Learn the Basics of Google Analytics

By Ashish Kumar Singh
on Aug 07, 2019
in Web Analytics

What is Analytics?

Collection, measurement, reporting of our web data.

So who is an analyst? Just think like that whenever you want to go and get a gift for your spouse we try to go ahead and reflect our historical conversation with them, what kind of things that they need, what kind of colour they like and then we try to go and pick gift accordingly.

Similarly, somebody who can actually go and look to our historical data someone who goes and draws insights of that data, and then act on those insights now your action can be right or wrong but they would be better than if you actually go and randomly do something.

Why do we need all these tools like google analytics, SAS, R, big data, etc. because data is so humongous the data is just too much right now. It will help us to analyze the data.

(i) AVERAGE DURATION SHOULD INCREASE

(ii) PAGES/ SESSION SHOULD INCREASE

(iii) RETURN USERS SHOULD INCREASE

So again the question comes how this data made how all the company knows about our requirement?

Information on the internet travels in the form of small data packets, they are very small data packets which are mainly from one system to another system.

This is the data packets which are coming from my system and going to another server. Now, this data packets structurally are very similar to the postcards that we are used to posting.

Postcards used to have space for a stamp, space for receivers add, senders address, message and all.

Similarly like that in every data packets we certain headers. These headers contain information like:

(i) OS

(ii) IP ADDRESS

(iii) OS VERSION

(iv) BROWSER

(v) BROWSER VERSION

(vi) SCREEN HEIGHT

(vii) SCREEN WIDTH

(viii) LANGUAGE

All this information is impeded with this data packets and these headers are mandatory to fill with every data packets. It means when I open flipkart.com data packets from my system will go to Flipkart webservers.

It means Flipkart will know about my all above details.

HITS

For understanding hits, we take an example like:

What is the core products of Flipkart?

They sell a market place it is a digital mall they provide a platform for sellers and buyers to come together and do their transactions that is their core products or markets.

So, similarly, FK.COM core competency is not analytics their core company is to create a platform, therefore, they implement a tool like Google Analytics or web analytics.

Which help them to track user activity and present meaningful reports.

To implement WA solutions they put a code, javascript, snippet on each and every page that they want to track. This code creates a 1*1 pixels image on each page.

This image is transparent so you can’t see it. It is placed on the top right corner of their webpage but is stored on the GA server.

Now GA server can analyze all this data and present to us in meaningful reports. Every time we send a request for this GA image to GA servers is called a hit/interactions/page view/image request.

SESSIONS

Collection of hits till the time a session expires and session expires under three conditions:

1. After 30 min of Inactivity

Let’s say I went to flipkart.com page A from the chrome of my laptop at 1:00 PM, then I went to FK.COM Page B from the chrome of my laptop at 1:10. In this case.

Inactivity: 10 mins

Hits: 2

Sessions: 1 (because of the inactivity period of 10 min)

Let’s take another example

I went to fk.com page c from chrome of my laptop at 1:35 pm

Inactivity: 25 min

Hits: 3

Sessions: 1

I shut down my system at 1:40 pm come back from the market at 1:50 restored my system and next to page A of fk.com from the chrome of my laptop at 2:00

Inactivity: 25 min

Hits: 4

Sessions: 1

It means shutting down of my system has no impact on my GA session.

2. When the Source is Changed

I go to fk.com by clicking on TOI banner source of the session is TOI.com @ 1:00.

I go to fk.com by clicking on an email campaign link at 1:20 pm same mail.

Hits: 2

Session: 2

3. After Midnight

Go to fk.com page A from the chrome of my laptop at 11:55 pm.

I went to fk.com page B from the chrome of my laptop at 12:02 am.

Hits: 2

Sessions: 2

USERS

Visitors who are coming on our digital platform user within GA is identified by the help of client ID.

IF I go to fk.com from chrome for the first time GA will check if I have a client ID.

No, because it will allocate a client ID, store it in a cookie and drop that cookie in my system 123456. If next day I come back to fk.com using my laptop GA will check if I have a client ID every time is stored in the cookie.

COOKIE: small computers program, designed to store a specific value for a certain period of time. In case of GA cookie lasts for 2years cookie are always browser-based stored on the local system.

BOUNCE & BOUNCE RATE

BOUNCE: that session where we have only 1 hit.

BOUNCE RATE: TOTAL BOUNCE/TOTAL SESSIONS *100

High bounce rate good for business is not good.

Retail Company: more than 40% not good

Less than 10-15% means you are doing something wrong

Less than 30% good

Banks: 25-30%

Blogs: 80-90 %

WRAPPING UP

This blog is about the basic of google analytics I cover this because in the field of web analytics google analytics tools plays a very important role. so that this blog gives you the basic idea about google analytics. How it uses in research filed we learn in further blogs.

Voice Search Optimization : An Incredibly Easy Method That Works for All

Google claims half of the inquiries will be directed by utilizing voice search by 2020.

It is safe to say that you are set up for this seismic move in SEO or for voice search optimization?

As a web site or business owner, your primary aim is to modify doubtless interested customers to search out and get your product or services.

If users are progressively using voice search to pick up data, optimizing your web site is sensible. By implementing the newest digital promoting ways, you can remain in front of the challenge and have the primary mover advantage.

What is Voice Search Optimization?

Voice Search is when consumers utilizing their voice through a device, typically a phone or home assistant to form a question via a search engine or digital assistant.

It’s growth statistics have exploded with the introduction of ‘smart speaker’ devices, like Amazon’s Echo, Google Home, and Apple’s new HomePod.

These devices have verified to be wildly common, which means that voice search isn’t any longer simply an elaborate toy that you simply use some times once you get a brand new phone and so ignore.

It has created its manner into our homes, and also the trends recommend that it’s here to remain.

Voice Search Optimization is the optimization of keywords and keyword phrases for searches using voice assistants.

Evolution of Voice Search

Keep in mind when voice search required calling a number from your cell phone and saying your search query?

That was what voice search gave the look of in its infancy (to be a lot of precise, in 2010). And to very little surprise, few individuals really used it.

Since then, it has improved considerably. On June 2011, Google declared they were beginning to take off voice search on Google.com.

At first, the feature may well be accessed solely in English. Today, we’ve got a selection of regarding sixty languages supported by Google Voice Search. With the Hummingbird update in 2013, the ideas of written and spoken search modified plenty.

The updated rule stressed regular language process and was aimed toward considering the users’ intent and also the context of the question.

From then on, search queries structured in sentences have come back a lot of relevant answers. With voice search, individuals usually raise a long query as they might commonly speak. Subsequently, the Hummingbird update gave an enormous push to voice search improvement.

The Trendsetters in Voice Search

Some of the trendsetters in voice search incorporate Siri from Apple, Google Now, Cortana from Microsoft, Alexa by Amazon among others.

With evolving technology tech giants have reduced the error rate on voice search results, completely impacting user experiences.

Voice labs found that there have been a complete of thirty-three million voice-first devices in circulation. In a survey of SEO trends for 2017 and on the far side, voice search stood at the third spot.

When and where which are individuals utilizing voice search?

In his keynote, Google CEO Sundar Pichai reported that one-fifth of the questions on Google are voice look.

