1. Avada | Responsive Multi-Purpose Theme by ThemeFusion
$60

avada theme for photography

Sometimes it is overwhelming having so many different ways to customize this theme! WooCommerce, as expected, works great with the Avada theme and offers many different ways to view products and collections.

2. X | The Theme by THEMECO
$65

X Theme for Photographers

Any business should consider the X Theme. Which wonderful support, if you have any questions, this theme has someone the quickly answer them. Take a look and see for yourself how the X Theme can transform your eCommerce store!

3. Enfold – Responsive Multi-Purpose Theme by Kriesi
$60

Enfold theme for photography

We’ve been in love with Enfold for a while now, and for eCommerce, this theme continues to outperform others. The new layout editor offers demo designs you can upload and it is incredibly simple to update specific elements in the theme options. I don’t think we will ever grow tired of how easily Enfold integrates with WooCommerce.

4. uDesign – Responsive WordPress Theme by AndonDesign
$59

uDesign WordPress Theme

uDesign offers WooCommerce integration for easy eCommerce set up. It’s a wonderful theme for high-end SEO, mobile friendly design, and over 2,000 fonts to choose from for extreme branding and customization!

5. Flatsome | Multi-Purpose Responsive WooCommerce Theme by UX-themes
$59

Flastsome WordPress theme ecommerce

Like the other themes listed for eCommerce, Flatsome allows for incredible customizations, is responsive, and offers fast page-load speeds. If there is a demo your like, you can copy these page layouts to customize in one click, which make it easy to get up and running quickly.

What about other CMS platforms?

And, of course, please take a look at Shopify. Shopify truly is an incredible interface built with eCommerce in mind. The back end is structured a little differently from WordPress, but you will quickly learn to love the interface! Unlike using WordPress and WooCommerce, Shopify can handle payments on your behalf or run through PayPal, Amazon, or other merchant accounts. It is a breeze to keep your store running with Shopify.

This guide is specifically for folks who need just a quick cheat sheet for updating their WordPress pages, specifically adding and editing pages.

Adding a new page:
1. Log into WordPress Dashboard.
2. Click “Pages > New Page”
3. Type Page Title to “Enter title here” text field
4. Type Page Content
5. Click Insert Media button, Click Media Library, and search for the image. Click Insert into Post. I will help you with this.
6. Click Publish

To edit Page Content (Home, About, Contact, etc):
1. Log into WordPress Dashboard.
2. Click “Pages > All Pages”
3. To edit a page click the page title. This will bring you to the page you can add the content.
4. Click Update to save changes

Blogging Your Business

What’s up with 60 Blogs in 60 Days?

This is a challenge I’m making for business owners (or marketing managers) to blog every day for 60 days straight. In our mind, blogging is one of the most important content creation activities you can do online. It not only is a way to show your expertise, it also provides collateral for you to share through other marketing avenues, and aides in boosting your on-site SEO.

Most small business owners can realistically commit to writing one blog every month, or those who really understand the value make an effort to blog once a week or hire a contractor to provide a few additional blogs here and there. Now imagine Google is trying to figure out which website is more relevant – one that has had 12 blogs in the past year, or one that has been actively updated, every day, for the past month?

Additionally, the blogs are a place for you to explore and dive deeper into topics that you haven’t focused on for a while or topics your clients and prospects care about. This additional writing can help you to position yourself as the expert you truly are.

What’s my goal with 60 x 60?

We have a team of individuals who write blogs for our business and for our clients. These blogs are incredible, but our writers aren’t in the daily grind of operating a digital marketing agency.

My goals for committing to 60 x 60 are two fold:

  1. To cultivate a community of business owners who are looking for support and guidance as they too work to change their business through blogging.
  2. To explore topics and create resources that we’ve rewritten over and over again for clients and prospects. These blogs are hopefully going to allow me to share my knowledge from the last 10 years of digital marketing and empower others to better position themselves online.

How can you get involved?

The more the merrier as we jump into the quest to write 60 blogs in 60 days! Please join our Facebook Group to gain insights into what practices and tips have worked for others on this journey or write in the comments about how you’ve taken your blog to the next level. We want to hear your successes (and failures), your goals, and the actual results of this practice!

Looking forward to working by your side as we transform our businesses!

Blogging Your Business

Facebook Ads is a very powerful tool. It is an excellent way to promote your business, increase brand awareness and can lead to increased conversion rate. Unless you have a big budget, achieving these goals can be difficult if you’re not an expert.

