How can Your Business Build Brand Awareness with Content Marketing?

mwon

Building brand awareness can be tough for small businesses, but an effective content marketing strategy makes it a little easier.

And in this post, we explore four great options that any company can try.

 

Write Guest Posts

Guest posts can introduce your brand to an existing audience, help your business earn more credibility, and demonstrate thought leadership.

But your guest posts have to be valuable and relevant to the site’s audience to be effective. Apparently, 79 percent of editors feel content written by guests is “too promotional”, and if yours falls into that category, it might not be published at all.

Take the time to find blogs related to your industry, products, or services, and look at the level of social shares their posts achieve. Sites accepting guest posts tend to offer detailed submission requirements and guidelines, so read these carefully before pitching.

 

Launch a Podcast

Podcasts are everywhere. More than half of the United States’ population has listened to at least one, and there are more than 550,000 active shows out there. And people who listen to podcasts are more likely to follow businesses on social media, too, which means you could gain another valuable touchpoint.

So, why not create your own show?

This gives you a chance to become a thought leader and present your business’s human side. Find out if any of your competitors run a podcast and make sure your ideas don’t overlap with theirs. Try to recognize what makes your favorite shows work, too.

Perhaps record a few practice episodes before releasing your first. This lets your host(s) get used to the process, establish a voice, and build a format without feeling under pressure to be entertaining from the start.

 

Take Advantage of Email Marketing and Newsletters

Email marketing is around 40 times more effective at helping companies acquire new customers than Twitter and Facebook.

You can capture visitors’ email addresses by offering gated content on your website, such as an ebook, whitepaper, or maybe even a podcast. The content has to offer real value to prospects, though. They’re pretty unlikely to submit their email address for information or advice they could find somewhere else.

Marketing emails and newsletters should be tailored to subscribers, with content that’s relevant to their interests or buying history. Personalize subject lines to include recipient names, as this can take open rates from 15 percent to more than 18 percent.

 

Share Content Across Social Media (Even if it’s Not Your Own)

Every piece of content your business generates should be shared across all of your social channels, not just Facebook. Encourage followers to comment with their opinions, suggest ideas for future content, and share posts with friends who might find them interesting.

Interact with followers who comment and show that you value their insights. And don’t be afraid to share content from high-authority blogs or sites, as long as it’s not written by a competitor.

 

An effective content marketing strategy will help build brand awareness and bring your business to a wider audience. Follow these tips to start making an impact.

Want help from a professional digital marketing team? Our Orange County Marketing experts can help you increase your company’s visibility and engagement with a tailored strategy. Get in touch for your free marketing analysis today.

 

 

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Content Marketing Tips for Small Businesses – The Right Way to Reach Your Audience

mwon

A well-planned content marketing strategy is a crucial asset for any small business, though it’s not easy. You might find yourself sweating at the prospect of having to write blog posts three times a week or putting together a comprehensive whitepaper. but the truth is, all the hard work can really pay off.

Just ask those small businesses posting blogs on a regular basis and earning 126 percent more lead growth than those that don’t have a blog.

So, to help you get more out of your content marketing, we’ve put together the following tips.

 

Know Who You’re Writing For

One of the most important steps in building a good content marketing strategy is understanding your audience. If you try to write for everyone, the results could be vague and, most likely, interesting to no one.

But when you focus your aim and write for a specific segment, you can inject more truth and power into your content.

Think about your current customer base, your competition, and the pain points your business addresses. This helps clarify your ideal reader and the action you want them to take.

 

A Content Calendar is Key to Success

It might be tempting to create content as and when the mood takes you. Especially when your small business is operated by a skeleton crew with little spare time to flex their creative muscles.

But implementing a content calendar establishes a tighter focus and boosts relevance. For example, generating ideas for Christmas-themed content weeks in advance gives you the time to think carefully about the sort of answers your audience will be looking to solve in the run up to the season.

Planning themes and topics early reduces time wasted scrabbling for ideas on the day a blog post is due, too.

