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Is Your Sales Language Awesome?

By on August 27, 2020 in Content Creation, Facebook, Sales Funnels, Social Media Marketing

Selling is a strategy that does not always come naturally to business owners when they are first getting started. It is the equivalent of the awkward first few years of dating and learning about your love language. In the book, The 5 Love Languages the author talks about how to better understand what your partner needs and how they communicate and express themselves, by understanding their language we are better able to build a strong relationship. The same goes for sales.

The Death Of The Agent

This week I had the wonderful experience of dealing with insurance agents, both car and pet. In almost every single interaction, all I could think was how long will it take these businesses to die? The way they do business is time-consuming and outdated. They have not evolved with tech. To get a car insurance quote takes me an hour on the phone. I send this quote to my current car insurance company, asking if they can match it, giving them the opportunity to keep the business. The agent insists on a phone call. To be clear, I hate phone calls and idol chit chat with agents. This process is a time-consuming interruption to my workday.

I should not need to make a 20-minute phone call to make one small change to my insurance. As someone who streamlines and automates corporations, I find these processes the equivalent of using slow wifi to stream a video.

Next, I needed to update my pet insurance. I have a service dog that travels with me for work to ensure my safety at all times. To be honest the only reason I have or need a car is that Bella loves car rides. This exercise seemed to be easier but it was all a facade, the fine print is hidden with the hopes that you just click on a plan and purchase without actually looking at the details.

I ended up choosing Pumpkin Pet insurance, they seem to go a bit outside the box from the traditional insurance companies, and I like companies that break the mold. Most importantly the information was easy to find, it was easy to sign up without chatting with anyone and when  I did need to make a change the email was sorted quickly. Enabling me to carry on my day with little interruption to my workflow.

The point of the story is that when it comes to car insurance I am not being sold in a way that I want to be sold to, but the pet insurance company has innovated the sales process to speak my sales language. People love to buy things, but they do not love to be sold to. This is why your sales language matters.

What Is Your Sales Language?

One of the most important questions we ask companies when we start working with them is who their audience is, which is of course no big surprise. We spend quite a bit of time going in-depth on what they do on the weekends, who is in their family, and why they want to buy something. What most companies do not do, is ask what language does your demographic of avatar speak?

A 20-year-old guy is less likely to respond to a phone call then a 57 year old one, conversely signing up entirely using tech may seem daunting for a different generation. Your sales page needs to go beyond your brand and pretty pictures, you need to ask yourself, Are you selling to your customers the way they want to be sold to? It is the single most important question we ask when we start working on an AWESOME new campaign, and it is the question you need to be asking yourself today to make your business AWESOME!

10 AWESOME Small Business Marketing Ideas

By on August 19, 2020 in Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Social Media Marketing, Time Management

Marketing Ideas You Can Do In 15 Minutes

Have you ever had those brief moments in your day where you have like 15 minutes and you’re not sure what to do to help you grow your business?

You know those moments where you have just enough time to do one more small task before you leave to pick up your kids or get on that call with your client. You sit there thinking about what to do and then your hand clicks the mouse into your favorite social site.

And then you say to yourself, “Hey, it’s just 15 minutes. I can take a few minutes to enjoy a little social break.”

Or maybe you spend your day moving from one project to the next and just feeling stressed. And you’re thinking, “Did you just say take a social break? I’m still trying to figure out how I’m going to get that Facebook fan page to grow or how I’m going to increase my followers on Pinterest.”

So whether you need ideas to grow your social presence or need a list of suggestions to use in those brief moments of time, I pulled together a list of things that you can do during those quick moments of the day to help you to keep growing your business.

10 AWESOME Small Business Marketing Ideas

Here’s my suggested list of action items you can do in 15 minutes to grow your social presence:

1. Make a list of what social sites are bringing you the most traffic:

To make this list, log into your Google Analytics and click on the links to follow this sequence: Acquisitions – All Traffic – Referrals

You’ll see a list showing which social site is generating the most referral traffic to your website. Each site is linked to a breakdown of the actual posts people clicked on to reach your site.

For example, if my top referral source is Pinterest. When I’m in this section, I click on the Pinterest link and it takes me to a breakout of the top pins/images that brought people to my site. To help me better understand what people are interested in, I write out my top 10 pins and the number of traffic clicks from those images to my list of my top social sites.