Teenagers are savvy clients of voice search, however, Thrive Analytics found that individuals in all age gatherings utilize mobile personal assistants. They use it on the go, with friends, and even within the restroom.

With the expansion within the use of digital assistants, Voice Search Optimization is vital to your SEO success. Let’s begin by understanding however it ties back to Google’s algorithmic rule.

1. User Intent

In 2013, Google launched a noteworthy algorithmic update — the Google Hummingbird. It started considering the user intent and logical importance of queries.

When individuals scan for your site, would they like to purchase something or would they say they are searching for information?

User intent tells us the reason an individual wrote their question or query into a search engine. Generally, the intent is clear and clearly expressed within the question with words like “buy,” “price,” “how to,” “what is,” etc. however alternative times, intent hides only in user’s mind.

The intent might or might not be expressed. Regardless — because of the Hummingbird update — Google digs into the context of the search question. They investigate sites’ content and furnish you with whatever answer is deemed most relevant.

For example, I’ll look for “Oscar winners” in search.

In the doubtless situation, I’m keen on the recent awards ceremony — not in results from twenty years past.

Search engines perceive this and take it under consideration. Therefore, you ought to take into account user intent once making content, so as to reinforce the connectedness of your pages to specific search queries.

So if you wish to optimize your page for a featured snippet, your main aim ought to be understanding user intent and giving your audience a direct answer. This can help you to optimize your webpage for voice search optimization.

On this subject, Jenny Halasz says:

“Try to match your customers’ intent together with your content, look for to answer queries, and supply details where attainable.”

2. Page Speed

Page speed means that the time required for your page to load. This additionally influences whether or not or not your page can seem in voice search results.

Imagine an individual using voice search — they’re likely in a hurry or in a rush. So to achieve those searchers, page speed improvement extremely could be a high priority. As an initial step, examine your present site speed with PageSpeed Insights.

This tool tells you whether or not your site’s current loading time is quick enough, and recommends for a way to create it even quicker.

Note also that mobile speed is a lot of vital than desktop for voice search improvement or voice search optimization.

This goes for overall style also — ensure your web site is mobile-friendly since a majority of voice searches happen via mobile devices.

3. Long Tail Conversation Keywords & FAQs Pages

Now keywords aren’t any longer simply keywords. Keywords within the voice search world are long-tail+. The “plus” refers to the informal phrases that you simply ought to add once optimizing for informal voice search.

First of all, talking to your voice assistant, you’d begin with “Hey Siri…,” “OK, Google,” etc. These phrases cause you to assume you’re communication together with your device, not simply conducting a keyword-based question or query.

Therefore once trying to find the best hotels, you’re presumably to raise a question: “Hey Siri, which are the best hotels to stay?”

Your keyword strategy should currently be a lot of informal in nature and mimic however real users speak and raise queries verbally.

Start considering the kinds of queries you get, about your business while talking to customers on the phone, then begin documenting and recording the precise words they use once they talking with your customer representative

Once you have got an inventory of queries and statements your customers provide you with over the phone, you’ll then begin making content pages that specialize in those longer, a lot of informal search terms.

An incredible method to use the same client data is to make FAQ pages that attention on those long-tail+ conversational watchword phrases.

Try and cluster common queries on an identical page. Opt for natural-sounding queries and phrases rather than the recent SEO-keyword phrases.

Also, anticipate a lot of direct queries from searchers. Searches like “best digital camera” can begin to disappear, and hyper-specific searches can become a lot of standards.

Supply fast, compact answers to queries that voice searchers are asking.

It will seem to be a difficult task, however making it won’t solely facilitate your website but, it show up in voice search results, however, it may increase your probabilities of showing in the Google “Featured snippet.

4. Featured Snippet

If you’re not known with the name “featured snippets,” you virtually acknowledge how they look like. Featured snippets seem at the highest of the SERPs.

Google pulls the foremost relevant content and places it in a very box like this:

Its matter as a result of up to half-hour of 1.5 million tested Google queries contain them. You’ll make sure that if the results embrace a featured piece, your voice assistant can pull its answer from there.

Therefore if you would like to rank in voice search results, you must target providing such quality knowledge that Google displays it within the featured snippet.

5. Structured Data Markup

Structured Data Markup is the code added to HTML markup and utilized by search engines to understand your site’s content in a better way.

Using structured data on your website can help search engines crawl and read your content efficiently. Having this data may also facilitate your pages in featured snippets and, consequently, in voice search results. Specifically, you can use it to provide better information to mobile devices about your site and its content.

So, if you are doing everything properly and manufacture content understood by search engines as most relevant (and if you get a small amount of luck), your piece can become featured.

When elaborating structured data, you must keep in mind it’s quick to become spammy. Use the information that has relevance to the content you give and eventually keep upgrading your markup, as everything tends to be changing constantly.

Use structured data markup (applying the right schemas) to provide the voice search devices even a lot of data regarding your website and it’s content.

Structured information markup from schema.org is crucial for your web site because it defines a lot of specific data and makes it easier for search engines to accurately analyze your content and perceive its context.

For the implementation part, you can use Schema.org as they have a set of schemas which enable SEO specialists to markup their websites.

6. Local SEO and Business Listing

58% of consumers use voice search to find local businesses. This comes as little surprise since most people use voice search when they’re walking or driving somewhere to discover where they should go.

Most significantly, people conducting voice search possible use the phrase “near me”.

Say I decide to have a coffee then I’m more likely to say “OK Google, a coffee cafe near me,” than “coffee cafe in Pune.” In this case, the search engine will use my location to understand which cafes are closest to me at the moment.

Remember that “near me” queries are simply adding a location intent to a search. If you would like to rank for “cafe near me”, then, by all means, track that keyword’s performance on your ranking tools, but don’t worry about putting “near me” in your actual site code.

Here is another way

Many voice searches are local in nature, having your Google My Business listing claimed can help increase your chances of showing up when a voice search is done pertaining to your local business, location or business category.

So, if you haven’t claimed your Google My Business listing yet, what are you waiting for?

It’s time! Claiming and optimizing Google My Business is a great way for Google to find out more information about your business, like the category of business you’re in, your address, phone number, business hours and more.

A lot of voice searches are for local queries and listing your business there will help you rank better for such queries.

7. Domain Authority

Did you recognize that sites with infinite links rank more often in voice search?

The answer to the current question is true.

In fact, the typical Ahrefs Domain Rating of a voice search result’s nearly 77.

Average domain rating (Which is high)

Many voice search “results” are literally simply one result. And Google wants to provide you a solution from an authorized source. (alternatively a domain with most trusted and authorized).

In order to they lean on domain authority over page authority.

For example, here’s a Google Home voice search:

Google Home voice search result
The answer comes from an authoritative domain (speedtest.net).
But the page itself includes a pretty low Page Authority (13).

The secret is this:
If you would like to rank in voice search, concentrate on the build-up your Domain Authority.
When you do, Google can wish to use your website} as source… even from pages on your site that don’t have a lot of links.

8. Rank Videos in the Search Results

Recently Google released what I call “Video Featured Snippets”.
This snippet as you’ll see, it’s a video result. however rather than a link to a YouTube video, Google pulls out the section of the video that’s relevant to your search.