 

Use Long-form Content to Achieve Better Results

Research shows long-form content brings stronger results, with articles of more than 2000 words performing well for around 56 percent of creators.

That’s not to say you should never publish short posts, such as news updates, insights into forthcoming products, or simple articles offering a quick read.

Just make sure to publish long-form content that demonstrates thought leadership and gives readers something they can sink their teeth into regularly.

 

Experiment with Visual Content

Images help users process information and grasp the core topics or themes of a piece of content before they even start reading. Posts including images generate 650 percent higher engagement and earn three times as many links as text-only ones.

Try publishing infographics and videos on a regular basis, but spend time and money getting them to a professional standard first. When using images in your content, use original photos or graphics as often as you can. Only rely on stock visuals when you have no other option.

These content marketing tips can help small businesses build more effective campaigns and reach the right people. But it can be difficult to implement a strict plan when you have a company to run and a team to manage.

Want to work with a professional Orange County SEO agency committed to achieve real results instead? Just get in touch for a free marketing analysis now.

 

 

 

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Social Media Marketing in Orange County

How to Get Social Media Marketing Right for Your Business

mwon

Social media marketing is a must for every business. Big or small. New or established.

Why?

So, we know social media marketing has big potential to get your brand and products in front of a huge audience.

But how can you get it right?

 

Know Who Your Audience is and What they Care About

When you know your target audience, their interests, their values, and their buying habits, you can narrow your marketing’s focus.

For example, let’s say you want to target millennials. You’re in luck: more than 90 percent of them use social media, compared to just 48 percent of baby boomers.

That means you have a high chance of reaching your ideal customer base through effective social media marketing. You need to:

  • Gather information on your existing customers (age, location, spending habits, purchase preferences)
  • Look at your competitors’ social media marketing: what techniques do they use to reach your shared audience?
  • Survey customers to discover which social networks they use, which days and times they tend to browse, etc.
  • Create buyer personas for different demographics within your audience

The more you know about your ideal customers, the more effective your marketing should be.

 

Focus on Engagement, Not Just Selling

It’s tempting to promote your products or services on social media shamelessly. But this is likely to bore and frustrate your followers.

Work on engaging your audience through relevant, valuable content. Use images, videos, concise text, and more to keep your posts diverse.

Another key element of engagement is interacting with followers, responding to comments on posts, and more. Be transparent and accessible. Build relationships with the potential to translate into conversions down the line.

 

A/B Testing is Your Friend

A/B testing (or split testing) is a simple but effective way to determine the best ads and content for your social media marketing campaign.

Create two versions of ads or posts, incorporating different images, language, video lengths, GIFs, and more. Run them both at the same time, split between your audience equally, for a fixed period.

Analytics will reveal which version secures the highest engagement. You may or may not keep it as is, or build a new variation implementing the strongest features of the most successful one.

 

Stay Consistent

Establish a voice and stick to it.

That’s not to say you can’t evolve over time and embrace a slightly different tone. But it does mean it’s best to stay consistent across posts and social networks.

So, if you use punchy language and humorous GIFs on Twitter, don’t be painfully dry on Facebook.

This can disorient your audience, and suggest your team behind the scenes is unprofessional or disorganized. Consistency helps your brand develop a recognizable personality, build trust, and ensure followers know what to expect during interactions.

 

Social media marketing isn’t easy, but it’s worth putting time into developing a sound strategy that suits your business goals, audience, and budget.

Focus on building brand awareness, gaining trust, and establishing a consistent voice to maximize your campaign’s performance. Want help from a seasoned Orange County SEO team? We’ve got a free marketing analysis with your name on it!

 

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How to use Featured Snippets

How can You Use Featured Snippets in Your SEO Campaign?

mwon

 

We’ve all seen featured snippets by now, even if you don’t know them by name.

They’ve quickly become a common fixture on SERPs (search engine results page), helping users to find fast answers from an authority source just by clicking on one of the snippets at the top of the page.

