Tags ArchivesMarketing Best Practices

Microsoft Excel vs. Google Sheets – Which is Best for Marketers? standard

You cannot escape spreadsheets when in marketing. Regardless of what you are working on, clients’ retention, small business marketing improvement, revenue calculation, or budget planning, it is always necessary to have it all tracked, measured, and summarized. Spreadsheets work great for not only keeping it all in one place but also visualizing things that matter the most. The two most famous apps for managing spreadsheets are Google Sheets and Microsoft Excel. They both seem to tick all the boxes. Is there any difference when picking the right one when it comes to storing and organizing data? Are you still in doubt about which one to choose? Without further ado, let’s discover their differences as well as similarities and find out which ...

Continue Reading

Useful Marketing Tips for Rehab Centers standard

Before every business venture, it's essential to do plenty of research. There are things you should know before starting an LLC, and mistakes to avoid during marketing campaigns. For instance, marketing for rehab centers can be especially difficult. You want to ensure that you're reaching the right people, but you don’t want to advertise in a way that's offensive or insensitive. In this article, we'll provide some useful marketing tips for rehab centers. Create A Marketing Plan This is a document detailing the necessary actions to achieve one or more marketing objectives. In order for your plan to be effective, it should include the following: Your target market An overview of the competition Your center's unique selling points (USPs) The objectives ...

Continue Reading

Marketer Inspiration Methods That Save From Boring Ideas standard

Digital marketing is, on the one hand, a constant search for new ideas, and on the other hand, it is attention to the smallest details. How to combine two such different components and not lose the ability to be creative? Let's think together about the sources of creative growth for a marketer. After all, we all know that without this, the world of modern professions can not. Get marketing ideas from movies about marketing, business, and sales Inspirational movies are a great idea to combine leisure and professional growth. Although there are not as many exciting scripts about marketing as there are about secret agents, for example, we will prepare a dozen interesting films for you. Although not all of these ...

Continue Reading

How to Improve Customer Communication for Your Marketing Business standard

Every business needs to be able to effectively communicate with its customers. However, it’s likely even more important for marketing businesses.  As a marketing business, your entire brand is built upon your communication skills. If you can’t effectively communicate with your customers, they’ll have a hard time believing you’re able to communicate with an audience on their behalf. So, it’s essential that you’re always on the lookout for ways to improve your customer communication.  When you consider that customers will stop doing business with an organization if they experience poor communication, it’s even more apparent. Below, we’ll outline a few ways you can improve customer communication within your marketing business and hopefully ensure each of your customers has a good experience ...

Continue Reading

2020 Vision – The Future of Marketing image

2020 Marketing Vision

January is that time of year for prognostications of the future, for outlooks and trends, and of course, New Year's resolutions. So why not a 2020 Vision - The Future of Marketing? Of course 20/20 vision is perfect, so is the future of marketing, perfection? If you are reading this article, you are interested in marketing. So why not indulge ourselves for a moment? Marketing is now mission critical to the success of every organization. Every brand. Every thing! In hyper-competitive markets, categories or industries, perfected marketing is the key differentiator. Of course your products and/or services have to be perfected. But quality or excellence no longer guarantee success. Consumers and business customers will no longer beat a path to ...

Continue Reading

Pump Up Holiday Sales with Personalization and Mobile Capabilities image

Holiday Sales

It looks like the season is going to be merry and bright. Whether entertaining at home or socializing away from home, consumers are looking to celebrate with others and spend money doing so. Holiday sales are expected to increase 5 to 5.6 percent over last year’s season, according to Deloitte’s annual retail holiday sales forecast. Additionally, ecommerce sales are forecasted to grow 17 to 22 percent, reaching $128 to $134 billion throughout the 2018 shopping season. And even businesses that think they might not really be in a position to capitalize on any holiday spending need to realize there’s an opportunity. According to Deloitte’s 33rd Annual Holiday Consumer Spending Survey, over half of shoppers (51 percent) believe in the spirit ...

