The post Traditional vs Modern Marketing Methods appeared first on Coretium.

Why do I need one?

Well having a marketing plan will allow you to understand what your customers really want and what they are actually willing to pay. You can also find out what it is that your customer wants and what they are willing to pay for it. Having a solid marketing plan will also present you with the tools and tactics you need to use in order to achieve your sales goals. In a nutshell your marketing plan should be like a guide that your company lives by.

Where Should I start?

You need to start by evaluating where you are now right now.

• How do your customers find you?
• What are your strengths and weaknesses
• What are some of the Issues you might face

 How?

After you’ve figured out where you are now you need to start creating your plan…

1. Describe your audience- You need to know key things like demographics- age, gender, earnings, location etc. How often do they purchase products/services like yours
2. Marketing Goals- Write down your specific goals and make them measurable. For example are you looking to increase your sales by 20%                   
3. Channels and tactics you will use. This is probably the most important part. Once you have identified your prospects and your marketing goals you need to figure out how you will reach out to your prospects and accomplish your goals. You need to figure out what is the best way to reach your audience. Is it online, offline or both. If it’s online you might want to consider using social media (twitter, FB, Linkedin etc). Do you have a website? Where will your customers find you? Do you have an SEO strategy? Will you use a paid marketing strategy to reach your audience- eg PPC, FB ads, linkedin ads etc. If it’s offline (although you might still need a website), will you be handing out leaflets, cold calling, product exhibitions, marketing events and trade shows.

Your Marketing Budget

How much will the marketing tactics outlined in the previous step cost you.

• For example,  if you are doing a google AdWords campaign how much do you need to spend to reach your target audience?
• Will you be outsourcing the marketing to an agency or will you be employing a marketing person. How much will this cost?

The post Why and How to Create a Marketing Plan? appeared first on Coretium.

One key factor in improving your Adwords click through rate is differentiating between the different purposes of search campaigns. There are three reasons why you would invest in PPC:

1. Brand awareness
2. Lead generation
3. Customer acquisition

Once you understand your business goals and decide on a campaign, your ads, keywords, message and call to action should be built around one single purpose, to maximise your Adwords click through rate and quality score.

Adwords gives you three marketing options to choose from and it’s up to you to decide which is best for your campaign…

1. Cost per thousand impressions (CPM) – good if you’re running a blog with external advertising
2. Cost per lead (CPL) – if your sales process starts on your website but cannot be completed there, e.g. bespoke solutions
3. Cost per acquisition (CPA) – someone clicks on your ad, visits your website and signs up for a newsletter or places an order

Choosing whether to use CPM, CPL or CPA largely depends on the nature of your business, but it also depends on the specifics campaign you run in Google Adwords.

Here are 3 examples of how a business can choose different campaign options in Google Adwords:

Your business installs bespoke kitchens, and sells a range of kitchen appliances. You run a campaign to increase brand awareness and opt for the CPM structure with broad keywords. You’ll want to keep the daily spend relatively low.

At the same time, you’re marketing a new range of products with the option to complete the purchase on your website, and you will use the per acquisition (CPA) model. Your keywords should be specifically targeted to people already looking to buy. You’ll want to spend a bit more here.

For your bespoke kitchen installation service, where your customers can specify their requirements on your website but the actual sale takes place in their home, you will use the per lead (CPL) structure. Again, target people looking to buy and set your daily spend accordingly.

Ideally you would run a mix of these, to keep developing your brand awareness for long term sales, and marketing your current line for immediate results.

Adapt To Your Audience

Even if your ads are on the first page, that doesn’t necessarily mean you will also get results. The most important aspect of your ad campaign is your message, which needs to be concise and engaging.

Write them from the view point of potential customers: what would encourage your target market to click your ad, rather than your competitors’?

In order to get your message across and improve Adwords click through rate, you will have to spend considerable time re-wording and re-working your messages. Ads that go straight to the punch get more clicks, but you need to be specific, too. Regularly review all your ads and keep improving on your messages in order to enhance your Adwords click through rate.

AdWords Quality Score

Your click through rate affects your Adwords Quality Score. If you have a maximum bid of £1,50 and an AQS of 10 (the score can be between 1 and 10), and your competitor bids £4,00 but has a score of 6, your ad will be shown even though you’re paying less than your competitor.

Improving your ads and Adwords click through rate not only generates more business, it also has the potential of reducing your search marketing costs over time.