Each featured snippet includes a link to the site, unlike answer boxes, which makes them a valuable addition to your SEO campaign. But how can you make the most of them?

 

Focus on Answering Questions

Featured snippets commonly answer questions, such as ‘what is a backlink?’ or ‘how do you bake a cake step by step?’.

How to use Featured Snippets
How you can Use Featured Snippets

Dedicate a full page to a question, with images, videos, strong keywords, and an in-depth answer that offers real value to searchers. Focus on giving the reader all the information they need in a well-structured format, incorporating keyword-rich header tags (H2, H3).

 

Embrace Lists

Lists are another type of featured snippet. They may appear in response to searches for ‘where should I stay in San Francisco?’ or ‘the best CRM tools’ (see below).

Featured Snippets List
Embrace Lists in Featured Snippets

A glance at the list gives users a fast answer, but still leaves enough missing to encourage a click through to the site. Lists’ accessibility can help to boost user engagement and aid scannability.

You may not be able to work lists into every piece of content you create, but try to include them when constructing pages dedicated to answering questions.

 

Build Authority to Gain Google’s Recognition

Google draws on authority sites for featured snippets, to ensure maximum value and expertise. So, if you want to increase your site’s chances of being picked, you need to build authority.

How can you do this?

  • Pay attention to your title tags, meta descriptions, and image alt tags
  • Make sure all content is high-quality and formatted in an engaging way
  • Work on achieving backlinks from other authority sites, to build your own credibility
  • Optimize your website for mobile devices

Building authority takes time and patience, but it’ll pay off when Google starts to notice you.

 

Add High-quality Pictures and Videos to Boost Value

Pictures and videos can increase your content’s value. Visual media has the power to convey meaning and present examples to users, answering questions in a more engaging way than text alone. Humans are more likely to remember visuals than words, and content with visuals tends to earn 94 percent more views than text-only content.

These are especially valuable for how-to pieces or resolving complex issues. One good way to increase videos’ impact is to create a transcript, so Google gains a clearer insight into its content.

Take advantage of these ideas to help your site rank for featured snippets. If you manage this, you’ll gain valuable real estate on SERPs and secure more traffic.

Want to learn more about increasing your visibility and ranking? Get in touch with our Orange County SEO experts now, and we’ll give you a FREE pro-marketing analysis.

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Essential SEO Trends for 2020 Every Business Has to Know

Essential SEO Trends for 2020 Every Business Has to Know

mwon

SEO trends come. SEO trends go.

Staying on top of the latest ones can help you strategize, make well-informed decisions, and adjust your work processes to accommodate industry changes. But what are the most important SEO trends worth your attention in 2020?

 

The Ongoing Rise of Featured Snippets

Featured snippets have become a regular fixture on SERPs (search engine results pages), and that’s set to become par for the course.

Featured snippets are a summarized version of answers to users’ search queries, pulled from multiple pieces of content. They also typically appear at the top of a page, taking prime position ahead of the highest-ranking organic results.

Businesses can take advantage of featured snippets by structuring content to include questions and answers.

 

Voice Search Dictates Content and Keywords

Our smartphones keep us connected to a world of information at all times. But, even better, we can use voice search to find immediate answers to questions without typing a single word.

This convenience is driving the proliferation of voice search so much it accounts for 20 percent of searches performed within the Google App.

As with featured snippets, your business can increase the chances of ranking higher by structuring content in a way that answers clear questions. Long-tail keywords are a key part of optimizing for voice search, too.

 

Mobile Optimization Continues to Influence Rankings

Google has switched to mobile-first indexing, giving ranking priority to websites optimized for mobile rather than just desktop. There’s no excuse for any business to inflict its desktop site on mobile users, especially if it’s already designed poorly.

In 2020, more companies and organizations must embrace mobile optimization to compete. Aim to keep the user experience as smooth, fluid, and convenient as possible.