I can also track my traffic from Twitter, my newsletter and all the places where I do guest blog posts but not Facebook. Right now, Facebook is the only program that won’t give me more information other than the number of people who came to my site.

2. Check your top posts on your Facebook business page:

To access this information, go to your business page. Look for the tab on the top of your fan page that says Insights and click on that button.

Then start tracking the activity from your Facebook posts. I used a word document but you can set up a spread sheet or just write it out on a piece of paper.

After you’ve logged into your Facebook business page Insights, review your posts and answer the following questions:

  • What were your top 5 posts for the week?
  • What time of day were they posted?
  • What day of the week were they posted?
  • What was the topic or message of these posts?
  • Did you add a video, photo or ask a question?

The more you check your Insights, the more you’ll start to see patterns emerge. You’ll start to see what type of content speaks more to your fans and what posts create more engagement with your potential customers.

3. Check what’s going on with your Twitter account:

To see what’s happening with your Twitter account, click into Twitter and click the link to take you to your Notifications section. This is the place where you’ll be able to view your recent activity.

When I log into my Notifications, I usually do these steps:

  • Did someone new follow you? Click over to their profile and decided if you want to follow them back. Look through their tweets and retweet a post of theirs or comment on one of their tweets.
  • Did someone share your blog post or promote your products? Hit the reply button under their post and thank them for sharing your stuff. I usually add in a personal note to show that I’m not automating these thank you messages.

4.  Find new people to follow in Pinterest:

One of the best ways to help you grow your Pinterest account is to find new people who are posting new content for you to repin on Pinterest. I usually run a search for new people and boards at least once a week.

  • Pinterest’s search feature is so easy to use and it’ll help you look for new people, boards, and pins. Just type in the words you’d use to run a search on Google.
  • This search is a huge help to look for more content to add to a board that you just started or want to grow. You’ll be able to find people who have already done the search work and just re-pin several of their pins. And depending on their content, go ahead and follow them or just their board.

5. Update your LinkedIn profile:

Sometimes we get so busy that we forget to add what we’re working on to our LinkedIn profile. I know this one well – it happens to me all the time!

Your LinkedIn profile is super important because if someone runs a Google search of your name, your LinkedIn profile will come up as an option. This may be one of the first places where a potential customer or partner will first learn about you so you want to make sure that your information is up to date.

To update your information, log into your LinkedIn profile, go to the Edit Profile section (you’ll see the edit pencil next to all the sections) and ask yourself these questions:

  • Did you recently add in a new product or service? You can add that to your profile under the Project section.
  • Did you write a guest post on another blog? Add in the link in the Publications section.
  • Have your services changed? Make sure you update that in your Summary section as well as in the Experience section.

6. Find new people on Instagram to follow:

Doing a search for people who do the same work as you do is a great way to see how others in your industry are using Instagram. Run a search for your company’s keywords in the search feature { the search looks like a magnifying glass } and see who comes up.

When I first started using Instagram for my business, I ran a search and found a ton of people to follow when I searched for social media and small business. I also found that when I followed people who were like me, several of them followed me back.

Also, make some notes about what hashtags they’re using! I found several of my strongest hashtags from checking out what others who were doing the same type of work as me were using.

7. Check your numbers in your social sites and set goals for each one for the month:

I usually do this at the end of every month so I can track what’s growing and what site needs a little help. And then I add in a goal number for the next month.

8. Do a mini-brainstorm social session:

Is there one social site that you’ve been meaning to give a little attention to help you grow your followers? Try doing a little brainstorm session.

Start by looking at the top content on that site and make notes about what’s connecting with your fans. Now list 5 ideas that you could do to help you create or find more of the type of content your fans want to see more of.

And since you’re keeping this to 15 minutes, there’s no time to judge your ideas, just keep writing down everything that comes to your mind.

9. Read and comment on one of your favorite blogs:

Take the whole 15 minutes to really read the article { not just scan it } and think about your comment. What could you say in your comment to really add to the conversation?

