The real estate industry is a competitive one! In order to stay ahead and attract clients you need to stay top of mind with former clients and prospects and one way to do that is through your communications. In this on-demand webinar designed specifically to help real estate firms communicate, small business expert Matt Mansfield discusses:

• USE EMAIL EFFECTIVELY to acquire new clients and drive loyalty with current clients
• DESIGN CUSTOMIZED EMAIL CAMPAIGNS using realtor-specific uses, such as promoting open houses, announcing a drop in a list price, or market assessment newsletters
• USE THE TOOLS that make sending and tracking email marketing campaigns a cinch

LinkedIn has evolved a great deal over the last few years, steadily releasing new features to its growing network of users. But unlike some of the more popular social networks, LinkedIn usually doesn’t generate widespread press coverage when it changes — certainly not the kind of buzz achieved by Facebook’s new timeline feature, for instance.If you haven’t signed in to LinkedIn for a while, or if you’re one those increasingly rare business professionals who has never set up profile at all, now might be a good time to (re)acquaint yourself with LinkedIn and what it has to offer. The site allows users to research and connect with stakeholders and decision-makers at other companies. If you’re a business-to-business company, chances are you can find and connect with your target market on LinkedIn.

Among the many new features released over the past few years was a revamp of LinkedIn Company profile pages. Now, in addition to your own professional profile, you can create a robust LinkedIn microsite for your business and build a list of followers for your company.

If you need help getting started, a recent blog post from business2community.com includes an impressive list of 25 (yes, 25!) tips to help you activate your company profile page and build a follower base.

As with any new marketing initiative it can take a bit of time to set up, but as the blog post indicates, it is well worth the effort: a recent study by Hubspot showed that traffic from LinkedIn converts into leads at almost three times the rate of any other network.

What about you? Are you active on LinkedIn personally or for your small business company page? What successes have you had? Please share your experiences below!

What Next?

LinkedIn is just one of the social media platforms to use in small business marketing. To learn more, read our other articles on social media marketing.

Getting the attention of customers. Few marketers would disagree that this is one of the biggest challenges in any marketing program.

Surprisingly, one of the most effective vehicles for getting your message in front of customers is often overlooked: the “lowly” invoice.  Invoices probably go out more often and get opened at a higher rate than any other communication you send to customers, yet so many marketers fail to take advantage of this golden opportunity.

If you’re not currently using your invoices as a marketing tool, or if you’re looking for more ways to do so, this resource is for you.

Download the guide to learn:

• Three easy ways to transform your invoices into marketing magic
• Practical, creative marketing ideas for your invoices
• How to do all this on a budget

After setting up a small business website, the next challenge we face is  the equally important (and never-ending!) task of guiding new and existing customers to it.

We began to address this topic in a few recent posts offering suggestions for promoting your website and using content to bring more traffic to it.

In keeping with that same theme, we turn our attention this week to local search marketing. For those not familiar with the term, local search describes any internet search that includes some kind of geographic modifier, most often used by consumers seeking products and services nearby (e.g. haircuts in Mytown, USA).

In a great introductory blog post on local search for small businesses, the author includes some powerful stats on consumer behavior and local search.

One of the highlights is the U.S. stat from TMP/comScore, revealing that 82 percent of local searchers follow up offline by visiting the business, phoning, or making a purchase. The other stats in the article are equally eye-popping. They all point to a clear conclusion: customers are looking online for local businesses. And once they find those businesses, the customers are willing to buy.

Naturally, this provides a huge opportunity. But small businesses have to make an effort if they are to reap the benefits: we need to make sure we keep local search in mind when designing our site and executing our SEO programs.

So is your business showing up online for the right local searches? If you are not sure, it is worth spending some time on a few search engines to find out.

What about you? Have you designed your site specifically with local search in mind? What successes have you had? Please share your experiences below!

What Next?

Interested in learning more about local search? Read this article:  Location, Location, Location: Why Google Matters for Offline Business

As we have outlined in previous posts, a disciplined approach to reviewing your small business website data can pay big dividends. If you aren’t regularly reviewing your website analytics data, then there are a few simple steps you can take to get started.

Whether you are new to analytics or you already review your data regularly, there is one source of information you won’t want to overlook when trying to improve the effectiveness of your website: your “internal site search” data.

