Marketing Moxie Blog

A good number of businesses are struggling in terms of growth. This can be attributed to a variety of factors for example economic conditions. However, most are suffering from what we could call “lead generation” problems. Most sales personnel have reached the end of the line because they believe they’ve hit the limit of people and businesses to sell to. A further misconception that sales is simply cold calling as many people as you can doesn’t help matters at all.

Yet for a business to be successful, it must be able to generate new sales leads or in other words find new business. The big question however is, “How many leads should be generated to be deemed enough?”

The number of sufficient leads varies from industry to industry or company to company but largely depends on how effective the following are:

• Marketing strategy
• Sales strategy
• Website performance
• Quality of content

According to a 2015 Demand Generation Benchmark Report by HubSpot, most industries except the financial one recorded a similar volume of traffic per month (10,000-50,000 visits). Nonetheless, an inbound marketing ROI calculator can simplify the process of establishing exactly how many leads a business needs to be successful in its marketing efforts. Based on revenue targets, the calculator assess the number of lead volumes to aim for.

But in as much as lead generation is important, statistics have shown that up to 68% of B2B marketers are yet to find success with it. Moreover, only 5-10% of sales qualified leads are successfully converted into customers. What’s more surprising is that only one in 10 professional marketers describe their lead generation efforts as “highly efficient and effective.”

As it turns out, most marketers and companies always think that they need more and more traffic. But in truth, they already have the traffic but are not converting it into sales. But why does this happen? Here are some of the reasons prospects don’t convert:

1. Conversion aversion

This is literally where a page does not tell the first time visitors what to do next. And if they do, they don’t offer reasonable steps.

1. Page pollution

This can be defined by crowded landing pages with numerous options, auto playing audio and videos, among others; simply a lot of confusion and poor design.

1. Keyword disconnect

Not delivering what the visitor used to find the page in the first place. A disconnect between what the visitor is looking for and what they are being offered.

1. Lack of credibility

This is simply failure to talk the talk and walk the walk by leaving no indication that the company knows its stuff or the industry at large.

1. A one-way website

Another reason why visitors don’t convert is running a one-way website that does not encourage any form of interaction or show interest in engaging with web visitors or capturing their personal information.

There are many more reasons for failure out there but we can all agree that in the world of Inbound Marketing, it’s all about the leads. Usually, the website should be the hardest working sales person. But while we could sit here and talk about how lead generation is a science or a process or whatever, it’s the essence of the marketing funnel. As such More in Store, the leading marketing agency in Halifax Canada, has come up with 30 Greatest Lead Generation Tips, Tricks, and Ideas.

This guide looks at the secrets HubSpot uses to generate over 70,000 leads per month. The guide will teach:

• The best lead generating content
• How to create irresistible offers
• Secret web optimization tools with A/B testing and much more

If you are a marketer, business person, blogger, or whoever, this guide is your yardstick to generating more high quality sales qualified leads. Download a free copy to great lead generation.

One challenge faced by many startups is reaching the right audience, either as a brand-new company or as a startup ready to scale. In a highly-competitive landscape, it can be difficult to gain traction and get the attention needed without being tempted to resort to cold calling and other often frustrating outbound marketing practices. In contrast – when done right – inbound marketing can appeal specifically to an ideal audience. In its simplest form, inbound marketing helps lure potential customers and investors to a company’s website – and keep them coming back. A software, such as HubSpot can help startups create and manage their inbound marketing efficiently, saving them time and money!

What is HubSpot?

HubSpot is an inbound marketing and sales software that helps companies attract visitors, convert leads, and close customers. It takes traditional marketing and takes control by optimizing your content for search engines and social media, as well as attracting prospects through innovative landing pages, calls to action, personalized email marketing campaigns, and so much more. HubSpot also gives companies the analytics and resources they need to make sure their inbound marketing efforts are working.

