4 Must-Haves For Every Small Business Website Posted on January 14, 2013 by Lindsey Stroud As a small business, you are facing a lot of competition, especially if you are still establishing presence within your community. People go online to learn about you and your business before they ever walk through the door or pick up the phone to call you. First and foremost, if you do not have a website – you are missing a great deal of opportunities to your competitor who does. Secondly, if you do have a website – there are key things that should exist for you to get the most benefit from having one in the first place. 4 Must-Haves For Every Small Business Website 1. About Us Page People need to find who you are and what your business does quickly, and in one place. If a prospect cannot understand what you can offer them in a short period, they will wander elsewhere. Distinguish in easy-to-understand language who you are, what you offer, and what sets you apart from the competition. Don’t forget to include physical address, phone number, email, and methods for easily contacting you. Nothing is more annoying than not being able to quickly get the contact information for a business. Don’t lose prospects because you didn’t give them a clear way to reach out to you. 2. Social Media Icons Show that you’re engaged with the online community by displaying your social media icons through your home page. Social media is a powerful tool for a small business by itself, and displaying it among the content on your website only doubles the visibility. Gaining a follower on your social media websites promotes long-term relationship building long after the prospect has left your website. 3. Updated Content Can you think of a time when you went on to a website and had to call because you knew the information on the website about their services or hours of operation was out of date? How frustrating! People who visit your website before ever visiting your business judge the time and effort you put in to keeping updated and assume you run your operations in the same way. From now on, assume that prospects are entering your website on an hourly basis so that you never allow your content to go unkempt. 4. Lead Capture Form If you truly want an edge against your competitor, a lead capture form is the place to start. Think of a time you stumbled on a website and wanted to redeem a coupon, free trial, or white paper. You were most likely prompted to enter your name and email address before gaining access to what you were wanting to receive. At this point, the business has traded you something you find of value in exchange for your contact information (something they find valuable). Don’t let a prospect stumble on and off of your website without attempting to capture their contact information. Remember to offer something of value that your business can give in return, as no body likes to give out their contact information for free.
SPAM I Am (Not): Top 5 Questions to Ask Yourself Before Sending an Email Posted on January 11, 2013 by Lindsey Stroud Did you know that SPAM accounts for almost half of all the emails received daily? If you take a look in your SPAM folder, you will most likely find a ton of junk emails compiled, and maybe some even made it into your inbox. You most likely spend time in the mornings sifting through junk email to find the important emails that you need to read. If you do not want to receive SPAM yourself – then make sure you are not creating and distributing SPAM to others. Ask yourself these 5 questions before sending an email out: 1. Do I Know You? The easiest way to prevent looking like a spammer is to know the contacts you are emailing. Have you met the person before? Had a conversation, or completed business with them? These are good things to consider when sending an email to a contact. If you are purchasing mass lists of people you do not know – chances are you are spamming them. 2. Do You Know Me? If you have not been in touch with your contacts in a while, send out a reintroduction email. Provide your contacts with a reminder of who you are and what your business does. Also let your prospects or customers know they will be receiving more emails from you, and you care about their approval. State the benefits of remaining on your list to keep contacts! 3. Is This Subject Line Full of Crap? No-one appreciates an e-mail that reads “free” in the subject line and is anything but. There are ways to sound compelling in the subject line without skewing the truth. Before sending your emails, ask yourself if the subject line accurately conveys the message you are trying to send in the body of the email. 4. Do Others Think I’m a Spammer? A good way to test whether you are appearing as spam is to send emails to your contacts gradually (50-100 contacts a day). This approach will help decide if your list has interest in hearing from you or not. If you notice you marked as SPAM repeatedly in your tests – you either need to tweak your messaging or revise your contact list. 5. Would I Read This Email? As a good rule of thumb before sending an email or newsletter ask yourself, would I want to read this email? If your answer is no, then understand that your contacts most likely will not want to read it either. Keep prospects and customers interested by providing with them content that you sincerely find relevant to their needs and interests (and above all, not boring.)
Anatomy of a Newsletter Posted on January 9, 2013 by Nicci Troiani This birthday newsletter is a great example of how businesses can send a friendly communication to their prospects and customers but also optimize it for business purposes. 1. Sending a communication to a customer or prospect for their anniversaries or birthdays should be standard in industries like insurance. Staying top of mind in necessary, or else the prospect will go elsewhere. 2. Notice how SIG has done a great job promoting all of their social media networks. Just because this is meant to be a friendly communication, that doesn’t mean you can’t add some business in. It works too– I was curious about what an insurance agency would be using Pinterest for, so I looked and followed their boards. 3. Contact information on the e-mail is vital. A friendly communication is still an e-mail to a business connection and should have your phone number, e-mail and website.
