Social Media Marketing : Secrets and Lies

Posted on by Chris Jenkin

While many businesses already understand the importance of having a social media strategy, others might argue that social media marketing is a trend without any real return on investment. There’s a little bit of truth to both. Take a look at the following social media marketing truths and secrets before you embark on building your social presence.

The Road Is Long

The social media road is long and cumbersome. There is no such thing as an overnight success, and it can take a significant amount of time before you see (if ever) any financial return from investing in it. While it might not cost much to build your social profiles, there are other things to consider that will cost both money and time in the long-run. If you’re expecting something that brings sales overnight and makes you a viral success, social media is not the answer.

You Only Get a Peek

The most difficult aspect of building a successful social media presence is actually in understanding your page guests and their behaviors. The problem is, social media only gives you a peek inside of who they are and what their interests are. There’s really no way to really track if they visited similar businesses as your own, or made a purchase outside of your website. The initial demographic reports will help you understand your audience, but it won’t tell you why they chose not to buy from you.

You Have to Maintain It

Posting on social media is a regular, if not daily, effort. In order to keep your brand afloat you will need to devote several hours per week on social media. In the beginning of launching a start-up that might seem feasible. Over time you might get burned on in writing fresh content that matters.

Managing the Workload

When it comes to managing your social media workload you might end up hiring a social media manager or a content writer who will create an editorial calendar and post blogs on a weekly basis. These blogs will help Google find your page and in turn you might rank higher in search results. Because your blog is constantly updated, your business page appears active and authoritative in the industry.

When you can no longer devote the time to writing for you web page, you’ll need to factor in the costs of hiring experts for the job. The problem is, social media marketing will never make you rich. You may never see much return from investing in hiring a social and content writing team. You will, however, have a business webpage and social presence that shows the world more about your brand, and that slowly builds a reputation. If you’re patient, social media marketing can be one of the most rewarding aspects of your brand strategy.

You Need Knowledge

Identifying your social audience takes emotional intelligence. If you hire a manager, they’ll likely begin to analyze your site visitors and try to figure out which sorts of posts and updates receive the best response. The problem is this will take time, and you’ll likely have more fails than success in the beginning.

Beyond understanding the demographics of your guest, you need to identify what makes them buy, or walk away from a purchase. You’ll also need to figure out what makes them “click” to read more. This is exactly why it takes time to build a presence on social media, especially one that carries any sort of return.

What Channels Should You Choose?

It’s always best to keep things simple, especially when you might be juggling your social media management with all the other aspects of your business. When you begin building portfolios for your brand, you’ll need to determine which ones will be the most worthy of your time.

Rather than hopping all over the place, you’ll need to evaluate where most of your customers are active, and then use those platforms to connect with your audience. This might mean adapting to other social platforms such as Instagram or Twitter.

It Costs Money

The last dirty little secret about social media marketing is that it costs money. Sure, everything is free in the beginning, but overtime you will be limited in your organic reach, and it will cost your company money if you want to be shown in reader’s search results. You also might decide to pass the buck and hire a creative team to handle the social side of your business. Either way, social media marketing costs money.

But it’s worth every penny.

Because when someone visits your page and clicks on your blog they should be able to read something relevant and recent. Just like this.

Now you know why social media marketing is important, so we won’t bother you with the lies. For what it’s worth social media is just something your brand has to do. Before you hire a social manager, make sure they aren’t making too many promises.

Do you need assistance navigating the world of social media marketing? We’re butterflies. Contact gotcha! Mobile Solutions today and send us a tweet.

Mobile Only Checklist: What Does Your Business Need?

Posted on by Chris Jenkin

There’s no denying the fact that people use their smartphones so much that they rely on it for the things they need. But apart from individuals, business owners swear that mobile phones have greatly impacted how they conduct their business. As a matter of fact, studies show that over 80 percent of small business owners now use their smartphones at least once per day. Shockingly, more than one-fourth of that number use their device once an hour. This just goes to show how important our smartphones have become.

