Posts from — August 2009

Social media branding doesn’t just incorporate Facebook and Twitter. There are over 200 well-known social media sites where you can focus your time and effort to create a great social media brand. An important part of your focus should be review sites. You can easily capitalize on good customer experiences and mitigate bad experiences by consistently monitoring these sites.

Two of the biggest review sites that you should consider are Kudzu.com and CitySearch: these are showing up more and more frequently in the top results of local searches. Other common sites are Yelp, Yahoo! local, DexKnows,

There are also other industry-specific review sites such as HealthGrades.com for reviews on medical doctors or TripAdvisor.com for city attraction reviews. Take a look and see if there are relevant industry specific review sites for you to consider as well as the larger review sites.

Once you have a list of the sites you need to consistently review, take a look and see what customers are saying. Ask yourself a few questions:

• What are you doing right?
• How many reviews have you found on your company?
• Is there anything you can work on?

If you find any negative reviews, work to see what happened on your end. Was there something that should have been done differently? If so, approach the reviewer and try to make amends – show that you care about all of your customers and are devoted to great customer service. By including these review sites into your social media branding strategy, you can improve your social media brand and capitalize on the great customer service you provide.

Looking for help with your social branding strategy? Contact The Envision Agency, Small Business Marketing and we can put together a custom social media branding strategy.

Try website optimization to improve your sales.

I just came across a question on a discussion board: the company had a good amount of website traffic but their sales volume had stayed at a consistent amount for months. They wanted to know how they could increase their sales volume.

There are a lot of things you can do, but one of the most effective is website optimization. Website optimization takes your website and makes it work harder. After all, your website should be your best salesman. Here are the first steps you should take to improve your website traffic.

1. Measure: If you don’t already have website analytics on your site, implement them now. If you don’t know what your website is currently doing, you can’t make it better. If you already have website analytics implemented, look at the reports. I know many companies that want to improve what they have but don’t know where they’re currently at.
2. Compare: Review your competitors’ websites and find the similarities and differences. Take notes on what you like and what you don’t like… and keep an open mind. These are the people your visitors who are leaving are going to: make sure you know what they’re seeing.
3. Develop: After you’ve reviewed your own website and your competition, develop variations of your website. You want to leave what is currently working and improve upon what isn’t working. Look at what you did and didn’t like from the competition: can you make your site better? Put together different variations that take what you liked from your competition to the next level.
4. Test: Using a website optimization software, implement a test campaign that tests what you currently have against your new variations. Make sure you let it run long enough to get a good result.

I have worked with companies that have optimized their website and were able to bring in twice as many leads from the same marketing spend after the initial optimization campaign. If done correctly, it will make your website work harder for you without spending more money or driving additional traffic.

Need help with website optimization? The Envision Agency, Small Business Marketing helps local businesses get the most out of their marketing dollars. Give us a call and we can review your current site and put together a personalized plan to help you make your website work harder.

All social media channels aren’t alike: you may not need a Twitter account or a Facebook, MySpace, Ping, LinkedIn, YouTube, Viddler, etc. account. It depends on your goals, your time, and your customers.

Demographics

If you’re targeting 60+ customers, it’s doubtful they’ll be on MySpace. But if your customer base is 14 – 18, you better be on MySpace and Facebook. Targeting professionals? LinkedIn and similar sites are for you. As you get to know your best customers, you can find the best places to spend your time and effort.

Timing and Length

Do you have consistent timely updates for your customers? Twitter may be for you. An extreme example is of an auction house using Twitter to let their regulars know about new items they’re going to have for auction. If they are expensive or hard to get items, people would want to know right away. Can you get your message across in 140 characters? Twitter has a non-negotiable character limit that can seriously hinder your message. For a longer message, consider a blog instead.

Business Goals

What are you looking to do with social media? To make sure that your venture into social media work to your benefit and maximizes your ROI, make sure you set goals that make sense for the platform… and that you give it enough time. Social media is not a quick fix, but a long term solution that should be added to your marketing mix.

Social Media marketing can be a very effective addition to your marketing mix. There are a lot of things to consider, besides just the channels you want to utilize. With over 200 sites as possibilities, you do need to evaluate your business, your customer base, and your goals carefully before embarking on your social media journey.

Do you need help determining your social media strategy and how it will work with your current strategy? The Envision Agency, Small Business Marketing specializes in social branding – using social media to create your brand and pulling together your other marketing efforts to form a cohesive marketing platform to maximize your brand and ROI.

Social media is a huge place where you can really get your brand known. In addition to getting your brand out there, by participating in social networks, you are also setting yourself up to capitalize on consumers as they are asking for and receiving referrals and recommendations on products and services.

