Christine, Author at Kreativworx (Pty) Ltd

Google Ads

5 Ways To Leverage The Latest Google Ads Trends In 2021

In today’s crowded online marketplace, it can be challenging to get enough traffic to your website. Some businesses spend hours promoting their business on every platform. But you shouldn’t have to do it the hard way, there are tried and tested methods to increase traffic and conversions with a small time and monetary investment. Google conducts 63,000 searches per second, a giant user base such as that is obviously where you want to be seen first and foremost. Here is why you should consider Google Paid Ads: Google has 90.46% of the search engine market share worldwide. 15% of all searches have never been searched before on Google. Google has a market value of $739 billion. An average person conducts 3-4 searches every single day. Here are 5 ways you can incorporate the latest Google Ads trends in 2021, to increase traffic and sales on your website: 1. Google Ads Smart Bidding Smart Bidding is one of the many ways Google has incorporated artificial intelligence (AI) in their advertising suite: Smart Bidding is a subset of automated bid strategies that use machine learning to optimize for conversions or conversion value in each and every auction — a feature known as ‘auction-time bidding.’ Machine learning enables Smart Bidding to manage several signals at once in order to tailor bids to each user’s context. Smart Bidding is a great option for businesses that are just getting started with Google Ads or for those who don’t have a ton of time to devote to managing a campaign. The one downside to this system is that you can’t control where the ads will be displayed. 2. Google Discovery Ads Google Discover is a personalized mobile newsfeed that shows relevant content to users even when they’re not searching. Because the focus of the content is relevancy, it doesn’t always give you the newest content — typically quality evergreen content is featured. Google Discover is available via the Google mobile app and by visiting Google.com on a mobile browser. Users can control what shows up in the feed, which leads to a more personalized experience. Google’s Discovery Ads are native ads that show up in multiple Google feed environments. Similar to Display Ads or YouTube ads, Discovery Ads must be visually engaging and mobile-friendly so that they feel native to the feeds they are displayed on. Google uses machine learning to optimize ad placement based on users’ search history, feed engagement, and other factors to deliver them to the most interested potential customers. 3: Google Gallery Ads Similar to Facebook’s Carousel Ads, Gallery Ads feature images that mobile users can scroll through to get more visual information about a brand, product or service. According to Google: Gallery Ads work: Early reports show that ad groups including one or more Gallery Ad have up to 25% more interactions. Gallery Ads will appear at the top of mobile search results and feature 4-8 images. Each image will have its own text, along with a static headline and URL, and advertisers pay when a user clicks or swipes an image. Gallery Ads may not have as many applications for B2B or service-oriented brands, but businesses with offerings that lend themselves well to rich visuals should definitely take advantage of them when they are widely released. As Google increasingly moves away from the text-only search ads, advertisers will have more opportunities to present their products and services in a way that makes the most sense for their business — and their customers. 4. Expanded Audience Segments As of October 2019, Google offers two expanded audience segments: Affinity Audiences: These audiences are built around interests and identified based on browsing behavior. Some examples of Affinity Audiences are beauty mavens, convenience store shoppers, and cloud services power users. According to Google, Volkswagen used affinity audiences to achieve a 250% increase in conversion rates. In-market Audiences: These audiences are actively researching or comparing products and services. Google recently rolled out new seasonal event segments for these audiences so that advertisers could reach consumers on search and YouTube with timely offers. With over 700 in-market audiences identified, many companies will have the chance to interact with customers who are ready to make a purchase. 5. Google Ads and Voice Search As more and more people buy smart speakers and search Google on mobile, text-based search is going to continue to decline. And that will mean big trouble for advertisers. Consider these stats: 72% of people who own voice-activated speakers say that their devices are used as part of their daily routines Voice shopping is set to jump to $40 billion in 2022 2 out of 5 adults use voice search daily As of right now, voice searches that use screens — such as using Google voice search on a desktop or on a phone — will display ads…but smart speakers like Google Home and Amazon Alexa devices don’t. But the good news is that Google is already testing ads on Google Home. As users move away from text-based search, the tech giant will surely find ways to monetize voice search. The Kreativworx experienced team can assist you in implementing the latest Google advertising trends, so you can get the best return for your investment. To request a free consult, give us a call or send us an email. Source: https://www.singlegrain.com/google/google-ads-trends-2021/

