Best Free Online Marketing Guide For Online Entrepreneur

30-second summary: Ecommerce has become an increasingly important element of any business, but it is more important than ever going into the 2020 holiday season. With the plethora of brands vying for ad space online, companies must make the most of their marketing budgets by adjusting their digital strategies. Socium Media CEO Owen Loft offers four tips for breaking through the noise to get in front of your customers and boost sales this holiday season. Retailers already set up for online sales had an immediate advantage, but others quickly fell behind. Instead of reaping profits from consumers who have chosen to shop from home, retailers without online infrastructures have missed out on booming sales opportunities. Online shopping was already trending upward before the pandemic, but the pandemic pushed the shift from physical to ecommerce ahead by five years . Businesses cannot afford to overlook digital. But one question remains: How can they bolster their online presence a...

30-second summary: Google’s rise as the dominant search engine has left the industry undisrupted for 20 years. The number of use cases for search are infinite meaning Google’s information lacks depth in some cases. Vertical search engines support unique workflows and provide domain expertise. Specialized search for consumers is well established but B2B search is rapidly growing due to a “digital exhaust” effect. B2B search helps fuel SMB’s and the mid-market because more businesses get found. On October 20, 2020, the Justice Department sued Google, an Alphabet subsidiary, claiming the company’s internet search platform is an illegal monopoly that is harmful to both competition and consumers. The case aims to prove that Google’s position as a dominant search provider limits consumer choice and partnerships with companies like Apple suppresses competition. Taking on Big Tech has been a mainstay in the national conversation ever since the 2016 Presidential election, but this is...

30-second summary: With remote work and the peak season coming in, creating an internal communication plan has become a massive priority for upper management to facilitate great teamwork. How can companies create internal communication plans that not only work in the short term but can also be utilized for years to come to achieve steady team growth? Eight great steps to improve your SMB digital marketing team’s internal communication plan and optimize successful outcomes. Creating an internal communication plan has become a massive priority this year.  With more companies working remotely , documenting processes and making them accessible to teams has taken precedence over many other tasks. Since team members cannot walk over to each other’s desks for a quick chat, it has become key for upper management to determine how best to facilitate teamwork. Overcoming communication barriers in such an environment will take planning—especially as this remote working situation ...

30-second summary: Visual content offers a ton of value for your website. It can boost critical statistics such as time on page. Visuals guide the reader through your content more smoothly. They make your content more consumable and increase sharing. Google loves images that are optimized for search. Read on to learn more about how adding optimized images to your site can boost your search visits from your target audience. See examples of how companies are successfully incorporating visual content into their marketing and websites. It’s no secret that visual content is hot right now (queue the Zoolander references). You know content formats like video, infographics, GIFs, memes, and more should be a part of your content strategy , but did you know these also impact your site’s SEO? How does visual content impact SEO? There is so much value to adding visual content on your website . While your written content serves the purpose of enabling you to naturally incorporate key...

30-second summary: As PPC costs continue to increase, it’s more important than ever for marketers and agencies to be able to access their data – all of their data. What’s even more critical is to track true conversions, meaning the leads that actually convert into paying customers for a business. The issue is that Google and other ad platforms treat all conversions as equal, a major flaw in the system. Do you really want your advertising budget being wasted on ads that are producing solicitations instead of qualified leads? More insights on how the world’s first AI Smart Core ℠ , SherloQ is revolutionizing how websites and digital ad campaigns operate altogether. As pay-per-click (PPC) costs continue to increase, it’s more important than ever for marketers and digital ad agencies to be able to access their data – all of their data. A recent article by Susan Wenogard talks about just how critical it is to track all conversions. I would argue what’s even more critical is to ...

30-second summary: Once you have the right product and pricing, succeeding with your online store essentially boils down to effective digital marketing and delivering a top-notch customer experience. For ecommerce, in particular, SEO — or ranking on the first page of Google — plays a huge role in effective marketing and online branding, as it builds trust in the eyes of your audience which paid ads can’t. And trust translates to a better customer experience. Here we discuss three proven SEO tactics that boost your search engine rankings while also enhancing your brand’s customer experience in ways that go beyond trust-building. Your modern online store has a lot of moving parts, with hundreds to thousands of different product pages, numerous variations of the same page, and dynamic elements. And you’re well aware of the importance of having your store rank on the first page of Google — more traffic, brand awareness, trust, and sales. However, SEO today is not just about includ...

30-second summary: Consumers expect ≈ and apps to respond quickly. Each second of delay can cost $100K in lost revenue for brands. There are tools to help understand a page’s overall speed. Looking at the relationship between page speed and SEO ranking shows that having a faster performing site/page does impact ranking in a positive way, albeit slightly. As marketers look for additional data points about why they should prioritize page speed, Jason Tabeling highlights the data and how it fits into an overall SEO strategy. The saying is, “Speed Kills.” However, when it comes to digital speed, it’s really, “Slow speed kills.” According to a study by Google and Deloitte for every 0.1 seconds that your page speed improves can increase your conversion rates by 8%. That data point creates a pretty powerful business case to improve the performance of your site. Think about this data point from your own experience browsing the web, mobile, and desktop. Have you ever found that a page w...

30-second summary: With the number of cases of the novel coronavirus rising once again, content marketers face a resumed challenge to meet consumer needs. Sales around the holidays will need to be approached sensitively, as unemployment rises and families are forced to tighten their belts. Creating empathetic and emotionally-driven content will be more likely to appeal to audiences during these times. The potential for future lockdown measures will see a potential increase in the demand for video content, particularly tutorials and explainers for new skills and products. Although the last few months have seen quarantine restrictions being eased around the world, a resurgence in COVID-19 cases has led to a new round of measures being put in place to quell the spread of the virus before winter. However, now that scientists have a greater understanding of the nature of the novel coronavirus, it seems more likely that these new rules will be less all-encompassing than they were th...

30-second summary: Although a business phone number isn’t as tough on your SEO as a complete rebrand, changing it can have an impact on your SEO. Preserving NAP consistency should be your primary goal when changing your phone number. Your marketing strategy can help make the transition easier for your customers, too, as you can notify them of the change ahead of time. The key goal in addition to retaining your ranking should be to not lose the trust of your customers by changing your information – hence the need to approach the process carefully. Much like all other aspects of digital marketing and brand positioning, SEO is a constantly changing game. With so many moving pieces and evolving trends, it’s no wonder that brands aren’t quite certain which decisions will negatively impact their SEO , and which ones are safe enough to make.  One day, it seems that one kind of behavior is perfectly fine, while the next Google will penalize it because they’ve implemented algorit...