the marketing bit
a marketing guide for small business
Email Marketing: Best Practices
Feb 29th
Email Opt In
Last week I received an unsubscribe notice and was immediately concerned. This hadn’t happened before and I wanted to know why this person had decided to unsubscribe.
Had I done something wrong? Wasn’t the information of value?
As my brain was going through a long list of reasons as to why this may have happened, my email service provider automatically asked them why. This subscriber response was…
I get too many emails…don’t have time to read them all. I just have to give some of them up. Sorry.
I breathed a little easier. First, what a sweetheart. He actually took the More >
Twitter Tweets – Dos and Don’ts
Feb 29th
I go gaga over research. No, it’s not the pretty graphs, but the bottom line research results I love the most. Data makes the decision process easy.
Which is why I was pleased to read a recent piece on Twitter by Derek Halpern of DIYThemes where he shared some MIT research results on what makes for a good Tweet.
Seems some MIT folks decided they wanted to understand why some tweets get read while others just eat up virtual space and are ignored. The MIT Twitter research study (Who Gives a Tweet?) was pretty simple. They collected about 1400 volunteers and had More >
Social Media: Whose Responsibility Is It?
Feb 27th
I talk to small business owners all the time and the one common, always present complaint is…
Is social media and marketing a top priority?
“I just don’t have enough time.”
I understand. I don’t have enough time to do everything I should do in my small business. But this is the nature of the beast. It isn’t like you’re the only business owner who feels this way.
But I do a couple of things many small business owners don’t. I prioritize and take responsibility for my business. Particularly when it comes to social media and marketing.
Marketing and Social Media Priorities?Yes, I make the More >
Pinterest: Who Is Using Pinterest?
Feb 27th
Are you wondering if the newest social media platform, Pinterest, is for your retail operation?
Well, the folks at modea worked through the numbers and created an infographic that gives you a pretty good idea of what is going on with Pinterest.
The bottom line: If you’re crafting a brand image (and you should be), then Pinterest allows your users to become curators of content and to do so very easily. Females (68% of users) and those with money ($100K plus) are using Pinterest. You don’t have to be a Nordies, or a Whole Foods to capitalize on this new upstart. Any More >
Social Media: Its Role In Innovation
Feb 24th
Some easily dismiss social media as a giant adult time waster. When, in fact, social media is far more. It just depends on how you view social media.
It certainly can be a giant time suck. But if you wrap your head around how you can use these tools and the relationships you form through social media to meet your goals and objectives, all of a sudden, this time waster turns into a robust turbo power booster to create better ideas, better products, additional services, etc. To capitalize on this power, you have to know HOW to use social media. We’ll More >
Social Media: Is it Youdia or Media?
Feb 23rd
We all suffer from it. The mental blank that occasionally forms when you ask yourself
“What can I tell my social media folks?”
You’ll find some helpful tips on this blog regarding social engagement, but they are not nearly as entertaining as this 1 minute interview from Peter Shankman giving you the load down on “engagement”.
After you view it, ask yourself…do you practice Media or Youdia?
SEO – SEO Tools That Drive Traffic
Feb 22nd
The devil is in the details with SEO
And sometimes those details are enough to drive normal, average folks mad. It can be messy and muddy because much of it is objective.
Nonetheless, SEO is the online task master and dictates what will and will not be found online. It is the source of traffic for your website. Like or not, you have to be aware of SEO and you need to practice it on and off of your website.
I tend to lose my patience with SEO. I definitely recognize its value in generating traffic, yet feel like I’m twisting my brain about More >
Email Marketing: How To Create Content
Feb 20th
What goes into your email newsletter?
Small business man preparing to write E-newsletter
This is where the rubber meets the road. I’ve seen perfectly capable small business owners freeze in utter fear staring at the email newsletter form while all of the color drained from their face. I understand writing can be a challenge for some and we’ll discuss some workarounds for those who are consistently experiencing writer’s block. I also know it can be intimidating to send a message to a faceless audience. You don’t ‘really’ know these people, yet they raised their hand and told you they were interested More >
Social Media: Who is Who?
Feb 17th
The world of social media expands and contracts daily making it difficult to keep up with what is really happening. The infographic below from Imbue Marketing helps narrow the field and to focus on the big players.
However, I see some of the data may be a touch out-of-date or a bit misleading. Linkedin‘s audience for example is closer to 130 million and growing. But an outdated figure doesn’t dilute the value of the infographic. It gives you a really good idea of the established players as well as some of the new, up and comers like Pinterest, which is really More >
Social Media: Expect the Unexpected
Feb 16th
Social Media Partnerships
I was busy checking into my various social media accounts last week, when out of the blue, I spied this request from Tracy Sestili, CEO of Social Strand Media on Twitter. She was asking me to do an interview for her blog. How nice is that?
For those of you who don’t consider yourself savvy about social media, these types of requests and connections happen all the time and are really a nice treat. I gain exposure to Tracy’s audience and she doesn’t have to create new material for her blog. It’s a win-win alliance. These are the type of More >
