond to comments, messages, and mentions promptly

Community Building:

Foster a sense of community among followers
Encourage user-generated content and share user stories relevant to your brand

5. Poor Linking Practices

Share links to high-quality, relevant content
Avoid excessive linking that can detract from user experience

Cross-Platform Promotion:

Promote your social media content across different platforms
Include links to your social profiles on your website and in email signatures

6. Not Leveraging Analytics

Performance Tracking:

Use social media analytics tools to track the performance of your posts and campaigns
Analyze engagement rates, reach, and follower growth

Insight-Driven Adjustments:

Adapt your strategy based on analytics insights
Test different content types, posting times, and engagement tactics to optimize results

Expanding Your Strategy

Explore emerging content formats like live videos, stories, and reels
Stay abreast of platform updates and new features to leverage them effectively

Collaborations and Partnerships:

Partner with influencers and other brands to expand your reach
Collaborate on content creation to tap into new audiences

Social Listening:

Monitor social conversations about your brand and industry
Use insights from social listening to inform content creation and engagement strategies

You Can Do it!

To maximize the impact of your social media strategy, it’s crucial to navigate around common SEO pitfalls. By focusing on platform-specific optimization, strategic keyword use, local SEO, consistent branding, and engaging content, you can elevate your social media presence. Additionally, embracing visual content optimization, active user engagement, strategic linking, and analytics will further enhance your strategy. By avoiding these SEO issues and continuously adapting your approach based on insights and trends, you can achieve sustained success!

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The Benefits of Inbound & Outbound Marketing

January 9, 2024/in Articles, Directors, Inbound Marketing, Search & Social /by Nicole Wagner

There are two main types of marketing: inbound and outbound. Inbound marketing involves positioning yourself to be found by your target audience, providing them with the content they need for self-informed decision-making. Examples include SEO and content marketing. On the other hand, outbound marketing is more traditional, advertising directly to a broad audience through channels like TV commercials, radio ads, and magazine ads instead of waiting to be found.

Many businesses tend to prefer one over the other. However, the most effective way to market to your target audience is to use a combination of both inbound and outbound. To understand why using both is a valuable investment to your business, you’ll need to understand the Benefits of Inbound and Outbound Marketing.

The Benefits of Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing is a non-invasive advertising approach. In contrast, outbound marketing interrupts the audience’s activities (reading, listening to the radio, watching TV, etc.). One benefit of inbound marketing is avoiding annoyance by not disrupting experiences. It allows potential customers to move through the sales funnel at their own pace without pressure. Providing content for them to read at their convenience helps build brand loyalty, trust, and comfort. Notably, outbound marketing is short-term, while inbound is long-term. The website and content you create continue attracting new leads over time.

8 Important Questions To Ask When Hiring Inbound Marketing Agencies

The Benefits of Outbound Marketing

The biggest benefit to using outbound marketing is that you have the potential to reach a larger audience. This could be an audience who may not be familiar with your brand or the services you have to offer. They may not know that they have a need for your products or services until they see your ad and wouldn’t have known to search for your brand beforehand. It’s also a great way to reach audiences who do know about your brand but who may not have known about new products and services that you’re offering.

Using Inbound and Outbound Marketing Together

Using both forms of marketing provides short-term and long-term results and can complement each other. Here are examples of effective combined use of inbound and outbound marketing:

Generate traffic via outbound: Consumers have smartphones or tablets even while watching TV. Running a TV commercial (outbound) can encourage viewers to visit your social media page or website (inbound). This applies to various outbound efforts, like putting your site on billboards or magazine ads, prompting in-store customers to follow you on social media, etc.
Nurture leads before promoting live events: Inbound marketing can inform audiences about your brand and familiarize them with you. Before promoting live events in-store or at a tradeshow (outbound efforts), where they can pick up pamphlets or speak with sales reps in person, nurture leads through inbound efforts. Interested in learning more about lead nurturing? Using Lead Nurturing During the Consideration Stage Of The Buyer’s Journey

Inbound VS Outbound Marketing: What’s Better for You?

Which One Should I Choose?

There’s no reason to limit yourself to either inbound or outbound marketing. Learning how to use both effectively can be a valuable skill for your business. The answer lies in recognizing the strengths of each and being able to leverage both effectively. Mastering this blend is not just a skill; it’s an important way to maintain a successful and impactful marketing approach.

