Facebook made $200 billion with Mobile Advertising

Facebook made $200 billion with Mobile Advertising

   September 10, 2014       prabhakardalvi

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Facebook logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

With special reports, Facebook market value increases with position 22^nd largest corporation. Mobile advertising boosts revenue of Facebook with all devices.

Founder of Facebook wealth has increased by $34.5 billion with stake & stock raised by 81% in last 12 months.

With mobile marketing, every product & services take speed booking, launching, delivered like snapdeals, flip-kart, jabong etc. In Advertising on Facebook charge minimum $10 but for, it’s questionable….

Facebook makes display ads, banner advertising with condition of your search in box or you have already seen pages on a different subject. Mostly small business giving first preferences to Ad-words for budget start from 500 to onward, but Facebook charge $10, LinkedIn as per region-target size etc.

LinkedIn is business network but Facebook it a personal chatting center, founder earn from shopping, business, promote a post.

Promote a post:

On a Facebook, when you post they ask you want promote this? With advertising power. It’s true!

Congrats Mark Zuckerberg 

Refer : DNA

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Important Ten Questions to Ask Your Digital Marketing Partner

Important Ten Questions to Ask Your Digital Marketing Partner

   July 16, 2014       prabhakardalvi

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The Top Ten Questions to Ask Your Digital Marketing Partner - Max Starkov & Mariana Mechoso Safer

It's challenging to find a good digital marketing partner these days. As more and more companies join the market as 'experts in hotel website design and digital marketing,' hoteliers are faced with a difficult decision. 

1. Do you consider yourself my property's digital marketing partner or vendor?

To achieve the highest long-term success rate, the hotelier-agency relationship must be based on trust and the client's best interests must be at the heart of everything the agency does. What does it mean to be a partner vs. a vendor?

Your digital marketing agency consistently offers proactive recommendations vs. simply "taking orders." Is your agency just an "order-taking" outfit or do they come up with consistent recommendations on how to tackle your occupancy, seasonal and other business needs? If you find yourself making all the effort to communicate with your agency first, you are working with a vendor.

Your digital marketing agency is an extension of your property's sales and marketing team. Are your agency's recommendations based on what's best for your property's business needs and what will generate the highest ROAS (Return-on-ad-spend)? Or are these recommendations based on how high a commission the agency receives? You'll need to do your research to find this out.

Your agency's company values are aligned with your values. If your partner has not identified any brand values, it has not clearly positioned itself in the marketplace. A team that stands behind its values strives to provide excellent customer service and produces better results for its clients. Aligned goals build authenticity and trust between a digital marketing agency and its clients.

2. Are you utilizing any proprietary digital marketing technology?

Digital marketing is becoming increasingly complex, especially compared to what it was just over 3-4 years ago. In this day and age, there is a complete convergence between digital marketing and digital technology. Crucial revenue-generating initiatives such as Meta Search Marketing, Dynamic Rate Marketing, and Content Management Systems equipped with personalized marketing capabilities are an equal part technology and marketing.

Today, you should choose a partner that has both digital technology and digital marketing capabilities under one roof to help you keep up with the rapid development and marketing opportunities available in the industry.

In this multi-device world we live in, hoteliers must meet the needs of their guests on each device. This means investing in technology that allows for the best user experience on the three screens: desktop, mobile and tablet, which many hoteliers find hard to do due to their website's antiquated Content Management System (CMS) technology.

Your digital marketing partner should be able to develop technology in-house that you can benefit from. Examples include a CMS with functionality developed specifically for the hospitality industry, interactive marketing applications, social media applications, dynamic rate marketing technology, and meta search marketing enablement technology.

3. What percentage of your total business is dedicated to providing digital marketing and web services?

A company that has too many 'core competencies' often finds itself not excelling in any of them. Giant global companies like Sony claim to have only two core competencies. Ask your marketing firm what percentage of their business is dedicated to digital marketing and web services. If you are working with a firm where these services constitute only a small part of their overall service offerings, you are taking a risk that your business will not be as important to them. There is also the chance that the team dedicated to your account, if you do have a dedicated team and not a general 'client services department contact email/phone number,' also has other responsibilities that can take them away from providing your account the attention it deserves.

4. What percentage of your clients are in the hospitality space?

The answer to this one should be close to 100% because of the uniqueness, complexity, and fast moving dynamics of the industry. Hoteliers need customized, expert advice that is specific to their needs.

This multi-billion hospitality industry is so large and dynamic that specialization in hospitality provides a unique and competitive advantage to mixed-industry and GDS-focused companies that are late and inexperienced to the online hospitality channel.

5. Do you offer full-service digital marketing?

Managing multiple vendor relationships is a job in itself. By partnering with an agency that offers full-service digital marketing, your team can stay efficient and focused. Does you agency offer the full spectrum of digital marketing initiatives such as website design and CMS technology to SEO, SEM, online media and retargeting, dynamic rate marketing, meta search marketing, social media, mobile marketing, and email marketing?

Additionally, the more vendors involved, the higher the chance for mistakes, campaigns that do not produce, and communication struggles.

