Monica McKitterick: Remarkable Business Model Success
Discover how Monica McKitterick, Founder of Impact Family Wellness, went from 23 patients to over 1,000 and counting. Get ready to be inspired by this champion!
Welcome back to our Champion Series, where we continue to showcase inspiring stories of exceptional individuals who have made a significant impact in the world of business and entrepreneurship through their determination, creativity, and resilience. In this edition, we are thrilled to introduce you to Monica McKitterick, the Founder of Direct Primary Care (DPC), an innovative healthcare model that focuses on building personal relationships with patients and providing personalized care.
Monica started her journey with just 23 patients and has since grown her practice to over 1,000 patients and counting! After spending a decade in the insurance-based system, Monica decided to take matters into her own hands and establish a healthcare model that prioritizes quality care, transparent pricing, and exceptional service. In our exclusive interview, Monica shares her tips on growing her practice and the challenges she has overcome along the way.
Get ready to be inspired by Monica’s story, as she discusses her experiences as a healthcare leader, the benefits of the Direct Primary Care model, and her commitment to revolutionizing the healthcare system. Join us as we uncover the remarkable journey of Monica McKitterick, a true champion in the world of healthcare and patient-centered care. 😊 #champions
Monica McKitterick, Founder of Direct Primary Care
Can you tell us a little about your business and how you got started?
I was done with the cattle call of typical healthcare and knew there was a better way. Realized by cutting out the insurance company we can provide amazing care at affordable prices. Our members love our care.
What have been some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced as a business owner and leader?
The lack of knowledge of our healthcare model is our biggest struggle.
How have you been able to overcome those challenges and continue to grow your business?
Networking, speaking to groups, getting involved in the community
What advice would you give to other business owners who are facing similar challenges?
Don’t expect everyone you meet to need your product or service. Be authentic and listen and they will share your product or service with someone who does need it.
Can you share a specific piece of data that you are proud of and why?
I started with 23 patients when I opened my doors 4 years ago and now have over 1150 patients and 4 full time employees
How have you leveraged the local community to support and grow your business?
Word of mouth and community support has been our best marketing plan. Without our amazing community we would not be where we are today.
In your opinion, how can businesses best combine online and offline strategies to reach and engage customers effectively?
It’s all about relationships and building them on and offline. Providing a solution to someone’s problem is the key to engagement.
Finally, what does being a community champion mean to you?
Being involved in the community means everything to me. I’ve never lived in such a supportive area and wouldn’t be where I am today without it. As I continue to grow my business into neighboring cities I look forward to growing the community and learning about the business owners around me.
🥳 Monica’s success story is just amazing! Congrats on your success!
About Impact Family Wellness:
After spending 10 years in the insurance based system, our founder, Monica McKitterick, had had enough of it. Seeing 30+ patients a day and spending 3-5 minutes with them was simply not why she went into health care. Direct Primary Care allows us to spend 30-60 minutes with patients to ensure we understand their health and wellness goals. Offering care via text/phone to make care convenient, efficient, and avoid lost time and money is one of the benefits we love best! Keeping care affordable and having transparent prices as well as offering exceptional care are just a few ways Impact Family Wellness is helping to revolutionize the healthcare system.
Sound too good to be true?
Schedule a free in office meet and we will show you how healthcare was meant to be!
MFG is a demand generation agency that specializes in identifying and creating growth opportunities for businesses. We understand that many companies engage in marketing efforts but often struggle to develop a solid marketing strategy and accurately measure the value of their campaigns. This can lead to disappointing ROI and dwindling motivation.
At MFG, we work closely with brands to generate leads and drive sales through targeted, data-driven marketing strategies. Our expertise in demand generation ensures that your marketing efforts yield tangible results, empowering your business to thrive in today’s competitive landscape. With MFG, you can be confident that your marketing investments are working effectively, fueling your business’s growth and long-term success.
The Trailblazing Journey of Julia McCoy, President of Content at Scale
Prepare to be inspired by Julia’s story, as she discusses her experience as a business leader, the powerful impact of AI on the content marketing landscape, and the ways in which she has harnessed innovation and technology to drive success. We invite you to join us in uncovering the remarkable journey of Julia McCoy, a true champion in the world of digital marketing and AI-driven solutions.
Welcome to this special edition of our Champion Series, where we celebrate inspiring stories of exceptional individuals who have navigated the world of business and entrepreneurship with determination, creativity, and resilience. In this feature, we’re excited to introduce you to Julia McCoy, the President of Content at Scale – an AI-driven content marketing platform that’s revolutionizing the industry.
As a successful entrepreneur, bestselling author, and former owner of a 100-person writing agency, Julia has had an incredible journey. She has now taken the reins at Content at Scale, playing a pivotal role in the company’s exponential growth and embracing the world of AI with open arms. In this exclusive interview, Julia shares her insights on overcoming challenges, building a high-traffic website, and leveraging AI to revolutionize content marketing.
Prepare to be inspired by Julia’s story, as she discusses her experience as a business leader, the powerful impact of AI on the content marketing landscape, and the ways in which she has harnessed innovation and technology to drive success. We invite you to join us in uncovering the remarkable journey of Julia McCoy, a true champion in the world of digital marketing and AI-driven solutions. 😊 #champions
Julia Mccoy, President of Content at Scale
Can you tell us a little about your business and how you got started?
I’m the President of Content at Scale, the leading AI writer in SEO content marketing. I come from ten years of entrepreneurship, as an author of 9 bestselling books and the former owner of a 100-person writing agency. In January 2023, I accepted a role as VP of Marketing at Content at Scale after finding it a perfect fit for my skills, and realizing I needed to learn AI content and join an active role so I could continue to stay active as a practitioner, not just a coach (I coach/teach at Content Hacker.) I moved into President of Content at Scale on April 1 of 2023. It’s been a wild and exhilarating ride in a company that is literally one of the fastest-growing ones in its space. AI is exploding, and I’m here to fully adopt and be a part of the ride!
What have been some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced as a business owner and leader?
Coming into Content at Scale and immediately taking leadership and ownership of my job role, I realized how vital it was that we keep our innovative founder, Justin McGill, busy on the software side. For industry leaders especially, marketing must never come ahead of your products or services. You MUST stay in stride with developing a show-stopping product that truly solves customer needs. Our marketing goals are heavy on SEO and inbound, because we know the value this brings. Our big goal is to hit 100,000 unique visits a day with our website – we’re at 20,000/day, so we’re able to approach that number rapidly because of our accelerated content marketing and SEO campaign, fueled by our own AI writer. Typically, content creation is the biggest bottleneck to achieving high-traffic websites built through 100s of pieces of content. How do you hire the writer? Where do you find them? How do you train them? How do you keep them? …All of that is solved now, with AI.
How have you been able to overcome those challenges and continue to grow your business?
Since coming in, I’m delighted to say that Justin’s time is back to being 90% involved and focused on the product side – and we’re on track to launch new features and platform updates that will significantly increase the impact and results our AI writer has in terms of quality, research, and depth (which is the main reason I came onboard Content at Scale – the quality of the proprietary AI product that Justin built is truly incredible, it writes with better flow and intellect/research capabilities than I ever could!). And regarding our content and inbound marketing goals, we’re on track to publish 100 pieces/month, because we’re relying on our AI writer to produce the content. We’re able to reduce the cost and time that content marketing would normally take by about 10x, and publish 100 pieces/month with just two writers. It’s unbelievable to live in these times and have the opportunity to use AI to grow our marketing and traffic opportunities so rapidly.
What advice would you give to other business owners who are facing similar challenges?
Want to grow a high-traffic site? Your bottleneck WILL BE content creation… but you can remove that by switching to AI. I built a model I call AIO that shows how you can re-route your writers to be much more effective as content ‘optimizers’, using AI to save HOURS of time and write the baseline draft. Here’s a guide on the AIO model I built: https://contentatscale.ai/aio-model/.
Can you share a specific piece of data that you are proud of and why?
Our users produce 40 MILLION words per MONTH with our AI long-form writing software. They’re using our AI writer to build the crux of what their SEO campaigns need to succeed; to reach more visitors and leads and publish more value-based content, and grow their business revenue. I’m incredibly proud to lead marketing and innovative next steps for a company making this much of an imprint in content marketing.
How have you leveraged the local community to support and grow your business?
Jessica and Marketing for Greatness has been an incredible resource for me to continue to connect with local business owners, innovators, entrepreneurs, podcast hosts, you-name-it! Showing up to her events, attending her dinner parties, has been a big accelerator for not just my personal growth, but business contacts, too. I cannot recommend her networking events enough. Find yourself a networking queen and go attend all of the events!!!
In your opinion, how can businesses best combine online and offline strategies to reach and engage customers effectively?
Combine your brick-and-mortar presence with a powerful online brand. Make your website the vehicle for your online sales, traffic, and revenue by hiring the best of the best to turn it into a real engine (don’t settle for a quick Wix website – hire Alex and Jessica at Marketing for Greatness, and turn it into a conversion-optimized, real vehicle for success!). The difference in NOT combining the two (for example, not investing in a great website that’s built to earn SEO traffic and revenue) – is you’ll miss out on a TON of revenue. With over 7 billion Google searches happening per day, you owe it to your customers to be online.
Finally, what does being a community champion mean to you?
Showing up and serving with an open, vulnerable heart for the people you can help. When you don’t show up with a true sense of care and love, being a champion is name-only without deep and genuine meaning. But when you show up fully capable of and ready to care for the people you serve (and that can be anyone: your kids, your family, clients, audience, local community members) – you are a true community champion. For example – through conversations that led to questions about what I do, where I was open to giving away my knowledge, I’ve ended up sharing many of my books and even frameworks and pathways to income with local schoolteachers, PTA moms looking for income, churchgoers, and many other people that were looking for real solutions to problems I knew how to solve. I believe that skilled entrepreneurs and executives are an incredible asset to their local community, if they show up prepared to be vulnerable and share their heart and skills with the community they’re in. We need more of them.
🥳 Julia is truly an inspiration for many! Congrats on your success!
About Content at Scale:
We’re the first-ever content marketing AI automation platform built to scale content marketing without losing quality. Our system researches topics before it writes. With over 40 million research-backed words produced per month by our users, our platform is BETTER than human writers.
MFG is a demand generation agency that specializes in identifying and creating growth opportunities for businesses. We understand that many companies engage in marketing efforts but often struggle to develop a solid marketing strategy and accurately measure the value of their campaigns. This can lead to disappointing ROI and dwindling motivation.
At MFG, we work closely with brands to generate leads and drive sales through targeted, data-driven marketing strategies. Our expertise in demand generation ensures that your marketing efforts yield tangible results, empowering your business to thrive in today’s competitive landscape. With MFG, you can be confident that your marketing investments are working effectively, fueling your business’s growth and long-term success.
Ai Marketing is here. Learn how we’re using it to help small business owners.
Hello! As a marketing leader, I am constantly on the lookout for innovative tools that can help businesses succeed. That’s why I’m excited to share with you our agency’s approach to AI marketing.
After much consideration of the various AI tools currently available, we have adopted a 50-50 approach to AI marketing. While we believe that robots can take over the world, we also recognize the importance of human involvement in marketing. We see AI marketing as similar to Tesla’s autonomous driving technology, where a human driver is still required to provide oversight. At our agency, we want our clients to know the tools we use to build and monetize their brands.
In this article, I am thrilled to explore the evolution of AI in digital marketing, the benefits of using 50Fifty Ai Marketing for businesses, and who can benefit from our brand-new packages.
So, let’s dive in!
What is AI Marketing?
You might be wondering, what exactly is AI marketing? By definition, marketing is the activity or business of promoting and selling products or services, including market research and advertising. AI marketing takes this definition one step further, by leveraging artificial intelligence technologies to optimize the efficiency of how marketing tasks are done.
Put simply, AI marketing allows digital marketers to do their jobs more easily and accurately. By automating certain tasks and processes that humans need to do manually, AI marketing helps teams work faster and provide better results for clients. This allows marketers to focus on tasks that require more human input, like developing creative strategies and customized experiences.
At Marketing for Greatness, we’re a digital marketing agency that specializes in demand generation using SEO and social media. With AI marketing tools, we’re able to expand our offerings and provide even more value to our clients.
Can AI Marketing Work For You?
If you’re considering using AI marketing for your business, it’s important to note that while current AI word processing models like ChatGPT and other AI content generators can generate content, they may not be accurate in terms of optimizing it for search engines. That’s why we continue to use our premium tools for market analysis and keyword research in our SEO tasks.
However, we have incorporated AI tools into other content marketing tasks, such as generating catchy headlines, producing long-form content outlines, and creating short product and service descriptions. Additionally, we have used AI to generate branding guides, social media calendars, social media posts, and even creative assets like logos, business cards, and promo items. Our team has put in hundreds of hours of work to craft AI-generated models, allowing us to offer AI marketing to our clients.
AI marketing can certainly work for your business, especially if you want to have a digital transformation almost overnight. However, there are situations where AI marketing may have limitations, such as when building a trademark or claiming copyrights.
For instance, the US Copyright Office only considers an AI-generated work copyrightable if a human can prove they themselves put a meaningful amount of creative effort into the final content. Digital art, poems, and books generated using tools like DALL-E, Stable Diffusion, Midjourney, ChatGPT, or even the newly released GPT-4 will not be protected by copyright if they were created by humans using only a text description or prompt, according to US Copyright Office Director Shira Perlmutter.
In other words, it’s important to be aware of how your marketing is being generated and how it is being picked up by search engines. AI marketing can be a powerful tool, but it may not be suitable for crafting your next bestseller novel or creating a patented product.
Introducing 50Fifty AI Branding & Website
We’re thrilled to announce the launch of our latest innovation: 50Fifty Ai Branding & Website. We’re using a set of AI tools with our unique library of marketing prompts to streamline the web development process and create stunning websites that deliver results.
Our AI algorithms work to analyze user behavior and optimize the design of both your brand and your website. With 50Fifty Ai Website, you’ll get a uniquely crafted website that not only looks great, but is also user-friendly and intuitive. We know that a website is often the first point of contact between a business and its customers, which is why we believe it’s crucial to have a website that delivers a great user experience.
50Fifty Ai Website also allows for faster development times and lower costs compared to traditional website development methods. This means that you can have a professional website up and running in no time, without breaking the bank.
But don’t worry – our team of web developers and designers are still involved in the process. We believe that human input is still crucial for creating a website that truly reflects your brand and engages with your customers. Our AI tools work alongside our team’s expertise to provide the best of both worlds – efficient, AI-driven development with a human touch. And with our focus on demand generation strategies and SEO, you can be sure that your website is designed with lead generation in mind.
Traditional Branding & Website vs AI
To give you a better idea of how are we using AI marketing, let’s compare a 100% human-based project vs a 50-50 AI Marketing.
We offer custom demand generation campaigns that are tailored to each client’s unique needs. Under our traditional model, the process of building a website looks like this:
Our brand strategist creates a visibility strategy
Our SEO specialists conduct keyword research
A content marketing plan is created and discussed with the client
SEO experts create “wireframes” or outlines for the content writers
Content writers produce the content
The project is sent to web developers, who take care of the visual elements of the website, such as the layout and design, and build the site using coding languages like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript
The final product is reviewed by our team and the client, and necessary changes are made before launching the site
We then perform a quality control revision, get approval from the client, and launch the site
Once the site is launched, SEO specialists configure it for technical and on-page SEO
Duration: 3-4 months
Team size: 6
Under our AI model, the process is more streamlined and efficient:
Our AI strategist builds a chat persona for the brand
Our brand strategist creates a visibility strategy
Our SEO specialists conduct keyword research
The chat persona is used to generate a holistic content marketing plan, which includes everything the brand needs
AI content writers produce the content and our writers review it
Once the content is approved by the client, the project is ready for the AI website
AI web developers take care of the visual elements of the website, such as the layout and design, and build the site using coding languages like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript
The final product is reviewed by our team and the client, and necessary changes are made before launching the site
We then perform a quality control revision, get approval from the client, and launch the site
Once the site is launched, SEO specialists configure it for technical and on-page SEO.
Duration: 1-2 months
Team size: 2-3
Our AI tools can assist with tasks like generating outlines and producing content, allowing our team to focus on the more creative aspects of website building, such as design and strategy. This approach not only saves time and resources but also delivers results that are just as effective as our traditional model.
With 50Fifty AI Branding & Website, we’ve taken our commitment to providing customized solutions to the next level. Our AI algorithms analyze user behavior and optimize website design to create a unique and user-friendly website that delivers results. And our team of web developers and designers work alongside our AI tools to provide the best of both worlds – efficient, AI-driven development with a human touch for SEO and Lead Generation Strategies.
AI Marketing Allows Us To Do More Events In Our Community
As the founder of Marketing for Greatness, I’ve been hosting business networking events in Austin for the past six years, and they’ve all been sold out! With our AI marketing services, our agency can be more efficient, and I get to work on my passion: connecting people!
Event marketing is a great fit for clients who want to see how customers interact with their products or services. Whether you’re a restaurant, or medical office, or you provide beauty services, home improvement services, or anything in between, we can create a tailored experience that engages with your target audience.
So if you’re looking to create a buzz around your brand and drive engagement with your target audience, let’s have a conversation. Let us help you take your marketing efforts to the next level and create a truly unique experience for your customers.
Access College America: Empowering STEM Scholars with Record-Breaking Results
In this inspiring Champions feature, we introduce Dale Price, the visionary CEO of Access College America, a college planning agency that is changing the game for STEM-focused students. With record-breaking results, Dale’s expertise and strategic niche marketing have empowered countless scholars to pursue their dreams in prestigious colleges and universities.
We’re excited to share the remarkable success story of Dale Price, CEO of Access College America, and his transformative approach to college planning in our latest Champions feature. Based in Austin, Access College America is a nationwide college planning agency that specializes in helping STEM-focused students and their families conquer the college admissions process.
Access College America’s seniors have received nearly 400 college acceptances and secured over $6 million in scholarships—and they’re not stopping there! Access College America’s curriculum is more competitive than ever before, equipping students with the skills and knowledge they need to thrive in higher education.
Dale Price’s strategic niche marketing and dedication to STEM students have propelled Access College America to the forefront of the industry. Join us as we dive deeper into this inspiring Austin-based business leader’s journey, celebrate his achievements, and explore how his visionary approach has empowered countless students to pursue their dreams. #champions
Dale Price, MBA, Leading College Consultant
Can you tell us a little about your business and how you got started?
We’re celebrating six successful years of helping our scholars prepare, apply & achieve! We’re the highest-rated college admissions planning agency in the region with over 50 five-star reviews. We are coaches for STEM majors and now include test prep services in our packages.
Behind a successful company, is a successful leader.
Since 2006, Dale Price has established himself as a knowledgeable and reliable expert in the college preparation process. His background in admissions at a prestigious California-based institution has equipped him with unique insights into the world of higher education. Over the years, Dale has guided countless students and parents, helping them secure millions of dollars in scholarships and receive acceptances from top-tier colleges across the country.
Dale’s primary mission is to ensure that each scholar finds the perfect fit in a college, emphasizing the importance of showcasing their strengths and unique stories in the most competitive environments. While working with Access College America, parents can focus on parenting, trusting Dale and his team to act as the college knowledge experts.
With the ever-changing landscape of college preparation, Dale stays ahead of the curve, adapting to online and hybrid learning, test-optional policies, and the diverse needs of students. His personalized and empathetic approach caters to a wide range of students, including those with special needs, members of the LGBTQIA+ community, returning students, veterans, and traditional high school applicants.
Dale holds a Master in Business Administration degree from the University of Redlands and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology with a minor in government from the University of Texas, Austin. Among his various professional affiliations, he is the Former Scholarship Chair and Past President of Texas Exes, Los Angeles, a Professional Member of the Higher Education Consultants Association, an Associate Member of the Independent Educational Consultants Association, a Life Member of the Texas Exes, and an Ambassador for the Westlake Chamber of Commerce.
What have been some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced as a business owner in the Austin area?
In general, college consulting is a fairly new profession, but Austin happens to be a hyper-competitive marketplace. There must be well over 50 consulting practices in Austin. We are all different.
How have you been able to overcome those challenges and continue to grow your business?
Many groups are generalists and assist with all majors and areas of interests. We have a STEM specialty, and we’re extremely well versed on applications to other big state flagships. And that’s how families hear about us. Also, we are constantly creating partnerships in the community too. Our focus has always been on community reach, providing pro-bono programming for schools, libraries and various civic organizations.
What advice would you give to other business owners who are facing similar challenges?
Make sure you have a business plan, follow it and adjust it when necessary. We made several pivots during the pandemic and our business grew nearly 50%, and it hasn’t stopped growing since then either. Stay hyper-focused on your brand, poll your customers often, really understand the community you serve, and lead with service to others. The more you take, the less you’ll get. So give a lot, all the time.
Can you share a specific piece of data that you are proud of and why?
The proof is in the pudding! Our current seniors have received nearly 400 college acceptances and already have $6 million in scholarships pledged! We’re beating last year’s totals in both of these categories and the year isn’t over yet either. This is validation that in the most competitive application year, our scholars are beating the odds. And our curriculum is more competitive than it’s ever been before!
How have you leveraged the local community to support and grow your business?
We give back to our community through pro-bono programming, workshops, and talks. We are very active in local chambers, and sponsor sporting events and education foundations. Most recently we were the ‘Educator of the Year’ sponsor for the Westies, an annual event recognizing business leaders in the Westlake community.
In your opinion, how can businesses best combine online and offline strategies to reach and engage customers effectively?
In my experience, it’s crucial to engage the expertise of professionals in marketing to ensure that your business remains competitive and relevant. By hiring talent, like MFG Agency, you can focus on your core strengths and thought leadership while they work on complex online marketing strategies tailored to your business’s needs. I hired MFG Agency, and they have been instrumental in taking my business to the next level, allowing me to concentrate on providing the best possible service to my clients.
Finally, what does being a community champion mean to you?
A community champion makes an impact and leaves the people it serves better than when they found them.
🥳 Dale is truly an inspiration for many! Congrats on your success!
About Access College America
Our mission is to help our scholars prepare, apply & achieve!
Access College America is a comprehensive college planning service dedicated to providing personalized support and guidance for students and their families. Our expert college consultants work one-on-one with each scholar to ensure they receive the individual attention they need to thrive in the college admissions process. We understand that every student has unique needs and aspirations, which is why we create a cohesive, targeted package tailored to meet each scholar’s specific requirements.
From SAT/ACT preparation to college list building and essay guidance, Access College America is committed to equipping students with the tools and resources they need to succeed. Our goal is to help scholars navigate the often complex and overwhelming process of college admissions with confidence, empowering them to pursue their dreams and achieve their full potential. Head over to our website and check out our Free Downloadable Guides.
MFG is a demand generation agency that specializes in identifying and creating growth opportunities for businesses. We understand that many companies engage in marketing efforts but often struggle to develop a solid marketing strategy and accurately measure the value of their campaigns. This can lead to disappointing ROI and dwindling motivation.
At MFG, we work closely with brands to generate leads and drive sales through targeted, data-driven marketing strategies. Our expertise in demand generation ensures that your marketing efforts yield tangible results, empowering your business to thrive in today’s competitive landscape. With MFG, you can be confident that your marketing investments are working effectively, fueling your business’s growth and long-term success.
Redefining Success: From Dentistry to Happy and Human
Too many of us grew up only seeing one kind of pathway to succeed. But what happens when that pathway doesn’t feel right?
We have the honor of connecting with many brilliant leaders in our Austin community and we’ve highlighted some amazing stories in this new series- Champions!
We asked them our question of the month: In your opinion, how can businesses best combine online and offline strategies to reach and engage customers effectively?
We encourage you to check out the business leaders we’ve highlighted below, follow them on social media if you find their work or story interesting and celebrate their greatness #champions.
Dr. Seema Desai, Transformational Success Coach
Can you tell us a little about your business and how you got started?
I’m a recovering perfectionist and life coach, and my mission is to help outwardly-successful, overachieving women feel successful from the inside out. I was raised by hard-working, well-intentioned Indian immigrant parents to think that “success” meant being a doctor, making good money, and being married with kids. So I checked off all those boxes. I was “successful.” On the inside, I felt unfulfilled and stuck.
While my life looked Instagram perfect to the rest of the world, I felt like it belonged on the Pinterest fails website instead. I had sold myself a version of success that wasn’t mine. I found a life coach to help me with my parenting and my whole life changed. I saw first hand how powerful shifting perspectives can be, and my relationship with my kids improved dramatically. But what I didn’t expect was experiencing life-changing successes in every area of life, not just in motherhood–all because I was no longer seeing life in ways that didn’t serve me.
Coaching was so powerful for me that I decided to get certified myself, and was able to retire from dentistry because it no longer brought me purpose and joy. In the process, I wrote a book called, “Connected: Discovering Your Inner Guides.” Helping women just like me is a passion. It’s my purpose in life. And being able to help them learn how to stop allowing themselves to be overwhelmed by their to-do lists, be a deeply connected parent, draw healthy boundaries, and have compassion for themselves so they can be their best at work and at home is an absolute gift.
I am soon to launch a podcast with my colleague and friend, Dinesh Melwani, called “Happy and Human” on March 28th. Its purpose is to help overeducated, high-achieving professionals create the simple mindset shifts they need to think, do, and be better and create success, happiness, and ease sustainably in every area of life.
What have been some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced as a business owner in the Austin area?
As a solopreneur, it can feel siloed and lonely, so it’s helpful to meet other women in the area who can serve as a network and support system.
How have you been able to overcome those challenges and continue to grow your business?
In addition to my answer above, lots of self care and self compassion, and the knowledge that there is a gift or opportunity in every situation helps immensely. Having the right mindset to see when my thoughts are not serving me allows me to avoid roads I don’t want to go down, and it also helps me to see where and how my energy is better-spent.
What advice would you give to other business owners who are facing similar challenges?
Recognize when your brain is running on its “default setting,” which means you are more likely making decisions based on sub-optimal choices that you see in the moment, rather than more optimal choices that are actually present. Work on building your mindset that will serve you by serving others first.
Can you share a specific piece of data that you are proud of and why?
In 2022, I published my first book, “Connected: Discovering Your Inner Guides” as a means to help kids (ages 8-80) and their families build meaningful, healthy relationships so that they can create ease in life, even in challenging situations. The tools and tips in the book are ones that help build healthy communication skills as well as self-awareness, so that we as parents can lead in a way that will teach our children to be empathetic, solution-seeking leaders themselves.
In your opinion, how can businesses best combine online and offline strategies to reach and engage customers effectively?
Speaking engagements and online trainings or experiences, networking, and being authentic across the board.
Finally, what does being a community champion mean to you?
Living life with an abundance mindset as you support others as and when you can.
🥳 Dr. Seema is truly an inspiration for many! Congrats on your success!
Want more inspiration from Dr. Seema?
What if your life could be filled with more success, ease, happiness–and you could have the time to enjoy it all with the people you care about? What if you could meet that version of you NOW? Head over to Seema’s website and grab your FREE centering session and bonus worksheet designed to help you do just that: www.drseemadesai.com.
We help find & create growth opportunities. Most businesses are doing some form of marketing but, they lack a true marketing strategy and aren’t able to attribute value to their marketing efforts leading to failed ROI which quickly becomes demoralizing. Sounds familiar? Browse our marketing services.
In this article, we’re talking about one of the biggest challenges in marketing: separating prospects from suspects.
Hey there! Jessica here from Marketing for Greatness, and today we’re talking about one of the biggest challenges in marketing: separating prospects from suspects. As a business owner or marketer, it’s essential to make sure that you’re targeting the right people with your marketing efforts. In this article, we’re going to give you six effective ways to separate prospects from suspects.
But First Things First: What is a Prospect vs a Lead?
Before we dive into the strategies to turn your suspects into prospects, we need to define some fundamental terms, starting with a lead.
What is a lead?
Simply put, a lead is a potential customer who has expressed interest in your product or service. However, not all leads are created equal. Some are more valuable than others, and it’s important to understand the different types of leads so you can target them effectively.
There are several different types of leads, including:
Marketing leads: These are leads that have shown interest in your brand or products through various marketing channels, such as social media, email, or online ads. They are usually at the top of the sales funnel and are not yet ready to make a purchase.
Sales leads: These are leads that have been qualified as potential customers and are actively considering making a purchase. They are closer to the bottom of the sales funnel and require more targeted messaging and sales tactics to convert them into customers.
Qualified leads: These are leads that have been evaluated and deemed as potential customers based on specific criteria, such as their demographics, behavior, or level of interest. They are more likely to convert into paying customers and are valuable assets to any business. Qualified leads are also known by prospects.
Now that we’ve defined what a lead is, let’s dive into the differences between marketing leads and sales leads.
What is a marketing lead?
Marketing leads are potential customers who have shown interest in your brand or products through various marketing channels. They may have engaged with your social media posts, subscribed to your email list, or clicked on an online ad. They are usually at the top of the sales funnel and are not yet ready to make a purchase. Marketing leads are important because they provide potential customers that can be nurtured and converted into sales leads.
Examples of marketing leads include:
Social media followers who engage with your content
Email subscribers who have opened or clicked on your emails
Website visitors who have downloaded a free resource or signed up for a newsletter
What is the difference between marketing leads and sales leads?
The main difference about marketing and sales leads has to do with where their mind is at. Sales leads are actively considering making a purchase. They are closer to the bottom of the sales funnel and require more targeted messaging and sales tactics to convert them into customers.
Examples of sales leads include:
Prospective customers who have requested a demo or a consultation
Website visitors who have added items to their cart or expressed interest in pricing
Leads who have attended a sales webinar or event
Marketing Leads vs Sales Leads: Who Handles What?
When it comes to handling marketing and sales leads, it’s important to have a clear understanding of which teams are responsible for each type of lead.
Marketing teams are typically responsible for generating marketing leads, which are the initial contacts made through marketing efforts. This includes lead capture forms on websites, social media engagement, and email marketing campaigns. The goal of marketing leads is to generate interest and create a pipeline of potential customers.
On the other hand, sales teams are responsible for handling sales leads, which are qualified leads that have shown a higher level of interest and are more likely to convert into paying customers. This includes leads that have expressed a direct interest in your product or service, engaged with your sales team, or have requested more information about your business.
In some cases, there may be overlap between the responsibilities of marketing and sales teams. For example, marketing teams may be responsible for lead nurturing campaigns that help move marketing leads down the sales funnel and qualify them as sales leads. Sales teams may also provide feedback to the marketing team about the quality of leads generated by marketing efforts.
Ultimately, the key is to have clear communication and collaboration between marketing and sales teams to ensure a seamless transition from marketing leads to sales leads. By working together, these teams can help increase lead conversion rates and drive revenue growth for the business.
