A Step By Step Guide to Digital Marketing

 

A Step By Step Guide to Digital Marketing

 

Understanding the basics of Digital Marketing

 

Digital Marketing is the term that was popularized during the 2000s. This online marketing strategy is meant for advertising websites. It might sound quite simple but things can get extremely challenging at times. Digital Marketing can connect various brands to consumers through multiple online platforms.

 

Every amateur marketer has to first have the knowledge of digital marketing. There is a marketing technique that businessmen should use for promoting their products online. They need to make proper use of the internet and its technologies.

 

Important Categories of Online Digital Marketing

 

Marketers can get accurate and real-time results from digital marketing. This is because you can track the investment return that online marketing generates. You can use analytical tools to estimate your lead generation, website traffic, attribution modeling, and content performance.

 

Marketers need to know about the 7 most important categories of online digital marketing. These important categories are:

 

• Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

 

• Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

 

• Content Marketing

 

• Social Media Marketing (SMM)

 

• Email Marketing

 

• Affiliate Marketing

 

• Pay-Per-Click Advertising

 

Essential Steps For Digital Marketing

 

After you have learned about these categories in detail, you need to follow some steps. These steps are important to understand what digital marketing is and how it can be useful. Here are some of the steps that can guide you better:

 

1. Identifying the right platform: Choosing your platform is the primary step to start online digital marketing. Through this digital medium, marketers can advertise their products better. Your brand would gain enough popularity when the audience reach is better. This way, the sales would also increase rapidly. Some of these effective digital media mediums are a search engine, email marketing, and Social Media Marketing. Each of these mediums has its set of strategies for product promotions. These are ideal for any marketer to start their promotions.

 

2. Design your brand advertisement: Your brand should be able to attract plenty of consumers. The appearance of the web page plays an extremely significant role in brand promotion. The way marketers design their website would determine the number of customers.

 

• Content is the most important design that can attract customers to your webpage. The content needs to be precise and have sufficient information. The language command should be quite apt and highly professional. The most important factor is that it should match the requirements of SEO.

 

• To keep a track of the number of customers visiting your advertisement, you need website traffic. You can do a monthly or yearly tracking of your audiences. So, your web page needs to be user-friendly and smartphone-friendly.

 

• Lead Generation is another design marketers need to take care of. The popularity of your webpage design will determine the number of generated leads. You will get an idea of the number of viewers with lead generation as well.

 

• Attribution Modelling will help you as a digital marketer. With this, marketers can track the history of their market sales. Marketers can identify both customer interests as well as identify all the buying trends. Any digital marketer needs to redefine their marketing strategy with this tool.

 

3. Identifying Target Audience

 

This is one of the most essential data-driven strategies useful in the field of digital marketing. Marketers should be able to identify their target audience before promoting their products. If your target audience is not categorized accordingly, digital marketing would not be successful. You need to frame different brand content for different audiences. This will lead to an increase in brand sales better.

 

Summing Up!

 

Digital Marketing is the most effective tool that companies use to sell their products and services. Companies sell these products to even bigger markets within a given time. Marketers need to invest their time, dedication, persistence, and determination into it. You need to understand a lot of things before becoming a successful digital marketer.

 
Author Bio:
 

Charlotte Lin is a content creator at escaperoom.com. She’s a passionate young woman, mother to an amazing nine-year-old, and an avid reader. Over the years, writing has helped her explore and understand the world as well as her own self. She loves to travel, meet new people, and spend quality time with her daughter. You can find her on LinkedIn.

Why Should You Choose an Ad Agency For Business Branding?

 

Why Should You Choose an Ad Agency For Business Branding?

 

Advertising is one of the most important measures to get to the high peak of the business. Every business owner knows that advertising and marketing are important tools for the development of business branding. And the Ad Agency helps the business to develop the brand.

 

When someone starts a business or already runs a business, they need to make people aware of the business and their product and services. Promotion is the most important aspect of every business. Every businessman needs success in his business. Hence they employ advertising agencies for branding the business.

 

Advertising agencies should know the business goals and objectives that they achieve by engaging advertising. When advertising agencies promote products and services, they know that the right message reaches the right people at the right time. And it is most important in advertising.

 

What is an ad agency?

 

An advertising agency creates advertisements for the business to attract customers’ attention. An advertising agency can make all efforts to promote a customer’s product by advertising. They have a group of people specializing in advertising, thus they help companies and organizations to reach their target customers easily.

 

Customers decide where and when advertisements are delivered. All this is in the hands of businessmen. Everyone knows that the business is running with the aim of making a profit. So they invest in advertising agencies for business branding.

 

Choose the right ad agency for business branding

 

An ad agency can charge the business owner after completing the advertising of the business. So this must be ensured that the businessman goes to that advertising agency who completes the work of advertising on the specified budget and does not exceed the charges for the advertising.

 

Choosing the right ad agency is important because the advertising industry has become a huge industry in the market. Many ad agencies are in the market and day by day the many new products also launch. That’s why the competition is also increased.

 

Every businessman needs to have the right dissemination of business products and services and use the best technique. So choose the right advertising agency for business branding that is able to reach the best potential customers.

 

Here we discuss the reason for choosing an ad agency for business branding.

 

The business hires the ad agency for business and for promoting the good and services of the business. The advertising agency is chosen by the business owner who controls the advertising and the marketing of the business.

 

Due to an advertising agency, Accessing the business brand to all the people and saves time.

 

If you are trying to run a business; and you do not have that much time to design an ad and a catchy slogan for the business. Then the ad agency helps to make your business brand. Hiring an advertising agency will save you time and your business.

 

Every business owner can understand the importance of time and it can not be possible that they only do all the work. Rather than spending time growing an advertising campaign, you can move that task to the pros and focus on other things that need your concentration.

