Are Customers Finding You

You have a website and you have something which people are looking for. The question is are your customers finding you? Only having a good website in place does not ensure customers dropping in and spending time on your website.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) takes care of this. SEM if harnessed effectively, will drive a sustainable pool of targeted traffic to your website, and will ultimately result in an increase in revenue.

SEM is still growing and evolving at a rapid pace, not because it is a relatively new concept(It has been there for more than two decades) but because it is highly dynamic and fluid with more refined methods and technology coming in each day. This dynamic nature makes the complete domain of internet marketing incredibly challenging and exciting.

An effective SEM strategy begins with website optimization. The process involves making the website suitable for the search engines to crawl and find it. This process is known as Search Engine Optimization or SEO. 

SEO is a broad mix of multiple factors – the quality of the site’s architecture, content on the website, various channels or ways to reach the website, the influence of the website: SEO is done correctly has to satisfy each one of these aspects.

WHY SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING IS IMPORTANT -Some important points to note-

During the month of December 2013, in the United States alone, search engines fielded more than 18.3 billion search queries (comScore qSearch). That’s more than two and a half searches for every living person on the planet in a single month!

•   70–80 percent of users ignore the paid ads on any given search, focusing solely on the organic results.
•   80 percent of users never scroll past the first page of search results.
•   Companies that regularly post their blogs have 434 percent more indexed pages. Companies with more indexed pages get far more leads.
•   SEO leads have a 14.6 percent close rate, while outbound leads (lead generated by email or SMS marketing, print advertising) have an aggregate of 1.5 percent close rate.
•   These statistics may vary across different spheres, a study from Slingshot SEO shows that of all Google searches 18 percent of organic clicks go to the #1 position, 10 percent of organic clicks go to the #2 position, and 7 percent of organic clicks go to the #3 position.

Optimizing the Website for Search Engines

This is where you Search Engine Marketing begins. Matt McGee, an SEO expert who specializes in advising small businesses (www.smallbusinessem.com), in an interview once said: “SEO is not rocket science... It’s simple, but it’s not easy. There’s a difference!... There’s a small set of basic rules that apply to any web page or web site, whether you’re a small business or not. Your site has to be crawlable, your content has to be good – and I’d include things like page titles, keyword use, etc, under the umbrella of “content” – and you need quality, relevant inbound links. That applies to everyone.”

This was way back in 2006, the early days when SEO and SEM had just begun to gain momentum, the fact is it still holds true and forms the groundwork of website optimization.

When you are trying to optimize your website for search engines, the best place to look out for tips on improving your site’s ranking with the search engines is with the search engines’ own guidelines and resources for your website.

Foundations of Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

·        Make your site easy to crawl

If you have to attract more search engine traffic to your website you have to make sure that your website is easily crawlable by search engine spiders. Spiders are interested in text, text, and more text. They don’t see the graphics, flashy animations that web designers primarily use to make websites look pretty. In fact, over-reliance on some of these things even hinders spiders, many times preventing some websites from being indexed at all.

·     Choose Right Keywords

The starting point for effective SEO is to have correct knowledge what the people who are looking for your products, services or information are typing into the search box. What they are typing is known as keywords or keyword phrases. Finding and using the right keywords in website content is a must for successful SEO.

       ·     Right Keyword at the Right Place

keywords are useful and important but their right placement on a webpage is even more important. Repeated use of keywords is strictly prohibited. Keywords can be ideally placed at the following locations-

• Title tag: Use the keyword in the title and as close to the beginning as possible.

• H1 header tag: Use the keyword in the header tag and as much as possible

in the other H tags.

• Body content: Use keywords but make sure it makes sense in context. Remember to use synonyms rather than focusing on one specific version of a keyword. You should aim for about 350 words of content. But don’t overdo it or it could look like spam to the search engines.

• Bold: Use <strong> tags around the keyword at least once.

• URL: Try to use the keyword in your page URL.

• Meta description: Use it at least once in the meta description of the page, which should entice users to click through to your site from the SERP.

• Link anchor text: Try to ensure that the keyword is used in the anchor text of the pages linking to you.

•      Focus on one page at a time

While optimizing your website you have to focus on one page at a time. When a search engine presents results to a user, it does not present the whole website, it presents individual pages that, according to its algorithms, best match a user’s query. This means each individual page on your website has to be optimized for specific keywords or phrases. It presents an opportunity to focus on different verticals of your business by promoting each one on a different page. For example on one page you can promote health insurance, on another, you can promote life insurance with respective keywords. 