It’s important to note that while your marketing team can be great at generating suspects and marketing leads, if the business doesn’t have a strategic sales process in place, sales won’t happen. It’s essential to have a clear understanding of the sales funnel and how leads move through it. This includes having a system for qualifying leads, nurturing relationships, and closing deals. Without a strategic sales process, even the most qualified leads may fall through the cracks, resulting in lost revenue for the business. By having a well-defined sales process in place, businesses can ensure that marketing leads are effectively converted into sales leads, ultimately leading to increased revenue and business growth.
We’ve covered everything about leads. Now let’s dive into prospects.
Lead vs Prospect: What’s the Difference?
A lead is a potential customer who has expressed interest in your product or service, whereas a prospect is a potential customer who has shown a higher level of interest and is more likely to become a paying customer. In other words, a prospect is a qualified lead that has been evaluated and deemed as having a higher potential to convert into a sale.
Let’s say you run an online clothing store. A lead may be someone who has subscribed to your email list in order to receive updates and promotions from your store. This person has expressed some level of interest in your products, but may not be actively considering a purchase at the moment.
In contrast, a prospect may be someone who has added items to their cart or clicked on a specific product page multiple times. This person has shown a higher level of interest in your products and may be closer to making a purchase.
By distinguishing between leads and prospects, you can more effectively target your marketing efforts and focus on those who are most likely to convert into paying customers. In this case, you may want to prioritize marketing efforts towards prospects by retargeting them with ads or offering them a discount to incentivize them to complete their purchase.
To recap: leads are typically at the top of the sales funnel, whereas prospects are further along in the sales funnel and may have engaged with your brand in a more meaningful way.
Prospect vs Suspect: What’s the Difference?
It’s important to note that depending on your sales system, you might use different terms to filter your suspects. But generally speaking, a sales funnel looks like this:
As mentioned previously, prospects are further down the sales funnel and have shown a higher level of interest in your product or service. On the other hand, suspects are potential customers who have not yet expressed a direct interest in your business. These individuals may have interacted with your business in some way, such as visiting your website, following you on social media, or subscribing to your email list, but have not yet taken a clear step towards becoming a paying customer.
Marketing teams typically focus on generating suspects through various marketing channels, such as email marketing, social media advertising, and content marketing. Once these suspects show a higher level of interest, they can be further qualified as sales leads and passed on to the sales team for further follow-up.
By generating suspects through marketing efforts, businesses can create a pipeline of potential customers and increase their chances of converting them into paying customers. However, it’s important to note that not all suspects will ultimately become sales leads, which is why it’s important to have a clear process for qualifying leads and moving them down the sales funnel.
Some characteristics of a prospect include:
They have a specific problem or need that your product or service can solve.
They have engaged with your brand through various marketing channels, such as social media, email, or online ads.
They have shown interest in your product or service by adding items to their cart, filling out a form, or requesting a consultation.
They fit the profile of your target audience, based on their demographics, behavior, or interests.
In contrast, some characteristics of a suspect include:
They may have stumbled across your brand but may not necessarily have a specific need for your product or service.
They have not engaged with your brand in a meaningful way or have shown a limited level of interest.
They may not fit the profile of your target audience, based on their demographics, behavior, or interests.
A Great Digital Marketing Strategy Should Focus on Increasing Your Suspects, Leads, and Prospects
A great digital marketing strategy should focus on bringing in and nurturing suspects, leads, and prospects in order to increase your chances of converting them into paying customers.
Where to start your lead generation strategy?
Start with your content.
1- Content Marketing SEO
Content Marketing SEO is a marketing strategy that combines the principles of content marketing and search engine optimization (SEO) to improve online visibility, generate traffic, and increase conversions.
At its core, Content Marketing SEO involves creating and sharing valuable and informative content that is optimized for search engines. By targeting specific keywords and search phrases that are relevant to your target audience, businesses can increase their visibility and attract more traffic to their website.
In addition to creating optimized content, Content Marketing SEO also involves building backlinks, improving website structure and technical optimization, and leveraging social media and other channels to promote content and increase engagement.
Ultimately, the goal of content marketing SEO is to improve online visibility, generate high-quality traffic, and increase conversions by providing valuable content that aligns with the needs and preferences of your target audience. This can help you build a larger pool of potential customers to work with and increase the overall success of your digital marketing efforts.
For example, let’s say you run a skincare brand. You may create a blog post that addresses common skincare concerns and offers helpful tips for solving them. By creating content that speaks to your audience’s needs, you can attract new potential customers who are searching for information about skincare and may not have heard of your brand before. Once you’ve attracted these potential customers, you can move them further down your sales funnel by capturing their email and turning them into marketing leads. One effective way to capture their email is by offering a free resource, such as an ebook or a webinar, to incentivize them to take the next step in the sales funnel.
It’s important to note that even if a lead has expressed interest in your brand and provided their email, there is still a chance that your emails may end up in their spam folder, which can lower the chances of conversion. One way to prevent this from happening is to include a confirmation email after a lead has provided their contact information. This email should confirm the subscription and encourage the lead to add your email address to their contact list to avoid future emails going to spam. By taking these steps, you can help ensure that your marketing efforts are more effective and that you are reaching your leads’ inbox.
You might be thinking “suspects are awesome, but they won’t pay my bills!”. And you are right. A great marketing strategy should bring you, not only suspects but also prospects and paying customers. Here’s how.
2- Personalized Emails: Providing Value and Building Relationships
Sending personalized emails to your suspects can be an effective way to build a relationship and demonstrate the value of your product or service. By providing helpful information and addressing their specific needs, you can build trust and encourage them to engage with your brand. This can help move them down the sales funnel and increase the likelihood of conversion.
For example, if you run a fitness coaching business, you may send personalized emails to your suspects that offer workout tips and nutritional advice based on their specific fitness goals. By addressing their needs in a personalized way, you can build trust and demonstrate the value of your coaching services.
3- Social Media: Engaging Your Audience and Encouraging Interaction
Social media can be a powerful tool for engaging your audience and encouraging interaction with your brand. By posting engaging content and responding to comments and messages, you can build a relationship with your suspects and demonstrate your expertise in your field. Then, from your DM’s, engage in private conversations where you can have the chance to get their contact information and get them into a nurturing campaign.
4- Webinars: Providing Value and Demonstrating Expertise
One of the most effective ways to build trust with your audience is to demonstrate your expertise in your field. By providing valuable content that addresses your audience’s needs and establishes your authority, you can position yourself as a leader in your industry and build brand credibility.
Here are some examples of how you can demonstrate expertise:
Thought Leadership Content: Providing Valuable Insights and Expertise
Thought leadership content can be an effective way to demonstrate your expertise and provide valuable insights to your audience. This can include blog posts, articles, white papers, and other types of content that offer valuable insights and expertise in your field. By providing content that addresses your audience’s needs and establishes your authority, you can build trust and encourage them to engage with your brand.
Case Studies: Demonstrating Your Successes and Achievements
Case studies can be an effective way to demonstrate your expertise and highlight your successes and achievements. By providing detailed case studies that showcase how your product or service has helped previous clients, you can demonstrate the value of your business and encourage potential customers to engage with your brand.
Industry Events: Speaking Engagements and Workshops
Participating in industry events such as speaking engagements and workshops can be a powerful way to demonstrate your expertise and build credibility in your field. By offering insights and expertise on relevant topics, you can establish yourself as a thought leader and build brand credibility. This can help attract new potential customers and encourage them to engage with your brand.
Live Webinars
Webinars can be a powerful way to provide value and demonstrate your expertise in your field. But they need to be done right. According to a report by GoToWebinar, webinars are one of the most effective marketing tactics for generating high-quality leads. The report found that 73% of B2B marketers and sales leaders believe that webinars are the best way to generate high-quality leads. Webinars also offer high engagement rates, with an average attendance rate of 40-50% and an average viewing time of 61 minutes per webinar.
By implementing some of the strategies we’ve discussed, you can generate a substantial number of marketing leads. However, it can be challenging to identify and filter out the true sales leads that are most likely to convert.
So let’s take care of this issue.
6 Ways to Separate Prospects from Suspects
Identifying the most qualified leads is critical to a successful sales and marketing strategy, as it allows businesses to focus their resources and efforts on those leads that are most likely to convert into paying customers. However, depending on the volume of leads and the complexity of the sales process, this can be a daunting task, especially if your business relies on manual lead qualification.
Fortunately, there are many customer relationship management (CRM) software options available that can help streamline the lead qualification process. These tools can automate lead scoring, behavior tracking, and other data analysis tasks, allowing sales and marketing teams to more effectively identify and prioritize leads for follow-up.
If you’re in search of a comprehensive CRM system, we highly recommend Kartra.
Kartra is an all-in-one marketing platform that offers a range of tools and features designed to streamline and optimize your marketing and sales efforts. With Kartra, you can easily create and launch marketing campaigns, manage your leads and customers, and track your sales and revenue performance.
As certified Kartra partners, we offer full integration services that enable you to focus on running your business while we take care of turning your lead generation engine ON! To get started with a free trial, click here.
Your CRM software can also help businesses gain insights into the behaviors and preferences of their leads, providing valuable data to inform their sales and marketing strategies. By using these insights to tailor their outreach efforts, businesses can build stronger relationships with their leads, increase engagement, and ultimately improve their chances of conversion.
Of course, the effectiveness of CRM software depends on the quality and accuracy of the data being input. It’s essential for businesses to ensure that their data is clean, up-to-date, and accurate, to ensure the most effective use of their CRM software. Additionally, it’s important to regularly review and update lead qualification criteria to ensure that they align with current business objectives and customer preferences.
Here are six effective ways to separate prospects from suspects:
Attribution. Attribution is a data analysis technique that can be used to track and measure the effectiveness of different marketing channels and touchpoints in the customer journey. By assigning credit to each touchpoint in the sales and marketing process, attribution can help businesses identify the most effective channels for generating and nurturing leads, as well as the touchpoints that are most likely to lead to conversions.
Behavior Tracking: Track the behavior of your leads, such as website visits, email opens, and social media engagement, to identify those who have shown a higher level of interest and engagement.
Lead Scoring: Use a lead scoring system to evaluate the level of interest and engagement of each lead. This can help identify the most qualified leads and prioritize follow-up efforts.
Irresistible Offers: To generate sales calls and increase conversions, businesses can offer an irresistible offer to incentivize leads to take action. An irresistible offer is a compelling offer that provides significant value to the lead and motivates them to take the next step in the sales process. Examples of irresistible offers might include a free consultation, a free trial or demo, a limited-time discount or special offer, or access to exclusive content or resources. The key to creating an irresistible offer is to provide a significant value that aligns with the needs and preferences of the lead, while also creating a sense of urgency or exclusivity that motivates them to take action.
Heat Mapping: Heat mapping tools can help businesses identify which areas of a website receive the most clicks, scrolls, and engagement, allowing them to optimize these areas for maximum effectiveness. By using this data to tailor website content, design, and user experience to the preferences and behaviors of their leads, businesses can increase engagement and ultimately improve their chances of conversion. Heat mapping can also be used to identify areas of a website that are not performing as well, allowing businesses to make improvements and optimizations to improve engagement and conversion rates. For example, if a heat map shows that a certain form field is consistently being skipped over, businesses can adjust the form to make it more user-friendly and increase completion rates.
Sales Team Feedback: Solicit feedback from your sales team to identify leads that have shown a higher level of interest and engagement. This can help identify the most qualified leads and prioritize follow-up efforts.
By using these strategies to separate prospects from suspects, you can focus your sales and marketing efforts on the most qualified leads and increase your chances of conversion. This can help improve your lead generation efforts and ultimately lead to increased revenue for your business.
In Closing
Separating prospects from suspects is a crucial aspect of a successful sales and marketing strategy. By identifying and engaging the most qualified leads, businesses can increase their chances of conversion and ultimately drive revenue growth.
To improve your lead generation and sales conversion efforts, it’s important to be strategic and intentional in your approach. This includes focusing on the most qualified leads, leveraging advanced tools and technologies, and building trust and loyalty with potential customers.
Shall we talk about your leads?
Wanna chat about your marketing and sales leads? We can provide valuable insights and recommendations to help you optimize your strategy and achieve your sales and marketing goals. Contact us today to learn more and take the first step toward growing your business.
Reasons Why You Should Be Using Storytelling To Sell More on Social Media
In this article, we’ll learn how incorporating storytelling into your social media strategy can help you build deeper connections with your audience and increase sales!
If you’re tired of putting a lot of effort to post on social media, but you’re not getting engagement, chances are, you’re considering giving up. So, before you quit social media marketing, we encourage you implement a storytelling strategy. This might be what you’ve been missing!
What is storytelling marketing?
Storytelling marketing is a way for your brand to create content that incorporates a narrative. Stories are the way we perceive and remember our lives. Storytelling gives your brand character, appeal and relatability that facts and stats simply can’t.
Storytelling has long been a staple of marketing and advertising, but in the age of social media, it has taken on a whole new level of importance.
Storytelling marketing can be your next best strategy. Here’s why
In a nutshell, instead of broadcasting messages, your social channels will have a well-oiled set of stories that will take your users into a journey.
Storytelling marketing isn’t a new concept. In fact, it’s been used by powerful brands like Disney, to build a deeper connection with their audience.
Let’s check out some of the benefits of storytelling marketing:
It helps you connect with your audience
One of the biggest advantages of social media is that it allows you to connect with your audience in a much more personal and intimate way. And what better way to do that than through storytelling? By sharing stories about your brand, your products, and your customers, you can create a sense of connection and emotional resonance with your audience that will make them more likely to engage with your content and ultimately make a purchase.
It adds depth and meaning to your marketing message
In today’s fast-paced and attention-deficit world, it’s all too easy for marketing messages to get lost in the noise. But with storytelling, you can add depth and meaning to your message that will help it stand out and stay in the minds of your audience. By sharing real-life stories that illustrate the benefits of your product or service, you can create a deeper connection with your audience and help them understand why your brand matters.
It makes your content more shareable
Social media is all about sharing, and if you can create content that is both interesting and emotionally resonant, it is much more likely to be shared by your audience. And when your content gets shared, it has the potential to reach a much wider audience, which can help you grow your brand and increase sales.
It helps you build a strong brand identity
Storytelling is a powerful way to build a strong brand identity and differentiate yourself from your competitors. By sharing stories about your brand’s history, values, and mission, you can create a distinct and memorable brand image that will help you stand out in a crowded marketplace.
It’s easy and cost-effective
Unlike traditional marketing methods, using storytelling on social media is easy and cost-effective. With a few clicks, you can create and share stories that will engage and inspire your audience, all without breaking the bank.
I Gained 20,000 TikTok Followers Quickly Using Storytelling
As a marketer, I always try to stay on top of the latest social media trends and techniques. But despite my best efforts, I felt like my account had reached a plateau. My Instagram followers weren’t growing, and my engagement was stagnant. I knew I needed to try something new to break through the noise.
That’s when I decided to give TikTok a try. I had heard a lot of buzz about the platform and how it was a great place for businesses to connect with their audience through storytelling. So, I decided to give it a shot.
I started by creating short, engaging videos that told a story about my brand. I focused on showcasing the personality behind my business and the unique challenges I had to overcome, as a mom of 4 and a businesswoman. I didn’t follow dancing trends or even trending sounds. I did “story time” videos.
To my surprise, my TikTok account started to take off. Within a month, I had gained over 10,000 followers, and my engagement was through the roof. People were commenting, sharing, and even reaching out to me to learn more about my brand.
Now, just a few months later, my TikTok account has over 20,000 followers, and it’s still growing. I can’t believe the impact that storytelling has had on my social media presence. It’s a powerful tool that has helped me connect with my audience in a whole new way and drive real results for my business. If you’re feeling stuck on social media, I highly recommend giving storytelling a try. It just might be the boost your brand needs to reach new heights.
Storytelling vs Educational Content
As a social media manager, I love doing audits for my clients. It’s a great way to get a fresh perspective on their accounts and identify areas for improvement. So when I was asked to do an audit for a coach, I was excited to dive in and see what I could find.
Upon first glance, the coach’s account seemed to be doing well. She had a good number of followers and a decent level of engagement. But as I dug deeper, I noticed that her account wasn’t reaching any new people. And when I analyzed her content, I saw that it was mostly educational in nature. While education is important, I knew that it wasn’t the only type of content that would resonate with her audience.
That’s when I suggested incorporating storytelling into her content strategy. I knew that stories had the power to connect with people on an emotional level and really drive home a message. So we started experimenting with different types of storytelling, from personal anecdotes to case studies.
The results were amazing. Within just a few weeks, we saw a significant increase in engagement and a return of lost followers. People were responding to the stories we were sharing and connecting with the coach on a deeper level. And as a result, her account began to reach new people again.
It was a great reminder of the power of storytelling in social media.
How To Find Storytelling Content Ideas?
Finding storytelling content ideas can seem intimidating, but it doesn’t have to be. Here are a few tips to help you get started:
Look to your customers for inspiration: Your customers are a goldmine of storytelling content ideas. Consider sharing stories about how your products or services have made a difference in their lives. This can be especially powerful if you can find a way to showcase the emotions behind the story.
Share behind-the-scenes stories: People love getting a glimpse into the inner workings of a business. Consider sharing stories about your team, your processes, or even your struggles and successes. This type of content can help humanize your brand and make it more relatable to your audience.
Share personal stories: If you’re comfortable doing so, sharing personal stories can be a great way to connect with your audience. Consider sharing stories about your own experiences or challenges that relate to your business or brand. This can help people see you as a real person and build a stronger connection with your brand.
Use customer reviews or testimonials: Customer reviews and testimonials can be a great source of storytelling content ideas. Consider sharing stories from customers that highlight the benefits of your products or services in a compelling way.
Look to your brand’s history: If your brand has a long history, consider sharing stories about its evolution or key milestones. This can help people understand the values and mission behind your brand and make it more memorable.
There’s a good chance that you’ve been looking for trends as ways to generate your content. I say, ditch that! You want to take a deeper look at your brand, and your message, and explore where is the gap in the market.
Don’t be a trend follower. Be a trendsetter.
How to create relatable storytelling content?
Creating relatable storytelling content is important for a number of reasons. Firstly, it helps you connect with your audience on a deeper level. By sharing stories that are relevant and relatable to your audience, you can create a sense of connection and emotional resonance that will make them more likely to engage with your content and ultimately make a purchase.
Secondly, it helps you stand out in a crowded marketplace. With so much content being shared on social media, it can be difficult to get noticed. But by creating relatable storytelling content, you can differentiate yourself from your competitors and create a distinct and memorable brand image.
Finally, it helps you build trust and credibility with your audience. By sharing real-life stories and experiences, you can help people see you as a real person and build a stronger connection with your brand. This can help you earn the trust and credibility you need to drive sales and grow your business.
Tips to create relatable storytelling content
Creating relatable storytelling content is all about finding ways to connect with your audience on a personal level. Here are a few tips to help you create content that resonates:
Use real-life examples: Rather than just talking about your products or services in abstract terms, use real-life examples to illustrate their benefits. This can help people see how your products or services can fit into their lives and make them feel more relatable.
Share personal stories: Sharing personal stories can be a great way to connect with your audience. Consider sharing stories about your own experiences or challenges that relate to your business or brand. This can help people see you as a real person and build a stronger connection with your brand.
Show vulnerability: Nobody’s perfect, and people appreciate honesty and authenticity. Consider sharing stories about your mistakes or challenges and how you overcame them. This can help people feel like they can relate to you and your brand.
Use relatable language: Use language that is relatable and easy to understand. Avoid using jargon or technical terms that people may not be familiar with.
Share stories from your customers: Customer stories can be a powerful way to connect with your audience. Consider sharing stories from customers that highlight the benefits of your products or services in a compelling way.
Mistakes To Avoid While Creating Storytelling Content
Creating relatable storytelling content is all about finding ways to connect with your audience on a personal level. But there are a few mistakes you’ll want to avoid if you want to create content that truly resonates:
Focusing too much on the product or service: While it’s important to highlight the benefits of your products or services, you don’t want to make that the sole focus of your storytelling content. Instead, focus on the emotions and experiences that your products or services create.
Being too salesy: While you want your storytelling content to drive sales, you don’t want to come across as too pushy or salesy. Focus on creating content that is helpful, informative, and engaging, rather than just trying to sell, sell, sell.
Being too preachy: Being too preachy on social media is a big mistake because it can turn people off and damage your brand reputation. Nobody likes being lectured, and if you come across as preachy or judgmental, it can be a turn-off for your audience. They may see you as being arrogant or out of touch and be less likely to engage with your content or make a purchase.
Not showing vulnerability: As mentioned above, people appreciate honesty and authenticity. Consider sharing stories about your mistakes or challenges and how you overcame them. This can help people feel like they can relate to you and your brand.
Being too self-centered: Your storytelling content should be about your audience, not just about you. Focus on creating content that resonates with your audience and addresses their needs and interests.
How to track results from social media?
Tracking your content on social media is crucial for understanding how much revenue it is driving for your business. Here are a few tips to help you track your content and see how it’s performing:
Use social media analytics: Most social media platforms offer built-in analytics tools that allow you to see how your content is performing. These tools can help you understand things like how many people are seeing your content, how many are engaging with it, and where your traffic is coming from.
Use Google Analytics: If you have a website or blog, Google Analytics is a powerful tool for tracking your content’s performance. It allows you to see things like how much traffic your content is driving to your site and where that traffic is coming from.
Use tracking links: If you want to get more granular data on how your content is performing, consider using tracking links. These are special links that allow you to see how many people are clicking on them and where they are coming from.
Use conversion tracking: If you have an e-commerce store or are selling products or services online, consider using conversion tracking to see how your content is driving sales. This will allow you to see how many people are making purchases after interacting with your content.
By using these tools and techniques, you’ll be able to track your content’s performance and get a better understanding of how it’s driving revenue for your business.
In Conclusion
Using storytelling on social media is a powerful and effective way to connect with your audience, drive engagement, and ultimately increase revenue for your business. But it’s important to do it right. By avoiding common mistakes and using the right tools and techniques, you can create relatable and engaging storytelling content that resonates with your audience and drives real results for your business.
If you’re struggling to create compelling storytelling content or want to boost your social media presence, we can help. As experienced social media experts, we have the skills and expertise to help you craft powerful stories that connect with your audience and drive real results for your business. Contact us today to learn more and see how we can help you take your social media presence to the next level.
5 Proven Ways to Boost Your Word-of-Mouth Marketing in 2023
In this article, we’ll recommend our top 5 easy yet effective techniques for creating an impressive oral advertisement strategy and taking your organization to new heights by 2023!
With digital content saturating the market, getting visibility in business is a huge challenge. While traditional marketing strategies are losing traction as consumers become more and more suspicious, one method that never fails to work is word-of-mouth marketing.
In this article, we’ll recommend our top 5 easy yet effective techniques for creating an impressive Word of Mouth Marketing Strategy and taking your brand to new heights by 2023!
What is W.O.M.M. and why is so effective
Before delving further into it, let’s get to the basics of word-of-mouth marketing. Essentially, it is when customers spread information about a business or product among their peers – be it through verbal conversations, social media posts or other means. Unlike traditional advertising which requires investment from companies themselves; this form of promotion comes free and has much higher reliability as its source of origin is often perceived as being trustworthy.
As the digital age continues to evolve, so does consumer skepticism of traditional advertising. With a plethora of marketing messages coming from every direction, consumers have learned how to distinguish what feels like “marketing.” Therefore, businesses should prioritize word-of-mouth marketing in 2023. This type of communication carries more weight as people are likely to believe and act on their friends’ or family members’ recommendations due its reliability and trustworthiness.
Word-of-mouth marketing is invaluable in forming an active community around a business. When customers feel involved and welcomed, they are more likely to stay loyal to the company and advocate for it among their peers. This snowball effect leads to further success as each new customer increases the amount of word-of-mouth referrals exponentially!
Types of Word of Mouth Marketing Strategies
Business owners can create a strong word-of-mouth marketing approach by taking advantage of these five straightforward techniques. Word of mouth promotion is an effective way to advertise products or services and to cultivate a devoted following for your brand. Here are the top five methods that successful business operators use:
1- Use Instagram stories to show your audience that you are human:
People bond with other people, not merely companies. If you share your business’s tales and experiences or even a bit of yourself, it can help form an honest and more understandable rapport with your customers. This strengthens the trust they have in your brand while also prompting them to spread positive words about your company to their social circle; ultimately helping increase sales!
2- Build a non-business related channel to expand your social
circle:
If you want to widen your online reach and create a strong connection with an even larger audience, it’s essential that you promote content on social media platforms that are not exclusively related to your business. Building a personal blog, creating an account for something outside of work or hosting podcasts is the perfect way to do this. Not only will this help grow your presence among potential customers but also expand your digital circle!
3- Sponsor local events:
Showing your support for the local community by sponsoring events such as charity runs, sporting tournaments, or cultural activities is an effective way to create brand recognition. Not only will it provide you with a chance to meet your prospective customers face-to-face and get their valuable input and feedback, but also give you leverage in building a positive reputation within the region!
4- Showcase your brand as an active member in your community:
Participating in local events, giving back to the community and supporting causes will not only demonstrate that your business is socially responsible, but it can also help build trust with customers. As a result of this loyalty they are likely to share information about your company with their family and friends – driving even more footfall through word-of-mouth.
5- Leverage short videos on Youtube:
Have you ever thought of leveraging YouTube to effectively promote your business and strengthen its online presence? Producing short, captivating videos can certainly do the trick! From showcasing products or services to sharing stories of how your company makes a difference in people’s lives, there are countless opportunities for you. You could also provide helpful advice and tips about using your offerings that would further build strong customer relationships with those who follow you.
In summary, building a strong community and focusing on word-of-mouth marketing can be a key driver of business growth in 2023. By leveraging these simple tactics, business owners can increase trust, attract new customers, and encourage loyalty.
Don’t take my word for granted, just watch this episode on Shark Tank!
In Season 14, Episode 10, you’ll observe the far-reaching effects of social media on your business success.
Despite having a great product or service, if you don’t have an online presence and a strong social media platform to showcase it on, then chances are that potential customers won’t be aware of it – leaving your business out in the cold!
Is your business in need of a marketing boost?
Let’s chat and explore how I can help you succeed! Reach out to me at mfgseo.co, and let’s get the ball rolling. I’m excited to discuss this opportunity with you soon!
From creating a personal brand to networking and gaining exposure, these are the top personal branding strategies you can start using today.
The Harsh Reality: If You Do Not Become A BRAND Then You Become A Commodity!
Personal branding entails creating a name and reputation for yourself in both the personal and professional spheres. This involves your goals, accomplishments, career growth, current projects, success stories–anything that would contribute to future objectives.
People naturally create a personal brand for themselves, but what separates those who are successful is the dedication they put into controlling their narrative. Oprah Winfrey is one prime example of how consistency and hard work can build an incredible personal brand that spans the globe.
20 Personal Branding Strategies for 2023
If you do not want your online brand to take on a life of its own and control the narrative, here are my top 20 brand-expert-approved strategies you should be implementing today.
Personal Branding Strategy #1: You Need A Website
If you want to be known, having a website is key. Whether it’s acting as your portfolio to showcase your talents, or simply outlining what you do and where people can find more information about you and your services, having an online home-base is essential and any brand consultant will tell you that.
If you’re considering building a website, start with the basics: make sure it has information about who you are and what you do, portfolio pieces that feature the projects that you’ve worked on, and contact information so contacts can reach out to have a conversation. Starting simple will help build a great foundation for later expanding by creating content that elevates your authority.
Personal Branding Strategy #2: You Need A Brand Voice
A strong personal branding strategy needs to include an established, consistent brand voice. Your audience will look for that when they engage with you so make sure it’s recognizable! Knowing and owning your unique tone helps you stand out in the crowd and sound like the real you.
Keyword here: the real you!
Personal Branding Strategy #3: Embrace Vulnerability With A Balance
Every social platform allows us to share a piece of ourselves with the world, but too much can come off as unprofessional and overly personal.
When crafting your personal brand, aim to be genuine and transparent, while still maintaining boundaries that are respectful to yourself and others.
Showing a vulnerable side allows you to connect more deeply with viewers, because they can feel seen and understood through your stories. To build rapport with your audience, open up about certain aspects of life, but make sure you don’t give away too much. You want to be personal, but not private.
Personal Branding Strategy #4: Develop Relationships
One of the best ways to establish yourself as a thought leader in your industry is to cultivate meaningful relationships. Make an effort to meet new people, engage with influencers and build strong networks.
Personal Branding Strategy #5: Leverage Email Marketing
Email marketing is an essential part of forming and maintaining your personal brand. Consistency is key to a successful personal branding strategy!
When done right, email marketing can help you build a strong base of loyal customers and followers who will recognize you as an expert in your field.
– I’d have a first conversation with someone. Most people do that.
– I took copious notes in our CRM. Some people do that.
– I loaded the person’s contact info into Salesloft with a sequence I’d built.
– The first step of that sequence was an email I sent the following day, which we personalized. It included the types of deals we wanted to see.
– A second step involved sending a mutually beneficial introduction to someone within the next 2 weeks.
– The third step was following up on that introduction within 3 weeks after.
– The fourth step was a handwritten note (time consuming, yes, but there are services that can help) that included the type of deal we wanted to see. This was usually 2-3 months after the first call.
– The fifth step was asking for another call to see how things are going.
Not rocket science. Just a little work all the time.
Personal Branding Strategy #6: Showcase Your Expertise
A great place to start is by writing long-form articles. Putting your knowledge and expertise down on paper (or digital) provides an effective way for your personal brand to break through the noise in any market. Long-form content offers substance, credibility, and personal insights that cannot always fit into simple posts or tweets. Allowing yourself to be vulnerable and open about sharing your true wisdom can really help you stand out from the crowd and enhance your reputation as an expert.
Personal Branding Strategy #7: Get Creative
Try out different platforms, test out different content types (e.g., podcasts, videos, images) and experiment with different formats, including edu-tainment (mix education and entertainment).
Personal Branding Strategy #8: Use Social Proof
Leverage the power of user-generated content to show others how passionate people are about your work. Get customer testimonials, reviews, and case studies in order to build trust and credibility.
Personal Branding Strategy #9: Build A Community
Encourage engagement and foster relationships within your network by creating an online community to engage with like-minded individuals. It can be a Facebook Group or a Telegram group.
Personal Branding Strategy #10: Give Back
Find ways to give back to your industry or local community through volunteering, mentoring, or donating. This will create goodwill and demonstrate your commitment to making a positive difference in the world.
Personal Branding Strategy #11: Know Your Audience
It’s important to know who your target audience is so that you can tailor your content and message accordingly. Find out what they care about, their pain points, and what type of content resonates with them. Especially their pain points. You want to create content that adds value so they come for more.
