Do You Know the Five Marketing “Must Haves” for Small Business Owners?

Grow like a weed!

According to the experts, to brand and market your business, you’ll need the following “must haves”:

1. A brand identity
2. An elevator pitch
3. Promotional tools
4. A social network
5. An experienced mentor

Brand Identity The key to great marketing is asking the right questions. What exactly are you offering and who will you offer it to? Understanding these simple questions will help develop your brand, which is the first step to marketing your business. Think about a brand as the story that informs who you are and what you want to be known for. Will you be a company with outstanding customer service? Or will you be known for high-quality products at a great value? Everything that shapes the public’s perception of your business is part of your brand identity, so all of your marketing efforts should build and promote the story you want to tell about your business. There are 5 elements you should consider when you start to build your brand identity: Description: How do you define your business? What is your product or service?  Audience: Who are you specifically trying to connect with? New moms? Urban professionals? Small business owners?  Customer needs: What are your customers looking for in a product or service? What is most important to them? And what are they looking for beyond just the product or service you offer? Is it a great price? The best quality? One-on-one support? Key benefits: How will you fill a need or solve a problem? What is the most important thing you offer your customers? Key differentiator: What makes you different from the competition? Why would a customer be better off doing business with you rather than your closest competitor? Once you’ve answered these questions, you will have defined your position in the marketplace and be able to answer the most important question about your business – why should customers buy from you? Here’s an example of brand identity brainstorming for a fictitious landscaping business: Description: We provide eco-friendly land care services. Audience: Local homeowners and businesses. Customer needs: Our customers are seeking eco-friendly landscaping and gardening solutions. They want more than just a beautiful garden – they want to know that it exists in harmony with the environment around it.  Key benefits: When you utilize our services, you get both a beautifully designed property and the peace of mind that comes with knowing all the materials are eco-friendly. Moreover, you’ll have access to an expert team that’s capable of educating you regarding the most sustainable land care methods. Plus, organic gardening methods ensure you’ll use less water and fertilizer in the long run.  Key differentiator: Unlike most of our competitors, we utilize pesticide-, herbicide- and petrochemical-free fertilizers. We also source our plants and materials locally and recycle all our waste. Stay tuned, more information to follow …

Tumblr’s Usage on the Rise

Over the past couple of years, Tumblr has turned into one of the most visited and used blogging platforms on the internet. The social media network boasts a whopping 4.5 billion impressions per week which represents a tremendous opportunity for small businesses to expand their reach. Here are three ways that Tumblr can help improve your business:

Reach the Younger Crowd.  Tumblr provides one of the best opportunities for brands to connect with young people. According to a recent report released by Comscore, 50% of Tumblr’s users are under the age of 25 and approximately 70% of its users are under the age of 35. While other social media outlets have an abundance of people from all ages, firms can count on Tumblr to drive traffic from Gen Xers and Millenials. Depending on your brand or what products you sell, reaching this demographic can have transformative qualities for your business.  If your brand caters to the 18-34 year old demographic, and if you have a compelling brand story, you can do well on Tumblr. Having a visual story is a must on this platform.

Spread Your Brand Message.  One of the greatest aspects of Tumblr is the way that it allows businesses of all kinds to spread their message. Because Tumblr is a very visual platform, brands that have a strong message that are able to communicate it effectively will have an easy time engaging customers. While blogs do a great job of helping brands define themselves, Tumblr gives companies more tools to do this in a way that people can connect with.

The Secret. The key to being able to take advantage of this is to have a very clear and well-defined brand identity that will engage people. Once that part is figured out, Tumblr will help you get that message across and hopefully generate interest in the process. Earlier this year Tumblr’s usage has skyrocketed over the past few years and all signs point to this trend continuing. It was no surprise then that brands flocked to the platform looking for new ways to connect with its abundance of users. Tumblr’s CEO admitted plans to help other brands in the near future admitting that the platform is “always actively looking for creative ways to help out brands.” With its recent acquisition by Yahoo, many experts believe that Tumblr’s new parent company will capitalize on the 15 billion page views per month by offering advertising for businesses. When Tumblr eventually does roll out advertising opportunities for brands, having an established Tumblr presence will place your brand in a perfect position.

If you have a success story, we’d love to hear about it. For more information or assistance, visit us on our website:  http://editwrite101.com

What is Social Media?

