Local Reputation Management

9-13-online-reputationConsumers Trust in Online Reviews Skyrocketing!

Myles Anderson of BrightLocal just released the 2013 Local Consumer Review Survey at SearchEngineLand. What is eye-catching within the study is that there are very clear and indisputable results that we can easily see.

What we learned offers us four distinct takeaways.

  • More people are trusting online reviews just as much as personal recommendations. A full 79 percent (up from 72 percent just a year ago!) say that genuine online reviews (emphasis on genuine) carry the very same impact if not more than a recommendation from someone they know.
  • The trust in online reviews is growing. A stunning 72 percent are of the opinion that genuine, positive customer reviews make them trust a business more. This is up from 58 percent in 2012! It’s very apparent that buyers are seeking and taking note more than before and are placing their trust in reviews. At the same time, only some 12 percent of consumers said they pay no attention of online reviews, down from 17 percent in 2012.
  • Also, people are viewing far fewer reviews before making their buying decisions. Notably, 67 percent of consumers read 6 reviews or less, up from 52 percent in 2012. Consumers are also reading less than 7 reviews – 22 percent now vs. 35 percent in 2012.
  • It’s now more significant than ever to make sure you manage your online reputation. Since the number or reviews read are shrinking, as well as the impact of those reviews heightened, it’s important to make sure you are monitoring your online reputation for all current activity. As the most recent reviews are swinging the buying decisions, you’ll want to find out if anything negative shows up and act on it. Create a policy for handling negative reviews in an open manner, and a system for generating new, positive reviews which will send those less than desirable reviews further down the page . Be sure that these are genuine, as consumers are getting better at ferreting out fake and corporate-generated “reviews”.

Take this and run with it!

Information such as this is pure gold, and clearly actionable. Kudos to Myles Anderson and the people at BrightLocal for this very beneficial and eye-opening study.

5 Surefire Tips for Location Based Marketing

5surefireways-aug-2013As business moves more and more in your local direction, you will want to make sure that you’re doing all that you can to ensure that not only is your business being found locally, but that you’re winning the space!

Here are 5 great tips to help get your location based marketing on track!

Optimize and complete your listings – According to Yext, businesses are losing out to the tune of some $10.3 billion dollars a year as a result of missing or sketchy listings. This one should be a no brainer. Take the small amount of time it takes to get your business listed correctly on sites like Google+ Local, Foursquare, Yelp, Facebook, MapQuest and others you are using. Not only does this ensure you’ll show up in local search, but the correct images, addresses, phone numbers and additional information can result in actual money coming in. Small price to pay!

Ask for and reward reviews – Anyone that loves your products or services and is willing to express that to you should be asked to do a review. Certainly regular customers will have no problem with this, but even first-timers can be persuaded to do so, particularly if you grease the wheels a bit with a reward of some sort. Sometimes this can be as simple as a link back, a shoutout, or a coupon.

Incentivize your local business – Incentives have become expected when it comes to location based marketing. The competition is stiff, and it is incumbent upon you to provide a reason for customers to come back again and again, and to refer others to do the same.

Coupons and geo-based local apps – According to Entrepreneur, “location-based marketing works in two directions. One, you can PUSH ads out to people based on their location. Are they in the same vicinity as your retail stores? That can help you avoid wasting money. Two, you can PULL people in who are in discovery mode. The Blue Fog Market is a new deli around the corner from my office. When I looked for a place to eat nearby, Yelp showed me they had a deal for a free cup of Blue Bottle Coffee with purchase when I “check in.”

Coupon apps are still viable, and people will use them to find deals in your local area! There are many such apps and companies out there, and you’re not limited to Groupon and Living Social.

Being responsive – Understanding that engaging and being responsive to customer and prospects needs and concerns via social media or through email or a website review is key to your success with location based marketing. This sword cuts both ways, so not only should you be mindful of how you reply, but how fast. Concerns left stewing for days or weeks can become infected, and that will not be good for the health of your business!

Location-based marketing is a great way to add value to people and money to your bottom line. Start winning your local area today!

