60 Blogs in 60 Days – Unexpected Consequences of Blogging Everyday [Recap]

Wow! Time sure flies. The past 2 months I have been blogging Every Single Day. This was an experiment to not only see the effects of blogging on our business, but also to embark on an educational adventure. Change obviously isn’t instantaneous, but my new attention to the business and writing blogs certainly had unforeseen outcomes.

In this blog post I’ll be reviewing some of the trials and tribulations as well as things I’ve learned, real results, and where we go from here.

Setting the stage:

In 2017, I wanted to take a more purposeful interest in our own digital marketing. So many of our clients are through relationships we’ve built offline, that as a digital marketing agency, I knew at some point we needed to start walking the walk. We’ve been cruising along with a 6 figure business managing marketing efforts and doing web design for small businesses, but our own online presence has always been more of an afterthought.

After years full of competing commitments and lifestyle changes, 2017 became the clear year that I needed to attention on the business to really get it to the next level! In 2015 I graduated with honor from the Leeds School of Business after getting my MBA while working and running BIMS full time. Then in 2016 we welcomed our gorgeous (and tough) little girl to the world. I was back to jumping on conference calls while breastfeeding within days (probably more like hours) of bringing her home. Though I cut back face to face meetings, I continued to run a networking group and somehow managed to juggle a transition to motherhood as a business owner as we went into our most profitable year in business. However, throughout this time, I knew there had to be an easier way to do business. I love working with clients face to face, but sitting as the face of the business certainly has its pitfalls as you can never really step away.

My goal for 2017 is to set the systems in place to redirect our business to less hands on work and more digital assets. Blogging for 60 days straight was meant as a launch pad to refocus attention on the business, our email lists, and ultimately launch a program that could be repeated over and over again. Surprisingly, besides blogs for clients, I had never actually written a post for our site as we always have had interns and contractors writing for us.

Not sure quite what to talk about, I followed the advice we  give to our clients and created a content plan utilizing Trello as an organizational guide. Before technically starting the 60 Blogs in 60 Days challenge, I was off to a good start with a weeks worth of posts ready as drafts in Trello. About 30 other topics were listed with notes and bullets to make the writing of the content a little easier. Then I jumped in!

Getting Started with Blogging:

It was exhilarating writing the blogs and publishing them on the site. Not one to really share personal information on my own social networks, I set up tools to automatically post the blogs including:

  • Zapier: On Zapier I create 3 Zaps. Two Zaps automatically posted the featured image to Pinterest (on 2 different boards) and the third was actually to automatically post our business Instagram images to Pinterest.
  • SNAP (Social Networks Auto Poster) Plugin: This plugin is great for WordPress. It automatically links your blog with Delicious, Medium, LinkedIn, Facebook and other networks so each blog post is published or back linked elsewhere. Though I never quite got the settings figured out for LinkedIn and the Medium SNAP became disconnected, I theoretically had the blogs going out to a handful of networks without needing to do anything else on my end.

Finding time to write the blog posts got more difficult, but at the  start of the 60 day challenge, I often used Voice to Text while walking our dog. Unfortunately, Mary Kathryn started wanting to walk during our walks rather than just hanging out in the stroller. Once this started, I decided not to multitask and just focused on playing with the girls on our walks. That’s when evening blog writing started and I’d carve out time after dinner to write the blogs hoping I wouldn’t need to finish them during the sacred morning nap time (or as I like to call it, the most productive part of the day).

Initial Results from Blogging:

The initial results from daily blogging were fantastic! Within weeks we had seen an increase in traffic to the site. Now keep in mind, like a lot of business websites, our site was really just a brochure for our business should someone we met in person want to read about our services. It was really built as an afterthought, rather than designed to fulfill a specific purpose.

We were pretty pleased with the initial traction we were getting from the blogs and actually sharing the blog posts to our social media networks online. To track this, I ran a Google Analytics report comparing the date range of 4/2-4/22 to the previous period. From here, I pulled the reports for Acquisition > Traffic > Source/Medium and Behavior > All Pages to see where people were coming from and what pages they were visiting on our site.

Traffic to BIMSTeam.com has INCREASED 117.65%!

Pageviews on BIMSTeam.com has INCREASED 83.02%!

An increase in traffic of 117.65% certainly was exciting even though our traffic numbers are still relatively small for a 6 year old business making 6 figures. This increase had to be a good sign, right? The only problem was that the site wasn’t set up to capture emails and leads. Once someone landed on a blog, that was that. We didn’t have any freebies or downloads. Recognizing this, my schedule of blogging once per day because a little more challenging.

