Feeling a bit stressed this holiday season? Get tips and resources that will help you become more efficient and alleviate stress!
Read more at PPCHero.com
0 Comments
“Wash. Condition. Rinse. Repeat.” Sound familiar? It's a common morning routine. And we all know how things run when we settle into a comfortable routine: it feels like life is on autopilot. Sometimes, that works. However, you might perform your routine so well that you forget to look for improvements. Perhaps your hair would look better without conditioner, but if you never stop to question your routine, you'll keep going down the same path. You'll be stagnant. The same logic applies to your social media strategy. It's easy to repeat the tactics that have worked well for you so far, generating a little bit of buzz and keeping you hooked into what's happening on Twitter. But are you just going through the motions without considering how you can use social media to improve conversion rates? If you've been using the same social media strategies for ages and your impact has leveled off, it's probably time to review your goals and make sure that your social media tactics are increasing conversion rates, building brand awareness, and bringing in new customers. Here's how. 1. Double Down on One (or Two) Channels That Work For You– And Share VideosLet's face it: Internet users are addicted to video, and that's great for publishers and marketers. On average, Facebook users devour 100 million hours of video every single day. About 82% of Twitter users watch video on that particular medium. Marketers are also seeing positive results with LinkedIn Video, which was introduced this past August to help users introduce themselves, explain their professional processes, or reach out to new people. If you want to increase conversion rates on social media, double down on the channels that are already working for you. For example, if you see more engagement on Twitter than you do on LinkedIn, it's a good idea to direct your efforts on Twitter. After we saw higher engagement with Facebook videos, especially the one about the three essential WordPress plugins for websites, we narrowed our targeting to people that are interested in WordPress as a software and those who work in IT industry such as the web developers or freelancers. As the result, we're able to reach more potential customers and generated immediate page likes and engagements, increasing the average daily registrations by 71%. 2. Use Thoughtful, Conversion-Oriented Social Sharing ButtonsMany publishers simply work hard to create content and trust that readers will figure out how to share their content. However, it's easy for publishers to integrate compelling social sharing buttons onto their blogs– and these easy-to-click buttons help drive virality. That's why it's crucial for publishers to optimize their social sharing buttons to drive more content engagement. But before we get into the tactics, let's talk about what makes a good social sharing button in the first place:
Depending on your specific blog and its graphic style, you'll likely want to choose between two types of social buttons: inline or sticky share buttons. The choice is ultimately a matter of your own strategy and preference, but here's an overview of each type:
Below, you'll see examples: first, inline buttons arranged neatly together for a graphically-satisfying result. Second, a “floating sidebar” that makes its presence clear: Your choice? Simple. Pick the style that suits your site the best. 3. Participate in Social Forum Sites and Add ValueWhen it comes to social forum sites, you're looking at three main contenders: Reddit, Quora, and Inbound. Each of these sites is full of active communities that are chatting, sharing, and getting support. If you participate on these sites, you'll get more attention on your brand. Here's a great example of a Quora answer that shot to the top because of the time and insight shared in the answer: If you have read this Quora marketing guide, you'll remember the site gives you exposure to 1.5 million monthly viewers so you stand a good chance of drawing more attention to your site. If even a fraction of those eyes want to check out more about you and what you do, the investment you've made in sharing value online will pay off. 4. Test the Life Out of Social AdsAre you thinking like a data-driven marketer? If not, you should. You need to analyze data to figure out which platforms performs the best in driving brand awareness, engagement, and ultimately conversions. A key component of data analysis is A/B testing. Perform A/B tests on your social ads to find out which version resonates more with your audience. On most of the social media platforms, you can invest a relatively small amount of money to gain insights that could generate huge returns. Facebook is big on promoting its own A/B testing platform, which means that most of the work is already done for you. Not sure you want to spend any money on social A/B testing just yet? You can even use strategies to test your Facebook posts without putting a single penny down. 5. Consider Exactly How Your Audience Buys on Social MediaGiven the variance in demographics of different social media platforms, it's not surprising to see that some products sell better on one platform than another. Some sales processes are built for the platform. Others…well, they'll take a while. For example, an email service provider may not capture many direct sales from Twitter, but that doesn't mean it can't build brand awareness and long-term name recognition. On the other hand, when Kylie Jenner announces a new lip kit on social media, she can expect instant sales.
