Freetimers Web Marketing - Blog

Facebook Live detonated in the first quarter of 2017 with live video streaming. Twitter and Instagram are quickly following suit. So how else will our much-loved platforms continue to rapidly progress through 2017. To be consistent with the well-known phrase, we do believe ‘You ain’t seen nothing yet’...

Google made the announcement that it would be expanding text ads at the annual Google Performance Summit on 24th May.

Word of mouth (WOM) will always influence customer decision making but the same can be said for online customer reviews. A study by Search Engine Land in 2013 stated that “79% of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations”. This is one of the reasons why online reputation management has developed so significantly in recent years and a major part of this approach is combating the outbreak of negative press on social media networks, blogs and review websites.

Many businesses will aim to communicate with their customers on a daily basis through various social media accounts, but the content shared must be carefully considered if you're looking to build your brand and relationships with customers. Conversing with customers and potential customers is an effective form of communication and social media is about being social and building relationships with different individuals, rather than just sending out snippets of old website content that customers may have already come across before. To build a trusted brand, it's important to think about who your audience is and what they would be interested in before you make a decision on the content you publish.

They then may feel the need to return to your social media page for the valuable content and maintain a relationship with your brand. Your audience is not necessarily going to be the same on all of your social media accounts, and content on Facebook may need to be slightly differen...

Occasionally there will be some website visitors who slip away; not having purchased any products or services, and behavioural retargeting can be used to potentially persuade them in a second attempt. It's a method that can help businesses advertise relevant products to previous website visitors on popular websites such as Google, Facebook and others; perhaps showing your previous visitors the products they viewed or added to their shopping cart basket before they abandoned it.

This method essentially sees a business reach out to previous website visitors, advertising to them once more in a bid to increase sales and maximise return on investment (ROI). For example, an eCommerce website may have a visitor that viewed a selection of products on their website and then left the page. Later that same individual may log in to their Facebook account to check out their news feed, and this is one of the areas where your advert can appear; showing them the products they viewed at on...

Digital engagement essentially involves using digital tools and techniques to find, listen and communicate with various individuals about a certain issue, and it can help make more people aware of your brand. It can be relatively easy for an individual to ignore a company if they're using forceful sales jargon, however, there are other ways for businesses to communicate their message, perhaps more naturally and effectively. Millions of online conversations occur constantly, about various topics, and they're engaging on a human level. Therefore, by getting your business involved in relevant online discussions and sparking your own conversations, you can begin to improve your digital engagement and connect with customers on a more personal level. Every individual has different interests, needs and different ways of communicating, which can make the digital engagement a difficult, yet essential marketing method.

One individual may engage better using their social media pages,...

Content marketing can apply to images and videos as well as written content, and presenting your audience with various types of content can be beneficial for a business and their sales. Written content may appeal to a range of customers and work effectively, yet there may be other individuals who engage more with images and videos. Pinterest and Instagram show just how beneficial images can be to reaching your audience and they are both capable of persuading customers to enquire about their products or services, especially when striking images related to a business and its products are posted.

If a website is largely image-driven, then the content on that site can be shared easily on Pinterest and Instagram, as well as additional social media platforms, such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. By sharing content on a range of social media platforms, a business can reach a wider audience, and perhaps gain loyal followers in the process. Another popular social media network t...

Content can help a business attract their target audience and it can help companies build relationships with its customers, especially if it is delivered on a regular basis. Online content comes in various styles; it can be a social media post, an email newsletter, a website news item or a video among other forms, and regular content marketing can help a business spread the word about their products and services. Before publishing content on a regular basis it should be understood that not every person is going to be interested in it, which is why it should only be aimed towards the audience you intend to reach.

Content marketing should always be seen as a commitment; especially if you want to see your customers return regularly. If a returning customer continued to revisit your website, social media page or blog without finding anything new, unique, engaging or relevant, they may be unlikely to return again, perhaps turning instead to your competitors, and it's important ...

It's not always possible to provide an effective overview of a business on one dedicated page, and that's why LinkedIn has created showcase pages; allowing companies to create a separate page for various aspects of their business. Some organisations will contain a selection of different teams or departments, and it can be beneficial for these teams to display their own messages, to their own audiences. Showcase pages are extensions of your LinkedIn company page, while there is a maximum of 10 free showcase pages for each business, making them ideal if you have numerous differentiating departments within your business.

Showcase pages are built to be more focused than company pages, mainly because they take a step away from the business as a whole, and focus only on one business department or section. LinkedIn aims to help various businesses build 'trusting relationships' and by showcasing your business through unique pages, you're able to share more information about your b...

Many people are perhaps aware of Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, yet there are many other social media networks that are well worth considering if you want to fully engage with your target audience, and Pinterest is one of them. Pinterest is a social media network that's well suited to imagery, so if your business's website has visually appealing images, the probability is that your 'pins' will get 're-pinned' (liked and shared) more frequently; helping your business reach a different audience. Pinterest is a useful tool for showcasing your products and your website content, whilst potentially directing Pinterest users to your website, and converting them into customers.

If your website frequently publishes images; perhaps in blog posts, product pages or in news items, then Pinterest can be used to pin that content to a relevant board (fronted by the image in your website's content), possibly reaching an audience that wouldn't have been exposed to using other or existing so...