 

An advertising agency can save your business brand and it is cost-effective

 

For running the business, hiring an ad agency is cost-effective if they select the digital media advertising solutions along with their regular offerings. The advertising agency can give an offer to the business which saves a lot of money on business than spending the money in direct advertising like magazines, tv, and newspapers.

 

Besides, you will have access to top-level experts in advertising your business branding. The best thing about reaching out to an advertising agency is that they are always available for you when you want them.

 

By hiring an advertising agency, the company will not require extra staff

 

For running your business, you just need the growth of the business. You also want that all people know your company brand name. But for this, the advertising agency can be needed by which the people can be aware of our company products and name.

 

So there is no need to hire a new employee for advertising and give them the monthly income. Better than this, hire the advertising agency and do our work to them in an effective way because the advertising agency can easily control the marketing and advertising of the product and services.

 

An advertising agency can help you to the stable the business in the market

 

In today’s time, all things change very quickly. Nowadays, many things change overnight. The trends are changing daily. If we talk about social media. Sometimes Facebook is in trend, sometimes Instagram, and sometimes Twitter is in trend. So we can’t be stable by advertising directly on social media.

 

Better than this, we hire the advertising agency for business which makes the stability of your business in the listing. And enjoy the stability of your business and be aware of the more new peoples which are good for your business.

 

Redesign the design and logo of your business by the help of an advertising agency

 

If you are using the same logo and design for many years. And if you want to change in your logo then you should hire the ad agency for business branding for changing the logo and design of the business. The ad agency gives you eye catchy, professional and informative designs.

 

It can help you to attract the targeted and new audience also. Because some people love the changes in the product.

Top 10 Essential Image SEO Tips To Generate More Traffic In Your Site!

 

Top 10 Essential Image SEO Tips To Generate More Traffic In Your Site!

 

Most people assume image optimization is downloading an image from any stock photo site, upload it on the back-end and then insert the image in the page. But it’s not image optimization. It’s a quite old way now. It will only increase the weight of the page which will lead to slowing down the whole site. Remember, the search engine cannot read your images without the Alt. texts. So for that, you should be careful to know what real image optimization is. It’s Image SEO which helps to redirect the traffic in your site with the right Alt. image texts, compression along with other SEO tricks. Without proper image optimization, you are losing an SEO asset which is very much important on the business increase through your website.

 

Here are some SEO tips for image optimization:

 

Name the image appropriately

 

The first and the most important tip is to give a proper name to the image. It’s the search engines which will automatically popup the images first, which contains the word written in the name of the image. As an example, we can say, if you have an image of butter, file named as ‘Butter.jpeg” it would be found on the search engine easily, rather than if it would be named like ‘xyz.jpeg’.

 

Use detailed alt. Texts

 

Alt. texts are the image descriptions, which helps the search engines to show the image to the readers. If anyhow the image fails to load, it’s the alt text which can make the reader aware that whats the text for the image they are supposed to see is. Adding alt. texts to your image also helps your website to get a higher rank on search engines by associating alt. description texts with the images.

 

Example:

 

Alt text can be written like this;

<img src=”chocolate-1.jpg” alt=”flower”/>

But better Image SEO will be done while written like this:

<img src=”chocolate-1.jpg” alt=” Red Colored Rose with Water Drops on Petals”/>

3. Right File Format

 

The various types of image formats are getting used by people according to the need. So before downloading any image you have to know the right image format for uploading the images in your website. There are mainly two types of images people are mostly using:

 

Png. Format – this format has a larger file size with the best quality.

 

Jpeg. Format – this format has less file size with adjustable image quality. You can adjust the image quality manually.

 

4. Image Compression

 

Uploading a heavy file is not at all recommended for your website. So you must be careful about the file size you are uploading in your website. So it is highly recommended to compress the images before uploading. You can do it through some software or any online tools available. But you have to care about the image quality too. Do not compress the image so much that it loses its quality and get pixilated or blurred. According to the survey, it’s shown that image compression can make your website more than 33% faster.

 

5. Unique and appealing Image Creation

 

Another important tip is to create an unique image for your website. The stock photos are too boring and are frequently used by other websites too. So it would never give you a chance to stand out with these same images. As an example, we can say, in any business, corporate or consulting firm websites, the smiling businessman image is mostly used. So to kick your website, you need to choose unique but appropriate images.

 

6. Image Dimensions And Resize

 

Using the right size of images on your website is another key to generate traffic. It does not just help to provide a professional and classy look to your site, but it also enhances the acceptability of the products or services you are providing through your website. Try to use images in the actual size it needs on the banner or other areas. Neither use larger images as it could make your site heavy, nor use smaller images, which can give it a blurry or pixilated look. So the right image dimension is also a crucial part of Image optimization SEO.

 

7. Mobile-Friendly Images

 

In the present day, most of the users are using mobile as their prime device to access the internet and websites. So you have to make your website and images user-friendly. So the responsive images can also be proven as one of the best SEO tips.

 

8. Use Dynamic Graphics Where needed.

 

Many websites nowadays are using vector graphics to give their site a fresh and unique look and feel. The advantage of a vector graphic is you can make it your style a brand-related. Creating a vector design is though time-consuming but it affects more. It not only reflects the branding and customization according to the site but also will help to attract a large number of visitors on your website.

 

9. Add Images On Sitemap

 

You must put your images in the sitemap, whether you are updating your images to the sitemap or creating an existing one. It increases the chances to put the images on the top in the search engines. These will increase the traffic to your website.

 

10. Schema markup Is Very Much Useful

 

If you know how to use Google search engine accurately, there are many options which lead a fantastic Image SEO. Schema markup is the text badges under the link of an article showing as the Google search result. It helps a great to SEO the site and generate traffics. Generally, recipe products and video images and sites have this kind of markups. But if you don’t have this kind of contents then you can easily skip this markup.

