Archive for BLOGGING – Page 4

Posted by DBC Digital on
 November 20, 2013

Digital Marketing Strategy: Don’t Forget the Basics!

Everyone is familiar with the experience of going online in search of a product or other solution. In many cases, the appropriate business or shopping destination isn’t immediately obvious, causing consumers to shop around for the business and product that suits their needs.

The Internet is a big place, though, and it doesn’t award web traffic to companies based on the strength of their product. That discount Afghan rug provider you found online isn’t necessarily the industry leader in that retail category. Instead, they’re the company that’s done the best job of creating a worthwhile online destination and making that website easy to find.

Web traffic doesn’t happen by chance. It’s an asset developed through effective digital strategy and a determination to build online commerce opportunities. But for all of the high-level strategic approaches that companies employ, these gains can be nullified by simple mistakes and oversights that create consumer roadblocks. Here are some of the most common ways businesses are shooting their digital strategy in the foot.

Ignoring Your Google Business Listing

Google tries to maintain an updated directory of physical businesses, and it creates a business listing for all of these establishments. Google allows the owners of these businesses to assume control of the business listing, which can lead to better online information, faster updates and revisions, and other information that can attract consumers. It’s a free and painless task, but most businesses don’t take advantage of this opportunity — in fact, many don’t even realize they have the option. Find your business listing and follow Google’s directions to bring the page under your own ownership. Then fill out as much information as you can and make consistent updates so that consumers can rely on this listing’s information.

Failing to Address Basic Business Information

Too many websites, Facebook pages and other business profiles are so concerned with creating a great consumer experience that they overlook the basics. This is often the information that frustrates consumers the most: Days and hours of operations, locations and addresses, phone numbers, contact emails. No business wants to think that this is the case with their business, but it’s worth reviewing to make sure you haven’t overlooked this information on one or more online profiles. If you do find this information missing, a quick fix will quickly remove this hurdle from your consumer base’s path to purchase.

Impeding the Lines of Communication

Today’s consumer wants to be able to contact the companies they patronize, and they want this interaction to be available through a variety of channels. In addition to customer service lines, the ability to contact businesses via email and through social profiles is critical in delivering a strong customer experience. Failure to create these communication channels, and/or reticence in responding to consumers, could frustrate individuals and push them to consider other options. Make sure these lines of communication are readily available, and make an effort to respond as quickly as possible.

Blogging Without a Goal in Mind

Blogs are valuable digital marketing assets, but they need to be aligned with a strategy that’s been developed ahead of time. Blog content is being wasted if you aren’t integrating a keyword strategy targeted to your customer base. Without this focus on keywords, businesses can’t use their website content to attract highly relevant Web traffic.

But while the SEO qualities of a blog are important to consider, the quality of your content also matters. Blog content should be planned and scheduled weeks in advance so that you can consistently produce content that your customers will value. In doing so, you can also organize your content so that it follows a natural progression of thoughts and ideas for your consistent readers.

If you’re looking for professional guidance from a Denver inbound marketing firm, contact DBC Digital today.

Categories : BLOGGING, EMAIL CAMPAIGNS, INTERNET MARKETING
Posted by DBC Digital on
 June 27, 2013

Guest Post: Tips for Making a Great Infographic

Posted by Nicole Rende on Thu, Jun 27, 2013 @ 04:59 PM

Information Graphics, or Infographics, are graphic visual presentations of information, data, or knowledge. These are intended to explain complex information quickly and clearly. This is especially good when trying to explain an internet marketing concept that may be confusing to some.

Follow these seven steps, and you will be able to create the most informational graphics:

  1. Edit first

    1. People can sometimes become too attached to their content. They want to include everything they found in their research, but that can get extremely cluttered and make the infographic look sloppy.

One reason this clutter occurs is because people do not clean up their information before they make the infographic and it becomes crammed. It is a good idea to do the layout first and this will give you an idea of how much information you need to throw out.

