Marketing

How Would BtoB Service Oriented Businesses Market Their Services Online?

Business to Business (B2B) service oriented businesses tend to have different marketing needs compared to (Business to Consumer) B2C and product oriented companies.  As a result, their online marketing efforts take on a slightly different focus than the other type of businesses.  So how would a B2B business approach online marketing online?  Below lists a few different area on how a service oriented business would focus their online marketing efforts to get the most return on investment.

 

1) SEO – Search Engine Optimization

This is still a very effective method to get more exposure for and traffic to your website therefore generating more leads for your business.  Ranking for specific keywords is powerful because you are able to specifically target your marketing based on the keywords people use to find your services.  If they come to your website from the search engines using your targeted keywords, you can be certain they are interested in your services.  Once they get to your website however, you still have to convert the visitors into leads and customers.  There are many web conversion tactics that are outside the scope of this article that you can engage in which will increase your percentage of ‘converted’ visitors on your website.

 

2) Social Media

Social media is a very powerful way of connecting with your target market.  For B2B businesses, it is very imperative to know which networks will work best for your because not all networks are the same.  In my experience, I have found that while Facebook can be a great resource for generating leads, it depends upon the type of business you have and who your target audience is.  For more BtoB service oriented businesses, LinkedIn is usually a better solution because […]

By |April 15th, 2013|Marketing|0 Comments
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Lead Conversion and Tailored Content – Better Web Conversion?

In reading a  ChiefMarketer.com article I ran across, I had an interesting idea.  The article (link shared below), discussed using content, such as ebooks, webinars and teleseminars, and whitepapers to generate leads.  Although the article didn’t specifically mention it, you can use any form of content including articles, videos and audios/podcasts/internet radio shows as well.  The whole point of using this content is to inspire opt-ins into the sales funnel.

The whole point of this article, and it makes a good point at this, is that when you get the opt-ins and leads, from using these methods, you need to realize that the prospect is usually not ready to buy at this time.  They are in the research phase.  The know they have a problem, but they don’t know which direction to turn in to solve it.  So it’s not about selling the prospect once you get the lead information, but about supporting the prospect into realizing that your service is what they are looking for.  So what are the keyword in the last sentence?

1) Support

2) Service

You support the prospect because by sharing with them the information they require be able to know where to go to solve their problem.  If you share the information from a true mindset of service, you will naturally attract those to you that are your ideal target market and then guide those that aren’t part of your target market onto someone who would love to serve that segment of the market.  This is the “wealth is in the few” mentality that comes from having an abundant mindset of knowing there is plenty for everyone.

So how is this done?  Adding personalization through experiences and stories is usually a great way to […]

By |June 24th, 2012|Marketing|0 Comments
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Email Automation Strategy Tip

Even with the rise in the use of Social Media among the masses, and thus your target market, email is still a very viable way of marketing to your prospects and strengthening your customer relationships.  News letters are much more effective at keeping your audience up to date on what you are doing in your business, or provide just enough valuable information to your readers that they are enticed enough to go to your business website to find out more information and take an action.

One automation process tip is to create an HTML page of your email, and send out an announcement to your social networks with a link pointing to the HTML page of your email.  This is tactic is great because it lets your extended social network, many of whom are probably not currently on your mailing list, get a chance to preview your email quality and then decide of they want to be on your mailing list or not.  When you are using the right email service, the HTML page is automatically created for you and a notice is sent out to your social networks with a link going back to the HTML page.  This takes a lot of manual steps out of your online marketing strategy, which makes it easier to implement and reduces implementation errors.

Another powerful tip for automating your email process combines the power of blogging and email marketing.  If you keep a regular blogging strategy, you can automate much of the email marketing process.  You can set up your email service to automatically send out to your mailing list the latest post of your blog.  The more sophisticated programs will allow you to set up how often […]

By |May 29th, 2012|Marketing|0 Comments
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Top 3 Tips For Writers To Generate Income

Content, especially original content is gold on the Internet, however, if you don’t know what to do with that content, you won’t be able to use it to generate additional revenue streams for your business.  There are many traditional writers out there who are very frustrated with how the Internet has changed their livelyhood.  They are now competing with writers who are willing to write for free and are slowly seeing their means of getting paid to do writing (especially providing content for online media sources such as blogs and other online publications) quickly diminishing.  That way of making a living is going the way of the dinosaur in most cases.  Sure, there are still some opportunities available for the traditional paid writing gigs, but they are not as prevalent as they used to be, and the pay isn’t what it used to be either.

