Get on Track with Digital Marketing

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Imagine your online marketing as a funnel.

The bottom of that funnel is your goal: customers. The step before that could be email subscribers. And the step before that could be user engagement.

Regardless, each step in your funnel leads people to becoming loyal customers.

And at the very top of the funnel is traffic. Everything you do online starts with traffic.

But not just any traffic.

You need traffic that is going to buy from you and become loyal customers for years to come.

And that’s usually where people go wrong.

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“Brand building” is always mentioned as one of the biggest benefits of social media.

By giving companies a “voice”, they can get the word out to more people.

But a funny thing happens when you give people a voice, too.

They use it.

Mashable just released a puff-piece about AT&T’s new social media campaign.

AT&T is taking advantage of the personal nature of social media with a new campaign called “Thank You Notes” that will include 500 customized YouTube videos thanking fans in song.

The effort, which began Tuesday, is a celebration of the brand hitting 2 million fans on Facebook. Fans interested in getting their own song are encouraged to fill out a form with their name, city, musical genre and reasons “why you’re awesome.”

Sounds great, right? They’re trying to “be personal”, “connect individually” with fans, and use “internet memes” – all at the same time. Looks like they’re hitting your typical social media marketing advice on the head.

Well what do you think the first comment on the article says? (And I’m not making this up…)

Diane S.: They should spend their time and money getting a better Customer Service process in place.

There are a lot of trolls on the internet. But this hints at a deeper issue.

It doesn’t matter how good your social media presence is if your product and service isn’t good.

In today’s harsh online environment, your brand value is derived from your product and service value – not from marketing or advertising.

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Everyone recognizes names like Hasbro and Mattel.

It seems like they’ve been around forever, and their children’s products are ingrained in pop culture.

But maybe you haven’t heard of the toy maker, Step2.

They’ve only been around for 20 years, so their toys haven’t been passed down through generations like the others.

How do you break into a competitive field with long-term market leaders like Little Tykes, Hasbro, Mattel?

I haven’t seen their commercials on the Super Bowl. So it hasn’t been through spending millions of dollars on brand advertising.

Instead Step2 is exploiting the social media opportunity gap, and using social media to drive sales.

The Wall Street Journal recently interviewed Step2 CMO Jerry McDermott.

Here’s how Step2 uses social media, and the marketing lessons you can apply to your own business.

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“Journalists” drive me nuts.

If you want to understand someone’s motivation, then look at how they’re compensated.

Journalists are in the business of getting more pageviews. That’s how they get paid by advertisers.

The only metric traditional publishers care about online is pageviews. I’ve experienced this first-hand by working directly with a multi-million dollar media company.

So journalists specifically choose topics that will drive more visits and increase pageviews. And when a topic becomes “trendy” or “hot”, other journalists jump on and ride the wave.

You’ve probably seen this the past few months with Pinterest. It seems like you can’t go a day without reading another article on “how important it is” or “how you should be using it”.

But here’s the deal.

I don’t care about driving pageviews to make advertisers happy. That’s not how I make money.

I make money by providing advice, and services based on that advice, to help businesses grow. And if my advice isn’t good, then I don’t get paid.

So here’s some advice when it comes to Pinterest:

Don’t waste your time.

Here’s why.

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Is your industry more boring than a hardware and appliance store?

Content marketing is the backbone of improving your marketing ROI.

And a blog writer can get more traffic, leads and customers than advertising.

But what if you’re in a “boring” industry. You know, the type where no one reads or shares anything.

Is content marketing still important?

And if so, how do you create content that will actually bring in business?

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Oprah has one of the biggest audiences of any TV personality.

And it’s not by accident.

She’s worked tirelessly for years on building a platform for her engaged followers. Some of her methods have been analyzed through a marketing lens in Chris Brogan and Julien Smith’s Trust Agents.

But on her new show, Lifeclass, she’s taken her social media use to the next level.

And her lessons can provide brands and businesses of all shapes and sizes, new insights into using social media to build their businesses.

Here’s how Oprah is taking advantage, and how you can do the same.

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Website traffic doesn’t just fall from the sky.

That makes getting a new website off the ground extremely difficult.

You’re desperate for traffic, so you start picking up the latest tactics you keep reading about like Pinterest.

But here’s the thing most people miss.

Not all traffic is created equal.

So who cares if you did actually get 10,000 visitors one day from StumbleUpon or Pinterest. Because this type of traffic bounces immediately and never returns.

Instead you need to build consistent, loyal traffic if you want people to join your mailing list and actually buy something.

So forget about magic potions and secret formulas to flood your site with traffic. Here’s how you can build consistent, high quality traffic by taking proactive steps each day.

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Traditional newspapers and magazines only serve one purpose: to grab and hold your attention.

That’s exactly how content marketing and social media work. Your goal when using these techniques is to get people’s attention and gain their trust.

American Express understands this perfectly.

For years, they’ve been at the leading edge of making digitally savvy moves. And a recent Mashable article has highlighted some specific strategies that drive their success.

Here are 3 things American Express can teach you about social media.

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Internet marketing is all the rage today.

People love to hail that “Content is King”, and social media is the Second Coming.

But what does it mean in dollars and cents?

Why is it really important? And how does it work?

It turns out, there is some truth in the hype. Inbound marketing creates a marketing asset that appreciates in value over time, and scales more effectively than paid channels or outbound marketing.

But it’s not that easy. There’s an important caveat that you need to beware of for it to work correctly.

Let’s take a look, and see how blogging really pays off.

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