February 9, 2021 No Comments

Social Media

How to make Facebook ads work for your small business

If you are allocating part of your 2021 marketing budget to Facebook ads, it’s important to get a good return on that investment. If you’re running an ad, you are probably concerned about the conversion cost. This will depend on all aspects of your ad – from the headline to the targeting, the copy, even the graphics or video assets used. Every element of how you set it up will affect your return on investment. In this article we go into some factors that you could optimize to increase the conversion rate and decrease cost per click on your Facebook ads. The quality and relevance of Facebook ad images One factor that most people don’t consider when they set up their ad, is the size of the graphic or video content they use. You can put hours into crafting excellent written content for your ad, but if you don’t pay enough attention to the graphic or video content, your ad won’t hook Facebook users’ attention long enough for them to read the copy. One way to approach this is to choose or design an image that can convey the same core message, result, or desired action, as you would in the written copy. Your image should always be related to what you’re selling, whether that is a product, a service, or for the user to click through to another website to a free resource. Even when a user skips reading the written content, the image should immediately convey the core idea of your offer. If your ad hooks the ideal customer for long enough, it will convert many of those who would have scrolled past. Make Facebook ad headlines actionable and short Writing a creative headline is not enough, dedicate most of the time you invest in your ad to crafting a powerful and actionable headline. Therefore most businesses who are successful with advertising on Facebook, invest in outsourcing their ad copy, including the headline. When optimizing your Facebook ad headline, consider these factors: Keep your headline short. Studies have shown that longer headlines do not lead to conversions. Put numbers in your headline. People tend to click headlines with numbers rather than headlines with words only. For example, a headline with “5 Benefits of using a contractor service” would get more clicks and conversions than “Why you should use a contractor service”. Don’t use too many superlatives. After analysing advertisements on Facebook, it was discovered that up to 51% of users tend to click headlines with zero superlatives. Instead, use as few words as possible in your headline to draw the user into action, choosing words that better convey the quality, scarcity, or excess that a superlative would. Facebook ad conversion is all about clicks. Most small businesses who aren’t experienced in crafting successful Facebook ads, is that these are not designed to sell. Rather, they are best used as a funnel to acquire more qualified leads. Therefore, the purpose of your ad is to get your audience to click through, with intent and curiosity, to the next step in your funnel. The goal of your copy is to draw the user into clicking the call to action button. A skilled copywriter will keep in mind that Facebook users generally are not in a state of mind to be sold to. An experienced marketing team will craft ad copy that promotes curiosity, relevant to your product or service offering. Use testimonials and reviews in your Facebook ads. Social Proof such as reviews will always make your ad better. Local services such as Restaurants, tourism companies, even movie theaters, experience tremendous success using reviews of their clients and customers, displaying them on various physical and digital platforms. Using social proof in your Facebook ads by including testimonials in the graphic and written content, tells the audience that people have loved using your product or service. Data has shown that ads containing five-star reviews as headlines obtain high conversion rates. The element of risk associated with a product or service diminishes greatly, once potential customers have proof of your past customers who’ve been happy with the service and value for money they received. Retarget website visitors through dynamic Facebook ads. Retargeting with dynamic ads can be a great strategy to leverage your product feed when executing a successful dynamic ad campaign. For example, you can link the product data from an ecommerce platform such as WooCommerce directly to Facebook. Dynamic Ads provide the opportunity to target users based on how they engage with specific products or pages on your website. Dynamic ads not only help reengage previous site visitors and cart abandoners, they also turn Facebook into an impactful ecommerce channel. The Kreativworx team is experienced in every facet of crafting effective Facebook ad content, as well as configuring your ads to get the best return for your investment. To request a free consult, give us a call or send us an email.

