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Marketing Strategy

What is Marketing Automation?

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Marketing automation is software that helps businesses automate marketing and sales initiatives to generate more leads, close more deals, and measure marketing success better. It gives businesses the power to take action based on the behaviors of prospective customers. On average, 51% of companies are currently using this tactic. With more than half of B2B companies (58%) planning to adopt this technology shortly.

Marketing Automation

How can marketing automation help your business?

Using a marketing automation software can help your business to improve efficiencies, personalize your marketing messages, connect marketing to closed sales deals, and measure your strategy effectively. To some degree, you can set-up marketing campaigns and leave it on “autopilot” while focusing on other business objectives. When used effectively, it will align your sales and marketing teams towards a common goal.

What are some features of marketing automation tool?

Below are few common features:

Lead Scoring – score prospects based on behavior so you can followup with proactive prospects.

Lead Nurturing – automatically stay in communication with prospective customers through the sales process

Prospect Tracking – identifies activities that prospects have interacted with on your website or marketing

Email Marketing – email design templates to send, test, and measure the effectiveness.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Tool Integrations – connecting your leads with marketing activities that closed deals.

Integrated Reporting – see where leads come from, which campaigns are working, and the number of deals closed

Example: Marketing Automation Features

This is just a brief list of the options it provides. With technology always improving, there are bound to be many more to come.

Should your company be using it?

If you have a contact database and are proactively marketing your company’s products or services, YES. The saying goes, “80% of sales come from 20% of advertising.” Marketing automation will provide some clarity into specifically which advertising efforts are working. By measuring your funnel, you can identify issues to the process and create strategies to improve conversion rates.

What do you need to know about marketing automation software?

It all starts with a strategy. Without a strategy, you have no chance of success! Marketing automation software can be complex, so start with the fundamentals and grow from there. It’s important to have standards for your contact data and keep it organized. Otherwise, you’ll end up with garbage in your CRM which will cause your marketing automation to be ineffective..

Lastly, you must have or create relevant content in different formats (text, images, gif, video, data sheets, case studies, etc.). Relevant content is king, and without it, you are just a peasant in your industry!

If you want more on marketing automation, drop us a line or comment with your feedback or suggestion.

Time Management Is Key For a Successful Work Day

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It’s Monday morning. You have a fresh to-do list and you’re ready to tackle it – that’s great! Finding a way to keep track of what needs to get done is a good start but many people stop their planning and organizing. There’s more to consider.

We’ve all been there – a mountain of work and a steep, never ending to-do list. It’s hard to enjoy your work when you always feel like you’re rushing to complete an assignment you forgot about while completing the one originally needed for that day. You may be using a planner or a task management system, but neither seems to assist in getting as much as you thought you would complete in a day or week.

Make your work week less stressful and exhausting. Here are a few tips to help wrangle those tasks, assignments, and deadlines.

Pencil and notepad

How Much Time Do You Really Have?

It’s important to be realistic about how much time you have to complete your tasks. Let’s say you have 5 tasks. This doesn’t sound like many, but stop to think how long it takes to complete each one. If each requires 2 hours, you’ll need more than one work day to complete them all. On the flip side, you may be staring down a list of 16 tasks but they each take 30 minutes or less. This could easily fit into a single work day.

Sometimes our minds deceive us on what we can really accomplish. We look at our assignments and get overwhelmed. Get a handle on the amount of time needed to complete your work through something called time blocking.
To me, time blocking is similar to a game of Tetris. You can visually organize your tasks to maximize the most effective use of your time with just a little thinking ahead. If you let your tasks build up, game over. To do this, you need to utilize your calendar!

Start with your high priority and urgent assignments and block out time to work on it during your workday or in smaller blocks throughout your work week. Then, fill in less pressing tasks in the remaining open time slots. Be sure to give yourself ample time when blocking out tasks. This way if you get done earlier than estimated, you’ll have more time to work with which is a win!