Personal Branding Strategy #12: Create A Clear Brand Image
Have an eye-catching logo, website design, and consistent color palette to help create a recognizable brand identity.
Personal Branding Strategy #13: Monitor Your Reputation
Keep an eye on what’s being said about you and your brand online so that you can address any issues or questions promptly. You can automate this process with social listening tools such as Hootsuite or Later.com for your social media, and create Google Alerts to get instant notifications.
Personal Branding Strategy #14: Promote Yourself
Advertising yourself and your personal brand is one of the most important things you can do to increase your exposure. Whether it’s sponsoring an event that aligns with your values or promoting yourself on social media, there are endless opportunities to get your brand out there.
Personal Branding Strategy #15: Influencer Marketing
Leverage relationships with industry influencers to give yourself a boost. Invite them to collaborate on projects, have them review your products or services, or just follow their content and comment on it.
Personal Branding Strategy #16: Measure Success
It’s important to track the key performance indicators (KPIs) of your personal branding strategy to see what’s working and what can be improved.
When it comes to optimizing a website to generate more conversions, co-founder and SEO expert at MFG, Alex Rodríguez it’s important it is to track KPI’s for the success of a website. One KPI he highly recommends paying attention to is how much time users are spending on your pages, as tracked through Google Analytics. This metric measures how long visitors are staying and how far they’ve scrolled down your page.
Knowing this KPI can give valuable insight into what content interests your users, meaning you can adjust your strategy accordingly and increase engagement, or make the necessary pivots until you see results.
Optimize your website, blog content, and social media posts to ensure they are easily found by potential customers or employers.
Personal Branding Strategy #18: Create A Personal Brand Statement
Take some time to think about who you are, what makes you unique, and your mission. Develop a personal branding statement that succinctly explains what you do and why people should care.
Personal Branding Strategy #19: Wear Your Brand
To make life a little easier and have fun in this process, why not take your personal branding to the next level by wearing it out?
Pick one word or phrase from your personal brand statement and have it printed on a t-shirt or even accessories like keychains, caps, and mugs! This can be your chance to show everyone what makes you, you! Get creative with this idea and personalize merchandise to ensure everyone remembers who you are while having fun doing it.
Personal Branding Strategy #20: Embrace Failure
Everyone makes mistakes – it’s part of life. Learn from them, take risks, and don’t be afraid to fail in order to succeed in the long run!
In Closing
By utilizing these top personal branding strategies for 2023, you will be able to build a powerful and successful brand that will capture the attention of your target audience. With hard work and dedication, you can create an impressive personal brand that will help catapult your career, open doors of opportunity, and set you apart from the competition.
Considering Hiring A Personal Branding Company?
We might be able to help. Our approach to branding is revenue-driven. We give brands visibility and conversions. For us, a website needs to be more than pretty. It needs to assist in growing your bottom line.
5 Ways to Automate Your Real Estate Business to Get More Leads
Are you looking for ways to automate your real estate business? Check out these five tips for automating your marketing and generating more leads.
If you’re like most realtors, you’re always looking for ways to streamline your business and make it more efficient. This usually involves buying a CRM or some real estate marketing software. But in order to get the most out of these tools, you need a strategy to activate marketing automation for your business.
By being strategic about your marketing automation, you can free up more time to focus on other aspects of your business.
If marketing automation for your real estate business sounds like music to your ears, keep reading!
What is marketing automation?
Marketing automation is the use of software to automate marketing processes such as customer segmentation, customer data integration, and campaign management.
A well-executed real estate automated marketing strategy allows you to target potential home buyers who have been searching for homes in a certain price range and will position your real estate brand in front of those potential home buyers, even while you’re sleeping or working on your open houses (to be more realistic!).
Marketing automation is where the money is at! Because, quite frankly, your day doesn’t have more hours. And if you want to hit those audacious goals, you’ll need to be able to do things differently than your competitors.
However, marketing automation is more than just software- it’s also about using strategies to improve the effectiveness of marketing campaigns. Or else you’ll find yourself with lots of tools and no direction on how to use them to actually generate leads.
Let’s cover our top 5 real estate marketing automation strategies that are design to save you at between 30-40 hours each month. You ready?
Marketing Automation Tools & Ideas
There are a lot of ways to do this, but we’ve compiled a list of the five best ways to automate your real estate business to get more real estate listings. By automating the tasks that take up the most time, you’ll be able to focus on what’s important: selling houses!
1) Real Estate Content Marketing Automation
There’s no question that content marketing is an essential part of any digital marketing strategy. After all, without content, there would be nothing to share on social media, no way to attract new leads, and no way to build trust and credibility with your audience. However, many realtors leave content marketing to their broker. This is a mistake for several reasons.
First of all, your broker is likely already marketing their own brand. As a result, they’re not likely to be too interested in promoting your content. Second, even if your broker is willing to promote your content, they probably don’t have the time or expertise to do it effectively. And third, by creating your own unique content, you’ll be able to reach new people online who might not otherwise be exposed to your brand.
Fortunately, there are plenty of automated tools and software programs out there that can help you with the content creation and promotion process. Below are some of the content automation tools you can use for your real estate content marketing:
Google Alerts. Follow your top targeted cities and neighborhoods and use Google Alerts to get news as soon as they happen.
Create your very own bank of ideas based on the questions that your clients have. No software required! Just use a Word Document or Google Document.
Generate a content calendar for the full year and plan the content that will support all the stages of your prospecting process. You can also plan content that can assist you to generate referrals from your existing clients. If you’re looking to automate your workflows and get reminders, we recommend using Monday.com. We’re been using it with our clients and works great.
By using a content publishing tool like HubSpot (for articles) or Later.com (for social media), you can plan, create, and publish your content ahead of time. This way, you can spend less time creating content and more time promoting it and following up with leads.
2) Real Estate Social Media Automation
If you’re manually posting to social media every day, it can start to feel like a full-time job! To make your life easier, try automating your social media process by breaking it down into smaller tasks. For example, you can batch create content ideas, graphics, and captions ahead of time. That way, when it comes time to post, all you have to do is hit publish. You can also use hashtags and location optimization (geotagging) to reach a wider audience.
That’s why social media automation tools are so valuable. Here are some of the tools we recommend for social media automation:
Facebook (now Meta) offers great features where you can schedule posts, stories, and videos ahead of time.
A pro tip: Schedule stories with clickable links using Meta, so you can ask your audience to book an appointment
Use the Canva pro features to set up your branding so your social media content looks uniform. You can even get Canva templates that can help you create your graphics quicker. Or simply outsource this process entirely so you can always have amazing graphics!
Just remember to keep an eye on your social media accounts so you can respond to any comments or messages in a timely manner.
How to schedule Instagram Reels ahead of time?
If you’re looking for a way to save time on your Instagram Reels, you can actually schedule them ahead of time. This can be a huge help if you’re trying to keep up with a consistent posting schedule. You use the native scheduling feature in Later. With Later, you can create your Reel and then select the date and time that you want it to go live.
You’ll be able to be consistent in pushing Reels out on a regular basis, even if you don’t have the time to post them every day.
3) Real Estate Newsletters Automation
Staying in touch with past clients and potential leads is essential for generating referrals and repeat business. However, manually sending out newsletters can be time-consuming.
Fortunately, there are plenty of great newsletter automation tools out there that can save you hours every month.
MailChimp and Constant Contact are two popular options that allow you to create beautiful newsletters with ease. Plus, they make it easy to manage your contacts and send out automated emails when someone subscribes to your newsletter.
Tips to facilitate your newsletter automation workflow:
Use a planner so you can build your newsletters around strategic dates.
Avoid sending newsletters during busy seasons. While there’s nothing wrong about sending a newsletter during Thanksgiving, you’ll be competing with the e-commerce brands who are already sending dozens of emails to your potential clients.
Write the content for your newsletters in batches. Here’s an example of your Q1 newsletters:
– January 11: Welcoming 2023 with market predictions for 2023 – January 25: Top 5 Communities for families in your city – February 7: Top 10 Ideas to Celebrate Valentines as a Family – February 23: Featuring a listing – March 1: Downloadable PDF with trusted providers for Spring Cleaning – March 14: Calendar of events for families (feature popular festivals during April, May, and June
Segment your audience so you can plan nurturing campaigns for your renters.
Once you plan the topics ahead, you then can automate your content management system and create reminders with the information you’ll need in order to prepare your newsletter following your content lifecycle plan. And just know that you can hire a real estate marketing agency and they will take over this entire process for you!
Between automating your real estate social media and newsletters, you’ll be saving at least 20 hours each month (if not more!).
Now let’s get you to save time with those repeatable tasks that are part of your real estate marketing.
4) Postcard Automation
Nothing says “professional” like getting a personalized postcard in the mail from your favorite realtor! However, writing out and mailing dozens of postcards can take up a lot of time—time that could be spent generating new leads.
Luckily, there are plenty of postcard automation services out there that make it easy to design and print professional-looking postcards without breaking the bank. Postalytics and Send Out Cards are two great options that offer affordable postcard printing and mailing services. They even offer automated campaigns so you can set it and forget it!
You’re probably doing all the above real estate marketing tactics. But if you want to stand out, a great real estate marketing idea for 2023 is to level up your Local SEO efforts so that people who are near you can actually find you.
So what is Local SEO and how can this be integrated with your real estate content marketing automation strategy?
5) Local SEO Automation for Realtors
One of the best ways to ensure that your site is visible to people in your vicinity is to optimize your online presence for local SEO. This involves making sure that your name appears prominently in search results for relevant keywords. This works great for realtors who have a physical location. Your broker might have Local SEO and you might be able to leverage their presence if you play your cards right.
While you’re not expected to be a pro and learn SEO, it’s important for you to know that your online presence can be optimized in a relatively fast way by using SEO automation tools. And by SEO Automation tools we mean automating the workflows. Unfortunately, while there are artificial intelligence tools for SEO tasks, the work that it takes in order to make edits on the site and actually distribute links and build directories is still done by humans.
Final Words
Real estate can be a very rewarding career, but it takes a lot of hard work to be successful. It’s important to have a clear vision for your business from the beginning. If you’re only looking to close a few deals per year and make some extra money, that’s perfectly fine. However, if you want to build a full-time business, you’ll need to be strategic to attract more clients.
Having a solid digital marketing presence is essential for driving leads and closing sales especially if you don’t have to be the one doing the work! Wouldn’t that be great?
Taking the time to invest in your marketing will pay off in the long run and help you achieve your business goals.
About MFG – Jessica Campos
Before becoming a digital marketer, I was a real estate attorney and closed close to a billion transactions. However, my success was all 100% offline. Facebook didn’t exist. The kind of digital marketing tools we have these days are in my opinion, untapped by real estate agents. This makes me excited to partner up with realtors!
Real estate is all about relationships and building trust. And what better way to build trust than by being present and accessible online?
I believe that the real estate industry is ripe for some serious disruption and that agents who embrace digital marketing will be the ones who come out on top. So if you’re a realtor looking for an edge, I hope you liked these real estate marketing ideas.
Real Estate Marketing Automation Services We Offer
When it comes to real estate marketing, having everything in one place is essential so you can move as quickly as possible. Luckily, we take pride in our fast turnaround for our marketing services.
We develop a real estate automated marketing system, customized to your needs and goals. This includes:
What’s A Healthy Bootstrapping Marketing Budget? Marketing Experts Answer
No matter how many times you’ve found yourself trying to figure out what your marketing budget should be, so you can sell your products or services, it’s never an easy answer. Read about the best ways to market your business in 2023.
No matter how many times you’ve found yourself trying to figure out what your marketing budget should be, so you can sell your products or services, it’s never an easy answer.
Most of the marketing conversations we’re having in our marketing agency are with business owners who aspire to build a brand, long-term, but need a plan to combine both: their short-term and long-term goals. If this is you, then, bootstrapping might be on your radar.
What do you mean by bootstrapping?
Bootstrapping your business is a lot like pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. It means you are using your own resources to get your business started. This can be done by using your own money, getting help from family and friends, or finding creative ways to barter for goods and services. Bootstrapping can be a slow process, but it can also be very rewarding.
Most U.S. businesses are self-funded and don’t raise outside capital. Statistics are sketchy, but experts generally agree that about 6 million new businesses start up in the U.S. in an average year. Of those, only about 70,000 startups get angel investment, and fewer than 5,000 get venture capital.
Some Bootstrap Marketing Ideas
Bootstrapping means that you have to be extra careful with how you spend your money. Marketing can be one of the first areas to get slashed when bootstrapping, but it doesn’t have to be. With a little bit of planning, you can set up a bootstrap marketing strategy that won’t break the bank.
The first thing you need to do when setting up your bootstrapped marketing budget is figuring out what you can realistically afford to spend. Make a list of all your current business expenses and then see what you can cut back on or eliminate entirely. This may include items like dining out, cable TV, and weekends away. Once you’ve determined what you can reasonably afford to spend on marketing, you can start thinking about where to allocate those funds.
One of the most important things to remember when bootstrapping is that you need to focus on ROI (return on investment). This means that every dollar you spend on marketing should bring in more than a dollar in revenue.
But How Do You Create A Boostrap Marketing Plan?
Since you want to make sure you’re not wasting resources, your bootstrap marketing strategy needs to be thoughtful. Your first factor to consider is which marketing channels you will be growing. Gone are the days where you could hire a PR firm to run a powerful marketing campaign and see amazing results.
You want to keep your advertising costs low, but effective at the same time, so you can see an influx of cash to keep your business running. You might also want to consider getting capital for your marketing projects. In this way, you’ll secure your investment and your business success. In case you need a trusted lender, we highly recommend One Park Financial.
How Much Do Digital Marketing Services For Small Businesses Cost?
Generally speaking, the size of your marketing budget generally depends on factors like the type of business you’re running, the size of your audience, and how competitive your industry is.
While digital channels are a top priority for business owners, there are other marketing costs that should be factored, in addition of your digital marketing budget. Examples of marketing costs outside of digital marketing are:
Advertising
Customer surveys
Gifts to customers
Printed materials and displays
Community Outreach
Sponsorships
Marketers can’t predict or guarantee results. No matter how good they are. So, be realistic about your expectations and be prepared to give your marketing efforts at least 6 months.
As a ballpark, anywhere from 5-10% of your desired revenue may be considered a reasonable amount for businesses that take a B2B approach. And if you are marketing to consumers, in a highly competitive industry, you’ll need between 15-20% of your desired revenue.
Now that you have an idea of the marketing budget for your small business, the next thing is: how will you invest it? Notice that we say “invest”, not spend. Your marketing is an investment. Not an expense. Especially when you’re in the startup phase.
The Top Three Marketing Strategies for Bootstrapping
The landscape of digital marketing has changed drastically. So, no matter what you heard about what works and what’s working for your competitors, you can’t ignore the fact that you’re starting under many different conditions than they had. In other words: what worked for them won’t work for you.
Any bootstrapping marketing expert will tell you this: you can’t grow what you can’t measure. So, before making any decisions about your social media platforms, Adwords, or considering using online advertising services, your marketing analytics need to be set up. We’re living in unprecedented times. And without access to your own data, taking a guess on how to market so you can drive sales is a risky practice.
When business owners come to us for bootstrapping marketing services, we start with analytics. We take a Forensic Marketing approach to marketing, which sets us apart from any other digital marketing agencies. We’re also practitioners with expert-level knowledge of digital marketing, which allows us to make decisions and execute quickly.
Where are small business owners seeing a great ROI from marketing?
Our top three marketing strategies are Content Marketing SEO, Social Media, and Paid Media. But to see a higher ROI from marketing, we recommend combining different marketing strategies based on what you need.
It can be 70% SEO, 20% Social, 10% Paid (Google Adwords or Facebook Ads) or 90% SEO, 5% Social, and 5% Paid or any combination, depending on what we gather from the data.
Another factor that’s helping small business owners is to keep advertising costs at the bare minimum. We see that organic marketing practices drive higher conversions than paid channels. That doesn’t mean you won’t use paid channels. You will.
We have saved our clients up to 90% of their advertising budget by integrating their ad campaigns with SEO best practices.
Now let’s take a deep dive into the top three marketing services for bootstrapping and the budget.
Content Marketing Budget: What Does This Include and How Much?
This includes things like blog posts, infographics, eBooks, and whitepapers. Content marketing is a great way to attract leads without spending a lot of money. Just make sure that your content is high-quality and relevant to your target audience. Because you want to gain the right visibility AND the right reputation so you can gain trust from true potential buyers.
You can hire a content marketing specialist on a project-based payment and this allows you to get high-quality work without committing to a monthly payment.
A healthy content marketing budget should consider:
New pages for your website or optimize the existing ones using top-notch SEO strategies so you can see conversions
Long-form content that positions your brand as a leader and helps you gain authority and build trust
Content to generate leads
Mistakes to avoid when hiring a content marketing specialist:
Be sure they have a track record of creating high-converting content. If they can show you tracked links, even better.
Here’s an example of a home page that our team optimized 10 months ago. Using Google Search Console we can filter a single page and see the impact of the optimizations that were performed. Each page or article can be tracked inside Google Search Console or Google Analytics using UTM codes.
If your content writer doesn’t have those digital marketing skills, you won’t have access to the full benefits of content marketing.
If you hire content marketing services, be sure they include SEO optimization and tracking. How else could you calculate the ROI of your marketing?
Don’t create educational content without a plan to turn them into paying customers.
Most content writers understand the tactics to drive website traffic. However, there’s a difference between driving traffic and driving conversions. And your content should be able to assist in your conversion flow.
Lastly, be sure they have your branding guidelines.
Your content marketing should represent your brand. Don’t assume that your content marketing specialist will pick your brand voice. Instead, provide them with your branding guidelines which should have guidance to persuade your future buyers.
“Your content should be informative, relevant, and persuasive at the same time.”
Social Media Marketing Budget: What Does This Include and How Much?
Promoting your content on social media is a great way to reach new people without spending any money. Just make sure you’re strategic about which platforms you use and how often you post.
You don’t need to hire a social media manager to take over. You can always start by outsourcing content creation and graphic creation. This will free up your calendar and will allow you to get more clients.
A healthy social marketing budget should consider:
Social media strategy, crafted on a monthly basis
Videos that assist your long-form content so you can generate traffic and conversions
Time to engage with your audience so you can expand your network by “socializing” with the right people
Bootstrapping Your SEO Marketing Strategies
Unlike many SEO agencies will want you to believe, you don’t actually need SEO all the time. You can get SEO in a project base and optimize a few website pages at a time. This will help you grow your online presence consistently, without breaking the bank. SEO takes about 6-9 months to kick in. But the good news is that once your pages are ranking, you’ll start to see the compound effect of SEO.
Advertising Budget: What Does This Include and How Much?
If you do have some money to spend on marketing, paid advertising can be an effective way to reach new people quickly. Just make sure you’re clear about your goals and target audience before investing any money in paid ads.
Save Time and Money by Hiring Expert Marketers
It’s no secret that marketing a business can be extremely time-consuming and expensive. If you’re bootstrapping your business, you might be tempted to try to do it all yourself or hire inexpensive freelancers on Fiverr to save money.
However, this is often a mistake. The truth is unless you have previous experience in marketing, you’re likely to end up spending more time and money than if you had just hired experts from the beginning. Here’s why:
It Takes Time to Learn Marketing
Even if you’re naturally good at marketing and have some experience with it, there’s still a lot to learn if you want to do it well. There are always new trends and techniques to keep up with, not to mention the fact that what works in one industry might not work in another. If you try to keep up with everything yourself, you’ll quickly become overwhelmed. This will lead to either subpar results or complete burnout. Neither of which is good for your business.
You Need an Experienced Team
Trying to do everything yourself also means that you won’t have a team of experienced professionals to collaborate with. A good marketing team will have a variety of skills and experience levels. This way, they can cover more ground and come up with better ideas than if you were working alone. Having a team also allows you to delegate tasks so that you can focus on running your business.
Marketing Teams Have Become Very Agile After The Pandemic
There’s no secret that marketing agencies suffered during the pandemic. As businesses shuttered their doors and consumers hunkered down at home, many marketers found themselves out of work or facing reduced hours and budgets. However, the pandemic also presented an opportunity for marketers to step up and show their value.
In our MFG Agency, we had to minimize our team and pivot with tools and efficient workflows so we could offer high-quality services to our clients while fitting into their budgets. This allowed us to become more agile. Because we had to!
In the end, we haven’t gone back to the old ways. We’ve found new ways to reach consumers and adapt to the ever-changing digital marketing landscape.
“It’s been fun seeing how a simple 15-second video reaches hundreds of thousands of people and boosts a brand! The power of short videos is still untouched by most business owners. This won’t last for too long.”
Jessica Campos, Founder of MFG
But How Much Does It Cost To Hire Expert Marketers?
The answer, unfortunately, is not a simple one. The cost of hiring a marketing expert depends on many factors, including the size of your business, the scope of the project, and the expert’s level of experience.
As for the price of individual services, here’s a ballpark amount of expert-level marketing services:
– Social media marketing: $500-$3,000+ per month
– Search engine optimization (SEO): $1,000-$5,000+ per month
– Pay-per-click (PPC) management: $500-$10,000+ per month
– Email marketing: $500-$2,000+ per month
– Content marketing: $500-$5,000+ per month
– Market research: $5,000-$20,000+
– Advertising campaign management: 10% of total ad spend
-Fractional CRO (Conversion Rate Optimization): $350- $600 per hour
How Do We Price Our Expert Marketing Packages At MFG Agency?
In our MFG Agency, we start by identifying quick wins. And sometimes those quick wins will need light adjustments to their branding, website, or social media.
A solid marketing plan takes between 20-40 hours per month to execute. Even though the hourly rate of a fractional CRO or CMO is $350, you won’t pay that. We’ve managed to create growth packages that start at $3,000 per month and that give you access to our team:
2 Digital Marketing Experts
Expert-level SEO & Content Marketing
Expert-level Social Media
A team of graphic designers
Copywriters
Website developer
Influencer marketing
In addition to our well-nurtured resources that can assist with branding, photography, video marketing, event marketing, funding, etc.
And we’ve managed to structure performance-based plans and help you find capital. We see ourselves as your success partners.
Final Thoughts
Everything has a price. Even the things you’re getting for free. And when it comes to receiving marketing services, what you’re truly getting is PEACE. How much would you pay for peace of mind? Some might say “it’s priceless.”
For some of you, your peace of mind comes from seeing a healthy banking account. You want to see short-term gains. And want to actually see it in the banking account.
We also speak to business owners that their peace of mind comes from having certainty about their long-term success. They don’t look for immediate sales. They want to build a brand and have long-term goals.
In which group are you? Knowing what success looks like for you is important when you’re considering hiring a marketing team.
Let’s Have A Conversation
We help businesses like yours to create and implement effective bootstrapping marketing strategies. It all starts by getting to know your business and your goals. Then, conduct market research and develop a personalized plan of action.
What’s the Best Way to Market a Small Business in 2023
Marketing your business correctly is essential to its success. Read about the best ways to market your business in 2023.
As we move into 2023, it’s time to start thinking about how to market your small business most effectively. While there are many different marketing channels you can use to reach your target audience, some are more effective than others.
Here are our top recommendations for digital marketing activities that will help you grow your business fast.
How Will Small Businesses Grow In 2023?
In 2023, the big thing for small businesses will be content marketing SEO to boost traffic on their websites. Paid advertising is getting challenging, as users are on multiple platforms and it’s hard to attribute the ROI from paid efforts. By focusing on creating engaging content that is optimized for search engines, small businesses can attract more organic traffic and get ahead of their competitors. Additionally, content marketing can help to build brand awareness and create loyalty among customers. With so many benefits, it’s no wonder that content marketing SEO is predicted to be one of the biggest trends for small businesses in 2023.
When it comes to online marketing, we’re recommending 3 essential best practices: 1) content marketing and SEO 2) email marketing and 3) social media. These are essential in order to effectively market your business online and connect with your target audience. Building brand authority means creating high-quality, informative articles that position you as an expert in your field. Email marketing helps you to stay in touch with your customers and build relationships with them. Social media is a great way to connect with potential and current customers and promote your brand.
Wondering why these three areas make the essential aspects of your business’s marketing plan? Here are the stats:
Vital Statistics That Small Business Owners Need To Know.
According to 92 percent of entrepreneurs, a website is one of the most successful digital marketing tactics.
Within 24 hours, 75 percent of local mobile searches result in visits to offline stores.
Long-term spending by customers who interact with a company on social media might increase by up to 40 percent.
Email is the most popular marketing technique for small firms, with a 54 percent usage rate.
The typical ROI for email marketing is 122 percent.
The stats show the significance of incorporating comprehensive and advanced digital marketing strategies to boost your newly established or existing venture.
Let’s delve into details to take a closer look at these digital marketing strategies.
Digital Marketing Strategies 2023 #1: Content
Marketing SEO
In this day and age, it’s not enough to have a website- you need to have a website that people can find. This is where SEO comes in. Search Engine Optimization is the practice of making sure your website comes up as the number one result for relevant searches. However, simply stuffing your website with keywords is not enough. You also need interesting and engaging content, or no one will bother to visit your site. This is where content marketing comes in. Content marketing is a strategy for creating and distributing content that is relevant to your target audience.
Content Marketing Tips to Grow a Business:
1.Segmentation
If you’re like most businesses, you probably want to reach as many people as possible with your marketing efforts. After all, more customers means more sales and more growth, right? Well, not necessarily. In fact, one of the most common mistakes businesses make is failing to segment their audience. Your audience isn’t everyone – it’s specific groups of people with specific needs and interests. Trying to appeal to everyone will just result in a generic, uninteresting message that doesn’t resonate with anyone.
Instead of trying to be everything to everyone, focus your content marketing efforts on specific segments of your audience. This will allow you to create targeted, relevant content that resonates with each group. As a result, you’ll be more likely to generate leads and convert them into customers.
2. Create Content Considering Micro Niches
As any marketer knows, casting a wide net is not always the most effective way to attract customers. Sometimes, it is more effective to focus on a smaller, more specific group of people. This is known as a micro niche. By definition, a micro niche is a subset of a larger market niche that has already been segmented.
For example, if you are selling bicycles, your micro niche might be children’s bicycles. The advantage of targeting a micro niche is that you can pre-qualify your potential customers and buyers in the initial phase of the marketing funnel. This saves you time and energy in the long run because you are not wasting your resources trying to reach people who are not interested in what you have to offer. To determine your micro niche, start by creating a buyer’s persona. This will help you to summarize the target audience’s demographics, needs, and wants. Once you have a clear picture of who your ideal customer is, you can start creating content that appeals to them directly. By considering micro niches, you can make your marketing more effective and save yourself time and money in the long run.
3. Mobile Design: A Website Is Not Enough Anymore
A responsive website provides a better user experience overall, especially for mobile and tablet visitors. Since designing for mobile is the most challenging, it is typically done for that platform first; after those issues are resolved, designing for the desktop is considerably easier.
A mobile-responsive strategy focuses on adaptive design to ensure that content looks beautiful regardless of the device used to view it.
4. Customer Experience
Over the past few years, customer expectations have steadily increased. With the rise of online shopping, customers have come to expect a certain level of convenience and accessibility. And rightly so – why should they have to settle for anything less? With so many options available at their fingertips, why would they put up with poor customer service or a lack of transparency?
COVID-19 has only served to heighten these expectations. With in-person shopping coming to a complete halt, customers were left with no choice but to turn to online options. And while in-person shopping has resumed, the pandemic has forced many businesses to reevaluate their approach to customer experience. In order to stay competitive, it’s more important than ever for businesses to take a customer-centered approach.
What does that mean, exactly? It means putting the needs of your customers first, constantly striving to exceed their expectations, and always being transparent. It’s about building trust and creating loyalty – something that will be invaluable as we continue to navigate these uncertain times.
If you want your marketing to really hit the mark, take a customer-centered approach. Instead of creating content to promote your business, do it the other way around. Start by identifying what your customers need and want, and then create content that meets those needs. Not only will this make your marketing more effective, but it will also foster a stronger sense of loyalty and trust between you and your customers. And at the end of the day, isn’t that what marketing is all about?
5- Ai Technology Is Here To Stay
In the future years, artificial intelligence will completely dominate digital marketing. You might be surprised to learn that AI can assess customer behavior in addition to search patterns by using information from multiple social media platforms.
Wait. Does this mean that a machine can actually write your articles and captions for your social media posts? Yes.
The following are the AI apps that our digital marketing agency is actively using:
AI Content Writing-A program that employs artificial intelligence to generate original, high-quality material from user-entertained keywords or phrases
AI Image Design- Due to AI’s increased speed and efficiency, designers can produce designs more quickly and affordably.
AI-Based Captions for Social Media- After understanding each image based on its various components, the AI-based Captioning tool produces captions or textual descriptions accessible by humans.
AI-Based Ecommerce- By gathering information about your consumers, automating follow-up queries about abandoned carts, and more, AI can help establish a more effective sales process.
Our digital marketing agency is already using AI-powered tools to be more efficient and cost-effective, and we’re seeing great results. So if you’re not already on board with AI, now is the time to get on board!
6- Establishing Clear KPIs for Your Content Marketing SEO Efforts
Before you start writing content for your website, it’s important to establish some clear KPIs (key performance indicators). These are the metrics that you’ll use to measure progress and performance toward your goals over time. We recommend setting up tracking plugins so you can attribute any changes in traffic or rankings to your content marketing efforts. Some common KPIs for content marketing include pageviews, unique visitors, bounce rate, time on site, and conversion rate. By monitoring these metrics, you’ll be able to see how your content is performing and make necessary adjustments to improve your results.
Marketing analytics can be a daunting task. There’s so much data out there, and it can be hard to know where to start. That’s where our Forensic Marketing Services come in. We’ll help you track down the data that matters, and then we’ll help you make sense of it all. We’ll show you what’s working, what’s not, and how you can improve your marketing strategy. With our help, you’ll be able to make smarter, more informed decisions about your marketing campaigns. So if you’re feeling lost in the world of marketing analytics, you’re at the right place today!
7- Measure Your Future Buyers Journey
Big data is great. It can tell you all sorts of things about your customers and their behavior. But if you want to create a truly effective marketing strategy, you need to go beyond the numbers. You need to understand the customer journey.
The customer journey is the path that your customers take from awareness to purchase. It includes all the touchpoints that they have with your brand, from first becoming aware of your product or service to making a final purchase.
Data can give you a lot of information about each individual touchpoint. But it can be difficult to see the big picture. That’s where expert analysis comes in. By understanding the customer journey, analysts can help you identify areas where you can improve your marketing strategy and drive more conversions.
If you want to create a successful marketing strategy, you need to start by measuring the customer journey. Only then can you get the insights you need to make informed decisions about your marketing efforts.
