Tag Archives: social media marketing

Using Social Proof to Get More Leads

Using Social Proof to Get More Leads There are many strategies for lead generation with digital marketing: blog content extras, social media advertising, lead magnets, etc. One particular strategy that is extremely powerful to get more leads is social proof.

What is social proof?

Social proof is a psychological phenomenon where people assume the actions of others in an attempt to reflect correct behavior for a given situation.

In layman’s terms, people are more likely to buy something when they see others doing the same. Here are a few examples where you’ve probably seen social proof in action:

  • When you go out to eat on a Friday or Saturday night, it’s likely that you’ll have to wait. Most restaurants tend to have a smaller lobby so that patrons have to wait outside, making it appear that this is a popular restaurant, and therefore a good place to eat.
  • Similarly, if you go out to a nightclub, the most popular clubs always have a line out the door, regardless of whether the club is full. This makes others want to get in line to check the club out as well.
  • Several years ago, Dropbox put out the Mailbox App and required new users to sign up to be put on a waiting list. This made people want to get in on the action because an app with a waiting list must be pretty awesome.

How can you use social proof to generate leads and increase the buzz about your business?

1. Customer testimonials

The most common forms of social proof are your business reviews and customer testimonials. Use these to your advantage by adding a testimonials section to your website or create branded graphics with testimonials to share on your social media profiles.

2. Influencer marketing

Using celebrity endorsements or getting well-known bloggers and social influencers to use and endorse your product is a great form of social proof. This can be an ad or offering of a free product to share with their followers.

3. Follower/social share count

Include your social media follower count or the number of social shares on your blog posts to increase the likelihood that others will share your posts. You can use plugins on your website that show these numbers automatically. Social Warfare is a great plugin for WordPress, and it adds a count to the social share buttons.

4. Mentions in the media

Has your business been written about on influential websites, magazines, or blogs? Create a separate page for all of your media mentions. Share links to the articles about your business so potential customers can read them and decide if they want to work with you.

5. Industry certifications, accreditations, or badges

If your business has certifications or accreditations from your industry, you should share these on your website. Some industries have required certifications, while others have badges that help your business stand out. Regardless if the certification is required or not, it’s a great idea to share your additional education, licensing and credentials with potential customers.

6. Number of customers

McDonald’s has the slogan “Billions and billions served” because it shows that they have a huge customer base. Share how many orders you’ve received, customers you’ve had, or clients you’ve worked with.

Social proof is a highly powerful method for getting new leads and new customers. Start implementing a few of these strategies to start bringing in more business.

How Engaging Your Fans on Social Media Helps Grow Leads

How Engaging Your Fans on Social Media Helps Grow Leads

Training your sales people to go from good to fantastic is challenging. But there’s a large amount of readily available information regarding lead generation that can be helpful in growing new leads.

What if I told you that there’s a sales tool that can accomplish all this – and more? It doesn’t require a fancy company car; no expense account and business cards are useless. The cost is free (yes, free) and it works late at night, on the weekends, and even holidays. This invaluable sales tool is social media.

Some business owners view social media as a tool to use occasionally for marketing or, as an afterthought. When you engage with current customers through social media, gathering new leads is possible and has a fairly low entry cost.

Social Media Selling

With social media, you aren’t giving a sales pitch. The rules of engagement are unique, but necessary to follow if you want to effectively acquire new leads.

Make sure you focus on what your customers say. Don’t worry so much about what you want to say. During any social interaction, remember the following:

  • Avoid pushing your products or services
  • Do not focus on yourself
  • Don’t recite a sales pitch

You aren’t trying to “sell” on social media, you are just trying to communicate. What does Selling on Social Media Look Like?

You know someone is selling if the majority of their posts focus on a service or product they offer. Or, if they list all the benefits of choosing “them” over the competition. Other signs of social selling include:

  • Sharing employee details
  • Posting information or images of awards their product or service has received
  • Featuring a testimonial about the service they provided

This is all focused inward, on the company.

When someone thinks about who to follow on social media they usually (intentionally or unintentionally) think “what’s in it for me?” If you only rehash your selling points, they’re going to turn away.

Educate, Excite, Engage

These are the three “E’s” of social engagement.