Make sure you don’t overload your day, avoid burnout and block out time for breaks such as to eat take a quick walk or simply look away from your computer. It’s also a good idea to block out a little time for planning and scheduling your next day or week in order to make this method a habit.

Personally, I like to use Google Calendar to schedule because I can set reminders to ding when my next time-block is supposed to start. This helps me stay on my scheduled routine. I also attach any necessary assets to the event’s description so I don’t have to search for what I working on.

Why Time Blocking Works

Time Blocking helps you visualize your work day and be more productive knowing that you can focus on one task at a time. You’ll become more motivated to complete your assignments. You’ll know whether you can take on more assignments and if a deadline is realistic. And crossing off items on your list will give you a sense of accomplishment and further alleviate your stress!

Will unexpected events or tasks pop up that throw a wrench in your schedule? Of course! Life is unpredictable, but finding a process that works for you will help you from sinking too deep in your work. The more you use time blocking the more you will know what you are capable of accomplishing in a day. You will start to notice patterns like when you’ve hit your daily slump and are least productive. During that time, it would be best to schedule less complicated tasks.

Have you used the time blocking method? How has it worked for you? Let us know in the comments below!

Reach 150 Million New Patients with Effective Healthcare Marketing

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In November of 2016, Google announced mobile-first search engine results. Combine that fact with 51% of Americans (that’s about 150 million people) use their mobile devices to research healthcare information. If you handle healthcare marketing or looking to grow your healthcare practice, it’s time that you get on the bandwagon or risk being run over!    

Mobile Friendly Healthcare Marketing

Mobile users within the US are using smartphones to search for healthcare related information ranging from health conditions, refilling prescriptions, and shopping for health or medical products. These potential new patients must be able to easily navigate your mobile website and get to the desired information.  

Connect with Local Patients Online

People are looking for healthcare information and medical products. The closer to your healthcare practice, the greater the likelihood of turning them into new patients. Clearly communicating your healthcare products, services, and doctor expertise across all devices, improves your opportunities to grow. Ask patients for reviews to your local listing such as Google My Business, Facebook, and Yelp to increase your exposure to potential patients.

Local listing management services in Reading, Pa
Grove Dental Group’s Google My Business

Create Content to Demonstrate Healthcare Expertise

35% of people go online to self-diagnose their symptoms. Healthcare marketers and medical practices have an opportunity to provide people with unique information to support your expertise and educate them. The content should follow SEO best practices to enhance visibility in the search engine results.

Create Content to Demonstrate Healthcare Expertise

Tell people why your healthcare practitioners are unique and what value your healthcare practice provides. Show some personality by engaging with your existing and potential patients on social media. Don’t just put your branding and mission on paper, demonstrate them with action within your community, as well as your area of expertise.

For more information on Healthcare Marketing, subscribe to our YouTube Channel or subscribe to our newsletter.

What Is a CRM and Where to Get Started

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CRM may be an acronym you’ve heard floating around before – but what is it? CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management, basically it’s how you can keep track of data on past, present, and potential future customers and log interactions with them whether it’s through, emails, phone calls, mailings and so on.

Why would you want to have that information? With information like that you can manage how to regain former customers, retain customers, and gain new ones. You’re probably starting to see that a CRM is an integral tool for sales and marketing for businesses and in fact it is.

You could start a CRM system by collecting and entering customer and potential customer information into something like an excel sheet but that can become tedious work that wouldn’t be very helpful in the long run. Fortunately, there are a ton of CRM systems out there that can help.

Track Conversions

There are a few helpful things to keep in mind when picking out a CRM:

Is It Automated?

As in does it integrate with any platforms you are already using such as your email and social media? This is useful because it will save you or your employees time from having to manually enter every bit of customer information on your own.

Is It Mobile?

Can you access your customer relation information on the fly? This is helpful when you meet a new prospective customer and want to get them in the system right away or access all the information about a customer out in the field without having to log into your computer.

Is It Usable?

A major factor to consider: is the program easy to use for you and your employees? A big reason for businesses leaving their CRM to the way side is not knowing how it functions.