Here’s an ideal example of what I mean…

Let’s say that you simply need to rank your videos on YouTube. therefore you opt to go looking for a few video SEO recommendation.

If you employ a keyboard, you’re likely to go looking for one thing like YouTube SEO search
Sure, their videos are within the search results. however, they rank within the fifth spot.

YouTube SEO SERPs video
Look what happens after you search for a keyword: “how do I rank my YouTube videos”
You get a Video Featured snippet in Google SERP

The secret’s this:
Video could be a massive part of Google’s strategy for responsive voice search optimization queries. Therefore if you wish to induce your content before of voice searchers, you would like to rank your videos in Google.

An Outline of Our Most attention-grabbing Findings are As Follows:

(i) PageSpeed seems to play a vital role in voice search SEO. the common voice search result page loads in 4.6 seconds (52% quicker than the common page).

(ii) HTTPS sites command Google’s voice search lists. Truth be told, 70.4% of Google Home outcome pages are verified with HTTPS.

(iii) Google prefers short, brief responses to voice search queries. The standard voice search result’s solely 29 words long.

(iv) The schema might not play a key role in voice search rankings. 36.4% of voice search results come back from pages that use Schema (which is just slightly beyond the worldwide average of 31.3%).

(v) Authoritative domains tend to supply voice search results considerably over non-authoritative domains. In fact, the mean Ahrefs Domain Rating of a Google Home result’s 76.8.

(vi) Content with extreme levels of social engagement tends to perform well in a voice search query. In fact, the common voice search result has 1,199 Facebook shares and forty-four Tweets.

(vii) Simple, easy-to-read content might facilitate with voice search SEO. The common Google voice search result’s written at a ninth-grade level.

(viii) We have a tendency to found that only a few voice search results had an accurate question in their title tag. Therefore, making individual pages for every voice search question doesn’t seem to be a good voice search SEO strategy.

(ix) The normal word check of a voice search output page is 2,312 words. Along these lines, Google will in general source voice search answers from long structure content.

(x) Content that ranks top in desktop search is additionally terribly possible to seem like a voice search answer. Indeed, roughly 75% of voice indexed lists rank in the main 3 for that inquiry.

(xi) Showing up in a Featured Snippet may enable you to rank in voice search. 40.7% of all voice search answers originated from a Featured Snippet.

Wrapping Up

Voice technology is another step within the direction toward improving user involvement with semantics. Voice search may be a trend that’s on the increase and not leaving at any point in the near future.

User already using voice search broadly — and its quality can develop significantly in the coming years.

Those who already take voice search optimization into consideration in their SEO can improve their content visibility considerably, as voice search results more and more limited to the top pages.

With voice search optimization, web site owners will simply offer answers to users needs and desires, that will increase traffic to their landing pages.

Searchers hungry for fast answers, this technology serves this needs and is a horny different to net search.

As a digital vendor, you wish to understand the importance of adopting new SEO trends to avoid falling by the roadside.

If implementing associate degree SEO strategy it’s time you incorporated voice search so as to make the most the increasing variety of individuals who are utilizing these tools for web search.

Learn about it, place it to use, and watch your business explode.

Beginner’s Guide to Facebook Ads

By Upasna Mukhija
on Aug 07, 2019
in Facebook Marketing

In today’s world, more than 1.2 billion people use Facebook and more than 30 million businesses have active pages.

Facebook ads help to reach businesses to the right audience with the right messages.

Paid advertising on Facebook is one of the best ways to impact the reach of the content. If you are willing to part with some funds, Facebook is a highly effective tool.

So, if you are thinking to try your hands in paid Facebook promotion for your business, here is the step by step guide with your first Facebook Ad.

To get started we must first visit the Ads Manager. Its where you create new ads, get an overview of your current campaigns and measure their performance.

Let’s jump right into the following steps: –

Step 1: Choose your Objective

Before creating any advertisement it’s important to think about the purpose of that advertisement and what you are aiming to achieve. That’s why the first step is to decide marketing objectives. Some goals could be as follows: –

1. Increase the traffic of website through Facebook

2. Increase number of people (attendees) at my event

3. Generating new leads

4. Boost engagement of our Facebook page

So, if the objective is clear in our mind, then making Facebook ads become much easier.

Step 2: Select your Audience

Once the objective has been deciding the next step is to select the correct audience so that we can put the relevant content according to that audience.

This is one of the important features for Facebook advertising as it helps in finding different audiences like: –

1. Core Audience

2. Custom Audience

3. Lookalike Audience

The Core Audience helps in finding the audience based on different criteria like demographics, interests, location. For e.g. the people who love doing online shopping.

There is a feature on Facebook called Custom audience in which we can engage to old customers. This feature helps in making a connection with the existing audience.

There is a feature of Look-Alike Audience as well in which the audience has not been engaged with the past, but they have the same interests as of the existing ones.

Step 3. Decide the Location of Your Ad

In Facebook this is not mandatory that you have to post your ads on Facebook only, you can post them in other mediums as well like Instagram and Messenger and within other mobile apps with Facebook audience network. It all depends on the target audience.

For e.g., If your audience is a frequent Instagram user then Instagram is a useful placement.

Step 4. Set your Budget

Budgeting is an important part of an advertising campaign. The cost depends on the total amount you spend or cost which you get from the ads.

The success of the ad depends on the ad auctions and how the ad has been performed in the mind of the target audience. An auction happens when a person is eligible to view your ad.

If you do not know much about auction bid, then you can set them to be automatic when creating the campaign.

You can also enter a daily budget or lifetime budget if you want to stop your campaign.

Step 5. Pick a Format

Ads can be very effective if we pick the right format for our campaign. The different options of ad formats can allow you to tailor your campaign to your selected target audiences.

The different options are as follows: –

1. Photo

Use different kinds of images to tell your story.

2. Video

Make videos to engage with your customer with the correct use of image, sound and motion.

3. Slideshow

Create lightweight videos in no time. This is the easiest, quick and affordable way to create a video like ads.

4. Collection

Showcase your products by telling the story in an impressive way.

5. Lead Ads

Use this format on Facebook to generate leads.

6. Link Ads

Increase the number of people on your website.

7. Dynamic Ads

It helps in finding the right audience for your products in a sophisticated and automated way.

Step 6. Place your Order

You can review your ad and confirm that you are ready to submit your ad.

Step 7. Measure the Performance of Your Ad

You can click on all available ads and analyze the ad performance. You can click on ‘view charts’ to get further details and measure it.

This is the place where we learn about the performance of the ad i.e whether it is meeting the objectives, but also the demographics and placement as well.

Metrics must be relevant to your ad’s objective. For eg, an ad is aimed at generating awareness is not measured by the same metrics as an ad focussed on increasing app installs.

With this, you can ensure your budget is well spent and you can track relevant metrics of your campaign.

With this, you can tell the actual success of each ad i.e which ad worked better and what can be improved in each ad.

Final Thoughts

As Facebook Marketing has gained immense importance in recent days, it is highly recommended that marketers should use this in their overall marketing strategy to reach out to their target audience. Hopefully, you must have got insights on Facebook Ads and will surely use it.

