Entries Tagged 'internet marketing' ↓

Since its inception in 2003, LinkedIn has grown from a fledgling platform with 4000-odd members to hundred million strong global users. More and more members are now discovering its scope as a networking channel. If you have checked LinkedIn off of your social media radar, you need to take a fresh look at the platform now!

Though it cannot surpass the obvious benefits of Facebook fan pages and more recently, those of Google+ brand pages, it can certainly help small businesses and entrepreneurs connect with potential clients. LinkedIn is not only your online resume; it is a chance to woo clients!

Here are a few tips on using LinkedIn as a marketing tool:

Join groups

Groups are the simplest way to communicate with people who share similar interests. Use the LinkedIn search feature to find groups to participate in. If you’re a freelance social media consultant, join social media marketing groups such as Social Media Marketing, Social Media Today, and Digital Marketing.

Participate in discussions

Participating in group discussions helps you network with other users and increase your list of connections. A lot of business owners also visit groups, either to keep updated with industry news or to find people to work with.

In either case, group participation helps you build trust. It also helps you in proving yourself as a subject matter expert, thus helping prospective clients make an easy decision about hiring your firm.

Think of it as a networking opportunity, similar to what you’d do in an offline environment. Use groups to sell your skills, not by direct upselling, but through creative, thought provoking, and logical discussions.

Understand that groups are visited by a global audience – keep your replies gender neutral and don’t include any racial biases.

Get recommendations

Recommendations are a clever way to demonstrate client feedback and testimonials. They tell people about your work style and what makes you different from other people with the same skills.

To get a recommendation, choose the “Recommendations” link under “Profile”. Select the role you want a recommendation for, decide who among your connections would be the best person to ask for a recommendation, and send them a message.

When selling a service, showcase recommendations from as many clients as possible. Recommendations are an opportunity to tell people about the work you do, how good your skills are, and what an amazing person you are to work with.

Write a great profile

Your profile is the first thing people see on LinkedIn and if you want them to read the whole thing, you have to make it interesting. Don’t copy information from your resume; create a short, enticing bio about how you can help them and what makes you different from your competition.

While the purpose of a LinkedIn profile is to list your abilities and credentials, don’t make it all about you. Clients are not visiting your profile to read about you, they want to know how you can help them and what you can do for them. Give them what they are interested in.

These simple tips will help increase your visibility on LinkedIn and get you more clients!

Author Bio: Joe Linford contributes on behalf of social shopping sites Broadband Genie and Crowdstorm 

The author’s views are entirely their own and may not reflect the views of FreelanceCopywritersBlog.com. If you are interested in producing a Guest Post for this blog, please get in touch with your ideas. 

Exciting times!

You’ve decided your business needs a new website, so it’s time to start planning and budgeting. For many companies, their website shopping list is a bit like this one…

• Find a great web designer
• Get a photographer on board for some arty shots
• Think about keywords
• Come up with a colour scheme
• Think of some cool graphics

But there’s something missing, something very important – what about the words?

Nine times out of ten, website copy is overlooked. After all, it’s not that important – anyone can throw a bit of text together…can’t they?

Why web content should be at the top of your list

Why do I need a copywriter? I know my business better than they do.

There’s no denying that, but copywriters don’t profess to know your business better than you because they’re not experts in your business. But they are experts in creating copy that sells.

If you’re still not convinced about the importance of your website copy, think of it this way.

[You’ll need your imagination for this bit.]

Your website is your online showroom.

The design, colour scheme, photos and graphics are your shop fittings – what makes it look inviting.

The copywriting is your sales team patrolling the shop floor, ready to help your customers.

Now, if you write your own copy it tends to be focused on your business, the features of your products and contains lots of ‘we’. That is the equivalent of your sales team huddled together, chatting about what they did last night while your potential customers mill around, get bored and head for the door.

When your copy is written by a professional copywriter it is focused on your customers, their needs and highlights the benefits of your products and services. That is the equivalent of a sales team that:

• Greets your customers as they come through the door
• Offers advice about which product/service that would suit their particular needs
• Counters any buying objections they may have
• Closes the sale

I know which sales team I’d rather have.