For digital marketing campaigns to generate the highest ROIs possible, goals and teams need to be fully aligned. For instance, Paid Search and SEO go hand in hand. Google updates its search algorithm 500 times each year, and the Panda and Hummingbird updates directly affected how Google indexes and values the underlying website landing pages. With Google constantly updating its algorithm, paid search professionals must treat search dynamically. SEM should align with the site's SEO in order to maintain a high Quality Index. Managing your SEO strategy should include a business analysis, comp set analysis, keyword analysis, etc., and having another company manage paid search, which includes exactly the same business analysis, comp set analysis, and keyword analysis, translates to double the work and double the cost.

6. Is multi-channel marketing part of the overall strategy for each client?

In today's multi-device, multi-touch world, digital marketing must be handled in a multi-channel campaign fashion to reach consumers at every touch point. All three screens (desktop, mobile and tablet) must be integrated in the hotel's multi-channel marketing strategy. These campaigns utilize the right combination of online channels effectively (paid search, email marketing, SEO, online media, social media, etc.) to promote one campaign theme. This strategy is the most effective way to increase reach and boost revenues for a need period.

7. Do you offer Dynamic Rate Marketing?

Today's always-connected traveler demands instantaneous hotel information with real-time pricing and resents any type of price promotion that feels like bait and switch.

The latest digital technology and marketing innovation available to hoteliers, Dynamic Rate Marketing, enables marketing campaigns featuring the property's real-time availability and rates. DRM is a next-generation direct-response marketing category, which allows real-time hotel inventory availability and pricing to be inserted in various marketing initiatives: from meta search to banner advertising, paid search to email marketing.

Does your agency utilize the technology needed to support Dynamic Rate Marketing? Dynamic Rate Marketing offers a multitude of benefits for both the travel consumer and hotelier. By combining online advertising and marketing campaigns with real-time hotel inventory availability and pricing, hoteliers can satisfy travelers' demands for instant and truthful hotel pricing information, as well as respond in real time to changing market conditions and comp set behavior. The main benefit here is that advertised rates in ad campaigns (banners, meta search, email, etc.) change automatically when the hotel changes their rates in the PMS or CRS.

The results? DRM dramatically increases campaign effectiveness, boosts conversion rates, and increases direct online bookings

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8. What percentage of the work on my account is handled in-house?

In-house services translates to total control over the quality of the work as well as the ability to offer services at more competitive prices. If your partner is outsourcing any or most of the business, you may be charged a higher commission than you realize and you will not have direct communication with the people who are handling your account. More services done in-house means less room for error, more intelligence surrounding the status of your marketing initiatives, and quicker turnaround times.

9. How many people work at your firm?

A team of 60-70 people is the absolute minimum for a digital technology+marketing firm to be able to handle all of the complexities of today's digital world: from SEO and Paid Search, online media and retargeting, social media and mobile marketing, dynamic rate marketing and meta search, website design and CMS technologies, dynamic content personalization, and more. Smaller and "one-man-team" agencies simply cannot handle today's complexities and there is a high likelihood of outsourcing or not having the resources you need available to drive the online revenues your property is capable of producing.

10. Are your employees considered industry though leaders and experts?

The management and employees of many digital marketing agencies that offer their services to the industry have no hospitality experience. They don't understand the needs of the hotelier, do not speak their language, and are incapable of providing the consulting and strategy services needed to grow the direct online channel.

Are employees published authors on hot industry topics and best practices related to online distribution and marketing? Also, ask your agency if their principals and experts are frequent guest speakers at major hospitality and digital marketing industry events and conferences. A company that employs team members who are frequently asked to share their expertise at major industry events every year is a company made up of thought leaders. The wider the variety of subjects they are asked to speak about, the better.

A company that is passionate about what it does also wants to stay ahead of the curve, creating products and services that will benefit the marketplace and its clients. In the highly competitive hospitality industry, this is a must. Hotels that fail to work with innovative digital marketing partners run the risk of losing market share, operating inefficiently and running campaigns with decreasing ROIs.

Important Ten Questions to Ask Your Digital Marketing Partner

When choosing your digital marketing partner, look at the web as the most critical and fastest growing revenue stream for the property. You should not settle for anything less than the best, a firm that will lead your property in achieving maximum revenue from the property website/direct online channel.

{{ The Guest Post Blogger organization was not involved in the creation of this content. - Dalvi Prabhakar B., Founder & Digital Manager (SEO,SEM,SMO) }}

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Backlink Profile Monitoring with Majestic SEO

Backlink Profile Monitoring with Majestic SEO

   July 03, 2014       prabhakardalvi

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Are you monitoring your back-link profile?

It is no secret Google have become very aggressive when it comes to links and link building strategies: highly optimized anchor text links have suddenly become toxic as they are unnatural. So perhaps branding is the way to go and people are thinking twice before placing questionable links on their money sites.

While link building is still an essential part of your SEO strategy, there is another aspect you need to consider as an everyday part of your optimization efforts: Monitoring your backlink profile.

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Backlink profile monitoring should be an integral part of your ongoing SEO activities. You need to know who is linking out to you, and if there are any suspicious activities, in order to react in real time and avoid a disruptive, (or devastating), penalty.

How you can use Majestic SEO to monitor your backlink profile?

