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Category: Digital Marketing

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Video Marketing

As you may already know, video is becoming the Michael Jordan of marketing. Because our current generation is lazy and can’t hold still for five minutes to read an article, videos have this problem covered. They provide a more personal experience for your customers who have that short attention span and are comfortable with social media.

Videos are an increasingly important marketing tool for businesses because they’re useful and versatile. Whether it’s for your social media, your website, or for your customers, videos are important to the success of your business. Enough with the boring content and memes that don’t mean anything (cat memes are still okay), upgrade to videos, you’ll thank us.

The Numbers:

Videos for business don’t just “look good,” they bring big numbers. Numbers and data are the name of the game in marketing, because that’s what everyone wants and needs. A survey by Renderforest.com found that videos can increase awareness of your brand by over 70%. As a result, your business reaches new audiences and attracts new potential customers to your website and media pages.

This increase in brand awareness correlates with traffic, which video can increase by over 51%. It’s simple: the more people that come to your website and social media sites, the more successful your business will be. Unlike the horrible traffic on US-19 at five o’clock where you’re stuck listening to “Put you to sleep” radio, this is the traffic you’ll enjoy.

But enough with the “boring” statistics, let’s get to the one thing that ALL business leaders are most interested in, MONEY.  Using video marketing increases sales by over 34%. Over 45% of people are more likely to buy a product or service after watching a video because of the improved SEO. It’s simple math, folks! People want to see what your product or service does. These stats are great, but you first need to know what type of video you need to produce, for what platform, and who your target audience is before these numbers even matter.  Keep reading if you’d like your business to make more money.

How to Use Video Marketing:

The amazing thing about video marketing is how far it’s come and how many different areas in which it can be used. With its ability to communicate and deliver messages efficiently, video marketing has evolved in numerous ways to help you be as successful as possible.

Informative Videos

To start out with video marketing, your best bet is to create informative videos.  These are videos that explain who you are, what you do, and how you can help the target audience you are pursuing. Don’t get too personal right away though; make them want to come back for more just like a first date (yes, we give dating advice as well).

Tutorials and How-to

People love tutorials or how-to videos. These go along with informative videos, but they are more in-depth. You can use these to show how a product works or show your audience how to better use an online system that they may already be using. Many people are visual learners, so these types of videos make it easier for them to follow along and want to visit your page for the next video you share.

Educational Videos

Depending on your company, educational videos are great as well. Use certain narrative resources such as graphics and scripts to gain their attention and combine them with interesting topics to keep their attention throughout. The purpose of these is to be engaging and fun while providing useful information in the process. Webinars and live streams on social media are two of the main effective ways to use this technique.

Testimonials

An effective video marketing technique that gets overlooked is testimonials. This is an powerful way for your audience to hear about how your company has helped others from the perspective of previous or current clients. Future customers tend to trust the opinion of others who are like themselves rather than the voice of the company. When doing this though, make sure these are people that ACTUALLY like you (if possible).

In today’s marketing era, video is essential to success. But, it’s more than just plastering your face or visuals in a video; you need to use it in a smart, content-strategic way. When you create video content for your company, remember that the #1 goal is to stay on track with the audience you are trying to reach. Make sure your quality is recognizable and that your viewers understand what you are trying to say about a product or service. Create videos that people will share and discuss with others, so that they are more likely to check out the rest of your company’s attributes.

One more word of advice: don’t try to go viral right away. Yes, it worked for the Kardashians, but being normal human beings like most of us are, perfection takes time and repetition. Repetition. Repetition.

 

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5 Social Media Trends for 2022

Want to stay ahead of the game on social media? A solid social media presence is very important, and trends are always evolving and growing different ways to engage your audience. Using these trends are a great way to get people involved and increase engagement. Check out these new trends to spice up your social media presence.

1. Video Content –

With the success of TikTok, other platforms like Instagram and Facebook have spiked their video content with clips like Reels to engage audiences. It’s predicted that by 2022, more platforms will include videos in their social feeds. Short videos have become a trendy way for brands to sell their products in an entertaining way. Video content is one way to increase your engagement and join the trend.