 

Though image SEO is a complex thing I’m sure after going through this article you can easily make your SEO without hiring a team or spending a single penny on it! Now you can increase the website traffic and put it in the top of the search list through the image optimization process.

Author Bio:

Rahul Roy is an enthuzastic writer in submitcube whose fields of expertise could be summed up in digital marketing, branding, and Social media related topics. He enjoys meeting new people and reading more books, also sharing his knowledge to help the businesses growing smoothly.

How to Write Email Subject Lines That Always Generate Clicks

 

How to Write Email Subject Lines That Always Generate Clicks

 

The subject line, just like any other headline, must draw the subscriber’s attention and make him/her read the email. However, not only the open rate that depends on the subject. The mailing headline indirectly has an influence on the clicks and unsubscribes number, as well as how the relationship between the company and the subscriber will develop. Here’s what to write in the subject line.

 

How long should the subject line be?

 

The longer the subject line is, the less open the letter gets. People usually open emails with subject lines of 10-20 characters most of all. These results are expected because short topics have several advantages:

 

✔️ They stand out in the mailbox.

 

✔️ They help you quickly understand what the email is about.

 

✔️ Displayed normally on mobile. If email clients show 60 characters of a subject line on a computer, then on a mobile device it’s only 30. At the same time, 3 out of 5 people check their mail on a smartphone.

 

Therefore, it’s better to make short headlines and consider not only openings but also clicks.

 

What about elements of the subject?

 

As a matter of curiosity, among the mailouts sent by U.S. email marketers, only 7% of emails contain emojis in the subject line. The reason is that not all devices display emojis correctly. Although there are examples where emojis increase open rates if used appropriately. Here are a few of them:

 

📝 Don’t add more than one emoji to a topic. According to Mailchimp research, the best thing is to use only one emoji at a time.

 

📝 Mind the subject line of your email. Use emojis only when they complete and enrich the subject line.

 

Capital letters and Exclamation marks

 

Catchwords and many exclamations have been a sure sign of spam for a long time. Over 30% of U.S. email marketing experts use only capital letters in the subject line and aren’t afraid of being blocked. With exclamation marks, their abundance still has a negative impact on both email deliver-ability and open rate.

 

Here’s useful advice: if you’re just going into the emailing business, it’s much better not to take risks and do without the caption. If you’ve already developed a reputation as a decent sender, try experimenting. For starters, add one or two words in capitals and track the delivery rate and the percentage of openings.

 

Stop words

 

The most popular stop words are “free, “help, “reminder”. Using the word “free” can have a negative effect on your email opening rates. The same effect extends to other words that sound like “spam”: “help” and “reminder. There are many psychological tricks you can use when offering discounts and free offers to make them more eye-catching. Generally, you don’t even need to use the word “free” for people to get the idea, so there’s no use spamming in the subject lines.

 

Creativity in the subject line: is it a good or bad thing?

 

If you describe the essence of the email in one sentence, you get a headline. That’s all. However, email marketers, in order to stand out in the inbox, often make up with creative headlines. Is this the right decision? Sean Bestor, Global Employer Brand Marketing at Whole Foods Market, decided to find out what creative headlines for subscription forms would do. Surprisingly, straightforward headlines were more effective 88% of the time.

 
Creativity in the subject line is it a good or bad thing
 

So what are the disadvantages of the creative approach? First, there’s a chance that the reader won’t get your idea, and will just delete the email. And second, it takes more time to make up a creative headline. At the same time, it will come in handy to check the original themes on your audience from time to time. However, don’t forget to make sure they match the content of the letter.

 

Model of effective subject line: Tech 4U

 

The approach suggests planning the subject line according to four criteria:

 
● Usefulness;
● Uniqueness;
● Ultraspecificit;
● Urgency.
 

Example: “Wing in 10 new customers tomorrow when you order Instagram ads today before 6 p.m.” You’ll probably find plenty of examples of these letters in your mailbox. Or maybe you won’t.

 

The whole point of email subject lines

 

There are many methods and techniques for writing email subject lines that always generate clicks. However, there are two key criteria that any mailing subject line must meet:

 

➢ Relevance. When the subject does not follow the content of the letter, subscribers feel cheated. They lose trust in the company and are unlikely to read such emails in the future. Manipulation, imaginary bonuses and far-fetched intrigue will increase your open rate, but they will damage the most important thing in email marketing — the subscriber relationship.

 

Relevance is so important that Oracle marketer Chad White suggested introducing the concept of “opener’s remorse.” According to research, irrelevant email subject lines are the main reason for users to unsubscribe.

 

➢ Benefits. Why is it vital for addressees to read your letter? The answer to this question is better reflected in the subject line. This will catch the subscribers’ attention and save their time. Furthermore, this way you can additionally test the emails. If you can’t plan the topic in a way that is useful to the reader, you should work on the content.

 

Conclusion

 

Email subject lines are a marketing element that directly affects user behavior. If your headlines don’t attract subscribers, there are chances they won’t even open your emails. And there’s only one thing left to add: don’t waste a lot of time trying to think of a supertopic. The subject line is important, but the content of the email is far more important.

 

Litmus research confirms this: 42% of subscribers look at the sender first when deciding whether to open the email. Addressees associate the sender’s name with the quality of the mailouts. Remember, the first place is quality content with care for the recipients, the second is the choice of email subject line.

 
Author Bio:
 
Isabelle
 

Isabelle Jordan is a business and marketing journalist at Ekta Traveling insurance company. She writes for different news portals and thematic blogs that helps her stay at the heart of the travel and insurance news. Isabelle knows everything and more about travel insurance. Click here to read about all the details of the medical insurance policy for traveling abroad.

