Dabrian Marketing Group

Why Manage Local Listings?

September 19, 2013 by Dabrian Marketing Group Leave a Comment

For any business, your customers need to be able to find you. You wouldn’t take any signage down from your building, would you? This includes the customer having quick and easy access to basic information such a telephone number and hours of operation. The majority of customers now turn to the internet to find this information; about 97% of customers use the internet to research business and products at a local level according to a study conducted by Bia/Kelsey. With this much purchasing intent at a local level, wouldn’t you like to boost your visibility?

Benefits of Local Listings

As mentioned in the previous paragraph, the obvious benefit of managing local listings is to make your business visible to those customers searching at a local level. But what else is there? When internet searchers utilize a specific geographic location, they are usually close to converting (i.e. making a purchase). It is imperative to draw these searchers in to convert, whatever you choose to define as a conversion.

Speaking of drawing in searchers to convert, making sure you have top notch local listings can help you stand out among the plethora of competitors. A great way to ensure that your local listings are up to par is to develop a local listing strategy for your business.

Local Listing Strategy

The process of managing local listings sounds relatively simple, but there are actually many steps in this entire process that require attention. The first step in your local listing strategy is to verify your place of business. Google, Bing, and Yahoo! have similar processes in which the business must fill out an online form. The form automatically generates and will send a postcard with a verification PIN to the business address listed. Therefore, you must have a physical location to claim a local listing via these major search engines.
While implementing a local listing strategy to the fullest extent, you will be maintaining business information across several platforms. It is important to ensure that this information is consistent across the board so that your prospective customers can find the correct information. Not only will you have to provide the correct information initially, but you will have to maintain this information. If there is a large-scale re-branding or something as small as a new telephone extension number, remember to update your local listings.

Local Listings are Going Mobile

Knowing the importance of local listings, where will it go from here? Will it affect certain demographics? With the rapid growth of mobile searching, business information will have to be available at a local level to be seen by this growing demographic. Just to explain this point by some numbers: According to Google, 95% of smartphone users look for local information specifically. Knowing this, local listings can be a significant source of traffic and potential customers. In conjunction with local listings management, it may be a good idea to create a mobile site or configure your current desktop site to fit a mobile screen. As mobile usage continues to rise, it will be critical to stay on top.

Have any questions about local listings management? Contact us today or leave us a comment below!

A Guide to Marketing Yourself Using Content

September 11, 2013 by Dabrian Marketing Group Leave a Comment

This week, we’re taking time to explore a topic that’s a little different. You. Yes, you. Not your business, not your marketing campaigns, but you on an individual level. If you think about it, the time and effort invested in marketing yourself plays just as crucial a role as marketing your business. This is especially true when it comes to goal achievement. If you work for a large corporation, growth is always welcomed, and if you’re employed by a local start-up, brand establishment is the name of the game. Both of these can benefit from the individual efforts of employees, but the question is, “what’s going to be your approach?” Well feast your eyes on the steps you’ll need to get started!

Step 1: Realize That LinkedIn is Your Friend

Your position as a thought leader is highly influenced by the people your message reaches. That should be a given. You wouldn’t want to spend your time and effort crafting content that embodies both your work and your personality, only to have it sit in perpetual stagnancy. The best remedy here is social networking, particularly using LinkedIn, self-proclaimed as the “World’s Largest Professional Network.”

LinkedIn contains distinct advantages over other popular platforms like Facebook or Twitter, including:

An environment for professionals to connect. This works to filter out audiences that may ignore your message
Groups that allow you to hone in on audiences within your industry, your geographic location, or your level of experience
An environment that’s becoming a big part of recruiting and talent acquisition processes

By taking advantage of this powerful networking tool, you’ll be able to easily contribute to the industry-wide conversation, connect with influential people in the space, and explore opportunities to progress in your field.