February 1, 2021 No Comments

Lead Capturing

Tactics to turn a website into your most powerful lead generation tool

Tactics to turn a website into your most powerful lead generation tool If your marketing goals for 2021 includes bringing in a larger amount of qualified leads, even with a small marketing budget, we’ve got good news! There are tried and trusted methods for turning your company/brand website into a powerful lead generation machine. In this article we’ll explain our recommendations for the top website tactics to focus on in 2021 and beyond. But before you can nurture and convert them into buyers, you will need to get a larger number of warm visitors onto your website. To do this, commit to tactics that improve your website authority and reputation – such as producing and publishing higher quality content, instead of a higher amount of content. SEO in 2021 and beyond puts the focus on strategic, quality content The days of stuffing as many relevant keywords into each page as possible are long gone. In fact, Google would probably penalize you for attempting this, resulting in your website’s rank going way down or the domain even disappearing from relevant search results. The team at Creative Click Media asked a few industry experts on their predictions for effective SEO practices in 2021 and beyond (source): Content is (Still) King One of the most important SEO trends that will continue in 2021 is high-quality content. It will be literally impossible to stand out from the rest unless you produce relevant content. The algorithm is now much more precise and able to recognize and boost websites with credible information. -Malte Scholz, CEO & Co-Founder of Airfocus Lengthy Content Rolling out stellar content doesn’t always involve keeping it short, though it should always be sweet. In fact, longer content (2000 words and above) has been attracting more views in recent times. These longer pieces tend to be comprehensive guides to popular subjects, and if they are well written as well, they become a one-stop shop for viewers. -Deepak Shukla, Managing Director of Pearl Lemon Topic-Focused Content I think 2021 will see a greater focus on topics, rather than individual keywords. Savvy SEOs have already been taking this approach for years, but recently, the data used by major keyword research tools has become less reliable and search engines are always getting better at understanding broad topics instead of one-off terms. If you want your content to do well over the next couple of years, try to take a step back and understand the whole issue, not just one keyword you hope to rank for. -Daniel Caughill, Co-Founder of The Dog Tale Mobile-First Indexing We feel that mobile-first indexing will be the biggest trend because more than 90% of the world uses Google as their primary search engine. There are many websites online that have very low mobile speed scores and some sites are still not mobile-friendly. We know that Google is switching over to mobile-first indexing this month, however, it is still unclear when all the pre-existing websites will be indexed based on the mobile versions. Our predictions are that websites that rank well currently but have a bad mobile version will slip down the ranks and there will be an increased demand for mobile optimizations in the SEO realm. -Caleb Riutta, Dusk Digital These predictions agree with our approach to planning and producing content for marketing clients from a wide range of industries and specialties. How to put SEO tactics for Lead Generation into practice Quality content = your customer’s current state of mind + your company’s unique ability to help Invest time in crafting excellent and valuable content, showing your brand’s unique positioning in your industry and what sets you apart, connecting it with your ideal customer’s most pressing needs and state of mind. Crafting longer articles to show expertise, generosity, and authority Don’t roll out short blog posts based on topics and interests that replicate what so many other websites in your niche have published in the past. Instead, invest more time to develop thorough and in-depth articles that could serve as cornerstone pieces which you can repurpose throughout the next month/quarter. This will also ensure that each blog post can be repurposed multiple times over a longer period, as the information should not become outdated. Keep the big picture in mind when choosing topics – think out of the ‘keyword box’ Instead of focusing on specific keywords and phrases when planning and writing content, drive more visitors to your website by considering the overarching themes and interests related to your service/product offering. If you have created your ideal customer avatar (which we recommend you do), think about the common interests, worries, or challenges, shared by most of those who would already be interested in or looking for what your business provides. Where does your niche, industry, or specific offering overlap with the information they would want to consume? Make a short list of these ‘big picture topics’ or overarching themes, and craft excellent and valuable content related to those. Design and develop for mobile, adapt for desktop It’s no longer good enough to ensure your website functions effectively on mobile browsers. Search Engines will soon start downgrading websites that are not 100% accessible, fast, and easy to index (if they hadn’t already). Mobile users have become accustomed to ease of use and speed, you now have even less time to grab their attention before they click away or close their browsers. They are likely to abandon their cart or online form if important information or key navigation elements are missing, inaccessible, or hard to read. We recommend you approach the design of your website with the first consideration being mobile users. Some visual/functional elements cannot be replicated or adapted for both mobile and desktop view, therefore it is vital to work with a professional web developer or agency who can advise you throughout the design and development process. Qualify and convert visitors in less time using Chatbots Bots enable your business to reach out to and gather data on more