I now recognized that we needed these additional resources as a way to actually capture the leads and again walk the walk of the advice we always give to clients. Traffic to the site is great, but you need to make sure you are being purposeful about what you then DO with those individuals.

Competing Priorities:

I haven’t mentioned this yet, but when I launched the 60 Blogs in 60 Days, I also signed up for ConvertKit as a way to provide daily emails to other individuals who wanted to commit to 60 Blogs in 60 Days. The one problem was that the day I first posted the landing page to some Facebook Groups, I immediately got 20 signups in a day. Great right!? Not for me. As I wrote the blogs, I also needed to make sure I wrote the corresponding daily email to be sent to subscribers. These emails include tips, blog topics, motivational quotes, and how to’s for SEO, sharing your content, writing headlines, and so much more. At times I was able to turn the email into a  blog post, but often it came down to basically writing 2 blogs Every Single Day.

I urge you to sign up for the 60 Blogs in 60 Days Challenge if you want to read all these tips 🙂

60 Blogs in 60 Days

So what did this mean… Well, basically from the beginning I had competing priorities. I wanted to fulfill the challenge myself, but I also had a commitment to the individuals who had registered for the challenge. To date, the landing page for the challenge has a 34% conversion rate – not too bad, ehh?! It was the first landing page I created with ConvertKit, so looking at it now, I would probably adjust the page and content some, but at 34% visitor to lead sign up rate, I may just keep it as is and test a second design if I decide to keep pushing the program.

As I also mentioned, I realized a few weeks in how important it was going to be to offer resources and freebies for site visitors as a way to grow our email list. This resulted in me continuing to write the blogs every day, but slowly nearly falling behind as I also was creating guides, ebooks, and a digital course.

About 3 years ago or so, I remember stumbling upon the Nectar Creative and loving the resources Melyssa Griffin offered. It seemed really unique to have one signup and then access to her full collection of downloads. Of course she’s now one of the business owners you want to emulate and has done an incredible job growing her business. But, when I first saw her resource library, I set out to recreate all of the resources. Getting caught up in business school, growing a family, and managing every day business operations, I never actually created a single download.

Knowing that the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, the second best time is today, I jumped in and got started. There is only so much you can do by kicking yourself for not acting on something years ago, but life is about prioritizing, right? For the past few years, my priorities weren’t growing the BIMS Team’s online presence. Now, at last, it is!business blogging, how to blog for business

SO, in addition to the daily blogs and daily emails, I now set out to create resources. As you work on projects like this, it can be difficult to stay committed and focused. Though I’ve always tried to be really good about not multitasking, I began to feel like my head was spinning and I would start jumping from project to project while trying to also finish up web design projects, on-boarding new clients, and fulfilling client obligations.

With hundreds of browser windows open, I began scrambling to balance the time I spent educating myself, committing to furthering BIMS, and working with clients. Above this, most days I also had Mary Kathryn by my side. Time management and prioritizing, one my dear friend, became a distant memory. So much for following tactics laid out in the Four Hour Workweek or discussed by Todd Herman. In the span of one month, I went from one neatly organized notebook to a cluttered desk and three notebooks each with meeting notes and to do lists from every day. I’m so excited as a am moving back towards normalcy as it comes to my time management and prioritization of tasks.

Did I mention that at this same time my husband left his job to focus on building his freelance business? At least I now have more consistent help with the girls 🙂

Actual Results from 60 Blogs in 60 Days:

Beyond slowing picking myself up from complete disarray, a lot has been accomplished in the past 60 days! Actually, even more than I imagined has been pulled together. Granted, some of the blog posts were god-awful and never edited and I think some may have been published without actually being completed, I did fulfill my goal of posting a blog every single day for 60 (actually 64) days.

But above and beyond that, through emphasizing a commitment to my business, I’ve begun creating some REALLY great resources for business owners, people just starting out, and bloggers.

Some examples include:

  • This Website Planning Guide: A free workbook that covers the steps you need to take before you start designing and developing your own website. It includes prompts for your brand values, fonts, and colors, as well as a step by step guide for writing you About, Services, and Product pages. My goal is for this to turn into a Website in a Weekend Program for those Do it yourself-ers who want to make sure they are building their site the right way without spending thousands for a web designer to build a site for you when you don’t have the money coming in the door.
  • Blogging Your Business: This course was built mostly using content from webinars we ran last year, but also provides the exact template we use to build an editorial calendar, broken down to daily posts, for our clients. It is a go-to resource to understand how blogging can be useful for your business  as an avenue to propel growth to the next level.
  • Blogging 101: This is a easy to implement guide for outlining your blogs and best practices for SEO. It is a great tool for those who just need a little extra help outlining their blog topics. [Sign up form is below].

