INBOUND 2016 GARY VAYNERCHUK KEYNOTE | BOSTON 2016

How is your business selling to the holiday shoppers in 2016?

How is your business selling to the holiday shoppers in 2016?

Fabulous, the holiday's are upon us.  If you sell products or service what are you doing to market to the holiday shoppers? Digital shopping is expected to increase 25% according to PwC's report.  Your customer or client is getting slammed with holiday sales & black Friday deals, so how do stand out? 

First and foremost we all search on ur phones and tablets, but we do not purchase. Then they are either going to the store or going to their computer to purchase. So please make sure that the mobile ads you are running are browser friendly and not pushing buy now, knowing they most likely will purchase differently.  Make it easy for them to save a picture or list of the top 5 or so items you find to be great holiday gifts.  

Do some research on what people may be searching for this year's gifts, be different, unique is good. Know your current customer base and offer a discount for a particular item or service, gift certificates are always a good idea.  Have your team's input on ideas remember someone quietly sitting in the corner may have a brilliant idea, listen carefully.

When it comes to the holidays make sure you are not missing out!  Do not be afraid to spend money on PPC ads on different platforms depending on your products and services you offer.  Keywords around holidays phrases and ideas, like Christmas, Santa, Rudolph, Hannukah think of your favorite holiday memories.  Have fun with your marketing if you are having fun then the end user will feel that as well, don't be afraid of being you and showing it in your ads.   Make sure you have your ads targeted for remarketing to get the biggest bang for your buck!

Understanding the SMM side of things live videos of your office short

 and sweet, showing your staff decorating or secret Santa silliness.  Remember you can get away with more around the holidays, be professional & kind, but have fun! Every business should be doing some sort of charitable drive whether it be Food, toys for tots or whatever your passion might be.  If people are able to work with and buy from a company that gives back, so make it public that people can come by and drop off donations or a portion of the service they purchase will go to a charity.

Jeanne Zierhoffer

Get a consultation for your business, make sure you are 

positioned correctly to get the holiday shoppers you deserve.

How Social Media May Boost Your Website

How Social Media May Boost Your Website:

My client's ask me all the time if social media is as important as everyone seems to think it is.  I laugh at this because google analytics will show you exactly how important it is to help drive traffic to your website, with the correct plan in place.

Planning is the key to success! I just finished reading and studying an article published in MOZ, which states that "Social Media indirectly influences website performance in Google."  She also states that SMM blogs perform in organic search results better that SEO blogs.  Social Media for local businesses in a target geographical area can create huge momentum for their business when done correctly with a well-targeted social media plan in place.  

When using social media referral marketing is one of the strongest tools you can implement to drive traffic to your website.  The great news is it is all trackable in Google analytics.  Posting to post is not the answer either, understand what you are trying to accomplish & what type of ROI you are expecting to receive. This is a process and will not happen overnight, be patient and consistent. Read the article and understand as much as possible, however, hire an expert. MOZ is a great tool to have in your arsenal of tools, but an expert in Local Marketing & Social Media is your real answer

Read the MOZ article written by Alexandra Tachalova 

Being An Expert vs Hiring An Expert

I just finished reading an article on Entrepreneur.com that was discussing the 10 best skills to learn online today.  I found it interesting but a little tough to accomplish such a task each  is an expertise in itself.  When I am out speaking to small business owners and entrepreneurs those 10 things would shut them down. I am not saying they are not important however for a small business owner to tackle such a daunting list, could be overwhelming.

Everything he has written about in this article is a learnable skill set, I agree, however, if you are becoming an expert in all these fields you won't be growing your business.  I believe in having an understanding how each one of these works is a huge advantage. That way when you are discussing your plan with each expert, you will have an idea if they know what they are talking about. Hire a team of experts to handle each one of these daunting tasks and have a plan for each of these specialized fields. I have a team of specialized people that are well versed in all of these fields.  

