Increasing your brand’s reach on social media used to be seen as a way to organically get the word out about your business for free or at a minimal expense. However, the complex algorithms the social media sites now use to determine whether or not a follower actually sees your posts makes it difficult to achieve organic reach, especially on Facebook. Every social media platform wants to show users only the content that is most engaging, and ignore everything else. The way this algorithm works is by putting your posts in a pool as small as one percent of your followers. If those people engage with the content, then it gets introduced into a larger pool. Slowly but surely, more and more people see it, but only if it’s engaging.
If you have a page/blog on any of the popular social media sites and need to stand out among your competitors, you need to up your game by creating shareable content people will engage with. If you are unsure about how to get started, we are here to help.
Below are some of the tips which you can use for improving your social media reach naturally and organically.
Choose the right platforms to market your brand
Choosing the right platform is the first step to achieving the desired social media reach. Every social media platform follows an algorithm that depicts the way content appears on your newsfeed. In order to perform best and to boost your organic reach on social media, it is important to understand how the algorithm for each social media platform works and to design content designed specifically for each channel.
Interact with your Audience
Whether it is Facebook or Instagram, interacting with your audience regularly will play a key role in increasing your social media reach. It gives an insight to your followers to know and understand you better. Without understanding your target audience, you won’t know the platforms they use, their interests, and their needs. This insight will help you focus on the content your audience enjoys and is more likely to engage with.
Go live
Brands now have the ability to interact with their audience in real-time. Doing live sessions gives your audience a chance to engage with your content and to be in touch with you directly. Talk about things that you think will resonate well with your audience. Going live is an invaluable way to gauge your audience’s interests and opinions. Live video is unique in that it creates a genuine sense of community in the comments section. Everyone is sharing the same experience at the same time, which spurs meaningful interaction and boosts organic reach.
Use the right hashtags
Hashtags give you the ability to help people focus on the keywords that relate to the content they care about. Using the right kind of hashtags is the key to getting maximum growth on any of your posts. You should come up with new and lesser-used hashtags but keep them relevant as possible. Another aspect to keep in mind is figuring out the optimal number of hashtags for your audience. Using hashtag best practices will help your posts stand out among the millions of posts and increase organic engagement.
Use attractive pictures and videos
Video and visual content continue to grow in importance as a powerful tool in engaging your audience. No matter which social platform you are using, high quality and eye-catching content is a must. Facebook posts with images get 2.3 times as much engagement as those without images. Try to capture most of your photos and videos in natural sunlight so that they stand out. Use beautiful filters but don’t overedit. Keep in mind to prioritize quality over quantity. It is best to put lesser content of superfine quality than posting substandard content every day.
Arrange contests and giveaways
Even though all the points mentioned above will help you in reaching a higher reach on your social media platforms, nothing works like giving away free stuff and gifts to your followers. Ask them to participate by engaging in your feed either by sharing your content or posting comments. Your audience will be happy in doing so because they will have something to look forward to.
These methods are proven to work like a charm in increasing your social engagement and growth. As you follow these strategies, keep in mind that patience is key. Work hard and be consistent with your content every day to reach your goals. If you want to learn more about how to improve your social media strategy, feel free to give us a call.
If you are someone who has recently created a new website, it is reasonable to assume that you would like to perform well in search engine results. A beautiful site that is not on the first page of a search engine’s results is not going to be found easily. For your web page to do well among thousands of others, it needs a good ranking. If you want to make your content more attractive to Google, you will have to put in a little work and effort. Even though getting high ranks on Google may seem tough for beginners, you can achieve it by hiring a good Digital Marketing Agency and carefully following a few simple steps.
We have gathered some tips that will help increase your website’s visibility in Google’s search results.
Provide high-quality content to your audience:
When a person visits your site, there is a high chance they are looking for certain information. They may be looking for general information about a topic, specific solutions to a problem, or looking to compare products they are considering purchasing. Understanding your visitors’ needs will be helpful in aligning your content to your business goals. High-quality content engages your audience when it is unique, knowledgeable, and well researched. Writing for your audience is key. By doing so you will increase your chances of satisfying searcher intent and by extension your search result ranking.