However, searching through all of the CRM options out there can be overwhelming in of itself. I’ve picked a few of some of the best ones out there to get you started.

SalesforceIQ CRM

One of Salesforce IQ’s features is the automatic collection of customer data such as emails, calendar events, and smartphone calls so you can spend more time focusing on the client and less time on data entry. You can also share information with other employees in order to collaborate when communicating with customers. It also creates reports to keep you on track and focused on the most promising sales. It’s mobile so you can work from anywhere and streamline your workflow.

Prosperworks

If you use G Suite then Prosperworks might be the best option for you. It was made for G Suite and seamlessly integrates with G Suite’s apps such as Google Sheets, Docs, Slides, Calendar, Inbox and Gmail and automatically syncs collected information from these apps. It will also remind you when you are not following your schedule to follow up with customers or potential customers. And whenever you update your Google contact information, it will roll over to your CRM.

Hubspot CRM

Hubspot has a great dashboard to gain visibility into what’s going on in your CRM to keep everything organized. You can also swiftly sort customers by a number of filters to keep track of what’s happening. Hubspot also syncs information across several platforms for email, social media, and phone calls. One of the best things about this platform is that it’s free!

Do you use a CRM platform? If so – which one? What are some of the benefits and pitfalls you’ve experienced with a CRM platform? Let us know in the comments.

How SEO Can Help Your Local Business Compete With Bigger Brands

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In the story of David and Goliath, David (not very big) is faced with the daunting task of killing Goliath (the name speaks for itself). With an effective strategy and persistence, David accomplishes this feat over his much more powerful adversary.

In today’s economy, your local business probably feels a lot like David: small and up against much larger foes such as national brands. But, fear not! With a well-thought-out SEO strategy, combined with hard work and dedication to the tactics listed below, your small business can walk amongst the giants.

SEO Tips for local businesses

Local SEO: David Has Home Field Advantage

If you’re going to battle, you’d ideally want it to be in an area you’re familiar with. The same is true for your small business. If you’re going to compete with bigger businesses, you have to do it in your local market. While bigger companies surely carry more notoriety, local SEO will prevent your business from going unnoticed.

When it comes to Local SEO, there are two tactics you need to cover: on-site and off-site.

Tactic #1 - On-Site

On-site local SEO is essentially optimizing your website (hence “on-site”) from a local perspective. To do so, I suggest covering the following:

  • Include Your NAP (name, address, and phone number) on every page of your site.
  • Create localized content.
  • Include local signals within your tags, titles, descriptions, and headers whenever possible, while sounding natural.
  • Add schema tags to your website.

Tactic #2 - Off-Site

Off-site local SEO deals with factors that influence your website’s performance that are not directly on your website. A huge factor for visibility within search engines is local listings. Being identified or “listed” accurately and consistently within local listings will send local signals about your business to search engines. This will allow you to appear higher in the search engines in your geographic area.

For example, when I conduct a Google search in Reading, Pa for “Italian Restaurant,” local restaurants appear as opposed to bigger chains.

Seo Consultants in Reading, Pa

On top of that, these local listings appear above the organic search results. That means that if you’re listed in them, you could be the first thing your searchers see.

Tactic #3 - Local Link Earning: Get The Crowd Cheering For You

When you’re in a competition, positive support from those around you can help. The same applies in the digital realm. In order to gain recognition and increase reach and visibility within the local market, you’ll need to place a heavy emphasis on local link earning (also known as link building). Link earning is a crucial part of any SEO campaign; but, the strategy is different for local businesses.

As opposed to going after major brands and influencers to obtain links like national brands do, local businesses should target the influencers within their community. These include:

  • Local Chambers
  • Local Online Directories
  • Local News Stations
  • Other Local Business
  • Local Bloggers
Local SEO Link Earning Tactics for Businesses

Tactic #4 - Social Media: There’s Strength in Numbers

Social Media has continued to grow in popularity and influence in digital marketing. For SEO, specifically, a social media presence is now an important ranking factor. Search engines want to see you engaged with your audience, having an active conversation, and disseminating relevant content.