As a business owner it’s best that you take advantage of mobile so you can get the benefits it provides to other businesses. If you are interested, these are the things you need to provide to make sure that your mobile marketing becomes a success:

Responsive Web Design for Mobile

One of the things you have to realize is that your identity on your website is the first thing that new customers get to see about you. Especially if they only searched for you online, your web presence is the first thing that will either make or break their ideas of what your business is all about. Knowing this, you have to make sure that when a prospective customer sees you, he will be interested in what you have to offer. And for this, you have to make sure that your website loads quickly and is responsive to mobile devices and navigations.

This is because majority of people use their mobile phones to look for your business. If your website takes a while to load and is difficult to navigate, there is a huge chance they will leave and never come back.

Mobile App

Commonly, mobile apps are famously used for games and social media. But this does not mean that you cannot build an app for your business. When you create an app for your business, it becomes an extension of what you are offering. Through an app, you get to reach out to your customers with more information, exclusive deals and other promotions that will make it better and easier for them to get in touch with you.

Before you decide to create an app for your business, make sure that you carefully study the different behavior of your customers. This way, you’ll be able to create an app that works with what they need from your company. For example you own a bank, you can create an app that directly leads them to your online banking services. Through this, they will be pleased that it is easier for them to use your service instead of visiting your website from a browser.

User Friendly Mobile Ads

When you decide to have your company advertised, you have to remember that it is best that you follow the basic principles of your web design. It should be user-friendly and mobile responsive since most of your customers will be looking at it through a small screen. You can invest in mobile ad options such as video, native and banner. These things will help identify the preference of your audience. On your end, it will deliver a campaign that your users prefer and you will get to understand this. In the future, you can also use the same channel to market your business.

Invest in Social Media Marketing

As a business owner, you need to identify the different social media platforms that best fit into your business. Depending on what your product is, it is good to use social media to help you address the needs of your customers. Some of these websites include Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, or even Snapchat.

But just because these websites are free to use, does not mean you should use all of them. Instead, only go for the ones that you will be able to fully use for your business. This means that you can use the social media site to check in and engage with your followers. You can use these websites to offer exclusive deals so that you can increase the number of people that follow you.

When you decide to make your business mobile-friendly, you’ll get to see the many benefits that other businesses are enjoying. It’s still not yet too late to implement a mobile solution for your business. It doesn’t require a rocket scientist to do this but you do need to make sure that you’re using these tools right. Need help? We gotcha! covered. Contact our professional team today.

Top 5 Facebook Business Page Mistakes

Posted on by Chris Jenkin

There’s no doubt that Facebook plays a huge importance for businesses trying to reach their customers. Considering there is 1.65 billion monthly active users on Facebook, it pays to make use of this social media tool to help a business promote itself. Because of this, there are individuals who are tasked to handle the social media accounts of the company to ensure that they get their message across properly.

However, it is unfortunate to know that not everyone does it right. There are still a number of individuals who are not properly utilizing Facebook to help their brand prosper. The fact of the matter is that everybody thinks they can handle social media easily. But as soon as they start doing so, they realize that there’s actually a big difference between handling your personal Facebook account and a page for a brand.

Experts believe that there’s actually a science and art to posting on Facebook. By eliminating the common mistakes people do on Facebook, you can start understanding the beauty behind this social media site. If you work as a social media manager and you want to avoid making the common mistakes people do on Facebook, make sure that you know these things:

No. 5 Facebook Business Page Mistake: Posting too much text

Let’s get one thing clear, a Facebook post is not meant for long paragraphs of text. It is not a blog post or an entire news article. Some of your followers could get turned off upon seeing a bulk of text that they have to scroll through to go to the next post. And when this happens, they’ll end up skipping whatever it is you’re saying and totally missing out the reason for the post. In some cases, these followers could even unfollow your page just so they don’t have to encounter the same type of post.

Whenever you post on Facebook, you have to remember to include small bite-size pieces of information they can easily digest from the post. Your followers want to know the gist of your post right away. And if they’re interested, they can just click on a link to get more details. A good practice is to follow Twitter’s 140-character limit even when you’re posting on Facebook.