The Ultimate Guide to “Social Media Stories”

By Rucha Dhawle
on Jul 14, 2019
in Social Media Marketing

“Social media stories” are a bit weird compared to regular content. For one, they don’t show up directly in users’ feeds by default. If somebody needs to look at the stories you produce, they need to manually access them.

Completely different apps and sites have other ways of displaying new story notifications; as an example, Instagram has icons of users who have created stories on the highest, and users will faucet them to examine the stories.

Secondly, any stories you are doing create aren’t around forever! Only to 24 hours, the stories automatically delete themselves.

This is often what makes stories a bit a lot of distinctive than regular standing updates –their lack of length suggests that they match a distinction niche than traditional updates.

Evolution of Stories

Stories are nothing new social media however with 3 of the massive boys battling it out at the highest we tend to thought we might take a fast look into however Stories have evolved over the years. Facebook, Snapchat and Instagram all enable the user to post their stories however who was first?

1. Snapchat

The Stories format for sharing content was 1st introduced into the social media landscape by Snapchat in 2013 that permits users to make up chains of content that might be viewed a limitless quantity of times over a 24-hour amount.

At the time, most media shops treated the medium as a brand new kind of video selfie: it had been considered a neat format that was clearly personal in its presentation, however on the far side that, most critics felt love it was simply means|a method} to save lots of Snaps in an exceedingly a lot of permanent way.

Sound familiar? Snapchat engineered their entire platform around this idea and it had been Instagram and Facebook who set to adopt the thought.

2. Instagram

In 2016 Instagram launched their version of stories that borrowed heavily from Snapchat. Instagram Stories allowed users to own an area to be within the moment and a touch additional fun amidst their regular posting of extremely structured, edited and formed photos. All stories lasted 24-hours and were engineered of video and pictures.

Around this point, some brands had already begun to adopt the Stories feature approach to promoting, however, most of those tries were extremely ad-driven—short, intrusive spots that centred additional on a product than revealing one thing new concerning the complete itself. In 2012 Facebook purchased Instagram.

January 2017 Instagram declared that they had one hundred fifty million user posting stories daily and as a result of this the Instagram extended adverts for his or her Story users.

3. Whatsapp

In February 2017 Whatsapp (another Facebook company) launched standing that allowed for sharing of GIFS, Photos, and Videos for a 24-hour amount.

4. Facebook

Finally, in March 2017, Facebook launched stories within the main Facebook Mobile App. This allowed users to share videos and photos from Facebook’s new camera.

5. Messenger

Finally, in March 2017, Facebook launched traveler Day that permits you to share videos and photos as and once happen throughout your day.

Later in Gregorian calendar month Facebook rebrand as “Messenger Stories” The electronic communication app permits you to play games, send cash to friends and currently transfer stories – these are photos, videos, and text telling the story of a happening, be it an evening out, a visit to the board game or a vacation abroad.

6. Youtube

Youtube, the undisputed king of video, And currently its youtube World Health Organization simply launched its own wrestle Stories with a brand new video format referred to as ‘Reels.’

Reels is accessible to any Youtuber World Health Organization has over 10,000 subscribers (now you have got even a lot of incentive to grow your channel!).

The thought behind Reels is to permit creators to share content while not having to make a full video. For several creators, making full videos will take weeks! You have got to set up, film, edit, refine, then publish. Such a big amount of creators solely post once or double per week at the most.

Reels takes the pressure off making good, long-form content. Rather than making 10-minute options, Reels are solely thirty seconds long.

Very similar to Instagram Stories and Snapchat, you’ll add text, filters, stickers, and music to create the video actually your own.

There is lots of information that proves that social media Stories square measure following massive issue for marketers. Here is a few of it that you simply ought to bear in mind of:

(i) 57% Female, forty-eighth Males and sixty-one teenagers (18-24) within the U.S. use Snapchat Stories.

(ii) 52% Male and forty-third feminine within the U.S. use of Instagram Stories.

(iii) There’s a mean of thirty-five .5% active users worldwide sharing their Instagram.

(iv) 7% of Facebook’s users share their recordings through Facebook Stories.

There square measure 450M daily active users on Snapchat, Instagram Stories, and WhatsApp standing combined.

The most well-liked varieties of Stories for a whole on Instagram square measure Merchandise content, stories that offer associate degree “Inside Look” involving a Guest Takeover or showcasing a happening.

Additionally, social media Stories square measure growing in quality and then, new options square measure intercalary unendingly.

Recently, Snapchat proclaimed it’d “allow users to share Stories to their coupled social media accounts or through text or email with a link to a webpage wherever those that do not have the app will read the message.”

This is often expected to spark new growth within the Stories quality across platforms.

Ephemeral Content Marketing Strategies with Ephemeral Stories

Are you ready to jump in? Here are some creative ideas on how to get the most of the social media Stories (Ephemeral Stories) whether you are planning to create them for Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp or Snapchat to build your brand online.

1. Get Interactive

There are a variety of highlights you’ll be able to integrate into a story post to create them additional exciting and additionally engaging.

Besides tagging and @-mentioning others, Instagram has new options like polls and queries that you simply will augment a Story post. Raise followers to vote for his or her favourite or get them to send you a brief text reply to a matter.

You can conjointly tag stories with a location, repost alternative Instagram posts as a Story (which sends followers to it post if they swipe up), and obtain followers to send you an instantaneous message in response to a Story.

The latter could be a good way to solicit feedback from followers, and conjointly build your Stories additional interactive.

2. Add Links to Your Social Media Stories

Social media Stories aren’t solely concerning having fun. Marketers, naturally, even have to consider sales. The best thanks to increasing the traffic of your website and boost conversion rates are by adding a link to your Story.

Instagram and Snapchat enable users to introduce links in Stories, supplying you with the chance to market your merchandise, newsletters or alternative merchandise.

An additional tip is to use an URL shortener like Bit.ly or Capsulink for your links. That way, you may be able to access elaborate click analytics and measure the success of your content.

3. Take Advantage of Snapchat Geo-Filters

A Geo-Filter is associate degree overlay image that Snapchat users will place on their photos or videos taken at a selected location.

Victimization Geo-Filters is an efficient thanks to interacting with your audience and enhance their expertise along with your complete.

In addition, as user-generated photos and videos square measure shared online, it’s additionally a wonderful chance to spice up awareness of your complete.

One of the primary brands to use branded Geo-Filters was McDonald’s. They allowed users to feature a filter of a burger and fry graphic on their photos once they’re just about a McDonald’s building.

For instance, on Instagram Stories, some location searches have a story icon that permits users to look at recent stories that have used the actual location sticker. This is often an excellent thanks to facilitating your completely get discovered regionally.

4. Add mentions (@) for other brands and your fans

Another attention-worthy feature of Instagram Stories is that the chance to say, alternative users.

For brands, this can be an excellent thanks to provides a shoutout to individual audience members for exploitation your complete, taking part during a contest or just thanking them for being a loyal fan.

The mention can produce a pop-up notification, showing the mentions to your followers. The person you’ve mentioned, in turn, can receive a notification.

Just like regular posts, you’ll be able to @-mention users in your Stories. Thus use it! A part of the facility of social media is creating connections and lavishing attention on others, and your followers can love being mentioned in your Stories.

