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Content, Marketing, Mobile, Social Media

The Top Instagram Marketing Hacks

entrepreneur.com

We all know Instagram is imperative to growing – and maintaining – a business. But some business owners aren’t as savvy when it comes to Instagram marketing. So, we’ve rounded up some of the best marketing hacks to help you grow your business using Instagram!

Hashtags are KEY

Chances are, you’ve seen hashtags on an Instagram post. But how many are you supposed to use? Which ones are the most effective? Hashtags are used in addition to your caption in order for those not already following you to find your page. Users search for relevant, industry-related hashtags and you want to make sure your posts show up.

When choosing and using hashtags, use a mix of both popular hashtags and less popular hashtag, yet extremely relevant hashtags. With this mix, you’ll attract those searching for popular hashtags while also attracting those who are interested in your specific industry.

Try to use at least one hashtag per post. You can even put them in a separate comment if you don’t want to clutter your caption.

Join the Instagram Community

Like any other social network, Instagram is most effective when you use it as a way to form relationships with other users. It’s not just a platform to post snapshots of your own life, it’s a way to form a community with others.

To build lasting relationships, use the appropriate hashtags as well as like and comment on other users photos. It’ll show that you are supportive of other people and put you in front of people who may not have otherwise found your page.

Keep Images & Profile on Brand

A super important Instagram marketing hack is to keep your images on brand. That means ensuring your images are cohesive and closely related to your brand. For example, if your brand is bright and colorful, don’t post dull, lifeless photos. Make sure you keep fonts consistent (or at least in the same font family), too.

Furthermore, optimizing your profile as a whole will ensure you stay on brand. Include a backlink to your website in your bio – it doesn’t have to be static, you can change it if you are running a promotion or campaign.

Use your logo – typically as your profile picture – so users know it’s your brand and include your physical location (or at least city and state), especially if you have a physical location. Use your bio to articulate exactly what your brand is to help users know exactly who you are.

Post Efficiently

While it is ultimately up to you how many times you want to post on Instagram, there is some research behind optimal posting frequency. According to one study, out of 55 brands, most post 1.5 times per day. Interestingly enough, they found that brands who most more than 1.5 times per day didn’t have decreased engagement.

So, don’t be afraid to post more than once or twice a day. Begin with one per day and if that works, try experimenting with two to three and go from there!

Enlist the Help of Apps

While you don’t necessarily need an outside app to be a successful Instagram marketer, it certainly helps. Iconosquare, for example, allows you to access your Instagram account from your computer.

There are also a number of apps that allow you schedule out posts as well as some that help you connect with the right audience and find engaging posts to share.

Use Instagram Ads

If you’re really looking to really rev up your business, consider Instagram ads. Similar to Facebook or Google ads, Instagram ads allows you promote a specific service or product using an advertisement. You can do an Instagram photo ad, video ad, carousel ad, or Instagram stories ad.

You need to have a Facebook page in order to run an Instagram ad but it’s fairly easy! Then, you can choose the type of ad you’d like and set your budget and choose how long you’d like to run it for. Try different types of ads to see which one works best for your business.

Grow Your Following

The best – and most loyal – followers are those that genuinely care about your brand. Sure there are ways to buy followers, but growing your audience organically will have a lasting effect.

One way to organically grow your audience is to post regularly and consistently, use quality photos and content, include relevant captions and hashtags, and engage with your followers!

Use these tips and you’ll be a pro Instagram marketer in no time! And if you’re looking for a little extra help when it comes to content marketing, let Retaliate1st help you! We offer services in social media, performance marketing, content marketing, and search engine optimization to help you take your business to the next level. Learn more about our services here.

June 9, 2017/by chris

Content, Digital, Marketing, Mobile

How To Utilize Micro-Moments & Increase Your Content Campaign

huffingtonpost.com

Where’s your phone? If you’re like most people, it’s probably already in your hand or sitting right next to you. Now more than ever, people rely on their smartphone for just about everything – from checking social sites to asking Google where the nearest gas station is. And Google has a name for those moments: “micro-moments.”

Micro-moments are “split seconds of time where consumers use their devices to act on a need.”

And these moments can be huge for your brand.

Seventy percent of mobile searches lead to instant action. If you make sure your content is easily found, relevant, and accessible, your brand can capitalize immensely on the micro-moments. Here are four ways to do so.

Understand The Customer

As with any content campaign, you have to really understand who your customer is – what do they like to do? What do they look like? What are their habits? Getting a good sense of who your customer is will help you attract the right ones.

What types of questions are they asking before purchasing a service or product? By creating content with the answers to those questions, consumers are more likely to turn to you during those micro-moments.

Make Sure You’re Relevant

Although following best search-engine optimization practices will help your brand stay relevant, content is still king when it comes to relevancy. Your brand not only needs to answer the right questions through your content, it also needs to be easily readable and digestible. Consumers shouldn’t have to go searching for answers. Making sure your content is educational and not overly promotional will also help.