Majestic SEO offers 2 different ways to monitor your backlink profile:

Via a Tracking Report. The link tracking report from Majestic SEO offers a view of Trust Flow, Citation Flow, and other link quality characteristics such as external backlinks, referring IPs, referring domains, and referring subnets: link quality characteristics of any URL or website over time, updated on a daily basis. This report is useful in 2 ways:

It allows you to follow the link quality of a URL and see if there is any correlation between a change in a URLs position and whether the change was caused by an increase in good (or bad) links. These flow metrics start calculating many link iterations away from the URL you are tracking – meaning there does not have to be a change to the pages that physically link to you, for there to be a change in the page’s fortunes on the web.

It offers an overview on the rate of growth of your Inbound Links (IBLs). The daily report offered by the tracking report offers strategic insights on a day-to-day basis which you can use to understand what is happening:

• There has been a spike in new IBLs, where are they coming from?
• Are they related in any way to a viral activity performed by the Social media Team?
• Was a link picked up and passed along on Twitter?
• Did the R&D team publish a white paper?
• Was a newsletter published offering a download?
• If the answer to any of these questions was YES, then you are safe and should be ready to bet those links are all legitimate.

But what if the answers to all these questions was NO – nobody did anything of the sort; there were no Social Media initiatives, no newsletters, none of your content went viral – then where are these links coming from?

Spikes in the IBL profile should be looked at with suspicion – they could be coming from a site which has nothing to do with us and could have dropped a run of site link in their navigation bar or footer… this deserves your immediate attention. 

In this case we can see there is a certain trend in backlink profile, then a sudden significant growth over a few days; (in this case the IBLs shot up from just under 12.000 to 24.000). These links were found to be coming all from the same site, a very big portal with thousands of pages that had placed a link in the sidebar.

In very competitive markets competitors can organize a negative link building campaign to discredit you by adding thousands of low quality links, and then by doing so, impacting your trust flow, and boosting your citation flow. The tracking report will keep you up to date and in a matter of days you will be informed of the presence of these undesired and hostile links.

Tracking reports offer top level numbers and information but not the actual links; (they can be found in the Site Explorer under the New tab):

Inbound Links Discovery with Majestic SEO

You can see the spike noted in the previous screenshot taken from the tracking report. By hovering over the dates Majestic will reveal total number of backlinks identified and date of discovery; (which is not necessarily the date of creation).

Inbound Link Analysis using Search Explorer by Majestic SEO

Clicking on the date will retrieve the links and allow a detailed analysis. If the links are legitimate you keep them, if they are not your only option is to disavow them: by doing so you are telling Google you have nothing to do with that inbound linking activity and are taking appropriate action to distance yourself from them; (and by doing so renouncing to any link equity coming from them). The disavow will feed into your link profile and these links will be removed from your link graph. In this way you are preventing any retaliation on behalf of Google when the day of reckoning will come … prevention is better than curing.

{{ The Guest Post Blogger organization was not involved in the creation of this content. - Dalvi Prabhakar B., Founder & Digital Manager (SEO,SEM,SMO) }}

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How to get Website Conversion Or ROI with winning landing page for Visitors

How to get Website Conversion Or ROI with winning landing page for Visitors

   June 11, 2014       prabhakardalvi

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Capturing and maintaining website visitors’ attention can often feel like herding cats. Visitors will wander around on your site, clicking here and there, perhaps converting into customers, and perhaps – just as easily – going elsewhere to find what they’re looking for. Your job as a web designer is not to celebrate your SEO successes, for all you’ve done is brought potential customers to your site. The reality is that SEO is not even half the battle – the real work begins once a visitor has landed on your site and needs to be convinced to do business with you. To accomplish this difficult goal, you need to keep your visitors focused on your site and lead them down a simple path toward the ultimate goal of conversion.

This article presents ideas and examples from Kevin Gao is the founder and CEO of Comm100 that will help you capture and maintain your customers’ attention while they familiarize themselves with your products and services. We will highlight 7 specific website design concepts and offer concrete suggestions on how you can keep your visitors focused on your website.

1. Get clear on your goal. This is perhaps the most important factor in capturing and maintaining your visitors’ focus. You must at all times understand and have clarity of the goal of the overall website, as well as each individual page.

Be warned that your can easily lose sight of your goal, because you’ll often be tempted to implement fancy animation or eye-catching graphics simply for the aesthetic beauty and nothing else. This is not to say that you shouldn’t implement crafty artwork or fancy animations or cool videos; you simply need to review such additions in light of your website’s true goal.

You should break down your website goal into the following three sub-categories:

Who is your target audience? Understand the type of customers you’re targeting. Are they engineers? Accountants? Once you’re clear on this demographic, you’ll have an easier time structuring your content and graphics. 

Engineers, for example, appreciate endless lists of features, whereas car enthusiasts want lots of cool pictures of sports cars.

What is the desired action? This question breaks down in different ways, depending on the specific page being designed. For example, one page may consider the subscription to an email newsletter to be a conversion, whereas another page considers a click on a shopping cart button a conversion. In all cases, you must identify a desired action on each page.

What’s in it for the viewer? Never lose sight of the value proposition to your customer. Each page must provide some sort of take-away for the customer, whether it’s an informative list of suggestions or an instructional video that helps customers understand your products or services.

2. Don’t make your visitors search for your message

This is perhaps the #1 problem with most business websites. How often have you landed on a website only to search endlessly for information on what the company does? If you spend more than 10 seconds searching for the answer, consider yourself in the minority. Most people are not so patient. Your website should instantly convey what it does and make the journey for your visitor simple and fast.