Make your website work

If you don’t make your website copy a priority and get it written professionally, the chances are your website won’t perform.

It won’t attract visitors, it won’t inspire them to do business with you, it won’t answer their questions – basically, it won’t sell.

By understanding the power of words and investing in good professionally written content, you’ll create a website that:

• Attracts visitors
• Answers their questions
• Convinces them to buy
• Closes the sale

It’s a no brainer.

Marketing your business involves a lot of writing.

Whether you do this in-house, or by hiring in the expertise of a copywriter, you’ll need one very important thing – lots of ideas for content.

Ideas can come from anywhere at any time, so here are a couple of tips to make sure your ideas keep flowing.

1. Paper and pen

Because you never know when inspiration will strike, make sure you have a pen and paper with you at all times (or a digital voice recorder).

During your working day, ideas will come at you from all directions:

• Comments from customers
• An article you’ve read
• A news item
• Mail shots
• Emails…

So when an idea strikes, write it down. It could be the start of a blog post, article or newsletter item.

Customer feedback is particularly important. If you’re scratching around for an idea for your next blog post, or newsletter, where better to look for inspiration than your customers?  If they contact you with a question, you could create a ‘how to’ or ‘top tips’ article based around their enquiry.

By keeping a record of ideas like this, you’ll never be scratching around for inspiration.

2. Swipe file

One word of warning – a swipe file doesn’t mean you are free to plagiarise other people’s work.

Every day you are subjected to hundreds of sales messages. You probably subscribe to several newsletters, receive loads of direct mail and read magazine and newspaper articles. Some of which you’ll read and some you’ll ignore.

But with the ones you read, think about what it was that made you take notice of them:

• What was in the headline that made you read on?
• How was it written?
• What type of information did it contain?
• What tone was used?

In other words, what was it that captured your attention? Once you discover that, you can reproduce that effect in your own marketing materials.

What it comes down to is this – online marketing is a continual process. We’re talking about newsletters, emails, web copy, blogs and articles – all things that have to be done regularly to keep your business in your customers’ line of sight.

By regularly jotting down notes, you’ll never be short of ideas for your online marketing.

In the wonderful world of website marketing, there are a number of things you must have if you are to leave your readers fulfilled rather than frustrated.

As an avid online shopper and researcher, I’ve come across a number of websites over the years that have simply left me cold.

There’s nothing worse than landing on a site and having no idea what to do next; or finding a site that makes you go round and round in circles just to find the simplest of information.

So, I decided it was time to form a list of website must-haves. 

Below are 5 things that your website must have, but I am sure you can come up with many more, so please leave a comment below with your list of website must-haves.

Website Must-haves

1. Photo

Whether you’re a freelancer, sole trader, partnership or larger company, make sure you get some photos of you and your team on your website.

People like to know who they are dealing with, especially as they will be (more than likely) doing business with you remotely. It helps to add a personal touch and makes your company appear more approachable and accountable.

2. Contact details

The FAQ page on a website is very useful, but it shouldn’t replace the contact page.

It is so frustrating to click on a ‘contact us’ link only to be taken to a forum or FAQ page. Don’t make your readers jump through hoops just to get in touch with you. Make sure your phone number, email and postal address are plainly visible.

If you use a contact form, make sure you have staff monitoring the incoming enquiries. I’ve lost count of the number of companies I’ve wanted to contact, filled out the form and never heard from.

3. Benefits

If there’s one thing your readers want to know, it’s what are you going to do for them.

They don’t really care about you or your company; they just want to know that you can solve the problem they have.

Your website copy should be firmly focused on your reader, their needs and the solutions you can offer.

4. Clear navigation

 There’s nothing worse than being on a website and having no idea where to go next.

Make sure your navigation is very clear and that your users can move between pages easily.

5. Call to action

If your web pages don’t include a call to action, your reader will simply wander off and look at a competitor’s site that does tell them to ‘buy now’, ‘call now’ or ‘sign up now’.

You might think that any intelligent person would know that you want them to get in touch, but if you don’t spell it out, it’s unlikely to happen.

Over to you

So they are my 5 website must-haves – what are yours?

Let’s see how many we can come up – leave a comment below listing your top 5 must-haves.

