You must be thinking, “What? How important can fancy titles for cleaning companies really be?”

The answer is, VERY.

That isn’t to say they are ALL that matters – not at all. The quality and consistency of your service and your dedication to the craft and your consumers needs to be top-notch.

But you will only get these consumers if you can attract them enough to actually opt for the services of your cleaning services company.

And the first way in which you can do that is from the business name.

With that, here are the steps to name your cleaning services company:

So, how do you come up with a unique name for your business that sets you apart but is also easy to remember?

We help you come up with a bunch of cleaning company names from which you can choose the best one.

Let’s begin!

How to Pick a Name for a Business – Top Tips for Your Cleaning Company

Your End Goal Should be Unique and Catchy Names

Imagine you are setting up a cleaning firm in Los Angeles.

If you call it LA HouseCleaning Specialists, you will have met the basic requirements. The cleaning company name idea tells the reader what the company does and where it is based.

But is it a name that is likely to stick once it leaves the sight of the reader?

We doubt it.

HouseCleaning Specialists could very well be the description of any of the hundreds of companies in the region.

Now imagine you call it “Spick and Span – LA Chapter.”

Will it give the reader the impression that you will provide unique cleaning services? Honestly, not really – after all, how unique can cleaning services be?

But will the name stick out to the reader on a billboard or flyer? It’s likely that it will! All because you chose a catchier name that is unique and stands out without being too vague.

Keep It Short and Simple

You want to come up with names for a cleaning business that are descriptive of your services.

Great.

Does that mean it’s a good idea to name your company something like “Housekeeping Services for Spotless Clean Rooms and Outdoor Areas Inc.”?

Of course not!

The longer the name of your business, the harder it will be to remember. And if people can’t remember your name when they need your unique clean services, what is the point?

A short name is easier to remember and also has added potential for creativity.

Now let’s suppose you call your business Wipe Unsullied. Many people reading this won’t even know what unsullied means (let’s face it, we Googled it too).

Using difficult words that people have trouble understanding won’t do you any favors.

It is, thus, best to keep the name as short and as sweet as possible.

Draft Something that is Easy to Remember

Nike. Fun, short, simple, easy to remember. Right?

Now imagine if it was Nikephostorus.

Would it still be as easy to remember?

It definitely wouldn’t.

Catchy business names are best when they do more than stun – they need to have the ability to be remembered and recalled at will.

And so catchy business name ideas shouldn’t be just that – catchy. They should also have other qualities that make them worthy of remembering. These include relevance, ease, length, and so on.

Example:

Cleanly as opposed to Cleanographily.

Use Words Related to Cleaning

We almost just heard you say “DUH, what else would I use?!”

Let us explain what we meant.

It can be very tempting to go for an out-of-this-world option when picking a company name for your business.

The catch? Aliens may be the ONLY beings it would be relevant or memorable for (pun intended).

You want potential consumers to instantly think of your services when they come across the name.

Let’s understand this with an example.

When you think clean, the first thing that comes to mind is a spaceship (more aliens – yikes!) with its slick and tidy finish. You, thus, decide to name your business UFO Unlimited.

While this makes sense to you, the consumer doesn’t have the backstory, nor are they aware of the thought behind the name.

They just see words that have absolutely nothing to do with a cleaning biz.

But if you use something like Squeaky Clean, Clean as a Whistle, or even UFO Clean, the consumer can tell, at first glance, what the company does.

And that will always work in your favor.

Use other words for cleaning such as housekeeping, concierge services, or similar house cleaning synonyms to make it clear what you do.

Cleaning phrases like spick and span and spotless clean, as well as their variants also keep the name relevant yet exciting.

Keep Future Changes in Mind

You want to narrow in on your current services and give potential consumers a clear picture of what you do, sure.

But you don’t want to do that at the expense of restricting the growth of your cleaning services company in the future.

Let’s suppose you call your firm New York Maidly. After a year or two, following unexpected success, you decide you want to open a branch in another state.

To do that, however, you will need to change your company name and branding. You can’t operate in Texas with New York in the name.

Similarly, if you specialize in cleaning small houses and call yourself “Tiny Housekeeping,” you won’t be able to attract bigger clients in the future, even if you want to.

The bottom line is this: your catchy company name should allow for expansion, whether it is in the form of location, services, or more.

3 Don’ts When Naming Cleaning Services Companies

Don’t Cross a Line Trying to be Creative

You are often told to forget all limits and boundaries when it comes to creativity. This is good AND bad advice.

Experiment, be inspired, imagine. That’s all great. But don’t forget to stay within the realm of good and ethical.

Don’t overdo it and end up being offensive or distasteful in any way.

Don’t Overexaggerate

You want to be open and honest in all your business communication if you want to maintain a good reputation with your customer base.

And that starts with your company name.

The last thing you want to do is mislead people.

For example, you can’t be called A-Z Cleaning if you only clean office spaces. Do you see what we mean?

Be honest and true to your brand.

Don’t Use Your Own Name Unless It Really Works

Anderson and Co.

This name may have a lot of meaning for you and your family but it gives nothing away to the consumer about your business.

Nor is it catchy or unique.

So should you ever use your name as part of the business name?

In this case, we would suggest you only use your name if you can make it fit the criteria of relevant, creative, and fun.

For example, if your family name is Whistle, what better than calling your company “Whistle Clean”?

What Next? Things to Do BEFORE You Finalize a Name for Your Cleaning Business

So, now you have some cleaning service name ideas.

The first thing to ask yourself is, “Is my company name taken?”

Competitors can beat you to grabbing even the most unique company names – been there, done that.

You will be shocked at how many of the options on the business name ideas list will already be taken.

On a side note: it is best to come up with a vast company name ideas list so that you don’t have to start from scratch because nothing is available.

But coming back to the point,

Check whether the business name and domain are actually available before you go and register your firm and start branding your business accordingly.

How can you do that? Here’s how:

Check the Availability of the Name

You can’t just decide you’re going to start selling shoes one day and set up shop the next. For you to start running a business, you need to first register it with the authorities.

And guess what one of the core considerations during that process is – the name!

You can’t launch with the same name as another company in the region/state. The name can’t even be too similar to that of another company because this would cause confusion for the consumers.

This is why it is best to shortlist your top options and not have your heart set on one prematurely – you just don’t know if it will be available. And you definitely want other names to fall back on instead of starting again from scratch.

Before we go any further, here are the top reasons to make sure your chosen name isn’t already registered before you launch your cleaning services company:

• You don’t want the request to register your company rejected.
• Copyright issues, if you find out about them too late, can cost you a lot of time and money.
• Having to rebrand your business with another name is not only time-consuming, but it also results in major losses in terms of brand image and customer loyalty.

So how exactly can you do that?

You can carry out a search on the Secretary of State Corporation & Business Entity Search website.

In this database, you can find information regarding ANY company that has been registered in any state in the US.

You can also find this information on every state’s official business listing directory or check with the Secretary of State for that particular state.

Moving on:

You also want to check DBAs to make sure you don’t miss anything. DBA stands for “Doing business as” and implies that a business is operating under a name that is different from its legal one.

Some states make it mandatory to file these DBA names. You should check these registrations to make sure your business name doesn’t overlap with any existing operating names.

So, what next?

Well, if you find that your name is similar to a business that already exists, it is best that you move on to your next option. But if you still really want the name, you can go and check your state’s specific requirements to see if you can make that work.

Another thing you can do is to play around with different versions of the name.

For example, Integrate can also be Integr8. You have to be mindful, in such instances, that at the end of the day, the name still sounds the same and your consumers may get confused between the two.

Check Whether the Domain is Available

Sooner or later, you’re going to want to set up a website for your business. In this digital age, we’d suggest sooner rather than later.

But whenever you do, you need a domain that matches your business name.

Finding out that particular domain is unavailable once you have the business registered and set up can be very problematic.

To avoid that, check whether the domain is available before you go ahead and register the business.

Here are a couple of sites where you can do that:

• Domain.com
• GoDaddy.com
• Bluehost.com

You can also go to the site whois.com to check out the history of a particular domain.

A great thing about these websites is that they don’t leave you feeling stranded. If the domain name you searched for isn’t available, they give you other similar options.

None of these options may hit home but you may get a few ideas about how you can modify the name.

Oh and the best part? These are all web hosting services. So if you find the name you are looking for, you can go ahead and buy the domain in a few easy steps.

Find more detail about these domain name search and registration sites here.

Here are a few considerations for domain registration that can help you choose the right one for your cleaning services company:

• Try not to use unnecessary punctuation and digits – these are hard to remember, type, and eventually search for. Going for app@rat3.com instead of apparate.com will work against you, no matter how creative you think it looks.
• Stick to a .com That is the first extension that comes to your consumer’s mind when they are searching for your business and that is the one you want to appear on.
• Avoid using hyphens. We’ve already talked about skipping punctuation but hyphens, in particular, can hint at spam sites and that is definitely not the impression you want to give to your consumers.
• Steer clear of double letters. Take a look at this: letterssync.com. There is a massive chance of a typo (lettersync.com) that will lead your consumer to an error page or, worse, a competitor’s site. That is something you just cannot afford.

Here’s a bonus tip:

Did you know that it is still possible to obtain a domain name that is owned by someone else?

You can:

• Contact the owner directly
• Go through a brokerage
• Make a legal claim that you are the rightful owner of the domain
• Opt for aftermarket bidding

Confused? Don’t be. Read all about it here.

Check Trademark Availability

Before you go ahead and finalize a name, you also want to check and see if the trademark rights are available.

When you register for a trademark, you protect yourself from competitors trying to misuse your name in the future or set up a company with a name so similar to yours that it confuses consumers, among other things.

And it isn’t just restricted to names – you can prevent competitors from using certain symbols, slogans, or other elements and protect your interests.

You can understand, then, why it is a problem if a business with a similar name to yours already has trademark protection.

To carry out a search, go to the United States Patent and Trademark Office site. Make sure you are not violating the potential trademark rights of another business.

You can also register a trademark for your firm to protect your operations in the future. Check out the basic information and requirements you need to know before you register for a trademark here.

Wrapping it Up…

Believe it or not, the name of your cleaning services company can decide how much business you attract.

And the scale doesn’t have to tilt toward the wrong side.

Be smart in naming and branding your business and watch the customers start to flow in.

Best of luck!

The post How to Name Your Cleaning Services Company – A Guide appeared first on Canz Marketing.

You must be thinking:

Why SEO for attorneys in particular?

Do I really need to be putting in ANY extra effort at all?

What will SEO do for my business that I’m not achieving already?

We understand your concerns and we’re going to address all of them in this blog post.

Making a decision about whether to opt for SEO for an attorney’s business or not can be confusing.

But we can help you get clarity so read on!

We’re Convinced You Need Law Firm SEO – Are You?

Did you know that 96% of people, when they need legal advice, carry out an online search? (Source: Google Consumer Survey)

But that’s not all.

74% of people visit an attorney’s website before they take any action.

What does this mean for you?

Well, if your legal business website is not optimized for search engines, you’ll find yourself in a bit of a pickle.

And the reason is simple: Your business won’t be the one that the 96% of people we just mentioned will see when they type a query into Google.

Or any other search engine for that matter.

When it comes to attorneys, there are many things a well-thought-out, custom-tailored SEO strategy can achieve.

But before we give you a short lawyer SEO guide that can help you maneuver the world of optimization,

Here’s How You Know You Need SEO

So how do you decide if you should spend time and effort – and it can take a lot of each – on search engine optimization. That is something that SEO for attorney businesses has in common with SEO for all nearly all other kinds of businesses.

The best way to do this is to ask yourself the following questions:

Is my website ranking AT ALL for the relevant keywords?

Carrying out a quick analysis of how you rank for certain keywords will reveal exactly where you stand right now.

If you’re not even on the first page of search engine results, the situation is, without a doubt, alarming. Law firm SEO is no longer an option for you at this point – you NEED it.

Now, let’s suppose you rank on the first page; just near the bottom. Most people don’t look past the first few results on the page. So you should be higher up – something attorneys’ SEO can help with.

And if you are at the top of the page, well, then you’re likely already using SEO!

What does the traffic on my site look like?

Are you able to get visitors to your site?

How long do they stick around?

How many of them end up converting or taking some other action?

If you’re not getting a lot of traffic to your site (from Google and other places), you need to put some of the best SEO strategies into action.

These steps will also bring more focused audiences to your site – which means more conversions!

Do mobile searchers get an experience worth remembering on my site?

Mobile dominates search nowadays – let’s face it, handheld devices dominate ALL aspects of life.

Don’t believe us?

31% of all traffic that has to do with law firms comes from mobile consumers (Source: FindLaw Aggregated Hosted Site Data).

So your site needs to optimized for mobile – after all, if a visitor doesn’t have a good experience browsing your site, how will they think they will when it comes to legal matters?

What is my reputation in the local community?

Most people look at online reviews before they opt for a brand or its services.

If the general opinion is that you are mediocre at best, no one will come to you for legal advice that their life may depend on.

But there’s something worse – yes, worse than bad reviews!

You may have no presence at all.

With online reviews, you can build your credibility and authority online, and leave a favorable impression on people who come across your company online.

So it’s decided – you need law firm SEO.

And here is how you can get started!

Lawyer SEO Guide – Equipping You For Success

Focus on Local SEO

Most often, when someone is searching for an attorney or any other professional from the legal niche, they are going to look for someone in their region – a local.

This is why a large chunk of your SEO strategy should focus on a local target audience.

While all SEO efforts can contribute to local SEO, there are some things you can do in particular to reach local audiences:

• Use Local Keywords

Local keywords are keywords that people in a particular region search for – they are location-based.