However, two things he  discusses I believe all business owners and entrepreneurs have to know is Analytics and Human Behavior if you do not have a handle on these two topics you are sunk.  First one is analytics, you must understand how to analyze your business meaning, your website utilizing google analytics (the basics) knowing how people are getting to your website.  

More importantly running a business requires you to manage people, whether it's just you or not , you will need to manage yourself, so understanding your own behavior is key.  You will probably be required to sell something even if it's just selling you, so to speak.  if you don't know how to sell you are sunk, Robert Kiyosaki says "the number one skill set in business is the ability to SELL."  Learning the art of selling is the most important skill set, it is a must for any business owner or entrepreneurs.  

Click to read full article on Entrepreneur:  R.L. ADAMS 
ENTREPRENEUR, SOFTWARE ENGINEER, AUTHOR, BLOGGER AND FOUNDER OF wANDERLUSTWORKER.COM

JZ LifeStyle Team thoughts on Andrew Hutchinson's 2017 Predictions

JZ LifeStyle Team thoughts on Andrew Hutchinson's 2017 Predictions:

Social Media has been in an upward swing and a great way to market in the most recent years. However, most small businesses and entrepreneurs, do not have a plan laid out properly, so they may be using social media, but in effectively.  Some companies outsource their social media, but still no plan or budget in place for it just winging it, more on this later.

Andrew has some great insights on where social media is going in 2017,  be ready Charlotte NC!

As we all know FB live is the greatest ever and underutilized at this point, by many small businesses in Charlotte NC. I share a lot of other people's articles so that my clients need not take my word for it, here is another's opinion.  Andrew writes about FB live which is growing like crazy, but is it an advertising platform for all businesses?  That's what I get asked all the time and the answer is YES!  Get a plan together and take action!

 

Andrew also stated in his article & I have researched this as well the virtual/360 being a big hit in 2017.  This will be an added expense to user's so in my opinion, it will not explode as fast as FB live. The TV plugin is also going to be rolled out even bigger and better.  We will also be seeing a movement in picture recognition, I had been working with a local landscape company here in Charlotte, I have been telling them that pictures, pictures, and more pictures, future customers will soon be able to click a picture and buy it!  Be ahead of what's coming.

With all the features and choices with social media, what do you do? All of it and repeat!  

Start with the basics Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Youtube, Pinterest and Instagram then expand from there, have a plan ask a local expert in your area.  Please use caution, most social media people just post no rhyme or reason random with no plan in place you will not get the results!

Andrew's article is full of great information.  Everything is trackable social media done correctly will explode any business, stay ahead of the game and start implementing it in your marketing plan.

Read Andrew's full article here: 24 Predictions for Social Media in 2017 on Social Media Today

Small Businesses are not taking advantage of social media...

Small Businesses are not taking advantage of social media...

In the UK as well as in the United States for some reason, small businesses have not caught on to the power of social media or they are doing it wrong.  

Sara Oberst, VP of marketing at Manta commented 

"There is no denying that Instagram is highly popular among today's consumers. With over 500 million monthly viewers on Instagram, small businesses have a unique opportunity to capture new customers. But as our poll found, small business owners aren’t taking full advantage of Instagram for business use – only 24 percent of small business owners actively use Instagram in their social media marketing.”

What I have found amongst the small business owner is that they just post stuff, there is no plan of action put into place for what they are trying to accomplish, whether it's branding, acquiring new customers/clients or to keep their existing customers/clients base informed. Put together a business plan for social media platforms only, what is your business's end game and what results are you trying to accomplish using social media.

The article was based on small businesses in the U.K., however, I find it relevant to what is happening in the local Charlotte NC marketing plans for small businesses I speak with.

Read the full article here: Small Business Owners - UK.  Business Matters - U.K.'s leading small business magazine, however, this is relevant in Charlotte NC.

Interesting Article About Facebook Live & Snapchat...