The bottom line? Understand the sales process of your audience and create a social media strategy tailored to the demographic of each platform. 6. Use Emotional Cues to Spruce Up Your HeadlinesAccording to CoSchedule, there are three headline formats that perform particularly well. These can be used as headline for your blog posts, and can then be used on social media to increase conversions.
These headlines share a few things in common. First, they get to the point: there's no doubt in what you can expect to get or learn when you read the post. Second, they take on the customer's perspective - some of them even sound like keyphrases that customers and readers are entering as they search for your solutions. When it comes to headlines, start from the customer's perspective. Think about what will resonate most with them, and you'll rarely go wrong. 7. Play Nice With OthersNo one wants to follow a social media robot online. Follow this golden rule: be the kind of social media account you would want to follow. For example:
For example, toilet paper is the opposite of a sexy product, but Charmin's Twitter account is so generous and engaging that social media users can't help but interact. The brand replies to Tweets that come in, and runs campaigns, such as #Tweet4ATree to encourage participation.
8. Use Social Media as a Primary Support ChannelDid you know that in the last two years, customer service interactions on Twitter have increased 250%? That's a lot of people asking for help on social media. Today's social media user expects your service to be timely and responsive, even in matters of customer support. Why not give them what they want? Send personalized and timely replies on social media, even if it's simply to direct someone to the right customer support channel. For example, Casper, an online retailer for mattresses, responds in a natural, friendly way to customers with questions. They don't be belabor the interaction or make it tough on the customer– they simply give a friendly answer quickly and efficiently. Take Advantage of Your Social MediaLet's face it: you're on social media anyway. If your old routine has gotten you nowhere, it might be time to incorporate the overlooked tactics that boost conversions and even sales. Let us know about any of your experiences with these tactics below! About the Author: Paul Lentz is the SVP of Publisher & Business Operations at ShareThis, a technology company that provides free sharing and content optimization tools to help more than three million publishers grow their digital audiences. When not doing what he can to support the publishers, he's taking a break from digital devices and experiencing nature through skiing, hiking, and running. All businesses can benefit from more sales. Whether your company is thriving or struggling to get by, a sales surge can help you get more cash in the bank. If your current marketing strategies aren't working or growing stale, I've got a solution for you. Produce more video content. Regardless of your industry, videos can do wonders for your company. Don't believe me? Well, more than half of marketing experts across the globe say that videos yield the highest ROI compared to other types of content. Furthermore, 43% of consumers want marketers to produce more video content. You need to give the people what they want. I've seen too many businesses avoid video marketing tactics because they don't know where to start. They are afraid of doing something wrong. I've even heard some business owners say they don't use video content because they don't have the right equipment. You don't need any fancy or expensive video equipment. All of the tactics I'm going to show you can be accomplished with a smartphone or basic camera. That's it. Here's something else to consider. Think about the other marketing tactics you're currently using. Can more than one person view them at the same time? I doubt it. But look at how video content gets consumed in groups: It's unlikely two or more people will sit side by side and read your email newsletter together. However, if you send a video, it's more likely people will watch it together. Plus, look at all the device options people use to consume video content. Videos can help you:
All these benefits lead to more sales. This is how you do it. 1. Create a YouTube channelIf you're not currently using any videos to promote your company, creating a YouTube channel is the first step. Here's why. Once you add videos to YouTube, it's easy to share them on other platforms. Whether you're embedding the video into your website or just sending a link, the YouTube platform makes it simple to accomplish this. As you'll see shortly, you're going to distribute your videos across lots of different platforms. Uploading all your content to YouTube first will help save you time because you won't need to make the same video more than once. Let's look at an example so you can see what I'm talking about. Here's a video I included in a blog post; Guess where it came from? I took it directly from my YouTube channel. Making the video again would have been a waste of time. That's why this should be the first place where you start. Don't be intimidated. You won't have hundreds of videos overnight. Just focus on one at a time. It took me years to get over 25,000 subscribers on my YouTube channel. But now, I have videos with over 22,000 views. Plus, users, in addition to viewing YouTube content on other platforms, will view it directly on that site as well. YouTube is only second to Facebook when it comes to the number of active monthly users. All the content on their platform is strictly videos, and it is still extremely successful. That alone should show you how powerful video content is in terms of what users want to consume. 