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

The Importance of Earning High Quality Backlinks

December 19, 2023/in Articles, Directors, Inbound Marketing, Search & Social, SEO /by Nicole Wagner

One of the major goals of an inbound marketing campaign is to be found online. There are many tactics that you can implement in order to achieve this. One such tactic is through link building. Link building refers to getting other websites to link to your content. The more high quality backlinks that you earn to your website, the more traffic you’ll receive. Because of the nature of high-quality backlinks, there’s a good chance that this traffic will consist of high-quality leads. Because of this, you should try to earn as many high-quality backlinks as possible.

High-Quality Backlinks Benefits

There are two major benefits of high-quality backlinks. The first is that a website that links to your content is doing so in order to provide their audience with a quality source that they think will benefit them. This means that your content will be exposed to an audience that is likely going to be relevant to your brand. Backlinks from websites with particularly big audiences are going to result in a lot of web traffic to your site as well, which can result in more potential leads.

The second benefit of earning high-quality backlinks is that they indicate to Google that your content is of high quality. After all, a reputable website wouldn’t send their audience to your page if the content wasn’t helpful or relevant. As such, Google factors the number of high-quality backlinks that your content earns into its page rankings. This means that the more high-quality backlinks you earn, the higher your page is probably going to appear on their SERP. As a result you’ll gain more exposure and more organic web traffic.

How to Earn High-Quality Backlinks

Earning high-quality backlinks might seem like a matter of luck. After all, you have no control over whether another website decides to link to your content. However, this isn’t necessarily true. There are a number of ways that you can increase the chances of being linked to. The following are a few tips on how you can earn more high-quality backlinks:

Create high-quality content – The first thing that’s required in order to earn backlinks is to have content worth linking to. This means that you should focus on creating high-quality content that is relevant to your target audience and that is helpful or informative in some way. Be sure to get your content out there too by promoting it. For example, link your content to your social channels and add social share buttons so that your readers can help expose it to more people. The more exposure the content is, the more likely it is that another website will stumble onto it and link to it.
Optimize your content for SEO – The higher your content ranks on Google’s SERP, the more likely it is that another website will find your content when doing research for their own blog content. If they end up referencing your content, they will link back to it.
Build your brand authority – The more brand authority you have, the more you’ll be trusted as an expert in your field. As a result, websites will be more willing to link to your content as a valid source that they can use to strengthen whatever argument they’re making or information they’re providing in their own content.
Build relationships with influencers – Find the influencers within your industry on social media and begin building relationships with them. Once they know you exist, they may link to your content. Not only can you earn backlinks this way, but the additional exposure can result in more backlinks in the near future.
Write guest blog posts – When you write a guest blog post on another website, that website will link your guest post back to your own blog. This means that you’re automatically earning backlinks for every guest post your write.
Link to other websites – Link your content to other high-quality websites. Doing this can result in them returning the favor.

How Businesses Can Use a Blog To Strengthen Their Online Marketing Efforts

Avoiding Low-Quality Backlinks

The thing about backlinks is that they only help in seo if they come from a reputable website. A low-quality website isn’t going to send you a whole lot of traffic, after all. Additionally, Google will evaluate where your backlinks are coming from to ensure that they are from a reputable source. The reason they do this is because, websites would try to trick Google into providing high page rankings. They did this by buying backlinks from websites that sold them, known as link farms. This was a common blackhat tactic that is now very difficult to get away with. If you buy backlinks, Google will penalize you by either lowering your page ranking. Or they’ll kick your page off of their SERP.

Importance of earning backlinks should be a tactic in seo that everyone invests in. Doing so can help to increase the exposure of your brand and your content. Help bring in traffic from other websites, and help boost your SEO rankings, thereby attracting more organic traffic from Google.

The Importance of Having a Mobile Optimized Website

November 8, 2023/in Articles, Digital, Digital Media, Directors, Marketing Strategy, Search & Social, SEO, Website Design, Website Growth Driven Design /by Terry Becker

More and more people are using mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets, to surf the web. At this point in time, more people are using their mobile devices to perform searches than they’re using computers. Roughly 60 percent of organic search engine visits occur on mobile devices in the U.S., according to Statista. This means that if you have a website, then you should consider optimizing it for mobile use. In fact, not having a mobile could actually be detrimental to your marketing efforts.

