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Tag: marketing

How to Drive Conversions With the Right Contact Form—And What to Avoid

Your business’ shiny new website just launched and everyone assumed a deluge of fresh new leads would follow. To everyone’s dismay, the predicted deluge turns out to be nothing more than just a trickle. What gives exactly? “Build it and they will come” may ring true with your traffic itself but that quote lacks an “and convert” at the end. In years past, traffic was the key metric for a lot of businesses since it was assumed that those users would appreciate the brand awareness. Fast forward to the present day in the “Silicon Age” where users not converting is sure to set your business behind further than the Bronze Age.

One easy way to convert users into customers is through the usage of a handy-dandy online form, but just having a form doesn’t guarantee a conversion rate anywhere near your industry benchmark. I’m here to help bolster those forms from some boxes into lead machines!

Positioning

Back when there were only brick and mortar buildings, there was always a huge focus on location, location, location. That phrase may seem like it belongs in the Bronze Age, but it instead adapted to the changing times and is still just as important as it was before. The location of your form is integral to the success of any lead collection campaign. Forms should always be placed in a very obvious place and above the fold, which is the portion of a page that initially loads in the screen’s viewport, as often as possible. Having a form in a good location puts it on users’ minds as soon as they visit your website and makes it more convenient to convert. Overlaying the form over a banner image is a good start for more visibility.

Another excellent location for your form is on the sidebar of your site. This allows casual site perusers to convert at their own leisure instead of forcing them to a contact page or trying to lead them back to whatever landing page they entered the site within. One last location for a form is on your contact page, of course. Any site user would expect a way to contact your business on the contact page. In addition to an address, phone number, or email, a contact form is a perfect way to capture visitors’ information and nurture leads to eventually becoming loyal customers of your business.

Layout

Now that you’ve figured out where to place your form, the next step is to create a form that users can easily understand, fill out, and convert on. One big helper that was pointed out in a Google AI test is how users’ eyes focus on form fields. Having your labels above the inside of form fields is preferable to labels next to the form fields. This allows users to better scan the information and breeze through forms quicker, which leads to lower rates of dropout and errors in fields. Speaking of fields, try not to overwhelm your users with a bunch of unnecessary fields for information that can be gathered further down the line. If you aren’t shipping something to someone, why would you require a home address? If you’re sending users a brochure via email, why would you require a phone number? Requiring an excess of information makes users go “hmm…” and abandon the website completely. This is not to say that long forms have no place on the internet, rather every bit of information should be relative to the call to action.

Here at Search Influence, we use our own proprietary lead tracking system to create fully customizable and extremely flexible forms that can keep track of your website leads in an easy-to-read reporting system. With our forms, you’ll know where your leads come from the most and learn how to optimize your campaigns to maximize your lead generation.

Call-to-Action

A “Call-to-Action” (CTA) refers to the phrase that is meant to draw users into completing conversions. In the case of forms specifically, this would be the text that is on the submit button. Hubspot compiled a list of 31 Call-to-Action examples taken from many different corners of the internet and from varying industries. The main takeaway here is your CTA needs to be catchy and draw a user in. “Submit,” which may be seen fairly often around the internet, doesn’t quite cut it anymore. The end of a form should establish some sort of value to a user. Saying “Submit” simply tells the user that you’ll gladly collect their information and may or may not do anything with it.

Having detailed text on the CTA button encourages users that your form is something worthwhile whether they’re about to “Subscribe to our newsletter” or Rover.com‘s “Book your next Rover sitter.” Users want to know the value of giving up their precious personal data, so make sure your form is honest and straightforward with how the users’ data will be used.

Mobile

One factor that can’t be ignored is the impact of mobile users on your website. Considering mobile users surpassed the amount of desktop traffic almost two years ago—eons in internet time—ignoring mobile users is a recipe for failure. What’s even more surprising is that in the same year, even though there were more mobile visits to websites worldwide, mobile users converted almost 65% less than desktop users according to the 2016 Adobe Mobile Retail Report.

Our advantage here is that this data is like, eons old. We’ve progressed since then and have become more accustomed to serving mobile users and Google even recognizes the efforts that developers put in to make their websites mobile friendly and adjusted their search to index mobile sites first. This coupled with the rising magnitude of mobile traffic means that being able to capture leads efficiently on mobile platforms is imperative for any campaign.

At Search Influence, we have everything you need to start a lead generating campaign, from SEO services, digital advertising, social media management, and the capability to track your campaign with pinpoint accuracy. We also practice what we preach; check out the form in the sidebar if you don’t believe us.

August 23, 2018
8 Facebook & Instagram Features You Might Not Know About
Facebook is going cross-country with a free conference, bringing it to 30 cities, including New Orleans! This is part of Facebook’s mission to better educate businesses in using their platform. They state that… “By 2020, we’re committing to provide 1 million US workers and entrepreneurs the digital skills they need to compete in today’s workplace.”

My evaluation is that their goal of this effort is to increase and improve business use of Facebook (and ultimately advertising dollars) and try to make up for their data privacy blunders earlier this year.

Given that 2.07 billion people access FB monthly, and ¾ of those users come back daily, there’s an appropriate way for most businesses to engage with consumers.

I really enjoyed seeing traditional advertising promoting this free event as I drove around New Orleans, from downtown digital billboards to suburban bus stop ads. While it may seem ironic that Facebook would use out-of-home media to promote their conference, it is not that surprising since part of their strategy is likely to reach NEW businesses in addition to improving the skills of those already on the platform.

In case it’s not coming to a city near you, check out these tips from our team of Influencers who attended various sessions!

Build Creative for Mobile

Because 90% of time on Facebook is spent on mobile, businesses must get out their desktop-focused world and think about the screen size of their audience.

One key media type for mobile optimization is video—your typical rectangle, landscape video (16:9 aspect ratio) videos are suboptimal for mobile. Square is better, but the best is to create vertical, full-screen videos—think Snapchat, Instagram Stories, and Facebook Live style.

