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Mar 01
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EMAIL MARKETING

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Do’s and Don’ts of Email Marketing



Did you know emails with subject lines titled “Thank you” are more likely to be opened by the user?


Email campaigns can be tricky and a lot of businesses begin to ask themselves if it is even worth it. Email marketing is something that comes with time, it takes time to accumulate subscribers, and it takes time to learn what kind of content they like. But it is one of the most underused marketing tools and it has shown to work very well for many businesses!
 
DO GROW YOUR EMAIL LIST ORGANICALLY. DON’T BUY AN EMAIL LISTS
The best way to grow your email list, organically, is to create a form on your website or Facebook page. If you are looking to increase the amount of subscribers, give the user an incentive. Add a plug-in to your website that forces the user to insert an email to receive a free item or product. This could be a free PDF with a video, or some kind of information the user feels like is worth some monetary value and you are giving it to them for free. 
Not only is receiving emails from companies you never subscribe to extremely annoying, it gives your business a terrible reputation. No, it isn’t against the law but ethically it draws some questions. If someone wants your information, they will sign up by themselves and if you market yourself well enough and raise awareness for your brand, they will know about you! 
DO CREATE TOP OF THE MIND AWARENESS. DON’T MAKE THEM WAIT TO HEAR FROM YOU WEEKS AFTER THEY SUBSCRIBE
Top of the mind awareness keeps your business on the users mind. This could look different depending on your companies industry, but it begins with sending an immediate email after the user subscribes. Creating top of the mind awareness comes with consistency. This can be a tricky line, but you need to find a balance between sending not enough emails and sending so many they get annoyed and unsubscribe. Usually, this means 2-3 per week or doing a once a week update. 
 
DO SEND PERSONALIZED EMAILS. DON’T SEND EMAILS THAT HAVE NO PURPOSE
Personalizing your emails could increase your open rate by 25%. This could be a simple task like adding the person’s first name to the top (Dear John, Hi John, etc.). It’s important to be intentional with each email you send and not rush through creating boring or irrelevant content. 
 
These are only three of the MANY things you can do for your email marketing. I highly recommend using a website called, Mail Chimp(featured on my screen). It is a great tool that usually links up well with most third party websites. It has many tools that help with automation, which allows you to reward users that have stayed with you for awhile! It does cost but with how helpful it is, I would say it is worth the small monthly fee! 
As always feel free to ask me any questions!

 

 

 

Mar 01
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HOW TO BEAT THE INSTAGRAM ALGORITHM

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Instagram has done it again, they changed the algorithm and now only 10% of your followers are going to see your posts! That means 90% of the individuals who CHOSE to follow you will no longer see your photos. I know, this makes me angry also, but there is hope! There are ways to beat the algorithm, we are all just going to have to work a bit harder!

The algorithm basically shows you only the Instagrammers content you interact with. The likes and comments you leave on the individual’s photos drives what content they bring to your newsfeed. They want to show you photos they think you will interact with. It also prioritizes accounts with high engagement.
This is depressing, I know. I personally liked it better when it was in chronological order, but it is better for the advertisers and instagram makes more money because of it, so why are we surprised? 
STEP 1 – HOW OFTEN AND WHY?
If you are wanting more of your followers to see your posts, you must be posting consistently, that doesn’t mean double posting every single day but maybe try posting every day or 3-5 times per week. 
Another good question to ask yourself is, why do I have an Instagram? Is it to gain more followers, sell a product or direct people to a blog? If you are on Instagram for business reasons, it is important to have a business profile. This can easily be done in your settings and doesn’t confine your content to strictly being business related. In fact, I would advise against only posting about your business because people don’t like having a product or blog constantly shoved down their throat. That leads to the next thing, what you are posting matters!
STEP 2 – POST RELATABLE CONTENT
The content you choose to post matters, greatly. I am not just talking about the quality of your photos(breathe, you don’t need to go hire a professional photographer for your Instagram photos), I mean to create content that is YOU, relatable and relevant to your life! If you are running a fashion blog get creative with your content, do a few styled shoots with some of your favorite products and tag the brands. If you are selling a product like graphics on Etsy or wedding invitations, create consistent content, find a flow in your editing and stick to what you love, there is a reason your started your business right? People love to see other passionate individuals, thriving in their work space. I know, I know, it feels like we have gotten off topic but ALL of this is related to defeating the algorithm. 

