The way social media was a buzz word in 2008, influencer marketing is going through the same nowadays. Back then I still remember how I had to explain, "what", "why" and "how" of social media to our prospective new clients. Thankfully "influencer marketing" doesn't have that much problem and is quite adaptive amongst the marketing professionals. But, now the problem is something else, it is the understanding of influencer marketing. It is not about the "What" but "How"! If you don't already know, influencer marketing is a type of marketing where the focus is on individuals (having high reach) than the target market as a whole. In general terms, it is widely used for online influencers like youtubers, Instagrammers, bloggers or tweeps having high online reach. On the basis of the content published, there are 4 categories of influencers:

1. Educators (help followers with content having insights)
2. Coaches (help followers with content and engage with them via tweets/comments)
3. Entertainers (create content which entertain the followers and further engage and inspire them)
4. Charismatics (create content which is based on the insights and inspire them to do more)

In my day-to-day interactions with brands, I often explain that money can't buy everything. They have to understand that the motivation of influencers is into things which is beyond free stuff. For planning Digital PR strategy with influencers, we should aim to convert our one-time relationship with them into marriage. Everyone loves to get respect and appreciation for the work they do. Today, I thought of listing down every possible key point that I use for planning a perfect influencer marketing strategy. Here are few valuable tips that you should know before planning the same:

1. The rule of a pitching to a digital influencer - the basics of Digital PR

   Do not pitch directly without an intensive research. Rather understand their flow of writing, acknowledge their work on their blog/ Youtube channel comment section and engage with them on Twitter over common points of interests. In a nutshell, "First get to know them better!"

2. Identify common passion points between brand & influencers

   It is important to find, the common passion points between your brand and an influencer before planning any content creation exercise. Bluntly, acquiring influencers for satisfying your "reach" ego won't work in the long run, because you will soon realise that it is not reflecting onto sales or consumer's sentiments.

3. Start with asking, "Why"

   Why would an influencer create content for your brand? Have you ever asked yourself that why does a reader/follower like the content created by an influencer? Why would the target audience share a video? If you have an answer to this "why" then you can effectively plan the "what" and the "how" of marketing with influencers. In most of the cases, I have observed that marketers are unable to effectively answer the "why" and henceforth, get puzzled in the "what" loop of execution.

4. Research and create a list of influencers

   Explore & create a list of influencers who are important for your brand. Having a targeted marketing approach always helps you to save time & bring efficiency to your digital PR plan.

5. Build relationships to reap results in the future

   Always think of a long term strategy. Plan to build on associations, that will help your brand in future. Having a long-term relationship will help you build a trustworthy bond between your brand and the influencer. Moreover, they will be pleased to create content for you, join your events & recommend your brand wherever necessary.

6. Analyse & iterate

   Your strategy should not be marketing for the influencers but to have a strategy of marketing with them. Do your regular analysis on how the content created by the influencers is performing. What is the organic reach of the content produced by the influencer for the brand. Can you invest in an improved setup for influencers for producing fine content? Iterating your plan after doing research on influencer performance is always recommended.

7. Influence the audience of an influencer

   If the agenda of your influencer marketing program is to influence the influencer, then my friend you are thinking in 2012! The aim should be, to influence the audience of the influencers. The virtue of an influencer is in his/her reach, so at the same time we should always focus on the end users.

8. Understanding the ecosystem

   If you want an influencer to create content for your brand then help them with amplification, reach and things required for creating "awesome" content. They will love it and aspire to create more in future for you.

9. The chemistry of affinity

   Understand what an influencer loves the most & wants to have. This question is very subjective and depends from person to person, but the answer is "not always the monetary benefits" provided by the brand. You can share their names in research reports, in changelog of upcoming OTA of phone updates, on the website as key thought leaders, or even promote them to a new set of audience.

10. Planning the correct compensation

    If you want influencers to attend your event, create content for you, publish video reviews or even live tweet, then they should get the compensation for the time spent in some way or the other. Planning the correct compensation method is a very crucial factor in determining the influencer's satisfaction. It can be a great exclusive news or the content getting an appreciation from a follower!

    [Bonus] Approaching an influencer

    I'm assuming that you always approach influencers after doing basic research. The research of what they write, what they like, what kind of events they go to, what kind of content they create for their owned properties, etc. Your approach towards them defines whether your influencer marketing strategy will work or not. Having a mindset of throwing money for paid content may not always work and can lead to a catastrophic PR disaster.

After reading this post do tell me if it helped you in planning your influencer marketing strategy. If you have any queries, feel free to reach me on twitter @honeytech or mail to honey at armdigital.in. Last but not the least, plan a kickass influencer strategy and keep me posted on how it went!

In the past few years, we’ve seen a huge surge in the number of marketing tools and technologies. From social media to smartphones, technology is making a huge impact on the life of customers. This influx of technology-revamped marketing has led to the transformation of “MarTech”, which is a combination of Marketing and Tech that is used to acquire customers. Today, CMOs and Marketing Heads are thinking through the lenses of businesses and customer experiences, while technology is aiding them to empower their own unique perspectives and create an executable strategy. MarTech is enabling personalized marketing, which is something that brands need to learn in order to cope up with the changing trends for customer acquisition. Inbound Marketing is the Best tool for Businesses for Customer Acquisition and Retention.

#1. Advertising: the Top of Mind Recall

Today, advertising also needs unique trends to get itself notified, and the most pervasive component is 'Top of Mind Recall'. We generally market brands or products with every possibility of it lasting longer, but always forget that once the Top Of Mind Recall is created, it's usually less expensive to advertise the product. Advertising and marketing have always obsessed over the youth, but never more so and never more pointlessly. The over 50's now have control over 80% of the wealth in developed nations, have more free time, look set to live far longer, are way healthier and more engaged in brands than before. Yet the world of marketing abandons them to look at the trending money. The trend lines are clear, so what can your business do about it?

