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DaBrian Marketing Blog: News, Insights, and Digital Marketing

To Bid Or Not To Bid on Your Branded Keywords?

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As a PPC manager for an agency, I have heard multiple reasons from clients why not to bid on their own branded keywords. “Branded searches should lead to Organic/Free clicks” is definitely the most common. But what if it doesn’t… what if a search for your brand leads to a competitor’s sale?

Let’s say a potential customer is looking for you, but he or she found your competitor instead because you assumed branded keywords generated free organic traffic to your site. That’s a loss for you and a win for your competitor. Who would want that?

Does Paying for Branded Keyword Clicks Help or Hurt Your Bottom Line?

If your competitor is bidding on your brand name and you are not, there is a good chance their ad is showing above your Organic listing. This means they are likely stealing clicks which could be leading to sales. This would definitely be hurting your bottom line!

If you are bidding on your branded keywords, you should easily have a high Quality Score and therefore, should only need a minimal bid to capture the #1 position. This would prevent competitors from stealing potential clicks and sales away from you. However, does it help your bottom line or just do damage control?

Google Ads Bidding Tips

Fortunately, studies looking at running Pay per Click (PPC) for keywords that you already rank for organically have already been analyzed and written. Thank You, Search Engine Land (@sengineland) and Google Research (@googleresearch)!

The Research is in – Bidding on branded keywords does not steal from your own organic clicks, but rather leads to incremental clicks, leads/sales, and revenue! The question is not longer “To Bid or Not To Bid?” instead it should be “Why aren’t you bidding on your branded keywords?”

Have any questions concerning PPC? We would love to hear from you via Facebook, Twitter, or comment below. If you are looking to build, protect, and/or improve your brand awareness, we can help you with that, too.

Increase Your Business’ Brand Awareness With SEO

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You have a great business that does fantastic work and offers quality products or services. So, why don’t more people know about you? Why isn’t your phone ringing off the hook and your email full? You have a website, that’s enough, right (it’s not)?

In order to increase your business’ brand awareness online, you need to be investing in Search Engine Optimization (SEO). According to a study by MarketingDive, 82% of participating marketers see SEO becoming more effective and 42% of this group stated its effectiveness is increasing significantly. This means that other businesses will be devoting more efforts towards SEO, which only stiffens the competition.

Build your business’ brand awareness and outperform your competitors online by utilizing the SEO tactics listed below.

1. Get In Front Of Your Audience With the Right Content

Unless you’re a large national brand, like Walmart® (if so, why are you reading this?), most people aren’t searching directly for your brand. Rather, they are typing in product/service related keywords.

To ensure your business pops up front and center amongst your competitors, you need to optimize your content to include the keywords and verbiage that your target audience and industry uses.

In addition to including the most relevant, trending, and traffic driving keywords, you also need to be cognizant of the forms of content you’re producing. Is your audience more susceptible to read blogs, articles, and white papers? Or, are they a younger, more visual audience who prefer videos and infographics?

By creating the appropriate content in the form most suited for your audience, users will be more likely to find and share your content. Thus, increasing the digital exposure your business receives.

2. Dominate the Local Market With Local SEO

For over a decade, Google and other major search engines have been placing a heavy emphasis on the importance of locality. Like your business, search engines also have a product and service, and their goal is to provide the most relevant and useful information to their users. While there are hundreds of factors that influence their results, the location has a massive impact, especially in regards to business-related searches.

To enhance your business’ local performance, there are a few tactics you’ll need to pursue:

Optimizing Your Site Locally

  • Have your name, address, & phone number (NAP) consistent throughout the site.
  • Embed Google Maps on your contact page.
  • Develop localized content.
  • Link to local partnerships, memberships, and affiliations.

Being Listed, Active, and Optimized on Popular Local Platforms

Many of these platforms (like Google, Facebook, and Yelp) have a review functionality. Meaning, customers can leave reviews about your business directly on their platform for the public to see. By owning these accounts, you are able to clearly see what people are saying. This allows you to get in front of any potential negative situations that may occur.

By being on top of things, you have the opportunity to improve your business based upon feedback, and resolve the situation. Showing that you’re listening to your consumers and taking action will actually help improve your brand’s online public perception.

According to a study by Moz, online reviews have been shown to impact 67.7% of purchasing decisions. Being uninformed of your online reputation can potentially spell disaster for your business.

3. Build Links Through Local Influencers

Link building, or link earning, is the process of obtaining backlinks from other websites that lead back to your website. While many owners may not see the value or understand fully the impact link building has, it is a hugely important component of a local seo strategy.

To improve your business’ brand awareness in your local market, you should target the following sites in terms of link acquisition:

  • Local Business Directories
  • Local Chambers
  • Local Businesses
  • Local News Stations
  • Local Bloggers/Social Influencers

Being listed on these sites will send local signals to search engines and place your website in front of your local audience.