Continue Reading

Plan a Campaign Around Small Business Saturday image

Small Business Saturday

Small Business Saturday (SBS) is right around the corner on the Saturday after Thanksgiving, November 24th. It offers businesses the opportunity to capitalize on the momentum of Black Friday and create some excitement of their own. For some companies it will be a way to start off the holiday shopping season, for others, it may be even more important. Small businesses that are more seasonal in nature, especially those with traditionally spring and summer products or services, can use SBS to offer a special promotion for consumers to consider their offerings during a time they otherwise would not. It can play an important role in facilitating business all year long. Not sure if it’s worth pursing? Consider the data from last ...

Continue Reading

Generate B2B Buzz with Facebook Lead Ads image

Facebook Lead Ads

Small business owners face the challenge of being found in a highly competitive market crowded with many similar products and services. Consumers’ easy access to an enormous amount of information makes it even more difficult for companies to reach and convert leads into lasting customers. Facebook offers a way to initially attract potential customers through advertising and then interact with them through ongoing, personal engagement tactics inherent to the platform. Many small and medium-sized businesses, especially those in the service sector, may consider LinkedIn to be the only social network able to deliver B2B leads. However, marketers are finding that Facebook also has the potential to generate results through solid tools and targeted markets for lead acquisition. The reason is in ...

Continue Reading

Simplifying Marketing in a TMI World image

Simplifying Marketing

In the age of information, it’s easy for a company’s audience to feel overexposed to marketing and ads. It’s also a lot of extra work for an organization’s staff to keep up with a multitude of platforms. It’s time to simplify marketing efforts, for the benefit of both the organization and purchasers. 6 Tips for Simplifying a Marketing Plan There are a number of ways to simplify your organization’s marketing process. Follow any of the following tips below for a simpler process. Zero in on Who Your Business is Selling to 50% of marketers use 10 or fewer profile segments, while the other half use up to 100 segments. Clearly, many businesses aren’t as focused as they believe they are on target audience. ...

Continue Reading

How to Land a Google Featured Snippet image

Google Featured Snippet

Featured snippets improve the search experience for users, especially in a world where users are increasingly using mobile and voice for their search. Instead of clicking through countless links, the answer will be provided at the top of the search results page. One issue, however, if you thought it was hard enough ranking on the first page, it’s even harder to earn a snippet. But put in some hard work, and you’ll earn position 0 in no time. SEM Rush analyzed 1.3 million snippets; here’s a summary of it’s findings.  PS: Need a refresher on what a featured snippet is? Read our blog here. What do top performers have in common? From SEM Rush’s research, they learned some common factors found among ...

Continue Reading

Short & Simple: Infographics are a Marketer’s Dream Tool image

Short Simple Infographics

Developing online content creation is an important marketing objective for almost any company in any industry. In fact, the goal today should really be on delivering the best content possible to really engage customers and drive sales. And one of the best tools available to marketers to accomplish this is still the infographic. Indeed, marketers have been using infographics since at least 2010. The use of infographics goes back further than that though if you think about it. Remember picking up a copy of USA Today 20 years ago and seeing the colorful little graphic organizer in the lower corner on the front page of every section? When USA Today first began publishing in the early 80s it differentiated itself ...

Continue Reading

Modern Marketing Trends to Watch For In 2017 image

marketing trends

Last year we predicted the Modern Marketing Trends of 2016. But times have changed; here are some marketing trends of 2017. Chatbots and AI will become mainstream. Chatbots and artificial intelligence aren’t exactly new, but their widespread adoption is. Chatbots will use AI to both learn from the users it speaks with and from sources around the web. We’re already seeing the start of chatbot and AI growth – with virtual assistants in both Apple and Google phones, on home devices like Amazon Echo, and branded chatbots on messaging apps. There are countless examples, and with both smart home technology and messaging app adoption on the rise, this trend is showing no sign of slowing down. Consider taking advantage of this trend ...

Continue Reading

Content Marketing Guide: Best Practices, Tips & Trade Secrets image

content marketing guide

A new content marketing guide is available that details 3 phases of the content marketing process:  planning, implementation, and measurement. Both business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C) content marketing scenarios were considered. Numerous content marketing examples and resources are provided. The Guide starts with the premise that content marketing is the hottest topic in all of marketing. Why? Because according to a 2016 study by the Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs, 88% of B2B marketers and 76% of B2C marketers are using content marketing. The content planning phase includes defining objectives, determining content topics, and identifying content types or tactics. Regarding tactics, the aforementioned studies identified both B2B and B2C content tactics in the charts below. No question, there are major differences in content types ...