2. Post videos on social mediaEven if you're not currently using videos, I'll assume you have active social media profiles. Use them to their full potential. You should be posting on social media every day. This will keep your brand fresh in the minds of your followers. The reason why so many companies don't always post on social media is because they don't know what to share. Well, if you're adding new videos to your YouTube channel, social media is the perfect platform to share your new content. Most social media platforms have their own software to create and publish video content, but we'll get to that shortly. For now, just try to focus on getting all your YouTube videos onto your Facebook and Twitter profiles. That's a great place to start. Take a look at how videos have been trending on Facebook for the last two years: We saw a 6% jump in video posts by businesses from 2016 to 2017. I expect that number to continue rising each year for the foreseeable future. 3. Add more videos to your websiteWhat's the first thing people see when they visit your website? Too many words on the page can be confusing and unappealing. You shouldn't have lots of long paragraphs explaining how your company operates. Nobody wants to read that. Instead, simplify the design and color schemes. Replace all of it with a video message. Square uses this tactic to explain how their products work: Do you see how little text they included on this page? This won't confuse anyone. Instead, the viewer's attention gets drawn to the video. When you click the link, it plays a video from Square's YouTube channel. It's much more effective than trying to explain how your products work in long and messy paragraphs. 4. Go live on FacebookI love it when businesses use Facebook live as a promotional method. It's one of the best ways you can engage with your Facebook followers in real time. But there's science behind it. You don't want to just go live randomly for no rhyme or reason. Instead, you should schedule your live streams to run at a set time every week. That way, you can continue building a regular audience. Think about your favorite TV shows. They are on at the same day and time every week. If they just came on sporadically, it's unlikely you'd be able to catch every episode. That's the kind of following you're trying to create here with your live video streams. Just like your website, Facebook live is a great chance for you to promote your products or do a demonstration. Facebook is the most popular live video streaming platform: The user interaction is my favorite part of Facebook live. Viewers have a chance to comment on your live stream. It's absolutely imperative that you respond to those comments. This interaction will help you build a stronger bond with your customers. The acknowledgement will show them how much you care. Call them out by name while you're live. Thank them for watching. Give the viewer a reason to tune in next week. Go live for a long time. Facebook allows you to have a stream that lasts for up to four hours. You don't need to use all four, but I'd say go for at least two or three. The longer you're live, the greater the chance you'll have of getting more people to watch. Long live videos mean you need to come prepared. Don't just wing it. Have some notes or references for topics, products, and services you're planning to discuss. 5. Use Instagram storiesYou can post pictures and videos to your Instagram story. For today's topic, we'll focus on the video portion of this. Instagram stories expire after 24 hours. Feel free to post several each day to keep your brand fresh in the minds of your followers. These stories appear at the top of everyone's homepage. Anyone who follows you will see you have a story posted that day. To view it, all they need to do is click on your photo, and the video will play through. Popular stories will also show up on the search page for users who don't follow you. It's a great way to increase brand exposure. Instagram also has a live video feature that's incorporated into their stories. You don't need to approach this the same way you do Facebook live videos. Instead, use your live Instagram stream when you're somewhere cool. You can give your followers a tour around your production facility or introduce them to your staff. This helps create an exclusive feeling for anyone watching. Now they have access to something that would normally be kept behind closed doors. Plus it's so easy to do. Just pull your phone out of your pocket and start recording. But like on Facebook live videos, you'll definitely want to respond to the live user comments. 6. Encourage customers to make their own videosNot all your video content needs to be produced by you. Try to get your customers involved. You'll accomplish a few things with this method.