Step 2: Seek out Media to Showcase Your Insight

While LinkedIn is a very powerful tool for getting your name out there and having discourse with others in your industry, the platform can sometimes lack recency and structure from the standpoint of interesting and innovative content creation. In other words, LinkedIn may offer a place to discuss your thoughts on a particular topic, but you’ll need a way to more formally (and regularly) share your ideas. In this regard, a great place to start is by using the resources already at your disposal.

Get together with colleagues and propose a company blog or YouTube channel if they don’t already exist. If they do, you’ve got a few options. You can develop a regular blog series that appears alongside your company’s posts or set up a YouTube playlist that features content that incorporates your unique personality. If you’re comfortable exploring digital roads-less-traveled, there are a host of less-traditional content outlets at your disposal, including SlideShare, infographics, screencast tutorials, or microcontent sites like Vine and Instagram).

No matter the avenue you choose to carry your message, keep one thing in mind—whether you try to or not, you are always representing your employer when interacting online. Your individualized content marketing endeavors should be approved by the higher-ups, portray your company in a positive light, and offer relevant information to your intended audience (Basically, upload those cat videos on your own time).

Step 3: Maintain and Measure!

When your personal digital marketing gets off the ground, there are a few important maintenance items to consider. First off, don’t embark on any content-driven marketing medium if you can’t maintain it. You’ll have to be strategic about allocating your time to satisfy your existing work responsibilities and your chosen “side project.” This point can be summed up very succinctly: “Any digital asset, if left to languish, will leave you worse off than if you hadn’t created it in the first place.”

In addition, consider your process for demonstrating the value of your efforts. If you’re approached by your supervisor and she wants to see the “results” of your self-marketing campaign, what will you do? Incorporating a measurement plan that shows your time is paying off with tangible goals, key performance indicators, and metrics will be invaluable. Not only will you be able to quell your boss’s wariness, but you’ll also begin laying appropriate procedural groundwork, should your content become company policy down the line.

What form of content best suits you? Share your thoughts and ideas in the comments!

Google Analytics API – Lesson 3: Starting to Code

September 5, 2013 by Dabrian Marketing Group Leave a Comment

If you’ve been with us through the entire series, welcome back! This time we’ll get in and get our hands dirty in some code. If you haven’t been with us for the series, start by reading the first part of the series, which discusses some background, and the second part of the series, which provides a high level overview of the steps we will be taking today.

Let’s Start at the Very Beginning…

The last installment in this series will look markedly similar to this session. However, throughout the next few posts I intend to reference code samples and actually guide you through the step-by-step process from my perspective. The goal is that you should be able to follow these instructions as a supplementation to Google’s already thorough instructions.

Since my final goal is to query specific metrics from Google and eventually move them to a database, I chose to complete this process in PHP. This way, I can easily interface with a MySQL database. PHP may not be the best language for the process that you are trying to complete. For this reason, Google also provides several other languages. This guide still may be useful in understanding overall how the process works, for those of you who may prefer Java or Ruby.

…A Very Good Place to Start

The first step, if you have not yet completed it, is to read the first two blog posts in this series. This will give you the background necessary to understand the process that I am going to follow.

In the last post, I mentioned the code libraries and the Hello Analytics API tutorial. The first step for this process will be to download the proper files. The PHP library can be accessed here.

The download area looks like this:

Once you have reached this page, click to download the latest release file. The file will be in a tar.gz format. Use a file manager such as WinZip or 7Zip to extract the .tar file to your desktop or other convenient location.

Open the containing folder. Within this folder, there will be several more directories.

It should look like this:

License, notice, and readme are all files necessary for legal purposes. You will not need to access these files for this tutorial. The other three folders are of the most interest.

Open “examples”. Once you have done that, you will see a lengthy list of a multitude of examples. To keep things simple, I recommend that you delete all of the folders and files except for the analytics folder and the batch text file.

When that is complete, it should look like this:

Once that is complete, you will free up some more space and make the files easier to work with.

Now your files are prepared for the process.

Understanding the Files and Process

Within this analytics folder is the actual code that will run and display in your browser. In addition to this folder, the “src” folder at the high level holds the code that runs in the background. This code will ensure that you are authenticating properly.