 

Videos are a Must for Engagement

One of the biggest SEO trends for 2020 is the inclusion of video. Obviously, YouTube is a marketing behemoth now, but video has become increasingly vital on social networks too. With videos, companies can convey messages and communicate with their target audience in less time than with text-based content.

Videos also lend themselves to social sharing and can utilize other elements (music, sound effects, language, facial expressions) to inspire an emotional response. It can be much harder to move people with words alone.

92 percent of marketers using video claim it’s a key element of their marketing strategy, an increase of 17 percent on 2018’s figure. Implementing video into your marketing campaign demands careful planning, investment in the proper equipment, and (potentially) a professional production crew.

However, there’s real potential to generate leads and achieve good ROI if you can get your video marketing right.

These SEO trends are set to make a big impact on the industry in 2020. That’s why it’s worth paying attention to each, and watching out for others emerging over the next 12 months.

Otherwise, you run the risk of falling behind — and losing customers to your more SEO-savvy competitors.

 

Want help from an Orange County SEO team of experts to help you grow your business in 2020? Just get in touch today for a FREE marketing analysis!

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How-can-You-Boost-Engagement-on-Your-Website

How can You Boost Engagement on Your Website?

nettsolutions

How engaging is your website?

If you can’t answer this question, it’s time to give it some thought.

And in this post on boosting engagement, our Orange County SEO experts give you plenty to think about. Let’s start with user experience.

 

The Power of Good UX

User experience (UX) is a key part of building and maintaining an engaging site, especially now that mobile search is so important to the digital marketing landscape.

Every business has to make sure its site gives visitors exactly what they’re looking for in the fastest time. The layout, presentation and content should all be designed for a smooth browsing experience.

Research by Google backs this up:

  • 61 percent of users will jump to a different site if they can’t find what they’re looking for on yours quickly
  • 50 percent will visit a business’s website less often if it’s not mobile-optimised, even if they like its products and services

So, the main factors to focus on:

  • Speed (fast load times, logical progression from page to page}
  • Convenience (value visitors’ time: show them what they’re looking for fast)
  • Mobile Optimization (make sure your site can be browsed on smartphones easily)

 

Keep Content Clear and Readable

It’s tempting to show off and pack your content with sophisticated language or technical jargon. But if you do this, you increase the odds of visitors clicking away out of boredom or frustration.

Here are some key points to keep in mind:

  • Content should be tailored to your target audience: speak their language and address their pain points.
  • Keep the layout clean and tidy with plenty of white space.
  • Use images and videos to break text up.
  • Make content valuable and ensure it serves a purpose.

 

Encourage Interaction

Invite visitors to communicate with your business and reach out to your customer support team to find out more about products or services. This can increase engagement and show users you value their input.

One effective way to do this is implementing live chat and / or chatbots. This lets visitors speak with an agent quickly and easily right on the website. There’s no need to login to an email account and draft a message or leave the browser to dial a number.

Live chat should be easy to access on every page. Don’t make users go searching high and low for it or they could click away to a business that makes things a little simpler.

 

Working with Experts

Working with a seasoned SEO team is a great way to boost your website’s engagement. Our Orange County SEO agency has helped many businesses give customers a better, smoother browsing and buying experience.

Want to know more? Get in touch with us today.

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Local PPC Tips for Your Company

Local PPC Tips for Your Company

nettsolutions

Local PPC is a must for reaching customers when we all have smartphones, with research showing almost half of mobile searches are for local businesses.

And that makes sense. While we might have flipped through a phonebook for restaurants, tailors, plumbers or other service-providers within our local area in days gone by, today we can just ask Google to find them for us.

You can use this convenience and accessibility to your advantage, boosting your company’s visibility for nearby customers.

How? We’ve pulled together some key local PPC tips to help you get started.

 

Get Colloquial

One simple but solid way to attract local buyers is to speak in a language they recognize.

This doesn’t mean you need to pepper your PPC ads with slang you hear on the streets to try and seem cool, but dropping relevant references helps establish your business as part of the community.