January 25, 2021 No Comments

Lead Capturing

Online Lead Generation Techniques for 2021 and Beyond

Online Lead Generation Techniques for 2021 and Beyond With most businesses being hard hit by the recent nation-wide restrictions because of the 2020 health pandemic, a focus on lead generation and sales is vital during 2021 and beyond, for each business owner and the economy. The good news is that you don’t need to hire sales staff or dedicate more of your own time in order to double down on certain marketing and sales tasks so you can drive more qualified leads into your small business. Modern Technology offers many low-cost tools and techniques to help you scale and refine your sales and promotion processes for lead capturing, nurturing, and conversion. This year presents SMEs with a wide range of options to capture new leads and drive them down the sales funnel, from website optimization and chatbots, through to paid Social Media campaigns, and even a new take on Google advertising. Below, we will provide an intro to the top 3 online lead capturing techniques SMEs can get started on today, to improve the quality and amount of leads they receive in 2021 and beyond. Lead Capturing on your website Did you know that your website is your most valuable lead capturing tool? It has the potential to attract an organic, ready-to-buy audience on a consistent basis. Every day there are customers and clients searching the internet for brands, products, and services, just like yours. Now that’s what we’d call a qualified lead! In 2021 every business should invest in lead capturing techniques for their website, to increase their business and brand’s rankings in search engines, so customers come to them. This could involve implementation of one or all of the following: SEO Starting with identifying the best target keywords for your site, optimizing your website content, generating high-authority backlinks, and optimizing your business’s online listings. Chatbots Facilitate real-time or automated conversations with website visitors, widen your marketing reach, and obtain new leads. Forbes predicts that “brands that master two-way conversational marketing and commerce will also deploy chatbots and AI” in 2021. Lead generation pages Create high quality landing pages that offer truly valuable and professional resources to your most preferred potential customer, in exchange for their personal and business information. This information can be used to nurture them through an email sequence and share more valuable content consistently, until they are ready to purchase. Google Ads Contrary to popular opinion, advertising through Google is not for those stuck in the 1990s – Google Ads are not dead. What PPC advertisers called “Google Ads” or “Google Banner Ads”, will be largely replaced with the “Google Display Network” and “Google Retargeting Ads”, also called Adwords. If you are new to these terms, here is the 101: Search Ads Search, the most familiar of paid online advertising, appears directly in a search results page – above and below the organic results. Search Advertising reaches people who have shown an interest in something you’ve designated as a good match to what your ads are selling, immediately after viewing your ad. Display Ads Display ads are shown on websites that sign up to the Google Display Network. The person being shown the ad did not see it as a result of entering a query into a search engine. Google Display Network ads are like background players – they are shown on external or non-search engine pages where a person is engaged in some other type of activity. Depending on the targeting you choose, there may or may not be any type of recognizable connection between your ads and the site being viewed. Remarketing / Retargeting Ads This refers to a method of display advertising that is only triggered if a person has previously visited your website or landing page or is targeted for being “similar” to people who visited your site. It can be set up to be very general – show my ads to anyone who has ever visited my site. Or it can be incredibly specific – show an ad to a person who visited your site and looked at boots but didn’t buy them, about those specific boots for 36 hours after the initial web site session. Or any number of different scenarios in between. Remarketing ads can be just the nudge you next customer/client needs, to convert from browser to buyer. FB Ads Small Businesses who are spending money on Facebook ads in 2021 want to get real value for their money. Considering all of the talk that the reach of posts on Facebook pages has decreased considerably, it is important to be smart and focused when planning your advertising campaigns. While it may seem like Facebook’s influence is waning, the truth is that there’s no social media platform that has more reach or number of active users than Facebook. A recent study has shown that of the total number of Facebook users, 70% use the app daily. The second most popular platform for daily Social Media use is Instagram, averaging at 58% daily users. Even Twitter retains only 38% of its total users daily. This data goes to show that if you’re running ads, Facebook is the best platform to focus on, as it ensures more eyes on your ads more often. If you are concerned about your ad’s conversion cost, know this – your conversion cost depends solely on your ad itself. Every element within your ad, from the headline to the targeting system to the copy and even the image used, affects how well it will convert. While there are countless tutorials and free resources on the internet that could teach you the basics around creating a Facebook ad campaign, it would be wise to consider outsourcing this task. An experienced Online Advertising professional will have up to date working knowledge into the finer details and different creative or content writing techniques, to help you increase your FB ad conversions, increasing the quality and amount of leads with a more conservative budget. Over the next

