(MKTG 348) Week 9 - Sending Effective Emails

Email Marketing? Is that still something we do? Yes! Email marketing is still really important and something that if used right can be very effective. According to Hubspot, email marketing is growing and the number of people that still use email today is exorbitant. Email allows you to converse one on one with your customer, there's no middle man in the way. When you use a social media site like Facebook, Facebook will always be in the middle of you and your customer. You own your email. Hubspot also makes the claim that you will get a 4300% ROI when you use email marketing. So for every one dollar you spend you can make forty three dollars back. Pretty crazy right? 

When you create an email you need to make sure that you are sending it to the right person at the right time with the right message. You need to be aware of what part of the buyer's journey your potential customer is in and tailor your content to meet that customers needs. You do not want to bombard your customer with thousands of email's trying to force them to make a purchase. You want to inform, create enticing offers, and send gentle reminders. 

It is important to remember that once you have obtained a lead as a customer you need to keep sending emails. You want to keep your customer happy and keep sending them offers. Everyone loves getting a coupon for their favorite store and it encourages them to keep making more purchases. Even if your email is just information about new trends or something related to your business you still want to send it to your customers. This will make them feel important and like you care enough about them to keep them in the know. Keeping your customers attention is very important!

Hubspot suggests four ways to create the best email:

1. Decide on your audience. Who in particular are you trying to reach?
2. Segment your contacts so that they match this audience
3. Determine what stage your buyers are in in the buying journey and tailor your content to fit these needs
4. Create an offer or message that encourages your lead to become a customer. Basically, create great content!

Some things to keep in mind when crating emails are that:

A. Personalizing is important: Customers respond to personalization, if they feel the content and email is really tailored to their needs they will be much more happy. 

B. Goals should be set: You should always have a goal with your email. Do you want to increase brand awareness, drive traffic to the site, encourage a purchase of a particular product

C. Engagement should be a main focus: You want to make sure your content engages your customer and makes them want to click on your email or respond to the message you have sent. After all, engagement leads to action.

D. You should test and analyze your results: You should always measure how effective your emails are. Is the content your putting in your email producing results? Could you being doing something wrong?

Now you may begin to better understand why emails are so important and how you can really send an effective email that produces an action that ends in a happy customer!

(MKTG 348) Week 8 - Thank You Page's

It's always nice to hear a Thank You after you've made a purchase or signed up for something but is it really the proper thing to do for a business? According to HubSpot, Yes! You need to make your customers feel appreciated and on the analytical side you can also track successful conversions this way. So really it's a win-win for everybody!

When creating your Thank You Page it is important to remember that this page can help you send your lead to other parts of your website. You may want to provide links to different pages that can provide more information or entice the lead to stay with your company. If you link to the right content you can help your buyer move further along their buyer journey.

You really want to make sure that on your Thank You Page you explain more about the offer and further expand on when the lead may hear back from you. You want them to be informed and feel confident about submitting their information to you. You should always make it very easy for your potential customer to get to the offer they submitted their information for. And again, if you cannot provide them with the information right away give them a time frame. No one likes empty promises or vague words. Be descriptive, will it take two days? A week? A month? Address this with an honest answer.

You should also make sure that your navigation tab is accessible on your Thank You Page. That way if your potential customer wants to browse through your site they have an easy way to do so. By showing the navigation menu on this page you are giving the potential lead an opportunity to further confirm their decision to work with you. This means that the content on your website should be enticing, correct, and informative. You want to make sure that your potential leads feel comfortable and happy about the decision they made to give you their information.

Although it may seem wrong, you should actually provide another call-to-action (CTA) for the leads to look at. Maybe there is an extension or something else you can add onto what the lead was just looking at or maybe there's another offer that might interest them. It is always important to try and move your buyer along their journey as smoothly as possible. If you have an offer that can help them even more then your previous offer then you should put a CTA to show it. Let these potential leads know that you have more to offer.

A few important things to remember for your Thank you Page are that you should be definitive with your time frame, provide additional information, and create additional enticing CTA's.

(MKTG 348) Week 7 - Landing Pages and Lead Conversion

Hubspot discusses ways to convert unknown website visitors into known leads. HubSpot suggests viewing your landing page as a type of sales rep that tries to convert your visitors into leads. A benefit to having a landing page is that it is operating at all times of the day. Unlike a real sales person, a website is constantly ready to convert visitors into leads.