For example, if you know consumers like calling your products by a specific term, feel free to adopt it in your content. Show you understand your audience and know how to communicate with them at their level.

 

Include Call Extensions for Direct Contact

Adding call extensions to your PPC ads empowers consumers with an easy way to interact with your brand.

Just by tapping a call button, a customer can book a table in your restaurant, schedule a haircut or plan anything else in a matter of seconds. It saves them having to search your website for your number and is far faster than using an online booking system.

 

Keep Your Google My Business Updated

Google My Business is a must-have element of your online marketing.

Make sure you take advantage of it. Add photos of your establishment, products and even staff or customers (provided they’re happy to be included). Show your business off with professional, clear images.

You can manage your company’s presence on Google Maps and in search results to keep all information updated. Using out-of-date images, contact details or even an incorrect location doesn’t just look amateurish — it means your customers can’t find you when they need to.

 

Avoid Targeting Irrelevant Locations

Exclude locations from your PPC campaign to avoid wasting money on customers outside your local areas. Obviously, if you ship your product around the country or world, you can still be marketing on a wider scale.

Otherwise, when you want to reach local buyers only, refine your target locations for a more cost-effective strategy.

 

Work with a Professional Team

Nett Solutions is an Orange County digital marketing agency committed to helping businesses of all sizes reach your goals.

We’ll work with you to create a bespoke PPC campaign targeting your local audience for maximum impact.

Want to learn more? Just get in touch with our friendly, hard-working team for your FREE marketing analysis!

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Making the Most of Ad Extensions for Better Marketing

Making the Most of Ad Extensions for Better Marketing

nettsolutions

You want to reach as many customers as you can. That’s an obvious element of any effective marketing campaign.

But are you doing everything in your power to achieve better results?

If you’re not using extensions in your PPC ads, the answer may be a resounding ‘no’.

Extensions are a simple but impactful way to increase ads’ appeal and reach a bigger audience. In this post, we’ll take a closer look at what they are, how they work and how you need to take advantage of them for better results.

 

Expanding Your Ads’ Power

Ad extensions give you the chance to inject extra details into your ads beyond the headline and copy. Implementing multiple extensions increases your ads’ ability to stand out from others and encourage clicks.

Ad extensions reveal more about your business, your products / services, and your site too. Using the following types of ad extensions can make a big impact on your paid marketing:

 

Sitelinks

A sitelink is simple: it’s a link to a specific page on your website. You can use these to promote sales, popular products or special events.

For example, if you’re hosting a one-off webinar in the coming weeks, you can include a sitelink to the respective page inviting prospects to sign up for it. Obviously, this should be relevant to the ad and appear as an organic element rather than a forced promotion.

Location Extensions

Adding location extensions to your ads gives searchers clear details on how to find your business or the branch nearest to them.

These also show the company isn’t online-only and may prompt them to visit in person. Research supports this: 78 percent of local-mobile searches lead to offline sales.

Call extensions

A call extension is a direct way to communicate with your customers. You can include a phone number for your local or main base, reducing the time it takes for searchers to get in touch.

These are most effective on mobile ads as customers are already on their smartphones and in a position to call you. Call extensions are especially helpful if your business is targeting local buyers rather than a wider audience.

Review Extensions

Want to show prospects all the nice things people have said about you?

You can include third-party feedback / coverage in your ads using review extensions. These boost your company’s credibility and may help you secure searchers’ trust sooner than you might otherwise.

 

Creating a Bespoke Advertising Campaign for Your Business

Want to launch a tailored PPC campaign for your company?

Our Orange County digital marketing team leverages ad extensions and other effective techniques to maximize your ads’ impact. Get in touch now and we’ll give you a FREE marketing analysis!

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Yelp Advertising in Orange County

nettsolutions

We’re excited to announce that Nett Solutions is a Yelp Advertising Partner. We’re
now able to support and manage Yelp Ads campaigns for all of our clients – both large and
small.  We have special rates that we can pass on to you as well as reporting and management
tools!  Keep reading to find out why you should pay attention to your business’ Yelp pages and
where you can learn more about Yelp.
Why is Yelp Important?

