A KICK-ASS GUIDE TO CREATING THE ULTIMATE€¦ · A ick-Ass Guide to Creating the Ultimate Inbound...

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A KICK-ASS GUIDE TO CREATING THE ULTIMATE INBOUND MARKETING STRATEGY EDITION 1

Transcript of A KICK-ASS GUIDE TO CREATING THE ULTIMATE€¦ · A ick-Ass Guide to Creating the Ultimate Inbound...

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A KICK-ASS GUIDE TO CREATING THE ULTIMATE

INBOUND MARKETING STRATEGY

EDITION 1

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

BRANDIGNITY.COM

E-BOOK

CHAPTER 1 WEBSITE & BRANDING PAGES 3 -4123456789

10

CHAPTER 2 ONSITE SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION PAGES 5 -7

CHAPTER 3 OFFSITE SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION PAGES 8 -9

CHAPTER 4 LOCAL SEO & ADVERTISING PAGES 10 -12

CHAPTER 5 SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING PAGES 13 -15

CHAPTER 6 PAY PER CLICK ADVERTISING PAGES 16 - 18

CHAPTER 7 REPUTATION MANAGEMENT PAGES 19 -20

CHAPTER 8 EMAIL MARKETING PAGES 21 -22

CHAPTER 9 CONTENT MARKETING PAGES 23 -24

CHAPTER 10 MOBILE MARKETING PAGES 25 -26

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WEBSITE DESIGN & BRANDING

CHAPTER 1

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“NOT HAVING PROPER WEBSITE

DESIGN CAN BE THE MAKE

OR BREAK OF YOUR ONLINE

SUCCESS.”

Your website is the primary way people will get interested in your brand. You can be funny or formal, interactive or informative, but there are certain essen-tials you need to have in a good website.

Follow the tips below to make sure your site is as well-designed as possible.

Up-to-Date Design

What do you think of when you see a website with nothing but plain text or a site that has a lot of animated GIFs? You probably think that the designer hasn’t entered the 21st century yet, and thus take the brand as a whole a lot less seriously. Keep these prin-ciples in mind:

Don’t turn your customers off by having an outdated website. That means no excessive use of animated GIFs or other poor graphical choices.

• Keep things clean and easy to read. Check color and font size.

• Use navigation bars to allow mobile users easy access to your site.

• Make your site as clean, modern, and responsive as possible.

Good, Solid Branding

From Amazon.com to Microsoft to McDonald’s, the most successful companies have consistent branding throughout the site. You should make sure your logo is prominent on each page within your site. Ideally, displaying the logo in a header or on a navigation bar is the best way to go. Keep your color themes and visuals consistent with your logo in order to create brand synergy. Everything about your website should scream your brand’s name. Including all external marketing.

Conversion Aspects

Once somebody has visited your website, how do you keep in contact with them? Your homepage should include at least one way to convert aone-time visitor into a regular customer. One potential conversion aspect to explore is a lead form, which is a way that people can use your

services in exchange for their name, address, and other important contact info. Putting up an option to join an email list is another great choice, since it helps your customers by letting them know when you have new updates while also making sure that you have a broader reach with your promotions.

Separate Services Sections

Your homepage shouldn’t be very text-heavy. If you have a number of different services to offer, you should make sure that each service has its own separate page. This will not only help avoid information over-load from customers visiting your site, but it will also improve your overall traffic. Search engines like Google will rank you higher if you have a number of useful, informative sections rather than just clumping every-thing together on one page.

Keep Code Clean

While the coding behind a website isn’t something the average customer sees, it can influence your search engine standings. Keeping your coding clear and easy to understand is great in case you have a change in staff and somebody else takes over the website. Gar-bled code or sites with a lot of junk code that doesn’t appear on the site often get flagged as potential spam pages in Google and other major search engines. The clearer and more concise you are, the better. This goes for text your customers can see as well as code which they can’t see.

These are the basic guidelines you should follow when developing or editing your brand’s website. These tips will ensure a better search ranking, more traffic, and a better conversion rate.

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ONSITE SEARCH ENGINEOPTIMIZATION (SEO)

CHAPTER 2

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Search engine optimization, or SEO for short, has changed a lot in recent years but remains an important part of marketing your brand online. If you hope to rank high on the major search engines, you need to tune up your site’s SEO using the following guidelines.

