Why Facebook Should be on your Marketing Strategy Plan

In general, the status of digital marketing in the Philippines and globally is competitive and has a high impact in one’s advertising strategies. One branch of digital marketing is the use of social media which include, on top of many, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. Given that the Internet users almost reached 4 billion, digital marketing is one good way of promoting products and services. But why Facebook should be a priority?

Facebook has a significant number of active users

If you are looking for an avenue where you can promote your products, services or brand in a wide range of audience, Facebook is there to help you. According to statistics, there are over 1.94 billion monthly active users for the month of March this year. It is 18 percent higher than the other year. It’s also important to note that the Philippines lead the world ranking for the most active people in social media (Facebook included, of course). Filipinos spend an average of 8 hours and 59 minutes online and regarding social media, we go for 4 hours and 17 minutes and still the number one in world stats.

Aside from that, 25 to 34-year-olds are usually are on Facebook which takes 29.7% of the pie. Your products and services may greatly appeal to these ages.

 

This social networking site is easy to navigate

Perhaps this is one of the reasons why many people go online on Facebook - it is user-friendly. Moreover, if you are managing a page, you wouldn’t need a couple of hours just to figure out how this button or ad work. There will always be the help section or FAQs to go to. On top of the regular posting, Facebook offers “boost” for your page and posts. No hassle, no tricks, no headaches - Facebook is just easy to use.

Advertising in Facebook won't hurt your wallet

Remember that Facebook offers services to boost your page and posts? It’s only for a minimal fee. Just think that you will be spending a small amount of money which is going to be worth it. Reports said that advertising in Facebook is comparatively cheaper than Google.

 

 

And you can always interact with your followers

One thing we love about Facebook is that it’s very interactive vis-a-vis other social networking sites. You can quickly respond to the queries you get from your friends and followers, reply to their comments and posts. It makes your leads and customers feel that you are just around the corner and ready to respond to their questions about your products and services. If you would closely look at it, many online sellers use Facebook as their platform.

 

 

 

Facebook Live is one for the books

Triple yes for this! If you are offering something new to the market, posting a video and making it live is a great move to promote your item. Your followers will know how your item works, and since it's live, they know there’s no hocus-pocus going on. And if they find it nice, word of mouth (actually, sharing) will do the magic itself. 

Facebook pretty much got everything

Though each social media or networking site is unique, we can say that Facebook got it all for you. Photo uploads like in IG? You can simply do it in your timeline and check the pictures in a separate tab. Videos similar to Youtube? You can also upload in HD on Facebook. Hashtags and trending reports like in Twitter? Say no more as Facebook got it too. 

  

So aside from registering for a personal account, you might want to make one for your business, group or brand as well. If the reasons presented above are not enough, you should start researching further and read reviews from other users. Anyway, give it a try as there’s nothing to lose. Happy marketing (digitally)!

Benefits of Partnering with Niche Influencers for Your Business

Building a solid reputation in business using personal effort alone can be challenging. After all, there are several factors to take care of and very limited time to tackle them all. At some point, you’ll need the aid of other professionals who are skilled in your venture.

This is exactly why some businesses choose to partner with someone else. By having a partner, you are helping yourself reduce cost in some aspects of a marketing campaign while at the same time getting more ideas from the other party.

Third party entities like the social media marketing companies in the Philippines have a very clear understanding of what it takes to succeed in your promotional strategies. If you’re considering the idea of striking a deal with someone for a long-term partnership, then it’s important that you get a sense of the benefits you will get from the agreement.

It helps add to your credibility.

Influencers have been working on building the reputation for some time, and this has rewarded them with a solid number of followers who read their content, buy their products and engage with them on a regular basis.

Partnering with someone who works in the same niche is an excellent opportunity to become known to your target market. If your name or content link is seen on the influencer’s site, then there’s a good chance that its readers would give you a visit.

It allows you to get in touch with more influencers in your niche.

Networking and getting to know more people who work in your field is vital in your overall marketing strategy. While you can network by yourself, asking the help of a notable individual is easier. 

