This month we’re exploring social media – it continues to evolve, new players are emerging and we see many of our entrepreneurs still not sure how to maximize their return on (time) investment for their businesses. In this edition of Marketing At Work, we will explore a little deeper what goes into a strategy, share some resources from around the web, and we’ll close with a special offer for those of you still on the social fence.
What is a social media strategy and why do I want one?
Social Media continues to be a challenging aspect for small business owners. Those that have adopted it but who are still in the trial stage are probably seeing time devoted to social media marketing without clear results. Those that have strategies, processes and metrics monitoring ARE seeing ROI, and that’s an expected outcome from Social Media Marketing today. If you’re in the trial or transition stages, developing a comprehensive social media strategy will assist in this progress to social media maturity.
What goes into a Social strategy? Like all good marketing strategy processes, we develop SMM strategies that align with current marketing strategy. We look at markets, messaging, content and calls to action – we are looking at each market and asking “what do they need? What do we want them to do?”
Companies who are operating at full social media maturity will be tracking ROI - and the method for tracking varies depending upon the client’s business model. A service or expertise business (such as Tria) will measure ROI by the number of signups to our e-mail newsletter, or the number of inquries and downloads of whitepapers and case studies from our web site that lead to a meeting and project engagement with a client. A client who has an online store will measure this by tracking the customer across their site and into their e-commerce store, knowing which posts yielded the most purchase activities and what dollar amount those posts represented. A client with a brick-and-click model or a brick and mortar store may use unique coupon codes for each offer and track these with their point of sale system, again, measuring what dollar amount those posts represented. With modern web site code tools, it’s easy to track all of these activities.
With our social strategies, we take into consideration content uniqueness of each client – some clients will want to develop video-based content (professional or on-the-fly depends on the audience), others will want to have information content (whitepapers, documents) still others will offer photograph-based content and many will offer all three. A content-development strategy is a key part of all of our social media strategies. Content is king – it is what keeps clients returning to your site, and in turn your ‘store’ – whether that be on line or in person. Converting content use by prospective clients to sales of goods and services is the goal of all marketing activities.
Here are a few resources on social media strategy and social media marketing maturity that will be helpful.
Get going on social media strategy:
Our DesignJuice Social Media strategy packages begin at $50 per month for 12 months. This includes our social strategy development, training and follow up meeting to answer questions about implementation. You will emerge with:
If you can’t manage the day-to-day (and many clients find this difficult both from a time and marketing message crafting standpoint) our monthly social marketing management packages begin at $125 a month.
I’ll suggest for some of you this is a LOT less than whatever you’re paying for those Yellow Pages ads or coupon books, and your social strategy will work harder for you than any of these vehicles will, in a digitally connected world.
Give me a call. Let’s talk about how we can put social media marketing to work for your business! 517-886-9708
How to have a top-notch marketing department without investing in a marketing department!
Small businesses – particularly here in Lansing – run lean. Hiring someone specifically to do marketing is a luxury small companies can’t usually afford – let alone someone with twenty years of marketing and branding expertise, or cutting edge social media marketing skills.
That’s where we come in! Consider Tria Marketing your marketing department. For our entrepreneurs, we can package up a very affordable monthly program of marketing activities based on your budget. Have just a small budget? No problem – for the monthly cost of one yellow pages ad that is probably no longer working for you, you can have our team’s expertise working on your marketing. For a bigger investment, you can have many of the marketing tools that your bigger competitors are using!
How many of these are you currently using to reach your customers? What could you be doing regularly if you had someone to do it?
Posters, advertisements, brochures and corporate literature
Logo, signage, vinyl graphics and trade show exhibits
Web site design, e-commerce site design
Search engine optimization – getting ranked high in Google
Social media marketing strategy and management
Blogging
e-mail newsletters
Strategic plans, tactical plans, week-by-week marketing plans
Market research, new product innovation strategies
Voice-of-the-customer research
Prospect list development
Professional social networking consulting
Sales followup and sales support
Marketing works when it’s done consistently and effectively.
Give Ann a call today at 886-9708 to talk about putting our team to work for you as your marketing department!
Local businesses are discovering the power that web sites like Groupon and Deal Chicken have to bring in new customers. While those are an important part of gaining new customers, a challenge with these daily deal sites is co-marketing fees are going to take most of your profit. Daily deal sites are a great way to build up your client base and generate awareness in your product or services.
One of our clients, Backbone Chiropractic in East Lansing thought of something a little different--creating her own daily deal offer. While looking at a nearly bare schedule for the upcoming Tuesday, Dr. Kristin Batdorf decided to offer a little daily deal of her own. Utilizing only social media and her e-mail contact list, she decided to offer her clients half off all massages for the upcoming Tuesday. Effective in rewarding her client base and generating profit, Kristin’s idea resulted in a full schedule of massage appointments the following Tuesday within an hour and a half of offering the deal.
Try this tactic in your own business.
It takes 20 days to make anything a habit - a new exercise routine, a new route to work, or a new business initiative. So I challenge you to start every day with marketing. In our Five-Minute Marketing for Entrepreneurs speaking series, we teach small business owners how to get marketing done when marketing is not what they do. Simply put, we want you to start your day by working ON your business not IN it.
One of the key business marketing initiatives is to stay in front of customers regularly. And an easy way to do that is (still) e-mail marketing. In this series appearing at Forbes.com called Minimalist Guide to Business Planning, Marketing Coach Ilise Benun shares her one recommended marketing tactic - e-mail marketing - and how she recommends her clients handle it. We agree with Ilise. There are also other business planning tips there too, all worthy of the minimalist entrepreneur.
Starting your day working on your business rather than in it helps you gain perspective on whether what you're doing is taking you in the right strategic business direction. For fans of Steven Covey, you know what I mean. You can work very hard but make no real progress in the direction of your goals every day. I recommend you end your business day the same way (as well as taking advantage of three other marketing-minutes during your day.) Read the Five-Minute Entrepreneur gude now.
Making your web site accessible to these users involves taking a whole new approach to web site development, called responsive design. We consider the mobile device first, and add layers to expanded views, utilizing the exact same content.
The first level of mobile accessibility is to have a basic point of contact for a smart phone user to connect with you when they are not at their computer. If they're heading your way and want to know where to turn, or whom to call, having at least a mobile-friendly contact page is essential. We build this into all of our level 1 digital strategy packages and new web design projects.
The second level of mobile accessibility is a mobile-friendly view. Using responsive design, we develop the site from the beginning with mobile use in mind. As the user expands the site beyond the mobile-sized area, the richness of layout and user interface also expands.
The third level of mobile accessibility is a mobile app or a mobile view of a web site (with browser detectibility). We develop specific interfaces for clients' content that is designed to make navigating that content on their mobile device a seamless experience. The top level of this is an app, distributed in an app store like the iTunes Store or the Android Market. Our e-commerce platforms are all mobile-friendly, offering mobile shopping experiences.