HubSpot for Startups

Over 6500 startups are using and succeeding thanks to HubSpot for Startups, and because they truly believe in their product – and in its power to help startups, qualifying startups receive up to 90% off Hubspot for Startups for the first full year and the discount continues with 50% off for the second year and 30% off for the third year!

It has quickly become a leading inbound marketing software for startups because Hubspot not only provides startups with their marketing, sales, and CRM software, but also offers education and support. 

What does Hubspot for Startups do?

Hubspot is the technology that powers Inbound Marketing, while Hubspot cut its teeth in the Inbound Marketing space, the tool now is so much more.

Hubspot for Startups is designed to jumpstart a startup’s inbound marketing as well as organize and analyze sales funnels, create innovative landing pages, automate email marketing, and so much more. It’s designed to let busy startups see their inbound marketing and sales efforts with a clear-eyed perspective. You’ll discover where your inbound opportunities are hiding out and get in control of where you should be focusing your marketing and content efforts.

Hubspot is the technology that powers Inbound Marketing, while Hubspot cut its teeth in the Inbound Marketing space, the tool now is so much more.

Startups know the value of timely growth and by saving on the right software to do the job you can focus on the strategy and plan to create marketing and sales that customers embrace.  That is where I come in, I have experiences working with start ups and helping customers putting the power of Hubspot to work for them with the right strategy and tactics.

 I’d love to tell you more about how Hubspot for Statups has fuelled growth for my clients, click to learn more.

Inbound marketing has been shown to cost 62% less and generate three times more leads compared to traditional marketing techniques (outbound). Despite this, 75% of businesses do not yet have an inbound marketing strategy. This may seem to underscore another finding that shows customers spend up to 50% of their time engaging with custom content online. But before any judgment can be passed on inbound techniques, it’s important to note that online buyers navigate 57% of the buyer’s journey on their own without really talking to any sales person. All thanks to inbound marketing.

While there’s a list of grievances about how majority of businesses remain lukewarm to this revolutionary way of marketing, it turns out there are reasons for it. The biggest reason which is also a huge grievance is that these businesses don’t have a dedicated person to handle their inbound marketing segment. The few that unsuccessfully give it a shot let juniors/ interns handle it just because they are “digital natives.” Nothing personal against them but no junior can post relevant content all day, engage with customers online, and do other whatnots.

It would be wrong to claim there is no inbound marketing recognition out there. Nonetheless, there’s failure to appreciate professional services about the same and the turnaround they can provide. These services are all about making your marketing work for you one step at a time. Businesses are three times more likely to see more Return on Investment (ROI) from professional inbound techniques than traditional outbound techniques. And for those who need a reason to go the inbound way, that is just one of them. The other reasons to do it professionally are:

1. Simplifies sales and marketing jobs-sales and marketing teams can come together to create powerful content with less hassle
2. Increases visibility and brand awareness even for the smallest companies
3. Educates prospects in the world they live in-majority of prospects do their research online. Therefore it’s more effective to meet them where they like to spend their time.
4. Increases trust and credibility-random emails and calls are now viewed as unnecessary interruptions. But if you can let a prospect consume information on their own and be there to respond to them when they have questions or need to engage, it creates a credible image.

So can a little inbound marketing work? Yes it is possible to do a little of it internally. But the real magic usually really happens with a well thought out plan, strategy, and regular inbound marketing tactics. This is where the professionals step in and take the wheel.

More in Store Marketing believes that marketing efforts should be accountable. Honestly, there’s a lot that needs to be done in coming up with a strategy. But we make light work of this and relieve businesses of all the marketing headaches they may have had. Why not take the first step with a free Inbound Marketing Assessment.

As a marketer you can’t be all things to all people. It can be helpful to get to know who you are selling to and who you aren’t. That is, the need to pinpoint exactly the kind of audience that is relevant to whatever products or services you are offering. This is where consumer psychographics come in.