#2. Science & Technology: The medium for creating demands

The science behind how you continue the conversation experience is getting smarter day-by-day. Recently, Oracle launched their machine learning technology, which they are calling ‘Adaptive Intelligence Applications’ (AIA). For acquisition, conversion, retention and growth, chief marketing officers (CMOs) want to know how technology can make these things easier to practice and constant hard work is taking place on that vision to make it a reality. Moreover, different markets have different demands. Australia is the most mature market and one of Oracle’s most successful clients in that country is an airline company called Jetstar, which has won many awards for its effective marketing practices. The challenge is that the share of economies that are still trying to do sophisticated marketing is relatively small. A lot can be provided to the customers, and at the end of the day a lot of brands do marketing – some do it well, others not so much. More often than not, sophisticated marketers tend to be those who have tried to understand their customers. We can aid them by providing training and guidance, and help them translate their strategies into actionable outcomes. The biggest challenge is avoiding the trap of thinking that marketing is about giving discount offers to people. There is a lot of simplistic marketing practiced as it’s a price-sensitive economy, and this for of marketing at times is just about making an offer or making a limited price discount. Though that is an important tactic to use in marketing, most of the CMOs are now seeing the value in building a brand. If you have a strong brand, you don’t need to make a discount offer, but at the same time it is not easier as a lot of brands practice the discount strategy to attract customers.

#3. CMOs , Tech & Acquisition

For CMOs, if you don’t adhere to the best practices, there are more dangers than benefits of using technology. To make technology an enabler, we have to follow the rules of effective engagement with the customers and put safety measures into practice as far as customer data is concerned. Digital marketing has become an established practice, and it is important for marketers to understand the science and nuances behind it to make it more effective. The number one priority of the CMO is the customer. A recent study by Gartner confirms this: “25% of CMOs say leading customer experience is the most-increased expectation CEOs have of them over the last year.” Today, the CMO’s decisions are driven by data, as they attempt to understand customer sentiment, buyer decision patterns, and predict future actions. There is no question that the CXO and CMO should work in tandem. CMOs have a wealth of useful information to share with CXO’s looking to optimize the customer experience strategy. As the CXO role evolves, it continues to gain traction. With customer success becoming a critical differentiator in an increasingly crowded marketplace, organizations embrace the CXO as an invaluable player in shaping the overall customer experience.

#4. B2B the best practice to build connections

We live in a world where connections matter. With our current global economy, it’s impossible for a business to thrive in isolation. Developing strategic partnerships is absolutely vital if you want to employ the most effective B2B customer acquisition strategies and reach more people. Partnerships like these are a great way to gain exposure. You’ve probably already seen many different examples of this online. For example, a group of online marketers who offer similar or complementary products/services may decide to collaborate on a project, such as an online seminar. Each individual marketer will offer the seminar to their current customers, which will then broaden the exposure of everyone in the collaboration. You should be actively seeking out like-minded companies to build relationships with. These connections don’t have to be made online; they’re just as effective offline as well. Don’t limit yourself to either/or. Make a point of networking at local and regional events in addition to finding connections online.

#5. Focus On What Works

The B2B customer acquisition strategies have been tested and proven to be effective. Which of these strategies do you think will work best for your company? If you’re looking for a good company to partner with (especially one that can help you with your exposure), we’d love to chat!

The online world is a space which constantly keeps evolving, which is the same case when it comes to web design. The designs which were popular in 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019 will simply not work as well in today’s date – such is the pace at which technology changes. So, web developers have to constantly update the look of their websites, such as their templates, navigation, action buttons, etc. They need to keep on experimenting with these in order to evaluate which design of the website attracts more customers and enhances their experience. With the advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Virtual Reality (VR), web designs are going to get even better. If you are on a lookout to refresh your web design, here are some web design trends you must try in this year. This will help you drive more traffic to your website, and keep your users engaged:

#1. Bolder and beautiful fonts

Many websites are cleaning up their home pages by using bold, eye-catching headings, and keeping the rest of the page minimal and clean. This makes the design of the home page look beautiful, and takes the focus to the content. For example, the men’s clothing retailer Frank and Oak uses big, bold fonts and large photography to keep their homepage extremely eye-catchy, while putting all the emphasis on their content.

#2. Use of bright gradients

Most of the brands are experimenting with brighter colours and duotone gradients all over their homepage. They are no longer sticking to using just single, solid tones and cramming the homepage with information. For example, Impossible Bureau uses very vivid colours and contrasting gradients on their page to make it look striking.

#3. Custom-made graphics and illustrations

More companies are turning to graphic designers and illustrators to create astounding illustrations and graphics for their websites, which resonates with their users and reflects their brand. It is a big break from flat designs and minimalism, which could be seen on the websites a few years back. Illustrations and graphics inject life into a simple, plain website, and helps to build the personality of a brand. For example, Dropbox uses an interface which is extremely easy to understand, and its hand-drawn and light-hearted illustration reflects its friendly personality and puts the user at complete ease while using their product.

#4. Microinteractions

Microinteractions are single, specific moments when a user is interacting with your website. These may be scrolling effects and/or hover-and-click animations. Most of the designers think of it as an important component of a website, which adds delight, creates surprise, and offers something attractive, engaging and exciting to the users.

#5. Cinemagraphs

Cinemagraphs such as high-quality videos or GIFs that run on a smooth, continuous loop, have been widely used to propagate the content to a user in an interactive and visually appealing manner. It breaks the monotony and adds life to an otherwise static page.

#6. Duotones

Many designers are experimenting with visually appealing duotones for their pages. Some are even experimenting with mixing more than two colors. For example, MyUKmailbox, uses duotone very beautifully in its design, to reflect the personality of the brand.

#7. Mixing Vertical and Horizontal Texts

Web designers keep on experimenting with the aesthetics of their web page, and mixing vertical and horizontal texts is one great way to do so. It is a relief for the user from the usual clutter of text and it instantly catches his/her attention. This also provides a fresh dimension to the page.

