The Whole Brain Group recently published an intriguing infographic explaining the key components of one of my favorite marketing methodologies, inbound marketing. I was drawn to this infographic because it compares traditional and inbound marketing before delving into the 5 steps to increase traffic and convert leads into customers.
In the infographic, the Whole Brain Group breaks down the inbound marketing process into the following five steps: Continue reading
The following is my most recent blog post for Mudbug Media entitled “What is Agile Marketing and Why is it Important?”.
Agile Marketing…Is it just a buzzword or a new way of marketing that could have a big impact on productivity and creativity?
Agile originally began as an approach to software development, but the ideas and practices have been adopted by those with a variety of skill sets, including design and marketing. By using an Agile approach, marketing becomes about being adaptive and responsive. The following are a few of the key components of the Agile approach to marketing: Continue reading
As search engines continue to alter their algorithms , so they can provide users with the best and most relevant content on the internet, the importance of content marketing is being pushed to the forefront. However, content marketing can be quite overwhelming when first diving in, so it is important to understand the influence that content has on customers and the core components.
Content+, a online marketing agency in the UK, created a captivating infographic to explain the importance and structure of content marketing.
Below are my favorite take-aways from the The Anatomy of Content Marketing – The Heart of Online Success infographic: Continue reading
There is no “one way” to gain the number one spot in search results. Search engines are constantly changing their algorithms, which means companies have to continuously adapt their search engine optimization strategy to meet the needs of both search engines and their customers. Before diving into the ever evolving world of SEO, here is a quick and simple breakdown of the basic factors that influence search results.
This article on search engine optimization is great for both beginners and intermediate marketers looking to better understand search engines. This article includes 10 easy to understand tips for increasing your site’s ranking in organic searches. If you want to increase your site’s search engine traffic, your site will need to show up on the first page of search results. Only one site can be #1 in a Google search, so I recommend setting a goal to get your site to appear above the fold. This article not only has great tips, it also has includes excellent resources for understanding and implementing an SEO strategy for your website. Check it out!
Your online reputation can make or break your personal brand strategy. In order to maintain your online reputation, regularly scheduled monitoring is necessary to keep track of what information about you is out there on the internet. While you can control what is on your personal online profiles (Facebook, LinkedIn, etc), you can’t always control the information others post (whether it is true or false).
I recently found a new site called BrandYourself that allows you to manage your online reputation and personal Google rankings. This site can help you manage an SEO campaign for your personal brand.
Their services are free, though you can pay a fee to upgrade to access additional monitoring features. To start off, I think that the features you get with your free account are sufficient though this may depend on what you want to achieve and the current state of your online reputation.
How it Works
For each step in the monitoring process, the site gives you a score and suggestions on how to improve.
Other Features
I have just started using this online reputation management tool myself, so I am still in the trial stage. But, so far I really like the features that the free membership offers and can see why upgrading would be beneficial as well. This is a one stop shop for managing your online reputation that I recommend checking out.
For more on Personal Branding, check out my other articles:
Social media has several purposes:
The list could go on and on, on why social media is beneficial to your brand. With any marketing attempt, there must be a goal (such as selling more of a products). Online marketing efforts are very successful at creating online “followers” into offline customers, including:
How Online Marketing Drives Offline Success Infographic
The infographic below from KISSmetrics breaks down how influential online marketing is for increasing sales and reaching conversion rate goals. Here are a few of the facts that stood out:
http://blog.kissmetrics.com/how-online-marketing-drives-offline-success/
Keywords are the basis of a successful SEO campaign. But, how do you decide what keywords to use?
One of the first things to remember when beginning search engine optimization is that you need to be realistic. There is a lot of competition to obtain the top ranking spots, especially for the very generic words. It is important to find out what your niche is and expand from there. You cannot be everything to everyone.
The Interne
t is ever evolving, so you do not want to be too specific or fixate on one keyword. Your keyword list should be constantly evolving.
Just like the other parts of your business strategy, SEO is about understanding your customer. Understanding how they search for your product and how they view your brand.
There is already a lot of information available regarding how customers are finding your website, just pull the Google Analytics “traffic generating” keyword list. This list will show what searches are already bringing the most traffic to your site. If you have an internal search, pull the keywords logs from there as well. After reviewing both lists, choose the less competitive (or less generic) keywords for your SEO campaign. Above all, remember that SEO is constantly evolving.
Once a quarter it is important to re-evaluate your campaign to:
As your campaign progresses, analyzing which keywords have the highest conversion rate. If your goal is to get people to your site and have them submit a “Contact Us” form, see which keywords are achieving this goal and which ones are not. If your keyword list is not achieving your goals, consider revising the direction. If your list is meeting your goals, you will still want to look for available opportunities for growth and monitor how the keyword results are changing. Because, one quarter you may hold the top spot, but by the next quarter you may not.
Atomicdust, an agency in St. Louis, posted a great blog on how to determine if your company should be using Pinterest. As of now, Pinterest is driving more referral traffic than Google+, YouTube, and LinkedIn combined (10 million monthly visitors and growing).
I really enjoyed this post because it asks three straight-to-the-point questions about Pinterest and your brand:
Use the link below to check out the full blog and learn more:
Should My Brand be on Pinterest? – Web Design and Marketing Blog.