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  • Oct 11 / 2013
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Articles, Inbound Marketing, Social Media

Lake Havasu Web Design – Social Advertising for Your Business

ThumbnailGood morning folks!

 

Are you looking to invest in some social advertising for your business? Check out Lauren Indvik’s article, “Social Advertising Tips for Your Business”, below:

 

 

“Social Advertising Tips for Your Business

 

For small business owners, the complex ecosystem of social media advertising can be difficult to navigate. For every success story — and there are plenty — there are hundreds, if not thousands, of small business frustrated by their attempts to attract customers through FacebookTwitterTumblrFoursquarePinterest, etc.

 

 

The problem, fundamentally, is that small businesses are on social media because they feel that they should be — not because it fits into some larger strategy. They’ve heard about the small businesses that have radically enlarged themselves through those networks, as if by magic — that magic being, in fact, the execution of very smart strategies.

 

 

 

Before you pour further resources into a Facebook page or a Twitter account, it’s worth laying out the factors — in marketing terms, the key performance indicators (KPIs) — that determine the success or failure of your business. Are word-of-mouth and customer advocacy essential to your customer acquisition strategy? Perhaps it’s worth looking at social media to amplify those messages. Likewise, if you find that your Facebook fans spend more and more often than non-Facebook fans, it may be worth investing in ads that will help you boost your fan count.

 

 

Here, we’ve outlined the ad products offered by the two most popular social networks: Facebook and Twitter. Perhaps in reading about them, you’ll find matches with your business’ list of KPIs. In that case, you may want to set aside a budget to test them against the marketing investments you’re already making. After all, you’ll never know what works until you try.

 

 

 

 

Facebook Ads

 

 

Facebook ads used to be extremely complex, but thanks to a recent overhaul, they’re much simpler to purchase these days.

 

 

Your first task is to identify your marketing objective. Do you want Facebook users to buy something on your site? You should optimize for website conversions. If you simply want more Likes on your Facebook page — knowing that Facebook fans tend to be valuable customers in the long run — then optimizing for page Likes is the way to go. You can also optimize for website clicks, post engagement, app installs, app engagement, Offer claims and RSVPs to a Facebook event.

 

 

 

facebook objectives 2

 

 

 

 

Once an objective has been identified, Facebook will guide you to the most appropriate ad type. It’s up to you to choose where that ad appears — in the News Feed, for example, or alongside it. Facebook will help you figure out where your ad is likely to perform best. You’ll also need to choose a headline, image (you can upload up to five on rotation) and text for your ad. Facebook recommends copy be “succinct, friendly and conversational.”

facebook choose placement

 

 

 

Once you’ve chosen your ad, you’ll need to decide who sees it. You can target people by location, age, gender, interest, relationship status, language, education and even workplace. You can also opt to target only people who are or are not already connected to your page or app, or the friends of people who already like said page or app. This kind of targeting is unique to Facebook, and should be thought out carefully. A restaurant, for example, may want to advertise a group happy hour special to employees of nearby businesses that tend to go out together after-hours.

 

 

Lastly, there’s the budget. You can allot a daily or lifetime budget, the former of which will allow you to space out your ads over a broader timeframe. You can also decide how you want to pay: You can either pay for specific actions (such as Likes or website purchases), or per thousand impressions. Facebook will help you choose the best one. Pricing varies according to the competition in the demographic you’re targeting.

 

 

Once you’ve set up your campaign, you’ll want to track its progress through Facebook’s analytics dashboard. Pretty quickly, you’ll be able to see which ads and images are performing the best — and can modify your spending accordingly.

 

 

Head over to Facebook’s advertising center to get started.

Twitter Ads

 

 

Twitter’s ad suite is much more simple. It’s divided into two categories: Promoted Tweets and Promoted Accounts. (A third ad product, Promoted Trends, isn’t available to small businesses.)