Customer Loyalty: 5 Strategies for Creating Lifelong Fans of Your Brand

 

Customer Loyalty: 5 Strategies for Creating Lifelong Fans of Your Brand

 

The last several years have seen a dramatic shift in consumer behavior, partially due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Nowadays, you not only can test your gaming strategy at the Ramses book demo, but you can also conveniently purchase anything you need from the comfort of your home. The sudden shift to online buying has forced many businesses to digitize their operations to improve the buying experience and build real customer loyalty.

 

During these uncertain times, online businesses are looking for ways to improve customer experience to remain competitive. One of the most effective ways to boost customer loyalty is to provide a reliable and seamless checkout process. Choosing a suitable payment gateway for your online business helps improve customer experience and increases your return on investment, sales conversion, and customer loyalty.

 

That said, here are some of the best strategies for building customer loyalty for your brand.

 

Top strategies to win customer loyalty

 

1. Streamline the Payment Experience

 

The ease of an eCommerce payment gateway plays a crucial role in the overall shopping experience. If your customers face difficulties paying for goods or services on your online shop, they’re likely to look for an alternative. Things like requiring customers to fill lengthy forms, clunky menus, or multiple redirects could significantly slow down the checkout process. And it is one of the reasons most customers end up abandoning a purchase.

 

Incorporating a payment gateway that eliminates anything that negatively impacts the shopping experience can help make the checkout process faster, increase conversion rates, and boost loyalty. Streamlining the payment process provides a seamless shopping experience that customers demand. This, in turn, helps ensure lasting customer loyalty.

 

2. Provide Multiple Payment Options at Checkout

 

Another effective strategy for winning customer loyalty is providing multiple payment options. Many online shoppers second-guess themselves about a purchase at the checkout stage, partly due to the lack of a preferred payment method. In most instances, this results in shopping cart abandonment, damaging customer loyalty.

 

The good thing is that you can leverage alternative payment options as an effective way to increase conversion and boost customer loyalty. Providing only credit and debit payment options increases your risk of losing existing and potential loyal customers. Instead, include other familiar payment gateways such as PayPal, Apple Pay, Amazon Pay, Square, and other online payment options.

 

There are many payment gateway providers that can help you enable flexible online payments and increase customers loyalty. Your preferred payment gateway service should allow for fast, flexible, and secure payments. Offering multiple methods gives online shoppers peace of mind and greater satisfaction, knowing they can pay using a method that works best for them. This also makes them feel more in control of their shopping experience, which helps build customer loyalty for your brand.

 

3. Integrate Payment Gateway on the website

 

Redirecting your customers to a different website to make payments can be confusing and worrisome for most online shoppers and could potentially destroy their loyalty. This could also destroy trust and credibility among your customers, and many might consider your store a scam. To build trust and loyalty with your customers and improve their shopping experience, you need to integrate the checkout page into your website.

 

Integrating an online payment gateway into your online store is often a hassle-free process. Choose a WordPress payment gateway that integrates seamlessly with your site and accepts a wide array of payment methods. This ensures consumers can complete their payments smoothly and securely without having to leave your online store. It also makes online shoppers consider you a trusted and secure online seller, improving customer loyalty.

 
Integrate Payment Gateway on the website
 

4. Customize Your Payment Page to Your Brand Persona

 

Brand consistency is an effective way to build trust and foster lifelong customers. Consumers are likely to be skeptical when sent to a checkout page that looks entirely different from your online store. Keeping your design consistent across all pages, especially the checkout page, can help raise brand awareness and build brand loyalty.

 

Ensure the online payment gateway you use is customizable to give you control over the feel and look of your checkout page. This way, you can customize the page to match your website’s design, fonts, and colors. This also helps boost consumer trust and confidence with your brand, building customer loyalty and keeping them coming back repeatedly.

 

5. Provide Reassurances on Security and Privacy to Win Loyalty

 

Most online shoppers are more likely to abandon a shopping cart at the checkout stage due to payment security concerns. Apart from maintaining a consistent design and eliminating redirects to third-party checkout pages, reassuring customers their data is safe and secure is crucial for building trust and loyalty. Showcasing the security measures in place can help customers trust you more with their personal information and increase brand loyalty.

 

Display your site’s Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate and PCI badges on your payment gateway page to provide assurance their confidential information is appropriately encrypted and securely stored. This makes customers feel safe shopping with you, which in turn boosts customer loyalty. Also, many customers are likely to recommend your online store to their friends and family, increasing your conversions and sales significantly.

 
Conclusion
 

There you have it! With these strategies, you can not only acquire and retain customers, but also build brand loyalty. Implementing these strategies can also help increase your sales conversion, increase revenue, and improve customer satisfaction ratings and win their loyalty. Understanding what a payment gateway is, how it works, and how to integrate a payment gateway to your eCommerce platform better equips you to boost customer loyalty in the long term.

 

Do you know of other effective strategies for building brand loyalty? Let us know in the comment section.

 
About the Author
 

Thomas Glare is a freelance copywriter who currently lives in Nashville, Tennessee. Thomas has written a lot of pieces about the customer experience for a variety of publications, some of which include some well-known e-commerce websites. He also takes part in seminars as a guest speaker to give valuable advice on brand development.

10 Mass Text Messaging Statistics That Will Leave You Speechless

 

10 Mass Text Messaging Statistics That Will Leave You Speechless

 

The COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly transformed the business realm and has forced brands to reconstruct their marketing strategies to keep in line with the current times. Despite such massive changes taking place in the business world, one marketing strategy that has managed to remain unshakable is mass text messaging. There is no denying that SMS has allowed businesses to reach out to their customers without spending too much money.