Use the right keywords:
Make sure each page of your website clearly targets a specific topic.It is very important to find the most suitable keywords related to your content and place them properly. Conduct keyword research to better understand how frequently audiences are searching for your topics. Focus on the words that people are using to search for services or products similar to ones offered at your site and make them keywords. Insert your keywords in your page title, meta description, subheadings, and image tags. Use your main keyword in the first couple of sentences of your content while making sure that your content is readable and understandable.
Interesting headline:
Be creative with the headline you are using for your article. Headlines are the first piece of content that visitors will see. A compelling headline can go a long way in attracting people’s attention and helping to convince them to visit your site. Adding keywords to the titles of your website pages will help both Google and searchers to identify them. Make sure that your headline is crafted so that it expresses a specific message for your specific audience.
Give your audience a compelling intro:
Once your headline has done its job and entices users to click on your site, it is imperative that your introduction is interesting and is able to convince them to stick around and learn more. Choose your words wisely and let your visitors know what your website is all about. Remember to keep the focus of your content on your users’ search intent. Write it in a way that your audience gets hooked and wants to further explore your website.
Make your website mobile-friendly:
People nowadays spend more time on their mobile devices than they do on their computers. So it only makes sense that you build your website and its contents in a way that they easily load on mobile browsers. For this, you will have to keep the image file size smaller. You can do so by using any image compression tool. Speed is also a major factor in this. If your website loads faster, there is a bigger chance of it appearing higher on google search engines.
Following these tips will make your content more attractive to Google and it will start appearing higher in search results. One thing that you should always keep in mind is that it takes time and patience. You have a lot of competitors so in order to stand out, stay consistent and keep creating meaningful and excellent content for your viewers.
Your website is a very important element of your brand. A recent study highlighted the need for a good brand website as the majority of consumers expect a better experience from a brand than from a retailer. A survey conducted of online shoppers by Astound Commerce spelled out the high expectations consumers have for site design. Consumers’ expectations of your brand site include comprehensive product and service information, enhanced customer service, and better prices. In an age where consumers do a lot of research on the items they want to buy, it’s necessary for a brand’s website to be as effective as a salesperson.
But did you know that the conversion often relies on the look & quality of your web design? Web site design influences perceptions of trust, and lack of trust has been shown to impact online sales. No matter how brilliant your content marketing sounds, if the website’s overall design fails to impress, it won’t make a significant impact. The fact is that websites play a vital role in how consumers perceive and engage with your business brand. Design decisions that were planned and made years before will continue to influence new users. Creative web designs that are aligned with consumers’ needs can generate 3X more leads than an ordinary-looking website that is hard to navigate.
WEB DESIGN can be divided into FOUR KEY ELEMENTS
ACCESSIBILITY. The goal of accessibility within web design and content marketing is to not exclude people from using their products and services. A brand’s website is an important resource that should provide equal access and equal opportunity to all people. Accessibility can enhance your brand by improving overall user experience and satisfaction. Web accessibility standards help define accessibility requirements in web design. For example, as the site is being built, text alternatives can be incorporated to provide an equivalent user experience. Text alternatives serve as labels for images, navigation controls, and interact with voice recognition. Being able to navigate your site by voice control, keyboard, or mouse is another example of accessibility. Meeting this requirement helps people to navigate through web pages in different ways, depending on their particular needs and preferences.
Aesthetic Appeal of Content. Aesthetics can influence important factors related to online purchasing decisions such as attitude toward the company, credibility, and motivation. Users make judgments of the visual appearance of a website very quickly and those judgments are very consistent over time. The best web page designs pay attention to aesthetics to provide the best user experiences and the best results for website owners. A visually appealing website is easy to digest, more functional, enjoyable and inviting. A good layout is critical to aesthetic design. When a website is too cluttered or has no structure, it is not visually appealing.
Readability. Readability is vital for every online business. However, even the best sales copy won’t make sense if the readability is poor. Website readability is measured on several parameters but mainly measured on ‘complexity of words’ and ‘sentence structure’ in the copy. Some easy ways to improve the readability of your web copy include large fonts (the font size should be at least 14px), contrast b/w text & background, length of paragraphs, images, and typography.
Visual Elements. Visual elements of a website can be a great way to increase website engagement. Elements like images, videos, animations, infographics, GIFs, pie charts, etc., bring more value to the content – by making it more digestible. Besides influencing the audience’s perceptions of your brand, visual elements serve the marketing purpose by grabbing readers’ attention, providing them with relevant context, and clarifying concepts via subtle demonstration. Moreover, visual elements bring added value to your web content by making it look fun, inviting, and making it more engaging.
