Effective and low-cost marketing tips every marketer should consider

Many marketers have found themselves in a situation where they are spending a lot of money in advertising and marketing but end up wasting their money. According to Forbes, almost 50% of advertising is wasted. That is a lot of money, considering the fact that companies spend billions of dollars to gain customers. So how do you ensure that your marketing efforts are strategic, practical, and low-cost? Here are some tips you need to consider.

Know your market

It is imperative to have a clear understanding of your market if you are to succeed in online marketing. Before you even start spending on marketing, you need to figure out your market. That invariably entails knowing your product very well. Once you know your product and how it can help solve your clients’ needs, it will be easier to identify your target market. Once you can identify your target audience, it easy to design a winning marketing strategy without even having to hire an expensive marketing agency.

Your advertising decisions should be based on research

No one goes into the battlefield without designing a winning plan. The case is no different when it comes to marketing and advertising. It is essential to come up with a well-researched and well-thought-out marketing plan. 

The plan you come up with will help you to determine the best and most effective marketing channels to reach your audiences. 

Things like demographics, bounce rate, conversion rate, acquisition, and audience should be familiar to you. It is important to know how each marketing channel will contribute to your overall growth if you want to make a difference and reap big from your efforts.

Networking 

Did you know that networking is one of the most effective marketing tools you can use without the need to break the bank? Join a local business community and be an active participant. If they like your brand, they will tell their friends, colleagues, and relatives without even your knowledge. 

People are your greatest assets. Do not underrate what they can do for you.

Content marketing

One of the most effective forms of marketing is content marketing. It is not only cheap but a very effective way of building relationships among people who are genuinely interested in your products. Serious marketers and small business owners have a blog. When writing your blog (or using video and/or podcast) try to offer genuine information to your audience. 

It shouldn’t always be about advertising your product because you don’t want to come across a salesman who is only interested in selling his/her products.

Leverage social networks

LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are all popular networks that you can take advantage of to market your products and services. They can be a great source of traffic if you share interesting stuff. 

By creating and sharing great content, you will grow your audience. However, it would be best if you were patient as it can take years before you build a strong following. 


How do you Create Marketing Emails that Will Generate Instant YES?

 

When a well-crafted email hits your inbox, you open and act on it because it grabs your attention.  These emails might look simple and natural.  Achieving a clear, balanced and persuasive message takes time and effort, but it is worth it. In order to create an email that will generate positive results (people clicking your Call to Action), here are steps that need to be taken into consideration. Think of these steps as a logical staircase where you need to move from one step to another.

  • Make your messages consistent and persuasive

 Human beings like consistency. It is hard-wired in our brains. For example, once someone decides to do something, they would strive to make all future behavior to match past behavior. If there is a mismatch, the person immediately begins to feel that something has gone amiss somewhere. It is the same with the emails you receive.

 An email campaign should have a consistent message to elicit an action. Emails that have a consistent and persuasive message always outperform those that don’t. A consistent and persuasive email should lead one to take an action. 

An inconsistent message is one whose parts don’t add up, i.e. they offer contradictory information.

Example

Suppose that your email is something like “Unbeatable Discount on iPhone 6 this Week”, yet the headlines says, “20% off on all smartphones,” with many types of smartphones being presented.

Although the email may not be factually wrong, it is inconsistent and you are likely to lose some customers. Your message will be more successful if all the components agree.

  • Use high quality and relevant images

Use images that are not only relevant to the offer, but also high quality and original. Showing stock images is an instant click-killer. Make sure your images supports the main messages and that they reappear on your landing page—the page your customer will land after clicking the Call to Action button. This will make people feel that they have landed on the right page.

  • Have a great presentation layer

Treat your promotional email like a shopping window. The more inviting the presentation, the more likely people will want to enter your shop. Just having a great product is not enough to make people want to buy from you or sign up for your services. Having an inviting presentation layer in your email will grab the attention of your subscribers.

  1. Precision Targeting is Indispensable: Target the right audience

In theory, it would seem like sending an email to everybody will increase your sales, but that is not what expert marketers do. When it comes to sending email campaigns, targeting the right audience is very important. According to Marketing Sherpa, sending an email to untargeted database is counterproductive. Unfortunately, many small business owners do this all the time.

Collecting email list and blasting everyone that is on that list with an email campaign is akin to shooting in the dark, and it is a bad habit that you need to stop immediately. Why would you want males on your list to receive email offers about "fashionable bras" that you recently launched? Wouldn't that be shooting yourself in the foot?

