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The 5 Biggest Reasons Your Online Marketing Sucks (and How to Fix It)

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The 5 Biggest Reasons Your Online Marketing Sucks (and How to Fix It)

The 5 Biggest Reasons Your Online Marketing Sucks (and How to Fix It)

 

Online marketing is an ever-evolving field. New websites, apps, and tools spring up every day. While online marketing is a must for any small business, the fact is that most small businesses aren’t doing a very good job with their online marketing. The chances are that you aren’t doing a great job either – in fact, your online marketing probably sucks.

Offended? Don’t be. Instead, read on to learn about the five biggest reasons your online marketing isn’t getting the job done – and specific steps you can take to remedy the mistakes you’re making.

Reason #1: You’re Not Optimizing Your Website Properly

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a complicated business. You might think that you have done everything you can to optimize your website, but I’m willing to bet that you haven’t. Here are some things you can do to change that:

  1. Pick the right keywords. A lot of small businesses try to optimize for head keywords. These are short, general keywords, and there tends to be a lot of competition for them. You should be aiming for medium-tail or long-tail keywords.
  2. Think about keywords in the right way. A keyword isn’t just a word – it’s a question. When a potential customer goes to Google and types in a keyword, he’s looking for information. He’s asking a question, even if he isn’t wording it like one.
  3. Don’t just include keywords in your content. Make sure to make use of H1 tags, image tags, and any other opportunity you have to use your keywords.
  4. Don’t overdo it with keywords. You need to use them, but the context in which you use them matters as much as the frequency.

 

The 5 Biggest Reasons Your Online Marketing Sucks (and How to Fix It)

 

Reason #2: You’re Not Analyzing Your Results

A lot of small businesses put up a website and use social media, but they never bother to look at how their marketing efforts are performing. There’s no excuse not to be reviewing that data. Google Analytics provides detailed information showing how people are getting to your site, whether it’s by clicking an ad, finding you on social media, or doing an organic search. Facebook provides detailed analytics too. Here’s what you should be doing:

  1. Look at your Google Analytics data to figure out which pages are attracting the most traffic and where people are bouncing (clicking away) from your website.
  2. Review your Facebook page performance and identify the types of content that get the most views and shares.
  3. Check the open rates and response rates for marketing emails to determine how well they are engaging customers.

Reason #3: You’re Not Testing and Refining Your Page Based on the Data

Reviewing the data from Google Analytics and other sources is important, but it won’t help you unless you do something with the data you collect. When you have information about how customers are finding your website, when they’re bouncing away from it, and how engaged they are with your email and social media posts, you can use it to improve your marketing campaigns. Here are some suggestions:

  1. If a page on your website has a high bounce rate, do some A/B testing to see if you can fix the problems customers are having.
  2. Make sure to test only one element at a time. For example, if you think your call to action is the problem, do a test to see how the old one performs against a new version.
  3. Revamp your social media strategy to increase customer engagement. If you see that photographs you post are getting a much higher engagement rate than written posts, you can increase the number of photographs you share. The same goes for checking out engagement based on days of the week or times of the day.
  4. Rewrite and split test emails to improve your open and reply rates.

 

The 5 Biggest Reasons Your Online Marketing Sucks (and How to Fix It)

 

Reason #4: You’re Not Creating Enough Content

 

In the early days of the internet, Bill Gates famously declared that “Content is king.” His statement was a remarkably prescient one. Today, creating great content is the core of any successful online marketing strategy – yet many small companies drop the ball on this very important task. You can get back on track by:

  1. Starting a blog. Blogging is still very popular, and it’s a great way to engage your customers on a regular basis. Each blog post should offer something of value to your customers, whether it’s a product explanation, some practical advice regarding a topic relevant to your industry, or a how-to video.
  2. Setting up – and sticking to – a social media schedule. Not all of the content you share has to be original. The important thing is that it is (a) relevant to your industry, (b) useful to your customers, and (c) entertaining. To find content, you can follow industry publications and related pages and share their content. Facebook has an automatic scheduling option for businesses, or you can use an online tool to manage all of your social activity at once.
  3. Set aside money in your budget to create videos. Videos are hugely popular and highly shareable, which makes them a great choice for any business.

