by Amber Miller | Mar 18, 2017 | Blog, Business Development, Entrepreneur, Memberships
Are you looking for other ways to increase profits using the web? Aren’t we all? One thing to consider is starting a membership site. It’s really quite simple… set up a website, charge a monthly fee, offer your customers awesome content, keep it running, aaaaaand profit. Ok – maybe there’s a little bit more to it than that, so that’s why we’ve got this handy list of benefits to owning a membership site.
• Dominate the competition in your niche
If you have a membership site, you’ll stand out amongst the people who have a score of e-books but nothing else to offer their customers.
• Get more money out of your list
You may have heard that “the money is in the list”. And, you’ll want to get as much money from your list members as you can. A membership site is the perfect way to do this.
• Increase customer loyalty
If your site has great content and you respond promptly to all queries, a membership site will increase customer loyalty a lot better than selling individual products. This is because the customer will feel as if you’re more accessible.
• Develops a sense of community
Membership sites that have a forum help encourage a sense of community. So not only do the members interact with you, but they can interact with each other. This is a good selling point and a benefit for the owner of the site because it is another thing that will help increase your customer’s loyalty.
• Great way to build a list
If you want to start a free membership site, or offer portions of your membership site for no cost, it can present an effective way to build a list.
• Develop passive income
Although internet marketing is a great career, the money can be a little unstable. A membership site is a good way to not only make more money, but to make the income you do bring in a lot steadier.
• They don’t need to be complicated
A lot of people assume that a membership site is complicated. Not necessarily. There are plenty of options that are simple, such as exclusive content delivered via autoresponder.
Back to that profit, let’s look at the math… say you have a membership site that offers exclusive content related to your niche. If you charge $19.95 a month and have 100 subscribers, that translates to nearly $2000 profit and all you needed to do was refresh the content and make sure the site is running properly.
Not a web person? Or a writer? We can help you with both. Shoot us a note at Smart to Finish – we can build, maintain, and market your new membership site and really make it a seamless process.
by Amber Miller | Mar 10, 2017 | Blog, Infusionsoft, Marketing
In all reality, this is a post about email marketing. In the next several years, email marketing is going to make up a big part of your overall online marketing strategy. So much so that it can make or break your business. We all know there are a ton of reputable email marketing programs out there, but what each of these programs lacks is an all-in-one email marketing solution.
And that’s why we would like to talk about Infusionsoft. If you really want your email marketing efforts to take off, you should seriously consider signing up for the software. Why you ask? Well, here are five reasons why… but we could literally go on forever if we wanted.
- You need an email provider that can be trusted.
Email deliverability is HUGE in email marketing today. If you’re using a program that isn’t trusted by ISP’s, then it’s very likely your emails won’t even get delivered in the first place. Since Infusionsoft has a very low tolerance for spam, it keeps the email deliverability rate healthy.
- You need an email program that can easily integrate with WordPress.
Did you know that about 25% of the web is run off WordPress? It’s most likely that your small business is using a CMS such as WordPress. Infusionsoft has the ability to link right up with your WordPress site and even offers some fun enhancement features!
- You need an open API program that allows you to scale and grow.
A small business isn’t going to stay a small business forever (if everything goes our way right?). You need room and flexibility to grow without having to change software as you grow out of it. Luckily for you, Infusionsoft offers an open API which allows its’ users to add custom add-ons.
- You need an all-in-one solution.
Do you really feel like hiring a bunch of people and companies to manage your online shopping cart and credit card processing? No, we didn’t think so… Infusionsoft can do it all for ya.
- You need to track your lead sources.
What good are marketing campaigns if you don’t know where your leads are coming from? Infusionsoft can help you track these leads and give you information on where they came from. Who would have thought all those Facebook Ads you did last year resulted in 75% of your online sales!
Still need more reasons why you need Infusionsoft in your life? Shoot us a note. We would love to talk to you about your business and help you understand just how much Infusionsoft can benefit your marketing efforts.
Want to check out the software some more, hurry on over to Infusionsoft so you can see all of the benefits they have to offer.
by Amber Miller | Mar 3, 2017 | Marketing
Before we even start, we need to understand what this fun new marketing tool is and how it works. Facebook Live is a stunning feature of the social platform that allows users to stream live video on their profiles. After the live stream is completed, the video is then permanently uploaded to the users timeline. Currently, you can stream live for 30 minutes and even have the ability to write a description of the event so users know what they’re tuning into.