Why Not Use Vine To Make Short, Shareable Videos for your Biz

vinevideo-aug-2013You might have heard about Vine, the latest video app available form Twitter, and wondered how in the world a six second video clip could possibly do any wonders for your business!

You’d be surprised!

In fact, smart business owners are using Vine to share these 6-second clips to help them brand, announce, introduce and otherwise promote their businesses in a way nothing else does.

Marketers are always moaning about ways to use Twitter for their business; well, here you go!

A couple of recent examples would include RedVines, Urban Outfitters and Nintendo.

How to use Vine in your business

While still in its infancy, companies are finding innovative ways to use Vine to get the word out. Here are 4 ways from Biznology.com

Employee introductions – Makes short videos of your best employees. This is terrific way to market your brand, and not simply your products and services. And don’t limit this to management: allow clients and customers see the people who answer phones, load delivery trucks and work the cash registers too. These are the ones they deal with!
Behind the scenes clips of your office – Give a glimpse of what goes on at your company, showing different departments or tasks to let your customers get a peek at your office environment. Holiday Vine videos may well be the card de jour this coming season!
Your latest promotions – Using Vine as a way to make an inexpensive commercial that is concise and right to the point. According to IAB, 10-15 second spots were the most popular ads. Show off your newest product or advertise your services through a cleverly-cut Vine video.
Vine your company announcements – You’re your Tweets about anything to do with your company far more exciting with a Vine video. You can introduce new team members or promotions, and highlight awards or special recognition in an engaging fun, and sharable way!

And even more from Publiseek.com :

Show what your product looks like from different angles.
Shoot a short personal introduction of your company owners.
Record short and crisp customer testimonials after they have used your product.
Use Vine to send out 6 sec coverage of your launch or event.
If you are a realtor, send out a quick walk through of the property that you have listed. (walk fast!)
If you are in fashion business, create a 6 sec video showing your latest, hottest outfits.
Share your website design or show how your new app or game works.
Food establishments can show menu items and specials.
Show your work process by recording its different stages.
Interior decorators can use Vine to show what the room looked like before and after.

Vine is trending hot right now, and is a great opportunity to catch some attention with clever, funny and informative short, looping videos that are drop dead easy to make! Grab that Vine before it swings away!

Groupon and LivingSocial aren’t the Only Players in the HyperLocal Scene

july-article2Hyperlocal marketing is not new, but the term may be unfamiliar to many. Christened sometime in 2009, hyperlocal refers to the immediate area that your business serves. This will be different for every business, but in general it means your street, part of town, rural area or within reasonable walking or driving distance from your location.

For example:

California (CA): not hyperlocal.
Los Angeles County, CA semi-hyperlocal.
Westwood Village, CA truly hyperlocal.

So now that we’re clear about that, you may be thinking that your only answer in grabbing your portion of the hyperlocal market is through the likes of Groupon or LivingSocial. In reality, there are a slew of smaller players in the daily deal business that can serve your needs as well. Let’s see who some of them are.

The who’s who of Hyperlocal

These are the ones everyone knows about, and many of us use regularly. They often acquire the smaller players as well, ever-increasing their market share. These include the likes of companies like Groupon, LivingSocial, Google and Facebook.

The next tier down you’ll find sites like Yelp, Woot, CitySearch, The Weather Channel, Seamless, YellowPages, WhitePages, Foursquare and MapQuest.

Then we come to the smaller companies that serve this space. You may not have heard of some of these: ELocal, Local Response, Zip Local, Signpost, Closely, CityMaps, Yipit and ShowMeLocal.

There are new sites springing up all the time. For a list of some of these sites go here.

How to use smaller hyperlocal companies to gain more audience

Sometimes using the smaller hyperlocal companies can work to your advantage. Since many small businesses may not be used to marketing digitally, coming from a strictly print-based ad experience, it makes sense to start with smaller hyperlocal companies that may be able to serve you better and more economically than a behemoth may.