Use Multiple Marketing & Sales Channels for Success Posted on January 7, 2013July 1, 2021 by Nicci Troiani With so many ways to market your business and try to make sales, it can seem overwhelming, and a lot of times costly. While it’s easy to fall into a rut and stick to one way of marketing as many small businesses do– that means you aren’t reaching out to your full audience potential and could be missing people who need your service or product. If you aren’t utilizing all of the marketing and sales channels below, you are missing out on many (mostly free) opportunities. 1. Written Content Written content overwhelms many small business owners, but it doesn’t need to be anything scary. You’re an expert in your business which makes you qualified to write about it. It’s free to start a blog and write your own content. If you’re busy, just try to write one blog a week and ask another employee to do the same. The hard part is coming up with the topics, so in your free time, brainstorm a list of 20-30 topics and then you won’t struggle for coming up with one at the last minute. If you want more in-depth content that you don’t have time to write, consider hiring a writer (look at sites like zerys.com or BlogMutt.com as examples). 2. Visual Content Not all businesses have intriguing visual content, but people, in general, are drawn to things that are visually appealing. If you are a retail store or restaurant, pictures of food, clothes, or other products can inspire the prospect to want to purchase. Photos of items like this are great for e-mail newsletters or sites like Instagram or Pinterest. If you are a small business like an accounting firm or insurance agency, most likely images of your products on Instagram are not going to inspire sales. You might have to dig a little deeper and hire someone to create an infographic using stats related to your business to get something visually appealing. 3. Videos Interviews and testimonials make great marketing and sales tools. Ask some of your best clients if they mind being interviewed. Any video content used for marketing/sales purposes should be kept short (think under 3 minutes) so it doesn’t need to be a lengthy, Oscar-worthy production. Promote videos like this across your social media platforms (including Pinterest which allows you to post videos) or in an e-mail campaign. 4. Webinars For businesses that have a lot of competition, educating your prospects is what will set you apart from the rest. Hosting even a 30-minute webinar about some common pains and solutions of your industry will educate your prospects and help them realize that you are there to help, not sell to them. Webinars can be used as link bait as well. Promote the webinar through your social media platforms and make sure you ask for sign-ups to get the contact information. After you have that, you can send the contact other marketing materials. 5. E-mail Campaigns Don’t count out email. It’s extremely cheaper than direct mail and has a higher response rate. Even a monthly newsletter that is informative and educational can help convert leads. An e-mail campaign could be a well-thought-out educational drip campaign over the course of a year or it could be a simple 2 step e-mail campaign telling prospects the benefits of using your business. The possibilities are endless in campaigns and the frequency and content vary depending on your business. 6. Social Media Businesses that aren’t using social media now are going to get lost among those who are. It is a FREE marketing tool and reaches out to people who want to hear what you have to say. However, if you are a small business, developing a following on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest or Instagram will take time and the only thing that will help is consistent posting of your content as well as timely responses back to your audience. If used like that, your social media accounts can become hubs for educational information as well as your number 1 customer service rep.
So You Provide Heating and Cooling Services… Posted on December 31, 2012 by Nicci Troiani You’d like to have more customers, sell more heating and cooling units and sign more annual service contracts. Watch this video to see if Systematic Revenue can help you achieve your dreams! Systematic Revenue for Heating and Cooling from Systematic Revenue on Vimeo.
Blogging Matters! Posted on December 31, 2012 by Lindsey Stroud As a small business owner, you may be intimidated or uncomfortable with the thought of blogging for your business, or maybe you just aren’t sure how to start. Blogging does not have to be a daunting task, but can have a tremendous impact for a small business if done regularly. According to BlogHer, 81% of U.S. online consumers trust information and advice from blogs, and 61% of those consumers have made a purchase based on a recommendation from a blog. What impact does blogging have on your business? People research about your products or services long before they are ready to speak with you People read into conversations forming around products and services to help shape their beliefs People are influenced by the experiences (good & bad) that other people have with products and services Blogging will help you develop deeper, more meaningful relationships with prospects and customers in a community-like atmosphere, and lets you to share expertise in your industry in a more laid-back, conversational fashion. Don’t underestimate the power of a blog – blogging can help a business’s search engine optimization (SEO) tremendously, and can drive more traffic than other methods. What effect does a blog have on SEO? To put this in perspective, let’s say there is a local wine shop. The wine shop owner has a website where prospects and customers can venture on to purchase their favorite wines. However, the wine shop owner also has a blog that is updated weekly with interesting articles related to wine such as, “The Top 5 Wine & Cheese Pairings” or “Best Wines for Beginners.” The wine shop is pushing out new, interesting content online related to wine that people are actively searching for. The wine shop has now attracted a following of readers that share their favorite blog posts on their social media outlets, and Google responds very well to this! The more times the blog post is shared, the higher the content moves in the search rankings. Now, not only has the wine shop has established expertise in their industry, built discussion and readership regarding wine, but is also driving regular traffic to their blog (which links to their website). Blog Traffic = Website Traffic = More Captured Leads = More Sales People value good content and relationships over traditional advertisements and website content now more than ever. Like the wine shop owner – you are the expert in your industry and you have valuable knowledge at your fingertips that people want to know. If you can make a habit to update your business blog with content you either create or leverage from another non-competitor, you can make substantial impact in your industry, and convert more leads into loyal customers over time. So you want to start a blog? www.wordpress.com www.blogger.com
So you’re an Insurance Agent… Posted on December 28, 2012 by Lindsey Stroud As an Insurance Agent – you probably face a challenge with following up with your leads and customers in a relevant and meaningful way on a regular basis. After all, there is only so much time within a day. Does this sound familiar to you? Someone buys an insurance policy from you and rarely hears from you (with the exception of a yearly Christmas card). You generate a quote for a lead that does not buy from you, so you toss them aside to focus on incoming leads. You often wish you had enough time in a day (but don’t) to make phone calls and send emails to follow-up with all of your leads and customers. Systematic Revenue for Insurance from Systematic Revenue on Vimeo.