 

 

Promoted Tweets are ideal when you want to advertise a specific message, or product. If your goal is new followers, promoting your account is the most efficient method, as you’ll pay only when you add new followers. It’s worth testing whether promoting a specific message, or having more followers (who may then see multiple messages), is more profitable for your business over time.

Screen Shot 2013-10-01 at 12.50.41 PM

 

 

 

 

You can opt for two kinds of targeting. The first is by keyword, which will allow you to target those who search, tweet about or otherwise engage with a specific term. You can also target by interests and followers, reaching people who fall into certain broad interest categories (like board games or college basketball) or who follow specific accounts — a skin care brand might want to target users who follow accounts that tweet about beauty and anti-aging advice. You can also limit your targeting to certain devices, like BlackBerry, and by gender.

 

 

Once you’ve set that all up, you can set lifetime and daily maximum budgets for your campaign. If you’re running a Promoted Tweet campaign, you set the amount you’re willing to pay every time someone retweets, replies, favorites, follows or clicks on your tweet. (Twitter recommends bidding somewhere in the $1.50 to $2.20 per engagement range.) For Promoted Account campaigns, you pay per follower — Twitter recommends bidding in the $2.50 to $3.50 range.

Beyond Facebook and Twitter

 

 

While small business participation on Twitter, and especially Facebook, is high, companies may find that other networks (and their ad products) are a better strategic fit. Pinterest, for example, has become essential to women’s lifestyle publishers, accounting for as much as 10% of their monthly referral traffic. Tumblr and LinkedIn may also be worth exploring, depending on your target customer demographic and other needs.

 

 

To repeat our earlier mantra: You’ll never know what works until you try. What you may discover is that social networks and their ad products don’t yet provide the kinds of returns that ad products from Google and elsewhere can — and that’s okay, too.

 

 

Images: Mashable composite from iStockphoto, Artpuppy; Facebook; Twitter”

 

 

 

success CTA

  • Sep 13 / 2013
  • 0
Articles, Inbound Marketing, Websites

Lake Havasu City Web & Graphic Design- Landing Pages, Part II

TGIF_50a4e8_3945565TGIF NSquared Readers, Boo yah!

 

Fridays are perfect for reading super cool articles about landing pages. At least we think so. See for yourself:

 

 

“What Is a Landing Page and Why Should You Care, (Part II)

 

…continued…

 

 

What makes a landing page most effective?

 

 

Ready to create your first landing page, or improve on a landing page you already have? Here are some of the most important elements to make sure your landing page is working hard for you:

 

  • Limit Navigation. You’ve brought your targeted traffic to a page where they can take your desired action. Don’t distract them! Limit the number of exits from your landing page so that your visitors are focused on filling out your form. A key part of this is to hide your website navigation elements on landing pages.

 

  • Deliver Value. First and foremost, if you have a valuable offer, your visitors will give up their contact information in exchange for your offer. Ask yourself if your offer is compelling to your audience and make sure that your landing pages demonstrates that value.

 

  • Enable Sharing. Tap into a huge community of your best (and free!) marketers: your audience.  Add share links to your landing page to encourage your website visitors to share your content with their audiences.

 

  • Keep it Short. The longer your landing page and form, the more friction you add to the lead conversion process. Keeping your lead form short and straightforward will increase your conversion rate.

 

  • Test, Test, Test. As many best practices as you may read about online, your landing page can always use more testing and improvement. Make sure you have a landing page creation tool that allows you to create and test many different landing pages to see what works best for your business.

 

Are you a landing page guru? Check out some of our advanced tips and data around landing page best practices on effective calls to action and the best/worst button text (hint: don’t use “Submit”). Do you need to make any of these 10 Quick Fixes to Build Killer Landing Pages?

 

 

If you’re working hard to drive traffic to your website, don’t make the mistake of not capturing that traffic as leads.”

 

 

Contact us if a landing page sounds like something you want on your website. Have an awesome weekend!