January 15, 2021 No Comments

Search Engine Optimization For Social Media

SEO

Search Engine Optimization for Social Media

Search Engine Optimization for Social Media Your target audience becomes your brand advocates when they consume your quality content that connects with their present state of mind. By becoming a reliable source of valuable information for them, your followers and readers will share and recommend your links with their network. Creating original content consistently and regularly, is an effective way to attract more visitors to your website. The type and format of content you create should engage your audience. Some content formats that are most effective are blog articles, videos, infographics, and podcasts. You can entice your target audience into returning repeatedly and ultimately converting them to customers, when you get into a consistent routine of creating valuable content for your website. That is the premise of content marketing, to share valuable information, knowledge, or advice, that helps your target market. Distributing this content as wide as possible and promoting it consistently, is vital to the effectiveness of this strategy. Your audience will get the ball rolling by sharing your posts to their own network. This increases your brand visibility, improves traffic to your online presence, and generates backlinks to your website. Social signals like these notify Google that your website content is popular and credible, which could dramatically improve your website’s rankings in search engine results. Here are some considerations regarding the impact of Social media on SEO: Content shared on Social Media should be education, entertaining, or increase awareness on a particular challenge or solution. Focusing on truly valuable content will help you gain traction, increase the reach of your posts, and generate links to your website. Quality content helps your profiles to rank better in relevant search results while increasing the traffic and subscriber/follower count of your Social Media pages. The above benefits will have a knock-on effect by enhancing your brand reputation. Increasing the number of times Social Media users share or post links to your website, will help Google with the correct and more effective indexation of your blog articles. Indexation can lead to more traffic from search engines and improved rankings of your website in search results. The social signals explained above will strengthen the factors Google considers when ranking a website in search results. You can accumulate those signals in mass by sharing on different Social Media platforms. Below are 4 practical recommendations on how to improve your SEO with Social Media 1. Value Quality over Quantity Google indexing bots and search engine algorithms have developed to understand user intent and the quality of content. This enables Google to offer users the most relevant content based on the phrases and words used in their search queries. It is no longer effective to cram relevant keywords into each page or post. In fact, it will most likely hurt your website’s ranking in search results. To make your blog content perform well on Social Media and in search engine results, prioritize well-researched and truly valuable content. Invest sufficient time in research and development of well thought out and strategic copy that will connect with your readers. This is much simpler when you truly understand your ideal reader’s present state of mind, how their current challenges relate to your industry or niche, and how your unique positioning could help them. 2. Make it easier for fans and followers to share your content With all the vital elements in place, such as social share buttons and interesting CTAs (calls-to-action), readers will share your content. Having social share buttons and compelling CTAs in place and immediately visible on each blog article, makes sharing on social media much simpler. Using CTAs in your social media content also encourages your followers and subscribers to share your posts. There are other important factors to keep in mind when creating content to ensure it is engaging and easy to share on social media. Write engaging headlines and captions. Design appealing graphics. Ensure the content is useful to your target audience. By focusing on the above three factors when creating content for social media, your profiles and pages have a much greater chance of reaching more of your ideal audience, more often. 4. Build relationships through thoughtful conversations Building relationships is one of the best ways to increase engagement on your social media accounts. This tactic also helps you understand your ideal customer’s state of mind, needs, and their most pertinent and current challenges. Here are our tips on how to start conversations with your fans and followers to build long-term relationships (which convert to repeat customers): Ask relevant questions to find out how they perceive your brand. Ask their opinion on your latest blog article. Search for questions related to your niche or expertise posted elsewhere on the platform and reply with helpful answers. Post a poll regularly to track their interests or challenges for ideas on topics to address in future blog articles. Encouraging these kinds of discussions often improves your SEO while establishing your brand as an expert in the industry. 5. Using storytelling as a powerful marketing tool Use enticing story snippets in your posts to hook your target market and make them share your posts with their network. “I believe the future of marketing is relatability, especially in our noisy digital world. And to be relatable, you must be authentic and engaged. There’s no better way to do that than telling a story! “ – Brian Fanzo “At the end of the day, people won’t remember what you said or did, they will remember how you made them feel.” – Maya Angelou “Because storytelling makes the connection between a brand and its audience, it’s like a bridge that makes the customer attached to a brand on an emotional level.” – Estelle Van de Velde You can expect a blog article from us soon explaining how to use storytelling in your Social Media strategy. In order to improve SEO using social media, add your most important keywords and phrases within the post captions. Include