How to Market — and Save Time Posted on December 26, 2012 by Nicci Troiani For most small to medium sized businesses, learning how to market themselves is a daunting task. The time and money that it is expected to take is overwhelming… but it doesn’t have to be. If you are spending a lot of time or a lot of money (or both), on your marketing efforts, you should re-evaluate your process. There are many tools and methods out there designed for business owners who don’t have the dough to shell out to big marketing agencies or don’t have the time or experience to spend to do their own marketing. 1. Social Media Schedulers Social media is a must for marketing. Not only is it FREE but it’s also where consumers are most influenced by brands. If your business is not utilizing social media, you are missing out on leads. Because it’s new to some people it can be intimidating but learning how to use social media for business doesn’t have to be difficult. There are plenty of resources out there to assist. Part of the struggle with using social media for business is scheduling posts for the right time, possibly multiple times and scheduling it for time that the most people will read it. Depending on your price range, there are many options out there to help you schedule your posts. Here are a couple of popular tools that will help you save time: Hootsuite– This program has a free or pro version (9.99/month). The free account allows up to 5 social media profiles, which is usually sufficient for a small business. Additionally, there are some free reporting features so you can analyze how each post is doing. Sprout Social– Sprout social is a paid option with plans ranging from $39-$99 a month. The $39/month plan allows you to have up to 10 profiles, publish and schedule messages, access reports and analytics, brand monitoring, and customer engagement tools. 2. Blog Writers For many, the hard part of content marketing is the biggest necessity– the content. There are many options out there to help businesses create content on a regular basis: Zerys— Zerys is an online writer marketplace. Price varies based on the project and word count. There are writers available for every industry and any content based project that you can imagine. Blogmutt— For about $80 a month you can actually have the Blogmutt writers write a weekly blog specific to your industry and preferences. The service sends multiple selections and you will get to pick the favorite, send edits and reject the rest. 3. Marketing Automation Software Now that you have your content and your content posting to your social media platforms, you should also be sending your content out via an e-mail campaign. One easy way to do that is to use a marketing automation software. Set up the e-mail templates and put the content into a campaign, let it run on it’s own and check the stats. Using a software like this saves you from sending e-mails one by one or copying and pasting addresses into the Bcc box. It also saves you from retyping e-mails that instead can be housed as templates. Creating campaigns that you can reuse, even a simple following up e-mail and phone call for a sales lead can be a huge time-saver.
3 Reasons to be Thankful for Email Unsubscribes Posted on November 28, 2012 by Nicci Troiani Yeah, Thanksgiving is past us, but shouldn’t we still be giving thanks? How about we try to be thankful for something unexpected… email unsubscribes! Why, you ask? You work hard on your e-mail marketing strategy and seeing people unsubscribe is frustrating but there are a few reasons that we should be Thankful for this group that we really want to feel frustrated towards. 1. They wouldn’t be reading it anyway— Most likely someone has unsubscribed because they either don’t like the information you are sending to them or it isn’t relevant to them. Your goal with your e-mail marketing strategy is to turn leads and prospects into customers. Someone who unsubscribes may not be that potential customer, so you shouldn’t sweat the fact that they unsubscribe. 2. It helps you judge your content— If you get a lot of unsubscribes on one specific campaign or e-mail template, maybe you should take a hint. It’s not good or people don’t like it. Use your unsubscribes to judge which content people don’t like just like you would opens and click through rates to judge how much people like other content. 3. Keeps you on your toes: Readers lose interest and that accounts for a lot of your unsubscribes. This could be a sign that your material is getting redundant or you are getting lazy with your writing. The unsubscribe should be an awakening for you to try to find some fresh, interesting content. The gist here is, yeah, email unsubscribes are maddening, but try to look at who is unsubscribing and why to keep you content relevant and interesting and hopefully increase your readership. Now on to that holiday shopping!….