No. 4 Facebook Business Page Mistake: Promoting your business or product too much

The main reason why your business is on Facebook in the first place is so you could promote it along with your products. However, this does not mean you should bombard your followers with posts that only talk about this. Although this strategy could work for a while, it does not mean that it will work every single time. Your followers could end up getting annoyed that they will unfollow your page.

The thing is, it’s okay to post about your business and products through your posts. However, the trick here is to do it in a way that you’re being creative, and ditch the pitch. Instead of directly talking about a product you are trying to sell, it would be better if you offer valuable information to them or you entertain them. You’ll find that this is more effective compared to directly promoting your products.

No. 3 Facebook Business Page Mistake: Posting at the wrong time and insufficiently

Another important trick to know about posting on a Facebook page is the right time to post. The good news is that there are now tools you can use to schedule posts in advance so you no longer have to do it in real time. At the same time, you have to make sure that these posts are time accurate and not too late. Otherwise, you’re posting something that’s no longer relevant to your followers.

In the same sense, it can be quite disappointing to find a Facebook page that has no activity for the past year. No matter how legitimate your business is, you still need to find time to let your customers know that your business is still ongoing. The best way you can do this is to come up with a content strategy and to be sure to post at least once a day. Remember that if you’re not posting, no one gets to find your company on social media.

No. 2 Facebook Business Page Mistake: Focusing on getting likes too much

In hindsight, having a lot of likes on your Facebook allows you to reach more people at once. But that’s it. Sure, there are days they get entertained by one or two posts you’ve made and they’d click on the like or share button. But when it comes to the business side of things, they’re actually too far away from it. In fact, your followers may even be on the other side of the planet. Even though you have a lot of likes on your page, it doesn’t mean that each one will convert into business for you.

This is why it is important that you avoid asking people to like and share your page. As a business, it will make you sound like you are begging for interest and this will turn off a lot of people. Instead of focusing your attention on getting likes on your page, find more ways you can share engaging posts. This is a better way you can generate genuine interest in your business.

No. 1 Facebook Business Page Mistake: Responding unprofessionally to negative feedback

Always remember that Facebook is an interactive platform where people can exchange ideas. Whenever you publish a post, you are giving people an opportunity to comment on it, positively and negatively. If you happen to receive a complaint on your page, the best thing to do is to keep calm and respond in a courteous manner. Always be thoughtful when you are responding but do so with a personal tone.

When someone leaves a negative comment on your page, think of it as a way to improve on that aspect of your business. At the same time, this helps give your followers an idea that their opinion matters and that there is more to your business than just sales.

Facebook is very useful to market your business online. How you use it, however, plays a crucial part in your success.

Mobile-Friendly vs. Mobile-Optimized Websites

Posted on by Chris Jenkin

There’s a lot of questions about the differences between mobile-friendly vs mobile-optimization vs responsive design for websites. These questions include:

What is a mobile-friendly website?
What is mobile-optimization?
What is responsive design?
What are the differences of all of the above?
Where does mobile first design fit in?
What is the best design strategy for my website?

The goal of this article is to answer all of these questions, plus a few more along the way.

For clarity’s sake, when referring to say mobile or mobile device, we are referring to devices that are the approximate size and shape of most smartphones (mobile phones).

Ok, let’s hop to it!

Mobile-Friendly Websites

Google’s search rankings now emphasize and reward mobile-friendly websites. Many people may think that having a mobile-friendly website is good enough, and for Google’s robots it is! But this is not necessarily good enough for the visitors coming to your website. In short, mobile-friendly is the bare minimum mobile design strategy you should have for your mobile visitors.

If you aren’t sure if your website is mobile-friendly, then check-out Google’s webmaster tool. A mobile-friendly website is often just a slimmed down version of the website viewed on a desktop.

For example, as a general rule your content should be written in at least 14 or 16 pt font. It seems big, but when it gets shrunk down anything less will be hard to read. Hard to read ≠ mobile-friendly.

