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4 Ways Your Business Can Benefit From Having a Mobile App

4 Ways Your Business Can Benefit From Having a Mobile App

In the past, only big businesses benefited from mobile apps. The rising cost of custom app developers made it impossible for small business owners to develop one. But thanks to app development software tools, small businesses are starting to enter the mobile app realm. This allowed business owners with no coding experience to develop an app for their business.

Does your business have a mobile app? If you don’t, now would be the perfect time to build one.

Here are 4 ways your business can benefit from having a mobile app.

Connect better with customers

People always seem to be busy and on the go. They’re going to the office, on their way to a meeting, hitting the gym, or meeting with a friend. When they’re outside, they don’t have access to a computer. But they always have their smartphone within reach.

Having a responsive website is great. Here, they’ll be able to find great products and buy them. However, it may not enable the two-way communication that the app boasts off.

A mobile app provides a direct channel of communication between you and your customers. It allows you to send push notifications directly to your customers’ phones. These notifications can be used to promote new products or services, announce sales or discounts, or share other important information about your business.

This two-way communication is key to building strong relationships with your customers and fostering trust.

Build a stronger brand

Mobile apps bring a lot of information about your products and services to your clients. It improves your mobile presence and exposes your business to a wider audience. Your company logo and slogan will always be visible to users whenever they use their smartphone.

Today, only 55% of businesses have a mobile app. If you don’t already have one, we urge you to develop one now. It will enhance brand recognition and make you stand out from the competition. By the time your competitors realize the importance of having one, you have already grabbed almost the entire market share.

Fast, seamless appointment scheduling

In today’s business world, time is money. People prefer convenience. According to a recent survey conducted by OpenMarket, millennials would rather send a message or an email than make a call.

One of the most beneficial features of mobile apps is the ability to schedule appointments quickly and easily. With a few clicks, clients can choose the date, time, and type of appointment they need. This convenience means that business owners can fill their appointment books more quickly and with less hassle. Additionally, mobile apps often allow business owners to send reminders to clients before their appointments, ensuring that appointments are kept and further reducing the chance for scheduling conflicts. In today’s fast-paced world, mobile apps that allow for easy appointment scheduling are a valuable asset for business owners.

Increase sales

Today, more and more prefer online shopping over conventional shopping. After all, it’s easier and more convenient. Having an app makes it easier for consumers shop whenever they want, wherever they are.

You may have a website where customers can check your newest products and services, but having a mobile app increases customer satisfaction. Remember, 70% of buying experiences are influenced by how customers feel they’re being treated. The more you provide value to your customers, the more they become interested with your products and services. This leads to more sales and bigger profits.

Final thoughts

As you can see, there are many benefits of having a mobile app for your business. If you don’t already have one, now is the time to consider developing one for your business. With a well-designed and user-friendly app, you can increase brand awareness, build customer loyalty, generate more sales, and gain a competitive advantage in the marketplace.

 

4 Ways Your Business Can Benefit From Having a Mobile App

4 Ways Your Business Can Benefit From Having a Mobile App4 Ways Your Business Can Benefit From Having a Mobile App

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4 Reasons Why You Must Have a Mobile Friendly Website

Take a look at the people around you and you’ll notice that majority of them are using their smartphones. According to a study that was conducted by Deloitte, most Americans would check their phones within 5 minutes of waking up and continue to do so throughout the day. In fact, a huge percentage of Americans check their phones 46 times per day.

If your website isn’t mobile optimized, it will look cluttered and unreadable on a 5-inch screen. With our fast evolving digital landscape, websites that aren’t mobile friendly are becoming defunct.

Here are 4 reasons why your business must have a mobile friendly website:

Mobile users make frequent purchases

Ask a business owner what they’re business goals are, and we bet majority of them would say “increased sales”. According to studies, mobile users buy more and spend more as compared to their desktop counterparts.

While tablet usage is comparatively lower than smart phone use, tablet users are said to be the biggest spenders. In fact, they spend 50% more per purchase than smartphone users. Take advantage of this by making sure that your website is mobile optimized. Otherwise, you’ll be missing out on revenue-generating opportunities for your business.