  • Sep 11 / 2013
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Articles, Inbound Marketing, Websites

Lake Havasu City Web & Graphic Design – Landing Pages, Part I

landingHowdy NSquared readers!

 

The rest of this week is all about landing pages and why they will rock your business socks off. Check it out below!

 

 

What Is a Landing Page and Why Should You Care, (Part I)

 

If you could do one thing to dramatically improve your marketing ROI today, it would be to use landing pages on your website.

What is a landing page?

 

 

Alanding page is a website page that allows you to capture a visitor’s information through a lead form. A good landing page will be targeted to a particular stream of traffic – say from an email campaign advertising a particular whitepaper – and, because it is targeted, and because it has an interesting offer behind a lead capture form, you will convert a higher percentage of your website visitors into leads with which you can follow up.

Why are landing pages so critical?

 

 

Too many companies send their advertising, email, or social media traffic to their homepage. This is a huge missed opportunity. When you know a stream of targeted traffic will be coming to your website, you can increase the likelihood of converting that traffic into leads by using atargeted landing page.

 

For example, imagine you have a Google AdWords PPC ad running for one of your best keywords. Even if you advertise how great your company is (a boring offer for any company) and someone (amazingly) clicks through on that ad, do you want to send them to your homepage? When they land on your homepage, what are they supposed to do? What do you want them to do? Once you figure out what you want the visitor to do, make it easier for them to do just that. Send them to a landing page that prompts them to complete that action. You’ll see the effectiveness of your online marketing improve dramatically…”

 

…to be continued…

 

 

 

Contact us if you’re interested in creating a landing page. Have an awesome hump day!

 

 

  • Sep 09 / 2013
  • 0
Articles, Blogging for Business, Inbound Marketing

Havasu Graphic Design-How to Get More Subscribers, Part III

IScdLIoosoDKZIBs7gcQDtvEezTdQnOBKTcUrtG1GJI-1Hi there readers!

 

Welcome to the final part of our series featuring Hubspot’s, “How to Convert Casual Blog Visitors Into Dedicated Subscribers“. Read on for more awesome information on turning your blog into a success!

 

 

“How to Convert Casual Blog Visitors Into Dedicated Subscribers

 

…continued…

 

 

4) Create a Blog Subscription Landing Page

 

 

Now that you’ve got all these great subscribe CTAs, you need somewhere to point them to. Sure, you already have your subscribe module on your blog’s homepage (at least you do now after our second tip, right?). But if you start promoting subscription to your blog via other marketing channels like social media and email (more on that later), it will start to get a bit complicated to direct visitors to that module. You’d have to say something like this:

 

“Go to blog.hubspot.com, and … see that little field on the top, right-hand side of the blog? Enter your email address there to subscribe.”

 

That isn’t exactly the optimal way to promote blog subscription, is it? And can you imagine trying to fit that into a 140-character update for Twitter? Furthermore, you’d be adding a lot of friction to the conversion process, meaning you’re guaranteed to lose out on some valuable subscribers along the way.

 

So what’s a more effective way to convert blog visitors into subscribers? Think … you know the answer. It’s the same way you convert website visitors into leads. That’s right — a landing page!

 

Create a blog subscription landing page to convert those blog discoverers into dedicated blog subscribers. This will become the heart and soul of your blog subscriber conversion efforts, allowing you to more easily promote blog subscription through your other marketing assets. So instead of that convoluted message directing people to the little module on your blog’s homepage, you can just link your CTAs directly to your landing page and say things like, “Visithttp://blog.hubspot.com/subscribe to subscribe to the HubSpot Marketing Blog!” in your social media and email promotions. So much simpler, right?

 

 

Tips for Optimizing Your Subscribe Landing Page

 

Optimize your subscription page using the same best practices you would for any other landing page on your website. Include descriptive headers/subheaders that capture visitors’ attention and summarizes what they’ll get, demonstrate the value of subscribing in your landing page copy, include a high-quality image, and emphasize email subscription by placing the form above the fold. You can also incorporate other elements — like social proof — to help boost conversion rates. Speaking of boosting conversion rates, don’t be afraid to do some A/B testing like you would for any other landing page (here’s a great article on landing page A/B testing to get you started).