While people may not make their decision on a social media channel – they typically ask friends and family for their opinion. Social media sites allow them to use their advice networks as sounding boards, getting opinions from people they trust. If you have a conversation on an online social site and have connections to that person’s network, it’s very easy for you to get in on those questions or for them to come to you and ask your advice. And, just like that, you have a potential customer.

To get the conversations started about your company, you need to put yourself out there. Review your options and your customer base and find networks that fit your customer demographics. There are over 200 social media sites out there – you don’t need to be on all of them. Choose a select few that fit into your demographic, business model, and needs and start talking.

As long as you know that you are providing your customers a good product and good service, you won’t have to worry about negative comments. All businesses have them and you’re setting yourself up to respond to them better. They still would have happened, you just may have found out about them too late. Now, with your social networking started, you’ll have great conversations with your current customer base that will open you up to new customers and referrals.

As an extra benefit, you’ll be able to help create a more loyal following with your current customer base and learn more about what you are doing right… and what you can work on.

Get started – and get your name on the “advice” channels to bump up your referral traffic now, before your competitors gain the leading edge! If you need help, give the experts at The Envision Agency, Small Business Marketing a call. We’ll review what you’re currently doing and your business goals to put together a plan to get you to where you want to be.

Blogs have a lot of benefits: they help with search engines (and rankings), they show your company’s personality, and they encourage customer participation. These are things a company, regardless of how long they’ve been in business, can capitalize on.

However, having a company blog may not be the best solution for you. There are many things to consider before you start a company blog, but here are three highlights:

Technology: How are you going to host the site and perform site maintenance? You need to decide if you can afford to host it yourself and if you have the technical skill-set at your company to handle the set-up and maintenance? There are different blogging solutions that you can take advantage of, based on your technical skill set: free, developer-hosted platforms, premium developer-hosted platforms, stand-alone platforms.

Time for blogging: How much time can you, or someone at your company devote to this? Once you start blogging, you should make sure you post something regularly: at least once a week. Can you devote the time to this? You need to make consistent posting a priority, not an option.

Relationship management: How do you plan to manage what is said about your company? You’re building online relationships with your customers but if there is a bad experience you need to be able to manage it – do you have the systems in place to do so? Are you willing to have the good and the bad displayed on the web? Keep in mind, it’s probably already out there – you just don’t know about it. If you have an online presence, you have more control over negative comments, and can capitalize on positive comments.

Starting a blog can be a great step for your company and can really help you start social branding. It’s an easy first step into social media marketing. Don’t have time to start your blog or need help with your social strategy? Contact The Envision Agency, Small Business Marketing and we can help you get started right away.

People are moving away from just relying on a search engine to give them the information they need to purchase a product or service. While they may be searching, having review sites like Kudzu.com and CitySearch showing up in the search results does mean that you need to focus on building up your brand on these review sites. People no longer depend solely on the BBB to tell them if you’re a company they should do business with – they look online and see what your past customers are saying.

Listen

The first thing you need to do is listen to what your customers are saying about their experiences with you. Are they saying anything at all? People are apt to talk about negative experiences more than positive experiences, but take a look at what they are saying. Can’t find a review? Talk to some of your customers and see what they would say about your company.

Ask

The best people to review your business are the people who have worked with you. Call some of your best customers and ask them about their experience with you. Since they’ve had a great experience with you, ask them to write a review on one of the review sites. You don’t need to offer a discount or a coupon, you’re trying to build good-will in your community and show that you are the local industry-leader, where everyone should go. You can also ask people to do this though your newsletter, at checkout, etc. Any place that you would ask for a referral, you can ask for a review.

Need some help getting yourself known on the review sites? The Envision Agency, Small Business Marketing can help you develop your social media branding strategy and get you seen as the industry-leader in your community.

Your customers are the most important part of your business and can be the best marketers for you. Make sure you’re treating your customers right and are protecting your customer relationships. Keep reading for four ways to quickly sour a customer relationship.

Value your customers.

You already have them, and they’re very important to you. Let them know that they’re valued and that you appreciate their business. If you have competition going out of business, reassure your customers that you are here to stay. Make sure that you are adding value for your customers. Send them newsletters, cards, coupons – make it about them, not you.

Contact your customers.

It’s easier and less expensive to keep a customer than it is to get a new one. They want information from you – you just need to let them know that it’s there and of value. Develop and grow an email list that will help you maintain constant, valuable contact with your current customer base. Let them know what they’ll be getting and how often – and keep to it. If you promise them weekly newsletters, don’t miss a week… and don’t send them emails once a day!

Listen to your customers.

Customer input is valuable. Let your customers know that you want and need their feedback, listen to and make changes as necessary. In order to keep your client, you may need to go above and beyond their expectations. This will be much easier if you know what the expectations are and how close you are to meeting, or exceeding, them. So talk to your customers, send surveys, and consistently reinforce your commitment to them.