In addition to it being a more immersive and engaging experience, a key benefit is you aren’t sharing the screen with other content.

If you use Instagram, you may not be surprised to hear that ⅓ of the content that people are engaging with on Instagram is BRAND content!

Thanks to Alison Zeringue & Amanda Ball for this takeaway!

Mobile Creative Doesn’t Have to Be Hard or Expensive

All you need is a phone, lighting and a $20 Amazon tripod (for video) to make something look REALLY nice!

These 10 apps can enable you to enhance your photos and videos on your mobile device, on the fly.

Considering that by 2020, 75% of content on Facebook will be videos, it is time to put on your videographer hat!

Photo Enhancing Apps
1. Adobe Photoshop Express
2. Adobe Spark Post
3. PicLab
4. Plotaverse
5. RIPL
Video Enhancing Apps
1. Videoshop
2. Quik
3. Instagram Stories
4. Boomerang
5. Legend
See here for direct links to these Top 10 Creative Apps.

Remix

The apps above and others allow you to “remix.” Easily take images you already have and create gifs and videos to better engage your audience, including overlaying text (love the Living Proof example… ask me how many bottles of Living Proof I have stocked—major “life hack” for professionals on the go!).

Amanda Ball likes the Pop Up Plus example, which uses e-commerce product images and “remixes” them into fun videos with vibrant colors and movement. An app called Videoshop can help do this FOR FREE.

Shooting from Scratch

Facebook also provides tips on making great videos from scratch for ads and posts. Check out this savvy use of Boomerang to show a spiralizer in action. As Amanda Ball describes it, “Potential buyers are prompted to feel like they know how the product works, making them more on board to dig deeper into your brand and products.“

Thanks to Amanda Ball, Account Management Team Lead, for this tip!

Secret Boomerang Menu

Did you know Boomerang has a secret menu!? Learn how a four finger tap can bring up options on options to edit your video. You can smooth it out, speed it up, slow it down, and so much more.

Thanks to Alison Zeringue, Director of Account Management, for this tip!

Custom Contact Methods on Instagram Profile

On a standard Instagram profile, call, email, and directions are standard calls to action that you can add.

Through settings, you can hook up third-party apps like Open Table and Eventbrite.
1. Go to your profile
2. Click “Edit Profile”
3. Click “Contact Method”
4. Choose from the ever-growing list of action buttons that correspond with other apps and services you may already be using
Thanks to Alison Zeringue, Director of Account Management, for this tip!

Get a “Shop” Button on Your Instagram Profile

Those who sell products may wonder how to activate the “Shop” button of their Instagram profile. After you’ve created nine “shoppable” Instagram posts, a “Shop” button will appear on your profile. It will direct users to all of your shoppable posts, making it that much easier for users to buy your product on their phone.

Thanks to Ariel Tusa, Account Manager, for this takeaway!

Vying for “Swipe Up for More”?—What to Do in the Meantime

We're all vying for the "Swipe up for more" feature on Instastories, but, alas, you must have 10,000 followers for this feature to show up. In the meantime, use the "screen record" feature on your iPhone to create a video that guides users to important content. Then you can add that video to your Instastories.
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Thanks to Ariel Tusa, Account Manager, for this takeaway!

Donate Button on Facebook Live

Facebook has offered a selection of calls to action (CTAs) for your page and ads for some time. One way non-profits can use CTAs creatively is by using the “Donate” CTA button on a Facebook Live video. For example, you can “go live” at a fundraising event so those who aren’t in attendance can check out the action, and you can feature the “Donate” button on this post to capture their wallets while you are capturing their hearts. Bonus—giving a sneak peek into your event this year can create a buzz that translates to more attendees next year (as we talk about in our blog post with more tips to increase event attendance).

Requirements for Fundraising on Facebook:

In order to have access to features like the “Donate” button, you must be an approved non-profit.
- 501c3
- US-based
- Verified page
- Page meets community standards
- Application approved
Thanks to Ceallaigh Montgomery, Sales Executive & Digital Marketing Strategist, for this takeaway.

Audience Network

I find the Audience Network isn’t talked about nearly enough. By default, ads set up on Facebook will run on Instagram as well as the Audience Network, which is a collection of sites around the web. This idea is core to Google Display, which leverages the Google Content Network as the avenue for showing all ads. When people talk about Facebook ads, they take for granted this opportunity to be in front of people when they are “surfing the web”—not just browsing the “ ‘book.”

Thanks to Shawn Kelly, Sales Manager, for this takeaway!

Also, thanks to Shauntae Joseph, Account Manager, & Jenna Mire, Account Coordinator, for takeaways worked in throughout!

If you need help implementing these tactics, let’s start a conversation about how we can help you.
August 9, 2018
Top 5 Google Analytics Metrics for E-commerce Tourism Companies

With a growing number of travelers using mobile search to book their vacations, it’s a great time to be in the tourism industry, assuming you have an e-commerce option for your customers. Whether you’re offering hotel rooms, dinner reservations, or curated experiences, your customers are more likely than ever before to make their travel purchases online and on the go. But, how can you tell if the e-commerce side of your business is operating at peak performance? With a strong track record of successful marketing for zoos, museums, and other tourist attractions, Search Influence is here to help! We’ve compiled the top five Google Analytics metrics that your business should be tracking to make sure you’re optimizing your potential.

1. E-commerce Conversion Rate

Google divides the number of completed sales by the number of visitors to your website to provide your e-commerce conversion rate. This metric is one way to measure your business’ success in terms of online sales. While it does not measure how much revenue each sale brings in (that’s the average order value, and we’ll talk about it next!), your e-commerce conversion rate tells you how many visitors to your site have become paying customers. It’s an especially important metric to keep track of because converting current visitors into customers is much more cost effective than acquiring a new customer base.

