Canopy Marketing

A frequent request of my clients is to get their website on page one of Google. It’s great to see a client’s site hit page one, and it’s always a goal to get the best placement possible. But who cares where your site lands on Google if no one is buying the service or product you are promoting? As the web evolves and consumers get more savvy, we are clearly seeing some trends. Top of the list is quality content and that leads to a concept called Inbound Marketing. Inbound Marketing means bringing the customer to you, rather than taking your web offering to them. It’s means pulling potential customers to your website and then converting them to paying customers. Sounds great, but how do we do that?

Effective Inbound Marketing is a combination of several strategies. First, you need to look at the content of your site. People at the beginning of the buying cycle are usually gathering information. Does your site provide the information your clients will be looking for? As info seekers get closer to becoming a buying customer, their needs get more specific. Does your site talk to this need and offer a solution that makes them want more information?

This is accomplished through a compelling “Call-to-Action”. A Call-to-Action trades the customer their contact information for something they want. It could be tips or info sheets at the information gathering stage, and a discount, coupon or appointment at the buying stage. Your site should have a Call-to-Action at a variety of levels for every service you provide. When you give away quality information people are happy to provide you with their contact info, and now you have the opportunity to nurture that contact and build a relationship.

It’s not magic and it’s not trickery. It’s honest business: giving people what they want in a way the want it, and, in turn, building confidence that your company is the best choice to move forward. The water out there is full of sharks. It’s really not that difficult to stand out when you offer straightforward, authentic help to people.

At Canopy Marketing we build Inbound Marketing programs for clients using the software platform developed by Hubspot. Hubspot is an amazing, affordable and well organized methodology to build quality leads for your business. Using the software, we develop a strategy and create an engaging, interactive site that will help your company:

• Get found online
• Convert site visitors to customers
• Analyze the process to increase conversions and measure your true ROI

It’s quality web marketing and we are seeing it work for our clients.

Every ten minutes the newest tactic for web marketing hits. How can anyone keep up? Is it my Facebook page that will make me money? Do I need to blog? What about on-line Yellow Pages? I talk to clients every day who are overwhelmed with the amount of information out there about how to market on the Internet. There’s more to do than hours in the day and it costs money. So what should people do who want to grow their business and know they cannot ignore Internet marketing?

Each facet of Internet marketing is like a stepping stone across the pond. Every pond is different and each step is simply a part of getting you across to the other side. Just as every business is unique, your approach to marketing on the Internet should reflect who you are. Is your competition local or national? Are you selling a product or a service? How and where does the financial transaction occur? What are your competitors doing on the Internet. All of that matters when deciding how to market and where to spend your money.

The Internet is evolving, and users are more sophisticated today. The driving force behind quality Internet marketing is providing quality content. Telling your potential customers why they should buy your product or service and giving them the information they are seeking in their buying process. It’s also called Inbound Marketing. It’s different than going out to your clients with your sales pitch. It’s drawing them TO you with quality info that they want and need in order to buy.

And here’s where keywords come into the picture. It used to be that putting a bunch of keywords into the code of your site was the ticket to getting listed at the top of Google. My perspective is “Who cares if you are on page one of Google if nobody is buying what you are selling.” More important is finding the client who wants to buy and earning their trust because they were looking for something specific and you provided it. That’s quality Inbound Marketing and it hinges on understanding keywords and how they impact they way people find your website.

When I blog for clients or coach them on how to blog effectively, the first thing I do is identify the primary keywords and long-tail keyword phrases that real people are using to buy what my client is selling. Once we’ve settled on these keywords we have a strategy to follow. We use the keywords to map out a blogging calendar, complete with blog titles that incorporate the keywords. So the next time my client sits down to blog they are not wondering, “What in the world do I talk about today?” Nope. They know they want to get hired as a wardrobe consultant, and they know what keywords they are targeting. So they sit down and write a blog with a meaningful title, incorporating the keyword. It’s a balance between strategic thinking and providing meaningful and engaging content that your customers want. It’s not rocket science, but it does take some planning. And it works. Most of your competitors are NOT doing this, so if you do, you just might find yourself with that next paying client.

Next time: more on Inbound Marketing…how it works and why.

Well, I realized the day was inevitable that I figure out Twitter. As a marketing consultant and website developer, social media is obviously an important factor for my clients considering all their marketing options. As a seasoned marketer, I recognize that no single effort will meet your marketing goals. I watch clients all the time, with fear in their eyes, fall for the latest telephone salesperson promising Page One Google Rankings or Social Media Magic 101.

So, I’m a bit of a skeptic. But I also know that every day brings a new dimension to social media marketing and its unprecedented affect on our world. What we talk about, buy and believe in is driven more and more by what we see online. So with that, here are a few tips for conquering Twitter with information from .net magazine and my spin: (more…)

I’m preparing a talk right now to present to my business networking group. What to say? I get the opportunity every few months to talk to this group and am always looking for something interesting to talk about so I don’t get too many glazed over looks peering back at me. Talking to any group at 7 a.m. in the morning is pretty daunting. (more…)