The most basic way to convert a visitor into a lead is by creating a submission form on your landing page. The form usually includes a space to provide contact information as well as leave any comments or questions. It is suggested that you have at a minimum 15 landing pages for visitors to browse through; one of these pages being a submission form. Here is an example of a submission form:

When creating your landing page it is important to keep in mind the stage of the buyer's journey your visitor may be in. This will help you tailor your content to meet those needs. It is also best if you have a goal in mind of the percentage of conversions you want. A conversion rate of around 20% is suggested by HubSpot. 

A good test to see if your landing page is effective is something called a blink test. With a blink test you should be able to quickly glance at your landing page and immediately know what is being offered or discussed. There are a few guidelines you should follow when you are creating a blink test worthy landing pages. These guidelines include a clear action oriented headline that also briefly and concisely explains the offer. You should also make sure that in the next few lines you explain the benefit and value of your offer to your buyer. It is important to understand that you should make your information stand out. You can accomplish this by using different font styles, colors, or symbols. All of these things will help draw attention to your offer and keep the potential lead engaged. 

Having a focused landing page that defines a clear offer to your potential customers is extremely important. It can truly make or break a sale for your business. 

(MKTG 348) Week 6 - SEO and Mobile Content

The article "Mobile Devices Upend Google Search" by Alistair Barr discusses some interesting points regarding the use of mobile content and how it can effect search engine optimization. One major change the author shares with readers is that SEO is no longer about using a million keywords to improve ranking. Now SEO is reliant on content that is not only relevant and consistent but also mobile friendly. With this being said, it is important to keep in mind that if you want better ranking on Google you need to focus on and consistently update your websites mobile content.

The article provides some insight into how the search world has changed since the use of mobile devices. Originally when you searched something it would be in a search engine and then that search engine would give you results based on your keywords. Now a search can come from a spoken command or a typed sentence. The results have also changed due to mobile devices. Now a result can take you to a website, app, email, or calendar event.

It is not as easy for Google to search through Apps as it is for Google to search through a webpage. Due to this difficulty, Google has needed the help of app developers in searching and reading the apps. Some apps like Amazon and Netflix don't actually let Google see their apps. All of these complications have ended up requiring Google to rank apps based on number of users and average use time on app.

Retailers are becoming more focused on product shopping ads on smartphones because Google usually leaves those ads at the top of the screen. "Digital-marketing agency Merkle Inc. estimates product ads generate 5% to 15% of Google’s annual revenue, or as much as $11.2 billion last year (Barr)." As you can see companies are spending a lot of money on this type of advertising. It seems that the more successfulyou want to be with Google the more money you have to spend.

Reference: Barr, Alistair. "Mobile Devices Upend Google Search." The Wall Street Journal. Dow Jones & Company, Inc., 25 Feb. 2016. Web. Mar. 2016. <http://www.wsj.com/articles/mobile-devices-upend-google-search-1456396202>.

(MKTG 348) Week 5 - Inbound Marketing

Hubspot's main focus is on inbound marketing. Inbound marketing differs from regular marketing in several ways. Traditional marketing focuses on sending out messages to the customer. Almost interrupting the buyer with your message during the day. The idea behind inbound marketing is trying to produce content that draws your buyer in instead of throwing content at them. So for example, instead of forcing a commercial on TV for someone to watch you may create a video and post it online with a title that attracts buyers. If the buyer wants to view the video they can and if they do not want to they don't have too. This helps break down the wall of total marketer control; it gives more control to the consumer. Giving consumers control is important because then they won't feel like they are being harassed with messages all day and will not be upset with the company.

Inbound marketing stresses the idea of being part of the conversation. You can do this by putting out  blog post that is helpful to your intended audience or even suggesting a tip that could help them with a problem they are having if they asked a question. According to Hubspot, the buying process has changed. People rarely go into a store and buy something based on what the salesperson suggested. Typically, a consumer will do their research online and then go and make their purchase based on what they found on the internet. If your company is the solution they found online they may be more inclined to purchase what you are offering. The customer found you, you didn't find them and this is important.

A few good ways to gain attention to your site is by blogging, using SEO, and using social media. Hubspot mentions that the most important thing to do once someone is at your site is get their contact information (email). The best way to do this is by offering the customer something in return. For example, if the customer gives you their email than you can offer a coupon, or free ebook, or whatever may be attractive to your audience.

