design

Security Threatened: Signs You Are Hiring A Bad Web Hosting Provider

Posted on by Mario

When it comes to building a business, almost many business owners nowadays know the importance of having a website for their business. However, not many know that having a website means having to protect it from unwanted attacks, such as virus, hacks and even malwares. Yes, having a website comes with many risks that can be bad for a business. For that reason, some business owners who are doing their homework on website knowledge hire web hosting services to protect their website. If you are one of them, good for you, but are you one of the business owners who hire a bad web hosting provider? If yes, please get out of there and rescue your business. If you are unsure, this article will tell you how to spot the signs. Keep reading to find out!

Too much downtime

One of the most important aspects of running a website is that you make sure the website has a good uptime. The uptime for your site can directly affect sales and conversions. If your website is down frequently, it should reflect in your traffic statistics as well as in your conversions. Nobody wants a website that is down more than 10% of the time. Every second that your website is down you are losing money. Most web hosting companies offer you a promise that the website will be up for a certain uptime percentage. However, you need to make sure they are telling the truth and proving their quality by looking at the reviews.

Poor customer services

One of the reasons why having a website is the best value for your business is that your website will be your 24-hour marketing strategy and 24-hour customer services. However, that also comes with a web hosting that is available for 24 hours a day. Whether you just have a question about the billing cycle or you are experiencing adware, viruses or other malfunctions on your site, the customer service department should be able to guide you in getting your website back up and running or answer any questions about billing to your account. If you cannot get in touch with the customer service department of your web hosting provider, then you’ve got a problem there.

Slow loading times

The first thing you have to have in your website in order to get the best first impression of your business is that you make sure your website visitors are not going to wait for your website to load the content they need to see. The amount of time that it takes for your website to load can be a strong factor to determine whether or not customers convert into sales. There is nothing more annoying than waiting for a website to load when with the simple click of a back button you can have other websites within a couple of seconds. Chances are if it’s taking your site too long to load, there is not enough bandwidth across the host server. Cheaper web hosting companies will sell shared hosting packages to multiple websites and bog down the processors and amount of bandwidth across the server making the websites slow. If your site takes more than 3 seconds to load, you need to change your web hosting provider.

That’s the most important parts in noticing whether or not you are hiring a bad web hosting provider. If you have got similar problems like the ones I have mentioned above, then I suggest that you change your web hosting provider. I know it is not as easy as it sounds, but when you look at it deeper, you will find what you are looking for. Don’t forget to check the reviews as well.

Tight on Budget? Here’s How to Use A Quick Social Media Marketing Strategy with No Budget

Posted on by Mario

Social media managers rarely boast about large budgets. Most can be found enviously gazing at the IT team that has been lavished with the latest tech tools, no expense spared. Your budget may not be reflective of the size of the business or organization. It may be reflective of the business or organization’s view toward social media marketing. As a person who provides social media services for businesses, I can tell that there are two main problems when it comes to social media marketing; first, the target, second, the budget. Finding targets can somehow be linked to the budget you have because using money, you can use social media ads to reach as many people as possible (depending on how much you are paying the social media platforms and what kind of target you want to reach) and those people are usually the ones who really need your business. However, if you own a small business that is still growing gradually, you can’t help but think about your budget, right? Sure, you might need that later when you have the budget, but for now, you can work on your social media marketing strategy without some budget first. Let’s call this “planned testing,” and let the results become your benchmark for your next more-budgeted strategy in the next following months. How? Keep reading this article to find out!

Make use of free design tools

80% of marketers use visual assets in their social media marketing. And there’s a good reason for that. When people read information, they’re likely to remember only 10% of that information. If a relevant image is paired with that same information, people retained 65%. Visual graphics are essential for social media. In fact, I would say they are the most important thing you must do to be successful at social media. While large brands out there have in-house graphic designers and their own special social media team, what if you don’t? Well, then, you can make use of free design tools. All you need to have is your own mobile phone camera and a little bit of basic Photoshop skill, you can create a unique design of your own. There are also graphic design tools offered for free by some websites. Although there is not much you can get from free design tools, at least for a start you can learn more about it and practice until you perfect it.