#8. Modular Design

This is one of the latest innovations in the world of web design. Modular designs are surely a spectacular way to create a clean, accessible website that will keep the users engaged. For example, Script & Seal, an illustration studio site, uses a modular design to make navigation easy for the user and makes the UI clean and very attractive to look at.

#9. Card and Grid UI’s

While there have been many new designs which have been on the rise currently, Card and Grid patterns are something which is going to stay. It was made popular by Pinterest and followed by likes of Facebook, Twitter, etc. It instantly shows the headings of the content which the user can expect on the page, hence enabling him to quickly scan the site in a visually appealing manner. For example, dribble.com, an invite-only sharing platform for designers, is a great example of a functional card UI with a simple grid. Each element is clear and accessible, allowing a user to scan through the content easily.

#10. Innovative Scrolling and Parallax

With innovations being made in web designing, the function of scrolling has changed, and it is being used in more creative capacities to deliver content online. Earlier, designers emphasized on keeping the most important content “above the fold”. But this concept is vanishing now, since the “fold” is now harder to define, with users viewing content on screens of all sizes. Designers have innovated basic functions such as scrolling to deliver content to the user in a more engaging and convenient manner. Infinite scrolling is one such innovation made towards the delivery of content. In this web design, the content loads as the user scroll down the page. This design would prove great for sites which have a large amount of information to disseminate. It is also widely used by social media giants such as Facebook and Twitter, where numerous updates are required to be delivered in the user’s news feed. Also, many more smart features in scrolling are being constantly developed. For example, it works well with video-based content, where the video can auto-pause as the user scrolls down, and resume when he scrolls up. Another way in which scrolling has been innovated is the implementation of parallax. It involves the background moving slower than the foreground, thus creating a beautiful 3D effect. For example, Apple is a brand which makes great use of the scroll feature on their site. Keeping all the important product information static on the left, a series of watches Cascades when you scroll, creating beautiful and seamless transitions on the page.

#11. Geometric Layering

Another innovation made in an effort to make websites look more attractive and exciting to users, the popularity of geometrical layering has only risen. It was first propagated by Google in their Google Material Design and has been used by designers ever since to add life to images that are otherwise plain. For example, buildings, interior designs, people working, etc. The greatest advantage of using geometric layering is that it is easy to work with and integrate with the rest of the design. They can also work with any type of content, putting direct emphasis on it. For example, Bailey and French – a Management Consultancy company – has beautifully incorporated geometrical layering in their design, which makes their sites highly attractive.

Minimalism

It is said, “less is more”, and this couldn’t be truer for website designs. Minimalistic designs are trending with companies nowadays. This design lets go of all the unnecessary elements from the framework of a site, leaving only what is most required. Most of the minimalistic sites use neutral colors, dramatic typography, large and vivid photography and very simple navigational tools and visual balance. Because there is a usage of very few elements in this approach, designers must be careful in choosing what to keep and what to leave. If designed and conceptualized properly, minimalistic design can work wonders for your website. For example, ‘Oh My!’, a Digital Design studio uses a large white background for some high-contrast effect and a very simple navigation to provide a great UX. These are some of the web design trends to look out for in this year. These will surely make your website stand out and keep your users engaged and wanting for more!

The online world has become highly competitive and unpredictable space. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) services has become an indispensable function for marketers to make their online presence felt and more importantly, rank on the first page of the search results. So, the only key to survival in this online world is to constantly follow the SEO trends. Google keeps on updating its search algorithms on a regular basis, and every digital marketer must follow those updates if he wants to stay on the top the search results page. Here are 8 SEO trends every CMO and marketer must know about, to incorporate in their marketing strategy”

1. Marching towards Mobile-only world

The increased usage of mobiles has changed the face of SEO over the past few years. Mobile search has not overtaken desktop search, but it will surely do so in the future. The majority of website traffic comes from mobile instead of a desktop, for many of the companies. In May 2015, Google reported that mobile searches have surpassed desktop on its search engine. Since then, it has taken many steps to give an indication of business that it is a must for them to create a mobile-friendly site. In fact, Google had also announced that it has been conducting experiments to make its index mobile-first, i.e., it would primarily consider a site’s mobile content, rather than its desktop while determining how to rank it in the results page. Google had also introduced Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP’s) in the market, which allows faster loading of web pages on the mobile devices. This allows 4 times faster loading speed of the page with 10 times less data. Hence, if your site receives a heavy volume of traffic from mobile searches, it may be a time you created an AMP version of your web page. Although it is still not considered to be a ranking factor by Google’s algorithm.

2. Voice Search has become more important than ever

Because of an ever increasing usage of mobiles, voice search has become all the more important. With the endeavor to constantly improve it, is becoming one of the fastest growing search options. Its appeal is undeniable since it is hand’s free and futuristic.As technology improves with each update, the error rate is only decreasing. In this front, it would be wise for companies to look beyond Google, since Bing may pose to be a big competitor in this arena since it is heavily fuelling its search through Siri and Alexa.

3. Optimize for user intent

Users now- a-days know what they want, and hence type full-phrase queries in the search engines. In its endeavor to provide better answers to users queries, Google introduced Google RankBrain late in the last year, widening the avenues of algorithmic machine learning. It is an extension of Google’s Hummingbird, which tries to learn the user’s natural language and how they phrase conversational queries. It tries to understand the context of the user’s search and shows up only those results on the top which matches with the user’s context and intent of the search. Hence, when it comes to optimising for natural language, voice search and intelligent voice search (such as Siri or Cortana), the SEO experts need to concentrate more on optimizing their content based on intent rather than keywords.

4. Local Search Optimization

With advancement towards a mobile-only world, the importance of local search optimization has increased even more. In a competition to rank on the first page of the SERP, companies having a local listing find themselves on the top of the SERP. This helps users looking for a local business to easily distinguish them from the other organic results. Having physical address and proximity to a user gives a local business an advantage of attracting local customers to their business. But all is not good as it looks like! Recently, Google reduced the number of local business listings in its SERP to only 3. But it is still a very important way for local businesses to rank at the top of the page and attract more customers. In 2016, there was as much fierce competition for local search results as organic or paid results.

