by tradesmeninsights | Oct 20, 2011 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tools, Social Marketing
Blogging greatly improves search engine optimization, which has proven to be a key lead generating factor for new business. Following are some highlights from a post from my social media mentor, Michael Gass.
How new business is being acquired for companies is currently undergoing a paradigm shift; instead of pursuing clients, it’s now more important for your prospective clients to find your company.
Blogs make their search easier.
2011 HubSpot ROI Study
In a recent 2011 HubSpot ROI Study, 69% of businesses surveyed said that blogging attributed to their lead generation success. The study also found that 75% of businesses believed SEO was a primary factor. The study shows companies that blog attract 55% more website visitors than non-blogging companies.
Blogs generate far more visitors by:
o Search visibility – blogs are organized to be search engine friendly. Plus the more content you have (well-linked), the more chances there are of attracting search traffic.
o Click-through traffic – through posting interesting articles a blog gives a reason for other people to link to you.
o Repeat traffic – regularly updated content and comments bring visitors back… and back… and back. Most company websites are not conducive to repeat traffic, particularly if your website hasn’t been updated in 5 years.
o Personality – create a blog around your company’s culture and let your personality shine through. People will be attracted to you. People like to associate with people they like. It’s hard to make friends with a business, but easy to warm to an individual with a welcoming personality.
o Viral effects – you create something cool and visitors tell their friends, who tell their friends… and so on.
o Authority/credibility – blogging allows you to become an expert in the minds of your prospective clients.
Company Website | Blog
Your company’s website functions well as an online brochure, a place for your credentials and credibility. A website doesn’t have the potential that a company blog has for significant online traffic and to provide prospects a reason to visit often. A blog can be the gateway to your company. Through content marketing, focused toward a specific target audience, a company’s blog can become a great lead generation tool for new business.
Your company’s website is about YOU, but your blog should be about THEM. Blogging keeps you focused on what is important to your prospective clients. It forces you to speak to their benefit instead of your company’s products and capabilities. Blog content, if developed correctly, will have more appeal to your prospective client audience because it is focused on their marketing needs and challenges.
by tradesmeninsights | Oct 19, 2011 | Marketing Tools, Social Marketing
To listen to all the “experts” Google+ is the next best thing to come down the pike and will eventually replace Facebook in the B-to-B space. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but since they opened it up to the public a few weeks ago, there are over 50 million users and it’s growing everyday.
I have to believe that if Google is involved then it has a pretty good chance of succeeding. I’ve been on it and have started building my circles, but have yet to fully understand all the ways we can use it.
I recently read an excellent post by Debbie Hemley in Social Media Examiner, 20 Ways to Improve Your Google+ Knowledge that I thought was very helpful. She gives tips on how to get through the basics and highlights ways that you can use it in everyday B-to-B applications from setting up your circle to creating your profile, setting up notifications, plus much more. Here are some highlights that I found interesting:
- Engage and learn – go to Google+ tips on Twitter and see what others are saying and dive in.
- Watch and learn – look at Google+ help and watch videos from people who created it.
- Set up Google Sparks account– that way you can get the latest developments on what’s new.
- Create a cheat sheet – to help you format and utilize hotkeys until you become more familiar.
- Show off your Google profile – by putting it on your blog or website.
- Go mobile – make sure you get the mobile app so you can use it from your phone.
So I’d like to know if you’re on Google+ and if so, what are your thoughts?
by tradesmeninsights | Oct 18, 2011 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tools, Marketing Trends, Traditional Marketing
I recently spoke with Scott Chapin from Circle 44 Mobile, a division of DigiKnow who is a strategic partner of ours, on how and why manufacturers should be using QR codes in their everyday marketing efforts.
Scott covers not only why they should use them, but gives some practical advice and best practices for those thinking of using them. If your end users are mobile, and most professional tradesmen are, then you need to listen to this informative interview.
Click here to listen.
If you like this post you may like:
What are you Doing to Insure a Successful QR Code Campaign?
Manufacturers: Are you Taking Advantage of QR Codes?
by tradesmeninsights | Oct 13, 2011 | Marketing Tips, Marketing Tools, Traditional Marketing
Alternative energy is a growth market and we decided to do an overview of what’s available for those thinking of getting into this market.
The market overview gives a quick snapshot of the industry, the industry players and industry trends. Driven by the agency’s existing knowledge and additional research, content was compiled into a basic overview of the growing alternative energy market.
This market overview highlights a vast amount of information on the alternative energy industry, from industry trends and issues to information on various types of renewable energy. The overview also features information on training firms and certification organizations, codes and standards, and offers online resources, websites, trade shows and trade publications in each individual market.
To sign up to receive a copy of the Alternative Energy market overview, or any of our other market overviews, click here.
by tradesmeninsights | Sep 14, 2011 | Marketing Tools, Social Marketing, Traditional Marketing
Contractors are busy people and they rely more and more on devices that they can use in the field. Between smartphones, tablets and even internet cards for your laptop, you had better have a mobile strategy either in place or on the drawing board or you will be missing opportunities to communicate and connect with your audience.
No one could sum it up any better than Noah Elkin, eMarketer principal analyst for mobile, “The rapid expanding smartphone and mobile internet user populations raise the stakes for marketers and make mobile web more of an imperative than ever.”
Here are some facts you need to consider:
- Almost 100 million consumers will be on the mobile web this year
- Smartphones represent 38% of mobile users this year
- In 2010, 96% of all tablets were iPads (15 million)
According to Bill Siwicki, managing editor of Mobile Commerce, The up-and-coming web programming language HTML5 enables developers to create mobile web sites that are more like apps, and to create apps that require little modification to operate on a variety of mobile operating systems. However, an HTML5-based app can’t do everything an app written specifically for Apple’s iOS or Google’s Android can, he adds.
So the question is, what’s your plan? Don’t miss out on an opportunity to touch and engage your audience.
Here are some other posts that might be relevant:
Mobile Marketing to the Professional Tradesman: What Are You Waiting For?
56 Mobile Marketing Facts
by tradesmeninsights | Sep 8, 2011 | Marketing Tools, Social Marketing
Social media is measurable. Isn’t that the mantra everyone talks about? I think everyone would agree that social media is a little easier to get your hands around as to where the lead originated as opposed to traditional media. I sometimes think there’s too much info out there.
Social has several tools to help you measure and monitor your activities and hopefully help you take action. My question is collecting data is one thing, but what you do with it (or not) makes all the difference.
Are you looking at where your referral sources are? Are they from groups on LinkedIn that you belong to or from places like Stumbleupon? If they are coming through search, which engines are picking you up? What key words/phrases are being used?
emarketer.com recently had a post on How Social Media Marketers Can Make the Most out of Monitoring Tools that I thought was interesting. They cited a June 2011 study by RSW/US and Web Liquid of Senior Marketers. Not surprising, Google Alert was the most popular tool being used by them. It was good to see that marketers were indeed using these monitoring tools to take some sort of action. See the chart below.
Tracking is the first step, but it needs to be followed by actions. What are you doing with your social info?
