Plain Language: The Best Marketing Tool for Your Business

By Charles Everet 

Overdoing SEO
When marketing your small business online, it's easy to get carried away by using search engine optimization (SEO) techniques. While SEO writing may help customers find your website, it has limited ability to keep the attention of a reader or new potential customer. In order to add relevant content to your website, you'll need to know what keywords people are using to find your site. But once they get there, clear, succinct writing--rather than overuse of keywords--will keep them there.
Natural Language
The key is to use natural language, without awkwardly introducing keywords into your writing. When you tell someone in person about your small business, for example, you wouldn't ordinarily litter your speech with redundant references to your location or the products you sell. That wouldn't sound natural. Instead, you'd tell them what you do, who your customers are, and what products or services you offer.
Think Face to Face
Same with good online marketing. Make your writing sound natural and drop the hype. One way to do this is to act as if you're having a friendly conversation with someone you just met. Your readers will be glad to hear what you have to say when you say it using plain language.
Why Hiring a Writer Sometimes Makes Sense
As a small-business owner, you may want to consider enlisting the help of a writer or editor to help you with your writing efforts. A good writer will meticulously prepare your material to ensure that it's targeted and error-free. Why? Because he or she depends on your referrals to be successful. Not only that, but a good writer is often a skilled editor. So if you already have something written and would like to hand it over to a professional writer, you'll be pleased to see the results of your final, edited work. Here are just a few elements that are a writer's meat and potatoes--elements that you might not have the time or inclination to give attention to:

• structure and organization
• quotation marks
• punctuation
• spelling
• comma usage
• capitalization
• audience appropriateness
• subject-verb agreement

Pretty mundane stuff. But ensuring that these elements are addressed means that you reach your audience and engage new customers with maximum effect. You won't have to wonder whether you've expressed yourself properly.
Compelling Writing for Your Target Market
Carefully crafting the writing in your online marketing efforts can make a tremendous difference to your business. And if you're projecting a distinct voice for your business and answering the "What's in it for me?" question for your customers, you're on your way to reaching your target market. And on the way, you're also establishing genuine rapport with new and returning customers.

Charles Everet is senior project editor of Cogent Text (http://www.cogenttext.com), a writing and editing services company that extends the reach of small- and medium-sized businesses by offering a range of writing and editing solutions. His clients are small-business owners, professional authors, and major publishing houses such as HM Harcourt and Simon & Schuster.

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How to Ask For (and Get) the Right Referrals

By Sydni Craig-Hart 

Do you want to work with more of your ideal clients?
Would you like to save time on marketing and get better results?
Do you desire to become a recognized expert in your field?
You can do all this and more when you build your business by referral. If you ask for and encourage referrals, you'll be able to fill your practice with ideal clients who need the exact solutions that you offer.
By taking the time to figure out exactly what type of clients you're looking for and how to ask for it, you'll have a much better success rate with attracting referrals and you'll see your business grow by leaps and bounds. Follow these three simple steps to ask for and encourage referrals from your current clients and contacts:
1. Decide what you're looking for. If you don't have an ideal client profile in mind, it's time to create one. Your ideal client profile should detail the qualities, attributes and needs of the exact type of person that you want to work with. Take some time to get clear on EXACTLY who you want to work with and what problems they are experiencing that you can help with. Getting clear on this before you start asking for referrals will make it easy for you to explain to your referral partners what kind of leads you are looking for. It will also help your clients and contacts to prequalify the referrals for you.
2. Time your referral requests just right. The best time to ask for a referral is when a client has commented on the quality of your work. Graciously thank them for their feedback and then ask "Who else do you know who is look for [SOLUTIONS CLIENT HAS ENJOYED]?" As they brainstorm who they can introduce to you, listen carefully to the contacts they have in mind. Be sure to explain simply how they can best introduce their contact, both so the individual is comfortable and so you can effectively follow-up on the lead.
3. Don't be afraid to ask! Many service providers stop themselves from asking for referrals because they are intimidated. But honestly, you have nothing to be afraid of. If you've been doing a stellar job for the client, it's completely acceptable for you to ask for a referral. And what's the worst they could say? "Probably, I'll keep that in mind." That is a good thing! The only thing you have to lose is the opportunity to be of service to a new client and increase your income.
In addition to asking your existing clients, let your contacts, family and friends know that you're open to referrals as well. Use the same steps outlined above to educate them about what solutions you offer. They may know someone who is struggling with the exact problems you solve. By arming them with information about your business, they'll be able to recognize people who need your services.
Many seasoned entrepreneurs have grown their business strictly by referral. If you like, you can be one of them. As with all effective marketing, creating the desired result, it simply takes focused, consistent effort on your part. By making it clear who you serve and what you do for them, you empower your clients and contacts to make referrals that will be beneficial to you and the people that they refer as well.