Internal site search is the name for the little box that allows visitors to search for keywords within your website. (Not all small business websites have internal site search but they should — they can be added to your site for free, and when they are available, visitors use them!)

Most website analytics packages include a “site search report” that lists all the phrases that visitors have entered into your website’s search box. This is a goldmine of useful information for website optimization.

What can you expect to find? Generally, the site search report gives you two clues to help you improve your website.

First, when the report regularly contains phrases for which you have a lot of content on your website, it suggests an issue with your website navigation. For instance, the information is there but visitors can’t find it. In these cases, you may want to adjust your navigation to make it more obvious where to find certain information, or you may want to add direct links to popular pages from your home page.

The second clue comes from phrases for which you do not have any content. In these cases your visitors are looking for something that isn’t there, showing you exactly where to focus your content development efforts. For example, if you run a hair salon and keep seeing searches for “discounts,” you may want to add a new page called “Special Deals” that you update regularly.

These sorts of gaps and opportunities are usually apparent with a quick review of the data, so don’t be afraid to ask your website manager to provide these reports. If you are doing it yourself and need help, renowned Web analytics expert Avinash Kaushik published a seminal blog post a few years back that includes some great tips on how to get the most out of internal site search reports.

What about you? Have you reviewed your internal site search data?  What helpful insights have you found there? Feel free to share your experiences and examples below.

What Next?

To learn more about measuring your marketing, read our other articles on marketing analysis.

A customer loyalty program? For my small business?

When we hear the phrase “loyalty program,” many of us probably think of the programs run by the biggest companies: airlines, hotels, grocery store chains and the like.

In fact, small businesses are some of the most active loyalty marketers around, and for good reason. Not only do loyalty programs help retain customers, they give you an edge in competitive markets and deliver valuable insights into customer behavior.

Want in on the loyalty game? Need inspiration for your existing loyalty program?

Download this short guide to learn:

• How to use loyalty programs to keep customers coming back
• How other small businesses are putting them to work
• Specific steps to help you plan your small business loyalty program
• Tips for keeping your program fresh and running smoothly

We all have our reasons for getting up and going into work in the morning. And when business is going well, it is usually easier to focus on that positive motivation to keep moving forward.

But where do we find a motivational push during difficult times? We all encounter tough periods in our careers, and this is especially true for small business owners. Economic downturns, growth and staffing issues, work-life balance are all familiar challenges for people who run their own company.

Fortunately, staying motivated during a rough patch often requires only the smallest change in our approach and routines. This blog post offers five helpful tips to keep the drive alive. It includes suggestions like increasing your networking efforts, physical exercise, and reminding yourself that you have had success in the past, which points to success in the future.

These examples illustrate a fundamental truth of success both in business and in our personal lives — our mindset is the key factor. As the veteran motivational speaker Zig Zigler put it: “It’s not our aptitude, but our attitude, that determines our altitude.”  Even when physical exercise is suggested as a motivational tool, it’s mainly for the purpose of recharging our brains to improve the quality of our thinking.

But engaging in motivating and inspiring activities like the ones suggested isn’t just for tough times. For small business owners, it can be an extremely productive habit. As Zig Zigler recommends: “People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing — that’s why we recommend it daily.”

What about you? Where do you turn for inspiration and motivation during challenging periods? Are there other activities not listed that help motivate you? Please let us know!

What Next?

Need to get out of a rut? Check out our post Five Ways to Inspire Creativity in Business.

Image is important to everyone, but it really matters to lawyers – and because of this having the right business card has taken on almost mythic proportions.  This is not without good reason.  In the fiercely competitive legal world, you only have one chance to make a good first impression. That is where QR codes come in –they allow lawyers and their associates to enhance and differentiate their image in their marketplace through having a unique business card that adds value beyond the traditional limitations of the format. 

Enhancing your Image with a QR Code: With the adoption of QR codes in advertising increasing exponentially, using QR codes in your marketing demonstrates that you are keeping up with trends and are a forerunner in adopting new technology.  Why is this important?  Although law is not traditionally seen as a “tech-savvy” industry, it is an industry where keeping up with legislation changes and nuances is key, so being seen to embrace new technologies can produce a halo effect.  Using QR codes puts you in the best light possible – as someone in your profession that is in the forefront on gathering and adopting new information.

