It’s been a good year here at Chris Strom LLC.  As a Denver Marketing company we are excited to take a look and plan out what the new year will look like for us. There are several ways in which every company can improve online. With the coming of the new year it would make sense for a business to make new years resolutions just like an individual would. However instead of pledging to lose weight or conquer a fear, companies will be looking to make that big sale or reach a new peak in online traffic.

New Followers

Most companies have a goal to gain a certain number of followers in the new year. Gaining new followers can come in many different forms. Whether it’s through a traditional marketing campaign, online marketing campaign, word of mouth, contests, giveaways, the list grows everyday. With new followers comes great responsibility, however if a company is experiencing growth or wants to experience growth having new followers will definitely play a part.

Better Content

Companies want to offer their viewers only the best content. It would make sense that a new years resolution would be to offer better content.  When we offer content to our viewing audience we do it on three levels. The first level is preplanned posting which we plan out a quarter at a time. The next level is blog posts which we try to group together and make relevant to the time of year or what is changing online. Our third level is sharing other content which we find interesting throughout the week. The key is to share content that is relevant to the companies followers that they will want to read and share with their friends as well.

Better Response Time

As a company experiences a growth in followers and begin to share relevant content they will most likely begin to seek out a faster response time to online media. The best way to ensure a rapid response is to have mobile capabilities. This includes not only mobile emails but notifications through social media applications as well. The more spread out a person is when it comes to updates through mobile devices the quicker and more efficient response time.

More Engaged Audience

Each of these new years resolutions build upon themselves to where if a company wants to have a more engaged audience in the new year they should expect to either have the previous three resolutions in place or working on them to reach this point. A more engaged audience means higher brand loyalty. Things like these help grow a company beyond its past years reach and helps them move forward to an even better year. It shows other companies and potential clients that the company knows what they are doing and are a worthy company to do business with.

We would like to wish you a happy new year. We’d love to hear what your new years resolutions are either as an individual or for your company! Simply share them in the comments below.

Bring in the New Year right!

We provide Inbound Marketing Services.  We have some success stories compiled which will hopefully convince you to use our services.  Take a read!

Download Now

You have gotten quite a few tips from us on the subject of email marketing lately.  Although email marketing is, relatively speaking, an older tool in the world of online marketing, it is certainly important!  We have talked about some email marketing tips, tools, and techniques.  Today we are going to get a little bit more creative and talk specific ideas for promotion and other uses of email marketing.  Get ready, after you have read our ideas, we hope you will be able to think of your own (and we know they will be fantastic)!

Sales & Specials

Since we are easing out of the holidays, promoting sale prices and clearance specials seems a pretty relevant idea to add to our brainstorm list.  Emails boasting outrageously low prices in their subject lines, and showcasing a whole array of discounted products once the email is actually opened are sure to attract a crowd.  Bonus points if you can segment your target market to send different emails to different segments of customers: a group of products for the soccer moms, another set for the business yuppies, and a third for the musical and artsy types.

Events

Conferences, sponsored events, fundraisers, etc…the possibilities are endless!  Again, bonus points for segmenting customers based on demographics.  More bonus points for connecting to Facebook, or another social media outlet, so that people can RSVP (which will help to complete the whole experience and ensure conversion of email readers to event participants).  Plus, after the event has been a huge success that was documented through photographs and videos, you can advertise its success via email.  Customers who were there will be pleased to see a positive review of it, and customers who were not there will vow to make it to the next event!

Input

To help further your internet marketing success, customer feedback on products and services is vital.  Email marketing asking customers to rate experiences, brand perceptions, and more is a great way to find out what you are doing well as well as what you need to improve on.  (Psst… a little incentive can be a good push to help customers fill out questionnaires or surveys, such as a coupon or website credit).

Newsletters

Quite possibly newsletters will encompass everything from events to recent blog posts, as well as plugs to articles on other websites.  Newsletters are a classic form of email marketing, and are still quite important today.  Newsletters are a medium not to be forgotten, and offer a lot of possibilities in the way of creativity to reflect your company and/or brand.

Shameless Advertising

Okay, don’t overdo it…but there is no harm in doing a little simple advertising here and again with email marketing.  Maybe it’s advertising for site memberships, social media, or a blog related to your company…whatever it is, a well-designed email can push customers in the right direction to end up where you want them to.  Sometimes, customers on your email subscription list may be minimally involved with your brand and/or business.  Simply getting these minimally involved customers more familiar and partial to your brand can inspire online conversion!

So, we hope that all helps and gives you a good starting point…what else can you come up with?

Free e-Book: Social Media for Business

You have a website, but is it getting found? Find out what you need to know about social media for business in our free e-book.

Download Now

As a Denver Marketing company we are constantly looking for ways to learn.  The holiday season presents just that.  There are many things that we can take from the consumeristic holiday season and apply to everyday business for this article we are going to look at the concept of giving.

The holiday is centered around giving.  There are several places where the concept of giving applies to businesses online.

Sharing Information

The internet is all about sharing.  That’s what we do with this blog essentially is share knowledge that we have with readers online.  With the holidays people give without expecting anything in return.  That is how companies should be at all times.  Obviously not giving away trade secrets but sharing knowledge without expecting anything in return.  A company that is willing to share information opens up the door for many possibilities.  Two great lessons to take from sharing information are:

1. Consumers can have conversations with the company.  This allows consumers to learn more and become better invested in the company and what it stands for.  This also allows for the company to gain a better feel for its market audience and how they feel about content that the company is sharing.
2. Connecting with potential clients. When a company shares information related to its field potential clients can see that the company is knowledgable in its sector.  This helps draw potential clients in to start conversation that could lead to new business.  New clients will feel secure doing business with a company that is willing to share information about how their company views and deals with things within their field.