If your law company is based in New York City, you want to clinch the top spot for the keyword “best attorney in New York City,” for example.

Your keyword discovery process should be done keeping this in mind.

• Google My Business

A Google My Business, or GMB, listing helps you manage your presence on Google’s search engine and map.

It is also a way for you to share a summarized description of your law firm with searchers at first glance. All the important details are right in front of them.

Oh, and we almost forgot – it helps people find the company office easily as the GMB listing also shows the location.

A great place to start, thus, is with your GMB listing.

Set it up, optimize it correctly, and keep it updated for the best results.

Choose the right keywords

Keyword research is one of the important aspects of an attorney’s SEO strategy.

If you don’t do this right, a lot of your subsequent steps (such as website content and meta tag optimization) are wasted effort.

For example, if your firm specializes in criminal law, it is of no use to you to rank highly for a general law services search.

Here are some things to focus on:

• Consumer profile

It is crucial to understand who your target audience is and what it is that they want.

Only when you understand the demographics and the psychographics of your audience will you be able to determine what they search for and how to reach them.

• Search Intent

Identify what you want your keywords to achieve.

There are different kinds of keywords that have different search intents – the searchers want to achieve different things.

For example, informational keywords are used when – you guessed it – one is looking to learn more about a topic. For instance, “how to file an assault complaint.”

The person searching for this keyword isn’t looking for any services – they’re looking for guidance. Writing an informational blog post around this keyword would hit the right spot.

A commercial keyword, on the other hand, reflects the searcher’s intent to make a purchase. An example could be “best lawyer in Sacramento.”

Someone who searches for this is definitely looking to hire legal services. Incorporating this keyword into your website content, as well as in blog posts that aim to generate leads, would be the way to go.

• Ease of Ranking

Good things don’t come cheap.

When a keyword is more popular (it has a high search volume), it is harder to rank for as there is a lot more competition.

And when we say harder, we mean it’s going to be more expensive and time-consuming to achieve a good rank.

If you have resources and the capability to rank for that keyword, great! But if you don’t, it would be a good idea to go for keywords with lower competition.

• Competitors

A good way to figure out what keywords you should be using is to study your competitors, preferably in the same region.

The keywords they’re ranking for are the ones you want to ace. Why? Because you know they are working – they are attracting clients.

Here are some resources that can help you get started with the keyword research process:

Ultimate Guide: How to Research and & select the right keywords for your business?

Keyword Research: A Guide to Improve your Google Rank

You can get more personalized advice from our SEO services experts – contact them here!

Ensure Keyword Optimization

Once you have determined the keywords you can easily rank for and that will be beneficial for your law business, you need to put them into action.

Your law firm SEO is only as good as the level of optimization of your content.

This is why you need to enhance your current content to ensure it contains keywords your target audience is searching for.

• Optimize all your content, including web page copy, blog posts, and so on.
• Optimize your meta tags – title tags AND meta descriptions.
• Use relevant header tags to structure your webpage and incorporate your keywords where you can.

Review Your Content Strategy

First things first – all of the techniques we shared for optimizing your existing content apply to future content too.

So keyword optimization is a given.

But how else can you tweak your SEO content strategy for the best results, i.e., more traffic and even more clients?

Here are a few tips you need to be mindful of across content channels and types:

• Create meaningful content that the audience actually wants to consume.
• Keep it simple – even though it’s attorneys’ SEO, you don’t want too much legal jargon.
• Be relevant – specializing in administrative law and writing about equities is just going to confuse and push away your audience.
• Do NOT plagiarize – if your content isn’t original, what is the point of it anyway?
• Focus on ALL aspects of the content, from the body to the headings, meta tags, and everything in between.
• Use the correct content length for different content types – a blog post is better when it is long and covers a topic completely but a social media post should rather be short and sweet.

Here are some kinds of content that have a lot of impact:

• Website pages – Each of your legal services should have a dedicated page that covers all the information a potential client may need.
• Blog posts – According to DemandGenReports, six out of 10 people admit that blog posts have an influence in the initial stages of the buyer’s journey. As a top law firm, you can write informational blog posts that answer questions your target audience may have and provide them value.
• Infographics – Whether posted on a blog or a social media page, infographics, when done right, grab the attention of your audience.
• Video – Videos providing guidance and, again, answering the questions of your consumers using your knowledge and expertise can establish your authority.
• Reviews – You don’t “create” reviews but you should focus on attaining them online. Reviews and feedback from clients play a massive role in your online reputation management and building credibility.

Before we move on, do you want to learn about creating more meaningful content? These resources will give you all the information you need:

Content Marketing – Everything You Need to Know

Content Marketing Strategy from Scratch – Ultimate Guide

9 Tips for an Effective Content Marketing Plan

Content Marketing Key takeaways from 15 Experts

SEO & Content Marketing: What’s the link?

Technical SEO

You want search engine spiders to be able to crawl and index your site in a better way so that you witness an increase in ranking.

And you can achieve this through some technical SEO best practices.

Site security

Use SSL or Secure Sockets Layer – the security technology spotted through a https:// URL instead of a http:// one.

It allows for encryption and reassures the user that they are surfing the site safely.

This is a particularly important aspect of law firm SEO because you want to show potential future clients that their security is non-negotiable.

Page speed

The best way to lose website visitors is to have low page speed – don’t let that happen.

After all, if a website takes more than 3 seconds to load, you’ve lost 40% of your visitors then and there.

There are many things you can do to ensure this doesn’t happen to you. This guide discusses them all:

Page Speed

While we’re on web pages, dead ones are much worse than slow ones – be sure your website visitors don’t come across any of those.

Mobile Optimization

Nearly a third of your traffic, as a law firm, comes from mobile search – we already told you that.

What we didn’t tell you is how you can prepare for it.

There are many aspects of mobile optimization you need to focus on. For example, you need to make sure you have a responsive website design – the layout of the site should adapt to the screen size of the device on which it is being displayed.

These two guides will give you a much better idea of the options you have when it comes to mobile optimization, and which one to go for:

Mobile Optimization

MOBILE SEO: The Definitive Guide

Read about these factors and others like structured data, XML sitemaps and more here:

 What’s technical SEO? 8 technical aspects everyone should know

Emphasize on Link- and Citation­-Building

Link-building is a very good way of increasing traffic to your site – an attorney’s SEO strategy can’t do without it.

Look at it like this: Focusing on getting traffic solely from search engines is like putting up a flyer in one building. Only the occupants of that particular building will see your business and visit your office.

Obtaining backlinks is like putting up flyers in buildings all over town – you get visibility and “traffic” from all these different sources as a result.

Backlinks

It is important to make sure that the backlinks you obtain are from trusted, credible sources.

Here are some great places to get backlinks from in the beginning

• Other law businesses and professionals (through collaborations)
• Guest posting sites
• Law schools
• Social media profiles

Internal Links

Once you have managed to get an interested reader on the site, you want them to stick around for as long as possible.

Spectacular content, great graphics, and a responsive website design can all help you achieve that.

And so can internal links. Lead visitors from one webpage to the other through carefully placed links that beg to be clicked.

Citations

Building citations is an incredibly effective way of increasing your presence around the web, obtaining more traffic, AND ranking higher.

How? You get traffic from reputed and trusted legal business directories. The cherry on top? You build authority and credibility in the process too!

For a list of some great citation sites for lawyers, click here!

Track progress, make improvements – rinse and repeat

Regular reviews of the law firm SEO strategy implementation are a must.

Keep a strict eye on metrics such as website traffic, bounce rate, ranking positions, shares, online reviews, leads acquired, conversions, and others.

By doing this, you will know which of your game plans is working and which ones aren’t bringing about the kind of results you hoped for.

Once you have this very valuable information, you will be able to make informed decisions about the changes you need to introduce.

An Attorney’s SEO Strategy – Is It for Your Business?

We think your legal business can definitely use an SEO strategy to gain more visibility, traffic, and conversions.

You should be convinced of the same by now too.

And it doesn’t matter if you don’t have the time and resources to go all in and implement a grand law firm SEO plan. You can start small, and take it one step at a time, building on it as you go.

And as always, if you need any assistance, our experts are a few clicks away!

The post Law Firm SEO – An Attorney’s Guide to Optimization Success appeared first on Canz Marketing.

What is the first thing they do? They devise a cost-cutting strategy and start to implement it straight away.

That’s great! So, what’s the problem? A lot of the time, that temporary low budget business strategy cuts down on marketing and advertising efforts immensely because the business just can’t afford it.

But guess what? You can still promote your business inexpensively. All you need is to have knowledge of the tools and channels at your disposal and how you can use them to your advantage.

Whether you want to learn how to use Facebook to promote your business, do it in person, or through email, we have you covered.

Here are just a few strategies to get you started. Read on!

Run a Useful Blog

You don’t need any money to run a blog – unless you’re outsourcing the work to an agency. But more often than not, your marketing team is fully capable of creating excellent content for your blog.

But how does a blog help you promote your business?

Do you try to sell your products through salesy blog posts?

Or does the blog just list your services and their details for people to view?

Neither, actually.

The point of a blog is to engage your customers and potential consumers with content they find useful, interesting, or plain entertaining.

Once they’re on your blog on a regular basis, you can redirect them to other parts of the site through internal links.

But that’s not all. You can also establish yourself as an authority in the field, resulting in the reader having more confidence in the brand.

You can also occasionally talk about your products or services but not in too much of a salesy manner.

The bottom line? An active and engaging blog will help you promote your business at little or no cost at all!

Not sure what you can write about? Maybe you can pick up a few tips here:

9 content writing topic ideas that will never fail you

Before we move on, here are some pointers on creating content that will go viral:

The 3 ‘F’s that Will Make Your Content Go Viral

Enhance Old Content

Content is king – but sometimes you don’t have money for royalty. So what can you do instead?

You can enhance content that you have already created in the past.

And this applies whether you are trying to figure out how to promote a catering business, how to promote a cleaning business, or anything in between.

While this is no match compared to actually creating new content, by reviving old content by making it more informative and relevant to the current time and audiences, you can get some visibility without investing a substantial amount of time and cash.

So what exactly do we mean by reviving old content? How can you make it relevant? It isn’t hard – here are some of the things you can do:

Add additional information

In the world of digital marketing, things change every single day. Which means you have plenty of new and useful information you can share with your readers.

Instead of creating new blog posts from scratch which will obviously take more time and effort, you can just add this information to current content.

Update the numbers

Let’s say you wrote a blog post in 2019 titled “Top content marketing hacks for your business in 2019.” While most or all the strategies you talked about may still be relevant in 2020, the title of this blog post will make it seem like outdated information.

All you need to do is to update the title, potentially add some new information, and share the blog post once again.

Share old content again

As long as the content is still relevant and useful to your readers, you can share it with them once again. There is absolutely no harm in that.

In fact, people who benefited from the content once are likely to remember it and give it another shot.

Taking these steps will help you put out content without a break, even when you can’t afford to create new stuff.

Aim for Perfection with Your Social Media Strategy

Does it cost you anything to post on Facebook?

Or has Instagram ever demanded any money from you when you post a picture of your latest product?

Social media platforms are the perfect way to promote your business for absolutely free!

And what do you get in return?

More than 3.7 billion people use social media on a daily basis worldwide. This is nearly half of the entire population of the world! Crazy, right?

You will agree with us, therefore, when we say with absolute confidence that you will find your target audience also uses social media. And you can reach them through platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, and so on, depending on your target demographic and other factors.

Through social media, among other things, you can:

• Share information about your products and services
• Post informational content
• Focus on image building
• Interact with your consumers
• Encourage feedback and respond to it
• Directly sell your products and/or services

Through all these activities, you get to – directly or indirectly – promote your business. Whether you choose to promote your business on Facebook or another platform, as we said before, depends on who you want to reach.

Unsure about how to create your social media strategy and implement it? CANZ Marketing can help – get in touch today!

Utilize the Power of LinkedIn

Wait – what? We just talked about using social media platforms to give your business an advertising boost. But here’s the thing: LinkedIn deserves a special mention.

LinkedIn is a great place to interact with other professionals, not just your end consumers. And you can get seen by other businesses, which is especially useful for you if you are a B2B service provider.

All you need to do is to maintain an active profile, join groups, engage in discussions that are relevant to your niche, and just be seen as a reliable professional in the digital community.

You can also use the platform to share news about your company, as well as to share your informational content, so that you remain in the feed of those who will potentially need your products or services in the future.

Enter Business Partnerships

Entering into a partnership with another business in your niche is a sure shot way of getting more work, as well as an increase in visibility.

How does that work? Let’s look at this with an example. Let’s say you are a small business that provides all kinds of content writing services. You begin noticing that more and more of your clients ask for content writing AND design services. While you cannot afford to hire an entire team for graphic design, what you can do is to collaborate with a designing agency.

Together, you can take on projects for clients that require both content and design services.

This does three things:

• First of all, you get to enjoy double the visibility – from your marketing efforts, as well as those of your partner.
• Secondly, you get clients you couldn’t previously target because you couldn’t provide them an all-round service.
• Collaborating with a trustworthy company that is known to provide high-quality products and services can boost your business image because a company with a great reputation agreed to work with you.

All in all, entering beneficial business partnerships can help you with your business image, as well as build an additional cashflow, which is exactly what you need.

Brand ALL Your Correspondence

One very easy way to promote your business and make sure people know about you is to make sure you are visible.

This is especially important if you are a new business (read, low budget business that can’t afford to spend a fortune on marketing and advertising).

So how do you do it?

It’s pretty simple. All communication from your end should be branded with your company name, your logo, and other branding elements.

Sending out an email? Include the name of the brand, as well as the logo in the signature.