Avoid over-communication.

Don’t send too many emails, call too much, or send too much mail. You want to keep them as a customer, but don’t overdo it. If you’re not sure how much is too much, ask your customers! You can determine how much is too much by looking at response rates and unsubscribe rates for your marketing pieces and see where you get the best return.

As a business owner, you should make sure your company is capitalizing on your current customer base… but you want to make sure you protect them as well. Don’t under or over communicate – and always make sure you’re listening to your customers!

Need help determining the right message and frequency? Contact The Envision Agency, Small Business Marketing for more information on customer protection and let us help you put together a customer retention strategy that will not only help you retain your customers, but build on their experiences to catapult your company to the next level.

Email can really work. We have improved email campaigns to have a 5% closing rate. What that meant for the client was that from the emails that were sent, 5% of the people completed an application and became a client and this was all without ever talking with a sales rep.

It took a while to get there. We segmented lists and tested messaging until we were able to really target our best clients… and then worked to make sure we closed those clients and reduced the overall cost to obtain that client. The first step was to improve our email list.

Collect email addresses from all leads and clients. If you can send them emails, you can try to convert them into a customer (or repeat customer).

Put your leads into buyer segments. Someone who has just expressed interest is different from someone who is in the process of becoming a client, and that person is different from an actual client. Take some time to learn the different places a person can be in your list and start segmenting out your buyers.

Survey your current list. If you already have a list, send a survey out to them and see if they’re happy with the emails that you’re sending, what their interests are, and if there is anything else they would like to receive with those emails.

Review your results. If you have been sending emails to your client base, review your open rates, click through rates, conversion rates and unsubscribe rates and compare those to the averages for your industry. If you’re not hitting at least those averages, review what may be causing it.

Having problems with your email campaigns or not getting the ROI you would like? The Envision Agency, Small Business Marketing can provide an email marketing analysis and help you revise or create your email marketing strategy.

Your brand is very valuable to your company. You know that – you built it. If you’ve already spent time and money trying to get your customers and community to know you as  Company X  you want to do everything you can to safeguard that investment.

There are always the examples of the common-sense branding mishaps that people make, but what about the little mistakes that could cost you in the long-run?

Overpromising and not delivering. Don’t promise your customers the world and miss. Referrals are the cheapest and most effective way to brand yourself. Make sure you deliver on every one of your promises and let your customers do the branding for you.

Copy-cat branding. Your competitor may have a great brand and a great message – don’t copy it. Differentiate yourself so people know that it’s YOU not your competition. Make your brand different and unforgettable and people will remember.

Low prices. It works for Wal-mart so it can work for you, right? Probably not. There will always be someone who will fight you on your prices and continue to drive your profit margins down. If you differentiate yourself on something other than price (think Best Buy), then you allow yourself room to charge more. People will still buy from you – and you’ll make more, if you provide something other than just a low price.

Brand changing. You’ve spent time, effort, and money in creating your brand. If it’s not working for you and you’re getting negative responses – or your brand itself is no longer competitive or dated, you may need to consider changing it. However, if you’re     just tired of your brand… reconsider. You see your brand 24/7, your customers see it significantly less. If it’s still working and recognizable – don’t change it.

Building a brand correctly takes time and effort, but it doesn’t need to cost a lot. If you’re looking to start on the right path, or are looking for a change, The Envision Agency, Small Business Marketing can help.

Listen to your target market

Social media can work for small businesses. There has been a lot of discussion over whether or not social media works as a marketing vehicle for businesses overall. And oftentimes, it doesn’t. It needs to be implemented correctly, monitored, and optimized just like every other marketing channel. And, since it involves having conversations with current and potential customers, it can easily be analyzed incorrectly because you need to consider social media as a combination of sales, customer service, and marketing.

With social media, you always need to make sure you’re actively engaging your target market. That means you need to listen to your target market and evaluate the conversations you’re having. Here are a few key points to keep in mind about your conversations.

• Talk to your customer. As a local business, you have an advantage over larger companies. You can talk with your customers and see what they would like to hear from you and what platforms they use.
• Interact with everyone online. Go online and research what people are doing and talking about on each social media site you’re considering. See who you can connect with and listen to the conversations they’re having: pay attention to what they say to you, about you, and most importantly, about the general topics that discuss your business.
• Make sure you have something of value to contribute. Social media is about having conversations online – in order for it to work, you need to have something good to contribute.

The Envision Agency, Small Business Marketing, develops and implements local marketing strategies for small businesses. If you’re not sure where to go next with your social media marketing plan, give us a call… we can help!