Interesting article about implementing Facebook live & Snapchat in your social media marketing.  I am finding that small business owners are having a little anxiety over this.  First and foremost, stop and breathe this is not the red carpet & it will not require you to take acting lessons.  The businesses I have been working with me, hear me say all the time people do business with people.  Put yourself out there be honest and act with integrity and the customers will come.

I agree with the article please make a plan and build on each live chat/video.  If you just get on, just to do it, without a plan it could absolutely backfire on your business.  What I am not seeing in this article is that when you are live please acknowledge who jumps on with you live, take a moment to let that sit.

Engaging with your live viewers will also take time so that you have quick decisive messages and thank your customers/clients and followers, without them, you have no business.

Below I have posted some great pointers from this article:

"When creating custom geofilters for Snapchat:

• Make sure you put in your request six weeks ahead of your event date because approval is on a first-come, first-serve basis.

• Get the maximum usage length of 30 days.

• Ensure that it’s a PNG file with a transparent background, a width of 1080 pixels, and a height of 1920 pixels. 80% of custom geofilters for businesses are disapproved because they aren’t transparent."  Search Engine Journal
• Here is the link to the full article in - Search Engine Journal-https://www.searchenginejournal.com

As always remember to suck every bit of life out of all your content, as my customers know, we turn video into podcasts and articles, we post our content everywhere on all of our platforms, this is easily done through the right training or software.

Remember, if you are not having fun, you are doing it wrong!

Veterans Day - A mere Thank you, doesn't seem good enough!

Veterans Day - A mere Thank you doesn't seem good enough!

Thank you for your service & your sacrifice 
for my families freedom. 

 I do not take freedom for granted and thank Veterans and service members every day when I see a service member or a veteran,  I reach out my hand to shake their hand, just to say, Thank you with gratitude in my heart & eyes.  I have embarrassed a few younger service members, that asked me why are you thanking me for doing my job?  

My answer is because thanking you is my job!

How To Use Share To Drive Traffic Today

How To Use Share To Drive Traffic Today

More and more webmasters have the recurring dilemma on how to increase the flow of traffic in their client's websites. During the past few years many methods that have been developed to solve this predicament. While most of them would work there are those that would not make even a small impact. Jeanne Zierhoffer at JZ LifeStyle Team understands how to efficiently target your local market and ideal client or customer. 

One of the methods that have spawned many success stories in driving traffic to your websites is viral marketing. Viral marketing makes use of the tendency of a person to share something to find informative, entertaining or amazing. 

Many companies bank on this behavior to increase the popularity of their companies website. Viral marketing makes use of many mediums in enticing this behavior. It might be in the form of an interesting story, an addicting flash game, an amusing video and many others that may catch a person’s fancy.

This ingenious form of marketing is typically low cost and is a wonderful tool for any company to utilize. The benefit greatly overshadows the cost or efforts to initialize this marketing scheme. Any website would greatly benefit with Jeanne Zierhoffer's viral marketing.

One of the easiest methods in viral marketing is using the share on social media. This is a simple way that you can attach to the programming of your website. Generally, share with a friend on social media are installed in pages where media is placed so that a person can easily share the media to any friends or fans.

Then the process can be repeated over & over again. As more people share the media with friends & fans, more and more people will know of the existence of your companies website. People who read the ads who liked your page will click on the link and visit your  website. This drives traffic to your website resulting in a greater number of potential customers.

In the search results page, you will see many links that will direct you to a site where you can tell a friend or share. It would just be a simple matter of looking for your ideal client or customer.

With share viral marketing strategy you can drive traffic to your site which could potentially spell profits. This is a simple harmless script that offers great benefits for low cost paired with great creativity and foresight.

It is imperative that you have patience in using a with a friend script or fan. If your chosen media doesn’t get the mileage that is expected of it, it may take some time before it gets spread or shared. But surely many people will see your ads and there is a greater probability that they will visit your website increasing your traffic flow.