Social media proves to be a powerful tool when it comes to growing a business. It allows companies to reach out to their customers, to get exposure and traffic, and to sell their services and products.

Your customers are likely to spend a lot of time on social – be it on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or YouTube.

Your customers are already interacting with brands through social media, perhaps even with your competitors. It’s nothing new that purchasing decisions are influenced by social media.

If you’re not taking advantage of social, you’re missing out on an inexpensive and effective way to reach your ideal customer base.

It is critical for any business to have a social media strategy.

Here are ten ways social media marketing can grow your business:

1.    Start with a plan

Set social media goals and objectives. What is it that you are trying to achieve?

Get more people to visit your website? Reach as many people as possible within your target market? Raise your company’s profile? All this and more is possible with social media marketing.

If you’re already using social media, conduct a social media audit, and evaluate your existing efforts. Create a social media calendar that will help you post the right content to the right channels. Use 80% of your content to educate or entertain your audience and use the other 20% to promote your business or sell your products.

2.    Decide which platforms are right for you

You don’t have to be on every social media platform. With so many channels to choose from, deciding which ones you should be on can be difficult. Knowing where your audience spends their time online can help. Do the research and join these social media platforms. If your audience is primarily on Facebook, then there is no point in posting content on Twitter.

3.    Know your audience

Do you know who your audience is and where they’re active?

To find and grow your audience on social, you first need to understand them truly. How old is your audience? Where they live, what are their interests, and behaviour specifications? Once you have a clear picture of who your ideal customers are, you can revisit your social media marketing strategy, and improve your targeting. This way, you will meet your prospects where they are.

4.    Develop trust with customers

Is it enough to post regularly and run ads? Unfortunately, it’s not. The whole point of social media is to be social.

Many brands come and go on social media, but the ones who inspire consumer trust and interaction– stay.

So, how to inspire that type of engagement? By encouraging user-generated content. Ask customers to review your company. Make videos so your audience can see the face behind the business. Talk to your customers! Answer their questions and make them feel heard.

5.    Paid social media advertising

One of the best and quickest ways to reach your target market is to use ads. You can drive traffic to your website and increase conversions. You can grow your social media pages or re-engage previous prospects with retargeting ads.

Paid social media advertising is cost-effective, efficient, and measurable. It can tell you which ads are working, how many people are seeing them, who’s clicking on them, where are they from, etc. You can also optimise your ad instantly if they’re not performing according to your social media objectives.

6.    Website and Social can work together

Did you know social media leads in driving traffic to a website? There are many strategies to boost website traffic, and social media plays a crucial role in it. Your website SEO will rank better if you add links to your social media profiles.

Promote your blog content via social media. Encourage your website visitors to share your web content by embedding a social media sharing tool.  Consistent interaction means better customer experience, which means – more traffic to your site.

7.    Go Visual

One of the best ways to get attention on social media is to use visual content. We’re more likely to remember information if it includes an image or video. Social media posts that include images are more likely to get more likes and comments. Showing is always better than telling.

72% of consumers prefer videos over manuals to decide on a buy. Create highly shareable visual content. Use images, emojis, GIFs, infographics and charts. A promotional video or an animation can go a long way to helping your content and your social media channels to stand out.

Stock photos are great, but it’s always better to hire a professional photographer or graphic designer to create custom content for your company.

8.    Create brand recognition

Brand recognition is the ability of a consumer to recognise one brand over other brands. It is a critical element of building brand awareness.

You want your customers to remain familiar with your company, so they consider your product or service when they make purchase decisions. If you want to be the first choice of your customers, then your social media presence shouldn’t look like everyone’s else’s. Don’t just post a picture or link and call it a day. Invest in increasing your brand awareness.

Organise giveaways and offer discounts. Take customer’s feedback seriously and learn from your analytics to form a better social media marketing strategy.

9.    Add a strong Call-to-action (CTA)

You need to be clear about what you want from your audience on your social media channels. It may be to “Read more”; to “Sign-up” for a newsletter; to “Download” something, or to lead users to a landing page.

Call-to-action is a stimulus to do something to achieve something.

CTA’s motivate your customers to interact with your content. If you get your audience to communicate with you, you are one step closer to the faster return on investment.

