Expanding your brand's digital footprint

 The larger your brand's digital footprint is, the easier it will be for your target audience to find you online, especially in today's a digitally connected world.

Let us see how B2B marketing companies can strategically expand their digital footprint -

Website

Your website is one of the most important digital marketing channels and the top source of information about your brand. Focus on having a professional, user-friendly website optimized for SEO and content.

Social presence

It is not enough to merely post content or offers on social media. Actively engage your customers and target audience in meaningful conversations by responding to their comments and participating in relevant group discussions.

Content

Value-driven content is one of the best ways to increase your brand visibility, and attract new customers to your business through inbound marketing.

Important email marketing metrics you should be keeping track of

Periodically analyzing metrics gives you an idea of how well your email marketing campaign and the steps you need to take to improve your results. However, with so many metrics available, it can be confusing to decide which metrics will prove to be useful.

Let us have a look at the most important metrics B2B marketing companies should pay attention to -

• Open rate – Tells you whether or not your subject lines are working out

• Click-through rate – Tells you how much your target audience is engaging with your emails

•  Conversion rate – Tells you whether or not your target audience is taking the action you want them to

• Bounce rate – Tells you whether or not your emails are getting successfully delivered to a recipient's inbox

• Unsubscribe rate – Tells you whether your target audience is finding your emails relevant and useful

Based on your email marketing goals, you can also keep a track of other metrics such your subscriber list growth, overall ROI and number of leads generated.

How to Create an Effective Editorial Calendar For Your Content Marketing Strategy

Why do you need an editorial calendar?

Content marketing involves a lot more than haphazardly scribbling a blog whenever you have the time. You also need to think about the objective you want to accomplish with every single piece of content you create, along with planning the distribution of content on relevant digital platforms.

                                          

Creating an editorial calendar would greatly help you streamline and organize this entire process. It will leave you plenty of time to properly strategize and create content before the actual publishing. Thus, an editorial calendar will not only help you save time and efforts, but will also improve the overall quality of your content.

Let us see how you can create an effective editorial calendar

Select an editorial template

Often, the main reason content marketers hesitate to create a calendar is that they have no idea where to start, or think that the task will take up too much time. You can use one of the many online calendar tools available and use readymade templates to make the process easier.

Establish your content objectives

If you haven't already, now is a great time to determine your content marketing objectives. They could include -

• Increasing your brand awareness

• Improving your SEO efforts

• Portraying yourself as an industry thought leader

• Driving more traffic towards your website

•  Generate leads for a product or service

Make sure that your calendar prioritizes and reflects and all these objectives.

Research and come up with content ideas

Conduct an in-depth research to get an idea of what kind of content is performing well in your niche, and the kind of content (and formats) that is preferred by your target audience. Based on this research, you can start coming up with different ideas for topics and headlines.

Perform a thorough keyword research

Before you start creating content on these topics, conduct a thorough keyword research and include the high-ranking keywords in your content so that it will easily show up in search results. As far as possible, try to categorize your keywords according to user intent (navigational, transactional or informational), so that it will have better chances of ranking for the relevant searches.

Analyze your results periodically

Regularly monitoring the performance of your content will allow you to optimize your strategy for better results.

A digital marketing company can help you create a detailed editorial calendar, as well as create content that is mapped to your marketing objectives.

TSL Consulting Pvt Ltd is an integrated marketing company based in India. We offer customized outbound marketing, inbound marketing, digital marketing and data profiling services to a wide spectrum of small and mid-sized organizations.

Single Opt-in vs Double Opt-in: Which is the best for your email list?

When you are making efforts to grow your email list, you will have to make a choice between using either single or double opt-in for getting subscriber permission to send emails. If you cannot decide, let us have a look at what exactly both the terms mean and weigh their merits against each other.

With the single opt-in, a person will only have to subscribe once through your sign-up form to start receiving your emails. On the other hand, double opt-in requires the person to re-confirm his subscription through a confirmation email.