Continue Reading

Thought Leadership Marketing Best Practices – Webinar image

thought leadership marketing

During June, Modern Marketing Partners will be hosting two webcasts. The first will be on Thursday, June 9th at 1 PM CST, titled Software Marketing Best Practices: Executive Briefing. The second, Thought Leadership Best Practices: Executive Briefing, will take place on Tuesday, June 14th at 1 PM CST. Thought Leadership Marketing Best Practices: Executive Briefing For complex or expensive products, customers won’t buy from just anybody. These purchase decisions take time and research; buyers want experts. Thought leadership is one of the most effective ways to prove your company to prospective customers. Although this is a great marketing tactic, it’s becoming more widely used than ever. How do you stand out for less? What’s Covered: Understand the challenges of thought leadership. Learn ...

Continue Reading

7 Habits of Highly Effective Marketers image

7 Habits of Effective Marketers

Stephen Covey published the hugely popular self-help book, "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" in 1989. 14 million copies later, a number of copy-cat topics have surfaced across all disciplines, and you know marketing is on this bandwagon! Nevertheless, we think there is still an opportunity for another perspective. Perhaps a modern marketing filter? Thanks in advance for indulging. Of course, to begin such an assignment, a Google search quickly identifies several attempts at the subject. The search also results in some more focused topics like 7 habits of effective digital marketing, content marketing, and inbound marketing. During this exercise, I found, not surprisingly, an email marketing software vendor identifying data and CRM software as highly effective marketing habits. So perhaps ...

Continue Reading

CMO Predictions for 2014 image

It’s the month of predictions for next year, and this is an important one for B2B Chief Marketing Officers (CMO’s).  International Data Corporate (IDC), offered their prediction regarding what Business-to-Business Chief Marketing Officers (CMO's) can expect for the year of 2014.  Learn 10 things you can expect as a CMO in the next year. 1. Increasing Complexity and Augmented Job Description As ways to best reach clients changes, so does the job description for a CMO.  The concept of marketing is becoming more and more complex, and as firms adapt, so will their needs.  Ideas have even come across as the development of a position known as the “Chief Content Officer” to augment the C-Suite, focusing strictly the company’s voice and ...

Continue Reading

How to Reduce Marketing Expense While Increasing Marketing Results image

Many so-called traditional marketing tactics like advertising, trade shows and print literature are huge cost-drivers in the marketing budget. Good news is that many of these often cost-prohibitive tactics can be reduced and replaced with more cost-efficient marketing. This blog will share 5 tips for stretching your marketing investment, while increasing marketing effectiveness and results! In addition, several resources are provided to assist in your quest for marketing nirvana—doing more with less! 5 Tips for Reducing Marketing Expense While Increasing Effectiveness 1) Customer insight:  marketing is expensive, mistakes costly. Avoid mistakes with insight into customer segments, needs, decision makers, and more. House all your customer intelligence in a  robust database or marketing automation software that can be updated easily and used for downstream marketing. Continually ...

Continue Reading

YouTube Video as a Top Marketing Strategy image

Some pundits project that video will soon dominate all content on the internet. While this seems unlikely, video is the fastest growing marketing vehicle, doubling in volume from just 2010 to 2012, and triple digit growth expected thru 2015! (Source: Cisco) This growth and popularity is propelling videos importance in the marketing mix. Not surprisingly, YouTube dominates video usage with 43% of all views. (Source: comScore). Why consider video? According to Forrester Research, “any given video in the index stands about a 50 times better chance of appearing on the first page of results than any given text page in the index.” Need more convincing? Google purchased YouTube. It is no coincidence that videos often rank highest in search engine results. Consumers are increasingly ...

