Creating a Content Marketing Strategy

Most businesses already know how important social media is. They are already aware of how crucial having good practice of social media can help lead their business to be better. But there’s a problem: not all of them know how to implement things so they can practice what they believe in. For some businesses, the problem actually lies when they try to create good content that will strike their audience on social media positively. If you’re wondering how you’ll be able to make the most out of your content strategy, it’s important that you know just how crucial it is for your business.

So What Exactly is a Content Marketing Strategy?

Think of it this way– it’s your guiding light that you should follow in terms of your planning, production, promotion and measurement of content for your business. If you want to be successful with your content marketing efforts, you also have to take the time to create a solid strategy that you believe will work for your brand. While it could be pretty heavy work in the beginning, it could reduce your workload in the future, thus making your content more effective. And how do you do that? Follow these tips to help you create a content marketing strategy:

Obtain Support from Stakeholders

First of all, keep in mind that content marketing is not just a short-term thing. It’s a long-term commitment that will require you to continuously collaborate and engage with your team members so that your efforts will succeed. If you have an executive team deciding for the business, it’s important that you sell the idea to them before anything else. Once they agree to the voice of the content marketing strategy, you’ll know that you are doing something right with your campaign.

The main reason why you need to get support from the executives of the business is so you can get the funds needed to implement your content strategy. At the same time, this will help you know that there is a commitment from them to fully implement the strategy to see just how well it would benefit the business.

Know Your Audience

Another thing you have to remember about content marketing is that you should know who your audience is. Content marketing is not about selling your products or services. It’s all about entertaining, educating, and informing your readers. This way, you’ll be able to earn their trust over time. By knowing who your audience is and what they are interested in, you’ll be able to determine how viable your current content is and what you’ll need to do to gain their attention.

Take a Customer-Centered Approach

It’s extremely important that you focus on and address what your audience wants. This is why you need to do your research and look for information that’s currently available so you can supply what’s missing. One way you can do this is to investigate social media such as blog and forums. Try to see how your audience is interacting through the use of tools so you’ll be able to collect data needed to help you create useful content. You can also conduct a survey on your customers so you know just what type of information they need from a company such as yours.

Have a Good Content Formula

You’ve already established that content marketing is about building trust between you and your customers. By doing so, they’ll be able to solve issues that are important to them. You can customize your content in a way where you engage with influencers, decision-makers and stakeholders to know what else is missing in your content. And at the same time, they’ll help promote your business since they were tapped to be a guest.

Plan Your Editorial Calendar

A good content marketing program starts with an editorial calendar that has been carefully planned. After all that you’ve researched and created, it’s time for you to execute and implement your content. Through the editorial calendar, you’ll be able to carefully create the content in a way that it doesn’t go against one another.

Make Use of Tools to Analyze Your Strategy

When you were still gathering information for your content marketing strategy, you made use of tools to help you out. In the same way, you should also make use of tools to gauge just how successful your strategy is doing. This will be a big help for you to know if you’re doing something right and to pinpoint what that is. Don’t be afraid to use tools for your content marketing. You’ll realize that this is actually one of the best ways you can get the help you need.

As a business owner, you need to know how to make the most out of your content marketing strategy so you can fully implement your business. Follow these tips to help you achieve this. If you need more help, contact gotcha! to learn more about our expert content marketing services.

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Social Media Marketing : Secrets and Lies

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.

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Mobile Only Checklist: What Does Your Business Need?

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.

Mobile Marketing

Top 5 Facebook Business Page Mistakes

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.

AllMobile Marketing

Mobile-Friendly vs. Mobile-Optimized Websites

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

AllDigital Marketing

Improve Your SEO Now With 5 Easy Tips

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.

AllContent Marketing

Email Etiquette

Let’s get back to the basics. In a world where keyboards have replaced the mighty pen, there’s still a place for email etiquette. Before you shoot off thousands of emails to your contacts or subscriber list, make sure you’re respecting their time, while representing your company with class.

