How to Make Your Marketing Sexy

    

                     

I did an article on how marketers have really left the idea of the marketing plan out of the messages that they have been sending these days.  All the techniques such as SEO, digital marketing, social media and even blogging are just pieces to the marketing plan.  But the marketing plan is not as "sexy" as all these topics.  Just read "How to Make Sure Your Marketing is Really Sexy".

By the way, if you join the VIP Marketing Academy within the next two weeks, you will get a bonus gift of which is yet to be named.  Check back here and find out what it is.

Joint venturing to expand business

I got married last week -- to two guys.  It was strictly business.

It is to two associates of mine who own a successful website development company. They are quite successful at their business but what I noticed was they were just a website development company. The construction guys. They knew all about web design, algorithms and analytics -- all the things to make the site function properly.

I explained to them how I felt they were missing a huge marketing opportunity.  So, I asked them how they were marketing to keep customers coming back once they created a website. They both looked at me rather blankly. Other than hosting fees and the occasional updates their clients decided on, not much. They were always seeking new business.  And we all know that getting new business costs more than keeping business.

I explained to them the opportunity for marketing their own website business was to expand into content development.  They needed to develop content for their clients -- for the websites they built, digital advertising campaigns, downloadable e-books, etc. They also had an opportunity to show clients how offering those pieces on websites can increase web traffic.

"You see," I began, "you can create your own additional line of business. Also by creating your own e-newsletter that you send talking about the need to update websites, how to create mobile advertising, using video, etc... you keep your clients engaged with you.  You can also become the only source they need for their digital marketing."

I saw the light bulb go on.  "Oh," they said in unison.  My proposal had worked.  Since I do content and digital advertising "we" thought a partnership would be great.  In the business world it is called a joint venture.

So, the newsletter I developed for their over 300 clients that talked about our joint venture went out last week.  It provided information I created on how websites need to continue to be updated and how video on websites can drive more traffic. The newsletter worked.  They got two clients to call immediately (clients they had for over 10 years) to talk about updating their sites and perhaps adding video.

Beyond the content I provide for my new "partners",  I also am getting exposure for other services I provide to the 300 clients they have.  I embed my affiliate links in the e-newsletter, my own downloadable content and other opportunities to generate revenue for my business as well -- along with creating the content for his clients.

Soon, I am sure we will have more clients -- you can call them our children -- who will need all types of content.

How to get to your niche market through digital advertising

When it comes to niche marketing many people don't really take the time to understand the importance of researching and narrowing down their target market.  They just throw advertising dollars at the next "new" thing, hoping they will hit their niche.

A niche market is a specific group of people that share something in common. In the business world they are the groups of consumers that you should be focusing on because they are the ones that will most likely purchase your product or service. They are referred to as your target market.

When I was growing up, we had three television channels.  So, if you wanted to advertise on TV, you had to be on one of those channels.  It was called mass marketing.  But very few people subscribe to mass marketing these days because we have so many options to place advertising. We have cable TV -- with it's defined audiences -- radio, various print vehicles, and of course the internet.  

So how do you reach your market?  Well, as you know, more and more people are on the internet.  So, wouldn't you like to be on the internet?  That means that you can actually find the people more likely to purchase your service or product.  How? You can actually target your customers WHEN they are ready to buy. 

By using keywords your ad can pop up when people are searching for a product or service like yours.  Based on keywords, ads are placed on websites, blogs, or other niche websites your market is viewing. 

This year Google opened up display advertising real estate for small businesses. Before this, only Fortune 500 companies could develop display campaigns and place on sites like national news, entertainment, and blogs as well as heavily trafficked local sites.   Wouldn't it be great if your potential customer was on the ESPN site and your pizza parlor showed up on the site?  And because it is targeted to your geographic area, you don't waste money advertising to someone out of your marketing area.

Advanced targeting options like “remarketing” can bring interested prospects back to your website, increase conversions and profit, keeps your business top-of-mind and help these interested prospects complete a transaction.

Remarketing is the process of your ad “following” the person throughout the internet.  This technique boosts conversions by 48 – 50% or more. You are probably familiar with this.  Have you ever been to a shopping site online and then every time you go to another site you see the same product or a product “you might like” on a totally unrelated site?  That’s re-marketing.

This type of advertising can be tracked for effectiveness as well.  Google makes it so simple to track your conversions and sales all the way back to every keyword in your campaign. 