Look at how GoPro encourages their customers to create video content: They post the best videos on their website and even give out awards to the creators of their favorite submissions. Giving the customer recognition for their work is a great way to get people on board. Plus, people are really creative. You may find out their content is even better than yours. Run a contest or some other promotion that gets your customers to break out their cameras and start filming. 7. Email videos to your subscribersRemember earlier I said we could use the videos from your YouTube channel on multiple platforms? Well, here's another chance to share those videos with your customers. Look to your email subscription list. Those people may or not be following you on social media, so it's not a guarantee they'll see your live streams or other shared videos. But you have direct access to their inboxes. Use it. Embed YouTube videos into your email marketing campaigns. Given the statistics above, you can see that emails with video content:
So it's a no-brainer to employ this strategy, especially since you don't have to come up with brand new videos for each email. Just use the existing ones from your YouTube channel. 8. Make sure all your videos are mobile friendlyOne constant you need to maintain with all your videos is the compatibility with mobile devices. That's why I've been recommending you use platforms like YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram to share your content. That way, the videos automatically get optimized. Take a look at how videos are being consumed on mobile devices: Mobile videos are trending upward. Just make sure any videos included on your website and emails are on mobile friendly templates. If your videos aren't loading and can't be viewed on phones or tablets, you'll defeat the purpose of posting them in the first place. ConclusionThose of you looking for an easy and inexpensive way to get more sales for your business need to start creating more video content. Create a YouTube channel, and add videos to it. You'll be able to share those same videos on other platforms like social media pages, your website, and even in email campaigns. In addition to sharing pre-recorded videos, take advantage of live video streams. Use Facebook and Instagram for this. It's a better way to engage with your viewers since you can respond to their comments in real time. Another way to produce more video content is by getting other people to do it for you. Come up with creative ways to get your customers to submit videos. You can share those videos on your website as well. No matter what kind of videos you're making, just make sure they are optimized for mobile devices. The increased brand exposure combined with an easy way for you to explain your products and services will ultimately boost your sales. What platforms are you currently using to share your video content? Many in the SEM world are concerned that artificial intelligence and machine learning will make their jobs obsolete -- but columnist Frederick Vallaeys believes that humans and machines working together will ultimately create the most value for clients.
The post PPC agencies will play these 4... Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article. Email is one of the best ways to communicate with your customers. Sending confirmation emails can help establish a stronger relationship with your current clientele. It keeps them in the loop. They won't have to second-guess whether their order went through or whether an action they completed was successful. That's why all companies need to utilize confirmation emails. For starters, if you're not sending confirmation messages, you need to start ASAP. But for those of you who already use this communication strategy, here is the question: what does the content of your message say? If the email is just a simple receipt, you're not using this marketing tactic to its full potential. Receipts aren't enough and won't squeeze any additional dollars out of the customer. Think about your current email marketing campaigns. For your marketing to be successful, your subscribers need to open the message and click on something in it. What are your current open rates and CTRs? Those numbers drastically improve for confirmation emails compared to bulk marketing campaigns. That's why this is such a great opportunity from a marketing perspective. Now is the perfect chance for you to send a promotional email in addition to a confirmation email. I've had lots of success using this strategy, and I've helped other companies increase their revenues through confirmation emails as well. I'll show you how to accomplish this too. Always send welcome messages to new subscribersLet's start at the very beginning. Don't wait for your next newsletter or promotional message to contact a new subscriber. If you do that, it could be over a week or two before this person hears from you. Send them a welcome message as soon as they sign up. Since they just provided you with their email address, your brand is fresh in their minds. This early confirmation is a great chance to encourage a sale or some other action like a download. Welcome messages are also necessary if you have a double opt-in strategy in place. I like using double opt-in landings because it helps eliminate fake email addresses from your subscriber list. This ultimately leads to higher engagement from the recipients and makes your marketing analytics much more accurate. Just look at how a double opt-in welcome message affects your open rates: Now that you've got the new subscriber to open your message, it's your chance to make some money.