STEP 3 – RELATIONSHIPS
This one goes hand in hand with STEP 2, as you are tapping into your more creative side with your content, people will become more interested in your life and if you allow yourself to show a little vulnerability with a post, you will begin to see your followers build a relationship with you. They may direct message you when you post a story photo and ask where you got your sweater from, or maybe even ask how much a beautiful piece of your art is. It is so much easier to purchase from someone, read someones blog, or follow their life when you feel like you know them! With that being said, always RESPOND to people who comment on your photos or message you.  
EXTRAS
Watch your analytics – you won’t have analytics until you swap over to a business account, but this allows you to see how well your posts are doing and to learn from how your followers respond. 
Use relevant Hashtags – you can use up to 30 of them! Be wise!

Tell your followers to turn on their notifications if they want to see your posts, they can also comment on 10+ of your photos, and “like” multiple photos on your feed. Many people don’t know this so don’t feel weird telling them. 
Run a giveaway – Why? because people will follow you if there is a chance of them winning something. 
Utilize Instagram Stories – These 24-hour images are a perfect way to let your followers in on your daily life with family, work and friends!

Instagram is constantly changing things up on us but you don’t have to sponsor a ton of posts to continue to grow your following! If you try these things out and being to see results, let me know!

Mar 01
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5 TIPS TO INCREASE PRODUCTIVITY

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It’s January, the holidays are over and everyone is feeling “blah” and lazy from all of the nasty cold temperatures. I mean really Oklahoma, since when do we have windchills in the negatives? I am not enjoying it at all. But if you are like me, you created some goals for 2018 and one of them probably involved productivity. Whether that be in the gym, home or work, we are always trying to spend our time a bit more wisely! I am pretty sure I set goals to be more productive in all areas of my life, because I get so distracted, in everything I do. I am serious, everything! Although I clearly haven’t conquered my lack of productivity, I have made a list that has helped me a ton these first few weeks of this year!

1. TIME STRUCTURE
After researching, I found that the most common place people lose time in their day is when it has little to no structure. I know I find myself breezing through my day, lacking intentional actions and try to chip away at my to-do list with no real set aside time to complete each individual task. One article encouraged individuals to set aside a certain amount of time to get a task done and actually finish it in that amount of time. Another good option for time structuring is to learn when you work best and dedicated multiple hours of uninterrupted work during those times(morning, afternoon or evening). These both have proved to boost productivity.

2. EMAILS FIRST
Most people dread getting to work and immediately opening their computer to several emails that are demanding a response and email has been shown to be one of the biggest distraction within a work day. Responding early in the day and allowing yourself to focus on the work that really needs to be done can increase your productivity greatly. Forbes did an article on how successful people structure their days and this one was near the top. They used the CEO of Apple as an example and mentioned that he begins responding to emails before he hits the gym, this usually means he is checking his email around 4:30 am. That may be a little intense, but it gets the point across that emails can suck the life out of your work day, so why not knock them out in the first hour while your coffee is still hot?



3. STOP TASK HOPPING
Task hopping an be detrimental to how much work you are completing. If you are starting on one task and then moving onto another before your first task is completed, you are leaving more for yourself to go back to later. Start and finish each task and then move onto the next one, this will allow you to focus and not bounce back and forth with different ideas and thoughts. This one is really difficult for me because a lot of what I do is creative. Creativity doesn’t come when you sit down and tell your brain to be creative, it comes when you are in the middle of something else. I get struck with a great idea, it creates excitement and suddenly I am distracted. A good way for me to grow in this area is to have a notepad next to me so, when I get a creative idea/thought I can write a small portion of it down and return to it at a later time.

4. UTILIZE YOUR LUNCH BREAK
It is easy to use your lunch break to sit on your phone and scroll through social media but studies have shown if you get up and moving on your lunch break, you will have a more productive afternoon. This means going for a walk after you finish eating, grabbing your protein shake and climbing a few flights of stairs or use your break to get in your daily work out at the gym. The key factor is to increase your heart rate for a period of time before sitting down for the afternoon.

