It’s the beginning of the year – which means creating New Year’s Resolutions and thinking about the year ahead. We reflect on the positives, we notice our mistakes and we work on how we can improve. Instead of indulging in high calorie food like we do over Christmas, we start cleansing our bodies and working on getting back into shape. And – like our bodies, our business’ need to detox too. The start of a new year is one of the best times to analyse the results of our digital marketing campaigns, try new strategies and create a marketing plan for the year.
Take your business to new heights by eliminating digital marketing mistakes and digitally savvy in 2016 by following these tips:
Mistake 1: Not Using Analytics Tools
If you’re going to promote your products and services online, you need to be able to identify what’s working and what’s not. Tools such as, Google Analytics, HootSuite and Buffer provides you with rich data that helps you build a picture of how your content and social media marketing connects with your customers. Check out these simple but essential things you need to monitor:
- Your social media insights. If you’re using a social media schedule tools like HootSuite, Sprout Social and Buffer, you can create reports on how your social media is performing in a few clicks. This will help you compare results, monitor your following, identify your demographics and see how much traffic is being directed to your website. On Facebook, you can see what time your fans are online, the most popular times are when you should be posting. You can do this by logging into your page, clicking ‘Insights’ on the top panel and clicking ‘Posts’ on the left hand side.
- See what’s popular on your website. Google Analytics provides you with a wealth of data which shows what’s popular on your website. Seeing what content brings in the most traffic can help you create future blog posts that are popular with your audience.
- Identify what’s converting. You might be investing a lot of time and money into moving up the page rankings for a chosen keyword. The keyword might be directing lots of traffic to your website, but the traffic may not convert into enquiries. On Google Analytics you can monitor your SEO campaign so you can identify when to stop optimizing a keyword and concentrate more time and effort on another.
Mistake 2: Forgetting to be ‘Social’ on Social Media
Don’t worry, you’re not the only one. Not being social on social media is one of the most popular mistakes businesses make. Check out our article on 3 Ways Social Media Automation on Twitter is Antisocial. Cut down on selling your products/services and engage with your following by following these strategies:
- Run competitions. Everyone loves the thought of winning something. Show your customers value in following your social media profiles by running a giveaway in exchange for a ‘like’ or ‘comment’. This is an effective way of increasing your brand awareness, social media following and reaching your target audience.
- Share your customer’s content. If your customers take a picture of your product, write a blog post reviewing your service/product – sharing it on social media will show your potential customers what your customers are saying about you.
- Start conversations with your customers and relevant influential people. Social media platforms are a great place to respond to comments from your customers and build trust. Twitter is a great place to get talking to popular people in your industry to build relationships and increase your brand awareness.
Mistake 3: Avoiding SEO
If we want to find something out, we Google it. Google is a very powerful tool to get your business noticed by potential customers searching for your services and products you provide. To kickstart your SEO campaign, take a look at our guide to SEO and use the following tactics:
- Find out the most relevant keywords for your industry. You can identify the most searched keywords for your business and area by using the Keyword Planner tool on Google AdWords. Once you’ve found the keywords, you can begin to optimise them on your website.
- Use your keyword in page titles and meta descriptions.
- Publish relevant blog posts to direct your potential customers to your website.
Mistake 4: Focussing on Promoting Your Services
You may find that a lot of us avoid information about businesses services. When we’re searching online, we are looking to find the solution to our problem. In place of promoting your products and services, start providing content that will show your expertise and gain trust from your potential customer:
- Create and share helpful content. For example, if sell fitness clothing and gym equipment, writing blog posts and social media posts about workouts, healthy recipes and benefits of certain exercises will engage with your audience more than sharing links to gym tops and Additionally, by publishing helpful content, you can work on a wide range of keywords which will drive more high quality traffic to your website.
Mistake 5: Not Having a Budget for Social Media Promotion
Facebook has made it more and more difficult to reach potential customers without paying. Simply by having a small Facebook budget, you can engage with more people and increase your brand awareness. Here are a few posts to sponsor:
- Advertise helpful content. If you’ve recently published a video, infographic or blog post that will help customers – paying to promote the post will help you connect with more of your target audience.
- Boost competitions to maximise your engagement. Similar to sharing helpful content, making more people aware of your competition will help you engage with a larger audience and get more entries.
Mistake 6: Not Having an Email Marketing Campaign
With 91% of consumers checking their email daily, email marketing could be the missing link in your digital marketing campaign. Get your email marketing started by:
- Creating a giveaway to build your mailing list. Try building your database of emails by offering free downloadable guides as well running competitors in exchange for an email address.
- Promoting your latest content. Like sharing your latest blog posts, videos and infographics on social media, you can use your email marketing campaign to share content and direct traffic to your website.
- Advertising special offers. As well as promoting your products and services, running exclusive offers will help keep your potential customers subscribed to your mailing list.
Mistake 7: Not Using the Right Social Media Platform for Your Business
In 2015 you may have not used social media to promote your business or you may have struggled to find the best platform to engage with your ideal customer. You can identify the best social media platforms by:
- Understanding your typical customer can help you create content for your potential customer. For example, if you offer services for businesses, LinkedIn is one of the best places to network and promote your content, but if you’re target audience is people – Facebook is an ideal platform to share your content.
Summary
Get ahead of your competitors in 2016 by keeping your strategies up to speed with the constantly evolving nature of digital marketing. Start understanding your audience, showing your expertise, blogging to boost traffic and using social media to engage with your customers. That way – you’ll reach your potential audience, gain their trust and boost your sales.
Questions, comments, straight up disagree? We want to hear from you! Reach out to us on twitter or comment below!
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