Use Google Analytics for Marketing. Here’s how:
Google Analytics is a powerful tool that can provide insights into how users are interacting with your website. However, it can be tricky to know which data is most important to look at. Here’s a breakdown of the most important data you can use to discover how users are navigating your site:
Bounce rate: This measures the percentage of users who leave your site after viewing only one page. A high bounce rate can indicate that users are not finding what they’re looking for on your site.
Time on site: This measures how long users are spending on your site. A low time on site can indicate that users are not engaged with your content.
Pages per session: This measures how many pages users are viewing during each session. A low pages per session can indicate that users are not finding enough content of interest on your site.
By understanding these key metrics, you can get a better idea of how users are interacting with your website and make changes accordingly.
8- Optimize Your Website For Conversions
When you’re running a business, it’s important to make sure that your website is optimized for conversions. This means making sure that your site is attractive to potential customers and easy to navigate. It also means ensuring that your site is keyword-rich and full of valuable content. By taking the time to optimize your website for conversions, you’ll be able to attract more organic traffic and generate more leads. And, in the end, that means more sales and more profits. So if you’re serious about growing your business, make sure that you take the time to optimize your website for conversions. It’s one of the best investments you can make.
You can collect the contact information of your prospects interested in goods and services using a lead capture form. However, you should focus on making lead capture forms that can add to your marketing plan. For instance, you can:
Create quizzes to gather information to segment your consumer base for personalization.
Make your lead-collecting forms interactive.
Gamify your holiday advertising strategies.
Digital Marketing Strategies 2023 #2:Social Media Marketing
In 2023, social media marketing will continue to be an important part of any digital marketing strategy. Customers are increasingly spending time on social media platforms, and they are more likely to trust a brand that has a strong social media presence. A recent study found that 62% of customers are more likely to trust a brand if it is active on social media. Additionally, social media provides an opportunity to connect with customers on a personal level and build relationships.
There’s just one issue: social media marketing can be time consuming. Creating one post can take up to 45 minutes and that’s not considering filming videos or editing.
In order to maximize the benefits of social media marketing, it is important to integrate it into your content promotion strategy holistically.
Social Media Marketing Tips To Grow Your Business:
1- Branding
As a small business owner, you know that branding is important to help your business stand out from the competition. But did you know that your social media channels are also a great place to reinforce your brand? Make sure your profile photos and cover images reflect your company’s logo and colors, and that your content is consistent with your brand messaging. By takes these simple steps, you can ensure that your social media presence reinforces, rather than detracts from, your brand.
2- Humanize Your Brand
In today’s competitive marketplace, customers are looking for brands that they can connect with on a personal level. So make sure your social media content humanizes your brand by featuring photos and stories of your employees, customers, and company culture. This will help potential customers see that there’s a real team behind your business, and that you’re committed to delivering a great experience.
3- Use Targeted Content
Not all of your social media followers will be interested in every aspect of your business. That’s why it’s important to use targeted content to reach different segments of your audience. For example, if you sell both B2C and B2B products, you might create separate social media channels or target different types of content to each group. By using targeted content, you can ensure that you’re sharing the most relevant information with each segment of your audience, increasing the chances that they’ll engage with your brand.
4- Boost Your Engagement With Videos
Videos are a particularly effective format for social media marketing, since they’re easy to consume and share. But how do you get started with video marketing? Here are a few tips:
Keep it short and sweet. People’s attention spans are shorter than ever, so it’s important to make your videos as concise as possible. Aim for under two minutes if possible.
Make it visually appealing. Use high-quality visuals and engaging editing to keep viewers’ attention focused on your video.
Use calls to action. Include calls to action throughout your video, so viewers know what they can do next (such as follow your brand on social media or visit your website).
Promote across all channels. Once you’ve created your video, be sure to promote it on all of your social media channels for maximum reach.
By following these tips, you can create social media marketing videos that will help grow your business.
5- Monitor Your Progress
Once you’ve implemented these tips, it’s important to monitor your progress and adjust your strategy as needed. Look at metrics like follower growth rate, engagement rate, and click-through rate to get an idea of how well your content is performing. If you see a dip in any of these metrics, take a closer look at what might have caused it and make changes accordingly. By monitoring your progress and being willing to adapt as needed, you can ensure that your social media marketing strategy is always working to grow your business.
Pay attention to your users! They know what they want!
Digital Marketing Strategies in 2023 #3: Email Marketing
Email marketing has been around for a while, but it’s still an effective tool for reaching customers. In 2023, email marketing will continue to be a key part of digital marketing strategies. Here are three reasons why:
Email is personal. You can address your subscribers by name and build a relationship with them through your messages. This helps you stand out in the inbox and creates loyalty among your subscribers.
Email is targeted. You can segment your list and send highly targeted messages to different groups of people. This allows you to tailor your message to each group and increases the likelihood that they’ll engage with your email.
Email is profitable. Email marketing is one of the most cost-effective ways to reach your audience. It has a high ROI and can help you achieve your business goals while staying within your budget.
Email marketing is a powerful tool that should be part of every marketer’s toolkit.
Email Marketing Tips That Will Boost Your Business in 2023
Email marketing can be a great way to connect with your audience and promote your product or service – but only if it’s done right. Here are a few tips to help you get the most out of your email marketing campaign:
1- Segment Your Audience
Not everyone is interested in the same thing, so it’s important to segment your list so you can send more targeted, relevant emails. This will also help you avoid having your emails marked as spam.
2- Keep It Short, Sweet, and Relevant
No one wants to read a novel in their inbox, so make sure your emails are concise and to the point. And always make sure the content is relevant to your audience – otherwise, they’ll tune out pretty quickly.
3- Be Creative With Your Topics
If you’re constantly sending emails about the same thing, people are going to get bored pretty fast. Mix it up and keep things fresh by coming up with new and interesting topics for your emails.
4- Set Expectations From The Start
Let your subscribers know how often you’re going to be sending emails – once a week, once a month, etc. That way they won’t be caught off guard when they start getting more frequent messages from you.
5- Incorporate Email And Social Media
Take advantage of both platforms by promoting your email campaign on social media and including social media buttons in your emails. This will help encourage people to use both channels and gets more eyes on your marketing efforts.
Now that you’ve gotten the best tips to boost your business in 2023, it’s time to talk about execution. How do we get there?
Outsourcing your marketing vs in-house marketing? What’s the best option?
There are pros and cons to both outsourcing and in-house marketing.
In-house marketing may be a better option if you have the budget to hire multiple people to handle different aspects of marketing such as content, web design, social media, and email. This way, you can be sure that everyone is on the same page and working towards the same goals.
However, outsourcing may be a better option if you don’t have the budget to hire multiple people or if you’re not sure how to get started with marketing. Outsourcing allows you to tap into a wealth of experience and expertise that you may not have in-house. It can also be more cost-effective than hiring multiple people, since you’ll only be paying for the services you need.
Ultimately, the best option for your business will depends on your specific needs and resources.
So, Where Should You Start Your Marketing Plan For 2023?
Marketing is a lot like baking a cake; you need to have all the right ingredients in order to create a delicious and successful final product. And just like with baking, the quality of your marketing efforts will only be as good as the quality of your strategy. That’s why it’s so important to have a well-oiled marketing strategy in place before you start implementing any tactics. By taking the time to plan and map out your goals, target audience, and key channels, you’ll set yourself up for success in the coming year. So, what are you waiting for? Get started on your marketing strategy for 2023 today!
Steal our social media marketing process so you can start attracting clients for your life coaching business.
It’s hard to know where to start when it comes to social media marketing.
You could spend hours reading blog posts and watching tutorials, or you could simply get a social media marketing plan for life coaches that considers the needs of your practice.
And that’s what this article is all about. You’re about to get a well-oiled social media marketing process that will end with the struggle of how to grow your coaching business using social media.
Let’s roll!
How do I market my coaching business on social media?
There’s one thing that separates a life coaching business from other businesses: your clients won’t hire you unless they can trust you.
They don’t buy from you because you are the cheapest. Hence the reason why promotions are not really effective for life coaching businesses.
You want people to hire you because you are the best and you can help them solve a problem.
For this reason, when we outline content for a life coach, we need to consider their future buyers and their journey first.
What should a life coach post on social media?
Since your clients need to like you, trust you, and believe in you, before they even consider working with you, your social media content needs to have a balance between those goals.
Your account should have a variation of:
Content that resonates with your audience at a personal level.
Content that builds your trust.
Content that builds your authority.
Our process to create a social media calendar for life coaches:
Step 1: Channel audit. We start by analyzing which channel is performing best by checking the website analytics. Why this step matters? Because our goal with social media marketing isn’t about getting likes. We measure success based on conversions. We identify which topics are driving users to the site, so we can capture leads and initiate the sales process.
We’re finding that Facebook and Instagram are still at the top of the platforms for life coaches. We recommend to use both channels.
Is it good to post to Facebook and Instagram at the same time?
The short answer: no. It’s important to understand that your users are in both platforms, but they use them for different reasons. We recommend to combine Instagram and Facebook strategically.
Instead of repeating the same post on Instagram and Facebook, for example, you can share a clickable article on Facebook, then, since Instagram posts cannot be clicked, you will share that article in Stories. Simultaneously, you can post a Reels with a recap of the article and share the it in stories, with a link to a freebie. Notice how just one topic is giving you a chance to create multiple posts in multiple formats.
Pro tip: always pick the shortest journey. For example: sharing a video, then asking them to click so you can grab their email will be better than sharing a video, inviting them to a Facebook Group, and expecting the group to help you generate leads and sales. Pick the shortest route!
Step 2: Campaigns. Once we define the topics, we then create our editorial calendar considering campaigns. Seasonality plays a big role here. Let’s say that you want to help women who are going through life transitions. If the holidays are approaching, create content that considers their struggles during that season.
Step 3: Create long-form content. We love using social media to identify conversations. Then we create long-form articles using SEO tools that give us content ideas that are relevant to the topics. Having a well-oiled content writing system is key.
In our social media marketing agency, our life coaching clients get 4 articles per month, plus 15 posts for their social media. This allows us to build a fresh calendar each month, so they never run out of content.
A typical monthly social media calendar for a life coach has:
4 long-form articles (turned into posts and Reels)
2-3 days to observe based on the campaigns
2-3 testimonials
2-3 promotions
Step 4: Editorial calendar. If you haven’t built a social media calendar, having a done-for-you social media planner will help you tremendously. Here’s our social media planner. If you have a chance, watch this video series where I show you how to use the planner. It’s available in Amazon, by the way!
You should be able to build your editorial calendar in about 2 hours. If you want to learn practical tips to save time, I cover it all in Social Greatness- a FREE series where you’ll get a year of content, written for you. This social media tool will save you dozens of hours!
Step 5: Social media graphics order. Your main role in your marketing is to build your network. You’re not a graphic designer. Therefore, delegating this process is crucial to take your business to the next level. I could make graphics; but I won’t. Since you will be ordering graphics after having your editorial calendar ready, your process will flow effortlessly.
Your social media graphic order should look like this:
Inspiration: add a link to a style you likes
Text to include: clearly write what the text will say
Sizes: ask for the graphic in multiple sizes so you can use it for your feed and stories
Step 6: Create captions for your social media posts. Once your graphics are ready, it’s time to write captions. If you love creative writing, great! But if you want to save some time and test Ai, we recommend using Jarvis (a software that writes professional content for you). It has saved us hundreds of hours! Click here to check them out.
In our social media marketing agency, one account is managed by 3 marketers. This allows us to deliver high-quality social media content.
Step 7: Scheduling. Once the graphics and captions are ready, the next step is scheduling. Use a scheduling platform instead of posting manually. Facebook has enhanced their scheduling platform and it’s free! Use it!
Be sure to schedule content in multiple formats: posts, videos, and stories.
You can add polls and stickers to your stories to generate more engagements.
Use hashtags that are relevant to the content you are talking about.
Do scheduled posts get less views?
You might be wondering if scheduling posts get less views than manual posts. This is a myth. Scheduled posts have the same chance to gain reach and engagement than manual posts.
Should I hire a social media marketing agency?
The short answer is NO.
As a life coach, you need more than a social media marketing agency. You need to grow your online presence, build authority, create content to monetize it, and attract clients. And all of this, while serving your clients. That’s a lot!
Your best hire will be a digital marketing team of experts that can be efficient and give your business what it needs so you can take it to the next level ASAP.
And if that team has a one-stop-shop where you can also create and produce content, even better! For those of you in Austin, Texas, MFG Agency is that one-stop-shop. We offer packages for life coaches, content creators, brands, and e-commerce businesses. Click here to chat about your business.
How do I advertise myself as a life coach?
Since we’re talking about how to market your life coaching business in social media, we need to consider advertising.
Advertising and marketing are often misunderstood. Advertising is all about direct response. Content marketing, on the other hand, is about engaging with the future buyer and use a seductive method to drive them closer to your brand. You won’t pitch your services before you’re further engaged with the user and know that they are interested in what you have to offer.
But let’s be totally candid: self promotion is totally accepted.
I know that sometimes it’s not easy to “brag” about yourself.
But… if you don’t share how amazing you are, who will?
Get on the spotlight as much as possible! Don’t be shy.
Get featured in publications
Get interviewed
Win an award
Join a conference
Play team with other industry leaders
Join networking associations so you can expand your sphere of influence
Pro tip: Use your offline marketing to create content for your online marketing.
Your users are watching you. They want to see that “you are the real deal”. And this is the kind of influence that will inspire them to work with you.
How do coaches grow on Instagram?
Coaches grow by growing their reputation. Your reputation, meaning reviews, is currency these days.
Take some time to ask your amazing clients to leave you a review on Google, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Then, use those reviews to create content and share it on Instagram. Not only you will gain followers but you will be able to turn them into clients.
Again, just because you don’t have a fancy social media presence today doesn’t mean you can’t change it. And the best part, you can do it today.
Bottom Line
Follow the tips mentioned above to get your life coaching business going. Focus on being genuine and organic on avoiding roadblocks in your coaching journey. Becoming successful in this field is not an overnight thing. It requires patience, passion, and perseverance. Keep on trying, and after some time, you will have more customers than you could possibly handle.
Who is Jessica Campos
My short bio: Jessica Campos, JD, BBA Forensic Digital Marketing Mentor & MFG Agency Founder with over 15 years of experience. I found my way to escape from my law firm to start my beach life, over a decade ago. I’m a living testimonial that you can truly live from your mastery and talents and work from anywhere in the world while having a life. I have 4 children, a loving husband, and 2 amazing dogs. The word busy is not included in my vocabulary 😁I replaced it with “I am intentionally living a purpose-driven life and business.
If you’re on the fence about whether or not to start a TikTok channel for your business, let me tell you why you should just go for it.
A little over a month ago, I decided to start a TikTok channel so I could test a new strategy for my business. Within a month, I had amassed over 10,000 followers and over 1M views. If you’re on the fence about whether or not to start a TikTok channel for your business, let me tell you why you should just go for it.
The Before:
Although I had a TikTok account for over a year, the account wasn’t really growing. Even when I was consistently sharing content, using trending sounds, finding the best times to post, etc.
Ironically enough, I shared my frustration with my kids and they told me that my account wasn’t growing because my content was not relatable. They told me “Mom, people don’t like to see a teacher.” So I asked them to put together a list of videos from creators that looked like my age that they considered relatable. That’s when I understood the assignment.
I thought that funny videos were relatable. But it turns out that funny videos are not what my audience wanted from me. So if you’re taking notes, please write down this one: your audience might need substance more than a good laugh.
What does relatable content mean?
Relatable content means content that creates an emotional connection with the user. In simple words: it’s content that triggers a reaction, beyond a like.
Tips to create relatable content:
Use words that your audience would use.
Practice vulnerability. People are inclined to adopt the emotional perspective of powerless (versus powerful).
Make your audience feel something.
Create thought-provoking statements, instead of common facts.
Use commonalities. These are things that people commonly like.
The results:
My team was totally right. I did a “story time” sharing a very personal story when I was dealing with my rebellious-teenage-daughter, while growing a business. Oh my!
I freaked out
My story time was taken the WRONG way. Many women criticized me for prioritizing my business over my daughter’s needs. But the algorithm did its thing and found me the other group of women who actually came to the story and left me supporting comments. My friend, I felt like I was on Judge Judy’s show.
That’s when I learned how TikTok’s algorithm works, firsthand! I was amazed to see that story going “viral for me” and attracting women who were going through what I went through. Keep in mind, “viral for me” means that generated more reactions than any other video.
When the one viral video turns into a whole niche
That very first “viral for me” video gave me a sense of community. I was able to connect with powerful women, right away!
People kept asking me for more parts of the “story time” video. And that into a whole series of videos where I was sharing my experience, my lessons, and every bit of resource I had on my toolbox that could help other women who are going through the same situation.
That natural progression gave my TikTok channel over 1M video views!
And, of course, the forensic marketing strategist in me forced me to come up with a clear goal for this channel, which is, for now, my very own case study. I want to be able to show step-by-step, how to grow from zero, build a community, and monetize it.
If you know the MFG-SEO story, then you know that I built Austin Networking Group from zero by leveraging event marketing and a Facebook Group. The group has been fundamental to the success of our marketing agency. The best part? It has been 100% organic, using attraction marketing. We don’t need to “sell” anything. We lead with value. So I’m taking the same approach with this new TikTok channel. I know that if I create high-valuable content, the audience will come for more. In fact, I just launched a Podcast a few weeks ago, so I can answer questions and create longer talks, based on the TikTok topics. And following a TikTok marketing strategy, the little podcast is growing organically!
Can TikTok help with sales?
You might not think that an app full of 15-second videos is the place to sell your product or service, you’d be surprised. TikTok can actually be a great place to market your business—if you do it right.
First, let’s dispel a common misconception: TikTok is not a direct sales platform. You’re not going to make a sale by posting a video of yourself holding up your product and saying, “Buy this now!” And that’s okay. Not every social media platform is conducive to making an immediate sale. That’s not what TikTok is for.
Instead, TikTok should be used as a way to build relationships with potential customers and create an emotional connection with your brand. If you can get people to like and trust your brand on TikTok, they’re more likely to buy from you. And this is where a marketing funnel comes in handy.
A social media marketing funnel is a path that your customers move through at each point of the user journey. You should have a social media marketing funnel as part of your TikTok strategy. If you need help with coming up with your strategic marketing funnel, this is an area where our MFG-SEO team can help tremendously.
Tiktok Tips for Business–My Secrets to Take TikTok Account from 0 – 10K in a month
TikTok Growth Secret Number One: Conduct Research
Create a personal account and use the search bar to explore topics. TikTok uses SEO tools to facilitate users. You can use long-tail keywords, which are great for specific questions. You will get suggestions as you type, and the “people also asked” section. Notice that I am recommending starting with a personal account first. The main reason is that you want to create a solid content strategy before starting your channel.
TikTok Growth Secret Number Two: Search for Specific Problems Within Your Niche
You can niche your content according to problems faced by the target audience. For instance, if you are a money coach, search for a relevant keyword such as “money problems in relationships.” Then, you can find questions you think potential customers want an answer to and make content accordingly.
TikTok Growth Secret Number Three: Choose a Video Style
After choosing your “winning” topics, you can select a video style. In my opinion, this is the most crucial step to drastically increase your growth. Many business owners mistake relying on sounds and trends and mimicking their niche. Avoid this mistake. Study accounts that talk about the problems you solve. But now, don’t just pay attention to the topics. Identify which videos generated the most comments and the video style they used. Here are a few questions you could use when trying to choose your video style:
Is the creator showing their face?
What kind of background do they have?
What kind of setting do they use? Are they inside their car?
Notice if they mix serious content with humor and how they do it
Do they answer questions from the audience?
Do they seem like they produce their videos, or are they casual?
Do they use editing effects or transitions? Which ones?
These lengthy steps might sound daunting to you, but believe me, I managed to boost my followers from 0 to 10K by following these steps in only a month. Plus, remember that you don’t have to do any of this. You can totally delegate it to an amazing team (hello MFG-SEO!).
TikTok Growth Secret Number Four: Editing
I’ve noticed that the quality of the video impacts the performance. Especially lightning. Also, add both, open captions and closed captions.
Do trending sounds make a TikTok video viral?
While audio might play a role in your video views, I’ve not seen consistency. In my channel, the videos that have generated the most views have been the ones with higher watch time.
TikTok Growth Secret Number Five: Thumbnail
Having a powerful thumbnail is essential. It’s quite interesting seeing how TikTokers love “clickbait” practices, especially when you push emotional boundaries.
TikTok Growth Secret Number Six: Caption and Hashtags
TikTok’s search engine is very powerful. Not only takes the content of your video by what your audio is about, but also using the text in your caption. I try to write down short lists.
Hashtags are also helpful. Pick your hashtags according to the customers’ problems you want to discuss. For instance, an author should use #booktok, #authorsoftiktok, etc. Keep in mind that viral hashtags such as #fyp won’t work.
TikTok Growth Secret Number Seven: Posting 4x Per Day
Growing your TikTok account requires consistent posting and engaging with the target audience. You must post 3-4 times a day for positive results. Here is the cadence I use on my channel:
8 am
1 pm
6 pm
8 pm
Remember that once you have questions from your audience, those will become your content. There are days when I have 20 questions that are worth an answer.
TikTok Growth Secret Number Eight: Avoid Follow for Follow
This strategy might work on Instagram, but TikTok is different. You should avoid “follow for follow” as you are not using Instagram. Search topics, engage with creators, and pay attention to your FYP. These actions will help you to make new and relatable content.
TikTok Growth Secret Number Nine: Respond to your Audience
Never ignore questions from users in the comment. When you respond to your users, they will feel valued and engaged with your content.
TikTok Growth Secret Number Ten: Advertise
TikTok’s algorithm suggests posts for boosting. I highly recommend following those suggestions as the algorithm understands which content has the potential to reach more. The healthy budget to start with post-boost is around $5 to $10 per day.
Why do you need 10,000 TikTok Followers?
The short answer: monetization.
TikTok has created a virtual gift economy for influencers that allows them to monetize their videos. Creators can earn money by streaming, tipping viewers with imaginary cash or coins (which are converted into real-world currency when gifted), and offering subscriptions where fans send payment in exchange for badges that you can customize with your brand.
TikTok requires that creators have a certain number of followers and views to access these features:
To join TikTok’s creator fund: a creator must be 18 years or older, have at least 10,000 followers, and have achieved at least 100,000 video views in a 30-day period.
To receive virtual “gifts” during a livestream: a creator must be 18 years or older and have at least 1,000 followers.
To receive “gifts” on other videos: a creator must be at least 18 years old and have at least 100,000 followers.
To receive “tips”: a creator must be at least 18 years old and have at least 100,000 followers.
No wonder you see so many creators doing livestreams with neon backgrounds!
In Conclusion
Starting a TikTok channel for your business is a great way to reach out to new audiences, promote your products or services, humanize your brand, and have some creative fun. And you don’t need any fancy equipment or editing skills—all you need is a smartphone and a willingness to have a good time. And of course, if you want to secure your TikTok marketing success, consider hiring MFG as your social media team.
The Ultimate Guide to TikTok Marketing Your Business
The case of why businesses need to be on TikTok and how to do it the right way.
With a significant hold on popular culture, TikTok is no longer an adolescent dance app. The popularity of the video-sharing site, which celebrities, Millennials, Gen Xers, and major corporations endorse, is astounding.
In just five years, TikTok has amassed an estimated 1 billion active users, rivaling some of the biggest names in social media. The post includes useful information about using TikTok and its capabilities, so you can determine why the app is so well-liked.
What Is TikTok & How Did it Get Started?
TikTok is a social media site where users can make, share, and find brief videos. The software gives content creators a platform to express themselves through lip-syncing, dancing, comedy, and singing. It also lets users make movies and share them with their social networks.
You might think that TikTok is just for people who want to dance, but that’s not the case at all!
The Algorithm
Which content will show up on your For You page is determined by the TikTok algorithm, which is a recommendation system that doesn’t need you to follow or befriend anyone. In my opinion, this is what makes TikTok unique.
Instead of having a newsfeed, TikTok has the FYP. On their For You page, no two users will watch identical videos, and the videos you see may change according to viewers’ choices and emotional conditions.
Besides the FYP, TikTok has the Discover page. This will appear by tapping the magnifying glass at the bottom of the screen. Users can navigate the Discover page and check the app’s hot videos. You’ll find some of the most recent trends on TikTok right here. “Example” videos are the initial group of videos to appear under a hashtag.
The Engagement
TikTok offers various tools for engagement, such as like, share, comment and follow options. Moreover, users can favorite the videos they like, share them, and even create content side-by-side (using the Duet feature) or grab a piece of the video (using the Stitch) feature.
Since users don’t need to be your friend or even follow you to find your content in their FYP, you’ll notice that engagement on TikTok is much higher than on other social media platforms.
How to Get More Views on TikTok
On TikTok, views are the name of the game. The time has come for you to increase your app’s visibility if you are new to this app. But it will require more than just capitalizing on the newest fads or hoping one of your videos miraculously becomes popular. You can take these steps to increase TikTok views:
Use the hashtag to reach the right people
Keep content short and engaging
Add trending sounds
Reach out to the specific audience
Try a how-to video
Collaborate with influencers
Identify the right time to post a content
Why Your Business Should Leverage TikTok Marketing
The beauty of the TikTok algorithm as a platform for people to create and express themselves, especially entertainingly, is that engagement promotes high-quality content that connects with viewers and doesn’t care how many followers you have.
Benefits of TikTok & Businesses
TikTok, in contrast to other significant social networking sites like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, allows users to produce 15, 60, and most recently, up to 3-minute videos, allowing users and businesses to create content catered to a range of demographics.
TikTok is special because it focuses on sharing relatable, interesting, and authentic bite-sized videos where users can add commentary and distinctive overlays to current popular music. Additionally, it can instantly interact with other social networking platforms, facilitating the sharing of material.
This alone creates an entire level of connection with the audience your company is trying to reach.
‘I don’t need another social networking platform,’ you might be thinking. Depending on your industry, target market, and specialty, this might sound true, but remember that it might be a long-term investment worth making for your brand.
Many businesses have found success on TikTok simply by providing access to an audience that other platforms don’t have because of the increased creativity and exposure it affords.
TikTok Marketing Benefit #2: Build Community
With an engaging and active community on TikTok, you can build a positive reputation, increase brand awareness, and achieve business growth. A community of audiences with the same interest gives a better understanding of their customers’ persona. Marketing teams can identify customers’ behavior and make crucial decisions. Moreover, you can address customer complaints, nurture advocates, and gather product feedback.
TikTok Marketing Benefit #3: Sell Products and Services
The main purpose of the social networking app TikTok is to make quick videos. It can be utilized as a marketing tactic because it makes it simple for customers to interact with brands. It is simple to post information, gain followers, and make money by leveraging your link in BIO.
The use of hashtagging, commenting, liking, and sharing features aids in brand promotion, much like any other social media platform. And there is absolutely no expense involved!
How to Use TikTok Analytics for Business
You can track viewers, followers, and other significant data to check insights about your account’s performance with the TikTok Analytics tool. You can better understand your content by seeing the precise amount of followers you have on TikTok and detailed information about the demographics of your audience. By doing so, you can make sure that your content speaks to the intended audience and encourage the growth of your following.
To use this function, you must upgrade your account to a TikTok Pro account. By doing this, you can create a profile for yourself as a creative or a business for free. Once your profile is set up for it, checking your TikTok analytics is simple.
Understanding the Value of Your TikTok Marketing
In a way, TikTok and TikTok for Business resemble the Wild West of social media. Since it is such a new medium, nobody knows how to use it effectively.
However, it also means that your company has many fantastic opportunities to set the bar high. If you make a breakthrough, you can end up creating brand-new paradigms for content and advertising.
Overall, there is no substitute for getting your hands dirty and experimenting with TikTok marketing. If you haven’t already, download the app, watch a few videos, and determine whether it works for your company’s marketing plan.
If you are considering using TikTok marketing for business, consider consulting experts. At MFG, we help businesses to promote their brand with TikTok marketing. Want to learn more? Let’s schedule a call.
Wondering what works better: social media or SEO? Let’s see the numbers.
The ongoing debate of social media vs SEO is one that has raged on for years. And, as someone who works in digital marketing, I can tell you that it’s one that I deal with on a daily basis, as we are constantly comparing the performance of our social media campaigns with our SEO efforts, to see which marketing channel is bringing the most ROI for our clients.
So, which one should you focus on?
Of course, as with most things in life, the best way to achieve both goals is to use a combination of both SEO and Social Media. But it’s still important to understand the strengths and weaknesses of each so that you can create a strategy that makes the most sense for your business.
So what’s the big difference between SEO and Social Media?
The biggest difference between internet users and social media users is how they use those mediums. So it’s not like one marketing channel is better than the other. They serve different purposes.
For example: let’s say you want to plan a trip to Alaska. You probably will start on Google, searching things like “Best places to visit in Alaska”, “Traveling tips Alaska”, etc. You might discover a particular hotel and get curious and check them out on social media.
The above example is called a “future buyers journey”. Successful brands leverage their online presence by amplifying each channel. They want to be at the top of their future buyers’ minds, to the point that you’ll see them everywhere. And if you pay close attention, you might have noticed a promotional email about a product that you were mentioning in a private conversation with a friend. How does that happen? That’s called remarketing.
The more you know about their journey, the better you will be able to use both, your internet real estate (your website) and social media real estate (Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Youtube, etc.) to get them to buy from you.
If you’re not sure how your buyers are finding you, a good place to start is by configuring your Google Analytics and Google Search Console. These free tools from Google will give you insights into how people are finding your website and what they’re doing once they get there. Armed with this information, you can work with an online marketing strategist to create a more targeted marketing strategy that will help you reach your target audience more effectively.
How do SEO and social media work together?
SEO and social media are two of the most important aspects of online marketing. When used together, they can be incredibly effective in driving traffic and conversions.
Google Analytics is a great way to see how SEO and social media are working together. By looking at the top visited pages, you can get a good idea of which keywords and phrases are driving traffic. You can then use this information to create targeted campaigns that attract buyers in the consideration phase.
When done correctly, SEO and social media can be a powerful combination that helps you drive traffic and conversions.
The graphic below is a snapshot of Google Analytics from one of our e-commerce clients. They hired us with the specific goal of increasing their conversions. We knew that focusing on one area of online marketing wasn’t enough.
We took the top visited pages and conducted a behavior analysis, to come up with a refined conversion path. This gave us the chance to outline campaigns to promote their winning products across social media and Google, both organic and paid.
The results of combining SEO and Social Media?
Powerful.
How did we help our client increase purchase conversions by 323% in just 5 months?
I wish I could tell you it was just ONE thing that helped our client increase purchase conversions by 323% in just 5 months. But it wasn’t. Instead, it was data-driven decision-making, a team effort, brand integration, and enhanced ROAS reporting that did the trick.
