Tag Archive for: social media marketing tips

The Importance of Digital Marketing in 2022

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Digital marketing is more important now than ever. You can utilize digital marketing to target specialized markets, allowing you to reach out to customers who may not have previously considered your company. But this industry is fast-growing, which also means ever changing and evolving. Where do you start if you want to develop a digital marketing strategy? Right here. 

As marketers think about building brands in the coming years post-COVID, how is digital marketing being leveraged to help companies bounce back? More importantly, how should you redefine your strategy for 2022?

According to a CISCO report, 90% of North Americans use the internet, and usage is expected to reach 92% by next year. Customers are now spending more time and resources on owned-media channels such as websites, mobile apps, and customer-service channels. There is also a noticeable increase in customer-conversion rates, with social and digital video channels driving the highest ROIs.

Having a digital marketing strategy in place allows you to reach millions of people cost-effectively. If your business doesn’t have a strategic digital marketing plan aligned with your business plan your business can suffer and you could lose out to competitors who are more digitally savvy.

Reasons To Use Digital Marketing

1. Reach a Specific Audience. 

With media like TV, billboards and radio, you are reaching out to a broad audience, and the chances of targeting a specific group of customers is low. Whereas in digital marketing, you can use the features of a marketing platform to specifically target an audience based on age, interests or behavior. 

Your chances of reaching the right audience are significantly higher, and you can pick and choose these metrics as your needs change. It also allows you to identify subgroups within your clientele. If you have more than one type of product, you can tailor a campaign to this more specific group of customers.

2. Access Metrics of your Digital Marketing Strategy ─ All in One Place.

Digital marketing metrics are the key performance indicators (KPIs) used to measure the success of a business’s marketing efforts online. The goal of using digital marketing metrics is to track and decipher the way consumers interact with your brand online through websites and social media platforms. While there are many benefits of using metrics, the main use of metrics are used to drive improvements and help businesses focus their people and resources on what’s important. Overall, metrics reflect and support the various strategies for all aspects of the organization, including marketing, competition, standards, or customer requirements and expectations. 

Metrics indicate the priorities of the company and provide a window on performance, ethos and ambition. This allows you to determine your return on investment. You know exactly how profitable your digital marketing campaign was, as you can see the results of each aspect of your efforts.

3. Becoming Visible Within the Industry.

Some of the largest corporations have millions of dollars to spend on traditional advertising. If you don’t have that kind of ammunition, digital strategies allow you to outrank big corporations on a smaller budget. 

Here’s what visibility in business can do for you:

  • Helps you get exposure to a larger audience.
  • Build your brand awareness, so that people know who you are and how you help. 
  • Establishes your credibility and expertise.
  • Allows you to reach and sign more ideal clients.
  • Connects you to opportunities you wouldn’t have otherwise. 

Search Engine Optimization

SEO is made up of multiple elements, and knowing what they are and how they work is key to understanding why SEO is so important. In short, SEO is crucial because it makes your website more visible, and that means more traffic and more opportunities to convert prospects into customers. 

It’s also a valuable tool for brand awareness, building relationships with prospects, and positioning yourself as an authoritative and trustworthy expert in your field. More traffic means more potential clients becoming aware of your brand and services.

SEO is composed of three parts:

  • On-page SEO focuses on the content on your website’s pages. You can research keywords that resonate with your buyer persona or keywords that potential clients might ask. The task is to create quality content when answering those questions, so your pages rank higher.
  • Off-page SEO relates to all activity that happens away from your website. It involves external optimization practices that happen away from your site rather than on it. The main technique used for off-page SEO is backlink building since quality backlinks to your site from external sites tell search engines that your site is valuable and high-quality which helps to build authority.
  • Technical SEO is the back end of your website. Things like coding, image compression and cascading style sheets, also known as CSS. These are important aspects of your website that determine how quickly your pages load. Search engines like Google use it as an important ranking factor.

Social Media Marketing

Social media networks are open to all, giving businesses a chance to follow their consumers’ activities or potential buyers. This helps marketers become more informed about their target audience, likes, dislikes, and interests so that they can create a better marketing strategy to attract customers. The opportunities are endless when it comes to social media marketing. A big plus in  using this type of marketing tool is that most of the basic services are free. 

The end goal is to create more traffic and generate leads for your business. The social media channels you can use for this purpose are:

  • Facebook.
  • Twitter.
  • LinkedIn.
  • Instagram.
  • Snapchat.
  • YouTube.
  • TikTok
  • Pinterest

In an increasingly connected world, your approach to marketing must be just as integrated.