In its simplest terms, the whole process works as follows:

Visit test site -> click link to authenticate -> allow application authentication via Google -> return to your original page with an auth token -> complete any more processes in your application.

Preparing for the Next Session

Now that all of the files are downloaded, you will need to prepare for the next post. In the next few posts, we will be editing and configuring code, getting this code on to our server, and running the code.

You will need the following programs to complete the next section:

A text editor such as Notepad++ or Notepad.
A FTP client such as FileZilla.
A live webserver. If a live webserver is out of the question, those of you who are comfortable with some development may be familiar with a locally hosted server such as WAMP, MAMP for Mac, or XAMPP.

I completed this testing on a protected subfolder of a live domain. If you do not have a testing environment that is live to work with one of the AMP programs will suffice. If you do have a live environment to work with, this is when you can edit or set up a new directory to work with. Either that, or install and configure your FTP client to work with your server.

In addition to having the proper software setup, you should familiarize yourself with the files in the analytics folder, such as the Hello Analytics file or the authorization files. Once downloading and installing the text editor, open the files and browse through them.

At this point, if you have not already done so, you will need to create a Google account. Once that has been completed, you are now ready to begin development. We’ll see you at the next tutorial!

Stay tuned for the next part of the series where we will begin to edit and understand the code! Questions? Comments? Post them below!

Debunking the Myth of Multitasking

August 21, 2013 by Dabrian Marketing Group Leave a Comment

First Things First: You Cannot Multitask

This isn’t ‘new news’ by any stretch, but it’s terribly easy to forget—our brains are only truly capable of focusing on one thing at a time. According to Earl Miller, a neuroscience professor at MIT, rather than being able to focus on multiple things at once, we’re simply shifting our focus at a very high speed. Another neuroscientist, Daniel Weissman, of the University of Michigan, points out in the same NPR article that we “frequently overestimate our ability to handle multiple tasks”. The real question here is—what do we do about it? How do we meet deadlines while knowing that we can’t truly juggle a million things at once?

Get Organized

While it’s tempting to continue to think that we can “do everything all the time,” it’s best to move forward and figure out a better method for managing our workloads.

There are several methods for getting organized, so find what works best for you. Do you use Outlook to keep track of tasks, deadlines, and a journal of your time spent? Do you prefer good, old-fashioned pen and paper to do lists? From a structured method for planning your meetings to prioritizing your tasks, being organized will serve you across the board as it applies to accomplishing your goals.

Communicate with Co-workers

A great tip I acquired at a SkillPath Seminar entitled, “Managing Multiple Projects, Objectives and Deadlines” (which is where the myth of multitasking was truly driven home for me) was to enlist the help of others to stay organized. Ensuring that your communication is clear and understandable allows for all members of the team to be aware of your goals. If you don’t clearly communicate to your team that you’ll be devoting your afternoon to finishing up documentation for a project, they may continue to (lovingly, of course) push you toward working on a different project. Use your newfound organizational techniques to share your plans with your team and encourage them to get organized as well—it’s a win-win situation.

Don’t Forget to Breathe

Transitioning from believing in your ability to multitask to an organization-based method of operation can be stressful—don’t forget to breathe! While you certainly can’t expect perfection from yourself, you can consistently work toward bettering your personal system for managing your workload. Get organized, communicate with your co-workers, and experience your focus and productivity levels increase exponentially.

Have you made the mental move away from believing in multi-tasking? How’s it going? Let us know in the comments!

The Pitfalls of Isolating Digital Marketing

August 7, 2013 by Dabrian Marketing Group 1 Comment

What is Digital Marketing?

For years, traditional marketing was the primary form of communication between businesses and their potential customers. It helped these businesses to create brand awareness and get the word out to potential customers about their product or service. Although traditional marketing continues to play a huge role in the business world, digital marketing has become just as, if not more, important. As the use of the Internet continues to soar, so does digital marketing. For the most part, digital marketing provides an inexpensive alternative to traditional marketing. When it comes down to it, business professionals are looking for “instant gratification,” two words that are not necessarily associated with the traditional side of the house. Digital Marketing gives businesses better insights into what marketing tactics are working and if those investments are contributing to ROI.