  1. Break your content into sections

    1. Breaking down your content into three or five sections makes your graphic easier to follow. Making an outline with each section title will help you organize your thoughts better. Another good way to break down your content is into a mind map. There are many websites that will help you with these mind maps.

  2. Organize your layout

    1. Use grid lines to layout your design. This will allow you to carve into the space. Do not have too many lines, like graph paper, but not less than four. A good medium is about seven lines. You want to leave enough space to make your design.

  3. Keep it simple

    1. Keep the layout simple and logical. The goal of the design should be to lead the reader easily through the information. You want to lead their eye through the design. Being too creative can often lead to clutter and be fatal for easy navigation. The easiest way of navigation is to start your graphic at the top left hand side and end at the bottom right.
    2. Make the topic’s main point the largest element
      1. For most marketing tactics, you want to grab someone’s attention and give them a quick idea for what the content is about. In this case, you want to make sure the infographic’s idea is the biggest part of the graphic. Make sure you have enough content in this section to justify its size.

  4. Keep type simple

    1. Using fonts like Comic Sans and Papyrus can cause laughter and reduce the level of your graphic’s credibility. It is hard to choose the correct font, so when you are in need of some help, just use Helvetica or Arial and use an array of sizes and weights. The headline is always going to be the largest because that is where you want people’s eyes to go first. Keep the text black and leave color for the graphics.

  5. Use color for good reason

    1. Do not use every single color in your infographic. Make sure to keep the color minimal by following a few simple steps. Make sure you color the less important parts a muted color and use one or two bright colors to accentuate where you want the readers eyes to go. Consider your company’s brand when choosing a color scheme. Lastly, you want all your palette colors to blend well together. You can find color families by searching the web for similar search terms.

When you are preparing to explain something rather confusing to others, making an infographic can be the best way to relay that information. Just make sure that you follow the above seven steps and you will have an amazing infographic.
Written by Nicole Rende from Ethical SEO Consulting

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Greg Sherwood is CEO of DBC Digital, a marketing agency based in Denver, Colorado.  With over 30 years of marketing experience with traditional and inbound (internet) marketing, Greg helps mid-sized businesses get a better return on their marketing dollars.  

You can reach Greg at (303) 357-5757 or at dbc@dbcdigital.com

Categories : BLOGGING, INTERNET MARKETING, MESSAGING AND DESIGN, PRINTING SERVICES
Posted by DBC Digital on
 February 23, 2013

Blogging: 5 Insider Tips for Growing Your Blog Audience

 

Blogging: 5 Insider Tips for Growing Your Blog Audience

It can be frustrating when you spend a great deal of time writing that terrific blog post filled with your targeted keywords for Denver-area readers, but find that your reader base is still smaller than your dog’s personal Twitter following.

Here are 5 tips you can use to drive traffic to your blog, and get the right audience to become readers:

1) Link your social media profiles to your blog

This is the easiest one.  When you’ve posted your content on your blog, be sure to link that blog post across all your social media profiles. Your blog content should be posted on LinkedIn, your Facebook business page and Twitter.

By posting your blog on these sites, your friends and followers will see it, and if they like it, they will share your content with the people in their network. This increases your “reach” to a much larger audience.

In addition to each individual post, make sure that your blog link is clearly visible within your profile information, so readers can easily get to your blog.

2) Submit your article to the major article directories

After you have written a compelling article that provides solutions to your target audience’s needs, submit your article to one of the major article directories such as “Ezine Articles,” “Go Articles,” and “Articles Base.” Check their submission standards to be sure you meet their criteria (minimum/maximum word count, etc.).

Remember to add your website address or blog link at the bottom of your articles.  This tactic will help to redirect people to your site to find out more about you. You should also “tag” your articles with the appropriate keywords so that your articles show up in the search results when people are looking for your type of information.