Choose Your Subject Carefully to Avoid the Trash Pile

The subject of your email will make or break it, and determine whether or not someone will even open it, or discard it. Make your subject purposeful and relevant to the content you’re sharing and avoid clever marketing ploys, which will only irritate your reader. Avoid using all caps, all lowercase, and poor grammar. Your subject line makes the first impression.

Practice Professionalism in Your Correspondence

Work emails are supposed to be professional. Avoid sending offensive jokes or irrelevant emails to your colleagues. If you’re using business owned equipment, keep it mind your employer will frown upon the misuse of company time and supplies. Internal emails are a serious issue. If you want to be treated with respect from your coworkers, you must practice professionalism on the job whenever you correspond.

Addressing the Recipient

How do you address an individual you just met? While many people quickly assume a first name is suitable, it’s proper etiquette to wait until your new contact requests a first name basis, for example he might state “You can call me Joe.” In the beginning of all correspondence, email etiquette includes using a formal salutation.

Avoid Misspelling Names

It takes just a second to check your recipient’s name and spelling.

Use the Blind Copy Option When Necessary

If you’re sending a bulk email to recipients who do not know each other, it is common email etiquette to use the blind copy option in the address fields, so that you’re not sharing their name and private email addresses to the rest of your contacts.

Avoid Reply All

Have you ever been caught in a texting chain of messages, none of which matter to you? Reply all is the same thing. Unless you want everyone to read your message, be sure to carefully select the appropriate reply option and don’t send to everyone unless necessary.

Get to the Point

Successful email marketing is targeted and gets right down to business. Don’t waste your reader’s valuable time by beating around the bush to say what needs to be said. Short sentences and short paragraphs are easier to read, and much faster too. The less time a reader has to invest his time reading, the more time he can use making an important buying decision.

Don’t Over-punctuate

Over-punctuating your sentences makes them cumbersome to read. Although you may hope that your reader feels your excitement through multiple exclamation marks, if you choose the proper words and format your sentences correctly, very little punctuation is necessary.

Add Links

The main purpose of your email correspondence might be to gain more business and make a sale. Don’t forget the importance of adding links within the body of your email message. At the end of your message you should provide that call to action and also close your email with the necessary contact information.

Why Email Etiquette Matters

Email etiquette matters because people’s time is valuable. In addition, it can be difficult to allow your humor or intent to correctly flow through words alone. Establishing a set of email etiquette rules for yourself will help guide you in the process of communicating with your partners and colleagues in a positive manner that encourages loyalty.

From the beginning to the end of your email message, proper email etiquette ensures your work ethic and professionalism shine.

AllMobile Marketing

Facebook Live and the End of Television

An anchor sits at a desk on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, talking with guests about the future of Facebook. The cameras pan and switch between shots, broadcasting in an eye-pleasing wide frame.

It would be easy to mistake the broadcast for a CNBC TV show, except for the big piece of cheese sitting on the middle of the desk. This is Cheddar, the first startup betting on Facebook’s embrace of live video as the next big thing.

Cheddar was founded by Jon Steinberg, who previously served as chief operating officer and president of BuzzFeed. It’s a business-focused, video-first media operation that broadcasts live five days a week for up to an hour. It plans to expand to eight hours a day by the end of the year.

Its content will appear on platforms aside from Facebook, but it’s clear Steinberg sees the social network, and particularly its Live platform, as the beginning of the end of TV.

“It’s going to replace live television,” Steinberg said. “I think it’s the opportunity of a lifetime for new entrants.”

Steinberg admits that might be a bit optimistic, but he has a point. It’s tough to find anybody who is willing to bet that Facebook Live definitely won’t be the wave of the future in media — particularly after a week in which CEO Mark Zuckerberg made it a centerpiece of this week’s big developer conference.

Then again, just about anything Facebook wants to do could change the media world.

And the rest of the media world is maybe kinda over it.

Facebook [fill in the blank] could change the entire media industry.