Mobile-friendly websites will work for mobile users, but these websites were designed for the desktop users. A smaller version of your desktop website can be functional but may not be as user friendly as it could be… And this is where mobile-optimization starts to enter the fray.

All mobile-optimized websites are mobile-friendly, but not all mobile-friendly websites are mobile-optimized. Mobile-optimization targets mobile users; these websites are designed for smaller screens.

A mobile-optimized website will reformat itself for mobile users. It is not just a shrunken down version of the desktop website.

Design features of a mobile-optimized website can include:

Single column layout
Easy, simple navigation that is “thumb friendly”
Large graphics with white-space borders for those of us with large or clumsy fingers
Formatted content for maximum readability
Limited to no need for typing
Image file sizes are smaller for the mobile version of the website than those used for the desktop version of the website. (This allows for quicker load times.)
A fewer number of features overall (minimalist, uncluttered design)
Mobile users are much more likely to be searching for a quick answer compared to their desktop search counterparts.

The goal of a mobile-optimized website is to make the website as frictionless as possible for the mobile user. Mobile users are seeking the quickest, most efficient way to answer their questions. Mobile-optimization aims to do exactly that.

Responsively designed websites do exactly as phrase suggest. They “respond” to the screen size of the device being used. In a sense, responsive design picks up where mobile-optimization leaves off.

Responsive design reformats and restructures websites for any device—regardless of screen size. Mobile-optimization only does this for mobile devices. With responsive design, the layout of the website will scale from the smaller screens of mobile, tablets, and small laptops, to the standard desktop screen and even larger widescreen monitors.

Responsive design offers flexibility and great usability on all devices for users. It’s really the only way to guarantee that your website will look good and have optimized usability on any device.

Mobile-First Design Strategy

Mobile-first is a design strategy in which the mobile version of the website is designed first over the traditional desktop version. This design strategy can also apply to products designed for and marketed to mobile users first, ahead of “traditional” internet users.

A lot of design issues come from trying to stuff too many features into a single page. When designing with mobile-first in mind, you tend to get a simpler, cleaner design structure. This works well as a base, because it’s easier to add relevant features into the desktop view as needed, rather than trying to stuff every bell and whistle into a mobile view.

What type of design is best for my business and my website?

The not very helpful answer is “it depends”. Honestly, the answer depends on the answers to the following questions:

What is the purpose of your website?
What do you want your website to do for visitors?
What devices are you expecting your visitors to be accessing your site from?

Websites are meant to take visitors on a digital journey. That journey is supposed to be as smooth and frictionless as possible. The easier you can make navigating your website, the more likely you are to increase conversions.

Also, what is the budget for your website? Mobile-optimized and responsively designed websites are often a little more expensive than mobile-friendly websites. Why? In short, they take longer to develop and build.

In the long run, the extra optimization to functionality and usability offered by a responsively designed or mobile-optimized site will provide you with a higher ROI than a site that is just mobile-friendly. Now, whether or not the expense is justified will have to be evaluated on a business-by-business basis.

On a side note, have you tried to use your business’s website as if you were a customer? What about as a mobile user? Do you know what your mobile site looks like? If you are drawing a blank, or have a panicky uncertain feeling right now, that’s probably not a good indicator.

Consider The Following for Mobile-Friendly vs Mobile-Optimized vs Responsive Design

Is your main customer base cruising your website on a desktop? Then maybe a mobile-friendly website is good enough for you. Google doesn’t penalize you in the search rankings, and you don’t spend extra money on a mobile-optimized or responsively designed website.

On the other hand…
Do you have any kind of e-commerce, blogs, or a customer base that actively uses mobile devices? If this is the case, then you may want to invest in a mobile-optimized or responsively designed website.

Mobile-Optimized and Responsively Designed Websites Can Offer a Creative User Experience

Just because visitors are viewing your website on a smaller screen, doesn’t mean your site has to be boring. Remember mobile users have the ability to take pictures and videos, make phone calls, use GPS for finding things near their location, and so much more!