Being transparent about who you are

The biggest problem in social media marketing is how difficult it is sometimes to trust a business owner or an online shop on social media in this day and age because many of them were involved in fraud or other shady things out there. For that reason, it is okay to represent your brand and let people know that you are the owner of your business. It doesn’t mean you are boastful – you are showing them that you are not a scammer. You can put your personal Instagram or Facebook information on your bio. For example, if you own an online shop on Instagram, you can start putting your personal Instagram account on your bio. This way, the people who need your products or services will know that you are a real person. Of course, for that reason, your personal account should also be more convincing as well.

Use proper hashtags in every social media content post

From Instagram to Twitter, hashtags have truly brought a revolution in social media marketing. A hashtag is basically a word or phrase that comes after a hash mark or a pound sign (#) and is used on social media platforms to group messages related to the same topic (i.e., #smallbiz is a hashtag used to identify a post that has information related to small businesses). In order for your content marketing efforts to be fruitful, you will need to find a way to get your content in front of the right people. This is where hashtags come in. Hashtags are very important for small businesses on social media because they provide a way to give your content added visibility. That being said, you need to make sure that the hashtags you are using are relevant to your business and have acceptable amount of traffic as well as reasonable numbers of followers of the said hashtags. Therefore, you can start gaining more relevant targets and the right people who will buy your products or services.

And with that, we wrap up your social media strategy guide for 2020 and beyond…on a tight budget or no budget at all, since the points I have mentioned above are absolutely free! Hopefully this guide served as some much-needed inspiration for figuring out how to create a social media marketing strategy.

Thousand Letters, Sent: A Guide to Effective Email Marketing Strategy

Posted on by Mario

Tell me, when was the last time you received a love letter? What were the most unforgettable words for you? To be honest, I used to cringe every time someone gave me a love letter. I mean, too much romance was too much for me and it was not worth it. Well, at least that was what I thought until this particular someone sent an amazing letter for me, with words so unforgettable and not too much romantic. The way he said things in that letter successfully made my heart flutter like no other. It was beautifully written as he put his sincerest heart into writing it – no hidden agenda, no hidden plot – just pure feelings. What makes it different than any other cringe-worthy love letters, though? Well, there is just one ultimate understanding I can easily explain to you; he was not trying to sell himself in that letter. People write love letters easily and give it to the one they love. However, most of them try to impress the recipient of that letter by ‘selling’ too much, hoping the recipient will accept their love by creating awesome love letters. Sincere and unique people like the one who sent me beautifully crafted message are purely expressing their feelings unconditionally and genuinely without trying to impress the recipient – they just want their feelings to reach the one they love. That is what makes it different. So, when it comes to this, how about applying the same mindset and method for marketing? As a person who works to provide Melbourne SEO services for many business owners out there, I know for a fact that email marketing is never outdated. In fact, many businesses use email marketing to generate more real paying customers. So, how do you plan effective email marketing strategy? Keep reading this article to find out!

Now, there will always be businesses who don’t believe in the power of email marketing. This happens mainly because they fail to see any positive results with their email marketing efforts due to their own shortcomings. Sometimes these business owners just need a few email marketing tips to increase the value of their emails. If you have the same problem, do these tips below:

  • First, know your audience. As a business, you should know why your business exists; to help solve your customers’ problems. Before sending your email marketing, make sure you know you are sending your email to the right people
  • Get to the point and make it short and simple. While it is still important to give introduction in emails, if you write a long-written text, chances are, your email recipients will stop reading the whole email because it doesn’t tell them the point exactly
  • Send regular, consistent emails. Now I am not saying you should email people every day. It doesn’t work like that. Regular emails don’t mean you should send emails every single day. Regular emails are sent consistently according to the day, date, time and occasional events. For example, your regular emails are sent every Thursday and Friday. Thursday and Fridays are the less hectic days where people can check their emails without having to fear of wasting time. Also, people seldom check emails during the weekends because it’s time for them to get some rest after their hard work. Aside from that, if you have an upcoming event in the near future, you can share it in your email
  • Make a unique subject. I have to admit, every time I got an email from any eCommerce website of which email newsletters I have subscribed to, I will forget their emails if the subject doesn’t attract my attention enough. A unique subject consisting of the benefits I will get (from opening that email) such as “Get a 50% discount without minimum order only for today!” will most likely trigger me to click that email. It is short and simple, yet very promising and reliable

The email marketing tips that we discussed above may seem simple at first, but once applied, you will see positive results. Try to take a step by step approach to improving your email marketing. It won’t happen overnight, but it will get better if you take the right steps at the right time. Remember, your email marketing campaigns will turn profitable only if take care of the details, which make up the big picture.