First Facebook pushed publishers to embrace branded pages and social reader apps. Later came an emphasis on visuals. More recently, it was all about Instant Articles and in-feed (but mostly soundless) video.

This month, it’s live video.

Nobody doubts the power of Facebook as a kingmaker. Its audience — and, perhaps more importantly, its willingness to control what that audience is shown — are unmatched. Zuckerberg could wake up one day and decide that interpretive dance was the way of the future, and media companies would have to at least give it a try.

So when he took the stage at Facebook’s F8 conference this week to announce that Live was not only a priority, but now completely open to any live video (hint: make it prettier), it was received with a mixture of cautious optimism and hard-earned weariness. You could almost hear the media companies respond in unison with: Sure, why not.

In conversations with a variety of media executives, the message was relatively uniform: Yes, we are investing in this, but we really hope that there’s a plan.

“Overall I think we’re really looking forward to Facebook articulating the monetization plans just so we as publishers can plan how to invest on the platform,” said Sarah Iooss, senior vice president of business development at Viacom.

Concerns about monetizing Facebook go beyond Live. The allure of Facebook’s massive reach helped boost companies like BuzzFeed — and yes, Mashable — and convince investors that their brands would soon supplant the old guard as the media titans of tomorrow.

That might still be true, but Facebook’s sluggishness to figure out how to help media companies make money in the near term has deflated expectations. In a quote that could be applied to most of the digital media industry, one source told Re/code about BuzzFeed: “They’re driving in the dark at 60 miles an hour, without headlights…but that’s still better than standing still.”

Facebook has provided some light at the end of that dark tunnel. Media executives who spoke to us on background said their own interactions with Facebook had indicated that Live would indeed have a payoff.

Facebook declined a request for an interview, but it noted in a statement that the company will “be working closely with these partners to learn from them how we can build the best Facebook Live experience and explore with them potential monetization models.”

One source at Facebook who agreed to speak on the condition on anonymity said the goal was to quickly monetize Live, with its willingness to pay some producers, including Mashable, BuzzFeed and the New York Times, an indication of Facebook’s priorities.

Facebook won’t pay media companies forever, but it’s a small taste of what could be on the way.

Penny for your live stream?

To be clear: Every major media organization you can think of has already done a Facebook Live video, and most of them are planning to do a lot more.

What will they look like? To start, most TV companies seem to want to avoid doing TV.

“We are not doing CNN TV on Facebook,” said Andrew Morse, general manager of CNN Digital Worldwide. “I think it’s an interesting opportunity, but I don’t look at it as an opportunity to do broadcast television.”

Fine, it’s not TV, but it’s pretty close. Fusion launched a broadcast-quality program on Facebook, “The Chris Gethard Show.” E! has announced a daily talk show. And CNN has a handful of shows in the pipeline.

As for what’s been popular online, the first truly viral hit came from BuzzFeed with its already infamous watermelon video. The stream received more than a 750,000 concurrent viewers and now has more than 10 million total views.

Ya gotta believe…

For all the frustration over Facebook once against moving the goal posts, there are some indications that this is the real deal.

“Facebook’s roots are a social network, but it aspires to be a full-blown media and communications company.”
For one, Zuckerberg himself is said to have placed the highest priority on the project, having reportedly been “obsessed” with building it out.

The eventual goals of Facebook also fit nicely with live video. Jessica Liu, a senior analyst at Forrester, noted that the broader ambitions of Facebook are well served by live video.

“Facebook’s roots are a social network, but it aspires to be a full-blown media and communications company,” Liu said.

“Currently, they have the community, publishers, and ad content. If they want to challenge the TV industry, they would need to successfully incorporate original programming, network programming, and major live events… and marry that programming with their user community.”

That community is key to making the Facebook Live experience better than regular TV.

“This would create a unique live viewing plus live social commentary experience that the broader TV industry can’t deliver,” Liu said.