The process of writing a blog every day allowed me to explore certain topics in much more depth than I ever had in the past. It created an avenue for me to actually set aside time to begin creating resources and to focus on the digital marketing for The BIMS Team.

We’ve always gotten clients through RFP’s or word of mouth and networking, so a lot of changes needed to take place on my personal accounts specifically and some of the layout of the website. These website changes are almost complete, but prior to a month ago, we had no forms or calls to action.

Additionally, as you can expect, website traffic increased as did email sign ups! We currently have 928 active email subscribers, of which 100 are new from the various calls to action and content upgrades on the site!

Where to from here:

While I wish I could continue blogging every day, the posts with the highest engagement and most traffic were, as you can guess, the longer blog posts. These posts I never wrote in one sitting and very clearly show cased more information than the shorter and sometimes poorly written posts.

My game plan after this is to:

  • Write 1 blog post per week that comes in at 1,500 + words
  • Write 1 blog post per month that is 5,000 words
  • Create 1 video per week or audio to complement the blog post
  • Focus on building Pinterest with more of a game-plan
  • Continue creating, updating, and optimizing the Content Upgrades or Free Resources on our site
  • Turn my attention on continuing to grow our email list
  • Update the Blogging Your Business course to include even more actionable advice

You can follow the progress and receive free tips, tutorials, and advice on our email list here.

Hopefully this overview of my experience with blogging 60 days straight was informative for you and provided advice and guidance that you can bring with you as you create your own blog and digital marketing plan!

Blogging | Blogging Management | Best practices for blogging | blogging for business

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Tips to Get Your Emails Noticed and Read

Emails are the most commonly used communication tool in business today. Businesses, big and small, use email to communicate with their clients and customers. Wouldn’t it be great if every customer and client reads and responds to your email? Unfortunately, most people only read the subject line.

Here are some tips to get your emails noticed and read. Use these tips and you’ll notice an increase in your open and response rates.

Subject line matters

Most people are so focused on the body of the email that they don’t give the subject line much thought. In order to get your email noticed and read, you want your subject line to stand out. Remember, this will be the first thing recipients see when you send an email. If you use generic emails, then you are less likely to get a response. This is especially true if the person receives about a hundred emails a day.

Be specific

Mention in your email what it is specifically you want the person to do. Do you want him/her to click a link to learn more about something? Do you want the recipient to connect you with someone? Or do you want the person to meet with you? Be clear about what you’re asking for.  If the recipient doesn’t know what you want, even after reading the email, he/she likely won’t respond.

Keep it short and simple

Long emails can look intimidating. No one wants to wade through long paragraphs looking for important bits of information.

When it comes to emails, the shorter the better. If possible, limit your message to 3 – 5 sentences. Your emails won’t stand a chance if it takes longer than a few minutes to read. Be considerate of the recipient’s time.

Pay attention to the time of the day

Email is a great way to reach out to your clients or target audience because it feels like a non-intrusive way to get a hold of someone. After all, it will be in their inbox and they’ll see it once they check on their email. But with emails coming in almost every hour, the one you sent last night can easily get lost in the fray.

To improve the chances of your email getting read and responded to, you want to send an email when the person is actively checking on his/her email. Early in the morning, during lunch break or during office hours is the best time to send an email.

Email marketing tips | How to get Email Marketing working for you | Increase email open rate

Email marketing tips | How to get Email Marketing working for you | Increase email open rate | Tips to get your emails open and read

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Search Engine Optimization in 2017 [VIDEO]

 

Hello everybody! I’m Caitlin McDonald with Boundless Marketing. Today I want to talk a little bit about SEO or search engine optimization.

Search engine optimization is even more important now than ever has been in the past. The reason is because article creation in general has shifted over the past year or two years. Basically there are so many different players out there, which is phenomenal, but in order to stand out you have to work even harder than you had to in the past. Especially if you’re just starting out, these blogging tips are really going to be helpful as you are making a position for yourself.

I have a couple of tips for you. The first ones we have talked about in the past, but then I’ll go into more detail, as well.

The first tip is that when you are writing those blog posts, don’t shy away from writing longer blog posts. We used to always emphasize splitting longer blogs up between part one, part two, and part three so that in one piece of content you’re going to be linking to different pages.  Now it’s actually a lot more important to have longer blog posts. I recommend going up to 5000 words within a single blog post. This is because when you’re really writing that depth about something you’re providing very valuable information to your clients and to your readers.