According to Chron.com, a consumer psychographic is “a profile of a potential customer based on interests, activities, and opinions. It is a snapshot into a consumer’s lifestyle organizations often used to quickly identify potential customers.” In other words, psychographics explain why someone buys.

Hubspot says that to effectively reach the target audience, a marketer needs to understand both the audiences’ demographics and psychographics. Demographics being who your audience are, that is, age, gender etc, the dry facts about them. A combination of demographics and psychographics form a buyer persona: a semi-fictional representation of the ideal customer.

If not the most important, buyer personas are one of the most important parts of any marketing strategy. For those who are skeptical of this, here’s why they are so important:

• Without them, marketers wouldn’t know what content to create. The whole purpose of constructing a buyer persona is to know who exactly to attract. Many businesses are struggling to understand the new buying behaviors of today or how to even keep up with them. Buyer personas highlight who the buyer is, their situation, how the situation has changed, and what they want to achieve/ satisfy.
• Trust and interest are the heart of marketing. Buyer personas allow marketers to identify their customer’s pain points and focus marketing power on providing solutions. With the right content, engagement with potential customers remains relevant. Without it, trust as well as interest is lost and there’s nothing like making first impressions twice.

How to create buyer personas

Those who have been near the world of marketing know buyer persona is a term thrown around casually as if everyone knows about it. As it turns out, creating one is just as simple. Hubspot advises marketers to go about creating buyer personas through:

• Research
• Surveys
• Interviews

To gather the relevant information, they offer the following methods:

• Going through contact databases to uncover trends about how customers find and consume your content
• Incorporating form fields on website forms to capture important personal information
• Sales teams feedback on who they interact with most
• Interviewing customers, prospects, third party networks, and even referrals
• Making use of behind-the-scenes website analytics

After the data gathering process, marketers are left with raw but rich data about potential customers. The big question is often what to do with it. Often, the next step is usually to identify common interests and patterns among the interviewees. However, filtering all this information is never that easy or straightforward.

More in Store Marketing has come up with a free and downloadable template to create a buyer persona. The template organizes information gathered and then shares the created personas with the rest of the company. We understand that getting the psychographic data is important but what’s even more important is how to apply it to marketing. With our help, we make the data effective to marketing efforts across various fields.

Social media has become a very visual marketing tool. According to Hubspot, 80% of marketers are using visual assets in their social media marketing. This means marketers have to produce graphics that are not only eye-catching and relevant, but also on brand. They also have to ensure these images are optimized for each specific social network. Graphic design can be a time-consuming and overwhelming endeavor, but thankfully online graphic design programs, such as Canva can help designers and non-designers alike easily produce attractive graphics for both web and print media.

Canva has a free version that allows marketers to use their simple drag and drop editor as well as create two folders to organize designs, have access to thousands of templates, get 1GB of storage for photos and assets, as well as access to photos starting at $1 each. The free version of Canva is a great starting point for marketers wanting to ensure the tool is right for them.

Once you start using Canva, you will quickly find yourself wanting to upgrade to Canva for Work – the paid version of Canva. Starting at $12.95 per month, the paid version of Canva is ideal to not only collaborate with team members, but also to keep your graphics organized either by client or brand. 

Canva for Work sets a team up for success by offering unlimited folders for designs, so you can separate images for specific campaigns, as well as offering the ability to upload custom fonts for your brand, save logos, set colour palettes and save templates accessible by everyone on a team. This enables everyone on a team to create graphics with a consistent look and feel.

One of my favourite features of Canva for Work is the ability to resize designs into set dimensions based on a social network i.e., Instagram, Facebook and Twitter at the click of a button, as well as resize graphics into custom dimensions. Canva for Work takes the excuses out of not having a well optimized and good looking social profile and marketing! 

If you are looking to improve your social presence, contact More in Store to review your marketing techniques and to gives you a broad-based analysis. We have set up Canva for Work accounts for several clients, including uploading logos, setting up folders, creating samples, and setting brand colours and fonts. More in Store can provide you with the insight to improve your online marketing to keep your brand at the top of customer opinion and drive forward the sales and engagement you require to ensure continued success in business.

