Social media, search engines, and popular review sites allow consumer opinions to travel faster and reach further than ever before. Reviews are modern day word of mouth (eWOM) marketing posted on sites like Yelp, Google+, Angie’s List, and more. Reviews are easily seen and shareable and are probably the most important aspect of marketing for small and local businesses who don’t have large brand advertising budgets. Good reviews will affect people’s decision to buy from your business and will increase your search engine rankings.
You need to develop online offers – Something of value. Not a free consultation. We are trying to get as many people in the sales funnel as possible. We want a soft yes. A free consultation (A.K.A. sales call) is a hard yes. What can you offer that will educate your target market as to why they should be buying from you instead of your competition.
If your company is like most companies, the answer is a resounding NO! or the truth is that you could do a better job. Explaining what it is that you do is the essence of what marketing is and should be. The best marketing is about great teaching and communication.
Videos cut through the digital noise of the internet by requiring a viewer’s full attention. In a minute, sometimes less, a video can convey a message that will take paragraphs and paragraphs to explain. Content marketing began with text blog posts but will now morph into text blog posts with video and maybe even an infographic. The content simply has to be better since there is more competition on the internet. Those who know how to use text, video, and images together and separately are going to be those who
As social media because more noisy, frustrating, and expensive, businesses will start concentrating on their owned digital assets more. Businesses don’t own their space on social media channels and some have found this out the hard way as organic access to the feeds slowing disappears. The website and the blog become the library for a company’s owned content and distribution of that content will more and more be driven by email and niche social media channels and groups/communities inside the larger social media channels.
Customers come to bars and restaurants and in an hour or two they are gone again for a month or two. Owners recognize their customers faces sometimes but to don’t really have a way to communicate with them when they aren’t in the bar or restaurant. Guest WiFi allows owners to collect customer contact information […]
Word of mouth marketing is still a small business’ number 1 way to generate more business. Referrals from current customers and warm leads from your strategic partners will still be the way most relationships start. Now put yourself in your prospects shoes for a minute. Someone just told you about a company and how they can help you. What will you do? You will check them out online if you’re like 9 out of 10 people! Probably 10 of out 10 in 5 more years.
There are a ton of marketing tactics that restaurants, bars, and coffee shops can use to get more customers in the door. Some of these restaurant marketing ideas are tried and true and some are very new. In this post, we are focusing on restaurant marketing tips that get the most bang for your marketing […]
Most small businesses we talk to just don’t have websites that convert. Some of them are pretty but pretty doesn’t pay the bills. Website leads all start with traffic because you have to have the traffic to convert the prospects into leads.
Brick and Mortar locations who have frequent repeat customers (ie. restaurants, bars, retail stores, salons, fitness centers, hotels, etc.) can use local online marketing and mobile smartphones to their advantage in ways that other companies can’t. New technology helps Brick & Mortar companies collect their customer contact information and communicate with them using software and […]