To add a strong CTA means to get more business. Customise CTA’s by the social media platform. Also, make the benefit visible. If you reader clicks the “Read more” CTA, what is in it for them? What value do you offer?

10.  Quality over quantity

Social media is about writing quality and useful content for your followers. It is a noisy space where consumers are getting bombarded with content from competing brands. Take more time to generate high-quality content instead of just posting because you think you need to. Posting more won’t necessarily give more brand exposure. The quality makes all the difference. If your social media posts are lengthy but fail to educate, entertain, and offer value – your work has gone waste.

Strategically planed marketing on social media can bring remarkable success to your business. Don’t sit on the social media sidelines! Reach new customers and educate them about your offerings.

The post Social Media Marketing for Business – 10 Tips to Grow appeared first on Ocean Media.

WordPress is one of the most popular content management systems in the world. It launched in 2003 as a tool for building a blog.

Today, WordPress is the foundation many websites are built on. It is free and has mountains of resources available – from outstanding flexibility and responsive design, to easy social media integration, security options, and intuitive interface.

WordPress allows users to easily create, edit and publish content without a need to learn about codes and programs.

Over 30% of websites today are powered by WordPress, thanks to its amazing architecture that includes plugins, themes, page builders, and customisation.

All this helps web developers create impressive business websites.

WordPress is not owned by any company which allows anyone in the world to download and use it.

Here are five benefits of building a website in WordPress:

1. The design is 100% customisable

When built right, WordPress websites are fully customisable.

With coding requirements reduced (although not eliminated) and an extensive choice of mostly free or reasonably priced plugins, WordPress offers hundreds of customisation choices.

A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features.

Plugins are the backbone of this platform and by making use of them, developers can customise websites.

You can download and use the codes to add functionality to your website yourself. However, we recommend hiring a web developer as experience with coding is necessary to properly develop WordPress websites.

2. Search engines love WordPress sites

Undoubtedly the most popular search engine Google – loves content, and WordPress makes it easy to create and publish content that search engines love.

WordPress has several SEO friendly options that help with your website ranking, such as SEO friendly URLs, H1 headers, sub-header control (H2, H3), on-page optimisation scoring, meta titles, etc.

Its extensive range of features allows for a professional looking, user-friendly, attractive, and responsive layout.

Best of all? Google will reward websites that provide an excellent user experience.

Page speed and optimising images for SEO are additional reasons why search engines love WordPress websites.  

3. Friendly user interface

WordPress can benefit your website in many ways. It is intuitive and easy to use. You can access and edit everything you need from the WordPress CMS – be it publishing your new blog post or setting sale prices for products in your online shop.

Moving quickly and improving your business is key and with WordPress you can do exactly that in a more cost-effective and efficient way.

With WordPress you can build a page, a blog, a portfolio, or a resume.

4. Secure and reliable

Keeping your website safe is easy if you keep your software up to date; if you enforce a strong password policy and back up your data; if you regularly scan your website for vulnerabilities and keep your website clean.

While you can take care of the little things yourself, there are many security measures that should be handled by an expert. Be vigilant in protecting your website. Take every possible measure on your end to ensure your website and your data is protected.

5. Easy content management

WordPress easily ticks all the boxes as far as content management goes.

It is a system that is easy to install and easy to understand.

Whether you want to create new static pages or publish blog posts, WordPress will make it easy for you to publish and organise your content.

Your website is a vital part of your online presence.

If you want your business to be noticed among the thousands, WordPress is the perfect website development tool for you as its platform contains all the elements for supporting your company’s vision.

The post Benefits of Building a Website in WordPress appeared first on Ocean Media.

Blogging is important for business growth and it should be a staple of every marketing strategy.

One of the most effective ways to build brand awareness and to generate leads, while providing relevant and useful content for your readers, is through blogging.

Blogging for Your Business

Blogging will get your business more online visibility. No matter what industry you’re in, you can set up a blog and start blogging.

The more pages and content on your website, the better the chance to rank in search engines results.

Let’s say you’re in a tourism business. When someone asks Google: “Best places to kayak in Ireland”, you want your blog posts to show up in the search. You want people to click and “land” on your website.

Google is looking for pages that contain high-quality, relevant content. With a consistent blogging strategy,

you create an opportunity to appear in Google’s search queries.

This is a proven way to get your business in front of the right people who may later convert into leads.

