5 Ways to Optimize Your Content Marketing

Is your content marketing strategy falling short, or not living up to your expectations? It may be time to optimize. Creating valuable content is a good start, but there are other aspects to consider. Planning the ins and outs of both your current and future content marketing strategy is the only way to ensure success.

Sound overwhelming? Don’t panic – here are a few simple tips to consider.

Switch it up. Don’t get stuck in a rut –producing diverse content is the easiest way to keep your audience active and engaged. Exploring new ways to format and present your content also keeps you current and interesting in the eyes of your audience. Step outside of your comfort zone – don’t be afraid to try something new.

Produce quality over quantity. Mass producing content may seem like a great way to generate clicks, but in the end, people will see right through you. Practicing thought leadership and strategic planning makes your content more credible.

Put yourself in their shoes. Take a walk in the shoes of your target audience and use social listening techniques to keep current about what they are saying. The best way to understand what they’re looking for is to view your content through their eyes and have a clear understanding of their thoughts and opinions.

Take it up a notch. In the world of content marketing, you’re always competing with someone. In order to stand out, you need to make an impression on your audience – and sometimes this includes paying for a service such as paid search or advertising. Consider multiple options for promoting your content – the possibilities are endless!

Think about user experience. The format in which you present your content is just as important as the content itself. The experience users have while viewing your content is crucial – if they aren’t impressed, they may not return. Design accordingly.

For content marketing and other integrated marketing services, please contact Sagefrog Marketing Group at 215.230.9024 or visit www.sagefrog.com.

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Drive Consumers To Your Brand

Consumers like excitement, and as marketers, it’s our job to stimulate that excitement within every aspect of our brand. We’re constantly implementing new techniques to improve our social media, advertisements, and overall messaging to get people talking.

Here’s the thing we often forget – consumers don’t always know what they want – in fact, many people rely on what someone or something tells them first before forming their own opinion.

In a marketer’s ideal world, new customers would come to us because they’re actively seeking our product or service. Obviously, this is not always the case. Customers tend to seek out brands based on second-hand information; they “heard” it was popular, expensive, high-quality, etc.

So how can you make sure your brand is intriguing the type of customers you’re looking for? Simple: understand the customer decision making process:

1. Customers aren’t experts. You know your brand inside and out, but not all of your customers do. So how do they formulate educated opinions? If your brand gets people talking and has a lot of positive feedback, new customers are more likely to explore what you have to offer. Maintaining a positive, memorable public perception of your brand could be the difference between making it big and falling short.
2. Money talks. Brands are associated with value. For example, in the customer’s mind, high quality = high price and low quality = low price, even though this isn’t necessarily true. It’s important to price your brand accordingly – you don’t want customers to under/overvalue what you have to offer, and you don’t want to target the wrong market.
3. Words, Words, Words. They go a long way, and more importantly they stick. Potential customers will associate your brand with words you use in your slogans and advertisements, so choose wisely! You want people to remember positive words and phrases, not negative ones.

Creating and maintaining a successful brand is a lot of work, but by understanding what goes into your customers’ decisions, you’re able to better tailor your image.

For branding and other integrated marketing services, please contact Sagefrog Marketing Group at 215.230.9024 or visit www.sagefrog.com.

*Source: BrandingStrategyInsider.com

Sagefrog is Growing! We’re Hiring!

Are you ready to be a frog? We only take the best.

Headquartered in Doylestown, PA, Sagefrog Marketing Group offers an open, casual and collaborative, high-performance team environment. We offer competitive salaries and a comprehensive compensation package with benefits including a 401k program with company matching, profit sharing, and financial planning; plus paid health insurance with vision and dental. We strive to be among the area's "best places to work", including happy hours, birthday celebrations, holiday parties and more. Sagefrogs possess these attributes: Passion, Proactive, Process-driven, Productive, Problem-solver, Positive and Professional. Think you have what it takes? We are looking to fill the following positions:

• SEM SPECIALIST – PAID SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING
• SEO SPECIALIST – ORGANIC SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING
• WEB DEVELOPER – HTML
• COPYWRITER – HEALTHCARE, TECHNOLOGY & SERVICES
• MEDIA PLANNER – PRINT ADVERTISING (PT)
• PAID MARKETING INTERNSHIP

Learn more at www.sagefrog.com/careers

If Sagefrog Marketing Group sounds like a good match for you, please submit your resume to us at careers@sagefrog.com.

You can check out our back story here: The Sagefrog Story.

Make Your Offers More Enticing

As marketers, our intentions are straightforward; we’re people pleasers. We want to make sure our audiences are engaged with our companies or causes, which can be more challenging than it seems.

So, how can we draw people into our market?

The answer is simple: Offers.

Offers range from eBooks, presentations, reports, videos, and blogs to giveaways and sweepstakes – basically anything that you’re providing for consumers coming directly from you or your company. Offers require a lot of developmental planning, which is why they’re often brushed aside and deemed too time consuming.