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia … What is Social Media?  Social media refers to the means of interactions among people in which they create, share, and exchange information and ideas in virtual communities and networks. The definition of social media is  “a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content.” Furthermore, social media depends on mobile and web-based technologies to create highly interactive platforms through which individuals and communities share, co-create, discuss, and modify user-generated content.

If that’s good enough for you, great!  If you are a business professional, we recommend taking a few minutes to read on to refresh and strengthen your expertise.

Social Media 101.

Most people associate social media with positive outcomes, yet this is not always the case. Due to the increase in social media websites, there seems to be a positive correlation between the usage of such media with cyber-bullying, online sexual predators, and the decrease in face-to-face interactions. Social media may expose children to images not appropriate their age.  Geocities, created in 1994, was one of the first social media sites. The concept was for users to create their own websites, characterized by one of six “cities” that were known for certain characteristics.  Much of the criticism of social media are about its exclusiveness as most sites do not allow the transfer of information from one to another, disparity of information available, issues with trustworthiness and reliability of information presented, concentration, ownership of media content, and the meaning of interactions created by social media. However, it is also argued that social media has positive effects such as allowing the democratization of the internet while also allowing individuals to advertise themselves and form friendships.

Social media differentiates from traditional/industrial media in many aspects such as quality, reach, frequency, usability, immediacy, and permanence. There are many effects that stem from internet usage.  It’s said that Internet users continue to spend more time with social media sites than any other type of site. At the same time, the total time spent on social media in the U.S. across PC and mobile devices increased by 37 percent to 121 billion minutes in July 2012 compared to 88 billion minutes in July 2011.  For content contributors, the benefits of participating in social media have gone beyond simply social sharing to building reputation and bringing in career opportunities and monetary income.

Social media technologies take on many different forms including magazines, Internet forums, weblogs, social blogs, microblogging, wikis, social networks, podcasts, photographs or pictures, video, rating and social bookmarking. Technologies include: blogs, picture-sharing, vlogs, wall-postings, music-sharing, crowdsourcing and voice over IP, to name a few. Many of these services can be integrated via social network aggregation platforms. By applying a set of theories in the field of media research (social presence, media richness) and social processes (self-presentation, self-disclosure) Kaplan and Haenlein created a classification scheme in their Business Horizons (2010) article, with six different types of social media: collaborative projects (for example, Wikipedia), blogs and microblogs (for example, Twitter), content communities (for example, YouTube and DailyMotion), social networking sites (for example, Facebook), virtual game worlds (e.g., World of Warcraft), and virtual social worlds (e.g. Second Life). However, the boundaries between the different types have been increasingly blurred. For example, Twitter, as a combination of broadcasting service and social network, it may be better to be classified as a “social broadcasting technology.”

Mobile Social Media.

When social media is used in combination with mobile devices it is called mobile social media. This is a group of mobile marketing applications that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content. Due to the fact that mobile social media runs on mobile devices, it differentiates from traditional social media as it incorporates new factors such as the current location of the user (location-sensitivity) or the time delay between sending and receiving messages (time-sensitivity).

Business Potential.

While traditional social media offer a variety of opportunities for companies in a wide range of business sectors, mobile social media makes use of the location and time-sensitivity aspects of it in order to engage into marketing research, communication, sales promotions and discounts, and relationship development and loyalty programs.

• Marketing research: Mobile social media applications offer data about offline consumer movements at a level of detail heretofore limited to online companies. Any firm can now know the exact time at which a customer entered one of its outlets, as well as comments made during the visit.

• Communication: Mobile social media communication takes two forms, the first of which is company-to-consumer in which a company may establish a connection to a consumer based on its location and provide reviews about locations nearby. The second type of communication is user-generated content. For example, McDonald’s offered $5 and $10 gift cards to 100 users randomly selected among those checking in at one of the restaurants. This promotion increased check-ins by 33% (from 2,146 to 2,865), resulted in over 50 articles and blog posts, and prompted several hundred thousand news feeds and Twitter messages.

• Sales promotions and discounts: While in the past customers had to use printed coupons, mobile social media allows companies to tailor promotions to specific users at specific times. For example, when launching its California-Cancun service, Virgin America offered users who checked in through Loopt at one of three designated Border Grill taco trucks in San Francisco and Los Angeles between 11 am and 3 pm on August 31, 2010, two tacos for $1 and two flights to Mexico for the price of one.

• Relationship development and loyalty programs: In order to increase long-term relationships with customers, companies are able to create loyalty programs that allow customers who check-in regularly at a location to earn discounts or perks. For example, American Eagle Outfitters remunerates such customers with a tiered 10%, 15%, or 20% discount on their total purchase.