Business blogging is a low-cost way to enhance your inbound marketing efforts.

Here are three reasons to start a business blog on your website:

1. It Helps Drive Traffic to Your Website

How many people are going to type in your website URL and go directly to your site? Probably very few excluding you.

Your target audience needs a strong reason to visit your website and that’s done by providing answers to the questions they have.

Write about how your products or services solve problems. Offer a solution. Make your website become a place where your readers go to get help and advice. Your products or services may be part of the solution you provide in your blog posts, but in a helpful way.

Google will then scan your pages and if your blog topics are relevant to a search, this will allow your blogs to get an advantage over other blog posts in the same space.

Blogging is an opportunity to work towards building a strong relationship with your customers or clients. As a result, your readers will share your content and link to it. Best of all – they will come back to your website for more of your valuable and insightful content.

Make your blog and social media accounts work together to reach new potential customers. This can help to increase traffic to your website and to improve overall engagement with your blog posts.

  2. It Helps Convert the Traffic into Leads

When you have people visiting your website through reading your blog, you have an opportunity to convert those readers into leads.

How does that work?

1. Susan comes to your website through your blog
2. Susan sees a call-to-action button on your website for a discount
3. Susan clicks the button and gets redirected to a landing page on your website which contains a form
4. Susan fills out a form and submits information; her name and her email address to receive a discount
5. Susan becomes a lead

Why do you need a call-to-action on your website? Because you need to give your website visitors an opportunity to convert into customers, by capturing some contact information and following up immediately.

3. Establish your Business as an Industry Leader

The more authority you have on a given topic, the higher you’re likely to rank in search engines. And the more quality content you have, the more topical relevance you have.

That’s why business blogging is so important.

Authority can’t be built overnight, but instead with a steady and consistent posting of strategic content that’s helpful for your target consumer.

For example, take your frequently asked questions and turn them into a blog post.

A consumer that has been reading your blog posts will enter the sales process more educated on what you have to offer.

Every successful blog is built by publishing exceptional content. Make your website a valuable marketing asset. Turn your business blog into a valued and respected authority blog, and a lead generation machine.

The post 3 Reasons to Start a Business Blog on Your Website appeared first on Ocean Media.

Has animated video become part of your digital marketing strategy yet?

If not, you may want to reconsider that.

85% of businesses use video as a marketing tool and 99% of people who use video for marketing say they’ll continue using video in 2020.

Most consumers prefer watching a video than reading. This doesn’t come as a surprise given that visual information is processed faster than text.

With an animated video your message is concise and captures the viewer’s attention in the first few seconds.

Animated videos give you an opportunity to stand out and stay ahead of your competitors.

They help your new and existing customers understand your products, services, and unique selling points.

Animated videos can answer your customer’s queries and address customer concerns.

Plus, animated videos are only limited by your imagination as they enable you to bring any ideas or concepts to life. They help simplify the most complex of topics.

Cost is also one of the reasons why businesses opt for animated videos. Unlike video production, animation is an affordable solution that delivers effective results.

Here are 10 benefits of animated videos:

1. Stand out from the competition
2. Tell the story of your brand
3. Explain your products and services
4. Explain your concept or idea
5. Increase reach
6. Animated videos can be made to have long-lasting relevance
7. Potentially viral
8. Mobile-friendly
9. Lower production costs, saving you time and money
10. Fun and engaging

Platforms to Share Animated Videos

A tweet with a video is more likely to get a click. A Facebook post with an animated video is more likely to get viewed and shared. Adding a video to your email marketing can improve your brand image.

Animated videos on your website can increase traffic and encourage social media shares and comments. They will also help to increase the average time people spend on your website.

As a business owner, you will do everything you can to stay on one of Google for the keywords relevant to your business.

Animated videos can help with that. They can boost your SEO efforts and improve your website’s ranking by increasing click-through rates and lowering bounce rates.

It is clear by now that animated videos are a powerful addition to a brand’s promotional toolbox.

Be strategic and selective when distributing your animated videos. Adapt animations to specific channels and platforms such as websites, social media channels, email newsletters; events or shows and blogs posts.

Animation fits for just about anything – product explainer videos, infographics or even a logo.

Incorporate “How-to” videos or “Behind the scenes” animated videos as part of your digital marketing strategy.