Take a look at the website for F5 Networks below. Is it immediately obvious what they do? The only hint you get is “Applications Without Constraints.” Though this is a compelling statement, it could be argued that visitors won’t “get it” and leave. Imagine wandering into a store, and the first thing a salesman says is, “Applications without constraints.” Immediately you know he’s not going to be of much use, and you’re probably going to turn and leave.

3. Walk your visitors through the website. 

Though it may seem silly, big buttons and an obvious path through your site will yield success. Keep in mind that your visitors simply want a solution to their problem, and if they believe you have what they need, they will follow you. Think about it: isn’t it easier to follow a leader than to forge your own path through the jungle?

As a good example, scan your eyes down the QuickBooks landing page as shown below. You’ll quickly see a placard that says, “Run your entire business with QuickBooks. Track your sales and expenses, get paid faster, and even run payroll with it.” This message gets right to the point, and as your eyes scan down from that message, you see a big button for “Shop and Save Now.” 

This button leads you directly to a price sheet, where you can immediately compare features and the associated prices. But if you want to learn more before purchasing anything, you simply click on the “Learn More” link. You are then taken to a page that breaks out the main features of QuickBooks. And on that page, there is yet another “Learn More” link, which takes you onto the next step in your journey to eventual conversion.

4. Keep It Simple (KIS). 

Keep in mind that visitors don’t come to your site because they enjoy clicking on links. They are looking for information, and your site design – clever as you may think it is – can only get in the way. Be conscious of the clutter on the screen. How many messages are you sending to your visitors? Does each of these messages reflect your website’s goal? Also, understand the simple beauty of white space. Important information will not stand out if flashing banners, clashing colors and inconsistent font styles surrounds it. Surround your most important messages in a “quiet” buffer zone of white space. It will reduce the cognitive load on the human brain and help it focus on the message.

The example below may be a bit extreme, but notice how this clever landing page for cameron.io gets you to focus on a message that’s minimal in size but significant in magnitude.

5. Use concise writing. Get to the point. Quickly.

Keep in mind that website writing is different than print writing. When people want to read a book, they’ll make time for it in their schedule. But they rarely come to your site with the same attitude. They will refuse to read long passages of promotional writing. If you can’t keep your writing short, then break it up with images and highlight the important text with bold letters. Break out multiple concepts into bulleted lists.

Additionally, avoid using company-specific language except where absolutely necessary. Use standard terms to refer to standard concepts. For example, use a button labeled “Learn More” when referring to more text, rather than something like, “Explore.” Use the standard buttons for RSS feeds, Facebook Likes, Twitter, and so on.

Notice how Sugar CRM breaks up different features into small bite-size chunks, each with its own graphic. They use the “Learn More” links to provide more information about each specific feature, so if you want to read more, you can. But if you stay on this page, you can quickly scan the features without spending a lot of time digging through text.

6. Communicate with a clean visual design. 

Suzanne Martin compiled an excellent write-up on this concept. In general, you need to be aware of how the human brain visually perceives information. The main concepts are visual organization and standardization. The graphic below is a sample taken from the Martin’s page. It clearly demonstrates how a chaotic layout can adversely affect visual communication.

7. Maintain an objective perspective.

 It is well understood that creative people lose their objectivity when working on the same project day after day. Web designers in particular can get so enamored with their code that they lose sight of the usability factor. It is therefore imperative that the website get evaluated by stakeholders on a periodic basis, so that a set of objective eyes can provide guidance.

Objective reviewers must not only look at the design with a fresh set of eyes, but they must keep the overall goals in mind as they review each page. This can be difficult, especially when the reviewer has a sense of pride in the company. For example, the reviewer might say something like, “Let’s feature our industry awards on the front page where everyone can see them!” This desire is most likely counterproductive, for the reviewer has forgotten that the web page is for the potential customer, not for employees who are enamored with the company.

in the end, Capturing traffic on your website is indeed a good SEO challenge, but captured traffic does not equal conversion. SEO is only the beginning of the long battle for customer business. To keep potential customers on the site, you need to structure the site to maintain the visitor’s focus and interest. This often involves leading her through a simple path toward conversion. This article highlights some of the challenges in sustaining that interest level and offers specific suggestions to convert visitors into long-term customers.

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How to Get the Results You Want Using Email Marketing Lists

How to Get the Results You Want Using Email Marketing Lists

   June 09, 2014       prabhakardalvi

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How to Get the Results You Want Using Email Marketing Lists

One really great thing about using Email Marketing Lists is that you are given the ability to track the results of your marketing campaign. You’ll be able to see how many people actually opened the email, how many people actually used any of the links included in the email, and possibly even which links they chose to use. Now you can take these results and use them when it comes time to create your next Email Marketing List.

Email Marketing Lists vs. SEO

According to the Email Marketing Census of 2012, a little more than 70% of business owners that currently use Email Marketing Lists state that their email marketing campaigns have so far proven to be highly effective. In fact, the high majority of these business owners would like to increase their spending on this marketing method for their next year of business. The fact that organic SEO scored a little higher than Email Marketing Lists doesn’t take away from the many benefits that an Email marketing List can, and does, provide for their business.