What is a Mobile Optimized Website?

You need to understand the differences between a mobile friendly site and a mobile optimized site. A mobile friendly website accurately displays on smaller screens. It usually appears as a smaller version, although it may not always work perfectly on touchscreen tablets. It should, however, still be functional. Mobile friendly websites also have features such as text-based phone numbers or email addresses that can trigger direct calls or email messages via mobile devices or slideshows and image rotators that function without Flash support.

While a mobile friendly site helps ensure your site functions on mobile devices, mobile optimization goes a step further. A mobile optimized site reformats itself for mobile devices. It not only makes sure to properly display on smaller screens, but also makes the site much easier to navigate. It reformats content, displays larger navigation buttons and optimizes images according to screen size.

The Benefits of a Mobile Optimized Website

Responsive design helps ensure the mobile optimization of your website. This tends to cost more to develop, but it ensures the mobile optimization of every aspect of your website. This will provide significant benefits over the long run. The following benefits result from a mobile optimized website:

Improve your user experience

User experience is essential. If you don’t provide a good user experience, visitors will leave and they won’t return. The mobile experience is much different from the computer experience. Visitors need to be able to read your web pages with ease, click links without zooming in, and navigate your site on a smaller screen. Without mobile optimization, users often struggle to read or navigate websites on mobile devices.

Improve website speed

When you optimize your website to meet mobile standards, then your website should load quickly. Websites that aren’t properly optimized for mobile often take a while to load, especially when they use Flash elements. Mobile users simply aren’t going to spend time on your site if they can’t get your pages to load. By improving the speed of your site, you’re more likely to keep visitors on your site for longer periods.

Increase user engagement

A mobile optimized website increases the likelihood of engaging your visitors. This is because visitors will spend more time on your site navigating through content. They will also be able to interact with your site, whether it be by liking content, clicking on CTAs, or even contributing to your comment sections.

Learn more about mobile with these Mobile Marketing Strategy

Increase average time on site

When you provide a good user experience to mobile users, they will end up spending more time on your website. The longer they spend on your site, the more likely they are to convert or return again later.

Improve your mobile SEO

A few years ago, your mobile SEO wouldn’t affect your regular SEO. However, due to how many mobile users there are now, Google has begun factoring a website’s mobile SEO into their regular SEO. This means that if you don’t have a website that’s optimized for mobile use, it will actually hurt your SEO.

Attract more local customers

Mobile SEO is extremely important to local SEO. Many people will perform search queries on the go when they are looking for a specific business. These people want to buy. If they are near your physical location and they find your website while doing a mobile search, they’re more likely to drop in and make a purchase. Poor mobile SEO will translate to poor local SEO, thereby potentially hurting your ability to attract local customers.

Grow Your Business With Mobile Optimization

Considering how many people use mobile devices to perform search queries and explore the web, the importance of a mobile optimized website can’t be overstated. If you do not optimize your website design for mobile use, you risk losing a significant part of your target audience.

5 Strategies to Gain More YouTube Subscribers

June 27, 2023/in Articles, Directors, Search & Social /by Nicole Wagner

As you probably know, video content tends to engage audiences much more than any other type of content. It’s why YouTube is so popular. However, what you may not realize is that YouTube is not only considered one of the most popular–and biggest–social platforms, it’s also the second biggest search engine on the web behind Google. As such, YouTube is not something you can ignore. In order to leverage YouTube to attract more leads, you’ll need to gain more subscribers on YouTube. This is a lot easier said than done. After all, just posting videos will not increase subscribers. To do so, follow these five ways to gain YouTube subscribers outlined below:

1. Create Content Worth Subscribing To

You’d be surprised how many people make the mistake of thinking that quantity is more important than quality. You might manage to get more views by uploading more videos, but nobody is going to subscribe to your channel if your videos are average at best. Put more time into creating good content — this means making sure your videos are relevant and informative and that they are highly produced–and you’re more likely to gain subscribers. A subscriber is worth way more than a view, after all, since subscribers are more likely to keep watching your videos.