Over half of the web traffic is mobile

As mentioned above, the number one goal of business owners is to increase sales. Next on their list would probably be more traffic to their website. If your goal is to drive traffic to your site, you need to be thinking mobile.

As of 2014, over half of all web traffic is via mobile. In fact, studies suggest that mobile media consumption as of this year was 21% higher than that of desktop.

Improve user experience

People are more likely to return to your website or purchase your products if you offer a satisfying mobile experience. Since mobile users are always on the go, they have limited time to wait. They want to get what they need fast. If you can’t give it to them, they’ll leave and move on to your competition.

You might be offering the most unique, valuable and useful products on the market, but people aren’t going to purchase if your site’s mobile experience is poor or non-existent.

Everyone is on mobile

More and more people are spending more time on their mobile devices. After all, it’s more convenient. It allows us to check our emails, log in to our social media accounts, check the news or research something even when we’re on the go.

4 Reasons Why You Must Have a Mobile Friendly Website

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4 Ways to Increase Your Visibility on Social Media

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Implementing a strong, multifaceted online marketing can help increase your company’s visibility. Social media marketing opens up a business’ doors to customers they wouldn’t be able to reach.

Here are a few suggestions to give your page maximum visibility and to ensure your posts are being seen by your fans or followers.

Content is still king

The more engaging and informative your content is, the more interaction you’re going to get. As a result, more people are going to see your posts.

In order to get this right, you must first know your target audience. This way, you can focus on creating contents that would be of value and interest to them.

Create conversations

Business owners and marketers use social media to stay in touch with their customers and clients, as well as to reach potential customers.

Make it a point to communicate with them on a regular basis. Use plain, straightforward language when communicating with your target audience. No corporate speak, no jargons, no acronyms. Speak directly to that person and make your communication personal.

Be on different social networks

Social networks are the perfect channel to improve the visibility of your brand or company. It can also be used to connect with your prospective and current customers. If you want to generate visibility, consider being on different social networks. But if you find it difficult to manage different social media accounts, you might want to concentrate on platforms in which your target audience spends most of their time in.

Partner with other visible brands

A direct partnership is a great way to build your own brand visibility. If you sell coffee makers, consider having a direct partnership, an affiliate partnership or an implied partnership with a coffee manufacturer.

Viral or video marketing

Videos commonly go viral. Living a busy and fast-paced life, most people choose to watch videos instead of reading a long article. Information is easier to consume and they’re easy to share. Because of this, video marketing gives you the ability to reach a large group of people in a short span of time.

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Tips for Social Media Success

socialmedia_9.8Now that so many businesses are using social media to reach out to potential customers and drive more traffic to their site, it’s only a matter of time before they realize how difficult it is to succeed in social media marketing.

This blog post shows you how to achieve success with social media. Check out the tips below and start incorporating them into you social media strategy.

Choose the right platform

There are dozens of social media platforms across the web so feel free to explore which platforms are best for your business. Choose the platforms where your prospective customers most likely spend their time every day.

Deliver content consistently

One of the best ways to increase engagement and grow your following on social media is for you to be active. Keep in mind, though, that social media success requires more than the random postings about your great sale or latest products. Be sure to provide content that are valuable, interesting and relevant to your audience.

Post timely

Research shows that 92.4% of all retweets happen within an hour of posting. That means that the day and time your post has an effect on virality.

Do your research and determine the best days and times to post for your demographics and industry. Also, remember that there are different time zones for different places in the world. To ensure that people will be able to see your content, no matter the time zone, we suggest that you post more contents throughout the day.

Include pictures

“A picture is worth a thousand words”, they say. But it may be worth more in social media. Posts with pictures get more engagement as compared to those without pictures. In fact, research reveals that 44% of Facebook users are more likely to interact with brands if they include pictures in their posts.

Measure results

The only way to determine whether or not your efforts are successful is by measuring and analyzing the results. If you publish a blog, you want to see how many readers are subscribing, what posts they are reading, how many comments you’re receiving and how well your blog compares to others in the industry.