Reason #5: You’re Not Engaging Customers

Having a Facebook page is great – as far as it goes. However, if your business is forgetting the “social” in social media, then you’re not getting the most out of your pages. Here are some tips that can help you increase customer engagement and loyalty:

  1. Make sure to monitor your page and reply to comments on a regular basis. Your comments don’t need to be long – sometimes a quick “Thank you” is fine. Customers like to feel that the brands they follow value their presence, and replying to comments are a good way to demonstrate that you do.
  2. Don’t overreact to negative comments and complaints. Sometimes customers take to social media to register a complaint about a product or service. Instead of getting defensive, be grateful for the opportunity to turn a customer’s experience around. Reply quickly and professionally. Other people will see the way you respond, and a courteous and useful response can help win you some new customers.
  3. Give customers a reason to comment. Asking customers to share stories about your product, or asking their opinions about something, is a great way to drive engagement and get customers involved. The more comments you get, the more likely it is that additional people will see your post.

Do these five mistakes sound familiar to you? I’m willing to bet that they do. The good news is that now you know about them, and you’re in the perfect position to revamp your online marketing so that it gets the results you want.

Crafting the Perfect Email Newsletter

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Crafting the Perfect Email Newsletter

Crafting the Perfect Email Newsletter

 

So you finally want to start a newsletter for your local business? It’s a good idea for local businesses. In fact, email newsletters can help boost your sales dramatically but most small business owners simply overlook its significance.  Email open rates are still very high, making an email newsletter a solid investment – if you do it right.

However, a lot of companies start newsletters without really thinking about what they want to accomplish. Don’t be one of them. Follow the advice here, and you can use your newsletter to increase your revenue.

Find a Focus

The first thing you need to do is to avoid the biggest mistake companies make when putting together a newsletter: they try to cover everything. A traditional marketing email is a relatively simple beast. It covers a single topic and concludes with a single call to action. It’s quick to write, easy to read, and if you do it well, it can convert like crazy.

The problem with the average newsletter is that it tries to be all things to all people. If you want people to read your newsletter, you need to give them a compelling reason to do so. Pick one vertical and stick to that. You can always segment newsletters for other aspects of your business if you want to.

Crafting the Perfect Email Newsletter

The second thing to keep in mind is that you are writing a newsletter, not a sales letter. People subscribe to a newsletter to get information, not to get a hard-core sales pitch delivered to their inbox. (Of course in many cases, they also went to hear about special promotions and deals, but we’ll get to that later.)

The ratio of information to sales pitch should be about nine to one in your newsletter. That means that 90% of the content you include is about educating and entertaining your subscribers. It’s fine to include a call to action at the end – you should do so – but if you spend all your time selling, you’re going to end up with a huge unsubscribe rate.

The benefit of leading with value for your subscribers is that it takes advantage of the psychological principle of reciprocity. It’s the same approach used by a lot of internet marketers who give away a freebie like an eBook or a list of tips to get people to sign up for their mailing lists. When you give a subscriber something for nothing, you create a sense of obligation in them. You have provided them with something valuable, and they feel they owe you.

Keep it Short, Sweet, and Simple

The third thing to remember when putting together your newsletter is that you want the content to come in small, easily-digestible chunks. It should be arranged in a single column with a few attractive images. If you want to include a long piece of content, embed a link back to your blog or website rather than copying the whole text into your email.

You should also choose a few relevant and dynamic images to illustrate your content. You don’t want to overdo it with pictures and video, so keep in mind that everything you add has the potential to slow a subscriber down when they scroll through the newsletter. Make sure to use alt image tags, too, so that if the pictures don’t display your subscribers will still know what they are.

Simplicity is also key for mobile search.

Add Video – and Mention It in Your Subject Line

Video is hugely popular, and recent research shows that simply including the word “video” in the subject line of an email increases open rates by 19%. If videos are already part of your marketing mix, then you should include them in your newsletter. If not, you might think about adding them. Even a short, 30-second video can add a lot of appeal.

