Training Marketer

Natural search is the best tactic for generating online leads and outperforms almost all other types of online marketing, according to a recent study out of the U.K. reported by eConsultancy. Meta-tag descriptions are a small piece of the SEO puzzle that can be easily overlooked, but can help search rankings even for non-text files.

“Meta-tag keywords and descriptions become more important when the search engines are not able to determine (or have a difficult time determining) the “aboutness” of a file, such as a video file. In this situation, a keyword-focused meta-tag description can make or break search engine visibility.”

While meta-tag descriptions have been devalued in the past, some major search engines still use metadata when displaying a page’s listing.

Meta tag descriptions should have three goals:

1. To encourage searchers to click through to your page
2. Reinforce the existing content on the page
3. Help achieve top search engine positioning in results that use meta tags to determine relevance

Meta-tag content alone will not make or break your search engine results, but is still an important factor to remember. Organic, natural search traffic requires a broad knowledge of SEO best practices including (but not limited to) how your site is set up, internal linking structure, page construction and quality content.

I came across a great post today from Paul Dunay at Buzz Marketing for Technology about how business to business marketers can use social media to spark lead consideration.

“A prospect reading a blog entry doesn’t mean they want to buy anything, but it does mean they have engaged with your brand.”

Engagement is the first step, and many times the hardest, when developing leads. Tools like blogs and podcasts can initially engage customers with ongoing and relevant conversation.

Social media helps business to business marketers, who are faced with selling complex products and services, by asking the customer to simply consider their brand. Once a visitor considers your business as a possible source to buy from, you can then start the lead nurturing process.

Dunay also has some good advice on how to measure social media success -

“Don’t measure your teams on page views generated from a campaign. Measure them on how engaged they can get your leads with your content and turn them into sales.”

Forget the chickens and listen to a little marketing advice from a real expert …

When customers and you sales team are telling you to lower your prices, remember what Seth Godin says - there’s “no such thing as price pressure.”

“You need to increase your value. If people don’t want to pay, it’s because you’re not delivering enough value for the money you’re charging.”

More important than price, companies should feel pressure to increase value for the customer. Lowering your prices may also mean lowering perceived value and could turn customers away.

A little marketing wisdom from Savage Chickens.

While some airline companies are nickel-and-diming their customers with the economy down, others like Southwest airlines refuse to charge for peanuts and keep their focus on superior customer service.

I came across a post today (I admit it was the picture that caught my eye) on Church of the Customer about how Southwest Airlines is dealing with recent negative industry news by focusing on their core values.

The picture is of a man holding a “birthday cake” his innovative Southwest crew created on his fight to Baltimore. The birthday cake was creatively made from a roll of toilet paper, topped with candles and a SWA happy birthday message. The passengers even sang him “Happy Birthday” during the flight. How’s that for in-flight entertainment?

Though times may be bad in the airlines industry, Southwest has stayed focused on customer service and has come out on top. While keeping fuel costs under control has helped tremendously, Southwest Airlines does hold the U.S. title for being the only profitable airline during the first quarter of the year. They are even considering growing their fleet and have no plans to charge for extra bags or in-flight beverages.

According to Herb Kelleher, Southwest’s president and chief executive officer, taking good care of customers is a top priority. He has said,

“We are not an airline with great customer service. We are a great customer service organization that happens to be in the airline business,”

It’s a great lesson in customer service during a time when including “great customer service” and “airline industry” together in the same sentence can be a tough thing to do.

HRmarketer.com published their “Trends in HR Marketing” report, providing information on trends and best practices for marketing to human resources professionals and on HR buyer purchasing behavior.

The reports can be downloaded for free from HRmarketer.com (after filling out a quick registration form).

It is usually the person in the HR role who is purchasing the training products for their company, so knowing their buying behavior can offer insights on how best to market your product. This report could help you market more effectively, by knowing the best tools and methods to reach your target audience.

Covered topics include:

• Use of Internet search engines by HR buyers
• HR and Web 2.0
• How important is exhibiting?
• How often do HR buyers go out to bid for various products and services?
• HR “pain points” for the coming year
• How HR buyers “go shopping”
• Where should HR vendors spend their marketing and PR dollars?

HubSpot’s new Press Release Grader is an online application that evaluates and scores your press releases for free. (Special thanks to David Meerman Scott for sharing the good news with the marketing world.)

Just cut and paste the press release content into the tool, along with company information including your name, website and email. In a few seconds the site will come back with a “marketing effectiveness score” and specific suggestions on improvements.

Press releases are graded on basic factors most public relations experts stick to, along with factors from Internet marketing experts such as links and search engine optimization characteristics.

If you regularly create and distribute marketing press releases, check out the Press Release Grader and see how well you score.

What do you get when you survey too often? Survey fatigue.

Those at Common Sense PR realize that “there’s a temptation to include custom measurement in every communication activity,” but marketers and public relations professionals should hold back from time to time.

In a recent Quick Tip, they advise to keep your measurement tools less noticeable than the information than you’re trying to communicate. While many customers are happy to fill out a quick survey, asking for too much can cause “survey fatigue” among those who you most want to hear from.

Lesson learned: Ask for customer feedback in the least intrusive way possible.

Example - Before sending post-purchase surveys immediately after a customer checks out, try imbedding a link in the “thank you” email. First thank the customer for their purchase and then ask politely if they would click trough to take a quick survey. It’s not intrusive and gets the job done.

Wondering if you should follow through with a new business idea? First, check to see if it’s “sticky” enough to sell by taking the Stickiness Aptitude Test.

The Stickiness Aptitude Test, from Electric Pulp, can help you determine how sticky your marketing message is. Answers are scored on a scale from one to 50, from Scotch Tape to Superglue.

Take the test to see if your ideas are “sticky,” or if you’re looking for an interesting way to make this Friday move a little faster. 

During the first quarter of this year U.S. online ad revenue totaled more than $7 billion dollars, an increase of 23.9% compared to the same time last year, according to research firm IDC.

According to the new IDC report, with the decreased threat of a recession, online advertising will continue to grow at a rate between 15% and 20% each quarter.

The IDC also projects that U.S. Internet ad spending will more than double over the next five years.

“What happens is that the current economic crisis puts pressure on advertisers to save money and find more effective marketing channels,” said Karsten Weide, program director-digital marketplace and new media at IDC.

“Effectively, the crisis accelerates the shift of advertising budgets from traditional media into new media.”