5. Give the Live Video a Try When Creating Stories

A live broadcast will create your whole appear “more real” for the users. Live stories change users to examine, like, and comment in real-time.

This, in turn, creates a way of community and happiness. The live video format will increase the legitimacy of your messages and can bring the audience engagement to ensuring level.

6. Invite Followers to Explore More with Clear Call-To-Actions

Adding a call-to-action (CTA) could be a good way to encourage your audience to try to do one thing when they need seeing your content.

Moreover, while not a particular CTA, your followers’ default reaction, presumably, is going to be to continue swiping to consequent post.

Consistent with Kissmetrics, CTAs among videos generated 380% a lot of leads than CTAs on a sidebar or web site.

Thus, if you employ Stories to prompt your followers to go to your web site or explore a brand new product, your sales ought to increase consequently.

7. Repost from Other Channels

As we have a tendency to mentioned, Stories tend to be terribly similar from social media network to network. Nothing is stopping you from cross-posting a Story you’ve created for Snapchat on Instagram, or vice-versa.

Facebook even has constitutional Story sharing from Instagram, that makes cross-posting straightforward and painless.

It’s conjointly doable to save lots of a snapshot post as a video that you simply will then re-post on Instagram and Facebook. Therefore if you needed to share Stories between those sites, it’s conjointly straightforward.

Another advantage of reposting your content on alternative channels is that you simply square measure sure to maintain consistency in your posts from one network to a different.

Consistency is significant if you wish to create consumers’ trust.

8. Text-Only Stories

Instagram recently further the power to possess text-only Story posts. This is often an excellent thanks to integrating additional text content into a sequence of Story posts to assist tie them along or to inform a short story in words instead of footage.

Many brands using text-only Story posts with #hashtags and different links to assist propel a narrative forward, make a case for a brand new technique or teach followers one thing, and lots of different things.

9. Story Highlights

Did we say that Stories are ephemeral? This can be true, however, if you have got a specific Story that you simply wish to stay around for extended, currently you can!

Story highlights remain your profile as long as you wish, which supplies you a great deal of flexibility. Besides “pinning” a Story thus it doesn’t disappear once twenty-four hours, you’ll use Highlights to form a straightforward story.

You’ll in all probability wish to use this feature strategically, and not overwhelm your profile with a great deal of highlighted stories.

Whether it’s the flexibility to edit and manipulate pictures or letter of invitation to form a brand-related image or story, passing promoting ways to invite the user to act on a brand’s behalf.

Wrapping Up

Stories are still a comparatively new medium on social media, thus this is often the most effective time to start out capitalizing on all they provide.

Stories represent a brand new and exciting thanks to gift content, run selling, and advertising campaigns, and move together with your social media followers.

Whether you’re a tiny small business, a start-up, or a longtime complete, Stories ar fastly changing into the de-facto thanks to reaching your customers with quick, easily-digestible bits of content.

Stories will provide a nice twist to your selling methods providing new ways that to push flash sales, discount codes, gift exclusive content or produce publicity before the upcoming event.

Keep your eyes open and sit up so far with the most recent options and trends for Stories and make your brand stand out online.

How to Create Successful Email Marketing Campaigns?

By Sumeet
on Jul 12, 2019
in Email Marketing

Emails are one of the oldest methods of communications.

We all receive and send emails but with billions of emails sent daily like promotional emails, offer emails, spam emails it has become very difficult to get the target audience to click on the mail and take your desired action.

Email marketing is the process of sending emails to your customers or your prospects. Sending an email might sound easy and you would be thinking it is just writing an email and sending to the prospects and we all can write emails what’s the big deal in it?

Well sending emails and running successful mail campaigns are two different things. So today I’m going to tell you to create successful email marketing campaigns.

How to Create Successful Email Marketing Campaigns?

1. Build a Solid Email List

Build a Solid Email List Image source:pixabay — Build a Solid Email List

The first step in creating and running a successful email marketing campaigns is building a solid email list.

No campaign can be successful without a solid email list full of people who are interested in your business and the best way to do so is using popups or signup forms on your site.

This not only helps in building a solid email list but also show that these people are interested in your offerings and might turn into your customers one day.

I know there are many people in the market that sell databases of email addresses but these databases do not contain verified email address and these people might not even open your emails. why?

Because they never signup for receiving emails from you and when it comes to running successful mail campaigns that is something we do not want to happen.

We want people to be interested in our emails, open them, engage with them, wait for receiving them again and take a desired action on the mail sent.

2. Know Your Goals

Know Your Goals Image source:pixabay — Know Your Goals

We got a super solid email list and ready to send those emails but before sending those emails the next thing you want to do is know your goals. What is the goal of your email marketing campaigns?

Whether you want to send welcome emails to those who have signed up on your site, want to engage with your subscribers, convert your prospects into your customers or you want to segment your subscribers.

We must be clear what our goal is and what we want to achieve through sending emails this will guide your efforts and help you in achieving your goals.

3. Use Segment Targeting

Use Segment Targeting Image Source Pixabay — Use Segment Targeting

Segment targeting is the process of segmenting your subscribers based upon certain factors like their interest in certain products or services you offer, online behaviour on your site, buying behaviour etc.

By segmenting your audience, you can target them more effectively and increase your engagement with them. This will not only increase your open rates but will also help you achieve your desired goals and your email marketing campaign will be super successful.

4. Write Solid Headline

Write Solid Headline Image source:pixabay — Write Solid Headline

When it comes to creating successful email marketing campaigns, we cannot ignore the importance of headline of email.

It is the first thing your customer sees and decides whether it is worth his attention or not. Write a headline that grabs receivers’ attention and gives an idea of the content of the email.

Don’t look like spammers we don’t want to look like spammers and get our sent mail to be moved to the spam folder of receiver. Write a headline that grabs the attention of the receiver and make them open your email.

5. Write Engaging Content

Write Engaging Content Image source:pixabay — Write Engaging Content

The mail got the attention of the receiver and is super excited to know what’s in there for him/her in the email. He/she opens it and gets disappointed.

Email does not have informative and engaging content and lefts reading just a few lines of the email. Content is the core of any marketing campaign. Write engaging content, use images, use CTAs.

By doing this you will be able to grab the attention of your receiver’s and ensure they read the content you have written and taken the desired actions you want them to take.

The actions can be visiting a webpage, view a recently uploaded YouTube video or any other action you want them to take. Keep this in mind you will be one more step closer to creating and running successful email marketing campaigns.

6. Use A/B & Multi-Variant Testing

Use A/B & Multi Variant Testing Image source:pixabay — Use A/B & Multi-Variant Testing

Next step in creating successful email marketing campaigns is the use of a/b and multi-variant testing.

A/B testing is basically comparing two versions of emails against each other and see which perform better whereas multi-variant testing is modifying certain elements of an email to see which combination of elements perform best.

These two techniques are very helpful and can help you in knowing which combination of elements or which version of your email performs wells with your target audience and get your desired action performed by them.

7.Frequency

Frequency Image source:pixabay — Frequency

How often you send emails to your prospects or your customers plays an important role in ensuring the success of your email marketing campaigns.