  • Yelp is a transactional platform consumers visit when they’re looking to purchase
    from a local business.
  • In the U.S., Yelp had 94.3M unique visitors on desktop and mobile and is the 20th
    most-visited internet property for desktop and mobile combined.*
  • According to Nielsen, consumers rank Yelp as the #1 review site for finding local
    businesses and 79% of consumers make a purchase within a week after visiting
    Yelp.

What are Yelp Ads?

  • The Yelp Ads program is broken into two parts: Cost-per-click advertising and
    Enhanced Profiles.

    • Cost-per-click advertising is performance-based, so you pay when Yelp users
      click on your ad.
    • The Enhanced Profile upgrades your Yelp Business Page, so you’re able to
      add a call-to-action button, a photo slideshow, and more to your page.

Do Yelp Ads Work?

  • Yelp Ads work for businesses across categories – everything from realtors to auto
    dealers to plumbers, and more! Check out our local and national success stories.
  • You don’t need many reviews to see success from Yelp Ads.
    • Nearly half of Yelp Advertisers have fewer than 5 reviews when they sign
      up.**

We’re looking forward to discussing ways we can help your business use Yelp. Reach out to
us to learn more about how to get started with Yelp Ads.
*ComScore, March 2017
** Methodology Results from 29,836 Yelp Advertisers in the US. Analysis of customer leads was measured from the month
prior to advertising, to the 12th month of the advertising program.

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Good First Impression with Effective Ads

Good First Impression with Effective Ads

nettsolutions

Marketing your niche business isn’t easy. You might face less competition than bigger brands in popular sectors but you still have to actually make an impact to secure those all-important conversions.

That means marketing. Smart, effective, consistent marketing. And one of the most important options open to any niche business is social media.

Here are some must-know tips to get you started.

 

Identify Your Audience

You should have a clear grasp of who your target audience is before you start marketing on social media. If you don’t, you could waste a lot of time and money throwing ads out to people who just don’t care how great your niche goods are.

Take advantage of Facebook’s Lookalike Audience tool to narrow your marketing reach. Twitter’s Tailored Audience lets you turn engagement into valuable marketing opportunities too. Do your research: look into what’s available and how it helps.

 

Reach Out to Influencers for a Little Boost

Niche businesses can receive some much-needed help from influencers. They might not generate $500 million for you like Cristiano Ronaldo did for Nike, but it’s still a smart move.

Working with individuals who have a lot of followers likely to take an interest in your products or services is a popular social marketing tactic. See if you can scoop a recommendation or two, whether you need to pay them or offer freebies instead.

 

Encourage Facebook Reviews

Invite customers to create honest reviews on Facebook: star ratings and a few sentences about your products, services, customer care, prices etc. lend real credibility to your niche business.

The more reviews you get, the better your business will look. First-time buyers may find the encouragement they need to convert when they see multiple solid ratings.

Just be sure you resist the urge to create fake reviews yourself: assume your consumers are smart enough to know when something doesn’t ring true.

 

Be Smart: Limit Your Network Choice

Running your niche business probably means long days, keeping multiple plates spinning and just trying to stay on top of everything you need to do to stay in the black.

So, be careful to not spread yourself too thin when diving into social marketing. Trying to run accounts on as many social networks as you can might be too much too soon.

Instead, focus on making the most of just one or two. Do a little research to find out where your target audience tends to be most active and really engages with businesses.

 

Trust the Professionals to Help Drive Success

The next key point to bear in mind: don’t take on more than you can handle. You have enough of a challenge growing your niche business and securing a foothold in the market without trying to navigate the complexities of social marketing yourself.

Trust professional marketing experts to handle your social marketing instead. Our Orange County digital marketing agency has the tools, the talent and the experience to bring your niche business to a bigger audience.

Want to know more? Have questions about how we can up your digital marketing game? Just get in touch now!

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