Why Marketing Lists Work

Marketing Lists work because this type of marketing method is one that speaks directly to those who are interested in any particular business niche. Marketing Lists allow a business owner to directly target their specific audience because the List is derived from lots of intensive and detailed research. By sending out marketing emails to those who are known to have an interest in a specific niche, business owners are not only driving their sales and getting more leads, they are also building relationships with both their current and potential customers. Relationship building is critical when it comes to wanting your customers to trust and be loyal to you, and you only. Find out more by contacting us today!

Tips for Building Email Marketing Lists

Instead of using the typical message, “Join our Email List”, try to get a little more creative and add some extra information that will really grab the attention of prospective customers. For example, “Subscribe today so you can stay current with any and all information about (your niche here)”, or “When you join our email list, you’re going to receive lots of great tips and tricks, as well as valuable coupons!”.

Include a place for people to sign up for your email list in your emails. Offer them some kind of benefit in order to gently persuade them to join, such as a free gift with their first purchase or being able to get all the latest news by simply signing up for your email list today.

Remember, asking permission is crucial! You don’t want people complaining to you that they never wanted to receive your emails in the first place.

Ask everyone you come into contact with if they would like to join your email list. Yes, everyone!

Growing Your Marketing Lists

Even though you may already have a few extensive Marketing Lists, eventually you’re going to need to think about making your List grow so you can get more business.

The following are 5 things you can do that can help your Marketing List continue to grow so you can continually market to new people.

1. Social Media – Join a few Social Media Networking websites so you can add an email subscription form that makes it really easy for people to sign up.

2. Blogging – Doesn’t it seem that everything comes back to blogging? Blogging keeps your website rankings up, which means more people are going to find your website, which means more people are going to see and hopefully sign up to receive your emails using your email subscription form.

3. Offer Incentives – Offer new buyers a discount or free item w/purchase. They will be more apt to buy your product or service, and accordingly are much more likely to sign up for more information using your email subscription form.

4. Mobile Apps – Use one of the many email marketing apps so you can easily enter someone’s information while you’re out and about.

5. Tradeshows – Attend a tradeshow with a goal of collecting email subscriptions. Simply place a large glass bowl on your table to hold all the new leads.

Read My post : Email Marketing Made Simple with Important Tip with Prabhakar

Although these are all completely legitimate ways for you to grow your Marketing Lists, it’s going to take a good bit of time to gather and collect the information you need. When you purchase one of our Marketing Lists, you are given immediate access to hundreds and even thousands of prospective customers so you can start marketing your products immediately. Call us today for more information.

We Specialize in Offering Some of the Best Marketing Lists Available

Business ListsEmail ListsInvestor ListsMailing ListsExecutive ListsDiscount ListsNon-USA ListsCollege Student Lists

When it comes to creating Marketing Lists, remember that quality exceeds quantity.

When it comes to getting Marketing Leads for your business, every single one of them counts. Now, in order to find the right and oh-so-crucial Marketing Leads (from our extensive selection of Marketing Leads Lists, of course) you’re going to first have to know who your audience is. Firstly, so you can choose the right Marketing Leads List and secondly so you can create a marketing plan that’s geared directly to your specific audience. You’re also going to need to know anything and everything there is to know about your particular niche so these potentially new customers will see you as a professional who really knows what they’re talking about so they will trust you and accordingly will be much more apt to do business with you.

Once a Marketing Lead is found, the work is not over. Now this lead needs to be converted into a sale with a goal of turning them into a repeat customer.

Did You Know…

When email marketing is used, the average ROI for every $1 spent is $43.52. Wow!

Email marketing shows no signs of slowing down and in fact is said to grow into a 2 billion dollar industry by 2014.

42% of consumers like receiving promotional emails

More than half of the consumers who receive a marketing email go on to make a purchase because of that email.

Social Media is more and more proving to be a great platform for gathering more leads.

Customer Profiles/How to Find the Ideal Customer

First of all, you’re going to have to know who your audience is. If you don’t, you’ll be wasting your time as not everyone is going to want to buy what you have to sell. Sorry, but that’s just the way it is. In order to find the ideal customer, you have to have an idea of what your customer profiles look like. Otherwise, you’re marketing words will simply be falling on deaf ears.

So what it is exactly that you need to know so you can find your ideal customers? Collecting the following information is a good place to start:

Lifestyle/Hobbies

• Age
• Race/Ethnicity
• Employment Status/Income Level
• Gender
• Location
• Shopping Behavior/Habits

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Diiference Between Good Or Bad Internet Marketing - Prabhakar

Diiference Between Good Or Bad Internet Marketing - Prabhakar

   May 27, 2014       prabhakardalvi

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Good, Bad, & Ugly of Internet Marketing

The Ugly: Yellow Page Advertising

It's hard to believe this still exists - 99% of homes throw this book out as soon as it arrives on their doorstep. It's a high cost marketing method that will yield a much lower ROI than any SEO marketing, as your advertisement will be buried in hundreds of slim yellow pages filled with thousands of ads just like yours. 1980 called, it wants its advertising methods back!

The Purpose: Phase-out ineffective & outdated marketing.

Hint: Yelp can be more effective marketing tool.

The Bad: Cheap SEO

Sure you can find SEO agencies that charge under $100 for all of your marketing needs, but treat them with caution. Cheap SEO is like cheap cars - just not worth it!

