Having a strong online presence is quickly becoming a necessity, even for brick and mortar stores who never thought it would apply to them. In addition to being accessible and informative for your customers, your websites and emails should also be busy marketing for you. Your website, social media and emails/SMS can be greatly optimized to start promoting and selling your goods or services.
There are many factors that go into an online marketing campaign, not all of which may apply to your business but all are worth checking out:
- Email/SMS, including newsletters, promotions, transactional, follow-up and more
- Your website or online storefront
- Social media
- Sales automation and analysis
Individually these factors are powerful implements of online marketing but used together they make an amazing online marketing campaign. Let’s explore the points in more detail to start planning your campaign today.
Email/SMS
Of course you’re already using email to connect with customers and clients alike, but have you automated the process with a polished, well designed campaign? If you’re using email for just the basics like transactional mail and customer service, you’re missing out on an opportunity to engage and sell to your subscribers.
Most people open their inbox daily and the majority of those people do so on a handheld device. You want to be in your loyal customers’ inboxes with quality content presented on beautifully designed, uniform pages. MailRelay email marketing gives even beginners the tools they need to create, send and track the success of personalized emails.
Some things to keep in mind when your making your email marketing campaign:
- Be upfront with your subscribers about what they’re signing up for on the form page.
- Always exchange value with your subscribers. Remember that it would be very easy for them to skip over your newsletter, so make it worth reading to them. Add a coupon at the end or provide them with valuable information.
- Keeping the above in mind, when you want to collect data about your subscribers, they’re more likely to give it to you in exchange for quality content.
- Make sure your templates, colors and fonts all match your brand, or that your company is otherwise well represented in every email.
- Also be sure your emails can be easily read on tablets and mobile phones.
- Take advantage of your subscriber’s attention by adding buttons for Paypal, social media or any other call to action.
- Send timely follow-up messages that engage the customer. For instance, after a purchase send a follow-up email asking for a review. The email may also feature a similar product they’re likely to like, and a discount if they complete the review.
Your Website
As your online base of operations, your website is arguably your strongest platform for online marketing. Competition is stiff, as it seems even the corner mini-mart has a professional-looking website, so it’s even more important to optimize your marketing attempts.
Your landing page is essential to your plan, as it needs to persuade visitors to stay, read or watch more and finally, make a purchase. So long as the other pages of your site are consistent with your successful landing page(s) you will have happy, repeat visitors.
Here are some tips to successfully market on your website:
- Cater to your audience and check out your competition. You don’t want to copy them but you should make note of their successful elements.
- Conversion is the whole point of marketing, so make it easy for your customers to go from “I want it” to “I have it.” Always make the check-out process a click away.
- Use space wisely. Use images can promote your products, or fill empty space next to block text with short quotes from rave reviews. Always be selling your brand.
- Just like with emails, make sure your website looks good and functions well on mobile devices.
- Develop a content strategy based around your current customers and the customers you’d like to have. Consider what it is you can offer that will turn someone who is interested in your website enough to visit, but not convinced enough to buy. What do they want? Give it to them!
Social Media
It’s not enough to have a website anymore, or even to have intriguing emails which build brand loyalty AND sales. Consumers want accessible companies too, those with strong social media presences that interact with fans and subscribers.
Social media is a superb opportunity for any business to promote and manage their public image while keeping and ear to their customers’ feedback. Like all your marketing content, however, what you post is as important as posting it at all.
- Keep uniformity between your social media content strategies and the rest of your campaign, but remember social media is about interacting with the public.
- Be professional with business-related posts only!
- Ask for feedback and respond to concerns.
- Use pictures, video and audio to capture your followers’ attention.
- Mix up your content across networks. Don’t post the same thing on Twitter that you just did on Facebook or you risk losing the interest of followers.
Sales Automation and Analysis
The menial tasks involved with sales involving recording, organizing and sending the right information to the right people can be easily automated with a number of tools available online. In addition to saving you and your sales force time, automating the process provides the opportunity to collect hundreds of points of data for in-depth sales analysis.
When looking for software to automate your sales and accounts, consider the following:
- What kind of reporting and analysis does it offer?
- Which points of data is the analysis based from?
- Does the software offer suggestions based on analysis or do they depend on you to make the right deductions?
- How does the software integrate with your other business solutions?
- How well will the software work with your online storefront?
A Successful Campaign
With all the right pieces in place, you can build a profitable online marketing campaign in a relatively short amount of time. Always keep your different “faces” of marketing uniform so your brand becomes recognizable across all platforms, whether someone has just opened your newsletter or visited your Facebook page. Offer your audience quality content and don’t spam them with unnecessary information or too many ‘promotions’.
Lastly, don’t forget to facilitate real and open communication with your customers and potential customers. Nothing builds loyalty like a customer receiving excellent service followed by a personal communication of gratitude or acknowledgement.
