As we approach the end of the year, it's the prime time to lock in your strategies for 2024. This is when most small businesses are looking for answers about the right things to do in their marketing and how to improve from this year to the next-- so we're here to answer those questions.
We're taking the most popular questions from our latest webinar and expanding upon them to assist you in putting together your marketing strategy for next year.
Have a question left over from the webinar? Leave us a comment below.
You can view the webinar directly through Wistia or right here on the Blog!
How do I create a list of steady customers who will be returning customers or clients?
Leads should be acted on right away while you have their interest. An automated welcome series is an easy way to keep the momentum going without you needing to lift a finger. Continue the conversation right away by sending an instant "thank you" email and letting them know what they should expect going forward. Follow up with them a few days later to continue the conversation, inviting them to connect over social media or point them toward your website to learn more about your business.
Email marketing
What kind of content is best to send via email?
Around 75-80% of your content should provide some kind of information, but it shouldn’t be transaction-heavy. If all you ever do is promote your products, recipients will stop opening your emails. Include short quick, interesting, non-sales content, then go for the sale. Make sure what you’re selling is related to what the rest of your email entails.
How often should I be sending?
Depends on the length of your emails. In many cases, you can get away with multiple emails a month if you’re keeping them short. There's no one answer for everyone. Pay attention to your reporting, like your opens, clicks, and unsubscribes. Your unsubscribes are sure to tell you if you’re sending too much.
How can I track what links are being clicked on in my emails?
This information will be under the "reporting" tab within your account. See our Knowledge Base article on email reporting.
Should we share our Constant Contact newsletters on social media?
Absolutely. Share once a month and include a sneak peek of what was sent. Make sure to ask them to join your list so they’re getting the news first.
Social media
How do I get more social media followers?
There's a lot that goes into getting more followers and the methods are different across platforms.
Make sure you're linking your social channels to your website and emails. Create an email with just the focus of asking people to follow you on your social media channels and state the benefit of them following you there. You might also think about some sort of contest or giveaway where you encourage people to link and share your page on their profiles.
I just created my Facebook business page. How to grow my page and get post traffic?
It might seem scary but go live on Facebook as it ranks higher than other content and shows more frequently on feeds. Media has the most visibility with video first then images. Links don’t perform well on their own so mix them in with media. You may have to “pay to play” if you don’t have a large following. Have a small budget for boosting your page or posts, starting at $2 a day.
What is the frequency of posting on LinkedIn?
When you’re ready, start three times a week. Provide updates about your business, other businesses in the community, or posts about employees. See our Blog post where we further explain how often to post on social media and what to take into consideration when posting.
How do you use social media to build your email list?
If your business or organization has a presence on social media, your followers may not be aware that you have a newsletter or you’re sending out messages through email! Sharing your emails on your social media channels is a quick way to accomplish this. The URL for a campaign includes a Join My Mailing List button for your followers to join your list. If you aren’t ready to share your emails just yet, create a Lead Generation Landing Page and share the URL in your posts and include it in your About section as well.
Can you explain how searches connect to pay-per-click?
Searches connect to pay-per-click via search ads. When someone performs a search, they'll use keywords and in the results, you'll see something labeled as an ad, right at the top. Check out this article on Google ads that goes into detail on how to use them with your small business.
Where's the best bang for my buck? Google Ads, SEO/PPC, email/SMS drip campaigns? Do you have an opinion on prioritizing the budget?
You need to have foundational elements in place before you move on to paid ads. Start with SEO, optimize your website and this is a continual thing. Start collecting those leads on your website and social media channels and sending emails/drip campaigns.
Once you're getting good results organically, test into paid ads. By then, you should know what captures your target audience's attention the most. Take that type of content and rework for ads. For budgeting, start small for as little as $2 a day. Play around with the targeting, content, etc. to see what's working and once you have good traction, you can increase your budget. But all of the things should be working together.
How can you target ads to reach those who can afford larger ticket services?
Social media ads are a great way to target your audiences. You can target things you know people in your demographic are interested in (it could be real estate, watches, travel, other luxury goods, etc). If possible, you can also use household income targeting and think about targeting based on specific zip codes. For Google Ads, you can choose details based on their age, and even household income. Facebook ads can yield high returns on investment, so you may want to consider reviewing your past ads and scaling them to reach the right audience.
SMS messaging strategies
How can we use SMS to grow our business or organization?
Create an irresistible offer on your website or social media and opt-in to text/email as the action step. Then create a VIP-like experience where you text them specials but not too often.
Read more: SMS Text Message Marketing Best Practices to Build Relationships and Increase Sales
What is the best way to get more SMS subscribers?
Is there something special you’re offering if someone opts in to receive your texts? You can advertise promotions for these specific contacts that your email subscribers may not see. Encourage new contacts to subscribe to receive messages when enabling SMS opt-in for a Lead Generation Landing Page. Share the URL for the landing page on your website, social media, and email signature.
Can my email newsletter be sent via SMS?
Absolutely! Every email that has been sent is archived by Constant Contact online and you are provided a short link to that email, so texting it out is a fantastic way to help your text list know about and enjoy your emails.
Landing pages
What are some best practices for utilizing landing pages to attract clients?
Keep it simple, clean, clear, and uncluttered. Make the offer super easy to understand at a glance. The more you put on that lead generation landing page, the more confusing it can be and can be counterproductive to them taking that single step.
Marketing Strategies
How should we be retooling our marketing strategies to include AI? How do we best adapt?
AI content generation is a great way to get past writer's block, but it can't replace the human element. Play around with different tones, but it's very important to use the content generated as a draft and make edits. In the end, it needs to sound like it came from you and your brand.
What are the biggest mistakes you see nonprofits making?
Being afraid to ask for the donation. It's okay to include a link to donate, even just in the footer of every email. Not everyone is ready to donate all the time.
The second missed opportunity is targeting and using automation to help with the workload. Target to personalize your messages based on their interactions/donations with your organization.