Continue Reading

Accounting and CPA Firm Marketing Best Practices image

Marketing is becoming more important than ever to Accounting and CPA firms of all sizes. Why? First, competition is increasing from local, regional, national and non-traditional accounting service providers. Second, marketing has changed radically in the last few years, and accounting firms, conservative by nature, have been slow to change. Third, like other professional service firms, CPAs do not invest enough in marketing, or implement as many marketing initiatives as other industries. So why should CPAs reconsider their marketing?  Because the modern and digitally-focused marketing mix is proving to deliver dramatic and yes, measurable marketing results, regardless of company size and financial resources. This blog will show you how with the Top 10 Marketing Best Practices for Accounting and CPA Firms, along ...

Continue Reading

Branding Basics: Why Branding is Your Biggest Marketing Decision image

Branding is typically thought of as developing a name or a logo for a company or product (service). However, branding is much broader and includes brand strategy, brand identity, brand management and the brand experience. Here we will cover quick basics of branding so that you can understand all the elements of brand creation. We'll also explain the importance of branding as it relates to customer brand perception. 1. Brand strategy relates to customer and market insight, positioning, product definition, brand hierarchy, and platform; brand strategy serves as the foundation to brand identity, management and experience. 2. Brand identity is all visual (and verbal) elements including name (trademarks), logo, messaging, graphic themes (including color), taglines and messages, and standards or guidelines. 3. Brand management ...

Continue Reading

Bad SEO: Blackhat Techniques Are a NO NO! image

Search engine optimization or SEO that employs so-called Blackhat SEO techniques is a NO-NO! These aggresive and unethical techniques are used in an effort to improve rankings of a particular website. On blackhat SEO techniques Google says, “In the pursuit of higher rankings or traffic, a few sites use techniques that don’t benefit users, where the intent is to look for shortcuts or loopholes that would rank pages higher than they deserve to be ranked.” How does Google deliver search results? Google crawls, indexes, and serves your website in search results. Google describes crawling as “the process by which Googlebot discovers new and updated pages to be added to the Google index”.  Then, “Googlebot processes each of the pages it ...

Continue Reading

Marketing E-Newsletter: Stay On Top of Marketing Best Practices image

A new e-newsletter focused on the latest and greatest marketing strategies and techniques is available from Modern Marketing University (MMU), the training and marketing thought leadership affiliate of Modern Marketing Partners. This e-newsletter is available to anyone interested in marketing and communications best practices, tips and techniques, marketing trends, measurement tools, case studies, and more. The  e-newsletter, called the Modern Marketing SCOOP, is free for anyone who registers. Quite frequently, MMU hears from various business professionals that marketing is changing so rapidly, that it's hard to keep up. And that many traditional marketing methods are either obsolete, or must integrate with Internet and social media marketing initiatives. The mission of Modern Marketing University, is to embrace this change, understand how to leverage new media and ...

Continue Reading

Search Engine Optimization—SEO—Top Priority for Modern Marketers image

Achieving top position for keywords in search engine results pages (SERPs) is becoming one of the highest priorities of marketers. Why? Because studies* show that only the top few search result positions drive click-through, website traffic, registrations, and other great results like sales! Despite this priority, the majority of company or brand websites lack even the most basic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) techniques. *(Source: Search Engine Watch) Developing your website, or retrofitting an existing website with best practice SEO is critical to achieving improved organic or natural search engine results (vs. paid search results). Search Engine Optimization Techniques SEO is impacted by on-page coding and content, off-page link-building, and social media presence. Some of the techniques and features that support search engine optimization include: Meta ...

Continue Reading

Modern Marketing Top Ten Best Practices image

Ok, so modern marketing is very different than marketing 20 years ago. 10 years ago. Even 5 years ago. The Four P's are celebrating a 50 year anniversary. Without an update? Advertising is no longer the epicenter of marketing. It has been replaced by the Internet for all but the biggest retail and consumer brands, or 99% of all marketing! So what are modern marketing best practices? The modern marketing mix is multi-faceted. Multi-channel. Modern marketing is the integration of traditional marketing with Internet and social media. Strategic marketing drives Outbound and Inbound marketing. Content is king and marketing is more cost efficient and measurable than ever before. Any questions? So if you are a modern, successful marketer, what should you be doing? ...

Continue Reading

This is a unique website which will require a more modern browser to work!

Please upgrade today!