You want to provide your customers with education. Tell them something they don’t know or help them make informed decisions about purchases they make down the road.

Make your posts exciting. Think local, think big, think different. Don’t post the same thing everyone else is. Let your customers know you care about more than just getting a sale.  Be a resource and a go-to value-adding source for the best information in your industry.

Once you have a prospect’s attention, you can engage them. Listen to their questions and concerns. It’s important they know you care about what they have to say and what they need.

The Bottom Line

Engaging your customers on social media means they’re waiting for what you have to say. They are also going to share this information with their friends on their social accounts. As a result, you can get new fans that will want to hear what you have to say. Social media offers powerful lead generation benefits. Use it to its full potential to increase your business sales.

5 Ways Non-profits Can Grow Their Email List

5 Ways Non-profits Can Grow Their Email List

Time and again, it’s been proven that email lists are effective marketing tools. A targeted list can get people back on your website, share news, and grow your volunteer and donor base. It’s a way to stay in touch, stay top-of-mind, and build trust. If you’re still wondering how you can start building or grow a non-profit email list, read on!

We’ve got 5 simple, actionable steps you can take to grow your email list!

1. Put a Form on Every Web Page

Make it as simple as possible for people to sign up for your email list. Place your signup forms high on your page, above the fold if possible, and put one on every page. The goal is to make them as easy as possible to find because most visitors won’t search for them.  One great way to do this is with a pop-up box or widget, using a tool like Waftio.

2. Create a Great Offer

Sometimes, just receiving your newsletter is not enough of an incentive. If your subscriptions are falling, creating a free download to entice people to sign up can make all the difference. A report, short e-book or even a free learning series can encourage people to sign up. Figure out what that incentive is and use it!

3. Encourage Sharing

If you’re like most non-profits, you already have a network of volunteers and employees. Ask them to sign up for your newsletter, and share your emails with their network. There’s a reason why networking is such a powerful marketing tool. Even if you have a small group of followers now and each of them shares your message with 10 friends, you could reach hundreds or even thousands of people!

4. Market Your Newsletter Everywhere

Don’t stop at a subscription form on your website. Mention your newsletter on your email signature and letterhead. Share it on your social channels, and advertise it at real world events. The more you talk about your newsletter, the more subscriptions you’ll get.

5. Send Great Newsletters

The final step is also the most important: make sure that once you have all those email addresses, you use them wisely. Send out regular (but not super frequent), interesting and valuable newsletters that your list will look forward too. That will increase their engagement with your cause.

Your non-profit email list can be a great asset to your organization. If you don’t already make the most of it, we hope these tips will help you. And to help your non-profit be successful with lead generation we’re offering a discount on Waftio. Use the code 50offplans and you’ll receive 50% off either plan for 3 months.

Targeting Your Ideal Client with Facebook Ads to Grow Website Leads

Targeting Your Ideal Client with Facebook Ads to Grow Website Leads

Successful inbound marketing is knowing who your customers are, and targeting them carefully so that you get maximum ROI for your digital marketing spending. Sounds great, but once you know who you want to reach, there’s still the small matter of figuring out how.

Fortunately for everyone, there are online tools designed for just this purpose, and Facebook’s laser targeted ad services are one of the very best.

What Are Facebook Ads?

Facebook ads range from those that show up in your news feed, and look like posts from friends, to those in the sidebar and elsewhere. Some look like ads, while others (usually called boosted posts) are actual posts that have been “sponsored” to show up in news feeds.

How Do Facebook Ads Work?

Facebook ads work (basically at least) like most PPC ad types. You set up the ad, set a budget, and pay per click or action. There’s a dashboard, where you can see what’s happening with your ad set, and you can have more than one at a time.

How Much Do They Cost?

Like most PPC advertising systems, there’s a cost per click or action for your Facebook ads, but since you can also set a total or per day budget, you can control your spending at a granular level.

So far, so good. Now, here’s how you really get more from Facebook ads.

Facebook Ad Targeting Tools

The thing that sets Facebook apart from most other advertising systems is the targeting options available. Because Facebook knows so much about their users, there are almost endless options you could choose, to reach only the people you want.