December 19, 2020 No Comments

Branding

Building an Online Brand Through Social Media

Building an Online Brand Through Social Media For any SME building a strong online brand in 2021, Social Media is an indispensable part of an effective marketing strategy. In a previous blog post, we explained why building a brand and building authority is important, the difference between the two concepts, and we shared our top recommendations on how to do that through writing unique blog content. The focus of this article is to share with SMEs our recommendations for building an authentic brand online through Social Media. It is important to understand that marketing and promoting your business on Social Media does not end once you have created a profile or company page. First, customize the graphics on your profile or page to match or resemble your website and overall brand look and feel. Then, and this is the part that requires ongoing focus and commitment, interact with your followers and fans to build authority in your industry. Our Recommendations On How To Utilize Social Media To Build Brand Image And Authority: 1. Customize your presence on each platform to be consistent with your brand image and with each other Imagine a prospective business connection or customer landed on your social profile, and they doubted even for a second whether it belonged to your company. This is something that you should try to avoid when designing any graphics or content for online use. Maintaining a consistent image across all social media platforms is one of the most important parts of building a brand online. Whichever Social Media platform or other online presence a customer or connection uses to find your business, it should always be clear to them it represents your brand. These are some examples of paths your future followers and fans may take to find you: Their friend could share one of your posts on their personal feed, see the post, then click on it, following it to your blog or another page on your website. After seeing a tweet about from you on Twitter, they could visit your profile, and then continue onto your website. When visiting your website they may click on a link to your Social Media profile to see how your company is engaging with fans and followers. 2. Make it easy to find your profile or page on Social Media It is important to follow some basic steps that will help your potential customers and business connections to find you online. Here are our recommendations for the most important tactics to do so: Feature all relevant Social Media icons in plain view on every page of your website Your website visitors should be able to find the Social Media platforms they can follow you on, quickly and easily. Link each icon to your page/profile so they can engage with you there and access more of your valuable content. The most common places to feature them is the very top of your website or in the top menu (next to the main menu links/tabs), in the sidebar, and in the footer. Put links to your Social Media profiles/pages in your email signatures and newsletters You can help your customers and other connections find you on Social Media by putting links to all of your profiles/pages in your email signatures (for employees as well), and listing them in other online communication such as email newsletters. Apply SEO practices to your Social Media profiles and pages If someone searches your brand name and the name(s) of your chosen Social Media platform(s), they should see a link to your profile or page in the search results. To make this happen, it is important to name your social profile or page (and the username if possible) the same as your brand name. Some individuals and companies assume that including keywords in the name, in addition to or instead of your brand name, is useful for search optimization, but we would advise against this. In the next blog post, we will share recommendations on how you can optimize your Social Media profiles and pages and posts, to rank higher in search results – for Google search and for the Social Media platform’s search function. 3. Engage with your Social Media followers, fans, and subscribers It should be obvious by now that it is important to post frequent updates consistently, but you should also be sharing valuable or interesting content much more often than promoting your offers. Engaging with your audience is one of the best ways of ensuring your account stays active on Social media. Here are our recommendations for engaging with your audience, and encouraging engagement from them, on Facebook and LinkedIn: How to encourage engagement on Facebook Updating Your Page on Facebook regularly It’s becoming more apparent that the reach of Facebook posts are limited when they originate from a scheduling and auto-posting application such as Hootsuite. Therefore, it is important to invest in the resources that will allow for most of your posts to be organic or added manually and originating from your page itself. Be sure to monitor your page every day to see when someone comments or shares your posts, so you can reply to them in a timeous manner. It will not give a good impression of your customer service when they comment with a question or complaint, only receiving your response a week or more thereafter. If you get into the habit of responding to comments within the same day or at the most a day thereafter, your fans and followers are more likely to return to your page and engage on future posts. Alternate the themes and types of updates you Different people find different content types/formats interesting and useful, therefore it is important to cater for everyone by regularly changing the content you post. Engage on posts and pages as your brand Search for pages that are not direct competitors of yours but cater to an audience who would be interested in your brand. Be sure to monitor