Keyword Research

The most important part of SEO is knowing what keywords to use. Your keywords should be something that is relevant to the content you are posting and that people are likely to type in a search for. Keywords don’t have to be limited to just one word, either – a two- or three-word phrase can work just as well if it is a common search term. Many search engines provide statistics as to which keywords are most popular. Among those, the most commonly used tool is Google’s Keyword Planner, which is focused specifically on the world’s most popular search engine.

Inserting Metadata

When people find a search result leading to your page, the default description will usually be a random selection of text pulled from your website. It’s important to make these custom.

You can get better control of the way your site appears to interested searchers by using a custom written metadata (or meta tag) description. This is a simple HTML tag that you put in as part of the header on any given page. By making the metadata description concise, accurate, and engaging, you will attract more casual searchers to your website. It also helps with SEO if you use keyword rich descriptions but don’t abuse it. Write for humans first, search engines second.

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“ONSITE SEO IS THE

FOUNDATION TO EVERYTHING

YOU DO MOVING FORWARD.”

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Structuring your URLs

Your site’s URL addresses don’t matter to anybody but the computers, right? Wrong. While search engines and bookmarks are the most common way that people access a website, many people still use URLs to navigate. Keeping your URLs short and easy to remember will help users find specific sections of your site easily. Search engines also tend to rank sites without a lot of subdirectories in the URLs higher. When you have multiple words in your URL subheading, make sure to separate them by hyphens instead of underscores, as some search engines filter out underscore-heavy URLs and give them a lower ranking.

Generate Good Content

While there are all sorts of SEO tricks you can use to boost your search rankings, absolutely nothing beats high-quality content. You should make sure that everything you produce on your site is relevant to your brand, engaging to the user, and updated regularly. Avoid redundancy whenever possible and listen to feedback carefully. New search algorithms have been ruthless about dropping rankings for low-content sites, so putting up the best quality possible is the best way to survive in the modern SEO environment.

Optimize your Images

The average user waits a grand total of three seconds for a website to load. If the site hasn’t fully loaded in those three seconds, the user gives up and goes elsewhere. Optimize your site through these notions:

• Reduce the file size of any images you post to your site to speed up loading times.

• Give your images a descriptive name and include an alt-text tag, as search engines look for both these items during image searches.

• Name your file in a clear and distinct manner

so the image can be found in search engines.

Generate a Sitemap

A sitemap is a piece of HTML or XML code that gives search engines a full layout of your website. Generating a sitemap gives search engines a way of determining the key focus of your website and including it in related searches, even if those searches don’t use your preferred keywords. XML is the most common sitemap format, although both work quite well. HTML, however, is probably best used for text-heavy sites only rather than Flash or media-heavy websites.

Your onsite SEO determines the way in which you present yourself to the rest of the world. Think of it as a job interview for your website – the better the presentation, the more likely people are to take your website seriously.

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OFFSITE SEARCH ENGINEOPTIMIZATION (SEO)

CHAPTER 3

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“YOUR LINKS TELL A LOT

ABOUT YOUR AUTHORITY.

THE BETTER THE LINKS THE

BETTER YOUR SEO.”

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Your web traffic isn’t determined by what’s on your site alone. You should also be aware of how your website interacts with other similar sites. This is called external SEO and it is an area of focus for Google and other search engine leaders. The better you manage your external SEO, the more successful your site will be.

Safe Linking

Have you ever fallen in with a bad crowd? Just being around certain people marks you as a potential troublemaker. On the Internet, search en-gines view your site by the “crowd” it is in, which in this case is determined by links to and from the website. Avoid creating link directories, as these often get marked as spam. Also make sure not to link to low-content sites. If such sites link to your website, do what you can to get those links removed. The links to and from your website are often seen as a direct repre-sentation of the type of content you have on the site.

Business and Niche Profiles

The Yellow Pages is a thing of the past for most busi-nesses, but there are still lots of directories you can take advantage of in order to promote your brand. The size of your industry and your target customer base should determine whether you go for a national directory, which has more listings and a broader reach, or regional directories, which has fewer listings and a more targeted audience. If you have the resources and the desire, you can also target both national and regional directories to get the best of both worlds.