 

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Signs It’s Time to Outsource Your Online Marketing

BIMS_9.1As a business owner, you want to oversee every aspect of the business. But as the business grows, you will then realize that you can’t do everything on your own. You need to delegate tasks so you can focus on things you do best. Knowing when to hire people is an important part of building a successful business.

In this blog post, we’ll give you 4 reasons why you should outsource your online marketing. Read on and find out if it’s time for you invest in the services of offsite experts.

You don’t have the right skills

At some point in time, you’ll be facing certain challenges you can’t solve on your own. Rather than spending countless hours trying to come up with an effective marketing plan, it might be best to pay someone else to handle the marketing side of your business so you can focus on providing quality service to customers and make more money.

You’re not producing enough fresh content

If you want people to find your website, you need a steady supply of fresh, quality content. But if writing isn’t your forte and you find yourself putting off the task until a few hours before the deadline, why torture yourself? Let an online marketing agency do the work for you while you sit back and enjoy the results.

You’ve reached a plateau

You’ve seen some promising results in the past, but after a few months, you realized that you’re not getting promising results.  Keep in mind that it is a fast-changing environment and you need to keep up in order to succeed. Outsourcing will help you keep up with the rising demands of your marketing.

You seem to be running behind

This is common, especially for small business with only a handful of employees. Your business is growing fast and their workload is starting to become heavy. Eventually, you’ll find that all your projects get pushed against tight deadlines and you seem to be running behind on projects and campaigns, it may be time to consider bringing in a new team.

 

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Tips For Your Mobile-Marketing Strategy

Did you know that half of all internet searches now take place on mobile devices? This calls for businesses to take action when it comes to updating their mobile strategy. The past two years have taken more of a simple approach to the design of mobile devices, but that is all changing in 2015. For businesses, having a site that renders across a wide variety of mobile devices is critical for doing business. untitled

Understanding your audience’s mobile habits is one of the most crucial steps in creating your own mobile strategy. Are they using tablets or smartphones? What activities are they doing on your site? What content are they accessing? Studying how your audience uses their mobile devices is the first step to bettering your mobile strategy. This will help you make content that is specifically focused on what your audience is looking for which will make them coming back to your site. Putting yourself in the shoes of your consumer will also help you to create headlines that will grasp their attention. When it comes to writing a headline for your mobile users, ask yourself whether it is highly relevant to your audience, whether it has a powerful hook, and whether it evokes an image or an emotional response to whoever is reading it.

After you’ve sparked your audience’s attention with the headline, now it’s time to lure them in with a good “lead-in”. The lead-in is what occurs in the first paragraph and is what keeps your reader eager to read on. This is your first paragraph and the most crucial. There is nothing wrong with delivering the most value early on because this is what will keep readers engaged. The readers with a screen that’s too small to read 2000 words on still get the value of a positive brand contact and are likely to come back for more.

Introducing video and visual content is another aspect of mobile strategy that is on the rise. Now is the time to make sure your mobile site has videos, infographics, images, and other visual content that reaches out to your audience. Video marketing is a great strategy when it comes to growing your business, and now with micro-video services like Vine, it is easy to compile your message in to 6 seconds. This may seem like a short amount of time to get your message across, but this can actually be more efficient for your users’ time.

In the past couple of years, we have seen tremendous growth for mobile devices. Our smart phones are becoming smarter than we have ever imagined. As the use of the internet on mobile devices continues to grow, this is giving businesses more opportunities in internet marketing. it is important to think more about our presence on mobile devices and developing a strategy that will help us become more efficient mobile marketers.

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Email Marketing Mistakes to Avoid

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Email marketing isn’t dead. In fact customer acquisition has quadrupled over the past 4 years. This goes to show how effective email marketing is for small businesses. That’s great news, provided that your emails are being read by the recipients.

In order to make sure that you’re getting the most out of your marketing efforts, you have to focus on what’s killing your open rates and find a way to fix them. While some mistakes are harmless, the following mistakes could be costly.

Poor frequency

While a flood of emails may distance the customer you’re trying to attract, the same reaction can also be expected if you send emails on an inconsistent basis.

