Strategic Internet Marketing advice and tips

Buzz Marketing – Yard Sale Style

Debbie — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 16:36:55 +0000

Buzz Marketing

Today is my neighborhood yard sale. We aren’t talking 3 or 4 homes with trinkets, broken lamps and 1980′s electronics, this is a massive 2,000 plus home community chocked full of young entrepreneurial types. This means loads of great stuff, furniture, CD’s, books, software, kitchen gadgets and anything else you may want.

Needless to say there is quite a buzz when the Yard Sale is announced. I woke up this morning (at 6am!) to the sound of heavy truck engines pulling trailers circling the neighborhood. People actually travel from other states to attend this sale.. seriously!!!

So what does my neighborhood yard sale have to do with internet marketing, you ask??? EVERYTHING. Think about it…we all want qualified potential customers circling our website and/or store like hawks, money in hand and ready to buy.

Are you ready to market Yard Sale Style? Check this out!

Friends and Neighbors -think connections on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter – make those connections by adding people to your social network who may benefit from your goods or services.
Signage/ Point people in the right direction - Send out E-mail campaigns and e-newsletters calling your potential customers to action.
Lemonade and Cupcakes - Give folks a reason to stop by and stay awhile. When sending out e-mail campaigns or attracting potential customers to your website, add in links and resources pointing back to your website or to other pages on your site.
Flyers – Don’t be afraid to hand out business cards, or better yet, put magnetic business cards on your vehicle. You will be surprised at how quickly they are removed. Vehicle graphics and magnetic business cards are a low cost way of advertising daily in your local area.
Neighbor Envy – Talk about keeping up with Jones’s!! Forget the matching cars and over-the-top landscaping.. set your self apart from your competition by finding your niche, focusing on it and daring to be different. I personally find the KFC Pothole Marketing brillliant!
Have fun – Last but not least, have fun. People tend to gravitate towards laughter and enjoyment. If you have a smile on your face and are enjoying what you do, people will notice.

Do you market, yard sale style? Tell me about it! Share your creative ideas and learn from others.

Debbie Stanton (dstanton@diversitybuilder.com)

Plexus Marketing – Make the Connection

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5 Low Cost Marketing Ideas

Debbie — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 02:01:17 +0000

Champagne Marketing

Champagne Marketing on a Beer Pocketbook!

5 Low Cost Marketing Ideas

1. Send targeted (html) email campaigns – Prices may vary but can be as low as a penny or less an email.

2. ‘Take Away’ Car Magnets – Business card magnets that adhere to your vehicle! Yes, this works, people take magnets off our vehicle on a daily basis. I just got a call yesterday!! Cost can be as low as $0.25 per magnet.

3. E-Newsletter – Creative, interesting material for your client and potential client base. Include special promotions and calls to actions. Could be FREE if you send out on your own or less than a penny an email if you hire an internet marketing specialist.

4. BLOG.. BLOG… BLOG… If you aren’t doing it now, GET STARTED!!!! The beauty of blogging is it’s FREE!!!

5. On-line Networking (social media networking) – build on-line relationships, brand recognition and create word of mouth marketing. FREE!

Tell me your thoughts on budget marketing!!! What is working or not working for you….

Debbie Stanton

Plexus Marketing

dstanton@diversitybuilder.com

Pimp My Business Profile – No more unicorns, butterflies and hearts

Debbie — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 18:35:53 +0000

No more hearts and butterflies

Okay, I admit I spent hours upon hours pimping my MySpace profile. I picked out the perfect background, a retro look in brown and teal, and the ever important, song list. I invited all my friends to check it out and even set up a blog about my Vegas winnings, or lack thereof. So why on earth would I create a generic professional page on LinkedIn with no resume data, blog links or key elements of the services I offer? WHO KNOWS!?!?!?!

Needless to say, I never received an inquiry, Google didn’t increase my ranking and the 3 or 4 connections I had never bothered to ask any questions on my services. Then I had an ‘AHA Moment’… while consulting with a client and discussing the importance of having a strategic marketing plan, I realized I was doing myself and my company a disservice. The rest, as you know, is history!!