By focusing only on activities with a higher ROI and setting up a multi-disciplinary team to handle creative, design, copywriting, and SEO, we were able to produce results that far surpassed the client’s expectations. And by working closely with the client’s dedicated team, we were able to ensure that all of our content was on brand.
Finally, by enhancing our ROAS reporting using Google Data Studio, enhanced with Super Metrics API, we were able to provide the client with even greater insights into our performance.
All of these factors came together to produce truly impressive results. While we noticed that social media drove sales, conversions from Google searches (both organic and paid) generated the vast majority of the conversions.
See the graphic below where it shows a Multi-Channel Conversion Visualizer.
In this particular case, we advised our client to shift their marketing budget to allocate less for their social media marketing and push further their SEO projects.
And this takes us to discuss the scarcest resource: TIME!
How much time you’ll need for your social media vs SEO?
Social media can help you reach a target audience who will feel a connection with your brand and will become your advocators. But in order to do that successfully, you’ll need to be “sociable”, which means:
Generate highly valuable content, tailored for the platform
Post frequently
Engage with your followers
Get vulnerable
Collaborate with other creators
Build a funnel so you can turn your followers into customers
A plan to grow a social channel such as TikTok takes about 2 hours per day (60 hrs per month), and this includes:
Watch trends to come up with content ideas
Create the videos
Edit the videos
Come up with catchy titles
Monitor analytics to find the best times to post
Post your videos
Monitor comments
Reply comments
This process is for each post
Expect to post 3-4 times per day
Social media channels bring a great opportunity for business owners, especially when we consider the increase in online and digital activities caused by The Pandemic. Therefore, even if you don’t have the 60 hours per month to keep up with your social media, outsourcing those activities can be a game changer for your business.
When it comes to time invested by business owners in their SEO efforts, is very minimal in comparison to social media. SEO tasks can be done by your SEO team, with very little effort from your end as a business owner. And this is a BIG PLUS for SEO services versus social media services.
For instance, in the example where we increased purchase conversions by 323% in just 5 months, we haven’t needed our client in order to do our SEO work. And this is possible when you hire the right talent for your marketing and sales needs.
Local SEO vs Social Media for local business owners
For local businesses, generating foot traffic from people nearby is key. So how do local business owners get more traffic?
The following is an example of a local business that was using only social media to promote its food. The business owner had a website with 3 pages: The home page, menu page, and contact us page, but no additional content. However, their social channels were active and they hit close to 5,000 followers. Because of that word of mouth, all their website traffic was from people who knew their business name. Although this is good, it’s not enough.
We combined SEO and Content Marketing SEO to drive website traffic from people who were looking for their food. We wrote blog articles around topics like “10 Best Places to Eat in [city]” and then optimized those pages for the city they’re in. So when someone Googled that query, our client’s website would show up. Because our client’s restaurant was one of the best in the city, people would click through and come to their website. From there, some would decide to visit the restaurant or order takeout/delivery.
This is just one example of how you can use SEO and Social Media together to grow your business. By creating great content and promoting it on social media and through other channels (like email marketing), you can attract new customers and grow your business. And if you track your progress with Google Search Console, you can see exactly how well your efforts are performing over time!
Does posting on social media help SEO?
If you’re wondering whether posting on social media will help your SEO, the answer is a little complicated. Technically speaking, social channels are separate from Google, so your activity on the site won’t directly impact your ranking in search results. However, that doesn’t mean that there’s no connection between the two, as we’ve discussed earlier.
In Conclusion
Social media and SEO are two of the most important tools in a marketer’s toolkit. When used together, they can provide an incredible boost to your visibility and reach. However, it’s important to remember that they are just tools – you’ll still need a comprehensive strategy to get the best results.
If you’re not sure where to start, the best thing you can do is to hire a team of experts who can help you develop a comprehensive marketing strategy.
I might be biased, but I personally think that here at MFG Agency, we have one of the most amazing resources! You’ll be able to make the most of social media and SEO, and you’ll see a real difference in your bottom line.
Are You A Construction Company Or A Construction Brand?
Wondering if you are a construction brand or a business? Advice from a Brand Marketing Agency.
James has done some small construction jobs and his customers have been sharing the results on social media. His business is booming. Quote requests are coming in almost daily. He’s so busy that is already sending business to other construction companies. But there’s one problem. James has no time to do anything else but work. Jenny is not feeling well, despite her success. She has a toddler and mom guilt keeps her up all night.
Can you relate with James? Is your construction business booming and now you’re starting to feel like this is too much?
Keep reading, ‘cause we are giving you our ultimate recipe to building a profitable construction business.
What’s a construction brand anyway?
A construction brand is a company that is known for its quality workmanship, customer service, and use of technology. A construction brand differentiates itself from the competition by having a clear identity that is communicated through all aspects of the business.
The best construction brands understand that it’s not just about the work they do, but also how they do it. They are constantly innovating and improving their processes. They treat their employees well and invest in their development. They focus on the customer experience and always deliver what they promise.
What are the 5 benefits of branding?
There are countless benefits to branding your construction company. Here are just a few:
Increased visibility: A strong brand will make your construction company more visible in the marketplace and help you attract new customers.
Improved customer loyalty: Brand loyal customers are more likely to return to your company for future projects and recommend you to their friends and family.
Greater employee satisfaction: Employees who feel proud to work for a well-respected company are more likely to be productive and happy in their jobs.
Access to new markets: A strong brand can help you enter into new markets and expand your business.
Increased profits: Companies with strong brands typically outperform their competitors and enjoy higher profits.
In our example, if James wants to grow more revenue, he needs fewer clients with larger contracts. And that’s going to happen if he attracts those sales leads using construction brand marketing.
If you’re ready to take your construction company to the next level, it’s time to start thinking about branding. Branding will give you a competitive edge and help you build a successful business that lasts.
What’s Involved in the Branding Process?
The first step in branding your construction company is to define your brand. What makes your company unique? What do you want to be known for?
Once you have a clear understanding of your brand, you need to start communicating it to the world. This involves everything from choosing the right name and logo to developing a website and social media strategy. You also need to make sure that all of your marketing materials, from business cards to proposal templates, reflect your brand in a cohesive way.
Should you build a local brand?
Building a local brand has a lot of benefits.
For starters, it’s a great way to build trust with your community. When people see your company name and logo around town, they’ll start to associate it with quality workmanship and customer service. This can help you attract new customers and win repeat business.
Another benefit of building a local brand is that it can help you stand out from the competition. There are a lot of construction companies out there, so it’s important to find a way to differentiate yourself.
How do you develop a local brand? Start answering these questions:
What made you start your construction company
What’s your business story
Who is your ideal customer
What are your company values
What’s your company culture like
What sets you apart from the competition
Pro tip: Successful branding begins with a well-defined story that is RELATABLE to your market.
Your company name, logo, and tagline should help you share your brand story. And if you already have a name, but you recognize that it doesn’t help you share a story, you can always add a strong tagline.
For example, if your company name is Sunshine Construction Inc. and you want to localize your business name, you can do it by adding a tagline. Sunshine Construction – Builder in Central Texas.
Keep in mind that people will be talking about you and they will Google you! For this reason, your brand story should be shared prominently on your website, business cards, and other marketing materials.
You also need to get involved in your community. Sponsor a little league team or donate to a local charity. Attend networking events and host open houses. The more people see your company name and logo, the more likely they are to remember it when they need construction services.
A construction brand example
A great example of a construction brand is M / I Homes. They identify themselves asone of the Nation’s Leading Home Builders. Their brand name has built online equity, based on how many people search “mi homes” online. Google has over 500,000 results for its brand name.
M I Homes has positioned itself to stand out from the crowd for its values. And this is a key element of building a successful brand. When you visit their website, you will be able to learn about their story, what makes them unique, and what are some of the processes and methods that they use that are different from other construction companies.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is key
As we mentioned earlier, your future buyers will Google you. This is where a great SEO marketing strategy comes handy.
SEO will help your website rank higher in Google search results when potential customers are looking for construction companies in your area.
The benefits of SEO go beyond just ranking higher in Google. A strong SEO strategy will help you:
Generate more leads
Build trust and credibility
Attract high-quality prospects
Increase brand awareness
SEO is a complex and ever-changing field, so it’s important to partner with a company that specializes in construction SEO. They will be able to help you identify the keywords that potential customers are using to find companies like yours and ensure that your website is optimized for those keywords.
Below is an example of M / I Homes online presence. They use effective SEO content strategies that have helped them gain brand recognition. And we say this, not because we work with them. We can find out how is a brand positioned online by using SEO tools.
What are the top construction brands?
Based on our research, the following are the top 5 construction brands in the U.S.:
Pulte Homes
Centex
Perry Homes
Ryan Homes
Taylor Morrison
Use this list and see which of these brands are your “hero brand”. Notice how they communicate their brand story, their values, their culture, and how they connect with their audience on social media.
Keep in mind, that this list is simply based on search visibility. Not in revenue.
Wondering if you should build a brand or build a business or both? How does that look like? Advice from a Brand Marketing Agency.
When it comes to your product launch strategy, it will require the right blend of approaches. I compare a brand success with a plane. Ever wonder how does a plane fly? It flies because of four forces. The four forces are lift, thrust, drag, and weight.
Let’s take these four forces and relate it to your product launch. First, you have to have a great product. This is what I consider the “lift” force. Your product has to be able to take off and fly on its own. You can have the greatest marketing strategy in the world, but if your product stinks, it will never get off the ground.
Second, you need the “thrust” force. This is your go-to market strategy. It’s how you’re going to generate demand for your product.
Third, you need to consider the “drag” force. This is all of the things that can slow down or hinder your product from taking off.
Fourth and finally, you need to consider the “weight” force. This is your overall business strategy. How much money are you willing to invest in this product? Is it a cash cow or a loss leader?
These are all important factors to consider when launching your product.
With a great marketing campaign can help create a successful product launch. But then what? How do you make a sustainable business outside of that one great launch? This is where a conversation about how to become a successful and sustainable brand comes handy.
Let’s dive in.
If you’re about to launch a product, you might want to consider launching your brand first. And we’re not talking about waiting years until having an amazing brand. Building a successful brand can be done in less than six months. In some cases, depending on the level of influence of the people behind it, it can be even quicker.
So what is a brand, anyway?
Since brand and branding are two of the most misused concepts, let’s clarify what do we mean by brand, so we can be on the same page.
When we say that you need a brand, we’re not talking about your logo, colors, and website. That’s branding. A graphic designer will take care of that part. However, that alone won’t share the story of your business.
As Jeff Bezos famously said, “Your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room.” And this isn’t different, whether you are building a personal brand or a business brand.
You didn’t start a business without a reason, right? So what it is? What’s the story? What’s the problem you want to solve? Is the impact in people’s lives worth sharing?
Pro tip: Successful branding begins with a well-defined story that is RELATABLE to your market.
Some of the benefits of building a brand before launching a product include:
1) You gain customer loyalty
By building a strong brand, you create loyalty among your customers. They’re more likely to continue using your products and recommend them to others.
2) You build a connection that keeps users coming for more
A strong brand connection means customers are more likely to come back for more. They’ll also be more likely to try new products from your company, as they know they can trust your brand.
3) It gives your team a sense of direction and motivation
Launching a product can be a daunting task. By having a clear brand identity, you can give your team a sense of direction and purpose. This will make them more motivated to work on the product and see it through to launch.
4) You can grow a bigger digital footprint
A strong brand presence online can help you reach more potential customers. It can also help with search engine optimization, as potential customers are more likely to find your product if they know your brand.
5) It can help with reputation management
In today’s digital age, it’s important to have a good reputation online. By launching your brand first, you can start to build a positive reputation before your product even launches. This can help ensure that customers have a positive experience with your product and are more likely to recommend it to others.
How do you share a brand story?
Now that you’re inspired to consider taking some time and resources to build your company brand, let’s go over some brand stories, starting with Tesla.
So how does Tesla do it?
How has Tesla become one of the most valuable car companies in the world without spending a dime on advertising? It all comes down to storytelling. Tesla tells its story through its product. Every Tesla is designed to be the safest, quickest, and most pleasurable car to drive. They are constantly innovating and pushing the limits of what’s possible with electric vehicles. As a result, Tesla has built a strong emotional connection with its customers. And when you have a strong emotional connection with your customers, they will do your marketing for you.
Pro tip: When you build a strong emotional connection with your customers, they will do your marketing for you.
As you might have noticed, Facebook rebranded recently and changed its name from Facebook to Meta.
Why did Facebook change its name to Meta?
Zuckerberg said it was time to turn the page on a new chapter. Meta’s name is directly related to metaverse, a new world built in virtual reality.
In reality, Facebook’s move was smart. The social platform had been under fire for spreading misinformation and other issues, so rebranding gave them a chance to give the media a new story.
You would figure that this time, Meta needed to come up strong, from the get-go. And they did. One of my favorite examples of how they’re sharing Meta’s brand story is their magical gate at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (AUS), transforming one of the terminal’s gate areas and adding 120 fantastical new air service destinations to the airport.
When you’re at Meta’s imaginary gate, you’ll see their imaginary destinations. Smart move! A great way to generate stories – at the emotional level!
Do you see a pattern here?
A great brand story tells the narrative of your brand, including where you’ve come from and where you are going. A great brand story must be true, authentic, and honest. It cannot be made up or derived; consumers sniff out inauthenticity in a heartbeat and will punish you for it.
Launching a product without first building a brand can be risky. Customers may not know who you are or what you stand for, and they may not be as likely to take a chance on your product. By launching your brand first, you can create awareness and build trust with potential customers before you even launch your product.
Great brands have great brand marketing
Brand marketing is promoting a brand’s products or services in a way that elevates the brand as a whole. It involves creating and maintaining brand-consumer relationships and marketing brand attributes—the traits that people think of when they picture a particular brand.
In Conclusion
Building a brand is essential to the success of any business, whether you’re just starting out or have been in the game for years. It’s what sets you apart from your competition and allows you to create a connection with your consumers.
How Much Does It Cost To Hire An Instagram Manager?
This article is a comprehensive look at the services of an Instagram manager, what they entail and how much you might expect to pay.
You’re a small business owner and you want to hire someone to help you with your Instagram account. But how much does it cost to hire an Instagram manager?
The short answer is that it depends on the services you need and the experience of the person you’re hiring.
Instagram Management Services in Austin: Job Description
A social media manager is responsible for creating and executing a social media strategy in order to grow the online presence of a business or brand.
Duties Of A Social Media Manager May Include:
Creating and posting content on behalf of the business or brand
Monitoring and responding to comments and messages
Analyzing analytics to gauge the reach and effectiveness of posts
Generating new ideas for content and strategies
Collaborating with other team members, such as designers and marketers.
The Skills Needed To Be A Social Media Manager Include:
Excellent written and verbal communication skills
Strong organizational skills
The ability to multitask
Creativity
A deep understanding of social media platforms and their algorithms
Basic graphic design skills
Basic SEO knowledge.
Is It Worth Hiring A Social Media Manager Just For Instagram?
Should you hire them for all the social media channels? Which one is the best?
This question comes very frequently, especially when you’re preparing a new marketing plan and want to make sure you’re staying on top of your game. And if you haven’t refreshed your marketing plan and want to know the top marketing strategies, consider reading this.
If you’re a small business owner with a limited budget, you may want to consider hiring a social media manager just for Instagram. This will allow you to focus your resources on one platform, and you’ll be able to work with someone who is an expert on Instagram.
If you’re a larger business with a bigger budget, you may want to consider hiring a social media manager for all of your social media channels. This will give you a cohesive social media strategy across all platforms and allow you to take advantage of the different strengths of each platform.
The best way to decide is to sit down and assess your goals. Do you want to grow your audience or do you want to simply keep your presence active? Do you want to generate website traffic from Instagram? What about leads and sales? The more specific you are about your goals, the better.
What Does Instagram Management Include?
A typical Instagram management contract includes:
Content strategy
Content creation
Content writing
Account monitoring
Technical support to troubleshoot your account
And depending on the expertise of the Instagram Manager, they might be able to offer you other advanced Instagram Marketing Services such as:
Instagram Ads
Instagram search engine optimization (SEO)
Keyword optimization
Analytics
Tracking
Advanced Reporting
Trends
But it’s important to remember that a lot of what goes into running a successful Instagram account is not included in a typical management contract.
What’s Not Included In Typical Instagram Management Services?
Some of the things that are not typically included in an Instagram management contract are:
Professional photography
Multi-format posting
Website management
Advertising
Outreach
Community building
Community management.
These services can be extremely valuable for growing your business, but they come at an additional cost.
What About Social Media Branding?
Your Instagram Manager isn’t expected to develop your brand. You can’t hire a plumber and ask them to paint your counters!
While some Instagram Management packages offer some branding and style, the scope of what they offer is limited. However, they might offer social media branding services.
Social media branding is the process of creating a unique and consistent identity for your business or brand across all social media platforms. This includes everything from your profile picture and cover photo to the tone and voice you use in your posts and it’s normally done during the first month of starting your Instagram Marketing Services.
Creating a strong social media brand is important because it helps you stand out from the crowd and makes you more recognizable to your target audience. It also makes it easier for people to connect with you and builds trust.
Keep in mind that a social media manager is not a branding expert or a graphic designer. They will be able to do basic design, but you should not expect them to be an expert designer. If you need both branding and social media management services, hiring a digital marketing agency will be your best option, since you will have all the services done by one team.
The Rise Of Content Creation Services
For businesses that have an in-house social media marketing team, outsourcing the content creation makes sense.
A content creator is a professional who creates content for social media, websites, and other online platforms. This can include everything from blog posts and articles to videos and graphics.
Content creators are important because they help you create valuable content that will attract and engage your target audience. Without high-quality content, your social media presence will suffer.
There are a lot of different types of content creators, and the type you need will depend on your business goals and the platforms you’re using. For example, if you’re focused on Instagram, you’ll need someone who is good at creating visuals. And now that the platform is preferring short videos, you might want to consider content creation services.
Why Get Content Creation Services Instead of Full Instagram Management Services?
Any successful social media presence these days requires engaging content. This is especially true on a visual platform like Instagram. Static images just don’t cut it anymore- users want to see innovation and creativity. That’s where content creation services come in. When you work with a content creation team, you’ll get high-quality, engaging content that is planned and strategized specifically for your brand. This will help you to attract new followers and keep your existing ones engaged. Additionally, it can be much easier to scale your content production when you have a team working on it, rather than trying to do everything yourself. So if you’re looking to take your Instagram presence to the next level, content creation services are the way to go.
Our content creation services package includes:
Content planning
Graphic design
Reels planning
Account analysis
Reporting
You’ll get your Instagram Content Plan with captions and images ready to post.
How Much Is Social Media Management Per Month?
According to the freelancer platform Upwork, the following are rates that other freelancers are charging clients for social media content management: Entry Level (social media posting, virtual assistant duties): $15-$50/hr. Intermediate (social media posting, content creation, and community management): $50-$100/hr. Expert (content marketing, blogging, and SEO skills): $125- $225/hr.
Another factor to consider is that the average total compensation for a Social Media Manager in the US is about $75,000 per year. This represents roughly $7,000 per month (with employment tax). Just for one employee.
Hiring A Marketing Agency Makes Total Sense
You’ll save money in payroll
The agency will take care of giving you the right account manager
You will be able to receive a plethora of digital marketing services beyond social media
No headaches of managing staff
No more missing opportunities, due to not having time!
Hiring someone to help you with your Instagram account is an important decision, but it doesn’t have to be a difficult one. By taking the time to find the right person for the job and being clear about your needs, you can ensure that your Instagram account is in good hands.
Instagram Marketing Services in Austin
If you’re ready to take your Instagram account to the next level, let’s chat.
We are a full-service Instagram agency in Austin that can help you with all of your Instagram needs, from content creation to community management, branding, website, SEO & Adwords.
We’ll work with you to create a custom plan that fits your budget and your business goals.
Are you a blogger or small business owner looking to make your blog more SEO friendly so that Google will rank it higher when people search for the same topic? This is the post for you!
In this post, I’ll cover the basics to help you get started and do some basic SEO on your blog.
What is SEO friendly?
Being SEO friendly means that you have created a blog and its content to make it easier for search engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo etc. to find your site when someone searches for the same topic or keyword phrase.
The purpose of doing this is so people who are looking for information on the subject can easily find your post related content instead of having to go through hundreds or thousands of results.
There are many ways that you can do this, and I’ll cover some basic ones for creating a blog post with SEO in mind below:
Step One. Pick your focus keywords
Picking your focus keywords is the first step in making your blog SEO friendly. Be sure to choose a handful of keywords that are relevant to the topic of your blog so that you can target these words throughout your content and link back to them in your URL. More targeted keywords will be found by more people who are searching for what you offer, and this will lead to higher rankings in Google and higher traffic for your site.
The goal is for the content on your blog post to be helpful and insightful so people will want to share it with their friends and followers through social media channels such as Facebook or Twitter.
Step Two. Optimize your on-page content with these keywords
Use all of those great keywords in headlines, subheadings, image captions, videos, descriptions, etc. Make sure you use some form of call-to-action as well and entice readers to click, subscribe or buy.
Step Three: Create XML sitemaps
I’ll assume that for most bloggers, it’s not enough to make sure Google can find your content because you want your blog to appear in Google’s search results. To do this, create an XML sitemap that will let the big G know about all of your content and where it can be found on your site.
Step Four: Generate blog categories using your keywords
As you write posts, categorize them with keywords that are relevant to the content. This will help Google find your blog and rank it higher in search results for those topics.
Step Five: Generate tags using your keywords as well
Tags work like categories, but they’re better because people who use Google’s site-specific search can find your content much more easily.
Step Six: Add social media buttons to your blog
One of the best ways to get people who are not on your site to visit and potentially share it is by adding these widgets next to each post. You can include options like Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, or whatever other networks you use for SEO purposes.
Step Seven: Create backlinks
Finally, go out there and create some quality backlinks from other sites to your blog. This will help Google find and rank you higher for keywords that are relevant to the content of your site.
A quality backlink is one that comes from a site with a high domain authority.
Step Eight: Create content frequently
Hopefully, you’re already doing this because it will help your blog rank better and keep people coming back for more!
Step Nine: Promote your articles on social media
Sharing your articles across all the social media platforms will help you generate traffic to your website, plus you’ll have the chance to expand your content based on the comments from your audience.
Step Ten: Monitor your blog performance
Monitoring your blog performance is essential because you want to make sure it’s running smoothly and that Google hasn’t penalized it for any reason.
Sign up for Google Search Console so you can get alerts about your blog performance.
As a forensic marketer, I am always paying attention to metrics (as you may know). The following are trackers that your blog must-have, so you can run reports, check performance, and plan future content:
Facebook pixel. Make sure your blog has a Facebook Pixel installed, along with custom events, so you can see important metrics such as article views and clicks on your call to actions. You can even build a custom audience from your article visitors.
Google Analytics tracker. A tracker will allow you to gather information on your article visitors, the time they have spent reading, other pages they visited, and depending on your settings, you can set up goals and campaigns to find specific users’ behaviors.
UTM codes. This tool allows you to easily add campaign parameters to URLs so you can track Custom Campaigns in Google Analytics. Watch the video below to see a quick tutorial on how UTM codes work.
We’ve covered a lot of ground today. But don’t worry, if you feel like we missed something important or left anything out, just let us know! If you want to get the most bang for your buck when it comes to SEO and blog posts, be sure to give our free SEO audit a shot. We will send you a video with our findings and schedule a call where you can ask us anything.
Ready to boost your SEO? We are an Austin-based online marketing agency specialized in performance based marketing
Empower your blog with these 10 simple steps to make you the most search engine friendly blogger on the web. No matter what kind of content you are blogging about (health tips, business hints etc.), following these 10 steps will catapult your traffic and see a major rise in ranking.
If you’ve been considering starting a business that you can work from anywhere, getting into social media marketing makes total sense.
In this article, I will give you an overview of why I think starting a social media marketing today is a great idea and how you can make money in 30 days or less.
Let’s roll.
Social Media Management Market Size
While social media marketing is not a new business idea, the market forecast presents a bright future for anyone with online marketing skills who loves social media and is open to doing the work it takes to provide excellent service.
The global social media management market size will grow to USD 17.7 billion by 2023. Source. Market size matters when it comes to starting a new business. However, market size isn’t the only factor. You also need to consider the market needs.
Challenges Small Business Owners Face On Social Media
If you Google the top challenges that small business owners face when it comes to their social media marketing, you’ll find this list of social media challenges:
Challenge 1: So many platforms to choose from and not knowing where to focus.
Challenge 2: Lack of resources to meet the users’ expectations.
Challenge 3: It’s difficult to measure conversions.
Challenge 4: There aren’t enough hours in a workweek.
Challenge 5: Not knowing how to set up the right goals.
According to Forbes, it takes 32 hours a month to manage a single social media platform correctly, that’s roughly 6-8 hours per week. Only 25% of small business owners spend 6-10 hours per week on social media. This isn’t because they underestimate the value; they just don’t have the time.
What Pains A Social Media Marketer Solve?
Social media management helps users with a wide variety of tasks to develop their social channels and effectively gain visibility amongst social media users.
A key factor to generate clients as soon as possible is your unique value proposition. All you need is to describe the pain that you’re trying to solve with your services, for a specific market.
A very simple way to craft your UVP is taking the 5 challenges listed above and turn one or two into your UVP.
Example of how to present your unique social media marketing value proposition:
I do social media marketing for business owners who want to turn social media accounts into income-generating channels and have no time to lose.
In this example, you’re solving 2 pains for small business owners, so they will see 2 benefits:
Save time
Make more money
Now that you have your UVP, your next step is your business identity.
To make things very simple, start with your name. Buy a couple of domain names (including yours if it’s available) in GoDaddy.com.
Make sure your online first impression is polished. What do I mean with this?
You have a professional Facebook profile and a business page
Crafting Your Elevator Speech As A New Social Media Management Agency
When you’re about to start and want to bring clients as quick as possible, it’s perfectly ok to pitch small business owners with the following message:
Hello, I’m ______. I’m about to launch my social media marketing agency. I would love to partner with small business owners who see the value in having a personalized and reliable social media specialist who can do the heavy lifting while generating conversions. Since I am starting and want to build a portfolio, the first 10 clients will have a special rate.
Share this message with everyone you know.
Try to come up with a list of at least 100 names so you can get to those 10 new clients as soon as possible.
Facebook Groups are a great resource to find business owners who want to collaborate with emerging marketers. In case you’re interested, I lead 2 Facebook Groups and can connect you with some opportunities. Click here to join my Marketing for Greatness Network.
Now that you have the tools you need to prospect, let’s discuss pricing.
How Much To Charge For Social Media Marketing?
Watch out for platforms like Fiverr.com, Upwork.com, and Freelancer.com. They have freelancers who are willing to offer social media management services at very low rates. I want to give you the heads up on how to handle those business owners who think that social media management is going to cost them $5 per hour.
Stay away from business owners who want premium services paying $5 per hour rate.
Set up your minimum hourly rate (even if you don’t disclose this with your future client). If you’re not confident about charging these prices, getting certified in social media marketing will help.
Social Media Marketing Pricing Plans
Social media beginner level: $15- $20 per hour. Expect to work about 10 hours a week between your work and research. Total of hours per month: 45. Average monthly fees: $750.
You could consider discounting your learning time, so your rate could be $600 per month.
Social media intermediate level: $30- $50 per hour. Factor your time spent on strategy and a fee from a social media manager, beginner level, so you can get more clients. 25 hours per month at $50 is $1,250. Expect to pay your manager by tasks, about $200 per account, so you have a net of $1,000.
You could get paid $2,000-$5,000 a month if you add other projects into the mix and create social media marketing packages, with add-ons such as:
Copywriting for website
Lead pages
Email marketing management
Additional platforms such as Youtube, Pinterest, Houzz, Etsy, etc.
How To Find Social Media Marketing Clients
I hope you’re excited about the possibility of owning a social media marketing agency. Hey! Imagine if you get 5 clients at $600 that’s $3,000 per month while working from home in your PJs!
Finding clients is all about leads!
Memorize this: leads are the heart of your business.
Just one thing, please! A lead is not a lead until it shows an interest in your offer. When you create your list of 100’s of names, those are NOT leads. Those are suspects. Once you pitch them and they want more information, they are prospects. And once they actually accept a meeting with you, they are leads.
So, how can you find leads then?
My Top 3 Lead Generation Activities
You will be surprised here! I’ve built 4 businesses: a law firm, 2 e-commerce businesses, and a marketing firm, without ANY advertising.
My top 3 lead generation activities have been:
Word of mouth
Organic marketing online
Networking events
Why should Marketers care about WOMM?
If you could master what has been identified as the most valuable form of marketing—the one that consumers trust above all others and the one that is most likely to drive sales for your company — would you instead choose to ignore it or leave it to chance?
Seriously! Start with WOMM. Work with that list and pitch your suspects without any hesitation. If you think you need help with prospecting skills, take a few hours a week to learn how to prospect. And remember, practice makes perfect.
Learn about Success Club- $10 a month will give you access to members-only content, marketing tools, and more!
Partnership marketing will be your next step.
8 Effective Partnership Marketing Examples
A great way to get clients faster is through partnerships. I’m not talking about partners who share equity. I’m referring to marketing partners who can generate win-win opportunities.
Some of the most effective marketing partnerships to consider:
Affiliation: Known as affiliate marketing. It’s a collaborative effort where the primary brand offers a product or service and the secondary brand benefits from commissions earned per lead or sale.
Content: Content partnerships can happen when brands collaborate to either a) produce content or b) share links. Link sharing means linking to the partner’s content from their own site. This provides exposure, aligns both brands together, and advances SEO.
Distribution: Where one partner agrees to cross-market or bundle another partner’s product or services into their own distribution channels to target the agreed customer base. This can happen by cross-marketing and/or creating bundles.
Charitable: A primary brand sponsors or markets itself with a charitable organization or cause. You can promote their cause and they promote your event. This helps with brand awareness and cultural influence.
Joint products or services: For example, you offer social media management and our firm offers SEO. The key here is that the service is an amalgamation of both products aiming at mutual target audiences. Example: white label products.
Licensing: Licensing is a business arrangement in which one company gives another company permission to manufacture its product using its brand image for an agreed payment or partnership.
Loyalty: Loyalty program or ambassador program. A retention marketing technique that offers consumers a reward in return for increased usage. Have you heard about Instagram ambassadors? That’s what this is about!
Sponsorship: The marketing tactic of placing a brand alongside a particular event, displaying itself as a partner or supporter, with the objective to increase brand recognition and reputation.