How Can Digital Isolation Affect Your Business?

When it comes to engaging in digital marketing, decision makers too often think that a single service is going to drastically impact their business and instantly change the competitive landscape. The fact of the matter is, looking at digital marketing in its entirety and developing well-thought-out digital strategies are what lead to success. When you isolate digital marketing, it can open the door to reckless budget spending on campaigns with no way of accurately measuring performance. Failing to see digital as a whole can greatly reduce your chances of reaching your target audience and leave you looking up at your competitors.

Putting the Pieces Together

Digital marketing can be very puzzling to some. It’s important to realize that digital marketing is not a solo act; it is performed in unison. Only when you begin to look at digital marketing as whole instead of one element or service, will you begin to see better results. For example, while social media is a great way to increase brand awareness and manage brand reputation, it does not often directly impact conversions and sales. However, increased brand awareness can help drive more site traffic and improve search engine optimization–related metrics. Ultimately, the more site traffic you gain, the more likely you are to generate conversions and see increased ROI.

Conclusion

As we move throughout the 21st century and beyond, digital marketing will continue growing and become a vital step toward a business reaching its organizational goals and objectives. Building and developing long-term relationships and strategies is what digital marketing is all about. The sooner you begin to realize that digital marketing is not just as simple as a one off service, the better off they will be.

Having trouble seeing the bigger picture? Share your thoughts or questions in the comments below or give us a call at 610-743-5602!

Mobile SEO: A Crash Course

July 31, 2013 by Dabrian Marketing Group Leave a Comment

Why is mobile SEO important?

The sight of someone peering down at a smartphone, tablet, or other mobile device is all too common, but it’s not simply just a fad. Mobile is the new way that information is extracted from the vast landscape of the internet quickly and efficiently. With the rise of users of mobile devices, it is becoming imperative that businesses prepare for the sharp increase in mobile traffic by optimizing for it..

There are many reasons why mobile SEO is important. One of the more obvious reasons, as with traditional SEO, is that visibility on the major search engines is crucial to businesses that participate in ecommerce. Rankings on search engines are important, but what about driving sales? According to Moz and Gartner, total purchases made on mobile devices reached $6.7 billion last year and are projected to reach approximately $31 billion by 2015. Not only have mobile devices become a major first point-of-contact for consumers, but also they have proven to be a reliable sales point as well.

How to Optimize for a Mobile Site

The YouMoz Blog (the hub of the Moz community) provides a comprehensive list of Google’s new best practices for mobile SEO. Google’s rules are not only a guideline for optimization through Google itself, but may help with optimization across other major search engines as well. Listed below are some major points to consider when starting any mobile SEO campaign:

1. Social media activity drives URL sharing

Consider the fact that smartphone users spend an average of 9 hours and 6 minutes per month on social networks. Being active in the social media realm should be a part of any link-building effort, including mobile and traditional.

2. Make mobile sites convenient and accessible

The whole point of mobile internet access is to browse the web for information wherever you are. Mobile sites must be prepared for this, whether it’s implementing responsive design or have having an entirely different URL for a mobile site so that information can be taken in quickly and conveniently.

3. Focus on local

It is very important to keep the idea of “local results” in mind when starting a mobile SEO campaign. This is especially important when focusing on business and retail searches; the vast majority of higher results will be the closest business or retail outlet to the user’s location.

Key Takeaways

It’s apparent that mobile users have established themselves as key players in ecommerce.As mobile traffic continues to increase it is crucial to target this ever-growing audience. By following Google’s best practices for mobile SEO, your optimization efforts should have positive results. Just like with traditional SEO, mobile SEO will require research, which while tedious, is necessary to increase your visibility. Keep in mind: some of the fundamental factors that result in solid mobile SEO results are implementing the proper URL structure and site design for your audience, being engaged in social media, and focusing on local searches.