It’s 2013 and a great time to take stock of last year’s business success and failures, arrange your books and make smart digital marketing new year resolution in your career and business for 2013.
Now how do you go about generating new leads, prospects and customers on the internet, social media and via mobile? I hope you will learn how in the 5 steps below:
1. Redesign Your Website: You need to give your online office a fresh, cleaner and simpler look without flashy animations, rainbow colours, whistles and bells that distract consumers from your main offering and takes them off your website. Get a responsive/mobile-friendly website that is easy to manage on your own. WordPress content management software is a great choice.
2. Improve Your SEO and Ranking:
SEO + Your Business = Daily Traffic, New Leads & Sales. 2013 is a great year to get your website and blog posts ranking high on Google with relevant keywords that are related to your business. I use Google Keyword Tool to find out what people are searching for.
3. Engage Your Audience on Social Media: Your potential customers are hanging out on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Pinterest, Google Plus, YouTube, SlideShare and Foursquare. Furthermore, social media is a great place to get closer to your audience, be human, strike up a conversation and monitor interactions about your brand. If you want your business to generate new leads, retain and gain loyal customers, then you need to use valuable content (blog posts, images, videos, infographs, and PowerPoint presentations) to attract them. I use Nimble Social CRM to learn what my business contacts are saying or doing on Facebook, Linkedin and twitter.
4. Beat Your Competition: This is a good time to spy on your competitor’s online marketing campaign activities. Check out their website, subscribe to their email newsletter, and follow them on twitter and/or facebook. Watch their every move and improve on your marketing strategy. If they are blogging, then you must blog. If they are on twitter, you must be there too. If they own a website, get your own FAST!
5. Accept online payment:
If you are in the business of selling, you need to make it easier for your clients to make instant payments online. There are e-commerce solutions out there like interswitch webpay or voguepay.
6. Advertise online:
If you want to create more awareness for your brand online, then you need to advertise on popular sites such as facebook, google adwords, LinkedIn, bing etc. they are easy to set up and manage depending on your budget.
7. Generate More Leads:
- Are you generating leads on your website by capturing your web visitors’ information (name, email, phone no.) via web form?
- Are you using reliable email marketing software to market your leads?
- If yes, are you engaging your email lists with informative and entertaining content on a regular basis?
- Are they actually opening your emails to read them?
- Is your email personalized and mobile friendly?
- Are you segmenting your subscriber list?
You need to answer these questions if you want to succeed in converting your website visitors into customers in 2013.
8. Monitor and Measure Your Digital Marketing ROI (return on investment): Measuring your online marketing ROI is much easier compared to traditional marketing (flyers, radio, newspaper, posters, and TV ads). Therefore you need to measure the following metrics:
- Your website traffic and goal conversions.
- Email subscriptions.
- Social media engagements (likes, comments, shares).
- Sales.
Your Turn:
What other digital marketing resolutions should Nigerian marketers be working harder to improve? Drop a line in the comments box below.