Creating flyers or promotional content for social media? Follow your color theme, add your name and logo, and make it visible at first sight.

Important side note: This also means that your logo and other branding elements should be so catchy that they stick with people once they see them.

Don’t believe us? Check out these blog posts to see why you should:

Understanding the Adidas Slogan and Its Powerful Impact

Ever changing Wendy’s Slogans and Mottos: How’s Wendy’s making headway?

But that’s not all – you also need to brand yourself and the company when you speak to people.

Which brings us to our next point:

Network As Much As You Can

What can I do to become better known? How to advertise my business locally?

If you have been asking yourself these questions, here is the answer:

Attend conferences, seminars, and other relevant events that help you connect with people who can benefit your business in one way or the other.

Heck, connect with people who don’t benefit you in any way but would potentially prove to be a useful connection in the future.

Converse with other professionals in your niche through Facebook Live if you have to (such as is the need now due to shelter in place).

You do you. But remember the end goal: you have to bring up the business and put it across in a way that it sticks with the person at the other end.

After all, local business advertising can only work if people actually remember you when they need a product or service you sell.

This is one of the easiest ways to promote your business without – wait for it – spending ANY money at all!

Note: Do NOT forget to hand out your business card to whoever you meet. On that note, make sure you have nicely designed, creative cards (especially if you belong to a creative industry) that will leave an impression and cause people to remember you.

Create a Listing for Your Business on Google My Business

If you’re wondering how to promote your business on Google locally, you need to set up a Google My Business (GMB) listing.

This is essential for you when you set up your new business.

There was a time when businesses used to list their information in phone directories, hoping consumers would find them if the need arose.

Can you imagine doing that today? Of course not! Online is where search is, and that is where your business listing needs to be.

So, what is a Google My Business (GMB) listing? Think back to the last time you searched for a business on Google. Remember a box that appeared on the right-hand side of the results page, with the brand’s name, maybe a picture of the store, and contact details among some other things?

Bingo – that is a GMB listing and that is just what you need to promote your local business.

By adding your listing and making sure it is always up to date, you can keep your consumers informed at all times. You can even get in touch with them through Google My Business messaging.

Here is a great resource by the king himself, Neil Patel, on how you can make the best use of a GMB listing:

How to Optimize Google My Business and Leverage It For More Sales

Engage!

The more you engage with other people, the more information about your business will spread through word of mouth.

We just talked about that, right?

But here, we’re referring to engaging with your target audience – who would actually have use for your products and services.

Interacting with them, showing them you care about them, welcoming and incorporating their feedback, and answering any questions they may have will do you as much good as it will do them.

And there are many ways in which you can do this. The best part? They’re free!

Here is an example of a few:

• Create a group to promote your business on Facebook – always keep the conversation going.
• Join other groups and be an active participant.
• Use the Facebook Live feature to have real-time conversations with your followers.
• Conduct contests and other fun activities.

In other words, you should be the first name that pops into a consumer’s mind when they need a product or service in your niche.

Become known as an authority in the niche

We know we have covered the gist of this in the previous points but it deserves a quick separate mention.

When you choose a brand over all other similar ones, what is your reasoning behind that decision?

More often than not, it will be because that brand is better than all the rest in the niche. Or you think that particular company knows exactly what they’re doing.

Now think about it: do you not want to be the exact same thing for the people you’re serving?

When your target starts to see you as an authority in the niche, as someone who knows the ins and outs of their business, they will trust you enough to buy your products and services.

And that is just what you need.

Here are some things you can do to establish this authority:

• Create magnificent content and add value to people’s lives through your blog posts.
• Write guest posts (we talk about this in detail later).
• Be visible whenever and wherever there is a discussion relevant to your business.
• Accept invitations to interviews and podcasts.
• Use social media to answer questions and concerns.
• Collaborate/correspond with other top names in the industry.
• Be an inspiration to and help newbies in the field.

There are many other things you can do but this is a start.

Give Freebies and Samples

You can talk and market and sell and do everything else in your power but sometimes, your target audience is just not ready to come on board.

They may have any number of reasons for this. Their loyalties may lie with your competitor. They don’t want to spend any extra money at the present time. They may simply not trust you.

At a time like this, you can start to give people samples to show them how spectacular your products and services are.

And this doesn’t have to be as expensive as you think.

Launched a new line of frozen chicken products? Set up fry stations at the local supermarket and give out samples to passersby. Came out with a new perfume? Offer people a smell at the mall on a busy day.

Once they experience the actual product or service and like it, they will be more inclined toward buying it.

And while we’re talking about giving out samples to promote your business, you can do this indirectly too by sharing informational or training content to show off your level of expertise.

Let’s say, for example, you are a digital marketer. You put out a free video that teaches small business owners how they can do basic keyword research.

They then optimize their content for those keywords and see instant changes to their website traffic.

What have you done?

1. Well, first of all, you’ve shown a potential customer that you know what you’re doing. But that’s not all – you’ve shown them that your strategies work for THEIR business in particular. What does this do? It proves to them that you are of special value to them. While today this is in the form of the information you share, tomorrow it can be in the form of your services.
2. Secondly, you’ve created a situation in which the person feels indebted to you because they benefited due to you. This may be on a subconscious level and something that doesn’t manifest itself immediately. However, it stays with them in the long run.

So, what’s going to happen as a result of these two things? The next time this person needs any sort of digital marketing services, they’re going to come to you!

Invest in Small Business SEO to Rank Higher in the SERPs

Are you wondering how to promote your business on Google and make sure it appears higher up in the search engine results pages?

Your answer is SEO. Search engine optimization (SEO) is the holy grail of digital marketing in today’s day and age. There’s no denying it.

The only reason we’ve included it this far down the list is because it can be a little more expensive than the other strategies we have talked about.

(You can hire an in-house team to take care of your SEO needs or you can outsource to an agency that specializes in that area.)

Search engine optimization ensures that your website appears at the top of the search engine results pages (SERPs) as a result of a relevant search. So what you are trying to do is basically to promote your business on Google.

There is much more to SEO than can be explained here but here are some blog posts that will give you a good idea of what it involves – do check them out!

Do you Really Need SEO?

Local SEO For Small Businesses: How Good Is That?

SEO & Content Marketing: What’s the link?

How to Rock Website SEO Audit in 2020? [Step-by-Step Guide]

How Should You Start Your On-page SEO and Optimize Your Website

5 SEO tips from 5 top content marketing influencers

How a local business can use SEO to tackle Covid-19 effects

Think you need a top SEO agency to take care of your optimization needs? Get in touch with one of our experts and learn all about our SEO services!

Use HARO for Free Publicity

One of the best ways to market yourself is to increase your visibility. There are a number of ways in which you can do that, some of which we’ve already discussed above.

One of the best ways you can get more people to know about your business is by responding to queries on HARO.

HARO, or Help a Reporter Out, is a platform where journalists post queries that can then be answered by experts in that particular niche. In other words, the journalists quote the experts in their articles – which is a win-win.

All you need to do is create a free HARO account, following which you are emailed newsletters every day. These newsletters contain queries from journalists who need help with stories they’re working on.

You can pick the queries that match your areas of expertise and pitch a response. If chosen, your response will be published, along with your name and a backlink!

Guest Post on Popular Sites

Guest blogging is basically blogging, but on somebody else’s site. You may think, I’m putting in all this effort to create informative, engaging content, but all the traffic it generates won’t even come to my site. What is the point?

But there is something in it for you – visibility!

And that isn’t all. When you guest post on an authority site in your niche, you:

• Increase traffic to your site too. If the guest site you are posting to has a substantial audience, you can tap into that pool too. If readers of the site like your content, they will want to learn more about you – hence, they will visit your site too.
• Become seen as an expert in the niche because you have valuable information to share.
• Build credibility because a popular, trustworthy site allowed you to post your content on their platform.

Do note, though, that your content needs to provide value for this to work at all.

In a similar way to guest posting, you can gain visibility by commenting on other people’s blog posts. This, of course, doesn’t have the kind of impact guest posting does, but you do get seen.

Come Up with a Customer Referral Program

If you are unable to market your products and services, you must be struggling to find new clients.

In other words, you are stuck in a vicious cycle where you don’t have cash to market yourself, hence you can’t find clients. Because you can’t find clients, you have little or no inflow of cash.

You need to find ways to get more and more clients. While that is possible through a lot of the strategies we have discussed above, there is one more thing you can do – come up with and implement a customer referral program.

It is wishful thinking that all your clients will refer you to their friends and family, even if you have provided them with the best services possible. You need to give them an inventive to refer clients to you.

Some incentives you can offer include:

• A free product, service or cash inventive for the referer
• Competitions that have great rewards but require your followers to submit high-quality leads in order to enter
• Customer loyalty tiers to encourage people to continue to refer leads. Offer a greater incentive every time a referrer moves to a higher tier.

Learn more about customer referral programs and all the different kinds of incentives you can offer here.

Make use of Guerilla Marketing

Guerilla marketing is the perfect tool for businesses that have little to no budget but lots of creative potential. And that is the kind of advertising boost you need to get your brand noticed and have your brand name stick in the minds of people.

Your aim with guerilla marketing is to catch people off guard in a pleasant way with an interactive advertisement they were not expecting.

Guerilla marketing strategies can be implemented indoors, outdoors, and at events in particular, actually making use of the people at the events.

Once you’ve caught people’s attention, you can rest assured that some of them will remember you when they need a product or service that you sell.

Here are some great guerilla marketing examples you can get inspiration from:

15 Examples of Guerrilla Marketing

So, What Did You Learn?

We’re hoping that the first thing you learned is that you CAN promote your business, even if you are a little tight on budget.

All that’s left now is for you to implement these strategies and promote your business like you never knew was possible.

And as always, if you get stuck, get in touch and we will work it out together!

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The post 16 Ways to Give Your Business an Advertising Boost on a Low Budget appeared first on Canz Marketing.

You go home and you Google it. Heck, you may even bring out your phone as your friend is making the recommendation and search for it there and then.

You know you’ve done at least once, if not multiple times.

Now, jog your memory back a little. What is the first result that comes up on the search engine results page?

You will likely be shown a website of the business.

If they don’t have a website, you’ll see a link to their Facebook page.

Sometimes, the Facebook page will be on the top position regardless.

You’ll browse through their posts, see if anything sticks out to you. You’ll check out their reviews, see what their consumers have to say about them. And so on…

Now put your customers in that position.

Imagine they whip out their phone and search for your brand and do not come across a page where they can learn all about you.

They won’t waste a second moving past you and onto your competitors who have an online presence on Facebook.

Don’t believe us?

Let us prove it to you.

This is what you will need to know:

Why a Facebook Business Page is a Must in 2020

1.49 billion people are active on Facebook on a daily basis.

eMarketer found that 87.1% of US marketers will make use of the social media platform for marketing purposes this year.

But wait, there’s more.

Do you know how many small businesses there are on Facebook? A whopping 90 million! Can you imagine how many of these are your competitors?

We aren’t trying to intimidate you with these numbers. All we want is for you to understand the importance of having a Facebook page – a digital presence on social media is a must these days!

If you ignore all the signs and stick to your old ways, your competitors will outrun you in no time. Heck, they may already be way ahead.

If you don’t start catching up now, it’ll be too late!

So, without wasting any more time, let’s get right into how to create an attractive, useful Facebook page.

We will walk you through the steps, one by one.

1. Create a Facebook Business Page.

If you are new to marketing on digital platforms, it is perfectly okay to be a little apprehensive about getting started with a new Facebook page.

You might be tired of hearing “create a FB page” from you friends over and over again but actually getting started can be intimidating.

Before you’ve gone through this blog post, of course.

We’re about to show you how to create a page step by step – it’s as easy as eating pie.

Let’s begin!

Step 1:

First of all, go to https://web.facebook.com/pages/creation/.

You will come to a page that looks like this:

For the purposes of this blog post, we will go with creating a page for your business or your brand.

Step 2:

Next, to create a new Facebook page, click on the Get Started button in the Business or Brand section.

Two fields will appear. Add your Page Name and Category to the fields.

To add the category, add a keyword that is related to your business.

In this example, we pretend we own a shoe store that goes by the name, Shoes for Blues. Keeping in line with this, we typed “shoes” in the Category field and a drop-down menu showed us a list of categories relevant to shoes.

We selected Footwear store, which for us was spot on!

You understand your business best – when you type in a keyword, you will be shown a list of related categories. Just select the category that is most relevant to your business.

Once you do that, two additional fields will pop up where you can add your address, as well as your telephone number.

While it is mandatory for you to add the address – it won’t let you proceed unless you do, we tried! – whether you add a phone number is up to you.

Whether or not you make this information public is also in your hands. You can tick the “Don’t show my address” box to only make the city and state visible to the public.

All that is left to do now is click on the Continue button to proceed to the next step.

Note:

Just before you click continue, a statement will inform you that the Pages, Groups and Events policies will become applicable once you create a page.

Giving them a read is a good idea.

Step 3:

You will now be redirected to a screen that asks you to upload a profile picture for your Facebook fanpage.

You can skip this part but only do this is you intend to add an image later – don’t publish your page without a profile picture.

Just click on the Upload a Profile Picture button and select a photo from your device.

But how do you know which picture to choose for your page?

Here’s something to keep in mind:

The best picture to use here is your business logo. That is something people automatically link to your brand.

Facebook itself provides some tips for choosing a profile photo that will really stand out to your audience. Click here to view these details.

Step 4:

Once you’ve uploaded the profile picture, you will be asked to upload a cover photo. You can use this Facebook banner photo to tell people a little more about your brand – even if it just what your physical store looks like or what your best-selling products are.