If you can’t provide the answers our customers are looking for, they’ll have no problem turning to another brand. Fifty-one percent of smartphone users actually purchased from a different brand or company they intended to because the competitor’s information was more relevant and useful.

Distribution is also important when it comes to content. You could create the most beautiful piece of content but if no one can find it, it’s utterly useless. Make sure you share your content on all the appropriate channels.

Anticipate The Micro-Moments

Companies that anticipate micro-moments have a higher ROI in mobile and marketing investment. To be micro-moment-ready, understand the when, where, and why of the moments and how your brand fits into that.

The anticipation correlates to the questions consumers ask prior to making a purchase. If a customer is searching for the best sushi restaurant in Los Angeles, sushi restaurants located in that area need to be ready to make sure customers choose their restaurant.

Create An Experience

Creating relevant and useful content is, of course, necessary but creating an experience is just as important. Focus on creating and implementing a positive experience with your brand to ensure the customer keeps coming back to you – even after those micro-moments.

Eliminate any unnecessary steps or filler to help make the experience as smooth as possible. If they have to fill out long forms to get what they want, they’ll lose interest pretty quickly and move right over to your competitor.

With a little preparation and some killer content, you’ll be micro-moment ready in no time.

If you’re looking for help creating an effective content campaign, let Retaliate 1st help you. We offer everything from help with content marketing to social media to business strategy. Learn more about our services here.

June 2, 2017/by chris

Content, Marketing, SEO, Social Media, Website

4 Places to Generate Ideas for Content Marketing

Marekting has many trends that rise and fall. The current trend that many marketers are focusing on is content marketing. Content marketing requires that a company creates content to power an inbound engine and drive leads or sales via their website. However, there is a flaw with content marketing. How do you come up with ideas for content? Especially as you start to scale the content up. Retaliate1st has pioneered content marketing for many companies, including start-ups in the pet, tech, wearable and app world. Here we make our 4 recommendations on how you can continually come up with content to power your content marketing and inbound strategy.

4 Places to Generate Ideas for Content Marketing

Google Auto-Suggest

Google’s autosuggest feature is a treasure trove for content creators. Google suggests the actual phrases or questions that people are searching for, so you know that these autosuggests will make great page and blog titles.

Google makes these suggestions based on real searches. The most popular get placed in the auto-suggest categories. If you click on one, you’ll notice at the bottom of the page there are even more suggested links.

How do you use this data to your advantage?

If you have a food deliver service in Philadelphia’s Rittenhouse neighborhood, start by typing in “food delivery”

You’ll see results like:

Food delivery near me
Food delivery near me open
Food delivery Rittenhouse
Food deliveries near here

You just found at least 4 article titles that will carry a ton of SEO value if they’re written and optimized well.

Customer Centric Content Marketing

The idea is to get into the mind of your customer. Play around with questions you’ve been asked.

A basic search for “can I order food” returns these suggestions:

Can I order food with paypal
Can I order food with a check
Can I order food to a hotel
Can I order food near here

Again, you have 4 SEO-rich titles and topics that people are actually searching for.

Trade Magazines

If you’re selling B2B services or products, trade magazines are loaded with ideas. Just because something has been written about doesn’t mean that you can’t offer a fresh perspective on the issue.

Plus, every magazine has a letters to the editor section. Again, what better place to address questions than those coming directly from your potential customers.

Check the back of the magazine. If you’ve been reading it for a few months, you’ll notice a few advertisers that are listed consistently. This is because whatever they’re selling, readers are buying. Study the ads, the products, and services they sell and address these things on your site, in your newsletter, and in your content strategy.

Lead Generation Through Content Marketing

Lead Forms

If your lead form has a text box with “how can we help you,” or if you have a help page on your site, the questions and concerns of your customers can not only help you create new content, but it will also help you from dealing with redundant issues.

If 15-people are writing in to ask where they can buy your widget in Green instead of red, then either make the answer clearer on your website, or address it in an FAQ. Either way, you have new content plus you won’t have to answer another 15-emails about the green vs red conundrum.

Social Media

Searching hashtags, trends, or simply following brands that offer similar, or related, services to yours can help you get into the mind of potential customers. Is there a need out there not being filled? More importantly, is there a want going unsatisfied?

Content Marketing –> SEO and Social Media

Can your business step in with the solution? Are a lot of Facebookers asking where they can find a product similar to yours? Or, are they confused about how a new app works? Find the questions, craft a response, post it to your website and social media channels. It will help your business climb in the Google rankings, and it will help your customers see why they should buy from you.

October 8, 2016/by chris

Content, Creative, Marketing, SEM, SEO

5 Steps to Dominating Google Local

Google Local is a great way for start-ups and small businesses to grab a foot hold in their industry. It allows marketers to target local customers and consumers to search for local businesses and products. Here we list our 5 keys to dominating Google Local.

5 Steps to Dominating Google Local

Consistency in NAP

Consistency in branding is important. It’s even more important when it comes to your listing on Google MyBusiness (Google Local) and across the internet on local sites. If you want to crack the top 3 in map listings, your business’ info must be on point.