Known as "The Smart Simple Marketing Coach," the tech-savvy Sydni uses a results-focused, "how to" approach in implementing simple, customized strategies so service professionals create profitable businesses in which they enjoy the lifestyle they choose.
Visit http://www.SmartSimpleMarketing.com for your FR*EE training course, "5 Simple Steps to More Clients, More Visibility and More Freedom" and apply for a FR*EE "Profit Breakthrough" session with Sydni!

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High Tech Vs High Touch Marketing? When To Use One Over The Other

By Kelly Weppler Hernandez 

There's no question that our new technologies have made it easier for us to keep in touch across distances and over time, but has the allure of these tools persuaded us to trade in our real relationships for something imitation and less sincere?
The key is to figure out how to integrate the high-tech with the high touch because high-tech alone is unlikely to produce a sale. Sure, somebody might buy a $29 item on-line or even a few hundred dollars for a well-known piece of software or a gadget, but when it comes to most purchases, both companies and people want to buy from people.
With a myriad of tools available and hawk eyes on marketing budgets and the rate of return on those budgets, it's extremely necessary to integrate the high tech tools with opportunities to create high touch as well to produce the best results. But when does it make sense to use each?
Face-to-face meetings are much more critical in helping you achieve certain business objectives. In-person meetings are much better at accelerating and deepening relationships faster than if you were to communicate solely with high tech tools. Face-to-face meetings are much more useful in situations that require the following:

1. Persuasion - If you're looking to close the sale, a larger sale with a longer sales cycle, an in-person meeting is much more likely to help you persuade someone in a certain fashion.
2. Decision -making - If you're moving a prospect or client toward a new purchase, decision-making is much more likely to happen when you're meeting one-on-one.
3. Frankness - If you're looking for a decision to be made and you're looking for complete candor, a face-to-face meeting is more likely to result in you completely understanding their position as you'll have a full view to body language and how their tonality and movement matches to what their words say.

High tech tools also play a critical role in a company's sales and marketing plan. While there are a number of virtual communication tools that can be used, the most common ones used for marketing include webinars, virtual events, and social networking. These tools are effective in communicating the following:

1. Delivering supporting data - Webinars are a useful delivery system for research as are blog posts which are amplified with social networking posts.
2. Maintaining Relationships - Social networking posts are useful for simply keeping in touch and keeping yourself and your company top of mind.
3. Connecting a Distant or Global Audience - When people are miles or oceans apart, introducing and connecting them via a social network LinkedIn or another virtual tool can be so valuable simply because you can make the connection almost immediately.

Take the time to carefully evaluate what you'll do based on your business objectives, your goals and your metrics. Then build the plan that will get you where you need to be. Other items that should be taken into consideration are the value of time and the budget for your engagement plan.
No doubt, there are significant advantages to face-to-face engagement. And the best reason for this live, real-time communication is to speed up the business relationship. Face-to-face meetings allow participants to connect on a much more personal level because of the real-time two way dialogue.
Now the benefits for virtual communication are significant as well and need to be used in building the engagement plan. The most common reasons for selecting virtual contact is time and money-it's super efficient and can be executed 24X7, and, in most cases, the costs are insignificant in comparison to the costs to travel and host some kind of face-to-face meeting. Not only is it flexible because you can record some of these virtual offerings like webinars, but you can also archive them on your web site for future use. That way, the company also gets the benefit of offering the information and experience to other prospects at their convenience and they receive the additional search-engine visibility for their web site.
What's most important to consider is how your high touch interaction converges with your digital tactics to facilitate and foster relationships with clients and prospects. Virtual communication is a perfect way to follow-up with your prospects after a face-to-face interaction so that you can bring the communication full circle. A fully integrated high tech and high touch system will produce the most authentic and desirable results.