Slideshows, case studies, tips and guides are also a good idea for animated videos.

Cut through the noise of traditional video production with animated videos that will help you further conversations with new and existing customers.

With online video consumption continuing to rise, many businesses have adopted animation as part of their digital marketing strategy.

If you want to grow online and get the best possible return on investment, perhaps it’s the time to give animated videos a chance.

The post How Animated Video Can Help your Marketing Strategy appeared first on Ocean Media.

Fortunately for many businesses that invest in online advertising, Facebook advertising is one of the least expensive platforms to advertise on.

Facebook advertising should be included in every businesses’ digital marketing strategy for following reasons:

• Reach new customers
• Target a specific audience
• Advertise to people by location, age, interests, and behaviour
• Ads tailored to your specific goals
• Various ad placements
• Multiple ad creatives to choose from

How Facebook ads work

You need to know what you want your Facebook ads to accomplish. This is done by identifying campaign objectives.

Would you like to drive more visitors from social media to your website? Or do you want to maximise the number of people who see your ad? Maybe you just want more likes on the page.

Once you’ve identified your campaign objective(s), it’s time to create or select your audience and choose the demographics and behaviours that represent your audience.

Facebook also allows you to create refined audiences called Custom and Lookalike audiences.

The next step is to decide where you want to run your ad – either on Facebook, Instagram, or the apps…

Set your budget, pick a format, and voila – you are ready to start running ads to meet your business goals.

Common Mistakes When Running Facebook Advertising Campaigns

On the surface, Facebook advertising looks straightforward: You simply create and publish the ads. The truth is that Facebook advertising still requires a level of expertise and strategizing.

Here are five common mistakes when running Facebook advertising campaigns:

1. Not having clear Facebook marketing goals and objectives

Having defined Facebook goals matters. Only by setting clear goals can you justify the actions you’re taking to meet the needs of your business. Social media objectives are contingent on KPI’s and metrics. You need to have goals and measure outcomes to know what’s working and what needs to be improved.

Your social media strategy needs to be thoughtful and on-point. You will need to do some research and adjust your tactics based on performance over time.

Top goals for social media advertising campaigns:

• Increase brand awareness
• Lead generation
• Increase engagement
• Increase web traffic
• Facebook page like

2. You don’t know who your audience is

Your current and potential customers are probably among the more than 2 billion people on Facebook.

How do you reach the segment of this audience that is relevant to your business?

Target by interest is one approach. Facebook analyses behaviours on the platform and categorises its users according to indicated interests. You can then use these broad interest categories to focus in on your audience.

For example, if you’re in the business of selling car tyres, you can target customers in the sub-category Off-Road Tyres. You can narrow that even further by targeting specific tyre manufacturers.

Facebook recommends narrowing your audience and searching for clear niches.

Facebook ads will be of little value unless you know who you are reaching out to.

Creating a buyer persona for your business will help you define your target market.

Create a profile of your ideal customer as if he or she were a real person.

Give your personas names. That will remind you that you’re speaking to an actual person!

3. Using the wrong Ad Format

There are different Facebook ad formats for different goals.

You can choose from Photo, Video, Stories, Messenger, Carousel, Slideshow, Collection, and Instant Experiences.

Choose the ad format you think will best suit your audience and goals.

Extra tip: test different ad formats!

4. Running too many ads at the same time

Running too many ads at the same time can be a costly mistake. This leads to confusion, a lack of efficiency, and, in the end, poor results.

If you have a very complex ad account, how can you even keep track of everything that’s going on?

Facebook needs at least 50–100 conversions per ad set per week to fully leverage the algorithm, so your ad sets need a reasonable budget if you want the Facebook delivery system to power your ads.

5. Not using the Facebook Pixel

The power of a single piece of code can be tremendous, especially when it’s a piece of code provided by Facebook.

The Facebook pixel allows you to track your website visitors or create retargeting audiences, track custom conversions, and optimize ads.

The time to install and utilise Facebook pixel is now.

Not only will you create better ads, but you will have the opportunity to target your audiences more accurately.

Install the pixel on your website and start collecting data so you can be ready to use it when launching your Facebook campaigns.

Facebook advertising can take some time to get the hang of, but by keeping these common mistakes in mind, Facebook ads will bring in amazing results and can even lead to faster growth of your business.

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