So what is a writer to do?  A writer (a good writer especially) doesn’t realize that they are a walking gold mine unto themselves, and even though their original means of making a living are disappearing, new ways of making a living have sprung up that actually provide much greater potential in revenue.   There is one major reason for this increase in potential.  That reason is due to the fact that as a writer, you no longer have to exchange hours of your writing for dollars.  Let’s face it, with the traditional methods, you would get paid per job.  You can only do so many jobs because there are only so many hours in a day.  An enterprising writer could use interns to expand their job capacity, however if you are your brand, you put that at risk by […]

By |May 6th, 2012|Affiliate Marketing|0 Comments
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Is Your Web Presence Road Kill on the Information Superhighway?

Let’s face it…. Long gone are the days when you could launch a website, do some occasional blogging or random marketing and expect to see a decent amount of traffic from your inconsistent efforts.  It worked in the early days however now when it comes to the Internet and getting your web presence to effectively bring in clients and customers, you need to have a strategy in place that will allow your efforts to continually build upon each other to create an effective marketing tool for your business.

So what is Internet road kill?  For the most part, it’s a revenue generating website doesn’t fulfill it’s intended purpose.  If you have a website intending to create more business and it isn’t doing so, then it’s Internet road kill.  Your website traipsed upon the information superhighway and got run over by the machinations of the Internet.  The good news is that unlike real road kill, you can bring your website back from the dead.

So what are some of the things you can do to resurrect your website to something more than a post-apocalyptic reanimated mindless flesh-eating zombie drone?  (How marginally clever!  I put website and zombie in the same sentence without it referring to a website about zombies).  Implementing the following 3 tips will put you on the right track and can raise your website up from the remnants of a 7 day old squashed animal carcass baking on the asphalt of a hot summer day.

1)   Strengthen your website’s connection to your target market

Are you still connecting strongly to your target market?  As your business grows and changes/expands/contracts, your target market can change as well.  What […]

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By |March 4th, 2012|Marketing|0 Comments
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Integrating Your Social Media Sites with Your Business Website

Even though social media has grown in significance, and it has now become a necessary part of a businesses’ online strategy, it should not completely replace the traditional methods of online marketing.  Social media has an important role in creating relationships, building brand and customer confidence in your business, product, or service.  For most businesses, your website is still the main place where you would convert your prospects and network friends into customers.

You also want to keep in mind that you still want to spend your marketing dollars building up your own online asset (your website) instead of another’s online asset (your social networking sites).  If you spend your efforts and energy promoting your Facebook page, Twitter account, or Youtube channel, in lieu of your own website, then you are putting your online presence at risk.  If one of your social network sites closes down, or your account gets deleted, then you lose your main means of marketing your business online.   Keeping the marketing focus on your own website allows you to maintain control of your online marketing.

That being said, how does the ever busy entrepreneur keep the appropriate level of focus on their own website while taking advantage of their social media networks to increase product or service awareness and create more clients and customers from this integration?

Well the first step is to be clear on what the focus is for each one.  Use your social media accounts to generate awareness for your business and services and then use your website to convert them into sales and new clients.

Your social media traffic is different than the majority of your other traffic sources because it is what is considered warm traffic.  These visitors already […]

By |February 20th, 2012|Marketing|0 Comments
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Top 5 Things to Demand in Your Email Marketing Service… Does Yours Do These?

Even with the rise of social media, email marketing is still an effective way to stay connected with prospects, generate sales and market affiliate products for additional revenue streams.  However, with the rise of social media and other forms of communication, such as text messaging, the way email marketing is done needs to be updated.  What should you be looking for in your email marketing service that will keep you updated with the latest developments on the Internet?

1) Consistent product improvement.
The email service provider should look very different today than it did 5 years ago.  If it looks the same, or has most of the same features, then you should look for another email service.  The email provider should keep their service up to date with the newest developments on the Internet and integrate their service to take advantage of these new online changes.