Content Marketing Techniques

Content marketing can be used for external SEO in addition to onsite SEO. Connect with other similar sites and brands that will cooperate with you and set up a content sharing program. This can include the follow-ing:

• Adding the occasional guest blogger or expert from another website.

• Issue targeted PR releases at sites that have the audience you want to reach.

• Use eBooks and white paper to prove users with content they can take from your site and can share as they see fit.

Video Marketing

Using sites such as YouTube, DailyMotion, or Vimeo to host ads or video content about your brand can help you reach a whole new audience. You can also get a leg up on the competition with shorter videos through services like Vine. Make sure you use strong content in the description of these videos and include keywords if applicable. You should see a video description as a sort of mini-site that tells people about your brand.

Building External Relationships

In almost all industries, it’s not what you know but rath-er who you know. You should make sure to touch base with bloggers and journalists connected to your indus-try so you can build a positive relationship with them. You should also make sure you generate excellent word of mouth through strong social media offerings and a comprehensive link profile. The more people know about you, the more they will trust you.

By managing your external SEO as thoroughly as you handle your onsite SEO, you will have a remarkable advantage over your competition. SEO is all about how you present yourself, and following these tips will place your brand in the best possible light.

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LOCAL SEO & ADVERTISING

CHAPTER 4

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“YOU CAN

BUILD NEW

FOOT TRAFFIC

TO YOUR

BUSINESS BY

BEING EXTRA

VISIBLE

ONLINE.”

Do you have a physical storefront or the type of business where local customers are extremely important? If so, you need to focus at least some of your web marketing on local SEO to make sure you bring them in. Some suggestions on how to go about this include the following.

Google, Bing, and Yahoo!

The three biggest search engines on the web – Google, Bing, and Yahoo! – all have local business directories you can tap into. Additionally, new search algorithms are placing more emphasis on

location so people in Boston, for example, can find plastic surgeon services in their area even if they just type “chiropractor” into the search field. Google Maps allow you to go even further, providing specific directions to your business and even a street view that allows people to immediately recognize your storefront, even if they’ve never been there.

*Encourage your audience to leave positive reviews on your Google local listing. It helps with rankings.

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“YOUR LINKS TELL A LOT ABOUT

YOUR AUTHORITY. THE BETTER

THE LINKS THE BETTER YOUR

SEO.”

Foursquare

Foursquare is an app for mobile devices that can help you drive foot traffic to your location. Users of this app check in at certain participating businesses and receive a number of points,badges, or another reward. They can then travel to the next location in their area. If you join Foursquare, you are increasing the odds that somebody will step into your storefront, even if only briefly.

Groupon

If you have coupons or deals you can offer as a promotion, Groupon is a great option for you. The biggest benefit to this system is that if too few people sign up for the offer, nobody gets it. That means you can determine what level of discount is profitable for you but still have protection if it doesn’t reach the right number of people. There is no upfront participation cost, so you can easily take advantage of this opportunity if it makes sense for your business.

Online Coupons

If you prefer a more traditional coupon strategy, there are still a number of online venues that can work for you. You can place special discounts up on sites like Coupons.com or CouponClipper.com, both of which have a Local Offers section. You can also look outside traditional coupon sites, offering online coupons through local news sites or even on such venues as Craigslist.org

Google AdWords

One of the most popular ways of marketing a brand these days is Google AdWords. These ads appear right alongside search results and can be embedded into certain content. The two big advantages that AdWords has over similar services are the robust analytics options and the high level of customization. Through simple IP exclusion and placement targeting, you can make sure your ads get focused on a local area without paying a high cost.

Implementing a Strategy

Some of the options listed above require more than an automatic signup. You will get more out of Foursquare,

for example, if you have a strategy in place before you sign up. This may mean allying with other local businesses to make sure that there is a clear path that leads Foursquare users to your front door. You should also implement a content strategy along with any of these moves, emphasizing information that will attract a local audience and calling out your deals wherever possible.

Even if you have an online store or rely on clientele from around the world, having a strong local base is good for most businesses. When you establish that, it makes everything else in marketing much easier.

Local SEO & Keywords

You can’t rank a website if you don’t have keywords on your website. We’re not talking about just jamming them in here and there but rather strategic placement of targeted keywords in page meta data, content, image alt tags and other areas. You want to make sure you are using your geographical location in your title tags and meta tag descriptions. Include your business address in your footer and your contact us page because it gives Google more meat to bite into. Just having a website is not enough. You need to implement various on page and off page SEO to get your local business ranking correctly.