Giveaways

As stated before, tis the season for giving.  What would be a lessons learned blog about giving without talking about giveaways?  Giveaways can have several great impacts for a company and its online presence.  Today we will look at a few lessons that companies can take from giveaways:

1. List Generation: When hosting a giveaway there has to be a way for the company to contact the winner.  This is a great way to generate an email list for a business.  This helps keep people up to date on what the company is doing and could potentially lead to a new client.
2. Social Media Buzz: Any company with social media accounts values conversation on their platforms.  Giveaways create buzz about the company not only on their site but on individuals sites as well.  This in turn leads to number three.
3. New Followers: Giveaways run correctly will most likely bring in new followers for the company.  These people will follow the company and can become valuable community members.  It’s all about how the company integrates the new followers into the community.

The Giving Continues!

RSS feeds can be confusing.  We developed a guide book that can help you understand them better.  Take this gift from us this holiday season and understand RSS feeds just a little bit better.

Download Now

Lately, we have been talking a lot about email marketing, and how to build a successful email marketing campaign into your online marketing plan.  Last week we discussed some key points on how to make sure your email marketing campaign is successful, such as making sure that your message can reach target customers.  We also talked about getting creative, and using metrics to measure the success of campaign.  Today, we would like to discuss a little bit about the integration of an email marketing campaign with the other component’s of your business’s Denver Online Marketing plan.

Gathering a target market with the help of social media, blogs, and/or website memberships

Now, as long as you are making sure to keep customer permission to receive emails in mind, it is important to remember that there are a variety of sources from which to build a customer database.  Having a customer membership option on your primary website is a great way to get customer email addresses from those who check options such as “allow us to email you offers, news, and updates” when signing up for your website.  Social media can also be used to encourage customers to sign up for an email database, with the promise of emails regarding sales, promotions, and the like.  Blogs as well can be used to encourage readers to sign up for company updates.  When obtaining customer email addresses from website membership sign-ups, social media outlets, and blogs with explicit customer permission from each source, it is certainly possible to build a customer email database quickly!  Website membership sign-ups, as well as social media research, and blog monitoring (for example, reading blog comments from various readers) can also help you to develop a better idea of your target market and what these customers want.  Once you have got a good idea of your target market’s wants and needs, you can use your Denver website design skills to sync website and email campaign details that will hopefully inspire online customer conversion, online sales, and more!

Getting personal with email marketing

Keep in mind that, once you have gathered information about customers through aforementioned means, your target market can be broken into segments.  Segments could be based on anything from demographics to behavioral characteristics to buyer history and habits.  Whatever you choose to identify your customer target segments with, it is important to keep in mind that a whole separate set of emails can be sent to each segment.  If online sales are your goal, different segments of customers could be sent emails featuring different items.  Maybe these items are grouped according to price range (based on buyer history), or maybe according to age range (based on demographic research from social media websites and your website’s online memberships).  Either way, the point is that email marketing is a great way to personalize your Denver marketing campaign.  Show your customer that you know them and care about them, and they are more likely to respond.

The entrance of the holidays allows for many different opportunities as a Denver Marketing company.  Every growing company is on the lookout for creative ways to generate leads and this week we are going to read about four ways companies can use the holiday season to generate leads.

Holiday Shopping

Most people shop during the holidays.  Even if it’s simply shopping for the essentials there are opportunities to encounter people wherever you are.  When out holiday shopping, while in line to make purchases spark up a conversation with those around you.  This is something that can be done not only at the holidays but year round.  The holidays simply allow for a larger audience to reach out to.  Sparking a conversation shows personality and helps potential customers see that your company can be related well with and would be a great company to be partnered with.

Holiday Parties

Depending on where a person is in the world, there are many parties and open houses this time of year.  Whether it’s a city holiday party or a company holiday party; these are great places to get a businesses name out to potential customers.  Obviously there is etiquette to promoting oneself at holiday parties and open houses but if a person isn’t over selling there shouldn’t be any issue.  It’s all about generating relevant conversation that helps a person see the need for the business in their life.

Friends & Family

The old adage “It’s not what you know, It’s who you know” comes true with this lead generation possibility.  As much as we might not want to admit our friends and family can at times be our best spokespeople.  Though our friends and family may not be our clients they have a wider sphere of influence than we do and can end up generating leads for us.  Once again it’s not about being pushy but simply comparing notes between each other and seeing how one can help the other.

Following up with Clients

One of the most overlooked places for business expansion is maintaining contact with previous clients.  The holidays are a great opportunity to either place a call or drop a personalized letter to connect with the past years clients.  Using the holidays helps open conversation during a businesses busy season when they may not have time to contact you and can lead to new business.  Especially if the company is offering new services, it is a great way to begin the conversation of how your company can assist any previous client in the new year.

The holidays open up the door for many lucrative opportunities for businesses.  Last week we looked at one this week we have looked at another.  We want to wish you and yours a happy holidays.  If you have any more suggestions for holiday lead generation don’t hesitate to drop them in the comments below!

Good Looks go a long way

A whole lot of lead generation doesn’t help much if there isn’t a good website behind it.  We have a guidebook for the fundamentals for websites that will get you there!

Download Now