Check in the below-given image, when I searched for health insurance plans, the results came up with the link to the health insurance page of all the companies.

•      Add a description for Search Images

Content-relevant and page-specific images make websites look much more appealing. As search engines are improving at recognizing the content of images, It is extremely important to properly tag and give content for each image for search engines and visitors. This includes adding an ALT description to all key images and a caption wherever possible.

•     Content- The most important thing on your website.

Content is the most important thing on your website, as it is the unique, relevant, and informative content that sets your website apart. The term content encompasses everything on your website- the flashy graphics, animation, videos, images, banners, and text.  Of all this, the search engine spiders only see the text. So with regard to SEO; the text is the most important form of content.

When writing content for your website The first and foremost thing you have to keep in mind is your audience- These are the people whom you want to visit your website. 

Your pages have to be search engine friendly, they have to include keywords but still, you have to make your content engaging for real, live people. If people visiting your website don’t spend adequate time on your website and make an inquiry or a purchase all your efforts will be pointless. Moreover, the search engines also take into consideration the time spent by visitors on individual pages of your website. More is the time spent more is the probability of your website moving up in SERP. So, always develop content that is more audience-friendly and follows the search engine protocols. 

Let’s Sum Up

Having an updated website is an important aspect for every organization or an individual offering some product or service. To make that website count and deliver results, Search Engine Marketing(SEM) is equally important. You have got a website developed and have invested money in it, now unless and until you tell people about it, people are not going to find it and the money invested will not reap you any benefits. But if you spend just a little more and persist with it you are sure to reap huge benefits.

Internet is a highly cluttered space but has attained a level wherein you cannot ignore it – if you are serious about the growth and sustainability of your organization. So, don’t waste time; because every second foregone is taken up by someone else to consolidate his/her position. Hire a professional Digital Marketing Agency today and reach out to more people with higher rankings and more visibility. 

“Promoting yourself on the internet is as important as having a presence on it”

Social Media Rules of Engagement

• Look, Listen, and Learn- Before you directly start engaging with the online community, spend some time hanging around. Get yourself acquainted with the different types of social media platforms which you plan to target. Get a feel of how the online community is responding and interacting on each platform. Every social media platform is different so familiarize yourself with the nuances before you dive in.

• Be open and honest- The phrase “Complete Disclosure” does not fit into the picture anywhere else more appropriately than in social media. What you write and post on social media should coincide with your real-world actions (offerings). Never ever go on social media pretending and exaggerating the virtues and merits of your brand. This will only shun people off and they may even completely block you.

• Make your posts relevant, interesting, and entertaining– The Internet is already cluttered with a lot of information, social media is barraged with millions of posts daily. Making your presence felt in such a space is not an easy task. Make sure that everything you do on social media adds value and at the same time it is interesting. You cannot go in every time promoting your offers and brand directly sometimes you have to put in simple engaging messages people can relate to. For example, the post saying – “Colourful and attractive worksheets @ 30 % discount” may find itself struggling for engagement on social media but at the same time if you touch upon the current highest-rated problem of parents- “ Give your child a break from online, keep them busy and happy” will be immediately clicked upon by most of the parents.

• Respect people- Never offend anyone, always be respectful to your fellow community members. There will be debates and discussions you don’t have to refrain from them, as these are always good for engagement, but never turn these discussions into arguments. Everyone, although on a common platform, have their individual rights, tastes and preferences so never make it personal.

• Respond to feedback– Always respond to the feedback you are getting from people. Getting genuine feedback is invaluable. Feedback if positive; you can appreciate and thanks for it and if negative, you can be apologetic and concerning. Make sure to tell how you have improved upon on the basis of the previous negative feedback.

Social Media allows you to engage with an online community and reach out to an appropriate audience. The outreach of social media is its greatest benefit if harnessed properly. If users like your content enough they share it with their own communities. Efforts to control the conversation in social media are soon found out and backfire horribly. So work on a social media strategy that is more engaging and more considering. Always follow the thumb rule and basic rules of engagement, also make sure to always provide your digital marketing agency with correct and updated information. Never forget that in this evolving landscape the customer really is the king and any attempt to dethrone the king can have dire consequences.

Social Media Marketing For Business growth

Social Media Marketing for organizations is crucial and should not be overlooked, but at the same time, it is also tricky. Effective social media marketing is less about product promotion and more about customer engagement. You should never be forcing or pushing your prospects, day in and day out to buy your products instead work on the art of creating a pool of loyal followers and a huge fan base.

Use Social Media to talk to the people rather than push at them and more importantly listen to them. If you manage to do this effectively, then social media can have an incredibly positive impact on your organization’s online profile.

