Online Marketing for Local Business
Posts tagged writer
Open Rates
15 years
by admin
in Uncategorized
There different ways to measure the success of your email marketing or E-newsletter, but the most common and easiest understood metric is the Open Rate. Makes sense. If folks don’t open your message, they can’t be influenced by it!
But what about the simple brand awareness/recognition that you achieve by recipients simply seeing your piece in their inbox? (see, it’s complicated…)
So your open rate is obviously of supreme importance over the long term. It’s the first step towards “conversion”, whatever that may mean to you, and marketing success.
It is also fairly clear that you’ll never achieve a 100% rate, or anything close. Everyone’s time is too short and inbox too full for that to happen. But you shouldn’t spend much time worrying about the specific open rate, anyway. (What?? I thought you said it was vitally important a second ago? Bear with me for a moment.)
The reason the actual number is of limited significance is this: What constitutes a “good” rate? In comparison to what?
There are many different types of communications, both business-to-consumer and business-to-business. Business-oriented lists tend to have higher rates, partly because emails seen in the preview pane of Outlook (a common business email service) count as “opened”. Everyone has a different list profile, too.
If you send to a rented list of 100,000 people, and 10% (or 10,000) view your piece, that could be a smashing success. If however you send to your own personal house list of 50 addresses, and only 10 view your email (20%), you might consider this a failure!
What matters most is when or how your open rate changes from campaign to campaign. An increasing rate says you’re hitting the mark, a decreasing open rate points to a problem.
That said, there are certainly some tricks and tips that our writers have learned to improve open rates over time. We’ll share some of these in future posts to help you improve your rates, too!
Purchasing Content: More Effective Than Web Advertising?
15 years
by admin
in Uncategorized
You have probably heard many sources online, including Hat Trick Associates, talk about the future of the Internet and how vital web content has become to the search engines and your SEO efforts of your website. Ideally, you want new content on your site every single time the Google crawler or one of the other large engines index your website. So a common question we hear from clients is, what is more effective for growing my website and doing more business in the future: Using my online marketing budget on advertising, or using those same resources to create more fresh content?
The answer may surprise you! Here are more vital web content-related statistics:
- More than 8 out of 10 Internet users look on search engines first to find information on the products or services they want to buy
- Up to 86% of searchers will ignore paid listings, or other advertising they know has been purchased as opposed to organic results
- On the flip side, 64% of the top natural (organic) listings will get click thrus
The reasons are fairly simple – people typically want to feel as if they have “discovered” the solution to their problem – the product, service or brand that they need – on their own. Which is why natural search results convert 35% higher than Pay Per Click campaigns! That’s a significant difference.
That doesn’t mean that web advertising should have no place in your marketing mix. But how many folks spend thousands upon thousands of their marketing dollars on Pay Per Click or Pay Per Impression campaigns, and then spend very little, or even nothing whatsoever, on their ongoing content? The answer is: many more than who actually should! And that is certainly a business mistake.
Sowing the Seeds…..Grow Your Email List
15 years
by admin
in Uncategorized
Email newsletters and other marketing is quite cost-effective, timely and very flexible. But these benefits will do you no good if you don’t have anyone to communicate with in the first place!
How can you grow your email list(s)?
The first step of course is utilizing all the addresses you already have. This means the friends, colleagues and other business associates who reside in your email contact list(s). You should also go through that pile of business cards you’ve been collecting since 1996* in your top drawer.
Next, ask all of your contacts on social media sites to join your list as well. Facebook fan pages, Twitter feeds, LinkedIn accounts, etc. Offer them something of value if they join your list. A special discount or other giveaway could work well.
Lastly, continue to build from there. Make it a point to ask for email addresses from new customers, members, clients, participants or donors. If you provide price quotes as part of your business, add these folks as well. Periodically re-contact your social network, since most people continually add new folks to their networks.
And for those with a large customer base already, create ways to add the email information for all the people you do business with. An “Enter to Win a Cool Prize” contest, with an email address needed “to notify the winner” could work well.
Just remember, your database of email contacts is one of your most valuable resources – don’t abuse it! Provide interesting content, thoughtful commentary, and value… like special discounts, coupons or exclusive information, and you shouldn’t have any problems.
*Don’t actually include email addresses from 1996! (if they even still function, that is…) There is no “law” written in granite regarding your old contacts and using their email addresses. But one rule of thumb is: if you’ve done business or spoken with the contact within the last 2 years, they’re fair game for your new list. But every business, and list, is different!