They already have their circle of friends and business partners so there’s a bigger chance of you, finding the right people whom you may want to work with in the future.

It helps boost your social media presence.

Social media is now the most efficient means of connecting with different people. If you want more presence, then building your reputation across various social media platforms is important. 

Partnering with influencers is a good way to gain leverage. With the huge fanbase that they already have in social media, you’ll have a better idea of reaching out to these people and ultimately gain your followers.

Partnering also widens the scope of your content’s reach. With more people sharing and talking about it, you get a better chance of attracting more people to read or consume what you offer.

It’s an excellent learning opportunity to see how you can enhance your marketing strategies.

Apart from the networking benefit, a good partnership gives, it also educates you on certain methods to build your reputation individually. There are lots of things partnership could do on your behalf such as allowing you to observe how an influencer does his marketing and the specific things he avoids when dealing with negative comments and feedback on his current campaign.

There are risks with letting another party know about your projects or even take part in its implementation. However, it’s also a proven fact by many successful businesses that partnership does wonders especially if you have chosen the right person or company to pair up with.

The real challenge is how to find influencers that are willing to work with you. While they already have solid followers, their priority remains to protect their own, and you’ll need to convince them that your business or venture is an asset to help them achieve that.

It must be a mutual relationship with both parties benefitting from the combined effort. Assess your current marketing efforts and see if you’re interested in collaborating.

Increase Your Social Media Knowledge Using these 5 Websites!

Social connectivity has undeniably stolen the spotlights in terms of information sharing. Digital marketers and even private individuals are now spending more time on social networking sites in finding people, promoting a product and even doing surveys.

But with its popularity comes the bigger challenge of utilizing a specific platform at its best. Setting up your account is one. Planning your posts is another. For personal use, this may seem like a no-brainer. After all, places like Twitter and Facebook can easily be used to serve as one’s online journal.

It means differently though for businesses. Rather than acting as a journal, social media sites act as promotional platforms that boost the visibility and credibility of a company. This is exactly why digital marketers invest considerable time in crafting strategies on how to improve their overall online presence and engagement with their market.

Today, we’ve listed five websites that could help marketers boost their social media expertise. Feel free to check out the following.

Social Media Examiner

 This site focuses on the nitty-gritty of different social media platforms and how they can be used to advertise, promote and connect with different people. If you think you know everything about social networking sites, think again. There’s more to it than mere sharing of information.

This website teaches you how to optimize its usage in the most efficient way fit for yout target market. It’s an excellent source as well of add on resources that could help increase traffic to your page or account.

Copyblogger

It’s composed of a community of skilled digital marketers who offer their tips, experiences and proven-effective guides on how modern marketers should treat online engagement. They feature articles, podcasts and even ebooks available for anyone who finds marketing essential.

Limited offers such as webinars or online symposium are sometimes held to gather interested in one place learn the most recent and practical approach in digital marketing.

CoSchedule

Scheduling is a crucial factor when it comes to sharing information online. If you don’t strategize well, chances are, you won’t catch the attention of your target on the same moment when they spend their time on SM platforms.

This issue in scheduling is what CoSchedule tries to address. Their blog site is an excellent source of informatin in terms of identifying the optimal times to share content online. They also offer tips to help marketers make their content more attractive to readers.

HubSpot

One of the major challenges digital marketers have is time management. This website gives helpful inputs on how marketers and salespeople could become more productive in their work.

This is also an efficient resource when looking for information involving SEO and blog posting.

SocialMediaToday

If its about anything relevant to social media and its recent innovation, then this website is the go-to place. It features the latest breakthroughs from website owners, social networking startup companies and more.

Social media marketing is now mainstream and companies who are serious in attracting more customers have no reason to shy away from this technique.

Even the most seasoned corporations recognize the importance of connecting digitally with their market. Should you find yourself having some difficulty in making your promotions more effective, perhaps it’s time to up your game by studying more closely the anatomy of the platform in use.