2. Organize Playlists By Engagement

Organizing your videos into playlists makes it easier for viewers to consume your content. When creating your playlist, organize your videos by engagement. This means putting the videos with the highest audience attention rate at the top of your playlist. The reason you should do this is because viewers who finish a video will be shown the next video on the playlist. They are more likely to watch through the video if it has a high audience attention rate (it’s usually an indication of its quality). Videos with the lowest audience retention rate should bring up the back of your playlist. Essentially, your goal should be to hook your viewers by showing them the very best of your video content. Youtube Icon

3. End Your Videos With A Subscription CTA

Always end your videos with a call-to-action (CTA) asking the viewer to subscribe. Viewers who watch all the way through your videos obviously kept watching it for one reason or another and as such, are more likely to subscribe to your channel in order to have easy access to new videos as they come. It might seem obvious, but this is one of the best ways to gain more subscribers since not all viewers will think to subscribe if not encouraged to after watching a video.

Check out our article: Powerful Call-to-Action Phrases to Increase Clicks

4. Optimize Your Videos With Relevant Keywords

Just because a video is visual content does not mean it can’t be optimized for SEO using keywords. You can attract subscribers to your channel by properly optimizing your videos and your channel using relevant, high-quality keywords. You can use these keywords in your videos’ titles, descriptions, transcription files, thumbnail files, and video files. Remember, YouTube is a massive search engine in itself, so you’ll want to make it easy for your content to be found.

5. Use Vibrant Thumbnails For Your Videos

You’re not going to get subscribers if users don’t click on your video links. Take care to choose high-quality and relevant thumbnails for your videos. This will help your videos stand out on YouTube’s search page.

YouTube can be a very effective platform when it comes to attracting new leads, especially if you manage to gain subscribers. Be sure to use these five tips to gain YouTube subscribers to your company’s YouTube channel.

Learn To Use Social Media To Find New Leads

Establishing Your Brand Personality Through Social Media Personas

April 12, 2023/in Articles, Blog, Brand Development, Search & Social, Social Media /by Nicole Wagner

When setting up accounts and profiles on various social media platforms to promote your brand, remember that your competitors are also on social media. Simply posting content on multiple platforms isn’t enough to get your brand at the forefront, especially without a clearly defined social media persona.

Customers are nowadays looking for content that resonates with their needs. Research shows that 90% of consumers buy products from businesses that advocate for a cause they can identify with.

People love associating with brands that provide a personal, human touch. They would prefer to associate with a business that delivers on its brand’s qualities and values. If your business demonstrates reliability, commitment, loyalty, honesty, and longevity, it can better succeed in the competitive business landscape.

However, if your posts still miss the mark and don’t help your brand effectively reach its target audience, it may be because you haven’t clearly defined your social media persona. The persona sets you apart from the competition and gives your brand a voice.

It guides your social media marketing strategy, engagement with your target audience, and the content you post. This post will explain how to create a buyer persona to boost your social marketing strategy.

Social media personas are fictional profiles you can develop to represent your brand and target your customers. They combine qualities and characteristics that give your brand a distinct personality, including character, tone, voice, and approach. These factors are critical because they influence how customers interact with your brand.

Remember that your customers don’t read statistics about your brand’s performance and probably don’t care how many awards you’ve won. They care more about who you are and what your brand stands for, not your logo.

Creating social media personas can help establish a consistent and familiar presence on your social media platforms. These personas must be authentic and align with the values of your organization. The process doesn’t have to be complicated, and you can find and build the perfect persona for your brand in a few steps.

The best practices to consider while creating these personas are:

Identify Your Target Audience

The first step to creating a successful social media persona is to make the “ideal customer.” Who is it that your brand targets, and what are their demographics? It would help if you established the following factors:

Their gender
Age
Employment status
Income levels
Location
Home types
Relationship status

You may also want to research more information like their hobbies, goals and motivation, purchasing triggers, pain points and fears, and personality traits. For a more comprehensive persona, it would also help to find out the social media channels they actively use, the influencers they like to follow, and the hashtags they respond to regularly.

You can research this information through the following:

Your existing customer data available on your CRM, email lists, point of sale systems, and customer support systems
Your social media analytics, such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and your website analytics
Collecting customer feedback through social media polls, emails, or surveys.

The goal is to create a brand persona that appeals to every segment of your target audience while aligning with your business niche.