Fortunately, there are a few simple steps you can take to ensure your offers are enticing your audience:

Emphasize scarcity. Using phrases such as “Limited Time and/or Quantity” in your offer create a sense of urgency among your audience; if they don’t act soon, they won’t receive whatever it is your willing to share with them. This will force people to act fast and make YOU and YOUR BRAND a priority.

Encourage people to hop on the bandwagon. By human nature, we’re more likely to participate in something if we see others are already involved. This “bandwagon effect” can be useful for marketers; indicating how many people have already taken part in your offer is a great way to establish credibility. Just be sure your claims are true and believable – no exaggerations here!

Newsjack. Stay on top of what’s trending, and incorporate it into your offer if possible. If a lot of people are talking about something, it increases interest, and more importantly demand. Give the people what they want with your offer!

Create offers for different stages. Not all of your audience is on the same level, so your offers should reflect these different stages. Creating unique offers for each stage shows that you’re acknowledging everyone – not just those who are already familiar with your brand!

Avoid jargon. Nothing screams “unprofessional” like using jargon words or phrases in your offer. You want to add meaning and emphasis to your subject matter, so avoid overused terminology (things like “flexible” or “ground breaking”).

For offer and content development, online marketing and other integrated marketing services, please contact Sagefrog Marketing Group at 215.230.9024 or visit www.sagefrog.com.

Generate Leads with a Call-To-Action

A Call-to-action (CTA) is the single most important attention grabber in the world of online marketing. A CTA is an instruction to your audience that is intended to elicit an immediate response, for example, “Call now,” “Click here for more,” or “Visit today”.

While CTAs may seem straightforward, you’re not the only one creating them, which means it’s imperative that your CTA stands out amongst your competitors. If your CTA isn’t persuading people to click your offer, it serves no purpose.

But if every brand is fighting for consumers’ attention, how will your CTA stand out?

Placement. You want to place your CTA where everyone will see it – in most cases, this is “above the fold,” meaning the part of your web page that is viewable without scrolling down. According to heat map analysis, anything below this point will only be viewed by half of the people who access your page. A simple fix like this can double your impressions and increase leads.

Clarity. While being clever can certainly attract consumers, being clear is much more important. It’s essential that you are specific when providing details describing how someone would benefit from your CTA. This way, they’re interested in receiving your offer because they know exactly what they’re getting out of it.

Contrast. Make your CTA stand out! Blending your CTA in with your website design is a recipe for disaster; use contrasting colors and an easy-to-read design to ensure people are seeing your offer – and clicking it!

Link to a landing page. Your CTA is intended to send people to a relevant landing page with an offer – NOT to drive traffic to your homepage! You’re ultimately looking to generate leads, and in order to do so, you need to send your traffic to a page that will convert visitors rather than simply increasing website traffic.

Specialize. If you’re offering different products and/or services, your CTAs should reflect each one. Consider making a separate CTA for each individual offer and placing it on that designated webpage rather than creating one general CTA for all of your offers.

Thank your visitors. Increasing your engagement with everyone who fills out a form is a great way to turn prospects into loyal customers. Creating a “thank you” page that appears after someone completes a form is a simple way to show you care – and also a great way for you to promote additional offers and/or content.

Perfecting your CTA will make your offers stand out amongst your competitors while ultimately increasing leads – and who doesn’t want that?

For content marketing including CTA design, email marketing, landing page development   and other integrated marketing services, please contact Sagefrog Marketing Group at 215.230.9024 or visit www.sagefrog.com

Content: The King of SEO

Online marketing has quickly made SEO (Search Engine Optimization) a priority for many businesses looking to improve search rankings, increase website traffic, and ultimately generate leads. However, not many people realize that content directly impacts just how successful their SEO will be. According to Todd Lebo*, partner and CMO of Ascend2, “Creating relevant content is not only the most effective tactic used for SEO purposes, it’s also one of the most difficult to execute.”

Content marketing isn’t always directly linked to SEO, and for that reason, many businesses fall short in this category, which ultimately hurts their search rankings. Because content marketing takes time to build and become successful, it’s often overlooked. People like to see immediate results, and search engine rankings are able to provide them with that. While an increase in search engine rankings is great, it’s your content that will ultimately sustain these rankings over time.

But how can you be sure that the content you’re developing is helping you reach your SEO goal?

One of the most important elements in this process is QUALITY, not QUANTITY. Many people think that the more you post, the better. However, it’s better to share meaningful content every once in a while rather than something insignificant every day. Ensuring your content is relevant to the type of traffic you want to drive to your website is vital; you want these visitors to keep coming back! Don’t overdo it here though – you want your content to be searchable, but not to a point where you’re forcing in keywords or topics just so your content is seen.

Another content tip is to make sure you’re staying up-to-date with the changing search engine processes for all different types of devices, and tailoring your content accordingly. If you’re unaware of what’s new or up-and-coming, your content may be stuck in the past… And who wants to read that?