*Remember, Google is a reader so if it can read it, it can’t rank it.

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SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING

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CHAPTER 5

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Social media isn’t the wave of the future – it’s the wave of the present. Even now, you probably have multiple ways to access at least one social media network, be it through your computer, phone, or tablet. Social media is also a powerful marketing tool, especially if you follow this advice.

Share Content Frequently

Any major updates to your website, such as a section redesign, new feature, or new blog entry, should be added to your social media channels. Some of the most clickable social media posts include:

• How-to guides• Press releases• General interest blog topics• Company information• Like minded content

Make sure that you not only include something to entice people to click on your link but also include an image of some sort, since the image will draw more attention than plain text will.

Important Social Platforms

There are a lot of social platforms out there. Here are some of the more important ones you should focus on.

Facebook - This one is pretty obvious. I don’t care if you “don’t like Facebook”. You need to be there if nowhere else.

Twitter - Sure it might seem silly but it’s an important place for website traffic. Follow like minded accounts and retweet often. Eventually you will see traction.

LinkedIn - A massive platform you should be active on. It’s about letting your peers see that you are serious.

Pinterest - Not just for recipes anymore.

Google+ - When Google has a social platform you should use it.

Make Frequent Status Updates

New content isn’t the only thing you need to share on your social media channels. You should also make frequent status updates on all your networks. These updates could include something about your brand

or they could be general interest topics that tap into whatever is trending at the time. The idea behind a status update is to show the personality behind the business so customers can form a personal connection with you.

Engage Followers

Follower engagement is one aspect of social media that a lot of businesses drop the ball on. Creating contests and quizzes, regardless of the prize offered, is a great way to generate interest in your brand. Using Instagram and other photo-sharing services for a contest is also helpful in this regard, as you can get some very artistic and interesting uses of your brand that go out to thousands of different potential customers.

Here are some ideas for engaging followers:

1. Caption contest2. Ask questions3. Put out a survey4. Post controversial content

“SOCIAL MEDIA IS ALL ABOUT SHARING AND ENGAGING. GET YOUR AUDIENCE TO

RECIPROCATE AN ACTION.”

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Social Advertising

Never underestimate the power of ads on social media sites. You can take out advertising space on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other sites in a targeted way that gives you control over what age groups, regions, and other key demographics see the ad. This is a great way to generate more followers, which in turn increases your brand’s overall reach. Every new follower has several dozen friends who are also potential new customers.

Remarketing

Some visitors might show interest in a social media post but not visit your site. Maybe they’re multitasking or maybe they want to check it out later. Remarketing makes sure that these potential customers get a gentle reminder through the form of another ad in the future. AdRoll is the most popular remarketing site out there, but there are numerous alternatives as well. This is a good non-intrusive way of making sure that potentially interested parties remain aware of your brand in the future.

Social media is a goldmine for a clever advertiser. Many companies these days even employ individuals whose main purpose is to maintain various social media networks and keep people engaged. While you don’t have to go that far, following these tips

will give you the chance to turn your social media pages into major hubs of activity and get many new customers in the process.

A few additional resources:

• http://www.brandignity.com/2014/01/a-guide-in-optimizing-your-social-media-accounts-to-get-traffic/

• http://www.brandignity.com/2014/01/3-tips-on-how-to-monetize-your-social-media-following/

“SOCIAL MEDIA IS ALL ABOUT SHARING AND ENGAGING. GET YOUR AUDIENCE TO

RECIPROCATE AN ACTION.”

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PAY PER CLICK ADVERTISING

CHAPTER 6

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“PAY PER

CLICK

ADVERTISING

CAN GIVE

YOU INSTANT

VISIBILITY

RIGHT NEXT

TO THE

BIGGEST

PLAYERS

IN YOUR

INDUSTRY.”

One of the oldest forms on online advertising, Pay Per Click or PPC for short offers a simple cost-to-effect ratio where a user displaying your ad is paid a small amount each time a visitor clicks on the ad. One of the biggest benefits of PPC ads is that it allows you to recruit website owners and many other independent parties to do your advertising for you. No matter how widespread your ad becomes, you only pay when it successfully draws people to click on it.