 

Last but now least, if your blogging software gives you the option, offer your prospective subscribers frequency options so they can choose how much (or how little) email they want to receive for their blog notifications. (HubSpot Customers: If you’re using the new Blog COS, you can provide instant, daily, weekly, and monthly email frequency options to your subscribers.)

 

 

blog-subscribe-lp

5) Add a Blog Opt-In Check Box to Your Landing Pages

 

 

I’m really excited to share this tip with you, because it caused us to increase our blog subscribers by 128% in just 3 months’ time. I kid you not. And all we did was add a new check box field to all our landing page forms so people could subscribe to our blog with just one click. Here’s what I mean:

 

 

check-box-on-lp-1

 

 

 

If your blogging software is integrated with the rest of your marketing software, this trick is very easy to implement. At the simplest level, you need to have control over the fields on your landing page forms as well as the ability to export a list of people who opt in to your blog through these forms so you can add them to your blog subscriber list. And HubSpot users who use the new HubSpot COS (note: this will not work on HubSpot’s legacy CMS), will be able to easily start boosting their email subscribers with this little trick without any manual maintenance once it’s set up. To learn how to set it up, we have detailed instructions in this blog post. Check ’em out!

 

Just keep in mind that the new blog subscribers you generate through these landing page check boxes won’t impact new lead generation directly. Because these people are subscribing to your blog because they’re filling out forms for your lead gen offers, they’re already leads. However, they do have the potential to increase the readership and help you reach new audiences through mechanisms like social sharing and email forwarding. You’ll also benefit from using your free blog content as a way to nurture existing leads.

6) Do Some Email Marketing

 

 

In addition to promoting blog subscription through social media and CTAs on your website,email marketing can serve as another effective channel for driving blog subscriptions. Here are two great email marketing methods through which to promote blog subscription:

In a Dedicated Send

 

 

Promote blog subscription to different segments of contacts in your marketing database. Tailor the messaging and language you use in your dedicated send to the interests and needs of that segment. For example, you could segment your list by people who recently converted on a particular offer, and promote subscription by providing examples of articles related to topic of the offer they downloaded as a way to demonstrate the value of subscribing.

Within Lead Nurturing Workflows

 

 

Not every email within your lead nurturing workflows needs to promote a lead gen offer. Switch it up by featuring some of your big hit blog articles targeted at the types of people you’re emailing in your segmented workflows.

 

In what other ways can you turn your casual blog readers into dedicated subscribers? Share your tactics in the comments!

 

And to learn about the other critical steps to blog marketing that can help you increase the reach and ROI of your business blog, download our ebook, How to Grow & Scale Your Business Blog.

 

 

 

Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in October 2012 and has been revamped and updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.”

 

 

 

Contact us if you want a website or inbound marketing campaign that will rock your business’s world. Until next time, stay classy!

  • Sep 06 / 2013
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Articles, Blogging for Business, Inbound Marketing, Social Media

Havasu Graphic Design-How to Get More Subscribers, Part II

calltoactionHowdy readers!

 

Welcome to Part II of our blog series featuring Hubspot’s article, “How to Convert Casual Blog Visitors Into Dedicated Subscribers“. Keep reading for more tips on having more subscribers and better CTA’s (call to actions).

 

 

“How to Convert Casual Blog Visitors Into Dedicated Subscribers

 

….continued…

 

 

Tips for Encouraging Subscription

 

One great tip for encouraging blog subscription is to use social proof to show new visitors just how popular your blog is among their peers. If you have impressive traffic or subscriber numbers, consider showcasing those. Something as simple as “Join more than 1,000 [insert persona]s who already subscribe!” can help you convert those visitors who may be on the fence.