As opposed to other digital marketing tactics, Social media is not all about metrics – it’s about relationships. This is where most big bands miss the mark. Many major companies are more concerned with just having high-level brand accounts that all speak the same (non-personalized) message.

You know your local audience better than the big brands, so speak to it! Craft messages they’ll relate to and connect with other local accounts. The more locals that share your social posts and the more local accounts that engage with you, the more buzz you’ll generate within your area. This will help boost your local positioning within search results, too.

Social Media Marketing Boosts Local SEO Performance

Local businesses tend to stick together, so it shouldn’t be difficult to gain support from others. You know what they say: “The more Davids, the better.”

Moral of This Local SEO Story:

With an effective SEO strategy intact, combined with a dedicated team, your small business can go toe-to-toe with the Goliaths of your industry. Oh yeah, and that all Davids are bound to be successful.

What are the biggest issues your small businesses face? Let us know in the comments below! To set up a consultation, contact us today!

By: David McDowell

Your Business Technology as Marketing – Mike Sutton, Guest Blogger

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Check out this educational guest-blog post and video from Mike Sutton at TS Tech.

Would you go out to a business mixer or shoot a promo video in a dingy old shirt? Of course not, because you know your appearance sends a message about your professionalism and competence.

But what about your operations process? Or your technology infrastructure?

Everything you do sends signals to your market and the people around you. Sometimes, like with your marketing and sales messaging, those signals are carefully crafted and intentional. But other times, they are not as closely managed.

When you communicate, it’s not just the content, but also the timing, style, and medium that signals your professionalism, responsiveness, and attention to detail. Consistency and clarity in your follow-ups say a lot about your quality and competence as a service provider. Your efficiency shines through when you can address inquiries quickly and accurately the first time.

Your internal operations process and technology integration can have a huge impact on your ability to do these things. I’m going to touch on three areas where your operations and technology act as marketing for your company.

Client Touch Points

Do you have a way to easily and consistently follow up with clients and prospects that serves to keep them informed, feel connected to the process, and helps to effectively manage expectations? Automated status updates to clients and follow-up reminders to you triggered by relevant events and timing can reinforce the appearance that you are responsive and competent. This kind of effective communication will add value and build relationships and trust in a way that can’t be matched.

High Quality Integrated Experience

If your ordering, customer service, billing, and delivery systems are properly integrated, it will not only make your life easier, but it will impress and satisfy your client’s desire for ease, convenience, and accuracy. Proper integration reduces mistakes and workload. This will not only make you more profitable, it will help you keep costs down and retain clients.

Business Technology Integrates & Automates Your Marketing for Efficiency

Efficiency Is a Win-Win

Technology is a resource multiplier. By properly equipping your team and integrating your systems you will be able to do more for a bigger market with fewer people. You keep costs down and deliver a high quality product or service. And your clients get fast, reliable, consistently good service. This creates a loyal fanbase and good word-of-mouth marketing.

Business Technology Is a Tool

When effectively implemented, technology will improve quality, productivity, consistency, and efficiency in a way that supports your strategic vision, goals, and objectives. If it’s your goal to be a budget solution provider, the efficiency of properly integrating your systems will be invaluable. If you desire to be a best-in-class provider and a price leader, leveraging your technology to deliver a top-notch, fully integrated client experience while maximizing quality and profitability will be invaluable to your organization.

The bottom line is that what you do and how you do it will deliver more impact than what you say, so make sure that your actions match your words. If you’re out there saying you’re the best in your industry, your infrastructure and process had better back that up.

If you’re looking for additional ideas on how to digitally transform your business, please check out my 20-minute video presentation on Digital Transformation for your business. I share over a dozen case studies and ideas to digitally transform your business that I’ve either used personally or with my clients to increase market share, expand to new markets, or maximize profit, revenue, and opportunity. You can find the video at tst.io/dabrian.