5. BEDTIME ROUTINE
One of the best things I have started to do, is prioritizing my sleep! I have a super weak immune system so my body needs all the rest it can get. I love to create a to-do list for the following day and leave it on my desk. This allows me to acknowledge and be aware of all the things I need to get done but doesn’t allow it to control my thoughts as I am trying to fall asleep. This is an easy way to not feel overwhelmed  and to get your mind off of the ridiculously long list of things that need to be done in the morning. The better you sleep, the more productive you will be in the work place.

These five things have worked great for me but like I said I still have my moments of dazing off or starting a task and realizing it has been 30 minutes and not a single thing has been done. I figured these would be practical ways for anyone. Let me know what things have helped you increase your work day productivity!




Jan 28
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THE IMPORTANCE OF LINKED IN

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LinkedIn is a social media outlet that many people have but few are active on, including myself. Instagram and Facebook have taken the front stage, while LinkedIn was quickly on the rise, in the background. LinkedIn now has over 500 million users(I know, snuck up on me also)!  After learning this, all I could think of is why? What made the platform that has been around 14 years suddenly grow?

The answer is all over the place, but can be found by spending just a few minutes scanning through your LinkedIn page.. it isn’t JUST being used for resumes and job openings anymore. It has become a resource for all kinds of relevant news and content. It has evolved and is continuing to evolve into a flourishing network, overflowing with resources.
Did you know Microsoft purchased LinkedIn back in 2016(They clearly saw the potential that many did not.)? The website now publishes over 100,000 news articles per week and grew from 140 million users in 2011 to now 500 million! It is beginning to contain networking opportunities no other social media platform can compete with.

Still not intrigued? Check out these facts:

  • 41% of millionaires use LinkedIn.
  • LinkedIn now has 3 million active job listings on the platform.
  • 1 million professionals have published post on LinkedIn.
  • An average user spends 17 minutes monthly on Linkedin.
  • Motivated was the most overused word on Linkedin in 2014.
  • Statistical Analysis and Data Mining are Top skills on Linkedin.
  • 59% of Linkedin members have never worked at a company with more than 200 employees.
  • There are 5.5 million accountants on Linkedn.
  • There have been 1 billion endorsements on LinkedIn.
  • The average CEO has 930 connections.
  • The most overused profile word continues to be “Motivated” – which also topped 2014 and 2015(Source).
Three things that helped LinkedIn grow so quickly:
1. Organic Written Content – after partnering with a content platform they began producing news articles, and other relevant/sharable content(read here for more info)
2. Video Content – They opened up their platform to all types of video, this includes vlogs(video blogs) which have recently become popular through YouTube. 
3. The prestigious influencer “invite-only” club – This includes people like Bill Gates, and getting the influencers to create great content is giving them an advantage. 

So what does this mean for us?

Focus more on video- creating authentic, short videos will assist your content in becoming, “share worthy”. People are watching videos more hours out of the day on digital devices than they are spending watching television, so it is something more businesses need to get behind.

Be active- participate in the sharing of relevant, creative and helpful content. Network and connect with people and use the platforms resources! 
2018 is going to be a great year for LinkedIn so it is a great time to get involved! They are releasing new features regularly that are assisting every day business owners, in marketing and networking. It is also helping target specific audiences and creating tons of engaging content you can share on your own social media/website. 
Jan 16
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DIY FACEBOOK MARKETING

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Is anyone else feeling the weight of this Monday? Whew, I am on my 3rd cup of coffee and feel like I am hardly making a dent in my to-do list today! Today, I am going to be giving you all an outline for your very own Facebook Ad Campaign. This step by step process can be time consuming, but it is also so simple you can do it from your bed, in your house shoes, like me! 


Let’s get started with some facts about Facebook marketing. Did you know Facebook has recently become one of the best tools for you to utilize in your small business advertising? 2.07 billion people are active monthly users are on the platform and there are 5 new profiles created EVERY SECOND. 