Let's say you have an ecommerce store. If someone signs up for your email subscription list, it's safe to say they have some genuine interest in buying something. Well, a welcome email confirmation offering a discount could just be the determining factor that turns a subscriber into a customer. Here's a great example of this strategy from GAP: Notice that the offer is valid only for 30 days. Making your promotional offer time sensitive is also a good way to encourage a sale. Get your subscribers used to confirmation emails by sending them one right off the bat with a welcome message. Remind shoppers about their abandoned shopping cartsIt happens to everyone with an ecommerce site. Customers browse for items online, add products to their carts, but never complete the checkout process. This is disheartening. Oftentimes, the shopper was only a click or two away from making a purchase. Just because the cart was abandoned doesn't mean you need to give up on that sale. If a customer was browsing on their unique customer profile from your website, you'll have their email address on file. Otherwise, they may have provided you with their email address as one of the earlier steps in the checkout process before they abandoned the cart. Some of the top reasons for cart abandonment include:
If it appears the price was the reason why this individual didn't complete the ordering process, send them an email with a discount or another promotion. Look at how Kate Spade New York accomplishes this with their cart abandonment messages: Now the customer has an added incentive to buy. They were already interested in those products in the first place, so the discount can really be the determining factor that finalizes the sale. After they finish checking out their online cart, they'll continue to get more confirmation emails from you, which I'll discuss shortly. Consider this statistic: 69.23% of online shopping carts get abandoned. If your abandonment rate is high, you can still squeeze money out of those carts through confirmation messages. Keep the customer updated once they place an orderAs I just mentioned, the confirmation emails don't stop when a customer places their order. You need to keep them updated throughout the entire process. Each step is an excuse for you to send another message. The customer will like these messages as well since they are receiving valuable information about their purchase. Every time something gets bought online, you have an excuse to send four confirmation emails to the customer, in this order:
The order confirmation message is simple. This will be their receipt. You can include the order number, items, and pricing breakdown. But it can be more than just a receipt. You can also promote other products as Target does with this confirmation: When the package gets picked up from your warehouse and the shipping process starts, send them another email with the shipping carrier and tracking information. Send another message once the package gets delivered. People aren't always home all day. So this email will be exciting. They know there's something waiting for them when they get home from work. Or they can make arrangements for a friend or family member to grab the package if they aren't going to be home for a while. Finally, a week or so after the order gets delivered, you can send them a follow-up message. Include a survey, and ask for their feedback. You want to find out if they were happy with the ordering process and ultimately if they are satisfied with your product. This final message in the drip sequence accomplishes a few things. It:
Here's the catch, however. All four of the messages you just sent to the customer after they placed an order need to be more than just their obvious value. Include promotional content as well, just like Target did in the above example. Offer a discount. Tiny Prints does this with their confirmation emails: Additional discounts give the customer a reason to become a repeat customer. It helps you squeeze more dollars out of one person. Upsell and cross-sellAs you can see from some of the examples we've already looked at, upselling and cross-selling methods can be incorporated into these confirmation emails as well. Upselling encourages the customer to buy something similar to the product they have but at a higher price point. Cross-selling promotes other products related to the item the customer just purchased. For example, let's say a customer bought a pair of headphones or some other electronic device, like a tablet or computer, from your ecommerce store. When you're sending the drip campaign of emails to keep them updated about their order, one of those messages can contain a cross-selling strategy. Offer them a protective case or travel bag to keep their new product safe. Any accessory compatible with what they just bought is worth including in these confirmation emails. It's a great way to increase profits, especially because you're marketing to an existing customer. It's easier to sell to repeat customers: Furthermore, loyal customers spend three to five times more money each purchase. So you're definitely pitching to the right crowd here if you're offering an upsell or cross-sell promotion. Encourage social sharing to gain referralsThe person receiving your confirmation emails shouldn't be the only person you're trying to squeeze more money out of. These people have friends and family members who could potentially be valuable sources of revenue as well. You just need to make them aware of your brand. That's why you need to encourage your subscribers to share your content. If you're sending a discount in your confirmation message, include a share link for social media websites like Facebook or Twitter. You can also have the recipient forward the message directly to their friends. But not everyone will do this out of the kindness of their hearts. Even if they really love your brand, they may not go out of their way to potentially spam their friends. You need to give them something in return. Check out this order confirmation email from Grubhub: If they refer a friend to Grubhub, they'll get $7. It's simple and effective. Now you're getting extra revenue from more than just one person. The customer who made the referral is very likely to buy from you again since they'll want to cash in their discount or reward. Plus, you're acquiring new customers and adding more subscribers to your list from the people they are referring. And guess what? As we discussed, new subscribers will also get a welcome message from you to confirm their