2)  Close integration with your blog
Your blog and your email provider should be closely integrated.  Your service provider should have the option to automatically email your blog postings out to your mailing list whenever you update your blog.  A good service provider will allow you to pick how often you want to automatically email your blog postings out so you don’t overwhelm your list.  This feature saves you time in keeping connected with your mailing list while you are posting great content to your blog.  Clever applications of this feature can practically automate a significant portion of your online business strategy.

3) Ability to connect to your social networks.
Your email list should allow you to send broadcast emails out to your social network accounts as well when you send an email out to your mailing list.  The networks that your provider should […]

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By |February 13th, 2012|Marketing|0 Comments
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How do I get my web presence to generate more business?

Sign up for our free web conversion webinar on how to get more business from your website!

This is a very common question that really has several parts to it.  Overall, generating more business can mean 1 of 2 different things, or both things together.  The first step is to have an overall business strategy.  You will need to decide on a target market and connect to that market.  Who is it you love to serve?  That passion will show itself on your web site, and that is what gets the clicks, phone calls, sales, email signups, etc.  That passion cannot be communicated to your target market if it isn’t there.

Another factor in generating more business from your web presence is being very aware of where your traffic is coming from.  What is your strategy for placing your links out on the web?  Random link exchanges and placing your links on directories that are filled with junk websites will not bring you visitors worth anything.  Those links may get you some search engine ranking clout, but in the long run, it’s what you receive is not worth the effort it takes to do all of that insignificant directory submissions.  4 or 5 good, quality and targeted directories will give you better results than 300 poor quality general directories.  So take the time up front to develop your strategy before you move forward on some random tactic here and there.

So what are the steps to generating more business?

  1. Determine your target market – the more defined and the smaller the better.  – you will be able to more easily connect with that market when it shares more characteristics in common.  Find out as much as you […]
By |December 5th, 2011|Marketing|0 Comments
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Web Conversion – What we leave on the floor

I was at a workshop this weekend and one of the speakers said something that was somewhat of a light bulb moment for me.  She said that most businesses and marketers focus on turning people who aren’t their clients into prospects instead of just focusing on those that are already interested in your services that don’t have to be convinced.

So what does this mean?

It means that if you feel you have to educate your client to know if they need your services or not, then they are not your target market.  They may be in the future, but let someone else educate that market and you focus on those that already KNOW enough about you to know if they need your services or not.

It also means that you may need to really put some focus into your marketing message so you can more strongly connect with those that require your services, or have someone available to be able to answer your website visitor’s questions.

The key is to really be clear and as specific as you can be about your target market and how you can help them, and what is your specialty in how you can help them.  The more specific you are, the more targeted your message can be, and the easier it will be for you to focus on those that are already interested in what you have to offer as opposed to convincing those that aren’t interested in your services.

What is an example of a clear message?

Let’s use an example for marketing, and a marketing firm.

Let’s say that their target market is small businesses who want to market their services to other businesses, and that is their […]

By |November 7th, 2011|Marketing|0 Comments
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The One Thing that Increases Your Website Conversion Rate the Most

One of the biggest things that is often overlooked is website conversion.  Most businesses focus on getting more traffic to their website.  They spend thousands and thousands of dollars getting that traffic to their website, yet they don’t seem to realize that if visitors are coming to your website and not taking an action, those efforts of getting the traffic to your website have gone to waste.

Before I go further, let’s talk about web conversion… what is a web conversion rate?

A website’s conversion rate is equal to the number of people who take a desired action on your website divided by the number of people who visit your website.  I say desired action because leaving your website is also an action, but not desired!  So a 3% conversion rate (slightly above average) means that out of every 100 people that come to your website, only 3 people take an action!

So with all those visitors who escape your clutches, what’s a poor website owner to do?  Well enter the art of increasing your web conversion rate!  There are few processes that will gradually allow you to increase your conversion rate, including things like split testing of various website elements.  If you are really good, you can get your conversion rate to up to 8%, which is phenomenal!

The whole split testing thing can take some time and lots of effort and someone who knows what they are doing.  If you are fortunate enough to understand how to do it yourself, and/or fortunate enough to find someone qualified enough and affordable enough for you, then you can expect to see an increase in your income.  This is a longer term effort and will eventually reach a plateau […]

By |October 14th, 2011|Marketing|0 Comments
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