Have a consistent enough cadence that your subscribers would be thrilled to receive an email from you, yet relaxed enough that they don’t wonder whether or not you’re still sleeping at night.

Forgetting to send emails at important events

The introduction of new products or services, promotions and events your business will be holding are some examples of email worthy announcements. If you have an important event to cover, make it a point to create a multi-email campaign around it.

Poor subject lines

Subject lines are your first impression to every email recipient. They have to be clear enough that people know why you’re sending an email, short enough that they fit the screen of tablets and smartphones and enticing enough not to give away the entire email. Also, be cautious about using words and phrases that could mark your email as SPAM.

Unreliable email list

Whether you’re emailing inactive subscribers, not removing hard bounces or collecting bad data, having an unreliable email list can affect your open rates.

The key to a successful email campaigns is clean data. Make sure that all customer information is valid and up to date. Hard bounces should also be removed from your database.

Additionally, 43% of email recipients click the spam button based on the sender email address and name. So, it’s extremely important that the recipient knows who you are and are expecting to receive emails from you.

 

 

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Social Media Marketing Strategies That Would Drastically Improve Your Efforts

Studies revealed that a huge percentage of American adults spend most of their online activity in social media sites, topping time spent on Google and email. Having this knowledge, marketers have decided to chase online users and focused their attention on social media. In fact, one study revealed that 97% of marketers use social media to promote their business.

If you have not yet taken advantage of the power of social media, then you might be missing a large chunk of your target consumers. Here are a few social media strategies that would allow you to take control over your social channels.

Create a game plan

Without an execution strategy, your content may begin to fall through the cracks. Set a limit on the number of tweets and Facebook posts you have to publish each day. If you are just starting out, you might want to check how often industry leaders are posting and take note of the ideal amount of content that should be published each day. You want to be active, but not overly active.

Treat each channel as an individual entity

Each social media channel should be treated as a separate entity. Make sure that the contents you share on each channel would appeal to the audience. LinkedIn caters to business-focused audience. So, you’ll have to provide them with educational contents. Instagram users, on the other hand, are in search for engaging visual contents.

Go above and beyond in customer service

Social media users today are expecting fast response from you. If someone posts on your Facebook page and they do not receive a response, the dissatisfied client may turn to your competitor and seek answer to their questions.

Taking time to respond to a personal inquiry is of great importance as it builds your authority. When you deliver a thoughtful and timely response, this will have a positive impact on your brand.

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Social Media Red Flags: 5 Signs You’re Using it Wrong

The sheer value of social media marketing combined with the rapid rate in which these platforms are progressing is something most business owners and companies cannot cast aside.

Social media marketing works and is here to stay. Everybody knows that. But that does not necessarily mean you’re using it right.

In an attempt to help you, we have outlined 5 signs that you’re using social media wrong plus a few tips on how to fix it.

Not updating regularly

Not sticking to a regular posting schedule is the most common mistake new social media marketers commit. If your profile runs dry for a few days or weeks, your followers may fall out of habit of checking in with your business.

Your tone is inconsistent

The internet is a noisy place. If you wish to cut through that noise, then you have to employ a unique tone for your business. Employing a unique voice will help you build trust, build and maintain your reputation and engage in meaningful conversations with your followers. Without it, your message shall be left twisting in the wind.

You are constantly broadcasting

Social media is all about interaction. Sending your thoughts in a one-ways fashion will not help you in any way. Instead, you’ll be missing out on the powerful benefits of engaging with people.

You ignore negative comments

No matter how popular your company is, you can’t prevent negative comments from coming. Instead of ignoring or deleting them, it would be best to offer your sincerest apology, provide them with a candid explanation and any actions you might want to take. Plus, re-assure your client that this won’t happen again in the future.

You are focused on quantity

When it comes to building a social media following, you should not focus on quantity alone. You may have a lot of followers but if your engagement rate is close to non-existent, then you’re definitely doing it wrong.

Build a following that would help you grow your business. Try to connect with people who would find your contents useful and whose content you can benefit from as well.

 

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