 

Another smart way to incentivize blog subscription is through the use of free offers. Check out how HubSpot partner IMPACT Branding & Design does it on its blog. They provide a little something extra for new subscribers by also providing a free ebook (something usually reserved for visitors who complete a much longer form):

 

 

 

blog-subscription-offer-incentive

3) Promote Blog Subscription With Smart Calls-to-Action (CTAs)

 

Be more “in your face” about converting your blog visitors into subscribers by creating subscriber CTAs and placing them directly within each of your blog articles. Don’t worry — they don’t have to replace your articles’ lead-gen CTAs; just insert your blog subscription CTA as a secondary CTAdirectly below the one you’re using for lead generation (like we’ve done at the bottom of this very post!). Here’s what I mean:

 

 

 

end-of-post-subscribe-cta-1-1

 

 

 

If you’re worried about it impacting the clickthrough rate (CTR) on your lead-gen CTA, just keep a close eye on your CTA analytics. When we implemented this on the HubSpot blog, we didn’t notice any dip in CTR on our lead-gen CTAs, but you should always test for yourself.

And Make Them Smart!

 

Here’s the thing: If a visitor is already subscribed to your blog, it doesn’t really make sense to continue displaying your subscribe CTAs to them, now does it? These people are already subscribed, and it’s a much better, more contextual use of your blog’s real estate to show off that lead gen CTA front and center — by itself. So how do you make sure you’re only showing your subscribe CTAs to visitors who aren’t yet subscribed? Technology, my friends … technology. I like to call these CTAs “magic CTAs,” because sometimes they’re invisible 🙂

 

 

 

magic-subscriber-cta-comparison-1

 

 

 

To create these “magic” CTAs, you are, however, at the mercy of your software. They’re powered by dynamic content, so you’ll need marketing software with this type of functionality.(Note: HubSpot customers can use a combination of the new HubSpot Blog COS and Smart CTAs to create these. You can find instructions about how to set them up in this blog post.)

 

Where appropriate, use your blog subscription CTAs on other pages of your website as well to give visitors a low-commitment conversion alternative. You might also consider adding your blog subscription CTAs to other Smart CTA groups to allow you to automatically customize which CTAs get shown to users in different lifecycle stages or based on specific list criteria.

 

…to be continued…

 

 

Contact us if you need a website, or the website you have needs some work and a blog. Have a great day, and stick around for Part II of How to Get More Subscribers. Tootledoo, and have a great weekend!

  • Aug 31 / 2013
  • 0
Articles, Inbound Marketing, Websites

Have a Rockin Lake Havasu City Website, Part IV

images (2)Good morning readers! Boo yah, it’s Saturday!

 

Welcome to the very last article featuring Hubspot’s cache of well-done homepages. Keep reading to see the rest of these easy to navigate, easy on the eyes pages.

 

 

“16 Brands That Totally Nailed Their Homepage Designs

 

…continued….

 

 

 

12) New Breed

New Breed’s website effectively balances its different buckets of content and presents it all in a well-organized, easily-digestible page.

 

 

 

new_breed

 

 

 

 

13) SilkTricky

Another example of content organized into visual tiles is SilkTricky. Notice the use of a carrot visual element (the white triangle in the text boxes) to unobtrusively connect the site’s text and visuals for the reader.

 

 

 

SilkTricky

 

 

 

 

14) Function Point

Function Point’s website maintains a consistent look and feel across all of its design elements. The site’s illustration, style, and choice of colors also help enhance the design and build a visual hierarchy.

 

 

 

FP

 

 

 

 

15) Woodwork

Despite the potentially overwhelming visuals on this page, clear navigation and layout (shown here) ensures that the user isn’t overwhelmed.

 

 

 

Woodwork

 

 

 

 

16) Quarter Rest Studios

This homepage is essentially one large slideshow paired with a simple top navigation. It gives the visitor a limited but useful set of options — presumably ideal for the magazine’s visual-based target market.