Google AdWords and Bing Ads

When you enter any search term, you are almost certain to see some ads on the screen before you see the results. On Google and Bing, these ads show up either at the top of the page or to the right of the search results. Both of these search engine giants use an ad system that allows you to customize your audience and tailor your own specific meta description. Make sure you use all

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“PAY PER CLICK ADVERTISING

CAN GIVE YOU INSTANT

VISIBILITY RIGHT NEXT TO THE

BIGGEST PLAYERS IN YOUR

INDUSTRY.”

the SEO principles discussed earlier when designing these ads in order to get the most benefit out of them.

Social Media PPC

Most of the major social media networks, including Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn offer PPC advertising that you can take advantage of. This approach works best if you want to target the Generation Y group that grew up in the 1980s, as they are the primary users of these sites. Social media PPC allows you to combine words and images in an attractive package and can be modified so that only specific users or groups of users are able to access the ad.

Landing Page Optimization

Once you have traffic starting to trickle in thanks to PPC ads, you should examine the landing page that people are reaching and make sure it is properly optimized to maximize your conversion rate. This involves making sure that you have a lot of related content and sales connected to the selling point that brought the customer to your page in the first place. For example, if you sell digital cameras, make sure you also have accessories available from your landing page so customers who have already bought a camera can still outfit their purchase with something you are selling.

Ad Copywriting

Good copywriting needs to be present in any PPC ad. Ad copywriting should take advantage of your brand’s specific strengths, but also of your competition’s weaknesses. You shouldn’t refer to a competitor by brand name, but if the brand is popular enough you can easily bring up flaws that others have experienced and then emphasize how your product addresses them. PPC is just like any other advertising – good copywriting and effective content is extremely important.

In the end, PPC is something you should approach like any other sort of marketing, but you should make sure to recognize the specific perks of PPC. You can customize these ads in ways that you can’t customize others, and the ability to specifically target search engines and social media networks gives you the ability to target key demographics with ease.

A few additional resources:

• http://www.brandignity.com/2014/01/a-guide-in-optimizing-your-social-media-accounts-to-get-traffic/

• http://www.brandignity.com/2013/12/3-ways-to-find-new-keywords-and-expand-your-adwords-presence/

• http://www.brandignity.com/2013/11/how-to-get-creative-with-your-ppc-campaigns/

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REPUTATION MANAGEMENT

CHAPTER 7

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“CREATE A BUFFER BETWEEN

YOU AND ANY NEGATIVE

MATERIAL THAT MIGHT REAR ITS

UGLY HEAD.”

The classic song goes, “I don’t care about my bad reputation,” but that doesn’t apply to businesses at all. Your brand is built on your reputation. Negative press or bad word of mouth can destroy you even before you properly establish your business. The problem with bad press is that almost everybody who is moderately successful receives it at some point. When your reputation is on the line, what do you do to defend your brand

The Proactive Approach

One option when it comes to reputation management is to be proactive and make sure you stop bad press before it even starts. This requires a lot of effort in terms of identifying potential sources that could harm your reputation and squashing them before they start. You might need to make alterations within your own company in order to respond to issues brought up before they reach wide circulation. Alternately, you can have your PR team focus on keeping your brand in a positive light, emphasizing ways it helps others and any philanthropy your company might do. You shouldn’t go on the attack and tear down other brands too much, as this may lead people to perceive you as a bully.

The Reactive Approach

For those companies that have less time or resources to invest in proactive PR, the reactive approach can often work as long as you stay vigilant. If you are going to be reactive, you need to make sure you are wired into the news as much as possible. Follow every newsfeed that might connect to you so you know exactly what others are saying about your company. When a PR disaster does rear its ugly head, its time to go into overdrive and make sure the problem is addressed as quickly and effectively as possible. The reactive approach is easier on company resources but still requires a team of people who are very skilled when it comes to communication so they can put metaphorical fires out fast.

Using Active Content

Whether you choose to be proactive or reactive about your reputation management, your greatest tool is making sure you have lots of high-quality active content that promotes a positive image of your company. Some active content you can includes:

• Let your customers get to know your employees as people. Doing so gains you valuable empathy and allows you to get the benefit of the doubt from your customers when something bad happens.

• Generate active reputation content through press releases that highlight the ways you are helping your community and providing valuable services to the public.