How far you go in reaching out and connecting with your prospective customers depends on a lot many factors-your business, your customers, your goals, and your overall digital marketing strategy. But one thing is for sure that there is something in it for everyone.

Understanding Social Media

Social media is a collection of internet-based software and services that allow users to connect, exchange of information, engage in discussions, communicate and participate in any form of social interaction.

Types of Social Media

Social media is present on the internet in varied forms. Each Social media platform has a different primary offering or maybe offering a mix of services. Each and every service offered presents, marketers, with a unique opportunity. To read in detail about the different forms of Social Media check out the article on Types of Social Media

Let’s go through the different forms of social media in brief and identify their offerings for Marketers as well.

• Social Media Submission Sites

Websites such as www.reddit.com, www.stumbleupon.com, www.digg.com fall in this category. The major feature which the social media submission sites have that here you can share the link of the content you like. These sites allow other online participants to rate and rank that content. The more people view and vote positive for a particular piece of content, the higher it rises in the rankings.

These websites also allow the top-ranked submissions to be displayed on the HOME page of the website, which in turn drives more traffic to these social media submission sites. 

What is has for Marketers?

• Keep an eye on what people are interested in- The marketers can use social media submission sites to keep track of what type of content do their target audience finds more compelling. Find out why is it more popular and what’s so appealing about it. Now develop similar or even better content for your organization and draw your target audience to it. 

•   What’s the talk of the town? Every now and then something becomes so trending on the internet that it becomes a point of discussion for everyone. Make sure you do not miss the bus at such a time. Be a part of the discussion and also try to include that trending news in your piece of content.

•  Add to your online reputation and increase traffic- Having content that is well perceived by the target audience makes your content rank higher on these websites. This high ranked content can give you a tremendous boost in traffic. At the same time, it also gives you a platform that adds to your reputation within the online community. Your constructive contribution in the form of content develops respect for the brand, and people begin to connect directly with the brand. 

•  Forum and Discussion Sites

These websites present the opportunity of an open discussion to like-minded people on any topic that one can think of. Discussion groups such as yahoo groups- https://groups.yahoo.com, google groups- https://groups.google.com have been around on the internet for a long time. People from the online community gather here to participate in discussions and express their views.

What it has for Marketers?

•     Understand your target audience better- Checking out what your target audience is talking about in these discussion forums lets you peep into his/her thought process. Getting to know how one thinks is a great way to align yourself with that person. Thus making it easier for you to engage with your customers in a meaningful way.

•     Earn Regard and Respect- When you contribute to the discussions, put forth your viewpoints, offer advice, and suggestions so that the online community gets to know you. If you do that continuously, and it is well perceived by people then over a period of time the online community starts respecting you thus doing wonders for your online reputation and profile.

•     Identify and get rid of what people don’t like- By continuously participating in forums you get to know what people like and what they don’t like it. Be proactive in taking care of their dislikes and increase your efforts towards what they like.

•     Don’t go for traffic- Your primary reason for joining a forum shouldn’t be traffic. Posting your website links, pushing your products and services in discussions creates a bad impression. Most forums allow one or two signatures, a short snippet at the bottom of every post you submit. Make sure you restrict to it. If people like your posts and comments they themselves will follow you through the links.

• Media Sharing Sites

Media Sharing websites are gaining in popularity day by day because of the very simple reason that they provide a platform for their users to become popular in the online world.

These websites allow users to post videos, images, and also share and comment on the uploaded content. Websites such as www.youtube.com, www.vimeo.com, www.blip.tv, www.pinterest.com lets members save and share images and videos. These videos and images can be seen by others and immediate reactions such as like, dislike, just love it, etc are available in form of emojis. Instagram and Flickr are other popular sites that allow users to upload, share, comment, and discuss their photographs. 

What it has for Marketers?

•      Find out the trigger which turns your target audience on- By keeping track of what’s trending on the content-sharing websites and how your target audience is reacting to it you can frame your marketing strategy.

•      Distribute and promote your content digitally- Media sharing sites have become the most ideal platform for reaching out to your potential audience. Develop the content which you think will be well accepted by your target audience and just post it on every suitable platform. And who knows the post you created triggers the next trend on the internet.

• Reviews and Rating sites

These websites allow users to review or rate anything they want to. It can be a product, a service, an individual or an organization. With their increasing credibility, these websites have the potential to build or destroy brands. Independent review website such as www.glassdoor.com allows users to rate and write a review for their current or previous companies. www.reviewcenter.com, www.epinions.com are some other standalone reviews and rating websites. These websites are extremely important for Social Media Marketing managers especially to maintain the online reputation of the company. 