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Small Business Integrated Marketing: More Focus Is Needed, Especially in the B-To-B Space

By Joseph A Hendershot 

Small businesses who operate in the business-to-business space do a lot of things right, but marketing is not one of them. This article will explain why this is the case and explore associated pitfalls and opportunities, as well as give you a definition of b-to-b (business-to-business) marketing and suggest some effective solutions to the problem.
Typically, companies with 20 to 100 employees or so who are in manufacturing, distribution, professional services and the like do not have a marketing manager, and rightly so; these firms are simply too small to justify that position. So the president or general manager is responsible for marketing. This doesn't work very well because that person has more important things to do such as keeping the place running and keeping the doors open. So, there's little or no time for marketing planning or to implement a plan consistently.
First let's define "marketing" as it applies to the b-to-b space. Simply put, marketing is not advertising. Advertising is part of marketing, but a small part.
The correct definition of b-to-b marketing is that it's the integration and orchestration of all of the tactics that go into bringing a product or service to market: marketing research and competitive analysis; face-to-face selling; online support including an optimized website with an SEO (search engine optimization) strategy; downloadable white papers and how-to's; email marketing; trade shows; sales lead generation; a customer retention strategy; sales tools such as brochures and literature and testimonials; online and offline press and publicity. You get the idea: it's not just advertising.
Most small business owners and general managers know they should be doing something to generate business other than shove their salespeople out the door. But they don't get around to those other things, meaning marketing. Suddenly a year has gone by and their sales and market share have suffered. So they scramble to do something like build a new website or try some online advertising. But they have no plan. As the saying goes, "He who fails to plan, plans to fail."
On the other hand, with a well-crafted marketing and advertising plan the business can actually have a strategy to develop a consistent market presence, generate sales leads, create a better brand and retain existing customers. But can the business afford to do this, and how does it get done?
The first part of the answer is, they can't afford to not put a marketing plan in place because their market is full of competitors who can and will beat them in the marketing arena. It's a market-share battleground out there and the best marketer wins.
Another argument for investing in an integrated marketing plan is this: companies pay for legal, IT and accounting services, right? Marketing expertise is no different.
In terms of cost, it comes down to needs. If there hasn't been a formal marketing plan in place for some time and if the company doesn't know where it stands in terms of its status (market share, perception etc.), some research will be needed and a marketing plan should be developed.
The plan will comprise three main components: the company's business objectives; its sales and marketing strategies; and the tactics and media spend necessary to achieve the objectives. Depending on where the company goes to get this done, the cost will probably be between $3,000 and $7,500 for a plan. Then the plan must be implemented.
Where does a company go to get this done? For smaller businesses, it's best to avoid larger ad agencies; those with 50 employees and above. They'll want to work with big marketing budgets, say, $500,000 at minimum. It's also better to work with an agency that specializes in the b-to-b space; they understand the integration referred to above. While it's handy if the agency is local, it doesn't have to be. It's more important that the agency is a good fit for the company.
Another alternative is to contract a good b-to-b marketing consultant to do your research and draft your marketing plan. But have the second step lined up, too: an agency who can implement the plan, ideally a smaller agency specializing in b-to-b marketing. Check their work and get referrals from their clients.
Whatever route you choose, make sure the firm you choose is very knowledgeable in the online space. Today, almost all marketing in the b-to-b space occurs online: information gathering and downloads of white papers and how-to's; organic search results, online ads, web engagement, SEO, email marketing, press, articles, etc.
Actually, this is good news since online marketing and the analytics associated with it are far less costly than the traditional methods b-to-b marketers have been used to such as trade magazines, lavish literature, direct mail and trade shows (not that those traditional tactics should be abandoned.)
So what is the cost for a full-blown integrated marketing plan, media spending and implementation-management by an agency or a consultant?
The best budgeting method is the "task method", meaning determining what tasks need to be done considering your market circumstances, then assigning costs to those tasks and their associated media. It varies by company. That's something a good marketing agency can do for you. If you have a very limited budget a good agency can develop your plan and focus on its most critical tasks, working with a first-year budget as small as $50,000.
But a full-blown integrated marketing-media plan is highly recommended if you want to be a market leader. As a rule of thumb, the higher your gross sales, the less you'll pay as a percentage of your sales. Roughly, if you're a smaller company, say, sales of $5 million or so, count on spending about three percent of your gross sales, or about $150,000. At $10 million in sales, perhaps two percent, or $200,000. At $20 million, probably between one and two percent, so about $300,000.
One thing is certain: a well-planned and well-implemented b-to-b marketing and advertising plan with a strong online component pays off. It helps you compete better for market dominance. However, marketing planning and implementation takes focus, consistency and the help of professionals.