• Include employee profiles with pictures to show your customers what kind of people work there.

The key to reputation management is to combat it with preparation and content. The more you reinforce the notion that you are a valuable asset to your community and the more you emphasize the personalities of your employees, the better a chance you will have of people giving you a moment to explain any lapses or problems that might come up.

Additional resource:

• http://www.brandignity.com/internet-marketing-services/online-brand-reputation-management

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EMAIL MARKETING

CHAPTER 8

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“AN OLDIE BUT A GOODIE.

EMAIL IS STILL ONE OF THE

MOST POWERFUL FORMS

OF MARKETING WHEN DONE

RIGHT.”

What is the most effective form of online marketing in the world? You might say SEO or social media, but while those are important, email marketing has been the best way to get conversions for years. Not only is email marketing effective, but its dominance in terms of conversions is unlikely to change in the next few years. Because of this, you need to make sure to have a strong email marketing strategy. The tips below will help you get started.

Gathering Email Contacts

Nobody likes to get unsolicited emails, so you will need to make sure that you build your email list from a group of people that specifically want to hear from you. The best way to accomplish this is to have a signup section for your email lists. This can be as simple as a box on your landing page that allows interested parties to put in their email addresses. Of course, it doesn’t hurt to provide incentives to get people to sign up. Offering coupons, special deals, and other incentives is a good way of making sure that people seriously consider signing up for your emails. Let customers know what sort of benefits your emails offer and you will be very surprised at the positive response you receive.

What to Include in your Emails

Once you’ve built your email list, what do you offer? In addition to coupons, company news, and the occasional employee profile, you can repurpose certain parts of your website to make sure your employees get the featured content you want everybody to see. This can include blog entries or even top stories that can be found on your homepage.

Yes, this might mean that your customers will be less inclined to check certain parts of your website if they can expect all the relevant content on a regular basis, but you should remember the conversion power of an email list. If you provide relevant links alongside your content, your customers are likely to click and return to your website.

Promote your Content via Email

As a way to provide additional incentive for people to sign up for your email list, you should provide special content to those who have joined the group. This can include previews of upcoming

information on your website, which gives your most dedicated customers a sort of sneak preview. It can also include special content that people who aren’t on the list can’t access. If you make this content multimedia, such as an exclusive video or podcast, it becomes even more desirable. This is a good way of turning your email list into something exclusive that people always want to become a part of.

Your email marketing can take many different forms. No matter how you use the list, however, it always represents one of the best ways to turn casual readers of your website into regular visitors and then into customers. Even in a world of social media and mobile-friendly websites, email still makes the world go ‘round and is an extremely valuable marketing tool.

A few additional resources:

• http://www.brandignity.com/2014/01/8-email-marketing-resolutions-for-2014/

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CONTENT MARKETING

CHAPTER 9

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“CONTENT MARKETING

HAS PROVEN TO BE ONE

OF THE MOST IMPORTANT

INGREDIENTS IN ONLINE

MARKETING.”

It is well established that content is king, especially with modern search algorithms such as Google Hummingbird. But how do you go about creating good, consistent content? Follow the advice below and you will surprise yourself.

Blog Writing

Blogs are incredibly popular in this day and age because they land in that sweet spot between informative content and personal interest. If you don’t currently have a blog section on your site, you definitely need to add one right away. Ideally, you should update your blog on a weekly basis at least – preferably more. Once you have the blog set up, consider bringing in the occasional guest blogger for cross-promotion purposes and to provide something new and interesting for readers.

Press Releases

Press releases are a good way of keeping your readers up to date on the latest development within your business, but they don’t have to be limited to your website alone. When you develop press releases, make sure you distribute them to industry news sites so you can maximize your exposure to readers. Press releases are usually best when kept short and concise, with a maximum length usually not exceeding 1,000 words unless you have some extremely big news to share.

Articles

The meat of most websites is the article content you provide. Your articles can cover a variety of different topics as long as they remain relevant to your brand. The ideal word count for these articles is usually between 300 and 800 words, which allows them to be informative without going on too long. You should also make sure your articles remain as timeless as possible, since they will be on your site for the long term.