Build Your Brand Organically

Increasing your brand awareness through SEO can take some time, but it’s well worth it. By following all of the steps and tactics mentioned above, you’ll set the foundation for your business to flourish digitally within your target market.

Ready to improve your brand awareness online through SEO? Schedule a FREE consultation today!

By: David McDowell

DaBrian Marketing Redesigns Hometown Heroes’ Website

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Hometown Heroes teamed up for a complete website redesign with DaBrian Marketing Group, LLC. The goal of the site is to increase brand awareness for the non-profit organization who is dedicated to paying it forward and giving back to the community. It’s developed to attract new donors, volunteers, and organizations who believe in their mission and want to become a Hometown Hero.

About Hometown Heroes

Hometown Heroes is a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization & nationwide charity. Their mission is to give assistance to any family or individual regardless of their gender, age, or ethnicity. They invite anyone – individuals, schools, businesses, and volunteers to join in to raise awareness and funds, together.

Types Of Opportunities to Provide Assistance:

  • Hurricane Relief
  • Homelessness
  • Domestic Violence
  • Drug Abuse
  • Disability
  • Food & Heat for the Elderly
  • Assistance for New Mothers with No Resources
  • Joint Fundraisers with Local & National Nonprofits

Super New Features

The site includes two new features that are unlike their previous site. Each month, they will be featuring a monthly hero spotlight (See Image Below). The Super Hero of the Month will honor local citizens or organization who have contributed or brought awareness to Hometown Heroes. It also will advertise upcoming events that benefit the organization. Through proper maintenance and updating, anyone across the country will be able to find a way to help!

Join The Ocean County Awards Gala Event

There was a pressing deadline to complete the website in order to be able to promote their event on May 3, 2018. The Gala will be at Jack Baker’s Lobster Shanty to celebrate another successful year of helping our neighbors through tough times. It includes cocktails, dinner, dessert, dancing, and a premier gift auction. Order your tickets to support the cause!

DaBrian Marketing invites you to check out Hometown Heroes’ website and become a hometown hero yourself.

5 Tips to Measuring B2B Marketing Initiatives

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The business-to-business (B2B) sales and marketing roles are continuously evolving because of social selling, marketing automation, mobile devices, and more. According to Biznology, today’s sales process takes about 22% longer than 5 years ago. So, how does your business measure the effectiveness of sales and marketing campaigns?  Below is a brief list of tips to successfully measure your B2B marketing initiatives:

Know Your Sales Pipeline Calculations

We get calls all the time from businesses that want to increase their sales and revenue.  Unfortunately, not all businesses take the time to access their sales pipeline and calculate what it will take to achieve their goals and objectives.

  • How many prospects do you need to call to book a meeting?
  • How many meetings turn into a quote?
  • What’s your quote-to-close ratio?

Knowing this information will give you a sense of your potential budget needed to create the incremental volume necessary while also determining whether or not your goals are realistic. You will also have visibility into phases in the sales pipeline that are under performing.

Capture Progress of the Sales Pipeline

It’s no secret that sales reps hate manually entering data. In fact, 23% of salespeople cite manual data entry as the biggest challenge using their existing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system (HubSpot, 2017). Capturing the progress of the sales pipeline in your CRM allows you to measure the impact of each sale or prospective customer’s actions. This will improve the sales forecast or closing ratio. The incentive for your business and the sales reps is to help focus on which actions will generate high revenue and sales. Use marketing automation to work on your sales reps behalf.

Access the Impact Marketing is Having on the Sales Funnel

So, you just want more sales but do you respect the sales funnel? The sales funnel is the buying process that companies lead customers through when purchasing products or services.  The goal of your marketing is to have prospects enter the sales process to solve your customer’s problem. Access the impact your marketing is having on moving prospects through the funnel. Your business won’t increase its sales until more prospects move through your sales process.  

Create a Measurement Plan for B2B Sales & Marketing Campaigns

A measurement plan is a document that translates your business objectives into metrics that can measure your website’s offline sales. It provides a framework to customize the configuration of your digital analytics and sales funnel. It is a vital part of your digital marketing strategy and will guide you to set realistic expectations. If you can’t get to raw numbers to calculate the metrics, can you really measure it?

Report Only on B2B KPIs That Matter

There are so  many reports, dashboards, and analyses , but whichget to the point of your marketing and sales campaigns? Narrow down the metrics to your key performance indicators (KPIs) so that you’re not looking at every metric associated with your business to business (B2B) marketing and sales initiatives – only the ones that matter.

Check out Pipedrive (CRM) to improve your sales & marketing campaign tracking. Already measuring sales and marketing?  Let us know your thoughts and add to the list of tips.

Grow Social to Build Your Brand

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Social media has exploded exponentially the past few years. It started off as a way to share a conversation with a colleague (Facebook), share music with a friend (MySpace), or write all of your personal thoughts in a public diary (Every platform?). But, it has grown into a marketing tactic to allow businesses to get their products or services seen and in the right hands. With how simple it is to click “Buy”, it’s now crucial for businesses to maintain active social media accounts. If you haven’t come to this realization, you’re falling behind.