Of course, e-commerce isn’t the only conversion rate you can measure. Break down conversion points on your site into micro and macro. In the world of e-commerce, your macro conversion would be a purchased products/tickets. Micro conversions are smaller actions that lead up to the end goal of purchases. For tourism, this would likely include visits to key pages (like ticket pricing page), to adding something to a shopping cart, to email signups. You should watch your success of micro conversions and tune your campaigns to those as well, as each of these actions should be designed to drive customers toward macro conversions—increasing that e-commerce conversion rate of visitors turned into paying customers.

2. Average Order Value

Average order value tells you how much revenue online purchases generate for your business, on average. It is calculated by finding the total revenue generated from online orders and dividing it by the number of orders. According to some experts, like Databox, it could be the one most important metric for your e-commerce business to focus on.

So, how do you improve your average order value? MonsterInsights provides some key suggestions.

First, price your products with upselling in mind. For example, if you’re a photographer shooting on-site family vacation photos, you might offer a base package of 20 photos, with the option to add more at an increased price-per-photo rate.

Second, offer product bundles at discounted prices. For example, if you’re running a walking tour company, you could bundle together a daytime and a nighttime tour. Customers will be enticed by the promise of extra touring for their dollars, and you’ll still gain more income than if they had just purchased a single tour.

Finally, offer savings with a minimum order—something like, spend $100 and get $20 free. Customers may spend more than they ordinarily would just to access the discount. All three of these strategies can drive up your average order value, bringing in more revenue for your e-commerce tourism business.

3. Revenue Per Visitor

Revenue per visitor is a crucial metric – increasing it can mean revenue growth for you without having to drive new visitors. You can increase this metric by both converting more visitors into customers and increasing your customers’ average order value. Revenue per visitor is calculated by dividing your total online revenue by the number of unique visitors.

You can increase revenue per visitor by using any of the previously discussed methods, like upselling, bundling products, and offering discounts with a minimum spend. Keep in mind that a low revenue per visitor is not necessarily an indication that your business is struggling. For example, if you’re selling lower priced items, like postcards or other tourism souvenirs, your revenue per visitor will be much lower than for a company selling high-dollar items like cruise tickets or hotel suites. You’ll just need a larger number of unique visitors to boost your sales and drive revenue overall, and this should play heavily into your marketing goals and strategy.

4. Customer Lifetime Value

Customer lifetime value tells you the total value that an individual customer, acquired during a particular time period, has spent with your online business.

This metric is best used for estimating appropriate marketing costs for your business, and for analyzing your customer acquisition strategy. For example, if your average customer will only spend $100 at your business over the course of their life, it isn’t worth paying hundreds of dollars to attract this customer. Maximize your return on investment (ROI) by keeping your marketing and advertising expenses reasonably lower than the income your average customer is likely to generate for your business. Most businesses are willing to spend 5-10% of revenue to acquire a new customer. (See more in our blog “What’s The Perfect Marketing Budget For Your Company?”)

5. Return on Advertising Spend

Speaking of ROI, let’s discuss return on advertising spend—or ROAS as it’s sometimes called—which is a key metric for determining the effectiveness of your digital advertising. It tells you how much income you earn for every dollar spent on advertising campaigns. If you’re running online ads and want them to be as effective as possible (who doesn’t?), you need to raise your return on advertising spend. Ideally, your ads should drive about three times as much income as you paid to advertise.

So, how can you raise your return on advertising spend to this ideal 3x level? Conversion Fanatics Blog offers some great tips. First, do some testing to figure out what channels work best for your business. For example, if your Facebook ads tend to perform better than your Google ads, channel your dollars to Facebook, where your ads drive the most revenue. Similarly, test the times at which your ads have the best results. If you notice that holiday ads bring in more clients for you than summer ads do, it could be worth concentrating your ad dollars on that crucial time of year. Finally, you can dive into even more metrics. Monitor the user journey by tracking how many customers click on your ad, how long they stay on the resulting landing page, and so on. If you can pinpoint which stages of the user journey are working well for you, and which stages are losing potential customers, you can fine-tune your ads and landing pages for an improved user experience.

These five metrics, all available through Google Analytics, are key components of e-commerce tracking for any online tourism company. For more information about how to optimize your travel business’ potential, contact Search Influence at 504-208-3900, or request a proposal today to hear opportunities from our strategists.

Images:

Camera and Phone

Touchscreen

Tablet

July 26, 2018
5 Things American Businesses Need to Know About GDPR

In the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal here in the U.S., the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) was established by the European Union in May to give users complete transparency on how their data is or will be used. Here’s everything you need to know about GDPR and how it will affect marketers not just in Europe but here at home as well.

1. Why Did the EU Create GDPR?

GDPR went into effect on May 25, 2018. It was initially approved by the EU in 2016, well before the news of the Cambridge Analytica data misuse broke. However, it’s hard not to associate one with the other because of the timing. To provide a bit of context, I will quickly outline the details of the Cambridge Analytica case. The data of an estimated 80 million Facebook users was sold and then used to create “psychographic” profiles of American voters. This data was collected through a seemingly harmless personality test called “thisisyourdigitallife.” The test filed away the data of participants and their Facebook friends. The participants unwittingly gave the app’s developers access to this data because by opting to take the test, they agreed to the test’s terms of service, which granted the test access to their information as well as their friends’.

Though this example of misuse has brought personal data protection to the forefront of the world’s attention, this is not a new practice. The personality test in question was launched in 2014, and people have been using similar techniques to acquire user data for years. The difference is that we rarely questioned the terms of service we agreed to for things like apps, free wifi, and other services in the past.

2. What Does GDPR do?

GDPR aims to give users more information on how their data will be used. Its central goals are to keep users informed and to require their consent. The exchange of data for free services such as Facebook and Google can be a fair one. The text of the GDPR legislation is a decent read and is broken into chapters here. Any sites or services attempting to collect data must do so transparently, with “unambiguous” and “specific” purposes. “Data subjects” must be able to request logs of all of the data collected about them and then allowed to ask for the data to be corrected or deleted (appropriately named the “right to rectification” and the “right to be forgotten,” respectively). Also, businesses cannot deny or restrict services to users who opt out of data collection.