You may be able to strike deals that you would never have a shot at with Facebook, Groupon or LivingSocial.

It will be easier to test using small runs. You’ll be far more likely to actually speak to someone who can help you.

Tying these offerings into your hyperlocal blog

Once you’ve got an offering you’d like to test, making it an integral part of your hyperlocal blog to get the offer seen is the next step.

One hyperlocal blog that’s doing a great job in many areas, but especially in getting offers in front of its many readers is the West Seattle Blog.

Hyperlocal is many things, not simply coupon deals, though they can add greatly to the legitimacy of your site. Finding the correct mix of hyperlocal offering s and content is the challenge before you.

How to Make Your Copy Much More Persuasive

july-article1How to Make Your Copy Much More Persuasive
Marketing automation

So what are the hallmarks of great copy today?

You know it when you read it. Makes use of emotional triggers, images and anything else it can get its hands on to hit you where you live.

The sickening truth for marketers is that it is damn hard to write great copy. The days of throwing up (apt phrase) for what passed for good web content even a few years ago are long gone as we find ourselves competing for slices of people’s time that are getting ever smaller.

With that in mind, we wanted to look at ways you can make your web copy, whether it be sales copy, emails, web pages or blog posts; vibrant and uniquely suited to get the results you are seeking.

7 Ways to make your copy more compelling and effective

1- Plan on scanners, but write for readers! – In a seminal study by Jakob Nielsen, research showed that some 79 percent of web users scan the copy, digesting only headlines, and parts that catch their interest. A dismal 16 percent actually read word for word. That said, while it’s clear that much of your copy may not get read, making sure that what is read is compelling is your challenge today.

2- Copy success – Look at what moves you to make a buying decision. What is their language like? As they say, success leaves clues. Study salespages of successful products, and examine emails and newsletters of people you subscribe to. There is much here to learn!

3- Write memorable words – Using rich language and painting vivid word pictures is one thing that will engage and thrill your reader. If what you write is pedestrian, and forgotten moments after being clicked off of, you’ve essentially wasted your virtual ink!

4- Understand the conversion process– Using hypnotic words, along with overcoming objections and providing social proof will go a long way toward increasing your conversions.

5- Structure your copy from the top down – Since we know we have precious little time to waste, employ what’s known as the inverted pyramid. Put your most important point at the top of your copy, followed by less important ones.

6- Use emotional imagery – Paint word pictures, but also employ emotionally powerful images to illustrate and attest to your words. These can often help keep the visitor on the page longer, so they can read more of your outstanding prose!

7- You’re asking for it! – I hope you are, anyway. Asking for the sale, opt-in or any other call to action is an indispensable part of your web copy. You are there to persuade: to ask for an action is not only expected, but vitally important to your success!

Social Media Smackdown: Facebook vs Twitter

7-13-facebook-vs-twitterBetter for Marketers? Facebook or Twitter?

Twitter recently announced that its paid ad platform is now open to any who would like to use it. In testing for over a year, Twitter has been evaluating user feedback and refining Twitter ads. The most noticeable difference in this ad platform vs. Facebook’s is that you are only charged when anyone follows your promoted account from your ad, or someone retweets, replies, favorites or clicks on your promoted tweets. So now that Twitter has ads, does it qualify as a valid alternative to Facebook? Who wins this battle?

The Ultimate Social Media Smackdown: Facebook vs. Twitter!

Back in the day, (a couple of years ago) this would have been no contest. Now – not so sure who wins. To be sure, there are many variables that will factor into who takes home the crown. I suspect that the answer in fact is probably, it depends. Facebook has long been the undisputed King of social media, considering the practical advantages it had. The first huge network to make use of personal and business pages, along with an ad platform that for people who understand how to use it, that rivals anything Google aspires to.

The Case for Facebook

Besides the obvious business pages that are getting more and more useful, the reach of its network is definitely astounding. With more than a billion users, Facebook has evolved into a lot more than a place where one can get together with old school chums. Now, with well-oiled Facebook Pages, relevant groups and an extremely robust ad platform, you have most everything you could desire in a social media outlet.

