5 Tips for Choosing an Online Marketing Specialist
December 27, 2012 by Lisa Santos · 1 Comment
Online Marketing is one of the most effective ways to generate new customers and profits for your local business. This is primarily due to the fact that most consumers go online to search for local products, services, and businesses that can provide what they’re looking for.
However, business owners are busy actually “running their businesses”… so they have very little time to implement online marketing strategies all on their own. First, they would have to spend a great deal of time learning the ins and outs of each method. Then, they would have to thoroughly implement, test, track, and refine those methods on an ongoing basis if they want to get the best results.
As you can imagine, this would be a huge, daunting task for any business owner to take on. However, it does not mean that internet marketing should be ignored or avoided – that would be a huge mistake.
Instead, business owners must find the appropriate resources and help to get the job done. But many of them prolong the process because they still haven’t found an Online Marketing Specialist that they know, like, and trust with their marketing efforts.
Here are 5 tips to help you choose an Online Marketing Specialist:
1. Set-up an appointment with them to get to know them. You probably receive tons of phone calls, emails, and direct mail pieces from online marketing specialists all over the world. If you’re struggling to move forward with your online marketing initiatives simply because you’re stuck on choosing a consultant, go ahead and break the ice.
Once you start a dialogue with someone, you can truly get a feel for whether or not that person is right for you. Have a list of questions that are important to you and pay close attention to their answers. Within just a few minutes of speaking with someone, you should be able to figure out whether or not they really have your business’s best interest at hand.
2. Make sure they understand “local” online marketing. There are some online marketing consultants who will try to sell you tools and systems that do not help at all when it comes to getting more “local” online exposure. So be sure to ask them if they specialize in “local” marketing.
3. Make sure they fully analyze your particular situation and can provide recommendations. Beware of marketing consultants who jump the gun and try to sell you something right off the bat. A professional consultant will ask you some detailed questions about your business so they can provide the most effective, targeted solutions that will help you get more local online visibility.
4. Make sure they can help you with various areas of online marketing – not just one. Some marketing consultants are focused on selling shiny objects; but in order to really make the internet work for you, there are several things you must do. For instance, a beautiful website is nothing if you’re not getting any traffic to that website. Likewise, a bunch of traffic is nothing if you don’t have effective conversion tools on your website that will turn visitors into customers.
5. Ask about pricing so you know what to expect. Just keep in mind that “cheaper price” could end up meaning “lack of service” – you get what you pay for most of the time. On the other hand, don’t assume that just because someone is charging premium prices that they will provide premium services.
As you can see, there are several factors to consider before choosing an Online Marketing specialist. But don’t let your own fears stop you from moving forward; instead, choose someone to help you so you can finally get in front of local consumers online.
Using Email Courses as a Way To Promote Products and Services
September 7, 2010 by Lisa Santos · Leave a Comment
Online courses, or email courses are becoming an increasingly popular way for savvy Internet marketers to promote their products and services. Online courses or email courses essentially include short online presentations or emails which include insightful information on a particular niche subject. These courses are usually offered in multiple, short segments to keep the students interested in the topic. This type of advertising serves a useful purpose and many of the participants do not even realize they are being subjected to a marketing campaign. This article will discuss creating and distributing an online or email course for the purposes of advertising your business.
The creation of an online course of an email course should begin with a solid idea for a series of educational articles which pertain to your business and will be of interest to your potential customers. Educational email courses can sometimes be sold for profit themselves but if you are interested in using the courses as marketing tools you will most likely be offering these courses free of charge in an effort to entice potential customers to purchase your products or services.
Determining the topic of your courses is very important because it can dictate the success of your marketing effort. Consider an online retailer of running shoes. This business owner may want to develop a series of email courses on subjects such as training for a marathon, preventing injuries, increasing speed and running for fun. Each of these courses may contain a few segments which offer different perspectives on the subject. These courses are ideal for this business because they are subjects which are likely to be of interest to the customers of the business. Likewise a real estate agent may opt to offer email courses on subjects such as understanding mortgage options, finding a lender or house hunting. Again these are all subjects which are likely to be of interest to the real estate agents clients.
