Tag Archives: pay per click advertising

Everything Else

Diverse Local Advertising Methods Reach Wider Audience

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by Liz Jones

For small business, advertising is the key to drawing in customers. There are several different ways to go about it. Using only one form of advertising is not always effective. Using multiple types of advertising venues reaches a broader audience, and therefore, more potential customers.

Demographics

Knowing some demographics about clientele is helpful in discovering what types of advertising will reach the. There are several ways to find out preference and background on present customers.

Conduct surveys with cards at cashiers counter or send them out with the mail on delivery orders. There are several online programs that can calculate demographics of those visiting a business’ website. These statistics can be used to streamline marketing and advertising strategies.

A business can cater marketing strategies towards its clients. If most of them are married adults without children, for example, a buy-one-get- one free coupon online might be successful. A local radio spot might also be efficient. Radio stations know their demographics, so, statistics can be mated to certain stations and commercial air times.

Format

Where and how a customer conducts business is key to reaching them in marketing strategies. If they rarely go online, the best pay-per-click advertising campaign is not going to reach them. If they never read the newspaper, classified ads will not help. Using both methods of advertising, however, will reach both clientele.

Methods

The type of online advertising used affects how a potential customer discovers a business, especially a small local one. If a business does not have a website it will be difficult for people to find them online. These businesses must use advertising online though social media websites or piggyback off of other websites such as the local Chamber of Commerce or a review site. Small businesses that are offline may also need to cater to an audience that is offline. Strategies might include flyer distribution, newspaper advertising, radio and television campaigns, direct mail and outdoor billboards.

Cost

The least expensive advertising with the greatest return on investment is always the best strategy. Some forms of local advertising cost very little. For example, writing a company blog is one way to advertise online at a cost of paying a professional or doing it in-house. Running coupons and flyers costs little and the method of distribution could also be low. However, if no one pays attention the cost won’t matter. If spending $3,000 on advertising online or through a radio campaign brings in $6,000 in customer sales, it is probably worth the investment.

About the Author

Author writes about a variety of topics. If you would like to learn more about local advertising, visit http://www.local-advertising.com/.

Everything Else

2 Types of Failures in Marketing – Where Are Your Marketing Efforts Failing?

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by Jonathan Roseland

Since we have clearly identified a target demographic & demand for what she is offering we can identify her problem as a marketing failure. I explained to her that in marketing there are 2 general types of failures.

Failures of Reach The Problem: Enough people don’t know about your product. The Solution: Increase the amount of people who know about your product. Easier said than done right? I could write a book and many people have, about how to increase reach. I would start with the free ways of increasing reach – Do some strategic friend requesting into increase your social media influence – Trade email lists with a strategic partner – Do some networking, get out more! – Do some research to identify some strategic partners that can act as distribution arms of your business – Post some Craigslist ads Then move onto paid reach methods – Talk to an SEO consultant to get yourself higher in the search engine rankings – Purchase an email list – Set up a pay per click advertising on one of the major search engines, Facebook ads or online ad networks – Consider doing some media buying (online banner ads, print media, radio, TV, newspaper, magazine) You may have heard the mostly true maxim that whatever problem you have in business, you can solve it with more sales. I will cautiously paraphrase this maxim by saying, whatever problem you have in marketing, you can solve it be increasing reach, provided you are savvy enough marketer (or hire one, LIKE ME!) to only market in highest possible ROI generating way. Failures of Conversion The Problem: People who do know about your product aren’t buying it. The Solution: If you are having a problem of conversion then you need to take an introspective look at several things. – Ad copy; is your ad copy creative, articulate, and concise? You may want to consider hiring an ad copy writer – Value proposition; is your product an excellent value for the people looking for it? – Need; This is business 101… The product or service you sell should either solve a problem people have or satisfy a real need. If it doesn’t you will have to market twice as hard (and smart!) to cram it down your customers throats – Competition; Do you have a competitor out there offering a better value or with massive branding presence? – Targeting to wide; Sometimes entrepreneurs are lured into competing in big markets by 1% projections (If I can only obtain 1% market share I’ll do a zillion a year in sales!), this kind of login rarely leads to a sustainable business model. I’d recommend ‘micro niche targeting’, more info on this later. – Feedback; are you asking your customers what they think of you & your offering? – 3rd Party credibility; do you have good, legitimate testimonials along with a good reputation on the net if people Google search you? If you think you are facing a failure of conversion it’s probably a good idea to read some marketing books, follow some blogs, take a course or hire a marketing consultant.