Three Tips To Improve Your Adwords Click Through Rate

1.Keep your ads per adgroup to the bare minimum Because ads in the same adgroup compete against each other, your time is best spent creating two or three great ads that speak to your audience. Analyse which ads are performing well and why, and build on their success.

2. Consider your call to action Offer a solution to a problem instead of simply promoting your product or service. ‘Save 20% on your weekend trip to Paris‘ is far more effective than ‘Click here for Paris weekend breaks‘.

3. Continuously review your campaigns Although time consuming, success in Adwords click through rates largely depends on continuous analysis of keyword performance, adgroup performance, and applying your insights to your campaigns. Search trends change constantly, and your competitors work hard to improve on their results, too.

Are you generating good success with your Adwords click through rate?

Are your clicks translating into business profit?

If you need any help with your website whether it be content, building or WordPress please do get in touch with us on the form above. Have a great day

The post Adwords Click Through Rate: How To Improve Yours appeared first on Coretium.

The post Boosting brand awareness appeared first on Coretium.

Here are 3 steps to improve your Adwords campaign to drive quality traffic to your website, generate more leads and convert more visitors into buying customers.

1. Target The Right People

Getting your advert out there is great for brand awareness, but you want to generate new business, too. So target people who are already looking to buy with ‘action’ search phrases. Examples include:

• Buy
• Order
• Register
• Custom made
• Bespoke
• Save
• Pay less
• Reduce

Make sure these action search phrases are in your ads, too.

You need to understand where and when to target your ads. If you run a local business and only serve a close radius, restrict your ads to local search only. You can also use campaign scheduling to show your ads only at times when when your potential customers are online searching for your product or service.

2. Constantly Improve Your Ads And Keywords

Your competitors are working just as hard on their campaigns are you are, so just because your ads are performing well today that’s not to say they will keep performing tomorrow. Stay ahead of the competition and constantly check and improve your ads and keywords, building on those that work and pausing or removing those that don’t.

Use a mixture of keyword matchings to improve your click through rate, generate leads and acquire new customers, while improving your Adwords Quality Score at the same time.

3. Optimise Your Landing Pages For Conversion

Your Adwords campaign and your landing pages should be seen as a whole, so when you generate traffic your landing page should match your Adwords ads. Be consistent in your message, focus on the product or service you’re advertising, and keep your completion process as simple as possible.

Look For More Ways To Improve Your Adwords Campaign

These three ways to improve your Adwords campaign will positively impact your Adwords Quality Score. And a higher score means better page ranking, more leads and a lower cost per click.

But this is only scratching the surface.

Those that have experience using Google Adwords understand that it’s no easy feat to generate significant and sustainable profits. You need to constantly test, measure and refine all aspects to improve your Adwords campaign.

Do you use Google Adwords for your business?

Is it delivering the results you expect, or demand, as a business owner?

If you need any help with your website whether it be content, building or WordPress please do get in touch with us on the form above. Have a great day

The post 3 Ways To Improve Your Adwords Campaign Today appeared first on Coretium.

1.Publish Great Content
You need to think of your content as an advertisement. You won’t publish a dull looking design on a billboard advertisement. So don’t do the same for your content. I’m not saying that the content has to have fancy designs or anything, rather it needs to be valuable content that your audience will love to read and share.

2.Create Tutorials
Tutorials that teach your audience how to do something is excellent. If its in video form then that is even better. It’s never been more easy to create videos. Pull out your smartphone and upload it to YouTube. Cheap and effective.

3.Use PPC vouchers (adwords etc)
Companies like Google and Bing are always giving out vouchers for you to try out their advertising platform. This will allow you to test your PPC (Pay Per Click) Campaign without using much of your own money. Take the plunge and try it out!

4.Get On Social Media
Post fun and interesting stuff that your market will love so much that they will tell others about it. If your content is shared enough times it can create a great buzz around your brand.

5.Use Infographics
Using infographics can be a fun way to educate your audience. It’s like a digital poster that is more attractive to look at rather than some dull text. Hire a designer to create one for you and slap your company logo on it. Every time its shared by someone your brand will also be shared.

6.Develop a Customer Referral Program 
This is a great way for you to get leads from your current customers. Tell them to tell their friends about your products and give them both a small reward. For example, 10% off for you and your friend.

