Coaching For Success
Marketing
Two Kinds Of Internet User
Sep 1st
Two Kind Of Internet Users
There are 2 general types of internet users: those looking for information and those looking to buy. We all wear both of those hats at different times and sometimes something is so compelling we put our buying hat on when we thought we only wanted to wear our research hat. For purposes of most effective optimization you want to make sure you are targeting both groups of people.
You want researchers because catching them early in the process exposes them to your expertise and creates you as a possible future solution for them. You also want buyers because that’s your bread and butter.
Which group you attract is determined by your keywords. You want keywords that call out to researchers and you want keywords that reach out and grab the buyers.
It’s important to consider commercial intent when selecting our keywords. A great tool that can be effective for this is http://adlab.msn.com/Online-Commercial-Intention/
The Leading Trends In Search Marketing For 2011
May 2nd
The subject of search is of vital importance to internet business owners, so the results of a recent survey by SEMPO (Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization) should be of great interest to anyone trying to achieve success online.
Social And Mobile More Important Than Ever
If part of your marketing strategy includes social and mobile marketing, the findings of the survey should be a real eye-opener for you; if they’re not part of your strategy, you’ll want to pay close attention to what you’re about to read.
Some 900 companies participated in the survey, which estimates that there will be an increase of 16% in search in 2011 over 2010.
Facebook is growing in popularity among pay-per-click (PPC) advertisers, with almost half of survey respondents claiming to use Facebook for PPC (47 percent based in North America and 45 percent elsewhere). Advertising agencies show even higher use of Facebook among their clients, with 74 percent of North American based clients and 69 percent of clients outside North America placing PPC ads on Facebook.
Mobile Is Changing The Game
But, at the end of the day, the mobile internet is what’s really changing the game where search marketing trends are concerned. About 40 percent of companies involved in the survey stated that the growth in mobile internet was seen as “highly significant” to their businesses, an increase of 26 percent over the preceding year. Another 39 percent claimed that mobile internet was “significant” where their businesses were concerned.
The numbers are even more impressive where agencies are concerned, with 47 percent declaring mobile internet’s impact highly significant.
Local And Other Search Trends
Hot on the heels of mobile in the internet search marketing trends arena comes local search, rated as a highly significant trend by some 43 percent of respondents, with 41 percent rating it as significant.
Ad agencies claim that their clients spend 34 percent of their search budgets on local PPC advertising, which consists of advertising at regional, city or sub-market (markets within a company’s principal marketing focus, also referred to as “hidden” markets) levels.
Local search has not had such a significant effect on client-side advertisers, with only 26 percent stating that its effect was highly significant and budgets being correspondingly smaller than the clients of agencies at around 23 percent compared to 34 percent.
According to the survey, behavioral targeting is also seen as taking on increasing importance, with the percentage considering it significant or highly significant rising from last year’s 68 to 2011′s 78 percent.
The use of social media in general for advertising purposes is on the rise, with 84 percent of companies surveyed using Facebook, compared to last year’s 73 percent. Twitter is used by 75 percent to promote their brands or companies, and 52 percent use Linkedin’s platform.
It should be obvious from the above that you should be positioning your internet business to take advantage of these search marketing trends, if you haven’t already.
A UK internet business consultant can provide all the assistance you need to help your company reap the benefits of these exciting new trends, so don’t delay – contact them today!
Use An E-mail Service Provider To Push Your Campaigns Into Overdrive
Apr 25th
E-mail marketing is still not only a relevant option for internet business owners, but it’s actually thriving, with e-mail newsletters still a very effective marketing tool.
In fact, a Pew research recently found that some 56 percent of internet users subscribe to e-mail newsletters of one kind or another, while online business owners are utilising this platform increasingly to transmit their messages.
Content Counts When All Said And Done
The trick is to provide subscribers with content that keeps them interested and wanting more, as well as increasing the number of subscribers, thereby expanding your business and its revenue.
Here’s a list of several e-mail service providers that can give your business the boost it needs:
1. Posterous
More a microblogging site than an e-mail provider, Posterous recently added a feature that allows bloggers to convert their content into e-mail newsletters. They’ve also stated their intention to enhance their e-mail services in future, so this is well worth looking at.
2. MailChimp
One of the most popular e-mail services, MailChimp provides tools that are easy to implement and use, including features for mobile and social marketing. A free trial is available, while packages are available costing up to $240 per month for up to 50,000 subscribers.
3. Constant Contact
Simple editing tools, mobile and social functionalities, as well as almost 500 templates for newsletters to which companies can add their own logos and colours are just some of the features that make this service such a standout. It’s priced from $15 a month (500 subscribers) to $150-plus a month (25,000-plus subscribers).