subscription. It's a cycle that works. ConclusionEvery email that gets sent out to customers needs to be strategic. While you may want to send your customers a promotional message every day to encourage sales, subscribers don't want that. In fact, getting too many emails is the number one reason why consumers unsubscribe from email lists. You need to make the most out of every message you're able to send. Confirmation emails are the perfect way to disguise promotional offers. The data we looked at earlier told us that confirmation messages have higher open rates and click-through rates than other types of emails. You should always send a welcome message to new subscribers to confirm they've been added to your email list. If you have an ecommerce store and customers are abandoning their shopping carts, it doesn't mean that sale is lost. Send a cart abandonment reminder email with a discount as an incentive for the customer to complete the checkout process. After customers buy something, keep them up to date with confirmation messages about the status of their orders. Let them know when the orders ship and when they get delivered. All of these confirmation messages are a great opportunity to upsell and cross-sell. You can also encourage your subscribers to share these promotions with friends and family as a way to acquire more customers and make more money. What types of promotions do you offer in your confirmation emails to encourage customers to spend more money on their next purchases? Getting new customers isn't always cheap. That's one of the reasons why I tell businesses to focus on customer retention. With that said, it's impossible to retain customers if you can't get them through your doors or to your website in the first place. If you're a new company without an existing customer base, you'll need to come up with some creative ways to acquire new ones. The problem is new businesses typically have a limited marketing budget. They need sales to generate money for promotional content, but they can't get any sales without those promotions. It's a paradox. This goes for companies that may have been in business for a while but are struggling with their revenue streams. Regardless of your situation, new customers can always help. You don't need to spend a fortune on customer acquisition. Here's a basic formula that shows how to calculate your acquisition cost: If you want an even more accurate version of this formula, you can add additional costs besides sales and marketing. They may include:
That's the true representation of how much it costs you to get a new customer. Keeping this number low will give you a much higher return on investment. The strategies I'm going to show you actually work. I know this from personal experience. These are the most inexpensive techniques to acquire lots of new customers. Start by retargeting old customersI know what you're thinking. If you're focusing on existing customers, it's retention, not acquisition-right? Not exactly. If you've been in business for a while and it's been a year or two since a customer was active, I wouldn't refer to that person as an existing customer. Getting them back to your business is basically like getting a brand new customer. Dig up any old information you have on this person:
Anything you have. Reach out to them with a promotion to try to get their business back. Here's an example of an email campaign from Carter's: They give an old customer a reason to make another purchase and come back to their brand. If you've recently made new improvements to your business, don't be afraid to let old customers know. Maybe the reason why they left in the first place was because they thought your company was outdated. Share any information about your infrastructure that has improved the customer experience. Do you have a new mobile application? Have you renovated your brick and mortar location? These are examples of things to promote when you contact these old leads. Step up your presence on InstagramTo survive, you have to adapt to the times. The days of using snail mail and local print advertisements to promote your business are slowly becoming a thing of the past. Your business needs to have a digital presence. Stay engaged with prospective customers via Instagram. Over half of users on Instagram are active on a daily basis. There are also 800 million active monthly users. These numbers continue to rise each year. The popularity of this platform isn't going to phase out any time soon. One of the reasons why I like to use Instagram is because it's so inexpensive. It doesn't cost you anything to create a profile. The only cost is your time. Even if you're paying someone to manage your social media accounts, it's OK as long as they're being productive. Here's what you need to do. Work on getting more followers on your profile. Realistically, not all your followers will become customers. Don't worry about converting all of them. Let's go through a scenario. Start with a goal. You want to gain 10,000 Instagram followers in the next month. It's a high number, but it's attainable. You're aiming to convert 20% of your followers to customers. That's 2,000 new customers in just one month. Don't forget the best part: it didn't cost you anything. For those of you who think a 20% conversion is too high or unrealistic, think again. Based on this generational data, it's actually quite modest: Internet users in the United States are likely to purchase something from a brand they follow on social media. If you get more followers, you'll get more customers. You can improve your conversion chances if you're managing your Instagram account properly. Post pictures and videos of your products and services. Get your followers involved as well. Try to encourage them to post images of themselves using your products. One of my favorite ways to do this is by featuring customer photos on your account. When your followers see they can get recognition for their photos, it gives them some extra motivation to post pictures with your product. Here's an example from the Thule Instagram: Now anyone who has one of Thule's products knows they can be featured as well if they take a cool photo. Getting customers to post photos on their personal accounts is a great brand awareness strategy. You'll get more followers and acquire more customers. Again, this strategy is completely free. Create more video contentLike I said earlier, you need to stick with the trends. Video content is trending upward at record rates. Across the globe, 52% of marketing experts