Consider Niche Marketing: Facebook Marketing Agency Or Instagram Marketing Agency
There’s a good chance that you meet an established marketing agency who is serving accounts with bigger budgets and need a platform-specific service.
You could market particular social media services such as:
Facebook community management and Facebook Groups admin
Instagram marketing, Instagram outreach
Facebook chat management
Customer service chat
Appointments management
Instagram stories
Instant posts
Facebook live coordinator
CRM integration
Shopping cart management
… Just to name a few.
Social Media Marketing Tools
I’ve constructed this guide to help entrepreneurs and small business owners without unlimited marketing budgets understand the erratic world of social media.
This ultimate guide gives you my favorite social media marketing tools that you can use to boost your social media without breaking your bank account.
I’m here to simplify your game by telling you exactly which tools I use as a small business owner and strategist with over 10 years in digital marketing.
My Go-To Social Media Scheduling Tools
I will recommend you tools that will help you plan and schedule posts a month ahead.
Scheduling Tool #1: Social Media Marketing Planner
You’ve probably seen fancy calendars and planners. I’m actually not a big fan of those scrapbooking style tools.
I rather get things done. I guess it comes with having a strict agenda and plenty of things to do.
So, for simplicity, your calendar can be just a Word Doc or Google Doc.
Here’s the format I use to plan my social media marketing every month:
Just think about this, on a Google document, super simple.
Part 1: Theme of the month: Growth. We want to share content that inspires, educates, and invites people to consider us for their business growth needs.
Part 2: Target audience: small business owners in their first 3 years of their business.
Part 3: Events of the month: Webinar week 2 and Networking event, week 4.
Part 4: Blogs to publish during the month: Ultimate guide of social media and Instagram tutorial
Part 5: Marketing Campaigns: #MembersMonday #SummerSocial
Scheduling Tool #2: Facebook Creator Studio
Your Facebook Business Page comes with the option to schedule posts in the future. Now with Creator Studio, if you have multiple pages, you can post and schedule multiple pages, all from the same dashboard.
Creator Studio integrates Instagram as well. You are able to see Instagram’s content library from Facebook. We still can’t post to Instagram from Creator Studio, but I won’t be surprised if that will come soon.
Scheduling Tool #3: Facebook Group Scheduler
Facebook Groups are a great way to grow your audience on social media. It’s by far one of my favorite social media tools.
In full transparency, I use Hootsuite for my agency. I like how authenticates and I can just add team members and assign accounts. So, for agencies, I believe they are staying competitive.
For solopreneurs, Hootsuite’s new pricing model might not make sense.
You only need a scheduler like Hootsuite for your Twitter and LinkedIn, since Facebook has its own scheduler. Buffer is a good alternative.
For those of you looking for more robust social media management tools that can offer curation and content suggestions, MeetEdgar is a great option.
Scheduling Tool #5: Later | Planoly
For those of you who are 100% Instagram marketing, you then need a social media management tool that specializes in the platform.
My research narrowed to 2 options and I chose Later.com. I liked their ability to add teams so I can get my team working on our clients while still having access to the accounts. Some of my clients use Planoly.com and are very happy too.
Later and Planoly also work on Pinterest.
Scheduling Tool #6: Sprout Social
Sprout Social does what Buffer and Hootsuite do but in a more complex way, but this platform is best for small-large agencies as their analytics feature beats Hootsuite and Buffer hands down. They provide full reporting details for their premium members, breaking down each account in bits. You can even compare your competitor’s figure and see where they are and how best to tackle them. It’s that deep.
The downside with Sprout Social is the fact that it is far more expensive than Buffer and Hootsuite put together and they have no free plan, just a 30-day trial. Sprout Social works with Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram.
We love to partner with social media managers who are looking to get more clients and want to learn best practices, strategies, and advice from marketing & sales experts.
We provide resources, templates, scripts, training, and certification, and powerful connections to help you thrive.
Let’s make it happen!
Schedule a virtual coffee where we can discuss how to collaborate.
From generating new sales leads to finding the perfect recommendation for a service, your sphere of influence can be the driving force behind your success as an entrepreneur.
Your sphere of influence is the fundamental marketing force behind your business success, and just like any other business keeps its fundamentals warm, you need to keep it warm for it to keep producing benefits.
If you’re wondering how to grow your SOI with your Instagram account, you’re so at the right place. Keep reading!
Your Sphere of Influence (SOI) Is Not Just About Your Close Friends
They say you’re the result of your closest 5 friends. While this is accurate, when you are in growth mode, meaning, you want to bring new clients to buy your products or hire you, your circle cannot be just those 5 closest friends. This is where the SOI comes handy.
To start your SOI, build a database of people you know (250). This includes everyone. Start with your phone, then check your social media channels. You will be surprised! Then, next to each name grade them A, B or C based upon the last time you spoke to them. Someone you grade an “A” would be someone you feel absolutely sure will refer you, a “C” is your long lost elementary school buddy that you haven’t talked to in over 20yrs.
Don’t worry is you can’t get too many A’s on that list. That’s about to change once you finish reading this article. So let’s keep going!
WARNING! Your database might get you excited and you might want to craft a pitch and send it to every breathing human being on that list. I beg you to please DO NOT do it. That is called spam and you will be burning connections instead. I don’t know about you, but, whenever I get a pitch from someone who I haven’t talked to in a while, I get very irritated. It makes me feel like they are all about a transaction and not the relationship.
The Confession Letter: How To Get Back In Touch With Old Friends
If you haven’t kept in touch with many of the people you know, don’t worry about it. Life happens, you move, new schools, jobs and you simply lose contact. How do you then call them out of the blue as if nothing had happened? This is where the confession letter comes in.
You craft a letter that admits to your friends or clients that you are taking a new approach to business that puts relationships first. You confess that you haven’t been as proactive in your personal communications as you would like, and that you’ll be keeping in touch much more regularly from now on.
For your various groups, the letter would be written appropriately for each. Try to customize it as much as you can. And one thing … by letter it actually means a real letter, printed, and mailed. Email and chat can work, but if you truly want to go above and beyond to make it up to that connection, it’s better to send them a letter.
Let’s get you committed to getting as many A’s on your database as possible, and here’s how.
Instagram Can Help You Expand Your Circles Easily
Since Instagram allows people to have public profiles, if you follow them, you will instantly get access to all their content. Note that this does not happen with Facebook or LinkedIn. So, there is no protective wall between you and your future best connection. Interesting …
So how can Instagram help you grow your SOI with individuals?
You will want to start with your database. Start with those A’s and B’s. Connect with them on Instagram. Then, navigate to the suggested connections.
One of the very common questions asked by Instagrammers is how actually Instagram determines suggested profiles? The people you see on your suggested list are sometimes familiar but most of the time they can be random people you do not know. There surely is an algorithm behind how Instagram determines suggested profiles to you.
Say, for example, you want to connect with people with high net worth. Start by being intentional about the connections you add. Don’t connect with random people, or profiles that don’t show high activity.
Monitor your follower count and quality. Once you have a good amount of the kind of audience you want to build, say, about 250 great connections, engage with them consistently. A great way to keep up with your connections is by adding them as close friends. In this way you will see notifications of your updates and it will be easier for you to stay in touch with your Instagram followers.
Follow this strategy, consistently, for about 2-4 weeks and Instagram will send you potential connections who have the same qualities of your current SOI.
But … Why Do People Unfollow You On Instagram?
In the early days of Instagram Marketing, everyone wanted ways to get more Instagram followers.
One of the ways to get those most wanted numbers was simply to follow people and then unfollow them so you could look like a celebrity.
Make no mistake, most micro celebrities earned that status following this method.
Have you ever received a message from a random person offering you followers for sale? I must admit, I tried that method and realized that it made no sense. Why would you want to add robots? Even when they tell you that you could get people to “follow” you for real, they will unfollow you.
The follow and unfollow game is part of the Instagram Marketing strategy. But for different reasons that, sadly, most business owners still can’t comprehend, due to the excessive misinformation out there.
It’s Ok To Unfollow Connections
If you put some effort in engaging with them and they never reciprocate.
If they are inactive.
If they don’t have real pictures, especially their profile picture.
If they share content that’s gross, repetitive, boring, and you sincerely dislike them.
Those who are fishing for compliments.
Tips To Avoid The Unwanted Unfollow
Share Instagram-worthy content. This is serious. Instagram is like a magazine. Your audience is not expecting to see your pictures of your scrapbook.
Claim your authority and expertise, starting with your BIO.
Be strategic with your content.
Use hashtags to expand your reach.
Engage in comments with like-minded individuals
A Pro Tip To Grow Your Sphere Of Influence And Nurture Those Connections (And Generate Leads On Instagram)
As a social media marketer with over 10 years of experience, I consider myself a master! When I hear tips and secrets, very often, they are not Instagram-only secrets. They apply to social media marketing in general.
One of the rules to generate leads is to engage in conversations just like in real life. Have a system to track the connections to follow up and get conversions.
Facebook allows you to edit your friends list so you can customize your notifications and feed. So does Instagram.
How do I turn notifications on or off for someone I follow on Instagram?
When you turn on notifications for someone you follow, you’ll get a notification every time that they share a photo or video. To turn notifications on or off:
Go to their profile.
Tap Following > Notifications.
Tap next to one of the following to turn notifications on or off:
Posts
Stories
IGTV
Live Videos
If you’d like to turn notifications on or off for multiple people, you’ll have to visit each profile and turn them on or off individually. Keep in mind that you may get a push notification when someone you follow shares something for the first time in a while, whether or not you have notifications turned on for that person.
People aren’t notified when you turn notifications on or off for them.
I wrote the Six Golden Rules of Social Media and shared the system I engineered and followed to generate multiple 7 figures in sales using social media marketing.
You might want to watch the recap of my 6 golden rules video!
https://youtu.be/4fBK0xsHeW0
Building your SOI using Instagram marketing will catapult your success. Especially because you can do it without leaving your home.
Don’t forget that consistency is key to seeing real engagement. You certainly want to have a long term vision for your Instagram marketing strategy, just like any other digital marketing activity.
Strategy Yes, Tactics No!
Gone are the days where marketers promise get-rich-quick tactics. And if you have been following those, I suggest you take the time to craft your Instagram Marketing Strategy.
Not sure if your social media marketing strategy follows the “hunters to farmers” sales approach? Want to learn a sophisticated approach to sales using social media?
This article will demystify the hunting and farming approach to social media for you and will give you some tangible steps you can take, starting today, to get the best of your social media channels. Plus, there is a quiz at the end to test your social sales strategy!
Social Marketing vs Advertising On Social Media
If you don’t know the difference between social media marketing and social media advertising, it’s okay to admit it. The distinction can be a bit confusing, especially because there are plenty of voices out there.
Check out two examples of posts:
Post A: Nick Leyden, a fitness coach, is asking a Facebook Group “what is one thing you are doing to stay healthy and active during this time?”
Post B: Capital Factory is sharing an invite to a webinar.
Post A will ignite conversations. Nick doesn’t need to solicit anyone. In fact, he will be able to give some tips and advice, and from there, those users who feel value from him will choose if they want to follow him.
Nick’s post is a brilliant strategy for a Facebook Group where people are open to having a community experience.
Post B is not asking users for any conversation. In fact, it is asking users to stop everything they are doing, read the long-form content, click a link, go to an external page, then read another invite, and fill out a form, and attend a webinar.
Post B is social advertising. Notice that it has the same format that you see on Facebook Ads. While Post B is appropriate for the group, there it won’t have the same engagement as Nick’s post.
If you’re not sure if your content is a social marketing content or social advertising content, here’s a rule:
If it sounds like a radio commercial, you’re advertising.
However, that doesn’t mean that it’s wrong to share content that has a strong call to action. The key is to have a content marketing strategy, so that users welcome your invitation or call to action.
Farmers vs Hunters, In Which Group Are You?
Salesperson reputations stink! In poll after poll, survey respondents typically rank salespeople above only members of Congress on trust, honesty, and competency.
For a long time, in the sales world, people identify themselves as hunters or farmers. What exactly does that mean and in which context?
The Hunters
Hunters are also known as the doers. They get their sales energy through “hunting” new opportunities. Hunters can be described as independent (with a lot of initiative) and solution-driven. They tend to focus on big deals and love going from one to the next as soon as they close their current prospect.
The Farmers
In contrast to the hunters, farmers are more focused on developing long-term relationships. They are the nurturers—building relationships with leads and clients for a lasting impact. They are team players that bring everyone else up and develop strong customer loyalty.
Some entrepreneurs and small business owners have a hard time combining both of the approaches. While it is great to add value and nurture relationships, they still need to close the sale.
How to balance nurturing activities with closing activities? It’s social selling.
The Rise Of Social Selling
Social selling is the art of using social media to find, connect with, understand, and nurture sales prospects. It’s the modern way to develop meaningful relationships with potential customers so you’re the first person or brand a prospect thinks of when they’re ready to buy.
Since social selling has become part of the modern sales processes, both salespeople and entrepreneurs can benefit from the modern social selling method. A big incentive for social selling is that there’s no need for cold calls anymore.
Perhaps equally important to explaining what social selling means is to explain what social selling is not.
It’s certainly not about bombarding strangers with unsolicited posts, tags, and private messages in your social media platforms. There’s a name for that: spam. And you shouldn’t do it.
Social Selling Strategy
If you haven’t implemented a social selling strategy for your social media management, here are some stats that will get you inspired to work on this ASAP!
78% of salespeople engaged in social selling are outselling their peers who aren’t. (Forbes)
77% of B2B buyers said they do not talk to a salesperson until they’ve performed independent research themselves (Source: CEB)
76% of buyers are ready to have a social media conversation with potential providers. (LinkedIn)
92% of B2B buyers are willing to engage with a sales professional who is a known industry thought leader.
53% of customer loyalty is driven by a salesperson’s ability to deliver unique insight, easily done through social media.
A full 71% of all sales professionals and 90% of top salespeople are already using social selling tools.
That percentage gets even higher with the younger generation. 78% of Millennials say they use social selling tools.
93% of sales executives have not received any formal training on social selling (source)
Social Selling vs. Social Media Marketing
Is social selling the same thing as social media marketing or advertising?
No. As we explained before, social marketing and social advertising are different things.
Social selling takes the social marketing approach but combines the methodology with ist sales process. They use social media marketing to nurture relationships, turn them into leads and potential sales opportunities.
Social Selling Is All About Value
When interacting with prospects and customers through social networks, it’s important to consider what’s in there for them.
Imagine this scenario: a coworker invited you for a family party. You know a few of other coworkers, but everyone else is a stranger. How do you approach people at the party? Do you stop them, get on their face, and tell them to buy from you? Of course not. You would get to know them first, ask questions, engage in conversations to find things in common.
Adding value is not subject to your opinion. Your users will find value depending on their very own stage. This is what makes marketing a very complex process.
Building A Sales Funnel
During the past few decades, the marketing funnel served as the primary model for how people learn about a product, decide to buy, and (hopefully) become loyal customers, helping spread the word to others.
In today’s age when every product has hoards of competitors, the loyalty loop is a more accurate picture of how the customer reevaluates their decision to buy again and again.
The best way to connect with your audience on Facebook is by mapping their experience, all while considering each stage of their decision-making process. To keep this simple, we’ll narrow the decision-making process into three stages:
Awareness: People have either become aware of your product or service, or aware that they have a need that must be fulfilled.
Evaluation: People are aware that your product or service could fulfill their needs, and they’re trying to determine whether you’re the best fit. Users turn into leads.
Purchase: Leads are ready to make a purchase.
What experience do you want to create for users who are in the awareness stage?
I want them to feel like they can trust my service or product.
I want them to identify our unique value proposition quickly.
I want them to know that they can ask any questions via chat or email.
Strategize Your Social Media Content
Gone are the days when professionals keep their professional and personal accounts separated. People buy you! Entrepreneurs who are able to build a personal brand thrive in social media. Remember, 76% of buyers are ready to have a social media conversation with potential providers.
Your social media channels are the amplifier. But you need a brand and a voice that speaks to your target audience. That’s where your content marketing strategy comes handy.
Social Media Marketing Quiz! See How Ready Are You For Social Selling!
My profile picture is professional (5 points)
My cover image inspires strangers to trust in me (5 points)
I am comfortable with letting strangers finding me (5 points)
I initiate conversations with people who I believe can be good connections (5 points)
I have prepared articles to share with my social media connections (5 points)
I have shared links where my connections can find more information about my services (5 points)
I have gotten referrals from my social media connections (5 points)
I have a content calendar and a content plan for my social media (5 points)
My social media accounts grow each month (5 points)
I take time each day to follow up with my connections follow up offline (calls, meetings) – (5 points)
Your score
5-20 It seems like you are on social media, but not engaging as much as you should.
25-35 You see the value of social media. Maybe with some guidance, you can start seeing leads and clients.
40-50 You are in the process to master the social selling game. Keep going!
In Closing
If you’re feeling overwhelmed from social media and want to have access to an expert who can remove the guess and make a plan to grow your business, let’s chat!
When my husband asked me for a picture of us in 2009, I immediately knew the #10yearchallenge went viral. He is never up to social media trends! So, of course, I wanted to jump into the challenge… until I checked out the stories that people were sharing.
What’s wrong with the #10yearchallenge?
There is nothing wrong. In a simple answer, you’re just supposed to share a picture side by side comparing your life in 2009 vs your life in 2019. The problem is that the trend went way too far in how people curated their lives.
In case you haven’t checked, go ahead and search on Instagram for the #10yearchallenge. You will the search results and will find Instagram influencers with unbelievable stories! Based on those search results, you will think that the world turned into a better place within the last 10 years.
This made me wonder… why do most people feel the urge to curate their lives on social media? Don’t we connect better when we are vulnerable and real? Then, why don’t people just show more vulnerability?
If you’re wondering where the line is between sharing your life- raw and vulnerable and attracting people to you- the real you, then keep reading!
The Mandatory Question: What The Heck Is Vulnerability?
One of the most quoted definitions of vulnerability is from Brené Brown “Vulnerability is about showing up and being seen. It’s tough to do that when we’re terrified about what people might see or think.”
As small children, we are open and free, sharing all of ourselves with others. Until something very painful happens: your best friend reveals your secret to someone and that someone decides to share with everyone. And now you’re exposed. This can be one of the most traumatic experiences for a child. Did you ever experience how is like being exposed and ashamed as a kid? I did… plenty of times.
As we grow and mature, we soon learn that the world can be a very painful place. We learn that not everyone is on our side, and not all situations are going to go our way. We get disappointed and go through growing pains, and that’s how the fear of vulnerability is formed.
Think about your first love. You believed in eternity. You thought this was the only person you could ever loved. And then… You got hurt.
The fear of vulnerability is ultimately a fear of rejection or abandonment. You have been hurt before, so you seek to minimize the risk of being hurt again.
Why Is Vulnerability A Good Thing, Especially For Your Marketing?
Vulnerability is scary. However, if you are business owners, c-suite executives, leaders, or trying to build a name and a personal brand, vulnerability is needed.
Here’s why:
The well-known neuroscientist, Antonio Damasio stated, “We are not thinking machines that feel rather, we are feeling machines that think.”
Damasio made this discovery: every human decision depends on emotion — every single one.
We make each choice somatically. In other words, we feel each decision out.
In sum, it’s about EMOTIONS.
Your personal-vulnerable stories will get you closer to your audience. Even more than your superhero stories. In general, people relate more with struggles than with wins.
Vulnerable Leaders Are Confident
People who do have a lot of self-confidence, are actually willing to show more of themselves. They’re willing to be vulnerable because they’re not afraid that someone might come in and take advantage of that. A recent set of studies calls this phenomenon “the beautiful mess effect.” It suggests that everyone should be less afraid of opening up—at least in certain cases.
The best example: video marketing!
Have you ever used video to increase your business? Have you thought about it but decided it wasn’t for you? Did you try it and feel embarrassed and not want to do it again? Even if you are a pro in video marketing, you know that the struggle is real, especially for women! We need to have the perfect background, the perfect hair and makeup, perfect nails, and of course, the idea of what we are saying. It’s exhausting.
With video, the more you do it, the more confident you get on camera, and then you learn that it’s ok if you mess up. You laugh and move on. By the way, I want to add a side note here and feature Barnes Team Media from Austin, Texas. They are educators on how to perform better on camera. You should check them out! Mike & Kim Barnes!
The next time you’re hesitating about sharing a great message on video, just think about the beautiful mess effect. People love messy! People love reality shows!
But what about your content marketing, in particular, social media marketing, how vulnerable do you really need to be? Where is the line between vulnerability and privacy?
The Golden Rule of Social Media: Be Personal, Not Private
In my book, The 6 Golden Rules of Social Media, rule #3 is Be Personal, But Not Private.
We all have that one friend on social media who tells us what she had for breakfast, what she wore to work today, the fight she just had with her mother, the supervisor at her job that constantly calls her out and, you know, I could go on and on about her life, or, just go check her social media pages to tell you exactly what is going on with her.
This is exactly WHAT NOT TO DO on social media. It is a desperate cry forattention and while you need the attention and you want new visitors to your social media profiles and pages, this is not the way to get it. In fact, this type of behavior attracts the attention you really don’t need.
You need to be more intentional with what you share on social media, especially if you want to attract a high-level profile.
Think about what your friends want to see from you.
Normally, people are open to know about things that benefit them, such as:
How to save money
How to make more money
How to save time, or
How to save efforts.
Those are the top motivators. You see, it’s not about you! It’s about them.
People don’t want to remember how dramatic your life is or how tough it is to be a parent. We all go through highs and lows. People don’t want constant reminders of your lows; especially when you have poor judgment on your images.
Your friends don’t need to see your c-section scar, bleeding, to know that you have a baby and it was a c-section.
You are entitled to a private life that you share with your family and close friends, away from your business. Do not cross the line of displaying your private life on social media.
Marketing is all about igniting human connections. You want to activate the power of emotions by being a human, to ignite those connections and then, give your audience what they want.
Is that simple! If you’re a content creator, having a clear understanding of how to humanize a brand without crossing the line is very important.
I wish I could tell you that in 10 years, I moved a magic wand and my life changed mysteriously. Well, that’s not true.
I wish I could tell you that in 10 years, I went from my 30’s to my 40’s and I retired with millions of dollars in the bank. This isn’t the case. I had multiple wins between 2010-2013 and several losses in 2014. Those generated plenty of changes for all of us. Changes that were scary, but we are now grateful for all.
I wish that in 10 years I didn’t find myself 50 pounds heavier, and still struggling with my diet. But that’s not the case.
In reality, I can claim some wins. More wins than losses. But I would be a fraud if I tell you everything has been incredibly great. Our family of 6 has seen adversity. It’s extremely difficult pursuing your personal goals, business goals while raising a family with intentionality. I wish more people were real when sharing their #10yearchallenge.
My goal for the next ten years is to be present. To be real. To be vulnerable. This might explain why my personal Facebook is off. I want to figure some things out before I go ahead and create content: for whom?
The last decade was all about growing a massive audience. For some reason, it doesn’t serve me well. I’m all about quality, not quantity.
I have realized how much I love being a small business owner, in particular, a solopreneur and how much I love helping others succeed; especially those who need me the most.
This is me- the real me. With grammatical errors and a crazy accent.
Being vulnerable has opened plenty of doors for me. I wish I had known this 9 years ago, when I was hiding my mistakes, my accent, and tried to be someone else.
If you’re in the process of building a personal brand, take vulnerability seriously and build an audience that you can connect with. Find that line that allows you to connect with your tribe, for real. And just focus on being you, just a little bit better each day.
Don’t Forget This Marketing Secret
The most important element of your content marketing strategy or social media marketing strategy is your reputation. Without great customer service and a great reputation, every marketing effort will be worthless.
Are you looking for a law firm marketing plan that has actually been created by a lawyer who is now a digital marketing strategist? You’ve landed in the right place.
In this article, my goal is to give lawyers and law firms a legal marketing game plan that adjusts to reality. So what exactly is reality? The most successful attorneys are not successful because they rank #1 in Google. They are successful because people know about their excellent work.
Does that mean that lawyers should not use digital marketing and social media marketing? Not really. But, certainly, their online marketing needs to be done differently. Social media marketing for lawyers is different than social media marketing for e-commerce, for example.
Keep reading, because in this article you will learn all about what it takes to market yourself differently for the better.
What Is Multichannel Marketing And Why Does It Fail For Law Firms?
So, let’s start with the basics. What exactly is multichannel marketing?
Multichannel marketing is pretty much taking you back to the days when a potential client opened the yellow pages, found your office, and called to make an appointment. Think back to the dark ages…before the Internet was really even a thing.
Marketing was a static message. You needed a message for the Yellow Pages, made for people to understand. You had your brochures with another message. Then, radio commercials, TV, etc. All of that advertising was created in hopes that the user would find you in one channel and respond. So, you needed to create different messages, depending on the channel in which you would advertise in order to get those end-users to respond.
That’s essentially a multi-channel approach. However, in today’s ‘digital everything’ age, users don’t behave that way.
In most cases, potential clients will use many different channeling outlets to figure out more about your law firm before actually contacting you. This is so essential for potential clients because it gives them the power and ability to do their own research.
Your potential clients come to your office prepared. In some cases, you will find that they have done extensive research before considering to even call you in the first place! You might have several stories when your clients think they know more than you! Because they learned on Google! Right?
How can we market to meet our users’ expectations? That’s the main question! Let’s just start by agreeing with one main rule: stop following a multi-channel approach.
Here’s an example of the “old fashioned and out of date” multichannel marketing.
The old way of multi-channel marketing.
We see the multichannel model failing, even in other forms of advertising like:
Paid leads
Paid display banners
Paid search
Legal listings (lawyers.com, avvo.com, etc.)
Print ads
Etc…etc…
Lawyers Don’t Want Leads From Google Searching
Contrary to what traditional marketing agencies will tell you, the way your law firm will grow is not from the volume of website visits, calls, or emails. As a lawyer and marketer, I would not set up a marketing plan strictly focusing on quantity. I know for a fact that the best clients are the ones who were referred by existing clients. I would prefer more quality contacts.
The chances of selling to a new customer are between 5 and 20 percent, while the probability of selling to an existing customer is between 60 and 70 percent.
So, in theory, what do lawyers need to do in order to grow their law firm? Avoid marketing practices that are predicated in attracting cold traffic, and instead focus on:
Provide excellent service.
Engage with their community online and offline.
Produce educational content.
Use social media channels to nurture their community with educational content, in a way that ignites relevant conversations.
I understand that it is so tempting to pay for Adwords, pay per click, newspapers ads, magazines, etc. But it will be better if instead, you craft a marketing strategy that actually helps you to communicate with your audience and warm them up so they can get you referrals.
The Omnichannel Marketing Approach
In today’s Now Economy, consumers demand highly relevant and personalized experiences as they interact with brands on a multitude of devices. As their expectations increase, an omni-channel strategy becomes mission-critical for marketers.
Omnichannel marketing really puts the customer at the core in order to ensure a completely consistent, unified experience at every touch point as opposed to simply enabling that touch point. Multichannel means many, and omnichannel means all (the customer is literally at the center).
Think about omnichannel as a holistic approach. The user is the center of your marketing and not the other way around.
A Law Firm Marketing Plan Example
The key ingredient for building your refreshed marketing plan for your law firm (or office if you’re a solo) is to put yourself in the users’ shoes. What do they want to see? What do they want to hear?
Multi-channel marketing consists of putting words in consumers’ mouths, whereas omnichannel marketing focuses solely on listening to what the client wants then delivering.
Let’s craft a simple marketing plan that gets you clients for your law firm, following the omnichannel approach.
Take A Look Of Your Online Marketing With The Users Experience In Mind
Think about what goes on in the minds of those potential users, when they have a need and believe they need to speak to an attorney. Let’s say, a worried mom that was involved in a car accident this weekend.
Worried mom researches online “car accident attorney near me”.
Found law firms advertising on Google, didn’t click in any.
Checked for the first law firm, organic, and found https://www.thevalentinelawfirm.com/. The website design is great! Clear, specific, represents trust and approachable. A great vibe!
Didn’t click on any page from the website.
Worried mom takes a look at the website for a few seconds and found the social media platforms. Great!
Worried mom checks that the lawyer has videos so she can now associate a face with the name. Great!
Additional points: Worried mom sees that some of her close friends are following this law firm. Fantastic!
This exercise should take you to identify the kind of content that your users are expecting to find when they are searching. The key to turn users into real leads is to provide them with the information they need, in a way that makes them easy to access.
Build A Content Marketing Plan Based On What Your Target User Can’t Find on Google
I’m sure you’ve considered writing a blog. However, when it comes to actually writing it, you can’t really think of topics that your users will find interesting. Who wants to read a law blog? Right?
Think about your blog as your library of resources that can facilitate conversations with your prospects.
Your content marketing doesn’t always have to be a long blog. It can be a checklist with items that are needed in case of a car accident. Or, if you’re a divorce attorney, a calculator of child support, with the appropriate disclaimers of course.
Create content based on a niche so that those users can find the information and follow you easier. You will be able to add other topics later. But now that you’re refining your content marketing plan, try to stick to a specific topic so users can identify your name with the kind of clients you want to take. Make it easy for them!
Build A Strong LinkedIn Profile (If You Haven’t Yet)
Don’t forget to add LinkedIn to the mix. Studies have shown that 92% of B2B marketers include LinkedIn in their digital marketing mix. Now, remember, to market a law firm is different than marketing for e-commerce. Your users are not expecting to see promotions. They are expecting to see real value from your social channels, including LinkedIn.
One simple goal for this platform is to get your profile to the all-star status. This impacts the number of views that your profile will get.
If you’re not sure if your profile is all-star, check on your dashboard and look at the top right. You should see the rank. Sometimes you get the all-star by just following the suggestions from LinkedIn.
I wrote a detailed article with everything you need to boost your LinkedIn profile and you can check all the details later, here.
Best Practices For A Strong LinkedIn Profile
1) Photo. No logo. Not your team. Not your office. A professional photo showing you approachable and trusted. Not sure if your photo makes the cut? Try this software! Photofeeler.
2) Your specialty. What do you do? Speak directly to your potential leads. Assume they search for you. Use common and clear words.
3) Your “summary” should be creative. Please, don’t be boring here! If you make it the exact same way as your competitors are writing their summary, nobody will be compelled to read it. Use emojis and bullet points.
4) Video! This is a great way to show your authority. Especially if you’re looking to build your authority.
5) Contact info. Most people forget to add their contact info or they hide it.
Don’t forget to add your content to your profile. For example, if you create a checklist or an article for your blog, you can add those on your LinkedIn profile via articles or media items on your profile.
As you will see below, LinkedIn will help you ignite referrals. Always keep that in mind. Give your clients reasons to share your content. If, for example, you’re participating in a conference to keep learning about something, share something thoughtful about your experience. Ignite those conversations!