Highly targeted email campaigns experience 208% higher conversion rates compared to the “batch and blast” emails. As a marketer, you need to rise above the mediocrity and segment your list. Optimized email marketing pays off big time. Marketers that use email segmentation record a higher ROI compared to aimless emails. Moreover, email segmentation drastically reduces opt-outs.

Here are the steps to take if you want to send targeted email campaigns:

  • Target a high-value segment

Now that you have an email subscriber list, it is time to separate the wheat from the chaff. A good way to find valuable segment from the list is to look at your list bearing three factors in mind:

  • How recent is the subscriber? Subscribers who have done business with you recently are more likely to respond to your email campaign.
  • How often does the subscriber buy? Subscribers who purchase from your more frequently are more likely to respond than others.
  • How much does the subscriber spend? Subscribers that have spent 50% more than your average subscribers are more likely to respond to your emails.

This is not the be-all and end-all email segmentation check list, but it is a good starting point.

  • Target using demographics

If possible, divide your list into specific groups to enable you send personalized, targeted and relevant messages. Without further ado, here are five main demographic features you can use to segment your list:

  • Geographical locations: if you are serving cross-border markets, dividing your list according to geographical location will make it easier for you to send emails at the right time. This will also ensure you don’t break respective laws and regulations.
  • Age: you might have offers targeting different age groups, which means that you can target millennials/college students, baby boomers, little kids and retirees, among others.
  • Gender: just as you might want to specifically speak to a college student or retiree, you might want to customize your offers and messaging based on gender.
  • Industry: if you have lists that cut across several industries, it is prudent to segment your list based on industry to add another level of personalization.
  • Persona: you should study your subscribers and understand them. Know what makes each of them tick and design email messaging around their persona.

Offering exclusive email content to target audiences allows you to offer exact solutions that solve specific needs/dilemmas and supports conversations that will drive your conversation rates and increase your ROI.

Email marketing is still one of the most effective ways to reach and engage with your customers. However, in the absence of effective email marketing strategy, you might not achieve your marketing goals.

Mjrvisuals  can help you increase your reach out of that content through our expertise. We run the gambit of visual imagination including video production, digital marketing, video editing, print design, advertising, graphic design, graphic animation, motion graphic and media design. Be part of our portfolio of clients and let us tell your story to the world. Click here to visit our website: mjrvisuals.com/


Are you Utilizing the Power of YouTube Marketing

 

If you have been ignoring the impact of YouTube marketing, then you have been committing a cardinal marketing sin. There are some shocking statistics that will show you just why YouTube marketing has become a big hit. Nielsen report shows that in the year 2011, internet video streaming views increased by 35% compared to only 0.2% increase in television views in America. Mobile video viewing also increased by 20%; therefore, it is clear that internet video marketing (like YouTube) is now more popular, cheaper, and result oriented than the traditional TV marketing. As a matter of fact, the number of people who visit YouTube for entertainment, research, and education is alarming. YouTube is now the second most search engine by volume.

However, something else you should know is that about 35 hours of videos are being uploaded in YouTube every minute, meaning if you take 10 minutes to read this article, you will meet about 350 hours of newly uploaded YouTube videos. So what? So, it means that if you are thinking of using YouTube to advertise your products, then you should bear in mind that competition is extremely high; so, you need to approach it with some plan if you hope to achieve positive results. In other words, just uploading a video does not necessarily mean that you'll automatically get YouTube hits.

The following are two suggestions to get you started on how to get positive YouTube performance:

1. Just like a website, content is king, and good quality is paramount. Please invest some time to create a quality and compelling video before you upload. Potentials customers should find your videos useful, engaging, and attractive to view. If you let them feel like they have wasted their precious moment viewing you video, be sure that the video will never go viral, or worse still, they wont come back. The rule of the thumb is this: the video should address the needs of the viewers. Anything else is thrash. Therefore, invest some time in researching on what the customer needs and create something relevant. For instance, it doesn't help uploading a video that talks about meditation, yet you are selling cars. In that case, you would want to talk about 'how to maintain a car'.

2. Since it is Google that owns YouTube, you have to play by Google Search optimization rules to get an edge. For instance, in order for the video to be findable, it must have a title, good descriptions, and tags, among others. Also, you should create a brand if you want to attract and retain customers. This doesn't have to be done with massive investment; all you need is to be consistent with your content, create a similar backgrounds, create a playlist for the most popular videos, and choose an appropriate layout.

All in all, taking your business online is not an option in this internet age if you are to stay profitable, and relevant. YouTube presents you with one of the best channel of informing the online users about your presence; hence you should take advantage.


The 3 Steps to Creativity

There is more to creativity then a camera, a lens, or the graphics - we state that videography is about creativity.   Here are our steps.

3 Steps to Creativity from MJRVisuals on Vimeo.