Only send an email when you are confident that the content is useful and informative don’t bombard your prospects with emails if your content is not informative or useful to your subscribers.

This will not only ensure a high open rate but will also increase the engagement rate of your emails and your mail campaign will be super successful.

8. Honour Opt-Out Request of Your Subscribers.

Honor Opt Out Request of Your Subscribers. Image source:pixabay — Honour Opt-Out Request of Your Subscribers.

Another thing you can do to run successful email marketing campaigns is honouring the opt-out request of your subscribers.

Although many famous email service providers automatically do this for their clients if you are not using one of those email service providers do remove those subscribers from your list who have requested to remove them from your email list.

Nobody gives a second look on those emails they don’t want to receive and they simply ignore or move such emails into the spam folder and we don’t want that to happen if your aim is to run successful mail campaigns.

This will improve the quality of your email list and help you target only those prospects or customers that are interested in your business offering.

Conclusion

Sending email is easy and running email campaigns is not to keep these points in mind and your email marketing campaigns will be super successful.

Feel free to write your views in the comment section and let me know if you find this post useful or not?

How to Optimise Your Own Website?

What is SEO?

SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) as its name suggests refers to the implementation of such practices that increase the visibility of the site on search engine and give the website visitor a good user experience while they browse through the site.

SEO is not just a one time process it requires you to continuously optimise your site as per the latest algorithmic updates of search engines. So, let’s get started with how to optimise your own site.

How to Optimise Your own Website?

1. Keyword Research & Using it for Creating Content

Image source - Pixabay — Keyword Research

The first step in optimising your site is doing keyword research before writing content. SEO is all about keywords these play a very important role they tell search bots which site should rank for which keyword.

Using relevant keywords which have high search volume for creating content will not only help in getting more traffic to your site but will also provide a good user experience and reduce your bounce rate.

Some tools for Keyword Research

(i) Google keyword planner(free)

(ii) Keyword tool.io(free)

(iii) Moz keyword research tool(paid)

Once you have found your keywords the next step is writing content using them. To ensure you don’t look like spam or to avoid Google penalties make sure you are not:

(i) Overusing the keyword (Not maintaining a keyword density of 2-3 times).

(ii) Keyword stuffing. (pasting the keyword many times in a row)

(iii) Writing thin content.

2. Use of Keyword in the Meta Description, Title, Alt Attribute.

Use keyword in Meta Description, Title, Alt Attribute. Image source - Pixabay — Use a keyword in Meta Description, Title, Alt Attribute

Another SEO tip to optimise your site is using your relevant keywords in the meta description, the title of your page, headline and an alt attribute of the image tag.

Make sure you are using your focus keywords as well as its close synonyms. This tells the search engine what is the content of the page and for which keyword you want your site to be ranked.

3. Link Building

Link Building Image source - Pixabay — Link Building

Next step to improve your SEO after creating content-rich of relevant keywords is” link building”. Link building is the process of acquiring hyperlinks from authoritative sites to your own site.

This improves the authoritativeness of your site and thus let your site rank high in search engines organic listings.

Best practices to avoid Google Penalties

(i) Acquiring natural link from authoritative sites

(ii) Not buying links from agencies

(iii) Disavow toxic links.

4. Fast and Mobile Responsive

Fast and Mobile Responsive Image source - Pixabay — Fast and Mobile Responsive

The next step in order to improve the SEO of your site is to make your site fast and mobile responsive. In today’s world, people spend most of their time on smartphones.

They consume content while using their phones. Since the screen of these phones is relatively small to desktops it becomes even more important to optimise your site and make them mobile responsive and fast (between 2-3 seconds).

5. Optimise Robots.txt & Sitemap

Optimise robots.txt and sitemap Image source - Pixabay — Optimise Robots.txt & Sitemap

Another thing which should do in order to improve the SEO of your site is helping the google bot. In order to crawl and index a site google bot uses two important things robots.txt file and sitemap of a website.

Robots.txt file instructs the bot on how the site should be crawled and indexed. The sitemap tells bots which pages are available for crawling.

Make sure there are no errors in your robots.txt file and all relevant pages are listed on sitemap and are being indexed by the bot.

6. Know the Latest SEO Updates

Know the Latest SEO Updates Image source - Pixabay — Know the Latest SEO Updates

As I told you in the beginning SEO is not a one-time thing and requires your site to be continuously optimised as per the latest updates in the algorithm of Google.

Make sure you know what is happening in the world of search engines. Follow SEO blogs to make sure you have information about the changes in the search algorithm of Google, so you can optimise your site as per the latest updates and keep It up to date with the latest updates.

Conclusion

When it comes to optimizing your site, it is a continuous process. Keep yourself and your site updated with the latest updates in the world of SEO. If you like my post leave your comment and thumbs up in the comment section.

Micro Moments – The New Consumer Behavior

“Life isn’t lived in years or days or even hours it’s lived in MOMENTS“

As mobile has become an important part of our daily lives, we’re witnessing a basic modification in peoples’ behavior the way people consume media and the interactions that now occur instantaneously.

There are hundreds of these moments occur every day—checking the time, texting, chatting with friends on social media.

Yet, at that point there are some different moments— I want-to-know moments, I want-to-go moments, I want-to-do moments, and I want-to-buy moments—that really matter. We call these “micro-moments“, and they’re distinct advantages for both customers and brands.

Micro-Moments

Micro-moments are intent-rich moments when decisions are made increasingly on a smart-phone to act on a requirement to learn something, do something, discover something, watch something, or buy something.

In this new age, it won’t be sufficient just to be available across more micro-moments. We’ll all be expected to stay a step ahead of consumers—to know their needs even better than they do.

Effective advertisers will have a lot of further understanding of their customer at each experience. They’ll concentrate on obtaining a point by point, information-driven view to truly know them and help them along with their individual journeys.

“Knowing your customer is great, but knowing how they behave is even better” – John Miller

Micro-moments have been quickening customer desires for “right here, right now” experiences.

Consumers have become more empowered than ever to get what they want and when they want it.

Here is the glimpse of Consumer Behavior –

1. The “Well-Advised” Consumer

Think about the last time you used your phone to search out a solution or guide a choice.

People today need to be enabled to settle on the correct choice, massive or small—and they’re turning to their phones for recommendation to guide them. So that they are often assured in any call they’re creating, massive or little.

2. The “Right Here” Consumer

People additionally expect digital experiences to be created only for them—including experiences that are tailored to the area they’re in the present moment.

Today, consumer expect brands to collect enough info to deliver location-specific responses while not somebody having to go looking for all the world.

Even they assume their mobile will know wherever they’re and can deliver info consequently.

3. The “Right Now” Consumer

Ever required a café reservation, a hotel room at the last minute? Or on the other hand medical store? Consumer turns to their smartphones more than some other source to assist them to get things done, decide or buy.

And everyday consumers are progressively dependent on their smartphones to help make a last minute purchase or they expect that brands should react by understanding their wants and addressing them immediately.

Illuminating this behaviour and also the associated customer expectations have proven to be extremely helpful for marketers.

In some ways, the micro-moments communication has provided a reset and a roadmap for companies. It helped marketers deem that moments mattered most, and it created urgency.

