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Top Internet Advertising Predictions – Here Comes Bing and Facebook

June 14th, 2011 by bstoller

The Top Internet Advertising Predictions Include A Change in the Way We Search

Google is Still the King of Local Search – almost 70% off all searches done on the internet are still on Google. Google will probably remain the “gorilla” of search, but there is a major change happening – it’s already started, yet very few people even know about it.

…. Recommendations from Facebook Friends

Here’s how it is working and why you should pay attention. Facebook and Bing have partnered few months ago. Now they are changing the rules when you search to find a local business. We’re starting to see some results now that show recommendations from a person’s friends from Facebook. This model is beginning to change the way local search is being done – in fact, Google has now modified their algorithms to include social media recommendations.

If you notice in the picture below, people can now use Bing through the “Facebook Connect”. Once they do, they can see what others are recommending through the pages that they “Like”. In this illustration, Jump It Party and Play shows up under the search phrase “birthday party ideas Lafayette IN”. In this case, their actual Facebook page shows up, as well as my personal Facebook profile image, as I have personally liked this page. If any of my friends would have “liked”the page, their profile pictures would also have showed up, in effect giving me a recommendation from one of my friends.

So What Does This Mean for You?

#1 – If you don’t have a Facebook Business Page (not a personal page), GET ONE NOW!!

#2 – If you already have a Facebook Business Page, you should make sure that you have a program that encourages people to become fans, or “like” your page.

Facebook is still in its infancy stage when it comes to business. The good news is that those who take adantage of Facebook now, will be many steps ahead of their competitors who choose to ignore the power today.

Let us know if you need any assistance with setting up or reviewing your business’s Facebook Business Page – the future of your advertising budgets may depend on it!

Categories : Marketing Strategies
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How to Use Marketing to Grow Your Business in Any Economy

June 4th, 2011 by bstoller

Marketing your small business is very confusing to most small business owners and advertising managers. How much should I spend? WHERE should I spend it? Should I not spend anything and only work on social media? So many questions about the changing face of marketing that many businesses have forgotten that there is more to marketing than simply spending money to attract traffic.

The essence of effective marketing is the ability to attract the customers attention and once having attracted it, to deliver an experience that will assure you that they will come back to repeat it again and again.

From my experience with many business owners, there are many who have simply forgotten this rule. Many believe that simply getting people to their doors is all it takes. The truth of the matter is that you have competitors who DO understand this rule and are probably going to end up with some of your customers at some point.

There's more to marketing than spending money

Unless….

You go back to the principle and and brush up on your business strategy for keeping your most profitable customers and having a process to handle incoming new customers (or potential customers) from your advertising programs.

Too many times I have seen where businesses have the belief that more customers will equal more profit. Some of that time, it is correct. However, if you continually gain more customers only to have them visit you once and never come back, you are probably going backwards.

Your marketing dollars should factor in not just the advertising expense, but also factor in the system to handle new customers.

If you have a hair salon, for example, a first time visitor is probably going to have a lot of questions. Some questions they will ask, but many will be simply questions like, “Do I feel comfortable here?… Are these people going to be able to listen to my hair care wants and desires?” …. and so on.

As a business owner, it is up to you to climb into the mind of your customers and figure out what questions they are going to have during their first visit to your store. You must take care of those questions and concerns or your first time visitor will not be a second time visitor!

Once you have determine the questions and concerns you believe your first time visitors may have, then your second step is to design a system for your business to handle them. Even if your business is typically not a high repeat business, let’s say a real estate business, by taking the time to understand what your customer wants and needs you will have another form of repeat business – referrals.

I hope this makes sense – marketing is not just getting people to your door. It’s the entire system that your business uses to process potential customers without alienating your most profitable ones you already have.

If reading this stimulates a little thought or questions, please visit our Facebook Page, become a fan, and post any questions or ideas you may have that could help others.

Categories : Marketing Strategies
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Internet Advertising is On the Rise

April 4th, 2011 by bstoller

I ran across this article today. It gives a good indication of what is going on in the advertising world today.

Despite the recent economic downturn and reduced marketing budgets, online ad spending continues to rise. According to Jason Gamwell, CEO of Morning Falls, a Denver-based Internet marketing firm, statistics show online ad spends were up 13.9 percent to a record $25.8 billion in 2010. Gamwell expects this trend to continue for many reasons, from the expanding use of social networks to the shrinking numbers in newspaper ad spending and readership – to the lower cost and higher tracking advantages of the Internet itself.