Again, you’ll find more information about this from Facebook (in the link we shared in the previous step).

Use the same steps to upload the cover photo.

This step may not seem essential but keep in mind – your Facebook cover page has a direct impact on your Facebook page likes. Do not ignore it!

Before we move on:

We found a great resource to help you choose the right images for your page. Click on the link below and read all about it:

How to Make Your Facebook Business Profile Imagery Stand Out

And voila! Your page template is ready. At this point, you should see something like this:

What Next?

If you look at the bottom right-hand corner of the page, you will see a pop-up that is highlighted.

This is the next logical step – although you can leave it for later if you wish.

This pop-up allows you to invite friends to like your page. It gives a list of some of your friends, as well as an option to see ALL your friends.

We’ll discuss this a little further into this blog post.

For now, let’s go back to what you need to do next.

2. Add more information about the business.

Ask yourself this: Why did you create a Facebook page?

To put up a few fancy pictures of your products and get the attention of your potential customers?

Well, yes, that too.

But your motivation behind setting up the fan page was for people to find out more about your business.

And that is what you want to work on once you have the page set up.

To do this, click on the Edit Page Info button in the menu bar near the top of the page.

You will be redirected to a page that will allow you to add important information to the page.

Let’s go through these points quickly so you know what you are dealing with.

Description

This is a very small summary of the page (the limit is 255 characters so you can only write a few sentences). It should give the reader a gist of the business and what it is about.

Once you’ve added the description, click on the Save Changes button.

Category

You have already added ta category for your business. But you may be limiting the number of people that the page can reach by assigning only one category to the page.

In this section, you can add other categories too, so your page reaches a much wider audience that could benefit from your products or services.

The method to add the category is the same as we described above.

Once you are done, just click on the Save Changes button.

Contact Information

Next, you can add contact information for your business so that it is easy for customers and potential consumers to get in touch with you.

You have the option of adding your:

• Phone number
• Website
• Email

For each of these details, you can either add the specifics or you can tick a box saying you don’t have a phone number/email/website before you click on the Save Changes button.

In our case, that is just what we have done:

Location

This only applies if you have a physical store or office, the location of which you want to make public so people can reach you.

The location section has two components:

• The actual location of the physical presence
• The service areas

Firstly, you can specify the location on Google maps to help people locate you easily. You do have to tick the “Customers visit my business at my street address” box, otherwise this location will not be shown to the public.

You can also add specific details, for example, if your office is present inside another building.

In the Service Area section, you can add the areas you provide your services in.

In our example, we have added Manchester, Stoke-on-Trent, and Dewsbury to the Service Area, specifying that we deliver to these areas.

Once again, when you are done, you need to save all the changes.

Hours

In this section, you need to specify when you are open – what time on what days.

You can choose the timings separately for each day of the week, or you can select a bulk option by ticking one of the boxes at the top of the section.

Make sure you are accurate with this. You don’t want to tell people on Facebook that you are open on Sundays, only to be closed when they turn up outside the shop on a Sunday.

Additional information

The More section allows you to add the following information, if relevant, to the page:

• Impressum
• Price range
• Privacy policy

As always, click on Save Changes to make sure none of information or selections are lost.

About tab

The About tab is another place where you can add and edit information about the business.

Some of these details are the same as the ones we just discussed whereas others are different.

But before, let’s see how you get to the About section.

There are a number of options on the left-hand side of the page under your profile picture. Click on About from this list.

You will be redirected to a page that looks something like this:

As you can see, a lot of the information that can be added here is the same as we have already discussed. Some things, though, are different.

Here are two examples:

Facebook Story

You’ve given people an idea of what you’re about and what you do. But it is in this section that you truly get to share your story with your audience.

Tell them how you started out. What motivated you to get started. How you aim to fill a gap in their lives. What they can expect from you. The list can go on.

This, in short, is where you are going to convince potential consumers to not only like the page but become loyal customers. So make sure it is compelling.

Once you have added a Title and a picture to the actual story, you can click on the Publish button to share it with the world.

Team Members

You can add yourself, an employee, or any individual who manages the page (or more than one if you want) as a team member here.

This person will be visible to the general public as part of the team for your business.

This builds their trust and confidence in your brand, as well as gives them a point of contact if they want to reach out to someone directly.

3. Come up with a Facebook page username.

A very important part of setting up a Facebook business page is to devise a username for the page.

The aim of the username is to help people search for and find you.

It is pretty obvious, then, that you want it to be as similar to your brand name as possible. Using your brand name as is may work perfectly. If you don’t think that’s your best bet, go for a slight variation but nothing major.

But how do you do it?

Under your profile picture on the page, click on Create Page @Username.

A pop-up will appear where you can add a username.

Note:

You won’t always be able to find the username you want. It is the same as creating an email ID for yourself – you have to go through at least a couple of variants, adding a dot here or a hyphen there to find one that isn’t already taken.

In our example, @shoesforblues was not available. Simply adding the digit “1” at the end of the username did the trick, though.

Create a username that reflects your brand persona/name and click on the Create Username button.

Once you’re done, Facebook will show you links using which people can connect with you.

4. Adjust the page settings to your preference.

The Facebook settings page is your next stop.

This is where you can play around with the settings of the Facebook page.

Simply click on the Facebook tab named Settings in the menu bar near the top of the page and you will be redirected to the Settings menu.

This is an elaborate menu with hundreds of major and minor things that you can adjust based on your requirements and desires.

You can see all of the sub-sections of the Settings page on the left side of the page. Clicking on any of these sections will open up the details on the right side of the page.

While there are too many details for us to cover in this blog post, let us discuss some of the more important ones so you get an idea.

General

The General settings tab allows you to control a number of things such as post visibility, various restrictions, updates, content specifics, and more.

Notifications

The Notifications tab allows you to specify your preferences regarding when you choose to be notified about certain activities on the page and when you can do without.

Page roles

Page roles allows you to assign new roles (you can choose from Admin, Editor, Moderator, Advertiser, and Analyst) when you want someone to help you run the page. You can also modify existing roles.

Instagram

From this tab, you can link the Facebook page to Instagram without a hassle. When you link Instagram to your Facebook page, you make sure that you reach more people.

Page Management History

The Page Management History tab lets you view all the actions carried out on the page by anyone who has been assigned a role.

There are many other settings you can control from this tab, such as page moderation, Facebook page messenger settings, and much more. You can play around with the detailed settings once you have the basics in place.

5. Invite people to Like the page.

I want people to open my Facebook page and interact with my content.

That’s a given.

But before that, I want to tell people that the page exists and invite them to like the page.

Facebook gives you the option to do that on the right-hand side of the page.

Invite friends you would want to like the page.

Remember: The more people that like your page and are a part of your community, the greater the chances you can manage to increase Facebook likes overall.

So encourage as many people as you can to like the page.

Once you’ve built somewhat of an audience for the page from within your own circle, you can begin to promote the Facebook page to strangers through immaculate content strategies and other means.

6. Don’t hesitate to reach out for help!

When you create a Facebook page for the first time, there will be many instances where you will have questions that will need answers.

And no guide will be able to answer these very specific questions.

That is when the Help tab comes into the picture.

Simply click on Help in the menu near the top of the page. A drop-down menu will appear, which is a help center in the truest sense.

The Help Center will provide you with resources and links that should help you solve any problems you may be having.

It also gives you a list of frequently asked questions so you may get specific answers without having to dig too deep.

In any case, never hesitate to reach out for help.

If you have a friend or colleague who runs a Facebook page, ask them for some assistance over coffee. If not, the Facebook Help center is always available to give you Facebook business page tips.

Now, before we conclude this post, let’s quickly see the most frequently asked important questions about the topic:

Most Frequent Queries 

1- Is a Facebook business page free?

Facebook has turned into a profitable marketplace for all kinds of businesses. Creating a Facebook business page, however, is still free. Irrespective of whether you have a hefty Facebook advertising budget or only rely on organic marketing, your Facebook page creation would always be free.

2- How do I create a Facebook account for a business?

Here’s a 7-step breakdown of how to create a Facebook account for any business:

1. Sign up on facebook.com/pages/create and pick your category.
   
2. Add your business or brand details, including name, address, and phone number, etc.
3. Upload the profile picture for your business. The more closely resonating this image is to your business – preferably the logo – the better.
4. Add a cover photo/banner that reflects your business.
5. Create a username that helps your prospects find you with ease.
6. Add other information in the *Edit page info* section, including:

• • Description
  • Page category
  • Contact information
  • Location
  • Hours
  • About 
  • Additional information
  • Facebook story

7. Adjust page settings to your preferences, including:

• • General
  • Messaging
  • Notifications
  • Page roles
  • Authorizations
  • Instagram
  • Cross-posting
  • Page management history, etc.

3- Can you have 2 business manager accounts?

Yes, according to Facebook terms, you can have up to two business manager accounts registered on one email id. 

4- How many business manager accounts can I have?

2 is the greatest number you can have for business mangers in your name (on one email id).

Therefore, when you need more accounts, you’d need access to a business manager account registered on someone else’s id from your organization.

5- How do you add a business manager to an existing Facebook page?

Often confused with the opposite case, you don’t add a business manager to a Facebook page. Here’s how you can add an existing Facebook page to business manager:

1. Get admin access to the business page you want to add to the business manager.
   
2. Acquire admin access to the business manager in which you want to add the business page.
3. Go to your business settings at business.facebook.com/settings/ (and pick your business manager to which you want to add a Facebook business page, in case of more than one business manager accounts).
4. In the settings tab, click on the “Pages” option under “Accounts.”
5. Click on the “Add” button and pick the “Add a page” option from the options bar that drops down.

• • You may also choose “request access to a page” to add a page to which you don’t have access yet.
  • If the page you want to add to the business manager doesn’t exist yet, you can create it right here, picking the “create a new page” option.

6. Add your page name or the URL of your page to the business manager and click on the “Add page.” As long as you are the admin of the page, your request would be approved right away.

6- Why are Facebook business pages important?

First off, you need a point of contact with your potential customers and your representation. Your customers and prospects hang out on Facebook, therefore that’s where you need to be to stay in their minds. That’s how they’d give you a consideration when they require your services or products. But there are other benefits of having a Facebook page as well, such as:

• Owning a Facebook business page gives you insights into your target market.
• Additionally, besides creating a physical name and place for your prospects to follow, it helps you create and nurture a community.
• Similarly, having a Facebook business page automatically boosts your SEO.

Wrapping it up

Setting up a Facebook page for your business isn’t the end goal – it is the beginning of a beautiful, tough, taxing, rewarding journey that can get you places.

But it all begins when you create a Facebook page in the best way possible and truly use it to connect with and assist your audience.

This guide will help you do just that!

As always, if you have any questions, leave them in the comments section below and we will get back to you.

Happy creating!

Oh and before we leave, once you have set up a Facebook page, we have a lot of resources that can help you win at Facebook marketing.

Here is a list of a few – you can find the rest on our blog!

Starting a New Company? How to Market Online for FREE

A Guide to Facebook Demographics, Age Groups & Age Ranges

7 Facebook Marketing Tactics You Should Know

Top 21 Facebook Marketing Mistakes [That Might Be Draining Your Business]

Creating Facebook Ad Accounts & getting them to work

5 Techniques to Generate ‘Clicks’ on Your Facebook Ads

Keeping Up with Facebook Business Manager Updates

The post Creating a Facebook Page for Business – An A-Z Guide appeared first on Canz Marketing.

We’ve been there. And trust us! It is no brainer!

So, let’s start with the basics.

Facebook is an excellent place for you, whether you are looking for fun and entertainment, shopping, or growing your business. 

As a regular user who feeds on Facebook for his life, all you need is a Facebook application in your handset (with the messenger installed if you are a fan of chatting). 

For a business owner leveraging the power of Facebook Marketing (or dreaming of that), Business Sophists stand up for FACEBOOK BUSINESS MANAGER.

So, in the first part of the series, we introduced you to and showed you exactly how to set up a Facebook business manager account. Your next point of concern and endeavor should be wondering how to create a Facebook ad account.

In case you are wondering (you should be though if you are not), read this:

Ad account is the place where you run all your marketing and the billings for your business. All the ad accounts are in your Facebook ads manager, which is in Business Manager.

So, this time let’s give it up for an Ad account and get into its dynamics.

Creating an ad account

In the business manager, there are several ways you can take to create an Ad Account. Let us go through them one by one:

Accessing Ad Account Creating – First Method

Having created the Business manager account, this is what you’d find yourself looking at.

Looking at the image, you’d see some options:

• Add more security to your account. Highly recommended!
• Add a page to view its performance directly.
• Add an (existing) ad account or create a new one to run advertisements from.

Now, for the scope of today’s blog post, we are concerned about creating an ad account and getting it to work.

Staring at the page above, your next step is obvious – to create an Ad Account. 

Accessing Ad Account Creating – Second Method

You might actually be staring at another page instead before you have worked on the settings:

In this case, too, your path is crystal clear. 

Click (on the add ad account), add (the required information), and enjoy (yuhooo!).

Accessing Ad Account Creating – Third Method

Yet another way to create an ad account is clicking on the *Business Settings* button on the Right side, right below the settings and notification symbols.

Let us walk you through this whole process:

1- Click on the *Business Settings*.

2- For the next couple of settings, you’d be lost in a line of clickable and explorable options. For us, however, the goal is clear. 

We’d head right to the *Ad Accounts* section on the left (shown in the red rectangle in the image below).

3- Clicking on the ad account calls for creating one since we do not have one yet. In case you have one (or multiples of one), you’d be able to land on them clicking on Ad Accounts.

4- Politely request the page to create an ad account for you to be able to view many options to choose from. Pick the one that suits you. In this case, we’ll start from scratch with a new ad account.