2. Behind the scenes content

With the video and TikTok trends comes behind-the-scenes content. Many small businesses have jumped on the trend and are showing the behind-the-scenes of how their products are made. Just as the do-it-yourself trend was popular a few years ago, customers are getting a glimpse into how their products are made and how their company operates. The customer can get more involved in the products, which increases sales and followers.

3. Interactive Posts

Interactive posts have increased in the last year as more and more people work from home or even from their cell phones, and this trend isn’t going away anytime soon. This trend is popular on Facebook and Instagram, but LinkedIn has also expanded its survey-like posts. Interactive posts are a great way to gauge your followers’ reaction with a simple slider or poll. Offering your followers something fun like a quiz or poll will increase their engagement and give them something to look forward to.

4. Shoppable posts

As more and more businesses turn to social platforms to share their products and reach customers, shoppable posts make it easier for customers to shop from their phones. With swipe features, embedded product links, and automatic product tagging, you can seamlessly connect your ecommerce brand to your social media by tagging images of your products in your posts for direct purchase.

5. Carousels

Carousels are still new to social media, but they’re growing in popularity on Twitter and Instagram, and are predicted to become even more popular by the middle of 2022. A carousel is a series of 5-10 texts or images in a single social media post that can be viewed by swiping or clicking. It’s a way to show lots of content, but only in one post, either for education or entertainment. It’s very popular with photographers showing multiple images from a photo shoot, or clothing brands introducing a new line or collection.

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Why is Lighting Important for Professional Photos

The importance of proper lighting in photography.

Lighting is a key factor in creating a successful image. Lighting determines not only brightness and darkness, but also tone, mood and atmosphere. Without lighting, you can’t create and expose a clear image. The light brings out the sharpness and details of the subject, so it’s very important that you expose the subject well.

Therefore, to take the best photos, it’s important to properly control and manipulate the light to get the best color and luminosity for your subject. By changing the lighting and shadows precisely, you can best highlight your subject and take the best professional looking photos.

When it comes to lighting, natural light is the best option for headshots or other professional photos, but sometimes it’s not the easiest option. If you’re shooting in the studio, lighting will be your best friend.

Positioning light

Scott Headshot

Where you place your lighting is very important and will have a big impact on how your subject is lit. Depending on where you place your studio lighting, your subject will look different in your photos and in the final result.

If the light is behind the camera and aimed directly at your subject, it’ll look very flat. Lighting from the side will bring out the subject better and create a small shadow that creates more of a 3D look. Tip: Make sure you match the height of the studio lighting to the height of your subject. If the shadow is too big, the photo will look more dramatic, which could be too much for a professional photo.

If you want to create a silhouette effect with headshots, you can keep the light source behind the person and use a strong light source to create a striking silhouette photo.

Hard light

If you’re using studio light, depending on the subject and the room, it can create too harsh a light for a professional photo. If the light is that harsh, it can cause too many shadows behind the subject or on the subject’s face.

If you add a diffuser to the light source, the harsh light and shadow can be reduced. This will also defuse imperfections on the subject and give it a healthy glow, like natural sunlight would.

Once you’ve achieved the best possible lighting with your studio setup, you can also edit the images in Adobe Lightroom. With the editing software, you can change color, balance, and temperature, enhance tones, sharpen, reduce noise, and crop images.

Lighting can make a big difference when taking pictures, because you want your subject to look as good as possible. Learning to use light to your advantage and get the best possible results from your setup will set your work apart from your peers and put you on the path to becoming a professional.

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TOP 3 WAYS TO UTILIZE INFLUENCER MARKETING

There are typically three different ways that a company can use influencers to spread the word about their product or service while creating brand buzz and awareness. All three of these strategies warrant different results and take a different type of budgeting, so when implementing these plans, take that into consideration.

These three strategies are discounts, product exchange, and paid advertisements, which are all commonly seen throughout social media and influencer marketing. Here is how to leverage your company’s influencer marketing opportunity to its highest potential by following some basic influencer engagement formats through Instagram and any other platform, you may find the presence and need for influencer marketing.