Write Killer Subject Lines

Speaking of subject lines, make sure yours are clear (you should state that you’re including your newsletter) and intriguing. You want to give subscribers a compelling reason to open your newsletter instead of ignoring it. For example, a local clothing store might try something like this:

April Newsletter: Spring Scarves and a Special Coupon for You!

That’s just one possibility, but you might try including a compelling line from a story, a mention of a product, or a detail about a promotion. However, make sure to stay away from clickbait headlines that have nothing to do with your newsletter. Your subscribers won’t thank you if they open your newsletter expecting something you promised in the subject line and don’t find it.

Crafting the Perfect Email Newsletter

It might be tempting to include multiple calls to action, but remember that 80/20 ratio and stick with one. You might offer subscribers a chance to click your CTA (call to action) to get a special coupon or discount code. Alternatively, you might link back to your online store, or give customers an opportunity to buy tickets to a special event. There’s really no limit to what you can do, but make sure that your call to action is relevant to your newsletter for the best results.

For local business owners, it’s also a good idea to offer customers the opportunity of downloading coupons or discount codes onto their mobile phones or mobile wallets.

Test, Test, Test

The final thing I want to mention is the importance of testing. If you’re using an email automation service like MailChimp or Constant Contact, it’s very easy to test multiple versions of your headlines, colors, images, or content. Just because it’s a newsletter doesn’t mean you can’t benefit from studying variations in open rates and click-through rates. The important thing to remember is that you should always test one option at a time. Testing more than one muddies the water, making it impossible for you to identify what’s working and what’s not.

Last but not least, make sure that you offer an easy-to-see, easy-to-use way for subscribers to opt-out of getting your newsletter. No customer enjoys the feeling of trying to unsubscribe and not being able to do so. Of course, you would prefer that they stay subscribed, but you don’t want to aggravate them to the point where you lose them as customers. As long as you put your subscribers’ needs before your own, you can create a great newsletter that will help you grow your business.

DIY Website Audit: How Does Your Site Measure Up?

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DIY Website Audit: How Does Your Site Measure Up?

DIY Website Audit: How Does Your Site Measure Up?

 

Technology evolves quickly. The software that’s new today is dated in a few months. What we see as cutting-edge web design this week may seem antiquated by this time next year.

How Websites Have Changed

In the early days of the internet, the only connection option available was dial-up. That meant that every site out there had to be designed with speed in mind. Slow modems didn’t allow for image-heavy sites or fancy design features. Most websites were all text, and the page structures were simple too.

Over time, web designers started to use table-based layouts that enabled them to split a single page into sections, making it slightly easier for users to find the information they wanted. These layouts had their drawbacks, but they were a definite improvement over the earlier designs.

The invention of Flash marked a huge breakthrough in web design, as did the gradual speeding up of internet connections. Things like graphics and videos became commonplace. Additional technological advances include the advent of CSS and Web 2.0, both of which allowed for more sophisticated design techniques. Web sites grew, encompassing many pages and various types of content.

Today’s websites are remarkably sophisticated compared to those early sites. They allow for elegant designs and seamless user experiences.

Why Website Audits Are Important

What is a website audit, and why does it matter? An audit looks at every aspect of your website, from content and design to the user experience. It helps to determine whether your website is functioning properly. A thorough audit can enable you to find potential problems including slow load times, broken links, and other issues that may take away from your site’s usability.

Every business needs to do a website audit periodically. Think of it as a check-up for your site – its annual physical examination. Regular audits will ensure that you catch problems early before they turn into real problems for you or your customers.

While there are certainly companies who will audit your website for a price, you can do an audit on your own if you prefer. All you need is a clear idea of how to do it.

DIY Website Audit: How Does Your Site Measure Up?

Auditing your website isn’t difficult to do, but it is meticulously detailed work. You need to be prepared to look at every aspect of your site, from the design and content to technical things like the user experience. Here are the things you need to check.