say video has the highest return on investment compared to other marketing content. That's great news for you if you're trying to keep acquisition costs low. Doing something as simple as adding a video to your landing page can increase conversion rates by up to 80%. One of the best parts about creating a video is that you can use the same one across all of your marketing channels. I'll go through some examples to show you what I mean. Let's say you created a video for your website. You can also send it via email to your subscribers. Not everyone on your subscriber list is a customer. Some people may have provided you with their email addresses, but never actually bought anything. Here's a great opportunity for you to acquire those individuals. Look at how Patagonia embedded a video in their email marketing campaign: You can use the same strategy. Don't create a different video for each marketing channel-that's a waste of time. If the video is less than a minute long, you can even add it to your Instagram profile, which I discussed above. Is your video longer than a minute? No problem. Just include a specific clip from the video or make it into a top highlights clip. All of this is much more cost effective than creating an entirely new video. In addition to email and Instagram, add videos to your:
I know what you're thinking. How can this be a low-cost strategy if I need to hire a professional cameraman and crew to make a high quality video? I've got good news for you: none of that is necessary. In fact, the vast majority of businesses produce their video content in-house. This helps keep costs low. Just invest in a decent camera and microphone. You don't need anything too fancy. There's plenty of inexpensive or even free video editing software that you can get on your computer as well. If you're willing to pay for a video editing tool, you can try Moovly. You can get a subscription for as little as $5 per month. They even let you try the software free for the first 30 days to see whether you like the experience. Some of you may have wanted to create videos in the past but didn't know what kind of content to produce. Remember, we're trying to acquire customers here. Your videos need to display your competitive advantage. What makes your products or services better than something similar on the market? Try starting with a video tutorial. Go through a step-by-step process of how your product can solve a problem. You can also create videos that demonstrate a product. That's not necessary for all products. For example, if your company produces hats and headbands, I don't think you need to teach potential customers how to put a hat on. With that said, you can still come up with a creative video that shows what makes your product unique. Dollar Shave Club uses this strategy with their promotional video content: The video doesn't teach you how to shave. Instead, it walks prospective clients through the process of getting razors and other shaving products delivered to their front doors. It's an effective and low-cost strategy for customer acquisition. Start running epic giveawaysIf people aren't buying your product, you need to come up with a clever way to get the product in their hands. Give it to them free. Let me clarify. I'm not saying you should give away thousands of products. But you can run monthly or even weekly promotions. You can choose between:
A sweepstakes means you're giving away something to a person picked at random. It doesn't require any skill, and there's nothing someone can do to increase their chances of winning. All the person can do is enter and hope for the best. Contests require skill, and the winner is selected based on judgment. I think contests are more effective. It gets the participants more involved, which is great if you're trying to acquire new customers. Let's say someone entered your contest but didn't win. They put lots of effort into their entry and were looking forward to getting the product. Well, now they may be more inclined to make a purchase. Here's an example of what a conversion funnel looks like when you run a contest: That's what I love so much about this strategy. First of all, it's not going to cost you anything except for the cost of the product you're giving away. But it's also a great way to build your email subscriber list. In order to enter, make it a requirement for customers to provide you with their email addresses. After all, how else will you be able to contact them if they win? Now at the very least, you'll be able to send them promotional emails. If the contest didn't entice them to make a purchase, your email marketing campaign can get the job done. Remember earlier I said that if you get more followers on Instagram you could get more customers? Well, the same concept applies here. Additional subscribers on your email list can improve your conversions. It's an inexpensive way to acquire new customers. ConclusionContrary to popular belief, you don't need to spend a fortune on customer acquisition. This holds true for startup companies as well as businesses that have been operating for years. While customer retention should be a priority as well, you can't keep a customer if you never got them on board in the first place. That's why I like to start with retargeting old customers. You already have their contact information. If it's been years since they last made a purchase, the additional revenue will have the same impact as the impact you would get from a new customer. Instagram is one of my favorite social platforms for customer acquisition. Since people are more likely to make a purchase from brands they follow on social media, focus on getting your follower numbers up. You'll be able to convert a percentage of those followers to customers. Adding more video content to your promotional channels will help as well. You can make these videos in-house, so it won't be very expensive. Contests and sweepstakes can increase brand awareness and get you some new customers. These strategies will also help you get more email subscribers, so you can continue to market to those people and increase conversions. What are some budget-friendly ways you've used to acquire new customers? |
ABOUT USTargeted Laser SEO provides SEO for surgeons, lawyers, and medical entrepeneurs, medspas, and spas. With an emphasis on local SEO and affordable SEO service packages for our clients, we are able to combine cutting-edge and innovative strategies to help our clients get ranked online in the most advantageous positions. Archives
June 2019
Categories |