01 DISCOUNTS

These are the companies that love to slide into the average joes’ direct messages and attempt to sell them something but masking it as a collaboration opportunity. This marketing strategy makes the nonsocial media savvy person feel special. They suddenly are being noticed by a company for what they can offer, and the allure of products makes it hard for them to resist. They did not even realize they looked like they could provide any service to a company. This group of people is not usually a career Instagramer or even taking it up as a hobby.

Turn on the charm and talk to the person about why their profile stood out to you. From there, you can proceed to tell them how you think they could rock your product, and you are willing to give them a storewide discount to shop your products if they promise to post about them! Now here is the catch, this will not work on most people inside the influencer world; that being said, it is a great strategy to target the everyday social media user who does not know the ins and outs of the environment or require payment for posts.

If you try this tactic on a seasoned Instagrammer, they generally will get very annoyed and refuse collaboration since, for them, time and energy is money in their line of work, and you are wasting it. We highly advise not reaching out to influencers with this offer if they are above 5,000 followers. Being an influencer is now recognized as a full-time career option to some, and you have to remember to have a level of respect for that.

If you target the right person though, this can increase your exposure, and you will still see some form of profit since you are not giving away anything for free or paying a creation or service fee. Some companies also will offer a free product but ask the person to pay for shipping. This is great for brands just starting out and getting their feet wet in the beginning stages of their marketing plan, but as you grow, you might want to reevaluate this strategy.

02 PRODUCT EXCHANGE

This is where there is an exchange of goods for services on social media or in a blog. This can mean a static in-feed post, stories, videos, IGTVs, blog posts, ad space, etc. Essentially, you offer the influencer a free product that you think they would love or need in exchange for any of their advertisements or services. This one is a little easier to get away with than discounts with a seasoned influencer if your product truly offers value to them, so it is vital to target people within your niche.

Many influencers are willing to work for free if the product has value to them or is worth a substantial price. Primarily to get someone to work for free for you, it has to be something they would like to have – because they are working for free. Creating content, planning, editing, and advertising takes substantial time, so it is crucial to remain in the mindset that they provide you a service. You will commonly see companies that deliver experiences or services that utilize product exchange. It is popular in the travel blogger community to exchange for tourist experiences, hotel stays, and exclusive experiences with a higher cost. Essentially, if what you provide is something a person would typically pay for anyways and is not a luxury item, then there is a pretty good chance you can get many influencers to participate in product exchange.

You will also see this with big-ticket items such as home goods and technology items since they are high priority items for many people, so if that is your company’s niche, give the product exchange strategy your best go!

03 PAID ADVERTISEMENTS

The final exchange you will commonly see is the one people are most familiar with, paid advertisements. These are the brands that pay for posts, stories, videos, or anything else you can imagine for sponsorship. When a brand is paying an influencer to advertise their product through experience, usually one-time posts do not see a large return. Still, if you are going to invest the money into an influencer, you might as well invest your time into them.

Create a relationship that spans for a longer duration of time. The more you get your product in front of an influencer’s audience, the more likely they will buy into what is promoted. It is all about the commitment to a repetition of exposure, and if you are going to put your money into this kind of advertising, you have to remember that it is a slow return process sometimes. This form of advertising is not just for the more prominent corporations; there is a range of influencer levels, which means people with different rates are willing to negotiate! If your budget is not as large, do not abort the mission on paid advertisements. You would be surprised by the number of micro-influencers you could implore that are not as expensive as what companies commonly assume influencer marketing costs.

Whether your company is large or small, you have the opportunity to try out all of these different influencer marketing strategies and see which one works best for your brand. Since the influencer world is so new and people are just beginning to discover influencer advertisement’s depths, it is still such a trial and error process. Be prepared to crash and burn a few times before you find what gives you the best return on investment and what suits your company’s feel best in the digital marketing world. Influencer marketing is the newest digital form to try out, and trust us; it is worth a go.

Need help getting started? Contact us today!
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BRANDING: THE LIFELINE OF ANY SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS

For any business, branding can truly affect the level of success you can achieve.  A brand is much more than a pretty logo. It’s what sets you apart from your competition while motivating employees.  Many proven business’ tend to give less attention to branding and focus more on funding and product development. This can be costly; branding is a huge component in building any business. Here are just a few reasons why you should focus more on branding:

GET NOTICED

In a world where most markets are saturated, the best way to stand out from the competition is brand recognition.  The advantage of being the first business to pop into someone’s mind when they are contemplating who to buy a product or service from is astronomical.