 

10 Interesting Mass Texting Facts

 

Over the years, businesses have constantly employed different marketing strategies for their brand development. However, mass text messaging has remained one of the most effective strategies to date, given the ease it process involves.

 

Here are a few mass text messaging statistics that prove how powerful SMS can be when it comes to business growth:

 

1. Sharp rise in user screen time

 

In the pandemic, mobile phone usage has witnessed a sharp rise. With every industry embracing online services, the chances of potential customers reading SMS promotions is higher than ever.

 

In the United States alone, an average consumer’s daily screen time rose 50% during the pandemic from the year 2019 to 2021.

 

Well, if you are considering kicking off your SMS marketing campaign, go ahead as now is the time to make the most of it!

 

2. Nearly 3.8 billion people own smartphones

 

Yes, you read it right! Imagine how fast you can reach out to potential customers considering how much of the world population owns a smartphone.

 

3. Text messages have high opening rates

 

People tend to open SMS quickly compared to emails and other promotional tools. Text message marketing is considered the most preferable method of advertising as 98% of consumers open the messages as soon as they pop up on the screen or within a few minutes of receiving them.

 

4. Text messages have higher reply rates

 

When compared to emails, text messages have been shown to have significant reply rates. About 60% of customers reply back within 2 minutes to promotional text messages compared to emails; known to have a reply time of about an hour.

 

5. 75% of customers are open to receiving business updates via SMS

 

If a business manages to make an impact on its audience the customers would naturally want to know more about it. There’s no better way of communicating to your customers than by reaching out to them with all the business updates on their phones.

 

6. Mass texting and business growth go hand-in-hand

 

According to a recent survey, 57% of business owners plan to invest in the SMS marketing arena in 2021.

 

7. SMS subscribers are expected to increase by 2023

 

Statistics reveal that a spike is expected in the number of SMS subscribers by 2023. With constantly growing digital marketing, businesses are utilizing SMS marketing widely. This is a direct result of the ever-increasing numbers of phone users interacting with their favorite businesses online.

 

62% of consumers revealed that they subscribed to receiving text messages from at least one brand in the last year alone.

 

8. Text messages are read instantly

 

With unbeatable opening rates, about 60% of customers read text messages within 1-3 minutes of receiving them. These statistics naturally allow greater access to your customers, hence making mass text messaging a favorable means for business promotion.

 

9. People appreciate businesses that use text message marketing

 

About 53% of customers value brands that adopt SMS text marketing for promotional communication. This type of communication between the customers and brands is easy yet impactful.

 

10. Increase in SMS volume

 

With brands being eager to establish a direct channel of communication with their customers, SMS volume has increased around 40% in the year 2021.

 
Final Thoughts
 

Looking at all these statistics, it is evident how mass text messaging can create significant brand awareness while bringing you greater business!

 

Communication is the key when it comes to business development as a customer will only approach a brand when it appears intriguing enough to them.

 

In a nutshell, with mass text messaging you can successfully capture your target audience’s interest by sending them appealing updates.

How to Bring Companies and Customers Together

 

How to Bring Companies and Customers Together

 

Every company needs to have a customer relationship management system {CRM} in order to maximize its growth. It will help the organization improve business performance, connect to customers, and grow the company at a faster rate.

 

CRM is the best way through which your business will deepen the relationship it has with partners, suppliers, service users, and customers. The company will look at every transaction through the eyes of the users.

 

Take the instance of the popularity of Asian culture through CRM, where more Asian-themed slot machines have penetrated the market. Thai Dragon is one of the most popular slot games with bonus rounds and other profitable functions. If your employees can wind up by playing this game, their minds will be refreshed and ready to handle business and clients in a better way. This way, you will see how business improves through gaming.

 

How to Choose the Right CRM

 

Some CRM benefits are essential for the smooth running of your business. Moreover, there are those that are non-negotiable when looking for solutions. They include the following:

 

1. It Stores all Customer Communication

 

Interactions with your clients can span many phone calls, email conversations, and online chats. Your CRM should be able to centralize all information, storing it in one location, to manage online customer feedback better.

 

2. Ease of Usage

 

Not all your employees are software experts, so your CRM should be user-friendly. Everyone in your organization should learn the system quickly and use it without any issues.

 

3. It should be versatile

 

Implementing your CRM does not mean you change how you operate. It should easily adapt to how you work, better customizing for more efficiency. It should be user-friendly and easily accessible from all devices, including mobile phones, for easier customer payments management.

 

Tasks to Do Before Creating a Customer Relationship Management {CRM} System

 

Before settling on a CRM software, you need to know the purpose of the system. There is no need to have software that manages customers and fails to use it.

 
Tasks to Do Before Creating a Customer Relationship Management CRM System
 

1. Outline the Organization’s Goal

 

Know what you want to get from the CRM system. Your goals can be anything from small-scale catering for a few customers to large-scale that will include international operations. For example, a local store may want to have a list of its customers, know those who come back, and offer a reward program. On the other hand, a large organization will institute a complex step in order to court, grow, and retain its customer base.

 

2. Identify your Clients

 

You should have a strong understanding of who your clients are, to be able to manage your customers’ needs. You need to have a customer profile and know the specifics of whom you serve; this way you will be able to do it better.

 

3. Understand what Your Customers Want

 

As your customer base grows, you may have problems understanding what each client wants. Having a well-managed customer data system will help your organization understand and analyze each customer’s journey separately.

 

Types of Customer Relationship Management

 

There are different CRM strategies, but they mostly focus on the three features below:

 

● Operational

 

Operational CRM focuses on sales, marketing, and service. It is an important tool for leads as it manages customer contacts and past data, including purchases, previous marketing campaigns, and service satisfaction. Operational CRM is great for companies with short sales cycles like e-commerce.