The next piece is when you’re writing a blog post that this longer, such as 1500 words long, you need to make sure that you’re dividing the content up into different sections. We do this by utilizing heading tags, bullet points, bolded words, etc. Now, heading tags are very easy to implement. Basically, when you’re writing, you’re going through and need to figure out where the obvious divisions are in your content. Are you coming up to a point where you’re going to be talking about five tips to do something, followed by five ways to implement it, and then techniques for follow up? Each of these is a clear division in the content. All you do is you highlight the text, and in the text editor you select the text style for Header 1, Header 2, Header 3 etc.

Which header tag you choose really this depends on how long your content is and how frequently are inserting the breaks in content.

This last piece we haven’t talked about before is using different types of media within your content. Right now, as you can see, I’m doing a video, but I’ll also have the transcript and some images. By creating and including diverse types of media in your blog post, you can help your post rank higher in your industry or in your category for specific keywords.

In general, not every reader is going to learn the same. Somebody who is more into listening and looking rather than reading, is going to be drawn to one type of post rather than another. Additionally, within posts you want to create the images that are going to be shareable. Having those shareable images really helps with the optimization for Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, Facebook, etc. If you don’t feel comfortable with filming a video you can also do a podcast. That’s another great way to increase the different types of media that you have on the site.

Now the next piece that I recommend doing is sharing all of your information or knowledge as downloadable resources and freebies on your website. I’ll go into more detail in that in a later post, but these tips will point you into the right direction as you’re jumping into using search engine optimization on your blog posts.

Search Engine Optimization in 2017 [VIDEO] | Blog SEO | Search Engine Optimization in Blogging

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The Most Common Misconception About Digital Marketing

Running a business in the digital age has its perks. It also can be incredibly difficult. Retail stores need to rethink their sales channels and social media networks get you sucked into a deep abyss if you aren’t careful. Over and over again, however, we see business owners make the same mistake. It is based off a misconception that can not only hurt the long term success of your business, but can also keep you from ever getting off the ground in the first place.

The most common misconception about digital marketing is that digital marketing replaces the need to make personal relationships.

When we first create social media accounts for clients, we have to consistently change our client’s mindset about what their networks will do for them. Our clients want to see their networks boom, which can be a great goal, but to what end? Would you rather have a small network of devoted customers who trust you and help sell for you or a large network of individuals who don’t even recognize your name, let alone buy from you?

Many times the client who wants and expects the large network then stops their in person networking and relationship building thinking that one post per day is actually going to lead to new sales. Though, again, if your network is active and trusts you, this may do the trick, but for businesses, you can and should never stop your personal relationship building.

The digital age has made many business owners lazy when it comes to getting their word out. They sit online wondering why nobody has come knocking on their door. Those who hustle, however, reap the benefits.

You now have access to millions of people, if you only reach out. My recommendation for clients is to find the individuals who are are your level or a step above you that you admire and wish to connect with. Start following their social media accounts and commenting on their posts. As you do this, share their posts, too, and tag them so they can a notification that you are publishing their content.

From here… reach out! Write an email or direct message the individual. Let them know how much you’ve enjoyed their articles on X, Y, Z and then get straight to the point. What are your goals for reaching out for them? Do you want to run a joint webinar? Do you have an article that you think their audience would enjoy or benefit from?

The more clear you are, the more likely you will receive a reply. Of course, leading up to this point you’ve been interacting with them on their social media and blogs, so you should already have some name recognition.

In addition to digital networking, keep up your local networking.

Meeting with people and groups keeps us on our toes and from moving away from what the market needs. It helps us refine our message and get real time feedback from individuals we know and trust. This blog post  goes into more detail about why networking groups can transform your business and how to get involved.

To make sure that you aren’t making the biggest mistake in the digital age, continually get out of your comfort zone and form actual relationships with people you admire who are one step ahead of you. Even if the relationships start online, you are still treating the account handle or email as a person, and that individual respond accordingly.

Do you still network in person? Have you succeeded at reaching out to an individual you now partner with online?

Be sure to share your success stories!

The Most Common Misconception About Digital Marketing. Running a business in the digital age has its perks. It also can be incredibly difficult. Retail stores need to rethink their sales channels and social media networks get you sucked into a deep abyss if you aren't careful. Over and over again, however, we see business owners make the same mistake. It is based off a misconception that can not only hurt the long term success of your business, but can also keep you from ever getting off the ground in the first place.