 

 

 

Quarter_Rest_Studios

 

 

 

 

 

Weren’t these just the coolest ever? Does your business need a website with a homepage that will keep potential clients browsing? Give us a holler! And while you’re at it, ask about our current specials on inbound marketing campaigns and websites. Have a wonderful, safe, and stylish weekend.

  • Aug 22 / 2013
  • 0
Articles, Inbound Marketing

Inbound Marketing vs. Outbound Marketing

wateringholeHere at NSquared, we like HubSpot. Thus, we are featuring one of their articles on why inbound marketing is the way to go. Check it out, yo:

 

Editor’s Note: A more detailed version of this article has been published here: “Inbound Marketing and the Next Phase of Marketing on the Web” 

 

 

When I talk with most marketers today about how they generate leads and fill the top of their sales funnel, most say trade shows, seminar series, email blasts to purchased lists, internal cold calling, outsourced telemarketing, and advertising.  I call these methods “outbound marketing” where a marketer pushes his message out far and wide hoping that it resonates with that needle in the haystack.

 

I think outbound marketing techniques are getting less and less effective over time for two reasons.  First, your average human today is inundated with over 2000 outbound marketing interruptions per day and is figuring out more and more creative ways to block them out, including caller ID, spam filtering, Tivo, and Sirius satellite radio.  Second, the cost of coordination around learning about something new or shopping for something new using the internet (search engines, blogs, and social media) is now much lower than going to a seminar at the Marriott or flying to a trade show in Las Vegas.

 

 

 

It’s Time to Transform Your Marketing

 

Rather than doing outbound marketing to the masses of people who are trying to block you out, I advocate doing “inbound marketing” where you help yourself “get found” by people already learning about and shopping in your industry.  In order to do this, you need to set your website up like a “hub” for your industry that attracts visitors naturally through search engines, theblogosphere, and social media.  I believe most marketers today spend 90% of their efforts on outbound marketing and 10% on inbound marketing, and I advocate that those ratios flip.

 

The best analogy I can come up with is that traditional marketers looking to garner interest from new potential customers are like lions hunting in the jungle for elephants.  The elephants used to be in the jungle in the ’80s and ’90s when they learned their trade, but they don’t seem to be there anymore.  They have all migrated to the watering holes on the savannah (the internet).  So, rather than continuing to hunt in the jungle, I recommend setting up shop at the watering hole or turning your website into its own watering hole.

 

 

 

Contact us if you’re ready to check out the watering hole. It’s a beautiful place filled with booming business opportunity. Until next time, stay cool!
  • Aug 13 / 2013
  • 0
Articles, Inbound Marketing

Promote Your Lake Havasu City Website – How to Boost Profits with Craigslist, Part II

use-craigs-list-to-benefitHey folks!

 

Welcome to part II of our blog featuring the article, Marketing on Craigslist. Last week we covered what sells best on Craigslist, identifying your market, and building ads. Today we will cover tracking results (you want to know how awesome you’re doing, right?), community commitment, and selling safely (majorly important one). Keep reading and start boosting, yo.

 

 

 

“Marketing Your Business on Craigslist

 

…continued…

 

Tracking Results
If you plan to post in multiple cities and offer specific promotions, tracking which ads produce the best results is important. You can track a Craigslist ad by e-mail, phone number or website referral. Each tracking mechanism should feature a unique component like a custom e-mail address, telephone extension or website referral code. How you choose to track should depend on your industry and the typical methods customer use to communicate with you. Unlike eBay, Craigslist does not provide you with any demographic or tracking data.

Regardless of whether you sell a product or service, it’s important to understand the competitive landscape on a daily or weekly basis. Supply and demand for certain products or services will fluctuate. Take the time to get to know the other players in your cities or categories. If you see a rush on a certain product, focus on something complimentary. For instance, if you’re a mattress wholesaler and see that a large number of a specific brand and/or size mattresses are flooding your market, either price match or focus your energy on a different size or bed frame until the market stabilizes. Also, take into consideration the season and the demographic (both income and recreational) of the cities in which you post. In the winter, a snowmobile will not sell nearly as well in California as it will in Vermont.