What’s in it for Marketers?

•     Advertising platform- Most review and rating websites rely on advertisements to generate revenue. Business houses can either directly or through affiliate networks advertise their brand or product or service.
•     Get insights into people’s likes and dislikes- Even if your organization is not under direct discussion on any such website you can still gain valuable information from these websites. For example, if you run a travel agency, you can see what people are talking about most about whether its price, its service, etc and you can then apply this knowledge to further improve your offerings.
•     Market Research- If smartly used these websites can be used as a good market research medium. If people are posting reviews about your business, or a product or a service; nothing matches it. It’s the feedback coming directly from consumers. Use this feedback to further improve your offering.
•     Get in touch directly- Make sure to respond to people who are posting reviews about your business. If it’s a positive review you can respond by a simple “Thank you “ but if it’s a negative review make sure you satisfy the reviewer so that next time he/she writes a positive comment about you especially referring to the previous negative comment. 

Social Networking Sites

These websites present marketers with tremendous opportunities because of their large user base. Popular social networking websites such as Facebook(www.facebook.com), Linkedin (www.linkedin.com), Twitter(www.twitter.com) have users in multi-millions. Facebook today has more than 1.3 billion users- which is like having the whole of India on Facebook. And marketers very well know how big a market India is.

What these sites offer to Marketer?

•      Advertising- Websites such as Facebook have become one of the most effective advertising platforms on the internet. These websites have started providing flexible advertising options which are usually based on the PPC model. The best part is they allow you to target audiences based on their tastes, preferences, interests, locality; overall you can target audience at a very micro level and keep track of every single penny spent. You have to make sure that your ads do not offend viewers since the viewers are coming on these websites to socialize and not to shop.
•     Build your online reputation- Most of the social networking sites allow businesses to set up their business page. People on the same network can then follow and like your page. Viewers can also like, share, and comment on your individual posts. You get to interact directly with the interested people and design your posts according to their tastes and preferences. This provides a great platform to develop a community of loyal followers around your brand thus adding to your online reputation.
•      Identify people who love your brand- A business page on a social network can be a great way to attract and identify people who love your brand. Recruit or nurture these people as they are your loyal brand advocates. Provide them with that extra bit of information, find details about the product or even run an incentive program for them, and see how they take your brand to places.

• Blog

The blog is an acronym for weB LOG.  Blogging gives everyone and anyone the freedom to express his/her views, opinions, share experiences or write about anything in detail and the people with similar interests are out there to read and comment on your blogs.

Various web services such as bloggers (www.blogger.com), WordPress (www.wordpress.com) allow users to set up and start their own blogs in a matter of few minutes. The blogs also rank in the search engines based on their popularity. Blogs and Bloggers have tremendous power.  Many bloggers have millions of loyal followers.

These bloggers have the potential to influence their followers which can be well harnessed by marketers.

How can Marketers use blogs?

•     Massive exposure- Connect with the prominent bloggers of your industry. Even if one of your stories or a blog is picked up and propagated by a prominent blogger the amount of traffic and views it can generate for you than any of your local press releases or a PR activity.

•     Better Consumer Engagement- Create your company’s own blogging page preferably on the company’s official website. Use your blogs to showcase your target audience the hidden side of the company, one which they don’t get to see in an infographic or a 2 line post on Facebook. Give your customers valuable and detailed information about your products and services, tell them how they can use it. Use your company blog to not only promote but also connect with people. Tell them about the company, how it started, how it had evolved, what innovations you are coming up with, and much more. Thus keep your audience always engaged and interested and develop strong bonds with them.

• Podcasts

Podcast can be best regarded as an audio form of the blog. Various portals such as www.podcast.com, www.podomatic.com, and www.apple.com/itunes allow uploading and distribution of podcasts for people to download or listen online. People can also subscribe to podcasts of interest.

What Podcasts offer to Marketers?

•    Indirect Promotion  - People listen to podcasts when they are most relevant to them. Podcasters are usually people who are experts in their respective domains. It is then only that they can speak out and express their views with confidence and conviction.  So, if a podcaster in his podcast emphasizes the usage of a particular brand product it might not sound like direct advertising but it leaves a stronger impression on the mind of the listeners. For example in a podcast on things to keep in mind while setting up a home theater if a podcaster politely tells me that I have been using speakers of this particular brand and they have given me extraordinary results till now, the listener will definitely give it a try. Because of the very simple reason that the suggestion is coming from an expert as well as a user.

