by tradespeopleinsights | Jun 2, 2009 | Marketing Tools, Social Marketing
For any of us who write a blog, you know it’s a major time commitment especially if you’re going to do it right. Some of you may only have 30 minutes or so each day and you really want to put out a good post. My audience are the manufacturers who sell to the professional tradesman and they know they need to get straight to the punch line in order to keep their attention. My main advice is to be consistent and keep the quality of your post high. Here are 4 guidelines I like to use to make sure I keep myself on track:
- Do at least one original post a week. Since a blog is about your opinion, then let’s make sure that you have one.
- Content over Frequency.We’re not in a marathon to see who can write the most posts. It’s what you say that’s important.
- KISS. Keep it simple. One key topic per post. Deliver the goods in the first paragraph (what’s in in for me).
- Keep it Short. The best and yet the hardest writing sometimes are those short, to-the-point sentences using just the right words.
These are on my checklist. What’s on yours?
by tradespeopleinsights | Jun 1, 2009 | Marketing Tools, Social Marketing, Twitter
I’m sure we all have stories of customer service experiences both good and bad. I’d bet you’ve had more bad than good experiences though. For manufacturers who sell to the professional tradesmen, these are even more challenging. Think about it for a minute, when do these guys have questions/problems? Usually it’s on a job site or out in the shop where they may or may not have access to a computer. If they do call, they may be on hold for what seems like an eternity and still not get an answer to their question.
You need to think outside the box. Twitter is an ideal tool to service your customers. Customer service departments are supposed to solve problems, reinforce a positive brand experience and not cost you an arm and leg to support.
- While phone calls may solve the problem, wait times do not. Twitter is almost instantaneous and can help solve most problems quickly.
- Brand experience. Great customer service gets talked about and can lead to more sales.
- Economical. Using Twitter often takes less time thus saving money.
Once you have an understanding of how Twitter can work, you can also easily track and monitor what people are saying about your brand.
Tweetbeep-Keeps track of contractor conversations that mention you.
Monitter-Lets you monitor the Twitter world for a set of key words and watches what people are saying about you.
Let contractors know how to know you’re there. Ask users to follow you on Twitter. Place a button on your web site in the customer service section so they know they can contact you in another manner.
Respond quickly and transparently. When you find a tradesman complaining about an issue, @reply them asking if you can help. If the problem is sensitive or the customer is highly upset, you can either direct a message to them or give them a quick way to contact you directly (direct line or your email).
Be engaged in the conversations. Twitter is a conversational platform. Contractors like to talk. This is an opportunity to build your brand.
Be authentic. Contractors are no dummies and if you try to pull the wool over their eyes, it will come back to bite you.
Twitter and social media are helping the way customer service is done. Think outside the box. Wouldn’t you want to be the first in your line of work to offer this as an optional customer service tool?
by tradespeopleinsights | May 29, 2009 | Marketing Tips, Social Marketing
Blogs, Forums, Twitter – are your brands or company being mentioned on any of these? If not, what are you going to do about it? Should you be joining the conversation? What are your competitors doing? Remember, those that start conversations often end up leading them.
I read an interesting post recently from Maria Pergolino, Social media: Signs your prospects want to hear from you, that I thought had some valid points to consider.
- People Talking about You. While this is the most obvious, when you do find those opportunities you need to start participating. Tools like Google and Twitter Search are good free tools to use to help identify opportunities.
- Friends on Parked Names. Sometimes companies reserve names (park) on social sites so no one else can get them, but aren’t active on the site other than some basic company info. While there, you might be attracting potential customers or editors even without putting content up. If this is the case, you’re missing opportunities.
- Someone Speaking for your Brand. Sometimes people (many times they are customers) take over your name and start talking about your brand or product. Often these advocates share tips and tricks on how you can do your job better. Other times they may be complaining about a product, its features or even your customer service. Regardless, the conversations that are taking place indicates interest in your products. In either case, you should know that you’re being talked about, and in the case of the customer who is unhappy, you should try to come to the root of his problem.