3. Does GDPR Apply to US Businesses?

Strictly speaking, GDPR applies only to EEA (European Economic Area, see image) citizens while they are in EEA countries, so one might expect that it won’t have a huge effect on American companies that only operate within the United States. However, because the internet is global in nature, it’s rarely that simple. Websites run by American businesses are frequently visited by people around the world.

Tourism is one of the industries that will be most affected. 39.4 percent of the American tourism market is comprised of European travelers. Zoos, museums, aquariums, and other attractions should review their data and cookie collection methods.

Also, American businesses must ensure that data they receive or purchase about EEA citizens were collected using techniques aligned with GDPR’s regulations.

4. What Can You Do to Make Sure Your Business Is Compliant?

GDPR isn’t intended to stop all data collection or to make targeted marketing less effective. On the front end, the main changes businesses would need to make to adhere to GDPR are stating that they are tracking user data and then how they plan to use the data, whether it’s cookies for remarketing, user session data for site analytics, or other reasons. Further down the line, companies would need to ensure that their records are well-maintained so that they can provide users with their data should there be a need to review or delete them. The key is transparency. As long as you let users know what you’re doing and why, there shouldn’t be any issues.

5. Will the U.S. Adopt Similar Policies?

Anyone who watched Mark Zuckerberg’s testimony to Congress in April might not think there will be changes in US data privacy laws anytime soon. The questions some congressmen and women asked revealed a lack of technical knowledge, as noted by Vox. However, on May 22 Vermont passed the nation’s first data privacy law. Vermont’s legislation focuses on “data brokers,” companies that sell or license data about their consumers to third-party companies that do not have a direct relationship with the consumer whose data they are purchasing.

A few weeks ago California passed a law that is more all-encompassing than Vermont’s. Similar to GDPR, the law requires businesses to state the type of data they are collecting and how they plan to use it. These changes will not go into effect until 2020, but the process was pushed along because Californian lawmakers were pressured by a grassroots ballot initiative with measures even more stringent than the bill the state passed.

Due to public outcry and interest, other states are bound to follow suit, so there’s never been a better time to review your data collection practices and consider how easily they can be adjusted to fit the level of transparency that is becoming the new standard.

Consult With Experts Who Are Up to Industry Standards

At Search Influence, we consistently stay apprised of new industry standards and regulations regarding how our client’s information is disseminated, including GDPR. Our goal is to help your business grow and optimize your potential online, all while making sure your business is in compliance with data protection laws. If you’d like professional insight into how we can help your business thrive, call 504-336-3422 or request a proposal online today.

Images:

EEA Map

Mark Zuckerberg

July 24, 2018
Everything You Need to Create an Effective Landing Page—and Everything You Don’t

If you have run any type of digital marketing campaign for your business, you’ve probably come across the term “landing page.” But what exactly is a landing page, and what role does it play in helping to convert leads into customers? Simply put, landing pages are the pages where users “land” after clicking on an ad from Google, Facebook, or a similar platform. When done right, they feature persuasive and highly relevant content, focused on one specific conversion. By directing users to a landing page rather than simply the homepage of your website, you can ensure that you are able to attribute leads to a specific campaign while simultaneously providing a better answer to the search inquiry of the user. A landing page should be specifically focused on lead generation, and these tips will help you have the highest conversion rates once users make it to your page.

Do Have a Compelling Call to Action

A clear call-to-action(CTA) is the most important part of your landing page and should clearly communicate what you want your reader to do on the page. This could be to register for an event, download an eBook, or schedule a consultation. Whatever it is, it needs to stand out from the rest of your content and be one of the only, if not the only, actionable items on your landing page.

If your CTA is a form instead of a button, the title of your form should be much more specific than a simple “Contact Us.” Entice your readers with simple, yet descriptive language like “Register to Get Your Free Marketing eBook” instead. For buttons on your form, avoid generic language like “Send” or “Submit” and instead use language like “Get My Analysis” or “Start My Free Trial.”

Users are also typically skeptical to give out more information than necessary, so you don’t need to ask for their full name, address, phone number, date of birth, where they went to high school, and their mother’s maiden name if all they’re doing is downloading an eBook. A user is much more likely to actually fill out the form if you keep it short and sweet. Sticking with essentials like their name and email may be all you need.

For more tips on how to craft stellar CTAs that will convert, check out this blog post.

Don’t Cram Everything Above the Fold

We’ve all heard for decades that readers rarely make it below the fold (originally used in reference to traditional newspapers), and that we should try to cram everything important above the fold. This doesn’t hold as true today as it once did, and cluttering the top section of your page can actually hurt your conversions. While it is still true that some users won’t make it below the fold at all, if what you have above the fold is compelling enough to grab their attention, they will scroll down to read the rest of your content. So while, yes, you do still want your CTA and most important information above the fold, try to limit it to just that. No one wants to read anything that is a cluttered mess, and you’ll retain users’ attention much better by avoiding the clutter.

Do Have Fast Loading Speed

A fast page load time is absolutely essential for any web page. Users expect a page to load within seconds, and if it doesn’t, they often abandon the page entirely. In fact, a case study from Hubspot found that a 1-second delay in site speed resulted in a 7 percent reduction in conversions. Images and videos often slow down page load time, so be sure to optimize elements like these to avoid losing users. Luckily, you can test out the load speed of your page and address any concerns.

Don’t Have Endless Content or Jargon

You don’t want to confuse any potential leads with overly complicated, industry-specific jargon. You should be able to demonstrate your expertise in your field without intimidating or annoying any of your users. While you want to give enough information to draw a user in, you don’t want to overwhelm them with too much information up front. If you do have longer content, try breaking it up with bulleted lists or by using icons.

Do Include Images and Videos

According to Unbounce, videos can increase conversions by about 80 percent—making them a worthwhile investment for your page. Since videos are often quite big and the play buttons can distract from your CTA, consider making your video considerably smaller than the standard minimum of 960px by 720px, with the option to make the video bigger when it’s actually playing.