3) Submit your blog post to social bookmarking sites

Social bookmarking sites are great places to post relevant content within your niche. It’s a way for Internet users to organize, store, share and search for “bookmarks” of various resources that can be found online. If your blog covers a particular topic that your niche audience finds valuable, you can share your blog on these social bookmarking sites so that other people can find it.

Popular social bookmarking sites include Delicious, Stumbleupon, Digg, and reddit. Again, be sure to tag your blog post with the appropriate keywords.

Since these social bookmarking sites have a high volume of traffic, they can also help boost your site’s search engine rankings, further increasing the chances of your blog being found online.

4) Comment on other people’s blogs

Check out other bloggers in your niche, and read their posts. Pay especially close attention to the blogs that have a high volume of traffic, along with those posts that are recording a high number of comments. After reading the blog article, post your own helpful comments and include a link back to your blog. Be sure your comments contain valuable thoughts and insights and further the discussion. Otherwise, other readers will view it as spam, and the blog owner may remove your comment and defeat your goal.  When other people see that you’re providing valuable insights, they will be check out your own blog through the link you included.

5) Guest post on popular blogs

Research your niche and find those blogs that have a high volume of traffic. You can find these blogs by searching on popular keywords in your niche, and checking out the blogs that rank high on Google searches.

Before asking a blogger if you can write a post for their blog, offer to post some of their material on your own blog. Focus on building a strong relationship with these bloggers and show them how your blog can provide added value and reach to their audience. Once you do this, you can ask them to write a guest-post on their blog, and (of course) include a link back to your own blog.

And above all, maintain consistency in your blogging.  There are millions of abandoned blogs on the web because someone gave up too early.  Don’t be one of them!

Do you have other suggestions or ideas that can help our readers?  Please post your thoughts below and forward this post to anyone you think can benefit from it.

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Categories : BLOGGING, SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING
Posted by DBC Digital on
 November 13, 2012

Keywords Strategy: 5 Common Mistakes that Kill Leads and Sales

As we like to say around here:  “They don’t call them keywords for nothing.” (Actually, we really don’t say that a lot. But we probably should.)

Keywords are key to Internet inbound marketing.  As a matter of fact, your keyword strategy can make the difference between a successful campaign and one that falls short of everyone’s goals.

Avoiding the most common mistakes is critical to an effective keyword strategy.  Here at DBC Digital, we talk a lot about how important it is to get keywords right, especially for inbound marketing.

 

So, let’s go over some of the don’ts:

1. Don’t neglect research

How are people searching for you?  What terms are they using?  You may know your business, and you may have a good idea of which terms you would use to describe your products or services.  But that doesn’t mean the words you would use are the same words your prospects are using to search for you.

Industry jargon, specific brand names and other keywords that you are familiar with may not be the ones potential customers are using—at least not yet.  It’s ok to use these terms, just don’t place all your bets on them.

Instead, get inside your audience’s heads to come up with the search terms that they actually use.  Use sales calls and social media surveys to pick their brains about how they’re finding you.  A great tool to use in researching keywords is  Google’s Keywords Tool.

 

2. Don’t forget the long tail

Long tail keywords capture the buyers who know what they’re looking for and are closer to making purchasing decisions.  For example, someone searching for “marketing service” is probably at the beginning stage of their search, whereas someone searching for “Internet inbound marketing service Denver” knows exactly what they’re looking for.

Your keyword list should be a mix of short- and long tail keywords, to capture all buyers at all stages of the sales funnel.

 

3. Don’t fail to check for competitiveness

Research from Optify reveals that sites listed in the first position on page one for their keywords receive 3 times as many click-throughs as those in the number two position, and four times as many click-throughs as those in the number three position.

If you don’t analyze your keywords for competitiveness, you won’t know which ones will vault you to the top of the rankings.  How about the terms are your competitors are targeting?  If these keywords are not on your list you’re missing out on the potential to rank for them—and guess who your market is going to find instead of you?

