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6 Amazing Ways to Use Facebook Local Awareness Ads

local marketing
March 25, 2020/by
6 Amazing Ways to Use Facebook Local Awareness Ads I love learning, and recently, I've been pondering taking an online course or two at a local college, just to sharpen my marketing and communications skills. When I started doing some research, like typing in local colleges and looking at courses, I took a break periodically to check social media. Surprisingly, as I was perusing Facebook, I noticed I had a brand new Reach Ad on my news feed: I knew this was a Reach Ad by the way it's designed. The copy is short, but it provides actionable language and was shown to me as a response to my recent search queries. Ultimately, the ad is incredibly effective. My high-intent while searching for education courses in my area makes me an ideal candidate to receive this sort of message. After seeing the ad, I immediately clicked the "Learn more" CTA. This is an example of Facebook's Local Awareness Ads. Here, let's explore what Local Awareness Ads are, and how you can use them to take your marketing strategy to the next level. You can use Reach Ads to let customers know about a promotion or upcoming sale, giving audiences an incentive to visit your website. Reach Ads can also build interest in a time-sensitive event, such as a happy hour or special offer, and make the content shareable. Reach Ads are also helpful for building your brand's ties to the community. An ad can...
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The Ultimate Guide to Local Marketing

local marketing
March 25, 2020/by
The Ultimate Guide to Local Marketing When I moved to Chicago two years ago, I knew very little about the city and my new neighborhood. As I got comfortable and established myself as a new Wrigleyville resident, I made a very important friend in Google. Google helped me find the businesses, vendors, and specialists I needed in a new city — from a hair salon and gym to an appliance repairman and locksmith. But Google couldn’t have helped me discover these folks without those businesses investing in local marketing. Did you know that 97% of people learn more about a local company online than any other medium? In fact, 88% of mobile online searches for local businesses result in either a call or business visit within one day. If your business caters to a local audience, has several service areas, and/or has a brick and mortar location, local marketing is a must-need strategy. In this guide, we break down local marketing and a slew of helpful strategies to help you get started. What is local marketing? Local marketing is a marketing strategy that targets consumers and customers within a certain radius of the physical location(s) of a business. Local marketing is also known as neighborhood marketing or local store marketing. If you have at least one brick-and-mortar business location (this applies to both local businesses and chains), local marketing is a marketing strategy you should consider adding to your arsenal. Local marketing can work for any...
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40% of People Say They Don’t Read Blogs: Here’s How You Can Still Get on Their Radar

How to Write a Blog Post
March 23, 2020/by
40% of People Say They Don't Read Blogs: Here's How You Can Still Get on Their Radar According to our 2020 State of Marketing report, blogging is the third most utilized form of content marketing, just behind video and infographics. Like any successful strategy, many brands, publishers, and individuals have jumped on the blogging bandwagon. Currently, there are 600 million active blogs globally. Meanwhile, the number of active U.S. bloggers rose from 22 million to 32 million between 2014 and 2020. "Despite the numbers that show the enduring impact blogs can have on business, the perception of blogging as a valuable content marketing channel is continually called into question: the phrase 'is blogging dead?' has 26.8 million results on Google. To determine where blog readership might stand today, I surveyed 400 people about how often they read blogs. As a blogger who constantly writes, discovers and reads blogs online regularly, I was expecting that a large number of people would say that they read blogs at least daily. However, after I performed the Lucid survey, I found the end results surprising -- and a little unnerving. When I asked participants, "How often do you read blogs?", a whopping 40% of them said, "Never." Data Source; Lucid Before you go deleting your blog just because of one survey -- remain calm. While 40% of people in this survey say they never read blogs, other research suggests that nearly 80% of internet users interact with them regularly. It's...
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How to Run a Successful Virtual Event [+ Examples]

conferences
March 23, 2020/by
How to Run a Successful Virtual Event Nowadays, plenty of business is done virtually. For instance, you might begin your morning by answering emails and editing a colleague's blog post via Google Doc. Your colleague is working from home today, so you Slack him to let him know when the piece is ready. In the afternoon, you have a 1:1 via Zoom with your remote manager. Then, around 4 PM, you log into a company's webinar to learn more about Social Media Marketing in 2020. The webinar has a panel of experts, and you're able to download the recorded webinar later for future reference. Undoubtedly, online tools and experiences are an integral part of a modern marketer's role. However, there is one aspect of business that seems, until recently, almost entirely untouched by virtual experience: conferences. Our historic mindset around conferences is that we board a plane to a conference, bring our business cards, and prepare ourselves for a week of keynote speakers, breakout sessions, and networking events that enable us to spread the word about our own products and services, while collaborating with other marketers who might have useful tools or suggestions of their own. In 2020, there will likely be a rise of virtual conferences. Here, let's explore the benefits of virtual conferences, take a look at some examples of successful virtual conferences to inspire you, and check out a few tools that can help you plan your own. But first — let's talk about why...
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The Marketer’s Guide to Content Aggregators in 2020