Morale to the story – Your Business Profile DOES matter!

Your profile is important!

Your first impression is often the most important - illustrate and focus on your specific skills and talent.
Think of your profile as your business card but better!!
Add a photo of yourself instead of a logo – Let the people who have met you find you easily.
Include testimonials or recommendations from current or previous clients.
List prior companies, education and experience – this will enable an easier way for your former colleagues, classmates or indirect contacts to find you.
Be consistent and set up all profiles with the same or similar content

No more wasting time

Time equals money so why waste it on unicorns, butterflies and hearts! Put your time and money back into your business. It will make a difference!

Debbie Stanton

dstanton@diversitybuilder.com

Pay-Per-Click VS. Organic Seach – Who Wins?

Debbie — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 22:22:46 +0000

Ding ding ding.. the winner is PPC (pay-per-click)!

Here are 4 reasons to used pay per click even if your site is already search engine optimized.

1) Pay per click allows you to get traffic to your site when visitors misspell a word. When running a search on Spellweb.com, the number of times chiropracter is searched in Google exceeds the number of times chiropractor (spelled correctly is searched.)

* The problem with organic search optimization here is that you’d have to misspell chiropractor on your site, which is not very professional. There are ways, you can sneak the misspelling in, but arriving on the top page of Google will be difficult. Note: to date, I have not found an ideal ‘reverse spellchecker tool,’ that provides you with common misspellings of search terms. Please respond to this email if you located a good (free) one.

2) Pay per click allows you to run directly against your local or national competitors. For instance, if you are competing against TruGreen Chemlawn, all you have to do is include that term as a pay per click term.

3) Extent of Search Terms – Organic search is limited to some extent on the number of terms you can secure, unless you have unlimited content and number of pages. Pay per click allows you almost limited combinations of terms (Google Adwords) * We generally select 500+ search terms for each pay per click campaign a client secures.

4) Geographic Targeting – Google Adwords and other pay per click sites allow you to geographically target your pay per click campaign. By limiting your customer base to local customers you are trying to serve, you will essentially target your market at some level. Think about this: if you want to target Chiropractors in Nashville Tennessee, and you know searchers often just type chiropractor, (not Nashville chiropractor), you can make sure you buy the term chiropractor and that ad will only show in the Nashville area…..pretty powerful purchase….

* Note: Microsoft Ad Center (MSN) allows additional targeting for demographic factors such as sex, income, etc. Facebook also allows for demographic targeting, but we will save Facebook ads for another post.

Debbie Stanton
dstanton@diversitybuilder.com
www.diversitybuilder.com

Best Day of the Week to Launch Your Email Marketing Campaign

Debbie — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 16:04:38 +0000

Monday.. Tuesday… Wednesday… blah blah blah. So you are sitting at home, probably in your pj’s, and have just finished creating the masterpiece of a lifetime. Clicking the ‘send’ button will launch your newly created email campaign into cyber world and you just KNOW your inbox will be instantly filled with responses from potential clients. WAIT WAIT WAIT… it really does matter what day of the week you send your email .

You will hear many theories on this but to follow is what has worked for me:

1) Don’t launch a campaign on a Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday – these days typically have low open rates. Often, emails sent during the weekend are read and deleted on Mondays, as people try to sift through their emails and discard anything they can.

* Certain exceptions apply. For instance, iIf you are promoting a weekend retail sale, Friday may be a great date. Some retail stores (brick and mortar) have found that Fridays and Saturdays work well to distribute offers to shoppers. Our company has a ‘Sunday Coupons’ newsletter offering grocery coupons and specials. Our subscribers expect the email to come to them on Sundays.

2) Tuesday and Wednesday have consistently been the best days for our business emails (B2B) to be opened and read.

3) Thursday has fairly high open rates too, but if we have the opportunity, we stick to Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

4) Stay far away from holiday weekends at all costs. People go out of town or just take a break and are less likely to check email. When they return to their office or computer, they are in ‘catch-up’ mode and are not likely to devote much time or attention to your email campaign. We wait until 2-3 days after the Monday following a holiday weekend to send emails again.

Debbie Stanton

Co-Founder/Diversity Builder, Inc.