Strategies to Succeed in Micro-Moments World

There are many micro-moments throughout the day people use their mobile phones to search out answers to their queries and solve issues whereas on the go. This means there are more opportunities than ever for your brand to be there and useful. People depend on their mobile devices to manage their lives and encourage their plans.

1. I-Want-to-know Moments

At the point when people look at their cell phones for information or motivation, they rely on relevant and quick results. These I-Want-to-know Moments are chances to decidedly impact view of your brand image.

(i) Anticipate customer questions – grab your smart-phone and perform a number of the highest searches associated with your category. Is it accurate to say that you are there?

(ii) Ensure answers are easy to search out – create it simple for customers to find the information they are trying to find regarding your complete brand or product.

(iii) Help customers at each step of the way – Even for larger purchases or future goals, mobile analysis plays a part. Ensure your brand offers potential customers useful data for each part of their decision-making process.

2. I-Want-to-Go Moments:

I-want-to-go moments happen when individuals are searching for things in their location be it an exercise centre, a shopping centre, coffee shop or a plumber. To win these moments, meet customers by utilizing location signals to focus on relevant locations, store inventory and driving directions.

(i) Recognize the importance of local search – In I-want-to-go moments, proximity matters since customer’s area unit searching for a link to the physical world. Once you are developing your advertising strategy, take into account the importance of location-based searches (i.e breakfast close to me, salon near to me).

(ii) Make your ads relevant to local messaging – People wish to seek out the information they are searching for as quickly as possible in their I-want-to-go moments. Direct customers to your stores by providing directions and featuring the in-stock things they need.

(iii) Provide helpful local info on your web site or app – Convenience usually matters in I-want-to-go moments over complete loyalty. Create it straightforward for customers to seek out helpful information such as hours, inventory, and pricing-while on their smart-phones.

3. I-Want-to-Do Moments

Thanks to mobile, the instruction manual is a thing of the past. Customers currently use their mobile devices and online video for facilitating with huge issues, tiny fixes and everything in between. And brands that are useful in these I-want-to-Do moments can leave a long-lasting impression.

(i) Identify your consumers’ moments of desire – Explore the actual times of day, week, or a year once how-to searches for your brand category are preferred, and make sure that you are providing helpful content in these moments.

(ii) The importance of online video – Consider what your consumers are doing with your product or service, and make sure you have-to videos that can help.

Add descriptive titles, details, and relevant tags to your how-to videos so that consumers can get to them quickly.

(iii) Make sure your content is mobile-ready – Your online videos should be viewable from any smartphones or gadgets, at whatever people choose to tune in.

4. I-Want-to-Buy Moments:

I-want-to-buy moments can happen anytime and anywhere- in the makeup aisle, in the kitchen, or on the street. When people need help deciding what to buy, your brand can influence their choice by being there with the right information and providing a frictionless checkout.

(i) Identify your shoppers’ micro-moments – Talk to your buyers to make sense of how and when they are researching and creating purchase choices.

(ii) Deliver relevant online communication – Look how customers are searching- the queries they raise, the terms they use – and build the ads and content that give useful answers.

(iii) Measure each shopper touch point – To account for all the ways in which digital impacts a consumer’s call to shop for one thing, take steps to live results online, across devices, in apps, and in stores.

Wrapping Up

So to capitalize on that behaviour and win over consumers, marketers have been forced to rewrite the rule book. You’ve had to double down on addressing the needs of consumers at the moment, committing to being there and being useful each and every time you can help advance the journey. In short, marketers have had to start being a lot more assistive towards their targeted consumers.

How to Create Effective Google Ads Campaigns?

By Sumeet
on May 27, 2019
in Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

Google ads are formerly known as “Google Ad Words” is an online advertising platform where you can place your ads and reach a relevant audience who is interested in the products and services you offer.

Running ad campaigns on Google might look easy but getting good results and maximum ROI requires you to do some research work before you run campaigns.

So, today we are going to discuss how to create effective google ads campaigns.

How to Create Effective Google Ads Campaigns?

1. Understand Your Goals

Google Ads Campaigns Goals Image Source - Pixabay — Google Ads Campaigns Goals

Goals are very important when it comes to running successful google ads campaigns.

Before getting started with creating your ads campaign ask yourself what you want to achieve from them? What is your goal? Whether you want to drive traffic to your site, build brand awareness, generate leads or you want to promote your newly created app on the Google network.

Select the right goal and let the google do its magic.

2. Understand Your Target Audience

Understand Your Target Audience Source - Pixabay — Understand Your Target Audience

If you don’t know who your audience you can never get the desired results you want from your Google ads campaigns. Research about your audience.

Understand what sites they visit? What type of content they are consuming? What services they are looking for? This information is very important and can help you in targeting your audience more effectively.

3. Select Appropriate Campaign Type

Ad Campaign Type Source - Pixabay — Ad Campaign Type

Once you know what your goal is and who is your audience is the next step is selecting best-suited campaign type. Each campaign type has its own benefits.

If you want to promote your business at the moment, they are searching for similar services like your search campaign type is the answer.

If you want to run ads on specific sites based upon the interest of your audience or your niche display campaign type is the right choice.

Want to sell your products? shopping campaign is the best choice or you just want to reach and engage with your audience on YouTube then select a video campaign type.

Understand what you want to target where and how and select a campaign type and you will be one step closer to creating successful Google ads campaigns.

4. Use of Ad Extensions/ Content Targeting

Ad extensions are used to provide additional information about your business to the customer.

If you are running google search ad campaigns use of ad extensions can increase your click-through rate by 15% select and use the ad extensions to increase your ad relevancy and get better results at a lower cost.

When it comes to ad extensions you have many options like. Here are some examples of types of extensions available you can use based upon your goals:

Site-link Extension– Lets you add additional links to your ad and let you take your customer to specific pages of your site.
Structured Snippet Extension-Let you highlight USP’s of your offered goods and services.
Call Extension-Let you add your contact number in your ad.
Location Extension– Let you add location address of your business
App Extensions-Let you link your business app to your text ads.
Promotion Extension – Lets you showcase special offers with your ads.

Content targeting in display campaigns helps in placing your ads on sites and placements of your choice. This gives a great degree of control on where your ads appear on the Google display network. Options available for content targeting are:

Keyword Targeting – It uses keywords to target relevant sites.
Topic Targeting – It can be used to target sites on the basis of certain topics.
Placement Targeting – It allows you to choose specific sites, videos and apps where your ad can appear.

5. Create Multiple Version of Your Ads & Use Ad Rotation Option

Create multiple version of ads for your Google ads campaigns and use ad rotation option. This option shows the ads which are likely to get more clicks or more conversions.

It is a small option but can deliver great results and when it comes to running effective ad campaigns even small optimization option does matter.

6. Evaluate & Continuously Optimize

In order to run effective campaigns, you must continuously evaluate and optimize your campaigns in accordance with the data you got from running them.

Like there can be keywords that are underperforming or bringing irrelevant clicks and you might remove those keywords or ad those keywords as negative keywords.

Similarly, there can be certain placements which might not be working as expected. Keep a check on your campaigns and optimize them so that you get most out of your google ads campaigns.