Stay True to the Values Which Your Brand Wants to Convey

Once you have all the information you need to develop your brand’s perfect social media persona, determine the values you want to convey to your customers. Your content creation strategy should revolve around the following:

The unique selling proposition that sets you apart from other brands
How you want to portray your brand
What you want to offer your audience on social media
The kind of tone that typically resonates with your audience

Once you have answers to these questions, brainstorm a list of adjectives to describe your brand’s voice. Think of terms like professional, candid, passionate, authentic, relatable, bold, honest, and trustworthy. These will guide your brand’s personality when approaching the above factors. Staying true to these values is the easiest way to maintain consistency across all your social media platforms.

Choose Visual Elements Which Align with Your Brand Identity

In maintaining consistency across your brand, you also must include visual elements that resonate with your brand. Studies prove visuals are more effective in passing your brand message than words. Photos, videos, illustrations, and infographics can strengthen your brand and boost engagement with your audience.

Choose visual elements that embody your brand’s personality and create a strong brand image. Some tips for creating compelling visual elements that your audience easily recognizes are:

Creating a visual guide to ensure consistency, including colors, sizes, fonts, and file formats
Using unique visuals such as custom illustrations as opposed to stock images
Repurposing content such as customer feedback, product images, and blog posts

Stay Consistent Across All Platforms

Inconsistency is one thing that can kill your branding efforts on social media. Strive to stick to the persona you created across all your social media platforms. If your business description, tone, values, messaging, or brand image differs across the platforms, your customers will likely perceive your business as multiple entities. The result is lower engagement and fewer sales.

An effortless way to maintain consistency in your message is to develop a comprehensive voice and tone guide for your brand. It should appear on your blog, company website, social media platforms, email newsletters, and other touchpoints relevant to your business.

Creating a social media persona for your brand can take time. It also requires that you have the right tools and leverage teamwork for the best results. Once you do the groundwork, you will have a valuable tool to create compelling content.

That way, you can meet your customers right where they are and communicate effectively. Besides, you will improve your social media strategy for more personalization to increase overall conversion rates. A digital marketing agency like Steven & Tate can help you get your social media marketing strategy right. Talk to us for a consultation.

New Social Media Channels and Clubhouse

June 22, 2021/in Articles, Directors, Search & Social, Social Media /by Nicole Wagner

Social media marketing is an essential way to expand your reach, increase your brand authority, build relationships with your audience, and drive traffic to your website. This is no secret to anyone, which is why businesses of all sizes have established a social media presence on some of the more popular social platforms, including Facebook and Twitter. However, as important as it is to market on the biggest social media platforms, you should always keep an eye out for newer social media channels. Ignoring new platforms in favor of focusing on the most popular social media sites can cause you to fall behind quickly. After all, platforms such as TikTok can gain massive traction over as little as a year. With that in mind, we recommend that you consider the Clubhouse app.

What Is The Clubhouse App?

The Clubhouse is unique in that it combines the social aspects of an online forum with the conversational aspects of a podcast. If you’re confused by this description, don’t be. To break it down further, it’s basically an audio-only social media network. The way it works is simple — there are different Rooms that you can join. In each Room, a live audio conversation is going on. You can listen to this conversation as well as join in.

The Clubhouse is a little over a year old, but it’s already gaining notice after both Bill Gates and Elon Musk appeared in Clubhouse rooms. One of the things that makes the Clubhouse app attractive to many users at the moment is its exclusivity. While there are over 10 million users, the app is currently only available on iOS. Additionally, you can only gain access to the social media platform through an invitation by a user.

How To Use The Clubhouse App

Users build their profiles based on their interests. They can then search the app for Rooms that focus on their interests, follow individuals on Clubhouse, and send messages. The Clubhouse homepage displays Rooms that are live at the time and that are related to the user’s interests (or that are being run by people the user is following). There’s also an Explore feature that let’s users scroll through suggested people, Rooms, or Clubs to follow.

Each Room is basically a live conversation that you can listen to or participate in. As you might imagine, it could get quite hectic if there are hundreds of people trying to talk over each other in any given room. To avoid this, users who join the room are muted automatically. The people who are running the room essentially have the floor. Users can then click on the Raise Hand button if they want to contribute to the conversation (such as by asking a question). One of the people running the room can then unmute that user if they want to hear what they have to say. Attendees can only see the profiles of the moderators and speakers, unless another user is invited to speak after raising their hand, in which case their profile can also be seen.

Starting a Room is easy. There’s a Start a Room button on the app’s homepage. You can start a closed chat (open to specific users), a social chat (open to followers), or an open chat (open to anyone).