Last Thoughts

In this day and age where just about everyone is connected to the internet, it is crucial for any business to have a strong online presence. As we continue to move forward within the digital age, younger generations are likely to be centered on using the internet to access different services. Having a strong digital marketing strategy is a must if you want to succeed in the increasingly competitive industries across the globe.

Could your digital marketing strategy use a boost? Onimod Global is your Chicago-based, in-house marketing team, your partner experts for specific marketing verticals or some nice balance in between. We excel in customer service and will teach you the most relevant and up-to-date digital marketing trends. From social media to SEO and paid search, you will have the tools to ensure your business succeeds online.  

Have questions about creating your online presence and need help strategizing? Contact us here today.

Spring 2021 Social Media Marketing Trends

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Social media platforms introduce new features and change their algorithms frequently throughout the year. As marketers, we have to keep up with the trends and continuously update our strategies to ensure they stay effective. 

As we make our way into the spring and summer season, here are 5 trends to watch out for and to take into consideration as you evaluate your strategies. 

1. Live Streams Stay Prominent 

As we’re all aware, last year forced many businesses to turn to online meetings, conferences, etc. Naturally, there was a large uptick in the use of live streaming features on social media as well. While the situation continues to evolve throughout 2021, people have gotten used to interacting with their favorite celebrities, influencers and brands without even having to leave their houses. According to a recent report from Sprout Social, 40% of consumers want to actually see more live video from brands. Which is why live streaming will continue to stay prominent and should be a part of your overall social media marketing strategy this spring. 

2. Augmented Reality Growing in Popularity

Augmented reality experiences are inherently interactive and highly effective for engagement on social media. Brands have started adopting this trend by creating AR filters to promote new products or encourage followers to interact. This keeps audience members engaged and entertained and could even help you attract new customers. As the Sprout Social Report also found that this is a content type that helps a brand’s social presence stand out. 

3. Stories Remain a Key Content Type 

500 million users interact with Instagram Stories daily. Stories have been a dominant form of content for some time now, but they’re definitely not going away anytime soon. In fact, this type of content may even start to outperform standard feed posts. A SocialInsider study found that images in Stories have a 5.65% higher tap-forward rate than videos. This is why it’s encouraged for brands to take a more organized approach and regularly plan stories into their content calendars. 

4. Social Commerce Continues to Grow

Social media platforms are constantly adapting and upgrading features to enhance their user experience. Recently we’ve seen a growing number of tools to support quick and easy shopping right from the platform. For example, Instagram now allows you to add product tags and enable easy checkout without ever leaving the app. And on Facebook you can set up a Shop that allows users to browse and make purchases right from the platform. 

If you have yet to capitalize on these tools, now is definitely the time. Why? 54% of social media users research products on social media and social media referrals can influence the purchase decision of 71% of users. You could be losing out on a whole range of prospective customers if you haven’t set up social media storefronts. 

5. The Importance of Inclusivity, Authenticity and Transparency 

Consumers are putting more pressure on brands than ever to make a meaningful effort to be inclusive, authentic and transparent in both their business operations and marketing. Audiences are aware that when it comes to making purchases, they have plenty of options. So they want to put their money behind companies that show investment in the communities and issues they are also passionate about. 

Brands can no longer stay silent and passive on issues that are important to their target audiences. However, audiences are also increasingly aware of performative activism that looks more like a marketing play rather than meaningful initiatives. If you are joining in on a conversation, it’s essential that your content is well-informed, relevant, meaningful and has actionable initiatives behind it. 

Similarly, consumers want brands to be completely authentic and transparent about their products and operation. A great way to do this is through social media. When mistakes are made and your audience is upset, social media is a great way to apologize, answer questions and connect with them. 

Final Thoughts

Anticipating the latest social media trends is essential to building a stronger presence, making connections with users and growing your brand. One way to ensure your stay on top of the trends is by working with professionals. At Onimod Global, we’re experts in Social Media Marketing and knowing how to connect our clients with their consumers in the places they’re engaging. If you’re interested in becoming a client and helping your brand reach its full potential, contact us today. 

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on the top digital marketing news and trends, click here. To find out more about who we are and what we do, click here.

Tips to Grow your Small Business Through Social Media

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The value of social media for businesses continues to grow, especially in light of COVID-19 pandemic. Social media allows for businesses to maintain connections with existing customers and extend their reach to new audiences. With over 2 billion worldwide users, everyone knows social media has now become a crucial part of an overall business strategy. But as a small business, joining social media effectively can be easier said than done. Let’s take a look at 5 ways you can start using social media to grow your small business. 