  1. Load times are hugely important – in fact, research shows that most web users will navigate away from a page if it takes more than four seconds to load, or if it loads improperly. In order to properly check load times, you need to do it from a variety of devices and web browsers. You should check it from a computer and preferably several smartphones with different operating systems. You should also check from different browsers, including Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, and Firefox. Time your site on each, making note of how long it takes to load. If your site is not supporting traffic from a particular browser, make note of that too.
  2. The next thing to check is navigability. In theory, any page on your site could be a landing page. You need to make sure that it is easy to navigate back to your home page from every page on your site. Many companies make their logo a link that will return users to the home page. Alternatively, you can have a “Home” button that appears on the menu at the top of the page, or on the right margin. Your menu placement is important too. Users will expect to see your menu at the top of the page, either permanently displayed or as a drop-down box, or on the right side of the page. Don’t make people search for your menu. You need to check every link on your menu to make sure each one works.
  3. Related to navigability is the issue of links. The links on your site, whether they lead to another area of your site or to an outside site, should be clear and easy to identify. Sometimes companies make the mistake of having their links appear in the same color as the rest of the text, which means that users will not be able to recognize a link unless their mouse is placed over it. Your links should be a different color from your text, and you need to test each one to make sure it works. Make note of any broken links so you can fix them later.
  4. The user experience is another important thing to test. How easy is it to opt into your list or to make a purchase? The experience should be seamless and intuitive. For this part of the process, it may be helpful to ask a friend who isn’t familiar with your site to walk through a subscription or purchase, especially if you have been over it many times. The best way to tell if your site is user-friendly is to have someone who has not used it give it a try. Have them make note of anything that is confusing or counterintuitive.
  5. A thorough audit should also include a review of your content. You should ask yourself the following questions:
    1. Is your content relevant and interesting?
    2. Does it offer value to your customers?
    3. Is any of your content outdated or inaccurate?
    4. Is your content free of spelling and grammatical errors?
    5. Is your content readable, with plenty of white space, images, and other things like bulleted lists?
    6. Are you using different kinds of content, including text, photos, infographics, and videos?
    7. Is each page of your website optimized for a single keyword? Keywords aren’t as important as they used to be, but local keywords that include your geographical location are still essential if you want to rank for local search.
    8. Are you using your tags in a smart way? Your title tag, page name, H1 tag, and image tags all represent opportunities to use your keywords and make it easy for people to find your site.

DIY Website Audit: How Does Your Site Measure Up?

  1. Finally, your audit needs to look at the design elements of your site. Here are some of the things to keep in mind:
    1. Is your color scheme relevant to your brand and pleasing to the eye? A lot of web designers use garish colors thinking that they will attract attention. However, if your site is painful to view, people are not going to stay on the page. You need to think about how a first-time visitor will see your site.
    2. Are your font choices appropriate for your business and easy to read? Readability should always be your first concern when it comes to the font choice. It’s perfectly acceptable to use a fancy or unusual font selectively, but the majority of your content should be in a clear, sans serif font. Most experts recommend a font size of at least 14 points for maximum readability.
    3. Are your images relevant and striking? You may use stock photos if you prefer, but it’s also worth considering hiring a pro to take some photos of you and your business. Most web users are pretty sophisticated and know a stock photo when they see one. Make sure that whatever pictures you choose to include some human faces to personalize your company.
    4. How many pages do you have? Ideally, you want to have a home page, an “About Us” page, and a “Contact Us” page at the bare minimum. You should also consider adding a blog, and individual pages talking about your products or services.
    5. Have you included the social following and sharing buttons in easy-to-find places?

As you can see, a website audit may end up taking several days to complete. You will have to be meticulous and keep track of the things you have reviewed. If you don’t have the technical know-how to fix the problems you find, remember that you can always hire a designer to correct them for you. However, platforms like WordPress make it very easy for non-designers to put together a website that will meet all of their needs.

 

 

DIY SEO Audit in 10 Steps

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DIY SEO Audit in 10 Steps

DIY SEO Audit in 10 Steps

 

Whether you manage your own website or you have a webmaster team dedicated to searching engine optimization and online marketing, a website audit can be useful. It will uncover SEO mistakes and help ensure that proper SEO techniques are being used, throughout your website.

The main reasons for using SEO are to make your website easier for search engines to navigate, to increase your search engine rankings, and help boost the amount of traffic your website receives. If you are worried about the SEO on your website, then use these 10 steps to perform your own DIY SEO audit.