How Can Clubhouse Help Your Marketing Strategy?

In the beginning, Clubhouse was meant as a social media platform for industry elites, such as CEOs, social media influencers, and celebrities. This is no longer the case, although general users are attracted to rooms being run by such members. The question is, how can joining Clubhouse be of benefit to your business? Essentially, Clubhouse could help you to connect with your target audience and expand your reach. More importantly, you could use Clubhouse to boost your brand authority.

For example, a small group of accountants might hold a discussion about taking deductions on your tax return. Such a discussion is going to be very informative for people who are looking to save money on their taxes, especially if it’s tax season. Not only will listeners be able to learn about the subject by joining the room (and listening as well as asking questions), but the accountants will get some exposure for their business as well. If their discussion proves informative, listeners who weren’t familiar with them might check out their website and connect with them further off of the app.

Read More About Posting on Social Media

Paying attention to new social media platforms over the years is vital to keeping your social media marketing strategyrelevant and fresh. Not only can you continue to reach a larger audience by expanding your presence to new channels, but new social media platforms like Clubhouse often provide new and innovative ways to connect with your audience.

Attract, Convert, and Close Prospects Using Social Media Strategies and Website Conversion Techniques

July 12, 2017/in Articles, Directors, News & Insights, Press Releases, Search & Social, SEO, Social Media /by Nicole Wagner

LOMBARD, ILL., July 12, 2017– This September, Stevens & Tate Marketing will be emphatically represented at the one of the most respected associations of providers serving Illinois older adults, LeadingAge Illinois. Internet Marketing Director Nicole Wagner will be sharing her extensive online marketing expertise. LeadingAge 2017 is being held from September 26th to the 27th at The Hilton Lisle/Naperville in Lisle, Illinois.

At the show, Nicole will carry out a 90-minute presentation on how to attract, convert, and close prospects using social media strategies and website conversion techniques. According to the agency, the Internet has become a cornerstone of our marketing efforts, and although it is now easier to reach our audience, it may be harder to stand out from the crowd. How do we get the most out of our online marketing efforts? How do we make sure our social media platforms are as effective as possible? The session will help attendees determine their top marketing strategies in order to hit their top 2017 business goals.

Wagner will present essential strategies that will teach how to use social media to communicate with an audience on a more personal level, as well as optimizing a website in order to make it easier to find. Her educational sessions continue to be well received by all types of organizations because she emphasizes providing relevant and actionable takeaways that are targeted to each audience.

From Wagner’s presentation, attendees should be able to determine what their key marketing tactics are to achieve overall business goals, be able to create buyer personas of future residents and prospects, and understand the stages of the buyer’s journey and how to communicate to prospects through each stage. In addition, attendees will walk away with defined steps to improve their website and social media platform to meet their objectives. Nicole’s presentation is a great opportunity for LeadingAge members to learn proven techniques to improve their marketing performance.

LeadingAge Illinois is one of the largest and most respected associations of providers serving Illinois older adults, and the state chapter of the significant national organization. LeadingAge Illinois serves more than 500 providers including home and community based services (HCBS), senior housing, continuing care retirement communities (CCRC), assisted living, supportive living and skilled nursing/rehabilitation centers.

Stevens & Tate Marketing is a full service advertising agency specializing in meeting the ever-changing demands of today’s consumer. As experts in all areas of Internet Marketing, we know how to navigate through evolving trends and technologies in the online space today – and have decades of experience delivering results for businesses nationwide. Through our unique combination of strategic thinking, creative execution and targeted communications, we Make Things Happen.™

Nicole Wagner, Internet Marketing Director at Stevens & Tate Marketing (stevens-tate.com), leads an enthusiastic team in strategic planning, web development, social media and search engine marketing as well as Internet and mobile marketing. She can be reached directly by calling (630) 627-5200 or via email at [email protected].

Learn more about Stevens & Tate’s speaking experience.

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SUMMARY: Stevens & Tate Marketing Internet Marketing Director Nicole Wagner has been selected as a featured speaker for the LeadingAge Illinois 2017 Conference in Lisle, Illinois. As a repeat speaker for this prominent national event, Nicole will provide key insight into proven strategies on how to attract, convert, and close prospects using social media strategies and website conversion techniques.

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