December 12, 2020 No Comments

Branding

Building an Online Brand Through Blogs

Building an Online Brand Through Blogs Small business owners who rely on marketing and sales through online channels should understand how to build a brand while building authority. But it is important to note that there is a difference between building a brand online and building authority online. Online branding is used to increase your brand’s reach and become more visible on all levels of online marketing. Building authority takes online branding to the next level by making every piece of content for a brand authoritative – micro-content such as comments and macro content such as articles and web pages. Our recommendations on how to build an online brand while building authority, through blogging: 1. Create Thought Leadership Content By contributing to your own or others’ blogs, you could improve your website’s ranking in search results. Google favours websites with content that are unique and regularly updated. Creating valuable and interesting blog articles also provides you with content easy to share on Social Media. It is hard to increase your brand’s reach and improve your authority in the market when you are only posting about your products and offers. But, if you’re sharing informative blog posts about your industry such as lesser-known trends, answering frequently asked questions, or providing helpful information, you’re likely to get a lot of engagement on your social media posts, increasing the traffic to your website. When creating a strategy or content plan for your own blog or contributions to other relevant blogs, we recommend focusing on thought leadership content – original content showing your expertise and specialized knowledge on a specific topic or field of interest. Going above and beyond the usual cookie-cutter blog articles by writing unique and valuable content (aka thought leadership content) helps your brand build authority. 2. Contribute to other relevant blogs The basic premise of contributing a guest blog post is to find a blog whose audience will be interested in your brand, and unique and valuable piece of content for that blog. The goal of this strategy is to increase engagement on social media (shares, likes, and comments) from the blog owner’s online following and customers, which ideally increases traffic to your website. Therefore, this content should be of even better quality than on your own blog. 3. Use guest blogging to build your online brand Find a blog whose audience would be interested in your brand. It should get a significant amount of traffic and social media engagement. Confirm that the blog allows guest bloggers or outside contributors. Start building a relationship with the blog owner before pitching your article idea. Follow their brand/company accounts on all Social Media channels, comment on some of their latest posts through valuable discussion, showing your writing skills and expertise in the industry. Share a few of their posts and tag the name of their page/brand account. You should do this for at least a week or two before pitching content to them. Once you have identified the right blogs and started engaging with the owners/writers themselves, you will get a feel for the content they publish. Write a list of topics that intersects with their current blog readers’ interests, and your business speciality or expertise. Refine the list until you have decided on the top 2-3 topics on which you can create top-quality and unique content. Now you can create a personalized email saying that you have recently enjoyed reading their blog (as evidenced by your commenting & social sharing) and would like to contribute to their site as a guest blogger. After reading their guest post guidelines, you would like to see if they would be interested in the following topics. Then add the shortlist of article ideas you believe will fit their audience. You should also include links to some of the best guest blog posts you may have contributed in the past or some posts from your own blog. When you work on your guest post, ensure that it fits the guest posting guidelines, and that it has the overall feel/tone of the blog. You could also add in relevant links to other posts or pages by the blog owner throughout your article. This shows them you are making an effort to create a post that will benefit their audience and brand, not just your own. After your guest post goes live, invest a lot of time in sharing it with your brand’s audience on all Social Media platforms, returning to those posts to reply to all comments as well. This will further boost your brand’s reputation as a blog contributor and confident authority in your niche. 4. Engage on your own and other blogs Commenting on blog articles can be very effective in building your brand and authority. We recommend subscribing to the top blogs in your industry through Google Reader. That way you can receive up to date and timely notifications on new articles, read it thoroughly, and then add your thoughts in their comments section. Most blogs allow commenters to mention a link to their blog or website. However, we want to remind you that this strategy is not about building links to your website, this is about building your brand’s presence online as an authority in your industry. Kreativworx can develop an online branding and authority-building strategy uniquely tailored to your business and target market. To request a free consult, give us a call or send us an email.