Quality work costs money, and the low-cost SEO companies could end up doing harm to your business' online presence in the long run. You'll get almost no value for your investment, and their Black Hat SEO tactics will only get your site to rank for a short time before it's slapped down by Google.

The Purpose: Preventing you from buying a lemon.

Hint: Content is King!

The Bad: Big SEO

The biggest SEO agencies are kind of like the federal government - they just take too long to deliver results. You won't get the proper ROI from these big agencies, and chances are you'll end up dealing with an employee that was just hired yesterday and who is answering all of your questions by reading off a flow chart.

The Purpose: Steering clear away from big company headaches: internal politics, bureaucratic red tape & ego’s

Hint: Smaller is better. Smaller is more innovating. Smaller means it is easy to get a hold of key people quickly in a time of need.

The Good: Testimonials

Every SEO agency website should have a testimonial page, but you should use Google to search for complaints as well as praise. A complaint or two is no problem, but too many complaints means that there's likely something wrong with the way the agency handles their clients' SEO.

The Purpose: Finding skeletons in your SEO agency’s closet.

Hint: Type in that SEO agency domain name in Google and glance the first 3 pages for any complaints.

The Good: Webpage Optimization

• A/B testing shows you valuable insight about improving your conversion rate.
• Every SEO company worth their salt will invest a good deal of time into optimizing webpage, but that time will cost you money. Good webpage optimization means two things:
• Making your site user-friendly and easy to read
• Designing the site and content according to Google's complex algorithms
• The purpose: making sure your website ranks well.
• Hint: Research your competitors' websites to see what they're doing wrong - and improve on it!
• The Good: Keyword Research

Try to find out what are people typing in Google to find your type of business?

This - like webpage optimization - takes a lot of time and money, but it's well worth it. Good keyword research will in the long run help your SEO consultant rank your website and get laser targeted traffic to your website.

The Purpose: Getting your phone ringing and your door swigging with customers.

Hint: Find long tail keywords that are related to your business — as they are much faster to rank.

The Good: Web Design

Responsive web design is viewable through smartphones, tablets and e-readers.

A professional design for your website will increase the user-friendliness of it, making the job of your SEO agency just a bit easier. Always go with a customized template for your website, as you want a design that is unique to your company. Stay away from template mills (designers that deliver a standard template with minor alterations made). Consider hiring your SEO consultant to design your website - they'll do so with SEO in mind. Pretty graphics aren't the only thing that matter!

The Purpose: Funnel wasted clicks into sales!

Hint: Heat maps is a graphical representation of how your visitors engage with your website. It can show you why your visitor’s are not converting!

The Good: Link Building

Good links are from High Domain Authority (DA) & High Page Authority (PA) websites

Cheap SEO agencies will get you low value links, which will do little for your website's SEO. You want high value links, but they are the hardest to get. A good SEO agency will know how to get those links, but cheap SEO will just get you crappy backlinks that will end up getting you banned by Google. Stay away from cheap link building - prepare to invest.

The Purpose: The internet is no longer a get-rich-quick scheme, and that it takes time and investment to build a profitable business.

Hint: Buy quality! Stay immune to Google’s algorithm updates: Panda, Penguin & Hummingbird.

It's Important to Remember:

If impatient? Do Yoga!

The Good: Be Patient. It takes time to achieve a good ranking - between 6 and 12 months, depending on your keyword. Your SEO consultant will need time to build good links, so don't pressure for instant links built overnight. They'll hurt your site in the long run.

The Purpose: A proper link building strategy will make your website immune to Google’s Panda & Penguin algorithm updates.

Hint: Pay-Per-Click (PPC) can be a quick short-term solution to get business flowing.

Spend time & money wisely! Don’t burn it!

The Bad: Your Time is Money. If you're trying to learn SEO, you'll spend far more time than you should - time you could spend growing your company elsewhere. Let your SEO agency do its job, you focus on being successful and efficient in your business.

The Purpose: Use your time effectively managing good people for the job instead of wasting many frustrated hours trying to do redundant mediocre tasks yourself.

Hint: There are a ton of other creative ways to advertise your business through networking groups, trade shows and/or conventions.

“It takes money to make money!”

The Good: Create a Good Business Model. Rich Fong, owner of BlissDrive.com - a top Los Angeles SEO agency - offers this piece of advice: "Make sure you have a good business model as well as an ample marketing budget." Remember that good SEO consultants don't take on every client - only those who are willing to go for the long haul with proper SEO. The more attention you get directly from the owner of a company, the easier it will be to stay focused on the mission of your SEO.

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Digital Agency what they plan for success

Digital Agency what they plan for success

   May 27, 2014       prabhakardalvi

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Running a digital marketing agency is tough. To succeed in today’s online environment, digital agencies need to redouble their efforts to attract clients and serve their needs. As one of the most respected entrepreneurs in the world, Sir Richard Branson has set up over 400 companies using innovative management techniques to stay one step ahead of the competition. What can we learn from his approach to business to run a digital agency in today’s climate?

Outsourcing Is Key

Sustained success comes from serving the needs of clients with a dedicated and well-rounded team. An effective digital marketing strategy encompasses so many disciplines — from public relations and content creation, to search engine and social media optimization — it’s necessary to employ a team that can handle every aspect of the process. It’s not something that one individual can handle; using the talents of a marketing firm can be critical to success.

