Inevitably, every fellow entrepreneur or small business owner has the same problem when it comes to digital marketing - time.
Time to figure out what to do, time to do it, and time to find the right person or firm to help them do it. It reminds me of the adage: we never have a time issue, it’s a matter of priority. And I found myself saying the same thing to some fellow entrepreneurs on the top of a mountain in Utah this past weekend.
These entrepreneurs would say, “I just don’t know who to turn to,” or “I’ve been burnt in the past…so I am reluctant to really get into the digital side of promoting my business.” I empathized deeply, and would simply remind them that digital is the single most effective way to market your business. It’s just a matter of how and where to focus your efforts.
Here are the three things you need to know to make smart digital marketing decisions:
1) Content
Creating content in the form of blogging is far and away the best thing you can do for visibility. Blogs get more play on Google (especially the ones that get good social proof through likes and retweets), so commit yourself to blogging once a week or once a month. This is how folks will hear about you. Even in crowded industries finding a very niche and unique voice or perspective on the matter will help you stand out. If you want a quick primer on best practices in business blogging, go watch this blogging fundamentals video.
2) Capture
Ninety-nine percent of your audience is not ready to buy from you. They are not ready to become a consulting client, they are not ready to buy your jewelry, and they are not ready to pay for anything. They are just trying to learn a bit about the topic or your product. So, let them. And then ask for their email address or to connect with you on Facebook or Twitter. Capture their information so you can email them again when they may be more ready to buy. Do yourself a huge favor and drop one line of retargeting code (it’s free) on your site to collect the cookie data to then be able to serve ads on Google Display and Facebook so you can remarket to folks who left your website. I know that all sounded a bit technical, so you can dive deeper into the subject with this retargeting video.
3) Convert
Now the real work begins. You need to set up a simple and consistent email campaign or newsletter that goes out monthly to remind folks of the great things you do. You need to have equally good landing pages to help convert folks into paying customers. And when you are ready, you need to spend $500 per month paying for ads on Google and Facebook to market to those folks you capture remarketing cookies from so they can see your ads. This is where the commitment comes in. You must do this and do it consistently. Great intro video classes on landing pages and email marketing strategy can give you a head start on making this effective.
Finally, let me address the big issue all of us struggle with…finding a good consultant or firm to help us with all these great changes. It’s tough. You get what you pay for, so when you go super cheap, you get super cheap results. When you go super expensive, you put your cash flow at risk. So, try to find folks that a) are not the cheapest, b) come with good referrals, c) have built their own success on doing the above, and d) may be willing to barter with you or base part of their compensation on success metrics (not sales but traffic and leads/email addresses).
I am happy to help on the referral side if you’d like to email me, or better yet, simply connect on LinkedIn. And on that front, for those willing to prioritize the time, I’d highly recommend going through this three-plus hour course on Small Business Demand Generation Essentials Learning Path to get a true end-to-end handle on how to think, plan, and execute quality digital marketing.
Good luck and happy learning!