In this blog post, we’ll give you 4 tips on how to create an effective Facebook ad campaign. Use these tips and you’ll be on your way to a great Facebook campaign.

Identify your target audience

To make the most out of your Facebook ad campaign, you first need to identify your target audience and then create an ad that is targeted to them. Take a moment to decide who you want to see you are ads. Are you looking to reach new audience? Do you want to connect with your existing fans? Or do you want to focus on the people in your area?

Facebook allows you to target your audience by gender, age, location, education, relationship status, workplace etc. The more relevant the ad is to the people you’re targeting; the more likely are they to notice and act on your ad. If done correctly, this will lead to a higher success rate and will reduce your spending in the future.

Establish goals

Before launching your ad, you need to consider what you want to get out of it. Ask yourself, why are you creating an ad in the first place? Do you want to increase your followers? Do you want to increase your web traffic? Or do you want people to download your app? This is important as it will help you plan your strategies for the said campaign and help you assess whether or not it is a success later on.

Choose your bidding option

If this is your first time to create a Facebook ad, you may think that your only option is to optimize your ad on a CPM basis. But the truth is that you have the option to choose from a number of bid setups. You can opt for CPC pricing or opt for bidding based on your objective. Don’t let Facebook do your bidding.

Use eye-catching images

Posts with eye-catching photos get more likes, comments and shares than those without. The same principle also applies with Facebook ads. If you want your ads to perform better, then you need to invest in good quality photos. If you are a restaurant owner, make sure your photos look appetizing. If you own a salon, then feature women with gorgeous, shiny locks. Remember, your goal is to create an ad that gets noticed and create more clicks. Good quality photos will help you achieve that goal.

 

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

social-media-content-ideas-for-the-holidaysNot too long ago, businesses celebrate the holiday season by decorating their stores with Christmas ornaments with music playing in the background. In today’s digital world, however, businesses try their best to add the holiday spirit into their social media campaign.

Bringing a bit of Christmas cheer into your social media posts will get everyone in a positive mood. It can also help you drive traffic to your site and customers to your store.

Here are 4 social media content ideas for the holidays.

Holiday recipes

If you are in the food business, it is a good idea to share some holiday recipes with your audience. A lot of people, especially those who are hosting a family get together for the first time, are looking for easy recipes that they can prepare for their family this Christmas and New Year.

Share recipes of desserts, typical holiday drinks and other holiday themed recipes. While you’re at it, you might also want to share some tips on how to serve these items.

Gift ideas

Did you know that 65% of shoppers go online to find great deals, considerable discounts and gift ideas for their loved ones this holiday season? Feature your products and let people know why they make an ideal gift for their loved ones.

DIY videos

According to Psychology Today, social media posts are likely to receive 56% more likes and 36% more comments if they are presented in a video format. In addition, 39% of users are likely to share these videos.

If your brand has a product that requires demonstration, go ahead and create a how-to video. Video generated content allows you to deliver your brand message with impact and encourages customer engagement as well.

Showcase your fans

Customers have this inherent urge to share their experiences with others. Now is a great time to encourage your fans and followers to share their stories. Ask them to take a picture of themselves with your products and have them create a story about how they use them.

By allowing your customers to take center stage, it allows you to grow your online presence, increase engagement and reach new market segments. The result – maximized conversions and sales opportunities.

4-ways-to-get-readers-to-spend-more-time-on-your-blogA blog’s success greatly depends on its readers. Without readers, all those content you’ve created will go down the drain. The problem is that, modern internet user have short attention span.

More often than not, people will browse through your post for a few seconds. If you fail to give them what they want, their cursor will be heading to the back button and on to another site. You’ve worked hard creating those contents, but why isn’t anybody sticking around to read your posts?

Here are 4 ways to get your visitors to stay on your site longer.

Provide them with valuable content

Content remains the number one reason people visit your site. You need to provide readers with valuable content. This includes detailed information about your products, educational tools, industry news or updates.  This will give you an opportunity to share your knowledge with your prospects and will eventually help you build a loyal fan base.

Use subheadings

Most people will scan through a post and just pick out pieces of information they need. Make it easier for them by using subheadings with descriptive wordings. This way, it will be easier for them to find what they need and allow them to jump to the appropriate section if they wish.