 

 

Community Commitment
As an open market, Craigslist welcomes sellers from all walks of life. Keep in mind that as a business owner, you’re just as likely to compete with everyday people selling the contents of their attic as you are a national brand retailer with sights on breaking into your market. The community element sets Craigslist apart from its competitors. Harness the power of your community by doing more than just posting. The most trafficked area of Craigslist is the forums. Use the forums to communicate with fellow sellers and potential buyers or to establish an active, ethical voice for your business.

 

 

Selling Safely
Fraud exists in every corner of the business world, both online and offline. The anonymous nature of Craigslist–the very thing that makes it so popular–is also the reason you should take measures to protect yourself against fraud. With no member or seller ratings system, Craigslist can fall prey to scam artists. Make an effort to talk to each new customer via phone, only ship items once payment is received, and always use your best judgment when it comes to business transactions.

Craigslist continues to experience rapid growth–additional cities have come online in recent months and more are expected to launch throughout the next year. The buzz about this great resource is sweeping the nation, and every day people from all over the world are visiting the site, looking to buy from trusted sellers and service providers. Get in on the action by harnessing the marketing power of Craigslist.

Shanon Lewis is a web-marketing expert who specializes in marketing on Craigslist. She’s also the author of The Unofficial Craigslist Book and regularly shares her wisdom on Craigslist and online marketing at her popular blog.”

 

 

 

So get out there and Craigslist it up! Contact us if you’re in need of some inbound marketing, IT consulting, or a super sweet site that will make you and your product look as legit as you are. Until next time, stay chill NSquared readers.

 

  • Aug 09 / 2013
  • 0
Articles, Inbound Marketing, Websites

Promote Your Lake Havasu City Website – How to Boost Profits with Craigslist, Part I

craigslist_LogoHowdy readers!

 

Craigslist. We here at NSquared are almost positive you have heard of this website. But, did you know that this website can be an extremely beneficial tool for marketing your business and boosting profits? Check out, Marketing on Craiglist, below:

 

 

 

“Marketing Your Business on Craigslist

 

Learn how to showcase your products and services on this popular online marketplace.

From e-commerce websites to furniture wholesalers, small businesses both online and off are realizing the marketing power of Craigslist.org. Founded in 1996 by Craig Newmark, Craigslist.org gets an estimated 10 million unique visitors per day. With an online classified ads format organized by either region or city, Craigslist connects buyers and sellers in more than 300 communities; for the most part, posting on the site is free.

 

If you’ve never heard of Craigslist or never considered using the site to market your business, the following tips will help you determine whether it might be a good fit for you and offer another outlet for marketing your products and services.

 

What Sells Best on Craigslist

 

From services like tutoring, car repair and real estate to products such as wholesale furniture, consignment goods and retail e-commerce, Craigslist is the ultimate destination for online marketers. If you manufacture goods, provide services directly or sell products regionally, Craigslist is a marketing tool you should consider. You can also easily promote an eBay store, a franchise operation or a referral partner. And it’s a bourgeoning business opportunity for affiliates and webmasters looking for new ways to find customers.

 

 

Identifying Your Market

 

Like any other advertising medium, Craigslist requires some strategy, though paramount to its usefulness is simplicity. To start, you need to determine which city or cities you’re going to post an ad. If you’re a service provider, you can identify available cities on Craigslist that encompass your service region. Keep in mind that some regions overlap. For instance, if you’re a mobile groomer working in Orange County, California, but service from Los Angeles to San Diego, Craigslist reaches your service area across four cities. So you’d want to develop your messaging and a posting schedule in each of these regions to increase your exposure. If you sell a product or offer a service nationwide, the opportunity to reach new customers is even greater.