Conclusion

Google ads are a very powerful tool and are capable of delivering high ROI if used wisely. Use different settings, experiment with them. Even a small setting which you are not using right now might deliver better results if you use them.

If you like this post leave your comments below and if you have any suggestion you can write those in the comment section too.

How to Build a Successful Social Media Marketing Strategy?

By Sumeet
on May 10, 2019
in Social Media Marketing

Social media has become part of our lives. People spend a lot of time on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc.

Social media sites have completely changed the way customer interacts with brands. No business can underestimate their power when it comes to building relationships, generating leads and sale of the product.

A good social media presence not only helps a business achieve its goals and objectives but also helps them build a strong relationship with their customers.

Social media marketing strategy is a guide to your actions on social media channels. It covers everything you want to do and hope to achieve the best from social media. So today we are going to discuss how to build a successful social media marketing strategy.

How to Build a Successful Social Media Marketing Strategy?

1. Audit Your Present Social Media Strategy

The first step towards building a successful social media strategy is to audit your present strategy. This will help you a lot in building your new strategy. Ask yourself the following questions:

Which platforms have worked for you in past?
Which platform has given you the highest engagement?
What types of post are being liked by your audience?

The answers to these questions will help you understand what is working and what is not working for you. This will save you efforts and resources which you can utilize somewhere else.

2. Set Your Goals

Goals play an important role in crafting a social media strategy. We can’t have a social media strategy if we don’t know what are the goals that we want to achieve. Goals are the roadmap to following a strategy. Whether your goal is to increase awareness of your brand, increase your blog subscribers, generate leads or increase sales. The goals you set should be SMART

Specific
Measurable
Attainable
Realistic/Relevant
Time-bound

Keep these points in mind while setting your goals and you will be one step closer to crafting your strategy.

3. Know Your Audience

Another thing you should do in order to build a successful social media strategy is to know who your audience is. Do research about your target audience.

Understand:

Who they are?
What they do?
What are their interest and hobbies?
Where they spend most of their time online?

This will help you in understanding your audience and help you to target them more efficiently.

4. Research About Your Competitor’s Strategy

Research about your competitor’s social media strategy. Understand what are they doing and how are they doing. Which platforms are they using? The type of posts they are posting and how frequently they are posting. This will help you understand what is working and what’s not working with your target audience. This will not only help you in targeting your audience more efficiently but will also save you a lot of money and resources too.

5. Select Your Platforms

Once you have done all the above steps. You will have a lot of data & insights and the next thing you would do is select the platforms for your social media strategy. These must be selected very carefully as different platforms have different strengths and weakness. For example, pictures work best on Instagram and text posts work best on Facebook. Use all the data you gathered and select your platforms accordingly.

6. Create Content Calendar

The next step in building your successful social media strategy is to create your content calendar. This will guide your efforts. The date and time when you will be posting, type of content you will be posting.

You can not have a great social media strategy if you don’t have a calendar. Build your calendar, set dates when you will be posting, what type of posts you will be posting, frequency of postings etc.

7. Evaluate & Refine Continuously

Social media strategy is very important and must be evaluated and refined continuously. As you implement your strategy you will get lots of new data.

This will let you know whether your strategy is working as per your set goals or not and you can refine it accordingly. You might find that things you thought won’t work that good are actually delivering and things which you thought will deliver might be under delivering. Keep a check on your strategy and continuously refine it with the data you get.

Conclusion

Social media strategy is very important and must be defined carefully and then it should be constantly evaluated and refined as things which might work today might not work tomorrow. Keep the above points in your mind while developing it.

If you like this post leave your comments below. If you have any suggestion you can also tell me about that in the comments section too.

How Social Media Marketing is influencing the sports industry in India

By Sagar Mohan
on Jul 16, 2018
in Social Media Marketing

There is a new wave of sports enthusiasm emerging in India. With the introduction of sports leagues like the Indian Premiere League, Indian Super League,Pro Kabaddi League,Indian Badminton League and in recent times the prestigious Under 17 Fifa World Cup being held in in our own back yard ,the future for sports in India looks bright.Due to this sudden surge in the popularity of these leagues and sporting events,Sports brands have realized that there is a huge market awaiting to be tapped in india not only for popular sports like cricket but also sports about which no one was talking about 4 years ago like Kabaddi,Football,Badminton,Hockey etc.

It used to be a challenge for a marketeer to reach a million people with the same interests ,but in today’s time a Mumbai Indians fan sitting in London can be influenced by the advertisements about their team being made in India. This has all been possible because of the popularity of Social Media marketing .Therefore in this post I will be highlighting how social media platforms like Facebook,Twitter,Instagram,Pinterest etc are influencing Sports brand and institutes in India.

1.Engagement on Media Platforms

A study conducted found that 83% of fans, while watching sports on TV , constantly access their social media and 63% access social media while watching a game,sitting at the stadium.This trend has been recognized by sports brands and have now started coming up with different strategies to engage their fans as well as promote themselves.This results in increase in traffic on the sports brands site as well as increase in the awareness about the sport in general.

For example: Pro kabaddi league team Puneri Paltan has almost a million followers .This gives the team a platform to interact with their fans,Sell merchandise,Create campaigns to engage furthermore with potential new fans thus increase their Market.

2.Blogs

Blogging has been be a great way in which clubs and teams can interact with their supporters on a personal level and reach out to more communities and sports enthusiasts .This can be done by allowing supporters and fans to write about their experiences. They can engage with bloggers, by sharing the latest happenings of the club, who can then get it out to their community of followers. This is strategy being used by ISL teams such as Bengaluru FC and Athletico de Kolkata ,to name a few,to garner more online coverage and promote their Sports team/Brand.

3. SEO for Sports Brands

SEO or “Search Engine Optimization” is the process of getting free ,organic,natural or editorial traffic onto a site from the search results on a search engine.To increase exposure and increase traffic on the website sports teams in india have started working on this,because this social media strategy is used to improve the rankings on the search engine results page. Teams succeeding in this make sure that their site link is easily accessible to the person actively searching for them and beat competition by being displayed higher on the google search page results.

4. Data Analysis

In today’s age of big data,marketeers and management are changing their approach when it comes to forming strategies.Social media platforms allow marketers to analyse the patterns which are trending thus making it easier for the Team to have a good idea of what their market segment consists of,their behavioral cycles and what strategies can be used to further engage and interact with them.

5. Content Driven Market

Photos,Videos,Posts,advertisements almost anything today can be shared through social media platform. Sports teams and brands have now realized the importance of good,easy to the eye,catchy content and how it has a huge influence on their market. People like to engage on social media by sharing content that can garner many “likes and shares”,therefore we see an increase in the quality and quantity of the content being shared by teams in order to increase engagement and increase their market share.

6. Increase in Revenue

All the above mentioned points lead to one conclusion which is “Increase in Revenue”. Since the sports team are increasing their popularity through engagement and increasing their market share , people are ready to book tickets to see their favorite team play,they buy merchandise to show support for their team,they take part in team events and share it through social media which all leads to an increase in sales therefore increasing their revenue.

In the end i would like to conclude this article by saying that their are more than 323 million people India using the internet and social media marketers in the sports industry should look at this as an opportunity.The future for digital marketing certainly looks attractive.