4. Campaigner
For a startup this is an excellent service that provides many features that allow users to create, send and keep track of their e-mail newsletters, as well as providing the ability to edit images without the need for additional software. The cost is $10 a month (includes 30 day free trial), rising to $55 a month for as many as 10,000 subscribers.
5. Campaign Monitor
An Aussie (Australian) company that’s mainly focused on design but is a full-service e-mail marketing provider. The service has a complete set of features to facilitate a company’s e-mail marketing campaigns, and its offerings are priced from $15 for 500 subscribers to $500 for as many as 50,000 subscribers.
Give your internet business and your e-mail marketing campaign a shot in the arm with any one of these fine services.
Check with a UK internet marketing consultant who can assist you with all aspects of your company’s e-mail marketing strategy and work with you to increase your subscriber base substantially.
Take Advantage Of The Tremendous Opportunity That Is Video
Mar 21st
Publishing videos is currently one of the most powerful methods of promoting an internet business, and should be a part of every online business owner’s search engine optimisation (SEO) arsenal.
But, despite the praise heaped on the use of video to improve search engine rankings and as a powerful promotional tool, both in these columns and throughout internet marketing circles in general, a recent report by SundaySky, a provider of online video solutions, has some pretty startling revelations regarding the use (or lack thereof) of video as a marketing force.
Top E-Commerce Sites Fail To Take Full Advantage Of Video
SundaySky’s report, based on data from the fourth quarter of 2010, shows that almost half of the world’s top 50 online retailers failed to make the most of the opportunity presented by video.
Despite the fact that some had started to add video to their sites, most had failed to take full advantage of the tremendous opportunity that video represents. But, that needs to change during this current year if better results in overall web site performance is the goal, and it should be a primary goal for all online retailers.
The Benefits Of Using Video
The benefits of using video are manyfold, one of the main ones as far as e-tailers are concerned being improved conversion rates, resulting in more sales on a wider range of products, reduced number of returns and increased web site stickiness, amongst other benefits.
Another major benefit is that video ranks higher in search results than other online content, delivering much more traffic to e-commerce sites. In addition, YouTube has been ranked 2nd in search since 2008, and is the fourth property overall on the web, which shows how valuable video content is these days.
Suggestions To Make The Most Of Video
What is evident from the report by SundaySky is that e-commerce business owners should be taking full advantage of video to drive more traffic to their web sites.
In order to do so, there are several steps online retailers should take:
- increase the scale of their videos to include all their product offerings
- look beyond YouTube for syndicating videos; publish videos on platforms such as Facebook
- apply simple SEO strategies such as video sitemaps and proper embedding
Although we’ve been referring to e-commerce web site owners here, increased use of video on their web sites would be advisable for all internet business owners.
For expert advice on the optimum use of video on your web site, consult a UK internet business coach.
Google Enhances Local UK Search With Nearby Shops
Jan 27th
If you are a UK internet business owner and you also run a brick and mortar retail store, you should be extremely excited about the recent introduction of the feature known as Nearby Shops into the UK.
A Boost For Both Online Shoppers And Merchants
Not only will online merchants benefit from this new feature, thanks to the increased visibility afforded their businesses through Google‘s global and local reach, but online shoppers will also benefit from increased awareness of the shopping options available to them in their vicinity.
Shoppers searching for products online using Google Products will be shown a map displaying shops that are nearby that sell the item or items entered in the search criteria, along with shops selling similar items.
The way it works is by you, the merchant, syncing up your account in Google Places (if you don’t have one, then obviously setting this up first is a pre-requisite) with the products you have listed in your Merchant Centre Account (again, this also needs to be created if not already there) by linking the two with the same URL, resulting in your shop being listed in the Nearby Shops results for a particular product search.
Local Is Going Global
Providing consumers with local information and options is becoming increasingly important for many of the bigger internet companies. A prime example is the fact that eBay decided to take the plunge into the local arena, just before Google made its move into local, through its purchase of the local shopping site, Milo. EBay’s new tool is called GiftsNearby, which combines its product inventory tool with the Milo software tool to provide searchers with local results.
Competition For Local Supremacy Is Increasing Dramatically
Competition in the local sector is growing more fierce as consumers’ preference for local search and results increases and the competition is only expected to intensify in 2011.
To that end Google has made dramatic improvements to its tools with a view to refining its local search capability. The company acquired Blue Dot to add mobile product inventory to its Product Search tool, which it further enhanced with the addition of two new search tools, Popular Products, which lists products by search volume, and Aisles, which sorts products into sub-categories.
The online search, offline purchasing market is huge, and, if your internet business isn’t set up yet to take advantage of this burgeoning market, contact a UK internet business consultant who can assist you with your local search efforts.