A user’s perception of a website can evoke a wide range of emotions and attitudes. Don’t neglect the importance of design and color treatments and their influence on your brand. We hope this blog has given you some insight into why you need to improve content marketing via creative web design.
Have you ever heard of SEO for images? Search is not just about words anymore. Over 20% of all U.S. web searches happen on Google images. Besides good information, users are looking for good visuals too – and Google knows this.
Image SEO is an area you must not neglect, especially if you’re running an e-commerce platform. Some users search for your product’s images on the internet, and optimizing them with relevant keywords can capitalize on online impressions and traffic. Image optimization creates a better user experience, faster page load times, and additional ranking opportunities. In this write-up, we will highlight tips for optimizing images for visual search.
No. 1 – Choose the right format.
Before you start adding lots of images to your website, you need to choose the right format for your image. The most common formats are PNG, JPEG, and WebP. Choosing the right format will help with smaller file sizes, faster downloads, and crisper graphics. PNG is broadly chosen for better quality images, especially creative graphics. JPEG is best for photography, and it allows you to adjust the quality level. WebP is a modern image format that provides superior lossless and lossy compression for images on the web.
No. 2 -Avoid Heavy HD Photos
It is a best practice to compress your images before publishing. Large file images on your website add extra weight to pages and affect the loading speed. According to HTTP Archive, images make up on average 21% of a total webpage’s weight. This added load degrades the performance of a website and affects its rankings on Google SERP pages. Using Photoshop or a dedicated plug-in for compressing your images will not only reduce the size of a file but will also improve SEO and page load time.
No. 3 – Find related keywords.
Image SEO starts with the file name. Keyword research is important to make your image meaningful and allows it to be found more easily by search engines. A descriptive file name would be much more useful than DSC73635.jpg. Along with the file name, every image has a keyword and an alt tag. These keywords are used by search engines and help index and rank your file better. The best alt tag descriptions are short and include relevant keywords.
Bear in mind that when you select keywords, you need to analyze the key traits of images as well. For example – let’s say you sell “shirts.” Now the key traits would be – material (i.e., cotton or woolen), full-sleeves or half-sleeves, plain or printed, etc. On the basis of key traits, you can choose keywords accordingly. From what we have observed, long-tail keywords work best for image SEO. They extend your focus keyword and bring in more traffic.
No. 4 – Optimize titles and descriptions.
Search engines rely on relevant, descriptive titles and descriptions to deliver quality search results. When thinking of a good, descriptive title, a good place to start is to think of the 5 w’s- who, what, where, when, & why. Once you have shortlisted the relevant keywords, it’s time to implement them into the image title and meta description. Keywords in the title & description describe the graphic and are important in ensuring that your content is more accessible to all users. Try to keep titles concise and literal while descriptions can include broader concepts and ideas.
No. 5 Create a dedicated sitemap for images.
Google gives emphasis to the sitemap for crawling and ranking purposes. A sitemap contains a map of your entire content. Adding images to a sitemap gives Google image extensions to discover images that it might not be able to find. In other words, it enables the search engine to crawl all the pages of your site. This allows Google to crawl & index all your images for better image SEO.
Eye-catching visuals make the content more interesting and play a crucial role in user engagement. Optimized images contribute to good user experience, SEO, and higher conversions. By combining high-quality content and properly optimizing it, you will benefit from search working for you.
The pandemic of 2020 had a huge impact on everything from our private lives to how we work and communicate. Businesses large and small were forced to respond quickly to a new normal and the changing needs of their customers. As we approach the half-year mark of 2021, it is worth a moment to stop and look back at how the digital marketing landscape has evolved. With this in mind, here are some digital marketing lessons that we will continue to carry forward as part of a robust marketing strategy to reach customers.
Conveying Value Via Storytelling
Businesses need a powerful story to grow because storytelling is essential for memorable communication. It is imperative for your brand to communicate the story of your history, your mission, and your values through your digital marketing. Consumers are more likely to connect with your products and services if they know how you got started and why your brand is beneficial to society. If you are successful in communicating your story clearly and consistently, you are more likely to earn customers’ attention, loyalty, and affection. The goal is to make the audience feel something. Decision-making is more emotional than logical. Telling a good story makes us think and feel, and will help your business stand out in the market.