Bio: Jessica Sanders is an avid small business writer touching on topics from social media to telemarketing. She writes for an online resource that gives advice on topics including credit card processing for lead generation resource, Resource Nation.

The author’s views are entirely his own and may not reflect the views of FreelanceCopywritersBlog.com. If you are interested in producing a Guest Post for this blog, please get in touch with your ideas.

When you’re a professional freelancer, you run a business of sorts. You find ways to reach out to potential clients, rack up references, and put your work out into the world with your name on it. Like a company, this builds your brand.  Between providing high-quality work and building relationships, people get a sense of who you are.

Once you’ve built your brand, though, you want to use it to your benefit. Like any other business, you need to market yourself and your brand to build larger client base.  Lucky for you, the internet is full of opportunities for personal marketing. And don’t worry, it won’t cost a penny.

1.       Start With Your Brand Audience

Before you can begin marketing, you have to assess what your brand is saying about you. This can depend on what you write about, who you cater your work toward, etc. To begin, consider what your audience will be.

• Topics: Are you an expert in your field? Do you write strictly about food, business or design? If that’s what you most associate with as a writer then that is what your marketing should illustrate.
• Clients: Do you write on various topics for specific clients? If you cater your writing to the female crowd, but write about everything from careers to parenting, then that will be important.
• Relationships: Do you pride yourself on the long term writing relationships you have with clients? If you touch on various topics, but have a solid group of people that you exclusively write for, then that will be a beneficial aspect in the placement of your marketing efforts.

 2.       Pick Where You’ll Represent Yourself

Once you’ve decided what your audience is, you’ll want to be present where they are. If you cater to business men in their 40’s, you don’t need to have a strong presence on Pinterest.

LinkedIn: If business people are your main client base, this will be a good place to start. As the professional social network, it gives you an opportunity to reach the crowd you are hoping to attract.

• Business people are busy, and LinkedIn cuts through the fluff of photos and comments, getting straight to your capabilities as a writer.
• If you rely on recommendations, this is a great place to show that off.

Blogosphere: As a freelance writer, you most likely already have a blog. Although you are adding great content frequently, marketing your brand will have more to do with your theme and design.

• Each color represents something different, and is an integral part of how long people spend on your blog. Consider this when designing and choosing your theme.
• While you write fresh content, consider including a page giving examples of previous professional work you’ve done.

Google+: This up and coming social network was made for freelance writers. Google+ is the perfect combination of LinkedIn and Facebook.

• Use the portfolio section to link to all your previous work. If you’ve done a lot, this will look great for your experience. It’s also an easy way for potential clients to check you out for themselves.
• Use the photo section to tell who you are without worrying about tagged photos from last weekend. “Pictures and references to traveling signaled openness to new experiences and adventurousness, while the number of friends you have indicates extroversion,” according to a Northern Illinois University study.

Pinterest: The biggest social network of 2012 is quickly becoming a great way to focus your branding. If you write for women’s magazines and blogs, this is a great place to direct clients.

• Have a work specific account, and create your boards around topics you write on.
• Link to relevant work in the caption of your pin. Photos are a simple way to represent your brand and your writing, not to mention fun for your clients to look through, while still being advantageous for you.

 3.       Finally, Get Yourself Out There

Now that you have your brand out in the wild jungle of the World Wide Web, you have to spread the word. While creating your accounts and profiles will do wonders for your marketing, you should always be looking to grow your client base and audience.

• Email: Create a personal signature for your emails. You can link to all your accounts, allowing those you are pitching to the opportunity to see your work before even responding. This can be the difference between hooking the client and missing an opportunity.
• Twitter: If you already have a Twitter account, consider getting one for your business alone. Here you can create a following that is strictly work related. Tweet about new blog posts and articles that have gone live.
• Blog: Your blog is not only a good spot to place content, but perfect for getting potential clients to check out more of your stuff. Get follow buttons for your Pinterest, Twitter and Google+.

Without spending a penny you can create a full blown marketing portfolio. Keep your brand constant throughout each platform, giving onlookers a good idea of what you have to offer and what you’re all about. The key to your personal freelance brand marketing is to direct potential clients to all the places you know will best represent what you and your business is all about.