 

#1 Search Your Business

The first step in this DIY SEO audit is to search for your own company, using Google Search. If you search specifically for your business, your website should be the first result. Look at what other references come up in the search, including customer reviews and any articles or websites that mention your company.

 

#2 Setup a Webmaster Tools Account

If you have not already done so, set up a Google Webmaster Tools account. This will allow you access to a variety of statistics related to your search engine optimization, including security issues.

When you performed your business search, if you noticed any results that include the message “this website may be hacked”, then you may have a security problem. Take a look at the security issues section in your Webmaster Tools account, for more details.

After you have resolved your security concerns, submit a request for Google to re-evaluate the security of your website, so that the warning messages can be removed from search results for your web pages.

DIY SEO Audit in 10 Steps

#3 Remove Dead Links

Using good link structure on your website helps ensure better navigation for users and for search engine crawlers. Dead links, which are links that are not active anymore, can lower your SEO and your search engine result rankings. A dead link can also cause a visitor to leave your website and go to your competition.

Use a free tool, or online resource, to check your website for dead links. These programs will scan your website, visit every link on your website, and determine if there are any dead links. Remove any external links that go to a web page that is no longer active.

 

#4 Add Redirects

If you have an internal link that results in a 404 error, then consider adding a redirect. This will help ensure your visitors are still able to reach the pages on your website when the old URL is linked to another website or comes up in a search engine result. Using a 301 redirect, you are informing search engines that the web page has been permanently moved and not deleted.

 

#5 Check Your Title Tags

Title tags are the default titles that appear in search engine results and at the top of the browser window when a web page is opened. Check your title tags, either using your website editor software, your databases, or whichever option you have for editing your web pages. Try to use your main keyword at the beginning of your tag. Keep your title tag to a limit of 70 characters or less, but do not make them too short.

 

#6 Check Meta Descriptions

After checking your title tags, check your Meta descriptions. These descriptions are also used by search engines when gathering results. Follow the same principles for writing a good title tag, but with a 155-character limit. Do not use special characters and try your best to describe your web page in a unique way.

DIY SEO Audit in 10 Steps

#7 Include Image Tags

Search engines cannot “see” your images when crawling your website. Every image on your website should include an ALT text tag. This tag will contain a short description of the content of the image. Limit yourself to 100 characters and use unique keywords that are relevant to the image and your web page.

This tag was originally intended to help people with browsers that cannot load images and blind people that use voice-to-text for reading web page content. It has now become a major SEO factor when determining search engine rankings.

 

#8 Check for Mobility Issues

The use of mobile devices has increased dramatically in the past decade. More people are relying on their smartphones and tablets to browse the web. If your website is not mobile-friendly, then you could end up losing a lot of the traffic to your website. Also, Google and other search engines have begun using mobility as a factor in creating DIY SEO scores.

Google has its own tool that you can use to check for mobility issues. After checking a web page on your site, this tool will provide you with tips and suggestions for editing your code for better mobility. You can find this tool by going to your Google Webmaster Tools account.

 

#9 Avoid Duplicate Content

While everyone knows that it is a bad idea to copy content from other sources, there may be occasions where you end up duplicating your own content. Whether this is due to the updating of a blog article, the creation of a second page offering similar information, or any other cause, you should let Google know which page is the preferred page.

Add Metadata containing a canonical link to the preferred page. When a search engine comes across this Metadata, it will understand that this is not a duplicate page. You will need to add this information yourself, using whichever method you normally use for editing Metadata on your website.

 

#10 Update Your Sitemap

Every website should have a sitemap. This is an XML file that contains links to the pages on your website. You can have separate XML files for different categories of pages on your site or a single sitemap file containing all links. If you do not already have a method of creating a sitemap, there are several free resources available online for building a free sitemap. Whenever you update a page or add a new blog article, your sitemap should be updated and submitted to search engines using Webmaster Tools.

After performing all 10 of these tasks, you should have a much better idea of your current search engine optimization. Your own DIY SEO audit is something that you should perform at least once per month, to monitor changes to your SEO and make sure that you are continuing to do everything that you can to boost traffic and increase your search engine rankings.

 

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