• E-Commerce: Mobile social media applications such as Amazon.com and Pinterest are influencing an upward trend in the popularity and accessibility of e-commerce, or online purchases.

As always, we appreciate your continued support and commitment to success through learning.  If you know someone who could benefit from this topic, please share this link. That’s how social media works!

How Well Do You Know Your Audience?

When it comes to technology, there is no doubt that social media is here to stay. It is quickly becoming one of the most powerful tools when it comes to achieving mass communication, and has become an accepted part of modern life. The good news is this quickly growing platform is a powerful way to promote your personal goals and professional business!  It’s also a great way to establish a product and to speak directly to a potentially large world-wide audience.

In order to achieve clear and effective communication, there are important considerations to think about before sharing what you have to say with the entire world.  Remember, once you hit the enter key, it’s out there for good!

It can be difficult to get your message heard in an incredibly crowded marketplace, so it’s important to be honest, helpful, and genuine.  Keep in mind that many people, including your readers, may have their own related blog, website, or other social media platform, so speak to them directly as if you were talking to a good friend or close business associate. This is why it’s so very important to know your audience.  Who are they?  What do they want?  What do they need?   The more you know about your readers, the more successful your objective will be.

Important considerations when identifying your audience.

• Who are you trying to reach?
• Are you trying to reach too many people?
• Is your subject base too wide?
• What message are you trying convey?
• Will your readers want to hear what you have to say?

Don’t try to be everything to everyone.

• Have a firm grasp about your type of readers.
• Make sure you know what your readers want.
• Know what resonates best with your readers.
• Choose an exact topic for your readers.
• Write and tailor your content accordingly.

Our suggestions for success.

If you keep your message simple and stay on topic, you’ll be on the right track.  If you write about what you know, your passion can show up in everything you do.  On the other hand, the experts tell us that the best way to learn about something new is to write about it.   So you see, there are a wide-range of possibilities and options open to you so just go for it because you can!

If you found this article helpful, please share your experience or words of wisdom with our readers below.  As always, we appreciate your continued support and commitment to success.   Do you know someone who could benefit from this topic?  Please share our link.  That’s how social media works!

How Much Should You Pay Your Blogger?

Are you perplexed as everybody else about how much to pay your blogger?  It’s true, blogging rates per-post vary greatly depending on your expectations and your needs.  You can expect to find a writer in the $25 to $150 range for one article. A lot of this depends on how much time and effort goes into creating the content. If little to no research is necessary to write a piece, you can easily source a writer at the lower end of the scale. 

However, if you require the writer to do research, locate and source images, tag and link your content, you can expect to pay more in the range of $75-$100 per article. This is especially true if your content is technical, such as medical, legal, or scientific. If you want your writer to also do things like take photos and do multiple interviews for a piece, expect to pay in the upper range of $125-$150 per post.

Once you’ve found a reliable writer whose work you like, you may want to investigate bringing them on board on a semi-permanent basis.  Negotiating a weekly or monthly flat rate will ensure that you’ve got a regular stream of content coming in, and freelance writers often like to take on some consistent clients.

Some writers may even discount their rates for regular work assignments.  If you have an individual that you’d like to contribute regularly to your blog, it’s most appropriate to compensate them.  This will help ensure the dedication and quality of their posts. A post a week from an expert may cost you somewhere around $1,000 a month or more. This also may be hard to come by.

The general rule of thumb is that if the blogger contacts you to do an article, you should offer the publicity and exposure benefits first. Then, maybe begin with the low-end compensation. If you seek out an expert to contribute to your blog, you should offer substantial compensation.  If you wish to have a blogger write consistently, you should offer some sort of flexible contract that requires an agreed-upon level of production. This will help to ensure the quality of the posts you receive.

When setting a price, take into account the following:

• Technical complexity of your topic, the expertise needed to write it, and the amount of research and time required.

• Reputation and current exposure of the blogger, level of skill, and the level the blogger’s career experience.

• Length of the article. Blog posts are generally about 200-500 words and no longer than about 750 words.

• Number of images, links, tags, original photographs, diagrams, etc.

• Amount of time needed to write a single post.

• How valuable is the post to you?

We appreciate your support and commitment to learning,  and we hope this information helps you to strengthen, refine, and promote your networking circles.   If you found this particular post or this blog helpful, please share it with friend!