And this is the beauty of stepping beyond just a mobile-friendly website. There are so many new and different user interface options for visitors NOT using a desktop. Some businesses even have completely different website versions for desktop users versus mobile users.

Think about your visitors. What type of experience do you want them to have using your website? Optimize your website for that experience! Given the possibilities with the internet, saying the sky’s the limit seems almost diminutive.

Ready to update your website? Contact gotcha! Mobile Solutions today.

Originally published on Torspark

Improve Your SEO Now With 5 Easy Tips

Posted on by Chris Jenkin

While it’s always wise to hire a SEO professional for guidance in improving search engine rank, you can improve your SEO now with 5 easy tips (and save some cash).

This list is for the digital marketing do-it-yourselfer. Keep in mind the depths of search are vast and complicated. This entry level guide will give you enough confidence to dive in, and swim.

Start in Production

In the early phase of your website production, you’ll need to carefully determine which keywords are relevant and most popular about your business, goods, and services. These keywords will be part of the original blueprint for your website, and as the developers build your site page by page, these words will be used to name the page urls, which will help improve your overall SEO score, improving the usability and indexing of your site.

When carefully analyzed in the very beginning, this research can be used to create a website that Google loves to share in its top search results. If your website is already developed and you’re suspecting some mistakes might have your rank down, it’s essential you contact an SEO expert, like gotcha! Mobile Solutions, for a free assessment of your website. Our report will reveal crucial errors that could be affecting your website’s traffic and overall visibility.

Optimize Keyword Usage in Design Structure

In addition to building the foundation of the site, core keywords should be implemented throughout all other parts of your website design process. Page designers should be made well aware what focus search terms and words have been selected so that the structured pages can incorporate optimal keyword usage.

Just like the developers who work on the back-end of a website, designers also need to know keywords and direction to inspire their own ideas for the layout and visuals. Work together with your designers to ensure that SEO is drawn right into your website from the very beginning, and you’ll be fast on track for ranking success.

Create a Successful Content Strategy

Moving past the design, you can improve your SEO right now by mapping out an effective content strategy that incorporates correct usage of said keywords throughout the heading tags, images, page content, and blogs.

What does that mean at the moment? It means scour your website from top to bottom and from page to page. Once you have your concrete list of targeted keywords, you can begin to see the gaps in your published material. Don’t be generic when it comes to writing copy, and by all means make every word count.

Ditch any pre-written web text or product descriptions and customize all of your content so that it is packed full of rich keywords, which in turn will help improve your site’s ranking. To add even more value to your site, consider writing a blog. Yes, of course. You’re probably wondering why the heck you need a blog. The short answer is, the more SEO-packed content that you can continually add to your website, the faster your SEO score could improve. When in doubt, focus on writing engaging and evergreen web content that is timeless. Become an expert in your niche so that Google will identify you as such, and you’ll rank higher in search results just by producing frequent and compelling content. If you can’t pen that many words in a week, hire a professional content writer who can. The results will be worth it.

Incorporate SEO in Your Social Media

It’s not all pins and memes. Don’t forget to integrate social media into your successful SEO strategy. After all, social websites are considered search engines, all in themselves. Google will search social pages for signals that a website is active. While links may not improve your social ranking on their own, viral posts can have significant impact and will increase your page visibility.

Social profiles are often the first introduction a potential consumer has to your brand. Keep your social profiles updated and interesting to help boost the engagement on your pages, and to help direct traffic to your website. Increased web flow will organically improve your SEO score.

Hurry Up and Wait

It takes time to improve your SEO ranking, but these 5 do-it-yourself tips will help you save some money, when time is all you have to spend. Small start-ups and at-home businesses can still tackle SEO at-home without having to hire a professional web developer or SEO company. Then again, when you’re ready to expand, you’ll need to incorporate much, much more to continually improve your SEO score and ebb and flow with any upcoming Google updates. Search is always changing. The best way to stay ahead is to make sure your site checks off with each of these SEO tips.

Ready to hire our team of SEO experts? Let us do the work.

Give it your best, and then call gotcha! for the rest.