While developing relevant content for your target audience can seem tedious and difficult, it’s vital for your long-term SEO success – be patient with your content and you’ll thank yourself later!

For SEO, website optimization, online marketing and other integrated marketing services, please contact Sagefrog Marketing Group at 215.230.9024 or visit www.sagefrog.com

Email Campaigns: Timing is Everything

When planning an email campaign, there are a lot of different factors to consider such as audience, email design, layout and copy. Often times within this planning process, the single most important factor is overlooked: the best time to send your email campaign.

Timing is everything, and we’re not just referring to morning, afternoon, or evening – days of the week also play a huge role in the success of your campaign. Because these options are seemingly endless, planning for the “best” time might be overwhelming.

Here are some general guidelines to keep in mind:*

• Monday
  • Highest ROI
  • Best day to send out email surveys
• Tuesday & Thursday
  • High volume days to send emails
  • Tuesday had the highest open and click-through rates
• Wednesday
  • “Middle ground” – neither the best day, nor the worst day to send emails
• Friday
  • Good day to send emails for retailers
  • Conversation rate only 2% behind Tuesday, which had the highest conversion rate of all days
• Saturday & Sunday
  • Open rates are the highest on the weekend – 44% on Saturday
  • Higher click rates – 10% on Saturday
  • Highest bounce rates

Additionally, time of day is one of the “make-or-break” email campaign planning aspects.

• Early morning (before 9am)
  • Highest click rates, highest bounce rates
• Mid-morning (10am-Noon)
  • Best email open rate = 10am
• Lunch time (Noon hour)
  • One of the worst times to send email – lunch break
• Early afternoon (1-3pm)
  • One of the worst times to send email – “work zone”
• Late afternoon (3-5pm)
  • Most email activity happening overall from 2-5pm
• Evening (5-7pm)
  • 26.4% of recipients opened B2B promotions
  • 17.9% opened holiday promotions
  • People are more likely to open emails on their own time rather than at work
• Late night (7-10pm)
  • Open rates reached 15.1% for messages between 8-11pm
• Late LATE night (Midnight-4am)
  • Lowest email volume, highest response rate
  • Open rates peaked at 20.4% for messages at 12am

Remember to take these factors about your audience into consideration as well:

• Mobile Email
  • Accounts for 15-70% of email opens
  • Friday through Sunday render the most opens
  • Special offers, vouchers, real-time tracking, and newsletters are the most preferred type of mobile emails
• B2B & B2C Audience
  • Wednesday & Tuesday tied for most effective email days
  • B2B marketers ranked Tuesday as best sending day

All in all, it’s important to test your campaigns to see which ones are the most successful.

*Source: Pinpointe.com

For email campaigns and other integrated marketing services, please contact Sagefrog Marketing Group at 215.230.9024 or visit www.sagefrog.com.

The Top 10 Most Trusted Brands in America

We’ve narrowed it down from the top 50 most trusted brands in America to the top 10 – but what makes these brands rise above the rest? More importantly, how can your business benefit from these success stories?

In our new eBook, you’ll discover what traits make brands trustworthy, and how this trust among their customers ultimately shapes their success. Learn from the best and apply their techniques to your brand so it can be successful too! Check out Traits of The Top 10 Most Trusted Brands in America here -> http://hubs.ly/y0VK7F0 

For branding, and other integrated marketing services, please contact Sagefrog Marketing Group at 215.230.9024 or visit www.sagefrog.com.

Responsive Email Design: Why You Need It

The design of your emails is equally as important as the content in your email itself – but we’re not just talking about pictures and graphics. With people accessing emails across multiple platforms and devices, particularly mobile devices, the layout and responsiveness of your email plays a vital role.

Various studies show that people who check their emails multiple times a day on their mobile devices and more likely to delete their emails if they do not display properly.* With the ease of accessing emails on tablets and mobile devises, potential customers can delete messages just as easily as they can view them. Without the proper design responsiveness, potential customers won’t be reading with your email.

So what can a responsive email design do for you?

1. More interaction. Keeping your message short, sweet, and easy to read will get your message across in seconds. This will lead to more people potentially clicking or interacting. Lengthy, poorly designed emails require too much time to look at, and as a result, are often deleted.
2. Better reputation. People like when things work. Creating an email that is consistent across all possible platforms and devices shows responsibility, which establishes your brand as trustworthy.
3. Embracing micro-moments. When do you check your email? A lot of people check their mobile email whenever they WANT to (when they have a spare second or two), rather than checking it when they HAVE to on a computer (work, school, etc.). Drawing customers in during these moments that may only last a few seconds is extremely effective because it makes your brand prominent during a time that you couldn’t plan for it to be.

* According to the US Consumer Device Preference Report: Q4 2013 from Movable Ink

* Via “The ultimate mobile email statistics overview” on Emailmonday

For responsive email design and other integrated marketing services, please contact Sagefrog Marketing Group at 215-230-9024 or visit www.sagefrog.com.