If you don’t have a relevant video for your page, strong visuals are still extremely important. Avoid stock photography whenever possible, but it’s still better to have stock photography than no imagery at all. Users also respond better to images with faces in them than images without.

Photos aren’t the only type of imagery you can utilize on your landing pages. Depending on the industry, your target audience might respond well to vectors or illustrations, which can also help explain complex subjects when photos aren’t available.

Whatever imagery you do end up using on your page should be consistent with the display, Facebook, or any other type of ads that are driving users to the landing page in the first place. When a user clicks on an ad with vector images, for example, they would expect the following landing page they land on to have similar imagery. If the look and feel of the page is completely different than the ad they clicked on, the user could be confused and think they clicked on the wrong ad altogether.

Don’t Include Navigation

While it may seem counterintuitive to exclude typical site features like a navigation bar, for landing pages, you actually want to include as few opportunities to leave the page as possible. This includes navigation, which can also be distracting and take away from your main call-to-action.

Do Conduct A/B Testing

Once you’ve got your pages built, you should conduct A/B testing by changing out elements of your page to determine what performs best. While audiences typically respond more positively to people in images, for example, maybe yours responds better to objects or vector illustrations. You should also test out CTA placement, button colors, font choices, and content. Keep in mind what you learned in science class though, you only want to change one element at a time when performing these tests. If you change multiple variables at once, you won’t have accurate data on which elements are actually making the page perform better or worse.

Creating landing pages that convert is no easy feat. Unbounce estimates that achieving a 12 percent conversion rate for your landing page will place you above 90 percent of the competition. With a comprehensive online advertising strategy, every step of the process will be clearly catered to your target demographic, making it as easy and risk-free as possible for users to take action. If you want help creating your online presence, reach out to Search Influence to receive your custom marketing analysis.

July 19, 2018
What’s the Perfect Marketing Budget for Your Company?

In our years of experience as a digital marketing agency, we’ve found that a typical marketing budget for a business is 5-10 percent of revenue, sometimes more when in growth mode. But don’t stop reading yet! Determining the exact budget for your business, and how to allocate it, depends on a wide range of factors, from goals to company age. Here are five questions that can help your business determine its ideal marketing budget.

1. What Are Your Needs and Goals?

Most effective marketing budgets start with a bottom-up approach. This means that your first step is to define your company’s quantifiable goals and objectives. This could be the number of new customers or accounts you’d like to see in the next year. It could also be how quickly you need to see results on your campaigns. The important thing is that the goal is well-defined. This way, you can come up with specific strategies to reach your target, and you can easily measure which strategies are working (and which ones aren’t!). Quantifying your business goals as much as possible will help you create a much stronger marketing budget and marketing campaigns.

2. What Does Your Historical Data Look Like?

So you need specific objectives…but how do you determine what those should be? One effective tool is historical data. For example, if you’re trying to figure out how many new leads you need per month, look at data from previous months. How many people typically contact you per month? How many of those people are qualified potential customers? How many typically convert into actual customers? And is this conversion rate providing you with enough customers to keep your company growing? Once you determine how your company has been performing, you’re in a much better position to decide if and how you’d like to change that performance. In other words, you’re in the perfect place to set measurable goals!

For more information on how to track leads and determine the quality of those leads, visit our Analytics & Lead Tracking page!

3. How Old Is Your Company?

Historical data is great—if you have historical data. Brand new companies usually don’t, which can make determining a marketing budget especially challenging. Luckily, the experts are here to provide guidance! Both entrepreneur.com and websolutions.com recommend that new companies should allocate between 12 percent and 20 percent of their gross revenue to marketing costs. While this range might seem a bit high, there is logic behind it. New companies must be more aggressive with marketing spend because survival depends on building lasting brand recognition with an audience that’s never heard of them before. Once companies have established their brand and customer base, they can change their focus to maintaining the awareness and market position they’ve gained, while incrementally growing their business. And they can adjust their marketing budget to the 5-10 percent we recommended earlier.

4. What Should Your Marketing Plan Include?

So once you’ve established your goals and consulted your historical data if possible, what sort of marketing tactics should you use to achieve those goals? First, a typical marketing budget covers both public relations and advertising, in addition to the previously discussed branding. It’s a very wide range, but it can most easily be broken down into print and digital communication. Print communication includes traditional marketing efforts, like billboards, newsletters, brochures, and press releases—and don’t forget to budget for design, printing, and mailing costs. Digital communication, on the other hand, includes developing a website that’s both SEO friendly and user-friendly, using online advertising to your advantage, and maintaining active social media accounts. Depending on your industry, you might also want to budget for additional marketing efforts that don’t neatly fit into the print or digital category. This could include broadcast advertising, on radio or television, or special events like conferences and trade shows.

To learn more about how digital marketing can help your company reach its goals, visit our pages about Content Marketing and Online Advertising!

5. Where Is Your Target Demographic?

With all those marketing options to choose from, how do you know which ones are right for your business? One key way to narrow down the list is to define your target demographic—not just who they are, but where they are. This question not only applies to the physical location but also to online behavior. What types of media does your target demographic use? Do they spend more time checking their emails or scrolling through Twitter? Whether you’re marketing in the print or digital arena, knowing the places your target demographic frequents can help you put your content in the best location to make the most efficient use of your marketing dollars. In fact, your target demographic can help you decide whether to use print or digital marketing in the first place. While traditional media can strongly contribute to brand awareness and complement your digital strategy, the right balance of print to digital marketing depends greatly on your industry and your customers. Know your target demographic, and you can feel confident you’re investing in the right media.

At Search Influence, our goal is to help you grow your business and optimize your potential online. If you’d like professional insight into choosing the ideal marketing budget for your company, call 504-336-3422 or request a proposal online today.