1. If you can’t create, curate. 

Posting consistent content is one of the most important factors that goes into increasing engagement. If you can’t create new content on your own, curate other’s content. Tools such as Pocket, Flipboard and Feedly allow you to curate useful, relevant content from other sources and share due credits. We recommend posting a minimum of twice per week and a maximum of 5, depending on your content type and industry. 

2. Use video to keep your audience engaged and growing. 

Nowadays, visual content is key. Algorithms have changed and evolved to actually preferring video content over all other forms. Going even further, 72% of consumers prefer videos over manuals to decide on a buy. There are numerous types of video content you can create to keep your audience engaged and growing. Consider sharing behind-the-scenes looks at your business, product launches, how-to’s, service examples, etc. 

3. Involve your followers. 

Finding ways to directly involve your followers in your content is another way to maximize engagement. Consider making quizzes, polls, giveaways and contests.  Many brands will create giveaways and contests and require those that enter to like, comment or share their posts with their friends. This is a simple and effective way to drastically increase your awareness among your followers and a larger audience. 

4. Utilize hashtags. 

Hashtags are one of the best ways to improve your searchability,  gain more awareness and expand the reach of your content. This goes beyond just creating your own hashtags. Find trending hashtags that are pertinent for your business: 

  • For your subject matter: #HowTo’s, #Hacks, #DIYS 
  • For your industry: #Food, #Fashion, #Auto 
  • For your audience: #StartUp, #WannaBeChef, #FitnessFreaks 

Research what’s trending among your audience and find a relevant way to involve yourself into the conversation. 

5. Reach out to influencers. 

Influencer marketing is a great way for new and small businesses to gain traction amongst a large audience. Influencers are now seen as more trusted, relatable and popular than celebrities. Consumers turn to them more for advice on what products to buy, services to use, brands to trust, etc. There are a number of tools that can help you research who the best influencers are in your industry and make it easier for you to reach out and connect with them. 

Final Thoughts

To be successful on social media it’s ultimately about giving value to your audience, whether that be through educating or entertaining. Users are constantly being bombarded with massive amounts of content and ads everyday. Meaning you have to find ways to bring value to them and differentiate yourself from the competition. Strategies will differ based on your industry and audience, but these 5 tactics are a great way for anyone to get started. If you need further assistance in social media marketing, or any other area of digital marketing, contact us today! 

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on the top digital marketing news and trends, click here.

Tips on Managing Negative Social Media Comments

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Social media is a unique public environment that has its own culture and expectations. And at some point in social media managing, you’ll have to deal with negative comments on your brand’s page or posts. While some of these comments may be from blatant trolls, others will be clear criticism of your product or service. It’s important to know how to effectively deal with these comments. Here are 5 tips on how to manage negative comments on your social media. 

Don’t ignore or delete. 

The worst thing a brand can do is ignore their negative comments. This can aggravate the commenter even further and may lead them to continue to leave negative comments in more places. This can also look bad to other users and existing customers. You want to remain transparent with your audience. Deleting messages rather than addressing them head-on conveys that you might have something to hide. 

It’s important to note that this doesn’t remain true for all negative comments. If a comment is inappropriate, offensive or derogatory, it should be deleted. To make this decision, exercise your own judgement or refer to your organization’s code of conduct. 

If it’s your fault, apologize sincerely. 

The saying goes, “the customer is always right.” Even if you disagree with their point of view, it’s still best to apologize. This is the first step in resolving a conflict. Keep a calm, cool and sincere tone throughout the conversation. When someone is bashing something you’re passionate about, this can be difficult, but it’s crucial to not let your emotions get in front of professionalism. 

On the other hand, you don’t want to admit fault for something you had no control over. If that’s the case of the complaint, lead with something like, “We’re sorry to hear you weren’t satisfied with your experience.” This shows you still care, but doesn’t recognize that you or a team member did anything wrong. 

Take offline if necessary. 

It’s best practice to resolve the conflict privately. Try to shift the conversation off of social media to another place. Whether this be through direct messenger, email, over the phone, etc. After you apologize, close the response by asking the customer to contact you through one of the mentioned forms of private communication. You never want to get in a further argument in the comments for others to see. Depending on the issue, the customer may write dozens more negative replies, which can reflect poorly on your brand. 

Be personable. 

No one likes their frustrations to be met with automated replies. This also looks bad to anyone else that reads the conversation on social. It’s beneficial to have a plan for negative comments, but you want to personalize the message as much as possible. This shows real empathy, authenticity and sincerity. You want to show that you really do care about your customers. See the following conversation between Delta and a customer. 

source:https://www.socialpilot.co/

It’s evident that these messages were written by a real person and are not automations. They effectively communicate with the customer and show that they genuinely want to help. 

Be timely. 