 

● Collaborative

 

Collaborative CRM is when businesses share customer information with other businesses. By sharing data, businesses can create a better customer experience as they serve each customer separately. Collaborative CRM works best where there is new product development and innovation involved. The additional information creates a detailed picture of what the market wants.

 

● Analytical

 

One major function of analytical CRM is analyzing customer data so that there is better management and understanding of the new market trends. Analytical CRM uses data mining and pattern recognition to improve customer satisfaction. It works well in highly competitive markets to better manage customer accounts as they all look for something different.

 
Conclusion
 

CRM is an excellent tool that will allow your business to not only increase efficiency and profits, but also customer satisfaction. It comes in different applications and strategies, and you can easily modify it to fit any business type. Your business will benefit from CRM software, and you should get one before it becomes really necessary.

 

If you have any additional information or questions about CRM, feel free to share with us in the comment box below.

 
Author’s Bio:
 

Jeremy Ambrose is a sales and marketing expert responsible for the driving product roadmap, provides consultation with strategy development of the product due to Mr Bet, high-level vision, and strategic partnerships for different companies in the United States. He has a master’s degree in strategic management from Harvard Business School.

Why Is Bulk SMS Marketing A Must For Modern Companies?

 

Why Is Bulk SMS Marketing A Must For Modern Companies?

 

In an ever-changing digital world, companies of all sizes and from all over the world are constantly looking for new ways to market effectively to their audiences. This is why such underrated techniques as bulk SMS marketing are coming to the forefront yet again.

 

Indeed, when used correctly, bulk SMS marketing can be incredibly effective and can help you achieve your marketing goals at a relatively low cost. Hence, here’s why bulk SMS marketing is a must for modern companies and how you can use it successfully.

 

What Is Bulk SMS Marketing?

 

To put it simply, bulk SMS marketing is a marketing technique that uses mass communication via SMS or mobile messaging apps to deliver marketing materials to its audience. To use bulk SMS marketing, you will need to have a database of phone numbers of your current or potential customers.

 

Bulk SMS marketing used to be about only using SMS, but nowadays, many people use different mobile messaging apps like WhatsApp, Viber, and Telegram that can also be used for similar campaigns. However, this article will focus only on SMS marketing (which, compared to mobile messaging apps, can help you reach even those who don’t use the said apps).

 

1. It Is A Cost-Effective Marketing Technique

 

First and foremost, bulk SMS marketing is a very cost-effective marketing technique. It is relatively affordable and can be incredibly efficient when used correctly. At its core, bulk SMS marketing is similar to email marketing which also uses the approach of mass communication.

 

Because of the similarities between bulk SMS marketing and email marketing, the transition from one to another will be relatively easy for a company. Moreover, bulk SMS marketing lets you collect valuable data (e.g. messages that failed to send, which texts were read by how many people, who responded to the CTA) that further helps you maximize the results you get from bulk SMS marketing while using the same budget for your campaigns.

 

2. It Has A High Return on Investment

 

Speaking of the effectiveness of bulk SMS marketing campaigns, this marketing technique is also known for having a high return on investment. This is especially true if you are using an established bulk SMS marketing service that guarantees great results for the fee you are paying them.

 

In other words, you know exactly what you are investing in and you know that your ROI will be at a particularly high level. This is because bulk SMS marketing usually generates high-quality leads which means you could be also growing your customer base with loyal clients.

 

3. It Easily Connects You with Your Audience

 

And, of course, one of the biggest benefits of bulk SMS marketing is that it easily connects you with your audience. Even if the person has never heard of you before, they might get interested and this will raise your brand awareness or at least give you more exposure. It’s the perfect way to improve your brand image as well.

 

Because your customers are always keeping their phones with them, they are bound to receive your message the moment you send it out. This means that your marketing materials will definitely be delivered to your audience and seen almost instantly. Your potential customer could be using public transport or working at the office or doing virtually anything else – and they would still get your message.

 

Best Practices of Bulk SMS Marketing

 

So, what exactly are some good tactics to use with bulk SMS marketing? Here are some of the best practices for this marketing technique to help you get started with it:

 

Always use a clear call to action. SMS messages are instantly delivered to your potential customers and you will likely want to get an instant response. A CTA is what will urge the person to act and to complete particular tasks you want them to perform (e.g. visit your website, call your customer service).

 

Segment your audience. Instead of blindly sending out messages to all the numbers in your database, try to tie these numbers to the different segments of your target audience. For instance, some of the numbers you have might be of your current customers who will be more interested in special offers and discounts rather than simply getting acquainted with your brand.

 

Track your campaign performance. Much like with any other marketing tactic you use, you will need to track the performance of your campaigns. If something isn’t working as well as it should, you probably need to improve it or get rid of it completely. If certain numbers don’t respond to your messages at all, you probably just have to stop messaging them completely.

 

Send out messages at the right time. One thing many marketers will definitely know about is that timing matters – and that’s true for bulk SMS marketing too. The time when you send out your messages can impact how well they perform, so it’s best to try different approaches before deciding when the best time is for you. The same goes for the frequency of your messages.

 

Keep your messages short. It’s been said a million times and it’s still true. If your message is too long, the recipient might not even want to read it and will simply delete it. Always assume that the person is busy, so you need to get to the point straight away and offer them what you have before they get bored and stop reading.

 

Allow people to opt out. While it’s sad that someone may want to opt out of your messaging campaigns, it’s still a choice you need to offer. Nobody wants to be annoyed by a brand they have absolutely no interest in. And this needs to be respected by businesses.