5. More Rich Answers and Snippets

In its endeavor to provide better content to users, Google has come up with rich answers and snippets in its SERP. The users find it relevant since they feature on the top of the results page, and give a rich summary to the user about the content. To achieve these enhanced results, a website can add a code called Structured Data Markup (often referred to as “schema markup”) directly to your site’s HTML markup. This markup helps search engines understand a website’s content better, and to show information which is the most relevant the user. According to a study by Stone Temple Consulting, the volume of rich snippets appearing in search results has nearly doubled from 2014 to 2016. Going by this trend it is only going to rise further in 2017 and in the future. Adding structured data on your website can enhance your chances of having an enhanced SERP listing, your content being featured as a rich answer, or in case of branded searches, having a knowledge panel appear. Also, users prefer to have quick content which is relevant to them. So, in order to stay ahead of your competitors, you must consider implementing schema markup for your website, if you haven't already.

6. Personalization as an SEO strategy

Earlier, everyone used to see the same search results. Nowadays, every search engine shows different search results for every individual. Search engines personalize results on three criteria, i.e., country, location and personal history. With Google enhancing its entity search and context, personalization has become more important than ever before. It means that Google would more often present from websites that are already in our search history, or through search entities, linked from websites already present in our search history. This would mean that brands should focus more on making their brands synonymous with their products in the long run.

7. Engage in intentional link building

Links have always been one of the most important factors for ranking in search. According to a report by Search Engine Land, Google has confirmed it to be one of the top three ranking factors (along with content and RankBrain). Also, several ranking factor studies have confirmed this. A recent study by Stone Temple has indicated that links are more powerful than we thought earlier. However, they emphasized that building links alone would not help to rank low-quality content. Hence, you need to also emphasize on quality of your content, apart from building high-quality links.

8. Focus on enhancing user experience

We know that improving user experience has remained a key ranking factor for many years now. However, you need to concentrate more on the relationship between user experience, click-through rates, and bounce rates. A recent study published by Moz blog shows that there is a direct connection between high rankings and beating out the expected CTR of the other pages in the SERP’s. In other words, if your content stays at the top of the SERP, but doesn;t outperform in other results in terms of clicks, you may not be able to remain in the top position for long. These are the 8 most important SEO trends for 2020 which every CMO and digital marketer must know about, and implement in order to rank at the top of the SERP and outperform their competitors. Know more about the Top 6 SEO Trends that will Dominate 2020.

Marketing blogs are an excellent way to stay out and discover crucial information and identify tried-and-tested ways to spot the various marketing trends around today’s fast-paced industry. So here are the top informative and essential marketing blogs that every CMO should follow:

#1. Marketing Land

Marketing Land is a reliable source of the latest news in the world of online marketing. It reports on the relationship between digital marketing and tech development, and ensures that your content strategy reaches the target consumer. It works with some subject matter experts and guest contributors to provide the latest articles from the marketing world. From updates in content management to new features on social media platforms; Marketing Land’s posts are highly informative and relevant. Search Engine Land is a publication for the same company. It looks specifically into issues regarding SEO, paid search and content marketing.

#2. Content Marketing Institute

Content Marketing Institute offers one of the best pieces of advice regarding content and how it can help your brand grow. One of their primary objectives is to provide qualitative information to educate marketers through research documents, events, eBooks and whitepapers. It provides the information on trends, helpful strategies, storytelling, news updates from major brands and case studies on how companies can construct their content marketing strategies. From latest business trends to best practices, their blogs offers bits and pieces of advice on how to generate effective content marketing and best strategies for the business. It is totally worth it to browse and bookmark this blog.

#3. The Moz Blog

Moz Blog is one of the best digital marketing blogs to read if you want to get updates and news from top industries related to inbound marketing initiatives. Each of their posts provides real value and offers the actionable insights of the businesses. It informs everything you want to know with the right amount of detail to make it comprehensible. Moz blog is packed with useful blogs on SEO strategies and practices. It helps you to understand the mechanics behind the SEO updates. For a beginner, their content is quite digestible. Whether it's a recent algorithm update from the leading social mediums, a statement from Google or a guide for keyword planning, their blog should be referred by the marketers to deepen their knowledge of SEO or how they can integrate the various digital approaches with marketing strategies.

#4. Kiss Metrics

Kiss Metrics specializes in analytics, marketing and testing and its various informative blog posts reflect this specialist knowledge. Their team examines the statistical trends that are making waves and reports it comprehensively. These reports inform people about the brand's online performance. It is useful for conducting research for your articles and selecting useful statistics to use for your campaign proposals. On the blog, you will come across beautifully designed infographics which contain the latest digital marketing statistics, studies and tests. You’ll also find an array of useful digital marketing guides that tackle subjects like email marketing, social media and customer analytics.

#5. Convince & Convert

Convince & Convert produces a variety of resources that include websites, blogs, podcasts, books and eBooks. They are digital marketing advisors and a perfect platform to learn more about digital advertising. Each of the articles is short and simple, despite being insightful and informative. Jay Bear and his team are the advisors of Convert & Convince who have advised various brands with tactics to use social media and content marketing. Their advice helps you to think outside the box, and you can incorporate those ideas to build the digital marketing strategy.

#6. Hubspot

Hubspot is one of the leading inbound marketing softwares in the industry. It was founded by Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah in 2006. It offers many services in one powerful and easy-to-use integrated marketing package. It is an incredible support for creating powerful and compelling content, organizing your online activities, managing your website and then measuring and controlling everything you do on one single platform which makes inbound marketing faster and more efficient. Beyond their product offering, their blogs are the first step towards effective inbound marketing strategies.