Create a dynamic online video with little or no money

Over the last five years, technology has made it very easy for entrepreneurs and small businesses to decrease the cost of  marketing their products and services. This is especially true about video. Now, with a little creativity and a few quick clicks of the mouse, you can create a  professional looking video that can be used in many venues and in many media outlets. Here are a few of my favorites:

Animoto 
Animoto is a subscription-based service The number of templates you can use is based on your basic or pro subscription. It's the easiest of the three programs listed here.  All you have to do is upload your favorite photographs.  The templates weave your photos through backgrounds -- from seasonal, romantic, business and techno.  There is a pretty extensive music library that you can use.  Or you can upload your own music.

Goanimate
Goanimate creates some really cool animated videos. It comes with ready-made templates or you can create your video from scratch. The program has a diverse number of characters. So many programs don't offer as many character options. A variety of backgrounds and extra "props" are also available to spice up the visual appeal.  It's a great program for a designer or marketing professional.

VideoMakerFX
I've done several videos using VideoMakerFX.  I have one on my website  It too, provides a sampling of templates but in animated slide presentation form.  Very limited on characters (although they will be adding more in the coming months), but you can mix and match slide templates, move them and re-color backgrounds and text. Much more fun than PowerPoint or Prezi.

Unlike the other two programs, no subscription is necessary -- just a one time very reasonable yearly fee that you can upgrade.  It only takes about an hour to learn and create a video.

While a good visual image always attracts attention, you still need to communicate to your niche with message development and good copywriting.  The combination of strong visuals and clear messaging will make your video awesome!

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Drive sales with your words

Getting the word out about your company can help drive sales.  You already know that.  But with the advent of the internet there are other options other than print advertising.  If you think just putting up a website and leaving it alone is good enough you're wrong, too.  Here are some things to think about:

1. First of all, YES, you need a website.  That is the basic online strategy.   (I'll tell you later about a company who has NO website).  By the way, what is it about entrepreneurs and small businesses who don't have one?  Ok, thats another blog.  Let's continue...

2. E-mail marketing. Stay connected with your customers.  If you are a part of my VIP Marketing Academy you get an email from me once per week, sometimes twice.  I personally think that is enough, unless you are promoting something special.  I personally think it shows you care about your clients/customers. Share some "special" information with them not given out to the masses.

3. Content distribution.  Everyone is saying that if you don't have any content out there you are missing out.  Content is basically articles about some aspect of your business. It positions you as an expert.  For, example, when I am finished with this blog, I could turn it into an article and submit it to SubmitYourArticles.com, EzineArticles.com or GoArticles.com. Not only are will the articles be listed in these directories, but they will distribute them to other social media sites --sometimes for a fee.  I currently have an article listed in SubmitYourArticles.com on the six tips of how to shine at expos and fairs (see earlier blog post).

4.  A blog. This is a blog.  I am authoring some information that will be picked up by search engines (I hope) and distributed throughout the world.  You don't have to be a member of my VIP Marketing Academy to see it.  But I will use it to promote my VIP Marketing Academy.

I'm only going to mention these four this time because I don't want you to get overwhelmed.  So, here is your homework:

You don't have to do all of these right away.  Choose TWO

1.  Think about what you would want to tell your customers on each of the platforms
2.  Decide how many times you want to send information out if you decide to do a blog, submit articles or do e-mailing.

HINT:  You don't have to write everything from scratch.  Once you get information about your product or service, you can re-purpose it and use it in all four categories.  If you are not a writer, then I suggest you get a content strategist to help you.  Or....you can e-mail us and we will walk you through it.

Bring in Customers with Sales Promotions

When will they learn?

When I was reading the link I have included below, it made me say "sho' you right!" It really hit home and says what I tell entrepreneurs and small businesses all the time: The money you pay someone to do what you are trying to do will actually bring in MORE money.  

And while the link speaks about a content strategist, it could very well speak about marketing specialists, website developer, social media specialist in general.  

The article just reminded me of a client that wanted to nickel and dime every little thing and then say, "I can do this myself". It's sad because they are doing it and they are in the same place they were in four months ago.

So, here is the link:

http://www.startupnation.com/grow-your-business/market-your-business/not-hire-content-strategists/

It's time to advertise

I've run into so many business owners who have analysis paralysis. (I have fallen prey to this too). But at some point we have to stop analyzing and DO something.  We have to make a decision.  And as an entrepreneur, you know that not all decisions will be the golden one.  But sometimes you have to get going.

Advertising has to be done. So, in order to give you a chance to exhale and make the decision, I put together the e-book Media Buying Insider   It will be a FREE download available to my VIP Marketing Academy within the next week.  It describes some techniques you can use when buying media, what media is hot and what is not, and how to target your advertising to your niche market.  And it is written so everyone can understand it.  Here is an excerpt:

"What you want to do with your advertising is place it where YOUR customers ARE. Your customers are increasingly on the internet – either on the computer or on their smartphones. The best answer is to use small business advertising that only charges the owner when and if it works. There are several ways of doing this.  You may have heard of pay per click advertising.