December 5, 2020 No Comments

Branding

The importance of building an online brand

The importance of building an online brand Why do so many business owners assume that creating a brand means to design a funky logo, write a catchy slogan, and they’re ready to go? But in reality, successful branding requires investing a significant amount of time and work. Developing your brand means ensuring a positive customer experience at every stage of interaction with your business, including your employees, advertisements, websites, and content. All of the touchpoints for your business need to come together in the mind of your ideal customer to form the impression you’d like to leave them with. If there is no consistency in your brand message, your business will appear scattered, unprofessional, and totally off the mark. Here are five reasons why building a strong online brand is vital to the future success of your business: 1. Branding Helps Differentiate Your Business from the Competition When you appear too similar to your competition in the mind of your ideal customer, you are missing a significant opportunity to set yourself apart and give them a reason to choose you. The brand has to stand for something, be recognized by the target audience, and communicate something unique and different from the competition. It is understood that it takes seven repetitions of any message to even be heard. Branding is much more than just creating a logo. It is the ongoing communication of your value proposition in a meaningful and effective way. 2. Developing a Brand Gives Your Staff Direction Without direction, your staff will work without a purpose driving and unifying them. By creating a mission statement and direction for your brand, your employees will know where you are going and how they fit into the picture, and they’ll be able to do their jobs much more effectively. This aspect of branding is very motivational for employees. When you have a clear and up to date strategy in place which is constantly communicated with your staff, they will know exactly what is expected of them, and they will be more driven to succeed at fulfilling those expectations. A consistent brand will help your employees see the bigger picture, and they’ll take their responsibilities much more seriously when they know what the company as a whole aim to accomplish. 3. Generate More Referrals through Branding Of the three major types of referrals, namely experience, reputation, and expertise, only experience-based referrals rely on direct interaction with your company. The rest of the referrals usually come from avenues that depend on your brand to do the selling. Reputation and expertise based referrals come from individuals or organizations that have not worked with your company directly but know you by reputation. They hear about you through friends or colleagues, but almost as many will simply “know” you have a good reputation. 4. Customers Know What to Expect When You Have a Strong Brand Consistency and clarity are necessities when creating the brand message you will share with the world. When done right, your customers will know exactly what you and your business believe in, what you aim to accomplish, and how you can serve them. They can therefore determine with more ease and fewer touchpoints whether your business is the right fit for them. 5. Strong Branding Presents a Promise to Your Customer Base Last but not least, your brand represents you and what you stand for. When you approach this correctly, you’ll be able to tell the world who you are quite clearly and effectively, and they’ll have a much better idea of what your business is all about. If you’d like to discuss this topic more in-depth to see how your business could benefit from more clear or consistent branding, get in touch with Kreativworx. To request a free consult, give us a call or send us an email.

November 28, 2020 No Comments

eCommerce Shopping Carts

Do you need an SSL Certificate?

Do you need an SSL Certificate? You may have heard the term “SSL certificate” or “secure website” mentioned online somewhere. But you may not be familiar with the meaning and importance behind these terms. According to Google, SSL and HTTPS should be used on all websites. Those not using SSL will be marked as unsecured if website visitors are using the Google Chrome browser. SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer. This technology helps to secure an internet connection and protect any data that is being transferred between a browser and a web server. It creates a secure and encrypted link between your website and server which accomplishes 5 goals: 1. Enabling Encryption 2. Verifying the Identity of the Site Owner 3. Increasing your website’s ranking in search engine results 4. Increasing sales rates online 5. Positively impacting user experience If your website visitors happen to be using Google Chrome, then your site will display as secure – if you have an SSL Certificate installed. But if you fail to use an SSL certificate, the browser will display an error message before they ever even reach your site. Imagine seeing a warning in your browser stating a website is not secure, the first time you land on a website. The chances are pretty high that you wouldn’t return. Schedule a call or meeting with Kreativworx if you need SSL encryption for your e-Commerce site or want to learn more about why this may be necessary for your online business.

October 28, 2020 No Comments

eCommerce Shopping Carts

Why update your website regularly?

Why update your website regularly? Once you’ve launched your website, you will probably breathe a sigh of relief, or even want to celebrate. However, it is vital to keep in mind that thorough and routine updates for your website are essential, to keep it secure, looking good in all current browsers and devices, and working as required. Below are 5 benefits you will reap from regular and ongoing updates to your website: 1. Software Updates Just like the operating system on your computer, these need to be updated regularly for security and performance reasons. 2. Security You can help prevent hackers from exploiting any vulnerabilities in your website code by keeping your website software updated with the latest patches and security releases. 3. Fresh Content Consumers use an average of almost six touch-points, nearly 50% regularly using more than four. (Marketing Week). You should offer new and valuable information to target customers regularly, to entice them into returning until they are ready to buy. 4. SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION Every time you update the website, you are giving search engines new material with which to rank your site. You must ensure your website is updated regularly with material related to the phrases and keywords with which you want people to find your business. 5. TAKE ADVANTAGE OF NEW FEATURES There are many exciting ways to provide an engaging and personalized experience to potential buyers. An experienced website developer can create a strategic project plan to help you integrate new features into your site, without excessive downtime of your website impacting user experience, and risk losing sales. Kreativworx can offer management packages for you to all of this and more, starting from @R149 per month. Contact us today to have a chat about your requirements!

October 21, 2020 No Comments

Author: Christine

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