#7. Social Media Examiner

Social Media Examiner dispenses advice on all social media platforms like Facebook, Youtube, Google+, Twitter and more. You can get advice from the social media experts on how to generate an effective social media strategy on each of these platforms. Their blog posts and articles include the expert interviews, case studies, podcasts, reviews of the latest research results in the industry and the most recent social media news. This content can help you plan and create your social media strategy and content calendar. Social media has become one of the most influential mediums to reach out to the masses. To keep your social strategy updated, Social Media Examiner helps the business through their advice.

#8. eMarketer:

eMarketer is a marketing news source similar to Marketing Land. It leans toward data-driven content like case studies or market research. If you’re looking for demographic information, such as mobile usage within your target market, eMarketer is a good place to consult. It is a place to research about marketing in the digital world. eMarketer majorly relies on sourcing this information from marketers and business professionals. They generate the information on marketing trends, consumer behaviour and have a huge database of essential data relating to the digital economy.

#9. Socialfresh

The best thing about Socialfresh is that they also publish alternative media pieces such as podcasts that offer various alternate modes for consuming their data. Others include the videos, speeches or presentations at various events. If you’re short on reading multiple articles from various sources, Socialfresh gives you the consume comprehensive content via their offering. The topics which are covered by them focus a lot on the power of social media and how the industry is evolving.

#10. PR Daily News

PR Daily provides public relations professionals, social media specialists and marketing communicators with a daily news feed. It combines the industry related stories and the top stories going on throughout the world. It offers content pieces on content marketing and tech information as well. The variety makes their blog easier and enjoyable to consume without any repetitive content.

When you’re a SMEs or start-up, it is essential that you want to reach to your potential users; you want the people to know about you. The real struggle for SMEs or Startups is how they become the part of any discussion. One of the classic ways to implement any marketing strategy used in such confusion is either to use Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) or Pay-Per-Click (PPC).

There are various questions raised in the mind of any small business during web marketing is "Whether I should be using SEO or PPC to drive traffic to my website?

Often PPC and SEO are approached with separate plans. Though they are dissimilar in their approaches, it is important to learn that they are part of the same domain: search. One is known for its paid clicks and another one for natural clicks. They both are suited for different outcomes and can be complimentary for any business if utilised together.

What is Search Engine Optimisation?

SEO is a strategy to maximise the number of visitors to a particular website by ensuring that the site appears high on the list of results returned by a search engine. It is an organic process of generating the lead through the results on search engine. SEO gives the link to the related websites as per the keywords typed by the users (depending upon the high-quality content of the website). Content marketing in many sights depends upon the SEO keywords to generate customer-centric content. Though SEO and Content Marketing are two different approaches, but they work together. SEO creates the demand for keywords and content

What is Pay-Per-Click?

Pay per Click is the Concept available on many internet marketing platforms like Google, Yahoo, Bing, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc. where you market your advertisements on these platforms and pay for every click that your prospective clients (viewers) make on these ads. It is an approach of internet marketing in which the advertisers pay a fee each time one of their ads gets clicked. By this, the business buys the lead to their website rather than generating leads organically. It offers an immediate ROI in comparison to inbound strategy.

Before you jump to the strategy, the marketers need to consider some several factors like the budget of the business, business goals, how quick you want to see the results.

Budget:

When deciding between SEO and PPC, you need to determine that by what size advertising budget your business can support. If the small business doesn't have enough budgets to support the PPC strategy, then it's better to opt for SEO as it generates the organic traffic to your website.

Average Cost per Click:

The term CPC refers to the price users are willing to pay for each click they receive on their ad. It is an internet advertising model which helps to drive traffic to your website in which the advertisers pay to the site when the users click the ad.

When you establish a digital marketing budget, you should also consider what other people in the industry are paying for ads for Search Engine results. Some CPC is not so cheap as they can cost up to as much as 20$-30$. Such prices can make it difficult for the small business to earn revenue at initial stages.

How fast do you need results?

Where PPC has the advantage of quick results, SEO has a benefit of generating traffic organically. PPC can be a good option for the business which has the newly established website and wants the initial boost to drive traffic. But as a result, it doesn't turn out a long-term effect on the customers where SEO compels the potential customer to reach to your website builds long term relations. Therefore, SEO is a much practical approach to implement.

Which marketing strategy is better: SEO or PPC?

The main advantage of SEO is; statistically, it tends to bring you better traffic and the leads who are interested in the content published on your website. In the case of PPC, lots of searchers have trained themselves even to ignore "paid results" completely when browsing on the search engine.

There's plenty of data which suggests that organic visitors to your website are brand loyal, trust your business, and trust your products & services. Ranking highly on Google with the help of SEO for a keyword phrase is a sign that you're credible and that you're a valuable player in your industry. These are the major advantages of SEO. Moreover, it showcases you as expertise in your industry.

Though SEO runs for long-term benefits for any business, it takes time, skills and resource to implement correctly.

Summing-up

In order to achieve the best of results, it is vital for the small business to choose the best model marketing to execute which could bring the digital presence and reach the potential customers. PPC is a jump-start way for any business to build an online presence, and drive traffic to the website. Though a holistic campaign of both SEO and PPC will work the best to boost your small business and bring out online success, SEO would be ideal for stabilising traffic, nurturing leads, and building a long-term relationship with the customers cost-effectively. Plus, SEO efforts will help your PPC results as well.

Social media is the new way of communication. It hasn’t been here for long (maybe just over a decade) but it already is the most widespread method of communication. Social media has become so important that it is one of the biggest contributors to website traffic. The advent of so many social media portals has got people of all races, ages, and religions glued so much so that most people spend at least an hour collectively on these social media portals.

Using this vast networking platform for marketing can amplify your brand awareness exponentially. After all, content marketing strategies on social media brings about a level-playing field for small companies to match their marketing strategies with those of large enterprises and MNCs. Thus, for SMBs with little to no visibility, social media marketing is a great tool to reach out to potential customers and create their brand awareness by posting engaging content.