Solidify Your Referral Marketing
Since we are taking an approach to online marketing that more user-centered, building authority and ultimately, building loyalty is what will pay your bills.
One word that should be on top of your head- referrals! And we are not kidding! Up to 76% of marketers are prioritizing customer loyalty over customer acquisition in 2018. (IDG)
Yes, we want to ignite your referral marketing engine.
Referral marketing is the preferred marketing source for many businesses including law firms. Business to business companies with referrals have a 70% higher conversion rate, and they report a 69% faster close time on sales.
Helping your customers become brand advocates is a smart business move no matter which way you cut it. Here’s an area where LinkedIn comes handy.
Don’t be afraid of connecting with your clients on LinkedIn. When their connections look for recommendations to hire a lawyer, your clients can easily tag your profile and you will be able to stay on top of those conversations.
Omnichannel Marketing: One User, One Voice, One Message, One Flow
Your law firm marketing should be simple. One ideal user. Craft the information that will help them build trust and loyalty. Stay in touch with them via social media, in particular, LinkedIn.
Don’t forget that what makes a law firm successful is excellent work. But if people don’t know about it, you won’t grow.
We’re currently helping clients revamp their marketing strategy. Who do you know that would benefit from great strategy? Share this article. Or if it’s you, please complete this 30 seconds assessment and we will schedule a complimentary session!
Using social media to promote your products or services into the world can be an amazing opportunity. It’s free and gives you the chance to connect with pretty much billions of people around the globe.
The virtual land is so powerful … it represents so many possibilities …
Wow! Right? …
… Until it’s NOT. It can be toxic, busy, overwhelming, especially if you’re a business owner.
Because there are so many social media platforms, and there is so much to do, most entrepreneurs and business owners see their social media as a heavy lifting chore or necessary evil and end up spending more time trying to learn social media marketing than marketing their business.
In my seminars, webinars, and conferences when I go and speak, I hear ALL THE TIME “where do I start?” “what do I post?” “where is the best platform to share content?”
The constant “getting ready to get ready” turns into marketing fatigue. That’s the danger zone. This brings them to do zero marketing and have zero clients. They get into desperation mode and sign up for 50 meetups a month. The fatigue is now even worse.
Are you in the danger zone or getting closer?
I’ve constructed this guide to help entrepreneurs and small business owners without unlimited marketing budgets understand the erratic world of social media.
This ultimate guide gives you my favorite social media marketing tools that you can use to boost your social media without breaking your bank account.
I’m here to simplify your game by telling you exactly which tools I use as a small business owner and strategist with over 10 years in digital marketing.
I’m dividing the amazing tools into the 4 job categories that a social media specialist performs. I chose the specialist role because it’s the most comprehensive one. I will cover “the what” which is the strategy and “the how” which are the tools.
Let’s catapult this complex world of social media marketing to take you out of the danger zone!
Chapter 1: Social Media Skills and Job Description
Social Media Marketing, What Exactly Is?
Social media marketing is a degree on its own.
In fact, if you were looking for a social media job, you will find all these different names:
Director, Social Marketing and Brand Communications, Social Media, Social Media Relations, Coordinator, Engagement Manager, Internet Marketing Coordinator, Social Media Account Executive, Social Media Analyst, Social Media Editor, Executive, Coordinator, Producer, Social Media Specialist … and Strategist.
Did the list confuse you even more? No worries. Chances are that you’re a social media specialist or a small business owner trying to learn how to market yourself. Regardless, you have to run most of the listed roles on your own, at least at the moment.
A Brief Job Description of a Social Media Specialist
Before we discuss the tools, let’s first cover the fundamentals of what the scope of a social media specialist looks like. This will help you, as a business owner, to understand the kind of skills you need and the time you need to set aside to make this work.
Here is a job brief of a Social Media Specialist from Workable.com.
We are looking for a driven Social Media Specialist to attract and interact with targeted virtual communities and networks users.
What does a Social Media Specialist do?
The goal is to gradually achieve superior customer engagement and intimacy, website traffic and revenue by strategically exploiting all aspects of the social media marketing roadmap.
Social media specialists should have a solid understanding of how each social media channel works and how to optimize content so that it is engaging on those channels. You are responsible for joining relevant conversations on behalf of the brand and “soft selling” the product by providing support to current and prospective customers.
Responsibilities
Build and execute social media strategy through competitive research, platform determination, benchmarking, messaging and audience identification
Generate, edit, publish and share daily content (original text, images, video or HTML) that builds meaningful connections and encourages community members to take action
Set up and optimize company pages within each platform to increase the visibility of company’s social content
Moderate all user-generated content in line with the moderation policy for each community
Create editorial calendars and syndication schedules
Continuously improve by capturing and analyzing the appropriate social data/metrics, insights and best practices, and then acting on the information
Collaborate with other departments (customer relations, sales etc) to manage reputation, identify key players and coordinate actions
Requirements
Proven working experience in social media marketing or as a digital media specialist
Excellent consulting, writing, editing (photo/video/text), presentation and communication skills
Demonstrable social networking experience and social analytics tools knowledge
Adequate knowledge of web design, web development, CRO and SEO
Knowledge of online marketing and good understanding of major marketing channels
Positive attitude, detail and customer oriented with good multitasking and organisational ability
Fluency in English
BS in Communications, Marketing, Business, New Media or Public Relations
You Think You Can Be A Great Social Media Specialist?
That’s exactly why you’re here!
Don’t get intimidated by the formal education the job description required. I happen to have a JD and a BBA, but, honestly, I didn’t learn any of the social media strategies from school. It was all from practice.
Social media marketing, thinking big picture, is about: communications, creative, technology, and analytical tasks. So let’s cover each task and the tools you need to become a great social media marketer.
Chapter 2: Communications
If you’re like most small business owners, you want to promote your business without breaking the bank.
And there is no better way to do that than by managing your own PR campaign internally without retaining the services of a media relations company or a full-service marketing company.
Wait! Do you mean PR as public relations? Free, like free lunch?
Exactly! If you take ownership of your own marketing communications strategy, you’ll learn how to build lasting relationships with your connections, including journalists and influencers, get free press, and acquire more customers through a sustainable organic approach.
Let me see your smile!
If you have no problem with having sales conversations with future clients, then, sharing your message on social media should not be a problem. You already know what to say so that’s a great step.
But what if you’re not that confident about what to say or how to say it?
No worries!
You’re here and that means you’re open to learning new skills. That’s a smart move. The last thing you want is burning your audience by sharing the wrong message and confusing them. A confused mind can’t make a decision.
What Is A Marketing Communications Strategy?
A Marketing communications strategy defines the entire range of activities you will do to market your products. It includes:
Your message (what is to be said),
The medium (where it is to be said), and
The target (to whom your message is reaching)
If you’re marketing yourself, knowing what to say is, perhaps, one of your struggles.
Have you taken the time to reflect about your why? (Hint: It’s not to make money.)
Think about the core purpose of your business, and then think about how you market your products or services. Are they aligned? As Sinek has found, having loyal customers is all about attracting the people who share your fundamental beliefs. Remember: People don’t buy what you do. They buy why you do it.
Yes, this might seem obvious, but it’s a critical step that is often overlooked. If you were (or are) the founder of your business, wouldn’t you want the people marketing it to know why you started it in the first place? Understanding “why” is essential to knowing how to communicate the “how” and “what”.
Life Gets Easier When You Work With Clients That Share Your Values
Keep this in mind when you’re planning your content and your target audience. You don’t want to just work with anyone. You want ideal clients.
When I say ideal clients, I mean clients with a strong connection. How strong? Well I guess it depends on your culture and values. For me, mi casa es su casa. Clients come to my home office, know my family, and are invited to special events. I consider my clients like family. But that’s maybe part of my culture. I’m Puerto Rican and we are completely open to host people. We love spending time with people! You don’t have to copy my model. But you certainly want to connect with those who hire you or buy your products.
A Great Communications Marketing Strategy Helps You Attract Ideal Clients
If you take ownership of your own marketing communications strategy, not only you will be able to build stronger relationships with your network, but you will also have the opportunity to participate directly in conversations.
When your message reflects your values, the right people will feel attracted to you. That’s attraction marketing!
If you haven’t experienced the benefits of attraction marketing, go back and review your messaging.
Are you sharing your why? Consistently?
Does your message have the right voice?
How about the vibe?
These factors are crucial when it comes to create a communications marketing strategy that let people say: “you’re talking to me”.
Best Tools To Have An Amazing Communications Marketing On Social Media (Spring 2020)
Monitor the web for interesting new content (including content about you). That’s right. You should set an alert to monitor your name and business name. Google Alerts is one of Google’s hidden gems. It’s a really powerful tool to keep track of trends, interesting topics, or anything really new that appears on the web. If you’re not using it already, here are a few creative ways to get started with it.
Google Alerts may not be one of Google’s most popular services, but it’s definitely one of the most useful.
BuzzSumo is a research and monitoring tool you also want to have. The functionality is broken down as follows: Find content that is most shared on social media channels – you can enter your own domain or another domain, and see what has been shared socially. Find influencers related to particular topics.
The best way I can describe what is content marketing?
Content marketing is a full strategy that tailors your communications to make people come to you rather than you reaching out to them.
According to the CMI, 72% of marketers say content marketing increases engagement and is a great lead generation tool. I’m certainly part of the stats.
Traditional sales methods assume that you’re exposing your product or service and the person is giving you 100% of their attention. As you know, in the digital-everything economy, that’s not the case. You’re lucky if someone gives you 60 seconds!
Even the best advertisers are having a hard time these days!
So what’s the solution? Avoid advertising? Let the consumer dictate the flow? Maybe! Of course not! That’s where content marketing comes in place.
✔ Content marketing gets three times more leads than paid search advertising.
✔ 47% of buyers viewed 3-5 pieces of content before engaging with a sales rep.
✔ Marketers who prioritize blogging efforts are 13x more likely to see positive ROI.
Do you need to maintain a blog to be successful on social media?
✔ 66% of marketers surveyed used blogs in their social media content. (Social Media Examiner, 2019)
✔ 43% of B2B marketers say blogging is their most important type of content. (Social Marketing Industry Report, 2017)
Based on these interesting stats and my personal experience, the answer is yes. However, before getting into the blogging production, your brand needs, what I call, the core content marketing pieces so that you can activate attraction marketing and see results in less than 30 days.
I teach a method called The Ice Cream Cone to create a content marketing strategy.
You plan your core content marketing pieces thinking about the ice cream cone, as follows:
Top Funnel: think about the sprinkles of the ice cream. The more visually appealing is, the quicker you want it. This is very important because you want to activate emotions!
You want to create the I Want This Now factor!
Middle Funnel: they liked you! They are reading your content. Now it’s your duty to make them feel like they need to know what you know. Lead with your expertise, and give them what they want. However, you need to keep a balance between free tips and expert-level content. That’s why we have the bottom funnel.
Bottom Funnel: Here’s where you invite those who trust you already, to experience another level of working with you, period. No need to add flashy discounts. Those who are meant to receive your help, will be ready for you!
The Ice Cream Cone is how I teach my clients how to create content to launch their brand and attract ideal clients. Before even writing blogs, these pieces of content will be shared on their website pages and across all their social media accounts.
When you activate a great content marketing strategy and mix with a great social media marketing strategy, you will start experiencing word of mouth marketing. Your followers will turn into advocators and they will share your amazing content with their network. Those who came recommended will trust you even faster.
According to Nielsen, 92% of people trust recommendations from friends and family over any other type of advertising.
Curious about what people trust these days? Source: Nielsen.
If content writing isn’t your talent and you want to learn, find content marketing mentors and follow them on social media. My favorite is Julia McCoy. Her content marketing practices have amazing case studies, including her own agency. She built it from 0 to $4M in 7 years using just content marketing.
The key to create profitable content is easy (please write this down): give people what they want!
Be strategic with your communications and share what people want. This means:
Stop sharing viral videos.
Create a content marketing plan and structure your days.
Listen to your audience. Find out the format your audience finds most valuable. If they tell you they love your videos, then, do more videos! If they tell you they love to read your long posts, then do more long posts.
This is a great Chrome extension that will make your writing super easy. It gives you real-time spell check and ideas to communicate your message correctly.
Communications Tool #5: Headline Analyzer
Now that you know what to say, how to write it, it’s time to learn how to market it. Believe it or not, sometimes, you can get more engagement by having a compelling headline. Check this headline analyzer by the Advanced Marketing Institute.
Check for example the headline I tested for this article. I typically settle for a 41-50% since it’s considered a PRO headline. You might want to test your writing abilities and get back to me!
So, you will get all the ideas and will systematize them to only share the profitable ones, based on what your audience wants.
Communications Tool #6: SEM Rush.
For those of you who are more advanced, especially freelancers that want to implement SEO and social media strategies, SEM Rush is going to be your best tool ever!
What is SEMrush?
SEMrush is an all-in-one tool suite for improving online visibility. Our tools and reports the following digital marketing services:
If you’re not familiar with this amazing -and free- service from Google, you just discovered a gem!
It’s your e-cabinet organizer. You should have a social media marketing folder and inside, different sub-folders and documents.
Open a content marketing folder. Inside this folder, create 2 separate documents: 1 for content ideas and 1 for content production.
This will be your bank or ideas and will turn eventually into your content factory!
Why Would You Consider Outsource Your Social Media?
A social media specialist will take care of your communications and content marketing (at least at my social media management company, we take care of that), so you can just sit down and have conversations with your targeted audience. That’s a big reason to even consider this solution, so you can focus on what matters the most.
Communications Tool #8: Trello Boards
For those of you who have a team, Trello Boards are great! For example, you can have a board per social media account and add tasks related to each.
Some of the tasks, for example, that you might have for LinkedIn tasks like: change the profile picture, connect with local professionals, and edit your BIO. Each task goes inside your LinkedIn board. You can always expand or delete as much as you need to.
So that’s it for communications. Now let’s talk about visuals!
Chapter 3: Visuals
When it comes to visuals, you might think that most entrepreneurs who are promoting themselves on social media, have this part very clear.
There is a lot of confusion, in particular, about branded content.
So let’s talk about “the what” first, and then discuss the amazing tools I have for you!
A Simple Rule To Create Amazing Visuals For Your Brand
8 out of 10 entrepreneurs I consult, use their social media channels as a billboard. All they do is talk about themselves, share promotions, and ask their audience to buy from them. This is wrong.
So, if you’re considering hiring me for your marketing team and all you have been doing on social media is talking about your product, that will be the first thing we will need to change.
To show you an example of what not to do on social media, take a look at this restaurant marketing.
Does it look pretty? Yes.
Does it call your attention? Maybe.
Would you return to their page if all you see is this content, daily? Maybe not!
If you want to discover how long your users are following your content from your Facebook Business Page, a great metric is Retention. If you dig into your analytics you will see this metric and will be able to understand what people want and what makes them coming back.
Click here to learn more about User Retention and Active Users Metrics. If it’s too complex, we can always have a conversation about this. Trust me, this part is essential, especially when you’re building your brand and your audience.
How Much Do Your Visuals Really Matter?
Shoppers can make snap judgments about a product in only 90 seconds, and 90% of them will base this perception purely on color.
PowerReviews Finds that 88% of Consumers Seek Visual Content Prior to Purchase
So, yes, your brand should be well represented by both, your content in writing and your content in visuals.
You might have heard about “branded content”. This is a concept that marketers can’t seem to agree.
Some entrepreneurs and marketers think that branded content is about adding a logo, phone number, and website to a picture and with that, they refer to their social media posts as “branded posts”. They see social media as an advertising channel, and all they care is about their ROI: leads and sales.
But guess what? Today’s consumer is way more educated.
“People don’t like being sold to. It’s a discomforting experience, so the challenge for content marketers is to make sure the entertainment value of the content outweighs the discomfort.” Mike Clear, Digitas
Branded content (also known as branded entertainment) is the practice of marketing via the creation of content that is funded or outright produced by an advertiser. Source: Wikipedia.
Perhaps you’re even more confused by this definition! I don’t blame you!
The Content Marketing Institute has argued passionately for the term to be dropped, insisting it gives content marketing a bad name.
Branded content gives agencies permission to keep talking about themselves, adding a bit of storytelling to product pitches. It should not be like that! This is actually what advertising is.
Now that we know what NOT to do with your visuals, let’s then discuss what kind of visuals should be part of your strategy.
Your visuals should have the power to ignite emotions and create a perception of the experience that the individual will have. Anything that interrupts the thinking process, will create friction (which is what you don’t want).
Think about your social media platforms as the store front. When people are in front of it, how do they feel?
Do they feel inspired by your content?
Do they like what they see?
Can they perceive the experience of your product or your service?
Will they be motivated enough to explore more?
Will they have something to say about your store? Did they see something unique?
Match Your Local Market’s Expectations
I consider myself lucky by having the privilege of being in marketing and in Austin! Trust me, the “keep Austin weird is real”. We should do a contest of the weirdest sign!
I will start with 3 Austin’s “interesting” marketing messages and see how far this list goes.
Rudy’s BBQ “worst BBQ in Texas”. Seriously? Why would you have a negative slogan?
2) El Arroyo. This location is a landmark! Their funny signs give people a reason to remember them! Plus, their $1 margaritas 😀 Some content they share is quite controversial, but they are ok with it. Again, it’s Austin!
3) Of course, the Austin Motel.
Now you see why I told you I’m lucky?
Marketing to consumers living in Austin gives you flexibility and green light for your imagination.
And don’t think it’s only to certain industries. Even attorneys get their creative going! David Komie is a great example!
Creative is the most important skill you want to develop for social media.
Dare To Be Contrarian
I’m a big fan of Russell Brunson. Since you’re into digital marketing, following Russell’s content is great.
Russell says the key to stand out in the crowd digital marketing space is to be prolific.
What exactly does that mean? That means you’re not too crazy or too boring.
Let’s say you’re an attorney and want to be known as the lawyer who represents dads during custody cases. Your message should be prolific and clear enough so people can remember you. Can you think of ideas?
Check, for example, the law firm The Firm For Men. I like they named their practice with a clear name and if you check their social media, their message goes into the prolific zone. It’s fun, creative, but delivers the message.
Case Study: Junkluggers
Junkluggers wanted to increase web traffic from social media. We identified several opportunities in their messaging and visuals.
By removing promotional posts and adding messages with a high prolific index, their website traffic from social media went from 26% to 67% in less than 2 months. That’s amazing growth, by just implementing 2 strategies on their social media marketing: messaging and visuals
Best Tools To Create Visuals
Now that we talked about the power of visuals and you have a plan, let’s then talk about the how!
As of spring 2020 here is the list of tools I’ve been either personally using for my social media marketing company, or have received great references from my great connections.
I hope this list saves you some time, pain, and energy! For simplicity, I will separate visuals in 2 sub categories: graphics and photos.
Recently enhanced with amazing templates for your Instagram stories. Also, their app got revamped and it’s a lot easier to use. Check Canva App. I use this tool a lot, even to create planners to track my personal goals. Here’s an article I wrote showing examples of how I use Canva.com.
Visuals Tool #2: Over App
These days you, your team (and your clients!) can create content using intuitive visual content apps, including amazing typography and image creation tools…all on your mobile phone. Over is my go to app! I love that I can even do videos! A great plus for Over app is their bank of images.
Visuals Tool #3: Magisto
Speaking of videos, Magisto, recently acquired by Vimeo, is an amazing app to create videos quickly. I’ve tried many video apps and they have music without the copyrights and your videos get flagged. That has never happened with Magisto so that’s why I recommend it.
Placeit is a useful online tool that allows you to create logos, images, videos, and mockups. I just published my new book on social media marketing and personal writing! So… see the mockup I just created using Placeit by Envato, for free.
So your stock images are great, but selfies and great shots of you and your team are even better. For those days when you need to fix some unwanted spots, or if you’re into Instagram filters, I have some recommended apps that are great photo editors for non-photo editors.
Visuals Tool #7: Apps and websites to make great photos
For this one I surveyed my Facebook Group of professionals and entrepreneurs, since the tools I use are pretty much 2: Facetune and Afterlight. But… it’s because I have a professional photographer on my team so I’m spoiled.
But, our group of professionals gave me their favorite apps so I created this top 5 photo editing apps:
Facetune: for the days when you need to do some light brushing or reshaping
PhotoLab – favorite for their artistic photo effects and options.
Snapseed gives even more editing features like advanced cropping and removing people from images. (Much needed sometimes)
Wondering How To Create Amazing Instagram Feed In Minutes?
Visuals Tool #8: Preset filters
For those of you who have Adobe Lightroom, you can actually buy a preset filter. Check Victoria Bee’s Etsy shop! She’s amazing.
In case you’re not into visuals that much, consider this!
Visual content is like music. In a flash, it connects you to a moment, message, and experience. And like a song, images are sticky…
How About Infographics?
People following directions with text and illustrations do 323% better than people following directions without illustrations. If you’re using a consultative sales model, this means you’re all about creating amazing content, mostly educational.
Infographics can increase web traffic by up to 12%. When the images are relevant, readers spend more time looking at the images than they do reading text on the page. This means better SEO too!
You might think you need to be a pro to design amazing infographics. Actually, that’s not the case at all.
Make amazing videos with open captions for your social media
Online videos, films, TV programs, video games…captions are gradually becoming a norm and many of us are expecting to have the option to check whether it’s available and to switch it on (whether it’s available or not is another debate).
But one thing that many of us have noticed is that there are 2 types of captions: open and closed captions.
As suggested by Media Pouch, a local video production company in Austin, open captions will give your videos a tremendous advantage.
Just think about it: Visual marketing is to you what music is to an artist.
A virtual calling card. An instant association with your business, giving voice to your content.
And with visuals earning a whopping 94% more shares than any other type of content.
Chapter 4: Distribution Channels
Scheduling Content On Social Media. Should You Use A Scheduler?
I used to be a firm believer that Facebook’s algorithm penalized accounts that used third-party schedulers. This lead me to only post native uploads to the platforms, per client. (Actually, I still do it for some clients).
It is truth that Facebook uses your edge rank to determine who will see your content. However, the third-party scheduler has very little effect. If your content doesn’t add value and people don’t interact with it, it won’t reach a lot of people, no matter if it came from a native post (using Facebook) or from a third party.
Once I switched my approach from “hacking the algorithm” to “add value to my audience”, I see the distribution channels much differently.
A Simple Rule To Automate Your Social Media Content
Think about the user experience first.
The days when we would take a look at the social media insights that told you “the best hours to post” are over. If your social media strategy follows advice that’s been given to billions of users, this will put your social media marketing in the danger zone.
Save yourself some time and don’t focus on what the platforms tell you.
The best times to post have to do with the best time that works for your audience.
Let’s say for example, you are targeting moms. You need to be mindful of their schedule. When do they go online? What do they do? Are they able to join you on a 45-min Facebook live? Will they rather read silently instead of playing a video? Those questions are part of the user experience.
One of the elements that makes Google successful is their ability to purify their algorithm to make sure they give users the best experience possible. Facebook’s attempts to change their algorithm model Google’s strategy.
Many social media gurus live by algorithm hacks. I have to admit, I love hacking too. However, at the end of the day, the best social media marketing strategy is the one that provides long-term and scalable results.
For that reason, I must tell you: lead with the user experience all the time.
Do you enjoy talking to bots? If you don’t, then chances are your audience won’t enjoy either.
Do you enjoy seeing 10 selfies from your best friend in 1 day? Maybe not! So, don’t do it either.
The Golden Rule will certainly help you here!
I wrote a book a few years ago that is so relevant, today, more than ever. In The 6 Golden Rules of Social Media I gave 50 examples of how to add value to your audience and how to generate leads the classy way.
Best Posts To Share (Profitable Social Media Content)
I will remind you, one more time, your goal with social media marketing is: more ROI and spending less time. Right? That’s why you’ve been reading this for over 10 minutes now. And I will honor my promise.
Let’s discuss what are the best posts to share.
Generally speaking, your goal is to get visibility. You want people to see your social media, feel intrigued, engaged with your content, and take action.
What does “take action” look like?
Post a comment
Share your content
Click the link shared on your post
With these 3 activities in mind, let’s make sure your posts play one of the following roles:
They stir some emotions
They catch attention
They entertain people
They send some powerful message
Don’t forget about a strong headline. In addition to images and descriptions, the title can be changed, and you do not need to use the headline from your article if you do not find it attractive enough for your social fans. Always remember about the audience you are trying to reach with your posts.
I’m sure you want more ROI and less wasted time. So I’m gonna give you my list of tools I use to plan the content and share it strategically!
My Go-To Social Media Scheduling Tools
You will notice something here! The list isn’t long! Again, I’m more focused on the user experience and giving people what they want.
I will recommend you tools that will help you plan and schedule posts a month ahead, and then, tools that will balance the automation and authenticity.
Scheduling Tool #1: Social Media Marketing Planner
You’ve probably seen fancy calendars and planners. I’m actually not a big fan of those scrapbooking style tools.
I rather get things done. I guess it comes with having a strict agenda and plenty of things to do.
So, for simplicity, your calendar can be just a Word Doc or Google Doc.
Here’s the format I use to plan my social media marketing every month:
Just think about this, on a Google document, super simple.
Part 1: Theme of the month: Growth. We want to share content that inspires, educates, and invites people to consider us for their business growth needs.
Part 2: Target audience: small business owners in their first 3 years of their business.
Part 3: Events of the month: Webinar week 2 and Networking event, week 4.
Part 4: Blogs to publish during the month: Ultimate guide of social media and Instagram tutorial
Part 5: Marketing Campaigns: #MembersMonday #SummerSocial
Your Facebook Business Page comes with the option to schedule posts in the future. Now with Creator Studio, if you have multiple pages, you can post and schedule multiple pages, all from the same dashboard.
Creator Studio integrates Instagram as well. You are able to see Instagram’s content library from Facebook. We still can’t post to Instagram from Creator Studio, but I won’t be surprised if that will come soon.
Scheduling Tool #3: Facebook Group Scheduler
Facebook Groups are a great way to grow your audience on social media. It’s by far one of my favorite social media tools.
In full transparency, I use Hootsuite for my agency. I like how authenticates and I can just add team members and assign accounts. So, for agencies, I believe they are staying competitive.
For solopreneurs, Hootsuite’s new pricing model might not make sense.
You only need a scheduler like Hootsuite for your Twitter and LinkedIn, since Facebook has its own scheduler. Buffer is a good alternative.
For those of you looking for more robust social media management tools that can offer curation and content suggestions, MeetEdgar is a great option.
Scheduling Tool #5: Later | Planoly
For those of you who are 100% Instagram marketing, you then need a social media management tool that specializes on the platform.
My research narrowed to 2 options and I chose Later.com. I liked their ability to add teams so I can get my team working on our clients while still having access to the accounts. Some of my clients use Planoly.com and are very happy too.
Later and Planoly also work for Pinterest.
Scheduling Tool #6: Sprout Social
Sprout Social does what Buffer and Hootsuite do but in a more complex way, but this platform is best for small-large agencies as their analytics feature beats Hootsuite and Buffer hands down. They provide full reporting details for their premium members, breaking down each account in bits. You can even compare your competitor’s figure and see where they are and how best to tackle them. It’s that deep.
The down side with Sprout Social is the fact that it is far more expensive than Buffer and Hootsuite put together and they have no free plan, just a 30 day trial.
Sprout Social works with Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram.
You’ve set up a Facebook page, Instagram profile, you respond to customer questions, follow fans, post important news, and thank your advocates for their support.
Beyond that, what are you doing to track and monitor these social interactions?
How do you really know if social media is working?
The answer will sound intimidating. The good news is it’s easier than you think to measure your ROI of social media efforts.
Metrics Tool #1 : Google Analytics
I know that perhaps you delegated your website project to your web guru and this is an area you don’t understand that well. Or maybe you built a website on your own. Regardless, Google Analytics is like the eyeglasses you need in order to see your digital footprints.
The CMO survey 2018 claimed only 23.3% of marketers are able to prove the impact of social media marketing quantitatively.
How can you make sure you track the results of your social media efforts? The answer is simple! By leveraging the power of Google Analytics.
Start by opening your Google analytics account and getting the code. Add the code on your website and it will start tracking for you. Sprout Social has a great step-by-step tutorial on how to use Google Analytics to track your conversions from social media by adding conversion rules. This might sound advanced so don’t panic. If at least you can install this code, you’re good!
What’s the difference between Google Analytics and Google Search Console?
Google search console = Health Report
How is your website performing
Any errors in your site
How many backlinks
For how many keywords your website and respective pages ranking for
CTR, impressions, ranking data
Any spam action has been taken
How many pages indexed
Google Analytics = Analysis Report
Where you getting traffic
Source of traffic
How many users landing on your page
User behavior – landing, activity, time spent, browser, technology details
Goals & conversions – how many visitors are converted into your customers
You need both tools, Google Analytics and Google Search Console.
Metrics Tool #3 : Facebook Analytics
For business owners, Facebook offers the Business Manager dashboard. I recommend you open a business manager account so you can have access to other tools like Analytics.
Facebook Analytics gives you data, not only from the page, but from behavior captured from your Facebook Pixel.
How the Facebook pixel works
When someone visits your website and takes an action (for example, buying something), the Facebook pixel is triggered and reports this action. This way, you’ll know when a customer took an action after seeing your Facebook ad. You’ll also be able to reach this customer again by using a custom audience. When more and more conversions happen on your website, Facebook gets better at delivering your ads to people who are more likely to take certain actions. This is called conversion optimization.
Metrics Tool #4 : Facebook Page Insights
Insights provide information about your Page’s performance, like demographic data about your audience and how people are responding to your posts. Keep in mind that you can only access data in Page Insights for the last 2 years, and demographic data, such as age, gender and location, are available in Page Insights once there is data for 100 or more people. Pages categorized as a Community Page don’t have Insights.
You can use Insights to:
Understand how people are engaging with your Page.
View metrics about your Page’s performance.
Learn which posts have the most engagement and see when your audience is on Facebook.
Keep in mind, you can change the date of the report and even export it. If you manage a Facebook Group, you can also check your insights.
Metrics Tool #5: Visibility Factor
Don’t google this you won’t find this.
I don’t want you to rely just on the numbers to measure how your social media is helping your business. From my personal experience, numbers will ever capture the conversations that happen offline, based on the stories they see online.
Pay attention to the connections you make on social media! Are you getting requests from influencers? Introductions? Referrals? You should! If you’re not seeing these kinds of results, maybe it’s time to work on your visibility factor. It’s not just about the numbers but the influence of your connections. A connection can transform your life and your business!
Metrics Tool #6: Bad Reviews Removal
Objection is a free negative reviews removal tool. They have a test designed to help you decide whether to respond to the review, to try to remove it based on its unique content and reviewer.