The advantage of single opt-ins is the reduced number of steps on the part of the user, contributing to a simplified user experience. It will also enable you to build your list in a shorter amount of time.

However, the additional step of double opt-in reinforces that the user is serious about receiving your emails, and you can be sure that the email id is valid for maximum inbox deliver-ability. Thus double opt-ins can enable you to build a cleaner mailing list and act as the founding stone of a greater conversion rate.

Both of these options have their own merits. Your choice will depend on your overall campaign goals and priorities. You can contact a digital marketing company if you need help in strategizing and executing effective email marketing campaigns.

How to prevent your emails from landing in the SPAM folder

You have worked diligently on your email marketing campaign, and have spent precious time and efforts on crafting personalized emails that you are confident will generate the expected response. But, after all this, what if your emails do not even reach the recipient's inbox?

Let us see some tips using which you can achieve maximum inbox deliver-ability -

•Ask your subscribers to whitelist your email address

• Get permission to send emails through option forms

• Avoid using purchases mailing lists

• Send relevant emails with clear subject lines, so that you do not get marked as spam from the recipient's side

•Avoid the use of risky words such as 'free' or 'promo' that might get you caught in the spam filters

• Use clear and recognizable From field names

• Clean up your mailing list periodically for unsubscribers and invalid email addresses

•  Get S/MIME certificates for your personal or company email address to increase your trustworthiness

•Give an option for the recipients to unsubscribe from an email itself

Use a trustworthy email automation platform that can take care of email validation and unsubscribers in real time

How Can You Effectively Track and Improve Your Email Marketing Campaigns

The importance of a sound email marketing campaign cannot be stressed enough. Reports have shown that emails can generate an ROI as high as 3800%. However, to get this promsing ROI, you need to keep an eagle eye on the performance of your campaigns and adjust your strategy wherever it might be found lacking. You can do this by tracking the right metrics.

                             

Let us have a look at what these metrics are, what they indicate, and how you can turn them into useful insights -

Open rate

This metric indicates the percentage of subscribers who have opened your email, out of your total subscribers.

If your open rate is low, this is a strong indication that the subject lines of your emails need your attention. A relevant, attention-catching subject line will ensure that your emails get opened. Of course, the problem might be that you are sending emails at a time when your prospects are too occupied or busy to look through them.

To improve your open rate, test out different subject lines and research the best times to send out emails based on the behavior of your target audience.

Click-through rate

This metric indicates the percentage of subscribers who have clicked on a link you have placed inside your email. This is a vital metric as it represents how inclined your subscribers are to take further action (such as subscription or direct purchase) through your emails.

If it is low, you will want to examine whether the anchor text you have used for the link is compelling enough for them to click, and whether it is placed in a position where it is easily visible to the reader.

Bounce rate

This is the percentage of the total emails sent which were unable to successfully reach the intended recipient.

In some cases, the email can bounce to due a server or other technical problem at the receiver end; however, it could also bounce due to an invalid or non-existent email. Thus, you need to carefully validate your subscriber list before sending out emails to prevent a high bounce rate.

Unsubscribe rate

This is the percentage of your subscribers who have opted out of receiving any further email communication for you.

A high unsubscription rate is definitely undesirable. There can be many factors responsible for unsubscription such as irrelevant/low-quality content, too high frequency of sending emails, and so on. You can simply send out a short survey to the unsubcribers to find and remedy the root cause, in order to reduce this occurence.

Of course, it can be quite difficult to execute a campaign and manually track these metrics. Using an email automation software will help you improve your campaign efficacy and get detailed, periodic analysis so that you can have more time to focus on your business strategy. You can also engage the services of a digital marketing company to strategize and execute creative email marketing campaigns on your behalf.

TSL Consulting Pvt Ltd is an integrated marketing company based in India. We offer customized outbound marketing, inbound marketing, digital marketing and data profiling services to a wide spectrum of small and mid-sized organizations.