Business Tools
March 23, 2020/by
The Marketer's Guide to Content Aggregators in 2020 I love to travel. My husband and I try to spend our vacations becoming immersed in a culture. It's one of our favorite things to do together. As a content creator, I'm predictably an avid content consumer as well. With my love of content and travel, I often find myself pouring through travel blogs looking for the best way to plan a trip and the best activities to do in a country. One thing that makes that easy is content aggregation. For me, I use a specific content aggregation site dedicated to travel blogs to find the best information. For marketers, content aggregator sites can be a useful strategy to reach new audiences. That's why it's important to consider using them in your marketing strategy to promote your brand. Below, let's review content aggregation in detail, from what it is to the different kinds of content aggregators. Essentially, content aggregator sites repost and collect content so viewers can see articles from various media on a given topic such as marketing, business, or design. Usually these sites are set up to automatically aggregate content through RSS feeds. For example, on Rotten Tomatoes, you can read reviews on movies from different blogs and sites, all in one place. As a note, content aggregators shouldn't post content without using proper credit and linking to the original source. If they do, that's considered copyright theft. Additionally, content aggregation is different from content curation in...
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How to Determine Your Internet Marketing Plan Based on Your Revenue Goals

Goal Setting
March 20, 2020/by
How to Determine Your Internet Marketing Plan Based on Your Revenue Goals 91% of marketers are confident that they're making marketing decisions that will positively impact revenue. Are you one of them? As marketers, we're well-versed in the main goals of internet marketing: to generate leads and new business. Revenue generated from online marketing justifies why we include online channels in our marketing efforts. Some companies use revenue as a jumping-off point to build their marketing plans. This method determines if current marketing efforts should be changed or repeated based on lead generation and customer acquisition data. A tactic like this measures and drives the growth of a business. To put it another way, some companies use revenue marketing when planning online marketing strategies. Revenue marketing is about coming up with a campaign that is driven by the desire to create more leads and drive sales. How then, do marketers come up with a winning online marketing strategy that directly ties to their revenue goals? If you're unsure of the answer, we've got you covered. To give you a starting point of how you can follow suit we've come up with some steps you can take to begin marketing planning based on revenue. Revenue Marketing When we talk about revenue marketing, we're talking about a method of marketing that's used for lead generation. Some marketing campaigns are implemented to increase brand awareness or support a...
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Your Email Testing Playbook for 2020 (& the Tools You’ll Need)

A/B Testing
March 20, 2020/by
Your Email Testing Playbook for 2020 (& the Tools You'll Need) A/B testing is one of those techniques that, if you have enough volume to give you significant results, is pretty much guaranteed to generate better results from your marketing. Email marketers have known this for ages, but what drives me nuts is that they waste their time on tiny little tests -- instead of tackling some of the bigger, more exciting tests that yield real insights and improvements. In fact, MarketingSherpa's email survey found that subject lines are still the most commonly tested element in email marketing. Meaning that those few words that get your subscribers to open your emails and see your wonderful offers are what marketers focus on most in their attempts to optimize their email marketing. While I'm sure this strategy can end up getting you the most tested, optimized subject line that will ever reach an inbox, the impact of these tests are minimal compared to all the other things an email marketer could be testing. So ... are you ready to run some big, exciting tests? In this blog post, we'll highlight what you should be experimenting with and which tools can help you. But, first, we'll explain the importance of A/B testing.    A/B testing is a great way to test two different newsletter formats that promote the same content or two newsletters with...
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How to Bridge the Gap Between In-Person and Online Lead Generation

Lead Generation
March 19, 2020/by
How to Bridge the Gap Between In-Person and Online Lead Generation From a marketing standpoint, the great benefit of online channels is the ability to track and measure how effective they are. Knowing which social links led to a conversion, or which web pages ultimately influenced a customer to purchase your product, makes us better and more effective marketers. But what about the power of in-person events? How do you measure the value of a speech or understand the influence a conference had amid all the other interactions a prospective customer had with your company online? Linking the online and offline activities has long been a challenge for marketers — but it's not impossible. Here, let's dive into a few ways you can bridge the gap between in-person and online lead generation. Additionally, we'll explore how to transition to online lead generation if you find some of your traditionally in-person events are now cancelled and replaced with virtual customer interactions. How to Transition In-Person Events to Online Lead Generation 1. Provide an option for your attendees to download slides. Speaking at an event carries with it a tremendous amount of potential — more than any vendor table or collateral seat-drop can offer. You have the capacity to captivate an audience, teach them something new, and form a lasting impression. But even the best speeches are lost opportunities if you don't translate them to visits to your website and potential conversions. Giving your email or website URL alone may not be...
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Everything You Need to Know About Business Process Automation

Business Tools
March 19, 2020/by
Everything You Need to Know About Business Process Automation When I think of automation, my first thought is that judgment day from "The Terminator" is upon us. However, conspiracy theories aside, automation can actually help marketers grow better and do their jobs more efficiently. In fact, 29% of marketers are using automation to help them personalize customer engagement. Overall, marketers' adoption of artificial intelligence has grown by 44% since 2017. When marketers use business process automation, they have more time for high-level, creative tasks. Without manual duties, automation can even allow your team to get more done. Below, let's review everything there is to know about business automation including what it is, the top benefits, and examples for how to use it. Then, we'll dive into the best business automation tools. You can use business process automation in many departments including marketing, human resources, sales, and customer service. For example, chatbots are a form of business process automation for marketing. Similarly, you can automate contract management for sales. Now, you might be wondering, "What tasks can I automate?" Ultimately, if a process is repeatable, needs to be free from human error, and requires consistency, then you should consider automation (more on this below). Before we dive into examples of business process automation, you might be curious why you should use it? Let's review some of the top benefits below. Business Process Automation Benefits Business process automation can help improve customer relationships, create reporting dashboards, and standardize your processes....
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