Timeliness is key with negative comments. Most users expect a response within 2 hours. If necessary, follow up with the relevant departments to give your customer a satisfactory answer. Word travels fast on social media, which is also why it’s so important to respond quickly. A slow response can make it seem like you don’t care or are ignoring the complaint, both which can quickly damage a company’s reputation. 

Be sure to consistently monitor your reputation throughout the day, whether it be through Google Alerts or other social listening tools. This will help to ensure no negative messages go unnoticed. 

Final Thoughts

Negative comments are unavoidable, but if managed the right way they can actually do more for your brand than positive ones. Responding to positive comments is easy. Dealing with negative comments is how you show company integrity, sincerity and personability. This is where long-term customer loyalty stems from. So if you want your company to succeed, watch what people are saying about your brand on social media. React to all the comments you get and be attentive to the problems of your customers.

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on the top digital marketing news and trends, click here. To find out more about who we are and what we do, click here.

The Right Social Media Image Sizes In 2020

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With the world searching more and more online during the COVID-19 crisis, it’s important your brand and social image is professional and polished. Using images which aren’t the correct size for each platform’s requirements can impact your brand perception. Low quality and pixelated visuals make you look unprofessional or not up to date. Are you not sure if you’re using the correct image sizes? Use our image size guide to see the key image requirements for all the major social platforms.

Facebook

  • Your profile photo is representative of your brand. We recommend that is a consistent logo among all of your social media accounts. This image must be 180 x 180 pixels.
  • Cover photos are the banner behind your profile picture, and this should also be consistent across social platforms that allow for an image in this location. Cover photos should be 820 x 312 pixels, if it’s anything smaller than this your image will be stretched and distorted.
  • Images that are shared in a post, for example a blog post news update, have a recommended size of 1,200 x 630 pixels.

Twitter

  • Twitter profile pictures have a recommended size of a 400 x 400 pixel square. Keep in mind that the actual Twitter profile picture appears as a circle, so we advise you to have the proper spacing around your logo so nothing is cut off.
  • Twitter also has a cover photo, which should be about 1500 x 1500 pixels for an image size. Pick an image that compliments your profile picture and make sure it is consistent across all platforms as well.
  • Photos in tweets, when expanded, appear at a maximum of 1024 x 512 pixels and a minimum of 440 x 220 pixels. Keep in mind that on mobile, the app collapses photos which could make for an awkward crop situation. Make sure your content is always centered horizontally to avoid odd cropping.

Instagram

  • Instagram profile pictures are small but powerful. These show any time you have a new story, in direct messages, and of course at the top of your profile page. The image size is recommended to be 110 x 110 pixels.
  • Your thumbnails for photos, or often referred to as your photo grid, will appear as 161 x 161 pixels. If you’re going for a certain aesthetic, the thumbnail size is an important one to keep in mind. Individual image uploads can be square or rectangular. Square photos image size is 1080 x 1080 pixels and rectangular images should use a 4:5 ratio.
  • Instagram stories are a must for your brand to remain relevant on the platform and also where you will have the most visibility. The recommended resolution for stories is 1080 x 1920 pixels or an aspect ratio of 9:16.

YouTube

  • Your profile image for YouTube should be the same consistent branding as your other social channels as mentioned above. The image size for YouTube profile picture is 800 x 800 pixels.
  • Attractive and engaging thumbnail images are crucial to success of your videos. For YouTube, make sure your thumbnail image size is 1,2080 x 720 pixels.
  • YouTube also allows for a cover image photo in addition to your profile image. The recommended image size here is 2,560 x 1,440 pixels.

Pinterest

  • On the Pinterest homepage, profile picture image sizes are 165 x 165 pixels.
  • It is recommended to use an image aspect ratio of 2:3 for pins.
  • Pins that are on the homepage or in a board will appear at 236 pixels wide. Once a pin is expanded, it has a minimum width of 600 pixels and the height of the image will scale proportionally.

LinkedIn

  • Your company logo is very important when it comes to the identification of your brand, of course. Make sure it’s visible with the image size of 300 x 300 pixels.
  • The company background image is similar to the cover photos on other platforms, where it takes up the entire top portion of your page. The recommended image size for your LinkedIn background image is 1,536 x 768 pixels.
  • Images in your content posts have a recommended size of 1,200 x 630 pixels. Keep in mind that LinkedIn is a professional social network platform with a large focus on building relationships with industry leaders. Make sure your posts are appropriate for this kind of audience and focus less on driving sales or website traffic.

*Data from Social Media Today

More From Onimod Global

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on the top digital marketing news and trends, click here. To find out more about who we are and what we do, click here.