Get started by downloading the More in Store social media sizing cheat sheet today!

If you’re reading this, then chances are you already realize the power of Inbound Marketing with Hubspot and therefore, you probably already know 54% more leads are generated by inbound tactics than traditional paid marketing (HubSpot State of Inbound). If you are a Hubspot user, you likely also understand that effective inbound marketing takes a well thought out strategy and time to devote to implementation and evaluation.

While the analytics of inbound marketing let you assess almost any aspect of your efforts, there is always something that needs your attention. As a business owner or marketer, it pays to take a step back and look at your inbound marketing efforts with objective eyes. But you know that kind of objectivity is nearly impossible when you’re a highly invested entrepreneur who lives and breathes your business. This is where a Hubspot Audit comes in. A Hubspot Audit gives you an accurate picture of your marketing presence and provides practical recommendations for improving marketing programs.

Inbound marketing review

Before you write your next blog post or enhance the SEO on your latest web page, let More in Store review your current Inbound Marketing Efforts. We will evaluate your content, your social presence, your efforts, landing pages and other key elements that customers see when they interact with you.

In addition to customer facing marketing, we will also review the back end of your inbound marketing efforts. We’ll focus on your specific needs, but common areas of focus include understanding and segmenting your customer for the most effective Inbound Marketing. 

Database Segmentation

One of the toughest challenges that marketers face is understanding who is in your database, how your contacts are different, and then deciding how to best market to them. The best place to start is by grouping your contacts by similar characteristics, and then building a strategy for each group. 

Defining these different groups is the art of segmentation, and getting it right is no small feat. You need both a framework to do it properly, and the tools to actually put your segments to use. 

If you are just getting started with segmenting your marketing database (or taking a step back to rethink how you’ve been segmenting for a while) More in Store can help!

Landing Pages Optimization 

How are your landing pages performing? How do they compare to similar businesses and to industry best practices? Do you have offers for different customer personas and different stages of the customer lifecycle? More in Store can work with you to determine what’s working, where are the gaps, what needs streamlining.

The Hubspot Audit is designed to let busy business owners and marketers see their inbound marketing efforts with a clear-eyed perspective. You’ll discover where your inbound opportunities are hiding out and get a grasp on what you can change today to better leverage your business’s strengths. Find out if a Hubspot Audit is right for you by clicking below.

LinkedIn is one of the most powerful, yet undervalued online marketing resources. Most people tend to gravitate
 toward Facebook and Twitter, and while those are great for getting results, LinkedIn can garner even more results. Because it's not used as much for marketing, there is some confusion as to how to market on LinkedIn effectively. One of the biggest sources of confusion is the difference between 'Share an Update' and 'Publish a Post'.

Share an Update

Generally, this is for used for short, simple messages. For example, if you wanted to share a link with a brief commentary, you would use this option. You can also upload photos here as well. When you do this, a thumbnail of the image will appear below the text box. This is the ideal option when you want to share relevant stories, video or photos with your connections.

Publish a Post

This option is for longer posts. Here you can put a couple of paragraphs, or even write a full blog post. It still shares your post with all of your connections when you publish, just like the share an update option does. It also sends a notification to all of your connections to notify them that you've published a new post. You can embed video and photos with this option as well.

Generally, you only want to use the post option if you have more than a few sentences to share. Be careful that you are not sending too much, either via the share or the post feature, as your connections may get a little tired of hearing from you, even if you having something relevant to say.

A longer post can be beneficial, though, to influence your followers and help get you viewed as an expert in your industry.  The publish a post feature also has a few marketing advantages -- like a headline and the ability to TAG the post with relevant keywords.

If you're not sure of what to post or how often, use the "Pulse" feature in LinkedIn, to follow posters and get an idea of their posting style and frequency.

The other major different is a post that is shared shows up in your followers notifications...