Right now, Live is just video that shows up in your news feed, but some see the potential for more.

Jigar Mehta, vice president of digital operations for Fusion, noted that Facebook has developed a habit of spinning off successful product.

“Right now it’s starting off in the feed, but I could see a future where it’s driving another experience kind of the way Messenger is driving another experience,” Mehta said.

As for Steinberg and Cheddar, he said watching Facebook Live develop has been like seeing a highway built in front of him as Cheddar was on the production line.

With Facebook Live, he sees a focusing of the tremendous power that the social network has to level the playing field. He’s already attracting thousands of concurrent viewers, hundreds of comments and plenty of prominent guests who are eager and willing to appear on his not-quite-TV show. And it’s just week one.

This is only the start of how Facebook is going to change TV and how people consume live video — as long as it still wants to.

“Nobody’s going to have a cable box, and you’re going to watch on-demand programming and that’s going to be Cheddar,” he said. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

Author credit: JASON ABBRUZZESE

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Red Flag Tips for Avoiding Shady SEO Providers

There’s shady people all over the world. That doesn’t mean you necessarily want to do business with them. While it’s normal for businesses to operate with the bottom dollar in mind, some will go to great extents to protect themselves at your expense. Don’t get taken advantage of while you wander into the world of digital marketing.

We stole (*not shady) the following tips from Search Engine Land’s Greg Gifford. These are the 10 red flags you should look out for. We’d make a list ourselves but that looks sorta shady and all. (And let’s face it- Greg seems like a pretty cool guy.)

Greg Gifford’s Red Flag Tips for Avoiding Shady SEO Providers

Maybe I should have used an image of me jumping on a soapbox, because I’m about to preach.
Spring conference season is in full swing, and I’ve had my mind blown several times already — not from amazing presentations (although there were several), but from conversations with business owners and newbies in the marketing world.

Case in point: At an automotive conference, I talked to a dealer who had deleted his dealership’s Facebook and Twitter accounts on the advice of his SEO provider. He said they told him it wasn’t good for him to have an open forum where customers could say whatever they wanted about his business. I pointed out that the customers would still be out there, even if his dealership wasn’t… and he agreed! He said he thought that sounded weird, but he shrugged and figured his SEO guy knew what he was doing.

I’ve talked to far too many business owners this spring who feel like they’re getting fleeced by their SEO providers. I’ve talked to far too many marketers who have just started off in the field who don’t know how to judge the value of the work their employer provides. Those conversations are scary, and they’re happening far too often.
I thought I’d take a look at some red flags and warning signs with this week’s article here. While I’m stepping up on my soap box to preach, I’m also taking a step back and looking at the SEO industry without any preconceived notions.

(Note: Yes, most of us are legitimate SEOs and marketers who know what we’re doing and do everything we can to help our clients. This post isn’t meant for y’all — sorry. This post is for the business owners and the noobs in the industry.)

Following are 10 red flags which signal that you may be dealing with a shady SEO provider….

1. Low quality, duplicated content

I talked to a dealership that suspected their content was just phoned in by their provider. Their blog was packed with “Honda Civic AC Repair in (city), (state)” posts — and there was a version for every car in their lineup. In total, we’re talking 15 or 16 posts, all exactly the same. The only thing different was the model of the car.
And it gets better! They had taken those 15 posts and used them all again, for around 20 different cities — 300 blog posts, all exactly the same, just with a few keywords substituted in each one.

Obviously, this was bad news. If you suspect you’re getting cruddy recycled content, copy a sentence from a post and search for it in Google inside of double quotes so you only see exact matches. If you’re like this dealer and see more than 42,000 exact matches, you know you’re in bad shape.

2. Lazy, outdated tactics

I had a fun conversation at SMX West with a few attorneys. One of them was telling me that their new SEO provider sent their website guy a list of requests (They had never asked for access to WordPress, which is a bad sign all on its own). The requested title tag was nearly 30 words long, and they had at least 35 cities listed in the META KEYWORDS.