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Rihanna

June 28, 2018
Zoos, Aquariums, and Non-profits: Here Are Three Top Tips to Fundraise Like a Pro

Based in a city known for its tourism and attractions, Search Influence is no stranger to digital marketing for zoos, museums, and other non-profits. We’re here today to pass on some of our knowledge to you! These three tips for fundraising through social media are sure to spark your creativity and help get donations flowing through the door.

1. Make Giving Easy

Even the most dedicated patron can get turned off if they have to fill out confusing forms or trudge to your office in person. Streamline the donation process by taking advantage of easy online giving platforms. Some user-friendly platforms and campaigns include:

FundRazr

MuseoBlogger points to the Boston Museum of Science’s success with FundRazr. This app is free to download and offers patrons a number of custom giving options. For example, they can either choose to contribute anonymously or to identify themselves via their Facebook profiles. Similarly, they can choose to give either by credit, debit, or PayPal. MuseoBlogger writes that FundRazr is “intuitive, convenient, and provides both instant gratification and recognition.” Maybe that’s why Boston Museum of Science raised over $1,200 from Facebook users alone—likely all donors who were not contributing via the traditional channels.

Text to Give

Colleen Dilenschneider, Chief Market Engagement Officer for IMPACTS Research & Development, highlights Cameron Park Zoo’s mobile giving campaign and Rosamond Gifford Zoo’s Adopt an Animal program as two nontraditional fundraising campaigns. As part of their mobile giving campaign, the zoo encouraged guests to donate $5 or $10 through a simple text message, making it easy for patrons to show support from home or say thanks after a great day at the zoo.

Adopt an Animal

The Adopt an Animal program at Rosamond Gifford Zoo is available to animal-loving patrons throughout the year, but in honor of National Adoption Day, the zoo ran a two-day promotion to spread awareness of the program. To reach a wider audience, they lowered the minimum donation requirement and created a smaller, custom donation package. This promotion generated an extra $350 and gave incentive to those who may not normally donate to the program.

It’s simple. The easier it is to give to your organization, the more likely people are to donate.

2. Establish a Brand

Having easy donation platforms is great—as long as people know about them! To make the most of any digital fundraising campaign, you first need a community of fans and followers. And the first step in building that community is establishing your own brand. This gives patrons a clear idea of who they’re engaging with and helps them feel a personal connection with your organization and its values. After all, no one wants to give away hard earned money to a stranger on the internet!

Complete branding should be an in-depth endeavor. It requires cohesion between your physical location, website, and social media platforms. If you’re looking for a place to start, think about visual branding: assure your color scheme, logos, fonts, and overall visual aesthetic remain consistent across all your on- and off-line locations. Or, you could start with brand values. Post clear causes or ideals that your organization believes in, and then provide evidence of those values through success stories and patron or employee spotlights. For an at-home example of establishing brand values, check out our About Us page and see how we communicate our dedication to optimizing business’ potential and the New Orleans community. Then, pop over to our pages about Success Stories and Company Culture to see those values demonstrated in action.

3. Get Inspired With Engagement Ideas

With your brand established and clearly communicating exactly who patrons support when they donate to you, it’s time to engage with the community! There are tons of great ideas out there, but here are some of our personal favorites.

First, make it very clear where donations will be going and how patrons will benefit by giving. Just like how people prefer to support trusted brands over internet strangers, patrons are more likely to donate if they know exactly what their money will achieve. Consider offering additional perks for high-dollar donors. For example, a newsletter with updates about their chosen animal or a plaque with their name by their sponsored exhibit.

Another popular engagement idea is live-streaming certain exhibits. Offer a night-stream that shows patrons what nocturnal creatures are up to when the zoo or aquarium is closed. Keep a 24/7 feed going on monkeys or other active and entertaining animals. Or, if one of your animals is expecting, consider broadcasting her pregnancy and birth, as well as her baby’s early growth. While this isn’t as directly tied to fundraising as animal adoption programs, it will nonetheless warm viewers’ hearts and get them engaged with and excited about your organization, building the meaningful connections that could turn into donations down the road.

Finally, appeal to photographers. Nothing gets people excited about zoos and aquariums like cute pictures of fuzzy animals, and encouraging visiting professionals to take photos means your organization gets all the exposure with a fraction of the cost and effort. Consider using your social media accounts to host fan photo contests, like the Shedd Aquarium, or repurpose the photos you already have with a caption contest. To go even further, consider hosting photographer-only after-hours events, like Aquarium of the Pacific. This offers amateurs and professionals alike the opportunity to take great pictures without the general public getting in the way. When they post their photos, it’s free advertising for your organization, and it’s a great opportunity to extend your network to include the photography communities.

Consult the Experts

We promised three fundraising tips, but here’s a bonus fourth! If you want to focus the majority of your time and energy on running your organization, Search Influence is here to help you with everything from content marketing to online advertising. Request your proposal online today.

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June 26, 2018
Your Referral-Based Business Still Needs Digital Marketing
Most referral based businesses are pretty happy watching the dollars come in without having to invest in marketing. The business model usually looks a little something like this: company does good work → client is happy → client tells a friend they are happy with great work by company → friend works with company. Badabing.

But wait, we missed a step! How’s the referral going to find you? Even if your name, number, address, and directions are written down, laminated, framed, and handed to a referral, they will still search online to find any business. According to Google, 97% of consumers use the web to search for local businesses.
- 96% of people seeking legal advice use a search engine
- 56% of students turn to search when research programs/degrees
- 78% of local-mobile searches result in offline purchases
These stats prove search is the best opportunity to influence your audience buying decision and shape their perception of your company. If your business isn’t investing in digital marketing, which of your competitors will the referral contact once they can’t find you online?

Who’s Representing Your Law Firm Online?

Only 13% of people are referred to an attorney by a family or friend. If you don’t have a strong brand or search presence online when the referral or new lead is searching for you, what does this say about your reputation? Some may think, “How good can this guy be if I can’t even find him on Google!” Even if you have a compelling slogan, your law firm needs to be competitive in local search results.