Choose geographical areas, languages, gender, and age. Then select from thousands of interests. Make your choices broad or very specific. Then choose when your ads will run, and where. Exclude people who already like your page, or add a tracking pixel, to track actions on your site.

In most cases, it’s best to start your Facebook ads a little broader, and then narrow it down over time, so that you spend less for clicks, views, and actions.

Creating Great Ads

The final step in Facebook ad success is the ad itself, and while targeting is very important, it’s the ad itself that will be driving traffic to your page or website.

Make sure that the image is relevant and interesting, and that you have rights to use it! Choose a clear, simple image, and remember that Facebook doesn’t like loads of overlaid text, so keep it simple. Write a great hook, and add an action button.

If you’ve chosen the right target audience, and crafted a great ad, you should soon see traffic to your site, blog or page spike.

Save

How to Measure Conversions on Your Website With Facebook Ads

How to Measure Conversions on Your Website With Facebook Ads

One of the biggest complaints marketers have about social media is that there’s no way to track conversions or ROI. Other than tracking which social network is sending more traffic to your website, there isn’t a way to track organic social media marketing.
Enter Facebook Advertising

Facebook Advertising has really changed the game when it comes to targeting your specific audience and tracking how many conversions you get from each ad. In fact, many digital marketing agencies have begun offering Facebook Ad-only services because of how their power.

Because this is still a relatively new development in the scheme of social media (Facebook Advertising has only been a prominent player for a couple of years now), not many business owners know how to use them to their advantage. Learn how to measure conversions with Facebook Ads.

1. Create a Pixel

How to Measure Conversions on Your Website With Facebook Ads

When you open Ads Manager to create a new ad, you have 3 options for your marketing objective: Awareness, Consideration, and Conversion. Click the option under conversion called “Increase conversions to your website”. Create a name for your campaign, then click continue.

The first thing you’ll be asked to do is select a conversion event. Do you want to track how many views you’re getting to a blog post from this ad? Do you want to track new email signups? New purchases or registrations? There are several conversion event options created for you to select from.

The next step is verifying your pixel. When you click Verify Pixel after selecting a conversion event, a box will open with your pixel code. You’ll install the code on your website in between the <head> and </head> codes to get the pixel working and tracking your clickthroughs.

2. Create Your Ad

Create your copy with a clear call to action and include a visually appealing image that doesn’t contain too much text. Make sure you’re targeting the correct audience, but don’t get so specific that Facebook can’t show your ad. Consider how much a new registration, purchase, or lead is worth to you before deciding on your budget.

3. Create a Valuable Landing Page

It doesn’t matter if your ad and targeting are perfect if you’re sending people to a busy or flawed landing page, they’re not going to convert. Make sure your landing page is clean and contains only the information the customer needs to know or do to take action.

You can use third-party service like Tabsite to create a landing page. When capturing leads, ask for the bare minimum–email address. Expecting people to fill out a long form full of required fields is unrealistic, and they’ll leave the page.

How to Measure Conversions on Your Website With Facebook Ads

4. Experiment with Facebook Ads

There are a number of ways to track conversions with Facebook Ads. Does your company do business over the phone more often than online?

Try call tracking from your Facebook Ads. Use a third-party service to generate a phone number that redirects to your business and is only used on Facebook.Then, check your analytics to determine how many times that specific number has been called.

Try video ads to see how those increase conversions.Leave links in the captions of your Live videos. Experiment and see which ads get you the most conversions.

Facebook Ads are changing the digital marketing game in terms of tracking ROI and increasing conversions.

6 Ways to Use Instagram Stories for Business

6 Ways to Use Instagram Stories for Business

When you think about the ways to use social media for your business, Instagram may not be the first channel that comes to mind. However, with the new feature offered by this platform called “Stories,” more and more businesses are hopping on the Instagram bandwagon.

“Stories” provides you the ability to create a string of videos and images that join together and then disappear after 24 hours. This offers you an effective and wide-reaching way to spread a message. Here are some specific ways “Stories” can be used for your brand:

Build Buzz and Create New Content Teasers

Instagram Stories offer a smart way to take your followers or customers behind the scenes and provide them a sneak peek of what’s coming in the future. Let them take a look at what is going on that is new or different in your company or take them on a journey to meet the staff in your office.

