Thursday, 22 January 2015

How good are the digital marketing capabilities for your business?

We think it’s really helpful for companies to review their current capabilities so that they can compare to competitors and then create a roadmap for where they need to prioritise for digital transformation.
Our Digital Excellence capability framework will help you review how effectively your digital marketing is managed across seven key areas:
  • A. Your Strategic approach
  • B. Evaluation and performance improvement process
  • C. Management buy-in to investment in digital marketing
  • D. Resourcing and structure for digital including integration
  • E. Data and infrastructure or platforms
  • F. Integrated customer communications across Paid-Owned-Earned media
  • G. Integrated customer experiences across desktop and mobile devices

Tuesday, 20 January 2015

Small Business Internet Marketing Tips

Looking for some basic Internet marketing tips for your small business? While there are hundreds of suggestions we can make, here’s a list of 10 tips that we think 90% of small business owners will find useful.
1. In the words of Ron Simon, “What the hell are you trying to do?” What is the goal of your website? Ultimately, it should be to drive more business, but how exactly will it do that? Start with one goal – such as increasing the number of phone calls – and branch out from there. It’s important to set goals, but it’s just as important to come up with a system for measuring those goals.
Website content is king2. Evaluate your website’s content – Content is King. What does your website say? Is the content unique and useful? Will people learn anything when they visit your site? When was the last time you added new content? Does your website have content worth reading? Does your content match your business goals?
3. The tag.</strong> Visit your website. Look at the very top of your browser window. What do you see? Does it describe the page you’re looking at? Is it a unique description? Does it contain the keywords you want people to associate with that page of your website? If you’re a local business, does it contain your key local search keywords? If you can’t answer ‘yes’ to all these questions, check out this article <a href="http://www.highrankings.com/allabouttitles" target="_blank">all about title tags</a>.</p> <p> <strong>4. Call tracking and analytics.</strong> You can’t improve upon what you can’t measure. Analytics provide a tremendous amount of incredibly useful data, such as where your website visitors come from, how long they stay, and what they do on your site. <a href="http://www.google.com/analytics/">Google analytics</a> is free and pretty darn good, and we recommend it. We also recommend you make sure you can track every lead that’s generated by your website.</p> <p> If you don’t have a dedicated phone number for the website that you can track calls on, visit <a href="http://www.hostednumbers.com" target="_blank">HostedNumbers.com</a>. They’ll issue you a unique tracking phone number and then forward every call you get to your main number while tracking the number of calls you receive, who called, how long the call lasted…etc. It’s surprisingly inexpensive.</p> <p> <strong>5. Take advantage of free local business directories.</strong> There are a few great local business directories that are completely free. Visit <a href="http://getlisted.org/" target="_blank">GetListed.org</a>, enter your business information, then take a moment to submit your business info to each of the directories shown.</p> <p> Additionally, we do not typically recommend paying for directory placements…we suggest starting with the free listings and then seeing how it goes.</p> <p> <strong>6. Check out your competition.</strong> Visit your competitors’ websites. Do searches for keywords related to your business. Find out what others in your vertical are doing and saying. This is a great way to get ideas and take stock of your own company’s online marketing efforts.</p> <p style="text-align: center;"> <img class="aligncenter" title="Ugly puppy dog" alt="Does this dog look ugly to you?" src="http://sporkmarketing.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/ugly-baby.jpg" align="middle" height="281" width="200"><br> <em>Does this dog look ugly to you?</em></p> <p> <strong>7. Repeat after me – “I have an ugly baby.”</strong> A lot of business owners love their websites, but the first step to improving your website is to admit that it has some deficiencies. No website is perfect, and every website can use improvement. <em>If you have a website, you have an ugly baby</em> [sorry]. Just how ugly your website is, however, is open to discussion.</p> <p> <strong>8. Start blogging.</strong> Every business, and we mean <em>every</em> business, has something to gain by blogging regularly. The list of benefits is long, but here’s a <a href="http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/1676/6-Reasons-Every-Small-Business-Should-Be-Blogging-Are-You-Missing-the-Boat.aspx">short list of reasons small businesses should blog</a>.</p> <p> <strong>9. Post online video.</strong> Video is still a little cutting-edge for some, but the benefits can’t be understated. Online video is the wave of the future, and every business needs to have something on YouTube, Metacafe, etc. If you’re concerned about expense here, keep in mind there are some low-budget options that won’t damage your brand while still providing concrete benefits.</p> <p> <strong>10. Read as much as you can.</strong> There are hundreds of resources online rife with excellent marketing advice. Some of our favorites include:</p> <ul> <li><a href="http://www.seomoz.org/beginners-guide-to-seo" target="_blank">The SEOMoz Beginner’s Guide to SEO</a> – If you <em>really</em> take the time to learn the information given, you’ll know as much about SEO as most people in the marketing/advertising industry.</li> <li><a href="http://www.seomoz.org/blog/the-complete-guide-to-link-building-with-local-events" target="_blank">The Complete Guide to Link Building with Local Events</a> – An excellent blog post explaining why <em>every</em> local small business owner should invest in small business marketing.</li> <li><a href="http://www.reelseo.com/online-video-101-for-small-business/" target="_blank">Online Video 101 for Small Businesses</a> – This is a free eBook that makes a great intro to marketing your business with online video.</li> <li><a href="http://mashable.com/2011/04/14/small-business-social-media-tips/" target="_blank">6 Effective Small Business Social Media Strategies</a> – There’s simply too much to talk about when it comes to social media, but this post is a good intro…reading Mashable.com’s <a href="http://mashable.com/social-media/" target="_blank">Social Media news category</a> is a great way to learn as well.</li> </ul> </div>

3 Expert Tips for Achieving Hypergrowth in Online Marketing

ore than 40 percent of the world’s population is now online. As that number grows exponentially, so do the success metrics for consumer startups. Investor Chris Dixon famously blogged that “10 million is the new one million” when it comes to user numbers.
However getting users is more difficult than ever, with multiple devices, operating systems and screens competing for people’s increasingly fragmented attention. It can feel impossible for a young startup to thrive when you couple that with incumbents like Facebook and Twitter that can well afford to spend lavishly on user acquisition ads and incentives.\
Enter Maud Pasturaud, a startup vet who has helped grow commerce companies like Gilt Group and new mobile powerhouse Secret. She is an expert on growth and has three vital tips to hitting it big.

SEO & SMO Internet Marketing

Based in Noida, I provide internet marketing and SEO consultation for clients nationwide. Whether you’re a Fortune 5 eCommerce retailer or a single brick and mortar store, my expertise gets you more business. I provide marketing mixes tailored for your business goals, resulting in authentic and authoritative web presences. Contact me to take the first step towards a more profitable online business. James River in Richmond, VA My favorite place on the pokhara My specialty is in organic search (SEO), which delivers the greatest return on investment, branding, web traffic, and long-lasting results. I also do paid search, content strategy, social media marketing, and email marketing to complete the inbound marketing picture. Once traffic reaches a site, I optimize for conversions to turn prospects into customers; whether this is a purchase or a lead. No matter your business goals, market niche, and level of competition, I can craft, execute, measure and refine strategies that make a real difference to your bottom line. What sets me apart from agencies? It’s simple. My consultation is in part to teach you how to maintain and further your web presence. This enables you and your team to take the strategies I develop and run with them, in-house. My business is to help your business; not to rack up retainer clients (which is often unnecessary).