Twitter’s Up

Twitter has the advantage of immediacy, and has a number of extremely useful applications, such as advanced search for leads, the ability to use embedded Tweets as testimonials, and it’s a wonderful platform for customer service. Inspite of the obvious differences in the length of the information you can share, Twitter’s speed and agility have definitely brought it onto the playing field with Facebook.

Now it’s just a matter of finding where your market is, (socially) and deciding which (if not both) are the best fit for your business!

New Mobile Marketing Tools

7-13-new-tools-for-mobile-marketingEnergize your Mobile Marketing with These New Tools!

Mobile marketing is changing as quickly as the phone models are, and keeping up with all of the cool gadgets to help us traverse this useful and now-indispensable technology is challenging but fun. So to help you stay informed, here are 3 new tools we’ve found that we now wonder how we ever did without them!

Red Stamp – Red Stamp characterizes themselves as your modern-day social secretary. And they couldn’t be more spot on! Red Stamp is a free Apple app that allows users to send wonderfully customized electronic and printed cards or notes in the blink of an eye. With lots of templates to select from, you are never unable when it comes to finding the perfect design or messaging to send out. Red Stamp integrates together with your contacts, and remembers your name and address. The coolest part is though, is the cards sent via email, text or Facebook and Twitter are free! If you would like send a printed card, it is physically mailed to the address of your choice for only $1.99 each. That’s good, since I can’t ever remember what happened to my stamps. Red Stamp is indeed a time saver!

Swipely – Essentially an online payments site, Swipely has branched out to incorporate a mobile loyalty program. Those days are gone of customers fumbling through their purse or wallet, searching for that tiny loyalty card to the establishment they’re frequenting. Swipely makes it easy with a text to join application that allows users to join with one simple text message. This type of program is invaluable for restaurants and retailers who are seeking ways to keep and win new customers. Mobile loyalty programs such as these can also be great for list building, which can also expand your business. Swipely’s mobile loyalty program is free to use for existing customers.

TextUs.biz – So many people prefer to text rather than talk (roughly 32 percent) TextUs.biz has found a way to fill a very real need for an affordable price. TextUs.biz is an app that allows businesses to send and receive texts from customers via their computer, phone or iPad, everything from simple reminders to promotional sales messages. Your end users don’t even have to download the app! TextUs.biz is totally free for the first 100 messages, and is very inexpensive after that, even if you end up sending tons of texts!

How NOT To Engage Using Social Media

7-13-what-not-to-do-with-your-social-media

What Not to Do On Facebook

Anyone watching “Kitchen Nightmares” starring Gordon Ramsey a few weeks ago in the episode featuring Amy and Samy Bouzaglo of Amy’s Baking Company in Scottsdale, Ariz. must still be shaking their heads in amazement at the social media fiasco that has ensued. It seems the owners didn’t think much of the recommendations offered by the often outspoken Ramsey, then took to their Facebook page to begin an all-out flame war with their critics, huge numbers of Reddit commenters that descended upon their page, and at last count have left some 45,000 comments. This developed into a classic lesson in how NOT to do social media. The always stubborn owner Amy, joined in by her husband, opened fire in an epic flaming match with the commenters, including salty language in all caps, to boot. There is no doubt they’ll be dealing whith this for a while, as the vast majority of the comments were, how should we say, less than complimentary. This was an epic social media train wreck if there has ever been one.

What not to do on Facebook

In a sober celebration of this meltdown, we thought it might be a good idea to talk about some the fundamentals concerning how you should comport oneself on a social media site like Facebook.

  • Always address complaints, but in a civil manner.
  • NEVER get into a flaming match with a poster. YOU WILL LOSE!
  • Correct whatever is wrong or misstated, but be sure you keep your end about you. No confrontations!
  • Keep a sense of humor whenever possible. Nothing feeds controversy like hurt feelings replied to negatively.
  • Be professional, generous, and watch controversy die on the vine.
  • Never be vulgar or confrontational. Calling people names, (deserved or otherwise) is a sure recipe for escalation.
  • Don’t share a lot of your personal information, but do let your personality shine through!