So, how can Facebook Live help market my small business?
The possibilities are endless when it comes to live video. You can showcase new products and give your fans a sneak peak before anyone else. Give an inside look to your business by showing your customers behind the scenes look at how your business works. Engage directly and in real time with your customers and fans by discussing topics of interest or by answering questions. I could really go on…
Instead, we would like to recommend checking out The Small Business Guide to Generating Leads with Facebook Live published by InfusionSoft. This guide will provide readers with everything they need to know to take advantage of this latest marketing trend. Go ahead and download the guide for free here.
Still have questions about Facebook Live after reading the guide? No worries, we have your back! Just shoot us a note and we will help you get on the road to success.
by Amber Miller | Feb 24, 2017 | Blog, Marketing
1. Unrealistic Expectations
Internet Marketing (IM) won’t cure AIDs or make you an instant millionaire. Many people get into Internet marketing with unrealistic expectations that they’d never consider entertaining if it were in some other field. Just because you don’t need to go to school for years to get a degree in Internet marketing for you to be able to open an online business doesn’t mean that it won’t take hard work and commitment to succeed within this arena. Like other business endeavors, it’s going to take money and time to get started and the results won’t be instantaneous.
2. Not Enough Research Before Beginning
If people fall prey to any of the unrealistic expectations we’ve discussed, the outcome is that they don’t spend enough time researching and planning their online activities to make them a success. Instead, they’ll think it’s just a matter of slapping a website up and putting a shopping cart on it to get orders. That couldn’t be the furthest thing from the truth. You have to start by knowing what niches are hot online and how you plan on attracting people to your site. Even if you managed to get a huge traffic stream, do you know enough to convert those visitors into leads or customers? This is where people fail miserably when they could have improved the chances of success simply by taking some extra time upfront to research and learn how to implement a successful online business.
3. Unclear Branding
Fuzzy branding can apply to multiple aspects of your online business. It can be as obvious as a bad domain name or it can even be how poorly you’ve designed the site. It’s any fault in your site that is an Internet faux pas that makes it difficult for your visitors to associate your name with the brand of product or service you’re offering. Instead, they’re left scratching their heads trying to figure out what your site is all about.
4. Poor Traffic
The site is now up and you’ve done your research to optimize it for success, but you’ve noticed that it isn’t getting enough traffic. Why is that? Many Internet marketers think that putting up a fantastic website is all that you have to do to attract traffic. There are millions of people on the Internet, so it seems a fair assessment that getting a thousand eyeballs a month is not a big deal. Actually, the most successful Internet marketers adopt promotional strategies to maximize their traffic streams and to make their websites a success.
The main way to increase traffic is to find sites that already have a large audience and to siphon off some of those people back to your site. There may be rules about what types of links you can post and how to do this, but it’s basically the same process.
5. Inability to Convert Traffic to Customers
Even if you manage to attract gobs of traffic, the real goal of any Internet marketer is to sell or make money. You have to monetize that traffic in order to achieve your dreams of success. If you aren’t aware of the strategies to convert traffic to customers, you will let many valuable opportunities pass you by. Worse, you will feel as if you are working your tail off for few rewards. Always keep in mind that it isn’t enough just to have a popular site; that site has to produce income, one way or another.
6. Not Planning Ahead for Sales
The whole point of Internet marketing is to sell online. It may come as a surprise then to find out that many Internet marketers fail to plan their sales funnel ahead of time. Doing things by the seat of your pants may work to make a few sales here and there, but to really exploit the power of the Internet and make a living doing Internet marketing, you must plan ahead for sales using a carefully thought out sales funnel.
7. Lack of Automation Tools and Services
At first, the temptation for most Internet marketers is to do everything manually to save money. This will quickly become unmanageable as your lists get bigger and your product line becomes more varied. Add a few extra sites to manage multiple income streams, and you can quickly become confused or overburdened with the multiple minute details of operating several Internet commerce sites. The solution is to start automating things before your business gets too unwieldy and you lose customers.
8. Failure to Track and Test Results
After a failure to plan ahead for sales, one of the biggest faults that young Internet marketers tend to fall into is a failure of tracking and testing results. They may not even be aware that there are techniques, like split testing, that can help them to define why one sales campaign works better than another. It might even be due to something simple, like a different headline in the sales copy that can generate 50% more sales, but having done no split testing, they will never figure that out. It’s very important to continually track and test the results of different sales campaigns and strategies to see which ones work for you and which ones yield poor results.