LinkedIn has the potential to catapult your business to the next level, if you understand the features and market properly. Don't ignore this invaluable resource.  Ready to put LinkedIn to work for you?  Download these free resources.

 Take a look at your website. How many pages do your potential customers need to click through before they find 

out how much you charge for what you do?

There's no right answer to this question - there's a valid argument for putting pricing information in various places on a website. However, if the answer is that the customer cannot find any pricing information at all, there may be a problem.

There's nothing more frustrating than searching for a price. Everyone's found themselves clicking through FAQs and 'About Us' pages hunting for some mention of cost. Everyone remembers giving up when the information remains elusive after a few clicks too!

The unfortunate truth is that customers probably won't bother searching through a website if it's difficult for them to find out this crucial information. Why would they when there's always countless other sites that provide the same products or services alongside specific details?

People want answers when they're surfing the web. Even if they're just browsing or following an enticing social media ad, they'll never consider using your services if they don't have at least a ballpark figure attached to you in their heads.

Here are some strategies for presenting your pricing information. Every business and every site is different, so these might not be right for you, but they represent a few simple and effective options.

1. Price on the Home Page

This might seem a bit upfront, but for some businesses this is ideal. How many websites that you use regularly have their prices in huge type and garish colours on their homepage? It's not the right technique for everyone, but if low price is a part of your USP then you'd be missing a trick not to advertise this on your primary landing page.

If you know that you're on the lower end of the price spectrum for your product or service then this is a great strategy, but it also works if you're promoting honesty as part of your core values. Putting a price, even if it's a starting price, out there before the customer knows your company intimately makes you seem upfront and open.

2. Price on a Dedicated Page

For more complex services or multiple options it can be good to have a dedicated pricing page. PDFs of full price lists should be available, but there's nothing wrong with listing a handful of your most popular options to give a sense of your cost-range.

This can act as a menu of what you offer, which gives you an excellent opportunity to upsell by offering packages.

3. Price Behind a Form

This can be polarising, so it depends on your service. If everything you do is highly bespoke, then it's OK to require potential customers to fill in a simple form to get personalised pricing estimates or an analysis of what you can do for them. Also: an email list is a mighty advertising weapon, so this option can have multiple upsides.

Having said this, some casual browsers would rather not have direct contact with a human representative before they know if they're able to afford services or not, so it's still a good idea to give some sense of scale with a 'starting from' price list.

There are as many web marketing solutions as there are businesses, so the right answer for your site may be a combination of these or something completely different.  The important thing is that you think about what your customers want from you and you deliever on that.  If you are ready to take your marketing to the next level, connect with me.

Before there was inbound marketing, there was outbound marketing. The latter included cold calling, direct mail and email blasts but these repelled rather than attracted customers. So brands sought out to related to consumers in a meaningful way and that was by creating content that was relevant, accurate and interesting.

In an era dominated by search engine use, pushing e-mails and messages the same old way will not cut it. There are three critical components of inbound marketing. They are SEO, content and social media. The three elements should be managed together as a comprehensive three-pronged approach. If well implemented, it can be very effective in drawing in customers.

SEO
Search engine optimization or SEO coordinates content with on and off SEO. This is achieved using a number of different methods including image names, site maps, alt text, meta data, html tags and content. This is easier to implement with platforms that are compliant with Web 2.0 platforms such as WordPress.

In putting out SEO content out there, it is important to realize that there are rules and regulations to be followed. Search engine giant Google leads and others follow so one must play by their rules. One reason Google stays at the top is because they go all out to ensure those who use their services only find relevant information. Overstuffing content with keywords can lead to a website getting penalized, including relegating such content to the bottom of the pile meaning browsers will never find it.

Content
Search engines thrive on content. The days of searching in the Yellow Pages are long gone; today, it's all about the internet. Being the website where browsers find the content they are looking for is what sets apart one website from another. Content must be relevant, current, easy to understand and interesting. Websites that often refresh their content often have higher rankings than those that don't. Things are always changing and content should be refreshed to reflect this. Content may be great but it it is old, it's not any good.