These small peeks into your business will not only help to strengthen your relationship, but also help to build buzz for new campaigns.

Create Short Term Contests and Games

If you want to provide a reward for your followers who remain engaged and active, consider creating a quick contest with Instagram Stories. These represent the ideal way to keep your followers interested and coming back for more. Since the Stories feature only lasts for 24 hours, they have to participate now or risk missing out altogether.

Increase Awareness and Traffic to Other Campaigns

Are you planning to host a Facebook Live Video spot? Do you need a few more people to register for your webinar? Instagram Stories can be used as a tool to remind your followers there is something exciting going on today, and they have one more chance to join in.

Creating an engaging image or short video can drive last minute sign-ups and help you get some additional traffic on other social media platforms.

Offer a Special Promo Code

If you are looking for even more ways to reward your active Instagram followers, consider offering them a coupon or discount code that they will only receive if they open your Instagram Story. The fact that the promotion will end in just 24 hours may be the thing that will encourage them to buy now, rather than waiting.

Flood Your Instagram with New Followers

You may wonder how you can gain new followers with Instagram Stories. With this unique feature, you’ll have Instagram exclusive content, which is an added bonus for anyone who is following you.

Announce rules for contests and let followers know this is the only way they’ll get this information. To get the information on an ongoing basis, they’ll have to follow you.

Set Engaging Content Apart from all the Rest

Instagram allows you to see what parts of your Stories generate the highest number of views. If you notice that specific content from the story is more engaging than other parts, you can post it on your Instagram feed for all of your followers to see.

This latest Instagram update has a number of fun ways and new opportunities for brands to engage customers and followers while sharing industry related information. With a bit of creativity and innovation, chances are you can think of a few new ways to promote what your business has to offer.

Save

5 Tips to make your Opt-in Form Stand Out

5 Tips to make your Opt-in Form Stand Out

To make sales, you need a customer base. A great way to build your customer base is by adding an opt-in form to your website. After all, an email campaign is more effective when your audience has already expressed interest in your business, instead of a group of strangers who don’t have an idea about your business before hearing from you.

If you want to be successful, you can’t just add an opt-in form and wait for the subscriptions to pour in. Online marketing is so competitive that everything about your website, including the opt-in form, needs to stand out. Gone are the days when you had to stick to a standard form that couldn’t be customized. Now, you can make your opt-in form exactly the way you want.

Though there’s no clear formula, the following guidelines can help you decide the direction you want your opt-in form to take:

  • Make an offer visitors can’t refuse.

    A strong call to action marked by a sense of urgency will get people to move faster. Let’s say you’re a reseller of designer labels, and you have a sale going on. You can use that sale to entice readers to subscribe. “Up to 50% off on luxury brands this summer only! Shop online now!” is more enticing than “Subscribe to our newsletter for sales announcements.”

  • Pique visitors’ interest with a bit of drama.

    Clickbait titles can be annoying, but they’re irresistible. You can apply the same principle to your opt-in form by creating a bit of a teaser. For example, you’re a financial advisor offering your services. Skip the boring text and go with something like “If money doesn’t grow on trees, where does it grow? Find out!” Most people know money grows when you invest it, but the way the question is presented like riddle makes it hard for folks not to be curious.

  • Give visitors a glimpse of what they can expect when they subscribe.

    It’s hard to convince people to sign up if they don’t see the value of subscribing, so why not offer a small taste? If you’re running a fitness site and you want people to subscribe to get access to your exercise programs and meal plans, add a tip to your opt-in form. “Half an hour of brisk walking can burn 150 calories” is a short yet useful tip. You can have the tips change each time the page is refreshed for added variety.

  • Make it entertaining for your visitors.

    Filling out an opt-in form takes time and effort, however minimal. That’s why many people don’t bother. But make it feel less like a chore and more fun. Let’s say you have a bakery and you want to market your cakes and pastries. A picture quiz like “Which dessert speaks to you?” is quick and light. After clicking, visitors can be redirected to a discount coupon they receive when they subscribe.