9. Failure to Meet and Exceed Customer Expectations
It’s not enough to just give people a good deal these days. It has to be a great deal that is perceived to be of such great value that it would be a shame if they lost out on the opportunity to buy. One of the ways to create value packages like this is to understand your customer’s needs and then exceed their expectations on what they think they can get for their money. This is a strategy that is becoming necessary as the recession wears away people’s discretionary income and people are buying based on perceived value.
10. Poor Backup Systems
If your site goes down, do you have a mirror site or backup strategy to get back up as quickly as possible? If the answer is no, then as Murphy’s Law suggests, this will happen at the worst possible time – mostly when you are rolling out one of your hottest, time-sensitive campaigns for the entire year. The impact will be immediately felt in lost sales. If you continue to have problems like this, you will also lose customers who will judge your online business based on the fact that you offer spotty service.
If you are still having trouble with your online marketing strategies and need someone to take a look at what you got, give us a shout out. We have a team of professional digital marketers who are ready to help you build your business!
by Amber Miller | Feb 14, 2017 | Blog, Business Development, Delegating, Entrepreneur
These days, it seems like the world is moving way too fast for any of us to keep up. If you’re trying to run a small business while trying to keep up with the hustle and bustle of life today, it’s especially difficult. There’s just so much to do and so little time to do it. We’ve all experienced times where you’re so bogged down with stuff to do it seems like you’re never going to get to everything you need to. Where does the time go?
If you feel like you’ve lost track of time and you’re ready to take it back, then read on my friend. We have compiled a list of five ways you can take back your free time and be more in control of your availability. So without further ado…
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Where is all of your time going in the first place?
Before we can figure out how to better manage your time, we need to know where it’s all going in the first place. Track your time for a couple of weeks and see where you’re spending the most of it.
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Time to Eliminate
Now that you’ve figured out where all your time is going, you’re ready to start eliminating those non essential tasks you’re spending way too much time on. Have a virtual assistant or part time employee? Delegate these tasks out!
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Avoid Multi-tasking
I know, I know, this is much easier said than done. But think about it… if you focus on one important thing at a time and just keep busting them out, eventually, you’re going to be through your to-do list and it’s only noon… Time for a lunch time margarita, don’t ya think?
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Set Aside Time to Communicate
Only check email a couple of times a day and set a specific time aside to do it! Continuously checking your email throughout the day is extremely wasteful because you’re focusing on more than one item, and you’re going to get distracted by new items coming in all day long. Just stop. Check first thing in the morning and after lunch, and that’s it!
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Learn it’s OK to say NO
You need to figure out what your limits are. If you’re already stretching your time thin, say NO. It’s really OK to say it if you just can’t manage the work. Your customers will be much happier waiting for products and services if they know you can focus your entire energy making sure they’re getting the best of your products and services. If you’re rushing through too many client orders at once, things can get messed up, mistakes can be made, and customers can get upset.
Still having trouble trying to figure out time management? We would love to help get you back on the road to vacations and free time with the family. Contact us today to get started.
by Amber Miller | Feb 7, 2017 | Blog, Business Development, Entrepreneur
It’s not easy building a business by yourself… In fact, we feel it’s almost impossible! There’s just so many little things you have to do all the time, it’s easy to get lost in all of the commotion. When you’re building a new business, it is important to have a group of contacts that can help you get things done the right way and in a reasonable amount of time. We’ve compiled this list of five different people you need to keep around in order to have a successful business.
1. Accountant
How are you going to run a business without someone to run the books? It’s important to always have your finances in order when your running a small business and most times… you’re better off giving it to a financial professional to handle so you can focus on other important aspects of your business.
2. Web Developer
This day in age, you NEED to have a website. If you don’t, you’re missing out on such a great opportunity we can’t even begin to explain it to you.
3. Graphic Designer
You’re going to need all kinds of graphics for your business. Things like logos, marketing flyers, social media images, graphics for your website… they all need to be created. A graphic designer will be helping you to build the brand of your business, so make sure to do your research and find a designer that understands the look and feel of your business.
4. Marketing Specialist
You’re going to need to market those awesome products and services some way. A marketing specialist can help you determine what strategies you should spend the most time and money on to get the most bang for your buck.
5. Virtual Assistant
There’s no better way to take care of all the redundant aspects of your business. Virtual assistants can literally run your business online so you can forget about having to deal with running your email marketing campaigns, updating your website, running weekly reports…you get the point.