Posting on Craigslist, either nationally or locally, requires an understanding of the rules. Craigslist has in place–a set of rules that prohibits advertisers from over-posting or spamming users. You can follow these rules and still get excellent exposure. To start, develop unique ads for each city you post in, focus on specific products and rotate them on a promotional schedule. Never post the exact same ad within 48 hours, and be careful to delete your old ad. Craigslist users are quick to spot businesses that misuse the system and can be quite unforgiving. The Craigslist flagging system puts the power of spam control into the hands of the users.

 

 

Building Ads

 

Building an ad on Craigslist can be as simple as typing in some text, or you can incorporate html and images. Typically, what works best is the direct approach. For instance, if you’re a real estate agent using Craigslist to promote properties for sale, build a text ad that incorporates images of the properties for sale–you don’t need to know html to do this. Simply define what property specifications best sell the property and keep the sales pitch to a minimum. Be sure to include important search words, such as “three bedroom” or “condominium,” as well as regional identifiers including a ZIP code, city or community name. You do this so that people who search for specific items find you in the search results.

Craigslist’s search function isn’t based on a search algorithm; instead, search results are displayed first by date, then by keyword. This makes the text content of your ad extremely important. Ads with images only increase ad effectiveness. And adding images to your ad isn’t difficult. If you’re not web savvy, use the “upload image” function available during the posting process. (If you want to feature a large image or more than one, you’ll need to upload your images to your own web server and reference them inside your ad using basic html.) Images, however, are not required. Often the best performing ads on Craigslist are simple text ads that get straight to the point.”

 

 

 

…to be continued…

 

 

 

Contact us if you need inbound marketing, IT consulting, or an awesome website. Stay tuned for Part II on Monday. Until next time, stay groovy!

  • Aug 07 / 2013
  • 0
Articles, Inbound Marketing, Social Media

Promote Your Lake Havasu City Website – Why a Google+ Profile is Important for Your Business

google-plus-for-businessHowdy NSquared readers!

 

You may have heard or seen the hype regarding Google+. But, if you’re anything close to an average American, you already have multiple profiles on multiple social media websites. Is it really that important to have one more password to keep track of? In regards to Google+, the answer is yes.

 

If you aren’t using a Google+ profile to boost your business, then you are missing out. Keep reading the article below to see why one more password is totally worth it. You won’t regret it!

 

 

 

“Why Google Plus Can be so Important for your Business

 

Google plus is indexed by Google so it can help customers find your business faster and easier also by creating a business page you can increase your visibility.Google+ has more than 90 million members and 60% of them log in every day.How to reach all those users?

 

Provide original information but more importantly share other people’s ideas. Also make sure that you post few times a day to reach people in different times zones.

 

Build up trust

 

If someone you trust shares a link, you are more likely to check it out. Therefore, comment on your shares, respond to other people’s comments.

 

Educate your followers

 

Let your circles know more about your brand as the more they know the easier it is to them to make informed decision about your product or service.

 

Customer service

 

Make sure that your customers are kept happy and respond rapidly to their questions and complains. Offer videos or other media to help resolve their problems or issues.

 

Build a community

 

Give fans a place to talk and share their experiences but tailor your community to your location and business.

 

Share media

 

Do not forget to add media and provide value. Always look for user-created content like e-book, video, reports or photos.

 

 

 

Few ideas how to get it done:

 

Build a relevant audience by looking for people who are appropriate to your business. You can do that by defining your audience by demographic or location or topic.

 

Look for a content that your circles would like outside of Google+

 

Engage in conversation on a post

 

Read posts by others and comment but at the same time you need to comment on your own posts.

 

Share a new post since the purpose of a social network is to connect and share.

 

Finally, do not forget to be consistent and keep your offline and online business presence the same. Moreover, provide a continuity so your clients always know what to expect.”

 

 

 

 

 

Contact us if you want to start promoting your business through inbound marketing. Until next time, stay social media savvy!

 

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