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Are you Making this Services Page Mistake?

Services pages are often thrown together by businesses just because they know they need something to explain what they do. We’ve spoken with hundreds of business owners who “plan” to go back and edit their services, but got busy and just haven’t had the time. Quick, take a look at your services page(s), what do you see?

If your website is like most businesses, your services pages focus heavily on the features of what you offer.

“Each is a feature-a factual statement about the product or service being promoted. But features aren’t what entice customers to buy. That’s where benefits come in. A benefit answers the question “What’s in it for me?,” meaning the feature provides the customer with something of value to them.” – Entrepreneur.com

This is the BIGGEST mistake your business can make on your services pages.

So, how should your services page be written? Rather than thinking about what you offer specifically, think about how your offerings can transform the lives of your clients. To do this, you need to change your mindset.

First, identify the individual who would benefit the most from each service you offer. Think about their pains, their successes, and how your service BENEFITS them. Think about what other services this individual could sign up for rather than working with you. What makes you different.

Second, try to transform the features of your service into benefits. Rather than answering what you are providing, go through the list of everything your service includes, and turn it into a benefit.

Lastly, create a story around your service. Explain what the ideal customer is going through and how you can solve their pains. Try to follow the structure below:

Structure for your Services Pages

Rather than simply listing the features of your services, the goal is to think in terms of the benefits and create an emotional response. Take a look at the answers you just wrote down – is there a way to turn this into a story?

Use Storytelling Copy:

  • Opening
    • Highlight the Pain
  • Conflict
    • The journey as the user tackles the pain
  • Dialogue
  • Solution
    • Share specific results
    • Utilize case studies

Goal: Highlight the benefits & be conversational

Are you Making this Services Page Mistake

I put together the following questions to help you with your Services pages rewrite!

Your services pages should be written in such a way that they speak directly to your target market and show them why they can’t live without working with you.

Instructions: For each service you offer, answer the following:

Who is the ideal client for the service? In other words, what kind of person is the service designed for? Go beyond the easy answer such as defining a market. Instead, look to be as narrow as you can. There may be a slightly different persona for each service.

 

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What is the real value of the service to the client? This one is always hard to quantify. Try to think of this as a benefit beyond the obvious. What can individuals do in their life that they weren’t able to do before? Is there an emotional benefit?

 

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What is unique or different about your services vs. your competitors’ offering? These differences could be process related, team expertise related, time to completion related, etc. It’s easy for someone to provide a generic answer such as “we’re more experienced,” so you will have to ask follow-up questions. How are we more experienced? Can we tangibly show how we’re more experienced?

 

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What is the cost of NOT having the signing up for your services?  This is a little more of the fear factor. What can go wrong for a client who doesn’t implement it? What do they risk if they forgo using you?

 

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How is the service delivered? This is a simple process question. What can your clients expect when they work with you with this service?

 

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Do clients typically have other services from you when they come in for this specific service?

 

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How to Create a Sales Page that Converts

The following template can be used to build a sales page that converts!

Step 1: Your headline: Keep your course title clear, but use the subheading to be descriptive and focus on how the item can transform your life. Below this include your first call to action button.

Step 2: Description: Keep this to 2-4 short paragraphs and focus on what it can transform.

Step 3: Add a Case Study or Testimonial: Include an image or video, name, and links to appropriate pages. If you are just started, ask your friends or other people you have helped.

Step 4: Add your second Call to Action button

Step 5: Introduce yourself! Give a bio block or a video. Make sure you answer the questions of why people should work with you.

Step 6: Add details about your offer or course. Start bringing up the class curriculum. Here you want the module titles and lecture titles.

Step 7: Include a second Case Study or Testimonial

Step 8: Answer any questions you often receive from your students or clients. Focus on answering objections people may have. Think about why would people not purchase your course?

Step 9: Add in your third Call to Action button

Take a step back and you are all set!

9 Steps to Create a Sales Page that Converts. Incredibly easy guide for your sales pages [Sales Pages for Online Course]

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Surefire way to Transform your Business

Email marketing can transform your marketing efforts. Think about it… A Facebook post is hardly seen by the people who Like your business, ads are expensive, and on other networks you need to be posting multiple times per day to even make a mark.

Emails on the other hand, go straight to your client’s inbox and 20-40% of recipients open the email. You are able to provide more information and target specific promotions for each type of individual on your list.

What tools can you use to make email marketing easier to manage?

I highly recommend using ConvertKit. ConvertKit allows you to create sequences for your different email segments and has the ability to automate moving a subscriber from one list to another without you even needing to log into the account. Best of all, through their interface, you can create landing pages, forms, and customize the look and feel of your marketing collateral.