Most people don’t realize the power behind quality targeted ads but over 5 million businesses use it as a main platform for advertising! Knowing where to begin and how to reach your targeted audience is important and something each business has to figure out, this basic outline will get you started! 


WHERE TO BEGIN?

Ad campaigns that raise awareness first, enable you to build relationships with your potential customers. It is important to not strive for an immediate sale. Raising awareness of your brand is the first stage. The best method for making people aware of your brand is to produce organic content and continue posting the content that is succeeding. If a post doesn’t do well, don’t continue to replicate it. Move forward with a post that has received more likes, comments, and shares. A good way to do this, is to “boost” a post that already has high engagement from your followers. This is a cheap way to put your money into something that is already working.

Organically produced content that does not feel like an advertisement should be your goal. This makes it much easier for your potential customer to share the content you are producing. This begins to look a lot like “word of mouth”, which most small businesses would say is their best method for growing their clientele. Someone shares an entertaining post on Facebook, whether that be a video, an article or a cute photo. It grabs attention way more often than a sales post, promoting your latest product. This type of method focuses on building relationships with your potential clients. Once someone’s attention is grabbed, they notice where the original content was produced, this is how your business sticks in the back of someone’s mind. This is a great place to start with the potential clients who know nothing about your brand.

Long story short, post content that builds trust and is entertaining

CONTENT

Your presence should be consistent throughout your website, social media, pretty much everything else you do(flyers, business cards, meeting outlines, etc.)!
Consistency with your branding is important. Your specific brand is what sets you apart from other companies and allows your ideal customer to relate to you. This is how your ideal customer begins to follow you on social media and also what makes them stick around.

Branding also assists in gaining consistent, repeating customers. It creates a name and look for your company and is the best way to reveal who you are, and what you stand for, all through design and styling.

With that being said, it is important to have a flow on Facebook with your posts and ads, you want individuals to begin to recognize your posts and ads before even looking at your name. This means consistent graphics, and consistent editing on photos and videos. To create quality, memorable content, it must be professional and flow well with your brand.

AUDIENCE 
I can’t tell you who your ideal audience is but I do have a set of questions I would encourage you to answer before creating your Facebook posts/Ads.

What type of customer do you want?
Are you looking for a particular age, gender, location, etc.?
What are the personality traits, emotions, needs, passions and frustrations of your audience?
What value can you bring to people?
What do they like/dislike?

TARGETED ADS

Once your content has been checked and your audience has been decided on, it is time to create targeted ads. These targeted ads are created to appear on the individuals timelines who have already viewed your business facebook page(maybe after you boosted an entertaining post). They have showed an interest and so now your goal, as the business, is to make them aware of the irresistible qualities your product or service has. We do this by placing specific ads on their timelines.

A good question to ask when creating one of these ads is, what is so intriguing that they must click on it? 


To reach people you must step back from being a salesman and step into being a friend with some great advice. Your audience is a group of individuals that sees the need for your service and is aware of your brand and what you have to offer. The next step is getting them to choose YOU. For this group, it is important to reveal the importance and value in your specific product or service, more than likely there are multiple businesses selling the same thing. You want to use the ads to show them why they want your company above others. This should be simple once you have quality content and have determined your audience!

The ad should have information about your product or service but more than anything it should offer them something free. This is the perfect opportunity to snag an email. This could be a free PDF, a free webinar or even a certain strategy(free advice). It is important to note that most small businesses usually get a conversion by offering something in their targeted ad. Conversions don’t always mean sales either, someone who downloads your PDF could end up being a valuable long-term customer, but that wasn’t an immediate sale.

A key part of seeing who you are reaching and if you are reaching the right people, is by tracking your results. This will be important in any social media campaign you run.

TRACKING RESULTS

This is the last part of the process but is just as important. After you run an ad, be sure to go back and analyze the results. Check the clicks, the engagement and most importantly have your Facebook linked up to your website so you are able to determine how many emails you gained through your website from your Facebook ad. Once you get emails, you are able to send out promotions and new products weekly. As you run more ads, you will be able to determine what is working and what isn’t, unfortunately, it does take some money and mistakes to get to that point. Don’t give up though because a lot of ads become perfected through trial and error! Feel free to shoot me an email with any questions regarding facebook marketing, this is just a simple outline and I hope it was useful!