2010 was the first year in history U.S. marketers spent more money to advertise online than in newspapers, and the first year online readership exceeded print readership. Overall, newspaper spending, including advertising in print and online editions, fell to $25.7 billion, a decline of 6.6 percent, making Internet advertising second only to TV in media spends. Source: eMarketer.com

The reason for this continued growth says Gamwell is that Internet marketing is relatively inexpensive when calculated using the standard formula of the ratio of the cost against the reach of the target audience. When advertising online, companies can reach a wider and more diverse audience for a fraction of the cost of traditional advertising.

The Internet also enables consumers to research and buy at their own convenience. Studies show over 90 percent of customers go online to check out potential purchases, competitive pricing, consumer ratings, and other factors before they buy. As a result, businesses have the advantage of appealing to consumers in a medium that can bring results almost instantly.

Online advertising also offers greater pricing flexibility as firms can run campaigns based on a variety of payment options such as pay per impression and pay per click; and, it provides more accountability, as marketers can measure their return on investment (ROI) quicker and easier than with other forms of advertising.

29 percent, or one in three businesses, say they plan to increase social media spending this year.

According to Gamwell, the advent of social media networks is also fueling online ad spending. In a report published by internetretailer.com, small- and medium-sized firms plan to up their online budgets this year by nearly 29 percent to $40.6 billion from $31.5 billion in 2009, primarily to leverage the rapidly growing social media phenomenon.

With over 550 million users, Facebook is now the web’s most popular site. Almost 72 percent of U.S. Internet users are now on Facebook, and over 70 percent of local businesses are marketing through this social media site – more than anywhere else online. Source: digitalbuzzblog.com.

Naturally, added Gamwell, Internet media spends are most effective when part of a mix of other mediums, including print, radio, and TV – depending upon a brand’s budget and demographics. Despite the dramatic changes brought on by the web, some things never change, such as the fact that repetition and consistency still bring the best advertising results, said Gamwell.

About Morning Falls. Based in Denver, Colorado, Morning Falls provides Internet-based media solutions to businesses worldwide. Established in 2004, the company has generated hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue for its clients around the globe. Morning Falls offers advertisers a single point of access to thousands of premium advertising channels online and billions of Internet users worldwide via its robust display advertising network, cutting-edge ad serving technology, and state-of-the-art analytics. The firm also provides lead generation, search engine optimization (SEO), and social media marketing as well as marketing and advertising support. More information on Morning Falls can be found online at http://www.morningfalls.com.

Categories : industry statistics
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Internet Advertising for Small Business is Changing

December 22nd, 2010 by bstoller

Internet advertising for small business is changing rapidly. How can a business owner, who is already busy trying to keep customers happy, be expected to keep up with the trends??

He or she can’t!

Of course, checking in with the Discovering Profits website is a good start! (Sorry, had to get that plug in there!) There are a few trends going on out there that every business owner needs to be aware of.

1. Local Search Marketing Taking the Place of Traditional Advertising

Local Search Lets You Dominate Your Niche

I think most people are starting to catch on to this, but most businesses are still very slow to catch on. Those that are are reaping low cost benefits. This form requires someone who knows the ins/outs of this, but once you are set up with Google Places and a campaign for articles, press releases, videos, etc., this program is like having a billboard on the internet. Once you build it, it continues to get traffic for a very long time with little maintenance involved (once the campaign is performed.

2. Mobile Marketing

This form of advertising is extremely new but is growing VERY fast. There are many forms, but this basically involves sending texts to your customers to announce certain activities or specials that your business has to offer. This is great for any business that has a high volume of traffic (or would LIKE to have a high volume of traffic!). Texts have been proven to have a 90-95% open rate within 15 minutes! Compared to e-mail that has an average open rate of around 17-22% and can take days to get this rate.

3. Social Media

Click to see Facebook Business Page

Social media is still very much misunderstood by most business owners. Every hears that they should participate, but very few actually understand what it takes to bring customers in the door. Here’s a hint – DON’T ASK FOR AN ORDER! Social media is to build relationships. If you have a new friend on your Facebook business page, that friend isn’t going to buy anything from you until he/she gets to know you a little bit and can feel that he/she can trust you. Usually it takes from 5-7 points of contact before you should ever approach them about a sale. There are many right ways and wrong ways to do Facebook, Twitter, and other social media avenues.