Download your Free Guide to Email Marketing here.

So what if you don’t have an email list yet?

“Early on when you’re growing your list it can be hard to know who to target and where to find
them online. You usually start by writing blog posts to no one. And it sucks. It’s really weird to
write posts for an audience of zero. I think you should start by writing to an audience of ten.
The 10 person rule is where you start by identifying 10 people you know personally who can
benefit from your writing. When I started out I was teaching about designing iPhone apps. So I
would think through my friends and co-workers and list out 10 names of people who want to
learn to design better apps. Let’s see, 3 developer co-workers who build apps on the side, a designer
friend who is great at web design, but doesn’t know anything about apps… And so on.

Don’t stop until you have ten actual names listed out.

If you can’t get to ten people you know personally who would benefit from what you may want
to teach, you may want to re-evaluate your audience choice. Or make some new friends.

Next you email each of them personally and ask them three questions:

  1. What’s your biggest frustration when learning about [topic]?
  2. What websites, blogs, or forums do you visit now to learn about [topic]?
  3. I’m starting a new site to teach [topic]. I’d love for you to be one of my beta readers. Interested?

You may have even better results if you split this into two separate emails. Questions 1 and 2
would go out in the first email to start a conversation, then if they’re interested you ask question
If you do this right you’ll finish the exercise with 10 new email subscribers, a list of exactly
where your target audience hangs out online, and material for your next 5 to 10 blog posts.”

To learn more about growing your email list, download your Free Guide to Email Marketing here.

How has email marketing transformed your business?

Surefire way to transform your business with email marketing

[This post contains affiliate links]

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Social Media Audit

When was the last time you took an audit of your social media presence? Did it include analyzing your competition? Performing a social media audit can help you to see where you are at, project where you are headed, and see how you can improve your presence. The goal of an audit to to make sure you are still working towards your larger goals and figuring out how you can tweak the daily management of your accounts to align more closely with your vision.

On your own accounts:

  • Make a list of all of your accounts
  • Check the About description and information. Is it missing anything? Has anything been changed?
  • Grab your network size numbers. Have the numbers grown in size since the last time you performed an audit?
  • Dissect the user comments and engagement. Are you getting more engagement? Is the engagement positive? Who makes up your network on each account?

In a social media audit you should ask yourself these 4 questions:

  1. Where is my audience?
  2. Where is my audience active?
  3. Where is my audience searching?
  4. What niche social media sites are right for me?

Examine your social media profiles

Locate and document all your social media profiles, official and unofficial

  • “Why are we using this social account?”
  • “Why do we want to use it?”
  • “What are our goals for this social media platform?”
  • “Are our target markets using it?”
  • If you no longer have a good reason to use the account or you find that your target market is elsewhere, don’t hesitate to cut ties and focus your effort where it is better spent
  • Check for completion of all details on these profiles and for consistency in imagery and message
  • Follow up on your goals and compare performance today to performance one and two years ago

Next, take a look at your competition:

  • How frequently are they posting?
  • What is their network size?
  • Are they growing faster or slower than you?
  • What is the level of engagement with their fans?
  • Does anything stand out that they are doing well?
  • What can you learn from each account?

Examine those who do it well…

Find 4 to 8 niche influencers and examine how they manage their brand on social media. Observe the imagery and branding on each of their profiles and then:

Measure key metrics like followers and engagement

  • Branding: How does their overall look promote the brand? Can visitors get an accurate sense of their personality or culture? How have they chosen to use images in header and avatar?
  • Popularity: How many followers/likes does the page have?
  • Frequency: How often do they post? What do they do on weekends?
  • Engagement: What is the number of people talking about the brand compared to the number of fans?
  • Types of posts: What topics do they frequently discuss? What types of posts do they use: photos, questions, videos, chats, text? What is engagement like for each of these post types?

Where is my audience active & where are they searching:

Every minute, people are conducting millions of queries on Google, Twitter, and Facebook. If you are active on these social media platforms, then you have a chance at appearing in social media search results.

Any Niche sites? Just because 1 business gets leads from a site, doesn’t mean you will.

Social media audit - the number one thing you should do to measure success. When was the last time you took an audit of your social media presence? Did it include analyzing your competition? Performing a social media audit can help you to see where you are at, project where you are headed, and see how you can improve your presence. The goal of an audit to to make sure you are still working towards your larger goals and figuring out how you can tweak the daily management of your accounts to align more closely with your vision.