Pay per click is available with numerous online merchant sites as well as hundreds of newspapers across the country and the globe. Simply put, a small business agrees to pay a specified amount to the publisher, or the merchant site, for each ad that entices a consumer to come to the small business site. The price paid is generally an amount that the small business owner has bid on. This means they have bid on keywords that describe their business.  More and more newspapers are offering this option as they struggle to maintain competitive online with eBay, Craigslist and other pure pay classified and marketplace sites."

Remember, digital advertising is here to stay!

If you are not a part of the VIP Marketing Academy, sign up at www.fluidcommunications.net

Beware of junky information

Let me tell you, "junky" is a nice term. I have been in a marketing/advertising reading and writing marathon for the last three weeks.  I've been in what I call the "vortex" of developing my presence on the web so that I can share information with you, my dear audience and followers.  

Most everyone who writes on the subject about building traffic to your website will tell you you have to have lots and lots of content (blogs, stories and photos about your product and services), get listed on lots of site directories and social media.

There are a lot people who will tell you that you can do this quickly and easily.  They may even charge for a single format that will do this.  From what I can see, it ain't so.  Not that there aren't ways to get some of it done through individual sites but in general, you have to take time and go out there an enter information yourself.

One of the sites for content contribution is SubmitYourArticle.com  This site will take your articles and blast it out to other content publishing websites worldwide.  What this does is builds traffic back to your website.  In the coming weeks, I will put together an e-book with everything I have learned and give it to you.

My goal is to provide you with great information that will help you develop your small business into a powerhouse.  Saying, that, I found a really great article for you to look at this week:

http://www.wix.com/blog/2013/11/how-to-make-sure-your-business-is-found-on-google/

How to get MORE for you business doing LESS

I can't really tell you how to do that. If I really knew how to do that I would be rich.  But I do know that you can become more efficient with your marketing.  There is no better time in history to be able to get more done than today.  With all of the technology that is available you can reach more people and it will cost you PENNIES or even FRACTIONS OF PENNIES on the dollar than it did just 10 years ago.

Remember when direct mail was all the rage? You could get your message and name in front of thousands of households. Compare that to digital advertising where you get can get millions of impressions for the same cost.

Now, you would think telling small businesses and entrepreneurs about this and helping them to find other marketing ideas would be an easy sell, right?  Wrong.  For some reason a lot of business owners are overwhelmed with the idea of doing marketing that will grow their business --even though you show them how to save TONS of dollars and reach the people they need to reach.  

My friend Tracie Davis (the Marketing Guru) and I (The Marketing Ninja Master)  have decided that there are businesses out there that need help so badly that we are going to GIVE information away.  That's right, give it away.

 So, stay tuned to find out what we -- as entrepreneurs ourselves -- are going to do in the very near future.

JOIN OUR VIP MARKETING CLUB

6 tips to shine at expos and fairs

It's fair and expo season!  I love going to fairs and expos.  They are not just informative and fun, but I get to evaluate the businesses on their expo and fair acumen.  It never fails.  I can find at least ten businesses that just don't know how to really promote themselves at these events.  And it has nothing to do with size of the company. 

Every company -- big or small -- should still put its best face forward. So, taking the positive approach, I have developed a six point list I call, "Six Ways to Shine at Expos and Fairs": 

• Be personable. You would be surprised how many people at booths just sit there. The don't smile. Step from behind the table and engage people that walk by. Make eye contact, smile,and speak. Offer literature, samples or demonstrate your product or service.  

• Be informed. If you can't discuss the benefits and merits of your product or service, you should not be at the booth or table. Don't send Martha in accounting just because she volunteered, leave her at the office if she doesn't have the answers.

• Be well-fed. Don’t eat at your booth. It’s not very enticing to go to a booth where people have greasy fingers, a paper plate of half-eaten food and crumbs on the table. Eat your meal in the designated eating area.  Hopefully this is far away from your booth.

• Be on time. Make sure you set-up during the appropriate time so that you can be fresh and ready to engage the attendees when the fair or expo begins. If you aren’t there at the beginning, you are losing money. You will get the most for your booth fee if you are there on time and stay until it is over.

• Be identified. Your marketing materials should be well-produced, have no misspellings, and include your contact information. Have a table cloth, sign and/or stand up banner with your company or organization name that can be seen from several feet away. If you wear a uniform, be clean and pressed — even if it is a tee-shirt.

• Be organized. Have your materials, samples, exhibit ready for people to pick-up, taste, or view.

I'll be seeing you!