B2B Inc. is a St. Paul, Minnesota-based marketing-advertising agency.
B2B Inc. offers several helpful, objective white papers and other information to help marketers craft better marketing programs. Visit B2B Inc. today at http://www.b2bmn.com for more information.

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Pay Per Click Advertising Can Pay Off For Small and Medium Size Businesses

By Joseph A Hendershot 

Pay per click, or PPC advertising, is a cost effective, measurable way to drive sales leads, build your brand and augment the power of your website, especially if you are a small to medium size business.
Most likely you've heard of PPC advertising. But it's also likely that you're not aware of what goes into creating, measuring and tweaking your PPC ads so that you get the most out of your advertising spend. We'll cover that below, but first, let's define PPC advertising and talk about its advantages.
PPC ads are simple in nature: you create and place an ad for a product, service, a special offer. The most common PPC ads are text ads that appear on the first few pages of search engine results.
When someone clicks on your ad, called a click through, you are charged a fee. You do not pay for "impressions", meaning, for all of the viewers who are exposed to the ad (although there are programs for that too.) The fee is partially based on what you have bid for the ad and partially on what similar ads are bidding and paying. You can set a maximum pay per click bid. A cost per click can range from pennies to dollars.
There are many advantages of PPC advertising. You can establish a maximum daily budget, whether a low budget such as a few dollars, or a much higher budget. You can change your budget or suspend your ads at any time. You can create a variety of ads with different headlines, subheads or offers and see which ads perform best. There's more...
You can set up different campaigns and ad groups that each target a different set of keywords. You can advertise locally, regionally or nationally. You can drive people to a landing page specially created for that ad or offer. And you can measure your advertising results within hours. You can even track whether your ads result in a "conversion" by placing a code snippet on your website.
For those who are in the process of optimizing their website, pay per click advertising can augment the SEO (search engine optimization) process. Since getting your SEO up to speed can take several months, PPC ads can drive traffic to your site and garner sales leads until your SEO program starts to deliver organic, or non-paid, results.
We mentioned above that measurement of your PPC ads can take place instantly. This is valuable because you can tweak your ads in real time until you get optimum results. By creating a variety of ads with different headlines and messaging, you can see which ones perform best, then drop the low-performing ads. You can watch how each ad performs in terms of its click-throughs and the cost per click. You can even see what specific keywords drive the most traffic to your ads.
The smartest PPC advertisers carry their campaigns a couple steps further. They create a landing page on their website for each ad group they create. This way, those who click through never have to navigate a website to learn more about what was offered in the ad; they get straight to a page that's 100% relevant to the ad copy. The other thing smart PPC advertisers do is to set up conversion tracking. This way they can measure not only visits to the landing page but whether the visitor "converted." A conversion can be whatever you want it to be: a form completed, a download, a request for a sales rep to call them.
Ideally, PPC ad campaigns are part of your larger marketing effort and your overall marketing strategy. It may pay off for you to discuss your broad or specific marketing needs with a qualified marketing agency.
So, pay per click advertising is simple in principle. But as you've probably surmised by the above overview and options for PPC, it can get somewhat involved in its execution. So your PPC campaigns should be set up by someone who knows what they're doing. Then your campaign should be monitored closely (as in weekly) so you can see how it's performing, then tweaked constantly until you have the right formula.
It's best to rely on an experienced agency or contractor to set up and manage your PPC advertising. Whoever you choose should also know about website optimization, or SEO, and be able to deliver compelling ad copy that gets results.

B2B Inc. is a St. Paul, Minnesota-based marketing-advertising agency.
B2B Inc. offers several helpful, objective white papers and other information to help marketers craft better marketing programs. Visit B2B Inc. today at http://www.b2bmn.com for more information.

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