How to Utilize Staff Strengths to Meet your Internet Marketing Goals
Written by Smartt Team on June 15, 2009
No matter what industry you’re in, everyone at the office is going to have different talents when it comes to internet marketing. Some people are excellent writers and can write pages and pages of content in the blink of an eye. Others are good at design and can effortlessly create custom banners and logos. Still others are good with the camera and love taking pictures and videos.
Instead of creating a marketing plan and then forcing staff members to fit into that mold, do the opposite. Allow staff talents to drive the direction of your internet marketing efforts. Working this way will lead to a more well-rounded campaign that everyone will enjoy doing.
1. Writing Content
Writing content is fundamental to internet marketing. For most websites, written content makes up the bulk of the site and the content falls into two categories: informational and sales. Informational content consists of free information put out on the web. These articles give advice or tips on how to do something related to your business or industry. But nowhere should you try to sell your product. There are other places to sell and this isn’t one of them. Informational content can include eBooks, articles and blog posts.
The other type of written content is sales. You’re a business (or an organization or charity or church) and you need a place to tell your customers what you have to offer. This is the place to do it. Sales and marketing content should give your customers enough information about your product in order to make a buying decision. Be sure to include a call to action at the end of the page and let customers know exactly what they should do next.
2. Design
People who naturally love design are excellent assets to your e-marketing team. They can make banners, landing pages and create flash videos to put on your site. Creating different aspects of the site, while keeping with the branding of your company will add flare to your website and help keep customer’s interest in the company and the site.
On the surface, it may not seem like design is an important part of internet marketing, but in fact it is. Good design that is clean, simple and professional helps with your e-marketing in that it builds credibility for the site. Design is part of positioning yourself as an expert in your field. It allows clients to feel comfortable with you and your product and will encourage them to return to your site for more information and eventually to buy your products.
3. Videos
If you’re lucky enough to have someone on your staff who enjoys making videos you will be able to reach a much larger audience. Different people have different styles of learning and many people learn best through videos. Adding instructional or informational videos to your website will provide another kind of content for your customers.
The beauty about videos is that they work overtime for you. Not only can you post your video directly on your website, but you can also post it on YouTube, where millions of viewers are likely to find you. At the end of the video make sure to include your URL and direct viewers to your website for more related information. “How to” and instructional videos are excellent to put on your site because people are always looking for information on the web. Additionally, you can transcribe the content of the video and publish it as an article or a blog post. Now when people search for your topic, your transcription will also be indexed, boosting your SEO.
Advertising Online
Written by Smartt Team on June 2, 2009
Advertising online is nothing like advertising offline. In fact, the two forms of advertising are so different they don’t even resemble each other anymore. Traditionally advertising has taken the form of “interruption advertising.” Advertisers compete for people’s attention through television, radio and print ads. The goal of this form of advertising is to grab viewers’ attention away from whatever they were watching, reading or listening to and make them pay attention to your ad.
Interruption advertising worked for a long time, especially for large corporations. Now, however, the game has changed. And the internet had a major role in this change. People no longer respond to interruption in the same way they used to. In the olden days you could run a commercial on TV and viewers would race to the store to buy your product. Now, interruption advertising is so commonplace that viewers have found defenses against all the unwanted interruptions. The result is that this form of advertising just doesn’t work anymore.
Just like television commercials and print ads are losing their effectiveness, so are most forms of advertising online. Banners, skyscraper ads and flash videos don’t capture people’s attention these days and actually have the opposite effect of annoying people.
Nowadays, advertising needs to be much more subtle. It’s no longer about shocking people into paying attention. Rather, it’s about providing useful and relevant information that is going to solve some kind of problem. This is not direct advertising. In fact, it’s a very indirect form of adverting. Instead of telling people what they need, it’s about building relationships with people and gaining trust.
Effective online advertising includes the following components:
- Article writing campaigns- articles should provide information that is relevant to your business and useful to your customers. “How-to” articles work well along with articles that give expert advice. An important point to keep in mind about these articles: Do not sell. This isn’t the time or the place for selling. No one wants to read a 500-word sales pitch. Focus on adding value and helping people. It will build trust.
- Blogs- blogging has become one of the most effective and important tools for advertising online. A blog is like an online opinion column and has an informal tone. Basically, it’s one person sharing what they know with the world. They generally should not contain any sales pitches, except for once in a while when something special and exciting is coming to the market. One major advantage of blogs is that they tend to rank well on the search engines. This helps customers find your site and boosts your SEO.
- Google AdWords- these four line advertisements are becoming one of the most popular and effective ways to promote your product. They only appear when someone searches for one of your keyword terms so ads are targeted. When people are looking to buy something, they appreciate getting a targeted ad that helps them find what they’re looking for. When using AdWords, it’s important to test your ads to make sure they’re effective. Run two ads simultaneously to find out which one pulls in the best results. Then, improve upon it and run it again alongside your improved ad. Working this way will help you achieve optimum results.