Effective ways to improve your email marketing campaigns

Email marketing is reputed for fetching one of the highest conversion rates amongst all the digital marketing channels. Yet, many marketers are faced by low open rates, click-through rates and a growing list of unsubscribes. 

Let us have a look at some of the most effective ways with which you can improve the performance of your email marketing campaigns -

• Segment your email list according to a specific criteria such as interest level, job title, geographical location, etc., to increase relevancy of the email

• Write precise, straightforward and compelling subject lines to improve your open rates

• Leverage customer data to send personalized emails to improve click-through and conversion rates

• Make sure that your emails are optimized for mobile devices

• Have clearly defined Call-to-Actions in a prominent place to improve click-through rates

• Test different types of subject lines, content and layouts to find out which of them are best preferred by your audience

• Ask your subscribers for their feedback on what kind of emails and content they would like to receive from you

How Can You Nurture Warm Leads Into SQLs Through Email Marketing

Marketers often make the mistake of becoming too complacent when they qualify a lead as warm. However, most of them are nowhere ready to buy or even be classified as a Sales Qualified Lead (SQL). A lack of active nurturing or communication on your part can cause them to fall through the cracks in your sales pipeline, leading to lost sales opportunities.

Studies have shown that companies that are good at lead nurturing are able to generate 50% more sales-ready leads. Email marketing proves to be a remarkably effective strategy for nurturing leads by allowing you to stay in touch with the leads and engage in meaningful, personalized communication.

Let us see some tips on how B2B marketing companies can use emails to nurture warm leads into SQLs -

Segment your mailing list or leads

Perhaps the best advantage of emails is the facility of personalized communication it offers. Of course, you cannot spend hours on creating individual emails for every lead, but segmenting your leads will prove close enough. Doing so will allow you to send out emails that are absolutely relevant and relatable to your leads, prompting a more favorable action on their part.

Map your emails to the buyers' journey

Knowing where a particular lead is at in the buyer's journey is crucial for effective lead nurturing. This will give you an idea of the kind of content you need to create for your next email. The main stages of a typical buyer's journey are -

• Awareness – Buyer realizes that they are facing a particular problem or challenge, and need a solution

• Consideration – Buyer is researching various options that can potentially solve their problem

• Decision – Buyer has chosen a solution or is considering the best option among the available solutions

Use an email automation software

There are a lot of considerations involved in an email marketing campaign other than creating content and designing emails. From validating emails and keeping an eye on the subscriber list to tracking the results of the campaign, it is a lot of work to do manually.

An email automation software will help you reduce the tedious manual work and provide detailed reports of your campaign, so that you focus on refining your strategy for maximum results.

TSL Consulting Pvt Ltd is an integrated marketing company based in India. We offer customized outbound marketing, inbound marketing, digital marketing and data profiling services to a wide spectrum of small and mid-sized organizations.

How can Business Owners Manage their Online Reputation

Maintaining a positive digital footprint is important for the success of every online business. In fact, a study has shown that 97% of business owners have stated that online reputation management is important for their business.

Why is online reputattion management so important for B2B marketing companies?

Today, customers trust the word of their peers more than any advertisement or marketing material you might provide them with. Customer reviews, or what other people are saying about your brand, play an important role in the buyer's purchase decision.

Armed with smartphones, it does not take more than an instant for the millennial generation to express their opinion or experience on social media. This opinion, whether good or bad, spreads like wildfire all over the Internet. Thus, if you have not yet paid much attention to what your customers or target audience is saying about you in the online world, it is high time to start doing so.

Steps you can take to manage your business' online reputation

Maintain an authentic online presence

The first vital step is to claim your business across all social networks and even local map applications.This is essential to deter any deceitful parties that can set up fake profiles in your name.