  • Highlight what visitors would be missing.

    Don’t just put a nondescript “No, thanks” button for people who want to opt out. Put something there that can make them think twice. If you’re running a travel agency, your opt-out button can say “I like to miss out on flight and tour discounts” or “I don’t like to save money on travel.”

Regardless of your niche, these 5 tips will help you design an opt-in form that stands out. To get the best results with the strongest impact, partner your copy with interesting visuals.

Save

Save

5 Ways to Drive More Traffic to Your Site Using Facebook

5 Ways to Drive More Traffic to Your Site Using Facebook

Facebook is a valuable marketing tool with the vast number of monthly active users well over 1.5 billion.  As well, the time spent by users per day is now averaging 40+ minutes! However, Facebook is changing and what worked before for marketers is not the same as a few months ago!

In particular, you should be concerned with Facebook’s news feed algorithm changes. Recently Facebook announced that it’s de-emphasizing the reach Facebook Business Pages will have in the News Feed. Why? Because many Pages tend to be more or less static, and they don’t offer new content. Facebook wants to keep users engaged and they see users engage with content from friends.  In particular, Facebook has identified that users like video and images, and so businesses need to be aware and make shifts!

5 Ways to Drive More Traffic to Your Site Using Facebook

1. Keep up a Steady Stream of Relevant Updates on Facebook

On your Facebook Page feed, regular updates are precisely the kind of fresh content that social media seems to favor these days. The sum effect is that Facebook will rate your Page higher in your visitors’ feeds if you’re posting good content regularly or semi-regularly. As noted, Facebook wants to see more video and Live Video.  By incorporating these type of posts in your weekly routine you can increase your reach.

2. Use Facebook’s Ad System

This may not be the news you want to know, but it’s important to hear.  You can get in front of the right people on Facebook, but to do so well you need to pay to get in front of them. Do not be put off by this.  Facebook Ads are affordable and it is a great way to reach your ideal target audience and drive traffic to key content and lead capture options on your website.

3. Pay Attention to the Elements of Your Content

Use best practices to maximize the reach of your content. For example – always use larger images, at least 1200×630. Vibrant images capture the attention more easily and fill the news feed space. People are always seemingly pressed for time, so keep your character count short while still conveying the full message – get to the meat quickly.

And when you can manage it (and when it makes sense), include a link to more content on your website to drive traffic to a specific page with a soft lead capture option.

4. Make Sure to Hyperlink to Your Best Web Pages

This is one of the most important ways to create more engagement. Facebook’s algorithm judges your social platform, in part, on how many people click through to your website. This means you have to catch their attention and make them want to read the rest.

5. Share Snippets of Your Blog Posts

This works if your blog posts are worth reading. Sharing a snippet doesn’t necessarily mean sharing text. It could be a snippet you share via a video you made. But only give them a sneak peak so that they’re compelled to finish the rest of it on your website.

It’s a fact that Facebook can be a driver of traffic if you stay current and use the latest techniques.  Once you drive traffic to your site, be sure to have a clear call-to-action to invite visitors to sign-up for your email list in exchange for some offer of value.  Your email marketing is a great next-step to nurture the fan into a customer!

Save

Using Google Ads to Drive Lead Generation

Using Google Ads to Drive Lead Generation

Using Google Ads to Drive Lead Generation

Entrepreneurs are embracing social media to promote their website content and generate sales leads.

Nevertheless, welcoming the new doesn’t have to mean saying goodbye to the old items that work. Online advertising in the form of pay-per-click (PPC) ads are still effective provided you know how to use them right.

There are a few PPC ad programs that you can choose from, but Google Ads remain a top choice for driving lead generation among the options. Google is still the go-to search engine, with around 65-70% of all monthly searches done on that search engine, so it makes sense why advertising on it is financially sound.

However, Google Ads are not necessarily cheap. To get a good ROI, here’s what you can do:

  • Design a Dedicated Landing Page for Each Campaign

    Aside from giving the impression of customized service, a dedicated landing page also cuts to the chase and gives your target market exactly what they want. Let’s say you’re a travel agency and you launched a campaign for luxury trips retirees can make. Retirees visiting your page wants to be directed right away to these trips, and not a generic homepage.  Yes, Waftio offers landing page options!