Keep in mind that different social media sites have their own unique metrics. The ones that work on Facebook may not necessarily receive the same response when applied on Twitter. As a marketer, it’s your professional obligation to assess the effectiveness of your strategy and continuosly work on making it better. 

Social Media Marketing Killers You Should Now Stop Doing

Seth Godin, a prominent American entrepreneur and marketer once said,’Markeing is no longer about the stuff that you make, but about the stories you tell.’

And when it comes to telling stories, we all know how social media has become everyone’s favorite. From text stories to images and videos, we’ve all seen how convenient and accessible it is to use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and the like for reaching friends and people with the same interests.

Now that anyone can readily create their accounts on social media, it shouldn’t be  surprise why marketers are also jumping into this platform to promote their company’s product or service.

Unfortunately for many, social media has been treated as one of those avenues to hard sell something instead of building connection with people, which is the very premise of why the platforms are created in the first place.

Today, we’ve listed notorious things that are most likely ruining your marketing strategy without you knowing about it.

Frequent content posting

We’re supposed to be active online. So shouldn’t we post more?

Posting social media content at a regular basis is important to gain traffic. But the frequency has to be strategic enough to avoid becoming more of a nuisance than an asset to your followers.

Remember that the typical SM user has scattered attention span as he or she jumps from one site to another, checking different information across various sources.

Posting stuff every minute or hour could be perceive as annoying especially if you’re just sharing posts that they’ve already read from somewhere else. Stop being redundunt and give your audience a breather.

Disregarding schedules

This is primarily related to the previous one. The secret to achieving a good posting frequency is to schedule. Naturally, schedules are adjustable depending on engagment results, but the point is, you’re abiding at something consistent and random.

Unfortunately, many noob marketers prefer random posting with scattershot frequency to experiment. While this has its own benefits, the negatives ultimately outweighs the positive.

Disregarding schedule doesn’t help in long-term marketing strategy. Plus it endangers your page’s ability to maintain solid viewership.

Spammy call-to-action

CTAs (call-to-action) are important since it helps lead your customers on what to do next. Unfortunately, CTAs could also backfire especially if you’re using inappropriate ones.

For instance, using the popular ‘Buy Now!’ CTA on every product you introduce may sound okay, but will ultimately appear as a spam.

It’s best to experiment on variation by studying how the best pages do it. There are lots of creative call-to-action out there. Make the best out of them!

Sharing random rants

Keep in mind that you’re focus is to market whatever product or service it is that you offer. While sharing random thoughts could be tempting, it doesn’t necessarily have a place in your marketing strateg especially if your rants are totally irrelevant to your branding.

Save those rants on personal accounts and away from your business’ identity.

Bombarding friends or followers to like, comment or share your post

Who doesn’t want to have more likes, comments and shares on social media? Marketers do. It’s technically part of their job.

However, these things are gained. They’re not forced. So there’s no point in having to tell all of your friends to engage on every post you share. It’s fine on special promotions but you can’t do it always on each single post.

Doing so would be annoying and irrelevant. Just stop. If your content is really worth sharing, organic shares and engagements would say so.

Maximize the usage of social media by making sure you don’t flood them with unecessary posts.

Be vigilant about everything you share and stay consistent with your brand. Your followers expect you to provide something of value and not just rehash of what other websites have provided.

Up your marketing strategy and don’t let the ones on our list ruin your momentum! 

Restaurants go Social: 9 Winning Strategies for a Successful Food Business

creative-digital.co

Starting up a restaurant doesn't just end up in a dream; you have sit down and draw up a plan on how you're going to make it work. And whether you realize it or not, there will always be a competition between restaurants to restaurants – and it's an intense competition! Some of you here might have tried running a restaurant without any problems so far, while others are struggling to save their business.

Yes, it is a tight competition. In fact, 60% of restaurants fail in their first year. However, if you want to succeed in the business industry, then you have to have the right approach towards it. In every business, there will always be winning strategies for you to apply. And when you are running a restaurant, going social is one of the best ways you can do to make it a success.