Creating an account and “posting” just isn’t enough. How do you create worthy content for your customers? How do you portray that your brand is the best to new customers? How do people even find what you’re posting!? With the right advice, this can all happen in no-time.

First Things First: Build Your Organic Reach

With Facebook’s new algorithm, it has become harder to build your organic reach, but doing so will only expedite your social success. Share a mix of intriguing content letting users discover not only helpful tips or information about your industry but allow them to get to know your business and your employees. Customers want to get to know YOU, your employees, and your personality. Any business with a strong company culture can soar on social media, no matter which industry you’re in. If your not an old, bland company, prove it.

Wendy’s strong social media presence gets everyone talking, even their competition.

— If people like your content, this can also help your search engine optimization (SEO) efforts, too! Social posts can be found in search results. —

Make It Known You’re There to Help

When someone messages your company on social media, do you reply? Do you wait days to respond? Do you have an automated message setup and think that’ll suffice? Customers want to speak with one individual, real human being NOW. A bot or automated response may be a time saver and at times, helpful, but it won’t do anything for the customer and in turn, your business. Most feel more comfortable writing to a business rather than calling about a question. Make it known that no matter how they reach out, you care enough to respond. So start getting those responsiveness rates up on Facebook!

Spend Money Where It’s Worth It

While growing your accounts organically is important, there’s nothing wrong with putting money behind the posts that are worth it! In fact, it’s important! There are several opportunities across all platforms that, depending on the scenario and the goal, you should put a few dollars behind. Facebook advertising can benefit almost every business. For this reason, Facebook offers many opportunities to do so such as Boosted Posts and Facebook Advertising. There even is a special, additional way for local businesses to expand their reach. Before you start spending money, think about what you’re trying to accomplish, what will resonate with your audience, and how much should your company spend on this ad? You’ll be surprised how little that cost could be.

Build a Brand Worth Talking About

Building your online presence is an ongoing process and takes a lot of time. While these tips will get you started, there’s much more you can do! If you still don’t see that you need to combine social media with all your other marketing efforts, let’s have a chat – especially if you’re a local business.

Avoid These Productivity Killers

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Working at a desk

We all have the same hours in a day but are we all making the most of the time we have? Benjamin Franklin said, “Do not squander time for that is the stuff life is made of.” We may not be able to change our workload but if we can get work done quicker and avoid needlessly wasting precious hours of our day, it’s a win! Let’s discuss a few changes we can make.

Be Proactive to Eliminate Distractions

We get info faster than ever before, but this can be overwhelming these days with the notifications, updates and reminders flooding our devices. Rather than constantly checking, turn on your “do not disturb” settings and designate time to check your updates at once. There’s also some great apps and plugins that deter the urge to check all the time.

Distractions can come from all angles especially if your work area isn’t private. Offices with open floor plans can be great for collaborating, but if others are interrupting your workflow by chatting by your desk, it can be hard to carry a thought. Let coworkers know your schedule and the best times of day to chat or ask them to set up a time to talk. If the office is just too noisy, headphones can be a great quick fix or find a quiet space like booking the conference room just to work. The change in surroundings might be a nice change of pace as well.

Sometimes, distractions can come from within when our brains won’t be quiet. It’s hard to be productive while thinking of a list of things I have to do and trying to remember them. I like to keep a notepad close by and jot down what I’m thinking about to get it off my mind and plan for it later.

Fatigue

Have you ever thought about how your overall health can affect your work performance? Many of us take pride in doing the best we can, neglecting our health at times, in order to get a job done well. However, cutting corners on health can catch up to us and not much is going to get done if you need a sick day or two. Getting sick is inevitable but do your best to eliminate the frequency by investing a little more time in yourself throughout the day.

Getting a good night’s rest can have a huge impact on our productivity. Research shows that lack of sleep can have an impact on a lot of the abilities we need to be productive like memory, thinking, and the speed in which we get things done. Rather than burn the midnight oil, feel good about going to bed early and if you’re thinking about the next day already, write it all down and rest easy.

If you think you can run full steam all day without taking any breaks, you are being unrealistic. Rather than planning on getting work done in large chunks at a time, space out your day a little with 5 minute breaks to let yourself reset and get back to work with a fresh energy and motivation. Don’t just use breaks to stare at your phone, get up, move around, and breath. Studies showed that taking a 30 min walk during lunch breaks at least three times a week improved enthusiasm, relaxation, and nervousness at work and resulted in less sick days.

These changes might not be easy to make all at once so start small and incorporate a few changes at a time. Stay mindful of what is cutting into your productivity, be proactive about improving yourself and turn it into a habit that you’ll be more likely to keep.

Resources

https://positiveroutines.com/increasing-productivity-with-sleep/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3290659/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25559067