Now sometimes marketing failures are a combination of both factors, so you may have work to do in both areas, but in most it’s one more than another.

In Connie’s case, she has great marketing materials prepared, a nice website, is really passionate about what she does & has a great product ready for consumption by large yet clear defined demographic. I think her biggest issue is with reach, she explained to me that her email, phone invite & social media circle of influence is no more than 200 people. I explained to her that in my previous business of nightlife event marketing, our digital marketing list (email, social media contacts, text marketing recipients, etc) was between 20000 – 40000 & we would only get 800-1200 heads inside a nightclub (3%-5% conversion rate). My suggestion was to increase the amount of people that hear about what she does. The strategy we use to accomplish this will be the topic of another blog.

One thing to be aware of is that different business models can have significantly different ratios on their conversion & reach rates. For example, a clothing retailer hopes to sell as close as possible to 100% of the people that walk in their doors, whereas on the other side of the spectrum an internet marketer sends an email blast to a million people about some product and a 2% conversion rate would be phenomenal. So you want to think about your business a little before you diagnose your marketing failure. The marketing team at my marketing firm, Essence of Design(www.denvermarketingfirm.com), is always happy to provide a free consultation.

About the Author

THE INVENTOR OF THE MOST CLEVER COCKTAIL TOAST EVER, AMONG OTHER THINGS…

Entrepreneur, Raconteur, Host of epic parties, Student of success, Marketer, Break dancer, An experiencer of some epic failures & successes

Website Marketing

5 Small Business Internet Advertising Strategies That Work

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Photo by treadBy: James Belt

Getting your small, local business found on the world wide web can be a challenge, and most small business owners jut don’t have the time to research what works, or the money to pay someone else to figure it out for them.

To get you started, here are five techniques you can use today to start seeing results tomorrow.

Blogging. Simply buy a domain name, secure a hosting service, and install WordPress. For less than $20 and an hour of your time, you can get a blog up and running.

Why blogging works: Google (and other search engines) loves fresh content. If you’re choice is between a static catalog type page and a blog, go with a blog every time. The more you update, the more Google will crawl your site, and the more Google crawls your site, the easier it will be for potential customers to find your site and your business.

Pay Per Click advertising. If you want to guarantee search engine placement, pay per click is the way to go. Those results that show at the very top of the search results page in Google? Those are paid for by businesses just like yours who don’t want to wait for their rankings to rise naturally. By bidding on certain keywords, they essentially are buying placement in the search results.

Why pay per click works: The average Internet user doesn’t distinguish between paid results and natural results. If the link matches her inquiry, she will follow it, regardless of how it got there.

Forum posting. Forum posting is about helping your potential customers with their problems. Simply join the conversation on relevant forums and provide thoughtful advice, and you’ll find clients following you back to your site to see what else you have to say about the subject.

Why forum posting works: People like to do business with people, not corporations. By offering advice on forums, you are reminding customers that there is a real person behind your small business.

Article marketing. Article marketing is the placement of useful, relevant articles in article directories across the web. It’s another way of getting your business in front of potential customers, again by offering advice they are looking for.

Why article marketing works: The purpose of article marketing is twofold. First, article directories likely rank higher in search results than your company’s site, making it easier to get your name in front of potential customers. Second, article marketing produces valuable back links to your company’s site, which improves your own search engine ranking.

Banner advertisements. Banner advertisements are those graphic ads you see all over the web. They can be nearly any size, but most typical are 125 x 125 pixels, 468 x 60 pixels, or 160 x 600 pixels. Typically, merchants pay advertising networks to place banner ads on websites, rather than dealing directly with site owners.

Why banner advertising works: People rarely click banner ads, and when they do, they generally don’t buy. So why bother? Brand recognition. If you own a florist shop on a street full of florists, how do you get people to stop in your shop instead of your neighbor’s? By getting your brand in front of them. They might not click on your ad on the Internet, but they will recognize your shop if they’ve seen it on line, and they will choose the shop they recognize over the one they don’t every time.

Author Resource:-> Getting noticed on line doesn’t have to be expensive or time consuming. At http://InAreaCode.com, we take care of all the details of Small Business Internet Advertising so you can get on with the business of running your business.

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