Nov 01
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TIPS + TRICKS TO SMALL BUSINESS MARKETING

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SMALL BUSINESS ADVERTISING METHODS/TECHNIQUES 



What marketing techniques can I implement to grow my clientele? 
First, I want to say having a presence on social media is EXTREMELY important. If you own your own business and are wanting to grow, you need to have a Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn, and/or Pinterest. Not only do you need to have accounts on these, but you need to be active on each one. This means posting 3-5 a week. This will only help you, never hurt your business(unless you are posting absurdities, but you shouldn’t do that). Packaging consistent social media management with a few of the options below will raise awareness about your business and enable you to thrive.



Blog Management
Monthly or Weekly Blog
Creating a blog post once a month can be very time consuming, but it is so necessary depending on what field of work. Photography to home construction to a dental office, all business have advice to give to people that the “common man” probably does not know. You specialized in this area and are consistently keeping up with news in the industry so what better person to give out advice?
Attaching a blog tab to your website and sharing it on your social media platforms can be crucial to building relationships with new clients and growing with previous clients. You can get creative with blog posts but always try to use video or photos when doing it, these catch the attention of viewers much quicker and usually keep them locked in longer as well! “How to” videos do great because people feel like you are giving away free advice that you were taught or learned.  Take some pride in what you do and don’t be afraid to show people the right way to do things!
I offer monthly and weekly blog management. I brainstorm ideas with the client, type out an outline, record video or take photos and send a draft to the client for edits. After approval, I move forward with publishing the blog and sharing it on social media platforms.

Review Management 
Review management deals with reviews and ratings on social media and google. These are important for your potential customers, seeing a 5 star average on Google and some well pleased customers comments can do wonders for your business. I are here to take over and revitalize your reputation. Reaching out to previous clients and asking for a survey and review on Facebook or Google, allows us to get personal with the individuals you have done work for. I am able to make the client/customer feel safe talking to us since I am not the owner, this opens the door for real honesty and gives us a realistic view of the quality work done. If they can be honest about a time mishaps or miscommunication, I can relay information back to the owner and fix the issue instead of being blind to the problems arising.
Most people leave bad reviews and rarely good ones, unless they are asked. Bad reviews are an opportunity to learn and change your business to better meet the needs of your customers. But customer satisfaction should be displayed as well, this is why I find it important to reach out and being to transform your reputation.

Monthly Email Campaign
A monthly update to your previous/current clients is important if you have a spot for individuals to give their emails on your website. If you do not have an email list this is not as important, but if people have given their emails, you should take advantage of the options at your finger tips. The content on this can be similar to blogging, stick to video or photos to grab attention. This is an easy way to keep people updated on your business and show current work or projects.
I offer monthly and weekly email campaigns. I brainstorm ideas with the client, type out an outline, record video or take photos and send a draft to the client for edits. After approval, I move forward with sending out to email list. After a few days have gone by, I report the results to the client.

Website Recreation
Whether it is a full redesign, or partial recreation, spicing up your website is never a bad idea. Many companies spend a large lump some on a new website but do not keep it updated with recent content. Creating a hub for your clients and potential clients to come and learn about your company without causing them a headache. Physical appearance and content are key ingredients to creating a simple and informative website. Limiting your webpage to 5-6 pages, will allow your company to provide sufficient content but not overwhelm the viewer. I can find a design that is perfect for your company and create content that is easy to read, informative and organized. My job is to partner with your company to gather photos, video, and other forms of media to make your website inviting and creative.

Social Media Ad campaign 
Pinterest, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram all allow you to run ads with your own content for a minimal price. To make a large dent in the social media platform it is smart to push at least $500 into each platform for the month. Videos, photos, surveys or giveaways do really well when you put some money behind them and honestly, in advertising this will get you the farthest for your buck! I currently run continuous ads for multiple small business. It is important to have an Ad running at all times, if not a few. Each industry is different but these tend to get a lot of website clicks and have shown to increase leads.