Videos and Images

We live in a visual society. People don’t mind doing some reading, but they tend get much more engaged when they have something to look at. Videos are a good way of managing this, especially considering that major streaming sites like YouTube

and Vimeo are constantly upgrading their terms of use to make life easier for content producers. If you want something visual without getting on film, an infographic might be the way to go. Infographics combine visuals with dense information, giving you a great chance to educate and inform. They are also easy to share and can often go viral if you make them visually appealing enough.

Downloadable Publications

Some content works best when people can download it and take it with them on an e-reader or smartphone. eBooks and white papers are both good ways to provide quality content that can be shared and distributed in a number of ways.

• eBooks are essentially regular books but in electronic format. However, you should note that they can be as long or as short as you want – a 10-page eBook can have the same impact as a 300-page manual.

• White papers are usually how-to guides but sometimes contain other information. Both of these are usually downloadable and can be distributed off-site, so make sure your brand is prominently displayed so people know where they came from.

Everything currently done by every prominent search engine out there is geared toward making content marketing more important. If you can follow these suggestions and build up solid content now, you will be further and further ahead of the game. everybody else in the future.

A few additional resources:

• http://www.brandignity.com/2014/02/content-marketing-strategy/

• http://www.brandignity.com/2014/01/5-secrets-to-creating-really-responsive-content/

• http://www.brandignity.com/2013/11/5-inspiring-content-ideas-for-your-blog/

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MOBILE MARKETING

CHAPTER 10

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“MORE CUSTOMERS ARE

ACCESSING

INFO ON THE GO. DON’T

FORGET ABOUT

A MOBILE STRATEGY.”

.”

The percentage of users who access sales websites via smartphones or tablets exceeded 50% in 2013. This number is continuing to climb rapidly with no end in sight. Because of this, no marketing plan is complete unless it accounts for the mobile world. You can provide the same content to mobile users, but you need to make sure you customize the look of your website so it can easily be accessed from a phone or tablet.

Is your Site Mobile Friendly?

The first starting point in optimizing your website for the mobile web is as simple as seeing how it looks when viewed from mobile devices. Make sure you test your site on both tablets and smartphones so you can see what the different screen resolutions do to your website. If you have access to multiple devices, you should check your site on those. For example, although an iPhone and an Android Phone usually see a website in the same way, they sometimes differ. The more thoroughly you test your site, the more confident you can be that it looks great on any device. If you detect issues such as not all of the content showing up appropriately, make sure you make the necessary changes as soon as possible.

App Development

It’s very easy to develop apps for both the Apple iStore and Android platforms. If you can think of anything that can make your customers’ lives easier, you should work to develop that into a downloadable app. If you’re having trouble trying to figure out exactly what you should develop, you should consider looking at what others in your field are developing. Don’t steal those ideas, but do make sure you’re receptive as to what those innovations do and how you might be able to improve upon them. It’s usually best to offer new apps for free, but if your development costs run higher than you expect, you can consider putting a price tag on it that can help your budget while also being affordable.

Mobile Promotions

Mobile devices are rife with promotion possibilities. You can:

• Provide downloadable coupons which provide a discount either on your website or in a brick and mortar store.

• Host “hot spot” events where people who gather at a certain point get to download a special prize or discount associated with your brand.

• Offer content that only activates if it is shared successfully with a certain number of people.

The biggest benefit to mobile promotions is that there is a lot of support from third parties, be it a major name like Foursquare or a smaller independent party. Find the promotion that fits your business best and go to it. The response you receive will almost certainly be impressive.

If your site isn’t mobile-ready, you are putting yourself at great risk of falling behind your competitors. If you’ve read any recent analytics reports, you’ve almost certainly noticed a steady increase in mobile traffic, so now is the time to make sure you are ready to meet the needs of those potential customers.

A few additional resources:

http://www.brandignity.com/2014/01/how-to-capture-offline-business-with-mobile-payment-options/

http://www.brandignity.com/2013/11/7-effective-easy-mobile-seo-tactics-for-better-result/

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CONTACT

Address

BrandignityPO Box 8036 Naples, FL 34101United States

Phone & Fax

Free Toll: 866-250-4541Direct: 617-959-3144Fax: Nope

Online

Email: [email protected]:www.brandignity.com

IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS REGARDING WHAT YOU READ OR YOU WOULD LIKE TO LEARN A BIT MORE ABOUT OUR SERVICES PLEASE DON’T HESITATE TO CONTACT US BELOW. THANKS AGAIN!

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