If your law firm generates cases based on client or attorney referrals, make sure to get that word-of-mouth online! Ask for and publish reviews and testimonials on your site. Don’t forget to spread the word and feature testimonials on avvo.com, lawyers.justia.com, findlaw.com, and other industry related platforms.

72% of people searching for legal advice only contact one attorney. So let’s make sure they find and contact you first!

Google’s Power in the Universities

According to Fortune, Millennials spend 27 hours a week consuming media. Getting in front of and grabbing the attention of millennials is becoming more competitive for universities. With educational resources and easy access to student loans, students are no longer applying to universities simply based on legacy or location. According to a Google Ipsos Research study in 2017, 20% of students read 3rd party ratings and reviews to compare schools, but you can expect that a higher percentage of searchers are influenced by the overall online reputation of a school.

Building Your Reputation Online

Reviews aren’t promotional advertisements full of promises; they’re hard evidence that your company goes above and beyond for customers. Don’t just sit back and wait for reviews to appear. With 88% of people likely to trust a review from a stranger as they would a referral from a friend or family member, you need to encourage happy clients to leave reviews on your site and on 3rd party sites. Since Google reviews appear alongside search results, those reviews are particularly important for referral-based businesses.

For 3rd party sites like Findlaw, Angie’s List, and Houzz, claim your profile and make sure all of your business information is accurate and updated. But don’t stop at conventional review sites! Video testimonials can be a great way to make online reviews more relatable. YouTube videos are easy to upload, and they can directly impact your search rankings. Before and after photos and videos for home renovations visually engage with an audience in ways content can’t. However you serve customers, look for a variety of ways to confirm that your services really set your company apart.

The Market Is Wide Open

Customers are searching for the products and services you provide, and they are influenced more by trusted and recognizable brands they engage with digitally. Google uses over 200 trust factors to rank websites and is constantly updating its algorithm. If you aren’t actively competing for searched products, services, and your audience’s attention, then you’re giving those undecided potential customers to the competition. So I’ll ask you again, if your business isn’t investing in digital marketing, which of your competitors will your referral contact once they can’t find you online?

Contact the team at Search Influence for a consultation, and learn how to shift your digital marketing strategy into high gear. Find out about our company’s reputation by reading reviews from other industry leaders in SEO and digital marketing. You know your industry, and we can help make your expertise more evident online. Request a marketing analysis, and we’ll find opportunities to amplify the visibility of your referral-based business.

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Search for Universities
June 20, 2018
Are Your KPIs Leading to a Healthy ROI?

One metric that every small business owner should track and strategically work to improve is return on investment (ROI). Improving ROI can depend on boosting any number of individual indicators that help businesses focus on what they’re doing right and where they need to improve. Learn how these indicators apply to digital marketing and how to track, set goals for, and improve those indicators.

What Are ROI and KPIs?

Most business owners are familiar with the concept of ROI as an important, perhaps the most important, bottom line for any expenditure. ROI provides a simple ratio that expresses how successful an expenditure is relative to the income it generates. For some business decisions, calculating ROI is relatively straightforward. The ROI for a rental property, for example, would be based on the cost of buying the property plus taxes and upkeep divided by the amount paid by tenants each year. In the world of digital marketing, however, it can be difficult to determine the value of clicks, shares, and retweets, and to draw a direct line from any specific customer to a specific advertisement.

Key performance indicators (KPIs) are more specific data that provide the metrics to analyze the effectiveness of a digital marketing strategy. In fact, ROI itself is a KPI. A business may select ROI as their #1 KPI, and then other secondary KPIs to watch as leading indicators of success. Paying attention to the right KPIs, and understanding how they relate to and inform ROI, can allow businesses to agilely hone a lean marketing approach around what works by cutting out the fat failing to provide a return.

How to Determine Your KPIs

It’s important to realize that not every metric is a KPI. For example, a tourism company might find it especially helpful to track how often promotional emails are forwarded or social media posts are shared. People like to share vacation experiences with friends who often rely on recommendations, and people also like to vacation with their friends. A high share rate could indicate a multiplier effect for some promotions, meaning that the marketing strategy is generating customers outside of a business’ subscriber list or social media following who nonetheless engage with the content. (Read more about creating customer advocates for tourism businesses). While every metric might not be important for your business, here are some common KPIs:

– Website traffic sources – Visitors enter your site from many avenues. The traffic sources can be organic, direct, referral, or paid. Each source can be reviewed to provide high-level information about your site traffic. Organic search traffic, when a visitor finds your website by searching keywords in a search engine and clicking through to your site, is the top source for generating traffic. It’s essential to improve SEO in order to increase your organic traffic.

– Engagement metrics – Take a moment to compare your favorite website to a website that you dislike. What impacted your experience on those sites? Optimizing your website for an intuitive user experience is essential. Bounce Rate and Average Time on Page are two key indicators of how visitors are interacting with your site. Be sure to monitor these metrics and optimize your website layout and content as needed.

– Conversion rate – This is a KPI that any business owner wants to see continually increase. Filling out an on-site form, clicking your number to call, or purchasing your product are just a few conversions that you want to encourage on your site. Each conversion can generate a lead for your campaigns. The higher the conversion rate, the higher the ROI.

How Do KPIs Affect ROI?

In a certain sense, ROI is the mother of all KPIs. The best performance indicator of almost any business investment is how much return it produces. Calculating ROI, however, requires an understanding of how a business’ applicable KPIs determine ROI.

A simple formula is just the return minus investment and then divided by the investment:

Your result can then be expressed as a percentage. In order to account for your KPIs, your return should take into consideration factors such as the average lifetime value of a customer and conversion rate of turning leads into customers, in addition to the average profit margin.