Use social media wisely

Social media platforms is a great way for B2B marketing companies to interact with their customers and even attract qualified leads. However, while posting, keep the following points in mind -

•                     Do not share any controversial news

•                     Do not attempt any humor that might be taken the wrong way

•                     Do not ignore or delete negative reviews, or respond angrily to them

Encourage reviews from customers

You do not have to wait until your users post a review. Actively request feedback from them through a online forms or an email marketing service. You can encourage positive feedback by asking questions about the quality of your services and their own experience.

Publish quality content regularly

Quality content that engages and educates the target audiences contributes a great deal towards a positive online impression. Value-added, SEO-optimized content will help you boost your brand authority and help your customers quickly reach an informed business decision.

TSL Consulting Pvt Ltd is an integrated marketing company based in India. We offer customized outbound marketing, inbound marketing, digital marketing and data profiling services to a wide spectrum of small and mid-sized organizations.

Avoiding information overload in content marketing

Digital marketing or content marketing entails reaching out to your target audience on multiple digital channels and educating them through content. However, the constant barrage of information from all channels such as emails, social media posts, blogs and newsletters can confuse and overwhelm the person at the receiving end, thus leading to information overload. 

This renders the person unable to take an informed decision, leading them to abandon your brand altogether.

Here are some tips to help you avoid information overload -

•                     Keep the content absolutely relevant to your audience's business requirements

•                     Break it down into easily consumable pieces and use visual content for easy comprehension

•                     Create non-screen content such as podcasts, so that users can consume information while mullti-tasking

A digital marketing company can help you strategize and create content in a way that engages and educates your target audience, without overwhelming them with information.

Marketing Qualified Lead vs Sales Qualified Lead

Qualified leads are important to streamline the sales process, but the different technical terms can be quite confusing. 

Let us understand the exact difference between the titular terms -

Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL)

MQL is a lead who is more likely to convert into a customer, compared to other leads. They fit your ideal buyer demographic or job title, and have shown interest in your product or service by placing enquiries, viewing your pricing information, etc. However, there is no guarantee that they will make a purchase. They have to be nurtured more, before they are ready to buy.

Sales Qualified Lead

A sales qualified lead (SQL) is a lead who is actively considering making a purchase and is willing to get in touch with your sales team. An SQL will be typcially researched and vetted by your marketing team, and handed over to the sales team upon being deeemed qualified. Essentially, SQL is an MQL who showed readiness to talk to your sales team.

Key benefits of Email Marketing

Chances are that you have heard a lot of talk about email marketing being dead. However, statistics show that more than 59% of marketers consider emails to be their biggest source of ROI.

If you are not already including emails as a part of your digital marketing strategy, here is why you should start doing so -

Improves personalization

Emails enable you to send targeted content to a very specific group of your customers or audience. Sending the right message at the right time can greatly increase your lead flow and conversion rate.

Helps strengthen customer relationships

Communication with customers is very important for inspiring brand loyalty. Emails let you stay in touch with them, without being intrusive.

Helps increase website traffic

Using compelling CTAs, you can use emails to drive traffic to your website, social media accounts, blogs, or any landing pages you have created.

Is cost-effective

Email marketing will cost you much less compared to traditional marketing channels like print and radio advertisements, even if you are investing in an email automation software.

Creating a Facebook group for your business

Groups on Facebook are popular for the simple reason that they unite a lot of like-minded people for meaningful discussions. 

Creating your own business group gives you an opportunity to bring a large part of your audience under one roof. Keep the following points in mind to reap the maximum benefits from your group -

•  Set a clear purpose of the group, i.e., decide whether you want to create the group to sell, to increase brand awareness, or simply to engage your existing customers. This will help you narrow down the members from target audience you want to be a part of the group.

• When you are inviting members, make sure you send a personalized message to them, to increase chances of a positive response.

• Keep your group public or private based on social media marketing goals. If you want it to be exclusive, keep it private.