One of the most important things to remember when using inbound marketing is that you need to analyze everything you do. You need to make sure that your strategies are effective. You do not want to waste time and money on something that is doing nothing for your customers or your business.

(MKTG 348) Week 4 - Buyer Persona

This weeks assignment required the class to create buyer personas based on information we learned from HubSpot. Understanding your buyer persona is very important because it helps you better tailor your content to meet your customers needs and wants. The first step in creating your buyers persona is developing the profile of your buyer. First you must define the demographics of your buyer. Demographics include things such as income, gender, age, and education level. There are many other steps in defining your buyer persona such as job level, problem definition and solution, and other various components. Once this is completed you will have a better understanding of your buyer which will help you learn what content to produce for your audience.

The next step in this process is identifying what stage of the buying process your audience is in. This is important to know because it helps you tailor your content to meet your buyers needs. A buyer can be in three different stages: Awareness, Consideration, and Decision. Another reason it's important to know your audiences buyer stage is because if you put out decision related content for someone who is unaware of your product they may not purchase. Whereas had you known your buyer was in the awareness stage you could have created content that helped them understand what your product/service is or does. Then this could have led your buyer to the consideration stage and potentially to a purchase.

Once you have taken all of this into consideration you can then begin to create content. It is important to remember that planning your content is just as important as executing it. It is pointless to try and get out as much content as possible if the content isn't going to be beneficial. You are much better off taking your time and working on content that will benefit your business and your buyer.

(MKTG 348) Week 3 - Fundraising Posts

Last week in class we had to post articles we reviewed for the RGB Exchange onto our social media sites. The topic of for the articles was fundraising. Everyone in the class found different articles and typed up a summary of what the article discussed. These articles were then posted to the RGB Exchange website. The article I chose to review was one about fundraising for non-profits. The author of this article gave readers new ideas for fundraising that they may have not thought of before. These ideas include things such as affinity fundraising, creating minor donor groups and participating in super events.

The original article can be found via this link: Fundraising Article

The article that I summarized can be found on the RGB Exchange website via this link: RGB Article

The image below shows the post that I shared through my Facebook page of the article I summarized for the website.

After I completed this task I then went onto the second assignment. For this assignment we had to rank check the RGB Exchange website using the word keyword fundraising. When I performed the rank check activity I found that the RGB Exchange website was not ranked under the keyword "fundraising" on Bing, Google, or Yahoo! In an previous assignment we tried to rank check the RGB Exchange website using the keyword/phrase "non-profit stock exchange".  The RGB website was not ranked under this keyword/phrase search either. It seems that more activity and relevant content needs to be created on the website before it becomes ranked on any of the search engines. Below is an image of the rank check activity using the keyword "fundraising."

(MKTG 348) Week 2 - SEO Rank Check

This weeks assignment was to see how different websites ranked based on a keyword search. This was a very interesting activity because customers who are searching for a new product will most likely search for a keyword instead of a particular brand or company name. I know that when I am looking for a new item, for example an iPhone case, I look up 'phone case' in google and click on the first few results. So it is clearly important that a company's website has a high rank on search results or it may not get viewed.
The exercise we worked on in class allowed the class to test different websites' rankings based on a keyword search. Our professor provided us with a website where we could type in a website address and then compare it to another website address. The sample sites we looked up were www.rgbexchange.org and npoex.strikingly.com and the keyword we searched was 'non profit stock exchange'. After you submit the two sites and the keyword this is the results you would see:

As you can see both of the websites are not ranked under the keyword search 'non profit stock exchange'. This means that when you Google search that particular key word these websites will not show up. The image above also shows whether or not the link appears on Bing or Yahoo! As an experiment I tried modifying the key word using the same sites to see if I could get different results. I modified the keyword from 'non profit stock exchange' to ' non profit stock' and these are the results I obtained:

Using this new keyword I was able to find the npoex.strinkingly.com website as the eighth result on Bing. It was interesting to see that with a slight modification to a keyword a website can go from not even being ranked to being placed as the eight link. Just to double check this finding I performed a Bing search using the keyword 'non profit stock'. Once I performed this search I found that npoex.strikingly.com did in fact come up as the eighth link on Bing. Picking the right key word can really make a difference in whether or not a website is ranked.