They had also requested that all but the first sentence of the home page be hidden behind a “read more” link.
If you’re reading Search Engine Land, then you’ve got access to a wealth of information about SEO best practices. If something seems shady or outdated, some simple checks online with trusted sources can help you confirm or deny your suspicions.

3. All you get is blog posts
If your provider’s entire SEO strategy is simply providing blog posts, that’s obviously bad news bears for your business. Clearly, there’s so much more to making your website a relevant resource than sharing a bunch of blog posts. Blogs are an important element, but they’re just one piece of a much larger pie.

4. Artificially lowered bounce rate
Sure, your bounce rate can be a good engagement signal, but it shouldn’t be your “be all, end all” metric. Far too many business owners obsess over their bounce rate when there are much more legitimate metrics for SEO success.

At the last SMX West before he went on hiatus, Matt Cutts said something in an open Q&A that’s stuck with me ever since. When someone asked about their bounce rate, he told them that if their call to action was a phone call, they wanted a high bounce rate. If they were driving users to make a call, then a high bounce rate could mean that users were converting and then leaving.

If your SEO provider promises a drastically lower bounce rate, you should ask them what they’re doing. Many times, they’re simply adding a script that pings Google Analytics every four or five seconds that a user is on a page. BOOM! The bounce rate is magically lowered — but not because the content is engaging or because customer behavior has changed.

5. A la carte SEO services

If you’re hiring an SEO provider, you’re doing so because you believe that their expertise will help your business get more visibility online. If they show you a menu of possible services, with everything broken out into individual elements, that’s not a good sign.

You’re hiring them because they’re the expert — they shouldn’t expect that you know exactly what your business needs to gain more visibility in searches. It’s perfectly okay if they have several different packages, but if you’re expected to choose individual components to create your own package, that’s not a good business decision.

6. Guaranteed ranking
I’m not going to dwell on this one, because it’s 2016, and you’ve read this about 327 times before. But hey, if you’re brand new to SEO, here’s the truth:

Nobody can guarantee rankings.

So if your provider is doing it, run away.

7. “Cheap” SEO
SEO can’t be automated — it takes people sitting there, doing the work. That’s not cheap. SEO takes manual work, and it takes time. If you’re paying less than $750 to $1,000 a month for SEO, that’s another bad sign.

8. Setup fees for SEO
If your provider is charging a “setup fee,” ask them why, and what’s included. Setup fees are rare — but sometimes, since there’s more research on the front end of an SEO project, providers try to saddle new clients with a setup fee.

It’s likely that they’re just asking for extra money because they can. If they’re charging a setup feeand your first month’s service fee, they’re not doing any extra work that first month, compared to what they do the following months.

9. No access to Google Analytics
If your provider sets up Google Analytics for your site but refuses to give you access, you need to run away as fast as you can. There’s zero reason why your provider should deny you access to the analytics for your own website. Yes, this sounds crazy to most of us, but it happens all the time.

On the flip side of the coin, if you start working with a new provider that doesn’t ask for access to your Google Analytics, you should run just as fast. Without access to your analytics, they have no idea what’s going on with your website — so how can they be optimizing for better traffic?

10. No monthly reporting

Your provider should absolutely be providing a monthly SEO report. I talked to several providers at a recent automotive conference who were using a large, well-known provider who only produced quarterly reports. Since that was the only provider they’ve ever used, they didn’t know any better.

I’ve also had a lot of people tell me that their SEO reports only show keyword rankings. In today’s world of localization and personalization, keyword ranking reports are worthless as an SEO success metric. Your reports should always show organic traffic and lead trends over time.

So, those are the most egregious offenses that I’ve run into over the past year or so…. but I’d love to hear from all of you. If you’ve got a great story, please share it on social so we can both laugh AND use the examples to help people avoid the shady providers.

Do you need to fire your current website developer or SEO provider? Contact gotcha! Mobile Solutions today and hire the real deal.

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