Make sure that the content you post is aimed at helping them solve their business challenges, and encourages open communication with you and other team members.

5 Best Career Opportunities in Digital Marketing

As more and more businesses are getting onboard the benefits of digital marketing in increasing brand awareness and conversion rates, there is a huge demand of skilled specialists in the various areas of this discipline.

Let us have a look at some of the many career opportunities that are available in digital marketing -

Digital Marketing Manager

This position is suitable for someone who has a solid, hands-on experience in executing digital marketing campaigns. As a digital marketing manager, you will be responsible for planning, developing and overseeing the execution of the overall digital marketing strategy for a particular campaign.

Content Writer

As a content writer, you will be responsible for drafting engaging content on various topics and in different formats such as blogs, emails, social media posts, newsletters, etc. Majority of organizations do not even demand a specific degree for hiring writers, as long as they are skilled and have a good grasp on the language.

SEO Expert

Increasing the online visibility of their website through Search Engine Optimization is a top priority for many business owners and digital marketers. Thus, SEO experts who can combine their knowledge of the way search engines work with various online keyword research and website analysis tools are in huge demand.

Social Media Executive

Social media marketing is an important part of any digital marketing campaign. Organizations are always on the lookout for social media executives who are familiar with the nuances of various social media platforms. They will be responsible for publishing suitable posts on all the platforms relevant to their organization.

Graphic Designer

From social media posts and emails to blogs, every piece of content needs an engaging visual to uplift it. So, if you are good at designing and using photoshop tools, the field of digital marketing has a huge opportunity for you.

Along with these, UX Designer, video editor, PPC marketing manager, search engine marketer, content marketing manager, and copywriter are some other opportunities in the digital marketing domain.

How to Draw Traffic from Search Engines Other than Google

Google might be the major player in driving organic traffic to your website, but you cannot disregard the credibility of other search engines for effective digital marketing.

Even if your website is currently faring well in terms of ranking and traffic, there is no telling when it will get adversely affected due to a core update from Google. It might take a long time to for your website to recover from a major update. In such cases, you can continue to draw traffic from other search engines until you mitigate the cause of drop in Google traffic.

Also, as majority of businesses focus on Google, you will face less competition on the alternate options. Let us have a look at these options, and how you can draw from them -

Bing

Bing focuses on verbatim keywords, i.e., it'll show results for the exact keyword a user has searched for. As with Google, keyword stuffing will not work, but placing optimized keywords in title tags, meta descriptions and introductory paragragphs will help ranking.

Bing is more lenient than Google when it comes to mobile-friendliness. As long as your content is of high quality, you can rank well even if your website is not mobile-friendly.

As Bing gives importance to page authority, your older pages can bring more traffic here than on Google.

DuckDuckGo

This search engine may not yet be as sophisticated as Google and its many ranking factors, but they are similar in many aspects.

Intent-based keywords, sound technical SEO, relevant and useful content, and quality backlinks are they key factors to draw organic traffic from DuckDuckGo.

YouTube

With the number of active users in billions, YouTube is a great source to drive traffic to your website. The volume of traffic will depend on the quailty of your videos, and how well you optimize for keywords in the video title and description.

Conclusion

When it comes to SEO, it is more than risky to put all your eggs in one basket. Other than Google, search engines such as Bing, DuckDuckGo and YouTube can prove valuable sources for increasing your traffic. You can take help of website SEO services to make sure that your web pages follow the guidelines for the major search engines and draw increased organic traffic from them.

TSL Consulting Pvt Ltd is an integrated marketing company based in India. We offer customized outbound marketing, inbound marketing, digital marketing and data profiling services to a wide spectrum of small and mid-sized organizations.

5 Digital Marketing Mistakes to Avoid in 2020

With a discipline that is proving to be volatile with every passing year, it is easy to make mistakes in an effort to increase your brand awareness. These slips can cost you a lot, even if your product or service is as good as any in your chosen market.