In Closing
My amazing friend, this is it! You made it until the end! I’ve shared it all with you. Now it’s your turn to leave me in comments what was your favorite tool!
Do you have favorite tools we should know about? Feel free to share!
Last week I had the amazing experience of teaching hashtags strategies at Austin’s Social Media Bootcamp at Capital Factory. I typically teach online for my Entrepreneurs’ Inner Circle, but having the chance to train in person, to a much bigger audience, takes my teaching and training to another level. It’s not an easy task, but I did it!
Let me make a pause to leave you here a “real talk”. The entrepreneur who asked that question, almost felt like she had to apologize because she thought the question was too basic. She didn’t know that she was not alone. I had received similar questions.
What are hashtags exactly?
Why do I see some of those #’s that have nothing to do with the business?
How many #’s per post I should use?
If creating your own hashtags is recommended.
Do we need to use them for Linkedin as well?
Are hashtags different on every social platform?
The point I want to make here is, don’t feel like you need to apologize for not knowing exactly the strategic vision about hashtags. Many people know about them but only a few have taken the time to understand it.
I get you! You’re not just going to copy and paste what other people are doing and just accept it. Or maybe you hired a social media manager and they are doing the work for you, and you can’t even comprehend what are they doing. There’s nothing wrong with you wanting to learn about digital marketing; especially when it affects you and your branding.
So what is the definition of a hashtag?
In information systems, a tag is a keyword or term assigned to a piece of information (such as an Internet bookmark, digital image, database record, or computer file). This kind of metadata helps describe an item and allows it to be found again by browsing or searching. A hashtag is a type of metadata tag.
From a user standpoint, hashtags are used to categorize content, making the discovery of new or related articles and insights easy to do. Therefore, when hashtags are used incorrectly, people looking for new content have to dig through irrelevant, miscategorized content in order to get to what they’re actually looking for. You don’t want this bad user experience associated with your brand!
Hashtags are supposed to help you, as the user, to search particular topics and join conversations. If you put yourself in the user’s shoes, you will be able to create a strategy using hashtags that your future readers will use, so they can come across your content.
How do you use them on my social media sites?
Let’s start with Twitter
I will never forget the very first time I took a social media workshop with Chalene Johnson. It was back in 2010 and she said: “Twitter without Tweet Deck makes no sense.” It’s interesting because Tweet Deck started as an independent app, but today is part of Twitter.
For those unaware, TweetDeck is Twitter’s own dashboard tool, similar to Hootsuite or Sprout Social, but entirely devoted to Twitter. Through TweetDeck, you can monitor and action every aspect of your Twitter presence – but what many don’t realize is that TweetDeck is always evolving.
Tweets with hashtags can increase engagement by almost 100% (2x) for individuals and 50% (1.5x) for brands. Sendible.
When should I use hashtags on Twitter?
You can use a hashtag whenever you’re referring to a specific topic. For instance, you could use hashtags for:
You’ll also see hashtags used for Twitter Chats; for example, #QChat, #SEMRushChat.
You may use as many hashtags in a Tweet as you like. In other words, there are no limits, besides Twitter’s post limit. Most tweets will now fit 280 characters, up from 140.
What About LinkedIn Hashtags?
I’m sure you’ve noticed more people using hashtags on LinkedIn. Let’s discuss 3 powerful ways you can use this amazing tool.
Discover trends and get content ideas
Find hashtags and set up your profile to follow them. For example, I follow:
#business
#smallbusiness
#marketing
#emailmarketing
#contentmarketing
#socialmediamarketing
Following a hashtag allows you to easily join the conversations built around them.
Bookmark your profile, posts, and articles using relevant hashtags
Adding hashtags to your profile will increase discoverability. But don’t just add any hashtag. We recommend doing some research to make sure you are choosing the best hashtags.
A good place to start is to see which hashtags the influencers in your niche are using on LinkedIn, as well as on sites such as Twitter and Instagram. Pay attention to who is using the hashtag and how they use it in tandem with their content.
Try Hashtagify.me to vet hashtag popularity (and reveal the influencers who are using them). There’s a free option, as well as plans that start at $29 per month, billed monthly. You can evaluate plan options with a 7-day free trial.
Ninja Tip: LinkedIn doesn’t limit the number of hashtags you can add to your articles, but they encourage users to use hashtags that are relevant. And while you can edit an article after it’s published, you can’t edit or remove hashtags. Remember to insert any hashtags before you publish your post!
Become an Active Member of LinkedIn Groups That Share an Interest in Your Hashtag
Once you find and join relevant LinkedIn groups, ask questions and share original content, interesting articles, and videos. Comment when other members post and share your experiences and insight.
How Hashtags on Facebook work?
Facebook themselves haven’t updated their own guidelines for hashtags since 2016, which has left marketers to pick up the slack to figure out best practices themselves. Meanwhile, there is no cut and dry answer as to whether or not hashtags significantly increase or decrease engagement.
Facebook uses hashtags to group or categorize conversations between people. However, they don’t give #’s a dedicated board, like Twitter, Linkedin, and Instagram. For example, I typed #socialmediamarketing and it’s giving me options to filter the posts. Once I search and see the options, I could join conversations. However, it’s not the norm to search for hashtags to join conversations. I say it’s more for research purposes.
Build brand awareness with #’s on Facebook
See, for example, The Junkluggers (a national franchise). Junkluggers of Austin uses Facebook to create brand awareness of its location. They use hashtags as part of their social media posts to ignite social conversations and educate their customers to get familiar with their brand via #junkluggersaustin.
According to the most recent Sprout Social data, 1 to 2 hashtags on Facebook posts work best, and hashtags with 10+ characters see more engagement.
Instagram Hashtags
Instagram hashtags not only categorize your content and makes it discoverable by users, but they are an effective way to get more followers, increase engagement and expand reach and brand awareness. Instagram is, by far, the social media platform that has dedicated resources to empower hashtags. Perhaps you didn’t know about hashtags until you got the Gram bug!
The term shadowban is used to refer to instances where your posts are not appearing in the hashtag search results. This can directly impact the ability for non-followers to discover your profile and content resulting in lower engagement. In such cases, your posts may still be seen by existing followers, but not to anyone else.
Check out this free tool to review if your posts have been shadowbanned. The Shadowban test.
Once you establish an audience, you don’t need to use 30 hashtags per post, in all the posts. TrackMaven analysis found that using 11 hashtags in each post is optimal for boosting engagement on Instagram.
The reality is, the key to Instagram hashtag success is to use them strategically.
Increase engagement per post
Since hashtags increase your engagement per post, we recommend being relevant and trendy. A common trend is the days of the week.
Here’s a list of popular instagram hashtags organized by day of the week:
It’s important to use top hashtags, but remember to incorporate branded hashtags into the mix.
Ninja tip: Use hashtags in stories, but don’t be spammy! Tell a story with hashtags. Set your mood. Embrace trends. Be personable.
By now you should be able to have a general idea of how to incorporate hashtags in your social media marketing strategy, to get your brand more visibility, engagement, and ignite conversations with relevant users.
Instagram continues to grow as one of the most popular social media platforms across all ages, locations, and brands. It has a massive user base and it boasts higher per-post engagement rates than any other social platform.
I’m happy you’re here. If this is your first time, welcome. If you’ve been here for a while, you know the drill then. Get ready to take notes and highlight lots of golden nuggets!
I have 2 goals with this article:
Give you a blueprint to grow your profile with 1,000 new targeted followers.
If you already reached the 1,000 mark but you’re not seeing the expected results from the platform, you should be able to find possible strategies that can help.
It’s common knowledge that Instagram is a “visual” social media platform because it’s geared towards photos and video-sharing. It was created by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger but is now owned by Facebook (bought it for $1 billion in 2012).
Instagram might not have the biggest audience size or highest activity volume, but it’s surely a major interactions driver for brands – more so than Facebook or Twitter.
Do You Want To Turn Your Free Instagram Account Into A Business Growth Engine? Follow These 5 Steps.
Step 1: Convert Your Account To A Business Profile
You might have a business account already but if you don’t, essentially follow these 7 steps to convert your profile into a business account and you should be all set. When I teach my clients how to convert a profile from personal to business, they don’t typically have a challenge with this step.
What if you want a new Instagram, but not a Facebook Page?
I have found that some clients don’t want to associate their page with their existing Facebook page.
Let’s say you have an existing business or a brand, and you want to create a new Instagram profile to launch a new product. You would like to create an Instagram-based marketing plan where you’re not using Facebook that much, except for sharing some updates. In that case, I recommend opening a Facebook Page during the process of setting up your Instagram business account, add any name like “This is a Test” but never publish the page. That should help you finish the process of your Instagram business account.
Step 2: Your Bio
The strategy behind your bio is all about visibility.
Your name and username are two of the most important components of your Instagram profile because they are the only two searchable criteria of your profile. When users type a keyword or name in the search field on Instagram, the app looks at only the username and name fields of accounts to determine if an account is relevant to that search query.
Choose a username that represents your brand, is recognizable, and, if possible, distinguishes what you do. Your username might be simply your business name or an adapted version of your business name, such as @louboutinworld, instead of Christian Louboutin. Or you might also include a word or two that describes your business industry or niche to further define who you are, such as @autin_promoitems.
Complete your bio thinking about keywords so that people can find you. If you are a local business, make sure to include your city as well.
Step 3: Your Strategy
Once you have your profile set up with all the whistles and bells, I recommend taking the time to craft your strategy. Without a strategy, you might be posting on social media platforms for the sake of posting. Without understanding what your goals are, who your target audience is, and what they want, it’ll be hard to achieve results on social media.
Start with your marketing goal
Your ultimate goal is to be where many people are holding conversations so you can be part of the discussion. You want to influence them to follow you, like you, and trust in you. Sounds easy, right? Yes, it is that simple. Social media isn’t different than having a real conversation which is rule 1 from my book, 6 Golden Rules of Social Media.
Who does your audience love?
Most of my clients know their audience very well. However, there are things that they don’t know, and that’s where having access to intelligence will make a significant impact on their results.
Use the power of Facebook intelligence IQ and find details about your audience. Who do they follow? What content do they consume? Do they love to read or they love watching videos? These are critical questions you want to consider in order to build a solid plan to grow your followers.
Notice that I say Facebook but we are discussing Instagram. This Facebook tool is completely relevant to Instagram marketing as well.
Give your audience what they love!
How do you know if you’re attracting the right users?
Instagram Insights help you learn more about your followers and the people interacting with your business on Instagram. Only accounts with a business profile can have access to Insights.
Since the platform is global, you won’t have followers in just one region. However, you can monitor with Insights your followers’ location, demographics, and their activity.
Step 4: Spread The News!
When you launch your channel, don’t just wait to get followers from heaven! You must actively tell people about your amazing content so they can follow you. You also want to have social proof so when new people find you, they like you and trust you.
Where do you share your profile to get followers? I can do 100 ways to get followers but let’s share 10 for now.
Announce it as an official launch in your existing social media platforms. Facebook, LinkedIn, Youtube, Pinterest.
Add your new handle/link on your email signature.
Update your website to add your link.
Check for your most visited pages on your website and find ways to add your link so you can get those users to follow you.
Send an email to your list.
Share your new profile news via Facebook Groups and LinkedIn Groups.
Use Instagram stories to promote your profile.
Update your business card. If possible, get a QR code so people can scan it from their smartphone and like your profile.
Join conversations, not only on Instagram but on other channels too. Leave people your handle or link so they can follow you.
Launch a brand awareness campaign using Instagram ads. Start with $10-$20 a day for 30 days so you can see results.
Step 5: Instagram Search By Location
Work your way up to generate 1,000 targeted followers. Again, don’t wait for users to come from heaven. Search for them! Do they love a particular store? Then search that location! You will be able to find people who are interested in the location and join the conversation!
These 5 steps should give you the chance to join plenty of conversations and attract targeted followers. Of course, if you launch a paid campaign, you will accelerate the process but just know that you don’t always have to.
What part of this 5-step process do you need help with?
I think you’re all set to press hard and get those followers. If you’re not sure about a particular step, or if you want to strategize, we can totally do that! I do live training (online and I can also come to you!).
Jessica Campos Social Media Marketing trainer, author, recovered attorney passionate about Forensic Marketing and Social Media Marketing. Jessica is known for breaking the record as the first Hispanic woman reaching the highest rank with Beachbody and helping thousands of individuals achieving physical and financial success. Her success systems took her to start her own Marketing Agency and her own Tribe of Professionals & Entrepreneurs. Austin’s #1 Networking Happy Hour.
There’s no doubt about it: influencer marketing is one of the hottest ways to reach new and potential customers in today’s digital world – especially if those customers are Millennials.
But is this buzzword-laden tactic actually worth your time and energy?
According to a recent study comprised of marketers from a variety of industries, 94% said influencer marketing was an effective campaign strategy. That’s great news for marketers — right?
Not so fast.
Even though a majority of marketers believe influencer marketing is a viable tactic, it’s still incredibly challenging to report accurately on influencer campaign return on investment (ROI). In fact, 78% of marketers said that determining the success of influencer marketing campaigns would be a top challenge this year, which is why today we will cover our Instagram Influencer Ultimate Guide- Our Best Practices To Boost Your Revenue Using Influencer Marketing.
When you first think of social media influencers, you likely picture individuals with flawless Instagram aesthetics, and follower counts in the millions.
But those are not the individuals we’re discussing in this article – here, I want to provide some insights into the power of micro-influencers, individuals with average follower counts, but with strong levels of influence over said groups within niche geographic or virtual communities.
That influence is due to their authentic connection with their audiences, developed by being a leader or expert in a particular field, and directly engaging with their communities. At the end of the day, you should be able to reach your ideal client, just like in every other marketing outlet.
Who Is An Influencer In Front Of Your Ideal Client
Did you know a sponsored post from Kim Kardashian can range anywhere from $173,000 to $289,000? Could you imagine how many non-celebrity individuals you could get to post for you for a fraction of that fee – or for that matter no fee at all? And… even more important, how many conversations do you think the audience can have with Kim Kardashian? I mean, really?
When a client requests that we create an influencer marketing strategy, the first step is to define who we want to influence. For example, if you sell nutritional supplements, you want to target individuals who are looking to improve their weight, performance, energy, and endurance. If your products cater to a narrower audience, like the vegan community, for example, then your influencer must have the power to affect the vegan community.
By the way, if we are not Instagram partners,follow me here.
Traits of Successful Influencers
Here is a list of the traits we look for in order to consider an individual an influencer:
They have reached a level of mastery in the targeted industry.
They have a clean online presence (check them on Google, Youtube, LinkedIn, and website). If they have third-party validation, even better!
Their values are consistent with the brand we want to promote. Ideally, they have a blog where you can read their content and get a good sense of their opinion.
They have an active audience both, online and offline. We want to see them active!
They are comfortable on camera! A big plus!
Engagement Rates
What separates a good post from a great post is how much your followers like, comment, or share it. Typically, micro-influencers are often able to maintain active relationships by replying to most comments or inquiries on their posts, and quickly. This constant connection can make followers feel like they actually have a relationship with the influencer, and they, therefore, tend to make a habit of engaging with more of that users’ posts.
When it comes to selecting your influencers, follow them closely and look for their engagement. Are they mostly engaging with the same friends or they seem to be in a growth mode. This is a crucial factor. You want your brand to be represented by people who are constantly connecting with people. This increases your ROI since your message won’t be limited to just a post via social media.
For Instagram, if they have reached 10,000 followers or have a verified status is a big plus, since their account has options to add links. Read more about verified badges here.
From Influencer Marketing to Empower Relationship Marketing
Part of our successful influencer marketing model is our ability to impact our local community in a scalable and consistent way. We host two strategic monthly events to attract professionals and business owners that have a growth mindset and want to build relationships. We educate our attendees on the importance of building relationships so that they can see the real return on their investment.
When you’re selecting influencers, have a clear vision about the impact you can create in your target market, not limited to social media.
Brand Ambassadors
Word-of-mouth marketing (WOM) is a powerful asset in our line of work. It not only piques people’s interest, but as the name implies, it gets people talking.
With game-changing numbers like those, it’s important not to neglect the importance of reviews, ratings, and recommendations when it comes to planning your organization’s marketing strategy. With that being said, there’s only so much one person can do; especially when they are launching a company with limited resources.
This is where brand ambassador programs become a part of the game plan!
Having an online community of brand ambassadors who are just as excited about your company and vision as you are can work wonders. You don’t have to do all of the sharing—because they will. When your company posts a new update or launches a new campaign, your brand ambassadors will be thrilled to pass it along to their networks, too—helping spread the word about what you’re doing to many more people than you could reach on your own.
Don’t assume that brand ambassadors will do it for free. You need to provide clear compensation and marketing resources so they can succeed. If there is one thing that direct sales companies do great is in this area. I am a living testimonial of how- using word of mouth and social media (and nothing else), you can generate millions of dollars in revenue! I did it with P90x brand!
What’s Next?
With the Instagram boom, not having your influencer marketing strategy in place is costing you a lot of opportunities as we speak.
I hope this article serves as a Guideline for your to craft a good influencer marketing plan that allows you to find followers, qualified leads, and sales opportunities. Remember to start by defining who is a real influencer. I have a memory jogger I use with my clients that allows them to build their list. You will love it!
If you don’t have a branding and marketing coach that is able to talk to you and create a plan, I would love to invite you to be part of my Inner Circle. Click the image below or just here.
If your list of “things to learn” to market your business has SEO (search engine optimization) on it, you are at the right place. I’m going to give you the most current SEO bites that you need to have a clear idea of how you can grow your business using this fascinating tool named SEO.
A decade ago, SEO was about keywords and content. For example, if you are a doctor and want to get more patients, all you needed was a website with a couple of pages that claimed your location. Your SEO expert would edit your pages URL to do something called “site structure” so your website pages would look like:
www.smithdental.com
www.smithdental.com/best-dentist-houston
www.smithdental.com/family-dentist-houston
www.smithdental.com/implants-dentist-houston
www.smithdental.com/crowns-dentist-houston
www.smithdental.com/emergency-dentist-houston
In theory, if your URL has the keywords that most people use to find the services that you provide, then Google would find your website and get you traffic. Like I said, SEO was done this way, a decade ago.
Google My Business Listing Has Changed The Game Plan
Getting a local business listed on Google My Business (GMB) and other online directories is one of the fastest and easiest ways to get a local business to start showing up for local search results on Google. Google My Business connects businesses directly with their customers — whether they’re searching on Google Search or Maps.
Most SEOs who work with local clients consider claiming their GMB listing the first step in their SEO strategy. Surprisingly, 56% of local businesses haven’t claimed their Google My Business listing, according to Local Business Institute.
I know you want to optimize your website and landing pages with SEO, but you might just need to focus on GMB first.
How To Get Started With Google My Business? Is This Free?
Yes, it’s a free service, which is the irony of this amazing tool. It costs nothing for you to list your business. Now, to be transparent with you, the listing alone won’t just do magic and take your business to rank on the first page of Google maps or the Google search. It will take work, just as traditional SEO. We will work with content and distribution, but the good news is… the results come much faster.
If you haven’t claimed and verified your Google My Business Listing yet, that’s the first step. To get started, visit https://www.google.com/business.
Google will ask you several questions about your business just to make sure that you are legit. Please note, if you want to market nationally, I recommend to start your SEO plan here at GMB (Google My Business). You will be surprised by the results, I promise!
Updating Your Information Is A Key
Also, it’s important to realize that Google encourages people who are familiar with your business to answer questions, so that Google can learn more information about your company. To do this they simply click on the “Know this place? Answer quick questions” link.
Once you get your listing verified, your next step is to work is to optimize it. This is where most business owners miss their chance to claim their spot!
Optimize Your Google My Business Listing
I can’t mention enough how important it is to log in to your Google My Business listing account frequently since Google might require you to answer some questions that they need, to complete your listing. How cool is that!
Here is a list of actionable items that will help you advance in your optimization process:
Review all the options from the menu. Your listing gives you options to add information, such as “call to action”, “hours of operations”, “services”. Make sure to complete all of them.
Micro-site feature. This feature is ignored most of the times. Instead of using your website, Goole gives you the option to use a template so you can add your basic information. I recommend using it, since the speed and size will help you in accelerating the optimization process. This is what our micro -site looks like.
Add high-quality images to your text.
Google My Business Updates or Google Posts
If you have used LinkedIn articles, then this feature will be familiar. If you haven’t used LinkedIn articles, then you might want to visit this link. LinkedIn articles are just as effective as blog posts, but they get you in front of your network much faster. Google updates / Google posts have a huge advantage:
Google Posts show up in Google search in your Google My Business listing (in the Knowledge Panel and on Google Maps). This is huge!!!!!
You can have fun with your Google My Business Posts by adding an image, a call-to-action (CTA), and even including a link to another page or website.
Not sure what type of Post you should make? Here are just a few Post ideas:
Memorial Day sale is a good reason to post an update.
Hiring new staff.
Announcing a promotion.
Hosting an event.
New service.
Featuring a new product.
Post a contest.
Sharing your latest blog post!
And many other ideas (here is how my help comes handy!)
Messaging
Did you know that your customers — and potential customers — can send you text messages? This is a great way to connect directly with people interested in what you have to offer, and a great way to engage with people looking at your GMB listing (and you know that Google is always watching engagement.)
To get started with Messaging, log in to your GMB dashboard and click on “Messaging”:
You can then set up the message people will receive after they send you a message and your mobile phone number.
If you don’t want text messages sent to your personal phone number, you can download Google’s Allo app. When you set up your Allo account, use the same phone number connected to your Google My Business account. Now when someone messages you, the message will be sent to the Allo app instead of appearing alongside your personal text messages.
Reviews
Transparency is the new currency. In other words, your reviews are money! I know that most business owners hire Yelp for reviews. However, they miss out Google which is detrimental to their SEO. Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with Yelp. However, I recommend Google My Business listing more than Yelp, in my opinion.
Since we are covering this topic, by the way, reviews matter so much that you might want to take some time to strategize around this topic. Your marketing team should get you solutions to get reviews on Facebook, Google, and other local platforms.
Alignable is a great platform to build your network. It’s also connected with your Google My Business listing. If you don’t have an account, let’s get you here!
My Ask!
I’m assuming that you want to increase your business. Visibility is what you need and that’s my specialty.
I have a recipe called Forensic Marketing that works deliciously for business owners who have been hiring freelancers for all kinds of digital marketing services and nothing seems to make sense. My ask is that, if you feel that something is off with your marketing, I can take a look and give you a complimentary assessment. Our budget isn’t like agencies. We have budgets for all kinds of sizes.
There was a time when the more time you spent networking in a trade circle, the better it was for the business. It was tough for the newcomers as they faced challenges such as hefty amounts of finances for an office, hiring many employees, paying the bills etc. etc.
Social media took all that hassle away and staged the whole world as a market on our mobile screens. Traditional marketing strategies are of limited use when it comes to the online world. Therefore, to use this opportunity to its full potential, we must learn how to navigate through it, especially on the marketing front.
Marketing has always been amongst us, so have the 7 Ps of how to do it, even before the social media scene burst into action. The 7 Ps are the golden rules to lead your business on to a path of success and sustainable ROI. With Social media establishing itself as the next-gen frontier for marketing effectively, 7 Ps have also evolved to a whole new level of business strategy planning.
Let’s be honest, every business prioritizes to ensure a bigger, better name of its brand. Brand value has been a major player in saving many businesses from going bust in the last few decades.
In the world of social media, your online platform is the face of your business, whether it is a website, Instagram, or Facebook page. Any or all of these represent your business ideology and product; therefore, they must depict relevance to your desired clientele, and continuously evolve to add value to the business.
The trick to a successful social media marketing strategy is, to perfectly align your digital promotional strategies with the marketing norms of the present. Doing so will not only enable your business to stand the test of times but also help you develop a successful brand awareness campaign for sustainable growth.
So, if you are about to start a new business or build a brand name for your product, then make sure you have applied the following 7 Ps of social media marketing.
Planning
To plan your business is like playing a game of chess; it requires focus, a strategy, and the right move at the right time. Your marketing strategy is integral to your growth. Therefore, you must adapt to the latest trends in promotion provided by social media. To do so, make sure your long-term goals are in line with your short-term goals.
You will be amazed to find out that according to experts, social media marketing has a flawless lead-to-close rate at 100%, and over 80% of businesses prefer to use one the online platforms or the other. If you play your cards right, this will set a momentum for you and your business towards success.
For you to come up with a plan that suits your brand or product, you have to ask yourself some very basic questions, the first of which is whether your business needs more awareness or publicity. If yes, then
Which platforms are suitable for your needs?
Is there a time-constraint on how soon you want to achieve your goals?
Have you utilized your current marketing resources in place, before you move to social media?
Are you planning to promote your business or product in a market you already exist in or are you expanding into a new market?
Where your brand stands in the market right now?
Presence
Let’s face it; evading social media presence is not an option – You want to target audience, you have to go get them where they are, and it’s ‘online.’ However, easier said than done, as the statistics show that it’s a make or break in a split of a second when it comes to online visitors establishing an opinion of your brand. Therefore, you have to be smart about how to make your online presence look appealing, reliable, and legit for the targeted audience.
There are many online tools such as RiteTag or hashtagify.me available for you to find out what topics and hashtags are trending in your arena. It will help you to engage with your targeted audience, but also keep up with the ever-evolving trends in the online world.
It is imperative that you steer clear of anything remotely negative that might affect your brand’s perception amongst the consumers. Having an online presence is not enough. Therefore, choose wisely, where you promote your business.
Perception or People
Third in line but probably the most important P of them all – Yes “People” your targeted audience. Always remember consumers put brands on the map, not companies. I cannot emphasize enough how vital it is for you to base and build a reputation and persona of your product around your clientele. Positive perception is only achievable if you strive to meet the expectations of your consumers.
To build an effective and appealing persona, you must consider some areas of focus.
Are you marketing a specific age group?
Are you marketing a gender-specific product?
Are you marketing internationally?
It is advisable to use the 80/20 rule, also known as the ‘Pareto Principle.’ In social media marketing terms, you must use 80% of your interaction with the customer, i.e., conversations, content and activities, to that useful and relatable to them. You can utilize the remaining 20% for promotional purposes. Sharing trustworthy content with your audience, backed up with well-thought marketing claims, will establish your authority with trust amongst the masses.
Technological advancements have facilitated this to a great extent, as all major players in the market now have chatbots to cater to the users in a personalized manner. Similarly, social media offers a variety of options for you to provide a more personal service to each client, such as private messaging, business pages, live broadcasts, and chats. It’s a proven phenomenon time and time again that customers feel content when they receive a positive and personalized service; this compels them to repeat business.
Product
Ever wondered what your audience thinks of the product you offer? And will they be willing to pay a premium price for it? Or do you have a miracle idea to turn your business into a star-brand?
The entire answer to the above is, it all depends on how well you know your product and its distinctiveness. If you are aware of the strong-suite your brand offers over others, it will be easier for you to identify, prioritize and showcase what your audience sees as featured services as they browse through your social media platform.
Do not forget to mention what a consumer can expect in the packaging you offer. We all get confused between guarantees and warranties, so be extra careful to state the right information as this can make or break your trust in your niche. Bragging a bit about the benefits and features never harmed a business, so ensure you customer knows that they are getting value for money. After all, you want a brand name that resonates with your patrons.
You and I witness one of the most recent and far-reaching strategies on YouTube. Companies are paying popular YouTubers to create unboxing content for their products, creating awareness amongst millions on a global scale. Similar strategies are in place by other social media platforms such as Instagram influencers marketing products via paid content.
Prominence or Placement
Those days were history when you needed a gimmicky website, a fancy outlet, or a corporate office to establish a brand name in the market. Social media can combine all of that in one and deliver your product to the mobile or laptop screens of every household globally. However, this incredible opportunity comes with a set of its complications – One of the most important ones in which social medium you must choose to showcase your brand. Will a FaceBook page suffice, or is Instagram a viable platform for you? Snapchat is trending or a simple tweet will make your product the next best thing? Maybe you should use all of them or should you? Decisions, decisions.
I would strongly suggest for you to address some factors while formulating your ideal social media placement strategy. You must know where your audience hangs out the most. There are several ways to find this out, such as ask yourself which social media you would visit if you were to buy a product similar to yours? Or a more direct approach is to email your customers for opinion.
You must also consider other factors like what type of feedback you are expecting from your consumers. And are you marketing a product or a service?
You have to ensure that you choose the social media platform that will best suit your business or product. You wouldn’t go to buy a bike at a meat shop, would you? So to be in the right place has never been more important for that strategic product placement online.
Power or Performance
To be able to succeed and evolve in the world of social media as a trendsetter, you must establish a viable framework of KPI in line with the industry’s standard benchmarks. A regular audit on how compliant you have been with your defined parameters.
To gauge your social media marketing performance, you must strive for expansion byways to attract a new audience. Ability to correctly predict the response from the masses can do wonders, as you will always be one step ahead of the supply and demand cycle. Higher a creative team of individuals to come up with content that can go viral, and last but not the least always monitor the traffic on your website or social media platform; as hikes or dips in hits to your page can tell a great deal, whether you are going in the right direction or not?
Processes
In layman’s term, it’s the mechanism that is responsible for delivering your brand to the consumer, but when it comes to social media marketing, it’s all about how it promotes your brand to the niche.
Not long ago, Primark, UK, faced a backlash from its consumers when it came to light that their outsourced factories in Bangladesh were breaking child-labor laws. Although Primark claimed they may or may not be aware of it, I bet they now keep a close tab on what goes on in their factories now.
Once you create a guideline that defines every step in your process, not only will you be clear about what each step is responsible for and the best resources to enhance it, but also how integral are they to your bigger marketing strategy individually?
As a starter, you may consider the following steps to define your social media marketing plan.
Create trustworthy content
Ensure the uniform distribution of your content throughout all your social media platforms for consistency. It will help avoid any confusion and doubts amongst your audience.
Stay on top of your social media management; many successful players in the market hire a team to do so.
Assign a budget for your paid content on social media platforms, as I mentioned a few scenarios earlier about YouTube and Instagram.
Come up with creative and appealing content, increasing its chances to go viral. You and I both know it; all it takes is one viral trend to make a product into a global phenomenon. Remember ALSA (The Ice Bucket Challenge)?
If possible, try to organize or participate in events to show your presence both online and offline.
It is safe to say that if you create somewhat similar steps, then you will have a process for your social media marketing. But do not stop, there is always room for improvement.
Conclusion
Now that you and I both know the 7 Ps of Social Media Marketing; I would like to reiterate that, although all of them are important to create a successful marketing strategy, some of them might be more integral than others depending on the nature of your business, services or the product.
There is no standard formula for success when it comes to social media marketing. Think critical and smart, identify your strengths, and apply the 7 Ps as they suit your brand.