Ensure fast loading time

Your site speed is also critical to its success. No matter how interesting and informative your contents are, people may not be interested to read them if your site takes too long to load. Remember, you only have a few seconds to convince people to hang around. A sluggish site will cause you to lose readers and subscribers. Don’t make people wait.

Make it visually appealing

People make snap judgements. In fact, it only takes less than a second for people to decide whether they like your site. You want to make sure you make a good first impression.

Aesthetics play an important role in first impressions. People like to look at pretty things. A visually appealing blog can attract attention, and may even convince them to stay for a little longer.

3-ways-to-turn-prospects-into-paying-customersIn the B2B world, one of the marketer’s primary goals is to generate new leads. Most businesses have no trouble acquiring leads. The problem is, many of them fail to realize another important component of the sales funnel – lead conversion.

There is no point in generating leads if you can’t convert those leads into customers. After all, that’s how your business thrives and succeeds. Make sure you implement these strategies to prevent prospects from slipping through your fingers.

Quick follow-up

Time is of the essence in the business world. The speed at which your sales team follows up on the lead is important. Make sure that you follow up within 24 hours or all your efforts will be put to waste. Call them or just send a follow up e-mail. Offer to answer any questions that they might have. Sometimes, this is enough to get them into purchase mode.

People lose interest faster than you may think. As such, a quick follow up is recommended. If your sales team aren’t fast enough, they will move on to your competitors. Don’t let them wait.

Herd mentality

People are often influenced by the behavior of the people around them. This includes their buying behavior.

If you want a consumer to buy a particular product, you can use this to your advantage. Let them know how many people have bought your product in the last few weeks. This simple strategy can help boost your sales. If they see other people jumping on the bandwagon, they are likely to do the same.

Qualify leads

Not everyone who visits your site is interested in what you have to offer.  As such, it is important to determine which leads are worth your effort.

Qualifying leads can mean the difference between wasting lots of time and energy and landing a new, juicy business. You want to make sure you’re selling to right people. Check to see if they fit your buyer profile and their activities on your site before passing them off to sales.

Learn How to Use Twitter for Your Business

With over 500 MILLION tweets being sent each day, it is important you know how to use Twitter correctly so you see a return on your investment!
In this webinar, we will review the components of a profile and talk about images, tips, and tools to manage your Twitter profile!  RSVP today!

In this webinar, you will learn how to properly use Twitter for your business and WHY it is SO important! 

Join Amber Irwin, CEO on September 27th
3:30 MST
 for this FREE webinar!

When:
September 27th, 2016
Where:
Free Webinar – Details provided to RSVP’s
 Time:
3:30-4:15pm MST

Anyone with a computer and internet connection has the ability to manage a social media account. When done right, businesses can see huge boosts in brand recognition and sales. If managed poorly, social media can be the downfall of your business.

The BIMS Team prides itself on keeping on top of the best practices of digital marketing and Amber is excited to empower you to feel confident in showing you how to use Twitter for your business!

Simple Ways to Generate Leads from Your Blogs

Your business’ blog can do a lot of different things. Blogging does more than let your followers know about upcoming events or recent news. Rather, it can help you develop better customer relationships, position your brand as an industry leader and generate leads.

If you’re not happy with the leads you’re getting from your business blog, then we urge you to keep reading. Use these lead generation tactics to drive more traffic and attract more high quality leads to your website.

Pen a killer headline

Make sure your title is interesting enough to capture the attention of your target audience and will compel them to click through and read your blog post.

Go social

Since you own a blog, you probably know how to write a blog post that that will generate leads. Now, your goal is to extend your reach to those people who know little about your business. Consider sharing your blog posts on social media so that people will come, learn something valuable and share them to their family and friends. This will help spread the word about your business.

Build a mobile-friendly site

A huge percentage of visitors use their tablets or mobile phones to access the internet. If they find it hard to read your blog posts or navigate your site through their mobile devices, they’ll leave even before they start reading your posts. Make sure your site is mobile-friendly or you’ll lose visitors.

Be consistent

Publish new content more frequently if you want people to visit your blog regularly. We know you’re busy, so you don’t have to write a blog every day. However, it is important that you keep up with your posting schedule.

Show up regularly and your readership will grow faster. You can’t expect people to return to your blog if you don’t have new content for them to read. Make sure you offer some valuable content to inspire them to keep coming back.