Let us have a look at the digital marketing mistakes that you must avoid at all costs in this year and beyond -

Not focusing on target audience

The importance of identifying and approaching the right target audience is not unknown. However, many marketers think that they are only limiting themselves to a particular niche by doing so. They aim at attracting a larger audience, but this strategy can lead them to following the wrong leads who cannot benefit from their solution.

By narrowing down your target audience and identifying their challenges, you can send them focused messages that elicit a better response.

Undermining your website

In a bid to reach out to the target audience on the increasing number of social media platforms and their own inboxes, many businesses tend to neglect their website. More and more users are turning toward online search for any service they need, and your website is the top source of finding out about your identity as a brand and whether you can help them solve their business challenges.

More than being just aesthetically appealing and user-friendly, make sure that your website properly conveys your brand message and provides avenues for interested prospects to engage in further communication with you.

Using Clickbait Content

An increased click through rate is undoubtedly a desirable metric for businesses, and it is tempting to use clickbait subject and head lines to achieve it. However, doing so only adversely affects the credibility of a business in the eyes of customers.

Ensure that the content's headlines makes it abundantly clear for your target audience what they are going to find inside. This will not only help you to maintain trust and credibility, but also generate regular visitors and leads with good content.

Underestimating Personalized Communication

The advantages of a more personalized approach toward your customers have been around for a long time, but many businesses ignore such communication. Even something as simple as wishing them on a festive day, or making them an offer based on their previous purchase can go a long way to inculcate brand loyalty.

Ignoring SEO

For many businesses, SEO is still all about stuffing keywords in the landing pages to increase search engine ranking. However, the continual updates to Google algorithms seek to root out such websites. To rank in 2020, you will have to focus on publishing quality, authentic content that will genuinely be helpful for your target audience.

Conclusion

It is common enough to make mistakes in digital marketing, however, these can be easily avoided with an in-depth knowledge of your target audience and smart content that aims to help them solve their business challenges.

TSL Consulting Pvt Ltd is an integrated marketing company based in India. We offer customized outbound marketing, inbound marketing, digital marketing and data profiling services to a wide spectrum of small and mid-sized organizations.

Social Media marketing trends to watch out for in 2020

Just like content; social media is at the heart of digital marketing. It is one of the most powerful tools that help distribute content to the right audience at the right time. With ever-changing social media trends, and the social media channels coming up with new, innovative tools; social media marketing has become omnipresent in IT B2B marketing industry.

Going visual-

The trend in 2020 in B2B Digital Marketing Services is definitely shifting from content-only to visual-only and also on social media. With the attention span of readers reducing by the day, and customers being spoilt for choice; videos are becoming the eye-catcher. Videos are becoming an equally dominant trend in the year 2019 as they were in the year 2018.  With the focus of social media on engaging audiences and building relationships with customers through fresh content-mediums such as stories and live streaming; the use of visual content has more demand now than ever. There is a shift in trends with brands wanting to create a richer, visual-content the medium that can yield a more effective business output.

GoLive-                                                                                                                                            

Video has been gaining popularity and is picking up fast since the year 2018. However; video content on social media has become yet another opportunity for marketers to attract, engage and convert prospects. Going live helps build trust and loyalty of customers. Going live with video also makes it more interactive, helping marketers connect better with their customers. In B2B Digital Marketing industry; video is helping personalization and customization become easier than before.

Enhanced customer experience-

Brands that emphasize more on elevating customer experience have more chances of fetching customer loyalty. A one-on-one communication with customers increases the chances of better and effective communication. Data is now being used and leveraged to make the best of personalization for enhanced customer experiences. Marketers are also focused on giving enhanced customer experiences through recommendations, brand reputation etc. to make the most of social media.

Social media is undeniably one of the most powerful tools for marketers to enhance brand image and reach the expected target audience. And the powerful combination of visual medium and social media is only helping marketers to gain a wider reach with better results.