Make sure that your business’ name, address, and phone number is the same on all sites. This can get tricky if you are using local numbers for different offices, but if you can manage to use an 800 number as your go-to, then add the locals as secondary points of contact, that’s a safe bet.

While it may seem trivial, make sure your address is the same on all sites that list your business. Sometimes this can be daunting because dozens of new sites pop up every day, and many of them simply scrape your info and post it. They make mistakes.

If your office is on 100 Third street, and one of them lists it as 100 3^rd street, you will run into problems.

Your business name should be consistent as well. Keep it simple! If you’re Joe’s Plumbing, don’t get cute with Joe’s Plumbing Brooklyn, Joe’s Plumbing Staten Island, Joe’s Plumbing and Hot Tubs. Pick one, and stick to it.

Google Local Guidelines

From Google’s guidelines regarding business names:

Any additional information, when relevant, can be included in other sections of your business information (e.g., “Address“, “Categories“). Adding unnecessary information to your name (e.g., “Google Inc. – Mountain View Corporate Headquarters” instead of “Google”) by including marketing taglines, store codes, special characters, hours or closed/open status, phone numbers, website URLs, service/product information, location/address or directions, or containment information (e.g. “Chase ATM in Duane Reade”) is not permitted.

Choose the Best Categories

Don’t “category stuff.” Google views this in the same way they view keyword stuffing, ie, they’ll hit you for it. Pick out the minimal number of categories that fit your business.

Content Drives Google Local

Add Content

Add as much relevant, helpful info as possible on your Google+ local page. IT’s possible to add video, photos, and long-form text. It’s no secret that Google thrives on content, and rewards content marketing. If you have videos of your product or service, add them. Link to your YouTube page.

Have pictures of your product? Social media-driven photos of your customers? Add them.
Go into detail (benefit-driven detail) about your products, services, staff, awards you’ve won, and what you can do for the customer.

Cultivate Customer Reviews

This is good practice in general, as user reviews are crucial to the health of your business. Having customers review you on your Google listing is important to both your business’ reputation, and your local ranking. Well-reviewed businesses have a leg up on the competition.

Build High Quality Links

Links to your business site help with SEO. The stronger your main site is, the stronger your local listing will be. Links from quality sites helps build domain authority, which in turn boosts your local ranking.

September 24, 2016/by chris

Content, Digital, Marketing, SEO, Website

Building Your Brand With Content

Content is like water, marketers need it to survive. It is the life-force of all modern marketing engines, especially those that rely on in-bound traffic. Having built many high-speed content engines, we recommend building your brand strategy, content plan and then following these tips to optimize your content.

Simple Content Strategy Flow Diagram

2 Ways To Build Your Brand With Content

Focus on the Customer

Just like in sales, if you want to gain and keep your customer’s attention, you need to focus on them. While many businesses are now utilizing content marketing, most miss the mark by using their content to talk only about themselves.

Content –> SEO and Social Media

Yes, you can use articles, videos, podcasts, pictures, and social media to tell your customers how great you are, how many awards your business has won, and how highly rated you are. But, you have to bend that info back, and let them know how all of that will benefit them.

Storytelling

Telling stories is one of the oldest ways to hold someone’s attention. In sales and business, it’s no different. In fact, good storytelling in your content marketing can build your brand and increase leads and sales.

Tying in with focus on the customer, using stories about people “just like them” helps cement your brand as a solution in their mind.

So, rather than simply cutting-and-pasting a review from a client, use that testimonial to create a story.

Content Options

What’s more compelling:

“This service is great. 5-Stars.” – Mrs. Jones, Westchester, NY

“Water was bursting out of the pipes, the water heater was rattling, and a small flood was forming in the basement. As if that wasn’t bad enough, when Mrs. Jones called us, she was in near-tears as she watched countless memories stored in irreplaceable photo albums float away. We were able to get to Mrs. Jones’ home within the hour, patch the leak, drain the flood, and had her waterheater up and running again by morning. Here’s what Mrs. Jones had to say about her experience with us: This service is great! 5-Stars.”

In the latter case, you’re walking the potential customer through a situation we all have been through. The testimonial is fairly weak in both cases, as many are. Most of your customers are going to give a short review. They’re busy, and most people have a tendency to “not know what to say” when faced with a blank page. So, don’t expect effusive praise from everyone. However, even small testimonials, when embedded in the story of how it happened, will implant in the mind of your future customer as the go-to solution when they have a similar problem.

September 17, 2016/by chris

Posts

How To Utilize Micro-Moments & Increase Your Content Campaign

Understand The Customer

Make Sure You’re Relevant

Anticipate The Micro-Moments

Create An Experience

5 Steps to Dominating Google Local

5 Steps to Dominating Google Local

Google Local Guidelines

Content Drives Google Local

Building Your Brand With Content

2 Ways To Build Your Brand With Content

Content Options

Contact

Get in touch

Address

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