Library - Marketing

There are dozens of studies that report from 51 percent to 90 percent of consumers read and trust online reviews.  No surprise there.  I do it all the time.  That means over half of consumers pay attention to online reviews.

Which makes good reviews critical if you have the type of business where people look for and read online reviews of products or services.

A press release has many components. In addition to the lead and headline, one of the most important elements is your call to action. What do you want readers to do when they’ve finished reading your press release? Let’s take a look at the seven steps to write a high-converting press release call to action.

Instagram has become one of the fastest-growing social media platforms, and one of the top five social networks businesses use to market their websites.

Using this image-based platform, companies can relate to their customers on a more personal level, generate more valuable leads and increase brand awareness. This platform offers a lot of potential for your business, but only if you have enough followers to make it worth grabbing their notice.

Most marketers today understand how important email is to their overall marketing strategy and recognize that it's not dying because of other emerging marketing venues like social media. But while most marketers realize that email is here to stay, unfortunately, that doesn't exactly mean they use email marketing best practices. Segmentation is one such best practices. Segmenting your communications can vastly improve your email marketing campaigns.  

With advertising now very focused on digital ads and social media, many business owners might be missing out on a highly effective advertising option: radio. Radio advertising has several benefits for small business:

Do you do public relations for your business? Many small business owners neglect PR because they think it takes too much time or requires hiring a PR person or agency. Others think their businesses just aren't newsworthy or that they can't write a good press release - so why bother?

Recent reports show that customers are paying attention to online reviews more than ever.

A recent survey of how Americans are using the Internet to search for business reports that nearly 70 percent of people trust businesses more when they have positive online reviews. That's a huge change from 2010, when almost half of survey respondents to the Local Consumer Review Survey stated that online reviews didn't influence them or they didn't even pay attention to them.

Technology moves so fast, it's hard to believe that social media has been used by businesses for a long time. In fact, it is now hard to find a business that is not on social media. Used primarily for marketing and advertising their business, many  business owners still don't know how to manage their social media fronts. Following are some of the mistakes businesses make when using social media in business.

You have a business, but are people talking about it?

Word-of-mouth is just as relevant today as it has ever been. When a business asks you to talk about how great they are on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and so on, that’s word-of-mouth. When you provide good content that others can share, that is also word of mouth. Today, potential customers are more likely to pay attention to people they know and a large general following (e.g., Yelp) than if they see the same commentary in a company advertisement.

We live in a a time when anyone with an internet connection and engaging content can reach an audience of millions.  But even you if don't want to be an internet 'star', what you post online becomes your Personal Brand and will influence your life in ways you need to take a moment to consider.