While Amy’s Baking Company is far from the first to actively engage their fans in entirely the wrong way, (see Nestle) it apparently wasn’t their first rodeo. They got in it with a Yelp reviewer in 2010, and the negative comments are still coming in!

Marketing Metrics You Can Ignore

7-13-metrics-that-are-safe-to-ignore

How to Safely Ignore Metrics and Get a More Accurate Picture

The term “vanity metrics” has made its way into the marketing vocabulary lately, and for good reason. What a great many use to measure “results” can quite often be misleading and because of this, it’s worth examining some of the marketing metrics you can (and possibly should!) disregard.

Those you can safely ignore:

  • Likes, Followers and Connections – The one with the most followers wins, right? If only it were that easy. In reality, more followers translate to a better bottom line only if you are actively engaging with them, and building a relationship leading to conversions. Merely developing a massive number of likes or followers who don’t make the transition to customers is relatively pointless.
  • Comments – Again, with the objective being to increase conversion,  merely creating a blog post that titillates and produces a large number of comments, but generates no leads, is a waste of a blog post. Make the reason they comment have something related to leading them further along the path toward conversion, such as a topical question.
  • Impressions – Mainly used in your advertising, the sheer number of ad impressions is relatively useless, as it will not indicate any measurable action. Simply having your ad display in front of a couple of million computer screens is no real measure of how it performs. Rather, take a look at click-thru rates and conversion rates.

A terrific piece about this is available at HubSpot.

Those you ought to keep an eye on:

  • Shares – Having people share your content, emails and other media is a step in the right direction. This means that not only is your content making an impact, but it’s also being passed around.
  • Social mentions, citations – Especially now that Google is including social signals (mentions) into the search algorithm, these can be most helpful. Not only will it help with search, but also authority as your content continually gets shared.
  • Conversions – The endgame. You must make sure that your social media and sharable content is actually resulting in more conversions.

Read more about this at Mashable.

Make Your Email Marketing More Effective

7-13-5-steps-to-better-email-marketingSimple Ways to Breathe New Life Into Your Email Marketing Efforts

You probably have heard all sorts of disparate predictions about the demise of email marketing, but what the evidence shows is that it’s still an integral component of your online marketing mix, both now and down the road. As reported by Sign-Up.to’s 2013 UK Email Marketing Benchmark Report, there has been a strong increase in average email open rates, rising from 18.35 percent to 21.47 percent within the past year. Also, (and more exciting) the average return on your email marketing investment is currently a mind-numbing $44.25 for each dollar spent. (iContact)

So how do you take advantage of this in your small business?

Here are 5 easy tips to get your email marketing efforts heading in the right direction!

  1. Create great subject lines – Headlines matter, as your open rates will tank if you overlook this aspect. Take time to craft a subject line that makes people want to open your email. This is usually a combination of curiosity, excitement, urgency, beneficial and spam compliant.
  2. Write amazing content – After your subject line, nothing will get your emails opened and read more frequently than delivering jaw-dropping content. Content that people can’t wait to open and read. I’m subscribed to several lists like this, where I open and read every word without delay. Aim to be one of those!
  3. Put in social media share buttons – very easy to do, and also very easy to forget to do, this is a great way to spread your emails around, especially those packed with your best content. Put these buttons in there and encourage your users to use them. You will often gain new opt-ins the easy way!
  4. Send mobile-friendly emails – Now that 64 percent of decision makers read their email on their mobile device,(TopRankBlog) and also the average person checks their smartphone some 34 times a day, do you need any more convincing to make your emails mobile friendly?
  5. Send email more often – This is one we frequently hesitate at. No one wants to keep pestering people who don’t want to read your messages. Sure, if you’re selling some shiny new object every email. Rather, make sure you keep sending great content that people simply can’t wait to read. Copyblogger reports that often your unsubscribes actually decrease if you mail more frequently.