If you can’t add to the conversation, move on to the next blog post or another blogger’s site. It’s OK if it was something that was posted a couple of weeks or a month ago. The point is to spend some time crafting your comment so that you can contribute the conversation and maybe even start a connection with your favorite blogger.

10. Remember you are AWESOME!

Take a moment to think about how far you’ve come, all the cool things you’ve done, and make a quick to-do list of what you want to work on next.

5  AWESOME Habits For Social Media Success

By on August 11, 2020 in Algorithm, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube

Once you AWESOME content on your social media with the help of the Ultimate Content Calendar, the next step is to develop the habits that will ensure that your social media becomes a success.

Today we are going to take a deep dive into what the experts do with their social media that makes them AWESOME or in other words, successful. These 5 AWESOME habits are tools you can immediately implement to get results on your social media.

LISTEN TO YOUR AUDIENCE.

Social media experts know that, without their audience, they have nothing. They understand the importance of listening to what their customers want. If they just sat back and spit out whatever content they felt like with no regard to their audience, they would be missing a ton of potential.

Social media experts pay attention to what their consumers are saying and how they’re saying it. Then they take that information and use it to create more content. They take note of what works and what doesn’t, what gets engagement, and what gets ignored. They play off of what their audience likes and what they don’t.

UTILIZE THE DIFFERENT SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS IN DIFFERENT WAYS.

Every social media platform is different, and social media marketers take advantage of that. Each platform caters to different demographics. Depending on the industry of their business, marketers choose to focus on the few platforms that will benefit them the most, instead of spreading themselves too thin by trying to tackle all of them.

Social media marketers also pay attention to what kind of information does that best, at what time. Each platform has certain types of content that outshine the rest and certain posting times that usually get more engagement.

For example, videos do really well on Twitter and Facebook, but not so well on Pinterest.

Pinterest seems to perform better in the evening, and Facebook tends to get more engagement during the day. Paying attention to these differences can make a world of a difference in your marketing strategy.

SET CLEAR, ATTAINABLE GOALS.

In order for social media experts to meet a goal…they have to have one. The more specific the better, that way they can easily tell if what they were doing is working or not. 

For example, if you want to increase your Facebook page likes, you should have a specific number or percentage in mind. Why? Because if you look at your page and you have 250 likes and you want to “increase them,” then technically getting 1 “like” would make you meet your goal. Would you be happy with a +1 increase? Probably not.

When you get specific about your goals, it gives you a clear visualization of what matters. By saying “I want to increase my Facebook likes by 50 because it will increase my exposure with potential clients,” you’re giving yourself a very clear objective. Now that you know what you want and why all you need is the how. Understanding your goals can help you plan out a strategy that will benefit your business in the most powerful way.

Also, don’t set goals that are too far out of your reach. Start your goals small. Small improvements can add up to big successes, without the stress and discouragement.

TRACK & ANALYZE THE IMPORTANT DATA.

In order to get insights from their social media efforts, experts track and analyze a lot of information. Which information do they look at directly? Well, that depends on the goal they have. (See why #3 is so important?!)

They break down their goals and pay attention to the data that affects them. If something isn’t working, they adjust it. Tracking and analyzing information helps them to compare numbers…which ultimately helps them decide if their efforts are working or not.

If you’re just tossing content out there to your audience and you’re not measuring it’s effectiveness, how are you going to make it better? You would have nothing to compare it to. It’s like going into a war zone…..blind-folded and just hoping for the best.

ENGAGE AND CONNECT WITH THE CUSTOMERS.

Okay, so we know that successful social media experts listen to their audience (that was #1), but what they also do is connect with them. That’s the whole point of social media, right? To be social. 

Social media marketers try to build meaningful relationships with their customers because, without their customers, there’s no business. They share great content with them, comment on their thoughts and opinions, and ultimately let them know that, as a customer, they’re important.

Connecting with your audience and engaging with them, whether it’s from posting tips/tricks, commenting or conversations builds trust. They start to see a personality behind the business, which makes your business more authentic and personable and ultimately leads to more trust & more sales.

When it comes to social media marketing, there’s plenty of ways to Be AWESOME. If you want to get the most from your efforts, you have to develop the best habits that surround them. Social media is forever changing, but understanding the habits of social media experts can help your efforts be powerful and effective, regardless of the algorithm.

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