So now that you know who you need to have sticking around… how do you find them? Being a business owner, I’m sure you’ve got a network of friends or old colleagues who might know someone who might know someone. When you’re looking for someone who is going to be responsible for sensitive business information and the reputation of your business, it’s important to make sure they are reputable. Referrals are one of the best ways to find someone worth your awhile, especially if it is a referral from someone you trust… So ask around!
Looking for help with a Virtual Assistant? Try hiring a virtual assistant team company that has access to several different types of professionals… kind of like STF ;-P.
by Amber Miller | Feb 1, 2017 | Blog, Business Development, Marketing
As a fellow small business, we know just how hard and expensive it can be to build your business. There are a ton of things you can do to quickly drive business to your company, but many of these things can cost small businesses an arm and a leg in the long run. It’s risky to try some of these ways because if they backfire or don’t give you the kind of return you were looking for, you could easily bankrupt your business.
Luckily, there are a lot of other things you can to to boost business without spending a ton of money. Below, we’ve listed six of these ideas to help you get on the road to success.
1. GIVE SOMETHING AWAY ON YOUR WEBSITE FOR FREE
People love free stuff. They do. And most people are even willing to give you a little something in return if you’re willing to give them free stuff. Stick an ebook or whitepaper up on your website and ask for an email address in return. Your customer is getting some great industry information, and you’re growing your email list for free.
2. START SOCIAL ACCOUNTS
If you’re not already on social media, then you’re WAAAAY behind in your marketing efforts. You absolutely have to be on social media today — not only is it awesome for communicating with your customers, but it’s perfect for showcasing new products and sales! The best part about it, profiles are free.
3. DON’T STOP AT SOCIAL MEDIA, GO TO WHERE YOUR CUSTOMERS LIVE ON THE NET
Do your customers have a favorite niche forum they like to talk on about your industry? Get on there too and become a trusted advisor.
4. SIMPLIFY YOUR BUSINESS
Sell a lot of different things? It might be time to cut some of that out. Anything that is unprofitable and hard-to-sell needs to go! Spend all of your time and money on items that will give you adequate ROI.
5. GET YOUR WEBSITE LISTED ON THE WEB
There’s a lot more to getting on Google that just publishing a website. Make sure to submit your site to the top directories on the web. It’s free to submit your site to most directories and it will help boost your SEO in the long run.
6. LAST BUT NOT LEAST, LEARN TO DELEGATE
You’re not superman/woman. You can’t do everything yourself. If you’re a one woman/man show; it might be time to hire some help and delegate out some of that work. If you’re too busy packing orders and managing suppliers, then you certainly don’t have time to do any marketing or other important tasks you need to focus on to grow your own business. One thing to note: hire a virtual assistant instead of an employee. VA’s are cheaper in the long run and you don’t have to worry about keeping them busy all the time if there’s no work to be done.
Obviously, there are a ton of other cheap things you can be doing to grow your business. If you’re stuck and you need someone to help you figure out what to do next, give us a shout out. We’re a small business too and we’ve learned a lot over the years – let us share our experiences with you to help you grow!
by Amber Miller | Jan 23, 2017 | Blog, Marketing
One of the biggest mistakes that young internet marketers tend to make is failing to track and test the results of their marketing efforts. They may not even be aware that there are techniques, like A/B split testing, that can help them to define why one sales campaign works better than another. It might even be due to something simple, like a different headline in the sales copy that can generate 50% more sales. By not doing any kind of A/B split testing, marketers may never figure what works best for them. It’s very important to continually track and test the results of different sales campaigns and strategies to see which ones work for you and which ones yield poor results.
Email Results Tracking
This can be especially true for internet marketers who choose to go it alone and not automate with tools and services that provide some sort of feedback on the efficacy of a campaign. For email services, you want someone who can give you open rates and click-through rates on the email campaigns that you send out. If you have low open rates, you will know that the hooks and headlines are potentially uninteresting. If you have low click-through rates, you can concentrate on increasing the immediacy of the promotion to add a sense of urgency to your sales promotions. There are a number of different things that can be tracked to give you feedback on how you are doing, even before you make a sale. So don’t let those things fall through the cracks. They can really help you make a difference in each of your email marketing campaigns.
Tracking Across Multiple Sites
Other types of functionality that need to be tracked are the results of your affiliate campaigns and sales promotions. If you are putting up multiple sites (as you should be), this type of tracking can be difficult to compare across websites. Try to centralize the operations of your sites so that you can get a good view of what techniques are more effective than others, regardless of the site you are on.
