tips

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.

Instagram Cheat Sheet: How to Use Hashtags for Your Instagram Posts Properly

Posted on by Mario

I used to not mind all the likes I could get on my Instagram posts and how many people were engaged with my content. However, after having a side business, I realized that using social media is much more than what meets the eye. From social media engagement itself, you can have a chance of getting people to consider buying what you sell. For that reason alone, many business owners start hiring social media services to engage with their potential and returning buyers. Social media is an essential piece of your business marketing strategy because social platforms help you connect with your customers, increase awareness about your brand, and boost your leads and sales. With more than three billion people around the world using social media every month, it’s no passing trend. Now with the rise of Instagram use for social media, it has become clearer that Instagram has better potentials for you to increase your brand awareness. Instagram enables a business to sell something more than just products. It can help to build up a better word of mouth. Reaching out to the audience through a platform like Instagram makes the relations with the target audience friendlier. However, reaching more audience and improving engagement with users is not an easy matter especially if you don’t set up social media ads. That being said, there is one of the ways you can ‘cheat’ Instagram marketing strategy without actually cheating if you haven’t got the time to hire a social media specialist; hashtags. Hashtags on Instagram are useful as they help other Instagram users discover your profile, which can ultimately increase the likelihood of obtaining more followers. Contrary to Twitter, using more specific hashtags on Instagram can help build a bigger audience for your business…only if you use it properly. So, how do you use hashtags for your business Instagram account posts and stories? Keep reading to find out!

When using hashtags, here are a few rules you need to know in order to use it properly:

  • Before posting your content, do some hashtag research
  • Find words that are related to your content and your business
  • Look at the number of engagements using the specific hashtags
  • Remember this; hashtags with most posts (like hashtags with million posts) may give you a boost in likes because many people will likely search those specific hashtags; however, there is also a higher chance that your posts that use those hashtags would be ‘cloistered’ and it could be possible that your posts would disappear from those specific hashtags because there would be other new posts coming from other users in just a few seconds since well, many people use those hashtags. Hashtags with thousands up to hundred thousand posts (below a million) may not give you a boost in likes and findings, but you can help people who are looking for what you sell narrow down search results and directly find you. Yes, hashtags like that can improve the possibility of your Instagram posts to be found by people in an easier way. For that reason,
  • It is important to combine both hashtags with most and least engagement in one post
  • You can use up to 30 hashtags and anything beyond that won’t show up in search, but I recommend using at least 15–20. In general, more is better! Go for all 30 if you use them well. Include as many as you can use strategically while staying relevant to your business.
  • Yes, you can use hashtags in your Instagram stories and even your bio! Make use of the right hashtags that are relevant to your business
  • Avoid using irrelevant topics and hashtags no matter how popular and trending those hashtags at the moment

Those are the rules to Instagram hashtag cheat sheet! That way, you don’t really cheat but if you follow those rules, you are on the right path of your business world.