•    Try it yourself- If you have someone in your organization who is extremely good at vocal skills you can certainly give it a try and start your company’s own podcasts. By starting your own podcast and reaching your target audience directly you will definitely develop better ties and gain even more trust of the targeted audience. 

Microblogging

Microblogging can be thought of as a short message broadcast service that allows people to keep their readers up to date via short text posts. Twitter (www.twitter.com) dominates the space of microblogging services on the internet.

Microblogging has been successful in the sense that collective aggregation of the mini-posts creates a tremendous impact which is much more than the sum total of the individual posts. When your readers receive short but frequent updates they begin to connect with you and develop a bond.  This eventually creates a loyal following the power of which can be well harnessed for effective Social Media Marketing.

What’s in it for Marketers

• Keep yourself updated -  As a marketer, microblogging platforms give you access to trendsetters and industry leaders. Most of them use microblogging services to post snippets about what they are doing, the latest developments in the industry, and much more. Most of the organizations-private and government have their business accounts. By ‘following’ these industry leaders and business accounts you can put to use their valuable insights, and make more prudent marketing decisions.

• Establish Connection with influencers: Influencers have this amazing power of swaying the people. It is always good to follow the industry influencers, and what is even more important is to get into the good books of these influencers. Some influencers charge to speak about a product or an organization while some do it as part of their routine activity but only after a thorough analysis. Getting an influencer to speak or post about you will provide a lot of impetus in the online community.  

• Communicate with your customers: After an already cluttered mailbox, people have now moved on to the microblogging platforms to keep themselves posted and updated about the people, organizations, newsrooms they want to follow. It has thus become essential for organizations to maintain a microblogging account and also do regular posts.   

• Generate traffic:  A microblogging platform can be effectively used for generating and diverting more traffic may be to your website, youtube channel, latest blog, or any other desired platform. Link sharing on Twitter helps you achieve this in a most significant way.

Wikis

Wikis are an online collection of web pages. What makes Wikis stand out is that these pages are open for anyone to create, edit, discuss, comment, and mostly contribute to.

This is the underlying premise of Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia has been developed.

Develop a strong collaborative community of your customers and people in your organization: wikis is a great platform to encourage constructive and collaborative interaction between the people inside your organization and people outside your organization including the customers. People here write what they know about the organization rather than critically reviewing and rating it. Once your customers start doing this it means that they now feel connected and have developed a bond with the organization. As a marketer encourage your customers to post on Wikis whatever knowledge they have about the organization. As it goes a long way in creating a strong background of the organization in the world of the internet.

Instant Messaging Service

With the advent of instant messaging service on mobile social media, the revolution has reached an altogether different level. This development is led by “WhatsApp”. Most of the instant messaging services provide you with a simple and straightforward interface where you send messages, pictures, videos, documents instantly to the receiver’s phone. It even allows you to make video and voice calls anywhere across the globe and at any time. All this comes at absolutely no cost(At least till date- October 2020)

Even though WhatsApp was acquired by Facebook for a whopping 19 billion USD  in February 2014, but it has still continued to operate as a separate entity since then. And also Whatsapp has not yet seen the same marketing-friendly features as Facebook Messanger has. It still has a lot to offer to the ever anxious marketers.

What is has for Marketers?

Establish one to one and personal connections- the instant messaging services are primarily tied to mobile phones, which are definitely more personal than computers. Use these services to send personalized messages and spread brand awareness. Apply one to one marketing and work on interpersonal marketing skills and present your product to the individuals the way they want it.

WhatsApp business app- WhatsApp has launched a Business App for which they say it is “built with the small business owner in mind.” This app is free to download, and currently only available for Android devices. It allows businesses to easily interact with customers by using tools to automate, sort, and quickly respond to messages.

Highest engagement rate- More than 60 billion messages are sent using WhatsApp each day and to cheer up the marketers approximately 82% of these messages are checked and read. Thus an engagement rate of 82 %. This is one thing that marketers are always looking for so start engaging with your customers on WhatsApp now. 

Social Media Marketing has helped businesses grow and achieve which otherwise, maybe, would not have been possible, at least at this pace. With the ever-increasing numbers on social media, organizations have become more and more concerned about ensuring their presence and maintaining a good online reputation.

It's important to reach out to people but in a way that appeals to them. So, for that matter, if hiring an expert is a problem you can always reach out to a Digital Marketing Agency having expertise and experience in the domain but don’t miss the opportunity.

“Don’t use social media to impress people, use it to impact people and change lives”

Posted on 01 Nov 2020, by Mudit Mittal