Do More Of What Works
It may seem to get boring, but a general rule is not to change a sales campaign until sales start to drop off. If a campaign is creating a lot of buzz and excitement amongst your visitors, it’s only going to lose you money to cut it short before demand peaks out. On the other hand, you can increase demand by putting up short one-time offers and limited quantity offers. If you find that these types of offers work best, have these types of offers more often to bring in more money.
We could go on and on about other types of reporting you should be paying attention to in your marketing efforts…. But for everyone’s sanity, we won’t. If you would like to learn more information on additional things you can do to improve your marketing campaigns, give us a shout out. We would love to talk!
by Amber Miller | Jan 19, 2017 | Blog, Blogging
Every year, it’s the same story… marketers and search engines are always telling you CONTENT IS KING and if you want to rank anywhere people are going to find you, then you best be spewing out some kind of great content. What if you’re already doing this though? And you’re still not seeing the kind of traffic to your site that you thought blogging would bring…. It’s a bummer, we know.
That’s why we are going to over you three ways how to make your blog totally kick a$$ in 2017.
1. CREATE FANTASTIC CONTENT, NOT MORE OF IT.
It’s not just about publishing new content all the time. What search engines are really for this year is for sites to offer them high quality content that’s better than the competition! What we are really saying is offer your customers something of incredible value and do it better than the competition. If you’re having a hard time trying to figure out what’s valuable, niche down your customers as much as possible and figure out what’s most important to them.
2. MAKE MONEY OUTSIDE OF THE TRADITIONAL METHODS
If you’ve got a steady following on your blog, then you have the opportunity to monetize your blog in a variety of ways by just posting content! First and foremost, Google Adsense is the bees knees. It’s a simple way to make money by doing what you’re already doing… sharing great content! But other than that, blogs can also pull in a buck or two by utilizing affiliate marketing, direct ad placement, and building your mailing list.
3. FOCUS ON MORE THAN YOAST AND OTHER SEO PLUGINS
We sign on new clients all the time who believe filling out plugins like Yoast or All in One SEO are all they need to do to optimize a blog post. That’s just simply not the case! Site speed, performance, loading time, and bounce rates can all play a huge part in your SEO strategy. One way to get a handle on where you stand is to use Google PageSpeed Tools and Google Webmaster Tools to analyze your site to see what needs to be worked on.
Obviously, there’s a lot more to each of these points. If you’re ready to make your blog kick a$$ and need a little help to get going, then shoot us a note. If you’re already on the road to success with your blog, please comment below and let us know how you were able to do it!
by Amber Miller | Jan 12, 2017 | Blog, Marketing
Do you already have your marketing strategies figured out for the first part of 2017? If you do, have you figured out a plan to implement those strategies? On top of it all, have you been able to keep up with the latest tools and tricks to make sure your marketing campaigns are running smoothly and efficiently? It’s seriously a lot to handle.
We’re going start off this post talking about #11. The other ten will be provided in just a moment…
We thought this was the most important sign because it can determine whether or not your marketing ideas, campaigns, strategies, everything… succeeds. So without further ado…
#11 No virtual assisting or marketing team in place.
So, why would this sign determine whether or not your marketing strategies succeed? It’s pretty simple… while we all know you’re awesome at what you do and you want to market your business, you simply don’t have the time to complete everything you need to do to successfully manage a marketing campaign. There’s posting, scheduling, writing content, taking pictures, updating websites, coming up with ads, sales, ideas of what to market… you get the point, it’s kind of a crazy web of wow that’s a lot of stuff to handle.
A team of virtual assistants will give you the freedom to focus on the aspects of your business that matter to you most. Forget about the hassle of keeping up with marketing trends and stop wasting time trying to manage multiple social media accounts and website updates on a daily basis. Assistants can take over and handle every single aspect of your marketing campaign(s).
On top of it all, hiring virtual assistants or specialized contractors can help small business save money by helping them to avoid the high cost of hiring actual employees.
Infusionsoft published a great article that covers the other 10 signs your marketing strategy isn’t ready for 2017. Each and every one of these items is something your business should seriously take into consideration. We see so many of these issues when we sign on new clients and will always do everything in our power to help our clients improve and automate their business procedures while saving a buck or two in the long run.
10 Signs Your Marketing Strategy Isn’t Ready for 2017
If you would like a free consultation to see how we can help you run your marketing campaigns or update your internal procedures, contact us today.
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