It takes the form of blogs, articles, podcasts, e-books, videos, white papers, listings. This should then be promoted through online marketing campaigns, integrated branding, lead capture campaigns and website development.

Social Media
Social media tools have become the means people and businesses use to keep in touch and to share what is happening around them. Facebook, Tweeter, LinkedIn, YouTube and other social media tools are being used to reach people all over the world.

Apart from unlimited reach, these tools are also ideal because they generate responses very quickly. A single tweet or Facebook posting can create a buzz very fast. These tools are also very inexpensive to use as a means of promoting a business and they give unlimited reach as they can be seen all around the world.

All together now

Just having these accounts is not enough though. They need to be synchronized, optimized and used effectively in a strategy that will ensure that one garners and holds the attention of browser so that traffic is continuously generated. The focus should be on capturing and retaining the attention of potential customers through the social media that they frequently use.

The three critical elements of inbound marketing should be viewed as a road map which if well laid out, will lead browsers to the intended destination of your website. There are 250 million websites worldwide and counting. These three elements must strategically be put to the best use possible to make your website stand out from all the others that competing for the attention of the same customers.

Ready to learn more about what Inbound Marketing can do for you?

Running a successful small business is a dream for many individuals. The dream often involves visions of happy customers returning time and again and new customers streaming through the door. However, the reality often involves long hours spent over marketing plans and deciding on how best to reach continually elusive new customers. It is possible to reconcile these two images, however, and the key lies in automation.

What is automated marketing?

Far from taking control away from the small business owners, automated marketing improves their control over the business and the direction it takes. It also allows small business owners to free up much needed time to concentrate on other important aspects of their businesses by providing the right tools and support to ensure that business marketing efforts are reaching the right audience, at the right time, at the right place.

How does it work?

As with any businesses marketing, automation starts with goals. Marketing automation services, such as those provided by HubSpot, take those goals and build upon them to nurture leads. The process involves more than just sending automated, yet personalised, emails to prospective customers; it also provides businesses with information and feedback, including internal notifications, lead scoring, and personalized website content. By having all of this processes running smoothly in the background, business owners are able to see the whole picture, rather than being bogged down in the small details.

Is it enough?

If the business owner has a good grasp on the goals, the customer segment, and the ever-changing world in which both the business and the customer are operating, then possibly automated marketing is enough on its own. However, no business can ever have too much support and having a guiding hand to support growing new campaigns, setting new goals, and redefining customer segments is a definite benefit.

The key is to utilise services specialising in the areas where the small business owner may not have enough knowledge, or may not even realise are essential. Something as simple as providing a business with a presence audit, an in-depth look at how the business and its brand are perceived, can make a huge difference to customer retention.

Involving other channels

Simply automating existing marketing channels may not be enough to gain the most out of services such as those offered by HubSpot, but knowing which new channels to open into is a daunting task. Using too many, or too few, or worse still ignoring the one channel where the business audience segment is found, can make even an automated marketing service pointless. Knowing which channels, including social media platforms, email, blogs, and websites to use is crucial. However, it is not just about the audience, it is also about the business's budget, future goals, and time needed to investigate this thoroughly. Support in researching channels, the best times to publish content, and the best types of content to place is essential if the automated marketing workflow is to work effectively and cost-efficiently.

Putting it all together

Take the time to learn and increase business knowledge by taking on training opportunities and consider mentoring and partnership opportunities. Consider bringing on an expert who can guide the business through the planning and evaluation stages, and take advantage of full market automation services.

Businesses vary in their support needs just as much as they vary in the goals and plans that are the basis of their marketing. Finding the support that understands this, and provides exactly what the business needs is always the first and most important step. It's never too late, or too early to ask for help!

Think you could benefit from Marketing Support? Let’s start the conversation.