Challenges SMB’s Face When it Comes to Marketing

SMB’s face many challenges when they try to reach out to potential clients. These challenges can at times be pretty daunting and somewhat confusing. Here is a list of the challenges they face:

• Compared to their competitors, they have lesser brand awareness and visibility among the target audience. This makes it tougher to push through the competition and make their voices heard.
• With a limited budget, the adaptable marketing strategies get limited, hence implying a limited reach.
• The limited budget calls for a creative marketing team that can make things happen inside this constraint. But as a small business, you can’t allot a big team just for marketing.
• In this fast-paced world, where trends rise and fall by the minute, staying above that wave to be heard is a big challenge.

How Social Media Helps?

Social media nowadays is not just a way of communication for people. Now people can get the latest news, buy things directly from social media, connect with companies and build communities with like-minded people. These things make social media more than just a pastime for individuals, and it paves the way for sharing and consuming valuable information with peers. You can reach out to anyone, with less effort and barely any problems.

These developments have paved the way for social media to become an important marketing tool for companies to use. It helps companies connect with the target audience conveniently. It makes it easier for companies to reach out to such people and interact with them, creating a strong social media presence. It can help strengthen brand perception and trust, by providing key information to a wide customer base. This ability to reach out to a large customer base with good content makes social media marketing a lucrative idea. It is easier to implement, doesn’t require a large team to handle the mandate. It is also a money-saving option, costing up to 60% lesser than traditional marketing tools.

Social Media marketing depends heavily on content, in the written, photo or video formats. On basis of this, you can connect with people who might be interested in your company’s products. For a successful social media campaign, you need good content and the help of social media influencers to help spread the word about your company. When people see your content being promoted by someone they follow, they are inclined towards your product as well. The network that you can create on social media to connect with your target audience is ultimately what gives widespread reach to your content and help in building brand awareness.

Another big advantage of social media marketing is that your content is instantly shareable with the click of a button. This makes interested customers a source of spreading brand awareness for you, improving your reach. It also provides a platform for customers to reach out to your company for any grievances they might face. By promptly addressing such concerns, you can improve your brand’s trust. Customers take this as a sign that you are listening to and are aware of their problems, helping with improving brand perception.

Thus as an SMB, using social media strategies can help brands grow quickly and be recognised by potential customers. The two-way interaction allows customers to reach out to the company, building upon brand trust and loyalty in customers. With the help of good content, strangers can be made interested in the products/services, making them visit the website and find out more about your brand. These interested/potential customers can then be engaged with the company, turning them into leads, thus improving the overall sales of the company. It also helps you provide richer customer experiences before and after sales, making people come back to you for repurchase.

You can also collaborate with other people and brands for mutually benefiting campaigns, helping you build relationships for the future.

Conclusion

With the rapid rise of social media, it has become the number one medium for people to connect and share ideas. This increase in people’s interactions online makes social media the perfect tool to reach out to a large number of people efficiently and effectively at the same time. The content can also be targeted, made specifically to interest a certain group of people, who can be potential customers of the brand. Using social media influencers, you can reach out to a large audience, increasing the base of people you reach. Also, the progress and results of social media marketing are instantaneous and trackable, giving you an insight into what strategy works and what doesn’t. This is an important part of media marketing as this is what makes the results tangible.

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Inbound marketing has become a buzzword and an upcoming trend to talk among marketers for building an effective marketing strategy. It is a form of marketing which empowers potential customers by generating the content that resonates with the readers. Inbound marketing uses strategies in a way so that a company is visible to its clients. So instead of them going out and hunting customers, the customers discover them. For organisations looking to up the ante in their sales, inbound marketing can be a great solution. Companies that follow the inbound marketing strategy have been shown to be 4x more efficient in driving revenue and hitting sales goals.

Inbound marketing focuses a lot on nurturing leads. It is a customer-centric approach which attracts people through the integrated use of content marketing, search engine optimisation and social media marketing.

Content Marketing: It is used massively in the industry to engage the larger audience. The digital media has widened the scope of content marketing, and even the range of users has also increased. The audience has become very interactive and wants fresh and accurate information. Content Marketing is not limited to blogging but various other creative areas as well. Videos and images have played a great role in generating traffic, as they are interesting and appealing to the viewers.

Search Engine Optimisation: SEO is a strategy to maximise the number of visitors to a particular website by ensuring that the site appears high on the list of results returned by a search engine. It is an organic process of generating leads through the results on the search engine. SEO gives the link to the related websites as per the keywords typed by the users (depending upon the high-quality content of the site). Though SEO and Content Marketing are two different approaches, they are meant to work together; after all, SEO creates the demand for keywords and content.

Social Media Marketing: It is an important pillar which has taken its fair share of hits, but it remains one of the most effective strategies for generating visibility. Throw your content into syndication and the followers will have more reason to stick around. Social media can generate a steady traffic to your site and build your brand credibility. Lead generation through social media platforms is fast, efficient and a relatively inexpensive way to drive traffic to the website

Inbound takes time, expertise and resources to be implemented correctly. Here are some ideas on how to showcase the value of inbound to your CMO.

Some Ideas to Showcase the Value of Inbound to Your CMO

ROI of Inbound Marketing

Outbound marketing methods such as print advertising and direct mail do make it difficult for any business to calculate the ROI. Inbound gives an easier measure of your marketing performance to single out the efforts that need to be improved in various other business functions which are not performing. The ROI of inbound marketing is a lot higher than that of outbound. It is cost-effective, and the effectiveness and efficiency of the efforts are increased, leading to higher profits.

Content Assets

When explaining inbound to your CMO, the inbound content becomes inbound assets. The major focus of content marketing is to engage the audience by using information and creating content in such a manner that would drive more traffic to the site and help to change the consumer behaviour that could lead to better sales. It continues to drive traffic from social channels and SEO long after it has been published, without any additional investment.