 

Final Thoughts

 

To sum up, bulk SMS marketing is a great way to achieve your marketing goals and connect with your target audience even when they are on the go. Use the tips in this article to help you create your own bulk SMS marketing strategy and start using this technique effectively.

 
Author Bio:
 

Paul Gotcher is an experienced writer who has been working as an author at Topwritingreviews. He believes that words have power and shares his passion for writing with readers. Paul has a long history of working in the educational management industry. He is a professional writing expert in the Creation of Web-Content and Self-Education.

10 Mistakes In Contextual Advertising That Drain Your Budget

 

10 Mistakes In Contextual Advertising That Drain Your Budget

 

Don’t Waste Your Marketing Budget Because Of These Mistakes

 

Did you know that for online casino, PayPal offers one of the safest e-wallets for betting transactions? PayPal has finally opened its services to many legal and licensed online gambling sites in the US and around the world.

 

If you already knew about these PayPal services, there is a probability that you received the information through contextual advertising. But what is contextual advertising?

 
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In layman’s terms, contextual advertising definition is the practice of choosing a specific web page to place an ad based on the content of that page. For instance, in the case of PayPal, if you saw the advertisement about their new e-wallet transaction services on an article about sports betting, this was contextual advertising.

 

In contextual advertising, Google uses keywords to target a specific context of information or a topic where the advertisement campaign should be placed. So then, you might ask why you should consider contextual advertising for your business.

 

It’s simple; the contextual advertising benefits are numerous. For instance, this type of strategic advertising is very pocket-friendly. It also helps you to target a specific set of consumers instead of generalizing your advertisement campaigns.

 

Other advantages of contextual advertising include boosting your online sales, providing user satisfaction, and offering measurable metrics for assessing your advertisement reach. But you’ll only get these benefits if you engage in campaigns that promise contextual advertising effectiveness.

 

One way to achieve this is by ensuring you do not make any mistakes. So here are ten of the most common contextual advertising mistakes you should avoid:

 

1. Having The Wrong Contextual Advertising Goals

 

Define your goals before you start your contextual advertising campaign. These can range from sales, leads, brand awareness, or product consideration goals. But the general rule is that you should select the objective that suits your business needs.

 

For instance, if you want to increase your brand recognition, then your goal should be brand awareness and reach. And if you want more sales, then your goal should be sales. The right goals will help you get the right campaign results.

 

2. Being Careless With Your Keyword Choices

 

Keywords are an integral part of contextual advertising. This also makes them one of the places you’ll make a mistake. Generally, there are four types of errors you can make with keywords in your contextual advertising strategy. These include:

 

● Using irrelevant keywords

● Using the wrong order of keywords

● Using low-quality keywords

● Not using negative keywords in your search campaigns

 

Therefore, get keywords that are an exact match to your goal, only use the keywords that correspond to your goal, get keywords that have a score that is greater than 7, and use negative keywords. Such keywords are often included in Google search requests but carry no commercial value that will perform best.

 

3. Not Using Enough Ads

 

You will use a call to action in your contextual advertising campaign. But more often than not, advertisers only use one ad campaign for a set group of keywords. Therefore, make your efforts worthy by including at least three or more ads for one set of keywords. This strategy will attract more customers to your contextual advertising campaign.

 

4. Not Conducting A Competitor Analysis

 

One other way to get the most out of your contextual advertising benefits is through analyzing your competitors. If the techniques your competitors are using are more effective, they will have an edge over you.

 

This means that your competitors will get to your potential customers first. Therefore, research your industry and look at what your competitors are doing. Don’t forget to compare your product price and that of your competitors as well.

 

Then use the information you find to offer value to your target market so that you can have an edge. This contextual advertising technique will land you first position on search engines.

 
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5. Not Considering Your Customers

 

Remember, your customers are, in essence, the foundation of your business success. Therefore, they are as important as your keywords or your contextual advertising goals. This means that you should avoid two of the most common mistakes marketers make with their customers:

 

● They ignore the customer lifetime value (LTV), which is essential for determining the optimum marketing budget. LTV = average purchase x total repeated transactions x customer lifetime span.

 

● They create contextual advertising campaigns that fail to forward the customers to the corresponding product. If your ads do not deliver the customer to your products, how will they purchase your contextual advertising products?

 

6. Choosing The Wrong Target Audience

 

How you position your ad will determine your contextual advertising effectiveness. This means you need to strive for high ranking every time you create your advertisement campaign. Therefore, focus your contextual advertising on your business field and make it relative to your products or services.

 

7. Not Including Information On Your Advertisements

 

Customers today are curious about the products or services they are buying. Therefore, if a customer clicks on your contextual advertising but fails to get any information regarding your product or service, they will likely abandon your web page. So, provide content for your contextual advertising.

 

8. Putting The Wrong Location For Your Ads

 

If you want to target the state of California in your contextual advertising, your campaign should not be focused on the entire nation. This will only cost you some potential customers in California. Instead, make sure you identify your target location precisely to give you a higher chance of attracting new clients.

 

9. Not Customizing Your Website To Contextual Advertising

 

You want to get rid of any obstacles that will prevent you from reaching your customer. One way to do this is by ensuring that your potential client can access your website from different screens and devices. Do not make the contextual advertising mistake of not creating your site layout a responsive one.

 

10. Not Taking Advantage Of Google Analytics

 

If you are not taking advantage of Google Analytics, how are you monitoring the success of your contextual advertising? After all, you need to know whether you are getting a return on investment through your marketing campaigns.

 
Conclusion
 

If you’re getting started making contextual advertising banners, it’s easy to fall prey to these mistakes. But do not get discouraged because the more you practice, the more you’ll perfect your art.

 

Besides, you can get a professional or look at some contextual advertising examples to guide you what to do. Just remember, the quick and easy creation of advertisements can lead to costly mistakes. So take your time and get it right.