Adding important Details

5- Give your Ad account a proper name, preferably your business name, or a relevant person’s name, if you don’t want to waste time thinking, which is the one you need when you have a long list. 

Pick the correct time zone (if it is not auto-selected) to save yourself the trouble of changing the timezone for a client 2 days ahead or behind your time. 

Hit Next.

6- You’ll be fed some important information about choosing whom you are creating the ad account for – your business or your client/another business?

Pick the appropriate information. We’d go with *My Business* this once. You’ll go with what is appropriate in your case.

Not sure if you want to know it (but we want to share it), the last option (the business ad account belongs to) is totally editable in later stages. 

7- At this stage, you are asked to manage settings/permissions for the ad account. You can pick either *Manage Campaign* or *View Performance*. 

Alternatively, give your self *Admin access* to have all the rights. From the left list of names, pick the names you want to grant the permissions.

Hit *Assign*.

Congratulations!

You own your Ad account now, which, however, can’t get to work until you add a payment method to it.

Now, hit close and feel the change.

Does something feel good? Great.

How does “a heck lot of responsibility” sound? Well, that’s what it is!

Let’s see how you learn to handle it. Meanwhile, let’s begin by adding payment information.

Adding billing information to an ad account

For running ads, you need a Facebook ads billing point. Here’s is one of the two ways you can take to get it done:

Adding payment method to ad account- First method

To add a new payment method or view existing, click on the *Payments* option in the list on the left.

1- Click on the *View payment methods*. You’d land on the page calling for creating a payment method. 

Hit *Add*.

2- Add all the information and hail your way to stress-free Marketing on Facebook Business Manager.

You’d be asked a few payment related questions in about 3 steps. In the end, you’d also be given the option to make the added payment method your primary payment method for this ad account. 

Adding payment method to ad account- Second method

Alternatively, click on the scroll bar on the right top – *Open in Ads Manager* – and click *View Payment Methods*. 

1- You’ll find yourself on this screen with many options you want to use. Click *Add payment methods*. Follow the instruction to add the payment mode discussed in the other method).  

2- Click on *Set your Account spending limit* to give Fb Business Manager a currency limit that you don’t want to cross before your ads are turned off.

Irrespective of the results, Facebook would turn your ads off when the adds reach their spending limit. However, you can always go back and change your spending limit.

Thinking what we are thinking?

Yes, Facebook has a tremendous accident-prevention policy!

In our case, since we just created an ad account, Facebook doesn’t have any receipts to share with us right now. 

All set?

Let’s keep moving!

Adding pages to an ad account

Now, you have added an ad account for a reason. 

What is that?

You want to run advertisements for a business.

How do you connect that business to the ads manager?

By adding that business’s Facebook page to that account.

Here’s how you do that:

1- On that Business Settings page, click on *pages* under the accounts dropdown. 

2- Click on *Add* to add a new page.

3- Pick an appropriate option from the dropdown menu. In our case, we have just created an ad account that has no page. That does not mean that the page we are trying to add hasn’t been created yet. So, we’ll go we *Add a page*.

In case you do not have access to the page you want to add here, you know you want to pick *Request access to a page*.

4- Write the page name you want to add to this ad account.

Congratulations! You have just added the page to this ad account.

However, if you do not have admin access to the page, you’d have to wait till the admin agrees to have you add his page to your ad account.

That’s right. 

You can’t add just any random page. They’d only give you access once they have already agreed for you to have that access. Good luck with that!

Giving An ad account’s access to partner/agency/freelancer

Say, you are hiring a digital marketing agency. You’ll already have a business manager account where they’ll create an ad account for your business. 

In case you already have an ads account and you want to give it’s access to a digital marketing firm, or an individual here’s what you need to do:

Again back to the business settings page, pick *people* to view or add people to your ad account.

Here’s what you can do:

1- Click on *Add* button right in front of *People*.

2- Use the email Id of the person you want to give access to the ad account and choose the access type. The protocol for adding anyone – any freelancer, an agency representative, or partner – is the same.

3- Pick the permission for the chosen person for the chosen page in your ad account.

4- The system has generated and sent an invitation to the person. Soon as the person accepts the invitation, he’d have access to the page in the given role.

At this stage, you can directly add more people from here.

All Set! What Next?

You have seen how simple the process is.

Trust us; it’s no brainer.

You wouldn’t believe that on big freelancing platforms like Upwork, freelancer, Fiverr, etc., people offer online jobs or offer to help with simple tasks like creating business manager, creating ad accounts, or even adding pages to them, etc.

But you can do it all yourself now that you have read it here.

What next?

Get on your toes. Do what you just read. And let us know when you’re done!

Done that?

Now, on a scale of 1-10, how difficult have you found the process?

We have set out on the venture to make the Facebook Business Manager a cinch for you.

Read more from the series here:

Creating a Facebook Business Manager Account

What is Facebook Creative Hub? Does your business need it?

Leveraging facebook Audience Insights in 2020 and beyond

There’s more to come. Keep your fingers crossed.

Happy learning business manager

The post Creating Facebook Ad Accounts & getting them to work appeared first on Canz Marketing.

As a medical practitioner, you are no different. You are a brand which exists to provide individuals with the best healthcare solutions possible.

And as such, you need to indulge in content marketing with a similar approach while keeping in mind the sensitive nature of the services you provide.

New to content marketing? Read all about it here:

Understanding Content marketing [A simple guide for beginners]

But before we get into the dos and don’ts of content marketing for medical practitioners, let’s look, in a little more detail, at why you need content marketing in the first place.

Why content marketing is essential for a healthcare professional

Did you know that, according to Pew Research, 80% of internet users have searched the web for a topic related to health?

But wait, there’s more:

44% of people who use the internet search for medical practitioners online.

That’s right, nearly half of the internet users will look online for a doctor or other professional. And the top of those search results is where you need to be.

Which is why a top-notch content marketing strategy is the way to go.

Without further ado, let’s dive right into some healthcare content marketing do’s and don’ts!

Content marketing DOs for a medical practitioner

Do have an up-to-date website

A business website is basically a hub of all the information your audience may need from you.

Whether it details your services and where you are located or mentions tips to make a patient’s post-surgery recovery journey easier on your blog, for example, your website has it all.

Make sure that your website is always updated with the latest information and content. Also ensure that is easy to use and navigate so that people from all walks of life have easy access to it.

Another very important thing to do is to optimize your website to appear in the SERPs. You can achieve this through a number of SEO techniques which will help you drive traffic to your site.

Find some great content optimization tips here.

Do post useful, relevant content

Whether you are creating content for your blog or are coming up with a post for social media, you need to provide value to your audience.

Seeing as your readers are mostly patients or people struggling with certain medical conditions, your focus should be to facilitate them as much as possible.

This could include anything from tips to lead a healthier lifestyle to post-op care routines and which drugs to stay away from, for example.

At the end of the day, whichever platform you are posting on, the content should provide value to the audience. And for this, you need to understand your target demographic inside and out.

Do be creative

You may think that, as a doctor or pharmacist, for example, the information that interests you and that you have to share with others is mostly boring.

But that is not the case. The truth is that you can share even mundane information in an engaging way if you put those creative gears into play.

Let’s say you are a dentist, for example. You realize that people with cavity-prone teeth don’t always know how to ensure utmost oral hygiene to protect their teeth from damage.

Instead of sharing a long paragraph of instructions, you can create an animated video that SHOWS your audience how to care for cavity-prone teeth, something they will find extremely useful.

Do have a social media presence

According to The Spark Report, 41% of people are influenced by social media when it comes to making a choice regarding a doctor or hospital.

You must have a social media presence if you are to attract these people – just a website or a blog aren’t going to cut it.

That said, you should follow all the general guidelines of social media engagement such as the following:

• Publish fresh, unique, relevant content.
• Post regularly.
• Link back to your website.
• Have interactive posts so your audience remains involved.
• Be responsive – your audience mainly consists of patients who may need your immediate help.
• Engage!
• Have a presence on multiple social media channels.

Want to read some fascinating statistics about how social media impacts healthcare? Give this blog post a read!

Do create a community

People who are going through a medical situation find comfort in the fact that there are others around them who are experiencing something similar.

You can facilitate healthy interactions between patients and other members of your audience by building a community online, such as a Facebook group.

Be mindful, though, that the conversations would have to be monitored and mediated to ensure false information isn’t being shared as this can possibly be detrimental to someone’s health.

Do encourage your patients/clients to review you positively

Did you know that 68% of potential customers only need to read one to six reviews before they form an opinion about a brand/product/service?

This means that by the sixth review, your potential patients have already made up their minds about what kind of doctor you are and whether they would like to come to you.

Can you imagine if multiple of these reviews were negative? Worse yet, can you imagine if there are no reviews at all for people to go by? Neither reflects too well on you.

For this reason, always ask people you have treated to post a review, if they are willing, about their experience with you.

Content marketing DON’Ts for a medical practitioner

Don’t post inaccurate information

You have to realize that you are a certified medical professional and will be seen by your audience as an authority in the field.

This makes it absolutely vital for you to authenticate all information that you share on your channels – and we mean ALL information.

While the result of being inaccurate for experts in other fields may be restricted to some negative publicity or a drop in popularity, your negligence can cause much direr consequences. And that is not acceptable.

So make sure you get your facts straight before you publish anything on the web.

Don’t sound salesy

Selling yourself may be an end goal of your online marketing efforts but you don’t want your posts to sound promotional or “salesy.”

Instead, you want to establish yourself as an expert within a particular niche. There are a number of ways in which you can do this, including the following:

• Sharing patient success stories (with their consent)
• Sharing useful information revolving around that niche
• Getting positive reviews
• Providing value to the audience or potential patients

All this and more, at the end of the day, will result in people coming to you for relief from their medical struggles.

Don’t get too technical

Remember that your readers do not belong to the field.

So as much as you may want to share some really technical findings from the most recent research you read or why a certain medication is being banned, try to keep it simple.

Don’t get us wrong – you can still the information you feel is important. But you can do it in a way that is relevant to your audience and easy for them to understand.

So basically, tell them about the implications of the research on their lives and that a particular medicine is being banned because it is dangerous – that will be more useful for them.

Don’t underestimate the power of a blog

We have established just how many people take to the internet to search about medical problems.

When they type their keywords into a search engine and hit enter, it will do you good if your blog, which has the answers to their questions, appears in the list.

Your blog is basically a platform for you to share all kinds of content of value to your consumers. Use it to your advantage.

Don’t trivialize issues or laugh them off

Humor and informal conversation is good – it often lets you get your message across in a better way. But there is a very thin line between funny and insensitive. That is a line you do not want to cross.

Medical jokes may have your colleagues in stitches but they may not sit too well with patients or other members of your audience who may be suffering from a related problem.

Similarly, if an individual gets in touch with a concern, do not brush them off or make them feel like they are dumb for having a particular belief or opinion. Help them if you can or refer them to someone who can.

Always be tactful and considerate to the feelings of the people who are going to be consuming your content.

Ending thoughts

We hope that within this list of do’s and don’ts, you have found useful content marketing tips for medical practitioners like yourself.

The key is to provide value to your potential patients and other audience members based on your unique circumstances.

Best of luck!

The post DOs and DON’Ts of content marketing for medical practitioners appeared first on Canz Marketing.

There is no denying that.

But what if certain beliefs you hold about content marketing are hurting your marketing efforts AND your business?

Content is king and queen and everything in between.

What does this mean for a business?

If you are not doing it right, you will pay the price.

That’s why you need to clear any misconceptions you have that may be causing all your efforts to go to waste.

Here are some of the most common content marketing myths that are taking you down.

Let’s begin!

My business may not need content marketing.

Technology, as well as access to any kind of information instantaneously, has changed the world as we know it.

Today’s customers are informed. They are smart, knowledgeable, and used to making well-informed decisions.

We have the internet and its easy accessibility to anyone with a smartphone to thank for that.

But what does this mean for businesses?

Well, business owners can no longer expect to provide average products or services and expect customers to stick around.

They can also not expect consumers to remain loyal without reason. These individuals are, at any given time, being targeted by multiple competitors to just give them a try. And if your consumer finds better service elsewhere or a brand that matches their ideology, they will definitely switch.

So what can YOU do to remedy the situation?

Remember how the internet and single-tap access to all the knowledge in the world can lead your customers away from you?

Well, what if you started using it to your own advantage?

By investing in a content marketing strategy and making sure your message reaches your consumers through the web, you can remain current, relevant, and known.

It is not just e-commerce businesses or those selling services that need a content marketing strategy. We discussed this above – content marketing involves getting your message across through storytelling.

And EVERY business needs to do that to remain in touch with their consumers.

To be more clear, a content marketing strategy can:

• Increase your sales
• Bring in leads and eventually encourage conversion
• Improve your brand image
• Vastly enhance your brand recognition and recall
• Increase traffic to your site
• Enhance a user’s experience with your brand
• Establish you as an authority in the niche
• Help you leave your competitors behind

There is no business in the world that does not need to achieve at least ONE of these aims. Most need to achieve multiple.

And content marketing is the answer to all your needs in that regard.

I should be promoting my business at every turn.

Around 68% of people spend time researching the brands they care about.

This stresses the need for you to put content out.

But many content marketers go about doing that the wrong way.

With the intention of giving people the information they are looking for, they create and distribute content that is way too promotional. In other words, it comes off as highly sale-sy and pushes people away from the brand as opposed to bringing them closer to it.

That is not what you want to be doing.

Instead, your content should be focused on the CONSUMER.

How can it do that?

Well, that’s simple.