Improves Customer Relations

Inbound marketing strives to provide high-quality content to their potential buyers to gain more insights from them and to be of value to them. It focuses on the long-term relationship between the consumer and the business. The main idea is to improve customer-business relations, and as a result, it improves the brand’s credibility, sales, reach and helps in generating new leads. By simply offering customer-centric content and services to the readers, it will contribute to improving brand credibility. This strategy can develop and improve the brand loyalty of the customers.

Retention Rate And Quality Leads

The people who generate traffic on the website are the actual people who are interested in your content. The retention rate in inbound marketing is more, as compared to outbound marketing as only the concerned ones take the effort of filling up a subscription form.

Inbound v/s Pay-per-click

Pay per Click is the concept available on many internet marketing platforms like Google, Yahoo, Bing, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc. where you market your advertisements on these platforms and pay for every click that your prospective clients (viewers) make on these ads. It offers an immediate ROI in comparison to inbound strategy.

But it is equivalent to renting space on someone else’s website, with which you are already competing on the digital platform. As a result, it doesn't lead to a long-term effect on the customers, whereas inbound marketing compels the potential customer to reach your website and build long-term relations. Therefore, Inbound is a more practical approach to implement.

To summarise, instead of outbound marketing methods of purchasing ads, buying email list or hunting down the leads, inbound marketing focuses on creating quality content. By publishing useful and accurate content and optimizing it according to your target persona, the potential customer reaches automatically to the website. So, therefore, the output of that content becomes educational and relevant instead of being interruptive.

Inbound Marketing can be an analysed source which can grow its trend in the future. Many companies still believe that traditional or outbound marketing maintains better leads for the sales. One can use both the marketing techniques creatively to improve the overall chance of landing leads with a higher potential.

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TED talks are the short stories from some of the most influential and an engaging speakers around the world. They’re full of insights on the endless range of topics from human nature to scientific breakthroughs to trends in designs. They’re inspirational and informative which can help you to become a better person in your personal and professional life.

TED hosts engaging and charismatic speakers who talk about their personal experiences and new ideas which are relevant to international audience. TED has hosted some of the most known personalities from around the world like Bono, J.J. Abrams, Bill Gates, Jane Goodall, Larry Page and Stephen Hawking.

If you’re a CMO or MD, or aspire to be one, it’s important to schedule time for activities that can help you to learn new things and increase your profile value. For the aspiring entrepreneurs, TED talks can help them in challenging assumptions and push the envelope so as to expand the thinking capabilities. Such motivation is perfect when you feel low on inspiration and are in need of some of encouragement.

Here are Some of the Best TED Talks

#1. Shawn Achor: The Happy Secret to Better Work

Shawn Achor is a funny guy who is loud, fast talking and a great storyteller to boot. The overall talk is about reorganising people’s idea of successful lives and happiness. In this video, he suggests people to use positive psychology by not only studying the positive outliers but by using those outliers to raise the entire positivity. He further suggests that by paying more attention to the good things around us we will be happy and therefore people will become more efficient and successful.

#2. Simon Sinek: How Great Leaders Inspires Action

Simon Sinek is the author of the book ‘Start with why: How great leaders inspire everyone to take action’. He has a powerful model for inspirational leadership which starts with the famous ‘golden circle of motivation’. In the video he discusses the idea of leadership and how some leaders are better at inspiring than others. He points out the various success examples of the leaders in the world of business in this video.

#3. Derek Sivers: How to Start a Movement

Derek Sivers became an entrepreneur by accident in 1998 where he started selling CDs on his website ‘cdbaby.com’. In his TED Talk, he explains that if a leader doesn’t believe in his idea then his followers will also not be able to trust it .If you really want to start a movement and bring a change, then you need to have the courage to follow that believe and lead others to it. “It’s the first follower that transforms the lone nut into a leader,” he says. Using the recording of a half-naked dancing man at the music festival, he emphasises that his easy-to-follow steps to begin a movement can be used in any situation.

#4. Amy Lockwood: Selling Condoms in the Congo

Amy Lockwood is a former ‘reformed marketer’ who now works in international development. She talks about how Congo is facing the problem of HIV where marketing about condoms was not effective in that area. There are 930,000 people infected with it, and even though the donor agencies provide condoms at lower rates, only 3% of adults actually use it. Her objective of speech was about the marketing fail of the donor agencies. It’s a useful message for marketers everywhere.

“If what we’re really trying to do is stop the spread of HIV, we need to think about the customer, the people whose behaviour needs to change . . . and whose lives depend on it,” she advised.

#5. Steven Johnson: Where Good Ideas Come From

Steven argues with the theme of how entrepreneurs credit their ideas to individual ‘eureka’ moments. According to him, a person cannot be a lone scientist, sitting alone and can brainstorm an idea. Instead, he believes that there should be an environment where a number of people can interact, discuss and improve each other’s idea.

#6. Stefan Sagmeister: The Power of Downtime

According to him, an average person spends 25 years of his life on learning, next 40 years of his life in working and then begins the retired life. He suggests pushing out the retirement age by five years and using them as a sabbatical in between the working years. This sabbatical helps us to get a better understanding in life so that we don’t have to wait till the retirement to do what we love. In every seven years, he closes up his shop goes on a sabbatical to rejuvenate himself so that he could be more fresh and productive after the sabbatical.

#7. Renny Gleeson: 404, the Story of a Page Not Found

No one likes to fall across a 404 error on the web. It makes us feel like you’ve felt through the cracks. In the video, Gleeson talks about how to utilize the opportunity that this page gives. His speech has created a feeling of positivity from a very negative page. His expressive words focus on how we can turn every situation into an opportunity. He says that “little things, done right, matter (and) well designed moments build brands.”

#8. Susan Cain: The Power of Introverts

Cain is the author of ‘Quiet: The power of introverts in a world that won’t stop talking.’ In her talk, she argues that how in the culture of socialising and extrovertism, the society undervalues an introvert. According to her, introverts bring extraordinary talents to the world which should be encouraged and celebrated. Her TED Talk is still one of the most viewed TED talks of all the time.