Yes, the quality of food matters, but it will also depend on how strategic you are when it comes to promoting your business. And promoting your business through social media gives a big impact on your business. If you are still new to it, here are some tips for you on how you can be successful in the business industry.

1. Have a Social Media Account

Without a social media account such as Instagram, Facebook, Yelp, Google+ Accounts, Pinterest, Twitter etc. it is impossible for you to promote your business. One way or another, having a social media account can make the promotion even faster with a wide range of audience. Of course, with billions of social media users, there will also be hundreds to thousands of people who will notice your post. And mind you, these people are your potential customers.

2. Develop your restaurant's brand identity

Yes, you already set up a social media account, then what's next? Create a brand identity. Your brand identity will give a great impact to your potential customers. When they know who you are, and what kind of restaurant you are promoting, there are higher possibilities that you can grab their interest when it comes to choosing the right restaurant to try. Of course, when you have a good background, people will know you by the quality of business that you have through good reviews from your satisfied customers.

3. Foodie Photos

Of course, photos! There MUST be a delicious looking photo posted on your accounts. Visual content is in high demand. That is why; you have to make sure that every photo that you have must be tempting to grab your potential customer's attention.

4. Show off your staff

Aside from posting food photos, why not try publicizing your staff? Don't you know it is one way to boost your business? Of course, when you have a good customer service, with a good personality, people would definitely want to engage and try your business. Who wouldn't, when they got to see happy and smiling employees? Well, attractive staff is also a plus.

5. Partner up with delivery services

When you do business, you have to expect that there will be a lot of people who prefer deliveries than going to restaurants personally. Perhaps, they don't have enough time to go out. Well, if you want to boost your business growth, then you might want to consider partnering with delivery services such as Seamless, Eat24, Deliver.com, or GrubHub.

6. Offer coupons and discounts

It is definitely an eye-catching when people see a coupons and discounts. Of course, who would say no to the tempting offers that you have? Especially when it comes to by group, people will definitely love to avail those promos.

7. Monitor your social media presence

When you go social, it doesn't end up in posting and/or promoting your restaurant and the good foods that you have. In order for you to stay longer in the social media world, you have to make sure that you are active in every social media account that you have. The more you are active in social media, the more people will come to notice your post, and they might be one of your potential customers.

8. Send out an email newsletter for potential customers

Doing email marketing is not a bad thing after all. In fact, it can also be useful for your business. Well, sending an email to your potential customers regarding the business that you have doesn't have to be daily or weekly. In fact, customers don't want to have flooded emails on their inbox. Just make sure that the content that you have is short yet with the necessary information about the business that you have.

9. Be mobile friendly

For some starters, you don't have to rush things out. However, if your business is already established, being mobile friendly can definitely contribute to its growth. People who want to eat can make some reservations and/or deliveries through their smartphones. It is also a convenient way to do business.
 

4 Personal Things You Should NEVER Put on Social Media

images.bidnessetc.com/

The main purpose of social media is to connect with other people. Right? We usually use it to make friends, to reach out to our close families and/or relatives who are far away from us. And most especially, almost all of the people nowadays rely on social media in getting information about the happenings with the surroundings that we have. Even digital marketing agencies use social media to connect with their potential clients. Without social media, just imagine how things would be inconvenient for us.

 Social media is important to our everyday lives. However, not all the information that we see and read can be on our advantage. Sometimes, we tend to be deceived by the tempting offers we see on social media – sounds real, but it is a scam! Of course, it is just not about what you see; it is also all about what you put on your social media account that puts you in the disadvantage side.

Yes, there are certain things that we put in our social media accounts that we are unaware of. When we do, there are high possibilities that the things that you include might be used against you. Well, if you are cautious enough when it comes to your security, then below are some things you should never include in your social media accounts.

1. Your personal phone number

Putting your personal number on your account is way too private for you to do. What’s the point in sharing your phone number publicly when they can even reach through private message? Also, if that person has something important to talk about with you, they can ask your phone number through messaging you privately.