7.Online Contests
This is another great way to create a buzz around your brand and more importantly drive sales. The prize doesn’t need to be expensive but just something that people would want. Also don’t go too cheap!

8.Email Marketing
This is actually a must no matter what business your in. Your email list is actually one of your biggest assets. With it you can update your customers with updates and new offers.

9.Always A/B test
No matter what form of advertising you are employing, you need to a/b test or split test. For example if you have a landing page, you should create an alternative one so that you can see which one performs better. One will always do better than the other. Once you see which one is doing better delete the other one and replace it with a new one.

10.Send newsletters
This is related to email marketing because you will be using email to send out your newsletter. Your newsletter is a short update you send out to your list at least once a week. In it you should have the latest news in your industry.

11.Classified ads
This is something you have most probably done but it still needs to be said. Just make sure you post ads on places like Gumtree about your services. Add loads of pictures and describe it well!

12.Get blogging and Comment on others’ blogs
Blogging is a great way to provide great content to your audience whilst getting organic search traffic from the search engines. Google ranks websites high in their search engine if the content is natural and engaging. You must have the right keywords in there if you want to be ranked highly. However, don’t pick keywords that are too competitive. Google’s keyword tool is an invaluable too to find out what kind of search volume a keyword is getting. You should also comment on related blogs because this will get you noticed. Post meaningful comments but don’t self promote!

13.Upsell Straight Away
The best time to sell to someone is the just after they have bought something from you. These customers are ready to buy; they already have their credit card in their hand so grab the opportunity while you can. If you still don’t get the gist I will give you a classic example. McDonalds- “do you want fries with that”. Straight after you’ve ordered something they will try and sell more to you. So don’t underestimate the Power of upselling!

14.Join forums
Joining in on forum discussions is a great way to pose your authority in your industry. When people see you as an authority they are more likely to do business with you.

15.Create A Survey
If you already have a customer database you can survey them to find out what they want or aren’t happy with. With this new found information you can tweek your products and services to suit your customers.

16.Employ scarcity offers
Having deadlines on offers is a great way to get people to buy your product or service. Psychologically, having a deadline makes people want to snap up your deals before its gone!

17.Create a Fear of not Having your Product
This ties in with the scarcity method. If people think that your product or service will no longer be available it will create a sense of urgency when deciding to purchase.

18.Say Thank You
When you’re leaving a supermarket or retail store what do you see as you are exiting. “Thank You for shopping with us”. Just saying thank you to your customers is a great way to make them feel appreciated. Like their business means something to you. More importantly this will make them want to shop with in the future.

19.Exceed in Value
When your providing a service or selling a product always try and over deliver. Your customers will love you for it. And when your customers love you they wont think twice about doing business with you in the future even if you are slightly more expensive that your competitors.

20.Be an Industry Expert
If you position yourself/business as an expert people will see you as an authority. When they see you as an authority you won’t have to do much to make them buy your products and services.

21.Your Best Customers Are Your Existing Ones
Considering you have delivered good service, these customers already know and trust you, so selling to them won’t be too hard. Therefore, a good chunk of your marketing efforts should be focused on these customers.

22.Always State Up-to-date With Your Competitors
No one starts a business without analysing the competition. So you shouldn’t stop analysing them once you are up and running. Business is an ever changing entity so understanding what your competition are doing is of extreme importance.

That’s all for now. I hope you enjoyed our 21 marketing tips for small businesses. If you employ these tips you are doing what a large percentage of businesses aren’t doing. As simple as they seem, people are just not implementing them into their marketing plan. Make sure you do!

How we can help

If you need any help with your website whether it be content, building or WordPress please do get in touch with us on the form above. Have a great day

The post Best Marketing Tips for Small Businesses appeared first on Coretium.

In order to get a higher ranking, you should optimise your business website to make it easier for search engines to understand the type of content you want to put across. This will make the search relevant and reliable to users who want your type of product/services.

If you have not featured SEO in your business then people won’t be able to find your services. You could buy advertisements online but it’s not as effective as search engine optimising.

• An easy way to get started with SEO is to create a sitemap which you will then submit to search engines such as Google & Bing. It may cost some money if you work with a professional but it will definitely be beneficial for your business in the long run.
• You can also merge PPC with SEO! PPC would be good to merge with SEO as most businesses are online now. Through paid search you can find out what keywords can be used when it comes to improving search results, you can filter your campaign targets based on location and demographics. By using PPC you can get an insight on where you are going wrong with your keywords.
• You main target is to apply keywords that relate to your target audience and keywords and to discover terms that your target audience are using to find products/services like yours.
• Another way you can increase search is by bidding on keywords with the highest ranking. By doing this you can increase your traffic depending on how much your competitor is spending on that keyword.
• Make your campaign organic!