 

With that in mind, can you think of any mistakes you’ve made in contextual advertising? Let us know how you were able to rectify your contextual advertising mistakes in the comments.

 
Author’s bio:
 

Arthur Rowley is an avid writer specializing in technology and marketing. Having spent years finessing his craft, he now can ensure you that Arthur has much acclaim for these areas and dedication to providing high-quality blogging content.

Ultimate Guide For E-Commerce Communication With Customers

 

Ultimate Guide For E-Commerce Communication With Customers

 

Just like in any other business, communication is the foundation of everything. Communication inside a company directly influences how successful this company’s team works and, therefore, impacts the success of the business.

 

However, it’s also important to remember about external communication, one that happens between the company and its clients. Hence, here’s the ultimate guide for e-commerce communication with customers.

 

Why Is Good Communication Important?

 

Before you start improving your communication strategy, it’s worth understanding why communication is so vital in the first place. Here are just some reasons why good communication is important:

 

• It helps you create and maintain a particular brand image and establish yourself as an authority in your niche.

 

• It allows you to build a lasting relationship with your customers and convert one-time into returning customers.

 

• It aids you in growing your customer base as happy clients spread the word about your company and bring more customers.

 

#1 Evaluate Your Current Communication

 

First and foremost, you need to evaluate your current communication. If your team is poorly handling customer support at the moment, you will need to work on your strategy before you make any upgrades to your communication. Here are some of the biggest issues your e-commerce communication can have:

 

• You are only using a single channel for communication and your customers don’t know how to reach out to you (or have issues doing so).

 

• Your customer response speed is very low, and your clients are often complaining about not having their issues resolved on time.

 

• You don’t have a loyal customer base and you aren’t a competitive brand in your niche.

 

• Your customer support agents don’t provide personalized customer experiences to your clients.

 

• Your team is somewhat chaotic when it comes to handling returns, refunds, exchanges, shipping, and so on.

 

#2 Use Different Communication Channels

 

If you identified any of the issues above with your own communication strategy, then you should take the necessary steps to resolve the problem. The first thing to consider is which channels you use for communication. One or two channels are simply not enough, and you need to be able to offer multichannel communication and customer support. Here are the channels to start from:

 

• Offer 24/7 customer support via phone and email. These are by far two of the best channels for communication that are usually preferred both by companies and by customers.

 

• Install either live chats or chatbots on your website. Live chats will cost you more, but they are better in every way because they allow you to deliver personalized customer experiences.

 

• Set up social media profiles and communicate with customers there. Social media platforms are great both for offering customer support and for making important announcements (for announcements, you can also use email).

 

#3 Increase Customer Response Speed

 

Another major issue e-commerce businesses usually have is low customer response speed. After a customer leaves a request via your support form on the website or when they send a message to your social media account, they expect to hear back from you as soon as possible. The best way to do this is to have a strict protocol on how to act in such situations.

 

Set up teams for each of your communication channels or have a single team handle all of them. Create rules for responding to customer requests and have all your customer support agents follow these rules closely. Consider setting up notifications for every channel so that no request goes unanswered.

 

#4 Take Responsibility for Mistakes

 

Even after all the precautions and all the rules you set up, there will still be mistakes from your side. To avoid losing face, most businesses will put out very serious and formal statements about the incident at hand. These statements are often worded in a way that removes all responsibility from the business.

 

However, this is not always the right thing to do, especially when it comes to communication. If your team messed up in some way, sometimes it’s better to actually take responsibility and acknowledge that there was a mistake on your end. A customer support agent can simply announce this to the customer who was wronged and then proceed to take the necessary steps to solve the issue.

 

#5 Deliver Personalized Customer Experiences

 

Most customers nowadays expect to receive personalized treatment because that has become somewhat of a default rather than a perk. That’s exactly why you should be delivering personalized customer experiences through every communication channel you use. Here are just some things to keep in mind about delivering such experiences:

 

• Train your agents to ask relevant questions. This way, they will be able to quickly find out what the customer needs and what their situation is.

 

• Keep extensive documentation of your existing customers. An agent should be able to check who they are the second they know the customer’s name, email, or other data.

 

• Send out special bonuses, discounts, gift cards, and offers. This shows how much you care about your customers, even if they have only shopped at your store once before.

 

#6 Train Agents to Become Better

 

As mentioned above, training your customer support agents is one of the ways you can improve your team and, therefore, your communication. The better your agents know what they are doing, the more high-quality support they can deliver.

 

It’s also important to remember that training is not a one-time thing. To truly make your customer support agents the best they can be, you need to train them regularly and help them upgrade their skill-sets. Give them opportunities to grow professionally, and they will gladly take them.

 

#7 Request Feedback to Improve Further

 

Last but not least, perhaps the best way to understand the issues with your e-commerce communication is to ask your customers directly about it. Request feedback from your clients to help you improve even further by addressing the issues they have with your communication right now.

 

Much like with training, requesting feedback is not a one-time thing and needs to be done regularly. You can send out surveys and even set up a feedback form on your website. You can also ask customers to rate the support they received (via phone or live chat, for example) right after their issue has been resolved.

 
Final Thoughts
 

To sum up, e-commerce communication is essential, much like anything else you do with your online commerce business. With proper communication, you should be able to have a good relationship with your customers and maintain a positive brand image long-term. Use this guide to help you create your own strategy for e-commerce communication and use it to your own benefit.

 
Author Bio:
 

Marcy Hendrix is a freelance writer and author of many articles. She currently works as an editor at a website that reviews writing services for students https://www.writingjudge.com/. Mostly she writes about business, self-growth, etc. In her free time, she plays musical instruments and tennis