Category: Scientific Marketing

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Word of Mouth Marketing Now Happens Online

Word of Mouth now happens online. People are talking up their favourite businesses directly; they’re consuming and sharing content they find useful or entertaining from those businesses, and they’re asking connections for recommendations. This topic is brought to you by our partnership with Constant Contact.

Your Word of Mouth Opportunity AwaitsYour business has an opportunity to be part of more of these conversations, but first, let’s get back to some basics.

People like to Talk about their successes.

The more you can do to keep your business top of mind and make it easy for others to talk about you, the more you increase the chances of people recommending or seeking you out when they need what you offer.

Beyond being part of the conversation, you must understand what people may find when they go looking for your business specifically by name, or by something your business offers.

And, of course, be aware that if people don’t find your business when they go looking online, it begs the question, “Does your business even exist?”

What do people find when they go looking online for your business?

It’s no secret that people turn to search engines like Google to get more information about the businesses they’re investigating. Let’s take a look at some of the things, including what is now considered word of mouth, that may show up on a search engine results page (or SERP) when someone searches for a business by name:

  • Paid ads
  • Organic (non-paid) search results
  • Google My Business listing
  • Social Media accounts
  • Reviews
  • Info from other sites

Example using “Constant Contact” as the search term

Online Word of Mouth Marketing - Constant Contact Example(click here for a LARGER image – a new tab will open)

What if people are looking for something your business offers?

In the example, we searched for a specific business — Constant Contact — by name. But, people don’t always search by name. Sometimes they know they want to buy a product or a service, but they don’t know who offers it. Then they type in a more generic search term, like “restaurants near me” or “tax preparers.”

Let’s take a look at an example of online Word of Mouth marketing.

Imagine you were throwing a dinner party and you want to impress your friends with a selection of cheeses not found at the grocery store. So you jump on your computer or mobile device and search “cheese shops near me.” Here’s an example of what may come up — of course, your actual results will differ.

Notice that “cheese shops near me” brings up the listings in Google Maps first. This information comes from Google My Business profiles (more on that later).

This is Part One of a three-part series. Be sure to join us for content delivered to you by filling out the form below, or on the pop-up, or in the sidebar of this blog.

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My #1 Question Asked: Do You Make Websites?

I decided to write this “My #1 Question Asked: Do You Make Websites?” post because at least once a week (50+ times per year), I get asked this question. This post is about the deeper answer, beyond “yes”.

We Make Websites

Today’s Marketing Professional

I am not boasting or making any claim that the average marketer of today has the same education as a physician, however, I have discovered that using the analogy of a family physician is an easy way to understand the term “marketing professional”.

Your family doctor would be able to administer a shot or take blood pressure, as well as specialize in some aspect of medicine. Today’s marketer can build a website with at least a WYSIWYG editor, and will often focus on a specialty.

That said, today’s typical marketer also specializes in something specific, such as what I do here at Cortex, conversion optimization and engagement engineering.

We make website to fit the Conversion Optimization Wheel

Yes, Cortex Marketing Does Make Websites

Although the skillset to make websites is needed in being a good marketer, today’s full-service marketing is bigger than that. An example is that Jason, and his business Ad-Sol.com, specializes in advertising, whereas Behrooz, and his business MasterPix.com, specializes in custom websites and graphic design. So, does Cortex marketing make Websites? Yes, but so does Ad-Sol and MasterPix. Clear as mud?

The bottom line is, marketing is a multi-spoked wheel and the many components of that wheel, support and works off of each other.

The General Top-10 Components Are:

      1. Big Picture Names (e.g. what you call your business, domain url’s, content titles, etc.)
      2. Big Picture Strategies and Plans
      3. Branding & Colour Schemes
      4. Target Defining
      5. Copy-Boarding
      6. Copywriting
      7. Online Development (websites, social media, etc)
      8. Publicity
      9. Testing
      10. Analyzing successes and failures

We Make Websites with Digital MarketingA Different Kind Of Marketing Company

If you are looking for an effective way to not just drive more traffic to your site, but to drive more qualified leads to your sales funnel, lets set up a time to chat… or you can call me now at 1-888-502-3523. I look forward to speaking with you about your ideas!!

 

 

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Engagement — 4 Quick and Easy Steps

Encouraging engagement, of some type, is what every marketing campaign is ultimately about. Unfortunately, many campaigns miss the mark by forgetting that the message should be less about the information of your features, and more about the emotional relevance and benefit of your widget or service to your target audience.

As such, when you are writing to your audience — e.g. a prospect or someone who is higher up the food chain and who is extremely busy — it is important to engage with your best storyline.

This can easily be done with a simple exercise and if you are reading this, you are in luck; sign up here for an online complimentary mini-coaching session on copy-boarding. This is for new clients only and is about 1-hour in length.

That said, it is often a challenge to develop what you want to say without is sounding like a cold-form-letter.

Engagement Matrix

Encouraging Engagement Like A Professional

Tim Ferriss (the number one business podcaster) shared this simple template in an interview:
1st paragraph: “I know you are very busy and get a lot of emails so this will only take 60 seconds.”

2nd paragraph: 1 or 2 sentences about who you are and how that’s relevant to the person you’re contacting.

3rd paragraph: 1 or 2 sentences with a specific question the recipient can answer quickly.

4th paragraph: “I totally understand if you’re too busy to reply. Even a 1-to-2-line response will make my day.”

Engagement

Encouraging Engagement Old-School Style

Note this could also work if you picked up the phone and called. This seems to be a dying art as many would rather sens an email or text message.

I believe it is because people like to think things through before they speak.  Additionally, they like to hear from other thinkers. Certainly, they want other people to know what they think, but doing that via a call can be scary for some.

So off to the email engagement campaign, and HubSpot’s Barry Feldman suggests “prompting your audience with one of the following ‘What do you think?’ strategies:

  • Probe their personality. Post a question that invites people to share their opinion or weigh in on something.
  • Play the “test your knowledge” game. It’s irresistible.
  • Post a poll. It’s easy to create polls on Twitter and Facebook. In addition to engaging your followers, you stand to learn meaningful things about them too.
  • Respond to my email. Email from brands are bound to ask you to click-through to read, watch, and try or buy something, but how often do they simply ask you to write back? I find this be an enormously engaging strategy and have seen it work for my brand and many others. Notice I wrote, “Respond to my email,” not “our email” or “this email.” A human-to-human first-person approach will be the engaging way to call this play.
  • Just ask. Interactivity 101: simply post a question. Whether done so in a social stream, blog post, online group or community, or on a Q&A site such as Quora, I’ve witnessed asking followers relevant, provocative, and timely questions create some of the most engaging and thought-provoking social media activity of all.

Learn how to write more compelling content with a personal copywriting and copy-boarding session, or contact me directly for a chat.

 

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