- Name Squatting. This is where someone else beats you to your name (brand) on a social site. It may be someone who wants to profit from your name like one of your distributors, or it could be a competitor trying to lock you out of that particular market. If it’s someone using your name, you should monitor it (use a service) to make sure they aren’t saying anything negative about you. Whatever the reason, it should indicate to you that someone thinks it’s important enough to capture your name.
In Social media, they’re going to talk about you whether you’re listening or not. Don’t stick your head in the sand and ignore them.
by tradespeopleinsights | May 28, 2009 | Marketing Tools
Professional tradesmen are just as busy as the rest of us and they need to know, what’s in it for them? My experience working with marketing departments is that they are in the features/benefits mode most of the time and have a difficult time adjusting to writing online. In order to write effectively, you must understand how people read on the web.
And how do users read on the web? The answer is, they don’t...they scan.
Nielsen Norman Group’s research found that 79 percent of their test users always scanned any new page they came across; only 16 percent read word-by-word.
For your company’s blog to be effective, your text must be scannable. Jakob Nielsen offers this advice:
- highlighted key words (hypertext links serve as one form of highlighting; typeface variations and color are others)
- meaningful sub-headings (not “clever” ones)
- bulleted lists
- one idea per paragraph (users will skip over any additional ideas if they are not caught by the first few words in the paragraph)
- the inverted pyramid style, starting with the conclusion
- half the word count (or less) than conventional writing
Nielsen’s research also found that users detested “marketese”; the promotional writing style with boastful claims. I’ve often said that the moment you start to sell on your company’s blog is when you will lose your audience.
You need to understand how people read on the web and learn to write for them effectively. Go to Jakob Nielsen’s web site and read this paper. If you look at the top blogs, you’ll find they follow Nielsen’s style guidelines remarkably well. How Users Read on the Web
by tradespeopleinsights | May 27, 2009 | Marketing Trends
I know you’re convinced that your product or service is the best solution to a tradesman’s problem. According to a recent post in B2B marketing online, a new study from Enquiro Research shows that 99% of B-to-B buying is about CYA. If business buying is driven more by risk adversion, then you need to address those and take the risks out.
This puts a different light on how to approach these buyers to improve your conversion rates. Here’s a summary of some of their suggestions:
- Understand Business Buyer Risk. To improve conversion rates, it’s essential to understand the extent to which your company and its products or services may be perceived by your target buyers. From the eyes of the buyers, where do you stack up: are you a major player in the market or a new entry?
- Become an “Approved Vendor.” If you’re not the 800# gorilla in the market, you have an uphill battle. You could have the most brilliant marketing strategy, were able to get in to see the right people and even demo the product, but you don’t get the order. Reason – we got a better deal from our existing vendor or we went with an approved vendor. One way to address this is champion a teaser offer, e.g. 60-day trial period.
- Use Search Marketing to drive Word-of-Mouth. Enquiro research suggests that word-of-mouth can be hugely influential in the buying process, especially in those cases where the buyer has no previous experience in that product category. Search marketing is a powerful tool for getting your message in front of prospects.
- Personalized messages to different targets. Make each landing page, e-newsletter or offer as relevant as possible to the target. To increase conversions: match prospects with happy customers that came from similar risk profiles. Also consider linking to customer reviews.
What are you doing to improve conversions to sales?
by tradespeopleinsights | May 26, 2009 | Marketing Tips
One of the great things about social media and blogs in particular is you can almost instantly see how you’re doing in the world of blogging. Most programs like WordPress have monitoring devices built in. You can see what’s hot and what’s not. You can monitor what sites are sending you traffic and what key words are doing their job.
While it’s nice to know these things, don’t get obsessed with them. Darren Rowse from Problogger had a post recently, 17 statistics to monitor on your blog, that you might find helpful. Here are a few that I think are important:
- Overall visitors. Are they increasing or decreasing?
- Most popular posts. Gives you direction for future posts.
- Referral stats. What sites are sending you traffic? If it’s another blog, maybe you should develop a relationship with them.
- Questions from Readers. This gives you a good indication of topics for future posts.
- Key Words. Which are generating the most traffic?
- Bounce rates. How many people go to your site and then click off ? You need to make your site sticky so people stay on it.
Remember, stats are good monitoring tools, but make sure you take that info to improve your content because ultimately, if you listen to your audience, your readership and pass along will increase naturally.