Love What You Do

As a business owner, one of the most difficult decisions is knowing when to delegate tasks, but it’s the only way to strengthen your business. To be more productive, focus on the activities that you enjoy and are good at, and leave everything else to the relevant experts. You may think it’s unaffordable, but by outsourcing core business tasks you can actually end up making more money. By hiring experts, you’ll free up your valuable time to focus on other important tasks to bring in more money.

Define Your Goals

By clarifying your digital marketing objectives, you can hire the experts that are the right fit for your agency. For example, if more clients are asking for social media expertise, track down a company that specializes in this field. The needs of your clients will constantly change, so it’s essential to establish relationships with dynamic, reliable, and established agencies. To cover all bases, look for agencies that have the following members on their team:

• Web development staff
• Content writers
• Programmers
• Research & development personnel
• Conversion experts
• Project managers
• SEO consultants
• Social media experts
• Growth hackers
• PPC experts

Optimize Meetings

Some meetings are necessary, but many businesses hold regular meetings that are really a waste of time. Schedule fewer meetings and concentrate on running your day-to-day business. If you’re going to hold a meeting, make sure it achieves certain goals. For example, set some ground rules to help your relationship with other agencies run more smoothly, or work out which metrics you need to monitor each month.

Richard Branson regularly holds meetings at his own home in Necker Island. The change of scenery inspires original thinking and is ultimately more productive. Think about where you can hold a meeting that will keep things fresh and interesting. Although you probably don’t own an island, you could hold meetings in a local park or gallery.

It Pays to Spend Money

You may think that hiring an SEO specialist or a copywriter in-house will save you money, but if you consider what you’ll have to pay them every year, hiring an outside agency is the smart move. Employing one person may cost you upwards of $45,000 per year, and that’s not including recruitment costs. On the other hand, paying decent money for outside expertise can actually save you money in the long run. Your marketing agency can be working around the clock on your campaigns, and you don’t have to worry about expensive overheads or vacation and sick leave.

Invest in People, Not Machines

Marketing automation tools seem like a good idea to many businesses trying to improve efficiency, but they’re not always cost effective. For example, the license for Adobe Omniture could cost you around $4000 per month. While basic automation tools can help with menial tasks, if you’re looking for effective long-term marketing strategies, it’s people and strategies that make the difference.

Inspire and Reward

A large part of running a successful agency is making sure your employees are happy and being compensated well. This involves empowering workers to make their own decisions and giving them the freedom to be creative in a forward-thinking work environment. Consider performance bonuses for good work. You could even invite outside agencies to your company events and celebrations to strengthen your ongoing relationships. Ultimately — and it’s been proven in various studies — making workers happy improves productivity.

In a constantly changing digital landscape, many marketing businesses are finding it hard to attract and retain clients, and as the digital marketing sector grows it’s not getting any easier. To run a successful agency today, you need to be innovative, focused, and invest in the right people. Ultimately, if you harness the talents of others to maximize productivity, just like Richard Branson, you can reach your goals more quickly.

Published On : Medium

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Inbound marketing focuses on leads instead of searching for customers

Inbound marketing focuses on leads instead of searching for customers

   May 21, 2014       prabhakardalvi

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Inbound marketing focuses on being found by potential leads instead of searching for customers.

Traditional marketing methods such as paid TV ads, direct mailings, cold calling and trade shows are costly. Inbound Marketing is not only effective and less expensive but the results are better tracked.

1. Search Engine Optimization

The primary way that inbound marketing works is through Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  SEO is a method to get your website to rank high on search engines for specific keywords.

When a potential customer does a web search, they are actively searching for your product or service. So as a marketing firm your audience might type in “Marketing San Antonio,” if you’re website is listed on page 1 of Google, Bing or Yahoo search engines you’ll be likely to receive more quality leads.

Help your business get visibility online with these SEO marketing tips.

2. Content Marketing

Content marketing is creating valuable information to display on your site to increase customer interest. Often businesses will attract customers by delivering a blog or a tips area on their website that provides relevant content making  their company a trusted and helpful resource.

Ways to provide valuable content:

• Educational Ebooks
• Training  or How To Videos
• Whitepapers
• Webinars

Tip: don’t forget to provide a call to action in your content to convert sales.

3. Email and Marketing Automation

Inbound marketing should not relying just on generating business but a balance of nurturing leads and converting visitors into customers. Email and marketing automation should contain information useful to nurture the visitor’s interest and is a great opportunity to deliver sales pitches.

How to capture email addresses:

Inbound marketing focuses on leads instead of searching for customers

Since the newsletter was actively sought, it is less likely to be viewed as spam, but it is wise to set expectations and inform how often your emails will be sent to the individual.  The optin opportunities are most effective on a landing page, above the home page fold, or on sidebars of your site.

Affordable and easy optin and email automation systems include:

• Aweber.com
• ConstantContact.com
• Infusionsoft.com

These email automation systems have customizable opt-in templates and for more creative opt-ins you may need a developer to create unique opt-in forms.

4. Social Presence 

Social Media Inbound Marketing

Using sites such as Twitter and Facebook to generate interest in a product or service are great ways to use inbound marketing strategies. Provide regular content that is engaging on your social media account to attract potential clients.