Stop Taking Customer’s Trust for Granted
Taking care of your existing customers is just as important as attracting new ones. Businesses should not allow themselves to focus solely on growth. Businesses can not allow themselves to believe that customers that are there now will continue to be there tomorrow. No company or product is indispensable. It is time that you stop taking their trust and loyalty for granted and think about retention strategies. To retain customers, it is very important to customize your offerings to fit consumer needs and place an emphasis on service and value.
Some of the best digital marketing strategies for successful customer retention are:
- Promoting your brand value and commitments
- Pivoting your product or services into a unique offering
- Offer virtual services
- Create helpful content (blog or video promotion)
- Run an offer or discount to increase loyalty and client retention
Contest promotion
Contest marketing strategy persuades people to interact with your brand through the use of contests, giveaways, and sweepstakes. Contest marketing is effective because it entices individuals into interacting with your business by offering prizes. The hope of winning is powerful and exciting. Gamifying promotions are also a fun and exciting way to create brand engagement. They involve tapping into people’s natural competitive instincts through contests and leaderboards.
How do you decide on your contest type? In order to be successful, you need to choose a contest that aligns with your overall strategy and goals. You must make sure the planning for the contest is thorough, taking into account the process for determining winners, delivering prizes, and tracking the performance of the promotion. Some of the most affordable contest marketing formats are event-based contests, polls, giveaways, reward-based quizzes, and trivia contests.
The Verdict
The past year brought forth a significant change in consumer behavior along with many changes in the marketing industry. People found that many aspects of their lives were forced onto online platforms. Brands that were able to cultivate long-term relationships with their customers & clients will continue to thrive in the post-COVID-19 era. There is no time to lose in planning and implementing a strong digital marketing campaign. Please feel free to contact us if you have questions or would like to learn more about making an impactful marketing approach.
It may be hard to believe, but 75% of people will never scroll past the first page on Google Search. Listing your business on Google’s first page is a crucial part of any successful marketing strategy. Before we dive deeper into the benefits of being listed on Google, consider the following three facts:
- There are 3.8 million searches conducted on Google every minute – users search and research a lot before making any purchase decision.
- 93% of all online experiences begin with a search engine.
- In the United States, 88% of users favor Google over other search engines.
Benefits of listing your business on Google:
- Direct exposure to millions of customers – As we mentioned before, Google is being searched by millions of people every day. Customers are out there searching for specific products and services. But they can’t buy them from you if they can’t find you. Enlisting your business in Google positions your brand directly in front of your customers. You can show your product or services on local search engine results pages (SERP) with relevant keywords and through simple search engine tactics.
- Precise targeting & high ROI – Google’s number one priority is to display results and information that is relevant to its users (based on their frequently searched terms, interests, and location). With precision targeting, you can display your ads only to those who are likely to buy. The entire ad campaign can be tailored to your business needs, which ultimately ensures a higher return on investment (ROI).
- Gateway to brand credibility – Google is where you are likely to be recognized as a brand. When customers search online, they compare companies and products. Customers prefer products from companies that appear more credible online. Seeing your business logo, information, testimonials, and pictures, will help convince potential customers that you are worthy of their business. Research has shown that businesses with complete listings gain more customer trust and result in almost 30% completing purchases.
- Long-term marketing strategy – Once you have claimed and optimized your Google My Business (GMB) listing, it is time to put it to work with your long-term marketing strategy. The ultimate goal is to help customers find your business. Over time your business will gain reviews that work to validate your company in the eyes of potential customers. You can also personalize your listing to help with local search results and by posting GMB posts that include business announcements, special events & offers, and new products. Don’t forget to keep an eye on the interesting insights you can pick up from Google analytics. This helps to better understand who your customers are and what they are looking for. Over time, your business will continue to build authority and naturally be one of the top search results in your category.
The verdict
Every business wants to grow and stand out in its competitive target market. So take the most important step and make it happen. Google, a robust marketing platform, can increase your chances of overcoming the competition. SEO, SEM, Google My Business, Google map promotion, and AdWords – these are some of the ways to promote your products and services.
Now that you have learned about Google and its significance in the marketing landscape, it’s time to make it a reality. For result-driven online marketing, contact us today.