 

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How to go from 0 to 100,000 Website Visits

Moving from 0 to 100,000 visitors takes a lot of leg work, no matter how easy a blog post or interview makes it sound. Unless of course you are buying ads, which provides a short-term solution, you’ll need to get working!

Depending on your industry, Pinterest. Reddit, Quora, and LinkedIn can all provide avenues to increase your site traffic. I’ll take a look at each below.

In order for any of these to be successful, however, you need to make sure there is a reason to go to your website. I recommend a combination of new blog posts, freebies, and diverse media (videos, infographics, etc).

  1. Pinterest: On Pinterest there are a variety of ways you can boost your traffic. You need to start with the basics.
    • Complete your profile and confirm your website. By confirming your account, your profile tends to rank higher in search results. Also, let people know what to expect if they follow you.
    • Use Rich Pins. These add more content to your pins from your site, which can increase their impressions and clicks.
    • Optimize Descriptions: Not only do you want your pins and boards to appear in search results, you also want to entice people to click them.
    • Engage: Don’t just go through and Follow everyone you can to gain Followers, go through and Like, Comment, and Repin appropriate Pins before Following someone (yes, there are automation tools like this, such as NinjaPinner or Tailwind*).
    • Participate in Group Boards: Find group boards that fit your business and request to join them. Of course follow the rules when you pin to these boards, but they open the door to a much wider audience (BoardBooster* is great for automating your pinning).
  2. Reddit: The goal on Reddit is to get a lot of Upvotes. When a post makes it big, it can bring thousands of visitors to your site. Reddit is set up to prevent spammers, so you do need to be cautious about what type of content you are posting here.
    • Find your subreddits: These are the subcategories that you can post to. You need to find the ones that is made up of your target market. You can find these subreddits through searches on Reddit. Look for the results that are relevant and have high traffic. You can also use Metareddit to find subreddits. Just make sure that the subreddits you decide on FIT your topic and aren’t too broad.
    • Research the posts in the Subreddit: take note if you see consistencies in the posts and what the most upvoted posts tend to be. You will want to emulate what works within each specific subreddit.
    • Participate: Hold off on posting your links for just a bit more and focus your energy on commenting on other posts (new accounts can only comment once every 10 minutes or so).
    • Post your own links! But only if it fits the guidelines for the subreddit. When you are posting, don’t hesitate to test different headlines and time of day. Always be clear about what the post is about and then don’t try to upvote your own things. Redditors can smell marketing from a mile away, so don’t try to hide what you are doing. Of course sometimes, even if you get downvotes, you still may make a sale, which has happened a few times to me).
  3. Quora: We are just starting out on Quora, so there are other folks who can provide better insight here, but participate and provide great answers to questions.
    • On Quora the best way to  is to get traffic to your website is to find questions to answer have followers, but less than 10 answers. This means you have found a question people are interested in learning more about, but you can have your answer stand out compared to others.
    • Don’t be afraid to answer questions that aren’t directly related to your business, either. You have expertise in a lot of different areas, so you can more generally have your profile stand out if you start receiving up votes across the board.
    • Research how other people are answering the question. Are they writing quick responses or going into detail? This can show you how you need to be writing the replies.
  4. LinkedIn: If you are B2B, you need to be on LinkedIn. I highly recommend using Group Discussions to push out your blog posts and LinkedIn Articles to re-publish your popular blogs with a call to action back to your site.
    • Find Groups: LinkedIn has switched around their interface, but the goal is to find active groups that fit your target market.
    • Participate: Just like with Reddit and Pinterest, you need to participate. This means liking and commenting on other members’ discussions.
    • Post Discussions: Often your discussion will be flagged if you just post the link to the blog post, so you want to start by asking a question as the discussion title. In the body of the discussion, use some of your blog post and then provide the link to your site.

With each of these tactics, you need to be CONSISTENT and focus on sharing high-quality content. If you want to learn more about how to grow your traffic, please join my free email course on digital marketing.

*Affiliate Link

The Definitive Guide on How to Grow Your Website Traffic from 0 to 100,000: Moving from 0 to 100,000 visitors takes a lot of leg work, no matter how easy a blog post or interview makes it sound. Unless of course you are buying ads, which provides a short-term solution, you’ll need to get working!

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Top Mistakes You Can Make as a New Business

Working with businesses owners we see a lot of mistakes and successes. Especially for the new business or freelancer, the mistakes below can completely destroy your business before it has the chance to succeed.

Mistake #1: Striving for Perfection

“Have no fear of perfection – you’ll never reach it.”