For instance, you can offset bids with lower search terms by finding keywords with the lowest PPC. By utilising this, you can see wasted spend and discover new terms like mentioned earlier. Google Trends is a great tool for this.

If you need any help with your website whether it be content, building or WordPress please do get in touch with us on the form above. Have a great day

The post Using SEO for Online Presence appeared first on Coretium.

If you’re using, or thinking of using, Google Adwords to market your business, then you’ll want to implement these 4 tactics to reduce Adwords spend straight away.

Less spend equals more money for clicks – and more customers through the door!

1. Analyse Your Cost Per Revenue

Because Adwords is effectively one large auction house and the demand for clicks on Google rises continuously, your campaign spend will keep going up.

There are ways to reduce Adwords spend and at the same time maintain campaign performance – we’ll look at cost per click (CPC) and two options to reduce costs.

For example, a CPC of £1 with a conversion rate of 2% and a value of £250 will result in a cost per revenue (CPR) of 20%. This means that for every pound spent on Adwords leads you see a five pound return.

You could reduce Adwords spend with a CPC decrease. When improvements to the CPC campaign causes a drop to £0.90 this will result in a CPR of 18%. This creates the possibility of reducing the budget by 10% without affecting return.

Tip: Choose long tail keywords. They’re often inexpensive and highly targeted.

Alternatively, increase the Conversion Ratio and value. When the CPC remains at £1, because you’ve made considerable improvements to your website, the conversion ration increases to 2.2% meaning the conversion value rises to £275. The CPR also decreases to 18%. Again, this creates the option to reduce the budget by 10% without affecting return.

Tip: Improve your Quality Score by re-working your ads and paying extra attention to your landing pages.

2. Lower Your Cost Per Click (CPC) To Decrease Your Spend

Following on from step 1, when the Quality Score has gone up, you can safely lower CPCs without risking a decrease in traffic. However, if your Quality Score isn’t perfected, there are still possibilities for lowering your cost per click. Try:

• Lower the CPC of expensive keywords
• Pause expensive keywords or reduce the budget and use the reduction on less expensive keywords
• Use Exact Phrasing or Phrase Matching for expensive keywords and avoid Broad Matching – the former tend to be less expensive
• Avoid bidding on expensive keywords: often you will find that with a little research, a different keyword with equal or slightly lower traffic costs less, but yield the same or better results

3. Reduce Adwords Spend By Avoiding Expensive And Irrelevant Actions

If your campaigns run 24/7, you’re likely spending more than you need. Research when your target audience uses Google – weekdays, weekends, day time, evenings – and schedule your campaigns accordingly. This will reduce Adwords spend as clicks won’t occur at times when your target audience is online, searching for your solutions.

This is especially relevant for campaigns with larger budgets and higher spends per ad group. Campaigns to improve your brand awareness can be run at times outside of the core activity time frame of your audience – as long as you keep the overall budget relatively small and the average spend down.

4. Exclude Visitors And Devices To Reduce Adwords Spend

Utilise negative keywords to prevent your ads being shown on search query results which have little or no direct value to your business. This will not only reduce Adwords spend, but also increase your click through rate.

You may also want to exclude visitors from irrelevant locations with geo-targeting. If your business operates exclusively in London, it makes sense to show your ads only in search query results from London.

If your web-infrastructure isn’t optimised for mobile devices and similar, exclude those devices. However, if your website isn’t mobile-friendly, you should seriously consider getting it fixed as more and more customers are using smart phones and tablets to access the internet. You wouldn’t want to lose out on those opportunities.

Excluding visitors and scheduling your campaigns has an immediate effect but, unsurprisingly, if you’re looking to reduce Adwords spend while safeguarding results, you’re in for a long-term game.

However, with a little perseverance and lots of attention to detail you can make your Adwords budget go a lot further.

Is your Google Adwords campaign running at peak performance?

If you need any help with your website whether it be content, building or WordPress please do get in touch with us on the form above. Have a great day

The post Reduce Adwords Spend With These 4 Powerful Tactics appeared first on Coretium.