How to Set S.M.A.R.T. Goals for Your KPIs

Businesses commonly use the acronym S.M.A.R.T. when setting KPIs; it stands for specific, measurable, achievable, results-oriented, and time-bound. Focus on goals that are detailed and clearly defined, and that can be tangibly measured to determine success or failure unequivocally. They should be within reach (a business that constantly falls short of its goals needs to rethink their achievability) and based on the objective ends rather than the means. Finally, they should have a definitive deadline to make sure goals aren’t kicked to the next quarter or year.

Digital marketing may not quite be rocket science, but it does get pretty complicated. It’s important to determine what KPIs are most important to your industry, look to competitors and market leaders to see where indicators are comparable and where there’s a discrepancy, then develop strategies to boost those indicators. Small business owners have enough on their plate to worry about without poring over the nitty-gritty of analytics and lead tracking. Search Influence is a nationally recognized leader in search-focused digital marketing, with the expertise to help small businesses succeed in an ever-more digital world. Read testimonials from our clients to get a feel for how we can help your business grow, or contact us today to see what our understanding of KPIs can do for your ROI.

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Social Media Machine

ROI Calculator

Rockets Away

June 14, 2018
Connect Your Brand With Your Community

Human beings are social animals, but what kind of community would form around your company’s online branding? Brand loyalty is easily observed in beverage and automotive industries, and fans of a particular brewery or manufacturer often consider that brand preference a part of their personal identity. Coke or Pepsi, Chevy or Ford, and Windows or Mac: these rivalries and preferences elicit emotions like the choice between sports teams. The fans of a brand develop a tribal sense of community, but it doesn’t happen with just any company. What if you could make your brand inspire that degree of enthusiasm and loyalty?

Make Your Brand Relatable

When kids try to make friends, the classic advice is to “be yourself.” Similarly, your online branding strategy needs to come from a genuine place if it’s going to build a following. Big promises and low prices will motivate a purchase, but you need to meet or exceed a customer’s expectations in order to make them a fan. When you think about brands that have been popular for decades, they have earned the lasting support of repeat customers. Quality products and reliable service aren’t just slogans, they’re perceptions that match the experience of satisfied customers.

A branding campaign should not require an overhaul of the way you do business. It can be as simple as identifying your strengths or making your marketing more consistent. But where do you go once you’ve got your brand established? The first step is finding those that relate to your brand the most. Target the interest groups and demographics most likely to identify with your brand through online advertising, and track their progress along the consumer journey. After they’ve visited your site or clicked on an advertisement, keep your brand visible with targeted remarketing. Every impression and interaction is an opportunity to confirm the value and reliability of your brand.

Emphasize Human Interaction

Automation is great for business efficiency, but customers appreciate interacting with your human employees. When an existing customer calls with a problem or question, they react differently when answers come directly from a person instead of a recorded message. We’ve all experienced the frustration of answering a dozen automated questions in order to complete a simple task. In contrast, it’s easy to imagine how it feels to interact with a single employee throughout an interaction with a business. Whether they’re contacting a travel agent, realtor, or secretary at a law firm, people have a different experience when they have the chance to repeatedly connect with the same human being. Their connection with that individual becomes their connection with the whole company.

Of course, the conduct of your employees can have a positive or negative impact on the way your brand is perceived, depending on how they interact with customers. When training and managing employees, remember how their treatment of customers can impact the long-term reputation of the business. Efficiency is important, but be sure to acknowledge and reward employees who go the extra mile for customers. It can be as simple as remembering a name or some other personal detail. A friendly voice and attention to detail can make customers feel valued by your company, even when you’re offering a no-frills product or service.

Find Followers on Social Media

Find a voice that resonates with your target audience and sets your business apart from the competition. On social media, your company’s response to news and trends will give the public additional opportunities to identify with your brand. Whether you develop a presence on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, or Pinterest will depend on your target audience and what’s appropriate for your industry.

You’ll want to post frequently in order to keep your business visible, but the majority of the posts should not be directly promotional. That doesn’t mean you have to spend all your time writing your own witty blogs. Not everyone is rocking the digital marketing industry like Search Influence. Rather, you can share news stories and articles related to your industry and community. By sharing authoritative, newsworthy content, you prove to followers that your business is keeping up with the latest trends. Not only are you building your brand, but you’re also making your business a valuable resource to potential customers, even when they aren’t currently in the market for your services.

One of the biggest benefits of social media is that it provides a more detailed view of your target audience. As your following grows, you’ll gain a more detailed understanding of the interests, demographics, and preferences of people interested in your company. This information enables you to develop customer profiles and more specifically define your target audience. Identify the trends that groups of your fans have in common, and you’ll have an edge on the competitors who still advertise indiscriminately to the public at large.

How Does Community Generate Revenue?

Your customers understand how traditional advertising works. Across all platforms, paid content and advertisements get a lower CTR than personal content generated by close friends and family. When a friend recommends a business or vacation destination, that recommendation is more impactful than a commercial. By building a connection with the community, your online branding can make itself a topic of conversation. You can design promotions that encourage fans to show their support on social media. When people see that a close friend voluntarily supports your business, that recommendation carries weight. Get customers to advocate for your tourist attraction, dealership, or boutique, and you have a powerful alternative to conventional ads.

Establish Your Brand As a Community Ambassador

Members of the public are generally skeptical about the motivations of corporations and businesses. The global economy never ran on gumdrops and compliments, but consumers like to see brands that make a visible effort toward conservation, disaster relief, and other causes with a broad base of support. Politically controversial issues are a gamble because they needlessly turn away potential customers. It’s far better to publicly give to a popular cause and leverage social media so that fans can share the news of your good work. Many of your donations to non-profits can be tax-deductible. Improving the image of your company isn’t a fast process, but it has the potential to greatly increase your revenue by converting potential customers into supportive fans.

If you need help clarifying your brand or marketing your business online, our team can help. Grounded in a foundational understanding of SEO, we know how to build authority and make your business stand out. Digital marketing isn’t just a way to generate new leads—it’s an increasingly vital part of remaining competitive in today’s marketplace. Request a proposal from Search Influence to amplify the digital voice of your online branding.

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We Like You

June 12, 2018