– Salvador Dali

As a type A perfectionist, I struggled with this. It also is the number one thing I see people starting a business struggle with, as well. Your business is your baby and you are pouring your heart and sole into making it a success, but being too wrapped up in the little things can keep your from actually going out and finding clients. If you find yourself:

  • Stressing over your logo
  • Tweaking every aspect of your website
  • Rereading your introduction email over and over to make it just right (but still not hitting send)
  • Working on perfecting your elevator speech before you attend your first networking group

then you may be focusing too much on being a perfectionist. Trust me, though thoughtful branding can help you land more clients, if you are receiving personal referrals, it isn’t going to stop you from getting paying clients. People choose who they are going to work with based on your personal connection not because of what your logo looks like. Then there is your website… Perfection for every site is a moving target. Your products and services will change. You will notice contacts respond more to one aspect of your business rather than another. As for the next two points, you are procrastinating! It is okay to want to define your messaging, but just getting out there and putting yourself out to prospects is far more important. Sure you want to make sure your messaging is just right when you reach out to that dream prospect or mentor, but these shouldn’t be your first contact. The best part about putting yourself out there before you think you are ready is that you get to understand what the market actually wants and needs! When I first started Boundless Marketing, I had my dream service offerings in mind. Turned out that nobody even understood what I was talking about! There wasn’t a market. I drastically shifted my messaging and began signing contracts almost immediately.

Mistake #2: Thinking you can get clients just by posting things online.

“The richest people in the world look for and build networks, everyone else looks for work. Marinate on that for a minute.”

– Robert T. Kiyosaki

The internet and social media has shifted many of our mindsets about how you can get clients. Even through online channels you need to create a personal relationship with your network. Just posting your blog posts online isn’t going to cut it. I recently signed up for a program to Gain 100 Followers in 3 Days, just to see how other professionals where growing and starting their email lists. Guess what, these influential bloggers and business owners all start int the same place – asking friends, colleagues, clients, and prospects individually if they wanted to join their email list! If you find yourself:

  • Wondering why your networks haven’t converted into paying clients
  • Haven’t asked your mom, sibling, aunt, and grandparent if they want to join your list
  • Are frustrated seeing all these other people succeed

Then you may just be making this mistake. Start going to networking groups and collecting business cards. Take the email address you collect and shoot out a quick note following the template below :

“Hi NAME, I recently met you at EVENT NAME and loved learning about your business. I am in the process of starting an email list focusing on 3 TOPICS YOU WILL BE WRITING ABOUT, and was wondering if you would be interested in receiving the emails. My goal with list is to LIST BENEFITS. Are you interested in learning more?”

Not everyone will say they are interested, but the ones who do will help you grow your contacts quickly! We work with a lot of businesses who see varying amount of success through their social media marketing. The ones who see a return quickly are the clients who are complementing our marketing management services with their own outreach and networking. To see the best results from your marketing, you need to treat social media as you do in person networking. Create personal relationships and treat handles and usernames as individual people not just another account.

Mistake #3: Not Understanding Your Own Values

“When your values are clear to you, making decisions becomes easier.”

– Roy E. Disney

Okay, so this one does tie into the branding of your business, but it really is getting out being your authentic self. Knowing your values helps you to better manage your time, set priorities, and work with clients you enjoy. If you find yourself:

  • Wishing there were more hours in the day
  • Being drained after meetings with prospects
  • Continually wishing you had done X, Y, or Z

Then you may be making this mistake. One of my first clients taught me this lesson the hard way. My values are Relationships (family), Creativity, Challenges, Health, Experiences, and Knowledge. Shortly after I began my business full time, I traveled to my brother’s wedding. I was ecstatic to see him tie the knot and spend time with my family. Unfortunately, a new client nearly ruined my weekend. As a people pleaser, I started bending over backwards for the client and found myself anxiously checking email during the rehearsal dinner. I wasn’t being present. Finally, I recognized I would resent my actions if I didn’t shut off all devices to be there for my family. Sure there was a nasty email from my client, but we worked through our differences once the owner understood my boundaries. If you find yourself stressed about client conversations, I urge you to lay out boundaries, guidelines, and a list of responsibilities. You may loose some clients, but they are the people who take up 80% of your time. Think of all the other things you could do to grow your business if you had 80% of your time back!

What mistakes have you made in your own business that kept you from success?

3 Mistakes that can Ruin Your Business and What to do About Them. Working with businesses owners we see a lot of mistakes and successes. Especially for the new business or freelancer, the mistakes below can completely destroy your business before it has the chance to succeed.

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