Some important factors to consider:

• Who is your target audience on social channels?
• Which social channels does your audience communicate and interact in?
• What type of content is valuable?
• Tip: don’t just self promote, give your audience useful information and encourage sharing.

Learn more why your business should get social!

5. Video Marketing

Viral Video Inbound Marketing

One of the most effective ways to convey information is through videos. People often go to popular video channels such as Youtube or Vimeo to get info to solve problems or learn about a service or product. Get in front of your audience by being visible on these video channels.

Tip: Also make sure to provide a link or phone number in the video description to ensure they will find your company.  Check out these top 5 tips to make your viral video reach more!

It’s a brave new world for marketing and it’s important for businesses to stay on top of all the current trends and directions that inbound marketing are taking. By staying current and staying focused on inbound marketing, businesses can take advantage of all the new possibilities being offered with today’s technology.

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Outside of the Search Engines want traffic - Explaination

Outside of the Search Engines want traffic - Explaination

   May 06, 2014       prabhakardalvi

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Build Traffic Sources Outside of the Search Engines Nick Stamoulis

When it comes to marketing your business online and generating traffic to your website, the search engines should be a primary driver of traffic. After all, when people are looking for a product, service, or information that is typically the first place that they turn to which is why an SEO program is so important today. However, even as an SEO firm we will be the first to admit that the search engines shouldn't be the only source of traffic to your website. Putting all of your eggs in one basket like that can be risky which is why it’s best to have a presence in many places across the web that can generate traffic to your website.

Build Traffic Sources Outside of the Search Engines

It’s important to consider where your target audience is spending time on the web (outside of the search engines) and seek out opportunities to build a brand presence (and a link) on those sites. Typically these sites are sites that are in some way related to the products or services that you sell. If you sell computer software, it might be a popular computer software industry blog. 

There could be advertising opportunities on the blog, or even better- guest blog posting opportunities. Getting a guest blog post published on an industry blog is ideal because it’s a way to share your expertise and gain attention in the industry. Niche sites like these can be the best source of traffic because the visitors are highly targeted and it’s likely that what your site offers correlates with their needs. In addition to industry blogs, industry forums, directories, and message boards are also great spots.

Social media is another important outlet to build up a brand presence today. People are visiting social media sites for a variety of reasons. Like the search engines, the major social networking sites all include search features. Those that are social media savvy might be more likely to conduct a search in social media as opposed to the search engines, to get insights from users or to find additional content outside of the static pages that exist on your site. 

For B2Bs, LinkedIn can be a great source of referral traffic as long as you are using the medium correctly. It’s important to join groups that attract like minded people and share any informational content that you create with these groups. It’s a significant source of traffic and again, these visitors are highly targeted. There are many opportunities within social media to share links that will deliver traffic back to your site.

Building links on industry sites and within social media is going to improve your SEO, but that is really just an added benefit. The main benefit is that these links will generate traffic to your site from those that are most interested in what you have to offer. The search engines are an important source of traffic, but the search engines are also unpredictable. You never know when an algorithm change could affect your placement for certain keywords. That’s why it’s important to build traffic from a variety of sources. If for some reason your SEO takes a hit, your business will still be able to survive because targeted traffic is still finding your site in other ways.

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The Most Important Component of B2B SEO is Content

The Most Important Component of B2B SEO is Content

   May 06, 2014       prabhakardalvi

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With all of the SEO rules changing as often as they do, and SEO tactics that were once beneficial now on the “bad” list, website owners that want to improve their search engine presence are now left wondering, “what can we do?” What we always tell our clients is that the most important thing that they can do to help improve their B2B SEO efforts is to produce quality content on a regular basis. This can be in the form of blog posts, guest blog posts, articles, white papers, press releases, webinars, etc.

Here are 2 key reasons why content is a necessary part of a B2B SEO campaign:

Content generates inbound links

In the early days of SEO there were plenty of ways to get inbound links back to your site and the focus was on getting as many inbound links as possible. Quantity was the goal, not quality. Link exchanges were common as part of a “you link to me, I’ll link to you” agreement. As the search engines cracked down on this sort of practice that was meant to manipulate the search results, it became much more difficult to generate inbound links. 

The best types of inbound links are the ones that occur naturally when a third party website owner thinks that you are worth linking to. Think about what kind of link this would be. Are they going to be linking to your service pages? Maybe, but not all that often. Third party sites are going to link to informational content that their audience will find beneficial. By consistently creating quality content you will be viewed as an authority in your industry and links to your content will serve as reference points that can supplement the content of others.

Content fuels a social media campaign

A social media campaign is a necessary component of online marketing today. After all, social media is where people spend lots of time online. It’s important to have a brand presence there and to keep your social media accounts active. There is no point in having a social media page for your business or brand if you never update it. One of the issues that businesses have is trying to figure out what they should be sharing in social media. If you are creating quality content on a regular basis, you will always have a steady stream of social media posts to coincide with when the content is published. If it’s possible, try and publish evergreen content as often as you can. 

This kind of content can be published in social media multiple times, since it will continue to be relevant for months or even years in the future and it’s doubtful that all social followers saw it the first time around. For SEO purposes, it’s necessary to get links shared in social media in order to improve your social signals, which indicates to the search engines that a page of web content is beneficial.

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