INCREASE VALUE

The importance of your company’s brand can be measured in dollars and cents. Having a strong brand ensures you will be top of mind in your target market, which in turn increases market share, sales and public image.  Brands are so valuable that larger organizations will put the value of their brand on their balance sheets.

PROVIDE DIRECTION

A solid brand can do wonders for employee loyalty. When employees have a clear understanding of the common goal, everyone works harder and overall office morale increases. This also lets the public know exactly what the intentions of the business are.

CONSISTENCY

Branding helps keep the overall image of the business consistent across all public outlets.  This, in turn, makes the brand stronger. In order to successfully stay consistent across all mediums, businesses must create a clear identity for what the brand stands for and apply this to all products/services offered.

In the end, your brand should represent a compelling promise to your target market and current customer base that is delivered at every level of the business.

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WHY HAVING A SOCIAL MEDIA BUDGET IS CRUCIAL

From Myspace, to Facebook, Twitter and sites that are still up-and-coming, social media marketing has evolved into something that is more than a place for the posting of funny cat videos and sharing family vacation photos – it can be used for enhancing your own brand or business at a more personal level. With this being the age of all things digital and social, using these sites for business is a smart way to increase exposure to a larger, more personal audience. The issue with this is that some people seem to forget to consider when thinking about using social media for business is including it in their budget.

Although it may be free to start a page for your business, advertisements do cost money, and factoring this cost into your budget must be considered for effective marketing. It is also not something that should be thought of as a quick addition to any kind of marketing campaign – social media takes time and manpower to build as a helpful tool for increasing the productivity of your business or brand.

Today, nearly everyone is involved in some sort of social media. Whether it is as simple as having a Facebook for sharing pictures, to writing for a daily blog, social media is something that has become part of everyday life for a large percentage of people. These digital platforms can be more informal and come across to a larger crowd, while also appealing to a more relaxed audience all at the same time. Information is pushed across the digital realm in a quicker, more efficient way while allowing for it to be up to date and keeping up with the times. For example, if something were to happen or needed to be shared with the audience of your business the moment it happens, news could be spread in nearly real time. Obviously, this can be incredibly beneficial for a number of reasons for your business.

A website or app, such as Twitter, allows for a more personal approach to pushing out content. On Twitter, followers may favorite, retweet, quote, and respond to a tweet with ease. This creates a more personal atmosphere that may be created without having to deal with the hassle of the phone or email. It is informal, so responses can be quick and to the point, while still getting results. Many people like this for business due to the fact that it somewhat humanizes the company. For smaller companies, this creates a brand image and more social networking for future and potential customers, all while helping with website traffic and explaining what the company is capable of. This also gives larger companies a chance to put off the smaller business feel, while still allowing for the recognition of the large-name brand.

Another thing to note when considering social media is that if you are not on it, your competitor is. A huge percentage of the general public is on the Internet regularly, and with a large percentage of those people actively on social media, it gives more people a chance to learn about your business. The average person checks their various social media accounts several times a day, and with your company being on these same sites it makes for a convenient place to further promote and market. Being on these sites also boosts your brand name in search engines, which creates more results and places where potential customers can hear about you.

In conjunction with your complete marketing strategy, social media can raise the overall value of your company while keeping costs at a minimum. Joining these websites will cause not just a noticeable amount of increased website traffic, but a quantum leap. If one of your posts are shared by fan or audience member, all of their followers or friends will be able to view the post, and they may share it – this creates an exponentially growing base of people who are seeing your information and getting your business name out there. There are also sites, such as StumbleUpon, which allow customers to literally “stumble” onto your website after creating a profile which is tailored to their specific interests. This obviously creates a better chance for the people who are already interested in the genre in which your brand is located to see your website. These sites can be just as helpful as things such as Twitter and Facebook, and help to ensure that other people that share the same interests as your company see you.