#9. Gary Vaynerchuk: Building Personal Brand within the Social Media Landscape

The method Vaynerchuk uses to convince is inspiring to watch. He says that to be truly successful; you’ll have to love what you’re doing. You’ll never be satisfied if you work in an industry that you don’t care about or do the work that you actually don’t enjoy.

#10. Amy Cuddy: Empowering Through Body Language

Cuddy shares a powerful message of boosting your confidence. She believes that the change in our bodies can change our behaviour which could affect confidence right before an important presentation, interview or meetings.

According to Cuddy’s research, the act of faking body postures actually changes our hormone level. Through her empowering words, she concentrates on ‘power pose’ that makes you appear physically bigger – boosts up the confidence and can affect the testosterones which might impact our chances for success.

#11. Linda Hill: How to Manage for Collective Creativity

This is the perfect TED talk if you’re trying to maximise the creative potential and productivity of your team. She comes up with a simple set of tools and strategies in her TED talk, which any entrepreneur can use to come up with great new ideas from their entire team and motivating the employees to move forward. Hill explains in her best way that how creative thinking and abstract problem-solving are one of the most important features of any company and can be incorporated into their culture.

#12. Navi Radjou: Creative Problem-Solving in the Face of Extreme Limits

Navi Radjou’s examples in his talk are directly applied to the third-world countries that have only limited resources. He encourages the entrepreneurs to work with limited capital, resource and time. It might seem difficult and challenging in the beginning, but would drive a great degree of innovation.

If you haven’t seen these TED Talks, add these to your list right now. The insights and inspiration you get from such talks will help most likely help you yo open to new ideas and experiences.

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With most companies shifting their marketing attention from traditional media to social media, the importance of good marketing tactics has constantly been increasing. Getting the right marketing tactics is very important, or else the strategy is ineffective.

There are a lot of methods that people have used from time to time-related to social media marketing, but not all of them are effective. Here is a list of 10 marketing tactics that have been tried-and-tested as effective marketing methods.

10 Effective Social Media Tactics for SMBs

#1. Post Frequently

Frequently posting on various social media mediums is important, as this helps maintain a connection between your brand and its customers. With an active social media account, people will stay updated about your brand, its products, and all information relevant to your brand. Also, regularly posting content improves page engagement and redirection of traffic to the company website. Social media users are constantly engaging with your content on a regular basis, facilitating brand recall.

#2. Have Good Content

Good engaging content is key for a good social media marketing strategy. If people do not find your content good or appealing, they will not share that content or remember it, which affects both brand awareness and brand recall. For a successful campaign where content leads people to the website, it is important to have engaging content that your target audience would relate to. You also have to factor in the timing and frequency of posts, or else people will block your content from their feeds.

#3. Run Collaborations and Giveaways

Running collaborations with big social media influencers and other brands help in widening your reach. This brings more post engagement and website traffic. The number of leads increases, which helps with sales. With new people seeing your content and interacting, brand awareness also increases. Also, with campaigns like giveaways, the brand engagement increases by a lot, making more people follow the posts and experience the content. This, in turn, will also make people engage with the company, and become potential leads.

#4. Keep it Organic

Don’t indulge in too many paid or in-the-face ads. People only like to see the content that they want to see, not what you want them to see. Don’t try selling them your products directly. Instead, involve them in discussions or interaction on topics relevant to your company. Discussions are the best way to ensure brand engagement on social media. Such discussions also help maintain brand recall and brand loyalty, as everyone loves a healthy discussion.

#5. Be Prompt

Always be prompt in your interactions with your audience. People like to feel involved and have the knowledge that their grievances are being heard. They feel a sense of belonging with the brand and that builds a sense of brand trust and loyalty with the customer. This also helps in making existing customers come back for repurchase as a part of this loyalty. Building a community of the interested and existing customers and keeping them in a loyalty program makes them happy with your brand and more likely to get more customers for your brand in the future. Giving this loyalty group added benefits from time to time works as an icing on the cake for customer satisfaction.

#6. Use Analytics

Using social media analytics, you can monitor and understand what communications or posts were successful in grabbing attention, and which ones didn’t succeed. Using this data, you can create better social media campaigns, which will have greater reach and engagement. It also helps you understand your ideal customer persona - what they like, what they dislike, what drives their interest and what subgroup of people they belong to. This helps answer questions like, ‘What age group is my audience majorly from?’ or ‘which region does my brand enjoy maximum popularity in?’ This information helps you create targeted content, which will help boost activity and engagement of the company via the posts on social media.

#7. Monitor Mentions

Monitor any mention of your brand, whether in a good sense or bad. Be appreciative towards people who like your products or content. It gives a sense of loyalty for the customers. Never ignore negative mentions. Always respond to them in an effort to solve people’s grievances. Seeing this responsiveness to grievances builds trust towards the brand, which helps in widening the customer base and improves brand recognition.

#8. Tell People about your Team

From time to time, share team pics and tell them more about your team. This brings in a sense of freshness and keeps things informal. People feel more engaged when they know who they interact with or talk to. This helps humanize the experience that people have engaging with your company.

#9. Use Social Media Influencers

Social media influencers are people with big fan followings on – you guessed it – various social media sites. They have huge pre-built networks, and when they share any content, the reach of these posts are widespread in nature. Collaborating with such influencers to promote your content means that a new, huge community is being reached with your content. This is a huge bonus for any company. Many such influencers readily promote brand content for publicity and collaborations. Contact with such influencers on social media can prove to be a huge asset for content promotion.

#10. Online Contests

Hosting online contests is a great way to ensure audience participation. Getting people to create and share photos or videos with brand-specific hashtags is one way to crowd source content for brand promotion. It is also a great way to get people engaged with your brand for a prize, which could be a product of your company. People readily take part in contests in hope of winning the prize. This also helps spread brand awareness and liking, which gets people talking about your brand.

Using these tactics in the right way ensures improvement in brand awareness, engagement, liking, and trust. It helps generate leads for sales and also help retain existing customers, making them promoters of your brand.

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