First, you need to identify what your goals are. In most cases, you need to:

• Inform people through educational content
• Keep people engaged through interactive content
• Ensure people have a good time through entertaining content
• Make people aware of new products and services through discreet promotional content

There are many ways in which you can do all of this. Let’s look at some examples.

Suppose you are a company that sells leather products. Here are some ways you can use content marketing to your advantage.

Educational content

You put up a step-by-step tutorial of what to do if the leather gets caught in the zipper of your bag. This is something that has happened to all of us at some point.

People will get the answer they badly need and you will show off the quality of your own bag in the tutorial, while also establishing yourself as an expert in the field.

Interactive content

You make a video about your customers’ favorite incidents involving your products. This will encourage others to share their stories in the comments section.

Entertaining content

You create a satirical list of how a leather attire is perfect for any weather.

Discreetly promotional content

You talk about different types of leather finishes in a video, giving the viewer an example of each from your very own range.

To sum up:

You can promote your products or services while primarily focusing on your consumers and fulfilling their content needs – it works WAY better than hardcore promotional content.

I can take care of my content marketing needs on my own.

This, or the belief that any Tom Dick or Harry can take over your content marketing operations and achieve your goals, is one of the biggest misconceptions you can have.

It may seem easy, at first glance – the business of creating and putting out content.

But it is a lot more complex than you think.

Here is a breakdown of the major steps that need to be taken when implementing a content marketing strategy:

• Finding out where you stand

This step consists of analyzing your current content marketing efforts, studying your competitors, and determining where you are currently so that you can make improvements.

• Strategizing

This is perhaps the most important part of the process.

You need to create a plan that reflects your goals and allows you to achieve them.

• Choosing your Platforms/Content Types

You need to figure out which platforms your target audience spends the most time on and what kind of content appeals to them the most.

• Indulging in SEO

Fancy words and creative big ideas are not enough to achieve your aims – you need to research and employ the right keywords, indulge in on- and off-page SEO, and make sure your content ranks on the top of the SERPs.

• Actually Creating the Content

Blogging is an art. Shooting and editing videos is a talent. Creating infographics and posters with catchy slogans is a skill.

Creating good content worthy of being shared is a lot more difficult than you may think.

• Sharing the content

Deciding when to post what kind of content on what channel in order for it to go viral is a talent that comes with experience. You need to be an expert to get it right.

Now go through this list again. How many of these tasks can you manage immaculately, along with all your other responsibilities?

One?

Two?

Four?

That is highly unlikely and yet still not enough. This is why letting the experts handle it is for the best.

This is why you need a team dedicated to your content marketing strategy. And a GOOD team, at that.

Here is a guide that will help you decide whether you want an in-house team for the job or you want to outsource it to a content marketing agency:

Content Marketing Agency vs. In-House Team – Factors to Consider

I won’t have to invest much (money) into content marketing.

It’s true.

You won’t HAVE to spend a lot of money into your content marketing efforts.

But that also means that you won’t see much of a return if you are stingy about the whole thing.

As an old saying goes, ‘The more sugar you add, the sweeter it gets.’

Think about it like this:

Why do you spend money on your Nike trainers when you can just go to the local shoe store and buy a pair for a fraction of the price?

Because the Nike trainer gives you something the others don’t.

Comfort.

Style.

Better performance.

The list can go on but it comes down to this:

You pay more for the quality of the results!

Content marketing is no different.

You will need to hire content marketing professionals who know the game inside out and can get you the results you desire.

If you are outsourcing, you will need to choose a good (and, hence, more expensive) agency.

You can’t just write blog posts – you will eventually have to invest in videos and podcasts, for example.

At some point, you will have to invest in Facebook or Google ads so that you can reach the right audience effectively.

All these things cost money and that is just something you will have to come to terms with.

I should see results instantly, or else I’m doing something wrong.

I’ve created a great team or outsourced to an even better one.

I have invested a lot of money.

I am utilizing all the tools and platforms at my disposal.

I’m doing everything I can.

It’s been a month and I am STILL not getting results.

Something is wrong.

Sound familiar? We wouldn’t be surprised if it does.

Most business owners and even digital marketers, especially those who are just starting out, have questioned their content marketing efforts way too early in the process.

In the worst-case scenario, they have abandoned efforts that were eventually going to have fruitful results.

What you need to understand is that it takes time for people to discover your content, consume it, and start seeing you as an authority.

Even before that, it takes time for search engines to find it and display it to your consumers.

It is a process and it is a lengthy one.

And there is nothing you can do except be patient and keep at it.

Finishing Thoughts

The first step in fixing a problem is acknowledging there is one.

And we hope we have helped you pinpoint any content marketing myths that are taking you down, but you just didn’t know what you were doing something wrong.

Are there any other misconceptions you want us to address?

Let us know in the comments.

In the meantime, beat the myths, get your game face on, and rock that content marketing strategy!

The post 5 Content Marketing Myths That Are Taking You Down appeared first on Canz Marketing.

This king requires Herculean efforts to be created, and you go all out to create the best of it.

If this language sounds alien to you, either you are not doing it right or have worked your way around with a better option.

(And if you have discovered a better option, we are all ears. After all, sharing is caring, and that’s the theme for this post too. Successful marketers don’t keep secrets.)

There’s a futile chance that you haven’t observed marketers sharing all the content with the world around (most of it FOR FREE).

Silly them! Who on earth came up with the idea of SHARING ALL THE CONTENT FOR FREE anyway?

Err…not sure who that was but wasn’t us for sure.  

Isn’t it more like changing your yarns back to cotton?

Well, no, it’s not. Because if it is, all the top marketers are either blowing smoke or are brainless idiots who got lucky. Apparently, they are not idiots, and you can’t possibly think they all got lucky doing the same thing (and that too for ages now). Luck is not the word here. The most appropriate expression would be *Strategy*.

What to Expect from Your Content Marketing Agency

Want to know the inside story?

Let’s first try and understand the term that digital marketers use more frequently than they breathe (please don’t take that literally, if you will).

CONTENT MARKETING:

The habit of marketers sharing highly valuable (less promotional) content with their audience is actually a strategic attempt to grab the prospect’s attention. They use every type of content for their audience (that benefits the audience) in an attempt to build a relationship with them.

This relationship keeps strengthening with continuous efforts, ultimately getting the audience down the funnel, converting them to customers and retaining the existing customers for long. This, at least, is how Content Marketing is meant to work.

What’s in Content Marketing for Marketers/Businesses?

As you already read, Content Marketing is simply your attempt to turn a target audience to a customer using Valuable Content (not as simple as stated, though).

Let’s dive into the benefits to find out the best part.

Provides Value to Your Prospects

Isn’t providing value to the people who need it, a benefit in itself?

Them getting what they want is not only good enough for them but for you too.

This is how you gain their trust. The building of trust is a way to start your relationship with them.

Once in a relationship, you nurture the bond to the level when they are ready to pay you for your services/products.

Ta-dah! Mission accomplished.

Establishes you as an Expert & Authority in your Market

You give high-quality content to your audience that targets their pain points (or should, if it isn’t already).

If they find your solutions better than the ones others provide, you successfully get your name stuck in their heads.

If you consistently provide solutions, predict outcomes, and give strategies that help them improve–CONGRATULATIONS. YOU ARE NOW PROMOTED TO THE POSITION OF AN INFLUENCER IN YOUR NICHE.

The day is not far when the world would see your name in the list of influencers in your niche.

The legend has it that a man in plight is more likely to turn to authority than to an apprentice (and we have no grounds to rule out the notion).

Yields High Level of Brand Loyalty

If you have what they need and you give it to them, you can certainly charge for it (and nothing can stop them from paying if they badly, BADLY want it).

However, when you provide a part of it for free, your customers and prospects are indebted to you.

If they are, they’d want to return the favor by becoming your loyal followers (with a higher chance of converting) and customers (who’d prefer you over your competitors).

In Neil Patel’s words, they’d want to reciprocate your action by doing what benefits you. This must mean to you a sale, cheque, or dough in any form.  Right?

Increases Your Traffic Quality

People interested in your services/products are likely to be looking for information you are producing. If you tailor your content to the needs of your prospects, not only would your traffic increase but the percentage of conversions would also increase.

Social Proof Multiplies Your ROI

When they get valuable content from you that interests them, they are more than likely to engage with it.

Part of that means that they’d comment, like and share your content as well. If they do, that is enough of social proof for others to know how people are happy with the value you provide.

If this begins to happen, your social proof helps you spread the word fast as well as increase your conversions against the same investment. Wouldn’t you call that *multiplied return on the same level of investment*?

Content Marketing widens your Remarketing Arena

A blog on WordStream by Dan Shewan explains how Content Marketing is helping them to broaden retargeting with clear intent.

Based on the data, they get to know how many people have been to page A (useful for the audience) but not been to page B (useful for the audience with associated business benefits for the company too). Once they know, they can strategically retarget the same audience to gain business benefits they intend to gain.

Content Marketing helps you Rank

Neil Patel says that every piece of content you produce is a chance for you to rank in Google’s SERPs (and prospect’s good books).

The number of chances you get to rank on SERP is directly proportional to the number of your published content. Luckily, you do not need to be a Mathematician to understand this simple fact.

Helps you build your Business Fast

If you haven’t already noted, let us put it in simple English for you one more time.

All the benefits of content marketing ultimately lead to your business growth.

The brand awareness, building trust and relationship, establishing yourself as a leader, ranking higher, and getting more traffic convert more people for you. The more the number of conversions, the higher your take-home income.

Hello! That is pretty much what your increasing caffeine consumption is all about, dude.

5 UNTAPPED Methods on how to Increase Your Blog Readers for FREE

How does it look in real?

Let us walk you through a short-cut to selling your products to someone showing interest in your valuable free content (but hey! that’s CopyBlogger. They have earned all the rights to do short cuts. Others have to take long route until they get there).

The moment you step on CopyBlogger.com’s online space, they talk you into improving your content with their free training (in exchange for your Email-id and permission to keep popping up in your inbox).

Once they have your attention (and Email), you’ll be landed on a thank you page with another purchase offer.

So, even if you are not interested in the paid offer right away, it is a win-win for you both.

How so?

You get the free resource. They get your Email id and a chance to convert you in the future. And that is a SWEET TREAT in the marketing world.

Conclusion

Business growth is an uphill battle, and not everyone has the guts to win it.

However, to make it slightly easier with lasting results and to stay ahead of the pack, your game plan should comprise of a killing CONTENT MARKETING STRATEGY.

Why? Because, the benefits of Content marketing show that if done right, it has the potential to skyrocket your business fast and easy.

You’re Up, Next!

Are you up for cornering your market?

Also read the following to make your content marketing more fruitful

Evergreen Marketing – A Detailed Guide to Implement Marketing that Lasts

Winning Content Marketing with Psychology – Persuasion Principles

Understanding Sustainable Competitive Advantage and the Role of Digital Media in Achieving It

Have you finalized your Content Marketing strategy yet?

(No big deal if you haven’t because they said *It’s never too late*. And rest assured that we can always help you with that if you want).

Let us know of other benefits of Content Marketing you have noticed. Is your content marketing strategy helping you the way you thought it would?

Let us know in the comments.

The post How does sharing Free Content work for marketers? [Content Marketing] appeared first on Canz Marketing.

You are about to find out powerful information on Facebook demographics, especially different age groups, age categories, and ranges – to overturn the way you reach the right Facebook target audience.

But, why do demographic age ranges and targeting the right audience age groups matter when you market your business?

The long answer: This entire blog post.

The short answer: Marketing to the Right Age Demographic groups through Facebook Ad targeting increases your revenue.

With that said, here is the list of topics you need to be familiar with to outperform your competition when running FB Ads:

Let’s start here.

Core Considerations For A Business

Let’s begin with a simple question.

WHAT DOES YOUR BUSINESS REVOLVE AROUND?

Your products?

We thought that would be your best bet.

But the thing is, that’s not the wrong answer, TRUE!

However, what’s important to know is, that’s not the ONLY right answer.

The Problem

Here’s the thing:

WHAT IS A PRODUCT WITHOUT PEOPLE FOR WHOM YOU MADE IT?

What good is your product if it doesn’t reach the right demographic age ranges?

Marketing your products to the right age demographics is as important as creating the right product that eases the right target audience and age groups’ pain points.

What if you learn one day that you could have used the wrong age ranges for the survey?

What if you learn that you could have been targeting incorrect ages or inappropriate age brackets to market your business?

For a fact, most business owners do not understand the right age categories or other demographic factors their right audience could actually be falling in.

There are many more marketing mistakes too you could be making but after having made them, WHAT TO DO?

The Solution

In a nutshell, the success of your business comes down to these 3 key elements:

• Creating the right product that has a demand
• Targeting the right audience that demands the product
• Using the right marketing strategy to reach and convert the right audience. 

Now that you have done it all wrong all along, what next?

Should you just cry over spilled milk and move over if that has happened to you?

There’s an alternative solution to this situation as well:

You could find your business another focus to earn revenue from and make up for the lost bucks, if at all possible!

The first option is easy as heck.

But the second is the best practical approach, especially if you love your ad dollars and want to see them coming back to you.

So, keep reading to learn how to get back your market share if you lost it to targeting the wrong marketing demographics (different age brackets, relationship status, and education level or job titles, etc.).

Let’s zero-in on how to focus on the crucial aspects of your business’s success, your CUSTOMERS using Demographics (especially the age demographics).

The Key Part Of The Solution – Knowing Your Customers Well

It is crucial to determine HOW WELL YOU KNOW YOUR CUSTOMERS!

What’s more important?

Making efforts to improve your knowledge of your targeted audiences and customers.