The danger when you share your phone number is that, you will most likely have some prank calls, stalkers, scammers, and identity thieves that would love to mess with you. And I’m sure you don’t want to experience being annoyed with those calls. Right?

 

2. Your home address

Your home address, especially when it is your permanent address, is definitely a confidential thing to share in public. Yes, your information is also important, however, sharing it in social media without knowing the consequences might put you in danger. If you don’t want to have some stalkers, burglars, thieves, and/or any other people who might want to know where you live, and with a bad motive in mind, then you better keep your home address private.

3. Your valuable and expensive things

One of the common attitude that we have is that, whenever we have something that we really like and proud of, we tend to boast it through online. Yes, there might be a lot of people will like it. However, you don’t know what others might think. There are times that it might be the cause of misunderstandings between the other people. Also, you might not know, there is someone out there who wants to steal it. And I’m sure you don’t want that to happen with you. Just be cautious of the valuable things that you have.

4. Your payment information

There are social media platforms that want your credit card number, and adding your financial information lets you buy gift cards and other products without any hassles at all. Well, that might work on your end. However, how sure are you that the financial information that you gave is safe with them? Giving them what they want might be one of the many ways that they can easily hack your account. You just don’t notice that you have been already robbed by unknown users. Yes, it already happened, and many people were already victimized by that kind of scam.

There will always be a freedom of expression in social media. Whatever you want to post something, you can definitely post it – without someone reprimanding you. Of course, it is your personal account and you have all the right to do what you want. However, you have to be responsible for what you do socially, that if you don’t want to put your life at risk – and I’m sure you don’t! You can enjoy using it without putting your life in danger. Well, just make social media as an entertainment, the source of information (verify it though), but definitely NOT your dairy!

4 Simple Tips for Dealing with Upset Clients on Social Media

clickz.com

What do you usually do when you unintentionally upset your clients? Have you done anything wrong that leads them to be upset? Why do you think your potential clients are upset with the post that you have? How will you handle their frustrations and critics towards you? How will you let them understand that what you have done was not on your purpose? What did you do to calm them down?

Yes, when it comes to social media, your approach towards your potential and target clients will be much different than in person. You have the need to know what words you should use in order to fit the context of what you are trying to imply. Moreover, the tone of your content should be convincing for you to immediately grab their attention before anything else. Sad to say, there are just times that we tend to forget all of these things and do whatever we want to do.

Well sometimes, we are not aware that we already have offended our clients. If you could just talk with your client personally, then it is better and easier for you to make things go back to normal. However, you are dealing with a client through social media, which makes it more challenging on your end on to how you are going to let them understand the situation. If you are one of those people who are still stuck on these kind situations, then here are some simple and effective tips for you to deal with your upset clients on social media.

Respond no matter what

Misunderstanding between you and your client will definitely not be resolved if you don't respond to their critics immediately. Especially when your clients have some complaints about your post, then it is your responsibility as a marketer to let them know and understand the things on what you are trying to imply to them, in as much as simple way as possible.

Remember, there are hundreds to thousands of people who can see your post, and if you don’t respond and just ignore it, they might think that you don’t care about your target audience at all. Well, you don't need to fret too much since your clients will definitely understand if you just know how to explain it to them.

Be patient and understanding

There will be times that your client will try to argue with you on social media and insist that they are right about what they believe. However, even if they have the right to complain, it doesn’t mean that they will always be right. You also have the right to explain your side about the post that you have on social media. Of course, you have to be patient and understanding with your clients in order for you to effectively convince them that what you have posted is true.

Contact your client privately

Arguing with your client on social media is an act of unprofessional. You do not attack them with words below the post that you have. Of course, the conversation between you and your client will bring some attention to the other people. And it is not an ideal thing to do if you are protecting your reputation.

One of the best ways you can lessen the tension is to communicate with them privately. It will definitely not hurt you if you extend some time and effort in letting them understand what you want to impart to them. Also, this is also a way for you to know how and why they are upset with the post that you have, and know their side of their story.

