What is a brand? It seems everyone has their own definition, and I have mine. It’s sometimes easiest to say what it isn’t, especially in an area where there appears to be the most confusion, so here goes – a brand is not a name, logo or package design. These are important, of course, but are really outward reflections of what the brand is rather than embodying its core essence.
An essential starting point for any organization’s brand strategy is to clarify exactly what it stands for. The company’s key internal management team needs to nurture development of a brand based on internal values and culture. The second part of the brand equation is aligning internal values with those held by target customers. By aligning these viewpoints — the internal expressing the aspiration and the customers the reality of the brand — we can be assured of a consistency of expression that is the hallmark of all successful companies.
We all know that if you have a business today, that that business should be on social media. But once you’re “on” social media, what do you do? This is where the social media strategy comes into place. This blog post discusses the five really important steps each business should take in order to develop a solid social media strategy.
Q4 is crunch time. For retailers with online operations the competition over shoppers’ share of wallet is ferocious and the competition just a click away. If you’ve got a pay per click (PPC) program contributing to the mix you need to get campaign performance dialed in and working to its full potential.
Social media is becoming a more and more popular channel for businesses to connect with their current and potential customers. You are missing out on opportunities to increase customers, improve customer service, and reward brand loyalty, just to name a few…
If you own/manage/market for a small to mid size business then you already know the importance of good SEO on your company website. But what can you do beyond making sure you’re using SEO best practices?
If you have a website, you’ve undoubtedly heard about the importance of good SEO (search engine optimization), especially if you have a website for your business. But what is SEO? And how do you determine if the SEO services you’re receiving are “good”? We often have clients come to us after they’ve had a bad experience with an SEO company or professional. The problem is, most SEO professionals promise clients the moon, but they don’t have a plan in place that will actually deliver real, sustainable value to their customers’ online presence. That’s why we’ve put this guide together; to help you avoid empty promises for “amazing! First page! #1 ranking!” SEO services, and help you to connect with professionals who are interested in the long term viability of your website and ultimately your business.
It’s not unusual, in fact it’s quite common, to have music on in the office while toiling away on projects. What recently struck me was how many songs are clearly about SEO and digital marketing. Who knew? As this concept started to take hold in my ears/brain, I began to dissect the songs and really listen to the lyrics for meaning. Digital marketing is everywhere…it was amazing! Mindblowing! In fact these artist are true soothsayers having penned lyrics before the dawn of the internet and digital marketing. It’s truly remarkable.
Many people are encouraging retargeting (or remarketing) across platforms and devices. However, there isn’t a way to connect different devices to the same person. This might seem self-explanatory, but it can be confusing.
I attended several different sessions at SMX Advanced this year covering topics from local search, to link 
building, to content marketing, and even an unexpected session-long commercial for Cortana, “the future of predictive search.”
I would say I learned a lot at the conference, but nothing that was Earth-shatteringly new or anything. For the most part these sessions helped to cement some ideas that had been bouncing around in my head for almost 2 years.