The distribution list for your online or email courses should mostly include members of your target audience. This can be achieved by either offering the course as a download online where only interested Internet users will partake in the course or only emailing the course to recipients who have specifically expressed an interest in receiving more information about your products and services and have submitted their email address for this purpose.
Once you decide on a subject for your online or email course, seek out a qualified writer to create the content for your online or email course. This will help to give your copy a more professional appearance. The writer can assist you by creating copy which is informative and useful to your readers but is also well written, clear, concise and easy to understand. If your niche topic is highly specialized you might have to provide the writer with product information as well as research materials to ensure the content is informative and accurate. Additionally, you should review the content once it is completed to verify the accuracy.
When distributing your email course or launching your online course, it is helpful to request feedback from the users as the conclusion of the course. This is completely voluntary but when users respond they can provide you with useful feedback which will be extremely helpful if you intend to launch a similar marketing campaign in the future.
How Personal Branding Leads to Successful Affiliate Marketing
August 12, 2010 by Lisa Santos · 2 Comments
Personal branding your affiliate marketing campaigns can help you succeed in affiliate marketing. The market will recognize you among other players in the business. Connection is also properly established with customers with personal branding.
Why You Should Use Personal Branding
Personal branding adds your touch to the business. Personal branding goes well beyond a sleek logo or a perfect tag line. It is a way of sharing your expertise and own set of values with your target market.
Personal branding helps a lot in establishing rapport with your clients. A sense of connection is formed leading to trust and confidence of your market to get what they need from you.
In a business world where competition is very stiff, other marketers can steal your concept, your tools, and your system. There will also come a time when your patent for your product will expire. Personal branding attaches your identity with the goods or services that you sell.
People will know it is you when they see something on the market. If they trust you, they trust what you offer them.
Tips on Building your Personal Brand
Building a personal brand is not an easy task. It does not come in a package nor is it achieved overnight.
Here are some tips to get you started in building your brand:
- Run your own blog – If you want to be seen as an authority in the business, you should have a site devoted to it. You can also receive important feedback from your followers and potential clients.
- Distribute information online- You can write free ebooks or newsletter and distribute this to your list or potential customers. This can help you as an affiliate marketer in building trust with your market.
- Publish write-ups on trade publications- Print is still a very powerful medium. People can get their ideas and business sources by reading magazines and journals. You will develop the authority in your field through this effort.
- Give seminars and webinars- These talking engagements put the spotlight on you and serve as a good venue to show your expertise. You can also push for your services or products during these events.
Affiliate marketing is like standing in a crowded room where everyone is wearing a black suit, donning the same shoes, and sporting the same smile. It is a crowded business and people will have a hard time seeing you. Personal branding magnets the attention of the market to you and puts a spotlight on what you can give them.
The Power of Article Marketing is Through Your Author’s Resource Box
July 22, 2010 by Lisa Santos · 3 Comments
If you are using article marketing as one of your traffic building strategies, then there’s one important element you need to understand and master.
Your author’s resource box is the ONLY element of your article that allows for promotion, so it’s vital that you create a compelling resource box that invokes a call to action and entices every reader to follow through by clicking on your links.
With sites like Ezine Articles, you are able to create multiple resource boxes, choosing one that compliments each article that you write. You can also create multiple author’s accounts so that you can cover a large number of topics, all within one account.
Use your resource boxes wisely, and make sure that you offer your reader with an incentive to click through.
One way of doing this is by offering a free giveaway in your author’s resource box that is relevant to the topic or market that your article is focused on.
If you are not sure what you can offer within your resource box, here are a few things I have used successfully for over a year now:
- Free Report
- Newsletter or Ezine subscription
- Free ebook
- Free sample of a paid product
- Free Trial Membership
When creating your author’s resource box, make sure to use anchor text whenever possible. This will help you rank for specific keyword phrases within the search engines.
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