The Important Thing To Remember is to Have a Plan

While advertising and marketing of small business is changing rapidly, don’t fall in the trap of doing something just because you hear it is the thing to do. EVERY marketing or advertising dollar needs to be part of a plan based upon your business’s strengths, weaknesses, and the business’s competitive advantage. While we have worked with many businesses, we’ve found that most do not have this plan and most are purely reactive. Call Discovering Profits to set up a marketing consultation to get you thinking – it’s free and it could change your business forever!

Categories : marketing fundamentals
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Internet Marketing Strategies for Small Business

June 30th, 2010 by bstoller

Business owners often struggle with internet marketing for small business. They especially struggle when trying to reach an audience that distrusts marketing messages. Even tougher when they dislike talking to salespeople.

The solution: Give the prospects the resources and education they need so they can make their own decision. This will allow the prospects to choose when they want to talk to you.

It all starts with knowing the customer – the customer profile

If the business owner or marketing manager must segment the different customers in his/her organization. Each customer group needs to be addressed differently. Some customers are purely impulsive, and will buy when they are presented an idea or product right away. If they don’t buy now, they may never buy. Other customers, as is the case for this example, don’t want to talk to anyone, and they need information before they make their decision to buy.

For this article, we’re going to focus on the difficult prospect who is resistant to marketing. Here are the steps that we should consider for the marketing plan:

1) Design website to mirror the customer profile

You need to find out what makes this customer “tick”. What do they like? Dislike? Do they like “boring information” or do they prefer to be entertained with humorous video?? The website needs to fit the customers, not the business owner.

2) Create web content for different stages of the buying process

Informational Stage – this stage represents the earliest stage of the buying process. People want to research about your product or service, so they need informative articles, blog posts, etc. If they don’t get the information from you, they will continue to search elsewhere until they find someone who DOES give them the information.

The company that controls the information stage is the one who gains the initial loyalty of the prospect and will usually end up with the sale when the customer is ready to buy.

Free Items

This stage progresses the “researcher” to take some form of action that doesn’t involve the prospect to spend any money. Each business is different, of course, but this could merely be some free trial, an e-book on the various types of services that the person can read about right away, a trial membership, etc. There must be a perceived value for this free item. The value needs to be placed on the high side of reality. $500 value for a movie ticket, for example, is outrageous and will counter act the benefit you wish to recieve. A $50 value for a complimentary dinner is more in line. I think you get the idea. Another idea could be to offer a “free” membership into your companies “preferred readers’ program that is limited and has a value of $50 monthly. You could simply give them a password to have access to articles and your newsletter that you would probably have given to them anyways.

Consideration Stage

Once you have the prospects trust and loyalty, you can offer them a free trial for your product or service. Price quotes are also an area where prospects can request from an online form.

3) Drive Traffic to your site through multiple channels

In order to maximize your leads, you want to make sure you have more than one avenue to driver your traffic. If you only utlize one website and hope to have people “find you”, you are only kidding yourself. The saying “If you build it they will come”, does not apply to marketing on the internet. Multiple blogs, press releases, etc. must be done if you are to be successful.

Categories : Marketing Strategies
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Online Advertising Growth Rate – At Least 20% a Year

June 13th, 2010 by bstoller

According to The Kelsey Group, they predict that advertisers will spend $147 billion by 2012. That’s worldwide advertising and it’s part of their report, “The Kelsey Group’s Annual Forecast (2007-2012): Outlook for Directional and Interactive Advertising.”

The Kelsey Group states that in 2007 the market hit 45 billion, which represents a growth rate of 23.4 percent.

“Interactive advertising, which comprises search (including local search), display advertising, classifieds and other interactive ad products, grew its share of global advertising revenues from 6.1 percent in 2006 to 7.4 percent in 2007. By 2012 Kelsey Group analysts expect the interactive share of global ad spending will reach 21 percent.”

Just focusing on the US, the group predicts that for the years 2007 to 2012, in the United States interactive advertising revenues will grow from $22.5 billion to $62.4 billion (22.6 percent CAGR).