  • Think of Mobile Platforms

    According to Statista, 4.61 billion people are using mobile phones in 2016. That number will go up in the next few years, reaching 4.93 billion in 2018. This means more and more people will be surfing the internet on their handheld gadgets. If your site doesn’t display and respond well on a smaller screen, you’ll frustrate your potential customers.

  • Find Out What your Quality Score Is

    Before paying for keywords, are you sure they’re relevant to your landing page and ad? Or are there better (and maybe cheaper) keywords to use? The last thing you need is to pay for pricey keywords that won’t attract the right target market. Luckily, Google lets you check your quality score before you begin so you don’t waste money.

  • Check out Successful Competitors

    Want to know what makes their ad campaigns tick? With Spyfu, you can find out easily. Spyfu lets you search for any domain and see all their Adword keywords including ad variations. These findings will help you decide what keywords your competitor dominates, and what keywords are underrated yet profitable.

  • Use Online Chat to Engage Visitors

    Getting people’s attention is a crucial step, converting them to buyers/subscribers is another one. After a visitor clicks an ad and is on your page, give them a reason to stay by offering support. Online chat is a good option because visitors don’t have to leave the page to contact you. If they have questions, they can quickly send you a message and get the answer they need right away.

  • Don’t Hesitate to Remarket

    A lot of people don’t take action when they first visit your site. They’re there to look around. They leave, with the intention to return (but forget to do so) or with no intention at all. It’s your task to remind them about you. Don’t be afraid to use a remarketing campaign and target your site visitors. Maybe 2nd or 3rd time’s the charm.

With these tips, you’ll help your leads turn into conversions when using Google Ads. Partner it with social media remarketing ads to get better results.

Save

Save

Save

Save

Save

The Value of a CTA in Your Blog Post

The Value of a CTA in Your Blog Post

Blogging is one of the best strategies you can use to communicate and interact with your online audience. Content management systems like WordPress make it easy to create a blog. As you use the blog to market your products and services, it’s crucial to include a CTA (call to action) within each post.

Without a CTA to motivate your readers into taking the action you want them to take, your readers won’t take any action at all. It’s simply information on the web.  You need to guide your readers to take the action you desire!

Here’s what a CTA can do for your blog:

Increase Web Traffic

Websites that get lots of traffic rank higher in the major search engines. This, in turn, makes the site more readily available (higher in search results) to those doing searches. The key is to include a link to the website product/service page in your CTA. It will help channel traffic from your blog to the site, increasing the success of your online marketing campaigns and your popularity.

Example of a form embedded in a blog post:

The Value of a CTA in Your Blog Post

Get the Reader to Read More Content

One of the best ways to convert traffic is with quality content that makes the reader stay on your website. Adding a call to action of related articles to your blog posts will invite readers to read your other posts. All you have to do is link to the related topics using keywords. For instance, the keyword “online marketing” can be linked to other articles on social media marketing, website marketing or email marketing within the blog post.

A simple and clear way to do this is with a titled area “Related Content” and then have a bulleted list with keyword titles linking to other articles on your blog or website.

Increase Chances of the Post Being Shared on Social Media

There are over 2 billion active social media users in the world today. Use social media to market your products and services. Because posting links to your blog posts on social media isn’t enough, you’ll need go a step further. Include social sharing buttons on your posts as your CTA at the end of all blog posts. Readers will be able to share the posts easily by just clicking on these buttons.

Add More Readers to your Email List

Email marketing is a powerful strategy to generate sales. Use a CTA to get your website readers to subscribe to your email newsletter. One of the best ways to tempt people to subscribe is by giving discounts or access to premium content in exchange for them signing up. For example, if your blog post focuses on photography, you could offer a free eBook with tips about photography to readers who provide their email address.

Finally, the CTA should be action-oriented, brief, clear, and easy to locate. Readers should be able to see it from a distance, but it shouldn’t be so large that it diverts attention from the main content. More importantly, it should be in an easy-to-find spot on the blog.   Try different ones including sidebar CTA’s, in-page CTA’s, and pop-up CTA’s.

 

Save

Save