Consider asking your client to remove the comment

It might be embarrassing to ask for a small favor from your client, however, it is the only way you can make the negative conversation stop.  Moreover, if you just leave the negative comment on your post, a lot of people can still read it and might try to continue the conversation that you had.  With that, your reputation as a marketer will definitely be destroy and people will not trust you anymore.

If you want to save your reputation, asking your client to remove the negative comment will not hurt you. Just at least reach out to them and let them understand what you want imply to them.

Taking a Break at Social Media

There comes a point in a person’s life where being active in social media becomes too boring and sappy because of the many unnecessary things that are seen on the newsfeed. For more obvious reasons, the social media has also been a hub for bullying and fake accounts lurking around the Internet. A digital marketing agency in the Philippines, among others, gives out a few reasons why taking a break from social media is needed. At the same time, it also suggests on a few things on how taking a break from social media could also help you more from getting a smooth come back. Taking a break does not always mean leaving. After all, everyone needs a vacation, right?

Troubled if taking a break from the social media is a good idea?

As social media marketers, there is a fine line between taking a break and quitting. And obviously, those are two different stories. According to Buffer’s Kevan Lee, seeking for a vacation from too much media presence won’t hurt. In fact, being a social media marketer needs one. And some of the reasons are the following:

• Posting consistently to social media for six months straight.
• Being a little turned off by some of Facebook’s experiments or Twitter’s redesigns.
• Being on the mood to reevaluate.
• Or just simply taking your mind off things.

And these are real deals. One might be thinking twice of taking a leave off social media because it might affect your site’s performance, but this isn’t always the case. Remember, taking a vacation isn’t always equal to leaving…for good.

Going back, there are still far more reasons why taking a social media vacation is a need, whether you are an individual, or a company who wants to minimize its online media presence for quite some time.

Too much information

Maybe one has been able to notice the fact that you have been posting too much information on your feed in a span of an hour. Which can actually trigger a more disturbing scene because it might get annoying. Unless you minimize posting stuff online, doing so might be helpful for you and your readers. Why? Because you can also allocate time for researching more information for the next content to post, at the same, have your readers wait and want for more.

Lack of time

This means forgetting that you have still other things to do. For some individuals who are too attached to social media like Facebook, one example is spending hours stalking and clicking on unknown people on Facebook just because they have interesting photos or posts on their profiles, rather than going out with friends or spending more time talking to more relevant people. This also goes out to social media marketers, who need a breather and talk with people who have the same passion as them—as social media marketing is concerned.

Privacy and safety concerns

This is one authentic reason why people decide to take a break from their social media activities. It often becomes detrimental and stressful at some point, and affects one’s psychological state and puts it at stake. Somehow, privacy is really an issue when it comes to social media presence albeit the ‘privacy settings’ you can set on your accounts.

Lack of enjoyment

It sometimes gets boring seeing everyone’s statuses, on the same routine, not mentioning the rants of people. I mean, who would enjoy other people’s rants? It even makes a bad day even worse and it does not help reading those on your feed, either. So go, take a break, clear your head and perhaps, enjoy a good book instead and write a good review about it and post it on your social media when you are ready to go back.

Too addictive

This is one legit reason why taking a break from social media is needed. It’s just too addictive and it consumes a lot of time. It’s too explainable and everyone knows what addiction means. You do, right?

Well, it just happened that there is a probable lean approach to social media. And if you do decide to that taking time away from it is in your best interest, then there are lots of options for you.

• Do nothing. Simply stop sharing, following, favoriting. Step away from the computer.
• Deactivate your account. Your can reactivate later anyway.
• Fill up the queue of your social media scheduling app. Facebook’s got one though making it as if you were still around.
• Or perhaps, delete your account. You have to start from scratch though if you wanted to go back.

Question: Is a social media break right for you?

Hoping that you have now got a little grasp on why a social media break might be a good take off and how to go about it in the right way. If it’s on your mind, maybe you can run through the ideas suggested and decide whether or not getting a social media vacation can be of good use to you. Social media has tons of advantages and uses when applied in the right way—and the right way so very often comes down to what feels right to you.