As it is a broad subject, your current read would only cover the demographic aspect related to your clients on Facebook. You will find a special emphasis placed on the different age ranges for the survey you conduct for audience analysis covering various age groups.

But WHY FACEBOOK only?

Here’s why:

Using Facebook To Learn About And Target The Right Demographics And Age Groups Increase Your Success Rates MANIFOLDS 

 Let’s only touch the tip of the iceberg to see what lies underneath. Shall we?

a. Age and Gender Demographics

We are social states that Facebook’s use has increased over time, and more than 34% of the audience is under 25 years of age (as of July 2018). 

Pew Research Centre shares interesting demographic and other stats about Facebook, especially among the American population. It states that the percentage of women using Facebook is higher than that of men, as is college degree owners’ rate compared to those of high school diploma owners.

SproutSocial quotes that more than 50% of teens are Facebook users.

Can you not see the potential of the platform you can utilize to target the people your business is most interested in?

And guess what, the info on demographics Facebook has, is not the only good news for business owners and marketers.

There’s more for you, all of you businesses out there!

b. Other Valuable Facebook Stats For Marketers And Business Owners 

We are social declares Facebook messenger app to be the most-downloaded mobile app (as of 2018).

Following in an optimists’ footsteps, you could think of many of them as your potential clients.

Facebook Newsroom announces shutting down 583 million fake accounts only in the first quarter of 2018, most of those within minutes of the account registrations too. Imagine the massive amount of genuine-ness the platform offers (and the efficacy of the platform).

“We are social” claims that each user is likely to spend 10-12 minutes on Facebook each time they log in. This gives you an estimate of time as well as the potential to find and target the right clients for yourself.

Hootsuite says that more than 88% of Facebook users access the platform via mobile..

A Facebook Inc. conference in July 2018 said Facebook had 80 million Facebook pages. Hootsuite’s  Social Media Barometer report, 2018 claims that Facebook happens to be the top marketing platform choice for both B2B and B2C businesses.

This suggests that even your competitors are on Facebook.

And last but not least!

Hootsuite goes on quoting that the Ad revenue for mobile Ads increased more than 50% last year.

What does that suggest?

In a nutshell, Marketers are rationally using Facebook’s data to market to the people their business matters to. And this is getting them some well-deserved results too.

c. What should you make of it then?

This calls for you to explore the nitty-gritty of Facebook customer research, and we’d be discussing the demographics part for now.

But before going into the details, let us take an overview of “Demographics” as per Facebook for Business.

In an attempt to explain audience insight, Facebook states *Know your audience like never before… See age and gender breakdowns, education levels, job titles, relationship status, and more*.

So these are some of the demographic factors Facebook takes into account. We have also touched every important aspect that makes Facebook Advertising the most valuable part of your advertising strategy.

Let’s now head to the next section to learn practically everything about the Target Audience.

So Who Is My Target Audience?

To get to your core audience, Facebook for Business calls audience based on Demographics as *the audience selected based on age, gender, education, relationship status, job title, and more*.

So, with what does the data on demographics help you?

It helps you narrow down the audience you call your Target market or Target Audience.

And what on earth is this *Target Market*, now?

Christina Newberry at Hootsuite defines the target Market as the people you want to approach with your marketing message. What makes them ideal for your message is their interest in the kind of product or service you offer

Now that you know what your target audience is, let’s get to some information, without which we wouldn’t be able to close the topic of the audiences:

What Are The 4 Types Of Audiences?

The topics of the types of Target audience/market and the market segmentation are somewhat synonymous

In case you are not clear about what a market segment is, here’s an easy definition for you:

It is a group of people that share common characteristics. Therefore this segment is taken as one whole to target for your product.

Each target segment potentially divides your audience into smaller, closely related chunks that have some features in common.

You reach the right audience or the target market based on these common features. 

Basically, from a marketing standpoint, there are 4 important customer segments. You could practically make many types of audiences out of these segments.

Here they are!

4 Types Of Market Segments

The 4 types of market segments are:

a. Demographic 

• • Age
  • Race
  • Gender
  • Education
  • Employment
  • Marital Status
  • Location

b. Psychographic

• • Personality features
  • Believes
  • Motivations
  • Interests
  • Focus and priorities
  • Values
  • Psychological influences
  • lifestyle

c. Behavioral

• • Brands or businesses targets interact with
  • Purchase behavior

d. Geographic 

• • Precise location / Zip Code
  • Town/village/city
  • Country
  • Climate
    

Now, here’s the best part:

Facebook helps you fish your target audiences out by means of one or more of these common characters in each segment.

How does that help you again?

It helps marketers and business in a variety of ways, mainly:

• Saves you bucks by not spending on those that do not matter to your business.
• Makes you dollars, too, by targeting the right audience that converts.

You can read about the detailed target analysis here.

For now, let us see each of the demographic factors in detail in the next section.

Facebook Marketing And Some Demographic Factors

a. Age:

Among the first few lines of information, you share with Facebook at the time of registration on the platform is your AGE. 

So, Facebook knows your age, and that of your friends even if you don’t know that.

Here’s the part that should excite you:

Marketers can utilize the demographic age ranges data right off Facebook (or from other resources) to find their target group.

Here’s the age categorization for surveys.

b. Different Age Groups For Surveys

Generally, you’d find the following age ranges for surveys:

Though the age categories could vary broadly, these are the general age groups found categorized in data collected for research and surveys.

But the important question is, WHY DO YOU NEED TO FOCUS ON AGE?

Because for most products/services, only a specific age group would be interested and needs to be targeted in your marketing efforts.

Imagine this:

You are a chef, and you have recently started a home food business.

Sounds yum!

Your burrito could have been world-famous if all the fellow earthlings had access to it. So, you decide to launch a vegan version of your burrito.

Now, as a rule of thumb, you wouldn’t want to advertise your vegan burrito to a non-vegan. 

Why?

Because when someone doesn’t lie in your targeted group (non-vegan, in this case), you have only a very fat chance to convert him.

And that sounds perfectly logical. Right?

That is precisely the case for age, gender, or any other targeting option for that matter.

If you do not stay within your targeted range, you waste your ad spent for close to no return.

Now, let’s apply the same rule on a situation for different demographic age ranges.

How To Target The Right Demographics Age Ranges – Example!

Your targeted age group for baby-food would be different against the targeted age group for the regular grownup’s food.

For an enchilada, you could probably hit up every age group, and it would still be a hit (as long as your product and ad elements are all on-point). All it would take you is to take a mouth-watering picture of an enchilada with dripping cheese. Create a similar picture with your words, and they are so coming for you!

But, try to mesmerize all the age groups with baby-food. 

Oops, that hurt hard!

Now, target the best appropriate age you figured out during your survey as parents of young babies. 

Do you see the climbing graphs now?

Because, baby food sure does mesmerize the parents of those young babies, especially when they do not have much time to prepare fresh every day.

So, that’s the thing with targeting the right demographics.

It feels really good (and the feeling is mutual for the targets and the business) and pays off really well.

Let’s shift to another concept now.

Do you think you know what the advertising demographic age groups really are? Did you ever think that having the right information on different age ranges is the next best thing to hitting the jackpot?

Carry on to the next section for the details on the concept of advertising demographic age groups.

a. Generational Marketing:

People belonging to certain age groups mostly have differences in their marital statuses, values, household income, behavior, usage of technology, etc.

Interestingly, most people belonging to a close age group tend to have somewhat similar habits, behavior, usage of technology, earning statuses, and other factors. 

When it comes to targeting the right people, Customer segmentation based on such similarities (within a group) and dissimilarities (outside the groups) plays a huge role. 

This customer segmentation based on the age group creates groups that are called Generations.

The marketing efforts directed to these generations, treating them as different audiences, are collectively termed as *Generational Marketing*.

Moving forward in this post, you‘ll find some interesting facts about different age brackets and age categories covered in Generational Marketing.

Different Generations And Age Ranges

Michael T. Robinson, founder and career coach at CarrerPlanner.com, identifies the following generations based on their age ranges/year of birth.

(Update: Feel free to add +1 in each figure in the last two columns for each year after 2019 you read this.

For instance, as of 2020, Gen Alpha lies in the age group between 0-7).

• It is worth noting that some of the years overlap in some generations. Also, some of the years for each generation are different from different sources on the internet.

Let’s have an in-depth look at how these generations help us gain insights into our targeted group and help make better-informed decisions for advertising:

b. Age Demographics For Advertising

The Lost Generation

• Not many people between the ages of 105-130 would be alive today. Therefore, this generation holds no particular value for marketers and businesses today.

The Interbellum Generation

• Like already mentioned, this generation has its demographic age range overlapping with the lost generation.
• However, if at all, there would be barely a few survivors of this generation probably in the remote islands or close to jungles. 

Would you be interested in marketing to those as good as dead or extinct people?

The Greatest Generation

• Lying between the ages of 96-110 as of 2020, these generations wouldn’t receive much different reception from marketers from the lost generation and the Interbellum generation.

The Silent Generation

• This is said to be the most educated and healthiest and wealthiest of the predecessor generations. Therefore this generation holds some good promises for marketers.
• Interestingly, they are into technology, but the stats would be different for them. Their usage of computers, mobile phones, tablets, and smart devices is comparatively lower in percentage than people below 65.
• They are more inclined towards text than images. Email Marketing would be a great connection builder with them keeping their preferences in mind.
• Another good way to approach them is through Television, probably radio too.

The Baby Boomers

• This generation is more likely to use print media and use less of the mobiles/tablets and more desktops. However, if it makes you think this makes them technology-illiterate, well…think again!.

• As per a report, this age range is most likely to spend money on technology as they have more disposable income.
• However, they are more inclined towards details and descriptions in the text, audio, or video.
• MarketingSherpa states that this age bracket doesn’t only rely on smartphone-based online purchases but uses desktops too. The purchase is well-researched and validated with reviews.

• However, it is not necessarily Social or Digital Media that compels them to research to initiate a purchase process. Television, radio and newspapers/magazines, etc. could also be the heroes-sans-cape here.

• However, based on their predictable behavior, they are assumed to be more reliable shoppers and customers. 

Gen X

• This age range seems to have overlapping features of both the adjoining generations.

• They prefer simplicity in content that is short and precise. Their use of old and new technology (desktops, tablets, and smartphones) is frequent. And, they base their purchases on research/reviews. They are equally inclined towards written information and videos on the web.

• Calling them a *Forgotten generation* based on the fact that this high potential market segment is not being sincerely and dedicatedly addressed, Rieva Lesonsky states that this is the generation with the highest buying potential.

Here’s the best part!

• Mostly being content with their lives currently, they tend to save more, hence a good age group to target for future marketing campaigns.  

Xennials

• This is called a micro-generation between Gen X and Millennials giving more accuracy to your targeting for advertising.
• They are the first generation to have used the internet at their homes. That’s how they grew, and that’s where they hung out.
• This could be one of your favorite target groups for their affinity to the internet and technology in general. 

Millennial

• This age category, also called Y generation, is more addicted to Social media, a short version of the content (videos, blogs). They are more into discounts and coupons and prefer real life, useful content.

• This is the first, real tech-savvy generation as they were born and bred in the age of the blooming internet. This generation is found online for most of their days and could easily be targeted for online offers and purchases.

• The marketing route to them is NOT necessarily Facebook only since they network at almost every cyber platform there is. However, with the shortest attention span of 3-seconds, this age range seems to be the most difficult to be hooked.

• The comparison research between Baby boomers and Millennials on MarketingSherpa by Daniel Burstein and Dr. Liva LaMontagne states:

• “Shoppers ages 18 to 25 are 2.5 times more likely to view retail advertising on a mobile device — 24% versus 10% for shoppers 55 and up.”

• The same research states:

“Millennials are incredibly engaged with companies and brands on social media platforms,” Brad Jefferson, CEO and Co-founder, Animoto, said.”

iGeneration

• This generation is frequently called Post Millennial, Gen Z, or Homeland Generation. The ones graduating from colleges are getting jobs and salaries and hence are the targets for marketers for their products and services.
• Unlike the trends with other generations, they are more likely to be found more on Snapchat and Youtube. Facebook has been amongst their favorite time-killers as well in the past.
• With an attention span of about 8 secs, you can grab their attention with attractive multimedia usage.
• However, to make them your lifetime customer, brand ambassadors, and loyal clients, you have to sell quality to this age range, or you might end up buying yourself a bad name. And that bad name can go viral just as quickly in their hands.

Gen Alpha 

• Between the ages of 0-7 years, this age group might not be the sweet spot for most marketers (unless you want to hook some of them up on Youtube, where they spend much time watching their favorite stuff).
• However, since this is a booming, living generation with real needs that are bound to increase with time, you’d have real products for them. If that stands true for you and your product, you need to find and pitch to their parents.
  
  And, very good luck with that!

Now, that’s not all, but that’s all for the generations!

The trends change, and some of them might not apply to one or all of these age groups depending on the nature of your business. So marketers have to combine the data on age ranges for surveys with other demographic factors to get the right kind of insight on their real audience.

Using Age Demographics For Advertising On Facebook

Now, getting back to using the different demographic age ranges data for Facebook.

The best thing about most digital marketing platforms (count Facebook in) is that you can restrict the page reach to a selective audience based on age.

Now, compare this to Traditional Marketing.  

Remember how we all used to mistakenly miss our favorite programs because we’d change the channel to avoid those imposing ads (and would forget to switch back the channel).

And remember the frustration of having to keep watching those irrelevant long advertisements (that took forever to end) just because we didn’t want to miss that one program anymore.

Facebook has revolutionized how you laser targets your market. And it pays off markets and businesses big time.