Google Ad words campaign 
Pay per click. Google helps you sort through keywords and gives you a cost per click for each keyword selected. The thing is, you only pay if someone clicks on your link. This helps you move up in the rank on google and when someone types in your specific keyword into the search engine your name will slowly be making its way to the top, depending on the amount of money put into it. This type of campaign can only be quick if you spend quite a bit of money upfront, but can really increase website activity and clients. But like I said, if your website is out of date, it may turn away a potential customer.

SEO 
This involves months of building powerful and diverse links that make your site appear more relevant to the search engine. These links are produced the hard way from “white-hat” sources including social media, directories, blogs, press releases, and other sources. The combinations of these operations bring our client sites to the top of the search results, producing dramatic improvements in site visitors.

These are all of the current options I offer for digital marketing and would love to assist you in starting a marketing campaign for your business! Fill out the contact form below if you have any questions.

Oct 16
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5 BASIC STEPS TO SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGEMENT

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Managing your businesses advertising can be confusing, frustrating and take a lot of time. Which is why businesses will hire out an advertising agency, but owning your own small business, you may not have the finances to do that. Luckily, for you, technology has advanced greatly in the recent years and social media platforms are the new place to advertise. The best part is, you can do digital marketing for extremely cheap by making free social media accounts. I manage social media accounts for businesses and have learned some simple “to-do’s” that will transform your social media.

1. Create a separate business “page”, on Facebook, that you can access from your personal account

This is so important! Trying to sell your friends something constantly through your personal Facebook page will force many people to feel annoyed and many to unfollow you. By making a Facebook business page, then inviting all of your personal friends, you leave the door open for them to choose whether or not they want you selling them something, every single day through Facebook. If they choose to follow, you know they have interest. If they don’t, you can still keep them as a friend instead of shoving a product down their throat they are not interested in. 🙂
This also works for Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest. It is important to separate yourself from your personal accounts and begin to create a brand all within your company name. The individuals who are interested will begin following once they know you exist so don’t be afraid to tell people about your accounts!

2. Join groups that allow you to engage your target audience

You have to join groups in your personal account, so this may be uncomfortable for some people. You can’t hide behind your business name because when you enter the group it will show your first and last name and your profile picture.
If you don’t know what I am talking about here, begin to search through the “groups” page on Facebook. There are literally groups for everyone. Cat lovers, single moms, entrepreneurs, ice cream lovers, and even a pen swapping group. That’s right, people who join that group meet up with individuals weekly and trade pens! This can be annoying due to the vast amount of options but this also works in your favor. If you have intricate/weird interests there is a group for you and that is the group you should join to begin reaching out to people about your business. You don’t want to pick a group that is filled with individuals selling the same stuff as you. You want to find a group of potential clients. This is a very fine line you are walking though, many people get kicked out of groups for being too “salesy”. This is where the relationship comes in, you MUST build relationships with people before you start selling them something.


Start by:


Searching groups
Joining 3-5 of them
Find commonalities with a few individuals
Engage in simple, small talk
Allow relationship to build with a few individuals in the group(give it a few weeks)
As you get to know the person, and they get to know you, share what you do for a living and tell them about your business.

3. Become an authority online 

The way you become an authority figure on social media is by giving out expert advice and opinions. If you have been in the industry for years, tell people and explain the things you have learned. This is a huge part of your content, be sure to offer mistakes you have made and also share the really great choices that have made you successful.

Ways to do this:
Tips + tricks
“How to” videos
Factoids
Recommendations

4. Post relevant content

This next point feeds off #3. The content you post will either bore your followers or keep them wanting more. This is important to susta
in hundred’s of followers. Post content that shows you are an expert in your field and be helpful to individuals asking questions.
Build a relationship with your followers, and allow them to see what real life is like for you. This intrigues people and makes them feel like they know you personally, even though they may not.

5. Be consistent

Post daily. That’s honestly it. The more your business name is popping up on someone’s timeline, the better. SO THAT MEANS DAILY. If you don’t have time to create and post content 7 days a week! Give us a call! That is what we are here for.