 

4. Don’t avoid local search terms

Local search is big.  In fact, according to Google, almost 75% of online activity online is related to local content.  If you don’t have local long tail search terms in your list, you are missing out on potentially huge markets.  Do you sell goods from a bricks-and-mortar storefront?  Do you have a network of local distributors for your products and services?  Add geographical areas to your keywords to capture these local markets.

This is known as “geo-targeting”, and it is an effective technique for getting more out of your keywords.  Think “Denver Colorado social media marketing service” (Yep.  One of our long-tail key words!)

 

5. Don’t fail to monitor

When it comes to your keywords, there’s no such thing as “set and forget”.  Your lists need to be maintained constantly.  This involves checking for performance on a regular basis, to determine which terms are effective and which are not. Are the keywords for which you’re ranking actually helping drive traffic, leads and sales?

If not, kick them to the curb!

 

 

 

 

 

Categories : BLOGGING
Posted by DBC Digital on
 June 27, 2012

Inbound Marketing: SEO and Your Business Blog

 

Our clients at DBC Digital in Denver occasionally ask us what they can do to attract more people to their business blogs. First, we congratulate them for understanding the importance of business blogging as part of their inbound marketing strategy.

We usually discover that problems occur in two primary areas. Their blogs tend to be either too SEO-heavy or else they’re devoid of any SEO cognizance whatsoever. Let’s take a look at these issues after first defining what SEO means to the business blogger.

SEO

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. Its purpose is to increase your blog’s visibility to the various search engines (Google, Yahoo!, Bing, etc.). In its simplest form, the basis of SEO is through your choice of keywords. Those are identifiers which establish your blog as a possible solution to someone’s search. There are 3 basic forms of keyword structure:

1. Primary keyword: Usually, this is only one word that broadly conveys the area of interest being covered in a blog. In this article for example, SEO would be a good choice as a primary keyword.

2. Secondary keywords: These are two or three words that are more specific to the topic being covered. Someone searching for SEO might find thousands of articles about the subject. In our article, we might want to use “SEO business blog” as a way to narrow the search, to make this blog more relevant to the searcher’s question.

3. Long Tail Keywords: These are longer descriptions which are not so commonly used in a typical search. However, when they are, it’s a gold mine. That means the searcher is looking for exactly what you’re offering. Think you can take it from there? In the example again of this article, we might use something like “in Denver attract more people to business blog.”

All of these are vital to the success of your business blog’s reach. However, some bloggers become obsessed with them. They forget the fact that they are trying to generate leads from potential customers. What they remember is that the optimization of their websites through keywords will rank them higher in a search engine. The people factor is neglected. They may as well be writing only for the “bots” that comb the Internet seeking keywords.

Remember, if your blog isn’t eminently readable and relatable to a prospect, they’re going to be turned off quickly.

 

Don’t Obsess

On the other hand, sometimes a blogger can be so enthusiastic about his business that the essential SEO strategy is neglected. Unless you have absolutely no business competition, you can be assured that there are others practicing the sound inbound marketing technique of Search Engine Optimization.

No matter how incredible your products and services may be, no one is really going to know unless you get extraordinarily lucky. When was the last time you won Powerball?

 

It’s a balancing act

Optimizing your business blog with keywords is a bit of a balancing act. It’s important to write valuable content for the people you would like to serve. It’s also critical that you research and utilize the keyword structures that will drive readers to your site. There are a variety of services that can help (including DBCdigital) if you don’t have the expertise yourself.

Here at DBC Digital, we encourage you to take an objective look at your business blog. How is it successful? Where does it require some authoritative tweaking? Please let us know in the comments section below.

 

Upcoming Workshop July 17, 2012

Do you live or work in the south Metro-Denver area? 

Register for our upcoming live workshop on how to improve your marketing “mojo” and leverage your current marketing activities with inbound marketing’s advantages.

 

 

Categories : BLOGGING, SEO
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