Let’s have a look at how to advertise selectively to your targeted demographic age ranges on Facebook:

There are 2 ways you can create ads. Both involve different steps in targeting audiences. Therefore, we’ll show you both the easy to selectively pick the targeted age groups.

1- Targeting Selective Demographic Age Ranges Right From Your Facebook Business Manager

While you are creating an advertisement from your Ad account in the Facebook business manager (BM), you are given the option to select the age ranges of your choice (starting from 13+ to 65+) based on your understanding of your target market’s age group.

You get to pick an appropriate age group at the ad set level in a campaign in the BM.

You can check out more restriction options at different levels in Jon Loomers’ comprehensive guide here. 

2- Targeting Selective Demographic Age Ranges Directly From Your Business Page

There are two ways you can target selective age demographics right from the Facebook page.

I- Targeting Selective Age Groups For Your Facebook Followers – Organic Reach

a-  Go to your Facebook business page. 

b- Click on “Settings” right next to the help dropdown on the top right of the page. 

c- You’ll find yourself on this page. Click on the blue-colored “Edit” tab in front of “Age restrictions” in General settings.

d-    A drop-down menu opens up here for you to choose from. As you change the option of your audience here, click on “Save changes” and move on.

This is how your Facebook page’s organic reach would be limited to the selected age group.

As easy as a, b, c and D, we say!

 II-Targeting Selective Age Groups Through Your Ads – Paid Marketing

a- Go to your Facebook business page.

b- Click either of the “Ad Centre” or the “Promote Button” on the left-side panel.

c- Either way, you’d land on the page where you’d be asked to pick your goal. You would have to – unless you do not want to proceed.

d- In the next step, you’d be asked to:

I- create your ad

II- pick your audience

• If you’re going to add a selective age group to target, EDIT your “Audience details” to set the age to what you want.
  
  

III- Add payment info

IV- Schedule

e- After adding all the info, click on “Promote Now” and enjoy the results of your campaigns targeting your desired demographic age ranges.

Easy as a, b, c, d, and e!

 Okeh now, enough of the age obsession!

Try to forget that Facebook knows our real ages (if you entered the correct ones, that is, and you happen to be age-conscious).

Focusing on the fact – that Facebook uses this data to bring you the best matching products and services that could be useful to you – might help.

Now, let’s move on to other demographic factors.

a. Gender:

The data in Facebook audience insights shows that there are more women on Facebook than men.

As per the breakdown of age and gender for *everyone on Facebook*, the women account for 55% of Facebook profiles than men, who are just 45%.

Similarly, the age-wise breakdown shows that except for the age ranges of 18-24 and 25-34, where men outnumber women with a slight difference, women have a far higher ratio for any age brackets.

Update: 

As of July 2020, different demographic age ranges have shown slight differences in the percentages as follows:

It is, however, interesting to see that the overall 55:45 ratio of females vs. males did not get disturbed over time.

Getting back to the original point now!

At the time of Ad creation, you are given the option to choose these demographic factors. 

You can choose to show the ad either to your male audience or female audience or i.e. age both based on how you’d like your spendings to go or based on the previous advertising experience or the right market segment for your product.

You can even split test your Ad by making two ad sets for both genders if you are not very sure about the better option for your product/service.

b. Education:

Facebook shows the following stats for education based on the data provided by the users.

If you know some of the features of your target audience (i.e., age, location, gender, interests, etc.), Facebook can sort out this information for you for the selected audience.

All you will need to do is fill in the audience traits you want to check the education stats for on business managers’ audience insights menu.

You can use the same method to check any other feature for your audience as well.

Now, why do you want to know any of that?

Because you want to know more about your audiences now. Don’t you?

Facebook Audience Insights tool helps you dig deeper into your audience for a better understanding.

While creating an Ad, you can use this information to target the audience based on their education level.

You can even narrow down your audience based on their field of studies, the name of institutions, and the year of graduation with the help of the audience insights tool.

c. Relationship Status:

The data everyone has given Facebook on their relationship statuses is crazy and could be bankable for you if your business makes you interested in these statuses.

For example, your business can leverage the data to find all the married people in XYZ location if your products/services are directed to them.

You can choose from the different types of relationship statuses your business might mean something to and get an estimated audience for each type during Ad creation.

Imagine the usefulness of this data as a lawyer, for instance, who specializes in domestic issues.

Yes, you got right to the point.

d. Job Title:

You can keep marveling at all the different job titles Facebook can help you reach if they are your right audience type. However, don’t just keep wondering, and get to them before your competitors do.

And to reach them, type the relevant job title while Ad creation and enjoy the results.

So, now that you have all the essential details and demographics about the targeted audience on Facebook, get on your toes.

a- Create new audiences.

b- Create new ads (or use the existing, best-performing options)

c- let Facebook run your ads to those audiences and do its magic while you enjoy Netflix.

As easy as a,b, C!

Now, this information is mind-boggling.

But is this all you could make out of Facebook audience targeting options? 

Bear in mind these are not the only targeting options in demographics. Facebook also offers you to reach people through their financial status, life events, parental status, etc.

Using your understanding of your audience (not only their demographics though), and combining the techniques to attract more people through your ads, you’ll see the results like never before.

Yes, that means boosting profits and continuous, sustainable growth.

Final Word!

The way you can use demographic age ranges and all the other demographic options through Facebook are additive, ecstatic, and profitable.

As a business owner or a marker, you’d be missing out on a lot of fun and revenue if you do not master the art of marketing to the right age demographic and the understanding of your audience. Age is one of the important dynamics of audience segmentation.

Make sure to learn and earn from it.

If you think you are interested in learning more about growing your business through Facebook marketing, check out our concise guide on 7 Facebook Marketing Tactics you should know.

But before you dive deeper to fly higher through Facebook marketing, share with us:

Do you still think that age is just a number? Or, do you now share our views on how using the write demographic age ranges could turn the tables for you.

Let us know in the comments

People Also Ask

The post The Ultimate Guide to Facebook Ads (Demographics & Ages Ranges) appeared first on Canz Marketing.

Every business owner, at some point, has been there and asked themselves the very same question.

Do I choose a content marketing agency to create a strategy and implement it in-house? Should the content creation agency take control of the content entirely? Or is it a better option to hire experts who will make up a content dream team within the company?

It isn’t as straightforward as it may seem at first but you can analyze your needs against a number of factors to reach the right decision.

And we will share all these factors with you so you can make an informed choice.

But first:

Why is the Decision So Important?

According to insights by Meaningful Brands, a massive 84% of consumers expect to see content from brands that provides entertainment and solutions.

No matter what the medium, a large portion of your success is dependent on the way you use content to your advantage.

You likely know that – we all do.

Today’s consumer is smart and well-informed. When they want to buy a product, they will go online and read the reviews first.

They will appreciate a brand that not only sells them the product or service but also gives them additional tidbits of useful info.

They will applaud a good ad with a strong message and subsequently support the brand.

The list can go on but it is settled – content matters!

What many people don’t know, unfortunately, is HOW to leverage the full potential of content to further their aims.

Which gives rise to the need to choose an expert for the job.

This leads us to our next question:

What Are My Options?

As with any decision – or most decisions, at least – you have options to choose from.

You may think we are going to share the top content agencies with you but that is not the aim of this blog post. Today, we want to give you all the information you will require to reach the decision on your own.

Let’s begin!

You can pick one of three main roads that will help you create a stellar content strategy.

What are they?

Well, you can:

1. Outsource your content to a content marketing agency.
2. Create an in-house agency (extensive internal team) that will create and implement a strategy.
3. Use a mix of both.

Before we go any further, let’s quickly take a look at what both the in-house and agency options comprise of.

Content Marketing Agency: A content marketing agency comprises of a group of experts in the field of content marketing with a diverse skill set that you outsource to.

In-House Content Marketing Team: An in-house team is a group of professionals that work for your company only. You are responsible for building and overseeing the activities of the team.

Coming back to our subject for today, all three of these courses of action are great – they can lead to amazing results, given that the right choice has been made.

Read on as we discuss all the considerations you should factor in when choosing your path.

Let’s dive right in!

Factors to Consider when Choosing between a Content Marketing Agency and In-House Team

Expertise

“An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes which can be made, in a narrow field.”

– Niels Bohr

Do you see where we are going with this?

An expert has given so much time to their particular niche that they have encountered all the hurdles, taken all the wrong steps, and, quite frankly, messed up in every way possible.

But what does all this mean?

It means that they have learned an IMMENSE amount from all their mistakes. An expert knows what to do, what to avoid, what shortcuts they can take when, and the list can go on. A content marketing expert knows JUST how to take your brand to the top with content.

So what does this mean for you?

You need the best of the best.

One way in which you can get that is by hiring the best professionals for each of the skillsets you require and creating a stellar in-house marketing team. Although we will discuss cost in more detail later, this will be quite expensive. In most cases, though, you will see a high ROI.

On the other hand, when you go for a good content marketing agency, you are automatically hiring the best professionals, those who have dedicated their lives to the art.

And while you might have gotten that with a top-notch in-house team, you pay a fraction of the cost here.

Services

Some companies go for a very modest content strategy, focusing on one or two media to connect and engage with their consumers.

Other brands go all out and want a well-rounded strategy that makes use of multiple media and techniques to expand their reach.

Regardless of your needs, these are some of the services you need, whether from an in-house or outsourced team:

• Strategy creation
• Content creation and optimization
• Content sharing and management
• Quality Assurance
• Reporting

Each of these steps – and these are only a few! – have many other components. For example, you need SEO services when it comes to optimizing the content. Similarly, top-notch social media content management may be required, depending on what medium you use.

So what do you choose?

Well, a content marketing agency employs talented individuals with each of the skillsets you require for your strategy to take off. They work together to bring the strategy together and implement it.

An in-house marketing team can also produce the same results but you will need to hire a team with a diverse skillset. Even then, there may come a point where you get stuck somewhere because you need a professional you didn’t think to hire.

Creativity

The marketing team at a content strategy agency comes up with brilliantly creative ideas every day. From that pool of brilliant ideas, they choose the best ones to include in their final strategy.

The end result is spectacular.

They do this all day, every day for multiple clients. They create different kinds of strategies for varying needs. Their brains are always buzzing with the next creative idea.

That is something the team at a content marketing agency can bring to the table. Their years of experience in thinking out of the box lets them pitch unique ideas for your brand.

Heck, they probably have a reserve of tons of ideas they rejected for other brands that would work perfectly for you.

Creativity comes naturally to them and the result is innovation. And when your content strategies are wonderfully different from anything your consumers have seen before, well, you’ll see the result for yourself.

This is one aspect in which an in-house team lacks. They do not have the kind of experience and exposure content creation agencies gain by working with big brands.

So while they may have brilliant minds, their juices just don’t flow as freely and the creativity of your content can take a hit.

Budget

The cost is a major factor when it comes to taking your pick.

No matter how badly you want a killer strategy, you HAVE to stay within your budget!

When you outsource to an agency, you have a wide range of pricing options in front of you. These generally depend on the:

• Reputation of the agency
• Expertise of its employees
• Extent of the strategy
• Content requirement and goals
• And so on

Most agencies are willing to create a custom package that fits your requirements perfectly. Depending on all the specifics mentioned above, these packages can vary immensely.

On the other hand, with an in-house team, you have to consider all the following:

• Recruitment costs for building a talented team (writers, SEO experts, editors, graphic designers, etc.)
• Monthly compensation
• Training
• And so on

If you have a large budget and a lot of content to produce on a regular basis, you can go for an in-house team but this is not the option most small- to medium-sized corporations go for.

Choosing an agency often is the more affordable option – it provides more value for a smaller amount of money.

Knowledge of the Brand

What does your brand represent?

What is your ideology?

What do you want to achieve in the short- and long-term?

Who is your main target audience?

What do they want?

Having COMPLETE knowledge of your brand gives you an edge when it comes to putting together a strategy to promote it.

A marketer needs to have an in-depth understanding of the brand if they are going to produce content that reflects it.

That makes perfect sense, right?

So who do you think will have better knowledge of your brand?

The best content marketing agencies make sure they know all the ins and outs of your brand before they get to work. They will conduct an in-depth analysis and ask all the right questions to get all the important information.

But they cannot beat the knowledge of the in-house team regarding the company. Your own employees will understand the brand – your vision, mission, goals, future plans – much better than anyone else. And that is a major plus.

Some other factors we would like to quickly point out are:

Industry Tools, Technology, and Knowledge

An outsourced team from an agency makes use of the best tools in the market all day, every day. They have all the right subscriptions, have purchased the latest updates and are up to date with the latest trends and best practices.

It is their job.

An in-house team has to do all this from scratch. On top of that, you have to keep training costs as part of the equation.

Ease of communication

Your in-house team is a single tap on the shoulder away. You can call a meeting whenever you need and have a discussion.

With a marketing agency, it is not as simple as that. You have to set up appointments and wait for long periods of time between conversations.

Time Dedicated

You are one of many clients a content marketing company has at any given time. So while they will put their expertise and skill set to the best use and dedicate the promised amount of time and effort to your content needs, they will only be able to dedicate a certain part of the day to your work.

The only job your in-house team has is to focus on your content. And so they are able to give it a lot more time.

Key Take-Aways

In-house vs agency.

The battle of the content maestros, internal and external, can be an intense one – in your mind at least.

But if you factor in all considerations and decide your course of action keeping all the variables in mind, you can implement the content strategy of your dreams.

Our advice: If you are a small or medium-sized business, outsourcing your content needs to an excellent agency is a great choice. It brings in a lot more talent, expertise, and creativity at a very reasonable price!

OR you could go for a combination of both.

So, which one is it going to be?

The post In-House Vs Agency – Choosing Your Content Marketing Route appeared first on Canz Marketing.