This form of marketing is much more inclusive for everyone involved as well. Employees and staff can be more involved with the communication aspect of the company, while teaching the general audience about said brand or company. This allows for the building of a digital community on a grander scale. On the contrary, the consumers can tell a company directly, via Facebook wall or Twitter for example, exactly what they want and what they think. This opens the channel for a direct connection between the company and the consumer. They may tell you how much they adore a product of service, or how much they may hate it and what needs to be improved. The audience can let you know exactly what they want and why they want it – just ask a question or for opinions on a social media site, and you will get responses.

The next question normally asked when it comes to advertising on social media is if it is actually worth it to pay for advertisements on an otherwise free site. The answer is yes, you should. Leaving room in your budget for these sites allows for a whole other realm of audiences to be found. As an example in the most traditional way, a post is put on Facebook, pushed into the newsfeeds of the people who have liked the page, and only seen those same people. There is no new audience, nor is there any chance for a real increase in visits because these people have already seen your information. When someone pays the fee for a promoted post or page, this shows up in newsfeeds of people that may have not liked the page, but have similar interests of your company. With costs starting at as little as ten dollars for promoted posts on Facebook, this form of effective marketing is affordable for nearly every budget. In comparison to the cost of a traditional marketing scheme, this is a more “bang for your buck” deal, which allows the marketing of your company to be enhanced on a social platform.

Within your social media budget, search engine optimization and tools for social media must also be considered in addition to actual advertisements. SEO must be considered for your website to rank higher and receive more traffic, which promotes your business. Tools are available to make your life on these social media sites much easier as well. Sites such as Hootsuite, SocialBro, ManageFlitter, and many others offer an easier way to create, schedule, and manage content in a more streamline way. Buffer is also a good tool to consider, as it allows you to schedule and put content into queues for pushing out at a later date. Using these tools also gives you a way to look at the analytics and statistics of your visitors. These are a must for any social media marketing strategy and will help you exponentially.

Allowing for the space in your budget for social media marketing will be a strategy that will pay for itself many times over. These platforms can increase exposure and create a more human forum as a direct connection with your clientele or intended audience. If social media is something that you are already doing in your marketing strategy, considering the use of paid advertisements can greatly increase your results with minimum financial impact. To put it simply, if you aren’t advertising on social media, you are letting customers walk out the virtual door.

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WEBSITE DESIGN – WHO NEEDS IT?

Website Design services are delivered in a number of different ways and with a number of different restrictions. Over the last several years there has been a push towards more dynamic and smart websites that can deliver a lot more functionality, interaction and optimization than the old custom coded html sites.

The use of a Content Management System (CMS) is also quickly becoming popular with companies who have resources to work on their website vs. having to hire a company, which has been the trend of the past. As the market continues to evolve there continues to be many misconceptions about websites, how to get them working, and most importantly how to get them found online for the purpose of lead generation.

So to the point of the question, Who Needs Website Design?

  • Large Companies
  • Salespeople
  • Small / Medium Sized businesses
  • Local Entrepreneurs
  • Anyone with a message to deliver and a desire to make some money from that message.

So lets dig into this a little more. Website Development and Design is the process of mapping out your existing site to cover all your business needs, be found my search engines, and then engage traffic in a way that can deliver new business. A well designed site can improve conversion rates by 5% or more when considering the higher rates of traffic, etc. Most existing sites have unfortunately either cost the owner a bunch of money related to initial design work and custom coding, which was all that was available, or lost opportunities to earn search engine relevance. In both cases we are finding many businesses who have been led down a bad road with designers and graphics artists who not only didn’t provide enough calls to action or conversion functions on the site itself but also didn’t take the standard actions to get the site relevant in search engines.

In this day and age of the digital marketplace there is an absolute need to be engaged with a viable website that can help your company get found, engage with, and convert new business opportunities. Unfortunately this creative design work may mean a big investment in technology, but as more and more consumers turn to the internet for research and investigation before buying it’s important to ensure your position is in tact.

So a Website Design service is essential for all businesses who want to compete within the high volume, ultra competitive, and fast paced digital marketplace. Some lower level versions can be used out of the box and we also can help develop a solution for those companies looking to get started and want the ability to grow into system.

Power On Marketing