The Mobile Marketing Angle: So you have a QR code – now what?  Where that first impression can fall flat is when the QR code links to a poor mobile experience.  What is mobile exactly?  Simply put it is any content formatted to make it easy to engage with that content on a mobile device (i.e. smart phone).  Creating well-formatted, easy to use mobile pages with a tool like pbSmart Codes  ensures your message is coming through loud and clear.  Here are some great examples of good mobile experiences your QR code can link to:

Business Cards:  Create a mobile page that gives a potential client a “snap shot” of you – literally!  Include a professional headshot, plus a brief biography including your education, specialty and local involvement.  Add direct links to an email, website, and phone number to give prospective clients an immediate way to contact you.

TV Spots:  Many law firms have created professional spots for television – but air space is expensive.  Use QR codes that link to your TV ad so it can be watched right in the palm of the hand of a prospective client.  Again, with a mobile page, you can integrate key contact information so interested prospects can connect with you immediately.

Ad Campaigns: Let’s face it, knowing when and where to place advertising is an art – not a science – since the person that reads that ad may not be in the market for a lawyer today – but may need one tomorrow.  Whether its advertising on daily deal sites like Groupon, in magazines, or on billboards, hitting a prospective client at the right time is difficult – especially if you’re specialty is litigation, injury or divorce.  Use a QR code with a mobile page formatted to give all the key information that a potential client would need in the future.  Create an ad that conveys the message “Hopefully you won’t need my services, but in case you do, scan here and know that you have a great lawyer on your side”. A prospective client may not need a lawyer on the day they see your advertisement, but if they have all your contact information in their smart phone, you’ll probably be their first call when they do need one.

Client Instructions:  Keeping existing clients informed, say as a court date approaches or schedule conflict, can be challenging, especially if your client doesn’t have easy access to a computer. QR codes can help make your business more efficient, and could even improve your success by driving what you want to communicate to clients through their smart phone.  Do you have a dress code that you want clients to adhere to in court?  Or maybe a set of instructions for personal injury clients like Pitt’s Law.com does.  Creating mobile pages that include text or videos can ensure the message is easy to communicate – anywhere, anytime.  Plus, the message can be changed or disabled in real-time (unlike printed materials) and, if you use a mobile marketing solution with tracking, give you insight into whether a client has actually read the information.

Next Steps:

Want to learn more about using QR codes. View our pre-recorded webinar “Getting Started with QR code marketing”.

You’ve probably seen a QR code or two on posters, in newspaper and magazine ads, on billboards and in direct mail – you may even be considering QR codes for your own marketing efforts.

While those channels are certainly viable, there are a lot more ways you can put QR codes to good use. If you’ve been wondering how to incorporate QR (Quick Response) codes into your marketing efforts, watch this on demand webinar now, led by Pitney Bowes marketing expert Peter Binder.

It is a pattern that most marketers are familiar with by now: a new digital network emerges, becomes wildly popular, and sends ripples of excitement throughout the marketing world. And the latest social network phenomenon is Pinterest (pronounced pin-ter-est). Pinterest was only launched last September and already receives over 10 million U.S. visitors each month — making it the fastest independent website to reach that mark, according to comScore. With such explosive growth, it is no surprise that marketers have entered the frame so quickly.

What is it? Pinterest is a social network based on a very simple use-case: as users find images or videos they like on the Web, and they can save, or “pin,” them to their Pinterest profile to share with their followers. Users can pin just about any image or video to their profile using the Pinterest toolbar in their Web browser.  Publishers of visual and video content can encourage visitors to pin content by adding a Pinterest “pin it” button to their websites.

Why it matters: Pinterest use continues to grow, primarily among women, and as a result, it provides another opportunity to reach potential buyers of your products and services. Simply put, it’s a way to attract users based simply on visuals. You could pin great photos of  your own products, infographics or visual tutorials and guides, or engage people by posting photos or videos on interesting topics relevant to your business.

Is it right for your business? There are already plenty of examples of marketers who have found creative and effective ways to reach customers on Pinterest, but is it right for you? If you are not already using Pinterest, you can learn more about how it works by requesting an invitation at www.pinterest.com and pinning items to your personal account. If you decide that it merits a trial for your business, this blog post provides an excellent step-by-step guide and some valuable tips to get your small business up and running on Pinterest. Happy pinning!

What Next?

Learn more about growing your business online with our other social media marketing articles.